Coachella 2025 lineup: Lady Gaga, Green Day, Post Malone and Travis Scott to headline in April

Other acts include Charli xcx, Megan Thee Stallion, Missy Elliott, Shaboozey and Blackpink members Jennie and Lisa

Lady Gaga, Green Day, Post Malone and Travis Scott will headline Coachella 2025.

Scott, whose prominent billing comes with the description “designs the desert”, will reportedly design an immersive experience called CatcusCon, Rolling Stone reported, and will perform after Green Day’s set on the Saturday nights.

Continue reading...

‘Bomb cyclone’ brings high winds and soaking rain to north-west US

Strongest atmospheric river seen by California, Washington and Oregon this season knocks out power and downs trees

What was expected to be one of the strongest storms in the north-west US in decades arrived on Tuesday evening, knocking out power and downing trees across the region.

The Weather Prediction Center issued excessive rainfall risks beginning on Tuesday and lasting through Friday as the strongest atmospheric river – a large plume of moisture – that California and the Pacific north-west has seen this season bears down on the region. The storm system is considered a “ bomb cyclone”, which occurs when a cyclone intensifies rapidly.

Continue reading...

One dead and dozens infected in E coli outbreak linked to organic carrots in US

California-based Grimmway Farms recalls carrots amid 39 reported illnesses in 18 states, including 15 hospitalizations

A California-based farm is recalling its carrots, including whole and baby organic carrots, following an E coli outbreak that has infected multiple people across the country.

In a statement on Saturday, Grimmway Farms in Bakersfield said that it has issued its recall of the carrots “that should no longer be in grocery stores but may be in consumers’ refrigerators or freezers”. The recall comes amid 39 reported E coli infections across 18 states, including 15 hospitalizations and one death, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Continue reading...

First known US case of person infected with new mpox strain reported

Person acquired clade Ib while traveling to east Africa and treated in California for mild illness, said health officials

US health officials reported Saturday the first known case of a person infected with the new mpox strain in the country.

The person acquired mpox while traveling to east Africa and was treated for a mild illness in San Mateo, California, according to health officials. The person is isolating at home and is recovering, and there is no evidence that mpox is spreading in the United States.

Continue reading...

California man jailed for life over hate-crime murder of teenage ex-classmate

Samuel Woodward, 27, sentenced to life without parole over stabbing of Blaze Bernstein, who was gay and Jewish

A California man convicted of stabbing to death a gay University of Pennsylvania student in an act of hate was sentenced Friday to life without parole in prison.

Samuel Woodward, 27, was sentenced in a southern California courtroom at the end of an all-day hearing for the murder of Blaze Bernstein nearly seven years ago.

Continue reading...

Bomb threats targeted Oregon election offices days after election day

Local clerks say they received threatening emails last week, amid a series of hostile election-related incidents

The FBI confirmed it is “aware” of bomb threats that targeted election offices in several Oregon counties. Local clerks in Deschutes, Crook, and Jefferson reported receiving threatening emails last week, just days after election day.

The FBI said that none of the threats were deemed credible.

Continue reading...

California city council passes $5.9m reparations deal with ex-residents

Palm Springs approves settlement for displaced Black and Latino families after decades-long fight for compensation

The Palm Springs city council on Thursday unanimously approved a $5.9m reparations settlement with former residents of a largely Black neighborhood that was leveled in the 1960s for commercial development.

The city council was also set to approve another $21m for housing and small business support aimed at the former residents and their descendants.

Continue reading...

Backlash as San Francisco votes to transform stretch of highway into park

Opponents say closing Great Highway to cars will increase traffic as supporters argue it will mitigate coastal erosion

Californians have voted to close part of a nearly century-old highway in San Francisco to cars, transforming a two-mile section into a park for pedestrians and cyclists.

On election day, city residents voted to approve Proposition K, extending the ban on vehicles on a portion of the Upper Great Highway along the coastline. The measure has sparked intense debate over whether cars should have regular access to the area.

Continue reading...

‘Devastating’: California fire victims return to sift through rubble of homes

Ten people have been injured so far by the Mountain fire, which was 17% contained by Saturday morning

As firefighting crews continued to battle the Mountain fire on Saturday, some residents were allowed to return to areas destroyed by the blaze to sift through the destruction to their homes.

As of 7am Pacific time on Saturday, the fire had been 17% contained, according to Cal Fire, the state’s wildfire-fighting agency.

Continue reading...

US tourist killed while on vacation in Hungary as suspect taken into custody

Mackenzie Michalski, 31, from Portland, Oregon, met 37-year-old man from Ireland at nightclub in Budapest

Family members of a 31-year-old American tourist who was killed while on vacation in Hungary’s capital mourned their loss while a 37-year-old suspect was in custody Saturday.

The victim, Mackenzie Michalski from Portland, Oregon, was reported missing on 5 November after she was last seen at a nightclub in central Budapest. Police launched a missing person investigation and reviewed security footage from local nightclubs, where they observed Michalski with a man later identified as the suspect in several of the clubs the night of her disappearance.

Continue reading...

Levi Strauss heir Daniel Lurie elected mayor of San Francisco

Wealthy Democratic outsider unseats incumbent mayor London Breed in expensive race

After years of negative headlines and post-pandemic economic struggle, San Francisco has picked a wealthy Democratic outsider with no government experience to serve as the city’s new mayor.

Daniel Lurie, 47, is one of the heirs to the Levi Strauss jeans company fortune, and previously spent 15 years as the executive of a San Francisco non-profit he founded. He defeated several Democratic challengers, including the current mayor, London Breed, in an election that was expected to break local campaign spending records.

Continue reading...

Wind-driven wildfire rages in California with scores of homes charred

Mountain fire in Ventura county still at 0% containment, with footage showing smoldering structures

A wind-driven wildfire roared through rural and residential communities north-west of Los Angeles, charring more than 19,600 acres and leveling scores of homes.

The Mountain fire in Ventura county, California, continued to burn on Thursday morning, as footage showed dozens of structures turned to smoldering ruins now lining the streets where neighborhoods once stood.

Continue reading...

Residents of conservative California county brace for tumultuous elections

‘More and more divided’ Shasta is grappling with baseless conspiracy theories of voter fraud and election denialism

Residents of one of California’s most conservative counties are bracing for a contentious election, as the community grapples with a thriving election denialism movement that has amplified conspiracy theories about voter fraud and made life increasingly difficult for election workers.

In recent weeks, some residents of Shasta county, home to 180,000 people in the state’s far north, have urged the county not to certify the election results while one official warned that if Donald Trump is “cheated” out of the election, there would be “a price” to pay.

Continue reading...

US students score win in push for fossil fuel divestment by private high schools

Concerned students press for their high schools – some with $1bn endowments – to reinvest in clean energy

A high school in California has decided not to invest in coal, oil or gas, instead pledging to put money into clean energy. It’s the latest win in a new fossil fuel divestment campus campaign launched by high schoolers across 11 countries that is gaining support in the US.

The Nueva School, an elite private school outside San Francisco, pledged in spring 2024 to invest a portion of its $55m endowment in renewable power. The commitment followed months of pressure from students.

Continue reading...

Elon Musk’s canvassing operation sued in California for alleged labor law violations

Plaintiffs accuse America Pac of several violations during its operation to support Orange county’s Michelle Steel

Elon Musk’s troubled canvassing operation on behalf of Donald Trump and the Republican party is now facing a lawsuit in southern California filed by two women who say they were cheated out of wages and expenses as they knocked on doors for an embattled Republican congresswoman.

The suit accuses Musk’s America PAC, which has poured more than $100m into this year’s election campaign, of “willful violations of the California labor code” by paying the plaintiffs less than it promised and refusing to make up the difference.

Continue reading...

Hundreds of damaged ballots saved following fire at drop box in Washington

FBI is investigating and workers are contacting voters about new ballots after incendiary devices were put in drop box

Officials in south-west Washington were able to salvage almost 500 damaged ballots from a ballot box that was set on fire on Monday in what officials have called an attack on democracy ahead of a contentious US election.

An unknown number of ballots were destroyed when someone placed incendiary devices in a drop box in Vancouver, Washington, while three ballots were damaged in a fire at a box in nearby Portland, Oregon. Those fires and one other are linked, officials have said.

Continue reading...

Early ballots burned in suspected attacks in Washington and Oregon

Hundreds of ballots damaged in fires that police believe are linked and vehicle involved has reportedly been identified

Hundreds of early ballots cast for the US presidential election have been burned in two suspected attacks in Washington and Oregon, exacerbating tensions ahead of next Tuesday’s knife-edge contest.

Police said Monday that the fires in the two states were believed to be connected and that a vehicle involved had been identified, according to the Associated Press.

Continue reading...

Missing US navy pilots declared dead after Washington state fighter-jet crash

Navy confirms deaths after jet crashed east of Mount Rainier earlier this week during routine training flight

Two crew members who were missing following the crash of a fighter jet in mountainous terrain in Washington during a routine training flight have been declared dead, the US navy said on Sunday.

The EA-18G Growler jet from the Electronic Attack Squadron crashed east of Mount Rainier on Tuesday afternoon, according to navy officials. Search teams, including a US navy MH-60S helicopter, launched from the air station to try to find the crew and crash site.

Continue reading...

Hundreds evacuated in Oakland after California brush fire grows out of control

Residents told to flee as firefighters battle blaze, with two homes burned and several others damaged

A fast-moving fire fed by strong winds burned two homes on Friday and damaged several others in a hillside neighborhood in the city of Oakland, where roughly 500 people were ordered to evacuate, officials said.

Damon Covington, the city’s fire chief, said that at about 1.30pm, calls had come in reporting a fire in front of a home in the Oakland hills. Crews arrived as the inferno quickly grew with winds ranging from calm breezes to 40mph (64km/h) gusts during red-flag conditions.

Continue reading...

Los Angeles Catholic archdiocese to pay $880m in child sex abuse settlement

Archbishop expresses sorrow in announcement to pay 1,353 people who alleged they were abused as children by priests

The Roman Catholic archdiocese of Los Angeles has agreed to pay $880m to 1,353 people who alleged that they were sexually abused as children by Catholic priests, in the largest settlement by a US diocese over decades-old abuse claims.

Archbishop Jose H Gomez expressed sorrow for the abuse in announcing the settlement on Wednesday.

Continue reading...