Pacific storm Lala strengthened into a hurricane as it edged closer to Hawaii’s Big Island, where it will make possible landfall on Saturday, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said.

Lala’s top winds reached 75 miles (121 kilometers) per hour, up from 65 mph earlier, as it closed to within 85 miles of South Point, Hawaii, the center said in...Read more

BOISE, Idaho — Taxpayers will pay even more costs for the Wilder raid, according to a local lawyer.

Hundreds of law enforcement officers swept into a Wilder horse track in October, detaining hundreds and zip-tying attendees, including some children, as part of what the FBI said was an investigation into illegal gambling. The raid drew ...Read more

NEW YORK — Hundreds of NYPD cops are expected to be patrolling the streets of Inwood in upper Manhattan this weekend to prevent a “teen takeover” of area streets — a wild event that sparked chaos in the area and ended in one death, city officials said Saturday.

A takeover following last Sunday’s Dominican Day Parade sent thousands of ...Read more

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent says the U.S. is getting ready to squeeze Iran with unprecedented economic pressure, a claim critics greeted with skepticism given the country is already subject to a naval blockade and thousands of sanctions.

While the Trump administration hasn’t said what it’s planning to do, there are still pressure ...Read more

BALTIMORE — Not that any murder case can truly be considered typical, but the brazen shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in December 2024 and Towson native Luigi Mangione’s guilty plea on Friday was far from it.

“This is anything but a normal case,” said Baltimore defense attorney Andy Alperstein. “The president talks ...Read more

Ukraine said it attacked a production unit of the Roscosmos space agency as it continued strikes at military and related infrastructure deep within Russia.

In the Samara region, some 900 kilometers (560 miles) from Ukraine’s border, Flamingo missiles hit the Progress Rocket and Space Center, “involved, among other things, in electronics ...Read more

ORLANDO, Fla. — SpaceX is set to launch eight satellites responsible for emergency SOS alerts on Saturday night and attempt a land recovery of the rocket’s booster that could bring a sonic boom to Central Florida.

A Falcon 9 rocket on the Globalstar 2-R Launch 1 mission is targeting a 9:12 p.m. at the opening of a 15-minute window to lift ...Read more

WASHINGTON — For most of his second term, President Donald Trump has been arguing that the “golden age” he promised for America’s economy is already here. There’s hardly been much evidence that voters agreed.

Now, with midterm elections less than three months away and campaigning poised to get underway in earnest, the gap has become ...Read more

INCHELIUM, Colville Reservation, Wash. — Flames thrashed in the crowns of the ponderosas, spewing chunky embers as a family fought to halt the fire’s spread toward their home.

The Modrite fire raced toward Inchelium along the Columbia River on the Colville Reservation in late July, consuming homes and just about everything else in its path....Read more

LOS ANGELES — Six years after the COVID-19 pandemic upended the world, experts in California say the disease appears to be becoming more of a summer rather than a winter phenomenon.

The shift was noted over the past couple of years and has become even clearer in 2026, prompting health officials to refocus their prevention efforts. The U.S. ...Read more

MINNEAPOLIS — Mauri Friestleben knows what it’s like to close schools in north Minneapolis, having served 20 years ago as an assistant to former Superintendent Bill Green when Willard Elementary and other buildings were shuttered.

“It was really hard. It was emotional,” she said. “I think people are assuming that’s what we’re ...Read more

A political ad released last month depicts Gov. Gavin Newsom operating a robotic Democratic Party machine that chooses former Health Secretary Xavier Becerra as the next governor.

Newsom explains to his would-be successor that the machine was “created to make sure that nothing ever changes” — as long as Becerra “submit(s) to the machine...Read more

“It’s all in your head.”

By the time many people with functional neurological disorder arrive in our clinic, they have heard these five words more times than they can count. They are told their brain scan was normal. Their electroencephalogram, a test that measures the brain’s electrical activity, is reassuring. “The good ...Read more

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration’s Cuba strategy is increasingly focused on ramping up sanctions and economic pressure rather than deploying military force to break the island’s Communist leadership, people familiar with the matter said.

U.S. attention is now centered on cutting off all revenue sources for the regime rather than any ...Read more

ANAHEIM, Calif. — California Department of Justice investigators will not pursue criminal charges against Fullerton police officers who fatally shot a man following a high-speed pursuit in 2023, Attorney General Rob Bonta announced Friday.

Austin Heiselman, 48, of Whittier, was shot and killed by Fullerton police on Feb. 10, 2023, after a ...Read more

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration has begun searching for new members for a vaccine advisory committee it is quietly reshaping to look at alternatives to vaccinations, a move that has drawn worries from outside groups.

The National Vaccine Advisory Committee, created in 1987, has worked across agencies to advise the Health and Human ...Read more

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A family vacation last month turned to grief when a Kansas City man was seriously injured by a falling rock at Glacier National Park in Montana and later died at a hospital.

The family of Rex Schowengerdt, 72, shared their story on a GoFundMe page, describing the man as a beloved husband, father, brother and grandfather who...Read more

NEW YORK — Two more people have died of Legionnaires’ disease, raising the death toll from this summer’s Upper East Side outbreak to nine, officials announced Friday.

“I’m saddened to share that 2 more people have died in connection with the UES Legionnaires’ disease cluster,” city Health Commissioner Dr. Alister Martin said in a ...Read more