Putin expected to win a fifth term, says he agreed to swap Navalny for prisoners held in the West
Russian President Vladimir Putin said Sunday that he agreed with the idea of a prisoner swap involving opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who died in a penal colony, and “some people in prison in Western countries.” Putin said the swap would have had one condition — that Navalny never return to Russia.
The remarks came on the last day of a national election Putin was leading with 88% of the vote. The election has been marked by sporadic acts of protest from Russians.
Two women were arrested after they poured green dye into ballot boxes, authorities said, and Yuliya Navalnya, Navalny's widow, joined supporters who turned out at polling stations en masse Sunday in protest.
Tensions around the election have been growing in Russia since Navalny's death, and a Russian civil rights organization said a local election official in Moscow was detained for visiting a polling station wearing a T-shirt with "Navalny" written on it.
The Kremlin is treating voter turnout as a referendum on the Ukraine war, with a high turnout to vote for Putin potentially indicating continued support for him despite ongoing Western sanctions and growing diplomatic isolation.
Netanyahu rebukes latest criticism from U.S.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., described Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu last week as an "obstacle to peace" and called for fresh elections.
Netanyahu said Sunday that Schumer's call was "totally inappropriate" and reiterated at a Cabinet meeting that a ground invasion of Rafah, where over 1.4 million Palestinians are sheltering, would go ahead as planned.
The White House is considering options for how to respond if Israel defies President Joe Biden's repeated warnings against an invasion without a credible plan to protect Palestinian civilians, according to one former and three current U.S. officials.
The level of distrust and tension between the U.S. and Israeli governments marks an extraordinary shift from the bear hug Biden and Netanyahu shared five months ago shortly after the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attack.
Meanwhile, a shipment of aid carrying flour, rice and canned goods arrived via ship on Gaza's shore Friday, but there are still questions about how and when it will be distributed.
Follow NBC News' live coverage here.
Biden's behind-the-scenes anger over re-election effort
President Joe Biden locked up the 2024 Democratic nomination last week, according to NBC News’ projections, but the frustrations rippling through the party about his chances have reached the top.
At a private White House meeting in January, according to a lawmaker, Biden began to shout and swear after allies told him his poll numbers in Michigan and Georgia had dropped over his handling of the war between Israel and Hamas.
Biden is second-guessing travel decisions and communications strategies, he chafes at restraints from protective aides, and on occasion he has directed his ire at his tightknit senior staff.
Gunman shoots 3 family members; suspect taken into custody after standoff
The man accused of fatally shooting his family members in Pennsylvania before he fled to New Jersey was charged with multiple criminal offenses Sunday, authorities said.
Andre Gordon carjacked a driver in Trenton to get to Levittown, Pennsylvania, where he’s suspected of killing his stepmother, his 13-year-old sister and the mother of his two children, police said, He then carjacked another driver at gunpoint and fled to New Jersey, where he lives, they said.
SWAT team members and other officers surrounded the home and evacuated neighbors because people inside told authorities they believed Gordon was inside on the first floor, Trenton Mayor Reed Gusciora said in an interview. Police were in standoff mode, surrounding the residence and blocking off streets, but the suspect wasn’t home.
After he was spotted less than a quarter-mile away, Gordon was arrested and taken into custody without incident.
Trying to address service members' traumatic brain injuries
Before he ended his life, Ryan Larkin made his family promise to donate his brain to science.
Larkin, 29, a Navy SEAL, was convinced years of exposure to blasts had badly damaged his brain, even though doctors told him otherwise. A postmortem study ultimately found a pattern of brain scarring unique to service members who’ve endured repeated explosions.
Larkin, a combat medic and instructor who taught SEALs how to breach buildings with explosives, is far from alone, with data showing 492,000 traumatic brain injuries, mostly mild concussions, in the military from 2000 to 2023.
An Army reservist who carried out a high-profile mass shooting in Lewiston, Maine, last year was also found to have brain damage, underscoring how much the research and technology needed to fully understand and treat traumatic brain injury is still lagging.
No such thing as too young to climb Everest
Everest Base Camp sits 17,600 feet above sea level, and the standard round-trip is 80 miles long.
That didn’t deter some parents from taking their kids with them on the treacherous hike.
“Kids in general have a lot of energy,” says Dimple Laddha, who took her 6-year-old daughter on the hike. “I find it’s the duty of the parents to channel that energy in the right direction.”
After blisters, leeches and muddy trails, parents who took their young children on the climb say they're proud of what they accomplished together.
Meet the Press
At a rally Saturday, former President Donald Trump vowed there would be a "bloodbath" if he's not re-elected in November and said some undocumented immigrants were "not people."
Sunday on NBC News' "Meet the Press," moderator Kristen Welker asked GOP Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana whether Trump's comments were appropriate. Cassidy said Trump "always walks up to the edge" with his rhetoric but argued that he may have been talking about an "economic bloodbath."
He also said Trump's rhetoric about immigrants was "dehumanizing."
"The best thing going for Donald Trump running for president is that he’s running against Joe Biden, about whom many people also have reservations," Cassidy said. "And frankly, that's why people are considering third parties. So it’s a sorry state of affairs."
You can watch the full interview here.
Politics in brief
- Deepfake simulation: Experts war-gamed what could happen if AI-enabled tools turbocharge the spread of false information in the 2024 election. Things went sideways fast.
- Fundraising haul: President Joe Biden’s campaign and its connected fundraising organizations raised $53 million in February, the campaign announced Sunday.
- Ohio GOP infighting: The Republican Senate primary in Ohio was already a mean-spirited, mudslinging affair. And then Donald Trump came to town.
Swiping right for job leads
In China, Tinder won’t just get you a hook-up these days. The dating app can also set you up with a new job.
Frustrated with high unemployment and intense competition, some young professionals are using Tinder and other dating apps to further their career goals.
“I simply swiped right on individuals in the industry I aspire to join,” said Jade Liang, a master’s student in Shanghai. Liang decided to dust off her Tinder account after she applied to more than 400 jobs online without success.
The Tinder approach doesn't come without risks. Romy Liu, who previously worked for an executive search company, warned that state-owned firms might "permanently blacklist" applicants who swipe for jobs on Tinder.
In case you missed it
- A suspect in the fatal shooting of a New Mexico State Police officer is in custody following a two-day manhunt.
- A Texas woman said she was drugged and kidnapped, then fatally shot her alleged kidnapper, police say.
- The convictions of teenage school shooter Ethan Crumbley's parents have set a legal precedent that could lead prosecutors to bring more cases against parents for the actions of their children.
- U.S. Marines were among 20,000 troops from 13 countries in the Arctic for NATO’s “Nordic Response” exercise, part of the biggest war games since the Cold War. Military leaders say control of the Arctic could be "critical" to a future conflict.
- Critics of the proposed TikTok ban working its way through Congress fear it could embolden authoritarian censorship abroad.
- Signs of depression in teenage boys are going undetected, mental health experts warn, leaving them without the help they need.
- Miami's chief heat officer is working to figure out how to protect people most vulnerable to spiking temperatures while navigating Florida politics around climate change.
- What's consumers' relationship with the economy these days? It's complicated.
- It's just water in a can. How did it become a billion-dollar business?
