Top of the Fold

• Twitter rolls out new “civic integrity policy” just in time for the midterms: Time to hit that conservative censorship button … again. That was essentially the message behind Twitter’s announcement on Thursday that it would reinstitute its speech-squelching thought police program, otherwise known as the “civic integrity policy.” Initiated in 2018, Twitter justified its speech censorship as a means to “elevate credible information” and “help keep you safe on Twitter.” Twitter further explained, “The mission of our civic integrity work is to protect the conversation on Twitter during elections or other civic processes.” In other words, like Twitter did in 2020 in suspending accounts that attempted to highlight the genuine news of Biden family corruption revealed by Hunter Biden’s infamous laptop, the social media platform is once again jumping to action to help Democrats and hurt Republicans just as the midterm campaigns ramp up. Of course, Twitter asserts that it is acting fairly and seeks to avoid bias in its speech-censorship enforcement by using “external data and internal country-based metrics” to “assess the potential for online or offline harm” and “the potential for false or misleading information about civic processes and human rights concerns.” So, feel free to say only that which Twitter wants you to say.

• AOC gets an earful from constituents: New York City residents are none too happy with radical leftist Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s defund-the-police policy stance. As crime has risen in AOC’s district by 57% compared to a year ago, residents are calling for more law enforcement, not less. “I don’t think it’s a good idea to defund the police,” one resident stated. “I think we need more police in the area.” Another constituent observed, “The more and more time goes on, and you see these crimes go up in the city, especially around this area, it’s gotten a lot worse.” AOC has been one of the biggest proponents of defunding the police, arguing back in June 2020 that then-Mayor Bill de Blasio’s concession to the Black Lives Matter activists with his plan to cut the police department’s budget by a whopping $1 billion was nothing but “a disingenuous illusion.” “This is not a victory,” she asserted. “The fight to defund policing continues.” Well, New York City residents are currently experiencing more crime, not less. And politicians such as AOC suggesting otherwise are only serving to hurt law-abiding citizens. As another NYC resident contended, “My father always said, if you’re afraid of the police, you’re doing something wrong.”

• Philly’s violent crime kills a man who moved away to avoid it: A 26-year-old man was shot to death in Philadelphia over the weekend after he returned to the city he had moved away from to avoid the violent crime. Diniar Camp had moved to Las Vegas to flee the violent crime plaguing the City of Brotherly Love, but he returned briefly in order to attend the funeral of a friend who had been shot to death a couple of weeks ago. His mother responded to the tragedy by calling for an end to the violence roiling the city. “They targeted him and it’s not fair because he would have loved you. He would have gave his heart to you,” she lamented. “My son was not a street person. He was loved by very many people… He went away to pursue his music career. He only came here to bury his friend and now he’s leaving on a toe tog. I wish he never would have ever even came here.” Camp was married and leaves behind a 22-year-old widow. Police have identified an individual who is a repeat offender as being connected to the murder.

Headlines

• CDC majorly eases COVID restrictions ahead of school year (Daily Wire)

• Report: FBI agents in Trump Mar-a-Lago raid sought nuclear weapons documents (Washington Examiner)

• Trump calls for “immediate” release of Mar-a-Lago warrant (AP)

• Merrick Garland, Christopher Wray clam up on Trump search after blabbing about J6 probe (Just the News)

• IRS deletes job posting seeking applicants willing to “use deadly force” (National Review)

• Read my lips: Biden administration panned for “no new audits” pledge (Washington Examiner)

• Suspect killed in standoff after alleged attempt to breach FBI office in Cincinnati (CBS News)

• Move over, Hunter Biden: Pelosi takes her investment banker son along on taxpayer-funded Taiwan trip (PJ Media)

• House incumbents on track to see most primary losses in decades (Washington Examiner)

• Remember how the UK just shut down its official pediatric “trans” clinic? Now 1,000 families are suing it over the harm it did to their kids (Not the Bee)

• Pediatricians privately slam American Academy of Pediatrics for pushing puberty blockers to teens (Daily Wire)

• “The Sacrifice Zone”: Myanmar bears cost of green energy (AP)

• Policy: Why so-called Inflation Reduction Act doesn’t reduce inflation (Daily Signal)

• Humor: Biden vetoes Inflation Reduction Act after reporting inflation to already be 0% (Babylon Bee)

For more of today’s editors’ choice headlines, visit Headline Report.