Month: September 2024

Hurricane Helene made landfall as a massive Category 4 hurricane, slamming into the Big Bend region of Florida on Thursday night with 140 mph winds. Helene made landfall about 10 miles west of Perry, Florida, at 11:10 p.m. Eastern Time, with maximum sustained winds of 140 miles per hour. Per the National Hurricane Center, as of 2 a.m. EDT, its winds had already diminished to 90 mph, making Helene a Category 1 hurricane at the time.

The storm moved across Florida into Georgia, leaving at least three people dead and millions without power across the Southeast. Significant flooding was reported across the region, with additional heavy rain expected Friday as Helene moves toward Tennessee. Helene weakened rapidly as it raced inland early Friday, with the National Hurricane Center stating that Helene was downgraded to a tropical storm as it moved over Georgia. However the NHC warned that Helene would still bring “life-threatening” storm surge, strong winds and heavy rain.

As of 5 a.m. EDT, Helen was approximately 40 miles east of Macon, Georgia and 100 miles southeast of Atlanta and was racing north at 30 mph – packing maximum sustained winds of 70 mph.

Some 1.2 million customers in Florida were without power early Friday morning, according to utility tracker PowerOutage.us, along with approximately 734,000 in Georgia and 363,000 in South Carolina. In addition, about 87,000 homes and businesses were in the dark in North Carolina, for a total of almost 2.4 million in the four states.

Several airports closed because of the storm, and airlines canceled nearly 1,300 flights Thursday, according to FlightAware. More than 600 U.S. flights were already canceled as of 5:30 a.m.

Editorial credit: BEST-BACKGROUNDS / Shutterstock.com

New York City Mayor Eric Adams has been charged with five criminal counts as part of a City Hall federal corruption investigation. Adams becomes the first sitting mayor of NYC to face criminal charges while in office.

According to the unsealed indictment, Adams is charged with conspiring to commit wire fraud, federal program bribery and receiving campaign contributions by foreign nationals; as well as one count of bribery, one count of wire fraud, and two counts of soliciting a contribution by a foreign national. The charges stem from an ongoing investigation by the Manhattan U.S. Attorney’s Office that has scrutinized allegations Turkey’s government funneled illegal donations into Adams’ 2021 campaign

U.S. Attorney Damian Williams said that Adams engaged in “long-running” corruption involving bribes from foreign nationals dating back nearly a decade, and added that as the investigation continues, more people “will be held accountable.”  Said Williams: “The conduct alleged in the indictment — the foreign money, the corporate money, the bribery, the years of concealment — is a grave breach of public trust.”

The new indictment accuses Adams of engaging in an alleged decade-long scheme to accept “valuable benefits” from foreign actors in exchange for giving them influence: “As Adams’s prominence and power grew, his foreign-national benefactors sought to cash in on their corrupt relationships with him, particularly when, in 2021, it became clear that Adams would become New York City’s mayor. Adams agreed, providing favorable treatment in exchange for the illicit benefits he received. After his inauguration as mayor of New York City, Adams soon began preparing for his next election, including by planning to solicit more illegal contributions and granting requests from those who supported his 2021 mayoral campaign with such donations.”

The indictment claimed that Adams “increased his fundraising by accepting these concealed, illegal donations — at the cost of giving his secret patrons the undue influence over him that the law tries to prevent.” The Turkish official mentioned in the indictment allegedly gave Adams and his staff more than $120,000 worth of free and discounted luxury travel to Turkey, France, China, Sri Lanka, India and Hungary, which Adams is accused of going through great lengths to cover up.

Adams, a former NYPD officer, was elected mayor in 2021 after serving eight years as Brooklyn’s borough president and seven years as a state senator. A series of officials in his administration have recently resigned or retired, many of whom had been involved in the federal probes.  However during a press conference Thursday, Adams said that while he was not surprised by the indictments, he vowed to continue his mayoral duties and was not considering a resignation. He asked New Yorkers to wait to make any judgments until after he presents his defense.

Adams’ attorney, Alex Spiro, said in a statement: “We have known for some time that they would try to find a way to bring a case against Mayor Adams. Yesterday — more improper leaks. Today — they emailed us a summons (and created the spectacle of a bogus raid). We will see them in court.”

Meanwhile, multiple NYC-based leaders have called for Adams to immediately step down. Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez wrote after details of the indictment was revealed:  “I do not see how Mayor Adams can continue governing New York City. The flood of resignations and vacancies are threatening gov [sic] function. Nonstop investigations will make it impossible to recruit and retain a qualified administration. For the good of the city, he should resign.”

Editorial credit: lev radin / Shutterstock.com