Catch up on the day’s news: Trump trial testimony, campus protests, Earth Day
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CNN’s 5 Things PM brings you the news you need to know.
👋 Welcome to 5 Things PM, and Happy Earth Day! The world produces about 400 million metric tons of plastic waste each year. Every day, 2,000 truckloads are dumped into oceans, rivers and lakes. CNN’s climate and photography teams took a closer look at where a lot of it ends up. Here’s what else you might have missed during your busy day: 1️⃣ Trump trial: Prosecutors and Donald Trump’s attorneys delivered opening statements in his criminal hush money trial, and the first witness — a former National Enquirer publisher — was called to testify. A hearing over whether Trump violated a gag order is set for Tuesday morning. 📹 Video: Legal analyst breaks down case 2️⃣ Campus protests: The turmoil at Columbia University ramped up as simmering tensions halted in-person classes and officials scrambled to ease security fears. ➕ At Yale University, police arrested dozens of protesters. 📹 Video: Hear what students say 3️⃣ Reproductive rights: Patients have a right to privacy when it comes to their medical information — even when they travel to another state for an abortion, IVF or birth control — federal officials declared in a new rule. 4️⃣ TikTok ban: The company will file a court challenge if Congress passes legislation paving the way to a nationwide ban of the app, a top executive told employees in an internal memo obtained by CNN.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth risked compromising sensitive military information that could have endangered US troops through his use of Signal to discuss attack plans, a Pentagon watchdog said in an unclassified report released Thursday. It also details how Hegseth declined to cooperate with the probe.
If nothing else, the controversy over the Trump administration’s second strike on an alleged drug boat in the Caribbean has surfaced a long-overdue debate about its already legally dubious first strikes.
Two top House lawmakers emerged divided along party lines after a private briefing with the military official who oversaw September’s attack on an alleged drug vessel that included a so-called double-tap strike that killed surviving crew members, with a top Democrat calling video of the incident that was shared as part of the briefing “one of the most troubling things” he has seen as a lawmaker.
Authorities in Colombia are dealing with increasingly sophisticated criminals, who use advanced tech to produce and conceal the drugs they hope to export around the world. But police and the military are fighting back, using AI to flag suspicious passengers, cargo and mail - alongside more conventional air and sea patrols. CNN’s Isa Soares gets an inside look at Bogotá’s war on drugs.
Young Americans are “a generation under profound strain” with little confidence in institutions and widespread economic concerns, according to a Harvard Institute of Politics survey of adults younger than 30 released Thursday.
As lawmakers demand answers over reports that the US military carried out a follow-up strike that killed survivors during an attacked on an alleged drug boat in the Caribbean, a career Navy SEAL who has spent most of his 30 years of military experience in special operations will be responsible for providing them.
The murder trial of Brian Walshe, who is accused of killing and dismembering his wife in 2023 continues. Follow for live updates.
The FBI arrested a person Thursday who investigators believe planted pipe bombs near the Republican and Democratic National Committee headquarters the night before the 2021 US Capitol riot.
Lawyers for the New York attorney general’s office are expected to appear in federal court in Albany on Thursday to try to disqualify a US attorney from investigating the state’s civil case against President Donald Trump.
A new poll shows more than 70% of Republicans with Obamacare coverage don’t want their enhanced premium subsidies to expire.
A safety volunteer accused of fatally shooting a man taking part in a “No Kings” protest last June in Salt Lake City while firing at another man he believed to be a potential mass shooter has been charged with manslaughter, prosecutors announced Wednesday.
The specter of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown looms over the Somali diaspora in the Twin Cities – home to the nation’s largest Somali population.
Honduras’ former President Juan Orlando Hernández thanked US President Donald Trump for pardoning his US drug trafficking conviction amid criticism from lawmakers that the pardon undermines the White House’s efforts to stop drug trafficking.