Today’s Top Stories from NBC News
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SATURDAY, AUGUST 15, 2026
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In today’s newsletter: Luigi Mangione’s guilty plea sets up “double jeopardy” legal war. Trump and his top aide have set out to find a new press secretary. And an unlikely hero emerges in the Lindsay Clancy trial.
Here’s what to know today.
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(Barry Williams / New York Daily News / Bloomberg via Getty Images)
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Luigi Mangione pleaded guilty yesterday to federal stalking charges in the death of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in New York City nearly two years ago — and revealed for the first time details about his plans to carry out the killing.
In a packed courtroom, Mangione, 28, said he posed as a potential investor in an email to UnitedHealthcare leadership to learn where its conference would be held on the morning Thompson was killed, allowing him to track the executive’s whereabouts. He said he then used a 3D printer to make a gun and silencer before traveling to New York. “On the morning of December 4, 2024, I shot Mr. Thompson in Manhattan, and he died,” Mangione said
Mangione’s defense team filed a 35-page double jeopardy motion in New York Supreme Court at the conclusion of the hearing, setting off a legal battle to determine if he can still be tried and convicted of murder in state court.
New York has a defense-friendly double jeopardy statute that could benefit Mangione, legal experts say, but the strategy is not guaranteed to work.
“New York’s law says that a person can’t be separately prosecuted for two offenses based on the same act or criminal transaction,” former federal prosecutor Berit Berger said. Even if the two sets of charges don’t amount to an “apples to apples” comparison, the defense can argue that both cases stem from the same “criminal transaction.”
NBC News legal analyst Danny Cevallos said the “federal guilty plea now could be the most valuable thing he ever does, or it could be the riskiest thing he ever does.”
Read the full legal analysis here.
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The White House plans to hire a new press secretary in the coming weeks, with President Donald Trump and White House chief of staff Susie Wiles having privately discussed two possible candidates so far, Wiles told NBC News. “I made two suggestions to the president and he said, ‘Yeah, go look at that,’ and that’s where we are,” Wiles said, without mentioning the names of the prospects.
Finding a suitable replacement for Karoline Leavitt, who will step down at the end of the month, may be tough given Trump’s high regard for what he has described as Leavitt’s poise and rapid-fire delivery, officials said. And whoever is chosen will face scrutiny, not least from the boss. Leavitt gave more than 60 White House press briefings — and the president watched every one, officials said.
More on the search for Leavitt’s replacement.
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- Trump dismissed concerns from families of service members about the grim conditions aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln, saying its extended deployment in the Middle East is “not nearly long enough.”
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- A woman accused of vandalizing the World War II Memorial and who appeared to have livestreamed the incident has been arrested.
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In Lowndes County, Alabama, children risk contracting parasites if they play barefoot outside. In Brunswick, Georgia, residents worry the air they breathe isn’t safe. In a 300-person village in Alaska, tribal members who relocated farther away from a river lack running water.
Congress promised to help fix these problems — and hundreds of similar ones across the country — when lawmakers four years ago dedicated unprecedented funding to help cash-strapped regions plagued with environmental issues. But at the start of President Trump’s second term, the EPA gutted the $2.8 billion grant program created to provide residents relief. After Trump issued an executive order to rid the government of what he called “radical and wasteful” DEI initiatives, the EPA said the grants no longer aligned with the agency’s priorities.
Once the program ended, many groups wound up receiving only fractions of their allocated sums or none at all. Now, more than a year later, communities are struggling to find new funding as environmental crises have been left to fester, in the worst cases threatening the health and homes of some of the most vulnerable Americans.
How affected communities are faring.
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The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said El Niño has a 69% chance of becoming the strongest on record, with this year’s event already “reaching or exceeding the all-time” high in the measurements scientists use to assess its intensity.
The natural climate pattern is characterized by warm seas and more intense storms in the Pacific Ocean, with higher temperatures on land and a mellow hurricane season in the Atlantic. In the Southeast, that could mean more deluges of rain. On the West Coast, warmer waters will raise sea levels, and storms are expected to send large waves to the shores.
Here’s what else to expect.
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- Blackmail
- Firing the weapon
- Driving the getaway car
- Orchestrating the hit
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Find out the answer and test your knowledge of this week's most-read stories. (The answer to the question is also at the bottom of this newsletter.)
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Lindsay Clancy’s 75-year-old lawyer, Kevin Reddington, who has spent decades representing clients with a no-nonsense defense strategy, has captured the attention of online viewers and true-crime fans following her livestreamed trial. Clancy is accused of fatally strangling her three children while suffering from postpartum psychosis, and her longtime defense lawyer has been a visible presence at her side — giving her space when she becomes overcome with emotion and forcefully advocating for her during cross-examination.
He’s also covered in tattoos, rides a motorcycle and keeps mementos from past cases — including skulls and pistols — in his office. His license plate reads “NG,” for “not guilty.”
Reddington contains multitudes. As a friend put it: “The man lives on black coffee and tough problems.”
— Rebecca Cohen, reporter
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- Jason Arday, Cambridge’s youngest Black professor, was found dead at 41, a week after resigning amid plagiarism allegations.
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- The violent crime rate declined by 9.3% from 2024 to 2025, according to new FBI data, the largest year-to-year decrease since the data-based estimations were introduced in 1936.
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Thanks for reading the Morning Rundown. Today’s newsletter was curated for you by Elizabeth Robinson.
By the way, the answer to the quiz question above is D. Orchestrating the hit.
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