Philadelphia local news, sports, jobs, cars, homes

Category: Wires

  • Behind closed doors, GOP lawmaker questioned ‘disturbing’ East Wing demolition

    Behind closed doors, GOP lawmaker questioned ‘disturbing’ East Wing demolition

    As GOP leaders leaped to defend President Donald Trump’s decision to tear down the East Wing of the White House last year, one Republican lawmaker privately warned a senior White House aide that he had “substantial concerns” and demanded answers about how the decision was made.

    Administration officials had pledged the project would not “interfere” with existing structures, and the public had no warning about the demolition.

    “The stark images of the East Wing demolished in mere days were disturbing to Americans who cherish preservation of our nation’s history,” Rep. Michael R. Turner (R., Ohio), co-chair of the congressional Historic Preservation Caucus, wrote in an Oct. 24 letter obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request and shared with the Washington Post.

    Turner’s correspondence to Will Scharf, Trump’s staff secretary and chairman of the National Capital Planning Commission, the review committee with the power to approve or reject the ballroom project, raised questions about oversight, transparency, and process, including whether the White House had taken steps to preserve artifacts.

    The communication, obtained by the government watchdog group Public Citizen, adds to the public understanding of sweeping concerns voiced by members of Congress, preservationists and others over transparency and other issues with Trump’s project. A federal judge is weighing a legal challenge to the construction.

    Scharf responded more than seven weeks later, telling Turner that Trump administration officials did not consult with or get the approval of the commission before tearing down the East Wing. But, he added, they were not required to since the commission’s review process covers only “vertical” construction — not demolition or site preparation. Scharf has made the same argument several times since, a position critics have blasted as absurd because those three steps are so closely linked — and because part of the commission’s duty in reviewing projects is to consider the preservation of buildings that already exist.

    Turner declined, through a spokeswoman, to discuss the letter or his concerns, and none of the other 17 Republicans on the Historic Preservation Caucus responded to interview requests.

    The letter from Turner “revealed what people were really thinking,” said Jon Golinger, democracy advocate at Public Citizen. “I bet there’s a lot more high-ranking Republicans who feel the same.”

    Trump has cast the 90,000-square-foot, privately funded addition as a needed upgrade to the White House that taxpayers will not have to support. Administration officials have publicly identified about two dozen companies and about a dozen individual donors they say have already contributed hundreds of millions toward the $400 million project, including major corporations such as Amazon, Google, and Palantir that collectively have billions of dollars in contracts before the administration. (Amazon founder Jeff Bezos owns the Washington Post.)

    Americans oppose Trump’s demolition of the White House’s East Wing by a more than 2-to-1 ratio, according to an Economist/YouGov poll conducted this month.

    Given that, Golinger said, he’s not surprised by Republicans’ relative silence on the project in a midterm election year.

    “I certainly haven’t seen a lot of campaign ads saying, ‘Elect me for this reason,’” Golinger said. “No Republicans have had to … put their name behind this project and say, ‘This is what I stand for.’”

    Many liberal lawmakers and political groups, meanwhile, have invoked the ballroom in appeals to voters ahead of the midterms. Congressional Democrats have pressed the Trump administration and its allies to divulge more details, asking whether donors stand to gain for their contributions.

    “BLOCK Trump’s White House Ballroom,” said one fundraising email sent by Defend Democracy Now PAC last month. “Top Democrats are fighting TOOTH AND NAIL to stop this wasteful project in its tracks.”

    On Oct. 30, Rep. Teresa Leger Fernandez (D., N.M.), Turner’s fellow co-chair on the Historic Preservation Caucus, was among the 60 House Democrats who sent Trump a public letter asking for some of the same information Turner had requested privately less than a week before.

    U.S. District Judge Richard J. Leon is expected to rule soon on whether the project can proceed after criticizing the Trump administration for making an “end run” around congressional oversight by soliciting private donations for the project rather than seeking taxpayer money.

    At a court hearing last month, Leon expressed skepticism of Justice Department lawyers’ argument that Congress had authorized the White House to make changes to its grounds by setting aside several million dollars in funding and allowing the Interior Department to solicit gifts for national parks.

    Leon, a George W. Bush appointee, said the congressional authorization was narrow and limited to matters such as White House maintenance, not carte blanche to undertake one of the biggest changes in the White House’s history. Justice Department lawyers have argued that any pause on the project could pose a national security risk and said they will immediately appeal if Leon grants a stay on construction.

    If he rules that Congress must explicitly authorize the ballroom building, Trump could press congressional Republicans to deliver, which would commit Turner to a public up-or-down vote.

    “There will be nowhere to run,” Golinger said, “and nowhere to hide.”

  • Robert Carradine, ‘Revenge of the Nerds’ and ‘Lizzie McGuire’ star, has died at 71

    Robert Carradine, ‘Revenge of the Nerds’ and ‘Lizzie McGuire’ star, has died at 71

    Robert Carradine, the youngest of his prolific Hollywood family and whose biggest hit was the 1984 comedy Revenge of the Nerds, has died at 71.

    In a Tuesday statement, his family said he lived with bipolar disorder for two decades. His brother told Deadline that Mr. Carradine died by suicide.

    “We want people to know it, and there is no shame in it,” Keith Carradine told Deadline. “It is an illness that got the best of him, and I want to celebrate him for his struggle with it, and celebrate his beautiful soul. He was profoundly gifted, and we will miss him every day.”

    Known for both his film and television work, Robert Carradine worked steadily in the industry for over 40 years. Though he collaborated with some of the most respected directors of the day, he never gained the worldwide recognition of his more famous siblings Keith Carradine (also the father of Martha Plimpton) and half brother David Carradine, who died in 2009.

    Robert Carradine, a Los Angeles native and son to character actor John Carradine, was introduced to audiences with roles on the television series Bonanza in 1971 and in the John Wayne western The Cowboys in 1972.

    Despite his family background, acting wasn’t his first calling, though.

    “I always had a passion to be a race car driver, and that’s what I thought I was going to do, and at some penultimate moment … I think I was sitting with my brother David when The Cowboys was being cast, and they were interested in David as the bad guy, and he didn’t want to be the guy that shot John Wayne in the back,” Mr. Carradine recalled in a 2013 interview with Popdose. “But he said, ‘You know, it is called The Cowboys, and they’re meeting all these young guys. Why don’t you go in?’”

    In addition to starring in a short-lived television spinoff of The Cowboys, and appearing alongside David Carradine in his popular ABC series Kung Fu, he would go on to nab roles in Martin Scorsese’s Mean Streets, Hal Ashby’s Vietnam drama Coming Home, and Samuel Fuller’s World War II film The Big Red One.

    The heights of his brother David’s success eluded Robert Carradine, but the two could often be seen in the same projects, including in Walter Hill’s The Long Riders and Paul Bartel’s Cannonball.

    Robert Carradine’s biggest hit would come in 1984 with the off-color comedy Revenge of the Nerds, in which he played head nerd Lewis Skolnick, with his abrupt, infectious, and guttural laugh. He reprised the role for the big-screen sequel and two made-for-television follow-ups, and continued to pay homage to the beloved character with a guest role on the series Robot Chicken and as a co-host (with Revenge of the Nerds co-star Curtis Armstrong) of the pop culture competition show King of the Nerds, which aired for three seasons.

    In the late 1980s and 1990s, according to the family statement, Mr. Carradine realized his racing ambitions and was a driver for Lotus. In the 2000s, Mr. Carradine gained small-screen success in The Disney Channel’s Lizzie McGuire as the eponymous character’s father.

    “It’s really hard to face this reality about an old friend,” Hilary Duff, who played Lizzie McGuire, wrote on Instagram. “There was so much warmth in the McGuire family and I always felt so cared for by my on-screen parents. I’ll be forever grateful for that. I’m deeply sad to learn Bobby was suffering.”

    Work remained consistent even if the projects diminished in prestige and quality. Then Quentin Tarantino, ever the champion of fading character actors, cast Mr. Carradine in Django Unchained as one of the trackers in the 2012 film after seeing a “very furry” photograph, as Mr. Carradine told Popdose.

    In 2015, Mr. Carradine was cited for a Colorado crash that injured him and his wife, Edith Mani. They later divorced, after more than 25 years of marriage.

    Mr. Carradine’s survivors include his three children, actor Ever Carradine, Marika Reed Carradine, and Ian Alexander Carradine.

    “Whenever anyone asks me how I turned out so normal, I always tell them it’s because of my dad. I knew my dad loved me, I knew it deep in my bones, and I always knew he had my back,” Ever Carradine wrote on Instagram. “I think it’s partly because we basically grew up together. Twenty years age difference really isn’t that much, and while I never ever thought of him as a sibling, I did always think of him as my partner. We were in it together.”

    This story includes discussion of suicide. If you or someone you know needs help, the national suicide and crisis lifeline in the U.S. is available by calling or texting 988.

  • Trump’s newest tariffs could face legal challenge, though time is short

    Trump’s newest tariffs could face legal challenge, though time is short

    President Donald Trump’s new tariffs are not legally justified, according to several prominent economists and trade experts, who say there is no sign of the profound international financial problems that such measures were intended to remedy.

    Hours after the Supreme Court invalidated the emergency tariffs that he imposed last year, Trump on Friday invoked a 1974 law to announce a new 10% global import tax, later raising it to 15%. The president cited a provision known as Section 122 that authorizes temporary restrictions on imports to deal with “fundamental international payments problems.”

    In an official proclamation, the president said the nation’s “balance of payments,” a comprehensive account of Americans’ financial transactions with foreigners, was suffering “a large and serious deficit.” And he listed a number of metrics reflecting a deteriorating U.S. financial posture.

    The law does not define “balance-of-payments deficit,” and economists disagree about what should be included in the term. But several critics, including the International Monetary Fund’s former chief economist and a prominent conservative legal commentator, disputed the president’s claim. Trump wrongly conflated an alleged payments deficit with the merchandise trade deficit that he targeted last year with his first set of comprehensive tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), they said.

    “The U.S. does not have a ‘payments’ problem. It can finance its trade deficits,” Gita Gopinath, the former IMF official, now teaching at Harvard University, wrote on X.

    Added Andrew McCarthy, a former federal prosecutor, writing in the conservative National Review: “These new tariffs are even more clearly illegal than Trump’s IEEPA tariffs.”

    Opposition to the new import taxes erupted even before they took effect at 12:01 a.m. on Tuesday. The outcry suggested that the president, still smarting from his 6-3 Supreme Court defeat, could face renewed legal jeopardy over the centerpiece of his economic agenda.

    “I do anticipate a lawsuit,” said Scott Lincicome, vice president of general economics for the Cato Institute and a former trade lawyer.

    U.S. importers would have the right to sue once they paid the tariffs. Liberty Justice Center, the nonprofit public-interest law firm that represented several small businesses in one of the tariff cases decided by the Supreme Court, said Monday that it is “closely monitoring” the president’s latest actions.

    “We will ensure that whatever authority the executive branch relies on, it follows the rules Congress actually wrote and the constitutional guardrails that protect our system of separated powers,” said Sara Albrecht, the center’s chairman.

    The debate over the Section 122 levies shows that questions of law and economics will continue to dog Trump’s bid to remake the global trading system. This time, there is no question that Congress has delegated to the president the power to levy tariffs — only under what circumstances. At issue are complex definitional questions of international economics and the legislative intent behind the wording of an untested provision in U.S. trade law.

    Time may also be a factor. The Section 122 tariffs expire after 150 days unless Congress votes to extend them, which is unlikely.

    Judges might be reluctant to “second guess” the president’s judgment on whether a balance-of-payments problem exists, said John Veroneau, a lawyer who served as deputy U.S. trade representative under President George W. Bush.

    Still, the administration’s newfound reliance upon Section 122 reverses the legal arguments it made last year. Defending the president’s emergency tariffs, Justice Department attorneys told an appeals court that Section 122 did not apply to Trump’s trade deficit concerns, which were “conceptually distinct from balance-of-payments deficits.”

    The White House declined to elaborate on the president’s Feb. 20 proclamation and fact sheet, which blamed a loss of domestic manufacturing for an excessive number of dollars leaving the country. Problems with the nation’s balance of payments can “endanger the ability of the United States to finance its spending, erode investor confidence in the economy, and distress the financial markets,” the proclamation said.

    Congress passed the Trade Act of 1974 when the United States was dealing with a distinctly different set of economic issues. In 1971, President Richard M. Nixon abruptly ended the convertibility of dollars into gold, marking the end of the Bretton Woods system of fixed exchange rates.

    At the time, foreign central banks were rushing to trade their unwanted dollars for gold, threatening to deplete U.S. financial reserves.

    There’s no sign of that sort of crisis today. The dollar has dropped about 10% over the past year, but it remains above its level for most of the decade leading to 2015. There’s certainly no sign of the “imminent and significant depreciation” that Section 122 requires.

    But even some Democrats say the administration is reacting to worrisome financial ailments.

    Economist Brad Setser, who served in the Treasury Department under President Barack Obama, said the global economy is characterized by dangerous imbalances.

    For years, the U.S. has run a deficit in its current account, the broadest measure of the nation’s trade balance, while China has run a mirror-image surplus. To keep running a large trade deficit, the U.S. must attract financing from abroad. So far, it’s been able to do that, which is why many analysts do not share the administration’s urgency.

    But the nation’s net international investment position — which balances the value of foreign stocks and bonds owned by Americans against what foreigners own in this country — is also deteriorating. That figure reached negative $26.7 trillion last year, down sharply in recent years.

    Some of that decline reflects foreigners’ large purchases of U.S. stocks, which have outperformed other markets, and thus is not a problem, Setser said. But the deterioration in the investment account also stems from the growth in the U.S. external debt, which carries a rising interest burden.

    “At this level of the current account [deficit], U.S. external debt will tend to rise. The external position will tend to weaken, which is one definition of a balance-of-payments problem,” he said. “The debt position does worry me.”

  • Savannah Guthrie says her family is offering a $1 million reward for her mother Nancy’s recovery

    Savannah Guthrie says her family is offering a $1 million reward for her mother Nancy’s recovery

    Today show host Savannah Guthrie said her family is now offering a $1 million reward for information leading to the recovery of her mother, Nancy Guthrie, who went missing from her Arizona home more than three weeks ago.

    Savannah Guthrie said Tuesday that her family is still holding out for a miracle and hopes her mother will be found alive, but she also acknowledged that they realize it might be too late.

    “She may already be gone,” Savannah Guthrie said in an Instagram post. “She may already have gone home to the Lord that she loves and is dancing in heaven.”

    Nancy Guthrie, 84, was last seen at her home just outside Tucson, Ariz., on Jan. 31 and was reported missing the next day. Authorities believe she was kidnapped, and the FBI released surveillance videos of a masked man who was outside Guthrie’s front door on the night she vanished.

    Savannah Guthrie’s mother is missing. But let’s not forget many others are, too. | Jenice Armstrong

    Drops of her blood were found on the front porch, but authorities haven’t publicly revealed much evidence. Since the first days of her disappearance, authorities have expressed concern about Nancy Guthrie’s health because she needs vital daily medicine.

    Savannah Guthrie said her family needs to know where her mother is no matter what happened.

    “Someone out there knows something that can bring her home,” she said.

    Several hundred people are working the Guthrie investigation, and more than 20,000 tips have been received, the Pima County Sheriff’s Office has said. The FBI and other agencies are assisting.

    The porch camera footage released two weeks ago, which showed a man wearing a backpack and gloves outside Nancy Guthrie’s house, gave investigators their first major break. But it also has fueled intense speculation.

    The sheriff’s department said Monday that it’s aware of differences in the masked person’s clothing depicted in various images that were released, namely with and without a backpack.

    “There is no date or time stamp associated with these images,” the department said. “Therefore, any suggestion that the photographs were taken on different days is purely speculative.”

    Sheriff Chris Nanos said a week ago that members of Guthrie’s family, including siblings and spouses, are not suspects.

    Savannah Guthrie said Tuesday that her family also will donate $500,000 to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

    “We are hoping that the attention that has been given to our mom and our family will extend to all the families like ours,” she said.

  • Chris Sale, Braves agree to one-year, $27 million deal for 2027

    Chris Sale, Braves agree to one-year, $27 million deal for 2027

    ATLANTA — Left-hander Chris Sale and the Atlanta Braves agreed Tuesday to a contract worth $27 million for the 2027 season.

    A 36-year-old, who won the 2024 NL Cy Young Award in his first season with Atlanta, Sale agreed to a deal that includes a $30 million team option for 2028.

    Atlanta acquired Sale from Boston in December 2023 and he agreed to a reworked $38 million, two-year contract that included an $18 million club option for 2026. The Braves exercised the option in November.

    Sale is 25-8 with a 2.46 ERA in 49 starts and one relief appearance with the Braves. He made the All-Star team twice, raising his total to nine.

    He is 145-88 with a 3.01 ERA is 15 major league seasons with the Chicago White Sox (2010-16), Boston (2017-23) and Atlanta, striking out 2,579 in 2,084 innings. His 11.1 strikeouts per nine innings are the most among pitchers with 1,500 or more innings.

    Sale has thrived with the Braves after making nine trips to the disabled and injured lists with the Red Sox, mostly with shoulder and elbow ailments. He had Tommy John surgery on March 30, 2020, and returned to a big league mound on Aug. 14, 2021.

  • Supreme Court ruling against Trump’s tariffs is unlikely to end to trade policy chaos

    Supreme Court ruling against Trump’s tariffs is unlikely to end to trade policy chaos

    WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court’s stunning rebuke of President Donald Trump’s most sweeping tariffs means he can’t conjure up new import taxes on a whim anymore.

    But the justices’ ruling on Friday is nonetheless unlikely to ease the uncertainty over Trump’s trade policy that has paralyzed businesses over the past year. “It’s only gotten more complicated for everybody,” said trade lawyer Ryan Majerus, partner at King & Spalding and a former U.S. trade official.

    Vexing questions remain: How will the president use other laws to reconstruct the tariffs the Supreme Court knocked down, and will those attempts withstand legal challenges? What does the decision mean for the trade deals Trump strong-armed other countries into accepting, using his now-defunct tariffs as leverage? Can importers collect refunds for the tariffs they paid last year, and if so, how?

    After Supreme Court rebuke, Democrats call for government to refund billions in Trump tariff money

    Then there’s Trump’s own unpredictability. Even though he had weeks to prepare for an unfavorable Supreme Court ruling, his response was still chaotic: On Friday, he said he’d use other legal authority to impose 10% levies on imports from other countries. Saturday, he ratcheted it up to 15%.

    Normally, lower tariffs arising from the Supreme Court’s decision might be expected to give the economy a little lift. But “any benefit you would get from that is more than offset to a modest negative from the uncertainty front,” said Mike Skordeles, head of U.S. economics at Truist, a bank.

    Small businesses, don’t expect tariff relief anytime soon | Expert Opinion

    Trump looks for new import taxes

    Gone for good are the sweeping tariffs Trump justified under the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), mainly to combat America’s persistent trade deficits. But that doesn’t mean the president can’t invoke other laws to rebuild much of his tariff wall around the U.S. economy.

    “Tariff revenues will be unchanged this year and will be unchanged in the future,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a Fox News interview Sunday.

    Trump reached for a stop-gap option immediately after his defeat Friday at the Supreme Court: Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974 allows the president to impose tariffs of up to 15% for up to 150 days. But any extension beyond 150 days must be approved by a Congress likely to balk at passing a tax increase as November’s midterm elections loom.

    Section 122 has never been invoked before, and some critics say the president can’t use it as a stand-in for the IEEPA tariffs to combat the trade deficit.

    Bryan Riley of National Taxpayers Union, for example, argues that Section 122 is meant to give the president a tool to fight what it calls “fundamental international payments problems,’’ not the trade deficit.

    The provision arose from the financial crises that emerged in the 1960s and 1970s when the U.S. dollar was tied to gold. Other countries were dumping dollars in exchange for gold at a set rate, putting alarming downward pressure on the dollar. But the U.S. currency is no longer linked to gold, so Section 122 has been “effectively rendered obsolete,’’ Riley wrote in a commentary.

    “Given the amount of money at issue for U.S. businesses, it is not hard to imagine a new wave of litigation attacking Section 122, and again seeking refunds of Section 122 duties collected,” said trade lawyer Dave Townsend, a partner at Dorsey & Whitney.

    A sturdier alternative is Section 301 of the same 1974 trade act, which gives the United States a handy cudgel with which to smack countries it accuses of engaging in “unjustifiable,” “unreasonable” or “discriminatory” trade practices. In a statement Friday, in fact, U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said the administration was launching a series of 301 investigations after the loss at the Supreme Court.

    Trump invoked Section 301 in his first term to impose sweeping tariffs on Chinese imports in a dispute over the sharp-elbowed tactics that Beijing was using to challenge America’s technological dominance. Those tariffs were upheld in court and kept by the Biden administration.

    “We’re eight years in, and those China tariffs are still here,” King & Spalding’s Majerus said. “They’re sticky tariffs.’’

    Confusion surrounds Trump’s trade deals

    The Supreme Court’s decision also raises questions about the lopsided trade agreements Trump negotiated last year, using the threat of potentially unlimited IEEPA tariffs to squeeze concessions out of U.S. trading partners from the European Union to Japan.

    Will countries try to back out of their commitments, now that the IEEPA tariff threat is gone?

    The European Union’s trade deal with Trump is already on hold amid confusion following the Supreme Court’s ruling — and Trump’s decision to respond to it with the 15% Section 122 global tariff.

    European lawmakers on Monday delayed a vote on ratifying the pact to seek clarification. They are worried that Trump’s new import tax will stack on top of the “most favored nation’’ tariffs the United States charges under pre-existing World Trade Organization rules — and lift U.S. tariffs on EU imports above the 15% the Europeans had agreed to last year.

    “A deal is a deal,” said commission spokesman Olof Gill. “So now we are simply saying to the US, it is up to you to clearly show to us what path you are taking to honor the agreement.”

    Then there’s the United Kingdom, which had reached a deal with Trump last year for 10% tariffs on its exports to the United States. Will they really go to 15%?

    Still, trade analysts largely expect U.S. trade partners to stick by the deals they reached with Trump last year. For one thing, the United States could wallop them with hefty Section 301 tariffs, which are potentially unlimited, for violating trade agreements.

    “They’re going to pretty leery of rocking the boat on their deals,” Majerus said. “Violations of trade agreements can be a basis for taking 301 action. So you could see Section 301 become an enforcement mechanism’’ for the United States.

    “We are confident that all trade agreements negotiated by President Trump will remain in effect,’’ U.S. Trade Representative Greer said in his statement.

    A messy refund process

    In its ruling, the Supreme Court didn’t bother to say what would happen to all the money collected from the IEEPA tariffs, $133 billion as of mid-December. It left the messy issue of refunds to importers — but likely not to consumers — to lower courts and the Customs and Border Protection agency, which collects import taxes. But they’re likely to be overwhelmed — hundreds of companies are already lined up to get their money back — and the refunds could take months or years to be paid.

    “The whole thing’s going to be a mess,’’ Majerus said.

    It’s possible that Congress will order Customs to take an “easy ‘one-click’ approach to refunds,’’ wrote strategists Thierry Wizman and Gareth Berry at the investment bank Macquarie. Otherwise, they warned, the Trump administration could “make the refund process as burdensome as possible, requiring every importer to file stacks of paperwork, if not file a lawsuit, to get its money back. That would be costly for businesses.”

  • Milan Cortina Olympics were the most-watched Winter Games since 2014 with 96% more viewers than Beijing

    Milan Cortina Olympics were the most-watched Winter Games since 2014 with 96% more viewers than Beijing

    The Milan Cortina Olympics averaged 23.5 million viewers in the United States, making them the most-watched Winter Games since 2014 with a 96% larger audience than the Beijing Games four years ago.

    NBCUniversal said the average includes combined audiences on NBC, Peacock, CNBC, USA Network and other digital platforms. It covered the live afternoon (2-5 p.m. EST) and prime-time (8-11 p.m. EST/PST) windows.

    The figures are based on Nielsen’s Big Data + Panel ratings (through Feb. 19), Nielsen’s early figures for the final three days (Feb. 20-22) and digital data from Adobe Analytics.

    Viewership numbers for the United States’ 2-1 overtime victory over Canada in men’s hockey on Sunday morning were not expected until Tuesday. The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation said on Monday that 8.7 million were watching in Canada when Jack Hughes scored the golden goal in overtime. The celebration that followed included American players carrying the jersey (and eventually the children) of late South Jersey hockey star Johnny Gaudreau, who was killed along with his brother by an alleged drunk driver while biking near their family home in Salem County.

    Johnny Gaudreau’s dream was to be an Olympian. His family lived it for him, in a moment fit for a ‘movie.’

    “I feel in so many ways that these Winter Olympics exceeded our expectations. We were reminded that the Olympics are the most exciting, unpredictable and biggest stage in sports,” said Molly Solomon, the executive producer of NBC’s Olympics coverage. “And what I think came together in Italy was that the settings were stunningly beautiful, the access we had to the athletes and their lives was unprecedented. And then you take the technology, the first-person view drones, the audio, and it took the audience inside the stories in fresh, meaningful ways.

    “And Team USA, I mean, the results, you’ve seen the numbers for the medals and things. America wants to see how their team’s performing, and it’s the best performance in an overseas Olympics. Everything lived up to the billing, and some of the superstars had riveting, dramatic performances. Not all of them gold, but that’s the Olympics, right?”

    Dylan Larkin (21) holds Johnny, the son of the Johnny Gaudreau while posing with teammates after Team USA beat Canada in overtime to claim its first men’s hockey gold medal since 1980.

    NBC broadcast the Super Bowl, the Olympics, and the NBA All-Star Game in February, the first time a network had all three in one month. It also premiered “Sunday Night Basketball” on Feb. 1.

    According to Nielsen, 215.6 million U.S. viewers tuned in for at least one of those events. Audience reach numbers have been higher under Nielsen’s new rating system since the minimum viewing requirement was reduced from 5 to 3 minutes.

    Super Bowl 60 averaged 125.6 million viewers across NBC, Peacock, and Telemundo, the second-most-watched program in U.S. history. The All-Star Game had its highest audience in 15 years, averaging 8.8 million, and the Lakers-Knicks game on Feb. 1 averaged 4.5 million.

    “I have to say it’s probably better than we expected. This doesn’t happen through luck or happenstance. This happens through just really good planning and then execution across the month. So really happy overall and I don’t think it could have gone better, honestly,” NBC Sports President Rick Cordella said.

  • Food companies simply can’t get enough of the word ‘simply’

    Food companies simply can’t get enough of the word ‘simply’

    Food companies are trying to keep it simple.

    Simply was the hottest word at an annual packaged-food and staples conference in Orlando last week. It’s become the preferred label for a new wave of products containing fewer, more natural ingredients — from beverages to peanut butter.

    Kraft Heinz Co. is putting a spotlight on its Simply line of ketchup that uses cane sugar instead of high-fructose corn syrup. Coca-Cola Co. now has Simply Pop, a prebiotic soda line with no added sugar, which was added last year to its existing Simply line of fruit juices and drinks. And PepsiCo Inc., which is in the midst of overhauling its snacks and lowering prices, has expanded its own Simply line of products that has no artificial colors or flavors.

    PepsiCo has expanded its own Simply line of products that has no artificial colors or flavors, such as Simply NKD Doritos and Cheetos, made by Frito-Lay, a division of PepsiCo.

    While simply has long been a popular marketing term in the industry, it’s making a resurgence as companies look to navigate pressure from Washington, which blames processed foods for health problems including obesity and diabetes, and a growing number of consumers who are scrutinizing ingredient lists. An added bonus: Companies can often charge more for “clean label” products.

    PepsiCo is updating its packaging to emphasize “simple ingredients based on nature,” chief executive Ramon Laguarta said last week at the Consumer Analyst Group of New York conference. The company updated its Lay’s brand last year and added a “naked” line of Doritos and Cheetos to its Simply portfolio without any artificial colors or flavors. It’s also revamping its Tostitos line of corn chips.

    “We’re changing the image. We’re making it more natural,” Laguarta said.

    Simply is also playing a key role at Kraft Heinz, as the maker of Jell-0 and Lunchables discards a previous plan to split up the company and instead looks to revitalize its brands. It’s starting with ketchup.

    “We’re just really getting started with this Simply platform and this organic platform that I think shows really great promise,” Kraft Heinz chief executive officer Steve Cahillane said Thursday in Orlando. But he noted that Kraft Heinz doesn’t plan to reformulate its entire portfolio.

    “Some consumers are willing to pay for that increased cost that comes with Simply and some are not,” he said.

    The meaning of “simply” has evolved for food companies over time, prompting the need for rebranding in some cases.

    JM Smucker Co. decided to create a new Jif Simply line of peanut butter, which has a shorter list of ingredients. It’s phasing out an earlier iteration, called Simply Jif, that had lower levels of sodium and sugar than regular Jif but still contained ingredients like fully hydrogenated vegetable oils.

    Smucker CEO Mark Smucker said the new Jif Simply is a “very basic formula that obviously is responding to consumer trends.”

    The new peanut butter still has lower sodium and sugar, and comes in three formulations: unsweetened, sweetened, and crunchy. It’s made from roasted peanuts, palm oil, salt, and sugar in the sweetened version.

    The new Jif Simply line “has already received strong retailer acceptance,” he said.

  • Former ICE instructor says agency has slashed training for new officers

    Former ICE instructor says agency has slashed training for new officers

    A former instructor for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Monday accused the agency of dramatically slashing training standards for new officers and lying to Congress about it as the Trump administration seeks to rapidly expand its mass deportation operation.

    Ryan Schwank, who resigned from his job at an ICE academy in Georgia last week, told congressional Democrats at a hearing that the agency eliminated 240 hours of “vital classes” from a mandatory 580-hour training program, including instruction about the legal boundaries for the use of force, how to safely handle firearms, and the proper way to detain and arrest immigrants.

    “Law enforcement is a deadly serious biz. It is not a place for shortcuts,” Schwank said. “Deficient training can and will get people killed. … ICE is lying to Congress and the American people about the steps it is taking to ensure that 12,000 officers can faithfully uphold the Constitution and perform their jobs.”

    Ahead of the hearing, Schwank provided a joint panel of House and Senate Democrats copies of internal ICE documents that he said shows the extent of the cuts.

    Schwank’s testimony comes two weeks after acting ICE director Todd M. Lyons testified in front of separate House and Senate committees amid growing public outrage over the aggressive tactics of ICE and other federal immigration officers. Two U.S. citizens were fatally shot by federal officers in Minneapolis last month.

    During his testimony in the House on Feb. 10, Lyons responded to questions about the agency’s training program by saying it has not reduced the “meat of the training” but has sought to reduce the time it takes to get officers into the field. He said training used to take place five days a week for eight hours a day but has been changed to six days a week for 12 hours per day.

    In a statement Monday, the Department of Homeland Security said ICE recruits receive 56 days of training before beginning their assignments, along with an average of 28 additional days of “on-the-job-training.” DHS said recruits are receiving the same total hours of training as they always have.

    “No training hours have been cut. Our officers receive extensive firearm training, are taught de-escalation tactics, and receive Fourth and Fifth Amendment comprehensive instruction,” said Lauren Bis, a spokesperson for the department.

    Schwank said that among the classes eliminated were 16 hours of firearms training. He also said that a two-hour class on the rights of protesters was shortened into 10 minutes of discussion during a lecture on “the concept of seizure.”

    Schwank was separately asked to review an internal memo, signed by Lyons, that said ICE officers are authorized to use administrative warrants, approved by senior ICE officials, to enter private residences. That marked a shift from the federal government’s long-standing position that officers must obtain judicial warrants signed by federal judges.

    Schwank said he was instructed to train the recruits on the policy but was told he could not talk about the information publicly or even take notes after reading the memo. The Washington Post and other news outlets reported on the memo last month.

    “ICE is teaching cadets to violate the Constitution and attempting to cloak it in secrecy by demanding I lie about it,” he said.

  • Armed man shot and killed at Mar-a-Lago was never interested in politics or guns, cousin says

    Armed man shot and killed at Mar-a-Lago was never interested in politics or guns, cousin says

    CAMERON, N.C. — The 21-year-old North Carolina man who entered a gate at President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort with a shotgun before he was shot and killed worked as a golf course groundskeeper and liked to sketch.

    Austin Tucker Martin rarely, if ever, talked about politics, seemed afraid of guns, and came from a family of Trump supporters, according to Braeden Fields, a cousin who said the two grew up together.

    “I wouldn’t believe he would do something like this. It’s mind-blowing,” Fields said. “He wouldn’t even hurt an ant. He doesn’t even know how to use a gun.”

    Martin walked up to the secure perimeter at Mar-a-Lago early Sunday and went through a gate when it opened for employees to leave, a U.S. Secret Service spokesperson said Monday. Martin dropped a gas can and raised a shotgun at two Secret Service agents and a Palm Beach County sheriff’s deputy, who then opened fire “to neutralize the threat,” said Sheriff Ric Bradshaw.

    Trump, who often spends weekends at the Palm Beach, Fla., resort, was at the White House at the time.

    Investigators have not identified a motive. Trump faced two assassination attempts during the 2024 campaign, including one just a few miles from Mar-a-Lago when a man was spotted aiming a rifle through shrubbery while Trump was golfing.

    Following Sunday’s incident, Secret Service spokesperson Anthony Guglielmi said investigators believe Martin bought his shotgun while driving to Florida. Authorities said his family had recently reported him missing.

    Martin was from central North Carolina, where guns and hunting are a part of life, his cousin said. But whenever they’d go hunting or target shooting, Martin would never pick up a gun, Fields told the Associated Press on Sunday.

    He lived with his mother in a modest modular house down a rutted sandy road near the town of Cameron. No one answered the door Monday, and the large police presence from the day before was gone.

    Martin’s sister was just 21 when she was killed in a car accident in 2023, and he has an older brother who’s in the military, Fields said.

    For the past three years, Martin worked as a groundskeeper at Pine Needles Lodge & Golf Club.

    “It’s tragic. I feel for his family,” said Kelly Miller, president of the course in nearby Southern Pines. “It’s just unfortunate what transpired. It was totally unexpected.”

    Martin last year started a business to sell pen drawings he made, according to state records. A website matching the company name features illustrations of golf courses, buildings, and ancient Roman architecture.

    Politics didn’t seem to be among his interests, his cousin said

    “We are big Trump supporters, all of us. Everybody,” Fields said, but his cousin was “real quiet, never really talked about anything.”