Tag: Article

Court blocks Louisiana law requiring schools to post Ten Commandments in classrooms
NEW ORLEANS — A panel of three federal appellate judges has ruled that a Louisiana law requiring the Ten Commandments to be posted in each of the state’s public school classrooms is unconstitutional. The ruling Friday marked a major win for civil liberties groups who say the mandate violates the separation of church and state,…

15 sets of twins are graduating from one New York high school
HEMPSTEAD, N.Y. — A high school in the suburbs of New York City will be seeing double on graduation day this weekend: Among the nearly 500 students in its graduating class, 30 are twins. It’s a tight knit group. Some of the students at Long Island’s Plainview-Old Bethpage John F. Kennedy High School have known…

Asian shares are mixed and oil gains as world waits to see if US will join Israel’s war against Iran
MANILA, Philippines — Crude oil prices rose and Asian shares were trading mixed on Friday as investors awaited more clarity on whether or not the U.S. will join Israel’s war against Iran. U.S. futures edged lower after Wall Street was closed on Thursday for the Juneteenth holiday. U.S. benchmark crude oil added 15 cents to…

Democrats in Virginia have a hefty fundraising advantage heading into November general election
RICHMOND, Va. — Democrats in Virginia have built up a hefty fundraising advantage for their effort to reclaim the governor’s mansion in a November election that is seen as a bellwether for the party in power in Washington ahead of the 2026 midterms. Democrat Abigail Spanberger, a former CIA spy turned congresswoman, has a more…

Sig Sauer, faced with lawsuits over a popular pistol, gets protection in New Hampshire
CONCORD, N.H. — Faced with mounting lawsuits over a popular pistol, New Hampshire-based Sig Sauer asked for — and got — protection in the form of a new state law that makes it harder to take the gunmaker to court. Supporters in the Republican-led Legislature said the law was needed to help a major employer….

Trump is silent about Juneteenth on a day he previously honored as president
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump honored Juneteenth in each of his first four years as president, even before it became a federal holiday. He even claimed once to have made it “very famous.” But on this year’s Juneteenth holiday on Thursday, the usually talkative president kept silent about a day important to Black Americans for…

Flooding and rock slides close heavily damaged I-40 section in Smoky Mountains
HARTFORD, Tenn. — Heavy rain, flooding and a rock slide have again closed a section of the major cross country highway Interstate 40 along its narrow corridor through the Great Smoky Mountains. The slide and flood happened Wednesday afternoon around mile marker 450 in Tennessee, just to the west of the state line with North…

Rebuilding one of the nation’s oldest Black churches to begin at Juneteenth ceremony
WILLIAMSBURG, Va. — A ceremonial groundbreaking will be held Thursday for the rebuilding of one of the nation’s oldest Black churches, whose congregants first gathered outdoors in secret before constructing a wooden meetinghouse in Virginia. The First Baptist Church of Williamsburg officially established itself in 1776, although parishioners met before then in fields and under…

Global shares decline as tensions simmer in the Middle East
TOKYO — Global shares retreated Thursday as worries persisted about conflict in the Middle East. On the seventh day of a conflict that began with a surprise wave of Israeli airstrikes targeting military sites, senior officers and nuclear scientists, Iranian state media reported that Iran’s foreign minister planned to meet with his European counterparts in…

2 men get life sentences in shooting death of 11-year-old outside stadium
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Two men were sentenced Wednesday to lifelong terms in prison in the shooting death of an 11-year-old boy outside an Albuquerque baseball stadium in 2023 that prompted the New Mexico governor to issue a controversial gun ban, the district attorney’s office in Albuquerque said. Investigators say a truck carrying a mother and…