WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court hears oral arguments Wednesday in a dispute over a Tennessee ban on certain medical treatments for transgender children, in a case that could set the boundaries on gender identity policies for states and Congress.

The state’s law prohibits prescription of puberty blockers, hormones and surgery for minors, but ...Read more

Where do we go in the aftermath of our recent elections? As MAGA forces mobilize to swiftly implement Donald Trump’s agenda, the Democrats are counseled to look in the mirror to understand how they ceded the working class to Trump’s now bigger-tent Republican Party.

The thing is, one cannot truly comprehend today’s new political landscape...Read more

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The woman on the telephone, Sylvia — too frightened to want her last name revealed — entered the United States illegally 20 years ago when she was 13, brought across the southern border by her mother, fleeing domestic abuse.

Her memories of Guatemala are faint.

Now, 33, with two teenage sons of her own, born as ...Read more

WASHINGTON — Russell Vought is well-known on Capitol Hill and thus far at least looks like a shoo-in to be confirmed as President-elect Donald Trump’s budget director, as he was during Trump’s first term on a party-line vote in 2020.

The hard-charging Vought is a revered figure on the right with his pledges to upend the “deep state” ...Read more

For most Americans this election has brought exhaustion, divisiveness and, for many, fear and deep pain. After the election Tom Nichols wrote in The Atlantic: “Americans must stay engaged and make their voices heard at every turn.” And Liz Cheney tweeted, “Citizens across this country … must now be the guardrails of democracy.”

But ...Read more

There is an argument that the single most important issue resulting in Donald Trump’s victory over Kamala Harris is the illegal immigration that the Biden-Harris administration not only tolerated but encouraged. The problem had grown untenable by Trump’s first victory in 2016 and was a key issue then as well.

Yet from the beginning, the ...Read more

Weeks before Election Day, more than 150 volunteers boarded early morning buses in Sacramento and traveled east, through the towering mountains of the Humboldt–Toiyabe National Forest and across the Nevada border to convince voters to approve a ballot measure that they, as Californians, could not vote on themselves.

When the group of mostly ...Read more

For those of us committed to protecting the ocean, it’s always been clear that restoring healthy seas will be the work of our lifetimes, and that of others who’ll come after us.

Unlike the majority of Americans, I believe the Biden administration did a decent job, particularly in responding to the climate emergency we’re currently living ...Read more

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — California lawmakers have a duty to balance taking on the incoming Trump administration with making the state a more affordable place to live, Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas said Monday.

Rivas, who was again elected speaker by his Democratic colleagues at the start of a new legislative session, called housing affordability...Read more

U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders has been a frequent critic of Elon Musk, clashing with the billionaire on numerous issues, including wealth inequality, foreign relations and space travel.

But, now the pair are on the same page — at least when it comes to one issue.

“Elon Musk is right,” Sanders, an independent who caucuses with Democrats from ...Read more

President Joe Biden’s decision to pardon his son Hunter Biden was not well received, especially after after months of saying that he would not interfere as the legal process played out.

Biden’s Sunday evening announcement that he would use his presidential authority to forgive felony tax and gun charge convictions against his son drew swift...Read more

BOISE, Idaho — Prosecutors can enforce most of Idaho’s ban on helping minors obtain abortions in states where the procedure is legal without parental consent, an appeals court ruled Monday.

Known as the “abortion trafficking” statute, the 2023 law was the first of its kind in the nation and an effort by the Legislature to expand Idaho�...Read more

If President Joe Biden is going to use his constitutional authority to grant a pardon to his son, he should also issue pardons to those charged and convicted for their roles in the January 6th attack on the U.S. Capitol, President-elect Donald Trump seemed to suggest.

Trump, shortly after news broke that Biden would pardon his son Hunter for ...Read more

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — California lawmakers met at the state Capitol on Monday to devise a plan to shield the state from President-elect Donald Trump’s conservative policies, including his vows to repeal environmental protections and initiate mass deportations.

The goal of the special legislative session called by Gov. Gavin Newsom is to ...Read more

WASHINGTON — A pardon from President Joe Biden appears to put an end to ongoing criminal cases against his son Hunter, but Congress under full Republican control still could further investigate the younger Biden or other members of the president’s family in the new year.

House Republicans fixated on Hunter Biden this Congress, with ...Read more

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Monday did not sound ready to sharply limit the power of the Food and Drug Administration to prohibit the sale of new candy-colored vaping products aimed at teenagers.

Instead, the justices, both conservative and liberal, said Congress in 2009 gave the agency the power to stop the sale of new tobacco products...Read more

A pair of New England senators are calling on the Biden administration to make it clear that the U.S. military should not be used against U.S. citizens except under the most dire circumstances.

U.S. Sens. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., said in a letter that it’s imperative that President Joe Biden and Secretary of...Read more

SAN DIEGO — U.S. Magistrate Judge Benjamin Cheeks, a former San Diego prosecutor and defense attorney, is tracking toward becoming one of the last two federal judges appointed by President Joe Biden, though it remains uncertain if he’ll make it across the finish line that is the Senate confirmation needed for the life-tenure position.

...Read more

WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden’s public justification of his decision to pardon his son — accusing the Justice Department of political targeting — threatens to undermine the image he carefully cultivated through decades in politics as an honest broker whose principal loyalty was to protecting the sanctity of critical U.S. institutions....Read more

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Attorney General Rob Bonta gathered with a handful of state lawmakers and abortion access advocates to introduce two bills that they intend to help fortify the Golden State against anti-abortion efforts.

The first bill, by Assemblymember Maggy Krell, D-Sacramento, would safeguard access to medication abortions by ...Read more