White House: Trump gets covid shot in preparation for upcoming travel
President Donald Trump has received updated flu and covid-19 booster shots in preparation for upcoming travel, the president’s physician announced Friday. Sean P. Barbabella, a Navy captain, shared the information in a letter submitted Friday to White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt. “President Donald J. Trump successfully completed a scheduled...
Education Department lays off roughly 20% of its workforce amid shutdown
WASHINGTON – The U.S. Department of Education on Friday laid off over 460 employees, dramatically reducing the workforce of a beleaguered agency that is already struggling to serve students on the heels of massive cuts. The number was made public in a court filing the same day from the Justice...
Trump to posthumously award Charlie Kirk the Medal of Freedom at White House ceremony
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump says he will posthumously award slain conservative activist Charlie Kirk the Medal of Freedom at a White House celebration next week. Trump said he’ll be rushing back to the U.S. from Israel and Egypt, following a trip that’s tied to a ceasefire and hostage-release deal...
White House lays off thousands of U.S. government workers, blaming shutdown
President Donald Trump on Friday blamed Democrats for his decision to lay off thousands of workers across the U.S. government as he followed through on his threat to cut the federal workforce during the government shutdown. Job cuts were under way at the Treasury Department, the U.S. health agency, the...
Nor’easter without a name to bring ocean flooding and high winds to U.S. East Coast
A storm without a name was expected to bring flooding to the East Coast from South Carolina to New Jersey and high winds to New York City over the holiday weekend. While the storm affecting the eastern U.S. wasn’t tropical, two other tropical storms were churning in the Atlantic Ocean...
MIT refuses to accept White House terms for funding; other schools still mulling
Massachusetts Institute of Technology President Sally Kornbluth on Friday said she “cannot support” a memo the White House sent to nine elite U.S. universities last week detailing policies they should follow to get preferential consideration for federal funding. In an open letter to U.S. Education Secretary Linda McMahon, Kornbluth said...
Trump ratchets up U.S.-China trade war, promising new tariffs
President Donald Trump revived the trade war against Beijing on Friday, ending an uneasy truce between the two largest economies with promises to sharply hike tariffs in a reprisal against China curbing its critical mineral exports. The president unveiled additional levies of 100% on China’s U.S.-bound exports, along with new...
19 missing, deaths confirmed as explosion rocks manufacturing plant in Tennessee
Nineteen people are unaccounted for after an explosion Friday at an explosive manufacturing plant in Tennessee. Humphreys County Sheriff Chris Davis initially said some people had died in the blast, later telling reporters 19 people were missing in wake of the explosion that occurred at 7:45 a.m., calling it a...
White House budget chief says government job cuts have begun
WASHINGTON - President Donald Trump’s administration has begun laying off federal workers on Friday during the government shutdown, with a White House budget office spokesperson characterizing the layoffs as “substantial” in number. The U.S. health agency confirmed that some of its workers have received layoff notices. “The RIFs have begun,”...
Trump sees no reason to meet China’s Xi, threatens tariffs in new rift
WASHINGTON - President Donald Trump threatened to hike tariffs on Chinese exports and cancel a meeting with President Xi Jinping, in a broadside against Beijing on Friday that sent markets and relations between the world’s largest economies into a spiral. Trump, due to meet Xi in about three weeks in...
Age 62, 67 or 70? Here’s the best time to claim Social Security
Some older Americans, staring down potential Social Security benefit cuts, might look to access the program as soon as possible. Experts say that could be a mistake. Instead, potential beneficiaries should consider their health and life expectancy, what buckets of money they can pull from, if they’re done working for...
Trump didn’t win the Nobel prize he coveted, but prizewinner dedicated it, in part, to him
WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump’s dream of becoming a Nobel laureate did not come true this year, although the prizewinner dedicated the honor to him, in part, for supporting her cause. The Norwegian committee that determines the winner of the prestigious awards passed Trump over for the peace prize he...
Trump administration airs video at airports blaming Democrats for government shutdown
WASHINGTON -President Donald Trump’s administration on Thursday began airing a video at airports across the country that blames Democrats for a nine-day-old government shutdown that has prompted significant flight delays. Some 13,000 air traffic controllers and about 50,000 Transportation Security Administration officers must still turn up for work during the...
Trump proposes barring Chinese airlines from flying over Russia on U.S. routes
WASHINGTON — The Trump administration on Thursday proposed banning Chinese airlines from flying over Russia on routes to and from the United States, saying the reduced flight time this practice enables puts American carriers at a disadvantage. The proposal is another escalation of the trade war between the world’s two...
White House says Nobel Committee places ‘politics over peace’
The White House responded to the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to a Venezuelan opposition activist María Corina Machado by saying the prize committee was playing politics by not giving it to President Donald Trump. “The Nobel Committee proved they place politics over peace,” White House Communications Director Steven...
Federal government shutdown: White House says mass layoffs of federal workers have begun
WASHINGTON – The federal government shutdown rolled on to Day 10 on Friday after senators the day before voted down dueling funding bills for the seventh time. With both sides not budging from their positions, it appears increasingly likely the shutdown will crash into the weekend and the next week....
Nobel Peace Prize awarded to Venezuela’s opposition leader Machado
OSLO — Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado won the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday for promoting democratic rights and fighting dictatorship, receiving the award despite President Donald Trump’s repeated statements he deserved it. Machado, a 58-year-old industrial engineer who lives in hiding, was blocked in 2024 by Venezuela’s courts...
Killing of man who shot 2 troopers ‘100% justified,’ Franklin County DA says
The commissioner of Pennsylvania State Police said it was “fierce gunfight” that left two Pennsylvania State Police troopers injured and a suspect dead in Franklin County on Wednesday. The shooting that followed a retail theft report and pursuit from outside Chambersburg to south of Greencastle on Interstate 81 was detailed...
U.S. to deploy 200 troops for Gaza task force with no operations on ground in Gaza
WASHINGTON — The United States will deploy 200 troops as part of a joint task force for Gaza stability, with no Americans on the ground in the Palestinian enclave, two senior U.S. officials said Thursday. The officials, speaking to reporters on condition of anonymity, said the 200 would be the...
U.S. judge blocks Trump’s deployment of National Guard in Illinois
CHICAGO — A federal judge in Chicago on Thursday temporarily blocked President Donald Trump’s deployment of hundreds of National Guard soldiers in Illinois, five days after another U.S. judge blocked a similar deployment in Portland, Oregon. U.S. District Judge April Perry said that permitting Guard troops in the state would...
Shapiro joins states in legal action against Trump’s National Guard deployments
Pennsylvania has joined nearly two dozen states in taking legal action in an attempt to stop President Donald Trump from deploying National Guard troops to U.S. cities. The multistate amicus brief argues that the deployment of National Guard troops in Oregon was “unlawful, unconstitutional and undemocratic,” according to Gov. Josh...
U.S. could fire air traffic controllers who fail to work during shutdown, transportation secretary saysVideo
WASHINGTON — Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy warned on Thursday that the government could dismiss air traffic controllers who repeatedly fail to show up for work during the government shutdown, saying a spike in absences is causing significant air disruptions. “If we have a continual small subset of controllers that don’t...
Health Secretary Kennedy, Trump link circumcision to autism through TylenolVideo
WASHINGTON – Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. expanded his crusade against using Tylenol with a cutting-edge warning: boys who were circumcised were twice as likely to be diagnosed with autism later. “There are two studies that show children who are circumcised early have double the rate of autism,” Kennedy...
U.S. buys Argentine pesos, finalizes $20 billion currency swap
The U.S. government purchased Argentine pesos and finalized a $20 billion currency swap framework with Argentina’s central bank, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Thursday, sending the peso and Argentine dollar bonds sharply higher. “The U.S. Treasury is prepared, immediately, to take whatever exceptional measures are warranted to provide stability...
New York AG Letitia James criminally charged in Trump’s latest effort to punish rivalsVideo
New York Attorney General Letitia James, a longtime foe of President Donald Trump, was indicted on charges of lying on a mortgage application on Thursday, the Justice Department said, as the administration seeks to use government power against those who have pursued investigations into him or publicly resisted his agenda....
