U.S./World category, Page 383
Biden believes U.S. Steel sale to Nippon Steel warrants ‘serious scrutiny,’ White House says
WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden believes “serious scrutiny” is warranted for the planned acquisition of U.S. Steel by Japan’s Nippon Steel, the White House said Thursday after days of silence on a transaction that has drawn alarm from the steelworkers union. Lael Brainard, the director of the National Economic Council,...
Rudy Giuliani files for bankruptcy days after being ordered to pay $148 million in defamation case
NEW YORK — Rudy Giuliani has filed for bankruptcy, days after being ordered to pay $148 million in a defamation lawsuit brought by two former election workers in Georgia who said his targeting of them led to death threats that made them fear for their lives. In his filing Thursday,...
UN report says more than 570,000 people in Gaza now ‘starving’ due to fallout from war
RAFAH, Gaza Strip — More than half a million people in Gaza — a quarter of the population — are starving due to “woefully insufficient” quantities of food entering the territory ever since Israel’s military responded to Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack, according to a report released Thursday by the U.N....
A lone gunman opens fire in a Prague university, killing 14 people and injuring 25
PRAGUE — A lone gunman opened fire Thursday in a university building in downtown Prague, killing at least 14 people and injuring more than 20 in the Czech Republic’s worst mass shooting, police and the city’s rescue service said. The bloodshed took place in the philosophy department building of Charles...
Taliban official says Afghan girls of all ages permitted to study in religious schools
KABUL, Afghanistan — Afghan girls of all ages are permitted to study in religious schools, which are traditionally boys-only, a Taliban official said Thursday. A day earlier, U.N. special envoy Roza Otunbayeva told the Security Council and reporters that the United Nations was receiving “more and more anecdotal evidence” that...
U.S. unemployment claims rise slightly, remain at low levels despite higher interest rates
WASHINGTON — The number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits rose slightly last week but still remained at historically low levels despite high interest rates intended to slow hiring and cool the economy. The Labor Department reported Thursday that jobless claims were up by 2,000 to 205,000 the week that...
Ready, set, travel: The holiday rush to the airports and highways is underway
It’s beginning to look a lot like a hectic holiday travel season, but it might go relatively smoothly if the weather cooperates. Travel over Christmas and New Year’s tends to spread out over many days, so the peaks in the U.S. are likely to be lower than they were during...
Parents of children sickened by lead linked to tainted fruit pouches fear for kids’ future
When Cora Dibert went for a routine blood test in October, the toddler brought along her favorite new snack: a squeeze pouch of WanaBana cinnamon-flavored apple puree. “She sucked them dry,” recalls her 26-year-old mother, Morgan Shurtleff, of Elgin, Oklahoma. Within a week, the family got an alarming call. The...
Health officials push to get schoolchildren vaccinated as more U.S. parents opt out
When Idaho had a rare measles outbreak a few months ago, health officials scrambled to keep it from spreading. In the end, 10 people, all in one family, were infected, all unvaccinated. This time, the state was lucky, said the region’s medical director Dr. Perry Jansen. The family quickly quarantined...
Federal judge blocks California law that would have banned carrying firearms in most public places
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — A federal judge on Wednesday temporarily blocked a California law that would have banned carrying firearms in most public places, ruling that it violates the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and deprives people of their ability to defend themselves and their loved ones. The law signed...
Christmas is in jeopardy for some New Englanders after storms and flooding knocked out power
PORTLAND, Maine — Megan Michaud and her family of five lost power for three days after a powerful storm throttled her home state of Maine, and a new challenge is creeping up on her: It’s almost time for Christmas. “This morning, my second grader told me, ‘It’s five days until...
U.S., Venezuela swap prisoners: Maduro ally for 10 Americans, plus fugitive contractor ‘Fat Leonard’
MIAMI — The United States freed a close ally of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in exchange for the release of 10 Americans imprisoned in the South American country and the return of a fugitive defense contractor known as “Fat Leonard” who is at the center of a massive Pentagon bribery...
Judge orders release of over 150 names of people mentioned in Jeffrey Epstein lawsuit documents
NEW YORK — A federal judge has ordered the public disclosure of the identities of more than 150 people mentioned in a mountain of court documents related to the late-financier Jeffrey Epstein, saying that most of the names were already public and that many had not objected to the release....
U.S. released ally of Venezuela’s president in swap for jailed Americans
MIAMI — The Biden administration has released a close ally of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in a swap for jailed Americans, the Associated Press has learned. Alex Saab, who was arrested on a U.S. warrant for money laundering in 2020, was released from custody Wednesday. In exchange, Maduro will free...
U.S. flies bombers for joint drills with South Korea, Japan after North’s long-range missile launch
SEOUL, South Korea — The United States flew long-range bombers for joint drills with South Korea and Japan on Wednesday in a show of force against North Korea, days after the North performed its first intercontinental ballistic missile test in five months. The trilateral training off South Korea’s southern island...
Study shows AI image-generators being trained on explicit photos of children
Hidden inside the foundation of popular artificial intelligence image-generators are thousands of images of child sexual abuse, according to a new report that urges companies to take action to address a harmful flaw in the technology they built. Those same images have made it easier for AI systems to produce...
Judge reverses earlier decision, allows removal of Confederate memorial at Arlington Cemetery
ALEXANDRIA, Va. — A federal judge on Tuesday allowed the Arlington National Cemetery to remove a century-old Confederate memorial one day after blocking the removal over a report that gravesites were disturbed. At a hearing in federal court in Alexandria, Virginia, U.S. District Judge Rossie Alston said he issued the...
Earthquake in northwestern China kills at least 131 people and is the deadliest in 9 years
BEIJING — A strong overnight earthquake rattled a mountainous region of northwestern China, authorities said Tuesday, reducing homes to rubble, leaving residents outside in a below-freezing winter night and killing 131 people in the nation’s deadliest quake in nine years. The magnitude 6.2 earthquake struck just before midnight on Monday,...
Sandra Day O’Connor called a pioneer and ‘iconic jurist’ as she is memorialized by Biden, Roberts
WASHINGTON — Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, the Arizona rancher’s daughter who became a voice of moderate conservatism as the first woman on the U.S. Supreme Court, was memorialized by President Joe Biden on Tuesday as a pioneer in the legal world who inspired generations of women. Biden and Chief Justice...
She bought a colorful vase at Goodwill for $3.99. The rare piece sold at auction for $107,000
Jessica Vincent had just started surveying the shelves of a Virginia thrift store when a vase caught her eye. It was shaped like a bottle and had ribbons of color, aqua green and amethyst purple, that spiraled up its glass surface like stripes of paint. The piece looked old amongst...
New York will set up a commission to consider reparations for slavery
ALBANY, N.Y. — New York state will create a commission tasked with considering reparations to address the persistent, harmful effects of slavery in the state, under a bill signed into law by Gov. Kathy Hochul on Tuesday. The bill signing comes at a time when many states and towns throughout...
Lawsuit against former Wisconsin Supreme Court justice dismissed after she turns over records
MADISON, Wis. — An open records lawsuit against former Wisconsin Supreme Court Chief Justice Patience Roggensack was dismissed Tuesday after Roggensack turned over all records she had related to her work investigating possible impeachment of a sitting justice. None of the records Roggensack produced earlier this month shed any light...
Putin hails Russia’s military performance in Ukraine, vows to achieve Moscow’s goals
MOSCOW — Russian President Vladimir Putin declared Tuesday that the military has seized the initiative on the battlefield in Ukraine after repelling Kyiv’s counteroffensive and is well positioned to achieve Moscow’s goals. Putin’s speech at a meeting with top military brass came a day after he presented documents to Russia’s...
Google to pay $700 million to U.S. states, consumers in app store settlement
Google has agreed to pay $700 million and make several other concessions to settle allegations that it had been stifling competition against its Android app store — the same issue that went to trial in another case that could result in even biggthe er changes. Although Google struck the deal...
Illegal crossings surge in remote areas as Congress, White House weigh major asylum limits
LUKEVILLE, Ariz. — Hundreds of dates are written on concrete-filled steel columns erected along the U.S. border with Mexico to memorialize when the Border Patrol has repaired illicit openings in the would-be barriers. Yet no sooner are fixes made than another column is sawed, torched and chiseled for large groups...
