TV News LIES

Three artists have now dropped out of Kid Rock's 2026 Rock the Country tour.

After rapper Ludacris said in mid-January he would not be on the festival tour, headlined by Rock and other vocal conservatives including Jason Aldean, two more artists – country singers Morgan Wade and Carter Faith – have reportedly backed out of the lineup.

Days after the lineup – which also includes Blake Shelton, Jelly Roll, Creed, Brooks & Dunn, Miranda Lambert, Lynard Skynard and Nelly – was revealed on Monday, Jan. 12, a rep for Ludacris, 48, told Rolling Stone that the inclusion of the rapper was "a mix-up. Lines got crossed and he wasn't supposed to be on there." Media personality Ebro Darden also relayed the message that the rapper was "never" booked on the lineup.

The clarification came after uproar from fans, who reacted in confusion to Ludacris' appearance. Fellow rapper Nelly has also faced similar backlash for performing on conservative stages in the past, including at the first Rock the Country festival and at President Donald Trump's inauguration.

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Israeli forces carried out a number of raids and assaulted many Palestinians across the occupied West Bank, with at least 130 Palestinians temporarily detained since Tuesday night, according to the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society.

Israeli forces shot 20-year-old Mohammad Rajeh Nasrallah during a military raid into the town of Ad-Dhahiriya, south of Hebron, and Nasrallah was pronounced dead Wednesday due to the severity of his wounds. Meanwhile, Israeli settlers stormed Palestinian land near the town of Turmus Aya, close to Ramallah, and uprooted at least 200 olive trees, according to the Wafa news agency.

A major settler attack began Tuesday evening in al-Halawa in Masafer Yatta, with at least 40 settlers assaulting residents, torching property, and blocking ambulances from reaching the wounded, according to Drop Site contributor Jasper Nathaniel. The attack has left many Palestinians injured as emergency medical access remains obstructed; no casualty figures have yet emerged.A major settler attack began Tuesday evening in al-Halawa in Masafer Yatta, with at least 40 settlers assaulting residents, torching property, and blocking ambulances from reaching the wounded, according to Drop Site contributor Jasper Nathaniel. The attack has left many Palestinians injured as emergency medical access remains obstructed; no casualty figures have yet emerged.

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Defence Minister Mykhailo Fedorov on Wednesday announced a new leader for a nascent small air defence branch within the Air Force.

Reporting to Pavlo Yelizarov, deputy commander of the Ukrainian Air Force, Colonel Yevhenii Khlebnikov will direct a newly designed air defense group meant to “analyze, counter and anticipate future threats,” Fedorov wrote on social media.

The Ministry of Defense described Khlebnikov as bringing both frontline experience and leadership qualities to the table, having served in Air Force anti-aircraft missile units and having worked within the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine on the development of air defence.

Specifically,  Khlebnikov led the use of Bayraktar drones during the defense of Kyiv and the region of Chernihiv in the early days of the full-scale Russian invasion, and took part in planning the operation to liberate Zmiinyi (Snake) Island of “Russian warship go f@#k yourself” fame.

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Spain's government announced Tuesday it will grant legal status to potentially hundreds of thousands of immigrants living and working in the country without authorization, the latest way the country has bucked a trend toward increasingly harsh immigration policies imposed in the United States and much of Europe.

The extraordinary measure will be implemented by expediting a decree to amend immigration laws, according to Spanish Minister of Migration Elma Saiz, bypassing a similar bill that has stalled in parliament. Eligible immigrants will be granted up to one year of legal residency as well as permission to work.

In contrast to other nations that have moved to restrict immigration and asylum, many emboldened by the Trump administration's policies, Spain has moved in the opposite direction with Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez and his ministers often extolling the benefits of legal migration to the country's economy and aging workforce.

Spain "will not look the other way," Saiz told journalists during a press conference. The government is "dignifying and recognizing people who are already in our country," she said.

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An Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent attempted to enter Ecuador’s consulate in Minneapolis, but was turned back by an employee, prompting an official complaint to the US embassy in Quito, the country’s foreign ministry said.

The Tuesday incident came as ICE and other federal agencies continue their aggressive campaign of arresting people in Minnesota’s largest city suspected of being in the United States illegally, despite outrage over the deaths of two US citizens in the operation dubbed “Metro Surge”.

“This morning, the Ecuadorian consul in Minneapolis reported that, at around 11.00am, an agent from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) attempted to enter the Consulate premises,” Ecuador’s foreign ministry said in a statement posted on Tuesday evening.

“Consulate officials immediately prevented the ICE officer from entering the consular headquarters, thus ensuring the protection of the Ecuadorians who were at the consular headquarters at that time,” the statement continued.

In response, Ecuador’s foreign minister “immediately submitted a note of protest to the US Embassy in Ecuador so that acts of this nature would not be repeated at any of Ecuador’s consular offices in the United States”.

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A federal judge has blocked the Trump administration from detaining refugees in Minnesota, following a spate of arrests in the state.

More than 100 refugees who had lawfully resettled in the state had been arrested in recent weeks, according to attorneys and advocacy groups. Some were flown to detention centers in Texas, according to attorneys representing the cases, and then were abruptly released – and left to find and pay their own way back home.

On Wednesday, US district judge John R Tunheim ordered the administration to temporarily halt the arrest and detention of lawfully resettled refugees, while a lawsuit about the administration’s policy of “re-vetting” this population continued. The judge mandated the immediate release of all detained refugees in Minnesota and the release of those taken to Texas within five days.

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A high-ranking Catholic leader and prominent ally to Pope Leo XIV offered a strongly worded condemnation of President Donald Trump’s crackdown on immigrants this week while encouraging more people of faith to speak out against it.

Cardinal Joseph Tobin of Newark, New Jersey, was one of several religious leaders to take part in an online prayer service organized by Faith in Action in response to the Jan. 24 shooting of Minneapolis resident Alex Pretti.

In excerpts of his remarks, Tobin urged Congress to “vote against renewing funding for such a lawless organization,” referring to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE.

“We mourn for a world, a country that allows 5-year-olds to be legally kidnapped and protesters to be slaughtered,” he said. “How will you say no to violence? Because as the great teacher Martin Luther King said, ‘Hate cannot drive out hate. Only love can do that.’”

Elsewhere in the service, Tobin referenced Ignazio Silone’s 1936 novel “Bread and Wine,” which was written while the author was living in exile from his native Italy during dictator Benito Mussolini’s regime.

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Bruce Springsteen seems equal parts outraged and inspired by the unrest and violence in Minneapolis.

So much so that on Saturday — the same day that Alex Pretti, the 37-year-old intensive care nurse who was fatally shot by federal agents during an Immigration and Customs Enforcement protest — the Boss began writing a song “dedicated to the people” of the city, Springsteen said Wednesday in a post on Bluesky.

“Recorded it yesterday and released it to you today in response to the state terror being visited on the city of Minneapolis,” he wrote on the social media platform. “It’s dedicated to the people of Minneapolis, our innocent immigrant neighbors and in memory of Alex Pretti and Renee Good. Stay free”

Pretti and Good, who was killed earlier this month by an ICE officer, are both name-checked in the lyrics of the song, “Streets Of Minneapolis.” So is “King Trump,” his “federal thugs,” White House senior adviser Stephen Miller and Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem.

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