BEIRUT (AP) - U.S.-backed Syrian forces celebrated in the devastated streets of Raqqa on Tuesday after gaining control of the northern city that once was the heart of the Islamic State’s self-styled caliphate, dealing a major defeat to the extremist…
Posted: 17 October 2017 [07:58 PM] Posted: 17 October 2017 [07:56 PM] WASHINGTON (AP) - Rep. Tom Marino, President Donald Trump’s nominee to be the nation’s drug czar, has withdrawn from consideration following reports that he played a key role in weakening the federal government’s authority to stop companies from distributing opioids.…
Posted: 17 October 2017 [07:55 PM] WASHINGTON (AP) - President Donald Trump on Tuesday will call the families of four soldiers killed this month in Niger, the White House says, as Trump again casts doubt on whether his predecessor appropriately consoled the families of military personnel…
Posted: 17 October 2017 [07:54 PM] HONOLULU (AP) - A federal judge in Hawaii blocked the Trump administration Tuesday from enforcing its latest travel ban, just hours before it was set to take effect. U.S. District Judge Derrick Watson granted Hawaii’s request to temporarily block the…
Posted: 17 October 2017 [07:52 PM] WASHINGTON (AP) - Republican and Democratic senators joined in announcing a plan Tuesday aimed at stabilizing America’s health insurance markets in the wake of President Donald Trump’s order to terminate “Obamacare” subsidies. Trump himself spoke approvingly of the deal, but…
Posted: 16 October 2017 [11:16 PM] SANTA ROSA, Calif. (AP) - The winds eased, some of the smoke began to clear and the forecast Monday offered a tantalizing chance of rain to firefighters trying to corral the blazes that have laid waste to the nation’s most…
Posted: 16 October 2017 [11:15 PM] FORT BRAGG, N.C. (AP) - Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, who was captured and held by the Taliban for five years after walking away from his post in Afghanistan, pleaded guilty Monday to desertion and endangering his comrades - charges that…
Posted: 16 October 2017 [11:14 PM] CAGUAS, Puerto Rico (AP) - Raw sewage is pouring into the rivers and reservoirs of Puerto Rico in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria. People without running water bathe and wash their clothes in contaminated streams, and some islanders have been…
Posted: 16 October 2017 [11:13 PM] WASHINGTON (AP) - President Donald Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell pledged Monday to work together on the GOP goal of overhauling federal taxes, proclaiming that despite reports to the contrary their relationship is just fine. “We’re probably now…
Posted: 15 October 2017 [10:26 PM] As U.S. communities ravaged by this year’s series of intense hurricanes and wildfires clear debris and begin to rebuild, many are counting on the federal government to help cover their costs. They could be in for a frustrating surprise. If…
Posted: 15 October 2017 [09:34 PM] MOGADISHU, Somalia - The most powerful bomb blast ever witnessed in Somalia’s capital killed 276 people with around 300 others injured, the country’s information minister said early Monday, making it the deadliest single attack in this Horn of Africa nation.…
Posted: 15 October 2017 [09:34 PM] WASHINGTON - President Donald Trump’s abrupt move to cut off federal payments to insurers jolted America’s health care and political worlds alike, threatening to boost premiums for millions, disrupt insurance markets and shove Republicans into a renewed civil war over…
Posted: 15 October 2017 [09:33 PM] SANTA ROSA, Calif. - With the winds dying down, fire officials said Sunday they have apparently “turned a corner” against the wildfires that have devastated California wine country and other parts of the state over the past week, and thousands…
Posted: 14 October 2017 [05:37 PM] SONOMA, Calif. - Rising winds fanned the California wildfires again Saturday, forcing hundreds more people to flee from their homes in the state's fabled wine country and threatening to undo the efforts of crews who have spent days trying to…
Posted: 14 October 2017 [05:36 PM] SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico - Authorities in Puerto Rico raised the death toll from Hurricane Maria by 3 to 48 on Saturday based on a review of medical records. The medical examiner concluded that the hurricane was the deciding factor…
Posted: 14 October 2017 [05:36 PM] President Donald Trump's decision to end a provision of the Affordable Care Act that lowered out-of-pocket medical costs brought swift reaction Friday from the states, as health officials and consumers said they feared the action could chase millions of Americans…
Posted: 14 October 2017 [05:35 PM] LONDON - Wind gusts of up to 80 mph (130 kph) may lash the United Kingdom and Ireland as the remnants of Hurricane Ophelia hit the British Isles, the two countries’ weather services warned Saturday. Ireland's Met Eireann weather service…
Posted: 14 October 2017 [05:35 PM] TEHRAN, Iran - President Donald Trump's refusal to certify the Iran nuclear deal has sparked a new war of words between the Islamic Republic and America, fueling growing mistrust and a sense of nationalism among Iranians. The speech has also…
Posted: 13 October 2017 [09:38 PM] MILAN (AP) - Some 600 migrants rescued at sea arrived Friday in Sicily - one of the biggest influxes since Italy struck a deal with Libyan authorities to limit migrant smuggling - raising concerns of a renewed surge on the…
Posted: 13 October 2017 [09:36 PM] WASHINGTON (AP) - President Donald Trump on Friday angrily accused Iran of violating the spirit of the landmark 2015 nuclear deal, accusing it of a long list of malign behavior and hitting its main military wing with terrorism sanctions. But…
Posted: 13 October 2017 [09:34 PM] BRATISLAVA, Slovakia (AP) - The leaders of four Central European countries have cautiously welcomed European Union proposals to address their concerns that multinationals sell lower-quality versions of their foods to consumers in Central and Eastern Europe than in the West.…
Posted: 12 October 2017 [08:53 PM] WASHINGTON (AP) - Congressional Democrats accused the Trump administration Thursday of falsely suggesting the nation’s electricity grid faces severe problems to justify an unnecessary bolstering of the coal and nuclear energy industries. Energy Secretary Rick Perry defended his department’s proposal,…
Posted: 12 October 2017 [08:53 PM] PARIS (AP) - The United States said Thursday it is pulling out of the U.N.’s educational, scientific and cultural agency because of what Washington sees as its anti-Israel bias and need for “fundamental reform.” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said…
Posted: 12 October 2017 [08:52 PM] SONOMA, Calif. (AP) - Search-and-rescue teams, some with cadaver dogs, started looking for bodies Thursday in parts of California wine country devastated by wildfires, authorities said, sounding a warning that more dead were almost sure to emerge from the charred…
Posted: 12 October 2017 [08:51 PM] WASHINGTON - President Donald Trump lashed out at hurricane-devastated Puerto Rico on Thursday, insisting in tweets that the federal government can’t keep sending help “forever” and suggesting the U.S. territory was to blame for its financial struggles. His broadsides triggered…
Posted: 11 October 2017 [07:49 PM] TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - Iran on Wednesday warned of a tough response if President Donald Trump presses ahead with his threats to scuttle the landmark 2015 nuclear deal. Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told lawmakers during a closed session of…
Posted: 11 October 2017 [07:48 PM] WASHINGTON (AP) - After days dominated by friction with his secretary of state and a Republican senator, President Donald Trump is trying to refocus on his top legislative priority, using a Pennsylvania visit to pitch his tax overhaul as a…
Posted: 11 October 2017 [07:47 PM] WASHINGTON (AP) - New federal rules would be the “the smartest, quickest” way to regulate the device the gunman in the Las Vegas massacre used to heighten his firepower, House Speaker Paul Ryan said Wednesday in remarks that suggested Congress…
Posted: 11 October 2017 [07:46 PM] SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) - Four deaths in Hurricane Maria’s aftermath are being investigated as possible cases of a disease spread by animals’ urine, Puerto Rico’s governor said Wednesday amid concerns about islanders’ exposure to contaminated water. A total…
Posted: 11 October 2017 [07:45 PM] SANTA ROSA, Calif. (AP) - Jose Garnica worked for more than two decades to build up his dream home that was reduced to ashes in a matter of minutes by the deadly firestorm striking California’s wine country. Garnica, who moved…
Posted: 10 October 2017 [08:35 PM] DALLAS (AP) - A Texas Tech University student confessed to killing a campus police officer who had been booking him on a drug possession charge, telling detectives he had done “something illogical” and that “he was the one that shot…
Posted: 10 October 2017 [08:34 PM] HARTFORD (AP) - Former Connecticut Gov. John Rowland, serving a 30-month prison sentence for campaign fraud, will be released nearly a year early from a federal minimum-security camp in Pennsylvania, a spokesman for the U.S. Bureau of Prisons said. The…
Posted: 10 October 2017 [08:32 PM] ATLANTA (AP) - One of the nation’s leading gun-control groups has filed a lawsuit against the makers and sellers of “bump stocks,” the devices used by the gunman in what is now the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history.…
Posted: 10 October 2017 [08:31 PM] SANTA ROSA, Calif. (AP) - An onslaught of wildfires across a wide swath of Northern California broke out almost simultaneously then grew exponentially, swallowing up properties from wineries to trailer parks and tearing through both tiny rural towns and urban…
Posted: 08 October 2017 [10:04 PM] PORT ARANSAS, Texas - Born and raised in this Texas Gulf Coast beach town, James Wheeler Jr. finds himself sawing plywood and hanging sheet rock at a time when he would normally be leading deep-sea fishing excursions, trying to hook…
Posted: 08 October 2017 [10:03 PM] BARCELONA, Spain (AP) - Hundreds of thousands of people rallied Sunday in downtown Barcelona to protest against the plans of Catalonia’s regional government to secede from the rest of Spain. The march was the largest pro-union showing since the rise…
Posted: 08 October 2017 [10:02 PM] HARTFORD - When a Connecticut lawyer threatened to get a gun and shoot two water company workers if they didn’t get off his property, was it a crime or were his words protected by free speech rights? That’s the key…
Posted: 08 October 2017 [09:59 PM] BILOXI, Miss. - Hurricane Nate brought a burst of flooding and power outages to the U.S. Gulf Coast before weakening rapidly Sunday, sparing the region the kind of catastrophic damage wreaked by series of hurricanes that hit the southern U.S.…
Posted: 07 October 2017 [04:53 PM] BEIJING - Securing North Korea's missile launchers and nuclear, chemical and biological weapons sites would likely be a chief priority for China in the event of a major crisis involving its communist neighbor, analysts say, although Beijing so far is…
Posted: 07 October 2017 [04:51 PM] NEW YORK - Three Islamic State group sympathizers plotted to cause bloodshed at New York City concert venues, subway stations and Times Square before U.S. agents thwarted the international terror plot, authorities said Friday. One of the defendants, Abdulrahman El…
Posted: 07 October 2017 [04:50 PM] GDANSK, Poland - Polish Catholics held rosaries and prayed together Saturday along the country's 2,000-mile border, appealing to the Virgin Mary and God for salvation for Poland and the world in a national event that many felt had anti-Islam overtones.…
Posted: 07 October 2017 [04:49 PM] TARRYTOWN, N.Y. - With a 1929 Model A Ford Phaeton making the final 3.1-mile journey across the Hudson River, the Tappan Zee Bridge in New York City's northern suburbs has officially closed. Much of the fanfare that accompanied the opening…
Posted: 07 October 2017 [04:47 PM] LAS VEGAS - Nearly a week after the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history, federal agents on Saturday started hauling away the piles of backpacks, purses, baby strollers and lawn chairs left behind when frantic concert-goers scrambled to escape…
Posted: 06 October 2017 [09:13 PM] WARSAW, Poland (AP) - Poland’s Foreign Ministry says the nation’s permanent representative to the European Union has stepped down and the resignation has been accepted. Foreign Minister Witold Waszczykowski said Friday that Jaroslaw Starzyk, 54, had submitted his resignation for…
Posted: 06 October 2017 [09:10 PM] OSLO, Norway (AP) - The Nobel Peace Prize was awarded Friday to the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, a group of mostly young activists pushing for a global treaty to ban the cataclysmic bombs. The award of the $1.1-million…
Posted: 06 October 2017 [09:03 PM] WASHINGTON (AP) - President Donald Trump is allowing more employers to opt out of providing no-cost birth control to women by claiming religious or moral objections, issuing new rules Friday that take another step in rolling back the Obama health…
Posted: 06 October 2017 [09:01 PM] BOSTON (AP) - Boston Police Commissioner William Evans says authorities will be stepping up security for concerts and sporting events following the shooting in Las Vegas. Evans told reporters on Thursday that a lot of events are coming up in…
Posted: 06 October 2017 [09:00 PM] NEW ORLEANS (AP) - When Tropical Storm Nate formed and forecasts put New Orleans in its projected path for this weekend, one big question loomed for residents and business owners: Will the pumps work? “That’s now a thought in everybody…
Posted: 05 October 2017 [07:46 PM] MOSCOW (AP) - In a major break with decades of rivalry, Russia and Saudi Arabia on Friday struck a slew of deals, including contracts for Russian weapons as part of a groundbreaking first visit by a Saudi monarch. The Kremlin…
Posted: 05 October 2017 [07:45 PM] HUNCHUN, China (AP) - The workers wake up each morning on metal bunk beds in fluorescent-lit Chinese dormitories, North Koreans outsourced by their government to process seafood that ends up in American stores and homes. Privacy is forbidden. They cannot…
