If, like me, you were wondering, "is there anything to this?" -- there does not seem to be any evidence for it.

More significantly, there appear to have been an increased number of whale deaths all the way up and down the east coast:
https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/national/marine-life-distress/2016-2023-humpback-whale-unusual-mortality-event-along-atlantic-coast

r/science is usually pretty good at spotting the issues with studies like this, and 'lo the very top comment:https://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/10mrbrl/comment/j653ida/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3

When I was a kid in the early 80s the ONLY people called autistic were the incredibly small minority with Savant Syndrome ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savant_syndrome ). This changed over time (to be clear: for the good) to the modern spectrum diagnosis. But I really don't think there's an easy way to control for this change in a study, and it always feels kind of reckless when researchers do. You throw something like this out there and people start panicking about vaccines or drinking water or whatever for no reason.

The usual model for measuring corruption in states is per capita convictions of public officials. Generally NJ is indeed among the top 10 states for corruption, it's never been #1 though. That's usually Illinois or Louisiana, sometimes New York or Tennessee.

Astute observers will also note an issue with the metric, if public officials are never caught or convicted of anything, no corruption! (see the article posted below https://www.texasobserver.org/corrupt-texas-politicians-face-little-accountability/ )