TV News LIES

More than 100 organizations that support victims of human trafficking have lost funding since October, leaving thousands of survivors at risk, a Guardian investigation has found.

Anti-trafficking advocates say the US Department of Justice’s failure to spend nearly $90m appropriated by Congress is impeding law-enforcement investigations and exposing survivors to homelessness and the risk of deportation, jail time or re-exploitation.

This is the latest in a series of Guardian investigative reports, which in September revealed that the Trump administration had rolled back efforts to combat human trafficking across the federal government. That retreat has far-reaching implications beyond those related to the release of the investigative files related to the late Jeffrey Epstein.

“It’s extremely irresponsible, and maybe even immoral,” said Kristina Rose, who ran the justice department’s office for victims of crime under Joe Biden and served as its deputy director during the first Trump administration.

A justice department spokesperson told the Guardian: “The justice department can remain focused on two critical priorities at the same time: support victims of human trafficking and prosecute criminals who exploit children, and ensure the efficient use of taxpayer dollars.”

The Guardian’s report struck a chord on Capitol Hill, where three US senators expressed outrage. Richard Durbin of Illinois said it fit a pattern by the Trump administration of “disregarding congressionally appropriated funds intended to target the most heinous crimes and national security threats – including human trafficking”.

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The Trump administration has said it is immediately pausing all leases for offshore wind farms already under construction, in the heaviest blow yet to an industry that the administration has relentlessly targeted throughout the year.

Trump’s Department of the Interior said that it was halting the building of five wind projects due to “national security risks”. The department said it would work with the US Department of Defense to mitigate the risk of the wind turbine towers creating radar interference called “clutter” that could in some way hamper the US military.

“The prime duty of the United States government is to protect the American people,” said Doug Burgum, secretary of the interior. “Today’s action addresses emerging national security risks, including the rapid evolution of the relevant adversary technologies, and the vulnerabilities created by large-scale offshore wind projects with proximity near our east coast population centers.”

The halt will affect the Vineyard Wind 1 project off the coast of Massachusetts, Sunrise Wind and Empire Wind in New York, Revolution Wind off Rhode Island and Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind in Virginia.

All of the projects were reviewed and approved under Joe Biden’s administration, which found there were no undue national security concerns raised by the developments. Democrats have pointed to two assessments by the Pentagon of Revolution Wind that found the project “would not have adverse impacts to DoD missions in the area”.

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A school district board in upstate New York is investigating school officials amid accusations that the district may have confined elementary school students inside wooden “timeout” boxes.

Images of the boxes, which resemble tiny padded cells, first spread on social media last week, after a former member of the Salmon River school district school board accused officials of building them to seclude children with disabilities. The images unleashed an immediate uproar in the small district, which teaches about 1,300 children and lies on the border between New York state and Canada.

In addition to investigating the officials, the Salmon River central school district board of education announced last Thursday it had placed three officials, including an elementary school teacher, on leave. It also reassigned the district’s superintendent to “home duties” and is cooperating with a New York state department of education investigation.

While the district superintendent acknowledged that the district had set up three of the wooden crates at two elementary schools, he also said that the district had removed the boxes and that no student had ever been confined inside them. However, at an emotional and tense community meeting last week, multiple parents said they suspected their children had been inside the boxes, the Albany-based Times Union reported.

One parent of a minimally verbal child said his son told him: “If you are happy or if you are sad, this is the place you have to go to calm down.”

More than 60% of Salmon River students are Native American. For several community members, the controversy over the boxes evoked memories of abusive residential schools, the US government’s boarding school system that sought to force Native American students to assimilate to white society. Nearly 1,000 students died at those schools, which operated as recently as the 1960s.

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US regulators on Monday gave the green light to a pill version of the blockbuster weight-loss drug Wegovy, the first daily oral medication to treat obesity.

The US Food and Drug Administration’s approval handed drugmaker Novo Nordisk an edge over rihttps://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/dec/22/us-regulators-approve-wegovy-weight-loss-pillval Eli Lilly in the race to market an obesity pill. Lilly’s oral drug, orforglipron, is still under review.

Both pills are GLP-1 drugs that work like widely used injectables to mimic a natural hormone that controls appetite and feelings of fullness.

In recent years, Novo Nordisk’s injectable Wegovy and Lilly’s Zepbound have revolutionized obesity treatment globally and in the US, where 100 million people have the chronic disease.

The Wegovy pills are expected to be available within weeks, company officials said. Availability of oral pills to treat obesity could expand the booming market for obesity treatments by broadening access and reducing costs, experts said.

About one in eight Americans have used injectable GLP-1 drugs, according to a survey from KFF, a nonprofit health policy research group. But many more have trouble affording the costly shots.

“There’s an entire demographic that can benefit from the pills,” said Dr Fatima Cody Stanford, a Massachusetts General Hospital obesity expert. “For me, it’s not just about who gets it across the finish line first. It’s about having these options available to patients.”

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A coalition of Democratic-led states filed a lawsuit on Monday seeking to prevent Donald Trump’s administration from defunding the US Consumer Financial Protection Bureau by refusing to request money from the Federal Reserve.

Democratic attorneys general from 21 states and the District of Columbia filed the lawsuit in federal court in Oregon, arguing that the administration’s decision not to seek additional funding for the US consumer watchdog is unlawful and undermines Congress’s authority under the US constitution.

“The administration’s actions are a handout to those who drive up costs by cheating hardworking Americans, and I will keep fighting to ensure they follow the law and our constitution,” New York attorney general Letitia James, a Democrat, said in a statement.

The CFPB did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Trump, a Republican, has sought to dismantle the CFPB since returning to office in January and has installed Russell Vought, his budget director, as the acting head of the agency. While efforts to fire most of its employees are tied up in litigation, Vought has effectively halted most CFPB activities.

The agency, which is tasked with protecting consumers in the financial sector, began operations in 2011 under Barack Obama after the 2008 financial crisis. It has since returned more than $21bn improperly taken from consumers, its supporters say.

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President Trump announced on Monday a new class of battleships as part of the U.S. Navy’s “Golden Fleet.” 

The president said that he approved a plan for the Navy to start construction of the two battleships, which will be equipped with guns, missiles, hypersonic weapons and high-powered lasers.

President Trump trumpeted the ships as being built with “all steel” as opposed to aluminum.

Trump said the timeline of building the ships would be about two and a half years

When asked if the new class of ships is developed to counter China, Trump said they are intended to counter “everybody.”

"They’ll be the fastest, the biggest and by far, 100 times more powerful than any battleship ever built,” Trump said standing alongside Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Navy Secretary John Phelan and Secretary of State Marco Rubio at a Mar-a-Lago public appearance.

The new battleships, which will anchor the “Golden Fleet,” will weigh more than 30,000 tons, and the military is expected to have between 20 and 25 as part of the effort to bolster the U.S. Navy.

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China on Monday accused the U.S. of violating international law in seizing oil tankers off the coast of Venezuela, appearing to take the side of Caracas as Washington looks to take a third oil tanker this month.

“The U.S. practice of arbitrarily seizing other countries’ vessels grossly violates international law,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian told reporters, according to Bloomberg, adding that Beijing opposes anything that “infringes upon other countries’ sovereignty and security, and all acts of unilateralism or bullying.”

Lin added that Venezuela “has the right to independently develop mutually beneficial cooperation with other countries,” and Beijing supports Caracas in “defending its own legitimate rights and interests.”

The comments come as the U.S. on Sunday sought to seize a third oil tanker in an effort to cut off funding for the government of President Nicolás Maduro.

But the effort in the Caribbean Sea by the U.S. Coast Guard was thwarted when the tanker, the Bella 1, refused to submit and sailed away. Washington last year placed sanctions on the ship for transporting Iranian oil.

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CBS pulled a "60 Minutes" segment hours before it was set to air on Dec. 21, a move that has apparently sparked backlash from its correspondent.

The segment was set to feature the notorious El Salvador prison CECOT.

The news program announced the programming update in a statement around 4:30 p.m. ET on Dec. 21, adding that the piece "will air in a future broadcast."

"We determined it needed additional reporting," CBS News said in a statement to USA TODAY.

Sharyn Alfonsi, a correspondent who has worked at the network for more than two decades, reported the piece. Multiple outlets, including The New York Times, NPR and CNN, obtained an email Alfonsi sent to colleagues in which she said the decision to pull the segment "is not an editorial decision, it is a political one." USA TODAY has not been able to reach Alfonsi.

"60 Minutes," instead, aired a segment on a family of classical musicians, the programming update said. The show's social media comments have since been flooded with viewers calling on the network to release the original clip.

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