Loading up for fireworks show

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — A federal appeals court on Wednesday threw out the 2020 conspiracy and bribery convictions of a major political donor in North Carolina and his associate, declaring that the trial judge erred in his jury instructions.

CAROLINA BEACH, N.C. (AP) — The boat of a North Carolina man missing for seven months has washed ashore in the Azores Islands, officials announced Monday.

PHOENIX (AP) — The skies over a scattering of Western U.S. cities will stay dark for the third consecutive Fourth of July as some major fireworks displays are canceled again this year — some over wildfire concerns amid dry weather and others because of enduring pandemic-related staffing and …

Churches across the U.S. are tackling the big question of how to address homelessness in their communities with a small solution: tiny homes.

Stocks shook off a morning slump and ended higher Friday, but not enough to erase their losses for the week. It was the fourth losing week in the last five for Wall Street. The latest choppy trading comes as investors worry about high inflation and the possibility that higher interest rates could bring on a recession. The S&P 500 rose 1.1%. It is coming off of its worst quarter since the onset of the pandemic in early 2020. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 1% and the Nasdaq added 0.9%. The yield on the 10-year Treasury fell to 2.89%.

The fireworks are still a few days away, but travel for the July Fourth weekend is off to a booming start. The Transportation Security Administration said Friday that it screened more people on Thursday than it did on the same day in 2019, before the pandemic. Travelers so far seem to be experiencing fewer delays and canceled flights than they did earlier this week. But it's still early. Leisure travel has bounced back this year, offsetting weakness in business travel and international flying. Still, the total number of people flying has not quite recovered fully to pre-pandemic levels.

Decades of anti-abortion laws have been created in some states, and many of them conflict with each other. Idaho has nearly three dozen anti-abortion laws dating back to 1973, and Attorney General Lawrence Wasden's office says he i giving them all a close look to see which might be enforceable now that the U.S. Supreme Court has overturned Roe v. Wade. But it's not an easy question — in Arizona, leaders in the Republican Party disagree over whether an abortion law from 1901 should be enforced over a 2022 version. Grant Loebs is the president of the Idaho Prosecuting Attorneys Association. He says decision on whether to charge someone under an older abortion law will probably come down to individual prosecutors at first.

The evolving legal landscape around abortion access is causing confusion for providers and patients across the country after the overturning of Roe v. Wade. In Florida, a new law banning abortions after 15 weeks went into effect Friday, after a judge said he would sign an order next week temporarily blocking it. Patients in Kentucky who were forced to cancel appointments with abortion providers this week are now scrambling to reschedule after a court there blocked the state’s restrictions. Elsewhere, clinics are reporting an influx of new patients from out of state, overwhelming providers and leading heath centers to tailor procedures to the legality of abortion in a person’s home state.

Companies that want to sell shampoo bottles, food products and other items wrapped in plastic in California will have to cut down their use of the material. That's under a bill signed Thursday by Gov. Gavin Newsom that sets the nation's most stringent plastics reduction rules. It would require producers to use 25% less plastic for single-use products 2032. That could be met through using less material, switching to another type of packaging or making the products refillable or reusable. It was negotiated by lawmakers, environmental and business groups. Backers of a similar ballot measure have removed their initiative from the November ballot.