AP National News

By MUNIR AHMED Associated Press ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) — Authorities in Pakistan have removed Pervez Elahi as the top elected official in populous eastern Punjab province after he failed to get a vote of confidence from the provincial legislature. The move early Friday was a setback to former Prime Minister Imran Khan, whose Tehreek-e-Insaf party

By HEATHER HOLLINGSWORTH and JILL BLEED Associated Press MISSION, Kan. (AP) — Thousands of flights were canceled and homeless shelters were overflowing Thursday amid one of the most treacherous holiday travel seasons the U.S. has seen in decades, with temperatures plummeting 50 degrees Fahrenheit in some areas and forecasters warning of an impending “bomb cyclone”

RABAT, Morocco (AP) — An explosion hit a propane gas storage unit on the Moroccan coast, sending balls of flames into the sky. No casualties were reported in the fire Thursday in Mohammedia, an Atlantic port 15 kilometers north of Casablanca. According to local authorities, five tank trucks were destroyed in the fire. An investigation

By DANIEL POLITI Associated Press BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — A human rights group in Argentina says DNA tests have confirmed that a man was taken from his mother as a baby by the country’s former dictatorship. That increases the number of this type of case to 131. The president of the Grandmothers of Plaza

By MAYSOON KHAN Associated Press/Report for America ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — Just in time for Christmas, New York legislators passed a bill in both houses on Thursday that will make them the best-paid state lawmakers in the nation. If signed by the governor, members of the state Assembly and Senate will make a base salary

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — A National Labor Relations Board decision means only union members may work heavy-lift equipment at a new shipping terminal in one of the nation’s largest maritime centers. The Dec. 16 order against the Port of Charleston in South Carolina brings an end to the “hybrid” union-non-union employment model long implemented by

By BRIAN WITTE Associated Press ANNAPOLIS, Md. (AP) — Adnan Syed, who was released from a Maryland prison this year after his case was the focus of the true-crime podcast “Serial,” has been hired by Georgetown University as a program associate for the university’s Prisons and Justice Initiative, the university said. Syed started working this

By ERIC TUCKER Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — Former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson described to the House Jan. 6 committee a wide-ranging pressure campaign from Donald Trump’s allies aimed at influencing her cooperation with Congress and stifling potentially damaging testimony about him. In extraordinary closed-door testimony made public Thursday, Hutchinson recounted how those in

By LINDSAY WHITEHURST Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — As the U.S. deals with its deadliest overdose crisis to date, a national crime-prevention group is calling on the Justice Department to clamp down on social media’s role in the spread of fentanyl, the drug largely driving a troubling spike in overdose deaths among teenagers. The National

By CAMILLE RODRIGUEZ MONTILLA and MANUEL RUEDA Associated Press CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — A group of opponents of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro is looking to strip Juan Guaidó of his authority as the internationally recognized head of the country’s so-called interim government. Three of the four major opposition parties are expected to vote Thursday on

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A prominent California medical school has apologized for conducting dozens of unethical medical experiments on at least 2,600 incarcerated men in the 1960s and 1970s, including putting pesticides and herbicides on the men’s skin and injecting it into their veins. Two dermatologists at the University of California, San Francisco — one

By LARRY NEUMEISTER Associated Press NEW YORK (AP) — Cryptocurrency entrepreneur Sam Bankman-Fried walked out of a Manhattan courthouse Thursday with his parents after they agreed to sign a $250 million bond and keep him at their California home while he awaits trial on charges that he swindled investors and looted customer deposits on his

By FATIMA HUSSEIN and MEG KINNARD Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — The Democratic-controlled House Ways and Means Committee on Tuesday voted to release former President Donald Trump’s tax returns, raising the potential of additional revelations in the coming days related to the finances of the longtime businessman who broke political norms by refusing to voluntarily

By HEATHER HOLLINGSWORTH and JILL BLEED Associated Press MISSION, Kan. (AP) — Travelers across much of the eastern United States were bracing Thursday for one of the most treacherous Christmas weekends in decades, with forecasters warning of a “bomb cyclone” that will pack heavy snow and wind while sending temperatures plummeting 50 degrees Fahrenheit in

By KEVIN FREKING Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate passed a massive $1.7 trillion spending bill Thursday that finances federal agencies through September and provides another significant round of military and economic aid to Ukraine one day after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s dramatic address to a joint meeting of Congress. The bill, which runs

By DIANE JEANTET Associated Press RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Brazil’s President-elect Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has appointed 16 ministers just over a week before he takes office. Another dozen or so nominations are expected next week, Lula said on Thursday. After weeks of negotiations, Lula looked to former governors of Brazil’s northeast region,

By JOHN RABY Associated Press CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — A company that plans to make batteries for the U.S. energy grid will locate its first full-scale manufacturing plant in a former steel town in West Virginia. Form Energy is making a $760 million investment in the facility in Weirton. Gov. Jim Justice says the plant

By CHRISTINA LARSON AP Science Writer WASHINGTON (AP) — Now you see them, now you don’t. Some frogs found in South and Central America have the rare ability to turn on and off their nearly transparent appearance, researchers report Thursday in the journal Science. During the day, these nocturnal frogs sleep by hanging underneath tree

By ERIC TUCKER Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — Former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson told the House Jan. 6 committee that her first lawyer advised her against being fully forthcoming with the panel, telling her it was acceptable to testify that she did not recall certain events when she actually did and that “the less

By SOPHIE AUSTIN Associated Press/Report for America SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — An earthquake warning system operated by the U.S. Geological Survey warned 3 million people about a quake that jolted Northern California’s coast. The temblor Tuesday was the biggest test yet to the ShakeAlert system since it launched in 2019. Various phone apps use ShakeAlert