Justice Department releases largest batch yet of Epstein documents, says it totals 3 million pages

NEW YORK (AP) — The Justice Department on Friday released many more records from its investigative files on Jeffrey Epstein, resuming disclosures under a law intended to reveal what the government knew about the millionaire financier's sexual abuse of young girls and his interactions with rich and powerful people such as Donald Trump and Bill Clinton.

Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said the department would be releasing more than 3 million pages of documents along with more than 2,000 videos and 180,000 images. The files, posted to the department’s website, include some of the several million pages of records that officials said were withheld from an initial release in December.

Included were documents concerning some of Epstein's famous associates, including Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, formerly known as Britain’s Prince Andrew, and email correspondence between Epstein and Elon Musk and other prominent contacts from across the political spectrum.

The documents were disclosed under the Epstein Files Transparency Act, the law enacted after months of public and political pressure that requires the government to open its files on the late financier and his confidant and onetime girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell. Lawmakers complained when the Justice Department made only a limited release last month, but officials said more time was needed to review additional documents that were discovered and to ensure no sensitive information about victims was released.

Friday's disclosure represents the largest document dump to date about a saga the Trump administration has struggled to shake because of the president's previous association with Epstein. Criminal investigations into the financier have long animated online sleuths, conspiracy theorists and others who have suspected government cover-ups and clamored for a full accounting, demands that Blanche acknowledged might not be satisfied by the latest release.

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Trump's choice of Warsh to lead Fed could reshape the world's most influential central bank

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump's nomination of Kevin Warsh to chair the Federal Reserve could bring about sweeping changes at a central bank that dominates the global economy and markets like no other.

Warsh, if approved by the Senate, will be under close scrutiny from financial markets and Congress given his appointment by a president who has loudly demanded much lower rates than many economists think are justified by economic conditions. Whether he can maintain the Fed's long time independence from day-to-day politics while also placating Trump will be a tremendous challenge.

Still, former associates and friends of Warsh say that he has the intellectual heft and people skills to potentially pull it off. His family also has connections to Trump that could reduce the pressure from the White House.

Warsh has “a judicious temperament and both the intellectual understanding but also the hopefully diplomatic talents to navigate what is a challenging position at this point,” said Raghuram Rajan, an economics professor at the University of Chicago and formerly head of India's central bank.

Warsh would replace current chair Jerome Powell when his term expires in May. Trump chose Powell to lead the Fed in 2017 but this year has relentlessly assailed him for not cutting interest rates quickly enough.

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Journalist Don Lemon charged with federal civil rights crimes after covering anti-ICE church protest

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Journalist Don Lemon was released from custody Friday after he was arrested and hit with federal civil rights charges over his coverage of an anti-immigration enforcement protest that disrupted a service at a Minnesota church.

Lemon was arrested overnight in Los Angeles, while another independent journalist and two protest participants were arrested in Minnesota. He struck a confident, defiant tone while speaking to reporters after a court appearance in California, declaring: “I will not be silenced.”

“I have spent my entire career covering the news. I will not stop now,” Lemon said. “In fact there is no more important time than right now, this very moment, for a free and independent media that shines a light on the truth and holds those in power accountable.”

The arrests brought sharp criticism from news media advocates and civil rights activists including the Rev. Al Sharpton, who said the administration of President Donald Trump is taking a “sledgehammer” to “the knees of the First Amendment.”

A grand jury in Minnesota indicted Lemon and others on charges of conspiracy and interfering with the First Amendment rights of worshippers during the Jan. 18 protest at the Cities Church in St. Paul, where a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement official is a pastor.

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The Justice Department has opened a federal civil rights probe into the killing of Alex Pretti

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department has opened a federal civil rights investigation into the shooting of Alex Pretti, the Minneapolis resident killed Saturday by Border Patrol officers, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said Friday.

“We’re looking at everything that would shed light on what happened that day and in the days and weeks leading up to what happened,” Blanche said during a news conference.

Blanche did not explain why DOJ decided to open an investigation into Pretti’s killing, but has said a similar probe is not warranted in the Jan. 7 death of Renee Good, who was shot by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer in Minneapolis. He said only on Friday that the Civil Rights Division does not investigate every law enforcement shooting and that there have to be circumstances and facts that “warrant an investigation.”

“President Trump has said repeatedly, ‘Of course, this is something we’re going to investigate,’” Blanche said of the Pretti shooting.

Steve Schleicher, a Minneapolis-based attorney representing Pretti’s parents, said Friday that “the family’s focus is on a fair and impartial investigation that examines the facts around his murder.”

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Senate passes Trump-backed government funding deal, sending to House

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate voted Friday to fund most of the government through the end of September while carving out a temporary extension for Homeland Security funding, giving Congress two weeks to debate new restrictions on federal immigration raids across the country.

With a weekend shutdown looming, President Donald Trump struck the spending deal with Senate Democrats on Thursday in the wake of the deaths of two protesters at the hands of federal agents in Minneapolis. Democrats said they would not vote for the larger spending bill unless Congress considers legislation to unmask agents, require more warrants and allow local authorities to help investigate any incidents.

“The nation is reaching a breaking point," Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said after the vote. "The American people are demanding that Congress step up and force change.”

As lawmakers in both parties called for investigations into the fatal shootings, Trump said he didn’t want a shutdown and negotiated the rare deal with Schumer, his frequent adversary. Trump then encouraged members of both parties to cast a “much needed Bipartisan ‘YES’ vote.”

The bill passed 71-29 and will now head to the House, which is not due back until Monday. That means the government could be in a partial shutdown temporarily over the weekend until they pass it.

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Judge bars federal prosecutors from seeking the death penalty against Luigi Mangione

NEW YORK (AP) — Federal prosecutors can’t seek the death penalty against Luigi Mangione in the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, a federal judge ruled Friday, foiling the Trump administration’s bid to see him executed for what it called a “premeditated, cold-blooded assassination that shocked America.”

Judge Margaret Garnett dismissed a federal murder charge that had enabled prosecutors to seek capital punishment, finding it technically flawed. She wrote that she did so to “foreclose the death penalty as an available punishment to be considered by the jury" as it weighs whether to convict Mangione.

Garnett also dismissed a gun charge but left in place stalking charges that carry a maximum punishment of life in prison. To seek the death penalty, prosecutors needed to show that Mangione killed Thompson while committing another "crime of violence." Stalking doesn't fit that definition, Garnett wrote in her opinion, citing case law and legal precedents.

In a win for prosecutors, Garnett ruled they can use evidence collected from his backpack during his arrest, including a 9mm handgun and a notebook in which authorities say Mangione described his intent to “wack” an insurance executive. Mangione’s lawyers had sought to exclude those items, arguing the search was illegal because police hadn’t yet obtained a warrant.

During a hearing Friday, Garnett gave prosecutors 30 days to update her on whether they'll appeal her death penalty decision. A spokesperson for the U.S. attorney's office in Manhattan, which is prosecuting the federal case, declined to comment.

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Israel reopening Gaza’s border crossing with Egypt on Sunday after long closure

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israel said Friday that it will reopen the pedestrian border crossing between the Gaza Strip and Egypt over the weekend, marking an important step forward for U.S. President Donald Trump’s Gaza ceasefire plan.

COGAT, the Israeli military body in charge of coordinating aid to Gaza, said in a statement that starting on Sunday a “limited movement of people only” would be allowed through the Rafah crossing, Gaza’s main gateway to the outside world.

The announcement followed statements from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Ali Shaath, newly appointed to head the Palestinian administrative committee governing Gaza’s daily affairs, that it would likely open soon.

While COGAT said the passage will open in both directions on Sunday, Shaath said the first day will be a trial for operations and that travel both ways will start Monday.

Israel as of Friday agreed to allow up to 150 people to leave each day — 50 medical patients with two family members, an official familiar with the situation told The Associated Press, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were discussing diplomatic talks. Up to 50 people who fled during the war can return daily, the source said.

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Thousands face another arctic blast without power as East Coast preps for a storm

NASHVILLE (AP) — Frustrations were bubbling up Friday for the tens of thousands who have been without power for nearly a week in the U.S. South as a new storm looms, including Tennessee's residents in Nashville, where the utility was criticized for storm preparations and recovery.

Terry Miles, a 59-year-old construction worker whose home has been without power since Sunday, said he's using a fish fryer for heat and is worried about carbon monoxide.

“I’m taking a chance of killing myself and killing my wife, because why?” Miles said after attending a Nashville Electric Service news conference intended to showcase the utility's repairs on poles and lines. He then pointed to officials.

“I came up here to speak my mind because I’ve been so cold," he said. "This is the coldest and worst I’ve ever been in my damn life.”

Crews have been working by ground and air to restore the lingering outages as another storm is predicted to hit the East Coast, threatening near-hurricane force winds, heavy snow and flooding, while arctic air moves into the Southeast.

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Catherine O'Hara, Emmy-winning comic actor of 'Schitt's Creek' and 'Home Alone' fame, dies at 71

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Catherine O’Hara, a gifted Canadian-born comic actor and “SCTV” alum who starred as Macaulay Culkin’s harried mother in two “Home Alone” movies and won an Emmy as the dramatically ditzy wealthy matriarch Moira Rose in “Schitt’s Creek,” died Friday. She was 71.

O’Hara died at her home in Los Angeles “following a brief illness,” according to a statement from her representatives at Creative Artists Agency. Further details were not immediately available.

O’Hara’s career was launched with the Second City comedy group in Toronto in the 1970s. It was there that she first worked with Eugene Levy, who would become a lifelong collaborator — and her “Schitt’s Creek” costar. The two would be among the original cast of the sketch show “SCTV,” short for “Second City Television.” The series, which began on Canadian TV in the 1970s and aired on NBC in the U.S., spawned a legendary group of esoteric comedians that O’Hara would work with often, including Martin Short, John Candy, Andrea Martin, Rick Moranis and Joe Flaherty.

O'Hara would win her first Emmy for her writing on the show.

Her second, for best actress in a comedy series, came four decades later, for “Schitt's Creek,” a career-capping triumph and the perfect personification of her comic talents. The small CBC series created by Levy and his son, Dan, about a wealthy family forced to live in a tiny town would dominate the Emmys in its sixth and final season. It brought O’Hara, always a beloved figure, a new generation of fans and put her at the center of cultural attention.

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US stocks fall while a break in gold fever sends metals prices plunging

NEW YORK (AP) — Financial markets churned on Friday as investors tried to figure out what President Donald Trump’s new nominee to lead the Federal Reserve will mean for interest rates.

U.S. stocks fell, with the S&P 500 down 0.4% after sinking as much as 1.1% earlier in the day. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 179 points, or 0.4%, and the Nasdaq composite lost 0.9%.

The value of the U.S. dollar rallied, but only after swiveling a couple times following Trump’s nomination of Kevin Warsh. And some of the wildest action was again in precious metals markets, where gold and silver prices plunged following their stellar runs over the last year.

Whoever leads the Fed has a big influence on the economy and markets worldwide by helping to dictate where the U.S. central bank moves interest rates. Such decisions lift or weigh on prices for all kinds of investments, as the Fed tries to keep the U.S. job market humming without letting inflation get out of control. Trump has been pushing for lower interest rates, which usually help goose the economy but can also cause higher inflation.

A fear in financial markets has been that the Fed will lose some of its independence because of Trump. That fear in turn helped catapult the price of gold and weaken the U.S. dollar’s value over the last year.

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