--:-- Shamita Basu: Good morning. It's Tuesday, February 22nd. That's 2-22-22. Very special date. We'll talk about it more later on in the show.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: I'm Shamita Basu. And I'm Duarte Giraldino. This is Apple News Today. Each morning, hear about some of the most fascinating stories in the news and how the world's best journalists are covering them.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Russian President Vladimir Putin has ordered troops into two breakaway regions of eastern Ukraine. He also recognized their independence from Ukraine. Putin announced the move in a made-for-TV speech. On camera, he sat with his top advisers and asked anyone who disagreed to speak up. They were all silent.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: The White House has promised new sanctions, though these sanctions don't go as far as the ones President Biden had promised if Russia were to launch a full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
--:-- Shamita Basu: We're in a moment where it's important to understand how this is so much bigger than Ukraine. As the Wall Street Journal puts it, Putin's goal is to renegotiate the end of the Cold War. Ukraine may be the current field where this is playing out, but it's not the whole ballgame.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: This piece looks at recent world history as well as Putin's personal history to understand what may be driving him to play such a risky bet by confronting the U.S.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Maybe the most important explainer in this piece is the map, which you can see on the Apple News app. You see, Putin sees NATO as a tool of American power. This map shows all the countries that joined NATO after 1990. And you can see how NATO's reach kept getting closer and closer to Russia, including signing up countries right on its border.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: The buffer zone of the Cold War was shrinking. Putin didn't want it to get smaller if Ukraine joins NATO. And he's been willing to move armies to make his point to Biden. He's called the Soviet Union's collapse the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century. Think about what that says about his mentality.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Understand that and you can see why he willing to provoke America. The goal seems to be to redraw the map on Cold War lines or at least stop things from going further.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: The journal digs into Putin's resume for more insight. Near the end of the Cold War, he was a KGB operative in what was once known as East Germany. He was pulled back to the Soviet Union just in time to see it collapse. He saw power built over decades shrink, both inside and outside Russia.
--:-- Shamita Basu: He couldn't do much about it then, but he seems to think he can now.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: The U.S. Soccer Federation and dozens of women's national team players have reached a settlement in their equal pay lawsuit. The total is $24 million.
--:-- Shamita Basu: This comes after years in court. ESPN reports once this is finalized, the bulk of the settlement money will go to the athletes. And $2 million is earmarked for players' post-career goals and charities related to women's and girls' soccer.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: The U.S. Soccer Federation is also committed to equal pay for the women's and men's teams in tournaments, including the World Cup. Previously, a World Cup win could earn a man around four times more than a woman.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Megan Rapinoe told ESPN, this is a monumental win for women's sports.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: You can read more about this in the Apple News app.
--:-- Shamita Basu: The first primary of the 2022 midterms is just a week from today in Texas. Votes by mail are already coming in, but local election officials say thousands of people may not have their votes counted this year.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: That's because of a new Republican-backed law that requires mail-in voters cite the same ID they used when they registered to vote.
--:-- Shamita Basu: On the surface, that may not seem like a huge complication, but in practice, it really is.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: So far, thousands of would-be voters have put the wrong form of ID down. An elections administrator explains it this way.
--:-- [Audio clip of an elections administrator speaking]
--:-- Shamita Basu: Let's say you registered to vote 20, 30 years ago using your social security number. Well, now, in Texas, if you try to use your driver's license number for your mail-in ballot, that might cause problems.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: It's a perfectly valid form of ID but it doesn't match the one you use to register. So you could get flagged for rejection.
--:-- Shamita Basu: NBC News reports in Texas' largest county, Harris County, 35 percent of mail ballots were flagged for rejection. In El Paso County, it's around 50 percent. Those are unusually high rates.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: Opponents of the strict new rules say they'll disproportionately hurt people of color. One elections administrator tells NBC that so far it seems to be affecting older voters the most.
--:-- [Audio clip of an elections administrator speaking]
--:-- Shamita Basu: 85% of ballot-by-mail voters are over 65 years old.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: Now, there's still time for voters to fix the errors, but historical data shows the number of ballot errors that get fixed in time for these votes to be counted is very low.
--:-- Shamita Basu: And this means the electoral voice of many Texas voters may be lost in the mail.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: When a large corporation inflicts damage on the environment, it can be really hard for people who are affected by it to sue and win. They're up against the power of a huge company and its army of lawyers.
--:-- Shamita Basu: But now, something different is starting to happen. Investors are stepping in to bankroll some of these types of lawsuits. They see the potential to make huge profits by helping low-income people sue companies.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: Luca de Paoli reported this story for Bloomberg Businessweek. He writes about a lawsuit over an environmental disaster in Brazil.
--:-- Shamita Basu: In 2015, a mining company's dam collapsed. The flood killed 19 people and the resulting pollution devastated the indigenous community there. 200,000 people are suing the company, BHP, for $7 billion.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: Bloomberg spoke to one of these people, Anderson Krenak. He says it's not just about the money. He wants to send a message that it's unacceptable to damage the natural world.
--:-- Shamita Basu: And as de Paoli explains, the financial and legal muscle to wage that fight is coming from an ocean away.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: We just thought that that was kind of weird that you had sort of fund managers in London working together with people like Anderson Krenak in Brazil to take on sort of large mining companies.
--:-- Shamita Basu: And we just thought that was super interesting. The investors take care of the legal fees in exchange for a cut of the settlement.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: As DiPaoli puts it, part of the draw for these investors is that more and more potential clients are eager to back ventures that are seen as environmentally positive.
--:-- Shamita Basu: The managers who invest in them believe that this can possibly aid their returns if they're investing something which can be seen to be a social good.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: So the investors stand to make money and maybe look like good guys. Though DePauli makes it clear, this is ultimately about making money.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Still, it does help to be seen as being on the right side of history. So, you know, whether they're sort of Erin Brockovich, I don't know. But they are funding people who I think might regard themselves as more like Erin Brockovich.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: The mining company in the Brazil case has said the lawsuit is unnecessary because there are other legal proceedings and it's setting up a compensation fund.
--:-- Shamita Basu: The case could go on for years. And if the indigenous people win, it won't just be a victory for them. It'll also be a payday for wealthy investors backing the suit.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: OK, finally, we promised we would talk about today's date. It is 2-22-22, all twos on a Tuesday.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Now, The Washington Post reports on how people are reacting. Many couples see this as an auspicious day to get married. In Vegas, they are bracing for a record-breaking day.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: The previous record was for the date 7-7-2007. And it's all too cute to bear, right?
--:-- Shamita Basu: Now, many people also see today as a lucky day. It's unique, so maybe it's got something special about it.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: The post profile is a pregnant woman whose original due date was later this month, but the doctor recommended scheduling a C-section. So she plans to deliver today.
--:-- Shamita Basu: And if you love palindromes, boy, you're going to love this. NBC Chicago points out we're going to have plenty of palindrome dates this month.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: Tomorrow is 2-23-22, the same backwards and forwards. And so are all of the days in the rest of February.
--:-- Shamita Basu: You can read more about all the unusual ways people are marking this day in the full story on the Apple News app, along with all the stories we talked about today.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: There's also coverage of the extreme winter weather hitting a lot of the country this week. Keep an eye on that so you can stay warm and safe.
--:-- Shamita Basu: And when you're in the app, keep listening to hear narrated articles from our News Plus partners.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: We'll talk to you again tomorrow. Thank you.
