An Ohio mother was convicted of abandoning her three young children — two of whom have special needs — to go on a Florida vacation to be with her friend who was getting liposuction surgery. On Feb. 22, a Westlake City Schools special education teacher notified police that one of her students — a 7-year-old girl — informed her that she had been left home alone with her twin sister and her 10-year-old sister. The special education teacher requested a welfare check from police, according to newly released audio. 'Do you remember why she was in Miami? Her friend needed liposuction surgery.'On the same day, police conducted a welfare check on the apartment in Westlake – roughly 15 miles west of Cleveland. Officers said the children were alone and the apartment was in complete "disarray."Citing police, WKYC reported that the apartment was "in shambles" and "there was clothing, food, trash, and an unknown liquid covering the floor." The officer noted there was "furniture stacked up in a corner, storage boxes stacked in another corner, and the apartment itself smelled of old food and body odor."“Garbage, bins, and bags were strewn all over the floor,” court records state, according to the Independent. According to court documents, the children told police they did not have a cellphone to contact their mother but had been communicating with her through Nest cameras located around the unit and FaceTime on a MacBook tablet.Investigators determined that the mother — Dominique Knowles — had abandoned her children to go on vacation in Miami. The children's grandmother purportedly told police Knowles had not left the state, and Knowles allegedly told a detective she was not out of state.Westlake Law Director Michael Maloney determined that Knowles had traveled to Miami a day before police conducted the welfare check. Investigators used subpoenaed cellphone records to determine that Knowles made or received 50 calls in the greater Miami area from Feb. 21 to Feb. 23, according to court documents. During a hearing Wednesday, a prosecutor informed the judge: “Do you remember why she was in Miami? Her friend needed liposuction surgery.”When arrested, Knowles allegedly told police, “My kids are allowed to be here by themselves.”The arresting officer allegedly responded, “Not when you have two special-needs kids.”Knowles told the courtroom Wednesday, "I understand what I did was wrong, and this absolutely would never happen again. I did believe my kids were able to dress themselves and get themselves to school. I wouldn’t dare let anything happen to my kids. I wish I could go back and change the circumstances."Despite her plea, Knowles was found guilty of two counts of child endangerment — a first-degree misdemeanor that can be punishable by six months in jail and a fine of up to $1,000 per count. However, Knowles was sentenced to five years of probation and 360 days of house arrest, ordered to attend a parenting class and mental health counseling, and given $800 in fines. Knowles will be allowed to leave house arrest to go to work.Judge Joseph Burke of the Rocky River Municipal Court declared, "Something bad could’ve happened to the children, they could have started a fire in the apartment, they could have hurt themselves or suffered a medical emergency, or they could have been taken by a stranger. But most of all, they needed their mother to be there and parent them and not ... by remote cameras from Florida."Burke noted, "I don’t want to further victimize your daughters by separating you from them. It is now time for you to become the mother that your daughters deserve, need, and require."Blaze News reported in February that an Ohio mother left her 16-month-old daughter alone in a filthy playpen at home for 10 days while she went on vacation in Puerto Rico.Kristel Candelario, 32, pleaded guilty to aggravated murder and child endangerment. In March, Candelario was sentenced to life without parole in what the judge described as the "ultimate act of betrayal."Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

A swath of internal TikTok documents revealed that the company knows much more about its platform's addictive properties than it publicly admits.The company knows how quickly users can become addicted and how disruptive the app is to children's lives.With 14 states currently suing TikTok predominantly over the platform's algorithm — claiming it addicts children — court filings are making their way into the public's hands. Large portions of Kentucky's 119-page court filing were redacted when it was uploaded online. However, as Louisville Public Media reported, Kentucky Public Radio was able to read the text underneath the digital redactions, which contained summaries and primary quotes of internal TikTok documents and communications.The summaries revealed shocking revelations, including the precise amount of videos it takes for a TikTok user to become addicted.According to state investigators, TikTok has determined that it takes 260 videos before a user is "likely to become addicted to the platform."Kentucky authorities stated that "while this may seem substantial, TikTok videos can be as short as 8 seconds and are played for viewers in rapid-fire succession, automatically.""Thus, in under 35 minutes, an average user is likely to become addicted to the platform."NPR reported that internal documents showed TikTok was aware that many of its features urged young people to keep opening the app. The company's research reportedly stated that "compulsive usage correlates with a slew of negative mental health effects like loss of analytical skills, memory formation, contextual thinking, conversational depth, empathy, and increased anxiety."Disturbingly, other TikTok research, distributed in 2019, found that younger users are more likely to be addicted, as well."As expected, across most engagement metrics, the younger the user, the better the performance," a document allegedly read.Along with disrupting sleep patterns, TikTok is allegedly aware that compulsive use of the app tends to interfere with personal needs such as work, school, and even "connecting with loved ones."'This complaint cherry-picks misleading quotes and takes outdated documents out of context.'When speaking to NPR, TikTok spokesman Alex Haurek said in a statement that the publication of such information from the legal documents is "irresponsible.""It is highly irresponsible of NPR to publish information that is under a court seal," Haurek said. "Unfortunately, this complaint cherry-picks misleading quotes and takes outdated documents out of context to misrepresent our commitment to community safety."Haurek said the company has "robust safeguards, which include proactively removing suspected underage users, and we have voluntarily launched safety features such as default screen time limits, family pairing, and privacy by default for minors under 16."The spokesperson has previously said that the company is "deeply committed" to protecting teens as they continuously update and improve their product.Sorry, you're uglyThe lawsuit additionally claimed TikTok is aware of how harmful their filters can be for minors, allegedly telling employees in an internal document that the filters perpetuate "a narrow beauty norm" that could "negatively impact the wellbeing of our community."At the same time, an internal report that analyzed TikTok's main video feed found that it was pushing "a high volume of ... not attractive subjects," so TikTok retooled the algorithm to amplify users that were deemed attractive."By changing the TikTok algorithm to show fewer 'not attractive subjects' in the For You feed, [TikTok] took active steps to promote a narrow beauty norm even though it could negatively impact their Young Users," authorities wrote.TikTok also experimented with screen-time prompts, but when implemented, they only reduced the average use time for teens by about 1.5 minutes, from 108.5 minutes per day to about 107 minutes. TikTok stopped the experiment following the results."The company did not revisit the design of the tool to be more effective at preventing excessive use of TikTok," the Kentucky filing said.Parent company ByteDance has until mid-January 2025 to sell TikTok in accordance with federal laws but is challenging the ruling in a Washington appeals court.The 14 states suing TikTok are the following: California, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Mississippi, New York, New Jersey, North Carolina, Oregon, South Carolina, Vermont, and Washington, along with the District of Columbia.TikTok does not allow children under 13 to sign up and restricts some content for those under 18.Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

The owner of the Los Angeles Times is setting the record straight.After decades of endorsing Democrats for president, the L.A. Times is not endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris for president — but that's not because the editorial board did not want to. Rather, Semafor claimed that L.A. Times owner Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong "blocked" the paper from endorsing Harris.'Instead of adopting this path as suggested, the Editorial Board chose to remain silent and I accepted their decision.'Mariel Garza, the now-resigned editorials editor at L.A. Times, told Columbia Journalism Review that she had drafted an outline for an editorial endorsing Harris when she was informed the paper would not be endorsing anyone. Garza, in an interview, suggested the decision blindsided her.But, according to Soon-Shiong, that's not exactly what happened.Instead, Soon-Shiong, a billionaire who purchased the failing newspaper in 2018, explained on Wednesday that the editorial board did not follow a directive to be fair and balanced."The Editorial Board was provided the opportunity to draft a factual analysis of all the POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE policies by EACH candidate during their tenures at the White House, and how these policies affected the nation," Soon-Shiong said."In addition, the Board was asked to provide their understanding of the policies and plans enunciated by the candidates during this campaign and its potential effect on the nation in the next four years. In this way, with this clear and non-partisan information side-by-side, our readers could decide who would be worthy of being President for the next four years," he explained.But his employees chose not to follow that directive."Instead of adopting this path as suggested, the Editorial Board chose to remain silent and I accepted their decision," Soon-Shiong revealed. — (@) In response, Garza did not dispute the directive to be fair and balanced to Harris and Donald Trump. Instead, she complained that a fair analysis of each candidate fails to qualify as an "endorsement.""What he outlines in that tweet is not an endorsement, or even an editorial," Garza told CJR.Importantly, CJR executive editor Sewell Chan explained why Soon-Shiong had the right to issue his directive to the L.A. Times editorial board."I have deep respect for the Soon-Shiong family, who rescued the paper from the doomed and recently bankrupt Tribune Company," Chan wrote at CJR. "He’s a decent and thoughtful person, and as the owner of the paper, it is ultimately up to him to set the editorial direction."Garza ultimately justified her resignation by telling CJR that she is "not OK with us being silent" because "in dangerous times, honest people need to stand up." Moreover, she acknowledged the L.A. Times is a "very liberal" newspaper whose readers are Harris supporters and whose endorsement would do next to nothing.And yet, it's telling that journalists at one of the biggest newspapers in the country allegedly refused to treat Trump in a fair and balanced way. The average American, though, is probably not surprised.Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

The Biden-Harris administration has prioritized the advancement of the LGBT agenda and climate alarmism in its foreign policy. President Donald Trump has identified a different priority for his future administration: Combat the brutal persecution of Christians around the globe. Trump noted Wednesday on Truth Social, "Kamala Harris did NOTHING as 120,000 Armenian Christians were horrifically persecuted and forcibly displaced in Artsakh. Christians around the World will not be safe if Kamala Harris is President of the United States." "When I am President, I will protect persecuted Christians, I will work to stop the violence and ethnic cleansing, and we will restore PEACE between Armenia and Azerbaijan," added Trump. The Republic of Artsakh, which is also known as Nagorno-Karabakh, is a region in the Caucasus Mountains that lies within Azerbaijan's borders. While internationally recognized as part of Azerbaijan — whose close ally Turkey, formerly the Ottoman Empire, killed 1.5 million Armenians in what is regarded as the first genocide of the 20th century — the region was, at least up until September 2023, home to over 100,000 Armenian Christians who contested Azerbaijan's territorial claims. The region became autonomous in 1923 while Armenia, the world's oldest Christian country, and Azerbaijan, whose population is 97.3% Muslim, were both still members of the former Soviet Union. Two bloody wars were fought over the area in the last 30 years — the first in 1988 and the second in 2020. Azerbaijan — given military assistance by the Biden-Harris administration despite its war crimes and torture of Armenian prisoners — launched a blitzkrieg on the region on Sept. 19, 2023, and saw to the dissolution of the Armenian enclave by Jan. 1. Azerbaijani forces killed hundreds of ethnic Armenians and added insult to injury by destroying churches and cemeteries. Hundreds of thousands of ethnic Armenians were forced to flee. 'Vice President Harris — whose Administration armed Azerbaijan's genocidal blockade and attack on Artsakh — did not lift a finger or even raise her voice against Azerbaijan’s 2023 aggression.' Armenia and Azerbaijan have been engaged in peace talks in the months since. While there has been some grumbling in recent years from the State Department — an official claimed in a September 2023 Senate hearing that the U.S. would not "countenance any action or effort, short-term or long-term, to ethnically cleanse or commit other atrocities against the Armenian population of Nagorno-Karabakh" — the Biden-Harris administration was less than helpful where Armenian Christians were concerned. The Armenian National Committee of America blasted the Democratic administration in July over its "two-faced policy." The ANCA said in a statement: There is no clearer example of the Biden-Harris administration’s two-faced policy towards Armenia than the spineless inaction of USAID Administrator Samantha Power during Azerbaijan’s blockade and ethnic cleansing of Nagorno-Karabakh. As Azerbaijan deprived Artsakh’s 120,000 Armenians of access to food, fuel, medicine, and humanitarian goods in a brazen violation of international law — Administrator Power refused to acknowledge the dire humanitarian crisis unfolding. The genocidal ethnic cleansing of Artsakh’s entire Armenian population was a humanitarian catastrophe the United States had every opportunity to prevent but instead chose to enable — sacrificing the existence of the region’s indigenous Christian Armenian population for misguided geopolitical interests. The ANCA noted further that the administration's inaction "will weigh heavily on the minds of Armenian American voters this November — including those in the key swing states of Nevada and Michigan as well as in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania." As of 2021, there were more than 2 million Americans with Armenian heritage. In late September, Harris signaled support for Armenian Christians' return to Artsakh. ANCA executive director Aram Hamparian said in response, "As Vice President, Kamala Harris has had a full year to act on Artsakh's right to return — via a U.S.-led resolution at the U.N. Security Council — yet she has only started talking (to Armenian Americans, not U.N. member states) about this right 40 days before an election in which Armenian voters across key swing states may prove decisive." "Notably, Vice President Harris — whose Administration armed Azerbaijan's genocidal blockade and attack on Artsakh — did not lift a finger or even raise her voice against Azerbaijan's 2023 aggression. Even at the level of campaign rhetoric, she has not said a word about cutting U.S. military arms and aid to Azerbaijan, or otherwise holding Baku accountable for its crimes," added Hamparian. Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio) echoed Trump Wednesday, writing, "The United States should fight against the persecution of Christians all over the world, and it will when President Trump is back in the White House. Kamala Harris has done nothing." Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy wrote, "Very gratified to see President Trump speak out about the persecution & displacement of Armenian Christians in Artsakh. It’s our job to call out the hypocrisy of the foreign policy establishment & we refuse to simply sweep this issue under the rug." Artsakh is hardly the only place where brutal regimes and radicals have sought to crush Christians and their faith. According to the persecution watchdog Open Doors, 317 million Christians around the world face very high or extreme levels of persecution. Last year, 4,998 Christians were reportedly slaughtered for faith-related reasons; 14,766 churches and Christian properties were attacked; and over 295,000 Christians were displaced. The top 10 worst countries for Christians in terms of persecution were, in this order: North Korea, Somalia, Libya, Eritrea, Yemen, Nigeria, Pakistan, Sudan, Iran, and Afghanistan. Supposedly developed nations farther up the list aren't a great deal better. China, for instance, subjects Christians to routine torture, detentions, and executions. Persecution and attacks have also been on the rise in Western nations, including the U.S., Canada, France, and the United Kingdom. Arielle Del Turco, director of the Family Research Council's Center for Religious Liberty, indicated in a report earlier this year that between 2018 and 2023, there were nearly 1,000 acts of hostility against American churches. Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

There's a new Steam Deck SteamOS release available to download, and among the numerous bug fixes and other tweaks included in the update, there are also some exciting hints at what could be in the future for SteamOS. That's because there's a mention in the release notes of the latest version of added support for "extra ROG Ally keys" and "Asus ROG Raikiri Pro controller." While this is hardly smoking gun levels of evidence, it adds to previous rumors we've seen where updates have included mentions of SteamOS support for consoles other than the Steam Deck. With the use of this custom Linux OS being one of the key reasons why the Steam Deck OLED retains its place as the best handheld gaming PC, its availability on other devices could put a whole new spin on the gaming handheld landscape. Continue reading Steam Deck OS on the Asus ROG Ally looking ever more likely thanks to new update MORE FROM PCGAMESN: Asus ROG Swift PG27UQ review, Asus ROG Raikiri review, Best gaming motherboard

Corsair has just unveiled two new ranges of AIO CPU cooler in the shape of the Nautilus RS and iCUE Link Titan RX. The latter is a premium option that certainly looks swish, but it's the Nautilus RS that has us intrigued, as it's one of the company's most affordable AIO launches in a long while. While the Corsair iCUE Link Titan RX starts at $199.99 for a 240mm version, the Nautilus RS starts at just $99.99. That primes it to potentially be among the best AIO cooler options around if it can deliver decent cooling performance. Continue reading Corsair just dropped its most affordable AIO CPU cooler in years MORE FROM PCGAMESN: Corsair HS80 Max headset review, Corsair M75 Air mouse review, Best gaming keyboard

Ah, Battlefield 2042. Despite being a very decent multiplayer FPS these days, the damage was already done from its infamously terrible launch. While it’s improved massively over the last three years it will sadly never be held in the same regard as some of its predecessors. However, despite support for seasonal content being wrapped up many months ago, DICE isn’t done dropping a few pleasant surprises for those still interested in Battlefield 2042. In the game’s new Circle of Hell event, you’ll be able to play an essential game mode that has been frustratingly absent: Hardcore. Continue reading Battlefield 2042 is getting a Hardcore mode three years too late MORE FROM PCGAMESN: Battlefield 2042 review, Best multiplayer games on PC, Best FPS games on PC

Even CNN’s own analysts panned the Democratic nominee’s performance. This was her first authentic campaign disaster.

Kamala Harris' Closing Arguments: Trump Is Hitler, J6 Bad, and 'Look, I've Got Beyoncé!'

ARGLE BARGLE RAR! Dana Bash Admits Kamala 'Failed to Close the Deal' and Aaron Rupar Just Can't DEEEAL