State Champ Radio Current Events
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Source: MediaNews Group/Orange County Register via Getty Images / Getty
Donald Trump attacked California Governor Gavin Newsom, blaming him for the deadly wildfires in Los Angeles and demanding he step down.
As the nation is gripped by scenes of the deadly wildfires plaguing Los Angeles over the past few days, President-elect Donald Trump’s ire is reserved for California Governor Gavin Newsom. In a late-night post on his Truth Social platform, Trump took to his usual tactic of attack in using a derogatory nickname for the governor: “One of the best and most beautiful parts of the United States of America is burning down to the ground. It’s ashes, and Gavin Newscum should resign. This is all his fault!!!”
In a follow-up post earlier that evening, Trump alleged that Newsom’s policy of protecting the delta smelt, a small fish on the endangered species list, was a cause of restricting water flow. “Governor Gavin Newscum refused to sign the water restoration declaration put before him that would have allowed millions of gallons of water, from excess rain and snow melt from the North, to flow daily into many parts of California, including the areas that are currently burning in a virtually apocalyptic way,” he wrote. Izzy Gardon, Newsom’s director of communications, refuted that claim: “There is no such document as the water restoration declaration, that is pure fiction. The Governor is focused on protecting people, not playing politics, and making sure firefighters have all the resources they need.”
Governor Newsom was asked about Trump’s attack by CNN’s Anderson Cooper in an interview while both were in a neighborhood in the Pacific Palisades area where the fires were being fought. “People are literally fleeing,” Newsom said. “People have lost their lives, kids lost their schools. Families completely torn asunder, churches burned down, and this guy wanted to politicize it. I have a lot of thoughts and I know what I want to say – I won’t.” His office would reiterate that sentiment in a post on X, formerly Twitter, afterward which featured the interview.
Firefighters are combating five infernos in the areas surrounding Los Angeles, fueled by the intense Santa Ana winds which have reached gusts up to 100 miles per hour. Officials have said that so far, five people have died as a result of the fires with the tally expected to rise in the coming days. The Palisades, Eaton, Sunset, Hurst and Lidia fires have consumed over 28,000 acres to date.
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Source: Anadolu / Getty
The United States declared that the rebel forces in Sudan are carrying out genocide and have announced sanctions against its leader.
On Tuesday (Jan. 7), U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced that the nation was imposing economic sanctions on the Sudanese paramilitary group Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and its Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, also known as Hemediti. “In December 2023, I concluded that members of the SAF (Sudanese Armed Forces) and the RSF had committed war crimes. I also determined that members of the RSF and allied Arab militias had committed crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing,” Blinken said in a statement, adding that the RSF and their allies were responsible for the murders of “men and boys – even infants” in addition to numerous sexual assaults on women during the now 20-month long civil conflict. “Both belligerents bear responsibility for the violence and suffering in Sudan and lack the legitimacy to govern a future peaceful Sudan,” Blinken said.
After reviewing the horrifying information of suffering inside Sudan, I have concluded that members of the Rapid Support Forces and allied militias have committed genocide in Sudan. The United States is committed to pursuing accountability for these atrocities.
— Secretary Antony Blinken (@SecBlinken) January 7, 2025
The economic sanctions levied against the RSF target seven businesses based in the United Arab Emirates. Almost all of the businesses are connected to the gold trade, according to reporting by the BBC. Hemediti and the RSF have obtained control of half of the country of Sudan, which includes the lucrative mine in Jebel Abel in North Darfur as well as others along the country’s border with the Central African Republic. The sanctions are also extended to cover Hemediti’s brothers, Algoney and Abdel Rahim, preventing them and their families from entering the United States.
The UAE has strongly denied any involvement in the Sudanese civil war. “The decision… expresses the failure of the [US President Joe] Biden administration to deal with the Sudanese crisis and the double standards it followed [with regards to the crisis],” wrote El-Basha Tbaeq, an adviser to Hemediti in a post on X, formerly Twitter. The news comes months after international bodies such as The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) have recorded the rise of famine throughout the Sudan.
The U.S. State Department’s report concurred, stating that “638,000 Sudanese” were “experiencing the worst famine in Sudan’s recent history, over 30 million people in need of humanitarian assistance, and tens of thousands dead.” According to the United Nations, 14 million have been displaced and over 24,000 have been killed in the fighting.
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Source: The Washington Post / Getty
Donald Trump has appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court to block the sentencing for the hush money case before it takes place at the end of the week.
On Wednesday morning (Jan. 8), Donald Trump made an emergency appeal to the Supreme Court to block his sentencing in the hush money case in New York City. “This court should enter an immediate stay of further proceedings in the New York trial court,” the application from his legal team read, “to prevent grave injustice and harm to the institution of the presidency and the operations of the federal government.”
Trump was convicted last May on 34 felony counts for falsifying business records related to payments made to adult film star Stormy Daniels, whom Trump had an affair with. The payments were made through Trump’s former lawyer and fixer, Michael Cohen, in 2016 before his election to the White House later that year. Trump is scheduled to appear in federal court Friday (Jan. 10) before District Court Judge Juan Merchan, 10 days before he is sworn in as president. Merchan has signaled that he may not give Trump any fines or jail time. Still, the sentencing would solidify Trump’s entering office with the dubious distinction of being a convicted felon.
Trump’s defense hinges on the polarizing ruling made by the Supreme Court last June that said that former presidents did have broad immunity for their past actions. His lawyers also argued that his status if fully sentenced would hinder his abilities as president. “In fact, the prospect of imposing sentence on President Trump just before he assumes office as the 47th president raises the specter of other possible restrictions on liberty, such as travel, reporting requirements, registration, probationary requirements, and others — all of which would be constitutionally intolerable under the doctrine of presidential immunity,” they wrote.
The Supreme Court has directed its prosecutors from the office of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg to answer the motion by 10 a.m. Thursday (Jan. 9). The previous appeal in New York was denied on Tuesday (Jan. 7), prompting Trump’s lawyers to file an emergency appeal to that state’s highest court and the Supreme Court simultaneously.
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Source: press handout / Mexico
El Chapo is being reminded that blood isn’t always thicker than water. The drug kingpin’s sons are allegedly negotiating plea deals with the United States government.
As spotted on Newsweek, the two offspring of Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán are said to be working with the court system on agreements that will essentially lessen their jail time. Back in 2019, their infamous father was sentenced to life in prison plus 30 years for overseeing a continuing criminal enterprise, the Sinaloa Cartel, a Mexican organized crime syndicate. Since then, federal prosecutors alleged that Ovidio Guzmán López, 34, and Joaquín Guzmán López, 38, took over the operation after their father was captured in 2016.
In 2023, the siblings were both named in indictments by federal prosecutors claiming they were principals in a fentanyl-trafficking operation. The “Chapitos” have since been arrested in 2024, both originally pled not guilty to various charges. On Tuesday (Jan. 7), attorneys confirmed the two are negotiating plea agreements. “We need a bit more time,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew Erskine said in court. “We’re trying to explore whether there might be a global resolution.” The legal professional did not comment further.
Ovidio Guzmán López is due in court Feb. 27. Joaquin Guzmán López is due in court March 19. El Chapo is currently serving his time in a ADX Florence, a super maximum prison in Colorado.
No plea deal — yet — for El Chapo’s sons, per report from their court appearance today in Chicago… https://t.co/2oDNGIE1QV
— Keegan Hamilton (@keegan_hamilton) January 7, 2025
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Source: Eric Charbonneau / Getty / Allison Holker / Stephen ‘tWitch’ Boss
Allison Holker, the widow of Stephen’ tWitch’ Boss, is facing a tremendous amount of backlash from both Boss’ family and social media after revealing the late dancer and Ellen Show DJ/dancer allegedly used drugs and made his family and friends sign NDAs to attend his funeral.
It didn’t take long for the backlash to surface after Allison Holker’s exclusive interview with People dropped, featuring her talking about her late husband’s tragic passing, which sparked Boss’ cousin, Elle, to air out Holker on X, formerly Twitter.
Per Page Six:
“He wasn’t an addict. He smoked weed and was actively trying to quit. He wasn’t some junkie,” she tweeted, adding that Holker has allegedly kept Boss’ three kids — Weslie, 16 (whom Boss adopted), Maddox, 8, and Zaia, 5 — from seeing his relatives.
“I’m so tired of keeping my f–king mouth shut bro. You did our family so mf dirty,” she added in a separate tweet, before alleging that Holker made Boss’ family and friends sign NDAs to attend his funeral.
“Yeah idgaf about an NDA. This crazy woman made me and his actual family including his mother sign an NDA just to even attend the funeral,” Elle claimed.
“She’s been trying to tarnish his legacy and refuses to let the Boss family see the children. Only to exploit and LIE on my cousin. Hell no.”
Boss’ Cousin Wasn’t Alone In Calling Out Allison Holker
Elle wasn’t alone; Courtney Ann Platt, a close friend of Boss and former New York Knicks dancer, also had time for Holker, calling her out in a lengthy Instagram post, confirming Boss’ cousin’s claims.
“This is by far the most tacky, classless, opportunistic act I have ever seen in my entire life,” Platt wrote in response to Holker’s interview with People where she is also plugging her memoir, This Far.
“We all had to sign some weird NDA to attend his funeral (even his own mother who you’ve treated like garbage this entire time and let’s just remember you wouldn’t have even had a husband if it wasn’t for her) not to share anything or ruin his name as if that was on anyone’s mind in the first place and here you go and write a book with all the dirty laundry smearing his name and attempting to dim the bright loyal, loving, light that was your husband, my friend,” Platt continued.
She added, “What a joke. Yes, he took his own life which is a fact all of us still can’t fathom and he was clearly having mental health issues, hurting so deeply and this is your example of empathy? Of your love?”
Boss’ brothers reshared Platt’s post in their Instagram Stories.
X users also got in on the action, calling out Holker for “tarnishing” her late husband’s legacy for bringing up his alleged drug use well after his suicide on December 13, 2022, at the age of 40.
You can see those reactions in the gallery below.
*If you or someone you know is affected by any of the issues raised in this story, call or text the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988.*
1. Holker’s own manager is not rocking with her
2. Choreographer Emmanuel Hurd also called out Allison Holker
4. Took off the ring and changed the last name with the quickness
5. Very vile
6. Allison Holker might want to stay off social media for a few days
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Source: Jose Perez/Bauer-Griffin / Getty
Newly released bodycam footage shows a pretty tense run-in between rapper/actor Ice-T and a cop during a traffic stop in Hudson County, New Jersey, last May.
Ice-T, known for his iconic role as NYPD detective “Odafin ‘Fin’ Tutuola” on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, was pulled over near a DMV office while driving his Porsche. The incident unfolded as Ice-T attempted to address registration issues with the vehicle.
According to the footage, the 66-year-old entertainer explained he was headed to the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) following a system outage that occurred when he’d tried to update his paperwork before. Despite the minor traffic offense, things escalated quickly, with both sides becoming frustrated. At one point, Ice-T asked if he was being arrested before questioning the officer’s right to tow the car. Things became so intense they called for a supervisor, who helped calm things down.
Ultimately, Ice-T got four tickets for expired tags, no inspection, and other paperwork problems. But his car wasn’t towed, and he was allowed to finish with the paperwork at the DMV to bring the vehicle registration current.
The footage has caused some online debate, with many wondering how the stop was handled and others pointing out how hard it is to stay calm in stressful situations.
This incident adds to the ongoing conversation about law enforcement and how public figures are treated. Even though things got tense, it didn’t escalate further, making people think about the balance between authority and respect in these situations.
Law & Order Star Ice-T Goes Off on Cop During Traffic Stop pic.twitter.com/N8Xp1x0WVC
— Bodycam Videos 🚔📹 (@BodycamVideos_) January 3, 2025
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Source: Scott Olson / Getty
Lawyers for Donald Trump are scrambling to block the final investigative report by Special Counsel Jack Smith from being released, calling them “failed cases.”
The legal team for President-elect Donald Trump sent a last-minute request to Attorney General Merrick Garland to halt the “imminent” release of the final report by Special Counsel Jack Smith claiming it would be a “bad-faith crusade” on the part of the Biden-Harris administration, and further arguing that Garland should fire Smith. This request was reportedly made after the team had the chance to review a draft of the report “in a conference room at Smith’s office between January 3 and January 6, 2025,” which Smith was scheduled to file with the Department of Justice at 1 p.m. “Because Smith has proposed an unlawful course of action, you must countermand his plan and remove him immediately,” the letter from Todd Blanche and John Lauro read. U.S. District Court Judge Aileen Cannon would ultimately block the release of the report for now in a motion.
Smith had requested that the election interference case against Trump related to the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol be dismissed in November after Trump won the presidential election. “The Department’s position is that the Constitution requires that this case be dismissed before the defendant is inaugurated,” he wrote in the motion filed with U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan, who oversaw the case in Washington D.C. “This outcome is not based on the merits or strength of the case against the defendant.” The case against Trump and other co-defendants in Florida where he was accused of hoarding classified government documents and refused returning them to the government, was dismissed by Judge Cannon, who has made decisions favorable to Trump in the past and was appointed to the bench by him in his first term. In her decision at the time, she ruled that Smith’s appointment as Special Counsel was “unconstitutional.”
Garland has stated that he would provide lawmakers with a copy of the report once Smith has filed it with his office, and in an overnight brief, Smith noted that Garland’s office would probably not release it until Friday morning (Jan. 10). In Cannon’s motion to block, the 11th US Circuit Court of Appeals would first review the emergency appeal by Trump’s lawyers. However, it does not distinguish between the two cases and allows for the court to also review the Department of Justice’s counter-appeal to Trump’s legal motion.
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Source: Prince Williams / Getty / Nelly and Ashanti
We know you care. Legendary spin the block couple, Nelly and Ashanti, are getting a docuseries at Peacock.
Deadline exclusively reports the music superstars will be the focal point of a docuseries fresh off their secret marriage and the birth of their first child.
According to the website, the series will be filmed and produced by Nelly, Ashanti, and Critical Content, the company behind the Netflix documentary Sly and MTV’s Catfish. It will follow the celebrity couple. The Haynes will also executive produce alongside Jenny Daly and Oji Singletary at Critical Content Studios.
Deadline also reports the series has been filming for the past few months, but no did not share when we can expect to see the series on the streamer.
Nelly & Ashanti’s Love Timeline
Nelly and Ashanti’s legendary love story began in 2003 and ended in 2013 before a chance encounter during the VERZUZ event (remember those?) between Fat Joe and Ja Rule when they were both brought in as special guests to participate in the music battle.
In April 2024, Ashanti confirmed what we all knew: that she was pregnant with the couple’s first child, born in July. We also learned the couple, without much fanfare, got married in December 2023 in Missouri.
The upcoming docuseries will mark Nelly’s return to television. He starred in 2014-2015’s Nellyville, which lasted for two seasons on BET, and the Kevin Hart-led mockumentary Real Husbands of Hollywood. The “Country Grammar” rapper also starred in Adam Sandler’s The Longest Yard remake and an episode of CSI: New York. He also showed off his dance moves when he competed in Dancing With The Stars.
Ashanti was also bit by the Hollywood bug, starring in movies like Resident Evil: Extinction and series like Army Wives and Love & Listings.
Will you be tuned in? Let us know.
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Residents in the Westside, Los Angeles neighborhood of the Pacific Palisades, are threatened by a raging wildfire, leading Gov. Gavin Newsom to declare a state of emergency, and officials are looking to tame the blaze. The Pacific Palisades and other neighborhoods in California are under evacuation orders while the images from the wildfire have sparked both concern and debate online.
All across social media, the California wildfire has been discussed widely with users posting stirring photos and videos of the blaze. According to various reports from the likes of CBS News and the Los Angeles Times along with local outlets.
The fire began in Northwest Los Angeles on Tuesday (Jan. 7) morning and led to the evacuation of around 30,000 residents of the Pacific Palisades, which is nestled in the Westside region of Los Angeles County. High winds throughout the day spread the brush fire and CalFire reports that the blaze grew to a size of nearly 3,000 acres. Damages from the blaze are still being tallied along with the number of injuries, with widespread reports of heavy traffic and the like as residents look to flee to safety.
A second blaze broke on in Eaton in the Northern Los Angeles County neighborhood of Altadena and has reportedly torched over 1,000 homes according to CalFire officials. There was also a blaze titled the Hurst Fire that broke out in Los Angeles’ Sylmar neighborhood on Tuesday and touched several hundred acres.
Winds reached as high as 99 mph in the Altadena region and 84 mph at Hollywood Burbank Airport according to the National Weather Service. Santa Ana winds are typical in California but not usually this intense according to officials covering the weather event.
On X, formerly Twitter, residents enduring the wildfires are sharing their accounts of what they’re facing and giving detailed photos and video footage of the spreading damage. Those replies can be viewed below.
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Photo: Getty
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With Dry January in full swing, several people are opting to abstain from alcohol for the entire month while others are employing a Damp January tactic and lowering the intake with lighter sips. U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy is urging alcohol brands to add a warning label that drinking can cause cancer, prompting a new debate about the ingesting of adult beverages.
Surgeon General Vivek Murthy issued an advisory last Friday calling for warning labels to be placed on bottles of alcohol meant for drinking highlighting the cancer risk links. In the advisory, Murthy says that drinking can lead to the cause of seven types of cancer – mouth, throat, voice box, esophagus, breast, liver, colon and rectum.
In a statement, Murthy clarified his office’s findings.
“Alcohol is a well-established, preventable cause of cancer responsible for about 100,000 cases of cancer and 20,000 cancer deaths annually in the United States – greater than the 13,500 alcohol-associated traffic crash fatalities per year in the U.S. – yet the majority of Americans are unaware of this risk,” said U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy. “This Advisory lays out steps we can all take to increase awareness of alcohol’s cancer risk and minimize harm.”
In the United States, around 100,000 alcohol-related cancer cases are active along with an annual total of 20,00 alcohol-related cancer deaths. The statement adds that many factors go into determining one’s cancer risks including biological, environmental, social, and economic factors. Currently, the standard of two drinks a day for men and one drink a day for women is considered moderate drinking and assumed to not bear any significant risks.
Congress would need to approve the warning labels and there would need to be quantifiable data findings to get this through the chambers. There has already been some resistance to the advisory by opinion writers who cover the health industry with one columnist suggesting that the same should be said of recreational marijuana.
With the incoming Trump administration, it isn’t known how much roadway this advisory will have with President-elect Donald Trump, who reportedly does not drink.
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Photo: Getty
