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Palm Beach County sheriff says suspected gunman didn’t appear to have clear shot at Trump

The day after the possible attempted assassination of Donald Trump, Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw said that the suspected gunman did not appear to have a clear shot of the former president on the golf course.

But that doesn’t mean he wasn’t in danger. And as a suspect was charged in connection with the incident, there were increasing calls for beefing up the former president’s Secret Service security.

“From where [the gunman] was at, he would have had to wait for the president to get up to that hole and then turn and face going toward the area he was at,” Bradshaw said on “Fox & Friends” Monday. “It doesn’t appear to me, knowing what I know about the terrain there and where we are looking at, that he had a clear shot from there to where the president was before he would make the turn to come that way.”

The suspect, Ryan Wesley Routh, was charged Monday in connection with the Sunday incident, appearing in federal court in West Palm Beach. He was charged in a criminal complaint with possession of a firearm by a convicted felon and possession of a firearm with an obliterated serial number, court records show.

German autonomous vehicle manufacturer to open first U.S. plant in Jacksonville, creating 100+ jobs

HOLON, a German autonomous vehicle manufacturer, announced this month that it will open its first U.S. facility in Jacksonville to produce electric shuttles, expected to be operational by 2026, creating more than 100 new jobs in the region.

The 500,000-square-foot plant will initially create 150 jobs, with the potential to generate 1,000 jobs as production scales. HOLON plans to produce 5,000 autonomous vehicles annually, designed for public transportation and other uses. The facility will comply with U.S. regulatory standards, including Buy America, allowing customers to qualify for federal funding to operate the shuttles. The project is backed by the Florida Department of Commerce.

“With openness and a supportive regulatory framework for autonomous vehicles, the U.S. offers an ideal environment for HOLON’s industrial initiatives and Jacksonville has demonstrated tremendous enthusiasm for our vision from the beginning, making the city a national leader in the deployment of autonomous transit,” said Henning von Watzdorf, CEO of HOLON said. “We are deeply grateful to our partners and team for their tireless passion and hard work, which have made—and will continue to make—our expansion into the U.S. a reality.”

Court to weigh Florida gun age law

A federal appeals court next month will hear arguments in the National Rifle Association’s constitutional challenge to a Florida law that prevents people under age 21 from purchasing rifles and other long guns.

The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals last week scheduled an Oct. 22 hearing in Atlanta, as it considers a law that passed in the aftermath of the February 2018 mass shooting at Parkland’s Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School that killed 17 people.

A federal district judge and a three-judge panel of the appeals court upheld the age restriction, but the full appeals court last year decided to take up the case in what is known as an “en banc” hearing.

As the Florida lawsuit has played out, the U.S. Supreme Court has issued closely watched opinions in other gun-related cases. That has resulted in attorneys for Florida and the NRA debating how the Supreme Court opinions should apply to the dispute about the constitutionality of the age restriction.

Florida women's healthcare ranks dismally

A recent study showed that, for healthcare coverage, access, and affordability for women, Florida ranks 48 out of 51 states including Washington, D.C. For prenatal care, the state comes in dead last – 51 out of 51.

The study was conducted by the Commonwealth Fund, a nonpartisan foundation that promotes a high-performing health care system. Dave Radley is one of the authors of the study.

“Some of the areas where, where we see the biggest challenges in Florida are around healthcare coverage and access and healthcare affordability,” said Radley.

Part of the problem is a lack of health insurance.

“14% of women, about 1 in 7 working age women in the state don’t have health insurance coverage,” he said.

That’s higher than in almost any other state, Radley said.