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NASA/NASA/TNS

To beat China, NASA streamlines plans to keep 2028 moon landing target

Current News / News & Features /

NASA’s hopes for a 2028 moonshot to return humans to the lunar surface has pushed the agency to make changes, including spiking original orbital plans and delaying a full version of the astronauts’ new spacesuits.

The details were revealed during an Artemis program update last week. While Artemis III, a low-Earth orbit mission, remains on ...Read more

Al Diaz/Miami Herald/TNS

Florida's Amendment 3 seeks to lower taxes for second homes and investors. Will it?

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MIAMI — Next week, Florida voters will decide on a ballot measure that, if approved, would introduce sweeping changes to property taxes.

Amendment 3’s impact on properties with homestead exemptions — which are their owners’ primary residences — has occupied the spotlight. If passed, Amendment 3 would exempt the first $150,000 of a ...Read more

Charly Triballeau/AFP/AFP/TNS

California, feds continue election war after courts rebuke challenge to 20,000 ballots

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LOS ANGELES —Soon after a federal judge in Los Angeles sharply rejected a Trump administration effort to block 20,000 California ballots from voters it alleged may be noncitizens, the U.S. Justice Department announced it will appeal — leaving attorneys on both sides preparing Thursday for yet another court battle.

That was despite the lower...Read more

Michelle Marchante/Miami Herald/TNS

Poll: Cuban Americans in Miami-Dade back 'maximum pressure' on Havana but reject deportations

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MIAMI — Cuban Americans in Miami-Dade County strongly support the U.S. government’s hardest push in decades to bring down the regime in Havana, but oppose the Trump administration’s immigration agenda when it affects Cubans living in South Florida, according to a new poll conducted by Florida International University.

The poll lands a few...Read more

John Tully/Getty Images North America/TNS

California Gov. Gavin Newsom to send election attorneys to counter federal poll watchers

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SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Gov. Gavin Newsom and the California Democratic Party are sending teams of election law attorneys to five congressional districts to guard against federal intervention in next week’s midterms after the White House accused the state of allowing noncitizens to illegally vote in recent elections.

The volunteer lawyers, ...Read more

Aaron Chown/PA Wire via ZUMA Press/TNS

Meghan Markle's dad's personal devices probed for illegal content

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Electronic devices belonging to Meghan Markle’s embattled father are being examined by authorities investigating Thomas Markle Sr. for possessing child exploitation material.

Police in the Philippines have obtained a warrant to look into the 82-year-old suspect’s digital equipment including computers, phones and hard drives, according to ...Read more

Pool/Getty Images North America/TNS

Iran receives Vance letter, signals no shift in peace deal terms

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Iran received a letter sent by U.S. Vice President JD Vance to its top security official, the semi-official Tasnim news agency reported, with one of the country’s top negotiators later suggesting Tehran’s positions on ending the war will not be compromised.

Tasnim didn’t disclose the contents of the letter addressed to Mohsen Rezaee, the...Read more

Jefferee Woo/Tampa Bay Times/TNS

AI detector flags much of Florida education chief's writing as AI-generated

Current News / News & Features /

Early into his tenure this summer, Florida Education Commissioner Henry Mack took to social media to talk about the limits of artificial intelligence.

His office had just rolled out a sweeping set of regulations meant to safeguard against the possible harms of AI in schools, including the outsourcing of critical thinking and work to the ...Read more

Karen Tapia/The Orange County Register/TNS

California's Orange County says it cannot comply with DOJ's request to verify citizenship of potential voters, citing state and federal law

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SANTA ANA, Calif. — Orange County’s election officials cannot comply with the U.S. Department of Justice’s request to check the citizenship status of more than 1,700 people, the county told the federal government Wednesday evening.

Citing state and federal law, the county denied the federal government’s request, saying it may revisit ...Read more

Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times/TNS

California man who beat elderly woman with bat captured in Oklahoma

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LOS ANGELES — The San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department announced the capture and extradition of a Southern California man Wednesday, more than two months after he was accused of beating an elderly woman with a bat and fleeing the state.

Erik Navarro, 26, was taken into custody in Oklahoma on unrelated traffic charges. Detectives from ...Read more

Dreamstime/Dreamstime/TNS

5 NC detention officers charged with arranging fight between female jail inmates

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RALEIGH, N.C. — Five detention officers at a North Carolina jail have been indicted on misdemeanor charges after allegedly allowing and facilitating a fight between two female inmates, according to court documents and interviews.

The five officers face the class-one misdemeanor charge of willfully failing to discharge duties by arranging a ...Read more

Solarseven/Dreamstime/TNS

Florida student scholarship website hacked, up to 4.9 million affected. What we know

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MIAMI — The Florida Department of Education reported a hack into the state’s student financial aid portal Thursday, potentially compromising millions of Floridians’ personal information such as Social Security numbers.

The department wrote in a release that the website FloridaStudentFinancialAidSG.org was the subject of the hack, referred...Read more

Craig Kohlruss/Fresno Bee/TNS

California's High Speed Rail Authority boss Choudri resigns under fire

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LOS ANGELES — The chief executive of the California's High Speed Rail Authority abruptly resigned late Wednesday amid intensifying scrutiny over cost overruns, project delays and wasteful expenses.

In a letter to authority executives Ian Choudri cited "personal and family priorities" for his decision to step down. Board chair Steve Kawa ...Read more

Daniel A. Varela/Miami Herald/TNS

Killer who shot tourist in front of his baby in Miami Beach sentenced to 50 years

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MIAMI — A man who gunned down a Colorado tourist inside a South Beach restaurant in front of his wife and baby will spend decades in a Florida prison, a judge said Thursday.

After hearing three days of testimony and argument, Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Laura Stuzin sentenced Tamarius Blair Davis, 27, to 50 years in prison followed by 20 years ...Read more

U.S. Marine Corps/U.S. Marine Corps/TNS

Camp Lejeune saga nears end as government seeks to limit damages

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The final stages of a decadeslong battle over contaminated drinking water at Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune are taking shape this week in a North Carolina federal court, where the first trial has begun and a mass settlement plan is in the works.

It’s been four years since Congress passed and President Joe Biden signed into law legislation ...Read more

Robert Gauthier/Los Angeles Times/TNS

Southern California coast braces for more flooding as El Niño's high tides break records

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LOS ANGELES — Southern California coastal communities are bracing for more flooding Thursday and Friday as El Niño conditions keep water levels very high.

Unusually high tides that have brought flooding to low-lying areas in Southern California including Newport Beach and Long Beach may linger longer than initially predicted.

The National ...Read more

(Robert Housman)/KFF Health News/TNS

Data center health worries animate midterm campaigns

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PAGE, Ariz. — Doug Herrera still lives in the house his father built, though his dad died some time ago from cancer. Herrera wonders if that illness could have been linked to pollutants from nearby uranium mining. Now, he worries that a possible new neighbor — a proposed $10 billion mega data center— could imperil his health.

“I’m a ...Read more

Chaffee County Sheriff’s Office/TNS

Missing college students found dead in Colorado mountains

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DENVER — Two college students who vanished in Colorado’s mountains over the weekend were found dead on Wednesday, sheriff’s officials said.

The bodies of Colorado Mountain College students Kaden Matsuda, 19, and Jackson Donlon, 20, were recovered from a basin of West Apostle Mountain at about 3:30 p.m. Wednesday, the Chaffee County ...Read more

Helen H. Richardson/The Denver Post/TNS

Boulder firebomber pleads guilty to federal hate crime charges

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DENVER — The man who killed one woman and injured more than a dozen others in a firebombing on Boulder’s Pearl Street Mall last year pleaded guilty to federal crimes Thursday.

Mohamed Soliman, 46, is already serving a life prison sentence after pleading guilty to more than 100 state crimes in connection with the June 1, 2025, attack. He ...Read more

KFF HEALTH/TNS

The campaign to defend trans healthcare in Missouri is slow going, on purpose

Current News / News & Features /

CREVE COEUR, Mo. — Reneé Luckfield tries not to knock like a cop.

In fact, the 29-year-old spends a lot of time thinking about how to make strangers comfortable when she shows up at their door to talk about transgender healthcare. A syncopated “tap — tap-tap-tap” sounds friendly even when she knocks loudly. In each encounter, she masks...Read more