(NEW YORK) — Severe weather is headed to the deep South, from Texas to Mississippi, with damaging winds, possible tornadoes and some large hail forecast.
A powerful storm system will move out of the Rockies on Saturday and will bring the severe weather across the deep South.
Storms will move into Dallas, Texas, late Saturday morning, with some gusty winds and very heavy rain.
The storms will move through Houston between 7 and 9 p.m. Saturday with damaging winds, a threat for an isolated tornado and some heavy rain.
New Orleans, Louisiana, and Jackson, Mississippi, will see storms moving through between midnight and 2 a.m. Damaging winds, isolated tornado and heavy rain is possible.
Storms move through Birmingham and Montgomery, Alabama, early Sunday morning from 5 to 8 a.m. with gusty winds and heavy rain.
Atlanta gets storms and heavy rain mid to late morning Sunday, but severe weather with tornado threat will stay south into Albany, Georgia, to Panama City, Tallahassee, Gainesville, Florida
This same storm system with severe weather will also bring heavy rain from Texas all the way to the Carolinas with a chance for flash flooding.
The highest threat for flash flooding will be from just east of Dallas, Texas, to Little Rock, Arkansas and into Memphis, Tennessee.
Locally some areas could get 2 to 4 inches of rain in a short period of time, causing flash flooding.
After a very dry period for the entire western U.S., a very active storm track has its eyes set on the West.
Starting Sunday afternoon, a series of storms will pound the West from California to Colorado with very heavy snow in the mountains and heavy rain and flooding for coastal California.
The highest threat for flash flooding and debris flow will be from just south of the San Francisco Bay area down to Los Angeles.
Sunday through Friday, some areas in California could see 3 to 6 inches of rain, which is expected to cause flash flooding and debris flow.
The Sierra Nevada Mountains, in California, some areas could see 3 to 6 feet of snow. The Rockies could also see several feet of snow next week.
Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny attends a rally in support of political prisoners in Prospekt Sakharova Street in Moscow, Russia on September 29, 2019. (Sefa Karacan/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny was poisoned with a rare lethal toxin found in poison dart frogs from South America, according to a joint statement from the UK, France, Sweden, the Netherlands and Germany.
The European partners said they are confident in their determination based on analyses of samples from Navalny which confirmed the presence of the lethal toxin, Epibatidine.
“Navalny died while held in prison, meaning Russia had the means, motive and opportunity to administer this poison to him,” the statement read.
Alexei Navalny’s widow, Yulia Navalnaya, said in a social media post she “was certain from the first day that my husband had been poisoned, but now there is proof: Putin killed Alexei with chemical weapon.”
Navalnaya said she is grateful to the countries who have worked on the investigation.
“Vladimir Putin is a murderer. He must be held accountable for all his crimes,” she said.
Russian officials did not immediately comment on the report.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) headquarters is seen on February 13, 2026 in Washington, DC. (Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — The Trump administration walked back an Obama-era environmental decision that has been the legal basis for establishing federal regulation of greenhouse gas emissions.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) said on Thursday it was rescinding the 2009 endangerment finding, which determined that six key greenhouse gases threaten human health and welfare.
The regulations that resulted cover everything from vehicle tailpipe emissions to the release of greenhouse gases from power plants and other significant emission sources.
President Donald Trump called the move “the single largest deregulatory action in American history” and said the repealed finding had “no basis in fact” and “no basis in law.”
The endangerment finding stemmed from the 2007 Supreme Court decision Massachusetts v. EPA, which held that the EPA could regulate greenhouse gases from motor vehicles under the 1970 Clean Air Act because those gases are air pollutants.
Some environmental scientists disagree, telling ABC News that the rescission is concerning and could have major implications for health. They add that decades of research has shown the impact climate change has on human health.
“The evidence is so overwhelming,” Dr. Ana Navas-Acien, chair of the department of environmental health sciences at Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University, told ABC News.
“The scientific evidence showing the connection between greenhouse emissions, climate change and then the related health effects — it’s massive, it’s substantial, it has been reviewed by independent organizations,” she said. “So, the fact that this body of evidence has become so well established, it just speaks to the level of rigorous science that has been done.”
How greenhouse gases, climate change impact health
Research has shown that greenhouse gases — such as carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide — drive climate change, and, in turn, can harm human health by exposing people to events including wildfire smoke, extreme heat, flooding and waterborne diseases.
For example, rising temperatures have direct harms on health by increasing risk of dehydration and causing more stress on the heart.
During heat waves, the risk of death from heart attack increases by 64%, according to a 2024 study from researchers at Yale School of the Environment.
Additionally, a 2025 study from Yale School of Public Health found that between 2000 and 2020, there were more than 3,400 preventable deaths in the contiguous U.S. due to high temperatures.
The World Health Organization has warned there will be an estimated 250,000 additional deaths around the world annually from 2030 to 2050 due to climate change-related heat exposure.
“We have recent studies showing heat exposure can lead to heart attack events … and it goes beyond just the cardiovascular system,” Kai Chen, an associate professor of epidemiology at Yale School of Public Health and faculty director of the Yale Center on Climate Change and Health, told ABC News. “It goes beyond these kinds of physical conditions or physical health, [also] impacting our mental health.”
High temperatures can also negatively impact the quality and quantity of sleep, which can raise levels of cortisol in the body.
Studies have also shown that extreme heat can exacerbate conditions such as depression, anxiety and suicide ideation. For the latter, a 2023 meta-analysis found that even a slight bump in the average monthly temperature can lead to increases in suicide and suicidal behavior.
“So, really, heat can lead to a broad spectrum of diseases,” Chen added.
In recent decades, wildfires in the western U.S. have become larger, more intense, and more destructive due to a combination of factors, including human-amplified climate change and rapid urbanization, according to the federal government’s Fifth National Climate Assessment.
The same report found that these fires are worsening air quality in many part of the country due to wildfire smoke, which is a mixture of gases, water vapor, air pollutants and fine particulate matter. The latter, known as PM2.5, is at least 30 times smaller in diameter than a human hair.
Experts say these particles are of concern because they are too small to be seen with the naked eye and can easily enter the nose and throat. They can travel to the lungs and even circulate in the bloodstream.
PM2.5 can cause both short-term health effects, even for healthy people, including irritation of the eyes, nose and throat; coughing, sneezing; and shortness of breath and long-term effects such as worsening of conditions such as asthma, heart disease or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease flare-ups.
“Recent evidence has shown that the fine particulate matter in the air can also impact dementia and cognitive function,” Chen said. “It can also affect birth outcomes, leading to pre-term birth and low birth weight. So, air pollution is a major risk factor.”
Regulating fossil fuel combustion reduced PM2.5-related deaths by approximately 54% from 1990 to 2010, according to 2018 joint study from researchers in the U.S. and China.
Short- and long-term implications
Navas-Acien believes that, in the short-term, the rescinding of the endangerment finding will lead to higher pollution levels.
“Higher pollution levels, if we allow that to happen, that means more pollutants in the air that we breathe, in the water that we drink, in the food that we eat,” she said. “And that’s going to result in a higher burden of chronic diseases and even not just chronic disease, but also like heart attacks.”
Research has shown that in the days following an increased level of air pollutants, there are more visits to emergency rooms and hospital admissions for cardiorespiratory events, according to Navas-Acien.
“So that tells you that the impacts of pollution, in the short term, are very rapid,” she added.
In the absence of federal protections, Navas-Acien and Chen said state and local leaders can take actions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and improve air quality.
On the individual level, to protect yourself, the experts recommend frequently checking the air quality in your area, wearing a mask if air pollution levels are high and supporting the creation of urban green spaces to combat climate change.
Chen said the EPA rescinding the endangerment finding is “very concerning” because “the scientific evidence has not become weaker, but actually became much stronger, showing the health harms from the climate change stirring from the greenhouse gas emissions. This rollback of policy will actually be threatening millions of Americans’ lives.”
“Climate change is impacting our health right now,” Chen continued. “It’s not a political debate. It is science and the science is clear. We need to take action.”
John F. Kennedy, Jr. and his wife Carolyn Bessette Kennedy arrive at the annual John F. Kennedy Library Foundation dinner and Profiles in Courage awards in honor of the former president’s 82nd birthday, May 23, 1999, at the Kennedy Library in Boston. (Justin Ide/Boston Herald/Getty Images)
Close friends and contemporaries of John F. Kennedy Jr. and Carolyn Bessette Kennedy are speaking out about the couple’s love story in a new special examining their lives and tragic deaths.
John and Carolyn | Love, Beauty and Loss, airing Tuesday, Feb. 17 on ABC, features interviews with close friends of the late couple, as well as their contemporaries and the journalists who covered their lives.
“From the very beginning, they had a volatile relationship, and unfortunately, the cameras were always there recording,” one person says in the trailer for the special, which dropped Feb. 12 on Good Morning America.
The couple’s lives were cut short when they died in a fatal plane crash in July 1999, along with another passenger, Bessette Kennedy’s older sister Lauren. The accident occurred when the light aircraft that Kennedy was piloting crashed into the Atlantic Ocean off Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts.
“There just wasn’t enough time,” a friend of the couple says in the special’s trailer.
John and Carolyn | Love, Beauty and Loss, airs Tuesday, Feb. 17, at 10 p.m. ET on ABC and streams the next day on Disney+ and Hulu.
In addition to new interviews, the special also features newly unearthed photographs of Bessette Kennedy and rare footage from the couple’s 1996 wedding, according to ABC News Studios, which produced the special.
The special on the Kennedys coincides with the release of Love Story: John F Kennedy Jr & Carolyn Bessette, a Ryan Murphy-produced scripted series about the couple, airing on FX.
In John and Carolyn | Love, Beauty and Loss, viewers will also go behind the scenes of the FX series and see new interviews with its stars, as well as its executive producers, costume designer and production designer.
Disney is the parent company of Disney+, Hulu and ABC.
Journalist Don Lemon arrives with his legal team for an arraignment hearing at the Warren E. Burger Federal Building and U.S. Courthouse on February 13, 2026 in St. Paul, Minnesota. (Photo by Stephen Maturen/Getty Images)
(ST. PAUL, Minn.) — Former CNN journalist Don Lemon pleaded not guilty on Friday to federal civil rights charges in connection with an incident in which anti-ICE protesters disrupted a service at a Minnesota church.
Lemon appeared in federal court in St. Paul before Magistrate Judge Douglas Micko, following his arrest in Los Angeles last month.
This is a developing story. Check back for updates.
Brianna Arango is seen in an undated photo released by the Southern Methodist University Police Department. Southern Methodist University Police Department
(DALLAS) — A missing Texas college student has been found safe, police said Friday.
Brianna Arango, 21, a student at Southern Methodist University, was reported missing on Thursday, according to police.
A family member contacted SMU Police at approximately 3:30 p.m. Thursday to report that Arango did not meet with them as planned earlier that afternoon, campus police said. She had a class at 1 p.m. that she also did not attend, police said.
She was last seen that day on the Dallas campus around 12:30 p.m. near Harold Simmons Hall, according to the Southern Methodist University Police Department.
SMU Police said in an advisory on Thursday that they were working to locate her and were “treating this as a matter of concern” while asking for the campus community’s help in locating her.
Campus police updated Friday that they had located Arangao and she is safe.
The incident remains under investigation, police said.
“We know this situation was concerning for many in our community, and we are grateful for your attention and assistance,” SMU Police said. “This remains an active investigation, and law enforcement is limited in the details that can be shared at this time.”
Yerin Ha as Sophie in ‘Bridgerton’ season 4. (Netflix)
(SPOILER ALERT) Make haste, dearest gentle reader, to watch the official trailer for part 2 of Bridgerton season 4.
Netflix has shared a brand-new trailer that shows off what will happen in the second half of the season centered around Benedict Bridgerton (Luke Thompson) and Sophie Baek’s (Yerin Ha) love story.
We see Benedict and Sophie seeking comfort in loved ones in the aftermath of Sophie denying Benedict’s proposal for her to be his mistress.
“Being a mistress is the last thing I would ever want,” Sophie says.
We also see Benedict’s reaction to Sophie’s rejection.
“How else am I to be with a woman society’s made it impossible for me to be with?” he says.
The trailer also ushers in the return of Jonathan Bailey’s Anthony Bridgerton and Simone Ashley’s Kate Bridgerton.
“You’ve convinced yourself that she is reason enough to risk everything,” Anthony tells Benedict in the trailer.
This fairy-tale fourth season of Bridgerton premiered its first part on Jan. 29. It found Benedict refusing to settle down, before meeting a mysterious woman at a masquerade ball. That woman turned out to be Sophie, a resourceful maid who now works at Bridgerton house after fate brings her back into Benedict’s life.
“Will Benedict’s inability to see these women as one in the same derail the undeniable spark between him and Sophie? And can love truly conquer anything — even a cross-class connection forbidden by society?” the season’s official synopsis reads.
Also starring in season 4 are Victor Alli, Masali Baduza, Nicola Coughlan, Hannah Dodd, Daniel Francis, Ruth Gemmell, Claudia Jessie, Luke Newton, Golda Rosheuvel, Isabella Wei, Michelle Mao and Katie Leung.
A woman looks on at a memorial for Renee Good who was shot and killed by an ICE agent last month, February 12, 2026 in Minneapolis, Minnesota. (Stephen Maturen/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — The acting head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement says that two of its officers appear to have made “untruthful statements” about shooting a migrant in Minnesota and may face federal charges for their actions.
“Today, a joint review by ICE and the Department of Justice (DOJ) of video evidence has revealed that sworn testimony provided by two separate officers appears to have made untruthful statements,” Acting ICE Director Todd Lyons said in a statement.
“Both officers have been immediately placed on administrative leave pending the completion of a thorough internal investigation. Lying under oath is a serious federal offense. The U.S. Attorney’s Office is actively investigating these false statements,” the statement said.
“The men and women of ICE are entrusted with upholding the rule of law and are held to the highest standards of professionalism, integrity, and ethical conduct. Violations of this sacred sworn oath will not be tolerated. ICE remains fully committed to transparency, accountability, and the fair enforcement of our nation’s immigration laws,” Lyons added.
The statement from Lyons comes a day after the top federal prosecutor in Minnesota asked a judge to dismiss charges against two men, including one who was shot in the leg by an immigration agent, citing “newly discovered evidence” in what was initially framed as a “violent” attack on law enforcement during an enforcement operation.
“Newly discovered evidence in this matter is materially inconsistent with the allegations in the complaint affidavit. … as well as the preliminary-hearing testimony,” U.S. Attorney for the District of Minnesota Daniel Rosen wrote in the filing Wednesday evening. It remains unclear what specific new evidence Rosen was referencing.
Rosen has asked the court to dismiss the case with prejudice, meaning the charges cannot be refiled.
“Accordingly, dismissal with prejudice will serve the interests of justice,” Rosen wrote.
In the wake of the shooting on Jan. 14 — a week after an ICE agent fatally shot Renee Good in Minneapolis — the Trump administration said the man who was shot, Julio Cesar Sosa-Selis, attacked a federal law enforcement officer with a “shovel or a broom stick” and that the incident was part of “an attempt to evade arrest and obstruct law enforcement.”
Lawyers for another man charged in the incident, Alfredo Aljorna, said surveillance videos did not corroborate the FBI’s claims that an agent was assaulted and said Sosa-Celis was shot while standing at his doorway some distance away from the officer.
Earlier this month attorneys for Aljorna also urged a judge to prohibit the government from deporting key witnesses who they said cast doubt that an agent was repeatedly struck with a broom or a snow shovel, Judge Paul Magnuson granted the request.
The reversal on the assault charges for Sosa-Celis and Aljorna comes after several discrepancies emerged between statements from Department of Homeland Security officials and details outlined in court records regarding their arrests.
DHS initially said in statements to media that officers were conducting a “targeted traffic stop” for Sosa-Celis when he fled in his vehicle, crashed into another car and attempted to evade arrest. The agency alleged that Sosa-Celis “violently” assaulted an officer and that two other individuals exited a nearby apartment and joined the attack “with a snow shovel and broom handle.”
According to DHS, Sosa-Celis struck the officer with “a shovel or broom stick,” prompting the officer to fire what the agency described as a defensive shot “to defend his life,” striking Sosa-Celis in the leg.
However, an affidavit from FBI Special Agent Timothy Schanz, who investigated the shooting, stated that ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations agents were attempting to stop a different man identified as Joffre Stalin Paucar Barrera — not Sosa-Celis — whom they believed was in the country illegally. According to Schanz, agents later identified the driver DHS agents stopped as a different man, Aljorna.
Schanz wrote that Aljorna struck a light pole and fled on foot toward his apartment building.
Sosa-Celis was allegedly standing on the porch and yelling at Aljorna to run faster, the affidavit says. Aljorna slipped and allegedly “began tussling” with the agent before Sosa-Celis grabbed a broom and began striking the agent, according to the affidavit.
The agent “then saw who he believed was a third Hispanic male approach with a snow shovel, and this male also began striking” him, Schanz said in the affidavit. The third man was identified as Gabriel Alejandro Hernandez-Ledezma by DHS, who accused him of also assaulting the officer.
Sosa-Celis was shot in the leg as he attempted to go inside the apartment, the affidavit says.
Video reviewed by ABC News’ Visual Verification team includes a 911 call from individuals identified as relatives of Sosa-Celis, who said agents fired as he was attempting to close the door.
