National News - The Morning Sun

FILE - In this March 4, 2018, file photo, MacKenzie Scott arrives at the Vanity Fair Oscar Party in Beverly Hills, Calif. Scott says her donations have yielded more than $14 billion in funding for about 1,600 nonprofits since 2019, according to her long-awaited website Yield Giving, unveiled Wednesday, Dec. 14, 2022. (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP, File)

New MacKenzie Scott website details $14 billion in gifts

Philanthropist MacKenzie Scott says her donations have yielded more than $14 billion in funding for about 1,600 nonprofits since 2019, according to her long-awaited website Yield Giving, unveiled … more

Associated Press | 12/15/22

FILE - Elon Musk arrives at the justice center in Wilmington, Del., Tuesday, July 13, 2021. According to a filing posted late Wednesday, Dec. 14, 2022, by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Musk sold another $3.58 billion worth of Tesla stock during the week, but it wasn’t clear where the proceeds were being spent. Musk has sold nearly $23 billion worth of Tesla stock since April, with much of the money likely going to help fund his $44 billion acquisition of Twitter. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke, File)

Tesla stock slips as Musk sells another $3.58B of its shares

Shares of Tesla are sliding before the market open on Thursday after news broke that CEO Elon Musk sold another $3.58 billion worth of the electric vehicle maker’s stock this week. The stock … more

12/15/22

Elon Musk sells $3.58B worth of Tesla stock, purpose unknown

Elon Musk sold another $3.58 billion worth of Tesla stock this week, but it wasn’t clear where the proceeds were being spent. The Tesla CEO and new owner of Twitter sold the shares from Monday … more

12/14/22

FILE - In this handout photo released by Roscosmos Space Agency Press Service, a view of the International Space Station taken on March 30, 2022 by crew of Russian Soyuz MS-19 space ship after undocking from the Station. NASA and Russia's space agency canceled a spacewalk by two Russian cosmonauts, Sergey Prokopyev and Dmitri Petelin, just as they were preparing to exit the International Space Station late Wednesday, Dec. 14 because of an apparent coolant leak from an attached space capsule. (Roscosmos Space Agency Press Service via AP, File)

Cosmonauts' spacewalk canceled at space station due to leak

NASA and Russia’s space agency canceled a spacewalk by two Russian cosmonauts just as they were preparing to exit the International Space Station. The cause: an apparent coolant leak from an … more

12/14/22

This image provided by the Federal Public Defender Office shows death row inmate Amber McLaughlin. McLaughlin, the first openly transgender woman set to be executed in the U.S., asked Missouri's Republican Gov. Mike Parson to spare her, on Monday, Dec. 12, 2022.(Jeremy S. Weis/Federal Public Defender Office via AP)

Transgender inmate on Missouri's death row asks for mercy

The first openly transgender woman set to be executed in the U.S. is asking Missouri’s governor for mercy. Lawyers for 49-year-old Amber McLaughlin on Monday asked Republican Gov. Mike Parson to … more

By SUMMER BALLENTINE and JOHN D. HANNA | 12/14/22

This image released by Searchlight Pictures shows Roger Deakins on the set of "Empire Of Light." (Parisa Taghizadeh/Searchlight Pictures via AP)

Q&A: Roger Deakins on cinema's past and future

For decades, Roger Deakins’ eye has been one of the keenest in movies. It’s not easy to pinpoint what makes a film’s cinematography identifiably Deakins’ work, but, at the same time, it’s … more

By JAKE COYLE | 12/14/22

A long row of double-stacked shipping contrainers provide a new wall between the United States and Mexico in the remote section area of San Rafael Valley, Ariz., Thursday, Dec. 8, 2022. Work crews are steadily erecting hundreds of double-stacked shipping containers along the rugged east end of Arizona’s boundary with Mexico as Republican Gov. Doug Ducey makes a bold show of border enforcement even as he prepares to step aside next month for Democratic Governor-elect Katie Hobbs. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)

US sues Arizona over shipping containers on Mexico border

The U.S. government has sued Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey and the state over the placement of shipping containers as a barrier on the border with Mexico, saying it is trespassing on federal lands. The … more

By ANITA SNOW | 12/14/22

This U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms photo provided by the U.S. Attorney's Office in Seattle, shows damage from an arson that destroyed the Jehovah's Witness kingdom hall in Olympia, Wash., on July 3, 2018. Mikey Diamond Starrett, 50, of Olympia, was indicted by a federal grand jury Tuesday, Dec. 13, 2022, on charges that he set that fire as well as two others at Jehovah's Witness halls in the area. Starrett has previously insisted that he is innocent. (ATF/U.S. Attorney's Office via AP)

Washington man indicted in fires at Jehovah's Witness halls

A Washington state man who is already in federal custody on weapons charges has now been indicted in a series of arsons at Jehovah’s Witness kingdom halls. Seattle U.S. Attorney Nick Brown said in … more

By GENE JOHNSON | 12/14/22

FILE - A visitor sits on a bench to look artist Suzanne Brennan Firstenberg's "In America: Remember," a temporary art installation made up of white flags to commemorate Americans who have died of COVID-19, on the National Mall in Washington on Oct. 2, 2021. The number of U.S. deaths has dropped in 2022 after soaring for two years during the COVID-19 pandemic, but it still is much higher than the levels before the coronavirus hit. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana, File)

US deaths fell this year, but not to pre-COVID levels

The number of U.S. deaths has dropped this year, but there are still more than there were before the coronavirus hit. Preliminary data — through the first 11 months of this year — indicates 2022 … more

By MIKE STOBBE | 12/14/22

Aaron Dean arrives at the 396th District Court for closing arguments on Wednesday, Dec. 14, 2022, in Fort Worth, Texas. Dean is accused of murder in the 2019 fatal shooting of Atatiana Jefferson. (Amanda McCoy/Star-Telegram via AP, Pool)

Jury starts deliberation in Texas officer’s murder trial

A jury began deliberations Wednesday in the murder case against a former Texas police officer charged with fatally shooting a Black woman through a rear window of her home in 2019. The Tarrant County … more

12/14/22

Law enforcement officials investigate the Motel 6 where two Bay St. Louis, Miss., police officers were killed in a shooting on Wednesday, Dec. 14, 2022. Officers encountered a female subject, who shot both officers before killing herself, the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation said. (Justin Mitchell/The Sun Herald, via AP)

Police: 2 officers slain in Mississippi; shooter also dead

Authorities say two police officers in coastal Mississippi were shot and killed by a woman early Wednesday as they checked on a call at a motel. The Mississippi Department of Public Safety said the … more

12/14/22

In this photo provided by the Florida Keys News Bureau, Monroe County Sheriff's Office Colonel Lou Caputo, right, costumed as the Grinch, leans on the shoulder of Deputy Andrew Leird, left, as he uses a laser speed detector to check speeds of motorists traveling through a school zone on the Florida Keys Overseas Highway Tuesday, Dec. 13, 2022, in Marathon, Fla. For drivers slightly speeding through the area, Caputo offers them the choice between an onion or a traffic citation. (Andy Newman/Florida Keys News Bureau via AP)

Deputy dressed as Grinch gives onions to speeding drivers

Several motorists who were speeding through an elementary school zone on the Florida Keys Overseas Highway received an odorous onion as a reminder to slow down from a county sheriff’s deputy … more

12/14/22

FILE - This May 25, 2022, photo released by the Mississippi Department of Corrections shows Thomas Edwin Loden Jr., who is set to receive a lethal injection at the Mississippi State Penitentiary in Parchman, Miss., on Wednesday, Dec. 14, 2022. He's been on death row since 2001, when he pleaded guilty to capital murder, rape and four counts of sexual battery against 16-year old Leesa Marie Gray.. (Mississippi Department of Corrections via AP, File)

Mississippi set to execute man for killing 16-year-old girl

A Mississippi man who pleaded guilty to raping and killing a 16-year-old girl is scheduled to be put to death. He would become the second inmate executed in Mississippi in 10 years. Thomas Edwin … more

By MICHAEL GOLDBERG | 12/14/22

FILE—Dr. Amos C. Brown, Jr., vice chair for the California Reparations Task Force, right, holds a copy of the book Songs of Slavery and Emancipation, as he and other members of the task force pose for photos at the Capitol in Sacramento, Calif., on June 16, 2022. California's committee to study reparations for African Americans will meet in Oakland Wednesday, Dec. 14, 2022, to discuss requirements for residents who may receive some form of compensation. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File)

California reparations task force to talk eligibility

California's first-in-the-nation task force studying reparations for Black residents will discuss potential eligibility requirements and what form reparations could take at a two-day meeting that … more

By SOPHIE AUSTIN | 12/14/22

FILE - This November 2014, file photo provided by the U.S. National Park Service shows a mountain lion known as P-22, photographed in the Griffith Park area near downtown Los Angeles. A mountain lion that killed a Chihuahua while the little dog was being walked on leash in the Hollywood Hills earlier this month is the famed cougar P-22, the National Park Service confirmed Monday, Nov. 21, 2022. (U.S. National Park Service, via AP, File)

Exam finds famed LA mountain lion may have been hit by car

Wildlife experts say the famous Hollywood-roaming mountain lion known as P-22 is drastically underweight and probably was struck and hurt by a car. The experts gave the big cat a health exam amid … more

12/13/22

Sigourney Weaver, James Cameron float on in 'Way of Water'

James Cameron and Sigourney Weaver's long-running friendship and collaboration reaches an unlikely pinnacle in “Avatar: The Way of the Water.” Though Weaver co-starred in Cameron’s original … more

By JAKE COYLE | 12/13/22

This cover image released by Columbia Records Group shows "Renaissance" by Beyonce. (Columbia Records Group via AP)

AP's top albums 2022: 'Renaissance,' 'Motomami,' Bad Bunny

Beyonce's “Renaissance," Bad Bunny's “Un Verano Sin Ti," and Rosalía's “Motomami” were some of the biggest album drops of the year and are among the year's best albums, as determined by a … more

By The Associated Press | 12/13/22

FILE - Jackie Sandler, left, and her husband Adam Sandler appear at the Governors Awards on Nov. 19, 2022 in Los Angeles. (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP, File)

Comedian and actor Adam Sandler to get 2023 Mark Twain Prize

The Mark Twain Prize for American Humor has gone to such luminaries as Richard Pryor, Carl Reiner, Whoopi Goldberg, Billy Crystal, George Carlin and Ellen DeGeneres. Next year, it’s going to Adam … more

By The Associated Press | 12/13/22

FILE - People watch lava from the Mauna Loa volcano Thursday, Dec. 1, 2022, near Hilo, Hawaii. U.S. scientists declared Tuesday, Dec. 13, 2022, that two active Hawaii volcanoes — one where lava destroyed hundreds of homes in 2018 and another where lava recently stalled before reaching a crucial Big Island highway — have stopped erupting. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull, File)

Scientists declare 2 Hawaii volcanoes have stopped erupting

Scientists have declared on the same day that two active Hawaii volcanoes have stopped erupting. The U.S. Geological Survey’s Hawaiian Volcano Observatory said in a statement Tuesday that Kilauea … more

By JENNIFER SINCO KELLEHER | 12/13/22

Mars rover captures 1st sound of dust devil on red planet

A NASA rover on Mars by chance had its microphone on when a whirling tower of red dust passed overhead last year and caught the sound. Scientists released the first-of-its-kind audio Tuesday. The … more

By MARCIA DUNN | 12/13/22