National News

An explosive device was found on Monday in a mailbox near the New York home of billionaire financier George Soros, a favorite target of right-wing campaigners in the United States and eastern Europe, the New York Times reported, citing police. Authorities responded to the home in Katonah, New York after they received a call about a suspicious package at about 3:45 p.m., the Times reported. “An employee of the residence opened the package, revealing what appeared to be an explosive device,” police said in a statement to the Times.

The company confirmed a CNN report, which said Twitter permanently suspended 18 accounts, partly because of their attempts to help Infowars and Jones circumvent the ban placed on them by Twitter in September.

More than 500 children have been housed in tents near Tornillo, Texas since August, and 46 have been held there since June, according to a Friday court filing in Los Angeles federal court by civil rights organizations and advocacy groups representing migrant children. The filing opposes a government request to exempt the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR), which runs the tent city as a branch of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), from oversight by a court-ordered monitor.

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday blocked a judge's order forcing Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross to give a deposition in a lawsuit by 18 states challenging a planned question in the 2020 census that would ask respondents whether they are U.S. citizens. The justices issued a stay of the Sept. 21 order by U.S. District Judge Jesse Furman in Manhattan requiring Ross to face questioning by lawyers for the states while litigation over the politically charged dispute continues. It represented only a partial win for President Donald Trump's administration as the justices declined to halt Furman's orders compelling a top Justice Department official, John Gore, to sit for a deposition and for the administration to hand over more documents on the matter.

Asked about a campaign promise to protect the LGBT community, Trump said: "I'm protecting everybody. The move would remove recognition of and protections for transgender people under U.S. civil rights laws promoted by the prior administration of President Barack Obama in health care, schools and the military. The reported proposal comes little more than a week after New York City created a gender-neutral "X" option for birth certificates, joining California, Oregon, Washington state and New Jersey in offering a third gender category on the government-issued identity documents.

German-based researchers tested the fragments and found five "show characteristics inconsistent with ancient origin and therefore will no longer be displayed," the museum said in a statement. Academics have long questioned the authenticity of Dead Sea Scroll fragments sold by antiquities dealers. The museum established by the Green family of Oklahoma, who own U.S. craft-store chain Hobby Lobby, funded research over the past two years into whether its 16 Dead Sea Scroll fragments were genuine.

A security guard shot and wounded a man who kicked in the front doors of the offices of the Fox 5 channel in Washington on Monday afternoon, the television station and police said. "The man was reportedly confronted by a FOX 5 contracted security guard who shot the suspect in the upper torso," the channel, owned and operated by Fox Television Stations, reported. No one else was hurt, according to Fox 5 and the police.

Gregory Baron, 24, and Ben Nelson, 27, on Monday were eagerly purchasing $2 tickets for the Mega Millions jackpot in hopes of winning the record-setting $1.6 billion prize and becoming among the richest people in the world. "I would incorporate myself as a business and become my own company," Baron said inside the Port Authority Bus Terminal in Manhattan, adding that he would also pay off his student loans and parents' mortgage and donate to charities if he wins. The Mega Millions website briefly crashed on Monday ahead of the drawing due to a surge in visitors, said a spokeswoman for the Maryland Lottery and Gaming Control Agency, which administers the website.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The U.S. Mega Millions lottery website crashed on Monday ahead of a record $1.6 billion drawing on Tuesday night.

U.S. actress Amber Heard, a star of the upcoming "Aquaman" superhero movie and a U.N. human rights champion, said on Monday her childhood in Texas near the Mexican border helped spark her activism. Going home in his pickup truck, there was an "indelible impression left on my soul", a recognition of injustice and unfairness for children on the Mexican side. "Simply due to where I was born, a few miles north of this line, I was free to travel back and forth as I saw fit," she told an audience at the United Nations in Geneva on Monday.

By James Oliphant PHOENIX, Ariz. (Reuters) - For most of this year, Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona has run what has been viewed widely as one of the best races in the nation. But with less than a month to go to Election Day, there are doubts whether she can make it across the finish line. Her matchup with Republican Martha McSally appears to be tightening at the same time that some voters are casting their ballots with the start of early voting in the state. ...

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission said on Monday it temporarily suspended trading in shares of American Retail Group after the company claimed SEC approval as a custodian for cryptocurrency trading. The agency recently cautioned investors that the agency does not issue such endorsements or approvals. Nevada-based American Retail Group, also known as Simex, Inc., claimed in August it had partnered with an SEC-qualified custodian for cryptocurrency transactions that would be "under SEC Regulations," according to the agency.

In a letter to the clerk of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, a Justice Department lawyer said the action would be necessary to give the litigation a chance of being heard by the Supreme Court in its current term, which ends in June. The case at issue was brought by the University of California and others challenging the administration's decision to end Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA). The program was adopted by the Obama administration in 2012 and has allowed 700,000 young immigrants to remain and work in the United States, although they do not have legal status.