When the Supreme Court considered the challenge to an Alabama congressional map that shortchanged the state's Black voters, liberal justices expected the conservative majority to side with Alabama -- if not gut the 1965 Voting Rights Act altogether.

Max Verstappen completed a practice double for Sunday’s Mexican Grand Prix by edging out Lando Norris. After leading the way in the first running at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez in Mexico City, Verstappen – who has won 15 of the 18 rounds so far – set the fastest time in the day’s concluding running. The Red Bull driver finished 0.119 seconds clear of McLaren’s Norris, with Charles Leclerc a quarter of a second back in his Ferrari. Home favourite Sergio Perez finished fifth, three tenths behind Red Bull team-mate Verstappen, while Lewis Hamilton took seventh for Mercedes, a third of a second down. Verstappen has dominated this year, and wrapped up his third successive world championship in Qatar earlier this month. And the Dutchman will head into the remainder of the weekend in the breathless Mexico City air as the man to beat. The high-altitude venue, which sits 2,200 metres above sea level, can often throw up anomalies, and Valtteri Bottas was a surprised fourth for Alfa Romeo, with Daniel Ricciardo sixth in his AlphaTauri, just three tenths off the top. Hamilton finished a close second to Verstappen in the United States a week ago before he was disqualified for running an illegal floor on his Mercedes. But despite his post-race exclusion, Hamilton hoped his speed in Austin would enable him to challenge Verstappen here. However, the seven-time world champion failed to challenge the top of the leaderboard on Friday, finishing 11th and seventh respectively in the two sessions. George Russell, who sat out the opening running as Mercedes blooded academy driver Frederik Vesti, finished 10th, half-a-second behind Verstappen. Earlier on Friday, Ollie Bearman made history by becoming the youngest British driver to take part in a Formula One weekend. Bearman, 18, competing for American outfit Haas, ended his F1 debut in 15th, only 1.6 sec slower than Verstappen and three tenths adrift of Nico Hulkenberg – a veteran of 200 grands prix – in the other Haas. Bearman also finished one place ahead of double world champion Fernando Alonso. F1 teams must run a rookie driver at least twice during the season and Chelmsford-born Bearman was handed his chance to impress, breaking the British record previously held by Norris. Norris was three months shy of his 19th birthday when he took part in practice for McLaren in Belgium in 2018 before he was promoted to a race seat the following season. Bearman turned 18 in May. The teenager, a member of the Ferrari academy, has taken four victories in F1’s feeder series Formula Two and is sixth in the standings ahead of next month’s season finale in Abu Dhabi.

Many Republicans have criticized Hunter Biden's plea deal. Some of them have focused on how the prosecutor who negotiated the deal, an appointee of President Donald Trump, agreed not only to endorse a sentence of probation on two misdemeanor tax crimes to which Biden pleaded guilty but to also permit the president's son to avoid a conviction on a felony charge of being a drug user or addict in possession of a firearm.

Michael Gaiera and Christian Gaiera, also known as 'The Tren Twins', rose to prominence on various social media platforms as bodybuilders

Luis Diaz takes to social media to share the message "free him now" as authorities in Colombia continue to search for his missing father. He was abducted over the weekend by armed gunmen in the town of Barrancas.

Lifelong soccer fan and full-time police officer Hugo Jorge Bravo felt there was only one thing to do when he received information over what has since blown up into a major alleged match-fixing scandal in Brazil

The EU has launched an investigation into Elon Musk’s X – formerly known as Twitter — over its alleged spreading of disinformation, “in particular the spreading of terrorist and violent content and hate speech” over the recent Hamas attack on Israel. It will be the first inquiry conducted in relation to the European Union’s recently implemented tech regulations and will also scrutinise the procedures at X for managing complaints. Earlier, X announced that it removed numerous accounts associated with Hamas from its platform. In a statement on Thursday, the EU said that “the European Commission services sent to X a formal request for information under the Digital Services Act (DSA)”. “This request follows indications received by the Commission services of the alleged spreading of illegal content and disinformation, in particular the spreading of terrorist and violent content and hate speech. The request addresses compliance with other provisions of the DSA as well.” The EU’s industry chief Thierry Breton clashed online with Mr Musk after telling him in a letter that “violent and terrorist content” had not been taken down from X despite warnings. Mr Breton refrained from giving more specific details about the disinformation mentioned in the letter. However, he noted that instances of “fake and manipulated images and facts” were widely documented on the social media platform. Mr Musk hit back on X saying: “Our policy is that everything is open and transparent, an approach that I know the EU supports. Please list the violations you allude to on X, so that the public can see them.” TikTok and Meta have also received warnings from the European Union for their alleged failures in addressing disinformation on their social media platforms. The EU is requesting that X provide information related to its investigation by 18 October. Mr Breton had initially written that Mr Musk should respond within 24 hours. Mr Breton also reminded Mr Musk that the DSA “sets very precise obligations regarding content moderation,” and that X needs “to be very transparent and clear on what content is permitted under your terms and consistently and diligently enforce your own policies”. He added that he expects X “to be in contact with the relevant law enforcement authorities and Europol, and ensure that you respond promptly to their requests”. “I remind you that following the opening of a potential investigation and a finding of non-compliance, penalties can be imposed,” Mr Breton wrote. Linda Yaccarino, CEO of X, announced on Thursday that the platform had taken action to remove hundreds of Hamas-affiliated accounts and had also initiated steps to either remove or label tens of thousands of pieces of content since the attack that occurred on Saturday. Read More Israel-Hamas war live: UN alarmed by north Gaza evacuation order as IDF ‘fires white phosphorus on Strip’ Hamas’s hostages: What to know about Israelis abducted by the militant group France has banned pro-Palestinian protests and vowed to protect Jews from resurgent antisemitism EU asks Elon Musk to ‘walk the talk’ on X/Twitter disinformation over Hamas attack Viral WhatsApp warning of cyberattack targeting Jewish people is fake Microsoft revised deal to buy Call of Duty maker Activision cleared by watchdog

By Tilman Blasshofer WINTZENHEIM, France Eleven people died in a fire that tore through a holiday home for

LOS ANGELES & MUNICH--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 15, 2023--

Explosions hit critical road bridges linking occupied Crimea with parts of Kherson region under Russian control, Russian authorities say, as Ukraine escalates its targeting of Russian infrastructure and territory.

Meta’s Twitter rival Threads appears to be struggling to hold on to users as its daily active user count is down by about four-fifth since its launch – just days after it broke records as the fastest-growing app ever. Within a few days of its launch, Instagram’s threads reached 100 million users, making it the most rapidly growing app ever developed. In comparison, OpenAI’s ChatGPT, which was the previous fastest-growing app, took two months to reach 100 million users. Growing at such a rapid rate, Threads easily became the leading competitor of X (formerly Twitter) with about three times as many users as all other rivals combined within hours of launching. But new data assessed by market research firm Sensor Tower suggests Threads is facing challenges in retaining its user base. The firm’s analysis points out that the daily active user count of Threads is down by 82 per cent since the app’s launch as of 31 July, CNN reported. Fewer users are opening the app and doing so less frequently, apart from spending less time there, according to Sensor Tower. Citing the market research firm, CNN said users spent barely three minutes per day on Threads, compared to nearly 20 minutes during its initial launch. Analysis by another firm Similarweb also pointed out that Threads is struggling to retain its users. While the app’s usage peaked on 7 July – immediately after its launch – with over 49 million daily active users on Android alone, this number had fallen to 12.6 million by 23 July, according to a blog post by Similarweb. At its peak, Threads reportedly had over a third of X’s audience on that platform, but by 23 July, this had dropped to about 12 per cent of the users on the Elon Musk-owned platform. Sensor Tower noted that Threads’ daily active user count is still falling at about 1 per cent each day. “Threads took off like a rocket, with its close linkage to Instagram as the booster. However, the developers of Threads will need to fill in missing features and add some new and unique ones if they want to make checking the app a daily habit for users,” Similarweb noted in its blog post. Despite falling numbers, Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg is “quite optimistic” about the app, intending now to focus on “retention and improving the basics”, according to CNN. “And then after that, we’ll focus on growing the community to the scale we think is possible,” Mr Zuckerberg said. Read More Meta is secretly building an AI chatbot with the personality of Abraham Lincoln Are you a Facebook user? Here’s how to claim your share of $725m settlement in privacy lawsuit Elon Musk red-faced as police halt Twitter sign removal leaving company called ‘ER’ Mark Zuckerberg reveals his 4,000 calorie diet and large McDonald’s order Meta is secretly building an AI chatbot with the personality of Abraham Lincoln Here’s how to claim your share of $725m settlement in Facebook’s privacy lawsuit

'They cop out or they start cooperating with the government as soon as they get there,' said an inmate