The Republican chairman of the House oversight committee on Friday asked Alex Acosta, the former U.S. attorney who signed off on disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein’s controversial 2007 plea deal, if he wanted to clarify his recent testimony to the panel.

Representative James Comer’s request follows a report by Bloomberg News that cited ...Read more

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. — Illinois stands to become the next state that would permit doctors to help terminally ill people end their lives after the controversial measure cleared its final legislative hurdle early Friday in a narrow state Senate vote in which opponents questioned the bill’s morality and one said it could bring “a culture of ...Read more

The Trump administration has made the decision to attack military installations inside Venezuela and the strikes could come at any moment, sources with knowledge of the situation told The Miami Herald, as the U.S. prepares to initiate the next stage of its campaign against the Soles drug cartel.

Sources told the Herald that the targets — ...Read more

RALEIGH, N.C. — North Carolina Rep. Cecil Brockman, facing criminal charges for alleged sex crimes involving a minor, resigned his seat on Friday, the same day a House committee formed to investigate and potentially expel him.

Brockman, a Democrat, submitted his letter of resignation to the principal clerk of the N.C. House of Representatives...Read more

MIAMI — U.S. Coast Guard investigators Thursday recommended the Justice Department charge the operators of the push tug and barge that rammed into a Miami Yacht Club summer camp sailboat, killing three young girls, with manslaughter.

But with the Coast Guard’s detailed Rules of Navigation, which dictate maritime law, prosecuting that charge...Read more

LOS ANGELES — Firefighters mopping up a small brush fire that authorities say reignited as the Palisades fire five days later were ordered to leave the original burn scene even though they complained the ground was still smoldering and rocks remained hot to the touch, according to firefighter text messages reviewed by the Los Angeles Times.

...Read more

LOS ANGELES — The six armed federal agents loomed around their detained suspect, Carlitos Ricardo Parias, who was handcuffed and sitting on the sidewalk, moaning as he held his right leg.

A small crowd had gathered around them on that day in June, according to video of the incident. Three civilians are seen helping Parias, 44, a well-known ...Read more

Almost a year after being arrested in his federal sex crimes trial, Sean “Diddy” Combs is getting a change of scenery, TMZ first reported.

In July, Combs was convicted on two prostitution-related charges and acquitted on the more serious charges of racketeering conspiracy and sex trafficking.

Combs will serve the remainder of his 50-month...Read more

DETROIT — The man who attacked Grand Blanc Township churchgoers last month, leaving four dead, was acting on anti-Mormon beliefs, federal authorities announced Friday.

"Based upon the facts, circumstances and information obtained in this case, I am confirming that this is a targeted act of violence believed to be motivated by the assailant's ...Read more

WASHINGTON — The top Republican and Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee are publicly pressuring the Pentagon to provide its legal rationale for the military strikes against alleged drug trafficking boats.

Committee Chairman Roger Wicker, R-Miss., and ranking member Jack Reed, D-R.I., on Friday released two letters they previously ...Read more

At least 19 people have lost their lives in Jamaica from Hurricane Melissa, which battered the island this week as the most powerful storm to ever hit the Caribbean nation.

Sen. Dana Morris Dixon, Jamaica’s information minister, said Friday that the toll is almost certain to rise. “We’re still at 19 confirmed. But we do expect that that ...Read more

PHILADELPHIA — Amid a financial tailspin and organizational upheaval, leaders at Valley Forge Military College have expressed interest in joining President Donald Trump’s plan for conservative colleges that would provide preferential access to federal education funding.

Trump’s proposed Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education ...Read more

President Donald Trump's favorite musical is, famously, "Les Misérables," but few fans have been storming the barricades to get into the Kennedy Center this season.

The Washington Post reports that sales for the current season of music, dance and theater at the Washington, D.C., cultural institution have declined dramatically since the ...Read more

CHICAGO — Leo Feler’s message to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security on Friday began with him quoting the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Standing at a downtown news conference with local elected leaders, the 45-year-old Lakeview resident then said masked federal agents violated that foundational language that sets warrant ...Read more

Rescue operations and urgent evacuations continued in Cuba on Friday, as people remained trapped by severe flooding left by the torrential rains from Hurricane Melissa on rural areas and towns across the affected provinces on the eastern end of the island.

Cuban state television reporter Lázaro Manuel Alonso said emergency evacuations were ...Read more

WASHINGTON — A federal judge in Rhode Island granted a temporary restraining order Friday that would compel the government to distribute food stamp benefits for November.

Chief Judge John J. McConnell Jr. of the U.S. District Court for the District of Rhode Island made the ruling from the bench in a lawsuit brought by the Rhode Island State ...Read more

Construction companies that have been tasked with demolishing the East Wing of the White House and building a $300 million ballroom for President Donald Trump are maintaining a low profile amid public backlash.

Websites for firms like Maryland’s EAI Rolloff hauling company appear to have since been taken down, offering no contact information ...Read more

CHICAGO — For months, Illinois transit leaders warned of a doomsday scenario that would hobble the region’s mass transit systems.

Dozens of bus lines were on the chopping block, they warned, along with whole portions of the “L.” Thousands of workers faced the threat of layoffs. Transit advocates warned that service cuts would have wide-...Read more

The Trump administration’s deadly bombing campaign of alleged drug-running vessels in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific Ocean violate international law and should be investigated, the United Nations’ top human rights official said Friday.

“These attacks — and their mounting human cost — are unacceptable,” High Commissioner for Human...Read more