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Video shows storm battering Bayesian superyacht before sinking off the Sicilian coast

Security camera footage showing the moments before a tornado sank a luxury yacht off the coast of Sicily has emerged, as rescue workers face tough conditions in the ongoing search for six missing people.

The black-and-white footage appears to show the British-flagged yacht, called the “Bayesian,” being battered by a violent storm on Monday. As rain lashes down on the port, the grainy video shows the boat rocking violently from side to side before capsizing.

The vessel sank early Monday – killing at least one of 22 people on board – after its mast, one of the world’s tallest, broke in half during the storm. Fifteen people have been rescued.

The body that was recovered from the vessel was identified as the onboard chef Ricardo Thomas, an Antiguan citizen, Reuters reported.

Among the missing is British tech tycoon Mike Lynch, Morgan Stanley International director Jonathan Bloomer, and Chris Movillo, a prominent American lawyer, according to Sicily’s Civil Protection.

Lynch’s 18-year-old daughter was also named missing. His wife, Angela Barcares, survived. Speaking to the Italian daily La Repubblica while sitting in a wheelchair in a Sicilian hospital, Bacares said she was woken at 4 a.m. local time as the boat tilted.

She said she and her husband were initially not concerned, but became worried when the windows of the yacht shattered.

The yacht sank after a small waterspout – a type of tornado – spun over the Mediterranean island, likely capsizing the boat, which was anchored about a half a mile from the port of Porticello. Eyewitnesses described furious gales and hurricane winds that left a mountain of debris near the pier.

One witness, the owner of a villa looking out to where the Bayesian was anchored, said that after news of the sinking yacht emerged, he watched back his CCTV footage, where the boat could be seen sinking.

“In just 60 seconds, you can see the ship disappear,” he told Italian outlet ANSA. “You can see clearly what’s happening. There was nothing that could be done for the vessel. It disappeared in a very short time.”

This grainy CCTV video shows the Bayesian rocking violently from side to side before capsizing.
Giornale di Sicilia via Reuters

Emergency crews resumed their search for missing people on Wednesday, with an underwater and surface operation ongoing. Italy’s fire brigade have warned that divers only have up to 12 minutes at the wreck site – thought to be around 50 meters underwater (approximately 150 feet) – before having to resurface.

Divers were able to access the inside of the wreck on Tuesday, the brigade said, including some of the rooms under the yacht’s control bridge. But the operations are “complex” due to numerous obstacles and narrow passages inside the ship, they said, adding that Wednesday’s operation would attempt to open some of those passages.

Three days on from the wreck, investigators are still at a loss as to how the ship sank so quickly. Matthew Schanck, chair of the Maritime Search and Rescue Council, said Tuesday that such events are exceedingly rare.

“Looking at the extreme weather, if it was a water spout, which it appears to be, it’s what I would class as a black swan event,” he said, referring to a rare, unpredictable occurence. “Even outside of the maritime industry, all industries struggle with the black swan events,” he added.

And while Sicily isn’t “renowned” for tornadoes or water spouts, “there is a risk” they can happen – just not every day, Schanck said.

“I think it’s important to see what comes out that may suggest changes to vessel construction, vessel stability, potentially,” he said, stressing that shipbuilding regulations “are all designed with safety in mind.”

This post appeared first on cnn.com

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Quit dating apps, Russia tells border region citizens over security fears

Russian authorities have urged people in the border regions to stop using dating apps and limit their use of social media to prevent Ukrainian forces from gathering intelligence as it presses on with its incursion into the Kursk region.

Russia’s interior ministry issued the plea on Tuesday, telling residents of Bryansk, Kursk, and Belgorod regions as well as military and police personnel stationed in the area territories to refrain from using “online dating services” and be mindful of streaming videos from sensitive locations.

“The enemy actively uses such resources for information gathering,” the ministry said in a post on its official Telegram channel.

As Ukrainian troops continued their advances through Russian territory, the ministry issued a long list of recommendations, advising people not to open any hyperlinks in messages received from strangers and not to stream videos from roads where military vehicles were present.

Authorities also warned citizens that Ukrainian forces were connecting to “unprotected CCTV cameras remotely, viewing everything – from private yards to roads and highways of strategic importance.”

Troops and police officers were advised to remove all geo-tagging on their social media, as “the enemy monitors social networks in real time by these tags and reveals the actual location of military and security forces.”

Ukriane’s offensive into the Kursk region has left Russia struggling to shore up its own territory. On Tuesday, Ukrainian military chief Oleksandr Syrskyi said Ukrainian troops had advanced up to 35 kilometers (21.7 miles) through Russian defenses since the start of their surprise assault last week, capturing 93 settlements.

More than 121,000 Kursk residents have been evacuated, Russia’s Ministry of Emergency Situations wrote on Telegram Monday.

Ukraine’s operations also targeted the Bryansk and Belgorod regions.

Apps reveal sensitive information

The security risk stemming from social media use is not hypothetical — there is a history of soldiers inadvertently revealing sensitive information by using their phones in conflict zones.

The United States and its “Five Eyes” intelligence allies – Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United Kingdom – warned last year that Russian military hackers had been targeting Ukrainian soldiers’ mobile devices in a bid to steal battlefield information.

And when a high-profile Russian submarine commander was shot dead while jogging in 2023, Russian media reported he may have been targeted by an assailant tracking him on Strava, a popular running app.

The officer, Stanislav Rzhitsky, was using a public profile under his own name to track his running and cycling routes. He was killed while out jogging on one of his regular circuits.

And after a Ukrainian strike that killed nearly 100 Russian troops in the occupied Ukrainian city of Makiivka on New Year’s Day last year, Russia’s defense ministry said the “main cause” of the strike was the widespread use of cell phones by Russian soldiers, although some officials questioned that assessment.

Last month, Russian state media TASS reported that the country’s lower house of parliament proposed punishing Russian soldiers caught using smartphones while fighting in Ukraine.

The lawmakers suggested that carrying internet-connected cell phones that can help identify Russian troops or the location of forces should be classified as a “gross disciplinary offense” and be punishable by up to 10 days’ imprisonment. Multiple offenses could lead to up to 15 days in prison.

The law would also prohibit the use of other electronic devices meant for “household purposes” that allow for video and audio recording and the transmission of geolocation data.

It’s not just Russia and Ukraine though. The US Department of Defense banned military personnel from using geolocation features in 2018 after it emerged that Strava and other fitness tracking apps could pose security risks for forces around the world.

The app created an interactive heat map that displayed 1 billion activity data points made public by users, inadvertently revealing the locations of US bases in countries around the world.

This post appeared first on cnn.com

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Benjamin Harrison won the White House by receiving the electoral majority, but losing the popular vote

Benjamin Harrison was the 23rd President of the United States. 

Harrison, born on Aug. 20, 1833, was from North Bend, Ohio, about 15 miles outside Cincinnati.

Harrison studied at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, and graduated in 1852. Upon graduation, he went to Indianapolis, where he practiced law and campaigned for the Republican Party. 

In 1853, he married future first lady Caroline Lavinia Scott. The pair had two children, Russell and Mary. 

During the Civil War, Harrison served as a colonel of the 70th Indiana Volunteer Infantry, according to The White House Association, and went back to Indianapolis after the war to practice law once again. 

In 1876, Harrison ran for political office, but was defeated for governor of Indiana. He went on to serve in the Senate during the 1880s before making his bid for president. 

In the presidential election of 1888, Harrison received 100,000 fewer popular votes than incumbent Democrat Grover Cleveland, according to WhiteHouse.gov, but he won the electoral vote 233 to 168. 

Harrison was one of the first to implement a campaign strategy known as ‘front-porch’ campaigns, delivering short speeches to the delegations that visited him. 

During his presidency, he showed support to veterans, including through his signing of the Dependent and Disability Pensions Act in 1890, which expanded aid to disabled service men, their widows and dependents, according to the White House Historical Association. 

Harrison also added six states to the Union during his presidency, according to the Benjamin Harrison Presidential site. 

In 1892, Harrison’s wife, while still serving the role of first lady, passed away. 

That same year, Harrison lost the White House to Cleveland. Following his term in the Oval Office, Harrison returned to Indianapolis and continued to practice law. 

In 1896, Harrison went on to marry the widowed Mary Dimmick Harrison, the niece of his first wife. They had one daughter, Elizabeth, who was born on Feb. 21, 1897. 

Harrison died on March 13, 1901, when he was 67 years old. 

This post appeared first on FOX NEWS

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With 17 days until voting starts, ‘election season’ kicks off sooner than you think

There are 77 days until Election Day on Tuesday, Nov. 5.

But if Americans vote like they did in the last two election cycles, most of them will have already cast a ballot before the big day.

Early voting starts as soon as Sept. 6 for eligible voters, with seven battleground states sending out ballots to at least some voters the same month.

It makes the next few months less a countdown to Election Day, and more the beginning of ‘election season.’

States have long allowed at least some Americans to vote early, like members of the military or people with illnesses. 

In some states, almost every voter casts a ballot by mail.

Many states expanded eligibility in 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic made it riskier to vote in-person.

That year, the Fox News Voter Analysis found that 71% of voters cast their ballots before Election Day, with 30% voting early in-person and 41% voting by mail.

Early voting remained popular in the midterms, with 57% of voters casting a ballot before Election Day.

Elections officials stress that voting early is safe and secure. Recounts, investigations and lawsuits filed after the 2020 election did not reveal evidence of widespread fraud or corruption. 

The difference between ‘early in-person’ and ‘mail’ or ‘absentee’ voting.

There are a few ways to vote before Election Day.

The first is , where a voter casts a regular ballot in-person at a voting center before Election Day.

The second is , where the process and eligibility varies by state.

Eight states vote mostly by mail, including California, Colorado, Nevada and Utah. Registered voters receive ballots and send them back.

Most states allow any registered voter to request a mail ballot and send it back. This is also called mail voting, or sometimes absentee voting. Depending on the state, voters can return their ballot by mail, at a drop box, and/or at an office or facility that accepts mail ballots.

In 14 states, voters must have an excuse to vote by mail, ranging from illness, age, work hours or if a voter is out of their home county on Election Day.

States process and tabulate ballots at different times. Some states don’t begin counting ballots until election night, which delays the release of results.

Voting begins on Sept. 6 in North Carolina, with seven more battleground states starting that month

This list of early voting dates is for guidance only. For comprehensive and up-to-date information on voter eligibility, processes and deadlines, go to Vote.gov and your state’s elections website.

The first voters to be sent absentee ballots will be in North Carolina, which begins mailing out ballots for eligible voters on Sept. 6.

Seven more battleground states open up early voting the same month, including Pennsylvania, Georgia, Wisconsin, Michigan and Nevada.

September deadlines

In-person early voting in bold.

Sept. 6

  • North Carolina – Absentee ballots sent to voters

Sept. 16

  • Pennsylvania – Mail-in ballots sent to voters

Sept. 17

  • Georgia – Absentee ballots sent to military & overseas

Sept. 19

  • Wisconsin – Absentee ballots sent

Sept. 20

  • Arkansas, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Utah, Wyoming – Absentee ballots sent to military & overseas
  • Minnesota, South Dakota – In-person absentee voting begins
  • Virginia – In-person early voting begins
  • Indiana, Kentucky, West Virginia – Absentee ballots sent

Sept. 21

  • Alabama, Alaska, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Kansas, Massachusetts, Maryland, Michigan, New Hampshire, New York, Oregon, South Carolina, Washington – Absentee ballots sent to military & overseas
  • Indiana, New Mexico – Absentee ballots sent
  • Maryland, New Jersey – Mail-in ballots sent

Sept. 23

  • Mississippi – In-person absentee voting begins & absentee ballots sent
  • Oregon, Vermont – Absentee ballots sent

Sept. 26

  • Illinois – In-person early voting begins 
  • Michigan – Absentee ballots sent
  • Florida, Nevada – Mail-in ballots sent
  • North Dakota – Absentee & mail-in ballots sent

Sept. 30

  • Nebraska – Mail-in ballots sent

Oct. 4

  • Connecticut – Absentee ballots sent

Oct. 6

  • Michigan – In-person early voting begins 
  • Maine – In-person absentee voting begins & mail ballots sent
  • California – In-person absentee voting begins & mail ballots sent
  • Montana – In-person absentee voting begins
  • Nebraska – In-person early voting begins 
  • Georgia – Absentee ballots sent
  • Massachusetts – Mail-in ballots sent

Oct. 8

  • California – Ballot drop-offs open
  • New Mexico, Ohio – In-person absentee voting begins
  • Indiana – In-person early voting begins
  • Wyoming – In-person absentee voting begins & absentee ballots sent

Oct. 9

  • Arizona – In-person early voting begins & mail ballots sent

Oct. 11

  • Colorado – Mail-in ballots sent
  • Arkansas, Alaska – Absentee ballots sent

Oct. 15

  • Georgia – In-person early voting begins
  • Utah – Mail-in ballots sent

Oct. 16

  • Rhode Island, Kansas, Tennessee – In-person early voting begins
  • Iowa – In-person absentee voting begins
  • Oregon, Nevada – Mail-in ballots sent

Oct. 17

  • North Carolina – In-person early voting begins 

Oct. 18

  • Washington, Louisiana – In-person early voting begins
  • Hawaii – Mail-in ballots sent

Oct. 19

  • Nevada, Massachusetts – In-person early voting begins 
  • Alaska, Arkansas, Connecticut, Idaho, North Dakota, South Carolina, Texas – In-person early voting begins 
  • Colorado – Ballot drop-offs open

Oct. 22

  • Hawaii, Utah – In-person early voting begins 
  • Missouri, Wisconsin – In-person absentee voting begins

Oct. 23

  • West Virginia – In-person early voting begins

Oct. 24

  • Maryland – In-person early voting begins

Oct. 25

  • Delaware – In-person early voting begins

Oct. 26

  • Michigan, Florida, New Jersey, New York – In-person early voting begins 

Oct. 30

  • Oklahoma – In-person early voting begins 

Oct. 31

  • Kentucky – In-person absentee voting begins
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7 reasons to fear Kamala Harris’ radical ‘Medicare-for-all’ schemes

Kamala Harris is a lifelong liberal with a health care platform to the left of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton combined. She promised that ‘Medicare-for-all is our goal’ and committed to abolish private health insurance in favor of a government-run plan.

Learning from Obama about the utility of lying to voters before you take away their health plans, she first allowed a limited exception for Medicare Advantage plans and more recently denied her previous positions. 

Make no mistake: Her radical ideas would put the government in charge of health care instead of doctors.

First, forcing everyone onto a government-run plan is like unleashing the bureaucracy of the DMV onto our health care sector, obliterating choice and competition. It forces 150 million Americans off their insurance, making workers give up popular plans provided by employers and unions. It ends the Medicare program for seniors, and ends private coverage for 30 million seniors with Medicare Advantage and 22 million seniors who supplement traditional Medicare coverage. 

Second, ‘Medicare-for-all’ requires unsustainable new spending. Claims that it saves taxpayer dollars were so egregious that even the left-leaning Washington Post gave them three Pinocchios. The program’s costs would range from $32.6 trillion to $44 trillion over a decade. This is an estimate of new spending – notwithstanding the Medicare trust funds that would be liquidated to fund ‘Medicare-for-all.’

Third, even with this astronomical new spending, ‘Medicare-for-all’ requires significant reductions in already low payments to doctors, nurses, hospitals and nursing homes, cutting $5.3 trillion over a decade. Providers would no longer be able to shift costs from Medicare to private payers, and could thus face 40% reductions from private insurance rates. Experts estimate this could result in 1.5 million job losses within the hospital sector. 

America is already facing an expected shortage of as many as 95,000 doctors and 63,00 full-time nurses by 2030. Shifting to ‘Medicare-for-all’ will only exacerbate these shortages and hurt patients, similar to how other single-payer systems have failed their citizens.   

Fourth, taxpayers would be on the hook for the increased costs even as Americans receive fewer care options. All businesses would be required, at minimum, to double their payroll taxes, which ultimately hits low-income workers the hardest. 

‘Medicare-for-all’ requires a plethora of additional taxes – ending the tax exclusion for health expenditures, ‘one-time’ taxes on businesses, new fees on financial institutions, new taxes on the wealthy, new estate taxes, and the list goes on. Harris has the audacity to say her plan will exempt those making under $100,000 from new taxes. 

Rather than increasing the true affordability of health care, ‘Medicare-for-all’ would leave families worse off, diminishing the average annual disposable income of a family on private insurance by $10,554. 

Fifth, promises of increased health care spending in single-payer systems have generally failed to achieve a higher quality of care. In countries like the United Kingdom and Canada, where there is coverage on paper but not in practice, patients are on year-long waiting lists, deprived of drug coverage, even basic drugs, and run to private insurance to get care. When a Canadian provincial government passed a prohibition on private health insurance, the Supreme Court struck it down, effectively saying that Canadians have a right to health care, not a right to waitlists.

In the United States, Medicaid expansions have tested the effect of unlimited, cost-free, government-run health care coverage. While studies find beneficiaries were able to access more providers or get financial assistance, the studies are more negative about the program’s ability to improve health outcomes. One found the program ‘generated no significant improvement in measured physical health outcomes,’ and another found that states that did not adopt Medicaid expansion had better mortality trends than those that did. 

Sixth, the one-size-fits-all ‘Medicare-for-all’ model doesn’t fit the unique needs of 330 million Americans. Other government-run health care systems block patient access to drugs until the government agrees on a price. When Vertex announced approval for their breakthrough treatment for cystic fibrosis, it took four years for British patients to get access. 

If Harris bans other payers or options for private care, there will be no release valve for patients to get care. Government-run health care sacrifices tomorrow’s innovations for today’s budget controls, with one CEO saying that they can no longer prioritize ‘innovation unfriendly’ Europe. 

Seventh, ‘Medicare-for-all’ promises to cover all individuals, using taxpayer funds to pay for health coverage for illegal immigrants. Recent projections estimate the cost would be $1.8 trillion over 10 years. Obama promised taxpayer funds would not subsidize health care for illegal immigrants, but the Biden-Harris administration has given states ObamaCare and Medicaid waivers to use tax dollars to pay for this care.

Harris and her fellow radical Democrats are the only people who think the problem with ObamaCare was that it did not do enough to raise taxes, increase government spending, and kick Americans off their health plans. Voters should believe her when she told them she intends to do more of all three.

Hannah Anderson is the director of the Center for a Healthy America at the America First Policy Institute.

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Critics claim Biden remains president ‘in name only’ despite DNC vow to finish next 5 months of term strong

Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s running mate, Nicole Shanahan, claimed Monday that President Biden at this point is ‘basically president in name only.’ 

‘Tonight, we are going to hear from President Joe Biden, who at this point is basically president in name only,’ Shanahan said in a video shared to X. 

‘You know, no matter what your opinion is of Joe Biden, if you love him or if you hate him or don’t really care, you have to realize that something feels very wrong about how the Democratic Party ran a full core pressure campaign to get him out of office after he won 14-15 million votes in the primaries,’ she said. 

‘Isn’t it strange how he bowed out because he didn’t feel like he could serve another four years, but somehow he’s OK to serve four more months as we face historic inflation, debt and war? Any impartial observer can look at that and realize the DNC machine did what they always do. They pushed someone out they couldn’t successfully puppeteer,’ Shanahan said. ‘So much for defending democracy.’ 

At the Democratic National Convention on Monday night, Biden said he had ‘a lot to do’ in the remaining five months of his presidential term. 

Comparing himself to Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris, Biden said, ‘Like many of our best presidents, she was also vice president. That’s a joke…’ 

Biden appeared to be referencing how he served as former President Barack Obama’s vice president.

‘But she’ll be a president our children could look up to,’ Biden continued. ‘She’ll be a president respected by world leaders because she already is. She’ll be a president we can all be proud of. And she will be a historic president who puts her stamp on America’s future. This will be the first presidential election since January 6th.’ 

 ‘Selecting Kamala was the very first decision I made before I became, when I became our nominee, and it was the best decision I made my whole career,’ Biden said. 

X users on Monday questioned whether Biden is truly in charge. 

‘Are we just forgetting that Joe Biden is still in office?’ wrote Jerry Wayne, a Michigan autoworker who went viral for confronting Biden about gun control on the 2020 campaign trail.

‘Joe Biden is still the President for 154 more days. Pray for America,’ Fox News contributor and former Trump campaign operative Steve Cortes wrote on X. 

At the DNC, Biden stressed that his term is not over. ‘Folks, I’ve got five months left in my presidency. I’ve got a lot to do. I intend to get it done,’ Biden said. 

Regardless of the outcome of the election in November, a new president would not, under traditional circumstances, be inaugurated until Jan. 20, 2025. As of Tuesday, that means Biden has 153 days left of his four-year term. The 25th Amendment of the Constitution stipulates that if the president dies, resigns or is removed from office, the vice president automatically becomes president.

After Biden’s disastrous debate performance against Republican nominee and former President Trump in June, Democratic lawmakers and donors pressured the 81-year-old president to step aside from the race amid concern his age and mental fitness would destroy the party’s chances of holding onto the White House and Senate, as well as reclaiming the House in November. 

In a clip shared by RNC Research, Biden stood at the podium during a stage test earlier Monday afternoon at the United Center while reporters shouted questions. 

One reporter asked, ‘Donald Trump claims that you were pushed out, put from the top of the ticket, and this amounts to a coup from your party. What do you make of these claims?’ 

Biden started to answer, but his response was quiet and barely audible, so the reporter pressed, ‘his what?’ The president then went silent, waved her off and other reporters began asking different questions. 

Biden ended his re-election campaign on July 21 and immediately endorsed Harris’ presidential candidacy. Harris secured enough delegates to become the presidential nominee on Aug. 1 during a virtual roll call conducted by the Democratic National Committee two weeks before the start of the party’s convention at the United Center in Chicago. The RNC, by contrast, did their roll call in person in Milwaukee. 

In his DNC speech Monday night, Biden insisted there was no bad blood and that he made the decision to back out of the race for the good of the country. 

‘It’s been the honor of my lifetime to serve as your president. I love the job, but I love my country more. I love my country more. Now, all this talk about how I’m angry. All those people said I should step down. That’s not true. I love my country more,’ Biden said. ‘And we need to preserve our democracy in 2024. We need you to vote, I need you to keep the Senate. We need you to win back the House of Representatives. And above all, we need you to beat Donald Trump.’ 

Harris isn’t expected to formally accept the Democratic presidential nomination until Thursday. But Biden left the DNC immediately after what some mainstream media billed his ‘farewell address’ Monday night. 

The speech concluded in the dead of night, and the president and first lady Jill Biden touched down in California early Tuesday morning. 

Listing priorities for the remainder of his presidency, Biden told the DNC that he would continue working with Harris to bring all Americans wrongfully detained around the world home. 

Biden said Monday night that his administration, namely Secretary of State Antony Blinken, is ‘working around the clock’ to prevent a wider war in the Middle East, bring back the remaining hostages held by Hamas after the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks on Israel, surge humanitarian assistance into Gaza to ‘end the civilian suffering of the Palestinian people’ and ‘finally deliver a cease-fire and end this war.’ 

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Gov Newsom says ‘everybody’s…jumping over each other’ to campaign for Kamala Harris

CHICAGO – Gov. Gavin Newsom said in the four weeks since Vice President Kamala Harris replaced President Biden at the top of the Democratic Party’s 2024 ticket, ‘everyone and their mother is jumping on to help.’

Harris has been riding a wave of momentum as she has enjoyed a surge in polling and fundraising after Biden’s blockbuster announcement that he was ending his re-election bid for a second term in the White House.

Biden’s disastrous performance against former President Trump in their late June debate fueled questions over whether the 81-year-old president had the physical and mental abilities to handle another four years in the White House and sparked a chorus of calls from within his own party to end his 2024 campaign.

Biden eventually caved to the pressure, announcing the suspension of his re-election campaign three days after the Republican National Convention ended with a solidified GOP ticket of Trump and running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance. 

Until Biden dropped out of the race, Newsom had been one of the president’s top surrogates.

When asked if he would be as voracious for Harris on the campaign trail as he was for Biden, the two-term California governor pointed to his longtime friendship and working relationship with the vice president, who also hails from the Golden State.

‘We knew each other a decade before we both got into politics. One of my oldest friends. So it’s a no brainier,’ Newsom told Fox News Digital on Monday during the first night of the Democratic National Convention at Chicago’s United Center arena.

‘But here’s the difference,’ Newsom said. ‘I’m a solution in search of a problem. Everyone and their mother is jumping on to help. So, I’m as needed. But obviously all in.’

However, Newsom, who is thought to have long harbored national ambitions of his own, added that he may not be asked by the Harris campaign to hit the trail on behalf of the vice president.

‘We’ll see. Because everybody’s out there. Everybody’s doing everything,’ the governor said.

Pointing to his campaign travels across the country on behalf of Biden this summer before the president ended his 2024 bid, Newsom told this reporter ‘you were with me in New Hampshire. There wasn’t many of us. Everything about that was very different. Right now, everybody is out there for Kamala.’

‘Everybody’s sort of jumping over each other to be out there on the campaign trail.’

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Israel recovers 6 dead hostages in ‘complex rescue operation,’ says bodies held under humanitarian area

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) recovered the bodies of six deceased Israeli hostages in a rescue operation Monday, the forces announced. 

‘Overnight our forces returned the bodies of six of our hostages that had been held by the murderous Hamas terrorist organization,’ Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement.

‘Our hearts grieve over the terrible loss,’ Netanyahu said. ‘My wife Sara and I convey our heartfelt condolences to the dear families.’

‘I would like to thank the brave IDF and ISA fighters and commanders for their heroism and determined action,’ he added. ‘The State of Israel will continue to make every effort to return all of our hostages – the living and the deceased.’

The bodies of Nadav Popplewell, Yagev Buchshtab, Yoram Metzger, Chaim Peri, Alexander Dancyg, and Avraham Munder returned from Khan Yunis area in Gaza thanks to the efforts of the IDF’s 98th Division and carried out by the ‘Yahalom’ Unit of the Paratroopers Brigade, along with others, the IDF announced. 

In a statement, IDF International spokesperson Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani said, ‘This was a complex rescue operation that was conducted both above and below ground. We have not yet finished all our missions in the area. We are still operating inside the tunnels’. He continued, ‘The bodies were being held in a tunnel under an area previously designated as part of the Humanitarian Area in Khan Yunis’.

The forces located a tunnel shaft about 10 meters deep leading to an underground tunnel route where the bodies of the hostages were found, according to a statement released on Wednesday.

‘The soldiers of the Yahalom Unit and the ISA investigated the route and neutralized the obstructions, blast doors, weapons, explosives and hideouts used by the terrorists,’ the IDF explained. ‘The rescue was carried out after prolonged combat in a built-up area and in multi-story buildings, in which the forces carried out operations and searches that led to the elimination of terrorists and the destruction of terrorist infrastructure.’

The IDF and ISA stressed that they continue to deploy ‘all operational and intelligence means in order to fulfill the supreme national mission of bringing back all the hostages,’ according to their statement.

‘The recovery of the bodies of Abraham, Alex, Chaim, Yagev, Yoram, and Nadav crucially provides their families with necessary closure and grants eternal rest to the murdered,’ the Hostages and Missing Families Forum said in a statement. 

‘Israel has a moral and ethical obligation to return all the murdered for dignified burial and to bring all living hostages home for rehabilitation,’ the organization said. ‘The immediate return of the remaining 109 hostages can only be achieved through a negotiated deal.’

‘The Israeli government, with the assistance of mediators, must do everything in its power to finalize the deal currently on the table,’ the organization said. 

Hamas still has 109 hostages in their custody, with 36 of them presumed dead and their bodies still in Gaza. Eight of those remaining hostages are American, with three believed to have been murdered in captivity by Hamas.

The rescue operation occurred as U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Monday announced that Netanyahu had ‘accepted’ President Biden’s cease-fire plan, even though Netanyahu has not yet formally agreed to any cease-fire at this time. The U.S. will continue to coordinate with Egyptian and Qatari leadership to ‘bridge the gaps’ between warring parties. 

‘The parties – with the help of the mediators, the United States, Egypt and Qatar – have to come together and complete the process of reaching clear understandings about how they’ll implement the commitments that they’ve made under this agreement,’ Blinken said without specifics on what was included. 

‘But there is, I think, a real sense of urgency here across the region on the need to get this over the finish line and to do it as soon as possible,’ Blinken added. ‘The United States is deeply committed to getting this job done – getting it done now.’

Blinken then met on Tuesday with Egyptian counterparts with the aim of trying to finalize a cease-fire deal in Gaza ‘that would secure the release of all hostages, surge humanitarian assistance and create a path for broader regional stability,’ according to U.S. State Department principal deputy spokesperson Vedant Patel.

‘They also discussed other regional issues and priorities relevant to our bilateral relationship,’ Patel said. ‘The Secretary and the Foreign Minister also agreed to continue close coordination on ending the Sudan conflict, and the need for the Sudanese Armed Forces to join negotiations in Switzerland.’

Additionally, the Israeli Air Force (IAF) struck two Hezbollah launchers in the areas of Mansouri and Taybeh in southern Lebanon. The launchers were ready to be used immediately against Israeli territory. 

The U.S. has also held strategic dialogue with Egyptian counterparts to ‘further strengthen the bilateral partnership’ between the two countries on a range of issues.

Netanyahu assured families of the remaining hostages that the IDF is using ‘all necessary force to dismantle Hamas’ rule and its military capability, and this is moving forward.’ 

‘At the same time, [we are] making an effort to return the hostages and preserve our strategic security assets in the face of major domestic and foreign pressure.’

‘The first thing is to eliminate Hamas and achieve victory,’ he told the families in a forum on Tuesday. ‘We are approaching this step by step.’

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Trump, Vance hit battleground states as they counter-program Harris, Walz at DNC

CHICAGO – As day two of the Democratic National Convention gets underway Tuesday in blue state Illinois’ largest city, former President Trump and his running mate, Sen. JD Vance, will be in nearby battleground states.

It is part of the Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee’s plan to offer a full week of counter-programming to the Democrats’ national nominating convention.

‘Donald Trump is barnstorming all across the country over the course of this next week,’ RNC Chair Michael Whatley emphasized in a Sunday interview on Fox News’ ‘America’s Newsroom.’

‘We are going to be out directly talking to every American family across the country the way that only Donald Trump can. And we are absolutely asking for their votes. We’re asking for their support,’ Whatley highlighted.

The move is partially to try and blunt the momentum of Vice President Kamala Harris heading into the Democrats’ convention. Harris has been riding a wave of energy and enthusiasm – both in polling and in fundraising – since replacing President Biden at the top of the Democrats’ 2024 ticket four weeks ago.

However, it also appears to be another move to try and put pressure on Harris for not holding a news conference or a major interview since Biden bowed out and backed his vice president.

‘At the DNC, Kamala Harris will hide behind celebrities because everyday families know that she has been an absolute disaster for our nation, and real Americans are worse off now than four years ago,’ Trump campaign co-chairs Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita charged in a statement on the eve of the convention.

They argued that the vice president ‘has failed to answer media questions for 28 days because she can’t explain away her record of supporting policies that cause inflation, bans on private health insurance, destroying American energy, and higher taxes.’

As Fox News first reported last week, both Trump and Vance are on the campaign trail during the Democrats’ convention, headlining ‘messaging events’ in the states that will likely decide the outcome of the 2024 presidential election.

Additionally, as a Trump adviser revealed last week, ‘a whole cadre of people’ – including top surrogates – will also be making the GOP’s case throughout the week.

Trump’s schedule is packed with more events than he has done in months.

On Monday, he was in York, Pennsylvania, taking aim at Harris over the economy, while Vance was also talking about pocketbook issues during a stop in Philadelphia.

Pennsylvania, with 19 electoral votes up for grabs, is the largest prize among the crucial swing states.

At his event at a factory in York, Trump reiterated his pledge to cut taxes if he returns to the White House.

‘Our plan will massively cut taxes,’ Trump said. ‘I gave you the best tax cut in history.’

Harris campaign spokesperson Sarafina Chikita took aim at Trump, charging that ‘Americans should be clear on what he will do: He will raise costs on middle class families by $3,900 a year. He will ship American jobs overseas. He will cut Social Security and Medicare and repeal the Affordable Care Act — just like he tried to do last time he was in the White House.’

On Tuesday, Trump will be in Michigan while Vance spotlights the issue of crime during a news conference in southeastern Wisconsin, close to the Democrats’ convention in Chicago.

On Thursday, Trump will visit the U.S.-Mexico border in Arizona while Vance highlights the issue of immigration during a stop in Georgia. On Friday, the former president stumps in Arizona and Nevada on his ‘no tax on tips’ pledge.

‘As they meet Americans where they are in battleground states across the country, President Trump and Senator Vance will remind voters that under their leadership, we can end inflation, protect our communities from violent criminals, secure the border, and Make America Great Again,’ LaCivita and Wiles said.

On Monday, as the convention kicked off, top Trump allies in the Senate – Sens. Rick Scott of Florida and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin – were also making the case for the former president and slammed Harris and Walz at a news conference in downtown Chicago’s Trump International Hotel and Tower. 

Rep. Byron Donalds of Florida, a top House ally of Trump, fills the role on Tuesday, and the campaign plans Wednesday and Thursday news conferences as well. 

The Biden campaign counter-programmed with news conferences that included top surrogates in Milwaukee during the Republican National Convention last month.

Meanwhile, Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, will travel Tuesday from Chicago to nearby Milwaukee to headline a rally in the key Midwestern battleground.

In years past, it was traditional for a presidential candidate to lie low while the other party held its national nominating convention. 

However, last month, as the Republicans held their convention in Milwaukee, Biden briefly campaigned in the key swing state of Nevada before cutting his trip short after catching COVID.

Days later, Biden’s blockbuster announcement that he was ending his re-election campaign following his disastrous late June debate performance against Trump upended the 2024 election.

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Dem candidates bankrolled by ‘defund the police donors’ targeted by House GOP

The House GOP is setting its sights on a handful of Democratic candidates who have been bankrolled by left-wing billionaires whose money has also gone toward promoting what Republicans call ‘soft-on-crime’ policies.

At least eight Democratic House candidates who have positioned themselves as left-of-center or moderate have received donations from the same wealthy liberals who poured thousands into promoting progressive crime policies in states like California and Florida, campaign finance records show.

All eight are also running in competitive districts, making them prime targets for the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC), the House Republicans’ campaign arm.

‘Defund the police donors backed up the Brink’s truck to bankroll the campaigns of extreme House Democrats,’ NRCC spokesman Will Reinert told Fox News Digital. ‘If elected, these far-left Democrats will work hand in hand with San Francisco liberal Kamala Harris to send violent crime rates soaring, reward felons and punish cops for trying to keep communities safe.’

Among the eight is Rep. Sharice Davids, D-Kan., one of the most vulnerable Democrats this election cycle — the most recently available campaign finance data shows Davids received $3,300 in April from Quinn Delaney, a California billionaire who runs the nonprofit Akonadi Foundation.

The Akonadi Foundation committed $12.5 million to an Oakland-based initiative whose goals include closing youth prisons and taking police officers out of schools, according to its website.

Delaney also spent hundreds of thousands to help elect progressive Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascon, whose progressive reforms have been accused of making residents feel less safe during his tenure.

Delaney along with California megadonor Patty Quillin were named as two of four billionaires who ‘channeled $22 million toward criminal justice ballot measures and allied candidates the previous two years,’ Politico wrote in 2021.

Quillin and her husband, Netflix co-founder Reed Hastings, also donated $1 million to support a California measure to end the cash bail system and replace it with a risk-based assessment.

Recent campaign finance records show Quillin donated $3,300 to Will Rollins, a former prosecutor running against Rep. Ken Calvert, R-Calif.

Delaney and Quillin also both gave $3,300 to Adam Gray, who is running to unseat Rep. John Duarte, R-Calif.

Gray, a former state lawmaker, has also received two $6,600 checks from Django Bonderman and Cale Bonderman respectively, both of whom donated significantly to support a 2018 Florida ballot initiative to grant most felons the right to vote.

Django Bonderman is also linked to Mountain Philanthropies, which Influence Watch has classified as a left-wing dark money group that has supported causes promoting leniency in criminal justice.

Campaign finance records show the Bondermans have also donated similar amounts to George Whitesides, who is running against Rep. Mike Garcia, R-Calif.; Laura Gillen, who is challenging Rep. Anthony D’Esposito, R-N.Y.; Monica Tranel, who is challenging Rep. Ryan Zinke, R-Mont.; and former House Rep. Mondaire Jones, who is running to unseat Rep. Mike Lawler, R-N.Y.

The Bondermans have also donated $3,300 each to Oregon state Rep. Janelle Bynum, who is challenging Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer, R-Ore.

Django Bonderman has given small amounts to more moderate members of the House GOP as well, giving $1,000 each to Reps. Dave Joyce, R-Ohio, and Steve Womack, R-Ark., in late June. 

A spokesperson for Womack said he returned the donation.

‘Voters have to remember what happened when George Soros funded all of those left-wing DAs,’ John Feehery, a former aide to ex-Speaker Dennis Hastert and current partner at EFB Advocacy told Fox News Digital.

‘Crime spiraled out of control. The same principle applies to these candidates. They will do what the billionaires want and the results won’t be pretty.’

Feehery argued there was a dissonance between such Democrats running more moderate campaigns while accepting funds from progressive sources. ‘They can try, but voters know where their bread is buttered,’ he said.

Crime and perceptions of public safety are likely to play a critical role in suburban districts where Republicans have hammered big-city Democrats as soft on crime. 

Democrats, particularly in competitive districts, have sought to dispel those arguments during this election cycle.

Both Gray and Rollins have touted campaign endorsements from local law enforcement in their areas. Gray has support from both the district attorney and the sheriff of Merced County, while Rollins is endorsed by the Palm Springs Police Association.

‘As a former federal prosecutor with the support of local law enforcement, I understand more than most that defendants should be detained if they’re a danger to our communities, that Prop 47 needs to be repealed so that cops aren’t put in the position of rearresting the same people for theft crimes again and again, and that our police officers need all of the support they can get to keep our families safe,’ Rollins told Fox News Digital. ‘I believe no one is above the law and that we should fund both local police and federal law enforcement.’

He also knocked rival Calvert for once claiming the FBI was ‘infiltrated’ by ‘rot’ and for House GOP proposals, not led by him, that would have seen funding cut to various law enforcement offices.

Tranel, meanwhile, told Fox News Digital, ‘Over half of my donors are from Montana, while only 7% of Zinke’s contributions came from Montanans. If we’re going to talk about donors, let’s look at Ryan Zinke, who took money from a company controlled by the Chinese Communist Party that has bought up US farmland and voted to make it harder for Montana ranchers to compete with China and drive up the cost of living. Montanans deserve a representative who stands up for them, not one who continues to exploit Montana for their own personal profit.’

Zinke’s campaign pointed out that Tranel also received donations from Jonathan Soros and his wife, adding, ‘Ryan Zinke continues to outperform perennial failed candidate Monica Tranel in every aspect of this campaign. Talk about a liberal afraid to be truthful to voters, she refuses to acknowledge that her top client wants to defund the police, she refuses to answer questions about her support for her VP nominee who let criminals burn Minneapolis to the ground, and her presidential nominee who tried to bail them out of jail.’

‘And on the point of Tranel’s statement — Congressman Zinke is the only person in this race who has actually taken action against the Chinese buying farmland, whereas Monica Tranel is pushing American’s reliance on Chinese-made solar, wind and EVs,’ the campaign added.

In Oregon, Bynum previously touted her support for recriminalizing fentanyl possession after the state’s controversial decision to ease drug penalties, which has since been reversed.

‘Voters can see right through the NRCC’s weak falsehoods for what they are: a lame attempt to hide the fact that it’s only been House Republicans who’ve voted for cuts to cripple local law enforcement and make our communities less safe, all while rewarding their convicted felon presidential nominee,’ Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) spokesperson Viet Shelton told Fox News Digital.

The remaining candidates did not respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.

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