By GEOFF MULVIHILL Updated 4:18 PM CDT, October 23, 2025 Officials in Louisiana, Vermont and Virginia pledged Thursday to keep food aid flowing to recipients in their states, even if the federal program is stalled next month because of the…
By MICHAEL GOLDBERG/Mississippi Today The Mississippi Senate passed a bill Thursday that would eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion programs from the state’s universities, a priority elevated by Republican President Donald Trump. Senate Republicans passed the bill with a party line 34-14…
By JIM LITKE Virginia McCaskey, who inherited the Chicago Bears from her father, George Halas, but avoided the spotlight during four-plus decades as principal owner, has died. She was 102. McCaskey’s family announced through the team that she died Thursday. She…
By GWEN DILWORTH/Mississippi Today Officials say a new Mississippi law to decrease the number of people being jailed solely because they need mental health treatment has led to fewer people with serious mental illness detained in jails – but the data…
By MARK KENNEDY NEW YORK (AP) — Linda Lavin, a Tony Award-winning stage actor who became a working class icon as a paper-hat wearing waitress on the TV sitcom “Alice,” has died. She was 87. Lavin died in Los Angeles on…
By EMILY WAGSTER PETTUS KOSCIUSKO, Miss. (AP) — A new historical marker has been unveiled in the hometown of James Meredith, honoring the Black man who fought white supremacy by integrating the University of Mississippi in 1962. Meredith, 91, wore a red Ole…
By EMILY WAGSTER PETTUS A judge declared a mistrial Wednesday in the case of Sheldon “Timothy” Herrington Jr. in the 2022 killing of Jimmy “Jay” Lee, a gay man who was prominent in the LGBTQ+ community at the University of Mississippi. Jurors…
By MARK KENNEDY NEW YORK (AP) — Chuck Woolery, the affable, smooth-talking game show host of “Wheel of Fortune,” “Love Connection” and “Scrabble” who later became a right-wing podcaster, skewering liberals and accusing the government of lying about COVID-19, has died.…
By EMILY WAGSTER PETTUS JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — Medical marijuana businesses in Mississippi don’t have the right to advertise on billboards or other places because marijuana itself remains illegal under federal law, an appeals court says. The owner of a medical marijuana dispensary argued that…
By ROBERT YOON WASHINGTON (AP) — Voters in central Mississippi and the state’s Delta and Gulf Coast areas will return to the polls Tuesday to resolve two judicial races in which no candidate received the vote majority needed in the Nov. 5…
By EMILY WAGSTER PETTUS JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — The U.S. Supreme Court should overturn Mississippi’s Jim Crow-era practice of removing voting rights from people convicted of certain felonies, including nonviolent crimes such as forgery and timber theft, attorneys say in new court papers.…
By EMILY WAGSTER PETTUS JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — Mississippi Republican Gov. Tate Reeves said Wednesday that he will continue pushing lawmakers to phase out the state income tax, even with the possibility of federal spending cuts that could affect states after Donald…
By JEFF MARTIN ATLANTA (AP) — A shooting early Sunday during homecoming weekend at Tuskegee University in Alabama left one person dead and injured 16 others, a dozen of…
By EMILY WAGSTER PETTUS JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — Mississippi’s Republican legislative leaders said Thursday that they plan to push for Medicaid expansion to cover working people who earn too little to afford private insurance — a position that business groups have advocated but…
By EMILY WAGSTER PETTUS and KEVIN McGILL JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — A conservative federal court said Mississippi cannot count mail-in ballots that arrive shortly after Election Day, however Friday’s decision was not expected to affect the Nov. 5 election. Although the appellate judges firmly…
MENDENHALL, Miss. (AP) — Three people were killed and four were seriously injured Wednesday when a bridge in Mississippi that was closed nearly a month ago collapsed while a work crew was prepping it for demolition, authorities said. The bridge…
By EMILY WAGSTER PETTUS JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — A Mississippi judge dismissed a lawsuit Tuesday that challenged a potential conflict between a 2022 state law that bans most abortions and a 1998 state Supreme Court ruling that said abortion is guaranteed in the…
ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) — Orlando’s tourism machine began grinding to a halt Tuesday with at least three major theme parks and the main airport announcing closures ahead of Hurricane Milton ’s expected hit as a major storm in Florida. Walt Disney World, Universal…
By JONATHAN LANDRUM Jr. LOS ANGELES (AP) — Cissy Houston, the mother of the late Whitney Houston and a two-time Grammy winner who performed alongside superstar musicians like Elvis Presley, and Aretha Franklin, has died. She was 91. Houston died…
By TOM KRISHER and TASSANEE VEJPONGSA PHILADELPHIA (AP) — A strike by dockworkers at 36 ports from Maine to Texas, the first in decades, could snarl supply chains and lead to shortages and higher prices if it stretches on for more than a few weeks.…
By EMILY WAGSTER PETTUS JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — Retired NFL quarterback Brett Favre is trying to expand his defamation lawsuit against Mississippi Auditor Shad White to include a book White wrote about the misspending of welfare money that was supposed to help some of the…
LONDON (AP) — Maggie Smith, the masterful, scene-stealing actor who won an Oscar for “The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie” in 1969 and gained new fans in the 21st century as the dowager Countess of Grantham in “Downton Abbey” and…
By KATE PAYNE, STEPHEN SMITH and HEATHER HOLLINGSWORTH CRAWFORDVILLE, Fla. (AP) — Hurricane Helene roared ashore in a sparsely populated region of Florida as a powerful Category 4 storm, peeling the siding off buildings, trapping residents in rising floodwaters and knocking out power to…
By EMILY WAGSTER PETTUS JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — Retired NFL quarterback Brett Favre, who has repaid just over $1 million in speaking fees funded by a welfare program in Mississippi, is scheduled to appear before a Republican-led congressional committee that’s examining how…
