Olivia Attwood had to miss Loose Women this week as she wasn’t feeling well – but she promised to come back soon and said fans will see more of her on ITV in 2026
20:57, 30 Nov 2025Updated 20:58, 30 Nov 2025
Olivia Attwood said she will return as a This Morning host in 2026(Image: OLIVIA ATTWOOD DACK/TikTok)
Olivia Attwood has shared an update on her future on ITV show This Morning after being forced to miss Loose Women this week as she wasn’t feeling well.
The 34-year-old Love Island star has been battling a chest infection, strep throat and “some fly type thing” that she is struggling to get rid of. Olivia admitted she felt at “death’s door” due to her multiple health issues – but said she is determined to come back to work soon.
On Sunday, she answered a Q&A on Instagram, where fans asked her about her career and her marriage to footballer Bradley Dack. One fan asked: “Are you still going to be a presenter on This Morning?”
Olivia replied: “Yeh I’m coming back for more – can’t get rid of me now 2026.” Earlier this year, the star appeared on This Morning to discuss her new TV show The Price of Perfection in June – and revealed her news to hosts Cat Deeley and Ben Shepherd.
Engineering the conversation, Ben told the former star: “We’ve got some big news about This Morning and you in the summer.” In response, Olivia said: “I have some news yes, it’s very exciting. I’ll be joining you guys on the hosting team on the other side of the sofa.”
The TV duo then gestured for Olivia to sit on their side of the sofa to “feel what it’s like.” Getting up to switch her seat, the newbie said: “This is even more surreal.”
Complimenting the new addition to the presenting team, Cat said: “We look amazing together.” And this prompted Olivia to ask Cat: “Shall we do a show together?”
The Loose Women panellist add more detail to her announcement as she said: “So it’s a couple of shows, I’m very excited, it’s a huge honour. I’ve grown up watching this show, and being part of the ITV presenting team with Loose Women has been a great experience so this just feels like a very natural progression.”
Earlier this week, Olivia apologised to fans for missing Loose Women. Sharing a photo of a doctor looking at a mobile heart monitor machine, the Love Island said said her body “finally said no” and she had to drop out of the show.
She wrote on Instagram that she wasn’t feeling well. Then in a new social media update, Olivia told her fans on TikTok: “I’m the firstborn daughter, first granddaughter, Taurus. I don’t listen to anyone. Apparently that includes my body. I just don’t like being defeated.
“This f—–g thing has defeated me. And now I’m on like 24 hours of doctor ordered lying about, being f—–g bone idle is what I call it. My half English, half German DNA is not coping well with being sedentary on the ADHD. Yeah.”
Scotland’s chance of gold at the European Curling Championships lies in the women’s competition after the men fell at the semi-final stage.
Bruce Mouat’s rink sailed through the round-robin phase with a 100% record but lost 8-5 to Sweden in the last four showdown.
Swedish skip Niklas Edin will now go for an eighth title against Switzerland, who beat Italy 8-7.
The Swedes, who lost three of their opening nine games, took two in the seventh and ninth ends to lead 7-5 and Mouat could not extend a tense tie when he was a fraction out with his final stone.
Team Mouat, runners-up last year and four-time winners, will play the Italians for bronze on Friday evening, with the action streamed on the BBC Sport website and iPlayer at 17:00 GMT.
“We’ve played a million times before,” said Edin of his team’s victory. “In the Olympic final it was the same situation.
“We just have to reach our own top level. We came in with the right mindset and executed well.”
On Thursday, Scotland’s women continued their revival in Finland by beating Switzerland in their semi-final.
The Scots – bronze medallists last year and ranked second going into this tournament – lost four of their opening six matches, but won their final three round-robin games to scrape into the knockout matches.
And in a dominant performance, Rebecca Morrison’s rink prevailed 8-5 to earn a place in the final against Sweden.
“Reaching our first European final together and that is a great achievement for us,” said an excited Jen Dodds, who won European gold in 2021.
“We got our bronze medal last year, which back then we were so happy with, and one of our goals for this season was to upgrade that and get to the final.
“Now we are really looking forward to getting that opportunity to compete in it.”
The final will be live on the BBC iPlayer and the BBC Sport website and app at 08:00 on Saturday.
About 83,000 women and girls were intentionally killed worldwide last year – 60 percent of them at the hands of partners or relatives.
Published On 25 Nov 202525 Nov 2025
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More than 50,000 women and girls were killed by intimate partners or family members around the world in 2024, the equivalent of one every 10 minutes or 137 per day, according to a new report.
Released to mark the 2025 International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women on Tuesday, the report by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and UN Women warned that femicide continues to claim tens of thousands of lives each year with “no sign of real progress”.
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Overall, 83,000 women and girls were intentionally killed worldwide last year – 60 percent of those deaths were at the hands of partners or relatives.
By way of comparison, just 11 percent of male homicide victims were killed by family members or intimate partners.
The report warns that many killings are preventable, but that gaps in protection, police responses and social support systems leave women and girls at heightened risk of fatal violence.
At the same time, it is thought that the figures are likely an underestimate, due to poor data collection in many countries, survivors’ fear of reporting violence, and outdated legal definitions that make cases difficult to identify.
Experts say economic instability, conflict, forced displacement and limited access to safe housing can worsen the risks faced by women trapped in abusive situations.
“The home remains a dangerous and sometimes lethal place for too many women and girls around the world,” said John Brandolino, acting executive director of UNODC.
He added that the findings underline the need for stronger prevention efforts and criminal justice responses.
Sarah Hendriks, director of UN Women’s policy division, said femicides often sit on a “continuum of violence” that can start with controlling behaviour, harassment and online abuse.
“Digital violence often doesn’t stay online,” she said. “It can escalate offline and, in the worst cases, contribute to lethal harm.”
According to the report, the highest regional rate of femicide by intimate partners or family members was recorded in Africa, followed by the Americas, Oceania, Asia and Europe.
UN Women says coordinated efforts involving schools, workplaces, public services and local communities are needed to spot early signs of violence.
The campaigners also called on governments to increase funding for shelters, legal aid and specialist support services.
The findings were released as the UN’s annual 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence campaign started.
POP star Lizzo has claimed plus-size women are being “erased” as society grapples with the impact of the “Ozempic boom.”
The Truth Hurts singer, 37, has lost a lot of weight in recent years but said she is “still a proud big girl” after years of championing the body positivity movement.
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Lizzo has claimed plus-size women are being ‘erased’ as society grapples with the impact of the ‘Ozempic boom’Credit: GettyLizzo has lost a lot of weight in recent years but said she is ‘still a proud big girl’Credit: Getty
In an essay shared on Substack, she wrote: “So here we are halfway through the decade, where extended sizes are being magically erased from websites.
“Plus sized models are no longer getting booked for modeling gigs. And all of our big girls are not-so big anymore.”
But Lizzo, who said she still weighs more than 14 stone, hit out at people who have criticised her for losing weight.
She said: “We’re in an era where the bigger girls are getting smaller because they’re tired of being judged.
“And now those bigger girls are being judged for getting smaller by the very community they used to empower.
“There’s nothing wrong with living in a bigger body.
“There’s nothing wrong with being fat.
“But if a woman wants to change, she should be allowed to change.”
She said she started exercising in 2023 following a lawsuit in which she was alleged to have sexually harassed former dancers, which she denies, and which she said left her suicidal.
Defenders: Georgia Brown (Sporting Club Jacksonville), Jenna Clark (Liverpool), Nicola Docherty (Rangers), Leah Eddie (Rangers), Sophie Howard (Como), Emma Lawton (Celtic), Rachel McLauchlan (Brighton & Hove Albion), Amy Muir (Glasgow City).
Midfielders: Erin Cuthbert (Chelsea), Freya Gregory (Newcastle United), Sam Kerr (Liverpool), Kirsty MacLean (Liverpool), Maria McAneny (Celtic), Miri Taylor (Aston Villa), Caroline Weir (Real Madrid).
Maybe not the entire six-pack, but almost. They include:
–A salable message. How’s the candidate going to make life better for the voter? Specifics, not just poll-generated platitudes. And beating up on President Trump isn’t going to be enough for Democrats next year.
Voters will probably be getting migraine headaches from listening to both Trump and his critics.
–Curb appeal. It greatly helps to have matinee-idol looks like Gov. Gavin Newsom. But that gift is rare. Average appearance, verbal skills and a good message will usually suffice.
–Boatloads of money. It costs tens of millions of dollars to market a gubernatorial aspirant’s message in far-flung, heavily populated and diverse California.
–A strong desire to win, also known as “fire in the belly.” Rather than relaxing in a recliner while watching the Rams or 49ers, the willingness to fly off to beg strangers for campaign donations.
–A thick skin. Top-tier candidates are constantly attacked by rivals and often covered by the news media in ways deemed unfair. But overreacting can destroy a candidacy.
–A strong record of public service to show voters you’re committed and won’t need lots of time with training wheels.
There also are other assets that can help. For example: youth.
“We are, in fact, going through a generational change in American politics,” says longtime Democratic strategist Darry Dragow. “That’s inevitable. New generations of voters have not been widely represented in government. The boomers have held political power for a very long time.”
Baby boomers are roughly ages 60 through 79 — born after World War II, between 1946 and 1964.
Another plus is political incumbency — the ability for a candidate to be identified on the ballot label as, for example, attorney general or lieutenant governor. That denotes credibility and a record. You’re not allowed to call yourself a “former” anything.
Democratic strategist Garry South calls the current crop basically “a field of formers” and says that saddles them with an extra burden.
That’s largely because the public’s political focus has been on Trump and the toady Republican Congress. But it’s also because none of the gubernatorial candidates possesses the full six-pack of vital assets.
For months, the contest was frozen in waiting mode: Waiting for former Vice President Kamala Harris and Sen. Alex Padilla to decide whether they wanted to run. Either would have been an early favorite, but not a shoo-in. They’d have faced a fight. And neither apparently felt the job was worth it. No fire.
Democratic donors and activists also were focused on Proposition 50 and waiting for the Nov. 4 redistricting election to be over. Most money and effort were going there.
Now that’s all behind us and the real race is underway.
“It’s a total free-for-all,” Sragow says. “None of these candidates is really on anybody’s radar.”
“You can’t read anything into the polls,” Democratic consultant Gale Kaufman says. “Just because somebody is a few points ahead doesn’t make them a front-runner. We don’t even know who all the candidates are yet.”
A late October poll of registered voters by the UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies showed that 44% were undecided. Former Orange County Rep. Katie Porter led Democratic candidates with a scant 11%. Former U.S. Health Secretary Xavier Becerra was second at 8%.
Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, a Republican, was first overall with 13%. But never mind. No Republican has been elected to statewide office in California since 2006. And one won’t be 20 years later.
Last week, two more Democrats leaped into the race:
–Billionaire hedge fund founder Tom Steyer, 68, who ran for president in 2020 and got nowhere. He has a good populist, anti-Sacramento message and tons of money to voice it. But he has never held elected office. And Californians have historically rejected mega-rich, self-financing candidates attempting to begin their political career at the highest level.
–Rep. Eric Swalwell, 45, from the San Francisco Bay Area, who also ran unsuccessfully for president in 2020. He has a good message for progressives. But right now it may be too focused on Trump and not enough on Californians’ needs.
Aside from Steyer, none of the other Democratic aspirants are independently wealthy. They’ll need to raise barrels of money — ”24 hours a day, seven days a week,” Sragow says. That takes fire.
Other Democratic candidates:
–Porter, 51. She has curb appeal. But she publicly showed a thin skin with a contentious, rude performance during a TV interview in October. The nasty episode probably wasn’t fatal. But it apparently dropped her in polls, and that hurts fundraising.
–Antonio Villaraigosa, 72, former Los Angeles mayor and state Assembly speaker. No one is more qualified to be governor. And he lets voters know where he stands. But they may be looking for someone younger.
–Betty Yee, 68, former state controller, Board of Equalization member and chief state budget honcho. She knows every inch of state government’s fiscal quagmire and has good ideas about unraveling it. But she’s short on curb appeal.
–State Supt. of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond, 57, the lone incumbent in the field. But he missed an opportunity to shine as state schools chief.
One of these people will probably be our next governor, although others could still enter the race. So, maybe it’s time to start paying attention.
“Suffs,” Shaina Taub’s musical about how women finally secured the right to vote in America, won Tony Awards for its book and score. It lost the best musical race to “The Outsiders,” but the respect it earned when it opened last spring on Broadway made it an unequivocal winner.
The show is having its Los Angeles premiere at the Hollywood Pantages Theatre in a touring production that is smooth and smart. Taub’s work deserves nothing less than an A. The cast is excellent, the staging is graceful and the political message could not be more timely.
The show might not have the crackling vitality of “Hamilton” or the bluesy poignancy of “The Scottsboro Boys.” It’s a good deal more earnest than either of these history-laden musicals. There’s an educational imperative at the heart of “Suffs,” which deals with a subject that has been marginalized in schools and in the collective consciousness.
The 19th Amendment, which gave women the right to vote, was ratified in 1920, a little more than a century ago. The history isn’t so distant yet I’m sure I wasn’t the only one at Wednesday’s opening who was learning about the forceful tactics that helped Alice Paul and her fellow suffragists push their movement over the finish line.
“Suffs,” a musical for the public square, is as informative as it is uplifting. It is above all a moving testament to the power of sisterhood. The struggle for equality continues to face crushing setbacks today, but Taub wants us to remember what can happen when people stand united for a just cause.
Alice (a winning Maya Keleher) doesn’t seem like a rabble-rouser. A bright, well-educated woman with a polite demeanor, she looks like a future teacher of the year more than a radical organizer. But she has an activist’s most essential quality: She won’t take no for an answer. (Keleher lends alluring warmth to the role Taub made her Broadway debut in.)
Marya Grandy and the company of the national tour of “Suffs.”
(Joan Marcus)
She’s rebuffed by Carrie Chapman Catt (Marya Grandy), the president of the National American Woman Suffrage Assn., whose motto (“Let your all-American mother vote”) is the basis for the show’s opening number, “Let Mother Vote” — a distillation of the old-guard approach that has yet to yield women the vote.
Alice wants to organize a march in Washington, D.C., to force the president’s reluctant hand, but Carrie prefers a more genteel strategy. “Miss Paul, if my late great mentor Susan B. Anthony taught me anything, it’s that men are only willing to consider our cause if we present it in a lady-like fashion.
“State by state, slow and steady, until the country’s ready” is, after all, NAWSA’s fundamental creed. But Alice points out that if they continue at this glacial pace they’ll be dead before they can ever cast a vote.
Swinging into action, Alice teams up with her friend Lucy Burns (Gwynne Wood), who worries that they haven’t the experience to take on such a momentous mission. “We’ve never planned a national action before,” she objects at the start of their duet “Find a Way.” But undaunted Alice has the bold idea of recruiting Inez Milholland (played at the opening night performance by Amanda K. Lopez), and a way forward miraculously materializes.
Inez has just the right glamorous public image that Alice thinks will give their march the publicity boost it needs. Studying for the bar exam, Inez is initially reluctant but agrees if she can lead the march on horseback.
This image of Inez on a steed becomes central both to the movement and to director Leigh Silverman’s production, which finds simple yet striking ways of bringing revolutionary change to life. A chorus line of activists wearing suffragist white (kudos to the luminous tact of costume designer Paul Tazewell) eloquently communicates what solidarity can pull off.
Brandi Porter, left, and Jenny Ashman as President Woodrow Wilson in “Suffs.”
(Joan Marcus)
An all-female and nonbinary cast dramatizes this inspiring American story. Taub takes some fictional license with the characters but largely sticks to the record.
Notable allies in Alice’s organization include Ruza Wenclawska (Joyce Meimei Zheng) a Polish-born trade union organizer with a no-nonsense grassroots style, and Doris Stevens (Livvy Marcus), a shy yet undeterred student from Nebraska who becomes the group’s secret weapon secretary.
Ida B. Wells (Danyel Fulton), an early leader in the civil rights movement, takes part in the march but resists being used as a prop in what she calls NAWSA’s “white women convention.” Mary Church Terrell (Trisha Jeffrey), a fellow Black activist, by contrast believes that it’s only through participation that representation can move forward.
President Woodrow Wilson (Jenny Ashman), who makes promises to the suffragists he is hesitant to keep, is a crucial target of Alice’s pressure campaign. Her group’s access to him is aided by Dudley Malone (Brandi Porter), Wilson’s right-hand man, who becomes smitten with Doris.
The score marches ahead in a manner that makes progress seem, if not inevitable, relentless in its pursuit of justice. The songs combine the patriotic exuberance of John Philip Sousa and the American breadth of Broadway composer Stephen Flaherty (“Ragtime”). The note of pop accessibility in Taub’s music and the satiric humor of her lyrics add to the buoyancy. You won’t leave humming a tune, but the overall effect (while ephemeral) is pleasing in the theater.
With the history already determined, the book can’t help resembling at times a civics exhibition. Dramatic tension is hard to come by. Alice and her cohorts suffer grave disappointments and indignities (including a harrowing stint in prison), but the eventual outcome of their struggles is known.
“Suffs” sometimes feels like a history lesson neatly compartmentalized into Important Episodes. There’s a whiff of PBS to the way the musical unfolds. This is cultural programming that’s good for you.
But the teamwork of the performers honors the messy yet undeniably effective cooperation of Alice and her freedom fighters — women who changed the world by not staying silent in their prescribed place.
‘Suffs’
Where: Hollywood Pantages Theatre, 6233 Hollywood Blvd., L.A.
When: 7:30 p.m. Tuesday-Thursdays, 8 p.m. Fridays, 2 and 8 p.m. Saturdays, 1 and 6:30 p.m. Sundays. (Check for exceptions.) Ends Dec. 7.
The final film of the late Glenda Jackson and, if he remains true to his word, of Michael Caine, “The Great Escaper” has made its way to America two years after its U.K. release. Premiering Sunday under the umbrella of the PBS series “Masterpiece Theatre,” the film tells the true-life story of Bernie Jordan, who, at 89, set off unaccompanied and unannounced from an English retirement home to attend celebrations marking the 70th anniversary of D-Day in Normandy, France. (This event also inspired a Pierce Brosnan film, “The Last Rifleman,” which came out about the same time.) Love and time and duty are its themes. Written by William Ivory and directed by Oliver Parker, it’s a simple story, simply told — sweet, but not saccharine, and moving even when you know what’s coming.
Bernie (Caine) lives with his wife, Rene (Jackson), in a care home by the sea in the town of Hove. She needs more medical attention than he, but both have their wits about them. Having missed securing a spot among the groups traveling to Normandy, Bernie, a Royal Navy veteran, with Rene’s encouragement, decides to go it alone. Though he uses a walker and can seem tired or abstracted at times — he has much on his mind, and a specific mission to fulfill — the trip itself is not especially hard on him. It becomes all the easier once he meets, on the ferry across the English Channel, Arthur Howard-Johnson (John Standing, very fine), an RAF veteran who offers him a place with his group and a bed in his hotel room. As the film goes on, he becomes more and more focused, growing alert and lively and taking charge of Arthur, who had earlier taken charge of him. Each, it will transpire, carries a burden of guilt dating from the invasion.
Michael Caine and Glenda Jackson in “The Great Escaper.”
(Rob Youngson / Masterpiece, Pathé, BBC Films)
Back in Hove, the staff, represented by aide Adele (Danielle Vitalis) and manager Judith (Jackie Clune), is not immediately aware of Bernie’s absence — he’s allowed to come and go — and Rene, who has a tendency to fence with them anyway, is keeping quiet in order to give him time to get away. When they learn he’s missing, a search begins; eventually, Rene lets the truth slip, the exploit hits the press and Bernie, unaware of any of this, is given the nickname “The Great Escaper.” He’ll return home an annoyed celebrity.
Flashbacks, with Will Fletcher as young Bernie and Laura Marcus as young Rene, recall the couple’s wartime meeting and Bernie’s interactions with a young soldier on D-Day. Integrated as memories, they enrich the present action without overexplaining it.
Jackson and Caine, you may know or should learn, were icons of British thespian glamour in the 1960s and ’70s, she in “Marat/Sade,” “Women in Love” and “Elizabeth R,” he in “Alfie” and the Harry Palmer films (“The Ipcress File,” et al.); in 1975, they starred together in Joseph Losey’s “The Romantic Englishwoman,” co-written by Tom Stoppard. Always politically active, Jackson took off 23 years from acting, from 1992 to 2015, to serve as a member of Parliament, and returned to play “King Lear” in London and on Broadway and win a Tony for a revival of Edward Albee’s “Three Tall Women.” Caine, notwithstanding some slow times, made movies all along, all sorts of them, playing Scrooge in “The Muppet Christmas Carol,” Mike Myers’ father in “Austin Powers in Goldmember” and Alfred in the Christopher Nolan’s “Batman” trilogy and parts in five other Nolan films. Watching “The Great Escaper,” you’re seeing history.
Neither has lost a step. (I find it pleasant to remember that, however frail or confused an older character may be, the person playing them is doing a job that requires strength and thought.) Given both the eminence of the actors and their age — Caine was 90 when “The Great Escaper” premiered, while Jackson, 87, died shortly before — it’s hard not to watch with a double consciousness of the players and the parts. But rather than a distraction, it redoubles the impact. Jackson and Caine wear their years proudly; there’s no vanity in their performance or their appearance. The couple’s eventual reunion is deep and real and, like their whole relationship, gorgeously ordinary.
WASHINGTON — Republicans won a significant political victory this month when moderate Senate Democrats joined them to end the longest government shutdown in U.S. history, relenting from a showdown over the rising costs of healthcare.
But the fight is already back on, with mere weeks to spare before the Trump administration faces a potential uproar from the public over the expiration of Affordable Care Act tax credits on New Year’s Day, when premium costs will skyrocket.
The White House response that emerged this week is a political Hail Mary for an increasingly divided party entering an election year: a second megabill, deploying the parliamentary tool of reconciliation, addressing not just healthcare costs but Trump’s tariff policies under intense scrutiny at the Supreme Court.
“We’re going to have the healthcare conversation. We’re going to put some legislation forward,” White House Deputy Chief of Staff James Blair said Tuesday, addressing a breakfast event hosted by Bloomberg Government, as House Republican leaders pitched the plan to their members in a closed-door meeting.
“The president probably would like to go bigger than the Hill has the appetite for,” Blair added, “so we’ll have to see how that, you know, works out.”
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House Majority Leader Steve Scalise presented the plan to skeptical Republican lawmakers on Tuesday, arguing an extension of tax credits for what he called the “Unaffordable Care Act” — even if they are renegotiated on Republican terms — would only mask the problem of rising premium costs, ultimately burdening the taxpayer.
Trump sent a message to the caucus ahead of their meeting on Tuesday morning with a post on Truth Social, emphatic in all caps.
“THE ONLY HEALTHCARE I WILL SUPPORT OR APPROVE IS SENDING THE MONEY DIRECTLY BACK TO THE PEOPLE, WITH NOTHING GOING TO THE BIG, FAT, RICH INSURANCE COMPANIES, WHO HAVE MADE $TRILLIONS, AND RIPPED OFF AMERICA LONG ENOUGH,” Trump wrote. “THE PEOPLE WILL BE ALLOWED TO NEGOTIATE AND BUY THEIR OWN, MUCH BETTER, INSURANCE. POWER TO THE PEOPLE!”
“Congress, do not waste your time and energy on anything else,” Trump added. “This is the only way to have great Healthcare in America!!! GET IT DONE, NOW.”
Yet the plan is causing anxiety across a wide ideological range of Republican lawmakers, including moderates in vulnerable races entering next year’s midterm elections as well as those from deep red districts whose constituents rely on the Affordable Care Act, more widely known as Obamacare.
Nearly six in 10 Americans who use the ACA marketplace live in Republican districts, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. Enrollment is highest across the South, where districts across Texas, Mississippi, Georgia, South Carolina and Florida consistently see more than 10% of their residents relying on the program.
Going for broke with reconciliation
Trump’s proposal would do away with the tax credits, potentially overhauling health savings accounts that would encourage Americans to save on their own and choose their healthcare plan.
But it’s unclear whether such a dramatic, last-minute change in the healthcare system, still in draft form, would garner enough Republican support to pass the House, where Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) can only afford to lose two Republicans on party-line votes.
The bill would come in a perilous political environment for Republican lawmakers, who one year ago faced a tie with Democrats on a generic ballot, according to an NPR/PBS News/Marist poll. In the group’s latest poll, Democrats are up by 14 points.
Even if Trump’s proposal were to secure House support, the Trump administration’s plan to pursue a bill through reconciliation in the Senate — which allows the upper chamber to pass legislation with a simple majority, instead of 60 votes — could face significant hurdles.
Senate parliamentary rules only allow reconciliation to be used for legislation that directly changes federal spending, revenues, or the debt limit. That could encompass an overhaul to health savings accounts, and potentially to codify Trump’s tariff policies, which have been approved through reconciliation in years past. But the fine print would be up to the discretion of the parliamentarian, whose cuts to tangential policy provisions could upend delicate negotiations.
Reconciliation was used in Trump’s last major push to repeal Obamacare, in 2017, when the late Sen. John McCain (R-Az.) surprised the nation with a thumbs-down vote on the measure.
That bill, McCain argued, would have repealed the healthcare of millions without a plan to replace it.
Kara Dunn held her right wrist aloft for an extra beat. Just to be sure.
It had been a while, by that point in the second quarter, since USC had seen a deep jumper drop. As Dunn lifted off from behind the arc against Portland on Tuesday, 19 of the Trojans’ previous 20 three-point attempts, going back to Saturday’s battle with South Carolina, had missed, a stretch of futility strange to a team that mostly scored at will a season ago.
But before any of those early concerns grew too glaring Tuesday night, Dunn watched as her jumper safely found the bottom of the net. Within a few minutes from there, USC found its offensive mojo again, bouncing back from Saturday’s South Carolina loss to beat Portland, 78-51.
It hasn’t been the smoothest ride for USC this season as it tries to fill the void left by injured superstar JuJu Watkins, who averaged 24 points last season.
Jazzy Davidson has done an admirable job stepping into that leading role early on. She led the way again Tuesday, stuffing the stat sheet with 19 points, seven rebounds, five assists and three steals.
The question through four games has been who might step up alongside the Trojans’ talented freshman. Londynn Jones scored 12 while Kennedy Smith overcame an inefficient start to score 13 on five-of-14 shooting.
There have been no such concerns this season about USC’s defense, which forced a stunning 29 turnovers. It was the most turnovers forced by the Trojans since last November, when they tallied 42 against California State Northridge.
It looked bleak through the first quarter Tuesday. USC opened the game one for seven from the field, with its offense looking out of sorts, and scored a meager 10 points in the first 10 minutes. Portland, fresh off an NCAA tournament invite last season, opened an early eight-point advantage and led for most of the first half.
Until Dunn’s three-pointer at the 5:42 mark of the second quarter, USC had hit just one shot outside of the paint.
But the mere sight of a long-distance jumper was apparently enough to jump-start things on that end. Davidson snagged a steal on the next possession, the third turnover of the quarter she’d turn into a breakaway lay-in. Kennedy Smith followed with a steal and a lay-in. Then, Jones pulled up from three-point range and sunk one.
By the end of the barrage, USC had turned an eight-point deficit at the start of the second quarter into a 13-point lead, just seven minutes later. It finished the half on a 24-5 run.
Davidson was the spark plug. She scored 14 on seven-of 10 shooting in the first half. The rest of the team was eight of 24 in that span.
Portland cut USC’s lead to just seven points midway through the third quarter. But the Trojans kicked into high gear again. A few minutes into the fourth, Smith hit a three-pointer. Then Jones followed with two more.
It seems only a matter of time before one of Becerra’s campaign rivals seizes the federal fraud case for attack fodder. I can hear it already: “If the man who wants to be governor can’t protect his own political funds, he shouldn’t be trusted to safeguard your tax money.”
That might not be fair, but this is big-time politics. And the word “fair” isn’t in the political dictionary.
Becerra is low-profile by comparison, although he has achieved a very successful and respectable career: U.S. Health and Human Services secretary under President Biden, California attorney general and 12-term congressman.
It was Becerra’s dormant state political account that allegedly got pilfered of $225,000 while he was health secretary.
Federal prosecutors allege that Williamson, former Becerra chief of staff Sean McCluskie and Sacramento lobbyist Greg Campbell illegally diverted money to McCluskie’s wife, funneling the loot through shell companies for bogus consulting services.
McCluskie and Campbell both pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit fraud and have been cooperating with the federal government.
Williamson, who allegedly fleeced Becerra’s political kitty when she owned a government relations firm before joining Newsom’s staff, pleaded not guilty to bank and tax fraud charges. Besides raiding Becerra’s account, she’s accused of falsifying documents involving a COVID small-business loan and claiming $1 million in personal luxuries as business expenses on her income taxes.
After news of the case broke last week with Williamson’s arrest, Newsom’s office said the governor suspended her last November after she informed him of the federal investigation.
There also was a sophomoric attempt by a Newsom spokesperson to link the federal case to the combative relationship between President Trump and the California governor. It’s true Trump has been targeting his “enemies.” But this three-year FBI probe began under the Biden administration.
Becerra issued a statement saying that the “formal accusations of impropriety by a long-serving trusted advisor are a gut punch.” He also said he had been cooperating with the U.S. Justice Department‘s investigation.
The federal indictment alleges that McCluskie and Williamson misled Becerra about how monthly withdrawals from his political account were to be used.
The account stash of nearly $2 million was raised for a 2022 attorney general reelection campaign that never occurred because by then Becerra was health secretary. But the money could be used in some future state race, such as for governor.
Political operatives I talked with were stunned that $225,000 could be siphoned out of a politician’s campaign account without him noticing.
“Did the account have no one watching it except the consultants who were pilfering from it?” asked veteran Democratic consultant Garry South. “Those of us who have run campaigns are scratching our heads. I can’t imagine how this would happen.”
I asked the Becerra campaign.
A spokesperson replied that the health secretary had authorized payments for “campaign management” after being misled by trusted advisors.
Also, the spokesperson added, Becerra was counseled by a Health and Human Services attorney to distance himself from any “campaign or political activity” prohibited by the federal Hatch Act and ethics rules. So he delegated responsibility for managing the account to advisors.
And he got snookered and ripped off.
Will it tarnish Becerra’s image and hurt his campaign for governor? We don’t know yet. But probably not that much, if any. His only sin, after all, was trusting the wrong people and following an attorney’s advice.
Even big scandals don’t seem to damage politicians in this era — Trump being the unfathomable best example.
It could crimp Becerra’s fundraising if potential donors wonder where their money is actually going and whether anyone credible will be watching it.
The gubernatorial race is still wide open without a real front-runner. No candidate is captivating the voters.
A late October poll by the UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies showed paltry numbers for all candidates. Former Orange County Rep. Katie Porter led Democrats with 11% support among registered voters. Becerra was second with 8%. A whopping 44% of those surveyed were undecided.
Riverside County Sheriff Chad Blanco, a Republican, was first overall with 13%. But no Republican need apply for this job. California hasn’t elected a GOP candidate to a statewide office since 2006.
Becerra has as good a shot at winning as any current candidate. He was the leading Democrat among Latinos at 12%.
By Annie Leibovitz with essays by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Susan Sontag and Gloria Steinem Phaidon Press: 493 pages, $100
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Annie Leibovitz strides onto the Wiltern stage to the thunderous cheers of 1,500 mostly female fans. She takes her place at the podium, a small, casually dressed figure on a big stage. On the screen behind her are images of the matching covers of her new two-book set, “Annie Leibovitz: Women.” Volume 1 is her 1999 collection. Volume 2 has 100 new photos captured in the 25 years since. Taken together, the slipcased set zooms in on the past quarter century of American womankind, rendered in 250 images of dancers, actors, astronauts, artists, politicians, farmers, writers, CEOs, philanthropists, soldiers, musicians, athletes, socialites and scientists.
“The book was Susan’s idea,” Leibovitz says on Tuesday, referring to writer Susan Sontag, her partner until Sontag’s death in 2004. “I thought doing a photo book about women was a bad idea, like going out and photographing the ocean. But then I heard what Hillary Clinton said at the U.N. Conference on Women in 1995 — ‘Women’s rights are human rights, and human rights are women’s rights’ — and I reconsidered.” Applause shakes the Wiltern rafters.
An image from Volume 2 appears, featuring a somber-looking Sontag. “This is the last formal portrait of Susan,” Leibovitz says. “You could think she’s projecting a sense of strength, but really, she was mad at me for making her go outside to take the picture.” The crowd roars with laughter.
Think of Leibovitz, and some legendary photographs spring to mind. Whoopi Goldberg submerged in a milk-filled bathtub on the cover of Vanity Fair, July 1984. Also on VF covers: Michael Jackson, fittingly clothed and shot in black-and-white, in 1989. Demi Moore, fully pregnant and fully naked, two years later. But the photo that remains Leibovitz’s most iconic to date is the January 1981 cover of Rolling Stone featuring a nude, fetal John Lennon wrapped around Yoko Ono. “John showed up naked,” Leibovitz tells the audience. “Yoko wanted to wear clothes, so she’s fully dressed.” Leibovitz took the Polaroid on Dec. 8, 1980 — a few steps away from, and a few hours before, Lennon was shot and killed by former fan Mark David Chapman.
Joan Baez in Woodside, Calif., in 2007, from “Annie Leibovitz: Women.”
(Annie Leibovitz)
In Volume 2, we find a barefoot Joan Baez sitting in a tree strumming her guitar; a pregnant Rihanna draped in jewels and fur; Billie Eilish dreaming over a journal with pencil in hand; Shonda Rhimes with her feet up on a desk as massive as her oeuvre; and an uninhibited Michelle Obama as we’ve never seen her before: chin raised, eyes closed, hair tossed back, T-shirt and jeans parted to reveal her midriff. “I was in shock,” Leibovitz says. “But the first lady’s assistant was standing next to me, shouting, ‘That’s my first lady!’”
Familiar faces dominate, but woven between them are portraits of “regular” American women. A botanist precedes Oprah Winfrey, a philanthropist and a rabbi surround the founder of a Skid Row nonprofit, the reproductive rights activists of Moms Demand Action share space with a nude Lady Gaga. “I told her to bring a slip,” Leibovitz comments. “I’d rather people keep their clothes on at this point in my life.”
Volume 2 includes one essay each from activist Gloria Steinem, Nigerian writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and Leibovitz herself. Steinem writes, “This book will help us to discover our adventurous true selves. … We are atoms whirling in place, affected by and affecting those near and far from where we are.”
Adichie agrees. “Taken as a whole,” she writes, “these photographs create a deeply moving experience, they refute the singular lens, they revel in plurality’s power, and because of — or perhaps in spite of — their wide range, they are infused with a spirit that is communal, collective, even unifying — and ultimately hopeful.”
Leibovitz concludes the second book. “For this volume I thought about issues that are important today,” she writes. In 2016, when she was beginning work on Volume 2, the notoriously cloistered Leibovitz told a New York Times reporter about the nationwide “talking circles” she and Steinem had organized, in which women shared their experiences with issues including sexual violence, technology and human rights. “Talking in groups like that, it brings me to tears,” Leibovitz told the reporter, adding that the new work she was making for Volume 2 was more “democratic.” Volume 2 is indeed more diverse, possibly in response to a widely discussed critique of Leibovitz’s photographs of Black women.
No celebrity survives fame without acquiring a layer or two of tarnish. In the decades between Volumes 1 and 2, Leibovitz’s representations of Black women painted Leibovitz with hers. A 2022 Guardian story was headlined, “Annie Leibovitz proves yet again: she can’t photograph Black women.”
“Leibovitz’s photographs are what happens when Blackness is seen through a white gaze incapable of capturing its true beauty,” contributor Tayo Bero wrote, referring to a list of Leibovitz subjects including Simone Biles, Viola Davis, Serena Williams and Rihanna. Bero wrote, “In all cases, she manages to make her subjects look dull, ashy, pained and sad, a far cry from the lively and graceful people that they usually are.”
Bero and others particularly criticized an image Leibovitz made for Vogue, depicting Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson at the Lincoln Memorial. In the photo, the snow-white marble statue takes center stage, overlooking Brown Jackson on the lower left. At the Wiltern, when that image appears, Leibovitz speaks of her own experience shooting it, not the controversy surrounding its publication. “I was skeptical about that idea,” Leibovitz says. “But she walked into the rotunda and she started reading Lincoln’s words that are engraved into the wall. It was such a moving moment.”
Two years later, the controversy was reawakened by Leibovitz’s depictions of Zendaya, also in Vogue. An April 2024 piece on the website Screenshot Media reiterated the photos’ failure to accurately reflect “the beauty of melanated skin tones, with poor lighting that often results in lackluster portrayals.”
In her introductory essay to Volume 2, Adichie, on the other hand, praises Leibovitz’s sensitivity. “The first time Annie photographed me, more than ten years ago at my home, she sensed my discomfort right away and knew it was not merely about my general awkwardness with being photographed. It was specifically about my belly, which was newly postpartum, although I would probably still have worried even if it wasn’t. … Annie’s sanguine reaction was a relief. There was no divisiveness, no judgment.”
Rihanna at the Ritz Hotel, Paris, in 2022, from “Annie Leibovitz: Women.”
(Annie Leibovitz)
Leibovitz, her representatives and her publisher, Phaidon Press, declined to comment on the critique. In an email interview with Phaidon Vice President Deborah Aaronson, who worked on four Leibovitz titles, Aaronson said, “‘Women’ reaffirms Annie Leibovitz’s place in the photographic canon. In the ‘Women’ series, she captures a breadth of experience and people who live and work in different spheres that’s unparallelled. I believe the series makes her the most important chronicler of women over the past 50 years.”
Annie Leibovitz entered the San Francisco Art Institute at 22, intending to be a painter. But a night photography class she took on a whim changed her medium, and her life. While still a student, manifesting the confidence that would characterize her career, Leibovitz pitched a Lennon shoot to Rolling Stone. Three years later, rendered immortal as the final photographer of Lennon and Ono, Leibovitz became Rolling Stone’s chief photographer.
In 1983, Leibovitz joined the staff of Vanity Fair, where her field of exploration, and her social sphere, expanded to include actors, athletes and politicians. In 1991, she became the first woman to have a solo show at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C. She was designated a Library of Congress Living Legend in 2000.
In 2001, at age 52, Leibovitz gave birth to her first daughter, Sarah Cameron Leibovitz. Sontag was at her bedside. In May 2005, via surrogate, Leibovitz became the mother of twin daughters, Susan (named for her beloved painter sister) and Samuelle. In 2009, Leibovitz was commissioned to make the official portrait of the first family — President Barack Obama; his wife, Michelle; and their daughters, Sasha and Malia — continuing the relationship that began in 2004 when she photographed Obama in his run for the U.S. Senate.
“I want to photograph the White House,” Leibovitz says, “but I don’t think there will be much of it left when I get to it.” The evening ended as it began: with the enthusiastic applause of her audience.
COLUMBIA, S.C. — Sending women who get abortions to prison for decades. Outlawing IUDs. Sharply restricting in vitro fertilization.
These are the strictest abortion prohibitions and punishments in the nation being considered by South Carolina lawmakers, as opponents of the procedure are divided over how far to go.
The bill faces a long legislative path and uncertain prospects, even if it clears the state Senate subcommittee that’s reviewing it.
But the measure up for a second hearing Tuesday would go further than any considered since the Supreme Court overturned Roe vs. Wade in 2022, as abortion remains an unsettled issue in conservative states.
What’s in the bill
The proposal would ban all abortions unless the woman’s life is at risk and eliminates exceptions for rape and incest victims for pregnancies up to 12 weeks. Current law blocks abortions after cardiac activity is detected, which is typically six weeks into a pregnancy, before many women know they are pregnant.
The proposal would also go further than any other U.S. state. Women who get an abortion and anyone who helps them could face up to 30 years in prison. It appears to ban any contraception that prevents a fertilized egg from implanting. That would ban IUDs and could strictly limit in vitro fertilization.
Providing information about abortions would be illegal, leaving doctors worried they couldn’t suggest legal abortion elsewhere.
OB-GYN Natalie Gregory said passing a bill like this would make so many discussions in her practice — about contraceptives, losing a pregnancy, in vitro fertilization options — a “legal minefield” that could have her risking decades in prison.
“It constitutes a unconstitutional reach that threatens the very fabric of healthcare in our state,” she said during an eight-hour public hearing on the bill last month, adding that the proposal is a waste of time and public money.
The proposal has even split groups that oppose abortion and once celebrated together when South Carolina passed the six-week ban in 2021, a trigger law that took effect after Roe vs. Wade was overturned the next year.
South Carolina Citizens for Life, one of the state’s largest and oldest opponents of abortion, issued a statement the day of last month’s hearing saying it can’t support the bill because women who get abortions are victims too and shouldn’t be punished.
On the other side, at least for this bill, are groups including Equal Protection South Carolina. “Abortion is murder and should be treated as such,” the group’s founder, Mark Corral, said.
Past messaging fuels divide
Mary Ziegler, a law professor at UC Davis who has written extensively about abortion, said the divide stems from long-standing messaging that labeled abortion murder while avoiding punishment of women.
Ziegler refers to groups pushing for more penalties and restrictions as “abolitionists” and said their success in reshaping laws in conservative states, as well as shifting the broader political climate, has emboldened them to push ideas that don’t appear to have broad public support. They also have enough influence to get lawmakers to listen.
“It’s not going to go away. The trajectory keeps shifting and the abolitionists have more influence,” Ziegler said.
As the nation’s social and political discussions lurch to the right, with debates over whether same-sex marriage should be made illegal again or whether women should work outside the home, Ziegler said it has become easier to push for restrictions that might have never been brought before legislatures before.
“There is more breathing room for abolitionists now,” she said.
The bill’s prospects
A similar House bill last year got a public hearing but went no further. As the subcommittee met, Republican House leaders issued a statement that they were happy with the current state law, and that bill went nowhere.
But things are less certain in the Senate, where nine of the 34 Republicans in the 46-member chamber were elected after the current law was passed. Three of them unseated the Senate’s only Republican women, a trio who called themselves the “Sister Senators” after helping block a stricter abortion ban after Roe was overturned.
Republican Sen. Richard Cash, who sponsors the bill and is one of the Senate’s most resolute voices against abortion, will run Tuesday’s subcommittee. He acknowledged problems last month with potentially banning contraception and restricting the advice doctors can give to patients. But he has not indicated what changes he or the rest of the subcommittee might support. Six of the nine members are Republicans.
GOP Senate leaders said there is no guarantee if the bill passes out of the subcommittee that it goes any further.
“I can say this definitively — there has been not only no decision made to bring up that bill, there’s been no discussion about bringing up that bill,” Senate Majority Leader Shane Massey said.
WASHINGTON — Before flying to Brazil this week, showing up for the United States at an international summit skipped by the Trump administration, California Gov. Gavin Newsom made a stop in Texas. The redistricting fight that had started there had come to a halt in California thanks to the governor’s action. “Don’t poke the bear,” Newsom told an elated crowd of Democrats.
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In Washington, a handful of Senate Democrats had just voted with Republicans to reopen the government, relenting on a fight for an extension of healthcare tax credits. Newsom lashed out harshly against his party colleagues. “Pathetic,” he wrote online, later telling The Times, “you don’t start something unless you’re going to finish.”
They were just Newsom’s latest moves in an aggressive strategy to shore up early support for an expected run for president starting next year, after the 2026 midterm elections, when both parties will face competitive primaries without an incumbent seeking reelection for the first time since 2016.
The opportunity to redefine a party in transition and win its presidential nomination has, in recent cycles, led to historically large primary fields for both Democrats and Republicans, often featuring over 20 candidates at the start of a modern race.
And yet, one year out, Newsom appears to be running alone and out front in an open field, with expected competitors taking few steps to blunt his momentum, ceding ground in public media and with private donors to the emerging front-runner.
Former Vice President Kamala Harris remains well-respected among Democratic voters and is said to be flirting with another campaign. Other candidates, including Govs. Wes Moore of Maryland, JB Pritzker of Illinois, Andy Beshear of Kentucky, Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania and Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, Sens. Ruben Gallego of Arizona and Chris Murphy of Connecticut, New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, are all said to be considering bids.
But Newsom has begun pulling away from the pack in public polling, emerging as the Democrats’ leading choice and running competitively against top Republican contenders.
“It’s very early, but at the moment Gov. Newsom seems to have his finger more acutely on the pulse of Democratic voters than his 2028 rivals,” said Sawyer Hackett, a Democratic strategist and content creator who worked on presidential campaigns for Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.
“As a governor, Newsom has an advantageous perch to fight back and command attention,” Hackett said, “but he’s getting a significant head start in defining himself politically — as the guy who can take on Trump. And the battle for attention will only get harder as more contenders enter the ring.”
Running to the center
Over the summer, Newsom embraced a social media strategy leaning into the vitalist, masculine culture that has captured the attention of young American men and helped drive them to President Trump’s reelection campaign last year — a strategy that Newsom has said will be key to Democratic hopes of recapturing the White House.
“We need to own up to the fact that we ceded that ground — we walked away from this crisis of men and boys,” Newsom told CNN in an interview this week. “They were attracted to this notion of strength: strong and wrong, not weak and right.”
The moves were seen as an effort by Newsom to position himself as a centrist heading into the campaign, a posture that could benefit him in a general election. But it could also open the governor up to a robust challenge from the progressive left.
In 2014, as former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was laying the groundwork for her run for president, polling showed her as the overwhelming favorite to win the Democratic nomination — and ahead of all competitors by 49 points in the crucial battleground state of New Hampshire. She would ultimately secure the nomination, but only after facing down a serious challenge from Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, who beat her soundly in the Granite State.
“One of the biggest pitfalls is who else might get in,” said Christian Grose, a professor of political science at USC and principal of Data Viewpoint, a data and polling firm. “At this stage with such a wide-open race, he is the front-runner, but who runs and who does not will shape his chances.”
Ocasio-Cortez could pose a similar challenge to an establishment candidate like Newsom, political analysts said. But her prospects in a Democratic primary and in a general election are different matters. In 2020, when Sanders once again appeared close to the nomination, other candidates cleared the field to help Joe Biden secure a victory and take on Trump.
“The shape of the field is still fuzzy,” said Jack Pitney, a politics professor at Claremont McKenna College. “AOC generates excitement, but no House member has gone directly to the White House since [James] Garfield in 1880.”
Risks to an early start
Newsom’s yearlong head start has earned him practical advantages. The campaign for Proposition 50, Newsom’s successful bid to redraw California’s congressional map along partisan lines, drew a new set of donors to a governor whose experience up until now had been limited to statewide office. Assertive exposure on social and legacy media has enhanced his name recognition nationwide.
He will need both to compete against Harris, a fellow Californian who could be convinced to stay out of the race if she isn’t confident she will win the primary, a source familiar with her thinking told The Times. Harris would enter the race with the benefit of widespread name identification and inherited donor rolls from her previous campaigns.
“This stage in the race for 2028 we generally call the ‘pre-primary’ period, in which would-be candidates compete for three resources: media attention, money, and staff. Newsom is definitely ahead in the “media pre-primary” at this point,” said Todd Belt, professor and director of the political management master’s program at George Washington University.
“A candidate definitely wants to be seen as the front-runner early on in order to attract the best staff,” Belt said. “It’s also good to get donors committed early on so they don’t contribute to others in the race, and you can then go back to them for more donations and bundling.”
But in a media environment where voters have increasingly short attention spans, Newsom could risk flaming out early or peaking too soon, analysts said.
Other centrist candidates could emerge with less baggage, such as Gallego, a young Latino lawmaker and Marine combat veteran from a working-class background.
“If Democrats care about winning the general election, Ruben Gallego is one to watch,” Pitney added. “He could appeal to groups with which Democrats have struggled lately. Newsom does not exactly give off blue-collar vibes.”
Grose, of USC, also said that Newsom’s association with coastal California could pose significant political challenges to the governor.
“There are pitfalls,” Grose said. “He needs to sell California, so any perceptions of the state’s problems don’t drag him down.”
IOM chief calls for ceasefire to allow aid groups to reach Sudanese civilians trapped in war-torn Darfur region.
The head of the United Nations’ migration agency has called for a ceasefire and a humanitarian corridor to help tens of thousands of civilians trapped in el-Fasher, the city in Sudan’s Darfur region that fell to the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) last month.
Amy Pope, director-general of the International Organization for Migration (IOM), told Al Jazeera on Wednesday that “the primary concern is getting access” to residents who have been largely cut off from humanitarian aid and services in el-Fasher.
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“When humanitarian actors are themselves at risk – when they’re killed, when they’re shot, when they’re detained – we can’t get the people what they need to survive,” Pope said.
“The primary issue is ensuring that there is a ceasefire, a humanitarian corridor, so that aid groups can bring in that aid to the civilians who are very much caught in the middle.”
Human rights groups have accused the RSF, which has been battling the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) for control of Sudan since April 2023, of committing widescale massacres in its capture of el-Fasher on October 26.
While thousands of residents remain stuck in el-Fasher, the capital of Sudan’s North Darfur state, nearly 90,000 others have fled since the RSF’s takeover, according to the latest IOM figures.
On Wednesday, Pope said displaced families have described dangerous journeys out of el-Fasher.
“They spoke about seeing dead bodies as they walked. They spoke about having to create makeshift trenches to avoid being shot at, or being harmed by the drones. They spoke of unspeakable, unbearable, sexual trauma [and] sexual abuse,” she said.
“The stories are really harrowing, and they’re happening now even as we speak.”
Her comments come a day after the IOM warned that humanitarian aid efforts in Sudan were “on the brink of collapse” due to continued insecurity and a lack of funding.
“Warehouses are nearly empty, aid convoys face significant insecurity, and access restrictions continue to prevent the delivery of sufficient aid,” the agency said in a statement, noting that violence is also spreading to other parts of the country.
Nearly 39,000 people have fled intense fighting in North Kordofan state, east of el-Fasher, between October 26 and November 9, the IOM said.
Meanwhile, Anna Mutavati, the regional director for East and Southern Africa at UN Women, told reporters this week that women and girls who fled el-Fasher now face serious threats of sexual violence in displacement camps around the city.
“What the women tell us is that … every step that they’ve taken – to fetch water, to collect firewood, or to stand in a food line – is carrying a high risk of sexual violence,” Mutavati said during a news conference in Geneva on Tuesday.
“There is mounting evidence that rape is being deliberately and systematically used as a weapon of war,” she added.
“Women’s bodies … have just become a crime scene in Sudan.”
About 20 women are lying blindfolded on yoga mats in an airy structure in the Joshua Tree desert. Some are partially dressed in loungewear or lingerie; others are fully nude. Sexy indie folk music blasts from the sound system and outside, through the open double doors, the wind kicks up, rustling the fragrant desert scrub brush, pomegranate trees and ponderosa pines.
Their bodies are layered with a collage of fresh fruit, feathers, cucumber slices, smooth stones and velvety flower petals, among other things. Facilitators quietly tiptoe around the room, gently placing more and more items onto their chests, arms and legs until their skin is barely visible. One woman lies with lemon slices on her nipples, a large strawberry in her open mouth and a bouquet of long-stem pink roses, in full bloom, on her pelvis.
Facilitators adorn women’s bodies with colorful objects during an exercise about receiving pleasure and feeling beautiful.
(Joyce Lee / For The Times)
The exercise is meant to help the women connect with their bodies by stimulating them with a spectrum of sensations: the cool slickness of a polished river stone or the prick of a pineapple rind. It’s about receiving pleasure and feeling beautiful — no matter your age, body shape or perceived limitations.
“The biological clock may be finite, but your sexuality — arousal — is infinite,” says the event’s host, Pamela Madsen, scattering rose petals on one attendee’s thighs.
Pamela Madsen, Back to the Body’s founder.
(Joyce Lee / For The Times)
Welcome to Back to the Body, a sexual wellness retreat helping participants — all women — access their erotic selves. In this group, attendees are straight or bisexual and range in age from mid-30s to mid-70s. They’re mostly from around California, but some have traveled from North Carolina, Florida and Connecticut. They’ve come to overcome intimacy issues or body shame, to process trauma, to learn how to better orgasm or otherwise improve their sex lives. Some are therapists themselves looking to expand their knowledge of “sexological bodywork,” a form of body-based sex therapy that Madsen practices. Others simply want to be in community with like-minded women who are also exploring their sexual selves.
The two-night retreat, which costs $550 to $2,000 depending on accommodations on the sprawling multi-villa property, includes mindfulness exercises, journaling, expert-led seminars, group discussions and meals by a private chef. It also features a preview of a “bodywork session” that one might experience at Back to the Body’s longer, weeklong retreat: a live “pleasure demonstration” at the event’s, um, climax — but more on that later.
Madsen guides participants in a “Lotus Lift Meditation,” meant to help them clarify their intentions for their lives.
(Joyce Lee / For The Times)
An unlikely high desert sex educator, Madsen, “60-something,” is a brash, outspoken New York transplant who oscillates between frank asides (“I like to say ‘f—’ — get used to it”) and welling up with tears (“I’m sorry, I’m just getting emotional, this is important stuff”) as she proselytizes about the power of erotic energy. She believes that “when a woman reclaims her arousal, she reclaims her aliveness.” Put another way: Pleasure isn’t just a component of your life — it’s a tool for transformation.
“I’ve seen women changing, improving their lives,” Madsen says of past participants, her voice cracking with emotion. “They start taking control of their finances, they start to care about how they’re spending their time.”
Sitting on the porch of the “big house,” a midcentury modern ranch home where the retreat meals are served, attendee Mandy Manuel, 39, a sex therapist from Connecticut, says that she found love — for herself and with a partner — after attending several Back to the Body retreats.
Back to the Body’s midcentury modern ranch home.
(Joyce Lee / For The Times)
“I’ve been in a large body my whole life. And the world will tell you ‘you’re not good enough, you’re not pretty enough, you’re not deserving of sex and romance,’” she says. “I totally bought into that story. And I wanted to challenge that. So I came and it was life-changing. Just recognizing ‘Oh, wow, I can receive.’”
Manuel eventually started dating online and met her current partner a year and a half ago (and is now facilitating a Back to the Body retreat in 2026). “My standard for dating shot way up. Previously it was: ‘I’m just going to accept whoever wants me’ and now it’s ‘who do I want?’”
Sexual wellness is a long-established sector of the medical establishment that, today, encompasses everything from contraception and safe sex practices to organic lube, tantric breathwork, couples counseling and the latest Magic Wand Rechargeable vibrator. It adds up to big business: the global sexual wellness market is projected to reach $48.2 billion by 2030, according to Global Industry Analysts Inc.
A participant in the “art of adoration” exercise.
(Joyce Lee / For The Times)
Somatic (or body-based) sex therapy, a subset of sexual wellness, is also not new in the medical field. Individuals struggling with sexual issues have for decades turned to sexual surrogates, or trained professionals who specialize in “experiential learning” and who work in tandem with a client’s sex therapist when talk therapy isn’t enough.
Whereas sexual surrogacy is interactive, mimicking partnership, sexological bodywork employs “one-way touch.” In Back to the Body’s private, one-on-one bodywork sessions that means certified sexological bodyworkers, trained in Madsen’s approach, are always clothed and focus attention on the consenting client without reciprocity. A session may involve breathwork, intimacy coaching, sensual touch, sound and movement, including dance. It’s a “body first” approach to healing, in which physical sensations inform thoughts, as opposed to talk therapy.
But hands-on sex education is controversial.
“I don’t endorse it with my clients,” says UCLA emeritus professor Dr. Gail E. Wyatt, a licensed clinical psychologist and board-certified sex therapist, “because I don’t trust [that] the individuals who are assigned [to touch clients] have the boundaries to see this as a professional act and not as an opportunity. Vulnerable individuals may end up in a situation where they’re being taken advantage of.”
Madsen acknowledges that sexological bodywork is edgy but stands by the modality.
“We cannot heal, expand or awaken our sexuality through words alone,” she says. “We must touch the body to hear it speak — and that terrifies people.”
The retreat includes journaling exercises as well as mindfullness activities and group discussions.
(Joyce Lee / For The Times)
Sexological bodyworkers are not doctors and there’s no national certification for the profession. Practitioners do, however, adhere to a code of ethics upheld by the Los Angeles-based Assn. of Certified Sexological Bodyworkers. While sexological bodywork falls into a legal gray area, the state of California first recognized it as a profession involving sex education in 2003 when it approved training at San Francisco’s the Institute for Advanced Study of Human Sexuality (the school closed in 2018 and no additional state-approved schools have emerged). Nonetheless, somatic sex education appears to be growing: two Back to the Body practitioners offer sexual wellness retreats through their own companies: Court Vox leads one for queer men through his the BodyVox and Cosmo Meens leads one for straight men through his Himeros Project.
“There’s a great need for education about sensuality and the body that we don’t get in school or at home, typically speaking,” says Regena Thomashauer, author of “Pussy: A Reclamation,” which explains that we live in a culture that teaches women to turn off their power.
To be clear, Madsen stresses, arousal is not just about orgasming, or even physical pleasure, but about agency. Erotic energy — desire — is a powerful, “life-changing tool” every woman has access to, she says — it connects you to your passion and creativity, to your intuition and voice.
“When women are in touch with their arousal, they start being able to see themselves, they start being able to express themselves, Madsen says. “They find their voice, they’re able to speak their desires.”
Addressing the group in the living room, Madesn elaborates on the empowering, if political, nature of Back to the Body’s work.
Madsen believes that “when a woman reclaims her arousal, she reclaims her aliveness.”
(Joyce Lee / For The Times)
“Women have only had the right to vote for just over 100 years,” she says. “You [often] couldn’t have a checking account or credit card until 1974 without a man. Why is this work important? Because we’ve been taught not to trust ourselves, not to trust our bodies. That we are vehicles for birth, that we are vehicles for sex, vehicles for entertainment, vehicles for service — we are not sovereign. What does this work do? It creates sovereign women.”
What’s more, Madsen says, it takes time for women to reach a state of arousal — and many women experience premature penetration during sex.
She breaks into song: “I want a man with a slow hand …” she croons, belting out the Pointer Sisters’ early ‘80s pop hit. Laughter erupts around the room.
A private chef, pictured in the background, prepares farm-to-table meals for participants.
In the book, Madsen documents her search for “sexual, personal and spiritual wholeness.” As part of that journey, she became certified as a sexological bodyworker in 2007 through the Institute for Advanced Study of Human Sexuality. She founded Back to the Body in 2011, adding her own spin on sexological bodywork. While most practitioners offered one-off sessions, she says, she launched multi-day immersive retreats, stressing the importance of being “away from the noise of the world.”
Back to the Body had no physical home initially and held retreats virtually or around the U.S. and internationally.
Several Back to the Body participants have gifted the retreat with artworks, now scattered around the property.
(Joyce Lee / For The Times)
“But then we found this place,” Madsen says while touring the Joshua Tree property, onto which she moved in July 2024. She strides across the land, more of a swagger, wearing a white flowy dress, white cowboy hat and cowboy boots, her long black hair cascading down her back and her curvaceous bosom occasionally spilling out of her dress.
“This is the house that women built,” she says, sweeping one hand across the horizon and tucking a runaway boob back into her dress with her other. “I couldn’t have afforded this place without help — investments and donations — from participants. This work changed their lives, and they wanted to give back.”
Previous attendees also gifted artworks or ephemera now scattered around the property: large crystals around the pool or a granite statue, outside the main house, of a woman bracing against the wind.
Late in the afternoon, the women settle into the community room for a 45-minute demonstration of what a bodywork session might look like. Madsen, dressed in aqua lingerie, is the client in this scenario; practitioner Cosmo Meens, a buff and barefoot 45-year-old with thigh tattoos and a salt-and-pepper beard, is her certified sexological bodyworker. There is sexy music; there is playful slow dancing; there is laughter. “Louder!” Madsen says of the music, laying down on what looks like a massage table. There is also a shelf of accouterments nearby — coconut oil, a vibrator, a feather — to stimulate pleasure or bring her to orgasm.
The women sit in a circle around the demonstration table, rapt.
Afterward, Madsen sits up, hair mussed and cheeks flushed. There’s a short question-and-answer session. Then Madsen hard-sells the weeklong retreat, which runs from $8,000 to $18,000, depending on programming, accommodations and location (some retreats are international). There are just 30 spots left for 2026, she tells the crowd; and for those who register today, there’s a $1,000 discount.
15 of the 20 women sign up.
Participants during the “Lotus Lift Meditation.”
(Joyce Lee / For The Times)
To some, the marketing pitch might have a transactional feel: Is this cutting-edge somatic sex education or the commodification of the orgasm, of pleasure?
“It’s inaccessible,” says Betsy Crane, a retired professor of human sexuality at Widener University, who sees value in the retreat’s work but balks at the pricetag. “I understand why they have to charge as much as they do — it’s staff intensive, they include food, nice venues — but it’s not affordable for most women, that’s the inequality of the world that we live in. If it were more accepted, it could become less expensive because it could be available locally.”
Madsen says the price is in line with today’s economy.
“Travel is expensive, experiences are expensive,” she says. “What I know is: that I’m not getting wealthy, that it’s hard to keep the ship running. That women get done in a week here what costs them 15 years in talk therapy.”
The end goal? Madsen hopes her retreat will change the world “one vulva at a time.”
Sitting on the porch, Deb Morris, 63, a retired business owner who lives outside of Denver, says she’s been on more than a dozen Back to the Body retreats over the past decade. (Do the math.) But the investment of time and money has been “life changing.”
Attendees enjoy downtime between retreat activities.
(Joyce Lee / For The Times)
“How I show up at 63 is so much more vibrant and committed to life,” she says. “I stay in, sexually — my beingness, how I dress, staying healthy in the gym, having a more vibrant friend group. All of those things definitely have been affected by doing this work from my mid-50s to my mid-60s.”
She looks out at the view, a vast desert landscape. Then adds: “I feel alive.”
Thousands of women fleeing violence in El Fasher are subjected to rape, starvation and bombing while seeking refuge, the United Nations reported on Tuesday. Photo by Marwan Mohamed/EPA
Nov. 11 (UPI) — Women fleeing El Fasher in western Sudan are subjected to rape, starvation and deadly bombing, the United Nations reported on Tuesday.
The paramilitary Rapid Support Forces recently captured El Fasher after a 500-day siege and are using rape as a “weapon of war,” according to the United Nations.
“Women speaking to us from El Fasher, the heart of Sudan’s latest catastrophe, tell us that they’ve endured starvation, displacement, rape and bombardment,” said Anna Mutavati, U.N. Women regional director for East and Southern Africa.
“Pregnant women have given birth in the streets as the last remaining maternity hospitals were looted and destroyed,” she added.
“What the women tell us in that on their horrific journey, every step that they’ve taken to fetch water, to collect firewood or to stand in a food line has carried a high risk of sexual violence,” Mutavati said.
“There is mounting evidence that rape is being deliberately and systematically used as a weapon of war.”
The situation is getting worse as fighting spreads throughout El Fasher, forcing thousands of women and girls to flee the city or risk being killed, raped or otherwise brutalized by RSF forces, the United Nations reported.
El Fasher is the capital of North Darfur and was the area’s last stronghold for the Sudanese Armed Forces amid the civil war in Sudan. An estimated 89,000 people have fled El Fasher and often seek refuge in Tawila, which is about 45 miles away, as well as Korma and Malit.
Humanitarian resources are scarce in those locales, though, according to the United Nations.
Satellite images also show evidence of widespread summary executions and other likely war crimes committed by the RSF, the Australian Broadcasting Company reported.
“All of my patients, my staff and everyone else in the hospital were killed,” a medical professional identified as “Abdullah” told the ABC. “They shot them all.”
Abdullah was part of the Saudi Hospital staff in El Fasher, where the World Health Organization said more than 460 patients and their companions were killed by RSF members.
At least six healthcare workers also were taken by the RSF, according to the WHO.
This article discusses the important issues underlying the #MeToo movement that has spread across the globe. On the one hand, the #MeToo movement has succeeded in gaining cross-border support for victims of sexual harassment, so that victims do not feel alone and have the courage to speak out. However, the #MeToo movement has not yet fully succeeded in reaching all groups. This article will explore why this massive online campaign has not truly reached those who need it most: victims without internet access, without digital devices, or who are technologically illiterate. As a result, they remain unable to voice their experiences of abuse and receive the support they need.
The #MeToo movement has indeed succeeded in changing the way we view, understand, and even produce new regulations in many countries. This demonstrates the power of the internet. However, the reality is that millions of victims living in villages, remote areas, or from poor families still feel alone. This is why this article will discuss the three main obstacles that have prevented #MeToo from being fully successful: limited digital access, inequality in technological capabilities and security, and weak direct activism in the field.
In my opinion, #MeToo is still far from successful. Success in changing laws has not been followed by success in helping those with proven limitations. These three main reasons will be discussed in more detail in this article. #MeToo was initially successful because it spread quickly on the internet. Platforms such as Twitter can connect people from all over the world. That’s amazing! However, this initial success mainly occurred in developed countries that have cheap and fast internet. This means that the movement reached more wealthy, educated people living in big cities. This shows that the movement was biased from the start because it only focused on issues faced by internet-savvy people. This was also evident when #MeToo, which had been around since 2006, only went viral and spread worldwide when Hollywood actresses started using #MeToo on social media in 2017.
Access barriers directly undermine the success of #MeToo. The movement fails to reach all those affected by abuse who live in villages, in conflict areas, and those who are technologically illiterate and lack financial resources. It is not only these disparities that set them apart, but also the lack of support and justice that is part of this difference. Victims without a signal, without a cell phone, or without data do not have the tools to know their rights. This situation is a very common problem for many people.
This failure results in “solidarity poverty.” According to a study by Amalia, A. R., Raodah, P., & Wardani, N. K. (2024), “In low- and middle-income countries, 300 million fewer women than men use mobile internet.” This shows that the issue of access is not only a geographical problem but also an economic and gender issue. Because they lack the ability to speak out, the #MeToo movement does not truly represent all victims, but only those who have the privilege of being connected.
In addition, there is also a gap in digital literacy and security that will become a second barrier preventing victims from successfully participating in the #MeToo movement. Victims who are technologically illiterate do not know how to use social media safely and anonymously. Furthermore, they lack knowledge about how to store digital evidence so that it is not lost. They do not understand privacy regulations, the dangers of doxing (spreading personal data), or cyber attacks. This ignorance causes them to fear speaking out even more than they fear the perpetrators.
In many countries, this issue is made more difficult by the threat of retaliation through legislation (e.g., defamation laws/cybercrime laws) that can be used against victims and lead to revictimization (ICJ, 2023). When victims speak without legal representation or digital literacy, they risk being perceived as lying. Victims in large cities have better digital safety nets than those in remote areas. This is why “Solidarity with Quotas” emerged. Only those who are digitally literate and financially secure can speak up, while others remain silent out of fear.
Due to these limitations, the #MeToo movement around the world has been dominated by issues occurring in large offices, elite campuses, or among public figures. In line with the criticism expressed by PUSAD Paramadina, the #MeToo movement in Indonesia is considered to have not yet reached a wider audience, as the discussion is still limited to those who are literate in social media and come from the middle to upper classes (Kartika, 2019). This criticism is not only relevant in Indonesia, but also in many other countries.
However, the problems with the #MeToo movement are not limited to the internet. The failure of activism to change offline behavior is also a weakness. Solidarity on the internet can indeed raise donations and spread information, but it often fails to translate this momentum into equitable direct assistance. The digital resources and extraordinary public attention received by this movement have not been wisely allocated to the areas most in need. This shows that digital activism often focuses only on the most popular topics but has no real impact on the most vulnerable victims.
Despite the large number of new laws passed as a result of #MeToo, integrated service centers, shelters, and legal services are still concentrated in capital cities or large cities. Victims who are not within reach of these services must face significant distances and costs to obtain justice. This situation shows that inequality in access to protection is still deeply rooted. This is in line with research published by Jurnal Perempuan (2024), which states that Online Gender-Based Violence (KBGO) is not an anomaly, but a continuation of gender-based violence that has been entrenched for centuries in patriarchal systems. Therefore, gender inequality will only persist in the real world if the struggle is only carried out in the online realm and is not balanced with the provision of real services for victims.
Three major issues hindering the success of the #MeToo movement are limited access, limited digital capabilities, and a lack of direct participation in the field. This shows that a digital struggle without real interaction risks losing sight of its main goal: justice for all victims, not just those connected to the virtual world.
The world has been changed by the #MeToo movement. However, the world it has changed is one that is connected to the internet. Millions of other women continue to struggle in silence, in places where there is no signal and no courage. Meanwhile, some people still cannot access it. This movement has raised awareness around the world, but there are still people who are left behind, hindered by digital poverty and the gap between those who have access to technology and those who do not. Digital justice should not be limited to viral hashtags or phone screens. In truth, solidarity is not just about thousands of posts or supportive comments. Rather, it comes from the courage to step into the real world, listen to those who are unheard, and ensure that protection is available for both those who can reach the network and those left behind. Because true justice does not require popularity to be seen, and true solidarity is measured by how far we collaborate with those who are most silent, not by how much we speak.
The International Olympic Committee pumped the brakes on a report Monday that the body was poised to ban athletes born male from competing in women’s Olympic events, saying that “no decisions have been taken yet.”
A report in The Times of London stated that the ban on transgender women in female competition would be implemented early in 2026 “after a science-based review of evidence about permanent physical advantages of being born male.”
The IOC insisted the report was premature but did not refute that a new policy was forthcoming.
A spokesperson confirmed that medical and scientific director Dr. Jane Thornton updated IOC members last week at a meeting in Lausanne, Switzerland, on the initial findings of a working group studying the issue. However, the spokesperson said in a statement that “the working group is continuing its discussions on this topic and no decisions have been taken yet. Further information will be provided in due course.”
New IOC president Kirsty Coventry succeeded Thomas Bach in June and three months later formed the Protection of the Female Category working group made up of experts as well as representatives of international federation to study the issue.
The findings and a new policy could be announced as soon as the IOC session, scheduled in February ahead of the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics.
Under Bach, the IOC declined to apply a universal rule on transgender participation in the Olympics, and transgender athletes remain eligible to participate. Each sport’s international federation is allowed to set its own rules.
However, Coventry said in her first news conference after becoming IOC president that she believes Olympic sports should do away with the current piecemeal approach to setting rules on transgender inclusion and instead implement a policy that applies to most or all sports.
“We understand that there will be differences depending on the sport,” she said. “But it was very clear from the members that we have to protect the female category, first and foremost to ensure fairness.
“We have to do it with a scientific approach and with the inclusion of the international federations who have done a lot of work in that area.”
President Trump signed an executive order early this year banning transgender athletes from competing in women’s sports in U.S. schools and said he intends to apply the policy at the Los Angeles Olympics in 2028. The order directs the Secretary of State to attempt to change IOC rules on transgender participation and also directs immigration officials to refuse admission to transgender women from other countries for the purposes of sports participation.
California Department of Education officials refused to comply with the order. However, Trump’s announcement prompted the U.S Olympic and Paralympic Committee to change their rules and ban transgender athletes from taking part in women’s sports.
The most recent Olympics controversy over gender eligibility occurred at the Paris Games last summer when boxer Imane Khelif of Algeria won the women’s welterweight gold medal a year after being disqualified from the World Championships for reportedly failing a gender eligibility test.
The IOC allowed Khelif and Taiwan’s Lin Yu-ting to compete in the women’s division because their passports identified them as female. Yu-ting had been banned by the suspended International Boxing Assn. (IBA).
In an attempt to identify athletes raised as female but who sometimes carry physical advantages of males — called Differences of Sexual Development (DSD) — international boxing this year introduced mandatory tests for athletes in the female category to detect a gene on the Y chromosome that triggers the development of male characteristics.
Other sports have created a range of thresholds to ban or allow transgender athletes to compete as women. World Athletics, the international governing body for track and field, bans transgender athletes who have undergone male puberty. World Rugby forbids transgender athletes from competing at the highest level. And World Aquatics allows transgender athletes who transitioned before the age of 12 to compete as women.
Very few transgender athletes have taken part in the Games. New Zealand weightlifter Laurel Hubbard became the first openly transgender athlete to compete in a different gender category in the 2021 Tokyo Olympics.
“I don’t think we need to redo all the work that’s been done — we can learn from the international federations and set up a task force that will look at this constantly and consistently,” Coventry said. “The overarching principle must be to protect the female category.”
