Latest news with #ThisWeek
17 hours ago
- Politics
Sen. Tom Cotton & the Latest on the Israel-Iran Conflict, Sunday on 'This Week' with Co-Anchor Jonathan Karl
This is a listing for 'This Week' airing Sunday, June 22, 2025. 1:18 ABC News SEN. TOM COTTON & THE LATEST ON THE ISRAEL-IRAN CONFLICT, SUNDAY ON 'THIS WEEK' WITH CO-ANCHOR JONATHAN KARL Sen. Tom Cotton Senate Intelligence Committee Chair (R) Arkansas Exclusive ISRAEL-IRAN CONFLICT ANALYSIS Col. Steve Ganyard (Ret.) U.S. Marine Corps Karim Sadjadpour Carnegie Endowment for International Peace Senior Fellow Chris Christie (R) Former New Jersey Governor ABC News Contributor Plus, ABC News Chief Foreign Correspondent Ian Pannell reports from Tel Aviv as the conflict between Israel and Iran enters its second week. POWERHOUSE ROUNDTABLE Donna Brazile Former DNC Chair ABC News Contributor Reince Priebus Former RNC Chair Former Trump White House Chief of Staff ABC News Political Analyst Sarah Isgur
The Herald Scotland
3 days ago
- Politics
- The Herald Scotland
Israel-Iran timeline: Maps, graphics show how Israeli attack unfolded
June 12 Israel conducted the first strikes of an air campaign targeting Iran's nuclear program and leadership at 11 p.m. ET, according to The Critical Threats Project (CTP) at the American Enterprise Institute and the Institute for the Study of War (ISW). June 13 The Israeli military conducted attacks targeting Iran's uranium enrichment facility at Natanz and hit additional targets "at the heart" of the Islamic Republic's nuclear and ballistic missile programs, according to Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The surprise attack killed nearly the entire top echelon of Iran's military commanders, Reuters reported. Netanyahu said that "Iran's leading nuclear scientists" were also targets in the attacks. Iran launched three retaliatory waves of missiles at targets in Israel. Here's a closer look at the locations Iran's weapons and nuclear facilities, according to The Nuclear Threat Initiative, a non-profit organization which describes its mission as "reducing nuclear, biological, and emerging technology threats imperiling humanity." June 14 The Israeli military struck an unspecified underground weapons facility in western Iran, according to ISW. Iranian state media reported that Israel bombed multiple energy facilities in southern Iran. South Pars field - the world's largest gasfield - was struck along with the Fajr Jam gas plant. Iran's Petroleum Ministry confirmed that the Shahran depot was also targeted by Israel, Al Jazeera reported. June 15 Israel and Iran continued to exchange airstrikes, ISW reported. Israel also targeted Iranian government buildings, such as the Iranian Foreign Affairs Ministry in Tehran and the Ministry of Intelligence and Security. Iran sent hundreds of drones and missiles to Israel, damaging the country's largest oil refinery near the port city of Haifa and the Weizmann Institute of Science, a top research center in the country, according to the Wall Street Journal. Israeli Ambassador to the United States Yechiel Leiter appeared on ABC News "This Week" where host Martha Raddatz asked Leiter to talk about Fordow Fuel Enrichment Plant, suggesting that Israel cannot destroy the site located deep under a mountainside without U.S. assistance in the form of bunker-busting bombs. Leiter suggested that Israel may not need to rely on the bomb Raddatz described, known as the GBU-57A/B Massive Ordnance Penetrator, to achieve its aims. "We have a number of contingencies which will enable us to deal with Fordow. Not everything is a matter of taking to the skies and bombing from afar," said Leiter. "We're certain that we can set back the nuclear weapons system development within Iran for a very, very long time." June 16 An Israeli strike hit Iran's state broadcaster on Monday June 16 and bombed a command center of an elite Iranian military unit, the New York Times reported. That same day, Israel said it hit Iranian F-14 fighter planes at Tehran airport. Rafael Grossi, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, told the BBC it was very likely all the roughly 15,000 centrifuges operating at Iran's biggest uranium enrichment plant at Natanz were badly damaged or destroyed because of a power cut caused by an Israeli strike. In a social media post, Secretary of Defesne Pete Hegseth announced the "deployment of additional capabilities to the Unted States Central Command Area of Responsibility." The Washington Post, citing flight-tracking data, reports that more than two dozen tanker planes were deployed from the United States to Europe on Sunday and Monday. Reuters reports that U.S. aircraft carrier USS Nimitz left the South China Sea on Monday morning heading west, according to data from ship tracking website Marine Traffic. The Pentagon has shifted warplanes and an aircraft carrier to the Middle East as the conflict between Israel and Iran continues to rage, but the moves have been defensive in nature as the U.S. observes rather than participates in Israel's punishing air campaign, according to U.S. officials. June 17 The ongoing aerial war between Israel and Iran entered its fifth day on June 17 as Israel hit Iranian cities with bombs and some Iranian missiles evaded Israel's iron dome defense system. More than 220 Iranians have been killed and at least 1,200 injured since the bombardment began, Iranian state media reported. Two dozen Israelis have been killed in Iranian missile attacks, officials said. Contributing: Jennifer Borresen, Tom Vanden Brook, Cybele Mayes-Osterman, and Shawn J. Sullivan, USA TODAY This is a developing story which will be updated. Live updates: 'Easy target': Trump threatens Iran's supreme leader, says he's safe 'for now'
5 days ago
- Politics
Members of Congress want more security after Minnesota lawmaker shootings
Senators will be briefed by law enforcement on Tuesday on safety and security after the murder of a Minnesota lawmaker and her husband and the wounding of another and his wife on Saturday. House Republicans held a conference call, which was described as "tense," on Saturday with the House sergeant at arms and U.S. Capitol Police to discuss their concerns, multiple sources familiar with the call told ABC News. Several Republicans said on the one-hour call that they feel unsafe in their home districts and want more protection, sources said. The key source of contention in particular was the request of police outside their homes at all times and law enforcement authorities saying they need more funding from Congress to provide that. Senators will be briefed by the Senate sergeant at arms and Capitol Police on Tuesday morning, two sources familiar told ABC News, after it was requested by Majority Leader John Thune and Minority Leader Chuck Schumer. House Democrats are expected to have a similar call in the coming days. Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said in a statement Saturday that he asked the sergeant at arms and Capitol Police to "ensure the safety" of the Minnesota delegation and members of Congress "across the country." While House and Senate leadership are provided with a security detail, rank-and-file members are not routinely protected unless there is a specific threat. Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar told ABC News' "This Week" on Sunday that political violence is a "rampant problem." Fellow Minnesota Sen. Tina Smith told NBC News on Sunday, "I don't want to think that I have to a personal security detail everywhere I go, but I think we really have to look at the situation that we're in. "This is no way for our government to work when people, any number of us, feel this kind of threat," she said. Rep. Jared Moskowitz said he might force a vote on a "secret session" in the House to discuss security and so that "members can handle this ourselves." Vance Boelter, 57, faces multiple federal charges in the killing of Democratic Minnesota state Rep. Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark, and wounding Democratic state Sen. John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette, in "political assassinations," acting U.S. Attorney for the District of Minnesota Joseph Thompson said Monday. In a 20-page affidavit, prosecutors outlined how they say Boelter "embarked on a planned campaign of stalking and violence, designed to inflict fear, injure and kill members of the Minnesota state legislature and their families." He allegedly had firearms and a list of 45 elected officials, "mostly or all Democrats," according to prosecutors. Authorities say Boelter traveled to the homes of at least four public officials during the early morning hours of Saturday before the killings. The number of threats and "concerning statements" against members of Congress, their families and staffs has risen for the past two years, according to Capitol Police, which pointed out that threats tend to increase during election years. The Capitol Police's Threat Assessment Section investigated 9,474 threats and statements in 2024 and 8,008. It investigated 3,939 cases in 2017.
RTÉ News
5 days ago
- Business
- RTÉ News
Which Dublin residential areas use the most and least electricity?
Analysis: The latest CSO report on electricity consumption in Ireland highlights some interesting facts about usage across the capital and country Electricity consumption in Irish households is up across the board, with every county in the country showing an increase. But in 2024, it was the Dublin postal districts that had the highest proportion of residential consumption at 19%, followed by Cork (12%), Dublin County (6%), Galway (6%), and Kildare (5%). This is according to the latest report on metered electricity consumption from the Central Statistics Office. This found that both residential and non-residential consumption saw a rise of 4% overall between 2023 and 2024, while Urban Residential grew by 5%, and Rural Residential by 3%. Within the Dublin postal districts, Dublin 15 (10%), Dublin 24 (9%) and Dublin 18 (6.5%) had the highest proportions of residential electricity consumption, while Dublin 2 (1.9%), Dublin 10 (1.6%) and Dublin 20 (1.3%) had the lowest. Dublin 15, which covers Ashtown, Blanchardstown, Castleknock, Coolmine, Clonsilla, Corduff, Mulhuddart, Tyrrelstown, Ongar, and Clonee (County Meath), used a total of 172 Gigwatt hours (GWh). Dublin 24, covering Firhouse, Jobstown, Old Bawn, Tallaght, parts of Ballymount, Saggart, Rathcoole and Brittas, consumed 152GWh. While residential electricity consumption was up across all Dublin postal districts between 2023 and 2024, figures from the last decade do reflect some fluctuations in our electricity usage. Overall, usage rose to a peak in 2020 and 2021 during Covid, when many were working from home, and then fell in all areas between 2021 and 2022, when energy prices also skyrocketed following Russia's invasion of Ukraine. When looking at usage in any given year, the weather, naturally, has an impact (2015, for example, was a very cold year, as was 2024). Because there are so many factors that feed into consumption, it's difficult to draw definitive conclusions on what's behind any changes in individual Dublin postal districts, says Orla McCarthy, Senior Statistician with the CSO's Climate & Energy Division. One factor is the percentage of BER A-rated homes in a postal district, as they use electricity as their main fuel but are also more energy efficient. From RTÉ Radio 1's This Week, why does Ireland have the most expensive electricity in the EU? The CSO also notes that the postal district could be extracted from the routing key where an Eircode was available. In other cases, there was uncertainty between some postal districts being derived from the street name. Hence the coding at this level should be regarded as only broadly correct. Looking at the total consumption in Dublin postal code areas, McCarthy highlights that it has decreased marginally between 2015 and 2024. At the same time, the number of properties has increased, and the number of properties in Dublin whose main space heating fuel is electricity has increased, implying an "overall reduction" in the use of electricity. Looking at the country overall, median residential electricity consumption rose by 2.3% in 2024 compared with 2023, with all counties showing an increase. Counties with the lowest median residential consumption in 2024 included Donegal (2,650 kWh), Leitrim (2,700 kWh), and Mayo (2,867 kWh), while Kildare recorded the highest median figure at 3,845 kWh, followed by Meath at 3,753kWh. The CSO explains the median can be regarded as typical usage as it is not influenced by outliers in the same way that the mean or average is. Around 10% of residential customers consumed less than 1,000 kilowatt hours (kWh) in 2024, significantly less than the median consumption of 3,246 kWh. Low consumption levels can indirectly indicate factors such as vacant properties, holiday homes, or energy poverty, and are also influenced by dwelling size and energy efficiency, the CSO said. Overall in 2024, total metered electricity consumption reached 31,903 GWh a 4.3% increase compared with 2023. Non-residential consumption constituted the largest share at 72% of the total. Urban and Rural Residential customers accounted for 18% and 10% respectively, the figures show. Large energy users, which include data centres, used 31% of metered electricity consumption in 2024, up from 30% in 2023. The proportion of electricity used by data centres continues to rise and represents over a fifth of all consumption in Ireland. In 2015, data centres accounted for 5% of consumption, rising to 21% in 2023 and 22% in 2024. Quarterly metered electricity consumption by data centres increased steadily from 290 GWh in the first quarter of 2015 to 1,829 GWh in the fourth quarter of 2024. Between 2023 and 2024, metered electricity consumption by data centres increased by 10% from 6,335GWh to 6,969 GWh. From RTÉ Radio 1's Drivetime, almost 2 million smart meters have been installed, but there is still no easy access to data Elsewhere, the CSO release noted there were 1.9 million residential customers with smart meters by the end of 2024, which is 83% of all residential meters. There was a 10% increase in the number of residential meters between 2015 and 2024, and the highest increases were in counties adjacent to Dublin City, with residential meters in Kildare and Meath both up by 19%. On the subject of electric cars, metered electricity consumption by stand-alone Electric Vehicles (EV) charge points rose by 43% from 23 GWh in 2023 to 33 GWh in 2024.
NDTV
5 days ago
- Politics
- NDTV
From Making Burritos To Minnesota Lawyer, All About Melissa Hortman
Minneapolis: Melissa Hortman's influence at the Minnesota Capitol and her power as a Democratic leader to shape the course of a deeply divided Legislature were a far cry from her job as a teenager making chili-cheese burritos and overshadowed her volunteer work training service dogs for veterans. She was a lifelong Minneapolis-area resident who went to college in Boston and then returned home for law school and, with degree fresh in hand, worked as a volunteer lawyer for a group fighting housing discrimination. Elected to the Minnesota House in 2004, she helped pass liberal initiatives like free lunches for public school students in 2023 as the chamber's speaker. With the House split 67-67 between Democrats and Republicans this year, she helped break a budget impasse threatening to shut down state government. Tributes from friends and colleagues in both parties poured in after Hortman and her husband were shot to death early Saturday in their suburban Brooklyn Park home in what authorities called an act of targeted political violence. Helping Paws, which trains service dogs, posted a message on its Facebook page, along with a 2022 photo of a smiling Hortman with her arm around Gilbert, a friendly-looking golden retriever trained to be a service dog and adopted by her family. "Melissa Hortman was a woman that I wish everyone around the country knew," US Sen. Amy Klobuchar, a longtime friend and Democratic ally, said Sunday on ABC's "This Week." Klobuchar added: "She was a true leader and loved her work, but was always so grounded and such a decent person. I think that's probably the best word to describe her. You look at her pictures and you know what she was about." The shootings followed a big Democratic dinner The killings of Hortman and her husband early Saturday followed the shootings and wounding of another prominent Minnesota lawmaker, state Sen. John Hoffman, and his wife, at their home in Champlin, another Minneapolis suburb. Hoffman is chair of the Senate committee overseeing human resources spending. A nephew posted Sunday on Facebook that the Hoffmans were out of surgery and recovering from multiple gunshot wounds. The Hortmans, the Hoffmans and other top Democrats had gathered at a downtown Minneapolis hotel Friday night for their party's annual Humphrey-Mondale dinner. It's named for two Minnesota liberal icons who served both as US senators and vice presidents, Hubert Humphrey and Walter Mondale. Minnesota Democrat and US Sen. Tina Smith said she saw both lawmakers at the dinner. "So it feels so personal, because we're all very good friends, of course, to have that have happened so shortly after we were all together," Smith said on CNN's "Inside Politics Sunday." Outside the state Capitol in St. Paul, a memorial to Hortman and her husband included flowers, candles, small American flags and a photo of the couple. Visitors left messages on Post-It notes commending Hortman's legislative work, including, "You changed countless lives." Hortman supplied a key vote for a budget deal Democrats disliked Legislative colleagues described Hortman as funny, savvy and fiercely committed to liberal causes. When lawmakers convened in January with a vacancy in a Democratic seat in the House giving the GOP a temporary advantage, Hortman led a boycott of daily sessions for more than three weeks to force Republicans into a power-sharing arrangement. Republicans were intent this year on ending state health coverage for adult immigrants who entered the US illegally, authorized in 2023 as part of a sweeping liberal program. Democrats wanted to keep it, and lawmakers began June - the last month of the 2025 budget year - without having passed a 2026-27 spending blueprint. Hortman helped negotiate a package that included a bill ending the state health coverage for adult immigrants on Jan. 1, 2026. She was the only House Democrat to vote for it last week- the 68th vote it needed to pass the chamber. She told reporters afterward that Republicans insisted on the bill, and Minnesota voters who gave the House an even partisan split expect the parties to compromise. But she acknowledged she worries about people who will lose their health insurance. "I know that people will be hurt by that vote," she said, choking up briefly before regaining her composure. "We worked very hard to try to get a budget deal that wouldn't include that provision." Tacos, auto parts, physics and Habitat for Humanity Hortman's earliest jobs didn't suggest that she'd become a power in Minnesota politics. The earliest job listed on her profile, when she was 16, was as a cook and cashier at a restaurant, where she made tacos and, "most importantly, chili cheese burritos." She also worked for caterers and was a runner at an auto parts store, putting inventory away and retrieving items for customers. Her husband, Mark, earned a physics degree from the University of North Carolina and later, a master's of business administration. He was the chief operating officer of an auto parts company for 10 years before co-founding a business consulting firm. He was active in Helping Paws and worked with homebuilding nonprofit Habitat for Humanity. They have an adult son and an adult daughter. Melissa Hortman earned a degree in philosophy and political science from Boston University, where she also worked as a residence assistant in one of its dormitories. She earned her law degree from the University of Minnesota, but also a master's of public administration from Harvard University. She served a decade on the board of a local nonprofit providing transportation and car repairs for low-income residents. She also was part of a committee in 2005 considering whether Minneapolis should submit a bid to host the Summer Olympics. "We remember Melissa for her kindness, compassion, and unwavering commitment to making the world better," Helping Paws said in its Facebook message.
