1 North Dakota officer killed, 2 injured in shooting that left suspect dead
FARGO, N.D. — One police officer was killed and two others were critically injured in a shooting that also left the suspect dead on a busy street in Fargo, North Dakota, police said. A civilian also was seriously wounded in the shooting that happened just before 3 p.m. Friday, police...
Efforts to deceive are a top concern among state election officials heading into 2024
WASHINGTON — Efforts to deceive the public about voting and elections remain a top concern for state election officials as they dig into preparations for the 2024 election. Misinformation and the emergence of generative artificial intelligence tools to create false and misleading content were cited in interviews with several secretaries...
DeSantis makes play for evangelical voters to chip away at Trump
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said signing a law restricting abortion in his state had cost him donors and support, defending the decision as he sought to burnish his credentials with evangelical voters in Iowa. “I lost a lot of really big supporters — some of them just aren’t pro- life,...
Mexico files border boundaries complaint over Texas’ floating barrier plan on Rio Grande
MEXICO CITY — Mexico’s top diplomat said Friday her country has sent a diplomatic note to the U.S. government expressing concern that Texas’ deployment of floating barriers on the Rio Grande may violate 1944 and 1970 treaties on boundaries and water. Foreign Relations Secretary Alicia Bárcena said Mexico will send...
U.S. sending F-16 fighter jets to protect ships from Iranian seizures in Gulf region
WASHINGTON — The U.S. is beefing up its use of fighter jets around the strategic Strait of Hormuz to protect ships from Iranian seizures, a senior defense official said Friday, adding that the U.S. is increasingly concerned about the growing ties between Iran, Russia and Syria across the Middle East....
House Republicans push through defense bill limiting abortion access, halting diversity efforts
WASHINGTON — The House passed a sweeping defense bill Friday that provides an expected 5.2% pay raise for service members but strays from traditional military policy with Republicans add-ons blocking abortion coverage, diversity initiatives at the Pentagon and transgender care that deeply divided the chamber. Democrats voted against the package,...
How DOJ made different death penalty decisions in the Pittsburgh synagogue and Texas mall massacres
CHICAGO — Two separate shootings 2,000 miles apart. One killed 11 at a Pittsburgh synagogue. The other killed 23 at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas. Both were motivated by hate. Both involved gunmen who later claimed mental illness. But earlier this year, the Justice Department authorized the death penalty...
Trump asks top Georgia court to disqualify election probe prosecutor and toss grand jury report
ATLANTA — Lawyers for former President Donald Trump are asking Georgia’s highest court to prevent the district attorney who has been investigating his actions in the wake of the 2020 election from prosecuting him and to throw out a special grand jury report that is part of the inquiry. Fulton...
Jesse Jackson to step down as head of civil rights organization Rainbow PUSH
CHICAGO — The Rev. Jesse Jackson plans to step down from leading the Chicago civil rights organization Rainbow PUSH Coalition he founded in 1971, his son’s congressional office said Friday. A spokesperson for U.S. Rep. Jonathan Jackson confirmed the long-time civil rights leader would be retiring from the organization. The...
New Jersey gambling revenue up nearly 14%, but most casinos still trail pre-pandemic levels
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. — New Jersey’s casinos, horse tracks that take sports bets, and the online partners of both those types of gambling won more than $457 million in June, an increase of nearly 14% from a year earlier. But the key metric for Atlantic City’s nine casinos — the...
GOP White House hopefuls face mounting pressure to stop Trump in Iowa
DES MOINES, Iowa — As the six-month sprint to the Iowa caucuses begins, the sprawling field of Republican presidential candidates is facing growing pressure to prove they can become serious challengers to former President Donald Trump. The urgency is particularly acute for Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who entered the race...
Disney asks judge to toss a lawsuit from board of DeSantis appointees
ORLANDO, Fla. — Disney asked a Florida judge on Friday to toss out a lawsuit against the company’s efforts to neutralize a takeover of Disney World’s governing district by Gov. Ron DeSantis and his appointees. The case in state court in Orlando is one of two stemming from the takeover,...
Former Trump White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson, a key witness at Jan. 6 hearings, has book deal
NEW YORK — A former White House aide to President Donald Trump who became a prominent congressional witness against him and his allies in the wake of the Jan. 6 siege of the U.S. Capitol has a book deal. Cassidy Hutchinson’s “Enough” will be released Sept. 26 by Simon &...
Biden and Democrats raised $72 million-plus for his 2024 race
WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden and the Democratic National Committee raised more than $72 million for his reelection in the 10 weeks since he announced his 2024 candidacy, his campaign announced Friday, in a strong but not record performance by an incumbent. That is all the money raised between April...
The term ‘unalive’ is a way that kids can safely discuss and understand serious matters
When Emily Litman was in middle school, kids whose parents grounded them would blithely lament: “I just want to die.” Now she’s a middle school teacher in New Jersey, and when her students’ phones and TikTok access are taken away, their out-loud whining has a 21st-century digital twist: “I feel...
Long Island architect charged in 3 of the Gilgo Beach serial killings
NEW YORK — A Long Island architect was charged Friday with murder in the deaths of three of the 11 victims in a long-unsolved string of killings known as the Gilgo Beach murders after detectives pursuing a new lead say they matched DNA from a pizza he ate to genetic...
Crowds cheer as India launches a lander and rover to explore the moon’s south pole
SRIHARIKOTA, India — An Indian spacecraft blazed its way to the far side of the moon Friday in a follow-up mission to its failed effort nearly four years ago to land a rover softly on the lunar surface, the country’s space agency said. Chandrayaan-3, the word for “moon craft” in...
Mark Cuban rules out running for president in 2024
And for those reasons, he’s out. Mt. Lebanon native Mark Cuban, who’s fond of using that line when he declines to invest in a pitch on “Shark Tank,” has decided he will not mount a third-party campaign for president in 2024. “No. My family would disown me,” Cuban wrote in...
DeSantis has hammered Biden on rising prices. Now Florida is an inflation hotspot
As he relentlessly accuses President Joe Biden and national Democrats of fueling rising costs and fiscal mismanagement, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is facing stubbornly high inflation in his own backyard. New data released this week show prices in the Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach metro area jumped 9% in the 12...
One-third of Americans under heat alerts as blistering weather spreads from Southwest to CaliforniaVideo
PALM SPRINGS, Calif. — More than a third of Americans were under extreme heat advisories, watches and warnings Thursday as a blistering heat wave that’s been baking the nation spread further into California, forcing residents to seek out air conditioning or find other ways to stay cool in triple-digit temperatures....
Rioter who hurled bow like a spear at police during Jan. 6 attack gets more than 7 years in prison
WASHINGTON — A professional butcher whose bloody, wild-eyed face became one of the most memorable images of the U.S. Capitol riot was sentenced Thursday to more than seven years in prison for hurling a bow like a spear at police and attacking several other officers. Kyle Fitzsimons, 39, of Maine,...
Soda sweetener aspartame now listed as possible cancer cause. But it’s still considered safe
The World Health Organization’s cancer agency has deemed the sweetener aspartame — found in diet soda and countless other foods — as a “possible” cause of cancer, while a separate expert group looking at the same evidence said it still considers the sugar substitute safe in limited quantities. The differing...
Secret Service: No fingerprints, DNA sample or leads from cocaine found at the White House
WASHINGTON — No fingerprints or DNA turned up on the baggie of cocaine found in a lobby at the White House last week despite a sophisticated FBI crime lab analysis, and surveillance footage of the area didn’t identify a suspect, according to a summary of the Secret Service investigation obtained...
Justice Department urges judge to not postpone Trump’s classified documents trial
WASHINGTON — The Justice Department urged a judge Thursday to reject Donald Trump’s efforts to postpone his classified documents trial, saying there was no basis for an “open-ended” delay sought by his lawyers. Federal prosecutors last month proposed a Dec. 11 trial for Trump, who is charged with 37 felony...
Digital divide hurts pocketbooks of Pa. residents, roundtable participants say
The digital divide leads to lost opportunities for people in underserved broadband areas, officials said Thursday as they discussed how to spend $1.16 billion expected from the federal government to help solve the problem. “People have been talking about the digital divide for decades,” said Evan Feinman, director of the...
