While presenting gifts to families at his annual Grant-A-Wish event in Georgia, 21 Savage received a special gift from the state. According to TMZ, the rapper now has his very own day, 21 Savage Day, set to be celebrated annually on December 21.
Billy Mitchell, a Georgia State representative, held the proclamation ceremony during the event, which saw 21 and his Leading By Example Foundation distribute gifts and snacks to 100 local parents and their children. Mitchell presented the rapper with a certificate honoring his humanitarian efforts, which include teaching underserved youth about financial literacy via his 21 Savage Bank Account campaign.
“Growing up in Atlanta, the hustling energy just rubs off on you,” the rapper previously said. “Financial literacy is important because that’s one of the main things that you need to operate and be successful as an adult. I just wanted to come up with something that could help kids understand what to do with that money.”
Note Language) As previously reported, Journey’s Neal Schon hit his bandmate Jonathan Cain with a cease-and-desist letter over Cain’s recent performance of “Don’t Stop Believin’” at Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate. Well, now Cain has responded.
“Schon is just frustrated that he keeps losing in court and is now falsely claiming the song has been used at political rallies,” reads the statement issued by Cain’s spokesperson.
But Schon has already fought back against that argument. “Now he’s claiming I keep loosing in court ?!? Inf******sane,” he tweeted. “Get off the kool-Aid. Wow lies after lies. I’ve won 1 case in court with Cain and the residing one has not been heard yet.”
Schon also took to social media to defend his actions. First, the guitarist shared a written excerpt from an earlier report showing the band’s former frontman, Steve Perry, who co-wrote “Don’t Stop Believin’” with Schon and Cain, did not want their music used for political purposes. He noted Perry tweeted that he didn’t give permission for the song to be used by any political candidate. Shon commented, “Well Steve and I agree on this.”
He followed that up with an audio clip of an interview with Cain, where he seemed to agree with that idea, noting, “Have a listen right around 9:25mins. Jonathan Cain himself talking about politics and religion not a good idea with our music. One word -hypocrite.”
Kevin Mazur/Getty Images for The Recording Academy
CBS aired a special Grammy tribute to Paul Simon Wednesday, featuring a host of artists performing some classic Simon tunes.
Homeward Bound: A GRAMMY Salute to the Songs of Paul Simon was filmed back in April at the Hollywood Pantages Theater and had Simon being serenaded by the likes of Dave Matthews, Jonas Brothers, Garth Brooks and Trisha Yearwood.
Among the highlights: Matthews teamed up with Angelique Kidjo for a rousing rendition of “You Can Call Me Al,” along with “Under African Skies,” while Take 6 sang the a cappella tune “Homeless,” which received high praise from Simon himself. Also, Jonas Brothers performed “50 Ways To Leave Your Lover,” Sting performed “America,” Garth and Trisha duetted on “The Boxer,” and Susanna Hoffs was on hand to perform The Bangles’ cover of Simon’s “Hazy Shade of Winter.”
Among the other performances: Stevie Wonder was joined by Sheila E, Jonas Brothers and Ledisi to perform “Mrs. Robinson,” then partnered with Ledisi for “Bridge Over Troubled Waters.” Bonnie Raitt and Brad Paisley performed “Something So Right”; Jimmy Cliff and Shaggy teamed up for “Mother and Child Reunion”; Billy Porter and Take 6 performed “Love Me Like A Rock”; and Eric Church performed “Homeward Bound.”
The night ended with a performance by Simon. He started off with “Graceland,” then brought out Rhiannon Giddens for a powerful performance of “American Tune.” He then ended the night with the classic “The Sound of Silence.”
On Thursday, Peacock launches The Best Man: The Final Chapters, the continuing story of Lance, Shelby, Jordan, Harper, Quentin and the rest of the friends from the hit Best Man films, which started in 1999.
The eight-episode series reunites Morris Chestnut, Terrence Howard, Melissa De Souza, Sanaa Lathan, Harold Perrineau, Regina Hall, Nia Longand Taye Diggs with the franchise’s director, Malcolm D. Lee, and follows the beloved friend group as they navigate middle age.
Long, reprising as Jordan, tells ABC Audio she’s touched the fans’ love kept the series alive. “I feel really humbled by it,” she expresses. “And I also feel like there’s a whole group of men and women that grew up with us. So as we’re having these sorts of ups and downs and experiences outside of playing the characters, so are they.”
Diggs, who plays Harper, agrees, calling the return “seamless.”
“It was weird because whenever we were doing the first, second and third installment, there was always something going on in my life that was very similar to what the character was going through,” Taye says. “So it’s always been kind of easy.”
Howard, who plays Quentin, got emotional about the entire cast returning. “You think about how fortunate we are to be able to come together this late in the game. The year I was nominated for Best Actor, Heath Ledger was nominated. And Philip Seymour Hoffman was also nominated that year. They’re not here anymore. These are the people that was my counterparts. And the likelihood that 20, 25 years later, all eight of us would still be here, still ready to go and do the thing? My God.”
Demi Moore is embracing her daughter’s journey to motherhood and celebrating milestones along the way with her.
In an Instagram post on Wednesday, the actress and author shared a photo of her and her daughters at Rumer Willis‘ ultrasound appointment. Daughters Tallulah Willis and Scout LaRue Willis are also in the photo and are all smiles as Rumer shows off her baby bump.
“Saying hello to the little nibblet!!” Moore wrote in the caption. “It’s an honor to witness your journey into motherhood, and can’t wait to welcome this baby in to the world!”
Rumer replied to her mom’s post, “So grateful for my incredible lineage of women in my family. I love you all so much. This baby is so lucky to have you guys.”
Rumer Willis, 34, announced the news of her pregnancy Tuesday on Instagram with a sweet photo of her baby bump. This will be her first baby with her boyfriend, musician Derek Richard Thomas. Rumer Willis’ baby will also be the first grandchild for her parents, Moore and Bruce Willis.
Moore shared her daughter’s photos Wednesday on Instagram and wrote in the caption, “Entering my hot kooky unhinged grandma era.”
Bruce Willis also has two daughters with his wife, Emma Heming Willis: 8-year-old Evelyn Penn and 10-year-old Mabel Ray.
Last week, Moore shared photos of their blended family celebrating the holidays together.
In November, Rumer made her relationship with Thomas official by sharing photos of the both of them during a fall photoshoot.
2022 has been a breakthrough year for Armani White: he released his smash hit “Billie Eilish,” signed a deal with Def Jam Recordings and performed at the BET Hip Hop Awards, the Made in America Festival, Rolling Loud NY and Jingle Ball. With much accomplished, the star told ABC Audio that he may take a short break, but “probably just for Christmas.”
“It might just be one of those things where I get to hang out for the day and then right back to work,” he said. After all, he has a lot more he wants to get done.
White says he “wanted to have the biggest song of the year” in 2022, which he believes he’s accomplished with “Billie Eilish.” The success of the single has changed his life, making him familiar to a lot more people.
“I can’t go to the grocery store anymore,” he said when asked how his life has changed in the past year. “That’s been the biggest, the biggest pivot in my life is, like, I walk in, they’re like, ‘I know you.'”
Armani’s 2023 goal is even bigger, but he’s confident he can get it done. “I want to just be the biggest artist of next year,” he expressed. “And I don’t know, I think, like, if I did the last one, I think I could do this one.”
‘Tis the season for Christmas movies, and different country stars have different favorites when it comes to cozying up in front of the TV.
Keith Urban favors the classics: “I love A Christmas Story, that’s a good one, and It’s a Wonderful Life, of course,” the singer says in an interview with his label, adding that the latter film inspired him to name one of the musical instruments he plays year-round.
“One of my main guitars is called Clarence, and it’s named after the angel [in It’s a Wonderful Life],” the singer adds.
But not every singer opts for the traditional holiday films. Jon Pardi prefers a movie that’s a little bit raunchier, he reveals.
“Bad Santa’s pretty good,” the singer tells his label, but says he’s got a tamer selection if there are “little cousins” around while the movie’s on.
“Elf is pretty much probably one of the funniest Christmas movies to ever be that new and beat out all of the old Christmas movies,” the star goes on to say. “It is definitely up there.”
This Christmas might be Jon’s last chance to watch Bad Santa for a while. The singer and his wife, Summer, are currently expecting their first child — a baby girl — who is due in early 2023.
(NEW YORK) — Workers at Amazon and Starbucks astonished allies and adversaries this year, delivering landmark labor victories and helping inspire a resurgence of unionization nationwide.
But labor headway at the two companies has stagnated in recent months, jeopardizing the ultimate success of the campaigns and casting the continued growth of the labor movement into doubt.
The downshift in momentum at Amazon and Starbucks owes primarily to the anti-union postures and deep pockets of the corporations, labor experts told ABC News.
The setbacks could deter workers inside and outside those companies from organizing their workplaces, as they weigh the risks of confronting their bosses against the potential rewards, they said. Still, the labor movement remains galvanized by sky-high prices, a tight jobs market and near-historic public approval that should enable continued growth next year, the experts said.
“The workers are stalled at Amazon and at Starbucks,” Nelson Lichtenstein, director of the Center for the Study of Work, Labor and Democracy at the University of California, Santa Barbara, told ABC News. “The companies have a plethora of legal and administrative techniques at their command, and their greatest weapon is delay.”
Despite the challenges faced by headline-grabbing union campaigns, the surge of U.S. labor organizing will persist, he said.
“Inflation has created real pressure on people and a real sense of collective action,” he said.
In the spring, a worker-led independent group unionized a 6,000-employee Amazon warehouse in Staten Island, New York, the first-ever U.S. union at the company in its history. Since then, however, the Amazon Labor Union, or ALU, has lost two consecutive union elections at other facilities; and certification of the Staten Island victory remains tied up in legal challenges.
“There are going to be ups and downs,” said Seth Goldstein, a lawyer at Julien, Mirer & Singla, who represents the ALU. “It’s a marathon.”
Starbucks workers, meanwhile, unionized more than 260 stores this year but the pace of union elections has fallen significantly and workers have yet to sign a union contract at a single location.
Over the first half of 2022, the National Labor Relations Board received union election petitions from an average of 47 Starbucks stores per month; but over five months ending in November, that election rate dwindled to 11 stores per month, according to data from the NLRB, a federal agency that oversees union elections.
Neither Amazon nor Starbucks responded to a request for comment.
“One of the big effects of Amazon and to some extent Starbucks organizing is it has encouraged other workers to raise their voices and think, ‘oh gee, maybe a union works for us, let’s try to get one,'” Thomas Kochan, a labor researcher and professor emeritus at the MIT Sloan School of Management’s Institute for Work and Employment Research, told ABC News.
“Workers are now looking around and saying, what’s the use of that?” he added. “If they can’t get a contract why should we go through with all this?”
Defying the apparent loss of momentum at Starbucks and Amazon in recent months, however, a surge in union organizing across the economy has sustained itself.
Over a year-long period ending in September, petitions for union representation jumped 53%, NLRB data showed. Moreover, this year labor unions reached their highest level of public support in the U.S. since 1965, a Gallup poll showed.
The resurgence of union organizing is especially stark in light of a decades-long labor decline that brought the private sector union rate to a record low of about 6% last year, government data showed.
Sara Beth Ryther, an employee at a Trader Joe’s in Minneapolis that unionized in August, said workers at the store draw inspiration from the campaigns at Starbucks stores nearby.
“When we go to Starbucks stores that are unionized around us, we see actions being taken in the workplace and we read about them in the newspaper,” she said. “I think it’s preserving this energy in a way that maybe hasn’t been the case in the past.”
“It’s really important for folks to know how unified many of these labor movements are,” she added.
Across the economy, the sense of company neglect for worker well-being that gave rise to pandemic-era organizing has continued to drive action, Michelle Eisen, a Starbucks employee at a store in Buffalo, New York that organized in December, told ABC News.
Eisen acknowledged setbacks faced by workers nationwide in the Starbucks campaign, citing anti-union efforts undertaken by the company. While those tactics may have dissuaded some workers, they’ve motivated others, she said.
“There’s always a chance some people will say, ‘You know what, this is exhausting and I can’t keep doing this,” said Eisen, a spokesperson for Starbucks Workers United, a labor union. “But I think what we’re seeing is more people willing to fight anyway.”
Three-time Tony winner Patti LuPone will be joining the cast of the upcoming WandaVision spin-off series, Agatha: Coven of Chaos, Deadline reports. LuPone joins Kathryn Hahn, who is reprising her role as Agatha Harkness, and Emma Caulfield Ford, who is expected to reprise her role of Dottie from WandaVision. The new Disney+ series also includes Joe Locke, Aubrey Plaza, Ali Ahn and Maria Dizzia…
Bravo dropped a sneak peek of season 13 of The Real Housewives of New Jersey Wednesday. In addition to covering Teresa Giudice‘s extravagant wedding to Louie Ruelas,the three-and-a-half minute clip teases fights involving fellow cast members Melissa Gorga, Joe Gorga, Frank and Dolores Catania, Margaret Josephs, and Dr. Bill Aydin and Jennifer Aydin. Viewers also get a glimpse at two new cast members — Danielle Cabral and Rachel Fuda. RHONJ season 13 premieres February 7…
(NEW YORK) — Sal, a U.S. Customs and Border Protection employee, was going through a difficult time in his life when he first started at the agency. His mother was being physically abused by her partner, he said — and that was the tipping point.
“So one day at work … I’m just pacing back and forth and I have a miserable look on my face,” Sal, who was not identified by his last name, said during a Customs and Border Protection (CBP) podcast in September 2021. “And someone overheard me say, ‘I want to eat my own gun.'”
His life was saved, he recalled, after a coworker noticed that he wasn’t doing well and called to check in on him. His supervisors came to his apartment and made the decision to take his firearm away, helping him get the help he needed.
He was put on light duty and was able to attend counseling sessions, with people who checked in on him regularly, he said.
On the CBP podcast, Sal said that he and others worried their personal struggles could be a professional liability.
“The big thing is a lot of officers, they think that if they get depressed or they’re going through a difficult time that they can lose their job or that they’re going to be embarrassed,” he said. “And the entire time, that wasn’t the case. If anything, my situation got 10 times better at work because of this.”
He called it a “silver lining.”
“You’re not going to lose your job because you’re going through a difficult time. And there is nothing to be embarrassed about because, I don’t care how much money you have or what your job is or, you know, anything that you do in life — everybody gets depressed. Whether you’re the president of the United States, the biggest rock star in the world, you’re a surgeon. It doesn’t matter,” he said last year. “Everybody gets depressed.”
Though Sal was saved from his crisis, this year saw the most Customs and Border Protection agents die by suicide since 2009 — a total of 14.
CBP Executive Assistant Commissioner Benjamine “Carry” Huffman told ABC News the situation was “concerning” and that he believes there isn’t one factor that’s contributing to the increase in suicides.
Both he and a doctor at the agency, however, highlighted problems with stigma around mental health and the need to encourage officers to get help.
“Law enforcement is a challenging profession,” Huffman said.
“The things that we face and things that we do on a day-to-day basis, that we ask our workforce to do, is very difficult. Whatever crisis the nation is facing, we face it first. Whether it’s this big surge of migrants, whether it’s dealing with the first contact with people with COVID or other disease or whatever is going on. We’re the ones that come see it first, and those things are all contributing factors,” he said.
Huffman said the agency is hoping to destigmatize seeking help when people aren’t feeling well enough to work, including if they are dealing with mental health issues — the very outreach that Sal said last year had helped him. Huffman said he has held 60 town halls over the past year with the CBP workforce.
“We have a culture of toughness,” he explained. “We ask our people to do dangerous things in dangerous places, go places where other people won’t go, do things they won’t do to keep Americans safe.”
The downside, he said, is that sometimes that toughness “deters” people from reaching out — something he said he is trying to change. When an agent breaks their leg or gets a physical injury, they go on leave to get better; and Huffman said there is no difference with mental health.
“If you have some sort of a mental crisis, we need to change the culture where we have that same thought process: You get the help you need to get it fixed, you get back from job and you’re good to go,” he said. “That’s the message we’re trying to say is it’s no different between those things — getting a physical injury or a mental injury — and treat them the same way and just have that same acceptance of your peers.”
The way the agency handled such issues in the past, he said, sometimes made the situation worse. Now, though, officials are trying to empower their officers.
Huffman said the influx of migrants along the southwest border isn’t going to impact the way CBP handles officer suicides, and they are offering the same help as they did before.
CBP is one of the only federal law enforcement agencies to have a suicidologist on staff. His name is Dr. Kent Corso.
“Culture change is by far the biggest challenge,” Corso told ABC News. “And some of the things we’re doing about that [are] we are hiring over a dozen operational psychologists. So these are specialists who are there to help consult with management, with employees. We have a new process in place, a policy that has come out of the commissioner’s office, that teaches managers how to slow the process down.”
When new recruits are at the academy, CBP officials work to make sure to let them know that it is OK to not be OK — part of the shift Corso and Huffman talked about.
Corso said the work environment is contributing to some of the challenges officers are facing.
“The last few years have been unprecedented,” he said, adding, “There are many changes going on. There is high unpredictability. And what we know from the psychology research is that when things become less predictable — that is to say, people perceive less control — it’s just more stressful. Add on to that the idea that everybody’s watching the border, it’s a bit of a fishbowl, if you will, that just makes things difficult.”
