A dangerous prank that was once the scourge of video game livestreamers has found a new target: US government figures.

On Sunday, swatters targeted Tanya Chutkan, the federal judge presiding over the case concerning Donald Trump’s alleged attempts to overturn the 2020 election, claiming there was a shooting at her house (there wasn’t). And she’s just the latest in a recent wave of swatting—a form of harassment that involves calling the police under false pretenses to send a SWAT team to someone’s home.

• Federal lawmakers including Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, New York Rep. Brandon Williams, and Florida Sen. Rick Scott have been swatted recently.
• Jack Smith, the special counsel who’s prosecuting former President Trump in two cases, was swatted on Christmas Day.
• A 911 caller pretended to have broken into the home of Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows the day after she disqualified Trump from being on the state’s primary ballot.

Threat to democracy

The fake calls often claim a bomb threat, murder, or burglary, creating a dangerous situation as law enforcement arrives prepared to deal with potentially armed criminals. In some cases (though not in the recent political spate), people have died. And as election season begins with the Iowa caucuses later in January, experts fear that the increase in swatting could affect how politicians conduct themselves, as violent threats have in the past.

It’s not the only kind of threat seeing an uptick: More than a dozen state capitols were closed or evacuated last week after election officials received fake bomb threats via email. Attorney General Merrick Garland said the threats of violence “threaten the fabric of our democracy.”

What’s being done about it: Multiple politicians have called for legislation that would make it easier to identify those responsible for swatting and levy stronger penalties. For now, no arrests have been made in connection with these crimes as the callers almost always use fake caller ID or phone spoofing software to remain untraceable.—CC

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Judges seem skeptical of total immunity for Trump. Former President Donald Trump was in a federal appeals court in Washington, DC, yesterday while his lawyers argued that he is shielded from any charges that he tried to overturn the results of the 2020 election. However, the three judges hearing the case didn’t appear sympathetic to the argument. One judge asked whether a president could be prosecuted if he ordered SEAL Team 6 to assassinate a political rival, and Trump’s attorney replied: only if he had been impeached and convicted first. The Supreme Court will likely ultimately decide the scope of presidential immunity, but Special Counsel Jack Smith is hoping for a fast resolution so he can try his case against Trump before the election.

The SEC’s X account got hacked. Everyone is waiting for the SEC’s decision, expected today, about whether it will allow spot bitcoin ETFs that would make buying the cryptocurrency easier and more accessible. But it seems someone wasn’t willing to wait it out: After the SEC’s account posted to X yesterday that the ETFs had been approved, Chair Gary Gensler said on his own account that there had been no approval and the agency’s account was “compromised.” The false post briefly caused a spike in bitcoin prices.

US defense secretary was hospitalized for prostate cancer surgery complications. Resolving a mystery that has troubled Congress and members of the public since news of his hospitalization broke last week, Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III’s doctors said he had been treated for a urinary tract infection that followed a prostate procedure. Lawmakers pushed for answers from the Pentagon because Austin’s Jan. 1 trip to the hospital was not immediately revealed to them or the public—even President Biden and national security officials were not told about it until three days after he was brought there. The doctors said they caught the cancer early, and Austin’s prognosis is excellent.

Everyone hoped for a Roaring Twenties-style global economic fox trot, but instead, it looks like the world economy is swaying to melancholic blues. The World Bank said yesterday that the early 2020s are shaping up to be the worst half-decade for global economic growth in over 30 years.

Despite the US going strong and major economies quelling inflation without sending the world into a recession, World Bank Chief Economist Indermit S. Gill claims the big-picture outlook remains “dismal.”

• He projects that global GDP will expand at a sluggish 2.4% this year, below last year’s 2.6% and the 2010s’ annual average of 3.1%.
• Meanwhile, per capita investment growth in 2024 is expected to slow to 3.7%, less than half the annual average in the previous two decades.

Poorer countries take a hit

Sky-high borrowing costs and slowing global trade growth will constrain economic progress in low-income countries. The World Bank expects that anemic growth means that the UN’s goals of eradicating extreme poverty and slashing greenhouse gas emissions by almost half ahead of 2030 will likely go the way of most New Year’s resolutions. It also predicts that by the end of 2024, 1-in-4 people in low-income countries will still be poorer than they were pre-pandemic.

The 2020s will be “a decade of wasted opportunity”…unless low-income countries boost investment and promote international trade, according to Gill. The US economy doing better than expected can be another boon, World Bank Deputy Chief Economist Ayhan Kose told Axios.—SK

After nearly 40 years of South Korean politicians pledging to end the dog meat industry, the country’s Parliament voted almost unanimously yesterday to make it illegal to breed, sell, and kill dogs for human consumption. The bill’s passage reflects the rapidly changing public sentiment toward the traditional dish in the country.

Eating dog meat dates back centuries in South Korea, but younger generations are quickly moving away from it.

• Only 8% of South Koreans in a 2022 survey said they had eaten dog meat in the previous year compared to 27% in 2015, according to Gallup Korea.
• Animal rights advocates credit the change in attitude to the growing number of pet dogs in South Korea. That number ballooned to 3+ million canines in 2022 from 1.3 million in 2018, according to the country’s Agriculture Ministry.

To help ease the transition, there’s a three-year grace period before the law takes effect, and local governments have made financial promises to businesses that rely on dog meat.

But there’s still been a lot of resistance. Despite those concessions, dog meat farms and restaurants that serve it tempestuously protested the bill. In November, farmers threatened to release 2 million dogs in Seoul.—MM

Stat: France may like its wine aged, but it prefers its politicians young. At age 34, Gabriel Attal was named the country’s youngest-ever prime minister yesterday. Attal also made history as the first openly gay politician in the job. President Emmanuel Macron, who himself was elected as France’s youngest president, appointed the popular figure as his No. 2 in hopes of injecting new energy into his government, which has pushed through controversial rules about the retirement age and immigration. But Attal isn’t totally without controversy: His first move in his prior role as education minister was to ban abayas in schools.

Quote: “2023 was an exceptional year, with climate records tumbling like dominoes.”

It’s official: Copernicus, the European climate change service, confirmed what everyone who had to bust out their extra-strength deodorant this summer already knew—2023 was the hottest year on record. Pointing out what a remarkable year it was, Copernicus Deputy Director Samantha Burgess said its temperatures were likely the warmest in 100,000 years. The heat was driven by both climate change and the naturally occurring El Niño phenomenon.

Read: When species names are offensive, should they be changed? (Yale Environment360)

Watch: How to cook perfect eggs every time.

Four for you: What the real Glen Coco thinks about Mean Girls.

Transferable skills: Everything you can learn about job interviews from dating apps.

Learn from a master: Before she was the best thing about the Golden Globes, Lily Gladstone taught filmmaking basics on YouTube.

Build your audience: Morning Brew has teamed up with YouTube expert Jamie Rawsthorne for a FREE workshop today on how to know what content will grow your YouTube channel.

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