10 things you need to know today: January 13, 2016

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1. Obama calls for resisting fears in final State of the Union address
2. Iran captures crews of two small U.S. Navy boats
3. Bernie Sanders takes first Iowa polling lead over Hillary Clinton
4. Nikki Haley takes aim at Obama and Republicans in GOP State of the Union response
5. Germany eases deportation rules as assaults stoke anti-immigrant sentiment
6. NFL owners vote to allow Rams, and possibly Chargers, move to L.A.
7. Supreme Court strikes down Florida's death-penalty sentencing system
8. Philadelphia newspaper owner donates publications to nonprofit
9. Steven Avery files new appeal claiming jury was tainted
10. Powerball jackpot reaches unprecedented $1.5 billion

published 13 January 2016

1. Obama calls for resisting fears in final State of the Union address

In his final State of the Union address Tuesday night President Obama called on Americans to overcome fear and partisan rancor and embrace an optimistic vision for the nation's future. Obama made a thinly veiled reference to GOP presidential frontrunner Donald Trump, who called for barring Muslims from entering the U.S. after the Paris terror attacks. The president urged Americans to resist voices trying to "scapegoat fellow citizens who don't look like us, or pray like us, or vote like we do." Obama also outlined remaining priorities, such as promoting trade and finding a cancer cure, and called on lawmakers to "fix our politics."

Iran said early Wednesday that it had released two 38-foot U.S. Navy boats and their 10 crew members after accusing them of trespassing in Iranian waters. The Pentagon said one of the boats experienced mechanical problems en route from Bahrain to Kuwait before the vessels were seized. Iran said it accepted the U.S. explanation and apology. The incident came at a tense moment, with the formal enactment of a nuclear deal looming.

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A poll released Tuesday showed Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) pulling ahead of Hillary Clinton in Iowa, 49 percent to 44 percent. The shift — a 9-point gain for Sanders and a 7-point drop for Clinton — came three weeks before the Iowa caucuses, the first prize in the presidential primaries. Sanders also now leads by 14 percentage points in early-voting New Hampshire, according to a new Monmouth University poll. Another poll found that Clinton's national lead among Democratic primary voters has dwindled, too.

South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley blamed President Obama for the national debt and "unrest in many of our cities" Tuesday night in the Republican response to Obama's seventh and final State of the Union address. She also took aim at her own party, taking what many perceived as a jab at Donald Trump by urging Americans to resist "the siren call of the angriest voices." GOP reaction was mixed. Jeb Bush praised Haley's "clear vision for a brighter future," but conservative CNN commentator Amanda Carpenter tweeted that she could have done without the "GOP self-loathing."

Germany plans to "significantly lower the hurdles" to deporting criminal foreigners following New Year's Eve assaults by crowds of mostly North African and Middle Eastern immigrants in Cologne, Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere said Tuesday. So far, 553 criminal complaints have been filed over the incidents. About 45 percent involve sexual offenses. The response came as Cologne officials said a group of Pakistanis and a Syrian were attacked, and as angry protesters in Leipzig waved signs saying "RAPEfugees" were not welcome.

On Tuesday National Football League owners voted 30-2 to let the St. Louis Rams move back to Los Angeles for the 2016 season. The team, which played in L.A. for decades before moving to St. Louis in 1995, will eventually play in a new stadium on the site of the old Hollywood Park racetrack in Inglewood. The stadium will be the league's biggest. It is projected to be completed in 2019 for $3 billion. The owners also gave the San Diego Chargers the option of moving to the Inglewood stadium.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that Florida's system of letting judges, not juries, make sentencing decisions in death penalty cases is unconstitutional. Florida is the only state with such a system. "The 6th Amendment requires a jury, not a judge, to find each fact necessary to impose a sentence of death," Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote for the majority. Florida has nearly 400 prisoners on death row, but most will not be affected by the ruling because their appeals have been exhausted, or the aggravating circumstances in their cases are indisputable.

The owner of the Philadelphia Inquirer, Philadelphia Daily News, and Philly.com announced Tuesday that he was donating the publications and their parent company, Philadelphia Media Network, to a new nonprofit institute. Philanthropist H.F. "Gerry" Lenfest, 85, the company for $88 million in a 2014 auction, and plans to contribute $20 million to the new nonprofit, the Institute for Journalism in New Media. It will now be up to the institute's board to help the struggling publications survive. Philly.com writer Jeff Gammage said the rare arrangement is "no quick fix."

Steven Avery, whose murder conviction was examined in the wildly popular documentary Making a Murderer, has filed another appeal in which says a biased juror bullied the rest of the panel into finding him guilty. Avery was sentenced to life in prison with no chance of early release for the 2005 murder of Teresa Halbach. The case has generated a fresh wave of publicity since the film's December release on Netflix. Avery, who was representing himself when he filed the appeal, last week secured a powerful new defense team. His original defense team said local law enforcement officials planted key evidence to convict Avery, who had already served 18 years for a wrongful sexual assault conviction.

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Harold Maass is a contributing editor at The Week. He has been writing for The Week since the 2001 debut of the U.S. print edition and served as editor of TheWeek.com when it launched in 2008. Harold started his career as a newspaper reporter in South Florida and Haiti. He has previously worked for a variety of news outlets, including The Miami Herald, ABC News and Fox News, and for several years wrote a daily roundup of financial news for The Week and Yahoo Finance.