News

The hantavirus scare is giving some people COVID flashbacks ... but this virus apparently doesn't have the same bite.

Dr. Ashish Jha -- the former White House COVID response coordinator -- stopped by "TMZ Live" to tell everyone to exhale a little over the deadly outbreak aboard the MV Hondius ... because while he's worried about people exposed on that ship, he tells us this thing is NOT shaping up to be another COVID-style nightmare.

Check it out ... he assures us, "This is not gonna be a pandemic. That's not how this virus is going to behave."

Ashlee Jenae’s fiancé Joe McCann has been given back his passport and will be returning home to the U.S. following Ashlee's shocking death earlier last month ... TMZ has learned.

Joe McCann's lawyer, Edward Andrew Paltzik, tells TMZ ... authorities in Tanzania returned Joe's American passport to him yesterday after he remained in Tanzania for nearly a month while cooperating with authorities.

Edward clarifies this was not a newly-issued passport from the State Department and explains it was Joe's actual passport that he voluntarily handed over to authorities the day after Ashlee's death. Tanzanian authorities chose to give it back to Joe on Thursday.

The Department of War has released the first round of files connected to unidentified aerial phenomena ... and conspiracy theorists are sure to have a field day with the docs.

As you know ... months ago, just after former President Barack Obama said on a podcast that aliens were real, President Donald Trump promised the American public documents regarding "alien and extraterrestrial life, unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP), and unidentified flying objects (UFOs)."

The DoW followed the commander-in-chief's order Friday ... releasing some of the many documents on the subject -- with everything from photos taken on space missions to sketches from alleged eyewitness accounts.

Burning outrage over Congressional redistricting in Tennessee is exploding in that state's capital ... where state Rep. Justin Jones set fire to Confederate flag.

Justin was protesting Tennessee Republicans approving a new Congressional map Thursday -- splitting up a majority-Black district in Memphis -- when he joined a crowd marching and chanting through the Capitol, held up a printout of the rebel flag ... and lit it up.

While still holding the burned flag -- which had "We will not go back" written along the edge -- Justin told The Tennessean, "They're taking us backwards to this type of environment where Black folks are not treated with equal representation, where we're pre-1965."

Ghislaine Maxwell’s arrival at a Texas prison camp apparently sparked major backlash behind bars -- with inmates now claiming they were screamed at and punished just for talking about her.

Former inmate Julie Howell told CNN she was abruptly transferred from the minimum-security Federal Prison Camp Bryan to a higher-security detention center in Houston after sharing her thoughts with a reporter on Maxwell being housed at the minimum-security facility meant for non-violent offenders.

According to Howell, she even checked the prison handbook beforehand to make sure speaking to the press wasn’t against the rules, but says prison officials still came down hard on her after the story blew up.

President Donald Trump went full HGTV mode Thursday ... unloading on an ABC reporter for asking why he’s focused on D.C. renovations instead of the Iran war.

The fiery exchange went down near the Lincoln Memorial, where the POTUS was showing off plans for his Washington makeover ... while the shaky Iran ceasefire and soaring gas prices continue dominating headlines.

That's when ABC News correspondent Rachel Scott asked why he's so focused on beautification projects during the conflict ... and Trump had quite the fiery response.

Absolute tragedy in Mexico ... a massive fire ripped through a packed fairground, killing at least 5 people.

Video from the horrifying scene Thursday night shows huge flames tearing through the Parque Tabasco shopping mall fair in Villahermosa in Southern Mexico. Terrified crowds of fairgoers scrambled to escape flames and thick smoke billowing into the sky.

Officials say they finally got the blaze under control by Friday morning, according to Tabasco’s Civil Protection agency.

Tabasco Governor Javier May Rodríguez confirmed investigations are now underway to determine what sparked the deadly inferno ... and he also announced the state will provide economic recovery for impacted businesses.

A Florida high school teacher has been arrested after he was allegedly found carrying cocaine and fentanyl in his backpack.

The Collier County Sheriff's Office booked 44-year-old Lely High School teacher Christopher D. Toukonen into the Collier County Jail Thursday after detectives interviewed him and determined he was in possession of a "mixture" of narcotics. He is charged with felony counts of possessing the drugs and is also facing a charge of possession of narcotic paraphernalia.

Police say Toukonen was caught after school administrators were notified he might be using narcotics "while he was alone in the classroom with no students present." Admins searched his backpack and located the suspected illegal narcotics ... and swiftly contacted the Collier County Sheriff’s Office.

The man accused of shooting up the White House Correspondents' Dinner wants some top government lawyers cut from the case ... arguing there's a conflict of interest because they were at the event and among those allegedly targeted.

Attorneys for Cole Allen submitted a motion Thursday night asking the judge to disqualify U.S. Attorney for D.C. Jeanine Pirro and acting Attorney General Todd Blanche because they're "purported victims and witnesses in this case." The motion cites Justice Department rules advising employees to recuse themselves from criminal investigations where they may have a conflict of interest.

His legal team further argues Pirro and Blanche have a personal relationship with President Donald Trump and have made numerous media appearances -- such as a CNN interview by Pirro -- and social media posts about being at the shooting, exemplifying a personal interest.

A nude painting from Jeffrey Epstein's New York City townhouse popped up on eBay ... and it sounds like the seller wanted big bucks.

The online auction house had a listing up for "Jeffrey Epstein's Desk Art" ... a lewd depiction of a woman that Epstein hung over his desk ... according to the New York Post.

The eBay listing, which has since been scrubbed, sought $25,000.

Apparently, the seller bought the art from a New Jersey auction and tried to flip it. Epstein's estate sold off a lot of his belongings.

Kyle Rittenhouse -- who shot and killed Joseph Rosenbaum and Anthony Huber during a 2020 Black Lives Matter protest in Kenosha, Wisconsin 6 years ago -- wound up in the hospital this week ... after he says he was bitten by a spider.

He posted some pics from a hospital bed on Wednesday, writing ... "The communists couldn't take me out and i'll be damned if I let a brown recluse take me out."

The selfie shows him hooked up to some monitors, while the other image shows circles drawn around a red splotch on his leg ... where he was allegedly bitten. Brown recluse spiders are no joke -- the bite can cause serious side effects ... sometimes taking months to heal.

Ashlee Jenae’s fiancé Joe McCann tried reaching out to her family after her death ... but the communication basically hit a wall immediately afterward.

Joe's lawyer, Edward Andrew Paltzik, tells TMZ ... Ashlee's mother Yolanda texted Joe asking what happened on April 9 shortly after Ashlee died in Tanzania ... and despite being completely crushed by her death, Joe responded promptly and appropriately.

But according to Joe's side, Yolanda never replied back -- and he says he hasn't heard from the family since.

A former inmate who was Jeffrey Epstein's suicide-watch companion in a New York jail says the convicted pedophile definitely killed himself ... telling TMZ the guy in the cell next to Epstein heard him ripping up bedsheets to hang himself.

Bill Mersey -- who was locked up with Epstein back in the day at the since-shuttered Metropolitan Correctional Center -- joined us on "TMZ Live" Thursday, and we asked him about the alleged Epstein suicide note, which was just released.

Bill spent hours talking to Epstein in lockup and says he watched Epstein lose all hope after being denied bail. He also says Epstein worried about what life in prison would look like and how he could stay safe from other inmates, particularly Black people.

Several Disney cruise ship staff members were reportedly arrested in April as part of a larger federal investigation into child sexual abuse material (CSAM) crimes.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents boarded 8 cruise ships in San Diego as part of an ongoing Child Sexual Exploitation Material (CSEM) enforcement operation between April 23 and April 27, a CBP spokesperson tells TMZ. One of the cruise ships belongs to Disney, the California Post reported.

After boarding the vessels and interviewing 26 suspected crew members from the Philippines, one from Portugal, and one from Indonesia, officers determined 27 of the 28 people were involved in either the receipt, possession, transportation, distribution, or viewing of CSEM, the CBP spokesperson tells TMZ.

Jeffrey Epstein's former cellmate Nicholas Tartaglione was NOT the one who penned the suicide note allegedly left by the late convicted pedophile in their jail cell ... according to NT's lawyer, despite a slew of online speculation.

Tartaglione's attorney, Bruce Barket, tells TMZ ... his client "didn't forge" the suicide note and "there's no debate" over it -- even though skeptics can be found all over social media and on TV talk shows like "The Ingraham Angle."

One critic on Reddit even pointed out the note appears to be written by someone else when comparing it to Epstein's confirmed handwritten letters.

A British ex-cop is speaking out after becoming the first identified passenger hauled off the hantavirus-riddled MV Hondius this week.

Martin Anstee was evacuated Wednesday -- and speaking from a hospital in Amsterdam, he said he's thankfully not feeling too bad right now ... though doctors are still running tests while he remains in isolation.

Martin told Sky News doctors should have a much clearer picture of his prognosis in the next few days -- so, for now, signs seem positive. Still, his wife Nicola admitted the whole ordeal onboard felt deeply traumatic.