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Dogs passing by a Ferris wheel in the ghost town of Pripyat near the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant (Picture: AFP) On April 26, 1986, the world’s worst nuclear accident happened at the Chernobyl plant near Pripyat, Ukraine, then controlled by …

Democracies are not undone in a single moment. They erode gradually — through toleration of excesses, normalization of intimidation and the quiet shrinking of space for dissent. The federal indictment of the Southern Poverty Law Center should alarm anyone who …

Bears general manager Ryan Poles is being more aggressive than ever in highlighting exactly the kind of player that fits the team in the NFL Draft. If they don’t, he said, they’re off his draft list. In the moments after …

Monthly payments for health insurance through the Affordable Care Act, commonly known as Obamacare, did not increase by as much this year as Illinois officials had initially expected after the expiration of federal tax credits that made coverage significantly more …

By Nora Gámez Torres, Miami Herald A decade after Fidel Castro’s death, the fate of his communist revolution might be tied to an unlikely figure: his great-nephew, a colonel who goes by the nickname “El Cangrejo,” the Crab, and has …

A crowd formed early at the gates to get into the Stagecoach Country Music Festival on Friday, April 24, at the Empire Polo Club grounds in Indio. Many of those lined up had to brave the sun with little shade …

By DARLENE SUPERVILLE WASHINGTON (AP) — What’s all the buzz about? Melania Trump on Friday announced that she is expanding the White House honey program by adding a beehive in the shape of the White House to two other beehives …

The South Coast Air Quality Management District issued a windblown dust advisory Friday, April 24, for the Coachella Valley, where the Stagecoach Country Music Festival is currrently underway. The advisory will be in effect from 5 p.m. Friday until 11 …

By CLAUDIA LAUER and REBECCA BOONE The body of a Bangladeshi doctoral student who went missing with his girlfriend from the University of South Florida was found on a bridge over Tampa Bay, and his roommate has been taken into …

MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — An appeals court on Friday reversed an $8.2 million defamation verdict awarded to Alabama politician Roy Moore, who sued a super PAC over a 2017 political ad detailing misconduct accusations against him. The panel of the …

When Californians cast their ballots in the fall, they may get to decide whether they’ll have to bring a form of ID with them the next time they vote. A proposed ballot measure that, if approved, would require voters to …

Tens of thousands of people are expected to take to the streets Sunday as CicLAvia opens a three-mile stretch of West Los Angeles roads to pedestrians, cyclists and other non-motorized users. The event, scheduled from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. …

April 25th is Independent Bookstore Day, and many of us readers honor and celebrate it by making pilgrimages to our favorite local shops to add more books to our already teetering TBRs. And you know what? A day devoted to books, …

With music festival season underway in the Coachella Valley, a Riverside County legislator is pushing to make these large events safer by restricting the airspace around them. As concerts such as the Stagecoach Country Music Festival — which begins Friday, …

When Chicago attorney Rachel Cohen sat down to do her taxes earlier this year, she thought about the half dozen times she had been tear-gassed or struck with pepper pellets at protests against federal deportation tactics. “I was thinking about …

Well over a year removed from his presidency, the Biden hangover lingers. The latest domino to fall is Spirit Airlines, which is on the brink of collapse with no good options to avert it. Although a spike in jet fuel …

By Shalina Chatlani, Stateline.org In three conservative states — Missouri, Oklahoma and South Dakota — residents in recent years voted to amend their state constitutions to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act. Now Republican lawmakers in all three states …

By MELISSA GOLDIN Speculation about links among a handful U.S. scientists who have died or disappeared in recent years was largely confined to niche online communities less than two months ago. As of Friday, the number had grown to at …

By CHAN HO-HIM and MATT O’BRIEN HONG KONG (AP) — DeepSeek, the Chinese artificial intelligence startup that shook world markets last year, launched preview versions of its latest major update Friday as the AI rivalry between China and the U.S. …

By EMILIE MEGNIEN and RUSS BYNUM NAHUNTA, Ga. (AP) — A volunteer firefighter died battling a wildfire in Florida while more than 120 homes in drought-stricken southeast Georgia have been destroyed by two large blazes, one of which investigators suspect …