What happens when politicians post false or toxic messages online? My team and I found evidence that suggests U.S. state legislators can increase or decrease their public visibility by sharing unverified claims or using uncivil language during times of high political tension. This raises questions about how social media platforms shape public...Read more

Last year was a record year for disasters in the United States. A new report from the British charity International Institute for Environment and Development finds that 90 disasters were declared nationwide in 2024, from wildfires in California to Hurricane Helene in North Carolina.

The average number of annual disasters in the U.S. ...Read more

More than five months after President Donald Trump defeated Kamala Harris, Democrats are still trying to understand why they lost the election and the Senate majority – and how the party can regroup.

These concerns have only increased in the wake of Trump’s sustained activity at the start of his second term. The American public ...Read more

In some parts of the world, a person may be secreted away or imprisoned by the government without any advanced notification of wrongdoing or chance to make a defense. This has not been lawful in the United States from its very inception, or in many other countries where the rule of law and respect for individual civil rights are paramount....Read more

Before Congress passed the Clean Water Act in 1972, U.S. factories and cities could pipe their pollution directly into waterways. Rivers, including the Potomac in Washington, smelled of raw sewage and contained toxic chemicals. Ohio’s Cuyahoga River was so contaminated, its oil slicks erupted in flames.

That unchecked pollution didn...Read more

LOS ANGELES — A growing number of Southeast Asian immigrants in Los Angeles and Orange counties whose deportation orders have been on indefinite hold for years are being detained, and in some cases, deported after showing up for routine check-ins at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement offices, according to immigrant attorneys and advocacy...Read more

Vice President JD Vance pushed for stronger ties between the U.S. and India across a range of areas from energy to defense, in remarks delivered during a four-day trip to the South Asian country that brought the two nations closer to a trade deal.

“This is very much a win-win partnership,” Vance said in Jaipur on Tuesday. “The future of ...Read more

A flurry of recent federal court rulings have stalled, for the moment, the Trump administration’s efforts to deport as many as one million undocumented migrants this year, as judges increasingly determine that individuals cannot be removed from the country without due process.

Some of the most significant decisions have centered on the ...Read more

LOS ANGELES — On Jan. 7, two residents on opposite sides of Altadena — Francois Tissot, a Caltech professor who studies the geology of ancient Earth and our solar system, living in the east side of town; and Jane Potelle, an environmental advocate living in the west side — fled the intensifying red glow of the devastating Eaton fire.

The ...Read more

ATLANTA — At the start of 2025, Ataulfo was living in Gwinnett County, where a job in landscaping made him feel on track toward achieving his version of the American dream.

Now, Ataulfo is back in Guatemala, picking beans and corn for sustenance and confronted every day by the poverty he tried leaving behind six years ago when he crossed ...Read more

As Republicans in Congress consider cutting the federal share of Medicaid funding, states are weighing numerous options to scale back their programs. But voters in three states have significantly limited those options by enshrining Medicaid expansion in their constitutions — creating a potential budget disaster and a political challenge for ...Read more

SISKIYOU COUNTY, Calif. — In far Northern California, beneath a towering mountain ridge still covered in April snow, one of the state's last cowboys stood in the tall green grass of a pasture he tends describing what he sees as the one blight on this otherwise perfect landscape: wolves.

"I hate 'em," said Joel Torres, 25, his easy smile ...Read more

In the hours following Pope Francis’ death Monday, leaders from Illinois — including former President Barack Obama and Gov. JB Pritzker — offered their condolences and urged the world to embrace the 88-year-old pontiff’s legacy of humility and compassion.

Here’s what they had to say:

“Pope Francis was the rare leader who made us ...Read more

Pope Francis, the 266th pope of the Catholic Church and the first pontiff from Latin America, died Monday morning at 88, the Vatican announced.

The Vatican said Francis died of a cerebral stroke that put him into a coma and led to heart failure. Francis is weeks removed from a lengthy hospital stay to treat pneumonia and a complex lung ...Read more

The wife of Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil gave birth Monday to the couple’s son after federal immigration authorities denied the family’s request for a temporary release for Khalil to meet their first child.

“I welcomed our son into the world earlier today without Mahmoud by my side,” his wife, Noor Abdalla, wrote in a statement ...Read more

Out of work with USAID as a result of a mass overhaul of federal agencies, a former contractor in the Philadelphia area recently applied to a job with the state of Pennsylvania, eager to use their government work experience as Gov. Josh Shapiro's administration encouraged laid-off federal workers to apply.

This month, however, the worker said ...Read more

Months after the most destructive wildfire in modern Los Angeles history, Mayor Karen Bass is seeking to add scores of new employees to the Fire Department, even as an array of other agencies face layoffs.

The mayor, who has been working to close a nearly $1-billion budget gap, called for adding 227 positions to the Fire Department in her ...Read more

Harvard University sued several U.S. government agencies and top officials for freezing billions of dollars in federal funding, significantly ratcheting up a high-stakes showdown with the Trump administration.

The Trump administration unlawfully suspended Harvard’s funding after it refused to comply with “unconstitutional demands” to ...Read more