Elijah Nouvelage/Getty Images(CHATTANOOGA, Tenn.) In a seismic union election Friday evening, Volkswagen workers in Chattanooga, Tennessee, voted to join the United Auto Workers Union.The workers voted 2,628 to 985 for union representation, according to a spokesperson for the National Labor Relations Board."There were seven challenged ballots that won’t be counted, because they aren’t determinative to the outcome of the election. There were three void ballots. The total number of eligible voters was 4,326," according to a statement from the NLRB.The employer will begin "bargaining in good faith" with the union, with parties having five days to file objections to the election.The vote to unionize has the potential to supercharge organizing in the nation s auto sector and demonstrate the strength of a resurgent labor movement through a victory in the South, a region typically resistant to unions.Workers began casting ballots this week in the most significant tes
ABC News(LITTLETON, Colo.) When 12 students and one teacher were gunned down in a mass shooting at Columbine High School in 1999, the tragic event marked a turning point for America.Twenty five years later, some survivors recall how they have dealt with the physical and mental impact of PTSD, anxiety and depression."It s a big part of my identity and who I am and not necessarily that day, but more who I ve become," Heather Martin, a Columbine survivor, told ABC News Live. "And a large part of that is because of the aftermath overcoming."America endured school shootings before Columbine, but never one quite like the April 20, 1999, shooting."We didn t have any context for a school shooting, couldn t name a school shooting," teacher Kiki Leyba a survivor, said.According to an ABC News review of the Gun Violence Archive, a website that tracks all shootings in the United States, 415 people have been killed in school shootings since the Columbine attacks. As
Michael Godek/Getty Images(WASHINGTON) House Speaker Mike Johnson on Thursday quashed rumors he was considering changes to make it more difficult to oust him from his leadership post, after Republican hard-liners warned it was a "red line" he shouldn’t cross.Johnson, in a statement posted to X, criticized the current rule allowing a single member to offer a motion to vacate the speaker s chair as having "harmed" the office and the party s majority in the House but said it will stand for now."Recently, many members have encouraged me to endorse a new rule to raise this threshold," he said. "While I understand the importance of that idea, any rule change requires a majority of the full House, which we do not have. We will continue to govern under the existing rules."Throughout the day, the party s right flank had sought assurances Johnson would not consider a change to the threshold to advance a motion to vacate.Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, w
Hemsworth (center) and cast at a Season 4 table read Courtesy NetflixNetflix announced Thursday that the fourth season of The Witcher is now underway, and the streamer has renewed the sword and sorcery series for a fifth but that will be it. The new seasons of the show will feature Liam Hemsworth succeeding original star and fan of the source material Henry Cavill as Geralt of Rivia. He departed the show after rumblings of creative differences behind the scenes began to surface. Cavill had told The Hollywood Reporter that he d stay with the series "as long as we can keep telling great stories which honor [author Andrzej] Sapkowski’s work," as seen in his beloved books and related games of which Cavill counted himself a devoted fanboy.As for The Witcher s new direction, the streaming service says seasons 4 and 5 will be shot back to back, "and will be the final chapter in Geralt’s story," centered on the author s books&nbs
Marilyn Nieves/Getty Images(NEW YORK) A federal judge has rejected an effort by former President Donald Trump to pause several civil lawsuits filed against him seeking to hold him accountable for his actions leading up to the Jan. 6 riot, according to a newly posted ruling.Trump had asked D.C. District Judge Amit Mehta to stay proceedings in the lawsuits brought by several members of Congress and police officers who protected the Capitol on Jan. 6 while his federal criminal case brought by Special Counsel Jack Smith was ongoing.Trump s attorneys reasoned that defending himself from the lawsuits could improperly impact his defense strategy in his criminal case, which Mehta rejected in his ruling Thursday afternoon.Mehta wrote that while, "it is true in a sense both cases center on the former President’s actions in the lead up to and on January 6, 2021. [Trump ] overstates the significance of that factual overlap in the present posture of these matters."Trump s team als