Category Archives: US News

One mass killing every 6.53 days: US shootings are on a record pace

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Despite the death toll, there is little indication of federal policy changes, but some states have tried to impose more gun control

The US is setting a record yearly pace for mass killings, with around one each week. According to a database tracking such events, the death toll from 17 mass killings in 111 days is 88. All were shot. Only 2009 saw as many such killings in the same period.

At a Nashville elementary school, three children and three adults were killed. In northern California, farm workers died over a workplace grudge. At a ballroom outside Los Angeles, dancers were massacred as they celebrated the Lunar New Year.

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DeSantis to meet UK foreign secretary with eye on US presidential bid

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Florida governor lines up four-nation tour in attempt to boost credentials as credible leader on world stage

Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor, is to meet the UK foreign secretary, James Cleverly, in London at the end of the month as he attempts to burnish his credentials as a credible Republican leader capable of operating on a global stage ahead of a widely expected run for US president.

He is to lead a Florida trade delegation on a four-nation tour taking in Japan, South Korea, Israel and the UK.

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Criminal charges against Alec Baldwin dropped in Rust film set shooting

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Baldwin was pointing a pistol at cinematographer Halyna Hutchins during a rehearsal in 2021 when the gun went off

Prosecutors in New Mexico have dropped criminal charges against the actor Alec Baldwin in the fatal shooting of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of the western movie Rust, officials confirmed on Thursday.

Baldwin, 65, was pointing a Colt .45 pistol at Hutchins during a rehearsal on 21 October 2021 when the gun went off, killing Hutchins and wounding the director Joel Souza.

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‘Legacy blue checks’ disappear from Twitter as Musk’s changes take effect

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Checkmark denoted accounts verified for authenticity, which can now be bought for an $8 a month subscription called Twitter Blue

Blue checkmarks began to disappear from formerly verified Twitter accounts on Thursday, as policies implemented under new owner Elon Musk began to take hold.

Musk, who purchased the company for $44bn in 2022 and has thus far struggled to make it profitable, has been threatening to remove what he called “legacy blue checks” for months now. The checkmark previously denoted accounts that had been verified for authenticity and was given to accounts of celebrities, journalists and media outlets.

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Biden may announce 2024 presidential campaign next week – report

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In recent weeks president has laid out likely themes of a re-election bid and secured a doctor’s note that he is ‘fit for duty’

The US president Joe Biden and his team may announce his re-election campaign by video next week, according to a source familiar with the matter on Thursday.

An announcement on Tuesday by Biden, 80, would coincide with the anniversary of his 2020 campaign launch four years earlier, the source said, asking not to be identified.

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Israel: self-proclaimed ‘racist’ politician nominated as New York consul general

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May Golan has insulted Africans in Israel and disparaged the Reform movement, the largest Jewish denomination in the US

Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has nominated a far-right politician who once boasted that she is “proud to be a racist” as his country’s top diplomat in New York.

The appointment of May Golan was swiftly denounced by Israeli and American former diplomats, and the head of the largest Jewish denomination in the US, as an affront to the US and damaging for Israel.

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Senate asks supreme court chief justice to testify on ethics amid Clarence Thomas revelations – as it happened

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The Democratic chair of the Senate judiciary committee has asked chief justice John Roberts to testify on 2 May about the court’s ethics, following revelations of undisclosed links between a Republican megadonor and conservative justice Clarence Thomas.

In a letter to Roberts, judiciary committee chair Richard Durbin did not mention those reports about Thomas specifically, but noted that since he last addressed the court’s ethics in 2011 “there has been a steady stream of revelations regarding Justices falling short of the ethical standards expected of other federal judges and, indeed, of public servants generally. These problems were already apparent back in 2011, and the Court’s decade-long failure to address them has contributed to a crisis of public confidence. The status quo is no longer tenable.”

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Mike Lindell ordered to pay $5m to man who debunked data used to push big lie

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MyPillow CEO’s ‘Prove Mike Wrong Challenge’ promised money to anyone who could disprove data he claimed showed Trump won

Mike Lindell must make good on a promise and pay $5m to a software expert who debunked data the conspiracy theorist touted in advancing Donald Trump’s lie that his 2020 election defeat was the result of voting fraud, an arbitration panel decided.

In its decision, the panel said: “The data Lindell LLC provided, and represented reflected information from the November 2020 election, unequivocally did not reflect November 2020 election data.”

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‘Cop City’ activist’s official autopsy reveals more than 50 bullet wounds

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No gunpowder residue found on Manuel Paez Terán, who was alleged to have fired first in fatal confrontation with Georgia police

Official autopsy results for Manuel Paez Terán, an environmental activist police shot and killed three months ago during a raid in a Georgia public park near the planned site of a police and fire department training center, do little to advance the state’s version of events, including the notion that the activist shot first, wounding an officer.

Paez Terán, or “Tortuguita”, was one of the “forest defenders” camped throughout the public park less than a mile away from the planned center, known as “Cop City”, when dozens of officers entered the South River Forest south-east of Atlanta, Georgia, on 18 January.

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US gun safety group’s chilling new ad calls for assault weapons ban

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Brady ad features US navy veteran’s shocking account of Vietnam gunfire and comes on heels of several devastating mass shootings

A gun safety group has created a provocative new ad campaign calling for the renewal of a federal assault weapons ban, in the wake of several devastating mass shootings across the US that involved the use of military-style rifles.

The ad, released on Thursday by the gun safety group Brady and shared exclusively with the Guardian, features a US navy veteran of the Vietnam war reading a chilling account of coming under gunfire and being struck by a bullet.

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California police under audit after racist texts discovered | First Thing

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Messages showing Antioch officers using racist slurs, and bragging about making up evidence and beating suspects have sparked outrage. Plus, supreme court delays decision on abortion pill restrictions

City officials in northern California have voted to audit the troubled police department amid outrage over text messages showing police officers using racist slurs and bragging about making up evidence and beating suspects.

The FBI and the Contra Costa district attorney’s office discovered the shocking messages while investigating officers within the Antioch police department suspected of crimes. Officials have named 17 officers who sent texts, including the president of the Antioch police union, but nearly half the department was included in the messages.

‘Boasting’. “The officers’ texts about my baby made me feel like he died all over again,” Kathryn Wade told the East Bay Times. “The boasting and bragging about what you did to people is so heartbreaking. The threats you make on this community, Black and brown [residents], something needs to be done.”

What does the pause do? It gives the justices additional time to study arguments and consider the restrictions ordered by the lower court, which include limiting mifepristone use after seven weeks of pregnancy – it is currently approved through 10 weeks – and banning delivery by mail.

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Alec Baldwin’s ‘Rust’ movie to resume filming 18 months after shooting

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A representative said filming likely to restart in Montana on Thursday while a number of legal issues remain unresolved

Filming on the western movie Rust could resume this week in Montana, the production company said, 18 months after the fatal shooting of a cinematographer during a rehearsal with actor Alec Baldwin on the original production in New Mexico.

Baldwin is set to continue his involvement with the project as both actor and co-producer. Rust Move Productions attorney Melina Spadone said via a representative that filming will restart on Thursday at the Yellowstone Film Ranch.

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TikTok must divest itself of Chinese ownership or face ban, FCC commissioner tells Australian inquiry

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Company accused of ‘gaslighting’ public on surveillance concerns during Senate inquiry into foreign influence through social media

TikTok will either need to divest itself from Chinese ownership or face a ban in the United States, according to the commissioner of the US federal communications commission, Brendan Carr, who accused the company of “gaslighting” the public on surveillance concerns.

Appearing before the Australian Senate inquiry into foreign influence through social media, the Trump appointee said concern about TikTok in the US was “broad and deep”, and crossed party lines.

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‘My world was taken from me’: boyfriend pays tribute to woman killed after pulling up to wrong driveway

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Blake Walsh, who dated Kaylin Gillis for more than four years, says he wants ‘the world to know how good of a person she really was’

A man whose girlfriend was shot dead after they pulled into the wrong driveway in upstate New York said their “high hopes and plans” were shattered in a single, brutal moment.

“I wanted to spend the rest of my life with her,” Blake Walsh, 19, told NBC of his girlfriend, Kaylin Gillis. “My world was taken from me.”

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California police department under audit after officers’ racist texts are discovered

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Shocking messages about beating suspects and making up evidence were found when Antioch officers were investigated

Amid outrage over text messages showing police officers in northern California using racist slurs and bragging about making up evidence and beating suspects, city officials voted to audit the troubled department.

The FBI and the Contra Costa district attorney’s office discovered the shocking messages while investigating officers within the Antioch police department suspected of crimes. Officials have named 17 officers who sent texts, including the president of the Antioch police union, but nearly half the department was included in the messages.

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Fox still in legal peril over election lies after settling with Dominion – live

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Media empire still faces defamation lawsuit from Smartmatic as shareholders reportedly considering trip to the courts

A top House Republican has signaled that the party will indeed try to impeach homeland security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, the New York Times reports.

Mark Green, the chair of the House homeland security committee, told donors this weekend that the effort would kick off this week when the secretary testifies before his committee, which happened Tuesday. The Times, citing a recording of a House Freedom Caucus fundraiser it obtained, said the case would focus on Mayorkas’s “dereliction of duty and his intentional destruction of our country through the open southern border.”

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Iowa teens plead guilty to beating Spanish teacher to death over grade

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Prosecutors recommend that Willard Miller, 17, receive 30 years to life and Jeremy Goodale, 18, 25 years to life for 2021 killing

Two teenagers in Iowa charged with beating their high school Spanish teacher to death over a poor grade have pleaded guilty to first-degree murder.

On Tuesday, Willard Miller and Jeremy Goodale admitted killing Nohema Graber, 66, at Fairfield high school.

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Dominion had planned to make Rupert Murdoch its second witness

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Lawyers were going to call media mogul this week, forcing him to appear in person for cross-examination

Lawyers for Dominion Voting Systems had planned to put media mogul Rupert Murdoch on the stand to testify this week before it reached a $787.5m settlement with Fox for its broadcasting of false claims about the company’s voting equipment after the 2020 election, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Dominion was going to call the 92-year-old Murdoch as its second witness, forcing him to appear in person for cross-examination before the end of the week. He would have followed Tony Fratto, a crisis communications consultant who represented Dominion after the 2020 election and contacted Fox many times to inform them they were making false claims.

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Two arrested and charged with murder over Alabama shooting that killed four

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Investigators make announcement following deadly shooting at 16th birthday party in small town of Dadeville on Saturday

Two people were arrested and charged with murder in connection with a shooting that killed four people at a Sweet 16 birthday party in Alabama last weekend, investigators announced on Wednesday.

It was the first police news conference since the day after the shooting, which happened on Saturday. The district attorney, Mike Segrest, said the pair would be charged as adults and prosecutors would ask a judge to hold them without bail.

Associated Press contributed reporting

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Family of Tyre Nichols sues city of Memphis and police over deadly beating

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Nichols died after beating by police, who said he was suspected of reckless driving but no evidence of traffic violation has emerged

The family of Tyre Nichols, a Black Tennessee man who died after been beaten by five police officers, has sued the city of Memphis, individual officers and emergency medical personnel involved in his case.

Lawyers for Nichols’s mother, RowVaughn Wells, filed the lawsuit on Wednesday in federal court in Memphis.

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