Samuel Chamberlain

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The city that hosts the largest St. Patrick’s Day parade in the South was left with the largest cleanup in the South on Saturday after revelers littered a downtown square with cups, food wrappers and other garbage.

Organizers of the festivities in Savannah, Ga., posted images of the rubbish in Wright Square with a chipper caption noting that "thanks to City staff and civic-minded volunteers the clean-up is well underway!" The image had been shared 1,320 times as of Sunday afternoon and drawn 330 comments.

"This is appalling," one user commented. "Who would be surprised to find that the jerks responsible for this mess don’t come from Savannah?"

"Until they start arresting and/or fining people, they will continue to do so," wrote another. "Savannah needs to develop a spine!!!"

An estimated 300,000 people were expected to attend the annual parade, which was first held in 1824 and has ballooned into a sprawling street party.

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The Associated Press reported that bars opened in the city at 7 a.m. Saturday. The parade and related festivities were held a day early to avoid conflicting with religious services. New York City and Chicago also held their St. Patrick’s Day parades on Saturday.

"Savannah’s like a bad drug," said Bruce Souers, a Savannah native who’s been attending parades for five decades, as he sipped Jameson Irish whiskey from a plastic cup. "Once it’s in your blood, you can’t get rid of it."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News National

The city that hosts the largest St. Patrick’s Day parade in the South was left with the largest cleanup in the South on Saturday after revelers littered a downtown square with cups, food wrappers and other garbage.

Organizers of the festivities in Savannah, Ga., posted images of the rubbish in Wright Square with a chipper caption noting that "thanks to City staff and civic-minded volunteers the clean-up is well underway!" The image had been shared 1,320 times as of Sunday afternoon and drawn 330 comments.

"This is appalling," one user commented. "Who would be surprised to find that the jerks responsible for this mess don’t come from Savannah?"

"Until they start arresting and/or fining people, they will continue to do so," wrote another. "Savannah needs to develop a spine!!!"

An estimated 300,000 people were expected to attend the annual parade, which was first held in 1824 and has ballooned into a sprawling street party.

CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP

The Associated Press reported that bars opened in the city at 7 a.m. Saturday. The parade and related festivities were held a day early to avoid conflicting with religious services. New York City and Chicago also held their St. Patrick’s Day parades on Saturday.

"Savannah’s like a bad drug," said Bruce Souers, a Savannah native who’s been attending parades for five decades, as he sipped Jameson Irish whiskey from a plastic cup. "Once it’s in your blood, you can’t get rid of it."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News National

A North Carolina man wanted on a first-degree murder warrant in connection with the killing of his wife was arrested Sunday morning in Arizona — just 34 miles from the Mexico border, officials said.

The Nash County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement that Rexford Lynn Keel, 57, was taken into custody following a traffic stop on Interstate 10 near Tucson. The statement added that Keel had many bank receipts "and a large sum of money with him" when he was arrested.

It was not immediately clear when Keel would be extradited to North Carolina. He was being held Sunday at the Pima County Jail in Tucson.

Nash County Sheriff Keith Stone told reporters Sunday afternoon that Keel "could have made it a lot tougher" for law enforcement to apprehend him if he had crossed the southern border.

The body of Keel’s wife, 38-year-old Diana Alejandra Keel, was found on March 12 by North Carolina Department of Transportation employees along a remote road about 30 minutes away from her home in Nashville. Her death has been ruled a homicide, though officials have not said exactly how she died.

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The woman’s mother told WTVD her daughter had planned to divorce her husband, but she also told the station that Lynn Keel had threatened Diana.

Detectives are also re-examining the 2006 death of his first wife, Elizabeth. Investigators initially ruled Elizabeth Keel’s death an accident after she fell on the corner of some concrete steps in front of their Nashville house.

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Fox News’ Anna Hopkins and Elizabeth Zwirz contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News National

Police in Christchurch, New Zealand, have urged people to stay indoors after a shooting was reported at a mosque in the center of the city.

New Zeland police tweeted that officers responded to a "serious ongoing firearms incident" at approximately 1:40 p.m. Friday (8:40 p.m. Thursday ET). They said schools in the city had been placed on lockdown.

It was not immediately clear how many people had been injured.

Witness Len Peneha told The Associated Press he saw a man dressed in black enter the Masjid Al Noor mosque and then heard dozens of shots, followed by people running from the mosque in terror. Peneha added that he also saw the gunman flee before emergency services arrived.

Peneha said he went into the mosque to try and help, but "I saw dead people everywhere."

Another witness, Mohammed Jama, told Stuff.co.NZ that a man with a gun went into the mosque. Jama said he saw four people injured and two others lying on the ground but did not know how many were alive and how many were dead.

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A third witness, Mohammed Nazir, told TVNZ he saw three women shot and bleeding outside the mosque. He told police that he called the police climbed a wall to escape, leaving his shoes behind in the process.

Christchurch, located on New Zealand’s South Island, is the third-largest city in the country with a population of just over 400,000. It was affected by a devastating earthquake in February 2011, which killed 185 people and triggered the collapse of thousands of buildings across the city.

This is a developing story, check back for more updates.

Source: Fox News World

Witnesses say several people have been killed and injured in a shooting at a mosque in the center of Christchurch, New Zealand.

New Zeland police tweeted that officers responded to a "serious ongoing firearms incident" at approximately 1:40 p.m. Friday (8:40 p.m. Thursday ET). They said schools in the city had been placed on lockdown and urged people to stay indoors.

There was no official word on casualties, but witnesses said the Masjid Al Noor mosque was full for Friday afternoon prayers and said many people were dead.

Witness Len Peneha told The Associated Press he saw a man dressed in black enter the mosque and then heard dozens of shots, followed by people running from the mosque in terror. Peneha added that he also saw the gunman flee before emergency services arrived.

Peneha said he went into the mosque to try and help, but "I saw dead people everywhere."

The Masjid Al Noor mosque in Christchurch, New Zealand.

The Masjid Al Noor mosque in Christchurch, New Zealand. (Google Earth)

Zayd Blissett, chairman of the Muslim Association of Marlborough told Stuff.co.NZ that he received a text the Federation of Islamic Associations of New Zealand (FIANZ) saying "50 shot" at the mosque.

"I’m just heartbroken," he said. "In fact, I’m sitting here crying. This is New Zealand. This can’t happen here."

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A third witness, Mohammed Nazir, told TVNZ he saw three women shot and bleeding outside the mosque. He told police that he called the police climbed a wall to escape, leaving his shoes behind in the process.

A witness who declined to give his name told Stuff the gunman was wearing a helmet and fired more than 50  shots.

"He had a big gun and a lot of bullets and he came through and started shooting like everyone in the mosque, like everywhere, and they have to smash the door and the glass from the window and from the small door to try and get out," he said.

Christchurch, located on New Zealand’s South Island, is the third-largest city in the country with a population of just over 400,000. It was affected by a devastating earthquake in February 2011, which killed 185 people and triggered the collapse of thousands of buildings across the city.

This is a developing story, check back for more updates.

Source: Fox News World

Former FBI Special Agent Peter Strzok believed he was "untouchable" before he was demoted from Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation in 2017, the top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee told Fox News on Thursday night.

Strzok testified before the committee behind closed doors in June 2018, but the transcript was not released until Thursday at the impetus of Rep. Doug Collins, R-Ga.

"The most alarming part of Peter Strzok’s testimony is, he seemed to believe he and he alone could do whatever he wanted to do and that his own bias and his own indiscretions with Lisa Page and anything else – nothing mattered except what he believed: that he was untouchable," Collins told Ed Henry on "The Story." " … Here’s someone at the Department of Justice, the FBI, who says ‘I believe that I can solve the world’s problems politically.’"

LISA PAGE TRANSCRIPTS REVEAL DETAILS OF ANTI-TRUMP ‘INSURANCE POLICY’

Strzok, a onetime senior counterintelligence agent, was fired from the FBI this past August after months of scrutiny regarding anti-Trump text messages between himself and FBI lawyer Lisa Page, with whom he was carrying on an extramarital affair. In one now-infamous text message sent in August 2016, Strzok told Page: "I want to believe the path you threw out in [then-FBI Deputy Director] Andy’s [McCabe’s] office — that there’s no way [Trump] gets elected — but I’m afraid we can’t take the risk. It’s like an insurance policy in the unlikely event you die before you’re 40."

Collins told Fox News on Thursday that Strzok, Page and McCabe were part of a "corrupt triumvirate."

"They were the insurance policy," said Collins, referencing the now-infamous text message from Strzok to Page. "They believed [in] themselves to protect the country from a president they didn’t like and from a man they didn’t like."

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Collins also discussed Strzok’s disclosure that Hillary Clinton’s attorneys struck a deal with the Justice Department that denied investigators access to Clinton Foundation emails found on the former secretary of state’s private email server.

"When we understand that Hillary Clinton was treated differently, it started, frankly, with President Obama’s Department of Justice," Collins said. "We are now seeing insight through Lisa Page’s testimony, through Peter Strzok’s discussion of this, that it was the Department of Justice basically saying, ‘there’s no way Hillary Clinton is going to be charged here, because we’re not going to use the standard of intent.’ The intent is not a part of gross negligence here … This just shows you there’s a two-tier system here."

Fox News’ Ed Henry contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News Politics

At least two rockets were fired at the Israeli city of Tel Aviv Thursday night, triggering air raid warning sirens, the Israeli military said.

Sources told Fox News that at least one of the rockets likely was intercepted by Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system. People living in the area reported hearing an explosion in addition to the sirens.

There were no immediate reports of any injuries or damage.

Tel Aviv has not been attacked by rocket or missile fire since a 2014 war with Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip.

This is a developing story, check back for more updates.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News World

The Senate voted Wednesday to end U.S. support for the Saudi Arabia-led coalition in Yemen’s ongoing civil war, the latest in a series of foreign policy rebuffs to President Trump.

Seven Republicans broke with Trump to support the resolution, which was co-sponsored by Sens. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt. and Mike Lee, R-Utah. They were: Lee, Susan Collins of Maine, Steve Daines of Montana, Jerry Moran of Kansas, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Rand Paul of Kentucky and Todd Young of Indiana.

Lawmakers have never before invoked the War Powers Resolution of 1973 to stop a foreign conflict, but Wednesday’s 54-46 vote brought them a step closer to doing just that in order to cut off U.S. support for a war that has triggered a humanitarian catastrophe.

"The bottom line is that the United States should not be supporting a catastrophic war led by a despotic regime with an irresponsible foreign policy," Sanders said on Wednesday from the Senate floor. He said a vote in favor of the measure would "begin the process of reclaiming our constitutional authority by ending United States involvement in a war that has not been authorized by Congress and is unconstitutional."

The measure will move to the Democrat-controlled House, where it is expected to pass. Trump has threatened to veto the resolution, which the White House says raises "serious constitutional concerns."

In its statement threatening a veto, the White House argued that the premise of the resolution is flawed, and that it would undermine the fight against extremism. U.S. support for the Saudis does not constitute engaging in "hostilities," the statement said, and the Yemen resolution "seeks to override the president’s determination as commander in chief."

"By defining `hostilities’ to include defense cooperation such as aerial refueling," the White House statement said, the Yemen resolution could also "establish bad precedent for future legislation."

Trump’s support for Saudi Arabia has been a point of tension with Congress since the killing of U.S.-based activist and writer Jamal Khashoggi last year. Lawmakers from both parties have criticized Trump for not condemning Saudi Arabia strongly enough for the killing.

Sen. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., addressed those tensions when he urged his colleagues to oppose the measure.

"We should not use this specific vote on a specific policy decision as some proxy for all the Senate’s broad feelings about foreign affairs. Concerns about Saudi human rights issues should be directly addressed with the administration and with Saudi officials," McConnell said from the Senate floor.

McConnell argued that the Yemen resolution would "not enhance America’s diplomatic leverage" and would make it more difficult for the U.S. to help end the conflict in Yemen and minimize civilian casualties.

Sen. James Risch, R-Idaho, who chairs the Foreign Relations Committee, argued that U.S. support for the Saudi-led coalition helps facilitate peace talks and withdrawing from the conflict would delay an eventual political settlement.

"Peace envoys are telling us they want deeper U.S. engagement in this situation," Risch said in a statement following the vote. "This resolution sends a terrible message of U.S. division and lack of resolve, and sets a bad precedent for using the War Powers Resolution to express political disagreements with a president. We should instead signal our resolve that the U.S. is committed to playing an important role in pushing for a sustainable political settlement in Yemen."

A similar resolution to end support for the Yemen war passed the Senate in December, but it was not taken up by the House, which was then controlled by Republicans.

Approaching its fifth year, the war in Yemen has killed thousands and left millions on the brink of starvation, creating what the United Nations called the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.

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Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., said before the vote that the resolution "will be seen as a message to the Saudis that they need to clean up their act."

"We are made weaker in the eyes of the world when we willingly participate in war crimes, when we allow our partners to engage in the slaughter of innocents," Murphy said.

Fox News’ Chad Pergram and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News Politics

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., told Fox News’ "Your World with Neil Cavuto" Wednesday that potential impeachment proceedings against President Trump would turn into "a huge distraction" from the party’s legislative agenda "without the probability of success."

"It does take our eye off the ball because an impeachment process is an extraordinarily all-consuming process, of the public’s attention and the Congress’ attention," Hoyer told Cavuto. "And we promised the American people that we would focus on them, on their jobs, on their healthcare, on the availability of affordable-quality health care, on climate change, reform issues."

Hoyer said he agreed with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., who told The Washington Post earlier this week that she opposed impeaching Trump in the absence of "compelling and overwhelming and bipartisan" evidence, adding that the president was "just not worth it."

"We’re going to have an election in about 18 months," Hoyer said.  "The American people elected somebody who I think ought not to be president of the United States. But they elected him, and a lot’s going to happen in the next, probably, few months. The Mueller report, actions by the Southern District of New York, House and Senate hearings – House hearings in particular, and we’ll see what develops there."

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Pelosi’s statement ruffled feathers among some of the more vocal left-wing Democrats, who have vowed to push for Trump’s impeachment. Hoyer took a verbal shot at Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Rashida Tlaib of Michigan and Ilhan Omar of Minnesota on Monday, telling Fox News that "we’ve got 62 new [Democratic] members. Not three."

"It’s not that Speaker Pelosi and I want to see President Trump [be] the president of the United States, because we disagree with him and we think he’s doing things that are not good for the country," Hoyer said Wednesday, "but we have a responsibility to do things we do think are good for the country and we want to be about that."

Source: Fox News Politics

A total of nine college coaches and one high-ranking athletics administrator were indicted by the Justice Department on Tuesday in connection with a nationwide scheme in which wealthy parents allegedly spent big to place their children in top universities.

The coaches, who represent the University of Southern California, Georgetown, Stanford, Texas, UCLA, Wake Forest and Yale, have led a variety of what are termed "non-revenue" sports, which is to say, sports that are dependent on the largesse provided by their university’s football and basketball programs. They have won conference and national championships; with USC men’s and women’s water polo, Jovan Vavic was named their conference’s "Coach of the Century."

All the coaches and administrators are charged with racketeering conspiracy unless otherwise indicated. Here’s what we know about them.

University of Southern California

Jovan Vavic: A native of the former Yugoslavia, Vavic led the women’s water polo program at USC since its inception in 1995 and took the helm of the men’s program in 1999. Since then, the two programs have won a total of 16 national championships (10 for the men’s team and six for the women’s team) and Vavic has been named the National Coach of the Year 15 times. In 2015, the Pac-12 Network named Vavic Men’s Water Polo Coach of the Century as part of its celebration of the conference’s 100th anniversary.

Joran Vavic

Joran Vavic (USC Athletics)

According to the indictment, Vavic accepted bribes totaling more than $250,000 to designate two prospective students as recruits, thereby smoothing the path for their admission to USC. The university announced Tuesday afternoon that Vavic had been fired.

Ali Khosroshahin: Khosroshahin was head coach of the USC women’s soccer team for seven seasons before he was fired following the 2013 season. He led the Trojans to the national championship in 2007, his first season on the job, and made the NCAA tournament in four of his seven seasons. According to his LinkedIn page, Khosroshahin is currently the owner of the amateur United Premier Soccer League’s Newport Futbol Club

Ali Khosroshahin

Ali Khosroshahin (USC Athletics)

Laura Janke: A former player and assistant coach under Khosroshahin at Cal State Fullerton, Janke followed him to USC as an assistant working primarily with defenders and goalkeepers. Janke lost her job along with Khosroshahin following the 2013 season and is currently listed as the Physical Education Department chair and educator at the Geffen Academy, a sixth-through-12th-grade school affiliated with UCLA.

Laura Janke 

Laura Janke  (USC Athletics)

The indictment alleges that the two accepted $350,000 in exchange for designating four prospective students as recruits.

Donna Heinel: Heinel, a senior associate athletic director and one of the highest-ranking members of USC’s athletic department, was fired Tuesday in the wake of her indictment. Prosecutors allege that she received more than $1.3 million to help smooth the way for more than two dozen students to enter USC between 2014 and 2018. In December 2017, Heimel allegedly received $50,000 from actress Lori Loughlin and her husband, Mossimo Giannullo, whose daughters were recruited to the USC women’s crew team despite having no rowing experience.

"It is immensely disappointing that individuals would abuse their position at the university in this way," USC Interim President Wanda Austin wrote in a letter to employees. "As our work on culture and values continues, we must take the appropriate action when we become aware of behavior that is contrary to our values … We will continue to cooperate fully with all law enforcement and regulatory investigations."

Georgetown University

Former men’s tennis coach Gordon Ernst is named in the indictment. He allegedly received $2.7 million in bribes, which were labeled "consulting fees" from charitable accounts set up by admissions consultant Rick Singer, who prosecutors say was the central figure in the scheme.

Gordon Ernst

Gordon Ernst (University of Rhode Island)

In a statement, Georgetown spokeswoman Meghan Dubyak said Ernst had not coached the men’s tennis team since December 2017 "following an internal investigation that found he had violated university rules concerning admissions." Dubyak added that the university had "cooperated fully with the government’s investigation" and was "deeply disappointed" in Ernst’s alleged actions, which she described as "an unprecedented breach of trust."

Ernst was hired to coach the women’s tennis team at the University of Rhode Island in August 2018. A university statement said that Ernst had been placed on administrative leave and noted that he " has not been involved in the recruitment of any current players nor in the signing of any new recruits."

Stanford University

Stanford head sailing coach John Vandemoer pleaded guilty in federal court in Boston Tuesday, admitting that he conspired with Singer to pretend two prospective students were competitive sailors in exchange for payments to the Stanford sailing program. Neither student ended up attending Stanford.

Former Stanford sailing coach John Vandemoer arrives at federal court in Boston Tuesday. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)

Former Stanford sailing coach John Vandemoer arrives at federal court in Boston Tuesday. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)

The university confirmed in a statement that Vandemoer, who has coached sailing at Standford since 2009 and previously held the head job at the U.S. Naval Academy, has been fired, saying that his "alleged behavior runs completely counter to Stanford’s values.

"Based on the Department of Justice investigation to date, we have no evidence that the alleged conduct involves anyone else at Stanford or is associated with any other team," the statement went on. "However, we will be undertaking an internal review to confirm that."

University of Texas

Michael Center

Michael Center (University of Texas)

Longtime Longhorns men’s tennis coach Michael Center was placed on administrative leave after he was charged with conspiracy to commit mail fraud and honest-services mail fraud. Center, who has been at the university since 2000, allegedly accepted a $100,000 bribe in exchange for designating a prospective student as a tennis recruit. The student was admitted to the university on a partial scholarship in the spring of 2015 and was added to the tennis team’s roster. Shortly after beginning classes that fall, the student withdrew from the tennis team and renounced his scholarship, but remained at the university.

University spokesperson J.B. Bird said Center’s alleged actions "run counter to the university’s values," and added, "Based on what we know at present, we believe this was an isolated incident in 2015 that involved one coach and no other university employees or officers."

Center’s teams have reached the NCAA tennis championship tournament in all 18 years of his tenure and made the final four three times: in 2006, 2008 and 2009.

University of California, Los Angeles

UCLA men’s soccer coach Jorge Salcedo was placed on leave after the indictment was announced. He is accused of accepting $200,000 to help get one female student and one male student admitted to the university in 2016 and 2018, respectively. Prosecutors say at least one of the payments was directed to a sports marking company Salcedo controlled.

Jorge Salcedo

Jorge Salcedo (UCLA)

"The conduct alleged in the filings revealed today is deeply disturbing and in contrast with the expectations we have of our coaches to lead their teams with honesty and integrity," UCLA said in a statement. "If the facts alleged are true, they represent a grave departure from the ethical standards we set for ourselves and the people who work here."

A former Major League Soccer player, Salcedo was hired as head coach of the Bruins in 2004. His teams have made the NCAA tournament in 13 of the last 14 seasons, reaching the championship game twice (2006 and 2014). In addition, 38 Bruins have been drafted by Major League Soccer (MLS) during Salcedo’s tenure, boosting the program’s attractiveness to recruits.

Wake Forest University

Women’s volleyball coach Bill Ferguson is accused of accepting $100,000 from Singer to help a prospective female student get into Wake Forest after she had been put on a waitlist. Wake Forest said Ferguson had been placed on administrative leave.

Bill Ferguson

Bill Ferguson (Wake Forest University)

Ferguson was hired by Wake Forest in 2016 after spending a decade coaching men’s volleyball at USC, during which time he led that program to three NCAA volleyball Final Fours. He’d had less success as the head coach of the Demon Deacons, compiling a 32-61 record over his three seasons in Winston-Salem.

"The alleged conduct is in direct conflict with the values and integrity of Wake Forest and its athletics program," University President Nathan Hatch said in a letter to the university’s students, faculty and staff.

Yale University

Tuesday’s indictments were an inglorious coda to the 24-year coaching career of Rudolph "Rudy" Meredith, who resigned as women’s soccer coach at the Ivy League institution this past November after 24 seasons in the job.

Rudolph "Rudy" Meredith

Rudolph "Rudy" Meredith (Yale University)

Prosecutors say Meredith received $400,000 in early 2018 after falsely designating a prospective Yale student as a women’s soccer recruit. Ivy League schools like Yale do not give athletic scholarships, but its member universities have increased the amount of financial aid to admitted students in recent years, making it easier to recruit athletes who previously would not have attended those schools.

According to the indictment, Singer sent the student’s resume and personal statement — which included an art portfolio — to Meredith in November 2017 and promised to "’revise’ the materials to ‘soccer.’"

In the spring of 2018, prosecutors say, Meredith met with the father of another prospective student in a Boston hotel room and agreed to designate the man’s daughter as a women’s soccer recruit in exchange for $450,000. The father agreed and gave Meredith $2,000 in cash as a down payment. The meeting was recorded by FBI agents.

Meredith’s charges include conspiracy to commit wire fraud and honest-services wire fraud.

"As the federal charging document makes clear, the Department of Justice believes that Yale’s Office of Undergraduate Admissions has been the victim of a crime perpetrated by its women’s soccer coach, who is no longer at the university," the university said in a statement. " … The Office of Undergraduate Admissions relies on varsity coaches to provide honest and expert evaluations of individual applicants’ athletic accomplishments and potential to contribute to a varsity team. The Admissions Committee considers these evaluations alongside the other components of an applicant’s file, but only students whose applications demonstrate their ability to succeed in the academic and residential components of the Yale experience are admitted."

Source: Fox News National


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