December 23, 2023 4:59 am
MADISON, Wis. (AP) — The liberal-controlled Wisconsin Supreme Court has overturned Republican-drawn legislative maps and ordered that new ones be created. The ruling Friday is a huge win for Democrats who have been in the minority under the GOP maps. The court ruled 4-3 in favor of ordering new district boundary lines before the 2024 election. Republicans have built large majorities under the maps they first enacted in 2011. Democrats argued that the maps were unconstitutional because the district boundaries were not contiguous. The case is one of more than two dozen legal fights over redistricting happening across the country.
December 23, 2023 4:58 am
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court says it will not immediately take up a plea by special counsel Jack Smith to rule on whether former President Donald Trump can be prosecuted for his actions to overturn the 2020 election results. The court revealed its decision Friday. The issue will now be decided by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, which has signaled it will act quickly to decide the case. Special counsel Jack Smith had cautioned that even a rapid appellate decision might not get to the Supreme Court in time for review and final word before the court’s traditional summer break.
December 23, 2023 4:54 am
SHAMONG, N.J. (AP) — New details are emerging about the fatal crash of a Philadelphia TV news helicopter earlier this week. The National Transportation Safety Board says WPVI’s Chopper 6 was returning to its base at Northeast Philadelphia Airport Tuesday night when something caused it to crash into Wharton State Forest in New Jersey’s Washington Township. Investigator Todd Gunther (pictured) says the chopper hit the trees at high speed, broke apart and caught fire. Killed in the crash were the pilot, 67-year-old Monroe Smith of Glenside, Pennsylvania, and a photographer, 45-year-old Christopher Dougherty of Oreland, Pennsylvania. They were returning from photographing Christmas light displays near Atlantic City.
December 23, 2023 4:51 am
GREEN TREE, Pa. — (WPXI) – Two men died in a murder-suicide in Green Tree Friday evening. First responders were called to the 200 block of Woodridge Drive around 6 p.m. Investigators said one of the men was rushed to a hospital where he later died. SWAT was called to the scene. When they arrived, they found the other man dead from a gunshot wound. The men were related to each other, according to police. Anyone with information is asked to call 1-833-ALL-TIPS.
December 23, 2023 2:28 am
An Allegheny County man faced his preliminary hearing Friday, accused of selling a fatal dose fentanyl to a Peters Township man. William Hockett, 23 of North Braddock faces felony drug delivery resulting in death, drug possession and criminal use of communications devices for his alleged role in the death of Vincent Knight, 21 of Peters Township. Hockett waived all charges to court. According to the criminal complaint, Peters Township police and paramedics were called to Knight’s home on August 28, when a relative who had not heard from him found him unresponsive in the bathroom of his home. Cell phone data extracted from Knight’s cell phone revealed text messages between him and Hockett regarding a sale of heroin on the day Knight died. The data placed Knight at Hockett’s residence that day as well. Cash transactions via phone app also implicated Hockett. Hockett is in the Washington County Jail, unable to post a $25,000 bond. He will be arraigned on January 25.
December 22, 2023 2:52 pm
WASHINGTON (AP) – The Supreme Court says it will not immediately take up a plea by special counsel Jack Smith to rule on whether former President Donald Trump can be prosecuted for his actions to overturn the 2020 election results. The court revealed its decision Friday. The issue will now be decided by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, which has signaled it will act quickly to decide the case. Special counsel Jack Smith had cautioned that even a rapid appellate decision might not get to the Supreme Court in time for review and final word before the court’s traditional summer break.
December 22, 2023 1:55 pm
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Federal Reserve’s preferred measure of prices fell last month, another sign that inflation is easing and that consumers should expect to see lower interest rates in 2024. Friday’s report from the Commerce Department showed that U.S. consumer prices slid 0.1% last month from October and rose 2.6% from November 2022. The month-over-month drop was the largest since April 2020 when the economy was reeling from the COVID-19 pandemic. The numbers show somewhat more progress against inflation than economists had expected. Inflation is steadily moving down to the Fed’s year-over-year target of 2% and appears to be clearing the way for Fed rate cuts in 2024.
December 22, 2023 1:52 pm
UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The U.N. Security Council has adopted a watered-down resolution calling for immediate speeded-up aid deliveries to hungry and desperate civilians in Gaza – but without the original call for an “urgent suspension of hostilities” between Israel and Hamas. Friday’s long-delayed vote in the 15-member council was 13-0 with the United States and Russia abstaining. The vote came immediately after the United States vetoed a Russian amendment that would have restored a call to immediately suspend hostilities. The U.S. abstention on the resolution avoided a second U.S. veto of a Gaza resolution following Hamas’ surprise Oct. 7 attacks inside Israel. A relieved U.S. Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield told the council after the resolution’s adoption: “This was tough, but we got there.”
December 22, 2023 5:20 am
NEW YORK (AP) — Rudy Giuliani has filed for bankruptcy. The former New York City mayor is acknowledging severe financial strain that’s grown as a result of his pursuit of Donald Trump’s lies about the 2020 election and was made worse when jury last week required him to pay $148 million to two former Georgia election workers he defamed. In a bankruptcy filing Thursday in New York, Giuliani listed nearly $153 million in existing or potential debts. That includes almost $1 million in state and federal tax liabilities, as well as money he owes lawyers and many millions of dollars in potential judgments in lawsuits against him. He estimated he had assets worth $1 million to $10 million.
December 22, 2023 5:19 am
PRAGUE (AP) — Prague’s police chief says a lone gunman opened fire in a university, killing at least 14 people and injuring 25 more. Police and the Czech Republic’s interior ministry say the gunman in the mass shooting Thursday is also dead. Authorities have not released the shooter’s name, but the police chief says he was a student at the university. Police officers sealed off Jan Palach Square and evacuated the philosophy department building of Charles University, where the shooting took place. Authorities are searching the area, including the building’s balconies, for explosives.
