Alec Baldwin was
told gun in fatal
shooting on set
was safe, officials say
On a ranch in New Mexico, Alec Baldwin was filming a new movie Thursday when his character needed a gun. An assistant director grabbed a prop gun on a gray cart, handed it to Baldwin and, according to an affidavit signed by Detective Joel Cano of the Santa Fe County sheriff’s office, yelled “cold gun!” — which was supposed to indicate that the gun did not have any live rounds. When Baldwin fired the gun, law enforcement officials said, it struck and killed cinematographer Halyna Hutchins, 42, and wounded director Joel Souza, 48. The assistant director “did not know live rounds were in the prop gun,” according to the affidavit.
Supreme Court again refuses to block Texas abortion law
The Supreme Court on Friday once again refused to immediately block a Texas law that banned most abortions after six weeks. But the justices agreed to fast-track their consideration of appeals from the Justice Department and abortion providers in Texas, scheduling arguments for Nov. 1. Only Justice Sonia Sotomayor filed a dissent. “For the second time, the court is presented with an application to enjoin a statute enacted in open disregard of the constitutional rights of women seeking abortion care in Texas,” she wrote. “For the second time, the court declines to act immediately to protect these women from grave and irreparable harm.”
Illegal border crossings
soar to record high
A record 1.7 million migrants from around the world were encountered trying to enter the United States illegally in the past 12 months, capping a year of chaos at the southern border. It was the highest number of illegal crossings recorded since at least 1960, when the government began tracking such entries. Single adults represented the largest group of those detained in the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, at 1.1 million, or 64% of all crossers. There were also large numbers of migrant families — more than 479,000, which is about 48,000 fewer than during the last surge in family crossings in 2019.
NASA plans February moon launch with giant rocket
NASA on Friday set dates for its giant rocket to launch a spacecraft to the moon and back, beginning in mid-February. In a news conference, officials from the space agency announced a two-week period beginning Feb. 12 for a flight — without astronauts — of the Space Launch System, the biggest rocket flown by the agency in decades. It will loft Orion, a capsule for transporting astronauts to deep space, on an uncrewed trip that orbits the moon then returns to Earth. Whether NASA will proceed with this February timeline depends on the results of testing on the ground leading up to the launch window.
By The New York Times
© 2021 The New York Times Company
