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Woman fatally shot outside PetSmart after dispute over not saying ‘thank you’: officials

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Woman fatally shot outside PetSmart after dispute over not saying ‘thank you’: officials

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A woman in Texas was shot and killed in a PetSmart parking lot after an argument over not saying “thank you” for opening the door, according to police.

Cecilia Simpson, 41, was shot several times outside a PetSmart in Dallas on Tuesday at around 1 p.m., Dallas police told FOX 4. A witness told police that Simpson held the door open for Keona Zachyua Hampton, 22, at a Five Below store, an arrest affidavit states.

Simpson allegedly became irritated that Hampton didn’t thank her for holding the door open, triggering an argument. Simpson and her daughter went to their car and drove to PetSmart, which was in the same plaza.

When Simpson and her daughter entered the PetSmart store, she told employees they were being followed by Hampton. Hampton allegedly walked into the store and began arguing with Simpson’s daughter. Hampton exited the store, but returned a few minutes later, when she allegedly started another argument with Simpson.

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THEIR TEENAGE SON WAS KILLED IN THE BACKYARD. NOW A CHICAGO FAMILY WANTS TRUMP TO ‘BRING ON’ THE TROOPS

Keona Zachyua Hampton was arrested after a fatal shooting in a PetSmart parking lot. (Paul Weaver/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images and Dallas County)

After being asked to leave the store, Hampton allegedly threw a bottle at the vehicle Simpson was driving with her daughter in it. According to police, a physical fight then ensued when Hampton took out a handgun and allegedly shot Simpson three times.

Hampton was arrested on Tuesday night during a traffic stop and admitted she got into an argument with Simpson, but claimed she only took out the gun when the situation became physical.

Hampton was booked into jail on a murder charge. Her bail hasn’t been set.

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VICTIM’S GIRLFRIEND AMONG 9 TEENS ARRESTED IN 16-YEAR-OLD’S BEACH TOWN MURDER

Cecilia Simpson died as a result of her injuries, officials said. (Simpson Family)

An ER nurse who saw the incident told FOX 4 her perspective on what happened.

“The shooter was saying, ‘Come outside. Let’s handle this outside. Let’s fight outside.’ And the mom and daughter were just telling her to like go away,” she said. “The mother and daughter tried to get in the car to de-escalate the situation but the lady wasn’t having it. They started to fight and that’s when the lady pulled out her gun and shot her.”

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A PetSmart logo is displayed outside a store on Feb. 28, 2025. (Kevin Carter/Getty Images)

The nurse said she performed CPR before paramedics arrived.

“The daughter was next to the mom the whole time. It’s hard, you know, because the screaming of a child for her mother is never easy and it’s never going to leave my head,” she said. “I’ve been trying not to cry, but just like, you know, being in high school, my mom was such an important person in my life and she’s the reason I became a nurse. My whole family is.”

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Kyrsten Sinema warns US adversary will program AI with ‘Chinese values’ if America falls behind in tech race

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Kyrsten Sinema warns US adversary will program AI with ‘Chinese values’ if America falls behind in tech race

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Former Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, I-Ariz., warned that the U.S. risks ceding global leadership on artificial intelligence to China, calling the AI race a matter of national security that the nation has “got to win.”

“China is doing everything it can to dominate AI globally, and they will program the AI with Chinese values,” Sinema said on “Fox & Friends” Thursday.

“And President Trump is 100% right. We’ve got to double down and make sure that American values are the values of the world, and that we control this global AI agenda. And that’s why these data centers are so important all across the country.”

US NEEDS TO BREAK CHINA’S SUPPLY CHAIN CHOKEHOLD TO WIN THE TECH RACE

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Former Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, I-Ariz., speaks to reporters in the Ohio Clock Corridor of the U.S. Capitol on Dec. 9, 2025. (Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc. via Getty Images)

Sinema argued the U.S. needs to quickly expand domestic data centers and invest in AI infrastructure.

“We have got to win that race,” she said. 

Sinema pushed back on concerns that AI may take American jobs, drawing a comparison between today’s “AI revolution” and the “internet revolution” of the 1990s. 

Former Sen. Kyrsten Sinema has advocated for greater investment in artificial intelligence infrastructure. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

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WHITE HOUSE OFFICIAL PRESSES ALLIES TO FREE AI FROM INNOVATION-KILLING REGULATIONS

She maintained the internet has made life more convenient, productive and efficient, despite anxieties that it would “ruin jobs” or “take control.”

“People think, ‘Oh, the robots are gonna take over.’ But what they’re maybe not thinking about is how it’s enhancing their lives already,” she said, pointing to AI-optimized firetruck and school bus routes as early examples of how communities are already benefiting from the new technology.

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Sinema then called out the left for spreading “misinformation” about the impact of AI and data centers within communities and praised the Trump administration’s messaging on the issue.

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“This administration is doing a good job of telling the truth,” she said. 

“That communication is bringing people together who just want efficient, proactive, good lives. Where their kids have a better life than they had,” she added. “So this is, I think, a really important issue that has nothing to do with partisanship.”

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Quiet GOP ‘Astroturf’ campaign convinced liberal firebrand to run for US Senate, source says

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Quiet GOP ‘Astroturf’ campaign convinced liberal firebrand to run for US Senate, source says

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It appears some behind-the-scenes tinkering by the Senate Republican campaign arm helped spur progressive firebrand Rep. Jasmine Crockett to declare her candidacy this week in Texas’ high-stakes Senate race.

The campaign launch by Crockett, a two-term lawmaker who represents a Dallas-area district and who is known as a vocal critic and foil of President Donald Trump, quickly shifted the political spotlight off of the Republican nomination race, where incumbent GOP Sen. John Cornyn is involved in a divisive primary with Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and Rep. Wesley Hunt.

The GOP boosting of a preferred primary opponent comes in a race with extremely high stakes, as it’s one of a handful across the country that will likely determine if Republicans hold their Senate majority in next year’s midterm elections.

As the race in Texas was heating up this past summer, Crockett, a rising Democratic Party star who enjoys a large social media footprint, was not among the list of Democrats widely considered as contenders for the party’s nomination.

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DEMOCRATS RIFT WIDENS: IS JASMINE CROCKETT TOO FAR LEFT FOR TEXAS VOTERS?

Rep. Jasmine Crockett, D-Texas, speaks after announcing her run in the Democratic primary for U.S. Senate Monday, Dec. 8, 2025, in Dallas.  (LM Otero/AP Photo)

But Republican strategists viewed Crockett as a more beatable opponent in the 2026 general election than either former Rep. Colin Allred, who until Monday was making his second straight Senate bid, state Rep. James Talarico, another rising party star who launched his campaign in September, and former Rep. Beto O’Rourke and Rep. Joaquin Castro, who at the time were mulling bids.

So the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) released a poll in July that indicated Crockett with a double-digit lead over the rest of the field of actual and potential Democratic Senate contenders.

The poll quickly grabbed plenty of national attention.

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A source familiar with the NRSC’s process told Fox News Digital that when they saw the results of the survey, they instantly said, “We’ve got to disseminate this far and wide.”

The survey spurred other polls which also indicated Crockett hypothetically in the lead, and the NRSC helped push those results “to really drive that news cycle and that narrative that Jasmine Crockett was surging in Texas.”

The NRSC then reached out to allies to aggressively push the polls in the progressive digital world in what the source described as an “AstroTurf recruitment process.”

FIERCE TRUMP CRITIC CROCKETT SHAKES UP HIGH STAKES SENATE RACE

The effort also included phone calls and text messages to Texas Democrats calling on voters to urge Crockett to enter the race.

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The source called it a “sustained effort that we orchestrated across the ecosystem for several months.”

Crockett, in announcing her candidacy, noted that “I never put myself into any of the polls.”

But she acknowledged that “the more I saw the poll results, I couldn’t ignore the trends, which were clear, both as it relates to the primary as well as the general election.”

Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina, seen standing for an interview with Fox News Digital, is chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee. (Paul Steinhauser/Fox News)

NRSC Chair Sen. Tim Scott, speaking exclusively with Fox News Digital on Monday, said that Crockett’s entry into the Senate race is a key sign of the Democrats’ shift to the left.

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“I think it says something about who the Democrats are nationally, not just in Texas. What it says is that they’ve been overrun by this radical left agenda that focuses on rhetoric, not reality,” the Republican senator from South Carolina claimed.

SENATE REPUBLICAN CAMPAIGN CHIEF SAYS CROCKETT CANDIDACY EXPOSES HOW ‘RADICAL’ DEMOCRATS ARE

Allred, who was making his second straight bid for the Senate after losing last year to conservative Sen. Ted Cruz by 9 points, abandoned his bid hours before Crockett launched her campaign and announced he would run next year to return to the House.

Former Democratic Rep. Colin Allred of Texas on Monday suspended his 2026 Senate bid and launched a House campaign. (Reuters/Marco Bello)

Crockett will now face off in her party’s primary with Talarico, a former middle school teacher and Presbyterian seminarian who is also seen as a rising Democrat. The two surging contenders with powerful fundraising operations will face off in the March 3 primary.

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In the GOP showdown, Cornyn, the longtime incumbent who hails from the party’s establishment wing, has cut into the one-time large lead by Paxton, a MAGA firebrand, with Hunt in third, according to public opinion polling.

The concern among Republicans is that Paxton, who has been battered over the past decade by a slew of scandals and legal problems and who is now dealing with a messy divorce, would put the seat in play if he were to win the GOP nomination.

Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas is facing primary challenges from state Attorney General Ken Paxton and Rep. Wesley Hunt as he seeks re-election in 2026. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty)

But Crockett’s Senate candidacy may change the political equation. While her aggressive push-back against Trump and the GOP should play well with the left, it could deflate her chances of winning next November among Texas’ more conservative electorate.

By dropping out of the race, Allred will likely allow Democrats to avoid a costly and messy primary runoff in the spring, giving the party more time to consolidate around their nominee and raise much-needed campaign cash.

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Meanwhile, with Cornyn, Paxton, and Hunt all taking aim at each other in a combustible primary, the GOP nomination appears headed towards a runoff, which would be triggered if no candidate tops 50% in the early March primary.

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Senate Majority Leader John Thune, Scott, and the NRSC are backing Cornyn.

Asked if he’s concerned about the GOP nomination battle extending to a primary runoff, Scott predicted that “Cornyn will win the primary and Cornyn will win the general election.”

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James Carville blasts Crockett for breaking ‘first rule of politics,’ focusing on herself more than voters

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James Carville blasts Crockett for breaking ‘first rule of politics,’ focusing on herself more than voters

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Veteran Democratic strategist James Carville spoke about Democratic Texas Rep. Jasmine Crockett’s bid for the Senate in Thursday’s episode of his podcast, arguing she tends to break a key rule of politics. 

“Politics War Room” podcast co-host Al Hunt argued Crockett throwing her hat into the ring for the Texas Senate is good news. He argued that the most likely Democratic candidate to win would be state Rep. James Talarico, saying, “If he ends up running against Ken Paxton, I like those odds.” 

Carville said he feels more optimistic about Texas than he has in a long time. 

“I’ll address the issue of Jasmine Crockett,” Carville said. “First of all, it seems like she’s well-educated. It seems like she’s got a lot of energy. But she, to me, she violates the first rule of politics, and that is, in politics, you always make it about the voters and never about yourself.

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CROCKETT SPENDS EYE-POPPING AMOUNT OF CAMPAIGN CASH ON THIS

James Carville warned that while Rep. Jasmine Crockett is viable in a heavily Democrat-leaning district, she may not do so well in a broader area. (Jemal Countess/Getty Images for MoveOn)

“You listen to her talk. It’s a lot more about herself than it is the voters.”

He warned that Crockett lives in a district that favors Democrats by 24 points, arguing it would be far better for her to try to rally Democrats in districts that slightly favor Republicans.

“You can stay in Congress as long as you want,” Carville suggested. “You can get all the hits. You can get all the clicks. You can get on all of the TV shows. You can get in as long as you’re polemic, but you’re not helping very much.”

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He went on to argue that a perfect example of Democrats making unforced errors would be Tennessee’s 7th district, where Aftyn Behn was considered a poor choice of candidate in an election where Republicans were unusually vulnerable.

Carville joked that it was as if Democrats had “gone into a lab” to “design the worst candidate that we could possibly run in Tennessee 7.

BIG WIN FOR TRUMP, GOP, AS SUPREME COURT GREENLIGHTS NEW CONGRESSIONAL MAP IN TEXAS

Rep. Jasmine Crockett, frequently seen in the news for incendiary rhetoric, caused a shakeup by entering the race for the Texas senate.  (LM Otero/AP Photo)

“We would pick somebody who said they didn’t like country music. We could pick someone that said they don’t even like where they live. We could pick someone that said they wanted to pay for gender-affirming surgery for prison. We could pick someone that said, ‘We want to defund the police.’ Actually, we picked that person. We actually did. And even there, she cut the margin from 22 to nine.

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“But we know what wins elections,” Carville concluded. “We just do. And what wins elections is not sitting there talking incessantly about yourself. Winning elections is not how many clicks you get or how much overnight fundraising you do. Winning elections is being part of framing issues and understanding where people are coming from, and I don’t think Congressman Crockett is very good at that. I’ll be very frank.”

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Veteran Democratic strategist James Carville has frequently warned that the Democratic Party loses what should be easy victories by catering to far-left cultural politics. (Emma McIntyre/Getty Images for SCAD)

Fox News Digital reached out to Behn and Crockett and did not receive an immediate response.

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