Nation and world news in brief for December 19
US House panel to release ethics report on Matt Gaetz, source says
WASHINGTON (Reuters) — The U.S. House Ethics Committee has voted to release its report on former Representative Matt Gaetz, a source familiar with the committee said on Wednesday, weeks after the Republican dropped out of contention to be Donald Trump’s attorney general in the face of Senate opposition.
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The report could be made public within days as Congress prepares to adjourn for the holidays, CNN reported on Wednesday, citing multiple sources with knowledge of the matter. Reuters was unable to confirm the timing of the report’s release.
The firebrand Republican and ally of President-elect Trump resigned from the House of Representatives in November as the Ethics Committee debated what to do with the findings of its probe into allegations of illicit drug use and of having sex with an underage 17-year-old girl. Gaetz has denied wrongdoing.
“In my single days, I often sent funds to women I dated – even some I never dated but who asked. I dated several of these women for years. I NEVER had sexual contact with someone under 18. Any claim that I have would be destroyed in court — which is why no such claim was ever made in court,” Gaetz, 42, said in a social media post.
2 endangered whales found entangled in fishing gear, with 1 likely to die
(NYT) — Two endangered whales have been found entangled in fishing gear off the coast of Massachusetts, and one of them is likely to die from his injuries, according to the federal agency that monitors the oceans.
The mammals were identified as North Atlantic right whales, one of the world’s most endangered large whale species. They face threats in their habitats from entanglement in gear and collisions with vessels, and there are now fewer than 370 left in the world.
On Dec. 9, an aerial survey spotted the whales swimming about 50 miles southeast of Nantucket, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said in a statement Tuesday.
One whale, identified as male #5110, has serious and most likely fatal injuries. A picture showed that he had a thick line resembling a fishing line that passes across his head and back.
The second whale, identified as adult female #4120, has two lines exiting the left side of her mouth and extending half to two thirds of the way down her body, the federal agency said.
Biologists believe the female whale has a so-called sublethal injury, meaning that the injury will not kill her but “can reduce or impair” her well-being.
Return of NASA astronauts from space station further delayed until late March
(Reuters) — NASA astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore’s return to Earth will be further delayed until at least late March, the agency said, taking what should have been an eight-day stay on the International Space Station to more than nine months.
The duo had traveled to the ISS in June for the test mission, but their return was extended by eight months to February, after the Boeing Starliner capsule they arrived on was deemed unfit to return them to Earth.
NASA said Williams and Wilmore, along with NASA astronaut Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov, would return to Earth after the four-member Crew-10 mission, now expected to take off in late March, reaches the space station.
The agency did not specify a date for the return of the astronauts. Hague and Gorbunov boarded the ISS in September, over three months after Williams and Wilmore.
Trump pushes for FBI probe of Liz Cheney over Jan. 6 panel
WASHINGTON (Reuters) — President-elect Donald Trump on Wednesday backed a call for the FBI to investigate fellow Republican former congresswoman Liz Cheney over her role in leading Congress’s probe of the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol by his supporters.
Trump, who will return to the White House on Jan. 20, has vowed retribution against his rivals, including the prosecutors who brought criminal cases against him while he was out of power, and former officials he contends impeded him during his 2017-2021 term.
He has also said he may grant clemency to some of the more than 1,250 people criminally charged for their role in the Jan. 6 attack, which was an attempt to overturn Trump’s 2020 election defeat.
Russia detains suspect over murder of chemical weapons chief Igor Kirillov
MOSCOW (Reuters) — Russia said on Wednesday it had detained an Uzbek man who had confessed to planting and detonating a bomb which killed a top general, Igor Kirillov, in Moscow on the instructions of Ukraine’s SBU security service.
Kirillov, who was chief of Russia’s Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Protection Troops, was killed outside his apartment building on Tuesday along with his assistant when a bomb attached to an electric scooter went off.
