(WASHINGTON) — The House Jan. 6 committee on Thursday announced it will hold what might be its final hearing next Thursday, Oct. 13.
It will take place at 1 p.m.
The committee postponed its Sept. 29 session due to Hurricane Ian, a Category 4 storm that made landfall in Florida the day before the hearing was set to take place.
It’s been more than two months since the panel investigating the U.S. Capitol attack last held a public hearing after airing eight televised sessions from June to July to reveal the findings of their probe.
In those hearings, lawmakers described what they called a “sophisticated, seven-part plan” by former President Donald Trump and his supporters to try to overturn his 2020 election loss to Joe Biden, including his pressure on the Department of Justice and local election officials. The last session focused exclusively on Trump’s actions while violence unfolded on Jan. 6, 2021, with witnesses telling the panel Trump initially refused pleas from his staff to condemn the mob.
Chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., previously said the committee would air “substantial footage” and “significant witness testimony” in this new hearing, but declined to give any more details on what the focus of the session will be.
Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., previously teased the hearing will be “more sweeping than some of the other hearings” and will “tell the story about a key element of Donald Trump’s plot to overturn the election.”
A major development in recent weeks has been the committee’s interview on Sept. 29 with Ginni Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, about her efforts to push state officials to reject the 2020 results.
Thomas told the panel she still believes the 2020 election was stolen, Chairman Thompson said after the interview. Thompson also said Thomas answered “some” questions, but didn’t elaborate on what questions she responded to.
In her opening statement to the committee, which was obtained by ABC News, Thomas reiterated that she doesn’t believe her husband’s work is within the scope of the investigation.
“I can guarantee that my husband has never spoken with me about pending cases at the Court,” her opening statement read. “It’s an iron clad rule in our home.”
Next Thursday’s hearing could be the last before the committee releases a comprehensive report on their findings and recommendations, and will take place just 25 days before Election Day.
(NEW YORK) — For the past decade, Kaitlin Preble of Tucson, Arizona, said she has gone to her local pharmacy each month to pick up her daughter’s prescription for methotrexate, a drug that is used to treat rheumatoid arthritis, among other things.
Preble’s daughter, Emma Thompson, was diagnosed at age 3 with juvenile idiopathic arthritis, an autoimmune disease that can cause joint pain and inflammation in body parts including the hands, knees and ankles, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Now 14, Emma relies on methotrexate and a combination of other medications to be able to do basic functions like walking, brushing her hair and attending school in-person, according to Preble.
Preble told ABC News’ Good Morning America that in the 10 years Emma has been prescribed methotrexate, she had not encountered any difficulties accessing the drug — until last month.
In late September, just days after a near-total ban on abortion went into effect in Arizona, Preble said she was denied the medication by a pharmacist at her local Walgreens.
“I went into Walgreens because I’m like, this is my baby, I need to see why they’re not going to give it to her,” said Preble. “The pharmacist said, ‘I denied it because she’s 14 years old.'”
Methotrexate, while prescribed to treat conditions like Crohn’s disease, psoriasis and cancer, in addition to arthritis, can also be used at higher dosages to medically terminate pregnancies.
Preble said she believes Emma’s prescription for the medication was initially denied because of confusion under Arizona’s abortion restrictions that were put in place after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June.
On Sept. 24, a 15-week abortion ban that was signed into law in March 2022 by Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey went into effect in the state.
Separately, on Sept. 23, a state judge granted Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich’s request to lift an injunction on a near-total ban on abortion, passed in 1901, only allowing exceptions to save the life of the mother.
Preble said the month prior, she had been questioned when picking up Emma’s prescription for methotrexate about how much she took and why she took it, but was given the medication.
She described being in tears upon learning that this time, the medication was denied, saying, “I was scared for my daughter. It’s the unknown.”
Preble said she interacted with a pharmacy tech at Walgreens, who conferred with the pharmacist on duty and ultimately gave her the medication.
“I did end up leaving with the medication that day, but I don’t know if it’s going to be filled next month,” she said. “I don’t know what the future holds right now, and not only for my daughter, but for every little girl that that needs this medication, whether it’s for arthritis, whether it’s for Crohn’s disease, and not just girls, women in general.”
A Walgreens spokesperson told GMA the company cannot comment on individual patients, but said it is working to help pharmacists “understand the latest requirements” in different states.
“Our focus is meeting the needs of our patients and making sure they have access to the medications they need, in compliance with applicable pharmacy laws and regulations,” the spokesperson said in a statement. “New laws in various states require additional steps for dispensing certain prescriptions and apply to all pharmacies, including Walgreens. In these states, our pharmacists work closely with prescribers as needed, to fill lawful, clinically appropriate prescriptions. We provide ongoing training and information to help our pharmacists understand the latest requirements in their area, and with these supports, the expectation is they are empowered to fill these prescriptions.”
Preble’s story went viral after Emma’s doctor, Deborah Jane Power, a Tucson-based pediatric rheumatologist, shared it on Twitter, writing, in part, “Welcome to AZ. Today a pharmacist denied the MTX refill for my adolescent patient. She’s on 5 mg/wk to prevent AHCA Ab production. MTX denied purely because she’s a female, barely a teenager. Livid!”
Power told GMA that Emma was her first adolescent patient to face a denial of a methotrexate prescription.
She said she shared it on Twitter as a wake-up call to people that non-abortion related health care was being impacted in a state like Arizona with abortion restrictions.
“I wanted folks to think about the ramifications beyond the obvious, banning abortion, how it affected women’s health in a broader aspect,” said Power. “This is health care for women, period. It’s not just reproductive health, but it’s their health in terms of rheumatologic problems and so many other conditions.”
Power said she contacted state and federal legislators and the state pharmacy board about the incident, and plans to keep speaking out.
“We are part of the noise of getting the word out and I think that’s how you start to affect change,” said Power. “None of my male patients have had methotrexate denied. There’s been no issue about getting their refills.”
This week, the Arizona Medical Association and a physician filed a lawsuit, asking a court to provide clarity amid what they say is “significant confusion” over the state’s abortion laws.
In July, the American College of Rheumatology issued a statement addressed to policymakers, calling on them to continue to make methotrexate “accessible.”
“Methotrexate remains the standard of care for a variety of autoimmune diseases. Therefore, methotrexate must remain accessible to people with rheumatic diseases, and legal safeguards must protect rheumatology professionals, pharmacists, and patients from potential legal penalties,” the college said.
Preble said she will continue to speak out and fight for Emma’s access to methotrexate because she has seen what a difference the medication has made in Emma’s life.
Since being diagnosed at age 3, Emma has faced countless hospitalizations and years of being barely able to leave the house due to pain, according to Preble.
This year, Emma’s freshman year of high school, is the first in many years that she’s been able to attend fully in person.
Both Preble and Power said it took several years to get the right dosage of methotrexate with other medications to allow Emma to live her life.
“She’s able to walk to her classes. She’s staying healthy and getting good grades. She’s able to shower on her own, able to stand up and go out to eat if she wants,” said Preble. “She’s feeling good enough to do those things, where before it was just, ‘I want to stay home. I don’t feel very good.'”
“It fills me with so much happiness to see where she is right now, and I couldn’t imagine her not being able to continue where she wants to go in life,” she added.
Taylor Swift has revealed the final five track titles of her new album Midnights during the last installments of her #MidnightsMayhemwithMe TikTok series.
“Tonight we mayhem til the morning!” Taylor captioned her first TikTok post of the evening, where she revealed the title of track one is called “Lavender Haze.”
On Instagram, Taylor explained that she first heard the phrase in an episode of Mad Men and it means to be in an all-encompassing kind of love. The song, she says, is also about doing whatever you can to protect that feeling.
“Like, my relationship for six years, we’ve had to dodge weird rumors, tabloid stuff, and we just ignore it,” Taylor explains of her relationship with Joe Alywn. “And so this song is sort of about the act of ignoring that stuff to protect the real stuff.”
Taylor also revealed the title of the much-anticipated track five – typically her albums’ most significant song – is “You’re on Your Own, Kid.” And in subsequent TikTok videos throughout the night, she rounded out the rest of the track list: track 10 is “Labyrinth,” track 12 is called “Sweet Nothing” and track four is titled “Snow on the Beach” and it features Lana Del Rey.
(LAS VEGAS) — Two people are dead and six others injured in a stabbing spree outside a Las Vegas casino on Thursday, according to police.
Three victims were in critical conditions and the other three survivors were in stable condition Thursday night, Las Vegas police said.
The victims include both locals and tourists, Sheriff Joseph Lombardo said during a press briefing Thursday.
The initial stabbing, which took place around 11:40 a.m. local time, occurred on the sidewalk along Las Vegas Boulevard, Deputy Chief James LaRochelle told reporters. It appears to have been unprovoked, he said.
The suspect then proceeded south and stabbed five more victims, and then an additional victim on Sands Avenue, he said. It’s unclear when or where the eighth victim was stabbed.
One victim was pronounced dead at the scene, and a second died after being transported to the University Medical Center of Southern Nevada, police said.
The two people who died were identified as Brent Allan Hallett, 47, of Las Vegas, and Maris Mareen Digiovanni, 30, of Las Vegas, according to the Clark County Office of the Coroner/Medical Examiner.
The suspect, 32-year-old Yoni Barrios, was taken into custody within a “matter of minutes” by a security guard and police officer after fleeing the scene, police said.
A large kitchen knife used in the incident has been recovered from the scene, police said.
Police believe Barrios acted alone, adding that a motive is unknown.
He was booked on two counts of open murder with a deadly weapon and six counts of attempted murder with a deadly weapon, police said.
ABC News’ Lisa Sivertsen contributed to this report.
(NEW YORK) — Since the early days of the monkeypox outbreak in the United States, Hispanic and Latino men may have been disproportionately affected.
While data from the CDC is limited and fewer than 50% of cases include information about race/ethnicity, it indicates that there may be disparities for Hispanic and Latino Americans affected by monkeypox.
Additionally, 47% of first doses of the JYNNEOS vaccine — a two-dose vaccine approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to prevent smallpox and monkeypox — have been given to white Americans, despite accounting for less than 30% of weekly cases with reported demographics, according to the CDC. Meanwhile, Hispanic Americans have received just 20%.
Data on a city-level shows similar trends.
In New York City, Hispanic residents make up a plurality — 34% — of infections, as of Oct. 1, according to data from the city’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. In Los Angeles, Hispanic residents account for 45% of cases, as of Oct. 4, according to the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health. Around 10% of race/ethnicity data was unknown for each city.
Public health experts told ABC News a lack of access to healthcare and insurance, language barriers and the stigma around the disease has led to such large disparities.
“I’ve lived through the HIV epidemic, I’ve lived through the COVID pandemic and now through monkeypox, and it is frightening to see the similarities in the sense that it’s always the same populations that really are at a disadvantage,” Dr. Judith Flores, executive board member of the National Hispanic Medical Association, told ABC News. “Don’t have the equity in access to care, equity in getting the care in the way they needed, and in the manner that’s most appropriate to them, culturally and linguistically. So, I’m not surprised that we’re seeing this.”
Lack of information
Public health experts told ABC News one reason Hispanic and Latino men may have been disproportionately affected by the outbreak is because getting information to the community about the disease was difficult.
David Cuevas, disease intervention specialist and supervisor at the Multnomah County Health Department in Portland, Oregon, told ABC News there was limited information being released by the CDC in Spanish.
“At the beginning, when there was an emerging communicable disease coming out, there was limited information in other languages,” he said. “At the beginning in our team, we were looking at information from other websites in the U.K. or in Europe that have translations in different languages.”
Dr. Sean Cahill, director of health policy research at the Fenway Institute, a healthcare organization that focuses on sexual and gender minorities, in Boston, also said there weren’t many televised briefings about monkeypox like there were with COVID-19, meaning most people received public health information via internet, as well as booking vaccine appointments.
According to a Pew Research Center poll, only 65% of Hispanic adults said they had a broadband connection at home, as of February 2021, compared to 80% of white adults.
“In the early weeks of the monkeypox outbreak, vaccine was made available in many locations in New York and Washington, D.C. and elsewhere online,” he told ABC News. “And you had to have a computer and an internet connection or data, or Wi-Fi access or a smartphone in order to be basically book an appointment to get a vaccine.”
He continued, “And there are racial/ethnic disparities that affect groups in terms of socioeconomic status and whether or not people have smartphones and computers and internet access. And so, I think that played a role.”
Cahill added getting access to the treatment TPOXX required doctors and patients to fill out a great deal of paperwork from the CDC, which was not available in Spanish until August.
Fear of stigma
Aside from lack of information, stigma associated with the disease may also be affecting vaccine distribution.
The outbreak has primarily been concentrated in men who have sex with men, a group that includes people who identify as gay, bisexual, transgender and nonbinary, although health officials have said anyone — regardless of sexual orientation — is at risk if they have direct contact with an infected patient.
“We started mass distribution, so you’re expecting people to go online to basically out themselves,” Flores said. “If you are especially from Hispanic communities and communities of color, it is not something perhaps you’re most comfortable doing and you don’t want to make it public.’
Cuevas, a gay Hispanic man himself, said because the disease was mischaracterized as a disease only affecting LGBTQ populations, Hispanic Americans may have been fearful of being outed.
“A lot of individuals in the Latinx community may not be feel comfortable with their sexuality, with their identity,” Cuevas said. “Myself included, when I went to get my vaccine, I’ve even thought about that. “I was like, ‘Wow, if I was me, like my younger years when I was more in the closet and wasn’t out with my sexuality, this will be very stressful.'”
Cuevas said when Multnomah County was scheduling vaccine appointments, one way of trying to remove the stigma was to try to make the process as anonymous as possible.
“We would give this list of the people that are eligible [and say], ‘You just have to say yes or no, you don’t have to specify which part of the eligibility you fall into,'” he said. “So, people don’t feel like they’ve been put on the spot.”
How to reduce racial/ethnic disparities
Public health experts say to prevent to reduce the racial/ethnic gap, public health leaders and community leaders need to knock down barriers that prevent access to care among minority populations.
“That means going to where they are, having vaccine clinics at flexible times, on the weekends and late at night, and going to the places where, like those individuals, maybe hanging out,” Cuevas said.
He added, “Specific to our county, we were working hard and putting information on social media, on dating apps, information that somebody that speaks Spanish can actually read and make sense of. You want to have individuals talking to you in your own language, when you call and make the appointment for your vaccine.”
The effort appears to be working. In the latest CDC report, as of Sept. 18, Hispanics made up 19% of weekly monkeypox cases nationally with reported race/ethnicity data. which is down from 31% a month prior.
Cahill added that the bigger systemic issue that will help is expanding Medicaid eligibility.
“In order to qualify for Medicaid, you have to be categorically eligible. You either have to be disabled, or be a parent with dependent children, and you also have to be really, really poor,” he said. “That’s another big systemic reason why we see these ethnic disparities in HIV, in COVID, and now in monkeypox affecting Hispanic and Latino populations, because people don’t have health insurance and they’re not in routine care.”
“So, when a new threat emerges, they don’t have someone they can just call and talk to about it or get an appointment, or you know they’re not familiar with a medical office where they have gone on a regular basis and, therefore, they’re losing out on information,” Cahill continued.
Iconic Hairspray and Pink Flamingos director John Waters is making his first movie since 2004 with a big-screen adaptation of his novel Liarmouth: A Feel-Bad Romance. Deadline reports the project, which centers on “suitcase thief, scammer and master of disguise” Marsha Sprinkle, will also be written by the 68-year-old filmmaker. Waters explains in the announcement that Liarmouth is the craziest thing he’s written in a while. “Thrilled to be back in the movie business, hopefully to spread demented joy to adventuresome moviegoers around the world,” he added …
Amazon has given the green light for a second season of the supernatural Western series Outer Range, starring Josh Brolin. The Hollywood Reporter notes that Luke Cage and Sons of Anarchy vet Charles Murray will be taking the reins as showrunner for the sophomore frame. The show, which is co-produced by Brad Pitt‘s Plan B company, has Brolin playing a rancher who finds an otherworldly void on his property. Imogen Poots, Lili Taylor and Tom Pelphrey also star in the strong-performing streaming show …
Fresh from the show’s 10 Emmy wins, HBO has released the season 2 trailer to the dark comedy The White Lotus. Newly minted Emmy winner Jennifer Coolidge and her first season co-star Jon Gries return, as the intrigue shifts to Sicily. Aubrey Plaza stars this season as a woman vacationing there with her husband and their friends. Also starring is The Sopranos vet Michael Imperioli, Oscar winner F. Murray Abraham and Haley Lu Richardson. It premieres October 30 …
(RALEIGH, N.C.) — On Friday, North Carolina voters will see their candidates for Senate face off for the first and probably only time.
The debate, hosted by Spectrum News 1, will take place in Raleigh and will start at 8 p.m. ET.
Former state chief justice and Democratic candidate Cheri Beasley will meet GOP candidate Rep. Ted Budd on stage in a swing-state race that could help decide the control of Congress.
According to FiveThirtyEight, Budd leads Beasley by less than 1 point.
Beasley has heavily run her campaign on issues such as access to abortion and lowering health care costs. Meanwhile, Budd, endorsed by former President Donald Trump, has emphasized combating crime and supporting law enforcement in North Carolina.
Just a few weeks out from Election Day, Beasley and Budd have ramped up attacks on one another. She hit him on his anti-abortion stance and he emphasized having ample support from the local law enforcement community, arguing he would be better at handling the issue of crime.
The Beasley campaign told ABC News that the former chief justice has been looking forward to the debate.
Budd’s campaign did not respond to our request for comment.
Tim Boyum a reporter for Spectrum News 1 in North Carolina, will be moderating the debate. Prior to the debate, Boyum spent a day on the campaign trail with both candidates, where, he said, it became clear what issues are top of mind for voters as the election nears.
“On the Republican side, the issues of inflation, immigration and the border and crime dominated the discussion,” Boyum said. “On the Democratic side, voters were talking extensively about abortion and prescription drugs. I think that follows the path of recent polling that shows that the economy, abortion, health care and immigration are topping voters’ minds.”
The issue of the economy and inflation is likely to be a powerful force pushing people to the polls this year. According to the latest ABC News/Washington Post poll, 74% of voters said the economy is in bad shape. Equally important, 84% called the economy a top issue in their vote for Congress and 76% said the same about inflation.
And although Republican voters are set with Budd and Democratic voters are set with Beasley, it could be the large number of unaffiliated voters who tip the scale of the race. Currently, there are 2.5 million unaffiliated voters in North Carolina, making it the largest voting bloc — surpassing the amount of registered Democrat and Republican voters.
Friday’s debate will allow unaffiliated voters to learn more about the Senate candidates.
“This race has run under the radar nationally, and a lot of voters may not be as familiar with the candidates as the political class,” Boyum, the moderator, said.
Prior to Friday’s face-off, neither candidate took part in any primary debates. Beasley cleared the Democratic field before a debate could even be put together and Budd declined to take part in any events with his Republican challengers.
As of now, this is the only Senate debate scheduled in North Carolina, a contrast with just two years ago, when then-candidates Cal Cunningham and Sen. Thom Tillis faced off three times prior to Election Day.
(MILWAUKEE) — The first senatorial debate in the battleground state of Wisconsin is happening Friday evening, with incumbent Republican Ron Johnson facing off against the state’s Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes, who, if elected, would be the state’s first Black senator.
The debate will be broadcast live from PBS studios in Milwaukee at 8 p.m. ET/7 p.m. local time and is presented by the Wisconsin Broadcasters Association Foundation.
Democrats view the Senate seat in the state as one of the easiest ones to flip, but Republicans’ focus on the issue of crime, along with attack ads on the topic targeting their opponent, have helped tightened the race there, although some Democratic operatives say Republicans’ focus on crime is a distraction from other big issues on voters’ minds, including abortion rights.
A source close to the Barnes campaign said the debates, like the election, will be a referendum on Johnson. Issues that voters can expect to hear Barnes take Johnson to task on will be the Republican senator’s restrictive stance on abortion, past suggestions to end Social Security and Medicare, and Johnson’s ties with his wealthy donors, according to the source.
When asked by ABC News about the first senate debate this Friday, Alec Zimmerman, the communications director for Johnson, wrote in an emailed statement that Barnes is a “dangerous Democrat who has supported radical leftist causes like defunding the police and abolishing ICE.”
Zimmerman adds, “The debate will show what’s at stake in this race: safer communities and an affordable economy — two issues where Mandela Barnes is completely out of touch with Wisconsin families.”
The source close to the Barnes campaign said voters should expect to hear Barnes share his story as the son of a public school teacher and a third-shift auto worker, and how he’ll fight for the middle class.
(NEW YORK) — The Nobel Peace Prize was awarded Friday to Belarusian human rights advocate Ales Bialiatski and two groups, Memorial, a human rights organization from Russia and the Center for Civil Liberties, which is based in Ukraine.
The prizes were awarded for contributions to civil society, according to the committee.
Bialiatski “devoted his life to promoting democracy and peaceful development in his home country,” founding the organization Viasna to counter the dictatorial powers granted to the Belarusian president, according to an announcement for the prize.
As a result of his work, Bialiatski was jailed from 2011 to 2014 and arrested again in 2020. Currently he is being detained without trial, the committee said.
Memorial, founded in 1987 under the former Soviet Union, grew to become the biggest human rights organization in Russia. It “became the most authoritative source of information on political prisoners in Russian detention facilities,” according to the announcement. Perils attached to the work — in 2009, the head of the group’s branch in Chechnya was killed.
And the Center for Civil Liberties, founded in 2007, has dedicated itself to making Ukraine a “full-fledged democracy.” Since the Russian invasion in February 2022, it has “engaged in efforts to identify and document Russian war crimes against the Ukrainian civilian population.”
Last year, the prize was given to two journalists, Maria Ressa and Dmitry Muratov, for their work in the Philippines and Russia respectively.
Ressa co-founded an investigative journalism company and worked to shine a spotlight on former president Rodrigo Duterte’s brutal anti-drug campaign, according to the prize announcement. Muratov was credited with founding the “most independent” newspaper in Russia today, Novaya Gazeta, which has garnered “harassment, threats, violence and murder,” including the killings of six of its journalists, the announcement said.
Past Nobel Peace Prize winners have included former Presidents Barack Obama and Jimmy Carter, Nelson Mandel, Mother Teresa and Martin Luther King Jr. Since the program’s inception in 1901. The International Committee of the Red Cross has been awarded the prize three times.
(DEARBORN, Mich.) — A suspect has been taken into custody following a deadly shooting and hourslong negotiations with authorities at a Hampton Inn in Dearborn, Michigan, the Michigan State Police said.
“The barricaded gunman has been taken into custody without incident,” police said Thursday night. “Michigan Ave. is still closed and will be as the investigation continues. This will be our final update.”
Dearborn Police Chief Issa Shahin said Thursday night there was one fatality, a 55-year-old clerk from Riverview “just trying to do his job.”
Police said the suspect — a 38-year-old man with a history of mental illness and drug abuse — was armed with a rifle and threatened officers many times.
Dearborn police said they had been in contact with the suspect’s family to get him to surrender peacefully.
According to police, the incident was a confrontation over a bill.
Officers evacuated hotel employees and guests, police said.
Authorities were urging people to stay away from downtown Dearborn.
ABC News’ Darren Reynolds contributed to this report.
