Comment on Georgia political crisis deepens as lawmakers vote in far-right ex-soccer player as president - CNN

“Personal photos of ousted Syrian President Bashar Assad have surfaced from his abandoned residences, sparking ridicule among Syrians who until days ago were persecuted for criticizing his carefully crafted public image,” the AP reports. “The intimate and candid photos, reportedly discovered in albums from Assad’s mansions in the hills of Damascus and Aleppo, offer a stark contrast to the polished, glamorous image that Assad and his father projected as they led Syria for half a century.”

Sen. Lindsey Graham told NBC News “no” he does not agree with President-elect Donald Trump that members of the Jan. 6 committee should go to jail.

“Sen. Mitt Romney, a frequent Donald Trump critic who will soon retire from Congress, stood by his criticism of the president-elect’s character but said Trump and his MAGA movement now define the Republican Party,” CNN reports. Said Romney: “I’m, as you know, not a supporter of President Trump’s. I didn’t support him in this election.

“President-elect Donald Trump has communicated to Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis that he wants his daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, to become the Sunshine State’s next senator — but it’s far from clear that DeSantis will acquiesce and appoint her,” the Washington Post reports. “DeSantis is seriously considering Lara Trump and cares about the president-elect’s view, according to one person familiar with his thinking who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe private deliberations.

The subject line of a press release this month from Weld County was stark and foreboding: “County’s assessed value sees 20% decrease.” The cratering of taxable property value in the large county that hugs metro Denver’s northeast corner — from nearly $25 billion in 2023 to just under $20 billion this year — would probably send many county finance directors running to the medicine cabinet for a fistful of antacids. But for Cheryl Pattelli, it’s all part of managing the books for a county whose economy relies largely on boom-and-bust commodity industries, like agriculture and energy, that can experience wild swings in both price and production. Energy, in particular, plays an outsized role.

Colorado prosecutors want to increase the total number of beds in the state’s youth detention centers by 50% amid rising juvenile-related violent crime — a dramatic upswing in youth incarceration that has been met with fierce pushback from juvenile justice advocates. The Colorado District Attorneys’ Council is working with a bipartisan pair of lawmakers in the Colorado legislature on a bill that would allow the state to hold 324 youth in pre-trial detention at any one time, up from the current cap of 215. Prosecutors argue the state doesn’t have enough beds to house violent youth offenders awaiting trial. As a result, they say, authorities are forced to release teens who might otherwise be deemed a danger to the public in order to free up spots for someone else. “We’re not meeting the moment to protect public safety or to provide intervention for juveniles who really need it,” said Rep.