The police chief of Hillsborough County, Florida, announced the death of two people, including the suspect, after reports were received from eyewitnesses of a shooting at the Citibank office complex outside the American city of Tampa, according to the Associated Press.
Police forces were deployed heavily in the complex on Wednesday afternoon, and television footage showed long lines of employees exiting the office buildings. The Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office stated in a post on the social media platform "X" that it "responded to a report of a security threat and is currently securing the building."
Police Chief Chad Chronister said on the X platform: “We believe the incident was a specific target.” He added, "The suspect has died."
It was not immediately known if there were any other injuries.
The Citibank complex in the suburbs of Tampa includes 4 three-story office buildings that house thousands of employees of the banking giant.
The Democrats' victory in a majority in the House of Representatives and the Senate in the midterm elections for the US Congress marked the emergence of remarkable names who achieved unprecedented results, and among these results was Deb Haaland's victory as governor of New Mexico.
The woman belonging to the Laguna Pueblo tribe became the first indigenous woman to hold the position of governor in the state, which is located in the southwestern United States.
Haaland had previously made history as the first indigenous woman to hold a cabinet portfolio, when she was appointed minister responsible for federal lands under former President Joe Biden.
So what do we know about Deb Haaland?
According to her official website, Haaland (65 years old) stands up to the millionaires and billionaires who manipulate the system against the people of New Mexico. When she takes over as governor, she will protect society from President Donald Trump and the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, and will focus on the biggest challenges: reducing crime, improving education, and lowering prices.
Haaland grew up in a military family and attended 13 public schools before graduating from Highland High School in Albuquerque. At the age of 34, she earned a bachelor's degree in English from the University of New Mexico and later earned a juris doctorate from the University of New Mexico School of Law.
She says that like other New Mexico residents, she has faced many challenges, such as homelessness and financial insecurity. She helped pay for her child's kindergarten by volunteering there for a reduced fee. She relied on food stamps from the government's Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program to provide her basic needs. She recovered from addiction more than three decades ago.
7 bills signed by Trump
While raising her daughter Sumah as a single mother, Deb worked in the catering industry and ran her own small sauce production and canning business. She wanted to make a difference in the lives of New Mexico workers; So I started participating in voter registration. In 2018, she made history as one of the first Native American women elected to Congress.
During her tenure as secretary, she led nearly 70,000 federal employees, secured thousands of jobs in New Mexico, advanced clean energy, and attracted hundreds of millions of dollars in investment in the state, according to her official website.
She cooperated with both parties, obtaining more cosponsors for her legislation than all freshman members of the House of Representatives in 2019. She introduced seven bills that President Donald Trump signed into law, among the most bills signed by any member of the House of Representatives in that Congress.
In his first speech, today, Wednesday, after the crushing defeat suffered by his Republican Party in the midterm elections, US President Donald Trump announced that holding the war with Iran responsible for his party’s loss in the elections was “largely true,” and stressed that Tehran could not be allowed to possess a nuclear weapon, adding: “It was worth it.”
Trump told reporters that if his name had been on the ballot, the Republicans would have won, considering that the party was unable to transfer the support it enjoys to its candidates.
He added that he did not mind his deputy, J.D. Vance’s post on social media, earlier today, Wednesday, in which Vance referred to the huge electoral losses, saying: “The reason we lost is because of the war.”
He added: “I can tell you that regarding that war, I would not have done anything differently.”
Trump also reiterated his belief that “if I had been on the ballot, we would have won.”
He continued: “But they simply could not convey that love.” There was so much love in those gatherings, it was unbelievable, and we were not able to transfer this love to the candidates.
In response to a question about the possibility of launching procedures to isolate him, he said: “I think that it would destroy the Democratic Party if they did it,” stressing that there was “no reason” to isolate him.
The new White House auditorium
Trump began his talk at length about the new ballroom in the White House, from the construction site.
Trump invited journalists to the construction site inside the White House, and spoke about the project for about 20 minutes, without mentioning the defeat suffered by the Republicans.
He said: “It will not only be one of the largest celebration halls, but I believe it will be the most beautiful in the world,” without mentioning at the beginning of his speech the midterm elections in which the Democrats achieved a landslide victory and took control of Congress.
There were originally no public events on the president's agenda, but at the last minute he invited journalists to attend. He also answered questions briefly, stressing: “If I had been on the ballot, I would have won.”
Republican losses led to the transfer of control of Congress to the Democrats, who achieved a series of victories in the Senate elections that had previously seemed out of reach in Republican strongholds.
These results reflect a categorical rejection by tens of millions of voters of President Donald Trump's policies.
Voters in conservative strongholds, who brought the president to a second term just two years ago, turned strongly to the Democrats, driven by intense dissatisfaction with the unsupported war on Iran, concern about the high cost of living, and anger at the way Trump is managing the country’s affairs.
He was elected the first Democratic senator in Kansas since the Great Depression nearly a century ago.
Democrats in South Carolina, a state that has not elected a Democratic senator since 1932, and which Trump won by nearly 18 points in 2024, ousted the president's chosen candidate for Senate.
In Texas, Democrats were unable to win any statewide race for more than three decades, until they were able to do so on Tuesday.
