The Brief

California law enforcement agencies are required to track and publicly document how they use military equipment, including less-lethal bean bag shotgun rounds, drones and armored vehicles, under a state law passed in 2022.

But Santa Ana’s Police Department has been out of compliance with this law for the past two years, Commander Mat Sorenson told a crowd of about 10 people at a community meeting Wednesday.

“We messed up,” Sorenson said. “ We dropped the ball, now we're trying to fix it.”

The law, Assembly Bill 481, requires law enforcement to make annual public reports describing how and why military equipment was deployed, including summaries of complaints, internal investigations and potential violations related to the equipment.

Police Chief Robert Rodriguez said the department prepared reports for the years of 2023 and 2024. But because of what Rodriguez called an “administrative oversight,” those reports were not shared publicly or presented to city leaders as required by the law to continue using the weapons.

The department retroactively produced the reports and discussed a report covering the past year at the sparsely attended community meeting Wednesday afternoon. LAist spoke with everyone who attended the meeting as a community member. Each one said they were disappointed by the hastily planned meeting and lack of detail in the reports.

David Pulido — who's on the police accountability committee at Community Service Organization Orange County, a group advocating for Chicano rights — told LAist after the meeting, “ I wasn't happy with the presentation. I felt it was kind of like running cover for the department. It was brief, not well publicized, poorly attended.”

What the reports say

According to a report covering May 2024 to April 2025 that was presented Wednesday, the Santa Ana Police Department has access to military equipment like armored vehicles, a “long range acoustic device” and one “tactical robot.” The report says the maintenance of the equipment cost the department around $30,000.

The report lacks summaries of why and how the equipment was deployed. It explains that Santa Ana police deployed military equipment in response to “field based incidents” 30 times — including four instances with the SWAT team — and to “community events” 11 times. Police detained 21 suspects while using military equipment, the report states.

No information was provided on whether the use of these weapons resulted in serious injuries. The report does say that no one was killed by Santa Ana police using military equipment during the review period.

According to the report, the police department did not receive community complaints and the use of these weapons were “deemed appropriate” per an internal review by police.

Problems with the law

The contents of military equipment reports vary by agency. If those in attendance Wednesday are disappointed with the thoroughness of Santa Ana’s reports, Sorenson said they could blame state lawmakers.

 ”The legislature's very good at telling us what we have to do, but not how to do it,” Sorenson told the audience.

He said he looked at other agencies' reports: some that were a few pages long, others that were 65 pages long, and picked a happy medium.

“I  don't know that anybody's gonna go through 65 pages of stuff,” Sorenson said.

Pulido, of the Community Service Organization Orange County, agreed that weaknesses in the report stem from weaknesses in the underlying law.

“ It's not enough to have a report,” he said, adding that a report can be “biased” as it is up to law enforcement agencies on how they want to frame it. The report provided by Santa Ana police was “very brief” and “lacking information,” Pulido said.

Assembly Bill 481 does not lay out any enforcement mechanisms, another weakness according to Pulido.

“If it has no enforcement mechanisms, it's not gonna get enforced,” he said.

Community weighs in

The presentation did not satisfy Bulmaro "Boomer" Vicente, a resident of Santa Ana and policy and political director at Chispa who was at Wednesday’s meeting.

“ I was concerned and disappointed in the report itself because there were some things that were missing, some costs that were missing as it related to transportation personnel costs, training and usage upgrade, things that should have been included,” Vicente said. “His response to not having a more detailed report is he doesn't think people will read them, which is very problematic.”

Vicente added that the report lacked information “ important for transparency, for accountability, and also to ensure that department is being fully compliant with state law.”

Vicente was also disappointed that the meeting appeared to be hastily put together for a time when few people could attend.

The meeting was announced on the police department’s social media accounts on July 10 and held at the department’s headquarters at 4 p.m. before the end of a typical work day. Vicente said that time and location was not accessible for all constituents in the city.

He said he wishes the meeting was held at a time where  working class families can attend and at a “more community central space where people who may not feel comfortable entering the police department can have the opportunity and feel comfortable in expressing their questions, their concerns, and their grievances.”

City leader weighs in 

Councilmember Jessie Lopez was the only city leader present at Wednesday’s community meeting.

“ I appreciate them being honest,” she said. “Their acknowledgement that a mistake happened and this is why they haven't had community meetings and I think it's a good starting point.”

Lopez, like the community members, did not find the report adequate, calling it a “quick presentation.”

“ We're a city of over 300,000 residents, and so there wasn't even 20 people in that room. It was being hosted at 4 p.m. during a workday. There was no Zoom link available,” she said about the limited community engagement.

The new reports will come in front of the City Council Tuesday. Lopez said the meeting Wednesday will help her prepare for the council meeting.

“ It helps me draft and come up questions that I'll be asking from the dais,” she said.

How to watchdog your police department

One of the best things you can do to hold officials accountable is pay attention.

AB481 requires police departments, including those at transit agencies, school districts and university campuses, sheriff’s departments, district attorney’s offices and probation departments, to provide reports about the use of military equipment..

So how do you know if they're in compliance? It’s simple, search for the law enforcement agency name and AB 481 on any search engine and a public page should pop up.

You can learn more about the use of equipment at community meetings law enforcement agencies are required to hold to provide transparency and discuss the policies that affect your community.

You can also attend City Council meetings where this is discussed.

• Read tips on how to get involved .
• The next scheduled Santa Ana City Council meeting is Tuesday, Aug. 19. You can check out the Santa Ana City Council full calendar here and learn how to submit a public comment. 

If your law enforcement agency is not in compliance and you would like to share a tip, reach out to yfarzan@laist.com.

What do thousands of pages of newly released material reveal about the well-documented relationship between convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and President Donald Trump?

Not much of anything, according to some of the right-wing influencers who have long been clamoring for the government to release more information about Epstein and his crimes.

"To me, these are nothingburgers — if they're even real," pro-Trump podcaster Jon Herold said on his "Badlands Media Rumble" livestream Wednesday. Herold gained an audience in the wake of the 2020 election after spreading QAnon-adjacent conspiracy theories .

His fellow Badlands Media personality, Brian Lupo, took a slightly different view on his own livestream this week. The emails didn't exactly say nothing, he claimed, but they show that Trump was informing on Epstein and his associate Ghislaine Maxwell , who is serving a 20-year prison term for helping Epstein sexually abuse underage girls. (Epstein died by suicide while in jail during the first Trump administration.)

"My take on this is Epstein and Maxwell are trying to figure out who's a mole or a rat or an informant in their circle of friends," Lupo said, referring to an email in which Epstein called Trump a "dog that didn't bark." (The White House has denied that Trump was an informant.)

Epstein looms large for many conspiracy theorists , including QAnon believers. He's seen as a prime example of the satanic cabal of pedophiles they believe are entrenched among the world's most powerful people. QAnon adherents think Donald Trump is destined to defeat that cabal.

Trump has acknowledged he and Epstein were once friendly but fell out decades ago. He's denied any knowledge of Epstein's trafficking of underage girls.

While one of the newly released emails suggests Trump did know about Epstein's behavior, some right-wing media figures say the new disclosures prove Trump did nothing wrong.

"They're claiming it's a hoax, they're claiming that the Democrats are cherry-picking the things that make Trump look the worst, and that these things prove that he didn't actually do anything wrong and that he's not a criminal and that he was actually gathering information for the FBI on Epstein," said Mike Rothschild, an independent journalist and author who has written extensively about conspiracy theories and QAnon.

He said that is "very different from the song they were singing for years before that, which is that if we just bring down the Epstein ring, all of the Democrats are going to go down with him."

Many prominent Democrats are shown communicating with Epstein in the newly released emails. Still, another common thread on the right is that the release is a distraction by Democrats.

"They think that the Epstein thing is something that is going to distract you from their failures, although the Epstein thing, all it's really doing is exposing more Democrat failures," Vince Coglianese, a radio host and the editorial director of the Daily Caller, said on his Rumble livestream on Thursday.

That echoes President Trump's Truth Social posts accusing Democrats of using Epstein to deflect from fallout over the government shutdown . On Friday, he called on the Justice Department to investigate Democrats mentioned in the emails. Attorney General Pam Bondi said she was appointing a federal prosecutor to lead a probe.

Meanwhile, some prominent influencers and conservative media outlets are essentially ignoring this week's release of documents.

"They already know that their fans are on board 100% with whatever Trump does," Rothschild said. "There's nothing for them here."

At the same time, the emails are fueling new speculation on both the right and the left as people race to interpret Epstein's often cryptic language.

To Rothschild, that is a fool's errand.

"Jeffrey Epstein was not the most trustworthy person. … You're taking him at his word because you want to believe him when he says things that are either good about Trump or bad about Trump," he said. "It's absolutely maddening circular discourse and it gets us absolutely nowhere."

NPR's Huo Jingnan contributed reporting to this story.

The government is back open.

It was the longest shutdown in U.S. history at 43 days .

There are lots of questions about what this means, how we got here and where we go from here. Let's answer some:

Why did it start?

The Democratic base has been urging its leaders to show more fight. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer caught tremendous blowback in March for doing an about-face and going along with Republicans to keep the government open despite what the left saw as an odious spending bill.

When the latest funding fight came up, Schumer this time showed a united front with House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries. Arm in arm, they refused to go along with continuing to fund the government and made the key issue extending health care subsidies, which if not extended, would mean tens of millions of Americans would see their health care costs increased.

How did it end?

It ended without the health care extensions Democrats were fighting for. Eight moderate senators crossed the aisle and indicated Sunday night that they had struck a deal with Senate Republicans to reopen the government.

The reason they didn't hold out longer, this group said, was because it was obvious President Donald Trump and congressional Republicans weren't going to negotiate, and too many people were suffering. The Trump administration — correctly — gambled that enough Democrats would not be able to stomach the amount of pain the administration was willing to inflict on the 42 million recipients of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, and more than 3 million federal workers.

So what does the bill do?

The bill passed by Congress and signed by Trump funds the government until Jan. 30 with carveouts for SNAP, benefits targeted at women, infants and children, or WIC, the Department of Veterans Affairs and Congress. Those will all be funded until the end of September 2026.

It notably also tries to rectify the firings and loss of pay to federal workers, although it's a leverage point the Trump administration could use again if the government were to shut down again after Jan. 30.

There is also money for increased security for members of Congress, executive branch officials, judges and Supreme Court justices. Several Republican members were outspoken about this after the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.

If the government is only funded until Jan. 30, does that mean there could be another shutdown soon?

It's possible. It depends on a few things. What lessons do Democrats take out of the shutdown? Does the fire within the base subside some between now and then? And is there an actual vote on health care subsidies?

OK, so what about those health care subsidies?

It's not clear yet, but the lack of a negotiation on them likely means they will expire unless enough moderate Republicans, feeling pressure in their districts, cross over to strike a deal with Democrats — and Republican leadership, including and especially Trump, go along with it.

But that seems highly improbable — and tens of millions of people would see their premiums go up.

If that's the case, what was the point of the shutdown?

That's a question a lot of people, especially those left of center, are asking. They see what moderate Democrats did as caving to Republicans.

The reality is, though, the eight moderate senators, who caucus with Democrats and took this deal, didn't want to see regular people feel more unnecessary pain — and they saw no hope for Republicans to compromise after what became the longest government shutdown in U.S. history.

Democrats did accomplish something in this shutdown, though. They elevated the issue of health care, and if Republicans block the extension of subsidies, then they will likely own increased health care costs in voters' minds.

What does this mean for federal workers and flight delays?

Government workers will get back to work, and recent mass layoffs are to be reversed. Furloughed workers were missing paychecks.

As far as airports, there are already signs of easing, but it will likely be several days or more until everything will get back to normal. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy noted that more air traffic controllers are heading back to work, but in the very short term, flight reductions at some major airports will continue.

Were there any surprises?

Yes, there were a few. First, there's drama around a provision slipped in the bill that would allow senators to sue the Justice Department for $500,000 each, if they were subject to subpoenas or had their phone records accessed as a result of DOJ's Jan. 6 investigation.

House Republicans pledged to pass a resolution repealing that provision, but there's no guarantee of that or that the Senate will go along.

There was also a clash about hemp regulation between two Republican senators from the same state. The disagreement between Kentucky Sens. Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul got pretty heated .

The bill also shines a light on how hundreds of local projects are funded — from the purchasing of equipment for a college in the Virgin Islands, the establishing of a veterinary doctorate program in Maryland, urban forest conservation in Texas and asbestos abatement in Alaska to funding for local hospitals, rural community facilities, youth centers, fire stations and so, so much more. It's earmarks — funding not voted on or allocated through the formal appropriations process but tacked on in spending bills — that pay for all of these things.

One day, there will be a vet that will say he or she got a degree from the University of Maryland, Eastern Shore — and it'll all be because of the funding deal to reopen the government.

Is there a guarantee on a health care vote?

No. The moderate Senate Democrats, who crossed over to open the government, thought so, but House Speaker Mike Johnson said shortly after the deal was reached that he wouldn't commit to a vote.

Whether the vote happens or not, if health care subsidies are not extended, it will be because of Republicans — and that will mean they will own higher health care costs heading into an election year.

What does this mean for the Epstein files?

The end of the shutdown meant the swearing in of Adelita Grijalva, a Democrat, who won a special election in Arizona replacing her late father.

That's key because she signed onto a discharge petition trying to compel the Justice Department to release the files associated with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, and her support gave a majority to those who want to see them released. Johnson, who is close to Trump, has argued compelling the release is not necessary — though the president has made clear he does not want them released in full and his Justice Department has not taken public steps to do so.

Even if it passes, though, it will largely likely be symbolic. The Senate is unlikely to get the required 60 votes. Trump would, of course, like it to fail in the House. Colorado Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert, one of three Republicans who have also signed the discharge petition, met in the White House Situation Room, apparently about Epstein. Boebert did not remove her name even after the meeting.

The day the shutdown ended, more investigative materials were released from the House Oversight Committee, including a leak from committee Democrats pointing specifically to emails from Epstein's estate, showing Epstein implying that Trump knew about the girls.

Any day Trump is talking about Epstein is not a good day for the White House.

Who winds up with the political advantage out of the shutdown?

Democrats really upset their base — again. Progressives continue to feel like they get rolled by party leaders. At the end of the day, though, Democrats are likely the ones who got the most out of the shutdown and will have the advantage in the midterm elections .

Consider that Democrats are coming off huge wins across the country earlier this month in the off-year elections. The central issue in those elections was affordability. And through the shutdown, they elevated the issue of health care.

The party and its candidates will likely be able to campaign on both of those issues next year, and with Republicans in charge, that will help Democrats — if they can mend fences with their base, that is.

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump announced Friday that he was scrapping U.S. tariffs on beef, coffee, tropical fruits and a broad swath of other commodities — a dramatic move that comes amid mounting pressure on his administration to better combat high consumer prices.

Trump has built his second term around imposing steep levies on goods imported into the U.S. in hopes of encouraging domestic production and lifting the U.S. economy. His abrupt retreat from his signature tariff policy on so many staples key to the American diet is significant, and it comes after voters in off-year elections this month cited economic concerns as their top issue, resulting in big wins for Democrats in Virginia, New Jersey and other key races around the country.

"We just did a little bit of a rollback on some foods like coffee," Trump said aboard Air Force One as he flew to Florida hours after the tariff announcement was made.

Pressed on his tariffs helping to increase consumer prices, Trump acknowledged, "I say they may, in some cases," have that effect.

"But to a large extent, they've been borne by other countries," the president added.

Meanwhile, inflation — despite Trump's pronouncements that it has vanished since he took office in January — remains elevated, further increasing pressure on U.S. consumers.

The Trump administration has insisted that its tariffs had helped fill government coffers and weren't a major factor in higher prices at grocery stores around the country. But Democrats were quick to paint Friday's move as an acknowledgement that Trump's policies were hurting American pocketbooks.

"President Trump is finally admitting what we always knew: His tariffs are raising prices for the American people," Virginia Democratic Rep. Don Beyer said in a statement. "After getting drubbed in recent elections because of voters' fury that Trump has broken his promises to fix inflation, the White House is trying to cast this tariff retreat as a 'pivot to affordability.'"

Grocery bill worries

Trump slapped tariffs on most countries around the globe in April. He and his administration still say tariffs don't increase consumer prices, despite economic evidence to the contrary.

Record-high beef prices have been a particular concern, and Trump had said he intended to take action to try to lower them. Trump's tariffs on Brazil, a major beef exporter, had been a factor.

Trump signed an executive order that also removes tariffs on tea, fruit juice, cocoa, spices, bananas, oranges, tomatoes and certain fertilizers. Some of the products covered aren't produced in the United States, meaning that tariffs meant to spur domestic production had little effect. But reducing the tariffs still likely will mean lower prices for U.S. consumers.

The Food Industry Association, which represents retailers, producers and a variety of related industry firms and services, applauded Trump's move to provide "swift tariff relief," noting that import U.S. taxes "are an important factor" in a "complex mix" of supply chain issues.

"President Trump's proclamation to reduce tariffs on a substantial volume of food imports is a critical step ensuring continued adequate supply at prices consumers can afford," the association said in a statement.

In explaining the tariff reductions, the White House said Friday that some of the original levies Trump relished imposing on nearly every country on earth months ago were actually no longer necessary given the trade agreements he'd since hammered out with key U.S. trading partners.

Indeed, Friday's announcement follows the Trump administration having reached framework agreements with Ecuador, Guatemala, El Salvador and Argentina meant to increase the ability of U.S. firms to sell industrial and agricultural products in these countries, while also potentially easing tariffs on agricultural products produced there.

During an interview that aired earlier in the week with Laura Ingraham of Fox News Channel, Trump hinted that lower tariffs might be coming.

"Coffee, we're going to lower some tariffs," the president said then. "We're going to have some coffee come in."

Tariff checks?

Despite pulling back on so many tariffs, Trump used his comments aboard Air Force One on Friday night to repeat his past assertions that his administration would use revenue the federal government has collected from import levies to fund $2,000 checks for many Americans.

The president suggested such checks could be issued in 2026 but was vague on timing, saying only, "Sometime during the year." Trump, however, also said federal tariff revenue might be used to pay down national debt — raising questions about how much federal funding would be needed to do both.

Trump rejected suggestions that attempting direct payments to Americans could exacerbate inflation concerns — even as he suggested that similar checks offered during the coronavirus pandemic, and by previous administrations to stimulate the economy, had that very effect.

"This is money earned as opposed to money that was made up," Trump said. "Everybody but the rich will get this. That's not made up. That's real money. That comes from other countries."

The first of 30 Bob Ross paintings — many of them created live on the PBS series that made him a household name — have been auctioned off to support public television.

Ross, with his distinctive afro, soothing voice and sunny outlook, empowered millions of viewers to make and appreciate art through his show The Joy of Painting. More than 400 half-hour episodes aired on PBS (and eventually the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) from 1983 to 1994, the year before Ross died of cancer at age 52.

Ross' impact lives on: His show still airs on PBS and streams on platforms like Hulu and Twitch . It has surged in popularity in recent years, particularly as viewers searched for comfort during COVID-19 lockdowns. Certified instructors continue teaching his wet-on-wet oil painting technique to the masses , and the Smithsonian acquired several of his works for its permanent collection in 2019. But his artwork rarely goes up for sale — until recently.

In October, the nonprofit syndicator American Public Television (APT) announced it would auction off 30 of Ross' paintings to raise money for public broadcasters hit by federal funding cuts. It pledged to direct 100% of its net sales proceeds to APT and PBS stations nationwide.

Auction house Bonhams is calling it the "largest single offering of Bob Ross original works ever brought to market."

Ross has become synonymous with public broadcasting and some activists have even invoked him in their calls for restoring federal funding to it.

"It's a medium that Bob just cherished," said Joan Kowalski, president of Bob Ross, Inc., in a phone call with NPR. "With the cuts, it's just a natural inclination to support public television."

"Winters Peace," which Ross painted on-air in 1993, was among the first of his works to be auctioned to support public television, in California in November.

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The first three paintings sold in Los Angeles on Tuesday for a record-shattering $662,000. Bonhams says the works attracted hundreds of registrations, more than twice the usual number for that type of sale. Each sold for more than its estimated worth, led by "Winter's Peace," which fetched $318,000 to set a new Ross auction record.

"As anticipated, these paintings inspired spirited bidding, achieved impressive results and broke global auction records, continuing the momentum we've seen building in [Ross'] market," said Robin Starr, the general manager of Bonhams Skinner, the auction house's Massachusetts branch. "These successes provide a solid foundation as we look ahead to 2026 and prepare to present the next group of Bob Ross works."

"Winter's Peace," which Bob Ross painted on-air in 1993, is among his first three works going up for auction in November. He used especially vibrant colors with his TV audience in mind.

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The next trio of paintings will be auctioned in Massachusetts in late January. The rest will be sold throughout 2026 at Bonham's salerooms in Los Angeles, New York and Boston.

How the offering could benefit public broadcasters 

At President Donald Trump's direction, Congress voted in July to claw back $1.1 billion in previously allocated funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), leaving the country's roughly 330 PBS and 244 NPR stations in a precarious position.

CPB began shutting down at the end of September, PBS has already cut 15% of its jobs, and several local TV and radio stations have also announced layoffs and closures.

Demonstrators dressed as Bob Ross at a Chicago protest calling for the restoration of federal funding to PBS in late September.

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"I think he would be very disappointed" about the CPB cuts, Kowalski said of Ross. "I think he would have decided to do exactly what we're doing right now ... I think this would have probably been his idea."

Kowalski, whose parents founded Bob Ross Inc. together with the painter in 1985, said Ross favored positive activism over destructive or empty rhetoric.

"That just was his nature," she said. "He was like that in real life. So I think this would have been exactly the thing that he would have chosen. I suddenly got really emotional thinking about that."

Ross spent about 26 minutes painting "Home in the Valley" on live TV in October 1993. It's been in storage ever since and will go on sale in November.

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The Ross auction aims to help stations pay their licensing fees to the national TV channel Create , which in turn allows them to air popular public television programs including The Best of the Joy of Painting (based on Ross' show), America's Test Kitchen, Rick Steve's Europe and Julia Child's French Chef Classics.

Bonhams says the auction proceeds will help stations — particularly smaller and rural ones — defray the cost burden of licensing fees, making Create available to more of them.

"This enables stations to maintain their educational programming while redirecting funds toward other critical operations and local content production threatened by federal funding cuts," the auction house says.

Ross' paintings rarely hit the market

The 30 paintings going up for sale span Ross' career and are all "previously unseen by the public except during their creation in individual episodes" of The Joy of Painting, according to Bonhams. Many have remained in secure storage ever since.

They include vibrant landscapes, with the serene mountains, lake views and "happy trees" that became his trademark.

Ross started painting during his 20-year career in the Air Force, much of which was spent in Alaska. That experience shaped his penchant for landscapes and ability to work quickly — and, he later said , his desire not to raise his voice once out of the service.

Once on the airwaves, Ross' soft-spoken guidance and gentle demeanor won over millions of viewers. His advice applied to art as well as life: Mistakes are just "happy accidents," talent is a "pursued interest," and it's important to "take a step back and look."

"Ross' gentle teaching style and positive philosophy made him a cultural icon whose influence extends far beyond the art world," Bonhams says.

While Ross was prolific, his paintings were intended for teaching instead of selling, and therefore rarely go on the market.

In August, Bonhams sold two of Ross' early 1990s mountain and lake scenes as part of an online auction of American art. They fetched $114,800 and $95,750, surpassing expectations and setting a new auction world record for Ross at the time. Kowalski says that's when her gears started turning.

"And it just got me to thinking, that's a substantial amount of money," she recalled. "And what if, what if, what if?"

Bonhams officially estimates that the 30 paintings could go for a combined total between $850,000 and $1.4 million. But Starr, of the auction house, predicted in October that they will continue to exceed expectations, based on their artistic value, nostalgia factor and more.

"Now we add in the fact that these are selling to benefit public television, I think the bidding is going to be very happy," she said. "Happy trees, happy bidding."

Disclosure: This story was edited by general assignment editor Carol Ritchie and managing editor Vickie Walton-James. Under NPR's protocol for reporting on itself, no NPR corporate official or news executive reviewed this story before it was posted publicly.
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