President Joe Biden was kept in the dark over his defense secretary's cancer diagnosis and subsequent hospitalizations for about a month, the White House admitted Tuesday, as details of Lloyd Austin's deeply unusual disappearance raised questions about leadership of the world's top military.

The 70-year-old's failure to disclose his hospitalization has prompted an extraordinary row in Washington and could be embarrassing for Biden, who faces multiple foreign crises in his reelection campaign year, including in Israel and Ukraine.

As defense secretary, career soldier Austin is personally overseeing military deployments to try and contain fallout from the Israel-Hamas war, which has sparked violence against American forces in Iraq and Syria as well as attacks on international shipping in the Red Sea.

After days of refusal to issue details, the Pentagon came out Tuesday with its first full account of Austin's health issues, but the new transparency came too late for a clearly upset White House.

In recorded calls released by the IDF, several Gazan civilians are heard stating how the terror group uses civilian infrastructure and aid organizations as cover for its activities.

Gazan civilians have testified to officers of the IDF's Unit 504 how Hamas murdered Gazan civilians who tried to get help from UNRWA and that Hamas terrorists steal food from US aid organizations and seize civilian properties for military use.

In one recorded call, a Gazan civilian testified that Hamas murdered his cousin because he tried to seek help from UNRWA. In another conversation, a civilian said he does not leave his home because he fears Hamas will seize it and use the property to fire toward Israel and destroy his house.

One civilian is heard on a recording saying, "When will you get rid of [Hamas]? They killed my cousin yesterday because he went to UNRWA."

"They killed him in Rafah," the civilian tells the IDF officer.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House said Monday that the administration will review what rules or procedures weren’t followed when Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin did not disclose his hospitalization for days to President Joe Biden and top officials at the Pentagon and the National Security Council.

“We’ll do what’s akin to a hot wash and try to see if processes and procedures need to be changed at all or modified so that we can learn from this,” John Kirby, the National Security Council spokesman, said Monday when asked whether Biden wanted a review of what happened.

Austin was hospitalized on Jan. 1, which the Pentagon did not disclose to the public until Friday. Biden and Jake Sullivan, the president’s national security adviser, were not aware of Austin’s condition until Thursday.

The Pentagon has refused to offer details about Austin’s initial medical procedure on Dec. 22 and what prompted him to be admitted into intensive care at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center on New Year’s Day. Austin has resumed his duties after deferring to a deputy, although he remains hospitalized.

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Wisconsin’s Democratic governor opposes keeping Republican Donald Trump off the ballot in the battleground state, saying that those who think he should be disqualified “can vote against him.”

Gov. Tony Evers also told The Associated Press in an interview Wednesday that in order for President Joe Biden to win Wisconsin, he must be a frequent visitor to the state and focus his message on his successes and issues that matter to the middle class, not just the argument that the fate of democracy is at stake.

Evers’ comments come ahead of a visit to Wisconsin later this month by Vice President Kamala Harris and ahead of the planned filing Friday of a lawsuit by a Democratic activist aimed at keeping Trump off the ballot, arguing that his involvement in the Jan. 6, 2021, U.S. Capitol riot amounted to unconstitutional insurrection.

Officials in Colorado and Maine have already banned Trump’s name from primary election ballots. Trump asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday to overturn the Colorado Supreme Court ruling from December that stripped his name from the state’s ballot.

WASHINGTON, Jan 4 (Reuters) - North Korea recently provided Russia with ballistic missiles and launchers for use in Moscow's war against Ukraine, some of which Russia has fired into Ukraine, the White House said on Thursday, citing newly declassified intelligence.

National security spokesperson John Kirby told reporters the United States will raise the development with the United Nations Security Council.

Kirby called North Korea's arms transfer to Russia a "significant and concerning escalation" and said the United States would impose additional sanctions against those facilitating the arms deals.

"Our information indicates that the Democratic People's Republic of Korea recently provided Russia with ballistic missile launchers and several ballistic missiles," said Kirby, using the official name of North Korea.

A consumer action group is accusing Starbucks of exploiting customers via its gift card and app payments, forcing them to enter a spending cycle where they will never be able to fully spend the remaining balance of prepaid amounts.

The Washington Consumer Protection Coalition, a self-described “movement of everyday consumers advocating for corporate accountability,” is calling on the state attorney general to investigate whether the company’s policies violate consumer protection laws.

“Starbucks rigs its payment platform so consumers are encouraged to leave unspent money on their cards and apps,” said Chris Carter, campaign manager for the group, in a statement. “A few dollars here and there left on a payment platform may not sound like a lot but it adds up. Over the last five years Starbucks has claimed nearly $900 million in unspent gift card and app money as corporate revenue, boosting corporate profits and inflating executive bonuses.”

Recognizing the broad consensus as expressed by 44 countries around the world on December 19, 2023, as well as the statement by the UN Security Council on December 1, 2023, condemning Houthi attacks against commercial vessels transiting the Red Sea, and in light of ongoing attacks, including a significant escalation over the past week targeting commercial vessels, with missiles, small boats, and attempted hijackings,

We hereby reiterate the following and warn the Houthis against further attacks:

Ongoing Houthi attacks in the Red Sea are illegal, unacceptable, and profoundly destabilizing. There is no lawful justification for intentionally targeting civilian shipping and naval vessels. Attacks on vessels, including commercial vessels, using unmanned aerial vehicles, small boats, and missiles, including the first use of anti-ship ballistic missiles against such vessels, are a direct threat to the freedom of navigation that serves as the bedrock of global trade in one of the world’s most critical waterways.

These attacks threaten innocent lives from all over the world and constitute a significant international problem that demands collective action. Nearly 15 percent of global seaborne trade passes through the Red Sea, including 8 percent of global grain trade, 12 percent of seaborne-traded oil and 8 percent of the world’s liquefied natural gas trade. International shipping companies continue to reroute their vessels around the Cape of Good Hope, adding significant cost and weeks of delay to the delivery of goods, and ultimately jeopardizing the movement of critical food, fuel, and humanitarian assistance throughout the world.

Let our message now be clear: we call for the immediate end of these illegal attacks and release of unlawfully detained vessels and crews. The Houthis will bear the responsibility of the consequences should they continue to threaten lives, the global economy, and free flow of commerce in the region’s critical waterways. We remain committed to the international rules-based order and are determined to hold malign actors accountable for unlawful seizures and attacks.

Alicia Menendez was filling in for Nicolle Wallace as host of “Deadline: White House” when the Department of Justice slapped the senator with the superseding indictment.

“We have to take a quick break,” the senator’s daughter said with about five minutes left in her two-hour guest stint. “And we’ll be back with some breaking news right after this.”

After the commercials ended, Menendez was no longer on camera and MSNBC host Ari Melber greeted viewers with the latest allegations against the senator.

New York federal court documents containing previously hidden names of people associated in some way with the late notorious sex offender Jeffrey Epstein will be unsealed Wednesday, an official said.

Many of the more than 150 people named in the civil court filings have previously been publicly disclosed as connected in some way with Epstein, who killed himself in 2019 after being arrested on federal child sex trafficking charges.

The soon-to-be unsealed documents were filed in connection with a Manhattan federal court lawsuit by Epstein victim Virginia Giuffre against Epstein’s longtime accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell.

“Things should start getting unsealed today,” Edward Friedland, the district executive for that court, told CNBC.

The year ahead, from one perspective, will be the most successful democracy has ever seen. Never in history will so many people have the opportunity to put a mark on a ballot: More than half the world’s almost six billion adults will go to the polls in some sort of nationwide vote in 2024, according to an estimate by The Economist.

Those elections will include some of the world’s biggest and most populated countries – India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Russia, Mexico, the United States, and likely Britain and Canada, will have a major vote in 2024, as will the European Parliament. You could call it a high-water mark for democracy, if the success of democracy were measured only by people voting.

Most crucial will be the Nov. 5 presidential election in the U.S., whose outcome could set the temperature of democracy worldwide. But while Donald Trump’s sometimes violent assaults on democratic institutions and outspoken alliances with overseas autocrats, if returned to world politics in a second presidential term, have the ominous potential of cementing a worldwide far-right authoritarian bloc, he is far from the only democracy-threatening candidate on the ballot next year.

The Sweden-based International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance, in its 2023 report, described 2022 as “the sixth consecutive year in which more countries have experienced net declines in democratic processes than net improvements.” And 2023 will almost certainly prove to have been a seventh – “democracy has continued to contract,” its analysis found, with declines of at least one major democratic measure in half the world’s countries.