Click on the Manage Content for adding and managing content.
Click on the Rotator Settings and choose what and how it will be displayed.

How the intensely private Melania Trump faced a ‘traumatic experience’ on the public stage

Kraig Pakulski 0 21 Article rating: No rating

By Betsy Klein, CNN

(CNN) — “A bad noise.”

That was first lady Melania Trump’s first reaction, according to her husband, to hearing gunshots outside the ballroom where she and President Donald Trump were seated onstage for Saturday’s White House Correspondents’ Dinner.

She straightened, eyes ahead, as law enforcement rushed toward the dias, then crouched under the table before being escorted out of the room to a secure location with the president and his staff.

It marked the first time Melania Trump, who has closely guarded her privacy and independence in her second term, has been alongside her husband when he has been aggressively evacuated by the Secret Service. She has said she learned about the 2024 assassination attempts against him in Butler, Pennsylvania, and at a West Palm Beach, Florida, golf course from watching TV while in a different city from her husband.

“I’ve been through this before a couple of times, and she has not — to this extent. She handled it great,” Donald Trump told CBS News’ “60 Minutes” on Sunday.

On the eve of her 56th birthday, the first lady — who’s long been concerned about security — recognized the danger she might face, her usual stoicism giving way to a look of surprise and distress.

The president, who had told reporters that it was “a rather traumatic experience” for his wife, was asked Sunday whether she had been scared.

“I don’t want to say, and people don’t like having it said that they were scared, but certainly, I mean, who wouldn’t be when you have a situation like that?” he told CBS.

Trump added that he saw a video of the scene and watched a close-up shot of the first lady’s reaction.

“She looked very upset about what just took place. Why not?” he said.

Melania Trump had been in the room for 18 minutes before that “bad noise.” Seated between her husband and White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, who’s expecting her second child, she’d been watching mentalist Oz Pearlman — the entertainer for the evening — guess the name of Leavitt’s new baby.

As Pearlman, leaning over between the Trumps, held up name cards in his magic trick, Melania Trump suddenly looked aghast, mouth open, seemingly realizing before those around her that all was not all right.

“I was performing right then for the president, the press secretary and the first lady. It’s kind of like a pivotal moment in the trick when you’re just about to do the reveal — like ‘wow.’ And we hear commotion,” Pearlman recalled Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union” with Dana Bash.

Roughly two hours later, the first lady, visibly shaken, appeared publicly in the White House briefing room for the first time, joining the president for his remarks to reporters.

After the Butler shooting, she issued a two-page statement calling for unity, love and kindness over politics. On Saturday, the first lady let the president do the talking.

Her team, a source familiar said, is holding up well and grateful to law enforcement for their quick action Saturday night, which was her husband’s first time attending the annual dinner as president, and hers as first lady.

But security has been top of mind for Melania Trump since that Butler incident, underscored in one of the more dramatic moments of her eponymous documentary, “Melania.”

“How does this area get secure?” she asked during a briefing on the inaugura

Nedra Talley Ross, last surviving Ronette, dies at 80

Kraig Pakulski 0 18 Article rating: No rating

By Lianne Kolirin, CNN

(CNN) — Nedra Talley Ross, the last surviving member of the 1960s girl band The Ronettes, has died. She was 80 years old.

The singer, who joined forces with her cousins Ronnie Spector and Estelle Bennett to form the musical trio, passed away on Sunday morning, according to her daughter.

Writing on Facebook on Sunday night, Nedra K. Ross said: “At approximately 8:30 this morning our mother Nedra Talley Ross went home to be with the Lord. She was safe in her own bed at home with her family close, knowing she was loved. Thank you Lord.”

Meanwhile a post on the band’s official Facebook account also shared the news: “It is with heavy hearts that we share the news of Nedra Talley Ross’ passing. She was a light to those who knew and loved her.”

“As a founding member of The Ronettes, along with her beloved cousins Ronnie and Estelle, Nedra’s voice, style and spirit helped define a sound that would change music. Her contribution to the group’s story and their defining influence will live forever.”

“Rest peacefully dear Nedra. Thanks for the magic.”

Born in New York City on January 27, 1946, Ross formed the band — originally known as Ronnie and the Relatives and later the Darling Sisters — with sisters Spector and Bennett in 1959. Ross and Bennett started by singing back up, while Spector took the lead.

They only became famous in 1963 after signing with music producer Phil Spector, creator of the 1960s’ “Wall of Sound” style. “Be My Baby,” their first single with Spector, was a massive hit. Among their other hits were: “Baby I Love You,” “Walking in the Rain” and “Do I Love You?”

They also enjoyed huge success in the UK and were billed alongside the likes of the Rolling Stones and Eric Clapton and the Yardbirds. They also opened for the Beatles on their final US tour in 1966.

The group broke up in 1967. Soon after, Ronnie wed Phil Spector, with whom she had a tumultuous relationship. They divorced in 1974.

The Ronettes were inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2007, two years before Bennett’s death. Spector died in 2022.

Inducting them that night was Rolling Stone Keith Richards. Recalling his first encounter with the trio in 1964, he said: “They touched my heart right there and then and they touch it still.”

In their acceptance speech that night, Ross spoke of the “dream” she and her cousins had starting out in their teens.

“We had a dream, but with a dream you need to have people behind you with your dream. For us, my mom knocked on doors when people didn’t want to hire and put under contract three young pretty girls that they said were going to change their minds down the road. I thank you for that — God knows what you’ve done.”

She went on to thank Jesus for saving her life through open heart surgery, as well as others, including her husband, Scott Ross, and their four children.

“Show business is a thing that can be great, but it can be bad, too,” she said. “For us, we had a family that gave us a core to help stabilize us in a very difficult crazy world. It was a fun time. I thank God.”

The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2026 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.

Brandon Griggs contributed to this report.

The post Read more

Supreme Court to debate whether police may seek sweeping cellphone location data in investigations

Kraig Pakulski 0 27 Article rating: No rating

By John Fritze, CNN

(CNN) — When an investigation into a Virginia bank robbery went cold a few years back, local police turned to Google.

Authorities served the tech giant with a “geofence warrant,” which required the company to parse location data on millions of people to find a handful whose cellphones pegged them within 300 meters of the bank at the time of the robbery.

With the data in hand, police solved their case. They also triggered a constitutional challenge that is now before the Supreme Court.

The justices will debate Monday whether the sweeping warrants, which are directed at tech companies rather than individual suspects, are consistent with the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition on unreasonable searches.

At a time when Americans store vast amounts of data online, the court’s decision could make it easier for law enforcement to solve crimes but also expose troves of personal information to authorities.

“It’s huge,” said William McGeveran, dean of the University of Minnesota Law School and an expert in data privacy law. “The issues involved apply to any of the digital technology that is tracking your location, which is a lot of things.”

In Virginia, police say Okello Chatrie passed a note urging a bank teller in 2019 to “hand over all the cash” and demanded “at least 100k and nobody will get hurt and your family will be set free.” Initially, police were unable to identify a suspect, but officers noticed on security cameras that the suspect was using his phone before the robbery. That’s when they sought the location data from Google.

After police identified Chatrie, authorities executed federal search warrants and found “robbery-style demand notes” in his bedroom, nearly $100,000 in cash and a 9 mm pistol. Police say Chatrie confessed to the robbery and was ultimately sentenced to more than 11 years in prison.

Chatrie entered a conditional guilty plea but reserved the right to appeal over the geofence warrant. The Richmond-based 4th US Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against him, holding that the warrant didn’t constitute a “search” for Fourth Amendment purposes. After all, the court reasoned that when people allow tech companies to collect data they generally do so voluntarily. It is an argument that the Justice Department, which is defending the warrants, relies on heavily.

Chatrie “took no steps to protect his location from disclosure, such as pausing the Location History feature he had enabled or adjusting, deactivating, or forgoing his cellphone during his crime,” US Solicitor General D. John Sauer told the Supreme Court.

But Chatrie’s attorneys argue that the logic doesn’t apply to his case, in part because of a 2018 Supreme Court precedent. In that case, Carpenter v. US, a divided court ruled that law enforcement generally needs to establish probable cause before accessing cellphone tower data to identify the movements of suspects. If authorities need a warrant to get cellphone tower data, Chatrie’s attorneys said, then surely they also must obtain one to get data that is far more reliable.

The location data at issue in Chatrie’s case can identify a person’s location within 3 meters every two minutes.

“The technology may be novel, but the constitutional problem it presents is not,” Chatrie’s lawyer, Adam Unikowsky, told the Supreme Court. “The Fourth Amendment was born of the Founders’ revulsion for general warrants and writs of assistance — instruments that allowed the government to search first and develop suspicions later.”

In the Carpenter decision, Chief Justice John Roberts, a conservative, was in the majority with the then-four-justice liberal wing. Three current conservat

Elon Musk and Sam Altman are about to face off in court. Is an impartial jury even possible?

Kraig Pakulski 0 23 Article rating: No rating

By Hadas Gold, CNN

(CNN) — A group of regular people who might not even know much about artificial intelligence could soon determine OpenAI’s future.

Elon Musk’s lawsuit against ChatGPT maker OpenAI and its leaders, including CEO Sam Altman, heads to court Monday. Some of the biggest names in tech are expected to testify about whether executives deceived Musk and betrayed OpenAI’s original nonprofit mission when it evolved to include a for-profit arm.

The trial comes at a precarious time for OpenAI, with a blockbuster IPO on the horizon and frenzied competition among rivals. OpenAI’s IPO ambitions may fall apart if Musk wins the case. Altman and OpenAI co-founder and President Greg Brockman could lose their positions – clearing an easier path for Musk’s AI company, xAI, to get ahead.

“This is a tech soap opera that all investors will be watching as Musk vs Altman enters the MMA ring,” Wedbush analyst Dan Ives said in an email. “We believe there will be a lot of dirt and slings thrown around in court between Musk and Altman, and that is not a good thing for anyone involved, but Musk has made this personal.”

But in a case involving the richest man in the world, the company that’s become synonymous with AI and major tech players and CEOs, finding impartial jurors will be a challenge.

How will the jury be chosen?

Musk and Altman aren’t just CEOs, they’re celebrities. Many possible jurors, especially from Silicon Valley, “will just have really strong opinions about these two titans of tech and AI,” jury consultant Alan Tuerkheimer told CNN.

But that alone isn’t a problem, said Professor Elizabeth Lippy, director of trial advocacy at Temple University law school.

“The law doesn’t require jurors who have never heard of Elon Musk or AI,” she said. “It requires jurors who can put aside what they’ve heard and decide the case based only on the evidence presented in court.”

The judge is calling a much larger pool of candidates during Monday’s jury selection, about three times larger than typical for a civil case, Tuerkheimer noted.

The judge and attorneys will try and “flesh out” how potential jurors feel not just about the bold face names, but also AI in general, Tuerkheimer said.

The jurors will only determine liability on an advisory basis for Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers, who will decide any remedies herself.

What is Musk alleging?

Musk cofounded and helped fund OpenAI as a nonprofit in 2015, giving what he says amounted to around $44 million in its first few years. But he split from the company in 2018 after an acrimonious power struggle. (Musk went on to later found his own AI company xAI.)

After Musk left, OpenAI needed to raise more cash. A for-profit subsidiary was established in 2019, which was converted into a public benefit corporation overseen by the nonprofit foundation in 2025. The attorneys general in California and Delaware approved the shift last year.

Musk claims that shift betrayed OpenAI’s original nonprofit mission to develop safe open-source AI technology for the public good, not private gain. He claims the company profited wrongfully from his contributions in a breach of charitable trust and unjust enrichment.

Microsoft, which Musk named as a co-defendant in the case, is accused of aiding and abetting OpenAI’s breach of charitable trust.

“Musk and the non-profit’s namesake objective were betrayed by Altman and his accomplices,” Musk’s original com

Giant fossil fuel companies made about $12,000 in the time it took you to read this headline

Kraig Pakulski 0 30 Article rating: No rating

By Laura Paddison, CNN

(CNN) — Six of the world’s biggest fossil fuel companies are on track to make almost $3,000 in profits every single second this year, according to a new report, as households across the world grapple with soaring energy prices and inflation, which are driving a cost-of-living crisis.

Chevron, Shell, BP, ConocoPhillips, Exxon and TotalEnergies will make $2,967 a second in profits in 2026, an analysis from the non-profit Oxfam International has found. It marks an increase of nearly $37 million a day compared to their 2025 profits.

The total projected fossil fuel profits for 2026 for all six companies stand at approximately $94 billion, the analysis found.

Oil and gas companies’ profits are soaring as the Iran conflict continues. Iran’s heavy restrictions on the Strait of Hormuz, a vital chokepoint for the oil and gas industry, have caused global oil prices to soar. Oil prices were pushed to an average of more than $100 a barrel in March.

“Fossil fuel corporations profit from geopolitical instability and subsequently inequality, as these disruptions lead to higher prices and higher profits,” said Mariana Paoli, the climate policy lead at Oxfam International.

The global ripples have been significant. While oil and gas companies make huge profits, people across the world are struggling with high costs of living, including soaring energy bills and punishing prices at the gas pumps.

Gas is averaging $4 a gallon in the United States, piling more pressure onto Americans already struggling with high grocery prices and housing costs.

Asian countries, many of which rely heavily on oil transported through the Strait of Hormuz, are among those hardest hit. Some governments have ordered people to work from home and are trialling four-day work weeks to cut fuel consumption, gas stations are rationing fuel and some hospitals are running out of supplies.

Fuel shortages have also affected sub-Saharan African countries, leading some to ration fuel.

The past few years of global conflict, including Russia’s war on Ukraine, have proved lucrative for oil and gas companies. Major fossil fuel companies made nearly half a trillion in profits in the four years since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, according to an analysis by non-profit Global Witness in February.

An analysis by Rystad Energy and the Guardian this month found the world’s top 100 oil and gas companies made more than $30 million an hour — $8,333 a second — in the first month of the Iran war.

Oil companies’ bumper profits, however, are not being channelled into a transition to clean energy and away from planet-heating oil and gas. Instead, many companies have scaled back climate commitments.

BP has slashed planned investment in renewable energy and increased oil and gas spending, Shell has watered down its 2030 targets to cut climat

RSS
First17411742174317441746174817491750Last