U.S. stocks eked out small gains on Wall Street Friday in a wobbly day of trading to kick off the new year.

Markets were mostly quiet on the first trading day of 2026, with the influential technology sector driving much of the up-and-down action. The mostly minor moves also cap off a tepid and holiday-shortened week. Markets were closed on Thursday for New Year's day.

The S&P 500 rose 12.97 points, or 0.2%, to 6,858.47. The benchmark index is coming off a gain of more than 16% in 2025.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 319.10 points, or 0.7%, to 48,382.39.

The Nasdaq composite fell 6.36 points, or less than 0.1%, to 23,235.63. The index was weighed down by losses for Microsoft and Tesla.

Foreign markets fared better and benchmarks in Britain and South Korea hit records.

Technology stocks steered the market, especially companies with a focus on artificial intelligence, continuing the trend that pushed the broader market to records in 2025.

Nvidia jumped 1.3% and was the biggest force trying to push the market higher. But a 2.2% fall for Microsoft helped to check those gains.

Tesla also weighed on markets with a 2.6% drop after reporting falling sales for a second year in a row.

Nvidia, Microsoft and Tesla are among the most valuable companies in the world and their outsized valuations give them more influence on the stock market's direction. That includes sometimes pushing the market up and down from hour to hour.

Technology companies have been a major focus because of advancements in artificial intelligence technology and the potential for growth within the sector. Wall Street has been betting that demand for computer chips and other items needed for data centers will help justify the big investments from technology companies and their pricey stock values.

Furniture companies gained ground following President Donald Trump's move to delay increased tariffs on upholstered furniture. RH rose 8% and Wayfair rose 6.1%.

E-commerce giant Alibaba climbed 4.3% and Baidu, maker of the Ernie chatbot, jumped 9.4% in Hong Kong after it said it plans to spin off its AI computer chip unit Kunlunxin, which would list shares in Hong Kong early in 2027. The plan is subject to regulatory approvals.

Crude oil prices were mostly stable. Prices for U.S. crude oil fell 0.2% to $57.32 per barrel. The price of Brent crude, the international standard, fell 0.2% to $60.75 per barrel.

The price of gold fell 0.3%.

Treasury yields held steady in the bond market. The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.19% from 4.17% late Wednesday. The yield on the two-year Treasury, which moves more closely with expectations for what the Federal Reserve will do, held at 3.48% from late Wednesday.

Wall Street will move past the mostly quiet holiday season starting Monday. The first full week of the new year will include several closely watched economic updates. They will also be some of the last big updates the Fed sees before its next meeting at the end of January.

Next week will feature private reports on the status of the services sector, which is the largest part of the U.S. economy, along with consumer sentiment. Government reports on the job market will also be released. The hope is they'll help paint a clearer picture of how various parts of the U.S. economy closed out 2025 and where it might be headed in 2026.

The Fed has had a more difficult task because of the complex shifts within the economy. It cut interest rates three times toward the end of 2025, partly to help counter a weakening jobs market. But inflation remains above its target rate of 2% and cutting interest rates could add more fuel to rising prices. Consumers have already expressed more caution amid the squeeze from stubborn inflation and the U.S. trade war with much of the world has added more uncertainty.

The Fed has already signaled concern and caution. Wall Street is betting that the central bank will hold its benchmark interest rate steady at its January meeting.

A yellow Labrador out for a walk with his owner in Rhode Island had to be rescued by firefighters on New Year's Day after he wandered onto a thin layer of ice covering a pond and fell through the center.

According to the Misquamicut Fire Department, volunteer firefighters and other emergency officials were dispatched early Thursday morning for a water rescue. Once on scene, firefighters saw a dog named Phoenix struggling and unable to move to shore in the slushy, icy water.

Members from both the Misquamicut and Watch Hill fire departments donned ice rescue suits, which help protect the body from frigid temperatures, to enter the pond and successfully rescue Phoenix. The National Weather Service reported it was 26 degrees Fahrenheit around 9 a.m. on Thursday, with the wind chill dropping the temperature to 14 degrees.

"It was the chillest dog I've ever seen in my life," said Steve Howard, deputy chief of the Misquamicut Fire Department, in a phone interview on Friday. "The dog never made a sound. He was pretty chill."

ICYMI | Hiker rescued after getting trapped in quicksand at Arches National Park

While the firefighters were evaluated for possible hypothermia, they did not require treatment. The fire departments described the incident as "a successful first call of 2026," in a statement posted on Facebook.

Phoenix was also declared free of injuries, but Howard made sure to check in with his owner later Thursday.

"He got a little bit of extra food last night," Howard said. "And he took a little nap."

The incident served as a reminder to treat all ice as potentially dangerous, particularly over bodies of water, the fire department warned.

"No ice is ever safe. Our firefighters train extensively for cold water and ice rescues, but these situations are extremely dangerous," the fire department said.

A woman was killed in a suspected mountain lion attack while she was hiking alone in the mountains of northern Colorado on Thursday, in what would be the first fatal attack by one of the predators in the state in more than 25 years, authorities said.

Wildlife officers later in the day located two mountain lions in the area and fatally shot the animals, said Kara Van Hoose with Colorado Parks and Wildlife

The attack occurred in the mountains south of the small community of Glen Haven, about 7 miles northeast of Estes Park and considered the gateway to the eastern entrance of Rocky Mountain National Park.

Shortly before noon, two hikers encountered a mountain lion near the woman's body along a remote section of the Crosier Mountain trail, which is on a national forest.

The hikers threw rocks at the animal to scare it from the immediate area so they could try to help the woman, Van Hoose said. One of the hikers was a physician who attended to the victim and did not find a pulse, she said.

RELATED STORY | Triathlete killed in Northern California shark attack while wearing shark-deterrent device

Details on the woman's injuries and cause of death were not immediately released.

Van Hoose said the search for other mountain lions in the area was ongoing. She said circumstances would dictate whether any additional lions that are found are killed.

Sightings of mountain lions are common in the forested area where the suspected attack occurred, but there have not been any recent documented attacks on humans, Van Hoose said.

"This is a very common time of year to take mountain lion sightings and reports and especially in Larimer County, where this is very good mountain lion habitat," she said. "Trails in this area are in pretty remote land, so it's wooded, it's rocky, there's elevation gains and dips."

Mountain lion attacks are rare and Colorado's last suspected fatal attack was in 1999, when a 3-year-old was killed. Two years before that, a 10-year-old boy was killed by a lion and dragged away while hiking with family members in Rocky Mountain National Park.

Last year in Northern California two brothers were stalked and then attacked by a lion that they tried to fight off. One of the brothers was killed.

The animals, also known as cougars, catamounts and other names, can weigh 130 pounds (60 kilograms) and grow to more than six feet long. They eat primarily deer.

Colorado has an estimated 3,800-4,400 of the animals, which are classified as a big game species in the state and can be hunted.

Tesla lost its crown as the worlds bestselling electric vehicle maker on Friday as a customer revolt over Elon Musks right-wing politics, expiring U.S. tax breaks for buyers and stiff overseas competition pushed sales down for a second year in a row.

Tesla said that it delivered 1.64 million vehicles in 2025, down 9% from a year earlier.

Chinese rival BYD, which sold 2.26 million vehicles last year, is now the biggest EV maker.

It's a stunning reversal for a car company whose rise once seemed unstoppable as it overtook traditional automakers with far more resources and helped make Musk the world's richest man.

For the fourth quarter, sales totaled 418,227, falling short of even the much-reduced 440,000 target that analysts recently polled by FactSet had expected. Sales were hit hard by the expiration of a $7,500 tax credit for electric vehicle purchases that was phased out by the Trump administration at the end of September.

Tesla stock was down nearly 2% at $441.15 in early afternoon trading Friday.

RELATED STORY | Musk could become history's first trillionaire as Tesla shareholders approve giant pay package

Even with multiple issues buffeting the company, investors are betting that Tesla CEO Musk can deliver on his ambitions to make Tesla a leader in robotaxi services and get consumers to embrace humanoid robots that can perform basic tasks in homes and offices. Reflecting that optimism, the stock finished 2025 with a gain of approximately 11%.

The latest quarter was the first with sales of stripped-down versions of the Model Y and Model 3 that Musk unveiled in early October as part of an effort to revive sales. The new Model Y costs just under $40,000 while customers can buy the cheaper Model 3 for under $37,000. Those versions are expected to help Tesla compete with Chinese models in Europe and Asia.

For fourth-quarter earnings coming out in late January, analysts are expecting the company to post a 3% drop in sales and a nearly 40% drop in earnings per share, according to FactSet. Analysts expect the downward trend in sales and profits to eventually reverse itself as 2026 rolls along.

Investors have largely shrugged off the falling numbers, choosing to focus on Musk's pivot to different parts of business. He has been saying the future of the company lies with its driverless robotaxis service, its energy storage business and building robots for the home and factory and much less with car sales.

Tesla started rolling out its robotaxi service in Austin earlier this year, first with safety monitors in the cars to take over in case of trouble, then testing without them. The company hopes to roll out the service in several cities this year.

RELATED STORY | Jury awards $329 million in case that blamed Tesla's Autopilot for deadly crash

To do that successfully, it needs to take on rival Waymo, which has been operating autonomous taxis for years and has far more customers. It also will also have to contend with regulatory challenges. The company is under several federal safety investigations and other probes. In California, Tesla is at risk of temporarily losing its license to sell cars in the state after a judge there ruled it had misled customers about their safety.

Regulatory is going to be a big issue, said Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives, a well-known bull on the stock. We're dealing with people's lives.

Still, Ives said he expects Tesla's autonomous offerings will soon overcome any setbacks.

Musk has said he hopes software updates to his cars will enable hundreds of thousands of Tesla vehicles to operate autonomously with zero human intervention by the end of this year. The company is also planning to begin production of its AI-powered Cybercab with no steering wheel or pedals in 2026.

To keep Musk focused on the company, Teslas directors awarded Musk a potentially enormous new pay package that shareholders backed at the annual meeting in November.

Musk scored another huge windfall two weeks ago when the Delaware Supreme Court reversed a decision that deprived him of a $55 billion pay package that Tesla doled out in 2018.

Musk could become the world's first trillionaire later this year when he sells shares of his rocket company SpaceX to the public for the first time in what analysts expect would be a blockbuster initial public offering.

Swiss investigators said Friday that they believe sparkling flares atop Champagne bottles ignited the fatal fire at a ski resort when they came too close to a crowded bars ceiling.

Forty people were killed and another 119 injured in the blaze as it ripped through the busy Le Constellation bar at the ski resort of Crans-Montana while revelers were celebrating New Year's Eve, authorities said.

Among the crowd was Axel Clavier, a 16-year-old from Paris, who said he felt as if he was suffocating inside the Swiss Alpine bar where moments before he had been ringing in the new year with friends and dozens of other people.

The teenager escaped the inferno, which broke out early Thursday, by forcing a window open with a table. But about 40 other partygoers died, including one of Clavier's friends, falling victim to one of the worst tragedies in Switzerland's history.

Many of the wounded were in their teens to mid-20s, police said.

Clavier told The Associated Press that two or three of his friends remained missing hours after the disaster.

RELATED STORY | About 40 people dead and 115 injured in fire at Swiss Alpine bar during New Year's celebration

Late Thursday, mourners left candles and flowers in an impromptu memorial near the bar. Hundreds of others prayed for the victims at the nearby Church of Montana-Station.

Pope Leo sent a telegram Friday to the bishop of Sion to express condolences and pray that "the Lord will welcome the deceased into His abode of peace and light, and will sustain the courage of those who suffer in their hearts or in their bodies.

On Instagram, an account filled up with photos of people who remained unaccounted for, with their friends and relatives begging for tips about the whereabouts of the missing.

Fire's cause remains under investigation

We have numerous accounts of heroic actions, one could say, of very strong solidarity in the moment, Valais regional government head Mathias Reynard told RTS radio Friday. He lauded the work of emergency officials on the day after the fire but added "in the first minutes it was citizens and in large part young people who saved lives with their courage.

An evening of celebration turns tragic

Clavier, the Parisian teenager, said he didnt see the fire start, but did see waitresses arrive with Champagne bottles with burning sparklers.

Two women told French broadcaster BFMTV they were inside when they saw a male bartender lifting a female bartender on his shoulders as she held a lit candle in a bottle. The flames spread, collapsing the wooden ceiling, they told the broadcaster.

One of the women described a crowd surge as people frantically tried to escape from a basement nightclub up a flight of stairs and through a narrow door.

Another witness speaking to BFMTV described people smashing windows to escape the blaze, some gravely injured, and panicked parents rushing to the scene in cars to see whether their children were trapped inside.

Gianni Campolo, a Swiss 19-year-old who was in Crans-Montana on vacation, rushed to the bar to help first responders after receiving a call from a friend who escaped the inferno. He described a scene of people trapped on the ground, severely injured and burned.

I have seen horror and I dont know what else would be worse than this, Campolo told TF1.

The severity of the burns has made it very difficult to identify bodies, bringing fresh agony for families who now must hand over DNA samples to authorities. In some cases, wallets and any ID documents inside turned to ash in the flames.

Emanuele Galeppini, a promising 17-year-old Italian golfer who competed internationally, is officially listed as one of Italys missing nationals. His uncle Sebastiano Galeppini told Italian news agency ANSA that their family is awaiting the DNA checks, though the Italian Golf Federation on its website announced that he had died.

Italys Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said 13 Italian citizens were injured and six remained missing by midday Friday. Galeppinis name was on the missing persons list.

Resort town sits in the heart of the Alps

In a region busy with tourists skiing on the slopes, the authorities have called on the local population to show caution in the coming days to avoid accidents that could further strain the area's already overwhelmed medical resources.

With high-altitude ski runs rising around 3,000 meters (nearly 9,850 feet) in the heart of the Valais region's snowy peaks and pine forests, Crans-Montana is one of the top venues on the World Cup circuit. The resort will host the best mens and womens downhill racers, including Lindsey Vonn, for their final events before the Milan-Cortina Olympics in February. The town's Crans-sur-Sierre golf club stages the European Masters each August on a picturesque course.

President Donald Trump defended his energy and health in an interview with The Wall Street Journal and disclosed that he had a CT scan, not an MRI scan, during an October examination about which he and the White House delayed offering details.

Trump, in the interview published Thursday, said he regretted undergoing the advanced imaging on his heart and abdomen during an October visit to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center because it raised public questions about his health. His physician said in a memo the White House released in December that he had advanced imaging as a preventative screening for a man his age.

RELATED STORY | Doctor explains why Trump underwent MRI during annual physical

Trump had initially described it as an MRI but said he didn't know what part of his body he had scanned. A CT scan is a quicker form of diagnostic imaging than an MRI but offers less detail about differences in tissue.

The president's doctor, Navy Capt. Sean Barbabella, said in a statement released Thursday by the White House that Trump underwent the exam in October because he planned to be at Walter Reed to meet people working there. Trump had already undergone an annual physical in April.

President Trump agreed to meet with the staff and soldiers at Walter Reed Medical Hospital in October. In order to make the most of the Presidents time at the hospital, we recommended he undergo another routine physical evaluation to ensure continued optimal health, Barbabella said.

Barbabella said he asked the president to undergo either a CT scan or MRI to definitively rule out any cardiovascular issues and the results were "perfectly normal and revealed absolutely no abnormalities."

RELATED STORY | Trump says he'll release MRI results but doesn't know what part of his body was scanned

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement Thursday that the presidents doctors and the White House have always maintained the President received advanced imaging but said that additional details on the imaging have been disclosed by the President himself because he has nothing to hide.

In retrospect, its too bad I took it because it gave them a little ammunition, Trump said in the interview with The Wall Street Journal. I would have been a lot better off if they didnt, because the fact that I took it said, Oh gee, is something wrong? Well, nothings wrong.

The 79-year-old became the oldest person to take the oath of office when he was sworn in as president last year and has been sensitive to questions about his health, particularly as he has repeatedly questioned his predecessor Joe Biden's fitness for office.

Biden, who turned 82 in the last year of his presidency, was dogged by scrutiny of his age and mental acuity at the end of his tenure and during his abandoned attempt to seek reelection.

But questions have also swirled around Trump's health this year as he's been seen with bruising on the back of his right hand that has been conspicuous despite a slathering of makeup on top, along with noticeable swelling at his ankles.

The White House this summer said the president had been diagnosed with chronic venous insufficiency, a common condition among older adults. The condition happens when veins in the legs cant properly carry blood back to the heart and it pools in the lower legs.

In the interview, Trump said he briefly tried wearing compression socks to address the swelling but stopped because he didn't like them.

The bruising on Trump's hand, according to Leavitt, is from frequent handshaking and the use of aspirin, which Trump takes regularly to reduce the risk of heart attack and stroke.

He said he takes more aspirin than his doctors recommend but said he has resisted taking less because hes been taking it for 25 years and said he is a little superstitious. Trump takes 325 milligrams of aspirin daily, according to Barbabella.

They say aspirin is good for thinning out the blood, and I dont want thick blood pouring through my heart, Trump said. I want nice, thin blood pouring through my heart. Does that make sense?

Trump, in the interview, denied he has fallen asleep during White House meetings when cameras have caught him with his eyes closed, instead insisting he was resting his eyes or blinking.

Ill just close. Its very relaxing to me, he said. Sometimes theyll take a picture of me blinking, blinking, and theyll catch me with the blink.

He said that he's never slept much at night, a habit he also described during his first term, and said he starts his day early in the White House residence before moving to the Oval Office around 10 a.m. and working until 7 p.m. or 8 p.m.

The president dismissed questions about his hearing, saying he only struggled to hear when theres a lot of people talking," and said he has plenty of energy, which he credited to his genes.

Genetics are very important, he said. And I have very good genetics.

Venezuela is open to negotiating an agreement with the United States to combat drug trafficking, the South American countrys President Nicols Maduro said in a pretaped interview aired Thursday on state television, but he declined to comment on a CIA-led strike last week at a Venezuelan docking area that the Trump administration believed was used by cartels.

Maduro, in an interview with Spanish journalist Ignacio Ramonet, reiterated that the U.S. wants to force a government change in Venezuela and gain access to its vast oil reserves through the monthslong pressure campaign that began with a massive military deployment to the Caribbean Sea in August.

What are they seeking? It is clear that they seek to impose themselves through threats, intimidation and force, Maduro said, later adding that it is time for both nations to start talking seriously, with data in hand.

RELATED STORY | Trump suggests Venezuelan dock explosion linked to smuggling crackdown

The U.S. government knows, because weve told many of their spokespeople, that if they want to seriously discuss an agreement to combat drug trafficking, were ready, he said. If they want oil, Venezuela is ready for U.S. investment, like with Chevron, whenever they want it, wherever they want it and however they want it.

Chevron Corp. is the only major oil company exporting Venezuelan crude to the U.S. Venezuela has the worlds largest proven oil reserves.

The interview was taped on New Years Eve, the same day the U.S. military announced strikes against five alleged drug-smuggling boats. The latest attacks bring the total number of known boat strikes to 35 and the number of people killed to at least 115, according to numbers announced by the Trump administration. Venezuelans are among the victims.

President Donald Trump has justified the attacks as a necessary escalation to stem the flow of drugs into the United States and asserted that the U.S. is engaged in an armed conflict with drug cartels. The strikes began off Venezuelas Caribbean coast and later expanded to the eastern Pacific Ocean.

RELATED STORY | Trump says U.S. strike hit Venezuelan dock used to load boats with drugs

Meanwhile, the CIA was behind a drone strike last week at a docking area believed to have been used by Venezuelan drug cartels, according to two people familiar with details of the operation who requested anonymity to discuss the classified matter. It was the first known direct operation on Venezuelan soil since the boat strikes began, a significant escalation in the administrations pressure campaign on Maduro, who has been charged with narco-terrorism in the U.S.

Asked about the operation on Venezuelan soil, Maduro said he could talk about it in a few days.

The Trump administration is facing a new legal complaint from a group of government employees who are affected by a new policy going into effect Thursday that eliminates coverage for gender-affirming care in federal health insurance programs.

The complaint, filed Thursday on the employees' behalf by the Human Rights Campaign, is in response to an August announcement from the Office of Personnel Management that it would no longer cover "chemical and surgical modification of an individual's sex traits through medical interventions" in health insurance programs for federal employees and U.S. Postal Service workers.

The complaint argues that denying coverage of gender-affirming care is sex-based discrimination and asks the personnel office to rescind the policy.

RELATED STORY | Trump administration seeks nationwide ban on gender-affirming care for minors

"This policy is not about cost or care it is about driving transgender people and people with transgender spouses, children, and dependents out of the federal workforce," Human Rights Campaign Foundation President Kelley Robinson said in a statement announcing the move.

The complaint, filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, includes testimonies from four current federal workers at the State Department, Health and Human Services and the Postal Service who would be directly affected by the elimination of coverage.

For instance, the Postal Service employee has a daughter whose doctors recommended that she get puberty blockers and potentially hormone replacement therapy for her diagnosed gender dysphoria, which would not be covered under the new OPM policy, according to the complaint.

The complaint notes that the workers are making the claim on behalf of themselves and a "class of similarly situated federal employees."

RELATED STORY | Democrat-led states sue HHS over a move to block youth gender-affirming care

The Trump administration has taken other steps to restrict care for transgender Americans, particularly minors. In December, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services released proposals that would block gender-affirming care to minors, including a policy that would bar Medicare and Medicaid dollars to hospitals that provide such care to children.

Senior Trump officials, such as Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., call gender-affirming care "malpractice" for minors. But such restrictions go against recommendations from major medical groups such as the American Medical Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Respondents to an annual Michigan college survey of overused and misused words and phrases say " 6-7 " is "cooked" and should come to a massive full-stop heading into the new year.

Those are among the top 10 words on the 50th annual "Banished Words List," released Thursday by Lake Superior State University. The tongue-in-cheek roundup of overused slang started in 1976 as a New Year's Eve party idea, and is affectionately called the list of "Queen's English for Mis-use, Over-use and General Uselessness."

Around 1,400 submissions came from all 50 states and a number of countries outside the U.S., including Uzbekistan, Brazil and Japan, according to Lake Superior State.

RELATED STORY | In-N-Out stops serving order number 67 because of a nonsensical meme

Also in the top 10 are "demure," "incentivize," "perfect," "gift/gifted," "my bad" and "reach out." "My bad" and "reach out" also made the list decades ago in 1998 and 1994, respectively.

"The list definitely represents the fad and vernacular trends of the younger generation," said David Travis, Lake Superior State University president. "Social media allows a greater opportunity to misunderstand or misuse words. We're using terms that are shared through texting, primarily, or through posting with no body language or tone context. It's very easy to misunderstand these words."

Few phrases in 2025 befuddled parents, teachers and others over the age of, say 40, more than "6-7." Dictionary.com even picked it as their 2025 word of the year, while other dictionaries chose words like "slop" and " rage bait."

But what does "6-7" actually mean? It exploded over the summer, especially among Gen Z, and is considered by many to be nonsensical in meaning an inside joke driven by social media.

"Don't worry, because we're all still trying to figure out exactly what it means," the dictionary's editors wrote.

Each number can be spoken aloud as "six, seven." They even can be combined as the number 67; at college basketball games, some fans explode when a team reaches that point total.

The placement of "6-7" at the top of the banished list puts it in good company. In 2019, the centuries-old Latin phrase "quid pro quo" was the top requested phrase to ban from popular use. In 2017, " fake news " got the most votes.

Alana Bobbitt, a 19-year-old sophomore at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, is unapologetic about using "6-7."

"I find joy in it," Bobbitt said. "It's a little bit silly, and even though I don't understand what it means, it's fun to use."

Jalen Brezzell says a small group of his friends use "6-7" and that it comes up a couple of times each week. But he won't utter it.

"Never. I don't really get the joke," said Brezzell, a 19-year-old sophomore at the University of Michigan-Dearborn. "I don't see what's funny about it."

But banning it, even in jest, might be a bit of a stretch, he said, adding that he does use other words and phrases on the list.

"I've always used the word 'cooked,'" Brezzell said. "I just think it got popular on the internet over this past year. It's saying, like, 'give it up, it's over.'"

RELATED STORY | What does 67 mean? Dictionary.com just made it the word of the year

Some of the phrases do have longevity, Travis said.

"I don't think they'll ever go away, like 'at the end of the day,'" he said. "I used 'my bad' today. I feel comfortable using it. I started using it when I was young. A lot of us older people are still using it."

Travis said that while some terms on the list "will stick around in perpetuity," others will be fleeting.

"I think '6-7,' next year, will be gone," he said.

Chief Justice John Roberts said Wednesday that the Constitution remains a sturdy pillar for the country, a message that comes after a tumultuous year in the nation's judicial system with pivotal Supreme Court decisions on the horizon.

Roberts said the nation's founding documents remain "firm and unshaken," a reference to a century-old quote from President Calvin Coolidge. "True then; true now," Roberts wrote in his annual letter to the judiciary.

The letter comes after a year in which legal scholars and Democrats raised fears of a possible constitutional crisis as Republican President Donald Trump's supporters pushed back against rulings that slowed his far-reaching conservative agenda.

Roberts weighed in at one point in March, issuing a rare rebuke after Trump called for the impeachment of a judge who had ruled against him in a case over the deportation of Venezuelan migrants accused of being gang members.

The chief justice's Wednesday letter was largely focused on the nation's history, including an early 19th-century case establishing the principle that Congress shouldn't remove judges over contentious rulings.

He also called on judges to "continue to decide the cases before us according to our oath, doing equal right to the poor and to the rich, and performing all of our duties faithfully and impartially under the Constitution and laws of the United States."

While the Trump administration faced pushback in the lower courts, it has scored a series of some two dozen wins on the Supreme Court's emergency docket. The court's conservative majority has allowed Trump to move ahead for now with banning transgender people from the military, clawing back billions of dollars of congressionally approved federal spending, moving aggressively on immigration and firing the Senate-confirmed leaders of independent federal agencies.

The court also handed Trump a few defeats over the last year, including in his push to deploy the National Guard to U.S. cities.

Other pivotal issues are ahead for the high court in 2026, including arguments over Trump's push to end birthright citizenship and a ruling on whether he can unilaterally impose tariffs on hundreds of countries.

Roberts' letter contained few references to those issues. It opened with a history of the seminal 1776 pamphlet "Common Sense," written by Thomas Paine, a "recent immigrant to Britain's North American colonies," and closed with Coolidge's encouragement to "turn for solace" to the Constitution and Declaration of Independence, "amid all the welter of partisan politics."

Zohran Mamdani became mayor of New York City on Thursday, taking over one of the most unrelenting jobs in American politics with a promise to transform government on behalf of the city's striving, struggling working class.

Mamdani, a Democrat, was sworn in at a decommissioned subway station below City Hall just after midnight, placing his hand on a Quran as he took his oath as the city's first Muslim mayor.

After working part of the night in his new office, Mamdani then returned to City Hall in a taxi cab around midday Thursday for a grander public inauguration where U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, one of the mayor's political heroes, administered the oath for a second time.

"Beginning today, we will govern expansively and audaciously. We may not always succeed, but never will we be accused of lacking the courage to try," Mamdani told a cheering crowd.

"To those who insist that the era of big government is over, hear me when I say this: No longer will City Hall hesitate to use its power to improve New Yorkers' lives," he said.

Throngs turned out in the frigid cold for an inauguration viewing party just south of City Hall on a stretch of Broadway known as the "Canyon of Heroes," famous for its ticker-tape parades.

WATCH: 'I've been called much worse:' Trump holds cordial first White House visit with Mamdani

Taxing the rich

Throughout the ceremony, Mamdani and other speakers hit on the theme that carried him to victory in the election: Devotion to using government power to lift up the millions of people who struggle with the city's high cost of living.

"I was elected as a democratic socialist and I will govern as a democratic socialist," Mamdani said. "I will not abandon my principles for fear of being deemed 'radical.'"

Before administering the oath, Sanders told the crowd that most of the things Mamdani wants to do including raising taxes on the rich aren't radical at all.

RELATED STORY | Mamdani makes history in NYC mayors race: 'We have toppled a political dynasty'

"In the richest country in the history of the world, making sure that people can live in affordable housing is not radical," he told the crowd. "It is the right and decent thing to do."

In opening remarks, U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said Mamdani would be a mayor dedicated to the working class.

"It is the people of New York who have chosen historic, ambitious leadership in response to untenable and unprecedented times. New York, we have chosen courage over fear. We have chosen prosperity for the many over spoils for the few," she said.

Mamdani was accompanied on the stage by his wife, Rama Duwaji. The previous mayor, Eric Adams, was in attendance, sitting near another former mayor, Bill de Blasio.

Actor Mandy Patinkin, who recently hosted Mamdani to celebrate Hannukah, sang "Over the Rainbow" with children from an elementary school chorus. The invocation was given by Imam Khalid Latif, the director of the Islamic Center of New York City. Poet Cornelius Eady read an original poem called "Proof."

In addition to being the city's first Muslim mayor, Mamdani is also its first of South Asian descent and the first to be born in Africa. At 34, Mamdani is also the city's youngest mayor in generations.

Free child care and bus rides

In a campaign that helped make "affordability" a buzzword across the political spectrum, Mamdani ran on a focused platform that included promises of free child care, free buses, a rent freeze for about 1 million households and a pilot of city-run grocery stores.

Mamdani insisted in his inaugural address that he will not squander his opportunity to implement those policies.

"A moment like this comes rarely. Seldom do we hold such an opportunity to transform and reinvent. Rarer still is it the people themselves whose hands are on the levers of change. And yet we know that too often in our past, moments of great possibility have been promptly surrendered to small imagination and smaller ambition," he said.

But he will also have to face other responsibilities: handling trash and snow and rats, while getting blamed for subway delays and potholes.

Mamdani was born in Kampala, Uganda, the son of filmmaker Mira Nair and Mahmood Mamdani, an academic and author. His family moved to New York City when he was 7, with Mamdani growing up in a post-9/11 city where Muslims didn't always feel welcome. He became an American citizen in 2018.

He worked on political campaigns for Democratic candidates in the city before he sought public office himself, winning a state Assembly seat in 2020 to represent a section of Queens.

Mamdani and his wife, Rama Duwaji, are departing their one-bedroom, rent stabilized apartment in the outer-borough to take up residence in the stately mayoral residence in Manhattan.

Mamdani inherits a city on the upswing, after years of slow recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. Violent crime has dropped to pre-pandemic lows. Tourists are back. Unemployment, which soared during the pandemic years, is also back to pre-COVID levels.

Yet deep concerns remain about high prices and rising rents in the city.

He'll also have to deal with Republican President Donald Trump.

During the mayoral race, Trump threatened to withhold federal funding from the city if Mamdani won and mused about sending National Guard troops to the city.

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But Trump surprised supporters and foes alike by inviting the Democrat to the White House for what ended up being a cordial meeting in November.

"I want him to do a great job and will help him do a great job," Trump said.

The progressives take on Trump

Still, tensions between the two leaders are almost certain to resurface, given their deep policy disagreements, particularly over immigration.

Several speakers at Thursday's inauguration criticized the Trump administration's move to deport more immigrants and expressed hope that Mamdani's City Hall would be an ally to those the president has targeted.

Mamdani also faces skepticism and opposition from some members of the city's Jewish community over his criticisms of Israel's government.

About 40 people were killed and another 115 injured, most of them seriously, after a fire ripped through a bar's New Year celebration in a Swiss Alpine resort less than two hours after midnight Thursday, police said.

Authorities did not immediately have an exact count of the deceased.

The Crans-Montana resort is best known as an international ski and golf venue, and overnight, its crowded Le Constellation bar morphed from a scene of revelry into the site of one of Switzerland's worst tragedies.

Valais Canton police commander Frdric Gisler said during a news conference that work is underway to identify the victims and inform their families, adding that the community is "devastated."

Beatrice Pilloud, Valais Canton attorney general, said it was too early to determine the cause of the fire. Experts have not yet been able to go inside the wreckage.

"At no moment is there a question of any kind of attack," Pilloud said.

She later said the number of people who were in the bar is "currently totally unknown," adding that its maximum capacity will be part of the investigation.

"For the time being, we don't have any suspect," she added, when asked if anyone had been arrested over the fire. "An investigation has been opened, not against anyone, but to illuminate the circumstances of this dramatic fire."

Gisler said the priority until further notice would be identifying the victims, and added that "this work will have to take several days."

An evening of celebration turns tragic

Axel Clavier, a 16-year-old from Paris who survived the blaze, described "total chaos" inside the bar. One of his friends died and "two or three" were missing, he told The Associated Press.

He said he hadn't seen the fire start, but did see waitresses arrive with Champagne bottles with sparklers, he said.

Clavier said he felt like he was suffocating and initially hid behind a table, then ran upstairs and tried to use a table to break a Plexiglas window. It fell out of its casing, allowing him to escape.

He lost his jacket, shoes, phone and bank card while fleeing, but "I am still alive and it's just stuff."

"I'm still in shock," he added.

Two women told French broadcaster BFMTV they were inside when they saw a male bartender lifting a female bartender on his shoulders as she held a lit candle in a bottle. The flames spread, collapsing the wooden ceiling, they told the broadcaster.

One of the women described a crowd surge as people frantically tried to escape from a basement nightclub up a narrow flight of stairs and through a narrow door.

Another witness speaking to BFMTV described people smashing windows to escape the blaze, some gravely injured, and panicked parents rushing to the scene in cars to see whether their children were trapped inside. The young man said he saw about 20 people scrambling to get out of the smoke and flames and likened what he saw to a horror movie as he watched from across the street.

Officials described how the blaze likely triggered the release of combustible gases that ignited violently and caused what English-speaking firefighters call a flashover or backdraft.

"This evening should have been a moment of celebration and coming together, but it turned into a nightmare," said Mathias Reynard, head of the regional government of the Valais Canton.

The injured were so numerous that the intensive care unit and operating theater at the regional hospital quickly hit full capacity, Reynard said.

Crans-Montana is less than 5 kilometers (3 miles) from Sierre, where 28 people, including many children, were killed when a bus from Belgium crashed inside a Swiss tunnel in 2012.

Resort town sits in the heart of the Alps

In a region busy with tourists skiing on the slopes, the authorities have called on the local population to show caution in the coming days to avoid any accidents that could require medical resources that are already overwhelmed.

With high-altitude ski runs rising around 3,000 meters (nearly 9,850 feet) in the heart of the Valais region's snowy peaks and pine forests, Crans-Montana is one of the top venues on the World Cup circuit. The resort will host the best men's and women's downhill racers, including Lindsey Vonn, for their final events before the Milan-Cortina Olympics in February. The town's Crans-sur-Sierre golf club stages the European Masters each August on a picturesque course.

The Swiss blaze on Thursday came 25 years after an inferno in the Dutch fishing town of Volendam on New Year's Eve, which killed 14 people and injured more than 200 as they celebrated in a cafe.

Swiss President Guy Parmelin, speaking on his first day in office, said many emergency staff had been "confronted by scenes of indescribable violence and distress."

"This Thursday must be the time of prayer, unity and dignity," he said. "Switzerland is a strong country not because it is sheltered from drama, but because it knows how to face them with courage and a spirit of mutual help."

President Donald Trump issued the first vetoes of his second term on Tuesday, rejecting two low-profile bipartisan bills, a move that had the effect of punishing backers who had opposed the president's positions on other issues.

Trump vetoed drinking water pipeline legislation from Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado, a longtime ally who broke with the president in November to release files on convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. He also vetoed legislation that would have given the Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida more control of some of its tribal lands. The tribe was among groups suing the administration over an immigration detention center in the Everglades known as " Alligator Alcatraz."

Both bills had bipartisan support and had been noncontroversial until the White House announced Trump's vetoes Tuesday night.

Trump appeared to acknowledge the tribe's opposition to the detention facility in a letter to Congress explaining his veto. The Miccosukee Tribe has actively sought to obstruct reasonable immigration policies that the American people decisively voted for when I was elected, Trump wrote.

Trump did not allude to Boebert in his veto of her legislation, but raised concerns about the cost of the water pipeline at the heart of that bill.

Boebert, one of four House Republicans who sided with House Democrats early on to force the release of the Epstein files, shared a statement on social media suggesting that the veto may have been political retaliation.

I sincerely hope this veto has nothing to do with political retaliation for calling out corruption and demanding accountability. Americans deserve leadership that puts people over politics, her statement said. Boebert added in another post: This isnt over.

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The Florida legislation had been sponsored by Republican Rep. Carlos Gimenez, whom Trump has endorsed. Gimenez and the Miccosukee Tribe were not immediately available for comment on Wednesday.

When asked whether the vetoes were punishment, the White House did not answer and instead referred to Trump's statements explaining the vetoes.

Congress can override the vetoes by a vote of two-thirds of the members of the House and the Senate, but its unclear if theres enough support in the Republican-controlled chambers to do so, especially heading into a midterm election year where many of them will be on the ballot and many GOP members will count on Trumps backing.

Boebert's legislation, the Finish the Arkansas Valley Conduit Act, aimed to improve access to clean drinking water in eastern Colorado.

While the congresswoman has long been a staunch supporter of Trump, she found herself at odds with the president with her support this year for legislation that required the Justice Department to release files related to Epstein.

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Trump fought the proposal before reversing in the face of growing Republican support for releasing the files. Members of his administration even met with Boebert in the White House Situation Room to discuss the matter, though she didn't change her mind.

Republican Rep. Jeff Hurd of Colorado, who co-sponsored the legislation, said he was deeply disappointed by Trump's veto.

This was a bipartisan, unanimous bill passed by Congress to uphold a long-standing federal commitment to southeastern Colorado, Hurd said in a statement.

He said the legislation did not authorize any new construction spending or expand the federal government's original commitment to the pipeline project, but adjusted the terms of repaying its costs.

South Korea said it will formally end its dwindling yet much-criticized bear bile farming industry this week, though about 200 bears are still kept in pens and raised for their gallbladders.

The Ministry of Climate, Energy and Environment announced Tuesday it will ban breeding and possession of bears and extraction of their bile beginning Jan. 1. The change is in line with a revised animal rights protection law that imposes up to two or five years of prison sentences to violators.

South Korea is one of the few countries that allow farming to extract bile from bears, mostly Asiatic black bears known as moon bears, for traditional medicine or as food believed to promote vitality and stamina.

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But the popularity of the practice has nosedived in the past two decades in response to questions about its medicinal effects, the introduction of cheaper medical alternatives and public awareness of animal cruelty.

Farmers and animal rights groups agreed on the ban

The ban is part of a broader 2022 agreement among officials, farmers and animal rights campaigners to prohibit bear bile farming beginning in 2026. Animal rights groups are responsible for handling purchases of bears from farmers and the government establishing facilities to hold them.

A total of 21 bears has been purchased and relocated to a government-run sanctuary in southern Jelloa province this year. But 199 bears are still raised in 11 farms across the country while disputes continue over the amount of money to be paid to farmers for giving up their bears, according to officials, activists and farmers.

The Environment Ministry said bear farmers will have a six-month grace period but will be punished by law if they extract bile from their animals. The ministry said it'll financially support farmers for keeping their bears until they are sold and moved.

Our plan to end bear farming business is an implementation of our country's resolve to improve welfare of wild animals and fulfill our related international responsibility, Environment Minister Kim Sungwhan said in a statement. We will strive to protect bears until the last one.

Farmers want bigger compensations

Kim KwangSoo, a farmer who raises 78 bears in the southern city of Dangjin, said other farmers sold their bears at extremely cheap prices because of economic difficulties, though he hasn't sold any of his animals.

This is a very bad policy, said Kim, who serves as the secretary-general of a bear farmers association. I'll still observe the law."

Bear farming began in South Korea in the early 1980s, with farmers importing bears from Malaysia and other Southeast Asian countries. The industry has since been condemned globally for keeping bears in small, barren cages their entire lives until they are slaughtered for their body parts.

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About 1,000 bears were raised in farms in South Korea in 2014. Kim KwangSoo said many farmers had since sterilized their bears in return for government compensations. He said some bears died naturally while others have been slaughtered for their bile or killed after being attacked by other bears held in the same cages due to a lack of proper management.

Animal rights groups want bigger bear sanctuaries

Animal rights groups praised South Korea's government for pressing ahead with the 2022 agreement but urged it to establish bigger protection facilities to accept rescued bears.

The government says its Jeolla province sanctuary can carry up to 49 bears, but Kang Jae-won, an activist at the Korea Animal Welfare Association, said the number of bears should not exceed 30. A second government facility was to be established in April but the opening has been delayed until 2027 due to flooding.

Kang said that activists are discussing with foreign zoos to send some rescued bears there.

It's really good (for the government) to reflect on bear bile industry and push to end it but it's regrettable that there aren't sufficient measures to protect bears, said Cheon JinKyung, head of Korea Animal Rights Advocates in Seoul. There aren't place where these bears can stay."

Sangkyung Lee, a campaign manager at Humane World for Animals Korea, also called for a greater government role in removing the remaining bears from captivity without further delay and supporting the creation of private sanctuaries "to give back these animals a life of peace and relative freedom in natural surroundings.

While schools, government and banks are closed on New Year's Day, most major retailers across the U.S. will be open, with many offering discounts on older inventory to clear the way for newer products.

But before you run out the door on New Year's Day to peruse deals, its wise to double-check your local store's operating hours, which can differ depending on their location. When in doubt, call ahead or look up more specific schedules online for stores in your neighborhood.

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Heres a rundown of what's open and closed on New Year's Day, 2026.

Government

Government buildings, post offices, courts and schools are closed.

Banks and the stock market

U.S. stock markets and banks are closed Thursday but reopen Friday.

Package Delivery

Standard FedEx and UPS pickup and delivery services will not be available on New Year's Day, although some critical services will be offered at certain locations. Check your local store for more information.

Retailers

Walmart is open on New Year's Day, but may have modified hours. Check your local stores website for hours.

Target is open on New Years Day, but may have modified hours. Check your local stores website for hours.

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Macys is open on New Years Day, but may have modified hours. Check your local stores website for hours.

Kohls is open on New Years Day, but may have modified hours. Check your local stores website for hours.

CVS is open on New Years Day, but may have modified hours. You can call your local store or check store and pharmacy hours on the CVS Pharmacy website.

Walgreens is open on New Years Day, but may have modified hours. Check your local store for more information, including whether or not the pharmacy is open.

Grocery Stores

Most national grocery store chains, such as Albertsons, Whole Foods, Kroger and Aldi are open on New Year's Day but may have modified hours. In-store pharmacies tend to be closed for the holiday. Check your local store for details.

National chains that are closed for New Year's Day include Trader Joe's and Costco.

Fewer Americans applied for unemployment benefits last week with layoffs remaining low despite a weakening labor market.

U.S. applications for jobless claims for the week ending Dec. 27 fell by 16,000 to 199,000 from the previous weeks 215,000, the Labor Department reported Wednesday. Analysts surveyed by the data firm FactSet forecast 208,000 new applications.

Unemployment benefit filings are often distorted during holiday-shortened weeks. The shorter week can cause some who have lost jobs to delay filing claims.

The weekly report was released a day early due to the New Years Day holiday.

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Applications for unemployment aid are viewed as a proxy for layoffs and are close to a real-time indicator of the health of the job market.

Earlier this month, the government reported that the U.S. gained a decent 64,000 jobs in November but lost 105,000 in October as federal workers departed after cutbacks by the Trump administration. That helped to push the unemployment rate up to 4.6% last month, the highest since 2021.

The October job losses were caused by a 162,000 drop in federal workers, many of whom resigned at the end of fiscal year 2025 on Sept. 30 under pressure from billionaire Elon Musks purge of U.S. government payrolls.

Labor Department revisions also knocked 33,000 jobs off August and September payrolls.

Recent government data has revealed a labor market in which hiring has clearly lost momentum, hobbled by uncertainty over President Donald Trumps tariffs and the lingering effects of the high interest rates the Fed engineered in 2022 and 2023 to rein in an outburst of pandemic-induced inflation. Since March, job creation has fallen to an average 35,000 a month, compared to 71,000 in the year ended in March.

Earlier this month, the Federal Reserve trimmed its benchmark lending rate by a quarter-point, its third straight cut.

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Fed Chair Jerome Powell said the committee reduced borrowing costs out of concern that the job market is even weaker than it appears. Powell said that recent job figures could be revised lower by as much as 60,000, which would mean employers have actually been shedding an average of about 25,000 jobs a month since the spring.

Companies that have recently announced job cuts include UPS, General Motors, Amazon and Verizon.

The Labor Departments report Wednesday also showed that the four-week average of claims, which evens out some of the week-to-week volatility, rose by 1,750 to 218,7500.

The total number of Americans filing for jobless benefits for the previous week ending Dec. 20 fell by 47,000 to 1.87 million, the government said.

Isiah Whitlock Jr., an actor who made frequent memorable appearances on the HBO series The Wire and Veep and in the films of Spike Lee, died Tuesday. He was 71.

Whitlock's manager Brian Liebman told The Associated Press in an email that the actor died in New York after a short illness.

Whitlock played openly corrupt city councilman Clay Davis on 25 episodes across the five seasons of The Wire.

Davis, a fan-favorite character, was known for his profane catchphrase sheee-it" delivered by Whitlock in moments of triumph and blunt honesty. The actor first used the phrase in his first film with Lee, 2002's The 25th Hour.

The Wire creator David Simon posted a photo of Whitlock on Bluesky in tribute.

Whitlock is the second significant star of the show to die in recent weeks after the death of actor James Ransone.

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A native of South Bend, Indiana, Whitlock went to Southwest Minnesota State University, where he played football and studied theater. Injuries pushed him to study acting, and he moved to San Francisco to work in theater.

He began appearing in small television guest roles on shows including Cagney and Lacy in the late 1980s, and he had very small roles in the 1990 films Goodfellas and Gremlins 2: The New Batch."

He went on to appear in five of Lee's films, including She Hate Me, Red Hook Summer, Chi-Raq, BlacKkKlansman and Da 5 Bloods.

He played Secretary of Defense George Maddox for three seasons on the political satire Veep. The character ran against Julia Louis-Dreyfus ' Selina Meyer in presidential primaries.

President Donald Trump's administration announced on Tuesday that its freezing child care funds to Minnesota after a series of fraud schemes in recent years.

Acting director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Jim ONeill announced on the social platform X that the step is in response to blatant fraud that appears to be rampant in Minnesota and across the country.

We have turned off the money spigot and we are finding the fraud, he said.

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ONeill said all payments through the Administration for Children and Families, an agency within the U.S. Health and Human Services Department, will require justification and a receipt or photo evidence before money is sent. They have also launched a fraud-reporting hotline and email address, he said.

The announcement comes after years of investigation that began with the $300 million scheme at the nonprofit Feeding Our Future, for which 57 defendants in Minnesota have been convicted. Prosecutors said the organization was at the center of the countrys largest COVID-19-related fraud scam, when defendants exploited a state-run, federally funded program intended to provide food for children.

WATCH | Inside Minnesota's $100M daycare fraud allegations

Federal fraud raids in Minnesota largely target Somali American suspects

A federal prosecutor alleged earlier in December that half or more of the roughly $18 billion in federal funds that supported 14 programs in Minnesota since 2018 may have been stolen. Most of the defendants are Somali Americans, they said.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, the 2024 Democratic vice presidential nominee, has said fraud will not be tolerated and his administration will continue to work with federal partners to ensure fraud is stopped and fraudsters are caught.

Walz has said an audit due by late January should give a better picture of the extent of the fraud. He said his administration is taking aggressive action to prevent additional fraud. He has long defended how his administration responded.

Minnesotas most prominent Somali American, Democratic U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar, has urged people not to blame an entire community for the actions of a relative few.

A swimmer who went missing after being attacked by a shark last week off the Northern California coast and whose body was found days later was identified as an open ocean swimmer from Pebble Beach.

Authorities recovered Erica Fox's body Saturday from the ocean south of Davenport Beach in Santa Cruz County, the sheriff's office said in a statement Monday.

Fox, 55, had been missing since going on a swim Dec. 21 in Monterey Bay with her husband and other members of the Kelp Krawlers, an open-water swimming club she co-founded.

"She didn't want to live in fear," her husband, Jean-Francois Vanreusel, told the Mercury News during a vigil Sunday, a day after her body was found. "She lived her life fully."

Vanreuse, who led the vigil to commemorate his wife of 30 years, said she was still wearing her white Garmin watch and a "shark band" was still attached to her ankle. The band is an electromagnetic device meant to ward off sharks. She was a triathlete who completed two Half Ironmans and numerous other triathlons.

Vanreusel didn't witness the attack on his wife but two people on shore did, the Mercury News reported. He told the newspaper she taught him how to swim, and like her, he came to love the ocean waters.

Experts say that shark attacks are exceedingly rare rarer than being struck by lightning or mauled by a bear.

Fox's death marks the second shark attack fatality at Lovers Point in 73 years. The first claimed a 17-year-old boy who was swimming there on Dec. 7, 1952, the Mercury News reported.

Still, members of her swimming club were shaken by her death since it was the second shark attack on a member of the group. In 2022, fellow club member Steve Bruemmer was attacked by a great white shark and was severely injured.

After his attack, many of the swimmers started wearing the same kind of electromagnetic "Sharkbanz" that Fox was wearing, even though most swimmers knew they would do little to deter a high-speed attack from below, the newspaper reported.

Bruemmer, who pledged never to swim in the ocean again, used walking sticks to join the vigil Sunday.

"I was also bitten by a shark," Bruemmer told the crowd, "and I can tell you that it doesn't hurt. I don't understand why, but it's not physically painful to be badly bitten. So I believe that in her final moments, Erica was not suffering in pain. And I hope that that can be of some comfort to people."

He paused and steadied himself on his walking sticks.

"There are also lessons, things we know that we're reminded of in moments like this," he said, "and one is that tomorrow is not guaranteed."