-Lauren Boebert, on how flying famously did not change at all after 9/11

Heads up! What A Day will be on hiatus next Monday for Memorial Day. Have a nice weekend, and see you back in the inbox on Tuesday, May 31.

Enraging and heartbreaking details of the disastrous police response in Uvalde, TX, continued to come to light on Friday, as the NRA proceeded to throw itself an annual party just a few hundred miles away. 
 

• Nineteen police officers waited in the hallway outside the adjoining classrooms where the shooting was happening for more than 45 minutes before killing the gunman, Texas Department of Public Safety Director Steven McCraw said in a Friday press conference. McCraw claimed that the on-site commander thought there were no longer any children at risk. Another department official said in a CNN interview that police held off from doing their jobs because “they could’ve been shot.” During those 45 minutes, children in the rooms repeatedly called 911 and begged for help, including a little girl who pleaded, “please send the police now.”
   
• “It was the wrong decision. Period,” admitted McCraw, in the understatement of the decade. Asked what he would say to the parents, McCraw replied, “I don’t have anything to say to the parents, other than what happened…If I thought it would help, I would apologize.” Horrifying decisions abounded: A Border Patrol tactical team reportedly arrived at the school far earlier than previously known, but Uvalde police officers blocked the agents from confronting the gunman sooner. The gunman fired more than 100 rounds inside the classrooms before he was stopped. 
   
• As law enforcement’s initial accounts of quick action and heroism rapidly disintegrate, parents and local residents have responded with increasing outrage. President Biden and Dr. Jill Biden are scheduled to travel to Uvalde on Sunday to meet with victims’ families and local leaders, in what will be Biden’s second trip to a community shattered by gun violence in less than two weeks, following his visit to Buffalo, NY, on May 17.

Meanwhile, the NRA kicked off its convention as scheduled in Houston, TX, and several senators from both parties have assembled to see if they can accomplish the bare minimum.
 

• Disgraced former President Donald Trump, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), and Gov. Kristi Noem (R-SD) are still proudly slated to appear, but Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick (R-TX) have both backed out. Not because they’ve had a change of heart, mind you: Abbott will send pre-recorded remarks, and Patrick, whose proposed solution to school shootings is fewer doors, said in a statement, “While a strong supporter of the Second Amendment and an NRA member, I would not want my appearance today to bring any additional pain or grief to the families and all those suffering in Uvalde.” Several musicians have also canceled their scheduled performances, and protesters have gathered in large numbers outside the convention. 
   
• A small group of senators led by Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) will spend the Memorial Day recess trying to reach a bipartisan compromise on limited gun control proposals, like expanding background checks and incentivizing state red-flag laws. Any small step forward the Senate can take will be well worth it, but this visualization of mass shootings in the U.S. before and after the federal assault weapons ban expired in 2004 is a powerful reminder that nothing is a substitute for reinstating that ban. 
   

To get that done, Democrats will need to keep control of the House and expand their Senate majority by two seats in November, which will be difficult, but not impossible. This has been an utterly harrowing week, right on the heels of so many harrowing weeks; be gentle with yourself and take time to process. When you’re ready, there’s work we can do to put an end to this.

Take Action Today: Protect Trans Youth

Lawmakers have introduced and advanced bills targeting transgender youth in state legislatures across the country – putting 2022 on track to be another horrific, record-setting year for attacks on trans rights, especially trans youth rights.

ACLU lawyers and advocates are monitoring and fighting back against these gratuitous attacks – but we need supporters like you to join the fight as well. Sign our petition today to protect trans youth.

Here's where some of the latest threats are unfolding:

• Texas: Trans youth and their families have had to face the terror of being subjected to invasive and threatening investigations simply for receiving medically-necessary care to affirm their genders.
• Arizona: Multiple anti-trans bills have been pushed in Arizona, including a healthcare ban for trans youth and a bill excluding trans girls from participating in sports at the grade school, high school, or collegiate level.
• Florida: Governor DeSantis signed a law banning any discussion of LGBTQ youth from classrooms, and his Department of Health issued fact-free guidance contradicting medical experts and federal guidelines for medical providers working with transgender youth.
• South Dakota: South Dakota passed the first anti-trans bill of 2022, which bans transgender girls from being able to play on sports teams that affirm their gender. 

These bills represent a nationwide, coordinated campaign to push trans people out of public life. To be clear, these bills will not stop youth from being trans. They only make it harder to access the support, education, and community that all young people need. It's a cruel and needless assault on the health and safety of kids just trying to grow up – and that's why the ACLU is pushing back relentlessly. Will you join us?

With strength,

The ACLU Team 

TGIF, let’s keep this light, uplifting news train rolling: A new report by international legal scholars and human rights experts concluded that Russia is responsible for inciting genocide in Ukraine. The report said that Russian forces’ mass killings, targeting of shelters and evacuations routes, and indiscriminate bombings of residential areas were atrocities intended to “destroy” the Ukrainian people. Relatedly, Russia has reportedly forcibly relocated hundreds of thousands of Ukranians to remote parts of Russia, after processing them through horrific “filtration camps” in eastern Ukraine. Many of those Ukranians have been picked up at checkpoints and bomb shelters against their will, and many of those who survive the filtration camps are left stranded in poor areas of Russia with no means of survival or way to get home. Meanwhile, Russia has made some incremental progress in its assault on the Donbas region, and the Biden administration is reportedly preparing to send advanced long-range rocket systems to Ukraine.

• House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and three other House Republicans signaled on Thursday that they won’t comply with their subpoenas from the January 6 committee. Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) has issued a list of his demands, including that the panel first show him all of the dirt it already has on him. 
   
• Then-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows burned papers in his office fireplace after meeting with Rep. Scott Perry (R-PA), one of Meadows’s former aides told the January 6 committee. It’s obviously not the standard way to handle White House records, but sometimes all the toilets are already clogged. 
   
• It took a few days, but Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) has finally ushered in the “blaming wokeness for school shootings” portion of the news cycle. You're doing the important work, Ron. 
   
• A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit from Donald Trump that sought to block New York Attorney General Letitia James’s civil investigation into his business practices, a day after a New York appeals court ruled that Trump must testify in that investigation. 
   
• Authorities in upstate New York have reportedly begun investigating whether a retired federal agent may have seen the Buffalo shooter’s plans about 30 minutes before the 18-year-old killed 10 people at a supermarket.
   
• Former Trump administration EPA chief Scott Pruitt regularly asked his security detail to violate federal policies by speeding, using their sirens, and driving the wrong way into oncoming traffic when he was running late for meetings or had to pick up his dry cleaning. You know, emergencies. 
   
• A recount began Friday in the Pennsylvania GOP Senate primary, where just 923 votes currently separate Dr. Oz and David McCormick.
   
• That little boy who was photographed touching former President Barack Obama’s hair in the Oval Office graduated from high school today and had a virtual reunion with Obama, in a nice reminder of a lovely moment and also of the ceaseless, inexorable passage of time. 

The Biden administration is reportedly nearing a final decision on student loan debt cancellation, which President Biden would have announced this weekend at the University of Delaware commencement if not for (gestures weakly towards top of email). The latest White House plan would wipe out $10,000 in student debt per borrower, as Biden promised on the campaign trail, but it would be means-tested, in a bid to neutralize the bad-faith attacks that Republicans will absolutely not hesitate to deploy anyway. Debt forgiveness would be limited to Americans who earned less than $150,000 in the previous year, or less than $300,000 for married couples. Most of the country’s 41 million student borrowers would still benefit, but means-testing will make the process a whole lot more complicated.

No one knows what you’re looking for in a doctor better than you. And no one’s better at giving you the tools to find the perfect doctor than Zocdoc. The people who created Zocdoc found the major pain points in healthcare - all the things that weren’t working - and said “enough!” And they made booking a great doctor surprisingly pain-free.

Zocdoc is a FREE app that shows you doctors who are patient-reviewed, take your insurance and are available when you need them. Read verified patient reviews and see what other real humans had to say about their visit, so when you walk into that doctor’s office, you’re set up to see someone in your network who gets you.

Go to Zocdoc.com, choose a time slot and whether you want to see the doctor in person, or do a video visit. And just like that, you’re booked! Find the doctor that's right for you, and book an appointment that works for your schedule.

In the chaotic world of healthcare let Zocdoc be your trusted guide to find a quality doctor, pain-free. Go to Zocdoc.com/HYSTERIA and download the Zocdoc app for FREE, to start your search for a top-rated doctor today.

New York residents will have the option to select an “X” gender marker on their IDs starting in June, and trans New Yorkers will be able to self-select their gender with no additional documents required. 

Researchers at Northwestern University have created a biodegradable temporary pacemaker that can dissolve without a trace when it’s no longer needed.

This spooky little robot crab could eventually be used to assist in minimally invasive surgeries. 

NASA scientists have put together a playlist of the Perseverance rover’s best Mars audio bangers.