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Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) is pushing bigotry and lies in a recent mailer his campaign sent out to voters ahead of next week’s midterm elections.

The mailer attacks DeSantis’ Democratic challenger, Charlie Crist, using a slew of misinformation, including that President Joe Biden’s student loan plan will force “hard working Floridians to pay back student loans for degrees like Gender Studies and French Poetry.” The mailer, which a Fort Lauderdale resident shared with HuffPost, shows a photo of Crist and Biden embracing, above a line that reads: “The Biden-Crist College Loan Bailout will: Make inflation worse; Punish hard-working taxpayers; Reward universities.” 

The flier also includes a photo of a student wearing makeup during their graduation ceremony. A speech bubble drawn over their head shows the student saying: “Thank you, Joe Biden and Charlie Crist, for making Floridians pay off my student debt.” The photo appears to be a stock image of a nonbinary student at a graduation.

A mailer sent from the DeSantis campaign to Florida voters.

A stock photo from Getty of a nonbinary student graduating.

Neither DeSantis’ office or the Republican Party of Florida immediately responded to HuffPost’s request for comment.

DeSantis is likely to win the governor’s race, boasting a nearly 10% lead in polls ahead of Crist. Some, including Crist and Biden, have criticized DeSantis for running for reelection when it is well known he will likely run for president in 2024.

Anti-LGBTQ rhetoric is nothing new for DeSantis, who has made his name on culture wars that dehumanize LGBTQ kids and people. Earlier this year, DeSantis signed legislation known as the “Don’t Say Gay” bill into law, which effectively forbids teachers from talking about sexual orientation and gender identity in most elementary school classrooms. The legislation sparked national outrage, with LGBTQ advocates criticizing it as hateful and discriminatory.

A mailer sent from the DeSantis campaign to Florida voters.

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DeSantis’ success demeaning and erasing LGBTQ folks has led him to campaign on the same issues. His new flier isn’t the first to mock gender studies majors and others interested in gender issues. One mailer sent to Floridians in October claimed that Crist is forgiving student loans for gender studies majors who have used their money on tattoos and piercings.

“I went into debt getting my Gender Studies degree,” the mailer read, Florida Politics reported.  “Thanks to Charlie Crist, taxpayers are bailing me out.” The DeSantis campaign included a photo of a white woman with multiple piercings next to the statement.

DeSantis also sent out a mailer to Florida voters that stoked fears around transgender athletes taking away opportunities from cisgender women, likening the situation to what happened when Black athletes first entered professional sports.

Biden slammed DeSantis at a campaign rally for Crist earlier this week, calling out the Florida governor for “demonizing the LGBTQ population.” Biden also suggested that DeSantis is just another bigoted version of former President Donald Trump, and if he wins a second term will likely leave to run for president in 2024.

If you have received any campaign mailers you think we should know about, send us an email: scoo[email protected].

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The body of an American who died fighting in Ukraine is being held for a potential war crimes investigation, his family said Tuesday.

This is another in a series of delays as Joshua Jones’ family waits to lay his body to rest. After the 24-year-old was killed in August while fighting as a member of the Ukrainian Foreign Legion, the Russians held his remains in the Donbas region. But last week, the family was notified that Ukraine had finally negotiated an exchange for the American’s remains.

His family began to prepare for a ceremony to put his body and some aspects of their grief to rest after receiving the news last week, but those plans were put on hold Tuesday.

His mother, Misty Gossett, said they were not given any further details about why Ukraine was potentially opening a case, but they were told a second autopsy was needed and the family should send a DNA sample.

Initially, the family was relieved to hear that his remains were secured, but since Oct. 26, the lack of information has been agonizing, she said.

“Every day this gets prolonged and we’re just trying to put him to rest,” Gossett said, as tears welled in her eyes. “We don’t know anything as far as how much longer it’s going to be, when he’s coming home. The communication is exhausting.”

Ukraine has worked to document potential Russian war crimes since the invasion began, investigating alleged murder, torture and rape of civilians and soldiers. The Ukrainian Office of the Prosecutor General said Tuesday it had documented more than 43,000 cases of Russian war crimes and crimes of aggression and identified more than 600 suspects from the Russian Federation.

Moscow has denied the many war crimes allegations it has faced.

Jones served in the Ukrainian Foreign Legion, a military unit comprised of non-Ukrainians that was organized after Russia’s invasion. The Foreign Legion informed Jones’ family Oct. 26 that Ukraine had fulfilled an exchange for his remains.

When reached for comment, a spokesperson for the legion referred questions to the Ministry of Defense’s military intelligence service, called GUR, where Jones served in a unit. GUR did not respond to a request for comment.

The State Department, which confirmed to the family that Jones’ remains were secured, did not respond to a request for comment.

Ned Price, spokesperson for the State Department, said in a statement last week, however, that the remains of a U.S. citizen were in Ukrainian custody — though he did not specifically mention Jones.

“The United States expresses our condolences to the family of the U.S. citizen killed in the fighting in Ukraine, whose remains have now been identified and released to Ukraine’s custody,” he said. “They will soon be returned to the family. The United States is appreciative of Ukraine for including recovery of this individual’s remains in its negotiations with Russia.”

NEW YORK — Food writer Julie Powell, who became an internet darling after blogging for a year about making every recipe in Julia Child’s “Mastering the Art of French Cooking,” leading to a book deal and a film adaptation, has died. She was 49.

Powell died of cardiac arrest Oct. 26 at her home in upstate New York, The New York Times reported. Her death was confirmed by Judy Clain, Powell’s email and editor in chief of Little, Brown.

“She was a brilliant writer and a daring, original person and she will not be forgotten,” Clain said in a statement. “We are sending our deepest condolences to all who knew and loved Julie, whether personally or through the deep connections she forged with readers of her memoirs.”

Powell’s 2005 book “Julie & Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment Kitchen” became the hit, Nora Ephron-directed film “Julie & Julia,” with the author portrayed in the movie by Amy Adams and Meryl Streep as Child.

Her sophomore and last effort — titled “Cleaving: A Story of Marriage, Meat and Obsession” — was a bit jarring in its honesty. Powell revealed she had an affair, the pain of loving two men at once, of her fondness for sadomasochism and even a bout of self-punishing sex with a stranger.

“People coming from the movie ‘Julie & Julia’ and picking up ‘Cleaving’ are going to be in for some emotional whiplash,” she told The Associated Press in 2009. “I don’t believe it’s going to be a Nora Ephron movie.”

Powell began her affair in 2004 as she was putting the finishing touches on her first book, a time she writes when she was “starry-eyed and vaguely discontented and had too much time on my hands.”

By 2006, she had landed an apprenticeship at a butcher shop two hours north of New York City, which offered an escape from her crumbling marriage and a place to explore her childhood curiosity with butchers.

“The way they held a knife in their hand was like an extension of themselves,” she said. “I’m a very clumsy person. I don’t play sports. That kind of physical skill is really foreign to me, and I’m really envious of that.”

The book explores the link between butchering and her own tortured romantic life. At one point, while cutting the connective tissue on a pig’s leg, she writes: “It’s sad, but a relief as well, to know that two things so closely bound together can separate with so little violence, leaving smooth surfaces instead of bloody shreds.”

Her book tapped into the growing interest in old school butchery and her experience slicing meat actually resulted in her eating less of it. She was an advocate for humanely raised and slaughtered animals.

“People want to get their hands dirty. People want to participate in the process. People want to know where their food is coming from,” Powell said. “People don’t want the mystery anymore.”

She is survived by her husband, Eric.

UPDATE: Accused gunman who shot 2 Newark police officers arrested as manhunt ends

A massive search was underway Wednesday for a gunman believed to be armed and dangerous who shot and injured two Newark police officers at an apartment building in the city’s South Ward on Tuesday afternoon.

Both officers were in stable condition late Tuesday at University Hospital in Newark — one was shot in the leg and the other’s neck was grazed before a bullet was lodged in his shoulder, officials said.

The alleged shooter — identified by police as Kendall Howard, 30, of East Orange — escaped after the officers returned fire. He was still on the loose following an extensive search by local, state and federal authorities that partially shut down part of the state’s largest city Tuesday, officials said.

Howard is considered armed and dangerous and anyone who sees him should call 911 immediately, authorities said. He is about 6-foot-3, 190 pounds with brown eyes and tattoo on his neck that read “FEATHER,” officials said.

Howard is charged with two counts of attempted murder and two weapons offenses, the Essex County Prosecutor’s Office said..

On Wednesday morning, the Essex County Sheriff’s Crime Stoppers said it is offering a $25,000 reward for information leading to the arrest. The United States Marshalls Service added an additional $5,000 to push the total reward to $5,000.

The incident began to unfold around 1 p.m. when a citizen called Newark police regarding a flier put out by the department concerning a shot fired on Friday, authorities said.

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2 Newark police officers shot by gunman, officials say (PHOTOS)

The caller reported seeing the person in the flier in an apartment building near the intersection of Van Velsor Place and Chancellor Avenue.

Two uniformed officers arrived at the building and spotted Howard, officials said.

“They stopped him to talk to him and to identify him, and a violent interaction occurred,” acting Essex County Prosecutor Theodore Stephens told reporters.

After a brief altercation, Howard allegedly pulled a gun out and shot the two police officers at close range, authorities said.

Streets in the South Ward neighborhood were blocked off for hours and residents were ordered out of the building where the shooting took place. Schools in the area were briefly locked down, but were dismissed on time, officials said.

A massive police presence spurred confusion and conflicting initial reports, including that a rooftop gunman was firing multiple rounds into the street and hit officers. That turned out to be untrue.

In the incident on Friday that first prompted police to put out the flier, a man fired a gunshot into the air around 11 a.m. while walking east on the 100 block of Hansbury Avenue. Police searched the area and recovered one shell casing.

The man was wearing ripped blue jeans, white sneakers and a gray hooded sweatshirt with a BMW logo on the front. He carried a blue tote bag over his shoulder.

Anyone with information about Howard’s whereabouts is asked to contact the Essex County Prosecutor’s Office tips Line at 1-877-847-7432 or the Newark Police Department at 1-877-695-8477. Calls will be kept confidential.

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NJ Advance Media staff writers S.P. Sullivan, Noah Cohen, Matt Stanmyre and Richard Cowen contributed to this report.

PHILADELPHIA — There was talk, mostly rooted in Bryce Harper’s pre-at-bat conversation with Alec Bohm, that Lance McCullers Jr. might have been tipping his pitches on Tuesday night. There was talk that the nine-day layoff, further prolonged by Monday’s postponement, might have played a part in the starter looking uncharacteristically rusty. McCullers didn’t want to hear any of it.

“I got whupped,” he said. “End of story.”

McCullers got beat in a way no man ever has this time of year. He gave up five home runs, the most ever allowed by a single pitcher in a single postseason outing, and made it a point to dismiss any excuses in the aftermath of the Houston Astros’ 7-0 defeat to the Philadelphia Phillies in Game 3 of the World Series.

“We got beat up pretty bad, and I got beat pretty bad,” McCullers said. “I obviously wanted to pitch well, and pitch much better than I did, but at the end of the day, all I can do at this point is get ready to go for a potential Game 7.”

The Astros will need to win two of these next three games to get there. The Phillies, who won 19 fewer regular-season games, have grabbed a 2-1 Series lead by completing an improbable five-run comeback in Game 1 and never letting the Astros breathe in Game 3.

Harper, slashing .382/.414/.818 in these playoffs, turned on a first-pitch, hanging breaking ball and lined it to right field to give the Phillies a 2-0 lead in the first inning. Bohm then led off the second by lining a first-pitch sinker out to left, and Brandon Marsh followed with another solo homer on a 2-0 slider, putting the Astros in a 4-0 hole.

The emphatic blows came in the fifth, just after McCullers had seemingly settled in. Kyle Schwarber waited on a 1-2 changeup slightly down and launched it 443 feet to straightaway center field, clearing the arborvitae trees. Five pitches later, Rhys Hoskins turned on a slider to give the Phillies back-to-back home runs and a 6-0 lead.

McCullers exited then, perhaps a little later than he should have. Astros manager Dusty Baker had let him see the top of the Phillies’ lineup a third time, even though he was clearly reeling earlier.

“He had had two good innings, two real good innings,” Baker said, referencing the third and fourth innings, when McCullers retired six consecutive batters. “And then they hit a blooper, a homer, and then I couldn’t get anybody loose. I mean, it was my decision.”

McCullers spent most of the 2022 season recovering from a setback to the flexor pronator strain that made him unavailable for the final two rounds of last year’s playoffs. He returned in mid-August and immediately pitched effectively, posting a 2.27 ERA through eight regular-season starts and a 2.45 ERA in his first couple of postseason appearances. He fell within the top 15% in ground ball percentage and home run rate among those who made at least five starts — and then he saw the complete opposite play out in his most important appearance.

McCullers denied that pitch-tipping was at fault.

“This has nothing to do with tipping,” he said, dismissing speculation that began with Harper getting in Bohm’s ear moments before he hit the first McCullers pitch he saw for a home run.

The Astros’ co-pitching coach, Joshua Miller, echoed similar thoughts.

“We didn’t identify anything specific today,” Miller said. “It’s something that we always monitor and look into.”

On MLB Network, former Phillies pitcher Pedro Martinz explained pitch-tipping and what he saw during Game 3.

But McCullers nonetheless approached this outing with a very predictable trait: Through his first two postseason starts, he had thrown only one fastball to opposing left-handed hitters. Lefties were basically able to narrow their selection to either McCullers’ curveball or breaking ball, the two pitches he throws most often, and they barely missed their chances. Three of the homers McCullers gave up — to Harper, Marsh and Schwarber — were to left-handed hitters. He totaled just one swing and miss against lefties in Game 3, a sign to Miller that his curveball, his best pitch against them, was not sharp.

“Listen,” McCullers said, “I am who I am. I’m going to throw a lot of off-speed. Everyone knows that.”

One-hundred and eighty-seven starting pitchers threw at least 750 pitches this season, and only one of them, Edward Cabrera of the Miami Marlins, threw fastballs less often than McCullers, who threw either a cutter or sinker just 32.3% of the time. Against lefties, that rate dropped to less than 25% — and became even more pronounced in the postseason.

McCullers said he didn’t like the location on his curveball to Harper but that the quality of his pitches was good enough.

“I would check on the iPads; my stuff was there,” McCullers said. “The movement was there. The location, for the most part, was there. I made a couple mistakes, and unfortunately for me, they hit it out of the ballpark.”

Before Tuesday night, McCullers hadn’t allowed a home run on any of the 651 off-speed pitches he had thrown this season. Then four of them went out. The Phillies had seen him near the end of the regular season, when McCullers pitched six innings of one-run ball on Oct. 3, and had gathered better intel on the shape of his breaking balls.

If McCullers pitches again, it’ll be in Game 7, from Houston, on Sunday night.

The Astros need to earn their way there.

“I still believe if we get to that point, I’m the best guy to take the ball,” McCullers said. “I just got to pitch better. That’s it.”

President Biden on Wednesday evening is set to deliver a speech at Union Station in the Capitol Hill neighborhood on democracy, where he will make clear what’s at stake in the midterm elections.

Driving the news: “You can expect to hear from him this evening … there is a lot at stake including democracy and that everyone has a role in that,” said White House Deputy Chief of Staff and Assistant to the President Jen O’Malley Dillon during an Axios News Shapers event on Wednesday.

• “The other thing that will be really important … people will be able to vote…democracy works to make sure every vote is counted.”

The big picture: White House Senior Advisor and Assistant to the President Anita Dunn said that the setting of Capitol Hill is important.

• “Because on January 6th we saw violence geared towards subverting democratic processes there.”
• “It is an appropriate place to make these remarks tonight,” she said.
• “The threat of political violence … it’s something that unites almost all Americans and something we can all be united against,” Dunn said.

What to watch: The speech is scheduled for 7 p.m. ET on Wednesday evening.

• “The president will address the threat of election deniers and those who seek to undermine faith in voting and democracy; and the stakes for our democracy in next week’s election,” the Democratic National Committee said in a statement.

Editor’s note: This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

North Korea is secretly supplying Russia with a signficant amount of ammunition, attempting to disguise the shipments as deliveries to the Middle East and North Africa, National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby told reporters Wednesday.

“We’re not talking dozens here. It’s a significant number of artillery shells,” Kirby said. “This is a sign of not only the degree to which North Korea is willing to continue to bolster support Russia, but a sign of Russia’s own defense articles, shortages and needs.”

The NSC spokesperson refused to give an estimate on the exact amount.

ORLANDO, Fla. – We now have two hurricanes swirling in the Atlantic.

Hurricane Lisa and Hurricane Martin formed in the Atlantic on Wednesday, according to the National Hurricane Center. This is only the third time on record that there have been two November hurricanes simultaneously in the Atlantic, according FOX Weather. The previous years were 1932 and 2001.

Meanwhile, forecasters are also watching a third system that could bring rain and wind to Florida.

HURRICANE LISA

Hurricane Lisa is moving westward toward the coast of Belize and is expected to make landfall in Central America and then weaken.

Lisa is packing maximum sustained winds of 80 mph. 

“On the forecast track, the center of Lisa will make landfall in Belize later today, and then cross northern Guatemala and move into southeastern Mexico by Thursday,” the NHC said. “Some strengthening is forecast before landfall. Rapid weakening will occur after the center of Lisa moves inland.”

RELATED: Disturbance in the Atlantic could have possible impacts on Florida

Hurricane conditions are expected along the coast of Belize and the southeastern Yucatan peninsula this afternoon.  Tropical storm conditions are expected during the next several hours over portions of the Bay Islands and along the northern coast of Honduras within the Tropical Storm Warning area, and in portions of Guatemala and Yucatan later today.

HURRICANE MARTIN

Hurricane Martin is now the seventh hurricane of the 2022 Atlantic hurricane season. 

Martin is located several hundred miles west of the Azores with maximum sustained winds of 75 mph. A turn to the northeast and a rapid increase in forward speed are expected during the next couple of days, taking Martin over the far North Atlantic.

Martin should get larger and stronger through Thursday, gradually lose strength from Thursday through the weekend, but remain a very large cyclone.

FOX 35 Storm Team Chief Meteorologist Jayme King says Martin is not expected to be any threat to land.

OTHER SYSTEMS

The hurricane center is also watching an area of low pressure with a 20-percent chance of developing. Longer term, this could develop over the Bahamas early next week, possibly bringing wind and rain impacts to Florida during that time.

Stay with FOX 35 for the latest throughout the 2022 Atlantic hurricane season, which ends Nov. 30.