While everyone seems to agree that Billie Eilish‘s music is impeccable, her personal appearance is something that she’s regularly criticized for — especially since she dyed her hair platinum blonde and started dressing in more revealing clothing.
Billie gets why fans wish she was still wearing her signature oversized outfits, but she doesn’t like it. “People hold on to these memories and have an attachment. But it’s very dehumanizing,” she tells ELLE magazine for its new cover story.
“I lost 100,000 followers, just because of the boobs,” she laughs. “People are scared of big boobs.”
Her decision to switch her naturally brown-blonde hair color from acid green to platinum blonde brought another wave of criticism. “I’ve had different-colored hair and vibes for everything I’ve ever done. I wanted this album to have its own thing,” she tells ELLE. “I’m still the same person. I’m not just different Barbies with different heads.”
That’s why Billie tries to avoid the online hate. “All my friends know I don’t wanna see any of [the negative chatter],” she says. “When people send me something mean, it hurts my soul.”
“I really wish that there was a way to avoid [social media]…Literally delete my account but still have contact with the fans,” she muses. “I want to be able to have both, but you can’t.”
Well at least Billie has the support of one music legend who practically invented reinvention: Madonna. The Queen of Pop tells ELLE, “If Billie were a man, no one would be writing about this. A man can show up dressed in a suit and tie for the first three years of his career, and then the next month he could be dressed like Prince or Mick Jagger, shirt off, wearing eyeliner, and no one would say a word.”
(NEW YORK) — As the 76th General Assembly of the United Nations went underway in New York City beginning Sept. 14, authorities arrested Enrique Figueroa on Sunday for allegedly posting threats on social media against Luis Abinader, the president of the Dominican Republic, according to a court document.
The charges state that Figueroa “intentionally transmitted in interstate and foreign commerce a communication containing a threat to kidnap and injure” Abinader, according to the criminal complaint filed in federal court.
When questioned, Figueroa denied intent to harm Abinader, according to the complaint.
His arrest resulted from a joint effort by the U.S. Secret Service, the FBI and the New York Police Department, according to the document. That collaboration between the agencies is part of the protocol for maintaining security at the United Nations General Assembly where this year, up to 190 world leaders gathered in Manhattan for the 13-day event.
Threats at the UNGA can be politically-motivated, personnel-related, terroristic or cyber.
Since the UNGA is a designated National Special Security Event, or, an NSSE, and one of the largest annual security events in the world, the U.S. Secret Service is in charge of overall security management. The agency collaborates with other federal, state and local agencies to identify, mitigate or eliminate any threats at the UN’s event.
As the lead agency, the Secret Service has to plan, coordinate and ultimately implement security operations for NSSEs.
For the UNGA, the Secret Service forms an executive steering committee that consists of senior representatives from other federal, state and local entities including the NYPD and the local office of homeland security and emergency management.
The executive steering committee gives final approval over a list of security and operational plans. Although the UNGA happens annually, that planning process is re-examined, revamped and updated every year.
The highest levels of government, including the directors of the Secret Service, FBI and secretary of homeland security are briefed on every facet involved in the UNGA’s security planning. Some security measures include increasing police presence; having SWAT teams on standby; as well as deploying dogs and other bomb-related resources. Even the water is covered — there is marine security staged near the UN.
Once world leaders and UN members are in New York City, there is close coordination among all security agencies. Part of that coordination is setting up operations and coordination centers throughout the city. These operations and coordination centers tackle everything from hotel lodging and logistics, to intelligence deconfliction, communication, medical response and air traffic. There are also redundant coordination centers and plans in place in the unlikely event of a major or catastrophic incident.
Each agency, in turn, conducts its own threat analysis of existing threats and how to manage them.
The Department of Homeland Security also provides a threat assessment of the event and the potential impact on the surrounding area. This assessment, conducted by the DHS Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), is provided to the other agencies to help them develop a full-threat assessment picture of the event.
The FBI typically co-leads security, intelligence and threat management. Through the FBI’s New York Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) and Joint Intelligence Operations Center (JIOC), threats are vetted and responses are coordinated. The JTTF is made up of over 50 federal, state and local partners. Those partners include: the Secret Service, which protects the president and visiting foreign heads of state; the Diplomatic Security Service which protects visiting minister-level officials including the U.S. secretary of state; the U.S. Marshals; domestic and foreign intelligence agencies; and the NYPD.
Any threat can potentially impact the security of the United Nations building such as the 2016 bombings in New York City’s Chelsea neighborhood during that year’s UNGA. That incident was an example of an existing threat that put all agencies involved with the UNGA on high alert.
Planning for an NSSE like the UNGA often takes over a year. During that time the nation’s front-line defenders work diligently to ensure that all risks are minimized and plans coordinated. This framework allows the planners to ensure that if something does happen, the response will be swift and strong.
(NEW YORK) — It’s not easy to do schoolwork on an old laptop with a poor internet connection.
Just ask Sabina Rodriguez, who went through her junior and senior year in online learning classes amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Her parents were both unemployed and couldn’t afford new devices.
“I was literally on the world’s oldest computer,” Rodriguez said. Her mother is Colombian immigrant who previously worked as a house cleaner. Her father grew up in a low-income household, and chauffeured for a living.
“As a minority, especially in a financial situation, school was like our only way to success,” she said. “Our parents came here so we could go to school.”
That’s when she discovered First Tech Fund, a new nonprofit dedicated to “closing the digital divide” among underserved high school students in New York City.
The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the burgeoning digital divide among students of different economic backgrounds. About 25% of all school-aged children across the U.S. live without the sufficient technology or access to Wi-Fi at home, according to the National Education Association.
It’s a situation First Tech Fund co-founder Josue De Paz knew well, and when the pandemic forced kids out of school and back into their homes, it was a need he was determined to help solve.
The organization offers high school students a year-long fellowship in which they are supplied with a laptop and a Wi-Fi hotspot, with unlimited internet access. They’re also paired with a mentor and are given weekly virtual workshops on digital skills, career growth and other professional development opportunities.
“I can never repay them for the situation I’m in right now,” Rodriguez said. She said she’s spent hours on Zoom calls with mentors and professionals who’ve helped edit her resume, college essays and more.
In New York City, 14% of students didn’t have a computer or computing device, and 13% didn’t have adequate internet access, according to the New York Civil Liberties Union and New York State Education Department.
The NYSE report showed how students in Black and Latino school districts suffered disproportionately during the pandemic: Compared with students in largely white districts, they were about four times as likely to lack internet access and three times as likely to lack a device that allowed them to complete schoolwork.
De Paz said some students were doing homework from phones or sharing devices with siblings, making it much harder to complete assignments, let alone excel among peers. First Tech Fund targets these marginalized communities.
Rodriguez said students felt more encouraged and supported throughout the school year, especially those on their way to college. One of 52 students chosen from 743 applicants in the first cohort of fellowship winners, Rodriguez is now a freshman at Fordham University, pursuing a career in psychology and medicine.
Some 23 of the 24 college-eligible students in that 2020-2021 cohort are now enrolled at a two- or four-year institution.
In this upcoming school year, outreach was expanded to 86 students out of about 200 applicants. De Paz credited donors, partner organizations and elected officials for helping him help so many.
“There’s more power in the community than we often give ourselves credit for,” De Paz said. “We should be leveraging it — now more than ever — when people need that support.”
De Paz, a DACA recipient, moved to the U.S. from Mexico when he was 5 years old. He thanks his mother for working long hours at several jobs to provide him with a personal laptop and dial-up internet.
“I saw my mom work two to three jobs in order for me to get that access, and then I really saw how that impacted my entire educational career,” De Paz said. “Even before I had a bed, my mom was like, ‘You’re going to have a desk, and you’re gonna have a computer,’ so I was sleeping on the floor, but I still had what I needed for school.”
De Paz is paying forward that gratitude to help students like Rodriguez.
“I’ve always struggled financially, growing up,” she said, “so the fact that Josue, another Hispanic who grew up in the same situation, that he actually has the courage to like be like, ‘I’m going to help, I’m going to give back’ … it really comes from, like, his heart.”
Keith Urban can no longer say he doesn’t have time to learn a new skill. The New Zealand-born star spent most of 2020 at home, with lots of time on his hands. Early in the lockdown, Keith and his wife, actress Nicole Kidman, determined to try to each learn something new, although Keith’s didn’t go entirely according to plan.
“I was gonna learn cooking and I said, ‘I can’t cook!'” Keith recalls to People. “I think Nic was gonna learn a language and didn’t. Yeah, we had all sorts of plans that just … no.”
While Keith might not be able to make his own dinner, his wife did improve on her goal, at least a little.
“That’s not true actually, Nic got better at her Italian,” he says.
Keith has a couple more dates for his Las Vegas residency this month. He will wrap up 2021 by performing a series of shows in Australia.
Nirvana has announced a reissue of Nevermind in celebration of the iconic album’s 30th anniversary.
The package will be available in a variety of formats, including as eight-LP and five-CD super deluxe box sets, starting November 12.
All versions of the reissue will feature newly remastered audio of the original Nevermind. Additionally, the super deluxe collections include four previously unreleased full live concert recordings: Amsterdam in November 1991; Del Mar, California, in December 1991; Melbourne, Australia, in February 1992; and Tokyo also in February 1992.
For the full track lists and pre-orders, visit Shop.Nirvana.com.
Released September 24, 1991, Nevermind and its lead single “Smells Like Teen Spirit” are credited for launching the ’90s grunge and alternative rock scene. The album has been certified Diamond by the RIAA for over 10 million sales.
(CA) — Nanette Packard, who was convicted of directing her ex-NFL lover to kill her millionaire fiance, told ABC News in an exclusive interview that she still carries “a lot of guilt over what happened.”
“Had I not been having an affair … Bill would be alive still,” Packard said. “I feel that way.”
She and former NFL linebacker Eric Naposki have spent nearly a decade behind bars as convicted killers serving life sentences without the possibility of parole for the murder of Bill McLaughlin. Both deny having any involvement in his death.
“I don’t know for sure [who killed McLaughlin],” Packard said. “I never said that Eric did it because I couldn’t say that Eric did it for sure. I don’t know that. He never said that to me.”
Packard met Naposki in the early ‘90s at a gym. Naposki, who had once played for the New England Patriots and Indianapolis Colts, had left professional sports by then, and was living in California, where he worked as a security guard for a nightclub and worked as a bodyguard on the side.
The two eventually started seeing each other romantically even though Packard, who was then a mother of two in her 20s, was already in a relationship with McLaughlin. He was an entrepreneur 30 years her senior who had made millions off of a medical device invention.
Packard was living with McLaughlin in Newport Beach, California, in a luxurious home located in a wealthy, gated community. However, she told Naposki that she and McLaughlin were just business partners.
“Eric knew about Bill and Bill knew that Eric was my friend. [Bill] didn’t know we were having an affair,” Packard said.
She said she met McLaughlin, a father of three, through a personal ad he had posted in the Pennysaver.
“Maybe it wasn’t the most intense [relationship] romantically but I did love him,” Packard said of McLaughlin. “He was a good man and he was good to my children, and I would never have killed him and probably would still be with him today if he were alive, because I had no reason.”
McLaughlin was 55 years old when he was shot six times in the chest by an intruder while he sat at his kitchen table on Dec. 15, 1994.
Authorities did not make any arrests in connection to his death until 15 years later, when investigators re-examined the case.
Packard and Naposki were arrested separately during a bicoastal sting operation in May 2009 on murder charges.
By the time of their arrests, Packard and Naposki had gone their separate ways. Packard had gone on to marry twice more and was still living in California. Naposki, meanwhile, had briefly gone back to playing professional American football overseas before returning to the U.S., where he had a fiancée and was living in Connecticut.
The prosecutor alleged Packard was the suspected mastermind behind McLaughlin’s death and that she convinced Naposki to kill him so they could collect a substantial sum of money.
Prosecutors argued that Packard stood to benefit from McLaughlin’s million-dollar life insurance policy, $150,000 from his will and access to his beach house.
There was reason to suspect Packard. In 1996, she had pleaded guilty to forgery and grand theft after she was accused of forging McLaughlin’s name on checks and stealing from his accounts. She served 180 days behind bars.
Packard denied the murder charges against her, saying she needed McLaughlin to continue her lifestyle.
“I only gained money if Bill was alive,” she said.
According to prosecutors, Naposki’s story evolved during questioning. He initially lied about owning a .9 mm handgun, which was the same kind of weapon used to kill McLaughlin.
“The single most important piece of evidence that we had against Eric Naposki was … the way he lied to the police,” said ABC News consultant and former Orange County prosecutor Matt Murphy, who tried the case.
When asked why he lied to police, Naposki told ABC News, “I just didn’t want to talk about it because, if I wasn’t at the scene, and I wasn’t in Newport, then I couldn’t have killed the guy even if I had a bazooka.”
Naposki went to trial first and was found guilty of first-degree murder in 2011. Afterward, he met with prosecutors and told them Packard had orchestrated a murder-for-hire plot against McLaughlin, and the killer had used his gun.
“[Naposki said] he was there, in the room, when they talked about [the plot],’” said author Caitlin Rother, who wrote a book about the case titled, “I’ll Take Care of You.” “But then he says, ‘But apparently, [the killer] went behind my back and made arrangements with Nanette. So the two of them planned this. It wasn’t me.’”
“The way he describes it, he is a co-conspirator in a murder case,” Murphy added. “Even if it was true, the way he describes that, he is still 100% guilty for exactly what he was convicted of.”
Packard was found guilty in January 2012 of first-degree murder and guilty of the special circumstance of committing murder for financial gain.
Naposki is serving time at Avenal State Prison in Avenal, California. He said he hasn’t spoken to Packard since everything “went down.”
“I didn’t kill anybody. I’m not a killer,” he said.
Packard is serving her sentence at the Central California Women’s Facility, training service dogs through a program called Little Angels.
“These dogs, they just bring so much healing,” she said. “It also helps to make a difference for me, for me to be able to live with the fact that I’m away from my kids.”
McLaughlin’s children, who at one point thought their father’s murder would never be solved, have tried to move forward. They believe justice was served.
“[Packard and Naposki’s lives] have been taken away from them … and hopefully they’re thinking about what they did,” Kim McLaughlin told ABC News. “What I miss most about my father is just having him as a friend … and I know he’d be very proud of us and the choices we’re making. And so, it’s hard not to have him be able to share that here on earth with him… We miss him dearly.”
R. Kelly declined on Wednesday to testify at his sex trafficking trial in Brooklyn, NY.
The New York Times reports that U.S. District Judge Ann Connelly obtained verbal confirmation from Kelly that he would not take the stand. With that decision, the defense rested its case and has ushered in closing arguments, which are expected to commence Thursday.
Kelly’s attorneys spent their half of the trial trying to discredit the women and men who have accused him of sexual misconduct over the years, with some witnesses saying they have never witnessed the alleged abuse and describing the singer as a kind and caring gentleman.
The prosecution, however, painted a much different story and called upon those who either saw or endured the alleged mistreatment. The prosecution also called upon several of Kelly’s former employees, who also accused the singer of retaliatory behavior, such as withholding pay and verbal abuse, over small errors.
The case has been argued in court since August 18.
Kelly, 54, whose birth name is Robert Sylvester Kelly, faces state and federal charges for sex trafficking, racketeering, coercion and other charges related to the alleged abuse and exploitation of six women — three of whom were underage at the time — over the course of 25 years. If convicted, he could be sentenced to up to 20 years in prison.
Following the ouster of former host and executive producer Mike Richards from Jeopardy! after controversial comments he made on a podcast resurfaced, it was announced Mayim Bialik and Ken Jennings would complete this season’s shows while the search for a permanent replacement for the late Alex Trebek continues.
In a Newsweek essay, Bialik shed some light on how she got the “dreamy” job, recalling it was her 15-year-old son who first told her the Internet was buzzing that she should guest-host the show.
“I had to learn all the rules and the language of the show,” Bialik recalled. “I was terrified,” but adds, “I had a spooky — but positive — feeling…’I don’t want to leave.'”
“I was also sure that someone newsy, like Savannah Guthrie, was going to be made the permanent host, so a lot of the buzz about me…went in one ear and out the other,” said Bialik.
Eventually, Richards was named the new host and Bialik was tapped to host special episodes of the game show. But everything changed when Richards stepped down.
“Of course I was in touch with Mike as he was my boss at that time, and I don’t wish ill on him, or anyone,” said Bialik. “My first response…was to say… ‘How can I help?'”
Bialik says she feels “very honored” by the opportunity, noting, “It’s been as dreamy as it was for the two days that I guest hosted.”
The Big Bang Theory vet explained, “There will never be another Alex…It’s important not to try and be him, because you can’t…”
That said, Bialik admits, “I joke that I would give up my first child to host permanently! I think my son and I have a close enough bond that he will come back to me!”
(BETHESDA, Md.) — Over 3 million infant loungers made by Boppy, the popular maker of baby products, are being recalled after reports of eight infant deaths between 2015 and 2020, the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) announced Thursday.
Boppy is recalling its Boppy Original Newborn Loungers, Boppy Preferred Newborn Loungers and Pottery Barn Kids Boppy Newborn Loungers, according to the CPSC.
The eight infant deaths reportedly happened after infants were placed on their back, side or stomach and fell asleep on the lounger, according to the CPSC.
The infants reportedly suffocated and were found on their side or their stomach, the agency said.
The CPSC urged people to “immediately stop” using the recalled loungers.
“These types of incidents are heartbreaking,” Acting Chairman Robert S. Adler, CPSC commissioner, said in a statement. “Loungers and pillow-like products are not safe for infant sleep, due to the risk of suffocation. Since we know that infants sleep so much of the time — even in products not intended for sleep — and since suffocation can happen so quickly, these Boppy lounger products are simply too risky to remain on the market.”
In response to the recall, Boppy said it is “devastated to hear of these tragedies.”
“Boppy is committed to doing everything possible to safeguard babies, including communicating the safe use of our products to parents and caregivers, and educating the public about the importance of following all warnings and instructions and the risks associated with unsafe sleep practices for infants,” the company said in a statement. “The lounger was not marketed as an infant sleep product and includes warnings against unsupervised use.”
The recalled products were sold at retailers including Pottery Barn, Target, and Walmart and Amazon.com from January 2004 to today, according to the CPSC. The loungers retailed for between $30 and $44 and were “solid in a variety of colors and fashions.”
Boppy also distributed about 35,000 of the recalled loungers in Canada, according to the CPSC.
The news of the recall follows a report from Consumer Reports earlier this month that found seven recent infant deaths were tied to nursing pillows and infant loungers made by Boppy,
It also comes one year after the CPSC issued a warning for caregivers about the risks of using pillow-like products for sleeping infants.
The 2020 warning from CPSC, which applied to all nursing pillows and baby loungers on the market, said infant deaths involving the products appeared to happen when “children are left on or near pillows, and the child rolls over, rolls off, or falls asleep.”
The recall announced Thursday applies only to loungers made by Boppy, and does not include nursing pillows or all pillow-like products on the market.
Caregivers should always place infants to sleep on their backs on a firm, flat surface and should never add “blankets, pillows, padded crib bumpers, or other items to an infant’s sleeping environment,” according to both the CPSC and the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP).
(WASHINGTON) — The U.S. special envoy to Haiti, Daniel Foote, has resigned in protest over the Biden administration deportations of Haitians from the southern border, calling them “inhumane.”
“Ambassador Daniel Foote, who had been serving as Special Envoy for Haiti since July 22, 2021, submitted his resignation to Secretary Blinken yesterday. We thank Ambassador Foote for his service in this role,” a State Department spokesman told ABC News on Thursday.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
