WASHINGTON — Licensed gun owners have a right to carry a concealed firearm into stores and other private places unless the owner objects, the Supreme Court ruled Thursday.

The 6-3 decision extends gun rights and strikes down laws in Hawaii, California, New York, New Jersey and Maryland.

Those measures would prohibit carrying guns onto ...Read more

CHICAGO — With the city facing a budget hole estimated at $680 million or more next year, a mayoral task force released its final proposals to strengthen Chicago’s long-term financial future Thursday.

Like last year’s ideas to help close a $1.15 billion gap, most are familiar, some are far-fetched and many have major tradeoffs or will ...Read more

LEXINGTON, Ky. — Two Lexington federal prisons have been connected to a large, multi-year drone smuggling conspiracy, according to a federal indictment originating in Georgia.

The Federal Medical Center in Lexington and Federal Correctional Institution Manchester were listed as two of 10 federal prisons where cell phones, drugs, weapons and ...Read more

BALTIMORE — The family of an inmate at Western Correctional Institution who died of dehydration while at the facility filed a wrongful death lawsuit Thursday in Baltimore City Circuit Court. Officers, who allegedly cut off water to his cell more than a week before his death, also failed to take him to a scheduled medical appointment the day he...Read more

The heat wave baking western Europe broke records in the U.K. and France, as the region faces another day of soaring temperatures.

The U.K. recorded its hottest June day on Wednesday, with daytime highs hitting 36.1C (97F) in Gosport in southern England, according to the Met Office. France’s average daily temperature reached an all-time high ...Read more

For the third year in a row, accidental drug-related overdose and poisoning deaths have dropped in Los Angeles County, a decline officials attribute to ongoing investments in prevention and harm reduction resources countywide.

There were 2,298 accidental drug overdose and poisoning deaths in 2025, down 6%, a relatively small drop from 2,438 the...Read more

As the top boss of Mexico's Sinaloa cartel, Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán ran a multinational drug-smuggling enterprise despite being functionally illiterate, having dropped out of school around the third grade.

Evidence presented at El Chapo's trial, which ended in 2019 with his conviction and a sentence of life in U.S. prison with no parole, ...Read more

Britons said Andy Burnham would make a better prime minister than Reform U.K. Leader Nigel Farage, according to a poll on Thursday that highlights how Labour’s likely new leader can provide the governing party with an electoral edge.

Some 43% of people surveyed in a YouGov poll said Burnham would make a better premier, compared with 23% who ...Read more

MIAMI — President Donald Trump’s border czar will join Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on Thursday for what could be the official closure of Alligator Alcatraz, an immigration detention camp built a year ago on a remote airport seized from Miami-Dade County.

DeSantis’ office announced the morning press conference with White House Border Czar ...Read more

The heat wave baking western Europe broke records in the U.K. and France, as the region faces another day of soaring temperatures.

The U.K. recorded its hottest June day on Wednesday, with daytime highs hitting 36.1C (97F) in Gosport in southern England, according to the Met Office. France’s average daily temperature reached an all-time high ...Read more

Scientists racing to develop potential vaccines and treatments against a deadly Ebola outbreak are having to do so without a viable sample of the virus, highlighting growing disputes over pathogen sharing and the difficulty of moving infectious materials across borders for research.

More than a month after the outbreak was identified in ...Read more

Bill Curry, 65, raises cattle on the same land in rural Oklahoma once owned by his father and generations before him. Each quarter, for several years, he has made the 2½-hour drive to Oklahoma City for an epidural in his spine to treat his back pain.

But this year, because of a new Medicare program, Curry has traveled a little more often.

In ...Read more

LOS ANGELES — Bob Blumenfield would like to see Angelenos’ old banana peels and moldy bread stay local.

The City Council member told a small crowd of waste advocates in front of City Hall this week that he was introducing a motion to reduce the city’s greenhouse gas emissions by strengthening local composting infrastructure and decreasing...Read more

LOS ANGELES — Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass is once again dealing with blowback for being out of town when a massive fire ignited.

The fire at a cold storage facility in Boyle Heights began burning Wednesday, hours after Bass departed for the dedication of the Barack Obama Presidential Center in Chicago.

Since arriving back in Los Angeles ...Read more

Drones could be a viable way to make transportation of potentially life-saving donated kidneys more efficient, according to a recent study conducted at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia.

On June 5, researchers had drones take human kidneys on two 15-minute flights in loops around NASA’s testing range beyond line-of-sight ...Read more

When Sheila Perry learned that she was a record-setter at 87 years old, she was surrounded by family, and all the group could do was laugh. Indeed, they had much to smile about.

The Wheaton local is the oldest known female in Illinois — and among the oldest in the United States — to have a successful kidney transplant.

“I knew it was ...Read more

States and cities are loosening building code requirements in an effort to lower construction costs and boost affordable housing.

Some of these changes include allowing low-rise apartment buildings to have just one stairway, reducing how often building codes are updated and rolling back specific electrical or fire safety standards.

But critics...Read more

Two powerful earthquakes struck Venezuela’s central and coastal regions on Wednesday just 39 seconds apart, triggering scenes of panic in Caracas and other cities as preliminary reports of structural damage and injuries began to emerge.

The United States’ official tsunami warning system reported that a 7.2-magnitude earthquake was actually ...Read more

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump said tolls on ships sailing in the Strait of Hormuz would be a red line issue for the U.S. in negotiations with Iran.

Asked if he would reject a final Iran deal if it included any service or shipping fees in the strait, Trump said that he would.

“It would be unacceptable to me, because we have numerous ...Read more