COLUMBIA, S.C. — A near-total abortion ban penalizing doctors and women easily cleared a full state Senate panel on Tuesday, but its chances at taking another step forward are unlikely.

While a majority of Republicans on the committee voted in favor of further restricting abortions in South Carolina, state Sen. Tom Davis, R-Beaufort, said he ...Read more

WASHINGTON — As revelations of sexual misconduct continue to ripple through Congress, calls for change are dominating the halls — so much so that Speaker Mike Johnson said he’d lead the cause himself.

“We are looking at every potential avenue to tighten up the rules and make sure that women have an avenue to report,” Johnson, R-La., ...Read more

Conservative pundit Tucker Carlson apologized for supporting President Donald Trump during a repentant discussion with his brother Buckley Carlson.

“You wrote speeches for him, I campaigned for him. I mean, we’re implicated in this, for sure,” the podcaster confessed on Monday’s “The Tucker Carlson Show.”

Buckley says he voted for ...Read more

President Donald Trump said he would like to see a buyer emerge for Spirit Aviation Holdings Inc. and was open to the government coming to the aid of the airline, while opposing a merger between American Airlines Group Inc. and United Airlines Holdings Inc.

“Spirit’s in trouble, and I’d love somebody to buy Spirit,” Trump said Tuesday ...Read more

Florida Congresswoman Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick resigned Tuesday afternoon, minutes before a scheduled House Ethics Committee hearing and vote on what sanctions she should face for the more than two dozen counts of misconduct her colleagues charged her with last month.

In a public statement, Cherfilus-McCormick called the committee’s two-...Read more

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court appeared ready to back limited forfeiture powers for federal agencies during oral arguments Tuesday, in a pair of challenges to the ability for the Federal Communications Commission to impose fines on alleged lawbreakers.

Telecommunications giants AT&T and Verizon asked the justices to toss more than $100 ...Read more

President Donald Trump on Tuesday said he would have won the Vietnam War and threatened to resume airstrikes on Iran in the latest round of disturbing mixed messages about the Middle East conflict even as the warring sides prepare to return to the table for more peace talks.

Expressing impatience with negotiations, Trump suggested he has the ...Read more

President Donald Trump’s unprovoked and illegal attack on Iran has sent crude oil, gasoline and diesel prices through the roof. In addition, farmers are facing sharp increases in the cost of fertilizers produced from oil and gas.

But while the costs mount for regular people, the administration’s allies in the fossil fuel industry stand to ...Read more

As a new round of opinions begins to arrive in the coming weeks, the U.S. Supreme Court enters its most consequential season. From April through June, the justices release decisions that do more than resolve legal disputes; they shape the country’s direction.

Alexander Hamilton once called the court the “least dangerous” branch, lacking ...Read more

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s super political action committee raised $35.6 million in March, bolstering his war chest to $550 million as he tries to defy history by hanging onto congressional Republican majorities in an increasingly difficult midterm election environment.

Billionaire Diane Hendricks, a longtime Republican donor who...Read more

ANCHORAGE, Alaska — A Republican lawmaker is urging Gov. Mike Dunleavy not to veto a bill updating Alaska’s voting and election laws.

Dunleavy has until the end of the month to decide whether to sign or veto Senate Bill 64, which would create a ballot curing process that allows voters to fix minor mistakes on their ballots; allow the ...Read more

California Gov. Gavin Newsom blasted the Trump administration on Monday over its decision to repeal the Endangerment Finding — widely considered the legal foundation for much of U.S. climate policy regulating greenhouse gas emissions for nearly 20 years — asserting that the move will worsen climate-driven extremes.

The criticism came two ...Read more

Two Republicans are hoping to unseat an incumbent Democrat in a Central Valley swing district that could determine control of the House.

U.S. Rep. Adam Gray faces entrepreneur Vinay Kruttiventi and former Stockton Mayor Kevin Lincoln in California’s 13th Congressional District. Gray flipped the seat in 2024 by just 187 votes, and it remains ...Read more

By Nina Heller

Posted April 20, 2026 at 5:43pm

WASHINGTON — Ethics violations will take center stage in the House for the second week in a row, as a push to expel Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick comes to a head.

Only six lawmakers have ever been expelled from the House, and prior to the expulsion of former Rep. George Santos in December ...Read more

WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans plan to release their budget resolution and take a procedural vote as early as Tuesday, kicking off the cumbersome process for a reconciliation bill designed to help end the partial shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said Monday he hopes to confine the ...Read more

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration is reviving its effort to secure billions of dollars in State Department funding in a wide-ranging account with few guardrails that was met with resistance from Democrats last year, who accused the administration of setting up a foreign policy slush fund.

This week, appropriators will give an initial ...Read more

WASHINGTON — Congress faces a 10-day scramble before the statutory expiration of a powerful surveillance authority next week, after a collapse on the House floor laid bare the opposition to renewing the tool without new privacy safeguards.

The early-morning votes Friday, a piercing setback for the Trump administration and House leadership, ...Read more

LANSING, Mich. — A clerk in northern Michigan says she's been conducting a "corrective audit" of the list of registered voters in her county, after the state Bureau of Elections questioned whether her actions have violated state law.

In a statement provided to The Detroit News on Monday, Antrim County Clerk Victoria Bishop argued that her ...Read more

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump invoked the Defense Production Act to provide federal funds for a wide range of energy projects, as his administration faces pressure to help curb rising oil and gas costs.

Trump on Monday signed five presidential determinations under the law, according to a White House official on condition of anonymity to...Read more