The District of Columbia sued Amazon on Wednesday, alleging the company secretly stopped providing its fastest delivery service to residents of two predominantly Black neighborhoods while still charging millions of dollars for a membership that promises the benefit. The complaint filed in District of Columbia Superior Court revolves around Amazon’s Prime membership, which costs consumers $139 per year or $14.99 per month for fast deliveries — including one-day, two-day and same-day shipments — along with other enhancements. In mid-2022, the lawsuit alleges, the Seattle-based online retailer imposed what it called a delivery “exclusion” on two low-income zip codes in the district — 20019 and 20020 — and began relying exclusively on third-party delivery services such as UPS and the U.S.

Airline executives were relentlessly grilled by furious senators on Wednesday over skyrocketing fees for luggage, seat assignments, and other “money-grabbing” practices. During a scathing hearing led by Sen. Richard Blumenthal, chair of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, lawmakers accused the airlines of treating passengers like walking ATMs. Blumenthal didn’t mince words, declaring, “Airlines these days view their customers as little more than walking piggy banks to be shaken down for every possible dime.” He tore into executives from American, Delta, United, Spirit, and Frontier, armed with a report showing these airlines raked in a staggering $12.4 billion in seat fees between 2018 and 2023. Republican Sen.

UnitedHealthcare’s CEO was shot and killed Wednesday in a “brazen, targeted attack” outside a Manhattan hotel where the health insurer was holding its investor conference, police said, setting off a massive dragnet hours before the annual Rockefeller Center Christmas tree lighting nearby. Brian Thompson, 50, was shot around 6:45 a.m. as he walked alone to the New York Hilton Midtown from a nearby hotel, police said. The shooter appeared to be “lying in wait for several minutes” before approaching Thompson from behind and opening fire, New York City Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said. Police had not yet established a motive.

President-elect Donald Trump on Wednesday named a health care executive to serve as his administration’s lead hostage negotiator at a time when the U.S. is trying to secure the release of prisoners in Gaza and other regions around the world. Adam Boehler will serve as the special presidential envoy for hostage affairs. That role has been held since 2020 by Roger Carstens, who was appointed by Trump and remained in the job for the duration of the Biden administration. During that period, the U.S. has brought home several dozen Americans held hostage or wrongfully detained in countries including Russia — among them, WNBA star Brittney Griner and Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich — Iran, China, Venezuela and Afghanistan.

Nearly three out of 10 U.S. drugstores that were open during the previous decade had closed by 2021, new research shows. Black and Latino neighborhoods were most vulnerable to the retail pharmacy closures, which can chip away at already-limited care options in those communities, researchers said in a study published Tuesday in Health Affairs. The trend has potentially gained momentum since the study’s timeframe, because many drugstores are still struggling. In the last three years, the major chains Walgreens and CVS have closed hundreds of additional stores, and Rite Aid shrank as it went through a bankruptcy reorganization. Drugstores have been dealing with shrinking reimbursement for prescriptions, rising costs and changing customer shopping habits.

President Joe Biden on his visit to sub-Saharan Africa pledged another $600 million for a cross-continent rail corridor project Wednesday, telling regional leaders that “Africa has been left behind for much too long. But not anymore. Africa is the future.” Biden used the third and final day of his visit to Angola to showcase the Lobito Corridor railway, where the U.S. and allies are investing heavily to refurbish 800 miles (1,300 kilometers) of train lines in Zambia, Congo and Angola. The project aims to advance the U.S. presence in a region rich in cobalt, copper and other critical minerals used in batteries for electric vehicles, electronic devices and clean energy technologies.

Federal authorities on Tuesday urged telecommunication companies to boost network security following a sprawling Chinese hacking campaign that gave officials in Beijing access to private texts and phone conversations of an unknown number of Americans. The guidance issued by the FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency is intended to help root out the hackers and prevent similar cyberespionage in the future. Officials who briefed reporters on the recommendations said the U.S. still doesn’t know the true scope of China’s attack or the extent to which Chinese hackers still have access to U.S. networks.

President-elect Donald Trump is bringing Peter Navarro, a former adviser who served prison time related to the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, back to the White House for his second administration. Navarro will serve as a senior counselor for trade and manufacturing, Trump announced on Truth Social, his social media website. Trump wrote that the position “leverages Peter’s broad range of White House experience, while harnessing his extensive Policy analytic and Media skills.” Navarro, a trade adviser during Trump’s first term, was held in contempt of Congress for defying a subpoena from the House committee that investigated Jan. 6.

Years of legal wrangling have come to an end for a woman who spent 43 years behind bars for a killing that her attorneys argue was committed by a discredited police officer. A judge ruled Tuesday that Sandra Hemme can’t be retried, the final step in a tumultuous journey to making her freedom permanent. Hemme had been the longest-held wrongly incarcerated woman known in the U.S., according to her legal team at the Innocence Project. She was freed in July but under a cloud as Attorney General Andrew Bailey continued to argue that she should remain imprisoned. Last month, an appellate court found that some arguments raised by Bailey’s office bordered “on the absurd” and sided with the lower court judge that overturned her murder conviction.