IM News May 9, 2023: Greenpeace win, 202 mass shootings, debt ceiling, MA revenues down $2.2B

Please donate to the show!IM news for Tuesday, May 9, 2023.This week’s activism!May 16 1pm - support Massachusetts Social Workers at their lobbying for the SUPER Act at the State HouseMay 20, 21 - Mass Alliance Grassroots Campaign Training for candidatesMA also has their Grassroots Organizing Academy running from May 15 - June 14Wednesday, May 24th - 9:30am-2pm, MTA THRIVE Act Advocacy Day - end the misuse of tests and let students thrive.ClimateApril was the hottest and driest on record for Spain, which is suffering drought. Authorities in Auckland, New Zealand declared a state of emergency as fire and emergency crews responded to floodwaters entering buildings, landslides, falling trees and trapped cars.A new study finds that decades of drilling in the Gulf of Mexico has left behind more than 14,000 old, unplugged wells at risk of springing dangerous leaks and spills, and estimates they may cost more than $30 billion to plug. Methane leaks from Turkmenistan’s two main fossil fuel fields caused more global heating in 2022 than the entire carbon emissions of the UK.A judge in California has dismissed a seven-year $100 million lawsuit against Greenpeace USA for exposing Canadian logging giant Resolute Forest Products’s climate-damaging practices.  InternationalHundreds of civilians on Sunday fled Ukrainian territories under Russian control as part of an “evacuation” ahead of what’s feared to be intense fighting around an area home to Europe’s largest nuclear power plant.Europe is the first regional bloc to significantly attempt to regulate AI.  They recently updated their 2-year-old AI Act to include chatbots like chatGPTNationalThis week in Allen, Texas, a gunman opened fire at a mall, killing 8 people and injuring 7. There have been 21 Mass shootings in the US in the first week of May. 202 mass shootings in 2023 (we are on day 129 of the year). Last year on this day we were at 183.Congress will likely hit the debt ceiling June 1st if they don’t come to an agreement. Please do watch our episode on MMT on this podcast.  First Republic, a California bank with branches in Massachusetts, is the third U.S. bank to collapse since March. North Dakota's Republican Gov. Doug Burgum has signed a bill into law to protect tribal cultures by codifying the federal Indian Child Welfare Act into state law. MassachusettsRestaurant technology company Toast will pay $16 million to get out of its lease in a Fenway office building more than five years ahead of schedule. Sequens/PCI Synthesis, A pharmaceutical chemical plant in Newburyport exploded last week, killing an employee from Methuen. Former State Police Association of Massachusetts President was convicted in federal court in November of racketeering conspiracy, obstruction of justice, conspiracy to defraud the Internal Revenue Service and three counts of wire fraud.In Worcester, the WRTA advisory board voted unanimously last month to keep buses free through June 2024.April tax revenues came in nearly $2.2 billion lower than what the state collected in the same month last year and $1.4 billion below the state’s benchmark projection. With just two months left in the fiscal year, collections are now running behind forecast.  The Senate will reveal their budget next month.John Moran and Bill MacGregor will join the Legislature after winning state representative primaries in the 9th and 10th Suffolk districts.