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NY Dem Sens. Schumer, Gillibrand avoid Columbia campus as 'Squad' descends to back agitators

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NY Dem Sens. Schumer, Gillibrand avoid Columbia campus as 'Squad' descends to back agitators

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., have avoided visiting Columbia University as anti-Israel and antisemitic demonstrations descend into chaos on the campus. 

A pro-Palestinian occupation first developed on the Ivy League campus earlier this month and soon evolved into an encampment, taking over a portion of the outdoor space at the school. 

It has persisted since then, being spurred on by the support of high-profile Democratic legislators from New York. Both Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and Jamaal Bowman, D-N.Y., were seen visiting members of the encampment as it continued to gain national media attention and attract significant backlash.

A spokesperson for Schumer did not respond to multiple inquiries but referred Fox News Digital to the majority leader’s Tuesday remarks on the Senate floor, in which he addressed the protests.

HOUSE DEMOCRATS TELL COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY ADMIN, ‘TIME FOR NEGOTIATION IS OVER’

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Prominent Democratic lawmakers, including Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, have avoided visiting Columbia University amid ongoing and escalating anti-semitic demonstrations. (Getty Images)

“Smashing windows with hammers and taking over university buildings is not free speech — it is lawlessness, and those who did it should promptly face the consequences that are not merely a slap on the wrist,” Schumer said, referencing the demonstrators’ recent takeover of a building on Columbia’s campus. 

The New York Democrat’s office would not say whether he would follow the lead of House GOP leadership and visit the school, which happens to be in his home state. 

Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., last week led several Republicans on a visit to the university amid the demonstration, remarking at the time, “We have to bring order to these campuses. We cannot allow this to happen around the country. We are better than this.”

On Tuesday, Johnson revealed he called on President Biden to make his own visit to the school as protests escalate. 

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Gillibrand, Schumer’s New York counterpart who has been outspoken in her support for Israel, also did not respond to Fox News Digital’s inquiry regarding any planned visits to Columbia or whether she supported “Squad Democrats” cheering on the protesters. 

“I am appalled at the virulent antisemitism being displayed on Columbia University’s campus,” Gillibrand said in a statement last week. “Threats of violence against Jewish students and the Jewish community are horrible, despicable and wholly unacceptable. Using the rhetoric of terrorists has no place in New York, where we pride ourselves on tolerance and the right of every group to practice their religion in peace.”

Rep. Jared Moskowitz said Jewish students are not being protected at Columbia University and compared anti-Israel protesters to ‘White Aryan’ protesters at Charlottesville. (Getty Images)

House Democrats, including several representing New York, have also made their concerns about the protests known. In a letter signed by 21 lawmakers and led by Reps. Josh Gottheimer, D-N.J., and Dan Goldman, D-N.Y., the Democrats urged the university’s Board of Trustees to dismantle “the unauthorized and impermissible encampment of anti-Israel, anti-Jewish activists on campus,” telling them “time for negotiation is over.” 

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Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand and Chuck Schumer were among those to denounce antisemitism on Columbia’s campus, joining their Republican colleagues.  (Getty Images)

Another New York Democrat, Rep. Ritchie Torres, a signatory of the letter, hasn’t visited the campus since the encampment began, but told Fox News Digital, “I have gone to Columbia University on several occasions — whether it is meeting with Jewish Students at Columbia Law School or joining students for Shabbat at the Columbia Chabad. I will continue to do so in the future.”

Rep. Thomas Suozzi, D-N.Y., who recently took over the seat of expelled former Rep. George Santos, was also a signatory of the letter. He shared a series of posts to X last week, detailing his visit to Columbia during the protests.

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“Yesterday I went to Columbia University to show my support for the Jewish students who have faced harassment, intimidation and vicious antisemitic attacks on campus,” he said in one post. 

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., denounced the visit of “a Member of Congress” to the encampment, “who accused some Jewish students of being, ‘pro-genocide.’” He was referencing Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., who said on video last week, “I think it is really unfortunate that people don’t care about the fact that all Jewish kids should be kept safe, and that we should not have to tolerate antisemitism or bigotry for all Jewish students, whether they’re pro-genocide or anti-genocide.”



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Vermont

Route 110 guardrail damaged in Vermont – Valley News

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Route 110 guardrail damaged in Vermont – Valley News


TUNBRIDGE — A significant portion of guardrail on Route 110 near Button Hill Road was recently damaged, Vermont State Police reported in a Wednesday news release.

Pieces of wood, logs and debris scattered the area near the damaged guardrail.

The incident is believed to have occurred between Sunday, May 10 and Wednesday, May 13, according to the release.

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The case remains under investigation. Anyone with information about the damage is encouraged to contact Vermont State Police Royalton Barracks at 802-234-9933.

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Marion Umpleby is a staff writer at the Valley News. She can be reached at mumpleby@vnews.com or 603-727-3306.
More by Marion Umpleby



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New York

Questions Arise About Jack Schlossberg’s Readiness for Congress

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Questions Arise About Jack Schlossberg’s Readiness for Congress

Good morning. It’s Friday. We’ll look at the Manhattan congressional campaign of Jack Schlossberg, President John F. Kennedy’s grandson. We’ll also get details on an obscure metric that will figure in the new second-home tax in New York City.

Jack Schlossberg is one of nine candidates running for a House seat in Manhattan. When he entered the race, he was known for his social media personality — and for being President John F. Kennedy’s grandson. But rapid staff turnover and Schlossberg’s own erratic actions have gotten attention in the New York political world. With the Democratic primary only six weeks away, I asked my colleague Nicholas Fandos for an assessment.

His campaign sounds like it’s not ready for prime time. Is that a reasonable assessment? This is the first time he’s run for office.

There are few political campaigns that I’ve covered that are not at least a little messy. It comes with the territory. But the degree of the messiness in Schlossberg’s campaign, and the specifics, are unusual.

He has had a surprisingly high rate of staff turnover — at least two campaign managers, two field directors, a handful of advisers and a rotating cast of consultants in the six months since he announced his candidacy.

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On the day of his campaign launch, Schlossberg said he needed to nap and then was unreachable for most of the rest of the day, which left his team scrambling. A couple of weeks after the announcement, he had a run-in with a sitting congressman who felt that Schlossberg had ripped off his social media commentary.

Many candidates run on their records. What does Schlossberg list as accomplishments when he’s asked?

Schlossberg has relatively little professional experience, so when he talks about what qualifies him for the job, he brings up things like receiving law and business degrees at Harvard, scoring near the top on the bar exam and being an E.M.T. in college. He’s also worked as a freelancer for Vogue and as an assistant at the State Department, but both of those gigs lasted only a few months. And he readily points out that he has built a large social media following.

There is no standard set of qualifications to be a member of Congress, but most people who run have worked their way up through local government or careers in business or the law. Sclossberg has not followed any of those paths.

What was that social media dust-up about?

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Social media seems to be one of Schlossberg’s biggest strengths, but it’s also potentially a vulnerability. He has built a large audience with revealing, funny and sometimes outright bizarre posts that are captivating to some and alienating to others.

I found that in at least one case in this campaign, he essentially mimicked a video from Representative Seth Moulton, a Democrat from Massachusetts, commenting on President Trump’s policy on Venezuela. He made his own video, saying almost the same thing Moulton had said. He rewrote the words, but it was still very close.

Moulton’s team was so taken aback that they reached out to Schlossberg, asking, What gives? They were told that he had indeed copied Moulton’s post because he had liked it so much. This may be common social media practice, but it’s traditionally been a no-no in politics.

What about fund-raising? Has he raised more than his opponents?

He’s doing well on fund-raising. He’s not at the front of the pack, but he has raised $2.3 million from donors.

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Some of that has come from small donations across the country, and others from large checks from friends of his famous family. He has his own substantial wealth but has said that he does not intend to spend any of it on the race.

Is he the front-runner right now?

There has not been good polling. The internal polls that we have seen show that he’s a slight favorite in a crowded field that includes two state assemblymen, Micah Lasher and Alex Bores. Lasher is a protégé of Representative Jerrold Nadler, who’s vacating the seat they’re all running for.

Two of the other candidates are George Conway, a former Republican who has become one of President Trump’s biggest critics, and Nina Schwalbe, a global health expert.

Schlossberg did not talk to you when you were reporting the story you wrote. What did his aides tell you about Schlossberg’s management of his campaign and the turnover of his staff?

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Schlossberg’s campaign did not dispute most of the details in my story. They downplayed the significance of the staff turnover, saying no one should be surprised that a first-time candidate, especially one as intense as he is, would cycle through staff members in a high-pressure campaign.

In addressing his occasional absences from the campaign, they pointed out that the campaign had coincided with the death of his sister Tatiana Schlossberg, from cancer.


Weather

Sunny skies with a high around 67 degrees. Tonight will be mostly clear with a low near 54.

ALTERNATE-SIDE PARKING

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In effect until May 22 (Shavuot).

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“I’m standing behind a mylar curtain, building the character. I part the curtain, stand in a fixed position, and allow the audience to feed me with shouts of joy and respect and admiration and whatever else they’re thinking. Let the people have what they came for. Apotheosis.” — André De Shields, who plays the godlike Old Deuteronomy in “Cats: The Jellicle Ball,” on how he gets into character.


What’s the “market value” of your co-op or condo?

Those two words are in quotation marks for a reason. In New York City, the “market value” of an apartment may not be what it sells for, because “market value” is a bureaucratic metric that often underestimates an apartment’s actual worth.

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“Market value” will figure in the new tax surcharge on part-time residents of the city. As proposed by Gov. Kathy Hochul, the second-home tax plan would initially target co-ops and condos that have a “market value” of at least $1 million. They would be taxed an extra 4 percent to 6.5 percent in addition to their existing property taxes.

How many apartments would be affected is unclear. The governor’s office says that an apartment with a “market value” of $1 million would sell for about $5 million. But the disparity is often more pronounced: One Midtown Manhattan penthouse with a “market value” of about $4.2 million sold for more than $135 million last year.

The surcharge has been the talk of the New York political world since Hochul announced it last month. It wouldn’t bring in as much revenue as some of its boosters had wanted, but Mayor Zohran Mamdani cast it as an example of how government was making good on his promise to tax the rich.

The “market value” metric would govern second-home surcharge payments for only the first two years of the new tax. After that, the city and the state would rely on a different measurement to determine which properties are above the threshold. That new metric would be added to a tax system that many taxpayers already find impenetrable.

“I know we just sent people around the moon and back, so you’d think anything is possible,” said Jason Haber, a real estate broker and a co-founder of the American Real Estate Association. “But because of how the city tax system is set up, this is crazy complicated in the first place. And they tried to rush it though, I think without fully appreciating its complexity.”

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METROPOLITAN diary

Dear Diary:

It was a Saturday, and I was on Fifth Avenue and 14th Street. Two young women were walking and talking behind me.

“Is there anything you need at the market?” one said.

“The will to live,” the other replied.

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I couldn’t help myself.

“I don’t think they sell that there,” I said.

We all laughed and kept going.

— Nancy Lane

Illustrated by Agnes Lee. Tell us your New York story here and read more Metropolitan Diary here.

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Boston, MA

JetBlue to pull out of N.H.’s largest airport amid capacity crisis, officials announce – The Boston Globe

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JetBlue to pull out of N.H.’s largest airport amid capacity crisis, officials announce – The Boston Globe


JetBlue will terminate all service to Manchester-Boston Regional Airport in New Hampshire this summer, with the airline’s final flight scheduled for July 8, airport officials said Thursday.

Airport officials said on social media that they were “very disappointed” that the airline will be pulling its service. Manchester-Boston is the largest airport in New Hampshire and sixth largest in New England.

“MHT has worked diligently to promote JetBlue service at MHT, providing air service incentives, a substantial marketing budget, and conducting various promotional activities to create awareness,” officials wrote. “Unfortunately, those efforts were not enough to overcome their ongoing business challenges, which have only been exacerbated by the recent spike in jet fuel prices.”

While JetBlue has long been one of the largest carriers at Logan International Aiport in Boston, some of its routes to Manchester, roughly 50 miles north, have seen lower passenger numbers.

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Aviation publication SimpleFlying reported that the airline’s least popular route last year were flights to Manchester from John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York, seating just 47 passengers on average.

JetBlue told the airport its decision came as they “make a tough call as to how to best support national connectivity in a time of capacity crisis,” officials said.

The announcement comes just weeks after JetBlue unveiled major route expansion plans in South Florida to fill gate spaces vacated by budget-friendly Spirit Airlines, which ceased its operations in May. A bid from JetBlue to buy Spirit Airlines was blocked in 2024 by the Biden Administration over anti-trust concerns.

JetBlue could not immediately be reached for comment on Friday.


Bryan Hecht can be reached at bryan.hecht@globe.com. Follow him on Instagram @bhechtjournalism.

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