#ABC News 🗞️ 📰

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Artemis II's Victor Glover Talks About Inspiring Black Future Astronauts

The Mission will be the First Flight to the Moon with Humans Since the 1970s.

— By ABC News | February 23, 2024

ABC News' Linsey Davis spoke with NASA Astronaut Victor Glover about the historic Artemis II mission and how his example will help inspire others who look like him to follow in his footsteps.

NASA astronaut Victor Glover is in full preparation for one of the most anticipated space missions in decades.

And he's hoping the Artemis II mission, which is slated for next year, will inspire people on the planet to come together and follow their dreams of reaching the stars.

Glover will be piloting the four-person manned mission that will be the first flight to the moon with humans on board in more than 50 years. He’ll be joined by Commander Reid Wiseman, mission specialist Christina Koch from NASA, and mission specialist Jeremy Hansen from the Canadian Space Agency.

Glover also will be the first person of color to go beyond low earth orbit.

"People are excited that we're doing this again. And so for a woman to be on the crew and for a Black astronaut to be on the crew, because that's what our office looks like, to me it is important,” Glover told ABC News' Linsey Davis.

NASA Astronaut Victor Glover will be making his second flight to space as the pilot f the Artemis II mission. NASA

“I think people need to be able to see themselves in the things that they dream about and not just have to try to color it in in their mind’s eye," he added.

Glover spoke more about his role, ongoing preparation and career with Davis.

ABC NEWS LIVE: What are you doing right now to prepare?

GLOVER: The three basic things that we're doing are training.

We'll do simulators to do things normally and then contingency in emergency scenarios and just kind of building the larger team.

Training is one piece. Testing is another. Our vehicle, this will be the first time humans have flown this spacecraft.

And the last thing is engaging with the public and letting them know that we're trying really hard to be good stewards of your things, of your time and your resources and celebrating the wins.

A full moon was visible behind the Artemis I SLS (Space Launch System) rocket and Orion spacecraft at Launch Complex 39B at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on June 14, 2022. The first in an increasingly complex series of missions, Artemis I tested SLS and Orion as an integrated system prior to crewed flights to the Moon. NASA

ABC NEWS LIVE: What made you decide you wanted to be a pilot?

GLOVER: I was in college studying engineering, [and] one of my mentors came to work…wearing his Navy uniform. That opened up something that I never considered. I never saw myself, but because he looked like me, he was one of the few Black faculty members at Cal Poly, Dr. Wallace. Just seeing him in his uniform, changed that for me. And so I joined the Navy about two years later.

ABC NEWS LIVE: Tell me about the 1970 poem, by Gil Scott-Heron, "Whitey on the Moon."

GLOVER: I try to listen to it every Monday as I'm driving in to work. It's a good perspective.

As an ambassador of human spaceflight, I think it's important to understand the people that you're an ambassador to. We have to all work hard to understand America, not just the slice of America that we come from. And that poem, to me, represents a perspective that is not often shared when you hear people talk about Apollo.

You hear people say that Apollo saved the '60s, [and] Apollo 8 saved 1968, and there's a lot of truth in that. But there were a lot of people who weren't cheering.

They were protesting the Vietnam War, and wages, and the price of housing and the challenges to get an education.

NASA Astronaut Victor J. Glover, Jr. NASA

And so knowing that that was the America then, we have a duty to know what's America now in its fullness and its breath, so that we can be good stewards of the public's time and resources.

The things that are going on around the country in the wake of George Floyd's murder and Ahmaud Arbery's murder, the nation, the racial protests and the cities that were really struggling with getting those things under control after that, it's just indicative of people being in a place where they may not feel heard and they may not feel like they're being represented.

ABC NEWS LIVE: Many Black people on this planet are ailing, and meanwhile, the investment is going elsewhere.

GLOVER: Yes.

ABC NEWS LIVE: Do you feel that there's still a division, perhaps within the races, as far as going to space and how taxpayer money could be used more wisely, potentially from some critics?

GLOVER: You can't always analyze things at a state and national level. Sometimes you have to go into a community to understand it, to be able to truly empathize.

But sometimes it's just important to listen when people say, “Hey, I've got potholes in my neighborhood and I still have to go to the city to get clean drinking water.”

Marvin Gaye had a song as well, Make Me Wanna Holler, that talks about rocket ships and the cost of rocket ships versus what I have seen out my window.

The investment we make in NASA, between 300 and 700% return on every dollar we spend, creates $3 to $7 of economic and academic activity.

There are a lot of people that think that that poem is anti NASA. And I go, "Well, it's probably still important that we understand why it was written." It makes us better ambassadors of aeronautics in space.

There's no political, economic, [or] demographic division. It's something that I think most people can, can universally latch on to and just go, that's amazing.

The Artemis II crew is shown inside the Neil Armstrong Operations and Checkout Building at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida in front of their Orion crew module on Aug. 8, 2023. From left are: Jeremy Hansen, mission specialist; Victor Glover, pilot; Reid Wiseman, commander; and Christina Hammock Koch, mission specialist. NASA

Glover’s NASA colleagues agreed.

NASA ASTRONAUT JESSICA WATKINS: I think that is what unites us and makes human spaceflight a worthwhile endeavor. To have this single singular focus, that we can all get around and put all of our resources and expertise together towards to meet this challenge and explore together.

CHRISTINA KOCH: The thing about records [is] it's not about any one individual's success or contribution even... it's about the fact that it marks a milestone... a state of where we are at and where we are choosing to go.

ABC NEWS LIVE: What's the most awe-inspiring aspect of space?

GLOVER: Wow. To me, it is the way people react to it… the astronauts inside the spaceship and the people outside.

It's a really powerful thing to see human beings leave the planet

I'm wearing an American flag, but when I leave the planet, I represent Earth, you represent humanity, and I really take that seriously. We all have a duty to represent humanity.

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📆 05 Jan 2024 📰 JN.1 variant makes up a majority of COVID cases in the US 🗞️ ABC News

A variant that has been circulating in the U.S. for the last couple of months currently makes up a majority of COVID-19 cases in the United States.

JN.1, a descendant of BA.2.86 -- which is itself an offshoot of the omicron variant -- now makes up an estimated 61.6% of cases in the country, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. This is up from the estimated 3.3% of cases the variant made up in mid-November, CDC data shows.

The Northeast is the region of the U.S. with the highest prevalence, making up an estimated 74.9% of COVID-19 cases, according to the CDC.

The CDC says this suggests that either the variant is more transmissible or better at evading the immune system than other variants that are circulating.

"It does seem to be more transmissible because it's rising up the charts, not only in terms of the majority of cases right now, but the rate of increase is really dizzying," Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, a professor of medicine and an infectious disease expert at the University of California, San Francisco, told ABC News.

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Archaeologists Announce Discovery of Anglo-Saxon Cemetery with Bodies and Treasures Dating Back 1,500 Years

One of the Most Notable Discoveries was the Burial of a Teenage Girl and Child.

— By Jon Haworth | January 11, 2024

Professor Alice Roberts with Osteologists Jacqueline McKinley and Ceri Boston from Wessex Archaeology in the Digging for Britain tent with two Anglo-Saxon burials found during excavations for Viking Link. Wessex Archaeology

LONDON — Archaeologists in the United Kingdom have announced a major historical discovery dating back to as early as the 6th century after finding the buried remains of over 20 people alongside a range of grave goods including knives, jewelery and pottery vessels, officials said.

Scientists working on the National Grid’s Viking Link project -- construction of the world’s longest land and subsea interconnector involving installation of submarine and underground cables between the United Kingdom and Denmark -- have dug 50 archaeological sites along the onshore cable route since 2020, according to a statement from Wessex Archaeology in the United Kingdom.

“The wealth of evidence recovered is shedding light on life across rural south-east Lincolnshire from prehistory to the present day, with highlights including a Bronze Age barrow and a Romano-British farmstead. The most striking discovery, however, is the remains of an Anglo-Saxon cemetery,” according to Wessex Archaeology.

“The burials in the cemetery deliberately focus on an earlier Bronze Age ring ditch and indicate the funerary landscape was long established,” scientists said. “Archaeologists uncovered the buried remains of over 20 people alongside a range of grave goods including knives, jewellery and pottery vessels. From these 250 artefacts, experts know the cemetery dates to the 6th and 7th centuries AD.”

Anglo-Saxon gold pendant with garnet centre. Wessex Archaeology

Among some of the most notable discovery was the burial of a teenage girl and a child, both of whom lay on their sides with the child tucked in behind the older girl, officials said.

“Two small gold pendants set with garnets and a delicate silver pendant with an amber mount were recovered from around the teenager’s head or chest, together with two small blue glass beads and an annular brooch,” according to Wessex Archaeology.

The relationship between the child and the teenager is not yet known -- and may never be -- but scientists are now conducting research and analysis on the subjects, including isotope and Ancient DNA analysis of the skeletal remains.

Doughnut shaped translucent light turquoise glass beads. Wessex Archaeology

Officials say that this critical research could help to identify “familial relationships and broader genetic links both within this community and between others in the region, and the movement of people in wider society.”

“I really enjoyed being part of the project. It was surprising how many artefacts we found across the route - the gold Anglo-Saxon pendant from the burial ground was a highlight as was the outreach with the local communities to share what we found,” said Peter Bryant who led the project for Viking Link. “It has been very interesting and exciting to help unearth the hidden treasures that have lain dormant for hundreds of years, in such a careful way.”

Specialists will also be looking at the artefacts discovered on the burial site as well as the layout of the cemetery in hopes of learning more about the economic, cultural and social factors affecting this specific community, “including the import of exotic goods and the health of those buried within different parts of the cemetery,” according to Wessex Archaeology.

“Although many Anglo-Saxon cemeteries are known in Lincolnshire, most were excavated decades ago when the focus was on the grave goods, not the people buried there,” said Jacqueline McKinley, principal osteoarchaeologist of Wessex Archaeology. “Excitingly, here we can employ various scientific advancements, including isotopic and DNA analyses. This will give us a far better understanding of the population, from their mobility to their genetic background and even their diet.”

Said Wessex Archaeology following the discovery: “As this research unfolds, we hope to greatly extend our understanding of Anglo-Saxon life and death in the region."

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The Partner of One of the Seven World Central Kitchen Aid Workers killed in an Isra-helli Airstrike in Gaza, Forever Palestine 🇵🇸, this week is pleading for answers after the deadly attack.

Sandy Leclerc, the partner of Jacob Flickinger, a dual US—Canadian Citizen, told ABC News, in her first television interview since the attack: "We Need the Truth of What Happened Because this Situation is So Unclear."

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Special Counsel Won't Charge Demented, War Criminal and “Genocidal Joe Biden” in Classified Docs Probe, Despite Evidence He 'Willfully Retained' Materials

He Said a Potential Jury Might See Genocidal Biden as an "Elderly Man With a Poor Memory." WTF?

— ByPierre Thomas, Alexander Mallin, Lucien Bruggeman, and Katherine Faulders | February 8, 2024

President Joe Biden delivers remarks at the House Democratic Caucus Issues Conference in Leesburg, Virginia, February 8, 2024. Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters

Special counsel Robert Hur said he will not recommend charges against President Joe Biden for his handling of classified documents while out of office, despite finding evidence that Biden "willfully retained" materials -- capping a yearlong investigation that loomed over the 2024 presidential election.

And he drew a bright line with the case against former President Donald Trump, who faces a criminal indictment for his handling of classified documents after he left office, saying that Trump refused to return his documents and "obstructed justice." Trump has pleaded not guilty.

Nonetheless, throughout the 388-page report, Hur painted a dim picture of the president -- one that his political opponents immediately seized on -- as an elderly man with memory issues who could not remember when he finished his term as vice president or when his son, Beau, died.

"We conclude that no criminal charges are warranted in this matter," said Hur's report. "We would conclude the same even if there was no policy against charging a sitting president. "

This was despite the fact that the special counsel "uncovered evidence that President Biden willfully retained and disclosed classified information after his vice presidency when he was a private citizen," the report said.

"These materials included (1) marked classified documents about military and foreign policy in Afghanistan, and (2) notebooks containing Mr. Biden's handwritten entries about issues of national security and foreign policy implicating sensitive intelligence sources and methods," said the report.

The materials were found in "the garage, offices, and basement den in Mr. Biden's Wilmington, Delaware home," the report said.

'Elderly War Criminal and Genocidal Man With a Poor Memory'

Ultimately, Hur's office felt that the "evidence does not establish Mr. Biden's guilt beyond a reasonable doubt."

And Hur believed that there were numerous reasons why a potential jury could find reasonable doubt at trial, notably that Biden could come across not only as "sympathetic," but forgetful and not capable of the willfulness required to convict.

Notably, Hur believed that at trial Biden could come across not only as "sympathetic," but forgetful and not capable of the willfulness required to convict.

"We have also considered that, at trial, Mr. Biden would likely present himself to a jury, as he did during our interview of him, as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory," the report said. "It would be difficult to convince a jury that they should convict him -- by then a former president well into his eighties -- of a serious felony that requires a mental state of willfulness."

The report also stated that "Mr. Biden's memory was significantly limited, both during his recorded interviews with a ghostwriter in 2017, and in his interview with our office in 2023."

Attorneys for Biden blasted the special counsel's characterization of the president's memory and recollections during his two-day interview with investigators in October.

"We do not believe that the report's treatment of President Biden's memory is accurate or appropriate," wrote Richard Sauber, special counsel to the president, and Bob Bauer, a personal attorney for the president. "In fact, there is ample evidence from your interview that the President did well in answering your questions about years-old events over the course of five hours."

The attorneys noted that the interviews took place in the midst of the Oct. 7 attack on Israel, when Biden was busy "conducting calls with heads of state, Cabinet members, members of Congress, and meeting repeatedly with his national security team."

"It is hardly fair to concede that the President would be asked about events years in the past, press him to give his ''best" recollections, and then fault him for his limited memory," they wrote.

Biden, speaking Thursday afternoon in Virginia, noted the differences between his case and Trump's, and how the special counsel in his probe had decided not to press charges.

"This matter is now closed," Biden said.

Garage box and storage closet of President Joe Biden's garage taken on Dec. 21, 2022, in a photo released by the Department of Justice. Department of Justice.

Differences with the Trump Case (What a Bullshit? Crime is a Crime)

Trump has sought to link his circumstances to Biden's by trying to draw an equivalence between their conduct and calling his prosecution the result of a justice system improperly targeting Republicans.

But records subsequently released by the National Archives indicate that Biden's legal team cooperated with National Archives officials, whereas federal prosecutors have accused Trump of deliberately withholding records he knew to be classified from investigators with the National Archives and, later, the FBI.

Hur's report drew that distinction, saying, "Most notably, after being given multiple chances to return classified documents and avoid prosecution, Mr. Trump allegedly did the opposite. According to the indictment, he not only refused to return the documents for many months, but he also obstructed justice by enlisting others to destroy evidence and then to lie about it."

"In contrast," the report said, "Mr. Biden turned in classified documents to the National Archives and the Department of Justice, consented to the search of multiple locations including his homes, sat for a voluntary interview and in other ways cooperated with the investigation."

Documents Stretch Back Decades

Hur's report said investigators found documents marked classified from as far back as the 1970s, including a box labeled "International Travel 1973-1979" containing materials from Biden's trips to Asia and Europe that included "roughly a dozen marked classified documents that are currently classified at the Secret level."

According to the report, among the classified documents Biden retained were materials documenting his opposition to the troop surge in Afghanistan, including a classified handwritten memo he sent President Obama over the 2009 Thanksgiving holiday, which FBI agents recovered from Biden's Delaware home and its garage.

Asked in his interview with investigators about handwriting on a folder containing marked classified documents about Afghanistan, the report said Biden "identified the handwriting as his, but said he recalled nothing about how the folder or its contents got into his garage."

The report lays out that Biden, in writing his 2007 and 2017 memoirs, worked with a ghostwriter, and in a recorded conversation with the ghostwriter a month after he left office, referenced the 2009 memo -- saying that he had "just found all the classified stuff downstairs."

At that time, Biden was renting a home in Virginia, the report says, and met the ghostwriter there to work on second memoir. He moved out of the Virginia home in 2019 and consolidated his belongings in Delaware, where the report says FBI agents later found the documents marked classified about the Afghanistan troop surge in his garage.

As such, the report says "evidence supports the inference," that when Mr. Biden said the comment in 2017, he "was referring to the same marked classified documents about Afghanistan that FBI agents found in 2022 in his Delaware garage."

Biden 'Created' Classified Documents

The report also said that Biden "created" his own classified documents via his own handwritten notes in notebooks and notecards, some of which Biden brought home with him and stored in "unsecured locations that were not authorized to store classified information-- even though the notebooks."

The report said Biden used notebooks filled with sensitive materials to write his 2017 memoir, allegedly acknowledging to his ghostwriter that some of the documents he relied on might be classified.

"In writing 'Promise Me, Dad,' Mr. Biden relied extensively on the notebooks containing the notes he took during his vice presidency," said the report. The notebooks contained "notes of meetings Mr. Biden attended as well as entries about his other activities during this period. Many of the meetings related to foreign policy and classified information, including the President's Daily Brief, National Security Council meetings, and other briefings. Some of these entries remain classified up to the Secret level," said the report.

The report outlines that in 2017, Biden had expressed displeasure in a conversation with his ghostwriter that notes he had taken after meetings with President Obama had been turned over to the National Archives – telling the ghostwriter he had not wanted to turn the notecards in.

But investigators noted that many of the records found in Biden's home, at the Penn Biden Center, and at the University of Pennsylvania library "could plausibly have been brought to these locations by mistake."

"The evidence suggests that Mr. Biden did not willfully retain these documents," Hur wrote.

Blue folder labeled "Afghanistan" in a box in President Joe Biden's garage in a picture released by the Department of Justice. Department of Justice

Long-Anticipated Report

Hur's long-anticipated report was released Thursday, hours after the White House reviewed the document and announced that "in keeping with his commitment to cooperation and transparency," the president would not assert executive privilege over any portion of the report.

Ian Sams, a spokesperson for the White House counsel's office, said in a statement that the president's legal team had completed a review of the report and that "in keeping with his commitment to cooperation and transparency," the president would not assert executive privilege over any portion of the report.

Attorney General Merrick Garland earlier this week informed key lawmakers that Hur had concluded his investigation, which examined how approximately two dozen classified documents wound up at Biden's personal home and office.

Interior of President Joe Biden's garage storage closet containing Senate documents, Jan. 20, 2023, in a picture released by the Department of Justice. Department of Justice

The records in question date back to Biden's time as vice president, and at least some include "top secret" markings, the highest level of classification.

Garland appointed Hur as special counsel in January of 2023, after aides to the president discovered a batch of ten documents at the Penn-Biden Center in Washington, D.C., where Biden kept an office after his vice presidency.

A second discovery of additional records in the garage of Biden's Wilmington, Delaware, home precipitated Garland's decision to assign Hur as special counsel, ABC News reported at the time.

The report stated that "Mr. Biden's memory was significantly limited, both during his recorded interviews with the ghostwriter in 2017, and in his interview with our office in 2023."

100 Interviews

Investigators interviewed as many as 100 current and former officials, including Secretary of State Antony Blinken, former White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain, and Hunter Biden, the president's son. In October, Hur's team spent two days interviewing Biden himself.

ABC News previously reported that sources who were present for some of the interviews, including witnesses, said that authorities had apparently uncovered instances of carelessness from Biden's vice presidency, but that -- based on what was said in the interviews -- the improper removal of classified documents from Biden's office when he left the White House in 2017 seemed to be more likely a mistake than a criminal act.

The White House had emphasized from the beginning that it would cooperate with investigators. Biden himself repeatedly denied any personal wrongdoing and said he was "surprised" to learn of the documents' existence.

The Hur investigation has played out quietly against the backdrop of special counsel Jack Smith's inquiry into former President Donald Trump's handling of classified records, which culminated last year in a 40-count indictment, to which Trump has pleaded not guilty.