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Utah and Arizona will pay to keep national parks open if federal government shutdown occurs

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:57:37 GMT

By ANITA SNOW (Associated Press)PHOENIX (AP) — Arizona and Utah will keep iconic national parks in those states open if a shutdown of the federal government threatens access to Arizona’s orange-striped Grand Canyon and the sheer red cliffs of Utah’s Zion Valley.Most importantly for state budgets, visitors can keep spending their money near the parks.A cutoff could come Sunday. The economic impact of the national parks is so important that Arizona’s Democratic governor and Utah’s Republican governor have decided to invest state funds in keeping Grand Canyon, Zion, Arches, Bryce Canyon, Capitol Reef and Canyonlands national parks open.For Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs and Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, it’s a simple question of economics. The nonprofit National Parks Conservation Association says that every $1 invested in the National Park Service annually supports more than $15 in economic activity. The association says that every day of a shutdown could mea...

Biden offers dire warnings about Trump, accuses mainstream GOP of ‘deafening’ silence

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:57:37 GMT

TEMPE, Arizona (AP) — President Joe Biden issued one of his most dire warnings yet that Donald Trump and his allies are a menace to American democracy, declaring Thursday that the former president is more interested in personal power than upholding the nation’s core values and suggesting even mainstream Republicans are complicit.“The silence is deafening,” he said.During a speech in Arizona celebrating a library to be built honoring his friend and fierce Trump critic, the late Republican Sen. John McCain, Biden repeated one of his key campaign themes, branding the “Make America Great Again” movement as an existential threat to the U.S. political system. He’s reviving that idea ahead of next year’s presidential race after it buoyed Democrats during last fall’s midterm election, laying out the threat in especially stark terms: “There’s something dangerous happening in America right now.” “We should all remember, democracies don’t have to die at the end of a rif...

What to know and what’s next for Travis King, the American soldier who ran into North Korea

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:57:37 GMT

DALLAS (AP) — An American soldier who sprinted into North Korea and was held there for two months before being returned to the U.S. is set to undergo medical testing and extensive questioning about his time in the isolated country before potentially facing charges under the military justice system. Pvt. Travis King ran across the heavily fortified border from South Korea in July and became the first American detained in North Korea in nearly five years. Pyongyang abruptly announced Wednesday that it would expel King, and he was flown to an Air Force base in Texas on Thursday. Here’s what we know about King, his mysterious entry into North Korea and what’s happened in similar cases.WHO IS HE, AND WHAT HAPPENED?King, 23, joined the Army in January 2021 and was in South Korea as a cavalry scout with the 1st Armored Division, according to military officials. On July 10 he was released from a South Korean prison after serving nearly two months on assault charges. He was set t...

Analysis: It looks like it’ll take all 162 games to decide MLB’s postseason races

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:57:37 GMT

PHOENIX (AP) — It might take all 162 games to decide the playoff races in both the National League and American League.The epicenter of the wild-card chase this weekend is in Arizona at Chase Field. Thanks to some fortuitous interleague scheduling, the AL’s Houston Astros face the NL’s Arizona Diamondbacks in a three-game set crucial to races in both leagues.Defending champion Houston is fighting for a berth after a September swoon. The Diamondbacks — who have played better lately after their own second-half slide — are trying to make the postseason for the first time since 2017.“We know it’s right in front of us,” Arizona manager Torey Lovullo said after his team beat the White Sox on Wednesday. “We control our own destiny in this particular situation.”Here’s a look at some of the other series this weekend that will decide the postseason field:Rangers at Mariners: This is a big four-game set that actually began Thursday night, with both teams fighting for po...

Another arrest made in toddler’s fentanyl-linked death at Bronx day care center

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:57:37 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — A man who fled a New York City day care center where a child died and three others were hospitalized with suspected fentanyl poisoning is in custody in California — the latest person to face charges in what investigators said was a drug lab run out of a place where toddlers played and napped.U.S. investigators searched for Felix Herrera Garcia, 34, for almost two weeks before he was detained by authorities in Mexico. He was transferred to U.S. custody Wednesday night in California, according to federal prosecutors in Manhattan. His wife, the operator of the day care center, and two other men were previously arrested.The manhunt began not long after a 1-year-old boy, Nicholas Dominici, suddenly died at the Bronx day care center. During nap time, other children at the center experienced symptoms of opioid poisoning and needed to be revived with the drug Narcan.Police found a brick of fentanyl stored on top of playmats for the children, along with equipment often used t...

Georgia Republicans suspend state senator who wants to impeach DA for indicting Trump

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:57:37 GMT

ATLANTA (AP) — Georgia’s Republican Senate Caucus is suspending a GOP state senator who attacked them for opposing his plan to impeach Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis for indicting former President Donald Trump.The caucus announced Thursday that it was indefinitely suspending state Sen. Colton Moore of Trenton, who represents a district in Georgia’s northwest corner.“Sen. Moore has a right to his opinion,” the caucus said in a statement. “However, during his advocacy for his ill-conceived proposal, Sen. Moore has knowingly misled people across Georgia and our nation, causing unnecessary tension and hostility, while putting his caucus colleagues and their families at risk of personal harm,” said the group, which has 32 of the Georgia Senate’s 56 members.Moore attacked his colleagues as “Republicans in name only,” or RINOs.“The Georgia RINOs responded to my call to fight back against the Trump witch hunts by acting like children and throwing me out of the...

Orioles announce new 30-year deal to stay at Camden Yards

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:57:37 GMT

BALTIMORE (AP) — The Baltimore Orioles have reached a deal with the state of Maryland that keeps the team at Camden Yards for at least 30 years, according to an announcement after the third inning of Thursday night’s game against Boston.Between innings, a message appeared on the scoreboard telling the crowd about the agreement between the Orioles, the state, Gov. Wes Moore and the Maryland Stadium Authority. The Democratic governor and Orioles chairman John Angelos were shown on the video board.The team’s lease was to expire at the end of the year, so this was a welcome announcement for fans — part of what could be a big night at Camden Yards. The Orioles had a chance to clinch the AL East title with a victory.___AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/mlbNoah Trister, The Associated Press

N.W.T. Premier Caroline Cochrane says she won’t run for re-election in upcoming vote

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:57:37 GMT

YELLOWKNIFE — The premier of the Northwest Territories has announced she won’t be running for re-election in November.Caroline Cochrane says representing the N.W.T. has been among the highest honours of her life.The former social worker was first elected as a member of the territory’s legislature in 2015 and was voted in as premier in 2019.She became a face of the fight against unprecedented wildfires in the territory in August when Yellowknife’s 20,000 residents were ordered out of the capital for three weeks due to an encroaching fire.Cochrane told a news conference at the time that she drove around the city, looking behind buildings and in bushes, to make sure homeless people weren’t left behind.The election, initially scheduled for Tuesday, was moved to Nov. 14 because of the fires.This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 28, 2023.The Canadian Press

MPs bicker over how to study Parliament’s recognition of former Nazi SS soldier

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:57:37 GMT

OTTAWA — Bickering over politics and procedure is getting in the way of efforts to have a House of Commons committee investigate how a man who fought with a Nazi unit was lauded as a hero in Canada’s Parliament.While all parties appear to agree a committee study is required, they differ on whom to blame: Liberal MP Anthony Rota, who resigned as Speaker after days of uproar over his choice to invite and recognize the man, or Prime Minister Justin Trudeau himself.The answer would determine which committee would pick up the probe into the events leading up to Yaroslav Hunka, 98, receiving a standing ovation in the House of Commons during Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s Sept. 22 visit to Ottawa.It later emerged that Hunka had fought in Ukraine during the Second World War with the Waffen-SS Galicia Division, a voluntary unit created by the Nazis to help fight off the Soviet Union.The Conservatives brought a motion to the government operations committee on Thursday t...

Siksika man files human rights complaint against Alberta Health Services, hospital

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:57:37 GMT

SIKSIKA, Alta. — A man from a First Nation in southern Alberta has filed a human rights complaint against the provincial health agency and a local hospital, alleging anti-Indigenous discrimination led to the death of his wife.The complaint filed by Benedict Crow Chief of Siksika Nation says his wife, Myra Crow Chief, died in April 2022, because staff and doctors at the Strathmore District Health Services hospital failed to disclose to them that she had active abdominal bleeding. The complaint alleges doctors knew about her condition but she was not given medication to manage her pain and was ignored by nurses.  Crow Chief wiped away tears Thursday as he described the ordeal at a news conference on the First Nation 100 kilometres east of Calgary. “Clearly my late wife’s condition was urgent. Her death was preventable. Why are our hospitals taking in patients when they’re just going to discharge us without proper care and attention?” he said as he grabbed a tis...