Biden announces $150 million in research grants as part of his ‘moonshot’ push to fight cancer - The Boston Globe (2024)

Cancer surgery “takes the best surgeons and takes its toll on families,” Biden said. He said the demonstration of cutting-edge technology he witnessed would offer doctors a way to visualize tumors in real time, reducing the need for follow-on surgeries.

“We’re moving quickly because we know that all families touched by cancer are in a race against time,” Biden said.

The teams receiving awards include ones from Tulane, Dartmouth College, Johns Hopkins University, Rice University, the University of California San Francisco, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, the University of Washington, and Cision Vision in Mountain View, Calif.

Before he leaves office in January, Biden hopes to move the nation closer to the goal he set in 2022 to cut cancer fatalities by 50 percent over the next 25 years, and to improve the lives of caregivers and those suffering from cancer.

“I’m a congenital optimist about what Americans can do," Biden said. “There’s so much that we’re doing. It matters”

Experts say the objective is attainable — with adequate investments.

“We’re curing people of diseases that we previously thought were absolutely intractable and not survivable,” said Karen Knudsen, chief executive of the American Cancer Society and the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network.

Both the president and first lady have had lesions removed from their skin in the past that were determined to be basal cell carcinoma, a common and easily treated form of cancer. In 2015, their eldest son, Beau, died of an aggressive brain cancer at age 46.

“It’s not just personal," Biden said Tuesday. "It’s about what’s possible.”

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Walz courts Calif. union members in first solo appearance

LOS ANGELES — In his first solo appearance as the Democratic vice presidential nominee, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz warned cheering union members Tuesday that Donald Trump would wage war on working people and threaten Medicare and Social Security as he kicked off a five-state fund-raising swing.

Speaking in a cavernous, dimly lit ballroom to thousands of members of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees — many dressed in green union T-shirts, and waving Harris-Walz placards — Walz said he and Vice President Kamala Harris want to spread collective bargaining and other worker protections to “every state in the union.”

The 1.4-million-member union has endorsed Harris.

“When unions are strong, America is strong,” Walz, a former school teacher and union member, said.

He warned of a grim future for unions if Trump and Ohio Senator JD Vance are elected, describing a nation where bargaining rights, overtime pay, and other protections would be scuttled. He said Trump and Vance have “waged war on working people.”

“The only thing those two guys know about working people is how to work to take advantage of them,” Walz said.

However, Trump also has courted union support. When he accepted the Republican nomination, he said that he would rescue the auto industry from what he called “complete obliteration.”

The Democratic campaign chose to kick off Walz’s national swing on the safest of political terrain — heavily Democratic California, home to Vice President Kamala Harris and where registered Democrats outnumber Republicans about 2-1.

Walz was scheduled to head to a fund-raiser in Newport Beach. On Wednesday, he will address fund-raisers in Denver and Boston, and then wrap up his trip on Thursday in Newport, R.I., and Southampton, N.Y.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Va. authorities investigate break-in at Trump campaign office

ASHBURN, Va. — A burglary was reported over the weekend at a Virginia campaign office for former president Donald Trump, and authorities were investigating whether anything was stolen.

It happened Sunday at an office in Ashburn being leased by the Trump for President 2024 campaign that also serves as the headquarters of the Virginia 10th District Republican Committee, according to a news release from Northern Virginia’s Loudoun County Sheriff’s Office.

The sheriff’s office said it has surveillance video that shows someone wearing dark clothing with a dark cap and carrying a backpack.

The video shows a person breaking in and going through the office, sheriff’s office spokesperson Thomas A. Julia said in an email Tuesday. Officials expect to issue an update once more is known, Julia said.

“It is rare to have the office of any political campaign or party broken into,” Sheriff Mike Chapman said in a statement. “We are determined to identify the suspect, investigate why it happened, and determine what may have been taken, as well as what may have been left behind.”

The Trump campaign and 10th District Republican Committee did not immediately respond to emails seeking comment.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Ex-Colo. county official guilty of charges tied to 2020 election

A Colorado jury on Monday found a former county election official guilty of seven charges connected to allowing a purported computer expert to copy election data from her office as Donald Trump and his allies spread false claims that the 2020 election was stolen and searched for evidence to prove it.

Tina Peters, the former Mesa County clerk, was found guilty on seven of 10 charges, including several counts of attempting to influence a public servant and conspiracy to commit criminal impersonation. She will be sentenced on Oct. 3 and could face prison time.

Peters is one of the few officials to face consequences for using their positions in local elections offices to try to prove false claims that took root after Trump’s defeat.

The verdict comes three months ahead of the 2024 presidential election and as Trump is already seeking to sow doubt about the fairness of the electoral outcome. As election officials around the nation have confronted years of hostility and suspicion about their work from those outside their offices, they have also sought to prevent — and prepare for — threats from people working within.

Election experts have cited the breach in Mesa County as a consequence of falsehoods spread about voting systems. Peters has been embraced and championed by many of those who continue to falsely claim the 2020 presidential election was rigged.

Peters stood as 21st Judicial District Judge Matthew Barrett warned those gathered in his courtroom against verbal outbursts before he read the verdict. The decision came about four hours after closing arguments in the closely watched trial, which lasted more than a week. Peters did not show visible emotion as the verdict was read or as the judge ordered her to report to a probation office on Tuesday.

Prosecutors accused her of helping secretly copy Dominion Voting Systems hard drives by sneaking a former professional surfer and purported computer expert into secure areas of her office in 2021 using someone else’s security badge. Within months, data from her office appeared online and was featured at a symposium held by Mike Lindell, the MyPillow chief executive who continues to trumpet false claims about elections and seeks to end the use of machines that count ballots.

WASHINGTON POST