German prosecutors have charged a paediatrician with 130 counts of sexual abuse, including the rape of children, most of them in his care, in a case that has caused shock and prompted clinics to step up safeguards.
The 46-year-old doctor, whose name has not been released, has been in custody since November after a mother suspected her child had been assaulted and notified authorities. The doctor worked in clinics in Brandenburg state, surrounding Berlin.
Announcing the charges this week, prosecutors said the alleged crimes were committed between 2013 and 2025. They did not specify how many children were believed to have been abused.
“The accused is charged with offences against sexual autonomy in a total of 130 cases. These include allegations of serious sexual abuse of children and rape,” the prosecutor’s office in the state capital, Potsdam, said in a statement on Wednesday.
The doctor is alleged to have committed most of the offences “in the course of his professional duties” at clinics operated by the Havelland healthcare group in the Brandenburg towns of Rathenow and Nauen.
“The accused remains in pre-trial detention,” the statement said, adding that the charges were brought on 6 May. A regional court in Potsdam will decide whether to proceed to trial.
At the time of the paediatrician’s arrest, investigators seized data storage devices believed to contain relevant images.
Bild newspaper said the mother’s complaint came after her child was allegedly assaulted while being treated in the paediatric ward of Rathenow hospital.
After the case came to light in January, the Havelland Klinikengroup said it was conducting an internal review with the help of experts. It had emerged that the “four-eyes protocol”, under which two people must be present during an examination of a child, had not always been respected, it said.
“The allegations undermine the trust of patients and their families,” the group’s medical director, Mike Lehsnau, said.
After the charges were announced, the group released a second statement, saying it would “fully support” prosecutors and provide any relevant information. “Our sympathy goes out to all patients who may have been harmed, as well as to their families,” it said.
In France last May, a former surgeon, then aged 74, was sentenced to 20 years in prison after a three-month trial for the sexual abuse of hundreds of patients, most under the age of 15 – the biggest child abuse trial in the country’s history.
Joël Le Scouarnec worked as a digestive surgeon in public and private hospitals across Brittany and the west of France, often operating on children with appendicitis.
He was accused of 111 rapes and 189 sexual assaults between 1989 and 2014 at a dozen hospitals. Many of the children he assaulted were under anaesthetic or waking up after operations. Some were assaulted in their hospital beds. Their average age was 11.
The ruling added to pressure on the French government to address failings in the health and justice system.
WARNING: This article includes graphic and disturbing accounts from the October 7 massacre in Israel.
Hamas and its Palestinian collaborators used sexual and gender-based violence “deliberately and systematically” as an inherent part of a wider strategy of the 2023 massacres in southern Israel, according to a report released Tuesday by the Civil Commission on Oct. 7 Crimes Against Women and Children.
The Israeli nonprofit said its investigation documented evidence of abuse at multiple sites during the Oct. 7 terror invasion, including the Nova Music Festival, kibbutzim near the Gaza border, Israel Defense Forces bases, among hostages in captivity and in the condition of recovered bodies showing signs consistent with sexual violence.
According to the report, investigators identified at least 13 recurring forms of abuse, including rape, sexual torture, shootings directed at victims’ genital areas and abuse carried out after death.
A Hamas terrorist is seen walking around a residential neighborhood in southern Israel in undated bodycam footage released by the Israel Defense Forces. The footage was shown to foreign correspondents on Oct. 16, 2023, as part of a 40-minute reel compiled from the Hamas attack on Oct. 7.(Israel Defense Forces/AP)
Dr. Cochav Elkayam-Levy, founder and chair of the Civil Commission and a principal co-author of the report, told Fox News Digital that the greatest challenge in compiling the findings was the team’s repeated exposure to graphic material and the trauma associated with reviewing it on a regular basis.
“We had to not only collect materials, but also review and analyze it alongside forensic experts while witnessing human suffering at its worst,” Elkayam-Levy said. “What motivated us was the denial, the hesitation and the questioning. We wanted to ensure that the world knows what happened to the victims.
“For us, it is a final act of justice for the victims,” she added.
The report also detailed cases in which sexual violence was inflicted in front of or involving family members, including one incident in which relatives were allegedly forced to carry out acts on each other.
People visit the site of the Nova music festival in Re’im, southern Israel, where revelers were killed in a cross-border attack by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023. The visit took place on Jan. 14, 2024, marking 100 days since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas.(Leo Correa/AP)
It further accused Hamas and allied perpetrators of using videos, digital platforms and social media as tools to magnify psychological harm, spread fear and publicize the attacks, including by distributing sexualized material.
Elkayam-Levy said she hopes the findings will not remain confined to academics, human rights organizations or activists, but will also be studied by counterterrorism and national security experts to better understand and confront such atrocities.
“We cannot prevent what we do not fully understand,” Elkayam-Levy said. “No single prosecution could ever capture the full magnitude of these crimes in the way this report does. It is therefore critical that policymakers, decision-makers, members of Congress and senators find ways to formally recognize these findings and hold hearings so we can begin addressing this issue. We want the findings of this report to receive formal institutional recognition.”
The report, Elkayam-Levy noted, underscores that victims of the Oct. 7 atrocities came from 52 countries, highlighting the global scope and impact of the attack.
Witness testimony cited in the report included an account of a woman being sexually assaulted before being beheaded. Another witness described seeing a woman dragged from a vehicle, pinned against a wall, repeatedly raped and then stabbed, with the assault allegedly continuing after her death.
In another case, a witness described discovering the body of a man whose genitals had been severed, lying beside the body of a woman holding them, in what the report described as an apparent effort to degrade and humiliate the victims.
A Hamas terrorist is seen walking around a residential neighborhood in southern Israel in undated bodycam footage released by the Israel Defense Forces amid the Hamas attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.(Israel Defense Forces/AP)
Investigators said some female victims were found naked or partially unclothed, with evidence of severe mutilation and objects including grenades, nails and household tools inserted into their bodies. The report also cited gunshot wounds, cuts and burn injuries concentrated on intimate areas.
The report said some female bodies brought to morgues showed broken pelvises or legs, bloodied underwear and additional trauma to the abdomen or groin.
Former hostages, both women and men, have also testified to rape, sexual torture and other forms of abuse during abduction or captivity, according to the report. It said some female captives reported sexual assaults while receiving treatment in Gaza hospitals for injuries sustained during the attacks.
A bloodied handprint stains a wall inside a house in the Nir Oz kibbutz near the Gaza border after a Hamas attack days earlier.(Alexi J. Rosenfeld/Getty Images)
Male hostages likewise described sexual abuse while in captivity, including assaults in showers and incidents carried out under armed threat while victims were naked, the report said. One former hostage recounted being sexually assaulted when a captor forcibly rubbed his genitals against the victim’s anus.
Last month, former hostage Rom Braslavski recounted the abuse he said he endured during captivity in an exclusive interview with Fox News Digital.
“They would hit me with whatever they had on hand. I underwent severe torture, bondage and sexual abuse. Everything they could do to me, they did. My body is still covered in scars. After four months of torture, I was clinically dead, rolling my eyes and passing out. They decided to stop the violence and brought doctors to treat me with injections and gave me food again,” he said.
The report said sexual and gender-based violence was “widespread and systematic” and constituted an “integral component” of both the Oct. 7 attacks and the subsequent treatment of captives, while calling the prosecution of such crimes an “urgent” priority to be pursued through international accountability mechanisms.
A soldier of the Military Rabbinate unit opens a container holding bodies killed during the Hamas attack on Israel’s southern border as identification continues at the Shura army base in Ramle, Israel, on Oct. 24, 2023.(Amir Levy/Getty Images)
Among its recommendations, the commission called for targeted sanctions against individuals and entities accused of carrying out or materially supporting the Oct. 7 attack and its aftermath. It also urged action against what it described as denial, minimization or politicization of the sexual crimes committed during the massacre and in captivity.
“The Commission further recommends that Israel adopt a comprehensive gender strategy within its prosecutorial framework and establish a specialized chamber or panel of judges dedicated to the prosecution of sexual and gender-based crimes committed on October 7th and during captivity,” the report said.
Elkayam-Levy said the report has received widespread international attention, including front-page coverage in U.S. and global media outlets. “We feel the discussion has shifted from questioning whether these crimes occurred to examining their consequences,” she said. “There is now a substantial legal evidentiary foundation preserved in a secure archive that cannot be denied.”
Amelie Botbol is a freelance journalist based in Tel Aviv. Her articles have appeared in the New York Post, Canada’s National Post, and the Washington Times. Amelie can be followed on X @DatReporter
Krishnan Iyer(from left), Senior Vice President, NSE, Nagamani Raja, Raja Bagmane, Founder and Managing Director, Bagmane Group and DK Shivakumar, Deputy Chief Minister of Karnataka, at the listing ceremony.
Blackstone-backed Bagmane Prime Office REIT ended Day 1 of listing on strong note, by gaining nearly 3.66 per cent at ₹103.66 against the issue price of ₹100. The units were listed at ₹103.40 on the BSE and climbed to a high of ₹104.48.
Earlier, the ₹3,405-crore initial public offering of Bagmane REIT saw a record response from investors, as the issue closed with a subscription of 23.71 times. The portion for other investors fetched 21.87 times subscription, while the portion for institutional investors got subscribed 25.25 times. According to sources, the company received over 2 lakh applications, the highest ever for a REIT issue.
anchor funding
Ahead of the IPO, the REIT raised ₹1,150 crore from anchor investors. The IPO of the Bengaluru-based real estate investment trust consisted of a fresh issue worth ₹2,390 crore and an offer for sale of ₹1,015 crore by the selling unit holder (Blackstone).
Proceeds will be used to acquire Luxor at Bagmane Capital Tech Park (spanning one million sq ft) as well as part-fund the acquisition of a 93 per cent stake in Bagmane Rio, which owns the 1.1 million sq ft Bagmane Rio Business Park.
The REIT’s portfolio comprises six premium Grade A+ business parks with 20.3 million sq ft total area, and it is located in the world’s best performing micro-markets (by net absorption since from CY21 to CY25). The portfolio consists of 19.6 million sq ft of leasable area, including 16.6 million sq ft completed area which is almost 99 per cent occupied.
Strengthening Indonesia’s digital ecosystem through AI, cloud computing, and next-gen connectivity
Partner Content ZTE
Corporation (0763.HK / 000063.SZ), a global leading provider of integrated
information and communication technology solutions, has officially signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with PT Telkom
Indonesia (Persero) Tbk to strengthen strategic cooperation in the development
of digital solutions and infrastructure.
ZTE signed an MoU with Telkom Indonesia to strengthen strategic collaboration in developing digital solutions and infrastructure in Indonesia
The MoU marks a significant milestone in the long-standing partnership between ZTE and Telkom, reinforcing both parties’ commitment to accelerating Indonesia’s digital transformation through the deployment of advanced technologies, including cloud computing, artificial intelligence (AI), and next-generation connectivity.
Through this collaboration, ZTE will leverage its global capabilities in digital infrastructure, AI-driven solutions, and integrated platforms to support Telkom in enhancing its digital ecosystem. The partnership is expected to accelerate innovation, strengthen service capabilities, and enable more scalable and secure digital solutions for enterprise and government sectors.
Zhu Yang, Sales Director of ZTE Indonesia, stated, “We are honoured to strengthen our collaboration with Telkom Indonesia, a key digital ecosystem enabler in Southeast Asia. This partnership reflects our shared vision to build intelligent, efficient, and sustainable digital infrastructure. By combining ZTE’s technological expertise with Telkom’s strong market presence, we aim to unlock new value and support Indonesia’s digital economy growth.”
From Telkom’s perspective, this collaboration aligns with the company’s broader transformation strategy to evolve beyond a traditional telecommunications operator into a digital infrastructure and platform-driven enterprise.
Seno Soemadji, Director of Strategic Business Development & Portfolio PT Telkom Indonesia (Persero) Tbk, emphasized that strategic partnerships play a critical role in accelerating the company’s long-term growth agenda. “This collaboration reflects our continued focus on strengthening digital infrastructure as a foundation for future growth. Moving forward, Telkom is committed to scaling its capabilities across data center, connectivity, and cloud-based platforms, while embedding AI as a core enabler to deliver more integrated and high-value solutions for our customers. Through partnerships like this, we aim to build a more resilient, secure, and competitive digital ecosystem in Indonesia and the region,” he said.
The cooperation also supports Telkom’s ongoing efforts to sharpen its portfolio focus and enhance execution discipline, ensuring that each initiative contributes to sustainable value creation and long-term competitiveness.
Looking ahead, ZTE and Telkom will explore various collaboration areas, including digital infrastructure development, enterprise solutions, AI-enabled services, and capability building, to support the evolving needs of Indonesia’s digital economy.
Google has denied breaching the Online Safety Act by promoting a “nihilistic” suicide forum associated with 164 deaths in the UK where it is supposed to be banned.
The UK’s internet regulator fined the forum’s US-based operator £950,000 because the site, which “presents a material risk of significant harm”, can still be accessed in the UK despite British laws criminalising encouraging or assisting suicide.
However, a link to the website still appears in Google’s search results allowing users with basic software to circumvent the block and access screeds of advice on suicide methods.
Google’s promotion of the site, not named by the Guardian, was raised by the Molly Rose Foundation, an online safety campaign, whose chief executive Andy Burrows told Radio 4’s Today programme: “If you search for it by name it will still come up in search results – a clear cut breach of the act, but on that matter Ofcom has so far declined to take action.”
The site listed by Google was the second entry beneath a link to the Samaritans. The associated url links to a page where the forum’s operators say access has been “voluntarily restricted to users in the United Kingdom due to legal risks associated with the UK Online Safety Act 2023”.
However it includes the website’s address which can then be used to access the full site using VPN software that simulates a computer being based in a different country.
When set to simulate internet access from the US, Germany and France, the full forum was easily accessible, including detailed advice on the efficacy of various methods of suicide.
The Molly Rose Foundation, set up in the memory of Molly Russell, a 14-year-old who took her own life after viewing negative online content, including about suicide, cited a section of the 2023 Online Safety Act that states search services must “take or use proportionate measures relating to the design or operation of the service to effectively mitigate and manage the risks of harm to individuals.
Google denied it has breached the law. Ofcom regulations allow search engines to respond to “navigational” queries, it said, adding that its results prioritise user safety by including a prominent help box with support resources, such as the Samaritans, alongside contextual news coverage. It said it aims to balance robust safety protections with the principle of ensuring information access and will implement any formal court orders to restrict access to specific sites.
Molly Rose, along with the campaign group Families and Survivors to Prevent Online Suicide Harms, have said coroners had warned the UK government about risks of further deaths from the forum “and a substance it promotes, glorifies and instructs for use as a suicide method”.
Adele Zeynep Walton, whose sister Aimee Walton took her life after accessing the site, said: “Families like mine have been agonisingly waiting for action against the website that took our loved ones and at least 164 UK lives. While we’ve waited further lives have been lost and we’ve had to fight every step.”
Ofcom has been urging the site to obey British laws criminalising intentionally encouraging or assisting suicide since last spring.
The Online Safety Act also allows Ofcom to seek a court order requiring internet service providers to block UK access to the site. The regulator is preparing an application to have the site’s connections effectively cut if its concerns relating to the breach are not addressed.
Hospitals in England have hit a key target for improving the time it takes patients to get treatment, which prompted Wes Streeting to declare that Labour’s “plan for the NHS is working” before departing as health secretary.
Streeting had told the NHS to ensure that hospitals treated at least 65% of patients within 18 weeks by the end of March. New NHS England figures published on Thursday showed that hospitals did so, treating 65.3% of people on the NHS waiting list within that timeframe in March.
The referral to treatment (RTT) target is a particularly important waiting time standard for the NHS to meet because it is the one that Labour has repeatedly pledged to restore to what it should be – 92% of patients being seen within 18 weeks – by 2029.
The NHS’s success will help Streeting burnish his record during his 22 months as the health secretary. He has stated that under his leadership “the NHS is on the road to recovery” after years of under-investment and neglect during the Conservatives’ 14 years in power.
Streeting said the NHS’s achievement showed that “our plan for the NHS is working. This is the biggest cut in waiting lists in a single month in 17 years.
“It means we are right on track to deliver the fastest reduction in waiting times in the history of the NHS.
“That is thanks to the government’s investment, modernisation and the remarkable efforts of staff right across the board.”
March was the first time since November 2021 that more than 65% of patients were seen within 18 weeks. “This is a huge moment for the NHS,” said Sir Jim Mackey, NHS England’s chief executive.
Sarah Woolnough, the chief executive of The King’s Fund, said it was “a significant achievement”. She added: “For patients and their loved ones, it means fewer long waits for treatment and some relief from the anxiety extended delays cause.”
The figures also show that the waiting list has shrunk by more than half a million since Labour took office. In July 2024, people were waiting for 7.62m tests and treatments, including surgery. That figure has fallen to 7.11m, a drop of 517,000. The total has now fallen for five months in a row.
However, the figures also showed the NHS missed targets to improve waiting times for other types of care – including A&E care, cancer treatment and ambulance response times – by the end of 2025-26. “Lots done, lots to do,” Streeting said.
Experts said hospitals’ success in delivering the required improvement in RTT performance was the result of NHS England giving them £120m in extra funding from January to undertake a “sprint” towards meeting the target. Hospitals used that money to see more patients and remove unnecessary or duplicate appointments by “cleaning” the waiting list, a tactic that the Conservatives claimed was “fiddling the figures”.
NHS trusts were offered financial incentives to undertake “validation sprint” exercises. For example, Shrewsbury and Telford Trust removed 14,148 patients from its waiting list after it was offered £33 per removal, and earned more than £460,000 in the process.
“It’s remarkable that 70% of the progress towards this [65%] target since April 2025 has happened during the final two months leading up to the deadline,” said Bea Taylor, a fellow at the Nuffield Trust health thinktank.
The NHS’s RTT performance has been below 60% for much of the time in recent years, which makes the 65.3% recorded in March even more striking. It was a big jump on both the 62.5% in the previous month and especially the 59.8% a year earlier in March 2025.
However, Taylor and Woolnough both cautioned that the NHS was unlikely to be able to sustain the same speed of progress seen recently to deliver Streeting and Starmer’s repeated promises that 92% of patients would once again be seen within 18 weeks by 2029.
Demand for NHS care is still intense. “Huge waves of patients are flowing on to waiting lists each month, making it difficult for the NHS to work fast enough to keep up,” said Taylor.
Russian drone strikes collapsed a residential building in the Ukrainian capital. Ukrainian officials say Russia launched more than 1,500 drones since Wednesday, despite a US-mediated ceasefire proposal. Audrey MacAlpine reports from Kyiv.
Republicans hoping to hold the U.S. House hit a setback Wednesday when Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves indicated he will not immediately pursue redistricting following a critical Supreme Court ruling, as officials seek to oust the leader of Democrats’ January 6 probe.
Following the Supreme Court’s “Callais” ruling on how race can or cannot factor into redistricting, several Republican-led states have moved to redraw congressional maps, arguing for race-neutral approaches — and officials in Jackson quickly took note.
Mississippi lawmakers were primed to convene a special session next week to redraw state Supreme Court and potentially congressional districts, but Reeves canceled the session Wednesday after the judge who ruled the court district maps inhibited Black candidates was overruled — sparking a now-in-limbo effort to oust entrenched former January 6 Committee chairman Bennie Thompson.
“Understand something, that maybe while it may be in the best interest of some individual politicians in Mississippi to talk about congressional redistricting, what happens in Mississippi doesn’t happen in a vacuum,” Reeves said in a talk-radio spot Wednesday.
“I’m going to do what’s in the best interest of Mississippi and I’m going to do what’s in the best interest of America and I’m going work very closely with the Trump administration to accomplish both of those goals.”
Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves speaks after defeating Elvis Presley’s cousin Brandon in the gubernatorial race.(Brandon Bell/Getty Images)
Reeves pushed back on claims he flip-flopped on congressional redistricting, noting the Magnolia State’s March 10 primary has passed — complicating any change in voting landscape, andalso said he was onboard with ending what he called Thompson’s 33-year “reign of terror.”
However, Reeves suggested it is not a setback to State Auditor Shad White and others’ renewed bid to shift the Magnolia State’s GOP representation from 3-1 to 4-0 and oust Thompson.
Thompson, a firebrand Democrat from Hinds County seeking his 18th term representing the predominantly Black and largely impoverished Delta region, is in danger of losing his reliably blue seat when redistricting commences.
Thompson and Reeves briefly sparred on X, with the Democrat depicting an elephant painting Mississippi “white” while Reeves countered that Thompson was wrong to claim ownership of the district with the term “my” versus the people of Mississippi.
“It must be done to go into effect before the 2026 elections,” replied voting rights activist Scott Presler, while Pastor William Pierce of Columbia drew a state map that comprised evenly divided 22-24-point Republican districts saying “this must be done now” -— as Reeves said the issue is not “if” but “when” and that he plans for the changes to take effect for the 2027 statewide elections.
White told Fox News Digital he was the first statewide official to publicly consider drawing-out Thompson and creating a 4-0 map, while Reeves rejected claims of pressure from the White House and Republican Party to redraw now.
As the Supreme Court was set to hand down the Callais ruling, Reeves took to Instagram to say he “do[es]n’t typically make news on a Friday afternoon” but made an “exception” to call a special session 21 days after the decision to consider redistricting.
White, a rising star in the GOP following his major anti-fraud and waste investigations, said that Thompson is “the worst congressman in America” and the state’s map favoring him must be dealt with promptly.
“Among Mississippians; normal taxpayers, Bennie Thompson is incredibly unpopular,” White said in an exclusive Fox News Digital interview Wednesday.
“As chair of the January 6 Committee, anyone who supports President Trump is not happy that Bennie Thompson represents a part of our state.”
“[I]t is absolutely both legally and practically possible to change our districts to a 4-0 state,” he said, pointing to Callais and Alabama’s successful bid Monday to get their “Livingston Map” through the courts.
Like Alabama, White said Mississippi officials have “dozens” of already prepared maps to choose from, including some that give each of the four congressional districts an even-keeled level of Trump support totaling 15 points or higher, citing 2024 election results.
“The real question is just whether our politicians here have the courage to actually get Bennie Thompson out. And that question remains unanswered right now,” he said.
White said Mississippi has been stuck with maps featuring a Thompson stronghold for decades, as Thompson himself told Jackson’s NBC affiliate it has been Republicans who have drawn the maps since his 1992 election to Congress.
Thompson said that the issue between the lines in the plans is race.
“I have a voting record that no other person in the [Mississippi] delegation can touch for those things that we need the most: Health care, housing, better educational opportunities… but they’d rather put somebody in position who’s against those things. And the only difference between Bennie Thompson and the rest of the delegation that represent Mississippi in Washington is that I’m Black,” Thompson told Memphis’ NBC affiliate.
Rep. Bennie Thompson, chairman of the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, and Vice Chairwoman Rep. Liz Cheney participate in the committee’s last public meeting in the Cannon House Office Building on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., on Dec. 19, 2022.(Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
Thompson added Mississippi has a history of requiring federal intervention to provide equal rights to Black people, including during the Civil Rights era and suffrage fights, and compared it to the dynamic today, calling it “Jim Crow 2.0” that he will “fight back with every fiber.”
Fox News Digital reached out to Thompson for further comment.
After Reeves’ comments were reported, White told Fox News Digital that he still hopes “Thompson is redistricted-out as soon as possible – even if it’s not going to happen next week.”
Fox News Digital also reached out to Mississippi House Speaker Jason White, R-West, and Senate Leader Dean Kirby, R-Brandon for their take on Reeves’ latest move and efforts to redraw the map.
Meanwhile, Shad White pointed to New England as precedent for Mississippi drawing out Thompson, saying Kamala Harris’ 38% performance mirrors the GOP partisan makeup of multi-district blue states like Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Hampshire and Maine.
State Sen. Michael McLendon, R-Hernando, joined Shad White’s call to redraw the map to “give Speaker Johnson another ‘+1’ and send Bennie Thompson home.”
He disputed timeframe concerns, saying that Democrats successfully sued Mississippi to redraw his region, costing the GOP their supermajority — and he was still able to run in a mid-off-year primary.
“When Democrats demanded redistricting, the establishment’s response was simple: ‘We have a court order, and we’re going to comply,’” McLendon said in a statement obtained by Fox News Digital. “Now, suddenly, many of those same voices have gone completely silent.”
Asked for his view on the matter, U.S. Rep. Mike Ezell, a Republican from Pascagoula, told Fox News Digital that redistricting is handled by the legislature in Jackson and that he trusts leaders there to “follow the law and do what’s best” for the state.
“My focus remains on serving the people of South Mississippi and fighting for our conservative values in Congress,” Ezell said.
Senate Minority Leader Derrick Simmons, D-Greenville and House Minority Leader Robert Johnson III did not respond to requests for comment.
With hopes of a 4-0 Mississippi map before the midterms dashed, House Speaker Mike Johnson in neighboring Louisiana will have one fewer likely pickup as he battles a series of Republican retirements and independent voter malaise toward Trump in the effort to keep the House red.
Fox News reached out to the White House for comment.
Charles Creitz is a reporter for Fox News Digital.
He joined Fox News in 2013 as a writer and production assistant.
Charles covers media, politics and culture for Fox News Digital.
Charles is a Pennsylvania native and graduated from Temple University with a B.A. in Broadcast Journalism. Story tips can be sent to charles.creitz@fox.com.
AI to the rescue as 11-year search for password turns up in old PC files
Eleven years ago, a stoner bought some Bitcoin, lit up, and entered a password that he soon forgot. Now, after searching for more than a decade, Claude AI has helped him figure out the credentials he needed to gain access to a crypto wallet containing currency that is now worth a whopping $400,000.
The man, who retains an anonymous online profile only going by the alias “cprkrn,” vowed to name his progeny after Anthropic’s CEO Dario Amodei, all because the AI tool helped him regain access to an Obama-era wallet he thought was impenetrable.
Armed only with an old mnemonic phrase, the man plugged it into Claude and told the AI to search his computer for ways he could use it to figure out the password that could regain access to the 5 Bitcoins he bought in 2015 at a Starbucks.
He told web show MTSlive that he had two of the three passwords needed to open up the wallet, but couldn’t find the crucial third after changing it, and naturally later forgetting it, while he was high.
He said he bought the tokens when the price for each was around $250. Altogether, his Bitcoin stash is now worth just shy of $400,000.
After eight weeks working to crack the password, and after the man gave it access to his old computer used for college work, Claude found a wallet backup that the mnemonic phrase was able to decrypt.
According to an overview of the mission, written by Claude, accessing the wallet backup gave the man access to the private keys required to access the Blockchain.com wallet.
Looking at the wallet’s transaction history shows the funds lying dormant since April 2015, and then being transferred out on Wednesday.
Previous attempts to regain access to the wallet involved brute forcing password strings, 3.5 trillion of them by Claude’s reckoning, all to no avail.
He even traveled back to his parents’ house to retrieve college notebooks, manually entering “anything that looked like password or a seed phrase” he thought might help the AI crack or find the third password.
The man ran Claude for eight weeks to realise he changed the password 11 years ago, while stoned, to “lol420fuckthePOLICE!*:)”.
This is a stellar case study to highlight the value of complex passwords, if there ever was one. ®
How does a Republican leader say no to Donald Trump? How do they criticize the US president’s policies without facing a social media riot, or losing their career?
Laying out his case, Massey made clear on Tuesday that he was addressing three audiences: his colleagues in chamber, Republican voters in his state, and the president himself. Democrats – whom he described as “crazy” and “hateful” – were not the intended audience.
And in this rancorous political era, dominated by tribal divisions and binary rhetoric, he tried to craft a nuanced position while senior GOP figures, including Henry McMaster, the South Carolina governor, push to redistrict.
Trump frequently demonizes anyone, especially conservatives, who dare oppose his agenda. Massey made that difficult, by trying to show that he remained firmly aligned with most of the president’s political goals. Just not this one.
I had never had the privilege of speaking with the president of the United States until last week. And it really was – it was a privilege. I enjoyed the conversation. It was a very good conversation. He gave me more time in a phone call than I could have expected…
The president told me, he said: “Look, I hope you can help us out.” He said: “But I understand you got to do what you’re comfortable with, you got to do what you think is right.”
He said: “But these people” – talking about the Democrats in Washington – he said:“These people are crazy.” “Yes, sir, I agree with you.” He told me: “These people hate me.”
And I think, Mr President, that’s obvious. There’s no question about that. There is a lot of hatred in Washington. There’s a lot of hatred in the world. And he’s certainly the recipient of a lot of that. There’s no question there.
Six of South Carolina’s seven US congressional districts are held by Republicans. The new map under consideration would dismantle the one district currently held by a Democrat: long-serving representative and party heavyweight James Clyburn.
Massey made clear he wanted Republicans to win the race for US Congress in November’s midterm elections. He touted the power of his party at the state level to advance conservative goals, insisting he agreed with Trump’s concerns and had no qualms about “ticking off” Democrats. “That doesn’t bother me,” Massey said. “I do that every day standing right here.”
But then Massey pivoted into a plain-language analysis of what he sees as practical issues with the proposed last-minute redistricting drive in South Carolina: not an ideological problem, but a legal and technical one.
‘Most people … think we’re freaking crazy’
Massey argued that South Carolina was as gerrymandered – by party, not by race – as possible, without creating a vulnerability for Republicans. He carefully framed his argument not to preserve the district of a Black, Democratic congressman, but to preserve the electability of fellow Republicans in districts that would have to absorb Democratic voters.
He also tore into the details of the proposal and how it sundered “communities of interest”: a term that Black voters have often used in legal arguments against redistricting. Here, Massey turns it on its side to apply it to ruby-red counties, along South Carolina’s coast and elsewhere. By doing so, he highlighted a partisan interest in preserving the local relationships in parts of South Carolina that people in Washington couldn’t identify on an unmarked map, relationships that remain invisible even on a marked map.
Those who drafted the redistricting proposal failed to consider the concerns of “South Carolina and South Carolinians”, Massey suggested. “When they were drawing this map, they didn’t consider those things,” he said.
“They”, in this case, is a faceless other – allowing Massey to avoid laying blame on the president, or on his party’s representatives, by framing the problem as “Washington”, both as an idea and a target.
Even as he was conciliatory toward Trump, cheering the prospect of Republicans retaining the House, Massey expressed contempt for the political product Washington sends back to South Carolina. The broad voting public is increasingly fed up with politics, regardless of party.
“What I am concerned about is how will this be received by people in the middle,” he said of the redistricting drive. “Look, everybody – I think we get lost on this sometimes – everybody in South Carolina is not a rabid partisan like I am. Everybody in South Carolina is not a rabid partisan like we are. Most people in South Carolina think we’re freaking crazy.”
He was less than positive, at times, about his own party’s recent record in US Congress, where it currently has majorities in both the House of Representatives and Senate.
I would hope that the home team can retain the majority. And I would also hope that if the home team retains the majority, that they’ll actually do something productive with it. Over the last year and a half, I suspect if we look back at what they’ve done with the majority, I don’t know that anybody in here could name more than one piece of legislation they’ve passed.
And no matter how big and beautiful it was, there’s a whole lot more that they’ve left on the table. And that, to me, is disappointing – to have a majority that doesn’t do anything with it.
The map under consideration is against Republican interests, Massey suggested, even if the party’s leaders in Washington do not know that themselves – calling into question whether it would ultimately leave the party with more, or less, congressional representatives from South Carolina.
‘It is up to us’
A backlash is likely to energize Black voters, which may cost Republicans some seats, he said.
Trying to go to 7-0 I think is extremely risky from a political standpoint. I think at best you’re going to get 6-1 and you may even go 5-2. I’ve told the press a number of times, I think if you get cute with this, you could end up in a 5-2 scenario. I don’t want to go 5-2.
I don’t want [Democratic House minority leader] Hakeem Jeffries as the speaker of the House. I think the best chance that South Carolina has to prevent that from happening is with our current maps.
“If the Democrats do win control of the United States House of Representatives, it will not be because of South Carolina,” he said. The unspoken implication: if Democrats win, it will be because of actions taken in Washington DC.
Peppered through the address were references to South Carolina’s independence from Washington, as Massey expressed stark fears about relinquishing it.
I cannot in good conscience surrender this authority that has been preserved to, for, and by the states, and merely take orders from those who are not in South Carolina …
I absolutely understand what the president’s concern is here. I understand what the president’s issue is here. I don’t disagree with that. But there are other concerns that we have to consider. Those concerns have not been considered at all with the proposal that we have. Those concerns affect South Carolina and South Carolinians. And it is up to us to consider those things.
If we don’t consider those concerns of South Carolina, there is no one left. We are the last line. I have too much southern blood in me to surrender.
John C Calhoun was an avidly pro-slavery South Carolina senator in antebellum America who argued passionately that states had a right to ignore federal laws they believed were unconstitutional.
Massey reached up to Calhoun’s portrait as he laid out his opposition to a proposal designed to rid South Carolina of its only Black congressman, in an audacious flourish that would have been immediately recognized by his peers.
It is not a reference a Black senator, or a Democrat, is likely to make. It is a reference offered to an audience of white southern conservatives. Massey framed his opposition as upholding the southern tradition of states rights: exactly how white southern conservatives framed their opposition to the civil rights movement.
“I don’t want to be a participant in further eroding federalism, in further diminishing the essential role of states,” he argued. “The states are not mere political subdivisions of the federal government. The states are not here to take orders and direction – the states are sovereign, independent creatures.”
‘Everybody knows it’
Massey addressed the pressure he faced to bow to Trump’s demands, which would have been high on the mind of a Republican lawmaker who saw what happened just last week to Republicans who refused redistricting in Indiana, five of whom lost primary elections to Trump-endorsed candidates.
“There are likely consequences for me, personally, taking the position that I am right now,” he acknowledged. “I’m comfortable with that. I may not like it, but I’m comfortable with it.”
“Too many people in power want to do whatever it takes to stay in power,” said Massey. “I believe the legitimate use of power in this case is to make people safer.”
South Carolina’s senate Republican majority leader pointed to other portraits, as well: James Byrnes, a congressman and US supreme court justice, and Floyd Spence, a congressman who served for 14 terms and chaired the armed services committee.
At the heart of his case was one simple argument – that Washington DC should be listening to South Carolina, not the other way around.
We’ve been able to punch above our weight regardless of the administration, regardless of who the president is, regardless of who occupies the White House. South Carolina has been able to deliver not just for South Carolina, but for the country and the world.
We have had that influence. Doing this will absolutely diminish that influence. It just will. And everybody knows it. Everybody in here, everybody who’s familiar with the process, we understand what’s going to happen here …
Y’all, regardless of who the president is, regardless of who’s in charge, there has to be somebody in South Carolina who can make a phone call and somebody at the White House will answer it. If we don’t have that, South Carolinians are the ones that are going to suffer because of it.
The consequences of this defiance remain to be seen.
