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  • Parents and teachers want smaller classes and no school closures. Here’s what else they said in Philly’s facilities planning survey.

    Parents and teachers want smaller classes and no school closures. Here’s what else they said in Philly’s facilities planning survey.

    The Philadelphia School District now has the feedback officials said they needed before making decisions about school closings and reconfigurations.

    The topline result: Philadelphians don’t want their local schools closed.

    Some urged prioritizing small classes. Others suggested adding more magnets, like Masterman; pouring more resources into neighborhood K-8s and high schools, and modernizing facilities.

    But while Superintendent Tony B. Watlington Sr. promised to use the feedback to shape the district’s plan, he and other district leaders have said school closings are a given — the district has 70,000 excess seats in schools across the district of 113,000, and dozens of buildings that are in poor shape.

    That process is expected to play out this year. It initially was to have yielded decisions in December, but Watlington said his administration needed more time to analyze data and reach out to school communities before ordering sweeping changes that they say are necessary.

    Watlington now says he will present a draft facilities plan sometime this winter, with more feedback and revisions to come before a board vote. The timeline for a final vote is not clear.

    In an email, he thanked those who participated in the survey and other parts of the planning process. “We have, and will continue to take your feedback very seriously, as we know these will be difficult decisions that could impact many families,” he wrote, adding that there will be additional “community conversations” before the final plan goes to the board.

    The district last engaged in a similar process in 2012, closing 30 schools by 2013, a hugely controversial process that officials later said did not improve academic outcomes for students or yield significant long-lasting savings for the district. Officials have said they will undertake the process more deliberately and with different aims in this incarnation.

    More than 8,000 parents, teachers, students, and community members participated in Watlington’s survey, sharing their priorities for the long-awaited facilities master planning process.

    Boosting neighborhood high schools, strengthening K-8s

    The new survey data, released by officials as winter break began, did not yield surprises, but reiterated themes that will be tough for the cash-strapped district to balance.

    Officials had previously identified four main topics that have emerged from more than a year of analyzing data and gathering feedback — strengthening K-8 schools, reinvesting in neighborhood high schools, reducing school transitions for students, and expanding access to grades 5-12 criteria-based high schools.

    Survey respondents rated each of those “important” or “very important” — with reinvesting in neighborhood high schools (85%) and strengthening K-8 schools (81%) at the top of the priority list.

    Overall, those who responded to the survey support their local schools, want strong schools close to where they live, and want the buildings closest to where they live to be renovated, not shut down.

    Respondents raised concerns around several topics districtwide: overcrowding, inadequate staffing, school safety, insufficient supports for students with disabilities, student behavior issues, facilities quality and cleanliness, and support for libraries, recess, and extracurricular activities.

    Some also expressed worries about transparency in the facilities planning process, and worries that when the district says its goal is “better use of space” it means that it will close schools.

    They outlined fears about potential hardships that closing schools could create, such as longer walks to school or tough bus rides in unfamiliar or unsafe areas. And they flagged worries about merging more than one school into a single building and having large grade spans in a single building. (Though some said they relished the idea of having many grades in one spot.)

    In their own words

    Respondents had plenty of ideas for officials as they plan steps that will have implications for the city for years to come. Here are some excerpts from survey responses:

    “I believe that we should stop closing schools and update areas so that we can utilize small class sizes. The ONLY way to accomplish meeting the needs of students, emotionally, physically, psychologically, and educationally is to have SMALL class sizes,” one person wrote.

    “By closing buildings and combining schools, some children will have to walk an additional distance, most likely making them late or just deciding on certain days that the travel distance is just not worth it,” another respondent said.

    “We need new high schools, middle schools, especially with vocational training. Current year textbooks, technology, air-conditioning, and programs for Tech and Art,” said another writer.

    “Many [Philadelphia high schools] currently lack basic college-preparatory opportunities — few or no Honors or AP courses, limited world languages, and minimal enrichment options. This pushes academically motivated students into magnet schools, leaving neighborhood schools underenrolled and concentrated with students who have the highest support needs,” wrote one commenter.

    “More schools like Masterman will prevent families from leaving the city if their child cannot get in through the lottery. It is beneficial to Philadelphia as a whole to keep these parents/families in the city instead of fleeing to the suburbs,” wrote one person.

  • Fifth anniversary of the Jan. 6 attack brings fresh division to the Capitol

    Fifth anniversary of the Jan. 6 attack brings fresh division to the Capitol

    WASHINGTON — Five years ago outside the White House, outgoing President Donald Trump told a crowd of supporters to head to the Capitol — “and I’ll be there with you” — in protest as Congress was affirming the 2020 election victory for Democrat Joe Biden.

    A short time later, the world watched as the seat of U.S. power descended into chaos, and democracy hung in the balance.

    On the fifth anniversary of Jan. 6, 2021, there is no official event to memorialize what happened that day, when the mob made its way down Pennsylvania Avenue, battled police at the Capitol barricades and stormed inside, as lawmakers fled. The political parties refuse to agree to a shared history of the events, which were broadcast around the globe. And the official plaque honoring the police who defended the Capitol has never been hung.

    Instead, the day displayed the divisions that still define Washington, and the country, and the White House itself issued a glossy new report with its own revised history of what happened.

    Trump, during a lengthy morning speech to House Republicans convening away from the Capitol at the rebranded Kennedy Center now carrying his own name, shifted blame for Jan. 6 onto the rioters themselves.

    The president said he had intended only for his supporters to go “peacefully and patriotically” to confront Congress as it certified Biden’s win. He blamed the media for focusing on other parts of his speech that day.

    Rep. Mary Gay Scanlon (second from right, front row), a Pennsylvania Democrat, was among members of Congress watching a video from the Jan. 6 attack during a hearing at the U.S. Capitol.

    At the same time, Democrats held their own morning meeting at the Capitol, reconvening members of the House committee that investigated the Jan. 6, 2021, attack for a panel discussion. Recalling the history of the day is important, they said, in order to prevent what Rep. Jamie Raskin (D., Md.) warned was the GOP’s “Orwellian project of forgetting.”

    And the former leader of the militant Proud Boys, Enrique Tarrio, summoned people for a midday march retracing the rioters’ steps from the White House to the Capitol, this time to honor Trump supporter Ashli Babbitt and others who died in the Jan. 6 siege and its aftermath. More than 100 people gathered, including Babbitt’s mother.

    Tarrio and others are putting pressure on the Trump administration to punish officials who investigated and prosecuted the Jan. 6 rioters. He was sentenced to 22 years in prison for seditious conspiracy for orchestrating the Jan. 6 attack, and he is among more than 1,500 defendants who saw their charges dropped when Trump issued a sweeping pardon on his return to the White House last year.

    “They should be fired and prosecuted,” Tarrio told the crowd before they arrived at the Capitol, confronted along the way by counterprotesters, and sang the national anthem.

    The White House in its new report highlighted the work the president has already done to free those charged and turned the blame on Democrats for certifying Biden’s election victory.

    Echoes of 5 years ago

    This milestone anniversary carried echoes of the differences that erupted that day.

    But it unfolds while attention is focused elsewhere, particularly after the U.S. military’s stunning capture of Venezuela’s president, Nicolás Maduro, and Trump’s plans to take over the country and prop up its vast oil industry, a striking new era of American expansionism.

    “These people in the administration, they want to lecture the world about democracy when they’re undermining the rule of law at home, as we all will be powerfully reminded,” House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York said on the eve of the anniversary.

    House Speaker Mike Johnson of Louisiana, responding to requests for comment about the delay in hanging the plaque honoring the police at the Capitol, as required by law, said in a statement on the eve of the anniversary that the statute “is not implementable,” and proposed alternatives “also do not comply with the statute.”

    Democrats revive an old committee, Republicans lead a new one

    At the morning hearing at the Capitol, lawmakers heard from a range of witnesses and others — including former U.S. Capitol Police officer Winston Pingeon, who said as a kid he always dreamed of being a cop. But on that day, he thought he was going to die in the mayhem on the steps of the Capitol.

    “I implore America to not forget what happened,” he said, “I believe the vast majority of Americans have so much more in common than what separates us.”

    Also testifying was Pamela Hemphill, a rioter who refused Trump’s pardon, blamed the president for the violence and silenced the room as she apologized to the officer sitting alongside her at the witness table, stifling tears.

    “I can’t allow them not be recognized, to be lied about,” Hemphill said about the police who she said also saved her life as she fell and was trampled on by the mob. “Until I can see that plaque get up there, I’m not done.”

    Among those testifying were former Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, who along with former Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming were the two Republicans on the panel that investigated Trump’s efforts to overturn Biden’s win. Cheney, who lost her own reelection bid to a Trump-backed challenger, did not appear. Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi urged the country to turn away from a culture of lies and violence that she said sends the wrong message about democracy.

    Republican Rep. Barry Loudermilk of Georgia, who has been tapped by Johnson to lead a new committee to probe other theories about what happened on Jan. 6, rejected Tuesday’s session as a “partisan exercise” designed to hurt Trump and his allies.

    Many Republicans reject the narrative that Trump sparked the Jan. 6 attack, and Johnson, before he became the House speaker, had led challenges to the 2020 election. He was among some 130 GOP lawmakers voting that day to reject the presidential results from some states.

    Instead, they have focused on security lapses at the Capitol — from the time it took for the National Guard to arrive on the scene to the failure of the police canine units to discover the pipe bombs found that day outside Republican and Democratic party headquarters. The FBI arrested a Virginia man suspected of placing the pipe bombs, and he told investigators last month he believed someone needed to speak up for those who believed the 2020 election was stolen, authorities say.

    “The Capitol Complex is no more secure today than it was on Jan. 6,” Loudermilk said in a social media post. “My Select Subcommittee remains committed to transparency and accountability and ensuring the security failures that occurred on Jan. 6 and the partisan investigation that followed never happens again.”

    The aftermath of Jan. 6

    At least five people died in the Capitol siege and its aftermath, including Babbitt, who was shot and killed by police while trying to climb through the window of a door near the House chamber, and Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick died later after battling the mob. Several law enforcement personnel died later, some by suicide.

    The Justice Department indicted Trump on four counts in a conspiracy to defraud voters with his claims of a rigged election in the run-up to the Jan. 6 attack.

    Former Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith told lawmakers last month that the riot at the Capitol “does not happen” without Trump. He ended up abandoning the case once Trump was reelected president, adhering to department guidelines against prosecuting a sitting president.

    Trump, who never made it to the Capitol that day as he hunkered down at the White House, was impeached by the House on the sole charge of having incited the insurrection. The Senate acquitted him after top GOP senators said they believed the matter was best left to the courts.

    Ahead of the 2024 election, the Supreme Court ruled ex-presidents have broad immunity from prosecution.

  • Trump says U.S. to get 30 million to 50 million barrels of oil from Venezuela at market price

    Trump says U.S. to get 30 million to 50 million barrels of oil from Venezuela at market price

    CARACAS, Venezuela — President Donald Trump said Tuesday on his social media site that “Interim Authorities” in Venezuela would be providing 30 million to 50 million barrels of “High Quality” oil to the U.S. at its market price, an announcement that came after officials in Caracas announced that at least 24 Venezuelan security officers were killed in the dead-of-night U.S. military operation to capture Nicolás Maduro and spirit him to the United States to face drug charges.

    Trump posted on Truth Social that the oil “will be taken by storage ships, and brought directly to unloading docks in the United States.” He said the money would be controlled by him as president but it would be used to benefit the people of Venezuela and the United States.

    Separately, the White House is organizing an Oval Office meeting Friday with oil company executives regarding Venezuela, with representatives of Exxon, Chevron, and ConocoPhillips expected to attend, according to a person familiar with the matter who requested anonymity to discuss the plans.

    Earlier Tuesday, Venezuelan officials announced the death count in the Maduro raid as the country’s acting president, Delcy Rodríguez, pushed back on Trump, who earlier this week warned she’d face an outcome worse than Maduro’s if she does not “do what’s right” and overhaul Venezuela into a country that aligns with U.S. interests. Trump has said his administration will now “run” Venezuela policy and is pressing the country’s leaders to open its vast oil reserves to American energy companies.

    Rodriguez, delivering an address Tuesday before government agricultural and industrial sector officials, said, “Personally, to those who threaten me: My destiny is not determined by them, but by God.”

    Venezuela’s Attorney General Tarek William Saab said overall “dozens” of officers and civilians were killed in the weekend strike in Caracas and said prosecutors would investigate the deaths in what he described as a “war crime.” He didn’t specify if the estimate was specifically referring to Venezuelans.

    In addition to the Venezuelan security officials, Cuba’s government had previously confirmed that 32 Cuban military and police officers working in Venezuela were killed in the raid. The Cuban government says the personnel killed belonged to the Revolutionary Armed Forces and the Ministry of the Interior, the country’s two main security agencies.

    Seven U.S. service members were also injured in the raid, according to the Pentagon. Five have already returned to duty, while two are still recovering from their injuries. The injuries included gunshot wounds and shrapnel injuries, according to a U.S. official who was not authorized to comment on the matter publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

    A video tribute to the slain Venezuelan security officials posted to the military’s Instagram account features faces of the fallen over black-and-white videos of soldiers, American aircraft flying over Caracas and armored vehicles destroyed by the blasts. Meanwhile, the streets of Caracas, deserted for days following Maduro’s capture, briefly filled with masses of people waving Venezuelan flags and bouncing to patriotic music at a state-organized display of support for the government.

    “Their spilled blood does not cry out for vengeance, but for justice and strength,” the military wrote in an Instagram post. “It reaffirms our unwavering oath not to rest until we rescue our legitimate President, completely dismantle the terrorist groups operating from abroad, and ensure that events such as these never again sully our sovereign soil.”

    Trump grumbles about how Democrats reacted to the raid

    Trump on Tuesday pushed back against Democratic criticism of this weekend’s military operation, noting that his Democratic predecessor Joe Biden had also called for the arrest of the Venezuelan leader on drug trafficking charges.

    Trump in remarks before a House Republican retreat in Washington grumbled that Democrats were not giving him credit for a successful military operation, even though there was bipartisan agreement that Maduro was not the rightful president of Venezuela.

    In 2020, Maduro was indicted in the United States, accused in a decades-long narco-terrorism and international cocaine trafficking conspiracy. White House officials have noted that Biden’s administration in his final days in office last year raised the award for information leading to Maduro’s arrest after he assumed a third term in office despite evidence suggesting that he lost Venezuela’s most recent election. The Trump administration doubled the award to $50 million in August.

    “You know, at some point, they should say, ‘You know, you did a great job. Thank you. Congratulations.’ Wouldn’t it be good?” Trump said. “I would say that if they did a good job, their philosophies are so different. But if they did a good job, I’d be happy for the country. They’ve been after this guy for years and years and years.”

    With oil trading at roughly $56 a barrel, the transaction Trump announced late Tuesday could be worth as much as $2.8 billion. The U.S. goes through an average of roughly 20 million barrels a day of oil and related products, so Venezuela’s transfer would be the equivalent of as much as two and a half days of supply, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

    Despite Venezuela having the world’s largest proven crude oil reserves, it only produces on average about one million barrels day, significantly below the U.S. average daily production of 13.9 million barrels a day during October.

    What U.S. opinion polls show

    Americans are split about the capture of Maduro — with many still forming opinions — according to a poll conducted by The Washington Post and SSRS using text messages over the weekend. About 4 in 10 approved of the U.S. military being sent to capture Maduro, while roughly the same share were opposed. About 2 in 10 were unsure.

    Nearly half of Americans, 45%, were opposed to the U.S. taking control of Venezuela and choosing a new government for the country. About 9 in 10 Americans said the Venezuelan people should be the ones to decide the future leadership of their country.

    Maduro pleaded not guilty to federal drug trafficking charges in a U.S. courtroom on Monday. U.S. forces captured Maduro and his wife early Saturday in a raid on a compound where they were surrounded by Cuban guards.

    In the days since Maduro’s ouster, Trump and top administration officials have raised anxiety around the globe that the operation could mark the beginning of a more expansionist U.S. foreign policy in the Western Hemisphere. The president in recent days has renewed his calls for an American takeover of the Danish territory of Greenland for the sake of U.S. security interests and threatened military action on Colombia for facilitating the global sale of cocaine, while his top diplomat declared the communist government in Cuba is “in a lot of trouble.”

    Colombia responds to Trump

    Colombia’s Foreign Affairs Minister Rosa Villavicencio said Tuesday she’ll meet with the U.S. Embassy’s charge d’affaires in Bogota to present him with a formal complaint over the recent threats issued by the United States.

    On Sunday, Trump said he wasn’t ruling out an attack on Colombia and described its president, who’s been an outspoken critic of the U.S. pressure campaign on Venezuela, as a “sick man who likes making cocaine and selling it to the United States.”

    Villavicencio said she’s hoping to strengthen relations with the United States and improve cooperation in the fight against drug trafficking.

    “It is necessary for the Trump administration to know in more detail about all that we are doing in the fight against drug trafficking,” she said.

    Meanwhile, the leaders of France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain and the United Kingdom on Tuesday joined Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen in defending Greenland’s sovereignty. The island is a self-governing territory of the kingdom of Denmark and thus part of the NATO military alliance.

    “Greenland belongs to its people,” the statement said. “It is for Denmark and Greenland, and them only, to decide on matters concerning Denmark and Greenland.”

  • Deer hunter shot with arrow by another hunter in Montgomery County, police say

    Deer hunter shot with arrow by another hunter in Montgomery County, police say

    A 48-year-old man who was deer hunting Tuesday afternoon was shot with an arrow by another hunter in Montgomery County, police said.

    Just before 3:50 p.m., emergency responders were called to the 7700 block of Green Valley Road in the Wyncote section of Cheltenham Township for a report of an injured hunter, police said.

    The injured man was transported to an area trauma center and was expected to survive, police said.

    The hunter who shot the arrow remained at the location, summoned emergency services, and was cooperating with the investigation, police said.

    The Pennsylvania Game Commission assumed primary responsibility for investigating the incident, police said.

    No other information about the hunters was released by police.

  • Shooter who killed Brown students and MIT professor planned attack for months, says DOJ

    Shooter who killed Brown students and MIT professor planned attack for months, says DOJ

    BOSTON — The man identified by law enforcement as the shooter who killed two Brown University students and an MIT professor had been planning the attack for at least six semesters, according to information released Tuesday by the U.S. Department of Justice.

    Claudio Neves Valente, 48, a former Brown student and Portuguese national, was found dead in a New Hampshire storage facility after he killed two students and wounded nine others in an engineering building on Dec. 13. Two days later, he killed MIT professor Nuno F.G. Loureiro in his home in the Boston suburb of Brookline.

    Justice Department officials said Tuesday that during the search of the storage facility where Neves Valente’s body was found, the FBI recovered an electronic device containing a series of short videos made by Neves Valente after the shootings.

    In the recordings, the shooter admits in Portuguese that he had been “planning the Brown University shooting for a long time,” according to a press release. He did not provide a motive for targeting Brown or the MIT professor, with whom he attended school in Portugal decades ago.

    He said he felt he had nothing to apologize for. He also complained in the videos about injuring his eye in the shootings.

    “I’m not going to apologize because during my lifetime no one sincerely apologized to me,” he said.

    Neves Valente said his “only objective was to leave more or less” on his “own terms” and to ensure he “wouldn’t be the one who ended up suffering the most from all this.”

    “No, that cannot happen. So if you don’t like it, tough luck,” he said. Neves Valente called his execution of the murders “a little incompetent.”

    “But at least something was done,” he said.

    In the recording, he said he’d had the storage space where his body was found for about three years.

  • Fear grips Caracas as a new wave of repression is unleashed in Venezuela

    Fear grips Caracas as a new wave of repression is unleashed in Venezuela

    For a brief moment, some Venezuelans allowed themselves to celebrate.

    When they learned Saturday that strongman Nicolás Maduro had been seized by U.S. Special Forces, many group chats filled with messages of joy and relief. Some people cried. One family in Caracas opened a bottle of champagne they had bought months earlier and saved for a special occasion. After more than a decade of living under Maduro, there were cautious hopes for a different future.

    By Monday, however, those feelings had been replaced by more familiar ones: fear, dread, and uncertainty.

    Venezuela’s government has moved quickly to suppress any public expression of support for Maduro’s ouster, launching a nationwide crackdown that has included the detention of journalists, the arrest of civilians, and the deployment of armed gangs across the capital.

    “It feels like it did after the presidential elections in 2024,” said María, 55, who like others in this story spoke on the condition that they be identified by their first name, or on the condition of anonymity, for fear of reprisals. “We won, but we also lost,” she said, referring to the country’s last elections, in which Maduro claimed victory despite tallies showing the opposition had prevailed.

    The crackdown unfolded as Delcy Rodríguez, the country’s vice president, was sworn in as interim president Monday at the National Assembly. Senior military officials publicly pledged their loyalty to her — a signal that while the country had a new leader, the old power structure remained in place.

    At least 14 journalists and media workers were detained Monday — including 11 working for international outlets, according to the National Press Workers Union. Most, the union said, were held for several hours and later released, but several reported that military counterintelligence officers searched their phones. Many of the detentions took place near the National Assembly as Rodríguez took the oath of office in a ceremony overseen by her brother, Jorge Rodríguez, who heads the legislature.

    Authorities also moved against ordinary citizens — empowered by a “state of external commotion” decree that ordered Venezuela’s national, state, and municipal police forces to immediately search for and arrest anyone “involved in promoting or supporting the armed attack by the United States of America.” The decree, which entered into force Saturday but was published in full Monday, also suspended the right to protest and authorized broad restrictions on movement and assembly.

    In the western state of Mérida, two people in their 60s were arrested for shouting anti-government slogans and “celebrating the kidnapping of President Nicolás Maduro and First Lady Cilia Flores,” according to state police.

    Across Caracas, pro-government paramilitary groups known as “colectivos” — a hallmark of the informal security state built by former president Hugo Chávez and inherited by Maduro after his death — set up checkpoints, including along the Cota Mil highway that runs north of the city. Residents described being pulled over, questioned and forced to hand over their phones. Some said the armed men scrolled through their messages and social media, looking for anything that could be construed as support for the U.S. raid.

    “We’re texting each other routes to avoid,” said a Caracas resident. “You hear ‘don’t go there — they’re stopping cars with machine guns.’”

    In the wake of Maduro’s capture, President Donald Trump has said repeatedly that the United States is “running” Venezuela, though it is unclear what influence Washington is exerting on authorities in Caracas.

    Overseeing U.S. involvement in the country, Trump said, would fall to a small group of senior officials, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Deputy White House Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, — and himself. Venezuela, the president told NBC on Monday, was not in a position to hold elections.

    “We have to fix the country first,” he said. “We have to nurse the country back to health.”

    In a news conference Tuesday, Trump suggested that the Venezuelan government planned to shut down El Helicoide, a sprawling, spiral-shaped detention center in Caracas that has long been used to hold and torture dissidents, according to rights groups.

    Foro Penal, a local human rights group, has said more than 860 political prisoners remain in state custody.

    “Of course I have hope things could get better without Maduro,” a 30-year-old man in the capital told the Washington Post. “But from where I am, all I see is the same people who destroyed my country still in power. They’re still persecuting us. And we’re still afraid.”

    In an interview with Fox News’s Sean Hannity, opposition leader María Corina Machado — who left Venezuela in December to accept the Nobel Peace Prize in Norway — called the crackdown “really alarming” and urged the U.S. and the international community to monitor the situation. She described Rodríguez as “one of the main architects of torture, persecution [and] corruption.”

    Late Monday, as weary families bedded down, gunshots rang out near the Miraflores presidential palace. On social media, residents shared videos from their window of armed men in the streets; some speculated that a coup was underway.

    Hours later, the Communication and Information Ministry put out a statement saying police had fired warning shots after “drones flew over the area without authorization.”

    “The entire country is completely calm,” the statement said.

  • Gov. Josh Shapiro, Pa. Democratic lawmakers criticize Trump’s Jan. 6 rioter pardons on anniversary of Capitol attack

    Gov. Josh Shapiro, Pa. Democratic lawmakers criticize Trump’s Jan. 6 rioter pardons on anniversary of Capitol attack

    Five years after rioters stormed the U.S. Capitol, Gov. Josh Shapiro and other Pennsylvania Democrats on Tuesday marked the anniversary of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack by sharply criticizing President Donald Trump.

    Trump, who was impeached for inciting the riot in the final days of his first administration, pardoned nearly every Jan. 6 defendant and commuted sentences for a handful of violent offenders as one of his first actions upon returning to office last year.

    “Law enforcement officers literally gave their lives to protect our country and our democracy — yet one of the first things Donald Trump did when he took office was pardon people who were convicted of assaulting police officers,” Shapiro said in a post on X Tuesday morning.

    “The President may not respect our law enforcement officers’ courage and commitment to service — but here in Pennsylvania, we remember the sacrifices they make and will always have their backs.”

    President Donald Trump has pardoned nearly every Jan. 6 defendant, paving the way for some to be released from prison

    Shapiro played a key role as state attorney general in defending the 2020 election results in Pennsylvania in the weeks leading up to the attack, which took place the same day that Congress was certifying former President Joe Biden’s victory.

    His comments Tuesday came as he’s preparing to announce his reelection bid for governor. As Shapiro has built a national profile as a potential Democratic presidential contender in 2028, he has repeatedly criticized Trump and presented himself as an alternative vision of leadership.

    The president has continued to falsely claim he won Pennsylvania in 2020, including at his rally in Mount Pocono last month, even after he won the White House again in 2024.

    Trump has downplayed the events of Jan. 6, and on Tuesday the White House unveiled a webpage dedicated to the events, falsely describing the riot as a peaceful protest and blaming Capitol Police for the violence that unfolded.

    How Donald Trump won Pennsylvania and the presidency
    Pennsylvania Senate Democrats hold an event in the state Capitol Tuesday to commemorate the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.

    Shapiro was one of several Democrats who marked the anniversary of the attack for the first time since Trump returned to office.

    State Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta, of Philadelphia, introduced a resolution alongside other House Democrats to designate Jan. 6 as the “Democracy Observance Day for Education, Remembrance, and Vigilance.”

    And Pennsylvania Senate Democrats held an event in the state Capitol Tuesday.

    State Sen. Art Haywood, who represents parts of Montgomery County and Philadelphia, described the events of Jan. 6, 2021, as an “attempted coup” orchestrated by Trump.

    He recounted the events in minute-by-minute detail drawing from what has been reported about the day, from Trump’s direction to rally-goers to go to the Capitol to former Vice President Mike Pence’s evacuation from the Senate chambers and rioters’ success breaking into offices.

    State Sen. Jay Costa, of Pittsburgh, said Tuesday’s anniversary event was aimed at drawing attention to the “lawlessness” of the day. Trump’s decision to pardon those involved, he said, was a “slap in the face” to law enforcement.

    Scores of Pennsylvanians were charged with taking part in the Jan. 6 attack, some of whom were convicted of committing acts of violence at the Capitol. In addition to the sweeping pardons eliminating the criminal cases of more than 1,500 people, the president also commuted the sentences of 14 people — including Philadelphia native Zach Rehl, the leader of the local far-right Proud Boys chapter who was convicted of seditious conspiracy and sentenced to 15 years in prison.

    Costa contended that other incidents of political violence in the years that have followed could be traced back to Jan. 6.

    “We cannot pick and choose, as our president has done, when we think about what we’re going to do and say about our law enforcement officers,” he said. “We need to stand with them all the time.”

  • A third person has died following the fire at a Bucks County nursing home

    A third person has died following the fire at a Bucks County nursing home

    A third person has died following the fire at a Bucks County nursing home that claimed the lives of two other people and injured 20 others days before Christmas.

    Bristol Township identified resident Patricia Mero, 66, as the latest death following the fire that destroyed parts of the Bristol Health & Rehab Center in Bristol Township on Dec. 23. Mero died Monday morning, according to the Bucks County Coroner’s Office. The cause of death was listed as a chest trauma; the manner of death an accident.

    Nurse Muthoni Nduthu and a woman whom Bristol Township Police identified as Ann Reddy, another resident, were also killed in the fire.

    First responders work the scene of an explosion and fire on Dec. 23, 2025, at Bristol Health & Rehab Center.

    An explosion occurred at the nursing home in the early afternoon on Dec. 23, flattening a section of the building that collapsed the first floor and sent people and debris tumbling into the basement. Bristol Fire Chief Kevin Dippolito said that at one point, a heavy odor of gas forced firefighters out of the building, only for another explosion to go off 30 seconds later.

    Investigators work the scene at Bristol Health & Rehab Center on Dec. 24, 2025 in Bristol Township.

    Many residents and visitors of the 174-bed nursing home reported the smell of gas in the days leading up to the disaster. Additionally, Peco had visited the nursing home hours before the explosion.

    The National Transportation Safety Board is leading an investigation into the cause of the fire, while the owners of the nursing home, Saber Healthcare Group, Peco, and others are being sued for their alleged negligence in the fiery explosion.

    On Monday, the NTSB said it had completed on-scene work in Bristol and would release a preliminary report on its findings by early February.

    The investigation into the fire will likely take months, with experts telling The Inquirer that federal investigators would focus on Peco and the nursing home operator’s actions leading up to the explosion.

  • The trolley tunnel is still closed as SEPTA tests repairs. When will it reopen?

    The trolley tunnel is still closed as SEPTA tests repairs. When will it reopen?

    Philadelphia’s trolley tunnel has been closed for two months, but SEPTA now is saying that it has completed most necessary repairs and could reopen the connection between Center City and West Philadelphia soon.

    Crews currently are running trolleys through the tunnel to test fixes for damaged overhead wires and other equipment and to decide when it is safe for normal service to resume.

    “We’re pretty close,” SEPTA spokesperson Andrew Busch said Tuesday.

    About 60,000 riders traveled daily through the tunnel between 13th Street and its West Philadelphia portal at 40th Street before SEPTA closed it in early November.

    Since then, people have had to use slower shuttle bus service or the Market-Frankford El as alternatives.

    At issue is a U-shaped brass part called a slider that carries carbon, which acts as a lubricant on the copper wires above the tracks that carry the electricity that powers the trolleys.

    Earlier in the fall, SEPTA replaced its usual 3-inch sliders with 4-inch models in an effort to reduce maintenance costs, but the carbon in the longer units wore out sooner than thought, causing metal-on-metal contact that damaged the overhead wires.

    The slider switch was meant to prolong their lifespan, but failed to work. Inside the tunnel, where there are more curves on the tracks and more equipment holding the wire to the ceiling, the new sliders and carbon burned through faster than earlier tests indicated.

    There were two major incidents when trolleys were stranded in the tunnels. On Oct. 14, 150 passengers were evacuated from one vehicle and 300 were evacuated from a stalled trolley on Oct. 21.

    The Federal Transit Administration on Oct. 31 ordered SEPTA to inspect the overhead catenary system along all its trolley routes.

    The directive came in response to four failures of the catenary system in September and October, including the tunnel evacuations.

    SEPTA has had to replace about 5,000 feet of damaged wire and make other repairs. It also switched back to 3-inch sliders.

    On Nov. 7, SEPTA shut down the tunnel to deal with the issue, which had cropped up again, then reopened it on the morning of Nov. 13, thinking it was solved. But it discovered further damage to the catenary system and the tunnel was closed at the end of the day.

    Other potential reopening dates were announced but postponed.

    This story has been updated to correct the amount of wire replaced in the tunnel.

  • Margaret Dupree, longtime funeral director and teacher’s aide, has died at 104

    Margaret Dupree, longtime funeral director and teacher’s aide, has died at 104

    Margaret Dupree, 104, of Philadelphia, cofounder, director, and president of Dupree Funeral Home Inc. at 28th and Diamond Streets in North Philadelphia, former teacher’s aide for the School District of Philadelphia, beautician, and mentor, died Monday, Dec. 15, of age-associated decline at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital.

    Mrs. Dupree and her husband, Troy, established the Dupree Funeral Home in 1955, and she became sole owner and president when he died in 1987. Her son Kenneth joined her as supervisor, and together, for nearly 40 years, they conducted thousands of funerals and oversaw a building expansion in 2000 and renovation in 2003.

    Most often, Mrs. Dupree supervised the books and answered the office telephone. Her son handles the funeral arrangements. “She was very meticulous and organized,” her son said. “She continued our legacy and served with integrity.”

    In the 1960s and ‘70s, Mrs. Dupree told The Inquirer in 1999, funerals were held at night because most people worked during the day. So she and her husband had day jobs, too. She was a reading and math aide at William Dick and Richard R. Wright Elementary Schools. He worked for the telephone company.

    Mrs. Dupree earned a beautician’s license after graduating from Philadelphia High School for Girls in 1941.

    She earned a beautician’s license after graduating from Philadelphia High School for Girls in 1941 and worked at her mother’s beauty shop at 13th Street and Susquehanna Avenue for a while. She became licensed as a funeral director in 1949 and met her husband when they were interns at a funeral home in South Philadelphia.

    “Her lifelong commitment to funeral service stands as a rare and remarkable testament to dedication, professionalism, and service to families during their most sacred moments,” her family said in a tribute.

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    Mrs. Dupree was among the oldest licensed funeral directors in the country, her family said, and she told The Inquirer she went into the business because morticians and barbers were so respected when she was a child. “They were the people who were looked up to,” she said.

    She used her makeup and beauty expertise to augment the cosmetic work on bodies in the mortuaries and said in 1995: “In the early stages, I liked doing reconstructive work. I relished doing the ‘invisible stitch.’”

    This photo of Mrs. Dupree (right) and her son Kenneth appeared in The Inquirer in 1999.

    Her family called her career “a powerful symbol of her lifelong devotion to the calling of funeral service” and praised her “mentoring others, serving families with dignity, and remaining deeply connected to the profession she loved.”

    She was a charter member of Child’s Memorial Baptist Church, known now as Keeping It Real Christian Fellowship, and supported affordable housing initiatives in North Philadelphia. “I like for women to have a place to raise their children,” she told The Inquirer in 1998 regarding a proposed housing renewal project. “If you give people a place to work and take care of their children, then the whole neighborhood will be improved.”

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    Friends and former colleagues called her “funny and sweet” and a “history maker” in online tributes. One friend said she was “a woman of grace, and her radiant smile always was contagious.” Another said: “She has had a positive impact on so many Philadelphians.”

    Margaret Alma McKenney was born July 8, 1921, in Belvedere, S.C. She relocated with her family to North Philadelphia when she was 5 and grew up at 13th and Diamond Streets.

    Mrs. Dupree doted on her grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

    During World War II, she worked for the Army Signal Corps and at the Frankford Arsenal. Afterward, she earned her funeral director’s license at the old Eckels College of Mortuary Science in Philadelphia.

    She married Troy Dupree in 1951, and they had daughters Melanie and Carrie, and sons Troy Jr. and Kenneth. For years, she reared the children, worked at the funeral home, and helped out at her mother’s shop.

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    Later, she doted on her grandchildren and great-grandchildren, and a friend said online: “I am a better grandma having watched from one of the best to ever do it.”

    Mrs. Dupree enjoyed knitting sweaters for her children, solving cryptograms in the newspaper, and traveling with family and friends to Bermuda, Africa, and elsewhere. She always, even at restaurants, her son Kenneth said, ate her dessert first.

    Mrs. Dupree (right) sits at her office desk while her son Kenneth talks on the phone in a photo that was published in The Inquirer in 1999.

    “She had a multifaceted personality,” her son Kenneth said. “She was a comedian, an organizer, and a fan of the underdog.”

    Her family said: “Margaret lived a life rooted in service, compassion, and purpose. Funeral service and education were never just her profession. It was her calling.”

    In addition to her children, Mrs. Dupree is survived by six grandchildren, six great-grandchildren, and other relatives. Two sisters and five brothers died earlier.

    Services were held on Dec. 28 and 29.

    Donations in her name may be made to Project Home, Development Dept., 1515 Fairmount Ave., Philadelphia, Pa. 19130.