Back in 2016, it was evident that Russian President Vladimir Putin was Team Trump. Top Kremlin officials cracked open champagne bottles in the early hours of Nov. 9 as the businessman-turned-politician emerged as the surprise victor in the U.S. election.

When it comes to determining where the Russian leader stands today, there is no easy answer...Read more

PHILADELPHIA — Colleges were bracing for a decline in Black and Latino freshmen at many of the nation's elite institutions following the U.S. Supreme Court's decision last year to ban race-conscious decisions.

Nationally, so far, that appears to be the case at some schools: Amherst College, a small liberal arts school in Massachusetts, ...Read more

LOS ANGELES — If a pet dog has a history of biting, does the public have a right to know?

The grand jury in San Diego County considered this question and answered in the affirmative.

In an investigation prompted by a complaint from a dog bite victim who found the official response inadequate, the watchdog group recommended that San Diego ...Read more

Boeing’s Starliner completed its Crew Flight Test without its crew undocking Friday evening from the International Space Station and making the trip back to Earth.

The spacecraft launched from Cape Canaveral atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V back on June 5 with NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams docking with the ISS the next ...Read more

California may enforce its recent ban on guns in “ sensitive places” when it comes to parks and playgrounds, bars and restaurants that serve alcohol, casinos, stadiums, amusement parks, zoos, libraries, museums, athletic facilities and the parking areas associated with them, a federal appellate court ruled Friday.

However, the state may not...Read more

WASHINGTON — U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito reported in a new financial disclosure that he took no trips in 2023 paid for by another person or organization, but revealed he failed to report a loan and did accept concert tickets from a German socialite.

The federal judiciary released Alito’s report on Friday after he requested an ...Read more

NEW YORK — Two veteran New York City newspaper reporters who cover the New York Police Department were given the boot Thursday from the media trailer at police headquarters dubbed “the Shack.”

Tina Moore, police bureau chief of The New York Post, and Maria Cramer, police bureau chief of The New York Times, were barred from NYPD ...Read more

LOS ANGELES — A federal judge on Friday ordered the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs to build more than 2,500 units of housing for low-income veterans on its West Los Angeles campus.

In a 124-page decision following a non-jury trial, U.S. District Judge David O. Carter also ruled that leases to the University of California, Los Angeles, ...Read more

WASHINGTON — The Pentagon has invested $5.3 billion of congressionally appropriated money since Russia’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine to boost U.S.-produced munitions for the besieged nation and replenish stockpiles, mostly for the Army, according to new figures released Friday.

American industry was making only 14,000 155mm shells a ...Read more

LOS ANGELES — Plans to improve Los Angeles International Airport will shift from a focus on terminal expansion projects to modernizing outdated infrastructure as passenger forecasts for 2028 have dropped below previous estimates, airport officials said Thursday.

“We previously expected 110 million passengers in 2028. We now expect slightly ...Read more

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Former President Donald Trump focused on rising crime and unchecked illegal immigration while in Charlotte Friday to formally accept the endorsement of the Fraternal Order of Police.

The Republican presidential nominee, speaking at the Hilton Charlotte University Place hotel, accused Vice President Kamala Harris, the ...Read more

Months after a federal appeals court revived charges against two alleged members of a white supremacy extremist group, one of the men this week agreed to plead guilty — potentially bringing to a close a case that's dragged on for nearly six years.

Robert Rundo on Wednesday agreed to plead guilty to conspiracy to riot tied to his role in the ...Read more

BOISE, Idaho — Defense attorneys for Bryan Kohberger will attempt to remove the possibility he’d face the death penalty, a sentence prosecutors plan to pursue if a jury finds him guilty of murder in the deaths of four University of Idaho students in November 2022.

Kohberger’s defense team met a court deadline Thursday to file challenges ...Read more

A Utah mother fatally shot her three young children before turning the gun on herself, authorities said Friday.

The bodies of Maribel Ibarra, 32, and her three children — a 4-year-old boy and two girls, ages 1 and 2 — were found inside a vehicle in West Haven, 40 miles north of Salt Lake City, late Tuesday night.

According to the Weber ...Read more

NEW YORK — The brothers of three high ranking officials in Mayor Eric Adams’ administration have become ensnared in a corruption investigation that prompted federal authorities to execute search warrants on them and several top mayoral advisers this week, according to law enforcement sources and other individuals familiar with the matter.

...Read more

LOS ANGELES — A sweltering heat wave that’s baked parts of Southern California with triple-digit temperatures during the day continues to punish the region with an unrelenting heat that continues after dark.

Temperatures in the Santa Monica Mountains didn’t drop below 95 degrees from Thursday night to Friday morning. At midnight Thursday,...Read more

Mexico’s opposition is pledging to block President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador’s controversial overhaul of the judicial system in the Senate, where the ruling coalition is within a hair of securing a two-thirds majority needed to change the Constitution.

Lopez Obrador’s Morena party and its allies are still one vote short of the 86 ...Read more

CHICAGO — A convicted serial killer dubbed the “Hollywood ripper” is appearing in court in Skokie on Friday after authorities long sought to bring him to trial in the 1993 slaying of 18-year-old Tricia Pacaccio.

Michael Gargiulo was questioned by police after the Glenview teen was found by her father stabbed to death on the front porch of...Read more