(WASHINGTON) — The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol riot will “swiftly consider” holding one-time Trump White House adviser Steve Bannon, and potentially others, in contempt of Congress for ignoring committee subpoenas, committee chairman Bennie Thompson vice-chair Liz Cheney said Friday.
The move came after Bannon formally advised the committee that he would be unable to comply with their requests, citing former President Donald Trump’s intention to invoke executive privilege. In a letter obtained by ABC News, Bannon’s lawyers said that until the matter is settled in court, they will not comply with the committee’s subpoena.
The committee last month issued subpoenas to Bannon and other top Trump aides Mark Meadows, Kash Patel and Dan Scavino, as part of its probe into the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. An additional 11 subpoenas were issued last week to organizers of the pro-Trump rally that preceded the attack.
Meadows, a former White House chief of staff, and Patel, an ex-Pentagon official, are “engaging” with the committee, officials said. The committee had no update on the status of Scavino.
“While Mr. Meadows and Mr. Patel are, so far, engaging with the Select Committee, Mr. Bannon has indicated that he will try to hide behind vague references to privileges of the former President,” Thompson and Cheney said in a joint statement. “The Select Committee fully expects all of these witnesses to comply with our demands for both documents and deposition testimony.”
Sources confirm to ABC News that Trump’s lawyer sent a letter to several of those subpoenaed informing them that the former president wants the subpoenas ignored and that he plans to claim executive privilege. In the letter, Trump suggested he would be willing to take the matter to court to block their cooperation.
However in an interview earlier this week with right-wing commentator John Solomon, Trump suggested that he would have no problem with his confidants participating in the probe.
“I’m mixed, because we did nothing wrong,” Trump said. “So I’m sort of saying, ‘Why are we hiring lawyers to do this?’ I’d like to just have everybody go in and say what you have to say. We did nothing wrong.”
Committee officials said that those who ignore the subpoenas could be held in contempt.
“Though the Select Committee welcomes good-faith engagement with witnesses seeking to cooperate with our investigation, we will not allow any witness to defy a lawful subpoena or attempt to run out the clock, and we will swiftly consider advancing a criminal contempt of Congress referral,” the statement said.
Any motion of contempt would be passed along for the full House to consider. If passed, the matter would then be referred to the Justice Department for potential prosecution.
Democrats considered holding Bannon in contempt of a House Intelligence Committee subpoena in 2018, but ultimately declined to do so. The full House voted to hold former Attorney General Bill Barr and former Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross in contempt of Congress in 2019 for ignoring House Oversight Committee subpoenas for records related to the 2020 census, but the Trump Justice Department ignored the requests.
Trump is also seeking to block the Jan. 6 committee from accessing selected documents held by the National Archives, which maintains control of White House records, including West Wing communications and visitor logs. On Friday he sent a letter to the agency asserting executive privilege over a tranche of documents that he said contain privileged presidential communications.
White House counsel Dara Remus said in an earlier letter to the agency that the White House “has determined that an assertion of executive privilege is not in the best interests of the United States,” but that they would “respond accordingly” if Trump asserts executive privilege over only a subset of the documents.
As of Friday, the committee has issued a total of 17 subpoenas, with most going to Trump associates and individuals linked to the rallies in Washington on the day of the Capitol riot.
The committee plans to schedule in-person depositions with cooperating witnesses in the coming weeks.
(NEW YORK) — A number of pediatric hospitals across the country are warning about an increase in the number of cases of multi-system inflammatory syndrome in children, a rare condition in which different parts of the body, including the heart, lungs, kidneys, brain, skin, eyes or gastrointestinal organs, become inflamed.
MIS-C, which most often appears four to six weeks after a COVID-19 infection, can be serious and potentially deadly, but most children who are diagnosed with it recover with medical care, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Federal data shows that there have been at least 46 confirmed MIS-C deaths and 5,217 confirmed MIS-C cases — and about 61% of the reported cases have occurred in children who are Hispanic/Latino or Black. Children between the ages of 6 to 11, who may soon be eligible for a COVID-19 vaccine, have reported the highest number of MIS-C cases since the onset of the pandemic.
Nearly 5.9 million children have tested positive for COVID-19, and MIS-C infections represent only 0.0009% of COVID-19 pediatric cases. However, between July and August, the average number of daily MIS-C cases nearly doubled.
“MIS-C happens about four to six weeks after a primary COVID infection, and we know that the delta variant has really impacted kids, more than previous waves have done, and so it’s not really that big of a surprise a couple weeks after your first cases of COVID start rolling, and then you start seeing your MIS-C cases roll in,” Dr. Amy Edwards, a pediatric infectious disease specialist at UH Rainbow Babies and Children’s Hospital in Cleveland, told ABC News Friday, in reference to the facility’s recent uptick.
Dayton Children’s Hospital told ABC News they too have seen an uptick in recent weeks. And it is not just in Ohio where officials are seeing increases. In Tennessee, the number of MIS-C cases has more than tripled since early February.
“We saw a dramatic increase in COVID-19 cases in children over the past two months with the delta variant surge in our region,” Dr. Sophie Katz, assistant professor of pediatric infectious diseases at Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt said in a press release on Wednesday. “Unfortunately, we anticipate an increase in MIS-C cases following this spike.”
Earlier this week, officials from Children’s Mercy Hospital in Kansas City, Missouri, said at a press conference that their physicians have seen an uptick in MIS-C in recent weeks as more children test positive.
“I saw three with MIS-C personally last week,” said Dr. Angela Myers, the division director of infectious diseases at Children’s Mercy. “I think we’ve had more [children] continue to get admitted to the hospital since then. That’s more than the zero we had multiple months before that.”
And on Wednesday, the University of Mississippi Medical Center, which houses Mississippi’s only pediatric hospital, reported that the state is still seeing acute cases of COVID-19 and MIS-C in children.
“What we have now is both MIS-C and severe acute COVID-19, and I think it’s because of schools dropping mask mandates,” Dr. Charlotte Hobbs, professor of pediatric infectious diseases and director of UMMC’s MIS-C clinic, said in a statement. “We saw this drop of acute COVID-19, and then MIS-C, and now acute COVID-19 is increasing again. Acute COVID and MIS-C at the same time is something that has not happened before, and it is preventable.”
Utah native Sharella Ruffin’s 6-year-old son, Zyaire, contracted the rare syndrome earlier this month.
“How can something like that take over your kid’s life in like a week? I’m not understanding that. It was like the most scariest things that ever happened in my life. No mother should ever have to hear that your baby might not make it,” Ruffin told ABC News Friday. “To see your 6-year-old son just laying there. And he’s scared and don’t know what’s going on.”
According to the CDC, the best way for a parent to protect their child is by taking “everyday actions” to prevent COVID-19, including mask-wearing and hand-washing.
At this time, severe illness due to COVID-19 remains “uncommon” among children, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children’s Hospital Association.
However, any acute illness from COVID-19 and death in a child is concerning, Dr. Richard Besser, a pediatrician and former acting director of the CDC, told ABC’s “Good Morning America” on Friday.
“One of the myths that is out there is that this COVID pandemic isn’t affecting children. There have been over 600 children who died. There have been thousands who have been hospitalized,” Besser said.
Experts continue to emphasize the urgency for not only children to be vaccinated, when eligible, but also for their parents and all of those in the communities around them to get the shot as soon as possible
ABC News’ Felicia Biberica, Kelly Landrigan and Kristen Red-Horse contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — Civil rights charges will not be pursued against the Wisconsin police officer who shot Jacob Blake last year, partially paralyzing him, the Department of Justice announced Friday.
Kenosha Police Officer Rusten Sheskey, who is white, fired seven times at Blake, who is Black, on Aug. 23, 2020, after responding to a report of a domestic dispute, authorities said.
Following an investigation, federal prosecutors said the evidence obtained was insufficient to prove Sheskey “willfully used excessive force,” the DOJ said in a statement.
Investigators reviewed police reports, law enforcement accounts, witness statements, witness affidavits, photographs, videos and more of the incident, which was captured on a witness’ cellphone and sparked days of large-scale protests in Kenosha.
“After a careful and thorough review, a team of experienced federal prosecutors determined that insufficient evidence exists to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the KPD officer willfully violated the federal criminal civil rights statutes,” the DOJ said.
The DOJ said it has informed representatives of Blake’s family about its decision.
ABC News spoke with Blake’s father, Jacob Blake Sr., shortly after the DOJ’s announcement. He said he had not yet heard about the decision.
“I was expecting more from the administration than this. I was expecting much more than this,” he said. “I believe that we’re in a systematic racist system, and that this system was not set up for us. So I didn’t expect the system to work for us, because it never works for us. It wasn’t made for us.”
Blake’s father said he disagrees that Sheskey didn’t willfully use excessive force.
“Seven times in the back is excessive,” he said. “I don’t care if you’re a dog. Seven times in the back, that’s not excessive?”
The shooting occurred as officers were attempting to detain Blake, who had a warrant out for his arrest. After Blake walked to the front of his vehicle toward the driver’s side door, Sheskey fired his gun seven times toward his back.
Blake was struck by six of the bullets and is now paralyzed from the waist down.
An unfolded knife was found on the driver’s side floorboard of Blake’s vehicle, authorities said.
Kenosha County District Attorney Mike Graveley also declined to file any criminal charges against Sheskey related to the incident last year, saying at the time the officer was justified in his use of force and was acting in self-defense because Blake was armed with a knife.
Sheskey was not disciplined for his use of force by the Kenosha Police Department either, which said he was acting “within policy.”
In March, Blake filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against Sheskey, accusing the officer of using “excessive and unnecessary” force.
“We believe that this lawsuit will help establish accountability,” B’Ivory LaMarr, one of Blake’s attorneys, told ABC News at the time.
ABC News’ Stephanie Wash contributed to this report.
(CODY, Wyo.) — After a video of her trying to photograph grizzly bears went viral, a woman from Illinois has been sentenced to four days in jail and banned from Yellowstone National Park for a year.
Samantha Dehring, 25, from Carol Stream, Illinois, was charged on Oct. 6 for disturbing wildlife at Roaring Mountain in the park on May 10 while attempting to get a close-up picture of a grizzly bear and her cubs. Dehring has to spend four days in custody, a year on unsupervised probation and faces up to $2,040 in fines and fees.
In an announcement on Thursday, acting U.S. attorney Bob Murray on behalf of the District of Wyoming said: “Approaching a sow grizzly with cubs is absolutely foolish. Here, pure luck is why Dehring is a criminal defendant and not a mauled tourist.”
Dehring appeared before a magistrate judge in Mammoth Hot Spring, Wyoming, on Wednesday, more than a month after she was slated to appear. She was also charged with another count of feeding, touching, teasing, frightening or intentionally disturbing wildlife, which was dismissed.
As per the National Park Service’s regulations: “willfully remaining near or approaching wildlife” is prohibited.
“The park is not a zoo where animals can be viewed within the safety of a fenced enclosure,” Murray said.
This news comes less than a month after Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon announced the state’s intention to ask the federal government to lift its protections for grizzly bears in the Yellowstone area.
(WASHINGTON) — The Senate narrowly averted fiscal calamity Thursday evening in a late-evening vote to raise the federal borrowing limit, but the short-term solution has set the stage for a fierce political showdown in December.
While no Republicans voted to raise the debt ceiling, 11 Republicans voted with Democrats to break a Republican filibuster so that the measure could advance.
The kicked-can deal comes a little more than a week before Oct. 18 — the date Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen pegged as when the U.S. may no longer be able to cover its debts.
But the short-term solution is still not yet totally secured. The House is expected to return to Washington from its recess on Tuesday to approve the measure, where it is expected to pass on party lines before heading to President Joe Biden’s desk.
When the $480 billion debt hike is exhausted, the political gamesmanship from both parties that made a short-term solution difficult to achieve will likely be on heightened display, as lawmakers aim to deal with the lapse of their short-term extension of federal government funding at the same time.
In the weeks leading up to Thursday’s vote, Senate leadership was locked in a political staring contest over which party ought to bear responsibility for raising the limit.
Republicans for months said that Democrats would need to act on their own to raise the debt limit because they have total control of Washington and are planning to pass a multi-trillion social and economic package with zero input from Republicans. Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said repeatedly that Democrats should have to hike the debt limit because of the high cost of Biden’s proposed agenda.
But Democrats have argued raising the debt limit is a bipartisan responsibility, in part because it covers spending that already took place under the Trump administration with unified GOP support.
Republicans blocked an earlier effort by Democrats to suspend the limit partially because they want Democrats to be forced to raise the limit by a specific dollar amount using a fast-track budget process budget tool called reconciliation. It would allow the majority to break a filibuster to pass certain legislation, but use of this arcane process is cumbersome, could take weeks and opens up Democrats to a series of potentially politically painful votes.
Majority Leader Chuck Schumer rejected the reconciliation option, arguing it would take too much time.
The stalemate was temporarily broken on Thursday when 11 Republicans, including McConnell, joined all Senate Democrats in casting a procedural vote to break a filibuster on the debt limit. Ten GOP votes were necessary to clear the way for a second, simple majority vote to raise the debt limit by $480 billion. No Republicans voted with Democrats in a subsequent vote on the debt hike.
McConnell offered the deal to allow Democrats additional time to use reconciliation to pass a more permanent debt limit fix without GOP support.
“This will moot Democrats’ excuses about the time crunch they created and give the unified Democratic government more than enough time to pass standalone debt limit legislation through reconciliation,” McConnell said in a statement Wednesday.
But Democrats have said they’re no more prepared to use reconciliation in December than they were this month.
“There’s not going to be reconciliation,” Senate Budget Committee Chairman Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., told reporters emphatically on Wednesday.
Following Thursday’s vote, Schumer took to the floor to lambast Republicans for holding the debt limit hostage, further committing that Democrats would not budge on reconciliation.
“Let me say that again. Today’s vote is proof positive that the debt limit can be addressed without going through the reconciliation process, just as Democrats have been saying for months,” Schumer said on the floor. “The solution is for Republicans to either join us in raising the debt limit or stay out of the way and let Democrats address the debt limit ourselves.”
Some Republicans, and a visibly frustrated Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., were miffed by Schumer’s victory lap.
“I was not in the chamber when he spoke, so I didn’t hear it first hand,” Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, said Thursday evening. “But I heard from others there was a fair amount of frustration.”
Republican Whip Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., said he told Schumer personally he was frustrated with his tone, calling it “out of line” and an “incredibly partisan speech after we had just helped him solve a problem.”
Many rank-and-file Republicans were also frustrated with McConnell for even offering Democrats a way to kick the can down the road on dealing with the debt limit.
“I believe it was a mistake to offer this deal. Two days ago Republicans were unified, we were all on the same page, we were all standing together and making clear that Democrats had complete authority to raise the debt ceiling, and to take responsibility for the trillions of debt that they are irresponsibly adding to this country,” Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said. “We were winning that fight and Schumer was on the verge of surrender. And unfortunately, the deal that was put on the table was a lifeline for Schumer. And I disagree with that decision.”
Discontent with the deal was on full display Thursday, as McConnell stood on the floor and counted his Republican “yes” votes to ensure the necessary 10 votes to proceed would be cast.
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., gave a dramatic thumbs down at his turn — just steps away from McConnell.
McConnell had arrived on the floor moments after the vote began — a rare, early appearance for the leader who usually waits until later in the vote series to cast his. But this time clearly wanted his presence known. Rather than giving a thumbs up on his vote, he gave a bellowing and affirmative “aye” and stood in the well with other “yes” voters as they amassed, leaning over the center table as votes rolled in.
Rankling in the lower ranks of the GOP all but assures there won’t be a similar compromise coming in December when the parties will almost certainly find themselves in a similar stare down.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki called the Senate’s action Thursday “welcome steps forward” on the debt limit but reiterated the Democratic view that it should be a “shared responsibility” to raise the limit in December.
“We cannot allow partisan politics to hold our economy hostage, and we can’t allow the routine process of paying our bills to turn into a confidence-shaking political showdown every two years or every two months,” Psaki said.
(NEW YORK) — The COVID-19 pandemic has had a major impact on the mental health of the nation, according to a new study published in the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s weekly journal, MMWR.
The CDC said that social isolation, coronavirus-related deaths and stress weighed heavy on Americans, forcing many to confront new mental health challenges.
Researchers noted that anxiety and depression scores fluctuated throughout the pandemic and reflected changes in COVID-19 cases. Throughout the study, they found that the more average daily COVID-19 cases there were, the more people experienced anxiety and depression symptoms.
From August 2020 to December 2020, there was a 13% increase nationwide in anxiety-related symptoms and a 14.8% increase in depression-related symptoms.
“We were really thinking about life or death,” said Dr. Panagiota Korenis, associate professor at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. “The pandemic has certainly identified the need to not just take physical health in isolation and really needing to emphasize also people’s mental well-being.”
As the COVID vaccine has rolled out, from December 2020 to June 2021, anxiety-related symptoms decreased by 26.8% and depression-related symptoms fell by 24.8%.
However, the severity scores for both illnesses remain higher than pre-pandemic levels.
“As this is drawing out, we’re seeing the aftermath of a lot of burnout. … I do very much believe that we are in it for the long haul,” Korenis said. “If people take the time to self-reflect, and they’re open to getting help, getting treatment, and taking time to do things that bring them joy, I think that’s really critical.”
Researchers said this study emphasized the need to make mental health resources readily and easily accessible during the pandemic.
The study included more than 1.5 million adults, and took into account 19 different waves of COVID-19 to assess anxiety and depression symptoms with questionnaires and surveys.
Dr. Adela Wu, a contributor to the ABC News Medical Unit, contributed to this report.
(BOSTON) — A guilty verdict was reached Friday afternoon in the trial of John Wilson and Gamal Abdelaziz, two wealthy fathers charged with paying bribes to secure prestigious college spots for their kids under false pretenses.
Wilson and Abdelaziz were the first defendants among about five dozen to stand trial in Boston for charges stemming from the sweeping Operation Varsity Blues scheme.
They pleaded not guilty to fraud and bribery conspiracy charges in the case.
Abdelaziz, a former casino executive from Las Vegas, allegedly paid $300,000 to get his daughter into the University of Southern California as a basketball recruit even though she didn’t make her high school varsity team.
Wilson, a former Staples executive, allegedly paid $220,000 to have his son designated as a USC water polo recruit and gave an additional $1 million to get his twin daughters into Harvard and Stanford.
While the two men argued they thought their payments to scheme mastermind Rick Singer were legitimate donations, the jury agreed with prosecutors that they amounted to bribes to buy their kids’ way into those schools.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephen Frank told jurors during closing arguments: “These parents were not willing to take ‘no’ for an answer, and to get to ‘yes’ they crossed a line. In crossing that line, they broke the law.”
Jurors deliberated for nearly 11 hours over two days. Abdelaziz will be sentenced Feb. 16 and Wilson on Feb. 17.
The trial featured audio recordings of phone calls between Singer, who pleaded guilty and agreed to cooperate in the investigation, and each of the men. Prosecutors argued the calls showed that the fathers understood they were partaking in a scheme.
On a phone call where Abdelaziz is heard saying, “Sabrina is loving USC!” Singer also is heard saying, “I’m not going to tell the IRS that your $300,000 was paid to Donna Heinel at USC to get Sabrina into school even though she wasn’t a legitimate basketball player at that level.”
“You’re OK with that right?” Singer asked.
“Of course,” Abdelaziz replied.
“I’m going to say your $300,000 payment was made to our foundation to help underserved kids,” Singer said. “I just want to make sure you’re OK with that.”
“I am,” Abdelaziz replied.
Three other parents are expected to face trials in January, and three coaches are scheduled for trails in November.
Four dozen other defendants, including the actresses Lori Loughlin and Felicity Huffman, opted to plead guilty, and many have already served their sentences.
(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden has restored the original boundaries of three U.S. national monuments that had their size drastically reduced by former President Donald Trump, saying Friday that Americans must protect the country together.
“These protections provide a bridge to our past, but they also build a bridge to a safer, more sustainable future,” he said.
The White House said Biden’s move “is fulfilling a key promise and upholding the longstanding principle that America’s national parks, monuments, and other protected areas are to be protected for all time and for all people.”
The orders Biden signed on Friday, alongside Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, restore Bears Ears and Grand Staircase Escalante national monuments in Utah to their original boundaries and will restore protections to the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine Monument in Rhode Island. Biden joked that making the changes “might be the easiest thing I’ve ever done so far as president.”
Haaland, the first Native American to ever serve as a Cabinet secretary, played a leading role in encouraging the restoration of the original boundaries.
“Thank you Mr. president, for the profound action you are taking today to permanently protect the homelands of our ancestors. Our songs, our languages, and our cultures are strong, and many people from many Indian tribes have sung and spoken in unison to protect this sacred place,” she said.
The monuments were created by former President Barack Obama using the Antiquities Act, which allows presidents to create national monuments. Trump was the first president to use that law to reduce protections for a monument.
Trump drastically reduced the size of the two Utah monuments in 2017, calling it an overreach of power to put so much land and resources under the control of the federal government. Native American tribes, conservation groups and scientists opposed the decision, saying the area needed protections to preserve the historic sites and sensitive ecosystems.
Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, a Republican, confirmed reports about Biden’s move in a statement on Thursday, saying he’s disappointed about the decision.
Biden said he spoke to both Utah senators — Republicans Mitt Romney and Mike Lee — about the decision.
“The protection of public lands… must not become, I should say, a pendulum that swings back and forth depending on who’s in public office. It’s not a partisan issue,” Biden said in remarks Friday.
Conservation groups applauded Biden’s decision to restore the original boundaries of the monuments, saying it will preserve the important natural, historical and cultural resources in the area and shows respect to Native American tribes who first called for the creation of Bears Ears National Monument.
(WASHINGTON) — It’s been nearly one month since the U.S. withdrew all U.S. troops from Afghanistan on President Joe Biden’s order to leave by Aug. 31, ending a chaotic evacuation operation after the Afghan government collapsed and the Taliban seized the capital Kabul.
Top Pentagon leaders are appearing before the House Armed Services Committee on Wednesday amid bipartisan criticism of the chaotic withdrawal and on the failure to anticipate the Taliban’s swift takeover of the country.
In their appearance Tuesday — the leaders’ first before Congress since the withdrawal of all U.S. forces from Afghanistan — Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen. Mark Milley and Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, commander of U.S. Central Command, candidly admitted that they had recommended to Biden that the U.S. should keep a troop presence there, appearing to contradict his assertions to ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos.
Here are the latest developments. All times Eastern:
Oct 08, 1:57 pm
ISIS-K claims responsibility of suicide attack at mosque
ISIS-K have claimed responsibility for a suicide bombing at a mosque in Kunduz on Friday, according to SITE Intelligence Group.
A local source told ABC News’ Aleem Agha the attack left at least 50 killed and more than 100 wounded. It was carried out during Friday prayers while the mosque was packed with worshippers, according to Kunduz provincial spokesman Matiullah Rohani.
An Afghan man films inside a mosque after a blast, in Kunduz, Afghanistan, Oct. 8, 2021.
According to a translation from SITE Intelligence Group, ISIS-K said in a statement that the attacker was of Uighur origin.
-ABC News’ Aleem Agha and Cindy Smith
Oct 08, 10:04 am
Suicide bombing during Friday prayers kills scores
A suicide bombing at a mosque in the city of Kunduz, about 200 miles north of Kabul, has left scores of people dead or wounded.
According to Kunduz provincial spokesman Matiullah Rohani, the attack was carried out during Friday prayers while the mosque was packed with worshippers.
At least 60 people were killed and 100 injured, officials said, though the exact number was not immediately clear and is expected to climb. A health official at the Kunduz provincial hospital told ABC News that it had received 26 bodies.
-ABC News’ Aleem Agha
Oct 05, 3:18 pm
UK officials meet senior Taliban leaders in Afghanistan
United Kingdom officials have traveled to Afghanistan to meet senior Taliban members, the U.K. Foreign Office said Tuesday.
“The Prime Minister’s High Representative for Afghan Transition, Sir Simon Gass, and Chargé d’Affaires of the UK Mission to Afghanistan in Doha, Dr Martin Longden, traveled to Afghanistan today to hold talks with the Taliban,” the UK Foreign Office said in a statement. “They met senior members of the Taliban, including Mawlawi Amir Khan Muttaqi, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar Akhund and Mawlawi Abdul-Salam Hanafi.”
The statement said the diplomats “discussed how the UK could help Afghanistan to address the humanitarian crisis, the importance of preventing the country from becoming an incubator for terrorism, and the need for continued safe passage for those who want to leave the country. They also raised the treatment of minorities and the rights of women and girls.”
“The government continues to do all it can to ensure safe passage for those who wish to leave, and is committed to supporting the people of Afghanistan,” it added.
-ABC News’ Sohel Uddin
Oct 03, 12:54 pm
5th Qatari evacuation flight, with Americans onboard, takes off from Kabul
The Qataris have confirmed to ABC News that there were Americans on board the fifth evacuation flight from Kabul since the U.S. troop withdrawal.
“The State of Qatar is pleased to have worked with a number of parties on the ground as well as its international partners to make this flight possible,” a senior Qatari government official said in a statement to ABC News.
The government said the flight carried 235 passengers, which is the second-largest Qatari passenger evacuation flight since the Aug. 31 deadline.
The majority of passengers onboard were Afghan citizens, while there were also citizens from several other countries, the official said. The number of Americans onboard the flight is not yet known.
“Upon arriving to Qatar, the passengers will be transported to the compound facility currently hosting Afghan civilians and other evacuees,” the official said. “There, they will be able to take a COVID-19 test, rest and remain in Doha until departing to their final destinations.”
-ABC News’ Sohel Uddin
Sep 29, 2:50 pm
House hearing adjourned
The House Armed Services Committee hearing has adjourned with Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, commander of U.S. Central Command, closing out a second day of questions from congressional lawmakers on the U.S. military’s chaotic exit from Afghanistan.
Several Republicans dug into Milley and McKenzie saying they had recommended leaving approximately 2,500 troops behind as a residual force in Afghanistan, appearing to contradict Biden’s comments to ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos that the opinion of his military advisers was “split” and that he didn’t recall being told 2,500 troops would allow for a “stable” situation.
Austin repeated his acknowledgments of “uncomfortable truths” about the two-decade-old U.S. military mission in Afghanistan, of which he is a veteran, but was careful not to contradict the president.
Sep 29, 1:30 pm
GOP lawmaker, an Air Force veteran, blasts Biden for alleged ‘falsehood’ on residual troops
Rep. Don Bacon, R-Neb., a 30-year veteran of the U.S. Air Force, nearly choked up when speaking in the House hearing on Afghanistan and offered some harsh words for Biden and the committee, which he said under both Democrat and Republican presidents cautioned against a premature withdrawal from Afghanistan.
“I think most veterans feel heartbroken knowing the blood and the treasure spilled ended up in a ‘strategic failure,'” Bacon said, quoting witness Gen. Mark Milley. “I think we’re enraged by it.”
“Then to have the president come out and say that this was a success, and he had no regrets — this does not break our hearts, that makes us mad as hell,” Bacon continued.
“The fact that President Biden on ABC said that no one that he can recall advised him to keep a force of about 2,500 troops in Afghanistan, it’s not true. We heard yesterday, and we’ve heard today that the chairman of the Joint Chiefs and the CENTCOM commander advise differently,” he said. “I have no other view to see this as a lie. A falsehood from our president — that makes us mad as hell too.”
Committee Chairman Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., pushed back on Bacon’s interpretation of Biden’s interview with ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos, by focusing on the world “stable.”
“He was asked, could they stay there in a stable environment. That is the option he said wasn’t on the table, not because it wasn’t offered, but because it didn’t exist,” Smith said.
Sep 29, 12:57 pm
Defense secretary says he ‘did not support staying in Afghanistan forever’
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told lawmakers at a House Armed Services Committee hearing he wouldn’t absolutely rule out sending troops back into Afghanistan, and added, “If we do, the military will provide good credible options to be able to do that and to be effective.”
While maintaining that he wouldn’t talk about his recommendation to President Biden on leaving a residual force, Austin said he “did not support staying in Afghanistan forever” and that keeping a presence there would have required more troops for force protection if the Taliban started attacking the U.S. military as it had promised to do.
“Let me be clear that I support the president’s decision to end the war in Afghanistan. I did not support staying in Afghanistan forever. And let me also say we’ve talked about the process that we used to provide input to the president,” Austin said.
“I will always keep my recommendations to the president confidential but I would say that in my view there is no, was no risk-free status quo option. I think that the Taliban had been clear that if we stayed there longer, they were going to recommence attacks on our forces,” Austin added.
“I think while it’s conceivable that you could stay there, my view is that you would have had to deploy more forces in order to protect ourselves and accomplish any missions we would have been assigned. It’s also my view, Mister Chairman, the best way to end this war was through a negotiated settlement and sadly that did not happen.”
Sep 29, 11:21 am
GOP links failed drone strike to ‘over-the-horizon’ capabilities
Rep. Michael Turner, R-Ohio, raising the August U.S. drone strike in Kabul that killed 10 Afghan civilians, including seven children, took direct issue with the U.S. military’s ability to conduct “over the horizon” drone strike capabilities in Afghanistan.
“What we know from your prior statements is that you did not know who it was, who was in the car, whose house it was,” Turner said. “This greatly concerns me as we look to the over horizon claims that the administration has of its ability for counterterrorism.”
Gen. Frank McKenzie, the commander of U.S. Central Command, told House lawmakers he took “full responsibility” for the strike.
“That strike was a mistake and I take full responsibility for that strike. I was under no pressure from any quarter to conduct the strike,” McKenzie said.
“While in many cases we were right with our intelligence and forestalled ISIS- K attacks, in this case we were wrong, tragically wrong,” he added.
“Over-the-horizon” capabilities are a cornerstone of the U.S. military’s counterterrorism strategy in Afghanistan. The top Pentagon commanders said the U.S. will continue to investigate the intelligence that led to the August strike and will be transparent with their findings.
Sep 29, 10:47 am
Milley praises Afghanistan War veterans, defends calls to China
Echoing Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said in his opening testimony that lawmakers can debate the decisions surrounding the Afghanistan withdrawal but that the courage of U.S. service members is not up for debate.
“Over the course of four presidents, 12 secretaries of defense, seven chairmen, 10 CENTCOM commanders, 20 commanders in Afghanistan, hundreds of congressional delegation visits, and 20 years of congressional oversight, there are many lessons to be learned,” Milley said.
“One lesson we can never forget: every soldier, sailor, airman and Marine who served there for 20 years, protected our country against attack by terrorists, and for that we all should be forever grateful, and they should be forever proud,” he said.
Milley again took the chance to push back on recent characterizations of phone calls to China’s top military official in the final days of former President Donald Trump’s presidency.
“At no time was I attempting to change or influence the process, usurp authority, or insert myself into the chain of command. But I am expected to give my advice and ensure that the president was fully informed on military affairs,” he said.
Sep 29, 10:18 am
Defense secretary delivers opening testimony for House lawmakers
Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, facing a House panel on Wednesday, repeated his opening testimony given to Senate lawmakers at Wednesday’s hearing, in which Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, commander of U.S. Central Command, appeared to contradict Biden by saying they recommended keeping a residual force of 2,500 troops behind in Afghanistan.
Austin again defended leaving Bagram Airfield, saying it would have required at least 5,000 troops and would have “contributed little” to the mission of protecting the embassy in Kabul, which ultimately fell to Taliban control.
“Staying in Baghram even for counterterrorism purposes meant staying at war in Afghanistan, something that the president made clear that he would not do,” Austin said.
He again walked through some “uncomfortable truths” about the two-decade U.S. military mission in Afghanistan, of which he is a veteran.
“We helped build a state, but we could not forge a nation. The fact that the Afghan army that we and our partners trained simply melted away, in many cases without firing a shot, took us all by surprise and it would be dishonest to claim otherwise,” he said.
Sep 29, 10:12 am
Heated House hearing underway with residual force in focus
House Armed Services Chair Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., opened Wednesday’s hearing on Afghanistan with a defense of Biden for ending America’s longest war — and with a preemptive strike on the panel’s Republicans, who he said would spend the day trying to get the military leaders to contradict the commander in chief.
“The option of keeping 2,500 troops in Afghanistan in a peaceful and stable environment did not exist,” Smith said, opening the hearing.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, commander of U.S. Central Command, face a second day of questions from congressional lawmakers on the U.S. military’s chaotic exit from Afghanistan.
Ranking Republican member Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Ala., said he “could not disagree more” with Smith and called Biden “delusional” before the leaders gave their opening testimonies.
Sep 29, 9:22 am
Top military leaders face more questions in House hearing
The nation’s top military leaders are back on Capitol Hill at 9:30 a.m. before the House Armed Services Committee — where Republicans are expected to seize on their comments from Tuesday that they recommended Biden keep a residual force of 2,500 troops in Afghanistan, appearing to contradict the president’s comments to ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos.
Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Gen. Frank McKenzie, the commander of U.S. Central Command, candidly admitted in a Senate hearing on Tuesday — their first appearance before lawmakers since the withdrawal of all U.S. forces from Afghanistan — that they had recommended the U.S. keep a small troop presence there, with Milley openly advising presidents not to assign complete withdrawal dates without conditions.
In the six-hour hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee, Milley also characterized that the U.S. military mission in Afghanistan as “a strategic failure” and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin acknowledged that it was time to acknowledged some “uncomfortable truths” about the two-decade U.S. military mission there. House lawmakers are expected to follow up on the revelations on Wednesday.
Sep 28, 3:53 pm
1st Senate hearing with top commanders on Afghanistan adjourns
After nearly six hours of testimonies and tough questions, the Senate Armed Services Committee has adjourned its hearing with Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, commander of U.S. Central Command — their first since the Afghanistan withdrawal.
Senators sunk into Milley and McKenzie saying they had recommended leaving 2,500 troops behind as a residual force in Afghanistan ahead of the chaotic evacuation effort. Several GOP senators called on the leaders to resign, to which Milley offered a powerful rebuttal.
“It would be an incredible act of political defiance for a commissioned officer to just resign because my advice is not taken,” Milley said. “My dad didn’t get a choice to resign at Iwo Jima.”
White House press secretary Jen Psaki, during the hearing, defended Biden’s interview with ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos in which the president said the views of his advisers were “split,” saying, “There was no one who said, ‘Five years from now, we could have 2,500 troops, and that would be sustainable.’”
“That was not a decision the president was going to make,” Psaki added. “Ultimately, it’s up to the commander in chief to make a decision. He made a decision it was time to end a 20-year war.”
It’s been nearly one month since Biden withdrew all U.S. troops, ending a chaotic evacuation operation after the Afghan government collapsed and the Taliban seized the capital Kabul.
(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden signed into law a bill that provides financial assistance and better health care to victims of “Havana syndrome,” the mysterious health incidents affecting dozens of U.S. personnel first identified in Cuba and now including several countries.
After a closed-door signing ceremony, Biden said in a statement that his administration is marshalling the U.S. government’s “full resources” to care for victims and “to get to the bottom of these incidents, including to determine the cause and who is responsible” — a mystery that has confounded U.S. officials for nearly five years now.
The HAVANA Act authorizes the CIA director and the secretary of state to provide affected employees with financial support for brain injuries under detailed criteria. It also requires both agencies to report to Congress on how those payments are being made and whether additional action is needed to aid victims.
Several affected personnel have complained privately, and in some cases publicly, that they have not been able to access proper medical care — in some cases questioning whether the U.S. government believes they are injured.
“For far too long, U.S. public servants and their loved ones who’ve suffered from directed energy attacks have been denied the care they need and deserve. That’s unacceptable,” said Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., one of the law’s co-authors who has advocated for victims for years. Its enactment will help “by removing barriers to critical medical attention and paving the way for personnel with brain injuries to recover,” she added.
American diplomats, spies and other officials have reported strange experiences and debilitating symptoms in several countries now. Symptoms include headaches, dizziness, cognitive difficulties, tinnitus, vertigo and trouble with seeing, hearing, or balancing. Many officials have suffered symptoms years after reporting an incident while some have been diagnosed with traumatic brain injuries.
In some cases, especially those first reported in Cuba in late 2016 and throughout 2017, U.S. officials described intense feelings of pressure or vibration and, at times, a screeching or chirping sound.
It’s unclear how many U.S. officials have confirmed medical symptoms, but new cases have been allegedly reported in several more countries in recent weeks, including India, Serbia and Germany. One reported incident in Vietnam delayed Vice President Kamala Harris’s trip there in August. Beyond more than 40 affected staffers in Cuba, the U.S. government has officially acknowledged reported incidents in China, Russia, Uzbekistan, Austria and the United States, although the White House said the vast majority have been reported overseas.
“Addressing these incidents has been a top priority for my Administration. We are bringing to bear the full resources of the U.S. Government to make available first-class medical care to those affected and to get to the bottom of these incidents, including to determine the cause and who is responsible,” Biden said in his statement Friday.
His National Security Council is leading a government-wide probe, while both the CIA and the State Department have their own internal task forces to coordinate their responses, too.
Many victims of “Havana syndrome,” which the U.S. government now refers to as “anomalous health incidents,” have struggled for years to get the health care they seek. Many others, including State Department officials who haven’t been affected, have been frustrated by the Trump and Biden administrations’ lack of information about reported cases — instead often learning about reported incidents in the press.
In his first note to all staff about the issue in August, Secretary of State Antony Blinken acknowledged the administration “can and will do a better job keeping you informed of our efforts to get answers, support those affected, and protect our people,” according to the note, obtained first by ABC News.
But the lack of information stems in part from how little the U.S. government knows about what was once referred to as “health attacks,” including what is causing them.
Last December, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine issued a report that concluded that “directed, pulsed radio frequency energy appears to be the most plausible mechanism in explaining these cases, especially in individuals with the distinct early symptoms.”
CIA Director Bill Burns, who has met with his agency’s affected personnel and escalated efforts to solve this mystery, has boosted that finding as well — telling NPR in July there’s “certainly a very strong possibility” that some actor is behind the incidents.
But last week, the State Department declassified a secret 2018 report that cast doubt on that theory in some corners. Conducted by JASON, an independent scientific advisory group created during the Cold War to consult the U.S. government on defense science and technology, it concluded that radio or microwave energy could not produce the sound recorded by some U.S. diplomats in Cuba and their reported medical symptoms.
Instead, it said, the sounds were “mechanical or biological in origin, rather than electronic. The most likely source is the Indies short-tailed cricket, Anurogryllis celerinictus.”
But a senior administration official told BuzzFeed News, which filed a Freedom of Information Act request for the JASON report and first reported on it, that its findings are “not aligned with the Biden-Harris administration’s understanding of AHI (anomalous health incidents) and it has not informed our response.”
Either way, the report — written before incidents were reported in several other countries — determined that the sounds themselves were not injuring diplomats and could instead have been “introduced by an adversary as deception so as to mask an entirely unrelated mode of causing illness in diplomatic personnel.”
ABC News’s Molly Nagle contributed to this report.
