Justin Moore and Priscilla Block‘s new video, “You, Me and Whiskey,” premieres Thursday night, and from the looks of things, it’s gonna be a hot one.
A short, steamy clip Justin shared on Instagram shows a couple falling into bed, just before the romance starts and the clothes come off. You can tune in at 8:50 p.m. ET to check out the full video.
Justin and Priscilla will also be going live on YouTube for the premiere, just as they kick off The You, Me & Whiskey Tour in Rapid City, South Dakota.
(MANILA, Philippines) — Seeking to deter China’s ambitions in the western Pacific, the U.S. and the Philippines have reached an agreement that will give the U.S. military access to four additional bases in the Philippines.
The agreement is the latest sign that both countries are reestablishing their military cooperation as concerns continue about China’s claims in the South China Sea and their stated intent to reclaim Taiwan, which it considers to be a breakaway province.
“That’s just part of our efforts to modernize our alliance, and these efforts are especially important as the People’s Republic of China continues to advance its illegitimate claims in the West Philippine Sea” Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told reporters during a visit to Manila, where the new deal was announced.
The new deal means that the U.S. military will now have access to nine Philippine military bases under the 2014 Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement where they can construct new facilities, preposition equipment, and rotate troops for training purposes.
The locations of the four additional bases that will be accessible to U.S. military personnel have not yet been finalized and were not not disclosed under the agreement.
But there has been speculation that some are located on the northern island of Luzon, where Manila is located, that at its northernmost tip the island is about 200 miles from Taiwan.
The U.S. military has focused its attention on redirecting its military presence and priority to the Pacific where China is seen by the Pentagon as its “pacing challenge” in the region.
Of mutual concern to the U.S. and the Philippines are China’s increasingly aggressive military exercises around Taiwan and its territorial claims in the South China Sea over the past decade, most notably in 2012 when China seized Scarborough Shoal from the Philippines.
Those concerns about China’s ambitions in the region spurred renewed military contacts between the U.S. and the Philippines that led to the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement in 2014 that granted U.S. access to five Philippine military bases.
The Philippines used to be home to large U.S. military bases including Subic Bay Naval Base and Clark Air Force Base, but those facilities were closed in the early 1990s.
Currently, the U.S. has no permanent presence and about 500 military personnel rotate regularly into the country for training.
While both countries have a long-standing military alliance, the U.S. military relationship with the Philippines deteriorated under former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte who courted China.
That relationship has improved since President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. took over in mid-2022.
Austin stressed on Thursday that the new agreement allowing access to four more bases does not mean that the U.S. is permanently stationing forces in the Philippines.
“It’s about providing access that allows us to increase our training opportunities with our partners, our allies here,” he told reporters in Manila. “It’s about having the ability to respond in a more effective fashion as we’re faced — as we’re collectively faced with humanitarian assistance issues or natural — or disaster response issues.”
“This is an opportunity to increase our effectiveness, increase interoperability. It is not about permanent basing,” he said.
“But it is a big deal. It’s a really big deal, in that, you know, it provides us the opportunity, again, to interact a bit more in an effective way,” he added.
Nick Carter has filed a countersuit against a woman who claimed he sexually assaulted her in 2001. Shannon Ruth, who is now 43, said she was 17 at the time.
TMZ reports he filed his counterclaim on Thursday and is seeking in excess of $2.35 million in damages, which he estimates is the amount of money he and the Backstreet Boys lost in canceled appearances and endorsement deals since she came forward with her claims in December.
Carter’s lawyers refute Ruth’s allegations that he sexually assaulted her after a BSB concert in Tacoma, Washington. They also questioned Ruth’s credibility by citing previous claims she made against him that “changed repeatedly and materially over time.”
His team claims Ruth’s assault allegations were previously investigated and no criminal charges were recommended.
Carter’s team further alleges Ruth’s parents, Jerome and Melissa Schuman, are coercing their daughter into accusing the singer as part of an extortion attempt to take advantage of the #MeToo movement.
Carter’s team also alleges Ruth and her parents attempted to prey on Aaron Carter before his death. The attorneys claim the Schumans and Ruth tried taking advantage of “Aaron’s fragile condition and family stresses to cloak their defamatory campaign with credibility, relentlessly and repeatedly using Aaron to try to legitimize their frivolous tales.”
Carter’s team claims Aaron realized he was being used. On the day Aaron died, Jerome Schuman tweeted, “I am sad that the chess game we started together was never finished.”
The singer’s attorney, Michael Holtz, said in a statement, “Nick has been the target of a malicious and long-running conspiracy. He has never done the outrageous things of which he has been accused; in fact, he is the victim of a calculated and concerted disinformation campaign designed to destroy his reputation.”
Ruth’s legal team hasn’t responded.
If you are affected by abuse and needing support, or know someone who is, call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233, or the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673). You can also chat online at thehotline.org or online.rainn.org, respectively.
Janis Ian took home two honors at the International Folk Music Awards in Kansas City, Missouri, Tuesday night. Ian was already set to receive the organization’s Lifetime Achievement Award, but as an added bonus she also earned top honors as Artist of the Year.
The Elaine Weissman Lifetime Achievement Awards are handed out each year by Folk Alliance International “to honor the cultural impact of legendary folk music figures.” For her honor, Billboard reports Ian was celebrated with a performance by musician Jake Blount, who performed the classic “At Seventeen,” and Wallis Bird, who performed “Better Times Will Come.”
And Ian’s winning ways could continue Sunday. She’s nominated for a Grammy for Best Folk Album for The Light at the End of the Line.
David Crane/MediaNews Group/Los Angeles Daily News via Getty Images
(MONTEREY PARK, Calif.) — Newly obtained 911 calls and radio traffic reveal the chaos and heartbreak as the Monterey Park, California, mass shooting unfolded.
One frantic 911 call came from a man who said his girlfriend had been shot in their car just outside the dance studio. He told police they were in the parking lot when “suddenly” somebody came and shot through the window.
The dispatcher asked the man if she was breathing, and he replied, “No, maybe she died? I’m not sure.”
He said he could see blood coming from her nose and head. The dispatcher advised him to lean her seat all the way back.
The dispatcher asked the man if he could see her chest moving up and down, and he said, “No, no, I’m not sure.” He pleaded, “Come, hurry!”
Another 911 caller said, “Somebody with a gun shooting people, inside the studio — we just scared him off.”
“Send police here right away,” the man said. “He might start shooting again. I’m outside of the building, I don’t know if anybody got hurt.”
Eleven people were killed and several others were injured when a gunman opened fire at a crowded Monterey Park dance studio on Jan. 21. The suspect then fled and went to nearby Alhambra, where he allegedly entered a second dance hall and was disarmed by a good Samaritan, according to police.
The suspected gunman was found dead from a self-inflicted gunshot one day after the shooting, police said.
ABC News’ Lissette Rodriguez and Abigail Shalawylo contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — The funeral for Tyre Nichols was filled with tributes for the 29-year-old who died after a violent encounter with police, and a call to action for reform.
Nichols’ mother RowVaughn Wells, who addressed the mourners gathered in Mississippi Boulevard Christian Church through tears, said she needed the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act bill to be passed.
“We need to take some action because there should be no other child that should suffer the way my son [did] and all the other parents here who’ve lost their children,” Wells said. “We need to get that bill passed because if we don’t, that blood — the next child that dies — that blood is going to be on their hands.”
Vice President Kamala Harris, Rev. Al Sharpton and attorney Ben Crump all pushed for lawmakers to revive talks on the legislation, which was crafted in the wake of George Floyd’s killing in 2020 at the hands of Minneapolis police.
“We demand that Congress pass the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act,” Harris said at the funeral. “Joe Biden will sign it. We should not delay, and we shall not be denied. It is nonnegotiable.”
The bill, which would’ve sought to address racial profiling and use of deadly force, was passed by the Democrat-controlled House in 2021 but stalled in the Senate over the issue of qualified immunity for officers.
Here’s what was included in the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act:
Accountability for police misconduct
The bill would have lowered the legal standard for prosecuting officers from willfulness to recklessness, and would’ve limited qualified immunity as a defense to liability in a private civil action against an officer.
It also mandated the creation of a National Police Misconduct Registry to collect data on complaints and records of police misconduct. The registry would’ve been designed to keep track of termination records, lawsuits against officers, discipline records and more at the federal, state and local level.
The Department of Justice would’ve also been granted administrative subpoena power in pattern-or-practice investigations — reviews the agency says are a central tool to accomplish police reform and restoring police-community trust.
Framework for addressing racial profiling
The bill would have banned racial and religious profiling by law enforcement at the federal, state and local levels. It would also have required officers to complete training on racial profiling and other discriminatory practices.
It would also have required procedures for investigating and “responding meaningfully” to complaints alleging racial profiling.
Limit use of force
The bill would also have banned no-knock warrants in federal drug cases. The use of no-knock warrants in such cases was highly scrutinized after police killed Breonna Taylor when entering her Louisville home on a no-knock warrant in March 2020.
It would also have incentivized local and state agencies to ban chokeholds by tying the prohibitions to federal funding.
Federal officers would also have been required to wear and activate body cameras except in narrow circumstances when stopping to activate it would endanger their life.
The bill would have prohibited federal officers from using deadly force unless all “reasonable alternatives to the use of the form of less lethal force have been exhausted” — including verbal warnings, de-escalation tactics and nonlethal force. The attorney general would also be mandated to establish a clear duty for federal officers to intervene in cases where another law enforcement officer is using excessive force against a civilian.
(NEW YORK) — When the highly infectious Mpox virus, formerly called Monkeypox, was declared a public health emergency in August of last year, more than 450 people were testing positive every day. With more than 30,000 cases and 28 deaths, many feared Mpox could become the next pandemic.
The virus — characterized by a painful rash and deep lesion — was primarily spreading via skin-to-skin contact among sexual networks.
Now, roughly six months later, the emergency is over, with the nation averaging fewer than three cases per day. According to doctors and public health experts interviewed by ABC News, the virus didn’t disappear on its own. Instead, the virus was controlled through an aggressive, highly coordinated public health response.
“Mpox is a success story of conquering an outbreak,” said Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, an infectious disease specialist at the University of California, San Francisco.
The successful control of Mpox was due largely to the rapid deployment of vaccines and treatments paired with an aggressive public awareness campaign that leveraged trusted voices in the LGBTQ community, which was hit first by the outbreak.
“Of course there have been criticisms,” said Dr. Vincent Hsu, an infectious disease specialist and AdventHealth’s infection control officer. “But the fact remains that in a relatively short period of time, we have been able to get the number of cases down to where there’s just very few.”
Key to that success was public outreach and education.
“Health departments and community advocates got the message out about Mpox — how the disease presented, how it was spread, how it could be treated and how it could be prevented, including vaccination,” said Dr. Roy M. Gulick, chief of the Infectious Diseases Division at Weill Medical College of Cornell University. “The sharp decrease in cases directly resulted from these efforts.”
Public health experts credited a strong, unified response from leaders in the LGBTQ community. In fact, the rapid response in the LGBTQ community did not allow the virus to spread even further, Hsu said.
“The LGBTQ community has a strong record of community advocacy and successful interactions with the public health system from the time of the HIV epidemic,” said Gulick. “Education led to behavior changes in the community, including limiting the number of sexual partners, as well as the enthusiastic uptake of the vaccine.”
“Some of the secret sauce came around communication,” added Chin-Hong, including “using trusted messengers from the community” to deliver the message. Chin-Hong pointed to Reggie Aqui, an ABC anchor in San Francisco and an openly gay man, as an example. Aqui was nominated for a GLAAD award for his work and community discussions about Mpox.
Another smart move was appointing Dr. Robert Fenton and Dr. Demetre Daskalakis to head the federal government’s MPox response, Chin-Hong said. Fenton and Daskalakis deployed evidence-based guidelines which helped doctors like him feel comfortable trusting their advice, he said.
Beyond education, an equally crucial factor in controlling the outbreak was the rapid deployment of existing vaccines and treatments that had been stockpiled for smallpox, a closely related virus.
“The prior availability of therapeutics meant we weren’t flying the plane as we were building it,” said John Brownstein, an ABC News contributor and chief innovation officer at Boston’s Children’s Hospital.
In August — with limited supplies of the only FDA-approved mpox vaccine — government public health officials made a controversial choice to break up a single vaccine into multiple doses, tweaking the route of administration to maximize the body’s immune response.
Thankfully, this new vaccine strategy worked — as did existing treatments, according to doctors and public health experts.
Still, experts warn the virus hasn’t been fully eradicated and could return. Although “the emergency is largely over,” Hsu said, “we need to continue to be vigilant.”
“The Mpox response is now a model by which to prepare for future infectious disease threats,” Brownstein said.
Added Chin-Hong: “I think Mpox generally provides a great playbook of how to deal with an outbreak: the alignment of science and politics needed, a national a local strategy that was implemented and having strong and unified consistent messaging that is empathic and specific.”
Drake recentlymade Spotify history as the first artist on the platform to surpass 75,000 streams. He recognized the accomplishment on social media while throwing in a suggestion to the streaming service.
“We should get bonuses like athletes to motivate the future artists to be consistent and competitive,” he captioned a screenshot of the story. “So feel free to send me a LeBron [James] sized cheque I have enough dinner plates @spotify.”
The news about Drake, who was previously Spotify’s most-streamed artist of 2010, comes days before the release of his NFL x OVO capsule collection. The merch drops Friday.
If you know anything about perfectionist director James Cameron, you know he’s not one to tolerate mistakes, let alone admit one. But in the spirit of the 25th anniversary of the release of his Oscar-winning film Titanic, he wanted to tackle one of the movie’s most lingering questions.
No, not whether Rose kept that necklace, but could Leonardo DiCaprio‘s steerage class scamp Jack have fit on the floating door that spared Kate Winslet‘s Rose from a watery grave?
In the NatGeo specialTitanic: 25 Years Laterwith James Cameron, the filmmaker set up an experiment using a tank and a pair of stunt divers to play the doomed lovers.
“Final verdict,” Cameron declares, “Jack might have lived, but there’s a lot of variables.” He added, “Based on what I know today, I would have made the raft smaller so there’s no doubt.”
For fans of MythBusters, however, this is a bit of old news: The gang famously proved that it was plausible both could have fit onto the door and lived happily ever after.
Previously, the Avatar visionary resisted this theory, noting to Vanity Fair in 2017, “The answer is very simple: Because it says on page 147 [of the script] that Jack dies. Very simple.”
If one wanted to prove it for themselves, they could buy an inflatable pool floaty made to look like the famous hunk of floating debris in Hollywood history.
Maksim Konstantinov/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images
(MOSCOW) — Nearly one year after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the U.S. is increasingly focused on denouncing what it calls a “brutal” paramilitary group aiding Russian forces there.
The Wagner group is a private military organization run by an ally of Russian leader Vladimir Putin with tens of thousands of fighters, according to U.S. officials, and it has also operated in Syria and in various African countries.
Last week, the U.S. labeled the group a “significant transnational criminal organization” and levied new sanctions, while human rights observers this week said they suspected Wagner fighters were linked to the mass killing of people in Mali last year.
Government reports, statements from U.S. officials and insights from experts, as well as other sources, shed light on the Wagner group’s history and goals, its alleged wrongdoings and its importance to Russia — in Ukraine and elsewhere in the world.
How is the Wagner group involved in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine?
According to Catrina Doxsee, an expert on the Wagner group from the nonprofit Center for Strategic and International Studies, Wagner was first involved in the Ukrainian-Russian conflict in 2014, when Russia illegally annexed the Crimean Peninsula.
Today, there are an estimated 50,000 fighters from the Wagner group in Ukraine, White House spokesman John Kirby said last month.
Around 40,000 of the fighters are believed to be convicts, according to Doxsee, which could lead to more allegations of human rights abuses. A video circulating online appears to show the group’s leader, businessman Yevgeny Prigozhin, asking prisoners to join the Wagner group.
“You have individuals coming in who are less experienced, less trained and who are kept in line in a much less efficient way by their commanders,” Doxsee said.
In September, a senior U.S. defense official downplayed the success of Wagner recruiting prisoners, with some felons declining to join given Ukraine’s success in its counteroffensive.
Other Wagner fighters have reportedly been drawn in for financial reasons.
Recent satellite images show a growing Wagner burial site, illustrating the grim chances for convicted fighters on the front lines. Another recent video from Russian media outlet RIA Novosti showed Prigozhin — who previously claimed he had no role with the group, a position he has since reversed — visiting the cemetery.
Kirby told reporters in December that Wagner has received weapons it purchased from North Korea to be used in Ukraine.
Despite what the U.S. says is the Wagner group’s significant presence in Ukraine, such mercenaries are technically illegal under Russian law and the Kremlin has long avoided discussing the use of contracted fighters.
Doxsee said Russia’s purported ban on private military companies (PMC) like the Wagner group allows the government a necessary distance from its operations.
“They are technically all operating in violation of Russian law by means of even participating in PMC activities, and ultimately in the mind of the Russian government they are more expendable,” Doxsee said.
She said the Kremlin is likely able to leverage the group’s illegal status: If Wagner turns, the government has the full ability to punish them.
Other countries, including the U.S., heavily rely on contractors for some military duties, from logistics to training.
Who is in charge of the Wagner group?
Dmitry Utkin, a former Russian officer, and financier Yevgeny Prigozhin started the Wagner group, which emerged around 2014, toward the beginning of the Ukraine-Russia conflict on the Crimean Peninsula, according to reports published by the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point.
The group’s moniker reportedly comes from a nickname for Utkin — or is a reference to the composer Richard Wagner, beloved by Hitler. Prigozhin is known in the West by the nickname “Putin’s chef,” because of how he and Russia’s president met decades ago, when Prigozhin was a restauranteur.
Reports in the Combating Terrorism Center have also noted some disagreement over Wagner’s operations, with some arguing it is less of a formal business entity (like American military contractors) and more of a movement.
Prigozhin denied involvement in the group until late last year when he confirmed his role, according to the Associated Press. He has since spoken repeatedly about it, CNN reported last month, casting the effort much differently than the American assessment that it is criminal.
“The fact that Prigozhin has been so open since the fall of 2022 about his connection with Wagner really indicates that he’s feeling extremely confident and secure in his current position in his political power and in Putin’s trust,” Doxsee said.
In 2018, U.S. prosecutors charged Prigozhin for his suspected role in funding the Internet Research Agency (IRA), which the U.S. described as a Russian “troll farm” that sought to use digital campaigns to increase political and social tensions in the U.S.
The Department of Justice accused the IRA of conspiring to “defraud the United States… for the purpose of interfering with the U.S. political and electoral processes, including the presidential election of 2016.”
The complaint described tactics like posing as U.S. citizens and creating false online personas.
A Kremlin spokesman at the time said the case was “absolutely unsubstantiated.”
Last year, Prigozhin said on social media that “we have interfered [in elections], are interfering and will interfere,” the AP reported.
Wagner’s role in other countries
Beyond Ukraine, the Wagner group has been active in several African and Middle Eastern countries where it has participated in regional conflicts, exploited resources and spread Russia’s influence, according to the reports published by the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point.
Doxsee said that exploiting the natural resources of vulnerable nations helps the group deal with financial punishments like the U.S. sanctions.
“Wagner’s ability to mine for gold and smuggle it out of the country has actually allowed Wagner and oligarchs like Prigozhin and others in Moscow to soften the blow of some of the Western sanctions,” Doxsee said.
A 2020 statement from the U.S. Department of Defense said there was evidence that the Wagner group violated a U.N. arms embargo and “laid land mines and improvised explosive devices in civilian areas in and around Tripoli, Lebanon, without regard to the safety of civilians.”
The Wagner group also moved troops to Syria in 2015 to support the Assad regime during the ongoing Syrian civil war, according to Combating Terrorism Center at West Point.
In 2021, the International Federation for Human Rights and others helped file suit against Wagner group fighters, alleging they were responsible for a “murder committed with extreme cruelty” after a Syrian man was killed in 2017. (The status of the complaint is not clear.)
There have been additional accusations from non-governmental organizations of human rights abuses in Mali, where government forces have been working with Wagner fighters, advocates say.
“We are disturbed by the apparent increased outsourcing of traditional military functions to the so-called Wagner group in various military operations [in Mali],” human rights observers said on Tuesday in a statement released by the United Nations. They described “gross human rights abuses and possible war crimes and crimes against humanity” since 2021.
Other countries with a history of Wagner group deployments include Mozambique and Madagascar.
Prigozhin claimed in a statement last week that the Wagner group is essential to many African nations.
“There are presidents to whom I gave my word that I would defend them,” Prigozhin said. “If I now withdraw one-hundred, two-hundred or five-hundred fighters from there, then [these countries] will simply cease to exist.”
State Department Principal Deputy Spokesperson Vedant Patel, in a briefing last week, did not say whether the U.S. would take action against countries working with sanctioned people or entities like Prigozhin or the Wagner group.
What is the U.S. response to the Wagner group?
Kirby, the White House spokesman, said last month that “we will work relentlessly to identify, disrupt, expose and target those who are assisting Wagner.”
Last Thursday, the U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned the Wagner group and related entities, labeling them a “significant transnational criminal organization” and accusing them of human rights abuses in the Central African Republic.
In total, the U.S. Treasury sanctioned nine people and 14 entities in Russia, China, the Central African Republic and the United Arab Emirates, mostly with alleged Wagner connections. The Treasury also identified two yachts and one aircraft that are now considered blocked by the U.S. government.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement the sanctions support “our goal to degrade Moscow’s capacity to wage war against Ukraine.”
Past sanctions from the Treasury Department went to Pregozhin, M Finans, Lobaye Invest, Concord Group and the Internet Research Agency.
ABC News’ Victoria Beaulé, Layla Ferris, Mariam Khan, Christopher Looft, Luis Martinez and Max Uzol contributed to this report.
