Author: PolitCens

In a joint appearance Monday morning, President-elect Donald Trump and Masayoshi Son, chairman and CEO of the Japanese technology conglomerate SoftBank Group, announced that the company would invest $100 billion in U.S. companies over the coming four years, saying that the infusion of cash would create 100,000 jobs in fields such as artificial intelligence.

Son attributed the decision to make the investment directly to Trump’s win in last month’s presidential election.

“I would really like to celebrate the great victory of President Trump,” Son said. “My confidence level [in] the economy of the United States has tremendously increased with his victory. So, because of that, I’m now excited to commit this 100 billion dollars and 100,000 jobs into the United States.”

In introducing Son, Trump pointed out that eight years ago, after Trump’s victory in the 2016 election, SoftBank had made a similar pledge, promising $50 billion in U.S. investments and 50,000 new jobs.

“And they did,” Trump said. “They kept that promise in every way, shape and form.”

The president-elect then went on to press Son to double his pledge, saying “I’m going to ask him right now. Would you make it $200 billion?”

Son reiterated his promise of $100 billion, but said he would “try” to get to $200 billion.

“All right. $200 billion,” Trump said.

Son burst into laughter, telling the crowd Trump is “a great negotiator.”

‘Trump effect’

After the announcement Monday, Trump’s rapid response director, Jake Schneider, sent media outlets an email attributing the announcement to what he called the “Trump Effect.”

“President Trump is already delivering on his commitment to re-make America into the world’s manufacturing superpower once again — and he hasn’t even taken office yet,” Schneider wrote. “It’s all centered around his Made in America agenda, which incentivizes companies that make their products in America with American workers.”

He added, “In January, President Trump will immediately begin implementing bold reforms to restore the nation to full prosperity and make sure AI, emerging technologies, and the other industries of tomorrow are created, built, and grown in the United States.”

Hits and misses

Since founding SoftBank in 1981 at age 24, Son has become one of the most storied — and controversial — technology investors in the world. The company has several investment funds and owns significant shares of hundreds of companies across multiple fields, including telecommunication, robotics, internet services, e-commerce, artificial intelligence and much more.

Throughout his decades-long career, Son has made headlines for spectacular victories as well as disastrous failures. For a time, at the beginning of 2000, he claimed to be the world’s richest man, with a fortune worth an estimated $78 billion amassed by buying up internet startups. However, the collapse of the dotcom bubble just months later wiped out more than 90% of his wealth.

Son started rebuilding his business that same year, and a $20 million investment that bought SoftBank a 34% ownership share in a little-known Chinese e-commerce startup known as Alibaba would prove key to his fortunes. In 2014, Alibaba went public at a price that valued SoftBank’s shares at $58 billion, some 2,900 times its initial investment.

Along the way, Son successfully managed to merge mobile telecommunications firms T-Mobile and Sprint, creating one of the largest U.S. service providers in 2020. Just two years later, though, SoftBank suffered disastrous losses with the collapse of the office-sharing startup WeWork, in which it had invested heavily, as well as other failed investments by in-house venture and hedge funds.

At the time, Son announced that he was retiring from public life. However, by 2023, he was back in the headlines when ARM Holdings, a British computer chip design firm that SoftBank bought at a valuation of $30.8 billion in 2016, went public in the U.S. at a valuation of $54.5 billion.

Choosing the West over China

Lionel Barber, the former editor-in-chief of the Financial Times, told VOA that he believes Son’s appearance at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort Monday signals more than just an international investor seeking to get on the good side of an incoming U.S. president.

Barber is the author of Gambling Man: The Wild Ride of Masayoshi Son, the first biography of the investor by a Western author, which will be published in the U.S. next month. He said that when Son made his pledge of $50 billion in 2016, he and Trump had clearly aligned interests.

“Trump wanted a big signal about business confidence in the Trump agenda and Masayoshi Son and SoftBank wanted to get in with the new Republican administration with an eye to getting [a] blessing for his big project, which was Sprint merging with T-Mobile,” Barber told VOA by phone.

Now, though, he sees something larger at play.

“Obviously, the world looks very different. Eight years on, we’ve got wars around the world, and we’ve also got de-risking and decoupling between China and the West,” Barber said.

In his last interview with him, Barber told VOA, Son said that he had realized that it was necessary for SoftBank to make a choice between China and the West.

Paraphrasing Son, Barber said, “He basically said, ‘We understand the world’s changed. We’ve been a global investor. We’ve been the biggest investor in China and the biggest investor in America. But now we have to choose. We’ve chosen the West.’”

“So, I see his getting into Mar-a-Lago as [saying], ‘I’ve chosen the West. I’ve chosen America, and I’m going with Trump.’”

Investment details unclear

The announcement at Mar-a-Lago did not include any details about specific investments that SoftBank intends to make, and not all foreign investments touted by Trump over the years have come to pass.

Taiwanese electronics manufacturer Foxconn in 2017 promised a $10 billion investment in a manufacturing facility in Wisconsin that was later dramatically scaled back.

Even SoftBank’s 2016 pledge is difficult to consider truly fulfilled unless the more than $20 billion the company poured into Sprint in 2013 — three years before making the pledge — is included in the total.

Barber, Son’s biographer, said he has some doubts about SoftBank’s ability to identify $100 billion in U.S. investments over the course of four years.

“I’m not saying it’s impossible, but I haven’t figured out how he gets to 100 billion, yet,” Barber said.

However, he said, it’s also important not to underestimate Son’s ability to achieve unexpected successes.

“You can’t write him off,” Barber said. “That’s what he does. He’s a bloody genius in that respect.”
…

NEW YORK — A judge Monday rejected President-elect Donald Trump’s bid to have his hush money conviction dismissed because of the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent ruling on presidential immunity. But the case’s overall future remains unclear.

Manhattan Judge Juan Merchan’s decision eliminates one potential off-ramp from the case ahead of Trump’s return to office next month. His lawyers have raised other arguments for dismissal, however.

Prosecutors have said there should be some accommodation for his upcoming presidency, but they insist the conviction should stand.

Trump’s lawyer did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

A jury convicted Trump in May of 34 counts of falsifying business records related to a $130,000 hush money payment to porn actor Stormy Daniels in 2016. Trump denies wrongdoing.

The allegations involved a scheme to hide the payout to Daniels during the final days of Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign to keep her from publicizing — and keep voters from hearing — her claim of a sexual encounter with the married then-businessman years earlier. He says nothing sexual happened between them.

A month after the verdict, the Supreme Court ruled that ex-presidents can’t be prosecuted for official acts — things they did in the course of running the country — and that prosecutors can’t cite those actions to bolster a case centered on purely personal, unofficial conduct.

Trump’s lawyers then cited the Supreme Court opinion to argue that the hush money jury got some improper evidence, such as Trump’s presidential financial disclosure form, testimony from some White House aides and social media posts made while he was in office.

In Monday’s ruling, Merchan denied the bulk of Trump’s claims that some of prosecutors’ evidence related to official acts and implicated immunity protections.

The judge said that even if he found that some evidence related to official conduct, he’d still find that prosecutors’ decision to use “these acts as evidence of the decidedly personal acts of falsifying business records poses no danger of intrusion on the authority and function of the Executive Branch.”

Even if prosecutors had erroneously introduced evidence that could be challenged under an immunity claim, Merchan continued, “such error was harmless in light of the overwhelming evidence of guilt.”

Prosecutors had said the evidence in question was only “a sliver” of their case.

Trump communications director Steven Cheung on Monday called Merchan’s decision a “direct violation of the Supreme Court’s decision on immunity, and other longstanding jurisprudence.”

“This lawless case should have never been brought, and the Constitution demands that it be immediately dismissed,” Cheung said in a statement.

The Manhattan district attorney’s office, which prosecuted the case, declined to comment.

Trump takes office January 20.
…

The U.S. Census Bureau is changing how it counts immigrants in annual estimates by including more people who were admitted for humanitarian, and often temporary, reasons. 

The change is being made in an effort to better reflect population shifts this decade, officials said Monday. Population estimates, including immigration, are due to be released Thursday showing how the populations of the United States and the 50 states changed this year. However, the new approach to counting immigrants will only be reflected nationally. 

The percentage of U.S. residents who were foreign born rose to its highest level in more than a century in 2023. It could be even higher under the new methodology. Census Bureau officials wouldn’t say Monday how much larger they expected the immigration figures to be in Thursday’s release because of the change. 

Capturing the number of new immigrants is the most difficult part of the annual U.S. population estimates. Although the newly announced change in methodology is unrelated, the timing comes a month before a return to the White House of President-elect Donald Trump, who has promised mass deportations of people in the United States illegally. 

“We feel confident that this was a good approach in order to make our estimates more current and reflect recent trends that we’ve seen,” said Eric Jensen, a senior research scientist at the Census Bureau. 

The bureau’s annual calculation of how many migrants entered the United States in the 2020s has been much lower than the numbers cited by other federal agencies, such as the Congressional Budget Office. The Census Bureau estimated 1.1 million immigrants entered the United States in 2023, while the Congressional Budget Office’s estimate was 3.3 million people. 

The group of people being included in the international migration estimates are those who enter the country through humanitarian parole, which has been granted for seven decades by Republican and Democratic presidential administrations to people unable to use standard immigration routes because of time pressure or their government’s poor relations with the U.S. The Migration Policy Institute, a Washington-based research organization, said last week that more than 5.8 million people were admitted under various humanitarian policies from 2021 to 2024. 

Trump appears certain to dismantle humanitarian parole, saying during his campaign that he would end the “outrageous abuse of parole.” The annual population estimates released by the Census Bureau each year are calculated from births, deaths, migration to the United States and migration between states. The population estimates provide the official population counts each year between the once-a-decade census for the United States, the 50 states, counties and metro areas. The figures are used for distributing trillions of dollars in federal funding.
…

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump contended Monday that the country’s military “for some reason” was keeping details secret about unexplained drones flying across the nighttime skies above the eastern United States.

“Our military knows … something strange is going on,” Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida in his first wide-ranging news conference since his election to a new four-year term in the White House starting next month.

For weeks now, residents in the state of New Jersey, which borders New York City, and other states to the north and south along the Atlantic Ocean coastline have reported seeing more than 5,000 supposed drones, a figure U.S. officials have concluded is wildly inflated.

They say that most of the alleged unmanned drones are manned aircraft, and that fewer than 100 of the sightings need to be investigated further.

All manner of conspiracy theories has been offered for the unexplained sightings, including the dispatching of drones by foreign countries and the deployment of Iran-launched drones from a mothership positioned off U.S. eastern coastal waters.

At a Pentagon briefing before Trump’s news conference began, Air Force Major General Pat Ryder, the Pentagon spokesman, told reporters there was “no evidence at this time that the reported drone sightings pose a national security or public safety threat, or have a foreign nexus.”

“We are sensitive to the fact that there are public concerns and many questions,” Ryder said. “We are also committed to providing as much information as possible as quickly as possible on this.”

The military has a rationale for not shooting them down, Ryder said, offering a “loose analogy” to unexplained cars traveling near military bases.

“On any given day, an unauthorized car or truck may approach one of the base gates, usually on accident,” Ryder said, and “99% of the time those cars are turned away without incident.”

“The point being is that flying drones is not illegal,” Ryder said. “There are thousands of drones flown around the U.S. on a daily basis. It’s not that unusual to see drones in the sky, nor is it an indication of malicious activity or any public safety threat.”

In recent days, Republican and Democratic officials alike have called on officials in the administration of President Joe Biden to be more forthcoming in saying what they know about the drones.

Republican Representative Michael Waltz of Florida, who is set to become Trump’s national security adviser when he takes office Jan. 20, told CBS’ Face the Nation on Sunday, “We need to get to the bottom of it.”

In his hourlong news conference, Trump touched on a wide range of topics five weeks before assuming power again and becoming the second president after Grover Cleveland in the 1890s to take over the White House for a second nonconsecutive term.

He said his reception from world leaders this time is sharply more favorable than it was in 2017 after his first presidential victory.

“It’s really the opposite of hostile. They’re calling me,” he said. “I’ve spoken to over 100 countries.”

Trump said he would not end the use of the long-accepted polio vaccine in the U.S. but questioned the mandates in many U.S. states for a range of childhood vaccines.

“I’m not really a big mandate guy,” he said, and asked rhetorically, “Why is the autism rate so high” in the United States, although any link between autism and vaccines has long been scientifically debunked.

He also questioned why Americans “are paying so much more than people in other countries” for medicines.

Trump said that he was doing his best to stop Russia’s nearly three-year war on Ukraine, and that he would have ongoing conversations with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy about a halt to the fighting.

He called much of Ukraine “a demolition site” because of Russian attacks. “People can’t go back there.”

Trump called the U.S. media “very corrupt” after winning a $15 million defamation settlement against ABC News over the weekend. He said he is planning lawsuits against other news outlets and individual journalists for what he considers to be false reporting, even as he lost other media-related suits.

The president-elect reiterated his plan to impose tariffs against imports from some of the U.S.’s biggest trading partners.

“Tariffs will make our country rich,” he contended, although individual importers pay the fees and often pass on their costs to customers buying the goods.
…

MADISON, WISCONSIN — Five people are dead and others injured after a shooting Monday at a private Christian school in Wisconsin, including a child who caused the attack, authorities said. 

Madison Police Chief Shon Barnes was speaking to reporters when the death toll rose to five from three people. He offered no details on the victims but says others were wounded in the shooting at Abundant Life Christian School. 

Barnes says police officers who responded did not fire their weapons. 

Police had blocked off roads around the school Monday afternoon. 

Agents from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives have responded to the scene to assist local law enforcement. 

“We are praying for the kids, educators, and entire Abundant Life school community as we await more information and are grateful for the first responders who are working quickly to respond,” Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers said in a statement. 

Abundant Life Christian School is nondenominational and has about 390 students, from kindergarten through high school, according to its website. 
…

WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris on Sunday thanked deep-pocketed Democratic donors who raised record sums in last month’s election loss to President-elect Donald Trump and urged them not to lose hope and to remain politically engaged.

Biden and Harris, along with their spouses, in remarks at the Democratic National Committee holiday reception sought to buck up key donors who the Democratic Party needs to stay committed as it tries to pick up the pieces. Republicans scored a decisive victory taking the White House and Senate while maintaining control of the House in an election where donors of all political stripes spent about $4.7 billion.

“We all get knocked down. My dad would say when you get knocked down, you just got to get up,” Biden said. “The measure of a person or a party is how fast they get back up.”

Harris, who stepped in as the party’s presidential nominee after Biden ended his campaign in July following his disastrous debate performance, praised donors for putting their time — and checkbooks — into backing her and Democrats that they believed in.

Democrats, their allied super PACs and other groups raised about $2.9 billion, compared to about $1.8 billion for the Republicans. Harris noted that Democrats raised a whopping $700 million over just 700 events organized by the Democratic finance committee.

“You rallied, you opened your homes, you reached out to your friends and your family,” said Harris, who will soon begin weighing in earnest her own future and whether to make another White House run. “You put your personal capital — and by that I mean your relationships — at stake to talk with people because you care so deeply, and you connected with people and took the time to remind them of what is at stake and what was at stake.”

While Biden acknowledged the sting that Democrats continue to feel about last month’s loss, he said they should take pride in what they accomplished.

The administration’s signature achievements include a $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill, the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act to boost semiconductor manufacturing in the U.S., and a surge in federal environmental spending through the Inflation Reduction Act, which Biden signed into law in 2022 after it cleared Congress solely with Democratic votes.

“We could never have gotten as much done as we did without you,” Biden said. “You not only contributed to the campaign, but you did something, I think, even more important. You were willing to lend your names, your reputation, your character to the effort.”

Biden said that he intended to remain engaged with party politics once he leaves office on Jan. 20. He also predicted that he expected Harris would remain a central character in the party’s future.

“You’re not going anywhere kid. We aren’t letting you,” Biden said to Harris.
…

Omaha, Nebraska — A tornado near a mall in central California swept up cars, uprooted trees and sent several people to the hospital. In San Francisco, authorities issued the first-ever tornado warning.

Elsewhere, inclement weather plagued areas of the U.S., with dangerous conditions including heavy snow in upstate New York, a major ice storm in Midwest states and severe weather warnings around Lake Tahoe. 

The ice storm beginning Friday evening created treacherous driving conditions across Iowa and eastern Nebraska Friday and into Saturday and prompted temporary closures of Interstate 80 after numerous cars and trucks slid off the road. In upstate New York, more than 33 inches (84 centimeters) was reported near Orchard Park, which is often a landing point for lake-effect snow.

On Saturday, a tornado touched down near a shopping mall in Scotts Valley, California, about 110 kilometers south of San Francisco, around 1:40 p.m. The tornado overturned cars and toppled trees and utility poles, the National Weather Service said. The Scotts Valley Police Department said several people were injured and taken to hospitals.

In San Francisco, some trees toppled onto cars and streets and damaged roofs. The  

damage was due to 129-kph straight-line winds, not a tornado, weather  

service meteorologist Dalton Behringer said Sunday.

Roger Gass, a meteorologist in the weather service’s office in Monterey, California, said the warning of a possible tornado in San Francisco was a first for the city, noting an advanced alert did not go out before the last tornado struck nearly 20 years ago.

“I would guess there wasn’t a clear signature on radar for a warning in 2005,” said Gass, who was not there at the time.

The fast-moving storm prompted warnings for residents to take shelter, but few people have basements in the area.

More than 30 centimeters of snow fell at some Lake Tahoe ski resorts, and 181-kph gust of wind was recorded at the Mammoth Mountain resort south of Yosemite National Park, according to the weather service’s office in Reno, Nevada. Up to 90 centimeters of snow was forecast for the Sierra Nevada mountaintops.

The weekend Tahoe Live music festival at Palisades Tahoe ski resort in California went ahead as planned in spite of a snowstorm Saturday. Lil Wayne and Diplo were scheduled to perform Sunday, the festival’s website said. An avalanche warning was in effect at least until Monday morning in the area.

Interstate 80 was closed along a 130-kilometer stretch from Applegate, California, to the Nevada line just west of Reno on Saturday. The California Highway Patrol reopened the road in the afternoon for passenger vehicles with chains or four-wheel drive and snow tires.

The severe weather in the Midwest resulted in at least one death. The Washington County Sheriff’s office in Nebraska said a 57-year-old woman died after she lost control of her pickup on Highway 30 near Arlington and hit an oncoming truck. The other driver sustained minor injuries.

Businesses announced plans to open late Saturday as temperatures rose high enough in the afternoon to melt the ice in most places.

“Luckily some warmer air is moving in behind this to make it temporary,” said Dave Cousins, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service’s office in Davenport, Iowa.

Tens of thousands of people in western Washington state lost electricity Saturday as the system delivered rain and gusty winds, local news outlets reported.
…

Denver, Colorado — Dozens of kids cheered on a festively decked-out plane in Denver on Saturday when the pilot announced their destination for the day: the North Pole.

More than 100 children, some of whom have serious health issues, were then taken on a roughly 45-minute flight near the city before landing back at Denver International Airport and being towed to a hangar transformed by United Airlines employees and volunteers into the North Pole.

Streamers, paper snowflakes and tufts of cotton resembling feathery snow dotted the plane and seats. Flight personnel paraded a bubble machine up and down the aisle to shouts of “bubbles, bubbles, bubbles” from the excited children. Holiday songs played in the background and there were apple snacks and juice for all.

Before landing, the children were asked to close their window shades. When they opened, the kids were met by the sight of a waiting Santa and Mrs. Claus and a host of elves. An ice cream truck was on hand and the children received gifts.

Bryce Bosley, 6, was tickled to see Santa and all the North Pole had to offer.

“The North Pole is fun because there’s games, food, and all the activities are really fun,” he said.

United Capt. Bob Zimmermann, the holiday flight’s pilot, was struck by the joy and wonder of the youngsters.

“Throughout the year I’ll think of the fantasy flight,” he said. “When life seems to get tough or I want to complain about something, I remember these kids and the joy and the love and what this feels like, and it just keeps my life in perspective.”

United partnered with Make-A-Wish Colorado, Girls Inc., Children’s Hospital Colorado and Rocky Mountain Down Syndrome Association to invite Denver-area kids ages 3 to 10 years on the flight.

For more than 30 years, United has staged its annual “fantasy flights” to fictional North Poles at airports around the world to bring holiday cheer to children and their families.

This year they took place in 13 cities, starting Dec. 5 in Honolulu and then in Washington, Houston, Los Angeles, London, Chicago, San Francisco, Tokyo, Cleveland and Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and on the island of Guam. Newark, New Jersey, also had a flight Saturday.

Jonna McGrath, United’s vice president for operations at its Denver hub, has participated in 29 flights and said it is one of her favorite days of the year.

“It gives them a day where they are away from some of the challenges they face in their day-to-day life,” said McGrath, who was dressed as an elf. “Bringing a little magic and some gifts to their holiday season is something they’ll never forget.”
…

President-elect Donald Trump has nominated Brendan Carr to lead the Federal Communications Commission, which regulates communications in the United States. Carr, an FCC commissioner since 2017, has taken aim at big tech and China’s influence on U.S. communications. VOA’s Dora Mekouar reports.
…

A large number of mysterious drones have been reported flying over parts of New Jersey and the East Coast in recent weeks, sparking speculation and concern over who sent them and why.

New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy wrote to President Joe Biden asking for answers. New Jersey’s new senator, Andy Kim, spent Thursday night on a drone hunt in rural northern New Jersey, and posted about it on X.

Murphy and law enforcement officials have stressed that the drones don’t appear to be a threat to public safety, but many state and municipal lawmakers have nonetheless called for stricter rules about who can fly the unmanned aircraft.

The FBI is among several agencies investigating and has asked residents to share videos, photos and other information they may have about the drones.

What’s the deal with the drones in New Jersey?

Dozens of witnesses have reported seeing them in the state starting in November.

At first they were spotted flying along the scenic Raritan River, which feeds the Round Valley Reservoir, the state’s largest aquifer, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) west of New York City.

But soon sightings were reported statewide, including near the Picatinny Arsenal, a military research and manufacturing facility, and over President-elect Donald Trump’s golf course in Bedminster.

The aircraft have also recently been spotted in coastal areas.

Republican U.S. Rep. Chris Smith said a Coast Guard commanding officer told him a dozen drones closely followed a Guard lifeboat near Barnegat Light and Island Beach State Park in Ocean County over the weekend.

Federal officials offer assurances that drones don’t pose a threat

The growing anxiety among some residents is not lost on the Biden administration, which has faced criticism from Trump for not dealing with the matter more aggressively.

In a call with reporters Saturday that was organized by the White House, senior officials from the FBI, Pentagon, FAA and other agencies sought to assure people that the drones are not a national security or public safety threat or the handywork of a malicious foreign actor.

An FBI official, who spoke on condition of anonymity under ground rules set by the White House, said the public concern is understandable but added, “I think there has been a slight overreaction.”

Pentagon spokesperson Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder said Thursday that the military’s initial assessment after consulting with the Department of Homeland Security and the National Security Council — that the drones are not of foreign origin — remained unchanged.

New Jersey congressman wants the military to take action

A New Jersey congressman has urged the Pentagon to authorize the use of force to bring down one or more drones to try to figure out who deployed them.

The objects could be downed over the ocean or in an unpopulated area on land, Smith said Saturday at a news conference.

“Why can’t we bag at least one of these drones and get to the bottom of it?” Smith said.

Rep. Jeff Van Drew, another Republican Jersey Shore-area congressman, has also called for the military to shoot down the drones.

Monmouth County Sheriff Shaun Golden said people should not take it into their own hands to shoot down drones, which would break state and federal laws.

Drones have been spotted over New York City

Drone sightings have now been reported in New York, where a permit is required, and Mayor Eric Adams said the city was investigating and collaborating with New Jersey and federal officials.

The runways at Stewart International Airport — about 60 miles (100 kilometers) north of the city — were shut down for about one hour Friday night because of drone activity in the airspace, Gov. Kathy Hochul said.

“This has gone too far,” she said in a statement.

The governor called on Congress to strengthen the FAA’s oversight of drones and give more investigative authority to state and local law enforcement.

“Extending these powers to New York State and our peers is essential,” she said. “Until those powers are granted to state and local officials, the Biden administration must step in by directing additional federal law enforcement to New York and the surrounding region to ensure the safety of our critical infrastructure and our people.”

Are these drones dangerous?

The White House has said that a review of the reported sightings shows that many of them are actually manned aircraft being flown lawfully, echoing the opinion of officials and drone experts.

The federal Homeland Security Department and FBI also said in a joint statement they have no evidence that the sightings pose “a national security or public safety threat or have a foreign nexus.”

Assemblywoman Dawn Fantasia, who was briefed by the Department of Homeland Security, said the reported drones have been up to 6 feet (1.8 meters) in diameter and sometimes travel with their lights switched off. This is much larger than those typically flown by drone hobbyists, and she said they appear to avoid detection by traditional methods such as helicopter and radio.

Who sent the drones?

Authorities say they do not know.

The FBI, Homeland Security and state police are investigating the sightings. Authorities say they don’t know if it is one drone that has been spotted many times or if there are multiple aircraft being flown in a coordinated effort.

Speculation has raged online, with some expressing concerns that the drone or drones could be part of a nefarious plot by foreign agents.

Officials stress that ongoing state and federal investigations have found no evidence to support those concerns, but Rep. Smith on Saturday echoed such speculation.

“The elusive maneuvering of these drones suggests a major military power sophistication that begs the question whether they have been deployed to test our defense capabilities — or worse — by violent dictatorships, perhaps maybe Russia, or China, or Iran, or North Korea,” he said.

Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh said Wednesday that the aircraft are not U.S. military drones.

What have officials said about the sightings?

Trump has said he believes the government knows more than it’s saying. “Let the public know, and now. Otherwise, shoot them down!!!” he posted on his social media site.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut said Thursday that the drones should be “shot down, if necessary.”

“We should be doing some very urgent intelligence analysis and take them out of the skies, especially if they’re flying over airports or military bases,” Blumenthal said.

Experts, however, warn not to shoot at anything in the sky.

Trisha Bushey, 48, of Lebanon Township, New Jersey, lives near Round Valley Reservoir where there have been numerous sightings and said she doesn’t believe the assertion that the drones aren’t a risk to public safety.

“How can you say it’s not posing a threat if you don’t know what it is?” she said. “I think that’s why so many people are uneasy.”

Are drones allowed in New Jersey?

The flying of drones for recreational and commercial use is legal in the state, but it is subject to local and Federal Aviation Administration regulations and flight restrictions.

In New York City, a permit is required to take off or land an unmanned aircraft.

Operators must be FAA-certified.

Have drones been spotted anywhere else?

Sightings also have been reported in Virginia and elsewhere.

Two people said they spotted an aircraft Thursday night near Virginia Beach that was unlike any other they’ve seen.

The object was over the ocean, and they watched as it slowly moved over an Army National Guard facility, John Knight told The Virginian-Pilot.

“It was definitely different,” said Knight, who took videos of what he thinks was a drone the size of a small truck.

“It flew like a helicopter but made no noise,” he added.

The Virginia National Guard did not have any aircraft operating in the area Thursday night, according to spokesperson A.A. “Cotton” Puryear. Its leadership is aware of the incident and it’s under investigation.

Another military installation in the area is Naval Air Station Oceana Dam Neck Annex. NAS Oceana, the East Coast master jet base in Virginia Beach, is aware of recent reports of sightings in the area and is coordinating with federal and state agencies to ensure the safety of its personnel and operations, Katie Hewett, public affairs officer, said Friday by email.

Knight submitted the videos Thursday night to the FBI tip line.

In Massachusetts, 10 to 15 drones were reported hovering over a home Thursday night in Harwich on Cape Cod. A resident told police they were bright and she observed them for more than an hour.

Earlier that evening, an off-duty police officer in the same town noticed similar activity near a public safety complex, police said. The information was forwarded to the FBI and Massachusetts State Police.

Drones were also spotted last month in the U.K. The U.S. Air Force said several small unmanned aircraft were detected near four military bases in England that are used by American forces.
…

OMAHA, NEBRASKA — A major ice storm created treacherous driving conditions across Iowa and eastern Nebraska this weekend and prompted temporary closures of Interstate 80 after numerous cars and trucks slid off the road. 

Many events were canceled across the region when the storm hit Friday evening, and businesses announced plans to open late Saturday as officials urged people to stay home if possible. Temperatures rose high enough in the afternoon to melt the ice in most places, however. 

“Luckily some warmer air is moving in behind this to make it temporary,” said Dave Cousins, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service’s office in Davenport, Iowa. 

At least one person died in a crash caused by the icy roads in eastern Nebraska. The Washington County Sheriff’s office said a 57-year-old woman died after she lost control of her pickup on Highway 30 near Arlington and hit an oncoming truck. The other driver sustained minor injuries. 

Trees topple

Elsewhere a storm and wind gusts of up to 96 kilometers per hour prompted the first tornado warning in San Francisco, California, and caused some damage. Parts of neighboring San Mateo County were also included in the warning, which went out at 5:51 a.m. to about 1 million people in the area. It was lifted by 6:15 a.m. 

The storm toppled trees onto cars and streets and damaged some roofs in San Francisco, which has not seen a tornado since 2005, according to the Weather Service. The damage was being assessed to determine if there was indeed a tornado. 

“This was the first-ever warning for a possible tornado in San Francisco. I would guess there wasn’t a clear signature on radar for a warning in 2005,” said Roger Gass, a meteorologist in the Weather Service’s Monterey, California. He said he was not there in 2005. 

The fast-moving storm prompted warnings for residents to take shelter, but few people have basements in the area. 

“The biggest thing that we tell people in the city is to put as many walls between you and the outside as possible,” meteorologist Dalton Behringer said. 

Snow falls at ski resorts

In upstate New York, people were digging out after heavy snow fell. More than 84 centimeters was reported near Orchard Park, where residents are used to dealing with lake-effect snow this time of year. 

And in Nevada, up to 91 centimeters of snow was forecast for Sierra Nevada mountaintops, with a winter storm warning in effect through 10 p.m. More than one-third of a meter fell at some Lake Tahoe ski resorts, according to the National Weather Service’s Reno office. 

Interstate 80 was closed for about an 130-kilometer stretch from Applegate, California, to the Nevada state line just west of Reno, where rain was falling and a winter weather advisory remained in effect through the afternoon. 

In western Washington, tens of thousands of people lost electricity Saturday, local news outlets reported, amid a system that brought rain and gusty winds. 
…

Hundreds of thousands of Rhode Island residents’ personal and bank information, including Social Security numbers, were likely hacked by an international cybercriminal group asking for a ransom, state officials said on Saturday. 

In what Rhode Island officials described as extortion, the hackers threatened to release the stolen information unless they were paid an undisclosed amount of money. 

The breached data affects people who use the state’s government assistance programs and includes the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families and healthcare purchased through the state’s HealthSource RI, Governor Dan McKee announced on Friday. 

Hackers gained access to RIBridges, the state’s online portal for obtaining social services earlier this month, the governor’s office said in a statement, but the breach was not confirmed by its vendor, Deloitte, until Friday. 

“Deloitte confirmed that there is a high probability that a cybercriminal has obtained files with personally identifiable information from RIBridges,” the governor’s office said in a statement on Saturday. 

A representative from McKee’s office was not immediately available to Reuters for comment. 

Anyone who has applied for or received benefits through those programs since 2016 could be affected. 

The state directed Deloitte to shut down RIBridges to remediate the threat, and for the time being, anyone applying for new benefits will have to do so on paper applications until the system is back up. 

Households believed to have been affected will receive a letter from the state notifying them of the problem and explaining steps to be taken to help protect their data and bank accounts. 
…

ABC News has agreed to give $15 million to U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s presidential library to settle a lawsuit over comments that anchor George Stephanopoulos made on air involving the civil case brought against Trump by writer E. Jean Carroll, a court document filed on Saturday showed. 

The lawsuit, filed on March 19 in U.S. District Court in Southern Florida, accused Stephanopoulos of making the statements with malice and a disregard for the truth. It said the statements were distributed widely to third parties and repeated. 

“We are pleased that the parties have reached an agreement to dismiss the lawsuit on the terms in the court filing,” an ABC News spokesperson said in a statement.   

The lawsuit cites a March 10 interview with U.S. Representative Nancy Mace, a Republican who has spoken publicly about being raped as a teenager. During the interview, Stephanopoulos said Trump was found liable for rape and asked her how she could endorse the candidate. 

According to the settlement, ABC News must publish by Sunday a statement at the bottom of a March 10 online article that accompanied the interview. 

“ABC News and George Stephanopoulos regret statements regarding President Donald J. Trump made during an interview by George Stephanopoulos with Representative Nancy Mace on ABC’s “This Week on March 10, 2024,” the statement must say, according to the court document. 
…

New York — Officials from the White House, FBI and DHS on Saturday stressed that most of the recently reported drone sightings in New Jersey and nearby states involved manned aircraft, and there was no evidence of any national security threat. 

An FBI official told reporters during an impromptu briefing that the agency was working with 50 local, state and federal partners to look into increased reports. The official said less than 100 of the over 5,000 reported sightings had turned out to merit further investigation, and all of the large fixed-wing reported sightings so far involved manned aircraft. 

“The combination of efforts so far … to include technical equipment, tip line information and noted consults has … not found any evidence to support large-scale [unmanned aerial systems] activities,” the official said, adding that many of the sightings occurred along regular flight paths. 

Extensive efforts were underway to investigate the remaining cases, using interviews and analysis of radar and intelligence, the official added. 

“We can’t ignore the sightings that have been there,” the official said. “We’re doing our best to find the origin of those drone activities, but I think there has been a slight over-reaction.” 

A spate of reported drone sightings that began in New Jersey in mid-November spread in recent days to include Maryland, Massachusetts and other states. The sightings have garnered media attention and prompted creation of a Facebook page called “New Jersey Mystery Drones — let’s solve it” with 56,000 online members. 

U.S. President Joe Biden is receiving regular updates on the issue, a White House official said. 

On Cape Cod in Massachusetts, residents and a police officer in Harwich reported seeing 10-15 drones flying in the Friday night sky, the Boston Herald reported. 

Police relayed the information to the Boston FBI and Massachusetts State Police. 

Governor Maura Healey said on Facebook that she is also “aware of a growing number of drone sightings across Massachusetts and we’re monitoring the situation closely.” 

New York Governor Kathy Hochul on Saturday called for a boost in federal law enforcement efforts after the runways at a local airport in the Hudson Valley were shut down for one hour due to drone activity on Friday. 

“This has gone too far,” Hochul said in a statement on the social media network X, urging the Biden administration to boost law enforcement in New York and other areas, and calling on Congress to pass drone reform legislation. 

An official with the Federal Aviation Administration said a temporary ban on drone activity had been put in place over Picatinny Arsenal, a military base in Wharton, New Jersey, that was due to expire on December 26 and could be made permanent. 

There had been drone sightings over Picatinny and another naval weapons station in December, a military official told reporters, but there was no intelligence or observation that they were linked to a foreign actor or had malicious intent. Drone operations over military installations are generally banned, but occur from time to time, the official added. 

A second ban was put in place over Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey, that was due to expire on Decemver 20, but could be extended, the FAA official said. 

 
…

Americans should eat more beans, peas and lentils and cut back on red and processed meats and starchy vegetables, all while continuing to limit added sugars, sodium and saturated fat.

That’s the advice released Tuesday by a panel of nutrition experts charged with counseling the U.S. government about the 2025 edition of the dietary guidelines that will form the cornerstone of federal food programs and policy.

But the 20-member panel didn’t weigh in on the growing role of ultraprocessed foods that have been linked to health problems, saying there’s not enough evidence to tell people to avoid them. And the group steered clear of updating controversial guidance on alcohol consumption, leaving that analysis to two outside reports expected to be released soon.

Overall, the recommendations for the 2025-30 Dietary Guidelines for Americans sound familiar, said Marion Nestle, a food policy expert.

“This looks like every other set of dietary guidelines since 1980: eat your veggies and reduce consumption of foods high in salt, sugar and saturated fat,” Nestle said in an email. “This particular statement says nothing about balancing calories, when overconsumption of calories, especially from ultra-processed foods, is the biggest challenge to the health of Americans.”

What the scientific panel said about healthy diets

The nutrition panel concluded that a healthy diet for people aged 2 years and older is higher in vegetables, fruits, legumes, nuts, whole grains, fish and vegetable oils that are higher in unsaturated fat.

It is lower in red and processed meats, sugar-sweetened foods and beverages, refined grains and saturated fat. It may also include fat-free or low-fat dairy and foods lower in sodium and may include plant-based foods.

The panel, which met for nearly two years, was the first to focus on the dietary needs of Americans through what they called a “health equity lens,” said Dr. Fatima Cody Stanford, a Massachusetts General Hospital obesity expert who was part of the group. That meant considering factors such as household income, race, ethnicity and culture when recommending healthy diets. It will help ensure that the guidance “reflects and includes various population groups,” she said in an email.

The panel didn’t come to conclusions on ultraprocessed foods or alcohol

Ultraprocessed foods include the snacks, sugary cereals and frozen meals that make up about 60% of the American diet.

The panel considered more than 40 studies, including several that showed links between ultraprocessed foods and becoming overweight or developing obesity. But the nutrition experts had concerns with the quality of the research, leaving them to conclude that the evidence was too limited to make recommendations.

That decision is likely to bump up against the views of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the nominee to lead the U.S. Health and Human Services Department, who has questioned potential conflicts of interest among members of the dietary guidelines panel and vowed to crack down on ultraprocessed foods that contribute to chronic disease.

The panel also didn’t revise recommendations that suggest limiting alcohol intake to two drinks or less a day for men and one drink or less a day for women.

In 2020, the last time the guidance was updated, the government rejected the advice of scientific advisers to recommend less alcohol consumption.

Two groups — the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine and a committee of the government agency that oversees substance abuse — are expected to release reports in the coming months on the effects of moderate alcohol use to inform the guidelines.

Do Americans follow dietary guidelines?

The advisory panel acknowledged that the diets of most Americans don’t meet the current guidelines. More than half of all U.S. adults have one or more diet-related chronic health conditions and 18 million U.S. households have insecure sources of food, according to the report.

“Nutrition-related chronic health conditions and their precursors continue to threaten health through the lifespan,” the report concludes. “Which does not bode well for the future of health in the United States.”

What happens next?

The scientific report informs the dietary guidelines, which are updated every five years. Tuesday’s recommendations now go to HHS and the Agriculture Department, where officials will draft the final guidance set for release next year.

Starting Wednesday, the public will have 60 days to comment on the guidance. HHS and USDA officials will hold a public meeting January 16 to discuss the recommendations.

The new guidance, which will be finalized by the incoming Trump administration, is consistent with decades of federal efforts to reduce diet-related disease in the U.S., said Dr. Peter Lurie, president of the advocacy group Center for Science in the Public Interest.

“Broadly, I think these are well-formulated recommendations that the incoming administration would do well to adopt,” Lurie said. 
…

WASHINGTON — Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has been hospitalized after she “sustained an injury” during an official engagement in Luxembourg, according to a spokesperson.

Pelosi, 84, was in Europe with a bipartisan congressional delegation to mark the 80th anniversary of the Battle of the Bulge in World War II. Her spokesperson, Ian Krager, said in a statement that she is “currently receiving excellent treatment from doctors and medical professionals” and is unable to attend the remainder of events on her trip.

He did not describe the nature of her injury or give any additional details, but a person familiar with the incident said that Pelosi tripped and fell while at an event with the other members of Congress. Another person familiar with the situation said she injured her hip. The people requested anonymity to discuss the fall because they were not authorized to speak about it publicly.

Krager said that Pelosi “looks forward to returning home to the U.S. soon.”

Among the members on the trip was Representative Michael McCaul, a Republican from Texas, who posted on social media that he was “praying for a speedy recovery” for Pelosi. The two lawmakers were captured holding hands in a group photo Friday at the U.S. Embassy in Luxembourg.

“I’m disappointed Speaker Emerita Pelosi won’t be able to join the rest of our delegation’s events this weekend as I know how much she looked forward to honoring our veterans,” McCaul wrote on X. “But she is strong, and I am confident she will be back on her feet in no time.”

The former leader’s fall comes two years after her husband, Paul, was attacked by a man with a hammer at their San Francisco home. The man, who was sentenced in October to 30 years in federal prison, broke into their home looking for Pelosi.

Pelosi, who was first elected in 1987 and served as speaker twice, stepped down from her leadership post two years ago but remained in Congress and was re-elected to represent her San Francisco district in November.

She has remained active in the two years since she left the top job, working with Democrats in private and in public and attending official events. Last summer, she was instrumental in her party’s behind the scenes push to urge President Joe Biden to leave the presidential ticket.

She attended the Kennedy Center Honors in Washington last weekend and was on the Senate floor Monday to attend the swearing in of her former Democratic House colleagues, Adam Schiff of California and Andy Kim of New Jersey.

Earlier this week, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, 82, tripped and fell in the Senate, spraining his wrist and cutting his face. McConnell, who is stepping down from his leadership post at the end of the year, missed Senate votes on Thursday after experiencing some stiffness in his leg from the fall, his office said. 
…

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton on Friday sued a New York doctor for allegedly providing a Texas woman with abortion pills by telemedicine.

The lawsuit by the Republican attorney general, which appeared to be the first of its kind, could offer a test of conservative states’ power to stop abortion pills from reaching their residents.

New York is among the Democratic-led states that have passed so-called shield laws aiming to protect doctors who provide abortion pills to patients in other states. The law says New York will not cooperate with another state’s effort to prosecute, sue or otherwise penalize a doctor for providing the pills, as long as the doctor complies with New York law.

“As other states move to attack those who provide or obtain abortion care, New York is proud to be a safe haven for abortion access,” New York Attorney General Letitia James said in a statement. “We will always protect our providers from unjust attempts to punish them for doing their job and we will never cower in the face of intimidation or threats.”

In the lawsuit, filed in the District Court of Collin County, Paxton said that New Paltz, New York, Dr. Margaret Carpenter prescribed and provided mifepristone and misoprostol, the two drugs used in medication abortion, to a Texas woman via telemedicine.

Medication abortion accounts for more than half of U.S. abortions. It has drawn increasing attention since the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 decision allowing states to ban abortion, which more than 20 have done.

The woman went to the hospital after experiencing bleeding as a complication of taking the drugs, which were subsequently discovered by her partner, according to the lawsuit.

Paxton claimed that Carpenter violated Texas’s abortion law and its occupational licensing law by practicing medicine in the state despite not being licensed there. He is seeking an injunction barring her from further violations of Texas’s abortion ban and at least $100,000 in civil penalties for each past violation.

Carpenter is a member of the Abortion Coalition for Telemedicine, which supports nationwide access to abortion through telemedicine, and helped start Hey Jane, an online telehealth clinic offering abortion pills, according to the coalition’s website. She could not immediately be reached for comment. 
…