Nation & World Glance
2nd high bond set in Stoneman Douglas-related case
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — A relatively high bond was imposed Wednesday in a case involving a student who brought a knife to Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, one day after the same judge set a $500,000 bond for the brother of the shooting suspect for trespassing at the school.
Broward County Judge Kim Theresa Mollica ordered 18-year-old Jordan Salter held on $12,500 bond after she brought a knife with a 2-inch (5-centimeter) blade to the school. Authorities arrested her after a confrontation with another student Tuesday in the school cafeteria.
The SunSentinel reports that Salter attorney Brian Reidy called the high bond “out of control” and “ridiculous” at a hearing and blamed it on fear from last month’s school shooting that killed 17 people.
“I don’t know when we all hit the fear button when everything is such an absolute emergency,” Reidy told the judge.
Also Wednesday, Florida Gov. Rick Scott ordered the state’s highway patrol to station eight troopers at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School to bolster security there. Scott’s office said the troopers will arrive Thursday morning.
Tempest over Trump-Putin call turns into uproar over leaks
WASHINGTON — The tempest over President Donald Trump’s congratulatory phone call to Vladimir Putin quickly grew on Wednesday into an uproar over White House leaks, sparking an internal investigation and speculation over who might be the next person Trump forces out of the West Wing.
The White House, which has suffered frequent leaks — at times of notable severity — said in a statement it would be a “fireable offense and likely illegal” to leak Trump’s briefing papers to the press, after word emerged that the president had been warned in briefing materials not to congratulate the Russian president on his re-election.
Trump did so anyway, and on Wednesday he defended the call, saying George W. Bush did not have the “smarts” to work with Putin, and that Barack Obama and his secretary of state, Hillary Clinton “didn’t have the energy or chemistry” with the Russian leader.
Aides had included guidance in Trump’s talking points for the call to Putin stating: “DO NOT CONGRATULATE,” a senior administration official said Wednesday, speaking to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because the official had not been authorized to discuss internal matters.
The document had been accessible only to a select group of staffers, two officials said, and had been drafted by aides to National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster. They also said there now is an internal probe of the leak but provided no other details.
Saccone concedes Pennsylvania U.S. House race to Lamb
HARRISBURG, Pa. — Republican Rick Saccone conceded defeat to Democrat Conor Lamb on Wednesday night in a closely watched special election in Pennsylvania, more than a week after the end of a remarkable race that has shaken GOP confidence ahead of the November midterm elections.
Lamb, 33, claimed the seat by about 750 votes in a Republican-held district that President Donald Trump won by almost 20 percentage points just 16 months ago. Lamb, who struck a moderate tone during the race and was backed by the district’s influential labor unions, beat Saccone, a state lawmaker who had compiled one of the most conservative voting records in Pennsylvania’s Legislature.
Lamb also benefited from what Pittsburgh-area Democrats called the party’s most energized electorate they had ever seen, driven by an anti-Trump fervor.
On Twitter, Lamb said he had just gotten off the phone with Saccone and congratulated him “for a close, hardfought race.”
Republicans considered seeking a recount request or a lawsuit to contest the result, even as vote-counting over the past week continued to pad Lamb’s lead. If there is no challenge, Lamb could be sworn in after April 2, when the last of the four counties in the district expects to finish certifying the result.
Video: Officers yelled ‘gun’ before shooting unarmed man
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Two officers yelled for a suspect to show his hands then shouted “gun, gun, gun” moments before fatally shooting the man who turned out to be unarmed, audio from body camera footage released Wednesday by Sacramento police shows.
Footage from the body cameras and an overhead helicopter does not clearly depict what the man, who was only holding a cellphone, was doing in the moments before the police fired on Sunday night. The shooting happened in the backyard of the man’s grandparent’s home, where he was staying. The police did not find a gun at the scene.
The Sacramento Police Department said the man, who was black, was seen breaking into at least three vehicles and later into a neighbor’s home. The break ins were first reported by a 911 call also released by the police. The police said deputies in the helicopter saw the man break a neighbor’s sliding glass door before jumping a fence. The helicopter video does not show the alleged break-in. It picks up as the man is running through a backyard and climbing over a fence into a neighboring property. It shows him looking into a truck in the driveway.
The helicopter, flying over the house, then loses sight of the man. It briefly shows him in the backyard as the police are running up the driveway along the side of the house.
Israeli military confirms it hit Syrian nuclear site in 2007
TEL AVIV, Israel — The Israeli military confirmed on Wednesday it carried out the 2007 airstrike in Syria that destroyed what was believed to be a nuclear reactor, lifting the veil of secrecy over one of its most daring and mysterious operations in recent memory.
Although Israel was widely believed to have been behind the Sept. 6, 2007, airstrike, it has never before commented publicly on it.
In a lengthy release, the military revealed that eight F-15 fighter jets carried out the top-secret airstrikes against the facility in the Deir el-Zour region, 450 kilometers northeast of Damascus, destroying a site that had been in development for years and was scheduled to go into operation at the end of that year.