Palatable versus poisonous: Eavesdropping bats must learn to identify which prey is safe to eat

Data collected on juvenile and adult fringe-lipped bats reveal the first clues into the development of eavesdropping behavior in predators

Smithsonian

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A fringe-lipped bat, Trachops cirrhosus, responds to the calls of the túngara frog, Engystomops pustulosus, one of its preferred prey species. First, the bat hears the call of a single male túngara frog, producing a complex call (a ‘whine’ plus multiple ‘chucks’.) Then, the bat hears the cacophony of a large túngara frog chorus, with many male túngara frogs acoustically competing for females at once.

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Credit: (c) Joseph See

Scientists at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI) found that the fringe-lipped bat, known to eavesdrop on frog and toad mating calls to find its prey, learns to distinguish between palatable and unpalatable frogs and toads through experience. The findings, published April 29 in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B, provide the first evidence that eavesdropping predators fine-tune their hunting cues over the course of their development. 

To source their food, some predators eavesdrop on calls emitted by prey. Fringe-lipped bats, which range from Panama to Brazil, are some of the most skilled eavesdroppers in the world: They are attuned to the sexual advertisement calls of over a dozen frog and toad species that live in their habitat. If a fringe-lipped bat hears a call, it will fly toward the sound within seconds. However, just like some incoming calls on people’s cell phones originate from scammers, not every frog or toad call guarantees a safe and healthy meal—if a frog is too large or emits a toxin, the prey can pose a danger to the bat. 

Fringe-lipped bats have adapted to this risk by developing their own caller ID; if they hear a call from an unpalatable frog or toad, they save their time and energy by not responding. But frog and toad calls do not come with automatic “spam” warnings like phone calls do, and until now, scientists did not know where the fringe-lipped bat’s ability to distinguish between palatable and unpalatable frogs came from. 

“It’s truly remarkable that these bats hunt using the calls of an entirely different group of animals in the first place, and we have wondered for a long time how these bats acquire this unusual skill,” said Logan James, STRI postdoctoral researcher and lead author of the study. “We knew from previous research that these bats are very clever and can learn during experiments, but we had not tested whether their aptitude for learning had a role in fine-tuning their responses to sound cues from their natural prey.”

The research team tested how individual, wild-caught adult and juvenile fringe-lipped bats responded to mating call recordings of 15 local frog and toad species. These species included frogs known to be palatable, toxic or too large to handle. First, the team confirmed previous studies showing that adult bats responded more strongly to palatable versus unpalatable frogs and toads. Yet, as the team discovered, juvenile bats did not make the same distinctions. On average, juvenile bats did not respond differently to frogs and toads based on their palatability. 

Looking more closely, the team found that juveniles could identify larger prey by their calls, just like adults can, but they could not distinguish the toxic species. This indicates that juveniles tend to respond to body size early on, but they learn to identify toxic species over time. 

“We have studied this fascinating species for years, and in many aspects, we understand its behavior very well,” said Rachel Page, staff scientist at STRI, and one of the study’s senior authors. “But this was the first time we had ever tested juvenile bats. It was so interesting to see that, like human children, young bats needed time and experience to hone their discrimination skills.” 

This study is the first to explicitly compare eavesdropping responses of generalist predators at different ages. But it is likely that this strategy is widespread across the animal kingdom, and fringe-lipped bats are not the only predators that need to learn how to distinguish palatable prey. Ultimately, this study highlights the critical role of experience in early life in shaping predatory behaviors in the wild. 

“This study highlights the power of development and learning to shape eavesdropping behavior, an insight that may extend far beyond bats to other predators also navigating complex sensory environments,” said Ximena Bernal, research associate at STRI, professor at Purdue University and one of the study’s senior authors. “We hope it will inspire other scientists to examine how early experience modulates predator-foraging decisions.” 

About the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute

      Headquartered in Panama City, Panama, STRI is a unit of the Smithsonian Institution whose mission is to understand tropical biodiversity and its importance to human welfare, trains students to conduct research in the tropics and promotes conservation by increasing public awareness of the beauty and importance of tropical ecosystems. Watch STRI’s video and visit the institute on its website and on Facebook, X and Instagram for updates.

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Journal

Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B Biological Sciences

DOI

10.1098/rspb.2025.0450 

Method of Research

Experimental study

Subject of Research

Animals

Article Title

The Ontogeny of Decision-Making in an Eavesdropping Predator

Article Publication Date

29-Apr-2025

A fringe-lipped bat, Trachops cirrhosus, approaches a Fitzinger's robber frog, Craugastor fitzingeri, in Panama. This species of bat eavesdrops on the mating calls that male frogs produce to attract females, and uses these frog calls to detect, assess and localize its prey. Young bats do not share the same responses to frog mating calls that adults do; juveniles must acquire the ability to discriminate which frog calls signify palatable and poisonous prey.

Credit

(c) Merlin Tuttle

A male túngara frog successfully evades capture by a fringe-lipped bat [VIDEO] 

A fringe-lipped bat, Trachops cirrhosus, hears a male túngara frog, Engystomops pustulosus, producing an advertisement call to attract a mate. The bat approaches the calling frog, but the frog detects it in time, stops calling and ducks, successfully avoiding the eavesdropping predator.

Credit

(c) Joseph See

A fringe-lipped bat eats its catch: a túngara frog [VIDEO] 

Jeff Bezos-backed Slate Auto announces factory location for its $25,000 electric truck

UNLIKE THE MUSK TESLA CYBERTRUCK 

THIS LOOKS LIKE  A TRUCK

Benjamin Zhang
Tue, April 29, 2025


Slate Auto said it would assemble its $25,000 EV in Warsaw, Indiana.


The 1.4 million-square-foot facility was occupied by a printing company until 2023.


Slate says it expects to make its first customer deliveries near the end of 2026.

Slate Auto, the Jeff Bezos-backed EV startup, confirmed to Business Insider on Tuesday that its $25,000 electric pickup would be assembled at a former printing plant in Warsaw, Indiana.

"We would like to see what we can do to go into an existing facility that has been shuttered and reindustrialize and revitalize that community," Slate CEO Chris Barman told us in an interview ahead of the truck's introduction last week.

Personalized Slate EV pickups at its reveal event this month.

Greg Doherty/Getty Images for Slate

The factory is expected to bring over 2,000 jobs back to Warsaw, more than the number of jobs lost when the plant's previous tenants shut down, a company representative said in an email.

A local news report said 500 jobs were lost when the facility ceased operations in 2023.

Slate's decision to repurpose existing production facilities follows a similar path to that of other high-profile EV companies, such as Tesla, which took over General Motors'/Toyota's NUMMI factory, and Rivian, which occupies Mitsubishi's former Normal, Illinois, plant.

The electric Slate truck was unveiled earlier in April.

Greg Doherty/Getty Images for Slate

However, Slate's future production site in Warsaw is not a former car factory but one previously owned by a printing company about 40 miles from Fort Wayne, Indiana.

According to a real estate listing, the facility was originally built in 1958 and last renovated in 2000.

The 1.4 million-square-foot compound features office space and two production facilities, each with about 600,000 square feet. The company declined to say how much of that square footage it planned to use.

Local authorities with the Kosciusko Economic Development Corp. declined to comment, citing a nondisclosure agreement.

A Slate truck converted to an SUV

Greg Doherty/Getty Images for Slate

The Slate Truck, which comes standard with 150 miles of range and a starting price of about $25,000, is expected to be the cheapest new electric vehicle and pickup truck in the US, staking out a spot in the market no truck — electric or otherwise — has been able to.

Barman said customer deliveries were expected to commence on the pickup, which, with tax incentives, could cost less than $20,000, near the end of 2026.

Reservations for the truck are open with a refundable $50 fee.

Business Insider

 

Being hit by an SUV increases the likelihood of death or serious injury, new research shows

The likelihood of a pedestrian or cyclist being fatally injured is 44% higher if they are hit by a sports utility vehicle (SUV) or light truck vehicle (LTV) compared with smaller passenger cars, new research shows.

London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine

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The likelihood of a pedestrian or cyclist being fatally injured is 44% higher if they are hit by a sports utility vehicle (SUV) or light truck vehicle (LTV) compared with smaller passenger cars, new research shows. For children there is an even larger effect, with a child hit by a SUV or LTV being 82% more likely to be killed than a child hit by a passenger car.

As part of a new analysis of existing studies, researchers at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) and Imperial College London gathered real-world collision data from over 680,000 collisions from the last 35 years. They compared the severity of injuries suffered by pedestrians or cyclists struck by SUVs or LTVs with the injuries of pedestrians or cyclists struck by passenger cars. LTVs are a category of vehicle that covers SUVs, small vans and pick-up trucks – the researchers found similar increases in risk when they looked at SUVs only.

The research is published in Injury Prevention.

SUVs and LTVs are typically taller, wider and heavier than traditional ‘passenger cars’, such as sedans or hatchbacks. Globally, SUVs are growing in popularity, with SUVs making up 48% of new car sales globally in 2023, up from 15% in 2010.

Multiple cities worldwide have recently introduced, or are currently considering, policies that discourage the use of these large vehicles.

In the study, the authors found that in the case of a crash, pedestrians or cyclists struck by a SUV or LTV suffered more severe injuries than those hit by a passenger car. The odds of fatal injury increased by 44% for people of all ages struck by an SUV, compared with those hit by a passenger car. Among children the odds of fatal injury increased by 82%, and among children under the age of 10 it increased by 130%.

When looking at the likelihood of having a fatal or a serious injury, as compared to a slight injury, the likelihood increased by around a quarter (odds 24% higher in adults and 28% higher in children) for those hit by an SUV or LTV. These effects were all similar for both pedestrians and cyclists.

Previous research indicates that a key mechanism for this increased risk is likely to be the taller and blunter profile of the front end of SUVs and LTVs. A taller front end means that a pedestrian or cyclist is struck higher up on their body (e.g. the pelvis not the knees for an adult, or the head not the pelvis for a child). A taller and blunter front end also means that the pedestrian or cyclist is more likely to be thrown forward onto the road, at which point the striking vehicle may hit them a second time or roll over their body.

Of the 24 studies analysed, all were conducted in high- or middle-income countries, with the majority (16/24 studies) undertaken in the US. There were also studies from countries including the Netherlands, Germany and France, but none from the UK. Analyses that compared the studies from the US to the studies from the rest of the world showed broadly similar results, suggesting that the findings are relevant to other settings.

As SUVs become more common, there is an increase in their impact at the population level. At present, the authors estimate that the proportion of car crashes involving an SUV is around 45% in the USA and around 20% in Europe. If all SUVs were replaced with passenger cars, the number of pedestrians and cyclists killed in car crashes would decrease by an estimated 17% in the USA and by 8% in Europe. The number of child pedestrians and cyclists killed in car crashes would decrease by 27% in the USA and by 14% in Europe.

Elsa Robinson, who worked on the study as an MSc Public Health student at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM), said:

"Analysing over half a million crashes from countries from across the world tells us that SUVs and other similarly large vehicles are much more likely than traditional passenger cars to cause serious harm if they strike a pedestrian or cyclist.

“Our findings also highlight that these larger vehicles are particularly dangerous for children, especially young children. This could be because children are shorter in height, and are therefore more vulnerable to the risks of being hit by vehicles with a tall front end.”

Anna Goodman, Assistant Professor at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) and senior author of the study, said:

“Around the world, we have seen a huge increase in the sale of ever-larger cars. Previous research has found that this trend is substantially undermining progress towards net zero goals. Similarly, our findings indicate that this proliferation of larger vehicles threatens to undermine all the road safety gains being made on other fronts.

“Cities and countries around the world are starting to introduce measures to discourage the use of these large vehicles, and our study strengthens the road safety rationale for this.”

A limitation of the research is that the individual studies analysed relied on manufacturers’ classification of what constitutes a SUV or LTV as there is no agreed legal definition. The authors say that further research is needed into the unique characteristics of these vehicles and what makes them more dangerous to pedestrians and cyclists.

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Journal

Injury Prevention

Method of Research

Meta-analysis

Subject of Research

People

Article Title

Do sports utility vehicles (SUVs) and light truck vehicles (LTVs) cause more severe injuries to pedestrians and cyclists than passenger cars in the case of a crash? A systematic review and meta-analysis

Article Publication Date

30-Apr-2025

 

Majority of Americans experience some form of gun violence in person

Rutgers researchers conduct a national study on racial disparities in direct and media-based exposure among U.S. adults

Rutgers University

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Nearly two-thirds of adults in the U.S. have experienced some form of in-person exposure to gun violence, according to a national study by Rutgers researchers tracking racial disparities in direct and media-based experiences.

This study, published in the Lancet Regional Health – Americas, examines how frequently U.S. adults are exposed to gun violence, both in person and through media, based on data from a nationally representative sample. It looks at who is most affected based on their race, income, and the neighborhoods they live in.

Researchers surveyed 8,009 adults throughout the U.S. to find out how often people experience gun violence, whether directly (such as being shot) or indirectly (such as hearing gunshots nearby). They also looked at how participants frequently see or hear about gun violence through TV, newspapers and social media platforms like TikTok and Instagram. The study compared these experiences across different racial and income groups, using advanced statistical methods to ensure accurate results.

According to the study, 64% of U.S. adults have experienced some form of in-person gun violence exposure. Black and Hispanic adults are significantly more likely than White adults to report being shot, threatened with a gun, witnessing a shooting or knowing someone who has been shot.

In addition to these direct experiences, more than half of Americans say they frequently encounter gun violence that happens outside their communities through conventional media, while one in three are exposed often through social media channels. Black adults reported the highest levels of exposure across both social and conventional media platforms.

“This is a public health crisis hiding in plain sight,” said Daniel Semenza, director of research at the New Jersey Gun Violence Research Center and associate professor in the Departments of Sociology, Anthropology and Criminal Justice, and Urban-Global Public Health. “Gun violence exposure isn’t just about being a victim. It touches people through what they see, hear and experience, especially in Black and Hispanic communities. These exposures accumulate and damage health over time.”

The findings illustrate racial disparities such that white adults are more often exposed to firearm suicide, while Black and Hispanic adults are much more likely to witness shootings or know someone who has been shot.

The researchers said gun violence exposure in the U.S. is widespread and extends beyond direct victimization to include hearing, witnessing, and knowing others affected, as well as frequent exposure through media. They added that stark racial and economic disparities persist, with Black and Hispanic adults and those in disadvantaged neighborhoods facing significantly higher rates of all forms of exposure.

Policymakers and public officials must prioritize efforts to reduce gun violence exposure and mitigate its effects in order to build healthier communities, the researchers said.

Explore more of the ways Rutgers research is shaping the future.

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Journal

The Lancet Regional Health - Americas

DOI

10.1007/s11121-020-01202-7 

Method of Research

Survey

Subject of Research

People

Article Title

In-person and Media Gun Violence Exposure in the United States: Prevalence and Disparities in a Nationally Representative, Cross-Sectional Sample of Adults

Article Publication Date

29-Apr-2025

 

Broader antibiotic use could change the course of cholera outbreaks, research suggests

University of Utah Health

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Models suggest that in some cases, expanded antibiotic use could slow outbreaks and even reduce the overall risk of antibiotic resistance by decreasing the number of people infected.

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Credit: Sophia Friesen / University of Utah Health

Cholera kills thousands of people and infects hundreds of thousands every year—and cases have spiked in recent years, leaving governments with an urgent need to find the best ways to control outbreaks.

Current public health guidelines discourage treating cholera with antibiotics in all but the most severe cases, to reduce the risk that the disease will evolve resistance to the best treatments we have.

But recent disease modeling research from University of Utah Health challenges that paradigm, suggesting that for some cholera outbreaks, prescribing antibiotics more aggressively could slow or stop the spread of the disease and even reduce the likelihood of antibiotic resistance.

The results are based in mathematical modeling and will require further research to confirm. But they represent a first step toward understanding how antibiotics could change cholera spread.

“This might be an underused opportunity for cholera control, where expanding antibiotic treatment could have population-level benefits and help control outbreaks,” says Lindsay Keegan, PhD, research associate professor in epidemiology at U of U Health and senior author on the study.

The results are published in Bulletin of Mathematical Biology.

 

Putting the brakes on outbreaks

Key to the researchers’ discovery is the fact that antibiotics make people less infectious. Medication is generally reserved for people who are most severely infected because moderate cases quickly recover with rest and rehydration. But while antibiotics may not help most individuals feel better faster, they reduce the amount of time someone is infectious by a factor of 10.

“If you recover naturally from cholera, you will feel better in a day or two, but you're still shedding cholera for up to two weeks,” explains Sharia Ahmed, PhD, assistant professor of epidemiology at Emory University’s Rollins School of Public Health and co-first author on the study, who did the work as a postdoctoral researcher in Keegan’s lab. “But if you take an antibiotic, you still feel better in about a day, and you stop releasing cholera into your environment.”

This means that treating moderate cases with antibiotics could slow outbreaks or, in some cases, stop them in their tracks. Even though a higher percentage of people with cholera would be using antibiotics, fewer people would get the disease so that less antibiotics are used overall.

Cumulatively, lower antibiotic use lowers the risk that cholera evolves antibiotic resistance—which is “a big concern in the field,” Keegan says. “Cholera is exceptionally good at evading antibiotics and developing resistance. It’s not just a theoretical problem.”

The researchers mathematically modeled the spread of cholera under a variety of conditions to see which cases could benefit from antibiotic use. The key variable is how likely someone is to spread the disease to other people, which in turn depends on factors like population density and sanitation infrastructure.

In cases where cholera spreads more rapidly—like in regions with higher population density or without reliable access to clean drinking water—treating moderate cases of cholera with antibiotics wouldn’t slow the spread enough to balance out the risks of antibiotic resistance.

But if spread is relatively slow, the researchers found, using antibiotics for moderate cases could limit spread enough that, in the long run, fewer people catch the disease and fewer people are treated with antibiotics. In some cases, they predict, antibiotic use could stop outbreaks entirely.

 

Cases are on the rise

Figuring out better plans for managing cholera is especially urgent because outbreaks are on the rise. Cases and deaths have spiked by about a third in the past year, likely related to mass displacement and natural disasters. “We thought it was well contained to a few specific places, and now it’s popped out again,” Ahmed says.

As the climate shifts and extreme weather events become more frequent, disruptions to infrastructure could lead to cholera outbreaks in countries that haven’t previously experienced the disease.

The researchers emphasize that further work is needed before their work could motivate changes to how governments treat cholera. Scientists need to see whether the results hold up in more complex simulations that incorporate factors like cholera vaccines, and they need to figure out rules of thumb to quickly estimate whether or not the disease will spread slowly enough for aggressive antibiotic use to be a good call.

“The takeaway is not, ‘OK, let’s start giving people antibiotics,’” Keegan says. “This is a first step at understanding antibiotic use as a possibility for outbreak control.”

“If the results continue to be this compelling,” Ahmed adds, “and we can replicate them in different settings, I think then we start talking about changing our policy for antibiotic treatment for cholera. This is a really good example of using data to continually improve our policy and our treatment choices for even well-established diseases.”

 

###

These results are published in Bulletin of Mathematical Biology as “A theoretical framework to quantify the tradeoff between individual and population benefits of expanded antibiotic use.”

Work was funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (grant numbers 1U01CK000675 and 1NU38FT000009-01-00) and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (grant number 5K08HS026530-06).

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Journal

Bulletin of Mathematical Biology

DOI

10.1007/s11538-025-01432-2 

Method of Research

Computational simulation/modeling

Subject of Research

People

Article Title

A theoretical framework to quantify the tradeoff between individual and population benefits of expanded antibiotic use

Article Publication Date

30-Apr-2025

US lost seven multi-million-dollar drones in Yemen area since March

SINCE SIGNAL SCANDAL 

W.G. DUNLOP
Mon, April 28, 2025 

MQ-9 Reaper drones cost around $30 million apiece (Isaac Brekken)Isaac Brekken/GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/Getty Images via AFP

The United States has lost seven multi-million-dollar MQ-9 Reaper drones in the Yemen area since March 15, a US official said Monday, as the Navy announced a costly warplane fell off an aircraft carrier into the Red Sea.

Washington launched the latest round of its air campaign against Yemen's Huthis in mid-March, and MQ-9s can be used for both reconnaissance -- a key aspect of US efforts to identify and target weaponry the rebels are using to attack shipping in the region -- as well as strikes.

"There have been seven MQ-9s that have gone down since March 15," the US official said on condition of anonymity, without specifying what caused the loss of the drones, which cost around $30 million apiece.

The US Navy meanwhile announced the loss of another piece of expensive military equipment: an F/A-18E warplane that fell off the USS Harry S. Truman aircraft carrier in an accident that injured one sailor.

A tractor that was towing the F/A-18E -- a type of aircraft that cost more than $67 million in 2021 -- also slipped off the ship into the sea.

"The F/A-18E was actively under tow in the hangar bay when the move crew lost control of the aircraft. The aircraft and tow tractor were lost overboard," the Navy said in a statement.

The carrier and its other planes remain in action and the incident is under investigation, the Navy added. No details of recovery work were released.


- Weeks of heavy strikes -

It is the second F/A-18 operating off the Truman to be lost in less than six months, after another was mistakenly shot down by the USS Gettysburg guided missile cruiser late last year in an incident that both pilots survived.

The Truman is one of two US aircraft carriers operating in the Middle East, where US forces have been striking the Huthis on a near-daily basis.

The military's Central Command said Sunday that US forces have struck more than 800 targets and killed hundreds of Huthi fighters, including members of the group's leadership, as part of the operation.

Huthi-controlled media in Yemen said Monday that US strikes hit a migrant detention center in the movement's stronghold of the capital Saada, killing at least 68 people.

Then early Tuesday, rebel channel Al-Masirah reported two strikes on Bani Hashish, northeast of the capital, citing the local governorate.

The Iran-backed Huthis began targeting shipping in late 2023, claiming solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza, which has been devastated by Israel's military after a shock Hamas attack in October of that year.

Huthi attacks have prevented ships from passing through the Suez Canal -- a vital route that normally carries about 12 percent of the world's shipping traffic.

The United States first began conducting strikes against the Huthis under the Biden administration, and President Donald Trump has vowed that military action against the rebels will continue until they are no longer a threat to shipping.

wd/mlm/md

Hegseth Has Another Blonde Fox Producer Aide—Who’s on Signal

Josh Fiallo
Wed, April 30, 2025



Photo Illustration by Thomas Levinson/The Daily Beast/Getty/DOD

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth‘s affinity for Signal group chats with former Fox News producers is worse than we thought.

Hegseth, who faced calls to resign after a report revealed he texted military strike details in a Signal chat that included his former Fox News producer wife, Jennifer Rauchet, was accused Wednesday of having a third chat on the app that included his spouse.

Sources told The Washington Post that the latest chat also included Hegseth’s senior adviser and spokesman, Sean Parnell, as well as Tami Radabaugh, a former Fox News producer who is a close friend of Rauchet’s.

What was discussed in the third chat is unknown, the Post reported, and it is not clear if that chat remains active or not. Still, the inclusion of Radabaugh is likely to raise eyebrows at the Pentagon, which has warned Signal is susceptible to hacking and should not be used outright, even to discuss matters that are not classified.

Tami Radabaugh, 51, is a former Fox News producer who worked with Pete Hegseth and his wife at the network. / Department of Defense

Radabaugh, 51, is a mother of two who was sworn in as Hegseth’s deputy assistant for public affairs on day one of MAGA 2.0. She remained largely out of view amid Hegseth’s initial string of Signal missteps. Still, her name appeared in reports last week as the adviser who suggested that Hegseth retrofit a room in the Pentagon into a makeup studio to help prepare him for his television appearances.

A source told the Post that Rauchet has had an outsized influence in shaping her husband’s tenure as defense secretary, despite not having an official role at the DOD. That has reportedly included her weighing in on what media hits he should do. A source said her first directive came as early as his first day on the job—when she asked DOD staff to compile his initial remarks to reporters and share them on social.

“We would always hear that she was saying what kind of videos he should be doing, and what kind of statements he should be doing, and how the press should be handled,” a source at the DOD told the Post.

Tami Radabaugh (right) shared a photo last month of her hanging out with Jenny Hegseth (left), Pete Hegseth, and the Fox News personality Brian Kilmeade. / Tami Radabaugh/X

Radabaugh worked with Hegseth and his wife at Fox News. She was an executive producer for Fox & Friends from 2019 to 2023, overlapping with the time Hegseth was an on-air personality for the hit morning news show. Rauchet, 40, served as an executive producer for Fox & Friends from 2006 to 2017, then transitioned to executive producer of Watters World for a year, and then became vice president of Fox Nation.

A personal website for Radabaugh is full of photos of her and right-wing political figures. A gallery at its bottom includes her smiling next to Donald Trump in the Oval Office, a selfie with Hegseth and Rauchet, and another of her smiling next to Republican Rep. Dan Crenshaw.

Tami Radabaugh participated in the Fab Over 40 competition and fundraiser. / Fab Over 40

The DOD official also participated in Fab Over 40, a competition and fundraising campaign that raises money for the National Breast Cancer Foundation. She placed 26th in her group, according to her page. Her bio for the completion read, “God’s daughter who is blessed with a loving heart full of gratitude for my faith, family, fabulous career, fun travel, and fitness.”

More in Politics

Radabaugh, who ran her own media company for a year and a half after leaving Fox, which she said on LinkedIn was “founded on faith,” was an avid MAGA poster after Donald Trump‘s victory last year. Her personal X account is filled with retweets from Elon Musk, Libs of TikTok, and other right-wing personalities.

A New York native, Radabaugh also posted videos in December from Queens amid hysteria over an increase in drone sightings there.

Radabaugh now posts more frequently on her official Department of Defense account, which included her retweeting a post Wednesday that claimed Hegseth has “received 100% NEGATIVE COVERAGE from the FAKE NEWS.”

Radabuagh did not respond to a request for comment from the Daily Beast.

U.S. accounting firms tap India to alleviate talent crunch



Mousepad with white dots representing offices of Moss Adams, a U.S. accounting firm, across the world, lies on a desk at the company's office in Bengaluru

Mon, April 28, 2025 
By Sai Ishwarbharath B

BENGALURU (Reuters) -U.S. accounting firms including RSM US, Moss Adams, Bain Capital-backed Sikich and Apax Partners-backed CohnReznick are expanding their operations in India to tackle an acute shortage of accountants at home.

The surge in recruitment has started boosting enrolment in specialised commerce courses in India, and could establish Asia's No. 3 economy as a hub for accounting talent, reminiscent of the 90s outsourcing boom that revolutionised the tech industry.


"This could be the breakthrough moment for public accounting firms in India," Balaji Iyer, managing partner at Moss Adams India, told Reuters. "Right now, the U.S. is facing a significant and growing shortage of certified public accountants, a trend that will only intensify in the coming years."

About 1.78 million people were working as accountants in the United States in 2024, about 10 percent fewer than in 2019, according to U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data, as many seasoned accountants retired without a reliable pipeline of qualified replacements.

The American Institute of CPAs (AICPA), the national body that conducts and grades qualifying exams and sets auditing standards for the profession, admitted a “talent pipeline issue” as it commissioned an independent study last year.

About half its members are over the age of 50.

“The accountant shortage is being acutely felt throughout the market," the National Talent Advisory Group study found, adding that several businesses such as toymaker Mattel reported a delay to annual reports and other key filings due to the shortage.


Accountancy - known for long hours, lower pay than many other finance jobs, and a rule effectively requiring a fifth year in university for CPA licensing - has also become unpopular with younger people.

"Fewer students are majoring in accounting, partly because the field is seen as less exciting than tech or finance, and automation has added uncertainty," said Rebecca Hann, associate dean of research at University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business.

Hann published a research paper on the country's accountant shortage last year.

RSM US aims to more than double its India workforce to 5,000 by 2027, the firm told Reuters.

Sikich also said it was increasingly hiring in India to fill vacancies for accountants and auditors, as well as tech talent to support its automation and AI-related efforts.

"Ultimately, it's less about filling roles one for one and more about transforming how we deliver services, using both highly skilled talent and advanced technology to meet evolving client demands," said Bobby Achettu, principal at Sikich and India operations lead.


The firm has a 200-member team in India, accounting for around 10% of its global workforce.

Larger rivals Deloitte, EY, KPMG, and PwC, the "Big Four" of accounting, had a combined headcount of between 140,000-160,000 people in their India global capability centres (GCCs) as of 2024, according to market intelligence firm UnearthInsight.

The Big Four companies did not respond to emails seeking comment.

TALENT PIPELINE

The turn to India for accounting talent echoes similar moves in tech over the past two decades, where global companies including Walmart, Microsoft and JPMorgan Chase have set up offices in India to tap into the South Asian country's engineering talent.


The U.S. Bureau of Labor has projected the number of accountant and auditor jobs will grow 6% from 2023 to 2033, outpacing the average for all occupations.

Some of the mid-sized accounting firms are so desperate to solve the recruitment gap that they are hiring direct from Indian campuses and even offering to sponsor CPA courses for their younger talent.

"First, it was the 'Big Four' accounting firms. Then, mid-sized firms such as EisnerAmper and BDO also started hiring from us," said Biju Toms, Director, Department of Professional Studies at Christ University in Bengaluru.

That has boosted demand for specialised courses such as the college's Bachelor of Commerce (International Finance), which got around 3,000 applications for the 120 available places.

"There is always the need for trained talent with industry exposure, and cost arbitrage into play, when you operate from India," Toms said. "So, similar to outsourcing in tech, accounting is a new area that is really opening up."

(Reporting by Sai Ishwarbharath B; Editing by Dhanya Skariachan and Kate Mayberry)

A leaking oil tanker explodes in Pakistan, killing 2 and injuring 56


This is a locator map for Pakistan with its capital, Islamabad, and the Kashmir region

. (AP Photo)

Updated April 29, 2025

QUETTA, Pakistan (AP) — A leaking oil tanker caught fire and exploded along a dusty road in southwestern Pakistan, killing two people and injuring 56 others, officials said Tuesday.

The explosion happened as firefighters were trying to put out the fire Monday in the Naushki district of Balochistan province, local police officer Atta Ullah said.

Firefighters and people in a crowd that had gathered at the scene were among the injured. The tanker driver and a bystander were killed.

Nearly a dozen of the injured were in critical condition and some were being airlifted to the southern city of Karachi, where better medical care is available, said Waseem Baig, a spokesman for Civil Hospital in Quetta.

Balochistan Chief Minister Sarfraz Bugti visited the Civil Hospital in Quetta, the capital of the province, and directed doctors to provide the best possible care to the victims.

Deadly incidents involving oil tankers are not uncommon in Pakistan.


In 2017, more than 200 people were killed in Ahmadpur East in Punjab province when a fuel tanker caught fire as residents attempted to collect leaking fuel.