Homeland Safety Secretary Kristi Noem stated on NBC Information’ “Meet the Press” Sunday that authorities consider the suspect within the Nationwide Guard taking pictures was radicalized within the U.S.
Rahmanullah Lakanwal got here to the U.S. in 2021, through the Biden administration, however was granted asylum through the Trump administration in April. Earlier than he settled in a quiet a part of Washington state, he was a part of a secret unit of Afghans who operated beneath CIA path and hunted down Taliban commanders in extremely harmful missions.
Some administration officers have claimed with out proof that the Biden administration didn’t vet Lakanwal.
However members of those so-called “Zero Models,” also called Nationwide Strike Models, have been among the many most extensively vetted of any Afghans who labored with American forces. CIA officers hailed their bravery, ability and loyalty, and the company prioritized their evacuation from Afghanistan following the autumn of Kabul in 2021 as a result of they have been prime targets for the Taliban.
As a member of the pressure, Lakanwal would have undergone in depth vetting earlier than he joined the Zero Unit and had common safety checks throughout his tenure, former intelligence and navy officers stated. Like different refugees, he would have been vetted once more, a number of officers stated, when he utilized for asylum.
Authorities haven’t offered a motive for the taking pictures, and a relative of Lakanwal’s has stated the household can not fathom why a person who fought alongside Individuals in Afghanistan could have carried out such an assault.
However since arriving in the US, 1000’s of Afghan veterans have lived in a authorized limbo with out work permits, struggling to feed their households, in response to refugee advocates. Their former CIA and navy colleagues appealed to each the Biden and Trump administrations and to Congress to take motion to resolve their authorized standing, warning that the shortage of progress was driving some veterans into despair, the advocates stated.
FDA claims Covid pictures killed 10 youngsters in an inside memo consultants say lacks proof
The director of the Meals and Drug Administration’s vaccine division instructed company employees in a memo that an inside evaluation discovered that at the very least 10 youngsters died “after and due to receiving” the Covid vaccine.
The three,000-word memo, obtained by NBC Information, claims that company employees decided that “no fewer than 10” of 96 baby deaths reported to the Vaccine Opposed Occasion Reporting System, or VAERS, between 2021 and 2024 have been “associated” to Covid vaccination.
Vaccine consultants stated the memo was irresponsible and omits key particulars about how officers arrived on the conclusion as a result of it didn’t embrace the youngsters’s ages or medical histories, timelines or documentation for the deaths referenced and doesn’t establish the producer of the vaccine. The FDA’s findings haven’t been revealed in a peer-reviewed journal.
‘Meet the Press’

Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., stated on NBC Information’ “Meet the Press” that President Donald Trump and Protection Secretary Pete Hegseth are “not severe individuals” in response to their feedback a couple of video Kelly and several other fellow Democrats made this month urging navy and intelligence personnel to “refuse unlawful orders.”
“This president thinks he can bully and intimidate individuals, and he isn’t going to, he’s not going to cease me from talking out and holding him accountable for the issues that he does which might be unsuitable and illegal,” Kelly instructed moderator Kristen Welker.
Officers on the Protection Division this month stated they have been launching an investigation into Kelly after Trump accused him and several other different lawmakers of “seditious conduct,” a cost that the president stated may very well be “punishable by dying.” Trump later walked again his feedback.
Nonetheless, Kelly stated that the video was concerning the future, not referencing any potential unlawful orders which will have already been given.
“We’re involved due to this president, with this secretary of protection, we might have a big drawback. So this was a easy message, ‘Comply with the regulation,’ and it was trying ahead,” Kelly stated.
Politics briefly
- Boat strike oversight: Each the Home and the Senate have began inquiries right into a reported second strike on an alleged drug boat within the Caribbean in September that killed the survivors of an preliminary strike. In the meantime, Trump stated that Venezuela’s airspace ought to be thought of “closed.”
- Noem denies defying order: Homeland Safety Secretary Kristi Noem stated deportation operations are her determination and denied defying a court docket order to halt deportation flights to El Salvador this 12 months, attacking “radical choices” from “activist judges.”
- Tough Dick’s comeback? A few of the most influential right-wing figures insist that Watergate was truly an underhanded scheme by the “deep state” to take down Richard Nixon as a result of he was a preferred Republican president.
- Extra college settlements: Northwestern College agreed to pay $75 million in a cope with the Trump administration to finish a sequence of investigations and restore a whole bunch of tens of millions of {dollars} in federal analysis funding.
Ukrainian troopers see Trump plan as capitulation, at the same time as they dream of peace

From his place on the jap entrance strains, the unique peace plan backed by President Donald Trump seemed extra like a proposal for Volodymyr Rzhavskyi’s give up.
“It’s not a plan. It’s an actual capitulation. There may be nothing to debate right here,” stated Rzhavskyi, a senior sergeant serving close to Pokrovsk, a provide hub beneath intense stress from Russian forces for some 18 months.
Whereas Ukrainian officers fought for modifications to the 28-point plan that emerged final week, NBC Information spoke with troopers within the nation’s embattled navy who expressed frustration on the concept Moscow could be handed its hard-line calls for but additionally hope that they may quickly be capable of return to their lives.
- The place talks stand: High U.S. officers and a Ukrainian delegation had a “very productive” assembly in Florida on Sunday, although “a lot work stays” to finish the battle, Secretary of State Marco Rubio stated.
Lane Kiffin leaves Ole Miss on brink of its first playoff look to take LSU job

School soccer’s strangest saga of the season is lastly over.
Ole Miss Rebels head coach Lane Kiffin introduced he’ll take the identical job with the LSU Tigers, leaving the seventh-ranked workforce within the nation for its convention rival.
“After numerous prayer and time spent with household, I made the tough determination to just accept the top teaching place at LSU,” Kiffin wrote in a social media publish.
The Tigers job grew to become out there after the varsity fired Brian Kelly in October. Kiffin instantly grew to become closely rumored to take over, regardless of the Rebels being within the midst of reaching the School Soccer Playoff for the primary time.
- ‘Sunday Evening Soccer’: In an already attempting season for the Washington Commanders, their subsequent problem comes within the type of the 9-2 Denver Broncos. NBC Information is masking all of the motion.
- Thieves eye draft picks: Id thieves have lately narrowed in on a very profitable goal: athletes on the verge of going professional.
- MLS Cup ultimate set: Lionel Messi’s Inter Miami will face Thomas Müller and the Vancouver Whitecaps in subsequent weekend’s championship match.
Notable quote
My greatest buddy’s mother died unexpectedly, everybody was in shock and sobbing, and I couldn’t cry in any respect. I simply felt nothing.
Liana Shatova, a enterprise growth supervisor who wished to go off antidepressants after 18 months
Antidepressants, primarily selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, are a number of the most generally prescribed medicines in the US, taken by tens of tens of millions of adults. However now a “deprescribing” motion is increase within the psychiatry discipline, aimed toward serving to sufferers cut back or cease their medicines when now not thought of mandatory.
In case you missed it
- British playwright Tom Stoppard, a playful, probing dramatist who received an Academy Award for the screenplay for 1998’s “Shakespeare In Love,” died at 88.
- 4 individuals have been killed and 10 others have been hospitalized following a taking pictures at a California banquet corridor the place a household was internet hosting a celebration, authorities stated.
- Regardless of wider financial uncertainty, U.S. customers spent a file $11.8 billion on-line to snag vacation offers on Black Friday, in response to Adobe Analytics.
- Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu submitted a request for a proper pardon amid a yearslong corruption trial, simply weeks after President Donald Trump stated he ought to be pardoned.
- A number of protesters have been arrested in New York Metropolis after they blocked streets and exits in an obvious try to stop federal brokers from finishing up an immigration raid, in response to police and video footage from the scene.
- A forty five-car pileup in Indiana and a Delta jet skidding off the runway in Iowa have been among the many journey disasters stemming from a robust winter storm on one of many largest journey days of the 12 months.