Michael Ivins/Boston Red Sox via GettyA former Major League Baseball player was arrested in Florida as part of what authorities described as a “child predator operation.”Austin Maddox, a pitcher who briefly played for the Boston Red Sox in 2017, was among 27 people who were taken into custody in a multi-agency underage sex sting last month, Jacksonville Sheriff T.K. Waters said Monday. Maddox “traveled with the intent of engaging in sexual activity with a 14-year-old child,” Waters said at a news conference about the operation.The 33-year-old allegedly started communicating with an undercover agent posing as a teenage girl on April 28, according to an arrest report cited by the Associated Press. He allegedly expressed intent to have sex with the girl even after learning that she was 14.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Louis Nastro/ReutersAt least one passenger was killed and more than 30 others were hurt when a Singapore Airlines flight from London to Singapore encountered severe turbulence, according to reports.More to follow...Read more at The Daily Beast.

Mark Peterson/ReutersEven in the closing stages of Donald Trump’s hush money trial, there’s seemingly no end to the drama.Defense witness Robert Costello—a former federal prosecutor called by Trump’s attorneys as they seek to undermine the credibility of the prosecution’s star witness, Michael Cohen—will be back on the stand Tuesday. His return comes the day after extraordinary scenes in the Manhattan courtroom that prompted Judge Juan Merchan to repeatedly rebuke Costello for his “contemptuous” behavior, even threatening to strike all of his testimony.After Cohen finished his fourth day of testimony, jurors heard from Costello—a lawyer who once advised Cohen and acted as a backchannel between Cohen and Trump’s White House in 2018.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Photo Illustration by Thomas Levinson/The Daily Beast/GettyThe Daily Beast has discovered previously unreported details behind the clandestine network that prosecutors say funneled hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes to U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-TX). The network’s sprawling roots stretch from a consulate at the edge of Los Angeles to the glittering capital of a despotic ex-Soviet regime, and from the D.C. foreign aid complex near Foggy Bottom to a hydroponic farm in Maryland that supplied Georgetown’s leading bipartisan hangouts.The bribery indictment of the Texas congressman describes, among other things, how the congressman allegedly struck a deal for his wife to receive $360,000 in “sham contracts” from the state-owned oil company of autocratic Azerbaijan. The feds say these arrangements ran through an Azerbaijani-born, U.S.-based intermediary—called “Individual-2” in the criminal complaint—and at times through his import-export business, referred to as “U.S. Company-1.” Cuellar and his wife have denied any wrongdoing.Based on details in the indictment—including that Individual-2 served as Azerbaijani vice consul in L.A. between March 2006 and April 2010, resides in Potomac, Maryland, and formed a shell entity in Texas on August 22, 2017—The Daily Beast can identify Individual-2 as Elshan Baloghlanov, which the The Texas Observer has also reported.Read more at The Daily Beast.

HBO/Everett CollectionThe below is an excerpt from ‘Too Funny for Words: Backstage Tales from Broadway, Television, and the Movies’ by Jerry Adler, which is available from May 21. I was stricken with terrible stomach pains and went to my doctor in New York’s Mount Sinai Hospital. I wound up with gastric problems and required an operation. The recuperation was pleasant, Joan flew back, and I lay there, bandaged heavily, just as David Chase called. Alisa had given David my number but didn’t tell him where I was. He was quite friendly, we chatted about our days on Northern Exposure. Frankly I had no memory of seeing David Chase there, though I knew he had written some of the episodes I had filmed.Finally, he got around to why he was calling. He was doing a pilot named The Sopranos, and there was a cameo he wanted me to do. I assumed it was a rabbi or a Jewish character because that kind of character was the basis of our relationship. I had no desire to do another Jewish person for fear of being typecast, but at my age that’s ridiculous. His insistence was very effective, and it was an offer. I agreed. David said he would call the office and make a deal.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Illustration by Elizabeth Brockway/The Daily BeastWhen Caitlin Clark took to the red carpet for the 2024 WNBA Draft, the talk was not just about her formidable skills on the court. The basketball player caught the attention of fashion lovers for her choice of a head-to-toe Prada ensemble, with details including a white double satin shirt and skirt, an embroidered rhinestone mesh top, black leather sling back pumps, a black handbag and sunglasses.Clark’s outfit became an extra celebratory one when she became the first pick for the Indiana Fever, and it also became a historic moment for Prada, as it was the first time the brand had dressed a player for either the WNBA or NBA draft.“It was almost too perfect the way Caitlin and Prada aligned so well, both being at the forefront of what they do,” Clark’s stylist Adri Zgirdea told The Daily Beast. “Fashion provides an exciting way to add to the conversation surrounding these WNBA players already inspiring stories. I think it’s fantastic that these women are getting the representation and recognition they deserve.”Read more at The Daily Beast.

Photo Illustration by Luis G. Rendon/The Daily Beast/Matthew Brown/Associated PressTim Sheehy, the Navy SEAL running to unseat Democratic Montana Sen. Jon Tester, has repeatedly told voters he was “discharged” from the military for medical reasons, owing to wounds sustained in service.But the Republican’s own autobiography, published just last year, says otherwise; he wrote that he became disillusioned with military personnel policies and left of his own accord after being injured in a training accident.“This line of inquiry is disgusting,” Sheehy’s campaign said in a statement, claiming there was no inconsistency.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Photo Illustration by Luis G. Rendon/The Daily Beast/NetflixDemand for a queer Bridgerton character is nothing new. Since the first season of the Netflix romance show, fans have speculated on certain characters’ identities—is Benedict (Luke Thompson) “artsy,” or does his femininity indicate something else about him? Does Eloise (Claudia Jessie) simply “hate marriage,” or does she only loathe the concept of marrying a man? We’ve wanted a gay character since the show premiered in 2020—and as the series reaches its midpoint in adapting the eight books, there’s never been a better time to twist the stories.With that in mind, I won’t beat around the bush with my plea to the Bridgerton creators, here: Let the girls be gay! You know, the two that are constantly hanging out and making eyes at each other? The ones that have more chemistry than any other couple that has graced this show?We’re talking about Eloise and Cressida Cowper (Jessica Madsen) here, people. Colin (Luke Newton) and Penelope (Nicola Coughlan) may be the couple du jour of Bridgerton Season 3, but just like how Season 2 set that friends-to-lovers arc in motion, I’m hoping Season 3 is setting up Creloise for Season 4. Or even Season 5. Just, at some point, please—they really do belong together.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Photo Illustration by Luis G. Rendon/The Daily Beast/Matthew MurphyIn 2020, I wondered if Michael Stuhlbarg was “the most underrated actor alive.” Four years later, that question no longer applies, given that the 55-year-old artist has just been nominated for a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play for his breathtaking performance in Patriots.A ripped-from-recent-history play from The Crown mastermind Peter Morgan, it features Stuhlbarg as Boris Berezovsky, the Russian oligarch who amassed a fortune (and attendant power) in his native Russia during the heyday of Boris Yeltsin, and then aided the ascent of Vladimir Putin (Will Keen) to the president’s office, only to unexpectedly run afoul of the authoritarian. As the ambitious and idealistic businessman, Stuhlbarg is a larger-than-life marvel, capturing—with every cunning smile and imposing outburst—both the virtue and vice of the mathematician-turned-billionaire. A masterclass of showmanship that sympathizes Berezovsky without letting him off the hook for his personal shortcomings and strategic failures, it’s a tour de force that’s rightly earned raves since the production debuted stateside on April 22.A portrait of that brief turning point in Russian history when Berezovsky and his free market-loving ilk took advantage of their new liberal environment to become personally wealthy as well as to push the country toward a new, more harmonious relationship with the West, Patriots is a lament for an opportunity lost, and a sharp and timely look at the ways in which autocracies emerge—or, in Russia’s case, re-emerge. Those themes are all embodied in the figure of Berezovsky, and it’s a tribute to Stuhlbarg’s immense talent that—paired with the excellent Keen as Putin—he brings them to life through formidable force of personality.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Photo Illustration by Thomas Levinson/The Daily Beast/GettyListen to this full episode of The New Abnormal on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon and Stitcher.After it was revealed that an upside down American flag was spotted outside the home of Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito in the days leading up to President Joe Biden’s inauguration in 2021, the longtime jurist had several chances to correct the record on why, exactly, a symbol favored by right-wing extremists to signal their false belief that the 2020 election had been stolen turned up outside the home of a supposedly nonpartisan judge.Alito has since blamed both his wife and a neighborly dispute for the brewing scandal in a pair of interviews—but he hasn’t once disavowed the symbolism behind the flag or even suggested that he didn’t know what it meant.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Photo Illustration by Thomas Levinson/The Daily Beast/Getty/Warner Bros.There are roughly 47,000—oh, wait, a new Netflix Original just dropped; make that 47,001—TV shows and movies coming out each week. At Obsessed, we consider it our social duty to help you see the best and skip the rest.We’ve already got a variety of in-depth, exclusive coverage on all of your streaming favorites and new releases, but sometimes what you’re looking for is a simple Do or Don’t. That’s why we created See/Skip, to tell you exactly what our writers think you should See and what you can Skip from the past week’s crowded entertainment landscape.See: FuriosaRead more at The Daily Beast.

Charles McQuillan/Getty ImagesThe cancer-stricken Princess of Wales, Kate Middleton, has been doing a little work from home—but she won’t be returning to public life anytime soon.Her office said Tuesday that she had remained heavily involved and “always on,” as a landmark new report for the Early Childhood Center, one of her key causes, was published. However, they added that her involvement should not be seen as a signal she was about to return to her public role, citing her need for “space and privacy to recover.”Kate has scarcely been seen at all in public this year.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Comedy CentralChiefs kicker Harrison Butker has stirred up controversy after a right-wing rant during a commencement speech earlier this month where he complained about abortion rights, “degenerate cultural values” and encouraged the female graduates to focus on getting married and having kids. The subsequent response by Fox News, who claimed Butker had become a victim of outrage since the speech, led The Daily Show host to take note.“Not the advice you want to hear when you’re $100,000 in debt, earning a degree in electrical engineering,” Jon Stewart quipped in his opening monologue, before musing, “But I imagine that the cancellation of one Harrison Butker was swift and unforgiving at the White House.”His statement was answered by a clip of White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre confirming that Butker was still invited to the White House to celebrate the Chiefs’ Super Bowl victory.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Scouted/The Daily Beast/Otterbox. Scouted selects products independently. If you purchase something from our posts, we may earn a small commission.If an ultra-rugged military-grade phone case fit for a construction site (or the apocalypse) comes to mind when you think of Otterbox, you’re not wrong, but despite their reputation for unparalleled, rugged, minimalist, and utilitarian options, you’d probably be surprised at the sleek options the brand offers—with the same military-grade protection intact. While the brand’s O.G. Defender Series is a best-seller, Otterbox has an impressive lineup of new, sleek, yet ultra-durable device cases. Case in point? Its latest vegan leather collection.After six months of customer anticipation following its debut at CES in January 2024, Otterbox finally released its ultra-luxe vegan leather Symmetry Series collection, crafted from organic nopal cactus that’s sustainably harvested and 100 percent cruelty-free. The collection infuses the brand’s signature protective technology, engineered with a 3X MIL-STD rating (a military-grade drop test) defense rating, with a bit of quiet luxury appeal.Read more at The Daily Beast.

CNNRudy Giuliani’s love for live streams allowed Arizona authorities to finally serve him, the state’s attorney general told CNN on Monday.The former New York mayor, who was indicted in the battleground last month for his efforts to overturn the 2020 election there, was served just after his 80th birthday party on Friday night in Palm Beach, Florida, following weeks of unsuccessful attempts.It was Giuliani’s live stream of the party that gave away his location, Kris Mayes told CNN’s Kaitlan Collins on The Source.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Mark Peterson/Getty ImagesAs if Donald Trump wanted to actually spend more time in court, his campaign is now threatening to sue the makers of The Apprentice after it was reported the biopic, which premiered at Cannes on Monday, features a scene in which Sebastian Stan’s Trump violently rapes his first wife.“We will be filing a lawsuit to address the blatantly false assertions from these pretend filmmakers,” campaign spokesman Steven Cheung told The Daily Beast on Monday night. “This garbage is pure fiction which sensationalizes lies that have been long debunked.”Cheung went on to blast the film as “election interference by Hollywood elites” on the same level as the criminal charges brought against Trump in four separate cases over the last year, which Cheung termed “the illegal Biden Trials.”Read more at The Daily Beast.

MSNBCFulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, in a rare television interview with MSNBC anchor Rachel Maddow, expressed her determination to not let threats and pressure from Republicans at the local, state and federal level prevent her from doing her job, which at the moment includes leading a high-profile case against former President Donald Trump.With that Georgia criminal case having ground to a halt amid a Trump appeal, Willis explained the effect of having personal security measures in place for an extended period of time.“It’s been happening since about a month after I took office—I began to get threats,” said Willis, whose term began in January 2021. Eventually, she said, the threats forced her to relocate out of her home.Read more at The Daily Beast.

David Dee Delgado/ReutersHad he still been a daytime anchor on MSNBC, Carlos Watson would no doubt have spent Monday marshaling reports about the Trump hush-money trial in downtown Manhattan.Instead, Watson was on the other side of the East River, sitting as a defendant in Brooklyn Federal Court, awaiting the start of jury selection in a multi-million dollar fraud case that could leave him facing as many as 37 years in prison.A 54-year-old Harvard and Stanford educated superachiever, Watson had gone from anchoring a morning news show in 2009 to co-founding the digital startup Ozy Media in 2013, when it seemed there a fabulous fortune to be made online with news articles, newsletters and podcasts. He also produced television, including The Carlos Watson Show, on which he interviewed notables ranging from Bill Gates to Scarlett Johansson to NASCAR’S Danica Patrick.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Photo Illustration by Thomas Levinson/The Daily Beast/GettyBillionaire mega-donor Timothy Mellon, who has poured millions into a super PAC supporting Donald Trump, gave another $5 million to Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in April, according to newly released campaign finance filings.The gift is sure to stoke speculation that Mellon believes Kennedy’s presence as an independent in the race could siphon votes away from President Joe Biden and help tilt the election toward the GOP.Mellon sent the cash to American Values 2024, a super PAC supporting Kennedy. He previously gave $20 million to the PAC, along with $15 million to the Trump-affiliated Make America Great Again Inc.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Nathan Congleton/NBC via Getty ImagesOpenAI is shelving an artificially intelligent voice assistant that has drawn scrutiny and criticism in recent days over its suspicious resemblance to the voice of Scarlett Johansson.“We’ve heard questions about how we chose the voices in ChatGPT, especially Sky,” the company said on Monday morning. “We are working to pause the use of Sky while we address them.”In a lengthy statement, Johansson said she was “shocked, angered and in disbelief” that Sky’s demo voice sounded “so eerily similar to mine that my closest friends and news outlets could not tell the difference.”Read more at The Daily Beast.

The Daily Beast/Getty ImagesSome people look at the apparent rough patch in Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez’s marriage and ask, “Why?” Others look at it and ask, “Why not?”Based on clues planted in Lopez’s documentary The Greatest Love Story Never Told, and a knowledge of celebrity couples, it’s easy to theorize which marital stressors led to this strife. Here are five theories on what went wrong.1. The problem with ‘a love that stops time’ is that time inevitably marches on.Read more at The Daily Beast.

STR/NurPhoto via Getty ImagesTrump Media & Technology Group, the company that owns Truth Social, on Monday posted an alarming loss and less than $1 million in revenue in its first quarter since going public. Trump Media, which began trading in March under the ticker symbol DJT, reported $770,500 in revenue—crediting its “nascent advertising initiative”—down from $1.1 million last year. However, it also reported a net loss of $327.6 million during the first three months of the year, as compared with a loss of $210,300 a year ago. Read more at The Daily Beast.

Reuters/Evelyn HocksteinMonths after he was accused of overseeing a “boy’s club” workplace rife with misogyny and harassment, the FDIC Chairman Martin Gruenberg said Wednesday he’s prepared to step down once a successor is confirmed. “In light of recent events, I am prepared to step down from my responsibilities once a successor is confirmed,” he said. “Until that time, I will continue to fulfill my responsibilities as Chairman of the FDIC, including the transformation of the FDIC’s workplace culture.”A Wall Street Journal report in November marked the beginning of Gruenberg’s downfall, with women at the FDIC claiming male employees got to keep their jobs despite sending colleagues pictures of their penises, inviting others to a strip club, and speaking openly about having sex with a subordinate. The agency was also accused of tolerating a messy drinking culture, with staffers having allegedly urinated off the roof and vomited in the elevator of a hotel where employees are housed for trainings.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Raymond Hall/GC ImagesThe fallout from the video showing Sean “Diddy” Combs assaulting his ex Cassie Ventura continues, as New York City Mayor Eric Adams is potentially reconsidering Diddy’s key to the city award, per PIX11.Adams presented the Harlem native the award in Times Square in 2023, for “his contributions to music, business, and philanthropy,” according to mayor’s office. The mayor was giddy to hand over the key, telling Diddy on stage, “The bad boy of entertainment is getting the key to the city from the bad boy of politics!” But the newly released video of Diddy violently attacking his ex-girlfriend at a Los Angeles hotel in 2016 has raised questions about whether the rapper should still be in possession of that award—particularly as Adams has staked his political platform on combating domestic violence in the city.Read more at The Daily Beast.

John Lamparski/WireImageA server at The Ribbon restaurant on the Upper West Side is suing his place of employment and Paramount Pictures, the distributor of the 2024 musical film Mean Girls, for discrimination, because, the server says, he was prevented from working at a release party for the movie because of his weight. In his lawsuit, which was filed on Monday and has been reviewed by The Daily Beast, plaintiff Joseph Sacchi—described as “a young, talented singer trained in classical opera [who] supplements his income by working as a server”—claims that his employer, The Ribbon, “excluded him from working at the reception because representatives from Paramount Pictures, the distributors of Mean Girls, specifically asked that he be excluded, solely based on his appearance.”Saachi is 6’2” and weighs 360 pounds, his suit notes. Read more at The Daily Beast.

Photo Illustration by Elizabeth Brockway/The Daily Beast/Getty/Rexburg Police DepartmentThe night before Tammy Daybell was found dead in her Idaho bedroom in October 2019, the doomsday novelist’s wife told her son that all she wanted was her favorite meal and some rest.“She said, ‘I don’t feel good today; I don't want to cook. Can you go get some McDonald’s for us?’” Garth Daybell testified on Monday at the trial of his father, Chad Daybell, who is accused of murdering Tammy and his lover’s two children.Garth Daybell said he made the McDonald’s run—making sure to get his mom a quarter-pounder with cheese—then left the house a few hours later for his night shift at a local haunted house.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Dia Dipasupil/Getty ImagesJen Psaki might not be President Joe Biden’s press secretary anymore, but there are some memories of the White House Press Briefing Room that you just can’t shake.Almost exactly two years after departing the position and taking up a gig at MSNBC, people are still asking her about her frostiest relationships with the room’s regulars. To this day, one name that constantly resurfaces is Peter Doocy, who proved one of the banes of Psaki’s tenure in his capacity as Fox News’ White House correspondent.His name was dropped once again at a recent forum hosted by The Ankler, where media executive Janice Min brought up the fact that Psaki discussed Doocy at length in her book, Say More: Lessons from Work, the White House, and the World, which hit shelves this month.Read more at The Daily Beast.

TIMOTHY A. CLARY/GETTYA cadre of MAGA loyalists who had gathered to show their support for Donald Trump during his hush-money trial was shouted down by a bevy of cowbell-clanging anti-Trump protesters on Monday when they tried to speak outside of a lower Manhattan courthouse.In what has become a familiar scene, several of the former president’s allies appeared in New York City on Monday to rail against Trump's prosecution and demonstrate to the 2024 White House hopeful their utter devotion to him. In recent days, a number of wannabe vice-presidential candidates and MAGA lawmakers have made the trek to curry favor with Trump and help him circumvent the judge’s gag order.The group that flanked the twice-impeached ex-president this time around included South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson, former New York police commissioner Bernie Kerik, ex-Trump administration official Kash Patel, Trump senior advisor Jason Miller, and Rep. Andrew Clyde (R-GA). All but Patel, meanwhile, were customarily decked out in Trump’s standard red tie and navy suit combo.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Getty ImagesIvan Boesky, the infamous inside trader who at least partially inspired the fictional character Gordon Gekko in the 1987 film Wall Street, died on Monday, his daughter confirmed. He was 87.Marianne Boesky told CNN her father died in his sleep, but did not share additional details about his cause of death. In an Instagram post, she called him a “dedicated and loving father above all else.”Boesky’s name became synonymous with financial greed in the 1980s, when, after making hundreds of millions by working on Wall Street, he told business school graduates University of California, Berkeley, that “greed is healthy.”Read more at The Daily Beast.

Mongrel MediaOne of the scariest moments in a film this year will invariably belong to Jeremy Strong.Early into The Apprentice, the new film about Donald Trump’s rise that premiered Monday at the Cannes Film Festival, Strong, playing notorious lawyer Roy Cohn, takes Trump, played by Sebastian Stan, into the room where he secretly records phone calls. With darkness behind in his intense eyes, Strong, as Cohn, tells Trump about how he orchestrated the death penalty for Ethel Rosenberg, the convicted Soviet spy. He explains how while others argued that her life should be saved because she was a mother, he disagreed. “She betrayed our country and she has to die,” he says, with no remorse. It feels like evil incarnate leaping off the screen.Strong’s work is another master class from the Succession star, currently on his way to a Tony for An Enemy of the People on Broadway. It feels like one of the first performances of this year’s Cannes that has true Oscar potential. That is, if the entire prospect of this movie doesn't scare people away.Read more at The Daily Beast.