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      What’s at Stake in Wisconsin

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      Elon Musk sees the state’s Supreme Court race as a way of preserving Republicans’ power in Washington.About nine minutes into his time onstage in Green Bay last night, Elon Musk neatly explained why he — a billionaire technologist who is already distracted by a little project in Washington — had poured $20 million and hours of his time into a Wisconsin Supreme Court election.“What’s happening on Tuesday is a vote for which party controls the U.S. House of Representatives,” he said.The party that controls the chamber, he added, “controls the country, which then steers the course of Western civilization.”Anybody not currently serving in the House might consider that last part to be hyperbole. But Musk’s words revealed his stated motivation behind his involvement on behalf of the conservative candidate, Judge Brad Schimel: He sees it as a way of preserving Republicans’ power well beyond Wisconsin.He has a point. Democrats don’t talk about it in quite such existential terms, but they are widely expected to challenge the narrowly divided state’s congressional maps, which currently favor Republicans, if voters maintain a liberal majority on the Supreme Court.With Republicans holding a thin majority in the House now, any changes that make it easier for Democrats to win seats could have major consequences in midterm elections next year.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Trump Administration Has Begun a War on Science, Researchers Say

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      Nearly 2,000 scientists urged that Congress restore funding to federal agencies decimated by recent cuts.Some 1,900 leading researchers accused the Trump administration in an open letter on Monday of conducting a “wholesale assault on U.S. science” that could set back research by decades and that threatens the health and safety of Americans.The letter’s signatories, all of them elected members of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, warned of the damage being done by layoffs at health and science agencies and cuts and delays to funding that has historically supported research inside the government and across American universities.“For over 80 years, wise investments by the U.S. government have built up the nation’s research enterprise, making it the envy of the world,” the letter said. “Astoundingly, the Trump administration is destabilizing this enterprise by gutting funding for research, firing thousands of scientists, removing public access to scientific data and pressuring researchers to alter or abandon their work on ideological grounds.”Read the LetterResearchers at academic institutions nationwide say that U.S. science is being dismantled.Read Document 75 pagesThe letter said that many universities and research institutions had so far “kept silent to avoid antagonizing the administration and jeopardizing their funding.” But, it said, “the nation’s scientific enterprise is being decimated.”The signatories called on Americans to appeal to Congress to protect scientific funding.With Elon Musk’s efforts to cut spending and President Trump’s crackdown on institutions he sees as ideological enemies, the administration has sought to dismantle parts of the federal government’s scientific funding apparatus.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Read the Letter

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      Pamela C. Ronald, PhD
      Distinguished Professor in the Department of
      Plant Pathology and the Genome Center
      University of California, Davis
      Michael Rosbash, PhD
      Peter Gruber Professor of Neuroscience
      Brandeis University
      Sara Rosenbaum, JD
      Professor Emerita Health Law and Policy
      George Washington University
      Irwin Rosenberg, MD
      University Professor Emeritus in Medicine and
      Nutrition
      Tufts University
      Steven A. Rosenberg, MD, PhD
      Chief, Surgery Branch
      National Cancer Institute
      Mendel Rosenblum, PhD
      Cheriton Family Professor of Engineering
      Stanford University
      Linda Rosenstock, MD, MPH
      Dean Emeritus and Professor
      University of California, Los Angeles
      Linda Rosenstock, MD, MPH
      Dean Emeritus and Professor
      UCLA
      Meredith Rosenthal, PhD
      Professor of Health Economics and Policy
      Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
      David K. Rosner, PhD
      Ronald Lauterstein Professor
      Columbia University
      Lainie Friedman Ross, MD, PhD
      Dean’s Professor and Chair, Department of
      Health Humanities and Bioethics, Director,
      Paul M Schyve MD Center for Bioethics
      University of Rochester
      Cornelius Rosse, MD, DSC
      Professor Emeritus
      University of Washington, School of Medicine
      Peter J. Rossky, PhD
      Professor
      Rice University
      Alvin E. Roth, PhD
      Professor
      Stanford University
      James A. Roth, DVM, PhD
      Distinguished Professor
      Iowa State University
      Lucia B. Rothman-Denes, PhD
      Haig P. Papazian Distinguished Service
      Professor, Department of Molecular Genetics
      and Cell Biology
      University of Chicago
      Martine F Roussel, PhD
      Professor
      St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital
      Ali Rowhani-Rahbar, MD, MPH, PhD
      Professor
      University of Washington
      Diane Rowland, ScD
      Executive Vice President Emerita
      Kaiser Family Foundation
      John L. Rubenstein, MD, PhD
      Professor of Psychiatry
      University of California, San Francisco
      Ronitt A. Rubinfeld, PhD
      Edwin Sibley Webster Professor of Electrical
      Engineering and Computer Science
      MIT
      David R. Rubinow, MD
      Chair Emeritus and Professor
      University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
      Alexander Rudensky, PhD
      Chairman, Immunology Program, Lloyd Old
      Chair in Clinical Investigation, Investigator,
      Howard Hughes Medical Institute
      Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center
      Joan V. Ruderman, PhD
      Nelson Professor of Cell Biology (Emeritus)
      Harvard Medical School
      Roberta L. Rudnick, PhD
      Distinguished Professor
      University of California, Santa Barbara
      David W. Russell, PhD
      Emeritus Professor of Molecular Genetics
      University of Texas Southwestern Medical
      Center
      58 More

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      As Rescuers Work at Collapsed Bangkok Building, Those Who Found Love There Await News

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      The Bangkok building razed by Friday’s quake employed men and women who had found love at work. Despite glimmers of hope, many were still beneath the rubble.The rescue teams at the collapsed office tower in Bangkok thought they’d found a miracle on Sunday night: a channel into the basement, leading to a wide-open space where workers still unaccounted for might have lived through Friday’s giant earthquake.“We thought for sure we’d find someone,” said Piyalux Thinkaew, chief of operations for the Ruamkatanyu Foundation, one of Thailand’s leading emergency organizations. “It was a whole room. It was big.”Around a dozen rescuers stepped in. They were from Thailand, China, the United States and Israel. They could see the foundation’s pillars holding strong. But the room was empty.The next morning, another wisp of hope arrived when infrared sensors found potential signs of life. The recovery work fell silent. But after a while, there was nothing. No one was pulled out alive or dead on Monday by the time the clock ticked past the so-called golden window — the 72 hours in which survival is most likely.“Hope is dimming,” Mr. Piyalux said. “We’re very disappointed.”Was rescue becoming recovery? Not officially. Around 80 workers were still under the pile of chest-crushing rubble and steel that was tall enough to be seen from blocks away. Rescue workers said they were racing against time, as if 72 hours really meant 96, or maybe more.Family members and acquaintances of the missing waited for news on Monday.Lauren DeCicca/Getty ImagesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Why the Right Still Embraces Ivermectin

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      Five years after the pandemic began, interest in the anti-parasitic drug is rising again as right-wing influencers promote it — and spread misinformation about it.Joe Grinsteiner is a gregarious online personality who touts the anti-parasitic drug ivermectin. In a recent Facebook video, he produced a tube of veterinary-grade ivermectin paste — the kind made for deworming horses.He gave the tube a squeeze. Then he licked a slug of the stuff, and gulped.“Yum,” Mr. Grinsteiner said in the Feb. 25 video, one of a number of ivermectin-related posts he has made that have drawn millions of views on Facebook this year. “Actually, that tastes like dead cancer.”Ivermectin, a drug proven to treat certain parasitic diseases, exploded in popularity during the pandemic amid false claims that it could treat or prevent Covid-19. Now — despite a persistent message from federal health officials that its medical benefits are limited — interest in ivermectin is rising again, particularly among American conservatives who are seeing it promoted by right-wing influencers.Mr. Grinsteiner, 54, is a Trump supporter and country music performer who lives in rural Michigan. He has claimed in his videos that ivermectin cured his skin cancer, as well as his wife’s cervical cancer. In a video last month, he said a woman told him her nonverbal autistic child had become verbal after using ivermectin. In a recent phone interview, Mr. Grinsteiner said that he takes a daily dose of ivermectin to maintain his general well-being.There is no evidence to support people taking ivermectin to treat cancer or autism. Yet Mr. Grinsteiner believes that the medical and political establishments just want to keep average people from discovering the healing powers of a relatively affordable drug. We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      What Ivermectin Can (and Can’t) Do

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      Social media posts have promoted the anti-parasitic drug for cancer and Covid. That has doctors alarmed.At least once a week, someone asks Dr. Skyler Johnson if ivermectin can treat their cancer.Patients have asked about the anti-parasitic drug for years, especially during the pandemic. But in recent months, Dr. Johnson, a radiation oncologist at the University of Utah Huntsman Cancer Institute, has fielded more and more questions about the medication.Exaggerated and inaccurate comments about ivermectin have intensified online lately. Google searches for “ivermectin” hit their highest point in January since a Covid wave in 2022. That month, the actor Mel Gibson appeared on the hit podcast “The Joe Rogan Experience” and said that three friends with Stage 4 cancer recovered after taking ivermectin, among other drugs. Researchers said the podcast, which received 10 million views on YouTube alone, fed into a flood of inaccurate claims and misinformation about the drug’s purported health benefits.At the same time, politicians in several states are promoting legislation that would make it easier for people to obtain ivermectin. The governor of Arkansas signed a bill last week that would enable people to buy it without a prescription. Lawmakers in Georgia, Texas, West Virginia, Alabama, Louisiana and Kentucky have filed, or said they plan to file, similar legislation. A wealth of research has shown the drug does not treat Covid. And there is not evidence to support people taking ivermectin to treat cancer.“I understand that people, a lot of times, want to take health into their own hands — they want to figure things out on their own,” said Krissy Lunz Trujillo, an assistant professor of political science at the University of South Carolina who researches health misinformation. “But that might have really serious consequences.”Dr. Johnson worries that people will forgo traditional cancer treatments for a drug that hasn’t been proven to work. He tells patients that there is no rigorous research showing the anti-parasitic drug cures cancer in humans. Still, he has seen some people with early, treatable tumors turn to the drug, and return months later with cancers that have spread to their lymph nodes, bones and brain.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Silver Fire in California Prompts Evacuations

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      Efforts to battle the 1,250-acre fire in eastern California were complicated by strong winds, which were expected to continue through Monday.A wildfire in eastern California that ignited on Sunday has spread to 1,250 acres and has prompted evacuations, state fire officials said.The wildfire, named the Silver fire, began around 2:11 p.m. north of Bishop, a city about halfway between Yosemite National Park and Death Valley National Park, according to Cal Fire, the state fire agency.The agency shared photos on social media that showed bright flames and clouds of smoke burning a grassy, rural area below towering mountain ranges.Timelapse video from an ALERTCalifornia camera showed plumes of smoke rising from the Silver fire on Sunday afternoon.ALERTCalifornia/UC San Diego via StoryfulStrong winds helped intensify the fire overnight, Cal Fire said on social media Monday morning, adding that it had “significantly increased” resources to stifle the blaze. “The fire is actively threatening structures, critical infrastructure, endangered species habitats, watersheds, and cultural and heritage resources,” the agency said.Officials ordered evacuations in parts of Inyo County and Mono County and closed a 30-mile stretch of U.S. Highway 6. The fire was zero percent contained, and there were no known injuries from the fire as of late Sunday night, according to Cal Fire.On Sunday, efforts to fight the fast-moving fire were complicated by strong winds that grounded some aircraft, Cal Fire said.The National Weather Service said a high wind warning was still in place in the region on Monday morning and would remain through the evening. The Weather Service warned that gusts could reach up to 65 miles per hour and that strong winds could blow down power lines and trees. More