Author: Reporter

A landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision on the Second Amendment is upending gun laws across the country, dividing judges and sowing confusion over what firearm restrictions can remain on the books. The high court’s ruling that set new standards for evaluating gun laws left open many questions, experts say, resulting in an increasing number of conflicting decisions as lower court judges struggle to figure out how to apply it. The Supreme Court’s so-called Bruen decision changed the test that lower courts had long used for evaluating challenges to firearm restrictions. Judges should no longer consider whether the law serves...

Supporters of abortion rights filed separate lawsuits Wednesday challenging two states’ abortion pill restrictions, the opening salvo in what is expected to be a protracted legal battle over access to the medications. The lawsuits argue that limits on the drugs in North Carolina and West Virginia run afoul of the federal authority of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, which has approved the abortion pill as a safe and effective method for ending pregnancy. The cases were brought by a North Carolina physician who prescribes the pill, mifepristone, and GenBioPro, which makes a generic version of the drug and...

Medication abortions in the United States usually involve two different drugs. In the latest effort to limit abortion access, opponents of the procedure are seeking to ban one of those medications. If they succeed, only one of the pills would be available, but women would still be able to get abortions. Here is a look at medications, efforts to curtail them and how clinics are responding. THE DRUGS The Food and Drug Administration regimen for medication abortions involves two drugs, mifepristone and misoprostol. The drugs can be taken at home and are used in just over half of U.S....

Nichole Mason first became concerned when she learned administrators at her children’s public school were allowing transgender students to use girls’ bathrooms. Her frustrations mounted when she felt her children’s next school went too far with how they enforced COVID regulations during the pandemic. Now, the mother of five is among a swelling number of parents around the United States funneling those frustrations into a renewed push to get state lawmakers to create taxpayer-funded programs to help parents pay for other educational options including private school, home-schooling or hybrid models. In Utah, a proposal would allow roughly 5,000 students...

The head of Japan’s wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant says details of the damage inside its reactors are only beginning to be known 12 years after it was hit by a massive earthquake and tsunami, making it difficult to foresee when or how its decommissioning will be completed. The most pressing immediate task is to safely start releasing large amounts of treated but still radioactive water from the plant into the sea, Akira Ono said in an interview with The Associated Press. The March 2011 earthquake and tsunami damaged cooling systems at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, causing three reactors to...

Twelve years after the triple reactor meltdowns at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, Japan is preparing to release a massive amount of treated radioactive wastewater into the sea. Japanese officials say the release is unavoidable and should start soon. Dealing with the wastewater is less of a challenge than the daunting task of decommissioning the plant. That process has barely progressed, and the removal of melted nuclear fuel has not even started. Here is an update on what is happening. HOW ARE WATER DISCHARGE PREPARATIONS PROCEEDING? Thirty giant tanks are used for sampling and analyzing the water for...