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Hello and welcome to the Ekō newsletter. Today we’re covering US
inequality, the war in Ukraine, and the climate crisis.
Dining out while the world burns
Trump gorges himself as Americans go hungry.
[ [link removed] ]Trump dines at Mar el Lago in a scene worthy of Marie Antoinette
As lower income Americans see their benefits suspended due to the
government shutdown, President Donald Trump and his wealthy friends have
been partying like it’s 1791.
Last week, they threw “A Little Party Never Killed Anyone.” On Friday,
attendees dined on filet mignon and held a raffle for vacations to resorts
worth in the tens of thousands of dollars while listening to live opera.
The out of touch nature of the event wasn’t lost on observers. And Trump’s
administration is giving more tax breaks to the richest Americans even as
SNAP benefits are drying up.
“It looks like Versailles in Mar-a-Lago.”—Eugene Robinson
([ [link removed] ]MSNBC) ([ [link removed] ]HuffPost) ([ [link removed] ]Daily Beast) ([ [link removed] ]the New York Times)
In other news
Power struggles
The war in Ukraine continues, as both sides are entrenched and attacks
continue.
Strikes from Russia have led Ukraine to cut electricity for the population
on a daily basis. Meanwhile, Ukrainian drones are hitting Russian energy
infrastructure as retaliation.
“These are our living conditions. It’s normal. We have fluctuations with
electricity in Kyiv, like everywhere else.”—Ukrainian President Volodymyr
Zelenskyy
([ [link removed] ]Al Jazeera) ([ [link removed] ]The Guardian) ([ [link removed] ]The Guardian)
Cop to it
The COP30 climate conference faces an uphill battle to get commitments for
real action on the environment.
This year, the conference is being held in Brazil. The US is not sending
any representatives at the federal level, though some state and local
officials are attending.
An ICJ ruling that nations of the world are duty bound to deal with the
existential danger of climate change is likely to drive much of the
conversation at the event.
([ [link removed] ]The Guardian) ([ [link removed] ]ABC News) ([ [link removed] ]CNN)
Damage, done
The US has been hostile to climate action for decades, and the
consequences are becoming clear.
Almost one million people fled the northwest of the Philippines over the
weekend ahead of super Typhoon Fung-wong making landfall. The powerful
storm follows Tino earlier this month which also hit the archipelago
nation.
In countries like Indonesia, the dismantling of USAID is having
deleterious effects on attempts to address the crisis.
But the Trump administration isn’t done yet. The White House has been
leaning on nations to curtail their efforts to address the environment,
notably last month, when a landmark deal which would have cut emissions
from cargo ships was scuttled due to Trump’s involvement.
“It was like a bunch of gangsters coming into the neighborhood and
smashing windows and threatening shop owners.”—Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse
(D-Rhode Island)
([ [link removed] ]the New York Times) ([ [link removed] ]NPR) ([ [link removed] ]PBS)
Here’s your campaign of the day.
From controlling nuclear weapons, to replacing millions of jobs, to
creating deadly viruses—unfettered AI development could have catastrophic
consequences for us all.
And it’s keeping top experts and scientists awake at night. 800 Nobel
Laureates, CEOs, faith leaders and public figures have put their names
behind a powerful new call to ban this advanced AI until it’s safe: the
Statement on Superintelligence.
That’s the foundation. Now it’s up to us to build a people powered
campaign so big that our governments have to respond.
[ [link removed] ]Slow down, superintelligence
Thanks for reading!
Eoin Higgins and the team at Ekō
PS: In case you missed it earlier, here's the original email about this
new project:
John,
Ekō is starting something new.
For more than a decade, we’ve kept you informed about ways we can use our
collective power to push back against corporate abuse and corruption. And
we’ve had a massive impact, filing shareholder resolutions, changing
policies, buying and protecting forests, and more.
Now, we’re offering a different way to keep up to date on Ekō’s campaigns
and mission. It’s called [ [link removed] ]Ekō News, and it’s a new project on the
newsletter platform Substack.
[ [link removed] ]Sign Up Now! (It's free)
To launch it, we’re working with Eoin Higgins, a US-based journalist whose
work has focused on corporate corruption and power. His book, [ [link removed] ]Owned:
How Tech Billionaires on the Right Bought the Loudest Voices on the Left,
delves into how Silicon Valley’s conservative lean has led to a takeover
of alternative media—and offers a history of characters like Elon Musk,
Peter Thiel, and others.
[ [link removed] ]Ekō News will publish twice a week, giving a digest of stories we’re
following about corporate (mis)behaviour, and taking a deeper dive into
one story or character from the news. We’ll also interview people making
change and show you the impact of our work together.
Please [ [link removed] ]sign up today—we hope to see you there. (It’s free, but we’d
love support for the new initiative and there will be an option for a paid
subscription, too.)
Ekō is a worldwide movement of people like you, working together to hold corporations accountable for their actions and forge a new, sustainable path for our global economy.
Please help keep Ekō strong by chipping in $3. [link removed]
