WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate has voted to confirm former wrestling executive Linda McMahon as the nation’s education chief, a role that places her atop a department President Donald Trump has vowed to dismantle. McMahon will face the competing tasks of winding down the Education Department while escalating efforts to achieve the Republican president’s agenda.…… MORE
ROME (AP) — The Vatican says that Pope Francis has suffered two new episodes of acute respiratory crises and has been put back on noninvasive mechanical ventilation. Doctors extracted “copious” amounts of mucus from his lungs in another setback in what has become a more than two-week battle to overcome a complex respiratory infection and…… MORE
Israel has introduced what it said was a new U.S. ceasefire plan and is trying to force Hamas to accept it by imposing a siege on the Gaza Strip. The plan is different from the one the two sides agreed to in January. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu referred to it as the “Witkoff proposal.” He…… MORE
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump says 25% tariffs on imports from Mexico and Canada will start Tuesday, sparking renewed fears of a North American trade war. He announced the coming tariffs at the White House on Monday. He says the tariffs are to force the two U.S. neighbors to step up their fight against…… MORE
WASHINGTON (AP) — The typically tight-lipped CIA is peeling back the curtain on some of its secrets with an upcoming presentation at South By Southwest festival. America’s preeminent spy agency plans to deliver a talk at this year’s edition of the SXSW music festival and tech conference held in Austin, Texas. According to the CIA,…… MORE
SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) — Authorities investigating the deaths of Oscar-winner Gene Hackman and his wife are waiting for more details from their autopsies to determine why they died. Santa Fe County Sheriff Adan Mendoza said Friday that both tested negative for carbon monoxide. Hackman and his wife, Betsy Arakawa, were found Wednesday at the…… MORE
DALLAS (AP) — Texas health officials say the number of people with measles has increased to 146 in rural West Texas outbreak that led this week to the death of a school-aged child who was not vaccinated. The Texas Department of State Health Services said Friday that the number of cases in the outbreak had…… MORE
Microsoft is closing down Skype, the video-calling service it bought for $8.5 billion in 2011 and which had helped spark a transformation in how people communicate online. The tech giant said Friday it will retire Skype in May and shift some of its services to Microsoft Teams, its flagship videoconferencing platform. Skype users will be…… MORE
(WBAP/KLIF) – Attorney General Ken Paxton has lost a bid to stop the City of Dallas from enforcing its ban on arresting people for low-level marijuana possession. On Friday, a Dallas County district judge rejected Paxton’s request for a temporary injunction. The state argued that since recreational marijuana is illegal the City of Dallas is…… MORE
WASHINGTON (AP) — An extraordinary breakdown in diplomacy leaves the world’s peace in limbo. President Donald Trump has cut short talks with Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy over a deal for U.S. access to that country’s rare earth minerals after shouting at him in the Oval Office. Trump berated Zelenskyy for being “disrespectful.” The pair had planned…… MORE
