Ohio bans gender-affirming care and restricts transgender athletes despite GOP governor’s veto
COLUMBUS — Ohio has banned gender-affirming care for minors and restricted transgender women’s and girls’ participation on sports teams, a move that has families of transgender children scrambling over how best to care for them. The Republican-dominated Senate voted Wednesday to override GOP Gov. Mike DeWine’s veto. The new law...
State university workers reach tentative contract with Pa. university system
The union representing 700 state university employees who work in admissions and financial aid, residence life, career services and other student support has reached a tentative contract agreement with the State System of Higher Education. The pact involving members of the State College and University Professional Association (SCUPA) would span...
The primaries have just begun. But Trump and Biden are already shifting to a November mindset
NEW YORK — Barely 400,000 votes have been cast in two rural Republican primaries over the span of eight days. But both Donald Trump and Joe Biden are behaving like their parties’ nominees already. Trump’s double-digit victory Tuesday in independent-minded New Hampshire, where he was considered more vulnerable than perhaps...
Proud Boys member sentenced to 6 years in prison for Capitol riot role after berating judge
WASHINGTON — A man who stormed the U.S. Capitol with fellow Proud Boys extremist group members was sentenced on Wednesday to six years in prison after he berated and insulted the judge who punished him. Marc Bru repeatedly interrupted Chief Judge James Boasberg before he handed down the sentence, calling...
Who are No Labels’ donors? Democratic groups file complaints in an attempt to find out
WASHINGTON — For months, the centrist group No Labels has stockpiled cash and diligently worked to secure ballot access for a potential third-party presidential bid, striking fear among allies of President Joe Biden that the effort could siphon away votes and hand the White House to Donald Trump. Now, with...
Scientists spot previously unknown colonies of emperor penguins in Antarctica
Previously unknown colonies of emperor penguins have been spotted in new satellite imagery. Emperor penguins, considered “near threatened” with extinction, are the world’s largest penguins. They raise their chicks in Antarctic winter on patches of frozen sea ice. But if the ice breaks up before the chicks have fledged, most...
Hungary is the last holdout for Sweden’s NATO membership. So when will Orbán follow Turkey’s lead?
BUDAPEST, Hungary — With Turkey completing its ratification of Sweden’s bid to join NATO, Hungary is the last member of the military alliance not to have given its approval. After more than a year of delays, and consistent urging from its Western partners to move forward with Sweden’s application, the...
Russia accuses Kyiv of downing a military transport plane, killing all 74 aboard, including POWs
Russia’s Defense Ministry on Wednesday accused Ukrainian forces of shooting down a military transport plane, killing all 74 people aboard, including 65 Ukrainian prisoners of war being swapped. Ukrainian officials did not immediately confirm or deny Russia’s claims about the crash in Russia’s Belgorod border region, although they said they...
New report sees a boost in undergraduate enrollment on college campuses
Research released Wednesday suggests fall undergraduate enrollment on college campuses across most of the nation rose for the first time since before the covid-19 pandemic, ending a slump that has strained many institutions. But while more than two-thirds of states saw overall gains, others — including Pennsylvania — continued as...
A blast of cold lets gators show off a special skill to survive icy weather
The recent blast of cold weather has given alligators a chance to show off their way of coping with freezing temperatures. The Swamp Park Outdoor Adventure Center in Ocean Isle Beach, North Carolina, posted eerie videos on social media on Sunday showing alligators suspended in frozen ponds with just the...
Heavy fighting in Gaza’s 2nd-largest city leaves hundreds of patients stranded in main hospital
RAFAH, Gaza Strip — Israeli forces battled Palestinian militants on Wednesday near the main hospital in Gaza’s second-largest city of Khan Younis, where medics said hundreds of patients and thousands of displaced people were unable to leave because of the fighting. Israel has ordered residents to leave a swath of...
Americans’ economic outlook brightens as inflation slows and wages outpace prices
WASHINGTON — After an extended period of gloom, Americans are starting to feel better about inflation and the economy — a trend that could sustain consumer spending, fuel economic growth and potentially affect President Joe Biden’s political fortunes. A measure of consumer sentiment by the University of Michigan has jumped...
As Hempfield pushes to unite fire department, stations grapple with future
Capt. Steve Kohl won’t miss worrying about keeping the lights on at the Midway-St. Clair Volunteer Fire Department. After putting the question to a vote, the majority of his station’s 20 members made up their minds — Midway-St. Clair would “go all in” and become a nonchartered fire station in...
Bill to have Floridians pay Trump legal fees draws veto threat from Ron DeSantis
MIAMI — A Miami Republican says she’ll drop a push to have Florida taxpayers help foot former President Donald Trump’s legal fees after Gov. Ron DeSantis came out in opposition to her bill. State Sen. Ileana Garcia, R-Miami, authored a proposal that would grant up to $5 million to the...
Appeals court rejects Trump’s bid to reconsider gag order in the election interference case
WASHINGTON — Washington’s federal appeals court on Tuesday rejected Donald Trump’s request to reconsider a gag order restricting the former president’s speech in the case charging him with plotting to overturn the 2020 election. Lawyers for the Republican presidential front-runner had asked the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the...
Pennsylvania state police, pension agency lost some online records, officials say
HARRISBURG — The Pennsylvania State Police is working to recover access to online records of how it handled evidence, state officials said, blaming the loss of the records on a mistake during routine server maintenance The same mistake also affected the State Employees Retirement System, which said online users temporarily...
‘Doomsday Clock’ signals existential threats of nuclear war, climate disasters and AIVideo
WASHINGTON — Earth, for the second year running, is nearing apocalypse, a science-oriented advocacy group said, pointing to its famous “Doomsday Clock” that shows 90 seconds till midnight. The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists made the annual announcement Tuesday rating how close humanity is from ending. It cited nuclear threat in...
New York man convicted of murdering woman who wound up in his backcountry driveway after wrong turn
FORT EDWARD, N.Y. — A man was convicted of second-degree murder Tuesday for fatally shooting a young woman when the SUV she was riding in mistakenly drove up his rural driveway in upstate New York. A jury found Kevin Monahan, 66, guilty of second-degree murder for shooting 20-year-old Kaylin Gillis...
Martin Luther King’s daughter recalls late brother as strong guardian of their father’s legacy
ATLANTA — The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s daughter remembered her late brother on Tuesday as a fierce and visionary steward of their father’s legacy. The Rev. Bernice King choked back tears at times as she shared memories of her childhood and recent visits with Dexter Scott King, who died...
Charles Osgood, CBS host on TV and radio and network’s poet-in-residence, dies at age 91Video
NEW YORK — Charles Osgood, a five-time Emmy Award-winning journalist who anchored “CBS Sunday Morning” for more than two decades, hosted the long-running radio program “The Osgood File” and was referred to as CBS News’ poet-in-residence, has died. He was 91. CBS reported that Osgood died Tuesday at his home...
Los Angeles Times to lay off one-fourth of newsroom staff starting this week, union head says
LOS ANGELES — The Los Angeles Times plans to lay off 94 newsroom employees — one-fourth of its newsroom staff — starting Tuesday, a number that is substantial but less than feared, the head of the journalists union said. The announcement comes after the LA Times Guild walked off the...
PennWest plans to transfer Clarion’s Venango campus to economic growth nonprofit
For decades, the modest hillside campus embodied the State System of Higher Education’s promise to deliver a public university education wherever needed — in this case, a small satellite location in the heart of Pennsylvania’s oil region. Students attending what was then the Venango branch of Clarion University in Oil...
George Santos says he doesn’t plan to vote in the special election to fill his former seat
CENTRAL ISLIP, N.Y. — Former U.S. Rep. George Santos says he doesn’t plan to vote in next month’s special election to fill his now vacant seat in Congress. The disgraced New York Republican, who became only the sixth lawmaker in history to be expelled from the U.S. House of Representatives...
Gov. Josh Shapiro’s administration blames ‘human error’ for deletion of state police records
HARRISBURG — Thousands of records, including evidence logs from the Pennsylvania State Police’s crime labs, were accidentally deleted from state servers at the start of the year — the result of “human error,” Gov. Josh Shapiro’s administration said. Though the majority of records have been restored, according to administration officials,...
Gov. Josh Shapiro’s administration blames ‘human error’ for deletion of state police records
Spotlight PA is an independent, nonpartisan, and nonprofit newsroom producing investigative and public-service journalism that holds power to account and drives positive change in Pennsylvania. HARRISBURG — Thousands of records, including evidence logs from the Pennsylvania State Police’s crime labs, were accidentally deleted from state servers at the start of...
