Biden commutes dozens of death sentences. Donald Trump responds to people who say Elon Musk is in charge. And NBC News speaks to four families who found themselves in debt after joining the health care ministries.
Here’s what you need to know today.
Biden commutes dozens of death sentences to life without parole
federal prison complex in Terre Haute, Indiana (Michael Conroy/AP)
President Joe Biden has announced he will commute the death sentences of 37 inmates, leaving just three people on death row in federal prisons. The commuted sentences will be commuted to life sentences without the possibility of parole, according to the White House.
“These commutations are consistent with my administration’s moratorium on federal executions other than terrorism and hate-motivated mass killings,” Biden said in a statement. “Make no mistake: I condemn these murderers, mourn the victims of their despicable actions, and mourn all the families who have suffered unimaginable and irreparable losses.”
One of the inmates whose sentence Biden will commute, Billie Allen, has maintained his innocence. Allen said he felt his hopes were “cut off” when Donald Trump won the presidential election last month.
Around the time of Trump’s election, some prison staff taunted inmates at the prison in Terre Haute, Indiana, according to a death row inmate and two federal defenders. According to the same sources, execution rehearsals have also increased at the prison, where nearly all federal death row inmates are held, ahead of Trump’s inauguration.
The three men remaining on federal death row are Robert Bowers, who murdered 11 people at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh in 2018; Dylann Roof, who killed nine people in a 2015 shooting at a historically black church in Charleston, South Carolina; and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, one of the 2013 Boston Marathon bombers. In 2021, Attorney General Merrick Garland issued a moratorium on federal executions. No federal prisoners have been executed during Biden’s presidency.
Read the full story here.
Trump addresses Elon Musk’s growing political influence: ‘He will not be president’
President-elect Donald Trump rejected any suggestion he would be usurped by his ally Elon Musk, following a week in which the tech billionaire helped derail an emergency spending measure to avert a government shutdown.
Musk, owner of the social media site The Democrats mockingly call him ‘President Musk’. History shows that anyone who upsets Trump or diverts attention from him does not stay in his job for long.
Trump spoke for more than an hour at Turning Point USA’s AmericaFest conference in Phoenix, in his first rally-style event since the election. Trump said the idea that he “ceded the presidency” to Musk is not true, and that even if Musk wanted the job, he couldn’t get it because of the Constitution’s requirement that the US president be a natural-born citizen . Musk was born in South Africa.
Read the full story here.
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Honda and Nissan announce plans to merge to create the world’s third-largest automaker
Honda and Nissan exploring possible merger (Kiyoshi Ota/Bloomberg via Getty Images file)
Japanese automakers Nissan and Honda announced they had entered official talks to merge and create the world’s third-largest automaker.
Honda CEO Toshihiro Mibe said the companies needed greater scale to compete in developing new technologies in electric vehicles and intelligent driving. Mibe added that the integration, if approved, would be a medium- to long-term project that is not currently expected to show visible progress until 2030 and beyond.
Nissan’s strategic partner Mitsubishi has been given the opportunity to join the new group and will make a decision by the end of January 2025. The deal would focus on sharing intelligence and resources and deliver economies of scale and synergies while protecting both brands, Mibe said.
NYPD arrests person of interest in fatal burning of woman on subway train
A man described as a person of interest was taken into custody during the search for a suspect who fatally set a sleeping woman on fire on a subway train, New York City police said.
New York Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said at a news conference that a person was seen in the area shortly after the crime, sitting on a bench, and that an officer’s body camera captured clear images of him. Three people, described as high school subway riders, saw the man and called 911, Tisch said. Officers boarded the train, found the man and took him away.
The woman, who was not publicly identified, was sleeping on a stationary F train at the Stillwell Avenue station in Brooklyn. There came a man to her, set her on fire and fled the train car.
NFL Week 16 Highlights
Zyon McCollum, Brandon Aubrey, Bryan Anger (Jeffrey McWhorter / AP)
The Dallas Cowboys entered “Sunday Night Football” with no chance of making the playoffs, but clearly no one told them that as they defeated the Tampa Bay Buccaneers 26-24. While Dallas quarterback Cooper Rush threw for 292 yards and a touchdown, the team’s defense was the real story. NBC News sports editor Greg Rosenstein talks about NFL matchups this week:
🤕 Despite trailing by 13 points early in the fourth quarter, the Washington Commanders came back to defeat the Philadelphia Eagles 36-33. Washington quarterback Jayden Daniels finished with five touchdowns, none more important than Jamison Crowder’s grab in the final seconds to secure the victory. The Commanders improved to 10-5 this season, tied for the franchise’s most wins in a season since 1992. Philadelphia (12-3), previously on a 10-game winning streak, played most of the game without quarterback Jalen Hurts to start. who suffered a concussion late in the first quarter.
🏈Speaking of comebacks, the Buffalo Bills overcame a 14-point deficit in the first half to defeat the New England Patriots 24-21. Quarterback Josh Allen, an MVP candidate, had a mediocre game by his standards, but running back James Cook stepped up with two touchdowns, one rushing and one receiving. The win prevented the Kansas City Chiefs from holding the No. 1 seed in the AFC postseason.
🏃♂️Colts running back Jonathan Taylor was criticized last week for his goal-line fumble (which upset many fantasy football owners), but he bounced back with the best individual performance of the weekend. Taylor rushed for 218 yards and three touchdowns on 29 carries in a 38-30 win against the Tennessee Titans.
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Personnel choice: Uninsured while pregnant, she turned to a Christian cost-sharing group. Her family remained in debt.
Andrew Sheffield and Rachel Kaplan with their son Lucas at their home in Arden, NC, (Mike Belleme for NBC News)
Health care sharing ministries, a type of nonprofit medical cost-sharing organization, offer paying members reimbursement for some medical bills. The groups market themselves as a kind of faith-based alternative to health insurance and have grown substantially. But they are not subject to the same regulations, nor are they legally required to pay people back. Many of the groups specifically limit members’ eligibility for childbirth coverage, a challenge four families told NBC News they faced as members. All warned others not to participate.
This story grew out of health reporter Aria Bendix’s reporting for an earlier article about insured families facing medical debt due to complicated deliveries. Instead, here she tells the story of uninsured families who sought support outside the mainstream health care system during their pregnancies but were disappointed with the results.
–Dana Varinski, science and health editor
NBC Select: Online shopping, simplified
The Oura ring is a health tracker disguised as a metal ring. While it won’t replace your smartwatch, it will track your heart rate, exercise, and sleep. Here it is what NBC Select’s technical editor liked and didn’t like after four months of using the Oura Ring.
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This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
