Sec. of State Marco Rubio en route to Germany after plane suffers mechanical issue
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(WASHINGTON) — Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s plane experienced a mechanical issue while en route to Munich, Germany, on Thursday, according to a State Department spokesperson.
The plane turned around returned to Joint Base Andrews before Rubio continued his travel to Germany and the Middle East on a separate aircraft, the spokesperson added.
Rubio is now safely en route to Munich on a smaller aircraft, according to the State Department.
Rubio is headed to Germany to attend the Munich Security Conference and to participate in the G7 Foreign Ministers’ Meeting, according to the State Department.
He will then travel to Israel, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to meet with senior officials, according to the agency.
“Secretary Rubio’s engagements with senior officials will promote U.S. interests in advancing regional cooperation, stability, and peace,” the State Department said of the trip, adding that the Israel-Hamas ceasefire and hostage deal will be a priority.
(WASHINGTON) — U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, who dismissed Donald Trump’s classified documents case, has ruled that the Justice Department can release Volume One of special counsel report Jack Smith’s report, covering his election interference case against Trump — but is reserving ruling on whether the DOJ can make Volume Two, on the classified documents case, available to congressional leadership for review.
Cannon has scheduled a hearing for Jan. 17 on that matter.
Cannon last week issued the injunction temporarily blocking the release of the entire report — both the first volume on the Jan. 6 case and the second volume on the classified documents case — as the Justice Department appeared poised to publicly release the report. Attorney General Merrick Garland had vowed to release the classified documents volume to top members of Congress and to publicly release the classified documents volume — which the DOJ attested in a filing this weekend has no bearing on the evidence or charges related Nauta and De Oliveira — but Trump’s former co-defendants continue to push for neither volume to see the light of day.
In a separate case, Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes, who in April indicted 11 individuals, including Trump allies Rudy Giuliani and Mark Meadows, on charges of attempting to overturn the 2020 election results in her state, told Garland in a letter Sunday that gaining access to the case file will “help ensure that those who should be held accountable are.”
“Today, my office has one of the only remaining cases that includes charges against national actors,” the letter said. “I have held steadfast to prosecuting the grand jury’s indictment because those who tried to subvert democracy in 2020 must be held accountable.”
The letter also asked the DOJ for any “exculpatory material” unearthed in the probe.
It also referenced a recent order from a state judge that granted a request from Meadows for discovery in the case to help aid in his defense. The letter, though, acknowledges that the state judge “cannot compel disclosure from a federal agency.”
“For the reasons discussed above, the Maricopa County Superior Court’s order should be fulfilled. In the alternative, consider this a request under the Freedom of Information Act,” the letter states. “Disclosure will ensure justice is done consistent with the rule of law.”
Trump pleaded not guilty in 2023 to 40 criminal counts related to his handling of classified materials after leaving the White House, after prosecutors said he repeatedly refused to return hundreds of documents containing classified information and took steps to thwart the government’s efforts to retrieve them from his Mar-a-Lago estate. The former president, along with Nauta and De Oliveira, pleaded not guilty in a superseding indictment to allegedly attempting to delete surveillance footage at Mar-a-Lago.
Trump also pleaded not guilty in 2023 to separate charges of undertaking a “criminal scheme” to overturn the results of the 2020 election in an effort to subvert democracy and remain in power.
Both cases were dismissed following Trump’s reelection in November due to a longstanding Justice Department policy prohibiting the prosecution of a sitting president.
John Kuklis, a clerk at the Horseshoe Curve Lodge in Altoona, Penn., is seen on “Good Morning America,” on Dec. 11, 2024. ABC News
(ALTOONA, Penn.) — Before he was arrested Luigi Mangione walked into the Horseshoe Curve Lodge in Altoona, Pennsylvania, on Monday looking for a room, according to the desk clerk who greeted him and noticed what he described as the man’s shifty behavior.
“He basically just walked in kind of cagey, just looking around, making sure he wasn’t being watched, asked if he could get a room here,” the hotel clerk, John Kuklis, told ABC News.
But that wasn’t the reason Kuklis had to turn the man away. They didn’t have a clean room available at that early hour, he said.
“I told him that he wouldn’t be able to get one right now, that our housekeeper hadn’t cleaned the rooms yet, that he had to come back at one o’clock. He asked if he could wait here. I told him no, because at the time, I didn’t know that I could just allow him to wait for, you know, half the day. And he said, ‘OK.’ And he turned around and just left. Didn’t say nothing. Never took his mask down,” Kuklis said.
Mangione’s arrival on Monday, the morning he was later arrested, came days after last week’s fatal shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in Manhattan. Mangione faces a second-degree murder charge in connection with that killing. His defense attorney, Thomas Dickey, said he anticipates that Mangione will plead not guilty.
The Horseshoe Curve Lodge is roughly a 17-minute walk from the McDonald’s where authorities would later confront Mangione, and take him into custody. Rooms at that hotel cost around $60 a night, according to a review of online price quotes.
At first, Kuklis thought the young man might be a veteran just returned to civilian life — there are “a lot of vets that stay here,” Kuklis said, and thought that might perhaps be why the young man was acting somewhat circumspect.
He added, “When [vets] come back, they have — anybody that walks up behind ’em, or you feel a little shadow, or you hear a specific noise, you just kind of look over your shoulders, watch yourself, and he just, he was like, wouldn’t turn his head, but his eyes were constantly looking like, is there somebody coming behind me, watching his surroundings?”
Had Mangione been able to get a room, Kuklis said, he would have been asked to show ID — but that didn’t happen. Mangione has been charged with falsely identifying himself to police, according to a complaint filed in Blair County, Pennsylvania.
Tuesday, officers called the hotel, asking if the suspect had stayed there, the clerk said.
“They called this morning and asked if he had stayed here, I says, no,” Kuklis said, but mentioned to police the young man’s earlier attempt to book a stay. “The officer goes, ‘did he have a mask on? Did he ever take a mask off?'” Kuklis said, realizing in real time to the officer, “No, he never did take the mask off.'”
“Next thing I know there’s three Logan Township police cars pulling in the parking lot. I’m like, holy crap” Kuklis said. “We pulled up our surveillance stuff, they go, ‘Yeah, that’s him.'”
Looking back, Kuklis said he “didn’t even realize” that furtive young man might have been carrying the very weapon allegedly used to gun down the CEO. “I mean, theoretically, I guess he could have just pulled it out and shot me.”
Members of the New York Police Department discuss a shooting in Queens, New York, at a press conference on Jan. 2, 2025. Via NYPD.
(NEW YORK) — Ten people were shot after several men opened fire at a group of people waiting outside of a music venue in Queens, New York, the New York Police Department said in a press conference early on Thursday.
Officers received reports of several people shot at an event space in Queens at 11:18 p.m. Wednesday evening, Chief of Patrol Philip Rivera said.
Ninety people were inside the building, which was at capacity, Rivera said. There was a line of about 15 people waiting outside to enter the space when three to four males approached and opened fire.
Ten people were shot, all between the ages of 16 and 20, Rivera said. Six of injured are female and four are male, he said. They were taken to area hospitals with non-life-threatening injuries. Police said they believe that at least 30 shots were fired in the direction of the group.
The male suspects fled on foot and drove away in a sedan with out of state plates, police said.
Authorities are investigating whether the shooting was gang related. This was not a terrorist attack, Rivera said.
