CBS News
Flight attendants hold picket signs and rallies in protest for new contracts, pay raises
Three separate unions representing flight attendants at major U.S. airlines are picketing and holding rallies at 30 airports on Tuesday as they push for new contracts and higher wages.
The flight attendants are increasingly frustrated that pilots won huge pay raises last year while they continue to work for wages that, in some cases, have not increased in several years.
They argue that they have not been rewarded for working through the pandemic and being responsible for the safety of passengers.
The unions are calling Tuesday’s protests a national day of action. It is not a strike.
Federal law makes it difficult for airline unions to conduct legal strikes, which can be delayed or blocked by federal mediators, the president and Congress. Mediators have already turned down one request by flight attendants at American Airlines to begin a countdown to a strike; the union plans to ask again next month.
“We appreciate and respect our flight attendants’ right to picket and understand that is their way of telling us the importance of getting a contract done — and we hear them,” American Airlines said in a statement Tuesday.
Flight attendants remain the last group standing at the negotiation table with the Forth Worth, Texas-based airline. Pilots for American Airlines reached a new contract agreement in August featuring big pay raises and bonuses. Soon after in December, American reached an agreement with roughly 15,000 passenger service agents, the Dallas Morning News reported at the time.
Tuesday’s protests were organized by the Association of Flight Attendants (AFA), which represents crews at United Airlines and several other carriers; the Association of Professional Flight Attendants, the union of crews at American, and the Transport Workers Union, which represents crews at Southwest and other airlines.
United Airlines in a statement Tuesday said that its first negotiation session has been scheduled for March 19 by a federal mediator requested by the AFA. “We’re looking forward to working with AFA to narrow the issues so that we can continue to work toward an industry-leading agreement for our flight attendants,” the company said.
Alaska Airlines said that its leadership and the AFA are continuing to bargain and meet with a mediator, describing discussions as “productive,” in a statement Tuesday. “With six recently closed labor deals at the company and a tentative agreement reached in January for a new contract for our technicians, we’re hopeful to do the same for our flight attendants as soon as possible,” the airline said.
Southwest Airlines said in a statement issued Tuesday, “We reached an industry-leading Tentative Agreement with TWU 556 in October 2023 and are scheduled to meet next week with the union and the National Mediation Board to continue working toward an agreement that benefits our Flight Attendants and Southwest.”
Transport Workers Union Local 556, the union representing Southwest Airlines flight attendants, overwhelmingly rejected a proposed contract agreement by the airline in December.
CBS News
Suspected serial killer Bruce Lindahl linked to 1979 cold case out of North Aurora, Illinois
CHICAGO (CBS) — Police suspect Bruce Lindahl was a serial killer who targeted mostly female victims in Chicago’s western suburbs in the 1970s—and now they say they have tied Lindahl to yet another victim.
Police vowed to provide answers to the families of Lindahl’s suspected victims. The latest murder case they say they have solved dates back 45 years to 1979.
The body of Kathy Halle, 19, was discovered April 24, 1979, in the Fox River south of the I-88 bridge in North Aurora. She had been missing almost a month.
Her body was found by a boy fishing near her apartment. Now, authorities are connecting the murder to Lindahl.
Lisle Police Department investigators told CBS News Chicago back in 2020 that they were determined to connect the deaths of multiple women to Lindahl—who police say killed himself while killing another victim, Charles Huber, in 1981.
Lindahl is also linked to the 1976 murder of Pamela Maurer, a 16-year-old girl who left her home to go get a soft drink. The next morning, her body was found on College Road in Lisle—she had been strangled and sexually assaulted.
In 2020, police exhumed Lindahl’s body and used DNA to solve the Maurer case. Now, Halle is the latest victim to be tied to Lindahl.
North Aurora police and the Kane County State’s Attorney’s office are set to hold a media briefing on the Maurer case on Wednesday—where more details are expected to be revealed. It is known that DNA was used to help solve the horrific mystery.
Russian disinformation groups likely orchestrated baseless claims targeting Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, falsely accusing the vice presidential candidate of sexually assaulting his students while he was a high school teacher, according to assessments by the U.S. intelligence community, independent researchers and a CBS News analysis.
At least four separate claims have spread since early October, racking up millions of views on social media platforms including X, owned by Elon Musk. Darren Linvill, co-director of the Media Forensics Hub at Clemson University, said at least two of the claims seem to be directly linked to Storm-1516, a Kremlin-aligned troll farm.
A Tuesday report from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence says the intelligence community found Russian disinformation groups were behind recent “manufactured and amplified inauthentic content claiming illegal activity” targeting Walz’s earlier career.
The claims
The initial claim emerged on Oct. 5 during a Rumble livestream, where an anonymous man said Walz abused him when he was a Future Leaders Exchange, or FLEX, Program student in Minnesota from 2004 to 2005. The man, whose voice appears altered, was interviewed by John Mark Dougan, a former Florida sheriff’s deputy living in Russia with alleged ties to disinformation campaigns.
This was the first sign that the claim was created by Russian disinformation groups, Linvill said.
“To have [Dougan] out there being interviewed on this story is basically a neon sign saying that maybe it’s connected to Russia. Not only do I think Russia is behind these stories, I think Russia wants us to know that they’re behind these stories,” he said.
Both the U.S. State Department and FLEX told CBS News they have no record “of any FLEX student from Kazakhstan in Mankato area schools from 2000 through 2020.” Mel Helling, the communications director for Mankato Area Public Schools, told CBS News they have no record of the allegations. NewsGuard first reported the claim.
When contacted by CBS News, Dougan claimed he has the alleged victim’s U.S. visa and the FLEX Program certificate. CBS News reviewed the documents and found several inconsistencies: The date of birth on the visa does not match the age the alleged victim stated in the livestream and the certificate has an incorrect logo on it.
The claims were picked up by other accounts that are not linked to Russian disinformation. On Oct. 12, an X account credited as Matt Wallace posted a Rumble video where he claimed without evidence that Walz may have acted inappropriately with the students during trips to China. The video was later removed and the user did not respond to a request for comment.
A third claim surfaced on Oct. 13 when an X account dubbed “Black Insurrectionist” posted grainy screenshots of supposed emails alleging Walz’s misconduct with a minor at a concert in 1995.
The supposed emails appeared manipulated. Among the clues was a comma in the date-time stamp that is not typically found in emails. “Black Insurrectionist” later deleted their account. Researchers have not linked this account to Russian disinformation.
On Oct. 16, another claim circulated when a man purporting to be Matthew Metro, a former Mankato West High School student, posted a video alleging Walz sexually assaulted him in 1997.
However, The Washington Post and AFP reported that a man named Matthew Metro did attend the school but the person in the video is not him. The Post interviewed Metro, who said he never met Walz.
Hany Farid, a professor at University of California, Berkeley, who specializes in manipulated media, said he believes the video was not created using AI; rather, he believes it is a “cheap fake,” in which a man is impersonating someone else.
A disinformation pattern
The video resembles the work of Storm-1516, Linvill said. The disinformation group previously promoted a false claim that Vice President Kamala Harris was involved in a hit-and-run incident, according to a report by Microsoft.
“Suggestions of sexual deviance in various forms are a favorite theme of Storm-1516,” said Linvill. “This campaign has recently turned from a focus primarily on the war in Ukraine to more frequent targeting of the Harris-Walz campaign.”
Linvill said versions of the Walz allegations appear to be a Storm-1516 “narrative laundering campaign,” a process of presenting false claims in a way that makes them appear credible. This often includes presenting the claims through a person who claims to be a victim.
CBS News reached out to X and Rumble for comment but has not heard back as of publication.
Georgia’s Supreme Court rejected a Republican-led effort to implement more than half a dozen controversial new election rules before Election Day.
In a brief order issued Tuesday, the court declined to reinstate the seven new rules implemented by the State Election Board, and declined to consider an expedited appeal — effectively ending the effort to get the new rules in place in time for the upcoming election.
A lower level Georgia judge on Oct. 16 declared the rules “illegal, unconstitutional and void.” The rules, which include one that requires ballots to be hand-counted and two related to certification of results, were supported by three of the State Election Board’s five members, all of whom were endorsed by former President Donald Trump.
President Biden defeated Trump in the state in 2020, and Trump has since repeated disproven claims that fraud cost him the election.
The new rules were opposed by not just Democrats, but also state Republican officials who cast doubt on whether they were legal. They said a hand count could delay election results, and argued in court that it was too late to properly train election workers on the new responsibilities.
Other rules passed by the board — include one that would have required county officials “to examine all election related documentation created during the conduct of elections,” a potentially laborious process — and another that would have required them to conduct a “reasonable inquiry” before certifying results. That rule did not explain what a “reasonable inquiry” entails.
The Georgia Supreme Court didn’t outright reject the appeal. In the order Tuesday, the court said it is declining to fast forward proceedings.
“When the appeal is docketed in this court, it will proceed in the ordinary course,” the justices wrote.
