A note sent to media outlets in February connected to the disappearance of Nancy Guthrie, mother of NBC “Today” show anchor Savannah Guthrie, said she had died, multiple law enforcement sources briefed on the investigation told CNN. It followed a first note that demanded a ransom of millions of dollars. Investigators believed they are legitimate communications from the kidnappers. The second note said Nancy Guthrie was dead — and they did not mean to kill her, but she died shortly after the kidnapping, according to the law enforcement sources. The family responded with an emotional video on February 7 when Savannah Guthrie said, “We received your message, and we understand.”
https://edition.cnn.com/2026/06/22/us/nancy-guthrie-ransom-note
The deadly destruction of a Florida beachfront condominium actually started weeks before it collapsed into a pile of rubble in the middle of the night, killing 98 people in 2021, federal investigators found in a final report issued Monday. The National Institute of Standards and Technology said in the report that two connections between garage columns and the pool deck started to fail around early June. The combination of a structure design that did not meet building codes and alterations made to it over its 40 years meant that the other parts of the pool deck weren’t strong enough to withstand the extra load, leading to the type of slow-motion collapse. “When building structures are designed and built to required codes and standards, they have margins against failure, meaning they should be able to support much more load than they are expected to bear,” said Judith Mitrani-Reiser, who co-led the investigation. “In the case of Champlain Towers South, these margins against failure were too narrow from the start.”
https://edition.cnn.com/2026/06/22/us/florida-surfside-condo-collapse-report
The catchphrase made famous by Bill Clinton’s 1992 presidential campaign springs to mind when considering the instability that seems to have become a feature of Britain’s political life. The United Kingdom is on course for its sixth prime minister in some seven years, as one political leader after another proves no match for a stubbornly weak economy, which has weighed on incomes and living standards, wearing down the electorate. Outgoing Prime Minister and Labour Party leader Keir Starmer, who is stepping down after just two years in the role, is in good company. His four predecessors — Rishi Sunak, Liz Truss, Boris Johnson and Theresa May — faced many of the same thorny challenges, and abided similarly brief terms.
https://edition.cnn.com/2026/06/23/business/uk-prime-ministers-economy-intl
As the justices of the Supreme Court prepared to meet behind closed doors on February 27, they had before them an explosive case involving President Donald Trump, who is seeking to overturn a federal jury’s finding that he sexually abused and defamed magazine columnist E. Jean Carroll. But a day before the justices held that private meeting, the Trump case was yanked without explanation. Since then, the politically sensitive appeal, which Trump initially filed in November, has been set on the court’s agenda and rescheduled 15 times. Only one other has been rescheduled as often in the current term, according to a CNN analysis.
https://edition.cnn.com/2026/06/22/politics/supreme-court-e-jean-carroll-donald-trump-appeal
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer was felled by a curse haunting most Western leaders — a failure to deliver change to voters who’ve lost trust in the capacity of modern politics to make their lives better and more affordable. Starmer, who announced his resignation Monday only two years after winning a parliamentary landslide, was unable to push through his program in an era of political chaos, stigmatized institutions and wrenching economic disruption. From the UK to Germany to France to the United States, leaders tap voter anger to get elected and promise to restore prosperity. But once in power, they often find it impossible to fulfill their promises, after failing to free-up entrenched political systems, control their parties, counter global economic forces or to overcome the cacophony of politics in the age of social media.
https://edition.cnn.com/2026/06/22/politics/keir-starmer-western-leaders-voter-anger