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12. Clemson Tigers 10-3 (7-1 Atlantic Coast Conference regular season) What's next: First-round at No. 5 seed Texas, Dec. 21 Head coach: Dabo Swinney (17th season, 180-46 overall) About Swinney: The 55-year-old, who is 6-4 in the CFP, took over during the 2008 season and has won two national titles (2016, 2018). He will take the Tigers to the CFP the first time since the 2020 season and the seventh time overall. Resume The Tigers, the only three-loss team in the 12-team field, were in a must-win situation in the ACC championship game, prevailing on a last-second, 56-yard field goal to defeat SMU 34-31. Clemson lost two games to SEC opponents (Georgia and South Carolina) this season. The Tigers' other defeat came at home to Louisville. The matchup with Texas will be Clemson's first true road game against the SEC this season. Postseason history A nine-time winner of the ACC Championship Game, the Tigers notched a double-figure win total for the 13th time in the last 14 seasons. Along with its two national titles, Clemson reached the title game two other times (2019 and 2015). This will be the first Clemson-Texas matchup. The road to Atlanta It will be a tricky road for the Tigers to reach the CFP title game in Atlanta at a venue familiar to Clemson fans. The Tigers will take at least two and maybe three trips outside of their own time zone to qualify for the final. Names to know QB Cade Klubnik Klubnik, a Texas native, has been taking snaps in crucial situations since a limited role as a freshman in 2022, when he rescued the Tigers in an ACC Championship victory vs. North Carolina. Sporting a 19-8 career record as a starter, Klubnik has thrown for 3,303 yards and 33 touchdowns along with five interceptions this season. He tossed four TDs in the ACC title game Dec. 7 against SMU after receiving All-ACC honorable mention following the regular season. "He's battle-tested," Swinney said. "He has got a lot of experience under his belt. He has had some failure, which has made him better." RB Phil Mafah The senior has racked up 1,106 rushing yards with eight touchdowns this season and has 28 career scores. Mafah has averaged fewer than 17 carries per game, so he makes the most of his opportunities, and at 230 pounds he can be a load to bring down. DE T.J. Parker He's been disruptive on a regular basis, racking up 19 tackles for loss (11 sacks) this season. The 265-pound sophomore helped set the tone in the ACC title game when the Tigers feasted on early SMU mistakes. Parker is tied for the Division I lead with six forced fumbles this season. K Nolan Hauser The freshman joined the Tigers this season with great acclaim and produced a career highlight with a 56-yard game-winning field goal -- the longest in ACC title game history -- to beat SMU at the buzzer. --Field Level Media

Stock market today: Wall Street rallies ahead of Christmas Stocks closed higher on Wall Street ahead of the Christmas holiday, led by gains in Big Tech stocks. The S&P 500 added 1.1% Tuesday. Trading closed early ahead of the holiday. Alex Veiga, The Associated Press Dec 24, 2024 10:12 AM Dec 24, 2024 10:35 AM Share by Email Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Print Share via Text Message Lights marking the entrance to a subway station frame the New York Stock Exchange in New York's Financial District on Monday, Dec. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Peter Morgan) Stocks closed higher on Wall Street ahead of the Christmas holiday, led by gains in Big Tech stocks. The S&P 500 added 1.1% Tuesday. Trading closed early ahead of the holiday. Tech companies including Apple, Amazon and chip company Broadcom helped pull the market higher. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.9%, and the Nasdaq composite climbed 1.3%. American Airlines shook off an early loss and ended mostly higher after the airline briefly grounded flights nationwide due to a technical issue. Treasury yields held steady in the bond market. The yield on the 10-year Treasury was little changed at 4.59% THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below. Tech companies led a broad rally for U.S. stocks Tuesday, a boost for the market in a holiday-shortened trading session. The S&P 500 rose 0.8% in midday trading. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 273 points, or 0.6%, as of 12:18 p.m. Eastern time. The tech-heavy Nasdaq composite was up 1%. Chip company Broadcom rose 2.9%, while semiconductor giant Nvidia, whose enormous valuation gives it an outsize influence on indexes, rose 0.8%. Super Micro Computer jumped 5.8%. Tesla climbed 5.1%, one of the biggest gains among S&P 500 stocks. Amazon.com rose 1.6% American Airlines slipped 0.1% after the airline briefly grounded flights nationwide due to a technical issue. U.S. Steel rose 1.1% a day after an influential government panel failed to reach consensus on the possible national security risks of the nearly $15 billion proposed sale to Nippon Steel of Japan. NeueHealth surged 68.9% after the health care company agreed to be taken private in a deal valued at roughly $1.3 billion. Treasury yields rose in the bond market. The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.61% from 4.59% late Monday. European markets were mostly higher. Markets in Asia mostly gained ground. U.S. markets will close at 1 p.m. Eastern and stay closed Wednesday for Christmas. Wall Street has several economic reports to look forward to this week, including a weekly update on unemployment benefits on Thursday. Tuesday’s rally comes as the stock market enters what’s historically been a very cheerful season. The last five trading days of each year, plus the first two in the new year, have brought an average gain of 1.3% since 1950. The so-called “Santa rally” also correlates closely with positive returns in January and the upcoming year. So far this month, the U.S. stock market has lost some of its gains since President-elect Donald Trump’s win on Election Day, which raised hopes for faster economic growth and more lax regulations that would boost corporate profits. Worries have risen that Trump’s preference for tariffs and other policies could lead to higher inflation , a bigger U.S. government debt and difficulties for global trade. Even so, the stock market remains on pace to deliver strong returns for 2024. The benchmark S&P 500 is up about 26% so far this year and remains within roughly 1.3% of the all-time high it set earlier this month — its latest of 57 record highs this year. Alex Veiga, The Associated Press See a typo/mistake? Have a story/tip? This has been shared 0 times 0 Shares Share by Email Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Print Share via Text Message More The Mix Magic and lights draw crowds to an alpine village in Washington state for Christmas Dec 24, 2024 10:22 AM YVR janitors suspend strike escalation after tentative deal Dec 24, 2024 9:30 AM Seafarers move global trade - and Christmas gifts. These ministries bring them holiday cheer Dec 24, 2024 9:06 AM Featured Flyer

In a new interview, the scandal-plagued Gaetz reaffirmed his commitment to being a member of Trump’s ‘America First army’. Former United States Congress member Matt Gaetz has confirmed he will not resume his seat in the House of Representatives, amid scrutiny over sex-trafficking allegations. Gaetz had been President-elect Donald Trump’s first pick for the role of attorney general in his incoming administration. But speaking on Friday to the conservative podcast The Charlie Kirk Show, Gaetz addressed his decision to withdraw his name from consideration, as controversy loomed over his nomination. “I think that eight years is probably enough time in the United States Congress,” Gaetz said in the interview. “I’m still going to be in the fight, but it’s going to be from a new perch. I do not intend to join the 119th Congress.” Gaetz, the son of a former Florida state senator, had served as the US representative for Florida’s 1st Congressional District since 2017. But on November 13, when Trump nominated him to lead the Department of Justice, Gaetz abruptly resigned his seat in Congress. Critics pointed out that his resignation came just days before the bipartisan House Ethics Committee was slated to release a report digging into allegations that Gaetz had sex with a minor, engaged in “illicit drug use” and “shared inappropriate images or videos on the House floor”. Gaetz has denied the allegations. But his departure from the House threw the report into limbo, as prominent Republicans argued the committee was only tasked with investigating active members. Democrats, meanwhile, argued the report’s publication was necessary to ensure a transparent and fully informed confirmation process in the Senate. On Wednesday, the committee voted along party lines to withhold the report. By the following day, however, Gaetz announced he would no longer be seeking the attorney general’s position in Trump’s administration. He explained his nomination was “unfairly becoming a distraction” to the goals of the Trump presidency. In Friday’s interview, Gaetz put a positive spin on his brief but fraught nomination. “I know there are people disappointed that I won’t be the next attorney general. But you have to understand: This is the political process, and sometimes the path you’re on is one that takes you to a different place, and it can be a glorious place,” he said. He added that he “enjoyed” his meeting with Republican senators earlier this week, as they discussed the ethics report. Still, he denied that the report played a role in his decision to abandon the confirmation process. “There is a play that is run in Washington when they’re trying to smear somebody. They go and dredge up false, years-old allegations of the most salacious and clickbaity flavour possible,” Gaetz said. “If the things that the House ethics report [said] were true, I would be under indictment and probably in a prison cell. But, of course, they’re false.” He cited his leading role in the removal of former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy in 2023 as stirring up animosity against him. With all the controversy and internal party tensions he faced, Gaetz described his brief stint as the attorney general nominee as akin to “having to do two jobs at one time”. “I had a full-time job explaining to senators that maybe a tweet I said about them was rash and not reflective of how I would serve as attorney general,” Gaetz said. “And at the same time, I was having to build out the Department of Justice with the right human talent, the right policy infrastructure.” One prominent question remained, though: Would Gaetz resume his seat in the House of Representatives? After all, Gaetz had already won re-election on November 5, making him eligible to join the 119th Congress when it gets sworn in early next year. Kirk, the podcast host and prominent conservative activist, put the question to Gaetz. “I’ve been in an elected office for 14 years. I first got elected to the state House when I was 26 years old,” Gaetz responded. “I’m 42 now, and I’ve got some other goals in life that I’m eager to pursue.” He nevertheless underscored his commitment to being part of Trump’s “America First army”. On Thursday, Trump quickly replaced Gaetz as his attorney general nominee with former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi , another longtime ally. On Friday, Gaetz emphasised that he and Bondi shared the same vision, and he was delighted a fellow Floridian would be his replacement. “My good friend Pam Bondi is going to be a phenomenal attorney general for Donald Trump,” he said. “She has the legal acumen. She hates criminals. She is a bright legal mind and a fellow Floridian. I think that, even though the path will take me to a different station in life and a different place in the fight for our agenda and President Trump, we’ve got a great person in place.”

he game between the and the will be a matchup between two disappointing teams who were expected to be . However, both franchises are far from that and even , but their meeting on Monday night has raised interest and not precisely because of the brand of the . The game will have an additional ingredient, as the duel will feature live animation and a transformation of the two teams in the style of . will be broadcast on and platforms worldwide, and fans will be able to see players from both teams, as well as coaches, referees and even commentators, transformed into the iconic characters of in real time. While , home of the Cowboys, the animated game between the two teams will take place at . As with previous alternate presentations of games, will be presented alongside the traditional MNF broadcast, giving fans a fun and very different way to enjoy the game with all the characters from the famous TV series. According to the NFL's announcement, the creators of The Simpsons have collaborated with the league "to ensure the authenticity of the longest-running scripted primetime series, with more than 750 episodes." How is the conversion done and how will the characters from The Simpsons appear? Each Bengals and Cowboys player . The tracking technology used by and , which will be combined with optical tracking to ensure fans see "every play, run, pass, score and more" from the real-life Bengals vs. Cowboys game on Monday live. , while , creating a true family dynamic as father and son will be cheering on their respective teams. The iconic duo will even jump into the game at select key opportunities, "replacing a player and joining their 10 other teammates on the field." In addition, throughout the game, while . In addition to the Simpson family, dozens of the show's iconic characters will also appear in the broadcast, all voiced by their respective real-life voice actors. Additionally, will each have their own group of followers who will join them in cheering

World News | Iran Restores Access to WhatsApp and Google Play After They Were Banned Amid ProtestsPolice arrested a 26-year-old man on Monday in the Manhattan killing of UnitedHealthcare’s CEO after they say a Pennsylvania McDonald's worker alerted authorities to a customer who resembled the suspected gunman. The suspect, identified by police as Luigi Nicholas Mangione, had a gun believed to be the one used in Wednesday’s attack on Brian Thompson , as well as writings expressing anger at corporate America, police said. Here are some of the latest developments in the investigation: Mangione was taken into custody at around 9:15 a.m. after police received a tip that he was eating at a McDonald’s in Altoona, Pennsylvania, about 85 miles (137 kilometers) east of Pittsburgh, police said. Mangione was being held in Pennsylvania on gun charges and will eventually be extradited to New York to face charges in connection with Thompson’s death , said NYPD Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny. In addition to a three-page, handwritten document that suggests he harbored “ill will toward corporate America,” Kenny said Mangione also had a ghost gun, a type of weapon that can be assembled at home and is difficult to trace. Officers questioned Mangione, who was acting suspiciously and carrying multiple fraudulent IDs, as well as a U.S. passport, New York Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said at a news conference. Officers also found a sound suppressor, or silencer, “consistent with the weapon used in the murder,” the commissioner said. He had clothing and a mask similar to those worn by the shooter and a fraudulent New Jersey ID matching one the suspect used to check into a New York City hostel before the shooting, Tisch said. Kenny said Mangione was born and raised in Maryland, has ties to San Francisco and that his last known address is in Honolulu. Mangione, who was valedictorian of his Maryland prep school, earned undergraduate and graduate degrees in computer science in 2020 from the University of Pennsylvania, a university spokesman told The Associated Press on Monday. He learned to code in high school and helped start a club at Penn for people interested in gaming and game design, according to a 2018 story in Penn Today, a campus publication. His social media posts also suggest that he belonged to the fraternity Phi Kappa Psi. They also show him taking part in a 2019 program at Stanford University, and in photos with family and friends at the Jersey Shore and in Hawaii, San Diego, Puerto Rico, and other destinations. The Gilman School, from which Mangione graduated in 2016, is one of Baltimore’s elite prep schools. Some of the city’s wealthiest and most prominent people, including Orioles legend Cal Ripken Jr., have had children attend the school. Its alumni include sportswriter Frank Deford and former Arizona Gov. Fife Symington. In his valedictory speech, Luigi Mangione described his classmates’ “incredible courage to explore the unknown and try new things,” according to a post on the school website. He praised their collective inventiveness and pioneering mindset. Mangione took a software programming internship after high school at Maryland-based video game studio Firaxis, where he fixed bugs on the hit strategy game Civilization 6, according to a LinkedIn profile. Firaxis parent company Take-Two Interactive said Monday it would not comment on former employees. He more recently worked at the car-buying website TrueCar, according to the head of the Santa Monica, California-based company. “While we generally don’t comment on personnel matters, we confirm that Luigi Mangione has not been an employee of our company since 2023,” TrueCar CEO Jantoon Reigersman said by email. Mangione comes from a prominent Maryland family. His grandfather Nick Mangione, who died in 2008, was a successful real estate developer. One of his best-known projects was Turf Valley Resort, a sprawling luxury retreat and conference center outside Baltimore that he purchased in 1978. The father of 10 children, Nick Mangione prepared his five sons — including Luigi Mangione’s father, Louis Mangione — to help manage the family business, according to a 2003 Washington Post report. The Mangione family also purchased Hayfields Country Club north of Baltimore in 1986. On Monday, Baltimore County police officers blocked off an entrance to the property, which public records link to Luigi Mangione’s parents. Reporters and photographers gathered outside the entrance. Luigi Mangione is one of 37 grandchildren of Nick Mangione, according to the grandfather's obituary. Luigi Mangione's grandparents donated to charities through the Mangione Family Foundation, according to a statement from Loyola University commemorating Nick Mangione’s wife’s death in 2023. They donated to various causes ranging from Catholic organizations to colleges and the arts. One of Luigi Mangione’s cousins is Republican Maryland state legislator Nino Mangione, a spokesman for the lawmaker's office confirmed Monday. Police said the person who killed Thompson left a hostel on Manhattan's Upper West Side at 5:41 a.m. on Wednesday. Just 11 minutes later, he was seen on surveillance video walking back and forth in front of the New York Hilton Midtown, wearing a distinctive backpack. At 6:44 a.m., he shot Thompson at a side entrance to the hotel, fled on foot, then climbed aboard a bicycle and within four minutes had entered Central Park. Another security camera recorded the gunman leaving the park near the American Museum of Natural History at 6:56 a.m. still on the bicycle but without the backpack. After getting in a taxi, he headed north to a bus terminal near the George Washington Bridge, arriving at around 7:30 a.m. From there, the trail of video evidence runs cold. Police have not located video of the suspect exiting the building, leading them to believe he likely took a bus out of town. Police said they are still investigating the path the suspect took to Pennsylvania. “This just happened this morning," Kenny said. "We’ll be working, backtracking his steps from New York to Altoona, Pennsylvania,” Kenny said. Associated Press reporters Lea Skene in Baltimore, Matt O'Brien in Providence, Rhode Island, and Cedar Attanasio in New York contributed to this report.

After withdrawing from AG consideration, Gaetz says he won't return to CongressFORT WORTH, Texas — David Seymour’s job over the next couple of weeks is to make sure that American Airlines flights take off on time and fly safely during one of the busiest travel periods of the year. Seymour is American’s chief operating officer, which means he oversees flight and airport operations for a carrier that figures to make about 6,500 flights a day between now and New Year’s Day. A West Point graduate and former U.S. Army infantry officer, Seymour joined America West Airlines in 1999. America West became US Airways, then merged with American in 2013. Seymour has held a variety of operations-related jobs and was promoted to his current post in 2020. Seymour spoke with The Associated Press recently about managing huge passenger numbers during the holidays and preventing people from getting on a plane before their boarding group is called. The answers have been edited for length and clarity. How are you going to make sure American flights run on time during the holidays? There are many thousands of people running the airline every day. My job, honestly, over this period isn’t so much about managing the chaos, it’s managing really all the challenges, and we’ll call it the headwinds that come our way. And I would say the vast majority of those are the uncontrollable. Such as? What’s going on the (air-traffic control) system around us. If there weren’t weather that we have to deal with and other complications that sometimes arise, running an airline would be pretty easy. How will you recover from disruptions? Before the pandemic, we would have a big storm in the DFW (Dallas-Fort Worth) area or the Charlotte (North Carolina) area, and it would take us a couple of days (to recover). We set about coming through the pandemic and coming out that we are going to recover better than any carrier out there. And how will you do that? By anticipating the weather. My team looks out constantly at what the weather is, looking at multiple weather forecasts to understand what’s coming, what could it do, and how are we prepared for that. How much do you learn from big cancellation events? And how much do you learn from meltdowns at other airlines? The team here, they do an after-action review. We will look at it and say, ‘What could we have done better?’ And we archive that information. Now, to your other question about competitors. I’m not inside the other competitors’ operations centers and looking at how they do that. Their networks are set up differently than ours. We do ask ourselves, ‘OK, if something similar were to happen to us, what would we do?’ With Christmas travel, what what are the big things you’re looking for? Is it weather? Air-traffic control problems? Weather is always a tough thing to predict. That’s really going to be one of the largest things because it has the potential for having the most impact. Controller-wise, we stay in touch with (the Federal Aviation Administration). We have a team out here that is in constant communication with the FAA, looking at what’s happening in the system, and we’re building contingency plans if they think there are going to be some challenges. You need to deice planes. The only difference between summer and now is we have to deal with winter weather in some locations. So, deicing. But we’re ready for that. The technology we have right now with the deicing vehicles ... we’ve been able to reduce our throughput time on deicing by half and still meeting all the requirements that we need to in terms of adequately deicing the aircraft, but having one person do it. Are the delays in deliveries of new planes from Boeing affecting your holiday season planning? No. Boeing needs to be successful, they need to be able to deliver quality aircraft, but we haven’t built our schedule for the holiday period that is dependent on getting any deliveries. We have enough buffer built in. American recently expanded the rollout of technology to catch people who try to board the plane before their boarding group is called. What went into that decision? Our frequent and premium travelers look at (the technology to catch line-jumpers) as a benefit of being loyal to American Airlines. It’s a huge plus for our gate agents because they do like order. Were people boarding out of order slowing down the boarding process? No. We just want a steady stream (of passengers) going in. The ability to get overhead bin space ... has gotten a lot better with some of the upgrades that we’ve done with larger overhead bins on the vast majority of our aircraft. We’re going to finish up the rest of the fleet in the next couple years with the large overhead bins. So that won’t be the issue, but that used to be a bit of that driver there. Get local news delivered to your inbox!

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