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.

Researchers at Rambam Medical Center in Haifa have made a groundbreaking discovery, identifying a mutation in the TBCB gene (Tubulin Folding Cofactor B) that is linked to autism spectrum disorder (ASD), developmental delays, and movement disorders. The mutation is found in 1 in 80 Ashkenazi Jews, significantly higher than its occurrence in the general population. The research, conducted by Dr. Sharon Bratman-Morag and Dr. Karin Weiss, has led to the inclusion of TBCB genetic screening in Israel’s national healthcare basket, ensuring all prospective parents have access to this test.

U.S. authorities made about 46,700 arrests for illegally crossing the border from Mexico in November, down about 17% from October to a new low for Joe Biden’s presidency, an official said Tuesday. The arrest tally marked a decline of more than 80% from an all-time high of nearly 250,000 in December and casts doubt on predictions of an increase ahead of President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration Jan. 20. U.S. authorities made about 700 arrests on the Canadian border in November, down from 1,283 in October, according to a U.S. Customs and Border Protection official who spoke on condition of anonymity because the figures are preliminary and not made public.

Jewish American job seekers face major hurdles in the U.S. labor market, needing to send 24% more applications to receive the same number of positive responses from prospective employers as candidates with Western European backgrounds, according to a new study published by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) Center for Antisemitism Research. The study, conducted by renowned labor economist Dr. Bryan Tomlin, revealed an even starker reality for Israeli Americans, who had to send 39% more applications to secure similar responses. The findings shed light on the persistence of antisemitic bias in hiring practices, even for roles as seemingly neutral as administrative assistant positions. Dr. Tomlin’s research involved a large-scale field experiment between May and October 2024.

France’s far-right and left-wing lawmakers joined together to vote Wednesday a no-confidence motion prompted by budget disputes that forces Prime Minister Michel Barnier to resign. The National Assembly approved the motion by 331 votes. A minimum of 288 were needed. President Emmanuel Macron insisted he will serve the rest of his term until 2027. However, he will need to appoint a new prime minister for the second time after July’s legislative elections led to a deeply divided parliament. (AP)

President-elect Donald Trump said Wednesday that he has selected a former soldier and Iraq War veteran to serve as secretary of the Army. Trump said Daniel P. Driscoll had completed Army Ranger school and deployed with the 10th Mountain Division to Iraq. Driscoll, who is from North Carolina, had been recently serving as a senior adviser to Vice President-elect JD Vance. Driscoll graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Yale Law School. “Dan will be a fearless and relentless fighter for America’s Soldiers and the America First agenda,” Trump said on his social media platform. The Army did not immediately respond to a request for Driscoll’s military service record. (AP)

An elaborate parody appears to be behind an effort to resurrect Enron, the Houston-based energy company that exemplified the worst in American corporate fraud and greed after it went bankrupt in 2001. If its return is comedic, some former employees who lost everything in Enron’s collapse aren’t laughing. “It’s a pretty sick joke and it disparages the people that did work there. And why would you want to even bring it back up again?” said former Enron employee Diana Peters, who represented workers in the company’s bankruptcy proceedings. Here’s what to know about the history of Enron and the purported effort to bring it back. What happened at Enron? Once the nation’s seventh-largest company, Enron filed for bankruptcy protection on Dec.

President-elect Donald Trump’s transition team on Tuesday signed an agreement to allow the Justice Department to conduct background checks on his nominees and appointees after a weeks-long delay. The step lets Trump transition aides and future administration staffers obtain security clearances before Inauguration Day to access classified information about ongoing government programs, an essential step for a smooth transiton of power. It also allows those nominees who are up for Senate confirmation to face the background checks lawmakers want before voting on them. Teams of investigators have been standing by to process clearances for Trump aides and advisers.