Congress approves Toomey-led bill expanding animal cruelty law
WASHINGTON — Congress has passed a bill making certain types of animal cruelty a federal felony. The bill would expand a 2010 law that made creation or distribution of so-called “animal crushing” videos illegal. The new bill would make the underlying acts of cruelty a federal crime. The Senate unanimously...
Trump attacks whistleblower anonymity, but won’t utter nameVideo
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump is blasting the media for not reporting the name of a person who has been identified in conservative circles as the whistleblower who spurred the impeachment inquiry. Yet Trump has carefully avoided using the name himself. Exposing whistleblowers can be dicey, even for a president....
House Dems announce public impeachment hearings next week
WASHINGTON — House Democrats will launch a major new phase of their impeachment inquiry next week with public hearings that will feature three State Department officials who have testified about their concerns about President Donald Trump’s dealings with Ukraine. House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, who is leading the impeachment...
Kansas City votes to remove MLK’s name from historic street
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Kansas City voters on Tuesday overwhelmingly approved removing Dr. Martin Luther King’s name from one of the city’s most historic boulevards, less than a year after the city council decided to rename The Paseo for the civil rights icon. Unofficial results showed the proposal to remove...
Sheriff: Murder suspects who fled California jail arrested
SAN FRANCISCO — Two murder suspects who escaped from a California jail over the weekend were arrested by federal officials, authorities said Wednesday. The Monterey County Sheriff’s Office said in a tweet that Jonathan Salazar, 20, and Santos Fonseca, 21, were arrested by Customs and Border Protection officials. It says...
Judge rejects moral-objection rule for abortion providers
A federal judge on Wednesday struck down a new rule, not yet in effect, that allowed health care clinicians to refuse participation in abortions and other services on moral or religious grounds. U.S. District Judge Paul A. Engelmayer in New York said he was tossing out the rule in its...
Caller leads LA police to $800,000 in stolen artwork
LOS ANGELES — This time, detectives didn’t have to track down the stolen art. Someone brought it to them. Los Angeles police said Tuesday they recovered $800,000 worth of prints by Scottish abstract expressionist Benjamin Creme after a caller said they were in a home in the Los Angeles suburb...
Citing voter approval, Marsy’s Law supporters call on ACLU to drop challenge
Advocates are calling on the ACLU of Pennsylvania to drop its lawsuit against a proposed crime victims’ rights amendment to the state constitution after unofficial election results showed voters approved it 3-1 Tuesday. The amendment, which passed the General Assembly twice in the last two years, was scheduled to become...
High-tech chestnuts: U.S. to consider genetically altered treeVideo
SYRACUSE, N.Y. — Chestnuts harvested from high branches on a chilly fall morning look typical: they’re marble sized, russet colored and nestled in prickly burs. But many are like no other nuts in nature. In a feat of genetic engineering, about half the chestnuts collected at this college experiment station...
Voters in U.S. states decide on sanctuary city, Airbnb rentals
Voters in the West took a dim view of taxes, while New Yorkers backed a new way to elect some of their leaders and a New Jersey city cracked down on Airbnb. Tucson voters seemed uninterested in becoming a sanctuary city, and those in Washington weighed whether to roll back...
Beshear claims victory in Kentucky governor race; Bevin refuses to concedeVideo
LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Kentucky’s bitter race for governor went into overtime as Democrat Andy Beshear declared victory while Republican Gov. Matt Bevin, a close ally of President Donald Trump, refused to concede with results showing he trailed by a few thousand votes. Kentucky has some sorting out to do before...
Democrats promise swift action after win in VirginiaVideo
RICHMOND, Va. — Virginia Democrats promised swift action on a host of liberal policy proposals now that they’ve won full control of state government for the first time in more than two decades. Democratic leaders said Virginians should expect a higher minimum wage, new gun restrictions and greater abortion rights...
Police: Man using racist slurs killed in Waffle House fight
JACKSON, Ga. — The Georgia Bureau of Investigation says a man was shot to death at a Waffle House as a result of calling other patrons racist slurs and starting a fight. The GBI says Butts County deputies responded Halloween night to three 911 calls that were minutes apart. The...
Democrats win full control of Virginia statehouse
RICHMOND, Va. — Virginia Democrats continued their winning streak under President Trump on Tuesday and took full control of the statehouse for the first time in more than two decades. Democrats won majorities in both the state House and Senate in the marquee warmup for next year’s presidential election, the...
Dem leads Kentucky governor’s race that’s too close to callVideo
LOUISVILLE, Ky. — The hotly contested race governor’s race in Kentucky was too close to call Tuesday night, with Democratic Attorney General Andy Beshear holding a narrow lead over Republican Gov. Matt Bevin. With 100 percent of precincts reporting, Beshear had a lead of 4,658 votes out of more than...
Chester County woman charged with faking cancer in fund-raiser scam
PHILADELPHIA — A Chester Springs woman has been charged with netting more than $10,000 in a fund-raising scam in which she falsely claimed she had cancer and needed money. In a criminal complaint, Uwchlan Township Police detectives laid out a months-long investigation of increasingly escalating lies that ended in the...
Most Republicans on impeachment committees aren’t showing up, transcripts revealVideo
WASHINGTON — Republicans have for weeks blasted the closed-door impeachment process, but transcripts released this week of private depositions show most GOP lawmakers on the three panels at the center of the probe have simply not shown up. The low attendance for most committee Republicans paints a very different picture...
‘I was appalled’: Black customers say Buffalo Wild Wings host told them to moveVideo
AURORA, Ill. — An attorney representing a group of black customers who say they were asked to change tables at a Chicago-area Buffalo Wild Wings because of their skin color urged the restaurant chain Tuesday to make wholesale changes to avoid a discrimination lawsuit. Some children who attended the birthday...
California mom Coral Lytle gets 4 years in prison for sex with teen boys
TULARE, Calif. — A central California mother convicted of having sex with two teenage boys has been sentenced to four years in prison. The Fresno Bee reports 42-year-old Coral Lytle, of Tulare, was sentenced Monday and taken into custody. Lytle wept as she was placed in handcuffs and several of...
Maryland police seek to ID suspect in death over Popeyes chicken sandwichVideo
OXON HILL, Md. —Police are trying to identify a suspect accused of fatally stabbing a man who was cutting in line for a chicken sandwich at a Popeyes restaurant in Maryland. Detectives believe Kevin Tyrell Davis, 28, of Oxon Hill had been cutting in line for 15 minutes when another...
Florida deputy arrested for throwing student to ground
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — A Florida sheriff’s deputy who worked at a school for children with emotional and behavioral problems is facing a felony charge after video shows him slamming a female student to the ground after she tapped his knee with her foot. Broward County Deputy Willard Miller was...
Impeachment reversal: Ambassador Gordon Sondland now acknowledges quid pro quoVideo
WASHINGTON — In a striking reversal, a top diplomat revised his testimony in the House impeachment inquiry to acknowledge that U.S. military aid to Ukraine was being withheld until the foreign ally promised to investigate corruption as President Donald Trump wanted. The three-page update from U.S. Ambassador Gordon Sondland, tucked...
Student: CVS workers rejected Puerto Rico ID, asked for visa
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — CVS apologized and said it’s investigating after a Purdue University engineering student was denied the purchase of over-the-counter cold medicine by employees who questioned his immigration status, refusing to accept his Puerto Rican driver’s license and U.S. passport. José Guzmán Payano said a clerk and shift...
Trump plugs son’s book while accusing Bidens of self-dealing
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump has accused former Vice President Joe Biden of major ethical lapses and railed against Biden’s son for allegedly profiting off his father’s office. But on Monday, Trump used his Twitter feed to publicize a new book by his eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., telling his...
Coroner: Woman found in home died from multiple dog bites
WAYNESVILLE, Ohio — Police say a pair of dogs suspected in the deadly mauling of an Ohio woman had bitten her and others in the past. A corner says 49-year-old Mary Matthews of Waynesville bled to death from numerous bites. Police say her husband found her body Friday. Police say...
