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Florida was the most prized swing state for decades. That won’t be true in 2024

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:32:16 GMT

For decades, Florida was an essential element of every candidate’s strategy for winning the presidency.Its status as a swing state — with victory within reach for either party — and the enormous trove of electoral votes for the winner often made it the nation’s most hotly contested election battleground.Candidates, for whom time is their most valuable commodity, lavished attention on Florida. Celebrity surrogates poured in to court pockets of voters from the state’s diverse communities. And enormous sums of money were spent on TV ads and field organizers.In 2024, much of that time, energy and money will be traveling to other states — not Florida, whose voters aren’t likely to be sought after as they’ve been in most of the presidential elections since the ultra-close 2000 contest between George W. Bush and Al Gore.Florida just isn’t as competitive as it once was.“The path to the White House for Democrats now goes through Arizona, Georgia, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — and not Florida,...

Is there a potential Triple Crown winner in this year’s Kentucky Derby field?

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:32:16 GMT

John Clay | (TNS) Lexington Herald-LeaderLEXINGTON, Ky. — There have been four Triple Crown winners since Secretariat snapped a 25-year drought in 1973. Seattle Slew and Affirmed were back-to-back Triple Crown winners in 1977 and 1978, respectively. After a 37-year gap, American Pharoah won the Triple Crown in 2015, followed by Justify in 2018.During that nearly four decades without a Triple Crown winner, plenty of skeptics voiced the belief we would never see another Triple Crown winner.Claiborne Farm’s Seth Hancock, who led the $6 million breeding syndication of Secretariat in 1973, was not one of them.“Never got to that point,” Hancock said. “And since I lived it, the last part of the first gap between Citation and Secretariat, I always said, yeah, I know all about it.“And everybody said the races are too close and there’ll never be another one. I said not only will there be another one, there will be three or four in a 12- or 15-year span. Sure enough, we’ve had two of them and ...

2 killed in house party shooting identified

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:32:16 GMT

EL CAJON, Calif. — Officials have identified the two people who were killed after a shooting at a large house party last week in unincorporated El Cajon.The shooting happened around 2 a.m. at a residence located in the 800 block of Renfro Way, according to the San Diego County Sheriff's Department.The house where the shooting occurred was rented through Airbnb and neither of the victims lived there, Lt. Joseph Jarjura said in a news release.The victims were identified as 20-year-old Jaden Davis and 29-year-old Seandell Jones, according to the sheriff's department. Both men were residents of San Diego and their cause of death was from gunshot wounds. Hiker dies on El Capitan Trail in Lakeside Davis was found after officials were notified of an injured person inside the home. He was airlifted to a nearby hospital where he later died, Jarjura said.While continuing to search the home, Jones was located inside the home suffering from multiple gunshot wounds. Responders rendered medical...

Business booming for Toronto bars as Maple Leafs advance

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:32:16 GMT

Bar owners in Toronto say they’re anticipating jubilant crowds as the Toronto Maple Leafs begin their second-round NHL playoff series against Florida on Tuesday.Christopher Murie, the owner of The Dizzy Pub, says business has been booming since the playoffs began.“We had record-breaking and the best sales for two weeks in a row since we shut down in the beginning of COVID,” said Murie, who added he also “bleeds blue.”Murie says there was an explosion of excitement when the Leafs clinched their first playoff series victory in 19 years on Saturday, and he expects fans to be buzzing as the second round begins on home ice against the Florida Panthers.“Something has changed this year. There’s something in the air. Saturday was so crazy that I thought the roof was gonna blow off of this place,” he said.He said the last time he saw such large crowds in the city was in 2019 when the Toronto Raptors defeated the Golden State Warriors and won th...

Crowds begin to gather in London ahead of the coronation of King Charles

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:32:16 GMT

LONDON — Crowds from all over the world — including Canada — were beginning to gather in London on Monday ahead of the coronation of King Charles.A group of diehard royal fans have already staked out their spots along the path to the palace, where they said they’ll be camping on the sidewalk to ensure they get the best view for Saturday’s procession.Maria Scott, from northeastern England, said she doesn’t want to miss a single moment of the atmosphere — from the military bands to the chance of seeing the King and Queen Consort ride by in the famous gold coach.“You have to witness these things with your own eyes, the TV doesn’t do it justice,” said Scott, who has been camping at Royal events since 2011. Scott chatted with fellow camper Patrick O’Neill, from Belfast, who wore a plastic crown and draped himself in Union Jacks as the group used a tarp to protect their belongings from the occasional rain shower. Both are big fan...

Union calls strike a ‘success’ after inking new collective agreements with feds

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:32:16 GMT

OTTAWA — The national president for the Public Service Alliance of Canada is calling the union’s strike action a success after reaching tentative agreements with the federal government that secure wage increases meant to compensate workers for inflation. The country’s largest federal public-sector union said in the early hours of Monday morning that it reached deals with the government covering more than 120,000 public servants across the country and bringing them back to work after a 12-day strike. The majority of federal workers who had been on the picket lines since April 19 were expected to sign in for duty on Monday morning or at their next scheduled shift.But some 35,000 Canada Revenue Agency employees represented by PSAC’s Union of Taxation Employees were still on strike Monday — the day of the federal tax-filing deadline — as negotiations over a separate collective agreement continued.The CRA said in a statement that that the agency and the union have ̶...

S&P/TSX composite dips on Monday, U.S. stock markets also slip

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:32:16 GMT

TORONTO — Weakness in energy stocks drove Canada’s main stock index to dip on Monday, while U.S. stock markets also fell to start the trading week.The S&P/TSX composite index was down 21.44 points at 20,615.10.In New York, the Dow Jones industrial average was down 46.46 points at 34,051.70. The S&P 500 index was down 1.61 points at 4,167.87, while the Nasdaq composite was down 13.99 points at 12,212.60.The Canadian dollar traded for 73.82 cents US, compared with 73.65 cents US on Friday.The June crude contract was down US$1.12 at US$75.66 per barrel and the June natural gas contract was down nine cents at US$2.32 per mmBTU.The June gold contract was down US$6.90 at US$1,992.20 an ounce and the July copper contract was up four cents at US$3.93 a pound.This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 1, 2023.Companies in this story: (TSX:GSPTSE, TSX:CADUSD=X)The Canadian Press

Why First Republic failed. Are other banks to follow?

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:32:16 GMT

First Republic Bank has become the second large regional bank with assets over $200 billion to fail in just a few weeks. Like Silicon Valley Bank, which was seized by the government on March 10, First Republic catered to a wealthy clientele, which helped it grow deposits rapidly but may have also contributed to its undoing. The bank’s business model left it susceptible to a sudden rise in interest rates. Since the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank — and Signature Bank the same weekend — investors have wondered who’s next. First Republic quickly rose to the top of that list, but investors and analysts worried about banks such as Comerica and KeyCorp, which also had large numbers of accounts with deposits above the federally-insured level of $250,000. Here are some things to know about the collapse of First Republic Bank. WHY DID FIRST REPUBLIC FAIL? First Republic grew rapidly through deposits from wealthy individuals and companies. It used those deposits to make large loan...

Democratic Sen. Cardin of Maryland retiring after 3 terms

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:32:16 GMT

ANNAPOLIS, Md. (AP) — Democratic Sen. Ben Cardin of Maryland announced Monday that he plans to retire at the end of his third term, triggering what is likely to be a highly competitive primary to replace him in the blue-leaning state.The decision by Cardin, a longtime fixture of Maryland politics, will open up his seat for the first time since 2006, when he was elected to the Senate after spending 20 years in the U.S. House representing a large part of Baltimore and several nearby suburbs.“I am proud of all I have done for Maryland. I have given my heart and soul to our great state, and I thank Marylanders for trusting me as your representative for all these years,” Cardin said in a statement.Cardin, 79, is the third Democratic senator to decide not to run for reelection next year, following Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California and Sen. Debbie Stabenow of Michigan. On the Republican side, Sen. Mike Braun of Indiana is eschewing a second term and will run for governor instead.Po...

Few leads, false alarm as search for Texas gunman drags on

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:32:16 GMT

CLEVELAND, Texas (AP) — Authorities on Monday still had not captured a gunman in Texas who killed five neighbors, and as the search dragged into a third day with false alarms and few apparent leads, Republican Gov. Greg Abbott faced backlash over drawing attention to the victims’ immigration status. An FBI agent on the scene near Houston acknowledged they have little to go on in the widening manhunt for 38-year-old Francisco Oropeza, who has been deported four times since 2009, but who neighbors say lived on their street for years prior to Friday night’s shooting.Abbott offered a $50,000 reward over the weekend for any tips that might lead to Oropeza, and while doing so, the three-term governor described all the victims as “illegal immigrants” — a potentially false statement that his office walked back and apologized for Monday. Critics accused Abbott, who has made hardline immigration measures a signature issue in Texas, of putting politics into the shooting. “We’...