News Briefs Issue 10

East:

East StuCo is set to host their annual trivia night in the cafeteria on Thursday, Feb. 21 at 7 p.m. Students must form teams of six, including a teacher of their choice, and pay a $25 entry fee to participate.

The questions asked will range in subject and difficulty, so no one teacher or team will have an advantage. StuCo members grade scorecards at the end of the game, announcing the winner that night.

Teams are encouraged to dress according to their own devised theme, with StuCo planning to hand out a prize to the best dressed group of the night. In addition to hosting, StuCo members are allowed to join and create teams for the competition.

“I’m really hoping to pull together a team this year,” sophomore class secretary Maisie Sheets said. “I had to miss last year’s so I knew I wanted to go for it now.”

The winning team will be given gift cards to a location of their choice, representing half of the entry fees. The other half will be donated to a charity of the team’s choice.

The teacher sponsor of last year’s winning team, Robert Bickers, has yet to know if he will be asked to compete this year.

“Last year I wasn’t invited to be on a team until about a week beforehand,” Bickers said. “I haven’t been asked yet, but I am happy to play again.”

Forms and payment are due Feb. 15 to teacher Brenda Fishman in room 307.

Local:

After nearly 45 years of business, the US Toy located in Leawood off of State Line Road is set to relocate. The State Line location will move to Metcalf Ave. in Overland Park this spring.

Third generation owner of US Toy, Seth Freiden, began to worry about the future of his company after an increase in online shopping led to a series of declining sales. He wanted to find a way to “Amazon-proof” his business so it didn’t end up like Toys R Us: shuttered and closed entirely.

Freiden’s business plan involved the decision to combine his newly obtained company, Pump it Up — an indoor bounce house — with US Toy at the new shared storefront in Overland Park.

“As retail changes all around us, we knew we needed to change too,” Frieden said.

Even with the drastic change, Freiden plans to run US Toy as his grandparents did, sticking to their morals of staying education-based — meaning they sell no electronics or video games.

For years, US Toy has been a popular destination for party supplies and props for East students and parents.

“I was really bummed when I first heard they were moving,” freshman Audrey Brown said. “It is my go-to for all parties and I don’t want to have to resort to going somewhere else.”

To prepare for the move, the current location began a 25 percent off sale beginning Jan. 7 to clear out for relocation day in May.

If his business plan works, Freiden hopes to expand US Toy and Pump it Up into different Kansas and Missouri locations and offer gift registries for birthday parties at Pump it Up.

“My job is to steward this into the next 66 years,” Freiden said. “Not to look back on where we have been, but where we are going.”

National:

The testimony of President Trump’s former lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen before the House Intelligence Committee has been postponed to Feb. 28.

Rep. Adam Schiff of California stated that Cohen’s closed-door testimony would be postponed “in the interest of the investigation,” but did not disclose which investigation it would involve.

Cohen also planned to testify in public to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on Feb. 7, but also postponed indefinitely following what he cited as threats from Trump and his attorney, Rudy Guiliani, towards Cohen’s family.

The ongoing investigation conducted by special counsel Robert Mueller into potential coordination between Russia and the Trump presidential campaign could be a subject of the Feb. 28 testimony, according to CNN.

Cohen pled guilty in November of last year to multiple federal crimes, several of which were tied directly to the Trump presidential campaign. Among the charges were tax fraud and campaign finance crimes.

Cohen admitted he acted “in coordination with and at the direction of Individual-1,” prosecutors wrote in December of last year. Individual-1 is what prosecutors use to refer to President Trump.

Cohen has previously admitted to making false statements to Congress about an abandoned effort to build a Trump Tower in Moscow, Russia’s capital. He claimed that talks of the construction ended in Jan. 2016, but now admits efforts persisted into June of the same year — well into Trump’s campaign and just months before the election.

Since his election in 2016, it was discovered that Trump had been involved in efforts and discussions regarding the skyscraper as well, according to the New York Times.

Talks of the tower’s construction were “going on from the day I announced, to the day I won,” Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s attorney, quoted the President during an interview with The Times.

According to the Times, Trump has personally acknowledged discussing the Moscow project with Cohen in written responses. Trump later gave the responses to special counsel Robert Mueller, days before it was revealed that Cohen had pled guilty.

Cohen is set to report to federal prison for the first day of his three-year sentence on Mar. 6 — just a week after his scheduled testimony.