Kgomotso Christopher plays Nandi Mahlati, a married woman who wants more from love and life, on Netflix's 'Fatal Seduction'

Last month, Taylor Swift told a Pittsburgh audience at a stop on her groundbreaking "Eras Tour" that "Cruel Summer" -- her self-professed "favorite song" off of her 2019 "Lover" album -- was finally becoming a single because so many people keep streaming it, leading to the track charting in the top 20 on Billboard's Hot 100 chart this week.

Ron DeSantis has championed his record targeting LGBT+ people, particularly transgender youth, with a platform that has echoed in state legislatures across the US and in the halls of Congress and drawn widespread condemnation from human rights groups. The governor’s far-reaching platform targeting civil liberties and trans rights is fuelling his campaign for the 2024 Republican nomination for president, with a pledge to impose his agenda at the national level. At the end of Pride Month, his campaign shared a video clipping together past statements from his Republican rival Donald Trump celebrating Pride and vowing protections for LGBT+ rights, before cutting to a fast-paced series of headlines and comments labeling the DeSantis agenda “draconian”, a threat to “trans existence” and “totalitarianism in disguise,” with a series of images and quick edits that mirror far-right and authoritarian memes. That appeared to be the last straw for gay right-wing influencers, pundits and political organizations who have otherwise endorsed him. An anti-trans group with close ties to the DeSantis camp appears to have imploded over the video, with a Gays Against Groomers co-founder resigning in protest after the “extremely anti-gay” video. Despite appearing in a pro-DeSantis ad less than a year ago, David Leatherwood appears to be among several recent departures from the far-right group, with speculation that blowback over the latest video provided a pretext among now-former DeSantis boosters to step away after lagging poll numbers. Log Cabin Republicans called the video’s message “divisive and desperate”. “This old playbook has been tried in the past and has failed – repeatedly,” group president Charles Moran said in a statement. “Ron DeSantis and his team can’t tell the difference between commonsense gays and the radical Left gays. He, sadly, sees them all the same. His naive policy positions are dangerous and politically stupid.” Republican US Rep George Santos of New York, who had vocally supported the so-called “Don’t Say Gay” bill last year, now says he feels “used” by Mr DeSantis. “I used to think he was a great governor,” he told The Hill. “Now, I’m starting to think differently.” Former Trump adviser and ambassador Richard Grenell, who is gay, called the video “undeniably homophobic.” Caitlin Jenner, who appears in the video, said that the governor has “hit a new low”. “But he’s so desperate he’ll do anything to get ahead – that’s been the theme of his campaign,” she wrote. “You can’t win a general, let alone 2028 by going after people that are integral parts of the conservative movement!” In May, Mr DeSantis approved a slate of bills that restrict affirming healthcare for transgender minors and threaten access to care for trans adults, forbid people from using bathrooms that match their gender identity, target public drag performances, and prevent people from using their chosen pronouns in school. Last year, he signed a law barring trans women and girls from playing on public school teams that align with their gender. He also backed legislation derided by critics as the “Don’t Say Gay” bill prohibiting classroom discussion of issues related to gender and sexuality, sparking fears that its broad scope could be used to effectively block discussion of LGBT+ people, history and events from state schools, and threaten schools with potential lawsuits over perceived violations. The governor expanded the law to explicitly cover all grade levels this year. Florida’s surgeon general Joseph Ladapo has been accused of deliberately misrepresenting research surrounding gender-affirming care to promote state policy and health guidelines that health experts have labelled “incorrect and scientifically unfounded.” The governor’s former press secretary, Christina Pushaw, helped elevate the “groomer” smear alleging LGBT+ people of abusing children. She now works for his campaign. “Opposing the federal recognition of ‘Pride Month’ isn’t ‘homophobic.’ We wouldn’t support a month to celebrate straight people for sexual orientation, either,” she wrote in defence of the video on Twitter. “It’s unnecessary, divisive, pandering. In a country as vast and diverse as the USA, identity politics is poison.” Mr DeSantis himself has defended the video, telling far-right influencer Tami Lohren that the former president is “a pioneer in injecting gender ideology into the mainstream, where he was having men compete against women in his beauty pageants, I think that’s totally fair game.” “He’s now campaigning, saying the opposite, that he doesn’t think that you should have men competing in women’s things like athletics,” he added. The former president, meanwhile, has accelerated his campaign against trans people, including plans to strip federal funds from schools that discuss “gender ideology” and impose a national ban on trans women and girls participating in sports that match their gender. He also wants to direct the US Food and Drug Administration to study the effects of gender-affirming healthcare and so-called “trans ideology” on mental health and “violence”, amplifying a baseless narrative that trans people are responsible for violent attacks across the country. Mr Trump’s four years in office included banning trans people from openly serving in the US military and reversing federal guidance under the Civil Rights Act that protected trans people from employment discrimination. The US Department of Education during his administration also eliminated guidance that ensured protections for trans students, among a slate of other measures opposed by LGBT+ advocates. Read More DeSantis doubles down on ‘homophobic’ anti-Trump ad: ‘Totally fair game’ Federal judge partially blocks Florida’s ‘latest assault on the right to vote’ Pete Buttigieg takes down Ron DeSantis over ‘strange’ anti-LGBT campaign video with ‘oiled-up bodybuilders’ Florida schools remove books by John Milton and Toni Morrison and restrict Shakespeare under DeSantis rules Federal court halts Florida’s drag ban, calling it attempt to ‘suppress the speech’ rights of performers

By Deena Beasley The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Thursday granted standard approval to Eisai and Biogen's Leqembi for

By Deena Beasley and Julie Steenhuysen LOS ANGELES (Reuters) -The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Thursday granted standard approval

Your parents were probably laughing at Eddie Murphy, Mel Brooks, or the guys from Monty Python.

The father of Keke Palmer's son is getting dragged on social media for recent comments he made regarding her clothing.

Voters in Ohio will likely decide if the state’s constitution should enshrine the right to abortion care, after abortion rights advocates collected tens of thousands of signatures on a petition to put the issue on ballots this fall. If certified, those 710,000 signatures – roughly 300,000 more than required by state law – will place a proposed constitutional amendment asking whether “every individual has a right to make and carry out one’s reproductive decisions.” A statewide vote for abortion protections follows a wave of anti-abortion laws in the aftermath of the US Supreme Court’s decision to strike down a constitutional right to care last year. More than a dozen states, mostly across the entire US South, have effectively outlawed most abortions. But the Supreme Court decision to overturn the half-century precedent under Roe v Wade also fuelled efforts to protect abortion rights across the country, including in neighboring Michigan and Kentucky, where voters in both states voted to support abortion rights in ballot measures last year. After the Supreme Court’s ruling, Ohio lawmakers swiftly outlawed most abortion after roughly six weeks of pregnancy, a law that is currently suspended by a state court injunction but could be reinstated by the Ohio Supreme Court. A vote to enshrine abortion rights in the state’s constitution would effectively overrule any such law. Abortion rights advocates and providers have warned that Ohio’s ban, which does not include exceptions for pregnancies from rape or incest, ignited a healthcare crisis that endangered patients and their families across the state, forcing people to seek care hundreds of miles out of state and navigate complicated legal and medical minefields while experiencing pregnancy complications. The petition launched by Ohioans for Reproductive Freedom and Ohio Physicians for Reproductive Rights will head to the secretary of state, which has until 25 July to determine the validity of the signatures. The campaign launched with an open letter on 7 July of last year signed by hundreds of physicians rejecting the state’s anti-abortion law. “Over the past year, support for the amendment has grown exponentially thanks to our partners at [Ohioans for Reproductive Freedom], the thousands of volunteers who gathered signatures in communities across the state, and the hundreds of thousands of people who added their names to our petitions,” according to a statement from Dr Lauren Beene and Dr Marcela Azevedo, co-founders of Ohio Physicians for Reproductive Rights. “Today, the message we and they are sending is loud and clear: ‘let the people decide,’” they said. The campaign will magnify the role of Ohio – a state that voted for Donald Trump by more than 8 percentage points over Joe Biden in 2020 – in the 2024 presidential campaign and the renewed battle for abortion rights surrounding it, as Republican candidates and members of Congress weigh federal legislation that would outlaw or severely restrict abortion access nationwide. President Biden and Democratic candidates have signalled the central role that abortion rights protections will play in upcoming campaigns, alongside their warnings of a GOP-controlled White House and Congress legislating on abortion at the national level. Last year, a record number of voters in Kansas – a state that Mr Biden lost by more than 15 percentage points in 2020 – turned out for an election to reject a Republican-drafted amendment that would strip abortion rights from the state’s constitution, the first test for abortion rights put directly to voters after the ruling in Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization. That measure was shot down by nearly 20 percentage points, sending a resounding message that underscored the immense unpopularity of the Supreme Court’s decision. The president has repeatedly invoked that election victory in remarks supporting abortion rights in the months that followed, stating that the Supreme Court “practically dared women in this country to go to the ballot box and restore the right to choose,” and that anti-abortion lawmakers vastly underestimated how Americans would respond. Following the outcome in Kansas, Mr Biden pointed to the justices’ own writing in the Dobbs decision: “Women are not without electoral or political power.” “They don’t have a clue about the power of American women,” he said. “In Kansas, they found out women and men did exercise their electoral political power with a record turnout.” Read More Man sentenced to life in prison for rape of 10-year-old girl in Ohio abortion case that drew national attention Senator who once worked at a Planned Parenthood warns that Republicans are planning a national abortion ban One year after Roe v Wade fell, anti-abortion laws threaten millions. The battle for access is far from over

Zambia says it plans to regulate the sale of carbon credits and take a share of the proceeds

Justin Trudeau has asked Taylor Swift to extend her global tour to include Canada.

'They Cloned Tyrone' is a directorial debut by Juel Taylor, with Jamie Foxx and John Boyega in lead roles

'They Cloned Tyrone' follows a trio who unpacks horrifying secrets about an experiment conducted on an entire town kept hidden by those in power