News

WASHINGTON — The Justice Department plans to focus on arresting the "most egregious" Jan. 6 rioters — particularly those who committed felony assaults on law enforcement officers but have not yet been arrested — in the remaining 72 days before President-elect Donald Trump is back in the White House, a law enforcement official told NBC News this week. Trump is expected to shut down the years-long investigation into the Jan. 6, 2021, attack and has said he would “absolutely“ pardon some, if not all , of his supporters who stormed the U.S. Capitol that day, labeling them “ warriors ,” “ unbelievable patriots ,” political prisoners and “ hostages .” A Trump campaign spokesman did not respond to a request for comment on which rioters Trump would conside...

A resistance movement was born in the wake of Donald Trump’s 2016 victory, sending thousands of people into the streets wearing pink hats and signs with punchy slogans . The leaders of left-leaning groups that emerged in response to Trump’s first election say they expect to be just as forceful in pushing back against the policy moves of a second Trump administration. “I think that folks are very angry and are going to be turning out,” Rachel O’Leary Carmona, the executive director of Women’s March, told NBC News. But “2016 was a long time ago, a pandemic ago, two presidential terms ago. Things are going to be different. It’s not going to be the same.” Following Trump’s re-election on Tuesday, scattered protests broke out in Seattle, Chicago, Philadelphia and B...

Coverage on this live blog has ended. What to know about the Trump transition plans President-elect Donald Trump, fresh on the heels of his victory in the election , is already working on staffing up his next administration. Some high-profile options for Cabinet posts, such as Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas and Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin, have removed themselves from contention for now, but other hires are underway, like the selection of co-campaign chair Susie Wiles to be the first female White House chief of staff . Meanwhile, the judge overseeing Trump’s criminal election interference trial has granted special counsel Jack Smith's request to pause the proceedings for a month to decide how to move forward, likely the beginning o...

President-elect Donald Trump’s transition team is considering ending two Biden administration programs that have allowed more than 1.3 million immigrants to enter the U.S. legally, making those who entered but have not yet received asylum eligible for deportation, two sources familiar with the plans told NBC News. The exact number of people who could face deportation after arriving in the U.S. legally is not known, but it is estimated to be in the hundreds of thousands. Trump’s plan to end the two Biden programs comes as the president-elect’s promised plan to carry out mass deportations is taking clearer shape. Trump’s transition team is considering plans designed to maximize the scope of the deportations and prioritize certain immigrants as among the first to be forced to leave. ...

State attorneys general across the country are urging people to notify the authorities if they received one of the racist text messages sent Wednesday to scores of Black people, telling them they had been “selected” to pick cotton “at the nearest plantation.” They said anyone who received these texts should contact local law enforcement, the FBI, or file complaints with state agencies if they feel threatened. New York Attorney General Letitia James directed recipients to file a complaint with the office’s civil rights bureau, while Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison encouraged anyone who received the message to fill out a complaint form with his office. The FBI said it is investigating the case but would not confirm to NBC News if they have information on whether ...

A suicide bomber blew himself up at a train station in restive southwestern Pakistan on Saturday, killing at least 24 people, including security officers, and wounding about 50 others, some critically, officials said. The attack happened when nearly 100 passengers were waiting for a train to travel to the garrison city of Rawalpindi from Quetta, the capital of the restive Balochistan province, a c cording to Hamza Shafqaat, a senior government administrator. A separatist group, the Balochistan Liberation Army , claimed the attack in a statement, saying a suicide bomber targeted troops present at the railway station. The outlawed BLA has long waged an insurgency seeking independence from Islamabad. Police said about a dozen security forces are also among...

Tony Todd , an American actor known for leading the “ Candyman ” horror franchise as its eponymous hook-wielding ghost, died Wednesday at his home in Marina Del Rey, California. He was 69. Todd’s death was confirmed by a representative for the actor. A cause of death was not disclosed. A reliable presence in genre fare across four decades, Todd’s series of credits include iconic titles such as Alex Proyas’ comic book adaptation “The Crow,” Michael Bay’s Alcatraz actioner “The Rock” and the elaborate killing-set-piece series “ Final Destination .” One of his earliest film performances came in his early thirties in Oliver Stone’s Oscar-winning war epic “Platoon.” On “ Star Trek: The Next Generation ,” Todd donned alien make-up to play Kurn, a Commander...

A brush fire broke out Friday night in Prospect Park, in the Brooklyn borough of New York City, amid a drought that has been plaguing the northeastern U.S. for weeks. The New York City Fire Department posted about the fire on X at around 8 p.m. Shortly after, it said units were using drone technology to find hot spots. "The fire's under control, and there are some hotter spots," FDNY Commissioner Robert S. Tucker said at a news conference . Firefighters would be at Prospect Park all night to ensure the fire is contained and that no fires break out from embers carried on the wind, Tucker said. The fire was in an “extremely dense” part of Prospect Park on a hill, and there were no structures nearby to be threatened, he said. The cause of the fire is under investi...

While supporters and relatives of Erik and Lyle Menendez have advocated for their resentencing and possible release from prison , current and former prosecutors who tried the brothers in the 1990s told NBC News that they believe the men are cold-blooded killers and should remain where they are — behind bars. In an exclusive interview, one of the prosecutors cast doubt on a new piece of potential evidence the brothers have presented in court to challenge their convictions. “They killed their parents. They slaughtered their mother,” former Los Angeles County Deputy District Attorney Pamela Bozanich, who prosecuted the brothers in their first trial, told “Dateline.” “Why should they live among us?” The brothers were sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of...

Calmer winds helped California firefighters battle the once out-of-control Mountain Fire on Friday as they continued to defend homes from the destructive blaze, officials said. By Friday evening, the fire had burned 20,630 acres, with firefighters achieving 14% containment amid improving weather, Andrew Dowd, Ventura County Fire Department spokesperson, said at a news conference Friday evening. The fire did not expand and made very little movement by the end of the workday on Friday, Ventura County Fire Chief Dustin Gardner said at the news conference. “The fire has laid down,” he said. “That is fantastic.” Evacuation orders have been lifted for 3,500 homes, with another 2,000 still covered by the orders, Ventura County Sheriff James Fryhoff said. Residents of about 1...