BEIRUT -- The death toll from Tuesday's port explosion in Beirut has risen to 154, a Lebanese Health Ministry official said, as rescue workers struggled to remove large pieces of debris in the search for survivors and victims.

"Due to the massive damage we are seeing, we have doubts there are survivors but we still have hope," one rescue worker...Read more

WASHINGTON -- Less than three months before Election Day, evidence is mounting that President Donald Trump is losing political influence in Washington and facing the early onset of "lame duck" status as Republican leaders in Congress increasingly appear willing to defy or rebuff him.

In recent days, GOP lawmakers who once saluted -- or at least...Read more

SAN FRANCISCO -- It was once said that California's coronavirus pandemic was hitting dense urban areas the hardest.

Now, it's rural, agricultural areas that are among the most severely affected.

"The epidemic is moving from urban Latino populations to rural Latino populations," Dr. George Rutherford, epidemiologist and infectious-diseases ...Read more

WASHINGTON -- The U.S. labor market continued to regain ground in July, though at a slower pace, indicating the economic rebound is still making headway despite a surge in coronavirus infections.

Payrolls increased by 1.76 million in July, beating estimates for a 1.48 million gain and after a 4.79 million advance in June, according to data ...Read more

WASHINGTON -- The Trump administration is poised to impose sanctions on Chinese officials and their allies in Hong Kong, including Chief Executive Carrie Lam, as soon as Friday over their role in curtailing political freedoms in the former U.K. colony, according to three people familiar with the matter.

The measures would also target Communist ...Read more

The scandals engulfing the National Rifle Association threaten to undercut its financial and political power heading into the crucial 2020 U.S. elections.

The organization has long been perceived as a kingmaker, and was in fact the top contributor to Donald Trump's 2016 election campaign.

Now complaints over lavish spending, internal battles, ...Read more

WASHINGTON -- Saudi Arabia reveled in Donald Trump's decision to make the kingdom his first overseas destination as president. It will have to decide how welcoming to be for Joe Biden if he wins the White House in November.

Trump's May 2017 visit was marked by claims of $100 billion in arms sales, a traditional sword dance and a glowing orb ...Read more

SEATTLE -- Nearly 41/2 years after six masked males stormed a Seattle homeless encampment to rob a drug dealer, two brothers who were found guilty of fatally shooting two people and critically injuring three others were each sentenced Thursday to 40 years in prison.

James and Jerome Taafulisia were 17 and 16 years old on the night of the Jan. ...Read more

WASHINGTON -- Prospects for a quick deal to extend supplemental unemployment benefits and other stimulus for an economy still reeling from the coronavirus pandemic have taken a sharp turn for the worse, leaving millions of Americans in the lurch a week after many benefits expired.

The light at the end of the tunnel spotted Wednesday by House ...Read more

President Donald Trump made good on his threat to ban TikTok on Thursday, issuing an executive order that will bar the wildly popular video app's parent company, ByteDance, from conducting business transactions with other American companies beginning in 45 days.

A separate order bans business transactions involving WeChat, a popular ...Read more

WASHINGTON -- President Donald Trump signed a pair of executive orders prohibiting U.S. residents from doing any business with TikTok, WeChat or the apps' Chinese owners beginning 45 days from now, citing the national security risk of leaving American's personal data exposed.

The move coincides with Trump's push for the sale of TikTok, the ...Read more

WASHINGTON -- Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden apologized late Thursday for comments he made earlier in the day that suggested that the African American community was not diverse.

"In no way did I mean to suggest the African American community is a monolith -- not by identity, not on issues, not at all," Biden said in an series of ...Read more

Fair Wayne Bryant is currently serving a life sentence in Louisiana for an attempted burglary conviction stemming from an attempt to steal some hedge clippers. According to six of the seven justices on the Louisiana Supreme Court, Bryant's sentence is a fair one.

The court last week denied a request from Bryant to review his life sentence, ...Read more

WASHINGTON -- With President Donald Trump pumping up supporters ahead of Thursday's primary, former U.S. Ambassador to Japan Bill Hagerty fended off a late surge by orthopedic surgeon Manny Sethi to win the Republican nomination to succeed retiring GOP Sen. Lamar Alexander.

Trump, who first endorsed Hagerty last year, reminded voters in a July ...Read more