Rachel Olding

A federal grand jury has indicted Trump loyalist Peter Navarro on contempt of Congress charges after he repeatedly ghosted the House committee investigating the Capitol riot. Navarro refused to comply “in any way” with a subpoena issued by the committee, the Justice Department said Friday. More to come Source link

The pro-gun Republican congressman representing Uvalde, who has come under fire this week for dodging questions on gun control and for previously boasting about opposing gun legislation, claimed on Friday morning that he had received “new information” that school shooter Salvador Ramos was arrested four years ago for threatening to shoot up a school. But the claim appears to be false, according to a local media report and the spouse of the trooper who investigated it at the time. “This wasn’t hearsay. I got this late last night: ‘The shooter was arrested years ago, four years ago, for having this plan […]

All 19 kids and two teachers killed in the massacre at Texas’ Robb Elementary School were in a single fourth-grade classroom where the shooter had barricaded himself as local cops tried to smash windows to free students, officials said. Tuesday’s horrific incident began when Salvador Ramos, an unemployed and increasingly aggressive 18-year-old who had recently dropped out of high school, shot his grandmother, whom he lived with in a modest bungalow in Uvalde decorated with a religious cross and a Christmas wreath. He then took off in a truck but crashed in a ditch near Robb Elementary, a school of about […]

An Alabama dog lover affectionately known in her community as “the mouth of the South” was viciously mauled to death by her neighbor’s canines in an early morning attack on Sunday. Ronda Persall, 57, died after two dogs somehow escaped her neighbor’s yard at around 2:30 a.m. and pounced on her on a road in the small community of Jones Chapel. Cullman County officials said the dogs, both lab mixes, were “confined and being tested” while the sheriff’s office investigates. The neighbor told local TV station WBRC that it was a “mystery” to him how his dogs got out. “They can’t […]

President Donald Trump was so deeply involved in the desperate, last-ditch effort to overturn the 2020 election results that he hand-wrote strategy notes, hired at least ten lawyers to work on just one court case, and spoke regularly with one of his lead lawyers both directly and through six conduits. John Eastman, the law professor tapped by Trump to craft a legal strategy to keep him in power, detailed those extensive communications in a new court filing late Thursday as he argued it should all be shielded from the House Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection because of attorney-client privilege […]

In the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, as cases spread rapidly and deaths mounted, then-President Donald Trump threatened to withdraw help for governors who didn’t treat him “nicely,” and his aides barred the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention from giving briefings for a staggering six months, according to a trove of new information released this week. Emails between top officials from the CDC and Trump administration, released by a House panel on Friday, also revealed that Trump aides strong-armed the CDC into watering down its public-health guidance for churches in May 2020, just as houses of worship were emerging […]

A pair of phony Homeland Security agents who allegedly infiltrated the highest levels of federal law enforcement and plied agents with lavish gifts were somehow tipped off to their arrest last week, allowing them to stash guns and other items, prosecutors revealed in a new filing on Sunday. Arian Taherzadeh, 40, and Haider Ali, 36, were arrested last week when cops swarmed the upscale Crossing Apartments in Washington, D.C.’s Navy Yard neighborhood, bringing what appears to be an extraordinary two-year-long ruse to an end. The pair were charged with false impersonation of a federal officer for allegedly running an elaborate scheme […]

A federal judge permanently blocked Florida’s new voter suppression laws from going into effect on Thursday, issuing a blistering ruling that said the bill unfairly and unconstitutionally violated minorities’ voting rights. U.S. District Judge Mark Walker blocked three major components of the sweeping bill from going into effect because they suppressed Black voters: A requirement that third-party voter registration drives include warnings, such as telling voters their registrations might not be done in time to vote; New limits on ballot drop-boxes including confining them to early voting hours unless they’re in a supervisor’s office and requiring them to be guarded at […]

Trailblazing diplomat and politician Madeleine Albright, who became the the first female secretary of state in 1997, died on Wednesday of cancer, her family said. She was 84. “She was surrounded by family and friends. We have lost a loving mother, grandmother, sister, aunt and friend,” the statement said. Source link

A maternity hospital in the southern port city of Mariupol was bombed by Russian forces on Wednesday, Ukrainian authorities claimed, marking a brutal new low in the two-week old invasion. “Direct strike of Russian troops at the maternity hospital. People, children are under the wreckage. Atrocity! How much longer will the world be an accomplice ignoring terror?,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky tweeted. Footage shared by the country’s Ministry of Defense showed smoke rising from the destroyed building. The city council wrote on Facebook that the destruction was “colossal.” “It’s all one complex—a maternity and children’s hospital. A lot of dead and […]

Four cars and a bus were left teetering on the edge of disaster when a Pittsburgh bridge collapsed early Friday morning, sending chunks of concrete tumbling into a park below. Photos from the scene show cars trapped in a chasm of cracked concrete and snow, and a bus teetering just inches from a huge crack spanning the bridge. Pennsylvania Lt. Gov. John Fetterman told CNN that there were no fatalities, miraculously. CBS Pittsburgh reported 10 people with minor injures. “It’s surreal, the entire span of the bridge has collapsed into the park and the walking trail below,” Fetterman said. Thankfully, he […]

Rooney Mara, a two-time Academy Award nominee for her star turn in 2011’s The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo and her lead role in 2015’s Carol, has been tapped to play Audrey Hepburn in a forthcoming biopic. Variety reports that Mara, 36, will also produce the Apple production. Luca Guadagnino, the Oscar-nominated director of Call Me by Your Name, will direct the film and the script will be written by The Giver co-writer Michael Mitnick. Depicting Hepburn will be no easy feat. The British actress and humanitarian is considered one of the all-time screen legends, with iconic performances in Breakfast at […]

A Florida real estate agent was fatally ambushed as she tried to sell a home on Thursday, and police have arrested a 51-year-old man described by neighbors as a “disgruntled tenant” who had recently moved out of the home. Sara Trost, a young mom from the United Kingdom who started her own business flipping discount homes in South Florida, was sitting in her Jeep in the home’s driveway at 12:30 p.m. when she was shot multiple times, police said. A neighbor, Roben Cipriani, said he was on a work call at home when he heard two gunshots. “I turn to my […]

Julio Patino spoke to his son, Franco, by phone on Friday afternoon as Franco was celebrating a 21st birthday at the Astroworld Festival in Houston with his high school buddy Jake Jurinek. “He was happy and eating with his friend. He was having fun,” Patino told The Daily Beast by phone on Sunday. But by the end of the night, Franco and Jake were both dead, among the eight victims crushed and trampled by a surging crowd at a festival that several attendees have since said was poorly organized, chaotic, and understaffed. Red flags had already emerged earlier in the afternoon, […]

Travis Scott’s festival performance on Friday night wasn’t shut down for a full 40 minutes after police declared it a “mass casualty event” and asked promoters to pull the plug, according to a timeline provided by officials Saturday afternoon. Eight people died and 23 people were hospitalized after a panic-fueled crowd crush at the Astroworld Festival. Among the casualties was a 10-year-old boy who remains in critical condition. The eight victims’ ages ranged from 14 to 27. Houston Police Chief Troy Finner said a mass casualty declaration was triggered around 9:30 p.m., about half an hour into Scott’s set, and first […]

Moments before Las Vegas Raiders wide receiver Henry Ruggs III’s fiery fatal crash early Tuesday morning, a security guard noticed a Corvette flying by at incredible speed. Just 10 seconds later, Alex Hart, who was patrolling an apartment complex on Las Vegas’ South Rainbow Boulevard, “heard a vehicle trying to stop as tires were screeching, followed by a loud collision,” the complex’s owner said in a statement to 8 News Now on Friday. Hart ran down the street to find Ruggs lying on the road beside his smashed up Corvette, and a Toyota RAV4 with Tina Tintor, 23, and her 3-year-old […]

Rapper Fetty Wrap was arrested at a music festival in New York on Thursday on federal drug charges. The FBI took the musician, real name William Junior Maxwell II, into custody at Citi Field late Thursday afternoon, a law enforcement source confirmed to The Daily Beast. He was scheduled to perform at 4:45 p.m. at the Rolling Loud music festival but some festivalgoers complained on Twitter that he never appeared. He is expected to be arraigned in Central Islip Federal Court on Friday. An indictment has not yet been unsealed. Maxwell, 30, was one of six people arrested for a drug […]

The body of Miya Marcano, a Florida college student who vanished after repeatedly rejecting romantic overtures from a maintenance worker in her apartment complex, was found on Saturday morning. “Obviously this is not the update I wanted to give everyone today,” Orange County Sheriff John Mina said at a press conference. “Our hearts are broken.” Marcano was last seen on Sept. 24 and was reported missing when she didn’t board a flight home to see her family. Three days later, Armando Caballero, later named the prime suspect by cops, was found dead of an apparent suicide. Caballero, 27, worked at the […]

South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem tried to mop up the damage from a nightmare week with a three-minute YouTube video released on Friday that defected blame to “the media.” Noem has been accused of strong-arming the state into giving her daughter a real estate license. Days after Kassidy Peters’ application to become a certified real estate appraiser was rejected, Noem brought the employee in charge of the relevant agency, as well as the woman’s supervisor and the state labor secretary, to her office. Noem’s daughter was also present at the meeting, the Associated Press reported. The 70-year-old head of the state’s […]

An Arizona man who claimed he was targeted in a terrifying Proud Boys “assassination” plot has been found dead in a suspected homicide, according to authorities. Officers from the El Mirage Police Department found Thomas Christopher Retzlaff, 55, dead at his home on Sept. 1 with unspecified “fatal injuries,” spokesperson Timothy Mason told the Phoenix New Times. Police had been asked to do a welfare check by his wife. The death was ruled a homicide by the Maricopa Medical Examiner, the New Times reported. Hanszen Laporte, a law firm that was representing Retzlaff in a slew of convoluted lawsuits, confirmed his […]

The owner of a private COVID testing clinic turned right-wing provocateur Candace Owens away for spreading COVID misinformation and discouraging mask use, according to a screenshot of an email posted online by Owens. “We cannot support anyone who has pro-actively worked to make this pandemic worse by spreading misinformation, politicizing and DISCOURAGING the wearing of masks and actively dissuading people from receiving life-saving vaccinations,” the owner wrote. “My team and myself have worked overtime, to exhaustion, unpaid and underpaid this past year, spending our own capital to ensure that our community remains protected. It would be unfair to them and to […]

Charlie Watts, one of the original members of The Rolling Stones, died on Tuesday at the age of 80, his London publicist said in a statement. “It is with immense sadness that we announce the death of our beloved Charlie Watts,” the statement said. “He passed away peacefully in a London hospital earlier today surrounded by his family.” The statement described him as “one of the greatest drummers of his generation” and a “cherished husband, father and grandfather.” Earlier this month, Watts was forced to bow out of the band’s upcoming U.S. stadium tour after undergoing an unspecified medical procedure. A […]

Shortly after 42 people were killed in Gaza City on Sunday morning, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gave a televised address in which he vowed to continue launching airstrikes “full-force.” Airstrikes on a major downtown street in Gaza City in the early hours of Sunday razed three residential buildings and killed dozens in the space of just five minutes, Palestinian health officials said. Among them were 10 children and 16 women. At least 50 people were wounded, and rescue crews spent the day sifting through the rubble, pulling out some survivors. It was the single deadliest attack in Gaza since the […]

Last summer, as Black Lives Matter protests erupted across the country and the presidential election campaign was in full swing, the FBI in San Diego was keeping a close eye on Grey Zamudio. Zamudio was part of a Facebook group called Defend East County that had been encouraging and celebrating violence against BLM protesters. “The only good liberal is a dead liberal,” Zamudio had written, according to an FBI affidavit. “It’s up to vigilantie [sic] militia to crush the liberal terrorists,” he allegedly wrote in another post, alongside photos of him in combat gear and videos of him reloading and shooting […]

Police in Houston received a tip about a possible kidnapping case on Thursday night, but what they eventually found left them shocked. After working through the night to verify the tip, police on Friday raided a two-story home on Chessington Drive, a quiet street in the southwest suburbs with manicured lawns and American flags hanging from beige homes. Inside, they found 91 people crammed onto every inch of wooden floor, Daryn Edwards, assistant chief of Houston Police’s Homeland Security Command, said in a Friday press briefing. “It was a big surprise when we got in the house and saw what we […]

The medical examiner who wrote the controversial report on George Floyd’s cause of death testified on Friday that the cops’ restraint “was just more than Mr. Floyd could take”—but he wouldn’t rule out the role of drugs and heart issues. Hennepin County Medical Examiner Dr. Andrew Baker’s testimony provided a small glimmer of hope for Derek Chauvin’s defense team after a devastating week of evidence in which the Minneapolis Police Chief said the former officer “absolutely” violated protocol, and two renowned medical experts said Floyd died of low oxygen caused by the cops’ actions alone. Baker’s official report listed Floyd’s cause […]

Two weeks before he allegedly rammed his car into two police officers guarding the U.S. Capitol, killing one of them, Noah Green posted an article on his Facebook page titled, “Lull Before the Storm.” “An Intro to the Honorable Elijah Muhammad and his divine warning to us all during these last days of our world as we know it. Satan’s rule over us is up,” the 25-year-old’s apocalyptic post said, linking to an article from Final Call, the official newspaper of the Nation of Islam. Green’s social media posts suggest he was spiraling in the lead up to the attack on […]

Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club is dealing with a coronavirus outbreak. But that doesn’t mean the parties stop. On Sunday, the club will host a 500-person fundraiser for a childrens’ charity—complete with vintage cars, Lamborghinis, Ferraris, and “everybody playing by the pool,” according to Palm Beach realtor Valentina Aved, who helped organize the event. The $375-a-head, invite-only party benefitting Place of Hope is sold out, Aved says, and nobody seems concerned about the outbreak. “It will be a very exciting event. The most beautiful cars, people, good friends,” she told The Daily Beast. The charity’s Instagram likewise promised “hundreds of historic cars […]

As the walls closed in on New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Friday with dozens of Democratic lawmakers calling for him to go, he invoked a new defense to accusations of sexual harassment: It’s cancel culture. “Politicians who don’t know a single fact but yet form a conclusion and then [an] opinion are, in my opinion, reckless and dangerous,” he said during a phone briefing that was supposed to be about coronavirus. “That, my friends, is politics at its worst. People know the difference between playing politics, bowing to cancel culture, and the truth.” Pressure for him to resign reached fever […]

New York health officials have undercounted the number of COVID-19 nursing home deaths by up to 50 percent in some cases, the state’s attorney general has revealed in a bombshell report. Attorney General Letitia James said the Department of Health’s public data dramatically obscured the true number of deaths in a state that has already logged more deaths than any other state. New York was ravaged by the virus early in the pandemic, and its effects were felt most acutely in the state’s nursing homes. More than 42,000 deaths have been recorded, of which 8,500 were nursing home residents. Gov. Andrew […]

President Trump will spend the last 12 days of his presidency cut off from Twitter completely after the company imposed a permanent suspension on his personal account Friday due to the risk of “further incitement to violence.” “After close review of recent Tweets from the @realDonaldTrump account and the context around them — specifically how they are being received and interpreted on and off Twitter — we have permanently suspended the account due to the risk of further incitement of violence,” the company said in a blog post. A Facebook source told The Daily Beast that a permanent ban from their […]

COVID-positive Rudy Giuliani called into another cringe-worthy “hearing” on election fraud claims on Thursday and managed to take his already-ludicrous conspiracy theory up another notch. Speaking before Georgia State House Republicans, he claimed that a video of election officials counting ballots in Atlanta’s State Farm Arena not only showed them “stealing votes” but also passing out drugs. Giuliani initially claimed last week that the “smoking gun” clip showed officials usher observers and reporters out of the room at 11 p.m. then pull out suitcases of stolen votes. On Thursday, he added: “Look at that woman, look at her taking those ballots […]

President Donald Trump’s son, Don Jr., has become the latest figure in the Trump orbit to test positive for the coronavirus, The Daily Beast has confirmed. He tested positive at the start of the week and has been quarantining in his cabin, a spokesperson said. “He’s been completely asymptomatic so far and is following all medically recommended COVID-19 guidelines,” the spokesperson added. Bloomberg first reported his positive test result. The virus continues to cripple the White House and Trump’s inner circle, even after the president himself was hospitalized with the virus weeks before the Nov. 3 election. On Friday, Rudy Giuliani’s […]