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Oct 03, 2026
Sen. Ted Cruz fired back at JD Vance for suggesting he's already focused on a 2028 presidential bid, calling the vice president "insecure" while insisting he's focused on the 2026 midterms.
"In my experience, people engage in political bomb-throwing when they're feeling insecure," Cruz said in a phone interview Saturday. "So he's welcome to make whatever comments he likes. I'm going to keep focusing on the midterms and helping us win on Election Day in the next 30 days."
Cruz's comments came in response to an NBC News interview Thursday with Vance in which the vice president suggested Cruz was prematurely eyeing a White House run.
"It is really obvious to me that, at this very moment, Ted Cruz is running for president," Vance said. "At this moment, I'm not. I'm trying to help elect Republicans. That's what I'm going to keep on doing."
Vance is widely viewed as the frontrunner for the Republican presidential nomination, but Cruz has said he doesn't believe Vance is the sure-fire nominee and suggested he might throw his own hat in the ring. "I'll certainly be part of the discussion," he told MS NOW in August.
On Saturday, Cruz told POLITICO he is dedicated to helping Republicans maintain control of both chambers of Congress. He pointed to his travel this cycle to campaign with candidates in Georgia, Iowa, Nebraska, South Carolina as well as in his home state of Texas as proof. He also said he has trips planned this month to campaign with Republicans in Alaska, Florida, North Carolina and South Carolina.
"Over the last 10 years, there's no Republican in the country who has campaigned for more Senate candi
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Oct 03, 2026
President Donald Trump on Saturday pressured Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas to support a bill to make daylight saving time permanent, urging Americans to call what appeared to be the personal cellphone number of Cotton, the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee.
The Sunshine Protection Act passed the House in July, but it faces roadblocks in the Senate where some Republicans are strongly opposed. Proponents, including the White House, argue that the change would provide more daylight during the times that Americans are most active. Detractors said permanent daylight saving time would lead to darker and potentially more hazardous winter mornings when children will be waiting for school buses and parents will be driving to work in darkness.
Daylight saving time is that period between spring and fall when clocks in most parts of the United States are set one hour ahead of standard time. Not all states observe it — and under the bill, states can opt out of the change if their respective legislatures act to do so before the bill's enactment.
"For some reason, Tom is stopping the Bill and, in the Senate, it's very easy to do, it only takes one!" Trump wrote on social media, noting that passing the bill would give professional golfers more time on the greens. "So, everyone in Arkansas, a State I love, and won 3 times, the last by by 34 points, tell Tom to, GET IT DONE! It will be appreciated by all," Trump said.
Trump included a phone number with an Arkansas area code. The Associated Press called the number, but no one answered and the voicemail box was full.
Cotton, a member of Republican leadership, reiterated his opposition to permanent daylight saving time in a social media post of his own. Saturday afternoon, though he is not the only Republica
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Oct 03, 2026
Tennessee's top prison official is stepping down after the state's failed attempt to execute Christa Pike, Gov. Bill Lee announced Saturday.
Correction Commissioner Frank Strada will leave this month. In a statement, he said resigning was "in the best interest of Tennesseans" while an independent review examines what happened Wednesday, when Pike survived two doses of pentobarbital.
Strada said he still believes the state "carried out its responsibilities in accordance with the established protocol."
Pike survived two doses of lethal injection drugs in Tennessee's death chamber Wednesday and was taken to a hospital in critical condition.
Pike, who was sentenced to death in 1996, was unconscious, intubated and breathing with help from a ventilator at a Nashville-area hospital as of Thursday night, her lawyers said in a court filing Friday. Hospital staff were trying to save her life and flush the pentobarbital from her system, the filing said.
Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee has paused executions in the state in response.
Pike, 50, remained alive and snoring loudly after being given two doses of pentobarbital, her attorneys and other witnesses said. She was subsequently taken to a hospital.
Both of Pike's arms were "swollen, burned, and blistered" when she arrived at the hospital, her lawyers wrote. They believe the IV lines were placed incorrectly or her veins burst, so that some or all of the drug went into the tissue of her arms instead of her bloodstream.
The filing asks a state court to order the Tennessee Department of Correction to preserve all evidence from the execution attempt.
"Last night was not just inefficient, it was cruel, and it was torturous," attorney Ran
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Oct 03, 2026
Tennessee's top prison official is stepping down after the state's failed attempt to execute Christa Pike, Gov. Bill Lee announced Saturday.
Correction Commissioner Frank Strada will leave this month. In a statement, he said resigning was "in the best interest of Tennesseans" while an independent review examines what happened Wednesday, when Pike survived two doses of pentobarbital.
Strada said he still believes the state "carried out its responsibilities in accordance with the established protocol."
Pike survived two doses of lethal injection drugs in Tennessee's death chamber Wednesday and was taken to a hospital in critical condition.
Pike, who was sentenced to death in 1996, was unconscious, intubated and breathing with help from a ventilator at a Nashville-area hospital as of Thursday night, her lawyers said in a court filing Friday. Hospital staff were trying to save her life and flush the pentobarbital from her system, the filing said.
Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee has paused executions in the state in response.
Pike, 50, remained alive and snoring loudly after being given two doses of pentobarbital, her attorneys and other witnesses said. She was subsequently taken to a hospital.
Both of Pike's arms were "swollen, burned, and blistered" when she arrived at the hospital, her lawyers wrote. They believe the IV lines were placed incorrectly or her veins burst, so that some or all of the drug went into the tissue of her arms instead of her bloodstream.
The filing asks a state court to order the Tennessee Department of Correction to preserve all evidence from the execution attempt.
"Last night was not just inefficient, it was cruel, and it was torturous," attorney Ran
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Oct 03, 2026
The co-pilot of the FlyDubai plane who allegedly attacked the plane's captain and attempted to crash a flight bound for Israel on Wednesday is an Omani national who was previously suspended from flying by Oman Air after being identified as a security risk, according to senior intelligence and law enforcement officials.
Multiple sources familiar with the investigation identified the suspected attacker as 29-year-old Hamam Al Hammami.
The officials told ABC News that Al Hammami, while working as a co-pilot trainee for Oman Air in 2024, was found to be in possession of extremist materials. The suspect was allowed to continue working for the airline in an administrative role, the sources said.
United Arab Emirates Attorney General Hamad Saif Al Shamsi on Saturday said the aircraft's co-pilot had attempted to carry out a terrorist act and that he began executing his plan during the flight by assaulting the pilot inside the cockpit using a crash axe and attempted to seize control of the aircraft's controls, according to WAM state news agency.
This is the first confirmation by UAE authorities that the co-pilot had attacked the captain and identified the weapon used as a crash axe. Previous UAE statements had described the incident as a security incident and said an investigation was underway to determine whether it involved terrorist activity or prior planning.
'The last push, Smit': FlyDubai captain Smit Machchhar recounts harrowing cockpit attackThe attorney general stressed that investigations are still ongoing to establish all the circumstances and motives surrounding the incident, as well as any related links. He added that tec
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Oct 03, 2026
Republicans know they have to spend big to save Ken Paxton. They're increasingly worried MAGA Inc. won't throw down in time.
In private conversations over recent weeks, senior Hill Republicans and GOP officials have nudged President Donald Trump's team to start spending more on the Texas Senate race before it's too late, according to three people with direct knowledge of those conversations, who were granted anonymity to discuss them.
Those fears escalated after audio leaked of Paxton privately trashing Trump's midterm convention, with some worrying it could impact whether MAGA Inc. continues spending after a current wave of GOP ad bookings run out Oct. 12.
A Trump operative told POLITICO that MAGA Inc. and its affiliates are expected to spend near $45 million on direct mail, TV, and digital advertising in Texas through Oct. 12, an increase from its previous $20 million to boost Paxton. But they said the team is still assessing how much more money to send in the final weeks, in consultation with Senate Republicans and their top super PAC, the Senate Leadership Fund.
The Trump operative, who like others in this article was granted anonymity to speak candidly, would not commit to any plans when asked by POLITICO.
With national Democrats starting to finally spend for their Senate nominee, James Talarico, after months of holding off, and as polling of the race tightens, Republicans expect the cost of salvaging Paxton's campaign will only skyrocket. And, they've started to panic.
"It's a five-alarm fire, no doubt," one GOP senator said. "Can we put it out? I hope so."
"This is a slow-moving car crash that we're witnessing right now," a Republican strategist in the state said. "And there's a 75% chance that the ultimate result here will be catastrophic from a GOP Senate majority standpoint."
A fourth Repub
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Oct 03, 2026
The jet, a Gulfstream G-100, lost contact with flight controllers early in the morning, the Coast Guard's Northeast District said. The Federal Aviation Administration said in a statement to USA TODAY that it issued a search and rescue alert notice for the jet at about 1:20 a.m. local time.
The six people on board were flying from L.F. Wade International Airport in Bermuda to Boston Logan International Airport, the FAA said.
Authorities are searching with air and surface crews off the coast of Nantucket, the island south of Cape Cod. Bermuda is nearly 700 miles from Nantucket.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Coast Guard searches for missing jet carrying 6 people off Nantucket
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY at https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2026/10/03/coast-guard-seach-jet-nantucket/92074905007/
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Oct 03, 2026
A father and son who worked at a Mississippi smoke shop were charged by federal prosecutors in connection with one of the two Ole Miss student deaths that took place last week.
U.S. Attorney Scott F. Leary for the Northern District of Mississippi announced Friday that a criminal complaint was filed against Yahya Mohamed Mosleh, 51, and Islam Yahya Mosleh, 18, on charges with possession with the intent to distribute controlled substances in connection with the death of Aidan Hamilton.
The father and son, who were arrested last week, worked at the smoke shop that allegedly sold illegal substances to Hamilton, investigators allege.
Oxford Police Department - PHOTO: Yahya Mohamed Mosleh, 51, and Islam Yahya Mosleh, 18Hamilton, a freshman from Englewood, Colorado, was found dead on campus on Sept. 21, and investigators found "packages, some with missing tablets, of suspected kratom derivatives," according to the U.S. Attorney's office.
Ole Miss deaths may be connected to 2 stores allegedly selling kratom products: Officials"The cause of death appeared to be consistent with a drug overdose," the U.S. attorney's office said.
An hour later, a second Ole Miss student, Robert Strang, a junior from Atlanta, was found dead in a different location, and investigators also found "packages of suspected kratom derivatives," according to the U.S. Attorney's Office.
Strang's death was also consistent with a drug overdose, the U.S. Attorney's office said.
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Oct 03, 2026
Perhaps emboldened by the rush of sweet tea he was sipping at The Floridian, an Old Florida institution here, David Jolly told me he "can get outspent by $100 million and win this race."
The Florida Democrat may well have to test that argument.
He is confronting the same daunting predicament as other gubernatorial candidates around the country: Democrats are poised to enjoy their best midterm election in two decades, but they may fall short in a series of governors' races because of the party's warped donor culture.
Major Democratic contributors and small-dollar givers are flooding Senate hopefuls with cash, but in some of the most politically crucial states they could lose winnable gubernatorial races because they're being so dramatically outspent by Republican nominees and their allied groups.
In former and future presidential battlegrounds Florida, Texas, Ohio, Georgia, Wisconsin and Nevada, the gubernatorial advertising gap is yawning. For the remainder of the campaign, Republicans are on track to outspend Democrats on television about 6-to-1 in Florida, more than 3-to-1 in Texas, 2.5-to-1 in Georgia, more than 2-to-1 in Wisconsin, and only slightly more narrowly in Ohio and Nevada.
That's if current trends hold, as Democrats are largely booking week to week. So the difference in what's already booked is even starker. As Kinetiq Political Insights data tells me, a single Republican, the Georgia gubernatorial nominee, has nearly as much advertising on the books there as Democrats do at the moment in all six of these races combined.
The public and private polling in these contests shows they're competitive, and GOP strategists tell me that, were it not for their financial advantage, they'd lose most of them.
The Democratic Governors Association, with finite resources and 36 statehouse races on the ballot this year, is not on the air in Florida or Texas a month before the elec
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Oct 03, 2026
By Donna Bryson and Jonathan Allen
Oct 3 - Women, some citing their own experiences of sexual assault, are posting on social media that they are Jane Doe, in solidarity with the woman using the pseudonym in accusing fraternity members of raping her at Cornell University in 2024.
In a case that has drawn national attention, the woman is suing ?seven fraternity members and the Ivy League school in Ithaca, New York, among others.
And although New York law allows "Jane Doe" anonymity for sexual assault lawsuits, the Cornell student has become distressed ?at attempts by some online skeptics of her account to discover her name and publish it, her lawyer said.
"I want us to support Jane Doe in coming to her own way of identifying herself in her own time," said Twanna LaTrice Hill, a writer ?and actor in Denver who has declared #IamJaneDoe on social media in recent days. "And if she never does, that's fine. But the flip side of that is that the people like me need to speak up if we are able to."
EFFORTS TO IDENTIFY ACCUSER DRAW BACKLASH
The woman, who was 20 at the time of the alleged 2024 gang rape, filed suit on September 16, prompting prosecutors to reopen a criminal investigation they had initially closed without charges. New York Governor Kathy Hochul has appointed the state's attorney general as special prosecutor in the case and on Friday faulted police and prosecutors, saying they had not fully investigated the woman's allegations.
The accused men have ?denied all wrongdoing, the New York Times reported. Cornell has defended its ?handling of the matter.
Since the woman filed her lawsuit, some commentators have sought to learn and publish the accuser's identity online, efforts that her lawyer, Thomas Giuffra, called an attempt to shame her.
"She's not doing well," Giuffra told CNN. "She's under siege on social media."
He said some women have been incorrectly identi
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Oct 03, 2026
The Cornell University gang rape allegation is the latest in a series of black marks for fraternities, leading critics to question why universities continue to support them.
Fraternities, almost as old as the country itself, have been a staple at colleges for young men to come together with the stated goals of teaching leadership, community service and building friendships.
But highly publicized incidents of sexual assault and hazing plague the groups, which could face a tough road to win back public trust.
The alleged gang rape of a 20-year-old woman at the Chi Phi frat at Cornell in 2024 is the latest in a long list of incidents that have made the public wary of Greek life.
A lawsuit filed last month by Jane Doe, the alleged victim who chose to remain anonymous, says on Oct. 20, 2024, she was coerced into alcohol and drugs at the fraternity and sexually assaulted by seven members.
During the alleged assault, one of the fraternity brothers sent a message to a Snapchat group for the frat saying there was "free p----" upstairs, according to a screenshot from the lawsuit.
The lawsuit targets Cornell, the Chi Phi fraternity, the victim's own sorority and the bar that served her alcohol at the beginning of the night when they allegedly knew she was underage.
Jud Horras, president and CEO of the Foundation for Fraternal Excellence, said the men accused of sexual assault and thos
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Oct 03, 2026
TEL AVIV — A Flydubai pilot attacked his fellow pilot using a crash axe and tried to take control of the aircraft's flight controls in an attempted terrorist attack, an official in the United Arab Emirates said Saturday.
The name of the alleged attacker is Omani citizen Hamam al-Hammami, multiple sources from three agencies briefed on the investigation, and a diplomat in the Middle East, told NBC News. Authorities have not officially released the identity.
The Wall Street Journal, citing sources familiar with the matter, reported that al-Hammami had "previously been banned from flying by Oman over concerns he had adopted radical ideological views."
Oman Air did not immediately respond to a request for comment on whether he previously worked for them.
Emirati officials are leading investigations into the mid-air incident, which occurred Wednesday on a flight carrying 174 mostly Israeli passengers from Dubai to Tel Aviv. A crash was averted, according to eyewitnesses and Israeli officials, when crew and passengers were able to enter the cabin and subdue the alleged attacker.
"Investigations into the incident aboard Flydubai flight FZ1073 revealed that the co-pilot attempted to carry out a terrorist act," UAE Attorney-General Hamad Saif al Shamsi said in an update on Saturday.
"The co-pilot began executing his plan during the flight, attacking the captain inside the flight deck using a crash axe and attempting to take control of the aircraft's flight controls," he said.
Al-Hammami was transferred from Saudi Arabia to Abu Dhabi on Thursday, the Saudi Interior Ministry said. The statement said his health had "improved," but his medical condition was unclear.
Al Shamsi s
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Oct 03, 2026
On Nov. 7, 2024, two weeks after the incident at Chi Phi, Jane Doe submitted to a sexual assault examination and evidence collection process, according to the police records.
(Heather Ainsworth for NBC News)Cornell University police spoke to witnesses and received anonymous tips about an alleged gang rape at a fraternity house in the first weeks of its investigation two years ago, but the local prosecutor did not review the additional information before deciding not to bring charges.
Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten said he based his decision not to pursue charges on the accuser's initial six-page statement given to police.
Investigators from the campus police department documented those witness interviews and other steps taken to determine whether Jane Doe, a 20-year-old woman who reported the incident, was the victim of sexual assault during a party at the Chi Phi house from Oct. 19 to 20, 2024, according police records obtained by NBC News.
Documents reviewed by NBC News offer the most thorough look to date at how police handled the allegations from Jane Doe, who last month filed a lawsuit against Cornell University and seven Chi Phi brothers who she alleges sexually assaulted her over the
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Oct 03, 2026
By Kanishka Singh
WASHINGTON, Oct 2 (Reuters) - President Donald Trump said the US government will send a one-time $90 payment to more than 20 million ?Americans enrolled in Medicare, a health insurance program for the elderly, ?to help offset the cost of their monthly medical insurance premiums.
Trump said on social media late ?on Friday the payments will come from the Medicare Improvement Fund, which he said was given $2 billion by Congress to improve the Medicare fee-for-service program.
The announcement is the latest in a series of financial promises the Republican leader has made to ?voters heading into the November ?midterm elections where control of Congress is at stake.
Trump's Republican Party currently has a narrow majority in both the Senate ?and the House of Representatives but his approval rating has been low over his handling of the high cost of living for Americans during the US-Israeli war on ?Iran that ?has spiked oil and gas prices.
The White ?House released some details of ?Trump's plan on its website, saying most eligible seniors will receive the payment in the form of a direct deposit of $90 in early October.
Those without direct deposit will receive a check, also sent in early October, to the mailing address they have registered with Medicare, the White House said.
Last month, Trump proposed sending $5,000 ?checks to all adult citizens if the ?Republicans keep control of the House and Senate ?in the midterms, though analysts, economists ?and even some Republicans in Congress reacted with skepticism to ?the plan.
The Trump administration is also ?separately sending $500 payments to ?nearly 1 million Americans in a move that strategists say could potentially influence some election races.
The White House says those payments were a refund ?for what it describes ?as excessive fees charged to people who purchased health insurance through ?the Affordable Care
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Oct 03, 2026
WASHINGTON (AP) — Sipping tea from beer mugs with his coworkers, Kyle Bos listed the ways his life is changing.
Bos has two daughters, with a third due in January. At the grocery store, five items cost as much as a full cart once did. And on Wednesday, Bos and nearly 1,400 other people were laid off from their jobs at what had been the Navistar truck factory in southwestern Ohio.
The layoffs — occurring just three days before Donald Trump's rally on Saturday at a nearby high school — were large enough to basically erase an entire year of job growth in the greater Dayton, Ohio area. And they are one reason why Bos, 30, plans to spend the final weeks before the November election canvassing votes for Democrats.
Asked how many times he voted for Trump, Bos held up three tattooed fingers. But he said he's done with the president.
"Something has to change politically in this country," said Bos, a member of the United Auto Workers who identifies as a centrist.
Trump is campaigning in this area on Saturday
This year's election is a test for the working-class coalition that lifted Trump into the White House and gave majorities to Republicans in the House and Senate. The outcome will be decided in places like Dayton, which once sprouted factories but shed about half of its 90,000 factory jobs since 1990 after the North American Free Trade Agreement and trade with China made it cheaper to buy auto parts from abroad.
Trump's blunt talk and status as a celebrity businessman initially helped him around Dayton, where voters sensed that politics as usual had failed them. But voters this year are disgruntled about inflation and the war in Iran.
An Ohio race could help determine control of the Senate. Republican Sen. Jon Husted is facing a challenge from former Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown, who is trying to harne
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Oct 03, 2026
WASHINGTON (AP) — Sipping tea from beer mugs with his coworkers, Kyle Bos listed the ways his life is changing.
Bos has two daughters, with a third due in January. At the grocery store, five items cost as much as a full cart once did. And on Wednesday, Bos and nearly 1,400 other people were laid off from their jobs at what had been the Navistar truck factory in southwestern Ohio.
The layoffs — occurring just three days before Donald Trump's rally on Saturday at a nearby high school — were large enough to basically erase an entire year of job growth in the greater Dayton, Ohio area. And they are one reason why Bos, 30, plans to spend the final weeks before the November election canvassing votes for Democrats.
Asked how many times he voted for Trump, Bos held up three tattooed fingers. But he said he's done with the president.
"Something has to change politically in this country," said Bos, a member of the United Auto Workers who identifies as a centrist.
Trump is campaigning in this area on Saturday
This year's election is a test for the working-class coalition that lifted Trump into the White House and gave majorities to Republicans in the House and Senate. The outcome will be decided in places like Dayton, which once sprouted factories but shed about half of its 90,000 factory jobs since 1990 after the North American Free Trade Agreement and trade with China made it cheaper to buy auto parts from abroad.
Trump's blunt talk and status as a celebrity businessman initially helped him around Dayton, where voters sensed that politics as usual had failed them. But voters this year are disgruntled about inflation and the war in Iran.
An Ohio race could help determine control of the Senate. Republican Sen. Jon Husted is facing a challenge from former Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown, who is trying to harne
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Oct 02, 2026
Days after a FlyDubai co-pilot made a violent attempt to crash the passenger aircraft and was subdued by passengers and other crew members, questions about his motive continued to swirl.
The flight Wednesday from Dubai to Tel Aviv was approaching Israel when the co-pilot allegedly stabbed the flight captain and attempted to crash the aircraft, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said. The captain was able to fight off the co-pilot long enough to unlock the cockpit door. Passengers then overpowered the co-pilot, and two off-duty pilots who were on the flight managed to gain control of the aircraft and make an emergency landing in Tabuk, Saudi Arabia.
There were 174 people on board the plane. No passengers were seriously injured in the incident. The pilot sustained stab wounds in the attack. Saudi authorities said two crew members were hospitalized with unspecified injuries, and the co-pilot remained in custody on Thursday.
Who was the FlyDubai co-pilot? The co-pilot of the flight has not yet been publicly identified, although multiple sources familiar with the investigation told CBS News on Friday that his name is Hamam al Hamami.
Al Hamami worked for a short time for Oman Air, where he entered new pilot training. Surveillance by the Omani government discovered that he was visiting radical websites, the sources said. Oman Air then transferred him to an office job.
One of the sources said the pilot resigned from his job at Oman Air after being placed on desk duty. He left the airline around 2024.
At one point, sources said, al Hamami posted a video of El Al Israeli Airlines planes in Dubai with a photo at the end of the clip showing Ayman al-Z
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Oct 02, 2026
(Photo credit: Beni Rae Harmony/Instagram)
Donald Trump's White House expanded its press team Friday, tapping Real America's Voice correspondent Beni Rae Harmony to be assistant press secretary.
The 24-year-old Harmony, who has served as Real America's Voice's White House correspondent since joining the conservative network in September 2025, confirmed her appointment on X Friday evening, after TMZ reported earlier that day that she had been scooped up to work for Trump.
"I'm excited to announce that I am joining the Trump Administration as Asst. White House Press Secretary," she wrote. "It's been an honor to report, travel and cover this historic administration as Senior White House Correspondent for Real America's Voice. My goal has always been to ask the questions that matter to real Americans and make sure their voices are heard."
"I'm incredibly grateful to President Trump for this opportunity and his trust," she continued. "I'm looking forward to this next chapter - serving the American people and continuing to fight for the American Dream. America First."
Harmony's addition to the press team comes as the White House has yet to find a replacement for Karoline Leavitt, who stepped down as White House press secretary at the end of August.
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Oct 02, 2026
The failed execution of Christa Pike in Tennessee on Wednesday has added new fuel to the longstanding debate over the death penalty in the United States. It has also drawn new scrutiny to the question of whether lethal injection, the nation's primary method of execution for the past 40 years, is truly a "more humane" alternative to other ways of putting someone to death.
Pike was given a death sentence in 1996 after being convicted of killing her classmate, Colleen Slemmer, in an attack she carried out with her then boyfriend. After 30 years on death row, and a last-minute legal battle that temporarily delayed her execution, Pike was scheduled to be put to death on Wednesday night.
However, the two doses of pentobarbital she was given proved not to be fatal. According to witnesses, Pike remained alive and snored loudly for 40 minutes after the drugs were administered. Eventually, the execution was called off and she was taken to the hospital for treatment.
Pike's attorney Randy Spivey reported Thursday afternoon that she was in critical condition and receiving "life-saving care." She was unconscious and placed on a ventilator in the hospital, according to a filing by her legal team on F
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Oct 02, 2026
[Getty Images]
The lawyer for the woman who alleges she was raped at a Cornell University fraternity house says she is "not doing well" as she finds herself "under siege" from online sleuths seeking to identity her.
Thomas Giuffra said the woman known in legal documents as Jane Doe was "incapable of consent" because she was "completely, grossly intoxicated" when she turned up at the home where she says the assault took place.
The woman alleges she was raped by seven men at the campus in Ithaca, New York, in 2024.
No charges were initially filed in the case. It has reopened since she filed a civil lawsuit that thrust the claims into the national spotlight, reigniting the possibility of criminal charges.
In an interview on Friday with CNN, Giuffra said: "She's under siege on social media where people are trying to identify her."
He said that postings have "incorrectly" identified other woman as Doe.
Watch: New York governor blasts handling of Cornell rape inquiry
In an interview with CBS, the BBC's US partner, Giuffra argued that his client, aged 20 at the time, was unable to provide consent because she was intoxicated when she arrived at the fraternity house.
Giuffra said she had been pressured into taking the drug ketamine before she was allegedly raped.
His comments came as New York Governor Kathy Hochul appointed the state's top prosecutor, Attorney General Letitia James, to take over the investigation.
At a news conference on Friday, Hochul said she had "lost faith"
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Oct 02, 2026
An Arizona road rage killer will be resentenced after an appeals court ruled that an AI-generated video message from his dead victim was improperly aired in court.
Gabriel Paul Horcasitas was found guilty by a jury of shooting and killing Christopher Pelkey, 37, during a confrontation at a red light in 2021. He was sentenced to 10 years behind bars.
But his legal team appealed, arguing that the trial judge should not have allowed an AI video, created by Pelkey's family, to be shown in court ahead of last year's sentencing.
The Arizona Court of Appeals agreed, ruling that Horcasitas, 55, must be resentenced because the AI clip "crossed that line".
"Rather than document an event or recording a particular moment, the AI video presents a depiction of the victim and his thoughts created from the imaginings of the victim's sister," the court of appeals wrote on Wednesday.
Horcasitas' lawyer, Kristen Reller, who filed the appeal, declined to comment.
Jessica Gattuso, an attorney for victims in the case, did not respond to a request for comment.
Pelkey's sister, Stacey Wales, told the BBC last year the family had used voice recordings, videos and pictures to recreate him for the AI video.
"To Gabriel Horcasitas, the man who shot me, it is a shame we encountered each other that day in those circumstances," said the AI version of Pelkey in court in 2025. "In another life, we probably could have been friends."
"I believe in forgiveness, and a God who forgives. I always have and I still do," the AI version of Pelkey - wearing a grey baseball cap - continued.
At the time of the sentencing, the judge who oversaw the case, Todd Lang, seemed to appreciate the use of AI.
"I loved that AI, thank you for that. As angry as you are, as justifiably angry as the family is, I heard the forgiveness," Judge Lang said. "I feel that that was genuine."
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Oct 02, 2026
The Supreme Court begins its latest term on Monday with a docket full of high-stakes cases that touch on some of the most contentious issues in American politics, including guns, voting and transgender rights.
This will be the second full term for the nation's highest court since President Trump returned to the White House. The previous term, which wrapped up in June, was packed with landmark rulings in a long list of major cases, including Trump's tariffs, birthright citizenship and a slate of key immigration decisions.
The justices will likely take on additional cases over the course of the term, but there are already plenty of pivotal cases for the court to consider in the coming months.
Here's a rundown of the big cases headed to the Supreme Court this term and what their eventual rulings might mean for the country.
GunsOver the past two decades, the Supreme Court has issued a series of decisions that have significantly expanded gun rights. It could go even further next term when it considers whether laws banning cert
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Oct 02, 2026
Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito has confirmed that he is considering retirement, leaving open the possibility that he could leave after next year's term and hand another nomination to President Donald Trump.
Alito said in excerpts of a CBS News interview released Friday that he thought about retiring this year and will do so again in 2027.
"It's something that I think that somebody at my age has to think about every term," the 76-year-old said in the interview scheduled to air Monday. "But I thought that I could still make a valuable contribution, which is why I became a justice and a judge in the first place."
Alito's interview, the first in a number of expected appearances to coincide with the release of a book about his judicial philosophy, raises the possibility that Trump, whose judicial picks shifted the Supreme Court to the right, may get an opportunity to nominate a fourth justice.
The president, who expressed regret in a recent interview about several nominees who ruled against his administration on some issues, would have a harder time getting a fourth pick through the Senate if Democrats win control in the midterms.
Alito, in the CBS interview, pushed back on concerns that the timing of his retirement and his replacement could potentially unravel his work on the bench.
"It's too hard to predict what the political situation will be and what any president might do with respect to a replacement," he said.
Alito also defended his majority opinion in Ju
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Oct 02, 2026
President Donald Trump said Friday he was ruling out a diesel export ban and never really considered one in the first place, hours after Europe caved to U.S. pressure and agreed to release fuel from its stockpiles.
The announcement appears to put to rest more than a week of frantic lobbying across two continents after surging fuel prices — caused by the ongoing war against Iran as well as Ukrainian attacks against Russian refineries — have angered farmers and put pressure on the Trump administration to act ahead of the November midterm elections.
"Europe has a lot of diesel, and they're going to be making a major world contribution, and so are we," Trump told reporters as he left the White House for a campaign trip. "And we're not going to be doing the export ban.
"It was never really ever on the table, but what Europe did was a great thing," he added.
Trump had repeatedly said over the last two weeks that he was open to suspending exports of the fuel, which would have been the first restriction on U.S. energy exports since the Obama administration lifted a decades-old ban on oil exports in 2015. The president said just over a week ago that "I've called for that" when asked about a possible ban.
But Energy Secretary Chris Wright and the president's allies in the oil industry publicly condemned the idea, warning it could pose major economic problems for foreign countries who rely on U.S. imports
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Oct 02, 2026
A new emergency court filing seeks to preserve all evidence related to Tennessee's failed execution of Christa Pike, arguing the state botched the lethal injection procedure. A judge granted an expedited hearing on the motion shortly after it was filed, though no date or time was immediately listed.
Pike was set to be executed by the Tennessee Department of Correction on Sept. 30, but survived two doses of pentobarbital. The document, filed in Davidson County Chancery Court on Oct. 2, revealed more details about Pike's condition. It said she is intubated, on a ventilator and unconscious, and that both her arms were swollen, burned and blistered. As of the night of Oct. 1, Pike was still in critical condition at a Nashville-area hospital, the motion said.
"Hospital staff are working to save Ms. Pike's life and to clear the pentobarbital from her system," the Oct. 2 motion stated.
Pike was convicted in 1996 for the first-degree murder and torture of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer in Knoxville.
'She's still talking': Inside each minute of Christa Pike's failed execution attempt
Pentobarbital is the single drug required under the state's lethal injection protocol. The failed execution attempt came after a complex legal back-and-forth delayed her execution several hours that day, which was originally set for 10 a.m. Media witnesses of the procedure said the blinds to the observation room w
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Oct 02, 2026
MIAMI (AP) — A former Republican congressman and longtime friend of Secretary of State Marco Rubio received a 10-year prison sentence on Friday for concealing a $50 million lobbying campaign on Venezuela's behalf during the first Trump administration.
David Rivera of Miami has been jailed since his conviction in May for conspiracy to commit money laundering and failing to register as a foreign agent for the government of Nicolás Maduro.
Rivera, 61, appeared stone-faced as Judge Melissa Damian denounced him for betraying his life's mission. His many friends in Miami would surely judge him harshly had the millions of dollars come from Cuba's communist regime instead of its allies in Caracas, she said.
"Nobody would accept that's ok and I don't think this is different," the judge said. "There's no dispute this money came from the Maduro regime."
The case offered a rare glimpse into foreign influence campaigns aimed at shaping U.S. policy toward Latin America, highlighting Miami's reputation as a magnet for both anti-communist crusaders and corruption among its sizable exile population.
President Donald Trump's secretary of state, Rep. Pete Sessions of Texas and a top Washington lobbyist all testified, saying Rivera had never mentioned his mammoth consulting contract with a U.S.-based affiliate of Venezuela's state oil company, PDVSA.
Rivera was charged in 2022, during President Joe Biden's administration. Charges of illegal foreign lobbying have plunged since Trump returned to the White House. Rivera's lawyers have applied
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Oct 02, 2026
By Maria Tsvetkova
ITHACA, New York, Oct 2 (Reuters) - Cornell University student Sophia Riley Sim skipped classes this week, consumed by allegations in a lawsuit that several members of a fraternity raped a young woman in 2024 and troubled by how her university handled the case.
"Cornell has failed our community ?through its lack of accountability, transparency, and failure to address the state of the Cornell student body at this time," Sim, a junior, said at a ?public hearing on sexual assault organized by Cornell's Student Assembly on Thursday.
"There has been a lack of meaningful communication from university leadership, administrators, and faculty."
The Ivy League school has defended its handling of the matter, saying it ?launched a comprehensive investigation and barred the Chi Phi fraternity involved in the alleged assault from campus. The school said it imposed a range of disciplinary measures, including expulsions.
It did not immediately respond to a request for additional comment.
The hearing, held in one of Cornell's historic halls, came days after the allegations became public with the filing of a civil lawsuit and the announcement that a criminal investigation would be reopened.
The case has reignited scrutiny of how law enforcement and universities handle sexual assault complaints, with students questioning whether processes are enough to protect ?them. It has also drawn the attention of New York ?state officials, who have appointed a special prosecutor to investigate.
FEELING UNSAFE
At the Assembly hearing, speakers recounted experiences with sexual assault, broke down in tears and criticized the response of the prestigious university.
The Student Assembly - which represents Cornell's undergraduate students and can make proposals to the university's ?bodies or officers - unanimously approved a resolution calling on Cornell administrators to provide a
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Oct 02, 2026
WASHINGTON (AP) — The FBI has released a classified report to its workforce examining what it says are chapters from the bureau's history "where this institution fell short," according to an internal message obtained Friday by The Associated Press.
It was unclear what episodes from the FBI's past are chronicled in the new "Patel Report." But the document's existence is in keeping with Director Kash Patel's frequent criticism of the leaders who preceded him as well as with his determination to rid the FBI of agents and other employees he contends have politicized the bureau in the past. Patel's critics, however, accuse him of politicizing the FBI.
Though Patel pledged at his confirmation hearing last year that he would not look "backward," he has encouraged investigation of former senior officials and has presided over waves of terminations, including of employees who participated in years-old investigations of President Donald Trump, were photographed taking a knee during a 2020 racial justice protest and contributed to a disputed analytical memo about Catholic extremism.
"The Patel Report looks backward because accountability demands it," says a memo to the workforce signed by the FBI's co-deputy directors, Christopher Raia and Andrew Bailey, that describes the document as marking the "closing of one c
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Oct 02, 2026
Brazil's President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and U.S. President Donald Trump are seen in this combination of pictures created on Dec. 2, 2025. —Pablo Porciuncula, Andrew Caballero-Reynolds—Getty ImagesPresident Donald Trump on Thursday said he is following the upcoming Brazilian election "very closely," referring to Brazil as a "very important" country. "The people of Brazil are fantastic people," he told reporters outside the White House. "It's a very important election."
The U.S. State Department later announced the suspension of its consular services in Brazil ahead of the election taking place on Sunday, citing unspecified security concerns. "U.S. citizens seeking emergency assistance during this time should not come to the Embassy, the Consulates, or other U.S. diplomatic facilities," the security alert advised.
Brazilians are heading to the polls for a set of federal elections spanning congressional and gubernatorial races, alongside the first round of the presidential election votes. It's set to be a decisive moment for Latin America's largest nation, as the region has seen a shift toward the right in recent years. An Oct. 25 runoff is expected, as polls show a tight contest between leftist P
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Oct 02, 2026
This year's Kennedy Center Honors will be held at Washington's Capital One Arena, not the riverfront building that's been at the center of a legal fight over adding President Donald Trump's name to the building.
The 49th annual awards are set to take place at Washington's downtown arena, a Kennedy Center spokesperson said Friday. Few other details were immediately available, and an explanation for the change wasn't given.
The center's board voted last month to close the iconic performing arts venue along the Potomac River waterfront after a federal judge blocked the institution from returning Trump's name to the building.
Trump has said in social media posts that the center needed to close for safety repairs. But he said the repairs would only happen if the board was allowed to move forward with plans to add his name to the building.
A federal judge has twice said that can't happen without the approval of Congress, which has allocated $257 million for repairs.
The president hosted the 2025 awards, whose honorees included Sylvester Stallone and George Strait. He said at the time that he would rename the facility the "Trump Kennedy Center," and not long after workers began adding his name to the building.
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Oct 02, 2026
THE TAKEAWAY
Holei Sea Arch collapsed into the Pacific sometime between Sept. 23 and Sept. 27.The arch had sustained damage in past years due to tropical systems and volcanic activity.Visitors are told to stay out of closed areas and away from cliff edges which are unstable and could collapse without warning.The iconic Holei Sea Arch, which stood for more than 500 years in Hawai'i Volcanoes National Park, collapsed into the Pacific during what has been a tumultuous hurricane season for Hawaii.
According to Hawai'i Volcanoes National Park, the famous lava rock arch was still standing on Sept. 23 before the national park closed ahead of Hurricane Nolo's impacts near the Big Island, but by Sunday, Sept. 27, when the park reopened, the arch collapsed.
Hawaii's Coral Reefs Have Their Own Insurance Policy — And It Could Help Save Them After Disaster Strikes
The Holei Sea Arch before its collapse in July 2022.The Holei Sea Arch stood 90 feet high and extended into the Pacific Ocean. Ancient lava flows created the sea arch 550 years ago, the national park said.
Photos shared by Hawai'i Volcanoes National Park show the arch prior to its collapse in 2022, versus the changed coastline after the arch disappeared.
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Oct 02, 2026
President Donald Trump warned Republicans that Texas and Michigan are among the states the party is "worried about" ahead of the 2026 midterm elections, while speaking to voters in Oklahoma on Thursday.
Fresh off an event in Texas, Trump told a crowd in the reliably Republican state that he was not concerned about Oklahoma but that Republicans needed to turn out voters in other states.
"I feel a little foolish, you know. I'm saying, 'go out and vote, go out and vote.' You're gonna, they're gonna win in the last half, but still go out and vote," Trump said. "But we're not worried about them. We're worried about Michigan. We're worried about Texas. We're worried about a few states."
Trump later said Republicans need to get the word out about the midterms, citing what he described as 35 to 40 races that the party is concerned about.
"But we have to get the word out because we have to win in those 35. Maybe you could even say 40 places, 40 races," Trump said. "You have many, you have hundreds of races, but it's all about 40."
Trump also again urged supporters to imagine that he himself was on the ballot.
"So you have to pretend I'm on the ticket and turn out for a midterm victory that's really too big to rig," Trump said.
Kent Nishimura/AFP via Getty Images - PHOTO: Donald Trump raises his fist after delivering remarks at the Peterbilt Motors facility in Denton, Texas, on October 1, 2026. Trump sought to rally Republicans by attacking Democrats over inflation and immigration, repeating claims about the number and backgrounds of migrants who entered the country during the Biden administration.
Trump has repeatedly made claims about millions of migrants entering the U.S. from prisons and mental institutions, but those claim
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Oct 02, 2026
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said Friday that a woman who alleges she was drugged and raped by multiple fraternity members at Cornell University in 2024 was "failed" by those obligated to protect her.
Hochul's comments came a day after announcing she had lost faith in the district attorney overseeing the Cornell University rape case and appointed New York Attorney General Letitia James as the special prosecutor to oversee the investigation.
"In what world would the police learn from a victim that she'd been literally gang raped while intoxicated by five men in a fraternity house and not elevate those allegations to the district attorney?" Hochul said at a press conference. "In what world does the district attorney not even interview her or anyone else involved or even request the full transcript?"
"At every turn, she was failed by people and institutions with an obligation to protect her," Hochul said.
Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten has come under intense scrutiny in recent days over his decision not to prosecute anyone when the initial allegations were made in 2024.
In a civil lawsuit filed last month against the school and seven current and former fraternity members, a former student identified as "Jane Doe" alleged that she was the victim of a "gang rape" at the Chi Phi fraternity on Cornell's Ithaca, N.Y., campus on Oct. 19, 2024. She said she was already intoxicated when she arrived and was given ketamine before and during the alleged assault. She reported the incident to campus police three weeks later.
Van Houten, who earlier this week reopened a cri
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Oct 02, 2026
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Group of Seven industrial nations said they agreed to release 100 million barrels of oil, starting with "substantial" amounts of diesel after the fuel recently hit record high prices in the United States, where President Donald Trump said the diesel release would happen "immediately."
Trump and his Republican Party face pressure to address surging prices ahead of November's midterm elections. Trump announced the action Friday on social media, saying, "Europe has just agreed to release a massive amount of their heavily stocked Diesel Oil. The process will begin immediately."
The president faces lagging approval ratings as the Iran war and his trade battles have increased U.S. prices for oil and other goods.
Gas prices in the U.S. and abroad have soared during the eight-month-long war, a cost Trump has repeatedly said is worth it for making sure Iran does not obtain nuclear weapons. Trump has insisted prices will come down after the war, though there's no end in sight.
The national average for a gallon of diesel in the U.S. was $6.37 on Friday, according to AAA, after hitting a record $6.52 on Sept. 22.
Trump had a conversation overnight with French President Emmanuel Macron, the chair of the G7, about the need to address rising fuel prices and the availability of petroleum products, according to the French Embassy in the U.S. Macron on Friday then chaired a videoconference of G7 leaders to discuss the issue.
France holds the rotating presidency of the G7 group and made the announcement in a statement released after video-conference talks that Macron presided over. The International Energy Agency will coordinate the effort to combat soaring fuel prices. "We will implement our
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Oct 02, 2026
A dangerous, long-duration heatwave is sweeping through much of Southern California beginning Friday, creating increased fire risk in the region.
Extreme to moderate heat warnings are in place for more than 34 million Californians, with temperatures forecast to reach between 92 and over 105 degrees, including along the coastal plains.
ABC News - PHOTO: Dangerous Heat Wave MapThe National Weather Service in Los Angeles warned the conditions have created a high risk of "large and fast-moving fires" in the region's valleys and mountains.
The heatwave is expected to begin on Friday and last through at least Oct. 8.
Tracking severe weather in the USTemperatures are expected to rise to around 15 degrees above average, creating potentially life-threatening conditions for those without access to air conditioning.
Little relief from the heat is forecasted in the overnight hours, though lower humidity is expected.
ABC News - PHOTO: Extreme Heat MapWindy conditions expected over the weekend will contribute to the fire risk. A wind advisory is in place, with gusts of up to 50 miles per hour forecasted.
Those under heat warnings are advised to watch out for heat-related illnesses, including heat exhaustion and heat stroke.
Anyone experiencing symptoms of heat-related illnesses is encouraged to move to a cooler area, wear loose clothing, sip cool water and apply ice. Those with heat stroke symptoms, including dizziness, confusion or becoming unconscious, are a
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Oct 02, 2026
A dangerous, long-duration heatwave is sweeping through much of Southern California beginning Friday, creating increased fire risk in the region.
Extreme to moderate heat warnings are in place for more than 34 million Californians, with temperatures forecast to reach between 92 and over 105 degrees, including along the coastal plains.
ABC News - PHOTO: Dangerous Heat Wave MapThe National Weather Service in Los Angeles warned the conditions have created a high risk of "large and fast-moving fires" in the region's valleys and mountains.
The heatwave is expected to begin on Friday and last through at least Oct. 8.
Tracking severe weather in the USTemperatures are expected to rise to around 15 degrees above average, creating potentially life-threatening conditions for those without access to air conditioning.
Little relief from the heat is forecasted in the overnight hours, though lower humidity is expected.
ABC News - PHOTO: Extreme Heat MapWindy conditions expected over the weekend will contribute to the fire risk. A wind advisory is in place, with gusts of up to 50 miles per hour forecasted.
Those under heat warnings are advised to watch out for heat-related illnesses, including heat exhaustion and heat stroke.
Anyone experiencing symptoms of heat-related illnesses is encouraged to move to a cooler area, wear loose clothing, sip cool water and apply ice. Those with heat stroke symptoms, including dizziness, confusion or becoming unconscious, are a
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Oct 02, 2026
An artist's interpretation depicts Beta Pictoris b (right) as it orbits its host star. The giant exoplanet was the source of a recently detected radio signal. - NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI/Ralf Crawford (STScI)
Astronomers say they have directly detected the first-ever radio emission from a planet outside the solar system. The signal, however, is evidence of a colossal magnetic field — not intelligent life.
"I know radio signals are associated with searches for extraterrestrial intelligence," said Edo Berger, a professor of astronomy at Harvard University. "But this is something very different."
The discovery, described in a new paper awaiting publication in a peer-reviewed journal, traces repeating radio bursts that appear to come from the exoplanet Beta Pictoris b, located 63 light-years from Earth — a short distance, astronomically speaking. The gas giant, about 12 times the mass of Jupiter, is one of three planets orbiting a young star that is 1.75 times as massive as the sun.
Processes associated with the planet's magnetic field produce the radio emission, according to Berger, a researcher at the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Specifically, the detection involves auroras similar to Earth's northern lights — the spectacular displays sparked by magnetic
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Oct 02, 2026
The Labor Department reported that the US added 29,000 jobs in September, missing expectations. The unemployment rate ticked up to 4.2% from 4.1% in the previous month.
Economists expected a gain of 90,000 jobs last month, following a revised print of 133,000 job gains in August.
"Weak across the board when it comes to the demand for labor," economist Mohamed El-Erian told Yahoo Finance. "The demand side is flashing yellow … [and is] going to put the Fed definitely on hold for October."
A stable labor market gives the Federal Reserve leeway to raise interest rates in October as the central bank focuses on tackling persistently high inflation. At a press conference following the decision, Fed Chairman Kevin Warsh said that bringing down inflation doesn't have to come at the expense of US workers.
The September jobs report follows a string of indicators on US employment trends this week.
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Oct 02, 2026
Christa Pike, pictured in 2012, is receiving life-saving treatment after surviving two lethal injections.Imagn Images via Reuters ConnectThe mother of the woman killed by Christa Pike said she was left without justice after Tennessee's failed attempt to carry out the execution, criticizing the state's handling of a procedure that left the death row prisoner hospitalized in critical condition.
"I didn't get justice for my daughter," May Martinez, whose daughter Colleen Slemmer was killed in 1995, told the Associated Press on Thursday.
Martinez traveled to Nashville to witness the execution Wednesday. Instead, she watched as officials administered two doses of the state's execution drug pentobarbital without killing Pike.
"I watched the whole thing. She was awake," she said. "She was moving her head, moving her feet. She was trying to sit up. Didn't work the first time they gave her a shot. It didn't work the second time, so she's in the hospital and alive."
The inmate is receiving life-saving medical care, according to her legal team, who have asked Tennessee Gov. Bil
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Oct 02, 2026
Manhattan District Attorney's Office
CNN has obtained newly unsealed police body camera footage showing the arrest of Luigi Mangione inside a McDonald's in Altoona, Pennsylvania, days after he fatally shot United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson.
The hours of footage capture officers questioning Mangione at the fast-food restaurant on the morning of December 9, 2024, before he is handcuffed, searched and transported to the police station. The videos show police conducting more thorough searches of Mangione and his belongings at the station, including the moment an officer finds a gun - now known to be the murder weapon - inside his backpack.
This is the first time the videos have been seen outside the courtroom. Some of the footage was played during a dayslong suppression hearing last December, when the defense argued evidence recovered during the arrest should be suppressed because Mangione's backpack was improperly searched.
New York State Judge Gregory Carro ultimately ruled most of the evidence would be allowed at trial and placed the videos under seal. The judge authorized their release after CNN petitioned for their unsealing following Mangione's guilty plea to federal charges in August, in which he admitted to fatally shooting Thompson, 50, on a Manhattan sidewalk.
The unsealed videos, taken from
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Oct 02, 2026
A Lewisville, Texas, barber returned $128,514 in cash he found sitting on top of a Bank of America ATM, with not a dollar missing, Lewisville police said.
The 37-year-old man, who asked not to be identified, came across the bag at roughly 10 a.m. on Aug. 3, outside a Bank of America branch on West Main Street. He was accompanied by a 42-year-old woman. Nearby, officers also recovered a second, smaller bag that held 19 checks, CBS News Texas reported.
Information on one of the bags suggested the money might belong to a nearby Chick-fil-A, so the man drove there to return it. A manager said the restaurant had no claim to the funds. The man then called 911, and officers arrived to secure the bags.
A bank receipt found inside the cash bag specified the precise dollar amount expected. According to CBS News Texas, officers ran two separate hand counts and put the total through a digital currency counter before the sealed bag went into the Lewisville Police Department property room.
Police determined the money belonged to Bank of America and was being handled by its cash vendor, Brinks. Investigators determined that a Brinks technician had completed work on the ATM and inadvertently failed to take the bag with him when he left. Police found no connection to criminal activity. Bank of America has since recovered the funds.
Lewisville Police Detective Gina Miller said nothing in her career had prepared her for a find of this scale. "I've had cases where good Samaritans have turned in property that they found, wallets, IDs, things like that," Miller told CBS News Texas. "But in the case of $128,000, I've never had somebody turn in that kind of money before."
Lewis
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Oct 02, 2026
Sea surface temperatures just hit a record high in a 2.4-million square mile region of the deep Pacific Ocean known as Niño 3.4, the key area scientists are tracking to measure the rapidly strengthening El Niño.
The daily average temperature - 85.73 degrees - on Sept. 29 was higher than at any other time on record in the region, according to preliminary data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. It continued to climb the next day.
The temperature is about as warm as the ocean off Miami Beach and San Juan, Puerto Rico this week and warmer than the water off St. Petersburg, Florida, and Galveston, Texas.
"We are seeing a perfect storm of climate change and a super El Niño that is maturing so fast," Ben Kirtman, dean of the University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric and Earth Science, told USA TODAY on Sept. 30. Sea surface temperatures in the region are still climbing and could continue into November, according to Kirtman.
NOAA emphasizes the Sept. 29 number is preliminary and could change when additional data from ships, buoys and other sources is integrated. However, water temperatures at buoys along a 1,000-mile swath of the 140th meridian on Sept. 30 ranged from 83.8 degrees to 87.8 degrees, according to data provided by NOAA's National Data Buoy Center.
The record-warm waters raise grave concerns for marine life and coral reefs and for the people and communities who make their living by the sea, said Bill Precht, a coral scientist and director of coastal and marine sciences for Florida-based Bio-Tech Consulting.
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Oct 02, 2026
Think a high salary is a ticket out of living paycheck to paycheck? Think again.
Roughly 4 in 10 workers earning above $300,000 say they're doing just that, according to Goldman Sachs Asset Management's 2026 retirement report.
"One of the more remarkable findings is whether or not financial security improves linearly with income," Chris Ceder, a senior retirement strategist at Goldman Sachs Asset Management, told Yahoo Finance.
You'd think financial security would improve as someone makes more money, with income tracking in a straight path with each extra dollar of earnings.
"It does for a while, but it's a U-shape pattern," Ceder said.
Those making between $100,000 and $300,000 aren't so stretched, according to the findings, but the number who say they are living paycheck to paycheck shoots back up among those earning above $300,000 annually.
"We can see a similar pattern as it relates to delaying financial goals, delaying retirement savings, and also paying the minimum of their credit card balances," Ceder added.
For example, the survey found that the people making only minimum credit card payments or less are clustered at the lowest and highest income brackets.
About 4 in 10 workers making under $100,000 are skating by on the minimum credit card payment. That drops to 35% for those in the $100,000 to $300,000 income bracket and pops up again to 42% for those who earn above that threshold.
Nearly half of those bringing in a half-million dollars made minimum payments this year, up from 39% last year.
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Oct 02, 2026
US bond yields have surged upward over the past month, as yields on both the 10-year Treasury (^TNX) and 30-year Treasury (^TYX) have reached levels not seen since 2002, surpassing 2007 high-water marks in the lead-up to the financial crisis.
Investors have attributed the run-up in yields to a variety of concerns, from the artificial intelligence build-out and the competition for capital to changing foreign ownership of gold versus fixed income.
Read more: How soaring Treasury yields could hit your finances
One overlooked source of upward pressure, argued Macquarie's Thierry Wizman, is not just the impact of the
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Oct 02, 2026
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said on Thursday she had lost faith in the district attorney overseeing the Cornell University rape case and appointed a special prosecutor to replace him.
Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten has come under mounting pressure in recent days over his decision not to prosecute anyone when the initial allegations were made in 2024.
"Newly released information continues to raise serious questions about the investigation conducted by the Cornell Police Department and the decision by the Tompkins County District Attorney not to prosecute an alleged sexual assault on Cornell University's campus in October 2024," Hochul said.
"This has, in turn, undercut my faith, and the public's faith, in the District Attorney's ability to effectively investigate and prosecute the case at this time."
Hochul appointed the office of New York Attorney General Letitia James as the special prosecutor to oversee the investigation.
The case has drawn nationwide attention after a civil lawsuit was filed last month against the school and seven current and former fraternity members at the university.
The woman, a former student identified as "Jane Doe," said that she was the victim of a "gang rape" at the Chi Phi fraternity on Cornell's Ithaca, N.Y., campus on Oct. 19, 2024. She said she was already intoxicated when she arrived and was given ketamine before and during the alleged assault. She reported the incident to campus police three weeks later.
Van Houten, who reopened a criminal investigation into the case based on new information
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Oct 02, 2026
[AFP via Getty Images]
Donald Trump has said he may ask European countries to release some of their diesel reserves as he considers banning US exports of the fuel.
The president's comment comes after diesel prices hit record highs on UK forecourts this week, as the Iran war continues to put pressure on the supply of refined fuels.
The UK is heavily reliant on imported diesel from the US. But with US voters also facing higher fuel costs ahead of the midterm elections in November, Trump has threatened to restrict diesel exports.
The UK has been discussing the US supply threats with the EU which is holding a meeting on Friday on the issue.
Banning exports would flood the US market with diesel, and could bring prices down significantly for American drivers.
But experts warn such a ban would put further pressure on diesel prices in other countries, unless they can access further supplies.
The US is a vital supplier of diesel to the world, exporting between 1.2 and 1.5 million barrels per day, with most of it going to Latin America.
European countries including France, the Netherlands and the UK, also import a significant amount from the US following the reduction in Russian and Middle Eastern sources of diesel.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine led to sanctions, diverting Russian sales away from Europe. More recently Ukrainian attacks on Russian refining capacity has had a knock-on effect on global supply.
The US-led war on Iran has constrained the flow of both crude oil and refined diesel from that region.
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Oct 02, 2026
A new facility in Alexandria, Louisiana, may begin receiving undocumented families with children, local officials and immigrant rights advocates say.
The 528-bed facility will house families with children, unaccompanied minors, and single adult females as they await removal inside renovated former Air Force barracks at England Airpark, a former military base that now houses the Alexandria International Airport and an immigration detention facility, according to a draft agreement between ICE and the England Economic and Industrial Development District (EEIDD) reviewed by ABC News.
A communications manager for EEIDD told ABC News the facility could start receiving people "within the next week or two."
Alex Wong/Getty Images - PHOTO: An exterior view of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency headquarters is seen, July 6, 2018, in Washington, D.C. The facility would be the second constructed to house children since President Donald Trump's second term began but is the first to hold unaccompanied minors who are usually held in shelters under the custody of the Department of Health and Human Services before deportation or release.
A board of commissioners that governs the airpark approved the facility in February amid protests from local residents.
The facility will be managed by LaSalle Family Foundation, a nonprofit arm of LaSalle Corrections, a private prison company that manages several immigration detention centers across the country. Daily operations will be run by Anovaeon, which describes itself as a humanitarian response company. The operators are calling the facility the Alexandria Family Staging Center and say it will house people who are voluntarily self-deporting or voluntarily leaving the country, for an aver
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Oct 02, 2026
Watch: Tearful pilot recounts moment of Flydubai attack
The Indian pilot of the Flydubai plane who was attacked by his co-pilot and opened the cockpit door to let others in has said he was determined not to let others die.
Capt Smit Machchhar said he was on the ground and still being attacked when he realised the plane carrying more than 170 passengers was sinking and he had to do something.
"I was lying on the floor injured but I told myself to go for one last push to open the door from inside," he said in a video call with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
"Others came in and also played a role [in controlling the situation]. I was of course fighting for my own life but at the same time I knew I was not going to let others die," he added.
Flydubai's flight FZ1073, which was bound for Tel Aviv from Dubai early on Wednesday morning, plunged more than 17,000ft (5,200m) two and a half hours into its journey.
It first sent an emergency signal to air traffic controllers before switching to code squawk 7500, which indicates hijacking.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu later told the media that one pilot had stabbed the other before "apparently trying to crash" the plane.
After fellow passengers overpowered the attacker, two reserve pilots, who were in the plane as passengers, safely landed the plane at Tabuk Airport in north-western Saudi Arabia at 06:58 local time.
Machchhar, who has been hailed as a "true hero" by Netanyahu, was taken to hospital in Tabuk before being airlifted to Abu Dhabi, where he is reported to be in a stable condition.
He told Modi he had been flying planes for 17 years and "can tell what is happening to the plane even with my eyes closed".
Indian social media has been awash with praise for him si
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Oct 02, 2026
President Donald Trump's Department of Justice is now looking to see if Nixon-era special prosecutors committed misconduct in investigating the Watergate scandal.
An early morning burglary at the Democratic National Committee's headquarters in the Watergate office complex in Washington, D.C., in June 1972 would become a two-year affair, uncovering corruption inside the White House that would ultimately lead to Republican President Richard Nixon's resignation.
More than 50 years later, Geoff Shepard, a former Nixon aide who has written books on Watergate, was invited last month to give a two-hour presentation to the DOJ's Office of Professional Responsibility, an internal watchdog created out of the Watergate scandal, on allegations that the special prosecutor's office that investigated the break-in committed misconduct, people familiar with the matter told The Wall Street Journal.
A DOJ spokesperson confirmed to The Independent that Shepherd gave a presentation to the Office of Prof
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Oct 02, 2026
Follow updates on the war in the Middle East for Friday, Oct. 2, here. See earlier developments below.
What to know about the Iran war:President Trump said Thursday night that Iran "is ready to fold up," adding he believes the U.S. will win the war "right after the election," though he also said "maybe before the election."Mr. Trump told TIME magazine that U.S. military action against Iran could resume after the midterm elections if Tehran and Washington fail to reach a satisfactory agreement, and that he doesn't think "you could ever have peace" with Iran.Mr. Trump told reporters Thursday that Iran might be linked to a co-pilot's attempt to crash a packed plane traveling from Dubai to Israel. The president didn't offer any further details and said Iran would be hit "very hard" if it was determined that Tehran was behind the incident.
Saudi coalition accuses Houthis of drone attack on holy city of Medina
The Saudi-led coalition fighting Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen said Thursday that the Houthis struck an electricity distribution station in the holy city of Medina in Saudi Arabia. The alleged attack sparked strong condemnation from the Muslim world.
It came as fighting intensifies in Yemen, where government forces said they carried out att
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Oct 02, 2026
By Lucia Mutikani
WASHINGTON, Oct 2 (Reuters) - US job growth likely slowed in September and the unemployment rate is forecast to have been 4.1% for a third straight month, suggesting the labor market remained stable heading into the fourth quarter.
The anticipated moderation would follow a surprise jump in nonfarm payrolls in August, which economists partly attributed to volatility ?linked to the model the government uses to strip out seasonal fluctuations from the data. The Labor Department's Bureau of Labor Statistics will publish its closely watched employment report on Friday.
"I am ?expecting a reaffirmation of the 'low-hire, low-fire' American labor market," said Joe Brusuelas, chief economist at RSM. "At this point, we're at full employment, and I think there will be nothing in the jobs report that will cause the Federal Reserve to change its ?bias from one more hike this year."
Nonfarm payrolls likely increased by 90,000 last month after surging by 162,000 in August, a Reuters survey of economists predicted. Estimates ranged from as low as 35,000 to as high as 180,000. Economists expected August's job count, which was the largest in five months, to be revised down. The initial payrolls print for August has typically been weak, making this year's jump an anomaly.
"We suspect that the seasonally adjusted August nonfarm payroll print will be revised down as the BLS extends its seasonal adjustment procedure forward to incorporate the September data," said Marc Giannoni, chief US economist at Barclays. "The seasonal adjustment significantly exaggerated that ?month's employment gain. Had the August nonfarm payroll employment been adjusted with ?the August 2025 seasonal factors, it would have registered a drop of 74,000 jobs."
Economists said there were no signs yet that the US-Israel war with Iran was disrupting the labor market. But they expected the growing headwinds from the conflict in the Middle
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Oct 01, 2026
OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman [Getty Images]
OpenAI has fired three researchers for allegedly mishandling information, including work that involved an external organisation that analyses artificial intelligence (AI) models.
"Our investigation confirmed that these individuals mishandled sensitive information outside established company procedures, violating our policies and breaking the trust essential to our work," a spokesperson told the BBC.
The ChatGPT-maker did not name the sacked workers, but at least two of them were involved in safety research at the firm.
The firings come as the debate over AI safety and the risks the technology may pose to humanity has intensified in recent weeks.
"We have parted ways with three individuals for violating our policies on accessing and handling sensitive company information," OpenAI's spokesperson said.
The BBC understands the former employees were not let go for raising safety concerns but for allegedly mishandling sensitive information.
Concerns over AI safety have made headlines after some researchers and industry executives called for more guardrails around the technology.
OpenAI has come under under intense scrutiny after its models went rogue and hacked several platforms, including Australian government websites.
In an earlier incident an OpenAI system accessed the internet and breached the open-source developer platform Hugging Face.
That incident led OpenAI to conduct a broad review of the activities of its AI models
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Oct 01, 2026
(AFP via Getty)
The Pentagon doubled hostile fire pay to $450 a month and raised imminent danger pay to $275 as of Thursday, the first boost to the two combat stipends since 2002.
A mid-July memo from Timothy Dill, assistant secretary of war for manpower and reserve affairs, took effect at the start of the new fiscal year, Navy Times reported.
Imminent danger pay will be prorated at $9.16 per day, up from $7.50, with a $275 monthly cap tied to days in a designated zone. Service members cannot collect both pays in the same period.
Anthony Tata, undersecretary of war for personnel and readiness, said troops facing combat "deserve higher compensation that reflects the risks" they take for the country, Stars and Stripes reported.
The increase lands as the Iran conflict enters its seventh month, with American troops still exposed to combat and reprisal strikes across the Middle East.
The Defense Finance and Accounting Service, which administers military pay, lists 58 locations as eligible for the imminent danger stipend.
The two stipends have been locked at a flat $225 per month since October 2002. Before that, hazardous-duty rates varied by rank and duty, typically ranging from $100 to $240 per month, officials said.
Pentagon chief spokesman Sean Parnell said the tiered model separates areas of potential danger from zones with hostile fire and lets commanders shift troops from imminent danger pay to hostile fire pay the moment a designated area tips in
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Oct 01, 2026
Governor Kathy Hochul/X
New York State Attorney General Letitia James will be taking over as special prosecutor in the case alleging sexual assault at Cornell University, Gov. Kathy Hochul announced Thursday, saying she "lost faith" in the district attorney's ability to oversee it.
The announcement comes as new details have emerged this week about the alleged gang rape of then-student Jane Doe in a room at the Chi Phi fraternity house in 2024, including what she told campus police about the alleged assault.
"New information has raised serious questions about how this case was handled, and I've lost faith in the Tompkins County DA's ability to fairly oversee it," Hochul said in a statement. "The young woman at the center of this case deserves to know that every fact will be examined and justice pursued."
James will now have the power to investigate the incident and, if warranted, prosecute any offenses and present evidence to a grand jury. Cornell told CNN Thursday it supports the governor's decision.
Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten has repeatedly told CNN that his office never received more than the Snapchat messages and a six-page investigative report before deciding not to bring charges in the case.
In the report, Doe she recounted being hit and feeling emotionally coerced into sexual activity while intoxicated.
She made a more explicit accusation of rape in a November 2024 interview with campus police - the transcript of which Van Houten told CNN
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Oct 01, 2026
The Grand Teton national park in Wyoming.Photograph: Ronen Tivony/NurPhoto/Shutterstock
Major League Baseball (MLB) leadership is no longer considering holding a game inside a national park, according to a letter commissioner Robert Manfred sent to officials in Teton county, Wyoming, on Thursday in what could be the league's biggest swing-and-a-miss off the diamond.
On 26 September, the Washington Post reported that MLB had reached out to the White House about staging a one-day game at Grand Teton national park in Wyoming. Teton county describes itself as a "a year-round resort community" and sits within the Jackson Hole valley. It's also a habitat for grizzly bears, osprey, bison and more.
News of MLB's outreach to the federal government quickly sparked concern about the impact that erecting a field and the infrastructure to hold spectators could have on the natural landscape and habitat of scores of wildlife that call the 310,000-acre (125,500-hectare) park home.
In the letter, Manfred noted that MLB had held games at places like the Fort Bragg military base in North Carolina and the nation's oldest Negro Leagues stadium in Birmingham, Alabama. He added that MLB staff had been doing their due diligence to see whether a game at Grand Teton was possible and to evaluate the potential environmental impact.
"Since the story was reported, it has become clear that the local community does not want us t
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Oct 01, 2026
New York Governor Kathy Hochul on Thursday said she issued an executive order to appoint Attorney General Letitia James as a special prosecutor for the alleged "gang rape" that took place at a Cornell fraternity in 2024.
"Newly released information continues to raise serious questions about the investigation conducted by the Cornell Police Department and the decision by the Tompkins County District Attorney not to prosecute an alleged sexual assault on Cornell University's campus," Hochul said in a statement.
"This has, in turn, undercut my faith, and the public's faith, in the District Attorney's ability to effectively investigate and prosecute the case at this time," Hochul added.
In a statement, James said she is "ready to lead a process New Yorkers can trust, guided by the facts and the law."
Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images - PHOTO: New York Governor Hochul Makes AI Safety Announcement"Every New Yorker deserves to know that when they report a crime, it will be investigated fully and fairly. The Governor has entrusted my office with this investigation, and we do not take that responsibility lightly," James said.
The appointment of James as special prosecutor comes five days after Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten said he would reopen the investigation into the former student's allegations.
'I felt like bait,' Jane Doe said at 2025 Cornell University hearing investigating allegations of fraternity house sexual assaultLate last month, the former student, listed as Jane Doe, filed a civil lawsuit alleging that she was drugged, assaulted and "gang raped" by
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Oct 01, 2026
"Politically, there's just a recognition that it's always going to be hard to win a midterm when you have the White House, the Senate and the House," Vance said in an interview with NBC News. (Brandon Bell / Getty)JOINT BASE ANDREWS, Md. — Vice President JD Vance acknowledged Thursday that Republicans face an "uphill climb" in next month's midterm elections — and that the results may be a data point he reviews as he decides whether to run for president in 2028.
"Historically there's always a bit of an uphill climb, and I think you definitely sense that," Vance said in an interview with NBC News. "I also think you can sense a sense of cautious optimism, in the sense that, you know, people feel like the numbers are sort of moving, maybe in our direction."
He added: "Politically, there's just a recognition that it's always going to be hard to win a midterm when you have the White House, the Senate and the House."
Vance spoke aboard Air Force Two shortly after it landed on a return trip from Lakeland, Florida, where he campaigned for Sen. Ashley Moody and Rep. Byron Donalds, the Republican nominee for governor. It was his latest headlining gig at a rally meant to boost support for the party's candidates in what is expected to be a challenging year for the GOP.
Aside from the historical trends Vance mentioned, polls have shown President Donald Trump and
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Oct 01, 2026
For well over an hour, the state of Tennessee tried to kill Christa Pike. Then they raced to save her life.
Seven members of the news media who witnessed Pike's botched execution on Sept. 30 described an increasingly troublesome scene in the death chamber at a state prison in Nashville. The process began with Pike's last words, and ended with the state closing curtains in the viewing chamber and ordering the witnesses to leave even as they could hear Pike snoring on what was supposed to be her death bed.
Pike had survived two doses of pentobarbital, the second of which is considered a backup in case the first doesn't prove lethal. The state's execution protocol has no guidance for what happens when two doses fail, something that hasn't happened in the history of lethal injections in the U.S., according to experts and a USA TODAY review of previous botched executions.
Pike's failed execution, Tennessee's second in just four months, is raising questions about the state's ability to carry out the death penalty and drawing increased scrutiny to the constitutionality of the method nationwide.
As questions swirl about what happened to Pike and what is
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Oct 01, 2026
WASHINGTON, DC - SEPTEMBER 29: U.S. President Donald Trump waves after speaking during the America.gov launch event at Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium on September 29, 2026 in Washington, DC. The website features an artificial intelligence tool to help Americans interact with the federal government. The event was attended by tech leaders Elon Musk, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang and Blue Origin CEO Dave Limp, along with U.S. Vice President JD Vance and U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio. (Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images) | Image Credits:Kevin Dietsch / Getty Images
In December 2025, about a month before the U.S. invaded Venezuela and captured its president, Nicolás Maduro, President Trump had a secret meeting with Elon Musk, Time magazine reports. This was roughly seven months after Musk left his role in the Trump administration at the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
During this meeting, Trump "spent hours" talking to Musk's Grok chatbot, including asking how Venezuelans would respond to the capture of their president, a source told Time. Just a few months earlier, in September, Trump began ordering U.S. military strikes against Venezuelan boats that Trump alleged were involved in drug trafficking.
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Oct 01, 2026
The Trump administration is airing campaign-style television ads using money Congress approved for border security upgrades, efforts to combat drug trafficking and memorials for officers killed in the line of duty, according to federal spending records.
Democrats say the ads break multiple federal laws by using taxpayer money for political purposes that Congress never authorized. The White House defends the ads as public service announcements.
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One of the spots closely resembles a 30-second video produced by the Trump campaign in 2024. The latest ad features President Donald Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth advocating for the Iran war. They feature disclosures saying they are "Paid for by the U.S. Government."
On Sept. 19, a few days before the ads began airing, the White House Office of Management and Budget added $20 million to a Department of Homeland Security budget line designated for "commemorative events," according to publicly disclosed OMB data. Congress approved the spending for those events in Trump's 2025 domestic spending package, known as the One Big Beautiful Bill, and intended it for "Line-of-Duty death memorials, Department or agency anniversaries, and commendation ceremonies," according to a House budget committee report.
The next day, Sept. 20, DHS awarded a $20 million contract for a "national media campaign" to the LMD Agency, a Maryland-based public relations and media firm that had previously worked for the department. The company did not respond to requests for comment.
DHS and OMB had originally planned to spend only $1 million on "commemorative events," according to OMB records. To add $20 million to tha
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Oct 01, 2026
Christa Pike, the only woman on Tennessee's death row, received two doses of a lethal drug in a Nashville execution chamber Wednesday night. But she didn't die.
Although her survival was "unparalleled," as one expert said, it was the latest example of a botched execution attempt involving lethal injections in Tennessee and elsewhere around the United States.
"All of this was predicted, and the court did nothing," said Steve Ferrell, an attorney for Pike, at a news conference Thursday, referencing the state's history of problems with its lethal drug protocol.
Pike, 50, was condemned for the 1995 murder of her former classmate Colleen Slemmer, then 19, whom she and two others tortured and killed in a manner widely described as gruesome, horrific and disturbing. Eighteen at the time of the attack and 20 at her sentencing, Pike was the youngest woman sent to death row in the country's modern capital punishment era.
The extent of Pike's injuries after the failed execution was unclear, but her attorneys said Thursday that she was still alive and receiving "lifesaving medical care" at a hospital. A doctor told CBS partner BBC News that Pike would have likely suffered traumatic brain injury.
Her legal team had said in an emergency motion to halt the execution Wednesday night that she had not lost consciousness, retained a heartbeat and could be heard audibly snoring on the gurney, despite correctional staff administering two syringes' worth of the drug pentobarbital to her through an IV. At one point, Associated Press reporter Kim Chandler, who witnessed the execution, said Pike "looked toward prison officials and asked if it was supposed to feel that way."
"The case of Christa Pike lays bare multiple reasons why the death penalty should be abolished," United Nations human rights chief Volker Tu
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Oct 01, 2026
WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. military is dispatching roughly 9,000 troops aboard a group of ships to the Middle East, a U.S. official said Thursday. The bolstering of the American military presence comes as President Donald Trump warned anew that new strikes against Iran could be on the horizon.
The troop movement, which includes a third aircraft carrier, underscores the rapidly evolving dynamic of Trump's war against Iran as he ponders his next move, with midterm elections in the United States looming large and new signs that the nature of the conflict may be becoming more complex.
Trump has threatened that a post-midterm election escalation — despite his initial promises to Americans of a campaign that would last a matter of weeks — remains a viable option. Further complicating matters, Trump told reporters Thursday that early indications suggest that Iran is linked to the FlyDubai co-pilot who stabbed his captain and tried to crash an Israel-bound flight on Wednesday.
In an exchange with reporters at the White House, Trump raised the connection when asked by a reporter if there were any links between the pilot behind the attack and Tehran.
"I wo
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Oct 01, 2026
Christa Pike's attorney said she is still alive a day after she survived two doses of lethal injection drugs on Wednesday. The inmate is in critical condition and is receiving life-saving medical care, her legal team told reporters Thursday afternoon.
Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee has since paused executions in the state.
Pike, 50, remained alive and snoring loudly after being given two doses of pentobarbital, her attorneys and other witnesses said. She was subsequently taken to a hospital.
Lee ordered "a comprehensive, third-party review to determine exactly what occurred" and said that another scheduled execution later this year had been paused.
"There are very few answers this morning. It's very early," Lee told reporters Thursday morning. "There are a lot of questions. The people of our state deserve to have those questions answered.
"This is a tragedy. There is no one who wanted what happened last night to happen. It's deeply disturbing to me that this has happened in this state."
May Martinez, the mother of Pike's victim, Colleen Slemmer, told NBC News the execution attempt had been a "mess," adding, "They didn't say anything, and then, all of a sudden, they asked all the victims to leave. We didn't know anything until we got up to the office and saw the commissioner. And he said that it didn't work ... and she's on her way to the hospital."
In a statement posted on
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Oct 01, 2026
Former Dallas police Officer Amber Guyger (center) in 2019 leaves the Frank Crowley Courts Building in downtown Dallas. (Tom Fox/Staff Photographer)
Guyger fatally shot Jean, a 26-year-old accountant, in September 2018 after mistaking his apartment for her own. She told investigators she believed Jean was an intruder.
Jean's killing drew protests in Dallas and national attention, particularly because Jean was an unarmed Black man killed in his own home by a white police officer.
A Dallas County jury convicted Guyger, now 38, of murder in October 2019 and sentenced her to 10 years in prison.
The Texas parole board confirmed Thursday to The Dallas Morning News that Guyger had been granted parole. She was previously denied in 2024.
It's not immediately clear Thursday when she will be released from prison.
Here's what to know about Guyger, Jean's killing and what has happened in the years since.
What happened to Botham Jean?
A large photo of Botham Jean is displayed with photos and cards on one of the tables in his childhood home in Castries, St. Lucia on Sept. 25, 2018. Botham Jean was shot and killed in his apartment by off-duty Dallas police Officer Amber Guyger. (Vernon Bryant/Staff Photographer)
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Oct 01, 2026
The Treasury Department said that over 60 million children have been automatically enrolled in Trump Accounts, according to guidance filed with the Federal Register.
"Millions of children have already enrolled in Trump Accounts. With automatic enrollment, over 60 million more eligible children now have an account ready to be claimed," Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a statement.
Why are children being automatically enrolled? The idea behind Trump Accounts is to give children a head start on building wealth. The accounts are a new type of tax-deferred individual retirement account for children. Any eligible child under 18 with a valid Social Security number can open an account, while U.S. citizens born between 2025 and 2028 may also qualify for a one-time $1,000 contribution from the government.
Until now, parents or guardians were required to sign up for accounts on their children's behalf. Participation has been low, however.
According to a study by the national nonprofit Commonwealth, participation rates remain low, with families citing conc
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Oct 01, 2026
By Lucia Mutikani
WASHINGTON, Oct 1 (Reuters) - New applications for US unemployment benefits drifted close to 57-year lows last week and layoffs decreased in September, suggesting labor market stability persisted even as employers remained cautious about boosting hiring.
The report from the Labor Department on Thursday joined a raft of other data, including robust consumer spending in August, in painting a rosy picture of the economy despite ?rising headwinds from the US-Israeli war with Iran, which has driven diesel prices to record highs. Economists said robust corporate profits growth and resilient domestic demand were shielding workers from layoffs, for now.
"At some point, ?elevated energy costs and material prices will force firms to lay off marginal workers to protect profit margins, but there is no sign of that here," said Carl Weinberg, chief economist at High Frequency Economics.
Initial claims for state unemployment benefits slipped 1,000 to a seasonally adjusted 197,000 for ?the week ended September 26, the Labor Department said on Thursday. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast 200,000 claims for the latest week.
Claims have held below the 200,000 level for three straight weeks and are near levels last seen in 1969. Some economists said historically low layoffs, if sustained, could raise questions about the labor market overheating, with monetary policy implications.
"We do not appear to be close to that result yet, but this is a new risk that the FOMC appears to be watching," said Stephen Stanley, chief US economist at Santander US Capital Markets, referring to the Fed's policy-setting committee.
A separate report from global outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas showed layoffs announced by US-based employers dropped 18% to 43,281 in September. They were down 20% ?from a year ago and fell 43% in the third quarter. Employers are, however, ?in no rush to increase h
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Oct 01, 2026
JERUSALEM (AP) — A dentist and other passengers wrestled with a violent copilot. A plumber seized the controls as the plane plunged towards the desert. And the captain, despite being stabbed, managed to open the cockpit door — helping save all 182 people aboard the Israel-bound flight.
"Hollywood isn't creative enough to come up with stories like this!" said Mike Huckabee, the U.S. ambassador to Israel.
Although major questions remained unanswered on Thursday about the attacker and his motive, the story of ordinary passengers saving the FlyDubai flight from disaster has quickly become the stuff of legend.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warmly embraced plumber Yaniv Hayoun shortly after the passengers arrived in Tel Aviv late on Wednesday. He later posted a five-star review of Hayoun's professional services, calling him "a hero who has saved many lives."
"He can help you too — I highly recommend him!" Netanyahu added on X.
Hayoun was among several Israelis recommended for the Presidential Award for Civilian Heroism, while Indian Capt. Smit Machchhar was called "a HERO" by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
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Oct 01, 2026
President Donald Trump said in an interview out Thursday that he would be open to pardoning members of his administration, pointing to former President Joe Biden's blanket pardon to relatives and members of the administration out of concern they would be politically targeted after he left office.
"Yeah, sure, I'd do that," the president answered when asked by TIME magazine earlier this week if he was "considering pardoning members of your administration prior to the end of your term?"
The president further said that Biden "gave pardons to everyone."
Kent Nishimura/AFP via Getty Images - PHOTO: President Donald Trump answers questions from reporters during an announcement in the Oval Office at the White House, September 28, 2026 in Washington.Biden issued preemptive pardons to several close family members in the final minutes of his presidency in 2025, saying that his family "has been subjected to unrelenting attacks and threats, motivated solely by a desire to hurt me" and that he had "no reason to believe these attacks will end" after he left office.
Those pardons included James Biden, Joe's younger brother; Sara Jones Biden, James' wife; Valerie Biden Owens, Joe's younger sister; John T. Owens', Valerie's husband; and Francis W. Biden, Joe's younger brother.
In 2024, Biden pardoned his son, Hunter Biden, who was convicted on tax evasion and
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Oct 01, 2026
Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee paused executions in the state after an inmate survived two doses of lethal injection drugs on Wednesday.
Christa Pike, 50, remained alive and snoring loudly after being given two doses of pentobarbital, her attorneys and other witnesses said. She was subsequently taken to a hospital. Her health status remained unknown as of Thursday, Lee said.
Lee ordered "a comprehensive, third-party review to determine exactly what occurred" and said that another scheduled execution later this year had been paused.
"There are very few answers this morning. It's very early," Lee told reporters Thursday morning. "There are a lot of questions. The people of our state deserve to have those questions answered.
"This is a tragedy. There is no one who wanted what happened last night to happen. It's deeply disturbing to me that this has happened in this state."
May Martinez, the mother of Pike's victim, Colleen Slemmer, told NBC News the execution attempt had been a "mess," adding, "They didn't say anything, and then, all of a sudden, they asked all the victims to leave. We didn't know anything until we got up to the office and saw the commissioner. And he said that it didn't work ... and she's on her way to the hospital."
In a statement posted on Facebook, Sen. Marsha Blackburn called for the state to return to the electric chair as a means of execution. "This situation is tragic," she said.
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Oct 01, 2026
The lethal drug administered in Tennessee's failed attempt to execute Christa Pike has been used in multiple states that carry out the death penalty and by the U.S. government after President Donald Trump resumed federal executions during his first term.
Pike, 50, remained alive after two doses of pentobarbital were administered Wednesday, according to her attorneys and media witnesses. One of her lawyers said Thursday that she was being treated at a hospital.
Tennessee officials haven't explained yet what went wrong during the execution.
Republican Gov. Bill Lee ordered a third-party review to determine what happened and said another scheduled execution in Tennessee will not take place this year.
What is pentobarbital?Pentobarbital is a barbiturate, a class of drugs that depresses the central nervous system.
Approved medical uses include sedation, short-term treatment of insomnia, preparation for anesthesia and emergency control of certain severe seizures. It is also used in veterinary euthanasia.
In an overdose, it can produce coma, suppress breathing and cause circulatory collapse and death.
Why is it used in executions?For years, lethal injections commonly used three drugs: an anesthetic, a paralytic that stopped breathin
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Oct 01, 2026
WASHINGTON (AP) — A judge in the nation's capital agreed on Thursday to permanently dismiss a criminal case charging a former Olympian with vandalizing the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, a move that could prevent federal prosecutors from reviving the case under political pressure from President Donald Trump.
D.C. Superior Court Judge Todd Edelman ordered the dismissal of David Hearn's case with "prejudice," which would block U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro's office from refiling the felony charge against him. The judge ruled nearly a month after hearing attorneys' arguments.
Hearn's lawyers say Trump administration officials have continued to falsely accuse the Maryland resident of vandalizing the reflecting pool despite Pirro's decision to drop the case on July 31. Trump responded by saying Pirro "choked" and "folded like an umbrella."
Edelman said the case presents "exceptional circumstances" that warrant dismissing the case permanently. He agreed with defense attorneys that the government "shot first and asked questions later" by charging Hearn in a "a lightning-fast indictment process."
"While the government wishes to hold open the possibility of the development of evidence that would support a future prosecution, its own representations make plain that such a possibility is theoretical at best, and more likely, is simply fanciful," the judge wrote.
Permanently dismissing the case protects Hearn from prosecutors electing to revive the case under political pressure from Trump, the judge said.
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Oct 01, 2026
A woman who accused seven members of a fraternity at Cornell University in 2024 of rape reportedly told the school's investigators that she "felt like bait" on the night of the alleged assault.
"I felt like lions around me," she said during a 2025 hearing, according to ABC News. "It just was a totally debilitating place to be in."
The comments were included in a 99-page report prepared by the university as part of its Title IX investigation, per ABC.
The report also included comments from a fraternity member who Cornell's investigation concluded did not engage in the assault but was found responsible for "attempted sexual exploitation."
"I was sorry that maybe if it wasn't consensual and she was victimized, I was sorry for not stopping it," the fraternity members said, according to ABC.
In a civil lawsuit filed last month against the school and the fraternity members, the woman, a former student identified as "Jane Doe," said that she was the victim of a "gang rape" at the Chi Phi fraternity on Cornell's Ithaca, N.Y., campus on Oct. 19, 2024. She said she was already intoxicated when she arrived and was given ketamine before and during the alleged assault. She reported the incident to campus police three weeks later.
On Tuesday, CBS New York
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Oct 01, 2026
A view of Catalina's Avalon Harbor. A medical transport helicopter crashed off the island on Wednesday. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)Investigators have located the wreckage of a medical transport helicopter that crashed in the Pacific Ocean after departing Wednesday night from Santa Catalina Island, killing a pilot and a nurse.
One person, a female patient being taken to the mainland, remains missing, and two people survived. Sources familiar with the investigation said the missing woman is a 45-year-old resident of Avalon who suffered a severe allergy attack.
At a press conference Thursday, Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert Luna said it's unlikely that the patient survived the crash, and noted the wreckage was deep in the water, 200 feet below the surface. Divers from the department's special enforcement bureau will work with other agencies and use technology to search the ocean floor.
"This is a tragedy for Catalina and for Los Angeles County," said county Supervisor Janice Hahn. "The men and women on board dedicated their careers to responding to crisis and saving lives. They are heroes."
The Los Angeles County Fire Department received a call at 7:53 p.m. Wednesday for a marine rescue to pull three people from the water, agency spokesperson Jonathan Torres said.
The department learned that the three were aboard a helicopter bound for the mainland and that five people were involved, Torres said. The aircraft was a Eurocopter EC135 P2, the National Transportation Safety Board said. The helicopter was equipped as a medical transport and was owned by REACH Air Medical Services, th
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Oct 01, 2026
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Renee Good's family sued the U.S. government and several immigration officials Thursday, alleging wrongful death, conspiracy and other violations in the 37-year-old woman's killing by an immigration officer during a federal crackdown in Minneapolis.
The two lawsuits were filed by Good's partner, Becca Good, and Renee's brother Brent Ganger.
The Justice Department didn't immediately respond to an email seeking comment on the lawsuits.
Officer shot Good as she turned her car away from him
Renee Good, a mother of three, was fatally shot Jan. 7 as protests against immigration raids flared across the city. According to Becca Good, her partner stopped their car in a street to support neighbors during an immigration operation.
Bystander video shows Renee Good in the driver's seat of a red SUV blocking part of the road and repeatedly honking her horn.
Two immigration officers get out of a truck, their faces covered, and one orders Good to get out of the car. She reverses briefly, then turns the steering wheel as the officer says again, "get out of the car."
Almost simultaneously, Becca Good, standing in the street, shouts: "Drive, baby, drive!"
One officer standing in front of the vehicle pulls his weapon and fires into the windshield. He lurches back as the car turns away from him. The officer, who is now very close to the open window on the driver's side, opens fire two more times, fatally shooting Renee Good, according to an analysis of the videos by The Associated Press and others.
Federal officials at the time said the off
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Oct 01, 2026
Matthias Huss with a four-metre-long measuring stake indicating the amount of ice that melted over the past year on the Scex Rouge glacier (Fabrice COFFRINI)Switzerland's glaciers, which are disproportionately impacted by climate change, have lost nearly 20 percent of their mass in five years, experts said Thursday, with 2026 registering the second-biggest melt on record.
Swiss glaciers saw 5.5 percent of their volume melt away this year, the Glacier Monitoring in Switzerland (GLAMOS) network found in a new study, published after a record hot summer preceded by a winter with little snowfall.
"The glaciers this year have lost enormous quantities of ice," said GLAMOS chief Matthias Huss, describing 2026 as "a catastrophic year".
Perched on the Scex Rouge glacier, at an altitude of nearly 3,000 metres, he gazed across the landscape in despair.
"This is a glacier that isn't surviving," he said.
"There will be probably no ice in 10 or maybe 15 years."
He carefully dismantled the four-metre-long aluminium measurement stake inserted at the centre of the glacier.
In late July, when it was installed, it was completely embedded, but now more than three metres protrude from the grey surface of the ice.
"It's not that we are surprised, because we know how fast the glaciers are melting," Huss said.
"But to see the colours of the mountains where there is no snow left, there is just these rocks and these dark glaciers that are a relic from the past... it's just incredible."
Between 2022 and 2026, the melt rate at Switzerland's glaciers was "more than twice as high as in any previously monitored five-year period", the GLAMOS report said, noting an ice volume loss of almost 20 percent since 2021.
While Switzerland's glaciers have long been sh
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Oct 01, 2026
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Thursday agreed to review a Trump administration policy denying bond hearings for immigrants as the government carries out a sweeping crackdown.
The justices will consider whether immigrants who have been living in the U.S. have a right to a hearing to determine if they should remain detained while challenging their possible deportation.
The case will test a key pillar of the Trump administration's hard-line immigration agenda.
Most appeals courts to have considered the issue have found that it violates federal law to detain immigrants, including those living in the U.S. illegally, without a bond hearing. Those decisions conflict with rulings by the 5th and 8th circuits, which held that immigrants accused of illegally entering and remaining in the U.S. must be detained while their deportation cases are pending.
The high court agreed to hear the case of Ricardo Aparecido Barbosa da Cunha, a citizen of Brazil. Authorities say he entered the United States illegally two decades ago and applied for asylum in 2016. He sought a bond hearing after an immigration judge determined that his detention was mandatory following his September 2025 arrest.
He has never been charged or convicted of a crime,
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Oct 01, 2026
"I Voted" stickers sit on a table at Naperville Municipal Center in Naperville, Illinois, on September 24, 2026, on the first day of early voting ahead of the November 3 midterm elections. - Kamil Krzaczyski/AFP/Getty Images
Election Day is still a month away, but more than 700,000 Americans have already voted across at least 30 states. There are signs emerging of the advantage Democrats have in motivating their voters - a trend that's played out in polling all summer long.
In several states with key Senate or governor races this fall, Democrats make up a larger share of voters requesting ballots so far than they did at this point in 2024.
In Iowa, Democrats have made 67% of ballot requests, up from 54% at this point in 2024. In Pennsylvania, it's 66%, up from 62%, and in Maine it's 57%, up from 53%. And according to data from the North Carolina State Board of Elections, 42% of ballot requests are from Democrats, up from 36% at this point two years ago.
It's worth noting that in all of those states except for Iowa, ballot requests at this point in 2022 were more Democratic than they are now.
The uptick in the share of requests from Democrats would be in line with polling, special election results and primary turnout, all of which have indicated Democrats may be more motivated to vote this November.
On the other hand, it could just be further evidence of Republicans continuing to shift to preferring other forms of voting.
An important caveat: While the fact that a person has voted is general
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Oct 01, 2026
WASHINGTON, Oct 1 (Reuters) - US President Donald Trump said he regretted nominating three Supreme Court justices — Neil Gorsuch, Amy Coney Barrett and ?Brett Kavanaugh — who have opposed him in recent rulings, according ?to a Time Magazine interview.
The Republican president was asked about his recent comments regarding the ?three conservative justices in the interview, which was conducted on Monday.
"Do you regret nominating them?" the interviewer asked, referring to Trump's comments in a recent Truth Social post.
"Yeah. Yeah," Trump responded, according to a transcript of the ?interview.
"What can I do? ?I put them in. They voted against me too often. I was very — I gave them the position of ?a lifetime, and they vote against me often."
Trump appointed Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and Barrett during his first term as president, building a 6-3 conservative majority and allowing the court ?to steer ?a dramatic rightward course since 2020.
"I ?do like loyalty, yeah," Trump ?told the interviewer, who then asked whether that was what he wanted from the justices.
"No, I don't want loyalty. I want good decisions," Trump said.
After the top US judicial body declined to allow a Postal Service rule restricting the use of mail-in ballots in the November midterm elections, ?Trump said his appointees were behaving differently ?than they had during interviews.
"These are not ?the people I interviewed to ?serve on the United States Supreme Court, they are ?merely a shell of their original ?selves," he wrote on ?Truth Social.
After the court in February struck down his sweeping global tariffs that it found he had imposed illegally using a ?law meant for national ?emergencies, Trump reserved special ire for Gorsuch and Barrett, who were in ?the majority in that 6-3 ruling.
(Reporting by Katharine Jackson and ?Doina Chiacu, Editing by Timothy Heritage)
This article originally
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Oct 01, 2026
Flagstaff — A former Northern Arizona University fraternity leader was sentenced to two months in jail Wednesday for his role in a hazing that led to the death of a pledge.
Carter Eslick, 20, also received three years of supervised probation during a sentencing hearing in Coconino County Superior Court. Eslick had pleaded guilty to a felony hazing charge in the Jan. 31 death of Colin Daniel Martinez, 18, at an off-campus house.
An autopsy found Martinez died of alcohol poisoning with a blood-alcohol content of 0.425% — more than five times the state's legal limit for drivers 21 and over.
Martinez was among four Delta Tau Delta pledges who shared two bottles of vodka to ensure they vomited, according to court documents. Witnesses reported adjusting Martinez's sleeping position and checking his pulse and breathing to look for signs of alcohol poisoning throughout the night, the documents said.
Martinez's parents appeared remotely in court, still grieving their son, and said they want accountability and reform within Greek life, CBS Phoenix affiliate KPHO-TV reported.
Eslick was the fraternity's pledge master at the time and was responsible for welcoming new members.
The hearing began with testimony from five of Eslick's friends and family members who attested to his character while warning about the dangers of fraternity
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Oct 01, 2026
The Trump administration used an emergency measure this summer to change the language of the federal voter-registration form used by U.S. service members abroad and citizens residing outside the country, potentially restricting some eligible American voters abroad from using the application to request their ballots.
Advocates for American citizens overseas say the changes will spark confusion among eligible voters abroad and officials within U.S. election offices. They argue the changes effectively disenfranchise some voters abroad, but the Pentagon says the changes are meant to align the form with federal law. More than 2 million Americans living abroad are eligible to cast their ballots in U.S. elections.
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Doris Speer, president of the Association of Americans Resident Overseas, said she believes the changes to the form known as the Federal Post Card Application are "an effort to deter the overseas vote, not to legally stop people from voting but to make the process so difficult that you really have to want to vote to get through it. The result will be confusion, chaos and fewer overseas votes."
The changes to the form follow the Trump administration's unsuccessful efforts to restrict voting by mail and pass sweeping voter ID legislation. That proposed legislation, the Save America Act, would require Americans to prove their citizenship when registering to vote and show photo ID to vote, and permit the Department of Homeland Security to obtain access to voter rolls.
The political stakes of the
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Oct 01, 2026
A medevac helicopter crashed into the water off Catalina Island in California on Wednesday night, with one of the five people aboard reported missing and the other four taken to hospitals, according to officials.
The Los Angeles County Fire Department received reports of the crash shortly before 8 p.m.
Search and rescue operations are ongoing, with the fire department dispatching helicopters and divers shortly after learning of the crash.
3 Dead, 1 Hospitalized After News Helicopter Crashes In Los Angeles Commercial Area
A medevac helicopter crashed into the water off Catalina Island in California on Wednesday night.The U.S. Coast Guard also responded to the crash.
"I have been informed that a medevac helicopter leaving Catalina Island has crashed shortly after takeoff. L.A. County Fire, Sheriff, Coast Guard, and Avalon Fire are on the scene," Los Angeles County Supervisor Janice Hahn said on X. "Search and rescue operations are underway, and I am praying for everyone who was on board."
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At least one of the five people aboard the helicopter remains unaccounted for as of late Wednesday night. Two others were transported to hospitals in
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Oct 01, 2026
Indian pilot Smit Machchhar has been hailed as a hero for saving passengers after he was stabbed by his colleague in an alleged attempt to crash a Flydubai plane on Wednesday. - Israel Foreign Ministry/Reuters
The Indian pilot who fought off a savage attack by his copilot and helped prevent an apparent hijack of a Flydubai plane heading to Israel with more than 170 people on board is being hailed as a hero.
Captain Smit Machchhar was stabbed while trying to fend off the attacker, leaving him badly wounded. During the struggle the cockpit door was opened, allowing other passengers to rush in, subdue his assailant, and take control of the plane that was enroute to Tel Aviv.
Machchhar's actions have received widespread praise from political leaders, passengers who were onboard, and those who know him.
"Smit Machchhar is a talented, soft spoken, kind-hearted and a person with good nature," said Jinat Shah, who used to live next door to him in Mumbai before the pilot moved to Dubai. "He is an incredible person, and I hope for his fast recovery," Shah told Indian news agency ANI.
Passengers who were on flight FZ1073 described those chaotic moments, during which the plane plumm
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Oct 01, 2026
Brittany Bee was wed to a man when she was a teen. [BBC]
California has officially banned child marriage, with Governor Gavin Newsom signing legislation to end the practice that is still legal in 32 US states.
The new law, which will come into effect on 1 January, states people must be 18 to get married in the Golden State.
Newsom called it a "long overdue measure to protect young Californians and minors". He signed the bill into law with Courtney Stodden, whose parents allowed her to marry a 50-year-old Hollywood actor when she was just 16.
Stodden, who has been advocating to end the practice, called the change a "victory" and said survivors of child marriage should "never have been expected to carry this burden".
Gov Gavin Newsom called the law "overdue" [Getty Images]
Stodden said she would "keep fighting until children are protected from marriage in all 50 states".
She was married to actor Doug Hutchison - known for roles in The Green Mile, A Time to Kill and I Am Sam - in 2011, spurring headlines internationally over the controversy and appearances on several reality programmes in the US, including the VH1 series Couples Therapy.
Other survivors of child marriage also applauded the new law.
"California has sent a clear message to the world today," Brittany Bee, a former child bride, told the BBC. "A message of hope for all children that they may be free from systemic violence. That they may choose their own path."
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Oct 01, 2026
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance will both hit the campaign trail on Thursday, but they will be heading to heavily Republican areas to shore up lagging enthusiasm in their party ahead of next month's midterm elections.
Trump's travel on Thursday to Texas and Oklahoma kicks off what the president said will be a 32-day campaign blitz leading up to Nov. 3. Vance will be stumping in Florida, putting the Republican Party's highest-ranking officials in areas where GOP candidates once expected to have glide paths to victory but are now facing tougher races.
A new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds that only 17% of U.S. adults approve of Trump's handling of the cost of living. Just 26% approve of his handling of the economy overall, marking a new low.
Republicans have expressed growing pessimism about their chances in the election, which will determine control of Congress, as the president has repeatedly dismissed concerns about high costs and gas prices as his unpopular war in Iran drags on.
According to Trump, his party's headwinds are merely a matter of poor public relations about a job he says is well done.
"We're not getting the word out," he to
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Sep 30, 2026
During a 2025 hearing at Cornell University, an unidentified female former student who alleges she was gang raped at a fraternity house in 2024 described her harrowing night at the house surrounded by multiple men: "I felt like bait. I felt like lions around me. It just was a totally debilitating place to be in."
Her description is included in a heavily-redacted 99-page report, obtained by ABC News, that was prepared by the university last year as it investigated what happened.
As part of its investigation, Cornell conducted 50 interviews with 32 witnesses, including the fraternity brothers Jane Doe accused in a civil lawsuit filed earlier this month of gang rape, and determined that someone at the Chi Phi house had overdosed on ketamine one day prior to Jane Doe's experience.
ABC News - PHOTO: This photo shows the former Chi Phi fraternity house in Ithaca, where a former Cornell University student alleges that she was drugged and gang-raped in 2024. "Ketamine was a substance used by multiple individuals in the Chi Phi house at the time, including [redacted] who had overdosed on or about October 18, 2024," the report said.
Jane Doe told investigators the ketamine she took that night induced a "vague consciousness" that left her disoriented.
"So, lights are on, but nobody's home. Your brain is not functioning at its proper level," Doe said, according to the report. "I know it sounds super weird to say. I know it happened, but I don't remember it."
The investigators also noted an apology from one of the fraternity brothers during the hearing.
"I was sorry that maybe if it wasn't conse
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Sep 30, 2026
President Donald Trump speaks to the media aboard Air Force One on its way to Joint Base Andrews, Md., from Ireland on Sept. 13.
(Brendan Smialowski / AFP via Getty Images file)The White House on Wednesday removed CNN from the press pool that's set to cover a trip by President Donald Trump on Thursday, escalating a feud with the cable network after a federal judge blocked the administration's push to restrict its media access.
CNN had been designated to travel with Trump on Thursday, according to a press rotation document the White House released Sunday. But when the daily guidance came out for his scheduled visit to a truck manufacturing facility in Denton, Texas, followed by remarks in Durant, Oklahoma, it did not list CNN as providing pool coverage.
The move comes less than a week after a federal judge halted Trump's effort to ban CNN, MS NOW and Politico from the White House. It also comes after the White House barred CNN from flying on Air Force One over the weekend when Trump traveled to Tennessee, when the network was scheduled to provide pool coverage. (The judge's order was limited to media access on the White House g
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Sep 30, 2026
A man accused of plotting a "violent attack" on the Texas Capitol in Austin is in custody after state authorities say they received a tip about the alleged threat and worked through the night to track down a suspect.
The Texas State Department of Public Safety and the FBI thwarted a "credible threat" against the state capitol, according to a notice sent to Texas state senators Wednesday and reviewed by ABC News. The alleged attack was to occur on Thursday, according to the notice and Texas DPS.
2 employees killed, 1 hurt in workplace shooting in Virginia; suspect dead: PoliceTexas DPS said it learned of the threat Tuesday evening. Special agents worked alongside the FBI and local partners before arresting 40-year-old Benny Caldera Jr., whom it called the "main suspect," at his residence in Converse, Texas, at around 3 a.m. Wednesday.
Caldera was transported to the Bexar County jail and has been charged with felony terroristic threat against a public servant, according to Texas DPS.
Eric Gay/AP Photo - The Texas State Capitol building is seen in Austin, Texas, Sept. 3, 2026.According to an official briefed on the investigation, the suspect had allegedly been threatening to conduct a mass shooting at the Texas Capitol on Thursday and had been collecting ammo and had guns.
Authorities were notified by people who knew the man that he has been growing more angry and potentially violent recently, the official said. Neither Caldera nor his wife are cooperating with the probe at this point, the official said, but other family members and co-workers are talking to investigators.
In recent weeks, the suspect h
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Sep 30, 2026
A man accused of plotting a "violent attack" on the Texas Capitol in Austin is in custody after state authorities say they received a tip about the alleged threat and worked through the night to track down a suspect.
The Texas State Department of Public Safety and the FBI thwarted a "credible threat" against the state capitol, according to a notice sent to Texas state senators Wednesday and reviewed by ABC News. The alleged attack was to occur on Thursday, according to the notice and Texas DPS.
2 employees killed, 1 hurt in workplace shooting in Virginia; suspect dead: PoliceTexas DPS said it learned of the threat Tuesday evening. Special agents worked alongside the FBI and local partners before arresting 40-year-old Benny Caldera Jr., whom it called the "main suspect," at his residence in Converse, Texas, at around 3 a.m. Wednesday.
Caldera was transported to the Bexar County jail and has been charged with felony terroristic threat against a public servant, according to Texas DPS.
Eric Gay/AP Photo - The Texas State Capitol building is seen in Austin, Texas, Sept. 3, 2026.According to an official briefed on the investigation, the suspect had allegedly been threatening to conduct a mass shooting at the Texas Capitol on Thursday and had been collecting ammo and had guns.
Authorities were notified by people who knew the man that he has been growing more angry and potentially violent recently, the official said. Neither Caldera nor his wife are cooperating with the probe at this point, the official said, but other family members and co-workers are talking to investigators.
In recent weeks, the suspect h
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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 decided not to pursue charges.
On Tuesday, CBS New York published excerpts from a Nov. 14, 2024, interview with police, 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 gan
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Sep 30, 2026
LSU's Tiger Stadium in Baton Rouge, La. (Stacy Revere / Getty Images file)A Louisiana State University student who claims a school football player raped her last year is speaking out about how the school handled her report and the lack of guidance she said she received throughout the process.
Kendall Danielle Francis talked on TikTok about the monthslong Title IX investigation that played out after she reported the October rape to the school. Two days into the current semester, she said, she received an email while she was in class to notify her that the student, who had been suspended for two semesters, had his punishment modified upon appeal to four semesters' probation. He would remain on campus and could continue to play football, she said.
"Now I am just trying to speak on my story, because LSU does really protect their athletes, especially their football players," Francis, who was 18 at the time of the alleged incident, said in the Sept. 14 social media post. As a result of the student's remaining on campus, Francis said, she moved her classes online.
Francis wasn't aware that filing the Title IX complaint was
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Sep 30, 2026
The winning entry of a prestigious scientific photography competition is being re-evaluated following criticism from other scientists that it was made with AI.
Nikon's annual Small World In Motion contest accepts photos and video taken using powerful microscopes, and has run annually for the last 15 years.
The winner was a short video submitted by Dr Ning Xu, a researcher at Tsinghua University in China, which claims to be footage of tiny, hair-like structures called cilia moving inside the airways of a child with a rare disease.
Xu did not respond to the BBC's request for comment, but has posted online denying he broke the competition rules.
In a response to a post by Nikon on LinkedIn, he did not dispute using AI within the image processing but said he remained within the rules of the contest.
"AI was not used to generate the experimental movie, the cilia, or their motion," he said.
Xu's video is artificially brightly coloured - common in microscopy and permitted in the contest - which is usually done manually using stains and dyes on the sample itself.
He accepted AI was used "to distinguish and visualize features in the reconstructed grayscale images".
But the ch
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Sep 30, 2026
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth made a flurry of announcements during a wide-ranging speech to active-duty officers Wednesday.
At the beginning of the address, the Pentagon chief stuck to his bread and butter: culture-war grievances, stripping the "woke" out of the Department of Defense (DOD), bashing the news media for its coverage of the Iran war, and proclaiming the "warrior ethos" has been revived and the U.S. military has been "rebuilt."
But the Defense secretary made several newsy announcements that lean into Hegseth's elevation of faith, create a combatant command, partner the Pentagon with different universities and tease a new domestic military base for which governors will compete.
Here are the takeaways from Hegseth's 52-minute speech at Marine Corps Base Quantico in Virginia:
New combatant command focused on autonomous warfare
Hegseth announced the formation of a new four-star combatant command focused on developing autonomous warfare like drones and defense robotics.
The Defense secretary said it would have "service-like authorities built to scale autonomous and robotic capabilities across the joint force in the fastest peacetime shift in modern military history," with the aim of being operational by Oct. 1 next year.
The Autonomous Warfare Command, or "AutoWarCom," will be initially led by Owen West, a former Mar
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Sep 30, 2026
Passengers on a flight to Israel have recounted how they subdued a pilot after he stabbed the other pilot and appeared to be trying to disable the plane, while others described the "terrifying" moment they thought they would die.
Appearing in a bloodstained shirt after the ordeal, Yaniv Hayun told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu he realised something was wrong when the aircraft suddenly dropped.
The plane, en route from Dubai to Tel Aviv, plummeted 17,000ft (5,200m) in less than two minutes.
"Someone screamed... the light went out," Hayun said in a video posted by the prime minister on social media.
He and others tried to push open the cockpit door, but the pilot who had been stabbed was very close to it, so it was hard to open. Before he collapsed, the injured pilot managed to open the door.
When Hayun and another man entered the cockpit, he said he saw one pilot down and the attacker on the instruments, between the two seats, "trying to destroy the instruments in order to...disable the plane".
"I grabbed the attacker, put him in a chokehold, and pulled him - first and foremost - outside," Hayun said.
"We pulled him out; it was a matter of seconds. I called out to the Israeli guys with us on the plane - I called them, and two other guys came over to me... we pinned [the attacker] down to keep him secure."
Hayun said he then jumped back into the cockpit and "started pulling the controls".
When asked by Netanyahu whether he knew what he was doing, the passenger answered: "I watch Air Crash Investigation, Mr Prime Minister."
Hayun said the plane then started to level out. By then, two on-duty pilots who had been in the passenger cabin were at the front of the plane, and one told Hayun he was taking control from there.
Netanyahu praised Hayun, calling him a "great hero" and a "lion".
Another passenger, Zvika Meness, told Israeli public broadcaster Kan he helped overpower the attacker
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Sep 30, 2026
Cornell University agreed Wednesday to initiate an independent investigation into how the Ivy League school handled what a former student now alleges was fraternity house gang rape, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said on Wednesday.
Hochul discussed the case during an exclusive interview Wednesday afternoon at her Midtown offices. The governor sits on the Cornell University board.
The governor called for the outside review, saying what happened raised "serious questions about Cornell campus culture" and whether the university is doing all it can to protect students.
"I wanted to make sure they knew how important this was, and they absolutely agreed. And they're acting on this this afternoon. So, they'll be reporting on what the details are, but they will be conducting what I asked for, which is an independent outside investigation of what happened," Hochul said.
"People need to know the truth and I think it's important for the public, for the victim, her family and the university community to know that their university did everything that they're supposed to do."
Cornell's internal data show 35% of undergraduate women reported experiencing sexual assault during their time on campus but Hochul said the problem acute on every campus.
"There's been a culture of this kind of treatment of young women on campuses for as long as I've been in college, and it has to change. There has to be an awakening and an awareness that says enough is enough," Hochul said.
Earlier this week, as outrage over the allegations grew, the Tompkins County district attorney decided to
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Sep 30, 2026
Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr has been a staunch defender of President Donald Trump and gone after some of his critics. (Al Drago / Getty Images file)Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr said Wednesday that new pro-Trump TV ads paid for with government funds don't "merit any sort of FCC review."
"It doesn't strike me as anything at all out of the ordinary," Carr said of the ads, which have aired across the country in recent weeks.
Asked about allegations that the ads are "propaganda," Carr laughed.
The White House has "explained that these are just normal-course public service announcements, PSAs, that you see all the time. I don't think there's anything unique or different about it," he said at a news conference.
"There's nothing in there that strikes me that merit any sort of FCC review," said Carr, whom Trump appointed to the agency.
A reporter pointed out that the progressive advocacy group Public Citizen filed a complaint with the FCC noting that the Trump campaign used one of the ads in 2024.
Carr brushed off the concern, telling reporters that "there's groups on the
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Sep 30, 2026
Major changes are coming on Oct. 1 for the tens of millions of Americans who rely on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) for food assistance from the federal government.
In the short term, most families will see a slight bump in their monthly payments to help afford groceries. But in the coming months, households will face stricter eligibility requirements and changes to how the benefits are administered that could ultimately result in far fewer benefits.
An estimated five million Americans -- including more than 1 million children -- have already lost SNAP assistance over the past year as part of President Donald Trump's signature tax and spending law, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
Short-term boost in benefits
Every year on Oct. 1, the federal government adjusts its monthly SNAP benefits to account for inflation. These cost-of-living adjustments apply across all states.
For a typical single-person household in one of 48 states (not including Alaska or Hawaii), checks will go from a maximum of $298 to $306 per month. That's an extra $8 monthly.
Joe Raedle/Getty Images - PHOTO: A sign indicates the store accepts SNAP benefits, April 21, 2026, in Miami.What to know about SNAP as benefits set to expire amid government shutdownFor a family of four, checks will go from $994 to $1,023 per month. That's an extra $29 per month, or $348 per year.
These inflation adjustments are intended to help families keep up with the rising cost of food. Grocery prices are up 2.2% in the past year.
Big funding changes
Whil
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Sep 30, 2026
A Parkside Pediatrics provider assessing a patient with measles symptoms in Spartanburg, South Carolina, on 30 January 2026.Photograph: The Washington Post/Getty Images
Pennsylvania has reported its fifth measles-associated death of 2026 as the state's ongoing outbreak climbs to 943 confirmed cases across 39 counties.
The Pennsylvania department of health said on Wednesday that an unvaccinated Lancaster county resident who tested positive for measles had died. Health officials did not release further information about the individual, citing privacy protections.
The death marks the fifth Pennsylvania resident to meet the state's definition of a measles-associated death this year after a fourth death two weeks ago. Due to how the Trump administration has changed its method for reporting measles deaths, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has not counted the Pennsylvania measles deaths in its national tally.
As of Monday 28 September, Pennsylvania had recorded 40 new positive cases. The outbreak has now reached 39 counties, with 943 cumulative confirmed cases, 176 hospitalizations and five confirmed measles-associated deaths.
Only four of those confirmed cases have involved vaccinated individuals, representing less than 1% of the state's total cases.
Health officials say daily totals can change, but monitoring the numbers gives residents and healthcare providers a clearer picture of community transmission across Pennsylvania and
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Sep 30, 2026
NASA's Swift Observatory orbits above Earth in an artist's concept. - Goddard Space Flight Center/NASA
A celebrated space telescope is rapidly dipping from its once-stable orbit and falling to Earth just shy of the 22nd anniversary of its launch.
The Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory will soon have to cease its science observations after a daring rescue mission's attempt to boost its orbit failed over the summer.
Named after fast-flying birds, the telescope could quickly pivot to observe blink-and-you-miss-it cosmic events like flaring black holes. The telescope was originally designed to study the most powerful explosions in the universe, called gamma-ray bursts, but scientists have also used it to observe other types of cosmic flashes, as well as asteroids and comets.
The 3,200-pound (1,452-kilogram) observatory is currently located about 200 miles (325 kilometers) above Earth. But engineers estimate that once Swift drifts below 185 miles (300 kilometers) in early to mid-October, operating the telescope will become a challenge, according to NASA. Then, Swift will drop from orbit and is expected to burn up in Earth's atmosphere during the plunge.
"While it's possible some hardware from the Swift spacecraft may survive re-entry due to its size, the probability of debris causing significant property damage or physical harm to any
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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.
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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
(Dreamstime)
The Federal Reserve's inspector general on Wednesday cleared former Chair Jerome Powell of criminal wrongdoing in the central bank's $2.4 billion headquarters renovation while faulting Fed managers for weak cost controls that led to a roughly $1 billion overrun.
The 120-page evaluation from Fed Inspector General Michael Horowitz found that "at no point" during a yearlong review did investigators uncover "reasonable grounds to believe that a violation of federal criminal law had occurred" in the renovation of the Marriner S. Eccles and 1951 Constitution Avenue NW buildings.
The office also did not identify administrative misconduct by Powell, who requested the review in July 2025 as White House pressure intensified.
The findings collapse the central premise of a criminal probe launched by U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro, who examined whether Powell misled Congress in June 2025 testimony about the project's ballooning cost.
That inquiry was closed on April 24 after Chief U.S. District Judge James Boasberg quashed the grand jury subpoenas in March, as The Hill reported, finding a "mountain of evidence" that the subpoenas were intended to pressure Powell to cut interest rates rather than to pursue a genuine crime.
Horowitz's team documented deep structural failures in how the Fed's Board of Governors ran the project. The construction budget more tha
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