(NEW YORK) — A political newcomer who beat New Jersey’s veteran state senate president in a surprise election upset met with a local Islamic group Wednesday after apologizing for a previous anti-Muslim tweet.
Edward Durr, a commercial truck driver, beat Stephen Sweeney in the state senate race for New Jersey’s 3rd Legislative District.
Soon after his victory, Durr came under fire for past social media posts, including a 2019 tweet where he called the prophet Mohammed a “pedophile” and Islam a “cult of hate.”
ABC News station WPVI-TV also uncovered statements from Durr comparing vaccine mandates to the Holocaust. Durr has since deleted some of his social media pages.
“I’m a passionate guy and I sometimes say things in the heat of the moment. If I said things in the past that hurt anybody’s feelings, I sincerely apologize,” Durr said last Friday, according to WPVI. “I support everybody’s right to worship in any manner they choose and to worship the God of their choice. I support all people and I support everybody’s rights.”
After his election victory, the New Jersey chapter of the Council on American–Islamic Relations (CAIR), a Muslim advocacy and civil rights organization, condemned his tweet but invited Durr to meet with the organization’s local chapter.
Durr accepted the group’s offer and met with CAIR-NJ members. WPVI-TV reported that Durr’s meeting with local Islamic leaders at Al-Minhaal Academy in Sewell lasted nearly two hours.
“I think we had a very productive conversation and I think it’s going to be one of hopefully many,” CAIR-NJ Executive Director Selaedin Maksut said in a joint appearance with Durr on Wednesday.
“I stand against Islamophobia and all forms of hate and I do commit to that,” Durr said at the media appearance.
“Our New Jersey chapter had a productive meeting with State Senator #EdDurr. He expressed commitment to opposing #Islamophobia. We welcome this outcome and hope to have more productive dialogues in the future,” the national CAIR tweeted later.
Jacci Vigilante, Gloucester County GOP chair, defended Durr last Friday, saying, “Ed is a passionate guy. He was a little bit of a keyboard warrior at the time. Certainly he’s made an apology. He didn’t intend to offend anyone’s religion and certainly believes that everyone has the right to practice their religion of their choice.”
Sweeney, Durr’s opponent, was the longest-serving state senate president in New Jersey history. He did not concede the race until Wednesday.
“I of course accept the results. I want to congratulate Mr. Durr and wish him the best of luck,” Sweeney said during a speech at the statehouse complex, according to local news reports. “It was a red wave,” he added.
(NEW YORK) — The adoptive parents of missing Isabella “Ariel” Kalua have been arrested and charged with second-degree murder after more than two months of investigations, according to the Honolulu Police Department.
Isabella would have turned 7 years old last week.
“It’s clear that [Isabella] was loved and missed by many people,” said Rade Vanic, HPD’s interim police chief. “Unfortunately, what began as a search for a missing girl turned into a murder investigation focused on the Kaluas. We believe that the evidence leads to the Kaluas and no one else.”
She was first reported missing on Sept. 13 in Waimanalo, Hawaii. HPD, the FBI and community members searched for Isabella for more than a week.
“Her photo and story touched the hearts of many in the community,” Vanic said. “We thank all of you for your efforts and concerns.”
Isaac and Lehua Kalua were arrested Wednesday. Investigators allege the couple murdered Kalua in mid-August, a month before she was reported missing. Police claim the Kaluas lied in their initial report, saying they last saw Isabella on Sept. 12 — a day before she was reported missing.
The Kaluas are being held without bail and will make their first court appearance on Friday.
Isabella’s four siblings have been taken into the custody of Child Welfare Services, according to police.
Isabella’s remains have not yet been recovered.
Lawyers for the Kaluas couldn’t immediately be reached by ABC News.
Investigators are urging anyone with information, including witnesses or people who had contact with Isabella and the Kalua family between August and September, to come forward.
Anyone with information is asked to call Crimestoppers at (808) 955-8300.
Anyone who may have witnessed neglect or abuse against the Kalua children is urged to call Child Welfare Services at 1-888-380-3088.
(NEW YORK) — With supply chain issues hitting the fresh food industry, due to delays and struggles to get products from farms to store shelves, certain Thanksgiving staples like cranberries will have a steeper cost and potentially less stock.
Ocean Spray president and CEO Tom Hayes joined Good Morning America on Thursday to address the upcoming run on Thanksgiving items and how his company’s signature fruit has had to stay afloat amid supply chain woes.
“Ocean Spray has had supply chain challenges, the whole industry has. We will continue to do our best to keep supplies going and supplies on shelves, but we’ve had to be resilient this year,” Hayes said. “We’re owned by 700 family farms and they continue to do everything they have for 90 years to keep the supply flowing, but it has been a challenge. Whether it’s steel cans and making supply chain adjustments, we have had to do it, and this year has been difficult of course.”
When it comes to price forecasting, Hayes explained that his company “unfortunately” has to pass on the rising production costs to consumers.
“That’s just a reality. We have a lot of costs going up — all ingredients, transportation. It is something that is continuing to affect us as a company and we do have to pass those on,” he said. “Remember, they’re family farms, so we have to make sure they have a livelihood too and we’re balancing that. We haven’t taken pricing in 10 years at Ocean Spray. We’re doing our best to keep costs down, but we have taken pricing and are looking forward to still having a great season.”
By the end of October, there were already some shortages on other crucial Thanksgiving items.
Turkeys were 60% out of stock, which was a little more than half of stock compared to the same time last year. Yams and sweet potatoes were 25% out of stock, while stock on refrigerated pies were down 5% and cranberries were 20% out of stock.
If consumers shop early, those products should be available, but — with price increases at the highest in 30 years — they will cost more.
To save some money on the total bill, experts recommend shopping now for non-perishable items and considering a potluck style Thanksgiving to spread the cost around.
“This is our super bowl at Ocean Spray,” Hayes said. “We are working day in and day out, all night in a lot of cases, to deliver products to the market.”
“My advice is to be absolutely flexible. Whether it’s jellied, whole or fresh cranberries,” he added. “Plan early and make sure you get to the grocery store. It will be a happy Thanksgiving, but you have to demonstrate more flexibility than you have in the past.”
(BIRMINGHAM, Ala.) — A boy who weighed just 15 ounces at birth has been named by Guinness World Records as the world’s most premature infant to survive.
Curtis Means, of Alabama, was born on July 5, 2020, when his mom, Michelle Butler, went into labor just 21 weeks into her pregnancy and gave birth to twins in an emergency C-section.
Curtis’s sister, C’Asya, died one day after birth, but Curtis survived while being cared for in the Regional Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (RNICU) at University of Alabama at Birmingham’s Women and Infants Center.
Bulter said she remembers praying that one of her twin newborns would survive the premature delivery.
“My prayers have been answered,” Butler told Good Morning America. “I gave God my little girl and he let me continue to be the mother to Curtis.”
Curtis, who was born 132 days premature, was so delicate at birth that Butler said she had to wait four weeks after giving birth to hold her son. At the time, he could fit in palm of her hand.
Curtis would go on to spend the next nine months in the RNICU, where doctors and nurses cared for him around the clock.
Butler, also the mother of two older children, ages 14 and 7, commuted from her house to the RNICU three or four times a week, a three-hour commute round trip, to see her son. On days she could not visit in person, Butler said the nurses would coordinate video calls so she could see Curtis.
“It was ups and downs, good and bad days,” she said. “For a couple of weeks he’d do really well and then he’d get sick and go about five steps backwards.”
Though he had a less than 1% chance of survival at birth, according to doctors, Curtis graduated from the RNICU after 275 days.
Butler took him home on April 6, 2021, where he met his siblings for the first time. They had not been able to visit Curtis in the RNICU due to COVID-19 restrictions.
“I surprised my kids,” said Butler. “They didn’t know we were coming home and they were so excited.”
Six months after that surprise, Butler and Curtis returned to the University of Alabama at Birmingham’s Women and Infants Center, where they were surprised by doctors and nurses who presented them with the Guinness World Records certificate naming Curtis as the world’s most premature infant to survive.
Curtis, now 16 months old, now weighs nearly 19 pounds.
He is still on oxygen and is still on some medications, but is continuing to thrive at home, according to Butler.
“He’s a happy baby,” said Butler. “He’ll laugh and smile at you.”
Looking back on Curtis’ long journey since birth, Butler said she would encourage other parents of premature babies to be their child’s “biggest advocates.”
“Us parents are the biggest advocates for our children, so whatever you feel in your heart you go by it,” she said. “And continue to pray.”
(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden will sign the $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill into law on Monday, joined by a bipartisan group of members of Congress during a ceremony at the White House, according to a White House official.
A bipartisan group of governors and mayors, as well as labor union and business leaders, would also join Biden at the ceremony, according to the official. The members of Congress who will attend will include those who helped write the legislation, the official said.
Facing low poll numbers, rising inflation and challenges getting the rest of his legislative priorities passed, the president has put off signing the infrastructure bill in order to put his major, bipartisan accomplishment on display.
During his remarks Monday, Biden also plans to address how the infrastructure legislation will play a role in bolstering supply chains and dealing with bottlenecks, the White House official said. The president planned to visit a port in Baltimore on Wednesday with a similar message.
The House of Representatives passed the bill late Friday, after the Senate passed it in August. Biden has said he wanted to hold a ceremony with members of Congress, who were on recess and out of Washington this week, as well as Vice President Kamala Harris, who is currently visiting France.
“Vice President Harris and I look forward to having a formal signing ceremony for this bipartisan infrastructure soon,” Biden told reporters Saturday.
“I’m not doing it this weekend,” he added, “because I want people who worked so hard to get this done — Democrats and Republicans — to be here when we sign it.”
The bill, officially known as the the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, provides hundreds of billions of dollars to improve the nation’s highways, bridges and roads; passenger rail; public transit; broadband access; and the power grid, among other investments in physical infrastructure.
The White House has cited outside economists to argue it will create hundreds of thousands of jobs over the next decade.
Despite wide public support for the infrastructure bill — as well as for the “Build Back Better” social bill he is also trying to push through Congress — the president himself has suffered from low approval ratings.
Biden and his administration have launched a public relations campaign to promote the two bills, with the president visiting a port in Baltimore on Wednesday and sitting for an interview with a Cincinnati television station, and Cabinet officials conducting interviews to explain how the infrastructure bill in particular will benefit Americans.
A nationwide poll from Monmouth University conducted Nov. 4 to 8 found that 42% of Americans approved of the way Biden was handling his job, and 64% of respondents said they believed things in the United States have gotten off on the wrong track.
But 65% of respondents said they supported the infrastructure package, and 62% said they supported the larger social spending plan.
In the coming weeks, the president, vice president, and Cabinet will continue to travel the country to communicate how the law will help communities, grow the economy, and position America to compete in the 21st century.
(WASHINGTON) — For Bryan Bowman and Bob Mohr, there was no question about making the nearly 400-mile trip from Canal Fulton, Ohio, to Virginia and Arlington National Cemetery for the chance to lay flowers at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.
To mark the tomb’s centennial, members of the public were given a rare chance to come close and lay flowers — for the first time since 1948.
“It was just surreal, very surreal,” Mohr said. “Who knows if we’ll ever get to do it again, in our lifetime.”
“It’s a reminder of service echoing back to 1921,” Bowman said.
One hundred years ago this week, the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier was dedicated to commemorate the final resting place of an unknown soldier from World War I, interred on Armistice Day, Nov. 11, 1921.
Since then, the tomb has served as a site of mourning and reflection in honor of unknown service members who died in all of America’s wars.
Bowman and Mohr, a Marine Corps veteran, were among the first members of the public to pay their respects on Tuesday, the first of two days visitors were being permitted to come near the tomb.
The line, hundreds long, included Americans from all ages and backgrounds: elderly veterans in faded uniforms, young children in the arms of their parents, military spouses and loved ones, melded together.
Each paused a moment to gently place a flower atop of a growing pile a few yards from the tomb. Some held hands over their hearts, while others raised them in salute.
Many eyes welled with tears.
Piles of roses, daisies, carnations and sunflowers with long, green stems lay under a red velvet rope, the colorful flowers in poignant contrast with the white marble sarcophagus, inscribed with the words, “Here rests in honored glory an American soldier known but to God.”
On the opposite side, a member of the U.S. Army’s “Old Guard” marched in silence exactly 21 steps back and forth across the length of a black mat, pausing at each end for 21 seconds, echoing the honor of the 21-gun salute.
Tomb guards, also called Sentinels, maintain their post 24 hours per day, seven days per week, throughout the year. A guard-changing ceremony takes place on the hour every hour during the winter and every half-hour during the summer.
“All gave some, some gave all,” said Amber Vincent, a cemetery public affairs specialist. “And some of them lost their identity in the process of serving our nation … That’s really what this ceremony and this centennial commemoration is about. Honoring those not only who have served that we know, but also those that we will never know.”
In the distance, the sound of three-volley 21-gun salutes at military funerals rang out over the hushed crowd.
Up to 30 funerals a day were taking place, Monday through Friday, elsewhere in the cemetery during the centennial.
Some 400,000 service members are buried there.
Wednesday, Nov. 10, marked the day before Bob Mohr would end a 22-day journey to run 22 miles per day, for veteran suicide awareness.
“So, I’m here today for this ceremony and then I’m gonna run my 22 miles through the streets of D.C. for my twenty-first day,” he said.
(NEW YORK) — As the COVID-19 pandemic has swept the globe, more than 5 million people have died from the disease worldwide, including over 758,000 Americans, according to real-time data compiled by Johns Hopkins University’s Center for Systems Science and Engineering.
Just 68.5% of Americans ages 12 and up are fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Here’s how the news is developing. All times Eastern:
Nov 10, 9:21 pm
COVID-19 deaths expected to continue to fall in weeks to come
COVID-19 forecast models used by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are currently predicting that weekly death totals will likely continue to fall in the weeks to come, though thousands of Americans are still expected to lose their lives.
The ensemble model expects just under 15,000 more virus-related deaths to occur in the U.S. over the next two weeks, with a total of around 781,500 deaths by Dec. 4.
The model estimates that 13 states and territories of the U.S. have a greater than 50% chance of having more deaths in the next two weeks compared to the past two weeks.
Nov 10, 9:15 pm
Federal judge strikes down Texas ban on school mask mandates
A federal judge ruled Wednesday that Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s executive order prohibiting local mask mandates, including in schools, violates the Americans with Disabilities Act.
Since the order was issued in late July, state Attorney General Ken Paxton has filed lawsuits against more than a dozen school districts for issuing mask mandates, according to the ruling from U.S. District Court Judge Lee Yeakel. In August, advocacy group Disability Rights Texas filed the lawsuit against the state on behalf of several students with disabilities who faced an increased risk from COVID-19, alleging it denied them equal access to in-person learning.
“The evidence presented by Plaintiffs establishes that Plaintiffs are being denied the benefits of in-person learning on an equal basis as their peers without disabilities,” Yeakel wrote in his ruling.
Yeakel also said the executive order “interferes with local school districts’ ability to satisfy their obligations under the ADA” by placing all authority with the governor.
Yeakel enjoined the state from enforcing the mask mandate ban and ordered that the plaintiffs recover their court costs from the state.
Paxton has said the state is “protecting the rights and freedoms” of residents by banning mask mandates.
Nov 10, 6:43 pm
States sue over vaccine mandate for health care workers
Ten states are suing the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services over the Biden administration’s vaccine mandate targeting health care workers.
About 17 million health care workers who are employed at places that get funding through CMS are required to get vaccinated by Jan. 4, 2022. They do not have the option to test.
“The mandate is a blatant attempt to federalize public health issues involving vaccination that belong within the States’ police power,” stated the suit, which was filed by Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt, a Republican who is running for Senate.
The attorneys general of Nebraska, Arkansas, Kansas, Iowa, Wyoming, Alaska, South Dakota, North Dakota and New Hampshire have joined the lawsuit, which is one of many filed against different parts of the Biden administration’s vaccine requirements but the first to target the health care worker mandate.
Twenty-six states are suing over the mandate that applies to businesses, while another handful are suing over the federal worker mandate. Last week, a federal court temporarily blocked the business vaccine rule.
Nov 10, 3:35 pm
Cases on the rise in 20 states
The U.S. daily case average has jumped by 15% since the end of October, according to federal data.
Twenty states have seen daily cases jump by at least 10% in the last two weeks: Arizona, California, Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, New York, Utah, Vermont and Wisconsin.
Cases are still falling in most of the South, which was the first region to get hit hard by the delta surge over the summer. In Florida, where high transmission was reported in every county over the summer, now only 1 out of the 67 counties is reporting high transmission, according to federal data.
(BALTIMORE) — President Joe Biden visited Baltimore on Wednesday to tout his infrastructure bill and highlight his administration’s work to ease port delays as the country approaches the holiday season with rising inflation and delivery slowdowns on the horizon.
Biden’s visit came five days after Congress passed his $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill that, among myriad investments in the nations’ physical infrastructure, will provide $17 billion to revitalize coastal, inland and land ports, as well as strengthen them against the effects of climate change.
The Biden administration on Tuesday announced short- and long-term steps to strengthen U.S. ports as part of an effort to tackle supply chain issues, including using money from the infrastructure bill, which the president plans to sign into law on Monday during a bipartisan White House ceremony.
“I’m not waiting to sign a bill to start improving the flow of goods from shifts to shelves,” Biden said during remarks at the Baltimore port. “Yesterday, I announced the port — a port plan of action. It lays out concrete steps for my administration to take over the next three months to invest in our ports and to relieve bottlenecks.”
As the U.S. continues to slowly emerge from the pandemic, Biden has been grappling with a crisis up and down the supply chain defined by worker shortages and delivery delays.
At the same time, the prices Americans are paying for everyday goods are soaring as the country approaches the holiday season — a potential political liability for the president. In Baltimore, he acknowledged the economic hardship people are facing.
“COVID-19 has stretched global supply chains like never before, and suddenly when you go to order a pair of sneakers or a bicycle or Christmas presents for the family, you’re met with higher prices and long delays — or they said they just don’t have any at all,” Biden said.
Demand for many goods has shot up just as global supply chains reel from disruptions brought on by the coronavirus pandemic.
“This is a recipe for delays and for higher prices, and people are feeling — they’re feeling it,” Biden said.
Biden will continue to hit the road to tout his infrastructure bill — and pitch his larger “Build Back Better” social bill he is trying to push through Congress — in the weeks ahead, according to the White House.
On Wednesday, he drew a clear line between the infrastructure bill and the real impact he said American families should see.
“This bipartisan infrastructure bill is a major step forward,” he said. “It represents the biggest investment in ports in American history. And for American families, it means products moving faster and less expensively, from factory floor through the supply chain to your home.
“The bottom line is this,” he continued. “With the bill we passed last week, and the steps we’re taking to reduce bottlenecks at home and abroad, we’re set to make significant progress.”
On Tuesday, the president spoke with the CEOs of four major retailers and shipping companies, Walmart, UPS, FedEx and Target. He said that the executives “assured me that the shelves will be stocked in stores this holiday.”
Even though the president does not plan to sign the infrastructure bill until next week — he has said he wants to bring Democrats and Republicans together to the White House for a ceremony marking the bipartisan bill’s passage — a senior administration official said Tuesday that work was already underway to get port-related programs started.
“Outdated infrastructure has a real cost for families, as we all know, for our economy and for competitiveness,” White House deputy press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said. “We’re seeing that right now, even as we move record goods through our ports, with supply chain bottlenecks forming that lead to higher prices and lower deliveries for American families.”
To provide immediate relief, the administration will now allow port authorities to redirect project cost savings toward immediate projects to address supply chain challenges, senior administration officials said Tuesday. One official said doing so was a way to “creatively” redirect grant money.
For example, the officials told reporters, the nation’s third-busiest port, in Savannah, Georgia, came under budget on a previous grant and could now use the leftover dollars to build a pop-up yard to store shipping containers; port authorities believe the site could be operational in 30 to 45 days, the officials said.
“It’s a great way to add capacity and efficiency at the port,” an official said. “We expect that that kind of flexibility will help other projects as well.”
The administration also plans to launch a $240 million grant program within the next 45 days to invest in port infrastructure — using money from the infrastructure bill.
Within the next two months, it will identify projects with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for construction work at coastal ports, inland waterways and other facilities, officials said.
In the next three months, they said, the administration will begin competition for the first round of port infrastructure grants funded by the infrastructure bill. The federal government will also identify ports of entry at the nation’s southern and northern borders that need modernization and expansion.
In Baltimore, Biden explained how his administration was helping fund the expansion of a 126-year-old tunnel near the port to accommodate trains carrying containers stacked on top of each other.
A senior administration official emphasized that the port was a public-private partnership and noted the port was making major investments in adding container cranes and a second deep, 50-foot berth.
“It’s an example of the kind of investments that are needed from both the private and public sector side,” the official told reporters Tuesday. “It’s also an illustration that the co-funding in the bipartisan infrastructure plan incentivizes the private sector to make these kinds of long-term investments as well.”
(WASHINGTON) — In a memo never before made public, the Presidential Personnel Office under the direction of John McEntee, a favorite aide of former President Donald Trump, made a case for firing then-Secretary of Defense Mark Esper three weeks before Esper was terminated, according to reporting in a new book by ABC News Chief Washington Correspondent Jonathan Karl.
The contents were first reported by Karl in The Atlantic for an article adapted from his forthcoming book, “Betrayal: The Final Act of the Trump Show.”
The memo from McEntee’s office, dated Oct. 19, 2020, provides what Karl calls a remarkable window inside the thinking of the Trump White House during the final months of his presidency and the power held by the then-29-year-old director of the Presidential Personnel Office.
It includes bullet points outlining what Karl calls Esper’s “sins against Trumpism,” including that he “barred the Confederate flag” on military bases, “opposed the President’s direction to utilize American forces to put down riots,” “focused the Department on Russia,” and was “actively pushing for ‘diversity and inclusion.'”
Three weeks later on Nov. 9, 2020, Karl says, Trump fired Esper in precisely the way McEntee recommended and replaced, as recommended, by Christopher Miller. The firing also came two days after Trump lost reelection and as the former president was expected to purge top members of his administration with whom he had long been unhappy.
Obtained by ABC News Chief Washington Correspondent Jonathan KarlObtained by ABC News Chief Washington Correspondent Jonathan Karl
Esper’s termination was made official with a terse two-sentence letter dated Nov. 9 and signed by McEntee that has also, until now, never been made public.
The Presidential Personnel Office, what Karl describes as a normally under-the-radar group responsible for the hiring and firing of the roughly 4,000 executive branch appointees, transformed into an internal police force in the final year of the Trump administration, with employees scouring for acts of dissidence in their ranks.
“Betrayal: The Final Act of the Trump Show” is scheduled to be released on Nov. 16, 2021.
(KENOSHA COUNTY, Wisc.) — Kyle Rittenhouse took the witness stand on Wednesday to testify in his own defense and broke down in sobs as he began to describe shooting three men, two fatally, in what he claimed was an act of self-defense.
Rittenhouse began testifying in a Kenosha County courtroom after telling a judge that he made the decision to do so after consulting with his lawyers.
In his hourslong testimony, the 18-year-old spoke of his background as a trained lifeguard, a fire department EMT cadet and a student studying nursing at Arizona State University.
“Did you come to downtown Kenosha to look for trouble?” his attorney, Mark Richards asked.
Rittenhouse, wearing a blue suit and matching tie, answered, “No.”
Rittenhouse said he went to Kenosha with his sister and friends on Aug. 25, 2020, after seeing online pleas for people to come to the city to help protect it after looting and vandalism broke out over a police shooting of Jacob Blake, a 29-year-old Black man who was left paralyzed.
“I went down there to provide first aid,” Rittenhouse testified, adding that he brought along his medical supplies as well as his AR-15-style semi-automatic rifle.
Rittenhouse has pleaded not guilty to felony charges of first-degree reckless homicide, first-degree intentional homicide and attempted first-degree intentional homicide. He claimed he shot and killed Joseph Rosenbaum, 36, and Anthony Huber, 26, and wounded Gaige Grosskreutz, 27, in self-defense.
“I didn’t intend to kill them. I intended to stop the people who were attacking me,” Rittenhouse repeatedly testified during his testimony.
‘I hear somebody yell, ‘Burn in hell”
Richards directed Rittenhouse to the event of the Aug. 25, 2020, shooting. He testified that he had witnessed a police officer being hit with a brick, another man getting his jaw broken and had been allegedly threatened by Rosenbaum.
He said he got separated from his friends who were guarding three car lots that had been vandalized. He said he was rushing to put out a fire at one of the car lots when he again encountered Rosenbaum and a man named identified by prosecutors as Joshua Ziminski.
“I hear somebody scream ‘Burn in hell,” said Rittenhouse of when he reached the car lot that was being vandalized. “I reply with ‘Friendly, friendly, friendly to let them know hey, I’m just here to help. I don’t want any problems. I just want to put out the fires if there are any.”
Rittenhouse testified that Ziminski pulled a gun and pointed it at him when he approached the car lot with a fire extinguisher.
“As I’m walking towards to put out the fire, I dropped the fire extinguisher and I take a step back (from Ziminski),” Rittenhouse said. “My plan was to get out of that situation.”
But he said before he could get away, Rosenbaum was allegedly bearing down on him and Ziminski and three other people were blocking his path.
Rittenhouse breaks into sobs
“Once I take that step back, I look over my shoulder and Mr. Rosenbaum was now running from my right side, and I was cornered from in front of me with Mr. Ziminski,” Rittenhouse said.
Rittenhouse then began to break down in sobs on the witness stand, prompting Judge Bruce Schroeder to call a recess.
Following the recess, Rittenhouse returned to the witness stand.
He picked his testimony back up at when he saw Rosenbaum charging toward him.
“Mr. Ziminski stepped towards me. I went to go run south,” Rittenhouse said.
‘I shot him’
He said as Rosenbaum began to chase him, he heard Ziminski allegedly tell Rosenbaum “to get him and kill him.”
“As I’m running in that southwest direction, Mr. Rosenbaum throws, at the time I know it’s a bag now,” Rittenhouse said, adding that he initially thought it was a heavy chain Rosenbaum had been seen carrying earlier in the evening.
“I turn around for about a second while continuing to run and I point my gun at Mr. Rosenbaum,” Rittenhouse said.
Richards asked, “Does that stop him from chasing you?”
Rittenhouse replied, “It does not.”
He said Rosenbaum continued to “gain speed” on him and then he heard a gunshot from behind him.
Rittenhouse said Rosenbaum lunged at him.
“I remember his hand on the barrel of my gun,” Rittenhouse said.
Richards asked, “As you see him lunging for your gun, what do you do?”
Rittenhouse answered, “I shot him.”
‘I was defending myself’
He said people in the car lot quickly scattered when he fired four shots at Rosenbaum. He said he tried to go and help Rosenbaum, but as people started to surround them again, he heard individuals screaming, “Get his a–, get his a–. Get him, get him, get him.”
He said he immediately called a friend, Dominick Black, who came with him to Kenosha and told him that he had just shot someone.
“I had to shoot him,” Rittenhouse said he told Black.
He said he started to run in the direction he thought the police were positioned.
Richards asked, “Why were you trying to get to the police?”
Rittenhouse responded, “Because I didn’t do anything wrong. I was defending myself.”
Shooting of Huber and Grosskreutz
Rittenhouse said that as he continued to run, Huber came up behind him and hit him in the back of the head with a skateboard. He also said a concrete rock hit him in the back of the head.
“I get lightheaded. I almost pass out and I stumble and hit the ground,” Rittenhouse said.
He said people quickly surrounded him and he pointed his gun at them and they backed off, except from one unidentified man who kicked him in the face. He said he fired two shots at the man and missed.
“I thought if I were to be knocked out … he would have stomped my face in if I didn’t fire,” Rittenhouse said.
He testified that Huber allegedly ran up to him as he was trying to sit up and struck him in the neck with his skateboard.
“He grabs my gun, and I can feel it pulling away from me, and I could feel the strap starting to come off my body,” Rittenhouse said. “I fire one shot.”
Rosenbaum was struck in the chest and died at the scene, prosecutors said.
He said he lowered his weapon and then saw Grosskreutz in front of him with his hands up.
“As I’m lowering my weapon, I look down and then Mr. Grosskreutz, he lunges at me with his pistol pointed directly at my head,” Rittenhouse said, adding they were so close that their feet were touching.
He said Grosskreutz held his hands in the air and looked at him.
“And that’s when Mr. Grosskreutz brings his arm down. … His pistol is pointed at me and that’s when I shoot him.”
Grosskreutz testified that he was shot in the bicep, causing him to retreat and yell for a medic.
Rittenhouse surrenders
Rittenhouse said he climbed to his feet and proceeded to walk toward a line of police vehicles to turn himself in. He said he approached the window of a squad car and said, “I just shot somebody. I just shot somebody.”
He said the officer responded by telling him to get back and threatened to use pepper spray on him.
The teenager said he then went back to one of the Car Source car lots he had been helping to guard and spoke to the group of allies who were locked inside.
“I’m in shock. I was freaking out. I was just attacked. My head was spinning,” Rittenhouse said.
He said his friend, Dominick Black, drove him to his home in Antioch, Illinois, where he told his mother and two sisters what happened to him. He said his mother drove him to the local police station, where he surrendered.
He said when he arrived at the police station, “I had to tell them that I was involved in a shooting in Kenosha and I needed the Kenosha detectives.”
‘I didn’t intend to kill them’
Prosecutor Thomas Binger then began cross-examining Rittenhouse by asking, “Everybody that you shot that night, you intended to kill, correct?”
Rittenhouse answered, “I didn’t intend to kill them. I intended to stop the people who were attacking me.”
“By killing them?” Binger pressed Rittenhouse.
The teenager responded, “I did what I had to do to stop the person who was attacking me.”
Binger began to ask Rittenhouse about sitting in court for the eight days of trial and having heard all of the 30 sum odd witnesses and view multiple videos that captured the shootings.
“And after all of that, you are telling us your side of the story, correct?” Binger asked.
Schroeder then stopped the questioning and after sending the jury out of the courtroom, Richards objected to Binger’s questioning, telling the judge, “He’s commenting on my client’s right to remain silent.”
Schroeder agreed, telling Binger, “You need to account for this.”
Binger responded, “No, your honor, I am making the point that after hearing everything in the case, now he’s tailoring his story to what has already been introduced.”
Schroeder warned Binger that it was a “grave constitutional violation” to talk about Rittenhouse’s silence until now.
“You’re right on the borderline and you may be over it,” Schroeder said. “But it better stop. This is not permitted.”
When Binger’s cross-examination resumed, he began to ask Rittenhouse about his use of deadly force.
“You’d agree with me that we’re not allowed to use deadly force to protect that Car Source building?” Binger asked.
Rittenhouse answered, “I wasn’t using deadly force to protect the property. I was using deadly force to protect myself.”
Blistering rebuke from judge
Binger then asked Rittenhouse about an incident 10 days before the shooting.
“But yet you have previously indicated that you wished you had your AR-15 to protect someone’s property?” Binger asked.
Richards immediately objected, saying Schroeder had not ruled on the admissibility of the previous act.
When the judge sent the jury out of the courtroom again, Richards suggested that Binger was “attempting to provoke a mistrial.”
“I ask the court to strongly admonish him (Binger) and the next time it happens I’ll be asking for a mistrial with prejudice,” Richards said.
Binger claimed that he believed the “court left the door open” on the matter, prompting an angry and loud response from the judge.
“For me, not for you,” Schroeder shouted. “You should have come and asked for reconsideration.”
Schroeder continued, “I was astonished when you began your examination by commenting on the defendant’s post-arrest silence. That’s basic law. It’s been basic law in this country for 40 years, 50 years.”
Why didn’t you just go home?
Following a lunch break, Binger continued his cross-examination of Rittenhouse, questioning him about his actions before the shootings and whether he would describe the protesters on the streets that night as hostile.
Rittenhouse said he didn’t believe the crowd was hostile toward him or his group. But after Binger played a video of the crowd setting a Dumpster on fire and chanting to Rittenhouse and others protecting the car lots to “protect the property, not the street.”
But Rittenhouse said that he once went into the street to retrieve a dumpster that had been taken from one of the Car Source properties and set on fire.
“Would you agree that the crowd was reacting to members of your group going out in the street and trying to interfere with what was going on off your property?” Binger asked.
Rittenhouse answered, “I didn’t think they were happy about it, no.”
Binger noted that police moved the crowd south past the Car Source lot where Rittenhouse and his group were and set up a demarcation line at 60th Street in Kenosha.
Rittenhouse agreed with Binger that once the police moved the crowd south there appeared to be no more threat to the Car Source location.
“So why not go home at that point?” Binger asked.
Rittenhouse said he stayed to help provide first aid to anyone in need.
Binger noted that despite the threat being apparently eliminated from the business he was protecting by police moving the crowd south, Rittenhouse ventured south of the demarcation line at 60th St. armed with his rifle and accompanied by another man, Ryan Balch, an armed military veteran.
Rittenhouse said he was looking for people who needed first aid when he and Balch got separated, leaving him isolated in the crowd Binger said appeared hostile.
“You are now entering a crowd of whatever you want to call them, protesters, demonstrators. Your attorneys called them rioters, or looters, or whatever. That’s who you’re now going to be part of. You’re going to be in that crowd, right?”
Rittenhouse responded, “I was walking through. I announced myself as friendly and that I was there to help them.”
The defense has three more witnesses to call before they will rest their case. Closing arguments could come Friday or Monday.
