(WASHINGTON) — Congressional Republicans are calling on top Defense Department officials to provide answers about who knew what and when about Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s secret hospitalization for complications resulting from a prostate cancer treatment. This comes as the White House makes clear that despite making an “overt and genuine” effort to learn more about Austin’s condition, President Joe Biden did not find out about his cancer diagnosis until Tuesday.
“We are deeply troubled by the apparent breakdown in communications between your office and the rest of the Department of Defense, the White House, and Congress over the past two weeks,” Sen. Roger Wicker, the ranking Republican in the Senate Armed Services Committee, wrote in a letter to Austin sent Wednesday.
“Further, the apparent failure to even notify your lawful successor in this case is a massive failure of judgment and negligence,” Wicker wrote in a letter signed by all the Republicans on the committee.
“It is an intolerable breach of trust with the American people at a dangerous moment for U.S. national security,” wrote Wicker.
Wicker labeled Austin’s initial public statement last week as “wholly insufficient.” Wicker requested that Pentagon officials who were involved in the notification process respond to his committee by Jan. 19 and answer questions related to the timing and notifications of Austin’s hospitalization and who made the decisions not to notify the White House and other senior Pentagon leaders.
The White House and President Joe Biden did not learn until Tuesday that Austin had prostate cancer and that complications from a surgical procedure to treat it had resulted in his ongoing hospitalization at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said Tuesday.
Kirby told ABC News Senior White House Correspondent Selina Wang on Wednesday that Austin is a “key member of this administration, so we were all very curious as to what put him in the hospital.”
When asked what explanation the White House received from the Pentagon, Kirby simply reiterated that they didn’t get the information.
“There was no lack of curiosity on our part,” Kirby said.
On Tuesday, House Armed Services Committee Chairman Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Ala., announced that he was also requesting answers from the Defense Department about the lack of transparency about Austin’s hospitalization.
Rogers wrote three letters to Austin, Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks and Austin’s chief of staff Kelly Magsamen requesting information regarding the events surrounding Austin’s hospitalization.
“It is unacceptable that neither the Department of Defense (‘Department’), the White House, nor the Congress were accurately informed of your position or capacity,” Rogers wrote in the letters. “With wars in Ukraine and Israel, the idea that the White House and even your own Deputy did not understand the nature of your condition is patently unacceptable.”
The Pentagon has launched a 30-day review of the circumstances behind the delayed notifications of Austin’s hospitalization and has put in place immediate changes to ensure that top Pentagon and White House leaders are notified promptly whenever the defense secretary’s authorities are transferred to the deputy secretary.
The White House has also ordered an administration-wide review of current policies for similar notifications at other federal agencies.
U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas holds a press conference at a U.S. Border Patrol station on Jan. 8, 2024 in Eagle Pass, Texas. (John Moore/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — House Republicans are moving ahead with impeachment proceedings against Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas as they continue to make immigration a key 2024 campaign issue.
House Homeland Security Committee Republicans opened Wednesday’s impeachment hearing against Mayorkas by rehashing familiar arguments that highlight the historically high levels of unauthorized migration across the southern border while Democrats continued to insist the proceedings are a sham.
The hearing comes after a yearlong probe to examine what the committee is calling the secretary’s “failed leadership” as the southwest border experienced a surge of migrants.
Chairman Mark Green, R-Tenn., played clips of Mayorkas discussing “operational control” of the U.S. border, which Congress has previously defined as zero illegal crossings. As Mayorkas has pointed out, under this definition, no administration has achieved operational control. At a previous hearing, Mayorkas said he believed there was a form of operational control and said he was not following the definition outlined in the dated statute.
Even still, Republicans have not identified a specific high crime or misdemeanor that Mayorkas committed. Chairman Green appeared to acknowledge as much.
“Secretary Mayorkas’ refusal to follow the law is sufficient grounds for impeachment proceedings,” Green said.
“The constitutional history is overwhelmingly clear on this subject,” he continued. “The founders designed impeachment not just to remove officials engaged in criminal behavior, but those guilty of such gross incompetence that their conduct had endangered their fellow Americans, betrayed the public trust and represented a neglect of duty.”
Rep. Bennie Thompson, the top Democrat on the House Homeland Security Committee, raised a number of procedural inquires about whether Mayorkas would have the ability to respond to evidence. Green dismissed the claim, saying the committee would “follow the rules of the House.”
Committee Democrats are united that the impeachment proceedings are unwarranted and purely the result of immigration policy disputes.
“It is now campaign season, and Republicans recently rolled out their impeachment proceedings against the secretary like the pre-planned, pre-determined political stunt it is,” Thompson said. “This is not a legitimate impeachment.”
“You cannot impeach a cabinet secretary because you don’t like the president’s policies,” Thompson said. “That’s not what impeachment is for. That’s not what the Constitution says.”
University of Missouri law professor and impeachment expert Frank Bowman, a witness at Wednesday’s hearing, echoed that argument, saying impeachable conduct does not apply to policy disputes or political debates.
“It is instead a measure of last resort reserved as one frame or put in for great and dangerous offenses,” Bowman said. “In other words, official misconduct, which is extraordinarily serious in degree and critically of a type that corrupts or subverts governmental processes or the constitutional order itself.”
Attorneys general of Montana, Oklahoma and Missouri also testified as witnesses. The three Republican leaders said Mayorkas has failed to enforce the law, and alleged he misled Congress when discussing “operational control” at the border.
Green, during a GOP visit to a Texas port of entry last week, accused Mayorkas of having “broken his oath to defend this country” and called him a threat to national security.
Mayorkas defended the administration’s work in his own visit to the Eagle Pass, Texas, entry point on Monday. He said the department’s taken “bold, necessary steps” while Congress has yet to pass legislation.
“Some have accused DHS of not enforcing our nation’s laws,” he said. “This could not be further from the truth.”
Migrant encounters at the U.S.-Mexico border reached a record high in December. Sources told ABC News preliminary data showed there were 302,000 encounters last month.
Border Patrol apprehensions have decreased from the historic level, with agents apprehending about 3,244 migrants daily over the past week, according to internal data obtained and verified by ABC News. This past Sunday, agents recorded 2,729 apprehensions, a sharp decline from the two-decade record of nearly 11,000 in a single day last month.
House Republicans used a trip to the border last week to double down on their demands for tougher immigration restrictions as negotiations continue on a supplemental aid package focused on national security.
President Joe Biden last year laid out a package that included nearly $14 billion for the border to hire more agents and immigration judge teams, while also providing aid for Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan. But Republicans are tying the foreign aid to more sweeping legislative changes when it comes to immigration, such as more restrictive asylum guidelines.
“If President Biden wants a supplemental spending bill focused on national security, it better begin by defending America’s national security,” House Speaker Mike Johnson said.
A group of senators have been working for weeks on finding compromise, and Congress returned to Washington this week after holiday recess. But disagreements over parole provisions has led to increasing pessimism that a deal can be struck by week’s end.
I just don’t see any way to be able to get that done this week,” Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., said late Monday. “There’s a lot more that needs to get done. It starts speeding up, and they you hit a point that you realize now this is going a whole lot slower.”
Mayorkas has been involved in the negotiations, and said Monday the department needs more Border Patrol agents, case prosecutors, asylum officers and technology to combat the flow of fentanyl.
“We now need Congress to do their part and act,” he said. “Our immigration system is outdated and broken and has been in need of reform for literally decades. On this, everyone agrees.”
Mayorkas has long been a target of Republican ire over the border. The House GOP effort to oust him would be the first potential impeachment of a Cabinet official since Secretary of War William Belknap in 1876, though it’s unlikely Mayorkas would be convicted in a trial in the Democrat-led Senate.
ABC News’ Allison Pecorin and Mariam Khan contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — Sen. Bob Menendez sought on Wednesday to dismiss the charges against him, arguing the government’s accusations that he sold his office and sold out his nation “are outrageously false, and indeed distort reality.”
Menendez has been charged with taking gifts — gold bars, wads of cash and luxury watches, among others — in exchange for doing official favors for New Jersey businessmen and the governments of Egypt and Qatar. He is the first sitting member of Congress to ever be charged with conspiracy for a public official to act as a foreign agent.
Menendez has pleaded not guilty.
In his motion to dismiss, Menendez argued, “Every official act the Senator took represented his good-faith policy judgments based solely on appropriate considerations.”
The senator’s defense attorneys argued requiring him to stand trial would “offend the Constitution,” because the “Framers believed Members of Congress should be principally accountable to the people, not to other branches of government; legislators must explain their conduct to voters, not to overzealous prosecutors.”
There was no immediate comment from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York, which brought the case and will file a response to the court.
The defense argued the second superseding indictment — there has since been a third — violated the Speech or Debate Clause that precludes drawing in question the legislative acts of a member of Congress.
“Yet the Second Superseding Indictment here does exactly that. It calls into question how the Senator, in his work with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, exercised his committee prerogatives. It casts doubt on how New Jersey’s senior Senator advised the President in connection with federal nominations in his State. And it heaps shade on how the Senator performed fact-finding and information-gathering in support of his legislative functions. All of this conduct is constitutionally immune,” Menendez argued.
The motion followed a lengthy speech on the Senate floor Tuesday in which Menendez declared his innocence and lashed out at prosecutors.
Menendez said he received “absolutely nothing” from Qatar and criticized what he argued is a relentless campaign by prosecutors to get him to resign.
“The United States Attorney’s Office is engaged not in a prosecution, but a persecution. They seek a victory, not justice,” Menendez said Tuesday. “It’s an unfortunate reality but prosecutors sometimes shoot first before they even know all the facts.”
(NEW YORK) — As children, they were part of one of the most dangerous polygamous cult movements in history, with members committing a mass killing at the behest of its late leader.
And now two sisters who grew up in the LeBaron Cult are telling their story of escape, shock and living in fear.
“Daughters of the Cult,” a five-part ABC News Studios docuseries now streaming on Hulu, chronicles the story of several people, including Anna and Celia LeBaron, who were involved in Ervil LeBaron’s splinter Mormon fundamentalist group that operated throughout the Southwest and Mexico.
The sisters said they were lucky to be alive as their father controlled dozens of their family members and manipulated his followers to enact a deadly wave of violence against rival groups and others who opposed him.
“Many of my siblings are afraid to tell their stories, and I don’t blame them,” Anna LeBaron said.
“We’re afraid. We’re doing this afraid,” Celia LeBaron said, referring to participating in the docuseries.
After the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints ended polygamy in 1890, it excommunicated members who were still marrying multiple spouses. Those former members created their own splinter group to continue their polygamous relationships.
Ervil LeBaron and his brother Joel were descendants of that group and led the community in 1951 after their father died.
The brothers formed the organization called “Firstborn of the Fullness of Times.”
Ervil LeBaron had over 13 wives and at least 50 children, according to his family.
Celia LeBaron described her family’s upbringing as very “closed-minded,” as her father claimed to be the “Prophet of God.”
“We were indoctrinated from birth,…and it was absolute brainwashing,” she said.
A rift began to form between Joel and Ervil LeBaron when Ervil accused his brother of being a “false prophet.” Celia and Anna LeBaron said their father then became more militant, practicing military drills and arming his family and other cult members, including the children.
“Ervil wanted all of Joel’s followers to bend the knee to him and give him their tithe money,” Anna LeBaron said.
In 1972, Joel LeBaron broke off and formed another group, the “Church of the First Born of the Lamb of God.” Later that year, Joel LeBaron was murdered in Mexico by Ervil LeBaron’s followers at his orders, law enforcement learned.
Hunted by the FBI, Ervil LeBaron would move his family around the U.S. and Mexico to avoid capture, unbeknownst to his children. Anna LeBaron said she moved as many as 15 times before she was 10.
“We were awakened up in the middle of the night one night. Told not to ask any questions. It was all hush hush, urgent tones and scary,” she said. “We were just told, ‘quickly, put on your shoes. Don’t ask any questions.'”
Celia LeBaron said that she and her siblings were taught not to trust the authorities and that they were agents of evil.
“If they were to ask us any questions, we were literally trained to say ‘I don’t know,'” she said.
Ervil LeBaron eventually turned himself in to the Mexican police, and was convicted for his brother’s murder in 1974. However, his conviction was overturned by a higher court on a technicality and he was released.
This would be the start of years of violence orchestrated by Ervil LeBaron, who used members of his group and family, including two of his wives, to murder rival polygamous leaders.
“I think they felt like they were doing the right thing because we were God’s chosen people,” Anna LeBaron said.
Ervil LeBaron didn’t just target rivals with violence, according to Anna and Celia LeBaron. He used his supporters to murder family members who crossed him or threatened to leave the group.
Rebecca LeBaron, Anna and Celia’s half-sister, was believed to have been murdered while pregnant with her second child, at Ervil LeBaron’s orders, when she expressed interest in leaving the cult, according to the sisters. Her body was never found and no one was arrested in connection with her disappearance.
“So many of the women in our group were taught to stay quiet. You weren’t allowed to complain, you weren’t allowed to question, you weren’t allowed to think your own thoughts about anything. It was normalized to just do what you’re told, and not ask any questions. And so, that’s what we did,” Anna LeBaron said.
Authorities in both Mexico and the U.S. tried to apprehend Ervil LeBaron and even raided many of the places he and his followers lived.
In 1979, he was apprehended by Mexican authorities and extradited to the U.S., where he was convicted in the murder of Rulon Allred, another polygamous leader.
Although he was behind bars, Ervil LeBaron still wielded power among his followers and family, according to Anna and Celia LeBaron.
He allegedly wrote letters to his followers with violent messages and orders, including one where he told them to break him out of captivity.
“When you read his writings, you would understand that these are not the writings of a man who is in his right mind,” Anna LeBaron said.
Ervil LeBaron was sentenced to life in prison in 1980, and he died while in prison a year later from an apparent heart attack.
Shortly after his death, Anna LeBaron was living in Houston with her mother. Her sister Lillian and her brother-in-law Mark Chynoweth were also living in the city and they were having misgivings about the cult, according to Anna LeBaron.
Anna LeBaron claimed that Dan Jordan, her father’s second-in-command, met with her mother and claimed that Mark was evil and she needed to move to Denver.
Anna LeBaron, then 13, ran away from her mother to her sister Lillian’s home in 1983.
“I felt like I had one chance. One chance to get out of there. So I started walking,” she said. “I am absolutely certain that somebody is going to come and find me. It was very frightening because I knew if somebody saw me, that was the end.”
“I didn’t feel like I was being rebellious. It never occurred to me that I was gonna be isolated from my mom and my siblings,” Anna LeBaron added.
Celia LeBaron remained with the family in Denver for another three years and said she was being emotionally and physically abused by Jordan and his wife.
In 1986, she called her sisters in Houston and Lillian arranged for a flight to leave the cult.
“I landed in Houston and walked down the runway, and there was my sister and her husband. And I knew, in that moment, that I was safe. I moved in with my sister and I got reunited with Anna,” Celia LeBaron said.
The sisters would later find out that their former family and organization would be involved in a gruesome series of killings orchestrated from beyond the grave.
While in prison, Ervil LeBaron wrote a manifesto titled, “The Book of the New Covenants” which was printed and distributed to his members.
The book contained a hit list of people who were deemed enemies of the church.
Anna LeBaron said she and her family members had heard of rumors of such a kill list and were concerned.
On June 27, 1988, at exactly 4:00 p.m., members of Ervil LeBaron’s cult took part in simultaneous shootings targeting people who were on that hit list.
Former follower Duane Chynoweth and his 8-year-old daughter and Eddie Marston, Ervil LeBaron’s stepson, were among the victims.
Mark Chynoweth was also shot six times in what was dubbed the “4 O’Clock Murders.”
“It was other parts of our family. Other people that we loved were killing these precious humans that we adored,” Celia LeBaron said.
The sisters immediately told authorities about their father’s plans, but they remained in constant fear that they could be next.
Anna LeBaron said she had trouble applying to colleges as administrators feared other students’ parents would be concerned. Her sister Lillian would eventually take her own life.
Seven cult members were arrested over the next two decades in connection with the murders. Five were convicted. Cynthia LeBaron was granted immunity for testifying against her co-conspirators.
Jacqueline Tarsa LeBaron was captured in 2010 and pleaded guilty to conspiracy to obstruct religious beliefs a year later. She was sentenced to five years in prison but was released early.
“It was better that they be in prison. But there are a lot of mixed emotions,” Celia LeBaron said. “These are people that you love. That you care about. It was heart-wrenching.”
The sisters said they have tried to live their lives the best they can despite their trauma.
“It’s been over 40 years since I escaped my father’s cult,” Anna LeBaron said. “To be able to grow and become the person that I am today. To heal enough that I was able to write my own story and to publish my book. I want to be an inspiration to others. Anyone who’s experienced abuse, neglect, abandonment, those things don’t have to define us today. I have overcome all of the odds, and here I am.”
“Daughters of the Cult” is produced by ABC News Studios, All3Media and Main Event Media. Emily Bon, Jimmy Fox and Jacob Cohen-Holmes are executive producers. Sara Mast is director and executive producer, and Smith Glover is co-executive producer. ABC News Studios’ David Sloan is the senior executive producer, and Beth Hoppe is the executive producer.
(NEW YORK) — Severe weather across the U.S. has left at least five people dead and is causing rivers to rise to dangerous levels as more winter storms move in.
Hundreds of thousands of customers are without power across the U.S. Wednesday, with New York and Pennsylvania hit the hardest.
While the rain in the Northeast has stopped for now, it could still cause rivers to rise over their banks in the next two days.
The Raritan River crested Wednesday in Piscataway Township, New Jersey, and local police urged residents to move cars near the river to higher ground.
In Norwich, Connecticut, dam conditions prompted officials to issue a mandatory evacuation order on Wednesday for areas along the Yantic River.
“Residents evacuating from Yantic are advised that they may be displaced from their residences and businesses for several days,” Norwich Public Utilities warned.
The Pawtuxet River in Rhode Island and the Pompton and Passaic rivers in New Jersey could also go to into major flooding stages.
On Tuesday, the storms caused at least five fatalities across the U.S.
In Wisconsin, one person was killed in a car crash due to poor road conditions amid snowfall, the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office said.
Another car crash killed a 35-year-old woman in Webber Township, Michigan, according to the Lake County Sheriff’s Office.
In Cottonwood, Alabama, an 81-year-old woman was killed when a possible tornado blew her mobile home over multiple times while she was inside, according to the Houston County medical examiner and coroner.
Another person was killed when severe weather damaged multiple residences at a mobile home park in Claremont, North Carolina, and the National Weather Service is evaluating where a tornado occurred in the area, according to the Catawba County Government.
In Jonesboro, Georgia, a tree fell on the windshield of a car, killing the driver, according to the Clayton County Police Department.
This week at least 23 tornadoes have been reported across Texas, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, South Carolina and North Carolina.
The same system brought up to 15 inches of snow to the Midwest and winds as high as 65 mph to the Northeast.
More than 3 inches of heavy rain fell on top of melting snow in the Northeast, crippling travel as floodwaters spilled into roadways.
Now, another winter storm is heading from the West Coast to the East Coast.
The storm already dumped up to 30 inches of snow and brought rare blizzard conditions to the Pacific Northwest over the last 24 hours.
On Wednesday, the heavy snow is falling in the Sierra Nevada mountain range and will move through the Rockies on Thursday.
This storm will bring another severe weather outbreak to the South from Thursday night through Friday. Damaging winds, large hail, flash flooding and tornadoes are possible from Texas to Florida to the Carolinas.
In the north, snow will stretch from Iowa to Missouri to Michigan to Chicago on Friday and Saturday, with more than 1 foot of snow possible in some spots.
The storm will reach the Northeast late Friday night into Saturday morning. More heavy rain, gusty winds and flooding are expected.
ABC News’ Victoria Arancio contributed to this report.
BetMGM, a leading sports betting and iGaming operator, has announced Luke Combs as the BetMGM Big Game Bash concert headliner.
The event will take place Saturday, February 10, at The Chelsea at Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas.
“First-class entertainment and Las Vegas are at the core of the BetMGM brand, and this Luke Combs concert will be a highlight of the weekend’s marquee entertainment events,” says BetMGM CEO Adam Greenblatt. “It is part of our full-scale efforts to deliver memorable experiences for fans who are in town for the momentous Big Game.”
“It’s going to be a whole lot of fun,” shares Luke.
Tickets start at $400 and go on sale Friday, January 12, at 8 a.m. PT exclusively on the BetMGM app.
Kate Bush has paid tribute to her longtime collaborator Del Palmer, who passed away earlier in January at age 71.
Palmer contributed to albums including 1985’s Hounds of Love, 1989’s The Sensual World, 1993’s Red Shoes and 2005’s Aerial, mostly as a bassist and engineer. You can hear his bass on Bush’s hit “Running Up That Hill.”
In a statement posted to her website, Bush, who was also in a relationship with Palmer into the ’90s, writes, “It’s hard to know what to say… He was a big part of my life and my work for many years.”
“It’s going to take a long time to come to terms with him not being here with us,” Bush continues. “He was incredibly creative — talented in lots of different ways. He was a brilliant musician, bass player, a great artist — he was always drawing. Once he covered a whole recording consul in cartoons. It took him days and it looked absolutely stunning. He taught himself to be a recording engineer, engineering several of my albums and later releasing his own.”
U2 is getting ready to wrap up their Las Vegas residency in March, but before they do they’re giving fans a chance to win a truly unique experience with the band.
The Irish rockers have just launched a new sweepstakes with Fandiem in which the lucky winner and a guest will receive two VIP tickets to see U2: UV Achtung Baby at Sphere on Saturday, February 24.
But that’s not all. The prize comes with two guest passes to meet the band before and after the show, plus roundtrip travel and hotel accommodations in Las Vegas, a guided tour of the Zoo Station U2:UV Experience at The Venetian Resort Las Vegas and a merch bundle.
Fans have until February 14 to enter the sweepstakes. Proceeds will be donated to The Farmlink Project, which helps to fight hunger by making sure food that would be wasted goes to people who need it.
U2 returns to the Sphere on January 26, with the residency set to run until March 2. A complete list of dates can be found at u2.com.
While walking the red carpet at the Golden Globe Awards on Sunday evening, Jennifer Lopez was caught on camera meeting a very enthusiastic fan — who happened to be “overwhelmed” Oscar winner Brie Larson.
In the meeting caught by Entertainment Tonight, Larson was in tears, telling the recording artist and actress that seeing her in Selena “made me want to be an actor.”
“Don’t make me cry!” Lopez said as the pair embraced.
To Zane Lowe on Apple Music 1, Lopez talked about the viral moment, saying, “It brings tears to my eyes now because it’s very moving.”
“You give your heart and soul to this when you’re an artist,” Lopez continued. “I remember being a little girl and watching West Side Story and seeing Rita Moreno and knowing what that meant for me.”
JLo said of the random meeting, “When I was looking at Brie and I saw her and I was just staring in her eyes because she was so locked in with me and just like, ‘I have wanted to tell you this for so long.’ I saw myself, I saw myself and I saw the little girl, and to think that I did that for somebody was really, really overwhelming.”
Lopez added, “I don’t think I ever imagined that I would have an experience like that with somebody who is so talented, and who I watch their movies, and who … is kind of in a way, my contemporary, even to feel that way and … to be so kind to express it, too.”
Jennifer said the moment meant “probably even more [to me] than it did to her.”
Priscilla Block is working hard on new music and recently teased a new, unreleased song.
“Feeling a little toxic today. Here’s a demo for you,” Priscilla captioned her Instagram Reel.
Titled “She Looks Good on You,” the midtempo track is a kiss-off tune where the persona addresses an ex who’s moved on and found someone new.
“She probably goes to church ain’t hungover in a pew/ Good on you/ She probably don’t cuss ain’t got a single tattoo/ Good on you/ Bet she’s uptown than she is downtown/ Bet she don’t get loud/ Bet your mom’s damn proud/ I was just something you had to shake loose/ Good on you,” Priscilla sings in a verse.
“Vanilla ain’t me/ It ain’t ever going to be/ It’s plain Jane to see that she looks good on you,” goes part of the chorus.
Priscilla’s latest album is her debut project, Welcome to the Block Party, which arrived in 2022 via Mercury Nashville. In August, she earned her first #1 with the Justin Moore-assisted “You, Me, And Whiskey.”
