News

(NEW YORK) — The State Department announced on Wednesday that a charter flight for American citizens stuck in the Middle East was en route to the United States — days after the war with Iran left thousands of American travelers stranded as combat operations led to the closure of airspace around the region.

The department said the flight is “part of our ongoing efforts to assist Americans return home” and said additional flights will be departing from the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Israel.

The move comes as hundreds of thousands of Americans stranded across the Middle East are trying to leave the region, faced with canceled flights and other travel disruptions. 

Chris Elliott, a pastor from Lexington, North Carolina, told ABC News that he and his family were stranded while visiting sites in Jerusalem. He said they ended up in a bomb shelter as sirens sounded and incoming missiles were intercepted.

“We want Americans to be on American soil right now,” Elliott said.

Eliott’s daughter, Riley, said it’s been frustrating and frightening to be forced to shelter in place since the joint U.S.-Israel attacks on Iran began on Saturday.

“The scariest for me was trying to go to bed at night and then being woken up by the sounds of sirens,” Riley Elliott told ABC News.

The U.S. State Department issued an advisory on Monday, three days into the military operation, urging Americans to immediately leave 14 countries in the region via commercial flights, but stranded U.S. citizens have said that’s become extremely difficult, given the significant disruptions to air travel.

The Trump administration is facing some criticism for apparently not having a plan in place to get American citizens out of harm’s way ahead of the joint operation.

Responding to a question on Tuesday from ABC News about why so many Americans became stuck in the Middle East absent any advance warning of the attack on Iran, President Donald Trump said, “Well, because it happened all very quickly.”

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said during a Wednesday press briefing that the U.S. did communicate the danger of traveling to the region.

“There was many signs, put out by the State Department,” Leavitt said. “The secretary of state issued level four travel advisories dating back to January for many of these countries in the region,” adding that they were “advising extreme caution and do not travel alerts to Americans in the region.”

However, a review of travel advisories issued by the State Department indicates that prior to the start of the conflict, of the the 14 countries American travelers were later urged to depart, eight of them were only listed at a Level 1 or Level 2 — meaning to exercise normal precautions or increased caution.

Leavitt also claimed that since the start of the U.S.-Israeli attack on Iran, over 17,500 Americans “have safely returned home from the Middle East, with over 8,500 American citizens returning home to the United States just yesterday alone.”

Multiple U.S. embassies in the region, including some that have been attacked, have said they are unable to help citizens trying to leave.

“Our embassies and our diplomatic facilities are under direct attack from a terroristic regime,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters on Tuesday in Washington.

Asked if there were plans in place to evacuate Americans before the attack took place, Rubio said, “That’s the plan we’re trying to carry out.”

“The problem is, or the challenge we are facing, is airspace closures,” Rubio said, adding that some airports were closed after being hit in strikes. “So, that’s a challenge, but rest assured, we are confident that we are going to be able to assist every American.”

Odies Turner, a private chef from South Carolina, told ABC News that he’s been stuck in his hotel in Doha, Qatar, since the military operation began. He said the unexpected experience of being in a war has left him “frustrated, anxious” and feeling helpless.

“How do you expect us to leave a country where the airspace is closed? People are really stranded here,” Turner said in a self-video recorded on Tuesday. “I really don’t know what to do. I’ve reached out to the embassy, consulate and airlines. There’s no information on when I will get back home. It’s a mess.”

American Lisa Butler said the military conflict left her and her family, who were part of a large travel group, stranded in Abu Dhabi before they were evacuated to Dubai.

“We were standing … outside of this beautiful mosque, looking up in the sky and seeing these missiles that have been intercepted,” Butler told ABC News about how she and her family learned while in Abu Dhabi that they were vulnerable to a major military conflict breaking out in the region.

Oliver Sims, an American from Texas, told ABC News that he has been stuck in Qatar.

“I was just a few minutes ago, listening to some explosions that are going off above my head,” Sims said. “And, you know, I know that officials have said use commercial means, but there are really no commercial means here for us to use. So it’s really difficult to try and figure out a way out.”

Asked to describe conditions in Qatar, Sims said that he has been awakened at night by “extremely loud explosions” that shook the windows of his hotel room.

“I looked out my window and I saw a bunch of debris that was raining down outside of my hotel window,” Sims said. “And it’s very jarring, too, because it’s not just how loud it is, just how it actually physically shakes you. The rumbling is really, really just as violent.”

Copyright © 2026, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

President Donald Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff revealed in an interview this week that Iranian negotiators told him in the lead-up to the U.S.-Israeli military operation in Iran that they had enough enriched uranium to “make 11 nuclear bombs.”

But since the major combat operations were launched on Saturday with the intent of crushing Iran’s nuclear ambitions, the administration has yet to publicly produce any concrete evidence on the whereabouts of the nuclear material or who is in control of it. The Israel Defense Forces claimed that at least 40 top military commanders were killed in the opening strikes of the conflict.

In an interview on Fox News, Witkoff told host Sean Hannity that as soon as he and Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, sat down with the Iranian negotiators for denuclearization talks last month, their counterparts spoke of their stockpile of enriched uranium.

“Jared and I opened up with the Iranian negotiators telling us they had the inalienable right to enrich all the nuclear fuel they possessed,” Witkoff said. “We, of course, responded that the president feels we have the inalienable right to stop you in your tracks.”

Witkoff claimed the Iranian negotiators openly shared details about their supply of nuclear material.

“In that first meeting, both the Iranian negotiators said to us directly with, you know, no shame, that they controlled 460 kilograms of 60% [enriched uranium] and they’re aware that that could make 11 nuclear bombs,” Witkoff said.

Witkoff said the 60% enriched uranium can be brought to weapons-grade in about a week and that the 20% enriched uranium can be brought to weapons-grade in three to four weeks.

“They manufacture their own centrifuges to enrich this material,” Witkoff said. “So, there’s almost no stopping them. They have an endless supply of it.”

The statement appears to contradict what the Pentagon said last summer about Iran’s ability to develop weapons-grade uranium following U.S. strikes on its nuclear facilities.

In July 2025, Sean Parnell, the Pentagon’s chief spokesperson, said at a news conference that that the strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities in June set back Iran’s capability to develop a nuclear weapon by “closer to two years.”

“It’s not just … enriched uranium or centrifuges or things like that. We destroyed the components that they would need to build a bomb,” Parnell said at the time.

But on Tuesday, that assessment fell to the wayside as the administration defended the U.S. military operation by insisting Iran posed an imminent threat to Americans. A senior administration official told reporters in a briefing that among the factors in the operation was that Iran had the ability to rebuild those components destroyed in the bombing, including its own centrifuges. 

The official said a lot of the enriched uranium remained mostly in Isfahan with some still at Natanz and Fordo.

“It can be a long and cumbersome process in extracting it and covering it up,” the official said. “I think the first question is, where is it? The second question is, how do we get to it, and how do we get physical control? And then after that, it would be a decision of the president and department, the Department of War, CIA, as to whether we wanted to physically transport it or dilute it on premises.” 

Iran has stated numerous times that it doesn’t want nuclear weapons, but believes it has the right to use nuclear power for civilian purpose. It had also been part of a nuclear deal with the U.S., which Trump withdrew from during his first term.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told ABC’s “This Week” anchor George Stephanopoulos on Sunday that the attack on his country was “unprovoked and unwarranted.” He said Iran was negotiating with the United States in good faith prior to the attacks.

“A deal was at our reach, and we left Geneva happily with the understanding that we can reach a deal next time we meet,” Araghchi said.

In their two public briefings on “Operation Epic Fury” in Iran, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, did not address what has become of Iran’s nuclear material since the widespread military strikes began on Saturday.

In several speeches since the attacks commenced, Trump has also not been specific about the status of Iran’s nuclear material.

Hegseth, Caine, CIA Director John Ratcliffe and Secretary of State Marco Rubio conducted a closed-door briefing with members of the U.S. Senate and House on the Iran operation on Tuesday afternoon.

In a letter sent on Monday to the administration’s briefers, five top House Democrats — including Rep. Gregory Meeks of New York, ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and Rep. Adam Smith, ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee — asked for information on nuclear security in Iran.

“Who currently controls Iran’s nuclear facilities and materials, and what safeguards are in place to prevent diversion or proliferation, or complete loss of control?” the Democratic lawmakers asked in their letter.

But following the briefing, Meeks said the briefers offered few answers.

“Here we are again without answers. Here we are again without complete transparency,” Meeks said. “Here we are again trying to go around Congress.”

Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., said the briefers provided “no additional” information on the imminent threat that prompted the military operation, adding, “There’s nothing that we got that you don’t have.”

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., challenged any suggestion that the Trump administration was unclear during their briefing with House members about their objectives in Iran. 

“This is really a very simple matter. It’s about the building of ballistic missiles. That’s what Iran was engaged in, and they were doing it at a speed and in a scale that was exceeding the ability of our regional allies to respond appropriately,” Johnson said. “This created an imminent and serious threat. It also gave them cover to continue with their nuclear ambitions.”

Johnson added, “As you know, we tried very hard to negotiate with them about that nuclear enrichment of uranium … and the buildup of their missiles was so important and so serious that the President of the United States, this president, thought that it was a great enough threat that we needed to act.”

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog, said in a social media post on Tuesday that, based on the latest available satellite imagery, it “can now confirm some recent damage to entrance buildings of Iran’s underground Natanz Fuel Enrichment Plant [FEP].”

“No radiological consequence expected and no additional impact detected at FEP itself, which was severely damaged in the June conflict,” the IAEA said in the post.

In June 2025, the U.S. and Israeli militaries launched “Operation Midnight Hammer,” targeting three of Iran’s nuclear facilities — Natanz, Fordo and Isfahan — with “bunker-buster” bombs, according to the White House.

At the time, Trump said the operation “completely and totally obliterated” Iran’s key uranium enrichment sites.

In a speech on Monday at the White House, Trump said that after “Operation Midnight Hammer,” Iran attempted to rebuild its nuclear facilities in another location, “because they were unable to use the ones we so powerfully blew up.”

“In addition, the regime’s conventional ballistic missile program was growing rapidly and dramatically, and this posed a very clear, colossal threat to America and our forces stationed overseas,” Trump said. “The purpose of this fast-growing missile program was to shield their nuclear weapon development and make it extraordinarily difficult for anyone to stop them from making these highly forbidden, by us, nuclear weapons.”

The Institute for Science and International Security said in a statement on Tuesday that its analysis of satellite imagery indicates the Natanz nuclear complex, Iran’s main uranium enrichment site, was struck twice during Saturday’s joint U.S.-Israeli attack.

Neither the Trump administration nor the Israeli government have confirmed the alleged strikes on the Natanz complex.

Meanwhile, Israel targeted a compound near Tehran linked to the regime’s nuclear weapons “capabilities,” the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said in statement Tuesday. 

After the U.S. targeted Iran’s nuclear facilities last year, Israel, which participated in the operation under the code-name “Rising Lion,” continued to track scientists connected to the Iran’s nuclear weapons program “and located their new location at this site in a manner that enabled a precise strike on the covert underground compound,” the statement said.

“The strike removes a key component in the Iranian regime’s capability to develop nuclear weapons and joins a series of strikes conducted during Operation ‘Rising Lion’ that were essential to eliminate the Iranian nuclear threat,” the IDF said.

-ABC News’ Mary Kekatos and Jordana Miller contributed to this report.

Copyright © 2026, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(ARIZONA) — As the search for Nancy Guthrie continues into its second month, one lead that hasn’t panned out for investigators is the glove recovered about 2 miles from Guthrie’s home.

The DNA on that glove traced back to a person who works at a nearby restaurant and “has nothing to do with the case,” according to Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos.

Nancy Guthrie, the 84-year-old mother of “Today” show host Savannah Guthrie, was abducted from her Tucson, Arizona, home by an unknown suspect in the early hours of Sunday, Feb. 1.

On Tuesday, the FBI met with Nancy Guthrie’s children in Tucson to brief them on the status of the case, sources told ABC News.

One of the sources described it as a routine “touch base,” saying investigators “have nothing to tell them.”

As the case has subsided from the news, the number of tips has tapered off, though investigators are actively running down possible leads.

Savannah Guthrie has offered a $1 million reward, bringing the combined reward between the family and law enforcement to $1.2 million.

“We feel the love and prayers from our neighbors, from the Tucson community and from around the country,” Savannah Guthrie wrote on Instagram this week. “please don’t stop praying and hoping with us.bring her home.”

Anyone with information is urged to call 911, the FBI at 1-800-CALL-FBI, or the Pima County Sheriff’s Department at 520-351-4900.

Copyright © 2026, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(BATAVIA TOWNSHIP, Ohio) — A 19-year-old who crashed and became trapped upside down in a river in Batavia Township, Ohio, was pulled from her sinking pickup in a dramatic rescue captured on body camera footage.

The footage from the Clermont County Sheriff’s Office obtained by ABC News showed first responders on Feb. 22 working to safely rescue Andi Burns as rising, freezing water filled the truck and a dispatcher stayed on the line to keep her calm.

Burns was driving home from work on State Route 222 when she lost control of her vehicle on black ice, hit a tree and plunged off a steep embankment into the Little Miami River, according to a copy of the accident report from the Ohio State Highway Patrol.

Deputies and firefighters arrived on the scene to find the truck overturned in the river, according to the sheriff’s office.

According to Clermont County officials, Burns was wearing an Apple Watch that automatically called 911 using its crash detection feature.

“Please God please,” Burns was heard saying on the 911 call, telling dispatch that her head was “barely up” from the water.

In an interview with ABC News recalling the incident, Burns said she was “terrified.”

“It was completely black out, pitch black,” she said. “I didn’t think that anybody could hear me or knew what happened — I just was starting to freak out.”

Rescuers jumped into the water and shouted for tools to shatter a window and pop the door as they fought to reach her, according to the body camera footage.

“Grab my hand, grab both my hands,” one of the firefighters could be heard telling Burns in the footage.

Firefighter and EMT Tommy Jetter, who’s in his first year on the job, told ABC News that “the way that the car went in and flipped upside down altogether, that’s a very, very dangerous car accident wreck.”

He credited Burns for “being able to stay awake and find that air pocket and for her staying calm is very impressive.”

With the cab of the truck nearly filled with water and her head just inches from the water, crews were able to free Burns and pull her to safety, according to the footage.

“We got her!” the rescue team was heard shouting in the body cam footage.

Burns did not sustain any serious injuries and was able to walk away from the scene with just bruises, the accident report says.

“Surviving that car accident of one being in the water is very, very, very lucky, very fortunate, God was definitely on her side for that,” Jetter said.

Burns told ABC News she plans to become an EMT in Clermont County.

Copyright © 2026, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(WASHINGTON) — Telesforo Cerero-Palacios is a home renovator in Minnesota who says he has no reported criminal history, so he was shocked to learn the Department of Homeland Security listed him as one of the “worst of the worst” detained immigrants in the U.S. who have serious offenses. 

“What happened here? Why does their system say this about you?” Cerero-Palacios, 53, recalled after a relative saw him on the list.

The DHS website features thousands who the agency claims are the “worst” individuals, including a photo of Cerero-Palacios with his alleged crime, “dangerous drugs.”

However, a DHS government document showed that Cerero-Palacio has no criminal history. The document, reviewed by ABC News, is known as a “Record of Deportable/Inadmissible Alien,” which is created by the agency when individuals are detained.

Cerero-Palacios said he has never been accused of any drug-related offense and an ABC News review of criminal records in Minnesota found several traffic and parking tickets and one small claim case, but did not turn up any drug-related charges.

In an interview conducted in Spanish, Cerero-Palacios told ABC News that agents entered his home on April 7, 2025, looking to detain a relative, but that’s when he was asked about his immigration status. He said he told officials he was undocumented and was subsequently detained.  

The DHS document appears to corroborate his account, stating that deportation officers working with the Drug Enforcement Agency were conducting fugitive operations at his address when they interviewed him about his immigration status.  

“During the interview, CERERO freely admitted that he did not have any documents that would allow him to reside in the United States legally,” the document said.

It also states that in 1998, Cerero-Palacios was arrested for giving a police officer a false name, but the case was dismissed in 2000. 

The document makes no mention that he’s ever been accused of any drug-related charges. 

“CERERO claims and appears to be in good health and takes no medication. CERERO does not use narcotics,” the document says.

Despite an Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokesperson citing his 1998 arrest in a statement shared with ABC News, DHS appears to have issued him a non-immigrant visa three times, until 2015, the document showed.  

“This illegal alien was previously arrested for giving a false name to a peace officer. The FBI number connected to this drug charge is linked to multiple aliases, including Telesforo Cerero-Palacios. We will give you more information on this case shortly,” the ICE spokesperson told ABC News. 

It’s unclear what drug charge the spokesperson was referring to. Days after ABC News began asking questions about its inclusion of Cerero-Palacios on its “worst of the worst” database, DHS appears to have removed Cerero-Palacios from the list.

DHS did not respond when asked if he was erroneously placed on the list and has not followed up with any additional information, despite repeated attempts by ABC News to obtain one. 

Cerero-Palacios spent 16 days in immigration detention last year and was released after posting a bond, Cerero-Palacios’ attorney, Gloria Contreras Edin said.

“What is interesting is we come to find that he’s on ‘worst of the worst’ so it’s like, why is he on there,” Contreras Edin told ABC News. “They would have never released him if he had been a drug dealer. They would have never let him out on a bond and then I wonder how many other people are they doing that to.”

Cerero-Palacios told ABC News that his inclusion on the website prompted him to stay at home except to go to work.

“I was afraid to leave the home thinking that they might detain me again,” Cerero-Palacios said.

Contreras Edin shared a letter with ABC News from the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension that said a background search using her client’s fingerprints, name, and date of birth “indicates that no record was found.” 

The letter says the search does not preclude any information being available at the county or city level.

“I have to believe in my heart that it was an error or a mistake, but it’s such a significant error and such a significant mistake that it worries me that they may be doing this to other people,” Contreras Edin said. 

DHS launched the “worst of the worst” website in December, promising to allow users to “search through some of the hundreds of thousands of criminal illegal aliens who have been arrested across all 50 states,” the agency said in a press release.  

Since then, the database has grown to include more than 30,000 people. DHS has used the information on the website to justify its expansion of immigration enforcement operations such as “Operation Metro Surge” in Minnesota, where two U.S. citizens were fatally shot by federal agents during immigration operations.  

Meanwhile, Cerero-Palacios is still in immigration proceedings and has a hearing about his case in April. He says the government’s claims about him have affected him profoundly. 

“Imagine how many others have seen my photo? My reputation is ruined, they’ll say ‘Oh, I thought he was a hard worker, but he’s involved with drugs,'” he said.

Copyright © 2026, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — Measurements of coastal sea-level height around the world may be higher than scientists previously thought, according to new research.

Past research may even have underestimated coastal sea level heights around the world by an average of .3 meters, or about 1 feet, a study published Wednesday in Nature found.

Sea levels in some areas in the Global South — regions such as Asia and the South Pacific — could be up to 3 feet higher than previously assumed, according to the paper.

The United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change estimates that ocean levels may increase by between 0.28 meters and 1 meter by 2100. Human-amplified climate change is the primary cause for present-day rising sea levels, climate research shows.

However, assessments of coastal sea-level often assume overall sea levels rather than the direct measurements of sea-level height in specific regions, according to the paper.

Researchers from Wageningen University & Research in the Netherlands analyzed 385 pieces of peer-reviewed scientific literature on coastal exposure and hazard impact assessments published between 2009 and 2025 and calculated the difference between commonly assumed and actual measured coastal sea level.

They found that 90% of all studies relied on assumed sea levels based on gravitational models — or geoids — rather than using the measured sea level, according to the paper.

Earth’s gravitational models only account for gravity and Earth rotation and do not account for other factors that determine local sea levels, such as tides, current and winds.

Less than 9% of the existing studies combined land elevation measurements and sea level measurements, but those studies appeared to suffer from conversion errors and data alignment issues, Katharina Seeger a geographer studying flood hazards and risks at Wageningen University & Research in The Netherlands and co-author of the study, said during a press conference Tuesday.

Sea level was found to be underrepresented by .24 to .27 meters, depending on the model used. Some discrepancies were found to be as high as 5.5 meters to 7.6 meters, the researchers said.

The underrepresentations were particularly noteworthy in regions like Southeast Asia, and the South Pacific.

Coastal sea heights were also underrepresented in Latin America, the west coast of North America, the Caribbean, Africa, the Middle East and the Indo-Pacific.

The new estimates could put up to 37% more land below sea level, impacting 77 million to 132 million people globally, the researchers said.

Nearly 40% of the U.S. population lives near the coast, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

Coastal subsidence is often underrepresented in flooding models, a 2024 study published in Nature found. The inundation coastal regions will experience due to rising sea levels may actually be worse than previously thought when factoring in how rapidly the land is sinking, according to the study.

Large cities surrounded by water — like Boston, New Orleans and San Francisco — will be among the regions that could experience flooding in the near future due to land elevation changes combined with sea level rise — about 4 millimeters per year, the 2024 study found.

The sinking is expected to cause structural damage to most existing properties, the authors said.

Parts of low-lying Florida, such as Miami, are already dealing with more frequent and impactful high tide flooding events. High tide flooding, the overflow or excess accumulation of water that covers typically dry coastal land during times of high tide, is happening more often in many coastal communities, even on generally quiet weather days, according to NOAA.

Miami showed the greatest share of exposure to flooding, with up to 122,000 people and up to 81,000 properties that could be at risk of flooding by 2050.

The latest research indicates that re-evaluation of the methodology of existing assessments for characterizing sea-level rise impact is needed, the paper noted. This could have implications for policymakers, climate finance and coastal adaption plans, the scientists said.

Copyright © 2026, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(WASHINGTON) — The Justice Department is proposing a new policy that would seek to limit the ability of state bar associations to launch ethics probes into DOJ attorneys, according to a new document posted Wednesday in the Federal Register. 

The proposal, which comes amid growing scrutiny of the department’s attorneys and whether they’re complying with ethical obligations in enforcing the Trump administration’s agenda, would seek to empower Attorney General Pam Bondi to request that state bar investigations be suspended pending a DOJ review of any originating complaint. 

In the event the state bar authorities “refuse” to suspend their investigations, the proposal says, the Justice Department “shall take appropriate action to prevent the bar disciplinary authorities from interfering.” 

It’s not immediately clear what “appropriate action” the department could take to influence state-level proceedings, and the proposed rule does not elaborate further. 

The proposal argues that the bar complaint and investigation process has been “weaponized” by political activists in recent years to ensnare officials across DOJ’s ranks into costly and time-consuming proceedings. 

“This unprecedented weaponization of the State bar complaint process risks chilling the zealous advocacy by Department attorneys on behalf of the United States, its agencies, and its officers,” the proposed rule said. “That chilling effect, in turn, would interfere with the broad statutory authority of the Attorney General to manage and supervise Department attorneys.” 

A Justice Department spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment from ABC News.

Copyright © 2026, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.