Brad Pitt threatened to beat up Harvey Weinstein after his then-girlfriend Gwyneth Paltrow told him that the movie mogul had sexually harassed her.

Paltrow is one of dozens of women coming forward to accuse Weinstein of sexual misconduct, telling the New York Times that the movie mogul made unwanted advances towards her in a hotel room when she was 22. The encounter, which she says occurred after Weinstein hired her for the lead role in Emma, allegedly ended with him placing his hands on her and suggesting a massage.

Pitt, who was dating Paltrow at the time, confronted Weinstein about the incident at a Hollywood party around 1995, a source tells PEOPLE.

“Brad threatened Harvey,” says the source. “He got right in his face, poked him in the chest and said, ‘You will not ever do this to Gwyneth ever again.’ “

The source adds that Pitt “made it clear there would be consequences” if Weinstein tried anything again, and “described it as giving Harvey a ‘Missouri whooping.’” (Pitt grew up in Springfield, Missouri.)

Paltrow and Weinstein in 1999.

“He made it absolutely clear this was not going to happen again and it didn’t,” explains the source.

As for Weinstein’s response, the source says, “At first Harvey tried to explain, then he stopped and listened and got the message.”

The source notes that Pitt was not yet a major star at the time, and was “taking a big risk” by confronting Weinstein: “He was a young guy in Hollywood taking a chance.”

Still, the source says, “He’s one of the only men in Hollywood who stood up and said something. That’s a fact.”

After the confrontation, Paltrow told the NYT that Weinstein called her and threatened her not to speak to anyone else about it. “I thought he was going to fire me,” she told the paper. “He screamed at me for a long time. It was brutal.”

Paltrow, who would go on to win a Best Actress Oscar in 1999 for the Weinstein-produced Shakespeare in Love, “feels relieved and pleased to have spoken out,” says the source.

Pitt also worked with Weinstein again, starring in Inglourious Basterds in 2009, which The Weinstein Company released and Harvey executive produced. Says the source: “He did Inglourious Basterds because of his relationship with Quentin Tarantino, and had nothing to do with Harvey.”

Paltrow and Pitt in 1996.

In the NYT report that ran last week, eight women — including actress Ashley Judd — spoke out against Weinstein, accusing him of sexual harassment and inappropriate behavior. The paper also reported that Weinstein reached private settlements with eight women, including actress Rose McGowan.

On Tuesday, a new story in The New Yorker revealed — among 13 different women’s accounts of alleged sexual harassment, assault or rape — that the mogul allegedly forcibly performed oral sex on Italian actress Asia Argento two decades ago. Actresses Mira Sorvino and Rosanna Arquette also claimed that after rejecting Weinstein’s unwanted advances, they were removed from or kept from being hired for projects.

In response to the lengthy allegations made against Weinstein in the New Yorker piece, a spokesperson for Weinstein said, “Any allegations of non-consensual sex are unequivocally denied by Mr. Weinstein.”

RELATED VIDEO: Harvey Weinstein Forced Out of Own Company After Sexual Harassment Allegations

“Mr. Weinstein has further confirmed that there were never any acts of retaliation against any women for refusing his advances. Mr. Weinstein obviously can’t speak to anonymous allegations, but with respect to any women who have made allegations on the record, Mr. Weinstein believes that all of these relationships were consensual. Mr. Weinstein has begun counseling, has listened to the community and is pursuing a better path. Mr. Weinstein is hoping that, if he makes enough progress, he will be given a second chance.”

On Sunday, Weinstein was removed from his powerhouse film studio in the wake of the publication of the allegations in the first New York Times report published last week.

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Environmental Protection Agency chief Scott Pruitt said Monday he’ll sign a proposed rule to withdraw the Clean Power Plan.
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WASHINGTON — The Trump administration’s move to start dismantling the Clean Power Plan rule intended to curb carbon emissions that contribute to global warming will not be a quick process.

EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt’s announcement Sunday to a group of coal miners in eastern Kentucky that he plans to sign a proposed rule Tuesday rolling back the Obama-era rule is simply the first of a number of steps the agency will have to take.

Proposing a rule to undo a regulation takes the same time-consuming, pain-staking, research-based, legally-defensible process used to adopt the very rule targeted for elimination.

“Today’s proposed repeal of the Clean Power Plan just begins the battle,” David Doniger, a climate change expert with the Natural Resources Defense Council, wrote in a blog Monday. “Pruitt’s EPA must hold hearings and take public comment, and issue a final repeal — with or without a possible replacement.  He must respond to all legal, scientific, and economic objections raised, including the issues we lay out here.”

And then, Doniger said, “we will take Pruitt and his Dirty Power Plan to court.”

Rolling back the rule was a major plank of President Trump’s campaign last year. 

He told friendly crowds in coal-producing states that lifting carbon restrictions would not only keep energy costs affordable but also help revitalize the coal industry and the communities economically ravaged by environmental regulations.

The president has called climate change a “hoax” perpetrated by China to gain a competitive advantage. And he’s vowed to pull out of the Paris climate agreement, the international accord on global warming Obama embraced through his power plan rule.

The budget outline the White House issued earlier this year called for defunding the Clean Power Plan that Obama announced in 2015, which some two dozen states are suing to overturn. Oklahoma, where Pruitt served as attorney general before joining the Trump administration, is one of those states.

Appearing in Hazard, Ky., Sunday with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Pruitt announced his plan to withdraw the rule saying Washington would no longer play favorites when it comes to energy production:

“When you think about the clean power plan it wasn’t about regulating to make things regular. It was truly about regulating to pick winners and losers and they interpreted the best system of emission reduction is generating electricity not using fossil fuels. Rule of law matters. Because rule of law is something that allows you to know what is expected of you. When you have a regulation passed inconsistent with the statute (it) creates uncertainty. That’s what happened with the past administration. We’re getting back to the basics of focusing on rule of law and acting on the authority that Congress has given us.”

The Clean Power Plan rule was finalized in 2015, mainly targeting coal-fired power plants that account for nearly 40 percent of U.S. carbon dioxide emissions. But it remains on hold under a Supreme Court stay pending the outcome of the legal challenge from the states.

Aimed squarely at coal-fired power plants, the regulation requires existing power plants to cut harmful emissions compared to 2005 levels. By 2030, the reduction would be 32% for carbon, 90% for sulfur dioxide and 72% for nitrogen oxides.

The rule was developed over years to cut “significant amounts of power plant carbon pollution and the pollutants that cause the soot and smog that harm health, while advancing clean energy innovation, development and deployment, and laying the foundation for the long-term strategy needed to tackle the threat of climate change,” according to an explanation from Obama’s EPA Web site.

Obama officials also touted the rule as key to protecting public health “because carbon pollution comes packaged with other dangerous air pollutants.” Having the rule in place, it says, would prevent 3,600 premature deaths, 1,700 heart attacks, 90,000 asthma attacks and 300,000 missed work days and school days each year.

“This is a reckless retreat that will hurt our children and grandchildren,” said Fred Krupp, president of the Environmental Defense Fund, echoing environmental activists and public health advocates.

Obama officials depicted the rule as one that gives states and utilities “ample flexibility and the time needed to achieve these pollution cuts … while expanding the capacity for zero- and low-emitting power sources.”

But opponents do not see it that way.

States are suing because they contend Washington does not have the authority to enact such a sweeping measure that they said would lead to higher electricity costs and reduced reliability of the nation’s power grid.

When the rule was implemented in 2015, New Jersey Commissioner of Environmental Protection Bob Martin called the rule “unprecedented regulatory overreach (that was) uncommonly cumbersome, difficult and costly to implement, could undermine reliability, and would yield insufficient results.”

Paul Bailey, president and CEO of the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, applauded the president earlier this year when he signed an executive order directing the EPA to begin the process of reviewing and rescinding the controversial rule.

“The Clean Power Plan is the poster child for regulations that are unnecessarily expensive and would have no meaningful environmental benefit,” Bailey said. “We look forward to working with EPA Administrator Pruitt to develop sensible policies that protect the environment without shutting down more coal-fueled power plants, one of our most resilient and affordable sources of electricity.”

Environmentalists have vowed to do what they can to block Pruitt’s rollback.

“The EPA’s announcement is the start, not the end of the process,” Ken Kimmell, president of the Union of Concerned Scientists, wrote on the organization’s Web site:

We must continue to make the case for lowering carbon pollution from power plants and accelerating the transition to clean energy, and put Pruitt’s EPA through the wringer for abandoning this key tool.  At the same time, we must push for actions by states, cities, businesses, and others to accelerate the transition to clean energy, regardless of what EPA ultimately does. And finally, one hopes that the DC Circuit Court of Appeals, which still has jurisdiction over this case, sees through this gambit and does its job—decide this legal dispute once and for all, the sooner, the better.

EPA officials say the proposed repeal will be conducted in a “robust, open, and transparent way, presenting a wide range of analysis scenarios to the public.” 

Liz Bowman, a spokeswoman for the agency, said any rule the administration proposes “will be done carefully and properly within the confines of the law.”

Contributing: Doyle Rice of USA TODAY

More: President Trump’s executive order will undo Obama’s Clean Power Plan rule

More: Harvey, Irma and global warming. We have to talk.

The fires began at about 10 p.m. Sunday and were fanned by wind gusts moving faster than 50 miles an hour, Ms. Upton said. The cause remained under investigation on Monday afternoon.

The worst fires in Northern California tend to hit in October, when dry conditions prime them to spread fast and far as heavy winds, known as north winds or diablo winds, buffet the region.

Ms. Upton said that conditions were critically dry, given the lack of moisture in the air and the buildup of grass, brush and trees.

“Combined, that’s a recipe for disaster,” she said.

Smoke billowed into the Bay Area, but the Marin County Fire Department reported that there were no separate fires in the area.

Reports suggested that residents in the region were caught unaware, many of them fleeing the area in cars and on foot as firefighters rushed to contain the outbreak. A number of roadways, including highways, were blocked by a fire.

Neighborhoods in Santa Rosa, the county seat of Sonoma, were evacuated, according to the city manager, who said the Kaiser Permanente and Sutter hospitals were being cleared out.

The fires raged through the hills that are home to some of the country’s most prized vineyards. The main north-south highway that connects San Francisco to the northernmost parts of California was closed Monday as fire engulfed both sides of the freeway. Santa Rosa is a hub for tours into wine country. At least two large hotels that cater to the wine tourism trade were destroyed by the fires.

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North of Santa Rosa’s downtown, residents of the Overlook, a hilltop apartment complex, used fire extinguishers to put out flames engulfing cypress trees planted along a building’s edge. Minutes later, the flames returned. At least three engines and ladder trucks arrived but could not stop flames on one of the buildings from spreading to the roof.

“It looks like they’re giving up on that one,” said Derek Smith, a Santa Rosa resident watching the blaze whose house was several blocks away.

When Mr. Smith awoke at 2:30 a.m. Monday to prepare to leave for work as an installer of laboratory equipment, he noticed very high winds and smelled smoke.

“It’s weird — I didn’t get any warnings or messages,” he said. “I left the house and then went back to get my mother’s jewelry.”

“The fire is everywhere now,” he said.

Traffic lights at multiple intersections in Santa Rosa were not functioning. Columns of black smoke could be seen in the evergreen forests on the northern outskirts of the city. A pall of white smoke across the city blotted out the sun.

Lisa Kaldunski, an operator at Sutter Santa Rosa Regional Hospital, said around 6:30 a.m. local time that the facility was being evacuated and that patients were being taken to other hospitals.

Marc Brown, a spokesman for Kaiser Permanente, said about 130 patients had been evacuated from the Santa Rosa medical center because of the fires.

The Lake and Mendocino County sheriffs’ offices ordered evacuations. The Butte County sheriff announced that there were two fires in the area and listed neighborhoods where evacuation was mandatory.

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Belia Ramos, the chairwoman of the Napa County board of supervisors, said the county was dealing with three main fires. One has threatened more than 10,000 acres in northern Napa County, another has endangered 8,000 to 12,000 acres, and a third has affected about 2,000 acres, she said.

Ms. Ramos said the fires were moving quickly and unpredictably. She said she did not know how many people had been evacuated early Monday, but added that the areas being evacuated were large and densely populated.

“Certainly we know that the numbers are high,” she said. “As day breaks and we get a better handle on this situation, we’ll be able to update those numbers.”

California was hit by fires throughout the summer. Late last month, several blazes led to the evacuation of about 1,000 people in Southern California.

“I’ve been with the department for 31 years and some years are notorious and they’re burned in your memory,” Ms. Upton said. “I’m afraid that 2017 is going to be added to that list now.”

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To some extent, however, the rift between the two men had been building for months, as Mr. Corker raised doubts about Mr. Trump’s character and fitness for office. Once a campaign supporter of the president, the senator has become openly derisive of his leadership.

After a report last week that Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson had once referred to Mr. Trump as a “moron,” Mr. Corker told reporters at the Capitol that Mr. Tillerson was one of three officials helping to “separate our country from chaos.” Those remarks were repeated on “Fox News Sunday,” which may have prompted Mr. Trump’s outburst.

In August, after Mr. Trump’s equivocal response to the deadly clashes in Charlottesville, Va., Mr. Corker told reporters that the president “has not yet been able to demonstrate the stability nor some of the competence that he needs to demonstrate in order to be successful.”

Mr. Trump’s feud with Mr. Corker is particularly perilous given that the president has little margin for error as he tries to pass a landmark overhaul of the tax code — his best hope of producing a major legislative achievement in the coming months.

If Senate Democrats end up unified in opposition to the promised tax bill, Mr. Trump would be able to lose the support of only two of the Senate’s 52 Republicans in order to pass it. That is the same challenging math that Mr. Trump and Senate Republican leaders faced in their failed effort to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act.

Mr. Corker, who is outspoken about the nation’s mounting debt, has already signaled deep reservations about the Republican effort to pass a tax overhaul, saying he would not vote for a tax bill that adds to the deficit.

In addition, Mr. Corker, who leads the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, could play a key role if Mr. Trump follows through on his threat to “decertify” the Iran nuclear deal, kicking to Congress the issue of whether to restore sanctions on Tehran and effectively scuttle the pact.

Republicans could opt to hold off on sanctions but use the threat of them to force Iran back to the negotiating table — a strategy being advocated by Senator Tom Cotton, the Arkansas Republican who is a leading hard-liner on Iran. But that approach could leave the United States isolated, since European allies have made it clear they would rather stick with the deal.

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Beyond the Iran deal, Mr. Corker’s committee holds confirmation hearings on Mr. Trump’s ambassadorial appointments. Were the president to push out Mr. Tillerson secretary of state — as some expect — Mr. Corker would lead the hearings on Mr. Trump’s nominee for the post.

Mr. Trump’s clash with Mr. Corker is somewhat analogous to his rancorous relationship with Senator John McCain, the Arizona Republican who, like Mr. Corker, is winding down his senate career and twice opposed Republican efforts to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act.

Mr. Trump’s budget chief, Mick Mulvaney, alluded to Mr. Corker’s political liberation, saying on “Meet the Press” that his decision not to run “sort of unleashes him to do whatever and say whatever he wants.”

A former mayor of Chattanooga, Mr. Corker, 65, has carved out a reputation over two terms in the Senate as a reliable, not overly partisan, Republican, who helped maneuver President Barack Obama’s divisive nuclear deal with Iran to a vote on the Senate floor. That exposed him to fierce fire from conservatives, who blame him for not blocking the agreement.

Mr. Corker was briefly a candidate to be Mr. Trump’s running mate in 2016, but he withdrew his name from consideration and later expressed ambivalence about Mr. Trump’s campaign, in part because he said he found it frustrating to discuss foreign policy with him.

“I don’t know that I really have a lot to say,” he said to a reporter in June, adding that he had tried to advise Mr. Trump and was “discouraged by the results.”

For much of Mr. Trump’s byzantine selection process for secretary of state, Mr. Corker was a dark horse. Though he met with Mr. Trump, he drew little of the attention of Mitt Romney, who dined with the president-elect at an expensive Manhattan restaurant and became the object of a very public tug of war between Mr. Trump’s aides.

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Known for his easygoing and affable manner, Mr. Corker’s positions on foreign policy issues are generally middle-of-the-road for a Republican. But he has shown occasional flashes of vehemence, particularly on subjects that concern him, like human trafficking.

In September 2016, Mr. Corker joined a small group of lawmakers at the residence of former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. for breakfast with Myanmar’s pro-democracy figure and government leader, Aung San Suu Kyi. Afterward, he bluntly faulted her for her reluctance to condemn the mistreatment of Myanmar’s Muslim Rohingya minority.

“While we certainly appreciate the work Aung San Suu Kyi has done to ensure a democratic transition in Burma,” he said, “I am somewhat appalled by her dismissive reaction to concerns I raised this morning about the problem of human trafficking in her country.”

But Mr. Corker is remembered most — and vilified by critics — for his role in advancing the Iran nuclear deal. Though not a fan of the agreement — he once accused former Secretary of State John Kerry of having been “fleeced” in the negotiations with the Iranians — he was instrumental in winning an up-and-down vote on it.

In the end, Republicans — including Mr. Corker himself, who voted against the deal — fell two votes short of the 60-vote threshold needed to pass a resolution killing the six-nation accord.

Republicans are less likely to do that this time, with a fellow Republican in the White House, but Mr. Corker’s voice will be important to framing how the Senate decides to handle the agreement.

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A crash outside a London museum that injured 11 people was not terror-related, police say.

A car mounted the pavement outside the Natural History Museum in Exhibition Road, South Kensington, at 14:20 BST.

The Metropolitan Police earlier said one person had been arrested and video footage that emerged on Twitter showed a man being restrained on the ground.

An update from the force said the incident was now being treated as “a road traffic collision”.

London Ambulance said the people it treated – including the detained man – had mostly sustained head and leg injuries. Nine were taken to hospital.

The Met said none of the injuries were believed to be life-threatening or life changing.

The man is being held in custody at a north London police station.

Prime Minister Theresa May tweeted her thanks to first responders and members of the public, adding: “My thoughts are with the injured.”

• Latest on London museum crash

London Mayor Sadiq Khan also tweeted his thanks and hopes for a “swift recovery” for those injured.

“For Londoners and visitors planning to visit our excellent museums and attractions in the area, please be assured they will be open as usual tomorrow.”

It took the Met almost four hours to confirm the circumstances around the incident.

The current terror threat in the UK is at “severe” – the second highest level – meaning an attack is highly likely.

Exhibition Road is an area popular with tourists as it is home to the Natural History Museum, the Science Museum and the Victoria and Albert Museum.

BBC reporter Chloe Hayward, who was leaving the Natural History Museum as the crash happened, said she saw a car “diagonally across the road”, looking like it had hit a bollard, before armed officers arrived.

At the scene

By Dominic Casciani, BBC home affairs correspondent

We have been to the south end of Exhibition Road nearest the Tube and the area, normally a busy destination for Saturday afternoon dining by locals and tourists, is deserted.

Eyewitnesses told us that police came rushing into each bar and restaurant and told people to get out.

We can see coats on chairs – some knocked over – half-eaten meals and half-drunk glasses of wine.

Police helped one restaurant owner to recover staff belongings, like house keys, because it’s unclear when the area will reopen.

An eyewitness who was walking to the Science Museum said: “When waiting for the light, we heard what I thought was gunshots and saw a car drive over the pavement. We just ran. My friend dived on the floor and cut her hands.”

The woman, who asked to remain anonymous, said: “When it calmed down we walked back to where we’d been and saw a gentleman on the floor being restrained by police.”

Connor Honeyman, from Essex, who was in the queue for the museum, said: “We heard a horrible thudding noise and a car engine. Everyone started running and screaming inside.

“We ran in, everyone was following us, and then all the security guards ran out and they closed the main entrance. There was much confusion before the police got there.”

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