The U.S. Supreme Court opens its new term under the shadow of a presidential election that threatens to create fresh strains at a court already deeply enmeshed in the nation’s political divisions.

Three months after releasing a barrage of far-reaching rulings, the justices return to the bench Monday with a docket that looks relatively tamer, ...Read more

LOS ANGELES — For the first time in nearly three decades, Erik and Lyle Menendez have some reason to hope they might one day live as free men.

In 1989, the Menendez brothers bought a pair of shotguns with cash, walked into their Beverly Hills home and shot their parents — Jose and Kitty — while they watched a movie in the family living ...Read more

CHICAGO — The mass resignation of the 7-member Chicago Board of Education may be only the first in a series of upheavals in Chicago Public Schools leadership, heralding an uncertain future for students and families in the district.

Although the board will transition to a hybrid elected and appointed makeup in January of 2025, the current ...Read more

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — If Missouri voters overturn the state’s abortion ban in November, how widely available abortion eventually becomes will depend in large part on whether courts block the state’s current restrictions on medications commonly used to end a pregnancy.

Before Missouri became the first state to ban abortion moments after the U...Read more

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — California has strengthened a new Beaver Restoration Program which is dedicated to supporting the species and their habitats.

With the passing of Assembly Bill 2196, the program has partnered with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife. The initiative works with California tribal nations, private landowners and ...Read more

WASHINGTON — In a late Friday night missive to congressional leaders, President Joe Biden wrote that the Small Business Administration’s disaster loan program is expected to run out of funding before Congress reconvenes after the November elections.

The SBA needs $1.6 billion to keep up with thousands of new applications coming in each day ...Read more

CHICAGO — Lawyers representing Gangster Disciples founder Larry Hoover filed a motion Friday asking the judge overseeing Hoover’s request for release from a life sentence to recuse himself because of his “intimidating” and “entirely inappropriate” comments at a hearing last week.

The request focuses on U.S. District Judge John ...Read more

Exiled opposition leader Edmundo González said he will return to Venezuela for the start of the new presidential term in January.

González, a presidential candidate in July’s presidential elections, presented detailed proof from a majority of polling stations that showed him as winner with nearly 70% of the vote. He fled to Spain last ...Read more

WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden sought to discourage Israel from attacking Iran’s oil fields, as the U.S. looks to shape Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s response to a ballistic-missile barrage and keep the region from descending into all-out war.

Biden, addressing reporters at the White House, acknowledged that Israel would respond ...Read more

NEW YORK — Sheena Wright, New York City Mayor Eric Adams’ second in command at City Hall, is set to resign from her post in what would be another high-level departure from his administration, which has become besieged by a flurry of federal corruption investigations, according to multiple sources close to the matter.

The first deputy mayor�...Read more

ORLANDO, Fla. — Odds are now high that a system developing in the Gulf of Mexico could become a tropical depression or storm before it makes its way to Florida next week, according to the National Hurricane Center.

As of the NHC’s 8 p.m. Eastern time tropical outlook, forecasters are looking at a broad area of low pressure in the ...Read more

LOS ANGELES — The Menendez brothers have fought a decades-long battle for freedom since being convicted in 1996 in the sensational murders of their parents at the family’s Beverly Hills home.

For years, they made little progress.

But a series of events in the last year have brought them closer to their goal after spending 34 years behind ...Read more

Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker will lead a trade mission to Japan accompanied by a number of top legislators, political allies and business people, his office said Friday.

The trip comes as Pritzker has announced ambitious pushes into quantum technology, clean energy and manufacturing, all of which were among the industries his office said would be ...Read more

At least 70 Haitians are dead and dozens of others are unaccounted for following a massacre in a farming community involving one of Haiti’s most ruthless armed groups.

The surprise attack happened in the early morning hours Thursday in Pont-Sondé, whose residents had been trying to defend themselves against the Gran Grif gang. It is raising ...Read more