Top 5 Live –WURD Thursday February 26
1. Giuliana Rancic apologizes on air for Zendaya hair insult at Oscars
E! network host Giuliana Rancic offered an extensive on-air apology
Tuesday for a controversial, and some have argued racially charged, joke at the expense of 18-year-old biracial Disney star Zendaya.
The singer and actress sported her natural hair in dreadlocks on the Academy Awards’ red carpet on Sunday. While covering the fashion angle at the Oscars, Rancic quipped that Zendaya, “smells like patchouli oil… or weed.”
2. Three men from Brooklyn arrested, charged with supporting ISIS
Three Brooklyn residents were formally charged Wednesday with providing material support ISIS.
Officials say the trio came to the attention of law enforcement last summer after they expressed their online support for the establishment of an Islamic caliphate in Iraq and Syria.
Officials allege they devised a plan to travel to Turkey and then to Syria for the purpose of waging jihad on behalf of ISIS. If they were not successful in joining ISIS in Syria, they allegedly planned to commit an act of terrorism in the United States, and one even allegedly offered to kill President Obama if ordered to do so.
3. Kentucky teen on crime spree: ‘I knew we were going to get caught.’
The Kentucky teen who eluded police with his 13-year-old girlfriend during a multistate crime spree felt he had nothing to lose.
“I knew we were going to get caught,” 18-year-old Dalton Hayes said during an interview on “Dr. Phil.” “I knew what I was facing after she had told me her real age. I knew what I would come home to.”
After Hayes and Cheyenne Phillips were nabbed in a Florida parking lot on Jan. 18, he came home to a number of charges, including statutory rape, burglary, theft, custodial interference, criminal mischief and more.
4. Deadline near, deal sets up Homeland Security vote in Senate
Just days before a partial shutdown, lawmakers cleared the way Wednesday for Senate passage of legislation to fund the Department of Homeland Security without immigration-related provisions opposed by President Barack Obama.
Senate approval would send the issue to the House of Representatives, where some conservatives said the plan was a surrender to the White House. Other Republicans predicted it would clear, but Speaker John Boehner declined to say if he would put it to a vote.
5. Suit: teachers union officials are ‘ghost employees’
A nonprofit created to fight public sector unions filed suit against the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers, saying employees shouldn’t be allowed to remain on the Philadelphia School District’s payroll.
Lawyer David Osborne of the Fairness Center called the workers – whose salary, benefits and pension costs are reimbursed by the PFT – “ghost employees.”
Click here to read these stories on 900amWURD.
Solomon Jones is an Essence bestselling author and award-winning columnist. He is the creator and editor of Solomonjones.com and morning host on 900 am WURD radio. Click here to learn more about Solomon
