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Polarizing coach Bela Karolyi, who helped turn Team USA into a gymnastics powerhouse but came under fire for his severe style and the abuse that happened on his watch, has died at age 82.

Born in 1942 in Romania, Karolyi coached the Romanian women’s national team, including gold medalist Nadia Comaneci, before he defected to the United States with his wife Martha in 1981.

Together, they opened up a U.S. gym where they would mentor eight national champions in 13 years.

Some coaches and elite gymnasts have criticized Karolyi’s harsh methods, including using name-calling, taunts about for their weight and, famously, urging Kerri Strug to perform with a sprained ankle at the 1996 Olympics.

Karolyi picked up Strug and carried her to the podium after she landed the vault that helped win the team gold. Tests would reveal she had two torn ligaments in her ankle.

“Bela is a very tough coach and he gets criticism for that,” Strug said after the competition. “But that’s what it takes to become a champion."

His coaching was especially scrutinized after former USA Gymnastics team doctor Larry Nassar received a life sentence for sexually assaulting female athletes, including gymnasts at the Karolyi ranch, for years. Both Bela Karolyi and his wife told CNN in 2018 that they were unaware of Nassar’s behavior. 

BREAKING: Republicans retain control of the United States House of Representatives, according to The Associated Press. 

Democratic Rep. Ruben Gallego has won his race for Arizona’s U.S. Senate seat, according to the Associated Press. He’ll become the state’s first Latino senator.


Gallego is a retired U.S. Marine who has been representing Arizona in the U.S. House since 2015. 

NEW: Incumbent Democratic Sen. Jacky Rosen wins reelection to serve Nevada for another term, The Associated Press reports. 

President-elect Donald Trump won support this election from some key demographic groups — some that have favored Republicans in the past and others that generally vote Democratic.

According to AP VoteCast, a survey of the American electorate conducted by The AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, 16% of Black voters supported Trump in 2024, an 8-point gain from his run in 2020. In comparison, 83% of Black voters supported Vice President Kamala Harris, an 8-point drop from the 91% that supported Joe Biden in 2020.

Among Latino voters, Trump's support grew from 35% in 2020 to 42% in 2024. Meanwhile, 56% of Latino voters cast their ballot for Harris in 2024 compared to 63% for Biden in 2020.


AP VoteCast also showed a gender gap in voting preferences for this election. Trump won support from 24% of Black men versus 9% of Black women, 47% of Latino men versus 38% of Latino women, and 59% of white men versus 53% of white women.


Newsrooms, including PBS News, turn to AP VoteCast to better understand voters and voting behavior. Rather than relying only on in-person interviews outside polling stations, VoteCast uses a combination of mail, phone and online research to better reach voters and better reflect changing voting methods.


Read more:  https://to.pbs.org/3UJy85n 

President-elect Donald Trump announced late Thursday that Susie Wiles, the co-chair of his 2024 presidential campaign, will be his next White House chief of staff. The appointment makes her the first woman to hold the job.

Wiles is a political consultant based in Florida who has run or worked for several Republican campaigns, including Trump's first bid for the White House in 2016.

She co-managed Trump's 2024 campaign with Chris LaCivita and received a shout-out from the president-elect during his victory speech in West Palm Beach, Florida, early Wednesday.

"Susie likes to stay sort of in the back, let me tell you. The ice baby. We call her the ice baby," Trump said. "Susie likes to stay in the background."

The White House chief of staff is an appointed position that serves the president and manages the executive office. Trump had four chief of staff during his first term in office — Reince Priebus, John Kelly, Mick Mulvaney in an acting capacity and Mark Meadows.

Kelly, a retired four-star general and Trump's longest-serving chief of staff, said in an October interview with The New York Times that Trump displayed fascist tendencies and did not endorse him in the 2024 election. 

Republican businessman Dave McCormick will become Pennsylvania’s next U.S. senator, The Associated Press reports. 

McCormick is a West Point graduate, combat veteran and Bronze Star recipient who was once CEO of Bridgewater Associates, one of the largest hedge funds in the world. 

NEW: Democratic Rep. Elissa Slotkin, a former CIA analyst, will become Michigan's next U.S. senator, The Associated Press reports. 

Republican Tim Sheehy, a former Navy SEAL, will become Montana's next U.S. senator, The Associated Press reports. 

Former President Donald Trump has won the 2024 presidential election and a second term in the White House, four years after losing the 2020 election to President Joe Biden, the Associated Press reports.

With his win over Vice President Kamala Harris, Trump becomes the first former U.S. president since Grover Cleveland in the late 1800s to return to the White House for a nonconsecutive second term.

Trump is the first convicted felon to be elected president in American history. A New York jury found him guilty earlier this year in an illegal hush money scheme intended to cover up a sexual encounter with an adult film actress before the 2016 election. Trump has faced three other local or federal indictments this year, including for his efforts to overturn the 2020 election results. He was impeached twice as president, but acquitted by the Senate in both cases.



At 78, Trump will be the oldest person ever inaugurated as president  – a few months older than Biden was when he took office in 2021.

Read more:  https://to.pbs.org/3UHaBC5