The Danville Pittsylvania County Regional Industrial Facility Authority will vote on a performance agreement this week for a company that plans to move into the Southern Virginia Megasite at Berry Hill. The company has not been named, but they are planning to spend $1.3 billion on the investment. The company is planning to bring over 2,000 jobs to the site and the average salary of those jobs is projected to be over $58,000 a year.
Governor Glenn Youngkin is slated to be in attendance for the announcement on Wednesday morning at 11 a.m.
Doug Mills/The New York Times/Bloomberg via Getty Images
(WASHINGTON) — Voters across the country tuned in to the ABC News presidential debate on Tuesday night to see Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump discuss issues and share their visions for the country.
Many were looking to see how Harris defined herself on the debate stage, especially given that she entered the race relatively late as a presidential candidate.
Some undecided or formerly undecided voters spoke with ABC News both before and after the debate.
Before the debate, they shared what they were hoping to see — and after, if they thought Harris made the case for herself as a presidential candidate as well as their thoughts a potential second debate between Trump and Harris. These voters also previously spoke with ABC News earlier in the election cycle, including before President Joe Biden dropped out of the race.
Patrick O’Rourke, a retired scientist and independent voter from Georgia, said ahead of the debate that he did not trust Harris to be a “unifier” for the country.
“If I can force myself to vote for VP Harris, it will be with the hope of [split-party control between the presidency and Congress] … I hope for a president who can respect the constitution and earn the respect of our country,” he told ABC News by text.
At 10:09 p.m. ET, as the debate was still on air, he texted ABC News that he had turned off the debate.
“Former President Trump has forced me into voting for VP Harris,” he said. The reasons: because of how Trump discussed Ashli Babbit — a Trump supporter who was fatally shot during the Jan. 6, 2021, attacks on the U.S. Capitol — whom the former president said “was shot by an out-of-control police officer;” and after Trump promoted being endorsed by Hungarian leader Viktor Orban, who is considered an authoritarian leader.
That doesn’t mean he thinks Harris made a strong positive case or defined herself enough, though.
Asked how he felt about her performance, O’Rourke said, “Still don’t know who she is other than not Donald Trump. Right now, that’s enough.”
Many voters feel they could benefit from more information about Harris and her platforms. A recent New York Times/Siena College poll found that 28% of likely voters said they feel they need to still learn more about Harris, while only 9% of likely voters felt that way about Trump.
O’Rourke said on Wednesday morning that he’s also not interested in another debate.
“One is enough for this cycle. I do not need to see another debate … I don’t need the candidates telling me what the other one’s policies are,” O’Rourke said.
But he said he’d like to see interviews with the candidates where they talk about economic policy, foreign affairs and civil justice priorities.
Rebecca Bakker, a registered nursing professor who lives near Grand Rapids, Michigan, told ABC News by text ahead of the debate that she was still undecided — although she had said beforehand she was not supporting Trump.
She was hoping to hear Harris “drill down on a clear economic message,” as well as clarity from her on how she would solve foreign policy and border issues.
Bakker told ABC News after the debate that the showing solidified her decision to not vote for Trump, who did not come across to her as “presidential” or as outlining clear policies.
“I think Harris did a great job to bait him so he [would] unravel during the debate and this worked to her advantage,” she said by text, but she felt Harris was still a bit “murky” on how her positions on some issues have changed.
“I remain undecided- she didn’t sway me enough (yet) to vote for her but for sure [Trump] swayed me enough NOT to vote for him,” Bakker wrote.
Bakker said she would like another debate to see if either candidate “reframes their narrative to address specifics on policies without ‘one of them’ losing focus and returning to childish behavior,” she wrote, adding she wants to see Harris discuss the economy and border issues more directly.
“So far, I don’t have a clear idea of her plan to address these areas.”
Karen Hughes, an independent voter and retired parole and probation specialist from Nevada, had previously been undecided but had decided to begrudgingly vote for Biden before he left the race in July. Ahead of the debate, Hughes told ABC News by text she was “hoping to see some policy discussions tonight. I’m interested in hearing Trump’s (final) position on abortion, and Harris’s explanation for why she won’t ban fracking.”
The debate affirmed her choice to vote for Harris, Hughes said on Wednesday, as she felt Harris “presents as competent, positive, and very sure of herself. I felt she knew exactly to get into Trump’s head and he fell for it every time,” Hughes said — although she said she felt Harris was still unclear about the shift in her position on fracking. Hughes also criticized Trump’s invocation of “wild conspiracy theories.”
But she’s not looking for another debate: “I think this one was good enough.”
Ian Mackintosh, a voter from Pennsylvania who lives in the Pittsburgh area, also said he hoped ahead of the debate to hear about policy. On Wednesday, he told ABC News by text, “Honestly, I thought it was a complete waste of 90 minutes. If anything, it moved me away from both candidates.”
While he said he understands the challenges of going in depth on complex policy stances in two minutes, it “could have been more substantial” with “less baiting and intentionally riling up the other candidate.”
Mackintosh said he is also disillusioned by Harris’ stance on Israel and Gaza, which he feels is the same as Biden’s.
He said he would not be interested in watching a second debate, and added, “After last night’s debacle I will probably only vote down-ballot.”
Brendan Fitzsimmons, a physician from Wyoming who is a Republican but does not support Trump, told ABC News by text before the debate that he did not expect much from the candidates, “although I would enjoy it if there is a lot of entertainment to it,” he said.
Fitzsimmons admitted that going into the debate, he didn’t feel sold on Harris: “I think she’ll be a terrible president, but I hope she wins,” calling her the “lesser of two evils.”
The morning after the debate, Fitzsimmons said the night changed how he was feeling about Harris.
“I enjoyed the debate and I thought they were both fairly strong, but all in all, Harris was stronger and won the debate and I think showed to a lot of people that she can be president … I am very concerned about foreign affairs, and I think she may be OK in that way,” he told ABC News by text.
Matthew Labkovski, a Republican voter from Florida who supported former United Nations ambassador Nikki Haley during the Republican presidential primaries, told ABC News by text before the debate that he hoped to see the candidates discuss policy, and not engage in personal attacks. He said Tuesday evening that he was currently not planning on voting for president.
After the debate, Labkovski said on Wednesday, “I think it actually convinced me not to vote for Donald Trump. All I saw was fear mongering from him and what seemed to be a stretching of the truth,” he said, particularly when it came to Trump’s false claims about abortion and about a false conspiracy theory over immigrants eating pets.
“I am still not convinced though with Harris, as I didn’t get enough policy with her in this debate. To be honest, I would love another debate to see if I was actually comfortable in voting for her,” he said.
Labkovski also criticized Harris’ laughter during the debate, saying that he wished she had remained more even-keeled.
He added that he would have liked her to discuss how she would implement the policies she was talking about.
“How is she going to fight inflation? How is she going to bring peace? That’s what I was hoping the debate would bring … I needed more from her to actually sway from not voting in the presidential slot.”
(NEW YORK) — Instagram this week unveiled mandatory accounts for teens that bolster privacy protections, enable parental supervision, and restrict notifications during overnight hours.
New and existing users under the age of 18 will be automatically enrolled in what Instagram is calling “Teen Accounts,” the company said.
The move comes 16 months after U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy warned in an advisory that excessive social media could pose a “profound risk” to the mental health of children. Instagram also has faced pressure from some federal and state lawmakers seeking to regulate social media use among children and teens.
Experts who spoke to ABC News differed about whether Meta’s new restrictions for teen users would effectively mitigate the risks that young Instagram users face.
Some experts applauded the guardrails as a meaningful, though insufficient, step toward preventing teen harm. Others said the absence of robust age verification account measures would allow young users to circumvent the rules, rendering the new settings largely pointless.
In response to an ABC News request for comment, Meta said the company is expanding its efforts to verify the age of teen users.
“We’re requiring teens to verify their age in new ways. For example, if they attempt to create a new account with an adult birthday, we will require them to verify their age in order to use the account,” Meta spokesperson Dani Lever told ABC News.
“We also want to do more to proactively find accounts belonging to teens, even if the account lists an adult birthday. We’re building technology to proactively find these teens and place them in the same protections offered by Teen Account settings,” Lever added.
One expert said the restrictions also risk going too far, potentially limiting the free expression of teens and subjecting them to the control of parents with whom they may disagree about fundamental aspects of their identity.
“We need to be conscientious about the content that platforms are showing kids and how that can shape offline attitudes and behaviors,” Jon-Patrick Allem, a professor of public health at Rutgers University, told ABC News.
Allem added that he is reserving judgment until the changes receive further examination.
The new Teen Accounts were announced by Instagram head Adam Mosseri in a live interview Tuesday on ABC News’ Good Morning America.
“They’re an automatic set of protections for teens that try to proactively address the top concerns that we’ve heard from parents about teens online,” Mosseri told GMA. “Things like who can contact them, what content they see and how much time they spend on their device … all without requiring any involvement from the parent.”
New teen users will automatically be enrolled in Teen Accounts, while existing teen users will see their accounts switch to the new model within 60 days, Mosseri said on GMA.
The new accounts will place users under 18 years old into a private account by default, the company said, while users under age 16 will require parental permission to switch over to a public account. Under the private account setting, teens will need to specifically accept new followers, and only those followers will be able to see their content and interact with them.
With the new accounts, teens also will have the power to choose the age-appropriate topics they want to see more of on Instagram, like sports or art, and parents will also be able to see the topics their teens choose, according to Instagram.
Jonathan Haidt, a social psychologist at New York University and author of The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness, offered lukewarm praise for the restrictions in a post on X on Tuesday.
“I am cautiously optimistic about Meta’s new teen accounts,” Haidt said. “Most of the problems with social media will still plague teens on Instagram. But this is a good start, and I hope it is just the first of many steps from Meta.”
Paul Barrett, a professor at New York University Law School and deputy director of the NYU Stern Center for Business and Human Rights, acknowledged that some of the Instagram changes would alleviate harm endured by teens on the platform. However, he added that the move would likely have little impact in the absence of better age verification measures to ensure that teens enroll in the Teen Accounts.
“This points in the right direction,” Barrett told ABC News. But, he added: “None of this is very meaningful until the company does something about age and identity verification. All of the other requirements become ineffective if kids just pretend that they’re adults.”
At least one expert said the changes risk causing some harm by putting too many restrictions on teen Instagram users. For instance, a child’s parents may have different views about fundamental questions of identity, such as whether one should believe in god, Eric Goldman, a professor at Santa Clara University School of Law who studies content moderation, told ABC News. The increased parental supervision in the new accounts could enable such parents to limit their child’s personal growth, he added.
“Parents might have norms about certain behavior for their children,” Goldman said. “This might take away self-expression and self-exploration.”
In general, some children would likely benefit from the changes, while others would suffer harm, he added.
“Groups of children have different needs,” Goldman said. “If it’s a one-size-fits-all solution, some children are likely to benefit and others are likely to be harmed,” though he added that Instagram has the right to make changes that it deems appropriate.
In response to such criticism, Meta said the company worked with relevant stakeholders to strike a balance between user experience and parental involvement.
“We consulted with parents, teens, and experts throughout the process of building Teen Accounts. With these changes, parents decide if teens under 16 can change the built-in settings,” said Lever, of Meta. “This allows teens to use social media to connect with friends, explore and discover, while giving parents peace of mind that their teens have the right protections in place.”
“If Instagram is adopting this because they think it’s the best for users, I support their freedom to set the policies and approach that is right for them,” Goldman said.
