(WASHINGTON) — A Washington, D.C., lobbyist and attorney who assisted with former President Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election filed suit this week against the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, to block the release of her phone records.
Katherine Friess filed her lawsuit in federal court in Colorado against the committee and AT&T, which alerted her earlier this month of the committee’s subpoena.
According to an affidavit included in the filing obtained by ABC News, Friess identifies herself as having volunteered as an “election integrity attorney, observing ballot counting, for the 2020 national elections” and later having served as a “staff attorney on the personal legal team of President Donald J. Trump” from November 2020 to January of 2021.
Former New York City Police Commissioner Bernie Kerik, who worked with ex-New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani and the Trump campaign to identify voting irregularities after the election, previously told The Daily Beast that Friess “assisted in the preparation of legal documents, interviews, and reviewed affidavits; and coordinated travel, legislative hearings and meetings, as directed by the mayor or myself.”
Friess’ filing argues that the subpoena targeting her personal cell phone would violate attorney-client privilege with Trump and other individuals she represents, as well as violate her personal privacy.
According to the notification letter from AT&T, the subpoena seeks records documenting the contacts Friess made over phone and text during the period between Nov. 1, 2020 and Jan. 31, 2021, including the times and durations of phone calls — but not the content of the messages or calls themselves.
Friess is the latest in a growing number of former Trump associates who have filed lawsuits seeking to block the release of their cell phone records to the Jan. 6 committee, including former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, former Trump national security adviser Mike Flynn, MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell and attorney John Eastman.
The Jan. 6 committee has confirmed issuing dozens of subpoenas as it seeks to gather evidence regarding the communications between Trump and his allies in advance of the Jan. 6 riot, and their behind-the-scenes efforts to overturn the 2020 election.
Friess did not immediately respond to multiple requests for comment from ABC News.
A spokesperson for the Jan. 6 committee declined to comment on the matter.
The 30th anniversary of Pantera‘s album Vulgar Display of Power will be celebrated with a new graphic novel.
The book, published by frequent rock world collaborators Z2 Comics, includes written and visual interpretations of each of the 11 Vulgar tracks. Contributors include Life of Agony‘s Alan Robert, Testament‘s Eric Peterson, former Fear Factory vocalist Burton C. Bell, and ex-Every Time I Die frontman Keith Buckley.
You can pre-order the Vulgar Display of Power book now via Z2Comics.com ahead of its expected September release. It’s available in a number of different packages, some of which include a bonus limited edition vinyl version of Vulgar with exclusive artwork.
Vulgar Display of Power the album was released February 25, 1992. It spawned the Pantera classics “Walk” and “Mouth for War,” and is the band’s best-selling record, having been certified double-Platinum by the RIAA.
Lady Gaga is not only up for a Screen Actors Guild Award this Sunday, she will also be presenting at the ceremony.
Billboardreports that Gaga, who earned a nod for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role for portraying Patrizia Reggiani in House of Gucci, will take to the stage and introduce the movie before a clip of it plays. She will speak alongside Jared Leto, who played Paolo Gucci in the film and is up for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Supporting Role.
Actors from four other movies also vying for the night’s highest film honor — Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture — will also take the stage. Both Leonardo DiCaprio and Tyler Perry will introduce a clip from their film Don’t Look Up, while Will Smith, Aunjanue Ellis, Saniyya Sidney and Demi Singleton will introduce King Richard. Other films up for the award are Belfast and CODA.
The 28th Annual SAG Awards will take place Sunday, February 27 at 8 p.m. ET. The ceremony will broadcast live from Barker Hangar in Santa Monica, California, on TNT and TBS.
Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood are helping Peaky Blinders say its farewell with some new music.
As director Anthony Byrne tells NME, the Radiohead duo has “contributed some original stuff” to the upcoming sixth and final season of the beloved British TV crime drama.
“I’m over the moon about all of that,” Byrne says. “The music has always been really important historically, and I was really keen to bring a dramatic score into it.”
Peaky Blinders viewers have previously heard the Radiohead tracks “You and Whose Army?” and “Pyramid Song” on the show. Its soundtrack also includes songs by The White Stripes and Jack White, Dan Auerbach, Royal Blood, PJ Harvey, Arctic Monkeys, Queens of the Stone Age, Foals, Black Sabbath and Joy Division.
The last season of Peaky Blinders premieres February 27 on BBC One. In the U.S., you can watch the first five seasons on Netflix.
Yorke and Greenwood, meanwhile, have been releasing new music this year with their side project, The Smile.
Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images for The Met Museum/Vogue
Kim Kadarshian is reportedly escalating her efforts to end her marriage to Kanye West.
“I very much desire to be divorced,” she wrote in new court documents, according to TMZ. The reality star also reportedly says she asked Ye to keep their divorce private, “but he has not done so.”
“Kanye has been putting a lot of misinformation regarding our private matters and co-parenting on social media which has created emotional distress,” Kim continued
Yeezy has made numerous accusations on social media, including accusing Kim of kidnapping their daughter, Chicago, and declaring that Kim believes he ordered a hit on her.
In the court filing, Kardashian states that West’s attorneys have admitted to her that it is difficult for them to reach their client. She claims they wrote to her lawyer, Laura Wasser, “We face challenges in communicating with our client.”
Kadarshian also states in her court documents, “While I wish our marriage would have succeeded, I have come to the realization that there is no way to repair our marriage. Kanye does not agree but at least it appears that he has come to the realization that I want to end our marriage, even if he does not.”
Last week, Kanye filed an opposition to Kim’s request to be declared single, stating that it should be denied without prejudice so that Kim can refile it with his “corrections and requested conditions.”
As she looks toward the follow-up album to her smash hit debut, Goldmine, Gabby Barrett says she’s grateful for all the international recognition she’s received so far.
“Wherever the Lord leads it, I’m just here for the ride,” she tells Billboard. Gabby captured the attention of pop fans with her crossover sensation “I Hope,” thanks in part to a 2020 remix of the song featuring Charlie Puth.
“I would love to eventually sell out Madison Square Garden someday. That’s a big goal,” she continues, but adds that the most important thing to her is her young family, including husband Cade Foehner and the couple’s baby daughter, Baylah. “My role first and foremost is being a good mother to my daughter and raising her correctly and to love the Lord.”
Plus, she’ll never stray too far from her roots. “I do know that I’m a country gal at heart, and that’s definitely always the kind of music I’m going to make,” she continues.
Gabby’s traditional country influences will be on full display at next month’s ACM Awards, when she co-hosts the show with Jimmie Allen as well as living legend Dolly Parton.
Fellow Oscar winners Jared Leto and Anne Hathaway star and executive-produce AppleTV+’s limited series WeCrashed, a trailer for which just dropped.
Based on the hit Wondery podcast WeCrashed: The Rise and Fall of WeWork, Leto plays Israeli entrepreneur Adam Neumann, who turned the office sharing company WeWork into a $47 billion empire — until its equally dramatic fall.
Hathaway plays Neumann’s wife, Rebekah, who helped him create his kingdom. “She helps him manifest things,” one character says in the trailer. Together, the power couple enjoy the trappings of their company’s fortune — lavish parties, private jets — and struggle as it eventually comes crashing down.
“You have to let them see…you’re a supernova,” Rebekah tells Adam.
“You’re afraid that he outshines you,” says America Ferrera as one of Rebekah’s friends. “Because he does.”
The streaming service teases, “WeCrashed is inspired by actual events — and the love story at the center of it all. WeWork grew from a single coworking space into a global brand worth $47 billion in under a decade. Then, in less than a year, its value plummeted. What happened?”
The first three episodes of WeCrashed: The Rise and Fall of WeWork, premiere on Apple TV+ on March 18, with new weekly installments of the eight-episode show dropping each Friday through April 22.
Dave Grohl has shared a tribute to late Screaming Trees frontman Mark Lanegan, who passed away earlier this week at age 57.
Speaking with the U.K.’s The Independent, the Foo Fighters leader recalls when he first met Lanegan. He had just joined Nirvana, which was about to explode in the Seattle grunge scene that Screaming Trees, a fellow Washington State band, had helped pioneer.
“When I first joined Nirvana I was living with Kurt [Cobain] in our tiny apartment,” Grohl shares. “One weekend he said, ‘Hey, I’m gonna go up to Seattle for the weekend and hang out with a friend, do you want to come?'”
“We went up to stay with his friend…and we went to a show,” he continues. “I passed out on the couch and woke up in the morning and opened my eyes and Mark Lanegan was sitting in a chair right across from me.”
Lanegan’s first words to Grohl? “Who the f*** are you?”
Grohl adds that he thinks Lanegan’s first solo album, 1990’s The Winding Sheet, is a “masterpiece,” and calls it one of the “most influential records” on him.
“It was so pure and so real,” Grohl says of Lanegan’s music. “If he sang about pain, you believed it and if he sang about love, you believed it.”
“There was nobody like him,” Grohl adds. “In Seattle he was much loved.”
(WASHINGTON) — After weeks of warning of “severe” sanctions if Russia invaded Ukraine, President Joe Biden was set to deliver remarks from the White House Thursday in what’s unfolding as a defining moment in his presidency as President Vladimir Putin continued a large-scale attack.
Expected to announce additional sanctions on Russia, Biden will lay out “further consequences the United States and our Allies and partners will impose on Russia for its unprovoked and unjustified attack on Ukraine,” according to a White House official.
But it’s still unclear how much further those sanctions will go — and whether they would make any difference in what Putin claimed overnight would be a “special military operation” in eastern Ukraine, but is proving to be much more widespread.
“To anyone who would consider interfering from the outside, if you do, you will face consequences greater than any you have faced in history,” Putin warned the world.
While it was also still unclear just how far Putin would go beyond eastern Ukraine, Russian forces attacked near the capital city Kyiv — raising new fears he would try to topple Ukraine’s government.
Will Biden sanction Putin personally?
The Biden administration has threatened further sanctions on major Russian financial institutions and banks, to take steps to restrict Russian access to technology, to cut Russia off from SWIFT (Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication) — which would hinder Russia’s participation in global markets, and to directly sanction Putin’s inner circle — or the Russian president himself.
Biden told reporters late last month that he would consider personally sanctioning Putin if Russia invaded Ukraine — a day after 8,500 American forces were put on “heightened alert” in the region — but those efforts did not appear to deter the Russian leader, nor did economic sanctions imposed this week by the U.S. and European allies, including halting the certification of Nord Stream 2, a major natural gas pipeline running from Russia to Germany.
The Biden administration has already begun to roll out a “first tranche” of sanctions, related to Russian banks, oligarchs and the natural gas pipeline Nord Stream 2, as some lawmakers have criticized Biden of not going far enough on sanctions, which haven’t resulted in Russia reversing course.
As of Thursday morning, Russian forces had advanced from three directions — from the south heading north, from Belarus heading south to Kyiv and from northeast of Ukraine heading to the south — as Ukrainian woke up to a nation at war.
US military assessment, diplomatic moves
U.S. intelligence believes these three axes were “designed to take key population centers,” a senior defense official said Thursday.
The White House has said the sanctions will be “united and decisive,” but it remains to be seen how the West can punish Putin, who seems intent on moving ahead with his plans, despite weeks of attempted diplomacy from the international community and a set of sanctions already imposed.
With the U.S. condemning what’s it calling an “unprovoked and unjustified” attack on Ukraine, Biden met with his National Security Council in the Situation Room early Thursday ahead of a virtual video call with G-7 leaders to discuss a united response to the Russian attack.
Earlier this morning, President Biden convened a meeting of the National Security Council in the White House Situation Room to discuss the unprovoked and unjustified attack on Ukraine. pic.twitter.com/QcZ5N2fcAa
Notably, Russia was a part of the G-7 until its illegal annexation of Crimea in 2014 — where it is now closing in further on Ukrainian borders.
Biden was at the White House overnight as the attack unfolded.
Within minutes, Biden was on the phone with the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who had reached out to him after receiving “silence,” he said, on a phone call to Putin. Russia has two tactical goals in Ukraine, according to Zelenskyy’s office: seizing territory and toppling Ukrainian leadership.
Consequences — for Americans
After their call, Biden released a statement saying that Putin “has chosen a premeditated war that will bring a catastrophic loss of life and human suffering.”
“The prayers of the world are with the people of Ukraine tonight as they suffer an unprovoked and unjustified attack by Russian military forces,” Biden said.
The American president has acknowledged that there will be “consequences at home” — particularly at the gas pump and in energy prices — as a result of the Russian invasion and subsequent sanctions but has vowed to mitigate those costs.
However, ahead of his Thursday remarks, U.S. crude oil prices topped $100 a barrel, sending gasoline prices to an average of $3.54 a gallon, according to the American Automobile Association. At least three states had average gas prices of $4 or higher. Meanwhile, U.S. stock and dow futures also plunged.
Still, Biden has reminded Americans that the U.S. has a responsibility to defend its NATO allies — and democracy around the world.
“Because this is about more than just Russia and Ukraine,” he said in remarks last week. “It’s about standing for what we believe in, for the future that we want for our world, for liberty, for liberty, the right of countless countries to choose their own destiny. And the right of people to determine their own futures — or the principle that a country can’t change its neighbor’s borders by force.”
ABC News’ Luis Martinez and Patrick Reevell contributed to this report.
Billie Eilishappeared calm and collected when she attended and performed on the Academy Awards and appeared twice on Saturday Night Live, but that may have been all an act.
“I’ve never been more nervous in my life. SNL and the Oscars are like the scariest things I’ve ever experienced because they are not people that I really know,” Billie said during her Wednesday interview on Late Night with Seth Meyers. She specifically said the Oscars were the “coolest, scariest thing ever.”
“It’s actors and actors are so much more eloquent than musicians. Musicians are weird and gross and smelly,” Billie joked. “It was intimidating.”
The Grammy winner revealed there’s one actor she was intimidated by — Daniel Craig. “When I met him I was like, ‘Whoa,'” she said of being blown away by his intense blue eyes. “You literally would not believe them.”
Billie then explained why she is so proud of her James Bond theme, “No Time to Die,” which is up for Best Original Song — her first Oscar nod ever. Billie detailed, “We made the song in October of 2019… [I was] 17 when I made it. I’m now 20.”
She continued, “It was a very long strategic process. It wasn’t like ‘You got the job! Here it is!’ We were auditioning pretty much. So it was not like an ego thing. It was really, ‘It’s got to be perfect. We got to do it right.'”
Billie said she and her brother, FINNEAS, “Worked really hard” to earn the opportunity and, later, were provided a “bit of the script, just the opening.” That snippet, she said, “Was literally what wrote the song” because it gave them “a little taste of the movie.”
