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The former employees were investigated for sharing data with an outside AI evaluation group.

A multi-national crew of four is arriving at the International Space Station for a six-month mission aboard the orbiting lab. They took off on Thursday morning and SpaceX Crew 13 is in the process of docking Thursday night. CBS News space consultant Bill Harwood has more about the process.

1. Gypsy Rose's Fiancé Ken Urker Dead at 33  TMZ
2. Gypsy Rose Blanchard’s fiancé Ken Urker dead at 33  Page Six
3. Ken Urker, Gypsy-Rose Blanchard’s Fiancé and Father of Her Daughter, Dies on His Birthday  People.com
4. Ken Urker Dies at 33: Gypsy Rose Blanchard’s Ex-Fiance Passed on His Birthday  Just Jared
5. Gypsy Rose Blanchard's Boyfriend Ken Urker Dead at 33  E! News

The BBC's Nada Tawfik was at the hearing, where the university's Student Assembly led a discussion around safety concerns and sexual violence on campus.

An upstate New York county prosecutor has reopened an investigation the alleged 2024 sexual assault of a female Cornell student at a fraternity house.

Skyrocketing diesel prices have pushed Washington to weigh an export ban, raising alarm across European economies.

Deployment underscores evolving complexity of Trump’s war against Iran as US midterm elections loom

The US military is dispatching a third aircraft carrier strike group to the Middle East, as President Donald Trump warned new strikes against Iran could be on the horizon.

The deployment, which includes a specialist amphibious attack group, underscores the rapidly evolving dynamic of Trump’s war against Iran as midterm elections in the US loom large.

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It’s no longer the stuff of sci-fi: AI sidekicks that simulate emotional support and guide routines. Robot companions are increasingly becoming part of everyday life for seniors, with certain U.S. […]

New York attorney general brought in by governor after recent questions raised over university’s 2024 investigation

Kathy Hochul, the New York governor, said on Thursday she is appointing Letitia James, the state’s attorney general, as special prosecutor to investigate the alleged gang-rape at Cornell University.

“The young woman at the center of this case deserves to know that every fact will be examined and justice pursued,” Hochul said in a statement. “This action will ensure that the matter is fully and thoroughly investigated without conflict or bias, and handled independently with the rigor that this matter demands.”

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New York Governor Kathy Hochul on Thursday said she issued an executive order to appoint Attorney General Letitia James as a special prosecutor for the alleged “gang rape” that took place at a Cornell fraternity in 2024. 

“Newly released information continues to raise serious questions about the investigation conducted by the Cornell Police Department and the decision by the Tompkins County District Attorney not to prosecute an alleged sexual assault on Cornell University's campus," Hochul said in a statement.

"This has, in turn, undercut my faith, and the public's faith, in the District Attorney's ability to effectively investigate and prosecute the case at this time,” Hochul added.

In a statement, James said she is “ready to lead a process New Yorkers can trust, guided by the facts and the law.”

Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images - PHOTO: New York Governor Hochul Makes AI Safety Announcement

“Every New Yorker deserves to know that when they report a crime, it will be investigated fully and fairly. The Governor has entrusted my office with this investigation, and we do not take that responsibility lightly,” James said. 

The appointment of James as special prosecutor comes five days after Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten said he would reopen the investigation into the former student's allegations.

'I felt like bait,' Jane Doe said at 2025 Cornell University hearing investigating allegations of fraternity house sexual assault

Late last month, the former student, listed as Jane Doe, filed a civil lawsuit alleging that she was drugged, assaulted and "gang raped" by seven former and current members of the Chi Phi fraternity at Cornell.

Van Houten said in a statement on Sunday that his office ​was considering whether to bring criminal charges related to the incident, though he said the allegations in the civil complaint are "dramatically different" than the woman's statement to police two years ago.

Lauren Petracca/Reuters - PHOTO: Student assembly at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York

In an interview with ABC News, Van Houten acknowledged that he relied on the investigation conducted by Cornell Police and said his office didn't "independently investigate" the allegations.

On Wednesday, Cornell University agreed to initiate an independent investigation into how the Ivy League school handled the allegations, Hochul told ABC News.

New York Gov. Hochul calls for 'transparent, independent review' of Cornell response to alleged group rape

Hochul called for the outside review, saying the allegations raised "serious questions about Cornell campus culture" and whether the university is doing all it can to protect students.

"Cornell shares Governor Hochul’s commitment to addressing campus culture issues, which affect universities across the nation and New York. We are committed to continuing to work with state officials to advance student safety and wellbeing,” a Cornell spokesperson said in a statement provided to ABC News.

This article originally appeared on ABC News at https://abcnews.com/US/attorney-general-letitia-james-appointed-special-prosecutor-cornell/story?id=136937149

Death row inmate Christa Pike was scheduled to die by lethal injection on Wednesday night in Tennessee, but the procedure failed and she is still alive. Her attorneys say she is in critical condition and is receiving life-saving medical care. Bo King, the attorney for Brad Sigmon, who was executed by firing squad, joins CBS News to discuss.

Two hundred and sixty miles above the Earth, the Dragon spacecraft is set to reach the International Space Station for a six-month stay. It has four astronauts on board, including one with another big mission back on Earth. Mark Strassmann has the story.

Dispute over contentious Orange Order march will now go to a legal appeal on Monday after talks hosted by Northern Ireland secretary Chris Bryant end

Talks aimed at resolving the Drumcree parade dispute have broken up without agreement, with Northern Ireland secretary Chris Bryant describing the situation as being between a “rock and a hard place”.

A legal appeal over the contentious march is now scheduled for Monday, after unsuccessful late-night negotiations at Hillsborough castle with representatives from the Orange Order and Garvaghy Road residents on the fifth day of the standoff.

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Jay Clayton will likely be the White House's pick for AI czar, and the Trump administration has been discussing having him remain in his current role as director of national intelligence, according to sources briefed on the matter.

Left-wing streamer Hasan Piker vowed Wednesday that he would push Democratic Texas Senate candidate James Talarico to govern as a leftist rather than a moderate Democrat if Talarico was elected.

"Hopefully, after James Talarico wins, we’ve got to hold him to account," Piker said during a campus event at the University of Texas at Austin. "We've got to make sure that he doesn’t become another, ‘do nothing Democrat’ ‘business as usual,’ and we've got to keep up that pressure.

"We have to remind him that we are the force that backed him both early on," he continued. "We are the force that allowed him to win this seat of power and if he wants to maintain it, he’s got to play ball. Right?

"And that’s good to build a resilient movement anyway, so job’s not done even after he wins," Piker added. "So, just remember that, and, you know, remember that we do hold a lot of power in mass organizing."

UNIVERSITY EVENT WITH HASAN PIKER IN TEXAS DRAWS BACKLASH FROM BOTH SIDES OF THE AISLE

Fox News Digital reached out to Talarico's campaign for comment but did not immediately receive a response. 

Talarico has moderated his rhetoric during his run for Senate, disavowing some of his past statements.

Piker, an internet personality popular on the Twitch platform, has become a major player in left-wing politics in recent years and has a long history of controversial comments, ranging from saying "America deserved 9/11" to praising an official in New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani's administration after a clip showed her saying she wanted to "impoverish the White middle class."

Proximity to Piker has been a lightning rod for Democrats. Since the left-wing streamer appeared with Michigan Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed on the campaign trail, the candidate repeatedly tried to shrug off Piker’s controversial remarks.

TALARICO’S ‘PROUD CAPITALIST’ ABOUT-FACE COLLIDES WITH RESURFACED CALL TO ‘DISMANTLE’ CAPITALISM

Jesse Arm, a Manhattan Institute vice president and pollster from Michigan, wondered whether Talarico’s avowed moderation will stick.

"Talarico is wise to acknowledge, in effect, that many of his past comments on key policy questions were absurd, but Texans have reason to wonder whether his convictions have changed or merely his political incentives," he told Fox News Digital. 

"If he is as wise a lawmaker as he is a crafty politician, he will govern as the more moderate liberal he currently purports to be.

"Hasan Piker’s faction can certainly exert pressure," he added. "And I would expect it to push Talarico back toward his earlier, more radical positions on policing, gender, race, immigration and energy."

A better indicator, he argued, was the fact that genuinely moderate Democrats have been driven out of office.

"We cannot know how Talarico would govern, but the broader Democratic Party gives us plenty of reason for skepticism: Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema were driven out, and John Fetterman faces endless hostility for breaking with its activist orthodoxy," he said. 

"Governing as a genuine moderate would give Talarico a better chance of keeping a Texas Senate seat beyond an unusually favorable Democratic election cycle, but Piker is already openly demanding that he ‘play ball’ with the far left."

Arm suggested Piker might actually be making a tactical mistake by suggesting Democrats are only campaigning as moderates but will govern like leftists.

"Above perhaps all else, this episode exposes Piker’s political stupidity: publicly suggesting that a candidate’s moderation is temporary and that radicals will call the shots threatens the very victory he claims to want," Arm said. 

"In truth, I suspect Piker would prefer an election cycle in which Talarico comes up short, but El-Sayed gets across the finish line. That would help advance Piker’s position that radicalism is the only viable path forward for the Democratic Party."

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Former Democratic advisor Dan Turrentine suggested Piker has vastly overestimated his importance both now and after the election.

"Hasan Piker is living in fantasy world," he said. "He did not elect Talarico in the primary. Progressives were split, with many going for Jasmine Crockett.

"If Talarico wins the general, it will be because he appealed to a significant number of R’s in a state Trump won by 14% in ’24," Turrentine continued. "If Talarico wins, it will be in spite of Piker, not because of him.

"Same, if they win, for Roy Cooper in North Carolina, Josh Turek in Iowa, Mary Peltola in Arkansas, and Sherrod Brown in Ohio," he added. "The Senate majority runs through the middle of the electorate, not Twitch."

"Politically, there’s just a recognition that it’s always going to be hard to win a midterm when you have the White House, the Senate and the House," Vance said in an interview with NBC News. (Brandon Bell / Getty)

JOINT BASE ANDREWS, Md. — Vice President JD Vance acknowledged Thursday that Republicans face an “uphill climb” in next month’s midterm elections — and that the results may be a data point he reviews as he decides whether to run for president in 2028.

“Historically there’s always a bit of an uphill climb, and I think you definitely sense that,” Vance said in an interview with NBC News. “I also think you can sense a sense of cautious optimism, in the sense that, you know, people feel like the numbers are sort of moving, maybe in our direction.”

He added: “Politically, there’s just a recognition that it’s always going to be hard to win a midterm when you have the White House, the Senate and the House.”

Vance spoke aboard Air Force Two shortly after it landed on a return trip from Lakeland, Florida, where he campaigned for Sen. Ashley Moody and Rep. Byron Donalds, the Republican nominee for governor. It was his latest headlining gig at a rally meant to boost support for the party’s candidates in what is expected to be a challenging year for the GOP.

Aside from the historical trends Vance mentioned, polls have shown President Donald Trump and the war in Iran highly unpopular among voters. A related rise in gas prices has added to a cascade of affordability concerns. And Americans are growing more skeptical of artificial intelligence and the large, power-hungry data centers being built to accommodate the technology. All of those issues could factor into voters’ choices in this fall’s key races for the House, the Senate and governor.

Vance speaks to Republican gubernatorial candidate Rep. Byron Donalds in Lakeland, Fla., on Thursday. (Kevin Lamarque / Pool via Getty )

Vance, 42, has said consistently that his focus is on his job as vice president and on helping his party through the midterms — and that any decision about running to succeed Trump in 2028 won’t come until after then.

Asked Thursday whether a poor showing for Republicans on Nov. 3 would factor into his thinking, Vance replied: “You make these decisions by collecting as much information and trying to make a wise decision. And yeah, I mean, regardless of what happens over the next 35 days, there will be new information, new things you have to make a decision over.”

Could substantial GOP losses convince him that the climate might not be favorable for him to run for president? Vance was noncommittal.

“Right now, I try not to think too much in hypotheticals,” he said. “I’m just going to try to do as well as I can and encourage people to elect the candidates that I think are good. The American people make that decision, and when they do, then yeah, I’ll have some new information to consider.”

Vance was more eager to assess a prospective rival: Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas. Cruz said in a recent interview with MS NOW that Vance does not have a lock on the 2028 nomination and spoke of wanting to “certainly be part of the discussion.” He also has framed the future of the party as a choice between being a “small-government, free-market conservative party” or a “big-government, nanny state party.”

Vance said Cruz’s efforts to engineer a clash don’t bother him.

“It is really obvious to me that, at this very moment, Ted Cruz is running for president,” Vance added. “At this moment, I’m not. I’m trying to help elect Republicans. That’s what I’m going to keep on doing.”

Cruz, who is not up for re-election to the Senate this year, has been raising money and campaigning for midterm candidates — not only in Texas but also in states like Iowa and South Carolina. Both are traditionally placed early on the GOP’s presidential caucus and primary calendar.

Cruz also is expected to campaign this month for Sen. Dan Sullivan in Alaska, as well as Republican Senate candidates Ken Paxton in Texas and Michael Whatley in North Carolina.

“Senator Cruz has been focused on electing Republicans up and down the ballot this November, and he will continue campaigning vigorously over the next several weeks to help make that happen,” a spokesperson said in a statement to NBC News.

In the interview, Vance tackled several of the issues that have become central to the midterm elections. He acknowledged frustration over high gas prices and said it was a topic he and Donalds discussed backstage at Thursday’s rally in Florida.

Vance also reiterated a message he has been delivering on Capitol Hill and across the country. Republicans, he said, can’t pretend things are perfect, but they can highlight their successes while they accuse the past Democratic administration of leaving them a mess and arguing that the next wave of Democrats would be worse.

“I think people recognize that the message is starting to penetrate a little bit — that we are solving problems the Democrats created and the Democrats are running a lot of crazy people,” Vance said. “I do get a sense that message is penetrating. Obviously, we’re going to find out in about 35 days whether that carries the day.”

Asked whether blame targeted at the Trump administration — which has now been in office for more than a year and a half — is justified, Vance acknowledged that such frustrations may exist.

“Voters are impatient, right? They ultimately make the decision,” he said. “We have to make the argument as best as we can. And what I honestly think is that we inherited a remarkably tough situation. … But I think that our approach is to brag about the victories, talk about the great accomplishments.”

Vance also wrestled with two of the hottest-button issues this campaign season: data centers and AI.

On data centers, Vance took something of a middle-ground stance.

“I certainly think that there are local apprehensions,” he said. “I think in some cases the companies building the data centers have done a good job of ensuring the community shares the benefits and ensuring prices don’t go — power, electricity prices don’t go up. And then in some communities, obviously, you don’t see that happening, and you see more of a pushback.”

His stance is more nuanced and tonally different than Trump’s. In an August post on Truth Social, the president likened data centers to a “Golden Goose” and charged that people opposing their construction “want to end up being backwards and poor.”

On AI, Vance has been both enthusiastic and cautious, having recently raised concerns about cybersecurity and its use in war. In the interview, the vice president noted recent alarm over how fast the technology is advancing and the fear that it will bring the end of human existence, drawing comparisons to the early days of the Covid pandemic.

“Actually, I felt a little bit like I did with Covid, where it seemed like there was a significant panic. The risk is real, just like it was with Covid, but the remedy was not necessarily appropriate or tailored to the risk,” Vance said. “And specifically, when I see people who quite literally have developed models that are good at hacking into other people’s software coming and saying, ‘Oh, my God, we’ve unleashed Frankenstein into the wild; the government should help us’ — well, one of the ways the government has to help is by ensuring that people who release Frankenstein into the wild suffer some consequences for it.”

He added a moment later: “My fear with AI right now is that we respond not by forcing more responsibility on the companies that are creating the products but by creating a regulatory regime that actually shields them from liability and in the process doesn’t deal with the real risk.”

This article was originally published on NBCNews.com

This article originally appeared on NBC News at https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/jd-vance/vance-2028-ted-cruz-midterm-climate-future-rcna600312

Wawanesa Mutual Insurance Co. has completed its acquisition of Ontario-based Everest Insurance Company of Canada and rebranded it as WSI, expanding Wawanesa’s commercial capabilities. WSI will operate as a distinct […]