Beyonce and Oprah Winfrey lead tributes to rock queen Tina Turner
Beyonce and Oprah Winfrey are among those who have paid tribute to Tina Turner, who has died aged 83.
Turner, one of rock’s great vocalists and most charismatic performers, died after a long illness at her home near Zurich in Switzerland, according to her spokesperson.
The US-born star was known for her electric stage presence and hits including The Best, Proud Mary, Private Dancer and What’s Love Got to Do With It.
Beyonce called Turner “my beloved queen” on her website, adding: “I love you endlessly.
“I’m so grateful for your inspiration, and all the ways you have paved the way.
“You are strength and resilience, you are the epitome of power and passion.
“We are all so fortunate to have witnessed your kindness and beautiful spirit that will forever remain.
“Thank you for all you have done.”
Oprah Winfrey and Tina Turner in 2005
Winfrey’s tribute on Instagram said Turner had been a “real friend” and “our forever goddess of rock ‘n’ roll who contained a magnitude of inner strength that grew throughout her life”.
She added: “Once she claimed her freedom from years of domestic abuse, her life became a clarion call for triumph.
“I’m grateful for her courage, for showing us what victory looks like wearing Manolos and a leather miniskirt.
“She once shared with me that when her time came to leave this earth, she would not be afraid, but excited and curious.
“Because she had learned how to live surrounded by her beloved husband Erwin and friends.
“I am a better woman, a better human, because her life touched mine.
“She was indeed simply the best.”
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Elton John and Tina Turner in New York in 1995.
Mick Jagger and Tina Tuner in New York in 1989.
Other tributes came from Sir Mick Jagger, Sir Elton John, Diana Ross, Bette Midler and Giorgio Armani.
“She was truly an enormously talented performer and singer,” said Rolling Stones frontman Jagger.
“She was inspiring, warm, funny and generous. She helped me so much when I was young and I will never forget her.”
Sir Elton posted a picture of himself with Turner and said she was “untouchable” and a “total legend on record and on stage”.
Turner found fame in the 1960s alongside ex-husband Ike Turner, with the classics River Deep, Mountain High and Nutbush City Limits among their hits.
The domestic abuse Ike subjected her to – and her struggle to break free – was documented in a 1993 film starring Angela Bassett, which won three Oscars.
Turner’s life story was also immortalised in a popular West End show that is still running.
Her popularity waned by the end of the 1970s and she found herself mainly playing the cabaret circuit as a heritage act.
However, her career was dramatically resurrected in 1983 when a cover of Al Green’s Let’s Stay Together became a huge hit.
Turner, then in her 40s, signed a new contract with Capitol Records which led to the Private Dancer album in 1984.
The title track, as well as What’s Love Got to Do With It, and I Can’t Stand the Rain were among the album’s seven singles, and it sold more than 10 million copies.
Her best-known song – with its distinctive intro, steady build and powerful chorus – is probably The Best, released in 1989.
Tina and Ike Turner performing in 1966. Pic: AP
Tina Turner with a chocolate sculpture of one of her legs, which she famously claimed to have insured for $3.2m. Pic: AP
There was also a foray into film alongside Mel Gibson in 1985’s Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, a movie that spawned another hit, We Don’t Need Another Hero.
Born Anna Mae Bullock in a segregated Tennessee hospital in November 1939, Turner became a Swiss citizen a decade ago.
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Tina Tuner meets the King, then Prince Charles. Pic: AP
Tina Turner with her husband Erwin Bach in Zurich in 2011
She lived on a sprawling estate on Lake Zurich with her husband and former EMI record executive Erwin Bach, some 16 years her junior.
The couple met in 1985, with Turner once telling Winfrey it was love at first sight when he was sent to pick her up from an airport in Germany.
“He had the prettiest face. You could not miss it,” she said.
“It was like saying, ‘Where did he come from?’ He was really that good looking. My heart went bu-bum. It means that a soul has met. My hands were shaking.”
Tina Turner and Lionel Richie at the Grammy Awards in 1985. Pic: AP
Turner had four children, two of them she adopted from Ike’s first marriage.
Her eldest son, Craig Raymond Turner, who she had when she was 18, died in an apparent suicide five years ago, and in 2022 her second son Ronnie died of cancer.
Turner previously had intestinal cancer and suffered a stroke, revealing in 2018 that her husband had donated a kidney to save her life as she contemplated assisted suicide.
Donald Trump has said he is considering “taking away” the US citizenship of actress and comedian Rosie O’Donnell, despite a Supreme Court ruling that expressly prohibits a government from doing so.
In a post on Truth Social on Saturday, the US president said: “Because of the fact that Rosie O’Donnell is not in the best interests of our Great Country, I am giving serious consideration to taking away her Citizenship.”
He also labelled O’Donnell, who has moved to Ireland, as a “threat to humanity” and said she should “remain in the wonderful country of Ireland, if they want her”.
O’Donnell responded on Instagram by posting a photograph of Mr Trump with Jeffrey Epstein.
“You are everything that is wrong with America and I’m everything you hate about what’s still right with it,” she wrote in the caption.
“I’m not yours to silence. I never was.”
Rosie O’Donnell moved to Ireland after Donald Trump secured a second term. Pic: AP
O’Donnell moved to Ireland with her 12-year-old son in January after Mr Trump had secured a second term.
She has said she’s in the process of obtaining Irish citizenship based on family lineage and that she would only return to the US “when it is safe for all citizens to have equal rights there in America”.
O’Donnell and the US president have criticised each other publicly for years, in an often-bitter back-and-forth that predates Mr Trump’s move into politics.
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This is just the latest threat by the president to revoke the citizenship of someone he has disagreed with, most recently his former ally Elon Musk.
But the two situations are different as while Musk was born in South Africa, O’Donnell was born in the US and has a constitutional right to American citizenship.
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Amanda Frost, a law professor at the University of Virginia School of Law, said the Supreme Court ruled in a 1967 case that the fourteenth amendment of the constitution prevents the government from taking away citizenship.
“The president has no authority to take away the citizenship of a native-born US citizen,” he added.
“In short, we are nation founded on the principle that the people choose the government; the government cannot choose the people.”
A farmer who fell from a greenhouse roof during an anti-immigrant raid at a licensed cannabis facility in California this week has died of his injuries.
Jaime Alanis, 57, is the first person to die as a result of Donald Trump’s Immigration Compliance and Enforcement (ICE) raids.
His niece, Yesenia Duran, posted on the fundraising site GoFundMe to say her uncle was his family’s only provider and he had been sending his earnings back to his wife and daughter in Mexico.
The United Food Workers said Mr Alanis had worked on the farm for 10 years.
“These violent and cruel federal actions terrorise American communities, disrupt the American food supply chain, threaten lives and separate families,” the union said in a recent statement on X.
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The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said it executed criminal search warrants at Glass House Farms facilities on Thursday.
Mr Alanis called family to say he was hiding and possibly fleeing agents before he fell around 30ft (9m) from the roof and broke his neck, according to information from family, hospital and government sources.
Agents arrested 200 people suspected of being in the country illegally and identified at least 10 immigrant children on the sites, the DHS said in a statement.
Mr Alanis was not among them, the agency said.
“This man was not in and has not been in CBP (Customs and Border Protection) or ICE custody,” DHS assistant secretary for public affairs Tricia McLaughlin said.
“Although he was not being pursued by law enforcement, this individual climbed up to the roof of a greenhouse and fell 30ft. CBP immediately called a medivac to the scene to get him care as quickly as possible.”
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Four US citizens were arrested during the incident for allegedly “assaulting or resisting officers”, the DHS said, and authorities were offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of a person suspected of firing a gun at federal agents.
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In a statement, Glass House, a licensed Cannabis grower, said immigration agents had valid warrants. It said workers were detained and it is helping provide them with legal representation.
“Glass House has never knowingly violated applicable hiring practices and does not and has never employed minors,” it added.
Donald Trump has said he is considering “taking away” the US citizenship of actress and comedian Rosie O’Donnell, despite a Supreme Court ruling that expressly prohibits a government from doing so.
In a post on Truth Social on Saturday, the US president said: “Because of the fact that Rosie O’Donnell is not in the best interests of our Great Country, I am giving serious consideration to taking away her Citizenship.”
He also labelled O’Donnell, who has moved to Ireland, as a “threat to humanity” and said she should “remain in the wonderful country of Ireland, if they want her”.
O’Donnell responded on Instagram by posting a photograph of Mr Trump with Jeffrey Epstein.
“You are everything that is wrong with America and I’m everything you hate about what’s still right with it,” she wrote in the caption.
“I’m not yours to silence. I never was.”
Rosie O’Donnell moved to Ireland after Donald Trump secured a second term. Pic: AP
O’Donnell moved to Ireland with her 12-year-old son in January after Mr Trump had secured a second term.
She has said she’s in the process of obtaining Irish citizenship based on family lineage and that she would only return to the US “when it is safe for all citizens to have equal rights there in America”.
O’Donnell and the US president have criticised each other publicly for years, in an often-bitter back-and-forth that predates Mr Trump’s move into politics.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Will Trump address parliament on UK state visit?
This is just the latest threat by the president to revoke the citizenship of someone he has disagreed with, most recently his former ally Elon Musk.
But the two situations are different as while Musk was born in South Africa, O’Donnell was born in the US and has a constitutional right to American citizenship.
Read more from Sky News:
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Amanda Frost, a law professor at the University of Virginia School of Law, said the Supreme Court ruled in a 1967 case that the fourteenth amendment of the constitution prevents the government from taking away citizenship.
“The president has no authority to take away the citizenship of a native-born US citizen,” he added.
“In short, we are nation founded on the principle that the people choose the government; the government cannot choose the people.”
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