Portal:Current events/2017 January 4
{{Current events|year=2017|month=01|day=4|content=
;Disasters and accidents
- 2017 Brooklyn train crash
- A commuter train from the Long Island Rail Road derails during the morning rush hour in Brooklyn, New York, injuring 103 people. [http://www.cbsnews.com/news/long-island-rail-road-train-derails-brooklyn/ (CBS)]
;Politics and elections
- Presidential transition of Donald Trump
- President-elect Donald Trump fills in more of his White House staff. [http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/312681-trump-taps-top-aides-to-rnc-sessions-for-key-white-house-roles (The Hill)]:
- Trump nominates Katie Walsh, former Republican National Committee (RNC) chief of staff, as Deputy White House Chief of Staff.
- Trump nominates Joe Hagin, former Deputy Chief of Staff for President George W. Bush, as Deputy White House chief of staff for operations.
- Trump nominates Rajiv Shah, former RNC Deputy Research Director, as White House research director.
- Trump nominates Rick Dearborn, United States Attorney General designee and Senator Jeff Sessions' former chief of staff, as head of the White House legislative affairs office.
- Trump nominates Omarosa Manigault, former contestant on The Apprentice, as an assistant to the president and director of communications for the Office of Public Liaison. [https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/people/2017/01/04/omarosa-gets-job-trump-white-house-public-liaison-leader/96167028/ (USA Today)]
- Trump nominates Wall Street lawyer Jay Clayton to head the Securities and Exchange Commission. [https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/01/04/trump-to-tap-wall-street-lawyer-jay-clayton-to-head-sec/ (The Washington Post)]
;Law and crime
- 2017 Chicago torture incident
- Chicago Police arrest four African-American suspects after they stream a video on Facebook showing themselves torturing and scalping a bound and gagged, kidnapped, white man with a mental disorder. The four suspects will face elevated hate crime charges. [https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jan/04/facebook-live-stream-video-man-attacked-chicago-trump (The Guardian)] [http://bigstory.ap.org/article/c0d964ae40f64e57a52cc3be213aa830 (AP)]
;Science and technology
- The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) announces the selection of two new Discovery Program space exploration missions: Lucy, a mission to several Jupiter trojan asteroids, and Psyche, a mission to the asteroid 16 Psyche, which is believed to be the exposed core of an early protoplanet. Both missions are scheduled for launch in the early 2020s. [https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-selects-two-missions-to-explore-the-early-solar-system (NASA)] [http://spaceflight101.com/lucy-and-psyche-discovery-mission-selection (Spaceflight101)]
}}