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--:-- Steve Inskeep: A passenger jet collided with a military helicopter in the skies over Washington, D.C. Rescuers are searching the icy Potomac River for survivors.
--:-- Michelle Martin: The water is dark, it is murky, and that is a very tough condition for them to dive in.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: I'm Steve Inskeep with Michelle Martin, and this is Up First from NPR News.
--:-- Michelle Martin: The president says he plans to use the naval base at Guantanamo Bay to house people deported from the United States.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: This is not the camps. This is a temporary transit where we can plus up thousands and tens of thousands if necessary.
--:-- Michelle Martin: OK, are the facilities at Guantanamo equipped to hold tens of thousands of people?
--:-- Steve Inskeep: And an NPR investigation uncovers lengthy criminal records for dozens of January 6th defendants who received pardons from President Trump.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Stay with us. We'll give you the news you need to start your day.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: First responders are searching for survivors in the frigid Potomac River this morning after a collision in the skies over Washington, D.C.'s closest airport.
--:-- Michelle Martin: A jet was on its way into Reagan National Airport and 64 people were on board.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: The plane followed the path of the Potomac, an experience millions of travelers have had at some point.
--:-- Michelle Martin: If you have a window seat, you can see the monuments of the Capitol below, and you know you're almost there.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: And that is when the plane collided with one of the many other aircraft in the skies over Washington, an Army helicopter carrying three people.
--:-- Michelle Martin: And Paris, Joel Rose has been following developments through a long night, and he is with us now.
--:-- Joel Rose: Good morning, Michelle. Good morning.
--:-- Michelle Martin: What do we know about what happened?
--:-- Joel Rose: The collision happened as an American Airlines regional jet was attempting to land just before 9 p.m. local time.
--:-- Michelle Martin: This was American flight number 5342 from Wichita, Kansas, on a narrow-body plane, a CRJ-700 built by a bombardier, with 60 passengers on board and four crew members.
--:-- Joel Rose: It was lining up to land at the airport, as you say, when it collided at low altitude with a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter.
--:-- Michelle Martin: The Army says there were three soldiers on board.
--:-- Joel Rose: Footage from a webcam in the vicinity shows a small aircraft, presumably the helicopter, colliding with the passenger jet, followed by a bright explosion.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Before both aircraft then crashed into the Potomac River.
--:-- Joel Rose: So we know that search and rescue efforts have been ongoing.
--:-- Michelle Martin: What can you tell us about this?
--:-- Joel Rose: Yeah, first responders were on the scene within 10 minutes, according to D.C. Fire and EMS Chief John Donnelly.
--:-- Michelle Martin: He said about 300 first responders were involved in search and rescue operations in icy water that was about eight feet deep.
--:-- Joel Rose: So it's just dangerous and hard to work in, and because there's not a lot of lights, you're out there searching every square inch of space to see if you can find anybody.
--:-- Michelle Martin: The divers are doing the same thing in the water.
--:-- Joel Rose: The water is dark, it is murky, and that is a very tough condition for them to dive in.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Donnelly said search and rescue operations would continue this morning and the airport will remain closed until at least 11 a.m.
--:-- Joel Rose: Joel is there any word about any survivors?
--:-- Michelle Martin: Authorities would not say at the briefing early this morning but at this point there is not a lot of reason for optimism.
--:-- Joel Rose: Both of Kansas' U.S. senators were at Reagan Airport for a briefing this morning.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Senator Roger Marshall called it an unbearable sorrow.
--:-- Joel Rose: Senator Jerry Moran said it was very likely that the senators would personally know some of the people on the plane.
--:-- Michelle Martin: I know that flight. I've flown it many times myself.
--:-- Joel Rose: And it is certainly true that in Kansas and in Wichita in particular, we're going to know people who are on this flight, know their family members, know somebody.
--:-- Michelle Martin: U.S. Figure Skating has confirmed that several members of the skating community were on board the flight, including athletes, coaches, family members who were returning home after the recent U.S. Figure Skating Championships in Wichita.
--:-- Joel Rose: Now, of course, the focus here is on trying to find survivors and, you know, perhaps other remains.
--:-- Michelle Martin: But is there any indication at this point about what could have caused this collision?
--:-- Joel Rose: No official word on that yet.
--:-- Michelle Martin: You know, it's very early in the investigation.
--:-- Joel Rose: You know, I will say this is highly congested airspace with a lot of helicopters and air traffic at the airport.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Investigators at the National Transportation Safety Board are leading this investigation, and they will likely be trying to understand the communications between air traffic controllers and the two aircraft, particularly the helicopter.
--:-- Joel Rose: There is some audio recordings of those communications, but what happened here is just not clear yet.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Those recordings could be a focus for investigators as they try to understand what appears to be the worst aviation disaster in U.S. airspace in at least 15 years.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: That is NPR's Joel Rose. Joel, thanks so much after such a long night.
--:-- Joel Rose: Thank you for your reporting.
--:-- Michelle Martin: You're welcome.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: President Trump says he plans to use a migrant holding facility at the U.S. Naval Base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to house up to 30,000 migrants deported from the United States.
--:-- Michelle Martin: The president brought this up at a bill-signing event.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: His notion was to detain what he called, quote, the worst criminal illegal aliens.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Reusing the famous base is an idea that Trump brought up before his first presidential term, but he never did it.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: His Homeland Security Secretary acknowledges the administration would need an act of Congress to spend money on the idea now.
--:-- Michelle Martin: NPR's Sasha Pfeiffer has been covering Guantanamo Bay for years, and she's here with us in our studios in Washington, D.C. to tell us more about this latest development.
--:-- Sasha Pfeiffer: Good morning.
--:-- Michelle Martin: So, Sasha, look, I think most people, when they hear Guantanamo, they think of a prison for suspected foreign terrorists.
--:-- Sasha Pfeiffer: Like, this is where the alleged 9-11 mastermind, Khaled Shariq Mohammed, is held.
--:-- Michelle Martin: So are we talking about the same place?
--:-- Sasha Pfeiffer: We are not.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: The Trump administration is saying that migrants would not be in that U.S. military prison detention facility where Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is held.
--:-- Sasha Pfeiffer: They would instead be on the naval base portion of Guantanamo, which is a separate area.
--:-- Michelle Martin: And for decades, the naval base has had a detention facility that houses migrants intercepted at sea.
--:-- Sasha Pfeiffer: They're usually Haitian or Cuban or Dominican. It's been mostly empty for years.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: So Trump is saying he wants to expand that migrant detention facility to make room for deported migrants.
--:-- Sasha Pfeiffer: So once there, how long would migrants be held there?
--:-- Michelle Martin: This came up on Fox News, where the Trump administration basically broke this news yesterday.
--:-- Sasha Pfeiffer: Fox had on Pete Hegseth, the new defense secretary.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: And Hegseth said the plan is not to hold these migrants indefinitely.
--:-- Sasha Pfeiffer: Indefinite detention is what is happening at the military prison. Some people there have been held for two decades more than two decades without being charged.
--:-- Michelle Martin: But Hegseth says when it comes to deported migrants Guantanamo would be a way station as he called it until the administration finds other countries to take them
--:-- Sasha Pfeiffer: This is not the camps You not putting criminals in camps where ISIS and other criminals. This is a temporary transit where we can plus up thousands and tens of thousands if necessary to humanely move illegals out of our country where they do not belong back to the countries where they came from in proper process.
--:-- Michelle Martin: But Michelle, details are very thin so far, and the Trump administration has not said how it would define what Hegseth called temporary transit.
--:-- Sasha Pfeiffer: Does the existing migrant holding facility at Guantanamo actually have 30,000 beds?
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Unclear.
--:-- Michelle Martin: When Trump first announced this, he said it did, but he later said he plans to expand the facility to full capacity.
--:-- Sasha Pfeiffer: I spoke about this with the executive director of the Center for Constitutional Rights, Vince Warren.
--:-- Michelle Martin: And he said this about the current status of Guantanamo's migrant detention operation.
--:-- Sasha Pfeiffer: There haven't been 30,000 beds in decades. The facility is decrepit. It's been falling apart. It's in disrepair.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: He told me he knows that through reports from migrants who've been there.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Defense Secretary Hegseth also said a golf course on the naval base would have room for 6,000 deported migrants.
--:-- Sasha Pfeiffer: So the administration seems to be trying to identify different spaces at Guantanamo that could have room for tens of thousands of people.
--:-- Michelle Martin: And before we let you go, holding prisoners at Guantanamo has been very expensive over the years.
--:-- Sasha Pfeiffer: Do we know how much this would cost and where this money would come from?
--:-- Steve Inskeep: The administration did not give a dollar figure, but you're right.
--:-- Michelle Martin: The plan would require construction, food, lodging for people held there, guards or staff to oversee it, money to transport migrants there.
--:-- Sasha Pfeiffer: Because Trump's border czar, Tom Homan, said the migrants would be flown there directly.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: So on cost, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said only that money would be appropriated by Congress for that.
--:-- Michelle Martin: She also said ICE, Immigration and Customs Enforcement would run the facility.
--:-- Sasha Pfeiffer: As for when migrants might start being flown there, they didn't say.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: There'll certainly be a lot of litigation about this.
--:-- Michelle Martin: That is NPR's Sasha Pfeiffer. Sasha, thank you.
--:-- Sasha Pfeiffer: You're welcome.
--:-- Michelle Martin: We are learning new information this morning about the lengthy criminal records of dozens of January 6th defendants who received pardons from President Trump.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Yeah, the president gave blanket clemency to all January 6th defendants, regardless of whether they violently assaulted police on that day.
--:-- Michelle Martin: People got clemency for January 6th, even when they had criminal records for other offenses on other dates, such as rape, sexual abuse, and domestic violence.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: NPR investigative correspondent Tom Dreisbach has been digging into the court records.
--:-- Tom Dreisbach: Good morning.
--:-- Michelle Martin: So what kinds of cases did you identify?
--:-- Tom Dreisbach: Well, many January 6th defendants had no criminal records at all, but we found dozens of cases where people had a significant criminal history.
--:-- Michelle Martin: One example that really sticks out is the case of Matthew Huddle.
--:-- Tom Dreisbach: He pleaded guilty to entering and remaining in the Capitol.
--:-- Michelle Martin: And he also had a lengthy criminal record, including for drunk driving.
--:-- Tom Dreisbach: And there's one incident that I should say people listening might find disturbing.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Prosecutors said, quote, Then even after Huddle took part in the Capitol riot, he continued to rack up charges for driving offenses in Indiana.
--:-- Tom Dreisbach: And just a few days after Trump pardoned him for his January 6th case he actually just got pulled over again by police in Indiana
--:-- Michelle Martin: We don't have a lot of details It is under investigation but we know a sheriff deputy shot and killed him during an altercation
--:-- Tom Dreisbach: So how did these criminal records or did these criminal records affect the January 6th cases
--:-- Michelle Martin: Well, federal judges always factor in defendants' criminal history when they decide on a sentence.
--:-- Tom Dreisbach: One example, defendant was Peter Schwartz.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Court records indicate he had 38 criminal convictions before he assaulted police with pepper spray on January 6th.
--:-- Tom Dreisbach: And that's one reason he got a really lengthy sentence, 14 years in prison for his January 6th charges.
--:-- Michelle Martin: And then Trump pardoned him.
--:-- Tom Dreisbach: So he obviously did not finish that prison sentence.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Trump has said in general, these defendants got sentences that were too long, but the White House did not make any distinction between people who had a criminal record and those who did not.
--:-- Tom Dreisbach: And I know that Trump has been asked about this.
--:-- Michelle Martin: So what has he said about the decision to give clemency to all of the January 6th defendants?
--:-- Tom Dreisbach: Well, I reached out to the White House. They did not respond.
--:-- Michelle Martin: But Trump has made some comments recently on Fox News where he seemed to say that it would have just been too difficult to evaluate all of the January 6th charges individually.
--:-- Tom Dreisbach: Most of the people were absolutely innocent. Okay, but forgetting all about that, these people have served horribly a long time.
--:-- Michelle Martin: It would be very, very cumbersome to go and look.
--:-- Tom Dreisbach: You know how many people are talking about? 1,500 people.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Almost all of them are, should not have been, this should not have happened.
--:-- Tom Dreisbach: Now, Trump's pardons only apply to the January 6th charges.
--:-- Michelle Martin: So are some people still facing some legal consequences for other cases?
--:-- Tom Dreisbach: Yes.
--:-- Michelle Martin: There's an example from a January 6th defendant named Theodore Middendorf.
--:-- Tom Dreisbach: He separately pleaded guilty to sexual abuse of a seven-year-old child.
--:-- Michelle Martin: He is still facing a lengthy prison sentence in Illinois on that case.
--:-- Tom Dreisbach: Another defendant, David Daniel, is facing allegations that he sexually abused two young girls in his family and possessed child sexual abuse images.
--:-- Michelle Martin: He has pleaded not guilty.
--:-- Tom Dreisbach: That case is ongoing.
--:-- Michelle Martin: That is NPR's Tom Dreisbach. Tom, thank you.
--:-- Tom Dreisbach: Thank you.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Here's an update on a story we told you yesterday.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: The White House has apparently backed off a plan to pause trillions of dollars in federal spending.
--:-- Michelle Martin: The Trump administration rescinded a memo that ordered the money to stop flowing while officials determined if it met the president's partisan priorities.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Now, after that memo was taken back, White House Press Secretary Caroline Levitt posted some more on social media.
--:-- Michelle Martin: She said, quote, the president's executive orders on federal funding remain in full force and effect and will be rigorously implemented.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: The president had previously said he wants government agencies to eliminate diversity, equity, inclusion, and other efforts he opposes.
--:-- Michelle Martin: So apparently that part goes ahead.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: We will bring you more as we learn it.
--:-- Michelle Martin: And that's up first for Thursday, January 30th.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: I'm Michelle Martin.
--:-- Michelle Martin: And I'm Steve Inskeep.
--:-- Michelle Martin: There's an easy way to stay connected to news and podcasts from the NPR network.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: It is the NPR app, which I use myself.
--:-- Michelle Martin: You hear community coverage from your local station, as well as stories from around the world, and podcast suggestions based on what you like.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Download the NPR app in your app store.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Today's episode of Up First was edited by Russell Lewis, Monica Evstatyeva, Barry Hardiman, Jenea Williams, and Alice Wolfley.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: It was produced by Ziad Butch, Nia Dumas, Claire Murashima, and Chris Thomas.
--:-- Michelle Martin: We get engineering support from Nisha Hainas, and our technical director is Carly Strange.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: We hope you'll join us again tomorrow.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Thank you.
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