AP National News

MIAMI (AP) — A Florida judge has rejected a self-defense claim by a white man accused of pulling a gun and yelling racial slurs during a traffic confrontation with a group of Black teenagers on Martin Luther King Jr. Day in 2019. The Miami Herald reports the judge ruled Thursday following a two-day hearing that

By BOB CHRISTIE Associated Press PHOENIX (AP) — Arizona’s attorney general says Maricopa County must give the state Senate what it wants for its review of the 2020 election results or lose all state funding. Republican Attorney General Mark Brnovich’s Thursday decision came after a GOP senator asked him if Maricopa County illegally refused to

By DON THOMPSON Associated Press SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — California lawmakers will wait until next year to consider decriminalizing psychedelics. Sen. Scott Wiener said Thursday that he will keep working to persuade the public and legislators that it’s a good idea. The bill would allow those 21 and older to possess for personal use small

By JULIE WATSON and BRIAN MELLEY Associated Press SAN DIEGO (AP) — Prosecutors for the first time are not opposing the release of Sirhan Sirhan, who is serving a life sentence for assassinating U.S. Sen. Robert F. Kennedy in 1968. The 77-year-old Sirhan on Friday faces his 16th parole hearing. Prosecutors won’t appear at the

By MICHAEL R. SISAK and MICHAEL BALSAMO Associated Press NEW YORK (AP) — The U.S. government says it is shutting down an embattled federal jail in New York City after a slew of problems that came to light following Jeffrey Epstein’s suicide there two years ago. The federal Bureau of Prisons said Thursday the Metropolitan

By DAVID KOENIG AP Airlines Writer DALLAS (AP) — Southwest Airlines is reducing the number of flights it will operate the rest of this year. Southwest has struggled all summer with high numbers of delayed and canceled flights. CEO Gary Kelly said Thursday that the cuts in the schedule should create a more reliable travel

By TOM HAYS Associated Press NEW YORK (AP) — A witness at the R. Kelly sex-trafficking trial says the R&B star once compared himself to rock legend Jerry Lee Lewis. The witness testified Thursday that Kelly called himself a “genius” just like Lewis, who became notorious for marrying his 13-year-old cousin decades ago. The witness

By JONATHAN MATTISE Associated Press NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — When deadly floods knocked out all communications but radio in rural Tennessee last weekend, emergency officials had a new tool at their disposal. Bobby Brown is director of Humphrey County’s 911 center, located in the hard-hit city of Waverly. He noted on Thursday that he was

By CALVIN WOODWARD, ELLEN KNICKMEYER and DAVID RISING Associated Press The terrorist attacks on the United States nearly 20 years ago brought profound change in America and the world.  The death and devastation stirred grief, rage and war. It also sparked solidarity, not only in the United States but among its allies — even some

By DAVID KLEPPER Associated Press While the Sept. 11 attacks united much of America in grief and anger, conspiracy theories about what happened that day uncovered a well of distrust. Twenty years on, the skepticism and suspicion first revealed by claims that 9/11 was an inside job have metastasized. They’ve been spread by the internet

By JERRY SCHWARTZ Associated Press Rudolph Giuliani was a hero before he was a punchline. Lisa Beamer was a wife and mother before she became a symbol of Sept. 11, and though her celebrity passed, her widowhood cannot. In the aftermath of the planes falling from the sky, America and the world were introduced to

By MARIAM FAM, DEEPTI HAJELA and LUIS ANDRES HENAO Associated Press NEW YORK (AP) — Muslim Americans who grew up under the shadow of 9/11 have faced hostility and surveillance, mistrust and suspicion. In the 20 years since the terrorist attacks, they’ve also dealt with questions about their Muslim faith and doubts over their Americanness.

By DAVID KOENIG AP Airlines Writer DALLAS (AP) — Ask anyone old enough to remember travel before Sept. 11, 2001, and you’re likely to get a gauzy recollection of what flying was like. There was security screening, but it wasn’t intrusive. There were no long checkpoint lines. Passengers and their families could walk right to

By JOHN RABY Associated Press CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — A grassroots group is using the centennial of a deadly fight to organize West Virginia coal miners to urge Sen. Joe Manchin to support higher wages and better voting protections. Members of the Poor People’s Campaign invoked the 1921 Battle of Blair Mountain after traveling by

By SIAN WATSON Associated Press LONDON (AP) — After a wildly successful career as a songwriter, the pandemic prompted Diane Warren to try a different approach to music. The result is her debut album, out Friday, that includes collaborations with friends old and new, including Celine Dion, John Legend, Ty Dolla Sign plus a bringing

MARINETTE, Wis. (AP) — A judge has sentenced an 84-year-old man to consecutive life sentences in connection with a 1976 double homicide. A jury convicted Raymand Vannieuwenhoven in July of killing David Schuldes and Ellen Matheys at a Marinette County park. WLUK-TV reported that Judge James Morrison handed down the sentence Thursday. He said life

By KEN RITTER Associated Press LAS VEGAS (AP) — A panel planning a permanent memorial at the Las Vegas site of the deadliest mass shooting in modern American history is focusing on stories about the more than 58 people killed and thousands left wounded and emotionally scarred, as well as on lessons learned. The 1

By MALLIKA SEN Associated Press NEW YORK (AP) — Time’s Up CEO Tina Tchen has resigned in the wake of revelations that leaders of the sexual harassment victims’ advocacy group advised former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s administration after he was accused of misconduct. In a statement posted to Twitter on Thursday, Tchen said she’s

By CHINEDU ASADU Associated Press LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) — A school official in northern Nigeria says gunmen have released some of the more than 100 children who had been abducted back in May. The kidnapping victims from the Salihu Tanko Islamic School in Niger state had included children as young as 5 years old. Other

CHICAGO (AP) — A judge has ruled that Jussie Smollett’s attorneys cannot call as a witness the Chicago prosecutor whose office dropped initial charges accusing the actor of staging a racist, anti-gay attack on himself in 2019. Cook County Judge James Linn also said Thursday that Smollett’s attorneys cannot mention various lawsuits linked to his