Category: National

(NEW YORK) — The Department of Homeland Security on Wednesday announced new arrival restrictions for flights carrying people who were recently in Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda or South Sudan amid the Ebola outbreak in the region.

All flights — excluding those operated by the Pentagon — departing after 11:59 p.m. ET on Wednesday carrying passengers that were in the named nations within 21 days of attempted entry into the U.S. will be ordered to land at Washington-Dulles Airport in Virginia, the notice said, where “enhanced public health measures are being implemented.”

The Ebola outbreak in the eastern DRC had caused 139 suspected deaths with nearly 600 suspected cases as of Wednesday, according to an update from World Health Organization Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

Tedros said cases of Ebola have been reported in several urban areas of the eastern DRC amid the ongoing outbreak, including the major cities of Goma and Bunia, and that at least two cases and one death have been recorded in neighboring Uganda’s capital, Kampala. Cases have also been reported among health workers, according to Ghebreyesus.

At least 51 cases have so far been confirmed in the ongoing outbreak.

The DHS flight restriction notice said that while South Sudan has not reported any confirmed cases in the current outbreak, “It is considered at high risk because of its close border with affected areas in eastern DRC and Uganda, limited healthcare infrastructure and cross-border population movement.”

The outbreak was first detected in the DRC’s northeastern province of Ituri, with cases officially confirmed by the health ministry on May 15. It marked the 17th outbreak of Ebola virus disease in the DRC, which is Africa’s second-largest country and its fourth-most populous nation.

The WHO convened an emergency committee on Tuesday night, following Tedros’ declaration of a public health emergency of international concern on Sunday — one level below a pandemic in the United Nations agency’s alert system.

It was the first time a WHO chief had declared such an emergency before convening the emergency committee. After the meeting, the committee agreed that the outbreak did not meet the criteria of a pandemic emergency, which was applied to the global COVID-19 outbreak.

Anais Legand, the WHO’s technical officer for viral hemorrhagic fevers, said on Wednesday that the Ebola outbreak may have started a couple of months ago and that investigations are ongoing.

“Our priority is really to cut the transmission chain by implementing contact tracing, isolating and caring for all suspects and confirmed cases,” she said.

The current outbreak is caused by the Bundibugyo virus, a rare variant of Ebola for which there are no approved vaccines or therapeutics and which requires different diagnostics than other variants. Case fatality rates for previous Bundibugyo outbreaks have ranged from 30% to 50%, according to the WHO.

Among the confirmed cases is an American, Dr. Peter Stafford, who contracted the disease while working in the DRC. Stafford was flown out of the DRC and is now hospitalized in Berlin’s Charité University Hospital.

Matt Allison — the executive director of Serge, the Christian missionary group Stafford works for — told ABC News on Wednesday that the doctor has been receiving monoclonal antibodies during his hospitalization and is “responding quickly.”

Dr. Satish K. Pillai, incident manager for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Ebola response, confirmed at a CDC press conference on Tuesday that genetic testing from this outbreak shows it is similar to the “genetic fingerprints” from outbreaks in 2007 and 2012, meaning there are diagnostic tools available that can detect this strain of Ebola.

Pillai said on Monday that the agency had activated its Emergency Operations Center through its country offices in the DRC and in Uganda, and is deploying technical experts that have been requested from Atlanta headquarters.

The risk to the U.S. general public remains low, Pillai said.

Also on Monday, the CDC introduced entry restrictions on non-U.S. passport holders that had been in Uganda, the DRC or South Sudan in the previous 21 days before attempted entry into the U.S.

ABC News’ Eric M. Strauss, Mary Kekatos and Morgan Winsor contributed to this report.

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(NEW YORK) — The House Oversight Committee on Thursday is scheduled to conduct a closed-door interview with Sarah Kellen, a former personal assistant to Jeffrey Epstein, as part of the panel’s ongoing inquiry into the federal government’s handling of investigations into the late sex offender.

Kellen, 46, was previously a subject of criminal investigations but has never been charged — due, in part, to her own allegations of persistent sexual abuse at the hands of the disgraced financier, according to court documents and records released earlier this year by the Justice Department.

“Every aspect of her life was controlled by Epstein. He dominated her psychologically. [Kellen] was constantly emotionally bullied and coerced by Epstein, including being required to submit to his constant sexual abuse,” her attorneys wrote in a civil complaint against Epstein’s estate in 2020.

Kellen’s appearance at the Capitol comes as the committee ramps up for a busy stretch of its investigation, which was officially launched in February of last year. Other notable witnesses scheduled in the coming months include Epstein’s longtime executive assistant Leslie Groff, former U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, former Goldman Sachs chief counsel Kathryn Ruemmler, and billionaires Bill Gates and Leon Black.

The committee’s chairman, Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), has indicated that a report on its findings will be produced before the end of the year.

Following Epstein’s death in custody in July 2019, federal prosecutors in New York investigating possible collaborators engaged in discussions with Kellen and her attorneys that spanned more than a year. Documents released by the DOJ earlier this year included prosecutors’ internal assessments of a potential case against Kellen and emails from her attorneys trying to dissuade the government from filing charges.

“We feel that given [Kellen’s] abuse, and given the fact that we see her basically as a cog in Epstein’s wheel, acting entirely at his direction and doing what she did at a time that she herself was a very vulnerable victim, a [non-prosecution] would be the appropriate disposition,” an attorney for Kellen wrote in the spring of 2020.

According to DOJ records, the government did not dispute that Kellen “was herself a victim of abuse by Epstein,” noting that her account was consistent with others who worked for Epstein and allegedly experienced sexual exploitation.

Prosecutors detailed in a proposed “statement of facts” sent to Kellen’s attorneys in late 2020 that several “minor victims reported to federal agents that Epstein paid them for sexualized massages while they were underage girls, including during massages that [Kellen] scheduled.”

Kellen conceded that Epstein directed her to schedule his daily massages in the early 2000s when he was staying in his Palm Beach, Florida, residence, according to the DOJ records. She claimed she was provided a directory of names and instructed on who to call, and denied having knowledge that some who came to the house were underage.

She told prosecutors she viewed the “masseuses as her peers — i.e. young adults in their early 20s — and it never [crossed] her mind that any of them were minors,” government lawyers wrote in a December 2019 memo summarizing their investigation for Geoffrey Berman, then the top federal prosecutor in New York.

Kellen said she “only learned that Epstein was sexually abusing minors when news articles started coming out about it” in the mid-2000s, according to the records. “She recalled being shocked, angry, and disappointed. She was particularly angry with Epstein for manipulating her to help orchestrate the abuse of other women,” the records said.

Federal prosecutors ultimately decided against charging Kellen, though the internal deliberations that led to that outcome are unclear. Much of the legal analysis in the prosecution memos remains redacted in the publicly available versions of the DOJ records. 

Epstein’s former associate Ghislaine Maxwell remains the only other person charged in connection with Epstein’s crimes. She is serving a 20-year sentence in a federal prison camp in Texas. Maxwell is presently seeking to have her conviction vacated or her sentence reduced.

Kellen — who has largely avoided public comment surrounding the Epstein investigation — told a reporter from a British paper who approached her on the street in New York in 2020 that she was “raped and abused weekly.”

“I have been made out to be such a monster — but it’s not true. I’m a victim of Jeffrey Epstein,” Kellen said, according to the U.K. Sun report.

An attorney who represented Kellen during discussions with federal prosecutors did not immediately respond to a request for comment ahead of Kellen’s appearance in Washington, D.C.

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(LOS ANGELES) — A social media influencer is accused of plotting to kill a pop singer in an alleged murder-for-hire conspiracy that prosecutors say stemmed from a “bitter custody dispute” over their daughter. 

The influencer, 24-year-old Gabriela Gonzalez, allegedly conspired with her father and then-boyfriend to hire a hitman to kill Jack Avery, the father of her 7-year-old daughter, several years ago, prosecutors in Los Angeles County said in a press release this week.

Avery, 26, is a former member of the boy band Why Don’t We, the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office confirmed in a press release.

Sometime between 2020 and 2021, Gabriela Gonzalez allegedly sought the help of her boyfriend at the time, 26-year-old Kai Cordrey, to hire someone on the dark web to kill Avery, prosecutors said.

She allegedly repeatedly told one witness that she wanted Avery dead and discussed hiring a hitman and that the “intended killing was discussed as occurring in Los Angeles and being made to look like a car accident,” the warrant for her father’s arrest stated.

Her father, 59-year-old Francisco Gonzalez, was “deeply involved in the custody conflict” and was the alleged source of the funds for the murder-for-hire plot, according to his arrest warrant.

Francisco Gonzalez allegedly sent Cordrey $10,000 back in April 2021 “as front money to use in locating, hiring and paying someone to kill Avery,” the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office said in a press release on Tuesday.

Two months later, Francisco Gonzalez allegedly sent Cordrey another $4,000 “after the alleged hit man asked for the additional funds,” the office said.

“Several days later, Cordrey allegedly requested that Avery be killed within a couple of days,” prosecutors said.

Cordrey spoke to an undercover law enforcement officer posing as a hitman about the alleged murder-for-hire plot in September 2021, during which he allegedly said Avery was the target and “discussed payment and proof of death,” prosecutors said.

“In a subsequent conversation, Cordrey allegedly told the purported hitman that Gabriela Gonzalez wanted the murder to happen and Francisco Gonzalez could pay for the expense,” prosecutors said.

Gabriela Gonzalez, her father and Cordrey have been charged with one count each of attempted murder, conspiracy to commit murder and solicitation of murder.

Gabriela Gonzalez was arrested on Monday and is being held on no bail, online jail records show. She was arraigned on Tuesday. Attorney information was not immediately available. 

Her father was arrested in Florida and is awaiting extradition to Los Angeles County. Court records show he is being represented by a public defender. ABC News has reached out to the public defender’s office for comment.

It is unclear if Cordrey is in custody at this time.

If convicted as charged, all three face 25 years to life in state prison.

Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman said the FBI began the “lengthy investigation” before the case was turned over to his office.

“This is a case where the defendants are accused of going to great lengths to find someone to commit murder,” Hochman said in a statement. “Most fathers raise their children to respect the law, but here we have a dad who allegedly helped his daughter and her boyfriend break the law in the most sinister way imaginable.”

Gabrielle Gonzalez has nearly 1 million followers between her Instagram and TikTok accounts. 

Her father has a law practice in Seminole County. His firm had no comment on his charges.

ABC News has reached out to Avery for comment.

In an interview on “The Zach Sang Show” last year, Avery said two FBI agents showed up at his residence and that “someone hired someone to kill me.” He did not publicly identify any suspects.

He said he was “traumatized.”

“I stayed in my house for like a month straight. I didn’t leave,” Avery said during the interview. “I was so scared. I was looking out my window every night.”

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(CALIFORNIA) — Fueled by gusting winds and warm temperatures, multiple large wildfires continued to menace Southern California on Wednesday, prompting thousands of residents to evacuate, authorities said.

As of Wednesday morning, the five largest wildfires had burned nearly 22,000 acres from Santa Barbara County to the U.S.-Mexico border, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire).

The Sandy Fire

The most evacuations were being prompted by the Sandy Fire, which ignited on Monday in the foothills above Semi Valley. At one point on Tuesday evening, more than 43,700 people were under mandatory evacuation orders or evacuation warnings, according to the Ventura County Fire Department.

The wildfire had grown to 1,698 acres by Wednesday morning and was 15% contained, according to Cal Fire.

Firefighters quickly attacked the blaze from the ground and the air as flames raced downhill in the direction of populated neighborhoods, officials said. As of Wednesday morning, only one structure had been destroyed by the fire, but many evacuation orders remained in place, according to officials.

The cause of the fire remains under investigation.

While winds were moderate overnight, Andrew Dowd, a Ventura County Fire Department spokesperson, said that the winds were expected to pick up on Wednesday afternoon.

“We’re anticipating right now seeing northeasterly winds in the morning and then early afternoon, from what I have got so far, shifting to the west,” Dowd said during a news conference Wednesday morning. “But we’ll continue to monitor the weather and kind of use that as our guide for where we put our resources and our priorities.”

The Bain Fire

In Southern California’s Riverside County, the Bain Fire was threatening homes in the Santa Ana River bottom in Jurupa Valley, according to Cal Fire.

The Bain Fire was reported around 12:20 p.m. local time on Tuesday and, driven by gusting wind, rapidly spread in the direction of homes, prompting evacuations, Cal Fire said.

Overnight, the Bain Fire grew to 1,375 acres and was 25% contained, Cal Fire said in an update on Wednesday morning.

While no structures were reported lost, Los Angeles ABC station KABC reported that three people suffered smoke inhalation and a fourth was taken to a hospital with traumatic injuries.

The Verona Fire

As firefighters were responding to the Bain Fire, another wildfire ignited nearby in Riverside County, prompting more evacuation orders and warnings, according to Cal Fire.

The Verona Fire in the unincorporated communities of Green Acres and Homeland had grown to 500 acres on Wednesday morning and was 5% contained, Cal Fire reported.

Residents in the area told KABC that three to four homes had been destroyed by the blaze.

Cal Fire posted a video on social media on Wednesday of a towering “smokenado,” or a smoke tornado, that formed as firefighters battled the Verona Fire.

The Santa Rosa Island Fire

The largest fire burning in Southern California is the Santa Rosa Island Fire in the Channel Islands off the coast of Santa Barbara County.

While the fire remains under investigation, the U.S. Coast Guard said it was likely ignited by emergency flares fired by a 67-year-old shipwrecked mariner on the island.

The Coast Guard posted a photo on social media showing the stranded sailor standing near a patch of blackened brush in which he had scratched “SOS” in the dirt.

The wildfire at last word was 26% contained after growing to nearly 17,000 acres, according to Cal Fire.

The Tusil Fire

The Tusil Fire, burning in San Diego County, had spread to 1,000 acres and had also forced evacuations on the Campo Reservation, according to Cal Fire.

The wildfire, which started on Tuesday, was 25% contained as of Wednesday.

“Fire activity moderated overnight, allowing firefighters to strengthen containment lines and continue making progress toward full containment,” Cal Fire said in an update on Wednesday.

At least one structure was damaged by the fire, which also shut down the Interstate 8 freeway in both directions in the fire zone on Wednesday, according to Cal Fire. The California Highway Patrol said on Wednesday morning that one lane in each direction of the freeway had been reopened.

One structure was damaged by the fire and some evacuation orders remain in effect, according to Cal Fire.

ABC News’ Amanda Morris, Jenna Harrison and Vanessa Navarete contributed to this report.

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(NEW YORK) — A sinkhole has shut down one of the runways at LaGuardia International Airport in New York City, prompting cancellations and delays, according to officials.

Crews found the sinkhole around 11 a.m. on Wednesday, while conducting a daily morning inspection of the airport’s airfield, according to the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

The sinkhole was located near Runway 4/22, one of the airport’s two runways, according to the Port Authority.

Runway 4/22 was “immediately” shut down, and emergency construction and engineering crews are on site to make repairs, the Port Authority said.

The Federal Aviation Administration said it is slowing flights into LaGuardia “due to weather and a sinkhole on Runway 4/22.”

“Travelers should expect delays and cancellations, particularly with forecast thunderstorms expected later today, and are strongly encouraged to check directly with their airlines for the latest flight status information,” the Port Authority said.

The airport is currently under a ground delay, with flights departing to LaGuardia delayed an average of 98 minutes.

According to FlightAware, there are currently 197 cancellations into and out of LGA, and 168 delays.  

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

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(WASHINGTON) — The Department of Justice on Wednesday charged a longtime federal prosecutor with attempting to steal a sealed report prepared by then-special counsel Jack Smith on President Donald Trump’s alleged retention of classified documents.

A grand jury indicted Carmen Mercedes Lineberger — a managing assistant U.S. attorney in Fort Pierce, Florida — with four felony counts for allegedly attempting to steal the report, which has been sealed from public view for more than a year.

Prosecutors allege that Lineberger downloaded a copy of the sealed report onto her work computer and sent it to her personal email account in January of 2025.

According to the indictment, Lineberger renamed the report “Bundt_Cake_Recipe.pdf” before attaching it to an email from her DOJ account to her personal Gmail account.

The report has remained secret since January 2025, when it was prepared by Smith in the final days before Trump’s inauguration to summarize Trump’s alleged crimes. U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon ordered the report be kept secret after a push from Trump’s lawyers to seal the records, and the Department of Justice under the Trump administration has since fought to ensure the report is never released.

Trump pleaded not guilty to 40 counts of retaining classified information, obstruction of justice, and false statements after Smith alleged he not only kept a trove of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate after leaving office in 2021, but also actively impeded law enforcement from retrieving them. After months of litigation, Judge Cannon dismissed the case on the grounds that Smith was not properly appointed special counsel.

Earlier this year, Cannon issued an additional order permanently restricting the department from releasing the report. Two legal groups are in the midst of appealing her orders arguing disclosure of the report remains in the public’s interest.

It’s not immediately clear based on court papers unsealed Wednesday if prosecutors will argue that Lineberger intended to leak the contents of the report.

She made her initial appearance in federal court in West Palm Beach Wednesday and entered a not guilty plea to the indictment. An attorney listed as representing Lineberger declined to comment when reached by ABC News. 

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(NEW YORK) — The Colorado River basin and its two largest reservoirs — Lake Mead and Lake Powell — are facing potentially record-low water levels in the coming months due to a snow drought that impacted much of the West over the winter season, projections from the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation show.

The 24-month study released by the Bureau of Reclamation, which oversees water resource management, on Friday indicates that Lake Mead could reach a record-low level of 1,036 feet of elevation in 2026.

Lake elevations indicate how much water is inside a reservoir. The Bureau’s scenario analysis looks at the end of month elevations for both Lake Powell and Lake Mead, and they make a future projection based on the probable inflow.

The previous low at Lake Mead was recorded in 2022, when levels dropped to around 1,040 feet.

Lake Mead could again approach these critically low levels over the next several months and years, according to the Bureau. This would depend on both the climate conditions as well as the response to those conditions, Dave White, director of the Global Institute of Sustainability and Innovation at Arizona State University, told ABC News.

Lake Powell is also projected to drop to a new record-low level in the coming months, surpassing the previous record of around 3,520 feet set in 2023. The amount of water flowing into the lake between April and July is forecast to be around 800,000 acre-feet, the lowest flow on record and only 13% of the average for that period, Cody Moser, senior hydrologist at the Colorado River Basin Forecast Center, said during a webinar on May 7.

Lake Mead and Lake Powell are the largest reservoirs in the U.S. Together, they store about 80% of the water supplies in the Colorado River system, Mark Squillace, professor of natural resources at the University of Colorado, told ABC News.

More than 40 million people rely on the river system for water, according to the Bureau.

Apart from actual water supplies, one of the biggest concerns for hydrologists is whether enough water remains in the reservoirs to operate hydropower systems. Another 2.5 million people are supplied by hydropower conducted in the Colorado River’s hydroelectric facilities, such as the Hoover and Glen Canyon dams.

The minimum surface elevation needed to generate power at the Hoover Dam is 1,050 feet, according to the Bureau. Anything below that is considered “inactive pool,” and a “dead pool” exists at 895 feet in elevation.

A “dead pool” is when water won’t flow to a dam and is too low to flow downstream.

Record low snowpack was followed by a heat wave in March that served as a “knockout punch” for lack of runoff leading to the reservoirs, Jon Meyer, assistant Utah state climatologist, told ABC News.

“We’ve been monitoring how the dismal thin snowpack melts travel down through the watersheds, and how much reservoir recharge and stream flow we can expect this year,” Meyer said. “It is just exceedingly underperformed a normal situation.”

But this isn’t a situation caused by one bad snow year, Arizona State University’s White said, adding that the Colorado River system is operating under an increasingly warmer, drier climate.

The West had been dealing with a decades-long megadrought before atmospheric rivers in the winters of 2023 and 2024 inundated the region with enough moisture to cause extreme flooding and alleviate drought conditions. This is further evidence of hydroclimate whiplash — the rapid shift between wet and dry conditions — that has resulted from anthropogenic climate change, the experts said.

“This is a multi-decade-old drought, and then on top of that multi-decade-old drought are the impacts of climate change, which predominantly translate into higher temperatures, more variable precipitation, and drier soils and higher [water] demand,” White said.

The most recent low reservoir levels occurred in 2022, in which Lake Mead’s water levels reached a record low of around 1,040 feet, according to the Bureau of Reclamation.

After that year, reservoir levels rebounded slightly due to aggressive conservation measures, especially from the lower basin states — Arizona, California and Nevada, White said.

The Colorado River system is integral for supplying water, power and watering the agricultural feeds that sustain the rest of the country, Erica Fleishman, director of the Oregon Climate Change Research Institute said.

But the river system is over-allocated, according to Fleishman. The water rights were established during a period of the 20th century in which levels were “unusually high,” she noted.

“The Colorado River is emblematic of what the entire West is seeing this year with limited water supply and ramifications for hydropower generation, for irrigation, for water quality,” Fleishman said.

The Bureau is anticipated to issue a record of decision with the operational guidelines for 2027 and 2028, as well as a framework for 2029 through 2036.

The lower basin states have submitted an allocation plan for consideration, but there is not yet a consensus plan among all of the states, including the upper basin states, according to White.

“I think it’s fair to say no one is happy with it,” he said.

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(NEW YORK) —  Two police officers who defended the U.S. Capitol in 2021 during the Jan. 6 attack are suing to stop the creation of President Donald Trump’s $1.7 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund,” calling it the “most brazen act of presidential corruption this century.” 

Former Capitol Police Officer Harry Dunn and Metropolitan Police Department Officer Daniel Hodges alleged that the compensation fund, which was announced by the Justice Department on Monday, would not only encourage those who committed violence in the name of President Trump but that it would directly finance their operations. 

“To prevent the public financing of paramilitary organizations in the United States, and to protect Plaintiffs from further violence, the fund must be dissolved,” the lawsuit said. 

The fund, which was part of a settlement agreement in Trump’s $10 billion lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service, was established by the Trump administration to compensate those who allege they were wrongly targeted under the Biden administration.

The officers alleged that the creation of the fund is arbitrary and capricious — and therefore a violation of the Administrative Procedures Act — and runs afoul of a prohibition in the Fourteenth Amendment barring the government from funding insurrections. 

“No statute authorizes its creation, the settlement on which it is premised is a corrupt sham, and its design violates the Constitution and federal law,” the lawsuit said. 

Filed in D.C. federal court, the lawsuit asked a judge to block the creation and funding of the compensation fund. The settlement agreement that initiated the fund gave the acting attorney general 30 days to create the entity and appoint five commissioners to run it. 

Dunn and Hodges are some of the most high-profile members of law enforcement who defended the Capitol that day. Hodges was pinned against a door frame, attacked, and crushed by rioters. Dunn was inside the Capitol and directly engaged the rioters. He ran for Congress unsuccessfully in 2024 and is currently running for Maryland’s 5th Congressional District.

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(NEW YORK) — Despite high prices for gas and airfare, a record-breaking 45 million Americans are expected to travel for Memorial Day weekend, according to AAA.

Whether you are hitting the road or taking to the skies, here’s what you need to know:

By plane

About 3.66 million people are expected to fly over Memorial Day weekend, according to AAA.

The top U.S. destinations are Orlando, Florida; Seattle; New York City; Las Vegas; Miami; and San Francisco, according to AAA. The top international cities are Rome; Vancouver, Canada; Paris and London.

American Airlines said its busiest travel day of the holiday weekend is expected to be Friday, May 22. American also said it’s predicting its busiest summer ever, with Friday, July 17, set to be the airline’s most popular day to fly.

By car

The majority of people are expected to drive to their Memorial Day destination, with AAA predicting 39.1 million will travel by car.

If you are heading out the door on Friday, May 22, the best time to be on the road is before 11 a.m., because traffic will be heaviest from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m., according to analytics company INRIX.

When you are ready to hit the road to go home on Monday, May 25, INRIX recommends leaving before 10 a.m., with the worst traffic forecast from noon to 5 p.m.

Although millions are driving to their Memorial Day vacation, filling up the tank will be costly as the war in Iran sends gas prices surging. As of May 10, the national average for gas was above $4.50 per gallon, according to data from AAA and Gas Buddy. Last year on Memorial Day, the national average for a gallon of gas was $3.17, according to AAA. This year marks the highest gas prices since the summer of 2022, AAA said.

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