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F r i d ay, N ov e m b e r 28, 2025
One Guard member shot in D.C. dies
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Louisiana homeowners remain stuck on safety net insurer Citizens policyholders have nowhere else to turn
BY SAM KARLIN Staff writer
ASSOCIATED PRESS PHOTO By MARK SCHIEFELBEIN
Emergency personnel gather in a cordoned off area where National Guard soldiers were shot near the White House in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday.
Second in critical condition; Afghan national charged in ambush attack
Nearly 15 years ago, Gerard Braud and his wife bought a raised cottage home in Mandeville, nestled on a sprawling yard with a live oak tree overlooking Lake Pontchartrain. He thought they would spend the rest of their lives in it. Life was affordable. His insurance premium with Lighthouse, a small company based in Louisiana, was around $4,400 a year. Then the storms came. He managed to avoid major damage from Hurricane Ida and other storms that hit south Louisiana in recent years. But Lighthouse went belly up in 2022, one of 12 insurers doing business in Louisiana to fold in the two years after Ida. Four years after the storm, he still can’t find anyone willing to write him a policy. That forced Braud to get insurance from the state’s insurer of last resort, Citizens, which charges him north of $12,000 a year for home insurance, triple what he paid with Lighthouse. His flood insurance — a separate system handled by the federal government — has soared as well. “My house has gone from affordable when I moved in to unaffordable now,” Braud said. After the rash of insurer failures, the number of people forced to turn to Citizens for insurance skyrocketed from about 35,000 to a peak of 140,000 in the summer of 2023, the organization’s
ä See STUCK, page 6A
BY BEN FINLEY, ANTHONY IZAGUIRRE and ALANNA DURKIN RICHER Associated Press
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — President Donald Trump said that one of the two West Virginia National Guard members shot by an Afghan national near the White House had died, calling the shooter who had worked with the CIA in his native country a “savage monster.” As part of his Thanksgiving call to U.S. troops, Trump said that he had just learned that Spc. Sarah Beckstrom, 20, had died, while Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe, 24, was “fighting for his life.” “She’s just passed Beckstrom away,” Trump said. “She’s no longer with us. She’s looking down at us right now. Her parents are with her.” The president called Beckstrom an “incredible person, outstanding in every Wolfe single way.” Trump used the announcement to say the shooting was a “terrorist attack” as he criticized the Biden administration for enabling Afghans who worked with U.S. forces during the Afghanistan War to enter the U.S. The president has deployed National
WEATHER HIGH 61 LOW 42 PAGE 12A
Democrats gain ground on Mississippi coast Local election dynamics reflect changing politics
BY POET WOLFE and MARTHA SANCHEZ ASSOCIATED PRESS PHOTO By CLIFF OWEN
ing is Rahmanullah Lakanwal, 29. The suspect had worked in a special CIAbacked Afghan Army unit before emigrating from Afghanistan, according to two sources who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the situation, and #AfghanEvac, a group that helps resettle Afghans who assisted the U.S. during the two-decade war. Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, declined to
After an hourslong Gulfport City Council meeting, newly elected council member Carrissa Corbett would change out of her black dress and leopard-print coat and into a T-shirt and jogging pants before heading to a community center to host her weekly line dancing class. Once there, Corbett collects canned goods the dancers bring to stock a food pantry for residents who lost food stamp benefits after the government shutdown. And during dance breaks, she slips in questions: Are y’all getting out and voting? Are y’all talking to your nieces and nephews about voting? Leaning into informal, unscripted settings like this one to connect with voters, she said, is helping Democrats along the Mississippi Gulf Coast
ä See AMBUSH, page 7A
ä See DEMOCRATS, page 8A
Flowers and an American flag mark the scene a day after two National Guard soldiers were shot near the White House in Washington, D.C., on Thursday. Guard members in part to assist in his administration’s mass deportation efforts. Trump suggested that the shooter was mentally unstable after the war and departure from Afghan- Lakanwal istan. “He went cuckoo. I mean, he went nuts,” the president said. “It happens too often with these people.” The suspect charged with the shoot-
Staff writer and Sun Herald
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