“This cold weather and extreme snowstorm are not an exception to global warming, but an alarming indicator of it,” the author writes. “New Yorkers feel this global weirding phenomenon and are paying the ultimate price.”

Piles of snow in lower Manhattan on January 29, 2026. (Michael Appleton/Mayoral Photography Office)

In New York City, we are seeing unusually cold weather and snow in the busy month of January. Instead of a joyous month of fresh beginnings, New Yorkers are seeing subway delays, icy sidewalks, and remote learning (or, for me, midterms are being pushed back a day). What might seem like something new from prior years of warm winters and no snow is, as counterintuitive as it may seem, just a symptom of the climate change that has been happening for decades. 

In the world of social media, another talking point to exploit has fallen into the hands of climate deniers. Snowstorms are no longer just weather, but have become “proof” of climate change being a hoax. Even though 2025 was one of the top three warmest years on record per the World Meteorological Organization, climate deniers turn a blind eye to overall trends in climate and fixate instead on occasional events as if a day’s weather were the same as the climate, formally defined by 30 years of weather data. This is equivalent to saying that all films make a lot of money by pointing only to Zootopia 2. 

This cold weather and extreme snowstorm are not an exception to global warming, but an alarming indicator of it. The jet stream is a narrow lane of fast-moving air, with its location depending on the boundary between hot and cold air. Its southward dip led to previously isolated polar air moving south, lowering temperatures in places like New York City. Cold air isn’t enough to create a big snowstorm, and moisture is the final ingredient. The Gulf of Mexico’s unusually warm surface temperatures fed moisture to storms in the northeast. The warmer ocean leads to more evaporation, and the warmer temperature helps the air hold more moisture, allowing for more intense snow.

New Yorkers feel this global weirding phenomenon and are paying the ultimate price. There is no reason to ignore the 17 people who have died outdoors, potentially due to the cold weather. The poorest are freezing in poorly insulated buildings or not in homes at all, essential blue-collar workers are wading through the storm, and our oldest neighbors are struggling with the cold impacting their health. The disruption of Earth’s climate systems by humans will not be easily adaptable to, with impacts ranging across extreme highs and lows of every variable.  

This is not just a one-off occurrence. New York City’s Bureau of Vital Statistics states that cold and hot weather have increased in weather-related illness levels, from 475 hospitalizations in 2005 to 638 in 2022. This is strongly correlated with the warming of our planet, as the past 11 years have been the 11 warmest on record, with more days being dangerous for our health. Snowstorms are not simply a nuisance; they are a symptom of a larger problem that must be solved if we want to protect our communities: climate change.

New York was a long-standing climate leader, but Gov. Kathy Hochul is failing to uphold that responsibility, especially given her placement on the TIME 100 Climate list. The correct course of action is not to give water quality permits to fossil fuel pipelines, as Gov. Hochul’s DEC (Department of Environmental Conservation) has. 

The pipeline will add gas to the fire of the affordability crisis. The pipeline will also bring toxins to New Yorkers in both their waterways and in their energy. Lives are on the line. Politicians need to stop carelessly making decisions without thinking fully about the consequences, as if we live in a fantasy world where there will always be a happy ending. This is not just what will come up in tomorrow’s newspaper headlines. Gov. Hochul needs to follow the law, as outlined in an Albany Supreme Court decision in Citizen Action of New York vs. DEC in October of 2025, stating that the DEC must put forward new regulations to reduce climate emissions in line with the state’s climate law by Feb. 6, 2026. 

Politicians must do the right thing. New York State legislators must champion climate- and affordability-first bills and not bow down to the industry interests of the fossil fuel companies. The Packaging Reduction and Recycling Infrastructure Act would save billions of dollars by eradicating unnecessary plastic waste from needing to be managed, and the Community SOLAR Act, which expedites permitting and lowers costs for community-based solar projects.

If the highest political officer in New York State cannot follow the state law, New Yorkers need to think critically about who they will vote for and what they will value with their vote. Until November, New Yorkers can keep calling for Gov. Hochul and state legislators to follow the state’s own laws with aggressive climate-forward policy like approving the Packaging Reduction and Recycling Infrastructure Act. 

The countdown has begun, and New Yorkers are watching.

Catherine Du is a member of Hunter College High School’s Class of 2029 with an interest in environmental science and public policy.

The post Opinion: Do Snowstorms Teach Us Anything About Climate Change?  appeared first on City Limits.

By JONEL ALECCIA

A newborn baby died from a listeria infection likely linked to the child’s mother drinking raw milk during pregnancy, health officials said.

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New Mexico officials this week warned people to avoid consuming unpasteurized dairy products following the death. Interest in and sales of raw milk have been rising in recent years, fueled by social media and growing support from the Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s Make America Healthy Again movement.

State officials provided few details about the newborn, citing privacy restrictions. While investigators said they could not determine the exact cause of the baby’s death, “the most likely source of infection was unpasteurized milk.” That conclusion was based on information gathered during the investigation, including the timing of the infection and reports that the mother drank raw milk during pregnancy, an official said.

Raw milk can contain several disease-causing germs, including listeria. That is a type of bacteria that can cause miscarriage, stillbirth, preterm birth, or fatal infections in newborns, even if the mother is only mildly ill.

Pasteurization — the process of heating milk to a high enough temperature to kill germs — can prevent infections from listeria as well as other types of bacteria as well as viruses. Raw milk can contain germs that cause infections from avian influenza, brucella, tuberculosis, salmonella, campylobacter, cryptosporidium and E. coli. Many of those infections are particularly dangerous to young children, people older than 65 and those with weakened immune systems.

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

One of two teens who broke into Palace Bar in downtown St. Paul and stole liquor and then tried to get onto the roof of the nearby St. Paul Hotel told police what they did was “dumb and irresponsible,” according to charges.

Seth Garrett Janick, 18, and Micah Scott Meyer, 19, both of Red Wing, are each charged in Ramsey County District Court with two counts of felony second-degree burglary and two counts of felony possession of burglary or theft tools in connection with the Jan. 31 early morning break-ins.

The duo are suspects in several other burglaries at St. Paul businesses, including Seventh Street Truck Park bar, Amsterdam Bar, 620 Club, Burger Dive and Keys Cafe, Tuesday’s criminal complaints said. The investigation is ongoing.

According to the complaints:

Just before 3:30 a.m., police responded to an alarm at the Palace Pub at 33 Seventh Place W. and found it’d been burglarized, with chairs turned over, a shoe print on the bar and bottles of booze missing.

About 15 minutes later, officers were called to the St. Paul Hotel at 350 Market St. after security guards reported two male suspects were on surveillance cameras trying to force open a roof access door.

When officers arrived, the two suspects ran and were caught and identified as Janick and Meyer. In Meyer’s backpack, officers found a pry bar, headlamp, bottle of Southern Comfort whiskey and bottle of Bacardi rum. Pry bars, a bottle of Bacardi, Malibu Original rum and two bottles of Bud Light beer were in Janick’s backpack.

Hotel video footage showed the pair forcing entry into the hotel by yanking on a lobby door and breaking the lock. They went to the roof door, where Janick tampered with a security camera and then used a crowbar to try to force open the door, but failed. They went back down through the stairwell, and left the hotel.

Video surveillance footage from Palace Pub showed Meyer pulling on a patio door, and the two going inside. Janick jumped over the bar and “the two selected and stole bottles of alcohol,” the complaint read.

In a police interview, Janick said he and friends were in St. Paul to explore tunnels. He admitted he went into the bar and was at the hotel ledge/rooftop, adding it was “dumb and irresponsible,” the complaint read.

Meyer admitted to pulling on the bar’s patio door to get inside and that he and Janick stole alcohol before walking over to the hotel. He told police they were “messing around (and) doing (expletive) we shouldn’t have,” the complaint read.

Janick and Meyer posted bond and were released from jail Wednesday. An attorney for Meyer is not listed in his court file. Janick’s attorney did not return a call for comment Thursday.

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Four days before the two break-ins, Janick was sentenced to a year of unsupervised probation after admitting to “exploring” Ardent Mills Lake City Mill in Lake City, Minn., with two others in September, according to court records. He was convicted of misdemeanor trespassing.

Janick told police he saw Snapchat videos of people going through the flour mill and ”thought it would be cool to check it out,” the complaint read.

In November, Janick was convicted of trespassing after being caught with three others on the roof of a railroad station in Red Wing in August. He was fined $188. “They stated that they saw the location on social media and thought it was abandoned,” the citation read.

By DÁNICA COTO

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — The U.S. government on Thursday announced an additional $6 million in aid for Cuba as the island’s crisis deepens and tensions escalate between the two countries, with Cuba’s president accusing the U.S. of an “energy blockade.”

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The aid is largely meant for those living in Cuba’s eastern region, which Hurricane Melissa slammed into late last year. The supplies include rice, beans, pasta, cans of tuna and solar lamps that will be delivered by the Catholic Church and Caritas, said U.S. Department of State Senior Official Jeremy Lewin.

He warned that officials with the U.S. embassy in Cuba will be out in the field “making sure that the regime does not take the assistance, divert it, try to politicize it.”

The U.S. previously sent $3 million in disaster relief to Cuban people affected by Melissa.

Lewin rejected that a halt in oil shipments from Venezuela — after the U.S. attacked the South American country and arrested its then leader — is responsible for the humanitarian situation in Cuba.

He said that for years, the island has “hoarded all of the resources for the few senile old men that run the country, for their henchmen, for the security apparatus” as he accused Cuba of “meddling abroad,” including “colonizing Venezuela.”

“So that’s what they’re spending their time and attention on,” said Lewin, who noted that his mother was born in Havana.

“Why can’t they get food? It’s not because we’re not letting illicit Venezuelan oil continue to make Raúl Castro rich,” he added, referring to the former Cuban president. “It’s because the government can’t put food on the shelves. They have billions of dollars, but they don’t use it to buy food for ordinary Cubans.”

Lewin spoke hours after Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel held a rare, invite-only press conference in which he fielded questions from a select group of reporters. The Associated Press was not invited.

Díaz-Canel said that there was a “psychological war” against Cuba as he described a recent threat by U.S. President Donald Trump to impose tariffs on any country that sells or provides oil to Cuba as “an energy blockade.”

He said such actions affect transportation, hospitals, schools, tourism and the production of food. In addition to severe blackouts, Cuban officials note that U.S. sanctions, which increased under Trump’s second term, cost the country more than $7.5 billion between March 2024 and February 2025.

“I know we are going to live through difficult times. But we will overcome them together, with creative resilience,” Díaz-Canel said in a two-hour speech in which he answered questions from a handful of reporters.

He noted that Cuba has not received oil shipments since the U.S. began its “naval blockade” on Venezuela in December.

“Therefore, we have problems with fuel availability to guarantee not only electric generation, but also basic activities,” he said.

Díaz-Canel promised that in a week, he would share details regarding the island’s current situation and how the government will confront it.

“There’s a lot of fear,” he said. “I know people say, ‘Sacrifice, again?’ Well, if we don’t sacrifice, and if we don’t resist, what are we going to do? Are we going to give up?”

Lewin said that if the Cuban government comes to its senses and is willing to allow the U.S. to provide more support, that there might be more announcements.

“They should be focused on providing for their people, not making these blustery statements,” Lewin said. “He can talk a big game, but again, any government, its first responsibility is always to provide for its people.”

In his speech, Díaz-Canel said his government is open to dialogue with the United States under certain conditions, including respect for Cuba’s sovereignty and “without addressing sensitive issues that could be perceived as interference in our internal affairs.”

“Cubans do not hate the American people,” Díaz-Canel said. “We are not a threat to the United States.”

Follow AP’s Latin America coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america