Disney sues DeSantis, Tucker Carlson out at Fox, a wave of celebrity deaths, and more top national stories from the past week

Harry Belafonte, the dashing singer, actor and activist who became an indispensable supporter of the civil rights movement, has died, his publicist Ken Sunshine told CNN.

He was 96.

Keep scrolling to the end of this story for a collection of photos from the life of Harry Belafonte

Belafonte died Tuesday morning of congestive heart failure, Sunshine said.

Belafonte was dubbed the "King of Calypso" after the groundbreaking success of his 1956 hit, "The Banana Boat Song (Day-O)." He also became a movie star after acting in the film adaption of the Broadway musical, "Carmen Jones."

But Belafonte biggest contributions took place offstage. He was a key strategist, fundraiser and mediator for the civil rights movement. He continually risked his entertainment career -- and at least once his life -- for his activism. He became a close friend of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., who often retired to Belafonte's palatial New York apartment to talk strategy or escape the pressures of leading the civil rights movement.

A voracious reader with a burning disdain for injustice, Belafonte's political consciousness was shaped by the experience of growing up as the impoverished son of a poor Jamaican mother who worked as a domestic servant.

"I've often responded to queries that ask, 'When as an artist did you decide to become an activist?' '' he once said. "My response to the question is that I was an activist long before I became an artist. They both service each other, but the activism is first."

The scope of Belafonte's activism was astonishing. He saw the civil rights movement as a global struggle. He led a campaign against apartheid in South Africa, and befriended Nelson Mandela. He mobilized support for the fight against HIV/AIDS and became a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador. He also came up with the idea for recording the 1985 hit song, "We Are the World," which assembled a constellation of pop and rock stars, including Bob Dylan, Michael Jackson and Bruce Springsteen, to raise money for famine relief in Africa.

Belafonte didn't mellow as his wealth and fame grew. He drew criticism after calling President George W. Bush "the greatest terrorist in the world" for leading an invasion of Iraq, and assailed Black celebrities such as Jay Z and Beyonce for not taking bolder stands on social justice. He criticized Barack Obama so much during the then Senator's first presidential run in 2008 that Obama asked him, "When are you going to cut me some slack?"

"What make you think that's not what I've been doing?" Belafonte responded.

***

Belafonte's hero and mentor

Harold George Belafonte Jr. was born March 1, 1927 in New York city to poor Caribbean immigrants. His father worked as a cook on merchant ships and abandoned the family when Belafonte was young. Belafonte also spent some of his boyhood in Jamaica, the former British colony and his mother's native country, where he witnessed White English authorities mistreating Black Jamaicans. He returned to New York City's Harlem neighborhood by 1940 to live with his mother, Melvine, who struggled to hold her family together amid grinding poverty.

"She was the one who taught him that you shouldn't let the sun go down without fighting against injustice," Judith E. Smith, author of "Becoming Belafonte: Black Artist, Public Radical," says about Belafonte's mother.

Belafonte had a tumultuous childhood and often had to fend for himself.

"The most difficult time in my life was when I was a kid," he told a magazine interviewer. "My mother gave me affection, but, because I was left on my own, also a lot of anguish."

Belafonte dropped out of high school and enlisted in the US Navy in 1944. He was relegated to manual labor on the ship and didn't see combat, but the experience proved to be profound. He met college educated Black men who gave him a wider exposure to the world, talking to him about big issues such as segregation and colonialism. The experience of fighting against fascism abroad while coming back to segregation at home angered Belafonte, much like many Black veterans from World War II.

He drifted into the entertainment field almost by accident. Belafonte was working as a janitor in New York when he attended a play at the American Negro Theater. He was so swept up by the performance that he decided to become an actor.

He eventually studied acting at a workshop attended by classmates such as Marlon Brando, Tony Curtis and Bea Arthur. He also fell into singing in nightclubs -- once in a band that included jazz greats Charlie Parker and Max Roach -- and landed a recording contract in 1949.

Belafonte had natural charisma, on stage and behind the microphone. He won a Tony Award for his acting on Broadway and was the first African American to win an Emmy award for his 1959 variety show.

Belafonte also looked for a way to merge his activism with his career and found a mentor and friend in Paul Robeson. The Black stage and film actor was a renaissance man, a star athlete and Ivy League-educated intellectual who became an outspoken civil rights activist and a critic of US foreign policy. Robeson was eventually blacklisted for his activism during the McCarthy era.

Belafonte called Robeson part of his "moral compass."

"For me, Mr. Robeson was the sparrow. He was an artist who made those of us in the arts understand the depth of that calling, when he said, "Artists are the gatekeepers of truth. We are civilization's radical voice."

***

His friendship with MLK

Belafonte also built a friendship with King, another a powerful Black leader. King often flew to New York City to raise money for the movement and to meet key advisors. During one trip, he called Belafonte, greeting him with, "We've never met, so you may not know who I am."

The two men met at a New York church where King was speaking and retired after the event to a basement room to talk.

"It was just us at a card table with straight-back chairs," Belafonte recalled. "What was supposed to be a few minutes led to almost four hours. I liked his courage, his thoughts, his ideas and his mission. I committed to him after that."

Belafonte's relationship with King would prove to be crucial. Belafonte had star power, connections, and more importantly, a willingness to risk all to help the civil rights movement. He raised money for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, the organization that King co-founded and led. Belafonte also helped bail out activists who had been jailed during civil rights campaigns, and helped organize the 1963 March on Washington.

He risked more than his career at times. In 1964, Belafonte and his friend and fellow actor Sidney Poitier traveled to Mississippi to deliver a doctor's bag filled with $70,000 to support voter registration efforts. Belafonte says the pair were chased and shot at by the Ku Klux Klan but eventually succeeded in hand-delivering their money.

Belafonte delivered crucial help to King's family as well. He paid for housekeepers and babysitters while King traveled the country. And he took out a life insurance policy for the civil rights leader that became one of the family's primary sources of financial support after King's assassination.

"Whenever we got into trouble or when tragedy struck, Harry has always come to our aid, his generous heart wide open," Coretta Scott King later said in her memoir.

Belafonte also became one of King's most trusted friends. King often stayed in Belafonte's Upper West Side apartment, and he wrote the outline to one of his most famous speeches -- his 1967 address denouncing the Vietnam War -- in Belafonte's home.

King was a self-contained man in public who rarely let his guard down. But in rare photos that capture King breaking into a huge, uninhibited grin, Belafonte is often at his side, hugging him and sharing some private joke. There is a marvelous YouTube clip showing King telling a joke to Belafonte when the entertainer filled in as a host on "The Tonight Show."

Belafonte provided more than emotional support to King, though. King relied on him for advice and strategy, says Miller, author of "Becoming Belafonte."

"He (Belafonte) was already a radical and already thinking about how Black liberation should unfold," Miller says. "He had already been in these groups where everybody was talking about, what should you to do to organize? How do you make change?"

***

Belafonte in his later years

Being a radical was essential to how Belafonte defined himself. As he got older, his silky singing voice lowered to a gravely whisper and he walked with a cane. But he never lost his movie-star looks or his hunger for radical change. In 2013, he was awarded the NAACP's highest honor, the Spingarn Medal. He said during his acceptance speech that what was missing from the contemporary struggle for freedom is "radical thought."

"America has never been moved to perfect our desire for greater democracy without radical thinking and radical voices being at the helm of any such quest," he said.

Belafonte also was a recipient of a Kennedy Center Honor in 1989, the National Medal of Arts in 1994 and a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2000. He also became a mentor to other artists, just as Robeson had inspired him years before.

He spoke with pride about the racial protests that spread across the US in the summer of 2020 after the death of George Floyd, writing that "we have never had so many White allies, wailing to stand together for freedom, for honor, for a justice that free us all in the end..."

A group of Black students approached Belafonte in Harlem in 2016 and asked if there was anything he was still looking for, despite his advanced age.

"What I've always been looking for: Where resides the rebel heart?" Belafonte replied. "Without the rebellious heart, without people who understand that there's no sacrifice we can make that is too great to retrieve that which we've lost, we will forever be distracted with possessions and trinkets and title."

Belafonte never lost his rebellious heart. Blessed with looks, wealth and fame, he could have been content with being the King of Calypso. But he made another choice. His made his biggest contributions offstage.

Photos: Remembering Harry Belafonte, 1927-2023

1955: Harry Belafonte with Ed Sullivan

1956: Harry Belafonte

1957: Harry Belafonte receives Brotherhood Award

1957: Harry Belafonte

1957: Harry Belafonte marries Julie Robinson

1957: Harry Belafonte and Nat "King" Cole

1957: Harry Belafonte

1958: Harry Belafonte speaks at Lincoln Memorial

1958: Belafontes in Italy

1958: Harry Belafonte and former first lady Eleanor Roosevelt

1960: Harry Belafonte protests lunch counter segregation

1960: Harry Belafonte on Broadway

1960: Harry Belafonte

1960: Harry Belafonte becomes first Black man to win Emmy

1961: Harry Belafonte and family

1964: Harry Belafonte visits Guinea

1965: Harry Belafonte with Martin Luther King Jr. and James Foreman

1966: Harry Belafonte performs at civil rights benefit

1968: Harry Belafonte, Coretta Scott King

1968: Harry Belafonte and Coretta Scott King

1968: Harry Belafonte sits in for Johnny Carson on "Tonight Show"

1979: Harry Belafonte wins "Golden Lion" award

1981: Harry Belafonte

1984: Harry Belafonte co-produces "Beat Street"

1986: Harry Belafonte and Ken Kragen win AMA award

1986: Harry Belafonte and Bishop Desmond Tutu

1987: Harry Belafonte and UNICEF

1988: Harry Belafonte with Pope John Paul II

1989: Harry Belafonte receives Kennedy Center Honors

1994: Harry Belafonte receives Medal of the Arts from President Bill Clinton

1999: Harry Belafonte and Nelson Mandela

2001: Harry Belafonte

2005: Harry Belafonte speaks during Nelson Mandela visit

2005: Harry Belafonte with then Sen. Barack Obama and John Lewis

2006: Harry Belafonte receives BET humanitarian award

2006: Harry Belafonte accepts BET humanitarian award

2010: Harry Belafonte, Willie Mays and Billie Jean King win MLB Beacon awards

2011: Harry Belafonte and Hill Harper

2012: Harry Belafonte and Sidney Poitier

2013: Harry Belafonte receives Spingarn award from Sidney Poitier

2014: Harry Belafonte gets honorary doctorate from Berklee

2017: Harry Belafonte

CINCINNATI — Jerry Springer, the onetime mayor and news anchor whose namesake TV show featured a three-ring circus of dysfunctional families willing to bare all on weekday afternoons including brawls, obscenities and blurred images of nudity, died Thursday at 79.

Keep scrolling for a gallery of photos from Springer's life

At its peak, "The Jerry Springer Show" was a ratings powerhouse and a U.S. cultural pariah, synonymous with lurid drama. Known for chair-throwing and bleep-filled arguments, the daytime talk show was a favorite American guilty pleasure over its 27-year run, at one point topping Oprah Winfrey's show.

Springer called it "escapist entertainment," while others saw the show as contributing to a dumbing-down decline in American social values.

"Jerry's ability to connect with people was at the heart of his success in everything he tried whether that was politics, broadcasting or just joking with people on the street who wanted a photo or a word," said Jene Galvin, a family spokesperson and friend of Springer's since 1970, in a statement. "He's irreplaceable and his loss hurts immensely, but memories of his intellect, heart and humor will live on."

Springer died peacefully at home in suburban Chicago after a brief illness, the statement said

On his Twitter profile, Springer jokingly declared himself as "Talk show host, ringmaster of civilization's end." He also often had told people, tongue in cheek, that his wish for them was "may you never be on my show."

After more than 4,000 episodes, the show ended in 2018, never straying from its core salaciousness: Some of its last episodes had such titles as "Stripper Sex Turned Me Straight," "Stop Pimpin' My Twin Sister," and "Hooking Up With My Therapist." Read the full story here:

Photos: Jerry Springer through the years, 1944-2023

Photos: Notable Deaths in 2023

Raquel Welch

David Crosby

Richard Belzer

Cindy Williams

Lisa Marie Presley

Jeff Beck

Gary Rossington

Wayne Shorter

Burt Bacharach

Tom Sizemore

Charles Kimbrough

Stella Stevens

Annie Wersching

Tim McCarver

Billy Packer

Dave Hollis

David Jude Jolicoeur

Barrett Strong

Lloyd Morrisett

Robbie Knievel

Gina Lollobrigida

Lynette Hardaway ("Diamond")

Adam Rich

Bobby Hull

Charles White

Jerry Richardson

Sister André

Tatjana Patitz

Russell Banks

Cardinal George Pell

Ken Block

Walter Cunningham

Anton Walkes

Robert Blake

Chaim Topol

Bobby Caldwell

Pat Schroeder

Lance Reddick

Willis Reed

Seymour Stein

Klaus Teuber

Michael Lerner

Harry Belafonte

Barry Humphries

Ginnie Newhart

Len Goodman

Jerry Springer

JACKSON, Miss. — The white woman who accused Black teenager Emmett Till of making improper advances before he was lynched in Mississippi in 1955 has died in hospice care in Louisiana, a coroner's report shows. Carolyn Bryant Donham was 88.

Donham died Tuesday night in Westlake, Louisiana, according to a death report filed Thursday in Calcasieu Parish Coroner's Office in Louisiana.

Till's kidnapping and killing became a catalyst for the civil rights movement when his mother insisted on an open-casket funeral in their hometown of Chicago after his brutalized body was pulled from a river in Mississippi. Jet magazine published photos.

Till traveled from Chicago to visit relatives in Mississippi in August 1955. Donham — then 21 and named Carolyn Bryant — accused him of making improper advances on her at a grocery store where she was working in the small community of Money. The Rev. Wheeler Parker, a cousin of Till who was there, has said 14-year-old Till whistled at the woman, an act that flew in the face of Mississippi's racist social codes of the era.

Evidence indicates a woman identified Till to Donham's then-husband Roy Bryant and his half-brother J.W. Milam, who killed the teenager. An all-white jury acquitted the two white men in the killing, but the men later confessed in an interview with Look magazine.

In an unpublished memoir obtained by The Associated Press in 2022, Donham said she was unaware of what would happen to Till.

The contents of the 99-page manuscript, titled "I am More Than A Wolf Whistle," were first reported by the Mississippi Center for Investigative Reporting. Historian and author Timothy Tyson of Durham, North Carolina, who said he obtained a copy from Donham while interviewing her in 2008, provided a copy to the AP.

Tyson had placed the manuscript in an archive at the University of North Carolina with the agreement that it not be made public for decades, though he said he gave it to the FBI during an investigation the agency concluded in 2021. He said he decided to make it public after people doing research at the Leflore County, Mississippi, courthouse in June 2022 found an arrest warrant on kidnapping charges that was issued for "Mrs. Roy Bryant" in 1955 but never served.

Tyson said in a statement Thursday that Donham's precise role in the killing of Till remains murky, but it's clear she was involved.

"It has comforted America to see this as merely a story of monsters, her among them," Tyson said. "What this narrative keeps us from seeing is the monstrous social order that cared nothing for the life of Emmett Till nor thousands more like him. Neither the federal government nor the government of Mississippi did anything to prevent or punish this murder. Condemning what Donham did is easier than confronting what America was — and is."

Weeks after the unserved arrest warrant was found, the office of Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch said there was no new evidence to pursue a criminal case against Donham. In August, a district attorney said a Leflore County grand jury declined to indict Donham.

Till's cousin, Priscilla Sterling, filed a federal lawsuit against the current Leflore County Sheriff, Ricky Banks, on Feb. 7, seeking to compel him to serve the 1955 warrant on Donham. In a response April 13, Banks' attorney said there was no point serving the warrant on Donham because the grand jury did not indict her last year.

Photos: Notable Deaths in 2023

Raquel Welch

David Crosby

Richard Belzer

Cindy Williams

Lisa Marie Presley

Jeff Beck

Gary Rossington

Wayne Shorter

Burt Bacharach

Tom Sizemore

Charles Kimbrough

Stella Stevens

Annie Wersching

Tim McCarver

Billy Packer

Dave Hollis

David Jude Jolicoeur

Barrett Strong

Lloyd Morrisett

Robbie Knievel

Gina Lollobrigida

Lynette Hardaway ("Diamond")

Adam Rich

Bobby Hull

Charles White

Jerry Richardson

Sister André

Tatjana Patitz

Russell Banks

Cardinal George Pell

Ken Block

Walter Cunningham

Anton Walkes

Robert Blake

Chaim Topol

Bobby Caldwell

Pat Schroeder

Lance Reddick

Willis Reed

Seymour Stein

Klaus Teuber

Michael Lerner

Harry Belafonte

Barry Humphries

Ginnie Newhart

Len Goodman

Jerry Springer

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Disney sued Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on Wednesday over the Republican's takeover of its theme park district, alleging the governor waged a "targeted campaign of government retaliation" after the company opposed a law critics call "Don't Say Gay."

The lawsuit was filed in Tallahassee minutes after a Disney World oversight board appointed by DeSantis voted to void a deal that gave the company authority over design and construction decisions in its sprawling properties near Orlando.

"Disney regrets that it has come to this," the case said. "But having exhausted efforts to seek a resolution, the Company is left with no choice but to file this lawsuit to protect its cast members, guests, and local development partners from a relentless campaign to weaponize government power against Disney in retaliation for expressing a political viewpoint unpopular with certain State officials."

The legal filing is the latest salvo in a more than year-old feud between Disney and DeSantis that has engulfed the governor in criticism as he prepares to launch an expected presidential bid in the coming months.

DeSantis, who has framed himself as a Republican firebrand able to deftly implement his conservative agenda without drama, has dived headlong into the fray with the beloved company and major tourism driver, as business leaders and White House rivals bash his stance as a rejection of the small-government tenets of conservatism.

"We are unaware of any legal right that a company has to operate its own government or maintain special privileges not held by other businesses in the state," said DeSantis spokeswoman Taryn Fenske. "This lawsuit is yet another unfortunate example of their hope to undermine the will of the Florida voters and operate outside the bounds of the law."

The fight began last year after Disney, in the face of significant pressure, publicly opposed a state law that bans classroom lessons on sexual orientation and gender identity in early grades, a policy critics call "Don't Say Gay."

As punishment, DeSantis took over Disney World's self-governing district and appointed a new board of supervisors that would oversee municipal services in the sprawling theme parks. But before the new board came in, the company pushed though an 11th-hour agreement that stripped the new supervisors of much of their authority.

The DeSantis board on Wednesday said Disney's move to retain control over their property was effectively unlawful and performed without proper public notice.

"Disney picked the fight with this board. We were not looking out for a fight," said Martin Garcia, chair of the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District, before the vote, adding "bottom line, what our lawyers have told us, is factually and legally what they created is an absolute legal mess. It will not work."

DeSantis has also vowed additional retribution, with proposals to enhance state oversight of the resort's rides and monorail, as well as a suggestion to build a prison nearby.

Disney has said all agreements made with the previous board were legal and approved in a public forum. Disney CEO Bob Iger has also said that any actions against the company that threaten jobs or expansion at its Florida resort was not only "anti-business" but "anti-Florida."

The Disney lawsuit asks a federal judge to void the governor's takeover of the theme park district, as well as the DeSantis oversight board's actions, on the grounds that they were violations of company's free speech rights.

"A targeted campaign of government retaliation — orchestrated at every step by Governor DeSantis as punishment for Disney's protected speech — now threatens Disney's business operations, jeopardizes its economic future in the region, and violates its constitutional rights," the lawsuit said.

The search is on for a very special little bear.

A Goodwill in Tennessee has put out a plea after a stuffed tie-dye bear from Build-A-Bear was accidentally donated, according to an April 15 Facebook post from WRIL.

The bear belonged to a 4-year-old girl and had a recording of her mother’s heartbeat inside, according to the post.

“My daughter’s mom passed away and her grandma made her bear with her mom’s heartbeat in it,” the girl’s father, Tylor Kennedy, told WATE.

The father said it was the only thing his daughter still had of her mother, WATE reported.

Goodwill said it would reimburse whomever had bought the bear if they would bring it back to the store so it could be reunited with the little girl, according to WRIL.

In an update on April 17, WRIL said they had been in contact with the girl’s father, but the bear had not yet been found.

“Please, if y’all find it or see anybody that has one, just check or turn it into and I believe that somebody will get a reward if they dropped it off. I mean I know they’ll get their money back for sure,” the girl’s father told WATE.

The store manager told WATE that she believes the bear was bought by someone local and is likely still in the county. Facebook commenters have been posting photos of rainbow colored bears they’d found recently, but they haven’t yet matched up with the girl’s missing bear.

The bear was donated to the Tazewell Goodwill, about 50 miles northeast of Knoxville.

30 toys that defined the 1980s

30 toys that defined the '80s

Care Bears

Atari

Strawberry Shortcake

Pogo Ball

Space Legos

Monster in My Pocket

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

Rubik’s Cube

Roller Racer

Speak & Spell

Lite-Brite Magic Screen

Koosh Ball

Glo Worm

Pound Puppies

Fashion Plates

Moon Shoes

Polly Pocket

Masters of the Universe

Monchhichi

Piano Dance Mat

Little People Family House

Madballs

Rainbow Brite

Teddy Ruxpin

Cabbage Patch Kids Doll

Simon

Game Boy

Smurfs

Power Wheels

Star Wars Figurines

Stacker looks at how long it takes for the things people throw away to decompose. From a few days to millions of years, find out the decomposition rates of the most commonly trashed household items.

NEW YORK (AP) — Fox News said Monday it has “agreed to part ways” with Tucker Carlson, its popular and controversial host, less than a week after settling a lawsuit over the network's 2020 election reporting.

The network said in a press release that the last program of “Tucker Carlson Tonight” aired Friday.

“We thank him for his service to the network as a host and prior to that as a contributor,” the press release from the network said.

Carlson became Fox’s most popular personality after replacing Bill O’Reilly in Fox’s prime-time lineup in 2016. He’s also consistently drawn headlines for controversial coverage, including most recently airing tapes from the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection to minimize the impact of the deadly attack.

There was no immediate explanation from Fox about why Carlson was leaving. A text message to Carlson seeking comment was not immediately returned.

Fox agreed last week to pay Dominion Voting Systems more than $787 million and acknowledged that some of its reporting following the 2020 election — which allowed former President Donald Trump's aides to amplify false charges of election fraud — was incorrect.

But that reporting mostly concerned other shows, not Carlson’s. His name did come up during the case, primarily because of email and text messages that were revealed as part of the lawsuit.

Carlson and other Fox hosts were caught in private messages doubting their own network's allegations about Dominion's role in the supposed election fraud, while also being concerned that Fox was losing audience among Trump fans at the time. In some of them, Carlson privately criticized Trump, saying he hated him passionately.

A few weeks ago, Carlson devoted his entire show to an interview with Trump.

Carlson was recently named in a lawsuit filed by Abby Grossberg, a Fox News producer fired after claiming that Fox lawyers had pressured her to give misleading testimony in the Dominion lawsuit. Grossberg had gone to work for Carlson after leaving Maria Bartiromo's Fox show.

Her lawsuit says that Grossberg learned “she had merely traded in one overtly misogynistic work environment for an event crueler one — this time, one where unprofessionalism reigned supreme, and the staff’s distaste and disdain for women infiltrated almost every workday decision.”

Fox has countered with its own lawsuit, trying to bar Grossberg from disclosing confidential discussions with Fox attorneys and saying in a statement that “her allegations in connection with the Dominion case are baseless.”

“Fox News Tonight” will air in Carlson's 8 p.m. ET prime-time slot, hosted by a rotating array of network personalities, for the time being.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Former Vice President Mike Pence testified Thursday before a federal grand jury investigating efforts by then-President Donald Trump and his allies to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, according to a person familiar with the matter.

The person requested anonymity to discuss the private appearance before the grand jury.

Pence's appearance before a grand jury in Washington scrutinizing the president he once loyally served is a milestone in the Justice Department's investigation and likely gives prosecutors a key first-person account about certain conversations and events in the weeks preceding the deadly Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. It also carries significant political implications, coming as Pence hints at entering the 2024 presidential race and a potential run against Trump, the Republican front-runner.

The testimony came hours after a federal appeals court in a sealed order rejected a bid by Trump's lawyers to block Pence's appearance.

Pence was subpoenaed to testify earlier this year, but Trump's lawyers objected, citing executive privilege concerns. A judge in March refused to block Pence's appearance, though he did side with the former vice president's constitutional claims that he could not be forced to answer questions about anything related to his role as presiding over the Senate's certification of votes on Jan. 6.

"We'll obey the law, we'll tell the truth," Pence said in an interview with CBS News' "Face the Nation" that aired Sunday. "And the story that I've been telling the American people all across the country, the story that I wrote in the pages of my memoir, that'll be the story I tell in that setting."

Pence has spoken extensively about Trump's pressure campaign urging him to reject Democrat Joe Biden's presidential election victory in the days leading up to Jan. 6, including in his book, "So Help Me God." Pence, as vice president, had a ceremonial role overseeing Congress' counting of the Electoral College vote but did not have the power to affect the results, despite Trump's contention otherwise.

Pence, a former Indiana governor and congressman, has said that Trump endangered his family and everyone else who was at the Capitol that day and history will hold him "accountable."

"For four years, we had a close working relationship. It did not end well," Pence wrote, summing up their time in the White House.

Lawyers for Pence had raised their own, more narrow challenge to the subpoena. They argued that because Pence was serving in his capacity as president of the Senate as electoral votes were being counted in Congress on Jan. 6, he was protected from being forced to testify about that process under the Constitution's "speech or debate" clause, which is intended to protect members of Congress from being questioned about official legislative acts.

A judge agreed with that argument, effectively narrowing the scope of his expected testimony.

The Justice Department special counsel leading the investigation, Jack Smith, has cast a broad net in interviews and has sought the testimony of a long list of former Trump aides, including ex-White House counsel Pat Cipollone and former adviser Stephen Miller.

Smith is separately investigating Trump over the potential mishandling of hundreds of classified documents at his Palm Beach, Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago, as well as possible efforts to obstruct that probe. On Wednesday, Trump's lawyers in that investigation called the Department of Justice investigation "severely botched" and "politically infected" and urged the House Intelligence Committee to step in by holding hearings and introducing legislation to correct classified document handling procedures in the White House and to standardize procedures for presidents and vice presidents for when they leave office.

"DOJ should be ordered to stand down, and the intelligence community should instead conduct an appropriate investigation and provide a full report to this Committee, as well as your counterparts in the Senate," the lawyers wrote.

It is unclear when either of the special counsel's investigations will end or who, if anyone, will be charged.

Photos: Mike Pence through the years

LONDON (AP) — Len Goodman, a long-serving judge on "Dancing with the Stars" and "Strictly Come Dancing" who helped revive interest in ballroom dancing on both sides of the Atlantic, has died, his agent said Monday. He was 78.

Agent Jackie Gill said Goodman "passed away peacefully." He had been diagnosed with bone cancer.

A former professional ballroom dancer and British champion, Goodman was head judge on "Strictly Come Dancing" for 12 years from its launch on the BBC in 2004. The dance competition, which pairs celebrities with professional dance partners, was a surprise hit and has become one of the network's most popular shows.

Goodman's pithy observations, delivered in a Cockney accent, endeared him to viewers. "You floated across that floor like butter on a crumpet," he remarked after one foxtrot. He praised a salsa-dancing couple as "like two sizzling sausages on a barbecue."

Goodman was head judge on the U.S. version of the show, ABC's "Dancing With the Stars," for 15 years until his retirement in November. For several years he judged the British and American shows simultaneously each autumn, criss-crossing the Atlantic weekly.

British broadcaster Esther Rantzen said Goodman had been "astonished and delighted" by his late-life fame.

"One of the reasons he succeeded so well in the States is that he was quintessentially British," she said. "He was firm but fair, funny but a gentleman and I hope the nation will adopt his favorite expostulation of 'pickle me walnuts.'"

Goodman also presented BBC radio programs and made TV documentaries, including a 2012 program about the sinking of the Titanic. As a young man, Goodman had worked as a shipyard welder for the company that built the doomed ship.

BBC director-general Tim Davie said Goodman was "a wonderful, warm entertainer who was adored by millions. He appealed to all ages and felt like a member of everyone's family. Len was at the very heart of Strictly's success. He will be hugely missed by the public and his many friends and family."

Goodman was also a recipient of the Carl Alan Award in recognition of outstanding contributions to dance, and owned the Goodman Academy dance school in southern England.

Photos: Notable Deaths in 2023

Raquel Welch

David Crosby

Richard Belzer

Cindy Williams

Lisa Marie Presley

Jeff Beck

Gary Rossington

Wayne Shorter

Burt Bacharach

Tom Sizemore

Charles Kimbrough

Stella Stevens

Annie Wersching

Tim McCarver

Billy Packer

Dave Hollis

David Jude Jolicoeur

Barrett Strong

Lloyd Morrisett

Robbie Knievel

Gina Lollobrigida

Lynette Hardaway ("Diamond")

Adam Rich

Bobby Hull

Charles White

Jerry Richardson

Sister André

Tatjana Patitz

Russell Banks

Cardinal George Pell

Ken Block

Walter Cunningham

Anton Walkes

Robert Blake

Chaim Topol

Bobby Caldwell

Pat Schroeder

Lance Reddick

Willis Reed

Seymour Stein

Klaus Teuber

Michael Lerner

Harry Belafonte

Barry Humphries

Ginnie Newhart

Len Goodman

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WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden on Tuesday formally announced that he is running for reelection in 2024, asking voters to give him more time to "finish the job" he began when he was sworn in to office and to set aside their concerns about extending the run of America's oldest president for another four years.

Biden, who would be 86 at the end of a second term, is betting his first-term legislative achievements and more than 50 years of experience in Washington will count for more than concerns over his age. He faces a smooth path to winning his party's nomination, with no serious Democratic rivals. But he's still set for a hard-fought struggle to retain the presidency in a bitterly divided nation.

Keep scrolling for a gallery of photos of Joe Biden through the years

The announcement, in a three-minute video, comes on the four-year anniversary of when Biden declared for the White House in 2019, promising to heal the "soul of the nation" amid the turbulent presidency of Donald Trump — a goal that has remained elusive.

"I said we are in a battle for the soul of America, and we still are," Biden said. "The question we are facing is whether in the years ahead we have more freedom or less freedom. More rights or fewer."

While the question of seeking reelection has been a given for most modern presidents, that's not always been the case for Biden, as a notable swath of Democratic voters have indicated they would prefer he not run, in part because of his age — concerns Biden has called "totally legitimate" but ones he did not address head-on in the launch video.

Yet few things have unified Democratic voters like the prospect of Trump returning to power. And Biden's political standing within his party stabilized after Democrats notched a stronger-than-expected performance in last year's midterm elections, as the president set out to run again on the same themes that buoyed his party last fall, particularly on preserving access to abortion.

"Freedom. Personal freedom is fundamental to who we are as Americans. There's nothing more important. Nothing more sacred," Biden said in the launch video, which painted the Republican Party as extremists trying to roll back access to abortion, cut Social Security, limit voting rights and ban books they disagree with. "Around the country, MAGA extremists are lining up to take those bedrock freedoms away."

"This is not a time to be complacent," Biden added. "That's why I'm running for reelection."

By the numbers: President Biden at the two-year mark

6.5% annual inflation

10.46 million job vacancies

$31.38 trillion national debt

$24.2 billion in security aid to Ukraine

2.38 million migrants stopped at border

97 federal judges confirmed

89 pardons and commutations

$3.36 average gas price

666 million vaccines administered

680,000 COVID-19 deaths

36 states visited

197 days in Delaware

6 chats with Xi

21 news conferences

$1 trillion in infrastructure

$40 billion for bridges

1 state dinner

0 Cabinet departures

A closer look

As the contours of the campaign begin to take shape, Biden plans to campaign on his record. He spent his first two years as president combating the coronavirus pandemic and pushing through major bills such as the bipartisan infrastructure package and legislation to promote high-tech manufacturing and climate measures. With Republicans now in control of the House, Biden has shifted his focus to implementing those massive laws and making sure voters credit him for the improvements, while sharpening the contrast with the GOP ahead of an expected showdown over raising the nation's borrowing limit that could have debilitating consequences for the country's economy.

But the president also has multiple policy goals and unmet promises from his first campaign that he's pitching voters on giving him another chance to fulfill.

"Let's finish this job. I know we can," Biden said in the video, repeating a mantra he said a dozen times during his State of the Union address in February, listing everything from passing a ban on assault-style weapons and lowering the cost of prescription drugs to codifying a national right to abortion after the Supreme Court's ruling last year overturning Roe v. Wade.

Buoyed by the midterm results, Biden plans to continue to cast all Republicans as embracing what he calls "ultra-MAGA" politics — a reference to Trump's "Make America Great Again" slogan — regardless of whether his predecessor ends up on the 2024 ballot. He's spent the last several months road-testing campaign themes, including painting Republicans as fighting for tax cuts for businesses and the wealthy while trying to cut social safety net benefits relied on by everyday Americans and roll back access to abortion services.

Biden, speaking over brief video clips and photographs of key moments in his presidency, snapshots of diverse Americans and flashes of his outspoken Republican foes, including Trump, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, exhorted supporters that "this is our moment" to "defend democracy. Stand up for our personal freedoms. Stand up for the right to vote and our civil rights."

Biden also plans to point to his work over the past two years shoring up American alliances, leading a global coalition to support Ukraine's defenses against Russia's invasion and returning the U.S. to the Paris climate accord. But public support in the U.S. for Ukraine has softened in recent months, and some voters question the tens of billions of dollars in military and economic assistance flowing to Kyiv.

The president faces lingering criticism over his administration's chaotic 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan after nearly 20 years of war, which undercut the image of competence he aimed to portray to the world, and he finds himself the target of GOP attacks over his immigration and economic policies.

As a candidate in 2020, Biden pitched voters on his familiarity with the halls of power in Washington and his relationships around the world as he promised to return a sense of normalcy to the country amid Trump's tumultuous presidency and the deadly COVID-19 pandemic.

But even back then, Biden was acutely aware of voters' concerns about his age.

"Look, I view myself as a bridge, not as anything else," Biden said in March 2020, as he campaigned in Michigan with younger Democrats, including now-Vice President Kamala Harris, Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey and Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. "There's an entire generation of leaders you saw stand behind me. They are the future of this country."

Three years later, the president now 80, Biden allies say his time in office has demonstrated that he saw himself as more of a transformational than a transitional leader.

Still, many Democrats would prefer that Biden didn't run again. A recent poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research shows just 47% of Democrats say they want him to seek a second term, up from 37% in February. And Biden's verbal — and occasional physical — stumbles have become fodder among the GOP, which has sought to cast him as unfit for office.

Biden, on multiple occasions, has brushed back concerns about his age, saying simply, "Watch me."

During a routine physical in February, his physician, Dr. Kevin O'Connor, declared him "healthy, vigorous" and "fit" to handle his White House responsibilities.

Aides acknowledge that while some in his party might prefer an alternative to Biden, there is anything but consensus within their diverse coalition on who that might be. And they insist that when Biden is compared with whomever the GOP nominates, Democrats and independents will rally around Biden.

For now, the 76-year-old Trump is the favorite to emerge as the Republican nominee, creating the potential of a historic sequel to the bitterly fought 2020 campaign. But Trump faces significant hurdles of his own, including the designation of being the first former president to face criminal charges. The remaining GOP field is volatile, with DeSantis emerging as an early alternative to Trump. DeSantis' stature is also in question, however, amid questions about his readiness to campaign outside of his increasingly Republican-leaning state.

To prevail again, Biden will need to revive the alliance of young voters and Black voters — particularly women — along with blue-collar Midwesterners, moderates and disaffected Republicans who helped him win in 2020. He'll have to again carry the so-called "blue wall" in the Upper Midwest, while protecting his position in Georgia and Arizona, longtime GOP strongholds that he narrowly won in his last campaign.

Biden's reelection bid comes as the nation weathers uncertain economic crosscurrents. Inflation is ticking down after hitting the highest rate in a generation, driving up the price of goods and services, but unemployment is at a 50-year low, and the economy is showing signs of resilience despite Federal Reserve interest rate hikes.

Presidents typically try to delay their reelection announcements to maintain the advantages of incumbency and skate above the political fray for as long as possible while their rivals trade jabs. But the leg up offered by being in the White House can be rickety — three of the last seven presidents have lost reelection, most recently Trump in 2020.

Biden's announcement is roughly consistent with the timeline followed by then-President Barack Obama, who waited until April 2011 to declare for a second term. Trump launched his reelection bid on the day he was sworn in in 2017.

Biden is not expected to dramatically alter his day-to-day schedule as a candidate — at least not immediately — with aides believing his strongest political asset is showing the American people that he is governing. And if he follows the Obama playbook, he may not hold any formal campaign rallies until well into 2024. Obama didn't hold a reelection rally until May 2012.

On Tuesday, Biden named White House adviser Julie Chávez Rodríguez to serve as campaign manager and Quentin Fulks, who ran Sen. Raphael Warnock's reelection campaign in Georgia last year, to serve as principal deputy campaign manager. Reps. Lisa Blunt-Rochester, Jim Clyburn and Veronica Escobar; Sens. Chris Coons and Tammy Duckworth; entertainment mogul and Democratic mega-donor Jeffrey Katzenberg; and Whitmer will serve as campaign co-chairs.

On the heels of the announcement Tuesday, Biden was set to deliver remarks to union members before hosting South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol for a state visit at the White House. He plans to meet with party donors in Washington later this week.

Biden's formal go-ahead comes after months of public incredulity that the president would seek another term despite plentiful signs that he was intent on doing so.

Ahead of the president's announcement, first lady Jill Biden expressed disbelief at the persistent questions about her husband's intent to run.

"How many times does he have to say it for you to believe it?" she told The Associated Press in late February. "He says he's not done."