L
    Lydia O'Connor

    Lydia O'Connor

    Reporter, HuffPost

  • Felicity Huffman Reports To Prison In College Bribery Scandal

    The “Desperate Housewives” star will serve 14 days in federal prison in Northern California for her role in "Operation Varsity Blues."

  • GOP Sen. Gardner Won't Say If It's OK For Trump To Pressure World Leaders

    The Colorado senator up for reelection in 2020 grew angry with reporters when they wouldn't let him dodge the question.

  • Rick Perry Subpoenaed In House's Trump Impeachment Probe

    The energy secretary is the latest person in President Donald Trump's orbit to face demands for documents.

  • California's Forced Power Outages Expose Systemic Failure, Governor Says

    This “is not how things should work," Gov. Gavin Newsom said of PG&E's forced power shutoff in response to wildfire risk.

  • Pentagon And Budget Office Subpoenaed In House Impeachment Probe

    It's the latest request for documents related to Trump's interactions with the Ukrainian president.

  • A Running List Of Republicans Criticizing Trump's Ukraine Scandal

    Republicans are not as unified over the controversy as the president is insisting.

  • Trump Brought Up Biden, Warren In A Call With Chinese President: Report

    Sources told CNN that Trump brought up his rivals' political prospects and promised to stay quiet on the Hong Kong protests in the same call.

  • Giant Boulders Mirror Desperation In California's Homelessness Crisis

    Residents in a San Francisco neighborhood set off a public feud when they lined sidewalks with rocks to curtail encampments, drug use and noise.

  • Right-To-Die Bill Abandoned In California

    A California bill that would allow terminally ill patients to seek a physician-assisted death failed to advance in the state legislature on Tuesday. Hours ahead of a vote in the Assembly Health Committee, lawmakers pushing forward the End of Life Option Act abandoned efforts to enact the legislation amid opposition from lawmakers representing heavily Catholic districts, The Associated Press reported. “We have chosen not to present SB 128, the End of Life Option Act, today, in the Assembly Health Committee," bill author Sen. Bill Monning (D) said in a press release announcing its removal from the committee's calendar this year.

  • NASCAR Fans Ignore Request To Leave Confederate Flags At Home

    Confederate flags flew in full force at NASCAR's Coke Zero 400 race last weekend despite event officials asking fans to keep the controversial banner away from the event. While several major retailers stopped carrying the flag after a white gunman apparently obsessed with the racist symbol allegedly slaughtered nine black churchgoers in Charleston, South Carolina, earlier on June 17, Florida’s Daytona International Speedway and 29 other NACAR racetracks stopped short of an outright ban and asked fans to voluntarily keep them away from future events. At the Coke Zero 400 race in Daytona this weekend, the first NASCAR race since the shooting, event officials also implemented an optional exchange in which attendees could trade in their Confederate flag for an American one.

  • California Just Cut Its Water Use In A Major Way

    In the households of drought-stricken California, something finally clicked. This May, the last month in which water conservation was voluntary, urban water users consumed 28.9 percent less water than in May 2013, the State Water Resources Control Board announced Wednesday. The major drop marks the steepest water-use decline in year-over-year comparisons since Gov. Jerry Brown asked residents to restrict their water use last year, the Sacramento Bee noted.

  • Controversial California Vaccine Bill Clears One Of Its Last Hurdles

    California's hotly debated mandatory vaccine bill passed the state Assembly on Thursday, leaving just one more floor vote before it heads to Gov. Jerry Brown for final approval. Under the proposed law, parents citing religious or personal reasons would no longer be exempt from immunizing their children enrolled in California schools. It passed 46 to 30 in the Assembly, The Contra Costa Times reported, and will move onto the state Senate for a final vote before seeking Brown's signature.

  • National Park Service Pulls Confederate Flag Merchandise

    The U.S. National Park Service announced Thursday that it will remove Confederate flag merchandise from its bookstores and gift shops. "We strive to tell the complete story of America," parks Director Jonathan Jarvis said in a press release.

  • Baseball Team Cancels 'Caucasian Heritage' Night Following Backlash

    After an outcry, the team issued an apology and canceled the event.

  • Hillary Clinton Just Gave This Kid The Best Excuse To Miss School

    There's a lot of debate over whether children should miss school for life experiences, but we have a feeling 9-year-old Ollie Olsen will get a free pass with his presidential alibi. On Tuesday, presidential candidate Hillary Clinton tweeted a photo of a note that Ollie appears to have written letting his teacher know he'd be absent from class to meet the frontrunner for the Democratic nomination in 2016. The former Secretary of State signed the note with her full name of Hillary Rodham Clinton and included a footnote that the signature is no joke -- thought we bet her tweet will clear up any doubts about its authenticity.

  • The DNC Has The Best Reaction To Donald Trump Announcing His Presidential Run

    If there's one thing that celebrity hotelier and reality star Donald Trump's presidential campaign promises, it's comedy. After cascading down an escalator onto a stage at New York's Trump Tower on Tuesday, the billionaire businessman announced his bid for the GOP nomination -- something he's flirted with doing for years. Following his speech that made mention of everything from his golf courses and his 1987 book to Mexican rapists and an apparent dearth of doctors, the Democratic National Committee quickly issued a tongue-in-cheek statement.

  • State Rep Blames California Drought On Abortion

    Scientists are still exploring the causes of California's historic drought, but one local lawmaker thinks it might all come down to one thing: God's wrath over abortion. While speaking at the California ProLife Legislative Banquet last week, California Assemblywoman Shannon Grove (R) suggested a theory that the state's worst drought in 1,200 years may be divine retribution for California providing women with access to abortions, RH Reality Check reported. “Texas was in a long period of drought until Governor Perry signed the fetal pain bill,” she told the audience.

  • Harry Reid Slams NFL For Caring More About Fantasy Football Than Racist Team Name

    Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) criticized the National Football League on Tuesday for shutting down a fantasy football event, but failing to take action against one of its teams' racist names. After the NFL canceled a Tony Romo-organized fantasy football convention in Las Vegas, claiming the event violated league rules, Reid -- a longtime advocate for renaming Washington's NFL team -- tweeted his frustration.

  • Carly Fiorina Calls The Chinese Unimaginative Idea Thieves

    GOP presidential contender Carly Fiorina tells a reporter in a video that surfaced Tuesday that Americans shouldn't fear competition with China because its people lack creativity. Fiorina, while speaking out against Common Core education standards with the Iowa politics blogger Caffeinated Thoughts in January, said the policy isn't the answer to concerns that American students are lagging behind China's. I've been doing business in China for decades, and I will tell you that yeah, the Chinese can take a test, but what they can't do is innovate,” said Fiorina, a former Hewlett-Packard CEO.

  • Mandatory Vaccine Bill Passes In California Senate

    A bill that would make vaccines mandatory for nearly every child in California passed the state Senate on Thursday morning. The controversial bill ensures that parents enrolling their children in California schools will be allowed to opt them out of immunizations only for medical reasons and may no longer cite religious or personal belief exemptions as reasons not to vaccinate. It passed 25-10 in the Senate, The Associated Press reported.