The official social media platforms for Star Wars posted a unified message of support for Obi-Wan Kenobi star Moses Ingram, after she shared on Instagram racists comments people had directed at her.
“There are more than 20 million sentient species in the Star Wars galaxy, don’t choose to be a racist,” the message reads.
“We are proud to welcome Moses Ingram to the Star Wars family and excited for Reva’s story to unfold. If anyone intends to make her feel in any way unwelcome, we have only one thing to say: we resist.”
Moses’ video begins with a collection of nasty comments, including claims her character Reva was a “diversity hire” by Darth Vader. The actress then addresses her followers directly.
“Long story short, there are hundreds of these. Hundreds,” the actress begins, adding she also sees so many messages of support. “And that means the world to me,” Ingram says.
“I think the thing that bothers me … that that feeling inside of myself … that I just have to shut up and take it, grin and bear it … But I’m not built like that,” she says defiantly.
Moses then thanked fans who have stood by her. And to the trolls? “Y’all are weird,” she says.
According to an interview in the U.K. Independent, Ingram was warned by Lucasfilm about racist comments that were made about Star Wars sequel stars Kelly Marie Tran and John Boyega. “It was something that Lucasfilm actually got in front of and said, ‘This is a thing that, unfortunately, likely will happen. But we are here to help you; you can let us know when it happens,'” Ingram says.
Lucasfilm is owned by Disney, the parent company of ABC News.
Anita Baker took a moment during her Las Vegas show over the weekend to shoutout Chance the Rapper, who was in the audience.
In a video of the moment posted to Twitter, Baker credits Chance with helping her regain ownership of her master recordings.
“You should say hello to a friend of mine by way of the music industry and by way of helping me to get ahold and ownership of my master recordings,” she says in the clip.
Chance tweeted in response to the video, “I saw one of THE greatest performances of my LIFETIME last night! Thank you so much @IAMANITABAKER for being an inspiration and an icon to so many of US.”
The mutual lovefest continued with Baker writing that Chance’s attendance at her show “brought tears to her eyes” and Chance responding that he is “honored and blessed” to call her a friend.
Baker announced in September 2021 that she won a long legal battle to regain her masters. “All My Children Are Coming Home,” she wrote on social media, with a photo of her first five studio albums: 1983’s The Songstress;The Rapture from 1986; 1988’s Giving You the Best That I Got;Compositions from 1990; and her 1994 release, Rhythm of Love.
Jimmie Allen and Michael Ray are among the artists speaking out about their mental health in partnership with ACM Lifting Lives.
In the new digital series The Check-In, multiple country stars are opening up about their mental health journeys, candidly “sharing stories from their own mental health experiences over the recent few years and revealing how music has played a crucial role in their healing process,” according to ACM Lifting Lives.
“You feel like your world is maybe coming to an end five years ago, 10 years ago, 15 years ago. It probably doesn’t even matter anymore,” Michael shares in a video advertising the series. “Learn to see the most beautiful things in life and really take it in. And I would also tell myself that everything’s going to be alright,” Jimmie says.
John Osborne and Lindsay Ell‘s episodes have already been released. New episodes will air throughout the summer, with Brett Eldredge; Chase Bryant, who previously opened up about his experience surviving a suicide attempt; and Caitlyn Smith also participating.
Justin Bieber is having a hard time accepting that his baby sister is entering high school. His half sister, Jazmyn, recently turned 14 and to celebrate, the “Ghost” singer took a sweet stroll down memory lane.
“Can’t believe im saying this but Happy 14th birthday to the sweetest, most beautiful, precious, little sis a brother could ask for,” Justin wrote, sharing a carousel of photos that documents their relationship.
The Grammy winner shared a recent selfie of Jazmyn making a face and two throwbacks of the two when the world was just getting to know Justin.
The two are related through their father, Jeremy Bieber, who had Jazmyn and her 12-year-old brother, Jaxon, during his relationship with ex Erin Wagner.
Jeremy has since married ChelseyBieber, and the two share their 3-year-old daughter, Bay.
(WASHINGTON) — Following a holiday weekend with at least 12 mass shootings across the country, President Joe Biden met with New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern at the White House on Tuesday morning, as families in Uvalde, Texas, prepared tiny caskets for the first funerals this week.
Biden told reporters he would meet with lawmakers on the issue of guns, but he didn’t say when that would happen or provide more details, according to the print pool reporter covering Biden’s Oval Office meeting with New Zealand’s prime minister.
Responding to a question about whether he’d meet with Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell about guns, Biden replied, “I will meet with the Congress on guns, I promise you,” according to the print reporter.
Shortly before, inside the Oval Office, Biden praised Ardern’s leadership on a range of issues and said, “We need your guidance.”
“There’s an expression by an Irish poet, it’s ‘too long a suffering that makes us stone to the heart.’ Well, there’s an awful lot of suffering,” Biden told Ardern. “I’ve gotten to more mass shooting aftermaths than I think any president in American history, unfortunately…And so much of it, much of it, is preventable, and the devastation is amazing.”
The two leaders were set to discuss combatting terrorism and radicalization to violence, the climate crisis, and the Indo-Pacific economy, according to the White House, but Ardern’s appearance in the wake of the elementary school massacre offered a side-by-side picture of two Western nations with starkly different responses to gun violence.
After a gunman murdered 51 people at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, in 2019, and streamed it on Facebook as it happened, Ardern led a dramatic push to restrict firearms in New Zealand within weeks of the attack. Less than a month after the attack, all but one of 120 Kiwi lawmakers voted to permanently ban military-style semiautomatic weapons and assault rifles.
“Can I bring the sincere condolences from the people of Aldi and New Zealand for what you have experienced and Texas and New York, and it’s been devastating to see the impact on those communities,” Ardern said, also raising a mass shooting in Buffalo, New York, this month where ten Black people were killed in a grocery store.
“Our experience, of course, in this regard, is our own but if there’s anything that we can share that would be of any value, we are here to share it,” she added.
In the U.S., meanwhile, gun control legislation has remained stalled for decades as Senate Republicans have used, or threatened to use, the filibuster to block such legislation. A small group of bipartisan senators — including Sens. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., John Cornyn, R-Texas, Tom Tillis, R-N.C., and Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., are meeting by Zoom Tuesday afternoon on gun reform talks, multiple sources told ABC News, as advocates and everyday Americans alike demand action in the wake of the latest violence.
Asked last week about New Zealand’s decision to ban most semi-automatic weapons and assault rifles in 2019, Ardern explained to CBS host Stephen Colbert how the country introduced a system to buy back guns from civilians and destroy them.
“I can only speak to our experience in New Zealand, but you know when I watch from afar and see events such as those today I think of them not as a politician, I see them just as a mother and I’m so sorry for what has happened here,” Ardern said.
“Then I think about what happened to us and all I can reflect is — we are a very pragmatic people. When we saw something like that happen everyone said ‘never again,’ so then it was incumbent on us as politicians to respond to that,” she continued. “Now, we have legitimate needs for guns in our country for things like pest control and to protect our biodiversity, but you don’t need a military-style, semi-automatic weapon to do that. So we got rid of them.”
After Biden told protesters in Uvalde on Sunday “we will” when they demanded the U.S. “do something,” it’s unclear if the president will get more involved on the issue since largely punting action to Congress. Biden has suggested assault weapons be banned and that lawmakers revisit the 1994 law but said in Texas, “I can’t outlaw a weapon. I can’t change the background checks.”
Tuesday also marks the first White House visit of a leader from New Zealand since 2014.
Måneskin has debuted the video for “Supermodel,” the band’s latest single.
The clip shows the Italian rockers chasing after the titular supermodel, who’s escaped a party with a mysterious, glowing purse akin to the briefcase in Pulp Fiction. There are also references to several other ’90s films, including Run Lola Run and Eyes Wide Shut.
You can watch the “Supermodel” video streaming now on YouTube.
The song “Supermodel” premiered earlier this month. It follows last fall’s “MAMMAMIA.”
Måneskin will launch their first North American headlining tour in October.
Dan + Shay are Kenny Chesney superfans and are pledging their allegiance through song.
The duo is currently one of the opening acts on Kenny’s stadium-sized Here and Now Tour. Ahead of their show at Nissan Stadium in Nashville, they debuted a new song they wrote in honor of the impact Kenny has had on them.
Dan + Shay hopped on Instagram to share the brand new track, with Dan Smyers revealing that it’s inspired by how much Kenny’s music means to them and how they used to go to his shows every summer. “It’s an absolute dream come true for us to be on this tour,” he said. “At the end of the day, we’re still just fans.”
With the lyrics pulled up on bandmate Shay Mooney‘s phone, the two turned the empty Nissan Stadium into their personal stage as they performed the acoustic number that references Kenny’s hit “I Go Back” while recalling the first time they met him.
“The first time I shook his hand/All I said was was thank you, man/You introduced me to country music/You’re the reason that I do it,” Shay croons, leading into the chorus. “Every time I hear that song/I’m right back there in that parking lot/Drinking discount beer with my best friends/We were drunk before we ever got in/And just like him it stops me in my tracks/Singing I go back.”
Many fans took to the comments to demand that the duo officially record the song, with one referring to it as “the song of the summer.”
Carly Pearce and Old Dominion are also part of the lineup of Kenny’s tour, which continues through the summer, concluding with a two-night stay at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Massachusetts, on August 26 and 27.
As with a lot of shows, Stranger Things is no stranger to fan theories. One of those theories is speculation that Noah Schnapp‘s character, Will, is gay. So, what does the actor think?
Speaking with Variety, Schnapp shared his perspective on how the writers, which include series creators Matt and Ross Duffer, approach Will’s sexuality.
“I feel like they never really address it or blatantly say how Will is,” he says. “I think that’s the beauty of it, that it’s just up to the audience’s interpretation, if it’s Will kind of just refusing to grow up and growing up slower than his friends, or if he is really gay.”
Millie Bobby Brown, who also stars in the series as Eleven, chimed in, “Can I just say, it’s 2022 and we don’t have to label things. I think what’s really nice about Will’s character is that he’s just a human being going through his own personal demons and issues.”
She added, “So many kids out there don’t know, and that’s OK. That’s OK to not know. And that’s OK not to label things.”
Schnapp agreed, stating, “I find that people do reach to put a label on him and just want to know, so badly, like, ‘Oh, and this is it,’ He’s just confused and growing up. And that’s what it is to be a kid.”
Stranger Things premiered in 2016 and quickly became a cultural phenomenon. The first part of season four hit Netflix May 27, with the rest due out on July 1.
Avril Lavigne plans to go all out when celebrating the 20th anniversary of her debut album, Let Go — but what does she plan on doing after that? She is teasing that she might whip up something special for the holidays.
Speaking to The Guardian, Avril revealed the three things atop her bucket list: making her own Christmas album, makeup line and cookbook.
The Grammy nominee teased of her cookbook, “My food is, like, gourmet … I can do everything! Pasta, sauce, vegan, salads and soups — I can do every kind of soup.” Avril wasn’t forthcoming about when fans can get their hands on the Avril Lavigne cookbook, but the singer noted that is a “major” thing on her to-do list.
The Canadian rocker also has another thing to look forward to — the movie adaptation of her 2002 hit “Sk8er Boi.” She told the outlet that production is full steam ahead now that she has finally found a director to helm the film.
“I can’t wait to learn this process of making a movie,” she raved. She noted that she won’t stop at just making a film for “Sk8er Boi”: “I think I’ll want to make more [movies].”
Looking back at the past two decades, Avril is thrilled the generation born around or after her breakthrough album was released are falling in love with her old music — especially Gen Z stars like Olivia Rodrigo, Billie Eilish and Willow Smith.
“That younger generations are discovering my stuff and that Billie, Olivia, and Willow go out into the world and continue to shatter the mold like I did 20 years ago is super inspiring,” she said, adding that those artists saying her music inspired them is “really trippy.”
Bob MacDonnell/Hartford Courant/Tribune News Service via Getty Images
(WASHINGTON) — A Democrat-linked lawyer charged by Special Counsel John Durham with lying to the FBI in 2016 was found not guilty a federal jury in Washington on Tuesday following a nearly two-week trial that served as the first in-court test of Durham’s more than three-year investigation into the Russia probe.
Michael Sussmann was charged by Durham last year for allegedly bringing forward a tip to a senior FBI official in September 2016 about a potential connection between computer servers for then-presidential candidate Donald Trump’s company and Russia’s Alfa bank — and lying about who he was representing at the time.
“While we are disappointed in the outcome, we respect the jury’s decision and thank them for their service. I also want to recognize and thank the investigators and the prosecution team for their dedicated efforts in seeking truth and justice in this case,” Durham said in a statement.
Through multiple days of witness testimony and evidence exhibits displayed in the D.C. district court, Durham’s prosecutors sought to convince the jury that Sussmann brought the info to then-FBI general counsel James Baker as part of Sussmann’s work for Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign and a technology company executive who had worked on assembling the data.
“He knew that if he told Mr. Baker that he was there on behalf of the Clinton campaign, the chances of the FBI investigating would be diminished,” assistant special counsel Jon Algor said Friday in closing arguments.
They alleged that Sussmann set up the meeting with the hope of generating an “October surprise,” to leak that the FBI was investigating a potentially suspicious tie between Trump’s campaign and Russia at a time when Russia was carrying out its hack-and-dump campaign against the Democrats.
While Sussmann’s attorneys acknowledged that he was at the time representing Clinton’s campaign and a tech executive named Rodney Joffe in handling the allegations, they claimed Sussmann’s intention in setting up the meeting with Baker was to alert the FBI to what he believed was concerning information and notify them that major news outlets were also pursuing it as a story.
In their closing argument Friday, Sussmann’s attorney Sean Berkowitz accused Durham’s team of pushing baseless “political conspiracy theories” through their prosecution of Sussmann, who he said brought forth the information to Baker in genuine good faith.
As a result of Sussmann’s meeting with Baker, according to his attorneys, the FBI was able to convince the New York Times to hold off on reporting the Alfa Bank allegations while investigators evaluated the data — which they quickly determined showed nothing nefarious. When the Times did eventually report on the Alfa Bank matter, it was part of a pre-election piece with the headline, ‘Investigating Trump, FBI Sees No Clear Link To Russia.’
“The meeting … is the exact opposite of what the Clinton campaign would have wanted,” Sussmann’s attorney Michael Bosworth said last week.
The two-week trial featured testimony from a host of current and former law enforcement officials as well as former key figures in Clinton’s campaign.
While the charge leveled against Sussmann was narrow, in the months since his indictment Durham used the case to bring forward other evidence that prosecutors suggested showed a broader conspiracy, alleging Clinton’s campaign and other political operatives sought to gin up and spread false accusations to smear Trump and use the nation’s law enforcement agencies as political tools.
But Marc Elias, the Clinton campaign’s former general counsel, and Robby Mook, the campaign’s manager, testified there was no discussion in the highest levels of the campaign about ordering or authorizing anyone to bring the Alfa Bank allegations directly to the FBI.
While Mook acknowledged that Clinton herself at one point signed off on disseminating the unverified allegations to the press so journalists could “vet” and report them out, he sought to throw cold water on the that the campaign believed it would have benefited from getting the FBI involved.
“Going to the FBI does not seem like an effective way to get information out to the public,” Mook said.
Mook said that after Clinton authorized sending the Alfa Bank data out to journalists, a press official — not Sussmann — was tasked with pushing it out to reporters. A report on the allegations was later published by Slate days before the election, though it made no mention of the FBI’s investigation into the data.
Sussmann’s attorneys also focused their strategy around undercutting testimony from the government’s star witness, Baker, who said under questioning from the special counsel’s office last week that he was “100% confident” that Sussmann told him in their Sep. 19 meeting he was not there on behalf of a particular client.
That testimony, Sussmann’s attorneys noted, directly conflicted with past statements Baker had made in interviews under oath with congressional investigators and the DOJ’s inspector general — where he either said that he believed Sussmann was there on behalf of unnamed cybersecurity experts or didn’t remember if Sussmann had mentioned representing clients one way or another.
But prosecutors also entered evidence this week showing that Sussmann had billed several flash drives he purchased days before the meeting to the Clinton campaign — two of which Durham says Sussmann provided to Baker in their meeting that included the unverified data purporting to show a connection between Trump and Alfa bank.
Additionally, they flagged multiple hours of time entries Sussmann had billed to the Clinton Campaign and the tech executive Rodney Joffe leading up to and after the meeting with Baker, where he wrote he was working on ‘confidential’ issues that Durham says was in reference to the Trump-Alfa bank allegations.
“If an opponent had brought this information, [the FBI] would want to know more about it,” Algor said. “They would question the credibility of the source and whether the FBI was being used — being played by politics.”
In the three years since Durham was initially assigned to look into the origins of the Russia investigation, he has secured one guilty plea of a former lawyer with the FBI who admitted to doctoring an email that was used to support a surveillance application that targeted a former Trump campaign aide.
The only other indictment brought by Durham outside of Sussmann was against Igor Danchenko, a lead analyst who contributed to the now-infamous Steele Dossier, who was charged last year with five counts of lying to the FBI about who his sources were for claims in the dossier. Danchenko has pleaded not guilty to all counts and his case is set for trial in Virginia in the fall.
The FBI’s investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election was not launched as a result of the Alfa Bank allegations or the Steele Dossier, and neither eventually factored into findings released by special counsel Robert Mueller following his two-year investigation. While Mueller’s probe found numerous instances of contacts between Trump campaign officials and individuals with ties to Russia’s government, he determined evidence didn’t support charging any individuals of engaging in a criminal conspiracy with Russia.
