MEXICO CITY — Mexico’s president said Wednesday he hopes that the former Mexican security chief convicted this week in the U.S. of bribe-taking will cooperate with prosecutors there and perhaps implicate former Mexican presidents. President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said he hopes Genaro Garcia Luna will make a deal with prosecutors to reduce his sentence, in exchange for testifying about López Obrador’s predecessors. The former top Mexican security official was convicted Tuesday of taking massive bribes to protect the violent drug cartels he was tasked with combating. Garcia Luna s ..read more

WASHINGTON — The leaders of a Senate Judiciary subcommittee that oversees competition policy and antitrust issues have called on the Justice Department to keep looking into Ticketmaster over concerns that it holds damaging monopoly power after a congressional hearing last month. In a letter Wednesday, Sens. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., and Mike Lee, R-Utah, the subcommittee’s chair and ranking member, respectively, said, “For too long, Live Nation and Ticketmaster have wielded monopoly power anticompetitively, harming fans and artists alike.” The letter, addressed to Jonathan Kanter, the assistant ..read more

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Astronomers have discovered what appear to be massive galaxies dating back to within 600 million years of the Big Bang, suggesting the early universe may have had a stellar fast-track that produced these “monsters.” While the new James Webb Space Telescope has spotted even older galaxies, dating to within a mere 300 million years of the beginning of the universe, it’s the size and maturity of these six apparent mega-galaxies that stun scientists. They reported their findings Wednesday. Lead researcher Ivo Labbe of Australia’s Swinburne University of Technology and his te ..read more

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Officials with the Problem Gambling Network of Ohio are shedding light on how legalizing sports gambling in the state has impacted the number of people developing a gambling problem. Derek Longmeier, the executive director of PGNO, said that in January, calls to the gambling helpline were three times higher this year than in January 2022.  Longmeier added the nonstop marketing for sports gambling had prompted many to reach out for help “As we look at all the marketing that’s taking place, it can be really hard to navigate some of those things. And it just looks like ..read more

Pope Francis canceled one audience and skipped speeches he was set to deliver Thursday because of a bad cold, the Vatican said. Francis, 86, did meet with young Orthodox priests and monks and members of the Max Planck Society, the German research organization that is celebrating its 75th anniversary this year. But because of a “bad cold,” Francis merely had printed copies of his remarks handed out and didn’t read them aloud, the Vatican said in a note. He later canceled a planned audience with members of an Italian YMCA group, the Holy See said in its daily bulletin. On Wednesday, Francis coug ..read more

Many of the organizations have been supplying the community with bottled water, particularly for those with private wells. EAST PALESTINE, Ohio — As the residents of East Palestine continue to pick up the pieces following the recent Ohio train derailment, The Salvation Army is giving back to the community.  “We are here to support our friends and neighbors in need no matter when they need it,” Cpt. Gene Spence, Commanding Corps Officer at The Salvation Army in Salem, said. “No one should ever have to go through something like this alone. At The Salvation Army, we will be here with th ..read more

Nearly 1,000 rescuers with heavy equipment were working Thursday to clear the debris and searching for survivors. ALXA LEAGUE, Inner Mongolia — Rescuers with backhoes and bulldozers dug through tons of earth and rubble Thursday for 48 people missing after a landslide buried an open-pit mine in northern China. State broadcaster CCTV reported that the death toll in the disaster rose to five. Conditions in the area remain dangerous, and the search had to be suspended for several hours after a second landslide at the gigantic facility in Inner Mongolia’s Alxa League. On Thursday afternoon, more th ..read more

A Florida journalist who was fatally shot on the job Wednesday after the suspect of an earlier shooting returned to the scene of the crime has been identified as Dylan Lyons, a reporter with Spectrum News 13. “Following the shooting death of one of our colleagues and the wounding of another, Spectrum News 13 has now identified the reporter who lost his life as Dylan Lyons,” the outlet, based in Orlando, said Thursday morning. Lyons was 24, according to a GoFundMe page set up by his family. He had joined Spectrum News 13 as a multimedia journalist in July 2022, according to a bio on the news ou ..read more

The jackpot now grows to an estimated $119 million for the next Powerball drawing, which is set for Saturday, Feb. 25. CLEVELAND — Although nobody won the $100 million Powerball jackpot in the drawing from Wednesday, Feb. 22, 2023, the Ohio Lottery says there are still thousands of smaller-tier prizes that were hit throughout the state. Those prizes are listed below… $200 prize: 6 winners $100 prize: 16 winners $14 prize: 307 winners $8 prize: 3,832 winners $7 prize: 579 winners $4 prize: 6,777 winners Editor’s note: Video in the player at the top of this story was originally published in a ..read more

Federal transportation officials are expected to release a preliminary report Thursday examining the derailment of a train carrying dangerous chemicals that left a small Ohio town gripped by fear and anxiety. The report from the National Transportation Safety Board could offer clues about what caused the 150-car Norfolk Southern Railway train to crash in East Palestine, just west of the Pennsylvania state line, on Feb. 3. An official with the agency previously said one of the cars may have had a broken or malfunctioning axle. The train was carrying several chemicals, including vinyl chloride ..read more