11.21.25

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Good morning everybody, and welcome to the reading of the
Lexington Herald Leader. Today is Friday, November twenty first, and
your reader is Rod Brotherton. And as you know, Radio
I is a reading service intended for people who are
blind or have other disabilities that make it difficult to
read printed material. We are in the middle of a saggy, cold,

(00:23):
rainy series of days and it's not going to end.
Our seven day forecast looks like this Today rain and drizzle,
high sixty three. Tonight, more rain and drizzle, high low
forty nine. Saturday there is a morning shower, the highest
fifty five and the low thirty nine, but Sunday Sunday

(00:43):
and pleasant high sixty low forty Monday, though it returns
clouds and sun high sixty, low fifty three. Tuesday, periods
of rain high sixty three, forty eight. Wednesday a thick,
thick cloud cover with a high have only fifty six
and low oh thirty five. Thursday there will be periods

(01:04):
of clouds and sunshine with a high fifty one and
a low thirty nine. Looking at the almanac, yesterday's high
and low fifty and forty four. Normal is fifty four
and thirty five. Last year it was sixty five and
fifty eight. The record high in nineteen forty two was
seventy seven and the record low in twenty fourteen was eleven.

(01:26):
Precipitation on Wednesday was a trace. Month to date, we've
had one point seventy nine, while the normal is two
point oh two last year. This year to date we've
had fifty six point two one compared to a normal
of forty four point twenty nine, and last year we'd
had forty four point sixty five. And the record for
yesterday was two point one inches of rain in nineteen

(01:48):
eighty eight. For the sun and the moon, the sun
rose today at seven twenty six, it will set tonight
at five twenty three. The moon will come up at
eight fifty seven and set tonight at six oh one.
And for our weather trivia, on the Celsius scale, what
are the freezing and boiling temperatures? Well, that's the one

(02:11):
that's opposite of fahrenheit at thirty two and two twelve,
zero is freezing and one hundred is boiling. All right,
let's look at the headlines for today. Ratings released for
Fayette County Schools. Middle schools in Fayette County increased one
spot to Kentucky's second highest rating during the twenty four

(02:34):
to twenty five school year. According to statewide data released Wednesday,
Fayette County's elementary and high schools remained at the third
highest rating as the same year before. In Kentucky's color
coded assessment for school performance during the twenty four to
twenty five school year, districts received indicators rating that correspond

(02:56):
to colors. Blue is the highest, then green, yellow, orange,
and red, which is the lowest. Several factors go into
the indicator's ranking, including test scores, school climate and safety,
and for high schoolers, graduation rates and post secondary readiness.

(03:17):
Elementary and high schools in Fayette County each received a
yellow rating, while middle schools received a green rating. Individually,
in Fayette County, ten elementary schools received blue ratings, six
elementary schools received green ratings, ten got yellow, ten received orange,

(03:39):
and two received red. Russell Cave and Cardinal Valley. The
following elementary schools received blue rating Veterans Park, Scappa, Cassidy, Athens, Chilesburg,
Rosa Parks, Wellington, Maxwell's Spanish Emersion, Clay's Mill, Glendover, and

(04:03):
metalthorpe Clay's Mill Elementary also ranked seventh best of any
elementary schools statewide. Russell Cave was one of fifty three
schools across the state the bottom five percent that was
federally classified as needing comprehensive state intervention. Two middle schools

(04:27):
in Fayette County received blue SCAPA AT Bluegrass and Edith
Jones Hayes five middle schools received green, three got yellow,
two received orange, but none received the lowest red. Among
high schools, none received blue, two received green, four received yellow,
and none received red. Clay's Mill received the highest overall

(04:51):
rating among Fayette County elementary schools and Russell Cave received
the lowest SCAT. Bluegrass received the highest rating among middle schools,
and Windburn Elementary received the lowest. Among high schools, Lafayette
scored the highest and Henry Clay scored the lowest. Brian
Station High which ranked in the lowest in Fayette County

(05:14):
last year, jumped from six to third, and Henry Clay
dropped from third to sixth. Fayette County Public School Superintendent
Demetrius Liggins said Tuesday he's very pleased with the results
in the progress made we have a very talented teaching
staff and leadership and support system in place to where

(05:36):
we're focusing on kids. Ligan said, that has certainly been
my focus from day one, and I'm glad that we're
continuing to make that progress. After taking the state's standardized tests,
each student is given a score of novice, the lowest apprenticed,
proficient or distinguished, which is the highest in several subjects.

(06:00):
District Wide, in Fayette County, fifty two percent of elementary
school students scored proficient or distinguished in reading, and forty
eight percent scored proficient or distinguished in math. Twenty three
percent of students scored novice in reading, and twenty six
per scored novice in math. Among middle school students, fifty

(06:21):
two percent scored proficient or distinguished in reading and forty
six percent scored proficient or distinguished in math. A little
more than twenty six percent of students got novice in
reading and twenty eight percent got novice in math. In
high schools, forty nine percent of the students scored proficient

(06:42):
or distinguished in reading, forty two profession or distinguished in math. Meanwhile,
twenty nine percent scored novice in reading and thirty three
percent scored novice in math. Of the thirty eight elementary
schools in Fayette County, eighteen reported that at least fifty
percent of the students scored proficient or distinguished in reading.

(07:05):
When the top performing schools were SCAPA had Bluegrass eighty
four percent of students proficient or distinguished in reading, Clay's
Mill Elementary eighty, Cassidy seventy six, and Rosa Parks also
seventy six. Cardinal Valley had more than fifty percent of
students test novice in reading. In math, seventeen of the

(07:29):
district's thirty eight elementary schools reported at least half of
the students testing proficient or distinguished, but two schools, Russell
Cave and Arlington, reported more than half of their students
tested novice in math. For middle schools, Fayette County's eight
of the twelve district schools reported that at least fifty

(07:50):
percent of students tested proficient or distinguished in reading, and
increased from five schools last year. In the top performing
school culture Scappa at eighty four, Edith Jones Hayes at
seventy one, and Jesse M. Clarke at fifty seven Windburn
Middle School had more than forty five percent of students
test novice in reading and in math. Five of the

(08:15):
district's twelve middle schools reported that at least half of
the students tested proficient or distinguished. Two of the twelve
had more than forty five percent test novice in math,
which were Lexington Middle and Windburn. For the high schools,
three of the district's six schools reported at least half
of their students tested proficient or distinguished. In reading. Lafayette

(08:39):
had sixty three, Paul Lawrence Dunbar fifty seven, Henry Clay
fifty one, and Frederick Douglas forty seven, Dates Creek had
forty three, and Bryan Station had forty. In math, two
schools reported at least fifty percent of the students tested
proficient or distinguished. Lafayette fifty five, Dunbar fifty three, Henry

(09:02):
Clay forty eight, Frederick Douglas thirty nine, Tates Creek thirty five,
and Bryan Station twenty eight. Every school of high schools
in Fayette County has a graduation rate above ninety three percent.
Lafayette ninety eight point four, Douglas ninety six point eight,
Tates Creek ninety six point one, Bryan Station ninety four

(09:25):
and a half, Dunbar ninety four point two, and Henry
Clay ninety three point nine. For the second year in
a row, no schools were flagged for low achievement among
its African American slash black and economically disadvantaged student population.
Liggins described this as a historic achievement. This is something

(09:49):
we work very hard on and continue to work to
ensure we are doing all that we can to narrow
the achievement gap between all of our students. Ligan said
about seventy five percent of schools in the district achieved medium,
high or very high ratings in twenty twenty five. Sixteen

(10:09):
schools in the district had a higher color rating in
twenty twenty five than in twenty four. Every very low
rated school in twenty four improved in twenty five. As
an entire district, Fayette County Schools scored higher than the
state average. The district also outperformed Jefferson County Public Schools,

(10:31):
the largest school district in Kentucky. We are very proud
to say that again we outperformed the state in every
single one of these as well as the Jefferson County
Public Schools, which is the next largest school district next
to US. Graduation rates in Fayette County Schools also continued

(10:52):
to rise. The four year graduation rate is ninety two
point four and the five year graduation rate is ninety
four point four. Our students are so much more than
their test scores, Ligan said, as we know, they are
problem solvers, leaders and innovators and the next story. Influencer

(11:14):
climbed to MAGA fame, but risks arrest if he returns home.
Nick Sorter was arrested last month in Oregon for disorderly conduct.
It was a huge booze for his career. In an
October second altercation with people protesting the actions of immigration

(11:35):
and customs enforcement in Portland, grabbed American flags that were
being burned and walked through protest camps before he was
pushed to the ground in the ensuing scrum. Police arrested
Sortoor and others on a misdemeanor charge. Sordier, a Kentucky native,
was already a prominent self described journalist and conservative influencer

(11:56):
on x, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter,
but the scene in Portland sent sorder star rising even higher.
White House Press Secretary Caroline Levitt fiercely defended him from
her podium, Sort her maid in appearance at the roundtable
discussion with President Trump, and The Washington Post featured him

(12:18):
in a lengthy story. At the roundtable, Sorder brought Trump
a tattered burn American flag and said he took from protesters.
The President express concern about the protesters, but quipped, at
least that horrible night made you famous. Three years ago,
Sordier was a twenty four year old, little known political

(12:38):
operative in Lexington. Now, at twenty seven, he's one of
the most popular conservative voices on X, where he has
one point two million followers. Sordier, who was raised in Louisville,
has more followers on X than virtually any other Kentuckian,
including the combined totals for Governor Basheer and actress Ashley Judd,

(13:01):
country music stars Chris Stapleton, and U S representative James Comer.
The sequence of events in Portland encapsulated Sorter's career, confrontational,
viral social media content on a bashed support both for
and from Trump, and an arrest. It was not Sordier's

(13:23):
first arrest, in fact, due to ongoing legal troubles in Kentucky,
Sorder would be subject to arrest again in jail time
if he returned to his native state. He has been
charged twice and convicted once for driving under the influence
in Kentucky, was arrested for menacing a police officer in

(13:44):
downtown Lexington, and was put on probation after pleading guilty
to criminal mischief for an incident with a woman who
accused him of being violent. Through most of his rise
as an influencer criss crossing the country, He's been absconding
on that probation sentence and has had an active in
state warrant for his arrest, and an October twenty eighth

(14:07):
interview with The Herald Leader, he said that that was
news to him. I'm not aware of this, Sorter said.
I guess the only thing I can say is I'll
handle it. I'll have to talk to an attorney now.
Court Sordier's probation sentence began on January of twenty twenty two,
and the initial warrant for his arrest for absconding was

(14:29):
issued June in twenty three. According to Kentucky court records,
sordiers probation officer sought a nationwide warrant for his arrest
in early October for skipping his probation for more than
two years. That request was denied by the court, but
his in state pickup for a ninety day jail sentence remains. Sordier,

(14:50):
who now travels regularly and has a home base in Washington,
could be arrested and detained in Kentucky at any time.
In a social media ecosystem that rewards emotional, partisan, and
outrage inducing content, and a platform an x that has
recently taken a right return, Sordi has thrived. Sordier's online

(15:14):
account is best known for die Hard Offen crass pro
Trump commentary and onseen video content from major news events
like the Portland's protest. He also helped boost the president's
political fortunes. According to Trump himself, thank you for being
a social media warrior in the fight to save our
country from the radical left, Trump wrote in a letter

(15:34):
disorder two months before his twenty twenty four election victory.
Comrad Kamala has the fake news, big tech, and deep
state swamp creatures, but I have you beyond Portland. He's
been on the ground interviewing survivors of disaster, as well
as officials bashing Democrats and rooting for Trump aligned Republicans

(15:58):
in the wake of twenty twenty threes, East Palestine, Ohio
train derailment, Maui, Hawaii fires, and other high profile events.
High profile events. Though his niche is on the ground
dispatches from scenes like Portland and East Palestine, the majority
of his post aggregate contents with a strong pro Tump magaspin.

(16:21):
For instance, he's posted another user's video of Milania Trump
at a rally in the lead up to the twenty
twenty four election with his own commentary, Milania Trump is
what a real first Lady looks like, not the power
hungry witch like Jill Biden. He wrote about eighteen thousand

(16:41):
accounts reposted it, the number of likes one hundred and
thirty five thousand. Tim Weininger, a computer science professor at
Notre Dame who studies social media, saidsorder as part of
a growing number of news content creators on x and
other social media platforms more focused on heightening partisan outrage

(17:03):
than sharing facts or their honest assessment of the news.
They trade in indignation and hyperbole. Wininger said it works
because humans really like outrage. It motivates us and drives
our blood pressure. So there's going to be a market
for this kind of stuff. No one's interested in sober

(17:23):
analysis of reality. That's boring. Tracking the course of his
most of his rise, Sorder has been skipping on his
probation in Kentucky, and a report filed October sixth, the
Fayette County Probation officer wrote that Sordi had had an
active warrant for his arrest in Kentucky since June of
twenty twenty three. The officer sought to issue a nationwide

(17:48):
pickup for Sorder, meaning that arrests in places like Portland
and at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, where he
had a medical episode in a ride sharing and responding
officers saw he warrant would lead to transports back to Kentucky.
That probation resulted from a case where he pled guilty
to criminal mischief in the third degree. He was originally

(18:10):
charged with second degree burglary, a felony following a November
twenty twenty altercation with the woman who accused Sorda of
being violent, according to court records. According to the initial
police citation. The woman said Sor called her twenty seven times,
sent harassing text messages, and took her dog before returning
to her home, where he attempted to make sexual advances

(18:34):
and retrieve his laptop. The suspect then put his foot
between the door and doorway so she couldn't close it,
forced his way inside, grabbed the victim by her hair,
and pulled her outside the apartment. He then went back
inside to retrieve his laptop. The victim stated the suspect

(18:54):
slapped her in the face as he was leaving. The
citation reads. Sorder claims that the case's amendment down to
third degree criminal mischief a misdemeanor, is a reflection of
the lack of evidence for that account. Sorder also got
a boost via character statements. One came from a young
woman who said the allegations were out of character, and

(19:16):
another came from a window whose veteran's husband died of
COVID nineteen days after the birth of their second child,
and Sorder helped raise one hundred thousand dollars for them.
He told the hair leader he would not have to
take the plead deal now, but given that he was
younger and had less financial independence. The plea deal for
a lower level offense seemed like a no brainer compared

(19:39):
to the original felony charge, though the consequences of that
arrest have lingered. It's far from Sortier's only brush with
the law enforcement in Kentucky. Outside of seven lower level
traffic convictions from twenty nineteen to twenty twenty two, sordera
has been charged twice with driving under the influence and
convicted in one of those cases. In one January twenty

(20:02):
twenty one incident, according to a police citation, at twenty fourteen,
Maserati quadriporte driven by Sorterer was seen losing control and
crashing into multiple occupied dwellings on High Street in downtown Lexington.
An open alcohol container and multiple pill bottles prescribed disorder
were found in the vehicle. For the citation, he refused

(20:24):
a blood test to determine his blood alcohol level. Upon
locating the suspect a short distance away, officers observed that
the individuals showed signs of intoxication, including slurred speech, bloodshot eyes,
and a strong order of alcohol. The citation reads, Sorder's
charges for driving under the influence and leaving the scene

(20:44):
of an accident were amended down. He pleaded guilty only
to reckless driving, driving with a suspended or evoked license,
and failure to report an accident. After an incident early
in September of twenty twenty two in Franklin County, Sorder
was charged and later convicted of driving under the influence
driving of vintage nineteen seventy nine Pontiac Firebird. Sorder was

(21:07):
spotted rolling through a stop sign in downtown Frankfort. According
to the erescitation, Sorta refused both a breathalyzer at the
scene and another blood alcohol test at Franklin County Regional Jail,
so it was also charged with menacing after an incident
between himself and the Lexington police officer downtown early on
July twenty fourth, twenty twenty two, He intentionally and unlawfully

(21:32):
placed me in fear of imminent physical injury. The officer wrote.
That charge was dismissed months later. In speaking about some
of his arrests, Sorder said he was not interested in
giving excuses. You've made mistakes in the past, but you
learned from them, and I guess to move forward. Sorder said.
Sorda's big first foray into politics began with a social

(21:55):
media post, but not from his account. Andrew Cooper Writer,
a conservative influencer focused on state politics and former Kentucky
candidate who was in the news for refusing to comply
with COVID nineteen restrictions at his Lexington coffee shop. As
for help printing out thousands of signatures in support of

(22:16):
a petition to impeach Basher in early of twenty twenty one,
Sorta offered a help. Real estate agent at the time,
he had access to the business's industrial printers. I went
to office depot and we bought out like all their
paper and all their toner sort of recall. He even
rented a U haul truck to deliver the thousands of signatures.

(22:40):
He used their printers to print off boxes and boxes
of these petitions. So we were pulling out all these
boxes on a dolly, wheeling them out, and the officer
admin sees what's going on, Cooper Writer said, Long story short,
they end up firing him for it. The incident closed
the door on Soder's time as a real trip director Hayden,

(23:01):
but it opened up in the so called liberty wing
of Kentucky GOP politics, which general aligns itself with US
Representative Thomas Massey, a contrarian libertary leaning Republican in northern
Kentucky who has repeatedly drawn the ire of Trump. It
was an unorthodox turn in a young professional's career, and

(23:23):
that had an unorthodox start. After graduating in twenty sixteen
from Trinity High School in Louisville, a large private Catholic school,
soor skipped college to develop an online gaming app. The
money behind the app, according to Sorders telling, was Louisville
native and famed pizzamogul Papa John Schnatter. News sources from

(23:45):
Sordiers past as a Wonderkin High School entrepreneur had caught
the Papa John's founder's attention, Sorder said, but when Shatner's
became embroiled in the controversy in mid twenty eighteen over
his use of a racial slur during an internal sensitivity training,
the funding dried up. After his real estate career was

(24:07):
cut short, Shorder developed strong ties with Cooper Writer, assisting
his coffee shop and Brewed with its online platform, and
later helping manage cooper writers ultimately unsuccessful twenty twenty two
campaign for state Senate. He also assisted other liberty aligned
Republican politicians with website creation and harsh attack mailers in

(24:30):
GOP primaries. He regularly posted on x lambasting both Democrats
like Bashir and Republicans he saw as too moderate on
issues like vaccines. Former State Senator Ralph Alvarado, who is
now running for Congress in central Kentucky, and former State
Senate Majority leader Damon Thayer were frequent targets, but Sorder

(24:53):
didn't really have an audience at the time. I didn't
even know that he criticized me it ever. Really it
was on my radar scheme to be honest with you,
theyer told the Herald Leader, adding that he thinks Sorder
is now doing pretty amazing work. Sordier's audience got a
drastic bump in early of twenty twenty three when he
drove from Kentucky to East Palestine, a working class small

(25:17):
town in Ohio on the border with Pennsylvania. He went
to see the aftermath with train derailment involving a Norfolk
Southern railcar full of chemicals, which led to a fiery
explosion and resident outcry over exposure to the hazardous material.
I kept seeing these photos of dark, thick mushroom clouds.

(25:38):
It looked like the town had been nooked, and it
was all no media coverage at all, especially on the
national level, and I was like, I'm going there to
see this for myself, the Sorder said. Then the coverage
came in part because of swords Work, one of the
heavy capitalized tweets at the time. Even more proof that

(26:00):
the EPA is lying to the people of East Palestine.
This water is insanely contaminated, Sorder wrote in a post
accompanied by a video showing chemicals surfacing in a woman's
backyard creek. It drew millions of views eleven point eight
to be exact in November twenty twenty five, and caught

(26:21):
the eye of Tucker Carlson, the former Fox News host
who has Sorder on his show. The national media and
the White House that sent the federal government into total
damage control mode, and that's when you started seeing national
media outlets putting people on the grounds, Order said. Sorder

(26:42):
became the leading voice criticizing the federal government, then led
by Democratic President Joe Biden and its response to the catastrophe.
Sorder thinks that may have been a tipping point in
the lead up to Trump's twenty twenty four victory. Biden's
absence there was a common gripe among Republicans, and Trump

(27:02):
capitalized on the attention by going to East Palestine himself.
That was pretty embarrassing for the Biden administration and the
Biden campaign, and I'm not sure that the Trump team
would have done it had it not been for me
covering the story in the way that I did, sort
or said. The attention of the country shifted toward East Palestine,

(27:24):
and Trump's Trump trip to the rural working class enclave
stood in contrast to Biden, who didn't visit until more
than a year later. The negative impacts on the residents
were real and later acknowledged in different ways. Norfolk Southern
paid out one point seven billion dollars in settlement funds,

(27:46):
and preliminary research from the University of Kentucky confirmed residence
fears of health problems due to the derailment. Soder's followers
count took off, and he became a regular onseen contributor
for right wing outlets like Fox News, Steve Banyon's War Room,
and the conspiracy laden Info Wars, in addition to some

(28:07):
appearances on moderate to left leaning outlets like c in
N and we will return this story after a short pause,
and I hope you'll return for a continuation of the
reading of the Lexing and Harald Leader for today. Thank
you for listening, and now please stay tuned for more
news right here on Radio I. Now we will continue

(28:30):
reading from the Lexington Herald for this Friday, November twenty First,
your reader is Rod Brotherton, and as always we start
with the obituaries, read only the name, age and location
if given. If you would like further information on any
of the obituaries, please see the website or call us
during the weekdays at eight five, nine, four two two

(28:50):
sixty three ninety and we will be glad to read
the entire habituary for you. I'll repeat the number at
the end of the listings. Today's obituary in dex starts
with James Michael Jim Bernard Junior who's seventy one and
lived in Baton Rouge, Donald C. Don Hargas ninety lived

(29:10):
in Lexington, and Julie Logan seventy, also from Lexington. If
you'd like any further information about any of the listings today,
please visit legacy dot com slash obituary Slash Kentucky or
you can call us at Radio I at eight five
nine four two two sixty three ninety and we will
try to read them to you over the phone. Now,

(29:33):
let's return to the news and the story that we
were reading about the influencer Sorter. The common threat on
Sorter's conservative media appearances was indignation. There is a market
for independent journalists on the right with this attitude when
there is a left of center government to blame, said Wellinger,
the Notre Dame professor. He called it a cottage industry.

(29:56):
The networks have to find someone that reinforces the story
they want to tell. It's a way of kind of
laundering the message through a different media messenger. So you
can't blame Fox or Newsmax or even NBC for the reporting,
because well, that's just they just found some guy and
that's what he's seeing. Winninger said, if the angle of

(30:19):
Fox is the protests in Portland are bad, you need
a reporter that has this kind of perspective. He added.
One of Sorder's friends via the liberal wing of the
Kentucky GOP, was Representative TJ. Roberts, Republican of Burlington Begs
to differ, though. Roberts, who has encouraged followers to hate
the legacy media, has been the subject of coverage for

(30:41):
his own social media posts, say Sorder's content is more
honest than mainstream media because he's open about his perspective.
The thing I admire the most about Nick is his authenticity.
He's never going to sugarcoat what he believes, Roberts said,
or at least tell you the truth or at least

(31:02):
the way he sees it. Catherine Montalbano, an assistant professor
of media law and ethics at the University of Kentucky
School of Journalism and Media, said Sorder appears to be
very committed to Trump, but not the truth. That's a
big difference between his work and that of a journalist
and a mainstream outlet. She said. When we think about

(31:24):
accountability in terms of fact checking, verifying sources, it doesn't
seem like there's much of that going on. It's just
kind of spewing out what the trend on the far
right media is, and it seems like there's no sense
of accountability to the truth, but rather to his followers,
she said. Auntle Bano said S's account fits in with

(31:46):
the increasing amount of echo chambers on social media, falling
into the extremely polarized space where there's just no exchange
of ideas across the political spectrum. Sorder did not see
himself as contributing to the polarization or increased partisanship. When
asked to address one recent post. Last month, he shared

(32:06):
a video of a Department of Homeland Security agent shoving
a woman to the ground and then retreating to an
unmarked van. The woman had previously tried to unmask the agent. LMAO,
some woman tried grabbing a DHS agent in Chicago, and
she quickly found out why that's a stupid idea. Hope

(32:29):
the pavement tastes a good lady, he wrote, punctuating the
post with a crying, laughing emoji. So Tour did not
directly answer if he thought the posts like that one
worsens polarization, instead focusing on his disapproval of the woman's actions.
Though he spoke much more at length about his disaster work,
he offered a brief summation of how his views his

(32:52):
commentary work. I feel like I have a platform that
I can use to give people that don't otherwise have
a voice a voice On issues that are happening on
the ground that the national media won't touch. Sort Or said.
Sorda has always been drawn to disasters and big events,

(33:12):
but after the East Palatine, Palestine event, he made a
point to do something similar when he could. In the
aftermath of fires that devastated Maui and killed more than
one hundred people in mid twenty twenty three, Sorta set
up there for two months. He posted repeatedly about the
number of missing people estimated at the time, calling it

(33:34):
a cover up, and a post that was shared more
than twenty thousand times. He hounded the Maui County mayor
at the press conference over the number of children dead.
This is a cover up. Children were burned alive, Sorta
wrote two weeks later, when the fire, after the fire,
and where are the children, mister Mayor? Of the one

(33:56):
hundred and two killed by the fires, three were children.
Sordier's coverage also fed to an online feud with Dwayne
the Rock Johnson, a Hawaii native. Months later, Sorder, ostensibly
misunderstanding the villain like role of a heel in professional wrestling,
wrote that a crowd in Las Vegas at a professional

(34:17):
wrestling event was booing Johnson because they were upset. He
and Oprah Winfrey, with whom Johnson started a relief fund,
didn't spend more to help. I typically refrained from responding
to toxic, false, click bait garbage like this because I
hate dignifying explative with a response. But when you use

(34:38):
Hawaii's tragic events to draw attention to yourself, I won't
stay away, Johnson wrote in a response to Sorder. Still
the Maui coverage groose Sore Tour's audience. In September of
twenty twenty four, when historic flooding hit western North Carolina,
killing one hundred and seventeen there washing outside over roads

(35:00):
and isolating entire communities, Sorder approached the disaster much like
he did Maui, but added a new wrinkle direct aid.
Sorder arrived armed with his own starlink, the portable satellite
connected to the Internet kit from SpaceX, a company founded
by Ex's owner and world's richest man, Elon Musk. When

(35:22):
he first arrived, he lent his own to first responders
and saw that they could benefit too. I was posting
about the need for starlinks and such, and Elon Musk
had has had an executive at SpaceX, reach out to
me and ask me how they could help, Sorder said.
A donor foot of the bill for a private jet

(35:42):
with thirty starlinks, and Sorder started managing the distribution network
all over the state. Sorder could do all of this
because he's independent. About ninety eight percent of his income,
he said, comes from advertising revenue on social media. I
can go to a place not even come back with
a story because I don't answer to anybody, he said.

(36:04):
So if I go to a place and I determine okay,
the best way I can help here is by utilizing
my contacts and utilizing my reach to do things like
disaster relief, then I'm going to do that instead. Still
Sordis trademark indignation at the government response to the last
major disaster of the Biden presidency continued through the Helene recovery.

(36:28):
Sordiers responded to an Asheville resident who called the government
response visible and vigorous, claiming he was full of expletive.
He also called for the impeachment of former Department of
Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. WTF DHS Secretary Alexandro Maorkas
spent just six hours in ravaged western North Carolina before

(36:54):
bolting back to DC to get high end sushi at
a Washington restaurant. No boot, this guy is a disgrace
and is consistently spitting in the faces of Americans, wrote
Sordier's post from the aftermath of the biggest natural disaster
of the second Trump era. A horrific flooding event in Texas,

(37:15):
a red state, this past July that killed one hundred
and thirty five people, including several children at a summer camp,
struck a different cord. He heaped praise on the Trump
administration's response, as well as that of Governor GOP Greg Abbot.
Texas has been handling this operation masterfly, especially given the devastation.

(37:39):
Hundreds of game wardens, state troopers, and National Guard all
rapidly deployed, and they're doing a fantastic job, wrote Abbot.
Later approached Sorder to commend him for his work. The
next day, Sorder was riding in a helicopter with Abbot,
surveying the damage and praising the governor. Sorder told the

(38:01):
Hera Leader the discrepancy in his messaging was in part
due to Texas his wealth as a state. They have
a ton of resources that they can shift very quickly.
Sort said, state of North Carolina does not have that luxury.
Federal responses are slow as hell always, and I don't

(38:21):
believe that that's changing anytime soon. So FEMA is hugely bureaucratic,
and they're not very good at prepositioning assets. This month,
the head of FEMA resigned following reporting that he was
unreachable during the height of the floods. According to The
Washington Post, that issue was a key reason it took

(38:45):
seventy two hours for FEMA to authorize spending on specialized
search and rescue crews in the wake of the flood.
Sorta claims he's not just a mouthpiece for Trump or
the GOP. In some ways, he has tried to differentiate
himself from the concernservative media pack. He's regularly criticized the
Trump administration's handling of the files related to the Slate

(39:06):
sex offender Jeffrey f Stein, but he's been resolute in
backing Trump himself. He often hits Republicans seen as too
moderate by the rest of the magabase, and he's called
out fellow MAGA influencers for taking money from big soda companies.
To spread their talking points. Nick is adamant about the
idea of having an R next to your name is

(39:29):
not enough. Robert sitt, He's not a part isn't hacked
by any stretch. I mean, you go through his feed
and he calls out Republicans who are betraying the principles
that they campaigned on regularly, and people admire that. Wennenger said,
So Tour's success is indicative of one of Musk's changes

(39:50):
to the ex algorithm dictating the content user c Before
Musk's purchase, he said, prior management weighed the algorithm toward
posts and accounts it deemed more truthful. Musk did away
with that in the early days of his ownership. Robert Kane,
a member of Kentucky's Democratic State Central Executive Committee and

(40:13):
co host of My Old Kentucky podcast, said the cost
has been steep. The story of this guy specifically may
not be as much about him as it is about
these platforms. Kanye said, they've stopped being a place to
create this town square and have instead been places that
incentivize partisanship and screaming into the void. I have no

(40:37):
idea who he actually is that makes him unique and
he just seems like one of a billion other people
that I've seen before. I just can't imagine reading that
stuff and finding it interesting on any level. It's just
completely boring to me. And our next story, more than

(40:59):
eighty people say a Lexington lawyer defrauded them. More than
eighty people now say they were defrauded by a Lexington
lawyer who was worth twenty five million dollars when he
died by suicide last spring. According to new court documents,
delmonte Lyle McQuinn, forty eight, had assets totaling twenty five

(41:22):
point three million dollars, including homes across at least ten counties,
thirteen plots of land, and in two states. Inside one
of his four Fayette County homes, this one off Old
Richmond Road, was worth about two point five million, was
a gun safe, stacked Florida ceiling with one hundred dollar bills,

(41:44):
according to an email filed in court documents by John Norman,
the public administrator tasked with sifting through mcquinn's vast estate.
But some former clients say much of mcquinn's fortune was
obtained fraudulently after he was hired to execute their wills
mcquinn's alleged scheme began to unravel when attorneys for Lynda Helton,

(42:08):
who was eighty, filed a lawsuit March fifth, claiming he
stole as much as five million dollars from her late
husband's estate. Eight days later, McQuinn abruptly married his longtime girlfriend,
Kelly Lee Jordan, and five days after that, on March eighteenth,
he died by self inflicted carbon monoxide poisoning, according to

(42:33):
a coroner's report. A July thirtieth story from The Hair
Leader revealed that Norman thought the probate attorney may have
perpetrated widespread fraud against his clients. He wrote in court
documents that there could be as many as thirty eight
hundred victims in nearly four months. Since then, dozens of

(42:56):
additional alleged victims have come forward. According to a pair
of recent court filings, the entire McQuinn ordeal, from his
death to what followed is a historic tragedy on many
levels that has no blueprint or precedent to guide those
such as the public administrator denounced to seeks to minimize

(43:17):
the fallout. Whitney Wallingford, a lawyer for Norman, wrote in
an October twelfth motion. Norman and Wallingford declined to comment.
McQuinn was a lawyer with Lexington's firm Goring, Goring and McQuinn.
The firm was well as partners of Dustin Beard. Stanley

(43:39):
Going and Matthew Going are named in Helton suit. In October,
the Going brothers and Beard denied the allegations in Helton's suit.
The Going's lawyer, John Dwyer, declined to comment for the story.
The claims against McQuinn are myriad. Alleged victims say he
stole from loved ones, estates through Phantom Tree Trust's excessive

(44:01):
attorney fees, voidable wills, and self dealings. Their claims ranged
from a few hundred dollars two millions. Most say their
wills were signed fraudulently by people who were not present
at the time of the signing, contrary to Kentucky law,
which requires that two witnesses be present to execute a will.

(44:22):
Several of the wills showed signatures from Beard and mcquinn's wife.
It's unclear if she was an employee at the firm
or why her signatures were on the wills. Though specific
allegations against McQuinn vary. Several families told similar stories of
potentially invalid wills. According to court documents file this fall,

(44:43):
the recent claims don't allege outright theft, but rather that
the services people paid for weren't completed. Since the wills
could be legally invalid, many former clients are working to
determine if their documents are legitimate. Will and Ton of
Wills filed a claim in October to request reimbursement of

(45:04):
eighteen hundred and ninety seven dollars they paid McQuinn to
draft their wills, powers of attorney and living wills. At
the time of signing, the witness and notary were not
present with missus wills, and only McQuinn was present to
act as notary from mister Wells, rendering all of our
documents invalid under Kentucky law. The Wells Claims reed. The

(45:26):
witness's signatures that appear on the documents appear to be
Beard and Jordan's court document show. Another couple, James and
Barbara Shared, filed a claim against the estate for thirty
two hundred dollars, which they paid to Beard to act
as notary. He was the only person at their home
in the day they signed their own estate documents. However,

(45:48):
McQuinn and Jordan's signatures were signed as witnesses. According to
court documents. Beard's attorney, Joyce Merritt, did not respond to
multiple requests for comment. As a result of the actions
of McQuinn and mister Beard and the unreliability of the
estate planning documents prepared by Going Going In McQuinn PLLC,

(46:09):
the Sherians have sought the advice of and retained counsel
to prepare new estate planning documents. Their claims reads, Karen
and Larry Springate learned about mcquinn's death from previous reporting
by The Herald Leader. According to their claim letter, they
said they feel cheated and deceived as no one from
mcquinn's office contacted the couple who paid nearly four thousand

(46:32):
dollars for their estate planning. We are left to pick
up the pieces of a document that has little to
no validity, The reddit letter reads. This has been distressing
and expensive. The total claims against mcquinn's estate since this
past spring total six point five to one million dollars.

(46:52):
According to an inventory filed at the court documents, mcquinn's
former clients have created a public Facebook commute unity page
called Lyle McQuinn Community and Information. According to the group's biography,
it intends to be a safe place for people to
share updates about their claims. In previous court filings, Norman

(47:14):
wrote the deed discovered that Jordan, her sister, and Beard
allegedly forged the notary or witness signatures on deeds and
documentation related to mcquinn's state. As well, Jordan tried to
transfer to herself the deed for the couple's old Richmond
Road residents. She submitted the deed transferred to the Fete
Clerk's office on April twenty third, weeks after McQuinn died,

(47:37):
and the same day Norman was appointed to oversee mcquin's state,
but signed it with the date of March fourteenth, one
day after the couple got married. Jordan continues to ask
the court officials to appoint her as the administrator of
mquinn's estate rather than Norman. Brian Sergeant, an attorney for Jordan,

(47:57):
filed a motion to remove Norman as the administrator that
was later denied. Sergeant indicated at a former court hearing
his plans to appeal that decision. Sergeant did not respond
to multiple requests for comment. In September, attorneys for Helton
amended her complaint to include mcquinn's estate, law partners Jordan

(48:20):
and her sister. Helton's attorneys now argued the group was
coordinating a civil conspiracy. According to the new complaint, Teddy Mims,
an attorney for Helton, said the process is moving slowly.
Glenn Cohen and Christopher Bates' attorneys with Louisville firm Siler Waterman,
joined Helton's team. Mem said the team is in the

(48:44):
process of written discovery with hopes to progress to depositions.
The next hearing from mcquinn's estate his schedule for December
the third, and the next story. Kentucky Politics Insider Year
with Biden says a dim governor should be president. Kentucky

(49:07):
Politics Insider provides an analytical view of Kentucky politics and
the conversations that drive decisions. Email me Austin Horn at
Ahorn at hero leader dot com or ping me on
any one of the various social media sites with tips
or comments. Watch Governor Basher on his long national media

(49:29):
tour and you'll hear the same lines many times over.
Democrats need to spend eighty percent of their time focusing
on issues that matter to one hundred percent of the people,
like infrastructure, healthcare prices. They need to focus on their why,

(49:49):
as he did when he vetoed a bill limiting trans
Kentucky youth healthcare options. And they've got some lessons to
take away from a Democrat who won a state that
goes red in every other election. These are sorts of
messages Basheer Hammer's home in his many appearances and the
lead up to the twenty twenty six midterm elections when

(50:10):
he will chair the Democratic Governors Association, and the twenty
twenty eight presidential election when he is expected to be
one of the many candidates vying for the Democratic nomination.
But the forty seven year old governor offered some new
takes of the state of politics and where the Democrats
can go from here on stage at Crooked Cohn, a

(50:31):
Democratic media event in Washington held earlier this month. In
an interview with Crooked Media's Alex Wagner, who called him
democrats Red state sweetheart, he said Democrats should stop thinking
about maximizing political appeal to specific coalitions often grouped by
race and gender, and focus more on appealing to everyone.

(50:56):
I think the strategy near the end for Democrats was
we've got the eighty four percent with this group, seventy
six percent with this group, sixty five percent with that group.
The Trump campaign said, let's do three percent better with everyone. Yes,
we have differences in our backgrounds that should be respected,

(51:16):
but we're not as different as people think when it
comes to our basic everyday needs, Bashir said. In an
id to his potential twenty twenty eight campaign. Wagner said
that politicians with defined principles tend to garner more energy.
Take New York mayor elect Zoran Mandani, who's easily to

(51:37):
repeat platform launched a young Democratic socialist to the biggest
local office in the country. She said, ken centrist build
that kind of energy. Yes, Basheer answered yes, and it's
because the most important emotion for people to feel about
any campaign is hope. Hope for a better country, hope

(52:00):
for a better life, hope that we won't be arguing
with our neighbors four years from now. Butsher said every
campaign ought to be about how we're going to be
better in the lives of American people. When a campaign
gets it right, people feel that hope. Another new answer
about his future, Basheer said the next president should be

(52:24):
a Democratic governor. That's not far fetched, as many of
the Democrats at the top of the pile and the
current discussion for the twenty twenty eight nomination our governors
including Gavin Newsom of California, Wretch and Whitner of Michigan, JB.
Pritzker of Illinois, and Josh Shapiro Pennsylvania. A Democratic governor

(52:44):
has not won the White House since Bill Clinton, who's
more moderate approach from a southern state isn't so unlike
Butshar's own. They ended with a lighthearted question on whether
a politician has to be cool to be president of
the primary and he has the cool factor, but Sheer
didn't quite answer that one directly. I think you have

(53:07):
to pay attention more to media than ever before. I
think though, you got to be yourself in different ways.
I'm a goofy dad. I love my kids and I
love my family, and I think those are the things
that people can relate to. He said. The map is
starting to take shape, not the actual election map for

(53:30):
the twenty twenty six GOP primary, Sure you have sentate,
but the map of where local officials are giving endorsements
are signaling their approval. Representative Andy Barr, Who's tenure in
Kentucky politics stretches the longest of the three main Republicans
vying for the office, as the most endorsements among state
legislatures and county judge executives. Gone are the days of

(53:53):
a county judge executative and a state representative rallying their
people and flipping a whole county in favor of their
preferred candidate. But these endorsements still matter, especially in cases
where the endorser is willing to get out spread the message.
Bars endorsements have bunched in central Kentucky, parts of eastern Kentucky,
particularly the old GOP loyal Fifth District area, and a

(54:17):
chunk of western Kentucky. He's gotten the support of House
Speaker pro Tim David Mead, Republican of Stanford, as well
as fourteen other members of the House GOP caucus. In
the state Senate, he's got eight of the thirty two Republicans.
Former Attorney General Cameron, having held the role as the
state's top cop, has garnered endorsements from law enforcement officials

(54:38):
across the state. When it comes to local policymakers, though
he started to develop something of a territory. Cameron's endorsements
come largely from the swath of Kentucky, cutting from suburban
Louisville like Bullet County just south of the state's biggest city,
reaching south into Bowling Green and west into Henderson. The

(54:58):
center of that superregion, if you will, is Cameron's hometown
of Elizabethtown. Nate Morris, on the other hand, has occupied
the outsider lane. He's got the support closely of Representative
John Hogsden, Republican of Fisherville in suburban Jefferson County, but
has not been officially endorsed by others. However, northern Kentucky

(55:19):
legislators like Representatives TJ. Roberts, Republican of Burlington Stephen Doane,
Republican of Berlinger, have frequented Morris's events. Morse has the
strong backing, however, of two huge names in national GOP circles,
Ohio governor candidate vvak Ravaswami and the late Charlie Kirk.
Morris was the last candidate to be endorsed by Kirk

(55:42):
before he was assassinated on September tenth. Basher has been
dipping his toe in Nevada politics in more ways than
one for starters, and this together pack has contributed to
several Nevada US House Democratic candidates. Second Libasheer visited the
Silver State Tuesday. According to a television interview he conducted

(56:03):
with Channel thirteen News in Las Vegas, he elaborated on
his a democratic governor should be president line with them
in twenty eight We need a democratic governor as the
head of the ticket, and we got a lot of
great democratic governors, said Basher in an interview with Channel
thirteen Tuesday. And that's not because someone is moderate, liberal

(56:24):
or conservative. It's because they're pragmatic. Governors have to get results.
We have to balance budgets, we have to create jobs,
we have to create that better life. I'm here as
proof that when Democrats put people first, when we stand
firm on our values, we can and we will win

(56:47):
tough elections all over the country. But Shehar said, according
to CT Insider, which noted that he slid into a
Kentucky drawl. And this concludes the reading of the Lexington
Herald Leader for to day, Friday, November twenty First, your

(57:10):
reader has been Rod Brotherton thank you for listening, and
now please stay tuned for sports news right here on
Radio I