Announcer: Major Funding for "NJ Spotlight News" is provided in part by NJM insurance group, serving the insurance needs of residents and businesses for more than 100 years.

Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey, an independent licensee of the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association.

New Jersey realtors, the voice for real estate in New Jersey.

More information is online at NJrealtor.com.

And by the PSEG foundation.

Briana: Today on NJ Spotlight News, the former Attorney General of New Jersey takes the stand in the Menendez trial.

He is questioned about requests from the senior senator to intervene in cases involving Jose Uribe.

Overhauling Oprah --OPRA.

Governor Murphy signs the controversial bill aimed at revising the state's open the public -- open Public records act.

>> Starting today, we should stop calling OPRA OPRA, we should call it NOPRA.

I think we have weakened government transparency here in New Jersey.

Briana: Also pumping the brakes.

Governor Hochul puts congestion pricing on any independent -- many indefinite hold.

Environmentalists are crying foul.

>> Diff Newark is not moving forward, not only will it mean traffic will get worse, it means underfunding will hurt New Jersey transit writers.

Briana: Magic mushrooms.

>> And many of the clinical trials, they have people taper off their antidepressants if they were taking them.

Briana: New research shows promising health benefits of silicide into treatment of health conditions.

NJ Spotlight News begins right now.

♪ >> From NJPBS Studios, this is NJ Spotlight News, with Briana Vannozzi.

Briana: Good evening and thanks for joining us this Thursday night.

.

I am Briana Vannozzi.

New Jersey's former top law-enforcement enforcement leader took the stand at Senator Bob Menendez's federal corruption trial.

Former Attorney General testified about phone calls and a meeting he took with the senior senator back in 2019, in which prosecutors allege Menendez tried to interfere with an insurance fraud case involving Jose Ruby -- Jose Uribe.

The is a businessman indicted in the skin.

Uribe is affected to be a star witness for the prosecution.

Gray wall is the most prominent official to testify against Menendez so far.

He offered key details about the direct conversations they had and what exactly the senator asked from him.

Senior correspondent Brenda Flanagan has been in the Manhattan courtroom for us all day and joins us with the latest.

What can you tell us?

Brenda: We got some very eye-opening testimony today from former New Jersey Attorney General gray wall.

He testified he refused to discuss a specific criminal fraud case at the request of Senator Bob Menendez.

He says Menendez asked him twice in a phone call, and also in a face-to-face meeting.

Prosecution says they are trying to prove that Menendez was using his political influence to help friends of Menendez's then girlfriend, Nadine.

And that they were essentially trying to interfere with a prosecution, a case out of the AG's office that was looking into insurance fraud in the trucking industry in New Jersey.

And this was at a request of Jose Uribe.

Briana: How exactly did Menendez pose this question?

Did you give grounds for a quid pro quo?

Brenda: He was asked if there was a specific request.

Gray wall said "there was not an explicit ask."

But he did say that Menendez told him he was concerned about how Hispanics versus non-Hispanic defendants were being treated by the prosecutors in the Attorney General's office who were investigating cases in the trucking industry.

And Graywall asked, is this about a specific case?

Menendez said, yes it is.

That is when Graywall shut it down.

He told Menendez, I can't talk to you about this.

He advised Menendez to let the defense attorneys in the case handle it.

That he was not going to talk about it.

Briana: Did Graywall ever relay that information to any of his staff?

Brenda: He said no, he didn't.

He had a policy that he was not going to ever mention this to his team.

He said he needed to insulate them from any kind of outside influence, and that he made it a point not to ask them.

He said when he refused Menendez, that the senator took it calmly and said, absolutely nothing about it.

Briana: I'm guessing that the defense got an opportunity for cross-examination today.

How do they play this?

-- how did they play this?

Brenda: The defense argued Menendez was not in any position to do anything for Graywall.

So, there really wasn't evidence of a quid pro quo.

Let's talk about what happened after this case.

The fraud case at point ended in a plea deal.

It was obvious, according to some text messages, that Jose Uribe realized and knew that Menendez was at least reaching out meeting -- trying to make some, I don't want to use the word interference, but influence in the case.

Now, just as a matter of coincidence, according to the prosecution, not coincidence, Jose Uribe's financed a brand-new $60,000 Mercedes-Benz for Nadine Menendez.

And that is the quid pro quo, according to the prosecution.

Here is where it gets very interesting.

Because Jose Uribe, who is a codefendant in this case and pleaded guilty, he flipped.

He pleaded guilty and now he is going to testify.

He is going to tell the jury it was indeed a quid pro quo, this was a bribe.

Briana: Did Menendez and Graywall exchange any words when he entered the courtroom?

The two served for a long time in federal capacities.

Brenda: If they locked eyes, I did not see it and I did not see them speak a word to each other.

Briana: A cold courtroom, a rainy day, Brenda Flanagan in a Manhattan for us.

Thanks so much.

Brenda: You are welcome.

Briana: The public's has government records is about to get harder after Governor Murphy on Wednesday signed the controversial bill overhauling New Jersey's open Public records act.

.

Municipal leaders hailed the signing as long overdue, but watchdog groups say by putting pen to paper, the governor wiped away years of progress made in government transparency.

Senior correspondent Joanna Gagis reports.

>> Starting today, we should stop calling OPRA OPRA, we should begin calling it NOPRA.

I do believe we have fundamentally weakened government transparency here in New Jersey.

Reporter: advocacy groups around the state are decrying Governor Murphy signing of the OPRA bill yesterday that makes changes to the open Public records act in New Jersey.

>> We are dismayed.

We are horrified, and frankly disappointed I this news.

Governor Murphy has in the past been a partner on really important progress for New Jersey.

And this bill takes us significantly back.

It is a bloated democracy.

It is a blow to government accountability and transparency.

Joanna:, their concerns are provisions that could subject someone seeking a public record to a lawsuit if the agency providing it finds the request would impair its operations.

It also puts the cost of requests on the requester, particularly if it is for commercial purposes.

And wet miles with the New Jersey working families parties as one of their main concerns is -- >> The specificity that is going to be required when submitting a request, or not being able to submit the same request to multiple agencies, which is a common practice that folks do when seeking public records.

Joanna: They say the governor has got some explaining to do, which you seem to agree.

Issuing yesterday what he told reporters was the longest signing statement he has ever written.

Here is his take.

>> This one was always going to be a tough call.

It needed to be updated.

There is no question about that.

Particularly in light of the Internet technology.

Joanna: Speaking with the governor this morning, it is clear he is conflicted on the bill.

When asked, he said it is not part of a compromise deal with legislative leadership to get his corporate transit fee past.

>> If this was something that I thought was protecting corruption, there is no way I would have signed it.

Would have vetoed it.

You are always trying to find common ground.

But at the same time, within the four walls of the bill, it has to stand on its own.

>> How do you deny that this OPRA law does not embolden bad behavior, bad actors in New Jersey?

>> We will watch it and the Government records Council will have a very powerful voice in the.

Joanna: It is that counsel, the GRC, that Tony Foucault says makes this law work.

>> We are putting more money into the GRC.

We are giving the municipalities the ability to post more documents online.

Which means people won't even have to file up a request anymore to get many of the documents that they ask for.

And we are requiring them to deliver their opinions within 90 days, which used to take 18 months.

Joanna: The bill appropriates $6 million to the Government records Council to launch and implement oversight, that another concern from opponents is the law only requires municipalities to update their digital records to the extent feasible.

They will have to do it with a $4 million appropriation that will be split between local and Cat 2 governments and.

School districts that is nearly 1200 entities.

It is not nearly enough, says Mike Sarah from the New Jersey league of municipalities.

They are thrilled to see the bill signed into law.

>> Years of meeting with legislators, to highlight issues and concerns that we wanted to see addressed.

Many of them have been addressed.

We wish the bill had gone further to address commercial data.

And the data brokers.

Our work is not done yet.

Joanna: Governor Murphy will put names forward to sit on the records Council, which he says we can expect to see very soon.

.

In Trenton, I am Joanna Gagis, NJ Spotlight News.

Briana: An 11th hour decision to halt New York City's congestion pricing plan is putting the region into a tailspin.

Governor Murphy and others on this side of the river cheered the call made by New York Governor Kathy Hochul, while environmental and transportation groups called it a slap in the face.

Many told Ted Goldberg today they see it as a critically missed opportunity to cut down on gas emissions.

>> New York's shocking decision to stop congestion pricing has inspired relief.

>> I'm grateful that Governor Hochul pulled back on congestion pricing.

I think that is a game changer for New Jersey.

Reporter: and also rage.

>> It was a shameless, spineless, and politically motivated decision.

Reporter: Kathy Hochul announced congestion pricing is on an indefinite pause, so people driving to Midtown Manhattan will not be looking at $15 charges that were supposed to start at the end of June.

Hochul said there would be too many unintended consequences for New York's families, their budgets, and the city's economic recovery.

>> Given these financial pressures, I cannot add another burden to working middle-class New Yorkers or creating another obstacle to our continued recovery.

>> That argument does not really pass the sniff test for me personally.

Reporter: some advocates for transportation think politics played a bigger role than economics.

Congestion pricing has been a polarizing topic since Albany approved it in 2019.

>> You could have said that a year ago, you could have said that three years ago.

Much of the country is still in recovery mode from the COVID pandemic.

>> Nothing has changed in the last year or month.

In fact, congestion in the city is just as bad, in fact worse than it was pre-pandemic.

Reporter: the NTA said congestion pricing would raise $1 billion a year for much needed improvements.

.

Others argued it would merely divert traffic to the George Washington Bridge, are enough north to avoid the tax.

>> Now we are not going to face that additional traffic, the 400,000 cars that come across the bridge, that was when to increase and create safety hazards, additional pollution, and bar mental issues.

So we are not going to see that.

>> That would have put an enormous burden on our commuters and it would not have eliminated pollution, they would have displaced it from Manhattan into Hudson and Bergen County's.

Reporter:Reporter: this EWB is in the district represented by Josh Gottheimer.

He says New York appears to have done right by hard-working Jersey families.

Congestion tax would have caused more traffic and cancer-causing pollution for families in northern Jersey.

Advocates worry have the NTA can make necessary repairs without that billion dollar windfall each year.

>> More than 80% of New Jersey commuters use NTA, subways and buses in New York.

If New York is not moving forward from congestion pricing, not only will it mean traffic will get worse as opposed to better, it means underfunding will hurt New Jersey transit riders who need a way to get around.

Reporter: since pricing is on an indefinite pause, people for and against it are in wait and see mode.

>> If she had said I am not supporting it and this will not happen, then I probably would have been doing cartwheels and jumping jacks.

>> We are hoping she is going to pull a Murphy.

The governor vetoed an increase in Turnpike tolls right before the last election.

Only to reverse his decision once the election was over.

Reporter: this does not end the lawsuits against New York.

Those are playing out in court while people wait.

I'm Ted Goldberg.

Briana: First it was marijuana, now lawmakers are turning their attention to legalizing medicinal use of silicide and.

It is better known as magic mushrooms.

A psychedelic drug that a growing body of research shows therapeutic benefits in treating mental health conditions.

The bill got a hearing before the Senate health committee today as supporting lawmakers tried to build the framework for a statewide program.

But it is not getting approval without a few changes first.

Legislators eliminated provisions that would have decriminalized the drug, and rock expungement's for people with past convictions related to it.

Able to the research informing the decision-making comes from a Stockton University study, which looked into the effectiveness and public support for magic mushrooms.

Psychology professor led the team of researchers and joins me to share their findings.

Great to talk to you.

Your research has informed a lot of the work that is going on in the legislative side with this.

I want to talk about a few elements of it, specifically what you found about the efficacy, and I think even more importantly, the safety of using psilocybin to treat these mental health issues.

Justin: Yeah, based on a series of multiple randomized clinical studies, looking at how professionally supervised use of psilocybin can help treat symptoms of clinical depression and anxiety, what we found was one or two doses of psilocybin, under professional supervision, has impressive long-lasting and immediate effects.

A lot of these clinical trials have found that just these one or two sessions of taking psilocybin can reduce depression and anxiety for up to six months, if not even years later.

As one clinical shed -- clinical study showed.

Briana:Briana: Is that contained him with someone who is taking a depression or anxiety medication, or on its own it has that kind of lasting effect?

Justin: In many of the clinical trials, they actually had people taper off their antidepressants, if they were taking them.

Before the psilocybin session.

So they were not under the influence of both simultaneously.

There was another clinical trial that showed that it doesn't really matter whether you are taking more traditional antidepressants along with the psilocybin, or just the psilocybin alone, that the effects are pretty comparable in both situations.

Briana: Why did you decide to look into this?

Obviously it is being talked about in the legislature for the past couple of years.

But why dive into the research?

Justin: Mostly because New Jersey introduced this bill to the Senate.

And one of the big motivations was that we identify that no one had looked into whether -- no one had looked into the degree of public support for this type of legalization of medicinal uses of psilocybin.

The real novel contribution of our study was being the first public poll of New Jersey residents to see if they support this type of legalization.

Briana: And do they?

Where do they stand?

Justin: What we found overall is 55% of our sample expressed support for using psilocybin under professional supervision to treat until health issues.

Whereas when 2% opposed, and 24% were uncertain.

We also found this varied depending on how aware the person was of the medicinal uses of psilocybin.

For people that reported being very aware of the use of psychedelic drugs for treating mental health purposes, 75% said they would support such legalization.

Whereas those that said that they were not aware of the use of psychedelics for mental health treatment, only 41% said that they were in support of that legalization.

It seems like education on this issue is a key predictor of how much people would support it.

Briana: Which is certainly the pathway soft for medicinal marijuana -- pathway we saw for medicinal marijuana.

The professor of psychology at Stockton University who has led research into psilocybin, thank you so much for sharing.

Justin: Thank you.

>> Support for the medical report is provided by Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey.

An independent licensee of the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association.

Briana: For Shores summer tourism season is underway.

And the city of North Wildwood is finally getting emergency repairs for severe beach erosion.

Contractors hired by the state began pumping new sand onto North Wildwood's beaches this week.

Work on the $10 million project is expected to last until July 4.

1000 foot long sections of the city's beaches will be closed at a time for the operation.

North Wildwood is one of the Jersey shore's erosion hotspots.

Those are places where Santa naturally washes away from beaches faster than it can be replenished.

The city has spent nearly $40 million on beach replenishment efforts since 2011.

City and state leaders have been locked in a legal fight over how to best address the problem.

This summer's emergency work is meant to tide the city over until a larger project led by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is expected to begin next spring.

In our spotlight on business report, Starbucks has been hit with a massive wave of petitions for union elections.

Workers at the Troy Hill Starbucks where one of 18 locations nationwide on Wednesday to submit union filings to the National Labor Relations Board.

Just one day after Starbucks workers United members wrapped up another round of bargaining with the coffee chain.

Both sides reported significant progress.

The election petitions join a growing nationwide movement that has ballooned to more than 10,000 workers at hundreds of stores across the U.S. Representative for the Paris styles say their decision to unionize does not stem from resentment towards Starbucks corporate.

The group says it wants a voice in the company to fight for higher wages, fair scheduling, and other protections.

Turning to Wall Street, stocks took a pause today as investors look ahead to a big jobs report out tomorrow.

Here is where the markets closed.

>> Support for the business support is sponsored byHalsey -- by Halsey street.

♪ Briana: Finally tonight, it was on this day 80 years ago, more than 150,000 young soldiers waited through the shores of Normandy and through gunfire to battle the Nazis.

Invading France by land and sea on an unprecedented scale and what would be a turning point for World War II.

Today, world, state, and local leaders held commemorations for D-Day veterans.

The last living links to that hunting day are now well into their 90's.

Some over 100.

Among them, alter stone, a 100 year old per se ago resident who served under General Patton through France and Germany.

He was awarded with the New Jersey distinguished service medal and a congressional commendation during a ceremony this morning at the Yogi Berra Museum.

Yogi was also a D-Day veteran, having served as a secon -- a second-class seaman this will likely be the last major D-Day anniversary with living members in attendance.

All the more important, according to national leaders, for us to be worthy of their service.

That is going to do it for us tonight.

Make sure you tune in tomorrow night for a special edition of NJ Spotlight News.

I will sit down with four of the gubernatorial candidates vying to replace Governor Murphy in 2025.

Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, Senator John Remick, former assemblyman, and Jersey City Mayor Steve Philip.

The conversation takes place at the 2024 New Jersey planning and redevelop and conference, in association with New Jersey future in the American planning Association.

That is tomorrow night right here on NJ Spotlight News.

I am Briana Vannozzi.

For the entire NJ Spotlight News team, thanks for being with the Spirit have a great evening, we will see you then.

>> New Jersey education Association.

Making public schools great for every child.

RW day Barnabas health.

Let's be healthy together.

And New Jersey realtors.

The voice of real estate in New Jersey.

More information is online at NJrealtor.com.

>> 21 for president of New Jersey realtors.

Whether it is guiding first-time buyers through the homebuying process, or securing space for small business owners, New Jersey realtors have been helping their clients through real estate transactions for more than a century.

No matter what your unique needs are, there is a knowledgeable New Jersey realtor for you.

Learn more at NJrealtor.com/find.

>> Life is unpredictable.

Health insurance should obey.

For over 90 years, Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey has provided quality, affordable health plans to New Jersey residents.

We have served generations of New Jersey families and businesses, and are committed to driving innovations that put you at the heart of everything you do.

Our members are our neighbors, our friends, and our families.

We are here when you need us most.

Horizon.

Proud to be New Jersey.

♪