(NEW YORK) — Thirty-three swimmers are being accused of “pursuing, corralling, and harassing” a pod of dolphins in Hōnaunau Bay on Sunday, Hawaii’s division of Division of Conservation and Resources Enforcement said on Tuesday.
Harassment cases were opened against each of the swimmers, who were not identified by name, Hawaiian officials said in a press release.
Officials released video and photos taken from a drone, which they said showed the harassment. Authorities were waiting onshore for the swimmers when they left the water.
Hawaii’s Division of Conservation and Resources Enforcement and the NOAA Office of Law Enforcement are investigating, according to the statement.
Officials in the Aloha State earlier this month announced a similar investigation into a man who refers to himself as “Dolphin Dave.” Officials said he was caught repeatedly harassing a humpback whale and a pod of dolphins during a snorkeling trip.
Metalheads rejoiced when Megadeth reunited with Marty Friedman for a few songs during their concert at Tokyo’s famed Budokan venue in February, marking the first time the guitarist has played with the thrash legends in 23 years. As Friedman tells ABC Audio, he and Dave Mustaine may have been just as excited, if not more so.
“Playing the Budokan was a dream for me, it was a dream for Dave Mustaine, it was a dream for Megadeth,” Friedman shares. “I always wanted to do it together with those guys, and it finally happened, and it happened in really the best way it possibly could.”
As a longtime resident of Japan, Friedman has a special reverence for Budokan.
“Budokan is not the biggest venue in Japan, but it’s very prestigious,” Friedman explains. “For Megadeth to continue their career to a point where they’re able to play Budokan and sell it out … I’m very proud to be part of that legacy.”
Since living in Japan, Friedman’s played Budokan seven times, though he puts the Megadeth show above all the rest.
“There was just so much hope for me and Mustaine to do this someday, even since the ’90s,” Friedman says. “To finally do it in good health and the band running on all 20 cylinders, it was just great.”
It remains to be seen whether the Budokan performance will lead to further reunions between Megadeth and Friedman, but he and Mustaine did send each other “the coolest emails” after the show.
“Just like high school kids after playing a really good gig,” Friedman says. “It was awesome.”
Friedman is currently touring the U.S. solo while opening for Queensrÿche.
Fans may have fallen in love with Megan Moroney‘s debut single, “Tennessee Orange,” but the song was not one her mom loved the first time she heard it.
“Mama” was shocked that her Georgia daughter actually wore a T-shirt representing another state.
“I wrote the song. I sent it to my mom and she immediately called me and was like, ‘What’s going on? Tell me, tell me the story is not true.’ But yeah, Georgia girl and wearing Tennessee. Disappointing a little bit,” Megan recalls with a laugh.
Her mom’s reaction, however, did not surprise her. In fact, it served as the inspiration for “Tennessee Orange.”
“I had on a Tennessee shirt and when I put it on, I had not — I’m a Georgia girl, so I’ve never worn an Alabama shirt. I’ve never worn a Florida Gators shirt, Tennessee shirt, never put any of those on,” Megan recalls. “And I had a Tennessee shirt on and … I looked in the mirror and I was like, ‘My mother would be very disappointed in me right now.’ And I knew since it evoked such a strong emotion for me that I could write a song about it.”
“Tennessee Orange” is currently number 16 and rising on the country charts.
As a busy businesswoman, artist and mom, Katy Perry doesn’t seem to be the type to be throwing back the booze — but it turns out she’s been dry for five weeks now, and she’s hurting.
Katy attended a cocktail event earlier this week in New York City with fellow American Idol judges Luke Bryan and Lionel Richie, but as People reports, she didn’t partake because she promised her fiancéOrlando Bloom that she’d stay sober for a specific amount of time.
“I’ve been sober for five weeks today… I’ve been doing a pact with my partner, and I want to quit,” Katy told People. When Luke asked her if she was caving, she responded, “No, girl! I can’t cave. I made a promise. Three months.”
Conveniently, Katy has her own line of non-alcoholic beverages, De Soi, so that’s what she drank at the event.
During her time in New York, Katy also took in a performance of the Broadway musical & Juliet. The show is a retelling of the story of Romeo & Juliet, featuring pop hits written or co-written by legendary songwriter Max Martin. Among those songs are Katy’s own “Roar” and “I Kissed a Girl.”
The Zombies are set to release their new album, Different Game, on Friday, but it may have been out earlier if the pandemic hadn’t gotten in the way.
Lead singer Colin Blunstone says the making of the album was “an interesting adventure” for the band because they started working on it before the pandemic. While some artists made records over Zoom during lockdowns, that wasn’t what they were going for.
“We’d already decided that we wanted to record it with everyone in the studio at the same time,” Blunstone tells ABC Audio. “With the pandemic, it made it very, very difficult and so I think this album’s taken two or three years. To be quite honest, I’ve lost track of time.”
Blunstone says it was important for the band to be together while recording, explaining, “We feel that there’s an energy in the studio when we’re all there playing together that isn’t there if we’re playing separately.”
He says he will “sing differently” when he’s in the studio with other musicians playing live, which gives a different feel to the record. He notes, “You can almost say this is very close to a live album but recorded in a studio environment.”
Are you living up to your true potential in life? And what is your true potential anyway? Those are some of the big questions asked in the new Apple TV+ series The Big Door Prize, debuting Wednesday.
In the series, Chris O’Dowd and Gabrielle Dennis play a husband and wife who live in a small town, when a mysterious machine appears that can print out a card telling you who you’re supposed to be.
“This machine arrives in the small town with the promise that it’s going to tell everybody what their true life potential is,” O’Dowd tells ABC Audio. “And for me, the conceit of the show is that we can so easily be led by a big idea, whether it be good or bad.”
“It’s not destiny, it’s potential,” he explains. “So you have to make it happen, being the difference.”
O’Dowd adds that people who reevaluated their lives during the pandemic may find the show especially relevant, noting, “the idea that let’s just have another go at it, folks. It didn’t work out the first 40 years, let’s do something entirely different.”
As for whether the show’s stars feel about the machine, Dennis shares that she’s wanted to be an actress since she was 4, and doesn’t really need a machine to tell her that.
“Of course, if I were to pull a card and it said something completely different, it would throw me so out of whack,” she admits. “And I think that is the struggle that a lot of people are going to ask that question when they watch…but if for nothing else, it just makes for great conversation in like you’re in this dream space of like the coulda shoulda woulda’s of life, right?”
(NEW YORK) — Here are the scores from Tuesday’s sports events:
MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL SPRING TRAINING
INTERLEAGUE
Washington 3, NY Yankees 0
Philadelphia 6, Toronto 5
Minnesota 7, Pittsburgh 5
Atlanta 7, Boston 5
Chi Cubs 8, Chi White Sox 5
Arizona 3, Cleveland 1
LA Angels 13, LA Dodgers 5
AMERICAN LEAGUE
Texas 5, Kansas City 3
Houston 5, Sugar Land 1
NATIONAL LEAGUE
Milwaukee 8, Colorado 1
NATIONAL BASKETBALL ASSOCIATION
Golden State 120, New Orleans 109
Washington 130, Boston 111
Toronto 106, Miami 92
Atlanta 120, Cleveland 118
Memphis 113, Orlando 108
Charlotte 137, Oklahoma City 134
NATIONAL HOCKEY LEAGUE
Edmonton 7, Vegas 4
San Jose 3, Winnipeg 0
Philadelphia 3, Montreal 2
NY Rangers 6, Columbus 2
Tampa Bay 4, Carolina 0
Nashville 2, Boston 1
Detroit 7, Pittsburgh 4
St. Louis 6, Vancouver 5 (OT)
Dallas 4, Chicago 1
Calgary 2, Los Angeles 1
(PHILADELPHIA) — Residents in Philadelphia can safely drink the water following a nearby chemical spill, the city’s water department said Tuesday evening.
The Philadelphia Department of Water declared that the water is “safe to drink and use” and that the drinking water wasn’t affected by Friday’s chemical spill in Bucks County.
Last week, the city recommended residents use bottled water “out of an abundance of caution” after a pipe ruptured at a chemical plant on Friday.
Philadelphia lifted its advisories monitoring the Baxter Drinking Water Treatment Plant, officials said.
Mayor Jim Keeney also announced the news on Twitter Tuesday, saying that Philadelphia worked quickly to deal with the situation.
“I’m grateful that no residents were exposed to unsafe chemicals in the city’s tap water following the spill,” Keeney said. “This is a result of the swift action, caution and preparedness of @PhiladelphiaGov and partners and our commitment to ensuring the well-being and health of all residents.”
An estimated 8,100 gallons of latex finishing material, a water-soluble acrylic polymer solution, was released into Otter Creek in Bristol, Pennsylvania, on Friday.
“It’s like the material you find in paint,” said senior vice president of manufacturing and engineering at Trinseo, Tim Thomas, according to ABC Philadelphia station WPVI. “It’s your typical acrylic paint you have in your house, that’s what really this material is, in a water base.”
According to the city, contaminants were never found in the city’s water supply at “any point since the spill.”
While residents in Philadelphia did not have their water contaminated, other cities have had ongoing water issues.
Historic flooding and freezing temperatures in Mississippi damaged Jackson’s water distribution system last year, resulting in boil-water notices or no running water for weeks at a time.
In September, Baltimore urged residents to boil their water after E. coli was discovered in West Baltimore. Over 1,500 people were affected by the advisory, as well as several local area schools.
ABC News’ Matt Foster and Julia Jacobo contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — While the nation’s latest mass shooting at a private school in Nashville, Tennessee, seems sadly all too familiar — so, too, are the now routine responses from congressional lawmakers of both parties.
Despite shock over more schoolchildren being gunned down by a mass shooter, politicians in Washington quickly returned to arguments that have become standards in a deadlocked debate.
Even President Joe Biden seemed resigned, telling reporters Tuesday he “can’t do anything except plead with the Congress to act reasonably.”
“Don’t tell me we can’t do more together,” Biden added later, sounding more hopeful at an event in North Carolina. “I again call on Congress to pass the assault weapons ban, pass it. That should not be a partisan issue. It’s a commonsense issue. We have to act now.”
He added, “People say, ‘Why do I keep saying this if it not happening?’ Because I want you to know who isn’t doing it — who isn’t helping — to put pressure on them,” referring to the GOP.
Democrats like Biden once again called on what they refer to as “reasonable Republicans” to join them in passing more gun safety measures while Republicans once again slammed Democrats for trying to exploit the tragedy for political purposes.
Republicans, avoiding or dismissing questions about new restrictions on assault weapons, instead advocated for ramping up school security. More and more they cite “mental health” as the real problem and called for prayer, not gun bans.
“The first thing in any kind of tragedy is I pray. I pray for the victims. I pray for the families. I get really angry when people try to politicize it for their own personal agenda, especially when we don’t even know the facts,” House Majority Leader Rep. Steve Scalise said Tuesday.
“Let’s work to see if there’s something that we can do to help secure schools,” he continued. “It just seems like on the other side, all they want to do is take guns away from law-abiding citizens before they even know the facts.”
“We’ve talked about the need to improve mental health in this country, and that’s been a driver of a lot of these shootings as well,” Scalise added, hitting many GOP talking points.
Senate GOP leaders were asked Tuesday afternoon if Republicans “risk looking out of step” when a majority of the country supports reforming federal law around guns.
Sen. John Thune of South Dakota echoed Scalise, deeming any discussion of new gun safety legislation “premature.”
“Our thoughts are with the families, the victims with the community. We are grateful for the quick rapid response of law enforcement, and I think with respect to any discussion of legislation, it’s premature. There’s an ongoing investigation. And I think we need to let the facts come out,” he said.
When a reporter followed up by citing the number of mass shootings already this year, Thune deflected.
“When we get the facts in from this current investigation, we’ll have a better assessment of that — but I think right now, it’s just premature to talk about it. And I think there are a lot of grieving, hurting families in Nashville,” he said.
Democrats, at the same time, attacked Republicans, claiming they place more importance on keeping widespread access to assault weapons than on protecting kids at school.
“It’s an outrage that we can’t find a handful of Republicans willing to put people over extremism on the far right,” said Rep. Pete Aguilar, D-Calif., following Scalise’s press conference. “The fact that the talking points Republicans use today are exactly the same that they used in December of 2012. It’s alarming. It’s disappointing. It’s just sad. And that’s just who the Republican Party is today,” he added.
As of Tuesday afternoon, there were no known new bipartisan discussions on gun safety in Washington — and there’s little appetite for such a move as Republicans hold a majority in the House. In the Senate, Democrats would need at least 10 Republicans to join them in order to pass meaningful reform.
The last major action from Congress on gun reform was last June, just over a month after the deadly Uvalde School shooting that left 19 students and two teachers dead. While it was nowhere near what Democrats or Biden had hoped for — with provisions like universal background checks left out — the legislation’s passage broke a decades-long stalemate in Congress.
Texas Sen. John Cornyn, a key negotiator in last year’s bipartisan effort, told CNN on Monday that, in his view, any new congressional action is not in the picture.
“I would say we have gone about as far as we can go — unless somebody identifies some area we didn’t address, but the president just keeps coming back to the same old tired talking points,” Cornyn said. “So he’s not offering any new solutions or ideas. If he does, I think we should consider them, but so far, I haven’t heard anything.”
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre called the response “devastating.”
“What do you say to those parents? What do you say to those families? You can’t say to them there’s nothing else that can be done. That’s not what their job is as legislators,” she said on ABC’s “GMA3.”
So why does Congress seem so unable to agree when Americans are demanding something be done?
Adzi Vokhiwa, federal affairs director at Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence, blamed the power of the gun lobby — including major campaign contributions from the National Rifle Association — for keeping lawmakers from considering more gun safety measures popular with Americans, such as universal background checks.
“Unfortunately, we do seem to see Republicans kind of parroting the talking points of the gun lobby. ‘Guns are not to blame. People are to blame,’ but the evidence shows us that our country’s gun violence epidemic is so unique because we have so few restrictions on access to guns,” Vokhiwa told ABC News. “They’re common sense, but a lot of Republicans just continue to be beholden to the gun lobby, which doesn’t want to enact any sort of law that would impact their profit margin.”
Vokhiwa said because assault weapons have a particularly devastating effect in a mass shooting scenario, “that’s why so many people in the gun safety movement really coalesce around that — why the president coalesces around that — and there’s certainly more work to do in terms of getting support in Congress.”
But, she said, “There are other policy proposals that would be just as, if not more impactful, than an assault weapons ban that do have broad support — like background checks, like extreme risk laws, like safe storage. So, even if we’re not at the point where we can pass an assault weapons ban, there are a lot of other things that we could do that would save lives from gun violence.”
An ABC News/Washington Post poll conducted in September 2019 found 89% of Americans support universal background checks and 86% support red flag laws. The poll found broad bipartisan support, as well; mandatory background checks and red flag laws won support from at least eight in 10 Republicans and conservatives, and as many or more of all others.
Another ABC News/Washington Post poll released in February found the public more divided over assault weapons with 47% supporting such a ban and 51% opposing it — reflecting a nine-point drop in support since 2019.
“Thoughts and prayers are far from our only option when it comes to addressing our gun violence crisis,” Vokhiwa added. “And I think the American people will hold Republicans accountable if they continue to refuse to act and if they value the gun lobby’s profit margin over the lives of American children in schools.”
Ultimately, she said, “As long as we have this divided Congress, it’ll be really hard to get something passed.”
One indication of how far apart lawmakers are is a bill introduced last month by Republican Rep. Barry Moore of Alabama to make the AR-15 assault-style weapon the “National Gun of America.”
Fellow House Republicans Rep. Lauren Boebert and George Santos were seen wearing AR-15 lapel pins.
(WASHINGTON) — Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin warned Tuesday that military readiness could be impaired by the growing list of senior military nominations being blocked by Alabama Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville over his opposition to a Pentagon abortion policy.
“Not approving the recommendation for promotions actually creates a ripple effect with the force that makes us far less ready than we need to be,” Austin said responding to a question from Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Jack Reed, D-R.I., during a hearing on the Pentagon’s defense budget.
Tuberville has been blocking military nominations since last month, over a Pentagon policy that covers the travel costs of service members seeking abortions in states outside of where they are stationed if their base is located in a state that bans the procedure.
Austin spoke directly to Tuberville at the hearing over the military’s need to promote officials during “one of the most complex times” seen in recent years.
“I really implore you to reconsider and allow our nominations to move forward. It will make a significant difference for our force,” Austin said.
After the hearing, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D, N.Y., lambasted Tuberville for blocking the Pentagon promotions.
“GOP Senator Tuberville is inflicting unnecessary damage to our military by blocking the promotion of 160 officers,” Schumer said in a tweet.
“For what? So he can push the MAGA hard line on blocking women’s choice? Women in the military are more than capable of making their own healthcare decisions,” Schumer said.
“We’re in a situation now where we are beginning to see critical positions that are in jeopardy of not being filled,” Reed added.
“If this continues, we will have within a few months, no leadership in significant [parts of the military]. In fact, almost the entire Department of Defense will have acting people, will have temporary people, and we need leadership right now,” he said.
Tuberville remained steadfast in opposition, arguing the policy was implemented without input from Congress.
“Y’all got the American taxpayer on the hook to pay for travel and time off for selective abortions. And you did not make this with anybody in this room. Or Congress taking a vote. In fact, this contradicts what Congress has actually voted for,” he said.
“I’m not going to let our military be politicized. I want our military to be the strongest and the deadliest it has ever been. But I also want the administration to follow the law. As long as I have a voice in this body, Congress will write the laws. Not the secretary of defense, not the Joint Chiefs,” he said.
Austin said his decision was based on “strong legal ground,” although he agreed to cooperate with Congress.
“Almost one in five of our troops are women. And they don’t get a chance to choose where their station, so almost 80,000 of our women are stationed in places that where they don’t have access to non-covered reproductive health care,” Austin said.
“And I heard from our troops, I heard from our senior leaders, I heard from our chiefs, and also our secretaries and this policy is based on strong legal grounds. And it is not a law. It is a policy. And so, you know, we obviously don’t pass laws in the Department of Defense,” Austin said. “But again, I assure you that we have great respect for this body, Congress, and we will do everything within our power to make sure that we continue to work with Congress.”
Tuberville’s hold on nominations may also have an impact on the process to pick a successor to Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark A. Milley whose tenure ends Sept. 30.
No name has been put forward yet for Milley’s replacement but it’s strongly believed that the two leading contenders are Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. C.Q. Brown and Gen. David Berger, the commandant of the Marine Corps.
