Mary Papenfuss

Janja Lula da Silva went on the attack ahead of the G20 Summit as she spoke up about the vital importance of regulating social media to fight disinformation

After a years-long battle to jettison the widely attacked “Redskins” name from Washington’s NFL team, a Republican senator is battling to revive the old logo featuring a depiction of a Native American chief and feathers. “We have had good discussions with the NFL and with the Commanders. There’s good faith ... negotiations going forward that’s going to allow this logo to be used again,” Montana Sen. Steve Daines insisted in an interview. The team is now known as the Washington Commanders after its “Redskins” name and logo dumped when it was attacked by Native Americans, supporters and sponsors as racist. President-elect Donald Trump mocked the name-changing move at the time as ridiculously “politically correct.” Daines’s push to revive the logo has emerged in the wake of a bipartisan bill supported by the Commanders and District of Columbia officials aimed at revitalizing the shuttered RFK stadium in D.C. to bring the team back from its current home in the nearby suburb of Landover, Maryland. Daines finally voted to move the bill from the Energy & Natural Resources Committee to the full Senate, previously holding it up as he called for a return of the logo. He suggested that any future controversy over a revived logo might be eased with money used to “honor Indian Country.” “Perhaps revenues [could go] to a foundation that could help Native Americans in sports and so forth,” Daines told Fox News last week. In a post on X, Daines slammed the move to drop the Commanders’ former name and logo as “woke gone wrong.” The “irony” is that the battle by the “diversity, equity and inclusion movement“ went “way too far” and ended up “canceling Native American culture,” he complained to Fox. Some fans have called on Donald Trump on social media to order the team’s name changed back once he’s back in the White House Opponents battling the team’s old name and logo attacked it as an insulting “slur” that also demeaned Native Americans as mere “mascots” of a football team. Native American Angelina Newsom wrote in The Independent when the name and logo were dropped : “Dear white people, stop telling Native Americans like me whether we’re offended by the Washington Redskins.” She called the name a “derogatory term coined by colonialists often historically used interchangeably with ‘savages.’” Daines called the logo depicting Blackfeet Chief Two Guns White Calf an “honor” to him. It was designed by the late Blackie Wetzel, a Blackfeet tribal member once prominent in Indian affairs in Washington, D.C. At least one organization that addresses indigenous issues has already attacked Daines’ proposal. “The decision to change the name and mascot came after years of organizing from Native communities and allies, and billions of dollars from investors in the ‘Change The Name’ movement. Going back on this commitment should be a non-starter,” Angel Charley, executive director of IllumiNative, said in a statement. “Native peoples are not mascots for sport and entertainment. It is impossible to heal from the decades of racism inflicted on us by way of the team’s fan traditions and former name if we must continue making this point,” she added. Commanders owner Josh Harris said at a press conference in August that the team would not return to its old name. “We’ve been very clear … for obvious reasons, the old name can’t come back,” he said. “The first objective is we got to start winning football games, and we need everyone supporting the team and not things that might, you know, drive people apart.”

Former Fox News host Pete Hegseth, Donald Trump’s pick to head the Department of Defense, ignored a reporter’s question pointedly asking him: “Do you have an alcohol problem?” Later, another journalist stopped him in a corridor and asked him: “Were you ever drunk while traveling on the job?” “I’m not gonna dignify that with a response,” Hegseth responded, adding: “I’m talking to all the senators and I look forward to their discussions.” Pete Hegseth forced out of non-profit leadership roles for misconduct – reportRead more Journalists fired questions as a grim-faced Hegseth walked quickly down a corridor surrounded by supporters to meet with Republicans senators on Capitol Hill on Monday. He also returned to talk to lawmakers Tuesday. The painful questions come amid mounting witness accounts of disturbing behavior by an apparently intoxicated Hegseth in various situations over the last several years. Ten former and current Fox employees told NBC News that Hegseth drank to a degree that concerned his colleagues, the network reported Tuesday. Hegseth’s own attorney said his client was “visibly intoxicated” after speaking at a conference of Republican women in 2017 in Monterey, California, when one of those attending accused him of sexual assault in his hotel room. Hegseth has insisted that the sex was consensual. Police investigated the issue, but did not press charges, and Hegseth paid his accuser an undisclosed sum as part of a nondisclosure agreement, according to his lawyer. Last week the New Yorker cited witnesses who described Hegseth as clearly drunk when he attempted in the past to join in onstage with topless dancers at a Louisiana strip club. He also drunkenly shouted “kill all Muslims!” in the middle of an Ohio bar in 2015, at a time while he was serving as the president of a veterans’ group, according to the magazine. CBS News reported that Jessie Jane Duff, a Marine veteran who served as one of Trump’s 2024 campaign executive directors, was among those who pressed to have Hegseth ousted from the head of Concerned Veterans for America in 2016 in part because of his drinking. He was also reportedly forced out of his leadership role in Vets for Freedom after allegations of financial mismanagement, aggressive drunkenness and sexist behavior. Besides Hegseth’s complete lack of experience running an organization anywhere in the ballpark of the Pentagon, with its massive $800 billion and 2.86 million personnel, critics are voicing increasing concerns about his apparent problem with alcohol — as well as his treatment of women. The New York Times last week revealed a bombshell email to Hegsmith from his own mother to him in 2016, berating him during his second 2018 divorce as a long-time “abuser of women.” The various controversies are threatening to derail his bid to become secretary of defense. “We got a process where he can be asked questions. The articles I’ve read, yeah, some of them are concerning,” said Republican South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham . “I don’t know if it’s true or not, but he’ll go through the process,” he added. “He’ll be asked about it. We’ll see what happens.”

Former parks department worker suspected in disappearances and murders stretching back five decades

Former parks department worker suspected in disappearances and murders stretching back five decades

‘The polio vaccine has saved millions of lives and held out the promise of eradicating a terrible disease,’ said outgoing Republican Senate leader

Outgoing Republican Senate leader and polio survivor Mitch McConnell on Friday condemned Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s lawyer's “dangerous” efforts to kill the polio vaccine.

Michael Steele suggests Donald Trump may be ‘too old’ to handle the challenges facing him, leaving an opening for Elon Musk to take charge

Panamanian President José Raúl Mulino fired back Sunday after President-elect Donald Trump twice threatened to take control of the Panama Canal.

Trump also calls American ‘ownership’ of Greenland ‘absolute necessity’ for ‘security’