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Pitt County Environmental Health is reminding operators of public swimming poos and spas that they must submit all paperwork and fees by April 1 to be guaranteed an operational permit by Memorial Day weekend.

Local Events

North Carolina elected leaders have enacted several ineffective and misleading laws over the years, but when it comes to undermining public confidence in government and taking advantage of vulnerable people, the badly misnamed “education lottery” has to be near the bottom of any “worst of” list.

After the 2020 election, Fox News was guilty of professional malpractice and ethical corruption. Faced with a choice — between telling viewers the truth about Donald Trump’s loss, or feeding their fantasies with blatant lies — Fox favored profit over proof, income over integrity.

What’s one good clue that President Joe Biden really intends to run for reelection in 2024? He is trying to distance himself from the Democratic Party’s soft approach to crime. The president, who in 2020 distanced himself from Democrats who advocated defunding the police, stunned many in his…

My own basketball coaching career ended many years ago, when my 13-and-under Billy Mitchell Boys Club squad lost to the Guy Thunderbirds in a one-sided blowout. My guys had laughed their foolish heads off all the way from Little Rock to Guy, a little country town in Arkansas’ Faulkner County.

When the Affordable Care Act was passed it contained an option for states to extend Medicaid coverage to adults with an income up to 133 percent of the federal poverty level, beginning in January 2104. To date, 39 states have adopted the expansion, which provides for the federal government t…

State AP Stories

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Federal prosecutors have rested their seditious conspiracy case against former Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio and four lieutenants charged with plotting to stop the peaceful transfer of presidential power from Donald Trump to Joe Biden after the 2020 election. Jurors will hear testimony by defense witnesses before they begin deliberating. Before prosecutors rested Monday, the jury heard over 30 days of testimony by more than 20 prosecution witnesses. A defense attorney told jurors Monday the Proud Boys did not travel to Washington to “cause a riot.” The case against the far-right extremist group’s leaders is among the most serious generated by the Justice Department’s investigation of the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection.

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Increased punishments for rioting in North Carolina will become law as Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper says he won't veto a measure containing them. Cooper on Friday announced he would let the bill become law without his signature. The governor successfully vetoed a similar bill in 2021. But now Republicans have padded their House and Senate majorities and a half-dozen House Democrats voted for this year's measure. That raised prospects of a successful override. Republicans have advanced the bills following the 2020 demonstrations about racial injustice that at times turned violent. Cooper says changes had been made to this year's bill but he still had First Amendment concerns.

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A retired Air Force officer who stormed the U.S. Capitol dressed in combat gear and carried zip-tie handcuffs into the Senate gallery has been sentenced to two years in prison. U.S. District Judge John Bates also sentenced Larry Brock on Friday to two years of supervised release after prison and 100 hours of community service. Brock declined to speak in court before the judge imposed his sentence. Brock joined other rioters on the Senate floor only minutes after then-Vice President Mike Pence, senators and their staff evacuated the chamber to escape the mob attacking the building on Jan. 6, 2021.

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Texas and Florida are being led by tough-talking Republican governors weighing presidential runs as their state lawmakers debate especially strict legislation on border security. Republican proposals in the Texas Legislature build on Gov. Greg Abbott’s $4 billion border project Operation Lone Star that includes increased patrols near the border. His aides have confirmed he's considering a presidential run. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is considered the strongest possible GOP competitor so far to Donald Trump in his new presidential bid. DeSantis has proposed increasing penalties for human smuggling. Hospitals would be required to collect data on patients’ immigration status and people in the U.S. illegally would be denied state ID cards

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Eleven of the biggest banks in the country have announced a $30 billion rescue package for First Republic Bank. It's an effort to stop the California-based bank from becoming the third to fail in less than a week. Shares of First Republic had fallen sharply this week, dropping 60% on Monday alone. For the package, JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Citigroup and Wells Fargo would each put $5 billion in uninsured deposits into First Republic. Meanwhile Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs would deposit $2.5 billion each. The remaining $5 billion would come from five other banks.

Legal advice from state attorneys general sought by other government officials often has been treated as a public record — but not in every state. Wyoming's attorney general has declined to publicly release the advice she provided to local officials about how to handle citizen requests for election recounts. The attorney general says that's closed as a matter of attorney-client privilege. An Associated Press review found that about one-fifth of states haven't publicly posted attorney general's opinions in recent years. Some attorney general offices say they haven't provided any recent formal opinions.

National & World AP Stories

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At least three Kenyan legislators and several protesters have been arrested in ongoing protests in Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, organized by the opposition demanding the resignation of President William Ruto. Hundreds of demonstrators spread across the city have not succeeded in reaching the designated meeting point in the central business district as police have dispersed them with teargas all morning. The opposition called for protests against Ruto who they say was not validly elected in the August 2022 elections. They are also blaming his administration for the rising cost of living.

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Officials say two students have been injured in a shooting outside a Dallas-area high school and police arrested the person suspected of opening fire. Police and school district officials says the shooting began Monday on a high school campus in the suburb of Arlington around 6:55 a.m., before many students arrived for the first day back to classes after the spring break. One student was injured by gunfire and another hurt by debris. Officials said both are getting medical care. Police say the suspected shooter never entered the Lamar High School building and was arrested soon after officers arrived.

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Amazon CEO Andy Jassy is telling employees in a memo that the company plans to eliminate 9,000 more jobs in the next few weeks. The job cuts would mark the second largest round of layoffs in the company’s history. Amazon had already cut 18,000 in the past few months. In the memo on Monday, Jassy said the second phase of the company’s annual planning process completed this month and led to the additional job cuts. This time around, the job cuts will hit profitable areas for the company including its cloud computing unit AWS and its burgeoning advertising business. Twitch, the gaming platform Amazon owns, will also see some layoffs.

For the third year in a row, Miami Beach finds itself struggling with spring break violence, including two fatal shootings and unruly crowds, despite a massive police presence and activities designed to give people alternatives to drinking and roaming the streets. The party-all-the-time vibe in the South Beach section of the barrier island city has already led officials to ban alcohol sales at larger clubs after 2 a.m. Police are stationed everywhere, including in mobile towers that give officers a birds-eye view of the streets. Art, music, yoga and volleyball tournaments were added this year, but the violence continues at night. The city imposed an overnight curfew that ended Monday morning and is considering another one next weekend.

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Wall Street is rising after regulators pushed together two huge banks over the weekend and made other moves to build confidence in the struggling industry. The S&P 500 was 0.8% higher Monday. Financial stocks were helping to lead the market's widespread gains. Much attention has been on banks because they may be cracking under the fastest series of interest rate hikes in decades. Swiss banking giant UBS is buying rival Credit Suisse in a deal quickly put together by regulators. Treasury yields also climbed ahead of a looming decision on interest rates by the Federal Reserve on Wednesday.