SZA tore into the White House on Wednesday after the administration shared a video on X featuring her vocals over footage of ICE agents carrying out arrests. The clip, posted to the official White House account, shows officers chasing and detaining people while audio of SZA singing “Big Boys”—from her 2022 Saturday Night Live sketch—plays over it. In a heated response on X, SZA accused the administration of deliberately baiting artists into reacting for engagement. Replying to her former manager, Terrence ‘Punch’ Henderson, who criticized the strategy, she wrote: “White House rage baiting artists for free promo is PEAK DARK .. inhumanity + shock and aw tactics .. Evil n Boring.” The backlash adds SZA to a growing list of performers publicly objecting to the White House’s use of their music in political messaging. Just last week, Sabrina Carpenter called out the administration for using her song “Juno” in a similar video. The clip was quietly deleted after she denounced what she described as the White House’s “inhumane agenda.”
Pop singer Charlie Puth is begging Elon Musk for some relief from rocket launches rattling his house and scaring his pregnant wife. “Hi @elonmusk…” wrote Puth, 34, to the tech mogul on X Wednesday. “These sonic booms have gotten progressively louder since they started launching the rockets in Santa Barbara. This one at 3am today felt like 150-160 dB, violently shook our whole house, and really frightened my pregnant wife. I hope they do not get louder :/.” SpaceX launched a rocket at 3:40 a.m. the morning of Dec. 10 from the Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. Santa Barbara is roughly 60 miles away from Vandenberg. It is unknown how he measured the decibel level, but the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association says any volume above 120 dB is unsafe for any period of time. SpaceX admitted on its website that “residents of Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, and Ventura counties may have heard one or more sonic booms during the launch, but what residents experienced depended on weather and other conditions.” The Daily Beast has reached out to SpaceX for comment. Unfortunately for Puth, SpaceX has another rocket launch planned for Sunday, Dec. 14.
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The Department of Homeland Security informed a journalist requesting legal copies of Kristi Noem’s Truth Social DMs that they couldn’t locate any. Lauren Harper, a journalist for the Freedom of the Press Foundation, reported that she requested copies of the DMs from “all cabinet officials with active Truth Social accounts,” including “restored copies of all deleted messages” after President Trump accidentally published direct correspondence with Attorney General Pam Bondi on the social media site. Harper submitted this request under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), which, amongst other things, allows people to request federal agency records. Correspondence on social media is deemed a federal record that, under federal records management rules, must be preserved and reviewed when FOIA requests are submitted. Harper wrote that she was expecting to receive “at least some records” from Noem’s account—which has over two million followers and receives regular engagement—as her account “is as active as Bondi’s.” However, DHS told her that, after conducting a “comprehensive review,” they could not locate the requested records. ”We are appealing the DHS denial to get to the bottom of it,“ Harper wrote. DHS did not immediately respond to the Beast’s request for comment.
Netflix announced on Monday that it will release a three-part documentary series about a missing-person case from 20 years ago that captured international headlines. The series will delve into the disappearance of Natalee Holloway, an 18-year-old who vanished during her 2005 vacation to Aruba. At the helm will be Murder in Big Horn co-director Matthew Galkin and Dani Sloane, who executive-produced the Netflix documentary The Menendez Brothers. Holloway arrived in Aruba in May 2005 with 124 graduates of Alabama’s Mountain Brook High School. She was last seen by classmates at 1:30 a.m. on May 30, leaving a bar in a car with Joran van der Sloot, a Dutch honors student who was later convicted in a 2010 murder, and his friends Deepak and Satish Kalpoe. All three were arrested but never convicted. She was never found despite extensive searching. Holloway was declared legally dead in 2012 at her father’s request. Over a decade later, in 2023, van der Sloot confessed to murdering her with a cinder block and leaving her body in the ocean. The series will include unreported parts of the case, as well as unreleased audio from Holloway’s family and friends.
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Lucas Bravo, who plays love interest Gabriel on Netflix’s hit show Emily in Paris, opened up about some of the upsetting fan interactions he’s had while filming the show. While on the Chicks in the Office podcast, Bravo, 37, expressed that “sometimes there’s that thing that people do” that he doesn’t enjoy. “You should always treat people with respect, no matter what you are going through,” he said. “Some people don’t do it on purpose, but they point at me and say, ‘Emily in Paris’ in the middle of the street. They startle me, and I am like, ‘What am I? Who am I? What is my name?’ I don’t want to be the guy who asks them what my name is, but it is a bit objectifying.” He clarified that outside of this, most fan interactions are “very respectful,” as there’s a bit of a barrier since he doesn’t share most of his life online. “They connect with my work and they recognize me, but they talk to me like you would talk to a person you don’t know,” he said. “That makes a huge difference because then I am not overexposing myself on socials. There is no freaking out.”
Jeff Garcia, the comedian best known for voicing Sheen Estevez in Jimmy Neutron, has died at 50 after weeks of escalating health issues, TMZ reported. Garcia was admitted to a Southern California hospital on Monday with severe shortness of breath. By Tuesday, his lung had collapsed, and he was taken off life support that night. He died the following morning surrounded by loved ones, according to the outlet. His family told TMZ that Garcia had been battling multiple medical problems leading up to his death. He suffered a brain aneurysm earlier this year and later sustained a serious head injury in a fall, but eventually recovered and returned to performing. In late November, he developed pneumonia, and although he initially bounced back, his condition deteriorated again, forcing him to cancel several stand-up shows—something sources said was unlike him. Garcia leaves behind a career spanning stand-up, television, and early-2000s animation, during which his high-energy performances helped define a generation of kids’ TV.
How monogamous are humans compared to the rest of the animal kingdom? Somewhere between the Eurasian beaver and a meerkat, according to a new study published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society: Biological Sciences, which ranks different species of animals in a “premier league of monogamy.” The research, led by University of Cambridge evolutionary anthropologist Mark Dyble, analyzed data from 103 human societies and 34 mammal species to create a “league table” of monogamy by comparing the number of sibling pairs born to the same parents. Humans ranked seventh among those analyzed, with 66 percent of siblings sharing both a mother and a father—making our species less monogamous than the Eurasian beaver but more than the Lar gibbon, meerkat, and gray wolf. Topping the list with 100 percent monogamy levels is the California deermouse, followed by the African wild dog and the Damaraland mole rat with 85 and 79.5 percent, respectively. Scotland’s Soay sheep ranked lowest at 0.6 percent, behind several different species of macaque. Dyble says the findings demonstrate that social monogamy—forming stable pair bonds to help raise children—is a core human characteristic crucial to our species’ success, although fellow academics have criticized the findings for oversimplifying human nature.
Friends were reportedly forced to call emergency services after comic Andy Dick apparently suffered a drug overdose while sitting on a set of steps on a Hollywood street, according to TMZ. One person, the outlet reported, was heard screaming for the comedian to “wake up” as another phoned an ambulance. Los Angeles Fire Department, which responded to the incident, reportedly said Dick was not taken to the hospital. TMZ reported Dick, 59, was given a dose of Narcan, a drug that can reverse the effects of opiate overdoses. TMZ also said it has since spoken with Dick, who confirmed he was OK without elaborating on what happened. The city’s police department also attended the scene on Tuesday. Dick is known to have suffered with substance abuse in the past, and also has a highly publicized history of encounters with law enforcement. The Daily Beast has reached out to his representatives for comment on this story.
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Cyber Week is the best time to save on big-ticket items like TVs, furniture, and yes, cleaning devices. Fortunately, the deals are extended this year, and Bissell’s huge sale is one of the best we’ve seen. For a limited time, the Bissell CrossWave OmniForce is up to 52 percent off. This powerful multi-surface cleaner effectively replaces vacuuming and mopping with one sleek machine that delivers a faster, deeper, and more efficient clean.
The Bissell CrossWave OmniForce wet-dry vac blends vacuuming and mopping to tackle everyday cleaning of wet and dry messes. Plus, not only does it sweep up crumbs, dirt, and pet dander, but it also mops away spills and pet accidents—and actually sanitizes—a must for cold and flu season.
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This all-in-one cleaning hero is a game-changer for parents and pet owners who need to tackle tough-to-clean fur, paw prints, and spills all in one go—and on a daily basis. At up to 55 percent off for the post-Black Friday sale event, the CrossWave OmniForce is a no-brainer. This is one of the best deals we’ve seen this year, so now’s the time to invest in a cleaner space for the holidays and beyond.
If you’re looking for a more compact device, Bissell is also offering a slew of deals right now, including discounts on its beloved range of portable carpet and upholstery cleaners (think the Little Green Mini Portable Carpet Cleaner).
Michael Virgil, 35, died last year aboard a Royal Caribbean cruise after allegedly being served 33 alcoholic drinks—and his fiancée says the ship kept sailing for days while his body was stored in a refrigerator. According to a lawsuit reported by the New York Post, Virgil’s fiancée, Connie Aguilar, begged the crew to return to port in Long Beach after he died, but the ship allegedly refused. Kevin Haynes, the family’s attorney, told The Daily Mail that Aguilar was traveling with Virgil and their 7-year-old son when staff ignored her pleas to dock early. The wrongful-death suit claims crew members tackled Virgil, pinned him under their full body weight, and injected him with the sedative haloperidol—before allegedly blasting him with pepper spray multiple times. Haynes told the outlet that the restraint caused “mechanical asphyxiation,” saying employees held him down for “three minutes,” which the lawsuit argues set off the chain of events that led to his death. This ordeal left Aguilier grieving on a ship that refused to stop, without control over what to do with her fiancé’s body.
A New York district judge ordered the release of grand jury transcripts from Jeffrey Epstein’s 2019 sex trafficking case on Wednesday. Judge Richard M. Berman cited the Epstein Transparency Act, enacted Nov. 19, which mandates that any files or materials related to the late sex offender be made public “not later than 30 days” after enactment. In August, Berman—who presided over the 2019 case—rejected the Justice Department’s request to unseal the transcripts, stating that they contained nothing more than “merely a hearsay snippet.” He added that the 70 pages of transcripts “pales in comparison” to the materials “in the hands of the Department of Justice,” which total around 100,000 pages. The decision comes as U.S. District Judge Paul Engelmayer ordered the unsealing of grand jury materials related to the case against convicted sex offender Ghislaine Maxwell—Epstein’s co-conspirator—and as a Florida judge ordered the release of grand jury materials from an abandoned probe into Epstein and Maxwell’s conduct between 2005 and 2007. Engelmayer also acknowledged, like Berman, that the materials on Maxwell “would not add to public knowledge” and “do not identify any person other than Epstein and Maxwell as having had sexual contact with a minor.” Under the Epstein Transparency Act, all unclassified materials related to Epstein must be released to the public by Dec. 19.