THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 11 , 2021. THE WASHINGTON POST EZ SU A
OKLAHOMAOrder halts nonbinary
birth certificatesOklahoma G ov. Kevin Stitt on
Wednesday directed the S tate
Department of Health to stop
issuing birth certificates listing a
nonbinary option instead of
designating a gender, despite a
settlement agreement in a civil
case in which the agency agreed
to do so.
The first-term Republican said
in his order that his
administration never reviewed or
approved the settlement
agreement, which requires the
health department to amend
birth certificates in a manner not
permitted under Oklahoma law.
The order directs the
department to cease amending
birth certificates in any way not
specifically authorized under
state law and to remove from its
website any reference to
amending birth certificates for
nonbinary people. People who are
nonbinary do not identify with
traditional male or female gender
assignments.
The agency issued a birth
certificate in May to Oregon
resident Kit Lorelied, who was
born in Oklahoma, identifies as
nonbinary and uses they/them
pronouns.
Lorelied sued after the
Oklahoma State Department of
Health initially refused the
request. The department,
represented by the attorney
general’s office, reached a
settlement in May in which itagreed to add a nonbinary option
on birth certificates.
— Associated PressCENSUS BUREAUFive-year survey data
delayed over pandemicThe U.S. Census Bureau
announced Wednesday the first-
ever delay in the release of its
American Community Survey
(ACS) five-year data, citing the
effects of the coronavirus
pandemic. The target release date
for the data, which reflects 2016
to 2020, will now be March 2022
rather than December.
“To reflect our quality
standards... additional time isneeded to continue refining our
methodology so that we can
minimize the impact of
nonresponse bias due to the
COVID-19 pandemic,” the bureau
said in a statement on its website,
adding that it would provide an
update in December.
Census data is used by the
government to allocate federal
funding, as well as by businesses,
academics and research
organizations.
The Census Bureau did not
release official one-year estimates
from the 2020 ACS this year,
saying the pandemic’s impact on
data collection meant estimates
did not meet its quality
standards.
— Tara BahrampourDIGESTED JONES/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGES
Pedestrians are reflected o n a storefront as they make their way
past a hot-dog stand Wednesday in New York City.Politics & the Nation
BY JON SWAINEVenue managers filed some
plans for the Astroworld Festival
to the city of Houston less than a
week before the music event, leav-
ing city officials scrambling to re-
view them in time, records re-
leased by the city on Tuesday
show.
Eight people died and dozens
were injured Friday at the music
festival headlined by rapper Travis
Scott at the Harris County-owned
NRG Park. Police are investigating
and autopsy reports for those who
died have not yet been released by
county authorities. Some attend-
ees have said they saw people
crushed or trampled as the crowd
tried to move closer to the stage.
T he records made public on
Tuesday by the mayor’s office were
focused on the city’s review au-
thority at NRG Park for street
closures, fire codes and some oth-
er duties. They did not include
other permitting documents that
the mayor’s office said are held by
Harris County.
Still, the released files — which
include emails, permit applica-
tions and plans — point to a pat-
tern of late filings to the city by
bosses at the venue.
Scott had announced the Hous-
ton show on April 30. The earliest
email released on Tuesday relat-
ing to the festival was dated Oct.
- That morning, a parking man-
ager at NRG Park emailed the
mayor’s office a site map and road
closure plan for Astroworld.
After 8 p.m. on Sunday, Oct. 31,
five days before the event, the
NRG Park manager sent revised
plans, citing requests made at a
public safety meeting.
“As you can imagine, Astro-
world is a fluid event,” the manag-
er, Sandeep Prasad,wrote to Remo
Mazzini, a project manager in the
mayor’s office of special events.
Mazzini sent the plans to police,
transportation and other officials
the next morning, starting
the subject line of his email:
“ (((((URGENT)))))))).”
“Just got this this morning,”
Mazzini wrote.
The mayor’s office approved a
city permit for NRG Park on Nov. 1.
But debate between venue manag-
ers and city officials about the
revised plans for Astroworld con-
tinued, emails show.
On Tuesday, Nov. 2, Prasad
emailed Mazzini to argue that
lane closures he had requested for
the street behind Astroworld’s
main stage would help avoid “a lot
of the transgressions” seen at the
festival in 2018 and 2019. “Those
included destroying property and
various acts of violence,” Prasad
wrote.
That day, a colleague of Mazzi-
ni’s notified a state transportation
official of the request, and com-
plained to them that the NRG Park
request had arrived “extremely
late to run through typical steps.”
The Nov. 1 city permit was an
update to one NRG Park obtained
in February, which broadly cov-
ered “concerts, Monster Jam and
other special events” set for 2021
at the venue rather than pertain-ing to any specific event. This
meant that a security plan filed as
part of the application for the
February permit made little dis-
tinction between music shows
and events with different setups
and audiences such as monster
truck rallies, the records show.
N o updated security plan for
the Nov. 1 permit appeared in the
released files.
The one-page security plan in
the February submission said
each event at NRG Park would
have 26 police officers assigned to
crowd control and 60 assigned totraffic control. The plan appeared
to cover policing for street and
parking areas.
T he permit application was ap-
proved by Mazzini on Feb. 4.
After Astroworld, police offi-
cials said that 528 Houston police
officers and more than 750 secu-
rity guards worked at the festival.
The Washington Post previous-
ly obtained a separate 56-page
event operations plan, written by
Astroworld organizers in what the
documents say was consultation
with police and fire officials. That
plan included more detailed secu-rity and emergency procedures.
The plan detailed how to re-
spond to threats such as lost indi-
viduals, missing children, trau-
matic injuries, deaths, active
shooters and unruly fans, but it
did not specifically address crowd
surges or safety in the mosh pit. It
was not clear if the document was
the final version of the event plan.
Reached by phone on Tuesday
evening, Mazzini declined to com-
ment, saying he was not author-
ized to speak to the media. Prasad
did not respond to an email and
voice mail seeking an interview.The records indicate that the
February permit process also be-
gan with a rush to file.
On Jan. 22, a day before a sched-
uled motorcycle race at NRG Park,
Mazzini in the mayor’s office
emailed police and other officials
with NRG Park’s 2021 schedule
and proposed road closures.
“Please review and approve
asap, this just came in and their
first event is tomorrow,” Mazzini
wrote. The 2021 schedule from
NRG Park was inaccurately titled
“2019 NRG Park Events,” records
show.
Permit applications relating to
Astroworld’s fireworks, catering
and fire code were also among the
files released on Tuesday. Those
that were stamped by city officials
were marked as having been re-
ceived between Oct. 27 and Nov. 5.
One required fire safety document
was unsigned, undated and had
no marks of approval.
Houston Mayor Sylvester Tur-
ner (D) said in a statement Tues-
day that the release covered “all
permits filed with the city” but
stressed that festival organizers
submitted other applications to
the county.
“The list of permits is not ex-
haustive, as some were filed with
Harris County, since the county
owns the property where the
event was held and the agreement
for the event was between the
producer, Live Nation, and NRG,”
Turner said.
Live Nation did not respond to
an email Tuesday requesting com-
ment.
[email protected]Annie Gowen contributed to this
report.Records: Venue filed plans just days before Astroworld
Repeated revisions left
city officials scrambling
to approve operationsMARK FELIX FOR THE WASHINGTON POST
The Astroworld stage at NRG Park is seen in Houston on Monday. Records released Tuesday show that
permits for street closures and fire codes were sent f or approval less than a week before the festival.BY RACHEL WEINERAn analyst who contributed to a
2016 dossier of allegations regard-
ing former president Donald
Trump’s ties to Russia has pleaded
not guilty to charges that he re-
peatedly lied to the FBI about his
sources of information.
Igor Danchenko appeared
briefly Wednesday in Alexandria
federal court. Attorney Mark
Schamel said in a statement this
week that his client’s work as a
researcher is “above reproach.”
“For the past five years, those
with an agenda have sought to
expose Mr. Danchenko’s identity
and tarnish his reputation while
undermining U.S. National Secu-
rity,” Schamel added. “This latest
injustice will not stand.”
A trial date was set for April
during the hearing, where all
Danchenko said was that he was
pleading “Not guilty, your honor.”
He and his attorney declined to
comment outside of court.
The case was brought by special
counsel John Durham, who was
appointed by the Trump adminis-
tration to look into the origins of
the FBI investigation into the for-
mer president’s ties to Russia.
Born in the Soviet Union and
based in Washington, Danchenko,
43, was hired by Christopher
Steele to investigate possible links
between Trump and the Kremlin.
Steele, a British ex-spy, was
working for a firm called Fusion
GPS. Fusion started its Trump re-
search on behalf of a conservative
website funded by a major GOP
donor but then continued it for a
different client — a law firm for
Hillary Clinton’s campaign and
the Democratic National Commit-
tee. Steele brought his findings to
the FBI, which used them to help
justify secret surveillance on for-
mer Trump campaign adviser
Carter Page.
But Durham says Danchenko
lied and prevaricated when back-
ing up the information that went
to the FBI. The indictment says he
lied about getting information
from a Democratic public rela-
tions executive who did business
in Russia, Charles Dolan Jr. (Dolan
said through an attorney he is a
witness in the case.) He is also
accused of lying about revealing to
sources he was working for Steele.
Durham says Danchenko made
up a conversation he claimed was
the source of one of the dossier’s
most salacious claims, that Trump
paid prostitutes at a Moscow hotel
room to urinate on a bed in which
President Barack Obama had once
slept. The dossier also suggested
Russian intelligence agencies had
secretly recorded that event as po-
tential blackmail material. Trump
has denied any such encounter.
The indictment suggests that
story came from Dolan, who in
June 2016 toured a suite at a hotel
in Moscow that was once occupied
by Trump. According to the indict-ment, Danchenko falsely told
Steele and the FBI that the infor-
mation came from the president
of the U.S. Russian-American
Chamber of Commerce at the
time. The indictment doesn’t
identify that person, but people
familiar with the case have previ-
ously said it is Sergei Millian.
Dolan and another witness told
investigators there was no men-
tion of anything inappropriate on
the suite tour, the indictment says.
Dolan was Danchenko’s source
for a part of the dossier on ten-
sions within the Trump campaign,
according to the indictment,
which says Dolan told investiga-
tors he claimed to get the intelli-
gence from a Republican friend
but actually based it on public
news reports. Someone working
with Danchenko also spoke with
Dolan about changes in the Rus-
sian government that were reflect-
ed in the dossier, according to the
court records. A 2019 report by the
Justice Department inspector
general also found major prob-
lems with the accuracy of
Danchenko’s information. The al-
legations cast new uncertainty on
some past reporting on the dossier
by news organizations, including
The Washington Post.
Durham has also brought a case
against a Democratic attorney, ac-
cusing him of falsely claiming
when he spoke to the FBI that he
was not doing so on behalf of
Clinton’s 2016 campaign.
[email protected]Devlin Barrett contributed to this
report.Man pleads not guilty in dossier case
Analyst denies lying to
FBI in probe of potential
Trump ties to RussiaIF YOU PURCHASED A MOLEKULE AIR PURIFIER
FROM A THIRD PARTY SELLER ON OR BEFORE OCTOBER 12, 2021,
A CLASS ACTION SETTLEMENT MAY AFFECT YOUR RIGHTS.
A proposed class action settlement has been reached in a case called Apaliski, et al. v. Molekule, Inc., No. 1:20-cv-01548-RGA, pending in
the United States District Court for the District of Delaware. In the lawsuit, Plaintiffs allege that Molekule, in its advertising, made a series
of material representations about the nature and efficacy of its Air Purifiers (namely, the Molekule Air, Molekule Air Pro, Molekule Air
Mini, the Molekule Air Mini+, and/or the Molekule Air Pro Rx). These include that the Air Purifiers (1) outperform HEPA filters in every
category of pollutant; (2) eradicate the full spectrum of indoor air pollutants; (3) provide allergy and asthma symptom relief; (4) combat
unhealthy levels of wildfire smoke by destroying airborne pollutants; and (5) that the representations were verified by extensive independent
testing. The Lawsuit alleges that this advertising was false and misleading. Molekule denies all of Plaintiffs’ Allegations and maintains that
its Advertising has been accurate at all times and supported by testing conducted by independent laboratories.
If the settlement is approved and you are a Class Member, you may be eligible to receive a Cash Payment and Coupon. Yo u are a Class
Member if you purchased an Air Purifier from a third-party seller such as Amazon, b8ta, Best Buy, MoMa Design Store NYC, and Sprout
before October 12, 2021 and, as of October 12, 2021, had not agreed to the arbitration provision in Molekule’s Terms & Conditions. Based
on the estimated class size and value of the settlement, the average net amount in cash Settlement Class Members would receive from the
Settlement if they purchased one Air Purifier is $43.80.
To obtain a Cash Payment and Coupon, you must submit a valid, signed Claim Form. Claim Forms are available on the Settlement Website
at http://www.airpurifiersettlement.com. Yo u can submit the Claim Form online, or you can mail it to the Claim Administrator at: Air Purifier
Settlement, c/o RG/2 Claims Administration LLC, P. O. Box 59479, Philadelphia, PA 19102-9479. Claim Forms must be submitted online or
delivered to, and received by, the Claim Administrator by 11:59 p.m. Pacific Time on May 31, 2022.
Yo ur options are to make a Claim, Object, Opt Out, or do nothing. In most circumstances, to receive a Cash Payment and Coupon, you
must submit a Claim, online or by mail, by May 31, 2022. If you Opt Out of the Settlement, you may pursue a separate lawsuit, but you will
receive no payment and cannot object to the Settlement. Yo ur Opt-Out request must be submitted online or postmarked by December 17,- If you do not Opt Out, you give up your right to bring a separate lawsuit. To Object, you must submit a written Objection that complies
with the requirements in the applicable Settlement Notice available at http://www.airpurifersettlement.com. Yo ur Objection must be filed with the
Court by December 17, 2021, with a copy sent to Class Counsel, listed below. Do nothing, and you will not receive a payment and you will
release claims against Defendant that relate to the Allegations in the lawsuit. Please see the Settlement Website at http://www.airpurifiersettlement.
com for more details for submitting an objection or opt-out request.
The Court will hold a Final Approval Hearing on January 7, 2022 to consider whether to approve the Settlement. The hearing will be held
in the United States District Court of the District of Delaware, and/or virtually, before Judge Richard G. Andrews at the J. Caleb Boggs
Federal Building, 844 N. King St., 6A, Wilmington, DE 19801-3555. This hearing date and location may change without further notice
to you. Consult the Settlement Website at http://www.airpurifiersettlement.com for updated information on the hearing date, time, and location.
The Court will decide whether to approve the Settlement and whether to award Attorneys’ Fees and Expenses of up to $410,000 in cash and
Service Awards of up to $5,000 in cash to each Plaintiff. The motion for Attorneys’ Fees and Expenses and Service Awards will be posted on
http://www.airpurifersettlement.com after it is filed. Yo u may, but don’t have to, attend the hearing. Cash Payments and Coupons will be issued to
Settlement Class Members only if the Settlement is approved and after any Objections are resolved. Please be patient.
For more information, visit http://www.airpurifiersettlement.com or contact the Claim Administrator at Air Purifier Settlement, c/o RG/2 Claims
Administration LLC, P. O. Box 59479, Philadelphia, PA 19102-9479 / Tel: 1-866-742-4955 / email: [email protected]. Yo u can also
obtain additional information by contacting Class Counsel at: Jason S. Rathod, Migliaccio & Rathod LLP, 412 H St NE, Washington DC
20002 / Tel: (202) 470-3520, email: [email protected].
PLEASE DO NOT CONTACT DEFENDANT OR THE COURT TO INQUIRE ABOUT THE SETTLEMENT.
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