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CNN head Chris Licht is out at the global news network after a brief, tumultuous tenure

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:30:40 GMT

By DAVID BAUDER (AP Media Writer)NEW YORK (AP) — Chris Licht is out after a year as chief executive at CNN, following a series of missteps and plunging ratings.David Zaslav, the CEO of CNN parent company Warner Bros. Discovery, announced the leadership change on CNN’s morning editorial call on Wednesday.Zaslav appointed a four-person leadership team to lead the network in the interim.Licht replaced Jeff Zucker as CNN’s chief executive last year, with a mandate to make the network move the network more toward the political center. But a town hall meeting with Donald Trump received wide criticism, and a revamp of the network’s morning show imploded with the firing of Don Lemon.A lengthy profile of Licht in Atlantic magazine that came out on Friday proved embarrassing and likely sealed his fate. Only two days ago, Licht promised on the same morning editorial call to fight to regain the trust of CNN employees.But internally, Licht couldn’t gain the support ...

Jacob deGrom’s former teammates feel for ex-Mets ace as his career is put on pause

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:30:40 GMT

ATLANTA — The last time the Mets were in Atlanta, they had their three best pitchers lined up to try and hold off the surging Braves for a chance to win the NL East. One by one, they all fell to the team that eventually won the division. It was Jacob deGrom’s final regular season appearance for the Mets, and though he kept the team’s title hopes alive with a Wild Card win over the San Diego Padres, ultimately, that was the end for the dominant, homegrown right-hander in New York.Now, the Mets are back in Atlanta, and they arrived just in time to find out that deGrom, now a member of the AL West-leading Texas Rangers, will have to undergo his second Tommy John surgery.“You feel awful for him,” Mets manager Buck Showalter said Tuesday at Truist Park. “I know how much it means for him to pitch and he enjoys pitching. It’s certainly sad news for all of us.”His former Mets teammates reached out right away.“I sent him a text and said t...

Mets lose to rival Braves, 6-4, despite home runs from Pete Alonso, Francisco Lindor

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:30:40 GMT

ATLANTA — The last time the Mets were in Atlanta, their stars went dim. This time, the Mets’ biggest stars hit like stars early in the game, but by the end the pitching and hitting failed to come through.After an hour and 40 minutes of a rainless rain delay to start a three-game NL East series, Francisco Lindor and Pete Alonso homered, with the latter extending his league lead to 22 on the season. But right-handers Carlos Carrasco and Drew Smith imploded in the sixth and the Mets lost 6-4.The Mets managed only four hits in the game and all four came off Atlanta starter Bryce Elder, with three relievers rendering the Mets’ bats ineffective.“We’ve got some guys who are capable of doing better, but we haven’t been able to string a lot together,” said manager Buck Showalter. “We got [Elder’s] pitch count up, but they have other good people they can bring in. Four hits is tough. Going to be tough to make that always stand up.”Ca...

Ukrainian dam breach: What’s happening and what’s at stake

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:30:40 GMT

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — The fallout from the breach of a river dam along a front line of Russia’s war in Ukraine continued to wreak havoc on lives, livelihoods and the environment on Wednesday. When the Kakhovka dam ruptured on Tuesday, it sent a torrent of water from Ukraine’s largest reservoir into streets and homes downstream on the Dnieper River where tens of thousands of people live — in the thick of a combat zone where shelling regularly takes place. It’s not clear what caused the breach: the structure had already been damaged in the war.Ukraine’s government, which controls the river’s western bank and the city of Kherson, has accused Russian forces of blowing up the facility. Officials in Russia, which controls the eastern bank for about the last 300 kilometers (about 185 miles) before the river reaches the Black Sea, has blamed Ukrainian military strikes.WHAT ARE THE LATEST DEVELOPMENTS?Authorities and rescue workers on both sides stepped up effort...

‘Home is like jail’: Afghan soldier who helped the US weathers injuries, uncertainty in asylum bid

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:30:40 GMT

HOUSTON (AP) — The April visit to a Houston clinic was just one of a never-ending assembly line of medical appointments Abdul Wasi Safi has had since his January release from an immigration detention center.The former Afghan soldier, called Wasi by family and friends, sat in a dental chair and conversed in Pashto with his older brother Sami as Carrie Underwood’s “Cowboy Casanova” played in the background. It was a scene thousands of miles from the places he’d been the past two years.After the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in August 2021, fear of retribution from the Taliban for sharing information with American soldiers while he was an intelligence officer drove Wasi Safi to flee to Brazil. The goal? Reaching the U.S. and applying for asylum.He eventually made it after crossing 10 countries, but the journey came at a high cost. A brutal beating by police officers in Panama severely damaged his teeth and jaw and left him with permanent hearing loss.Wasi Safi didn’t appear ne...

Stock market today: Wall Street edges higher to edge of a new bull market

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:30:40 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — Wall Street is drifting higher as the market continues to hover near the edge of a new bull market. The S&P 500 rose 0.2% early Wednesday. The U.S. stock market’s main benchmark is 20% above where it was in mid-October. If it holds those gains, it will mark the end to its painful bear market. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 49 points, or 0.2%, and the Nasdaq composite was up 0.5%. Wayfair rose 3.5% after the home goods retailer said its revenue trends have been improving. Campbell Soup fell 8% after reporting weaker revenue than expected.THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.Markets were slow to gain traction again on Wednesday with scant market-moving news scheduled until next week’s inflation reports.Futures for the S&P 500 were up just 0.1%, while futures for the Dow Jones Industrials were essentially flat. Next week, the U.S. government will publish its latest monthly updates on inflation and the Federal Reserve wi...

Ukraine rushes drinking water to flooded areas as officials wrestle with impact of major dam breach

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:30:40 GMT

KHERSON, Ukraine (AP) — Authorities on Wednesday rushed supplies of drinking water to flooded areas from a collapsed dam in southern Ukraine as officials weighed where they might resettle residents who relied on the breached reservoir on the Dnieper River that forms part of the front line in the 15-month war.More than 2,700 people have fled flooded areas on both the Russian and Ukrainian-controlled sides of the river, according to official tallies, but it was not clear whether the true scale of the disaster had yet emerged in an area that was home to more than 60,000 people.The Kakhovka hydroelectric dam and reservoir, essential for supplying drinking water and irrigation to a huge area of southern Ukraine, lies in a part of the Kherson region occupied by Moscow’s forces for the past year. It is also critical for water supplies to the Crimean Peninsula, which was illegally annexed by Russia in 2014.Ukraine holds the western bank of the Dnieper, while Russia controls the eastern side...

Andrew Young was at Martin Luther King’s side throughout often violent struggle for civil rights

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:30:40 GMT

ATLANTA (AP) — Andrew Young’s first thought when he heard the Voting Rights Act had been signed into law was not celebratory. It was strategic.“Where are we going to get the money to get the country mobilized to register these voters?” he recalled thinking at that momentous time nearly 60 years ago.Now 91, Young is one of the last surviving members of Martin Luther King Jr.’s inner circle. The two were together from their first meeting in 1957 at a fraternity symposium at Talladega College until King was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee, in 1968.But while King and fellow close adviser Ralph Abernathy were at the U.S. Capitol for the 1965 signing, Young was not.“That wasn’t my part of the movement,” he said. “I was maybe a field general.”Young would go on to become mayor of Atlanta, a congressman and the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations.The journey to the Voting Rights Act was an arduous one, he recalled. In December 1964, Young and King headed to Washington to meet with Presi...

Shell’s clean energy campaign is misleading, UK advertising watchdog says

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:30:40 GMT

LONDON (AP) — A marketing campaign by oil major Shell has been banned by the U.K.’s advertising watchdog Wednesday for implying a big proportion of its business was in low carbon energy even though fossil fuels make up the “vast majority” of its operations.A television commercial, a YouTube video and a poster campaign in Bristol, England, variously described providing large numbers of British homes with 100% renewable energy, installing electric vehicle charging points and driving the energy transition.In its written ruling the Advertising Standards Authority found consumers would interpret the marketing materials as making a “broader claim about Shell as a whole providing cleaner energy.”Although Shell does have a clean energy business, the company estimates its operations released almost 1.4 billion tons of heat-trapping carbon dioxide in 2021.In a statement, Shell spokesperson Tara Lemay said the company “strongly” disagrees with the ASA’s decision, “which could slow the U....

Wildfire smoke blankets Ontario, Quebec, air quality plummets, affects activities

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:30:40 GMT

TORONTO — Poor air quality is forecast to persist into the weekend across parts of Ontario, as plumes of wildfire smoke blanket the province and prompt school boards to limit outdoor activities.Environment Canada has issued special air quality advisories for large swaths of Ontario and Quebec, warning of high levels of pollution from wildfires burning across both provinces.Ottawa, Belleville and Kingston registered some of the worst air pollution levels in the country, maxing out the air quality index at very high risk. Air quality index levels were forecasted to peak at high risk in many other Ontario cities, from Windsor through to Toronto and north to Sudbury. Toronto District School Board says all strenuous outdoor activities will be rescheduled, or moved indoors when possible, while school boards in York Region say they will hold recess inside. As of Tuesday, there were more than 200 forest fires burning across Quebec and northern Ontario. This report by The Canadian Press was ...