US Domestic News Roundup: U.S. Supreme Court takes up second Biden appeal in student debt plan fight; Rupert Murdoch to be deposed in $1.6 billion Dominion defamation case and more

Following is a summary of current US domestic news briefs.

U.S. Supreme Court takes up second Biden appeal in student debt plan fight

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday agreed to hear President Joe Biden's appeal of a judge's ruling that found his plan to cancel billions of dollars in student debt unlawful, taking up the matter alongside another challenge to the policy that the justices are due to hear in the coming months. The justices will consider the Biden administration's appeal of Texas-based U.S. District Judge Mark Pittman's decision in a challenge backed by a conservative advocacy group, the second of two rulings by lower courts that have put Biden's debt relief policy on ice.

Rupert Murdoch to be deposed in $1.6 billion Dominion defamation case

Fox Corp Chairman Rupert Murdoch is set to be questioned under oath on Tuesday in a defamation lawsuit over his network's coverage of unfounded vote-rigging claims during the 2020 U.S. presidential election. Election technology company Dominion Voting Systems is seeking $1.6 billion in damages from Fox News Network, which it alleges spread false claims that its machines were used to rig the 2020 election against Republican Donald Trump and in favor of his Democratic rival Joe Biden.

Virginia capital removes last public Confederate monument

A Black-owned construction business on Monday dismantled and removed the last public Confederate statue on display in Richmond, Virginia, the city that served as the capital of the Confederacy during the U.S. Civil War. The memorial to Ambrose Powell Hill, a Confederate general killed in battle days before the war ended in April 1865, was taken down as a small crowd of onlookers cheered.

U.S. solar installations to fall 23% this year due to China goods ban: report

New U.S. solar installations are on track to fall by nearly a quarter this year, with panel imports stalled by a ban on goods from China's Xinjiang region over forced labor concerns, according to a market report released on Tuesday. The dour forecast by industry trade group the Solar Energy Industries Association and research firm Wood Mackenzie comes as solar companies are seeking to take advantage of generous subsidies in the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), a new law that encourages clean energy technologies to address climate change.

U.S. tells jury Oath Keepers plotted to use force to keep Trump in office

A federal prosecutor on Monday told a court that four members of the far-right Oath Keepers should be found guilty of seditious conspiracy for plotting to use force to stop the peaceful transfer of presidential power at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, in order to keep Donald Trump in the White House. Monday marked the beginning of the U.S. Justice Department's second major Jan. 6 sedition trial, this time involving Oath Keeper defendants David Moerschel, Joseph Hackett, Roberto Minuta and Edward Vallejo.

Bankman-Fried charged by SEC, to appear in Bahamas court

FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried was charged by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Tuesday with defrauding investors in what regulators called "a house of cards," hours before he was set to appear before a magistrate in the Bahamas. Since at least May 2019, FTX raised more than $1.8 billion from equity investors in a years-long fraud in which Bankman-Fried concealed that FTX was diverting customer funds to its affiliated crypto hedge fund Alameda Research LLC, the SEC alleged in a statement.

U.S. hate crimes drop in 2021, FBI data finds, but undercount likely

U.S. hate crime incidents dropped in 2021 from a two-decade high in 2020, according to FBI data released on Monday, but the agency acknowledged that the figures exclude totals from more than one-third of the country's law enforcement agencies. Overall, more than 7,200 hate crimes were reported in 2021, about 1,000 fewer than a year earlier. More than 60% of the reported incidents were based on race, ancestry or ethnicity, while about one in six were classified as sexual orientation-bias crimes and one in seven as religion-bias crimes.

Court allows New York to enforce limits on guns on private property

A federal appeals court on Monday allowed New York to restrict the carrying of firearms on private property under a new law adopted in wake of a major U.S. Supreme Court ruling that expanded gun rights. The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals put on hold a judge's order from last month that barred officials from enforcing part of the new law making it a felony to carry a gun on private property without the property owner's express consent.

Alabama, Utah become the latest U.S. states to ban TikTok on state devices

Alabama and Utah on Monday joined other U.S. states prohibiting the use of Chinese-owned short-video sharing app TikTok on state government devices and computer networks due to national security concerns. The actions follow warnings from FBI Director Chris Wray last month who said the Chinese government could use the ByteDance-owned app to control data collection on millions of U.S. users or control the recommendation algorithm, which could be used for influence operations.

U.S. Senate aims for stop-gap bill as funding deadline looms, Schumer says

The U.S. Senate will aim to vote on a bill to keep the federal government operating for one week past a Friday deadline, as Democrats and Republicans bicker over a longer-term measure likely to spend more than $1.5 trillion, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said on Monday. "Over the weekend, appropriators held positive and productive conversations," Schumer said in a speech to the Senate. Referring to a short-term bill known as a "continuing resolution," he added, "Later this week members should be prepared to take quick action on a CR, a one-week CR, so we can give appropriators more time to finish a full-funding bill before the holidays."