10th death reported in Boar’s Head deli meat listeria outbreak
A 10th person has died in the listeria outbreak that shuttered a Boar’s Head deli meat plant, federal health officials said Wednesday. At least 59 people in 19 states have been sickened by the bacteria first detected in liverwurst made at the Jarratt, Virginia, plant. Illnesses were reported between late...
Judge approves $600 million settlement for residents near fiery Ohio derailment
A federal judge on Wednesday approved a $600 million class-action settlement that Norfolk Southern railroad offered to everyone who lived within 20 miles of last year’s disastrous derailment in East Palestine, Ohio. Judge Benita Pearson gave the deal final approval after a hearing where the lawyers who negotiated it with...
Secret Service investigating report that agent groped Harris staff member
A U.S. Secret Service agent has been accused of groping and sexually harassing a member of Vice President Kamala Harris’ official staff during a trip last week, according to three people familiar with the matter. The Secret Service office of professional responsibility is investigating a misconduct allegation involving an employee,...
Speaker Johnson demands Zelenskyy remove Ukraine’s ambassador to U.S. after Pennsylvania visit
WASHINGTON — House Speaker Mike Johnson is calling on Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to fire his country’s ambassador to the U.S. as Republicans criticize the war-torn leader’s visit to a swing-state Pennsylvania site producing munitions for the Russia-Ukraine war as a political stunt. The Republican Johnson’s demand Wednesday came as...
Congress passes temporary bill to avoid shutdown as lawmakers punt spending decisions to December
WASHINGTON — Congress on Wednesday passed a temporary measure that keeps government agencies funded into December, avoiding a shutdown for now while punting final spending decisions until after the Nov. 5 election. The Senate approved the measure by a vote of 78-18 shortly after the House easily approved it. The...
Pennsylvania bakery known for its election cookie poll is swamped with orders
HATBORO — A suburban Philadelphia bakery’s cookie “poll” that started during the 2008 presidential campaign as a joke between the owners and their customers has grown into much more. Lochel’s Bakery in Hatboro is swamped with orders. People are driving from a couple hours away to buy the cookies in...
Judge: Fluoride in drinking water poses enough risk to merit new EPA action
NEW YORK — A federal judge has ordered the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to further regulate fluoride in drinking water because high levels could pose a risk to the intellectual development of children. U.S. District Judge Edward Chen cautioned that it’s not certain that the amount of fluoride typically added...
Former Houston officer convicted of murder in deaths of couple during drug raid
HOUSTON — A former Houston police officer was convicted Wednesday of murder in the deaths of a couple during a 2019 drug raid that revealed systemic corruption problems within the police department’s narcotics unit. A jury found Gerald Goines guilty of two counts of murder in the January 2019 deaths...
Pope expels bishop, others from a Peru movement after Vatican uncovers abuses
VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis took the unusual decision Thursday to expel 10 people — a bishop, priests and laypeople — from a troubled Catholic movement in Peru after a Vatican investigation uncovered “sadistic” abuses of power, authority and spirituality. The move against the leadership of the Sodalitium Christianae Vitae,...
Funds are cutting aid for women seeking abortions as costs rise
Organizations that help pay abortion costs are capping how much they can help as travel costs rise and the wave of “rage giving” that fueled them two years ago has subsided. Abortion funds, which have operated across the U.S. for decades, in many cases as volunteer groups, ramped up their...
Gallery: Photos from Sept. 25, 2024
Here is a selection of photos from Western Pa., around the country and world, for Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2024....
Helene strengthens to a Category 4 hurricane as it nears Florida’s Gulf CoastVideo
CRAWFORDVILLE, Fla. — Hurricane Helene strengthened into a Category 4 storm ahead of its expected landfall on Florida’s northwest coast Thursday night as forecasters warned that the enormous system could create a “nightmare” storm surge and bring dangerous winds and rain across much of the southeastern U.S. Helene prompted hurricane...
California Gov. Newsom signs bills to bolster gun control
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed several gun control measures Tuesday, including one that allows the court to consider stalking and animal cruelty as grounds to restrict access to firearms. The state already has some of the strictest gun laws in the country. The new laws signed by...
Hezbollah fires missile at Tel Aviv as Israel activates reserve troops in response to rising tension
Hezbollah hurled dozens of projectiles into Israel early Wednesday, including a missile aimed at Tel Aviv that was the militant group’s deepest strike yet, and the Israeli military said it would activate reserve troops in response to the rising tensions. The Israeli military said it intercepted the surface-to-surface missile, which...
Missouri executes man for 1998 killing of a woman despite her family’s calls to spare his life
BONNE TERRE, Mo. — A Missouri man convicted of breaking into a woman’s home and repeatedly stabbing her was executed Tuesday over the objections of the victim’s family and the prosecutor, who wanted the death sentence commuted to life in prison. Marcellus Williams, 55, was convicted in the 1998 killing...
Secret Service failures before Trump’s Butler rally shooting were ‘preventable,’ Senate panel finds
WASHINGTON — Multiple Secret Service failures ahead of the July rally for former President Donald Trump where a gunman opened fire were “foreseeable, preventable, and directly related to the events resulting in the assassination attempt that day,” according to a bipartisan Senate investigation released Wednesday. Similar to the agency’s own...
Ex-NYC covid adviser is fired after video reveals he attended parties during pandemic
NEW YORK — A former New York City official who helped coordinate the city’s response to the pandemic was fired from his private-sector job after a recording showed him talking about attending a sex party and other private gatherings when the city was urging people to practice social distancing. Dr....
U.S. intelligence says Russians created fake California news site to fabricate Harris scandal
WASHINGTON — Russian actors created a fake San Francisco news station that published a staged video this month in an attempt to generate a scandal about Vice President Kamala Harris — the latest example of Moscow’s attempt to denigrate the Democratic presidential nominee in her campaign against former President Donald...
Man who staked out Trump at Florida golf course charged with attempting an assassination
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — A man who authorities say staked out Donald Trump for 12 hours on his golf course in Florida and wrote of his desire to kill him was indicted Tuesday on charges that he attempted to assassinate a major presidential candidate. Ryan Wesley Routh had been...
Tropical Storm Helene expected to become a hurricane. Florida residents begin evacuatingVideo
Tropical Storm Helene formed Tuesday in the Caribbean Sea and could strengthen into a major hurricane while moving north toward the U.S., forecasters said. Heavy rains and big waves already lashed the Cayman Islands, and some Florida residents began to evacuate or fill sandbags ahead of anticipated flooding. Hurricane watches...
Former FTX executive Caroline Ellison gets 2 years in prison over fraud
NEW YORK — Caroline Ellison, a former top executive in Sam Bankman-Fried ‘s fallen FTX cryptocurrency empire, was sentenced to two years in prison on Tuesday after she apologized repeatedly to everyone hurt by a fraud that stole billions of dollars from investors and customers of what once seemed like...
Haitian group in Springfield, Ohio, files citizen criminal charges against Trump and Vance
COLUMBUS, Ohio — The leader of a nonprofit representing the Haitian community filed criminal charges Tuesday against former President Donald Trump and his running mate, JD Vance, over the chaos and threats experienced by Springfield, Ohio, since Trump first spread false claims about legal immigrants there during a presidential debate....
U.S. to send $375M in military aid to Ukraine, including medium-range cluster bombs
WASHINGTON — The U.S. will send Ukraine an undisclosed number of medium-range cluster bombs and an array of rockets, artillery and armored vehicles in a military aid package totaling about $375 million, U.S. officials said Tuesday. Officials expect an announcement Wednesday, as global leaders meet at the U.N. General Assembly,...
Georgia court could reject counting presidential votes for Cornel West and Claudia De la Cruz
ATLANTA — Georgia Supreme Court justices expressed skepticism during a Tuesday hearing that votes for presidential candidates Cornel West and Claudia De la Cruz should count, possibly setting the stage for disqualifying them from the battleground state’s ballots. Democrats who are trying to prevent other candidates from siphoning votes from...
TikTok removes Russian state media accounts for ‘covert influence operations’ ahead of U.S. election
TikTok has removed accounts associated with Russian state media for engaging in “covert influence operations” ahead of the U.S. presidential election. The short-form video sharing company said Monday the changes affect accounts associated with TV-Novosti — the parent organization of the Russian state media RT — and Rossiya Segodnya, the...
