Hundreds of steelworkers stand in the 26-degree chill outside the local U.S. Steel plant at a pep rally of sorts, broadcasting their defiance and their desperation to the leaders that they believe have abandoned them.

The Education Department on Friday withdrew President Joe Biden’s proposed student debt relief regulation that would have delivered forgiveness to more than 25 million Americans.

The Biden administration says it has decided not to pursue a $10 million reward it had offered for the capture of a Syrian rebel leader of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, which led the ouster of President Bashar Assad. Hayat Tahrir al-Sham remains designated a foreign terrorist organization.

The USO partnered with the Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Christopher Grady and widely-known talents to bring its seven day holiday tour to U.S. military bases across Europe. They reminded those who serve, and their families that they are loved and appreciated even from a distance.

Venezuela’s attorney general says an opposition politician met with prosecutors after leaving the Argentine diplomatic compound in the capital, Caracas, where he had sheltered for nine months to avoid arrest.

Officials acknowledged at the time that one line of inquiry would be whether Russia played a role given its suspected involvement in cases of sabotage, though they stressed there was no evidence pointing in that direction.

As its older sibling branches count centuries of service — the U.S. Army and Navy are older than the country itself — the Space Force’s few birthdays thus far “hold special significance,” a spokesperson for the force said.

The Secretary of the Air Force has signed off on stationing F-35 jets at Barnes Air National Guard Base and the National Guard’s 104th Fighter Wing.

The annual display of the national Christmas tree in Washington is meant to be a way for students to show pride in their state. For children of service members living overseas, it can also be a way to feel connected to home at a time of year when being away can be particularly difficult. 

Service members assigned to about three dozen urban areas of the U.S. will see a bump in cost-of-living allowance rates at the start of 2025, while more than 50 other locations will lose the extra money, the Pentagon announced Friday.

U.S. forces in the Middle East killed a leader of the Islamic State group in a precision airstrike in Syria, U.S. Central Command said Friday.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer is set to appoint Peter Mandelson, a veteran Labour Party figure and trade specialist, as the UK’s ambassador to the US, in an effort to spare Britain from being hit by tariffs by Donald Trump.

The military has ordered new safety guidelines for a key part in all Osprey aircraft after a recent accident revealed the same problem that caused a fatal crash in Japan last year.

Facing a government shutdown deadline, the Senate rushed through final passage early Saturday of a bipartisan plan that would temporarily fund federal operations and disaster aid, dropping Donald Trump’s demands for a debt limit increase into the new year. It now goes to President Joe Biden, who is expected to quickly sign it into law.

The number of veteran suicides continued to hold steady in 2022 despite an infusion of $13.5 billion in funds for mental health services for former service members, according to newly released findings from the Department of Veterans Affairs.

But Putin has set strict conditions for any deal, including keeping Ukraine permanently out of NATO, significantly reducing its military and hanging on to Ukrainian territory. Analysts see little hope for a peace deal, given Putin’s maximalist position and Trump’s wariness of looking weak if he gives too much to Russia.

The Corruption Investigation Office for High-Ranking Officials, which is leading a joint investigation with police and military authorities on Yoon’s brief martial law declaration, said it plans to question Yoon on charges of orchestrating a rebellion and abuse of authority.

Meanwhile, Ukraine’s air force said that it intercepted five Iskander short-range ballistic missiles fired at Kyiv. The attack killed at least one person and knocked out heating to 630 residential buildings, 16 medical facilities and 30 schools and kindergartens, the city administration said.

An official at the Wisconsin school where a student shot and killed a teacher and a fellow student says the 15-year-old was in her first semester there. Police are still investigating what motivated the shooter.