WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump suspended the green card lottery program on Thursday that allowed the suspect in the Brown University and MIT shootings to come to the United States. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said in a post on the social platform X that at Trump’s direction she is ordering the United States […]
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — A Lake Tahoe school district is caught between California and Nevada’s competing policies on transgender student athletes, a dispute that’s poised to reorder where the district’s students compete. High schools in California’s Tahoe-Truckee Unified School District, set in a mountainous, snow-prone area near the border with Nevada, have for decades competed […]
References in U.S. Coast Guard policy calling hate symbols “potentially divisive” were removed Thursday, and a U.S. senator said she was lifting a hold she had placed on a nomination for the service’s top job. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, whose agency oversees the Coast Guard, said on social media that the latest changes were […]
LAS VEGAS (AP) — The seven states that rely on the Colorado River to supply farms and cities across the U.S. West appear no closer to reaching a consensus on a long-term plan for sharing the dwindling resource. The river’s future was the center of discussions this week at the annual Colorado River Water Users […]
NEW YORK (AP) — One of New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani ’s appointees has resigned over social media posts she made more than a decade ago that featured antisemitic tropes, Mamdani’s office said Thursday. In a statement, Catherine Almonte Da Costa, who was tapped this week to join the incoming administration, said she expressed […]
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump’s “blockade” of sanctioned oil tankers off Venezuela’s coast is raising new questions about the legality of his military campaign in Latin America, while fueling concerns that the U.S. could be edging closer to war. A blockade is illegal outside of warfare and would be considered an act of aggression. […]
UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The United Nations General Assembly on Thursday approved former Iraqi President Barham Salih as the next head of the U.N. refugee agency, its first from the Middle East since the late 1970s. The 193-member world body elected the 65-year-old Kurdish politician as the U.N. high commissioner for refugees by consensus and […]
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — Four-term North Carolina Gov. Jim Hunt, a towering figure in North Carolina politics in the late 20th century who helped the Democratic Party focus nationally upon public education reform, died Thursday at the age of 88, his daughter Lt. Gov. Rachel Hunt announced. Hunt, whose career provided a prototype for the […]
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — TikTok has signed a deal to sell its U.S. business to three American investors — Oracle, Silver Lake and MGX — ensuring the popular social video platform can continue operating in the United States. The deal is expected to close on Jan. 22, according to an internal memo seen by The […]
President Donald Trump has directed his administration to work as quickly as possible to reclassify marijuana as a less dangerous drug. Trump’s executive order on Thursday does not legalize marijuana under federal law. And it’s not the final word. The proposed change still requires federal regulatory approval. But the change could make the marijuana industry […]
MADISON, Wis. (AP) — The U.S. Justice Department sued three states and the District of Columbia on Thursday for not turning over requested voter information to the Trump administration. The latest lawsuits were filed against Wisconsin, Illinois, Georgia and the District of Columbia. The Justice Department has now filed 22 lawsuits seeking voter information as […]
WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. military has amassed an unusually large force in the Caribbean Sea and the waters off the coast of Venezuela since this summer, when the Trump administration first began to shift assets to the region as part of its anti-drug trafficking operations. In all, U.S. Southern Command says there are around […]
ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) — A federal judge on Thursday denied a request for a preliminary injunction to close an immigration detention center in the Florida Everglades dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz,” saying a detainee who asked for the order hadn’t shown he was suffering irreparable harm at the facility. U.S. District Judge Kyle Dudek said the detainee, […]
MIAMI (AP) — Democrat Eileen Higgins was sworn in Thursday as Miami’s first female mayor, two weeks after defeating a Republican endorsed by President Donald Trump. Higgins also becomes the first Democrat in almost 30 years to lead the city of 487,000 people. She replaces Republican Francis Suarez, who has served as the city’s mayor […]
A judge in Miami has dismissed a complaint challenging a college’s decision to gift prime downtown real estate for President Donald Trump’s future presidential library, clearing the way for the real estate developer-turned-president to build a towering monument to his political rise in an iconic stretch of the city. A local activist brought the lawsuit […]
WASHINGTON (AP) — The “Warrior Dividend” that President Donald Trump announced during his televised address to the nation Wednesday is not a Christmas bonus made possible by tariff revenues, as the president suggested. Instead, the $1,776 payments to troops are coming from a congressionally-approved housing supplement that was a part of tax cut extensions and […]
CHICAGO (AP) — A commission formed to document alleged harassment and abuse by federal agents during an immigration crackdown in the Chicago area reviewed the wide use of chemical agents in its first public hearing Thursday. The immigration operation, which started in September, has been marked by aggressive tactics widely denounced by judges, elected leaders […]
WASHINGTON (AP) — The House approved legislation Thursday aimed at speeding up permitting reviews for new energy and infrastructure projects and limiting judicial review. The bill, dubbed the SPEED Act, would enact the most significant change in decades to the National Environmental Policy Act, a bedrock environmental law that requires federal agencies to consider a […]
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Federal regulators will allow tech companies to effectively plug massive data centers directly into power plants, issuing a long-awaited order Thursday, as the Trump administration urges it to help the U.S. lead the world in artificial intelligence and revive domestic manufacturing. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s unanimous order is designed to […]
LONDON (AP) — British Prime Minister Keir Starmer appointed a new U.K. ambassador to the United States on Thursday, replacing a diplomat who was fired over his over his links to the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Christian Turner, currently the U.K.’s permanent representative to the United Nations, will replace Peter Mandelson, who was sacked […]
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump’s handpicked board has voted to rename Washington’s premier performing arts center the Trump-Kennedy Center, the White House said Thursday.
ATLANTA (AP) — Democrats will not issue a postelection report on their 2024 shellacking after all. The Democratic National Committee head has decided not to publish a formal assessment of the party’s defeat that returned Donald Trump to power and gave Republicans complete control in Washington. Ken Martin, a Minnesota party leader who was elected […]
WASHINGTON (AP) — House Democrats released several dozen more photos Thursday from the estate of the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, showing his associations with the rich and famous, as the Department of Justice faces a deadline to release many of its case files on the late financier by the end of the week. The […]
