New Orleans attacker had researched similar rampage, and how to access Bourbon Street balcony

BATON ROUGE — Before plowing a pickup truck into a crowd of New Year’s revelers in New Orleans, killing 14 people, the man who carried out the Islamic State group-inspired attack had researched how to access a balcony on the city’s famed Bourbon Street and looked up information about a similar recent attack at a Christmas market in Germany, the FBI said. 

Nearly two weeks after Shamsud-Din Jabbar’s rampage, the FBI continues to uncover new information detailing the extensive planning by the 42-year-old Army veteran who scouted out the area multiple times in the months leading up to the attack. Authorities also have been piecing together a timeline of his radicalization. 

In the early hours of New Year’s Day, Jabbar could be seen on video surveillance placing two containers with explosive devices, which would remain undetonated, in the French Quarter. Shortly after, about 3:15 a.m., Jabbar sped a white pickup truck around a police car blockading the entrance of Bourbon Street, where partygoers continued to wander around the street lined with bars. He drove through revelers before crashing and being killed by police in a shootout. Fifty-seven people were injured, authorities said. 

Just hours before the deadly onslaught, Jabbar had searched online for information about an attack at a busy outdoor Christmas Market in east Germany that occurred just 10 days earlier and where a car was also used as a mass weapon, the FBI said on Tuesday. The attack in Europe left five people dead and more than 200 injured after a car slammed into a crowd. Police arrested a 50-year-old doctor from Saudi Arabia who has renounced Islam and supports the far-right AfD party. 

In other online searches, Jabbar had looked up how to access a balcony on Bourbon Street, information about Mardi Gras, and several recent shootings in the city, the FBI said. 

But Jabbar’s research ahead of the attack was not limited to online: He also made a one-day visit to New Orleans from Houston on Nov. 10, during which he looked for an apartment, the FBI said. While Jabbar applied to rent the apartment, he later told the landlord that he changed his mind. 

That was not his only visit to New Orleans, though. The FBI had previously reported that Jabbar had traveled to the city for a planning trip on Oct. 31, when he used glasses from Meta, the parent company of Facebook, to record video as he rode through the French Quarter on a bicycle. 

In a series of online videos, posted hours before he struck, Jabbar proclaimed support for the Islamic State militant group. The Bourbon Street attack was the deadliest Islamic State-inspired assault on U.S. soil in years. On Tuesday, the FBI continued to draft out a timeline of Jabbar’s radicalization, saying that he began isolating himself from society and became a more devout Muslim in 2022. By the spring of 2024, he began following extremist views. 

While investigations into the attack are ongoing and additional information continues to trickle out about Jabbar’s planning of the deadly rampage, city officials face questions about safety concerns. 

State and local authorities have launched probes into possible security deficiencies that left New Orleans vulnerable. The work is especially urgent since Carnival season, a monthslong celebration that attracts tens of thousands of visitors to the French Quarter, began last week. The city is also set to host the Super Bowl on Feb. 9.

US finalizes rules banning Chinese, Russian smart cars

The White House says it has finalized rules that crack down on Chinese and Russian automobile technology effectively banning all personal smart cars from the two countries from entering the U.S. market.

In a White House fact sheet detailing the decision, the Biden administration Tuesday said that while connected vehicles offer advantages, the involvement of foreign adversaries such as China and Russia in their supply chains presents serious risks granting “malign actors unfettered access to these connected systems and the data they collect.”

“The Department of Commerce has issued a final rule that will prohibit the sale and import of connected vehicle hardware and software systems, as well as completed connected vehicles, from the PRC and Russia,” the fact sheet said.

PRC is the acronym for China’s official name, the People’s Republic of China.

Connected vehicles are smart cars that are designed to be convenient for consumers and provide safety for drivers, passengers, and pedestrians through the use of many connected parts such as Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, cellular, and satellite connectivity.

“Cars today aren’t just steel on wheels; they’re computers,” said Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo when speaking on the rule.

“This is a targeted approach to ensure we keep PRC- and Russian-manufactured technologies off American roads,” said Raimondo.

The new rule is the “culmination of a year-long examination” of potential risks posed by connected vehicles and will “help the United States defend against the PRC’s cyber espionage and intrusion operations, which continue to pose a significant threat to U.S. critical infrastructure and public safety.”

The crackdown on cars follows Washington’s announcement earlier this month that the U.S. consider new rules aimed at addressing risks posed by drones that utilize technology from China and Russia.

The U.S. has repeatedly emphasized the need to balance technological progress with the protection of national security interests.

World Economic Forum says Trump to take part virtually in Davos meeting, days after inauguration

GENEVA — U.S. President Donald Trump will take part virtually in the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in Davos just days after his inauguration, the forum president said Tuesday. 

Borge Brende, a former Norwegian foreign minister who heads the Geneva-based organization, noted that Trump had twice attended the elite gathering of business, government and other leaders in person during his first term. 

“On Thursday afternoon, he will join us digitally, online, live in a dialogue with our participants,” Brende told reporters Tuesday as he presented the five-day program that will start Monday — the day of Trump’s inauguration. 

“We think that will be a very special moment,” he added, notably to help learn the administration’s “policy priorities.” 

Brende said he didn’t know whether Elon Musk, the multibillionaire who is poised to co-lead Trump’s new Department of Government Efficiency, would attend, but said the forum expects “additional, high-level representation” from the administration once confirmation processes for Trump’s nominees get underway in the U.S. Senate as early as Monday. 

Forum organizers say a record of around 900 business leaders, including from important emerging markets, will take part in the annual meeting this year, which is expected to draw nearly 3,000 participants from over 130 countries. 

With climate change, war, global tensions, economic uncertainty and other issues in mind, Brende acknowledged that the 55th annual meeting of the forum will take place “against the most complicated geopolitical backdrop in generations.” 

“But still in that fragmented and partly polarized world, there are still areas where we can collaborate and … we have big opportunities and responsibilities to find those areas where there is a possibility to improve the state of the world,” he said. The theme of this year’s edition is “Collaboration for the Intelligent Age” — a nod to the growing importance of technology in the world. 

The WEF has long been derided as a gathering of world elites who plot the future at a cushy, snow-bound powwow in the Swiss Alps. Critics often argue the developing world gets less attention than global powers and big business in the West or Gulf states. 

Forum managing director Mirek Dusek insisted that the number of businesses from developing countries in the “Global South” was growing, and the attendance of their leaders was “on parity” with the participation of leaders in the developed world. 

Ursula Von Der Leyen, president of the European Union’s executive commission, plans to attend the opening day of meetings on Tuesday, after an introductory gala the night before. Other top envoys include President Javier Milei of Argentina, President Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa, and Chinese Vice-Premier Ding Xuexiang. 

The vast array of topics will include the future of Syria — its new foreign minister is expected to attend — after the fall of President Bashar al-Assad last month; the fight against climate change; the threats and promise of artificial intelligence; global trade and economic growth; and wars in places like Ukraine, Sudan and beyond. 

“We are ready to roll up our sleeves to make the best out of a situation where we are faced with many, many challenges,” Brende said.

Hegseth vows a ‘warrior culture’ if confirmed as Trump’s defense secretary

WASHINGTON — President-elect Donald Trump’s choice for defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, vowed Tuesday to foster a “warrior culture” at the Pentagon, portraying himself as a “change agent” during a testy Senate confirmation hearing that drew protesters but also veterans in support. 

Hegseth did not initially address the allegations of sexual assault, excessive drinking or his derisive views on women in combat and minorities, as senators determine whether the veteran and TV news show host is fit to lead the U.S. military. Instead, he focused on his combat experience in the Army National Guard. 

“It’s time to give someone with dust on his boots the helm. A change agent,” Hegseth said in his opening remarks. 

“This is not academic,” he declared, wearing an American flag pocket square on his suit coat. “This is my life.” 

Asked directly about the sexual assault allegation, Hegseth dismissed it as a “smear campaign” and unfair attack. But he did not specifically address any of the accusations, or tell the senators that he did not drink or womanize. 

Senators immediately began drilling down on the questions surrounding Hegseth, with the Republican chairman of the Armed Services Committee acknowledging the “unconventional” choice and the top Democrat warning of “extremely alarming” allegations against him. 

Senator Roger Wicker, a Mississippi Republican, the chairman, compared Hegseth to Trump himself, dismissed the various allegations against him as unfounded and said he will “bring energy and fresh ideas to shake up the bureaucracy.” 

But Senator Jack Reed, a Democrat from Rhode Island, said flatly: “I do not believe that you are qualified to meet the overwhelming demands of this job.” 

Hegseth, 44, comes from a new generation of veterans from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and his military experience is widely viewed as an asset. But he also brings a jarring record of past actions and statements, including about women, minorities and “woke” generals. He has vowed not to drink alcohol if he is confirmed to lead the Pentagon. 

Trump backed his pick, saying Hegseth has “my Complete and Total support” in a morning post. 

The hearing at the Senate Armed Services Committee is the start of a weeklong marathon as senators begin scrutinizing Trump’s choices for more than a dozen top administrative positions. 

Hegseth is among the most endangered of Trump’s Cabinet choices, but GOP allies are determined to turn him into a cause célèbre for Trump’s governing approach amid the nation’s culture wars. Outside groups, including those aligned with the Heritage Foundation, are running costly campaigns to prop up Hegseth’s bid. 

In the audience were cadres of men wearing clothing expressing support for veterans or service in the military, but also protesters who momentarily disrupted proceedings but were removed from the room. 

The Republican-led Senate is rushing to have some of Trump’s picks ready to be confirmed as soon as Inauguration Day, Jan. 20, despite potential opposition to some from both sides of the aisle. With a narrow GOP majority, they need almost all Republicans to support Trump’s pick if Democrats oppose. 

Hegseth faces perhaps the most difficult path to confirmation. He was forced to confront allegations of sexual assault, which he has denied, and his own comments that are far from the military mainstream. 

Pressed on his opposition to diversity initiatives in the military and women serving in combat roles, Hegseth agreed that the military “was a forerunner in courageous racial integration.” But he argued that modern diversity and inclusion policies “divide” current troops and don’t prioritize “meritocracy.” 

And Hegseth had to answer for his comments that women should “straight up” not be in combat roles in the military, a view he has softened following recent meetings with senators. 

In one fiery exchange, Senator Kristen Gillibrand, a New York Democrat, told Hegseth: “You will have to change how you see women to do this job.” 

Gillibrand said of Hegseth’s comments: “They are brutal, and they’re mean, and they disrespect men and women” who fight for this country. 

Hegseth was combative at times, and scoffed as Reed asked him to explain what a “jagoff” was. Only after further pressure from Reed did Hegseth say it was a military lawyer, a JAG officer, who “put their own priorities in front of the warfighters.” 

Many senators have not yet met with Hegseth and most do not have access to his FBI background check, as only committee leaders were briefed on its findings. Reed said the background check on Hegseth was “insufficient.” It did not probe or produce new information beyond what’s already in the public realm about him, according to a person familiar with the situation who insisted on anonymity to discuss it. 

In many ways, the Hegseth hearing was following the template set during Trump’s first term, when one of his choices for Supreme Court justice, Brett Kavanaugh, came under intense scrutiny over allegations of sexual assault but turned the tables on his critics and recouped to win confirmation to the high court. 

“He will be ripped. He will be demeaned. He will be talked about,” said Senator Tommy Tuberville, a Republican from Alabama, at an event with former Navy SEALs, Army special forces and Marines supporting the nominee. “But we’re going to get him across the finish line.” 

Hegseth was largely unknown on Capitol Hill when Trump tapped him for the top Pentagon job. 

A co-host of Fox News Channel’s Fox & Friends Weekend, he had been a contributor with the network since 2014 and apparently caught the eye of the president-elect, who is an avid consumer of television and the news channel, in particular. 

Hegseth attended Princeton University and served in the Army National Guard from 2002 to 2021, deploying to Iraq in 2005 and Afghanistan in 2011 and earning two Bronze Stars. But he lacks senior military and national security experience. 

In 2017, a woman told police that Hegseth sexually assaulted her, according to a detailed investigative report recently made public. Hegseth has denied any wrongdoing and told police at the time that the encounter at a Republican women’s event in California was consensual. He later paid the woman a confidential settlement to head off a potential lawsuit. 

If confirmed, Hegseth would take over a military juggling an array of crises on the global stage and domestic challenges in military recruitment, retention and ongoing funding. 

Besides being a key national security adviser to the president, the defense secretary oversees a massive organization, with nearly 2.1 million service members, about 780,000 civilians and a budget of roughly $850 billion. 

The secretary is responsible for tens of thousands of U.S. troops deployed overseas and at sea, including in combat zones where they face attacks, such as in Syria and Iraq and in the waters around Yemen. The secretary makes all final recommendations to the president on what units are deployed, where they go and how long they stay. 

The secretary’s main job is to make sure the U.S. military is ready, trained and equipped to meet any call to duty. But the secretary also must ensure that American troops are safe and secure at home, with proper housing, health care, pay and support for programs dealing with suicide, sexual assault and financial scams. 

Pentagon chiefs also routinely travel across the world, meeting with international leaders on a vast range of security issues including U.S. military aid, counterterrorism support, troop presence and global coalition building. And they play a key role at NATO as a critical partner to allies across the region.

153 winners of Nobel and World Food prizes seek new ways to grow food

DES MOINES, Iowa — More than 150 recipients of the Nobel and World Food prizes released an open letter Tuesday calling for a dramatic increase in research and a commitment to new food distribution efforts with a goal of producing more crops and avoiding a global hunger crisis in coming decades.

The letter notes that an estimated 700 million people now are “food insecure and desperately poor” but that without a “moonshot” effort to grow more and different kinds of food, far more people will be in dire need of food because of climate change and population growth.

“As difficult and as uncomfortable as it might be to imagine, humanity is headed towards an even more food insecure, unstable world by mid-century than exists today, worsened by a vicious cycle of conflict and food insecurity,” states the letter, signed by 153 recipients of the two prizes. “Climate change is projected to decrease the productivity of most major staples when substantial increases are needed to feed a world which will add another 1.5 billion people to its population by 2050.”

Corn production in Africa is expected to decline and much of the world could see more soil degradation and water shortages, the letter says.

“We are not on track to meet future food needs. Not even close,” it adds.

The letter grew from a meeting of food accessibility experts last fall. Despite the potential gloom, it holds out hope for an optimistic vision of the future if people take needed actions. The letter says that a dramatic increase in research funding coupled with more effective ways to share information and distribute food could prevent a hunger crisis.

Brian Schmidt, who won the Nobel Prize in physics in 2011, said the need to dramatically increase food production in the coming decades is a huge challenge. He calls it a “destination with destiny,” but one that can be achieved with proper funding to enhance existing knowledge as well as global leadership.

“It is an imminently solvable problem. It is a problem that will affect billions of people in 25 years. It is a problem that to solve it, there are no losers, only winners,” Schmidt said in an interview. “All we have to do is do it.”

Schmidt said he hopes governments in the U.S., Europe and elsewhere can commit to solving the problem, but he thinks private groups like the Gates Foundation may need to take the lead in funding initial steps that will draw attention and prompt action by politicians.

The letter calls for “transformational efforts” such as enhancing photosynthesis in essential crops such as wheat and rice, developing crops that are not as reliant on chemical fertilizers and lengthening the shelf life of fruits and vegetables.

Cynthia Rosenzweig, a climate research scientist at NASA who won the World Food Prize in 2022, said in an interview that researchers are already making progress toward breakthroughs, but their work needs to be turbocharged with more funding and emphasis from world leaders.

“It’s not that we have to dream up new solutions,” Rosenzweig said. “The solutions are very much being tested but in order to actually take them from the lab out into the agriculture regions of the world, we really do need the moonshot approach.”

The term moonshot refers to an unprecedented effort, stemming from President John F. Kennedy’s call in 1962 for Americans to rocket to the Moon. Rosenzweig, noting she works for NASA, said meeting the food needs of a growing population will take the kind of commitment the U.S. made in achieving Kennedy’s goal of reaching the Moon.

“Look at how the scientists had to come together. The engineers had to be part of it. The funding had to come together as well as the general public,” she said. “That base of support has to be there as well.”

US special counsel report says prosecutors had enough evidence to convict Trump in 2020 election case

In a report to Congress released early Tuesday, special counsel Jack Smith said his office had sufficient evidence to “obtain and sustain” a trial conviction of President-elect Donald Trump for efforts to overturn Trump’s loss to President Joe Biden in the 2020 election.

Smith said Trump “resorted to a series of criminal efforts to retain power” after it became clear that he had lost and that legal ways to challenge the results had failed.

“This included attempts to induce state officials to ignore true vote counts; to manufacture fraudulent slates of presidential electors in seven states that he had lost; to force Justice Department officials and his own Vice President, Michael R. Pence, to act in contravention of their oaths and to instead advance Mr. Trump’s personal interests; and, on January 6 , 2021, to direct an angry mob to the United States Capitol to obstruct the congressional certification of the presidential election and then leverage rioters,” Smith said in his report.

Smith said Trump acted both in his private capacity as an election candidate, as well as with the help of multiple co-conspirators, and that Trump tried to use “the power and authority of the United States Government in furtherance of his scheme.”

The report further says that Trump’s false claims, such as votes being cast by large numbers of dead people or ineligible voters, or that voting machines had changed votes for Trump into votes for Biden, were “demonstrably and, in many cases, obviously false.”

Trump has repeatedly denied wrongdoing and attacked the special counsel’s work as politically motivated.

He responded to the report’s release early Tuesday with a post on his Truth Social platform calling Smith “a lamebrain prosecutor.”

“Deranged Jack Smith was unable to successfully prosecute the Political Opponent of his ‘boss,’ Crooked Joe Biden, so he ends up writing yet another ‘Report’ based on information that the Unselect Committee of Political Hacks and Thugs ILLEGALLY DESTROYED AND DELETED, because it showed how totally innocent I was, and how completely guilty Nancy Pelosi, and others, were,” Trump said.

Trump is set to be inaugurated for a new term next week after defeating Vice President Kamala Harris in the 2024 election. During the 2024 campaign, Trump denied he lost the 2020 vote, including in a September debate with Harris. 

Tuesday’s report release came a day after U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon cleared the Justice Department to make public the portion of Smith’s report that dealt with Trump’s efforts to cling to power.

Judge Cannon, who was appointed by Trump, had earlier blocked the release of Smith’s full report, which also includes an unreleased section about accusations that Trump illegally retained classified documents after he left office.

Smith sought to prosecute Trump on both matters, while Trump denied wrongdoing.

Judge Cannon dismissed the classified documents case in July, ruling that Smith was illegally appointed.

The Supreme Court also ruled in July that presidents have broad immunity from prosecution for official acts, which blunted Smith’s efforts in the election interference case.

After Trump defeated Harris, the Justice Department dropped both cases against Trump, citing longstanding policy against prosecuting a sitting U.S. leader.

Some information for this story was provided by The Associated Press and Reuters

Supreme Court rejects Utah’s push to wrest control of public land from the federal government

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Monday turned back a push by the state of Utah to wrest control of vast areas of public land from the federal government, marking a small victory for land conservation advocates who worry that similar efforts may escalate in a Republican-controlled Washington.

The high court refused to let the GOP-controlled state file a lawsuit seeking to bring the land and its resources under state control. The decision came in a brief order in which the court did not explain its reasoning, as is typical. It marks the latest roadblock for states in a running feud with the U.S. government over who should control huge swaths of the West and the enormous oil and gas, timber, and other resources they contain.

Utah’s top state leaders said they have not ruled out taking their lawsuit to a lower court.

In the Western state known for its rugged mountains popular with skiers and red-rock vistas that draw throngs of tourists, federal agencies control almost 70% of the land. Utah argues that local control would be more responsive and allow the state access to revenue from taxes and development projects.

The complaint sought control of about half of federal land, which still amounts to an area nearly as large as South Carolina. The parcels are used for things like energy production, grazing, mining and recreation. Utah’s world-famous national parks and national monuments would have stayed in federal hands.

Monday’s decision by the high court comes as the newly Republican-controlled Congress adopted a rules package that includes language allowing lawmakers to more easily transfer or sell off public lands managed by federal agencies. The rules consider public lands to have no monetary value, meaning lawmakers will no longer need to account for lost revenue if they decide to give parcels to states or extractive industries.

While conservationists applauded the court’s rejection of what they called a land-grab lawsuit, many remained worried that the efforts will continue.

Public lands under state control could be vulnerable to privatization, degradation and oil drilling, said Steve Bloch, legal director for the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance.

“If successful, Utah’s lawsuit would result in the sale of millions of acres of public lands in red-rock country to the highest bidder, an end to America’s system of federal public lands and the dismantling of the American West as we know it,” Bloch said.

Utah’s Republican Sens. Mike Lee and John Curtis criticized the court’s decision and promised legislative action. Curtis, who campaigned on being a climate-conscious Republican, said the people of Utah should be entrusted to manage the land they have lived on for generations.

“Building roads, moving cattle and cleaning up campgrounds all require navigating a behemothic bureaucracy that’s stacked up against the average Utahn,” Curtis said.

In a joint statement with Utah’s Republican legislative leaders and attorney general, Gov. Spencer Cox said he was disappointed in the court’s decision to turn away the lawsuit.

“Utah remains able and willing to challenge any BLM land management decisions that harm Utah,” state leaders said. “We are also heartened to know the incoming administration shares our commitments to the principle of ‘multiple use’ for these federal lands and is committed to working with us to improve land management.”

While lawsuits typically start in federal district courts and eventually work their way up to the U.S. Supreme Court, disputes involving states can start at the nation’s highest court if the justices agree to hear them.

Utah leaders noted that the high court did not comment on the merits of their arguments or prevent them from filing the lawsuit in a federal district court. Conservation groups say they’ll remain ready to challenge any future lawsuits.

“This lawsuit is an assault on the country’s long-standing and successful history of safeguarding valuable and vulnerable landscapes in trust for all Americans,” said Chris Hill, who leads the Conservation Lands Foundation. “And while the Supreme Court’s decision to not hear the case is a reprieve, we fully expect this small group of anti-public lands politicians to continue to waste taxpayer dollars and shop their bad ideas.”

The federal Bureau of Land Management declined to comment.

Millions have had student loans canceled under Biden, despite collapse of his forgiveness plan

WASHINGTON — Despite failing to deliver his promise for broad student loan forgiveness, President Joe Biden has now overseen the cancellation of student loans for more than 5 million Americans — more than any other president in U.S. history.

In a last-minute action on Monday, the Education Department canceled loans for 150,000 borrowers through programs that existed before Biden took office. His administration expanded those programs and used them to their fullest extent, pressing on with cancellation even after the Supreme Court rejected Biden’s plan for a new forgiveness policy.

“My Administration has taken historic action to reduce the burden of student debt, hold bad actors accountable, and fight on behalf of students across the country,” Biden said in a written statement.

In total, the administration says it has waived $183.6 billion in student loans.

The wave of cancellations could dry up when President-elect Donald Trump takes office. Trump hasn’t detailed his student loan policies but previously called cancellation “vile” and illegal. Republicans have fought relentlessly against Biden’s plans, saying cancellation is ultimately shouldered by taxpayers who never attended college or already repaid their loans.

Biden loosened rules for debt forgiveness

The latest round of relief mostly comes through a program known as borrower defense, which allows students to get their loans canceled if they’re cheated or misled by their colleges. It was created in 1994 but rarely used until a wave of high-profile for-profit college scandals during the Obama administration.

A smaller share of the relief came through a program for borrowers with disabilities and through Public Service Loan Forgiveness, which was created in 2007 and offers to erase all remaining debt for borrowers in a government or nonprofit job who make 10 years of monthly payments.

Most of Monday’s borrower defense cancellations were for students who attended several defunct colleges owned by Center for Excellence in Higher Education, including CollegeAmerica, Stevens-Henager College, and Independence University. They are based on past findings that the schools lied to prospective students about their employment prospects and the terms of private loans.

Before Biden took office, those programs were criticized by advocates who said complex rules made it difficult for borrowers to get relief. The Biden administration loosened some of the rules using its regulatory power, a maneuver that expanded eligibility without going through Congress.

As an example, just 7,000 borrowers had gotten their loans canceled through Public Service Loan Forgiveness before the Biden administration took office. Widespread confusion about eligibility, along with errors by loan servicers, resulted in a 99% rejection rate for applicants.

Huge numbers of borrowers made years of payments only to find out they were in an ineligible repayment plan. Some were improperly put into forbearance — a pause on payments — by their loan servicers. Those periods didn’t end up counting toward the 10 years of payments needed for cancellation.

The Biden administration temporarily relaxed the eligibility rules during the pandemic and then made it more permanent in 2023. As a result, more than 1 million public servants have now had their balances zeroed out through the program.

All those rule changes were meant to be a companion to Biden’s marquee policy for student debt, which proposed up to $20,000 in relief for more than 40 million Americans.

But after the Supreme Court blocked the move, the Biden administration shifted its focus to maximizing relief through existing mechanisms.

Republicans have called for a different approach

Announcements of new cancellation became routine, even as conservatives in Congress accused Biden of overstepping his power. Republican states fought off Biden’s later attempts at mass forgiveness, but the smaller batches of relief continued without any major legal challenge.

As Republicans take hold of both chambers of Congress and the White House, Biden’s changes could be targeted for a rollback. But it’s unclear how far the next administration will go to tighten the cancellation spigot.

Trump proposed eliminating PSLF during his first term in office, but Congress rejected the idea. Project 2025, a blueprint created by the Heritage Foundation for a second Trump term, proposes ending PSLF, and narrowing borrower defense and making repayment plans less generous than existing ones.

Elon Musk says third patient got Neuralink brain implant

Elon Musk said a third person has received an implant from his brain-computer interface company Neuralink, one of many groups working to connect the nervous system to machines.

“We’ve got … three humans with Neuralinks and all are working well,” he said during a recent wide-ranging interview at a Las Vegas event streamed on his social media platform X.

Since the first brain implant about a year ago, Musk said the company has upgraded the devices with more electrodes, higher bandwidth and longer battery life. Musk also said Neuralink hopes to implant the experimental devices in 20 to 30 more people this year.

Musk didn’t provide any details about the latest patient, but there are updates on the previous ones.

The second recipient — who has a spinal cord injury and got the implant last summer — was playing video games with the help of the device and learning how to use computer-aided design software to create 3-D objects. The first patient, also paralyzed after a spinal cord injury, described how it helped him play video games and chess.

But while such developments at Neuralink often attract notice, many other companies and research groups are working on similar projects. Two studies last year in the New England Journal of Medicine described how brain-computer interfaces, or BCIs, helped people with ALS communicate better.

Who’s working on brain-computer interface technology?

More than 45 trials involving brain-computer interfaces are underway, according to a U.S. database of studies. The efforts are aimed at helping treat brain disorders, overcoming brain injuries and other uses.

Many research labs have already shown that humans can accurately control computer cursors using BCIs, said Rajesh Rao, co-director of the Center for Neurotechnology at the University of Washington.

Rao said Neuralink may be unique in two ways: The surgery to implant the device is the first time a robot has been used to implant flexible electrode threads into a human brain to record neural activity and control devices. And those threads may record from more neurons than other interfaces.

Still, he said, the advantages of Neuralink’s approach have yet to be shown, and some competitors have eclipsed the company in other ways. For example, Rao said companies such as Synchron, Blackrock Neurotech and Onward Medical are already conducting BCI trials on people “using either less invasive methods or more versatile approaches” that combine neural recording with stimulation.

What are the benefits of BCIs?

Marco Baptista, chief scientific officer of the Christopher & Dana Reeve Foundation, called BCI technology “very exciting” with potential benefits to people with paralysis.

Through clinical trials, “we’ll be able to see what’s going to be the winning approach,” he said. “It’s a little early to know.”

Baptista said his foundation generally tries to support research teams financially and with expert help – though it hasn’t given any money to Neuralink.

“We need to really support high-risk, high-reward endeavors. This is clearly high-risk, high-reward. We don’t know how safe it’s going to be. We don’t know how feasible it’s going to be,” he said.

How are BCIs tested and regulated?

Neuralink announced in 2023 that it had gotten permission from U.S. regulators to begin testing its device in people.

While most medical devices go on the market without clinical studies, high-risk ones that undergo pre-market approval need what’s called an “investigational device exemption” from the Food and Drug Administration, said Dr. Rita Redberg, a cardiologist at the University of California, San Francisco, who studies high-risk devices.

Neuralink says it has this exemption, but the FDA said it can’t confirm or disclose information about a particular study.

Redberg said the FDA tends to be involved in all steps from recruiting patients to testing devices to analyzing data. She said this regulatory process prioritizes safety.

She also pointed to another layer of protection: All research involving people needs an institutional review board, or IRB. It can also be known as an ethical review board or an independent ethics committee. Members must include at least one non-scientist as well as someone not affiliated with the institution or organization forming the board.

The role of such boards “is to assume there is reasonable risk and reasonable chance of benefit and that patients are informed of those before they enroll,” said Redberg.

Judge clears way for release of special counsel Smith’s report on Trump’s Jan. 6 case

WASHINGTON — The Justice Department can publicly release its investigative report on President-elect Donald Trump’s 2020 election interference case, a federal judge said Monday — the latest ruling in a court dispute over the highly anticipated document days before Trump is set to take office again. 

But a temporary injunction barring the immediate release of the report remains in effect until Tuesday, and it’s unlikely U.S. District Court Judge Aileen Cannon’s order will be the last word on the matter. Defense lawyers may seek to challenge it all the way up to the Supreme Court. 

Cannon had earlier temporarily blocked the department from releasing the entire report on former Special Counsel Jack Smith’s investigations into Trump that led to two separate criminal cases. Cannon’s latest order on Monday cleared the way for the release of the volume on Trump’s 2020 election interference case. 

She set a hearing for Friday on whether the department can release to lawmakers the volume on Trump’s classified documents case. The department has said it will not publicly disclose that volume as long as criminal proceedings against two of Trump’s co-defendants remain pending. 

Smith resigned his position on Friday after transmitting his report to Attorney General Merrick Garland, the Justice Department revealed in a footnote in a court filing over the weekend. 

The ruling, if it stands, could open the door for the public to learn additional details in the coming days about Trump’s frantic but ultimately failed effort to cling to power in the run-up to the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the Capitol. 

But even as Cannon permitted the release of the volume on election interference, she halted the Justice Department from immediately sharing with congressional officials a separate volume related to Trump’s hoarding of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida. Lawyers for the Republican president-elect’s two co-defendants, Trump valet Walt Nauta and Mar-a-Lago property manager Carlos De Oliveira, had argued that the release of the report would prejudice them given that criminal proceedings remain ongoing against them in the form of a Justice Department appeal of Cannon’s dismissal of charges. 

As a compromise, the Justice Department said that it would not make that document public but would instead share it with select congressional officials for their private review. But Cannon halted those plans and instead scheduled a hearing for Friday afternoon. 

“All parties agree that Volume II expressly and directly concerns this criminal proceeding,” she wrote. “All parties also appear to agree that public release of Volume II would be inconsistent with the fair trial rights of Defendants Nauta and De Oliveira and with Department of Justice Policy governing the release of information during the pendency of criminal proceedings.” 

US designates extreme right-wing ‘Terrorgram’ network as terrorist group

WASHINGTON — The U.S. on Monday imposed sanctions on an extreme right-wing online network, designating the “Terrorgram” collective a terrorist group and accusing it of promoting violent white supremacy. 

The U.S. State Department said in a statement that it had designated the group, which primarily operates on the Telegram social media site, and three of its leaders as Specially Designated Global Terrorists. 

The State Department said the group has motivated and facilitated attacks and attempted attacks by users, including a 2022 shooting outside an LGBTQ bar in Slovakia, a planned attack in 2024 on energy facilities in New Jersey and an August knife attack at a mosque in Turkey. 

“The group promotes violent white supremacism, solicits attacks on perceived adversaries, and provides guidance and instructional materials on tactics, methods, and targets for attacks, including on critical infrastructure and government officials,” the State Department said. 

The action freezes any of the group’s U.S. assets and bars Americans from dealing with it. 

The leaders targeted on Monday with sanctions were based in Brazil, Croatia and South Africa, according to the statement. 

In September, U.S. prosecutors unveiled criminal charges against two alleged leaders of the group, saying they used Telegram to solicit attacks on Black, Jewish, LGBTQ people and immigrants with the aim of inciting a race war. 

Britain in April said it would proscribe the Terrorgram collective as a terrorist organization, meaning it would become a criminal offense in the country to belong to or promote the group. 

U.S. President Joe Biden has railed against white supremacy while in office. 

In 2021, Biden launched the first-ever U.S. National Strategy for Countering Domestic Terrorism, which included resources to identify and prosecute threats and new deterrents to prevent Americans from joining dangerous groups.

Here’s what happened when previous US presidents tried to downsize government

President-elect Donald Trump pledges to reduce government spending when he takes office. He has tasked billionaire businessman Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, who’s worth an estimated $950 million, to lead the Department of Government Efficiency, a proposed presidential advisory commission. It’s not a new concept. U.S. leaders have tried to reduce the role of government since the founding of the republic.

Philadelphia 76ers won’t build disputed $1.3B downtown stadium

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania — The Philadelphia 76ers have decided not to build a $1.3 billion downtown arena, a surprising move that comes just weeks after the team received approval for the controversial project from the city council.

The Philadelphia Inquirer reported Sunday that multiple council members had confirmed the change in plans. The team has struck a deal with Comcast Spectacor to remain in the city’s sports stadium district, the newspaper said, but further details about the new proposal have not been released.

The 76ers, the mayor’s office and Comcast Spectacor — which owns the Wells Fargo Center, where the team currently plays — did not respond Sunday to requests for comment. The team rents the arena from Comcast Spectacor, which also owns the Philadelphia Flyers of the NHL, who also play there.

The council had voted on Dec. 19 to approve the downtown arena after more than two years of heated debate over the proposal, and the owners of the NBA team had hoped to move into what would be called 76 Place by 2031. The council vote came despite vocal opposition from nearby Chinatown residents and other activists.

“I’m so livid right now I don’t even know what to do,” Jimmy Harrity, an at-large member of the council, told the newspaper. Harrity, who supported the team’s move, said, “I feel as though I was used as a pawn.”

Mayor Cherelle Parker, a Democrat who had championed the plan, has said the entire city will benefit from what she called a “historic game-changing economic development project.” Supporters had hoped the 18,500-seat arena would help revive a distressed retail corridor called Market East, which runs from City Hall to the Liberty Bell. The area has struggled for years despite several redevelopment efforts.

The team owners, Harris Blitzer Sports & Entertainment, had pushed for city approval by year’s end so they could meet their target opening date. They had vowed not to ask the city for any construction funding, although they were free to seek state and federal funds. Instead of property taxes, they would have paid about $6 million in annual payments in lieu of taxes.

Opponents feared the arena would bring gridlock on game days as well as gentrification and rising rents to the area.

The Chinatown community has fought a series of proposed developments since the 1960s, including casinos, a prison, a baseball stadium and a highway, the last of which dissected the neighborhood when it opened in 1991.

Fires burn Los Angeles schools, destroy outdoor education sanctuaries

For Irina Contreras, a program manager for Los Angeles County’s Department of Arts and Culture, outdoor education was a refuge for both her and her daughter during the pandemic.

Now, much of that refuge has been burned in the raging wildfires around Los Angeles.

Her 7-year-old daughter, Ceiba, hikes with a kid’s adventure group called Hawks and attended Matilija, a bilingual forest school for preschool and kindergarten. Rain or shine, she and her friends would spend their days climbing, jumping, hiking, and swimming in places like Eaton Canyon Nature Area, a 77-hectare (190-acre) preserve near Altadena, now destroyed by fire.

Ceiba learned to ask plants for permission before taking samples to glue into her nature journal. Once, her group discovered a hidden path that led behind a waterfall. Ceiba couldn’t stop talking about it for days.

For parents like Contreras, the wildfires have been devastating not just because of the loss of life and thousands of homes. They are mourning natural and educational areas that served as sanctuaries and learning spaces for local families, especially in the years since the pandemic. The fires have torn through natural areas that served every type of educational setting: public and private schools, nature-based preschools, homeschool groups, summer camps and more.

“It’s about so much more than what she’s been learning,” Contreras said. “I can speak with absolute confidence that it totally affected me, personally.”

The fires have burned school buildings, too, including Odyssey Charter School in Altadena, which Miguel Ordenana’s children attend.

“The community has been devastated by the fire,” said Ordenana, senior manager of community science at the Natural History Museum. “It’s been a challenge to carefully share that news with my children and help them work through their emotions. A lot of their friends lost their homes. And we don’t know the impact to school staff, like their teachers, but a lot of them live in that area as well and have lost their homes.”

Some areas untouched by fire were inaccessible because of poor air quality. Griffith Park, home of the Hollywood sign, had not been affected by the end of the week but it’s not clear when the air quality there will be good enough to resume outdoor programs, said Ordenana, who was the first to capture on camera a late puma in the nearby area that gained fame under the name P-22.

Ordenana said his family was able to connect with some other families from Odyssey Charter School for pizza and an indoor playdate, but he is uncertain what the days will look like for them with school closures already extending through next week.

All schools in the Los Angeles Unified School District, the nation’s second largest, were closed Friday because of heavy smoke and ash over the city. Classes will not resume until conditions improve, officials said. Pasadena Unified School District also closed schools and several of its campuses sustained damage, including Eliot Arts Magnet Middle School.

The California Department of Education released a statement Wednesday saying 335 schools from Los Angeles, San Bernardino, Riverside, Ventura, and San Diego counties were closed. It was unclear how many would be closed Monday.

During the pandemic, Contreras felt like she was stuck on a screen. She devoted much of her energy to working, writing and organizing, but her daughter’s outdoor education helped her better understand the value of stepping away from the grind.

Contreras feels confident the outdoor programs will return, although it’s unclear when it will be safe for people to hike around areas like Eaton Canyon.

“The nature center is gone,” Richard Smart, superintendent of the Eaton Canyon Natural Area in Pasadena, said Thursday. “The wildflowers, the shrubs are gone.” The park hosted dozens of school field trips a year and Smart estimates more than a thousand students visited yearly.

“Teachers liked it because it was also free, it was local, it was nearby. And it was a place to see nature — wild nature but also in a friendly, safe environment,” he said.

Only a few exterior walls of the Eaton Canyon Nature Center were left standing, he said.

“For many of the local school districts, we truly were in their backyard, and now they won’t be able to use it for the foreseeable future,” he said. “The park is such a touchstone for people in the community, and so to lose that is just, devastating is not even the right word. It feels indescribable.”

Many parents and teachers are likely wondering what to do and where to take their children as fires continue to burn across Los Angeles, said Lila Higgins, a senior manager for community science at the Natural History Museum and author of “Wild L.A,” a field trip and nature guidebook.

A certified forest therapy guide, Higgins says time in nature lowers heart rates, lowers blood pressure and helps children with attention deficit disorder feel more calm and relaxed.

“For children’s cognitive development, time in nature and time spent connecting with nature is so important,” Higgins said. Outdoor spaces also can help children learn how to develop relationships through connections with animals, understand orientation through space by following trails and map-reading and understand human impact on wildlife.

“A lot of the places that we’re talking about are really popular with homeschoolers, but they also are a destination for some field trips, certainly places like Eaton Canyon,” said Greg Pauly, co-author of “Wild L.A.” and director of the Urban Nature Research Center at the museum. “I do think it’s safe to say that people are going to continue to be interacting with those landscapes and it will hopefully still be a field trip destination in the future. But it’s certainly going to be a while before that happens.”

“This is the reality of modern Southern California,” he said. “Fire changes the landscape and people’s lives shockingly often.”

‘Den of Thieves 2’ is No. 1 at box office as ‘Better Man’ flops

New York — On a quiet weekend in movie theaters, while much of Hollywood’s attention was on the wildfires that continue to rage in Los Angeles, Lionsgate’s “Den of Thieves 2: Pantera” debuted atop the box office with $15.5 million, according to studio estimates Sunday.

Mid-January is often a slow moviegoing period, and that was slightly exacerbated by the closures of about 10 theaters in Los Angeles, the country’s top box-office market.

A sequel to the Gerard Butler 2018 heist thriller, “Den of Thieves 2” performed similarly to the original. The first installment, released by STX, opened with $15.2 million seven years ago. O’Shea Jackson Jr. co-stars in the sequel, which debuted in 3,008 North American theaters.

Butler’s films are becoming something of a regular feature in January. He also starred in “Plane,” which managed $32.1 million after launching on Jan. 13 in 2023.

“Den of Thieves 2,” made for about $40 million, was a bit more costly to make. Audiences liked it well enough, giving it a “B+” CinemaScore. Reviews (58% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes) weren’t particularly good. But it counted as Lionsgate’s first No.1 opening since “The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes” in November 2023.

Also entering wide release over the weekend was the Robbie Williams movie “Better Man,” one of the more audacious spins on the music biopic in recent years. Rather than going the more tradition routes of Elton John (“Rocketman”) or Elvis Presley (“Elvis”), the British popstar is portrayed by a CGI chimpanzee in Michael Gracey’s film.

The Paramount Pictures release, produced for $110 million and acquired by Paramount for $25 million, didn’t catch on much better than Williams’ previous forays into the United States. It tanked, with $1.1 million in ticket sales from 1,291 locations. Gracey’s previous feature, 2017’s “The Greatest Showman” ($459 million worldwide), fared far better in theaters. Reviews, however, have been very good for “Better Man.”

It was bested by “The Last Showgirl,” the Las Vegas drama starring Pamela Anderson. The Roadside Attractions release expanded to 870 theaters and collected $1.5 million.

Also outdoing “Better Man” was Brady Corbet’s “The Brutalist.” Coming off winning best drama at the Golden Globes, the A24 postwar epic grossed a hefty $1.4 million from just 68 locations. It will expand wider in the coming weeks.

The weekend’s lion share of business went to holiday holdovers, including “Mufasa: The Lion King,” “Sonic the Hedgehog 3,” “Nosferatu” and “Moana 2.”

In its fourth week of release, Barry Jenkins “Mufasa” continued to do well, adding $13.2 million to bring its total to $539.7 million worldwide. Also on its fourth weekend, “Sonic the Hedgehog 3” padded its $384.8 million global total with $11 million. Robert Eggers’ “Nosferatu,” the surprise hit of the Christmas period, collected $6.8 million in ticket sales, bringing the vampire tale to $81.1 million domestically.

The Walt Disney Co.’s “Moana 2,” in its seventh week of release, added $6.5 million to bring its global tally to $989.8 million. In the coming days, it will become the third Disney film released in 2024 to notch $1 billion, joining “Inside Out 2” and “Deadpool and Wolverine.”

Final domestic figures will be released Monday. Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Comscore:

  1. “Den of Thieves 2: Pantera,” $15.5 million.

  2. “Mufasa: The Lion King,” $13.2 million.

  3. “Sonic the Hedgehog 3,” $11 million.

  4. “Nosferatu,” $6.8 million.

  5. “Moana 2,” $6.5 million.

  6. “A Complete Unknown,” $5 million.

  7. “Wicked,” $5 million.

  8. “Babygirl,” $3.1 million.

  9. “Game Changer,” $1.9 million.

  10. “The Last Showgirl,” $1.5 million.