Authorities are investigating what they believe was a swatting incident at Rep. Tom Emmer's home west of the Twin Cities over the weekend. According to the Wright County Sheriff's Office‚ deputies responded shortly after 6 p.m. Saturday to Emmer's home in Delano. They were responding to a report of a "possible homicide/hostage situation" at the residence‚ the sheriff's office said. Deputies checked the residence and determined the report to be unfounded. Authorities were able to get in contact...

As the House GOP works to oust Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas‚ former DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff called on Republicans in the lower chamber to drop the "impeachment charade." In an opinion piece published Sunday in The Wall Street Journal‚ Chertoff contended that Republican lawmakers have failed to make their case against the Biden administration cabinet member. "As homeland security secretary under President George W. Bush — and as a former federal judge‚ U.S...

The deaths of three American soldiers—who were killed overseas on Sunday—has prompted a comparison of political records on troops' safety between the two frontrunners fighting it out for the White House. Three U.S. service members died and at least 34 were wounded this weekend in a drone strike at a base in Jordan near the Syrian border‚ which officials say was carried out by Iran-backed militants. Jordan is a close ally of the U.S. and has condemned the "terrorist" attack‚ while Biden said...

Days before the New York City Council was set to vote on a measure requiring more documentation on police stops‚ the NYPD pulled over a member of the body — and he said he was given no reason for the stop. Yusef Salaam‚ the newly elected councilmember representing Harlem’s Ninth District‚ said in a statement Saturday that he had been stopped by police the previous night while driving with his family. Salaam was wrongfully convicted and imprisoned and later exonerated as a member of the Central...

The CEOs of X‚ TikTok‚ Meta and other major social media sites will be on the hot seat on Capitol Hill this week when a Senate panel convenes a hearing on their “failure” to protect children from online sexual exploitation. The tech industry is under intense scrutiny as pictures and videos depicting child pornography proliferate online. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children’s CyberTipline received 31.9 million reports of suspected possession‚ manufacture...

“It’s a hell of a thing‚ killin’ a man‚” Clint Eastwood’s character said in the 1992 Western Unforgiven. “You take away everything he’s got and everything he’s ever gonna have.” The statement‚ made with cold indifference by a hardened killer‚ underscores the stakes in putting someone to death. Those stakes are not only born by individuals who take another’s life‚ either in murder or in self-defense. We as a community face its enormity whenever our government‚ state or national‚ executes a...

Alabama on Thursday became the first state to execute a death row inmate using nitrogen gas. Kenneth Smith was put to death by nitrogen hypoxia at the William C. Holman Correctional Facility in Atmore‚ Ala.‚ making his execution the first in the U.S. to be carried out using the previously untested method. Smith was executed for his role in the murder-for-hire plot of Elizabeth Sennett in 1988. Alabama Department of Corrections Commissioner John Hamm addressed reporters during a press...

The outrage over Alabama using the previously untested method of nitrogen gas to execute 58-year-old Kenneth Eugene Smith on Thursday night isn’t misplaced. The use of any human being as a “guinea pig” for a method of execution‚ in the words of Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor‚ makes the blood boil.  But there’s a chance that the focus on Smith‚ whom Alabama tried and failed to kill in 2022‚ will distract attention from the much larger outrage: that our country is still pulling human...