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Seahawks Start Super Bowl Title Defense With Rally Over Patriots After Early Darnold Injury

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Seattle Medium
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Josh Jobe celebrates with Seattle Seahawk teammates after intercepting a pass in the end zone to win the game on Wednesday. (Jane Gershovich/Getty Images via CNN Newsource)
Josh Jobe celebrates with Seattle Seahawk teammates after intercepting a pass in the end zone to win the game on Wednesday. (Jane Gershovich/Getty Images via CNN Newsource)

By Jacob Lev, CNN

(CNN) — On a night where the Seahawks were honored for their Super Bowl LX victory, the celebrations felt short lived as starting quarterback Sam Darnold left the game with an injury in the team’s 13-10 win over the New England Patriots at Lumen Field on Wednesday night in Seattle.

As fans settled in under sunny skies in The Emerald City and Pearl Jam guitarist Mike McCready blared the national anthem with his guitar, the stage was set for a celebratory kickoff, a marquee rematch against the team Seattle defeated for its second Lombardi Trophy.

With the “12’s” bringing deafening noise at kickoff, Seattle opened on offense. However, the initial drive ended with concern when Darnold was sacked by Patriots defensive tackle Dre’Mont Jones.

The 29-year-old Darnold walked off the field with a noticeable limp.

After initially waving off any medical attention, the ninth-year signal caller went into the injury tent and then eventually walked towards the tunnel to the locker room accompanied by team staff.

Darnold was later ruled out for the remainder of the game with a hip injury and was reportedly getting X-rays, according to the NBC broadcast.

With Darnold sidelined, it was up to backup Drew Lock to keep the reigning champs in the game but the 29-year-old was not able to produce any momentum for Seattle as the Patriots struck first. Patriots quarterback Drake Maye connected with tight end Eli Raridon for a two-yard touchdown pass to give New England a 7-0 lead at halftime.

The Patriots quickly added a field goal to extend the lead as the second half got underway.

But the injury concerns extended to the other sideline as newly acquired Patriots wide receiver AJ Brown left the game with an ankle injury early in the third quarter and was later ruled out for the rest of the contest.

Needing a score, the Seahawks finally found some life later in the third quarter with Lock leading the offense down the field after wide receiver Cooper Kupp reeled in a 24-yard catch.

Just as it seemed the Seattle fans had something to celebrate as Lock went right back to Kupp for a seven-yard score, the play was then nullified due to a penalty for illegal motion.

The Seahawks would eventually settle for a field goal to cut the lead to a single possession 10-3.

Seattle’s defense came into Wednesday’s game down two starting safeties in Nick Emmanwori and Ty Okada but the unit was the catalyst for getting the team’s first touchdown.

Early in the fourth quarter, cornerback Nehemiah Pritchett intercepted Maye on a deep throw to wide receiver Romeo Doubs.

On the Seahawks’ ensuing offensive drive, Lock finally unlocked his connection with star wide receiver Jaxon Smith-Njigba on fourth-and-one for a 45-yard touchdown, tying the game at 10-10 with just over 11 minutes to go.

Seattle had all the momentum and forced Maye to throw a second consecutive interception, this time safety Julian Love corralling it in to give the Seahawks the ball back.

Lock and the offense were again driving down the field while taking time off the clock but two penalties in the red zone stalled the drive, leading to a Jason Myers 26-yard field goal to give the Seahawks a 13-10 lead with just under six minutes to go.

Maye and the Patriots were running out of chances to stop the bleeding and secure a season-opening win.

New England drive seemed to have stalled a multitude of time before converting on fourth down twice to keep moving down the field.

But to add to Maye’s disaster of a second half, the 24-year-old threw his third interception of the game in the end zone with cornerback Josh Jobe securing the victory for Seattle.

Lock played hero in relief of Darnold, finishing with 187 yards through the air and a touchdown while Maye had 178 yards, one touchdown and three interceptions.

Lock said the one thought he had was “take care of the football” after coming in for Darnold.

“I know what kind of defense we have,” Lock told the NBC broadcast after the game. “I know the playmakers we have on this side of the ball – on the offensive side of the ball. But take care of the football, get it in their hands, don’t turn it over, win the turnover battle by the end of the game.

“I’d like to think we’d have a pretty good shot of winning and sure enough, 13-10.”

Seahawks head coach Mike Macdonald said the team got “great news back” on Darnold’s injury.

“I’d say its good news right now, so our thoughts and prayers are with Sam,” Macdonald told reporters. “We love him and the guys really pulled through for him.”

Macdonald added that they were able to rule out a fracture for Darnold but he will get more tests done.

Both teams will get extended time off before returning to action on September 20. Seattle will hit the road to face the Arizona Cardinals, while New England will head home to host the Pittsburgh Steelers.

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‘Gambling With Our Lives’: Another A.I. Employee Quits Over Safety Concerns

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Seattle Medium
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A number of AI employees have loudly quit their companies over safety concerns. (Jonathan Raa/NurPhoto/Getty Images via CNN Newsource)
A number of AI employees have loudly quit their companies over safety concerns. (Jonathan Raa/NurPhoto/Getty Images via CNN Newsource)

By Hadas Gold, Martin Goillandeau, David Goldman, CNN

(CNN) — “The people building AI earnestly believe that it could kill us all by the end of the decade.”

That blunt admission from former Anthropic employee Jacob Coxon made waves Tuesday, as the just-quit 27-year-old AI researcher spilled the beans on his way out the door in a resignation thread on X.

As alarming and serious as Coxon’s revelations sound (“These will soon be superhuman systems that can hack anything, revolutionize any field overnight, and acquire real power and resources”), they’re also not new. Anthropic got its start in exactly this way, as OpenAI employees concerned about the company’s safety protocols left Sam Altman’s startup to launch their own AI company, arguing their approach was more responsible.

The concerns are becoming commonplace. A number of AI employees have loudly quit their companies over safety concerns over the past several months and years. Others have publicly voiced worries that the technology is moving too quickly and will one day outpace humans’ ability to control it.

In July, nearly 1,400 AI company employees signed an open letter urging the US government to regulate the technology to rein in Big Tech and slow the pace of AI to ensure its safety. And two days ago, OpenAI Chief Scientist Jakub Pachocki warned that AI capabilities are advancing faster than researchers’ ability to reliably monitor and control them.

Now, a relatively junior researcher has become the latest to sound the alarm.

“They are racing straight to self-improving superintelligence and gambling with our lives,” Coxon posted.

Coxon’s post gained attention after a more senior Anthropic employee, Evan Hubinger, commented that Coxon was correct.

“We really do earnestly believe AI could kill all humans!” Hubinger posted on X. He said he personally believes the chance is under 10% over the next decade, and despite Anthropic’s good intentions it doesn’t have a plan to avoid so-called superintelligence that could exceed humans’ ability to control AI. Superintelligence, a state at which AI surpasses human capabilities, is a widely debated theoretical milestone with no benchmark that some AI researchers believe has already been achieved and others believe will never come.

Hubinger shortly after clarified his statement in a follow-up post that Anthropic’s own Risk Report acknowledges the concern but says present AI poses little chance of gaining such power.

“We have always been transparent that AI will bring both enormous benefits and unprecedented risks,” an Anthropic spokesperson said in a statement. “To address these risks, we continue to build models with some of the strongest safeguards in the industry.”

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei has also repeatedly warned that the race to move fast on the technology could unintentionally result in a catastrophic human-caused error that causes a company to lose control of its AI.

“This is a complex engineering problem and I think something will go wrong with someone’s AI system. Hopefully not ours,” Amodei told the New York Times in February.

Regulation stagnation

Despite the constant stream of warnings, regulation seems far off. The Trump administration has actively worked to undermine state AI regulations and Congress has so far been unwilling to rein in the technology. A common refrain: Any effort to regulate AI represents a capitulation to China, which is under no such constraints.

Except China has introduced AI regulation, particularly aimed at risk management and safety. Last year, the government required AI companies to label AI-generated content to make it transparent and traceable. However, China has resisted the kind of stringent regulation that would prevent the kind of problems Silicon Valley researchers have raised.

In the meantime, in the US at least, AI companies are more or less responsible for policing themselves.

The White House has moved toward a voluntary framework to review certain AI models before launch, sources familiar with a meeting last month between the Trump administration and several top AI companies told CNN.

Among the representatives were those from OpenAI, Anthropic, Google and Meta, according to multiple sources familiar with the situation. The details of the framework will not be released publicly and many of the standards set within it will be classified, according to a June executive order on the framework.

In July, Altman suggested it may be time to slow AI development, saying in the Invest Like The Best podcast that the recent testing incidents involving advanced models were raising “long-term questions” about how AI companies should manage rapid advances in capabilities.

“We may have to pace the rate of AI development to give ourselves enough time for society to harden around these new capability levels,” Altman said.

Anthropic, in a statement on Wednesday, concurred with Altman.

“We believe the world would benefit from the industry adopting a lawful, verifiable way to work together to pace how we release powerful models.”

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Trump Makes An Extraordinary Offer Of $5,000 Payments, And Other Takeaways From RNC Convention’s First Night

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Seattle Medium
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President Donald Trump takes the stage at the first-ever Republican midterm convention at the American Airlines Center in Dallas on Wednesday, September 9. (Tristen Rouse/CNN via CNN Newsource)
President Donald Trump takes the stage at the first-ever Republican midterm convention at the American Airlines Center in Dallas on Wednesday, September 9. (Tristen Rouse/CNN via CNN Newsource)

By Eric Bradner, CNN

(CNN) — President Donald Trump vowed to pay every American adult $5,000 if Republicans retain their House and Senate majorities in November’s midterm elections – an extraordinary offer as he tries to keep his party in power.

But he offered no details on how he would pay for such a move, which he equated to companies paying shareholders dividends and the extra $1,776 checks his administration issued to members of the military last year.

“Here is my promise: If the Republicans win the House of Representatives and the United States Senate, both of them,” Trump said, “I will issue a dividend to every adult citizen in the United States of America for $5,000.”

Trump’s pledge came in a speech to Republicans who gathered in Dallas on Wednesday for the first night of an unusual midterm convention.

The president is seeking to overcome lagging approval ratings, economic headwinds and historic trends against the party in power in his bid to retain the GOP’s majorities – and stave off a slew of likely Democratic investigations and fierce opposition to his agenda – for his final two years in office.

In a speech at the conclusion of the first of the convention’s two nights, the president mocked Democrats, calling them “dumocrats.” He touted his border security efforts and bragged about the political potency of his opposition to transgender women participating in women’s sports. And as his political operation begins spending tens of millions of dollars, Trump vowed to campaign hard for the GOP through November 3.

“I’m asking you to pretend that I’m on the ballot,” he said. “I’m on the ballot. Just one more time.”

Here are takeaways from the first night of the convention dubbed by the president’s supporters as “Trump-a-palooza”:

Campaigning for, and mocking, Paxton

Trump told Republicans he would hit the campaign trail aggressively this fall, holding events with about 35 House and Senate candidates in competitive races as the GOP fights to keep its congressional majorities and Trump looks to buck the historic trend of poor performance by the sitting president’s party in midterm elections.

“We’re going to have rallies just like this. We’re going to have big arenas, loaded up with people,” Trump said.

He urged Texans to rally around Ken Paxton, the Republican attorney general who ousted the more moderate Sen. John Cornyn in the primary. Trump’s endorsement played an important role in tipping the race in Paxton’s favor — but also set up a tough general election against the much better-funded Democratic state Rep. James Talarico.

In a now-familiar riff, Trump mocked Paxton, even as he acknowledged that doing so was “so insulting.”

He said Texans “may not like the way he dresses. I don’t.” (He did compliment the suit Paxton wore Tuesday night.)

Trump also said voters “may not like the way he talks. I could see that, yeah.”

But, Trump said, Paxton is “maybe the top attorney general in the whole United States.”

“We have to elect Ken Paxton. We have to,” Trump said. “And if I have to, I’ll come back twice or three times.”

Fetterman makes a surprise virtual appearance

Several Republican senators in competitive races — including Maine Sen. Susan Collins and Alaska Sen. Dan Sullivan — skipped the convention, seeking to showcase their independence from their party and president.

But a swing-state Democratic senator did make a virtual appearance.

Sen. John Fetterman recorded a video introducing his Pennsylvania colleague, Republican Sen. Dave McCormick. In the video, recorded outside a US Steel plant, Fetterman said he is a Democrat but rejects “the extremes of socialism” and “the anti-American way of life.”

Fetterman introduced McCormick as a “great American, great senator, and yes, he is in a different party, but I’m proud to count him as my great friend.”

The introduction highlighted one of the Senate’s odd couples — a friendship forged between two senators whose swing state seats are sure to be targets of the other party when they are next on the ballot: Fetterman’s seat in 2028; McCormick’s in 2030.

The Democrat’s introduction of the Republican received one of the biggest rounds of applause of the night. And Fetterman received a loud cheer again when McCormick asked the crowd: “How great is John Fetterman, right?”

Fetterman, in particular, has been the subject of speculation about a potential party switch in recent months. He’s been one of the most vocal critics of the progressive insurgency that has swept the party’s primaries this year.

He’s repeatedly rejected talk of a party switch – and addressed it again in a statement after the video aired.

“I’m a lifelong Democrat who votes overwhelmingly with my party – and should the Senate flip in November, I will still be the 51st vote that I ran on,” the statement said.

Iran and gas prices

The war Trump launched with Iran has sent gas prices soaring. The price of oil hit $100 per barrel earlier in the day, for the first time since July.

Democrats have hammered GOP candidates on high costs. At the convention, Republicans did attempt to home in on a message of affordability, praising Trump’s 2025 tax law that included eliminating taxes on tips and overtime for eligible workers.

Wisconsin Rep. Derrick Van Orden, whose 3rd District seat is a Democratic target this fall, praised Trump’s tax cuts and the One Big Beautiful Bill Act’s rural health care funding.

“He is fighting to make quality health care a reality for everyday Americans,” he said.

Michael Whatley, the Republican Senate nominee in North Carolina who faces Democratic former Gov. Roy Cooper in another key race, praised Trump for putting “thousands of dollars back into the hands of families and seniors.”

The most direct acknowledgement of the war in Iran and its impact on gas prices came from Trump himself, when he said prices would drop as soon as the United States wins the war. He then said the Strait of Hormuz should be renamed the “Trump Strait.”

Progressive insurgents become a top target

Abdul El-Sayed, the Democratic Senate nominee in Michigan, might have been the most frequently mentioned member of his party.

El-Sayed’s race against Republican former Rep. Mike Rogers is one of the most important Senate contests in November’s midterms — and perhaps the GOP’s best chance of flipping a Democratic-held seat. Democrats need a net gain of four seats to win a Senate majority.

“He hates part of his own state. He’s not sure Israel should exist,” South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, said of El-Sayed in a fiery speech. El-Sayed is a critic of Israel’s war in Gaza following Hamas’ October 7, 2023, attacks and declined to answer whether he believes the state of Israel has a right to exist, describing the question as a distraction.

Republicans broadly sought to portray democratic socialists who have won a handful of House primaries and progressives like El-Sayed as anathema to American values — describing them as extremists, communists and terrorist sympathizers.

And they sought to tie the entire Democratic Party to progressive figures like El-Sayed, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar. All three are Muslim.

“This election is very clear: it’s the mainstream vs. the extreme. Because there’s another political movement in our country right now that doesn’t believe that America is or ever was great,” said Texas Rep. Brandon Gill, who has previously said Muslims should be banned from immigrating to the US. “They sometimes call themselves socialists, some even call themselves communists. But most of them simply go by Democrats.”

Speakers focus on cultural issues

Republicans made clear that they see cultural issues — particularly Democrats’ positions around transgender Americans’ rights — as their strongest line of attack.

Republicans played a video mashup focusing on Trump’s push to bar “men from playing in women’s sports” that included podcaster Joe Rogan calling the move “common sense.”

They also highlighted Democrats’ past rhetoric about transgender people.

“James Talarico claims there are six genders. He believes God is non-binary. He thinks God needs special woke pronouns,” Scott, the NRSC chairman, said of the Democratic Senate nominee in Texas. Talarico on Wednesday told Fox News that he “missed the mark on some of (his) past statements,” including his comment on the number of genders.

Paxton, his rival, claimed Talarico “wants to transition your kids.”

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent lambasted Democrats who he said are “relentless in their pursuit to remake America in the image of every socialist hellscape of the last century.”

Immigration enforcement on the agenda

Most Republicans didn’t directly advocate for Trump’s efforts to ramp up deportations. But they portrayed Democrats as to blame for lax immigration enforcement under former President Joe Biden and for the crimes committed by undocumented immigrants.

Georgia Rep. Mike Collins, who is running against Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff, said Ossoff wouldn’t help him pass a bill named after Laken Riley, the Georgia nursing student who was murdered by an undocumented immigrant in 2024 — even though Ossoff voted for the measure, which was signed into law by Trump in 2025.

“He wouldn’t lift a finger to help me. He forgot her name until it was politically convenient,” Collins said.

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White House Removes Controversial Video Game After Warning From Gaming Company

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Seattle Medium
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A screenshot of the White House website showing arcade-style games that allow users to arrest immigrants and build a border wall. (arcade.gov via CNN Newsource)
A screenshot of the White House website showing arcade-style games that allow users to arrest immigrants and build a border wall. (arcade.gov via CNN Newsource)

By Kit Maher, CNN

(CNN) — The White House has removed from its website an arcade-style “Build the Wall” game closely styled like Tetris, which comes after the gaming company warned of copyright infringement.

The White House last week launched a series of games on its website to tout the administration’s priorities. But two games focused on immigration — “Build the Wall” and “Rio Run” — quickly sparked backlash, including from the Tetris brand, which said that it believes “in the power of connection, and bringing people together, not dividing them.”

The “Build the Wall” game — which first appeared on the site last Thursday — asked users to stack bricks and “hold the line” against a “zombie border siege.” Soon after its debut, Tetris posted on Instagram that it was not involved in the game’s creation and added, “We take copyright infringement very seriously.”

The game was gone from the White House website as of Wednesday. But some clips of the game are still featured in videos that the White House posted on social media. The White House did not immediately respond to CNN’s request for comment.

“Tetris has no comment,” a representative of Miller PR, which represents Tetris, told CNN on Wednesday.

Another immigration-themed game, “Rio Run,” still appears on the White House website. The game, which is similar to Snake, has users “patrol the line” along the Rio Grande and “pick up every crosser in the lot” to earn a high score of deportations.

The White House is also still featuring three other arcade-style games — one that prompts users to fill their “kids’ Trump accounts”; one that prompts users to fly a bald eagle down the National Mall; and another where users can sort a school lunch to “Make America Healthy Again.”

The launch of the arcade games was the White House’s latest aggressive online effort to troll Democrats, which has at times surfaced racist and offensive images. Trump and the White House have drawn sharp criticism, for example, for their use of social media and official government platforms — including by using racist and offensive images, like House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries in a sombrero and the Obamas depicted as apes in a jungle.

A White House official last week cast the arcade games as “an effort to further contrast between a culture of fun and winning and the dark socialist vision Democrats have for America.”

And on social media, the White House hasn’t shown signs of backing off of using video game imagery to promote its agenda.

On Tuesday, for example, the White House released a video on X modeled after Nintendo’s “Legend of Zelda,” called “Legends of Trump.”

And it’s not just video games the administration is using in its messaging on social media. On Wednesday, the Department of Homeland Security posted on X an AI-generated image of Immigration and Customs Enforcement styled like a “Transformers” movie poster that reads: “Transformers Age of Deportations.”

This story has been updated with additional information.

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Drinking Very Hot Beverages Could Triple Cancer Risk, Large Study Finds

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Seattle Medium
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Drinking very hot beverages could triple cancer risk, a large study finds. (Galina Zhigalova/Moment RF/Getty Images via CNN Newsource)
Drinking very hot beverages could triple cancer risk, a large study finds. (Galina Zhigalova/Moment RF/Getty Images via CNN Newsource)

By Amarachi Orie, CNN

London (CNN) — A study of nearly a million people has found new evidence to suggest that drinking scalding hot coffees and teas could significantly increase a person’s risk of getting cancer in their esophagus.

Drinking these beverages very hot, rather than warm, is associated with a three-fold risk of esophageal cancer, according to the study, conducted in the UK and published Tuesday in the International Journal of Cancer.

The finding applies specifically to esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (SCC), the most common form of esophageal cancer worldwide.

The esophagus, also known as the food pipe, is a muscular tube that passes food and drink from your mouth to your stomach.

Globally, there were about 604,000 new cases of esophageal cancer and about 544,000 deaths from esophageal cancer in 2020, according to the World Health Organization’s cancer agency, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC). The agency estimates that global cases will rise by more than 50%, to almost a million new cases a year by 2040.

In the UK, there are around 9,500 new cases each year, according to Cancer Research UK. However, an estimated 14% of new esophageal SCC cases in the country could be avoided if individuals drank their teas and coffees at lower temperatures, the researchers from the UK’s University of Oxford said in the study, which is the largest of its kind.

The researchers analyzed data from nearly 980,000 middle-aged adults in the UK who were asked questions about their hot drink consumption habits, including whether they preferred their drinks “very hot,” “hot,” or “warm” or if they “do not drink hot drinks,” or “prefer not to answer.”

They were also asked how many hot drinks they consumed each day, with the option to choose “fewer than 6 hot drinks per day” or “6 or more hot drinks per day.”

All the participants were from two large cohorts, the Million Women Study and UK Biobank, which both routinely log participants’ health information. Across the cohorts, 2,348 incidents of esophageal cancer occurred during an average follow-up period of 14.2 years and 11.1 years, respectively.

The researchers found that just under half of the participants reported consuming six or more hot drinks per day, and approximately 15% said they preferred their drinks very hot.

The risk of esophageal SCC increased with the preferred drink temperature, with those who liked their drinks hot having almost twice the cancer risk of those who preferred them warm. For those who liked their drinks very hot, the risk was more than three-fold.

The number of drinks consumed also mattered. After the researchers controlled for temperature, they found that drinking six or more hot drinks a day, compared with fewer than six, was associated with a 71% higher risk of esophageal SCC.

“This is the largest study to date, and it does really add to the evidence that drinking very hot and hot beverages could increase the risk of this type of cancer,” lead study author Keren Papier, a senior nutritional epidemiologist at Oxford Population Health, told CNN Wednesday.

Drinking very hot beverages was classified as probably carcinogenic to humans by the IARC in 2016. The IARC defines “very hot” beverages as being at temperatures above 65 degrees Celsius, or 149 degrees Fahrenheit.

However, previous studies were mostly conducted in South America, Asia and the Middle East, where drinking cultures are a bit different, Papier noted.

People in the UK often add milk to their hot beverages, for example, but the researchers found that the cancer risk did not change based on whether participants added milk to their drinks or not — provided the drinks were still hot.

Papier added that the new study finds “evidence from typical drinking habits in the UK,” where “most people are consuming tea or coffee on a daily basis, and it shows that how we consume the drinks matters, and that the findings are also relevant in this Western population in the UK.”

Relative risk remains low

Despite the findings, the chance of getting diagnosed with esophageal cancer remains relatively low. The cancer makes up only 2% of cancer cases in the UK, where people have around a 1% lifetime risk of being diagnosed with it, according to Cancer Research UK. In the US, esophageal cancer is estimated to have made up just 1.1% of new cancer cases this year, according to the National Cancer Institute.

However, “for anyone who does enjoy drinking hot drinks and they’re worried about these findings, really a simple step is to let the drink cool down,” Papier said, adding that a drink can be cooled down by letting it sit for a while, adding milk or cold water, blowing on it or taking sips.

“There is prior evidence that hot liquids damage the cells lining the oesophagus and can cause inflammation, so there is a plausible explanation for the findings,” epithelial physiologist Ian Johnson, an emeritus fellow at the Quadram Institute in England, who was not involved in the study, told CNN via email Wednesday.

“I am inclined to take the research at face value and conclude that it would be prudent for people to consume cooler drinks (less than 65°C) rather than hotter,” Johnson added. “It sounds simple enough, but whether people who favour hot drinks can change their habits so easily is another matter.”

That being said, the researchers were not able to explore the exact temperatures of the drinks consumed by participants, who could have different perceptions of heat, and so could not determine whether the self-reported heat levels were likely to have corresponded with specific temperature figures.

Physiologist Muy-Teck Teh, a professor of molecular oral oncology at the UK’s Queen Mary, University of London, said in a statement released via the Science Media Centre that since the perceived drink temperatures were self-reported by the participants, and since the varying sensitivities of the participants’ mouths to hot drinks were not known, “the results should be interpreted as robust associations rather than causal proof.”

Papier said smoking remains the biggest risk factor for this form of cancer, which has higher incidences in Eastern Asia and Southern and Eastern Africa, where alcohol consumption and indoor air pollution are also likely contributing factors, according to the IARC.

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He Studied A Black Church In Canada. Now, He’s The Pastor

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Seattle Medium
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Rev. Dr. Alfred Bailey's unlikely move to Nova Scotia connects centuries of Black migration and faith with a historic congregation confronting a thoroughly modern question: how to preserve its past while building its future. Credit: Courtesy of New Horizons Baptist Church
Rev. Dr. Alfred Bailey’s unlikely move to Nova Scotia connects centuries of Black migration and faith with a historic congregation confronting a thoroughly modern question: how to preserve its past while building its future. Credit: Courtesy of New Horizons Baptist Church

by Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware

It sounds like a Lifetime movie plot: a seasoned Black minister trades the pulpit of a big-city American megachurch to lead a congregation of fewer than 200 souls on Canada’s rocky Atlantic coast — a historic place he’d studied for an academic paper nearly a decade earlier.

Ask the minister in question, the Rev. Alfred “Al” Bailey, and he sounds like he can scarcely believe it himself. He acknowledges he never dreamed he would trade majority-Black Baltimore, his spiritual home, for life in smaller, overwhelmingly white Halifax, Nova Scotia. 

“No, there was not that at all,” he said, laughing.

But God, Bailey discovered, had already drawn the map.

Bailey is the new leader of New Horizons Baptist Church, a historic congregation founded in 1832 by a Black man who escaped slavery in Virginia and settled in a place that was a stop on the Underground Railroad.

Yet Bailey’s unlikely path to New Horizons is more than a story about a Baltimore preacher taking a job across the U.S.-Canada border in a city whose Black population is less than 5%. It is a journey that connects generations of Black migration, faith, and freedom—from enslaved people who fled the United States for Canada to a 21st-century pastor following some of those same routes in search of history, purpose, and, ultimately, a calling. 

Past as Prologue

Eight years before New Horizons asked him to become its pastor, Bailey had spent a month studying the congregation and the African Nova Scotian community around it, then wrote a 200-page doctoral dissertation on how Canadian churches could strengthen their leadership. He had no idea he was effectively writing a manual for his future self. 

Now Bailey is drawing on that research — and his years in one of Baltimore’s largest Black churches — to lead a historic congregation wrestling with a familiar challenge: how to honor a remarkable past while building a church for the future.

“God was like, ‘Now tell me you don’t know these people,’” he said, recalling his deliberations about whether to accept the job offer. “Well, I kind of know the people because I had to write a 200-page paper on these people.”

New Hope was founded when Richard Preston, the enslaved man, escaped bondage by saving money and purchasing his freedom. He then traveled to Nova Scotia — one of Canada’s smallest, most remote provinces — searching for his mother, who had fled there as a refugee during the War of 1812. 

God was like, ‘Now tell me you don’t know these people.’ Well, I kind of know the people because I had to write a 200-page paper on these people.

Rev. Dr. Alfred Baily, New Horizons baptist Church

Mother and son were eventually reunited, and Preston, who had taught himself to read and write, heard the call to ministry. He studied under a local Baptist minister, then founded New Horizon, the church Bailey now pastors.

Ministering to the church wasn’t on Bailey’s radar until 2017, when he entered Virginia Union University’s Global Leadership Cohort, a doctoral program. It dispatched eight students, two by two, to Canada, Zimbabwe, India and Haiti. 

He chose Nova Scotia because he wanted to learn what happened to enslaved people who escaped from Maryland and other parts of the United States and settled in Canada.

‘Use Your Own Book’

Bailey spent about a month studying New Horizons, interviewing its pastor, members, community leaders, police officials, and other professionals. His dissertation examined how churches in Canada could develop greater leadership capacity.

The editor reviewing his dissertation told him it read less like a traditional academic paper and more like a guidebook.

“She said, ‘You are telling people how to literally build leadership capacity in churches in Canada,’” Bailey recalled.

Eight years later, that guidebook became a blueprint for his own ministry.

Bailey had begun sensing a call to the pastorate, but none of the available churches felt right. Then, an email arrived from his former professor. The pastor who had supervised Bailey’s international doctoral work was retiring, and New Horizons wanted him to apply, so he did.

His next concern was distance: Halifax is in another country, even if the flight home to Baltimore can take only about three hours with a connection.

Then Bailey remembered the editor’s words about his dissertation.

“God brought that thought back to me and said, ‘Now go apply. You didn’t sell it. You do it,’” he said. “Use your own book.”

Divine Intervention

There was still one more person who needed convincing: Bailey’s wife.

He submitted the application while the couple was vacationing in the Virgin Islands, suggesting that she go to the pool while he handled “one little thing.”

“She said, ‘Application for what?’” Bailey recalled. “I said, ‘For the pastor in Nova Scotia. But you go on to the pool.’”

The selection process unfolded through a series of doors opening at exactly the right time. 

After an initial interview, the church requested a video of Bailey preaching, and then asked for another. Bailey, who served at New Psalmist Baptist Church in Baltimore, did not have a recent second sermon because Bishop Walter Scott Thomas Sr. and Rev. Dr. Walter Scott Thomas Jr. regularly preached.

Then Thomas underwent shoulder surgery and could not preach as planned. Bailey was asked to step in. That gave New Horizons the sermon it needed.

Eventually, Bailey learned that, under the church’s denominational process, he wasn’t just one of several candidates being invited to preach. He was the final candidate. 

He interviewed with the committee on Saturday and preached Sunday morning — a sermon he doesn’t remember. 

“I preached something, and they liked it,” he said.

Building on Heritage and History

The congregation called him, and Bailey arrived in Halifax in May. His September 6 induction service  — the Canadian term for what many Black Baptist churches in the United States call an installation — brings his Baltimore and Nova Scotia communities together.

The transition has required more than learning new terminology. As a U.S. citizen working abroad,, Bailey had to obtain a Canadian work permit and social insurance number change his driver’s license, and get used to a different health care, currency and tax system.

He is also moving from a megachurch environment to a congregation of about 150 members — a number Bailey believes is just right, given the challenge and scope of his transition.

“When you add 150 members, plus a whole different country context, a whole different health care system and a whole different government parliamentary system, everything is totally different,” he said. “All of that adds up.”

At New Horizons, he is helping build systems he once took for granted, including a church-management database and an upgraded livestream operation. His challenge is to honor a congregation rich in African Nova Scotian history while reaching young adults asking what that history means for their lives in 2026.

‘They Don’t Take No Stuff’

He has also encountered a Black community accustomed to fighting for recognition and justice. Bailey points proudly to Viola Desmond, the Black Nova Scotian entrepreneur and civil rights activist featured on Canada’s $10 bill.

“One thing I love about the African Nova Scotian people: They don’t take no stuff,” he said. “If something is wrong, they fight for it.”

While racism exists in Canada, Bailey saysut he has noticed a different response when injustice is confronted. In the United States, he said, racism has been allowed “out of the basement” and onto the front porch.

Yet the heart of Bailey’s assignment remains the church. Worship at New Horizons is unmistakably Baptist, complete with gospel music, although liturgical dance may soon be “coming to a theater near you.” Bailey has been given room to reshape the service while respecting the congregation’s traditions.

His wife still misses their children, grandchildren and extended family. But whenever homesickness comes, Bailey said, church members surround her with love.

And each Sunday, the call becomes clearer.

“Every time I have an exciting sermon to preach — which is every Sunday — you just feel it,” Bailey said. “God places you somewhere.”

His Fiancée Died On Flight 77. He Won’t Let 9/11 Define Her

By
Seattle Medium
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Sarah Miller Clark boarded Flight 77 to help her D.C. students. John Wesley has spent a quarter-century making sure the world remembers the woman beyond the casualty list. Credit: Photo by SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images
Sarah Miller Clark boarded Flight 77 to help her D.C. students. John Wesley has spent a quarter-century making sure the world remembers the woman beyond the casualty list. Credit: Photo by SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images

by Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware

On the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, Sarah Miller Clark, a middle school teacher in Washington, D.C., left for Dulles International Airport just outside the city to catch an early flight to Los Angeles. Her fiancé, John Wesley, thought about going with her. 

Clark was headed to an educational event in Santa Barbara, California, with a student, 11-year-old Asia Cotton. It was Wesley’s first day working on the HBO series “The Wire” as deputy director of communications for Baltimore’s public housing agency. 

Clark encouraged him to stay behind. She’d come home early.

“I don’t feel too good about this anyway,” she told him. “I’ll see you on Saturday.” 

National Tragedy, Personal Heartbreak

Clark and Asia boarded American Airlines Flight 77 for the cross-country flight. Clark had agreed to make the trip because National Geographic, the organization sponsoring the event, promised to provide computers for the students in her classroom.

She and Cotton never reached California.

John Wesley has worked to keep his fiancée’s memory alive. (Photo courtesy of John Wesley)

Hijackers seized the plane and crashed it into the Pentagon, killing all 64 people aboard and 125 people inside the building. He didn’t know it then, but the breaking news unfolding across the country was about to become heartbreakingly personal for Wesley.

After the attacks in New York and reports of other possible threats, Wesley was instructed to send his staff home. He arrived at his Columbia, Maryland, home around 1 p.m. Soon afterward, he received a call from a woman who had accompanied Clark to the airport.

“She asked  [if] I had talked to American Airlines,” Wesley recalled. “I said, ‘No, why?’ She said, ‘John, I think the plane that’s in the Pentagon was the flight Sarah was on.’”

Wesley called the airline. When a representative answered, the questions became increasingly specific.

“Are you John Milton Wesley? You live in Columbia, Maryland, on Tamar Drive?” the representative asked before placing him on hold.

“At that moment is where I knew,” Wesley said.

Once you have gone through the experience, you rely on prayer. If you have faith, once the moment has passed, God has you.

John Milton Wesley, fiancÉe of Sarah Miller Clark, 9/11 Victim

He walked into the bathroom and picked up Clark’s toothbrush to see whether it was still wet.

“Fortunately, it was,” he said. “So I just sat there. I mean, I just sat there trying to grapple with this in my head.”

Courtship and Commitment

The couple had known each other for years through their church in Columbia. Clark sometimes accompanied Wesley on piano when he sang at weddings. Their friendship eventually deepened, and seven years before her death, they became a couple.

They planned to marry on April 4, 2002. But after several friends died unexpectedly, Clark reconsidered the long engagement. While the couple was on vacation, she told Wesley she did not believe they should wait. Together they moved the wedding date to Dec. 22, 2001.

They had come home ready to prepare for a wedding. Instead, Wesley had to prepare for her memorial.

Only days before the attacks, the couple attended a friend’s four-hour funeral. As they stood near the urn, Clark told him that when her time came, she wanted music, a brief ceremony by her Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority sisters and a service lasting no more than an hour.

“I remember saying to her, ‘Well, Sarah, let’s just get past the wedding first,’” Wesley said.

Eleven days later, he was searching for an urn for her remains.

Clark had taught school for nearly 30 years, but her care extended beyond classroom instruction. Even her final journey was made on behalf of her students. National Geographic fulfilled its commitment after her death and provided the promised computers.

She also poured her energy into Wesley’s writing career. Although she was an educator, she researched what literary managers did and began advocating for him. When she learned his publishers had never sent him on a book tour, she contacted them. Soon Wesley was traveling on East and West Coast tours.

Remembering Emmett Till

Clark also urged him to submit a piece about Emmett Till to The Washington Post. Wesley had grown up in Rosedale, Mississippi, across the street from the white men who murdered the 14-year-old Till in August 1955. He says he initially wrote the piece as a letter suggesting that the newspaper recognize the 50th anniversary of Till’s death.

“John, send the letter to The Washington Post,” Clark insisted.

The newspaper bought international rights to the expanded article, and Wesley’s work reached readers worldwide. Clark would not live to see that particular success, but Wesley knew her encouragement had helped make it possible.

In the years following her death, grief became both ritual and remembrance. Wesley left the house largely as Clark had it for five years. Her clothing remained where she had placed it. Her belongings stayed on tables. He burned candles at his prayer table so often that the smoke from the flame gradually darkened the yellow walls.

Yet he made a deliberate decision about how he would speak of her. Each time a reporter called, he says, he shared another positive story — another piece of the woman beyond the airline’s passenger manifest and casualty count.

One of his favorites involved their aquarium. When Wesley fed the fish, they ate and continued swimming. When Clark fed them, they gathered at the glass.

She explained her secret: She knelt and placed her face close to the aquarium so the fish could see her eyes.

It was a small act, Wesley says, but it captured her gift for making contact — with students, with Wesley and apparently even with fish.

‘You Rely on Prayer’

After her death, Wesley also returned to music. He began with four songs and limited piano skills. Nine years later, he released a recording of original music that reached listeners internationally.

Faith, he said, made it possible for him to tell Clark’s story without being shattered each time.

“Once you have gone through the experience, you rely on prayer,” Wesley said. “If you have faith, once the moment has passed, God has you.”

Twenty-five years after 9/11, Sarah Miller Clark is remembered among the nearly 3,000 people killed that day. She was a teacher who boarded a plane so her students could receive computers. She was a musician, a mentor, an advocate, and a woman preparing to become a bride.

The wedding never happened. But the life Clark and Wesley shared did not disappear inside the Pentagon. It lives in his music, in the career she helped nurture, and in every tender story he still tells.

The Dolly Some Never Knew

By
Seattle Medium
-

by Dr. E. Faye Williams

(Trice Edney Wire) — We’ve lost a lot of people who did work we didn’t know about. In the last few days, we lost Dolly Parton. How many knew about the great things she did?  We knew she allowed Whitney Houston to give us her version of “I Will Always Love You.”

Only after Dolly’s passing did the world know what she did with her royalties from Whitney’s version.  She gave the royalties to honor Whitney by investing in the Black community. With her royalties from Whitney’s recording of Dolly’s song, she invested them in a predominantly Black neighborhood in Nashville. She bought a commercial complex there and later called it “The House that Whitney Built.” She acknowledged that a Black woman’s extraordinary voice had created enormous wealth from her song, and that some of that wealth should return to the Black community.

Much of this effort reached poor Black families and other communities of color. Her gifts addressed the inequities that follow people from the cradle and beyond. Her philanthropy is only now becoming widely known. She paid for band uniforms and other needs at Tennessee high schools. Her foundation awarded college scholarships, and an early initiative promised 7th and 8th graders $500 if they completed high school. The dropout rate fell from 35 percent to 6 percent! When some were being critical of Black Lives Matter, it was Dolly who  offered one of the clearest statements about Black Lives Matter made by any White entertainer—especially the country music industry. She made it clear that to her Black Lives Matter.

She donated to COVID challenges that disproportionately killed Black Americans, and later gave $1 million for pediatric infectious-disease research. A Black journalist said Dolly made a choice to be a humanitarian and true Christian. She never backed away from putting clarity to the fact that Black people are human beings.

Beyonce said Dolly was an artist whose generosity she praised and said her individuality made her “truly one of one.” They collaborated on Beyonce’s delve into country music and she agreed that ”Dolly made a choice to be a humanitarian. She lived a life that NEVER made you question her heart and ideology on the humanity of Black people. This is why so many of us appreciate her and celebrate her life.” She went on to call Parton “the barometer” and “the North Star,” describing her as an artist whose generosity and individuality made her “truly one of one.” Beyonce  and Dolly collaborated on “Cowboy Carter,” where Beyonce explored country music’s Black roots.

Despite achieving global superstardom, accumulating a vast fortune and reaching larger-than-life status in an industry that struggles with diversity, Dolly was embraced by the Black community. When her family announced her death a wide range of Black icons noted her passing. They included President Barack Obama, who honored her by saying,“Born in a one-room cabin, she earned 11 Grammys and an Emmy, built a business empire, and helped millions of kids learn to read.”

She was once called “a White person who ‘got it’”— someone who not only saw and understood Black America but also empathized with the people and tried to help.

So many White people are trying to erase us from history, but Dolly embraced Black artists, spoke plainly against racism, distributed millions of books that helped countless Black children read.She treated Black people and culture not as something outside her world, but as part of it. 

Dolly said, following the murder of George Floyd, “Of course Black lives matter. Do we think our little white (word for rear ends) are the only ones that matter?

Her generosity is worth repeating. She paid for band uniforms and other needs at Tennessee high schools. Her foundation awarded college scholarships, and promised 7th- and 8th-graders $500 if they completed high school.  Many who might not have otherwise done so, were successful! Thank you Dolly.

King County Council Questions Advancement And Equity In Proposed Employment Plan

By
Seattle Medium
-
Councilmember Rhonda Lewis

By Aaron Allen, The Seattle Medium

King County Council members raised questions about employee advancement, the representation of women in the county workforce and whether recommendations from the county’s Black Women’s Experience study are adequately reflected in a proposed four-year Equal Employment Opportunity/Affirmative Action Plan.

The council’s Committee of the Whole deferred action on the proposed 2026-2029 EEO/AA Plan as legal review continued, leaving questions about how the county will address advancement and workplace equity before the proposal returns for further consideration.

The plan would establish King County’s equal employment opportunity and affirmative action goals for a workforce of approximately 17,000 employees working across agencies and services ranging from public transit and wastewater treatment to courts, parks and jail health services.

King County is required to maintain an EEO/AA plan under county code and as a recipient of federal grant funding. The proposed plan addresses workforce representation and the county’s efforts to provide equal employment opportunities.

During the committee’s review, Councilmember Rhonda Lewis questioned county officials about who participated in developing the plan and whether it sufficiently addresses advancement opportunities for employees already working for the county.

“For that staff report, I have a couple of questions, and they may be questions for executive staff,” Councilmember Lewis stated. “The first question is, how were the EIB managers, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging Managers involved in the creation, updating of this report? And the other question, I’ll ask it now, as I read the report, there was a lot in the report about recruitment and retention. And I’m interested in where the report addresses advancement for people of color and women, and also how it addresses the recommendations of the Black Women’s Experience study that the county invested quite a bit of resource in having that done.”

Gloria Ngezaho, King County workforce equity manager in the Department of Human Resources, said Equity, Inclusion and Belonging managers were not directly involved in drafting the proposed plan, although they participate in ongoing discussions about workforce equity and implementation.

“In crafting the plan, we did not engage the EIB manager, but in ongoing efforts to continue to diversify workforce through our advisory committee, the EEOAA advisory committee, there are ongoing conversations that include conversations with HR managers and EIB managers,” Ngezaho explained. “In terms of implementation and making sure that not only are we meeting our hiring and retention goals, but we are also looking into data that is ongoing, advisory committee members do have those regular meetings to continue to make sure that departments are being held accountable.”

Ngezaho said the Department of Human Resources intends to involve EIB managers more directly in future plan development while continuing to work with human resources managers on recruitment, retention and advancement.

Lewis’ questions also brought attention to the county’s Black Women’s Experience study, an initiative examining the workplace experiences and disparities faced by Black and African women employed by King County and developing recommendations aimed at improving workplace equity.

Councilmember Teresa Mosqueda also raised the Black Women’s Experience study during the discussion and suggested council members review its findings and recommendations as they consider the proposed EEO/AA plan.

Council members separately questioned changes in the gender makeup of the county workforce.

Committee of the Whole Chair Jorge Barón pointed to workforce data showing that the percentage of county employees who identify as women has declined in recent years and called on the executive branch to address the trend.

“One of the areas that we have, I would say, backtracked as a county workforce in the past few years has been the issue of gender percentage of our workforce,” Chair Baron noted. “Identifying women is going, I would say, in the wrong direction. I urge the executive branch [that this is] something that I think we want to monitor closely, and perhaps when we take action, I would love to hear from our executive branch specifically on that issue, on what steps we’re taking to reverse that trend.”

The proposed EEO/AA plan is intended to guide county departments through 2029 as they monitor workforce representation and compliance with equal employment opportunity requirements.

Because legal review of the plan remains underway, the Committee of the Whole deferred action on the proposal. The ordinance remains before the committee for further consideration, leaving council members’ questions about employee advancement, gender representation and how recommendations from the Black Women’s Experience study will be incorporated into the county’s workforce equity efforts unresolved.

Cleveland Football Returns To Varsity Play As Roster Grows Under Second-Year Coach Robert Richmond

By
Seattle Medium
-

By Kiara Doyal, The Seattle Medium

After a season spent rebuilding the Cleveland High School football program with a roster too small to compete at the varsity level, head coach Robert Richmond is entering his second year with a significant sign of progress: 24 players ready to take the field for varsity football.

A year ago, Cleveland could only field a junior varsity team, with the program fielding a maximum of 11 or 12 players for its games. This season, the team has more than doubled its numbers, giving the Eagles an opportunity to compete at the varsity level while continuing to build a foundation for the future.

“It’s a great start, but we are nowhere near the end. This is just a great start, and I think that’s amazing,” said Richmond. “I’m very satisfied with where we are right now. It’s a decent second year in real time, and we’re ready to go.”

The growth, according to Richmond, has come largely from within the program. Players who were part of the team two years ago remained committed to helping bring more students into the program after experiencing a difficult season.

“It’s all the players. These guys, my juniors, who were here two years ago, and when it didn’t go so well, they vowed,” said Richmond. “These guys were committed to getting kids out, and they are helping start the program from the inside out.”

That player-led effort has allowed the coaching staff to focus more on football while giving current players an active role in recruiting their classmates.

“A lot of my job right now is coaching, and they’re doing the self-policing. I just get to coach now, which is great,” Richmond said. “I have some young captains, and they are really, really doing a good job, and so that helps me get in the school, talk to the kids because they’re doing it too.”

Half of Cleveland’s 24-player roster is made up of freshmen, giving the Eagles a young group of players Richmond hopes can help strengthen the program beyond this season.

“As students, prospective football players in the school are hearing it from two different areas: students and coaching. They didn’t get that before, and so that’s huge,” Richmond said. “My players are letting students know, hey, we’re ready to go, and you know we have got 12 freshmen right now, and that’s outstanding.”

Richmond said many of the younger players already developed relationships with one another through middle school and their years of attending school together.

“The chemistry is actually really great, and that is because they went to school together, and they’ve gone to middle school together,” said Richmond. “All of those years of school together, spending time with each other every day, they have gotten used to each other and built that chemistry.”

With just 24 players on the varsity roster, however, Cleveland will have little room for error. Players are expected to contribute on both sides of the ball, making conditioning a major point of emphasis throughout the season.

“They already know we’re going both ways. They just know that,” said Richmond. “So our conditioning is really what’s going to make the difference, and win the game at the end of the day.”

Richmond said the players understand the physical demands that come with having a smaller roster and have bought into the work required to compete for four quarters.

“They have bought in. They know what this season is going to take,” said Richmond. “They know they have to do the running, right? The conditioning piece is big, because the game is four quarters. We can’t do three and a half quarters, and say I got to go home.”

The team’s rebuilding effort has also been accompanied by an unexpected challenge away from the field. Just before the start of the season, a water pipe burst in the team’s locker room, forcing Cleveland’s football players into the smaller visiting boys’ locker room, which is also used by other sports.

“We went from a five-bedroom house to a studio apartment, and it was all overnight,” Richmond explained.

Despite the inconvenience and reduced space, Richmond said the players have adapted to the temporary arrangement.

“We’re ready to go back into our room, whatever that is, whenever they say it,” said Richmond. “We’re ready to rock and roll because we’re all on top of each other, and it’s been very different to manage.”

“They’re just dealing with it, and that is the great news about these kids that I have. They’re very, very adaptable,” said Richmond. “Nobody’s really complaining and saying why us. They don’t have that attitude. They are great kids, great people, and I love that about them.”

Richmond is also encouraged by the mix of young players developing across the roster, particularly on the offensive line.

“We are starting from the front and working our way back, and the chemistry has helped,” said Richmond. “And I’m very, very, very happy that I’ve got a great mix of freshmen, sophomores, and juniors on my offensive line.”

As Cleveland returns to varsity competition, Richmond said his measure of progress goes beyond simply making it through this season. He wants the program to continue attracting players so the Eagles finish the year with an even stronger foundation than they started with.

“When I started last year, I wanted more kids the year after I started, and I have that,” said Richmond. “This year, I want us to look back at the last game of the year, which is going to be Lakeside, and I want us to have more kids on our roster than we do now, or at least on the sideline that can say I’m playing football next year.”

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