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Fans raise $260,000 for cat adoption charity in honor of Buffalo Bills kicker Tyler Bass, following missed field goal
Football fans and beyond are stepping up for Buffalo Bills player Tyler Bass after he missed a pivotal field goal during the team’s playoff loss against the Kansas City Chiefs, which led to the kicker getting a lot of online hate for it.
More than $260,000 was raised for the Ten Lives Club, a New York-based cat adoption group Bass endorsed in the past, a spokesperson for the nonprofit told CBS News on Wednesday.
Ten Lives Club’s Kimberly LaRussa said the donations have poured in from football fans from all over, and even TV personality Rachael Ray and pet food brand Nutrish together gave $30,000. While Bass deactivated his social media accounts after the loss, the group defended him on social media, posting,”DON’T BULLY OUR FRIEND.”
“We were all so sad when we heard Tyler was receiving hate because he doesn’t deserve that,” LaRussa told CBS News. “Yes, he’s an athlete and people are very passionate about football but he’s also a person… and a great one at that. We just wanted to show support for him like he showed our rescue cats support.”
LaRussa said their group first met Bass through the Show Our Softside, a nonprofit that works with athletes and aims to prevent animal abuse. He met with their rescue kittens and participated in a photo shoot with them, according to LaRussa. A photo of him with the kittens hangs in their shelter lobby, she said.
Al Bello/Getty Images
On Sunday, with less than two minutes left, Bass missed a 44-yard field goal attempt during the AFC divisional playoff game that could have tied the score. Instead, the game’s result cut the Bills’ postseason dreams short and the kick drew comparisons to a similar missed field goal attempt etched in the minds of Buffalo fans –the dreaded miss from Scott Norwood during Super Bowl XXV.
But LaRussa told CBS News she hopes Bass can see “how much he is supported and loved and the incredible impact he’s making for our rescue cats.”
Buffalo Bills fans have opened their wallets in the past to show their appreciation. Many donated to Baltimore Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson’s charity after he got hurt in a playoff game against the Bills. In 2018, fans donated to then-Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Andy Dalton’s foundation after he threw a winning touchdown pass that allowed the Bills to snap their 17-year playoff drought.
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The House Ethics Committee, which has been conducting an investigation into sexual misconduct and obstruction allegations against Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida, scheduled a vote for Friday on whether to release its report, according to three sources with knowledge of the committee’s work.
Hours after President-elect Donald Trump said he planned to nominate Gaetz to be attorney general, Gaetz resigned his congressional seat, effective immediately.
“I do not intend to take the oath of office for the same office in the 119th Congress, to pursue the position of Attorney General in the Trump Administration,” Gaetz said in his resignation letter obtained by CBS News
House Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters that there was about an eight-week period during which Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis could fill his seat by setting the date for a special election.
Now that Gaetz has resigned, it is unclear whether the panel will vote on releasing the report, since Gaetz is no longer in Congress.
There is precedent in Congress on the Senate side for an ethics committee report to become public after a member resigns from Congress, however. In 2011, this happened when Sen. John Ensign of Nevada resigned amid allegations that he tried to hide an extramarital affair.
But it’s not clear that that would apply to the House, leaving open the possibility that the report on Gaetz would not be released.
In June, the House Ethics Committee released a statement saying it was investigating a range of allegations against Gaetz, including sexual misconduct, illicit drug use, and bribery.
Multiple sources at the time told CBS News that four women had informed the House Ethics Committee that they had been paid to go to parties that included sex and drugs, and that Gaetz had also attended. The committee has Gaetz’s Venmo transactions that allegedly show payments for the women.
Gaetz has repeatedly denied wrongdoing and has called the committee’s investigation a “frivolous” smear campaign.
Some of the allegations of sexual misconduct under review by the committee were also the subject of a previous Department of Justice probe into Gaetz. Federal investigators sought to determine if Gaetz violated sex trafficking and obstruction of justice laws, but no charges were filed.
The House Ethics Committee resumed its investigation into Gaetz in 2023, following the Justice Department’s decision not to pursue charges against him.
Gaetz has long blamed then-House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, also a Republican, for the probe. And Gaetz later led the movement to sack McCarthy as speaker.
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