EastEnders Charlie Brooks has revealed all on her return to the BBC soap as Janine Butcher, amid a new storyline for Linda Carter ahead if actress Kellie Bright’s exit

EastEnders’ Charlie Brooks says returning to her role as bad girl Janine Butcher “feels like home”.

The actress, 45, returned to the soap last night (Thu) four years after the character was arrested for perverting the course of justice and jailed. Viewers saw her eyeing up the contents of a mystery brown envelope, teasing what tricks she may have up her sleeve this time around.

Brooks, who first played the role in 1999, aged 17, said: “I always love coming back to Janine. She’s an exciting character to play, and it’s always fun to discover what she’s been doing and what she’s been up to as an actress.

“Seeing everyone back at the studio, and working with Kellie [Bright] again, has been amazing.” Asked what to expect from her character’s return, Brooks says: “I don’t know if anyone wants to see a reformed Janine ever, so we can rest assured that we are leaning into the true nature of who Janine is. As always, it’s about survival for her.”

Despite all the drama that follows her character, she says Janine is fun to play. She said: “I always like trying to understand a little bit more about her each time I play her, and I think the ‘why’ is so important.

“She’s a lot of things, but she’s also a super fun character to play. She’s very camp, and I have a lot of fun with her. Janine is also deep, and she’s got a lot going on, so it’s always interesting to explore that.”

The character’s return will lead to a bombshell discovery for her former rival Linda Carter, ahead of actress Kellie’s exit from the soap after 13 years. Linda hasn’t seen Janine since her arrest in 2022.

Linda had been framed for a drink-drive crash, and the truth only came out after the tragic death of Janine’s husband, Linda’s ex Mick Carter, played by Danny Dyer. Mick is believed to have drowned after being swept out to sea, after saving pregnant Janine following a car accident.

Mick had returned to the water to save his true love Linda, unaware she had already reached the shore. Brooks said: “One of the reasons I was coming back was to be part of Kellie’s storyline as we had such a great time working together last time.

“I’ve known a lot of the cast for many years, and that brings a nice sense of familiarity and peace when I go back. It also allows playfulness because it’s familiar and it feels safe.

“Being in that environment and having done it since I was 17 is why I feel like I can be quite brave with Janine because I’m surrounded by great people.”

EastEnders airs Mondays to Thursdays at 7:30pm on BBC One and BBC iPlayer. * Follow Mirror Celebs and TV on TikTok, Snapchat , Instagram , Twitter , Facebook , YouTube and Threads.

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Robert Martinez, a retired IT guy, stepped out of the Eagle Rock Rec Center polling place Tuesday afternoon and said he had just filled in a ballot bubble not for L.A. Mayor Karen Bass but for challenger Nithya Raman.

“You know, I’m not really thrilled about her, either,” Martinez said, but he told me what a lot of people have been telling me.

He wanted a change.

“I saw what happened these last four years,” Martinez said, citing the continuing homelessness epidemic and the broken-down condition of the city, “and I’m hoping something different goes on this time.”

He and thousands of others were ready to roll the dice, and meanwhile, Raman began to catch fire with young progressives who were voting for her rather than against Bass.

Some votes are still being tallied, but it’s now clear that Raman will be the next mayor of Los Angeles.

And that will be remarkable, and fun to watch, for a number of reasons.

She will take over despite every single one of her City Council colleagues having endorsed Bass, which is like the least popular kid in class getting elected school president.

She will take over despite having flip-flopped on several major issues, including Bass’ signature homelessness strategy, which Raman willingly implemented until just recently.

She will take over despite having unexpectedly rescinded her endorsement of Bass and eliciting whispers in and out of City Hall that she couldn’t be trusted.

She will take over despite having lukewarm support from the very organization through which she began her rise, the Democratic Socialists of America.

Raman is either a political savant or someone with really good timing, or maybe a little of both.

Everybody in L.A. knew that Bass was mortally wounded, and ripe for a takedown, but it was Raman who had the killer instinct, a trait that could serve her and the public well, putting everyone in city government on notice.

The mayor, having spent her entire adult life in public service, had made the worst decision of her career by leaving town in January 2025 despite conditions that led to the incineration of Pacific Palisades.

And she had made homelessness her marquee issue with scant progress to show despite throwing billions at the problem.

The mayor’s unfavorability rating was so epic, “undecided” voters were neck in neck with supporters of either Raman or Bass, and even the knuckleheaded former TV reality star Spencer Pratt looked like a solid contender in the primary.

But winning the election may turn out to be much easier than fixing City Hall.

Roads and sidewalks are falling apart. The Palisades rebuild is a maddeningly long work in progress. The homeless count tops 40,000. New housing takes forever. The cost of living swallows paychecks. The budget for just about everything is tight, and more of it will go to parks with the passing of the measure to set aside more for greenery. And the ‘28 Olympics are coming our way.

“You have all of these wicked problems that are difficult to solve in a perfect scenario, and [even more] in a governmental system as tangled and confused as L.A.,” Cal State Northridge political science professor Tom Hogen-Esch told The Times’ Jennie Jarvie.

Tangled and confused is an understatement. Homelessness does not get solved without the help of the county, which generally oversees mental health services and drug intervention and rehab.

On the bright side, it’s possible that L.A. will be able to wrangle more federal assistance now that the bloated carcass of President Trump’s political career is floating in the reflecting pool on the National Mall.

And Raman will have two key allies in City Controller Kenneth Mejia, who monitors and critiques City Hall’s many inefficiencies, and in Los Angeles County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath, who is a potential candidate for the new position of county executive.

“You’re right. It is daunting,” Horvath said of the countless challenges. “But I don’t think it was a secret to Nithya when she got into the race.”

Raman’s campaign, Horvath said, was about building power by acknowledging the exasperation of voters rather than building traditional coalitions in what has been an unresponsive political establishment.

“Whether or not you like each other, or formally agree or disagree, when people are able to accomplish change that the public is longing for, everybody wants to be a part of that win,” Horvath said.

Among City Hall’s problems has been a mummified tolerance of arthritic leadership and the rusted machinery of basic services. Raman, for better or worse, might be inclined to push-start the old jalopy, oil the gears and throw department heads overboard if they don’t deliver.

Early on as a council member, Raman told me she was sorting out the fragmented response to homelessness, having identified overlapping services, a lack of accountability, and broken lines of communication and coordination. In her district, homelessness has declined, and she has called out Bass for the high cost, slow pace and low returns of the mayor’s efforts.

“I know this about Raman,” Horvath said. “She is not afraid of a tough conversation.”

She’s definitely going to have them. As a YIMBY who favors greater housing density, there will be pushback in some neighborhoods. And her opposition to bans on homelessness in certain public areas (she prioritizes solving problems rather than relocating them), will test patience. As reflected in the relatively tight election, nearly half of voters are a bit wary about whether Raman would move the city’s policy and philosophy orientation too far to the left.

In San Francisco, according to USC political science professor and pollster Christian Grose, Mayor Daniel Lurie’s popularity has dipped a bit since he took office in 2024 and tackled issues similar to those in L.A., but it remains high. Grose said Lurie won immediate support and high marks among both moderates and progressives by cleaning streets and moving people indoors while also working on longer-term problem-solving.

Raman could conceivably try that formula, Grose said, and take advantage of what figures to be a honeymoon period with voters who are hungry for change. The question will be whether the honeymoon turns into a longer romance.

In Pico-Union, retired airline attendant and interpreter Aurora Corona has seen some neighborhood improvements of late. But she has long been unhappy overall with the lack of progress on homelessness, trash and infrastructure issues like broken street lights.

“It’s not working,” Corona said, telling me she visits other cities that are in better shape and wonders why L.A. can’t sort through its bureaucratic sclerosis. She doesn’t put all of that on the mayor, though, and said that after considering Raman, she voted for Bass even though she wants to see a shakeup.

“Whoever it is, I’d like to see some changes for the better,” Corona said.

In Studio City, Jon Manzanares and neighbors spent five years reporting encampments and myriad problems at an abandoned property. They tried city departments and got no help, and they tried Raman’s office repeatedly, with the same result.

In September, a fire at the abandoned property spread to an adjacent house, and finally, Raman and Bass both showed up and blamed each other.

“Between Bass and Raman, I wasn’t happy with either,” Manzanares said.

He wants a mayor who does a better job of getting homeless people whatever help they need, who respects the frustrations of taxpayers, and who demands more accountability regarding all the money thrown at various entrenched problems.

“I ended up voting with Raman,” Manzanares said. “I feel like Bass had her shot and didn’t do much with it.”

And now it’s Raman’s turn.

Good luck to her, and to nearly 4 million Angelenos hungry for change.

steve.lopez@latimes.com

Russell said he and his team had analysed the season so far and worked out that he has had a trouble-free run in only six of this season’s 20 races.

“These issues constantly keep popping up but unfortunately this always seems like it’s on my side of the garage,” he said.

“We concluded we’ve only had six races from the 20 where we’ve had a clean weekend. So to think 14 of those weekends have had issues is unbelievable.

“We need to look to understand why that is, if there’s something we are overlooking or if it’s just pure misfortune. At the moment it does seem like it’s more misfortune than anything.

“In a normal season you might have two weekends or three weekends where there are issues. We’ve had three quarters of this season and that has been incredibly unfortunate.”

He said it was the fact that he had been struck by another technical glitch that made him skip his media duties after last weekend’s Mexico City race, rather than the fact Antonelli had just won the title.

Russell, who started second to Lewis Hamilton’s Ferrari, had a loss of power on the run to the first corner when the electrical part of the power-unit did not reply properly.

He was swamped by the field, and then collided with Isack Hadjar’s Red Bull at Turn Six, earning himself a 10-second penalty. He finished sixth and dropped from second to fourth in the drivers’ championship, behind Antonelli, Max Verstappen and Hamilton.

“In racing you always pick yourself back up and for me the best way to pick myself back up was getting out of there,” Russell said on media day for this weekend’s Sao Paulo Grand Prix.

“It was as simple as that, really. I was just very upset with missing out on the chance of a good result because the championship for me was already over but I just couldn’t believe how things had panned out again.

“In that moment, yeah, I just wanted to get out of there.

“I think I’m 99% of the time a true professional and I try not to spit my dummy out, but sometimes missing out on doing the press – OK, it’s not ideal but not the end of the world.

“Moments like that you don’t really want to deal with it.”

Iranian forces say five oil tankers and a tugboat have caught fire in several incidents in the Strait of Hormuz.

At least five tankers have been damaged in the Strait of Hormuz, Iranian forces said, making clear that shipping would remain in peril as long as the United States and Israel’s war on the country is unresolved.

Since the war on Iran began in late February, Tehran has severely restricted traffic through the strategic waterway, which normally carries about one-fifth of global oil consumption.

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“Last night … a large oil tanker attempting to pass through the illegal passageway south of the Strait of Hormuz suffered a fire after striking a mine and was brought to a halt,” Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) told the Fars news agency on Thursday.

“Another supertanker was halted by a massive fire while exiting the eastern Strait of Hormuz. A tugboat that had approached the supertanker to extinguish the fire also caught fire,” the IRGC added.

The Iranian army later said three more tankers were hit by naval mines and caught fire.

“Early this morning, a violating oil tanker – navigating through an unsafe area east of the Strait of Hormuz – caught fire and came to a halt after striking a naval mine,” the army said, according to the official IRNA news agency.

“Today at around noon, two more oil tankers struck naval mines and caught fire in the unsafe waters east of the Strait of Hormuz,” said another army statement carried by IRNA.

Separately, the British military said a tanker was struck by two projectiles off Qatar’s coast.

The vessel was hit about 50 nautical miles (about 93 kilometres) north of Qatar’s ⁠Madinat ash-Shamal on Wednesday at 23:20 GMT, the ⁠United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) agency said on Thursday.

UKMTO did not identify the tanker or which country’s flag it was sailing under. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack.

In an incident last week, a Qatari tanker was hit by “unidentified objects” while sailing in the Gulf.

The liquefied natural gas (LNG) carrier Al Mayeda was hit on October 30, the Qatar Gas Transport Company (Nakilat) said on Sunday.

No crew members were injured, and there ‌was no environmental impact, the company said, adding that the vessel remained ‌safe and ‌operational while the impact was being assessed.

Attacks on tankers in the Gulf are still running close to a record pace.

UKMTO said in a report last month that it was “struggling to accurately report” the true number of attacks as the majority of ships now refuse to report them.

Qatar has stepped up mediation efforts to resume talks on ending the war in recent days.

Qatar’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ spokesperson said on Tuesday that ⁠both sides were reviewing proposals ⁠put forward by mediators, with talks continuing.

But unnamed Pentagon officials and military commanders told The New York Times on Wednesday that thousands of US air and naval forces on more than a dozen ships and at bases around the Middle East and in the US are poised to resume major combat operations against Iran on President Donald Trump’s orders.

Iranian government and military leaders, however, have warned of repercussions if the US or Israel pursue further military action.

On Wednesday, Iranian Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei said there should not be “even the slightest inclination towards submission” to the US, which he said would remain hostile towards Iran no matter which party was in power.

IRGC Ground Force commander Brigadier General Mohammad Karami said on Wednesday that the continuation of “hostile and brutal actions by Iran’s enemies” would lead to “further Iranian victories and greater national pride”, while accelerating the expulsion of foreign powers from the region and the collapse of Israel.

New Democratic Congress expected to probe Trump Justice Department civil rights office’s handling of Epstein files and ICE killings.

As President Donald Trump’s administration prepares for a flurry of congressional investigations into shootings by immigration agents and the Jeffrey Epstein files, the top official in charge of the United States Department of Justice’s civil rights division has resigned.

US Attorney General Todd Blanche on Thursday confirmed Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon’s departure in a post on social media.

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“Today, I accepted the resignation of Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon,” Blanche wrote on X. “She has defended the civil liberties of every American and enforced the law without fear or favor.”

A top Trump ally, Dhillon was confirmed to her role in April 2025 and has overseen a dramatic overhaul of the Justice Department’s civil rights division, which is tasked with enforcing anti-discrimination laws. Hundreds of former Justice Department officials penned a letter last December decrying the “destruction” of the agency division under Trump.

Dhillon is the first high-ranking official to resign from the Trump administration since US Democrats swept both chambers of the US Congress in the country’s pivotal midterm elections on Tuesday.

Democratic congressman Robert Garcia, who will likely become the new chair of the powerful House of Representatives Committee on Oversight and Accountability, pledged on Wednesday to take on four major investigations, including abuses of power by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents and the Epstein files.

Dhillon reportedly told her staff earlier this year that her office, which has typically been charged with investigating law enforcement killings by police officers, would not be looking into the fatal shootings of two US citizens – Renee Good and Alex Pretti – who were gunned down by ICE agents in Minneapolis.

In May, Garcia accused the administration of continuing to shield Trump from scrutiny related to unreleased documents tied to the Epstein investigation

During a closed-door hearing in which Blanche’s predecessor, Pam Bondi, was asked by lawmakers about the case, the California Democrat Garcia alleged Dhillon repeatedly intervened to block questions about the president’s connection to the release of the files.

The Justice Department referred Al Jazeera to Blanche’s social media post when asked when Dhillon submitted her resignation. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

HOLLY WILLOUGHBY has revealed the secret to her glossy blonde locks – she doesn’t use shampoo.

The glam mum-of-three has one of the most famous barnets on British TV, and the fact that she doesn’t get in a lather over it is something even the most slovenly among us can get on board with.

In fact, Holly reckons skipping the suds helps keep her tresses thick and shiny.

And that’s not the only hack the down-to-earth presenter has in her locker — she’s also got a go-to look up her sleeve for when she’s hungover.

In an exclusive chat, Holly said: “In the summer, I tend not to even shampoo my hair, ’cause I try not to take any of the oils out of it. I just condition it.

“But I’ve had hair fails. When you’re a blonde, you have to be really careful. Chlorine is a b*****d.

“My natural colour . . . it’s like a dirty blonde, so once I was brunette then tried to go blonde again and it went green.

“Then I had to put red in it, and obviously I was, like, ‘Just go to the hairdresser’s, you silly cow’. Like, ‘No, no, I can fix this [at home]’. I’ve always been a bit like that, where I will experiment and try things.”

Refreshingly honest Holly even admitted she had hair extensions put in for added volume as she launched her firm Wylde Moon’s new body cream and wash range with Beauty Pie this week.

She revealed: “The first time I had my skin pigmentation lasered off, I was really shocked at what you’re left with.

“Because it goes really brown and then it kind of flakes off for about a week later, so you just look like you’ve been in some horrendous kind of sunburnt situation.

“My beauty sin is I remember, back in the day, wearing brown lip liner and concealer on my lips. Nowadays, if I’m hungover or tired, an [eyeliner] flick and a red lip, always.”

There’s hope for us all . . . 

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HOLLY reckons her TV pal Leigh Francis will make a great campmate on I’m A Celebrity — because he’s “not an a**e”.

After The Sun revealed he had signed up for the latest series, Holly told me: “The thing about Leigh is that he’s pretty resilient.

“I know he’s always played a character [Keith Lemon], but I know him as Leigh and  . . . what you see is what you get.

“He won’t be one of those people that has to go in there and try and keep up some sort of facade for ages.

“He will just be him through and through and he’s just a really great guy.

“I think people will see that. He’s not an ae, you know, he’s just a really lovely person.”

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Kanye’s kidding around

KANYE WEST had a rare smile on his face as he had an even rarer photo snapped with all four of his children.

The rapper, now known as Ye, posed with his eldest North, who was sporting long blue hair, at his Yeezy Season 01 runway show in Los Angeles on Wednesday.

They were joined by his other daughter Chicago, as well as sons Saint and Psalm.

Meanwhile, their mum Kim Kardashian was in New York, where she was photographed out for dinner with actress Jennifer Lawrence.

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BONO has opened up about U2’s last-ever collaboration with Dolly Parton.

The frontman and bandmate Adam Clayton spoke to Chris Evans on his Virgin Radio Breakfast Show and admitted they didn’t know just how ill she was when they recorded new single Torn.

Bono said: “I didn’t even know she was into our band. She was being really sassy and everything you’d love about her.

“Because we’d taken this song in a very different direction, she sends this quite emotional note, having finished the vocal. She says, ‘Just so you know, I’ve always loved your music. I’ve always loved you, and I will always love you.’

“I could feel a puddle about to happen. She’s taking the piss, because that’s her song! . . . And we knew she was ill.

“And I just didn’t know that she was so sick. And she sang this, honestly, like she sang herself somewhere else, for sure.”

New single Torn is out next Friday.

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Blazing year for Cara

SHE plays a party promoter in new film Club Kid but Cara Delevingne was dolled up for a far more demure night out than a sweaty rave in this chic blazer dress and scarf.

Cara, wore the ensemble to the Los Angeles premiere of the film, which won’t hit screens here until January.

It tells the story of party animal Peter – played by Jordan Firstman who she gave a kiss to on the red carpet – whose life is turned upside down when he is forced to care for a ten-year-old son, who he didn’t know he’d had.

It’s been a busy year for Cara, who released her debut album Not Normal in September following a lengthy summer tour.

And she’s recently been back on set for the upcoming erotic thriller Non Compos Mentis, in which her character finds herself in a love triangle with two men played by Liam Hemsworth and Sam Worthington.

She’s a lucky lady.

KATHERINE’S READY FOR FESTIVE FUN

CHRISTMAS has come early with a flurry of new festive songs out today, led by Katherine Jenkins who has recorded a seasonal rendition of Heaven Is A Place On Earth.

The Welsh mezzo-soprano’s cover of the Belinda Carlisle hit is the soundtrack to this year’s Marks & Spencer Christmas advert, and she appears in the clip as a singer at a fete.

Olivia Rodrigo has dropped her track Take Me Home (4 Christmas) and NECTAR WOODE has released her festive ballad, Only Want You.

Away from the jingle bells, Slayyyter has released her song Hey Boyyy and Poland’s 2026 Eurovision entrant Alicja has returned with the appropriately titled She’s Back.

For something rockier, check out Cage The Elephant’s Make It Easy, from their newly announced album Dying In Reverse, which will be out on February 5.

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LEWIS CAPALDI has confirmed his performance at Capital’s Jingle Bell Ball with Barclaycard will be the last time his fans can see him before he takes a lengthy break.

Speaking ahead of the event, taking place at London’s O2 Arena on the first weekend in December, Lewis said: “I need to go away and make new music so it feels like a nice fitting tip of the cap.

“It feels fitting that it’s at Jingle Bell Ball. I’m very excited.”

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OZZFEST TO KEEP OZZY’S LEGACY ALIVE

OZZY OSBOURNE’s Back To The Beginning concert was one of the highlights of last summer, and the late rocker’s legacy will continue to live on with the return of Ozzfest.

The hard rock festival was first held two decades ago – and next year, it will be brought back for a one-day extravaganza at The National Bowl in Milton Keynes on July 10.

The line-up will be announced in the coming months but if Back To The Beginning is anything to go by, it’ll have some belters on board.

It had been hoped the event could take place at Villa Park in Ozzy’s hometown of Birmingham, but construction work prevented it.

The rocker’s widow Sharon said: “Ozzy was the first to launch his own traveling metal festival, and Ozzfest will always remain an important part of Ozzy’s legacy.”

LITTLE MESS, JES

A FEUD appears to have broken out between Jesy Nelson and the father of her twin daughters Zion Foster.

Fans of the couple, who split in January, noticed Zion sharing a reel on his Instagram account from a man who posted a video about “Dad’s who don’t get access to their kids”.

It comes just weeks after former Little Mix singer Jesy appeared to take a swipe at the R&B artist by liking a comment online which said: “How deadbeats be convincing new women they’re a good dad.”

The pair, whose twins Ocean and Story were born with genetic muscle-weakening condition SMA Type 1 in May last year, had previously been on good terms but pals told me it’s turned “very messy”.

A friend added: “It’s a very sad situation. Jesy and Zion have very opposing views on who is at fault and they cannot see eye to eye at all. Those close to them want them to come together and focus on their children.”

Yesterday Zion released a new song, which he said would be the “first and last time” he would say his piece.

On the track he raps that he is “hurt to the core”, before adding: “The real truth ain’t going to hit the surface, cause I aint going to put my babies through that.

“Got the receipts in my phone and notepad, why would I save myself and put my girls through that pain as well.”

I think it’d do Jesy and Zion well to step away from social media and sort out their issues behind closed doors.

Gov. Gavin Newsom told the California Supreme Court Thursday that he will commute the death sentences of all 548 state prisoners awaiting execution, reducing their punishments to life in prison without parole.

Newsom can commute about 40% of the death sentences with the stroke of a pen, but the rest will require the high court’s approval in order to be finalized.

The mass commutation would apply to inmates convicted of some of the most heinous acts in the state’s history. Newsom and other opponents of capital punishment have long argued that the process is costly, cruel and discriminatory, with death sentences disproportionately handed down to defendants of color.

“I take this action because I firmly believe that state-sanctioned killing is incompatible with California’s values, undermines the foundation of our legal system, and diminishes each of us,” Newsom wrote in a letter to Californians explaining his decision. “I know we cannot execute people in our imperfect legal system and remain true to our core values, first among them justice and human decency.”

The move comes in Newsom’s final months as governor and as he considers a run for president. Reducing the death sentences could help him in a primary with a Democratic base of like-minded liberal voters, but potentially hurt him in a general election with a national electorate that supports capital punishment.

The decision to officially spare the condemned inmates is largely symbolic in a state that has not executed a prisoner since 2006, though experts say it could save millions of dollars in court costs every year. Only 13 inmates have been killed since voters reinstated the death penalty in 1978. The state’s electorate reaffirmed its support a decade ago, voting down a ballot initiative that would have abolished capital punishment. Polls show its popularity has waned in the years since.

Despite his outspoken opposition to state-sanctioned executions, the governor has declined to use his political influence with voters to pursue a ballot measure that would amend the state Constitution to align with his position and officially end the death penalty. Without changing state law, criminals can continue to be sentenced to death in California.

“California voters have voted to keep the death penalty on the books and I respect that,” Newsom wrote in the letter to Californians. “But the constitution also gave every governor clemency authority, and that power exists for moments when law as applied cannot be squared with justice. For me, this is that moment.”

Newsom made national headlines two months after his inauguration in 2019 when he issued a temporary moratorium on executions and vowed to dismantle the death chamber at San Quentin State Prison, now called San Quentin Rehabilitation Center.

Calling the death penalty system a “failure,” Newsom said the punishment is also often reserved for poor people who cannot afford expensive legal representation, fails to deter crime and wastes taxpayer money.

Careful to avoid elevating a death penalty debate in the midterm elections, Newsom intentionally waited until after the general election on Tuesday to go a step further and launch the process of commuting all California death penalty sentences.

The decision is another bold signature Newsom move that sits well with his base of support in California and wealthy, white and college-educated national voters who would be crucial to his success in a Democratic presidential primary, said Mike Madrid, a Republican political consultant.

However, his liberal stance on government executions could also create a vulnerability for him if he advances in the 2028 presidential election as the party’s nominee.

“Gavin’s exactly right with that base Democratic voter on that position,” Madrid said. “One hundred percent. It makes him a champion.”

But more moderate blue-collar voters who helped the party flip Congress in the midterms, Madrid added, are “not in line with him on this.”

A poll conducted in August by the Pew Research Center found that about two-thirds of voters nationally favor the death penalty for people convicted or murder.

Those numbers could shift following the botched lethal injection of Christa Pike in Tennessee in September and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s now-scuttled plan to livestream the execution of Ft. Hood shooter Nidal Hasan by firing squad.

“Those events have really ripped the veneer off the death penalty in this country,” said attorney Natasha Minsker of the California Anti-Death Penalty Coalition. “The death penalty is an act of violence. It’s taking another life. I think that’s become clear to the entire country.”

The state spends more than $200 million a year to adjudicate automatic death penalty appeals and habeas corpus petitions for inmates who, in all likelihood, will never be executed, according to a 2025 report by the Habeas Corpus Resource Center.

The case of Clarence Ray Allen, the last inmate killed by lethal injection in California 20 years ago, is emblematic of how the law has failed, death penalty opponents say.

Allen was 76, making him the second-oldest person ever executed in the United States. He had been on death row for 23 years and his appeals cost the state more than $750,000. Many current condemned inmates are even older — some in their 80s and 90s — and their appeals even more drawn out and expensive.

“It’s just a broken system,” said Michael Hersek, former executive director of Habeas Corpus Resource Center and an ex-state public defender.

Taxpayers foot the bill for both the defense and the prosecution in post-conviction capital cases, as well as the administrative judicial costs associated with years of complicated appeals in state and federal court.

The existing appeal requirements were instituted to counter long-standing racial bias in capital sentencing. Attempts to reform and expedite the appeals process over the years have further gummed up the system.

“There is no indication that the situation has improved, and … [there are] data indicating that it has worsened,” Justice Leondra R. Kruger wrote for the California Supreme Court in 2024.

It’s estimated that death penalty appeals alone constitute about a quarter of the work of the California Supreme Court.

“It’s ludicrous, the amount of time, resources and energy put into these cases,” Hersek said.

Some victims’ families agree.

“The death penalty is this promise to people who are angry and broken that you’re somehow going to make them feel better by executing this person,” said Bethany Webb, whose sister Laura was among eight people killed in a mass shooting in Seal Beach in 2011.

Their mother was also shot and badly injured in the attack.

“It is brutalizing to family members, the whole system,” Webb said.

Others say Newsom’s latest move is a betrayal of the justice they were promised.

“It’s total disrespect for the victims. It’s a slap in the face,” said Sandy Friend, whose 8-year-old son Michael Lyons was abducted, raped and murdered in 1996.

She and other relatives stressed the unique brutality of many capital crimes, saying Newsom did not consider victims’ suffering when commuting their killers’ sentences.

The commutations would go to inmates such as Charles Ng, who was convicted of killing six men, three women and two infant boys in Northern California in 1984 and 1985. Also in line to benefit is Richard Allen Davis, who abducted and murdered 12-year-old Polly Klaas of Petaluma in 1993, sparking a months-long search that gripped the nation. Another condemned inmate, Christopher Cheary, was convicted of murdering, raping and torturing his girlfriend’s 3-year-old daughter, Sophia Acosta, in Tulare County.

Gov.-elect Xavier Becerra also opposes the death penalty. If state leaders wanted to resume executions, experts say it would take the better part of a decade and millions of dollars in new spending for the state to design and approve a workable protocol for lethal injections, rebuild a death chamber and secure the gray-market drugs necessary to perform executions.

Legal experts believe the end of the death penalty is likely inevitable in California, with or without Newsom’s involvement.

In 2024, the Office of the State Public Defender sued California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta’s office, arguing “persistent and pervasive racial disparities infect California’s death penalty system.”

This spring, the California Supreme Court ordered Bonta’s California Department of Justice to show cause why it should not declare the death penalty unconstitutional — a move widely read as signaling the justices’ ultimate intent to end it.

“The statistical findings in the studies invoked by petitioners are extraordinarily disturbing,” Bonta wrote in his reply to the order in August. “Evidence of pervasive racial disparities in the administration of the death penalty could show that California’s capital punishment system gives rise to a constitutionally intolerable risk of arbitrariness.”

Around 60% of the inmates in line for commutations would require review and approval by the California Supreme Court before Newsom’s term ends in January. Those cases involve prisoners who had a felony conviction on their record prior to receiving a death sentence, or racked up additional crimes while awaiting execution.

The high court previously rejected 10 clemency cases without much clarification when Gov. Jerry Brown submitted them in 2018 months before he left office.

If approved by the California Supreme Court, the immediate effect could be relatively muted. The death chamber was taken down and all but a handful of the remaining condemned inmates were relocated from segregated housing in San Quentin to other facilities across the state after Newsom’s 2019 moratorium.

The decision to formally pause executions drew support from the late Pope Francis during Newsom’s 2024 trip to the Vatican, according to the governor’s retelling of a brief conversation between the two men.

In a subsequent interview, the governor said his Catholic background and the inequities in the criminal justice system influenced his refusal to sign off on executions. His father, the late William Newsom, also opposed the death penalty.

His father and grandfather were involved in the case of Pete Pianezzi, a friend who was wrongfully convicted of first-degree murder in the shooting and killing of a gambler and busboy in Los Angeles in 1937.

Pianezzi escaped the death penalty by a single vote and served 13 years in prison. He was later exonerated.

Even if it were possible to limit inequity and wrongful convictions in the criminal justice system, Newsom has said he would still be against the death penalty.

“The decision is among the most difficult in my career, not because I doubt its necessity for our state but because I know its announcement may surface excruciating memories for victims’ families,” Newsom wrote in the letter to Californians. “Today I am acting on my long and deeply held conviction that individually and collectively we are stronger as a society when we reject state-sanctioned killing.”

England have made medical checks on Cole Palmer as Thomas Tuchel considers whether to select the Chelsea forward in his next squad.

The 24-year-old missed all four games during the previous international window with a minor injury.

He completed 90 minutes for Chelsea against Brentford before those matches, and started for the Blues in the first game afterwards.

Tuchel, who names his squad to face Croatia and Spain on Friday, said at the time that Palmer was “playing with discomfort and pain” but was “missing too many opportunities” with England.

Whether he is recalled will be a key theme on Friday. While it is normal for England medics to check on players under consideration, it also underlines that Palmer remains on Tuchel’s radar despite his stark comments last month.

In addition to deciding whether to select Palmer, head coach Tuchel has a number of other dilemmas to resolve.

Bukayo Saka’s injury absence opens the door to another attacker, with his Arsenal team-mate Noni Madueke pushing for a recall following a string of impressive performances.

Manchester United forward Marcus Rashford has not played since mid-October and is not fit for selection, while Chelsea defender Trevoh Chalobah is a major injury doubt.

Defenders Ben White and Djed Spence are pushing for recalls after missing out on the previous squad through injury.

The likes of Harry Kane, Jude Bellingham, Declan Rice and many others are now stonewall selections – but the intrigue is around the remaining few spots still seemingly up for grabs.

Will some old faces earn a recall or will there be new faces soon pulling on the England shirt? BBC Sport runs down some of the potential candidates for selection.

After Democrats delivered a once-in-a-generation midterm thumping of Republicans in the United States midterms, their current leader, Chuck Schumer, has expressed confidence he will helm his party’s larger-than-expected majority in the US Senate.

“I’ll be re-elected as majority leader,” the New York Democrat told reporters in Washington on Wednesday.

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But as calls for change reached a fever pitch among voters in this week’s pivotal elections, not every newly elected Senate Democrat is open to the idea of having Schumer, a 75-year-old stalwart of the chamber, reprise his role as the head of their agenda.

At least seven incoming Democratic freshmen have publicly suggested – or said outright – they will not commit to supporting Schumer in next month’s leadership vote:

• Illinois Senator-elect Juliana Stratton, through a spokesperson, said she will not support Schumer.
• Kansas Senator-elect Adam Hamilton told CNN in September: “I’m not supporting Schumer”.
• Maine Senator-elect Troy Jackson said on Monday he told Schumer he will “support somebody else”.
• Michigan Senator-elect Abdul El-Sayed reiterated in an interview with CNN on Thursday that he will support his soon-to-be Democratic colleague, Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, as leader.
• Minnesota Senator-elect Peggy Flanagan told reporters on Wednesday, “It is time for new leadership”.
• New Hampshire Senator-elect Chris Pappas said in an interview last week that “voters are hungry for … a new generation of leadership in the Senate”.
• Texas Senator-elect James Talarico has called for “new blood” in Washington, and since being elected, has indicated he wanted to “hear about [Schumer’s] vision” for the Senate before committing to back him.

Jackson has openly questioned Schumer’s ability to connect with working-class voters, while Flanagan’s staff has said the senator-elect wants “a progressive champion” who will shepherd Democrats through the final two years of Donald Trump’s presidency and into 2028.

New members, like El-Sayed, may not be won over after Schumer backed the former public health official’s opponent, Haley Stevens, in Michigan’s Democratic primary.

Schumer, the first Jewish Senate leader, has often found himself at the centre of brewing cultural and foreign-policy debates within his party.

In remarks that were posted online in February, Schumer told Jewish leaders in New York City one of his core duties was “to fight for aid to Israel”.

“We delivered more security assistance to Israel, our ally, under my leadership than ever, ever before”, he said. “We will keep doing that.”

Schumer has also faced fierce criticism for not doing enough to block Trump’s cabinet members from being confirmed. Some have even chastised the leader for retreating during last year’s government shutdown after he backed a Republican bill to reopen federal agencies without getting anything in return.

Critics in his party, including California Governor Gavin Newsom, called that a “capitulation” that abandoned key Democratic priorities, like healthcare subsidies. Michigan Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib said Schumer should have stepped down as leader over the matter.

The Democratic leader said on Wednesday the party’s new Senate plan would include launching investigations into the Trump administration, challenging the president’s agenda and ending his war in Iran.

However, that’s not good enough for some current members, like Van Hollen, who recently told Bloomberg that Democrats should not commit to Schumer without promises of a “bold agenda”.

Before Tuesday’s election, a senior campaign staff member for Senator Jon Ossoff, who was easily re-elected to his seat, would not say whether the Georgia Democrat would back Schumer.

“I do not have an answer,” the Ossoff source told Al Jazeera. “We can do all the fantasy football stuff later.”

When Democratic lawmakers return to Washington next week, voters and Democratic-aligned groups will likely pressure them to support an alternative candidate.

After calling for new leadership after the election, Indivisible, a progressive US-based organisation that bills itself as a movement “to stop the rise of authoritarianism”, released a memo on Thursday detailing their opposition to Schumer.

“Everyone with a Democratic senator – including those with newly-elected senators on their way to DC – should be demanding a contested leadership election, not a cleared field for Schumer”, the memo read.

“Any Democrat who is considering business as usual, or unwilling to fight at a level that matches the public’s demand for action – is not qualified to lead the party at this moment. Who leads the party in this era must be an open question, not a coronation. It’s time to define what the next era of the Democratic Party will be.”

Al Jazeera asked Schumer’s office how he plans to address those concerns and whether he is speaking with frustrated Democrats, but it has not yet responded.

To be re-elected, Schumer needs a simple majority of the Democratic Senate caucus, projected to comprise 54-56 members, and Schumer, who previously served as majority leader during the duration of former President Biden’s term in office, still has allies he can count on.

One of those is Democratic Senator Cory Booker of New Jersey, who told ABC on Wednesday that he commended Schumer’s handling of the midterms, saying he delivered “one of the most historic sweeps” for the party.

“We’re gonna have a family discussion,” Booker said. “But I think America should give … Chuck Schumer his due for what we were able to achieve.”

When asked Wednesday about building criticism of his leadership, Schumer demurred, saying Tuesday’s elections were “not about” him.

“This is about the American people and what they want and what they need and what we can do to help them. Plain and simple”.

The Army on Wednesday unveiled its new system allowing front-line troops to rapidly convert 60mm and 81mm mortar rounds into drone-droppable munitions. Dubbed the Munitions Air-dropped Lethal Effects Tool (MALET), it is part of the service’s Picatinny Common Lethality Integration Kit (CLIK), which enables lethal payloads to be placed on unmanned systems, including small drones.

The development of these systems is taking place as the Army races to catch up to a mode of delivering munitions on enemy targets that began to show up a decade ago, when ISIS fighters started using this capability during the Battle of Mosul in Iraq in 2016 and 2017.

Work on the MALET system began in 2024, the Army explained in its announcement Wednesday morning. Experts at the Armaments Center’s Fuze and Mortar Divisions “recognized a critical opportunity,” according to the service. “Rather than introducing new munitions to the battlefield, soldiers could benefit from a capability to safely drop existing munitions without having to perform field modifications or manually remove safety mechanisms.”

What they came up with was a clip-on kit that adds a fuze function to the round that allows it to be detonated after being dropped and includes fins to ensure “the aerodynamic stability required for a drone drop of the cartridge,” the Army stated.

Once the rounds are converted, the goal is to drastically extend the range of mortars. Fired from a tube, they have a range of about between two to 3.5 miles. While the Army did not specify which drones were used in recent MALET tests, a solicitation earlier this year said the service is seeking to place these systems on drones with a desired operational range of between 20 and 40 km (about 12.5 to 25 miles).

The MALET system doesn’t damage the mortar, nor does removing it. That way, if the mortar is not expended, or mission requirements shift, soldiers can return the munition back to its original state, allowing it to be fired as a conventional mortar if needed.

Another advantage of the MALET system, according to the Army, is that it has a large supply of mortars.

“Instead of having to procure purpose-built munitions on drones, soldiers will be able to use rounds which they have in abundance already, such as 60mm and 81mm mortar rounds,” the Army noted.

Recent test drops at multiple facilities “have already shown the MALET’s effectiveness, successfully maturing both the system’s fuze function and its critical safety elements,” the Army claimed. “The team just recently had a successful test where they demonstrated the performance of MALET with live 60mm mortars. The items were dropped from a UAS on the move; they oriented correctly and detonated within the desired target area.”

The Army only provided still images showing the round after it was released and then hitting a target, so we can’t independently confirm how well the system worked or how easy it is for soldiers to use it.

As it conducts these tests, the Army says the MALET architecture can be applied to munitions other than these two mortar types. Mortars were the first to be demonstrated due to their maturity and alignment with large UAS requirements.

“The MALET Integrated Product Team (IPT) is exploring even more concepts” which are “mostly close-hold for now,” said the Army. Senior Scientific Technical Manager for Indirect Fire Munitions Ryan Gorman would say only that these new concepts are “unique.” 

“The MALET program is a great example of how the DEVCOM Armaments Center can leverage core competencies like fuze design, safety, and ammunition development and apply them to a dynamic, emerging space like lethal UAS to provide a unique and viable option for the warfighter,” Gorman added.

For the Army, the next step is to distribute the kit to major military exercises this fall “to allow for soldier touchpoints and receive feedback,” the service stated. “Conversations with industry partners, the User and Acquisition communities have already proven fruitful.”

As we noted at the top of this story, MALET is part of the Picatinny CLIK modular system. It includes the Armament UAS Delivered Immediate Battlefield Effects (AUDIBLE) Weapons Release System and the Gunslinger fire control software.

AUDIBLE enables “quick change adapters to safely drop existing munitions, like the M67 grenade, providing a proven concept that is scalable to service a larger array of munition options,” the Army said in a 2025 release.

Gunslinger was originally designed by the Armaments Center for the Future Vertical Lift – Future Attack Reconnaissance Aircraft XM915 20mm Cannon, the Army explained in a separate release. 

Fire control software helps users point the weapon where it will most likely result in a strike while taking into account variables like target or weapons platform motion.

While the Army is touting the MALET system, it should be noted that last year, the service came under fire for lauding its ability to drop a grenade from a drone. This practice had been in widespread use by even the lowliest of actors for years by then.

“Have you ever seen a drone drop a GRENADE?” a now-deleted post from the official U.S. Army account on X read. “Watch Soldiers from @7thATC [7th Army Training Command], the Joint Multinational Training Group-Ukraine [JMTG-U] and @173rdAbnBde [the 173rd Airborne Brigade] execute the Army’s first live-grenade drop from an unmanned aircraft system in Grafenwoehr Training Area, Germany.”

The accompanying video, also since deleted, showed Army personnel loading standard M67 fragmentation hand grenades, as well as inert M69 practice types, onto small quadcopter-type drones fitted with purpose-built mechanisms for dropping them. The system was designed to pull out the safety pin on the unmodified grenade as it is released.

The following image is a screen capture of the now deleted video.

As we pointed out last year, the answer to the “have you ever seen a drone drop a GRENADE?” is a resounding ‘yes’ for anyone who has watched this area of development over the past decade. We had predicted exactly this kind of application for commercially available drones even years before ISIS began using them in Iraq in 2016.

I have gotten a lot of crap for continuously nailing the Pentagon on being absurdly behind on low-end drone warfare threats and opportunities. This official post is all you need to know. It’s 2025. Mosul was nearly 9 years ago. https://t.co/1z2hwuTWuC

— Tyler Rogoway (@Aviation_Intel) July 21, 2025

There was a deep disconnect between the tone of the social media post, what is seen in the video and the comments therein, as well as the global reality when it comes to small armed drones.

The Army suggested this was a technological advancement. However, as we noted earlier in this piece, this mode of attack has been used for quite some time.

After the initial use by ISIS in Iraq a decade ago, ISIS and other militant organizations also used drones to drop small munitions, including on American forces in Syria. The threat of weaponized commercial drones, including types carrying improvised explosive payloads designed to just smash into their target and detonate, migrated to Afghanistan, as well. They have been a big part of the Ukraine war, used widely by both sides.

You can see a video of Ukrainian forces dropping munitions from drones early in the war below.

In addition, various nation-state armed forces and non-state actors around the world, including drug cartels in Mexico, now regularly employ small armed drones.

Difunden video de bombardeo desde drones en Tepalcatepec

The concept of adapting surplus munitions to be dropped from drones is not new by any means either, though it has been largely done in more of an improvised manner than the MALET system.

Ukrainians in particular became masters of this, including breaking down some of the U.S.-made cluster munition artillery shells they received to repurpose the submunition bomblets inside as improvised weapons to be air-dropped from small drones. Now there are munitions built just for this, as well.

The following video shows one example of how that worked.

Given that the Army is still testing the MALET system, it will be some time before it is actually fielded. While the service remains behind the curve, if MALET works as advertised, it will be a welcome addition for soldiers who want to extend the reach of a plentiful munition.

Contact the author: howard@twz.com

Russell Brand tried to block rape trial before it even began

Russell Brand tried to smear journalists as “criminals” in a doomed bid to avoid standing trial, it can now be revealed.

However, his bid failed when the judge simply ruled the jury could be made up of people who had not seen the 2023 media reporting. He rubbished Brand’s claim that the former comedian’s reputation had been “destroyed”, pointing to a sell-out Wembley show he performed after being publicly accused of rape.

Nov. 5, 2026 10 AM PT

WASHINGTON — President Trump’s administration held secret talks with Iran on deporting Iranians even as the war there dragged on, court documents obtained by The Associated Press show.

The court documents unsealed Thursday show the Republican administration as recently as mid-October said it had plans to deport the Iranians through an unnamed third country, although it was unclear when it intended to do so. The judge in the case ordered the government to give the court 24-hour notice of any finalized plans to deport Iranians to Iran or to any other country and five days’ written notice before any such deportation is carried out.

The documents show that the administration maintained contacts with Iranian officials during the war over the removals, specifically for submitting travel documents and figuring out “possible avenues for removal.”

“We are at war with a country where the President of the United States has said, as recently as two or three days ago, if not yesterday, that it is essentially lawless … A country that is an enemy of the United States, according to the current president. A country that, according to our president, murdered tens of thousands of protestors,” Judge Ana Reyes said according to the Oct. 15 transcript.

“And what you’re telling me is that the United States of America is going to send individuals back to that region, facing what you and I and everyone who would ever look at this would know would be, at a minimum, a serious threat of certain death.”

“Yes, your honor,” Justice Department attorney Dimitar Georgiev-Remmel said. “The government is executing lawful orders of removal.”

The Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The development emerged from an ongoing lawsuit that alleges the Trump administration’s immigration agencies have been sharing confidential information about Iranian asylum seekers with the Iranian government, violating national immigration regulations and endangering countless Iranians, court filings argue.

The new court documents show the coordination continued during the war.

The lawsuit depicts a coordinated campaign between the U.S. and Iranian governments to identify Iranians in Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody and pressure them to return to Iran — a marked departure from decades of diplomatic hostility between the two governments and an ongoing war. DHS has denied that it is sharing asylum application records with the Iranian government.

Hundreds of emails exchanged between U.S. immigration officials exposed how the two countries worked together to arrange for more than 100 Iranians to be flown back to Iran on three immigration flights in September and December 2025 and January 2026.

Deportations of Iranians back to their home country are historically rare, owing to the lack of diplomatic relations between the U.S. and Iran and the possible persecution they could face if they were sent to Iran.

But under the Trump administration, ICE has aggressively pushed to deport people even from countries that have typically been reluctant to take people back or with whom the U.S. has had icy or no diplomatic relations.

Sometimes that has meant sending people back to their home country but it has also meant deporting people to other countries that they have no connection with.

The Trump administration has deported people, including Iranians, to countries other than their own in an attempt to circumvent diplomatic hurdles with governments that won’t take their people back. During Trump’s second term, countries including El Salvador, Costa Rica, Panama and across Africa have accepted noncitizens from the U.S.

In June, an Iranian woman was among the two dozen migrants the U.S. deported to the Central African Republic.

Activists abroad have expressed concern about deportees returning to Iran, whose theocracy has been cracking down on intellectuals and where the government vociferously cracks down on any dissent.

Kunzelman and Santana write for the Associated Press.

Former Northants Steelbacks batter Chris Lynn returned a positive drugs test after playing in this season’s T20 Blast Finals Day, the Cricket Regulator has announced.

Cocaine’s metabolite benzoylecgonine was found in Lynn’s urine sample and he was given a one-month suspension, which has now been served.

The 36-year-old top-scored with 39 runs in their semi-final win over Somerset, before making four as they beat Hampshire in the final at Edgbaston on 18 July.

Lynn admitted using cocaine, external in the week before Finals Day – during hours spanning 15 and 16 July.

However, he asserted the usage amounted to “an out-of-competition violation” and was “unrelated to sporting performance”, a view supported by an expert assigned by the regulator.

The former Australia international served his suspension between 31 July and 30 August 2026.

He has since completed a substance of abuse treatment programme which reduced his potential suspension from three months to one month.

Lynn returned to play for Northants this year, having scored 880 T20 runs in two previous spells with the county in 2022 and 2023 and was also part of the Hampshire side beaten by Somerset in the 2025 Blast final.

Northamptonshire, who the regulator confirmed would receive no sanction for the positive test, have been approached for comment.

The Cricket Regulator is an independent body, established in December 2023, responsible for monitoring compliance with the game’s regulations.

DEVELOPING STORYDEVELOPING STORY,

Paraguayan President Santiago Pena resigned on Thursday after calls for his removal swelled following the collapse of digital lender ueno that left millions of customers unable ‌to access their accounts.

“I do so with the stability of our country, social peace and the need to preserve our democratic institutions in mind,” he said in a video recorded address on Thursday.

Pena, an ally of US President Donald Trump, is stepping down after the ⁠opposition called an extraordinary session to begin the process of filing an impeachment motion in Congress, and as protesters demanded his resignation.

Earlier on Thursday Pena lost backing from members of his own conservative party. Vice President Pedro Alliana is set to take office as his replacement.

Lawmakers had accused Pena of conflicts of interest, misuse of pension funds and institutional cover-ups linked to the collapse of ueno, which had grown ‌quickly ⁠from a niche fintech player into a mid-tier bank administering close to $850 million in public funds.

“He is accused of negligence at the very least and complicity in covering up the fact that the bank was insolvent,” said Al Jazeera’s Latin America editor Lucia Newman.

“The congress right now is tying to impeach the president and the vice president, this session is underway,” she added. “As a I speak, there are people outside urging congress not to accept the resignation of the president because they say that they want him tried and impeached.”

Paraguay’s central bank intervened in ueno after determining ⁠that it had breached minimum solvency requirements, setting off a crisis that has left the company’s roughly 3 million customers, in a ⁠country of 6.5 million people, unable to access accounts.

“My greatest wish is that the return of those funds be guaranteed, that the deposit guarantee fund fulfill its purpose, and that ⁠public funds – as well as the resources that belong to all Paraguayans – be protected,” Pena added in his address.

Ueno has made no public statement on the issue.

A Jordanian security officer has been killed and another one wounded near the Sri Lankan embassy in Amman, in what authorities say was a terror attack.

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Yes, this old-school bakery and diner chain offers tons of delicious pies, but it also takes the rest of Thanksgiving seriously. At locations throughout L.A., including Long Beach, Cerritos and Montebello, you can order several heat-and-eat meals, including a whole turkey feast with an 11- to 13-pound bird ($199.99), a whole ham feast ($189.99), and a half ham feast for smaller gatherings ($104.99). Each comes with an array of sides, including smashed potatoes, homestyle stuffing and Southern-style green beans, plus your choice of pie. The larger meals feed six or more, while the half ham serves up to four. If you’re handling the turkey yourself, the Everything But the Bird package ($109.99) takes care of the sides. Individual turkey and ham dinners are also available, along with à la carte sides. And, of course, there’s pie — lots of it. Choose from classics like apple, pumpkin and pecan to boysenberry, banana-strawberry, pumpkin maple crunch and more. Orders can be placed online.

THE DOWNFALL of Russell Brand is a “watershed moment” which will empower women to report celebrity sex offenders, the detective who nailed him said.

Predator Brand, 51, follows in the footsteps of Jimmy Savile and Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein, both of whom abused their fame to target women and girls.

Detective Inspector Laura Nelson, who led the Met investigation into Brand, told The Sun: “The conviction of Russell Brand will be a watershed moment.

“This case demonstrates that no person is above the law, no matter how much money they have or how famous they are.

“This might be a case where women, or indeed males, look back and believe they were abused within the media industry or workplace.

“I would encourage them to contact the police and we will listen to you and treat you with care.”

Her message comes as Brand was found guilty of rape and sex attacks on a string of victims as part of a depraved campaign.

Brand was never reported to police for sex offending before being unmasked by a joint September 2023 investigation by C4’s Dispatches and The Sunday Times.

DI Nelson, of the Met’s Complex Sexual Offences Unit, said: “That documentary gave women the confidence to realise they were not alone as victims of Russell Brand.”

She added: “It goes to show how powerful he was that women didn’t report any behaviour as they didn’t think they would be believed.”

DI Nelson said “society has moved on” since the Savile and Goldstein scandals.

She added: “I think we are more emboldened now to challenge bad behaviour.

“I think over the last 10 years, with the MeToo movement, this has brought up themes about power and people abusing it.

“I believe we now have better support mechanisms in place, not only in the police but in work places too, to report any criminal behaviour.”

However, DI Nelson adds: “The methods of reporting and awareness are improving but they can always be better.

“I think maybe this case demonstrates where women didn’t feel they had the confidence within their work places.

“We can all be better but signposting maybe needs improvement if criminal offences are identified and should be reported to the police.”

Ironically, Brand and Savile’s paths had crossed and were cemented in smut seven years before the Jim’ll Fix presenter died aged 84 in 2011.

Brand called Savile live on air during a 2007 episode of his BBC Radio 2 show and told him it would be ‘’very nice one day” to meet him.

Two minds came as one as Savile replied he “doesn’t usually meet fellas, but if you’ve got a sister then that’s ok.’’

Brand’s misogynistic response was to offer to send his personal assistant naked to meet the as-yet-unmasked sex monster.

A year after his death, Savile was exposed as a prolific sexual predator.

It emerged that police and the CPS repeatedly failed to charge Savile despite multiple complaints over decades.

The resulting scandal gave victims courage to come forward and led to a spate of other celebrities being jailed for exploiting their fame to prey on victims.

Weinstein, now serving a 15-year jail sentence, was revealed as a predator in 2017, sparking the #MeToo movement.

Like those notorious sex offenders, Brand used his celebrity status to target girls and women while hiding in plain sight for years.

DI Nelson said of Brand: “His fame only seemed to encourage him and spur him on in terms of how he abused women and the level of offending.

“There is an arrogance about him. He just didn’t care in the end. He saw what he wanted and took it.”

Brand revelled in his reputation as a lothario and boasted that he wanted to bed 5,000 women.

DI Nelson said that because of Brand’s fame, “people chose to tolerate his behaviour rather than stand up to it”.

She said others linked to Brand had been identified “and looked at” during the investigation.

DI Nelson added: “We have not identified any offences that were linked to other people but that will continue to be under review.”

The detective went on: “I think that everybody who employed Brand – or worked with him – will think of this trial and maybe reflect on how they acted at the time.”

Brand was accused in the Dispatches programme, ‘Russell Brand: In Plain Sight,’ and The Sunday Times of sex offences against four women between 2006 and 2013.

None of the complainants featured in his trial and Brand has denied all allegations.

Three of the alleged incidents occurred in the US and were beyond British jurisdiction.

But their accounts gave other women the confidence to come forward to accuse Brand of sexually abusing them.

Today at Southwark Crown Court, a jury found Brand guilty of groping an MTV worker during a party at a Soho bar in 2004, but not guilty of going on to rape her in a toilet.

Brand, 51, was convicted of “sloppily” kissing and groping a Capital Radio worker after encountering her in a corridor in 2005.

He was found guilty of raping a 21-year-old fan at his Hampstead house after meeting her at a 2009 stand-up show at the Hammersmith Apollo.

Brand was also convicted by the jury of sexually assaulting a Channel 4 worker in 2009 when she had been forced to give him a massage.

The vile attacker was found not guilty by the jury of raping a woman he met at a cabaret show on the fringes of the 1999 Labour Party conference in Bournemouth.

He was also cleared of trying to drag an MTV worker into a toilet to indecently assault her in 2001.

DI Nelson described the victims’ questioning by Brand’s KC Ian Winter as “uncomfortably robust” at times.

She added of the victims: “They have been so strong.

“They knew it was going to be difficult but I think they have handled themselves really well.

“They have been fantastically resilient and as a team we feel really proud of what they have done.”

The Met set up a special hotline for other potential victims of Brand’s to come forward.

DI Nelson said: “I do believe there are more victims of Russell Brand.

‘’If those women wanted to come forward and make a report then I would encourage those women to contact the police.

‘’We will listen to you and treat you with dignity and we will guide you through the processes.’’

Unusually for the electronic age, the case against Brand was brought with statements from women and corroborated by witnesses.

Senior Crown Prosecutor David Roberts said: “Fundamentally our case was that Russell Brand was a manipulative predator who used these moments opportunistically to override consent.”

He also urged other potential victims to get in touch with police.

Mr Roberts said: “I think this trial has shown whether someone is a Hollywood star, we will prosecute them regardless of their position.”

NEW YORK — Billionaire Leon Black has filed a federal defamation lawsuit against Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Long Beach) for public comments the Democratic congressman made tying him to disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein.

The suit, filed Wednesday, comes less than two months after the House approved a resolution holding Black in contempt of Congress for defying the Oversight Committee’s subpoenas in its investigation into Epstein.

In June, Black appeared for a voluntary interview at the committee during which he denied any knowledge of Epstein’s sex trafficking network.

Weeks later, Garcia said during a TV interview that “Leon Black is at the center of Jeffrey Epstein’s crimes” and that Black “was one of the last people to actually interact” with Epstein before he committed suicide in prison.

In addition, Garcia said that he had “talked to survivors that have credibly named Leon Black as someone that was involved in direct abuse of women and was directly involved” with Epstein.

Those statements were false and were made maliciously, Black asserts through his lawyers. The defamation lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York seeks a jury trial and $7.25 million in compensatory and punitive damages.

“Congressman Garcia’s knowing lies have caused real and significant ongoing harm to Mr. Black. His physical safety has been threatened, he has received a barrage of hateful calls, emails, and social media posts, and his business and philanthropic endeavors have suffered,” the filing states.

Garcia’s office didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment on the lawsuit.

In September, Garcia called the contempt resolution against Black “an important step toward justice and accountability.”

Black had refused to respond to subpoenas asking him to appear and to turn over any potential nondisclosure agreements involving the investigation into Epstein.

Black’s lawyers have repeatedly denounced the Oversight Committee’s pursuit of the former head of a private equity firm as an abuse of congressional power. They have maintained he had no knowledge of any of Epstein’s criminal conduct.

Black was among several prominent figures, including Bill Clinton and Bill Gates, who had been asked to appear as part of the Oversight Committee’s long-running probe of Epstein. Survivors of Epstein’s alleged sexual abuse have told personal stories of being young women in a trafficking enterprise organized by Epstein and his colleague Ghislaine Maxwell.

Scotland’s Willy Hutchinson will be on a mission to realise the dream he wrote about as a 13-year-old when he fights for the vacant WBC light-heavyweight title on Saturday.

Hutchinson and British rival Joshua Buatsi meet in a rematch at Manchester’s AO Arena, just over two years after Buatsi earned a split-decision win in a thrilling first contest.

At the final news conference before the championship fight, Hutchinson, 28, explained that he jotted down his boxing goals as a teenager while working with his dad – and becoming WBC champion was at the top.

After David Benavidez gave up the WBC gold to move up to cruiserweight, a fight that was originally scheduled to be for the interim title was upgraded.

“I wrote on a pen and book that I’ll become Scottish, British, European and world amateur champion,” Hutchinson said.

“On the opposite side of this book – I’m 13 and I still have this book to this day – I wrote that I’ll become WBC champion of the world.

“I already got the silver and the international and now I’m fighting for the main belt.”

The ‘Hutch-Train’ became the first Scottish boxer to win gold at an amateur World Championships nearly 10 years ago, triumphing at youth level.

The date of that victory and the Buatsi fight night are just days apart on the calendar, which Hutchinson says is “absolutely fantastic”.

Broadcaster Adam Smith, who hosted Thursday’s news conference, challenged Hutchinson to bring along the book containing his boxing ambitions on Saturday night and the Scot said he was “sure we can sort something”.

Hours after results confirmed that the Republican Party had lost control of both the Senate and the House of Representatives in the United States Congress in the midterm elections this week, senior Republicans were hand-wringing over what had gone so badly wrong and whether a major course correction would now be required.

As once-Republican strongholds like Texas fell to the enemy, US Vice President JD Vance took to X to declare that the “real reason we lost is obvious to almost everyone”.

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“The reason we lost is the war. The president himself said so last night. If you’d like to argue it was worth it, that losing the Senate for the next 6 years was worth it, then do so. Argue it was a worthwhile cost to pay. Agree or disagree, that’s at least honest,” Vance said.

Former Trump voters had switched sides, he said, over the Iran war and the US ties to Israel.

The elephant in the room was no more.

“I remain hopeful about our country. To the people who are pissed off and want to say, ‘I told you so’: you’re right, you did tell us so. Take that energy into electing Republicans who share your worldview,” he wrote.

A poisoned chalice

Just days after the US and Israel launched strikes across Iran on February 28, Tehran effectively closed the critical Strait of Hormuz, which once transited roughly 25 percent of the world’s seaborne oil trade, triggering a massive spike in oil prices and a major global energy crisis. The price of Brent crude – the global benchmark – hit $120 in March and April and has hovered around $115 in recent weeks.

On Thursday morning, oil prices dropped to $93.82 a barrel on expectations that Republican Party losses would reduce the likelihood of US President Donald Trump renewing strikes on Iran following weeks of speculation.

But as consumers in the US struggle with sky-high petrol and diesel prices – not to mention the soaring cost of food, which has also been impacted by Trump’s trade tariffs – the midterms have forced a leadership rethink as the Trump brand appears increasingly toxic.

While no Republicans have declared their intention to run for the 2028 presidential election, some in the party are believed to be eyeing it now.

Andrew Payne, from the Chatham House think tank, told Al Jazeera that any Republican wanting to take on the 2028 election will now need to “distance themselves from the more unpopular aspects of Trump’s record”. That means the Iran war, the greatest poisoned chalice of them all.

“That, I think, is why Vance came out so clearly in blaming the war. It is evident to those who have been watching closely that he has always been the voice of scepticism behind the scenes, and he now needs to make that difference of opinion clear to the average voter. But doing so will be really hard while Trump is still in office and, presumably, wants to play an active role as kingmaker,” Payne said.

Unpopular, but not as unpopular as Trump

The most obvious pick and frontrunner for the Republican 2028 nomination is currently Vance, who is known to have ambitions to take over from Trump.

Regarded as an anti-US interventionist, Vance, while publicly supporting Trump’s Iran war, has also been privately urging him and others to end the conflict, according to the US news outlet Axios.

Last week, Vance sent a letter to the secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, Mohsen Rezaei, proposing a meeting between US and Iranian officials soon in a bid to prevent further escalation. By contrast, this week Trump said the war would only come to an end “when I want it to”.

This move, coupled with his post on X on Wednesday night, is increasingly being seen as Vance putting as much distance as he can between himself and the war.

Throwing off the Trump touch may be trickier than he thinks, however, according to one Vance ally close to the White House who spoke to Politico on Wednesday. While it is “possible for him [Vance] to modestly differentiate himself” from Trump, the source said, there is no way to completely delink himself.

“He’s still Trump’s vice president. This is still a Trump administration war. They’re still both unpopular. He’s not as unpopular as Trump but he’s unpopular,” the anonymous source said.

According to Tuesday polling from The New York Times on who is ahead in a theoretical Republican presidential primary, Vance is at 40 percent. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio follows at 21 percent, alongside Donald Trump Jr, also at 21 percent.

Rubio has yet to comment on the Republican wipeout. Still, like Vance, he is allied with Trump’s administration, which may make a presidential bid challenging.

Any potential candidate now faces a choice between two routes, Payne said. One is to “re-energise the [Make America Great Again or MAGA] movement, which I expect will be difficult, because Trump did it through sheer force of personality that is hard to replicate”.

“The second route is to keep as much of the base on board as possible while appealing to the traditional conservative groups who have drifted from the party over the past decade, thereby expanding the coalition. If he runs, I would think Marco Rubio has a better shot at doing that,” Payne said.

‘Blue tsunami’

There are other potential candidates to consider.

A former frontrunner for the 2016 presidential election, which saw Trump secure his first administration, Ted Cruz is now Texas’s only statewide Republican lawmaker.

In a post on X after the results, Cruz wrote: “2026 was not simply a blue wave; it was a blue tsunami. It was an a** kicking”.

“Food is too high, gas is too high, diesel is too high, insurance is too high, life is too high. Tariffs have made everything too expensive, and the Iran war has dragged on too long. It should have been brief, decisive, and over,” Cruz wrote.

“Understandably, people were pissed off, and elected Republicans didn’t do enough to address their very real pain. So, what do we do now? We need to listen and respond. We need to champion economic policies that make a real difference in working people’s lives, and we need to deal with the consequences.”

In September, the Wall Street Journal reported that Cruz was testing the waters for the 2028 nomination. But as one of the early cheerleaders for the Iran war, Cruz will struggle to disassociate himself from it, other than to criticise the manner of its execution.

As the blame game continues, the Republican Florida governor, Ron DeSantis, described the results of the midterms as “close to an extinction-level event” for the party.

“If the Republican Party doesn’t have Texas as an anchor, then we are not going to be viable nationally going forward,” he said.

“We’re in a very volatile political era, things shift quickly, and the leaders just got to recognise that.”

DeSantis’s time as governor ends in January after two terms, but speculation has grown about whether he also wants to throw his hat into the ring for the US presidential nomination as the playing field remains wide open.

Spain’s national football team coach and the president of Real Madrid joined family, friends and teammates on Thursday at the funeral of Jesus de Miguel, the Tenerife player who died after an on‑field collision earlier this week.

The service was held in Navahermosa, a town of about 3,000 people in central Spain, where De Miguel’s parents were reportedly born.

A hearse covered in flowers moved slowly towards the church as dozens of mourners, some carrying candles, walked behind. The town hall declared three days of mourning, with flags at half-staff.

De Miguel, 30, suffered cardiac arrest after colliding with Andorra goalkeeper Jesus Owono while challenging for a high ball during a second‑division match on Monday. He died in hospital the following day.

Spain coach Luis de la Fuente and Real Madrid President Florentino Perez attended the funeral, with De la Fuente saying the game’s community “stands united” in grief.

Police have opened a routine investigation into possible involuntary manslaughter to assess whether the challenge went beyond normal play.

Tributes have poured in from clubs across Europe, with De Miguel’s death described as a rare and shocking tragedy in professional football.