Graeme Sloan for The Washington Post via Getty Images
(NEW YORK) — New York City Mayor Eric Adams asked a federal judge on Monday to drop criminal corruption charges before a political deadline this week — trying to speed up a decision by the judge in the case.
The mayor wants the case dropped before petitions to get on the June primary ballot are due on April 3, according to his lawyer.
“Now, with the petition-filing deadline just days away, we respectfully urge the Court to issue its decision as soon as possible,” the mayor’s attorney, Alex Spiro, said in a letter to Judge Dale Ho.
The Justice Department has asked the judge to dismiss the charges without prejudice to free Adams to cooperate with President Donald Trump’s immigration agenda. Without prejudice means the charges could resurface.
Ho accepted a legal brief urging him to dismiss the case with prejudice, meaning it could not be revived, eliminating an incentive for the mayor to bow to administration demands.
Adams pleaded not guilty in federal court last September to charges related to an alleged conspiracy with Turkish nationals that landed him lavish gifts in exchange for beneficial treatment.
Trump’s Justice Department asked in February to dismiss the charges, a move that caused several prosecutors to step down in protest, including the Trump-appointed interim U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Danielle Sassoon, who alleged a quid pro quo.
“It is a breathtaking and dangerous precedent to reward Adams’s opportunistic and shifting commitments on immigration and other policy matters with dismissal of a criminal indictment,” Sassoon wrote at the time. “Nor will a court likely find that such an improper exchange is consistent with the public interest.”
(NEW YORK) — Foreign markets saw a wave of selloffs on Monday morning ahead of the expected introduction of President Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs on Wednesday, measures the president said will impact “all countries.”
Japan’s Nikkei index fell more than 4% and South Korea’s KOSPI slipped 3% after opening on Monday. In Europe, the British FTSE 100 fell by 1.18%, the German DAX index fell by 1.82% and France’s CAC 40 dropped by 1.76%.
Gold — a traditional safe-haven asset — reached a new record high of $3,128 per ounce.
U.S. markets will open Monday morning after tumbling at the end of last week. The Dow Jones closed 1.7% down on Friday, the S&P 500 down 1.97% and the Nasdaq Composite down 2.7%.
Trump told reporters this weekend that his tariffs could affect “all the countries.”
“The tariffs will be far more generous than those countries were to us, meaning they will be kinder than those countries were to the United States of America,” he said.
“Over the decades, they ripped us off like no country has never been ripped off in history and we’re going to be much nicer than they were to us, but it’s substantial money for the country,” Trump said.
Auto tariffs of 25% are among those expected to come into effect on April 3. The measures will apply to imported passenger vehicles, including cars, SUVs, minivans, cargo vans and light trucks, according to a White House statement released last week.
Analysts widely expect the tariffs to raise prices for foreign-made cars, since importers will likely pass along a share of the tax burden to consumers.
Cars produced in the U.S. are also expected to undergo significant price hikes since manufacturers will bear higher costs for imported parts and face an uptick in demand as buyers seek out domestic alternatives, experts have told ABC News.
Trump dismissed concerns about auto tariffs this weekend. “The automakers are going to make a lot of money,” he said. “American automakers or international automakers, if you’re talking about them, are going to build in the United States.”
“The people that are going to make money are people that manufacture cars in the United States,” he continued. “Outside of the United States, that’s going to be up to them. I don’t care too much about that. But you have a lot of companies coming into the country to manufacture cars.”
ABC News’ Max Zahn and Hannah Demissie contributed to this report.
(BANGKOK) — A desperate search for survivors continued Sunday — from a collapsed high-rise building that was under construction in Bangkok, Thailand, to the rubble of ancient buildings in neighboring Myanmar — as a series of powerful aftershocks from Friday’s 7.7-magnitude earthquake made it precarious for rescuers digging through debris, officials said.
The death toll in the Bangkok metropolitan region rose to 18 on Sunday, according to government officials. In Myanmar, the epicenter of Friday’s earthquake, at least 1,644 people were dead and another 139 were officially missing. At least 3,408 people were injured in Myanmar alone, officials said.
The number of deaths across the devastated region is expected to rise, officials said.
In the Bangkok metropolitan area, home to more than 17.4 million people, search-and-rescue workers were focused on a collapsed high-rise building in the Chatuchak district of Bangkok. At least 11 people, believed to all be construction workers, have been confirmed dead and another 78 people remain missing in the rubble of the 34-story Sky Villa condominium, according to the Bangkok Metropolitan administration.
More than 30 people were injured when floors of the building that was under construction began to pancake on top of each other around 1:30 p.m. local time on Friday, trapping construction workers in the debris and creating a large dust cloud that enveloped the area, officials said. The building collapsed about half an hour after the powerful earthquake, centered in Myanmar, struck.
Family members of the missing construction workers gathered near the collapsed building as search-and-rescue crews dug through the pile of debris by hand, racing against time in a search for survivors.
One brother and sister told ABC News their parents were among the workers who were in the building at the time of the collapse and are now among those unaccounted for.
American tourists Garret Briere and his wife told ABC News they never could have imagined that their first vacation to Thailand would end up being one of the most terrifying experiences of their lives.
The couple from Washington state was in the mall across the street from the Sky Villa construction site when the massive earthquake hit. Briere said he watched in horror as the building fell in the quake’s aftermath and described panicked people running for their lives away from the structure. Briere said a huge dust cloud enveloped the area.
“We ran out of the building because it started shaking,” Briere said. “I grabbed my wife’s hand and I said, ‘Don’t let go.’ Immediately, we were just covered in dust and debris, and we couldn’t see, and there were thousands of people just in a panic.”
It took just several seconds for the entire building to be reduced to a 7-story-high pile of rubble, the couple said.
The epicenter of the earthquake was in Mandalay, Myanmar, the country’s second-largest city. Bangkok is about 600 miles from the epicenter.
A series of aftershocks continued to shake the region Sunday. A 5.1 magnitude aftershock struck about 17 miles north of Mandalay on Sunday afternoon, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
The USGS also recorded another strong aftershock as a 4.2 magnitude quake struck near Shwebo, which is about 68 miles northwest of Mandalay, earlier on Sunday.
Several videos emerged Sunday showing rescuers pulling survivors from the rubble in Myanmar. The Myanmar Fire Services Department released a video overnight showing rescuers pulling a woman alive from a collapsed building. People could be heard cheering in the background as the woman was taken to medics for treatment.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio posted Friday about the potential U.S. response to the earthquake.
“My prayers go out to the people of Burma and Thailand who are impacted by the earthquake,” Rubio wrote in a social media post. “We’ve been in contact with these countries and, as @POTUS said, stand ready to provide assistance.”
Rubio also confirmed the State Department’s teams in the affected countries were “safe and secure.”
The U.S. Embassy in Myanmar has suspended nonemergency consular services for the time being. The U.S. mission to Thailand has not reported any disruption in services.
ABC News’ Karson Yiu, Gamay Palacios and Preechaya Rassadanukul contributed to this report.
(MIAMI) — Two people are dead after Florida authorities alleged a Miami-Dade Transit bus driver pulled out a weapon and opened fire on a bus during a disturbance.
The shooting erupted just before 3 a.m., when a Miami-Dade Transit bus driver was involved in a disturbance with two male passengers aboard the bus, Officer Diana Delgado of the Miami Gardens Police Department said at a news conference Sunday.
During the disturbance, the bus driver pulled out a weapon and opened fire, shooting the men, according to Delgado.
The two passengers were taken to HCA Florida Aventura Hospital in critical condition and later died from their injuries, according to police.
ABC affiliate TV station WPLG reports both of the shooting victims were male.
It was unclear, according to authorities, whether the bus was moving at the time of the shooting or how many passengers were aboard the bus.
The driver is being detained by police, Delgado said Sunday.
(RALEIGH, NC) — A massive wildfire burning for more than a week in South Carolina jumped the border Saturday and was spreading Sunday into North Carolina, where firefighters were already battling multiple blazes, officials said.
The Table Rock Fire, which started on March 21 in the Table Rock State Park in Pickens County, South Carolina, had burned 11,468 acres total as of Sunday morning in both South Carolina and North Carolina, charring more than 500 acres overnight, according to the South Carolina Forestry Commission.
The Table Rock Fire is now the highest-priority fire in the United States as fire crews responded from multiple states to help battle the blaze, which prompted the evacuations of more than 1,400 homes and businesses on Thursday.
As the fire spread across the border into North Carolina, the South Carolina Forestry Commission said firefighters had upped containment of the fire from 0% on Saturday to 9% by Sunday morning.
Derrick Moore, operations section chief with the South Carolina Forestry Commission’s Southern Area Blue Team, said fire crews are hoping that rain forecast for the area later Sunday and into Monday will help firefighters extinguish the flames.
Pickens County Sheriff Tommy Blankenship said last week that investigators suspect the Table Rock Fire was started by four teenagers. He alleged that the negligent behavior of the teens caused the fire but declined to elaborate.
“They will be held accountable for their actions. I can promise you that,” Blankenship said in a video posted to social media.
Another fire, the Rattlesnake Branch Fire, spread Saturday from South Carolina’s Pickens County into western North Carolina’s Transylvania County, according to an update Sunday from Transylvania County officials.
The Rattlesnake Branch Fire in North Carolina’s Pisgah National Forest in Haywood County was burning close to the Transylvania County line but had not breached it, according to Transylvania County officials. The fire had burned nearly 1,900 acres and was 20% contained, according to the Sunday update.
A third fire threatening to spread into Transylvania County is the Persimmon Ridge fire, which is burning in South Carolina near the Table Rock Fire and had grown to more than 2,000 acres as of Sunday afternoon. That fire also was threatening to jump the border into North Carolina, Transylvania County officials said.
Meanwhile, in Polk County, North Carolina, three wildfires continue to burn but authorities said firefighters who have been battling the blazes for days had made significant progress.
The Black Cove Complex Fire – comprised of three wildland blazes: the Black Cove Fire, the Deep Woods Fire and the Fish Hook Fire – had reached a combined 7,670 acres as of Sunday, according to Polk County officials.
The Black Cove fire, which was started March 19 by a downed powerline, was 35% contained after burning 3,501 acres, officials said.
The Deep Woods fire, which also started on March 19, has burned 3,970 acres, authorities said Sunday. The cause of the fire is under investigation.
The Fish Hook Fire, which started March 20 by a downed powerline, was 100% contained on Sunday after burning 199 acres, according to officials.
(MADISON, WI) — Just hours after the state Supreme Court rejected Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul’s effort to block Elon Musk from handing out $1 million checks on Sunday night, the billionaire took the stage at a town hall in Green Bay and gave away two $1 million checks to attendees in his latest effort to support conservative candidate Brad Schimel.
Urging the crowd to back Schimel, Musk cast Tuesday as “a vote for which party controls the House of Representatives” and implied “the future of civilization” is at stake.
One of the recipients of a large, showy check, Nicholas Jacobs, is the chair of the Wisconsin College Republicans.
The Wisconsin Supreme Court’s order came just minutes before the event was set to start.
Notably, the court also rejected a bid from Musk’s lawyers to ask two justices, who had campaigned for Wisconsin Supreme Court candidate Susan Crawford, to recuse themselves.
The ruling came after an appeals court on Saturday denied Kaul’s emergency motion to stop the giveaway from taking place.
Kaul wrote in his initial filing on Friday that he was asking for emergency relief to stop Musk and America PAC “from further promoting a million-dollar giveaway to attendees of a planned event on Sunday, March 30, 2025, and prohibiting Respondents from making any payments to Wisconsin electors to vote.”
However, the judge assigned to the case, the Honorable Columbia County Circuit Court Judge W. Andrew Voigt, refused to hear the lawsuit before Sunday’s Green Bay rally with Musk — prompting Kaul’s emergency motion asking a Court of Appeals to take action.
After that emergency motion was rejected, Kaul appealed to the Wisconsin Supreme Court to step in on Sunday.
Lawyers for Elon Musk and America PAC then filed motions for the recusal of Wisconsin Supreme Court Justices Rebecca Frank Dallet and Jill J. Karofsky.
They argued that because Dallet and Karofsky campaigned for Crawford, and Crawford has been critical of Musk, “to avoid any potential perceptions of bias and manifestations of possible bias, Justices Dallet and Karofsky should decline to participate in consideration of this matter.”
The lawyers also framed the planned Sunday night giveaways as “spokesperson agreements” for spokespeople for the PAC.
In the initial lawsuit, shared by Kaul’s office, Kaul argued that “Musk’s announcement of his intention to pay $1 million to two Wisconsin electors who attend his event on Sunday night, specifically conditioned on their having voted in the upcoming April 3, 2025, Wisconsin Supreme Court election, is a blatant attempt to violate” state law, which “forbids anyone from offering or promising to give anything of value to an elector in order to induce the elector to go to the polls, vote or refrain from voting, or vote for a particular person.”
The suit asked for a restraining order “prohibiting Defendants from any further promotion of the million-dollar gifts to attendees of the planned Sunday March 30, 2025,” as well as a temporary restraining order “prohibiting Defendants from making any payments to Wisconsin electors to vote,” and injunctive relief to “restrain and prohibit all actions by Defendants taken in furtherance of a planned violation” of the state law.
In addition to presenting the checks on Sunday night, Musk said his PAC is launching a “Block Captain” program ahead of the election on Tuesday, where participants will make $20 for each picture they post of someone with a Schimel sign and a thumbs up outside of their home.
So far, two political groups aligned with Musk — America PAC and Building America’s Future — have poured nearly $20 million into supporting Schimel for the open seat.
The world’s richest man has used cash giveaways in the past, including a controversial $1 million sweepstakes offered to voters in swing states during last year’s election cycle as part of an effort to boost President Donald Trump’s chances of winning in those states.
The Wisconsin Supreme Court election, on Tuesday, has generally become the center of a political firestorm, and has become the most expensive state supreme court race in American history, according to the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University.
A vegetation fire in California rapidly spread to 1,000 acres on Sunday, prompting evacuations of parts of Inyo and Mono counties. (Cal Fire)
(BISHOP, CA) — A vegetation fire in California rapidly spread to 1,000 acres on Sunday, prompting evacuations of parts of Inyo and Mono counties.
The fire was first reported just after 2 p.m. PT near Highway 6 and Silver Canyon Road north of Bishop, California, a city east of Fresno, according to Cal Fire.
Officials named the fast-moving blaze the Silver Fire.
Cal Fire said Sunday evening that the blaze crossed Highway 6, threatening multiple structures and power lines. The fire remained at 0% containment as of 8 p.m. PT.
There are no known injuries associated with the fire, officials said.
Fighting the blaze was impacted by strong winds, with gusts reaching up to 35 mph at Bishop Airport, according to Cal Fire, which noted extreme turbulence grounded some firefighting aircraft.
The National Weather Service forecasts continued windy conditions for the region, with a High Wind Warning in effect through Monday evening.
ABC News’ Timmy Truong and Tristan Maglunog contributed to this report
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(LONDON) — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called for further “tough measures” against Russia to push President Vladimir Putin into a ceasefire agreement, suggesting after another round of drone strikes that Moscow “couldn’t care less about diplomacy.”
Long-range cross-border strikes have continued throughout U.S.-mediated efforts to secure a ceasefire in Ukraine, intended as a springboard for a broader peace deal to end Russia’s 3-year-old invasion of its neighbor.
Both Kyiv and Moscow last week agreed to freeze attacks in the Black Sea and on energy infrastructure, though both have since accused the other of violating the pause on attacking energy targets.
In a Sunday evening video address, Zelenskyy reported “more strikes and shelling” in seven Ukrainian regions. “The geography and brutality of Russian strikes, not just occasionally, but literally every day and night, show that Putin couldn’t care less about diplomacy,” he said.
“For several weeks now, there has been a U.S. proposal for an unconditional ceasefire,” Zelenskyy continued. “And almost every day, in response to this proposal, there are Russian drones, bombs, artillery shelling and ballistic strikes.”
“Russia deserves increased pressure — all the tough measures that can break its capacity to wage war and sustain the system that wants nothing but war,” Zelenskyy said. “Sanctions against Russia are essential. More air defense for Ukraine is essential. More cooperation and unity among all partners is essential.”
President Donald Trump on Sunday hinted at his apparent frustration with the lack of progress toward a peace deal in Ukraine, telling NBC News he was “very angry” at Putin after the Russian leader again criticized Zelenskyy and called for his removal in favor of a transitional government.
Trump added that he would consider applying new sanctions on Russia’s lucrative oil exports and on any nations purchasing its oil. China and India are among the most significant customers for Russian oil products.
The president later told reporters on Air Force One that his administration was making significant progress toward ending the war. Asked about his relationship with Putin, Trump responded, “I don’t think he’s going to go back on his word.”
“I’ve known him for a long time,” Trump said. “We’ve always gotten along well despite the Russia, Russia, Russia hoax.”
The president said he was “disappointed” by Putin’s latest attacks on Zelenskyy. “He considers him not credible, he’s supposed to be making a deal with him, whether you like him or you don’t like him, so I wasn’t happy with that.”
Asked if there was a deadline for Russia to agree to a ceasefire, Trump suggested there was a “psychological deadline.” He added, “If I think they’re tapping us along, I will not be happy about it.”
Russia and Ukraine continued cross-border strikes through Sunday night into Monday morning.
Ukraine’s air force said Russia launched two missiles and 131 drones into the country overnight, of which it said 57 drones were shot down and 45 lost in flight without causing damage. The Sumy, Donetsk, Kharkiv, Kyiv and Zhytomyr regions were affected by the attack, the air force said in a post to Telegram.
Russia’s Defense Ministry, meanwhile, said its forces shot down 66 Ukrainian drones overnight — 41 over Bryansk region, 24 over Kaluga region and one over Kursk region.
ABC News’ Hannah Demissie and Will Gretsky contributed to this report.
Members of the Chicago White Sox grounds crew struggle to deploy the rain tarp in the bottom of the seventh inning as hail and rain delay a game against the Los Angeles Angels at Rate Field on March 30, 2025 in Chicago, Illinois. (Photo by Matt Dirksen/Getty Images)
(CHICAGO) — More than 400,000 customers across the Midwest were without power in the early hours of Monday after severe weather battered the region.
As of 5:30 a.m. ET, more than 292,000 customers were without power in Michigan, according to poweroutage.us — a website that tracks power outages throughout the country.
Another 56,000 were disconnected in Wisconsin, 53,000 in Indiana, 15,000 in Kentucky and 13,000 in Ohio, the website said.
ABC News Chicago affiliate WLS reported that one person was killed in Valparaiso, Indiana, when “severe crosswinds” blew a tractor and a trailer onto their sides, according to a statement by Sgt. Benjamin McFalls of the Porter County Sheriff’s Office.
Severe weather was forecast for much of the Midwest and South as the storm traveled eastward through the weekend.
More than 75 million Americans were in the threat zone of the storm as of late Sunday. The system was expected to bring a range of hazardous weather impacts, including severe thunderstorms and a wintry blast on the northern side.
Sunday’s forecast said the severe weather was due to move to the East Coast and I-95 corridor from Upstate New York all the way south to Tallahassee and New Orleans on Monday.
Damaging winds will be the biggest threat for northern cities but tornadoes cannot be ruled out across southern areas.
ABC News Darren Reynolds and Jessica Gorman contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — In a recent court filing, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has submitted what they believe is a document that the Trump administration uses to identify members of a Venezuelan gang and remove them under the Alien Enemies Act.
The filing is part of their request for a preliminary injunction to bar the administration from deporting migrants under the act.
The document, titled “Alien Enemy Validation Guide,” appears to be a checklist that the administration is using to identify Tren de Aragua (TdA) members with a points-based system, according to the filing.
ACLU attorney Oscar Sarabia Roman submitted a declaration, stating that the organization believes the document is used “to determine whether Venezuelan noncitizens are members of Tren de Aragua and subject to summary removal under the Alien Enemies Act.”
ABC News has reached out to the Department of Homeland Security for comment.
The checklist submitted by the ACLU is divided into six categories including “Criminal Conduct and Information,” “Self-Admission” and “Judicial Outcomes and Official Documents,” and assigns varying quantities of points to different types of evidence that can be used to score the migrants.
Migrants who score eight points and higher are “validated as members of TdA,” the document says. But the document also appears to leave a lot to the discretion of ICE officers conducting the review, stating that even migrants who only score six or seven points may still be considered members of the gang after the officer consults with a supervisor and the Office of the Principal Legal Advisor and “reviewing the totality of the facts, before making that determination.”
The document indicates that individuals who score five points or less should not be validated as a member of TdA but encourages officials to initiate removal proceedings under other existing authorities.
Communicating electronically with a known TdA member is worth six points, in other words, it appears to be enough evidence for an official to classify a person as a member of the gang.
One of the categories labeled “Symbolism” includes a section about “tattoos denoting membership/loyalty to TdA” and social media posts by the subject displaying symbols of TDA. According to the document, individuals with tattoos that are believed to be associated with TDA are worth four points.
The document informs officers to consult with supervisors before classifying migrants as TdA members or initiating removals if they score eight points or more on the “Symbolism” or “Association” categories alone.
In their motion for preliminary injunction, the ACLU also claims intel gathered across different agencies on TdA are “internally contradictory.”
One document submitted by the ACLU — that they state is from Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) — includes photos of tattoos that they say HSI considers identifiers of TdA which include tattoos of crowns, trains, stars and clocks. Additional identifiers, according to the document, include “often wear sports attire from U.S. professional sports teams with Venezuelan nationals on them” and “dressed in high-end urban street wear.”
But a separate document the ACLU alleges is from the Border Patrol’s El Paso Sector Intelligence Unit says they “determined that the Chicago Bulls attire, clocks, and rose tattoos are typically related to the Venezuelan culture” and are not indicators of being members or associates of Tren de Aragua.
The ACLU also submitted a document called the “Notice and warrant of apprehension and removal under the Alien Enemies Act” claiming the government may require each alleged TdA member to sign. They say that the five plaintiffs represented in their lawsuit did not receive the document.
“You are not entitled to a hearing, appeal, or judicial review of this notice and warrant of apprehension and removal,” the document states.
