Florida appeals court strikes down law letting minors get an abortion without parents' consent
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — A Florida appeals court ruled Wednesday that a state law that allows minors to get an abortion without their parents' consent is unconstitutional.
A three-judge panel of the Fifth District Court of Appeal found that the state's judicial waiver law violates parents' Fourteenth Amendment rights to due process, citing the state's parental rights laws, a recent ruling by the Florida Supreme Court and the landmark 2022 U.S. Supreme Court decision that stripped away federal abortion rights.
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Toronto Star
26 minutes ago
- Toronto Star
New searches are underway in Portugal near where toddler Madeleine McCann disappeared in 2007
LAGOS, Portugal (AP) — Police investigating the disappearance of British toddler Madeleine McCann searched near an abandoned rural building in southern Portugal on Tuesday as they launched fresh probes near the holiday resort where she was last seen 18 years ago. The case received worldwide interest for several years, with reports of sightings of McCann occurring as far away as Australia, while books and television documentaries were produced about her disappearance.
Winnipeg Free Press
35 minutes ago
- Winnipeg Free Press
Environmentalists criticize Trump administration push for new oil and gas drilling in Alaska
ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — Top Trump administration officials — fresh off touring one of the country's largest oil fields in the Alaska Arctic — headlined an energy conference led by the state's Republican governor on Tuesday that environmentalists criticized as promoting new oil and gas drilling and turning away from the climate crisis. Several dozen protesters were outside Gov. Mike Dunleavy's annual Alaska Sustainable Energy Conference in Anchorage, where U.S. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, Energy Secretary Chris Wright and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin were featured speakers. The federal officials were continuing a multiday trip aimed at highlighting President Donald Trump's push to expand oil and gas drilling, mining and logging in the state. The trip has included meetings with pro-drilling groups and officials, including some Alaska Native leaders on the petroleum-rich North Slope, and a visit to the Prudhoe Bay oil field near the Arctic Ocean that featured selfies near the 800-mile (1,287-kilometer) trans-Alaska oil pipeline. Calls for additional oil and gas drilling — including Trump's renewed focus on getting a massive liquefied natural gas project built — are 'false solutions' to energy needs and climate concerns, protester Sarah Furman said outside the Anchorage convention hall, as people carried signs with slogans such as 'Alaska is Not for Sale' and 'Protect our Public Lands.' 'We find it really disingenuous that they're hosting this conference and not talking about real solutions,' she said. Topics at the conference, which runs through Thursday, also include mining, carbon management, nuclear energy, renewables and hydrogen. Oil has been Alaska's economic lifeblood for decades, and Dunleavy has continued to embrace fossil fuels even as he has touted other energy opportunities in the state. Another protester, Rochelle Adams, who is Gwich'in, raised concerns about the ongoing push to allow oil and gas drilling on the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Gwich'in leaders have said they consider the coastal plain sacred, as caribou they rely on calve there. Leaders of the Iñupiaq community of Kaktovik, which is within the refuge, support drilling as economically vital and have joined Alaska political leaders in welcoming Trump's interest in reviving a leasing program there. 'When these people come from outside to take and take and take, we are going to be left with the aftereffects,' Adams said, adding later: 'It's our health that will be impacted. It's our wellness, our ways of life.' Zeldin, during a friendly question-and-answer period led by Dunleavy, said wildlife he saw while on the North Slope didn't appear 'to be victims of their surroundings' and seemed 'happy.' Burgum, addressing a move toward additional drilling in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, said wildlife and development can coexist. His agency during the Alaska trip announced plans to repeal Biden-era restrictions on future leasing and industrial development in portions of the petroleum preserve that are designated as special for their wildlife, subsistence or other values. Wright bristled at the idea of policy 'in the name of climate change' that he said would have no impact on climate change. Stopping oil production in Alaska doesn't change demand for oil, he said. 'You know, we hear terms like clean energy and renewable energy. These are inaccurate marketing terms,' he said. 'There is no energy source that does not take significant materials, land and impact on the environment to produce. Zero.' Officials court Asian countries to support gas project Wednesdays Columnist Jen Zoratti looks at what's next in arts, life and pop culture. Joining for part of the U.S. officials' trip were representatives from Asian countries, including Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, Taiwan and United Arab Emirates. Asian countries are being courted to sign onto the Alaska gas project, which has floundered for years to gain traction amid cost and other concerns. The project, as proposed, would include a nearly 810-mile (1,300-kilometer) pipeline that would funnel gas from the North Slope to port, with an eye largely on exports of liquefied natural gas. Wright told reporters a goal in inviting them to the Prudhoe Bay stop was for them to see the oil pipeline infrastructure and environment and meet with residents and business leaders. Glenfarne Alaska LNG LLC, which has taken a lead in advancing the project, on Tuesday announced expressions of interest from a number of 'potential partners.' Costs surrounding the project — which have been pegged around $44 billion for the pipeline and other infrastructure — are in the process of being refined before a decision is made on whether to move forward. ___ Bohrer reported from Juneau, Alaska.
Winnipeg Free Press
an hour ago
- Winnipeg Free Press
New searches are underway in Portugal near where toddler Madeleine McCann disappeared in 2007
LAGOS, Portugal (AP) — Police investigating the disappearance of British toddler Madeleine McCann searched near an abandoned rural building in southern Portugal on Tuesday as they launched fresh probes near the holiday resort where she was last seen 18 years ago. The case received worldwide interest for several years, with reports of sightings of McCann occurring as far away as Australia, while books and television documentaries were produced about her disappearance. German investigators and Portuguese police officers and firefighters were searching in the countryside several miles from the Praia da Luz resort, where the 3-year-old disappeared from her bed while on vacation with her family on May 3, 2007. The teams were seen using pickaxes, shovels and chainsaws to clear dense vegetation and dig near a derelict building. Firefighters pumped water out of a well. Almost two decades on, investigators in the U.K., Portugal and Germany are still piecing together what happened on the night the toddler disappeared. She was in the same room as her brother and sister — 2-year-old twins — while their parents, Kate and Gerry, had dinner with friends outside. Portuguese police said Monday that detectives were acting on a request from a German public prosecutor as they carry out 'a broad range' of searches this week in the area of Lagos, in southern Portugal. The main suspect is a German national identified by media as Christian Brueckner, who is currently serving a seven-year prison sentence in Germany for raping a 72-year-old woman in Portugal in 2005. He is under investigation on suspicion of murder in the McCann case but hasn't been charged. He spent many years in Portugal, including in Praia da Luz, around the time of the child's disappearance. Brueckner has denied any involvement. The last time police resumed searches in the case was in 2023, when detectives from the three countries took part in an operation searching near a dam and a reservoir about 50 kilometers (30 miles) from the resort. McCann's family marked the 18th anniversary of her disappearance last month, and expressed their determination to keep searching.
