Stephanie Hockridge and her husband falsified details to obtain PPP loans guaranteed by US small business agency
A former Phoenix news anchor has been sentenced to 10 years after being found guilty of participating in a fraudulent $63m Covid-19 relief scheme alongside her husband.
Stephanie Hockridge’s sentence on Friday came after a jury convicted her in June. Meanwhile, her husband, Nathan Reis, pleaded guilty in August.
Continue reading...Anna Kepner, 18, from Titusville, was found dead of asphyxiation under a bed on a Carnival cruise ship
The grandparents of a high school senior found dead on a cruise ship earlier in November say they fear they have lost two grandchildren after her stepbrother has emerged as a suspect in the case.
“No matter what we find out, no matter what they tell us, it’s not going to bring either one of these children back,” Barbara Kepner, the grandmother of the late 18-year-old cheerleader Anna Kepner told ABC News on Monday.
Continue reading...Army secretary Daniel Driscoll presented a Russian wishlist, highlighting differences with the administration
The US army secretary, Daniel Driscoll, was an unlikely envoy for the Trump administration’s newest proposal to end the Russian invasion of Ukraine – but his ties to JD Vance have put a close ally of the Eurosceptic vice-president on the frontlines of Donald Trump’s latest push to end the war.
Before his trip to Kyiv last week, Driscoll was not known for his role as a negotiator or statesman, and his early efforts at selling the deal to European policymakers were described as turbulent.
Continue reading...Four main food distribution sites operated by the opaque company had been flashpoints of deadly violence
A controversial and secretive private company backed by the US and Israel that distributed food in Gaza has announced the end of its operations in the devastated territory.
The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), which had four food distribution sites that became flashpoints of chaos and deadly violence between May and October, said in a statement that it would shut down permanently, having “successfully completed its emergency mission”.
Continue reading...Venezuelan group known as Cartel of the Suns designated as terrorist organization despite doubts over its existence
Venezuela’s government has accused the US of peddling “ridiculous hogwash” about its supposed role in sponsoring “narco-terrorism” as Washington continued to turn up the heat on Nicolás Maduro’s regime and leftwing European politicians warned South America faced being plunged into “a torrent of bloodshed”.
On Monday, the Trump administration officially designated a Venezuelan group known as the “Cartel de los Soles” (the Cartel of the Suns) a terrorist organization – despite widespread doubts over its actual existence.
Continue reading...Actor who appeared in My Own Private Idaho, Blade, Armageddon and Dogville, as well as Madonna music videos and video games, died on Sunday
Udo Kier, the German actor who appeared in 275 roles across Hollywood and European cinema, including multiple films by Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Gus Van Sant and Lars von Trier, has died aged 81.
Kier died on Sunday morning, his partner Delbert McBride told Variety. The actor died in hospital in Palm Springs, California, his friend the photographer Michael Childers announced on social media. No cause of death was given.
Continue reading...Morgan Geyser of Wisconsin cut off her electronic monitoring device and was last seen with an acquaintance
A Wisconsin woman who admitted to stabbing a classmate nearly to death in 2014 to please the online horror character Slender Man is missing after she cut off an electronic monitoring device and left a group home, authorities said on Sunday.
Madison police issued an alert on Sunday for Morgan Geyser, now 23, saying she was last seen around 8pm on Saturday with an adult acquaintance.
Continue reading...Mark Kelly, a veteran and Democrat targeted by Trump over military comments, says he is ‘not going to be intimidated’
Senator Mark Kelly on Sunday urged congressional Republicans to publicly reject Trump’s threats against him and five other Democratic lawmakers who stated that military personnel are not obligated to follow illegal commands.
“We’ve heard very little, basically crickets, from Republicans in the United States Congress about what the president has said about hanging members of Congress,” Kelly, of Arizona, said on CBS’s Face the Nation.
Continue reading...New York mayor-elect reaffirms past criticisms of president after agreeing to work with him on cost-of-living concerns
Zohran Mamdani has reiterated his view that Donald Trump is a “fascist” and a “despot” just days after the pair had a surprisingly cordial meeting at the White House.
Speaking to NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday, the New York City mayor-elect was asked if he still considered Trump a threat to democracy. “Everything that I’ve said in the past I continue to believe,” Mamdani replied. “I think it is important in our politics that we don’t shy away from where we have disagreements.”
Continue reading...Christian Jimenez, Oregon high school senior, faces possible obstruction charges after traffic stop by immigration agents
Immigration officers detained a student at a high school in Oregon during his lunch break on Friday, according to the student’s family.
Seventeen-year-old Christian Jimenez, a US citizen and senior at McMinnville high school, was driving his father’s vehicle around 12.30pm during lunch when agents from the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) stopped him, his older brother, Cesar Jimenez, told Oregon Live.
Continue reading...Users posing as rightwing Americans are operating internationally, per the platform’s transparency feature
Many of the most influential personalities in the “Make America great again” (Maga) movement on X are based outside of the US, including Russia, Nigeria and India, a new transparency feature on the social media site has revealed.
The new tool, called “about this account,” became available on Friday to users of the Elon Musk-owned platform. It allows anyone to see where an account is located, when it joined the platform, how often its username has been changed, and how the X app was downloaded.
Continue reading...South African president bangs gavel after rejecting plan from US, which hosts next meeting, for him to hand over to junior official
South Africa’s president, Cyril Ramaphosa, closed the G20 summit in Johannesburg by banging a gavel, having rejected a US proposal for him to hand over to a relatively junior embassy official for the next summit in Florida in a year’s time.
South Africa presented the two-day event as a triumph for multilateralism but it was marred by a boycott by the US, which has repeatedly accused South Africa of discriminating against white-minority Afrikaners, a claim that has been widely discredited.
Continue reading...Pageantry and trillion-dollar promises reveal how Washington’s loyalties may be tilting toward the Gulf
The White House welcome bestowed on the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, was the most lavish of the Trump presidency, and a gaudily clear statement of its foreign policy priorities.
It was billed as a mere working visit, but it was more extravagant than any previous state visit. The president greeted the prince on the south lawn, the White House’s biggest stage. There were uniformed men on horses bearing flags and a flypast of fighter jets.
Continue reading...US president signals potential room for adjustments after Zelenskyy says proposals force Ukraine to choose between national dignity and losing the US
Donald Trump said on Saturday that his “peace plan” was “not my final offer”, after a furious backlash from Ukrainians who described it as reminiscent of Neville Chamberlain’s 1938 Munich agreement with Adolf Hitler.
The US president told reporters during brief remarks at the White House: “We’d like to get to peace. It should’ve happened a long time ago … we’re trying to get it ended, one way or the other we have to get it ended.”
Continue reading...Incident happened hours before Saturday’s game
Two players in stable condition in local hospital
A University of Alabama at Birmingham football player allegedly stabbed two teammates on Saturday morning, hours before the team’s game against the University of South Florida, the university said in a statement.
“UAB’s top priority remains the safety and well-being of all of our students,” the statement said. “Given patient privacy and the ongoing investigation, we have no further comment at this time.”
Continue reading...Fire-resistant upgrades are included in replacement structure less than a year after fires destroyed 13,000 homes
Less than a year after the Palisades fire destroyed nearly 7,000 structures in Los Angeles, the first completed rebuilt home is being celebrated in Pacific Palisades.
In a statement, mayor Karen Bass confirmed that the Los Angeles department of building and safety had issued the certificate on Friday, certifying that the home had passed inspection and was ready for occupancy.
Continue reading...Some Republicans offered congresswoman plaudits, but AOC was scathing in her dismissal of her frequent sparring partner
Marjorie Taylor Greene’s surprise resignation from Congress late on Friday, saying she refused to be a “battered wife” following her public fallout with Donald Trump, has been slammed by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the Democratic congresswoman and Greene’s frequent sparring partner.
“She’s carefully timing her departure just 1-2 days after her pension kicks in,” Ocasio-Cortez said in a statement on her Instagram account, and criticized her voting record on healthcare.
Continue reading...Move could affect hundreds of Somalis who fled civil war in their home country
Donald Trump said on Friday night that he’s “immediately” terminating temporary legal protections for Somali migrants living in Minnesota, further targeting a program seeking to limit deportations that his administration has already repeatedly sought to weaken.
Minnesota has the nation’s largest Somali community. Many fled the long civil war in the east African country and were drawn to the state’s welcoming social programs.
Continue reading...Temporary hold on lower court ruling will remain in place while supreme court considers whether to allow new map
The US supreme court on Friday temporarily blocked a lower court ruling that found Texas’s 2026 congressional redistricting plan pushed by Donald Trump likely discriminated on the basis of race.
The order, signed by Justice Samuel Alito, will remain in place at least for the next few days while the court considers whether to allow the new map, which is favorable to Republicans, to be used in the midterm elections.
Continue reading...Georgia representative had said she had received death threats and was called a ‘traitor’ by Trump over Epstein vote
Marjorie Taylor Greene announced on Friday evening she will be resigning from office effective 25 January.
The Republican congresswoman who was denounced by Donald Trump over her support for the release of the Epstein files, explained her decision in a 10-minute social media video posted on X.
Continue reading...