Author: Press Room

CNN  —  Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema decided to shake up the political world on Friday by becoming an independent. The former Democrat is still caucusing with the party in the Senate, so the Democratic caucus still has 51 members. Now, instead of 49 Democrats and two independents within their ranks, the caucus has 48 Democrats and three independents. But that simple math hides a more clouded picture for Democrats and for Sinema herself. Sinema’s interests are no longer necessarily the Democrats’ best interests in the next Congress, and the 2024 Senate map became even more complicated for Democrats with Sinema’s…

CNN  —  No injuries were reported after part of a cliff collapsed onto a beach Friday in coastal Palos Verdes Estates in Los Angeles County, the Southern California city said in a statement. The landslide, at 10 a.m. local time, forced the closure of the beach and comes as an atmospheric river event – or a plume of moisture streaming in from the Pacific Ocean – is expected to bring heavy rain up and down the West Coast over the weekend. The potent storm system could mean more danger in the area in the coming days, geologist Pat Abbott told…

CNN  —  A New Orleans Police Department employee who was driving for Uber in her time off was stabbed to death by a passenger on Thursday, and a suspect has been arrested, authorities said. Yolanda Dillion, 54, picked up an Uber passenger in New Orleans and drove to the adjacent Jefferson Parish, according to parish Sheriff Joseph Lopinto. When the ride ended, the passenger “stabbed (Dillion) repeatedly before leaving the vehicle,” Lopinto’s office said Friday. Someone reported the stabbing to authorities just before 3 p.m. Thursday, and sheriff’s deputies found Dillion wounded in the vehicle in a hotel’s parking lot.…

For the first time in more than 25 years, Georgia men Darrell Lee Clark and Cain Joshua Storey will be home for Christmas, thanks to a true-crime podcast that uncovered their wrongful convictions for murder, and attorneys from the Georgia Innocence Project.  Clark and Storey walked out of the Floyd County jail as free men Thursday after the Rome Judicial Circuit District Attorney’s Office agreed that their convictions in the 1996 shooting death of a friend should be overturned. They were embraced by tearful friends and family who gathered to meet them. “You never think something like that is going to…

Winnipeg police are investigating a fatal two-vehicle crash on King Edward Street early Saturday. Emergency crews were called to the crash at King Edward Street and Inkster Boulevard around 12:30 a.m.A woman driving one of the vehicles died at the scene, police said in a release later in the day Saturday.A 21-year-old man driving the second vehicle was taken to hospital in stable condition, where he was treated for his injuries.Police say the woman who died has yet to be identified. King Edward Street was closed to traffic in all directions around the crash for several hours.Officers from the WPS…

Morocco have entrenched themselves in World Cup history, and Portugal have crashed out in controversial, unceremonious fashion. The conversation following Morocco’s 1-0 defeat of Portugal in the quarterfinals will inevitably center on Cristiano Ronaldo, who was not included in the starting lineup for the second straight game, whose international career is likely finished and, if that is indeed the case, has now gone his entire Portugal career without scoring a goal in the World Cup knockout stage. In truth, though, if this World Cup ends up being Lionel Messi’s last great victory, it is also the moment where the pomp…

The Cinderella story at the World Cup continues. Morocco beat Portugal in the quarterfinals Saturday morning, 1-0. Morocco advances to play the winner of the quarterfinal match between England and France.  It’s the first time an African country has reached the semifinal stage. WORLD CUP 2022: MOROCCO SHOCKS SPAIN IN ROUND OF 16, ADVANCE TO QUARTERFINALS FOR FIRST TIMEPortugal star Cristiano Ronaldo was benched for the second consecutive game, coming in as a sub in the 51st minute. “A group too united to be broken by external forces,” Ronaldo said in an Instagram post on Thursday. “A nation too brave to let itself…

In August, New York mayor Eric Adams stood before a banner festooned withcannabis-leaf emblems, making what he billed as a major announcement. “Today, welight up our economy,” enthused the mayor. Referring to recreational pot sales, hecontinued: “The regulated adult-use cannabis industry is a once-in-a-generationopportunity … Cannabis NYC will plant the seeds for the economy of tomorrow.” Welcome to New York’s post-pandemic economic-development policy: the promotion ofvice. In this New York, vice isn’t something to tolerate, operating on the edges of thelaw, in a black market in a dense, wealthy city; it’s a premier growth industry. And pot isn’t the only vice that…

Independent Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema’s departure from the Democratic Party on Friday raises questions concerning the future of her pivotal Senate seat in the body’s already slim margin between Democrats and Republicans.The former Democrat was first elected in 2018, winning a tight race against then-Republican Congresswoman Martha McSally, and is up for re-election in 2024 in what is expected to be a primary target for Republicans to flip.Regardless of whether Sinema chooses to continue to caucus with her Democratic colleagues in the Senate, Arizona law will not allow her to run as a candidate of a particular political party if…

Jimmy Lai, media mogul and opponent of the Chinese Communist Party, has been sentenced to 69 months in prison after an extensive trial period.Lai was sentenced on two counts of fraud related to leases for the offices of his newspaper, Apple Daily.In addition to the prison sentence, Lai was ordered to pay a fine of approximately U.S. $256,837.APPLE DAILY: HONG KONG POLICE RAID OFFICES OF PRO-DEMOCRACY PAPER, MAKE ARRESTSLai, 75, was charged with fraud on Dec. 3 of 2019 for allegedly violating the lease terms for office space for the Next Digital, the media company he founded.He was charged again…