Morning Wire - Trump Trial Juror Excusal & New Iranian Sanctions | Afternoon Update | 4.18.24

Episode Date: April 18, 2024

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This episode is brought to you by Birch Gold Group. Diversify your savings with Birchgold. Their experts can turn your 401k into a 401k in gold. Just text Wire to 989898 today. I'm Daily Wire, editor-in-chief John Bickley. It's Thursday, April 18th, and this is your Morning Wire afternoon update. The third day of former President Donald Trump's hush money trial began with seven seated jurors, but two have since been removed.

Juror number two was excused after saying that upon sleeping on it, she wasn't sure if she could be fair and impartial in the case. Prosecutors also raised concerns that juror number four may not have told the truth about his previous criminal activity. The former president has pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records connected to his $130,000 payment made to Stormy Daniels. The U.S. and UK have applied a new round of sanctions on Iran. Daily Wire reporter Tim Pierce has the latest.

The Treasury's Office of Foreign Assessies. control has zeroed in on 16 individuals and two Iranian drone engine producers. It's believed that the entities being sanctioned contributed to the drones used in the April 13th attack. OFAC sanctions also targeted a handful of firms involved in steel production and three divisions of Iranian automaker bombin group, accused of materially supporting Iran's military. The UK has issued sanctions as well, targeting several Iranian military organizations, individuals and entities involved in Iran's drone and ballistic missile industries. Meanwhile, the U.S. Commerce Department is cutting off the flow of commercial-grade microelectronics.

Congress is also quickly pushing forward legislation that would financially punish the Islamic Republic and its leaders. Iran is still able to make tens of billions of dollars a year selling oil, mainly to China. House Speaker Mike Johnson is still up against a wall of pressure as he hopes for a weekend vote on bills that provide assistance to Israel, Ukraine, and Taiwan. This comes as Johnson faces a serious threat to his speakership from representatives Marjorie Taylor Green and Thomas Massey. However, when asked about the potential ouster, Johnson says his philosophy is to do the right thing and let the chips fall where they may. If I operated out of fear over a motion to vacate,

I would never be able to do my job. Look, history judges us for what we do. This is a critical time right now, a critical time on the world stage. I can make a selfish decision. and do something that's different. But I'm doing here what I believe to be the right thing. I think providing lethal aid to Ukraine right now is critically important. Ukraine funding is proving to be the biggest challenge, as the issue has the House GOP divided. Multiple Republicans say they oppose funding Ukraine,

meaning Johnson will likely have to lean on Democrats to pass the bill. Johnson hopes to hold final votes on Saturday. This episode is brought you by Beam. Try Beam's best-selling dream powder for up to 40% off for limited time when you go to shopbeam.com slash wire and use code wire at checkout. That's shopbeam.com slash wire. Over two dozen Google employees were fired over their protests of the company's contract that provides Israel with cloud and AI services.

Google, Google, you can't hide. No, Google, Google, you can't hide. You are funding genocide. You are funding genocide. The 28 firings follow sit-ins at company offices. in Seattle, New York, and Sunnyvale, California, and the arrest of nine employees for their refusal to lead cloud CEO Thomas Curian's office. Here's some audio from the arrest. All right, you guys got to leave. You guys refusing to leave?

Yes, yeah. Okay. He first had up. Protesters sat in Currian's office for more than nine hours, wearing shirts and raising banners that read, quote, no more genocide for profit. While the protests were made up of some number of Google employees, a spokesperson for the company said the protests were part of a campaign organized by people who do not work for the company. The group that led these demonstrations, known as No Tech for apartheid, have been demanding that Google and Amazon drop their project Nimbus, which provides Israel with various cloud and AI technology. Lawyers for the man accused of killing four University of Idaho students in

2022 say new evidence proves his innocence. Daily Wire senior editor Ash Short has more. The suspect, who we will not name due to company policy, was indicted on murder charges last May, but claims that his alibi has been confirmed by the location data on his phone. Now, all four victims were stabbed to death in the early hours of November 13, 2022, at their off-campus residence in Moscow, Idaho. According to prosecutors, DNA from a knife cover led police to the suspect. The cell phone data suggests that he was out driving nowhere near the scene of the crime. The suspect's legal team plans to use expert witness testimony from an experienced military

and law enforcement instructor to prove their client was miles away from Moscow at the time of the crime. An affidavit last year argued that a white Hyundai launcher was caught on camera near the scene. An investigator said the vehicle was driven by the suspect, but yesterday's filing could prove different. An illegal immigrant has been charged for his involvement in a car crash that killed an advisor to Democratic Nevada Senator Catherine Cortez Mastow earlier this month. The 18-year-old suspect is charged after failing to stop at the scene of the accident

after a crash in Reno that killed Kurt Englehart, a senior state advisor to Mastow. According to the Department of Homeland Security, the suspect illegally entered the U.S. in March 2021. And a major 911 outage across four states left millions with no way to contact authorities last night. Most of the outages were reported in Nebraska, Nevada, South Dakota, and Texas, and were restored by late evening. Officials say that so far there's no evidence of a cyber attack or anything malicious, but while the FCC continues to investigate, a spokesperson for Lumen Technologies says one of their fiber cables was cut by a third-party company, which may have caused the outage. All right, those are your drive-home updates this afternoon. To learn more about these stories, go to DailyWire.com, and for more in-depth discussion of the big.

biggest stories of the day. Listen to our latest full episode of Morning Wire every morning.