Top Stories category, Page 171

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 — Power plant operators, gambling magnates, charter school backers, and trade unions are among the interests that gave almost $18 million to Pennsylvania’s top...

President Donald Trump has taken aim at a portrait of himself hanging in Colorado’s Capitol. He’s demanding that it be taken down. Unveiled in 2019, the portrait was painted in oil by the Colorado-based artist Sarah Boardman, the New York Times reported. It depicts the president in a dark suit...

U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York reached out publicly to apologize to fellow Democrat and former U.S. Rep. Conor Lamb. In a post on the social media platform X, AOC tweeted a response to Lamb’s post critiquing Democrat Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman. Lamb, of Mt. Lebanon, lost to Fetterman...

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration asked the Supreme Court on Monday to halt a ruling ordering the rehiring of thousands of federal workers let go in mass firings aimed at dramatically downsizing the federal government. The emergency appeal argues that the judge can’t force the executive branch to rehire some...

An iconic Pittsburgh beer, Duquesne — with its “Prince of Pilseners” logo — has popped up again. Bill Clevenger, whose grandmother sold Duquesne beer through her distributorship in his native McConnellsburg in Fulton County, has revived the Pittsburgh beer that had been dormant since 2021. “I’m keeping the tradition and...

The phrase “Give me liberty or give me death!” has been expressed by protesters from the 1989 Tiananmen Square uprising in China to those who opposed COVID-19 restrictions in the U.S. in 2020. Malcolm X referenced it in his 1964 “Ballot or the Bullet” speech, demanding equal rights for Black...

Here are some of the latest news items from this morning, Monday, March 24: Postal workers rally in Pittsburgh Pittsburgh postal workers rallied Sunday in the California-Kirkbride neighborhood on Pittsburgh’s North Side — part of nationwide rallies to protect the U.S. Postal Service. TribLive news partner WTAE said the rally...

Fallingwater isn’t a typical house, so renovations are anything but normal. When architect Frank Lloyd Wright pushed the envelope in the 1930s with his revolutionary home design, wedged into a stream in Fayette County, he may not have been thinking about how the iconic house would be preserved 90 years...

One of the nation’s most outspoken vaccine experts believes the U.S. is already forgetting a critical lesson reinforced during the covid-19 pandemic: Vaccines save lives. Dr. Peter Hotez said increased vaccine hesitancy, misinformation and politicization are jeopardizing people’s health. As dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor...

Prosecutors can use a Pittsburgh rape defendant’s own words against him at trial after the state Supreme Court refused to suppress a statement he made to police, who falsely told him he was not a suspect. The court last week said the statement — in which Keith Foster told a...

President Donald Trump has ramped up his fight with the judiciary as he racks up losses in court over his administration’s efforts to reshape the U.S. government and its approach on everything from immigration to federal spending. Two months into his term, Trump is already fighting more than 150 lawsuits...

State police are investigating a report of missing opioid pills at a Hempfield assisted living home. The potential theft was reported after an inventory audit by staff at Mountain View Senior Living revealed 24 oxycodone pills were missing. The pills were taken from the home on Nature Park Road sometime...

No one was injured Sunday when a fire destroyed a house in Pittsburgh’s Troy Hill neighborhood, public safety officials said. The blaze was reported around noon at the intersection of Herman and Adair streets, near Lowrie Street. The main building collapsed. Heavy smoke poured out of the building, widely visible...

Indiana Borough police arrested a New Kensington man accused of assault and making terroristic threats while displaying a gun Saturday evening during the IUPatty’s student celebration held annually in the community. Police said Adisun Lee Jackson, 22, who is not a student at local Indiana University of Pennsylvania, refused to...

Bishop Larry J. Kulick of the Diocese of Greensburg was among a crowd of hundreds that gathered Sunday outside Gemelli Hospital in Rome for Pope Francis’ first appearance since he was hospitalized on Feb. 14 for life-threatening double pneumonia. The pope gave a short blessing to the crowd, who cheered...

Pittsburgh Pirates manager Derek Shelton laid out the key to his team’s 2025 improvement on a 76-86 record a year ago. “I think you win in the margins, very much so,” Shelton told reporters in Bradenton, Fla. “We have to win those margins.” Exactly how wide are these “margins” we...

The future isn’t clear for the former Newport Business Institute property in Lower Burrell, but officials say it is bright. Brian Lawrence, executive director of the Westmoreland County Redevelopment Authority and Land Bank, said the property is in the land bank’s “preparing for sale” status after the agency acquired it...

Hempfield Area school board will see at least two new faces next year, as veteran members Paul Ward and Diane Ciabattoni are opting not to run for reelection. Board President Jerry Radebaugh and Vice President Scott Learn will seek another term, according to Westmoreland County records. The former Westmoreland County...

Jerry Deible of Murrysville can remember standing on the ground at a Vietnam firebase in the early 1970s, staring up at a massive C-130 airplane passing overhead. He craned his head back and snapped a photo of the plane as liquid streamed down from tanks strapped to its sides. The...

Uncle Charley’s Sausage once had about 60 employees at its Parks Township processing, packing and shipping facility. Now, it has one — an affable, mustached maintenance supervisor named Randy Braden. A veteran of the food manufacturing business, he came on about 2½ years ago after the soup cannery in Pittsburgh’s...

When covid-19 struck, Natalya Rodriguez, fresh out of nursing school, watched as a flood of overwhelmed colleagues abandoned the health care field. Nothing had prepared nurses in the U.S. for a pandemic — or the death and fear it brought. The National Council of State Boards of Nursing estimated 100,000...

A special election in the Mon Valley will determine control of the state House. The chamber has been gridlocked, with 101 Democrats and 101 Republicans, since the January death of state Rep. Matt Gergely, D-McKeesport. Gergely had represented the 35th Legislative District for just under two years. Looking to fill...

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has too much power as he advises President Donald Trump and spearheads efforts to slash the size of the federal government through his DOGE Service, Isaac Elias said Saturday. It’s the reason Elias, 43, of Baden in Beaver County, helped organize a series of protests outside...