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There are two kinds of politicians: those who value an evidentiary and principles-based approach to law-making; and those who spurn analysis in favour of short-termism.

Paul Keating was the consummate member of the first category.

The cleansing power of competition. The will to drive unprecedented economic and social transformation. The threshold test of believing in something before committing to it, and then sparing no effort in delivering it.

Australias media ownership rules are a case in point.

Mr Keatings oft-quoted queens of screen or princes of print was deeply rooted in theprinciple of media pluralism and its benefits in a modern liberal democracy.

Heunderstood the importance of constructing a regulatory framework to promote a diversity of voices in the face of concentrated media power. And the only way to achieve that, he said, was through competition.

Malcolm Turnbull falls into the second category.

Dismissing the relevance of a rule which prohibits a person from controlling all three regulated forms of media commercial radio, commercial TV and associated newspapers in the one licence area, his sole justification is: time.

The rule is old. It pre-dates the internet. Throw it out.

Mr Turnbull is only too eager to repeal the twoout of three cross-media control rule and hand unprecedented power to a privileged few, despite Australia having one of the most concentrated media markets in the world.

He views the two out of three rule as an anti-competitive fetter on industry. Paradoxically, this is the law which does the heavy lifting in fostering competition and diversity in Australian media.

The proposed CBS acquisition of Network Ten demonstrates as much.

After so opportunistically exploiting Tens voluntary administration to spruik his case for repeal, Mr Turnbull appeareddismayed when CBS entered the frame.

CBS eclipsedan Australian joint bid that seemed good to go, save for the small matter of it not being permitted under law.

Mr Turnbull even stoked the protectionist fire of CBS being a US entity, despite the fact that he was a minister in the Howard government which abolished foreign ownership media limits.

And Mr Turnbull peddles the furphy that existing competition law is adequate for the task performed by the two out of three rule. The ACCC decision on the Birketu/Illyria bid to acquire Ten confirms that it is not the job of the ACCC to consider pluralism or democracy and that competition laws are no safeguard for diversity.

Chairman Rod Sims was at pains to clarify that, while the transaction would not substantially lessen competition, it would reduce diversity across the Australian media landscape.

After almost four years, the Abbott-Turnbull government has failed to achieve media law reform. Their response blame Labor is as predictable as their ineptitude.

Instead of rolling up their sleeves and devising a long-term roadmap for transition in the face of relentless disruption,the Turnbull government rolls out the red carpet for big business, cherry-picking a few measures to benefit select vestedinterests.

They bemoan the two out of three rule as archaic, but propose no alternative in its place to adapt our laws and preserve pluralism in the new media environment.

All of this undertaken with complete disregard for consumers. An Essential Poll showed 61 per cent of Australians are opposed to repeal of the two out of three rule.

As for the argument that this is about saving jobs, show us the evidence that the synergies, efficiencies and scalability behind mergers creates rather than sheds them.

Mr Turnbull gifts a cool $30 million to Fox Sports but nothing for audio description for the blind. He waives $127 million in licence fees for commercial broadcasters, but cuts a deal with One Nation to undermine our public broadcasters.

The PM who once called for innovation now regards the internet as the reason for junking public interest safeguards as though the internet appeared overnight or as if traditional media doesnt already use it to run multi-platform businesses.

He complains Labor isnt co-operating, yet twice he has voted down Labors constructive amendment to save the two out of three rule while letting other measures pass the Parliament measures industry should already be enjoying.

As Mr Keating said, the idea that convergence is turning all forms of media into one is the most powerful reason for not making it easier to concentrate ownership.

The principles of pluralism and diversity are enduring.

Just as hes failed engineering and economics on the NBN and sold out his beliefs for power at every turn, Malcolm Turnbull has confirmed he is no Keating.

Michelle Rowland is Labors shadow communications spokeswoman.

Read more:
Media reform package hands 'unprecedented power to a privileged few' - The New Daily

Analysis

Parliament resumes this weekwhich means media ownership laws are back on the Senate's agenda, although with a little less urgency now Channel Ten's administrators have found a buyer in US broadcasting giant CBS.

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Ten Network's receivers, managers and voluntary administrators have confirmed that CBS has entered into a binding agreement to buy the broadcasters business and assets.

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The stand out listings traded on the ASX captured at key moments through the day, as indicated by the time stamp in the video.

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With earnings behind us, and US politics and geo-politics still at the heart of the conversation, this week central banks also come into the mix with the RBA and ECB taking central focus. (This video was produced in commercial partnership between Fairfax Media and IG Markets.)

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Finance Minister Mathias Cormann says he has a positive outlook for global economic growth, and comments on media law reforms.

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For many, Friday is simply September 1, but for Star Wars fans it's officially Force Friday II - a chance to get the latest toys from the upcoming film.

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Sweden's big banks have been pinoeering new AI technology, with SEB rolling out their latest chatbot, Aida, during their 2017 AGM.

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In the 1970s Kisaku Suzuki invented the sushi robot which revolutionised the market. Today most of the sushi eaten in Japan is made by a robot.

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Bitcoin and Ethereum are just some of the digital currencies that have been on a tear this year. But it hasn't been smooth-sailing in the cryptocurrency world.

Ten Network's receivers, managers and voluntary administrators have confirmed that CBS has entered into a binding agreement to buy the broadcasters business and assets.

Details of the CBS offer for Ten are likely to emerge on Monday.

The Senate did not get around to discussing media reformlast sitting week, despite the government brokering a deal with Pauline Hanson's One Nation party. And it is unlikely to get to the chamber unless the government can secure the support of Nick Xenophon's team, or somehow get the Greens on board.

But while the existing media laws remain in place, the question remains of what-on-earth-happened-at-Network-Ten.

It still isn't clear how twoshareholders holding a combined 22 per cent of equitymanaged to leave the board with "no choicebut to appoint administrators".

Both these shareholders, Lachlan Murdoch and Bruce Gordon, were guarantors for Ten's debt. However, both men cannot"control"Network Ten due to ownership restrictions inthe Broadcasting Services Act.

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The Australian Communications and Media Authority gets final say on what is considered controland one would think it should be analysing whether Murdoch and Gordonbreached these rules when they played their trump card overTen's debt facility.

Keen to see whether the ACMA is in fact keeping tabs on what happened at Network Ten, Fairfax Media submitted a Freedom of Information request for emails, internal investigations and file notes written the week Ten went into administration.

In return for a fee, the ACMA agreed to release Ten's stock market announcements (which are publicly available anyway) and 14 heavily redacted emails, including 14 totally blank pages. It founda further 24documents related to the search, but is keeping these secret because they contain 'deliberative matters', legal advice, and personal information.

The emails and schedule of documents provethere was a flurry of activity on Tuesday, June 13 when Ten went into a trading halt and again when it wentinto administration on Wednesday, June 14.

For example, at 11.46 am on June 14 acting chairman Richard Bean sent an email to the manager of the ACMA's Diversity branch, Jenny Brigg.

"Hi Jenny, you may have seen that Ten has announced the appointment of an administrator.". The rest of Mr Bean's email has been redacted, but Ms Brigg replies "I'll call him now".

By lunchtime Ms Brigg advises she has been in touch with the in-houselegal department and by 5pm she has emailed KordaMentha's Jennifer Nettleton to "make sure you are aware of your obligations as a controller of commercial television broadcasting service licences".

The ACMA reminds KordaMentha it has ten business days to lodge of any change in control for all five commercial television broadcasting licences controlled by Ten.

The regulator was also in touch with the Communications Minister's office and its four authority members. But it remains secret whether the regulator raised concerns about ownership breaches, or was simply sending a memo in case the Minister or authority members missed the biggest news story of the day.

While releasing this internal correspondence could "promote transparency...in relation to issues that are a matter of public debate", Ms Briggtold Fairfax Media it could also compromise future law enforcement.

"In my view, if material of this nature were released prematurely, it would prejudice the ACMA's ability to act in this matter by disclosing the ACMA's approach to certain issues," she wrote as justification for the opacity.

The regulator also refused to revealwhat information it received from outsiders because this "would demonstrate how the ACMA gathers intelligence and information for the purpose of actively monitoring potential breaches of media ownership rules," Ms Brigg said.

An email received from one outsider was withheld because it contained commercially sensitive information about several businesses that "may cause significant harm to the ongoing operations of Ten" if it were released.

In short, the ACMA may be working behind the scenes to uphold existing laws, or it might not be. It might have found a breach, or not.

"The ACMA has been actively monitoring, and continues to monitor, the activities and developments in relation to Network TEN," a spokeswoman said on Friday, adding it has been making "all of the inquiries necessary to satisfy itself" media rules are complied with.

The subtext being silence equals compliance.

"Where the ACMA is of the view that a regulatory breach has occurred, it will take regulatory action commensurate with the seriousness of the breach and the level of harm," the letter reads.

The ACMA uses "the minimum power or intervention necessary to achieve compliance", she added.

Seven yearsago Mr Murdoch did breach mediaownership rules when he became thedirector of too many radio stations in the Brisbane-Nambour area between October and November 2010. And his business advisor, Siobhan McKenna, made a similar breach from December 2009 to November 2010.

The ACMA revealed these breaches two months later in January 2011 and took no further action noting their "resignations and co-operation in the matters". Thebreach was easily fixed.

But given the irreversible nature of what is happening at Ten, shareholders and employees might wish theACMAhadeither stepped in earlier or announcedthe all-clear.

It is now 12 weeks since administrators were appointed at Tenand nearlythree years since Murdoch, Gordon, and fellow shareholder James Packer took personal responsibility for the company's debt.

Given the public interest in this matterand the potential damagedone to a struggling but functioning business, surely theACMAshould atleast explain itself.

Read more here:
In Ten takeover, the media regulator is refusing to prove itself useful - The Sydney Morning Herald

MPs return from their summer breaks next week and one of the first issues on the agenda will be 21st Century Foxs proposed takeover of Sky.

A quick recap: before recess in June, Karen Bradley, the culture secretary, revealed the findings of Ofcoms report into the deal and her initial view on whether it should go ahead.

There were effectively three parts to Ofcoms work a look at the deals impact on media plurality and broadcasting standards, and a separate report on whether the Murdochs, who control Fox, were fit and proper owners of Sky.

On the basis of Ofcoms findings, Bradley said she was minded to refer the deal for a full investigation to the Competition and Markets Authority on media plurality but not on broadcasting standards.

When Bradley made this statement on 29 June it was expected that she would confirm her decision before parliament broke up for summer. When that didnt happen she was expected to make an announcement during the summer, but that did not happen either.

The reason for this delay is that Ofcom and the government were overwhelmed with the volume of people expressing their views on the deal after Bradleys announcement with some of these new submissions raising issues that the culture secretary subsequently asked Ofcom to examine.

During this period there have also been significant developments regarding the deal. Fox News has been accused of colluding with the White House regarding a discredited story that a murdered Democrat aide was the source of leaked emails, and then last week it was announced that Fox News will no longer be broadcast in the UK, apparently for commercial reasons.

All this means that Bradleys statement on her final decision is eagerly anticipated. It could be made as early as this week.

The most likely outcome is still that she stands by her original view to refer the deal to the CMA on the grounds of media plurality but not broadcasting standards. However, campaign group Avaaz and a group of high-profile MPs led by Ed Miliband and Vince Cable have made a compelling and powerful argument that it should also be referred on broadcasting standards due to the scandals at Fox News and the potential for the Murdochs to Foxify Sky News by giving it a rightwing slant.

Avaaz and the MPs have threatened legal action if Bradley doesnt do this. They claim Ofcoms fit-and-proper test was flawed and that it did not use the correct legal threshold when considering the deal in regard to broadcasting standards, thereby making it less likely that the deal would be referred.

It is difficult to establish how much weight this argument has with Bradley. Her Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport has remained tightlipped during the process and insiders on both sides of the House of Commons say Bradley is determined to do things by the book when considering the deal. This means the fact she asked Ofcom to do more work on the deal does not necessarily mean she is leaning towards a referral on broadcasting standards. Instead, it could be that she justs wants to be seen as dealing with the submissions by Avaaz and the MPs seriously.

Nonetheless, the Murdochs appear to be increasingly concerned about the takeover, judging by the firm wording of their statements and the decision to pull Fox News from the UK.

One of their main complaints has been how long the process is taking and it must be said there are no winners apart from the government in dragging this out. The government is a potential winner because the delays may dampen anger about the deal or even force the Murdochs to walk away from the takeover which would make the issue disappear entirely but it is not ideal for Sky, a company with thousands of employees whose future is uncertain.

The Murdochs bid for Sky was revealed last December and a CMA investigation will last six months once Bradley gives the go-ahead. That means it will have taken well over a year for the deal to be resolved either way.

The main reason for it taking so longer is the governments insistence on a two-pronged inquiry featuring Ofcom first and then the CMA if called upon. But is the CMA really better qualified than Ofcom, the media regulator, to make a judgment on media plurality and broadcasting standards? How will the CMA, effectively a consumer body, make judgments about how people get their news and analyse a market that includes a dominant public sector organisation in the BBC?

The CMA is used to assessing whether takeovers will distort markets so that consumers are worse off either through a drop in quality or higher prices. But the concerns around the Fox/Sky deal are so sector-specific ie will it lead to one family having too much control of news coverage that the media regulator is surely better placed than the competition watchdog to offer recommendations to the government.

If the CMA is called upon, as seems likely, it will be fascinating to see the panel it puts in place to examine the deal and how it goes about it. It will be effectively starting from scratch and, as Bradley has already intimated, it could simply wave the deal through without demanding any concessions from the Murdochs.

After waiting all summer to discover whether it will be called upon, the CMA is close to discovering whether it will be invited to offer the decisive verdict on this long-running saga.

Hollywood has a problem with diversity but so does the British film and TV industry. Last week, British actor Ed Skrein pulled out of his role in a forthcoming film reboot of Hellboy because the character he was playing has an Asian heritage while actor Chloe Bennet revealed she changed her name from Chloe Wang because Hollywood is racist.

But while Hollywood has issues, so too British broadcasting. There is frustration that the much-hyped Project Diamond, which was supported by all the broadcasters and designed to monitor diversity in the industry, may have underplayed the problems in British broadcasting.

It found that 21.5% of on-screen workers have a black, Asian or minority ethnic (BAME) background and 10.1% of off-screen workers do. This compares with 13% of the UK population with a BAME background.

However, critics of the report claim that the reality is worse than this and that the survey was distorted by just 24% of the industry actually taking part.

Diamond was supposed to help improve diversity in broadcasting but at the moment it is just creating more divisions.

One of the least-vaunted policies in Labours manifesto for the 2017 general election was a plan to launch a national review into the demise of local media. However, the closure of the Oldham Evening Chronicle last week shows how important this could be.

The Chronicle has been published for more than 160 years but will disappear unless the administrators can find a buyer to rescue it.

The manifesto said Labour was concerned about the closure of local newspapers and broadcasters and that they are an important part of our democracy and culture. As the Grenfell Tower fire showed, the lack of a powerful local voice can have a devastating impact.

The government should follow Labours proposal and launch a review immediately.

Here is the original post:
Rupert Murdoch's proposed Sky takeover reaches endgame - The Guardian (blog)

President Trump spent the final days of August dutifully performing his job. He tended to the massive recovery from Hurricane Harvey. He hit the road to sell his tax-cut plan. And he convened policy meetings on the federal budget and the North Korean nuclear threat.

Behind the scenes during a summer of crisis, however, Trump appears to pine for the days when the Oval Office was a bustling hub of visitors and gossip, over which he presided as impresario. He fumes that he does not get the credit he thinks he deserves from the media or the allegiance from fellow Republican leaders he says he is owed. He boasts about his presidency in superlatives, but confidants privately fret about his suddenly dark moods.

And some of Trumps friends fear that the short-tempered president is on an inevitable collision course with White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly.

Trump chafes at some of the retired Marine Corps generals moves to restrict access to him since he took the job almost a month ago, said several people close to the president. They run counter to Trumps love of spontaneity and brashness, prompting some Trump loyalists to derisively dub Kelly the church lady because they consider him strict and morally superior.

Hes having a very hard time, one friend who spoke with Trump this week said of the president. He doesnt like the way the medias handling him. He doesnt like how Kellys handling him. Hes turning on people that are very close to him.

President Trump's chief of staff John F. Kelly has a long military career but limited experience in politics. Here's how he rose to a top political position. (Amber Ferguson/The Washington Post)

Aides say Trump admires Kellys credentials, respects his leadership and management skills, and praises him often, both in private meetings and at public events. In a tax policy speech Wednesday in Missouri, Trump singled out Kellys work to decrease the number of illegal border crossings when he was secretary of homeland security.

Meanwhile, people close to the president said he is simmering with displeasure over what he considers personal disloyalty from National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn, who criticized Trumps responses to a deadly white supremacist rally in Charlottesville on Aug. 12. He also has grown increasingly frustrated with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, who has clashed with the president on issues including Afghanistan troop levels, the blockade on Qatar and Cuba policy.

This portrait of Trump as he enters what could be his most consequential month in office is based on interviews with 15 senior White House officials, outside advisers and friends of the president, many of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity to be candid.

In September, Trump will face deadlines to raise the federal debt ceiling and pass a spending bill possibly tied to his campaign promise to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border; make his first big push for tax cuts; and oversee a potentially historic disaster recovery in Texas and Louisiana.

If Trumps 75-minute rally performance on Aug. 22 in Phoenix served as a public testimonial to his rage over the media and Congress, he is agitating privately about other concerns, as well.

[As Trump ranted and rambled in Phoenix, his crowd slowly thinned]

Trump lashed out at George Gigicos, one of his original campaign staff members, for what the president considered unflattering television camera angles at the Phoenix rally, which Bloomberg News first reported. The president also was distressed by a New York Times report that was posted a few hours before the event documenting the turmoil between him and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).

Trump was especially angered by something he learned at his stop earlier in the day, a border visit in Yuma, Ariz., several of his associates said.

A group of Border Patrol agents who had endorsed him and become campaign-trail buddies initially were blocked by the Trump administration from attending. Although the agents eventually were allowed into the event, the president made his displeasure about their treatment known to Kelly, said people who were briefed about the incident. Two of those people said Trump raised his voice with his chief of staff, whom he faulted for trying to restrict outside friends from having direct access to him.

That evening in Phoenix, Trump attempted to call Kelly onto the stage. Wheres John? he asked. Where is he? Wheres General Kelly? Get him out here. Hes great. Hes doing a great job.

Kelly did not join his boss in front of the crowd.

It is not unusual for staffers to hear him bluster about things, said Barry Bennett, a former campaign adviser. That doesnt mean its real. There were people on the campaign staff that he said to fire a dozen times, but he never did it. It was just bark. And some people dont know the difference between the bark and the bite.

Kelly took the job with the express goal of implementing strict order in a West Wing that had become rife with turmoil, infighting and damaging leaks to the media.

[Trump enlists Kelly to enforce order, but can the zoo be tamed?]

Friends used to be able to call the White House and be patched directly through to Trump; now those calls are routed through Kelly and do not always make it to the president. Friends used to drop by the West Wing when they had time to kill, wandering to the Oval Office to say hello; now they must have an official appointment and a clear reason to visit.

The changes are largely welcomed by senior administration officials, who say the presidents time is too valuable to be wasted on chitchat and hangers-on.

But Trump sometimes defies and even resents the new structure. He has been especially sensitive to the way Kellys rigid structure is portrayed in the media and strives to disabuse people of the notion that he is being managed. The president continues to call business friends and outside advisers, including former chief strategist Stephen K. Bannon, from his personal phone when Kelly is not around, said people with knowledge of the calls.

Donald Trump resists being handled, said Roger Stone, a former Trump adviser and longtime confidant. Nobody tells him who to see, who to listen to, what to read, what he can say. Stone added, General Kelly is trying to treat the president like a mushroom. Keeping him in the dark and feeding him s--- is not going to work. Donald Trump is a free spirit.

Kelly has told colleagues that he has no intention of controlling what Trump says or tweets. Although he has tried to manage the information the president receives, Kelly recognizes that there are limits to what he can do, according to White House officials.

The president can turn on the television, the president can call people, and the president can read the newspaper, said a Republican close to the White House who added that the onus is on Trump, not his staff, to control his impulses.

Trump has jettisoned some of the more controversial figures in his administration this summer. For instance, the firing of Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci after just 10 days earned the flamboyant aide the moniker suicide bomber in the West Wing for having taken down with him Chief of Staff Reince Priebus and press secretary Sean Spicer. Trump also parted ways with Bannon, who often channeled the presidents nationalist instincts.

More changes may be afoot under Kelly, who is continuing his personnel review and is said to be targeting aides without clear portfolios of responsibility.

On Tillerson, Trump has come to see his top diplomats approach to world affairs as totally establishment, in the words of one Trump associate. Several people close to Trump said they would be surprised if Tillerson stays in his post past his one-year mark in January. They hinted that his departure may come far sooner, with one describing it as imminent.

And some who have recently seen Tillerson say the former ExxonMobil chief executive unaccustomed to taking orders from a superior, let alone one as capricious as Trump also seems to be ready to end his State Department tenure. He has grumbled privately to Kelly about Trumps recent controversies, said two people familiar with their relationship.

Others, however, caution that Tillerson remains fully enmeshed in the administration. After having lunch with the president Monday, Tillerson sat in the front row of Trumps joint news conference with the president of Finland and was a key member of Cabinet discussions focused on handling Hurricane Harvey.

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told reporters Wednesday that Trump absolutely has confidence in Tillerson.

[Public rifts between Trump and some senior officials widen in the wake of Charlottesville]

Tillerson made headlines over the weekend when he was asked on Fox News Sunday, in the context of Charlottesville, whether Trump speaks for American values. The president speaks for himself, Tillerson told anchor Chris Wallace.

Many Trump insiders were aghast at the diplomats apparent denunciation of the president, but several senior White House officials said Trumps frustration with Tillerson has been about specific policies. The Fox interview did not bother Trump, one official said, even though the president was upset about Cohns scolding of him to the Financial Times.

Trump was especially upset that Cohn went public with his complaints about the presidents handling of Charlottesville, even after Trump listened to Cohn vent during a private meeting on Aug. 18 in Bedminster, N.J.

The president has been quietly fuming about Cohn for the past week but has resisted dismissing him in part because he has been the face, along with Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, of the administrations tax-cut strategy.

Still, Trump has other ways to slight Cohn. The economic adviser traveled with Trump on Wednesday to Springfield, Mo., for his speech about tax reform, yet when the president ticked through the many distinguished guests in attendance, he did not mention Cohn. Afterward, Ivanka Trump, the presidents daughter, tweeted a call for tax reform with a picture of Trump backstage flanked by her and Mnuchin. Notably absent was Cohn, the plans co-architect.

Asked about the perceived insults, Sanders told reporters aboard Air Force One on the flight home to Washington that it was pretty standard tactics for Trump not to call out staff members in his remarks.

Pressed on the state of Trump and Cohns relationship, Sanders said only that both men are committed to tax reform.

Well, look, she said, Gary is here. The president is here.

Robert Costa, Anne Gearan and Carol D. Leonnig contributed to this report.

Read more:
During a summer of crisis, Trump chafes against criticism and new controls - Washington Post

The disaster of Harvey has created an influx of misinformation, rumors, and scams.

FEMA has created a list of rumors, debunking them and calling out scams.

Below is a list of a few of the debunked rumors.

FUEL SHORTAGES

There are rumors that the fuel shortages in Texas are due to either FEMA blocking sales or fuel being committed elsewhere. This isFALSE. (September 1)

FLOOD INSURANCE

There are reports individuals must file a flood insurance claim before Friday, September 1 because a new Texas law goes into effect that day and all claims filed after Sept. 1 would be negatively impacted. This isFALSE.(August 30)

SHELTERS AND ID CHECK

There are rumors undocumented immigrants cannot go to a shelter because they will be reported to ICE or CBP. This isFalse.(August 27)

For a complete list of rumors visit FEMAs Hurricane Harvey Rumor Control page.

They will update constantly as new rumors and scams are reported

The rest is here:
FEMA's Hurricane Harvey Rumor Control - Houston Public Media