By Jeff Winter, CNN

(CNN) — When Greg Pryer served in the Marine Corps three decades ago and then worked as a New York City police officer who experienced the trauma of September 11, alcohol was his go-to coping mechanism.

After retiring from the NYPD in 2015, his drinking habit only worsened, he said. Without the job, he had no structure or direction, just time, memories and the bottle.

“I went from being a veteran and being in law enforcement, over 20 years of really having an obvious purpose, and retirement somewhat stripped me of my identity,” said Pryer, who retired as a sergeant. “All I had, in a way, was my alcohol to deal with it.”

With liquor running his life, Pryer was arrested in 2019 on weapons and driving while intoxicated charges, and again in 2022 on similar weapons charges, in New York’s Suffolk County, on Long Island. He had been in courtrooms plenty of times as a cop. Being in one as a defendant was a difficult reality to accept.

Because of his military service, Pryer was eligible to have his cases transferred to the Suffolk County Veterans Treatment Court. A specialized part of the local court system, vets court helps troubled service members get into drug and alcohol rehabilitation programs and mental health counseling in lieu of doing jail time. Veterans who complete their court-monitored treatments can have their sentences reduced, or charges dropped.

“Yes, it’ll help out your legal situation, but it’s also a chance to work on yourself, whatever that underlying issue that brought you into the legal system to begin with,” Pryer said. “It’s really a blessing that the court picked me up.”

For 15 years, hundreds of struggling vets like Pryer have received a lifeline through Suffolk’s veterans treatment court, run by those who served just like they did. Today, nearly 750 similar programs are found in 49 states, according to Department of Veterans Affairs data.

Like so many fellow veterans, Pryer was not aware of the treatment court’s existence until he wound up in the criminal justice system.

“I had to learn the hard way,” Pryer said.

The judge doesn’t wear a robe

The country’s first specialized court for vets started in 2008 in Buffalo, New York. Two years later, Judge John Toomey, a Vietnam War combat veteran, worked with the Suffolk district attorney’s office, the local VA health care system and a small group of volunteers known as the Green Jackets to create the Suffolk County Veterans Treatment Court.

The idea was so new it had no set guidelines or rules, providing Toomey and company freedom to develop their operation from scratch. Toomey, a two-time recipient of the Bronze Star, set a casual tone: He didn’t wear a robe on the bench, knew veteran defendants by name, and talked with their families about life at home. He even gave out his phone number.

“You had to put your trust that this is going to work out, and that this (person) is going to do the right thing,” Toomey said.

It worked because the veterans in the program wanted to get better. Toomey said they could have gone through the regular court system, served a few months of jail time and gone right back to what they were doing before their arrest.

The court accepts vets arrested for a gamut of crimes, including driving while intoxicated, misdemeanor and felony drug charges, robbery and criminal possession of weapons.

“They made the decision they want to turn their lives around. They’re sick of what’s going on,” Toomey said. “It gives you an advantage in helping them.”

To ensure accountability, the DA’s office developed a screening process to evaluate eligibl

By Ashley Strickland, CNN

(CNN) — Bright full moons, dazzling meteor shower displays and remarkable total eclipses will give stargazers plenty of reasons to look to the sky in 2026.

The new year kicks off with the full wolf moon on Saturday, the first of three supermoons this year. Jupiter, the largest planet in our solar system, will appear south of the silvery orb, according to EarthSky.

The luminosity of the supermoon, which appears brighter and fuller than a regular full moon due to its proximity to Earth, may prevent visibility of the Quadrantid meteor shower.

The Quadrantids are expected to peak from 4 to 7 p.m. ET Saturday — right when the full moon is dominating the night sky.

But there are many more meteor showers and celestial events to look forward to in 2026, according to Robert Lunsford, fireball report coordinator for the American Meteor Society.

Supermoons and full moons

Most years see 12 full moons with one occurring each month. But in 2026, there will be 13, with two in May.

The second full moon in a month is known as a blue moon — like the phrase “once in a blue moon.”

Typically, full moons happen every 29 days, while most months in our calendar last 30 or 31 days, so the months and moon phases don’t exactly align — resulting in a blue moon about every 2 ½ years.

After January’s supermoon, the next two supermoons will be in November and December. On average, the moon is about 238,900 miles (384,472 kilometers) from Earth. But December’s supermoon will be the closest of the year at 221,667 miles (356,740 kilometers) away, according to EarthSky.

Here are the rest of the full moons in 2026, according to the Farmers’ Almanac:

• February 1: Snow moon
• March 3: Worm moon
• April 1: Pink moon
• May 1: Flower moon
• May 31: Blue moon
• June 29: Strawberry moon
• July 29: Buck moon
• August 28: Sturgeon moon
• September 26: Harvest moon
• October 26: Hunter’s moon
• November 24: Beaver moon
• December 23: Cold moon

Meteor showers

After the peak of the Quadrantids in early January, sky-gazers will have to wait a bit until the Lyrid meteor shower in April.

Here are the dates for the rest of the meteor showers peaking in 2026, according to the American Meteor Society.

• Lyrids: April 21-22
• Eta Aquariids: May 5-6
• Southern Delta Aquariids: July 30-31
• Alpha Capricornids: July 30-31
• Perseids: August 12-13
• Orionids: October 21-22
• Southern Taurids: November 4-5
• Northern Taurids: November 11-12
• Leonids: November 16-17
• Geminids: December 13-14
• Ursids: December 21-22

“The Perseids and the Geminids will be the best showers of the year,” Lunsford said. “The Perseids are predicted to peak with no lunar interference.”

The Geminids produced a powerful shower in 2025 with hourly meteor rates as high as 135, Lunsford noted.

“There is no reason why we could not expect similar rates in 2026 once the moon sets.”

Solar eclipses

Sky-gazers can look forward to the dramatic appearances of two solar eclipses and two lunar eclipses this year, according to NASA.

An

By Gloria Pazmino, CNN

(CNN) — New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani has spent the last several weeks sprinting towards a deadline.

After publicly committing to filling many of the top posts in his new administration before taking office, Mamdani, 34, is closing 2025 with a still-evolving image of the team that is going to help steer his government and enact an ambitious agenda to tackle the affordability crisis in the nation’s largest city.

During the campaign, Mamdani – a former state assemblyman who will make history as New York’s youngest mayor in a century when he takes the oath of office at midnight on New Year’s Day – battled criticism that he lacked the experience needed to lead the city’s massive bureaucracy.

Since his election, Mamdani’s transition has continued to try to swat away that criticism even as it has slow-rolled some of its appointments, leading critics and political insiders watching from the sidelines to wonder if the pace of the transition is an indication of what the Mamdani era of government will bring.

The appointments of newly elected mayors are closely watched affairs, as they provide an early test for a new administration. Mamdani has continued to name new appointees, including as recently as Tuesday afternoon.

Still, several members of the transition granted anonymity to speak freely about confidential proceedings acknowledged the transition has indeed moved slower than previous administrations, in part due to Mamdani’s limited network of seasoned government hands and a struggle to appease competing constituencies inside the transition.

“He wants to broaden his coalition,” said one Mamdani transition member granted anonymity to discuss confidential proceedings. “But he also has a lot of very hard left people internally who are less interested in compromising, and that push and pull is really delaying things.”

Another member described the effort as a “careful managing of everyone’s political feelings.” And while some have been quick to focus on the delays, members of the transition have also praised some of Mamdani’s picks so far, describing them as “sane, sober choices” that should put at ease anyone worried Mamdani would place a “bunch of radical kids” in charge.

“I feel confident about the team we’re putting together,” Mamdani said earlier this month when asked about the pace of his appointments. “We are going to be building out a team that New Yorkers will see being the ones who will help to make the decisions that will shape their lives and their ability to afford living in this city.”

A massive bureaucracy

Since winning the general election in November, Mamdani hasn’t quite stopped running.

He has held a series of quasi-campaign events in the past two months: Rallying alongside independent Sen. Bernie Sanders and Starbucks workers on strike, distributing hot chocolate to tenants in the freezing December temperatures to highlight his proposal to freeze stabilized rents, meeting with daycare workers to talk about his universal childcare pitch and traveling to Washington, DC, for an Oval Office meeting with President Donald Trump.

All the while, his team has been working to fill out key roles in the administration.

New York City’s municipal gears turn with the help of more than 300,000 public workers and dozens of agencies, mayoral offices and boards. They’re tasked with everything from picking up the more than 10,000 tons of garbage the city produces daily, to leading the city’s public hospital system, helping small businesses, and awarding city contracts, to name a few of their collective responsibilities.

So far, Mamdani has named leaders to the

By Alexandra Banner, CNN

It’s been a whirlwind year, and we’re grateful you have read along with us. If it all feels like a blur, CNN’s Year in Review Quiz is a fun way to jog your memory.

Here’s what else you need to know to get up to speed and on with your day.

1⃣ New Year’s Eve

In the coming hours, countries around the world will ring in 2026 with dazzling fireworks and grand celebrations. US authorities have said they are taking extra precautions to ensure public safety at major events. In New York City, thousands of NYPD officers are deployed throughout Times Square ahead of the iconic ball drop, supported by helicopters and drones for comprehensive monitoring, Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said Tuesday. “New Year’s Eve in Times Square is one of the largest and most complex public safety operations in the world, and one the NYPD has secured successfully for decades,” Tisch added. Meanwhile, on the West Coast, California will usher in the New Year with more stormy weather just days after a destructive Christmas-week storm caused intense flooding and debris flows.

2⃣ Health care policy

The Affordable Care Act’s enhanced premium subsidies are set to expire after today, leaving millions of Americans facing higher health insurance costs in 2026. While the House is expected to vote in January on a Democratic proposal to extend them for three years, the effort faces significant hurdles in the Senate. This comes after Democratic lawmakers refused to fund the federal government this fall unless the subsidies were renewed, leading to a record-long shutdown that only ended in mid-November with an agreement to hold a vote in the Senate on the matter. Both Democratic and Republican health care bills failed to pass the chamber in mid-December.

3⃣ SNAP restrictions

Starting Thursday, Americans in five states who receive government help paying for groceries will face limits on buying soda, candy and other foods deemed unhealthy. Indiana, Iowa, Nebraska, Utah and West Virginia are the first of at least 18 states to adopt waivers restricting purchases through the SNAP program — long known as food stamps — which serves 42 million people. The move aligns with the Trump administration’s “Make America Healthy Again” initiative, aimed at reducing chronic diseases like obesity and diabetes linked to sweetened drinks and processed foods.

4⃣ Stock market

The US stock market is on the verge of a rare milestone: three consecutive years of double-digit gains. Historically, a three-peat is unusual and has only happened five times since the 1940s. The S&P 500 is set to rise 17% in 2025, following gains of 23% in 2024 and 24% in 2023, despite worries over tariffs, geopolitical tensions and the longest government shutdown in history. Financial analysts say stocks were fueled this year by strong corporate earnings, Read more

Por Helen Regan, Hira Humayun, Eugenia Yosef y Mohammed Tawfeeq

Varias organizaciones humanitarias internacionales, incluida Médicos Sin Fronteras (MSF), se enfrentan a la posibilidad de que se les prohíba trabajar en Gaza a partir del jueves por no cumplir con las nuevas restricciones de Israel para los grupos de ayuda que operan en el devastado enclave.

Israel dijo este martes que suspenderá las operaciones de los grupos de ayuda internacional que no renovaron su registro, lo que incluye requerir a las organizaciones que trabajan en Gaza que proporcionen detalles personales de los miembros de su personal.

Las agencias de ayuda han expresado repetidamente su preocupación por esos requisitos, citando la seguridad de sus empleados.

La decisión de Israel se produce cuando 10 países advirtieron que la situación humanitaria de Gaza enfrenta un “nuevo deterioro” y que las condiciones en el enclave “siguen siendo catastróficas”.

Gaza, que está en ruinas, está sufriendo un duro invierno, con fuertes lluvias y temperaturas en descenso que empeoran las ya de por sí terribles condiciones de vida.

Las fuertes lluvias y los fuertes vientos destruyeron las frágiles y anegadas tiendas de campaña en las que muchos palestinos se ven obligados a sobrevivir, y al menos 20 personas han muerto al derrumbarse sus casas y edificios mientras buscaban refugio de las severas condiciones climáticas, según la Oficina de Medios del Gobierno en Gaza (GMO) dirigida por Hamas.

“A medida que se acerca el invierno, los civiles en Gaza se enfrentan a condiciones espantosas con fuertes lluvias y temperaturas en descenso”, dijeron los ministros de Asuntos Exteriores de Canadá, Reino Unido, Dinamarca, Finlandia, Francia, Islandia, Japón, Noruega, Suecia y Suiza en un comunicado el martes.

Los grupos de ayuda dicen que la decisión de Israel afecta a más de dos docenas de organizaciones de ayuda y que suspender sus operaciones en Gaza “costará la vida de los palestinos”.

“Eliminar a estas organizaciones humanitarias ahora agravará la exposición, las enfermedades y las muertes evitables”, declaró Refugees International en un comunicado. “Es un pretexto para restringir aún más la ayuda a Gaza y silenciar a las organizaciones de ayuda independientes”.

Un fin de semana de duro invierno trae más muerte y desesperación a la gente de Gaza

Israel afirmó que sus normas de registro buscan impedir que Hamas se aproveche de la ayuda internacional, una afirmación que la ONU y las organizaciones de ayuda han rechazado. Una revisión del gobierno estadounidense realizada a principios de este año no halló pruebas de robo generalizado por parte de Hamas, según afirman tanto Israel como el Departamento de Estado estadounidense.

“El requisito de registro tiene como objetivo prevenir la participación de elementos terroristas y salvaguardar la integridad de la actividad humanitaria, como se demostró en casos anteriores”, dijo el Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores de Israel en un comunicado.

Las agencias de la ONU y los grupos de ayuda han expresado reiteradamente su preocupación por las normas de registro de Israel.

Israel afirmó haber notificado a las organizaciones inter