News Wrap: Tropical Storm Bertha makes landfall in Louisiana

Amna Nawaz:

In the day's other news: Tropical Storm Bertha made landfall on the southern coast of Louisiana this afternoon about 40 miles east of New Orleans.

Satellite imagery shows the sheer size of the storm, with winds stretching as far as 100 miles from its center. Officials are warning of dangerous storm surge and damaging wind, even as Bertha weakens moving westward across the Gulf Coast. In a press conference today, Louisiana's governor said the state is prepared for the worst, though the storm is not expected to cause major damage.

Gov. Jeff Landry (R-LA):

Today's forecast is encouraging, but it doesn't mean that we should be complacent. I expect every level of government to stay focused on, and that's its core responsibility of protecting people and maintaining the critical infrastructure.

Amna Nawaz:

Meantime, flash flooding has swamped homes and businesses in West Virginia, with up to seven inches of rain falling in some areas. Governor Patrick Morrisey declared a state of emergency for all counties and sent more than 300 National Guard troops to affected areas.

Emergency crews on the other side of the Atlantic are battling conditions of a different extreme. Wildfire has engulfed entire homes in Turkey, while, in the mountains of Sicily, towns were surrounded by a wall of smoke. In Spain, a fire in Guadalajara, north of Madrid, has burned some 80,000 acres and forced more than 1,200 people to evacuate. It's now the country's second largest wildfire on record.

Today, Spain's prime minister visited the fire zone. He said, compared to this time last year, the number of wildfires in Spain has quadrupled.

Pedro Sanchez, Spanish Prime Minister (through translator):

Spain needs a major state pact against the climate emergency, because we cannot only think about wildfires when they occur. We have to act beforehand. This is not about politics. It is not about ideology. It is science.

Amna Nawaz:

The fires come in the middle of a still sweltering summer across Europe. In France, public health officials say there were upwards of 5,700 more deaths than usual during a record-setting heat wave last month.

This year's cyclosporiasis outbreak in the U.S. is officially the worst on record, as the CDC says there are more than 4,100 confirmed cases across 41 states. The agency is aware of 7,400 additional cases that have not been confirmed. No deaths have been reported.

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. told ABC News yesterday that the outbreak is -- quote -- "under control." Officials are still investigating iceberg lettuce from Taylor Farms as a potential source of the outbreak and say the number of cases could rise further.

On Capitol Hill today, the House passed a flurry of Republican-led measures, including the GOP's $95 billion budget proposal that would further fund the Iran war.

Woman:

The concurrent resolution is adopted.

Amna Nawaz:

The tally was 216 to 214, with all Democrats opposed. The vast majority of the funds would go towards the Pentagon and other national security needs. The rest would help farmers struggling under President Trump's tariffs and pay for voting law changes that he's pushing.

The measure faces an uphill battle in the Senate, but House Speaker Mike Johnson touted it and other bills passed today as a win.

Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA):

This was obviously a consequential week for House Republicans, but it was a very consequential week for the American people.

Amna Nawaz:

The House also approved measures that would ban insider trading for lawmakers and officially renamed the Defense Department as the Department of War.

OpenAI says it's investigating what is called an unprecedented cyber incident after one of its A.I. models went rogue and hacked another company. The ChatGPT maker says the breach happened last week while OpenAI was testing the cybersecurity capabilities of its systems.

The head of the hacked company, Hugging Face, called the attack mind-blowing, but said there was -- quote -- "no malicious intent." The incident has raised concerns about the growing capabilities of A.I. and the need for guardrails to keep the technology in check.

On Wall Street today, stocks ended a bit lower as oil prices spiked. The Dow Jones industrial average lost just six points, so basically flat. The Nasdaq fell nearly 150 points. The S&P 500 also closed the day in negative territory.

And we have two passings to acknowledge this evening, starting with the death of former CIA Director James Woolsey. His tenure under President Bill Clinton was a rocky one, marked by the 1994 arrest of CIA case officer Aldrich Ames, who sold secrets to the Soviet Union for nearly a decade.

Woolsey's decision to not fire or demote anyone in the wake of the scandal cast a shadow over his time at the CIA. His politics tilted to the right over the years. In 2016, he joined Donald Trump's presidential campaign as a senior adviser. And he continued to defend America's 2003 invasion of Iraq, which he spoke about on this program in 2016.

James Woolsey, Former CIA Director:

Two of the three weapons of mass destruction, biological and chemical, were in the hands of Saddam the whole time. It was the third kind that everybody's particularly worried about, nuclear, that was lied about and so forth. But two-thirds of the types of weapons of mass destruction were in fact in Iraq.

Amna Nawaz:

His wife says James Woolsey died at his home in Washington from a stroke. He was 84 years old.

And celebrated saxophonist Plas Johnson has died. He's best known for his playful musical turn on one of the most recognizable movie themes in history. Johnson's recording for composer Henry Mancini's "The Pink Panther" helped the song to win three Grammys and an Oscar nomination.

The Louisiana native was also a prolific session musician, recording alongside the likes of Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, and the Beach Boys, among many others. Johnson's family says he died last week at his home in Los Angeles. Plas Johnson was 94 years old.