video

Israeli troops opened fire Saturday at a group of Palestinians who did not appear to be posing a threat in the occupied West Bank, wounding one man, according to video obtained by The Associated Press.

The video, shot by an eyewitness, showed the man falling to the ground near the Palestinian village of Faqqua, north of the West Bank.

At least 14 shots in total were fired during the duration of the video. They continued as several men rushed to move the injured man to safety before setting him down and tying a tourniquet around his leg in an apparent attempt to stop the bleeding.

Mahmoud Shahin, a resident of the village, said the Palestinians had rushed to the area after receiving reports that Israeli settlers had arrived there with a flock of sheep. He said Israeli soldiers then came and began firing in the air and toward the Palestinians.

He added that the wounded man was undergoing surgery at a hospital in Jenin.

Israel’s military said the video was authentic and confirmed its forces had fired toward the Palestinians, wounding one man, and said commanders would review the incident.

Under the ultranationalist government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, settler violence in the West Bank has surged. The international community largely considers Israeli settlements to be illegal and obstacles to peace.

Over 700,000 Israelis now live in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, areas captured by Israel in the 1967 Mideast war and claimed by the Palestinians as parts of a future state.

Judy Judge is hanging up her robe.

Nearly 30 years after Judy Sheindlin launched a career that made her TV’s most widely recognized judge — first on the syndicated small claims series “Judge Judy,” which premiered in 1996 and ran for 25 seasons; then on Amazon Prime’s streaming show “Judy Justice” starting in 2021 — she’s passing her gavel to a fitting successor: her son, Judge Adam Levy.

The 83-year-old Sheindlin told People magazine that when “Judy Justice” wraps in October, she’s moving away from on-camera work to focus on other endeavors, including afternoon naps and developing the animated series “Judyverse” based on the “Baby Judge Judy” videos circulating social media.

Created with AI, the videos feature a toddler version of Judge Judy overseeing cases with her signature New York accent and no-nonsense barbs.

“I don’t want to do hair and makeup anymore, but I still want my message to get out there,” she told the outlet.

Sheindlin will also produce her son’s syndicated court TV show, “Adam’s Law,” which debuts Monday.

“There aren’t a lot of people who can carry a half-hour on their own, unscripted,” Sheindlin continued, adding that Levy has what it takes.

The 58-year-old earned his law degree from Hofstra Law School in 1992. This isn’t his first foray into TV, as he joined a panel of judges on Prime’s “Tribunal Justice” in 2023. After three seasons, Sheindlin said he’s ready for his close-up.

On Sept. 22, CBS will air a 30th anniversary special looking back on Sheindlin’s career, “Judge Judy: Unfiltered, Unforgettable.”

“I don’t think that I’ve ever been this content before,” she told People of entering the next era of her life. “I don’t have to prove anything else. I did it.”

The sprawling snack-food factory in upstate New York appeared to be closed when a small army of immigration officers arrived after 9 a.m. Following a brief discussion of whether to force their way inside, a manager opened the front door.

Over the next several hours, body cameras were running as federal authorities from several agencies made 57 arrests, debated which files to seize and when to release employees who were U.S. citizens. They also searched for anyone in hiding.

The footage from September 2025 shows the raid at the Nutrition Bar Confectioners plant in Cato, N.Y., town of 2,500 people east of Syracuse, and offers a rare glimpse inside a workplace immigration sweep. The Associated Press analyzed the video, which was part of a lawsuit filed Thursday that accuses authorities of overstepping their search warrants.

The officers ordered a manager to announce their presence over loudspeakers while they entered the building and caught employees on the production line, in the warehouse and a few in the bathroom. Officers covered all exits while others swept the interior, including homing in on locked doors.

Male officers encountered a locked bathroom and began shouting instructions in broken Spanish at female employees through the door, demanding that they come out. After about 10 seconds, officers broke through the door.

One woman was outside of a stall and another in the stall. A male officer peered through a locked stall door, and his body cam video revealed a woman sitting on the toilet.

“Miss, pull up your pants. Come out of the bathroom,” he told her.

“You have to wait. I can’t come out like this, naked!” she replied.

Investigators interviewed the general manager and said they were looking into hiring practices and potential fraudulent documents. Inside and outside the building, officers checked every office, storage room and hallway for anyone who was hiding.

Employees were lined up and separated into groups of U.S. citizens and potential noncitizens. Officers asked for their immigration status, requested documents and posed questions about their entry into the U.S. Some employees were pregnant.

Some were parents and expressed concern for their children at home. Others said they would not answer questions without first speaking to their attorneys, and officers told them they would be arrested.

One employee refused to answer questions. “Will you let me talk to my attorney?” she asked the officer. He raised his voice and continued asking about her immigration status.

U.S. citizens were asked for personal information, including their phone numbers and addresses before they were allowed to leave.

A Border Patrol agent who spoke to another official wearing a camera used disparaging language about children from other countries when recounting his experience working at a South Texas immigrant detention center. He said President Biden’s administration allowed millions of people to enter the United States from countries where children are treated “differently” than they are by American parents.

“In other countries, kids are more of a commodity or it’s more of like, I’m going to put it in those terms. It’s more like an animal, right? It’s not prized the way that we do it,” he said.

“There’s countries like Brazil and other places where they’re literal street rats at a very young age who commit crimes, and then they come here. I don’t know if you have kids, but they’ll eat our kids for breakfast.”

The Homeland Security Department said Friday that it executed a criminal search warrant at the plant as part of an investigation that is still open. Its statement did not address the contents of the video or the merits of the lawsuit.

Not all officers wore body cameras, but those who did often indicated to other officers that they were recording before they initiated a conversation.

ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations unit is responsible for workplace raids, which have been relatively few and low-key compared with ICE’s removal unit, which arrests people in the street, at homes and in public and also manages detention centers. The Trump administration’s largest workplace raid was last year at a Hyundai electric vehicle plant in Georgia. It resulted in nearly 500 arrests and fueled diplomatic tension with South Korea.

The lawsuit against Homeland Security claims federal officers exceeded the authority of their warrants and violated workers’ constitutional rights against unlawful search and seizure.

“There were no arrest warrants,” said Perry Grossman, a supervising attorney at the New York Civil Liberties Union, which filed the lawsuit with the Worker Justice Center of New York.

“There was no suspicion that individual workers had committed crimes. And they seized easily 100 people for nonconsensual questioning. They arrested 57. Out of those 57 people, criminal charges were brought against only five. And the most serious charge was unlawful reentry.”

Grossman said one employee got her charges dismissed after contending in a lawsuit that her 4th Amendment rights were violated. He said he was not aware of any charges or indictments against the employers.

Officers detained about 60 people and deported some employees, including two plaintiffs who are part of Thursday’s lawsuit. One plaintiff has since been allowed to reenter the country. Attorneys for the second deported plaintiff are seeking his return.

Law enforcement agencies have come under criticism for not using body cameras and for refusing to release footage when they do. ICE, in particular, has been scrutinized after a $75-billion infusion from Congress and an expanding street presence that has led to three fatal shootings this year.

ICE’s own rules on releasing video are unclear. Its policy calls for expedited release of footage after a serious injury or death in custody when doing so is determined to be in the “ best interests of the agency.”

The Trump administration has repeatedly promised to equip ICE field agents with body cameras, as required by Congress. Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said last week that the agency was “on track” to do so by the end of September.

Gonzalez and Vancleave write for the Associated Press.

Pennsylvania senator who has clashed with party over Israel support says he will reject ‘the extremes and socialism’.

Pennsylvania Senator John Fetterman, a Democrat who has distanced himself from his party, has appeared in a video recording on the first day of the Republican Party’s two-day midterm convention in the United States.

The video on Wednesday was a surprise for those who attended the conservative gathering in Dallas, Texas, where President Donald Trump is seeking to galvanise support ahead of the November elections.

“Yes, I’m Senator John Fetterman, Pennsylvania. Yes, I’m a Democrat. Why am I here talking to you today? Because, well, I’m a common-sense Democrat,” Fetterman said as he introduced his Republican colleague, Senator Dave McCormick of Pennsylvania.

Fetterman, a 57-year-old first-term senator, has cast himself as an outsider within the Democratic Party.

He has offered outspoken support for Israel and the war on Iran, even as voters and progressive voices in his party criticise those elements of US foreign policy.

“I’m always going to stand with America. I’m always going to reject the extremes and socialism and that anti-American way of life,” Fetterman said in the video clip.

But his appearance at the Republican Party’s first-ever midterm convention is likely to exacerbate criticism from his Democratic colleagues.

US Representative Brendan Boyle, another Pennsylvania Democrat, has repeatedly questioned Fetterman’s party allegiance, as well as his commitment to public service. He renewed that sentiment after Wednesday’s video aired.

“A year ago I labeled John Fetterman ‘Trump’s favorite Democrat.’ Tonight, he yet again proves why,” Boyle wrote on social media.

Fetterman has also faced questions about his fitness for office following a series of reports that detail his apparent lack of enthusiasm for his Senate responsibilities.

A recent Wall Street Journal article found that the senator had cancelled meetings with constituents.

In one case, The Wall Street Journal said he skipped a June meeting with injured military veterans, citing illness, only to show up later for a Fox News interview about Israel and its joint war with the US on Iran.

His approval rating is now higher among Republicans in Pennsylvania than among members of his own party.

Last month, a poll from The New York Times, Siena College and The Philadelphia Inquirer suggested that 73 percent of Pennsylvania Republicans approved of Fetterman’s performance, up from 25 percent in 2024.

Meanwhile, Democratic support in the state had slid dramatically over the last two years, slipping from 74 percent to 22 percent. Some 63 percent of Democratic respondents held an unfavourable view of him.

While Fetterman has depicted himself as a maverick within the Democratic Party, he has denied that he would switch parties to become a Republican.

“I’m not going to be a Republican, but I’m going to be a Democrat that’s going to have a conversation with whoever is playing it straight,” he said in a recent interview with Fox News.

Still, speculation about Fetterman’s party credentials has continued as the midterms near.

The election on November 3 will decide which party controls Congress for the final two years of Trump’s term.

Republicans currently hold a small majority in the House of Representatives and Senate, but they could face a setback at the polls as voters express frustration over cost of living issues and Trump’s deepening unpopularity.

Still, reclaiming the Senate especially could be an uphill climb for Democrats. Only a third of Senate seats are up for re-election this year, compared with all 435 House seats.

Fetterman is not up for re-election until 2028.

Workers at “World of Warcraft” video game developer Blizzard Entertainment have ratified union contracts after two years of bargaining.

The ratification vote means all union-represented Blizzard employees — nearly 1,900 people across all units in the company’s games teams and shared services — will have the same contract language in their respective departments, the union said Wednesday.

Blizzard quality assurance workers in Albany and Austin were the first to unionize in 2022, followed by “World of Warcraft” employees in 2024. Last year, workers on the “Overwatch,” “Diablo,” “Hearthstone” and Warcraft Rumble” games teams, as well as the story and franchise development and platform technology units unionized.

“This contract marks the beginning of a new era at Blizzard Entertainment, but it doesn’t stop with us,” “Overwatch” bargaining committee member and quality analyst Simon Hedrick said in a statement. “I believe that the positive change we have won will ripple out and help make the games industry as a whole a better place for workers and players alike.”

The Blizzard contracts include wage increases and a hybrid work week of three days in the office, among other provisions, the union said. The contracts also require Blizzard to discuss and bargain over the use of artificial intelligence in the workplace.

“We appreciate the dedication and engagement of our represented employees and the bargaining committees throughout this process, as well as every Blizzard employee whose work continued alongside it,” Johanna Faries, Blizzard’s president, said in a statement. “The ratification of these agreements marks a significant milestone and reflects our shared commitment to continuing to work together in support of our teams and our players.”

Blizzard is a subsidiary of Santa Monica-based Activision Blizzard. The company was acquired by tech giant Microsoft Corp. in 2023.

In July, Microsoft said it would cut 3,200 jobs in its video game division, or about 20% of that staff, over the next year as the gaming industry continues to face a flagging landscape. The layoffs were part of a larger cost-cutting effort at Microsoft, which is laying off about 2% of its workforce in total.

Blizzard’s union said the planned layoffs, as well as job cuts throughout the video game industry, were a major issue during contract negotiations.

One of the provisions in the Blizzard contracts gives laid-off workers the right to be “recalled” into open jobs across Blizzard’s bargaining units for 14 months after the announcement of their layoff.

“This contract secures a lot of what people already love about working here while adding strong protections around layoffs, job security and remote work,” Daniel Weltz, platform and technology bargaining committee member and principal software engineer, said in a statement. “Blizzard helped shape the gaming industry, and I’m proud that this contract allows us to continue setting new standards for this work.”

Ben Shelton messed up.

Sure, the U.S. tennis star advanced to his second U.S. Open semifinal in epic fashion, knocking off defending champion Carlos Alcaraz in a five-set marathon that did not end until 3:33 a.m. ET Wednesday.

It was during his on-court interview afterward, however, that Shelton committed a bit of a faux pas while discussing the match that ended later than any other in tournament history.

“I’m just hoping that my best friend and my sister over there don’t have to be at work at 6 a.m. in three hours,” Shelton said following the 6-7 (5), 6-1, 6-3, 1-6, 7-6 (10-7) victory. “It’d be huge from their employers to let them have the day off today.”

Shelton certainly didn’t have to give a shout out to two of his loved ones for hanging in there for the entire 4 hours 28 minutes … but since he did, there’s one other person Shelton probably should have mentioned as well: soccer star Trinity Rodman, who also was sitting courtside throughout the match. TV cameras showed her laughing and apparently saying, “What about me?”

Shelton and Rodman have been dating for more than a year, after going Instagram official in May 2025. They are seen in the stands at each other’s sporting events when their schedules allow.

For the record, Rodman apparently did have to work hours later. The U.S. national team and Washington Spirit player posted a video later Wednesday morning on TikTok that showed her inside a gym with the caption, “Yes, I’m at training now.”

She doesn’t seem to hold a grudge over her boyfriend’s omission, though. Rodman posted a video on her Instagram Story of the match’s aftermath, with the caption, “The moment belongs to Shelton!”

And Shelton actually did include Rodman in that moment, with the two of them making eye contact and flashing his signature “dialed-in” hand motion to each other as he celebrated.

Rodman’s schedule with the Spirit hasn’t allowed her to attend all of Shelton’s matches at Flushing Meadows, but she has been to at least three. For his Round 2 victory against Hubert Hurkacz, Rodman wore a black crop top that read, “I ❤️ my boyfriend.”

For the quarterfinal, Rodman carried a Shelton figurine, possibly as a good luck charm.

Shelton will face fellow U.S. player Frances Tiafoe in Friday’s semifinals.

ROCKERS Liam and Noel Gallagher have teased yet another tour location in a cryptic new video – and fans are convinced they’ve guessed it.

But, can you guess where too?

The legendary band, Oasis, reformed in 2024 after the long-feuding brothers split up in 2009.

Over the past few weeks, Liam and Noel, 59, have dropped a string of cryptic videos, leaving fans scratching their heads.

The clips have confirmed another tour is coming in 2027 and left viewers scrambling to decode the gig locations after their reunion success last year.

Taking to X, the brothers shared a short clip of a European-looking side street.

I DREAM OF VIEW

Where to watch the Oasis documentary: Cinema and Disney+ release dates

call back

Oasis teaser video ‘confirms’ tour location with cheeky nod group’s history

Two girls on a red Vespa then come zooming down the alley and it’s once again left silent.

Of course, fans immediately began dissecting the video in the comments and most came to the same conclusion – Rome.

One fan wrote: ” Rome. The area looks like Trastevere. Other clues: Red scooter and yellow headlight = AS Roma colours.

“Rider 1 in light blue & blue helmet = Lazio colours. Rider 2 in the Italian flag helmet.”

Sharing a snap that looked very similar to the video location, another fan said: “Stayed in Trastevere in Rome last week and it looks like the same area.”

A third fan added: “Pretty sure I’ve walked down that exact street in Rome.”

Just yesterday, Liam, 53 and Noel, teased another upcoming tour location with a subtle nod to a moment that happened around the group’s original split.

In the clip, a man wearing a leather jacket took out a plum from a paper bag and began eating it.

Soon after this, he lobbed the plum away somewhere off camera, into the distance.

It cheekily references Noel previously telling how – during a heated 2009 argument at the Rock en Seine Festival in Paris the time of his Oasis departure – Liam threw a plum at him.

Fans were convinced the clip hinted at a France tour date – with references to “Rock en Seine” and “Au Marché” visible.

Back in June, The Sun exclusively revealed that Oasis will returning to the stage next year with a record-breaking run of six concerts at Knebworth and a 12-date residency at the Etihad Stadium in Manchester.

WASHINGTON — In the real world, President Trump is struggling to stop inflation, rout the Iranian government and restore American manufacturing with tariffs.

However, it’s a different story in the fantastical vision that he shares with supporters on social media. Over Labor Day weekend, Trump and the White House unleashed an extraordinarily heavy torrent of memes that portrayed the president as singularly powerful.

One video depicted Trump as a superhero wielding Green Lantern’s ring to effortlessly build a wall to keep out migrants and erect a slew of busy factories. Another post showed him in a U.S. hockey uniform looming over Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney as Carney cowered on the ice. And another had Trump on a military ship as it bombarded an enemy fleet.

Trump’s allure has always relied on a mythical version of himself, from “The Apprentice” to the White House, but the gap between meme and reality has become glaringly stark ahead of the midterm elections. Most U.S. adults are unhappy with Trump’s handling of the economy and say the Iran war hasn’t been worth it, but Trump has responded with outlandish images of himself as unstoppable and omnipotent.

Memes risk sidestepping reality

Some of the pictures are generated with artificial intelligence, and the administration has previously defended the memes as funny and their critics as humorless. Yet the stakes right now are serious for congressional Republicans who have tied their own fate to a president with low approval numbers. Trump’s party will put him center stage at an unusual midterm convention on Wednesday and Thursday in Dallas in hopes of stoking voters’ enthusiasm.

Kevin Madden, a Republican strategist, said that Trump’s social media posts can energize his base of “Make America Great Again” followers, although the tradeoff is that he’s not talking about how to fix inflation.

The voters who are likely to determine control of Congress in the midterms “are not going to be won over with memes,” Madden said. “The affordability voter is driving this election cycle and the issues they care about are anchored in the economy.”

The White House press office did not respond to a request for comment. Trump sometimes plucks memes from a sprawling ecosystem of online conservative supporters, and sometimes his government staff produces them as part of their official messaging. Recently they created a series of old-school video games, such as a “Tetris” knockoff called “Build the Wall.”

“The memes will continue,” Kaelan Dorr, a member of the White House communications team, recently posted on social media. “The winning will continue.”

Aging presidents promote vitality online

The problem for Trump is that voters have other images they’re using to define him. Drivers can spot through their windshields that gasoline is averaging $4.15 a gallon, up nearly 30% from a year ago because of the Iran war. And social media is inundated with questions about the 80-year-old president’s health and vitality, spurred by pictures of his bruised hands or video clips of him appearing to fall asleep in meetings.

White House officials have said the bruising is caused by “frequent handshaking” and Trump’s aspirin regimen, and they’ve denied that he’s dozed off.

Trump’s predecessor, Joe Biden, is three years older and faced relentless scrutiny about his age while in office. His White House came to embrace a meme version of Biden with lasers for eyes, suggesting that he was powerful and focused rather than infirm.

Andrew Bates, who was a deputy press secretary for Biden, said that Trump’s memes seem to be about avoiding the actual responsibilities of governing. He said they risk angering voters who see Trump as more focused on redecorating the White House than bringing the Iran war to a successful end.

“When a president who ran on bringing gas prices under $2 a gallon is now saying, ‘You’re at four dollars, it’s OK,’ it unfortunately makes sense that he’s also posting fever dreams,” Bates said.

Some memes have caused trouble

The memes have occasionally gotten Trump into trouble. He posted an image of himself as Jesus in April, which caused a degree of consternation among some supporters. The president later claimed he thought the image showed him as a medical doctor — albeit a doctor in Biblical robes with light emanating from his hands.

In February, his account posted a racist video of former President Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, as primates, which he deleted after a backlash.

Last October, Trump shared a video of him in a fighter jet dumping feces on Americans who were protesting his policies.

What the memes have not done so far is boost his wider approval ratings. Only 33% of U.S. adults approve of how he is handling the job of being president, according to a July AP-NORC poll.

But the polling also hits at a reason why he might be sending the memes to rally his core supporters. Just 15% of U.S. adults strongly approve of his presidency, the poll found, a slight decline from 22% shortly after he took office.

Boak writes for the Associated Press.

A SLEW of Howard Stern Show staffers have been marked safe from the rounds of layoffs that concluded over the summer.

In a new video posted to the show’s official Instagram page, at least nine employees were revealed to still be working for Stern.

Executive producer Gary Dell’Abate, also known by his nickname Baba Booey, greeted fans from his office in Stern’s SiriusXM studios before colleagues began to imitate his signature voice.

Producer Jason Kaplan then chimed in with his impression, along with associate director Sam Greenwood.

Richard Christy, JD Harmeyer, Steve Nowicki, Will Murray, Mike Pearlman and Sal Governale also gave their takes on Dell’Abate.

Sadly, at least 50 Stern Show employees were laid off in two rounds of layoffs this year, including the last cut in July.

OUT OF HIS LEAGUE

Howard Stern Show segment CANCELED after shock jock’s mass layoffs

On-air talent Memet Walker, Benjy Bronk, Jonathan Blitt, Mike Trainor and Rahsaan Rogers were among those let go from the team.

The cuts come with many changes at the Stern Show, including the shock jock downsizing to just one show a week.

SiriusXM archival channel Howard 101 was dropped, and taken over by Stern’s rival Andy Cohen. (Just Howard 100 remains.)

In addition, segments like The Stern Show’s Fantasy Football League will not return this season.

“The Stern Show Fantasy Football League is defunct…it’s done,” the league’s commissioner Michael Rapaport announced last week.

The league had been held for the past 18 years, and the source of major friction between staffers each fall.

The reclusive Stern has remained silent about the layoffs and changes, though he will return to air on September 14.

Stern is thought to have remained hunkered down on his Hamptons compound, making just a rare appearance at John Mayer’s concert in Amagansett in August.

The King of all Media re-signed a three-year deal with SiriusXM in December, after heated negotiations and rampant rumors the show would be canceled once and for all after 20 years at the streamer.

A NEW teaser video from Oasis ‘confirms’ an upcoming tour location – with a subtle nod to a moment that happened around the group’s original split.

The legendary rock band – led by brothers Liam Gallagher and Noel Gallagher – reformed in 2024 after breaking up in 2009.

It saw the pair overcome their 15-year feud as they embarked on a reunion tour in summer 2025.

The band have now posted a cryptic clip online, with fans certain they sussed out an upcoming tour location.

Fans were convinced the clip hinted at a France tour date – with references to “Rock en Seine” and “Au Marché” visible.

One person commented: “A French date for next year’s tour I see! Possibly for the 7th of July?? Interesting…”

BACK IN ANGER

Oasis shock as secret recordings to be released by ex employee for huge sum

FERRY NICE

Oasis tease another huge gig with cryptic post that throws back to chaotic tour

Another added: “Hey Oasis, you owe me a gig in Paris!!! I was there that night in 2009. F*****g night. So VIVE LA FRANCE!!”

In addition to this, the video also includes a reference to an infamous moment in Oasis history.

A viewer remarked: “Please tell me that was a plum he threw. Genius.”

While a second person said: “OMG ITS LIAM THROWING A PLUM AT NOEL !!!!!”

In the clip, a man wearing a leather jacket took out a plum from a paper bag and began eating it.

Soon after this, he lobbed the plum away somewhere off camera, into the distance.

It references Noel previously telling how – during a heated 2009 argument at the Rock en Seine Festival in Paris the time of his Oasis departure – Liam threw a plum at him.

In 2011, he said at a press conference for solo album Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds: “He storms out of the dressing room and on the way out, he picked up a plum and threw it across the dressing room and it smashes against the wall.”

Noel added: “Part of me wishes it did end like that – “plum throws plum.”

WASHINGTON — It should have been the safest of political appearances — a group of kids gushing about their love of science and space exploration with Vice President Kamala Harris.

But for Harris, it became a controversy.

The children, it turned out, were paid actors. And the video, filmed on location at the White House and the vice president’s official residence at the Naval Observatory, was promoted on NASA’s YouTube Channel and Harris’ Twitter account last week without making that clear.

The fallout over the video, produced for YouTube’s original programming platform, is the second in recent weeks where a seemingly innocuous appearance by Harris has become modestly troublesome.

Late last month, Harris generated more serious consternation and criticism from pro-Israel Democrats and media for not pushing back when a student at a classroom encounter at George Mason University in Virginia accused Israel of “ethnic genocide.” Harris spent the next several days clarifying her longstanding support for Israel and reaching out to pro-Israel organizations, including the Anti-Defamation League.

Such stumbles have been featured extensively in conservative media, where Harris is a regular target. But they also reinforce concerns among Democrats that Harris has not yet found her political footing since taking office amid high expectations. The presumed front-runner to succeed President Biden on the Democratic ticket in 2024 or 2028, Harris recently enlisted two veteran Democrats to help stabilize her communications efforts.

Harris’ office and NASA would not discuss the decision-making process that led to her participation in the YouTube Original or the administration’s marketing of the special, which was produced by a Canada-based company called Sinking Ship Entertainment.

Harris’s office did not select the children who participated in the YouTube Originals special, a White House official said. A YouTube spokesperson said that “the casting process for this show was no different from typical unscripted kids’ shows across other networks and streaming platforms.”

The special debuted during World Space Week. It features NASA astronaut Shane Kimbrough giving five children the clues for a scavenger hunt that takes them to the U.S. Naval Observatory, where they not-so casually run into Harris, who welcomes them onto the porch of the vice presidential residence.

While sitting in a white chair alongside the children, Harris reminisces about going to the lab with her scientist mother during her childhood and says she is excited to chair the National Space Council. She offers advice to the children about showing their true selves.

“Never let anybody tell you who you are,” she tells them. “You tell them who you are.”

Like many online productions, the special has the feel of something between a kids’-oriented news segment and a scripted show. The children, who introduce themselves with their hometowns, act surprised and excited as they meet the real-life astronaut and the vice president.

Earlier this week, one of the children who appeared in the video described in detail his audition process to KSBW TV in Salinas, which sparked mockery online and news coverage. Harris’ appearance drew especially sharp critiques in conservative news outlets. Fox News, in its coverage, has tried to draw a comparison to the criticism unleashed on former President Trump after his 2015 campaign launch in which he paid people to act like supporters.

Appearing as a guest on Fox News host Tucker Carlson’s show, commentator Candace Owens falsely told viewers that Harris paid children to appear in the special.

White House officials have a long history of appearing as themselves in scripted shows, often with children. First Lady Nancy Reagan promoted her anti-drug message on the popular 1980s sitcom “Diff’rent Strokes,” and then-President Obama participated in a televised sketch alongside comedy duo Keegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele during the White House Correspondents’ Dinner.

The difference this time was that the show’s format was ambiguous, and its presentation and promotion by Harris and NASA led commentators to believe it had been produced by the government.

Communications consultants said the vice president’s staff should have more thoroughly vetted the program and ensured it was clearly labeled as a reality show with paid actors when the U.S. government promoted it.

Ultimately, Harris’ staff let her down, they said.

“The vice president and the president can’t do their own vetting on things like this,” said Kevin Madden, who served in senior communications roles for Mitt Romney’s 2008 and 2012 campaigns.

Madden added that Harris should not have participated in the program with paid actors, especially “in an era where there is a very high quotient of fake news and misinformation, you have to expect this kind of scrutiny.”

“The criticism [here] becomes warranted,” he said.

Tehran: Iranian authorities have arrested a number of people accused of appearing in a rare video waving the flag of an outlawed opposition group, state television said Sunday.

Videos circulating online in recent days showed individuals riding motorbikes on empty streets in Iran while waving the white-and-red banner of the banned People’s Mujahedin Organisation of Iran (MEK).

On Sunday, state television said authorities had identified and arrested “all the individuals who appeared in this clip” and that they were “associated” with MEK, without specifying how many.

It said the motorcade had been travelling near the city of Karaj, west of Tehran, but it was not clear when the footage was recorded.

Founded in the 1960s in opposition to Iran’s then Western-backed shah, the MEK was outlawed after the 1979 Islamic revolution and later fought alongside Saddam Hussein’s forces during the Iran-Iraq war.

The group has for decades advocated regime change in Iran from abroad, while Tehran has accused its members of cooperating with its arch-enemy, Israel.

Iran has been at war with the United States since February 28, when US-Israeli strikes killed the Islamic republic’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei along with senior military officials.

Iran retaliated with attacks across the region as the conflict spread.

Real Madrid defender Raul Asencio has been acquitted of alleged involvement in distributing a sexually explicit video involving a minor.

The 23-year-old was absolved of the offence by a Spanish court, external and charges were withdrawn against him in Las Palmas, Gran Canaria.

The court also gave minimum sentences to the three defendants who were convicted after the victims, who were two women aged 16 and 18, forgave the accused.

The case was “linked to the recording and dissemination of a sexually explicit video related to an intimate encounter at a beach club in Gran Canaria in June 2023”.

Three of Asencio’s former team-mates from the Real Madrid academy were given a one-year suspended prison sentence for “child pornography” and must attend a sexual “re-education” course.

They were also handed a two-year restraining order against the victims, and three years of disqualification from working in any profession related to minors.

In a statement, Asencio said: “Today, after a long period of silence and after respecting a judicial process in which I always had faith, I can say that I have been acquitted.

“Over these past months I have been through a difficult situation and, at times, I have had to see how information and opinions about me were published before justice had its say.

“I understand and respect the work of the media and the right to report and express opinions, but I also believe it’s important to remember that behind every piece of news there is a person and a family who live with the consequences of it.

“I have always trusted that justice would eventually set things right. Today there is a judicial ruling that speaks for itself, and I accept it with peace of mind and with the satisfaction of being able to close a very important chapter in my life.”

In another separate case, Real Madrid have opened disciplinary proceedings against Asencio over a drink-driving conviction which also happened in Gran Canaria.

He was more than three times over the limit in the 16 August incident, which resulted in him being fined and having his driving licence suspended for eight months.

When asked about the incident, Real boss Jose Mourinho said: “Raul Asencio, given the situation he found himself in, I talked to him when he arrived and I talked to him about things that happened in the past.

“I haven’t talked with him since but I don’t discuss situations outside Valdebebas.

“His attitude is perfect here. He picked up an injury a few weeks ago and since then, he is first to arrive and last to leave working on his recovery.

“But obviously a Real Madrid player is a Real Madrid player for 24 hours, seven days a week, 12 months a year, so when you do something outside your professional area, it’s still Real Madrid and it hurts the club’s prestige that is untouchable.

“So I am not happy. We all make errors but no, I’m not happy.”

Asencio referred to his drink-driving conviction in his statement as he added: “I am deeply sorry for what happened and I fully accept my responsibility.

“It has been an experience from which I have learned and I am very clear that it will not happen again.

“I don’t want to get involved in controversies or look back. I want to close this chapter with respect, with my head held high and with a great desire to move forward. And I [am] absolutely in agreement with my coach: not only on the pitch, but also off it.”

KATE Beckinsale has revealed her PTSD diagnosis and admitted she’s in a ‘lonely place’ in a heartbreaking Instagram video.

The actress said that there’s loads of information around military PTSD but not Civilian PTSD and that people find that harder to understand.

Kate, 53, explained that people who “have seen or experienced levels of horror, terror or violence” see it every time they blink or any time they close their eyes for a second.

She said: “Those people aren’t recognised as heroes.”

She went on to explain that although people with PTSD go about their everyday lives that “they don’t sleep for more than an hour because when they do, it’s full of nightmares.”

She said: “Anything, smells, sounds, thoughts, feelings. Can trigger them into a place that is actually like hell.”

FAKE FRIENDS?

Premiere ‘misery’… why Sandra and Nicole’s pals act is a load of Bullocks

CLEMMIE MOODIE

Twist in Katie Price divorce as Lee Andrews gets ready to play his ace card

She shared that since battling PTSD is “invisible,” people should be “kinder and gentler” to others.

She continued: “It really is true that if you haven’t walked a mile in someone’s shoes — however fancy you think the shoes are — you have absolutely no idea what they might be carrying, masking, dealing with day and night.

“And if in doubt, especially to a little child. And I am someone who had a little child who was treated extremely cruelly by grown adults, who forgave themselves immediately.

“So if in doubt be kind. Always be kind.”

The star ended her video by explaining that PTSD victims “are the loneliest people because they are alone with a level of horror that’s incompatible with life.

“Yet a lot of the time these people continue to try and put one foot in front of the other.”

Fans flocked to comment and one wrote: “Thank you for sharing this, I appreciate you being so open n giving some insight, I don’t know if it helps but I hope you know it’s appreciated.”

Kate replied: “I’m really glad that makes me happy. I just hope at least one person can feel seen and appreciated and understood. It can be such a lonely place.”

Another added: “Sending love and hugs.”

A third wrote: “The truest words I’ve heard all f***ing year! Hope you’re ok xx.”

While a fourth said: “You’re right… there’s not enough awareness of complex PTSD at all!”

Kate lost her beloved mum Judy Loe, 73, in 2025 after a battle with cancer.

Kate first revealed her mother’s cancer diagnosis last year, shortly after the death of her famous stepfather Roy Battersby, who tragically passed away following a massive stroke.

The Serendipity star also lost her father Richard Beckinsale at the age of five after he suffered a huge heart attack.

That Girl is back.

Olympic gold medalist Jordan Chiles announced her intention to train for the L.A. Olympics on Wednesday, publicly beginning her attempt for a third Olympic Games in a video narrated by NBA legend Michael Jordan.

“Why again?” says Jordan, whom Chiles is named after. “Because the dream is still there.”

Chiles helped the United States to a team gold medal in 2024, competing in all four events in the final. She won her first individual Olympic medal, a bronze on floor with her energetic Beyoncé-inspired routine, but that result still is being considered by the Court of Arbitration for Sport after controversy involving the inquiry process that led to Chiles’ score being upgraded to overtake Romania’s Ana Barbosu.

Chiles is the fourth member of that gold medal-winning team to announce a comeback for the 2028 Olympics, joining Suni Lee, Jade Carey and Hezly Rivera. Simone Biles, the 29-year-old, 11-time Olympic medalist, has not officially come out of retirement.

Before Biles, a U.S. female gymnast had not competed in three Olympic Games in 24 years. Dominique Dawes, who competed in her third Olympics in 2000, Linda Metheny and Muriel Grossfield are the only other American women to accomplish the feat. But in a sport no longer dominated by teenage one-hit wonders, there will be three women vying to join the exclusive triple Olympian club in 2028.

Chiles used college experience to help raise her game after winning a team silver in her first Olympic experience in Tokyo, and after returning from Paris with gold, she finished a standout college career at UCLA. The 23-time All-American won her second and third individual NCAA titles, on bars last year and floor this year, and won the AAI Award, which goes to the top senior gymnast in the nation. She had 19 perfect 10s in her college career, which ranks third in UCLA history. On Tuesday, UCLA announced Chiles would return to the team as a student coach.

“Jordan has made an incredible impact on our program over the years,” UCLA gymnastics coach Janelle McDonald said in a statement. “I’m excited to watch her continue that influence in a new capacity as she steps into this next chapter with student coaching. Her energy, passion, leadership and gymnastics experience will make a unique and positive impact on our team this coming year!”

Outside of the gym, Chiles has capitalized on her Olympic stardom. She was a finalist on “Dancing with the Stars” and authored a memoir, “I’m That Girl: Living the Power of my Dreams.” She was named to Time Magazine’s 100 most influential people in sports this year and has been a ubiquitous presence on red carpets and at major sporting events and galas.

With her post-gymnastics life rolling, Chiles still is choosing to return to training with less than two years remaining until the 2028 Games.

“When the world asks why she’s back for a third time,” Jordan says in Chiles’ announcement video, “the answer’s simple.”

“Why not?” Chiles chimes in.

SACRAMENTO — California lawmakers on Sunday approved bills aimed at preventing interference in this fall’s midterm elections and requiring more transparency from social media influencers who are paid by political campaigns.

They join a growing pile of bills on Gov. Gavin Newsom’s desk as the legislature nears the end of its two-year session, which adjourns early this week.

Social media influencers took on a more visible role in California’s 2026 gubernatorial primary. Candidates including Democratic billionaire Tom Steyer paid thousands of dollars to influencers who posted videos endorsing Steyer or talking about him in a positive light. These videos did not always disclose that influencers were paid by a candidate’s campaign.

Assemblymember Marc Berman (D-Menlo Park) said his bill would ensure “that voters are not misled by paid content” by requiring a disclosure on paid posts and videos. Campaigns will also be required to report funds spent on social media posts.

If Newsom signs the law, it could result in fines for influencers and campaigns that fail to disclose such payments.

Two other bills sent to Newsom on Sunday would make it a felony to interfere with mail ballots or to seize ballots and other election materials before an election is certified. They come amid concern from Democratic lawmakers that President Trump or his supporters will seek to interfere with the casting and counting of ballots in the Nov. 3 election.

Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco drew outrage and legal challenges when he ordered his deputies to take more than 650,000 ballots from the county elections office over unproven claims of fraud. The case was argued before the California Supreme Court last week.

Newsom earlier this year signed a bill preventing local and federal law enforcement agencies from taking ballots without a warrant.

Legislation by Assemblymember Gail Pellerin (D-Santa Cruz) goes even further by making it a felony to take or order the seizure of ballots, election records or voting machines. Such actions would be punishable by up to four years in prison.

“The federal administration and those seeking to spread lies about our democracy continue to call for interference in elections in ways we have never seen before in this country,” Pellerin said Sunday. “AB 282 helps ensure that every lawfully cast vote can be counted, and that the will of the voters of every political party will be respected.”

Republican lawmakers argued in previous hearings that the bill is unnecessary because it is already a crime to steal ballots.

Another bill, SB 259, makes it a crime to interfere with a mail ballot on the way to or from a voter or order the seizure of ballots that are in transit to a local elections office.

Newsom has until Sept. 30 to sign or veto bills.

CHRISTINE McGuinness has shown off her incredible abs and tan in a tiny bikini – before declaring she refuses to let summer be over yet. 

The 38-year-old model and TV personality shared a new video lounging on a sun bed in the garden, soaking up the last of the UK’s heatwave before this weekend’s rain. 

Donning sunglasses and a deep bronze tan, Christine posed to show off her chiselled muscles in a sparkly lime green string bikini as she faced the sun to get most of its rays. 

Across the clip, she wrote: “Summer doesn’t officially end until 23rd September! Respectfully, keep your Pumpkin Spice lattes and Santa hats away from me!” 

She then added: “😎 This summer has been one big holiday for Mummy and her mini Mc’s 🥰 … Respectfully, we’re not ready for the school run!☀️😂🥹” 

The mum-of-three has always been a proud lover of the sun, enjoying holiday getaways as often as possible. 

READ MORE CHRISTINE MCGUINNESS

EX FILES

Christine McGuinness says it’ll be ‘strange’ to live apart from ex husband Paddy

BEACH STUNNER

Christine McGuinness stuns as she strips down to tiny thong bikini on holiday

But there’s set to be some big changes in her household after her ex-husband, Paddy McGuinness, went public with a new romance. 

The former couple split four years ago, but have continued to live together in their £2million family home in “separate wings” of their Cheshire mansion. 

This was done for the sake of their three kids – twins Leo and Penelope, 13, as well as nine-year-old daughter Felicity – who are all on the autism spectrum. 

However, now he’s dating BBC publicist Emma Carey, Christine has acknowledged that she will learn how to live without him. 

Asked by Virgin Media Television host Lucy Kennedy, 50, about her and her ex-husband’s “current living arrangements”, she said: “He’s been a huge part of my life. I met him at 19. Which was 19 years ago, which is crazy… yeah, half of my life.”

Christine then added: “I suppose it will be strange living without him one day.

“But right now, the last three years we’ve been separated and it just works.

“We’ve got our own space. We do our own thing. We get on really well and we love our children.”

BERKELEY — Twelve hours after walking offstage at the Greek Theatre on Tuesday night, David Byrne sits down with a cup of coffee on the patio of a tony hillside hotel and admits that he’s starting to get a little misty.

Last night’s concert on the campus of UC Berkeley was one of the remaining few on Byrne’s yearlong world tour after 2025’s “Who Is The Sky?” album. About an hour from now, a bus will pull up to ferry the 74-year-old musician and the dozen or so members of his touring company to the airport for a quick flight to Los Angeles, where they’re set to perform Friday and Saturday nights at the Hollywood Bowl.

“There’s a firepit over there,” Byrne says, pointing across the patio, “so after the show we all sat around and told stories. Everyone’s such a joy to work with — we’re all having a really good time.” He sighs. “That’s kind of rare, actually.”

“Who Is The Sky?,” which Byrne made with the producer Kid Harpoon, contrasts deep lyrics about art, home and enlightenment with bright pop arrangements filled with crisp grooves and singalong melodies. (Kid Harpoon, whose real name is Tom Hull, is known for the hits he’s created with Harry Styles and Miley Cyrus.) In the show, Byrne blends whimsical new tunes like “My Apartment Is My Friend” and “I Met the Buddha at a Downtown Party” with jittery oldies by Talking Heads, the hugely influential art-rock band he formed in 1975 with Jerry Harrison, Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth.

Yet even when the songs get dark — as in “Life During Wartime,” which comes with images of police violence on the enormous digital screens behind the players — the mood is euphoric: Like Byrne’s previous tour behind 2018’s “American Utopia,” this one has the musicians holding their instruments as they execute choreographed moves on a bare stage; the result is more or less a nonstop dance party. (Also like “American Utopia,” which Spike Lee adapted into an acclaimed concert film, this tour will make its way to movie screens courtesy of “The Brutalist” director Brady Corbet.)

So you can see why Byrne would be sad to see it come to an end, not least because he’s been using his days off to tool around a given town and take pictures of cool local color. At the top of the gig in Berkeley, he showed photos from a hike he’d taken and of a car he’d come across with a tricked-out sound system.

“Any ideas of things to see in L.A.?” he asks me, dressed in a violet-colored chore jacket only a few shades removed from the blue one he wore onstage. “That hike was a workout. Even some of the dancers said those hills were steep.”

“Life During Wartime” was maybe 15% faster last night than the original record.
Could’ve been, yes. You’ll have to ask the drummers — they set the tempo, and they get excited and it kind of ramps up. It’s sometimes hard for me to keep up — I’ve got a lot of words to get out.

I was fortunate to be at Van Halen’s next-to-last show at the Hollywood Bowl, and I remember every song felt insanely fast.
Wonder if that was drugs?

You ever see Van Halen?
Never saw them live. David Lee Roth was a Talking Heads fan — came to visit our rehearsal loft once. I was kind of surprised: “How did you…?”

David Byrne performs at the Coachella festival in April.

(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)

Would you say things turned out better or worse than the future you predicted in “Life During Wartime”?
Well, we’re not having a total civil war. There’s maybe still a chance that could happen, but it seems there’s more resistance now than there was before — a sense that we don’t have to just roll over and take all the stuff that’s going on. The footage we got kind of hits home.

You show the video of the guy on the bike pedaling away from ICE agents in Chicago.
That often gets a cheer.

I wondered if it ever doesn’t.
In the United States, no. Seeing the underdog get away — that’s a pretty timeworn story. We didn’t have that video at the beginning of the tour — it didn’t exist. I saw it on some news service, and I thought, oh, this has to lead the whole sequence. When we were first putting the show together, we had more video stuff. But screens are really seductive, so you start looking at that. We said, no, you have to connect with real live people, then you can put it up.

Have you been to the Sphere in Las Vegas?
A bunch of the band and I went to see “Wizard of Oz.” I haven’t seen a band in there. But it was really a lot of fun — quite a spectacle with the video all around you.

Don Henley compares the Eagles’ role there to the organist at a silent movie.
The pit band, yeah. That’s a thing to do — works especially well, I would imagine, for bands like the Eagles and other groups that don’t do a whole lot of song and dance.

At 74, can your body do all the dancing you want to do?
Oh, no. With more physical training, I’d probably be able to do a little more than I can now. But I’m never gonna be able to do what some of the dancers can do.

How about what you used to be able to do?
Like in “Stop Making Sense”? There’s some stuff in there where I go, nope, can’t do that. But I can do other things. I don’t have a feeling that I’m barely getting by.

Are you an exerciser?
I have a person I see in New York. It hasn’t happened so much lately because we’ve been moving around so much. But Sasha [Rivero, from the touring company] leads us through these warm-up exercises before shows — kind of a cross between strength training and yoga.

Beyond the value of staying agile, how do you think about maintaining your looks?
I’m aware it’s a thing. If I came across as old and decrepit, it might be less exciting for some of the audience. Not great for business.

When did your hair go gray?
In the ’90s, I want to say. I dyed it for a while when I started seeing a fair amount of gray coming in. Then at one point I was on holiday with my then-wife and just said, “Let’s cut it off and see what’s under there.” By that point it was pretty much all gray. I was OK with it.

Who’s a performer you admire who’s still out there doing it late in life?
Caetano Veloso — he’s served as a role model for me. He’s someone who’s reinvented himself over and over and over again — done records that are very different than the record before. Even on the same record, he can be really experimental and then do something incredibly romantic.

Can you envision a time when you’d stop performing?
I don’t think so. I can see there might be a point where I don’t do as much dancing around.

I’ve seen Willie Nelson probably half a dozen times in the last 10 years. He sits there and plays, and it’s great.
“My Apartment Is My Friend,” that was inspired by a Willie Nelson song: “Hello Walls.” There’s also a George Jones song, “The Grand Tour,” where he takes you into his place: “This is where she sat, that’s where she put out her cigarette,” all this kind of stuff. I loved that you can make an apartment into a character. So I started putting down ideas, and I realized: Should I reveal that it’s about an apartment right off the bat, or should I wait till the last line of the chorus? Before that, you don’t know — it sounds like a love song. The title gives it away. But Tom, when I said “should I change the title?” he said, “The title’s what got me to listen to the demo.”

If I say that the songs from the new album didn’t come alive for me until the show, how does that strike you?
Good and bad. I wish the record had the same impact that the songs have live. But then I also think to myself: Well, the reason you go to see a live show is because you’re getting something more than you get by just putting a record on.

(Josh Edelson / For The Times)

You’ve been playing for years now with this mobile handheld setup.
I wasn’t sure an audience was gonna go for it. I don’t know why, but I thought it was kind of a big step for an audience to take in.

To not have the traditional rock band stage set.
“Here’s the drummer — we know what he does.” There were people on the last tour who would say, “It’s got to be playback — you’re not really playing it.” So I added an introduction to a song where one by one we introduced the musicians at the beginning of the song, and you could hear how we put it together. An unexpected consequence is that it democratized the whole stage experience for the band members. There’s parts where the drummers come to the front and I go to the back, which you would never have in a regular kind of show where the drummer’s stuck on a riser. Everyone gets to be a star — everyone gets to be recognized as an individual.

Would you say your eagerness to share the spotlight could only have come after years of being the focal point?
I have no idea.

Most of the musicians are pretty young.
Younger than me, anyway.

Why is that important to you?
I learn from them — musically but also personally. I learn about what music they’re listening to, what their experiences have been, what their take on things is. They’re not living in the past — they don’t have nostalgia for the good old days.

In 2023, you spent a fair chunk of time looking back with the rest of Talking Heads for a rerelease of “Stop Making Sense.” Did you enjoy that or grit your teeth through it?
It was fine — it was really nice. As we said over and over, we’re very proud of that show and the music that we did and the film that Jonathan [Demme] made. And that it was going to connect with a completely new generation. Jerry came to the show last night. He lives in Marin.

You guys hang out?
Afterwards, yeah. I mean, he had to drive back. He said he enjoyed it — said it was a good show. I connected him with our keyboard player because the keyboard player came up with these interesting technical things I thought Jerry might be interested in. He has an accelerometer attached to his arm — you don’t see it because his sleeve covers it — where he raises his arm and it increases the volume like a foot pedal on a keyboard.

Tell me about Brady Corbet’s concert movie. He shot it in 70mm.
To be honest, I wasn’t sure why. But Brady made the case, and it wasn’t about bringing people into the theater. He said when you go to 70mm it’s a little bit closer to what your eye experiences.

Talking Heads in Italy in 1982: Tina Weymouth, from left, Jerry Harrison, Chris Frantz and David Byrne.

(Luciano Viti / Getty Images)

This is kind of a cutesy formulation, but I wonder if it’s pushing back on the dominance of vertical video.
Biologically and evolutionary-wise, we experience the world horizontally. We don’t go walking around looking up at the sky — the stuff that’s gonna come get us is somewhere on our eye level.

Jimmy Iovine gave an interview to the New York Times the other day where he said one of the last things he asked AI was about your set list.
He could’ve just asked me.

Iovine was extremely pro-AI in this interview. What’s your vibe?
My vibe is positive and negative. On the positive side, we’ve all heard the hype from Silicon Valley that we’re gonna have medical breakthroughs. The negatives — how could there not be massive job loss? What concerns me is the environmental stuff. The last thing the planet needs is a massive increase in energy usage. We’re talking about the survival of species — of everything that lives on Earth. To ramp up that part of what humans do just seems like the worst possible thing you could do.

The other thing that worries me is that machines aren’t really thinking — they’re probabilistic. This stuff has been designed intentionally to mimic human beings, and we are very, very easily fooled. I think that’s dangerous because we give it agency. We assume all these things about it — we trust it. I mean, people will listen to a political argument from a chatbot more than they will from another person.

Seems bad.
Right?

Any worthwhile creative application you can identify?
I used it a little bit to animate my drawings in one of the sequences from the show. They’re my drawings — I wasn’t taking from anybody else. In that case I feel like it’s a tool that’s very efficient. Might put some animators out of work, but if I had to pay the rate for animators on something like that, it would take a year to do and cost me a fortune.

What if the producer on your next record says, “Hey, here’s a little shortcut we can use”?
We already use little shortcuts — Auto-Tune is one. That’s not AI, but we’ve been using those kinds of tools, and there’s always the danger of overusing them. When people use Auto-Tune a tiny bit, it’s pretty much invisible. But on a lot of records — I’m not talking about the Cher record — it’s a little too perfect, and you start to lose the human connection. So it’s not a clear-cut choice of: Do I use this or not? It’s: Do I get seduced and use it too much?

Three months after Josh Jacobs was arrested on five charges relating to domestic abuse, the Green Bay Packers star running back on Thursday was formally charged with misdemeanor battery and misdemeanor criminal damage to property.

The Brown County (Wis.) District Attorney’s Office released an incident report that asserts that video footage taken inside Jacobs’ garage corroborates the altercation the alleged victim described. However, a felony and four misdemeanor charges pertaining to domestic violence were dropped.

Jacobs’ legal team led by David Z. Chesnoff issued a statement: “The Brown County District Attorney has reviewed evidence and elected to file misdemeanor charges against Josh that do not include domestic violence. The allegations will be addressed in court, and not in the media. Mr. Jacobs respects the District Attorney’s office and the process it followed.”

The report states that on the morning of May 23, police were dispatched to Jacobs’ home near Green Bay because of a disturbance between Jacobs and a woman described as his girlfriend.

The woman told officers she had a lump on her head as a result of a physical struggle with Jacobs. She said she became upset after looking through Jacobs’ phone and seeing he had been talking to other women. Jacobs had her phone, and she told Jacobs he could look through it, but when she tried to take back her phone, he grabbed her arm and she ended up on the floor.

According to the report, the video shows that Jacobs followed her to the garage. When she attempted to exit, Jacobs grabbed her, threw her to the ground and she struck her head. The woman lay on the ground before standing and walking into the house.

The report stated that a responding officer observed redness on the woman’s face and neck and felt the bump on the back of her head.

Retrieving relevant video from the surveillance system in the garage “was complex and took several weeks,” according to the report. Surveillance footage “corroborates the relevant portions of [the alleged victim’s] statements” that occurred in the garage but “does not depict any portion of the incident that is alleged to have occurred inside the residence.”

The day of the incident, Jacobs was charged with felony strangulation and suffocation, and four misdemeanors pertaining to domestic abuse. However, he was released from jail the next day because the District Attorney’s office said it found insufficient evidence to pursue criminal charges.

Three months later, that changed, although neither of the Class A misdemeanors filed Thursday mentioned domestic abuse. Jacobs would be subject to a fine of not more than $10,000 and not more than nine months in jail if he is convicted.

“Our office sought to ensure a fair and complete review of available evidence, some of which only recently became available to our office due to significant, ongoing forensic efforts by law enforcement,” Brown County District Attorney David L. Lasee said in a statement. “A criminal complaint is nothing more than a written, formal accusation against a defendant alleging the commission of criminal offenses and does not raise any inference of guilt. Mr. Jacobs is presumed innocent of these charges.”

The Packers and the NFL both issued statements saying only that they are monitoring the developments and will cooperate with law enforcement.

Jacobs has been one of the top running backs in the NFL since he was drafted out of Alabama in the first round by the Raiders in 2019. He signed a four-year, $48 million contract with the Packers as a free agent after the 2023 season.

Jacobs, 28, has rushed for more than 1,000 yards in four of his seven NFL seasons and last year rushed for 929 yards despite missing two games with a knee injury.

The ITV reality star was shown falling from a horse while riding in Meet the Owens.

Former Love Island star Gemma Owen’s horror horse riding accident has been aired in her new show Meet the Owens on Prime Video. The six-part programme follows former England footballer-turned-horse breeder Michael Owen and his family, including his feisty eldest daughter Gemma.

In a harrowing episode on the show, Gemma, 23 is shown falling from a horse and appearing to hit a railing while she is training to compete in the charity race the Magnolia Cup. Gemma, who represented Team GB in Dressage at youth and junior levels, is an experienced horse rider and the fall came as a shock to her family.

Luckily, Gemma escaped the fall without any broken bones, however she did get whiplash and sustained cuts to her face, as well as being covered in bruises. Gemma was riding her father’s horse He’s A Gentleman when she suffered the accident, after the horse appeared to bolt.

Audiences were shown images of Gemma’s huge bruises and she could be seen sporting a cut on the left side of her face, near her chin. The accident came six days before she was due to compete.

Speaking about the incident, her father Michael, 46, said Gemma was “tough as nails” and got back on a horse the day after. Meet the Owens then showed Gemma competing in the Magnolia Cup, despite being hardly able to move her neck.

Despite the accident, Gemma ended up coming fourth in the race after being initially stuck in 12th position when she was boxed in early on in the race. Michael later commented in a VT: “She came fourth but it’s just the start” as he knew Gemma would be gearing up to race another day in the future.

Reflecting on the fourth-place position, Gemma said she was “beyond gutted” and confirmed she would be doing it again, saying, “because I need to b****y win!” She also conceded that her father Michael had been right when he’d encouraged her to try horse racing.

She’s initially been skeptical about becoming a jockey, but over the course of training Gemma realised that this was what she wanted to do. Gemma was previously a contestant on season eight of Love Island back in 2022 and was a runner-up in the dating series.

Along with focusing on Gemma, Meet the Owens also delves into Michael and his wife Louise’s sweet marriage after the pair grew up together and attended the same primary school. They also touched on a tough point in their marriage during Michael’s move to Real Madrid, which had left new mother Louise isolated and without a support network.

Get Amazon’s Prime Video free for a month

This article contains affiliate links, we will receive a commission on any sales we generate from it. Learn more

£8.99

£0

Amazon

Get Prime Video here

TV lovers can get 30 days’ free access to tantalising TV like The Boys, Reacher and Clarkson’s Farm by signing up to Amazon Prime. Just remember to cancel at the end and you won’t be charged.

Michael’s only son, James, and his degenerative eye condition are also spotlighted in another episode. James was born with the genetic condition Stargardt disease, which means he is clinically blind.

Despite this, James showed his ambitions to become part of Michael’s family business, Manor House Stables and help to get potential investors on board. At one point, Michael and James even went to Bahrain together in the hopes of securing some more potential buyers and money for the stables.

Meet the Owens is streaming on Prime Video now