More Tesla vehicles vandalized across US since Musk began White House role
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(KANSAS CITY, Mo.) — Two Tesla Cybertrucks caught on fire at a dealership in Kansas City, Missouri, on Monday evening, the latest in a wave of similar incidents seemingly directed toward the electric vehicle company, according to the Kansas City Police Department.
Tesla vehicles, dealerships and charging stations have been vandalized, suffered arson and faced protests in recent weeks since the company’s CEO Elon Musk began his work at the White House spearheading the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE.
In this latest incident, a Kansas City Police officer in the area spotted smoke coming from one Cybertruck at a Tesla dealership on State Line Road shortly before midnight. The officer attempted to put out the flames using a fire extinguisher, but the fire spread to a second Cybertruck parked next to the original one, police said.
The Kansas City Fire Department ordered the bomb and arson unit to assist on the scene, the fire department said. Officials were able to put out the flames and the vehicles were “covered with a fire blanket to prevent reignition,” the fire department said.
“The circumstances are under investigation but preliminarily the fire is being investigated for the potential of being an arson,” police said in a statement on Monday.
There have been no arrests made for this incident, police said.
This follows a spree of similar incidents that have occurred across the country in the last few weeks.
Another fire was started at a Tesla Collision Center in Las Vegas on Tuesday, according to the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department. Officials received notice that an individual had “set several vehicles on fire in the parking lot and caused damage to the property.”
Last week, “more than a dozen” shots were fired at a Tesla dealership in Tigard, Oregon, according to Kelsey Anderson, the public information officer at the Tigard Police Department.
Additionally, three Teslas were vandalized in Dedham, Massachusetts on March 11, according to the Dedham Police Department. Officials said “words had been spray-painted” on two Tesla Cybertrucks, with all four tires of the trucks and a Tesla Model S being “reportedly damaged.”
Protests against the company have also occurred at dealerships nationwide. Illinois State Treasurer Michael Frerichs told ABC News the demonstrations and the company’s plummeting stocks — which have tumbled nearly 48% this year — can all “be tied to [Musk’s] time at DOGE.”
“It has been a distraction for the company and it’s been a problem for the brand,” Frerichs said.
In recent weeks, four top officers at the company have sold off $100 million in stock, according to filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
Musk, the owner of X, said on Monday that his companies “make great products that people love and I’ve never physically hurt anyone, so why the hate and violence against me?”
“Because I am a deadly threat to the woke mind parasite and the humans it controls,” Musk said on X.
Musk has also reposted reactions that criticized previous Tesla attacks, calling an incident earlier this month in Seattle “crazy.”
A spokesperson for Tesla did not immediately respond to ABC News’ request for comment.
New police footage shows the moment a sheriff’s deputy rescued a baby from a burning apartment in Winder, Georgia.
At approximately 1:13 p.m. on Tuesday, Winder police and fire units reached out to the Barrow County Sheriff’s Department for assistance in a residential fire, according to the sheriff’s department.
While on the way to the scene, police were informed that “an infant child was still in the apartment and was unable to be reached,” the sheriff’s office said in a statement.
Deputies immediately attempted to rescue the infant, but several units were “not able to continue beyond a certain point in the building” due to the significant amount of smoke.
Despite the dangerous conditions, Deputy Jhancarlos Arango and a Winder police officer entered the building to save the child, police said.
The moment, which was captured on body worn camera video obtained by ABC affiliate WSB in Atlanta, shows the two officers racing into the apartment, with the deputy even covering his nose and mouth with a pair of pants to prevent inhaling the smoke.
Police said Arango and the other officer were “able to crawl to the infant, following the cries, and rescue the child.”
In the video, Arango can be heard saying, “I can’t breathe” while rescuing the child. Once everyone was back outside, the deputy said, “Thank you, God.”
This infant was not the only child saved from this fire, according to the Winder Fire Department. Two other small children were removed from the apartment complex, the fire department said.
The children — including the infant — and both law enforcement officers were transported to the hospital for smoke inhalation, but are all expected are to be OK, according to officials.
The fire was contained to the room of origin, according to Winder Fire Chief Matt Whiting.
“We are incredibly grateful for the swift and coordinated efforts of our local first responders,” Whiting said. “Their quick actions ensured that this situation was contained effectively, and lives were saved.”
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(LOS ANGELES) — Ippei Mizuhara, the former interpreter for MLB star Shohei Ohtani, is set to be sentenced Thursday on federal charges related to stealing nearly $17 million from the Dodgers player, nearly a year after the gambling controversy first surfaced.
Mizuhara, 40, admitted to fraudulently transferring the money from Ohtani’s account for more than two years to pay his gambling debts, including impersonating the athlete on two dozen occasions in calls to the bank, according to a plea agreement in the case.
Prosecutors called the scheme “deep” and “extensive” fraud and that Ohtani was “harmed substantially” by Mizuhara’s actions.
Mizuhara pleaded guilty last year to one count of bank fraud, which carries a maximum of 30 years in prison, and one count of subscribing to a false tax return, which carries up to three years in prison. A sentence of 48 months was recommended by the probation officer.
Mizuhara, a permanent resident of the U.S., also faces a risk of deportation back to his native Japan upon completion of the federal sentence, prosecutors said.
Mizuhara asks judge for mercy
In a three-page letter to Judge John Holcomb filed ahead of Thursday’s hearing, Mizuhara asked for a “merciful and not punitive” sentence and set out to explain why he committed the fraud.
He described mounting financial stresses that he said led him to use an online sports betting website run by Mathew Bowyer starting in 2021. He said that due to his “ignorance to the gambling industry,” he did not realize it was an illegal gambling business until early 2024.
“Being desperate for money at the time, I stupidly thought this might be an opportunity to help myself out financially and started to use his website for sports betting. And before I knew it, the results were the complete opposite,” Mizuhara wrote. “My gambling debt had grown so much that I could not find any way to pay it but to use Shohei’s money … I felt terribly guilty about putting my hands on his money but this was the only solution I could think of at the time.”
Mizuhara also said that the offseason was “physically and mentally” harder while detailing some of his errands for Ohtani, such as driving him to trainings, taking his dog to the vet and fixing his bicycle — saying he had “almost no true days off.”
“I felt like I was getting severely underpaid but I was afraid to speak up for myself as I was on a one year contract every year and I didn’t want to upset them and end up getting fired,” he wrote.
Mizuhara said he hopes to use his experience to help others dealing with gambling problems. He also outlined the impact a prison sentence would have on his wife.
“I understand that I have made a decision that will impact my entire life and I am not making excuses for what I have done. I am not trying to justify my actions in any way. I am asking that you will look at me as a man and believe change can happen,” he said. “I don’t believe an apology will fix my wrong. I am prepared [to] accept my consequences. I am asking for a little mercy from the court concerning my sentence you will hand down.”
He lastly said he is “truly sorry” for violating Ohtani’s trust in him.
Defense, government make case for sentence
Mizuhara’s attorney asked the judge to impose an 18-month sentence, arguing in a memorandum that the interpreter was devoted to his work for Ohtani but suffers from a “longstanding gambling addiction, which was uniquely exacerbated by his grueling work and exposure to high-stakes bookmakers in the world of professional athletes.”
Mizuhara “made a terrible mistake as a result of his serious gambling addiction, an anomaly in an otherwise law-abiding life in which he was dedicated to his career as an interpreter for Mr. Ohtani and other baseball players,” his attorney, Michael Freedman, wrote.
The defense attorney also said Mizuhara’s reputation here and in Japan has been “irretrievably stained” and that he “will continue to suffer as a result of harm to his reputation and career in the global press and through certain deportation.”
Prosecutors, meanwhile, asked the court to impose a prison sentence of 57 months while disputing what they called “unsupported claims” by the defense on the extent of Mizuhara’s gambling problem and the financial problems he had said led him to Bowyer’s illegal sports betting business.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Jeff Mitchell wrote in a response to the defense’s sentencing filings that the government could find no proof of a long-standing gambling addiction, and that Mizuhara did not have “such a ‘tremendous debt’ that it forced him to steal millions of dollars from Mr. Ohtani, as he claims.”
Mitchell also questioned whether Mizuhara is “truly remorseful or whether they are just sorry they were caught” and highlighted portions of Mizuhara’s letter to the judge, in which he detailed his offseason duties for Ohtani.
“The government does not question defendant’s work ethic, but only his characterization of the work and his true intention,” Mitchell wrote. “Instead of using this opportunity to apologize and show true remorse, he has used it, in a public filing, to complain about his work and Mr. Ohtani.”
In addition to the prison sentence, the government asked for three years of supervised release, restitution of $16,975,010 to Ohtani and $1,149,400 to the IRS.
Sentencing comes nearly year after firing
Mizuhara worked with the Angels as Ohtani’s interpreter and then in the same capacity with the Dodgers, until the team fired him nearly a year ago, in March 2024, after the gambling controversy surfaced.
Ohtani addressed the scandal at the time during a press briefing, saying in a prepared statement through an interpreter, “I am very saddened and shocked that someone who I trusted has done this.”
Mizuhara pleaded guilty to the federal charges in June 2024.
According to the plea agreement, from November 2021 to March 2024, Mizuhara transferred nearly $17 million from the account to associates of the bookmaker in more than 40 wires without Ohtani’s permission.
Ohtani signed a 10-year, $700 million contract with the Dodgers prior to last year, the richest deal in sports history.
Bowyer pleaded guilty to federal criminal charges for running an illegal gambling business that took unlawful sports bets from hundreds of customers, including Mizuhara, the Department of Justice said. He is scheduled to be sentenced in April.
Mizuhara also admitted in the plea agreement to falsely claiming that his total taxable income for 2022 was $136,865 when, in fact, he failed to report an additional $4.1 million in income.
“The source of the unreported income was from his scheme to defraud the bank,” the DOJ said, noting that he owes approximately $1,149,400 in additional taxes for the tax year 2022, plus additional interest and penalties.
His sentencing has been postponed several times after the defense asked for more time to prepare and for a forensic psychologist to complete a report about Mizuhara’s gambling.
Fort Knox, Kentucky: Exterior view of the United States Bullion Depository at Ft. Knox, Kentucky. (Bettmann via Getty Images)
(FORT KNOX, KY) — President Donald Trump is casting doubt — without providing evidence — over whether much of the nation’s store of gold still exists at the famous United States Bullion Depository at Fort Knox, Kentucky, raising questions about whether somebody “stole” it.
What’s more, he’s said he wants to go to Fort Knox to see for himself.
The ultra-secure facility holds approximately 147.3 million ounces of gold, according to the U.S. Mint.
In raising questions, Trump is echoing Elon Musk, who has repeatedly questioned the whereabouts of the gold.
Their expressed skepticism comes despite Trump’s Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent saying that there is an audit every year and that “all the gold is present and accounted for.”
It’s also despite Trump’s treasury secretary in his first term, Steven Mnuchin, personally visiting the reserves and confirming that the gold was there.
Still, both Musk and Trump continue to raise questions without evidence.
In an episode of The Joe Rogan Experience podcast released Friday — one of Musk’s first comprehensive interviews since becoming a “special government employee” — Musk repeated this suspicion.
“A live tour of Fort Knox would be awesome … is the gold there or not? They say it is — is it real? Or did somebody spray paint some lead?” he asked.
In fact, these concerns appear to be brought to Musk’s attention recently. On Feb. 15, he reacted to an X post that asked him to look into the gold supply, in which he responded, “Surely it’s reviewed at least every year?”
Fort Knox is a military base that has stored U.S. gold since 1937, according to the U.S. Army’s website.
What do Trump and Musk believe?
Last week, Trump brought up the gold supply after being asked about Musk’s most recent DOGE efforts.
“We have found hundreds of billions of dollars of fraud so far. And we’ve just started. We’re actually going to Fort Knox to see if the gold is there, because maybe somebody stole the gold. Tons of gold,” Trump said.
He raised it again at his recent meeting with the nation’s governors at the White House on Feb. 21, saying that they plan to “open the doors to Fort Knox.”
“You grew up hearing about Fort Knox. You can’t get in. You can’t even see it. Nobody sees it. You go there and the place is dry,” Trump said.
Trump also referred to the site as the “fabled Fort Knox” while speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One last week.
Musk — who has been tasked to eliminate government waste and fraud — has repeatedly expressed suspicion about the gold bars.
“This gold is the property of the American people. I sure hope it’s still there!” he wrote on X last month. He has also repeatedly touted that the gold could have been stolen, asking on X, “who is confirming that gold wasn’t stolen from Fort Knox?”
Musk floated the idea of live-streaming a walkthrough of Fort Knox, responding to conspiracy theorist Alex Jones’ coverage of his comments by suggesting he’d like to film inside the vaults.
He repeated this idea during the Conservative Political Action Conference in February, in addition to saying, “part of this is also, you know, let’s have some fun.”
During Musk’s podcast appearance with Joe Rogan on Friday, Rogan asked the billionaire to think about his DOGE findings in relation to the gold.
“Think about all the other stuff that you pointed out. All the checks that just go out, the NGO payments, the social security people … now apply that to the gold,” Rogan said, to which Musk replied, “absolutely.”
Not all members of Trump’s administration share the same doubts.
“I think the gold is probably there. It’s probably almost certainly there,” David Sacks, Trump’s crypto czar, told Fox News last week, though he still agreed with the president’s calls to investigate the matter.
“Nobody thinks this is a crazy idea to go check because we don’t know,” Sacks added, arguing that “we cannot fully trust that our gold is still in Fort Knox” because of the “corruption” in Washington.
When was the gold last seen?
According to the U.S. Mint, “the only gold removed has been very small quantities used to test the purity of gold during regularly scheduled audits,” and no other gold has been transferred to or from the depository “for many years.”
The building was constructed using 16,000 cubic feet of granite, 4,200 cubic yards of concrete, 750 tons of reinforcing steel, and 670 tons of structural steel, the U.S. Mint says.
The gold is located at Fort Knox because it is “far from either coast, adjacent to a military installation for added security and close to a rail head for transportation,” according to a fact sheet from the U.S. Mint.
The depository has a strict no-visitors policy, as Trump alluded to, and even the president is restricted from accessing the vault. Former President Franklin D. Roosevelt was the only non-authorized person to obtain access.
However, it first opened it in 1974 for journalists and a congressional delegation to view the reserves after rumors swirled surrounding the gold’s whereabouts.
“We’ve never done this before and we’ll probably never do it again,” then-Director of the U.S. Mint Mary Brooks said after displaying the gold supply, according to a New York Times report following the visit.
The second viewing came over 40 years later in 2017 during Trump’s first administration. Then-Treasury Secretary Mnuchin and then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell were members of a delegation invited to view the gold.
“The gold was there when I visited it,” Mnuchin said in Feb., adding that he’s “sure” nobody’s moved it and emphasizing the “serious security protocols in place.”
Former Republican Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin — who was present during this visit — also attested to the gold being at Fort Knox.
“The reality is, there is an extraordinary amount of gold that is in there,” Bevin told Fox News Business last week. He added that he agrees in transparency and that “the people’s wealth should be known and accounted for, no question.”
“Is it possible that through the years things could be taken? It is,” he admitted, before arguing that the building “is so ridiculously secure that it is not possible to sneak anything out of there.”
Bevin also floated the possibility that Musk, as the world’s richest man, may want to see what his riches look like “in physical form.”
“It is almost equivalent to how much his net worth is,” Bevin said, admitting that he would want to see the gold, too, if he were Musk.
There are “restrictions on sharing any information related to the facility’s security,” according to documents detailing the 2017 visit’s schedule and security measures published by CNN.
“Access to the USBD is limited, as the facility exists solely for the storage of gold,” the document said. “To prevent compromise of security, photographs will be subject to review by the U.S. Mint Police.”
“The Treasury Secretary allows the visit when rumors persist that all the gold had been removed from the vaults,” the U.S. Mint said in a statement.
After affirming that “all” of the gold was present, Bessent said last month, “any senator, they call the Treasury, we’re happy to arrange a visit. They can do an inspection.”
According to the Treasury’s monthly status report tracking gold owned by the Treasury, 147.3 million ounces of gold were recorded in Fort Knox as of Jan. 31, 2025.
Fort Knox has also been utilized to temporarily store valuable historical items, such as the Declaration of Independence and Constitution during World War II, as well as the Magna Carta.
The urgency to locate the gold comes despite the U.S. dollar no longer being linked to the value of gold. In 1971, Roosevelt ended the gold standard and switched to a fiat money system.
However, the traditional belief that the U.S. dollar and gold have an inverse relationship still prevails. When the dollar weakens — especially during times of inflation — the value of gold is believed to increase.
Conspiracy theories surrounding Fort Knox
Rumors of the gold being missing or stolen have been a decades-long conspiracy theory.
In 1971, Peter Beter, a lawyer and financial adviser to former President John F. Kennedy, alleged that British spies informed him that the gold in Fort Knox was secretly removed, the Washington Post reported.
Beter’s book, The Conspiracy Against the Dollar, continued to make such allegations that gold was missing. The 1974 visit, inviting journalists and congressmen to view the vault, followed soon after.
The 1964 James Bond film, “Goldfinger,” also centers around a gold smuggler who is being investigated for scheming a break in of Fort Knox in an attempt to contaminate its gold supply.
In 2010, then-Rep. Ron Paul of Texas was outspoken in his suspicions regarding the gold’s whereabouts. He introduced the “Gold Reserve Transparency Act of 2011” which called for a full audit of U.S. gold reserves.
When asked during an interview last month if he thinks the U.S. government has all the gold it claims to have, Paul said “no, I don’t. But I don’t have evidence to prove it.”
“Even if they showed us the gold, maybe the gold has been loaned out,” Paul said, citing ways that the government can “deceive the people.”
Musk has expressed support for Paul, even throwing his support behind calls for the former congressman to audit the gold.
Last month, in response to X posts asking Paul to audit the Federal Reserve, Musk responded “good idea” and “this will be great.”
Ron Paul’s son, Sen. Rand Paul, a Kentucky Republican, weighed in with a similar position to his father. Responding to Musk’s tweet asking whether the Fort Knox gold supply is reviewed every year, Rand Paul responded, “Nope. Let’s do it.”
On Feb. 21, Rand Paul penned a letter to Bessent requesting to audit the gold reserves at Fort Knox.
Appearing on “Fox and Friends” last month, Rand Paul acknowledged that the treasury secretary attested that the gold was there but emphasized the need for it to be audited, arguing “the more transparency, the better.”
Musk appears to not mind that his claims are perceived to be tied to conspiracy theories.
During The Joe Rogan Experience, the podcast episode opened with Rogan and Musk attempting to ask Musk’s Grok AI machine if all the gold is still in Fort Knox. While Grok AI did not provide an answer, she asked if Musk was a “conspiracy theorist” to which the two shared bouts of laughter over.
“These conspiracy theories don’t really spread per se on their own, beliefs in these conspiracy theories are instead a product of politicians and media elites sharing these ideas to trusting audiences who are already disposed toward believing them,” Peter Uscinski, professor at University of Miami that specializes in conspiracy theories, told ABC News.
“Trump and his allies have shared numerous conspiracy theories over the past eight years; there is nothing new about this, and it ties in closely with Trump and Musk setting themselves up as people who are uncovering fraud in the government,” Uscinski added.
ABC News’ Will Steakin contributed to this report.
