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  • A deputy chief of Russia’s military intelligence service is shot and wounded in Moscow

    A deputy chief of Russia’s military intelligence service is shot and wounded in Moscow

    MOSCOW — A deputy chief of Russia’s military intelligence agency was shot and wounded in Moscow on Friday in an attack that follows a series of assassinations of senior military officers that Russia has blamed on Ukraine.

    Lt. Gen. Vladimir Alekseyev was hospitalized after being shot several times by an unidentified assailant at an apartment building in northwestern Moscow, Investigative Committee spokesperson Svetlana Petrenko said in a statement.

    She didn’t say who could be behind the attack on the 64-year-old who has served as the first deputy head of Russia’s military intelligence agency, known as the GRU, since 2011.

    He was decorated with the Hero of Russia medal for his role in Moscow’s military campaign in Syria and in June 2023 was shown on state TV speaking to mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin when his Wagner Group seized the military headquarters in the southern city of Rostov-on-Don during his short-lived mutiny.

    The shooting came a day after Russian, Ukrainian, and U.S. negotiators wrapped up two days of talks in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, aimed at ending the nearly 4-year-old war in Ukraine. The Russian delegation was led by Alekseyev’s boss, military intelligence chief Adm. Igor Kostyukov.

    President Vladimir Putin was informed about the attack, said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, who added that law enforcement agencies need to step up protection of senior military officers during the conflict in Ukraine.

    Ukrainian authorities haven’t commented on the attack.

    Asked about the shooting, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said it would be up to law enforcement agencies to pursue the investigation but described it as an apparent “terrorist act” by Ukraine intended to derail peace talks.

    The business daily Kommersant said the attacker, posing as a delivery person, shot the general twice in the stairway of his apartment building, wounding him in the foot and the arm. Alekseyev tried to wrest away the gun and was shot again in the chest before the attacker fled, the report said.

    Alekseyev, who was born in Ukraine when it was part of the Soviet Union, rose steadily through the ranks to lead operations of Russian military intelligence in Syria, Ukraine, and elsewhere.

    He was sanctioned by Washington for meddling in the 2016 U.S. election and also faced sanctions in the U.K. and the European Union over his alleged role in the 2018 poisoning of former Russian intelligence officer Sergei Skripal and his daughter with the nerve agent Novichok in Salisbury, England.

    Since Moscow sent troops into Ukraine in 2022, Russian authorities have blamed Kyiv for several assassinations of military officers and public figures in Russia. Ukraine has claimed responsibility for some of them.

    In December, a car bomb killed Lt. Gen. Fanil Sarvarov, head of the Operational Training Directorate of the Russian Armed Forces’ General Staff.

    In April, another senior Russian military officer, Lt. Gen. Yaroslav Moskalik, a deputy head of the main operational department in the General Staff, was killed by a bomb placed in his car parked near his apartment building just outside Moscow.

    A Russian man who previously lived in Ukraine pleaded guilty to carrying out the attack and said he had been paid by Ukraine’s security services.

    Days after Moskalik’s killing, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he received a report from the head of Ukraine’s foreign intelligence agency on the “liquidation” of top Russian military figures, adding that “justice inevitably comes” although he didn’t mention Moskalik’s name.

    In December 2024, Lt. Gen. Igor Kirillov, the chief of the military’s nuclear, biological and chemical protection forces, was killed by a bomb hidden on an electric scooter outside his apartment building. Kirillov’s assistant also died. Ukraine’s security service claimed responsibility for the attack.

  • Seif al-Islam Gadhafi, son of Libya’s late dictator, killed in north Africa country, officials say

    Seif al-Islam Gadhafi, son of Libya’s late dictator, killed in north Africa country, officials say

    CAIRO — Seif al-Islam Gadhafi, the son and one-time heir apparent of Libya’s late dictator Moammar Gadhafi, was killed in the northern African country, Libyan officials said Tuesday.

    The 53-year-old was killed in the town of Zintan, 85 miles southwest of the capital, Tripoli, according to two Libyan security officials in western Libya. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the media.

    Khaled al-Zaidi, a lawyer for Seif al-Islam, confirmed his death on Facebook, without providing details.

    Abdullah Othman Abdurrahim, who represented Gadhafi in the U.N.-brokered political dialogue which aimed to resolve Libya’s long-running conflict, also announced his death on Facebook.

    Abdurrahim, who leads his political team, didn’t provide further details, but Libyan news outlet Fawasel Media cited him as saying that armed men killed Seif al-Islam in his home. The outlet reported that prosecutors were investigating the killing.

    Seif al-Islam’s political team later released a statement, saying that “four masked men” stormed his house and killed him in a “cowardly and treacherous assassination.” The statement said that he clashed with the assailants, who closed the CCTV cameras at the house “in a desperate attempt to conceal traces of their heinous crimes.”

    Born in June 1972 in Tripoli, Seif al-Islam was the second-born son of the longtime dictator. He studied for a Ph.D. at the London School of Economics and was seen as the reformist face of the Gadhafi regime.

    Moammar Gadhafi was toppled in a NATO-backed popular uprising in 2011 after more than 40 years in power. He was killed in October 2011 amid the ensuing fighting that would turn into a civil war. The country has since plunged into chaos and divided between rival armed groups and militias.

    Seif al-Islam was captured by fighters in Zintan late in 2011 while attempting to flee to neighboring Niger. The fighters released him in June 2017 after one of Libya’s rival governments granted him amnesty. He had since lived in Zintan.

    A Libyan court convicted him of inciting violence and murdering protesters and sentenced him to death in absentia in 2015. He was also wanted by the International Criminal Court on charges of crimes against humanity related to the 2011 uprising.

    In November 2021, Seif al-Islam announced his candidacy in the country’s presidential election in a controversial move that was met with outcry from anti-Gadhafi political forces in western and eastern Libya.

    The country’s High National Elections Committee disqualified him, but the election wasn’t held over disputes between rival administrations and armed groups that have ruled Libya since the bloody ouster of Moammar Gadhafi.

  • Jill Biden’s first husband charged with killing wife in domestic dispute at their Delaware home

    Jill Biden’s first husband charged with killing wife in domestic dispute at their Delaware home

    WILMINGTON — The first husband of former first lady Jill Biden has been charged with killing his wife at their Delaware home in late December, authorities announced in a news release Tuesday.

    William Stevenson, 77, of Wilmington was married to Jill Biden from 1970 to 1975.

    Caroline Harrison, the Delaware Attorney General’s spokesperson, confirmed in a phone call that Stevenson is the former husband of Jill Biden.

    Jill Biden declined to comment, according to an e-mailed response from a spokesperson at the former president and first lady’s office.

    Stevenson remains in jail after failing to post $500,000 bail after his arrest Monday on first-degree murder charges. He is charged with killing Linda Stevenson, 64, on Dec. 28.

    Police were called to the home for a reported domestic dispute after 11 p.m. and found a woman unresponsive in the living room, according to a prior news release. Life-saving measures were unsuccessful.

    She ran a bookkeeping business and was described as a family-oriented mother and grandmother and a Philadelphia Eagles fan, according to her obituary, which does not mention her husband.

    Stevenson was charged in a grand jury indictment after a weekslong investigation by detectives in the Delaware Department of Justice.

    It was not immediately clear if Stevenson has a lawyer. He founded a popular music venue in Newark called the Stone Balloon in the early 1970s.

    Jill Biden married U.S. Sen. Joe Biden in 1977. He served as U.S. president from January 2021 to January 2025.

  • U.S. shoots down Iranian drone that approached aircraft carrier, military says

    U.S. shoots down Iranian drone that approached aircraft carrier, military says

    WASHINGTON — A U.S. Navy fighter jet shot down an Iranian drone that was approaching the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln in the Arabian Sea, U.S. Central Command said Tuesday, threatening to ramp up tensions as the Trump administration warns of possible military action to get Iran to the negotiating table.

    The drone “aggressively approached” the aircraft carrier with “unclear intent” and kept flying toward it “despite de-escalatory measures taken by U.S. forces operating in international waters,” Central Command spokesman Capt. Tim Hawkins said in a statement.

    The shootdown occurred within hours of Iranian forces harassing a U.S.-flagged and U.S.-crewed merchant vessel that was sailing in the Strait of Hormuz, the American military said.

    The developments could further escalate the heightened tensions between the longtime adversaries as President Donald Trump has threatened to use military action first over Iran’s bloody crackdown on nationwide protests and then to try to get the country to make a deal over its nuclear program. Trump’s Republican administration has built up military forces in the region, sending the aircraft carrier, guided-missile destroyers, air defense assets and more to supplement its presence.

    The Shahed-139 drone was shot down by an F-35C fighter jet from the Lincoln, which was sailing about 500 miles from Iran’s southern coast, Hawkins said. No American troops were harmed, and no U.S. equipment was damaged, the military’s statement noted.

    Talks between special envoy Steve Witkoff and Iranian officials are still planned, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters.

    “President Trump is always wanting to pursue diplomacy first, but obviously it takes two to tango,” Leavitt said. She added, “As always, though, of course, the president has a range of options on the table with respect to Iran.”

    Hours before the drone was shot down, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi posted on Telegram that he had spoken with his counterparts in Kuwait, Qatar, Turkey and Oman regarding regional developments and the importance of protecting “regional stability and security.”

    U.S. says Iran also harassed a merchant vessel

    Hours after the shootdown, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps forces harassed the merchant vessel Stena Imperative, the military said. Two boats and an Iranian Mohajer drone approached the ship “at high speeds and threatened to board and seize the tanker,” Hawkins’ statement said.

    The destroyer USS McFaul responded and escorted the Stena Imperative “with defensive air support from the U.S. Air Force,” the statement said, adding that the merchant vessel was now sailing safely.

    Tensions began to rise again between the U.S. and Iran as the Islamic Republic spent weeks quelling protests that began in late December against growing economic instability before broadening into a challenge to the country’s ruling theocracy.

    Trump had promised in early January to “rescue” Iranians from their government’s protest crackdown before starting to pressure Tehran again to make a deal over its nuclear program. That is even as the Republican president insists Iranian nuclear sites were “obliterated” in U.S. strikes in June.

    “We have talks going on with Iran. We’ll see how it all works out,” Trump told reporters Monday. Asked what his threshold was for military action against Iran, he declined to elaborate.

    “I’d like to see a deal negotiated,” Trump said. “Right now, we’re talking to them, we’re talking to Iran, and if we could work something out, that’d be great. And if we can’t, probably bad things would happen.”

    Iran’s president said Tuesday that he instructed the country’s foreign minister to “pursue fair and equitable negotiations” with the U.S., marking one of the first clear signs from Tehran that it wants to try to negotiate with Washington despite a breakdown of talks last summer.

    Turkey had been working behind the scenes to make the talks happen there later this week as U.S. Mideast envoy Steve Witkoff is traveling in the region. A Turkish official later said the location of talks was uncertain but that Turkey was ready to support the process.

    U.S. military builds up presence in the region

    Meanwhile, the U.S. military has been moving a growing number of assets into the region over the past several weeks, including the Lincoln and several destroyers, which arrived last week.

    The carrier strike group, which brought roughly 5,700 additional service members, joined three destroyers and three littoral combat ships that were already in the region.

    Analysts of flight-tracking data also have noticed dozens of U.S. military cargo planes heading to the region.

    The activity is similar to last year when the U.S. moved in air defense hardware, like a Patriot missile system, in anticipation of an Iranian counterattack following the U.S. bombing three key nuclear sites. Iran launched more than a dozen missiles at Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar days after the strikes.

    The U.S. has several bases in the Middle East, including Al Udeid, which hosts thousands of American troops and is the forward headquarters for U.S. Central Command.

  • Sheriff says ‘we do in fact have a crime scene’ in search for mom of ‘Today’ host Savannah Guthrie

    Sheriff says ‘we do in fact have a crime scene’ in search for mom of ‘Today’ host Savannah Guthrie

    TUCSON, Ariz. — An Arizona sheriff said Monday that “we do in fact have a crime scene” as authorities search for the 84-year-old mother of “Today” show host Savannah Guthrie, who was reported missing over the weekend.

    Speaking during a news conference, Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos said there are signs at the home indicating Nancy Guthrie did not leave on her own.

    “I need this community to step up and start giving us some calls,” Nanos said.

    Asked to explain why investigators believe it’s a crime scene, Nanos said Guthrie has limited mobility and said there were other things indicated she didn’t leave on her own.

    Nanos said at a news conference Sunday night that Nancy Guthrie was last seen around 9:30 p.m. Saturday at her home in the Tucson area. Her family reported her missing around noon Sunday. Nancy Guthrie has some physical ailments, but no cognitive issues, he said.

    Searchers were using drones and search dogs to look for Nancy Guthrie, Nanos said. Search and rescue teams were supported by volunteers and Border Patrol and the homicide team was also involved, he said. It is not standard for the homicide team to get involved in such cases, Nanos said.

    “This one stood out because of what was described to us at the scene and what we located just looking at the scene,” Nanos said. He was not ruling out foul play.

    Savannah Guthrie issued a statement on Monday, NBC’s “Today” show reported.

    “On behalf of our family, I want to thank everyone for the thoughts, prayers and messages of support,” she said. “Right now, our focus remains on the safe return of our dear Nancy.”

    “Today” opened Monday’s show with the disappearance of the co-anchor’s mother, but Savannah Guthrie was not at the anchor’s desk. Nanos said during the Monday news conference that Savannah Guthrie is in Arizona.

  • Demond Wilson, who played Lamont on ‘Sanford and Son,’ has died at 79

    Demond Wilson, who played Lamont on ‘Sanford and Son,’ has died at 79

    Demond Wilson, who found fame in the 1970s playing Lamont on Sanford and Son and went on to become a minister, has died. He was 79.

    Mark Goldman, a publicist for Mr. Wilson, confirmed to the Associated Press that he died following complications from cancer on Friday.

    “A devoted father, actor, author, and minister, Demond lived a life rooted in faith, service, and compassion. Through his work on screen, his writing, and his ministry, he sought to uplift others and leave a meaningful impact on the communities he served,” Goldman said in an emailed statement.

    Mr. Wilson was best known as the son of Redd Foxx’s comically cantankerous Fred Sanford character in a sitcom that was among the first to feature a mostly Black cast when it began airing in 1972.

    The thoughtful Lamont had to put up with his junkyard owner father’s schemes, bigotry, and insults — most famously, and repeatedly, “You big dummy!”

    The show was a hit for its six seasons on NBC but ended when ABC offered Foxx a variety show.

    Mr. Wilson was born in Valdosta, Ga., and grew up in the Harlem section of Manhattan, according to the biography on his website.

    He served in the U.S. Army in Vietnam and was wounded there, and he returned to New York and acted on stage before heading to Hollywood.

    A guest appearance on All in the Family in 1971 led to his best-known role. Norman Lear produced both shows.

    Mr. Wilson told AP in 2022 that he got the role over comedian Richard Pryor.

    “I said, ‘C’mon, you can’t put a comedian with a comedian. You’ve got to have a straight man,’” he said he told the producers.

    After Sanford and Son ended, Mr. Wilson starred in the shorter-lived comedies Baby I’m Back and The New Odd Couple. He later appeared in four episodes of the show Girlfriends in the 2000s, along with a handful of movie roles.

    Though he returned to the screen at times, he told the Los Angeles Times in 1986 that the acting life was not for him: “It wasn’t challenging. And it was emotionally exhausting because I had to make it appear that I was excited about what I was doing.”

    Mr. Wilson became a minister in the 1980s.

    He is survived by his wife, Cicely Wilson, and their six children.

  • USWNT star Crystal Dunn announces retirement from soccer at age 33

    USWNT star Crystal Dunn announces retirement from soccer at age 33

    PARIS — United States international Crystal Dunn has retired from professional soccer after a decorated playing career to spend more time with her family.

    The 33-year-old New York native helped the U.S. win the 2019 women’s World Cup and the gold medal at the Paris Olympics.

    “This decision has not come easily, but I am at peace and deeply fulfilled with all that I have accomplished,” she wrote in an Instagram post Thursday. “I’ve achieved nearly everything I dreamed of in this sport and gave all I had to give.

    “I’m ready to embrace the life that awaits me on the other side. I look forward to spending more time with my family and being a more present mom.”

    Dunn was under contract with Paris Saint-Germain, which said Thursday that both sides agreed to end their collaboration. A versatile player who contributed from multiple positions, Dunn joined PSG in January 2025 after leaving Gotham FC of the NWSL. She made nine appearances for PSG, scoring two goals and providing two assists.

    Dunn appeared in 160 games for the United States, scoring 25 goals.

    “As one of the first Black stars of the U.S. women’s national team, especially as a field player, Dunn has long been a role model to many young players of color across the country who aspired to reach the highest levels of the game,” the U.S. Soccer Federation said in its announcement about Dunn’s retirement.

    USWNT captain Lindsey Heaps will join NWSL expansion team Denver Summit

    “Dunn’s career will be remembered for her versatility, her tremendous one-on-one defending, her ability to perform far above her size (5-foot-1), her popularity among her teammates, her ability to inspire generations of U.S. Women’s National Team players and for a heck of a lot of winning.”

    Before Gotham, Dunn played for the Portland Thorns and took most of 2022 off for the birth of her son, Marcel. She also had stints with the North Carolina Courage, Chelsea, and the Washington Spirit.

  • Amazon cuts about 16,000 corporate jobs in the latest round of layoffs

    Amazon cuts about 16,000 corporate jobs in the latest round of layoffs

    Amazon is slashing about 16,000 corporate jobs in the second round of mass layoffs for the ecommerce company in three months.

    The tech giant has said it plans to use generative artificial intelligence to replace corporate workers. It has also been reducing a workforce that swelled during the pandemic.

    Beth Galetti, a senior vice president at Amazon, said in a blog post Wednesday that the company has been “reducing layers, increasing ownership, and removing bureaucracy.”

    The company did not say what business units would be impacted, or where the job cuts would occur.

    (From October 2025) Amazon will cut about 14,000 corporate jobs in AI push

    The latest reductions follow a round of job cuts in October, when Amazon said it was laying off 14,000 workers. While some Amazon units completed those “organizational changes” in October, others did not finish until now, Galetti said.

    She said U.S.-based staff would be given 90 days to look for a new role internally. Those who are unsuccessful or don’t want a new job will be offered severance pay, outplacement services and health insurance benefits, she said.

    “While we’re making these changes, we’ll also continue hiring and investing in strategic areas and functions that are critical to our future,” Galetti said.

    All Amazon Fresh stores, including six in the Philly area, are closing

    CEO Andy Jassy, who has aggressively cut costs since succeeding founder Jeff Bezos in 2021, said in June that he anticipated generative AI would reduce Amazon’s corporate workforce in the next few years.

    The layoffs announced Wednesday are Amazon’s biggest since 2023, when the company cut 27,000 jobs.

    Meanwhile, Amazon and other Big Tech and retail companies have cut thousands of jobs to bring spending back in line following the COVID-19 pandemic. Amazon’s workforce doubled as millions stayed home and boosted online spending.

    The job cuts have not arrived with a company on shaky financial ground.

    In its most recent quarter, Amazon’s profits jumped nearly 40% to about $21 billion and revenue soared to more than $180 billion.

    Late last year after layoffs, Jassy said job cuts weren’t driven by company finances or AI.

    “It’s culture,” he said in October. “And if you grow as fast as we did for several years, the size of businesses, the number of people, the number of locations, the types of businesses you’re in, you end up with a lot more people than what you had before, and you end up with a lot more layers.”

    Hiring has stagnated in the U.S. and in December, the country added a meager 50,000 jobs, nearly unchanged from a downwardly revised figure of 56,000 in November.

    Labor data points to a reluctance by businesses to add workers even as economic growth has picked up. Many companies hired aggressively after the pandemic and no longer need to fill more jobs. Others have held back due to widespread uncertainty caused by President Donald Trump’s shifting tariff policies, elevated inflation, and the spread of artificial intelligence, which could alter or even replace some jobs.

    While economists have described the labor situation in the U.S as a “no hire-no fire” environment, some companies have said they are cutting back on jobs, even this week.

    On Tuesday, UPS said it planned to cut up to 30,000 operational jobs through attrition and buyouts this year as the package delivery company reduces the number of shipments from what was its largest customer, Amazon.

    That followed 34,000 job cuts in October at UPS and the closing of daily operations at 93 leased and owned buildings during the first nine months of last year.

    Also on Tuesday, Pinterest said it plans to lay off under 15% of its workforce, as part of broader restructuring that arrives as the image-sharing platform pivots more of its money to artificial intelligence.

    Shares of Amazon Inc., based in Seattle, rose slightly before the opening bell Wednesday.

  • Man arrested after spraying unknown substance on Rep. Ilhan Omar at Minneapolis town hall

    Man arrested after spraying unknown substance on Rep. Ilhan Omar at Minneapolis town hall

    MINNEAPOLIS — A man sprayed an unknown substance on Democratic U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar and was tackled to the ground Tuesday during a town hall in Minneapolis, where tensions over federal immigration enforcement have come to a head after agents fatally shot an intensive care nurse and a mother of three this month.

    The audience cheered as the man was pinned down and his arms were tied behind his back. In video of the incident, someone in the crowd can be heard saying, “Oh my god, he sprayed something on her.”

    Just before that Omar had called for the abolishment of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and for Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to resign or face impeachment. Calls are mounting on Capitol Hill for Noem to step down after the shooting deaths in Minneapolis of two people who protested deportations. Few Republicans have risen to her defense.

    “ICE cannot be reformed,” Omar said, seconds before the attack.

    Minneapolis police said officers saw the man use a syringe to spray an unknown liquid at Omar. They immediately arrested him and booked him at the county jail for third-degree assault, spokesperson Trevor Folke said. Forensic scientists responded to the scene.

    Police identified the man as 55-year-old Anthony Kazmierczak. It was not immediately clear if Kazmierczak had an attorney. The county public defenders’ office could not immediately be reached.

    Omar continued speaking for about 25 more minutes after the man was ushered out by security, saying she would not be intimidated.

    There was a strong, vinegarlike smell after the man pushed on the syringe, according to an Associated Press journalist who was there. Photos of the device, which fell to the ground when he was tackled, showed what appeared to be a light-brown liquid inside. There was no immediate word from officials on what it was.

    Minneapolis Council Member LaTrisha Vetaw said some of the substance also came into contact with her and state Sen. Bobby Joe Champion. She called it a deeply unsettling experience.

    No one in the crowd of about 100 people had a noticeable physical reaction to the substance.

    Omar says she is OK and ‘a survivor’

    Walking out afterward, Omar said she felt a little flustered but was not hurt. She was going to be screened by a medical team.

    She later posted on the social platform X: “I’m ok. I’m a survivor so this small agitator isn’t going to intimidate me from doing my work. I don’t let bullies win.”

    The White House did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment Tuesday night.

    President Donald Trump has frequently criticized the congresswoman and has stepped up verbal attacks on her in recent months as he turned his focus on Minneapolis. During a Cabinet meeting in December, he referred to her as “garbage.”

    Hours earlier on Tuesday, the president criticized Omar as he spoke to a crowd in Iowa, saying his administration would only let in immigrants who “can show that they love our country.”

    “They have to be proud, not like Ilhan Omar,” he said, drawing loud boos at the mention of her name.

    He added: “She comes from a country that’s a disaster. So probably, it’s considered, I think — it’s not even a country.”

    Omar is a U.S. citizen who fled her birthplace, Somalia, with her family at age 8 as a civil war tore apart the country.

    The Minneapolis-St. Paul area is home to about 84,000 people of Somali descent — nearly a third of Somalis living in the U.S.

    Officials condemn the attack

    Democratic Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz expressed gratitude that Omar was safe, adding in a post on X: “Our state has been shattered by political violence in the last year. The cruel, inflammatory, dehumanizing rhetoric by our nation’s leaders needs to stop immediately.”

    U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace, a South Carolina Republican, also denounced the assault.

    “I am deeply disturbed to learn that Rep. Ilhan Omar was attacked at a town hall today” Mace said. “Regardless of how vehemently I disagree with her rhetoric — and I do — no elected official should face physical attacks. This is not who we are.”

    Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, a Democrat, called the attack “unacceptable.” He said he was relieved that Omar “is OK” and thanked police for their quick response, concluding: “This kind of behavior will not be tolerated in our city.”

    The city has been reeling from the fatal shootings of two residents by federal immigration agents this month during Trump’s massive immigration enforcement surge. Intensive care unit nurse Alex Pretti was killed Saturday, less than three weeks after Renee Good was fatally shot behind the wheel of her vehicle.

    Lawmakers face rising threats

    The attack came days after a man was arrested in Utah for allegedly punching U.S. Rep. Maxwell Frost, a Democrat from Florida, in the face during the Sundance Film Festival and saying Trump was going to deport him.

    Threats against members of Congress have increased in recent years, peaking in 2021 in the aftermath of that year’s Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, before dipping slightly only to climb again, according to the most recent figures from the U.S. Capitol Police.

    Lawmakers have discussed the impact on their ability to hold town halls and public events, with some even citing the threat environment in their decisions not to seek reelection.

    Following the assault on Omar, U.S. Capitol Police said in a statement that the agency was “working with our federal partners to see this man faces the most serious charges possible to deter this kind of violence in our society.”

    It also released updated numbers detailing threats to members of Congress: 14,938 “concerning statements, behaviors, and communications directed against lawmakers, their families, staff and the Capitol Complex” in 2025.

    That is a sharp increase from 2024, when the number of cases was 9,474, according to USCP. It is the third year in a row that the number of threats has increased.

    Capitol Police have beefed up security measures across all fronts since Jan. 6, 2021, and the department has seen increased reporting after a new center was launched two years ago to process reports of threats.

  • Man wounded after exchanging gunfire with Border Patrol agents near US-Mexico border

    Man wounded after exchanging gunfire with Border Patrol agents near US-Mexico border

    ARIVACA, Ariz. — A man who authorities say was involved in a smuggling operation was shot Tuesday in an exchange of gunfire with the U.S. Border Patrol and after firing at a federal helicopter near the U.S.-Mexico border, authorities said.

    Federal agents were attempting to apprehend the 34-year-old Arizona man near Arivaca, Ariz., when he shot at a Border Patrol helicopter and at agents, the FBI said. Agents returned fire, striking the man and wounding him, the FBI said.

    The man was transported to a hospital and was recovering from surgery Tuesday evening, authorities said.

    The Pima County Sheriff’s Department said the FBI asked it to lead a use-of-force investigation of the Border Patrol. It noted that such investigations are standard when a federal agency is involved in a shooting in the county.

    FBI special agent Heith Janke said suspect Patrick Gary Schlegel has a criminal history that includes a 2025 warrant for escape stemming from a smuggling conviction.

    Hagle was in federal custody and is expected to be charged with a criminal complaint, Janke said.

    Arivaca is a community about 10 miles from the border. The area is a common path for drug smugglers and migrants who illegally cross the border, so agents regularly patrol there.

    The Santa Rita Fire District said it responded to the shooting and the person who was wounded was in custody.

    “Patient care was transferred to a local medical helicopter for rapid transport to a regional trauma center,” the fire district said.

    One level-one trauma center hospital in Tucson declined to release information, and the AP was waiting on a response from another.

    The shooting comes in a month that has seen three shootings — two fatal — by immigration officers involved in the massive Department of Homeland Security enforcement operation in Minnesota.

    While there were numerous videos of those shootings taken by residents monitoring the enforcement operations in the Minneapolis area, the latest shooting in Arizona happened in a community of about 500 people apparently without any bystander video of the incident.

    The sheriff department said its involvement in the investigation was the result of “long standing relationships” built over time in the border area to promote transparency.

    Sheriff Chris Nanos, a Democrat, has previously said his agency will not enforce federal immigration law amid President Donald Trump’s crackdown and that he will use his limited resources to focus on local crime and other public safety issues.

    U.S. Customs and Border Protection did not immediately respond to emails and telephone calls seeking more information.

    Border Patrol agents fired weapons in eight incidents during the 12-month period through September 2025, 14 times during the year before that and 13 times the year before that.