TV News LIES

Jimmy Kimmel is making sure Stephen Colbert has the spotlight as CBS' "The Late Show" wraps.

The late-night comedian will show his respect for Colbert by not airing a new episode of "Jimmy Kimmel Live!" on Thursday, May 21, the day of Colbert's final "Late Show," USA TODAY has learned.

The news was first reported by LateNighter. Kimmel told the outlet he isn't going on the air that night out of deference to Colbert. The comic is not otherwise on hiatus from "Jimmy Kimmel Live!" that week, as new episodes are still scheduled for May 18 through May 20 on ABC.

Kimmel made a similar decision in 2015, deciding not to air a new episode opposite David Letterman's final "Late Show" on CBS. "I have too much respect for Dave to do anything that would distract viewers from watching his final show," Kimmel told The New York Times. "Plus, I'll probably be crying all day, which makes it hard to work."

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Jose Espinoza, public information officer with the Laredo Police Department, told USA TODAY that just after 3 p.m. on May 10, a Union Pacific worker called the police department after finding sixindividuals in a boxcar.

Upon arrival, police requested local fire and EMS to assist with the individuals, but all six were confirmed dead on scene.

Espinoza said the investigation is ongoing pending an autopsy from the medical examiner's office, and the identities of the individuals are not going to be released until the next of kin are informed.

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Robert was at work when the call came.

It was his wife, and she was frantic. She said she'd just hung up with their daughter's therapist at Asheville Academy, the residential treatment center where they had sent their 14-year-old to live four months earlier. 

The program was shutting down, she told him. They had 24 hours to pick her up.

The family, based in Texas, dropped everything. Within hours, Robert’s wife purchased a plane ticket to North Carolina, then drove from Charlotte through a storm to reach the campus in Weaverville.

“We just packed her up and headed home, not knowing why we had to come get her,” says Robert, who stayed in Texas to prepare the house for his daughter's return. “All of a sudden, she's home, and it's like radio silence. We're not hearing anything from Asheville.”

It was May 31, 2025, and everything was unraveling. 

Two days earlier, a 12-year-old girl at Asheville Academy had died by suicide. It was the second such death that month; a 13-year-old died on May 3. The North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services had suspended further admissions on May 27 as it began investigating. Then, the program shuttered.

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Israeli soldiers said the army ordered troops to kill any man they encountered in Gaza during the genocide that began in 2023.

“A man, no matter what age, don’t play games with it; kill immediately,” one soldier said, describing the orders they received.

“They even told us that if it’s a woman or a child, use your judgment, because things happen,” he added, saying similar instructions were given regarding donkeys. 

His testimony was given to Iris Haim, the mother of an Israeli captive killed by Israeli forces in Gaza, and aired on Channel 13’s investigative programme on Thursday.

In December 2023, Israeli soldiers killed three Israeli captives in Gaza City’s Shujaiya neighbourhood despite them being shirtless, waving a white flag and posing no apparent threat.

The incident sparked widespread criticism of Israel’s rules of engagement in Gaza, which have led to indiscriminate killings of Palestinians near homes, aid sites and "buffer zones". 

In the Channel 13 investigation, the soldier, who spoke anonymously, said he was the one who shot one of the captives during the incident.

Describing his mindset at the time, he said: “I fire 500 bullets a minute. I blow things up. I don’t care. I’m here to kill terrorists.”

Recalling the shooting, the soldier said: “There are three terrorists, I’ll kill them. Then I realised two had already been killed, and one had escaped.”

That captive, he later understood, was Yotam Haim.

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Yuri Ushakov, an aide to Vladimir Putin, asserted on May 10 that any settlement regarding the war in Ukraine will “stand still” unless Kyiv withdraws its military from the Donbas. Despite this rigid ultimatum, Ushakov expressed confidence that the US has not abandoned the diplomatic track, predicting that Donald Trump’s envoys, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, will soon return to Moscow for further talks.

The Kremlin has signaled that diplomatic efforts to end the war will face a continued deadlock unless Ukraine agrees to a total military withdrawal from the Donbas region.

Speaking to Russian state media, Presidential Aide Yuri Ushakov emphasized that Russia’s stance on territorial control remains unchanged. “A settlement in Ukraine without the withdrawal of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) from Donbas will stand still even after 10 rounds of negotiations,” Ushakov stated, adding that he believes Kyiv will eventually be forced to “realize” this necessity.

Despite the harsh rhetoric regarding territorial concessions, the Kremlin appears to remain open to the diplomatic channel established by the Trump administration.

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A federal judge on Friday dismissed a lawsuit alleging defamation by Fox News, ruling for a second time against a former supporter of Donald Trump who claimed he became the target of death threats after the network broadcast inaccurate conspiracy claims about his involvement in the 6 January 2021 US Capitol attack.

Raymond Epps was wrongly accused by Fox of being a government operative who allegedly stirred violence around the Capitol that day in an effort to pin responsibility on supporters of Trump who were upset his first presidency ended in defeat to Joe Biden. According to Epps, formerly a marine and member of the far-right Oath Keepers group, the backlash from those reports led him and his wife to sell their ranch in Arizona and relocate to a recreational vehicle in an attempt to avoid the ongoing harassment.

Jennifer L Hall, a Delaware-based US district judge, ultimately sided with Fox by granting the network’s request to dismiss the lawsuit, concluding that Epps did not provide sufficient evidence showing Fox knowingly aired false information.

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A convicted participant in the 6 January 2021 US Capitol attack who was pardoned at the start of Donald Trump’s second presidency has been ordered to serve seven years in prison after a jury found him guilty of committing a burglary in Virginia in May 2025.

Zachary Alam, 34, had previously drawn one of the stiffest prison sentences – eight years – for his hand in the violence carried out at the US Capitol in Washington DC by supporters of Trump after his first presidency ended in defeat to Joe Biden after the 2020 White House election.

The judge who sentenced Alam after he was declared guilty in that case mentioned how officers regarded him as “by far the loudest, the most combative and the most violent of the rioters” at the Capitol that day.

He went on to spend nearly four years in prison. But he was unconditionally pardoned along with 1,500 others of his fellow Trump supporters on the first day the Republican president retook office in January 2025, after winning the previous November’s election against his Democratic rival, Kamala Harris.

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Nobel Peace laureate and activist Narges Mohammadi has been transferred to a Tehran hospital more than a week after collapsing in prison, her foundation said Sunday.

Her transfer comes after days of pleading by her family and others who described her condition as critical. Her foundation said she has been granted a prison sentence suspension on bail. It was not clear for how long her sentence is suspended, the foundation said.

A statement from her foundation, shared with The Associated Press, said the suspended sentence is not enough and that Mohammadi needs “permanent, specialized care.”

The statement added that “we must ensure she never returns to prison to face the 18 years remaining on her sentence. Now is the time to demand her unconditional freedom and the dismissal of all charges.”

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