
Cigarette sales went up for the first time in 20 years during the pandemic
CNN
We all had to find our own ways to cope with the pandemic lockdowns last year. Some people bought Pelotons and baked bread. Others took a slightly less healthy route.
Cigarette sales in America last year rose for the first time in two decades, a new report from the Federal Trade Commission says. It was a only a slight 0.4% increase — the total number of cigarettes sold to wholesalers and retailers nationwide increased by about 8 million, from 202.9 billion in 2019 to 203.7 billion in 2020.
But it marks a surprise reversal of a long-running downward trend.

Botched Epstein redactions trace back to Virgin Islands’ 2020 civil racketeering case against estate
A botched redaction in the Epstein files revealed that government attorneys once accused his lawyers of paying over $400,000 to “young female models and actresses” to cover up his criminal activities

The Justice Department’s leadership asked career prosecutors in Florida Tuesday to volunteer over the “next several days” to help to redact the Epstein files, in the latest internal Trump administrationpush toward releasing the hundreds of thousands of photos, internal memos and other evidence around the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

The US State Department on Tuesday imposed visa sanctions on a former top European Union official and employees of organizations that combat disinformation for alleged censorship – sharply ratcheting up the Trump administration’s fight against European regulations that have impacted digital platforms, far-right politicians and Trump allies, including Elon Musk.










