Report says ethnic violence has risen as the civil war passed two-year anniversary in the first half of 2025.
Civilians are bearing the brunt as Sudan‘s vicious civil war extends and intensifies, the United Nations has warned.
The UN’s Human Rights Office (OHCHR) said in a report released on Friday that civilian deaths and ethnic violence rose significantly as the war passed its two-year anniversary during the first half of 2025. The same day, reports said that dozens were killed by paramilitaries in an attack on a mosque in Darfur.
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The rate of civilian deaths across Sudan has increased, the report says, with 3,384 civilians dying in the first six months of the year, a figure equalling 80 percent of the 4,238 civilian deaths throughout the whole of 2024.
“Sudan’s conflict is a forgotten one, and I hope that my office’s report puts the spotlight on this disastrous situation where atrocity crimes, including war crimes, are being committed,” OHCHR chief Volker Turk said in a statement.
“Several trends remained consistent during the first half of 2025: a continued pervasiveness of sexual violence, indiscriminate attacks, and the widespread use of retaliatory violence against civilians, particularly on an ethnic basis, targeting individuals accused of ‘collaboration’ with opposing parties,” said the report.
New trends include the use of drones, including in attacks on civilian sites and in Sudan’s north and east, which until now have been largely spared by the war, it said.
“The increasing ethnicisation of the conflict, which builds on longstanding discrimination and inequalities, poses grave risks for longer-term stability and social cohesion within the country,” said Turk.
“Many more lives will be lost without urgent action to protect civilians and without the rapid and unhindered delivery of humanitarian aid.”
Since April 2023, Sudan has been gripped by a brutal war between the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF).
The conflict has killed tens of thousands and displaced some 12 million people. The UN has described it as one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises, with famine prevalent in parts of Darfur and southern Sudan.
The war has, in effect, split the country, with the army holding the north, east and centre, while the RSF dominates parts of the south and nearly all of the western Darfur region.
Efforts by the United States, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates to broker a ceasefire between the warring parties have so far failed.
The RSF killed 43 civilians in a drone strike on a mosque early on Friday in the besieged city of el-Fasher, the capital of North Darfur, the Sudan Doctors’ Network NGO said in a social media post.
The NGO labelled the attack a “heinous crime” against unarmed civilians that showed the group’s “blatant disregard for humanitarian and religious values and international law”.
The Resistance Committees in el-Fasher, a group comprised of local citizens from the community that includes human rights activists, who track abuses, posted a video reportedly showing parts of the mosque reduced to rubble with several bodies scattered on the site, now filled with debris.
The same group reported on Thursday that the RSF had targeted several unarmed civilians, including women and older adults, in displacement shelters in the city.
A day earlier, it said that heavy artillery by the RSF had continuously targeted residential neighbourhoods.
Sam Farmer makes his picks and predictions for NFL Week 3, with the Rams upsetting the Eagles on the road and the Chargers going 3-0 against the AFC West.
SACRAMENTO — In howling winds and choking smoke during the January fires that devastated Altadena and Pacific Palisades, more than 1,100 incarcerated firefighters cleared brush and dug fire lines, some for wages of less than $30 per day.
Those firefighters could soon see a major raise. On Thursday, California lawmakers unanimously approved a plan to pay incarcerated firefighters the federal minimum wage of $7.25 per hour while assigned to an active fire, a raise of more than 700%.
“Nobody who puts their life on the line for other people should earn any less than the federal minimum wage,” said the bill’s author, Assemblymember Isaac Bryan (D-Los Angeles), before the Thursday vote.
Bryan’s legislation, Assembly Bill 247, would take effect immediately if signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom. Newsom’s office said he typically does not comment on pending legislation. But in July, he signed a budget that set aside $10 million for incarcerated firefighter wages.
Working at one of the state’s 35 minimum-security fire camps is a voluntary and coveted job, giving inmates a chance to spend time outside prison walls, help their communities and get paroled more quickly.
Incarcerated firefighters don’t wield hoses, but clear brush and dig containment lines while working on front-line hand crews and do work such as cooking and laundry to keep fire camps running.
Prison fire crews at times make up more than 1 in 4 of the firefighters battling California’s wildfires, and have drawn international praise during major wildfire seasons. After the January fires in Los Angeles, celebrity Kim Kardashian called them “heroes” who deserved a raise.
The state’s 2,000 or so incarcerated firefighters earn $5.80 to $10.24 per day at fire camps, and an extra $1 an hour during active wildfires, according to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. That means the lowest-paid firefighters earn $29.80 per 24-hour shift and the highest-paid, $34.24.
Higher wages are not only a key way to recognize the life-risking contributions made by incarcerated firefighters, backers said, but could also help inmates build up some savings before they are paroled, or more quickly pay restitution to their victims.
Republican lawmakers who backed the plan emphasized the life-changing nature of finding work with meaning.
“When we talk about anti-recidivism, when we talk about programs that work, this is one of the absolute best,” said Assemblymember Heath Flora (R-Ripon).
Flora said he worked alongside incarcerated and formerly incarcerated firefighters during 15 years as a volunteer firefighter, and said they were “some of the hardest working individuals I’ve ever had the pleasure of working with.”
Bryan originally had proposed a $19 hourly wage, similar to the wage earned by entry-level firefighters with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. During the summer’s budget negotiations, that wage was trimmed to $7.25.
A lobbyist for the California State Sheriffs’ Assn., which opposed the bill, told lawmakers in July that incarcerated firefighters already are “receiving compensation in different ways.” Prison workers assigned to hand crews have their sentences reduced by two days for each day they serve on an active fire.
State Sen. Kelly Seyarto (R-Murrieta), who co-sponsored the bill, cautioned in July that paying higher wages could lead to hiring fewer incarcerated firefighters overall.
The cost to the state will depend on the number of inmate crews staffed and the severity of the fire season.
From 2020 to 2024, inmate firefighters spent 1,382,117 hours fighting fires for $1 per hour, according to a bill analysis by legislative staff. The state would have paid about $10 million in wages — or about $8.6 million more — had the federal minimum wage been in place over those five fire seasons, analysts said.
Years with more fire activity would be more expensive for the state. In 2020, the largest wildfire season in modern history, the state spent about $2.1 million on inmate firefighter wages at $1 per hour, which would have cost $15 million under the new bill language.
The bill follows years of effort to help improve the working conditions of inmate firefighters.
The number fell off sharply after the California policy known as realignment in 2011, which shifted many people who were convicted of nonserious, nonviolent and nonsexual offenses from California state prisons to county jails.
California bars people with a felony conviction from receiving an emergency medical technician, or EMT, certification for a decade after their release from prison. There is a lifetime ban for those convicted of two or more felonies.
In 2020, Newsom signed a bill allowing formerly incarcerated firefighters who were convicted of nonviolent, nonsexual offenses to appeal a court to expunge their criminal records and waive their parole time.
The Legislature this week also passed AB 218, by Assemblymembers Josh Lowenthal (D-Long Beach) and Sade Elhawary (D-Los Angeles), which would require prison officials to draft rules by 2027 to recommend incarcerated firefighters for resentencing.
A number of other bills dealing with fire issues are still pending in the Legislature in its final week of the year. Those include:
AB 226, which would allow the California FAIR Plan, the state’s home insurer of last resort, to increase its capacity to pay out claims by issuing bonds or seeking a line of credit.
AB 1032, which would require healthcare insurers to cover 12 visits a year with a licensed behavioral health provider, including mental health and substance abuse counselors, to residents affected by wildfires.
Week 2 of the NFL season has several big matchups, including a Super Bowl rematch between the Eagles and Chiefs and a Monday showdown between AFC West rivals.
CLUB football is back for the Premier League this weekend after the international break.
After the last round of fixtures, a chaotic transfer deadline day followed as clubs splashed out £375million on new talent to take the overall spending for the window to over £3BILLION.
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Alexander Isak is in line to make his Liverpool debut at the weekendCredit: Reuters
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Nick Woltemade, Newcastle’s record signing, will have big boots to fillCredit: Getty
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Alejandro Garnacho could play for Chelsea this weekendCredit: Getty
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Harvey Elliott completed a move to Aston Villa from LiverpoolCredit: Getty
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While Jadon Sancho was a deadline-day loan arrivalCredit: Instagram @avfcofficial
And with that wave of new arrivals, including emergency loans, the conclusions of blockbuster sagas and shrewd deals, there will be several new faces for fans to watch.
SunSport has taken a look at stars who could make their debuts this weekend, including two club-record signings.
Kicking off the team in goal is new Manchester City star Gianluigi Donnarumma, who arrived on deadline day from Paris Saint-Germain for £26million.
New £18m Manchester United star Senne Lammens could have been selected just as easily, but they can let their goalkeeping do the talking during the Manchester Derby on Sunday.
Alejandro Garnacho, a £40m sale from Man Utd to Chelsea, was not a deadline day switch but was only announced after the Blues’ most recent game at Stamford Bridge – meaning he will be in line for his debut this weekend.
The 23-year-old German looked impressive during the Under-21 Euros this summer, while he scored 17 for Stuttgart last season.
But he – alongside fellow new Toon ace Yoane Wissa – will have big boots to fill following Alexander Isak‘s record-breaking £130m departure to Liverpool.
Isak’s saga dragged on all summer and was on and off and then on and off again, before possibly the move of the summer was finally put to bed on deadline day.
Elsewhere, there are the likes of Kevin, Fulham‘s own £35m record-breaking arrival from Shakhtar Donetsk, Jaydee Canvot at Crystal Palace and Brian Brobbey at Sunderland who could also make first appearances for their new clubs at the weekend.
While some flag football teams have been playing for weeks, one of the City Section’s expected top teams, Birmingham, finally debuts on Wednesday at Arleta.
Coach Jim Rose has only two seniors on his team and has been working to get his players familiar with new rules, from punting to the defense getting to be only one yard away from the line of scrimmage before hiking the ball.
Bella Gonzalez, a second baseman on the softball team, will handle quarterbacking duties early while waiting for the No. 1 quarterback to recover from a knee injury.
Rose is particularly excited about freshman Ellie St. Hubert, a safety and receiver. “She is really good,” Rose said.
Banning is the defending City Open Division champion. Birmingham won the first title in 2023.
“We always think we’re going to be one of the top teams,” Rose said. “Athletically we’re better than last season.”
This is a daily look at the positive happenings in high school sports. To submit any news, please email [email protected].
At least 24 people were killed and 19 others injured in the village of Yarova after Russian military forces struck the area around 11 a.m. local time at Ukraine’s national post service as local workers and residents stood in line to receive a pension payout. Photo Provided By EPA/State Emergency Service of Ukraine
Sept. 9 (UPI) — At least two dozen people in Ukraine on Tuesday morning were killed in a Russian airstrike, with nearly as many injured at a postal building.
According to local authorities, at least 24 people are dead and 19 others injured in the village of Yarova in the Donetsk Oblast region after Russian forces struck the area around 11 a.m. local time at Ukrposhta, Ukraine’s national post service, as local workers and residents stood in line to receive a pension payout.
“Such Russian strikes must not be left without an appropriate response from the world,” Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky posted on social media.
Two injured were hospitalized but the full extent of damage was not immediately clear.
Regional Governor Vadim Filashkin called Russia’s air attack “pure terrorism” and said it was “not a military operation,” he wrote on Telegram.
The Ukrainian postal service facility sat less than 6 miles from Russian-occupied territory. Video footage depicted bodies among damaged postal service cars.
The attack represented a higher fatality count bombing since the end of last month when around 23 Ukrainians were killed in overnight air strikes on Ukraine’s capital Kyiv.
On Tuesday, Zelensky added that the world “must not remain idle” as a result of Russia’s morning airstrikes.
“A response is needed from the United States. A response is needed from Europe. A response is needed from the G20,” he stated.
Spurs lost 22 of their 38 league matches last season, accumulating only 38 points as they finished 17th – their worst finish in the Premier League.
They conceded 65 goals, with only Wolves and the relegated trio of Leicester, Ipswich and Southampton shipping more.
But Postecoglou led the club to a first major trophy in 17 years with a 1-0 win over Manchester United in the Europa League final.
The victory secured Champions League football, but it was not enough to keep Postecoglou in a job and he was sacked by the club 16 days later.
Spurs, who appointed Thomas Frank as his successor, said Postecoglou would be remembered for delivering “one of the club’s greatest moments” in becoming only the third manager to win them a European trophy.
Tottenham finished fifth in his first season in charge before he kept his promise to provide silverware in his second year.
Postecoglou was initially praised for the attacking style he implemented, but he was forced to defend himself from criticism for sticking to his principles and had to contend with a catalogue of injuries to key players.
The United Arab Emirates warned Wednesday that Israel’s annexation of the occupied West Bank would cross a “red line,” and end “the vision of regional integration,” Anadolu reports.
“Annexation would be a red line for my government, and that means there can be no lasting peace,” Emirati Special Envoy Lana Nusseibeh told The Times of Israel news outlet.
“It would foreclose the idea of regional integration and be the death knell of the two-state solution,” she said.
In 2020, the UAE signed US-sponsored agreements with Israel to normalize their relations. Bahrain, Sudan and Morocco also followed suit.
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said early Wednesday that Israel plans to annex 82% of the occupied West Bank to prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state.
“Israeli sovereignty will be applied to 82% of the territory,” Smotrich, the leader of the far-right Religious Zionism Party, told a press conference in Jerusalem.
The far-right minister called the West Bank annexation “a preventative step” against moves by many countries to recognize Palestinian statehood.
Several countries, including Belgium, France, the UK, Canada, and Australia, announced plans to recognize Palestinian statehood during the upcoming meetings of the UN General Assembly on Sept. 8-23, joining 147 nations that already do.
On Aug. 20, Israel approved a major settlement project, called E1, which aims to split the occupied West Bank into two parts, cutting off the northern cities of Ramallah and Nablus from Bethlehem and Hebron in the south and isolating East Jerusalem.
The international community, including the UN, considers the Israeli settlements illegal under international law. The UN has repeatedly warned that continued settlement expansion threatens the viability of a two-state solution, a framework seen as key to resolving the decades-long Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
In an advisory opinion last July, the International Court of Justice declared Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory illegal and called for the evacuation of all settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Late night has a new tone in 2025, and Greg Gutfeld is the one setting it, one unpredictable quip at a time. Rewriting the rules and bringing his signature acerbic style to “Gutfeld!” on Fox News, his show is drawing in more than 3 million viewers nightly, making it the most-watched show at the edge of prime time at 10 p.m. Eastern time / 7 p.m. Pacific time, airing over 90 minutes earlier than such hosts as Jimmy Kimmel and Jimmy Fallon
Stacking up gigs, he’s also the resident wild card on the network’s hit show “The Five,” and he hosts the new reality game show “What Did I Miss?” on Fox Nation, which was just renewed for a second season. Gutfeld isn’t just leaving his mark on the network; he’s reshaping it.
Before he became polarizing to some, and well before his New York Times bestsellers and his night of reminiscing on Jimmy Fallon’s couch, Gutfeld was climbing the editorial ranks at magazines like Men’s Health, Stuff and Maxim. His biggest break came when he landed the very late slot hosting his own Fox News show, “Red Eye,” which would set the stage for his runaway success.
Taking nothing too serious while being surrounded by complete seriousness, and with “Gutfeld!” pulling in some of the strongest ratings on TV, he’s proving that irreverence can be its own kind of relevance. His refusal to put so-called untouchables on a pedestal has everyone taking notice, and like him, loathe him or don’t know what to think about a grown man obsessed with unicorns, there’s no denying that Gutfeld has turned having a good time into a full-time job. And he’s just getting warmed up.
How do you find out you’re No. 1in the 10 p.m. timeslot? Is there a cake and a massive check?
It’s more brought to you and then happens over time. I get ratings every single day, so I was able to watch us win. I guess I wasn’t that surprised by it; I just knew that it was going to take time. I thought, yeah, maybe in a couple of years, but it was in like a matter of months.
For old–school fans of “Red Eye,” “Gutfeld!” feels familiar, with the blended panel that’s always down to have a good time. But now everyone gets more comfortable chairs, which is nice too.
I agree. “Gutfeld!” is basically “Red Eye” but for everybody. Red Eye was operating on the assumption that you really had a select group of people awake at 2 or 3 in the morning. It wasn’t trying to be a cultlike pleasure; it just happened to be that way. We did want it to be for everyone, though. Now we have 10 times the viewers and we’re No. 1, so in my mind I’m going, I want the same sensibility, but I don’t want to completely confuse the viewers. I realize that my humor on “Red Eye” was deliberately obtuse in some ways, and not really deliberately. It was just surreal and bizarre, and maybe that won’t fly in prime time or late night, but like “Red Eye,” our show now is as interesting and unpredictable as that show was. And that’s 90% of the fight.
There’s definitely an unpredictability theme going on because “The Five” can get somewhat fiery at times, but not for the reasons one would think.
With “Gutfeld!” and with “The Five,” I really push the concept of teasing, because when I genuinely like somebody, I tease them. When everybody is together teasing each other, it’s a very fun thing and the viewers are in on it. On “Red Eye,” we were all basically roasting each other, and on my show, we’re all making fun of each other, some more than others. On “The Five,” of course, I needle Dana [Perino] and Jesse [Watters], they needle me, I go after Jessica [Tarlov], she makes fun of us all — we all do it, and I think that’s really the secret sauce to the success of “The Five,” “Gutfeld!” and why “Red Eye” was so beloved. You felt like you were with the people. It was like a perverted version of “Friends.”
There really is this vibe that, no matter what gets said, when the camera goes off you’re all knocking back a few together.
Yeah, I think the key is that nothing you say should warrant an apology. Meaning, if I were to insult you, you’re not going to demand an apology from me. When somebody wants an apology for a comment I always ask them, “How would that apology sound? I’m sorry that the jokes I made hurt your feelings?” How insulting is that to that person you’re apologizing to! I’m sorry I hurt your feelings with this insult. It’s like the people that are demanding an apology don’t even see how absolutely insulting it is that they are asking for it.
Some people really write their own headlines. I imagine yours ramped up after you took “The King of Late Night” joke and ran with it?
I’m trying to think where “the king” came from, and I think I have to credit Dave Rubin. I think Rubin was on during the first week of the show and said something like, “You’re going to be the king of late night. You’re going to be No. 1.” I don’t like saying stuff like that because then it’ll just be thrown back in your face, but he was right! Then, of course, I had to put it on my book cover. I don’t even know how that all happened, but putting it on the cover of my book was just, like, this audacious and ridiculous thing, having me on the top like I’m a skyscraper where King Kong swatted down people.
Silly is definitely your lane. What do you think the term “late night” even means anymore? It used to be pretty neutral, and now it’s almost like you better choose a side before you watch this comic make their TV debut!
Yeah, it kind of became defined as maybe a person who wanted to go to bed angry with somebody who wanted to go to bed happy. One thing that I always want to do is not send people to bed enraged. Sure, maybe you’re sad that Biden lost, but we’re going to have so much fun, and this is going to be great! And then Trump wins. This is going to be so much fun, and this is going to be great! So, we’re going to have fun, and things are going to be great no matter who wins or loses. I’m not going to let that impact the time that we have. I think doing a late-night show that makes everyone feel bad is a disservice. I don’t understand that. That’s when you have people switching the channel to come to us. They didn’t even know that we existed until then.
What a shakeup that channel flip caused and, also, it’s pretty monumental because the viewers are staying.
You know, for a long time they couldn’t even mention my name and it was a personal thing for them, but then I think they realized that all I did was point out what was missing. I mean, they gave me the opportunity by not addressing most of the country, and it was there for the taking. There was literally free money on the table, and so I took it, and I showed [mainstream media] that they don’t own the culture. I think it’s not just about late night; it’s about all of culture. It’s the ability to tell people, you aren’t the cool kids at the table anymore. You took people for granted, you insulted everybody else, and we’re the ones now who are having fun.
Seeing you on Fallon also looked like a lot of fun. You could seriously feel your excitement as you told him your drunken story of meeting him. You think he’d ever come on ”Gutfeld!”?
It was fun! It went the way I think we both wanted it to go, which was like an old-school TV segment you would have seen on Carson. Just two people having a fun conversation. I probably talked too much, but I had to tell that drinking story because I’ve been telling that story for years, and the only person I hadn’t told that to was Jimmy. So yeah, we were both happy about it, and it’s good to see two industry people in whatever “supposed rivalry” who genuinely like each other without that other bull—. I haven’t asked him to come on, though. Our show is a little different because if you come on, you’re on for the whole hour. You’re also on with other people so it’s kind of a bigger ask of someone, but the president did do it so…
Early into my tenure as a new line-dancing enthusiast, I found myself in Chatsworth, alone on a Friday night. I was looking for action — the country dance kind. It was not yet dusk when I entered the Cowboy Palace Saloon, which hosts line dancing on most nights. Suddenly, L.A. felt very far away. In the parking lot, men were flicking cigarettes into the hot summer air. The space was almost dreamlike, with leather boots hanging above the bar table. American flags strung up. A cue ball clattered on a pool table.
In the bar area, I stumbled upon a crowd in denim vests and leather-soled boots dancing in unison. They were line dancing, warming up the dance floor before the live band started their set. A man told me that on any given Friday night, this is the wildest bar in America. I believed him.
The appeal of line dancing is simple: It’s a partnerless dance. And still, it naturally fosters community. Scared? Saddle up anyway. If you fumble, the line will keep moving — feet brushing, stomping, rocking it back — and soon enough, you’ll find your rhythm again.
In Los Angeles, line dancing has a storied legacy. “In the early ‘90s, there used to be country dance bars all over L.A.,” says Sean Monaghan, one of the founders of queer line dancing night Stud Country. While the popularity of line dancing has seen dips since then, the scene is once again experiencing a revival, partly due to the 2021 closure of country western institution Oil Can Harry’s in Studio City. Deeply feeling its absence, the community filled the void with pop-up line dancing nights scattered across L.A.
”People want to share their joy,” Monaghan says of these gathering spaces.
About This Guide
Our journalists independently visited every spot recommended in this guide. We do not accept free meals or experiences. What should we check out next? Send ideas to [email protected].
No one is born a cowboy; they become one. You can see that in the zeitgeist. Pop stars like Chappell Roan, Post Malone and Beyoncé are making country albums and singles. Sabrina Carpenter released a line-dancing tutorial to accompany her hit song “Man Child.” Cowboy boots and camouflage have become fashionable in the L.A. nightlife scene too, littered across wine bars and nightclubs. Queer-themed line-dancing nights are popping up at queer bars across the city, from Dude Ranch at Micky’s WeHo to Hogtied at Precinct. Line-dancing has experienced a Gen-Z makeover in L.A. with TikToks showing line dancers accessorized with Labubus.
Today you can try line dancing at several country western bars around town, each one as eclectic and unique as the dances themselves. Each of these events on the dance floor will have you feeling like you’ve been teleported to a rollicking barn party — and may just make you want to abandon your life for the Old West.
Kim Jong Un’s visit comes ahead of planned trip to China to attend military parade with Xi Jinping.
Published On 1 Sep 20251 Sep 2025
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has inspected a new missile production line and missile-manufacturing automation process, according to state media.
His visit on Sunday to the missile production line came ahead of a planned trip to Beijing to attend a military parade along with Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
North Korea is under heavy international sanctions imposed over its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programmes, which were developed in violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions.
Experts and international officials say the sanctions have lost much of their bite amid growing economic, military and political support from Russia and China.
Kim said that the modernised production process would help increase major missile units’ combat readiness, the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said on Monday.
North Korea has sent soldiers, artillery ammunition and missiles to Russia to support Moscow in its war against Ukraine.
North Korea’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs also criticised US cooperation with Japan and South Korea, singling out a recent trilateral joint statement that warned of cybersecurity threats from Pyongyang.
The ministry “strongly denounces and rejects” the United States, Japan and South Korea for using cyberspace as a “theatre of geopolitical confrontation and hostile propaganda”, a spokesperson said in a statement carried by KCNA.
“The more the US persists in its anachronistic and malicious hostile acts against the DPRK through the intensified collaboration with its satellite countries, the more distrust and hostility will be piled up between the DPRK and the US,” the spokesperson added, using the initials of North Korea’s official name.
CHELSEA are interested in signing Sporting Lisbon striker Conrad Harder, according to reports.
The Blues could re-enter the transfer market for a forward following the injury suffered by Liam Delap against Fulham on Saturday.
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Conrad Harder is attracting interest from ChelseaCredit: Shutterstock Editorial
Enzo Maresca’s side were on the brink of loaning Nicolas Jackson to Bayern Munich, having deemed the 24-year-old to be surplus to requirements.
Jackson was allowed to travel to Germany for a medical yesterday, only for Chelsea to pull the plug on the deal upon Delap’s injury.
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Pop superstardom, it turns out, did absolutely nothing to improve Sabrina Carpenter’s love life.
That’s the thrust of the singer’s shrewd and tangy “Man’s Best Friend,” which dropped Thursday night, just a year after last summer’s chart-topping “Short n’ Sweet.” The earlier album, which spun off a pair of smash singles in “Espresso” and “Please Please Please,” went on to be certified triple platinum and to win two Grammy Awards — more than enough to transform Carpenter, now 26, from a former Disney kid into the latest (and horniest) member of pop’s A list.
Yet all that success seems only to have attracted more of the losers she sang about last time. Here she’s dealing with a smooth talker doling out empty promises, a crybaby who can’t decide what he wants, even a guy so fixated on self-betterment that he’s lost interest in the bedroom.
“He’s busy, he’s working, he doesn’t have time for me,” she trills exasperatedly in “My Man on Willpower,” “My slutty pajamas not tempting him in the least.”
It’s a veritable gallery of rogues, this LP, not least the dude in the dark suit pictured on the cover of “Man’s Best Friend” with a hank of Carpenter’s blond hair in his fist as she kneels before him. The image inspired an instant controversy when she unveiled it in June, with critics accusing her of propping up dangerous ideas about the submission of women in the age of the tradwife.
Responded the singer in a CBS News interview that aired Friday: “Y’all need to get out more.”
Indeed, to take the album artwork at face value is to miss the whole point of Sabrina Carpenter, which is not just lampooning a prudish instinct — of course she’s in on the joke — but demonstrating the limits of a dating scene — of an entire social power structure — in which this is what a girl at the top has to work with.
“I like my boys playing hard to get / And I like my men all incompetent,” she sings in the LP’s opener and lead single, “Manchild.” She swears she’s not choosing them — that they keep choosing her. Then she punctuates the claim by batting her fake eyelashes and rhyming “Amen” with a flirty “Hey, men.”
As with “Short n’ Sweet,” Carpenter made “Man’s Best Friend” with a tight crew of accomplices — Jack Antonoff, John Ryan and Amy Allen, plus a bunch of tasty studio players — and once again they get a sound that combines the hooky splendor of ’70s-era AM-radio pop (think ELO, Wings and especially ABBA) with touches of country and dance music.
“Tears,” in which Carpenter lusts after a guy capable of putting together a chair from IKEA, is a pillowy disco thumper with echoes of KC and the Sunshine Band’s “That’s the Way (I Like It)”; “Nobody’s Son” puts starchy palm-court strings over a bouncy reggae groove. Carpenter’s singing plays like an actor’s sizzle reel, by turns winsome, sneering, bubbly and resigned; in the twangy “Go Go Juice” alone — it’s about a woman who’s woken up at 10 a.m. and opted to spend the day drunk-dialing exes — she runs through every emotional gradient separating determination from shame.
Song for song — line for line, really — “Man’s Best Friend” isn’t quite as sharp as “Short n’ Sweet,” which offered the rare thrill of a young artist coming into her own on her sixth studio album. Occasionally, you can sense Carpenter reaching for a memeable lyric, as in the many gags about wetness in “Tears”; “When Did You Get Hot?,” meanwhile, feels like something Ariana Grande abandoned after workshopping for a minute.
When she’s on, though, she’s on: “Goodbye” is a dazzling orchestral-pop number in which she gives the boot to a hot-and-cold lover — “Arrivederci, au revoir / Forgive my French, but f— you, ta-ta” — and “House Tour” a winking sex romp whose thwacking drums and rubbery funk bass call to mind Paula Abdul’s “Opposites Attract.” (After Doja Cat’s Antonoff-produced “Jealous Type,” might this signal a coming Abdul-aissance?)
Near the end of the album, Carpenter dials down the comedy for “Don’t Worry I’ll Make You Worry,” a sad and shimmery ballad about the thin line between love and war. “Silent treatment and humbling your ass / Well, that’s some of my best work,” she sings over strummed acoustic guitar before promising oh so sweetly to “leave you feeling like a shell of a man.”
Gov. Gavin Newsom spearheaded a bold overhaul of California’s congressional map, a move that could dramatically shift the state’s political landscape.
A Times analysis of recent election results found the redistricting effort, which will go to voters on Nov. 4 as Proposition 50, could turn 41 Democratic-leaning congressional districts into 47. Democrats currently hold 215 seats in the House, while Republicans control 220. If California voters approve the new map, the shift could be enough to threaten the GOP’s narrow majority.
Newsom’s plan was pushed by state and national Democratic leaders, following a move by Texas to approve its own maps that could give the GOP five more House seats. There’s also a push by the Republican-led states to redraw their lines before the 2026 midterm elections to help the Republicans remain in control. The governor’s plan was approved by the state Legislature last week and now goes to the voters in a November special election. This week California Republicans filed a lawsuit with the state Supreme Court to block the ballot measure.
To get a sense of how the proposed maps might alter the balance of power in Congress, The Times used results from the 2024 presidential election to calculate the margin of victory between Democrats and Republicans in the redrawn districts.
In some cases, districts were split apart and stitched together with more liberal areas. In one area, lines have been redrawn with no overlap at all with their current boundary. As a result, four formerly Republican-leaning swing districts would tilt slightly Democratic, while two others would shift more heavily toward the left. Four out of the five remaining Republican strongholds would become even darker red under the proposed map.
1st District: Rep. Doug LaMalfa (R-Richvale)
Under the proposed changes, the district would shift from a GOP-leaning area to a Democratic-leaning area.
In its current form, California’s 1st Congressional District sweeps south from the Oregon border almost to Sacramento. For the last 12 years, it has been represented by Republican Rep. Doug LaMalfa, who won reelection last November with nearly two-thirds of the vote.
But under the proposed map, that district is split in two. The new 1st District would run inland from Santa Rosa through Chico to the Nevada border. The redrawn 2nd District would follow the north coast from Marin County and the border with Oregon. It would also include deep red Shasta County.
The Times analysis found the proposed 1st District experienced the largest Democratic shift, among all the districts that flipped from red to blue, moving from a 25-point advantage for Trump to a 12-point advantage for Harris. That gain was made possible in part by pulling in more Democratic-leaning areas from the 2nd District, making it slightly less blue.
3rd District: Rep. Kevin Kiley (R-Rocklin)
The proposed district dips into blue Sacramento, flipping the district from red to blue.
Rep. Kevin Kiley has represented the 3rd District since 2022. But he would face an uphill battle to keep the seat on the redistricted map. The new lines lop off the conservative-leaning Eastern Sierra and instead pulls in Democratic voters from Sacramento.
In the 2024 presidential election, the current 3rd District backed Trump by 4 points. Under Newsom’s proposed map, that same area would have gone for Harris by 10 points, creating a 14-point swing that transforms the district from purple to solidly blue.
Kiley, whose district is targeted for elimination under Newsom’s plan, has called for a ban on all mid-decade congressional redistricting. The 3rd District’s boundaries are significantly reduced in the new map, and shifting demographics, including growth in the Asian American population, could further tilt the seat away from Republicans.
41st District: Rep. Ken Calvert (R-Corona)
The current 41st District will move completely.
Rep. Ken Calvert’s 41st District, long centered in the competitive western Inland Empire, would be eliminated and completely redrawn in Los Angeles County. The district would transform from a swinging GOP-leaning seat into one where Democrats would hold a 14-point advantage.
Parts of the new 41st would be carved out of the current 38th District, represented by Democrat Linda Sánchez. That change shifts some of Sánchez’s Democratic base into the new 41st district, making it more favorable to Democrats while leaving the 38th slightly less blue.
The proposed boundary for District 41 includes parts of District 38.
At the same time, the Hispanic share of the population would rise, further bolstering the Democrat‘s strength in the proposed district. The new 41st seat would become a majority-minority district. The redistricting proposal includes 16 majority-minority districts; the same number as the current map except for swapping the 41st District for the 42nd.
A section of the current 41st district would be added to Rep. Young Kim’s 40th District. The reshaped 40th District would move 9.7 points to the right — the biggest rightward shift among Republican-held districts.
48th District: Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Bonsall)
Under the proposed changes, 32% of the citizens of voting age in this district would be Latino, an increase from 24% currently. This district now includes Palm Springs.
The 48th District, a Republican stronghold represented by Darrell Issa, carried a 15-point GOP margin of victory under the current map. But the proposed lines would shift voters into San Diego County, giving Democrats a new edge. The district’s demographics would also change, with a larger share of Hispanic voters. As a result, what had been a safe Republican seat would become a swing district, where Democrats would hold a narrow 3-point advantage. The proposed 48th District includes Palm Springs, a liberal patch that was previously in the 41st District.
Deepening blue
Beyond flipping Republican-leaning swing districts, another aim of the redistricting plan is to shore up vulnerable Democratic seats. Democrats have long fought to hold onto these coastal Orange County seats, eking out narrow wins. Rep. Derek Tran of Cypress unseated a Republican incumbent by just about 650 votes, while Rep. Dave Min of Costa Mesa survived last November with a margin of less than 3 percentage points. Asians are the largest minority currently in Districts 45 and 47.
Under the current map, Harris carried the 45th District by only 1.5 points and the 47th by 4 points. But in Newsom’s proposed map, those advantages widen to 4 and 10 points, respectively, transforming fragile footholds into far safer Democratic turf.
The new changes dilute the number of GOP voters in both Rep. David Valadao’s District 22 and Rep. Adam Gray’s District 13.
— Additional development by data and graphics assistant editor Sean Greene.
Roberto Delgado and his wife were praying the rosary on the night of Jan. 7 when they heard two loud booms that shook their Sylmar home. Then came a flash of light so bright that in the dead of night they could briefly see out their window the rocks and gullies of the San Gabriel foothills behind their house.
Seconds later, Delgado said in an interview, the couple saw flames under two electric transmission towers owned by Southern California Edison — even more shocking because they had seen a fire ignite under one of those towers just six years before.
“We were traumatized,” he said. “It was almost the exact same thing.” In both fires, the family was forced to race to their car and flee with few belongings as the flames rushed through the brush toward their home, which survived both blazes.
Edison’s maintenance of its power lines is now under scrutiny in the wake of January’s devastating Eaton fire, which destroyed a wide swath of Altadena and killed 19 people. Video captured by eyewitnesses shows the Eaton fire igniting under Edison transmission towers.
A lawsuit making its way through Los Angeles County Superior Court is raising new questions about Edison’s role in the 2019 Saddle Ridge fire in Sylmar and whether the company was transparent about the cause of the blaze. The fire killed at least one person and destroyed or damaged more than 100 homes and other structures. Firefighters were able to contain the more recent Sylmar fire, called Hurst, before any homes were destroyed.
The lawyers contend that both fires were caused by the same problem: an improperly grounded transmission line running through the foothills of Sylmar that Edison failed to fix, which the company denies.
In a court filing, the lawyers included a deposition they took of an L.A. Fire Department captain who said he believed that Edison was “deceptive” for not informing the department that its equipment failed just minutes before the 2019 blaze ignited, and for having an employee offer to buy key surveillance video from that night from a business next to one of its towers.
Edison has flatly disputed the lawyers’ assertions, calling their claims about the 2019 fire an “exotic ignition theory” based on “an unproven narrative.”
Kathleen Dunleavy, a spokeswoman for Edison, said that the utility had complied with the requests of investigators looking into the two fires and that “there is no connection” between the incidents.
Dunleavy said Edison did not tell the fire department about the failure of its equipment in 2019 because it happened at a tower miles away from where the fire ignited. And she said it is common for any investigator to seek to obtain video that could aid in an investigation. “SCE’s investigator did not offer to buy surveillance video,” she said.
“We follow the law. Period,” she said.
Dunleavy said the company has completed tests that show the transmission line is safe. She declined to share the results and pointed to testimony by Edison’s expert in the case — Don Russell, a Texas A&M professor of electrical engineering — who said the line was properly grounded.
As for the Jan. 7 Hurst fire, the utility told regulators in a February letter that it believes its equipment “may be associated with the ignition” of the blaze. The letter said the company found two conductors on the ground under a Sylmar tower. The repairs, the letter said, included replacing equipment at several towers and more than three miles of cable.
Delgado and Perez say that on the night of the fire they heard two loud booms and a flash of light so bright they could briefly see out their window the rocks and gullies of the San Gabriel foothills.
(Myung J. Chun/Los Angeles Times)
Undergrounding of towers questioned
In dispute is whether the failure of steel equipment at the top of an Edison transmission tower on the night of Oct. 10, 2019, caused a massive power surge across the system, resulting in multiple towers becoming electrified and intensely hot.
The tower, where the steel part known as a y-clevis broke, sits just off the 210 freeway in Sylmar on land shared with a nursery. The Edison tower behind Delgado’s home where investigators say the 2019 fire ignited is more than two miles away from the nursery.
The attorneys said in court filing that Edison made a “cost-saving choice” when building the transmission line in 1970 to not include “any purposeful grounding devices” that would enable power surges to dissipate down the tower and into the earth. Instead, the company used “only insufficient concrete footings,” the lawyers said in their filing.
Mark Felling, an electrical engineer and paid expert in the case, testified that he found that the size of the cement footings under the towers along the line varied by a factor of 10. The size of the footings, he said,affects whether the tower is properly grounded.
Felling said he believed that a sudden power surge could cause some towers to become “electrified and potentially very hazardous.”
Edison has disputed that theory and said in court that the electrical surge caused by the failure of equipment at the tower by the nursery safely dispersed. The utility said it was scientifically impossible that the electrical surge caused a fire 2½ miles away.
“The undisputed material facts cannot support plaintiff’s theory that SCE caused the Saddleridge fire,” the company wrote in a motion this month, which asked the judge to dismiss the case. A hearing on the motion is scheduled for Oct. 6.
Edison’s motion included a copy of the L.A. Fire Department’s investigation, which included new details of how the company responded to fire investigators days after the 2019 fire.
Delgado said his rosary and prayers were important to surviving the fires.
(Myung J. Chun/Los Angeles Times)
Failure to report power surge
L.A. Fire investigator Robert Price arrived at the dirt road leading up to the hillside transmission line where the fire had ignited the night before to see the yellow crime scene tape lying on the ground and an Edison truck driving out, Price said in his report.
Price also wrote that Edison’s equipment recorded a fault that resulted in a surge of electricity about three minutes before Delgado reported the fire to 911 at 9 p.m. But the company did not tell the Fire Department about the fault, Price wrote.
Instead, L.A. Fire Capt. Timothy Halloran learned from a news report that Sylmar resident Jack Carpenter had recorded a large flash of light on his dashboard camera at 8:57 that night as he was traveling west on the 210 freeway.
Halloran traced the flash to a transmission tower built on land used by Ornelas Wood Recovery Nursery. Halloran interviewed employees at the nursery, who told him that an Edison employee had offered to buy the surveillance footage from the nursery’s camera, according to a deposition Halloran later provided to lawyers representing the victims.
A nursery employee also had taken photos of the broken steel equipment he found at the foot of the tower, according to Price’s report. The employee told Halloran that an Edison crew came the day after the fire and cleaned up the shattered pieces.
Halloran said in the deposition, according to a June court filing, that the company’s failure to report the fault and its offer to buy the nursery’s surveillance video made him believe that the company’s actions were “deceptive.”
Price said in his report that he also saw Edison crews cleaning the towers along the line three days after the fire’s start. An Edison employee told him that the utility cleans the towers once a year but had decided to clean them that day “because they were dirty from the smoke and fire,” Price wrote.
The cleaning did not prevent fire investigators from finding burn marks at the bottom of a second tower not far from where Delgado and his wife live, which Price said may be related to the “catastrophic failure” of equipment at the tower by the nursery.
In his final conclusion on the fire, Price wrote that it was “outside my expertise” to determine whether the failure of equipment at the tower above the nursery “could cause high voltage to travel back through the conductors … and cause a fire, possibly through the tower’s grounding system” more than two miles away.
“Therefore the cause will be undetermined,” Price wrote.
Dunleavy said that Edison had notified the California Public Utilities Commission about the fire before it began cleaning up the broken pieces of equipment found under the tower at the nursery. That cleanup and the company’s repairs, Dunleavy said, were needed to “ensure safety and reliability” of the line.
She added that it was common practice for utilities to wash down equipment after a fire before the system was reenergized.
According to an L.A. Fire investigator, Edison’s equipment recorded a fault that resulted in a surge of electricity about three minutes before Delgado reported the fire to 911 at 9 p.m.
(Myung J. Chun/Los Angeles Times)
State utility investigators find violations
Also investigating the 2019 fire in the days after its start was Eric Ujiiye at the Public Utilities Commission.
The commission’s safety staff investigates fires that may have been caused by electric lines to determine whether the utility violated safety regulations.
Ujiiye said in his report that he found that Edison violated five regulations, including failing to safely maintain its equipment at the tower by the nursery.
Even though Price’s investigation for the L.A. Fire Department stated that the cause is undetermined, Ujiiye said in his report that he believed that the failure of equipment at the tower by the nursery “could have led to a fire ignition” at the pylon more than two miles away.
The commission’s staff asked Edison to perform tests to show that the towers on the line were properly grounded. According to a written response from Edison, the utility objected to the request as “vague and ambiguous.” But the company agreed to do the tests, which would be observed by the commission inspectors.
Terrie Prosper, a spokeswoman for the commission, said that the agency’s staff was planning to meet with Edison at the transmission line to witness the tests. However, COVID-19 pandemic restrictions delayed that meeting and the requested undergrounding tests. She said that commission staff later learned that Edison had performed similar tests soon after the fire. Those test results “sufficed,” Prosper said, and the company “was not made to re-do the tests.”
Prosper said the commission did not fine or otherwise penalize Edison for the five violations because the LAFD report said the cause was undetermined. She said company had corrected the violations.
April Maurath Sommer, executive director of the Wild Tree Foundation, which has challenged Edison’s requests to have utility customers pay for fire damages, questioned the commission’s handling of the 2019 fire.
“You would think that the Public Utilities Commission would use fines to address really egregious behavior in the hope it would deter future behavior that causes catastrophic fires,” she said.
Maurath Sommer noted that Edison has been repeatedly found to have failed to cooperate with investigators looking into the cause of devastating fires. For example, commission investigators said in a report that the utility refused to provide photos and other details of what its employees found at the site where the Woolsey fire ignited in 2018. The Edison crew was the first to arrive at the scene of the fire that destroyed hundreds of homes in Malibu. Edison argued that the evidence was protected by attorney-client privilege.
Edison’s Dunleavy said the allegation by commission investigators was later resolved. “We take our obligation to cooperate with the CPUC seriously,” she said.
Prosper of the commission said, “Public safety is, and will remain, our top priority,”
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1.Fire fighters kept an eye on the wild fire burning behind Olive View Medical Center.(Irfan Khan/Los Angeles Times)2.A firefighting plane drops red Phos-Chek, a fire retardant, to protect Olive View Medical Center from wind driven Saddle Ridge wild fire in October 2019.(Irfan Khan/Los Angeles Times)3.Interstate 5 and California State Rute 14 were closed to traffic through Newhall Pass due to the Saddle Ridge fire.(Irfan Khan/Los Angeles Times)4.Firefighters cleared brush and mopped up a hillside along California State Highway 14 due to fire in 2019.(Irfan Khan/Los Angeles Times)
Another fire in Sylmar
At about 10:30 on the night of Jan. 7, Katherine Twohy heard a loud crack and saw a bright flash. Edison’s transmission towers in Sylmar skirt around the edge of the Oakridge Mobile Home Park, where Twohy, a retired psychologist, lives.
“I was just coming in my back door and there was just this incredible flashing of white lights,” Twohy said. “Incredibly blue-white lights.”
She walked to her living room window where she can see two Edison towers, which are separated by more than a hundred yards. Twohy said she could see flames at the base of each one.
“The fires had made little circles around the base,” she said.
Twohy said she saw flames under the same towers the night the Saddle Ridge fire ignited in 2019.
“I thought, ‘Oh my god, it’s just like last time,’” Twohy said.
In court, lawyers representing victims of the 2019 fire have seized on Edison’s admission that its equipment may have sparked the Jan. 7 fire.
“The evidence will show that five separate fires ignited at five separate SCE transmission tower bases in the same exact manner” as the 2019 fire, they wrote in a June court filing.
Delgado’s home sits next to the dirt road leading up to the towers. The Jan. 7 fire melted his backyard fence but did little more damage. In the days after the fire, he found that some of the same Edison employees he spoke to in 2019 as a witness reappeared.
“I saw the exact same people from Edison show up,” he said. “I told them your towers almost killed my family again.”
Times staff writer Kevin Rector contributed to this report.
The arrest of more than 700 people during Palestine Action demonstrations has rekindled the debate. These arguments revolve around how to balance state security and individual freedoms in the UK. Heavy policing, frequent raids and mass arrests have accompanied the protests that centre mainly on the UK based firms importing weapons related to the arms trade in Israel. It has been portrayed by the government that these are done as a part of law and order, but critics claim that such a magnitude of arrests against mostly peaceful protestors is alarming as it moves the state towards authoritarian policing. Civil liberties may be gutted when protest action is coded by the state through a mass punishment process that renders citizens freer to disagree with government policies or with corporate participation in controversial wars overseas.
The main problem with such developments is that there is an eroded distinction between policing and political repression. The actions of protesting arm companies with ties to Israel might be considered disruptive, however they are really acts of political speech which is a pillar of the democratic society. It is this aggressiveness in pursuing protesters that the state risks criminalizing activism. This is a bad precedent, peaceful opposition will be identified with crime, and any rightful protest will be discredited in the name of order. This attitude that the political leanings of a person can dictate the response of the police negatively affects the belief of the people in the police system as well as in encouraging people to practice democracy freely.
It is also a step in the wrong direction to make it public that these arrested suspects are of a particular race and their immigration status. Superficially it can be explained by the need to be transparent. Nevertheless, in practice it might stigmatize minority communities and present the picture protest as an imported issue by immigrants instead of a domestic political problem. These actions may strengthen the racist discourses as migrants or racial minorities appear to participate in the rebellion or crimes in huge proportions. When anti-immigrant rhetoric is already present in segments of political speech, racial and migration issues interact in the form of intensifying scapegoating of vulnerable groups and the continuing division of society. It is unsafe to make these sensitive factors of the anti-immigrant rhetoric and anti-immigration activism components of the public record in protest related cases.
The government has justified its move as a logical trade off: we must compromise our freedoms so that we can enjoy national security and safety. But history teaches us repeatedly that once you have unleashed restrictions of freedoms in the name of security, it seldom returns. The historic legacy of civil liberties in the UK in the form of the right to protest, freedom of speech and the right to assembly has already been undermined over the last few years by legislation like the Police, Crime Sentencing and Courts Act.
Such actions have empowered the police to repress demonstrations and thwart the fundamental meaning of democracy interaction. The recent suppression of Palestine Action is further evidence of this, only exacerbating the trend due to the simplicity with which governments justify making use of security to cover its authoritarianism.
Brute force policing of activists would even backfire as well. Likewise, surveillance, a sense of being silenced and wrong criminalization, are other factors that contribute to alienation among people. Such policies are likely to have the opposite effect to what they intend because they radicalize even more people into believing that peaceful means of protest are exhausted. These communities are already marginalized be it political, racial or immigration background and thus they are highly susceptible to such alienation. This strategy of the state fails to achieve its intended purpose of ensuring that society remains safe, opening even wider rifts in society and creating feelings of vengeance toward the institutions whose purpose is to cater to the needs of every citizen.
The UK will have to change its tune on protest and political dissent should it wish to continue adhering to its democratic ideals. Policing must be equally reasonable and unbiased, not a club of political expediency. Mass arrests and stigmatizing disclosures of race or immigration status are undone by dialogue and accountability instead of the involvement of activists by the authorities. An effective democracy needs to welcome disruptive protest when it reveals unpleasant facts about foreign policy or corporate cooperation in war. Silencing such activism can temporarily cripple vocal opinions but it will also undermine democracy within society in the long term.
The argument that is generated by the crack down on Palestine Action is not a single protest movement. It goes to the very core of what type of a society the UK aspires to be. Will it increase its authoritative policing that defies liberty at the cost of security? Or will it hold fast to its democratic tradition by safeguarding dissent even when that is disruptive or makes things uncomfortable? Publication of race and immigration status of suspects is nothing but a distraction to these underlying questions because it shifts the blame to a certain community instead of looking at the root of the problem which is the right of the citizens to speak and act against their own government. Finally, there is a chance that a society founded on the concepts of security over liberty will end up losing it all. The issue of liberty versus fear has few more clear cut versions in the UK.
ITV bosses have reportedly offered boxing champ David Haye a spot on the next season of I’m A Celeb’s All Stars spin off – with one major topic expected to be discussed around the campfire
David Haye is expected to return to I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here!(Image: ITV)
I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! is planning to add boxing champ David Haye to their knockout line-up of the next All Stars spin-off season. The former heavyweight champ, 44, first appeared on the long-running ITV reality show’s twelfth season back in 2012.
And he may be returning to the jungle as one of the All Star contestants for the spin-off series that sees past participants return for another round of stomach churning trials. The first season of the All Stars version, titled I’m a Celebrity… South Africa, aired in 2023 with Myleene Klass being crowned winner.
And now a string of popular former contestants are being lined up for a second trip to the outback – with David among the top names wanted to take part in the series. He came third when he participated in the series the last time behind winner Charlie Brooks, of EastEnders fame, and Pussycat Dolls runner-up Ashley Roberts.
The boxing hunk was a hit on the show back in 2012(Image: davidhaye)
Since then, David’s foray into the world of media stardom has seen him appear in shows including The Big Narstie Show and his own David Haye versus series, which saw him interview and train with major celebrities.
A source told The Sun: “David was delighted to get the call from ITV. As viewers know, no chats are off-limits around the campfire, so they can expect to see David grilled over his quirky relationships.” The Mirror has contacted representatives of David and ITV for comment.
It is expected that the new season of the ITV show will begin filming in the autumn months when a string of other former contestants will return to the wilderness to survive on basic rations. Football icon Harry Redknapp, 78, who won in 2018, and Gemma Collins, 44, who quit the show after three days in 2014, are among names linked to the new season.
A number of familiar faces are expected to jet to Australia in November to film the next season of the main I’m A Celeb series. It will be the 25th outing of the show – which first aired way back in 2002.
Gemma Collins is also tipped to return to the jungle(Image: PA)
Hosts Ant McPartlin and Declan Donnelly will travel Down Under to preside over all the terrifying trials and encourage the celebs to eat revolting meals and drinks. The 2024 season of the show was won by McFly singer Danny Jones.
But the 39-year-old singer has had a difficult few months since he was crowned the king of the jungle. He was shamed in March when video footage emerged of him locking lips with fellow I’m A Celeb 2024 contestant Maura Higgins, of Love Island fame.
The footage sparked shock among his fans – who have championed his marriage to beauty contestant Georgia Horsley – a former Miss England winner. The couple have been an item since 2009 and they have been married since 2014.
They also welcomed a son named Cooper who was born in 2018. Danny offered a groveling apology to his wife which he issued via social media soon after his extramarital kiss went viral.
In a statement, the McFly singer said: “Hello everyone, sorry it’s taken me a while to post this but I’ve taken some time out to be with those closest to me. I want to deeply apologise to my wife and family for putting them in this situation. I love them so much and we’ll continue to deal with this privately.
“I love you guys, thank you for your patience, understanding, and support. See you all soon, Danny.” Meanwhile, a source close to Danny revealed at the time that he was “mortified” by what happened as well as the “awful situation he has put everyone in”.
Sixth in a series of stories profiling top high school football players by position. Today, Mikhal Johnson, Sierra Canyon defensive lineman.
Mikhal Johnson, 6 feet 2 and 255 pounds, has played defense all his football life. Then came the moment last season when Sierra Canyon coach Jon Ellinghouse gave him a chance to catch a pass from quarterback Wyatt Becker in a Mission League championship game against Gardena Serra.
Johnson called it “something out of a movie.”
“We practiced it a couple times during the week,” Johnson said. “Coach called me over, ‘We’re running the play.’ I lined up at tight end. I did a fake block. I go out, nobody is guarding me. This is it. Wyatt throws me the ball over my shoulder. I catch it. It was like, ‘Yes.’ I was so excited. My first ever touchdown the first time I played a skill position in my life.”
Nothing comes as a surprise for Johnson, who also had a baseball game in the spring in which he hit two home runs and had seven RBIs against Camarillo.
Ivy League football schools have been lining up trying to get him to consider their experience of academics and athletics. He had 16 tackles for losses last season.
“I think he’s almost unblockable,” Ellinghouse said. “I’ve seen him screw up several of my practices and go up against some the best high school players in the world. He’s a perfect combination of strength and twitchiness. He has long arms and deceptive strength.”
Johnson is one of many outstanding defensive linemen and edge rushers set to make an impact this season. The position might be the strongest of any in Southern California when considering talent and depth.
Richard Wesley of Sierra Canyon changed his classification to class of 2026 because he’s been a standout since freshman year and is a Texas commit. Mater Dei has the most dominant lineman in Tomuhini Topui, a 315-pound USC commit known for throwing around blockers and running backs.
Khary Wilder of Gardena Serra, an Ohio State commit, is coming off a junior season in which he recorded 11 tackles for losses. Andrew Williams of Fremont is a 6-5, 220-pound USC commit trying to prove you can still make it out of the City Section. Sophomore Marcus Fakatou of Orange Lutheran and junior ElijaHarmon of Inglewood are big, strong and intimidating young stars in the making. Anthony Jones of Crean Lutheran is a UCLA commit known for his pass-rushing skills.
Before spring break, 6-foot-2, 255-pound defensive lineman Mikhal Johnson of Sierra Canyon had seven RBIs and two home runs, including grand slam pic.twitter.com/S4YMBfa4cy
Malik Brooks of St. Pius X-St. Matthias is a 330-pound tackle committed to USC who knows how to take apart double teams. Devyn Blake of Edison has the size to cause havoc. Elijah Staples of Marquez is a defensive end who had 13 sacks as a sophomore. Dutch Horisk of St. John Bosco is an Oregon commit who had four sacks last season.
There’s many defensive linemen this season ready to be difference-makers, and Johnson fits right in.
He has used baseball to help him excel in football.
“I feel they both help me,” he said. “Baseball is good hands-eye coordination and because I’m a defensive linemen I use my hands a lot. Seeing a baseball, the reaction time is like an offensive lineman using their hands.”
Sierra Canyon is still trying to find a way to get past Mater Dei and St. John Bosco in the Southern Section Division 1 playoffs, a roadblock that most teams in Southern California have failed to get through.
“It’s a fire under our butts to keep going,” Johnson said. “We practice hard.”
Monday: Ventura linebacker Tristan Phillips.
Defensive linemen to watch
Malik Brooks, St. Pius X-St. Matthias, 6-4, 330, Sr. USC commit is big roadblock in the middle
Marcus Fakatou, Orange Lutheran, 6-7, 265, So. His talent level is off the charts
Dutch Horisk, St. St. John Bosco, 6-3, 240, Sr. Four-year starter is Oregon commit
Mikhal Johnson, Sierra Canyon, 6-2, 255, Sr. Had 16 tackles for losses
Anthony Jones, Crean Lutheran, 6-4, 285, Sr. UCLA commit keeps building up strength
Simote Katoanga, Santa Margarita, 6-5, 250, Sr. JSerra transfer is physical specimen
Izak Simpson, Simi Valley, 6-3, 260, Sr. Sacramento State commit has 29 sacks the last two years
Tomuhini Topui, Mater Dei, 6-3, 320, Sr. USC commit could play for any college in the country
Richard Wesley, Sierra Canyon, 6-5, 250, Sr. Texas commit had nine sacks last season
Khary Wilder, Gardena Serra, 6-4, 260, Sr. Ohio State commit is four-year starter who shows up every game
ANCHORAGE — President Trump is on his way to Alaska for a high-stakes summit with Vladimir Putin, indicating he will take a tougher line with the Russian leader over a ceasefire in Ukraine after three brutal years of war.
Speaking with reporters aboard Air Force One, Trump said Putin would face “economically severe” consequences if negotiations in Anchorage today fail to yield progress toward peace. He said that only Ukraine could decide whether to cede territory to Moscow. And he expressed support for U.S. security guarantees for Ukraine in any future peace agreement, so long as they fall short of NATO membership for the beleaguered nation.
“Yes, it would be very severe,” Trump said. “Very severe.”
Traveling from Moscow, Putin is bringing along several Russian business leaders, according to the Kremlin, a sign he hopes to begin discussions on normalizing relations with Washington. But Trump said he would not discuss business opportunities until the war is settled.
It’s a position that will relieve allies in Europe that have been hoping Trump would approach Putin with a firm hand, after months of applying pressure on Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, to prepare to make concessions to Moscow.
Zelensky was not invited to the Alaska negotiations. But Trump said he hoped his meeting on Friday would lead to direct talks “very shortly.”
Trump had said in recent days that a peace deal would include the “swapping” of land, a prospect roundly rejected in Kyiv. The Ukrainian constitution prohibits territorial concessions without the support of a public referendum.
“They’ll be discussed, but I’ve got to let Ukraine make that decision,” the president said of land swaps. “I’m not here to negotiate for Ukraine. I’m here to get them to the table.”
Trump will host Putin at the Elmendorf Air Force Base in Anchorage later on Friday, the first meeting between a U.S. and Russian president since 2021.
Russian Foreign Ministry officials said Wednesday that Putin’s war aims remain “unchanged.” And an aggressive Russian advance along the front lines this week provided evidence to military analysts that Moscow has no plans to implement a ceasefire.
The two leaders are expected to greet one another on the tarmac before meeting privately. Afterward, they will take an expanded lunch meeting with their aides, followed by a news conference, according to the White House.
