President Barack Obama sanctioned top Russian officials on Thursday in response to Moscow’s reported hacking during the U.S. presidential election.
“All Americans should be alarmed by Russia’s actions,” the president said in a statement.
Obama’s successor, president-elect Donald Trump, has cast doubt on the U.S. intelligence community’s conclusion that Russia was responsible for unearthing and releasing material damaging to Trump’s Democratic opponent, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. On Wednesday, Trump said it was time to “move on” and repeated that he believes it’s impossible to know who targeted Clinton.
But Obama appears committed to proving Russia’s responsibility. His administration wants Congress to receive intelligence reports showing the proof before Trump enters office and is able to call off such investigations. Officials may release some public details on its findings soon, according to The New York Times.
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Sputnik/Kremlin/Alexei Druzhinin/via REUTERS
Russian President Vladimir Putin meets with U.S. President Barack Obama on the sidelines of the G20 Summit in Hangzhou, China, on Sept. 5, 2016.
Carrie Fisher, best known for her portrayal of the plucky Princess Leia in George Lucas’ epic intergalactic movie series, died Tuesday, days after suffering a heart attack on a plane. She was 60 years old.
“It is with a very deep sadness that Billie Lourd confirms that her beloved mother Carrie Fisher passed away at 855 this morning,” Simon Halls, a representative for Fisher’s daughter, said in a statement to NBC News. “She was loved by the world and she will be missed profoundly.”
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Carrie Fisher on the set of “Star Wars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi” directed by Welsh Richard Marquand. Sunset Boulevard / Corbis via Getty Images
An explosion blasted Mexico’s best-known fireworks market Tuesday on the northern outskirts of Mexico City, the capital, killing 31 people and injuring 72 others while sending a huge plume of charcoal-gray smoke into the sky, officials said.
The explosion, which wasn’t being linked to terrorism, happened at the open-air San Pablito Market in Tultepec, in the State of Mexico.
Local authorities said Wednesday that the death toll had increased to 31. Earlier, Eruviel Ávila Villegas, governor of the State of Mexico, said at a news conference that 26 people were killed at the scene and that three more died later in the hospital.
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Smoke billows over the San Pablito fireworks market Tuesday on the northern outskirts of Mexico City.Orlando Ruiz / Twitter.
A driver who plowed a truck through a Christmas market in Germany’s capital, killing 12, acted deliberately in an incident that authorities said early Tuesday was probably terrorism.
At least 48 other people were injured in the incident Monday night at Berlin’s Breitscheidplatz, a public square in the center of the city. German police said Tuesday morning that investigators now believe the truck was “intentionally directed” into the crowd.
Police said a man who was found dead in the truck, which bore Polish license plates, was a Polish citizen but was not the driver.
A second person was arrested near the public square, police said. No further details of the arrest were provided.
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Police take a suspect into custody Monday near the Christmas market at Breitscheidplatz in Berlin. Moe Zoyari/Redux / Redux Pictures
The American political landscape has changed a lot over the past 25 years but there is no more dramatic shift than the one that has pushed this state from deep blue to ruby red.
In the 1992 presidential election, Democrat Bill Clinton won West Virginia by a solid 13 percentage points. In November, Republican President-elect Donald Trump captured the state in a walk — winning it by more than 40 percentage points.
The forces behind that turnaround are complex. The decline of the coal industry and the changing demographics of the political parties explain part of it. But underneath that are the peaks and valleys of the Appalachian Mountains that make West Virginia what it is: picturesque, resource-rich and remote.
Coal has dominated much of the state’s story, and the industry’s declines are very real. Coal production in West Virginia has declined by 30 percent since 2010 and, in that time, coal mine employment in West Virginia has fallen by more than 27 percent. Some places have been hit especially hard.
As President-elect Donald Trump prepares to be sworn in as the country’s commander-in-chief next month, a majority of Americans say they are either uncertain or pessimistic about his presidency, even as the country is sounding a more optimistic tone about the future of the economy and Trump’s ability to bring positive change to Washington D.C.
A new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll finds 54 percent of adults saying that they are either uncertain (25 percent) or pessimistic and worried (29 percent) about how Trump will perform during his presidency, compared with 45 percent with either an optimistic and confident view (22 percent) or a satisfied and hopeful view (23 percent).
That’s a significantly worse outlook than Americans expressed after the elections of both Barack Obama and George W. Bush. A combined 66 percent were either optimistic or hopeful about Obama in January 2009, according to the same poll, while 59 percent were optimistic or hopeful about George W. Bush in January 2001.
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Russia’s ambassador to Turkey was fatally shot Monday at an art exhibition by a gunman shouting “God is great!” who continued ranting as the diplomat lay dying on the floor and onlookers ducked for cover.
Andrey Karlov was delivering a speech at a museum in the capital city of Ankara when a man dressed in a suit and tie suddenly appeared and opened fire.
“God is great,” he yelled in Arabic. “Those who pledge allegiance to Muhammad for jihad. God is great!”
The gunman, who fired eight shots, also smashed several of the photos at the exhibition, according to an AP photographer who was in the audience.
Switching to Turkish, the gunman then yelled, “Don’t forget Aleppo, don’t forget Syria! Step back! Step back! Only death can take me from here!”
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An unnamed gunman gestures after shooting the Russian Ambassador to Turkey, Andrei Karlov, at a photo gallery in Ankara, Turkey, on Dec. 19, 2016. Burhan Ozbilici / AP
Zsa Zsa Gabor, the Hungarian beauty queen-turned-nine-times-married Hollywood icon who once served three days in jail for slapping a cop, died Sunday at 99 from a heart attack.
“They tried to save her,” her husband, Frédéric Prinz von Anhalt, told NBC News. “She was still breathing when they got here, but we ended up losing her. I am grateful that she died with no pain.”
In her later years, Gabor — who followed her almost equally famous sisters Eva and Magda to Hollywood — served as a template for a generation of “why are they famous?” celebrities. It was a caricature that her longtime friend and former publicist, Edward Lozzi, found offensive.
A 3-year-old child was fatally shot in a road rage incident in Little Rock, Arkansas Saturday after a gunman opened fire into the car because the boy’s grandmother “wasn’t moving fast enough at a stop sign,” police said.
Police were called to a shopping center at around 6:22 p.m. on a report of a child shot inside a vehicle, and the boy was taken to a hospital where he later died, Little Rock police Lt. Steve McClanahan said.
A gunman is still being sought. It was the second time in a month that a young child was fatally shot while riding in a car, Police Chief Kenton Buckner told reporters. “This is about as frustrated as you can be,” he said.
E. R. Braithwaite, a Guyanese author, diplomat and former Royal Air Force pilot whose book “To Sir, With Love,” a memoir of teaching in London’s deprived East End, was adapted into a hit 1967 film starring Sidney Poitier, died on Monday in Rockville, Md. He was 104.
Mr. Braithwaite’s companion, Genevieve Ast, confirmed his death to The Associated Press. He had taught English at Howard University, in Washington, and lived in the area for many years.
Mr. Braithwaite, who became a diplomat and represented Guyana at the United Nations and in Venezuela, wrote several books, many about racism in countries like South Africa and the United States, where he lived much of his life. But he is best known for “To Sir, With Love”
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The Guyanese writer E.R. Braithwaite, circa 1960. He wrote “To Sir, With Love,” drawing on his experiences as a teacher in the East End of London.Credit FPG/Archive Photos, via Getty Images
Film and Writing Festival for Comedy. Showcasing best of comedy short films at the FEEDBACK Film Festival. Plus, showcasing best of comedy novels, short stories, poems, screenplays (TV, short, feature) at the festival performed by professional actors.
Smoke billows over the San Pablito fireworks market Tuesday on the northern outskirts of Mexico City.Orlando Ruiz / Twitter.
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James' World 2 