11.9.25

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to the reading of the Lexington Herald Leader. Today
is Sunday, November ninth, twenty twenty five, and your reader
is Roger Hamperion. As a reminder, Radio I is a
reading service intended for people who are blind or have
other disabilities that make it difficult to read printed material.

(00:20):
We'll start with the seven day forecast, brought to you
by ACI Weather. In the Weather, Sunday we'll see a
shower or two with a high of forty eight degrees
and a low of twenty five. Monday will be cloudy
and colder, with a high of thirty five and a
low of twenty five. Tuesday will be chilly, with some

(00:41):
sun and a high of forty five and a low
of forty. Wednesday will be sunny and windy, with a
high of fifty nine and a low of forty. Thursday
we'll see partial sunshine with a high of fifty five
and a low of thirty eight. Friday we'll see times
of sun and clouds, with a high of fifty six

(01:02):
and the low of forty eight. Saturday we'll have an
am shower, otherwise cloudy with a high of sixty four
and low of fifty In the weather Almanac. The high
temperature is sixty in the low thirty five normal high
sixty normal low thirty nine. Last year's high seventy one.

(01:25):
Last year's low sixty seven. Record high was seventy eight
in nineteen thirty eight, record low twenty two in nineteen
seventy three. Thursday's precipitation there was none month to date
point one six inches normal month to date point six
six year to date fifty four point five eight inches

(01:49):
normal year to date forty two point nine three last
year to date forty one point seventy five. Record for
the date one point four to three in nineteen fifty one.
There's no pollen count today. Sunrise today will be at
seven thirteen am, sunset five thirty two pm. Moonrise today

(02:14):
eight fourteen pm. Moonset eleven o seven am moon phases.
Last quarter will be November twelfth, new moon, November twentieth,
first quarter November twenty eighth, full moon December fourth. Now
we'll read the front page headline from today's edition. Hell's Fury,

(02:38):
Kentucky continues to mourn this weekend as investigators comb through
the wreckage of Flight twenty nine to seventy six. The
cargo jet operated by UPS crashed just seconds after takeoff Tuesday,
when one of its three engines detached from the left wing.
The plane crashed into an auto parts and recycling center

(02:58):
business near the airport, and its CEO described it in
the starkest of terms, what did he see? Hell's fury?
The first article from today's edition is titled we are
Strong People after coping with flooding, tornadoes and shootings. Kentuckians
now banned together in the wake of devastating plane crash

(03:21):
just seventy miles from downtown Lexington by Richard Greene. The
wide body cargo jet arrived at Louisville's airport from Baltimore
on the morning of November fourth. That Tuesday was supposed
to be just another routine day of cross country flying
for a three person UPS crew with a familiar brown

(03:42):
and yellow gold logo on its tail. UPS Airline's flight
twenty nine seventy six was to leave Muhammad Ali International
Airport at three pm that afternoon for its forty three
hundred mile journey to Honolulu. That Louisville to Hawaii flight
happens three days a week, but for some reason, Tuesday

(04:03):
afternoon it was delayed for more than two hours. At
five two pm, as nearby interstates began to slow with
rush hour traffic and businesses within sight of UPS's massive
worldport complex were shutting down, the McDonald Douglas MD eleven
cargo plane pushed back from its dock with its engines

(04:24):
revved up. It began to sprint down Runway seventeen r
hitting two hundred fifteen miles per hour. For reasons investigators
have yet to determine, the plane lost its left wing
engine during its takeoff role. A member of the National
Transportation Safety Board would say Wednesday, the engine rattled to

(04:44):
the runway. That's when tragedies struck. The jet, carrying thirty
eight thousand gallons of fuel, cleared defense at the runway's end,
but at then korem in terrifying fashion toward an industrial park,
ripping a gaping hole in a UPS maintenance building before
crashing violently near several businesses. A huge fireball engulfed one

(05:07):
of those companies, Grade A Autoparts. Brilliant orange flames erupted
as a series of explosions thundered Hell's Fury. That's how
Sean garber CEO of the autoparts and petroleum recycling center
he has owned for decades, described the scene. His employees,
he told CNN, screamed and sprinted from the fire and

(05:29):
the thick, apocalyptic blanket of oily black smoke. With at
least thirteen deaths as of Thursday evening, including the three
member flight crew, a young child, and nine people on
the ground, it ranks as the deadliest plane crash in
the one hundred eighteen year history of the global shipping
and logistics company. UPS Airlines won federal approval in nineteen

(05:52):
eighty eight and has been flying globally since. Anybody who
has seen the images the video knows how violent this
crash is. Kentucky Governor Andy Basheer said it's impossible to
describe the devastation. He urged Kentuckians to pray for those
who died, those hospitalized in critical care, those still missing,

(06:14):
and all of their families. We are strong people, he
said Tuesday night. I've seen it time and time again, flooding, tornadoes, shootings.
We've always banded together. We will again. Thursday evening, Louisville
Mayor Craig Greenberg said at a vigil for the disaster,
a thirteenth victim had been claimed. We prayed tonight for

(06:35):
the victim and their families, he said. Shortly after Tuesday's crash,
a shelter in place order was issued for thousands of
Louisville residents, even those across the Ohio River. Bashier issued
a state of emergency, and more than two hundred first
responders from across Metro Louisville raced to the scene. Crews

(06:55):
were there overnight. They put out the fire that spanned
about a half mile and searched for victims. Blackened, charred
debris was removed. It was an unfathomable tragedy just seventy
miles from downtown Lexington that garnered international news coverage. The
BBC in London, for instance, trumpeted huge fireball after plane

(07:17):
crash in Kentucky. It was as though we watched the
crash and its aftermath unfold in real time. Snippets of
gruesome images of flames, smoke, and people racing for their
lives almost instantaneously appeared. They came from dash cam videos,
closed circuit cameras at businesses, and smartphone photos from commuters.

(07:39):
They filled the internet Tuesday night with more photos and
videos from different angles and locations surfacing Wednesday and Thursday.
Details about the victims and the cause of the crash,
specifically why the engine detached, will emerge in the days ahead.
For now, Kentucky Morns The Herald Leader will continue to
cover the act after math of flight twenty nine to

(08:01):
seventy six IS crash. For immediate updates, please stay tuned
to Kentucky dot com. The next article from today's edition
is titled flight Data depicts UPS Cargo Jets' final minutes
before fatal Kentucky crash by Austin R. Ramsey. The UPS
Cargo plane crash in Louisville that killed at least thirteen

(08:23):
people and injured several others late Tuesday afternoon was a
regularly scheduled flight. The delivery and logistics company operates to
Honolulu three days a week. According to public aviation data,
the wide body TRY engine McDonnell Douglas MD eleven f
arrived from Baltimore Tuesday morning and was scheduled to depart

(08:44):
Louisville Muhammad Ali International Airport at three pm. Flight Radar
twenty four dot com record show the jet didn't begin
moving down the runway until about five eight pm, according
to the real time flight tracking software data. It's still
unclear what caused the two hour delay, but videos from

(09:05):
the scene show the aircraft barreling down the Louisville International
Airport's longest runway with its number one left wing mounted
engine in flames. Seconds later, after climbing just one hundred
and seventy five feet off the ground, according to flight
Radar twenty four data, the Boeing made jet began careening
toward an industrial park just south of the airport, where

(09:27):
it impacted nearby buildings and exploded. UPS Flight twenty nine
seventy six Final moments timeline. Here's what flight data tell
about the plane's final moments. Five o two pm. UPS
Flight twenty nine seventy six pushes back from a dock
at the UPS Worldport near the center of the airport

(09:49):
and begins traveling northwest on Ramp five S toward a taxiway.
Five oh seven pm, the cargo jet holds on Ramp
five S near a ramp access road. Five o eight pm,
the flight crosses Taxiway C at the C one intersection
and begins taxing northbound on Taxiway B at eleven miles

(10:11):
per hour. Five oh nine pm. Still traveling north on
Taxiway B, the cargoagjet speeds up to about twenty three
miles per hour for about a minute five eleven PM.
As it nears the Louisville International Airport passenger terminal and
air cargo facilities at the north end of the airport,

(10:32):
the jet slows and begins a runway turnaround near the
threshold at Runway seventeen R five twelve PM. The crew
completes the runway turnaround maneuver, turning south on Runway seventeen
R and begins accelerating up to two hundred and fourteen
miles per hour five thirteen PM. Flight Radar twenty four

(10:55):
data showed the aircraft rotating at a vertical speed of
about two hundred and fifty six feet per minute, at
two hundred eleven miles per hour, and reaching one hundred
seventy five feet off the ground before suddenly reading zero
feet of barometric altitude and vertical speed. Bystander videos show
the plane taking off with the engine engulfed in flames,

(11:17):
before descending sharply to the left and hitting the roof
of a ups supply chain warehouse. The plane appears to
roll along its length into a parking area before smoke
and fire obscure the footage. Crash Responds Timeline. First responders
quickly arrived on scene to control the blaze started by
the aircraft loaded with thirty eight thousand gallons of jet fuel. Tuesday,

(11:42):
November fourth, five twenty four pm, the Louisville Metro Police
Department says on x dot Com formerly Twitter, it is
responding alongside other agencies to reports of a plane crash.
Five thirty six pm, the Louisville Regional Airport Authority announces
their are closing the airport. All flights are temporarily suspended.

(12:04):
Five thirty eight pm, Louisville Metro Emergency Services issues a
shelter in place order for all locations within five miles
of the airport once first responders realize a petroleum recycling
facility and autoparts business were damaged. Six ten PM, the
shelter in place order is extended to cover most of

(12:25):
downtown Louisville. The order is revised multiple times through the
evening as crews assess the damage and air quality in
surrounding areas. Eight forty seven pm, the National Transportation and
Safety Board says it is launching a go team to
investigate the crash. Board member Todd Inman is named the
ONSEEN spokesperson, and investigative units are expected Wednesday eight forty

(12:51):
nine pm. Jefferson County public schools closed through Wednesday ten
o three pm. Airport authorities cancel all five flights Wednesday,
November five, six thirty six am. The shelter in place
order is reduced to a quarter mile radius surrounding the
crash site, and partial airport operations resume on Runway eleven

(13:14):
twenty nine, eight forty five am. UPS cancels operations at
its Worldport facility. Eleven fifty two am, Governor Andy Basher
declares a state of emergency. Noon. The Governor updates the
fatality count to nine and says he is confident the
death toll could increase more. The next article from today's

(13:38):
edition is titled hundreds of US flights canceled as shut
down hits air travel by Niraz Chakshi, New York Times
News Service. A wave of flight cancelations hit the United
States on Friday, bringing home the effects of the government
shutdown to many more Americans. Though major airports appeared to
be working largely as normal in the more. The cuts

(14:01):
were announced by Federal Aviation Administration this week to limit
air traffic as the shutdown, now the longest in US history,
leaves air traffic controllers working without pay. Major airlines said
most customers would not be affected, and that travelers who
wanted to change or cancel a flight for a refund
could do so. International flights were virtually unaffected. Starting Friday,

(14:27):
the FAA required airlines to cut four percent of flights
at forty of the nation's busiest airports, including those serving Atlanta, Chicago,
Los Angeles, New York, and other major cities. The mandate
will remain in place through Monday, rising to six percent Tuesday,
eight percent Thursday, and ten percent next Friday. Airlines took

(14:50):
a surgical approach to the cuts. The vast majority of
US routes Friday still have some service, and cancellations were
concentrated on short distance flights. According to Syrium, an aviation
data firm. As of early morning, airlines had canceled about
seven hundred forty eight flights, about three percent of the

(15:11):
twenty five thousand scheduled for the day. That constituted a
relatively light disruption. If the number holds. Friday would be
the seventy second worst day for flight cancelations since the
start of last year. According to Syrium. More flights were
canceled on October thirtieth. While it is sudden, it is
definitely not chaotic, David Kinselman, United's chief customer officer said

(15:36):
in an interview Thursday, Knowing the location and scale of
the cuts in advance helped, He said, At some of
the nation's busiest airports, including Chicago O'Hare, LaGuardia and New
York and Hartsfield Jackson in Atlanta, travelers and staff members
reported few disruptions. About one in five of the canceled

(15:56):
flights Friday connected destinations within a state, mainly in California
and Texas. According to Syrium data, only ten canceled flights,
mostly operated by international airlines, included destinations abroad, four in Canada,
three in Jamaica, and one each in Germany, New Zealand
and Switzerland. Airlines are accustomed to handling disruptions caused by

(16:20):
myriad factors such as bad weather, staffing shortages, and technological outages,
and while the scale of these cuts is larger than usual,
airlines said they would be manageable. Flying is generally less
congested in the weeks before Thanksgiving, which gives the industry
some room to maneuver. While the cuts this weekend are limited,

(16:42):
they will be more difficult to manage as the reductions rise,
and if the shutdown lingers travel around Thanksgiving, one of
the busiest periods of the year could be affected. Here's
what else to know. Airlines United said it expected to
cancel fewer than two hundred flights per day through the
weekend and that travel between its main hubs would not

(17:03):
be interrupted, comparing the cuts to those it would make
during a mid size winter storm. Delta said it expected
to cancel about one hundred seventy flights Friday and fewer Saturday,
but intended to continue service to all its destinations. Americans
said it expected to cancel about two hundred twenty flights
per day through the weekend. Collectively, those airlines operate more

(17:27):
than fifteen thousand daily flights affected airports. The forty airports
affected include the busiest for commercial traffic and several high
traffic cargo hubs and airfields favored by private jets. What
travelers should know. Some US airlines have indicated that they
will maintain international flights and reduce regional trips, meaning the

(17:50):
cuts could have a significant impact on smaller airports that
prioritize domestic and regional flights. D C stalemate Republicans and
Democrats appeared far from reaching a deal to end the shutdown.
Polling shows that public opinion has shifted against Republicans, a
fact President Donald Trump acknowledged. The next article from today's

(18:12):
edition is titled Whitney Houston hit to get New Life
for Holidays from parade. One of Whitney Houston's biggest songs
will be getting a new life at the Macy's Thanksgiving
Day Parade this year. Ahead of the ninety ninth annual
holiday event, Houston's estate announced via social media that British

(18:33):
singer Callum Scott will be performing his duet version of
Houston's classic nineteen eighty seven hit I Want to Dance
with Somebody. The news was announced on an Instagram post
shared to the official account for the late singer on Monday.
We just know this will be a performance to remember,
the Macy's Instagram account commented under the post. Scott, who

(18:56):
rose to fame on Britain's Got Talent, released the new,
stripped down version of Houston's song in September, using her
original vocals and adding his own for a new seamless duet.
Scott needed permission from Houston's estate to record his version
of the song. Her sister in law, Pat Houston, who
is the executor of her estate, said the decision was

(19:19):
a no brainer after she heard what Scott could do
with the classic song while staying true to the Houston style.
Whitney was a balladeer, and that's why we all fell
in love with her, she told the Associated Press, and
Callum turned the song into a beautiful ballad. The next
article from today's edition is titled Supreme Court clears way

(19:40):
for Trump transgender passport rule by Abbey Van Sickle, New
York Times News Service. The Supreme Court cleared the way
Thursday for the Trump administration to stop issuing passports that
include gender identity markings selected by applicants. The emergency order,
which will remain in as the case makes its way

(20:01):
through the lower courts, marked the latest victory for President
Donald Trump before the Supreme Court. The case Trump the
Or stems from a Trump administration policy to change gender
requirements for passport holders. The policy has been blocked since June,
when a federal court temporarily stopped the administration from enforcing it.

(20:22):
While the court case continued. No vote count was given,
as is typical in such cases, but the majority offered
four paragraphs of reasoning for granting the administration's request. Displaying
passport holders sex at birth no more offense equal protection
principles than displaying their country of birth. In both cases,

(20:44):
the government is merely attesting to an historical fact without
subjecting anyone to differential treatment, The justices who cited with
the Trump administration wrote in an unsigned order. Justice Ketanji
Brown Jackson wrote a dissent, and she was joined by
the court's two other liberals, Justices Elena Kagan and Sonya Sotomayer.

(21:05):
Jackson wrote that it had become routine for the Trump
administration to seek emergency relief from the justices after lower
courts block its policies, adding, as is also becoming routine,
this court misunderstands the assignment. She said that the government
had found an obliging audience for its efforts to change
the passport rules among the Supreme Court justices. Jackson explained

(21:28):
that she would have rejected the government's request because the
documented real world harms to these plaintiffs obviously outweighed the
government's unexplained and inexplicable interest in immediate implementation of the
passport policy. The case arose in the early days of
Trump's second term as a legal challenge to an executive
order signed by the President on his first day back

(21:50):
in office. That order prompted the State Department to rescind
long standing policies allowing transgender people to update gender markers
on their travel documents. The State Department began allowing transgender
people to obtain passports with updated sex markers in the
nineteen nineties, so long as they provided evidence of having

(22:11):
undergone gender transition surgery. That requirement was rescinded in twenty
ten under then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and the
department began asking only that transgender passport applicants provide a
doctor's letter affirming that they had received appropriate clinical treatment
for gender transition. In twenty twenty one, the State Department

(22:33):
issued the first passport with a gender neutral marker and X.
The following year, the Biden administration announced a policy allowing
passport applicants to select any gender marker. The American Civil
Liberties Union challenged the Trump administration's reversal of the passport policy,
bringing a lawsuit in federal court and Massachusetts on behalf

(22:55):
of seven people who claimed they had not been able
to obtain passport that matched their gender identity because of
the new policy, or that they would be harmed by
the policy when renewing their passports. In the lawsuit, the
ACLU argued that the policy violated the Constitution's right to
travel and write to privacy, as well as the equal

(23:17):
Protection clause that requires that people be treated the same
under the law. The group also claimed that the policy
violated the passport holder's First Amendment rights, compelling transgender, non binary,
and intersex passport holders to go along with the government's
ideologically infused message that their sex is what the executive
order defines it to be. In June, a federal judge

(23:40):
in Massachusetts ordered the state department to allow people whose
gender identity is different from their sex assigned at birth
to self identify on their passports. While the legal case proceeded.
On September fourth, a panel of Appeals Court judges unanimously
upheld the lower court's decision. Later the Trump administration filed

(24:02):
an emergency request with the Supreme Court asking it to
step in and clear the way for the new State
Department policy to take effect. In the emergency application, d.
John Sower, the Solicitor General, argued that private citizens cannot
force the government to use inaccurate sex designations on identification
documents that failed to reflect the person's biological sex, especially

(24:26):
not on identification documents that are government property and an
exercise of the president's constitutional and statutory power to communicate
with foreign governments. The next article from today's edition is
titled Kentucky Utility regulators set rates for Power co ops.
Future data center customers by Piper Hanson Data centers hoping

(24:50):
to become customers of the East Kentucky Power Cooperative will
have different electricity rates than residential consumers, according to the
state's utility regulatory agency. The Public Service Commission modified the
co op's request for setting rates in approving a special
tariff system outlining how the state's perspective data centers ought
to pay for electricity. According to the October thirtieth order,

(25:14):
owners and operators of eligible data centers must agree to
special contracts with the co op for service, which would
require additional approval from the Commission. Those contracts would outline
the terms for payment and service. East Kentucky Power Cooperative
is often known as EKPC. Also in the order, the

(25:34):
Regulatory Board removed a cap on application fees for developers
and said qualifying data centers are responsible for paying fees
in addition to associated costs with providing the data center
with service. Eligible data centers are those that have a
projected peak energy demand of fifteen megawatts or more, and

(25:54):
there are separate rules for those anticipated to use more
than two hundred fifty megawats. The state's Loan Data Center project,
under construction in South Louisville, an area not serviced by
the co op but by Louisville Gas and Electric and
Kentucky Utilities, is projected to use five hundred and twenty
five megawants. The order also said the co op and

(26:16):
the data center are encouraged to proactively address community concern
through engagement programs like public meetings in order to mitigate
the community resistance to locating a data center in ekpc's territory.
The order said. In a statement following the order, EKPC
President and CEO Tony Campbell said that tariffinshure's cooperative members

(26:38):
are treated fairly when data centers come to Kentucky and
applauded the Commission for approving the payment system. Data centers
will provide the infrastructure enabling the next era of progress
in science, technology, productivity, communications, and even national security. Campbell said,
EKPC is establishing the tools to a common date that

(27:00):
infrastructure if it is located in Kentucky. The co op
is a nonprofit, member owned wholesale electricity company with sixteen
distributors serving one point one million Kentuckians across eighty nine counties,
with power generated through coal fueled plants, natural gas fueled plants,
and renewable energy plants. Due to the large scale of

(27:22):
some proposed projects, energy agreements must be structured from the
outset to ensure costs and risks are appropriately identified and
allocated to data centers and to protect other cooperative members,
which is the goal of this new tariff. EKPC General
Counsel David Sandford said following the order, due to time constraints,

(27:42):
we'll need to end this article at this time and now,
after a short pause, I hope you'll rejoin us for
a continuation of the reading of the Lexington Herald Leader
for today. Thank you for listening, and now please stay
tuned for more news right here on RADIOI. Now we
will continue reading from the Lexington Herald Leader for Sunday,

(28:05):
November ninth, twenty twenty five. Your reader is Roger Hampiion.
We will start with the obituaries. We read only the name,
age and location. If you would like further information on
any of the obituaries, please see their website or call
us during the weekdays at eight five nine four two
two six three nine zero and we will be glad

(28:28):
to read the entire obituary for you. I will repeat
that number at the end of the listings. Today's obituaries
are as follows. Martha Lane Collins eighty eight of Lexington,
Charles Randall Gilkerson seventy four of Titusville, Robert Lale eighty
four of Lexington. If you would like any further information

(28:52):
about any of the listings today, please visit the following
website www dot legacy dot com slash obituaries slash Kentucky.
Again that site is Legacy dot com slash obituaries slash Kentucky.
You can also call us at our RADIOI studios at
eight five nine four two two sixty thirty nine zero

(29:15):
and will try to read them to you over the phone.
There is no Paul Prather column this week, so we'll
continue to read the next article from the day's edition
of The Herald Leader titled police Kentucky Sheriff's deputy strikes
kills pedestrian while searching for burglar by Christopher Leech, A
Kentucky sheriff's deputy struck and killed a pedestrian while searching

(29:38):
for a burglar Wednesday, According to state police and the
Christian County Sheriff's Office, the pedestrian masked the description of
the suspect for whom the deputy was searching, according to
the Sheriff's office. The office did not say if they
confirmed the pedestrian was the suspect. Brandon Higgins, forty, of Hopkinsville,
was pronounced dead at the scene. Ac to State Police.

(30:01):
Collision happened Tuesday evening on Madisonville Road near Mount Zor
Latham in Hopkinsville. State police said a Christian County Sheriff's
deputy was responding to a call for service and struck
a pedestrian who was in the road. The deputy, whose
identity was not released, was driving a marked police cruiser.
State Police said Higgins jumped over a guard rail and

(30:24):
ran into the path of the deputy's vehicle, said the
Sheriff's office. Earlier that evening, sheriff's deputies were notified of
a burglary on Morgan Lane. The Sheriff's office said the
suspect fled the scene before deputies arrived, and deputies began
searching the area for the suspect. State Police is investigating
the collision. The next article from today's edition of The

(30:46):
Herald Leader is titled after appearing on Doege cuts list,
Eastern Kentucky Court House to move federal proceedings by Austin R. Ramsay.
Federal court proceedings in Pintville will according to a general
order signed by U. S. District Court for the Eastern
District of Kentucky Chief Judge David Bunning. The order, signed

(31:09):
by Bunning and certified by a six circuit judge late
last week, will transfer all pending Pikeville cases to the
Ashland and London divisions starting Wednesday, December thirty one, marking
an end to a federal judiciary presence in one of
Kentucky's easternmost cities after eighty three years. Shifting Pikeville's cases

(31:29):
elsewhere will lengthen the commute time for some Eastern Kentuckians
who are needed in federal court. Ashland and London are
both about a two hour drive from Pikeville. Future cases
from Johnson, Macgoffin, and Martin Counties will be transferred to
the court's Ashland Division, while Pike, Letcher, Floyd, and not
cases will be moved to London. Operations in Covington, Frankfort,

(31:53):
and Lexington remain unchanged by the order. It remains unclear
whether the suspension of buss business in the division is
permanent and whether any staff in Pikeville will be reassigned.
Business at the courthouse on Main Street in downtown Pikeville
will be pretermitted the order reads, or abandoned or suspended indefinitely.

(32:15):
A court representative reached by phone Thursday declined to answer
Herald Leader questions. Pikeville Mayor Jimmy Carter said he believes
the order will be permanent because the city's courthouse has
been on the shopping block before. City officials have lobbied
Kentucky's congressional delegation to preserve it in the past. He
said the federal courthouses in Ashland, London, and Pikeville will

(32:38):
list it as non core US government assets rite for
disposal in a since deleted General Services Administration list of
properties spurred on by President Donald Trump's Department of Government
efficiency spending cuts. Since learning of the court's general order
October thirty first, however, calls to Senator Mitch McConnell's office

(32:58):
have gone unanswered. Carter said it's going to put a
hardship and a burden on people that have business in
front of the court because of the extra long drives.
He said, I'm not going to say it's a status symbol,
but it's impressive that you have a federal courthouse in
your city. It makes a big difference in how you're perceived.
There have been fewer cases heard in Pikeville recently, said

(33:21):
Gene Vance, a member of stolel keenan Ogden law firm
in Lexington. A permanent judge hasn't made the city their
duty station since the early nineteen nineties. Magistrate Judge Edward
Adkins moved his duty station from Pipeville to Frankfort in
the last few years. Vance added the order only pertains
to cases in the Pikeville Division and doesn't explicitly close

(33:44):
the course. Vance said jury divisions are not statutory in Kentucky,
leaving it solely up to the Eastern and Western District
judges to determine how to allocate cases within the counties
under their jurisdiction. Local federal judiciary rules and content Ucky
are subject to a joint commission. Although court security personnel

(34:04):
were present Thursday, there did not appear to be a
complete listing of clerk or judicial staff who make the
Pikeville Court House their permanent workspace. Use of the word
pretermitted to reallocate cases is unusual, according to Vance. I've
never seen that word used before in this context. He said.
The order will likely be most significant for criminal cases,

(34:27):
as in person civil cases are becoming more infrequent. Vance
said there were two civil cases and no criminal cases
pending before the Pikeville Divisional Court. According to public electronic
court records queried Thursday, the overall impact is probably small.
Vance said. The next article from today's edition of The
Herald Leader is titled ups Plane Crash No groc Governor

(34:52):
Andy Basheer's photo isn't from twenty twenty one tornadoes by
Piper Hanson. Andy Basheer has gotten a lot a lot
of use out of his Navy blue emergency management jacket
in his six years as Kentucky governor. He wore it
when he visited London in May after a tornado ripped
through the area, killing twenty He wore it in twenty

(35:12):
twenty two when catastrophic floods killed forty five across eastern Kentucky,
and he wore a November fifth surveying damage from a
ups plane crash in Louisville that has left at least
thirteen dead. Similarities among photos of the governor in the
jacket with yellow text seem to be confusing social media
users online, including a popular AI chatbot. Basher's director of

(35:37):
Digital and Creative Services, James Hatchett, told The Herald Leader
he took the posted photo November fifth. It's impossible to
describe the devastation from yesterday's deadly plane crash. My heart
is broken. Basher's recent posts said, my prayers are with
all those affected, and I promise we will be there
in the hours, days, and weeks ahead. We will get

(36:00):
through this together. We love you, Louisville, replies to the
post that went up Wednesday around seven to fifteen pm
on X formerly known as Twitter, criticized the governor for
reusing a photo of himself among destruction. Several users speculated
because of the grassy background, the image of Basheer was
from a trip to western Kentucky in twenty twenty one,

(36:22):
when he consoled grieving families near Mayfield and Dawson Springs
after a tornado outbreak damaged the area. One user asked Groc,
a generative artificial intelligence chatbot integrated with X, where the
photo was from. This photo shows Governor Basher's surveying damage
from the December twenty twenty one tornado outbreak in Dawson Springs, Kentucky,

(36:46):
where over eighty people died. Grock replied, it's not from
the recent ups plane crash. That's not true. Hatchett, who
is part of the Governor's Digital and creative services team,
said Grok was entirely false. As someone who was there
to photograph the twenty twenty one tornadoes as well, those
photos do not contain the fire damage clearly seen in

(37:08):
the picture from yesterday. In Louisville, said Hatchett, who took
the photo. Our focus should be on the victims and
their families at this time. In the photo, Basheer is
wearing the same genes shown in photos posted this week
by Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg and US Representative Morgan McGarvey,
who represents much of Jefferson County in Congress. When Basheer

(37:30):
was in western Kentucky December fourteenth, twenty twenty one, where
he was joined the following day by then President Joe
Biden Harold Leader, photographers caught the governor examining the damage
in Khakis in an online photo album from the Governor's
office titled eleven O five twenty five ups Plane crash Site.
Basheer's team has uploaded several photos of the governor shaking

(37:53):
hands with firefighters and walking to the crash site with
Greenberg and McGarvey. Satellite image from the line of the crash,
just beyond Louisville Muhammad Ali International Airport Show records continues
past several businesses south of ups Worldport, separated by roads
and some small patches of grass. In the Grock Conversation,

(38:15):
a feature that appears when you ask the AI tool
a question, chatbot corrected itself and identified the image as
being one taken at the ups plane crash site. The
original Grock post that incorrectly said the photo was from
twenty twenty one has not been taken down and has
been amplified Thursday morning by two prominent Kentucky personalities, Terry Miners,

(38:38):
who is a WHAS radio host, and Andrew Cooper, writer
who is part of the liberty movement within the state's
Republican Party. A number of replies on the governor's post,
which includes just one photo, take aim at what one
user described as an ig photoshoot at a grave site,
and others agreed was nothing but a stage photo opera unity.

(39:01):
This isn't a harlequin romance, It's a tragedy, another user replied.
Basher is, as the Associated Press called him in twenty
twenty two, Entucky's consoler in chief forged by natural disasters
or accidents, and the blue jacket he wears when hugging
those grieving. Photos of the governor in the jacket with

(39:21):
yellow text have been consistent throughout his two terms. Since
twenty nineteen, Kentucky has had at least eighteen severe weather
emergencies requiring state of emergency declarations. Those are in addition
to numerous declarations made during COVID nineteen Native Emergency Declaration
following the plane crash, and another recent one made in

(39:42):
response to the disruption of federal funding for the Supplemental
Nutrition Assistance program that keeps more than six hundred thousand
Kentuckians fed. The next article from today's edition of The
Herald Leader is titled Award winning meteorologist is Leaving Lexington
News Station by Christopher Lee. Each WKYT morning meteorologist Jim

(40:03):
Caldwell will leave the news station after working more than
ten years in Lexington. He announced this week. Caldwell will
become the public relations and marketing director for the Kentucky
Educational Development Corporation. According to the news station, his last
day at WKYT is December fifth. From the mountains of
eastern Kentucky to the heart of the Bluegrass, You've welcomed

(40:26):
me into your homes, your classrooms, and your lives, Caldwell
said in a Facebook post. I've had the privilege of
helping you prepare for everything from sunshine to snowstorms, and
through it all, your kindness and trust have meant more
than Morge could ever express. When he was fifteen, Caldwell
began recording promos for WRLV AMFM in his hometown of Sallyersville.

(40:49):
He later got the opportunity to do color commentary alongside
his high school electricity teacher for the mcgoffin County High
School Hornets. Caldwell was offered a job at the stage
and started out recording the evening weather and commercials. He
held many roles at the radio station until he started
working as the chief weathercaster for WYMT in two thousand

(41:11):
and one. While with WYMT, Caldwell became a member of
the American Meteorological Society and the National Weather Association. Received
his Broadcast Meteorology certificate from Mississippi State University. In twenty thirteen,
Caldwell joined WKYT's first Alert weather team. He is a

(41:31):
three time AP Best Weather Anchor Award winner. When I
first walked into WYMT all those years ago, I was
a kid from eastern Kentucky who dreamed of doing weather
for the state I love. That dream carried me to WKYT,
where I've spent countless early mornings long storm nights and
unforgettable moments in Kentucky's most iconic newsroom, Caldwell said on Facebook.

(41:56):
The KDC is Kentucky's largest educational cooperative and has more
than eighty school districts across the state. The corporation provides
many services to its members and is focused on improving
the educational community. Though my time on these airwaves is
coming to an end, my passion for weather and my
love for Kentucky will never fade, Caldwell said in the

(42:18):
Facebook post, I look forward to the next chapter and
the new ways. I'll continue sharing the new passion with you.
The next article from today's edition of The Herald Leader
is titled Kentucky farmer sentenced for one point nine million
dollar crop fraud. Others await sentencing by Tailor six. A
Kentucky farmer who lied about crop losses to get insurance

(42:42):
payouts was sentenced to serve four years in federal prison
and pay almost two million dollars in restitution. David Wisdom,
sixty nine, was sentenced to four years in prison Monday
on a charge of conspiracy to defraud the United States.
According to federal prosecutors, Wisdom still roll nine hundred forty

(43:02):
one thousand and seven dollars in crop insurance indemnity payments
over a span of four years. Wisdom was considered an
organizer or leader in the activity, which included several others
who were being actively prosecuted by the government. He pleaded
guilty on February twenty eighth. Wisdom, of Barron County owned

(43:22):
and rented farmland in Baron and Metcalf Counties and grew crops,
including tobacco. According to his plea agreement, Wisdom admitted that
over several crop years, he wrote checks showing he bought
tobacco from Farmer's Tobacco Warehouse, creating the impression his crops
had been short and he needed to buy tobacco to
fulfill his contract. Thomas Kirkpatrick, the former manager of the warehouse,

(43:46):
pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit money laundering in July.
Kirkpatrick is on the hook for nearly sixteen million dollars
and could receive a twenty year sentence. Wisdom used the
checks to support claims for ensurre insurance payments by making
it appear he had grown less tobacco than he actually had.
In reality, the warehouse paid him back for those checks,

(44:08):
though it kept a cut in some cases. According to
his plea agreement, Wisdom also wrote checks to other farmers
from twenty fifteen through twenty twenty to make it appear
he had bought tobacco from them, according to the plea,
and one example cited in indictment, Kirkpatrick allegedly received five
checks totaling seven hundred sixty three thousand, four hundred thirty

(44:29):
four dollars from a farmer named Larry Walden in February
twenty twenty as evidence that Walden had bought four hundred
seventy nine thousand, seven hundred and four pounds of tobacco
from the warehouse. Walden pleaded guilty to one charge of
conspiracy to commit money laundering in May and was ordered
to pay nine point nine million dollars in restitutions. He

(44:51):
faces twenty years in prison. Prosecutors said in a sentencing
memorandum that Wisdom grew up in a stable household, strong
family support, and no mental or physical abuse. Because of this,
federal attorneys said only greed and the ease of obtaining
unearned income as the principal motivators. The next article from

(45:11):
today's edition of the Herald Leader is titled Kentucky man
admits to chopping off heads of Jesus and Mary's statue
by Taylor six, a Western Kentucky man, pleaded guilty this
week to a federal charge of damaging religious property after
admitting to using an act to chop off the heads
of a statue that depicted Jesus and Mary. Marley R. Taylor,

(45:34):
twenty seven, of Hopkinsville, said he destroyed the Italian sculpted statue,
which depicted the Christian biblical figure Mary holding baby Jesus,
because he thought people prayed to them as an act
of worship. The statue was on display at an unnamed
Catholic church. Federal court documents do not indicate where the
church was. The statue was hand carved and imported from Italy,

(45:58):
according to Taylor's pleagresam. Taylor pleaded guilty November three. The
violent destruction of religious property due to hatred for another's
faith is both intolerable and Unamerican Harmit. K. Dillon, Assistant
Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division of the U.
S Department of Justice, said in a news release the

(46:18):
Department of Justice stands firmly against anti Christian bias and
will hold accountable anyone who targets Americans because of their
religious beliefs. Taylor could face three years in prison and
have to pay nearly thirty six thousand dollars the amount
to import a new marble sculpture. A sentencing hearing is
scheduled for March tenth, twenty twenty six. The next article

(46:41):
from today's edition of The Herald Leader is titled Fayette
Judge Lucy van Meter running for Court of Appeals representing
Central Kentucky by John chevs. Fayette Circuit Judge Lucy Ferguson.
Van Meter announced Wednesday that she's running in the May
twenty twenty sixth primary for one of the two Kentucky
Court of Appeals seats representing Lexington and the rest of

(47:03):
Central Kentucky. Van Meter hopes to win the first Division,
fifth district seat that was held by Judge Pamela Goodwine
until her election to the Kentucky Supreme Court in November
twenty twenty four. Governor Andy Basheer named William moynihan of
Lexington to fill Goodwine's vacancy earlier this year, but as
of Wednesday, Van Meeter was the only candidate for next

(47:25):
year's election filed with the Secretary of State's office. The
fourteen judge Court of Appeals reviews cases appealed from circuit
courts around the state. Its own decisions can be reviewed
by the Supreme Court. The Court of Appeals Fifth District
includes Fayette, Madison, Franklin, Scott, Jessmine, Woodford, Clark, and Bourbon Counties.

(47:48):
Van Meeter was elected to Fayette Circuit Court in twenty eighteen.
She was previously a member of the firm stole keenan
Ogden in Lexington. I am running for this election because
I believe the Court of Appeals bench benefits when its
members have deep practice experience in the state court system
and have presided over cases as a trial judge, she
said in a prepared statement. In my nearly twenty five

(48:11):
year career, have handled just about every type of case
that will come before the Court of Appeals, and believe
I can serve the people of Kentucky independently and honorably,
she said. Van Meter is married to Lawrence van Meter,
a former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. The next
article from today's edition of The Herald Leader is titled
owner of Lexington Sober Home pleads guilty to kickback conspiracy

(48:35):
by Taylor six, the owner of a Lexington sober living home,
pleaded guilty to charges after she was found to have
fraudulently billed twenty million dollars in medicaid for unlawful urine tests.
Dolores Jordan, the owner and operator of Serenity Keepers, pleaded
guilty Wednesday to one count of charging a kickback conspiracy.

(48:57):
The facility is also referred to as Sender Keepers in
the court record. Sober living homes are places where people
in recovery from substance use disorder can stay and receive
services such as counseling. Those named in the original indictment
are Jordan fifty six of Charlotte, North Carolina, her son
Deshaun Dawkins of Lexington, Jordan's boyfriend Jerome Davis of Indianapolis,

(49:22):
and Ernest Williams of Lexington. According to the indictment filed
in November twenty twenty four, sober living homes often employ
what are called peer support specialists to help residents. Dawkins
and Williams held that job with the facility. The indictment
charges that in August twenty nineteen, Jordan started soliciting kickbacks

(49:43):
to refer urine samples to drug testing laboratories that could
be billed to Medicaid and Medicare. Jordan's solicited payments from
a person in Boyle County who had a consulting company
with connections with drug testing labs. The indictment said Jordan
initially received kickback paid to her son of about thirteen
hundred dollars every two weeks in return for sending urine

(50:05):
samples from Serenity Keepers, but up that demand to five
thousand dollars every two weeks beginning around October twenty twenty one,
based on the volume of samples her sober living home
was sending. The indictment charges. Jordan also demanded five thousand
dollars payments every two weeks to her boyfriend Davis through
his company Extremely for christ LC. According to the indictment,

(50:29):
Jordan allegedly recruited a doctor who was not identified by
name in the indictment to sign order forms for urine
drug testing. The billing for the tests was fraudulent because
the tests were not used for medical diagnosis or treatment,
and Jordan knew that. According to the original complaint, Medicaid
and Medicare reimburse providers for tests that are used in

(50:51):
medical treatment, but not for tests that are used for
non medical purposes, such as testing for the use of drugs.
Serenity Keepers call just about twenty million dollars in unnecessary
drug testing to be billed to Medicaid between August twenty
nineteen and March twenty twenty two, and another six hundred
seventy thousand dollars to Medicare, according to court documents. Jordan

(51:15):
is the only person to have pleaded guilty as of Thursday,
her sentencing is not yet scheduled. She faces up to
five years in prison. The indictment also accuses Jordan, Dawkins,
and Williams of fraudulently billing for peer support services. Dawkins
and Williams are charged with conspiracy to commit health care fraud.

(51:35):
Dawkins and Davis are charged with a kickback conspiracy. Dawkins
and Williams face up to ten years in prison if convicted,
and Davis could get up to five years. According to
a news release, a trial is scheduled for December eighth,
twenty twenty five, at nine am in Lexington. It is
expected to last ten days. The next article from today's

(51:57):
edition of The Herald Leader is titled The New Redistricting
Battles Have Few parallels in US History, by Richard Fawcett
and Nick Carrossanity of the New York Times News Service.
In twenty nineteen, Justice Elaina Kagan of the U. S.
Supreme Court issued a dire warning about a force that
could irreparably damage our system of government. It was the jerrymander,

(52:21):
that political practice almost as old as the country itself,
and which a political party creatively draws legislative districts to
preserve or enhance its power. Today, an all out jerrymandering
war sparked by President Donald Trump has erupted nationwide, with
state legislators on all sides scrambling to redraw congressional maps

(52:41):
in hopes of maximizing their party's chances of controlling the U. S.
House of Representatives after the twenty twenty six mid term elections.
It started in August, when Trump and his allies cajoled
Texas lawmakers to redraw the state's districts, which yielded five
Republican leaning seats. It was matched on Tuesday when voters
in California in a special election passed Proposition fifty, which

(53:05):
could squeeze out as many as five new Democratic leaning
districts for the twenty twenty six elections. North Carolina, Ohio,
and Missouri have also redrawn boundaries. Another dozen or so
are considering it. Democrats in California and other left leaning
states argue that they must keep the playing field level
as Trump plows ahead with his own redistricting campaign. The

(53:29):
White House and other Republicans proclaimed that the new districts
pushed back on the existing Democratic gerrymandering and helped them
hold on to the House. But election lawyers and experts
say that what is happening now is a crisis with
few parallels in American history, especially given the potential weakening
of the Voting Rights Act, which the Supreme Court is

(53:50):
expected to rule on in the coming months. I fear
this one two punch could weaken democracy. The wheels are
coming off the car right now, said Nathaniel Person, a
professor at Stanford Law School who has studied gerrymandering. There's
a sense in which the system is rapidly spiraling downward
and there's no end in sight. Congressional redistricting is typically

(54:12):
carried out after the national census, which has taken every decade.
States can win and lose House seats according to population changes,
and state legislatures from both parties have used the once
per decade opportunity to redraw districts that benefit them politically,
but this year that norm has been shattered. Election experts

(54:32):
worry that if the trend continues, redistricting could become a
chaotic and near constant process, with state lawmakers redrawing districts
with the onset of every mid term election. Political calculations
as well as litigation, could slow the downward spiral, but
if not, experts say the electoral system is likely to
encourage even more extremism among candidates, so confusion and cynicism

(54:57):
among voters, and create a reality in which the House
delegations from states no longer reflect the political diversity of
their residents. Or now little can stop the states. Kagan
issued her warning about jerrymandering in a dissent to RUCO
of the Common Cause a twenty nineteen redistricting case out
of North Carolina that map drawn by a Republican led

(55:19):
state legislature tilted ten out of thirteen districts toward the GOP,
even though voters in the state were split just about
evenly between the parties. David Lewis, one of the Republican
architects of the twenty sixteen map, was blunt in describing
his motives. I think electing Republicans is better than electing Democrats,
so I drew this map to help foster what I

(55:41):
think is better for the country. Due to time constraints,
we'll need to end this article at this time. This
concludes the reading of the Lexington Herald Leader for today, Sunday,
November ninth, twenty twenty five. Your reader has been Roger Hamperion.
Thank you for listening, and please stay tuned for sports
news here on Radio I