5 things to know for Sept. 30: Helene’s damage, Middle East, VP debate, Chemical plant fire, SpaceX
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Port workers from Maine to Texas are threatening a major strike this week that could disrupt the flow of popular products into the US. Consumers wouldn’t necessarily feel the impacts immediately, but experts say a long port strike would eventually cause shortages of chocolate, booze and fruit, including bananas and cherries. Here’s what else you need to know to Get Up to Speed and On with Your Day. The Southeastern US is grappling with widespread devastation after Helene made landfall Thursday as the strongest hurricane on record to slam into Florida’s Big Bend region and tore through multiple states, killing at least 95 people. Millions are still without power and authorities warn electricity could be a week away or longer in some areas. In the Carolinas, days of unrelenting flooding have turned roads into waterways, left many without basic necessities and strained state resources. President Joe Biden will visit some of the affected communities later this week, “as soon as it will not disrupt emergency response operations,” the White House said Sunday. Israeli airstrikes hit an intersection in the Lebanese capital of Beirut today, the first time the strikes have landed within the city limits since October 7. The attack comes days after Israel assassinated Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah. In recent weeks, Israel has expanded its attacks on Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Houthis in Yemen, stoking fears of a regional war, as Hezbollah pledged to continue fighting despite losses in its senior ranks. President Joe Biden said he is “working like hell” with allies to prevent an all-out war in the Middle East. Before Nasrallah’s killing, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu brushed off a ceasefire proposal brokered by the US. Vice presidential nominees Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and Ohio Sen. JD Vance are gearing up for a high-stakes debate on Tuesday — five weeks before Election Day. The Walz-Vance matchup may be the last debate of the 2024 election, unprecedented in modern presidential campaigns, with former President Donald Trump rejecting calls from Vice President Kamala Harris to agree to a second meeting, including one proposed by CNN for October 23. With a tight race entering the closing stretch and early voting underway in several states, the running mates’ showdown Tuesday in New York presents one of the last major opportunities to make the case for their respective tickets. The debate will be hosted by CBS and will begin at 9 p.m. ET. A reaction following a fire at a Georgia chemical plant on Sunday forced evacuations, shelter-in-place advisories and interstate road closures. The blaze broke out on the roof of BioLab in Conyers, Georgia, about 30 miles east of Atlanta. Officials said a malfunctioned sprinkler head “came in contact with a water-reactive chemical and produced a plume.” The fire was put out Sunday evening but the smoke may be visible for several days, officials said, adding that air quality surveys “revealed the harmful irritant chlorine” emitting from the facility.
Members of President Donald Trump’s “Board of Peace,” the committee that will oversee the reconstruction of Gaza, will receive a permanent seat if they pay $1 billion, according to a US official.
The announcement Saturday night signaled an unusually direct effort by the White House to influence college football scheduling and television programming.
Chilean President Gabriel Boric announced a state of catastrophe in two regions in the south of the country early on Sunday as raging wildfires forced at least 20,000 people to evacuate and left at least 16 people dead.
The Pentagon has ordered about 1,500 active-duty soldiers to prepare for deployment to Minnesota, according to defense officials cited by The Washington Post and ABC News, as Minnesota officials have also mobilized the National Guard.
The Democratic Party has a deeply motivated base and a clear advantage on the generic congressional ballot ahead of this fall’s midterms despite dismal impressions of its current leaders in Congress, according to a new CNN poll conducted by SSRS.
American Battleground: Demolition Man – How Trump’s first year back is changing the nation’s capital
On a breezy autumn morning beneath skittering clouds, the demolition crew strikes quicker than almost anyone expected. Working seemingly under the sole command of President Donald J. Trump, who has long fashioned himself the Builder-in-Chief, they take only days to reduce the 123-year-old East Wing of the White House to rubble. No drawn-out debate. No approval by independent preservationists.
What was once a place of worship filled with precious objects packed with meaning now sits in heavy layers of dark soot, burdened by the pungent smell of smoke after someone set fire to Mississippi’s largest and oldest synagogue.
Dos semanas después del derrocamiento de Nicolás Maduro, los ciudadanos venezolanos que viven en diferentes países de la región siguen con atención lo que ocurre en la tierra que los vio nacer. Jimena de la Quintana visitó Gamarra, el emporio comercial más grande de Perú y uno de los más importantes de Latinoamérica, que es fuente de empleo de muchos venezolanos. ¿En qué condiciones regresarían esos migrantes venezolanos a su país? ¿Para ellos es suficiente que Maduro ya no esté en el poder?
The US on Saturday announced it conducted a lethal strike in Syria on an al Qaeda affiliate leader it says had direct ties to an ISIS attacker who killed three Americans in early December.
President Donald Trump has leaned into his presidential clemency powers much more aggressively in his second term –in fact, he’s pardoned one woman twice.
The Pentagon has ordered the military command that oversees new recruits’ enlistment to hold off on initial training for people who are HIV-positive and recently enlisted in the military, CNN has learned, saying that a decision on reinstating a Defense Department ban on their joining the military was “expected in the next few weeks.”
Democrat Abigail Spanberger was sworn into office Saturday as Virginia’s first female governor, amid a cold drizzle outside the state Capitol after centuries of men holding the commonwealth’s top office.
The European Union and the Mercosur bloc of South American countries formally signed a long-sought landmark free trade agreement on Saturday, capping more than a quarter-century of torturous negotiations to strengthen commercial ties in the face of rising protectionism and trade tensions around the world.