CNN fires Chris Cuomo after new details on help he gave his brother
Star anchor Chris Cuomo was fired by CNN on Saturday amid a network inquiry into his efforts to help his brother, Andrew Cuomo, then-governor of New York, fight off a sexual harassment scandal. The announcement completed a stunning downfall for Chris Cuomo, the top-rated anchor at CNN and a veteran television journalist who had built a successful broadcast career outside of his famed political family. Until last month, Cuomo had enjoyed the support of CNN’s president, Jeff Zucker, and faced no discipline for his behind-the-scenes strategizing with Andrew Cuomo’s political aides, a breach of basic journalistic norms. CNN executives had placed him on indefinite suspension Tuesday.
After manhunt, parents of shooting suspect are arraigned
The parents of a Michigan teenager who police say fatally shot four classmates at Oxford High School in suburban Detroit were arrested Saturday after being the subject of an intense manhunt. The teenager’s parents, James and Jennifer Crumbley, were taken into custody in a commercial building in Detroit, officials said. The arrests came a day after they were charged in the deaths, failed to show up for their arraignment and apparently fled town. The couple were arraigned Saturday morning, and they each pleaded not guilty to all four charges of involuntary manslaughter. The judge set bond at $500,000 for each of the parents.
Fearing a repeat of Jan. 6, Congress eyes changes to electoral count law
Members of the select congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack at the Capitol are pressing to overhaul the complex and little-known law that former President Donald Trump and his allies tried to use to overturn the 2020 election, arguing that the ambiguity of the statute puts democracy at risk. The push to rewrite the Electoral Count Act of 1887 has taken on new urgency in recent weeks as more details have emerged about the extent of Trump’s plot to persuade Vice President Mike Pence to throw out legitimate results when Congress met in a joint session Jan. 6 to conduct its official count of electoral votes.
Friends at animé convention with man who tested positive for omicron also fell ill, he says
About 15 people who attended an animé convention in New York in November with a Minnesota man who later was found to have the omicron variant have tested positive for the coronavirus, the man has told health officials in his state. It is uncertain whether any of those cases involved the omicron variant. The man said that his friends — a group of about 30 people — had come from all over the country for the event, which started Nov. 19. About half of them also later tested positive for the virus, he told the officials. The man, officials said, was fully vaccinated and had gotten a booster before the convention.
With around 160 omicron cases, Britain tightens restrictions
As the number of confirmed cases of the omicron coronavirus variant rose to 160 in Britain, the government Saturday announced further tightening of travel restrictions to combat its spread. Beginning Tuesday, travelers will be required to take a coronavirus test within 48 hours of traveling to Britain regardless of their vaccination status and restrictions will be placed on travelers from Nigeria, the country’s health secretary said in a statement. There are now 160 confirmed cases of the omicron variant across Britain, Britain’s Health Security Agency confirmed Saturday, up from 134 cases reported by the agency Friday.
Afghanistan is gripped by starvation
Afghanistan is on the brink of a mass starvation that aid groups say threatens to kill 1 million children this winter. This winter, an estimated 22.8 million people — more than half the population — are expected to face potentially life-threatening levels of food insecurity, according to an analysis by the U.N. World Food Program and Food and Agriculture Organization. Since the Taliban seized power in August, the United States and other Western donors have grappled with questions over how to avert a humanitarian catastrophe in Afghanistan without granting the new regime legitimacy by removing sanctions or putting money directly into the Taliban’s hands.
Palestinian who stabbed Israeli in East Jerusalem is killed by police
A Palestinian assailant stabbed and wounded an Israeli civilian near the Old City of Jerusalem on Saturday afternoon, before approaching two Israeli police officers who fired at the attacker, knocked him to the ground and then killed him as he lay on the road, videos of the confrontation showed. The knife attack was at least the fifth in Jerusalem since the start of September, reviving memories of 2015-16, when scores of Israelis were stabbed by Palestinians in what some called the “knife intifada,” a reference to earlier Palestinian uprisings against Israeli occupation. It also follows the killing of an Israeli tour guide by a Palestinian gunman last month.
Honeybees survived for weeks under volcano ash after Canary Islands eruption
About 50 days after the Cumbre Vieja volcano in the Canary Islands erupted in September, a beekeeper returned to one of the devastated villages to see what the volcano had done to his hives. What he found shocked beekeepers and delighted scientists: Inside five hives covered in volcanic ash were tens of thousands of bees, still buzzing away. Not only had the bees managed to survive the heat and noxious gases of the volcano, but they also had avoided starvation by feeding off stores of honey inside the hive, said Antonio Quesada, a beekeeper in the Canary Islands and a spokesperson for the Gran Canaria Beekeepers Association.