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FILE - Rep. Billy Long, R-Mo., asks questions during a House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Health hearing May 14, 2020, on Capitol Hill in Washington. (Greg Nash/Pool via AP File)

IRS nominee who sponsored legislation to abolish the agency faces pointed questions

May 20, 2025

A former congressman who sponsored legislation to abolish the IRS and is now the nominee to lead that agency has faced pointed questions from senators. Billy Long of Missouri was asked at his Senate confirmation hearing Tuesday about his past promotion of questionable tax credits, his lack of background in tax administration and the timing of political contributions he received after being nominated to lead the agency. Long told senators he wants to make “real, transformational change to an agency that needs it more than any other.” Long’s hearing comes as the IRS has hemorrhaged employees and churned through acting leaders.

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This undated photo provided by the Library of Congress shows the Thomas Indian school in Irving, N.Y. (Library of Congress via AP)

NY governor apologizes for ‘atrocities’ at state boarding school for Native Americans

May 20, 2025

New York’s governor has formally apologized for the “atrocities” she says were committed at an upstate boarding school where Native American youths were forcibly separated from their families and forced to assimilate into American society. Gov. Kathy Hochul also said on her Tuesday visit to Seneca Nation land that her budget will include funding to create new education materials about local indigenous communities and their contributions. Seneca President J. Conrad Seneca, who invited the Democrat, said the apology was overdue. The Thomas Indian School in western New York operated from 1875 to 1957 and was among hundreds of such boarding schools across the U.S.

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FILE - Lab staff prepare small petri dishes, each holding several 1-7 day old embryos, for cells to be extracted from each embryo to test for viability at the Aspire Houston Fertility Institute in vitro fertilization lab Feb. 27, 2024, in Houston. (AP Photo/Michael Wyke, File)

White House says Trump is reviewing IVF policy recommendations promised in executive order

May 20, 2025

A White House official says the Trump administration is reviewing a list of recommendations to expand access to in vitro fertilization. It comes after President Donald Trump signed an executive order in February that instructed his administration to give him a list of policy recommendations for protecting access to IVF and making the common fertility treatment more affordable. A White House official told The Associated Press on Tuesday that the recommendations had been delivered to Trump but did not offer additional details about when a plan would be released or give details about the report. It comes days after a bombing outside a Southern California fertility clinic.

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Tradition and change intertwine to create beauty at a century-old arboretum

May 20, 2025

Planting Fields Arboretum State Historic Park is a rare old estate with its original acreage intact. At 409 acres on Long Island, New York, it’s also the largest existing residential commission of the famous Olmsted brothers landscape designers. But the century-old estate isn’t frozen in time. A multimillion-dollar revitalization project includes a focus on biodiversity and native plantings. It’s a shift in emphasis that’s gaining traction in many historic gardens across the country. The focus on sustainability was also evident when the arboretum recently replaced its half-mile-long double allee (al-AY) of European beech trees with native oaks. A new book about the Planting Fields park shows the continued craftsmanship at the gardens and estate.

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FILE - A Levi's banner adorns the facade of the New York Stock Exchange, Thursday, March 21, 2019. (AP Photo/Richard Drew, File)

Levi Strauss agrees to sell Casual Friday staple Dockers for up to $391 million

May 20, 2025

Levi Strauss is set to finally part ways with Dockers — inking a deal to sell its brand once credited with propelling the popularity of “Casual Fridays” to Authentic Brands Group. In an announcement Tuesday, the denim giant said it had agreed to sell Dockers to Authentic for up to $391 million. The transaction will start at an initial value of $311 million, with the potential of adding another $80 million to the price tag based on business performance under the new ownership. The sale arrives as San Francisco-based Levi Strauss boosts its focus on the chain’s core Levi’s brand — as well as Beyond Yoga, which the company acquired in 2021, as more and more consumers continue to cozy up to athleisure wear.

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Tony Award nominee Marjan Neshat makes history in celebrated Broadway play ‘English’

May 20, 2025

Marjan Neshat, a veteran of stage and screen, teaches fledgling actors. This spring, her students got to celebrate her becoming a Tony Award nominee. Neshat earned the nod for her work — appropriately enough — playing a teacher in Sanaz Toossi’s Pulitzer Prize-winning and Tony Award-nominated play “English,” which premiered on Broadway in the fall. The play has made history by making Neshat and her co-star Tala Ashe the first female actors of Iranian descent to be Tony-nominated. Neshat adores the plays of Anton Chekhov and watching movies on the Criterion Channel and she’s obsessed with the novel “Anne of Green Gables.”

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FILE - Josef Newgarden crosses the finish line to win the Indianapolis 500 auto race at Indianapolis Motor Speedway in Indianapolis, Sunday, May 26, 2024. (AP Photo/AJ Mast, file)

Hot dog: Oscar Mayer’s Weinermobile fleet set to race during Indy 500’s Carb Day festivities

May 20, 2025

Oscar Mayer’s iconic Wienermobile fleet will be “hot dogging” it later this week at the inaugural “Wienie 500.” The six vehicles will be starting their engines Friday at 2 p.m. as part of the Indianapolis 500’s Carb Day festivities. It’s the first time in a decade all six Wienermobiles will be at the same location — and it’s the first time they’ll ever race. Each vehicle will represent regional hot dog favorites for six American regions. The race will be streamed on the FOX Sports app with highlights being shown during Sunday’s pre-race show.

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Ken Ham, founder of Answers in Genesis, poses for a portrait at the Ark Encounter in Williamstown, Ky., Friday, March 21, 2025. (AP Photo/Madeleine Hordinski)

With a massive ark and museum, he spreads creationism a century after Scopes trial. He’s not alone

May 20, 2025

The 1925 Scopes monkey trial famously put the spotlight on evolution and appeared to mark a defeat for biblical fundamentalism. But a century later, many Americans still embrace creationism, the belief that the biblical story of human origins is literally true. That’s most evident at a giant replica of the biblical Noah’s Ark in Kentucky, which draws 1.5 million visits per year along with a related Creation Museum. The message is that “the history in the Bible is true,” contends founder Ken Ham. This trend alarms science educators, who say the evidence for evolution is overwhelming and who see creationism as part of an anti-science movement affecting responses to climate change.

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The Ark Encounter is seen in Williamstown, Ky., Friday, March 21, 2025. (AP Photo/Madeleine Hordinski)

Takeaways from AP’s report on creationist beliefs 100 years after the Scopes trial

May 20, 2025

Some people thought the 1925 Scopes monkey trial marked a cultural defeat for biblical fundamentalism. But a century after what was dubbed the Trial of the Century, the issue is far from settled. Many American adults still embrace creationism — a belief in the literal truth of the Genesis account of the origins of the Earth and humanity. Polls generally show that somewhere between 1 in 6 and 1 in 3 Americans hold beliefs consistent with young-Earth creationism. That belief is most evident in a region of northern Kentucky that hosts a Creation Museum and a gargantuan replica of the biblical Noah’s Ark.

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President Donald Trump speaks during a Kennedy Center board dinner in the State Dining Room at the White House, Monday, May 19, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

Trump vows to turn the Kennedy Center around as he seeks to remake arts and culture in America

May 20, 2025

President Donald Trump hosted the Kennedy Center’s leadership, reinforcing how much time he’s devoting to remaking one of the nation’s premier cultural centers in a larger effort to ideologically and socially overhaul the nation’s arts scene. Monday night’s meeting in the White House’s State Dining room of the center’s board of trustees follows Trump firing its previous members and announcing that he’d serve as chair. Trump called it a “hot board” and said of the center, “We’re gonna turn it around.” He also said of running the board, “When I said, ‘I’ll do this,’ I hadn’t been there” and joked, “That’s the last time I’ll take a job without looking at it.”

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