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National Guard member dies from injuries. And, death toll in Hong Kong fire rises
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Sarah Beckstrom, one of two West Virginia National Guard members who were shot in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, has died. President Trump announced the 20-year-old’s death during a Thanksgiving call to service members. Beckstrom and the other Guard member, 24-year-old Andrew Wolfe, were on patrol a few blocks away from the White House when the alleged gunman, Rahmanullah Lakanwal, opened fire. Wolfe remains in critical condition. In the wake of this shooting, the Trump administration is launching a comprehensive “reexamination” of thousands of refugees and migrants who have been admitted to the U.S. and granted green cards.
This photo combination shows West Virginia National Guard Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe (left) and Specialist Sarah Beckstrom, who were injured in Wednesday’s shooting in Washington, D.C.
U.S. Attorney’s Office/AP
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U.S. Attorney’s Office/AP
- 🎧 Lakanwal served in Afghanistan alongside U.S. forces as part of an elite counter-terrorism unit connected to the CIA and the military, NPR’s Brian Mann tells Up First. The alleged gunman applied for asylum during the Biden administration and was granted protection in April of this year under the Trump administration. Trump has called for an effort to “denaturalize migrants” and “deport” foreign nationals. Mann notes that the Trump administration’s narrative suggests that Lakanwal was allowed into the U.S. without proper vetting, indicating that this could be a broader issue. But sources like the nonprofit group AfghanEvac tell NPR that Lakanwal would have been scrutinized repeatedly in Afghanistan and before he arrived in the U.S. Experts say that while the vetting process for Afghan refugees was audited and found to be imperfect, it was thorough. They also emphasize that the majority of refugees from Afghanistan are living in the U.S. peacefully.
At least 128 people have died after a massive fire engulfed a high-rise housing complex that houses around 4,600 people in Hong Kong from Wednesday to Friday. This is one of the region’s deadliest blazes in decades, and authorities have indicated that the death toll may continue to rise. The police have arrested three men for alleged manslaughter in connection with the fire. Here’s what else we know.
(Just a few) of the Books We Love
Hey folks – Andrew Limbong here, host of NPR’s Book of the Day podcast. I’m tapping in this week to let you all know about our annual recommendation engine, Books We Love. If you wanna come and hang and keep chatting about books stuff, subscribe to the books newsletter!
This week, NPR dropped its massive year-end book recommendation tool, Books We Love. It’s not quite a year-end list, 10 best or whatever, seeing as there are more than 380 books included. Instead, it’s a way of saying: Here’s a bunch of books. There’s something in here for you.
But I get it — 380 is a daunting number, even with Books We Love’s handy-dandy filter tag system. So here’s just a small slice, a sliver, a taste of a few of the books several of our staffers and critics were into this year.
📚 The Dream Hotel by Laila Lalami — You know that spooky feeling you get when you make small talk with someone about needing a new TV, and your phone then just happens to send you the latest TV deals? This dystopian novel is like that but scarier. Emily Kwong, host of NPR’s Short Wave, writes, “I found The Dream Hotel instructive for navigating a society beset by mass surveillance — where the only escape can be found in shouldering risk together.”
- 📚 King of Ashes by S.A. Cosby — If gritty crime fiction is more your thing, Cosby’s latest centers around a family-run small business that gets roped into being involved with a local drug gang. If you think you’ve heard this one before, that small business happens to be a crematorium. Weekend Edition producer Melissa Gray writes, “This story spins and spins violently to a dark and satisfying conclusion.”
- 📚 Mother Mary Comes to Me by Arundhati Roy — This time of year finds lots of folks feeling … different, complicated, conflicting feelings about their parents. The novelist Arundhati Roy wrestles with her own ambivalent feelings about her mother in this new memoir. Morning Edition host Leila Fadel writes, “It’s a story of turbulent love and of liberation that is beautiful, witty and at times uncomfortable to read.”
- 📚 Everything Is Tuberculosis: The History and Persistence of Our Deadliest Infection by John Green — You might recognize TB by its more romantic name, consumption. But … it’s weird there was a time when we romanticized this deadly disease, right? In this book, Green presents TB as very much a present, fatal, yet curable concern. Here & Now producer James Perkins Mastromarino writes that the book is “witty, cogent and achingly beautiful.”
Again, this is just a tiny fraction of the hundreds of books we’ve got on this year’s edition of Books We Love, as recommended by our staffers and critics. But if you’re into this and want to read about books all year round, subscribe to the books newsletter!
Black Friday stories you may have missed
It’s gift-giving season, and some consumer and child advocacy groups are raising concerns about the latest buzz-worthy AI toys
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Elva Etienne/Getty Images
The nonprofit children’s safety organization Fairplay is urging gift-givers to refrain from purchasing AI toys for kids this holiday season. In an advisory, Fairplay and other child and consumer advocacy groups highlight the potential dangers of toys such as interactive dolls and children’s robots designed to mimic human behavior and engage with kids as if they are friends. The advisory points out that these toys exploit children’s trust and can disrupt human relationships, among other negative effects.
Muralist Maxx Moses is putting the “Black” in Black Friday. For the second year in a row, he’s hosting the Black Friday Artists Market at the Graffiti Gardens in San Diego. Moses painted the walls of the studio, which he uses to partner with local organizations. The market will feature a diverse group of emerging and established local artists, aiming to celebrate Black culture, community and economics. (via KPBS)
This holiday shopping season, expect deep discounts as retailers aim to encourage cautious shoppers to splurge. The National Retail Federation predicts a record-breaking season, with Americans projected to spend over $1 trillion on gifts, food, and decorations, reflecting a growth rate of about 4% — similar to last year.
Now that the Thanksgiving excitement is over, it is time for millions of Americans to make that long trek home. For some, the trip means dealing with car sickness. If you are one of those people, don’t fret, NPR’s How To Do Everything podcast has the guidance you need to make the ride better.
Weekend picks
Renate Reinsve in Sentimental Value.
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Check out what NPR is watching, reading and listening to this weekend:
🍿 Movies: In Sentimental Value, a well-known filmmaker works on his next feature while he tries to reconnect with his estranged daughters. According to Pop Culture Happy Hour, his endeavor highlights the complexity between art and parenthood.
📺 TV: This week marked the beginning of the end for Netflix’s 1980s-set horror drama Stranger Things. But will this final season provide a satisfying conclusion? Here’s what NPR critic Eric Deggans has to say. (Warning: there are spoilers ahead).
📚 Books: Do you really need MORE recommendations after Andrew Limbong’s essay? If the answer is yes, check out four books that were released this week, which range from a deep dive into crosswords to a posthumous collection of short stories.
🎵 Music: Now that Thanksgiving is over, as Mariah Carey famously says, “It’s time…” to turn on the holiday music. Download the NPR app today and explore our special collection of holiday music streams from across the NPR network, from the perfect soundtrack for your next party to the finest holiday jazz.
🍽️ Food: Are leftovers taking over your fridge today? Chef Kathy Gunst offers recipes to help transform them into something possibly even better than when you first ate them.
This newsletter was edited by Suzanne Nuyen.
On the night of her resounding win in last fall’s election for Virginia governor, Abigail Spanberger told her supporters that they had sent a message to the world. “Virginia,” she said in the opening lines of her victory speech, “chose pragmatism over partisanship.”
But even then it was clear that the first big issue of her term would be as partisan as it gets: a proposed amendment by her fellow Democrats to allow them to gerrymander the state’s 11 congressional districts.
The push to redraw the Virginia map was another salvo in a barrage of redistricting spurred by President Trump in a bid to keep Republicans in control of the House in this year’s midterm elections.
Virginians vote on Tuesday on whether to adopt the proposed map, and if the “Yes” vote wins, Democrats could end up with as many as 10 seats, up from the six they hold now. The redistricting battles of the last year would end up in something of a draw, with gains for Democrats in California and Virginia offsetting gains for Republicans in Texas, Missouri and North Carolina — unless Florida lawmakers decide in the coming weeks to draw a new, more Republican-friendly map.
Historically, redrawing of congressional maps has been done each decade after the U.S. census. But with Republicans holding such a slim majority in the House, Mr. Trump began by pressing Texas to redraw its maps, touching off the wave of gerrymandering
Virginia Democratic legislators rolled out their redistricting plan last October, setting in motion the state’s lengthy amendment process just as the campaign for governor was entering its final weeks. At the time, Ms. Spanberger expressed support for the plan, though she emphasized that its passage was up to the legislature and then to the voters.
But even if her formal role in the process was relatively minor — Ms. Spanberger signed the bill setting the date for the referendum — the politics of the effort has loomed over the first few months of her term. Her support for the amendment has drawn accusations of hypocrisy from the right and complaints from some on the left that she has not been outspoken enough in her advocacy.
“There’s always going to be somebody who wants me to do something differently,” the governor said in an interview on Saturday at a rally in support of the amendment outside a home in Northern Virginia. “I will always make someone unhappy, and I will always make someone happy.”
Ms. Spanberger, a former C.I.A. officer and three-term congresswoman, won a 15-point victory in 2025 after running on a campaign focused on pocketbook issues. Centrism has been her political brand since she was first elected to the House in 2018, flipping a district that had long leaned to the right.
Now Republicans campaigning against the amendment have made Ms. Spanberger a prime target, deriding her as “Governor Bait-and-Switch” and highlighting an interview in August 2025 in which she said she had “no plans to redistrict Virginia.”
“This was the perfect opportunity for her to show that she is the middle-of-the-road suburban mom that she portrayed herself as,” said Glen Sturtevant, a Republican state senator. He dismissed the notion that this was an effort that had been thrust upon her, pointing out that she had signed the bill setting the date for the referendum. “She is certainly an active participant in this whole process,” he said.
Republicans have eagerly highlighted recent polls suggesting that Ms. Spanberger’s honeymoon is over, though because governors in Virginia cannot serve two consecutive terms, public approval is less of a pressure point than it might be elsewhere. Some of her political adversaries have tied the drop in her ratings to her involvement in the campaign for the amendment.
But a number of factors are at play in those sagging poll numbers. Some on the right are irked by her support of standard Democratic priorities like gun control measures and limits to cooperation with federal immigration agents.
But some of the most vociferous criticism of her from Republicans, up to and including the president, has been for a host of proposed taxes and tax hikes in the legislature — on everything from dog grooming to dry cleaning — that she in fact had nothing do with. Most of those taxes, which were floated by various lawmakers, never even came up for a vote.
But Ms. Spanberger did not publicly hit back against these attacks until recent days, a delay that some Democrats say was costly.
“She let other people define her,” said Scott Surovell, the State Senate majority leader.
Mr. Surovell’s frustration echoed a growing discontent among Democrats about the governor’s recent moves. For all the Republican criticism of her, some operatives and lawmakers said, Ms. Spanberger has not been aggressive enough in pushing for Democratic priorities, redistricting among them.
This criticism broke out into the open in recent days, after the governor made scores of amendments to bills that had passed the General Assembly. Some lawmakers and Democratic allies accused her of unexpectedly diluting long-sought goals like expanded public sector unions and a legal retail marketplace for cannabis.
“Our party base is looking for us to stand up and fight and advocate and deliver,” said Mr. Surovell, who represents a solidly Democratic district in Northern Virginia. “It’s hard to deliver when you’re standing in the middle of the road.”
In the interview, Ms. Spanberger insisted that she supported the purpose of many of the bills but had to make amendments to ensure that her administration could implement them.
And she said she had been explicit in her support of the redistricting effort, appearing in statewide TV ads encouraging people to vote “Yes” even as an anti-amendment campaign has sent out mailers suggesting that the governor opposes the effort.
But she said she had never been in a position to barnstorm the state as Gov. Gavin Newsom did in the months leading up to the redistricting referendum that passed in California. Mr. Newsom is a second-term governor in a much bluer state, she said, while she only recently took office and has been “in the crush of their legislative session,” with hundreds of bills to read and examine in a short period.
“Those who may not be focused on the governing and only on the politics, they’re going to want me to do politics 100 percent of the time,” she said. “And for people who care about the governing and not the politics, they’re going to want me to do governing 100 percent of the time.”
Her preference, as she has often made apparent, is for the governing over the politicking. But she acknowledged that it is all part of the job.
Asked if she lamented that the highest-profile issue of her term so far was such a polarizing matter, rather than the cost-of-living policies she emphasized on the campaign trail, she said: “Any person in elected office wants to talk about the thing they want to talk about all the time, and that’s it. So I won’t say ‘No’ to that question.”
new video loaded: Singer D4vd Is Charged With Murder of Celeste Rivas Hernandez
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transcript
Singer D4vd Is Charged With Murder of Celeste Rivas Hernandez
The musician D4vd was charged with murder on Monday, seven months after the police said that the body of a teenage girl, Celeste Rivas Hernandez, had been found in the trunk of his Tesla. D4vd, whose real name is David Burke, pleaded not guilty to the charges.
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“On April 23, 2025, as has been alleged by the complaint, Celeste, a 14-year-old at that time, went to Mr. Burke’s house in the Hollywood Hills. She was never heard from again.” “These charges include the most serious charges that a D.A.‘s office can bring. That is first-degree murder with special circumstances. The special circumstances being lying in wait, committing this crime for financial gain or murdering a witness in an investigation. These special circumstances carry with it, along with the first-degree murder charge, a maximum sentence of life without the possibility of parole, or the death penalty.” “We believe the actual evidence will show David Burke did not murder Celeste Revis Hernandez nor was he the cause of her death.”
By Jackeline Luna
April 20, 2026
In this photo illustration, The Onion website is displayed on a computer screen, showing a satirical story titled Here’s Why I Decided To Buy ‘InfoWars’, on November 14, 2024 in Pasadena, California.
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Mario Tama/Getty Images North America
The satirical website, The Onion, has a new deal to take over Infowars, conspiracy theorist Alex Jones’s far-right media company. If approved by a Texas judge, the deal would take away his Infowars microphone, and allow The Onion to resume its plans to turn the website into a parody of itself.
Families of those killed in the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, who sued Jones for defamation, want the sale to happen. They’re still waiting to collect on the nearly $1.3 billion judgement they won against Jones for spreading lies that they faked the deaths of their children in order to boost support for gun control. That prompted Jones’s followers to harass and threaten the families for years.
The families are also eager to take away Jones’s platform for spewing such conspiracy theories. The deal not only would divorce Jones from his Infowars brand, but it would turn the platform against him by allowing The Onion to mock his kind of conspiracy mongering and advocate for gun control.
The families “took on Alex Jones to stop him from inflicting the same harm on others” by using “his corrupt business platform to torment and harass them for profit,” said Chris Mattei, one of the attorneys for the families. “When Infowars finally goes dark, the machinery of lies that Jones built will become a force for social good, thanks to the families’ courage and The Onion’s vision, persistence and stewardship.”
A mourner visits the Sandy Hook Permanent Memorial on the 10th anniversary of the school shooting on Dec.14, 2022 in Newtown, Connecticut. Twenty-six people were shot and killed, including 20 first graders and 6 educators, in one of the deadliest elementary school shootings in U.S. history.
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For its part The Onion called it a “significant step in an effort to transform one of the internet’s more notorious misinformation platforms into a new comedy network for satire.” The company says it could announce its new rollout of Infowars in a matter of weeks if the judge approves the deal.
“Eight years, almost to the day, after the Sandy Hook parents first filed suit against Alex Jones, they’ll finally get some justice, and even some money,” said Ben Collins, CEO of The Onion. “This is a chance to make something genuinely new out of a very broken piece of media history.”
On its website Monday, The Onion posted a satirical message from the fictional CEO of its parent company, Global Tetrahedron, “Bryce P. Tetraeder,” stating a “dream is finally coming true.”
Jones’s posted on X Monday that “The Onion Has Fraudulently Claimed AGAIN That It Owns Infowars!!!” adding that “The Democrat Party Disinformation Publication Is Publicly Bragging About Its Plan To Silence Alex Jones’ Infowars And Then Steal & Misrepresent His Identity!”
On a podcast in March, Jones alluded to the impending demise of Infowars, saying, “We’re getting shut down. We beat so many attacks. But finally, we’re shutting down like the middle of next month,” before insisting, “We’re going to be fine.”
Jones suggested Monday he would appeal any court decision to approve the leasing deal. And even if he loses control of Infowars, Jones could continue to broadcast from another studio, under another name.
Jones’s attorneys did not respond to a request for comment.
More than a year ago, a federal bankruptcy judge rejected The Onion’s first attempt to buy Infowars through a bankruptcy auction, saying the process was flawed. Since then, the bankruptcy court clarified that because Infowars’ parent company, Free Speech Systems, is not itself in bankruptcy, its property should be handled instead by a Texas state receiver. That cleared the way for the new pending deal to lease Infowars to The Onion, with the hope that a future sale could be approved.
In papers filed in state court, the Texas receiver said he “determined that licensing the Intellectual Property is in the best interest of the receivership estate.”
The deal calls for The Onion to pay $81,000 a month to license the Infowars.com domain and brand name, which the receiver says will “cover carrying costs to preserve and protect the assets of the receivership estate” until an appeal filed by Jones is decided and the path is cleared for a sale.
Jones’s personal bankruptcy case is proceeding in federal bankruptcy court, where a trustee continues to sell off Jones’s personal property, including cars, homes, watches and guns, with proceeds intended for the families.
A memorial to massacre victims stands near the former site of Sandy Hook Elementary on Dec. 14, 2013 in Newtown, Connecticut, one year after Adam Lanza shot and killed 20 first graders and six adults at the school.
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