Georgia elections official to speak to federal prosecutors probing Trump’s efforts to undo 2020 loss
ATLANTA — Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger is scheduled to speak to federal prosecutors from the office of special counsel Jack Smith, who is investigating efforts by former President Donald Trump and his allies to overturn his 2020 election loss. In a rambling phone call on Jan. 2, 2021,...
Wagner ex-convict returned from war and a Russian village lived in fear
TALLINN, Estonia — When Ivan Rossomakhin returned home from the war in Ukraine three months ago, his neighbors in the village east of Moscow were terrified. Three years ago, he was convicted of murder and sentenced to a long prison term but was freed after volunteering to fight with the...
Pepsi takes on ketchup, debuting its 1st condiment
Heinz Ketchup better watch out, Pepsi’s comin’ for ya. Of course, Pittsburghers know there’s no sub for the ol’ 57, but Pepsi’s giving it a go anyway. The soda company is launching Pepsi Colachup — in a joint venture with the Culinary Institute of America Consulting — as “the world’s...
Victims confront Colorado Springs gay nightclub killer, calling shooter a monster and a coward
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — One-by-one, nearly two dozen victims stood in a courtroom to confront the person who pleaded guilty to murdering five people and injuring 17 others in an attack last year on a nightclub that served as a sanctuary for the LGBTQ+ community in Colorado Springs. Some cried,...
Pennsylvania’s mail-in voting law is upheld again, as court rules against Republican challenge
HARRISBURG — A Pennsylvania state court on Tuesday rejected the latest Republican effort to throw out the presidential battleground state’s broad mail-in voting law that has become a GOP target following former President Donald Trump’s baseless claims about election fraud. It is the latest of several refusals by a state...
Ford cutting several hundred white-collar jobs to reduce cost amid transition to electric cars
DEARBORN, Mich. — Ford Motor Co. is going through another round of white-collar job cuts as the company continues to reduce costs amid a transition to electric vehicles. The company confirmed Tuesday that it was starting to notify several hundred engineers and other salaried employees that their jobs are being...
Supreme Court makes it more difficult to convict someone of making a threat
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court ruled Tuesday to make it more difficult to convict a person of making a violent threat. The case could make it harder for prosecutors to convict certain people who threaten elected officials, including the president. The high court ruled in a case that involves a...
Supreme Court rules state courts can play role in policing federal elections
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled that North Carolina’s top court did not overstep its bounds in striking down a congressional districting plan as excessively partisan under state law. The justices by a 6-3 vote rejected the broadest view of a case that could have transformed elections for...
U.S. consumer confidence jumps to highest level since early 2022
WASHINGTON — The American consumer’s confidence jumped in June to its highest level in 18 months as a strong labor market continues to buoy the U.S. economy. The Conference Board reported Tuesday that its consumer confidence index rose to 109.7 in June from 102.5 in May. That’s the highest the...
Justice Department blames Jeffrey Epstein suicide on jail guard negligence, misconduct
WASHINGTON — Jeffrey Epstein, despite his high profile and a jail suicide attempt two weeks earlier, was left alone in his cell with a surplus of bed linens. Nearly all the surveillance cameras on his unit didn’t record. One worker was on duty for 24 hours straight. The Justice Department’s...
Court date postponed for Trump valet Walt Nauta in classified documents case
MIAMI — A court appearance has been postponed for a valet for Donald Trump charged with helping the former president hide classified documents that the Justice Department wanted back. A lawyer for Walt Nauta told a judge Tuesday that Nauta had not yet been able to find a Florida-based attorney...
Italy seeks man in viral video carving names into Rome’s ColosseumVideo
ROME — Italy’s culture and tourism ministers have vowed to find and punish a tourist who was filmed carving his name and that of his apparent girlfriend in the wall of the Colosseum in Rome, a crime that resulted in hefty fines in the past. Video of the incident went...
U.K. was ill-prepared for pandemic because resources were diverted to Brexit, ex-health chief says
LONDON — Britain was ill-prepared for a pandemic partly because government resources had been diverted away from pandemic planning to brace for a possibly chaotic exit from the European Union without a deal, the U.K.’s former health secretary told an inquiry Tuesday. Matt Hancock also said officials had to scramble...
UN report: Russia tortured, executed civilians in Ukraine
BERLIN — Russian forces carried out widespread and systematic torture of civilians who were detained in connection with its attack on Ukraine, summarily executing dozens of them, the United Nations human rights office said Tuesday. The global body interviewed hundreds of victims and witnesses for a report detailing more than...
Philippine police raid alleged cybercrime buildings, rescue 2,700 workers
MANILA, Philippines — Philippine police backed by commandos staged a massive raid Tuesday and said they rescued more than 2,700 workers from China, the Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia and more than a dozen other countries who were allegedly swindled into working for fraudulent online gaming sites and other cybercrime groups. The...
Tape has Trump discussing ‘highly confidential’ document with interviewerVideo
An audio recording from a meeting in which former President Donald Trump discusses a “highly confidential” document with an interviewer appears to undermine his later claim that he didn’t have such documents, only magazine and newspaper clippings. The recording, from a July 2021 interview Trump gave at his Bedminster, N.J.,...
Pennsylvania House votes to extend I-95 disaster proclamation until next June
A resolution that would extend to next June Gov. Josh Shapiro’s emergency disaster declaration issued in the response to the collapse of a bridge on I-95 in Philadelphia passed the state House of Representatives. The proposed extension, approved by a bipartisan 165-38 vote, would allow PennDOT to continue to be...
Witness list in Trump classified documents case should be public, press say
The judge overseeing the criminal case against former President Donald Trump over his handling of classified documents denied a government request to file under seal a list of dozens of potential witnesses who the former president has been barred from speaking to about the case. Special Counsel Jack Smith hasn’t...
Malaria cases in Texas, Florida are the first U.S. spread since 2003, CDC says
NEW YORK — The United States has seen five cases of malaria spread by mosquitos in the last two months — the first time there’s been local spread in in 20 years. There were four cases detected in Florida and one in Texas, according to a health alert issued Monday...
Prosecutors seeking death penalty against man accused of slaying of 4 University of Idaho students
BOISE, Idaho — Prosecutors say they are seeking the death penalty against a man accused of stabbing four University of Idaho students to death late last year. Bryan Kohberger, 28, is charged with four counts of murder in connection with the deaths at a rental house near the Moscow, Idaho,...
Next big advance in cancer treatment could be a vaccine
SEATTLE — The next big advance in cancer treatment could be a vaccine. After decades of limited success, scientists say research has reached a turning point, with many predicting more vaccines will be out in five years. These aren’t traditional vaccines that prevent disease, but shots to shrink tumors and...
San Antonio airport worker died, ‘ingested’ by Delta plane engine
A worker died last week after being “ingested” into an airplane engine at San Antonio International Airport. Shortly after Delta Flight 111 arrived at the airport from Los Angeles around 10:30 p.m. Central time, a worker on the tarmac was “ingested” into the plane’s engine as it was taxiing to...
White Florida woman charged with manslaughter in shooting of Black neighbor
A white woman accused of firing through her door and fatally shooting a Black mother in front of her 9-year-old son in central Florida was charged Monday with manslaughter and assault. Susan Lorincz was arrested earlier this month following the fatal shooting of Ajike Owens in Ocala, Fla. She was...
Putin thanks nation for unity after aborted rebellionVideo
Russian President Vladimir Putin thanked the nation on Monday for unity after an armed rebellion over the weekend was aborted less than 24 hours after it began. Earlier in the day, the mercenary chief defended his short-lived insurrection in a boastful statement. In his first appearance since the rebellion ended,...
A woman fatally shot an Uber driver. Police say she wrongly thought she was being kidnappedVideo
EL PASO, Texas — A Kentucky woman has been accused of fatally shooting her West Texas Uber driver after mistakenly believing she was being kidnapped and taken to Mexico, according to police. Phoebe Copas remained jailed Sunday in El Paso, Texas, after being charged with murder last week in the...
