WASHINGTON (AP) – President-elect Donald Trump has questioned intelligence assessments about Russian involvement in election hacking for weeks. The nation’s top intelligence officials are making their most detailed and persuasive case yet directly to Trump, pointing to multiple motives for Russia’s interference. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, CIA Director John Brennan and FBI Director…
BOSTON (AP) – U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren has told supporters she will run for re-election in 2018. The Massachusetts Democrat made the announcement Friday. It was expected that she would run again. Warren has emerged as one of Republican President-elect Donald Trump’s fiercest critics in Congress. She said in the message that Massachusetts voters did…
CHICAGO (AP) – Prosecutors have filed hate crime and aggravated kidnapping charges against four black suspects accused of beating and taunting a white man during an attack streamed live on Facebook Cook County prosecutors on Thursday announced charges against three 18-year-olds – Jordan Hill of Carpentersville, Brittany Covington of Chicago and Tesfaye Cooper of Chicago…
CHICAGO (AP) – Republican Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner says he won’t be in Washington later this month for GOP President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration. Rauner says he’s “focused on Illinois” and is trying “to minimize the distractions” and his time out of state. Rauner is amid a state budget impasse with Democratic lawmakers. Trump is to…
WASHINGTON (AP) – The Director of National Intelligence says attempts to deter foreign hackers don’t work, despite President-elect Donald Trump’s plans for a buildup of defensive cyber capabilities. James Clapper told the Senate Armed Services Committee during a hearing Thursday that the U.S. cannot put stock in what he called cyber deterrence. He says cyber…
CHICAGO (AP) – Chicago police say authorities are considering whether an attack on a white man that was broadcast live on Facebook falls under hate crimes statutes. Chicago Police Department spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said Thursday morning that the four black suspects made “terrible racist statements” during the assault but that police believe the victim was targeted…
ATLANTA (AP) – The president of a historically black college in Alabama says its band will perform in President-elect Donald Trump’s inaugural parade, despite a barrage of criticism. Talladega College President Billy Hawkins announced the decision Thursday. It comes after the Presidential Inaugural Committee had announced that the Alabama band had accepted its invitation to…
WASHINGTON (AP) – Under mounting pressure to free convicts as a last act, President Barack Obama is planning at least one more batch of pardons and commutations before leaving office in two weeks. But don’t expect many famous offenders to make the list. The list of bold names appealing to Obama for compassion in his…
CHARLESTON, S.C. (AP) – Convicted Charleston church shooter Dylann Roof did not ask jurors to spare his life or for the death penalty during his brief opening statement at his sentencing trial. The soft-spoken Roof told jurors Wednesday that there is nothing wrong with him psychologically and that his lawyers forced him to go through…
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) – A federal appeals court has reversed a lower court decision that declared Minnesota’s sex offender program unconstitutional because it holds people long after they complete their prison sentences. A three-judge panel of the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Tuesday sided with the state and sent the case back to a lower…