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HARD NUMBERS: Spanish coach’s forced kiss trial begins, RFK Jr. faces vote, Blast kills paramilitary leader in Moscow, Dems try to win back workers, Sotheby’s pulls the plug on China

February 03, 2025
Alex Kliment
Jenni Hermoso leaves the National Court in Madrid, Spain after testifying on day one of the trial of former national team coach Luis Rubiales, who is accused of forcibly kissing her, February 3, 2025
REUTERS/Ana Beltran

2.5: Spain’s former soccer chief, Luis Rubiales, wenton trial Monday over the forced kiss he gave star player Jenni Hermoso on live television after the team won the Women’s World Cup in 2023. Prosecutors are seeking a prison sentence of 2.5 years not only for the kiss itself but for Rubiales’ subsequent attempts to force Hermoso to downplay the incident amid public outrage.

14: Louisiana Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy, a physician, faces a critical decision in Tuesday's Finance Committee vote on Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s nomination for health secretary. Cassidy has expressed reservations about Kennedy’s vaccine views. With 14 Republicans and 13 Democrats on the committee, a “no” vote from Cassidy could complicate Kennedy’s path to confirmation by impacting the committee’s recommendation to the Senate.

7: A blast at a Moscow residential building located 7 miles from the Kremlin killedArmen Sargsyan, the leader of a pro-Russian paramilitary group operating in Eastern Ukraine. Ukraine has not commented on the incident but Sargsyan has been wanted since 2014 for murders committed in Kyiv. Ukraine is believed to be the author of several assassinations of high-profile Russian security figures in and around Moscow in recent months.

$50 million: The Democrats are pivoting (back) to the working class. The leading SuperPac that supports the party has created a $50 million “Win them Back” fund to better appeal to Americans without college degrees ahead of the 2026 midterm elections. The working class used to be a bulwark of Democratic support but Trump’s economic nationalism message and attacks on “wokeism” have helped him to forge an increasingly multi-racial working-class coalition.

2: Going once, going twice … gone! Sotheby’s is closing down its e-commerce business in China after barely two years. The famed auction house had bet on the wisdom of creating an online market in China, which for decades has been one of the biggest drivers of global demand for high-end luxury goods and elite art. But interest turned out to be weaker than expected, and after Sotheby’s overall auction sales dropped by nearly 25% in 2024, the company brought down the gavel on its China e-commerce business.

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