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Pressuring Maduro, passing the torch and crowd-size conspiracies

 
Today's INTERNATIONAL story

US, Venezuelan opposition press Maduro to concede

What happened
The Biden administration has offered Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro amnesty in exchange for giving up power as "overwhelming evidence emerges" he lost last month's election, The Wall Street Journal said Sunday. Official ballot tallies collected by the opposition show that its candidate Edmundo González beat Maduro in a landslide in the July 28 election. Maduro, whose loyalist-stacked electoral commission declared him the winner without releasing required evidence, has cracked down on dissent, arresting opposition party officials and trying to steer Venezuelans from getting information through WhatsApp and X.

Who said what
The White House has put "everything on the table" in secret negotiations to persuade Maduro to step down, a person familiar with the talks told the Journal. "International action may be the only avenue to force out Maduro," and the U.S. attempt to offer him a "face-saving option dovetails with the opposition's strategy," the newspaper said, but the Venezuelan leader's "total grip on power stacks the odds against the Biden administration" and other Latin American countries trying to resolve the standoff.

"Don't mess with Venezuela's internal affairs," Maduro said to the U.S. in a news conference Friday. A National Security Council spokesperson told the Journal the U.S. was "considering a range of options to incentivize and pressure Maduro to recognize the election results," but "the responsibility is on Maduro and Venezuela's electoral authorities to come clean" on the legitimate vote tally.

What next?
Opposition leader Maria Corina Machado on Sunday called for August 17 to be an international day of protest "to support our victory and recognize truth and popular sovereignty." The U.S. and opposition have "five months before Venezuela's presidential inauguration to pull off a deal," the Journal said.

 
 
Today's CULTURE story

Stars help close out Paris Olympics, hand off to LA

What happened
Tom Cruise and Billie Eilish helped draw a close to the 2024 Paris Olympics on Sunday night. The star-packed closing ceremony highlighted French artistry and included Cruise descending from the roof of the Stade de France and riding out carrying the Olympic flag toward Los Angeles, host of the 2028 Summer Olympics.

Who said what
France "closed out its 2024 Games just as they started — with joy and panache," The Associated Press said. Los Angeles will have a challenge topping Paris, which made "spectacular use of its cityscape," but "the City of Angels, like the City of Light, showed that it, too, holds some aces."

Cruise's "Mission: Impossible" stunt ended with a prerecorded video of the actor skydiving into Hollywood and a Venice Beach concert featuring Eilish, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Snoop Dogg and Dr. Dre. The French band Phoenix played in the stadium and gold medal swimmer Léon Marchand brought the Games to an end by blowing out the Olympic flame.

What next?
The U.S. finished the Olympics tied with China tied in gold medals — 40 each — but holding a 126-91 lead for total medals. The Paralympics begin on August 28.

 
 
Today's Politics Story

Trump protests Harris crowd sizes, fact-checks

What happened
Donald Trump on Sunday falsely claimed that his Democratic opponent Kamala Harris digitally manipulated photos of her recent Detroit rally to make the crowd, estimated at 15,000, look larger.

Who said what
"Kamala CHEATED" and "'A.I.'d'" a photo of a crowd greeting her airplane, Trump wrote in one of several Truth Social posts on the subject. "She had NOBODY waiting, and the 'crowd' looked like 10,000 people! Same thing is happening with her fake 'crowds' at her speeches." Trump "appeared to have fallen for a far-right conspiracy theory — one easily disproved by photos and videos captured by attendees and media," CNN said. 

Trump also threatened to sue The New York Times for disputing a story he told Thursday about an emergency helicopter landing with former San Francisco mayor Willie Brown in the 1990s. Brown said that never happened, and the Times suggested Trump was remembering an uneventful 2018 helicopter ride with former California Gov. Jerry Brown. But former Los Angeles city councilor Nate Holden told Politico late Friday it was him in the emergency landing with Trump, in 1990. A former Trump employee confirmed Holden's story. "Willie is the short Black guy living in San Francisco," Holden said. "I'm a tall Black guy living in Los Angeles."

What next?
The Harris campaign has "begun to mock" Trump for his "obsession with the large crowds" she's drawing, the Times said.

 
 

It's not all bad

If you want to see a late-night astronomical spectacle, look up on the night of August 12 through dawn on August 13, when the annual Perseid meteor shower will peak. Up to 150 shooting stars an hour will be visible in the Northern Hemisphere, with the best viewing conditions in dark-sky areas. The meteors originate from debris left by Comet 109P/Swift-Tuttle and now radiate between the constellations Cassiopeia and Camelopardalis.

 
 
Under the radar

"We welcome our guests if they don't come with guns," said a Ukrainian tourism chief after the nation's travel industry brought in more taxes in the first half of this year than in pre-war 2021. Officially, Ukraine is "planning for post-war tourism," said The Independent. But visitor numbers are already ticking up, said The Times, and there is growing "disquiet" over "war tourism" and the "commercialization of tragedy."

When people think about Ukraine it is "maybe about bravery, about war, about destruction," Mariana Oleskiv, chair of Ukraine's State Agency for Tourism Development, told The Independent, but only "about 20% or 30% of territory" is occupied. The rest is "all right" and "very beautiful," she said, though it's probably better for tourists to put off their visits until the war is over.

"We are not inviting anybody now because of many reasons," said Oleskiv, including that logistics are "very complicated" and "insurance companies do not cover risks in Ukraine." The tourism board is also not interested in "dark tourism," she added, but visitors from abroad are already coming back and a lot of it is for war tours. 

"Guided excursions around the sites of Russia's war crimes" are "big business," said The Times, with weeklong "war tour" packages covering de-occupied areas of Ukraine selling for more than $3,800. Some locals "balk" at the idea of individuals "profiteering in a town where some people lost everything," said The Times. But war tours are "not the only draw," and in cities of "relative safety" local authorities are "gradually welcoming visitors back," with numbers up 37% on last year.

 
 
On this day

August 12, 1908

The first Model T automobile was constructed at the Ford Motor Company's plant in Detroit, Michigan. The Model T is generally considered the first car that was available to the masses. Ford remains one of the world's largest car companies. Earlier this month it unveiled an electric bike inspired by its classic Mustang.

 
 
TODAY'S newspaperS

Monday's newspapers mostly lead with the star-studded finale of the 2024 Paris Olympics. "French officials went for the gold with an ambitious Olympic plan — and mostly succeeded" in "sticking the landing," The Washington Post says. The closing ceremony was a "five-ringed final spectacle," The Boston Globe says; USA Today calls it a "farewell with a flourish," while The New York Times goes with "a glittering goodbye." After the Paris handoff to the 2028 host city, "the flag's in Los Angeles' hands now," the Los Angeles Times says.  

► See the newspaper front pages

 
 
Tall tale

A good egg

A Scottish woman who found a round egg in her grocery order put the rarity up for auction. Round eggs are thought to be a "one in a billion" occurrence and previous auctions saw similar items sell for as much as $610, said David Miller, auction manager at Thomson Roddick Callan. The egg, which was part of a $2.50 carton of 15, ended up fetching $191 at auction late last week.

 
 

Morning Report was written and edited by Theara Coleman, Nadia Croes, Catherine Garcia, Scott Hocker, Anya Jaremko-Greenwold, Justin Klawans, Chas Newkey-Burden, Devika Rao, Rafi Schwartz and Peter Weber, with illustrations by Stephen Kelly and Julia Wytrazek.

Image credits, from top: Pedro Rances Mattey / Anadolu via Getty Images; Jamie Squire / Getty Images; Demetrius Freeman / The Washington Post via Getty Images; Erin Clark / The Boston Globe via Getty Images