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E. Jason Wambsgans/Chicago Tribune/TNS

Environmentalists push back against US EPA plan to extend coal plant closings

Current News / News & Features /

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is facing strong public opposition to its proposed plans to extend closure deadlines until October 2031 for 11 coal plants across the country — three of which are in Illinois and one in northwest Indiana.

But many environmental experts, including Earthjustice senior attorney Mychal Ozaeta, say the ...Read more

Shawn Inglima/New York Daily News/TNS

Mayor Mamdani swears in Lillian Bonsignore as new FDNY commissioner

Current News / News & Features /

NEW YORK — Mayor Zohran Mamdani swore in his new Fire commissioner Tuesday, and made it clear — despite critics’ fearmongering — that she’s more than qualified to head the nation’s largest Fire Department.

“I have appointed Lillian Bonsignore to this role for her wealth of experience and vision for how to lead the FDNY, as well as...Read more

Imago/Imago via ZUMA Press/TNS

Rapper Tekashi69 surrenders himself at Brooklyn jail where Maduro is held

Current News / News & Features /

NEW YORK — Tekashi69 surrendered himself to federal authorities on Tuesday at the same Brooklyn jail where Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife are being held.

The rapper, whose real name is Daniel Hernandez, turned himself in at the Metropolitan Detention Center on 29th St. near Third Ave. in Sunset Park to serve a 90-day ...Read more

STR/GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/TNS

China courts South Korea as it pressures Japan over Taiwan

Current News / News & Features /

Hours after President Xi Jinping posed for selfies with South Korea’s Lee Jae Myung in Beijing, China sent a very different message to Japan, escalating their dispute by imposing export controls.

The new restrictions bar exports of all dual-use items to Japan for military purposes, the latest step in a dispute triggered by remarks by Prime ...Read more

Tom Gralish/The Philadelphia Inquirer/TNS

Gov. Josh Shapiro, Pa. Democratic lawmakers criticize Trump's Jan. 6 rioter pardons on anniversary of Capitol attack

Current News / News & Features /

Five years after rioters stormed the U.S. Capitol, Gov. Josh Shapiro and other Pennsylvania Democrats on Tuesday marked the anniversary of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack by sharply criticizing President Donald Trump.

Trump, who was impeached for inciting the riot in the final days of his first administration, pardoned nearly every Jan. 6 defendant ...Read more

Al Seib/Los Angeles Times/TNS

A court ruling that let teachers tell parents about a child's 'gender incongruity' is paused

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A court order giving California teachers full freedom to tell parents about their child's gender identity at school is on hold after an appellate panel blocked it from going into immediate effect.

Had the three-member panel not acted, the ruling, by a federal district judge, would have required immediate changes to policies at hundreds of ...Read more

JIM WATSON/GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/TNS

Trump says Venezuela to send US up to 50 million barrels of oil

Current News / News & Features /

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump said Venezuela would send the United States as much as 50 million barrels of oil, declaring it would be sold with the proceeds to benefit both countries.

“I am pleased to announce that the Interim Authorities in Venezuela will be turning over between 30 and 50 MILLION Barrels of High Quality, Sanctioned ...Read more

JIM WATSON/GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/TNS

Trump says Venezuela will 'turn over' up to 50 million barrels of oil to US

Current News / News & Features /

President Donald Trump said Tuesday evening that Venezuela’s interim authorities have agreed to turn over between 30 million and 50 million barrels of oil to the United States, an unexpected sign of the rapidly evolving relationship between Washington and the Caracas socialist leadership.

It was not immediately clear which Venezuelan entities...Read more

Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images North America/TNS

Minnesota Republican lawmakers to testify on fraud before U.S. House panel

Current News / News & Features /

Three Republican members of the Minnesota House are set to testify Wednesday morning before the U.S. House Oversight Committee for a hearing on fraud and misuse of federal funds.

Rep. Kirstin Robbins, R-Maple Grove, the chair of Minnesota’s Fraud Prevention and State Agency Oversight Committee and a Republican candidate for governor in 2026, ...Read more

Handout/Dominican Republic Customs/TNS

They shipped high-powered ammo, guns to Haiti from Miami, federal prosecutors say

Current News / News & Features /

Months after authorities in the Dominican Republic intercepted a Haiti-bound cache of ammunition and firearms, including a high-powered military-grade machine gun, three Floridians are now facing federal charges for their alleged roles in the trafficking scheme.

Francesca Charles, 28, a naturalized U.S. citizen, and brothers Jacques Pierre, 32,...Read more

Mandel Ngan/Getty Images North America/TNS

California judge weighs whether First Amendment lawsuit against Trump officials can proceed

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SAN JOSE, Calif. — Lawyers clashed Tuesday in a federal courtroom in San Jose over whether student newspaper The Stanford Daily can proceed with a First Amendment lawsuit alleging the Trump administration used immigration law to punish student speech — a case that could set a legal precedent for the constitutional rights of noncitizen ...Read more

News briefs

Current News / News & Features /

Classified Venezuela briefings precede likely war powers vote

WASHINGTON — Congressional leaders, emerging Monday from a classified briefing on Venezuela, offered sharply contrasting takes on both the president’s odds of overhauling that country’s government and whether leaving Congress out of the decision to strike was constitutional.

...Read more

LUDOVIC MARIN/AFP/Getty Images North America/TNS

Trump won't rule out military force to acquire Greenland

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WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump won’t rule out the use of military force to acquire Greenland, the White House said, ramping up tension with fellow NATO member Denmark over a dispute that’s surged back into public view following the ouster of Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro.

Trump is considering many ways of achieving his goal of ...Read more

Ed Reed/Mayoral Photography Office

As Mayor Mamdani and NYPD Commissioner Tisch tout drops in city's crime, unclear how their policy differences will play out

Current News / News & Features /

NEW YORK — As NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch on Tuesday announced the city just saw its safest year since the department began keeping modern-day crime stats in 1994, Mayor Zohran Mamdani, standing by her side, didn’t address how he will fulfill campaign promises to reform policing.

Tisch and Mamdani appeared together at NYPD headquarers ...Read more

Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images North America/TNS

NC Sen. Thom Tillis pushes to hang plaque in Capitol honoring Jan. 6 law enforcement

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WASHINGTON — North Carolina Republican Sen. Thom Tillis announced a plan Tuesday afternoon to ensure that a plaque is hung in the U.S. Capitol to honor the law enforcement who responded to the attack on the building on Jan. 6, 2021.

The plaque has already been created. It was commissioned by Congress in March 2022 in an appropriations bill ...Read more

Leila Navidi/The Minnesota Star Tribune/TNS

Minnesota queer legislators, advocates band together to protect gender-affirming care

Current News / News & Features /

A flurry of federal actions in President Donald Trump’s second term has transgender Minnesotans wondering whether they will continue to exist in public life.

Rollbacks on the liberties of transgender people have been a hallmark of Trump 2.0 since day one, when Trump issued an executive order declaring that the policy of the United States is ...Read more

Bethany Mollenkof/Los Angeles Times/TNS

What Trump's vow to withhold federal childcare funding means in California

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Gov. Gavin Newsom and other state Democratic leaders accused President Trump of unleashing a political vendetta after he announced plans to freeze roughly $10 billion in federal funding for child care and social services programs in California and four other Democrat-controlled states.

Trump justified the action in comments posted on his social...Read more

Nancy Lane/Boston Herald/TNS

Massachusetts deaths from flu rises to four children, with two Boston deaths under two years old

Current News / News & Features /

Boston reported two children have died related to the flu this season Tuesday, the first pediatric flu-associated deaths in the city since 2013, bringing total related deaths Massachusetts children up to four.

“We’ve noted a dramatic increase in flu cases in Boston, particularly among children, and we are very concerned about the severity ...Read more

Mandel Ngan/Getty Images North America/TNS

Trump warns he'll be impeached if Republicans lose midterms

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WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump implored Republicans to turn around their political fortunes ahead of November’s midterm elections, warning that if Democrats retake control of Congress, he would be impeached for a third time.

“You got to win the midterms,” Trump said Tuesday at a retreat for the party’s House caucus in Washington....Read more

GIORGIO VIERA/AFP/Getty images North America/TNS

CIA advised Trump against supporting Venezuela's democratic opposition

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WASHINGTON — A highly confidential CIA assessment produced at the request of the White House warned President Donald Trump of a wider conflict in Venezuela if he were to support the country's democratic opposition once its president, Nicolás Maduro, was deposed, a person familiar with the matter told the Los Angeles Times.

The assessment was...Read more