The Supreme Court on Tuesday allowed Alabama to use a congressional map that eliminates one of two majority-Black districts in the state in a win for Republicans.

The justices, split 6-3 on ideological lines with conservatives in the majority, granted an emergency request filed by Republican officials seeking to use the map, which was enacted in 2023 but has never been used.

In the unsigned three-page order, the court said that the state is likely to ultimately prevail on its claim that the map was lawfully drawn.

In dissent, liberal Justice Sonia Sotomayor said the majority’s decision “disregards both democratic values and the rule of law.”

The Department of Justice has permanently abandoned plans for a $1.8 billion anti-weaponization compensation fund created to settle a lawsuit by Donald Trump against the Internal Revenue Service, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche testified to a House panel on Tuesday.

But Trump, his family members and related business entities remain protected from tax audits and enforcement actions in connection with tax returns filed before last month's out-of-court settlement of his lawsuit, Blanche told the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies.

Blanche, who previously served as Trump's criminal defense attorney, personally signed off on the DOJ's May 19 addendum to the settlement of the lawsuit that gave Trump and his family that protection, a day after the deal was announced.

Ocean Observatories Initiative, $368m network that has provided crucial climate data, latest victim of Trump cuts

The Trump administration plans to dismantle a $368m deep-sea observation system that has for more than a decade provided crucial data on ocean systems and climate change.

In a notice, the National Science Foundation (NSF) announced that it had “initiated descoping of the Ocean Observatories Initiative” (OOI), a vast ocean observation network comprising more than 900 instruments that collect data on ocean health, including current patterns, climate variability and marine biodiversity.

The notice, issued on 21 May, came just days after Trump fired all members of the independent board that oversees the NSF. It outlined plans to remove all in-water infrastructure from observation sites off the coasts of North Carolina, Oregon, Washington and Alaska, as well as from the Irminger Sea, a marginal sea between Greenland and Iceland.

New PM Péter Magyar calls policy a sign of ‘social justice’ after years of political loyalty being rewarded with economic opportunity

UN agency predicts phenomenon that supercharges weather extremes has 80% chance of forming before September

The world must prepare for the imminent return of El Niño and the supercharged weather extremes it brings, the UN has warned.

The powerful natural weather pattern, which raises global temperatures and worsens some rainfall, has an 80% chance of forming before September and a 90% chance before November, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said on Tuesday.

It found most models projected the return of the cyclical phenomenon in the ocean and atmosphere to be “at least moderate” in strength, and possibly strong.

Scientists have previously warned that it could be the strongest this century. However, the WMO stopped short of backing such projections and said forecasters were still in a window of uncertainty.

Revealed: AIEF, a charitable affiliate of pro-Israel lobby AIPAC, has spent millions on travel for lawmakers from both parties, even as voters’ support for Israel plummets

Revocation of access newest attempt by Trump’s defense department to restrict reporting on military affairs

Journalists may no longer enter the Pentagon’s press office, which has been designated as a classified space amid growing moves to restrict press access to the defense department.

“This is the most transparent war department in history. No amount of spin from the Fake News media will change that,” Jose Valdez, the acting defense department press secretary, said in a social media post. “The Pentagon Press Office has been redesignated as a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility due to speechwriters from the Office of the Secretary of War sharing the facility.”

Valdez added that, because speechwriters handle classified material, “journalists will no longer be permitted to enter the office space”.

At their state convention, Minnesota Republicans held a moment of silence for former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin.

Like many other GOP state chapters, the Minnesota Republican Party has been unabashed about flaunting its extremism in recent years.

One of the clearest examples of this has been in the party’s promotion of far-right figures like Royce White, who rode the Minnesota GOP’s endorsement in his 2024 Senate race to a shellacking in the general election.

But even so, a moment of silence the party held for Derek Chauvin over the weekend — that is, the former Minneapolis police officer convicted of murdering George Floyd — underscores a uniquely sadistic strain of racial bigotry within the state Republican Party.

Experts worry that some young people are turning to AI bots during mental health crises, which the tech isn’t made to handle. An author of the survey said regulations are needed.

Nearly 1 in 5 adolescents and young adults are turning to AI chatbots for advice when they’re sad, angry, nervous or stressed, according to a new study.

The findings, from the research institute RAND, represent an increase from early 2025, when the nonprofit conducted a similar survey. At the time, around 13% of respondents said they used chatbots for such advice, but the share rose to 19% in the group’s latest survey in November, the results of which were published Monday in the journal JAMA Pediatrics.

“It’s a sad number, because you’d hope that young people would have the sorts of supportive relationships that they would feel comfortable and empowered reaching out to those around them,” said Ryan McBain, a senior policy researcher at RAND and the lead author of the study.

The State Department plans to drastically slash the number of U.S. embassies and consulates in Africa that can process visas for foreigners seeking to come to the United States.

The almost 50 U.S. embassies and consulates that are processing visa applications will be reduced to 20 in the coming weeks, according to three U.S. officials and an internal memo obtained by The Associated Press. There is not yet a set date for the change, but it is expected in June, according to the officials, who were not authorized to comment to the media and spoke on condition of anonymity.

The Trump administration plans to drop the Department of Justice’s $1.8 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund” in the face of legal and political pushback to it, reports said Monday.

The fund was created as part of a settlement of Donald Trump’s $10 billion lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service. It is intended to compensate people who were purportedly victims of prosecutorial overreach by the DOJ under the Biden administration.

Iranian negotiators will stop exchanging messages with the U.S. through intermediaries, and Tehran will move to fully close the Strait of Hormuz, in retaliation for ongoing ceasefire violations, Iran’s state-affiliated news outlet Tasnim said Monday.

The report, in a translated post on the social media site Telegram, homes in on Israel’s military operations in Lebanon against the Iran-backed militia Hezbollah.