Current News

/

ArcaMax

U.S. Navy/Getty Images North America/TNS

Europe hardens stance against Trump's Iran war in threat to NATO

Current News / News & Features /

Donald Trump’s NATO allies are increasing resistance to getting involved in his Iran war, risking a deeper rupture in the already strained military bloc.

Spain closed its airspace to U.S. jets Monday, and Italy denied U.S. military aircraft bound for the Middle East permission to land at a base in Sicily, according to a person familiar with ...Read more

Tasha Poullard/Lexington Herald-Leader/TNS

KY judge voids impeachment of Fayette Circuit Judge Julie Goodman

Current News / News & Features /

LEXINGTON, Ky. — A Franklin Circuit Court judge on Tuesday voided the impeachment of Fayette Circuit Judge Julie Muth Goodman, saying she committed no offenses or misconduct that rose to the level of impeachment.

The ruling by Judge Phillip Shepherd nullifies a House Resolution that, on March 20, impeached Goodman in an unprecedented move.

...Read more

Brian Cassella/Chicago Tribune/TNS

Operation Midway Blitz in charts: Roughly 3,800 detained, and 2,500 deported, most with no criminal record

Current News / News & Features /

CHICAGO – Newly released data shows that Operation Midway Blitz led to the deportation of nearly 2,500 immigrants — most of them with no criminal record — during last fall’s immigration enforcement surge that fueled massive protests and led to two shootings, one deadly.

A Tribune analysis of the data, released Monday, offers the first ...Read more

Emily Curiel/Kansas City Star/TNS

KC's affordable housing rules haven't worked. Would mayor's new plan be better?

Current News / News & Features /

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — As Kansas City considers big changes to its rules for developers seeking tax breaks, local affordable housing advocates want officials to pump the brakes and think more about the consequences of such a shift.

City officials are hoping to better align the requirements of all the agencies that grant developers tax breaks in ...Read more

Al Drago/Getty Images North America/TNS

Supreme Court says state bans on 'conversion therapy' violate counselors' free speech rights

Current News / News & Features /

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that state laws forbidding “conversion therapy” for minors violate the free-speech rights of licensed counselors.

The court said Colorado’s law violates the 1st Amendment. The free-speech ruling is likely to invalidate similar laws in California and 23 other states.

In an 8-1 decision, ...Read more

Oliver Contreras/AFP/Getty Images North America/TNS

Iran still firing missiles, US ground operations remain an option, Hegseth says

Current News / News & Features /

WASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Tuesday that Iran still retains the ability to launch offensive missiles a month into the war, even as U.S. and Israeli forces have carried out sustained strikes aimed at degrading Tehran's military capabilities.

"Yes, they will shoot some missiles, but we will shoot them down," Hegseth told ...Read more

Europe hardens stance against Trump's Iran war in threat to NATO

Current News / News & Features /

Donald Trump’s NATO allies are increasing resistance to getting involved in his Iran war, risking a deeper rupture in the already strained military bloc.

Spain closed its airspace to U.S. jets Monday, and Italy denied U.S. military aircraft bound for the Middle East permission to land at a base in Sicily, according to a person familiar with ...Read more

Pennsylvania consistently ranks among the top three states in the country for reported Lyme disease cases each year. Ladislav Kubeš/istock via Getty Images Plus

Ticks are the backyard threat southwestern Pennsylvania homeowners keep ignoring

Current News / News & Features /

As spring unfolds, new research highlights an issue for southwestern Pennsylvania residents: Most people know ticks are in their backyard, but few believe they’re actually at risk of contracting tick-borne illnesses.

Every year in the United States, an estimated 500,000 people are diagnosed with Lyme disease. The illness, caused by ...Read more

Mindfulness meditation is a process of noticing difficult thoughts and feelings rather than shutting them out. Marco VDM/E+ via Getty Images

Benefits of mindfulness meditation go far beyond relaxation – here’s what it is and how to practice it

Current News / News & Features /

Imagine being asked to sit alone in a quiet room for 15 minutes with nothing to do – no phone, no music, no external distraction. In a well-known 2014 study, many participants found that task so challenging that they chose to press a button to give themselves an unpleasant electric shock instead of continuing to sit with their thoughts and ...Read more

Furniture confiscated from Jewish homes is delivered to other people in Boulogne-Billancourt, Paris in April 1942, after an Allied bombing. Art Media/Print Collector/Getty Images

Holocaust survivors in France came home to stolen apartments, looted furniture and bureaucratic hurdles

Current News / News & Features /

In 1945, an angry mob confronted Aba Mizreh and four of his sons outside their former home in Paris. The Jewish family had hidden in Lyon during World War II, only to learn that their apartment had been looted and rented in their absence. Despite an eviction notice, the new tenants refused to leave, leading to a street fight.

...Read more

Before catalytic converters, starting a gas-powered vehicle could choke the surrounding area with smog. Bettmann via Getty Images

How California’s war on smog and its ambitious car pollution rules made everyone’s air cleaner

Current News / News & Features /

Cars on the road today are 99% cleaner than they were in 1970. Air quality in the United States is much, much better as a result. In Los Angeles, where I live, lead levels in the air were 50 times higher in the 1970s than today, and the amount of lead in kids’ blood has plummeted.

What made that drop possible is arguably the most ...Read more

How NASA plans to keep Artemis astronauts alive if disaster strikes

Current News / News & Features /

EDWARDS, Calif. — If NASA's colossal new moon rocket, slated to launch with astronauts for the first time as soon as tomorrow, explodes on the pad or breaks up as it accelerates through the atmosphere, the space agency has a plan:

Fire a powerful motor affixed to the top of the crew capsule that is literally designed to outrun debris from an...Read more

Julien De Rosa/Getty Images North America/TNS

Iran attacks oil tanker after Trump wavers on war escalation

Current News / News & Features /

Iran hit a fully laden Kuwaiti oil tanker off the coast of Dubai during a fresh wave of attacks around the Persian Gulf, a sign it’s willing to escalate strikes on energy assets as the war drags on.

The Tuesday assault on the Al-Salmi, a large crude carrier in an area packed with ships, is one of the most significant on a vessel since the U.S...Read more

Ernesto Benavides/AFP/GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/TNS

Peru's crowded election leaves room for a surprise contender

Current News / News & Features /

With 35 candidates and about a third of Peruvians undecided or backing no one, a surprise contender could yet emerge in the final days ahead of the April 12 vote.

Conservatives Rafael López Aliaga and Keiko Fujimori have been stuck in a technical tie each with about 10% to 12% of support for weeks now, primarily from voters in the capital of ...Read more

Chris Dorney/Dreamstime/TNS

Florida Democrats profess midterm optimism: 'The reaction we're getting from people is amazing'

Current News / News & Features /

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — After years of falling further and further behind the Republicans and losing election after election, Florida Democrats are increasingly optimistic about the 2026 midterm elections.

This time, they believe, it isn’t just the usual wishful thinking.

At the Broward Democratic Party’s annual Obama Roosevelt Legacy ...Read more

Ricardo Ramirez Buxeda/Orlando Sentinel/TNS

Cubans in Central Florida feel a change is coming, but concerns about deportations also rise

Current News / News & Features /

ORLANDO, Fla. — For thirty years, Julio Varona has built a life in Central Florida, enjoying the special status allowed to Cuban immigrants even though the U.S. government had a standing order to deport him.

Only now, amid high-level talks and heightened tensions between the United States and Cuba, does his deportation seem likely to happen �...Read more

Leila Navidi/The Minnesota Star Tribune/TNS

Minnesota risks rankling Trump by prioritizing diversity in federal health grants

Current News / News & Features /

MINNEAPOLIS — Minnesota risked irking President Donald Trump’s administration this month by prioritizing diversity in the use of nearly $200 million in new federal rural health grants

Hospitals applying for the funding were urged in the state’s application to “intentionally identify how the grant serves diverse populations, especially ...Read more

(Giorgio Viera/AFP/GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/TNS

He runs a Miami plastic surgery clinic and wants to be Cuba's next leader

Current News / News & Features /

Armando Labrador owns and operates a plastic-surgery clinic in a Miami strip mall that advertises low-cost breast implants and liposuction. He dreams of being Cuba’s next president.

Labrador, 56, fled Cuba with his family as a teenager, after his father was imprisoned for almost eight years and his grandfather was executed. When he isn’t ...Read more

(Abigail Gonsoulin)/KFF HEALTH/TNS

'They tricked me': A father was chained after he went to ICE to reunite with his kids

Current News / News & Features /

Carlos arrived at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in New Mexico in December, believing he was one step closer to reuniting with his children. By that point, his 14-year-old son and 16-year-old daughter had been in a federal shelter in Texas for nearly a year after crossing the border to be with him.

“I feel like I’m ...Read more

ROUZBEH FOULADI/Middle East Images/AFP/Getty Images North America/TNS

Who's who in Iran? Guide to the Islamic Republic's top leaders

Current News / News & Features /

The U.S. and Israeli war on Iran has targeted the Islamic Republic’s most senior leaders and mobilized every branch of its sprawling state apparatus in a fight for survival.

In the past, power ultimately rested with the supreme leader, the country’s top authority. But since last year’s 12-day war, important national security and foreign ...Read more