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Sep 30, 2026
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On Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín, who is overseeing the antitrust case aimed at blocking the Paramount-Warner Bros. deal approved Paramount's settlement with the 12 Democratic state attorneys general who brought the case to resolve the litigation.
More from VarietyHow HBO's Casey Bloys Wound Up With the Keys to Paramount-Warner Bros.' Streaming Empire, and What's to ComeParamount Deal and U.S. Film Incentive Reflect Hollywood's Deepening Ties to GovernmentDavid Ellison Recruits Mattel's Ynon Kreiz for Senior Role at Merged Paramount-Warner Bros.
Paramount has tentatively set next Tuesday, Oct. 6, to close the merger, according to regulatory filings.
The order approving the settlement by Martínez-Olguín was the final remaining barrier to Paramount's debt-fueled $111 billion merger with Warner Bros. Discovery, after it had been cleared by regulators in 68 jurisdictions worldwide including the Jus
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Sep 30, 2026
By Richard Cowan
WASHINGTON, Sept 30 - The US Senate on Wednesday blocked legislation placing new restrictions on stock trading by members of Congress, as Democrats refused to provide enough votes to advance the measure toward passage, arguing that it falls ?short of a full ban.
By a vote of 53-47, the Senate halted a Republican drive to open debate on the partisan ?bill, which was passed in July by the House of Representatives. Sixty affirmative votes were needed to get the legislation over a Senate procedural hurdle.
The bill's failure, coupled with ?the Senate defeat of unrelated legislation aimed at tamping down households' rising electricity costs, nonetheless gives Republicans hopes of delivering a new line of attack against Democrats in the closing weeks of the November 3 midterm election campaigns.
For years, voters have expressed outrage over the thousands of stock trades by lawmakers that many argue are improper given lawmakers' privileged position.
Members of Congress shape legislation, often behind closed doors, and at the same time execute trades ?on stocks and bonds whose prices could be affected ?by actions in the House and Senate.
The legislation also contained a Republican provision to tighten requirements on photo IDs needed to vote in American elections - language Democrats labeled a "poison pill" they said would make it more difficult ?for eligible citizens to vote in federal elections.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune said in a press conference on Tuesday that the bill's provisions "strike at the very heart of issues that the American people care deeply about."
The "Stop Insider Trading Act" would prohibit members of Congress, spouses and dependent children from buying stocks of ?publicly traded ?companies. But Democrats bridled over their ability to keep stocks they already hold, ?let them use dividends to buy more shares and ?allow spouses or children to trade
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Sep 30, 2026
Passengers aboard a FlyDubai flight to Tel Aviv on Wednesday sprang into action after a pilot allegedly stabbed another and plunged the plane thousands of feet in an apparent attempt to crash it, in what Israeli officials are saying was an act of terror.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the intention was to "crash the plane, killing everyone on board" the flight from Dubai.
Passengers described a violent mid-air incident as the unidentified pilot allegedly stabbed the other pilot in the cockpit.
"We just heard screams, and they opened the cockpit and saw amounts of blood from someone who had simply tried to murder the pilot and stabbed him with a pocketknife. Then the plane lost control," a passenger who identified herself as Miriam told Israeli media.
Obtained by ABC News - PHOTO: An image from a video circulating online taken by a passenger inside a FlyDubai flight from Dubai to Tel Aviv that was diverted to Saudi Arabia, Sept. 30, 2026, after an incident took place inside the cockpit."We felt like we were, like, going to crash. I was already screaming, 'Shema Israel'," she added, referring to the Jewish prayer. "I can't die, I'm my only daughter, I can't do this to my mother."
Netanyahu said in a statement that the plane "went into a spin and began to dive." The passengers were predominantly Israeli citizens, he noted.
The prime minister said that some passengers took a stand, referring to one he said he spoke with after the incident.
"He managed to break into the cockpit with one of the crew members, and together they subdued the pilot who had committed the stabbing while he was attempting to sabotage the aircraft's systems," Netanyahu said.
"Another flight crew member on board entered the cockpit and manage
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Sep 30, 2026
The New York state prosecutor who has reopened an investigation into the alleged rape of a woman by seven members of a fraternity at Cornell University in October 2024 says he was not provided with a transcript of her interview with campus police before his office initially decided not to pursue charges.
On Tuesday, CBS New York published excerpts from the November 2024 interview, in which the woman reportedly asserted, "I can say with 100% confidence I was raped."
Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten said he had never seen the transcript before.
"I'm going to follow up on this because this is news to me," Van Houten told the network. "If she had said those words, we certainly would want to have explored that more. Like I said, that wasn't provided to me."
In a civil lawsuit filed earlier this month against the school, the woman, a former student identified as "Jane Doe," said she was the victim of a "gang rape" at the Chi Phi fraternity on Cornell's Ithaca, N.Y., campus.
In a lengthy statement released on Monday, Van Houten announced that he had started pursuing criminal charges against the seven fraternity members and would present the case to a grand jury. He also sought to explain why he initially decided not to prosecute them.
According to Van Houten, Jane Doe "did not allege that she was drugged against her will or gang raped" in her six-page sworn statement to campus police in N
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Sep 30, 2026
By Jody Godoy
Sept 30 (Reuters) - The Federal Trade Commission is conducting an industry-wide probe into Anthropic, OpenAI and other AI labs to uncover the potential dangers their technology ?poses to consumers, a senior FTC official told Reuters on Wednesday.
The probe is the first ?official US enforcement action that delves into rogue AI agents, following a surge in incidents first reported in July that ?have stoked fears among the public that uncontrolled AI could one day harm humans.
The FTC plans to issue formal demands for information and compel testimony from executives at top AI developers, including Anthropic, OpenAI and the research group METR, the official said.
Anthropic and OpenAI have used METR to conduct independent ?investigations into security incidents involving their ?agentic AI technology.
Anthropic, OpenAI and METR did not immediately respond to requests for comment from Reuters. The New York Post first reported the news.
FTC Chairman Andrew ?Ferguson had concerns about the companies before AI agents developed by OpenAI hacked the open-source platform Hugging Face, the official said.
But the incident in which OpenAI agents had probed the AI coding hub for vulnerabilities before ?carrying out ?a large-scale attack increased urgency around the issue, the ?official said.
Ferguson suggested last week in an ?interview with Reuters that developers who instruct agents in cybersecurity tests that result in hacks should be liable for any harm they cause.
The US should look to existing laws before seeking to pass new ones regulating AI, Ferguson said at the Reuters Momentum AI event in Austin.
The FTC has broad authority to sue companies over unfair or deceptive practices, and has used that authority in ?the past to take action against companies for failing to ?take reasonable measures to secure consumers' data.
US President Donald ?Trump met w
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Sep 30, 2026
On Tuesday, President Trump met with tech executives at the White House to have them sign a "morally binding" agreement on artificial intelligence. Rather than pushing for government regulation, Trump called for "tremendous self-regulation" among companies in the AI industry. The document reflects that, encouraging AI leaders to implement "robust internal controls" and partner with independent external auditors.
The summit comes after months of increased scrutiny for AI companies as they've disclosed concerning incidents of AI "going rogue" during testing. The event that kicked it all off was the Hugging Face incident, in which AI agents from OpenAI that were being evaluated escaped their ostensibly isolated testing environment and infiltrated another company's systems in an effort to "cheat" at the task they were given. After that, OpenAI, Anthropic, Meta and Google have reported even more incidents in which AI agents have gone rogue in various ways. We've rounded up all the cases you need to know about, along with details about what (if anything) is being done about them.
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Sep 30, 2026
Crude oil is moving through the Strait of Hormuz at a pace that is starting to approach prewar levels, a notable rebound for the world's most critical oil choke point.
That restored flow is mainly the result of Iran's somewhat depleted military capability and a U.S. Navy operation that has secured a portion of the waterway for relatively secure passage.
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But the forces driving high fuel prices are not receding along with the development. That will require a lot more than the costly military campaign that is clearing the way for passage of one product at one particular moment in the war.
Most of the refined gasoline and diesel that was moving through the strait before the war is still not getting shipped, a major factor keeping prices elevated.
The rebound of crude shipments "is good news, but we are far from out of the woods," said Bob McNally, founder of the research firm Rapidan Energy Group. "The market realizes that. We have dug ourselves into a deep deficit over the last several months, and this only reduces it. It does not get us back to where we were."
Crude oil prices dipped Tuesday - largely as a response to Saudi Arabia's East-West pipeline resuming limited operations. The price of Brent crude, the global benchmark for oil, remained above $100 a barrel Wednesday morning, roughly 40 percent higher than it was when the Iran war began in February.
The outlook for the war and for oil was further clouded on Wednesday, when the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations Centre reported that three vessels carrying fuel through a corridor of the strait the U.S. military has been trying to protect had been attacked the d
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Sep 30, 2026
A teacher noticed the gun Monday morning and took "immediate action," Canton Police Chief Joseph Bialy told ABC Detroit affiliate WXYZ.
Officers then responded to the incident in Canton, just outside of Detroit, and secured the weapon, according to Canton police.
Florida mom allegedly abandons 4 kids to go on cruise: Court documentsNo injuries were reported.
Charges against the parent were not immediately clear, but the Wayne County Prosecutor's Office told ABC News the parent is expected to be arraigned on Thursday.
"The message here is that no matter how busy our lives are, we have a great responsibility if we're going to choose to own a firearm," the chief told WXYZ.
Guns are the No. 1 cause of death for children in the U.S., according to Everytown For Gun Safety.
This article originally appeared on ABC News at https://abcnews.com/US/toddler-found-loaded-gun-daycare-michigan-police/story?id=136884435
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Sep 30, 2026
WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. economy grew at a solid 2.2% pace from April through June as consumer spending and business investment came in strong.
Growth in gross domestic product — the nation's output of a goods and services — decelerated from a 2.5% pace from January through March, the Commerce Department reported Wednesday. The second-quarter growth was an improvement on the department's previous estimate of 1.5% — a surprise to economists who had expected little or no change in the GDP number.
Consumer spending — which accounts for about 70% of U.S. economic activity — increased at a healthy 3.8% annual pace, up from 0.7% in the January-March period. Spending has been helped by a strong stock market, which reflects enthusiasm over the prospects for artificial intelligence and which enriches wealthy investors and gives them more money to buy things with.
The overall growth number was dragged down by imports. They are subtracted from growth because GDP is only supposed to count domestic production. Imports rose at a 12.6% annual pace from April through June, partly due to a surge in shipments of computer chips and other products that support artificial intelligence investment, and slashed nearly 1.7 percentage points off second-quarter growth.
The U.S. economy has proven surprisingly resilient in the face of fighting with Iran and the energy price spike it caused.
Business investment, excluding housing, rose at a 9% clip in the second quarter, reflecting the AI investment boom. And a measure of the economy's underlying strength — which strips out volatile government spending and trade numbers — grew at a strong 4.6% rate, up from 1.8% in the first quarter.
"The eco
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Sep 30, 2026
Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (ilia YEFIMOVICH/Getty Images)
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Wednesday that the situation was under control after a flydubai flight carrying about 180 Israelis was diverted to Saudi Arabia and that steps were being taken to bring the passengers home safely.
"The situation is under control, and all measures are currently being taken to bring the Israeli passengers back to Israel safely," Netanyahu's office said in an official statement.
Netanyahu held security consultations after the flight from Dubai to Tel Aviv landed in Tabuk, Saudi Arabia, his office reported.
The circumstances of the incident remain under investigation, but passengers aboard the flight said they intervened to stop an apparent attempt by one of the pilots to crash the plane.
According to reports Wednesday, the copilot, reportedly an Omani national who had worked for the airline for about a year, stabbed the captain and tried to crash the plane before passengers subdued him.
Israeli sources said that initial investigations suggested the suspected attacker was Omani, but his identity had not been confirmed.
The aircraft landed safely in Saudi Arabia, and there is no indication at this time that the incident was directed by a state or organization, according to reports.
However, a growing assessment among Israel's security establishment, including the IDF, Mossad, and Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency), is that the incident was intended as an act of terror, reports The Jerusalem Post.
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Sep 30, 2026
Republicans in both chambers are increasingly breaking ranks with President Trump across a host of sensitive issues, hoping some separation from the GOP's unpopular standard-bearer will help avert a blue wave in the midterm elections.
The divisions are highly unusual for a party that's walked virtually in lockstep with Trump for more than a decade. But as the president's numbers have tanked over the summer and rising costs have squeezed voters of all stripes, more and more Republicans are distancing themselves from Trump's agenda, if only as a temporary strategy to retain power in the next Congress.
The pushback targets a range of policies, including Trump's hard line on immigration enforcement; his full-throated embrace of data centers despite the public backlash; his signature tariffs, which have challenged businesses at home and alliances abroad; and his warm reception of Chinese President Xi Jinping during a recent visit to Washington.
But none of those issues seems to resonate quite as much as the cost of gasoline and diesel fuel, which have spiked in response to the global trade disruptions caused by Trump's decision to launch a war with Iran earlier in the year. Even the top GOP leaders on Capitol Hill have been forced to acknowledge that Trump's agenda, which was once their winning ticket, has become a liability heading into November.
"What's happening in Iran [has] sort of trumped everything else that's going on," Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) told Fox News on Monday.
Weeks ahead of the midterms, gas prices are hovering at an average of just less than $4.50 per gallon, dies
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Sep 30, 2026
In a six-page statement given to police in November 2024, a Cornell University student told a campus police officer what happened to her at the Chi Phi fraternity house a month prior "felt like coercion," according to a copy of the police report obtained by ABC News.
The statement from the student, sworn on Nov. 15, 2024, is the most detailed account yet of what "Jane Doe" described in a civil lawsuit two years later as a "gang rape."
The former student did not call it that in her statement at the time. She did detail multiple instances where she declined to participate in certain sexual acts suggested by the men, according to the statement.
Heather Ainsworth/AP Photo - PHOTO: Cornell Fraternity LawsuitDistrict attorney reopens case of alleged Cornell University 'gang rape'The woman's statement was central to a decision by the Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten not to bring charges in 2024.
In an interview with ABC News this week, Van Houten described the allegations as "morally disturbing" but argued Jane Doe's 2024 account of the incident suggested that she consented to the sexual activity. He said that she did not withdraw her consent, and that when she raised concerns, the fraternity members "stopped and did not pursue what they were doing."
According to her 2024 statement, at one point she said "no to the foursome" one of the fraternity brothers proposed, she said in her statement. At another point she recalled "a group of multiple men" walking into a room and "I was instantly horrified, and I remember squealing out loud and running across the room and hiding und
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Sep 30, 2026
Treasury Department checks, along with letters signed by Trump notifying recipients, will begin going out to more than 950,000 Americans across 30 states, according to an administration official.
"For years, the Biden administration overcharged you to fund the operation of HealthCare.gov," Trump says in the letter, which was viewed by USA TODAY. "That money belongs to hard-working Americans, not the Government, and now I'm returning it to you!"
'Flagrant bribery': Trump faces MAGA backlash over $5K election offer
Trump announced the $500 Obamacare refund checks on Sept. 10 in a video posted by the White House that coincided with the Republican midterm convention in Dallas. The money is separate from a controversial $5,000 dividend Trump has vowed to distribute to all Americans if Republicans retain control of Congress after the November midterm election.
The White House has said the Biden administration collected user fees from health insurance companies that consumers paid for in the form of higher pr
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Sep 30, 2026
Containers are seen at the container terminal of Nanjing Port, in China's eastern Jiangsu province on September 8, 2026. Most Chinese goods shipped to the United States have faced a minimum 12.5% tax. - AFP/Getty Images
Here we go again: President Donald Trump's sweeping global tariffs are back under the legal microscope.
On Wednesday, a three-judge panel at the US Court of International Trade is set to hear arguments in a case that could determine whether the president can use a 1970s trade law to impose tariffs on nearly everything the United States imports.
Since late July, goods from 80 countries, including China, India and Japan, have faced tariff rates ranging from 10% to 12.5%. The administration imposed the duties after determining that those countries had allegedly failed to address the use of forced labor in producing goods shipped to the US. The US Trade Representative recommended the tariffs as a remedy, with higher rates applying to countries deemed the "worst offenders."
The rollout of these tariffs coincided with the lapse of a separate 10% near-blanket duty Trump had imposed earlier in the year under a different legal authority. The Supreme Court later ruled that Trump had overstepped his authority, which immediately invalidated the tariffs and triggered $168 billion worth of refu
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Sep 30, 2026
A commercial plane traveling from Dubai to Israel was forced to make an emergency landing in Saudi Arabia on Wednesday, briefly raising concerns about a possible hijacking and prompting Israel to scramble its jets.
Israeli media, citing security officials, said the incident stemmed from a feud between the plane's two pilots, and everyone on board was safe. The plane landed in Tabuk, a civilian and military base in the kingdom.
The FlyDubai plane transmitted an emergency alert shortly after takeoff, according to publicly available flight tracking information.
A regional official briefed on the incident said a fight broke out in the cockpit and apparently involved pilots. It wasn't immediately clear what had caused the fight, the official said.
A second official confirmed that Israel had scrambled warplanes, fearing a hijacking of a plane carrying dozens of its citizens. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has warned in recent days of unspecified, escalated security threats.
Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because the incident was still under investigation.
Netanyahu's office later said the situation was under control and Israel was working to bring the passengers home.
Emergency landings for personnel reasons are rare yet not unheard of. In 2022, two Air France pilots were suspended after fighting in the cockpit on a Geneva-Paris flight, though it did not have to be diverted and landed as planned.
FlyDubai is the lower-cost sister carrier of Emirates airlines. The United Arab Emirates has become a popular vacation destination for Israeli tourists since the countries normalized ties in 2020.
Israel has not experienced a hijacking in decades but maintains some of the strictest airport security in the world. Commercial flight have flown between Israel and the United Arab Emirates since the countries normalized ties in 2020.
This article originally appeared on CBS
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Sep 30, 2026
The Chi Phi fraternity house at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, on September 28, 2026. - Heather Ainsworth/AP
It was 7:05 p.m. on a Wednesday in mid-September when Jane Doe's lawsuit hit the New York County Supreme Court docket. Within days, the 101-page, double-spaced filing had captured the nation's attention, sparking outrage and controversy and refocusing attention on a longstanding issue: sexual assault on college campus.
The complaint was explosive, claiming that seven members of a Cornell University fraternity took part in the sexual assault of a 20-year-old sorority member during a drug-fueled, hours-long encounter in the fall of 2024. Included in the filing was a screenshot of a Snapchat message where one of the men wrote that there was "free p*ssy" and others responded gleefully, with comments like "CHI PHIII."
Soon after the lawsuit's filing on Sept. 16, a familiar pattern played out. Furious onlookers took to social media to demand accountability, flooded the district attorney's office with complaints and shared photos and other identifying details of the fraternity members many have taken to calling "the Cornell 7." Others, meanwhile, condemned the rush to judgment or urged caution in drawing conclusions from the allegations in the lawsuit, which a prosecutor said differ from what the alleged victim reported in 2024. Some hurried to try to unmask the anonymous woman behind the accusations.
There were flashes of politics and victim blaming, judgment and shame in a case that's rife with unanswered questions and likely to evolve as more details come to light.
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Sep 30, 2026
BAGHDAD (AP) — The U.S. military announced on Wednesday that it has completed the withdrawal of all American troops from Iraq, ending a 12-year mission to fight the Islamic State group. The last U.S. troops left an air base in northern Iraq under a deal between Baghdad and Washington.
The withdrawal, agreed on two years ago, comes against the backdrop of the ongoing war between the United States and Iran that has also sometimes spilled over into Iraq, with Iran-backed militias firing on U.S. troops and the U.S. striking the groups' strongholds.
Baghdad touted the end of the U.S. mission as a sign of the country's increasing strength and sovereignty.
The withdrawal was also celebrated by Iran-backed groups but raised concerns among some other Iraqis, particularly in the Kurdish region. Meanwhile, questions loom around the future of the Iraqi militias, which the Baghdad government has sought — with little success so far — to disarm.
Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell said in a statement that U.S. troops and equipment had completed an "orderly departure" from the air base in Irbil, in northern Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdish region.
"This milestone reflects the success of a 12-year campaign that defeated ISIS as an organized military threat in Iraq and across the region," he said. "It also marks a transition from a wartime coalition mission to an Iraqi-led security effort supported by a more normal bilateral security relationship."
Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi presided over the handover ceremony and described the U.S. withdrawal as the beginning of a "new phase, one defined by Iraq's sovereignty, the strength of
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Sep 30, 2026
TORONTO (AP) — Mark Carney built a global profile in 2026 by standing up to U.S. President Donald Trump. If some prediction-market traders and prominent admirers are right, the Canadian prime minister could end the year with the Nobel Peace Prize and Time magazine's Person of the Year.
Carney briefly became the favorite Monday for the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize on Kalshi, a U.S.-based prediction market, when traders on the exchange put his chances at 14%. His odds later fell, illustrating the highly speculative nature of the wagering.
There is no public evidence Carney is on the Nobel Committee's secret shortlist for the prize that will be announced Oct. 9 in Oslo, Norway.
But the buzz about the Canadian leader possibly winning the esteemed peace prize reflects the message that has raised his profile: Middle powers should band together to defend sovereignty as great powers increasingly use economic and military leverage.
Whether that position resonates with the Nobel Committee is impossible to know. One thing is certain, though: the Nobel and Time's annual award happen to be two honors Trump covets.
Trump believes he deserves Nobel honor
Carney and Trump are locked in an escalating trade war, with 50% U.S. tariffs on billions of dollars of Canadian goods and Canadi
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Sep 30, 2026
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Tennessee's execution of Christa Gail Pike for a murder she committed at age 18 was halted Wednesday about an hour before it was set to begin, as a federal appeals court sought to review whether her allegations of childhood sexual abuse and rape were fully considered at her sentencing.
This would have been the state's first execution of a woman in at least 200 years.
Pike, now 50, and her boyfriend were convicted of stabbing and beating 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer, their classmate at a job training facility in Knoxville in 1995.
The case garnered widespread attention at the time in part because a pentagram that was carved on Slemmer's body and other elements of the crime stoked fears of Satan worship during the "satanic panic" of the 1980s and 1990s.
It wasn't immediately clear if Tennessee's attorney general was appealing the decision, or how long the execution might be delayed. A phone message and email were left with a spokesperson for the attorney general's office seeking comment.
Execution witnesses had already gathered at the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville when the order came down at around 9 a.m. CDT.
As the execution date drew near, it renewed debate over the death penalty for young offenders.
Pike does not deny committing the killing, but her supporters argue the state should consider Pike's age at the time, mental illness and a history of severe sexual abuse that included being raped from the time she was a toddler. Assistant Federal Defender Stephen Ferrell said Pike's death sentence is an outlier because other 18-year-olds sentenc
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Sep 29, 2026
Bernie Sanders is cracking open his war chest.
For months, the Vermont senator crisscrossed the country vaulting progressives to a series of primary wins. Now, he told POLITICO, he's dipping into his substantial campaign coffers as part of a broader effort to propel battleground Democrats over the finish line in November.
His campaign had nearly $23 million as of July 1 and is currently in the process of contributing hundreds of thousands of dollars to support Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan in Minnesota's Senate race, according to Sanders' campaign and a second person granted anonymity to share details of the transfer. He also plans to financially boost other candidates he's endorsed, including Angie Nixon's Senate campaign in Florida and Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison's reelection bid, according to Sanders' campaign.
Those donations, which have not previously been reported, are the first that Sanders has made from his campaign account for the general election, part of a surge of activity from the left's leading figurehead in the final midterm sprint.
"I am very proud that many strong progressives have won Democratic primaries. We got to defend them right now," the Vermont senator said in a brief interview Tuesday. "We got three Senate races in Michigan and Minnesota and Florida that I want to see us win, three great candidates, and they're all taking on enormous amounts of money. So we need to strengthen the grassroots movement in those states. Got great congressional candidates in Wisconsin, Ohio, elsewhere … so we got a lot of work in front of us."
Sanders' operation is also spending to hire more full-time organizers in Michigan, Minnesota and Florida, according to his team, and is planning get-out-the-vote text campaigns for federal candidates he's endorsed.
Sanders' escalating efforts come as some Democrats have wondered whether the senator — having flexed considerable influence after helping power a series of high-prof
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Sep 29, 2026
Thomas Jefferson has long been rumored to have fathered children with Sally Hemings. New genetic evidence strengthens that connection. (Photo by Burstein Collection/Corbis/VCG via Getty Images) - Burstein Collection/Corbis/Getty Images
Opening a Bible that once belonged to Thomas Jefferson, staff at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History in 2011 discovered a reddish-blond hair pressed between the pages. That hair, suspected to have belonged to Jefferson himself, launched a DNA investigation spanning more than a decade that's now providing a long-missing puzzle piece regarding Jefferson's relationship with Sally Hemings, an enslaved woman in his household.
After spending years reconstructing DNA fragments, scientists have revealed the most compelling evidence to date that Jefferson, a founding father of the United States, also fathered children with Hemings — a relationship that has been long rumored but never definitively proven. How that investigation unfolded is documented in the book "History by a Hair: Thomas Jefferson, Sally Hemings & Solving a 200-Year-Old Mystery," written by Richard Kurin, a distinguished scholar and ambassador-at-large at the Smithsonian, and published on September 22.
Kurin is also senior author of a paper describing the methods that connected the former US president to Hemings' descendants, which involved delving deep into the genetics of the Jefferson and Hemings fa
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Sep 29, 2026
The U.S. military is expected to complete the total withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq on Wednesday after a 12-year presence prompted by the war against the Islamic State militant group ISIS.
It will be the second time that the U.S. has withdrawn all of its military forces from Iraq.
In 2011, the U.S. pulled out after an eight-year presence that began with the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003. U.S. troops returned in 2014 as ISIS conquered wide swaths of Syria and northern Iraq and threatened the approaches to Baghdad. The U.S. defeated ISIS militarily in 2019, but the continued U.S. presence was seen as a necessary one to prevent a resurgence of ISIS.
Staff Sgt. Pat Caldwell/U.S. Army - PHOTO: A line of Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles operated by Soldiers with Company F, 3rd Battalion, 116th Cavalry Regiment, 3rd Sustainment Brigade, 103rd Sustainment Command stand ready to begin a convoy at Joint Base Balad, Iraq.Iran live updatesThe withdrawal was negotiated with Iraq by the Biden administration in 2024, and the Trump administration has continued with the withdrawal plan that set Sept. 30 as the final pullout date. But the U.S. war with Iran has created a different regional situation for Iraq and the United States than when the deal was agreed upon.
Iraq and Iran have a shared Shiite cultural heritage and Iran has militarily assisted Shiite-militias inside Iraq. It remains a question how far Iran will be able to increase its presence and influence in Iraq and whether ISIS could become resurgent.
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Sep 29, 2026
Transportation Security Administration agents sit as they check boarding passes and IDs at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, on Monday, January 26, 2026. - Valerie Plesch/Bloomberg/Getty Images
Airport security employees checking boarding passes and IDs will no longer be allowed to sit down while working, the Transportation Security Administration confirmed Tuesday.
All chairs are being removed from the travel document checker podiums at the entrance to checkpoints nationwide, the union representing the screeners said. The American Federation of Government Employees TSA Council 100 said it found out about the decision from its members and called it a "disregard for workers rights and safety."
TSA defended the move, saying the document checkers are the first to interact with the traveling public and requiring them to stand will create a better experience for passengers.
"This welcome change reinforces both our security posture and our commitment to hospitality by having these officers on their feet and alert," the agency said in a statement. "All officers must meet fitness for duty requirements to be capable of performing their vital national security function while simultaneously creating a welcoming and professional environment for travelers."
The move comes nearly two months after TSA Administrator David Cummins was confirmed to lead the agency.
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Sep 29, 2026
Christa Pike, Tennessee's only female death row inmate, has lost her final appeal after the U.S. Supreme Court declined to intervene in her imminent execution.
The nation's highest court denied Pike's request for a stay of execution on Sept. 29, less than 24 hours before Pike is set to be executed by lethal injection on Sept. 30. The court joins Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee and lower courts in rejecting arguments from Pike's attorneys that she should be spared because of her exceptionally traumatic childhood.
Also on Sept. 29, Amnesty International joined more than 100 women's advocacy groups and sex abuse experts in continuing to argue for a reprieve for Pike.
"It is unthinkable that Governor Lee would even consider moving forward with this execution," Justin Mazzola, deputy director of research at Amnesty International USA, said in a statement. "In this moment, people around the world are asking Governor Lee to grant clemency to Ms. Pike, and we add our voice to theirs."
Lee announced
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Sep 29, 2026
Christa Pike, Tennessee's only female death row inmate, has lost her final appeal after the U.S. Supreme Court declined to intervene in her imminent execution.
The nation's highest court denied Pike's request for a stay of execution on Sept. 29, less than 24 hours before Pike is set to be executed by lethal injection on Sept. 30. The court joins Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee and lower courts in rejecting arguments from Pike's attorneys that she should be spared because of her exceptionally traumatic childhood.
Also on Sept. 29, Amnesty International joined more than 100 women's advocacy groups and sex abuse experts in continuing to argue for a reprieve for Pike.
"It is unthinkable that Governor Lee would even consider moving forward with this execution," Justin Mazzola, deputy director of research at Amnesty International USA, said in a statement. "In this moment, people around the world are asking Governor Lee to grant clemency to Ms. Pike, and we add our voice to theirs."
Lee announced
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Sep 29, 2026
President Trump gathered top artificial intelligence leaders in Washington on Tuesday and doubled down on his opposition to government intervention, suggesting that "self-regulation" is the answer to growing worries about the technology getting out of human control.
"There's a belief that there should be tremendous self-regulation," the president said after meeting with the assembled CEOs. "There was a lot of commonality in this room."
Trump said he and the CEOs signed a "morally binding" accord that would keep the companies in line through "self-policing and group policing."
Trump posted a copy of the accord to his Truth Social account with a one-page document that called for each participating company to implement four different measures to safeguard the technology and added that, later on, "it might make sense to codify these steps into laws or regulations."
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) September 29, 2026 Some executives on hand said the accord included commitments to a combination of technological controls to detect problems with new models, internal risk review efforts, external auditors, and other measures.
Meta (META) CEO Mark Zuckerberg called the accord "a start," while others suggested some details still needed to be worked out.
"The mechanism, how we address those risks, is still
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Sep 29, 2026
NEW YORK — Striking a blow to New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani's rollout of his pied-à-terre tax on the rich, a Staten Island judge on Tuesday ruled in favor of owners of high-value second homes who sued the city and ordered the city to start the process over.
Justice Wayne Ozzi found that notices the city mailed to property owners informing them that they may be subject to the surcharge were unlawful and had to be canceled and re-sent. He also ruled that the controversial supplemental property tax roll posted online must be taken down.
"No crime is involved here, but homeowners are being substantially harmed and penalized needlessly," Ozzi wrote in a 22-page decision, referring to the city's method of implementing the tax law on high-value second homes.
The city did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The second-home surcharge is a key source of revenue for the city, expected to raise a whopping $500 million to help close what ahd been a massive budget gap.
Randy Mastro, representing the homeowners in the case, said the city had botched the rollout and wasted taxpayers' time.
"The fact is that this administration failed to follow state law when it burdened New York City homeowners with proving they live in their own homes or be on the hook for paying a new surcharge," Mastro said. "Now the administration must go back and do what it should have done from the start: use all the information at its disposal to make an individualized ‘initial determination' about who truly owes this surcharge before demanding that they pay it."
The city and the state have estimated that the number of properties impacted will be around 10,000. A larger net was cast in July when the city wrote to approximately 17,000 luxury property owners, saying they may be subject to the tax and could file for an exemption. Around 900,000 pricey properties were described in an online public database as potentially related to the surcharge.
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Sep 29, 2026
An Ohio man who had called 911 to report that an intruder had broken into their home and fatally shot his wife was found guilty of murdering the mother of two.
Caleb Flynn, 40, who once appeared as a contestant on "American Idol" in 2013, was charged with aggravated murder and multiple counts of murder, felonious assault and tampering with evidence in connection with the death of his wife, 37-year-old Ashley Flynn. He had pleaded not guilty.
Pool via ABC News - PHOTO: Caleb Flynn reacts as he listens to the reading of his guilty verdict inside the Miami County Court of Common Pleas, Sept. 29, 2026, in Troy, Ohio.The jury deliberated for nearly 2 1/2 hours before reaching a verdict Tuesday afternoon, finding him guilty of all charges. Caleb Flynn began to tear up as the verdict was read and appeared to briefly sob in his chair.
The judge set sentencing for Oct. 5 and revoked his bond.
Pool via ABC News - PHOTO: Caleb Flynn cries after being found guilty inside the Miami County Court of Common Pleas, Sept. 29, 2026, in Troy, Ohio.The former pastor called 911 early on Feb. 16 to report that his wife had been shot by an intruder at their home in Tipp City, north of Dayton. He was arrested three days later.
Prosecutors alleged that Caleb Flynn "executed" his wife by shooting her twice in the back of the head in bed so that he could be with his mistress and manipulated the crime scene to make it seem as if an intruder had
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Sep 29, 2026
By Andrew Chung
Sept 29 (Reuters) - The US Supreme Court on Tuesday let President Donald Trump's administration resume deporting migrants to countries other than their own without offering them the chance to show the harms they may face, bolstering a tool his administration has used for rapid expulsions as part of his immigration crackdown.
The court granted ?the Justice Department's emergency request to put on hold Boston-based US District Judge Brian Murphy's ruling that the Department of Homeland Security's policy to remove migrants to so-called third ?countries is unlawful. The court also agreed to hear arguments in the dispute in December, with a formal ruling on the policy to follow.
The court has a 6-3 conservative majority. Its three liberal justices dissented from the decision to let ?the deportations immediately resume pending the final outcome of the litigation.
Murphy's ruling came in a class-action lawsuit filed by immigrant rights groups on behalf of migrants seeking to prevent the US government from sending them to third countries without notice and a chance to assert the harms they could face.
More than 25,000 migrants have been deported to 29 countries under the policy implemented last year, according to a tally by human rights groups, with the vast majority going to Mexico.
The policy is one of a number of measures the administration has taken in its pursuit of Trump's goal of mass deportation. The Republican president has enforced ?a sweeping crackdown on immigration — among his top priorities — since returning ?to office last year.
The administration has carried out third-country deportations to politically unstable South Sudan, which the US State Department urges Americans to avoid due to the risks of crime, kidnapping and armed conflict, as well as Uganda, Equatorial Guinea, Liberia, the Central African Republic, and other nations.
Department of Homeland Security
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Sep 29, 2026
Former special counsel Jack Smith fielded insults from Republicans and questions about his prosecutorial decisions as he sat before lawmakers on the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday.
Chair Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) has been a leading voice in scrutinizing Smith's twin probes into President Trump, obtaining and releasing reams of documents about the investigations while criticizing his decision to subpoena some lawmakers' call logs.
Smith defended his work, saying Trump faced criminal charges related to the Mar-a-Lago classified documents case and the case tied to the president's role in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol as a result of his own illegal conduct. He added that he would have brought charges against any president who committed such crimes.
Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), meanwhile, accused the GOP of "gaslighting" the American public about how damaging the Jan. 6 attack was to democracy.
But Smith largely served as a punching bag for the committee's Republicans.
"You may think you're a hero in this story, but let me tell you something. You're the villain. You've done so much damage," Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.) told Smith.
"You will go down as a total dirtbag."
Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) said Smit
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Sep 29, 2026
The site of the fish-shaped intaglio damaged by border wall construction contractors at Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge in Arizona. (Courtesy Russ McSpadden / Center for Biological Diversity)An ancient ground carving that was severely damaged by the administration's border wall construction was created before Stonehenge and Egypt's oldest pyramid, according to recently publicized research.
The Las Playas Intaglio, a giant fish carved into the Sonoran Desert in Arizona, is now considered the oldest example in the Americas of a geoglyphic, the ancient art form that is carved into or drawn on the ground.
In April, contractors hired by the Trump administration to make way for a second wall along the Arizona-Mexico border "scraped" a 50-foot swath through the ancient carving, according to the Center for Biological Diversity, which documented the damage.
The intaglio on the ground of the ancestral homeland of the Tohono O'odham and other Indigenous tribes is estimated to be about 2,000 years older than Egypt's first pyramid and to have been created about 1,500 years before the first construction of
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Sep 29, 2026
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Department of Homeland Security has tapped $20 million to pay for the campaign-style ads glorifying President Donald Trump that have drawn widespread criticism from Republicans and Democrats as a blatant misuse of taxpayer dollars that likely runs afoul of anti-propaganda law.
In a letter Tuesday to Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, two top Democratic senators said that the money is being drawn from Trump's so-called "One Big Beautiful Bill" and was supposed to go for U.S. Customs and Border Protection.
"We should not have to remind you that using government funding to create or air political ads like the ones that have been running over the last few days is illegal and a shockingly corrupt misuse of taxpayer dollars," wrote Sen. Patty Murray of Washington, the top Democrat on the Senate Appropriations Committee, and Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut, the ranking Democrat on the subcommittee that handles Homeland Security funding.
The senators demanded answers within the next 48 hours about "how this president is literally stealing their tax dollars to air campaign ads celebrating himself."
They asked the secretary if the department plans to use additional federal funds to air these ads or create new ones, and if so to share contracting information with Congress. They also
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Sep 29, 2026
Lindsay Clancy returned to court on Tuesday for the first time since her murder trial ended with a deadlocked jury.
Defense attorney Kevin Reddington asked Judge William Sullivan for an acquittal, arguing that there was not enough evidence to prove that the 36-year-old former nurse killed her three young children.
"This entire case is based on speculation," Reddington said. "Where is the admission? Where does she say that she did this?"
Prosecutor Shanan Buckingham called the argument "laughable."
Sullivan did not immediately rule. The next hearing in the case is set for Nov. 2.
During the trial, Clancy's attorneys did not dispute that she fatally strangled her children — Cora, 5; Dawson, 3; and 8-month-old Callan — with exercise bands at their Duxbury, Mass., home in January 2023. She had been charged with three counts of murder in the first degree.
Her lawyers argued that she could not be held criminally responsible for the killings because she was suffering from the rare mental illness that they said made her unable to understand the wrongfulness of her actions.
Prosecutors contended that Clancy, who was never formally diagnosed with postpartum psychosis, carefully planned the killings and bears full responsibility for her children's deaths.
The trial hinged largely on discussions of Clancy's mental state. Over nearly five weeks of testimony, a series of family members and medical professionals took the stand to describe the mental and emotional struggles she endured in th
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Sep 29, 2026
Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Oregon, and Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, who lead the Senate panel that oversees funding for the Kennedy Center, tried to pass a bill that would require an act of Congress to demolish any national memorials that honor a president. An objection from a single senator can block a bill from being passed by unanimous consent.
Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, objected.
The bill - dubbed the "Protecting Presidential Memorials Act" - would also apply to Lincoln Memorial and Washington Monument. But Merkley and Murkowski made their immediate goal clear.
"This has of course to do with the president planning to demolish the Kennedy Center," Merkley said on the Senate floor late Monday evening, Sept. 28, after the passing of the Protect College Sports Act, a major overhaul to college athletics related to NIL (name, image and likeliness) payment for student athletes.
'Bringing order to chaos': Senate passes major overhaul of college sports rules
Lee's office said in a statement to USA TODAY that this effort should go through "the appropriate committee process."
"Democrats should join us in lowering the cost of living and securing American elections instead of wasting the Senate's time with partisan scaremongering," Lee said in the statement shared by communications director Bi
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Sep 29, 2026
A United States ban of hundreds of millions of dollars worth of Canadian products took effect on Tuesday, escalating a trade war between the longtime allies and pinching imports from one of the top U.S. trade partners.
The ban applies to an array of products spanning from alcohol to motorcycles to dairy goods, White House documents show.
In all, the affected products account for $967 million worth of annual imports from Canada, Jacob Jensen, director of trade policy at the right-leaning American Action Forum, said in a blog post.
Iran live updates: Tehran waiting for US response to 7-point proposal, Araghchi saysNearly $9 of every $10 worth of impacted products belongs to the category of alcoholic beverages, making them the primary target of the ban, Jensen said. The move comes after some Canadian provinces pulled U.S.-made alcohol off of liquor store shelves, crimping sales for American producers.
The list of banned alcoholic products includes beer, wine, whiskey, vodka, rum and brandy.
The policy also bars some mopeds and motorcycles, as well as some food items featuring whey, a popular protein-rich additive derived from dairy. Molasses and non-alcoholic beer also stand among the banned imports.
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Sep 29, 2026
SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) - Kristi Noem, the former governor of South Dakota and former secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, has filed for divorce from her husband, Bryon Noem, according to court records.
Kristi Noem filed for divorce in Hamlin County, South Dakota, on April 6, but the documents were not posted to the online court service until Monday. The basis for the divorce is irreconcilable differences, documents show.
The couple has been married since May 23, 1992, according to the documents. Speculation about the Noem marriage has swirled around the couple for several months.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, left, and her husband Bryon Noem, right, appears for an oversight hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee, at the Capitol in Washington, Tuesday, March 3, 2026. Her husband, Bryon Noem, is seated at center. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
When contacted by Nexstar's KELO on Tuesday, Bryon Noem said, "I can't comment right now."
Attempts to reach Kristi Noem, who now serves as the Special Envoy for The Shield of the Americas, were unsuccessful.
The divorce paperwork was filed shortly after a tabloid leaked a photo of Bryon Noem, who
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Sep 29, 2026
Another top Trump loyalist tasked to help lead a controversial conspiracy probe targeting President Trump's political foes has resigned from the Justice Department, sources familiar with the matter confirmed to ABC News.
The resignation of Kurt Olsen, a 2020 election denier who was assigned to the so-called "grand conspiracy" probe in Southern Florida earlier this year, comes just weeks after Trump ally Joe diGenova similarly announced his departure after suggesting to the New York Post that he was being pressured by DOJ leadership to bring charges without supporting evidence.
Olsen had no prior prosecutorial experience and was deeply involved in litigation surrounding President Trump's efforts to challenge his 2020 election loss.
Joe diGenova, loyalist tapped by Trump to oversee controversial DOJ probe targeting his foes, resigns: SourcesOlsen could not immediately be reached for comment. A DOJ spokesperson declined to comment to ABC News.
Other line prosecutors on the investigation are also said to have departed the U.S. attorney's office in South Florida in recent days, sources said, though one source said that those officials had only been temporarily assigned to the office on a detail basis and that their terms had expired.
Additional attorneys were recently been added to assist in the conspiracy probe in recent weeks, that source said.
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Sep 29, 2026
Officer Ball, of the San Francisco Police Department, stands behind a barricade during a rally against ICE in front of the San Francisco Police Department Headquarters in San Francisco, Calif., Wednesday, March 25, 2026. (Minh Connors)
"Trump has put his political interests above the health, safety and livelihood of American families," Newsom said in a statement. "California is taking action to strengthen transparency, accountability, and oversight around immigration enforcement in our state. This is about stepping up where the federal government has failed our communities."
The bills largely govern the conduct of Immigration and Customs and Enforcement officers, conditions in the state's detention centers and ways the state can use financial levers to make it harder for ICE to operate or expand.
"We will continue protecting our people, upholding the rule of law, and making clear that if the federal government operates in California, we will hold them accountable," Newsom said.
Sen. Scott Wiener's "No Kings Act," SB 747, creates a clearer legal pathway to sue any federal agent that violates a Californian's civil rights. The bill took effect immediately upon its signing, allowing people in the last year who have alleged mistreatment at the hands of immigration agents to file lawsuits against the officers.
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Sep 29, 2026
Federal prosecutors in Texas have charged a Venezuelan delivery driver who was shot by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent earlier this month with assaulting a federal officer, according to court documents unveiled Tuesday.
The prosecutors accused 28-year-old Wilber Rafael Garces Perez of striking an ICE officer with his vehicle's side-view mirror as he drove away in an attempt to evade arrest. Garces Perez faces one count of assaulting, resisting and impeding a federal officer.
An agent from the Department of Homeland Security's Homeland Security Investigations laid out the allegations in an eight-page affidavit filed in support of a criminal complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas. The agent said he had interviewed one of the two ICE officers who was involved in the Sept. 20 incident, identified as D.F. The other officer, L.G., was the one who opened fire, and that officer's account is not included in the filing.
D.F. said both agents began following Garces Perez's car after checking his license plate and finding that he had a final order of removal from an immigration judge.
The agents were in separate vehicles and pulled Garces Perez over, the affidavit said, parking in front of and behind Garces Perez's car. The agents approached and told Garces Perez to get out, according to the affidavit, but he allegedly ignored the order and asked one of the agents, L.G., if he could move the car and park it.
"Approximately one minute later, GARCES abruptly closed the window and drove off. L.G. tried
to avoid contact with the car but GARCES' driver's side-view mirror struck L.G. in his torso as it
drove off," the affidavit said.
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Sep 29, 2026
The Chi Phi fraternity house at Cornell University in Ithaca on Monday. - Heather Ainsworth/AP
A former Cornell University student filed a lawsuit this month alleging she was drugged and gang raped inside a fraternity house in 2024, and the fresh scrutiny has prompted prosecutors to reopen the investigation.
The 101-page lawsuit details disturbing allegations about what the woman, identified as Jane Doe, says unfolded inside Chi Phi's frat house the night of October 19, 2024, and how the university and local prosecutors in Ithaca, New York, handled the case. Doe is accusing seven members of the frat of participating in the assault while she was unable to consent.
The Tompkins County District Attorney's Office said Monday it reopened the case to seek a grand jury review after being "asked by the community to revisit the decision whether to pursue criminal charges against the seven fraternity members."
County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten said no criminal charges were initially filed because Doe had not provided police in 2024 with the same key allegations outlined in the new lawsuit.
Doe's attorney says the information was promptly given to Cornell authorities, and the report was "not materially different from what is contained in the (2026) complaint."
The legal dispute, lack of criminal charges and university's response has prompted fierce backlash and
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Sep 29, 2026
President Donald Trump speaks in the Oval Office of the White House, Monday, September 28, in Washington, DC. - Alex Brandon/AP
President Donald Trump has personally driven the controversial, taxpayer-funded video ads promoting himself and his administration's policies, including helping select the imagery and videos used, a source familiar with the matter told CNN.
Two Trump advisers familiar with the ads said that they were being created in-house by the White House video team — which is part of the communications team, responsible for the administration's public messaging.
Coming just over a month before the November midterms, the ads have generated bipartisan criticism over how the Trump administration is spending taxpayer dollars.
"It's a great message. I like the message, but it shouldn't be paid for with taxpayer dollars," Senate Majority Leader John Thune told reporters in the Capitol on Monday.
GOP Sen. John Cornyn of Texas echoed that sentiment: "It's not even a close question."
The White House has broadly defended the ads, saying they are akin to public service announcements past administrations have put out about Medicare, Obamacare and Covid-19 vaccinations. Officials have insisted they "are very clearly not campaign ads."
"These public service announcements are about reminding Americans to love their country and understand what makes it worth defending, at home, at our borders, and abroad," a White House spokesperson said Monday.
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Sep 29, 2026
Apparent confusion over team names derailed a line of questioning as Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.) grilled former special counsel Jack Smith on Tuesday about his attendance at a basketball game, suggesting the prosecutor may have coordinated with others bringing charges about President Trump.
The exchange would later prompt Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) to say the panel had been "witness to a narrative, a false narrative of accusing [Smith] of being at a game that you were nowhere near, and I suppose that was supposed to be in furtherance of some sort of conspiracy."
Schmitt asked Smith if he had traveled to Atlanta in 2024 to watch an Atlanta Hawks basketball game, alluding to the trip as a chance to meet Fani Willis, the top prosecutor in the city. Willis also brought charges against Trump.
Schmitt said he had texts referencing the game, though a board displaying the messages was only briefly shown by the senator's staff.
Schmitt seemed surprised when Smith said he did not recall going to Atlanta during that time period and also said he did not meet Willis. For his part, Smith seemed puzzled.
"I really don't think so. It's possible I flew through the Atlanta airport on the way to Florida, but I do not have a recollection of going to Atlanta. I definitely did not go to a Hawks game," Smith said.
The significance of the trip from Schmitt's perspective was that the February 2024 game he referenced was the day after Willis revealed she was in a relationshi
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Sep 29, 2026
The X2 roller coaster has long been one of Six Flags Magic Mountain's main attractions, featuring seats that spin 360 degrees. (Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)Six Flags Magic Mountain's X2 roller coaster is permanently closed, following a history of injuries, including some that led to deaths, park officials announced on Tuesday.
The ride was first closed temporarily in July following reports of back-to-back brain injuries.
"While X2 consistently passed a multitude of safety tests, we have decided to close the ride because we believe it's the right thing to do. Ride safety is a cornerstone of our business, and when we see guest confidence affected, we take it seriously," Brian Oerding, Six Flags Magic Mountain president, said in a statement.
The ride was opened as X in 2002, closed for repairs and reopened as X2 in 2008. It has long been one of the park's main attractions, featuring seats that spin forward and backward 360 degrees.
Months after the ride opened in 2002, it had to be closed to repair design flaws. Then, in 2007, it was closed again to replace the trains with lighter ones.
Anne Hawley, whose son died in 2022 after riding X2, was emotional Tuesday morning after learning the ride was permanently closed. Christopher Hawley was 22 when he rode X2, stumbled after getting off it, lost consciousness and died shortly thereafter. His family sued Magic Mountain and settled the case in August.
"We have tried for four years to do the best we can to spread awareness," Hawley said. "They finally listened."
Hawley was just one of
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Sep 29, 2026
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), antifa and the Muslim Brotherhood will be labeled domestic terrorist organizations under a new state law, after Florida leaders OK'd the designations at their Sept. 29 meeting.
These designations were in a 427-page packet submitted by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement for approval by Gov. Ron DeSantis and Florida Cabinet members: Attorney General James Uthmeier, Agriculture Commissioner Wilton Simpson and state Chief Financial Officer Blaise Ingoglia.
The packet also named numerous other groups labeled by the federal government as foreign terrorist organizations.
Although the Governor and Florida Cabinet approved these notices without any discussion, these designations don't come as a surprise. Weeks earlier, the governor and Cabinet approved an emergency rule setting procedures under a new state law (HB 1471) allowing them to designate terror groups.
Additionally, the day this law took effect, DeSantis announced his intentions to declare CAIR, the country's
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Sep 29, 2026
The Google homepage now has an AI Mode button instead of a Search button. —Matteo Della Torre/NurPhoto--Getty ImagesIf you've used Google to search for something over the last few months, you may have noticed that the experience has changed. If you ask certain questions, an AI overview will pop up, followed by another search bar that encourages you to "Ask Anything." Click on that, and you suddenly find yourself conversing with a chatbot in Google's AI Mode interface.
This pathway has resulted in millions of people—who never intended to use AI in the first place—unwittingly becoming acclimated to a new chatbot reality. Google Search usage hit an all-time high this year, and much of that activity involves AI. Google's AI Mode has racked up more than 1 billion monthly users, the company says, a figure rivaling the estimated 1 billion monthly active users of ChatGPT in May, according to Sensor Tower.
At the beginning of the AI arms race, Google lagged far behind its upstart competitors like OpenAI and Anthropic. But by aggressively implementing AI tools into its dominant search engine, Google is arguably doing more to bring AI into people's everyday lives. In the process, the company is already transforming how users and content creators behave online.
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Sep 29, 2026
President Donald Trump launched America.gov on Tuesday, unveiling what the administration has billed as a new AI-powered gateway to federal information and services that aims to streamline Americans' interactions with the government.
The website, which Trump introduced at Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium in Washington, features a chatbot-style interface that allows users to ask questions about government programs, benefits and services. The administration described America.gov as a "front door" to federal resources, consolidating information that is currently spread across dozens of agency websites.
"It's not just simply a website. It's a restoration of America's founding promise, and it's a reinvention of your government for the 21st century and beyond," Trump said at the rollout.
— Leonardo Feldman (@Leonardofeldman) September 29, 2026The debut of America.gov comes as policymakers, technology companies and privacy advocates continue to debate the expanding role of artificial intelligence in public-facing services. While AI tools have been touted for their ability to simpli
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Sep 29, 2026
A New York state prosecutor has reopened a criminal investigation into an alleged rape at a Cornell University fraternity in 2024 after a civil lawsuit filed last week by the alleged victim drew national attention.
In a lengthy statement released on Monday, Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten announced that he had started pursuing criminal charges against seven fraternity members and would present the case to a grand jury.
He also sought to explain why he initially decided not to prosecute them.
According to Van Houten, the woman identified in the civil lawsuit as "Jane Doe" did not say that she was "drugged against her will or gang raped" in her 2024 sworn statement to police.
"On the contrary, Jane Doe's statement described her participation in drug use and sexual conduct as voluntary, conscious, and consensual," Van Houten said. "My office obviously did not and could not have based our November 2024 decision on the allegations in a civil lawsuit that would not be filed until nearly two years later."
Cornell University issued a statement saying it supports the district attorney's decision to reopen the case while pushing back against claims that the school did not thoroughly punish those involved in the alleged assault following its own Title IX investigation.
"Any suggestion that the university did not impose consequential punishments for those involved is false," the university said. "A continuation of the false narrative that there were minimal consequences in this case is irresponsible, will make survivors feel less safe and supported, and will perpetuate the underreporting of sexual assault."
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Sep 29, 2026
After weeks of Washington being gripped by a new wave of fear about artificial intelligence gone awry, the Trump administration will take a sharply different take Tuesday, seeking to convince a skeptical public that the nation is instead about to embark on a tech-powered "golden age."
President Donald Trump will deliver a speech launching America.gov, a new AI-powered portal for accessing public services, part of a day-long event featuring members of his Cabinet and tech executives. AI company leaders are also set to meet with the president and House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana).
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The events come at a pivotal moment for the technology. AI firms say their latest systems have become increasingly powerful, showing signs of being able to design their own more-potent successors. But companies have struggled to keep control of the technology, as rogue AI agents have hacked into company and government systems, and a roster of top industry figures have warned that the end result could be catastrophic for humanity.
Last week, it was disclosed that the federal government itself had been a victim, with a handful of websites probed by AI agents deployed by ChatGPT maker OpenAI. (The Washington Post has a content partnership with OpenAI.)
Yet even as the public's concerns have grown and Democrats in Congress have pressed for regulation, Trump has largely dismissed the risk, calling it a "hoax."
Tuesday's events are a chance for the administration to focus on the upsides of the technology, propelling a different narrative than the warnings introduced by company CEOs in recent weeks. AI's many boosters expect it will invigorate the economy, push th
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Sep 29, 2026
Watch: Evan Gershkovich describes the moment he was detained by masked men
US journalist Evan Gershkovich has said that he knew he was being set up by Russia when he was arrested by FSB agents and accused of being a spy.
In an interview with Radio 4's Today programme, Gershkovich spoke about the moment he realised he had been "lured into a trap" when masked men surrounded him at a restaurant in 2023, and detained him.
"I'm not interrogated, I'm not tortured… I'm accused of espionage," he said, describing a sense of relief: "They've set me up and fabricated this case so that I can be a valuable hostage - a pawn in a greater game".
Gershkovich, now 34, was sentenced to 16 years in prison, but freed 16 months later as part of a high-profile prisoner swap deal.
Gershkovich had been living in Russia since 2017, and was the Wall Street Journal's foreign correspondent in Moscow when he was arrested - he is now based in Berlin, Germany. He and his employer have always maintained that the charges were false.
On the day he was arrested, Gershkovich was in Yekaterinburg - about 1,600km (1,000 miles) east of Moscow - meeting someone who he thought was a source for a story.
They were sitting in a half-empty dining hall "and a group of about half-dozen masked men marched in and said 'I think we booked that table'." An odd phrase, Gershkovich said, but on reflection it is clever because it "freezes you in place".
The two men stood up and Gershkovich was told he was under arrest by the notorious and powerful FSB, Russia's domestic security service.
"It's at that moment that you realise it's something really serious… When it's the FSB,
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Sep 29, 2026
War Secretary Pete Hegseth will announce plans to reduce by 20% the number of positions reserved for generals and admirals during his State of the Force address on Wednesday.
Hegseth approved reduction plans for the Army, Navy, Air Force and the military's joint pool earlier this month, according to memos seen by Fox News Digital. The services were directed to implement the plans and complete the reductions by Jan. 1, 2027.
Wednesday's address in Quantico, Va. is expected to lay out Hegseth's priorities for the military in the year ahead, with the reduction in senior leadership positions among the changes he will unveil.
The new target doubles the 10% overall reduction in general and flag officer positions Hegseth ordered last year as part of his effort to streamline the military's senior ranks. That earlier directive separately called for a 20% reduction in active-duty four-star positions and a 20% reduction in National Guard general officers.
Senate Republican Pushes Merit-based Military Promotions, Targets Biden-era Dei Policies
Secretary of War Pete Hegseth addresses senior military officers at Marine Corps Base Quantico in Quantico, Virginia, on Sept. 30, 2025.Hegseth dubbed that effort "less generals, more GIs," arguing that reducing senior headquarters positions would pus
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Sep 29, 2026
JERUSALEM - A slew of reports that Arab officials warned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu about a serious threat emerging from Gaza days before the Oct. 7, 2023, attack by Hamas have put the longtime Israeli leader on the defensive less than 30 days before a pivotal election.
Ever since the attack, the most deadly in Israel's history, Netanyahu has argued that Israeli security chiefs collectively failed to foresee the surprise attack by Hamas - but that he led the fightback, scoring redemptive battlefield victories in Gaza, Lebanon, Syria and Iran.
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But that narrative is fraying as reports of the advance warnings, including one delivered by United Arab Emirates President Mohamed bin Zayed al-Nahyan, train a spotlight on Netanyahu's handling of the attack and his refusal to allow an independent commission to investigate it.
Netanyahu and his office have denied the reports, and his political party and supporters have accused "left-wing" Israeli officials, as well as journalists and overseas interests, of conspiring to oust him from office through a coordinated smear campaign ahead of the Oct. 27 election.
The disclosures began to trickle out in early September, when the Israeli newspaper Haaretz published an excerpt from "Hostages: 843 Days of Abandonment," a book by two Israeli journalists that details an encrypted call reportedly made by the Emirati president, who is known as MBZ, less than two weeks before Oct. 7, 2023, to warn Netanyahu that Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar was planning a major operation that could destabilize the Middle East. Netanyahu did not pass on the warnings to his security aides, according to the book authors, Shlomi Eldar and Ruth Y
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Sep 29, 2026
JERUSALEM - A slew of reports that Arab officials warned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu about a serious threat emerging from Gaza days before the Oct. 7, 2023, attack by Hamas have put the longtime Israeli leader on the defensive less than 30 days before a pivotal election.
Ever since the attack, the most deadly in Israel's history, Netanyahu has argued that Israeli security chiefs collectively failed to foresee the surprise attack by Hamas - but that he led the fightback, scoring redemptive battlefield victories in Gaza, Lebanon, Syria and Iran.
Subscribe to The Post Most newsletter for the most important and interesting stories from The Washington Post.
But that narrative is fraying as reports of the advance warnings, including one delivered by United Arab Emirates President Mohamed bin Zayed al-Nahyan, train a spotlight on Netanyahu's handling of the attack and his refusal to allow an independent commission to investigate it.
Netanyahu and his office have denied the reports, and his political party and supporters have accused "left-wing" Israeli officials, as well as journalists and overseas interests, of conspiring to oust him from office through a coordinated smear campaign ahead of the Oct. 27 election.
The disclosures began to trickle out in early September, when the Israeli newspaper Haaretz published an excerpt from "Hostages: 843 Days of Abandonment," a book by two Israeli journalists that details an encrypted call reportedly made by the Emirati president, who is known as MBZ, less than two weeks before Oct. 7, 2023, to warn Netanyahu that Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar was planning a major operation that could destabilize the Middle East. Netanyahu did not pass on the warnings to his security aides, according to the book authors, Shlomi Eldar and Ruth Y
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Sep 29, 2026
Iran's Revolutionary Guard urged Americans in a message ahead of U.S. midterm elections to take to the streets and rally against Donald Trump, claiming the U.S. president's war in the Middle East has failed.
Meanwhile, in the occupied West Bank, settlers rioted, throwing rocks, blocking roads and setting Palestinian property on fire to prevent a Palestinian man escorted by the Israeli military from returning to his home in the village of Jalud.
Here is the latest news from the Middle East on Tuesday. Full coverage is available here.
An Iranian spokesman advises Americans to reconsider their leaders
Gen. Hossein Mohebbi, spokesman for the Revolutionary Guard, held a news conference in Tehran, Iran's capital, on Tuesday and read from what he said was a "letter to the American people."
Reading from the prepared text, he said that the only way for the war to end is for Washington to admit defeat and leave. The message was apparently meant for the U.S. public just weeks ahead of the Nov. 3 midterm elections for the U.S. Senate and Congress — a vote in which Trump's Republican Party faces fierce headwinds as it looks to maintain control of Congress.
Later, in remarks to The Associated Press, Mohebbi urged Americans to take to the streets and protest Trump's policies to denounce what he called the U.S. government's war-mongering policies.
Mohebbi also said Americans should "revise their decision" about their leaders.
He accused the United States of using Iran's nuclear program as a ruse to "plunder Iran's wealth" and to turn the coun
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Sep 29, 2026
WASHINGTON (AP) — Former special counsel Jack Smith forcefully defended his prosecutions of President Donald Trump and his investigative tactics, pushing back against repeated Republican criticism in a congressional hearing Tuesday that featured a senator's bungled attempt to accuse him of lying about a basketball game.
The hearing offered a forum for Republicans to try to paint Smith as a political operative and assail him anew for what they contend were politicized prosecutions that unfolded during the 2024 presidential race. Democrats rallied in his defense, eliciting testimony on the legal and factual basis for the criminal cases against the then-candidate and decrying the Trump administration's firing of prosecutors involved in the investigations.
Smith, for his part, defended his work in an hours-long Senate Judiciary Committee hearing — the latest congressional effort to revisit federal cases that accused Trump of conspiring to overturn the results of the 2020 race and of hoarding classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida.
"Anybody who has worked with me and knows me during the course of my career knows that I would not let politics play a role. And I would just add that if you knew the people I worked with, they would not either," Smith said. He lamented what he called an unprecedented assault on the rule of law by the Trump administ
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Sep 29, 2026
WASHINGTON (AP) — Former Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith, who brought two federal indictments against President Donald Trump, told lawmakers on Tuesday that he "will not be silenced by continued threats of prosecution" from the Trump administration and that he believes the rule of law is being threatened like never before.
Smith also told the Senate Judiciary Committee that he stands behind the criminal cases he brought against Trump, a Republican, and that he and his team acted without regard to politics.
"I made those decisions without regard to President Trump's political association, activities, beliefs or candidacy in the 2024 presidential election," Smith said. "Our investigation developed proof beyond a reasonable doubt that President Trump engaged in serious crimes against our nation. If asked whether to prosecute a former president today based on the same facts, I would do so regardless of whether that president was a Republican or a Democrat."
Republicans sought to cast the prosecution as a political fishing expedition, accusing Smith of bending ordinary procedures in an overzealous pursuit of the president.
"The Smith election case ultimately wasn't just about Trump," said Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, the chairman of the committee. "It was about partisan agents and prosecutors mapping out the Republican apparatus."
Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, the top Democrat on the committee, accused Republicans of spreading "baseless conspiracy theories" about Smith's investigations as part of an effort to "whitewash" the history of Trump's 2020 election loss and the Jan. 6, 2021, attack by
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Sep 29, 2026
WASHINGTON (AP) — Former Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith, who brought two federal indictments against President Donald Trump, told lawmakers on Tuesday that he "will not be silenced by continued threats of prosecution" from the Trump administration and that he believes the rule of law is being threatened like never before.
Smith also told the Senate Judiciary Committee that he stands behind the criminal cases he brought against Trump, a Republican, and that he and his team acted without regard to politics.
"I made those decisions without regard to President Trump's political association, activities, beliefs or candidacy in the 2024 presidential election," Smith said. "Our investigation developed proof beyond a reasonable doubt that President Trump engaged in serious crimes against our nation. If asked whether to prosecute a former president today based on the same facts, I would do so regardless of whether that president was a Republican or a Democrat."
Republicans sought to cast the prosecution as a political fishing expedition, accusing Smith of bending ordinary procedures in an overzealous pursuit of the president.
"The Smith election case ultimately wasn't just about Trump," said Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, the chairman of the committee. "It was about partisan agents and prosecutors mapping out the Republican apparatus."
Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, the top Democrat on the committee, accused Republicans of spreading "baseless conspiracy theories" about Smith's investigations as part of an effort to "whitewash" the history of Trump's 2020 election loss and the Jan. 6, 2021, attack by
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Sep 29, 2026
By Waylon Cunningham
NEW YORK, Sept 29 (Reuters) - McDonald's is increasingly using artificial intelligence to guide menu prices across the U.S. and some global markets, a plan that aims to boost headquarters' profit but risks alienating customers and attracting antitrust scrutiny.
One pricing factor supercharged by AI: an estimate of how much each store's patrons are willing to pay.
The details of how that pricing system works, its extensive use of AI, the company's regulatory concerns and the tensions with its franchisees haven't been previously reported. For this story, Reuters reviewed screenshots of the company pricing engine taken in August and interviewed nine sources with first-hand knowledge of the burger chain's strategy.
McDonald's pricing ?engine uses machine-learning algorithms to continually analyze data from millions of daily transactions across McDonald's nearly 14,000 restaurants and generate what the company calls "the optimal price" at each location for each menu item, from Big Macs to discounted coffee for seniors.
The engine has widened existing price differences for the same product between restaurants, including from neighborhood to neighborhood within ?the same area, three franchisees told Reuters.
Screenshots of the interface franchisees use, reviewed by Reuters, show messages including: "Your restaurant is showing MEDIUM SENSITIVITY to Price" based in part on "customer willingness to pay in your area." The platform also contains public price information pulled from online menus of nearby restaurants of competitors including Wendy's and Burger King. Those chains said they do not use AI in pricing decisions.
A Reuters check of prices in September on the McDonald's mobile app showed price differences. For example, ?a company-run store in Fresno, California sells a Big Mac for $5.69, but another company-run restaurant two miles away sells the same sandwich for $6.89, a 21%
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Sep 29, 2026
Washington — Michigan Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed is making a play for Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s "Make America Healthy Again" supporters with the release Tuesday of a new health policy platform.
"I think we have an opportunity to remind folks that we've always been the people who want people to be healthier, rather than the folks who capitulate to the food, ag and pharmaceutical corporations that are too often on the wrong side of things," El-Sayed told CBS News.
The platform, dubbed the Building A Healthier America Policy Agenda, takes aim at pesticides in food, backing legislation that would give people the right to sue pesticide manufacturers over harm caused by the products. It seeks accountability for polluters, with a pledge to get industry lobbyists out of regulatory agencies. And it aims to get substances such as lead and microplastics out of water, in part by strengthening federal drinking water rules. It also proposes investments in school meal programs and grocery stores on wheels.
El-Sayed, a former Michigan health official, has been vocal about healthcare issues along the campaign trail, speaking frequently about Medicare For All alongside a push to get money out of politics and a focus on affordability issues more broadly. Now, he's zeroing in on issues that helped build President Trump's coalition in the 2024 election, as he takes on former Republican Rep. Mike Rogers in a closely watched Senate race that could be key to determining which party controls the upper chamber.
El-Sayed said for MAHA voters who largely supported Mr. Trump and the GOP in the last election, "a lot of them felt like Democrats weren't paying enough attention to their fears about healthcare." But he argued that since then, voters have been "completely let down and lied to" on the issues at the root of the ag
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Sep 29, 2026
President Trump's new government-funded ads pledging to "cast out the communists, Marxists and fascists" are getting strong pushback from Senate Republicans who are warning the president not to use taxpayer money to promote himself in such a brazenly political way.
While Republicans generally approve of Trump's political message, they say using taxpayer dollars to fund a series of ads that closely resemble Trump's past campaign advertising right before the midterm elections is inappropriate.
"It's a great message, I like the message, but it shouldn't be paid for by taxpayer dollars," Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) told reporters Monday.
The White House, however, argues the ads — which ran over the weekend during "Fox News Sunday" and several college and NFL football games — are "very clearly not campaign ads" and instead "a reminder for Americans to love their country and know why it's worth defending."
Republican senators are not buying that argument, and warn that it creates an improper appearance to be using taxpayer money to pay for television ads that could easily be confused with regular campaign ads, even though Trump himself is not on the ballot.
"It would not have been something that I would have done," said Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.). "I know that the White House is not covered by the same guidance that we are, but it's not something I would have done."
"I just don't think it's right to be using taxpayer money in that way, particularly if it's tied to political campaigns," he added. "I think they need to rethink that strategy."
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) said using
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Sep 29, 2026
President Donald Trump intends to spend the next 30 days campaigning for Republicans, many of whom are underwater in states the president easily carried two years ago.
Bastions of conservatism — including Alabama, Alaska, Iowa, Ohio and Texas — need Trump's star power, and a visit by the president could persuade some of his most die-hard supporters to turn out to the polls. But each trip to play defense in red strongholds robs the GOP of a chance to put Democrats on the back foot in states that are traditionally competitive.
Trump's upcoming travel — including to Alabama, Oklahoma and Ohio this week — puts a focus on what Republican donors and operatives have feared for months: that even a gerrymandered House map and whopping cash advantage won't be enough to save the House or Senate from Democrats.
"The problem is that the fires are everywhere right now," said one GOP donor, who like others in this story was granted anonymity to speak candidly about the party's prospects.
Inside the White House, concern is particularly high over the Senate races in Alaska and Ohio, which the president both won handily in 2024. In Alaska, Republican incumbent Dan Sullivan lost by 8 points in a nonpartisan primary to the Democrat Mary Peltola. Trump is planning to make the trek to Alaska later this month to shore up Sullivan's chances — a significant commitment of time and presidential resources that underscores how dire the situation is for Republicans.
"On a scale of 1 to 10," said a person close to the White House, "10. In Alaska, because of the obvious situation of what happened in the primary, and in Ohio, because [Jon] Husted is proving not to be a compelling candidate."
The White House referred a request for comment to the Republican National Committee. RNC spokesperson Natalie Baldassarre, in a statement, pointed
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Sep 29, 2026
By Toby Shepheard and Will Russell
FAIRFORD, England, Sept 29 (Reuters) - US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the "hands of a foreign actor" were involved in an incident in which five men were arrested on suspected explosives and terrorism offences near a ?British airbase used by US forces to strike Iran.
British police declared a major incident at the RAF Fairfordbase in western ?England following the arrests early on Sunday, and the government held a national emergency meeting.
However the police released the five on bail on Monday, but said the investigation was ?not over and they were examining whether individuals acting for a foreign state were involved.
A source familiar with the situation told Reuters that three large white vans the men appeared to travel in had not contained viable explosives.
The source said Sunday's police response had not been intelligence-led - an indication that the five were not under direct surveillance - but security had been beefed up at the base, suggesting there was information it was being targeted.
"What happened, ?what almost happened, what could have happened in the ?UK over the weekend is a very serious situation. It's one that clearly involves the hands of a foreign actor. I won't get into great detail about that yet," Rubio told the Fox News network's "Hannity" program late ?on Monday.
He provided no evidence and did not give specific details.
US President Donald Trump told reporters at the White House on Monday that the incident "might be" connected to Iran, with which the United States is at war since late February, and that he would not have released the suspects on bail.
"I ?wouldn't have ?done that," he said.
IRAN DENIES INVOLVEMENT IN RAF FAIRFORD INCIDENT
The five arrested are ?all British nationals in their early 20s from London. ?They were detained in the early hours on Sunday after police were alert
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Sep 29, 2026
Clipped From Video
Months into the disappearance of Nancy Guthrie, with no main suspect or person of interest named, authorities say they are now investigating the credibility of a new possible ransom note tied to the 84-year-old's disappearance.
The Pima County Sheriff's Department said its joint task force, along with the FBI, were "recently made aware of a new possible note," and they were looking into it.
The comments were the latest by the sheriff's department after it announced in August that human remains had been found in the Tucson desert, just 15 miles from where Nancy Guthrie was believed to have been abducted.
While authorities quickly said there was no indication the remains were connected to the case, every possible lead among the saguaro cacti of the Sonoran Desert has brought renewed hope for the return of Guthrie and a stinging reminder of the ongoing grief felt by her loved ones.
Guthrie, the mother of NBC "Today" show host Savannah Guthrie, vanished from her Tucson-area home on February 1 without her phone or critical medications.
The investigation has been marked by a ransom note demanding millions of dollars and video of an armed, masked person tampering with the doorbell camera at the Tucson home.
More than half a year later, her family has live
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Sep 29, 2026
Sept 29 (Reuters) - US President Donald Trump said he has offered Iran nothing to end the war, rejecting media reports that cited US officials saying he was willing to ease sanctions and release frozen funds for "concrete" steps regarding Iran's nuclear ?programme.
"This is untrue. I offered them NOTHING," Trump wrote on Truth Social on Monday.
Axios and CNN both reported, citing unidentified US ?officials, that Trump was willing to give Iran sanctions relief and free Iranian funds as part of a final deal on the condition that Iran showed "concrete progress" on the nuclear ?issue.
Trump has cited preventing Tehran from acquiring a nuclear bomb as a key goal of the war, along with ending its ability to attack its neighbours and creating conditions for Iranians to topple their leadership.
Iran does not have nuclear weapons and denies it wants to develop them, but argues it has the right to a domestic nuclear energy capacity.
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, in an interview with the CBS show "Face the Nation", said Tehran was ready for ?talks on its nuclear programme and other issues, but ?would not accept "bullying or coercion".
"Iran is not seeking war, but will defend itself against pressure, threats and attacks," Pezeshkian said, adding that it had already agreed that "we're not supposed to develop nuclear weapons".
US and Iranian officials spoke separately ?with mediators on Monday as part of a renewed effort to end the seven-month war, according to officials of both countries.
Iran insisted on Sunday that only diplomacy can solve its conflict with the United States and Israel.
"Our conditions are clear, and any move toward reopening the Strait of Hormuz is contingent on ?these ?conditions being met," Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi posted on social media. "Only a negotiated solution ?can get them out of this deadlock."
Araqchi told reporters ?at the U
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Sep 29, 2026
Sept 29 (Reuters) - US President Donald Trump said he has offered Iran nothing to end the war, rejecting media reports that cited US officials saying he was willing to ease sanctions and release frozen funds for "concrete" steps regarding Iran's nuclear ?programme.
"This is untrue. I offered them NOTHING," Trump wrote on Truth Social on Monday.
Axios and CNN both reported, citing unidentified US ?officials, that Trump was willing to give Iran sanctions relief and free Iranian funds as part of a final deal on the condition that Iran showed "concrete progress" on the nuclear ?issue.
Trump has cited preventing Tehran from acquiring a nuclear bomb as a key goal of the war, along with ending its ability to attack its neighbours and creating conditions for Iranians to topple their leadership.
Iran does not have nuclear weapons and denies it wants to develop them, but argues it has the right to a domestic nuclear energy capacity.
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, in an interview with the CBS show "Face the Nation", said Tehran was ready for ?talks on its nuclear programme and other issues, but ?would not accept "bullying or coercion".
"Iran is not seeking war, but will defend itself against pressure, threats and attacks," Pezeshkian said, adding that it had already agreed that "we're not supposed to develop nuclear weapons".
US and Iranian officials spoke separately ?with mediators on Monday as part of a renewed effort to end the seven-month war, according to officials of both countries.
Iran insisted on Sunday that only diplomacy can solve its conflict with the United States and Israel.
"Our conditions are clear, and any move toward reopening the Strait of Hormuz is contingent on ?these ?conditions being met," Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi posted on social media. "Only a negotiated solution ?can get them out of this deadlock."
Araqchi told reporters ?at the U
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Sep 29, 2026
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Last week, U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly granted a temporary restraining order, forcing the White House to restore access to the White House to the outlets as he more fully considers the legal arguments. The TRO lasts for 14 days.
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In a filing in federal court on Monday, attorneys for the three news outlets argued that the Trump White House actions since then "leave little doubt that it will immediately reinstitute a complete ban of CNN, MS NOW, and Politico if allowed the opportunity."
The outlets' legal team, led by Theodore Boutrous Jr., pointed to the White House's restriction on CNN from access to State Dinner arrivals on Thursday evening. The network then was barred from serving as TV pooler on Air Force One on Trump's trip to Tennessee on Saturday, with no replacement stepping in, and leaving a dearth of
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Sep 29, 2026
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S.-Canada relations, already tense, are likely to deteriorate further after the United States went ahead early Tuesday with a decision to ban nearly $1 billion worth of Canadian imports, including alcoholic beverages, dairy products and motorcycles.
The ban amounts to barely a ripple in $880 billion worth of a two-way annual trade between the two northern neighbors. But it marks another ratcheting up of President Donald Trump's second-term trade war with America's longtime ally and trading partner.
The import ban "certainly won't do anything to help the trade tensions between the United States and Canada,'' said trade attorney Patrick Childress, a partner at Holland & Knight and a former U.S. trade official.
The latest sparring began over the summer when Trump reached back to a Great Depression law to impose 50% tariffs on about $20 billion worth of Canadian imports, charging that Canada discriminates against U.S. dairy, auto and alcoholic beverage producers. Canada promptly counterpunched with tariffs of 15%, 25% or 50%, matching U.S. imports dollar for dollar.
To punish Canada for retaliating against his tariffs, Trump decided to ban a list of Canadian products, effective 12:01 a.m. Eastern time Tuesday.
The economic impact is likely to be minimal. Childress noted that the products on the banned list were already facing Trump's tariffs. "For a lot of these goods, the 50% was already acting as a de facto ban by making importation from Canada into the United States uneconomical,? he said.
Jacob Jensen, director of
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Sep 29, 2026
PLYMOUTH, Mass. — A Massachusetts judge overseeing the Lindsay Clancy case is expected to hear arguments on her double jeopardy motion Tuesday, while another push to investigate the lone holdout juror in her mistrial may be on hold — for now.
Clancy is expected in court in person for the first time since her trial ended in a deadlocked jury and the judge declared a mistrial on Sept. 4.
In the weeks since her mistrial, Clancy's case has remained a topic of national interest, with fellow jurors and Clancy's defense attorney attacking the lone holdout. At the same time, Plymouth County District Attorney Tim Cruz's office has been relatively quiet about their plans for a potential retrial.
Lindsay Clancy Holdout Juror Asks For One Thing In New Video After Mistrial Drama
Lindsay Clancy in court last month.Lindsay Clancy's Push To Investigate Holdout Juror Could Be Paused As Defense, Prosecutors Agree To Adjourn
Here's a roundup of what to expect as she returns to court:
Read On The Fox News App
Clancy's defense lawyer Kevin Reddington had called for an inquiry into the lone holdout juror, Michael Desronvil, whom he has dubbed "the obstructionist juror." Desronvil opposed 11 others on the panel and was the only one
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Sep 28, 2026
The Protect College Sports Act is halfway home.
U.S. senators on Monday overwhelmingly voted to pass legislation intended to bring regulation to an unruly industry — a historic moment in NCAA history but one expected after lawmakers advanced the bill through multiple procedural steps over the last week.
The bill, mainly authored by Republican Sens. Ted Cruz and Eric Schmitt and Democratic Sen. Maria Cantwell, garnered 77 supporting votes in the 100-member chamber — a considerable margin in such a divided Congress and a result that now sends the legislation toward the House of Representatives in an authoritative way.
"We wanted a big bipartisan vote," Cruz said earlier Monday. "We got a big bipartisan vote."
But as supportive lawmakers celebrate their thundering victory, a question continues to loom: Will the legislation pass the House?
"That bill is dead," said one Democratic House staff member.
"We have no intention to return to take up this bill before the midterm elections," said another.
Even the most ardent supporters of the legislation believe a stiff challenge awaits in the 435-member House, which historically operates in a more unpredictable manner because of its sheer size, diverse makeup and clashing cultural and geographic beliefs — even among those within the same party. Unlike the Senate's 60-vote procedural voting threshold to bypass the chamber's filibuster, House legislation only needs a simple majority for passage.
In the House, Republicans hold a four-vote margin — for now.
There are landmines that threaten to tank the bill across the landscape of the lower chamber of Congress. That starts with the elections themselves on Nov. 3.
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Sep 28, 2026
OpenAI is scrapping the planned release of its next-generation AI model after researchers raised safety concerns during internal testing, Newsweek has confirmed.
An OpenAI spokesperson told Newsweek Monday evening that safety leaders made the decision not to ship GPT-6.1 Astra, which was set for an October debut. The decision was first reported by The Wall Street Journal.
"For anything regarding safety and alignment, there's a trade off. You really do need to find what's the right line between staying within scope, but also avoiding laziness in terms of how the model actually pursues tasks even when it hits friction," Saachi Jain, OpenAI's head of safety systems, said in a statement.
GPT-6.1 Astra did not perform as well as Astra GPT-6 on alignment evaluations, the spokesperson said.
The model "didn't quite meet the bar in terms of staying within scope and authorization, and how it communicates back to the user about the type of work it's done," Jain added.
The decision comes amid growing concerns about whether AI safety measures can keep pace with the technology's rapid development.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman addressed the United Nations Security Council on September 23, saying the technology has taken on a new urgency in recent weeks and months.
"AI can either be more like a new Renaissance of creativity and discovery, or more like a new Industrial Revolution of upheaval and disarray," Altman said in remarks.
Altman said there are two ways he believes AI progress could go "very badly" that must be avoided.
"First, we could lose control of the future to AI," he said, warning that the technology could move so quickly that people can no longer understand what is happening or intervene when necessary.
The second risk, he said, is that AI systems could "concentrate too much power in too few hands."
"No one person or company or country should be able to use the most powerful AI
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Sep 28, 2026
A breach of the Pentagon's sprawling personnel database exposed sensitive information belonging to a massive swath of military personnel, including Social Security numbers and details about the jobs they held, according to a U.S. defense official.
The breach affected 2.76 million living people and another 294,000 who are deceased, the official said. The scope and sensitivity of the exposed information could raise national security concerns, particularly because the files included details about the jobs performed by military and civilian personnel.
"A Defense Manpower Data Center (DMDC) information system experienced unauthorized access of personally identifiable information by a small number of unauthorized users between October 2025 and July 2026. Upon discovery, DMDC immediately remediated the vulnerability," the official said.
Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP - PHOTO: The Pentagon is seen from Air Force One, Sept. 26, 2026, in Washington, D.C. The Defense Manpower Data Center serves as one of the Pentagon's main repositories for personnel records, holding information on active-duty and reserve troops, civilian employees, contractors, retirees, veterans and military family members.
FBI investigating possible cyber breach of its job application website: SourcesThe agency maintains more than 60 million personnel records. Military Times first reported the breach last week.
The unauthorized access stretched from October 2025 until July, when DMDC discovered the vulnerability and patched the affected system, according to the defense official, adding there's no evidence yet that any of the exposed d
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Sep 28, 2026
Prosecutors in upstate New York are defending their decision not to bring charges in 2024 after an alleged "gang rape" at a Cornell University fraternity.
Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten described the allegations as "morally disturbing" but argued that the facts he knew at the time did not support a prosecution.
"If what was said on social media about this case was true, those fraternity members would be in prison right now," Van Houten told ABC News.
Van Houten argued that Jane Doe's account of the incident from 2024 suggested that she consented to the sexual activity. He said that she did not withdraw her consent, and that when she raised concerns, the fraternity members "stopped and did not pursue what they were doing."
"She clearly consented in the beginning, and there was never any indication that she changed that to the things that she participated in," he said. "There is a disconnect in the sense of how the community and how social media has understood this to have happened. If at any point Jane Doe had said, ‘I don't consent to this anymore,' or in those words, or in any form of communication. If there had been continued sexual activity, contact by these individuals, that would be a crime. But that's not what was alleged in her statement."
STOCK IMAGE/Getty Images - PHOTO: In this undated file photo, Cornell University campus is shown. Van Houten acknowledged that his office did not examine a photo of the fraternity's Snapchat group, but he argued that the messages do not change his view of the case.
He called the messages, "disgusting and vulgar and immoral."
"But the question that we analyzed was: Did Jane Doe consent to what happened, and was she unable to consent?" he said. "I'm not clea
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Sep 28, 2026
Iowa Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley, the oldest sitting U.S. senator, lamented the possibility that a Democratic governor could appoint his successor if he were to die in office, according to video of remarks he delivered late last week.
"At 93 years of age, I don't know how many more groups of Republicans like this I'm going to have a chance to talk to," Grassley said on Friday during the GOP's annual Reagan Dinner in West Des Moines. "But I want to take advantage of it. But one of the reasons I'm worried about who's going to be elected governor -- I don't plan on dying in office -- but if I did, I don't want a Democrat governor choosing my successor."
Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images - PHOTO: Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee Sen. Chuck Grassley presides over a hearing on men in women's sports in the Dirksen Senate Office Building, Sept. 23, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Grassley, who celebrated his 93rd birthday on Sept. 17, is currently serving in his eighth term in the Senate -- set to expire Jan. 3, 2029.
'All eyes are on Iowa this year' as Democrats hope to turn red seats blueA
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Sep 28, 2026
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth instructed the Pentagon last week to prioritize and deploy "advanced intelligence and cyber capabilities" to track down, disrupt and neutralize "foreign actors to protect the 2026 midterm elections" while "maintaining the fundamental freedoms that characterize our country."
"Commander U.S. Cyber Command and the Directors of the Combat Support Agencies will prioritize the use of DoW [Department of War] intelligence and cyber capabilities to ensure foreign actors do not meddle in our democratic systems," Hegseth said in a Sept. 22 memo, which was made public Monday.
The Pentagon chief directed the Defense Intelligence Enterprise to execute collection and production on foreign threats to U.S. elections in accordance with the "law, regulation, Executive direction and DoW policies and directives."
Hegseth instructed Gen. Joshua Rudd, head of U.S. Cyber Command, to use existing capabilities and authorities in coordination with the Department of Homeland Security to counter "potential cyber threats from foreign actors targeting our elections."
"Our Nation's ability to conduct free and fair elections is a steadfast principal of our Democracy," Hegseth said in the one-page memo. "Assuring and protecting this ability is a no-fail mission and the DoW will do its part in supporting this whole of government effort."
The meddling of foreign actors and nations has been a concern for U.S. administrations.
Similarly, in 2022, the National Se
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Sep 28, 2026
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — The U.S. Coast Guard said Monday that it rescued at least 40 people in open waters after their boat capsized several miles from a tiny, uninhabited island west of Puerto Rico.
Two people were found dead, with survivors reporting an estimated 60 people aboard, the agency said.
Rescue efforts were ongoing as of Monday evening.
Survivors spent more than 12 hours in the water before a boat passing near Mona Island spotted them on Monday around noon and called authorities, helping rescue four people at that moment.
The Coast Guard said the makeshift boat capsized late Sunday following a fight in which people were severely injured by a machete, leading the group to jump into the water without life vests.
It wasn't immediately clear where the people were from. A U.S. Coast Guard spokesperson said she did not have that information.
Migrants fleeing poverty and violence have long traveled from Hispaniola, the island shared by Haiti and the Dominican Republic, to Puerto Rico and other islands, navigating the treacherous Mona Passage.
Many of them do so on makeshift vessels that sometimes capsize in rough waters, with Monday marking the latest deadly voyage.
In June 2022, 11 Haitian girls and women
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Sep 28, 2026
A 71-year-old man who was convicted of killing a police chief's aunt and spent decades on death row is being released Monday after prosecutors said newly analyzed DNA evidence doesn't link him to the crime.
A Utah judge ordered Douglas Stewart Carter let out on bail late Monday over objections from the victim's family. Carter will be required to wear a GPS monitor while he awaits a new trial in the 1985 killing of Eva Olesen.
The state Supreme Court ordered a new trial last year, citing misconduct by investigators. Carter has maintained his innocence and says a signed confession was coerced.
No physical evidence linked him to the crime scene, but the jury convicted Carter, a Black man, based on the confession and the testimony of two witnesses who said he bragged about killing Olesen, who was white. Those witnesses later recanted.
A DNA analysis received Sept. 22 excluded Carter as a possible match to blood found on a doorknob and genetic material recovered from the handle of a knife used to stab Olesen, who was also shot.
Judge Derek Pullan said those results further undermined the case against Carter, but a reasonable jury still could conclude that he killed Olesen.
Prosecutors are reconsidering the case
Pullan also ordered Carter to avoid contact with Olesen's family. Defense attorney Neal Hamilton said Carter was expected to be fitted with the GPS monitor and released Monday night.
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Sep 28, 2026
Mask policies at a lesbian bar in a small western Massachusetts town don't sound like the kind of topic that would become a viral sensation. But that's exactly what happened when the Boston Globe published a look last week into the uproar that ensued when Last Ditch, a bar in the small LGBTQ-friendly town of Greenfield, Mass., decided to transition to a mask-optional policy for its Saturday night happy hours.
"Shocking news … the internet is a strange place, particularly when it comes to extremely niche squabbles," Globe correspondent Dave Beard wrote in reaction to the story's extraordinary reach.
The day after the story was published, the paper's managing editor reportedly told staff that it had generated more than 1,000 new subscriptions, was "by far" the best-performing story of the year and was on pace to "shatter" all sorts of content records.
— The Boston Globe (@BostonGlobe) September 22, 2026
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Sep 28, 2026
With her execution days away, the lone woman on Tennessee's death row says she is prepared to die but "nervous" about how the state intends to carry it out.
Before learning Monday that Gov. Bill Lee would not be intervening in her case, Christa Pike wrote in a letter to NBC News, shared by her spiritual adviser: "Whether my clemency is granted or not, I am at peace."
"I am not afraid to die," wrote Pike, who has been on death row for over three decades. "I'm only nervous about the process."
Prosecutor Will Ayers speaks during a hearing for Christa Gail Pike in Knox County Criminal Court in Knoxville, Tenn., on Aug. 11. (Brianna Paciorka / News Sentinel / USA TODAY Network via Reuters)Tennessee is poised to execute Pike, 50, on Wednesday by lethal injection — the first time in more than 200 years that the state will put a woman to death, according to historical records.
In 1995, Pike was 18 when Knoxville police say she and two teenage accomplices worked together to torture, slash and fatally beat Colleen Slemmer, 19. Police say Pike and the others lured Slemmer, a classmate in their Job Corps training program, to an abandoned steam plant at the nearby University of Tennessee and attacked her.
The case became sensationalized when investigators said it was
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Sep 28, 2026
Three news outlets that President Donald Trump abruptly banished from White House grounds this month asked a federal court to block the ban until the case is resolved, saying the administration has "persisted in unpredictably and inconsistently implementing its ban" despite a judge's restraining order — including selectively barring CNN from White House pool duties.
"The White House's words and actions leave little doubt that it will immediately reinstitute a complete ban of CNN, MS NOW, and POLITICO if allowed the opportunity," lawyers for CNN, MS NOW and Politico wrote in a filing late Monday.
"Because the ban is an unlawful assault on the most fundamental First Amendment freedoms and will inflict irreparable harm on Plaintiffs and the public if not restrained, this Court should preliminarily enjoin its enforcement pending the resolution of this case," the filing said.
It was the latest development in the back-and-forth saga of the Trump administration and the news media during the second term of his presidency. It has been a contentious relationship that has raised multiple First Amendment questions, produced sanctions and restrictions on White House and Pentagon reporters and led to several lawsuits that are winding their ways through the federal court system.
A two-week temporary restraining order on Trump's ban of the three organizations, issued by U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly last week, restored the outlets' White House access, but expires Oct. 8. The preliminary injunction requested in Monday's filing would extend the White House access until the case is finally resolved.
In a statement emailed to The Associated Press immediately after the filing, the lead attorney for the three news outlets called the ban "a blatant violation of the Firs
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Sep 28, 2026
The conservative firebrand whom the Trump administration installed as a No. 2 at the FBI announced Monday that he is resigning from the bureau.
Andrew Bailey, the former Missouri attorney general who has supported debunked claims that the 2020 election was stolen, told bureau employees in an email that he was leaving to spend more time with this family, according to three people familiar with the personnel move who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a matter they were not authorized to speak about.
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Bailey, who was hired for the leadership role about a year ago, confirmed his departure in a social media post.
"With great pride in what we have accomplished, I am announcing that I am stepping down to return to my family in Missouri," Bailey wrote on social media. "I am confident Director Patel will continue to reform the FBI, combat violent crime, defend the homeland, ensure strong organizational accountability, and restore public trust in this institution of excellence."
The departure marks a dramatic turn for Bailey, a loyalist of President Donald Trump who had been floated as a candidate early in the administration to run the FBI or Justice Department.
It is also the latest shake-up at the federal law enforcement agency under FBI Director Kash Patel. Bailey was hired to serve as the co-deputy director alongside Dan Bongino, a conservative podcast host and former Secret Service officer.
Neither Bongino nor Bailey had FBI experience, which made them highly unusual picks for a position that typically goes to a veteran of the bureau. The position does not require Senate confirmation and is tasked with running th
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Sep 28, 2026
Trump administration officials said on Monday that the United States has no plans to sell weapons to China after U.S. Ambassador to China David Perdue indicated during a televised interview that President Donald Trump offered a weapons deal to China's Xi Jinping during a high-profile summit last week.
"President Trump continues to say, 'Hey, we sell arms to other people around the world,'" Perdue said Sunday during an appearance on Fox News. "He actually asked President Xi would he like to buy some at one point."
Jim Lo Scalzo/EPA/Shutterstock - PHOTO: President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping depart the National Archives Museum in Washington, September 25, 2026.Perdue did not provide further details about the offer, and he did not reveal Xi's response.
A U.S. official denied there were plans to sell weapons to China.
"The U.S. government has no plans to sell weapons to China," the official said to ABC News on Monday.
The State Department also denied a potential sale, saying in a statement to ABC News that "U.S. law prohibits arms sales to China and there is no offer or plan to sell arms to China."
Asked about Perdue's comments in the Oval Office on Monday, Trump said he "didn't discuss it" with Xi, suggesting he meant Taiwan instead of China.
"I never heard of that one. I'm going to have to ask him. You mean we're going to sell? Now they'd probably like to buy it because we do make better equipment than them. So maybe it's a good idea. Yeah, but, we didn't discuss it," Trump said, later adding "I think he probably was talking about Taiwan."
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Sep 28, 2026
A residential building was hit in the eastern city of Kharkiv (SERGEY BOBOK)Russian drones struck Ukraine's National Academy of Sciences in the historic heart of Kyiv on Monday, in the latest deadly daytime attack on the Ukrainian capital.
Kyiv has increasingly faced Russian drones and missiles as Europe's worst conflict since World War II grinds through its fifth year.
The capital again came under fire after an air force alert warning of approaching drones.
Video footage shared online appeared to show a high-speed drone smashing into the National Academy of Sciences at a sharp angle, exploding and sending acrid smoke into the blue sky above.
People were seen leaning out of windows as bright orange flames engulfed part of the building.
Ukraine's former national security and defence council secretary Volodymyr Gorbulin told state broadcaster Suspilne that he was at work at the academy at the time and was slightly wounded.
But he said his assistant, who was near the building, was killed.
The National Academy of Sciences is close to the German embassy, a cathedral, the national opera and government buildings.
Kyiv cultural sites, government buildings and schools have all been targeted before, according to Ukrainian authorities.
The academy called the attack "Russian terror" and "barbarity", targeting "peaceful people who were simply at their workplaces... Ukrainian science, education and culture".
President Volodymyr Zelensky said a separate strike in the capital hit a medical facility.
Elsewhere, Russian strikes killed four and wounded at least 19 at a business centre in the central city of Dnipro while authorities reported an unspecified number of fatalities in a strike on a residential area in eastern Kharkiv.
Prime Mi
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Sep 28, 2026
Flooded neighborhoods, damaged highways and widespread power outages stretched from the East Coast to Hawaii over the weekend. A deadly nor'easter forced water rescues along the Atlantic coast, while Hurricane Nolo brought flooding rain to Hawaii and powerful Hurricane Polo approached Mexico.
If your weekend weather bingo card had major hurricanes, a wildfire, pending volcanic activity and a nor'easter, you nearly had it covered. Then a "zombie storm" came back to life and Monday brought a new tropical storm.
Here is a look at the biggest weather stories from the weekend and what comes next.
Powerful waves from a nor'easter crash over homes in Scituate, Massachusetts, on Sept. 26, 2026. (Image: Tony Laubach)
The season's first nor'easter flooded roads and homes, disrupted travel and knocked out power to more than 200,000 customers across the Northeast over the course of the storm. A New York City Housing Authority employee was killed by a falling tree on Saturday.
Along the Massachusetts coast, powerful waves crashed over seawalls and homes in Scituate as repeated high tides prolonged the damage.
Ted Friedli kayaks his
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Sep 28, 2026
Gov. Greg Abbott declared a statewide disaster on Monday over soaring diesel prices and a worsening fuel shortage created by wars abroad.
The 30-day disaster declaration, which can be extended indefinitely, allowed Abbott to lift some restrictions on commercial transportation, which he said will alleviate some of the elevated costs. Diesel fuel is used in farming and commercial shipping, so elevated fuel prices are passed through to consumers in the form of higher costs for goods at the grocery store.
The declaration expands the use of dyed diesel on Texas roads, suspends Texas Low Emission Diesel rules to the limit the federal government authorizes and raises the allowable weight for fuel, agricultural and timber loads. The governor also requested the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to waive federal ultra-low sulfur diesel requirements to boost supply.
"Texas agriculture and freight run on diesel," Abbott wrote in a statement. "Record prices put both industries at risk and raise costs for every Texas family. Farmers and truckers can now use dyed diesel on Texas roads, and fuel, crop, and timber loads can move at a higher weight. These steps cut costs on the farm, on the road and at the store."
Dyed diesel is chemically the same as regular diesel available at gas stations, but it is tinted the color red and used in off-road farm and construction equipment. Because it's exempt from federal and state motor fuel road taxes, typically its use on public roads is prohibited and violators are subject to fines for tax evasion, according to state law.
Removing restrictions on the use of dyed diesel could reduce prices by increasing the supply of diesel avail
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Sep 28, 2026
Washington — President Trump on Monday announced that the company Mesabi Metallics will build a $15 billion steel plant in Iowa over the coming years, in what would be the largest of its kind in U.S. history.
"There's a company known as Mesabi," the president said in the Oval Office. "And they're going to make a big investment in a place called Iowa. I love Iowa. I won Iowa every time. Today, we're thrilled to announce that Mesabi Metallics will be building the largest steel plant in American history in the great state of Iowa."
The president and the Minnesota-based Mesabi Metallics unveiled the company's plans for what the White House is calling a mega steel plant, alongside Mesabi executives and Republican representatives from Iowa who face tough races in November.
Once it's up and running in 2030, the plant is expected to produce 7.5 million or more tons of steel per year. A White House official said the plant is expected to create 1,750 permanent jobs in Iowa.
Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick and Export-Import Bank Chairman John Jovanovic joined Mesabi executives and Republican members of Congress in the Oval Office for the announcement.
Plans for the new plant are the Trump administration's latest move to boost domestic steel manufacturing in the face of overseas competition, a centerpiece of the president's trade agenda. Last year, he doubled tariffs on imported steel to 50%, and steel levies have been part of the ongoing tra
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Sep 28, 2026
By John Kruzel
WASHINGTON, Sept 28 (Reuters) - US Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito will not participate in an upcoming case involving a bid ?by oil companies to scuttle a lawsuit seeking to hold them liable ?for helping fuel climate change, a court official said on Monday.
Alito owns stock in several ?oil and gas companies but not Exxon Mobil and Suncor Energy, the two companies involved in the dispute to be heard by the court on October 5. He had initially declined calls from watchdog and environmental groups to recuse. Alito stepped ?aside when the litigation reached ?the court at an earlier stage in 2023.
Alito is one of the most conservative justices on the court, which has ?a 6-3 conservative majority.
Lawyers for the oil companies and those representing officials in Boulder, Colorado, who sued Exxon and Suncor in 2018, were informed on Monday of ?Alito's recusal ?in a letter from Scott Harris, clerk ?of the Supreme Court.
Harris did ?not provide a rationale, stating only, "I am writing to inform the parties that Justice Alito has determined that he will not continue to participate in this case."
The dispute, which will be heard on the first day of the court's new term, could determine the fate of dozens of state and local climate-related ?lawsuits against fossil fuel companies.
According to his most ?recent financial disclosure, Alito's holdings include stock in ?ConocoPhillips and Phillips 66, which are ?defendants in separate but similar climate-related lawsuits.
The upcoming Supreme Court ?case involves whether federal law precludes ?certain claims under ?state law seeking damages for harms allegedly caused by the effects of greenhouse gas emissions. The justices also directed the parties to address whether ?the court has jurisdiction ?to decide the case at this stage.
President Donald Trump's administration has ?backed Exxon and Suncor, arguing that federal law p
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Sep 28, 2026
A satellite view shows an overview of the Natanz nuclear facility near Natanz, Iran, on June 30. - Vantor/Reuters
President Donald Trump is willing to give Iran sanctions relief and release frozen funds as part of a final deal, but only if Tehran offers "concrete progress" on the nuclear issue, a US official told CNN Monday, as mediators try to bring both countries back to the negotiating table.
The United States is having "positive and constructive discussions through the mediators," the official said, though they noted that there will not be a deal unless nuclear issues are addressed. Trump on Saturday rejected Iran's latest proposal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, calling it "unacceptable."
On Sunday, Trump told Axios that he expects more talks with Iran to occur this week. The official said that special envoy Steve Witkoff, Jared Kushner, Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio are leading the talks on the US side.
"They want to make a deal, but it is not the deal that I want to make," the president said. "It is what we would have maybe agreed to a year ago. They overplayed their hand."
According to the official, Iran has indicated they are flexible on nuclear issues — but both sides have not reached an agreement on the timing of the commitments.
US Ambassador to the United Nations Mike Waltz told CNN's Jake Tapper on Sunday that Trump rejected the proposal because h
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Sep 28, 2026
The growing number of measles cases across the U.S. this year is nearing 3,700, federal data shows, as an outbreak in Pennsylvania continues to surge.
There are now 3,659 confirmed cases this year, according to the latest update from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
That total includes new cases from Pennsylvania, where 129 cases have been reported over the past seven days, a dashboard from Pennsylvania's health department shows, bringing the total to 890.
Possible measles exposures have been traced to the Philadelphia International Airport and the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.
The updates come as the Trump administration and Pennsylvania leaders have sparred over measles-associated deaths — the first in the U.S. this year.
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Sep 28, 2026
By midmorning, the 10-year U.S. Treasury yield had risen to 5.27%, its highest level since mid-June 2007. (Samuel Corum / Bloomberg via Getty Images file)Stocks fell Monday alongside a jump in bond yields and erratic oil trading as geopolitical upheaval remained front and center for traders.
The S&P 500 ended lower by 0.7% and the Nasdaq Composite dropped 0.9% as oil prices rose, pushing Brent crude oil back above $106 per barrel.
Earlier in the day, Brent rose beyond $108, but the jump moderated after reports said mediators planned to meet with U.S. and Iranian officials separately to discuss the stalemate between the two sides over the war with Iran. Iran's semiofficial ISNA news agency downplayed the significance of the meetings, saying that Iran's foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, would attend talks with mediators but that no U.S. representatives would be present.
Other reports throughout the day that said President Donald Trump was open to offering Iran economic concessions to reboot talks and reach a deal also took some of the heat off oil prices. NBC News has not confirmed those reports.
Over the weekend, Trump said he had rejected a recent proposal from Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, through which critical energy supplies flowed before the war.
"They want to make a deal, and I think that's fine," Trump told reporters in Washington. "I like making a deal too, but ... that deal would not be acceptable."
Monday's rocky oil trading has been a familiar feature of t
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Sep 28, 2026
Donald and Josephine Johnson's GoFundMe campaign aimed to raise money for Josephine's cancer treatment. (KXAS)GoFundMe pulled the plug Sunday on a campaign to raise money for an elderly Texas couple, saying it had "identified factual misrepresentations."
The account was created after the husband went viral for working a backbreaking job to cover his wife's mounting bills for cancer treatment.
The digital fundraising site did not immediately reveal what kind of misrepresentations were behind its decision to end the campaign set to benefit Donald and Josephine Johnson.
The GoFundMe gained national attention and raised nearly $290,000 before it was pulled down.
The campaign was started by a "concerned stranger" identified as "Erin H," who said she spotted on her Ring camera the 81-year-old husband struggling to carry heavy luggage up a flight of stairs.
The organizer said she asked why he was working such a physically demanding job at his age, and Johnson said his wife was fighting cancer and this was the only job he could find to pay the overwhelming hospital bills.
Door camera video shows Donald Johnson preparing to carry luggage up a flight of stairs. (KXAS)But somewhere along the line, GoFundMe said it found "misrepresentations" in the campaign.
The platform received a tip that the organizer of the campaign might not be who they said they were. GoFundMe investigators called the organ
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Sep 28, 2026
President Donald Trump is unveiling Monday plans for a massive steel plant in Iowa that the White House says will be the largest in American history and promises to bring 1,750 permanent jobs to the state.
The roughly $15 billion steel plant is touted as a major new investment and evidence that Trump's economic agenda is bringing heavy manufacturing back to the U.S. with just over a month until the midterms. It will create between 5,000 and 6,000 construction jobs during its first phase.
Trump is expected to make the announcement from the Oval Office at 2 p.m. alongside executives from Mesabi Metallics, a White House official told Fox News Digital. The company plans to build the facility using iron ore from its newly constructed mine in Minnesota.
Sen Kevin Cramer: China Builds For War While America Waits On Permits
President Donald Trump will announce plans Monday for a roughly $15 billion steel plant in Iowa that the White House says will be the largest in American history, touting a major new investment as evidence his economic agenda is bringing heavy manufacturing back to the U.S.The Iowa plant is expected to produce 7.5 million tons of steel annually in its first phase before eventually reaching 10 million tons per year, according to the White House. The administration says that would make it the largest steel plant ever built in the U.S.
If completed as planned, the project would represent a significant expansion of American steel-making capacity. At its planned 10 million tons of annual production, the Iowa
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Sep 28, 2026
The Education Department announced Monday it has formally rescinded the Biden-era Title IX interpretation that gave sex-based discrimination protections to students on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity.
Schools now must go back to the Title IX code as held under the previous Trump administration in 2020, which the department says will protect women's sports.
"Thanks to today's action, the published Title IX regulations faithfully reflect court orders and Congressional intent — reducing confusion for parents, students, and educational institutions. We will continue to relentlessly champion equal opportunity for all Americans and hold accountable any school or college that violates the rights, privacy, or athletic opportunities of our women and girls," Education Secretary Linda McMahon said.
The Biden-era Title IX rule was already struck down in the court system after challenges from Republican states.
And the administration has pursued its own definition since President Trump returned to office, making deals with schools such as the University of Pennsylvania to take transgender athletes out of their women's programs.
Opponents of the move say it will harm transgender athletes and weaken protections for sexual assault victims.
"Sexual harassment and assault continue to be pervasive in schools and, to the fullest extent possible, we should be working to enforce the laws that protect student survivors of sexual violence. Yet, Education Secretary Linda Mc
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Sep 28, 2026
The Trump administration has rolled back car fuel efficiency standards requiring automakers to ensure their cars and light trucks were using less fuel.
While the Biden-era standards would have been expected to get the nation's car fleet to average 50.4 miles per gallon by 2031, the Trump administration on Monday brought that number down to 34.9 miles per gallon.
The administration argued that this would make cars cheaper, though opponents of the move point out that car owners could spend more on gasoline as a result. The change could also lead to more pollution and worsen climate change.
The Trump administration says that the move will make new cars $1,300 cheaper on average.
The Biden administration said its change, which would have increased fuel economy requirements by 2 percent per year for model years 2027 through 2031, would have saved drivers more than $600 in fuel costs over the lifetime of a vehicle.
President Trump touted the change in a Truth Social post over the weekend.
"BIG DAY FOR AMERICAN AUTO WORKERS AND CAR BUYERS! I have just approved new Fuel Economy Standards that TERMINATE Sleepy Joe Biden and Pete Boot-EDGE-EDGE's ridiculous EV Mandate," he wrote.
"The Dumocrats cost our Great Auto Manufacturers $Billions, forced Americans into cars they never wanted, and wasted Billions on Chargers that were never built," he added.
The move comes after the standards were made toothless in the president's Big Beautiful Bill as a pro
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Sep 28, 2026
SpaceX launched its enormous Starship into orbit for the first time Monday, aiming for six full laps around Earth to prove its readiness for NASA's Artemis moon program.
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) September 27, 2026 The spacecraft almost didn't achieve the long-desired goal after one of its engines shut down too soon. But with everything else working well and the bad engine no longer needed, flight controllers decided after several tense minutes to proceed as planned.
"Starship is orbital," Mission Control announced to cheers.
Founder Elon Musk's showpiece rocket — the biggest and most powerful ever built — carried 26 of the latest and most advanced Starlink satellites to join the 11,000 older models already providing internet service. They popped out of the spacecraft one by one, drawing more cheers from the SpaceX crowds looking on from the launch site at Starbase, Texas.
It was Starship
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Sep 28, 2026
SpaceX launched its enormous Starship into orbit for the first time Monday and successfully delivered the most advanced Starlinks yet, but cut the flight short to ensure safety.
The spacecraft reentered over the Pacific and splashed down north of Hawaii three hours after blasting off from Texas. The company had been aiming for a 10-hour flight, spanning six full laps around Earth, to prove its readiness for NASA's Artemis moon program.
Starship tipped over and erupted in flames upon splashdown, a dramatic end to the mission.
Founder Elon Musk's Starship almost didn't make it to orbit when one of its engines shut down too soon. But with everything else working well and the bad engine no longer needed, flight controllers decided after several tense minutes to proceed as planned.
"Starship is orbital," Mission Control announced to cheers.
NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman congratulated SpaceX on reaching orbit and "managing every step in a safe, responsible and especially inspirational way."
Rocket carries 26 of Musk's most advanced Starlink satellitesMusk's showpiece rocket — the biggest and most powerful ever built — carried 26 of the latest Starlink satellites to join the 11,000 older models already providing internet service. They popped out of the spacecraft one by one, drawing more cheers from the SpaceX crowds lookin
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Sep 28, 2026
What to know about the Iran war today:Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Sunday that Tehran is "fully prepared for the war to be resumed," and also for the possibility of renewed diplomacy with the U.S. aimed at ending the seven-month conflict, and it's "up to President Trump to choose."Mr. Trump told Axios on Sunday that he expected talks with Iran to resume this week, insisting again that the Islamic Republic is "losing badly" and eager to strike a peace deal. Last week, Iran proposed a seven-day ceasefire and the phased reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, contingent upon the U.S. meeting conditions laid out in the mid-June memorandum of understanding, which fell apart after several weeks. Mr. Trump publicly rejected the new Iranian proposal last week, and Iran has insisted it will not change its demands.
Iran lodges complaint with U.N. over U.S. sanctions on its aviation industry
Iran has lodged a complaint with the United Nations over U.S. sanctions against its aviation sector, which have forced the cancellation of many flights across the region, state media reported Monday.
The U.S. imposed restrictions this month on the entire Iranian aviation industry and vowed to take a hard line against any companies or countries that continue to assist it.
As the sanctions took effect last Wednesday, some major airlines were forced to cancel international flights as several nations in the region implemented bans.
"To defend the legitimate rights of the aviation industry and counter illegal restrictions imposed by America, Iran has drafted and submitted a formal protest to t
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Sep 28, 2026
The SpaceX Starship and Super Heavy booster lift off for a 13th test flight from the company's launch complex in Starbase, Texas, on July 24. - Steve Nesius/Reuters
For live updates on SpaceX Starship's 14th test flight, follow CNN's coverage here.
People near the sandy shores of Texas' southernmost coastline are accustomed to the earth-shattering roar of the most powerful rocket ever made: Since 2023, various prototypes of SpaceX's Starship have taken flight from the area 13 times — with nearly half ending in some form of unintended explosion.
But the stakes are about to get even higher.
On Monday, SpaceX will attempt to launch Starship to orbit for the first time, allowing it to deploy the inaugural batch of a new generation of Starlink internet satellites. A 75-minute launch window opens at 8:15 a.m. ET. The company is aiming to lift off at 8:48 a.m. ET.
If successful, Monday's test flight could mark a monumental step forward — signifying that Starship may soon leave its test flight phase and enter full operation.
As Starship crosses that threshold, the ripple effects for the broader space industry are expected to be seismic.
Starship is set to deploy a host of new space-based technologies, including the upgraded Starlink satellites designed to boost the capacity of SpaceX's global internet business and orbital data centers that CEO Elon Musk hopes will power energy-sucking AI models.
The promises only grow bolder from there: Starship has a mult
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Sep 28, 2026
The valuation on Nvidia (NVDA) is too appetizing for CEO Jensen Huang to ignore any longer.
The king of AI chips revealed a stunning new $150 billion stock buyback plan on Monday — the largest share repurchase authorization increase in history. It brings the company's total buyback authorization to $235 billion.
"NVIDIA's growth is being driven by a once-in-a-generation platform shift to AI and accelerated computing," Huang said in a statement. "Our cash generation gives us the capacity to invest in the technologies that advance this transformation and return capital to shareholders. This authorization reflects our confidence in the long-term opportunity ahead."
Read more: Nvidia launches AI safety platform after Jensen Huang calls Anthropic, OpenAI warnings 'odd'
Huang likely sees a great moment to buy back Nvidia shares on the cheap, ahead of further acceleration in AI development.Nvidia's forward price-to-earnings (P/E) multiple has declined steadily since August 2024, when artificial intelligence began to take hold, unleashing a boom in the company's stock pr
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Sep 28, 2026
A screenshot of President Donald Trump's 2023 ad for the 2024 presidential elections. —Screenshot from Donald Trump's Truth Social account @realDonaldTrumpPresident Donald Trump declares that "this is the final battle" in one of several taxpayer-funded television ads airing ahead of November's midterm elections, prompting bipartisan scrutiny over whether the spots violate federal law.
The 30-second ad is a black-and-white video of Trump walking down a hall over audio of his warnings against "the deep state," "warmongers," "globalists," "Marxists," "communists," and "fascists."
Trump posted the same video on his Truth Social platform in 2023, but with one difference: Then, the monochromatic ad ended with words on screen calling on the viewer to join Trump's campaign and fine print saying it was "Paid for by Donald J. Trump for President 2024, Inc." This time, the 2026 ad says at the bottom: "Paid for by the U.S. Government."
CNN reported that the ad aired during at least two NFL games on Sunday. CNBC also reported that the ad aired during Fox News Sunday, citing data from advertising intelligence company AdImpact, adding that the TV ad has cost more than $362,000 so far.
A second advert with the same "paid for by the U.S. government" disclaimer began airing on Wednesday. The ad, which featured the song
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Sep 28, 2026
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NorthPoint Development wants to build a data center on 1,300 acres in the Pocono foothills, near Hazle Township, Pennsylvania. As well as seeking to charm the local government with various funding packages, it has proposed paying checks of $10,000 per household. Despite the Pennsylvania town's median income of $60,000, the offer isn't being warmly welcomed by locals, reports the Wall Street Journal. Those interviewed were widely against the data center development plans and cited several reasons for being averse to accepting the payout. The major concerns regarded potential impacts on property values, the specter of noise pollution, and a distrust of both the AI moguls and local government representatives.
Offer letters began to be received by Hazle Township back in June. The WSJ recently talked to several residents about NorthPoint's $10,000 offer. While some say the $10,000 would be handy, it couldn't find many residents who were "eager to welcome the data center for the payout," in
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Sep 28, 2026
LONDON — Police have arrested five British nationals in connection with a massive security operation near a base used by the U.S. Air Force to facilitate strikes on Iran, the counterterrorism officials running the operation said Monday.
The five men, all from London and in their early to mid-20s, were arrested Sunday on suspicion of terrorism and explosives offenses after three suspicious vehicles were seen moving toward RAF Fairford, a royal air force station about 90 minutes west of London.
Dozens of homes were evacuated in the early morning and a large emergency presence was seen around the installation, shaking the normally quiet area in rural Cotswolds.
But after "extensive interviews and inquiries," the head of Counter Terrorism Policing, Laurence Taylor, said Monday that they had been released on bail, adding that "does not mean that the investigation is over."
"They are subject to stringent conditions on their movement and contact with others," he added.
A police roadblock outside RAF Fairford in southwest England on Monday. (Ben Stanshall / AFP via Getty Images)Earlier, a local farmer recounted how she had seen a "large group of hooded and masked me
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