The Associated Press has released its list of top news stories of 2016. Other major stories not included in the top ten are: Europe’s migrant crisis, the death of former Cuban leader Fidel Castro and the spread of the Zika virus across Latin America and the Caribbean.
1. The U.S. election. The arc of 2016’s top story, in the AP’s view, can be traced back to Donald Trump’s descent of an escalator to the Trump Tower lobby on June 16, 2015. The rest is history.
2. Brexit. The U.K. vote in June to quit the European Union stunned pollsters and political commentators and felled a prime minister.
3. Black people shot by police. The July deaths in police shootings of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile in Baton Route., LA, and St. Paul, MN, respectively, rekindled a debate over policing practices and the Black Lives Matter movement, according to the AP.
4. Pulse nightclub in Orlando, FL. The mass shooting at a gay nightclub in the central Florida city was the worst in modern U.S. history, according to the AP. The gunman, Omar Mateen, killed 49 people and injured dozens more before dying in a shootout with SWAT team members. During the rampage he reportedly declared allegiance to Islamic State.
5. Terror attacks around the world. The AP names Brussels, Istanbul and Nice attacks as among the year’s highest-profile terrorist attacks. The news service notes, though, that “extremist attacks flared at a relentless pace throughout the year” in disparate locales around the globe.
6. Attacks on police. Ambushes and other targeted attacks on police officers claimed at least 20 lives in the U.S. this year, according to the AP, with victims including five officers in Dallas working at a protest of the fatal police shootings of black men in Minnesota and Louisiana. Ten days later, a man killed three officers in Baton Rouge, LA. Later, in Iowa, two officers were fatally shot in ambush-style attacks.
7. Democratic Party email leaks. Hacked emails, made public by WikiLeaks, revealed embarrassing messages among Democratic Party operatives. Democratic National Committee chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz resigned over the matter, as other DNC officials lost jobs or esteem. The CIA, the Associated Press notes, later concluded that Russia was behind the DNC hacking in a bid to boost Donald Trump’s chances of beating Hillary Clinton.
8. Syria. Backed by Russian might, the government forces of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad recently seized rebel-held portions of the virtually ruined city of Aleppo, after numerous failed attempts to reach a cease-fire arrangement among warring parties and spare civilian lives.
9. The Supreme Court. After Antonin Scalia’s death in February, President Obama nominated Merrick Garland, chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals, to fill the high-court vacancy. Senate Republicans refused to consider Garland’s, or any, nomination.
10. The Clinton emails. Against the backdrop of the presidential campaign, the FBI conducted an investigation into Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton’s use of a private server for emails she sent during her 2009-13 tenure as secretary of state. FBI Director James Comey called Clinton’s practices careless but said the bureau would close the case without criminal charges. That decision, of course, was later reversed for a several-day window just before the November 8 election.
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