First Run News

Senate Majority Leader MORE (R-Ky.) has his work cut out for him to save the Senate tax bill, which stalled Thursday evening after three GOP rebels threatened to effectively kill it. After weeks of careful negotiations, Senate Republicans are locked in a huge behind-the-scenes fight over what the tax bill should look like. To pass the bill, McConnell and his leadership team will have to craft substantial revisions and they have only 24 hours to do it, give or take, or otherwise postpone the effort altogether until next week. But that approach isn’t sitting well with

Russell Simmons, the hip-hop mogul who co-founded Def Jam Records and a slew of other businesses, is stepping down from his companies after a woman said he sexually assaulted her in 1991. His resignation followed a guest column in The Hollywood Reporter by Jenny Lumet, a screenwriter best known for “The Mummy” and “Rachel Getting Married.” “I have been informed with great anguish of Jenny Lumet’s recollection about our night together in 1991,” he said in a statement

She took decades to come forward. She can’t remember exactly what happened. She sent friendly text messages to the same man she says assaulted her.

In 1986, Maddie Corman was a 16-year-old actress performing Off Broadway as her mother lay dying in a hospital bed, hours after having a stroke. Backstage, Ms. Corman was consoled by Israel Horovitz, the show’s 47-year-old playwright and her mentor. As she prepared to go on, he pressed her against a wall and forcefully kissed her, she said in a recent interview. Jocelyn Meinhardt was 19 when she began a summer fellowship in 1989 with Mr.

Matt Lauer expressed “sorrow and regret for the pain I have caused” in a statement on Thursday morning, his first public comments after NBC News fired the star “Today” show anchor amid allegations of inappropriate sexual behavior with colleagues. “Some of what is being said about me is untrue or mischaracterized, but there is enough truth in these stories to make me feel embarrassed and ashamed,” Mr. Lauer wrote in a message issued by his public relations team.

LONDON — Egypt, in what appeared to be a snub to the Trump administration, has reached a preliminary agreement to allow Russian military jets to use its airspace and bases, both sides said Thursday. If finalized, the agreement would give Russia its deepest presence in Egypt since 1973, when Cairo expelled the military of the Soviet Union and instead became Washington’s closest Arab ally. The United States has provided Egypt more than $70 billion in aid in the four decades since, at a rate of more than $1.3 billion a year in recent years.

It was a distinguished group of lawyers that orchestrated the discreet fund-raiser in Washington in mid-November. Vernon E. Jordan Jr., the counselor to Democratic presidents, and Eric H. Holder Jr., the former attorney general, were listed as hosts on the invitation.

An undocumented Mexican immigrant was acquitted of murder and manslaughter charges on Thursday in the killing of Kathryn Steinle, whose death while out walking on a San Francisco pier became a touchstone in the national debate over immigration fueled by Donald J.

LONDON — One member of Parliament called him a “fascist.” Another described him as “stupid.” A third wondered aloud whether President Trump was “racist, incompetent or unthinking — or all three.” The stream of criticism that began after Mr.

LONDON — One member of Parliament called him a “fascist.” Another described him as “stupid.” A third wondered aloud whether President Trump was “racist, incompetent or unthinking — or all three.” The stream of criticism that began after Mr.