CHICAGO — Mayor Brandon Johnson on Thursday condemned further cuts to Chicago Public Schools following the district’s latest proposal to address a yawning budget deficit by eliminating teaching staff, arguing the fate of Black enrollment is at stake.

During an interview with the Tribune ahead of his three-year mark in office, the mayor ...Read more

BEIJING — A conciliatory President Donald Trump on Friday hailed success in his state visit to China, claiming a tonal reset with Xi Jinping despite departing Beijing with few concrete achievements.

The visual spectacle around Trump's visit was itself considered a breakthrough by the two sides, who expressed an eagerness entering the talks ...Read more

President Donald Trump said China’s Xi Jinping largely agrees with him on the risks of Iran becoming a nuclear power but said he did not push his Chinese counterpart to pressure Tehran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.

“He said that very strongly, they cannot have a nuclear weapon and he wants them to open up the strait,” Trump said Friday,...Read more

MINNEAPOLIS — A judge’s order saying Minnesota’s fraud-fighting approach may have “potentially disastrous consequences” for vulnerable people is giving hope to service providers who have decried the state’s tactics as unfair and heavy-handed.

Ramsey County Judge Mark Ireland allowed part of a lawsuit against the Minnesota Department...Read more

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The Kansas City Election Board plans to move ahead using Missouri’s new gerrymandered congressional map, unlike other area election authorities.

More than 100,000 registered voters under the Kansas City Election Board’s jurisdiction are expected to change congressional districts, Shawn Kieffer, the Republican director ...Read more

BALTIMORE — Three Baltimore families notified Baltimore City Public Schools of their intent to sue on Thursday, alleging their children with autism left school property unnoticed by staff.

“What we assumed was an isolated incident now appears, we fear, to be part of a disturbing pattern, only made worse by the fact that these children are ...Read more

Work is already underway at the site of a planned ICE detention facility just outside Gilroy, setting up a legal and political fight between Santa Clara County and the federal government over what could become Northern California’s newest link in the federal government’s expanded deportation system.

“It’s the federal government building...Read more

Chicago police were questioning a 17-year-old boy in connection with last week’s fatal shooting of Damarion Johnson and Jassen Cho, according to department representatives and police sources.

Police arrested the teen Wednesday afternoon on the city’s West Side, sources said. Charges had not been announced as of Thursday.

Cho, 38, was ...Read more

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s latest financial disclosures show that he made a slew of stock and bond purchases with major American companies in the first quarter of the year totaling in the tens of millions of dollars and possibly more.

The transactions, spelled out in documents filed with the U.S. Office of Government Ethics that...Read more

U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said he anticipates that China would commit to billions in American agricultural purchases, as Presidents Donald Trump and Xi Jinping complete their summit in Beijing.

“We expect to also see an agreement for double-digit billion purchases of ags over the next three years, per year, coming out of this ...Read more

BOSTON — A pair of Boston city councilors are vowing to walk away from the job if Mayor Michelle Wu doesn’t fully restore her proposed 14.6% cut to the city’s veterans budget.

The proposal to slash $724,000 from the veterans’ services office has sparked outrage among councilors, former service members, and EMTs who favor a full ...Read more

Ian Jackson hired and paid for an attorney to defend him in a 2020 murder case. But two years after his second-degree murder arrest, Miami prosecutors successfully sought a first-degree murder indictment — and opted to seek the death penalty.

Jackson, 32, is accused of killing two men minutes apart on June 22, 2020. One of the killings ...Read more

WASHINGTON — The landmark Supreme Court decision axing a majority-Black congressional district in Louisiana has intensified redistricting battles across the nation, rippling as far as Washington state. The ruling has renewed a Republican challenge to Washington's new legislative districts while spurring some Democrats to seek new congressional...Read more

BOSTON — Boston Mayor Michelle Wu took action to try to tamp down a revolt after learning that “some” councilors were mobilizing to vote against her $4.9 billion budget and seek additional funding to prevent painful cuts.

Wu sent a rebuke to councilors in a Thursday letter, saying that a vote to reject her proposed budget for next fiscal ...Read more

State lawmakers are planning a new tax on some New York City homes purchased in cash, state Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie said Thursday, as new details about the governor’s planned pied-à-terre tax were also revealed.

That new surcharge is expected to be included in the state budget, which is now more than six weeks late.

The tax on cash ...Read more

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — California Gov. Gavin Newsom reaffirmed his decision to call state workers back to government offices during his final budget revision presentation Thursday, appearing exasperated that his employees are still resisting a four-day, in-office requirement.

“While I’m empathetic to change, we’ve been previewing this for...Read more

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Thursday rejected an antiabortion challenge to federal regulations that permit sending pills through the mail once a patient has consulted a doctor online.

The justices granted an emergency appeal from the makers of mifepristone and set aside an order from a U.S. appeals court in Louisiana that would have ...Read more