(BOSTON) — The Massachusetts Air National Guardsman charged with leaking national defense information online is due back in Boston federal court Wednesday for a hearing to determine whether he should remain in federal custody.
Jack Teixeira, 21, “improperly and unlawfully retained and transmitted national defense information to people not authorized to receive it,” according to a criminal complaint unsealed last week after his arrest at home in North Dighton, Massachusetts.
He has been held in custody since his arrest after the FBI said he caused “serious damage to the national security of the United States.” At his initial appearance, Teixeira’s court-appointed attorney from the Federal Defenders of Boston did not object to his detention pending the outcome of Wednesday’s hearing.
Teixeira began posting classified information on Discord in December, according to the complaint.
At first the material appeared as paragraphs of text. Then, when Teixeira allegedly became concerned he could be discovered copying material at work, “he began taking the documents to his residence and photographing them,” the complaint said.
In addition to a detention hearing, Wednesday is also billed as a preliminary hearing, an indication the judge could lay out a progression for the case, including whether it moves from the District of Massachusetts to the Eastern District of Virginia, where it may ultimately be prosecuted since much of what was leaked originated at the Pentagon.
(WASHINGTON) — The Supreme Court on Wednesday was expected to decide whether to wade into a legal challenge to the Food and Drug Administration’s approval of the abortion pill, a case that could restrict access to the drug mifepristone nationwide — even in states where abortion is legal.
If the Supreme Court agrees to take up a Texas judge’s ruling that threatened to pull the drug from the market, it would be the second time in less than a year that the high court will deal with limits to abortion access, potentially paving the way for another blockbuster ruling this summer that could dramatically change how drugs are approved in the U.S.
“It is not a stretch to say that a judge can wake up in the morning and decide that they want to take a certain medication off the market,” including vaccines or anti-depressants, if the lower court rulings stand, said Josh Sharfstein, former principal deputy commissioner at the FDA.
The case has deeply divided the country, with Republican governors and lawmakers lining up behind the conservative plaintiffs in the case.
“Fundamentally, chemical abortion drugs pose serious health and safety risks to women and girls,” states a brief filed with the Supreme Court, signed by nearly 150 Republican lawmakers including Senate Minority Whip John Thune of South Dakota, Senate Republican Conference Chairman John Barrasso of Wyoming, and House Majority Leader Steve Scalise of Louisiana.
On the other side are Democratic governors, lawmakers and the nation’s largest medical associations, as well as hundreds of pharmaceutical executives and companies. They note mifepristone has been widely available for 23 years — used by an estimated five million women and accounting for more than half of all abortions in the US.
“There is a greater risk of complications or mortality for procedures like wisdom-tooth removals, tonsillectomies, colonoscopies, and plastic surgeries, than by any abortion method (medication or procedural),” the American Medical Association and American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, wrote in a court brief.
FDA Administrator Bob Califf was scheduled to testify before a Senate panel Wednesday, where he was expected to field questions about the drug’s safety.
Mifepristone is the sole drug approved by the FDA to end early pregnancies, typically given along with second drug misoprostol that helps empty the uterus.
Since the drug’s 2000 approval, the FDA later expanded access, greenlighting a generic version of the drug and allowing it to be given up to 10 weeks of pregnancy instead of seven and provided via telehealth and the mail.
The drug’s rise in popularity and widespread accessibility has made it a target of the anti-abortion rights movement. Last fall, the conservative legal group Alliance Defending Freedom sued the FDA, insisting that federal regulators ignored critical safety concerns during the drug’s 23 years on the market.
Earlier this month, the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals ordered the FDA to roll back its rules on the drug — only allowing the drug to be given to patients up to seven weeks of pregnancy instead of 10 after three in-person doctor visits and prohibiting it from being mailed.
The Biden administration appealed, and Justice Samuel Alito issued an administrative five-day stay of the ruling — keeping the FDA’s current rules on the drug in place through the end of the day Wednesday until the high court has a chance to consider how to address the case.
If the Supreme Court decides to weigh in, it is expected the justices also would decide Wednesday whether to keep the 5th Circuit ruling on hold — preserving the status quo — while the legal challenge plays out.
Depending upon what the Supreme Court decides, access to the abortion pill could potentially be severely restricted or even eliminated, including in states where abortion is legal — at least until the case has a chance to wind its way through the legal process.
Complicating the issue is an opposing ruling by a federal judge in Washington who ordered the FDA to keep the drug on the market under its current rules. Danco Labs, which makes the brand-name version of the drug Mifeprex, said the dueling rulings if left unaddressed would create “regulatory chaos.”
The company also warns that if left in place, the 5th Circuit ruling would result in all doses of mifepristone being “misbranded” because the labeling would no longer comply with the approval standard.
Adjusting the drug’s labeling “could take months,” they say, resulting in a stop of production.
The 5th Circuit ruling also would invalidate the 2019 FDA approval of the generic version of the drug — an estimated two-thirds of the market.
(ROCKVILLE, Md.) — Three children have been hospitalized after falling sick when they found and ingested a container of what they thought to be candy.
The incident occurred on Monday when three 7-year-old students became sick at College Gardens Elementary School in Rockville, Maryland — approximately 15 miles north of Washington, D.C. — and went to the nurse complaining of dizziness, according to the Montgomery County Police Department.
“The investigation by detectives determined that a group of students found a container of blue items that they believed to be candy,” authorities said.
The three children went to the school nurse who subsequently called emergency medical services. The children were taken to a local area hospital as a precaution and treated there following the incident.
It is unclear if the container was found on school property or was found elsewhere.
While none of the items were recovered during the police investigation, “based on toxicology of some of the victims, investigators believe that the items may have been a methamphetamine related drug, such as Adderall or MDMA (ecstasy or Molly),” police said.
“I am relieved that the students will ultimately be fine, but in many ways, what happened today is frightening,” said Chief Marcus Jones. “I hope that it serves as a powerful motivator for parents to keep having the difficult conversations with their children about the dangers of taking or eating unknown substances.”
Authorities still aren’t completely sure what the students ingested on Monday but all three of the students have since been discharged from the hospital and are home with their parents.
The Montgomery County Police Department says the investigation into the incident is currently active and ongoing.
(ELGIN, Texas) — Two Texas cheerleaders were shot after one of them said they had mistakenly got into the wrong vehicle in a parking lot early Tuesday morning after practice, officials said.
Elgin Police Department officials said in a statement that a 25-year-old man was arrested for the shootings. ABC News affiliate KTRK-TV verified the information with Bastrop County authorities.
One of the victims was treated and released at the scene, the other was helicoptered to a hospital and is in critical condition, according to Elgin police.
Elgin Police said they arrested Tello Rodriguez Jr., 25, and charged him with deadly conduct, a third-degree felony.
Heather Roth, a cheerleader with the Woodlands Elite Cheer Co., said on Instagram Live that she and three other cheerleaders had completed practice when they went to a carpool lot just after midnight Tuesday.
Roth said she got out of her friend’s car and opened the door to a car she thought was her own, but a man was in the passenger seat. She said she got out of the car and back into her friend’s vehicle.
When the man approached their vehicle, Roth rolled down the window to apologize and the man started shooting, she later said.
(WASHINGTON) — Two key members of the far-right Proud Boys group testified Tuesday hoping to prove their innocence in the seditious conspiracy case against them for the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, while admitting some of their actions were wrong.
Zachary Rehl and Dominic Pezzola both acknowledged their wrongdoing when they breached the Capitol building on Jan. 6, 2021, during the riot.
“I basically trespassed through all the breaches,” Pezzola testified, describing how he pushed his way through multiple police lines before entering the building.
Pezzola, who also goes by the nickname “Spaz,” admitted to using a police officer’s riot shield to smash a Capitol building window and then trespassing in the building for more than 20 minutes.
Asked by his attorney why he decided to take the stand, Pezzola said, “to take responsibility” for what he did on Jan. 6 and explain that his co-defendants were not involved in many of his actions.
Pezzola and Rehl, along with three other Proud Boys leaders, are charged with seditious conspiracy against the United States, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding and actual obstruction of the 2020 election certification, as well as assaulting, resisting or impeding officers and destruction of government property.
Pezzola faces an additional charge of robbery for allegedly stealing the riot shield he used to smash the window. He denied the allegation on Tuesday, saying he got the shield from someone else.
Federal prosecutors seeking to discredit Rehl, president of the group’s Philadelphia chapter, presented video evidence that they suggested showed Rehl macing police at the Capitol on Jan. 6.
Over the course of his own testimony, Rehl repeatedly said under oath that he did not assault officers. He is not charged with assaulting officers with a chemical spray.
Asked directly by Assistant U.S. Attorney Erik Kenerson if he was “spraying at police officers,” Rehl responded: “Not that I recall.”
Kenerson showed the jury multiple camera angles of a person wearing what he suggested was identical attire to Rehl moving through the crowd. Rehl said he could not confirm the person was him. Images of the person were obscured and low resolution as Kenerson moved frame by frame through the sequence.
“It’s a really grainy video,” Rehl said, adding at one point that he could not “confirm or deny” the person was him.
Rehl has been testifying over the past week in the seditious conspiracy case against him. The jury trial has dragged on for months with a variety of tedious procedural hurdles since jury selection began in December.
Responding to questions from his attorney Carmen Hernandez last week, Rehl cast the Proud Boys as a rowdy social club — a stark contrast from prosecutors’ characterization of the group as a far-right militia intent on overthrowing the U.S. government.
“Yeah, we’d party … we’d go get lit,” Rehl said in reference to social gatherings the group had after attending a protest.
The parties at times were unrelated to any protests, Rehl said, referring to the group’s occasional travel to Las Vegas.
“We go out there and we just get trashed all weekend,” Rehl said. “We get drunk. We gamble. We meet other guys from other chapters. It’s a great time.”
To close out his testimony, Rehl apologized to members of the jury, “if you believe I did anything wrong that day.” He acknowledged he should not have entered the Capitol building and said it was a mistake to have smoked a cigarette in the building.
“It was a terrible day,” Rehl said. “A lot of bad stuff happened.”
(BOWDOIN, Maine) — A 34-year-old man has been arrested in connection to the deaths of four people who were found dead inside a home Tuesday, according to Maine State Police.
Police announced Tuesday evening that Joseph Eaton has been charged with the murder of the four victims.
“Investigators will be working throughout the night processing multiple scenes and continuing to interview people involved with this incident,” police said in a statement.
Eaton was sent to Two Bridges Regional Jail in Wiscasset and is expected to make an initial court appearance later this week, police said.
Four people were first found dead inside a home in Bowdoin, and a short time later, around 10:30 a.m., three people were shot while driving south on Interstate 295 in Yarmouth, police said. Authorities said the incidents were connected.
Maine State Police previously said there’s no threat to the public.
The interstate victims have been hospitalized. One person is in critical condition, police said.
The cause and manner of death of the four people found dead in Bowdoin have not yet been determined, according to police.
Netflix announced Tuesday that it would be sending its last red envelope on Sept. 29, 2023, ending its DVD mailing service after 25 years.
“Our goal has always been to provide the best service for our members but as the business continues to shrink that’s going to become increasingly difficult,” the company said in part of a statement shared with ABC News.
The now-ubiquitous streaming company began sending rented DVDs by mail in April 1998. Nearly a decade after its first disc was shipped out in a red envelope (that movie was Beetlejuice, by the way), the company introduced its online streaming and video service in 2007.
Since then, Netflix says it has sent over 5.2 billion mailer DVDs and accrued more than 230 million paid memberships for its streaming services. The company is currently valued at around $150 billion.
The move comes as the streaming giant continues to make its foray into producing and investing in original content. In March, Netflix won six major Oscars at the 95th Academy Awards, including best international feature for All Quiet on the Western Front and best animated feature film for Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio.
“We feel so privileged to have been able to share movie nights with our DVD members for so long, so proud of what our employees achieved and excited to continue pleasing entertainment fans for many more decades to come,” the company said in a statement on Tuesday, in part.
Netflix released its Q1 earnings report on April 18 at 6 p.m. ET.
Jonas Brothers stopped by NBC’s The Tonight Show on Tuesday to tackle a new segment called “Musical Stairs.”
Noting that a stairwell at 30 Rock, where The Tonight Show is taped, has great acoustics, host Jimmy Fallon thought it would be fun to do some kind of musical performance there. So, on Tuesday, the Brothers — featuring Joe Jonas and Nick Jonas trading lead vocals and Kevin Jonas playing acoustic guitar — were joined by members of Fallon’s house band The Roots for a stripped-down version of “Waffle House,” the second single off the band’s upcoming collection, The Album.
The Jonas Brothers previously joined Jimmy and The Roots for a performance of their hit “Sucker” played with classroom instruments back in 2019.
The Album, also featuring the first single “Wings,” is due out May 12.
White Reaper and KennyHoopla have joined the bill to support select dates on the “All the Small Things” trio’s upcoming North American trek.
Other newly added openers include Travis Barker‘s son, Landon Barker, Beauty School Dropout and Destroy Boys.
The North American dates kick off May 4 in St. Paul, Minnesota. The bill also includes the previously announced Turnstile.
Blink performed at Coachella Friday, April 14, marking their first show with Tom DeLonge back in the band since 2014. DeLonge rejoined Blink at the end of 2022 after parting the ways with the group in 2015.
Issa Rae appears in the upcoming film Barbie, but she’s staying quiet about details and her role in the movie. Speaking to People earlier this week, she says she’s taking the back seat just to be safe.
“I can’t confirm or deny anything,” she responded when asked if she plays President Barbie in the film. “You’re not about to get me in trouble. I’m going to let Greta [Gerwig] and Margot [Robbie] take the lead, and I’m shutting the f*** up and sitting back.”
Issa did, however, reveal what it was like to work with Greta, the director of the film.
“I’m such a fan, and the fact that she thought about me for this, I just feel super honored,” she said. “It was such a fun project to be a part of. I’m shouting it from the rooftops.”
Issa added that “it’s been amazing” to see fans’ reactions to the forthcoming comedy, noting, “I’m super, super excited that people are excited, and I’m just sitting back waiting for it all to come out.”
Barbie, which also stars Ryan Gosling, Dua Lipa, Alexandra Shipp, America Ferrera, Helen Mirren and more, premieres in theaters on July 21. Issa thinks fans should “go in and enjoy it as is without too many expectations.”
