By Jeanne Bonner, CNN

(CNN) — Steven Wright knew he had a problem long before the first snowflake fell.

Wright, who runs the Jay Peak ski resort in northern Vermont, realized something was wrong last summer while talking to Canadian season pass holders who had decided they wouldn’t be coming to the US — or his property — for the 2025-2026 winter ski season.

The political enmity between the US and Canada had reached a fever pitch, especially once President Trump began referring to Canada as “the 51st state,” and Jay Peak, located just 9 miles south of the Canadian border, was going to pay the price.

“I called hundreds of season pass holders, and to a house, they mentioned the ’51st state’ thing,” Wright said in an interview with CNN.

He testified last year about the conversations to a US Senate committee, and he said many of the customers “were choking up over the fact that they just couldn’t, in good conscience, come to the States.”

Beyond rhetoric about the 51st state, Trump had also ignited a trade war, with the threat and reality of stiff tariffs.

Jay Peak is arguably unique; 50% of its business comes from Canada, which feels more like a neighboring town than a foreign country.

Many US ski resorts don’t rely as much on Canadian traffic. And as the season has progressed, the exodus of Canadian visitors has slowed significantly while the snowfall in the East has ramped up.

But Wright’s experience illuminates what he calls the current plight of “the border economies,” encompassing many business owners who live and work near the US-Canada frontier.

It also humanizes the repercussions of recent trade policy: many Canadian residents are abandoning or severely curtailing their years-long tradition of visiting the US.

“We have a hockey arena — millions of dollars in hockey tournament business each year. We have a dozen restaurants on-site, conference space, wedding facilities. It all relies on Canadians to make it go,” he said.

The blow to Wright’s business and to other ski resorts in the Northeast and out West that depend on Canadian travelers comes at an unusual moment. Snowfall in the eastern US this year has reached blockbuster levels. And much of the West has been suffering from a snow drought.

While the number of Canadian tourists continues to lag in the US, many American ski resorts on the East Coast are heaving a sigh of relief. The massive amount of snow falling on mountains this season is luring many American skiers, offsetting the Maple Leaf hiatus.

For Wright at Jay Peak, which has 81 trails, business is now only off 10% to 15%. But while he said he’s pleased after the season began with a much steeper decline, he has no illusions.

“Heavy snow has insulated us from the potential big downside of Canadian visitation. It has done so much to mitigate the situation with Canada,” he said. “What happens when that snow melts?”

Canadians are staying away and so is the snow out West

The number of Canadians re-entering Canada by car from the US was down every month last year, compared to 2024, according to Statistics Canada, the national statistical office. In December alone, there was a 30% drop in traffic from December 2024.

US National Travel and Tourism Office figures show

Por Dakin Andone, CNN

Videos e imágenes que muestran a un individuo armado y enmascarado afuera de la casa de Nancy Guthrie en Tucson, Arizona, han renovado la búsqueda de la mujer de 84 años y podrían ofrecer a los investigadores pistas importantes sobre su identidad.

Las imágenes publicadas por el FBI el martes representan el mayor avance hasta el momento en el caso de la madre desaparecida de la presentadora del programa “Today”, Savannah Guthrie. Fueron captadas por la cámara del timbre de Guthrie, fabricada por Nest, y recuperadas gracias a la experiencia técnica de Google, según informó a Brian Stelter de CNN una persona familiarizada con la investigación.

El objetivo de los investigadores al compartir las imágenes, según los expertos, es conectar con el público con la esperanza de que alguien reconozca al individuo y proporcione una pista crucial que pueda resolver el misterio del presunto secuestro de Guthrie en la madrugada del 1 de febrero.

El jueves, el FBI calificó a la persona del video como la “sospechosa del secuestro de Nancy Guthrie” y afirmó que mide entre 1,75 y 1,80 metros.

El Departamento del Sheriff del Condado de Pima afirmó haber recibido más de 4.000 pistas en las 24 horas transcurridas desde que se publicaron las fotos y los videos de vigilancia.

Mientras tanto, el departamento ha solicitado a los vecinos de Guthrie que envíen cualquier grabación de video que incluya autos, tráfico, personas o peatones, y cualquier cosa que consideren fuera de lo común o importante para que las autoridades la revisen durante la investigación de su desaparición.

Esto es lo que llama la atención a los expertos de las fuerzas del orden sobre las grabaciones e imágenes del individuo armado y enmascarado:

El sujeto que se ve en las imágenes está armado y porta lo que parece ser una pistola dentro de una funda a la altura de la cintura. Sin embargo, algunos expertos afirman que la funda y su ubicación en la ingle sugieren que carece de dominio de las armas de fuego.

“En mi opinión, no se trata de alguien, en primer lugar, que haya recibido entrenamiento para portar un arma”, declaró Andrew McCabe, analista sénior de fuerzas del orden de CNN y exsubdirector del FBI.

“Ninguna persona con entrenamiento policial o militar llevaría jamás un arma de fuego en una funda como esa, casi en el centro de su cuerpo, colgando de su cinturón”, añadió. “No es muy sensato tácticamente por muchas razones”.

Steve Moore, agente especial supervisor retirado del FBI, también afirmó que la funda y el arma no parecían estar correctamente emparejados.

“Es un poco ridículo”, declaró Moore. “Tiene una pequeña pistola semiautomática, diseñada para ocultarse, que podría haber guardado en su bolsillo, pero en su lugar la lleva dentro de una funda diseñada para un revólver de armazón grande. Ni siquiera coinciden”.

Las imágenes también muestran al individuo cubierto de pies a cabeza, con máscara, guantes, chaqueta y pantalones largos, además de la funda y la mochila.

El corresponsal senior de CNN, Josh Campbell, exagente del FBI, afirmó que la vestimenta del individuo “podría haber sido un intento deliberado de evitar dejar ADN en la escena, proveniente de piel o fibras capilares, así como huellas dactilares”.

Cada artículo del sujeto será examinado, afirmó Campbell, con la esperanza de determinar su marca y, por lo tanto, dónde podría venderse.

“En casos anteriores”, añadió, “las autoridades han registrado lugares como tiendas de ropa y ferreterías para determinar si los empleados pudieron haber reconocido a un posible sujeto en el momento de la compra de los artículos”.

La mochila parece ser una Ozark Trail Hiker Pack, parte de la marca propia de artículos para actividades al aire libre de Walmart, según un análisis de CNN.

Los investigadores recuperaron un guante negro a aproximadamente d

By Whitney Wild, Elizabeth Hartfield, CNN

(CNN) — Don Lemon will appear in a Minnesota courtroom Friday to be arraigned on federal charges following his arrest last month in connection with a protest at a church in St. Paul.

Federal prosecutors allege Lemon and another independent journalist, Georgia Fort, participated in a “takeover-style attack” of Cities Church and intimidated congregants, after the two livestreamed a group of anti-Immigration and Customs Enforcement protesters rushing into the church on January 18, interrupting the service.

Lemon is being charged with two federal crimes: conspiring to violate someone’s constitutional rights and violating the FACE Act, which prohibits the use of force or threats to intentionally interfere with someone expressing their First Amendment right to practice religion.

The journalist and former CNN anchor – who now hosts his show on YouTube – has vowed to fight the charges. He has hired Joseph H. Thompson, a former Minnesota federal prosecutor, to represent him, according to court records filed earlier this week.

Thompson was one of at least six federal prosecutors who recently resigned from the Minnesota US Attorney’s office amid tensions with the Trump administration over the investigation into the fatal shooting of Renee Good.

Lemon was arrested in a hotel lobby in Beverly Hills on January 29 while he was in Los Angeles to cover the Grammy Awards. More than two dozen agents from Homeland Security Investigations and the FBI arrested him, according to a law enforcement source familiar with the operation.

He was held overnight in federal custody, and released on his own recognizance the following day.

“I have spent my entire career covering the news – I will not stop now,” Lemon said on the steps of the federal courthouse in Los Angeles following his release. “In fact, there is no more important time than right now, this very moment, for a free and independent media that shines a light on the truth and holds those in power accountable.”

Lemon has repeatedly said, even during his live YouTube stream of the church disruption, that he was present at the demonstration as a journalist, not an activist. In footage of the episode, Lemon was heard saying, “I’m just here photographing, I’m not part of the group … I’m a journalist.”

The Justice Department first attempted to charge eight people, including Lemon. A magistrate judge rejected the charges against five of those people – Lemon among them – saying there was insufficient evidence to charge.

The judge, however, encouraged prosecutors to take the case to a grand jury and seek an indictment. And Lemon on his YouTube show said the government would try again to charge him.

The-CNN-Wire
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CNN’s Brian Stelter, Kara Scannell, Hannah Rabinowitz, Nick Watt and Nicki Brown contributed to this report.

The post Don Lemon set to appe

By Haley Britzky, CNN

(CNN) — The Defense Department has been aggressively pursuing laser weapons and defense systems, a push that gained significant attention this week when the use of an anti-drone laser system led to the temporary shutdown of airspace over El Paso, Texas.

The interest in high-energy systems has only accelerated as military planners look to grapple with the rise of commercially available drones and as the defense industry has jumped to develop laser-based weapons systems for ground, sea and air forces.

CNN reported that Customs and Border Protection was using a new counter-drone laser technology in El Paso which caused the Federal Aviation Administration to shut down airspace over the west Texas city. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth signed off on loaning the laser technology to CBP from the Defense Department in recent weeks, one of the sources told CNN.

It’s just the latest in the Pentagon’s long-running efforts to harness lasers for the military. The Defense Department has been researching directed energy weapons since at least the 1960s, according to a Congressional Research Service report, though only in roughly the last decade has the department made significant progress. The first directed energy weapon was deployed in 2014, the reports says, aboard the USS Ponce, a now-decommissioned amphibious transport dock.

But the last several years, with the surge in the use of drones in the war in Ukraine along with persistent concerns about protecting US troops stationed in the Middle East, has driven a surge of interest in the technology.

In November, the head of research at the Pentagon whittled down the list of technology priorities for the agency, with directed energy making the cut as one of six areas the military would push resources towards.

Directed energy weapons, such as high-energy lasers, could be used to shoot down drones, complete short-range air defense missions, and defend against rockets, artillery and mortar attacks, CRS said.

In 2017, the Army demonstrated the Mobile Expeditionary High Energy Laser 2.0 at the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico. The system was used to take down small drones and quad copters, which the lead of the Army’s SMDC High Energy Laser Division, called “highly successful.”

“We look forward to working with industry and continue to mature the technology because we believe this technology is critical to the Army and will be very beneficial once we are able to get the technology mature enough to transition it and field it one day,” Adam Aberle said in the release.

And just last fall, the Army put out a request for information to defense industry partners specifically on an Enduring-High Energy Laser (E-HEL) production request. The RFI says the weapon system will be used against drones classified in groups 1-3, meaning smaller drones that weigh under 1,320 pounds.

But it’s not just the Army. The Air Force deployed a High-Energy Laser Weapon System Read more

By Meg Tirrell, CNN

(CNN) — “Our public health system has squandered the trust of our citizens,” President Donald Trump said on February 13, 2025, the day his nominee to run the nation’s health agencies, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., was sworn in. “They don’t trust us. They don’t trust anybody, frankly. They’ve gone through hell.”

Trump promised that Kennedy would “lead our campaign of historic reforms and restore faith in American health care.”

A year later, polling shows that RFK Jr.’s tenure atop the US Department of Health and Human Services has had the opposite effect. Trust in government health agencies has plummeted, according to health policy and research group KFF, with declines across the political spectrum. And experts told CNN that they fear things could get worse.

“Today, the federal government’s public health agencies and leaders represent the greatest threat to efforts to prevent measles, whooping cough and other vaccine-preventable diseases,” said Dr. Jason Schwartz, an associate professor at Yale School of Public Health. It’s “a scenario that would have been inconceivable a few years ago.”

HHS spokesperson Andrew Nixon said that trust in public health was damaged by the Biden administration’s “inconsistent guidance and a message to Americans to ‘trust the experts’ without showing the evidence.”

“Secretary Kennedy’s mandate is to restore transparency, scientific rigor, and accountability to restore the trust the Biden administration squandered,” Nixon continued. “Secretary Kennedy is leading the most transparent HHS in history, with unprecedented disclosure and openness aimed at restoring public trust in federal health agencies.”

Kennedy’s strategy has at times involved gutting organizations; after he fired all 17 experts on the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s vaccine advisory panel in June, he published an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal headlined, “HHS Moves to Restore Public Trust in Vaccines.”

And he’s moved to dramatically reshape the makeup of HHS.

The day after Kennedy’s swearing-in, Valentine’s Day, thousands of employees were fired from their jobs at the CDC, the US Food and Drug Administration, the US National Institutes of Health and other health agencies, part of a Department of Government Efficiency purge. It would precede an even bigger reorganization of HHS just six weeks later that aimed to shrink its ranks by nearly a quarter – a total of about 20,000 employees.

Meanwhile, public health emergencies were already on his doorstep.

Two weeks after Kennedy was sworn in, health officials in Texas announced that a school-age child had died in the fast-growing measles outbreak centered in the western part of the state. Kennedy, asked about it in a Cabinet meeting later that day, called measles outbreaks “not unusual.” It was the first death in the US from measles in a decade.

The year that followed would bring two