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  Actor and Democratic megadonor George Clooney called on President Joe Biden to drop out of the 2024 presidential race in a blistering op-ed, saying the Biden he encountered at a fundraiser three weeks ago was diminished compared to the version of the president he knew years ago. Colorado’s Michael Bennet is the first Democratic senator to publicly say that he doesn’t believe Biden is capable of winning reelection after his disastrous debate performance last month. Several House Democrats have also publicly called on Biden to drop out of the race. But Democratic aides to the president say they are “done talking about the debate” as they attempt to shift focus to the effort to defeat former President Donald Trump. The Republican National Convention, where the GOP will nominate Trump as its presidential candidate, kicks off next week in Milwaukee. The convention’s platform committee has overwhelmingly passed the new Trump-aligned Republican platform, which softened the party’s language

  The two surviving Americans in a group of four   violently abducted last week   in Mexico returned to U.S. soil Tuesday, one of them with a leg wound not considered life-threatening. Mexican authorities said the two other members of the group traveling for cosmetic surgery were killed Friday after getting caught in the crossfire of rival cartel groups in the border city of Matamoros in Tamaulipas state, just south of Brownsville, Texas. Tamaulipas Gov. Americo Villarreal said the Americans, traveling in a white minivan, had crossed the border only 2 1/2 hours before the shooting occurred. A 33-year-old woman not linked to the group was killed by a stray bullet, he said. Attorney General Irving Barrios said no ransom was demanded and all signs point to the U.S. travelers being the victims of mistaken identity. They were kidnapped after the attack and located Tuesday around 8 a.m. in a house outside Matamoros, Barrios said. A suspect who was standing guard over them has been arrested.

  In 2017, the Weinstein investigation and #MeToo movement shook the world. Where does the industry stand today? When actress Sarah Ann Masse saw the  New York Times ’ investigation of Harvey Weinstein, published five years ago this October, her heart dropped into her stomach. For the first time since Weinstein had interviewed her in his underwear to be a nanny for his children in 2008, pulling her into a tight hug and telling her he loved her, she learned she was not alone. “I saw the first story and started thinking,  Well, maybe now I can talk, maybe now I can tell my story, and my career won’t be destroyed ,” she remembers. She  told her story in  Variety  at the time and ended up joining the class action lawsuit against Weinstein, who has since been sentenced to 23 years in prison in New York and faces further charges in Los Angeles. “I was most fearful about retaliation,” Masse says. “And in those first couple of months, after people started coming forward with their stories abou

  The Mom Who Stole Her Daughter’s Identity When a young victim of domestic violence showed up in a small town in Missouri, the residents took her in. But she wasn’t who she said she was. MOUNTAIN VIEW POLICE DEPARTMENT / ARTWORK BY MATTHIEU BOUREL In early 2016, a blonde stranger with round cheeks arrived at a domestic violence shelter near the small town of West Plains, Missouri, visibly shaken. She said her name was Lauren Ashleigh Hays and that she was 22 years old. The story Lauren told was both familiar and sad: She was running from a boyfriend who beat her. She needed help starting over. A woman affiliated with the shelter had friends nearby named Wendy and Avery Parker, who offered to take Lauren in. The Parkers, an older married couple, found Lauren an old truck to drive and a place to live in their town of Willow Springs, a quaint community with 2,160 residents and a main street lined with red brick buildings. They helped her enroll at a satellite campus of Southwest Baptist