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(NEW YORK) — New York City Mayor Eric Adams has announced a lawsuit against 17 bus and transportation companies helping to send asylum-seekers to the city as it deals with major budget issues surrounding the crisis.

The city is seeking $708 million in the lawsuit to cover costs for caring for migrants.

“New York City has and will always do our part to manage this humanitarian crisis, but we cannot bear the costs of reckless political ploys from the state of Texas alone,” Adams said in a statement. “Today, we are taking legal action against 17 companies that have taken part in Texas Governor [Greg] Abbott’s scheme to transport tens of thousands of migrants to New York City in an attempt to overwhelm our social services system.

He continued, “These companies have violated state law by not paying the cost of caring for these migrants, and that’s why we are suing to recoup approximately $700 million already spent to care for migrants sent here in the last two years by Texas.”

The lawsuit has yet to be reviewed by the county clerk.

New York City has struggled to keep up with the financial burden of tens of thousands of migrants coming into the city since Abbott began Operation Lone Star. Abbott said on Dec. 29 the state had sent “over 33,600” migrants to New York City since August 2022.

The transportation companies named in the lawsuit include: Buckeye Coach, Carduan Tours, Classic Elegance Coaches, Coastal Crew Change Company, Ejecutivo Enterprises, El Paso United Charters, Garcia and Garcia Enterprises, JY Charter Bus, Lily’s Bus Lines, Mayo Tours, Norteno Express, Roadrunner Charters, Southwest Crew Change Company, Transportes Regiomontanos, VLP Charter, Windstar Lines and Wynne Transportation.

“As of November 27, 2023, the Defendants have earned millions of dollars in revenues from Texas for implementing the Texas Governor’s plan,” the lawsuit claims.

The lawsuit cites section 149 of the New York Social Services law, which requires “[a]ny person who knowingly brings, or causes to be brought a needy person from out of state into this state for the purpose of making him a public charge … shall be obligated to convey such person out of state or support him at his own expense.”

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul stood in support of the lawsuit as well.

“Governor Abott continues to use human beings as political pawns, and it’s about time that the companies facilitating his actions take responsibility for their role in this ongoing crisis,” Hochul said in a statement. “If they are getting paid to break the law by transporting people in need of public assistance into our state, they should be on the hook for the cost of sheltering those individuals — not just passing that expense along to hard-working New Yorkers. I’m proud to support the mayor’s lawsuit.”

Adams and Hochul have each repeatedly pressed for support from the federal government to deal with the costs of migrants arriving in the city.

Adam also announced a new executive order in late December that would “improved coordination from charter bus companies transporting new migrant arrivals into New York City, ensuring the safety and well-being of both migrants and city staff receiving them.”

“New York City has begun to see another surge of migrants arriving, and we expect this to intensify over the coming days as a result of Texas Governor Abbott’s cruel and inhumane politics,” Adams said in a statement.

Just days later, buses began dropping migrants off in New Jersey and telling them to take public transit into the city in order to avoid running afoul of the executive order.

In an August 2022 interview with “Nightline,” just after the launch of Operation Lone Star, Abbott accused Adams of “playing politics” and called him a “hypocrite.”

“He’s also being a hypocrite because New York City is a self-declared ‘sanctuary city,'” Abbott said. “And so why he’s ever complaining for one moment about these people being bused into a city goes against his own self-declaration of being a sanctuary city.”

The term “sanctuary city” refers to municipalities like New York City that are willing to defy federal immigration laws in order to protect undocumented immigrants.

There were a record 302,000 migrant encounters at the southern border in December, according to Customs and Border Protection.

ABC News’ Mark Osborne contributed to this report.

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(NEW YORK) — Former President Donald Trump’s businesses received millions of dollars from foreign entities located in 20 different countries during his presidency, according to a new report released Thursday by Democrats on the House Oversight committee.

The top Democrat on the Oversight Committee, Rep. Jamie Raskin, released the report and provided documents from Trump’s former accounting firm that show that 20 governments, including China and Saudi Arabia, paid at least $7.8 million during Trump’s presidency to business entities that included Trump International Hotels in Washington, D.C., and Las Vegas, and Trump Towers in New York.

The 156-page report by House Democrats is entitled “White House For Sale.”

In the forward to the report, Raskin wrote, “By elevating his personal financial interests and the policy priorities of corrupt foreign powers over the American public interest, former President Trump violated both the clear commands of the Constitution and the careful precedent set and observed by every previous commander in chief.”

The reports says that, according to “limited records” obtained by the committee, Saudi Arabia likely paid Trump-owned business at least $615,422 during Trump’s first term in office.

“While the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia was making these payments, President Trump chose Saudi Arabia as the destination of his first overseas trip — a choice that was unprecedented among U.S. presidents,” the report says.

The report claims that the payments violated the Constitution’s foreign emoluments clause, a rule that bars the president and other federal officials from accepting money or gifts from foreign governments without Congressional approval.

In 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court dismissed lawsuits accusing Trump of profiting from his presidency, on the grounds that he is no longer in office.

“Through entities he owned and controlled, President Trump accepted, at a minimum, millions of dollars in foreign emoluments in violation of the United States Constitution,” Democrats write in the report. “The documents obtained from former President Trump’s accounting firm demonstrate that four Trump-owned properties together collected, at the least, millions of dollars in payments from foreign governments and officials that violated the Constitution’s prohibition on emoluments ‘of any kind whatever’ from foreign governments.”

ABC News has reached out to Trump’s representatives for comment on the report.

 

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(NEW YORK) — At least one person was killed and others injured in a shooting Thursday morning at Perry High School in Iowa, according to law enforcement officials briefed on the situation.

The suspected shooter is also dead of an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound, according to multiple law enforcement sources, ABC News has learned.

The scene is now “secured,” according to Dallas County, Iowa, officials.

Two patients were being treated at Iowa Methodist Medical Center, according to a hospital spokesperson. Their conditions are unknown.

An active shooting incident was reported at approximately 7:37 a.m. local time, Dallas County Sheriff Adam Infante told reporters during a press briefing.

Infante said an officer responded to the school seven minutes later and located “multiple gunshot victims,” though it is unclear at this time how many or the extent of their injuries. The sheriff did not say who was among the victims.

The sheriff said police have identified the suspected shooter, but did not release any additional details on the suspect.

“There is no further danger to the public. The community is safe,” Infante said. “We’re just now working backwards, trying to figure out everything that happened and make notifications.”

Jody Kurth told reporters that her stepson was struck in the back and arm in the shooting, but is “doing really well.”

She said her daughter texted her about the shooting.

“It was absolutely horrifying, that’s one of the worst moments of my entire life,” she said. “But the best phone call I got was saying that they were OK.”

“I really never thought that Perry would have an issue like this,” she added.

The shooting occurred before the school day had started, and there were very few students and faculty in the building, “which I think contributed to a good outcome in that sense,” Infante said. Thursday was the first day of school back from the winter break.

The FBI’s resident agent at its Des Moines office has responded to the scene to assist the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation, the FBI said. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is also on scene.

The U.S. attorney general has been briefed on the incident, a Department of Justice spokesperson said.

Perry is located in the suburbs northwest of Des Moines.

Police plan to hold another press update Thursday afternoon, where they will be joined by Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds.

“Our hearts are broken by this senseless tragedy,” Reynolds said in a statement on social media. “Our prayers are with the students, teachers & families of the Perry Community.”

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

 

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(NEW YORK) — At least one person was killed and others injured in a shooting Thursday morning at Perry High School in Iowa, according to law enforcement officials briefed on the situation.

There appears to be at least two people injured on scene as well, the officials told ABC News.

The scene is now “secured,” according to Dallas County, Iowa, officials.

An active shooting incident was reported at approximately 7:37 a.m. local time, Dallas County Sheriff Adam Infante told reporters during a press briefing.

Infante said an officer responded to the school seven minutes later and located “multiple gunshot victims,” though it is unclear at this time how many or the extent of their injuries. The sheriff did not say who was among the victims.

The sheriff said police have identified the suspected shooter, but did not release any additional details on the suspect.

“There is no further danger to the public. The community is safe,” Infante said. “We’re just now working backwards, trying to figure out everything that happened and make notifications.”

The shooting occurred before the school day had started, and there were very few students and factually in the building, “which I think contributed to a good outcome in that sense,” Infante said.

The FBI’s resident agent at its Des Moines office has responded to the scene to assist the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation, the FBI said. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is also on scene.

Perry is located in the suburbs northwest of Des Moines.

Police plan to hold another press update Thursday afternoon.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

 

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(NEW YORK) — The influx of new stuff that makes its way into homes over the holiday season can be overwhelming for families, but so can figuring out what to do with it all.

For parents hoping to declutter post holidays in the most sustainable way possible, there are ways to discard old toys while minimizing environmental harm by preventing them from ending up in a landfill.

TerraCycle, a New Jersey-based recycling company, is requesting toys that families no longer want but are not suitable for curbside recycling, Tom Szaky, founder and CEO of TerraCycle, told ABC News. The waste management company sorts, cleans, shreds, crushes and melts down the toys into materials that are later used to make goods like lunchboxes and flower pots.

An estimated 3 billion toys are sold in the U.S. every year, according to The Toy Association, a business trade association.

The “vast majority” of toys are thrown out after just one child has played with them, Szaky said.

The company said it has prevented at least 550,000 pounds of landfill waste over the last four years with the recycling of more than four million toys. In the last four years, TerraCycle has launched six different free toy recycling programs in the U.S. taking items that typically cannot be recycled, such as pet toys and pool inflatables, Szaky said.

Toys can be sent to TerraCycle by either requesting a shipping label sponsored by a brand — such as prominent toy company Hasbro — or by purchasing a “Zero Waste Box.”

“The industry is really caring more and more and this is because people are asking, ‘Well, what happens to my toy once my child is done playing with it?'” Szaky said.

Szaky emphasized that recycling is not a perfect solution and that it is still up to the toy industry and consumers to push for better alternatives to dealing with plastics and other waste.

Much of the plastic that was sent to recycling centers ended up in a landfill, Lisa Ramsden, a senior plastics campaigner at Greenpeace USA and one of the authors of the report, told ABC News in 2022.

Consumers can also help prevent unnecessary waste by making conscious purchasing decisions, such as really considering whether their child will actually enjoy the toy for a long period of time before they buy it, Szaky said.

Buying toys used — or selling old ones online — is also key to keeping toys out of landfills, according to experts.

The most popular resale brands include Squishmallows, Disney, Lego, American Girl and Barbie, according to Poshmark. The most popular category of toys include stuffed animals, dolls and accessories, action figures and playsets, building sets and blocks as well as learning toys, the company said.

Other good places to donate toys include charities, local “Buy Nothing” groups, hospitals, children’s shelters, day care centers and houses of worship, according to Good Housekeeping.

 

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(NEW YORK) — There was a shooting Thursday morning at a high school in Iowa, a police official told ABC News.

The shooting took place at Perry High School, according to a Perry, Iowa, police administrator.

Perry is located in the suburbs northwest of Des Moines.

Further details were not yet available.

Story developing…

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(NEW YORK) — The first batch of what is expected to be hundreds of sealed court filings pertaining to the late sex-offender Jeffrey Epstein was made public Wednesday, and in the documents, it included arguments by attorneys for Virginia Giuffre — an alleged victim of Epstein — who sought to depose former President Bill Clinton as part of her defamation lawsuit against Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell.

In the newly unsealed material, Giuffre’s lawyers wrote that Clinton was “a key person who can provide information about his close relationship with Defendant and Mr. Epstein.”

The document, dated June 14, 2016, marked the first time Giuffre’s attorneys indicated their desire to depose Clinton for his testimony, as ABC News previously reported. Giuffre’s lawyers had begun informal talks with Clinton’s attorneys five days earlier, on June 9, 2016, ABC News previously reported.

The now-unredacted document revealed specifically why Giuffre’s lawyers sought Clinton’s testimony.

“In a 2011 interview, Ms. Giuffre mentioned former President Bill Clinton’s close personal relationship with Defendant and Jeffrey Epstein. While Ms. Giuffre made no allegations of illegal actions by Bill Clinton, Ms. [Ghislaine] Maxwell in her deposition raised Ms. Giuffre’s comments about President Clinton as one of the ‘obvious lies’ to which she was referring in her public statement that formed the basis of this suit. Apart from the Defendant and Mr. Epstein, former President Clinton is a key person who can provide information about his close relationship with Defendant and Mr. Epstein and disapprove Ms. Maxwell’s claims,” the document said.

In response, Maxwell’s attorneys pointed out that “Each and every part of Plaintiff’s claims regarding President Clinton has conclusively been proven false,” according to another document unsealed Wednesday.

Giuffre had claimed to a reporter in 2011 that she had seen Clinton on Epstein’s private Caribbean island shortly after his presidency ended, had dinner with him and claimed to have witnessed Maxwell flying Clinton to the island in a “big, black helicopter.” Giuffre later disavowed witnessing the helicopter flight.

“With the record thus, Plaintiff’s claims about Clinton’s presence on the Island and the fully concocted story about the dinner party that occurred thereon totally debunked … the relevance of any testimony he might add is non-existent,” the newly-released document said.

Giuffre’s proposal to depose Clinton was denied by a federal judge in a still-redacted order, something ABC News previously reported.

Giuffre made no allegations of wrongdoing against Clinton. After Epstein’s arrest in 2019, Clinton’s spokesman denied that Clinton knew about Epstein’s crimes, denied Clinton was ever on Epstein’s private island and said the former president had not communicated with Epstein in more than a decade.

Wednesday’s unsealed documents are part of a long-settled defamation lawsuit Giuffre filed against Maxwell. Giuffre claimed she was a teen sex slave for Epstein and directed by him and Maxwell to have sex with powerful men.

U.S. District Judge Loretta Preska ruled last month there was no legal justification for continuing to conceal more than 150 names of “John and Jane Does” mentioned in the records. Preska had ordered the unsealing to begin after Jan. 1.

Additional associates of Epstein’s, including Prince Andrew, are named in the documents.

Reacting to the release of the documents, Managing Partner of Boies Schiller Flexner Sigrid McCawley, counsel for Giuffre, said the public deserves to know more about what happened with Epstein.

“The public has wondered and many have rightly demanded to know how Epstein operated his vast, global sex trafficking enterprise and got away with it for decades. Questions of who enabled and facilitated him and who participated in an operation that resulted in unspeakable harm and devastation to the lives of countless girls and young women quickly surfaced,” the statement read. “Some of those questions have been answered; many have not. Some justice for the survivors has, indeed, been achieved; not nearly enough as hoped for and deserved. The public interest must still be served in learning more about the scale and scope of Epstein’s racket to further the important goal of shutting down sex trafficking wherever it exists and holding more to account. The unsealing of these documents gets us closer to that goal.”

Late Wednesday night, Maxwell’s attorneys, Arthur L. Aidala and Diana Fabi Samson, also released a statement reading: “Ghislaine Maxwell took no position on the court’s recent decision to unseal documents in Giuffre v Maxwell as these disclosures have no bearing on her or her pending appeal.”

“Ghislaine’s focus is on the upcoming appellate argument asking for her entire case to dismissed,” their statement continued. “She is confident that she will obtain justice in the second circuit court of appeals. She has consistently and vehemently maintained her innocence.”

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(LOS ANGELES) — Late night host Jimmy Kimmel lashed out at Aaron Rodgers on social media on Tuesday night, accusing the NFL quarterback of putting his family at risk and threatening to take him to court.

The comments on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, were just the latest in a simmering disagreement between the two celebrities that appears close to boiling over.

Why did Jimmy Kimmel blast Rodgers on social media?

Kimmel and Rodgers’ disagreement was taken to the next level on Tuesday when Kimmel, whose show airs on ABC, angrily responded to comments made earlier in the day by the quarterback on “The Pat McAfee Show,” which airs on ESPN.

McAfee’s co-host A.J. Hawk brought up the list of names tied to convicted sexual abuser Jeffrey Epstein that is expected to be released this week.

The documents stem from a 2015 civil defamation lawsuit centered on allegations that Epstein’s one-time paramour, Ghislaine Maxwell, facilitated the sexual abuse of Virginia Giuffre, an alleged trafficking victim. Giuffre also accused Epstein and Maxwell of directing her to have sex with Prince Andrew and several other prominent men. Prince Andrew denied the allegations and claimed he could not recall ever meeting Giuffre. He later settled a different lawsuit she filed against him.

In response to Hawk mentioning the documents’ expected release, Rodgers quipped, “There’s a lot of people, including Jimmy Kimmel, are really hoping that doesn’t come out.” Rodgers, who was conducting the video interview from his wine room, followed up, saying he would be “popping some sort of bottle” when the list is released.

Kimmel responded to Rodgers’ comments Tuesday night on social media, writing, “for the record, I’ve not met, flown with, visited, or had any contact whatsoever with Epstein, nor will you find my name on any ‘list’ other than the clearly-phony nonsense that soft-brained wackos like yourself can’t seem to distinguish from reality. Your reckless words put my family in danger. Keep it up and we will debate the facts further in court.”

No connection known between Kimmel and Epstein

There has never been any indication that Kimmel’s name would appear in the Epstein documents.

Most of the prominent names that appear in the documents are already associated in some way with Epstein; for a variety of reasons, including allegations of wrongdoing, for having worked for Epstein, flown on his planes, or visited his homes, ABC News previously reported. Some were mentioned during Maxwell’s criminal trial in 2021. In some instances, the only appearances of the names are in potential witness lists or in proposed terms for searches of electronic records.

It’s unclear exactly why Rodgers would mention Kimmel’s name being on the list, but Kimmel did mock Rodgers’ previous comments on the Epstein list on his show last February.

In a February episode of “The Pat McAfee Show,” where Rodgers appears as a weekly guest, Rodgers brought up, in a discussion about the Chinese spy balloon and UFOs, “There’s a lot of other things going on in the world. Did you hear about the Epstein client list about to be released? There are some files that have some names on it that might be getting released pretty soon.”

Kimmel mocked Rodgers’ comments on his late night show at the time, calling him a “tin-foil hatter” and saying, “It might be time to revisit that concussion protocol, Aaron.”

McAfee alluded to that moment Tuesday when Rodgers mentioned Kimmel, saying, “Jimmy mocked him for it, and Aaron has not forgotten about it.”

Have Kimmel and Rodgers bickered about anything else?

In addition to the criticism Kimmel levied at Rodgers last February, he has commented on the New York Jets quarterback’s anti-vaccine stance.

In November 2021, Kimmel joked about Rodgers testing positive for COVID-19 and missing a game against the Kansas City Chiefs. The news of his positive test led to the discovery by the public that Rodgers had not been vaccinated.

“Aaron Rodgers reportedly received a homeopathic treatment over the summer instead of the vaccine,” Kimmel said, setting up a joke about the quarterback’s man bun with a photo. “Nothing says I heel myself with crystals like this haircut.”

The NFL ended up fining the Packers $300,000 while Rodgers was fined $14,650 for misleading the league about his vaccination status.

Rodgers told “The Pat McAfee Show” a few days after the fine that he stood by his comments on vaccination, but apologized for misleading people about his own status.

“I made some comments that people might have felt were misleading,” Rodgers said. “To anybody who felt misled by those comments, I take full responsibility for those comments.”

ABC News reached out to Rodgers’ agent, David Dunn, and the New York Jets for comment, but did not receive an immediate response.

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(NEW YORK) — A former adviser to Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, along with a former aide to one-time presidential candidate Dr. Ben Carson, have admitted to unlawfully lobbying on behalf of Qatar, the Justice Department announced Wednesday.

Barry Bennett and Douglas Watts admitted to lying to the Justice Department about their work running a pair of Washington, D.C.-based advocacy groups that advocated for Qatar’s interests, without properly registering as agents for the wealthy Middle East country.

The admissions are part of a deferred prosecution agreement that will dismiss charges against them after a year of compliance.

Both Bennett and Watts served as advisers to Carson’s 2016 presidential campaign before Bennett ultimately joined Trump’s campaign as an unpaid adviser.

After Trump’s election, court papers say Bennett established the consulting firm “Avenue Strategies” and tasked Watts with operating a separate company that promoted the interests of Bennett’s foreign clients.

The two established an organization called “Yemen Crisis Watch” that promoted a public relations campaign denigrating Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates for their role in the conflict in Yemen — all on behalf of Bennett’s Qatari clients, according to the Justice Department.

Bennett has agreed to pay the U.S. a $100,000 fine as part of the deferred prosecution agreement, while Watts will pay a $25,000 fine.

The charges against them will be formally lifted after one year of compliance with the terms of the deal.

 

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(NEW YORK) — An imam was shot outside a mosque in Newark, New Jersey, on Wednesday morning.

The imam, who has not been named, was taken to University Hospital in critical condition, according to Newark Public Safety Director Fritz Fragé.

The shooting occurred just after 6 a.m. outside Masjid Muhammad, Fragé said.

Investigators do not have a motive at this point, according to an official briefed on the probe.

The investigation is being handled cooperatively by Newark police and the Essex County Prosecutor’s Office.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

 

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