California lawmakers announced a slate of bills Thursday that advocates say is the largest push to strengthen drunk driving laws in over two decades.

The proposals include AB 1605, a bill by Assemblymember Rhodesia Ransom, D-Tracy, which would give judges the discretion to add a “no alcohol sale” designation to the IDs of people who have ...Read more

LOS ANGELES — A federal immigration judge ended the deportation case against Narciso Barranco, a Mexican father of three U.S. Marines, whose arrest on video showing masked federal agents pinning him down and punching him outside an IHOP in Southern California went viral last year.

Rigo Hernandez, 44, told The Times that the judge terminated ...Read more

PHILADELPHIA — As U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick’s relationship with Jeffrey Epstein gains new scrutiny, questions have emerged on Haverford College’s campus about how to address their mega donor’s involvement.

Lutnick, a 1983 Haverford graduate who has donated $65 million to the college and whose name is on the school’s ...Read more

SAN DIEGO — A proposed ballot initiative would ask Lemon Grove, California, residents if the retail sale of commercially bred birds should be banned.

Led by a local group of animal rights activists, the initiative would extend current state law — which applies to dogs, cats and rabbits — to forbid bird sales in Lemon Grove unless they ...Read more

Rejecting science, Trump reverses conclusion that climate change is harming Americans

The Trump administration on Thursday reversed the U.S. government’s longstanding scientific assertion that planet-heating pollution seriously threatens Americans, erasing a foundational piece of the country’s efforts to address climate change.

The repeal ...Read more

A federal judge Thursday blocked the Pentagon from punishing Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., for appearing in a social media video that urged U.S. troops not to obey illegal orders.

District Judge Richard Leon ruled that Pentagon officials violated the retired Navy pilot’s free-speech rights by taking steps to cut his retirement rank and pay over ...Read more

MINNEAPOLIS — Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz said the state and federal government were close last week to announcing a joint investigation into the shootings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, but the Trump administration appeared to pull back after the Minnesota Star Tribune reported an agreement was imminent.

The Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party ...Read more

WASHINGTON — Tariffs that have driven down Minnesota exports by double-digits are growing increasingly unpopular in Capitol Hill, as evidenced by a vote this week in the GOP-controlled House of Representatives.

In a rare rebuke from the House late on Feb. 11, six Republican members joined all but one of the Democrats to approve a resolution ...Read more

A federal judge ordered the Trump administration on Thursday to take concrete steps to facilitate the return to the U.S. of Venezuelan men who were deported to a Salvadoran mega prison after he ruled they were denied their constitutional rights in U.S. immigration proceedings.

In March 2025, the United States deported hundreds of Venezuelans ...Read more

MIAMI — Lech Walesa, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate who was president of Poland, was honored Thursday with the title of “ambassador of freedom in Cuba” and a standing ovation at the American Museum of the Cuban Diaspora in Miami.

Walesa, who revolted against communism in Poland and became the first democratically elected president of the ...Read more

Authorities are examining security camera footage from a home in the Tucson area near Nancy Guthrie’s property that shows a man wearing a backpack trying to scale a wall near a home the morning of her disappearance.

The video, which was captured on a Ring camera about 1:54 a.m. Feb. 1, shows a bald man wearing a gray jacket and a backpack ...Read more

The head of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said Renee Good and Alex Pretti were not domestic terrorists, contradicting what other top Trump administration officials said in the immediate aftermath of the fatal shootings in Minneapolis.

“To my knowledge, no,” acting ICE Director Todd Lyons said when asked if Good and Pretti were ...Read more

The Food and Drug Administration has refused to review an application from the biotech company Moderna to approve its mRNA-based flu vaccine.

The agency’s decision, which Moderna announced in a press release on Feb. 10, 2026, is the latest step in efforts by federal health officials under Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F...Read more

MINNEAPOLIS — One defendant was due in court for what was supposed to be a routine hearing about his federal drug charges. But when proceedings began in the St. Paul courtroom, no one appeared for the prosecution.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office in Minnesota hadn’t assigned a new prosecutor to the case after the previous lawyer for the U.S. ...Read more

In a hearing that highlighted the increasing pressure the federal judiciary is facing in high-stakes immigration cases, a Washington, D.C., judge on Thursday declined to reverse her decision that blocked the Trump administration from ending immigration protections for more than 300,000 Haitians.

“I am denying the government’s motion to stay...Read more

Former Minnesota gubernatorial candidate Jeff Johnson and his wife, Julie, released a statement overnight addressing their 22-year-old daughter’s fatal stabbing.

“We are heartbroken beyond words by the tragic and senseless loss of our beloved daughter, Hallie Marie,” they said in a message published by People on Thursday.

“Hallie was a...Read more

TECUMSEH, Mich. — Sorrow emanates from residents’ T-shirts, from frayed purple ribbons around trees, from signs in store windows next to ones exhorting the high school team.

It’s written all over the face of Tecumseh.

Alas, deliverance may be on its way as opening statements were held Thursday in the murder trial of a Tecumseh farmer in ...Read more

U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton has announced that he will be bringing an immigrant detained by ICE for a week in May 2025 to President Donald Trump’s State of the Union address.

Moulton, who is running for U.S. Senate, announced Thursday that he has invited Marcelo Gomes da Silva to attend the annual address to the nation to “capture what’s ...Read more

OAKLAND, Calif. — Shane Killian’s neighbor heard loud bangs on the night of July 10, 2024, but assumed it was just someone lighting off the last of their fireworks from Independence Day.

Instead, the resident of Kitty Hawk Road in Alameda was hearing five family members being killed next door, gunned down one at a time, allegedly by Killian...Read more

The Trump administration on Thursday reversed the U.S. government’s longstanding scientific assertion that planet-heating pollution seriously threatens Americans, erasing a foundational piece of the country’s efforts to address climate change.

The repeal of the 2009 endangerment finding — a conclusion based on decades of science that ...Read more