Crews repair a sinkhole at LaGuardia International Airport in Queens, New York, May 20, 2026. (WABC)
(NEW YORK) — A sinkhole has shut down one of the runways at LaGuardia International Airport in New York City, prompting cancellations and delays, according to officials.
Crews found the sinkhole around 11 a.m. on Wednesday, while conducting a daily morning inspection of the airport’s airfield, according to the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.
The sinkhole was located near Runway 4/22, one of the airport’s two runways, according to the Port Authority.
Runway 4/22 was “immediately” shut down, and emergency construction and engineering crews are on site to make repairs, the Port Authority said.
The Federal Aviation Administration said it is slowing flights into LaGuardia “due to weather and a sinkhole on Runway 4/22.”
“Travelers should expect delays and cancellations, particularly with forecast thunderstorms expected later today, and are strongly encouraged to check directly with their airlines for the latest flight status information,” the Port Authority said.
The airport is currently under a ground delay, with flights departing to LaGuardia delayed an average of 98 minutes.
According to FlightAware, there are currently 197 cancellations into and out of LGA, and 168 delays.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
FBI photograph of redacted documents and classified cover sheets recovered from a container stored in former U.S. president Donald Trump’s Florida estate that was included in a U.S. Department of Justice filing, Aug. 30, 2022. (U.S. Department Of Justice)
(WASHINGTON) — The Department of Justice on Wednesday charged a longtime federal prosecutor with attempting to steal a sealed report prepared by then-special counsel Jack Smith on President Donald Trump’s alleged retention of classified documents.
A grand jury indicted Carmen Mercedes Lineberger — a managing assistant U.S. attorney in Fort Pierce, Florida — with four felony counts for allegedly attempting to steal the report, which has been sealed from public view for more than a year.
Prosecutors allege that Lineberger downloaded a copy of the sealed report onto her work computer and sent it to her personal email account in January of 2025.
According to the indictment, Lineberger renamed the report “Bundt_Cake_Recipe.pdf” before attaching it to an email from her DOJ account to her personal Gmail account.
The report has remained secret since January 2025, when it was prepared by Smith in the final days before Trump’s inauguration to summarize Trump’s alleged crimes. U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon ordered the report be kept secret after a push from Trump’s lawyers to seal the records, and the Department of Justice under the Trump administration has since fought to ensure the report is never released.
Trump pleaded not guilty to 40 counts of retaining classified information, obstruction of justice, and false statements after Smith alleged he not only kept a trove of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate after leaving office in 2021, but also actively impeded law enforcement from retrieving them. After months of litigation, Judge Cannon dismissed the case on the grounds that Smith was not properly appointed special counsel.
Earlier this year, Cannon issued an additional order permanently restricting the department from releasing the report. Two legal groups are in the midst of appealing her orders arguing disclosure of the report remains in the public’s interest.
It’s not immediately clear based on court papers unsealed Wednesday if prosecutors will argue that Lineberger intended to leak the contents of the report.
She made her initial appearance in federal court in West Palm Beach Wednesday and entered a not guilty plea to the indictment. An attorney listed as representing Lineberger declined to comment when reached by ABC News.
Former Cuban President Raul Castro speaks during the National Assembly at Convention Palace on April 19, 2018 in Havana, Cuba. (Photo by Alexandre Meneghini-Pool/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — The Justice Department on Wednesday charged former Cuban President Raul Castro with murder over his alleged role in shooting down two planes that were carrying humanitarian aid in 1996, according to a newly unsealed court docket. The shootdown resulted in the deaths of three Americans.
The indictment marks a major escalation in the United States’ ongoing pressure campaign to achieve regime change of the island nation’s Communist-led government, though it’s not immediately clear whether the 94-year-old Castro will ultimately see the inside of a U.S. courtroom.
The indictment charges Castro with seven counts including conspiracy to kill U.S. nationals, destruction of aircraft and murder for each of the four passengers aboard the planes being flown by Brothers to the Rescue, a group that conducted rescue missions for Cuban exiles who sought to flee the country.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and other senior officials are expected to speak about the charges later in Miami.
The Colorado River, located two miles from the entrance of Arches National Park, is viewed on October 3, 2023 near Moab, Utah. (George Rose/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — The Colorado River basin and its two largest reservoirs — Lake Mead and Lake Powell — are facing potentially record-low water levels in the coming months due to a snow drought that impacted much of the West over the winter season, projections from the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation show.
The 24-month study released by the Bureau of Reclamation, which oversees water resource management, on Friday indicates that Lake Mead could reach a record-low level of 1,036 feet of elevation in 2026.
Lake elevations indicate how much water is inside a reservoir. The Bureau’s scenario analysis looks at the end of month elevations for both Lake Powell and Lake Mead, and they make a future projection based on the probable inflow.
The previous low at Lake Mead was recorded in 2022, when levels dropped to around 1,040 feet.
Lake Mead could again approach these critically low levels over the next several months and years, according to the Bureau. This would depend on both the climate conditions as well as the response to those conditions, Dave White, director of the Global Institute of Sustainability and Innovation at Arizona State University, told ABC News.
Lake Powell is also projected to drop to a new record-low level in the coming months, surpassing the previous record of around 3,520 feet set in 2023. The amount of water flowing into the lake between April and July is forecast to be around 800,000 acre-feet, the lowest flow on record and only 13% of the average for that period, Cody Moser, senior hydrologist at the Colorado River Basin Forecast Center, said during a webinar on May 7.
Lake Mead and Lake Powell are the largest reservoirs in the U.S. Together, they store about 80% of the water supplies in the Colorado River system, Mark Squillace, professor of natural resources at the University of Colorado, told ABC News.
More than 40 million people rely on the river system for water, according to the Bureau.
Apart from actual water supplies, one of the biggest concerns for hydrologists is whether enough water remains in the reservoirs to operate hydropower systems. Another 2.5 million people are supplied by hydropower conducted in the Colorado River’s hydroelectric facilities, such as the Hoover and Glen Canyon dams.
The minimum surface elevation needed to generate power at the Hoover Dam is 1,050 feet, according to the Bureau. Anything below that is considered “inactive pool,” and a “dead pool” exists at 895 feet in elevation.
A “dead pool” is when water won’t flow to a dam and is too low to flow downstream.
Record low snowpack was followed by a heat wave in March that served as a “knockout punch” for lack of runoff leading to the reservoirs, Jon Meyer, assistant Utah state climatologist, told ABC News.
“We’ve been monitoring how the dismal thin snowpack melts travel down through the watersheds, and how much reservoir recharge and stream flow we can expect this year,” Meyer said. “It is just exceedingly underperformed a normal situation.”
But this isn’t a situation caused by one bad snow year, Arizona State University’s White said, adding that the Colorado River system is operating under an increasingly warmer, drier climate.
The West had been dealing with a decades-long megadrought before atmospheric rivers in the winters of 2023 and 2024 inundated the region with enough moisture to cause extreme flooding and alleviate drought conditions. This is further evidence of hydroclimate whiplash — the rapid shift between wet and dry conditions — that has resulted from anthropogenic climate change, the experts said.
“This is a multi-decade-old drought, and then on top of that multi-decade-old drought are the impacts of climate change, which predominantly translate into higher temperatures, more variable precipitation, and drier soils and higher [water] demand,” White said.
The most recent low reservoir levels occurred in 2022, in which Lake Mead’s water levels reached a record low of around 1,040 feet, according to the Bureau of Reclamation.
After that year, reservoir levels rebounded slightly due to aggressive conservation measures, especially from the lower basin states — Arizona, California and Nevada, White said.
The Colorado River system is integral for supplying water, power and watering the agricultural feeds that sustain the rest of the country, Erica Fleishman, director of the Oregon Climate Change Research Institute said.
But the river system is over-allocated, according to Fleishman. The water rights were established during a period of the 20th century in which levels were “unusually high,” she noted.
“The Colorado River is emblematic of what the entire West is seeing this year with limited water supply and ramifications for hydropower generation, for irrigation, for water quality,” Fleishman said.
The Bureau is anticipated to issue a record of decision with the operational guidelines for 2027 and 2028, as well as a framework for 2029 through 2036.
The lower basin states have submitted an allocation plan for consideration, but there is not yet a consensus plan among all of the states, including the upper basin states, according to White.
“I think it’s fair to say no one is happy with it,” he said.
(NEW YORK) — Two police officers who defended the U.S. Capitol in 2021 during the Jan. 6 attack are suing to stop the creation of President Donald Trump’s $1.7 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund,” calling it the “most brazen act of presidential corruption this century.”
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
Committee chairman Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) speaks during a House Financial Services Committee hearing on Capitol Hill February 24, 2010 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Brendan Smialowski/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — Barney Frank, the former Massachusetts congressman who championed Wall Street reform and served as one of the first openly gay members of Congress, has died at 86, sources told ABC News.
The former U.S. representative served as chairman of the powerful House Financial Services Committee from 2007 to 2011 and was a leading co-sponsor of the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act, which was enacted in response to the 2008 financial crisis.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
Russian President Vladimir Putin walks with Chinese President Xi Jinping during a welcoming ceremony at the Great Hall of the People on May 20, 2026 in Beijing, China. (Photo by Maxim Shemetov – China Pool/Getty Images)
(LONDON) — Chinese President Xi Jinping hosted Russian President Vladimir Putin in Beijing on Wednesday, with the two leaders releasing a joint statement urging an end to the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran as a matter of “utmost urgency.”
“The sides agree that military strikes by the United States and Israel on Iran breach international law and fundamental norms of international relations and seriously undermine stability in the Middle East,” the joint statement published on the Kremlin website said.
The statement stressed “the need for a return as soon as possible of the conflicting parties to dialogue and negotiations aimed to prevent the conflict zone from spreading and urged the international community to maintain an objective and impartial position, to assist de-escalation, and to defend the fundamental norms of international relations together.”
The two leaders also condemned what they called “treacherous military strikes against other countries, the hypocritical use of negotiations as cover for preparing such strikes, the assassination of leaders of sovereign states, the destabilization of the domestic political situation in these states and the provocation of regime change, and the brazen kidnapping of national leaders for trial.”
Moscow and Beijing have both been key partners for Tehran in recent years, as the U.S. and its European allies have sought to weaken the Islamic Republic through international sanctions and diplomatic isolation.
Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine since 2022 prompted the fostering of deeper military and economic ties between Moscow and Tehran, with Iranian munitions — in particular Iranian-designed Shahed strike drones — playing a key role in Russia’s ongoing campaign.
China, meanwhile, remains a key customer of Iranian oil, with some analysts estimating that Beijing accounts for up to 90% of Tehran’s crude exports.
China has been pushing for a diplomatic resolution to the conflict in Iran, which began with joint U.S.-Israeli strikes all across the country on Feb. 28. Beijing says it has been coordinating closely with Pakistan, which has emerged as a key mediator in as-yet unsuccessful peace talks between Washington and Tehran.
Following the meeting between Xi and Putin, both sides expressed support for the other’s “territorial integrity.”
Russia, Putin said — according to the Kremlin readout — “reaffirms its commitment to the One China principle and recognizes the existence of only one China. Taiwan is its integral part, and the government of the People’s Republic of China is the only legitimate government representing all of China.”
China, the readout said, “supports Russia’s efforts towards the provision of security, stability, national development, prosperity, sovereignty and territorial integrity and ‘opposes external interference in Russian internal affairs.'”
ABC News’ Joe Simonetti contributed to this report.
Former Cuban President Raul Castro speaks during the National Assembly at Convention Palace on April 19, 2018 in Havana, Cuba. (Photo by Alexandre Meneghini-Pool/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — The Justice Department is expected to announce charges against Raul Castro, sources familiar with the matter tell ABC News.
The charges are expected to include allegations of murder for shooting down two planes carrying humanitarian aid to desperate migrants in the 1990s that resulted in the deaths of three American pilots.
The charges will be announced in a press conference this afternoon.
This is a developing story. Please back for updates.
Hundreds gathered to hold a vigil at Lindbergh Park, down the street from the Islamic Center of San Diego, to mourn the loss of three people from the Islamic Center of San Diego. (Photo by Nelvin C. Cepeda / The San Diego Union-Tribune via Getty Images)
(SAN DIEGO) — Investigators are continuing to build a picture of the two suspects in the deadly Monday shooting at the Islamic Center of San Diego which killed three people, and which law enforcement officials say may have been driven by nihilistic and accelerationist extremism.
Three men, one of whom was a security guard, were killed in the shooting on Monday, authorities said, with investigators saying they are currently considering the incident as a hate crime.
Two suspects, aged 17 and 18, were found dead in a vehicle nearby, police said. Authorities are investigating two teenagers, Cain Clark and Caleb Vazquez, as the suspected attackers in the shooting, several sources told ABC News.
Authorities are reviewing a video apparently posted online by one of the suspects in Monday’s shooting that appeared to capture a livestream of the attack and its aftermath, sources told ABC News.
Sources said a video posted to an online gore site allegedly shows the suspects approaching the center and then opening fire, with a person believed to be suspect Clark wearing camouflage fatigues and a plate carrier.
In a later portion of the video, sources said the person believed to be Clark can be seen reaching into the backseat of the vehicle and then shooting Vazquez, before chambering a second round and taking his own life.
The video and items found with the suspects’ bodies appeared to indicate associations with extremist ideology, law enforcement officials said.
A Sonnenrad patch, depicting a neo-Nazi symbol, and what analysts assess is likely a patch for a militant accelerationist group, are both visible on the plate carrier being worn by the person believed to be Clark, according to sources. Additionally, writings are visible on a gun, including drawings of SS bolts and neo-Nazi insignias, sources said.
Further symbols associated with neo-Nazism and militant accelerationism were found at the scene of the shooting, including a flag with a Sonnenrad on it and a gas can with SS bolts drawn on it, according to sources.
Investigators are examining a lengthy document circulating online that is comprised of two hate-filled essays totaling 75 pages allegedly written by the suspected shooters, sources told ABC News.
Both essays promote white nationalism and express a hatred for immigrants, racial minorities and others, as well as anger toward women who prefer taller men, according to sources. Vazquez allegedly writes he is an “accelerationist” in his essay, echoing nihilistic rhetoric, sources said.
It’s unclear when the essays were actually written — a section intended to identify the “targets” is left blank, sources said.
Social media accounts believed to be tied to Clark reflect possible associations with nihilistic violent extremist ideology, sources also told ABC News.
Early last year, police in Chula Vista, California, spoke with Vazquez after someone who knew him expressed concerns that he was interested in extremist ideology and mass-casualty attacks, though the concerns at that point didn’t meet the threshold for making an arrest, sources told ABC News.
A spokesperson for the Chula Vista Police Department told ABC News on Tuesday that the department “extends its deepest condolences to all those affected by this tragedy” but declined to answer questions about the prior contact.
The suspects met online and discovered they both lived in the San Diego area, according to Mark Remily, the special agent in charge of the FBI’s San Diego Field Office. They appear to have been radicalized online and had a “broad hatred” toward a wide array of races and religions, Remily said during a press briefing Tuesday.
“They didn’t discriminate on who they hated,” Remily said.
Investigators have recovered writings that outline “religious and racial beliefs of how the world they envision should look,” Remily said. Authorities are in the process of analyzing their writings to learn what led to the attack and how to prevent future ones, as well as looking into “how the radicalization occurred,” he said.
It’s too early in the investigation to tell if the mosque was the specific target, authorities said.
“We’re still looking through electronics to give us the answers, but again, what I can say is they definitely had a broad hatred towards a lot of folks,” Remily said.
San Diego Police Chief Scott Wahl said law enforcement is still working to determine the scope of the “threat picture,” when asked if the Islamic center’s schools were the intended target.
Police are investigating how the suspects obtained firearms in the shooting, Wahl said Tuesday. The guns belonged to the parents of one of the suspects, he said.
During searches of two residences associated with the suspects, authorities seized “numerous pistols, rifles, shotguns, ammunition, tactical gear, as well as electronics,” Remily said.
“So far in this investigation, we’ve seized over 30 guns and a crossbow,” he said.
The shooting was reported shortly before noon Monday, police said.
A video review shows that the suspects got into a “gun battle” with the security guard, who was killed outside the mosque, according to Wahl.
The security guard had managed to put out a “lockdown protocol,” which along with the sound of gunfire, allowed those in the main common areas of the mosque to go into hiding, he said. There were some 140 children inside at the time, he said.
The suspects moved room by room once inside, but did not run into anyone, the police chief said. At one point, they are seen looking out a window, with one pointing to the window, before running out a nearby door, at which point they “immediately engage” the two other victims outside in the parking lot, he said.
Amin Abdullah, the security guard killed, has been hailed as a hero.
“His actions, without a doubt, delayed, distracted and ultimately deterred these two individuals from gaining access to the greater areas of the mosque where as many as 140 kids were within 15 feet of these suspects,” Wahl said Tuesday.
The two other victims killed in the shooting — identified by authorities as Mansour Kaziha and Nadir Awad — “drew the attention” of the suspects into a parking lot “where they were unfortunately unable to flee,” Wahl said. They were cornered by the suspects and killed, Wahl said.
Police are investigating a potential motive but said the shooting is currently being considered as a hate crime.
“There was definitely hate rhetoric that was involved,” Wahl said during a Monday press briefing.
Anti-Islamic writings were found in the vehicle with the two teens, sources told ABC News.
About two hours before the shooting at the mosque, San Diego police received a call involving the 17-year-old suspect, about a runaway juvenile, according to Wahl. The teen’s mother reported that “several of her weapons” and her vehicle were missing, he said. The mother also found a note, Wahl said, the contents of which the police chief did not share.
The mother told police that her son was with another individual and that they were both “dressed in camo,” Wahl said.
Officers were attempting to track down the vehicle and dispatched police to a mall and to a school with which one of the teens was associated, when the shooting at the mosque was reported, he said.
The Islamic Center of San Diego says it is the largest mosque in San Diego County.
“We have never experienced a tragedy like this before,” Taha Hassan, Imam and Director of Islamic Center of San Diego, said of the center at a news conference.
“It is extremely outrageous to target a place of worship. Our Islamic center is a place of worship. People come to the Islamic center to pray, to celebrate, to learn, not only Muslims, but we have people from all walks of life,” Hassan added.
“The religious intolerance and the hate, unfortunately, that exists in our nation is unprecedented,” Hassan said.
“We strongly condemn this horrifying act of violence,” Tazheen Nizam, the executive director of the San Diego chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said in a statement. “Our thoughts are with everyone impacted by this attack. No one should ever fear for their safety while attending prayers or studying at an elementary school.”
San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria told ABC News that “we immediately have increased patrols around religious sites, both our Muslim, Jewish and other faith communities across the city. And I imagine we’ll maintain that posture for some time.”
Rep. Thomas Massie speaks with supporters after his concession speech on May 19, 2026 in Hebron, Kentucky. Massie, who has served Kentucky’s 4th Congressional District since 2012, conceded his loss after the most expensive US House Primary in US history against Trump-endorsed candidate Ed Gallrein. (Photo by Jon Cherry/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — A batch of closely watched primaries in six states on Tuesday both set up some key midterm election matchups and gestured to major forces shaping the Democratic and Republican parties — from the strength of President Donald Trump’s endorsement to the road to the White House in 2028.
Here are some of takeaways from Tuesday night’s results.
The strength of Trump’s endorsement, again?
President Donald Trump had turned his ire on Rep. Thomas Massie, the maverick Republican representing Kentucky’s 4th Congressional District, given Massie’s push to release the Jeffrey Epstein files, his vote against the president’s sweeping domestic tax policy legislation and his vocal opposition to the Iran war.
Trump constantly excoriated Massie and endorsed his primary opponent Ed Gallrein and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth even campaigned with Gallrein on Monday. The primary also became the most expensive House primary on record, with more than $32 million in ad spending.
Massie had held firm — adamant that his constituents would pull through for him. But the power of Trump’s endorsement was more firm, just as it had been in the Louisiana Senate primary last Saturday, where Trump-endorsed Rep. Julia Letlow and state Treasurer John Fleming advanced to a runoff after Trump had turned against incumbent Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy.
“We weren’t really running against Ed Gallrein, we weren’t running against Donald Trump. We were running for what we believe in,” Massie told supporters on Tuesday night.
Mixed results for Trump in Georgia
But it seems Trump’s endorsement could not carry his candidate of choice, Lt. Gov. Burt Jones, over the finish line outright in the Georgia Republican gubernatorial primary. Jones now heads towards a June 16 runoff against billionaire businessman Rick Jackson.
In remarks Tuesday evening, Jackson, who entered the race just three months before the primary, said his campaign sent an “earthquake” through the political establishment and called Jones a political insider.
“We have 28 days to finish it, and the choice could not be more clear or more important. Burt Jones is a political insider. I’m the opposite. I don’t owe the lobbyists anything. I don’t need the establishment’s permission. I cannot be bought, and I will not back down,” Jones said Tuesday evening.
What Tuesday meant for potential 2028 presidential candidates
Tuesday was a good night for Pennsylvania’s Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro, a rumored 2028 presidential candidate, as all four of the primary candidates he endorsed in Pennsylvania’s battleground U.S. House districts — where Democrats hope to flip seats held by GOP incumbents — were projected by ABC News to win, although one of the four, Paige Cognetti, was unopposed.
Shapiro’s success on Tuesday could bolster his standing among Democrats both in the state and nationally — possibly helpful if he does launch a bid for the presidency — although he still faces the general election campaign for governor against state Treasurer Stacy Garrity, and Democrats still face an uphill battle trying to flip all four seats they are targeting.
And down south in Georgia, Gov. Brian Kemp, who has not ruled out a presidential run in 2028, also played a hand in shaping the state’s GOP Senate primary. Kemp backed Derek Dooley, a former football coach who is projected by ABC News to face a runoff against Rep. Mike Collins in a race that Trump did not endorse in.
Kemp, who opted out of running for Georgia’s Senate seat after being recruited by Republicans, threw the full force of his political weight behind elevating Dooley from a political unknown to a candidate for one of the most-watched Senate races in the country.
Working behind the scenes, Kemp made calls to donors to build support for Dooley, and Kemp’s PAC, Hardworking Americans Inc., has also invested millions in the race to support Dooley, the son of legendary former University of Georgia football coach Vince Dooley.
Kemp also campaigned heavily with Dooley in the lead-up to Georgia’s primary.
Kemp has had a rocky relationship with Trump since refusing his pressure to overturn Georgia’s election results in 2020. But Kemp remains popular among Georgians, winning reelection against a Trump-endorsed primary challenger in 2022.
ABC News’ Emily Chang and Halle Troadec contributed to this report.
