Bomb cyclone hammers West Coast, 2 dead in Washington state
Mathieu Lewis-Rolland/Getty Images
(SEATTLE) — Two people were killed by falling trees in Washington state as a powerful storm hammered the Pacific Northwest.
In Bellevue, a tree fell into a home, hitting and killing a woman while she was in the shower Tuesday night, Bellevue fire officials said.
In Lynwood, a woman in her 50s was killed when a tree fell on a homeless encampment, officials said.
Hundreds of thousands of people lost power in the storm, which snapped power lines and caused significant damage. As of Wednesday evening, about 320,000 customers were still without power, according to Puget Sound Energy CEO Mary Kipp.
“We haven’t had a storm like this since January of 2012,” Kipp said in in a video on X.
Crews were prioritizing restoring power to hospitals and schools, and Kipp estimated power wouldn’t be back for all customers “for at least a few days.”
Another roughly 23,000 customers of Seattle City Light were still without power as of Wednesday evening, according to a post from the utility on social media platform X.
The storm exploded into a bomb cyclone off the coast, near Vancouver Island, Canada, where winds gusted near 101 mph.
A bomb cyclone means the pressure in the center of the storm drops 24 millibars within 24 hours.
The storm is bringing dangerous wind and rain to the West Coast.
Two to 4 inches of rain has been recorded so far in western Washington, western Oregon and northwestern California.
The rain started in northwestern California on Tuesday afternoon and it isn’t expected to stop until Friday morning. Twelve to 18 inches of rainfall is expected by the end of the week.
A high risk for excessive rainfall has been issued. The rain will be the most dangerous on Thursday.
Flash flooding, rockslides and landslides are all likely.
In the mountains of Northern California, blizzard conditions will be possible as wind gusts reach 50 to 70 mph. One to 4 feet of snow is possible at higher elevations. One foot of snow has already hit the mountains west of Redding, California.
ABC News’ Marilyn Heck contributed to this report.
(NEW YORK) — As Luigi Mangione pleaded not guilty Monday to state murder and terrorism charges in the brazen killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, supporters of the suspect continued to donate tens of thousands of dollars for a defense fund established for him, leaving law enforcement officials worried Mangione is being turned into a martyr.
Several online defense funds have been created for Mangione by anonymous people, including one on the crowdfunding website GiveSendGo that as of Tuesday morning had raised over $200,000.
The GiveSendGo defense fund for the 26-year-old Mangione was established by an anonymous group calling itself “The December 4th Legal Committee,” apparently in reference to the day Mangione allegedly ambushed and gunned down Thompson in Midtown Manhattan as the executive walked to his company’s shareholders conference at the New York Hilton hotel.
“We are not here to celebrate violence, but we do believe in the constitutional right to fair legal representation,” the anonymous group said in a statement.
The crowdfunding campaign prompted donations from thousands of anonymous donors across the country, many of them leaving messages of support for Mangione, including one person who called themselves “A frustrated citizen” and thanked Mangione for “sparking the awareness and thought across this sleeping nation.”
In a statement to ABC News, a spokesperson for GiveSendGo said the company “operates with a principle of not preemptively determining guilt or innocence.”
“Our platform does not adjudicate legal matters or the validity of causes. Instead, we allow campaigns to remain live unless they violate the specific terms outlined in our Terms of Use. Importantly, we do allow campaigns for legal defense funds, as we believe everyone deserves the opportunity to access due process,” the GiveSendGo spokesperson said.
The spokesperson added, “We understand the concerns raised by such campaigns and take these matters seriously. When campaigns are reported, our team conducts a thorough review to ensure they comply with our policies. While other platforms may choose a different approach, GiveSendGo’s core value is to provide a space where all individuals, no matter their situation, can seek and receive support, with donors making their own informed decisions.”
Other crowdfunding sites such as GoFundMe have taken down campaigns soliciting donations for Mangione’s defense.
“GoFundMe’s Terms of Service prohibit fundraisers for the legal defense of violent crimes,” the crowdfunding website said in a statement. “The fundraisers have been removed from our platform and all donors have been refunded.”
Amazon and Etsy have removed from their websites merchandise featuring Mangione, including T-shirts and tote bags reading “Free Luigi” and the phrase “Deny, Defend, Depose,” words police said were etched in the shell casings discovered at the scene of Thompson’s homicide.
“Celebrating this conduct is abhorrent to me. It’s deeply disturbing,” Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg told ABC News senior investigative reporter Aaron Katersky in an interview last week. “And what I would say to members of the public, people who, as you described, are celebrating this and maybe contemplating other action, that we will be vigilant and we will hold people accountable. We are at the ready.”
When Mangione appeared in court Monday for his arrangement, more than two dozen young women, who had waited in the frigid cold outside the courthouse, said they were there to support the defendant.
Most of the women wore face masks and a few appeared visibly emotional as Mangione entered the courtroom.
“This is a grave injustice, and that’s why people are here,” one of the women, who said she arrived at the courthouse at 5 a.m., told ABC News.
Other supporters outside the courthouse chanted, “Free, free Luigi” and “Eat the rich,” and held signs reading, “People over profits” and “Health over wealth.”
Manhattan grand jury indicted Mangione last week on 11 charges, including first-degree murder in furtherance of terrorism. Mangione is also facing federal charges that could get him the death penalty if convicted.
Mangione’s attorney, Karen Friedman Agnifilo, raised concerns in court Monday that her client is being used by police and New York City Mayor Eric Adams as “political fodder.”
Angifilo also slammed last week’s extradition of Mangione back to Manhattan to face charges, calling Adams’ presence amid the massive display of force used in the transfer “the biggest staged perp walk I have seen in my career.”
“What was the New York City mayor doing at this press conference — that is utterly political,” she said, before referencing the mayor’s own criminal case. “The New York City mayor should know more than anyone the presumption of innocence.”
Retired FBI special agent Richard Frankel said suspects have received unsolicited support in previous politically charged violent crimes.
“We saw it with the Unabomber,” said Frankel, an ABC News contributor, referring to Ted Kaczynski, the mathematician-turn-domestic terrorist who blamed technology for a decline of individual freedom and mailed handcrafted explosives to targeted individuals between 1978 and 1995.
Frankel said Eric Rudolph, who detonated a bomb in Atlanta’s Centennial Olympic Park during the 1996 Olympic Games and carried out three additional bombings as he eluded capture for five years, also attracted supporters.
“In my opinion, they’re supporting individuals who have committed potentially terrorist acts, but it’s a politically charged act,” Frankel said.
Referring to the Thompson killing, Frankel added, “You can be up in arms about the health care industry, but you can’t threaten or actually hurt members of the health care industry.”
Most recently, Marine veteran Daniel Penny was acquitted of criminally negligent homicide in the chokehold death of Jordan Neely, a homeless man who was acting erratically on a New York City subway, after supporters donated more than $3 million to his legal defense fund.
Law enforcement officials have expressed concern that Mangione is being turned into a martyr. Someone this week pasted “wanted posters” outside the New York Stock Exchange naming other executives.
A recent bulletin released by the Delaware Valley Intelligence Center, a multi-agency law enforcement intelligence-sharing network based in Philadelphia, included a photo of a banner hanging from an overpass reading, “Deny, Defend, Depose,” which are the same words etched on shell casings police said were recovered from the Thompson homicide scene.
“Many social media users have outright advocated for the continued killings of CEOs with some aiming to spread fear by posting ‘hit lists,'” the bulletin, obtained by ABC News, reads.
(WASHINGTON) — Attorneys for President-elect Donald Trump and his allies unleashed a legal blitz this week to prevent the release of special counsel Jack Smith’s final report on his classified documents and election interference investigations, successfully convincing the federal judge who dismissed Trump’s documents case to issue an emergency injunction temporarily blocking the report’s release.
While Smith has released many of his findings already — through four indictments and a lengthy filing outlining the evidence against Trump — recent disclosures made by attorneys for Trump and his co-defendants suggest that the special counsel’s final report could contain previously undisclosed details that are potentially damaging to the president elect.
Trump’s lawyers, Todd Blanche and Emil Bove, who reviewed a draft version of the report over the weekend, argued in a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland Monday that the report’s release would be a “partisan weapon” and “lawless political stunt, designed to politically harm” President-elect Trump and his allies.
According to Trump’s lawyers, a draft of the report included multiple “baseless attacks” on members of Trump’s incoming presidential administration that could “interfere with upcoming confirmation hearings.”
The letter did not provide any additional information about which, if any, of Trump’s nominees or appointees were mentioned in the report.
According to a court filing from Trump’s defense lawyers Monday, a draft version of the report asserts that Trump “engaged in an unprecedented criminal effort,” violated multiple federal laws, and served as the “head” of multiple criminal conspiracies.
Trump pleaded not guilty in 2023 to charges of unlawfully retaining classified materials after leaving the White House, and, in a separate case, pleaded not guilty to charges of undertaking a “criminal scheme” to overturn the results of the 2020 election. U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon dismissed the classified documents case this past July after deeming Smith’s appointment unconstitutional, leading Smith to appeal that decision.
Smith, who is now winding down both his cases against the president-elect due to a longstanding Department of Justice policy prohibiting the prosecution of a sitting president, has not provided any details about the contents of his report. Smith’s team has accused Trump’s attorneys of violating a confidentiality agreement by making portions of their findings public in their filings.
Special counsels are mandated by internal Justice Department regulations to prepare confidential reports at the conclusion of their investigations to summarize their findings, and the attorney general can determine whether to release the report publicly. Smith’s report includes two volumes, covering his investigation into Trump’s alleged retention of classified documents and efforts to overturn the 2020 election.
Trump’s lawyers argued that the report’s release would disrupt the ongoing presidential transition process and “exacerbate stigma and public opprobrium surrounding the Chief Executive,” suggesting that the report — which is being prepared by a prosecutor independent from the president — contradicts the Biden administration’s vow to “facilitate an orderly and collegial transition process.”
“It’ll be a fake report, just like it was a fake investigation,” Trump said at a news conference Tuesday at his Mar-a-Lago estate.
Trump’s lawyers also suggested that the report included a “pathetically transparent tirade” about social media platform X’s effort to “protect civil liberties.”
ABC News previously reported that X — then known as Twitter — was held in contempt and fined $350,000 for failing to comply with a search warrant for records and data from former President Trump’s social media account. X’s owner, Elon Musk, is now one of Trump’s most vocal supporters and advisers, and spent more than a quarter of a billion dollars to help elect Trump.
Blanche and Bove — both of whom Trump has picked for top Justice Department posts in the incoming administration — have argued that the report’s release would only offer a single-sided view of the case and give “rise to a media storm of false and unfair criticism” that Trump would need to address during the transition period.
While Trump is no longer being prosecuted by Smith, his two former co-defendants in the classified documents case have argued they would be unable to have a fair trial if the findings are released publicly. Lawyers for Walt Nauta and Carlos De Oliveira have claimed that the report would reveal sensitive grand jury material — such as communications obtained via a subpoena — and support the finding that “everyone Smith charged is guilty of the crimes charged.”
Describing Smith as a “rogue actor with a personal and political vendetta,” lawyers for Trump’s co-defendants argued in a filing that the report would irreparably bias the public by amplifying the government’s “narrative” without providing Trump and his co-defendants the ability to respond.
“Smith’s planned Final Report — now that he is unshackled from due process requirements that restrained him as a government actor — would engender the very prejudice, passion, and excitement and be an exercise of the tyrannical power that our court system is designed to insulate against,” the filing said.
In a brief filing Tuesday, a lawyer on Smith’s staff confirmed that the special counsel’s office is “working to finalize” its report, and said that Garland will have the final say over what material will be made public.
(WASHINGTON) — The U.S. Department of Labor is proposing a rule that will eliminate the certificates that allow employers to pay some workers with disabilities less than the federal minimum wage, which stands at $7.25 an hour.
The department announced the change on Tuesday, which also marked the International Day of Persons with Disabilities.
“One of the guiding principles of the American workplace is that a hard day’s work deserves a fair day’s pay, and this proposal ensures that principle includes workers with disabilities,” said Wage and Hour Administrator Jessica Looman in a statement on the proposed rule.
She continued, “Since the enactment of the Fair Labor Standards Act in 1938, opportunities and training have dramatically expanded to help people with disabilities obtain and maintain employment at or above the full federal minimum wage. Similarly, employers today have more resources and training available to recruit, hire and retain workers with disabilities in employment at or above the full minimum wage, and this proposed rule aligns with that reality.”
The rule, if passed, would no longer allow employers to apply for certificates under Section 14(c) of Fair Labor Standards Act, which allows for the subminimum wage. It would set a three-year phase-out period for employers who currently have existing certificates.
A 2020 report from the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights found that some workers were being paid less than a dollar an hour for their work.
The disability community faces higher rates of poverty and lower rates of employment in the workforce, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and the National Council on Disability. Disabled advocates have long criticized Section 14(c) for perpetuating what they call discrimination and stigma.
