Couple randomly attacked, 1 stabbed, by group of teens in Toronto, police say
A man has been transported to hospital after police say he was stabbed in a random attack carried out by a group of teens in Toronto on Friday night.
Texas' Republican-led House of Representatives impeached state Attorney General Ken Paxton on Saturday on articles including bribery and abuse of public trust, a sudden, historic rebuke of a GOP official who rose to be a star of the conservative legal movement despite years of scandal and alleged crimes.
Impeachment triggers Paxton's immediate suspension from office pending the outcome of a trial in the state Senate and empowers Republican Gov. Greg Abbott to appoint someone else as Texas' top lawyer in the interim.
The 121-23 vote constitutes an abrupt downfall for one of the GOP's most prominent legal combatants, who in 2020 asked the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn President Joe Biden's electoral defeat of Donald Trump. It makes Paxton only the third sitting official in Texas' nearly 200-year history to have been impeached.
Paxton, 60, decried the move moments after scores of his fellow partisans voted for impeachment, and his office pointed to internal reports that found no wrongdoing.
"The ugly spectacle in the Texas House today confirmed the outrageous impeachment plot against me was never meant to be fair or just," Paxton said. "It was a politically motivated sham from the beginning."
Paxton has been under FBI investigation for years over accusations that he used his office to help a donor and was separately indicted on securities fraud charges in 2015, though he has yet to stand trial. His party had long taken a muted stance on the allegations -- but that changed this week as 60 of the House's 85 Republicans, including Speaker Dade Phelan, voted to impeach.
"No one person should be above the law, least not the top law officer of the state of Texas," Rep. David Spiller, a Republican member of the committee that investigated Paxton, said in opening statements. Another Republican committee member, Rep. Charlie Geren, said without elaborating that Paxton had called some lawmakers before the vote and threatened them with political "consequences."
Lawmakers allied with Paxton tried to discredit the investigation by noting that hired investigators, not panel members, interviewed witnesses. They also said several of the investigators had voted in Democratic primaries, tainting the impeachment, and that they had too little time to review evidence.
"I perceive it could be political weaponization," Rep. Tony Tinderholt, one of the House's most conservative members, said before the vote. Republican Rep. John Smithee compared the proceeding to "a Saturday mob out for an afternoon lynching."
Paxton is automatically suspended from office pending the Senate trial. Final removal would require a two-thirds vote in the Senate, where Paxton's wife's, Angela, is a member.
Representatives of the governor, who lauded Paxton while swearing him in for a third term in January, did not immediately respond to requests for comment on a temporary replacement.
Before the vote Saturday, Trump and U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz came to Paxton's defense, with the senator calling the impeachment process "a travesty" and saying the attorney general's legal troubles should be left to the courts.
"Free Ken Paxton," Trump wrote on his social media platform Truth Social, warning that if House Republicans proceeded with impeachment, "I will fight you."
In one sense, Paxton's political peril arrived with dizzying speed: The House committee's investigation came to light Tuesday, and by Thursday lawmakers issued 20 articles of impeachment.
But to Paxton's detractors, the rebuke was years overdue.
In 2014, he admitted to violating Texas securities law, and a year later he was indicted on securities fraud charges in his hometown near Dallas, accused of defrauding investors in a tech startup. He pleaded not guilty to two felony counts carrying a potential sentence of five to 99 years.
He opened a legal defense fund and accepted US$100,000 from an executive whose company was under investigation by Paxton's office for Medicaid fraud. An additional US$50,000 was donated by an Arizona retiree whose son Paxton later hired to a high-ranking job but was soon fired after displaying child pornography in a meeting. In 2020, Paxton intervened in a Colorado mountain community where a Texas donor and college classmate faced removal from his lakeside home under coronavirus orders.
But what ultimately unleased the impeachment push was Paxton's relationship with Austin real estate developer Nate Paul.
In 2020, eight top aides told the FBI they were concerned Paxton was misusing his office to help Paul over the developer's unproven claims that an elaborate conspiracy to steal US$200 million of his properties was afoot. The FBI searched Paul's home in 2019, but he has not been charged and denies wrongdoing. Paxton also told staff members he had an affair with a woman who, it later emerged, worked for Paul.
The impeachment accuses Paxton of attempting to interfere in foreclosure lawsuits and issuing legal opinions to benefit Paul. Its bribery charges allege that Paul employed the woman with whom Paxton had an affair in exchange for legal help and that he paid for expensive renovations to the attorney general's home.
A senior lawyer for Paxton's office, Chris Hilton, said Friday that the attorney general paid for all repairs and renovations.
Other charges, including lying to investigators, date back to Paxton's still-pending securities fraud indictment.
Four of the aides who reported Paxton to the FBI later sued under Texas' whistleblower law, and in February he agreed to settle the case for US$3.3 million. The House committee said it was Paxton seeking legislative approval for the payout that sparked their probe.
"But for Paxton's own request for a taxpayer-funded settlement over his wrongful conduct, Paxton would not be facing impeachment," the panel said.
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Bleiberg reported from Dallas.
A man has been transported to hospital after police say he was stabbed in a random attack carried out by a group of teens in Toronto on Friday night.
Ron Ellis, who played over 1,000 games with the Toronto Maple Leafs and was a member of Canada's team at the 1972 Summit Series, has died at age 79.
The wildfire that sparked Friday and caused evacuation orders for more than 3,000 people in Fort Nelson, B.C., and the nearby Fort Nelson First Nation, has grown to nearly 1,700 hectares in size, according to a Saturday morning update from the BC Wildfire Service.
Hours before the final, Dutch contestant Joost Klein was dramatically booted out by organizers over a backstage incident. He had failed to perform at two dress rehearsals on Friday, and contest organizer the European Broadcasting Union said it was investigating an "incident."
From London, to Grand Bend, Collingwood and Guelph, here are some highlights of Friday night and Saturday morning's northern lights display.
A growing number of civilians and police officers are demanding the dismissal and arrest of Haiti's police chief as heavily armed gangs launched a new attack in the capital of Port-au-Prince, seizing control of yet another police station early Saturday.
Irresponsibly using a credit card can land you in financial trouble, but personal finance columnist Christopher Liew says when used properly, it can be a powerful wealth-building tool that can help grow your credit profile and create new opportunities.
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The rolling hills leading to the hamlet of Rosebud are dotted with sprawling farms and cattle pastures -- and a sign sporting a simple message: No Race Track.
A family of fifth generation farmers from Ituna, Sask. are trying to find answers after discovering several strange objects lying on their land.
A Listowel, Ont. man, drafted by the Hamilton Tigercats last week, is also getting looks from the NFL, despite only playing 27 games of football in his life.
The threat of zebra mussels has prompted the federal government to temporarily ban watercraft from a Manitoba lake popular with tourists.
A small Ajax dessert shop that recently received a glowing review from celebrity food critic Keith Lee is being forced to move after a zoning complaint was made following the social media influencer’s visit last month.
The Canada Science and Technology Museum is inviting visitors to explore their poop. A new exhibition opens at the Ottawa museum on Friday called, 'Oh Crap! Rethinking human waste.'
The Regina Police Service says it is the first in Saskatchewan and possibly Canada to implement new technology in its detention facility that will offer real-time monitoring of detainees’ vital health metrics.
Just as she had feared, a restaurant owner from eastern Quebec who visited Montreal had her SUV stolen, but says it was all thanks to the kindness of strangers on the internet — not the police — that she got it back.
The stakes have been set for a bet between Vancouver and Edmonton's mayors on who will win Round 2 of the Stanley Cup playoffs.
A grieving mother is hosting a helmet drive in the hopes of protecting children on Manitoba First Nations from a similar tragedy that killed her daughter.