Erie’s view of the 2024 solar eclipse will be exceptional. It’s also going to cost you.
This story first appeared in PA Local, a weekly newsletter by Spotlight PA taking a fresh, positive look at the incredible people, beautiful places, and delicious food of Pennsylvania. Sign up for free here. Next year, an army of people will descend on Erie to don mail-ordered glasses and watch...
Biden to sign order prioritizing ‘environmental justice’
WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden on Friday plans to sign an executive order that would create the White House Office of Environmental Justice. The White House said it wants to ensure that poverty, race and ethnic status do not lead to worse exposure to pollution and environmental harm. Biden is...
Frequent shootings put U.S. mass killings on a record pace
LOS ANGELES — The U.S. is setting a record pace for mass killings in 2023, replaying the horror on a loop roughly once a week so far this year. The carnage has taken 88 lives in 17 mass killings over 111 days. Each time, the killers wielded firearms. Only 2009...
Calling beer Champagne leaves French producers frothing
BRUSSELS — The guardians of Champagne will let no one take the name of the bubbly beverage in vain, not even a U.S. beer behemoth. For years, Miller High Life used the “Champagne of beers” slogan. This week, that appropriation became impossible to swallow. At the request of the trade...
Child among 10 family members killed in S. Africa shooting
JOHANNESBURG — Ten members of the same family, seven of them female and at least one of them a child, were killed in a mass shooting at a house in South Africa, police said Friday. A male suspect was killed in a shootout with police hours after and two men...
Conservative commentator Dan Bongino leaving Fox News
Dan Bongino, a former Secret Service agent and New York City cop turned conservative talk show host, told his radio listeners Thursday he is leaving Fox News where he had a weekly TV show since June 2021. Bongino, 48, said his departure is amicable. It comes after Bongino and Fox...
Appeals court halts House interview with ex-Trump prosecutor Mark Pomerantz
NEW YORK — A federal appeals court has temporarily blocked House Republicans from questioning a former Manhattan prosecutor about the criminal case against ex-President Donald Trump, the latest twist in a legal battle between Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office and the House Judiciary Committee. The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court...
Narcan’s over-the-counter price will still put it out of reach for many, experts say
The life-saving drug “Narcan” is expected to be available over-the-counter later this year, but its price tag is expected to put it out of reach for many below the poverty line. Emergent BioSolutions announced Thursday that it plans to sell the medication, which can reverse the deadly affects of opioid...
Pennsylvania state lawmaker involved in single-vehicle alcohol-related crash
A state lawmaker was involved in an alcohol-related crash late Tuesday evening in Huntington Township, Adams County, according to state police. State Rep. Torren Ecker, 37, of New Oxford, was traveling south on State Route 94, a hilly two-lane rural road that connects Carlisle and Hanover, when his car drifted...
EPA agrees to make Pennsylvania cut Chesapeake Bay pollution
BALTIMORE — Pennsylvania must minimize its outsized role in polluting the Chesapeake Bay, according to a proposed settlement agreement announced Thursday that would subject the state to increased oversight from federal environmental officials. The agreement comes after other jurisdictions in the bay’s watershed — Maryland, Virginia, Delaware and the District...
Mask mandate ends at Allegheny Health Network while Excela, UPMC hold to CDC guidelines
Allegheny Health Network is lifting the mask mandate in place at hospitals, outpatient clinics and other “patient-facing” facilities as of Thursday, officials announced. “Throughout this pandemic, AHN has made every effort to help reduce the spread of covid-19 in our region while also keeping out patients, visitors and staff members...
Search continues after 3 sailors on Mexico-to-San Diego trip go missing amid rough seas
Three American sailors with decades of experience who went missing during a trip around Mexico’s Baja California peninsula would have been battling strong winds and 15-foot waves from the outset, officials said. The Mexican Navy and the U.S. Coast Guard continue their search for the trio, who were expected to...
Tornadoes kill 3 in central U.S.; new storms possibleVideo
DALLAS — Strong storms with tornadoes that plowed across the central U.S. killed at least three people in Oklahoma and left thousands without power Thursday as forecasters warned of potentially more severe weather. Authorities were still unsure of the full scale of injuries and destruction in Oklahoma, the storms produced...
Tennessee GOP lawmaker resigns after ethics panel finding
NASHVILLE — A Republican lawmaker in Tennessee resigned Thursday because of an ethics violation involving the Legislature’s workplace discrimination and harassment policy. Rep. Scotty Campbell, vice chair of the House Republican Caucus, was among the GOP legislators who voted two weeks ago to expel two Black Democratic lawmakers for protesting...
Man accused of shooting girl, parents over stray basketball arrested in Florida
GASTONIA, N.C. — A North Carolina man accused of shooting and wounding a 6-year-old girl and her parents after children went to retrieve a basketball that had rolled into his yard was arrested in Florida Thursday afternoon, authorities said. The violence was the latest in a string of recent shootings...
Former WWE wrestler Ted DiBiase Jr. charged in Mississippi welfare fraud case
JACKSON, Miss. — Companies run by a former professional wrestler received “sham contracts” in Mississippi and misspent millions of dollars of welfare money that was supposed to help some of the neediest people in the U.S., according to a new federal indictment. The indictment of former wrestler Ted “Teddy” DiBiase...
Twitter begins removing blue checks from users who don’t pay
This time it’s for real. Many of Twitter’s high-profile users are losing the blue check marks that helped verify their identity and distinguish them from impostors on the Elon Musk-owned social media platform. After several false starts, Twitter began making good on its promise Thursday to remove the blue checks...
Racial gap in U.S. stroke deaths widened during pandemic
NEW YORK — The longstanding racial gap in U.S. stroke death rates widened dramatically during the covid-19 pandemic, government researchers said Thursday. Stroke death rates increased for both Black and white adults in 2020 and 2021, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study. But the difference between...
Part party, part call to action: A look at pot holiday 4/20
SEATTLE — Thursday marks marijuana culture’s high holiday, 4/20, when cannabis fans gather in clouds of smoke at music festivals, celebrate with all-you-can-eat deals on chicken wings and other munchies, and take advantage of pot-shop discounts in legal weed states. This year’s edition provides an occasion for activists to reflect...
Distrust in America: Small mistakes, deep fear — and gunfire
In suburban Detroit, it was a lost 14-year-old looking for directions. In Kansas City, it was a 16-year-old who went to the wrong house to pick up his younger brothers. There was the 12-year-old rummaging around in a yard in small-town Alabama, the 20-year-old woman who found herself in the...
NATO chief: Ukraine’s ‘rightful place’ is in the alliance
KYIV, Ukraine — NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg defiantly declared Thursday that Ukraine’s “rightful place” is in the military alliance and pledged more support for the country on his first visit to Kyiv since Russia’s invasion just over a year ago. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy urged Stoltenberg, who has been instrumental...
IRS agent alleges Hunter Biden probe is being mishandled
WASHINGTON — An IRS special agent is seeking whistleblower protection to disclose information about what the agent alleges is mishandling of an investigation into President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, according to a letter sent to members of Congress. Mark Lytle, the attorney for the IRS whistleblower, wrote to lawmakers...
SpaceX giant rocket explodes minutes after launch from Texas
SOUTH PADRE ISLAND, Texas — SpaceX’s giant new rocket exploded minutes after blasting off Thursday on it first test flight and crashed into the Gulf of Mexico. Elon Musk’s company was aiming to send the nearly 400-foot Starship rocket on a round-the-world trip from the southern tip of Texas, near...
Daffodils bloom as symbol of Warsaw ghetto uprising memory
WARSAW, Poland — Yellow daffodils are everywhere in Warsaw this week, a symbol of remembrance for the 1943 uprising by Jews in the city’s ghetto against Nazi German occupiers. There are the real daffodils that residents and visitors to the Polish capital place on memorials to honor Holocaust victims, and...
House passes trans athlete ban for girls and women’s teams
WASHINGTON — The Republican-led House passed a bill Thursday that would bar federally supported schools and colleges from allowing transgender athletes whose biological sex assigned at birth was male to compete on girls or women’s sports teams. The legislation approved by a 219-203 vote is unlikely to advance further because...
