- WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican Rep. Tony Gonzales of Texas said Monday he will retire from Congress after bipartisan calls to expel him. Gonzales had already said he would not seek reelection after admitting to an affair with a staff member who had later died by suicide. His retirement announcement came just hours after Democratic Rep. […]
- A man shot by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents during an enforcement stop in central California last week was arrested Monday by the FBI after being discharged from a hospital, his attorney said. Attorney Patrick Kolasinski said federal officials have not said what charges Carlos Ivan Mendoza Hernandez might face. Messages were sent to […]
- April 13 (Reuters) – A Texas man was charged with hurling a Molotov cocktail nL4N40T1GB at the home of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and attempting to set fire to the AI firm’s headquarters. Daniel Moreno-Gama, 20, was captured on surveillance video throwing an incendiary device outside Altman’s San Francisco residence, according to a Federal Bureau […]
- NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — A man linked to white supremacist movements pleaded guilty on Monday to setting a fire that destroyed an office at a historic social justice center in Tennessee, a court document shows. Regan Prater also pleaded guilty to attempting to aid a foreign terrorist organization for efforts to provide the militant group […]
- WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump had two bags of McDonald’s delivered to the Oval Office on Monday by a DoorDash driver he tipped $100, using his favorite food and a reality TV flourish to promote a tax policy he says has meant big rebates for Americans who earn gratuities. Sharon Simmons, dressed in a […]
- Lebanon and Israel to hold first direct diplomatic talks in decades in Washington
on April 14, 2026 at 10:18 amBEIRUT (AP) — Lebanon and Israel are set to hold the first direct diplomatic talks in decades on Tuesday in Washington following more than a month of war between Israel and the Hezbollah militant group that has rocked the tiny Mediterranean country. U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio will take part in the talks in Washington with Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Yechiel Leiter and Lebanese Ambassador to the U.S. Nada Hamadeh Moawad. At least 2,089 people have been killed in Israeli strikes in Lebanon, the Health Ministry said, among them 252 women, 166 children and 88 medical workers, while 6,762 others were wounded. More than 1 million people are displaced. The Lebanese government hopes the talks will pave the way to an end to the war. While Iran has set ending the wars in Lebanon and the region as a condition for talks with the United States, Lebanon insists on representing itself. Hezbollah and critics are skeptical and believe Lebanon’s government in Beirut has no leverage and should take advantage of the position of Iran, the group’s key ally and patron. The Israeli military continues an invasion into southern Lebanon, which some Israeli officials have said aims to create a depopulated “security zone” from the border to the Litani River, some 30 kilometers (20 miles). Iran-backed Hezbollah, though weakened in its last war with Israel that ended in November 2024, still fires drones, rockets and artillery daily into northern Israel and on ground troops inside Lebanon. The Israeli and Lebanese governments are meeting to discuss ways to ensure long-term security on Israel’s northern border and support for Lebanon seeking to take control of its territory and political future from Iran-backed Hezbollah, a U.S. State Department official said. They will be the first talks between the two since 1993, according to the official, who was not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity. Lebanon’s top political authorities, critical of Hezbollah’s decision to fire rockets towards Israel on March 2 in solidarity with Iran, quickly proposed direct talks in a bid to stop the escalation, hoping that Israel would not launch its ground invasion. Israel did not respond positively until last week, after it launched 100 strikes across the country, including in the heart of the Lebanese capital. Beirut wants a truce as a prerequisite to talks, similar to Pakistan-brokered negotiations between the U.S. and Iran. “Israel’s destruction of Lebanese territories is not the solution, nor will it yield any results,” said President Joseph Aoun Monday, who came to power vowing to disarm non-state groups including Hezbollah. “Diplomatic solutions have consistently proven to be the most effective means of resolving armed conflicts globally.” Israel has ruled out a ceasefire. “We will not discuss a ceasefire with Hezbollah , which continues to carry out indiscriminate attacks against Israel and our civilians,” Shosh Bedrosian, a spokeswoman for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, said Monday. Hezbollah and its supporters have been critical, calling it a free concession to Israel. Hezbollah Secretary-General Naim Kassem delivered a fiery speech calling on Lebanon to cancel the talks. Hezbollah wants a return to the 2024 agreement under which talks were conducted indirectly with the U.S., France and the United Nations peacekeeping mission in southern Lebanon as mediators. ___ Lee reported from Washington. Brought to you by www.srnnews.com
- Trump’s voting restrictions bill may fail, but parts live on in 23 states
on April 14, 2026 at 9:05 amBy Julia Harte April 14 (Reuters) – The SAVE America Act looks set to die in Congress, but 23 mostly Republican-led U.S. states have recently changed their voting procedures to mirror key aspects of President Donald Trump’s sweeping package of voting restrictions in time for November’s midterm elections, a Reuters analysis shows. States from Wyoming to Georgia since 2024 have imposed new proof-of-citizenship requirements on Americans registering to vote and limited the types of photo ID accepted at the polls. Officials in at least 17 of the states have opted to follow one of the SAVE America Act’s most controversial mandates: screening lists of registered voters for non-U.S.-citizens by running them through a federal system normally used to verify eligibility for public benefits. Most of these state changes are not as extreme as the SAVE America Act when it comes to how voters can prove their citizenship and the types of photo ID accepted when casting a ballot, according to the Reuters analysis. But voting rights advocates warn that these copycat measures could still disenfranchise citizens who lack certain forms of identification during this year’s elections, which will determine whether Trump’s fellow Republicans retain control over Congress. Senate Majority Leader John Thune, a Republican, did not mention the SAVE America Act in his opening address after Congress reconvened on Monday. At a signing ceremony in March for an executive order to tighten mail-in voting rules, Trump called U.S. voter fraud “massive.” Trump’s executive order has been challenged in court and is unlikely to take effect in the near future. Although most new state-level proof-of-citizenship and photo ID requirements are not as severe as those Trump has pushed, they “still have really serious impacts on voters,” said Danielle Lang, vice president for voting rights and the rule of law at the Campaign Legal Center. The bipartisan political reform group Issue One analyzed an election fraud database maintained by the right-wing Heritage Foundation think tank and found 65 total convictions of non-citizen voting between 2000 and 2025, out of about 1.4 billion votes cast in federal elections. The Heritage Foundation, which describes the database as a “non-comprehensive” sampling of election fraud cases on its website, did not respond to a request for comment. MORE LENIENT STATE MEASURES The SAVE America Act’s most well-known provision is its requirement that people registering to vote in a federal election provide proof of U.S. citizenship, such as a passport or birth certificate. Of seven states that have imposed new proof-of-citizenship requirements in time to take effect in November’s election, only one – New Hampshire – is as strict as the SAVE America Act. Chris Diaz, legislative tracking director at the non-partisan Voting Rights Lab, noted that many Americans are already required to provide documentary proof of citizenship when applying for a driver’s license or state ID, and that the 2005 Real ID Act requires states to retain digital copies of such records. “It just doesn’t make any sense for a state to not leverage the massive amount of information they already have about voters,” he said. Similarly, most states recognize that the SAVE America Act’s limits on the types of ID voters could show at the polls – only unexpired U.S. passports, driver’s licenses, state IDs, military IDs or tribal IDs – are needlessly restrictive, Diaz said. Of nine states that have recently tightened their photo ID rules in time for November’s election, some allow voters to show student IDs, expired IDs, or simply any ID with a voter’s name and photo. New Hampshire and Indiana are two exceptions where lawmakers have replicated the photo ID requirements in the SAVE America Act. SENDING VOTER ROLLS TO DHS The part of the SAVE America Act that officials in 17 states have copied more closely is its mandate that voter rolls be sent to the Department of Homeland Security to be run through a system typically used to verify the citizenship or immigration status of people applying for benefits. Historically, election officials had occasionally used that “Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements” system to check specific voters whose citizenship status was unclear. Last year, the Trump administration expanded the system to include additional types of personal information, such as data from the Social Security Administration, and invited states to upload their entire voter rolls to be screened for non-citizens. Six states have since passed laws requiring their voter rolls to be run through the DHS system on a periodic basis. In 12 others, top election officials have opted to do so. In Iowa, the process revealed 277 non-citizens among the state’s 2.1 million registered voters, of whom 40 had tried to vote in the 2024 election, according to the secretary of state’s office. In Utah, the DHS system flagged nearly 9,000 of the state’s 2 million voters as requiring further investigation – but manual verification found only one non-citizen, according to the state’s lieutenant governor. “The initial results of those searches mostly just prove that there’s nothing to see here, that there isn’t a problem to be fixed,” said Sean Morales-Doyle, director of the Voting Rights program at the Brennan Center for Justice. A ProPublica-Texas Tribune investigation in February found that state officials in Missouri and Texas incorrectly flagged dozens of voters as non-citizens after running their lists through the system, suspending their right to vote or initiating their removal from voter rolls altogether. (Reporting by Julia Harte. Editing by Paul Thomasch, Michael Learmonth anf Alistair Bell) Brought to you by www.srnnews.com
- Efforts underway for second round of US-Iran talks as Strait of Hormuz showdown endures
on April 14, 2026 at 8:18 amISLAMABAD (AP) — The standoff between the United States and Iran deepened Tuesday as the U.S. declared it had blockaded Iran’s ports, Tehran threatened to strike targets across the region, and Pakistan said it was racing to bring the sides together for more talks. Though last week’s ceasefire appeared to hold, the showdown over the Strait of Hormuz risked reigniting hostilities and deepening the region-wide war’s economic fallout. Talks aimed at permanently ending the conflict — which began Feb. 28 with U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran — failed to produce an agreement last weekend, though Pakistan has proposed hosting a second round in the coming days. Two Pakistani officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to discuss the matter with the media, said that the first talks were part of an ongoing diplomatic process rather than a one-off effort. Two U.S. officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomatic negotiations, said on Monday that discussions were still underway about a new round of talks. They said that the venue, timing and composition of the delegations hadn’t been decided, but that talks could happen Thursday. The war, now in its seventh week, has jolted markets and rattled the global economy as a great deal of shipping has been cut off and airstrikes have torn through military and civilian infrastructure across the region. The fighting has killed at least 3,000 people in Iran, more than 2,000 in Lebanon, 23 in Israel and more than a dozen in Gulf Arab states. Thirteen U.S. service members have also been killed. The blockade is intended to pressure Iran, which has exported millions of barrels of oil, mostly to Asia, since the war began. Much of it has likely been carried by so-called dark transits that evade sanctions and oversight, providing cash flow that’s been vital to keeping Iran running. Both the nature of enforcement and the extent to which ships will comply remained unclear during its first full day in effect on Tuesday. Tankers approaching the strait on Monday turned around shortly after it took effect, though one turned around and transited the waterway early Tuesday. The tanker Rich Starry had been waiting off the coast of the United Arab Emirates, according to shipping data firm Lloyd’s List, which cited data from the energy cargo-tracking firm Vortexa. It wasn’t immediately clear whether the Rich Starry had earlier docked in Iran. Yet it is listed by the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control as linked to Iranian shipping. Lloyd’s List, citing ship registry and tracking data, reported that it’s owned by a Chinese shipping company and ultimately bound for China. U.S. Central Command didn’t immediately respond to questions about the vessel after it cleared the 21-mile-wide (nearly 34-kilometer) waterway. A day earlier, it said that the blockade applied to vessels going to and from Iranian ports. Since the start of the war, Iran has curtailed maritime traffic, with most commercial vessels avoiding the waterway. Iran’s effective closure of the strait, through which a fifth of global oil transits in peacetime, has sent oil prices skyrocketing, pushing up the cost of gasoline, food and other basic goods far beyond the Middle East. U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday said that Iran’s control of the strait amounted to blackmail and extortion as the U.S. blockade took effect. He said in a social media post that Iran’s navy had been “completely obliterated,” but still had “fast attack ships.” He warned that “if any of these ships come anywhere close to our BLOCKADE, they will be immediately ELIMINATED.” Iran threatened to retaliate against Persian Gulf ports if attacked. “If you fight, we will fight,” Iran’s parliamentary speaker, Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, said in a statement addressed to Trump. Meanwhile, direct talks between Israel and Lebanon were set to begin in Washington on Tuesday, the first such negotiations in decades. Israel has pressed ahead with its air and ground campaign since last week’s ceasefire in Iran, insisting that it doesn’t apply to fighting in Lebanon. It has, however, halted strikes in the country’s capital since April 8, after a deadly bombardment that hit several crowded commercial and residential areas in central Beirut. It sparked an international outcry and threats by Iran that it would end the ceasefire. After more than a year of near-daily strikes in southern Lebanon, Israel escalated its offensive in the early days of the war following Hezbollah launching rockets into Israel. The fighting has carved a path of destruction from agricultural towns near the border to Beirut, killing more than 2,000 people and displacing in excess of 1 million others, according to Lebanese authorities. The talks are expected to be preliminary, focused on setting parameters rather than resolving core issues. Lebanese officials have pushed for a ceasefire, while Israel has framed the negotiations around Hezbollah’s disarmament and a potential peace deal, without publicly committing to halting hostilities or withdrawing its forces. Israel wants Lebanon’s government to assume responsibility for disarming Hezbollah, much like was envisaged in a November 2024 ceasefire. But the militant group has survived efforts to curb its strength for decades and said on Monday that it won’t abide by any agreements that may result from the talks. ___ Sam Metz reported from Ramallah, West Bank. Aamer Madhani and Matthew Lee in Washington, and Farnoush Amiri at the United Nations, contributed to this report. Brought to you by www.srnnews.com
- The Latest: Pakistan proposes new US-Iran talks as Vance and Trump hint at progress
on April 14, 2026 at 7:18 amPakistani officials said Tuesday that Islamabad has proposed a second round of talks to the U.S. and Iran, while U.S. Vice President JD Vance earlier said negotiations with Iran “did make some progress” and U.S. President Donald Trump said Monday “we’ve been called by the other side” and “they want to work a deal.” The Pakistani officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter with the press. A senior Hezbollah official on Monday said the Lebanese militant group will not abide by any agreements that may result from direct Lebanon-Israel talks set to start Tuesday in Washington. Lebanese officials hope to broker a ceasefire in the Israel-Hezbollah war that has killed at least 2,089 people in Lebanon. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said he doesn’t want a ceasefire and the goal is Hezbollah’s disarmament and a potential peace agreement between Lebanon and Israel. A U.S. blockade of Iranian ports that began Monday and Iran’s threatened retaliation set up an extraordinary showdown posing serious risks for the global economy and raising the specter of a ceasefire collapse and resumed fighting. Here is the latest: French President Emmanuel Macron and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer will co-chair a conference Friday in Paris, bringing together non-belligerent nations willing to participate in a mission in the Strait of Hormuz “when security conditions allow.” Other participants will take part via videoconference, Macron’s office said. European and other partners are ready to contribute to a “purely defensive mission aimed at restoring freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz,” the statement said. France and Britain have been working in recent weeks to set up an operation to escort oil tankers and container ships to help ensure safe passage through the strait. The tanker is listed by the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control as linked to Iranian shipping. It is flagged to Malawi, one of several landlocked countries often cited in so-called “false flag” operations, in which ships are registered under foreign flags with little or no connection to their owners, complicating oversight. According to MarineTraffic, a maritime analytics provider, the vessel was headed for Sohar, an Omani port outside the strait. Lloyd’s List, citing ship registry and tracking data, reported it is owned by a Chinese shipping company and ultimately bound for China. A tanker that aborted an attempt to exit the Strait of Hormuz on Monday turned around and transited the waterway early Tuesday, in one of the first tests of the U.S. blockade. The Rich Starry, a chemical and oil tanker, had been waiting off the coast of the United Arab Emirates, according to shipping data firm Lloyd’s List, which cited data from the energy cargo-tracking firm Vortexa. The U.S. military said on Monday that the blockade applied only to vessels traveling to or from Iranian ports, and it was not immediately clear whether the Rich Starry had earlier docked in Iran or was carrying Iranian oil. U.S. Central Command did not immediately respond to questions about the vessel. French Foreign Affairs Minister Jean-Noël Barrot reaffirmed Tuesday that Lebanon must be included in the initial ceasefire agreement. “The ceasefire must absolutely include Lebanon, which under no circumstances can be the scapegoat of the Israeli government,” Barrot said on French radio RFI. Israel’s strikes on Lebanon are “intolerable,” he said, because they undermine the ceasefire reached between the United States and Iran and because it strengthens militant group Hezbollah. “Destroying Lebanon, targeting the Lebanese state, does not weaken Hezbollah — quite the opposite, it strengthens it,” Barrot said. Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said he sees China as the main global interlocutor that can help end the war in Iran and other conflicts, such as Ukraine, and urged the Asian giant to do more on the diplomatic front. “I find it very difficult to find other interlocutors, beyond China, who can resolve this situation created in Iran and the Strait of Hormuz,” he said Tuesday after meeting Chinese President Xi Jinping. Sánchez is in China for his fourth trip in just over three years as Spain looks to strengthen its political and commercial ties with the world’s second-largest economy. Sánchez said Spain wants to avoid impunity for those who commit crimes and described what has happened in Gaza as “genocide.” “International law is being violated today, fundamentally by one country: the government of Israel,” he said. “There is also an absolutely illegal response from the Iranian regime regarding a war that we have described from the very beginning as a mistake and an illegality.” German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said in a phone call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that he supports direct peace talks between the Israeli and Lebanese governments, which are set to start Tuesday in Washington. Merz called for an end to hostilities in southern Lebanon and said militant group Hezbollah must lay down its arms, the German chancellery said in a statement Monday night. Merz reaffirmed his government’s strong support of a diplomatic understanding between the U.S. and Iran and its readiness to contribute to freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz if the necessary conditions are met, his office said. Merz also expressed deep concern about developments in the Palestinian territories and said there must be no de facto partial annexation of the West Bank. Chinese President Xi Jinping floated a four-point proposal for promoting Middle East peace during a meeting Tuesday with Sheikh Khaled bin Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the crown prince of Abu Dhabi, Chinese official news agency Xinhua reported. Xi’s proposal calls for upholding the principle of regional peaceful coexistence and respecting national sovereignty while underscoring the principles of coordinating development and security, Xinhua reported. “Safeguard the authority of the international rule of law. It can’t be ‘use it when it suits us, discard it when it doesn’t,’ and we cannot allow the world to revert to the law of the jungle,” Xi said. Asian stocks were trading higher tracking and oil fell on Tuesday as expectations rose over a possible second round of talks between the U.S. and Iran. Benchmark U.S. crude fell 1.7% early Tuesday to $97.37 a barrel. Brent crude, the international standard, was down 0.9% to $98.49 per barrel. Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 was up 2.3% to 57,804.81. South Korea’s Kospi jumped 2.7% to 5,968.06. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rose 0.5% to 25,783.41, while the Shanghai Composite index climbed 0.5% to 4,007.93. Oil prices continued to pull back on Tuesday from earlier gains. Pakistan has proposed hosting a second round of talks between the United States and Iran in Islamabad in the coming days, before the end of the ceasefire, two Pakistani officials said. The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter with the press, said the proposal would depend on whether the parties request a different location. One of the officials said that, despite ending without an agreement, the first talks were part of an ongoing diplomatic process rather than a one-off effort. — By Munir Ahmed Brought to you by www.srnnews.com
- A 5.7 earthquake jolts rural Nevada near Carson City, causing some damage
on April 14, 2026 at 6:18 amA magnitude 5.7 earthquake struck a rural part of Nevada east of the state’s capital of Carson City on Monday. The temblor hit just before 6:30 p.m., the U.S. Geological Survey said. It was centered 12.9 miles (20.7 kilometers) east of the town of Silver Springs at a depth of 3.1 miles (5 kilometers). Video shot in the town of Fallon showed shattered glass and food scattered on the floor in the aisles of a grocery store. Trina Enloe was sitting with one of her daughters as she did homework in their dining room when the quake hit. “You could hear the rumbling just coming before it even got to us,” Enloe said. The shaking continued for about a minute, she said. The jolt knocked over some cast iron candle holders but Enloe didn’t see any cracks or damage in her home in Fallon. The USGS said some residents in nearby communities reported strong to very strong shaking and light to moderate damage. ____ Corrects spelling of town’s name to Silver Springs. Brought to you by www.srnnews.com
Recent Comments