With more than $2.8 billion in rewards warbled out by schoolchildren and broadcast live across the globe, Spain's 200-year-old holiday lottery, "The Fat One," provided a substantial jackpot once again this year. The nation's premier opera house, Teatro Real, in the capital, Madrid, hosted the yearly drawing for "El Gordo" on Sunday. It has no single prize, in contrast to many lotteries, and the winnings are dispersed among thousands of participants via a sophisticated algorithm. Families, coworkers, and acquaintances frequently join together throughout the nation by pooling their funds to purchase tickets. Since stores often only sell one or two numbers and multiple tickets with the same number might be sold, the people who win the biggest rewards frequently reside in the same area. With o...

Sydney On Monday, Australia granted the United States' request for extradition of Daniel Duggan, a former U.S. Marine pilot who is accused of violating U.S. weapons control legislation by instructing Chinese military pilots on how to land on aircraft carriers. Shortly after returning from China, where he had resided since 2014, 55-year-old Duggan, a naturalized Australian citizen, was taken into custody by Australian Federal Police in a rural community in the state of New South Wales in October 2022. Duggan was no longer a citizen of the United States at the time of the alleged offenses, and his attorneys have contended in court that there is no proof the Chinese pilots he trained were military. According to a certificate issued by the U.S. embassy in Beijing, he renounced his U.S. citiz...

The director of one of the remaining hospitals in northern Gaza warned Monday that premature newborns are among those who could perish if the facility complies with Israeli evacuation demands. But according to Dr. Husam Abu Safiya, the director of Kamal Adwan Hospital, simply remaining there puts 400 people—including patients, medical staff, and civilians providing shelter—at risk. Tanks and bulldozers surrounded the hospital's western gates during the weekend, according to Abu Safiya, and the Beit Latiya facility was the target of constant, intense bombardment. In a statement posted on WhatsApp, he said that bullets had entered the specialist surgery department, the maternity unit, and the acute care unit. Gaza's Health Ministry also reported on Telegram that explosives were being used to...

In the Northeast and Great Lakes regions, where some residents might wake up to a white Christmas, around 10 million people were under winter weather alerts on Monday. The National Weather Service issued an advisory on Monday that stated, "An arctic surface high will slowly move east across the region, giving much of the East Coast region a very cold start to the holiday week on Monday." The weather agency said Sunday was "the coldest morning of the season thus far" for numerous Northeastern and mid-Atlantic states. Although a little milder than Sunday, Monday was predicted to be another frigid day. Over the weekend, snow was already falling in the Northeast, and more is expected. While weather in the north are predicted to deteriorate with a crust of ice and the possibility of 2 to 6 inch...

The Mexican department retailer El Puerto de Liverpool and Nordstrom's founding family agreed to a $6.25 billion takeover agreement, and Nordstrom announced on Monday that it will become a private company. The deal, which is anticipated to finalize in the first half of 2025, was unanimously authorized by the company's board of directors. According to the agreement, Liverpool will hold 49.9% of the business, while the Nordstrom family will own 50.1%. According to a press statement, common stockholders will get $24.25 in cash for every share of Nordstrom common stock they own. According to a news statement from Nordstrom CEO Erik Nordstrom, the company has been operating on the fundamental tenet of helping consumers feel good and look their best for more than a century. The company is embar...

Walmart and a financial technology company are being sued by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau on charges that they unlawfully coerced drivers into using expensive deposit accounts in order to get paid. According to the agency, the drivers who were a part of Walmart's Spark Driver gig-work platform were coerced by Walmart and its vendor, Branch Messenger, into using Branch Messenger's bank accounts in order to receive their pay. If they refused to utilize this service, they would be fired. The CFPB further claims that drivers had to go through a convoluted procedure in order to receive their money, and that Walmart and Branch Messenger misled employees about the possibility of same-day access to their earnings. The CFPB claims that even when drivers were able to access their money, ...

According to federal officials, a guy who was charged with murder in connection with the death of a lady who was set on fire in a New York subway car was in the country illegally and had already been deported. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials reported that New York police arrested 33-year-old Sebastian Zapeta-Calil, a Guatemalan national, in connection with the attack on Sunday. He arrived in Sonoita, Arizona, on June 1, 2018, was deported from the United States, and was sent back to Guatemala on June 7, 2018, according to ICE. ICE says it does not know where or when Zapeta-Calil illegally returned to the country. According to the NYPD, the Brooklyn resident was charged on Monday with first-degree murder, second-degree murder, and first-degree arson in connection with the...

A top adviser informed NBC News on Monday that former President Bill Clinton was hospitalized in Washington after he became ill with a fever. "After developing a fever," Clinton, 78, "has been admitted to MedStar Georgetown University Hospital for testing and observation," according to Clinton's deputy chief of staff, Angel Ure. "He is in good spirits and grateful for the care he is receiving," Ure a stated. Clinton, the 42nd president, has a source who described the issue as "not urgent." According to the source, "the former president will be fine," "He wanted to get looked out after getting a fever. He is conscious and awake. Since leaving office in 2001, Clinton has experienced several health scares. At New York-Presbyterian Hospital, he had a quadruple bypass operation in 2004. In 2010...

The long-awaited report on the House Ethics Committee's inquiry of former Representative Matt Gaetz, R-Fla. Since 2021, the panel has intermittently looked into a number of charges against Gaetz, including those pertaining to sexual misbehavior, drug usage, improper gift-giving, providing preferential favors to those with whom he had personal relationships, and hindering the House Ethics investigation. Gaetz's resignation from Congress in November following his announcement as President-elect Donald Trump's nominee for U.S. attorney general marked the conclusion of the probe. (Only current members of Congress are subject to the Ethics panel's jurisdiction.)When information regarding the testimonies of women who addressed the Ethics committee surfaced on November 21, Gaetz withdrew his name...

Two significant efforts to provide student loan forgiveness have been canceled by the Biden administration. The secretary of the U.S. Department of Education would have been able to cancel student loans for a number of borrowers under the proposed regulations, including those who had been making payments for decades and others who were having financial difficulties. Millions of Americans' student loan debt might have been lowered or removed as a result of the combined actions. Weeks before President-elect Donald Trump takes office, the Education Department announced its plans to remove them in notifications published in the Federal Register on Friday. Due to operational difficulties in putting the suggestions into practice, the department announced in writing that it was ending the rulemak...