Louisiana lawmakers vote to end jail time for marijuana use
BATON ROUGE, La. — In a demonstration of the changing opinions about marijuana use, Louisiana lawmakers have agreed that people caught with small amounts of pot for recreational use should not go to jail, voting Monday to send the bill lessening the penalties to the governor’s desk. The Senate’s 20-17...
Harris says leaders need to restore hope in Guatemala
GUATEMALA CITY — Vice President Kamala Harris on Monday emphasized the need to restore hope for residents of struggling Central American nations to help address the increase in migration from the region as she faced the first major test of her diplomatic skills on a three-day foreign trip. Her comments...
Vote on new Israeli government to be held in coming week
JERUSALEM — Israel’s parliament speaker said Monday that a vote to approve a new government that would end Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s 12-year rule will be held in the coming week, without setting a precise date. The announcement by Yariv Levin, a close Netanyahu ally, leaves time for the prime...
FDA approves much-debated Alzheimer’s drug panned by experts
WASHINGTON — Government health officials on Monday approved the first new drug for Alzheimer’s disease in nearly 20 years, disregarding warnings from independent advisers that the much-debated treatment hasn’t been shown to help slow the brain-destroying disease. The Food and Drug Administration said it granted approval to the drug developed...
Supreme Court rules against immigrants with temporary status
WASHINGTON — A unanimous Supreme Court ruled Monday that thousands of people living in the U.S. for humanitarian reasons are ineligible to apply to become permanent residents. Justice Elena Kagan wrote for the court that federal immigration law prohibits people who entered the country illegally and now have Temporary Protected...
Democrats brace for 2022 elections with ‘little margin for error’
WASHINGTON — Democrats are at high risk of losing control of Congress next year, and the perilous outlook is shaping party strategy on every level, a modern illustration of the old saw: Nothing focuses the mind like the sight of the gallows. Defending fragile House and Senate majorities in the...
Polio: When vaccines and re-emergence were just as daunting
CINCINNATI — The covid-19 pandemic and the distribution of the vaccines that will prevent it have surfaced haunting memories for Americans who lived through an earlier time when the country was swept by a virus that, for so long, appeared to have no cure or way to prevent it. They...
‘Get used to me’: Postmaster Louis DeJoy evokes Trump style in Biden era
WASHINGTON — Louis DeJoy is uninterested in the niceties of Washington. The wealthy longtime businessman with an outer borough New York accent prides himself as a problem solver ready to disrupt an unwieldy bureaucracy. And he’s facing potential legal troubles. In other words, the postmaster general may be the closest...
Fisher-Price recalls baby soothers after 4 infant deaths
EL SEGUNDO, Calif. — Fisher-Price says it is recalling a model of its baby soothers after the deaths of four infants who were placed on their backs unrestrained in the devices and later found on their stomachs. In a joint statement with the Consumer Product Safety Commission, Fisher-Price said Friday...
Mexico president appears to hold key majority in elections
MEXICO CITY — President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s party and its allies appeared poised to maintain their majority in Mexico’s lower chamber of the congress, according to initial results. Electoral authorities released “quick count” results based on voting samples that allow estimates of the voting trends to determine the rough...
FRANKIE’S FRIENDS
The mission of Frankie’s Friends Cat Rescue is to stop cats from suffering, cruelty, neglect, disease, injury, homelessness, and to reduce the number of cats (with high volume spay/neuter services) that enter shelters, or are euthanized due to overpopulation. Frankie`s Friends is in dire need of hiring a veterinarian as...
Philadelphia teen dies after being shot 13 times
A Philadelphia teen died after he was shot 13 times while riding his bike on Sunday. The shooting occurred on the 1700 block of 68th Avenue around 4:39 p.m., NBC 10 is reporting. The teen’s mother, Shineka Crawford, told CBS 3 that her son, Shaquille Barbour, 18, was riding home...
Jeff Bezos plans to go to space aboard Blue Origin flight in July
Jeff Bezos will be aboard for Blue Origin’s first human space flight next month. In an Instagram post early Monday, Bezos said he, his brother, and the winner of an ongoing auction, will be aboard Blue Origin’s New Shepard spacecraft during its scheduled launch on July 20. July 20 is...
Minneapolis sees more protests after man killed by deputies
MINNEAPOLIS — Protesters took to the streets for a fourth consecutive night in Minneapolis over the shooting death of a Black man by members of a U.S. Marshals task force. Crowds marched Sunday evening in response to Thursday’s fatal shooting of 32-year-old Winston Boogie Smith Jr. in Minneapolis’ Uptown neighborhood....
Train barrels into another in Pakistan, killing at least 45
MULTAN, Pakistan — An express train barreled into another that had derailed in Pakistan before dawn Monday, killing at least 45 people, authorities said. More than 100 were injured, and rescuers and villagers worked throughout the day to search crumpled cars for survivors and the dead. Cries for help pierced...
U.S. administers 300 millionth covid-19 vaccine shot
The U.S. passed another milestone in its covid-19 vaccination effort Sunday after administering its 300 millionth dose. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that 301,638,578 shots had been given. The country now has fully vaccinated 41.9% of the population and 51.5% has received at least one dose....
Cyberattacks on U.S. targets are ‘here to stay,’ says commerce secretary
Regular cyberattacks, targeting everything from businesses to basic infrastructure, are the new normal, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said Sunday. U.S. businesses and lawmakers are struggling and have a long way to go to bolster cyberdefenses after the May attack on the country’s biggest gas pipeline, she said on ABC’s “This...
Last of Soviet soldiers who liberated Auschwitz dies at 98
BERLIN — David Dushman, the last surviving Soviet soldier involved in the liberation of the Nazi death camp at Auschwitz, has died. He was 98. The Jewish Community of Munich and Upper Bavaria said Sunday that Dushman had died at a Munich hospital on Saturday. “Every witness to history who...
Militia plotted ‘war’ against California cops, taking up arms if Trump invoked Insurrection Act, feds say
OAKLAND, Calif. — In the weeks before a gunman allegedly killed two officers in separate shootings last year in California, prosecutors say he and other members of an extremist militia known as the Grizzly Scouts held firearms trainings, scouted protests, and laid out terms of “war” against police. In recent...
Normandy commemorates D-Day with small crowds, but big heart
COLLEVILLE-SUR-MER, France — When the sun rises over Omaha Beach, revealing vast stretches of wet sand extending toward distant cliffs, one starts to grasp the immensity of the task faced by Allied soldiers on June 6, 1944, landing on the Nazi-occupied Normandy shore. The 77th anniversary of D-Day was marked...
Police: 3 dead, others hurt in Florida grad party shooting
MIAMI — Three people are dead and at least six others injured following a shooting at a Florida graduation party, the latest in a string of such violence in the Miami area, police said Sunday. One of those killed was a state corrections officer, Miami-Dade police Director Freddie Ramirez told...
Trump’s grievances cloud Republican agenda heading into 2022
RALEIGH, N.C. — Republicans are fighting to seize control of Congress. Just don’t ask what they’d do if they win. Look no further for evidence of the GOP’s muddled governing agenda than battleground North Carolina, where party leaders packed into a convention hall Saturday night to cheer former President Donald...
Manchin say he’ll vote against ‘partisan’ Dem elections bill
WASHINGTON — A key Democratic senator says he will not vote for the largest overhaul of U.S. election law in at least a generation, defying his party and the White House and virtually guaranteeing the failure of the legislation after a near party-line approval in the House. “Voting and election...
Advocates push for citizen input and transparency in new congressional and legislative maps
Jim Brewster, the McKeesport Democrat, has vivid memories of going to bed in December 2011 in his Allegheny County home and waking up to find his 45th Senate District had been moved across Pennsylvania to the Poconos. Strange things can happen when politics collides with the need to resketch district...
New England’s success against covid-19 could be a model
For Dr. Jeremy Faust, the moment he realized the pandemic no longer dominated his workday came over Memorial Day weekend, when he didn’t see a single coronavirus case over two shifts in the emergency room at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. Kerry LaBarbera, an ER nurse a few miles...
