Season’s 1st hurricane aims at Mexico
Hurricane Agatha is the strongest hurricane on record to make landfall in May in the easter Pacific and it hit a stretch of tourist beaches in southern Mexico on Monday.
Hurricane Agatha is the strongest hurricane on record to make landfall in May in the easter Pacific and it hit a stretch of tourist beaches in southern Mexico on Monday.
The White House on Friday announced the next list of recipients of the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Olympic gymnast Simone Biles, gun control advocate Gabrielle Giffords and actor Denzel Washington are among the 17 individuals chosen to receive the nation's highest civilian honor. The ceremony will take place at the White House on Thursday, July 7.
In the early days of the coronavirus vaccine rollout, scientists were hopeful it might herald the long-awaited turning point of the pandemic, not only bringing the threat of severe disease, hospitalization and death to an end, but also completely halting the spread of the disease. Dr. Anthony Fauci, chief medical adviser to the White House, said in December 2020 that if the nation's COVID-19 vaccine campaign went well, the U.S. could approach herd immunity by summer’s end and “normality that is close to where we were before” by the end of 2021. In the months that followed the Provincetown outbreak, breakthrough infections would shift from a statistical anomaly to a regular occurrence.
"The Princess and the Frog" attraction at Disneyland Resort in California and Walt Disney World Resort in Florida has a name. The re-themed ride's new name was unveiled Friday at the 2022 ESSENCE Festival of Culture in New Orleans, a fitting location since the Louisiana city is also Princess Tiana's hometown.
New York lawmakers introduced legislation Friday that would ban the concealed carry of guns in a "sensitive location," including Times Square and all mass public transportation, according to a draft of the bill. The bill comes after a Supreme Court ruling overturned a state law that limited who could get concealed carry permits to people who had "proper cause." Sensitive places where guns cannot be carried include the subway, trains, buses and ferries, as well as government buildings, houses of worship, schools, libraries, public playgrounds, public parks, zoos, homeless shelters and polling places, according to the legislation.
Arizona Democratic Sen. Kyrsten Sinema remains committed to upholding the Senate filibuster, a spokesperson said Friday, a day after President Joe Biden said he would support making an exception to codify abortion rights in federal law. "Senator Sinema's position on the filibuster has not changed," the spokesperson told ABC News. While West Virginia Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin hasn't weighed in specifically after Biden's call, all signs are that he, too, remains opposed to such a carveout.
A suspect has been identified in the 1990 cold case murder of a Seattle teenager through the investigative tool of genetic genealogy, Washington state officials announced. Brooks has now been linked to the sexual assault and murder of 17-year-old Michelle Koski, who was found dead on Aug. 25, 1990 in Snohomish, the sheriff's office said. Koski's case had already been unsolved for 15 years when it was picked up by the cold case team in 2005, the sheriff's office said.
“I think a lot of parents are anxious about starting potty training,” Jandu, a mom of two, told "Good Morning America." Jandu leads online courses that help parents teach their toddlers to use the toilet. “My motto is that there's no one-size-fits-all potty training method,” Jandu said.
"Dancing with the Stars" pro Sharna Burgess and her boyfriend, actor Brian Green Austin, welcomed their first child together. Burgess, 37, shared the news Thursday on Instagram, writing, "Zane Walker Green 06/28/2022 at 12:12pm," alongside a black and white photo of the baby clutching his dad's finger. The dancer's post was flooded with congratulatory remarks from many members of the "Dancing with the Stars" family.
The Supreme Court's overturning of Roe v. Wade has led to increasing concerns around access to the abortion pill among patients and healthcare professionals. Medication abortion already has a long history of strict regulation by the FDA, and many states had their own restrictions even before the Court decided on Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization last week. After the fall of Roe, nearly half of states are likely to ban abortion entirely -- many already have.
Melissa Gates, who is physically disabled and uses a cane or scooter to move around, was actively searching and applying for a federal job. With accessible hiring practices, people like Gates can get a fair shot at jobs across industries.
Republican lawmakers are proposing what they call "pro-family" platforms following the Supreme Court's scrapping of the constitutional protections around abortion to try to help people who, in some states, could now be forced to carry a pregnancy to term. Florida Sen. Marco Rubio put out a sprawling framework last week, while Sens. Steve Daines of Montana, Mitt Romney of Utah and Richard Burr of North Carolina put out their own proposal pushing for a monthly cash stipend for working families pulled from other tax benefits.
Authorities in North Korea have instructed its people to avoid “alien things” falling near its border with South Korea. “State Emergency Epidemic Prevention Headquarters saw to it that an emergency instruction was issued stressing the need to vigilantly deal with alien things coming by wind and other climate phenomena and balloons in the areas along the demarcation line and borders,” Rodong Sinmun said Friday. The influx of non-native objects, especially from the southern half of the Korean peninsula, has put North Korea’s border at the highest level of alert for the longest amount of time since the two Koreas separated in 1953.
A teenage girl was seriously injured in a shark attack at a Florida beach on Thursday, authorities said. The unidentified girl was scalloping in water approximately 5 feet deep near Grassy Island, just of Keaton Beach, when she was bitten by a shark, according to the Taylor County Sheriff's Office. The girl suffered "serious injuries" and had to be airlifted to a hospital in Tallahassee, about 80 miles northwest of Keaton Beach, according to the sheriff's office.
In a speech celebrating the 25th anniversary of Hong Kong’s return to China, Chinese President Xi Jinping strongly reaffirmed the territory’s autonomy under the promise of “One Country, Two Systems” but with one very strong caveat: Beijing has full jurisdiction and Hong Kong must respect that. Xi’s words run counter to the view of many in the city who supported the now-silenced pro-democracy activists and Western politicians around the world who view Beijing’s increasing direct influence in the city as reneging on the agreement made between the United Kingdom and China that led to the handover on July 1, 1997.
On June 24, the Supreme Court's smallest-possible majority struck down the long-standing Roe v. Wade ruling, which had for five decades guaranteed a right to access abortion. It was a rare instance of the court -- whose transformative power on society stretches back to the early 19th century -- restricting rights it had previously extended via the Constitution. Roe's reversal was partly possible because of the votes of the court's three most recent justices, all of whom were appointed for life by President Donald Trump -- himself elected by a minority of the population though he lost the popular vote -- and confirmed by Senate Republicans representing roughly 43 percent of the country.
As a 19-year-old, Jeanette Taylor was a single mother raising three children inside a one-bedroom apartment she shared with her mother, brother, sister and her niece. Taylor, now a Chicago alderwoman, said her story is indicative of the housing crisis people continue to face, so she's taking legislative action to address the housing crisis and the system that keeps change from happening. "I paid taxes, I worked, I volunteered at the kids' school," Taylor told ABC News.
While the celebration is often colorful and exciting, it is also a time that can be very loud and frightening for dogs around the country, causing it to be the weekend more pets go missing than any other time of the year, according to the American Kennel Club. The noise of fireworks causes dogs to enter survival mode, according to Kitty Block, president and CEO of The Humane Society of the United States. "It is a logical response if you think of it from the dog’s perspective," Block explains.
More than one month since the massacre at Robb Elementary School that killed 19 children and two teachers in Uvalde, Texas, families of victims demanded answers from city leaders during a special council meeting on Thursday. Frustrated by the lack of information from the ongoing state investigation, families turned to the council for answers – but they got none. “We’re not trying to hide anything from you,” said Uvalde Mayor Don McLaughlin on Thursday.
A former White House aide's stunning testimony before the House panel investigating the Capitol attack indicated that the U.S. Secret Service may have had advanced warning of the potential for violence at the Capitol, raising new questions about the agency's planning ahead of the riot and actions taken by agents on Jan. 6. Cassidy Hutchinson, a top deputy to then-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, told lawmakers on Tuesday that the security team guarding then-President Donald Trump and senior White House officials were aware there was a serious threat posed by some descending on Washington, D.C., on Jan. 6, when Trump was planning to address a rally to support his baseless accusations that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from him. In Hutchinson's telling, the agency famous for its teams of bodyguards, sharpshooters and hyper-skilled drivers was aware that among the throngs headed to Washington were some who were planning to carry a variety of weapons and military gear, and were seeking to target members of Congress and breach the Capitol building.
A 71-year-old woman was gored by a bull bison at Yellowstone National Park, making her the third person attacked by a bison at the park this year. A park official said that the Pennsylvania woman and her daughter were headed back to their vehicle at Storm Point at Yellowstone Lake on Wednesday when they inadvertently approached the bison, causing it to charge at them. The woman sustained non-life-threatening injuries and was sent to West Park Hospital in Cody, Wyoming.