News category, Page 1271

More than a million tons a year of America’s plastic trash isn’t ending up where it should. The equivalent of as many as 1,300 plastic grocery bags per person is landing in places such as oceans and roadways, according to a new study of U.S. plastic trash. In 2016 —...

DES MOINES, Iowa — Even as a long-feared second wave of coronavirus infections strains hospitals, officials in many hard-hit states are resisting taking stronger action to stop the spread, with public fatigue and political calculations running up against pleas from health experts. Days before a presidential election that has spotlighted...

LITITZ, Pennsylvania — They began to arrive more than 40 hours before President Donald Trump took the stage in this stretch of rural Pennsylvania where horse-drawn buggies remain a common sight. By 10 p.m., a small group had set up an overnight camp on lawn chairs as a cold drizzle...

Spotlight PA is an independent, non-partisan newsroom powered by The Philadelphia Inquirer in partnership with PennLive/The Patriot-News, TribLIVE/Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, and WITF Public Media. Sign up for our free newsletters. HARRISBURG — In a precarious position in the polls and with his focus fixed on the swing state of Pennsylvania, President...

The Pennsylvania Department of Health posted 2,641 new cases of coronavirus Friday, its second highest tally in a single day. The new cases include 2,416 new one-day positive cases and 225 cases from previous days that were reported Friday, according to the state. With the latest batch, the state’s seven-day...

CONEWAGO — A Pennsylvania Department of Corrections bus that was carrying 38 inmates was involved in a crash on the Pennsylvania Turnpike early Friday, leaving a guard and 11 inmates with minor injuries. The crash in the turnpike’s eastbound lanes in Conewago Township was reported shortly after 9 a.m. A...

WASHINGTON — There are no crowds at Disneyland, still shut down by the coronavirus. Fewer fans attended the World Series this year than at any time in the past century. Big concerts are canceled. But it’s a different story in Trumpland. Thousands of President Donald Trump’s supporters regularly cram together...

WASHINGTON — It’s time for a change for most of the United States. The clock is running out once more for daylight saving time. Standard time begins at 2 a.m. local time Sunday. Until almost next spring, in states red and blue and in between, it’ll be lighter earlier in...

WAUKEGAN, Ill. — An Illinois judge said he will decide late Friday afternoon whether a 17-year-old accused of killing two demonstrators in Kenosha, Wisconsin, should be extradited across the border to stand trial on homicide charges. Defense lawyers had indicated before the hearing in Waukegan that they would call witnesses,...

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Thousands of Muslims, from Pakistan to Lebanon to the Palestinian territories, poured out of prayer services to join anti-France protests on Friday, as the French president’s vow to protect the right to caricature the Prophet Muhammad continues to roil the Muslim world. Demonstrations in Pakistan’s...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — A lawsuit filed by the state of Rhode Island against 21 fossil fuel companies seeking damages for the impacts of climate change will be allowed to proceed in state court, a federal appeals court has ruled. The decision Thursday by two judges of the 1st U.S. Circuit...

BOSTON — Two more former eBay Inc. employees have admitted to their roles in a campaign to terrorize a Massachusetts couple with threatening social media messages and disturbing deliveries of things like live spiders sent to their home. Brian Gilbert, 52, who was senior manager of special operations for eBay’s...

ISTANBUL — A strong earthquake struck Friday in the Aegean Sea between the Turkish coast and the Greek island of Samos, killing at least 14 people and injuring over 600 amid collapsed buildings and flooding, officials said. A small tsunami struck the Seferihisar district south of Izmir, the city in...

NICE, France — The investigation into a gruesome attack by a Tunisian man who killed three people in a French church had a second suspect in custody Friday, as France heightened its security alert amid religious and geopolitical tensions around cartoons mocking the Muslim prophet. Muslims held more anti-France protests...

ORLANDO, Fla. — A pregnant Florida woman didn’t let labor stop her from casting her vote in the presidential election, refusing to go to the hospital until she filled out her ballot. Officials with the Orange County Supervisor of Elections said the woman was already in labor when she arrived...

WARSAW, Poland — Women’s rights organizers are preparing for what they say will be the largest protest so far in over a week of mass nationwide street demonstrations in Poland triggered by a court ruling banning abortions of congenitally damaged fetuses. The march is planned for Friday evening in Warsaw,...

STOCKHOLM — The Swedish domestic security agency said two individuals have been charged with attempted murder and accessory to attempted murder in a February hammer attack on a blogger and critic of Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov. The agency, known as SAPO, said in a statement issued Thursday that “the attack...

BOSTON — Federal agencies warned that cybercriminals could unleash a wave of data-scrambling extortion attempts against the U.S. health care system, an effort that, if successful, could paralyze hospital information systems just as nationwide cases of covid-19 are spiking. In a joint alert Wednesday, the FBI and two federal agencies...

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration has pumped billions of dollars into the health care industry during the covid-19 crisis, padding bottom lines at some of the country’s most profitable businesses even as millions of Americans have been left struggling with mounting medical bills. And although taxpayer money has poured into...

WASHINGTON — Looking to undermine Democratic rival Joe Biden, President Donald Trump’s campaign is pushing a familiar line of attack: unverified allegations about Biden’s son and his foreign business ties. But reporting in the New York Post, and the emergence of a man who says he worked with Hunter Biden,...

Facing a pandemic, record unemployment and unknown future costs for covid-19 treatments, health insurers selling Affordable Care Act plans to individuals reacted by lowering rates in some areas and, overall, issuing only modest premium increases for 2021. “What’s been fascinating is that carriers in general are not projecting much impact...

COLUMBUS — Two Ohio political operatives pleaded guilty Thursday to charges that they conspired as part of what another defendant called an “unholy alliance” aimed at bailing out two aging Ohio nuclear power plants, court documents show. Former Republican House Speaker Larry Householder and four others were charged with racketeering...

PHILADELPHIA — Philadelphia could soon join other cities in blocking police from using tear gas, rubber bullets or pepper spray on protesters as the city continues to churn over the fatal police shooting of a Black man days before the heated presidential election. The sharp political battles being drawn nationwide...

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — A local judge in a north Florida county resigned Thursday from a vote-counting board after concerns were raised about his political partisanship. The Florida Times-Union reports that Senior County Judge Brent Shore resigned from the Duval County Canvassing Board after the newspaper reported he had donated $170...

HOUSTON — Months before the Trump administration separated thousands of families at the U.S.-Mexico border, a “pilot program” in Texas left child-welfare officials scrambling to find empty beds for babies taken from their parents in a preview of bigger problems to come, according to a report released Thursday by congressional...