E. Jason Wambsgans/Chicago Tribune/Tribune News Service via Getty Images
(WASHINGTON) — With the Supreme Court’s looming decision that could overturn Roe v. Wade, doctors are voicing concerns about the well-being of adolescents in states where abortion is likely to become illegal.
Although teen pregnancy has been on the decline since 1991, pediatricians say abortion remains an important option for girls under 18 who become pregnant.
Most girls get their first period between the age of 10 and 15 years old, and most teens report being sexually active before they turn 18.
Despite their capacity to become pregnant, teenage girls are often left out of a national conversation about abortion, said Chez Smith, the CEO of Gyrls in the HOOD, a non-profit organization in Chicago committed to improving reproductive health outcomes for adolescent girls in urban neighborhoods.
“It’s like they shouldn’t be having sex anyways, so they’re not even part of the conversation, but they are a part of the conversation,” Smith said.
Teen pregnancy rates have improved thanks to contraception, sex education and community outreach. But “when something improves, doesn’t mean it ceases to be a necessary focus,” said Dr. Charis Chambers, a fellow at the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.
In 2020, females ages 15-19 accounted for just under 5% of U.S. births, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. But disparities still exist, with Hispanic and Black/Non-Hispanic teens each accounting for more than twice as many births each year as teenage white girls, HHS reported.
Motherhood can be related with positive experience, much like any mother, Chambers said. Teens “tend to be in awe of what the body is capable of,” she said. The challenges, however, “are really plentiful, and in a lot of cases, outweigh the triumphs,” she said.
For teens, accessing resources and navigating the healthcare system for themselves and their new baby can be extremely daunting.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, only about 50% of teenage mothers receive their high school diplomas by age 22.
The emotional burden of childbirth can also take a toll. Adolescent mothers are twice as likely as their adult counterparts to suffer from postpartum depression, according to a report in the journal Pediatrics. Teenagers are also at high risk for developing generalized depression and anxiety, the report said.
The pregnancy itself is not without risk. As Chambers explains, pre-term labor, premature rupture of membranes — which increases the risk for infections like chorioamnionitis — and delayed labor occur most commonly with younger moms and older moms. Other medical conditions, like preeclampsia and even postpartum hemorrhages can also occur. Maternal death during childbirth is also a very real risk.
But becoming a mother as a teenager doesn’t only affect the mother. Children of teenage mothers are more likely to have lower school achievement, drop out of high school, give birth as a teenager and face unemployment as a young adult.
Despite the litany of short-term and long-term effects of becoming a mother as a teenager, the decision to terminate a pregnancy can also be challenging.
“There can be profound grief,” Chambers said.
Battling the stigma of being a teenage mom and the stigma of having an abortion, the ultimate decision to terminate can be very lonely.
“They feel a little traumatized or guilty or shameful,” Smith added.
Medical and surgical abortions are also not without risks, including the risk of bleeding or infections.
Some girls, Smith says, become more responsible after terminating a pregnancy. The experience changes them because they don’t want to be in that situation again and know they don’t have the resources or supports to care for a baby right now, they make different decisions around sex and contraception, according to Smith.
Both Smith and Chambers agree that for teenagers, prevention is the best strategy. But when prevention is no longer an option, the ability to seek safe abortion is even more important. Smith adds that reversal of Roe vs Wade, which would limit options for pregnancy termination in many states, would be particularly detrimental for the teenagers that she serves.
“It’s an invasion of that sacred space where the doctor and the patient are making decisions together,” said Chambers. It is in that space that a woman brings her specific experiences, hopes, fears, and goals and uses that context to make the very difficult decision to terminate a pregnancy if that is the decision she chooses, she said.
The teenage mind is still developing, with impulse control being one of the last parts of the brain to fully develop, so elimination of safe options may make young girls go to desperate, dangerous measures, Chambers said.
“They are gonna find a way to do it – Google, YouTube, performing it on each other,” Smith said.
“Abortions will always be done,” Chambers agreed. “It’s a matter of making it harder for disenfranchised patients – those typically with lower socioeconomic status, lower health literacy and limited access to healthcare – including teenage girls, who are still children themselves.”
Chidimma J. Acholonu, M.D. M.P.H., is a pediatric resident physician at the University of Chicago and a contributor to the ABC Medical Unit.
(WASHINGTON) — Pennsylvania’s Lt. Gov. John Fetterman, the leading candidate for the Democratic nomination in the state’s Senate race, was scheduled to undergo surgery for a pacemaker and defibrillator on Tuesday after suffering a stroke late last week.
“John Fetterman is about to undergo a standard procedure to implant a pacemaker with a defibrillator. It should be a short procedure that will help protect his heart and address the underlying cause of his stroke, atrial fibrillation (A-fib), by regulating his heart rate and rhythm,” his campaign announced in a statement on Tuesday afternoon.
A day after Fetterman announced his stroke, his team also said that he would not be attending his election night party and would remain in the hospital. His wife, Gisele, will speak in his place.
Fetterman’s campaign released a photo of him Tuesday morning voting with an emergency absentee ballot from the hospital, where he is recovering.
The lieutenant governor since 2019, Fetterman entered the national spotlight when he launched his campaign for the Senate last February. A progressive, he is vying for the Democratic Party nomination against the more moderate Rep. Conor Lamb and others. The general election there, later this year, could help decide the balance of power in Congress.
Fetterman doesn’t fit the mold for what a typical senator looks like: Standing 6-foot-8, he is bald, goateed and tattooed and frequently eschews traditional suits and ties in favor of shorts and Dickies shirts.
He earned his master’s degree in public policy from Harvard University but has campaigned with a blue-collar approach, having served as the mayor of the small borough of Braddock, just outside Pittsburgh, for 16 years before being elected alongside Gov. Tom Wolf, a fellow Democrat, four years ago.
Fetterman previously ran for Senate in 2016, but lost in the primary.
Speaking with ABC News outside a polling place in his district on Tuesday, Lamb said of Fetterman amid his health challenges, “I wish him well.”
Lamb called their race a choice between “two very different paths based on two different sets of experience and two different personalities.”
The three leading candidates to watch in the Pennsylvania Democratic primary race are Fetterman and Lamb as well as state Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta. Polls close at 8 p.m. ET.
ABC News’ Hannah Demissie, Devin Dwyer and Oren Oppenheim contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — An athletic icon and business success, Herschel Walker has the type of background that Republicans hope will propel him to the U.S. Senate, where his presence could very well tip the balance of power in the deeply divided chamber.
But Walker’s political ambitions have also revived scrutiny of another side of his record: allegations of domestic violence, physical threats and stalking. Walker has denied some of those accusations. Others he claims not to remember – a byproduct of his diagnosis with dissociative identity disorder, or D.I.D., a complex mental health condition characterized by some severe and potentially debilitating symptoms.
Recruited and endorsed by former President Donald Trump, his longtime friend and mentor, Walker is expected to win next week’s Republican primary by a substantial margin. Some Republicans fear, however, that if Walker earns the GOP nomination, these claims could catch up with him come November – when he would likely face formidable Democratic incumbent Sen. Raphael Warnock – particularly if he fails to adequately answer for them now.
“[Walker] will have a better shot to win the general [election] if he addresses those issues that are out there from his past,” Georgia’s Republican Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan, who has not endorsed any candidate in the primary, told ABC News’ “Nightline.” “If he doesn’t, then I think it’s going to be a tough day in Georgia when we get to the November election, and we’re going to send, unfortunately, another Democrat to represent us as a U.S. senator.”
Walker has insisted that he has made a full recovery and taken responsibility for any past transgressions, and in response to questions from ABC News, his campaign referred to his 2008 memoir, “Breaking Free,” in which he revealed his diagnosis, and a 2008 interview with ABC News’ Bob Woodruff, in which he discussed its effects on his marriage.
Watch “Nightline” on ABC on Tuesday night for a special report on Herschel Walker.
“This is an obvious political hit job [eight] days before an election orchestrated by Herschel’s primary opponents who are failing to get any sort of traction. Voters will see through it. Herschel addressed these issues in detail with Bob Woodruff 14 years ago — he even wrote a book about it,” Mallory Blount, a spokesperson for the Walker campaign, told ABC News. “The same reporters who praised him for his courage are now trashing him because he is a Republican. It is shameful and is why good people don’t run for office.”
But in his book, Walker does not address several claims about his behavior – some of which are documented in police records. Walker did not write, for example, about allegations that he once held a gun to his ex-wife’s head. Nor does he address a claim made in 2002 that he stalked a former Dallas Cowboys cheerleader. After the book was published, a woman claiming to have had a long-term relationship with Walker accused him of stalking and threatening her as well.
His critics have contended that he has yet to address the full scope of troubling allegations. Walker did not participate in any of the primary debates, and his opponents, most notably Georgia Agricultural Commissioner Gary Black, have demanded an explanation in his absence.
“Georgia deserves to know the details,” Black told ABC News’ “Nightline.” “There’s a pattern of deflect, defer, run, hide, twist. It’s unacceptable for service in the United States Senate. In my opinion, I think most Georgians are going to agree.”
A stunning interview
Walker ended a decorated football career in 1997, with a Heisman Trophy and more than a decade in the NFL to show for it. In Georgia, where he attended high school and college, he is an icon – widely considered one of the greatest college football players to ever hail from the state.
In 1984, the New Jersey Generals and its bombastic owner, Donald Trump, selected Walker with the first pick of the upstart USFL draft. It was the beginning of one of Walker’s most consequential relationships. In the ensuing decades, Walker has appeared as a contestant on the Trump-hosted reality television show, “Celebrity Apprentice,” and later served as co-chair of President Trump’s Council on Sports, Fitness and Nutrition. Walker has also credited Trump with helping him navigate a lucrative post-football career in the poultry industry and other business enterprises.
But shortly after retiring from the game, according to his memoir, “Breaking Free,” Walker’s mental health and 16-year marriage deteriorated. He discussed the book in a 2008 interview with “Nightline,” telling ABC News that many of his struggles stemmed from dissociative identity disorder.
The once fearsome running back claimed that his psyche had fractured into as many as 12 alternate personalities, or “alters,” and he admitted to experiencing both violent urges and significant gaps in memory.
“It’s just personalities that can do different things for you,” Walker told Woodruff in 2008. “I told somebody once, you don’t want the Herschel that played football, you don’t want the Herschel that do business babysitting your child. You want a different person. When I’m competing, I’m a totally different person.”
In his memoir, Walker described one incident, from 2001, in which he became “so angry” with someone who arrived late to deliver him a car that Walker became consumed with “the visceral enjoyment I’d get from seeing the small entry wound and the spray of brain tissue and blood — like a Fourth of July firework — exploding behind him.”
“With murder in his heart and mind,” Walker wrote, he got behind the wheel of his Mercedes – where he kept a Beretta pistol in the glove compartment – to find the delivery man. But he soon spotted a “SMILE. JESUS LOVES YOU” bumper sticker, he wrote, and returned home.
But it was Walker’s ex-wife, Cindy Grossman, who offered the most harrowing glimpse into Walker’s post-football life, telling ABC News that Walker once threatened her with a weapon.
“He got a gun, and he put it to my temple,” Grossman told Woodruff in 2008.
“Put the gun right to your temple,” Woodruff replied, “and what did he say?”
“I’m gonna blow your effin’ brains out,” Grossman said.
Walker told ABC News at the time that he had no recollection of the incident described by Grossman. He did not deny it, acknowledging that he “probably did it,” but asserted that the gaps in his memory, a hallmark symptom of D.I.D., left him unable to address it.
“Do you not remember something like that because you think that was another alter,” Woodruff asked Walker in 2008, “or do you want to get out of having to talk about it?”
“No, no, no, no,” Walker insisted. “I’m talking about everything else. If I can remember it, I’ll talk about it.”
For Grossman, however, the chilling experience remained clear in her mind.
“[Walker] says he doesn’t remember a lot of these details,” Woodruff told Grossman in 2008.
“He may not,” Grossman replied. “But I certainly do.”
Some observers have suggested that Walker’s diagnosis provides a convenient mechanism for deflecting responsibility.
“It’s an excellent excuse to use if you’ve pointed a gun at somebody,” retired Atlanta Journal-Constitution politics editor Jim Galloway recently told The Washington Post. “‘That wasn’t me; it was somebody else.’”
Walker and Grossman divorced in 2002, and Grossman sought and was granted a restraining order against Walker in 2005. Court records related to those proceedings contain additional allegations that Walker made other threats of violence toward Grossman and her then-boyfriend.
Walker denied the allegations when he was interviewed by police in 2005, and the police report notes that he “was very calm but surprised about [the statements]” and suggested that someone was “making allegations about him to help with future child custody issues.” Walker’s campaign did not respond to questions about the incident.
Grossman did not respond to multiple requests for comment for this story. Walker’s allies have pointed to the fact that she has participated in several interviews in support of Walker’s condition as evidence that the couple remains on friendly terms.
But police reports obtained by ABC News and others have since shown that Grossman is not the only woman to have made allegations of threatening behavior against Walker.
In 2002, a former Dallas Cowboys cheerleader told police that she believed Walker was lurking outside her home, and that a year earlier, Walker had “made threats to her” and was “having her house watched.” The former cheerleader declined to comment for this story. She told police in 2002 that she did not want officers to pursue Walker for fear of “[making] the problem worse.”
In 2012, Myka Dean, who claimed to have had an on-again, off-again relationship with the former football star for nearly two decades, told police that Walker “lost it” after she tried to break up with him, and she said he threatened to “sit outside her apartment and blow her head off when she came outside.” Dean died in 2019, but in a statement provided to ABC News from the Walker campaign, Dean’s mother said the family was never aware of her daughter’s allegations, and they are “very proud of the man Herschel Walker has become. We love him, pray for him, and wish we lived in Georgia so we could vote him into the United States Senate.” Dean’s mother and stepfather also served on the board of Walker’s company, Renaissance Man, Inc.
Walker, who has never been charged with a crime, has denied both claims, telling Axios in December 2021 that “people can’t just make up and add on and say other things that’s not the truth. They want me to address things that they made up.”
A complex condition
Dissociative identity disorder, formerly known as multiple personality disorder, is a rare mental illness that Walker had said he has struggled with since childhood: “I just didn’t know what it was,” Walker told ABC News in 2008.
Walker was initially diagnosed and primarily treated by Dr. Jerry Mungadze, a Bedford, Texas-based licensed professional counselor with a Ph.D. in counselor education. Mungadze penned the forward to Walker’s memoir, in which Walker described him as “one of my best friends and probably the most essential,” as he has become central to Walker’s recovery narrative.
But Mungadze’s embrace of controversial or unproven psychological theories and treatments over the years have since raised questions about the treatment Walker may have received. In 2008, Walker wrote that Mungadze “played an important role in my healing process,” which featured both out-patient treatment at a hospital in Southern California and a protocol apparently developed by Mungadze himself.
“Dr. Jerry described his procedures and proposed treatment for the part of me I had never truly understood,” Walker wrote. “He said his treatment would focus on the whole person rather than the separate parts of personalities I created. He assured me it was possible to achieve emotional stability based upon the approach and methods he had developed.”
Mungadze did not respond to multiple requests for comment, and Walker’s campaign did not respond to questions about the nature and extent of the candidate’s treatment.
Walker told Axios in December 2021 that he held himself “accountable” for his behavior toward Grossman, and said he has since experienced something close to a full recovery from the disorder that previously led him down that violent path.
“[I’m] better now than 99% of the people in America,” he said. “Just like I broke my leg; I put the cast on. It healed.”
But according to one expert, recovery from D.I.D. is not as straightforward as Walker seems to suggest, and it often requires long-term treatment to manage symptoms that can cause “impairment on work and social function.”
Dr. J. Douglas Bremner, a professor of psychiatry and radiology at Emory University who specializes in the treatment of severe trauma-related conditions, cautioned that he could not speak definitively about Walker’s condition because he had not personally treated him, but he said the goal for most patients would “be more management of symptoms and, in some cases, it can be eventual integration of personalities.”
“In my experience, that kind of recovery is not something that is typical,” Bremner said of Walker’s assertion that he had completely healed. “The treatment is long term, so there’s no quick fixes.”
Walker’s campaign did not respond to questions about the current status of his recovery or whether he still receives treatment to manage the condition, leaving voters to parse Walker’s past statements.
“A lot of people may have this problem, but they’re too ashamed or they’re too scared to come out and say something,” Walker told ABC News in 2008. “I said I’m not ashamed, because guys, I’m human. I’m not nobody special. I’m just Herschel.”
Georgia Republicans will soon decide whether that’s enough for them.
ABC News’ Kate Holland and Jake Lefferman contributed to this report.
(SANTA FE, N.M.) — A massive wildfire currently burning east of Santa Fe, New Mexico, is now the largest in the state’s history as thousands of firefighters continue to battle the blaze.
The Hermits Peak-Calf Canyon fire — made up of two fires that merged into one giant blaze last month — has burned 299,565 acres, state fire officials said Tuesday.
It officially surpassed the Whitewater-Baldy Fire as the largest fire in New Mexico’s history on Monday. That fire, which was caused by lightning and also consisted of two separate fires that merged, had burned 297,845 acres primarily in the Gila National Forest before being contained in late July 2012.
The Hermits Peak-Calf Canyon fire, the largest active fire in the U.S., was only 26% contained as of Tuesday morning, with more than 2,090 fire personnel responding. The Hermits Peak fire was caused by spot fires from a prescribed burn, while the cause of the Calf Canyon fire is under investigation, according to state fire officials.
Residents of San Miguel, Mora, Taos and Colfax counties are advised to remain on “high alert” Tuesday for evacuation updates and road closures, officials said.
Firefighters faced unfavorable wind conditions, warming temperatures and severe dry conditions since the Hermits Peak and Calf Canyon fires ignited in early April.
“The challenge of predicting how wildfires move, the best experts in the world on this topic still are not going to get it right,” Dr. Jason Knievel, deputy director for the National Center for Atmospheric Research, told Albuquerque ABC affiliate KOAT this week.
There is a mix of conifer trees, ponderosa pine, brush and grass where the fire is now — and “critically dry fuels” may increase fire activity, fire officials warned Tuesday. The fire is burning near an area with steep terrain, which can also help spread the fire, according to Knievel.
“Fire tends to move uphill,” he said.
New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham declared a state of emergency in several counties last month as multiple wildfires burned, including the Hermits Peak-Calf Canyon fire.
President Joe Biden approved a disaster declaration earlier this month for New Mexico that brings financial resources to the areas battling the fires.
Thousands of residents have been forced to evacuate and hundreds of structures have been destroyed due to the recent wildfire activity, the governor noted in a letter to Biden last week requesting additional aid.
(WASHINGTON) — Top Pentagon officials told a House panel on Tuesday that there are now close to 400 reports from military personnel of possible encounters with UFOs — a significant increase from the 144 tracked in a major report released last year by the U.S. intelligence community.
A Navy official also said at Tuesday’s hearing that investigators are “reasonably confident” the floating pyramid-shaped objects captured on one leaked, widely seen military video were likely drones.
That footage, which the military confirmed last year was authentic, had helped spur interest in purported UFOs, also referred to as “unidentified aerial phenomena” or UAPs.
Indiana Rep. André Carson, the Democratic chairman of the House Intelligence Counterterrorism, Counterintelligence, and Counterproliferation Subcommittee, called Tuesday’s hearing, the first in more than 50 years focused on the aerial incidents.
UAPs, Carson said, “are a potential national security threat and they need to be treated that way.”
“For too long the stigma associated with UAPs has gotten in the way of good intelligence analysis,” he added. “Pilots avoided reporting or were laughed at when they did.”
The number of UAP reports has risen to “approximately 400,” a significant increase from the 144 between 2004 and 2021 that were tracked in last year’s report, according to Scott Bray, the deputy director of Naval Intelligence. Bray told the House panel that the spike was due to a reduction in the stigma associated with stepping forward to report such incidents in the wake of the 2021 report.
“We’ve seen an increasing number of unauthorized and or unidentified aircraft or objects and military control training areas and training ranges and other designated airspace,” Bray said. “Reports of sightings are frequent and continuous.”
But Bray believes many of the newly disclosed accounts are actually “historic reports that are narrative-based” from prior incidents that people are only now coming forward with, which leads him to believe there will be fewer new accounts in the future.
Last year’s intelligence report could only explain one of the documented 144 encounters and did not contain the words “alien” or “extraterrestrial.” The report stated then that the UAP incidents would require further study.
At Tuesday’s hearing, Bray echoed last year’s conclusion that most of the phenomena were likely physical objects and noted that “the UAP task force doesn’t have any wreckage that … isn’t consistent with being a terrestrial origin.”
Even so, Bray said, questions remain.
“I can’t point to something that definitively was not man-made, but I can point to a number of examples which remain unresolved,” Bray said, citing video of a 2004 incident in which a Navy pilot recorded an unusual, Tic Tac-like object over the water.
“We want to know what’s out there as much as you want to know what’s out there,” said Ronald Moultrie, the Pentagon’s top intelligence official, who also testified at the hearing.
Moultrie said the Pentagon is establishing an office to speed up “the identification of previously unknown or unidentified airborne objects in a methodical, logical and standardized manner.”
“We also understand that there has been a cultural stigma surrounding UAP,” Moultrie said. “Our goal is to eliminate the stigma by fully incorporating our operators and mission personnel into a standardized data gathering process.”
“Our goal is to strike that delicate balance: one that enables us to maintain the public’s trust while preserving those capabilities that are vital to the support of our service personnel,” he said.
Bray said “Navy and Air Force crews now have step-by-step procedures for reporting on a UAP on their kneeboard in the cockpit” and that these efforts have led to more reporting.
The increasingly mainstream interest in UFOs and UAPs has been sparked in recent years by leaks of once-classified videos and the Navy’s release of footage from their pilots’ own encounters.
At Tuesday’s hearing, the defense officials played three clips to help explain how brief the aerial incidents could be, making it very difficult to determine what was seen in the videos.
In one of the more notable cases, the officials detailed how “considerable effort” went into determining a theory for what was observed.
Bray played footage taken in July 2019 off the California coast from the deck of the destroyer USS Russell that seemed to show several pyramid-shaped objects hovering above the ship.
Bray acknowledged that investigators did not initially have an explanation for what was seen in the green night scope video — until they were able to contrast it with a more recent video of an incident that occurred off the coast of the Atlantic Ocean.
Officials who looked at that video found a similar pyramid shape. They concluded the phenomena were likely from drones that had been seen on sensors from another Navy asset.
“We’re now reasonably confident that these triangles correlate to unmanned aerial systems in the area,” Bray explained. “The triangular appearance is a result of light passing through the night vision goggles and then being recorded by an SLR camera.”
“This is a great example of how it takes considerable effort to understand what we’re seeing in the examples that we are able to collect,” he added.
Ahead of the hearing, Jeremy Corbell, a documentary filmmaker and UFO enthusiast who made public that “pyramid” video last year, said he was happy to see increasing awareness and government action.
“What is so great is that this is a direct response to public will,” Corbell told ABC News. “It is direct response to public pressure. It is representative government representing the citizens and their interest.”
“I am encouraged by the public desire to know and find out the truth of what UFOs represent to humankind,” Corbell said then. “It’s the biggest story of our time. And finally we’re beginning to have the conversation without ridicule and stigma that has so injured the search for scientific truth on this topic.”
Moultrie, the Pentagon official, said at Tuesday’s hearing that he wasn’t immune to a bit of the zeal himself as a science fiction fan.
“I have gone to conventions — I’ll say it on the record. Got to break the ice somehow,” he told the panel in one lighthearted line of questioning, adding, “We have our we have our inquisitiveness. We have our questions.”
ABC News’ Matthew Seyler contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — The Justice Department special counsel investigating the origins of the probe into Russia’s interference in the 2016 presidential election is facing his first major test in federal court this week, with the start of a criminal trial against a Democrat-linked lawyer charged with lying to the FBI.
Prosecutors are seeking to convince a jury that lawyer Michael Sussmann lied in bringing forth a tip to a senior FBI official in September 2016 about potential connections between then-presidential candidate Donald Trump’s company and a Russian bank, by allegedly telling the official that he was not working on behalf of any client at the time.
According to John Durham, who has been investigating the Russia probe for more than three years and was appointed special counsel by former Attorney General William Barr just before Barr’s resignation in 2020, Sussmann was in fact bringing the info to then-FBI general counsel James Baker as part of Sussmann’s work for Hillary Clinton’s political campaign and a technology company executive who had worked to assemble the data.
This “led the FBI General Counsel to understand that Sussmann was acting as a good citizen merely passing along information, not as a paid advocate or political operative,” Durham’s indictment alleges.
“Many people have strong feelings about Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, but we are not here because these involve allegations involved either,” Durham prosecutor Deborah Shaw said in opening arguments Tuesday. “We are here because the FBI is our institution. It should not be used as a political tool for anyone.”
The alleged lie by Sussmann had an impact on how the FBI ultimately investigated the allegations, Durham has claimed, which involved data showing a potential communications channel between computer servers for the Trump Organization and the Russian-owned Alfa Bank. The FBI eventually determined the data did not show anything nefarious.
A key piece of evidence Durham’s team has said supports their case was revealed only last month. Prosecutors will point the jury to a text message that Sussmann allegedly sent to Baker the night before they met in which Sussmann wrote, “I’m coming on my own — not on behalf of a client or company — want to help the Bureau.”
While the charge against Sussmann is narrow, through their 27-page indictment and hundreds of pages of court filings in the months since Sussmann was indicted, Durham’s prosecutors have sought to allege a broader potential conspiracy regarding efforts by Clinton’s campaign and other political operatives to spread unverified allegations about possible ties between Trump, his campaign and the Russian government.
“No one should be so privileged to have the ability to walk into the FBI and lie for political ends,” Shaw said Tuesday, adding “whether we hate Donald Trump or like him,” all have to agree lying to FBI is illegal.
Sussmann’s attorneys have disputed he told Baker at the meeting that he was not bringing the information forward on behalf of a specific client, and have argued that there’s no evidence such a statement had a measurable impact on how FBI agents eventually investigated the allegations.
In opening statements Tuesday, Sussmann’s attorney Michael Bosworth said while Sussmann was representing Clinton’s campaign “generally” in the fall of 2016 — and that representation included work on the Alfa Bank data that was brought to him by tech executive Rodney Joffe — his meeting with the FBI was not part of his work for the Clinton campaign.
On the contrary, according to Bosworth, Sussmann sought the meeting to give the bureau a heads up on a story the New York Times was working on about the Alfa Bank data at the time, so it wouldn’t be caught “flat-footed.”
While Durham’s team argues Sussmann was hoping the meeting would later result in an “October surprise” news story about the FBI opening an investigation on potential ties between Trump and Russia — Bosworth said that as a result of the meeting, the FBI was actually able to persuade the Times not to run the story.
In other words, according to Bosworth, Sussmann’s meeting generated the “opposite” result of what the Clinton campaign would have wanted at the time.
Sussmann’s attorneys have previously accused Durham’s prosecutors of trying to promote a “baseless narrative that the Clinton Campaign conspired with others to trick the federal government into investigating ties between President Trump and Russia,” and have successfully sought to limit some of the evidence that Durham’s team had hoped to present in the two-week trial.
Last week, the judge overseeing Sussmann’s case, Christopher Cooper, issued an order that will prevent Durham’s team from bringing forward evidence alleging what they have described as a “joint venture” between Sussmann, representatives for Clinton’s campaign and the technology executive Rodney Joffe to collect and spread opposition research about Trump.
In his ruling, Cooper said he would not oversee “a time-consuming and largely unnecessary mini-trial to determine the existence and scope of an uncharged conspiracy to develop and disseminate the Alfa Bank data.”
The witness lists for both Durham’s prosecutors and Sussmann’s team are extensive, and include an array of current and former law enforcement and intelligence officials, former Clinton campaign operatives and a former New York Times reporter who was in touch with Sussmann around the time he met with the FBI.
In the three years since Durham was initially assigned to look into the origins of the Russia investigation, he has secured only one guilty plea of a former lawyer with the FBI who admitted to doctoring an email that was used to support a surveillance application that targeted a former Trump campaign aide.
Durham’s only other indictment outside of Sussmann was against Igor Danchenko, a lead analyst who contributed to the now-infamous Steele Dossier, who was charged last year with five counts of lying to the FBI about who his sources were for claims in the dossier. Danchenko has pleaded not guilty to all counts.
While he has conducted his investigation largely out of public view the past three years, Durham has notably opted to attend the first days of Sussmann’s trial in person.
Photo by Russian Defense Ministry/Handout/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
(NEW YORK) — Ukraine’s military has ended its combat mission in the city of Mariupol and hundreds of Ukrainian fighters are being taken by bus to Russian-controlled territory after nearly three months of heavy fighting in the port city. Russia began its attacks on the city in early March.
The Ukrainians and Russians struck a deal to exchange badly injured soldiers from the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol for Russian prisoners of war, Ukraine’s Deputy Defense Minister Anna Malyar told a Ukrainian TV station.
Mariupol’s mayor confirmed that a cease-fire remains in place in the port city.
The Ukrainian military ordered remaining troops who had been sheltering beneath the Azovstal steel factory to focus on efforts to save the lives of their personnel.
More than 260 Ukrainian soldiers were evacuated through a humanitarian corridor, some of whom were injured, according to Ukraine’s defense minister.
Malyar said that 53 wounded soldiers are being transported from Azovstal to Novoazovsk where they will receive immediate medical attention.
“About Azovstal, we hope that we’ll manage to save their lives. There are seriously injured among them. I want to stress that we need our defenders alive. The operation to rescue them was launched by our military. We work on getting them home and this work demands delicacy and time,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his daily address.
Another 211 Ukrainian fighters were accompanied by Russian forces from Azovstal to Olenivka in rebel-held Donetsk, where they will be part of the exchange for Russian prisoners of war.
“As a part of an exchange deal, 50 wounded were evacuated from Azovstal to Novoazovsk. Negotiations are underway for them to be transferred to Zaporozhzhya,” another source told ABC News, confirming the exchange.
Russia’s state-run TASS reported that Russia’s defense ministry confirmed an agreement was reached on Monday to evacuate wounded Ukrainian troops from the plant and transport them to a medical facility in Novoazovsk to “provide them with all the necessary assistance.”
The Russian defense ministry on Tuesday said 265 Ukrainian militants have laid down arms and surrendered, including 51 who are seriously wounded. All those in need of medical assistance were sent for treatment to a hospital in Novoazovsk, Donetsk People’s Republic.
(BUFFALO, N.Y.) — Assuming his role as consoler in chief, President Joe Biden traveled to Buffalo, New York, on Tuesday to visit a community in mourning and call out the dangers of white supremacy on the national stage following Saturday’s racially-motivated mass shooting at a supermarket that left 10 Black people dead, three wounded and others fearing for their lives.
Biden wanted to meet with victims’ families to “try to bring some comfort to the community, particularly to those who lost loved ones” and “grieve with them,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Monday.
BREAKING: Pres. Biden addresses community of Buffalo.
“Jill and I bring you this message from deep in our nation’s soul: In America, evil will not win, I promise you. Hate will not prevail. And white supremacy will not have the last word.”https://t.co/EiAF227UVlpic.twitter.com/dw2AkgqtCn
He and first lady Jill Biden visited the Tops market memorial to pay their respects on Tuesday morning, laying flowers. They then met behind closed doors with the families of victims and first responders at a community center. During an afternoon address, Biden called on Americans to reject white supremacy, calling it a “poison” that’s “running through our body politic.”
“What happened here is simple, straightforward,” Biden said. “Terrorism. Domestic terrorism. Violence inflicted in the service of hate. And the vicious thirst for power that defines one group of people as being inherently inferior to any other group,” he said.
Alluding to the “great replacement theory” conspiracy, an idea espoused by the alleged shooter and echoed in language used by some Republicans and media figures, Biden called on Americans to “reject the lie” and condemned those “who spread the lie for power, for political gain and for profit.”
“We need to say as clearly enforced as we can, that the ideology of white supremacy has no place in America,” Biden said. “Silence is complicity, is complicity. We cannot remain silent.”
The president also named each victim in the attack and their ages, giving details of their everyday lives before they were suddenly gunned down.
“I know tragedy will come again. It cannot be forever overcome. It cannot be fully understood either. But there are certain things we can do,” Biden added.
The president called on Congress to pass legislation to “keep assault weapons off our street” and to do more to “prevent people from being radicalized to violence,” such as addressing what he called “the relentless exploitation of the Internet to recruit and mobilize terrorism.”
“We just need to have the courage to do that, to stand up over the American experiment in which democracy is in danger — like it hasn’t been in my lifetime,” he said. “The American experiment in democracy is in danger at this hour. Hate and fear are being given too much oxygen by those who pretend to love America.”
Biden has said in the past that he was compelled to run for office, in part, because of how former President Donald Trump responded to white nationalists marching in Charlottesville, Virginia. He was the first president to directly address white supremacy in his inaugural speech, calling it “domestic terrorism that we must confront” and released the first-ever national strategy to counter domestic terrorism.
Civil rights attorney Ben Crump, representing Ruth Whitfield, an 86-year-old who was among those killed Saturday, had called on the Biden administration to label the shooting an act of domestic terrorism, which the president did Tuesday.
“We can’t sugarcoat it, we can’t try to explain it away talking about mental illness,” Crump said in a press conference with the victims’ families on Monday. “This was an act of domestic terrorism perpetrated by a young white supremacist.”
Biden’s first in-person comments on the shooting came while speaking at an event on Sunday to honor law enforcement officers killed on duty, where he described the accused gunman as “armed with weapons of war and a hate-filled soul.” He also said that he has been receiving updates from his team at the White House, which remains in close contact with the Department of Justice, while it investigates the shooting as both a hate crime and an act of racially-motivated violent extremism.
“As they do, we must all work together to address the hate that remains a stain on the soul of America,” Biden said. “Our hearts are heavy once again, but the resolve must never, ever waver.”
During a previously scheduled Medal of Valor ceremony at the White House on Monday, Biden also paid tribute to retired Buffalo Police Department officer Aaron Salter, the security guard at the Tops Friendly Market who was killed after engaging the shooter and “gave his life trying to save others,” Biden said.
“He actually was able to shoot the assailant twice, but he [the assailant] had a bulletproof vest, and he [Slater] lost his life in the process,” Biden added.
On a somber Monday afternoon, Jean-Pierre — taking over for former White House press secretary Jen Psaki — began her first briefing by reading out the names of each victim of the shooting and giving a little description of who they were.
Asked who or what may have influenced the shooter, Jean-Pierre opted, at first, to speak about the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville in 2017, which saw one counterprotester dead, saying Biden “is determined as he was back then, and he is determined today, to make sure that we fight back against those forces of hate and evil and violence.”
When pressed again by ABC News Chief White House Correspondent Cecilia Vega about elected officials who have expressed views echoing those espoused by the alleged gunman, such as Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., Jean-Pierre said the administration would call out those who “spew this type of hate” — but refused to name anyone — and gave few details about what the White House can do to prevent these kinds of views from becoming more widespread.
“What we’re going to continue to do anyone, any one person, right, doesn’t matter who they are, who spews this type of hate, hatred, we’re going to, we’re going to call out we’re going to condemn that,” she said. “I’m not going to speak or call out any individual names. I’m saying that this is something that we need to call out. And so this is what the president has been doing and will continue to do that.”
“I’m not going to get into a back and forth on names and who said what,” Jean-Pierre added. “We’re just saying, if someone does that, if there’s an individual that is espousing hate, xenophobia, you know, has, you know, has just white supremacy type of extremism, we need to call that out. And this president has done that.”
With renewed calls for gun control from the public, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told ABC’s This Week Sunday that Democrats in Congress is “of course trying to do something about gun violence” but noted that efforts to address mass shootings on Capitol Hill have fallen short not in the House but in the Senate, where Republicans have opposed gun control measures, making it impossible for Democrats to advance legislation over the 60-vote threshold in the chamber.
A document obtained by ABC News Monday appears to show how the alleged shooter, Payton Gendron, 18, carefully planned out his attack at least two months before he was arrested at the supermarket on Saturday and charged with first-degree murder. He has pleaded not guilty.
ABC News’ Justin Gomez and Armando Garcia contributed to this report.
Jepayona Delita/Future Publishing via Getty Images
(LONDON) — Several people in England have tested positive for monkeypox, according to the U.K. Health Security Agency.
Officials announced Monday four more cases of the rare disease have been detected, bringing the total to seven.
The most recent infections do not seem to be connected to the first case confirmed May 7 in a person who had recently traveled to Nigeria.
But the most recent four cases had not traveled to a region where monkeypox is endemic, raising the possibility that the virus could be circulating within the U.K.
Additionally, the most recent people to test positive self-identified as gay, bisexual or men who have sex with men, leading health authorities to advise people in those groups to watch out for rashes or lesions.
“This is rare and unusual,” Dr. Susan Hopkins, chief medical adviser for UKHSA, said in a statement. “UKHSA is rapidly investigating the source of these infections because the evidence suggests that there may be transmission of the monkeypox virus in the community, spread by close contact.”
What is monkeypox?
Monkeypox is a rare disease caused by the monkeypox virus.
It was first identified in 1958 when two outbreaks of a pox-like disease occurred in crab-eating macaque monkeys that were being used for research, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The first case among humans was recorded in the Democratic Republic of the Congo in 1970, and the illness has since spread to several other nations, mostly in central and western Africa.
How monkeypox is transmitted
Monkeypox can transmit from animals to humans when an infected animal — such as a rodent or a primate — bites or scratches a person.
The CDC said humans can also be infected when hunting wild animals or preparing bush meat for consumption.
The disease can also spread from person-to-person via large respiratory droplets in the air, but they cannot travel more than a few feet so two people would need to have prolonged close contact.
What are the symptoms?
The incubation period for monkeypox is between seven and 14 days, and symptoms are generally mild, according to the CDC.
The most common symptoms include fever, headache, fatigue and muscle aches.
In more severe cases, patients can develop a rash and lesions that often begin on the face before spreading to the rest of the body.
Most people recover within two to four weeks. Although there have been no cases of death reported in the U.S., monkeypox has led to death in as many as 1 in 10 people in Africa who contract the disease.
Monkeypox detection in the U.S.
Very few cases of monkeypox have been identified among Americans.
According to the CDC, the disease does not naturally occur in the U.S. and infections are usually identified among people who recently traveled to countries where monkeypox is more commonly found.
In 2003, 47 confirmed and probable cases were reported among six U.S. states, the first human cases reported outside of Africa.
All the infections occurred after coming into contact with pet prairie dogs, which in turn became infected “after being housed near imported small mammals from Ghana,” the CDC stated.
Since then, just two other cases have been detected in the U.S., both associated with travel.
In July 2021, a case was confirmed in a Texas resident who had recently returned from Nigeria and in November 2021, another case was found in a Maryland resident who had also traveled to Nigeria.
Treatment and prevention of monkeypox
Currently, there are no specific treatments available for monkeypox. Antivirals typically used for smallpox have been shown to be effective in lab studies and in animal trials.
One vaccine has been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for use in those aged 18 and older at high risk for monkeypox or smallpox.
ABC News’ Sony Salzman and Rashid Haddou contributed to this report.
(BALTIMORE) — A fire and explosion at a suburban Baltimore nail salon that injured seven people was deliberately set by an “emotionally distressed” man, authorities said Tuesday. Four police officers and two emergency medical workers were wounded in the incident.
The suspect, whose name was not immediately released, was critically injured in the blast at the Libra Nails & Spa salon in Windsor Mill about 23 miles northwest of Baltimore, according to the Baltimore County Police Department.
Baltimore County Fire Department officials said the suspect is a former employee of the nail salon, the Baltimore Sun reported.
Police officers responded to a workplace disturbance call at the nail salon, in the Security Station Shopping Center, just after 9 p.m. and encountered the suspect who was refusing to leave business, police said in a statement released to ABC News Tuesday morning.
A police spokesperson told reporters Monday night that officers called EMTs to the scene to examine the “emotionally distressed” man. While the officers and EMTs were inside the salon, the suspect suddenly ran to the back of the business, police said.
“The individual refused commands by officers and proceeded to run into the back of the store where he started a fire that produced an explosion,” according to the police statement.
The four police officers and two EMTs were taken to hospitals with minor to non-life-threatening injuries, according to the statement. One officer remained in the hospital Tuesday for further observation, while the other officers and emergency medical workers were treated and released.
The suspect was placed into custody and taken to a hospital with life-threatening injuries, according to the statement.
Charges against the suspect are pending further investigation, police said.
A motive also remains under investigation.
The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and the Baltimore County Fire Department are assisting the probe.
Fire officials said the blaze and explosion were fueled by flammable chemicals, including acetone and nail polish remover, stored inside the business. The fire quickly engulfed the business and prompted fire officials to declare a hazmat situation.
The fire was brought under control at about 10:30 p.m. Tuesday.
