The Petersburg Post
Top News Stories for Friday, March 20th 2026
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
The U.S.-Israeli military campaign against Iran took a dangerous turn on March 18, 2026, with tit-for-tat strikes on critical energy infrastructure that amount to the most serious regional escalation since the conflict began. First, an Israeli drone strike targeted facilities at Iran's Asaluyeh complex, damaging four plants that treat gas from the offshore South Pars field, which straddles the maritime boundary ...
Source: theconversation.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
Average rate on the benchmark 30-year fixed mortgage rose to 6.22%, Freddie Mac says Mortgage rates jumped this week to the highest level in nearly four months, mortgage buyer Freddie Mac said Thursday. Freddie Mac's latest Primary Mortgage Market Survey, released Thursday, showed the average rate on the benchmark 30-year fixed mortgage rose to 6.22% from last week's reading of 6.11%. The average rate on a ...
Source: foxbusiness.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
Republican Rand Paul opposed Mullin, but Democrat John Fetterman crossed the aisle to give the nominee a one-vote margin in the Senate Homeland Security Committee. WASHINGTON — A key Senate committee voted 8-7 on Thursday to advance President Donald Trump's nominee to be the next secretary of the Department of Homeland Security. The vote in the Senate Homeland Security Committee sends Sen. Markwayne Mullin , ...
Source: nbcnews.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
We've all heard a lot about the potential impact artificial intelligence and agentic AI will have on the SaaS sector. But its conversion from SaaS to GaaS is a new wrinkle. The acronym technically stands for "governance as a service." But it was used in a different way by Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang during this week's GTC 2026 keynote where he said, "Every SaaS company will become a GaaS company." Accuracy aside, ...
Source: pymnts.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
The Trump administration temporarily suspended the Jones Act on March 18, 2026, as part of its efforts to bring down soaring U.S. gasoline prices . But what does this more-than-century-old law, which originally was designed to support the shipping industry, have to do with the price of gas? As the director of the Center for Energy Innovation at UMass Lowell, I've learned that the impact of the Jones Act ripples ...
Source: theconversation.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
The European Central Bank, Bank of England, Sweden's Riksbank and Swiss National Bank all delivered their latest monetary decisions Thursday. The war in Iran has upset the economic equilibrium in Europe, threatening energy supplies, growth and the outlook for inflation. Central banks appeared relaxed in their growth and inflation forecasts for the years ahead but uncertainty over the war in Iran is upending their ...
Source: cnbc.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
A new video released on Thursday shows Taylor Frankie Paul attacking her ex-boyfriend, Dakota Mortensen, in front of her daughter three years ago. Shortly after the video was published, a Disney spokesperson confirmed that they had pulled Taylor's season of "The Bachelorette," which was set to premiere on Sunday. "In light of the newly released video just surfaced today, we have made the decision to not move ...
Source: nbcnews.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
Stay up to date with notifications from The Independent Notifications can be managed in browser preferences. Chavez's family said in a statement that they are devastated by the allegations Removed from bookmarks Mary Rose Wilcox and her husband marched and fasted alongside César Chavez. They helped him open a radio station in Phoenix and plastered their Mexican restaurant with photos and a mural of the ...
Source: independent.co.uk
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
The race to adopt AI is accelerating, but most enterprises are building dependency, not capability. Here's what CIOs must do differently. There's a quiet assumption baked into most AI adoption conversations: that access equals advantage. Buy the API. Plug in the model. Watch productivity soar. Brief the board on your AI transformation. Repeat. It's a compelling narrative, and for vendors, it's a lucrative one. But ...
Source: cio.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
March 19 (UPI) -- The FBI is investigating Joe Kent, who resigned this week as the counterterrorism director in protest over the war with Iran, over allegations that he leaked classified information, according to reports, while Trump administration officials attack his credibility. Kent resigned Tuesday as director of the National Counterterrorism Center, a position to which the MAGA supporter and far-right ...
Source: upi.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
Day 2 of our Guardian analysis of more than a million Epstein emails exposes the child sex offender's deep relationships with more high-profile figures The Epstein files have led to intense scrutiny over links between the child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and the rich and powerful. But the vast trove of information has made it difficult to assess the extent of some of those connections. In this second of a ...
Source: theguardian.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
Soaring energy prices due to the Iran war could provide a massive windfall for U.S. oil companies. Rystad Energy, a market research firm, estimates that shale oil producers in the U.S. could earn an additional $63 billion in sales as prices soar past $100 a barrel. If oil prices averaged $70 a barrel — their approximate level before the outbreak of hostilities in the Middle East last month ...
Source: cbsnews.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
VR will be on life support while mobile remains the focus, though. The dream of the metaverse may have died for now, but Meta has decided it's not completely giving up on the VR experience in Horizon Worlds, the virtual worlds service that it originally envisioned as the first step toward said metaverse. The news was announced via the Instagram account of Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth. "We have decided, just today ...
Source: arstechnica.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
FBI Director Kash Patel admitted under oath at a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on Wednesday that the agency purchases data, which can be used to track Americans. The acknowledgement came after a question from Sen. Ron Wyden , a Democrat from Oregon. Wyden noted that in 2023, former FBI Director Christopher Wray testified that, to his knowledge, the FBI did not purchase commercial data that included ...
Source: cnet.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
UPDATE: This article includes additional details regarding the proposed rules. Processing Content WASHINGTON — The Federal Reserve, Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. issued a suite of proposed rules Thursday that would cumulatively reduce the amount of capital banks will have to retain by billions of dollars. The agencies, led by the Federal Reserve, published three ...
Source: americanbanker.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
UK health authorities are probing 27 cases linked to a deadly meningitis outbreak believed to have spread at a nightclub in southeast England. Here's everything we know about the disease and the outbreak: – What is meningitis? – Meningitis is a potentially deadly infection causing the inflammation of the brain or spinal cord linings, which can lead to sepsis. Bacterial meningitis, as seen in this ...
Source: digitaljournal.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
The impact is particularly high in western Europe, and in teenage girls in English-speaking countries, a new study finds. The UK stays at an all time low in happiness rankings. Heavy social media use has led to a stark drop in happiness among young people, according to a major academic study. Fifteen-year-old girls who use social media for more than five hours a day are the most likely to see a drop in ...
Source: news.sky.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
Former reality TV star Joseph Duggar is facing a child molestation charge in Florida, almost five years after his brother Josh, who also starred in the TLC show "19 Kids and Counting," was convicted of downloading child sexual abuse images. Joseph Duggar, 31, was arrested in Arkansas, where he lives, and was awaiting extradition to Florida on Thursday. Duggar is charged with lewd and lascivious behavior on a child ...
Source: apnews.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready... By CHRISTOPHER RUGABER, AP Economics Writer WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump has for months wanted to remove Jerome Powell as chair of the Federal Reserve. But instead, an investigation by one of his own officials could end up extending Powell's time at the top of the central bank even after his term formally ends May 15. Trump has ...
Source: orlandosentinel.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
WASHINGTON — A group of federal judges Thursday added to the chorus of concerns raised about the rise in violent threats against members of the judiciary at a time when President Donald Trump has ramped up his criticism of the courts. hosted by a legal group called "Speak Up for Justice" that was formed to defend the judiciary and the rule of law. "I don't think being a federal judge is a job for the ...
Source: news.yahoo.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
March 19 (UPI) -- A 20-year-old student from University of Alabama reported missing in Barcelona, Spain, after an evening at a nightclub was found dead Thursday, authorities announced. Barcelona police said the body of James "Jimmy" Gracey of Elmhurst, Ill., was found on Somorrostro beach near the Shoko Barcelona nightclub where he was last seen, a representative from the Barcelona police said in a statement to CNN ...
Source: upi.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
Reading time 2 minutes As robotaxis start hitting city streets around the world, Uber is making moves to ensure it doesn't get left behind. Uber announced Thursday that it is partnering with EV maker Rivian to roll out up to 50,000 unsupervised robotaxis by 2031. As part of the deal, Uber has agreed to invest $1.25 billion in Rivian through 2031. An initial $300 million has been committed following the signing of ...
Source: gizmodo.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
MADISON, Wis. (AP) — A second Republican leader in the Wisconsin Legislature announced on Thursday he will not seek reelection this fall, another sign of the in politics in the key battleground state as Democrats get increasingly optimistic about gaining a majority. The two highest-ranking Republicans in the Legislature are retiring, along with the Democratic governor, soon after in favor of Democrats, who ...
Source: news.yahoo.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
Save this article to read it later. Find this story in your account's 'Saved for Later' section. While testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee last month, former Homeland Security secretary Kristi Noem denied that her top aide, Corey Lewandowski , was involved in approving DHS contracts. When ProPublica found internal DHS records contradicting that, a DHS spokesperson reiterated Noem's denial , adding that ...
Source: nymag.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
reached a surprisingly peaceful resolution Wednesday afternoon: Compass, the country's largest real estate brokerage, dropped its lawsuit against Zillow, marking the end of a The legal volleys kicked off last summer, when Zillow started banning some for-sale listings from its well-trafficked website. A growing number of real estate agents, the search site said, were Compass quickly sued Zillow in federal court over ...
Source: insider.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
When Jaynie Parrish, the executive director and founder of Arizona Native Vote, saw the details of the Republican elections bill President Donald Trump has called his "number one priority," her first thought was: "Here we go again." Parrish, who is Navajo, has seen firsthand how Native voters living on tribal lands already face significant challenges to voting access. She views this legislation, which would add ...
Source: newrepublic.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
Four weeks after surviving a mass shooting at one of their games, the Blackstone Valley Schools co-op team won the Rhode Island Interscholastic League Division II Boys Hockey Championship Wednesday. Defenseman Colin Dorgan lost his mother, brother and grandfather when his father killed them during a game at the David M. Lynch arena in Pawtucket on Feb. 16. The father then died of a self-inflicted gunshot. ...
Source: wbur.org
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
Top Gun star Val Kilmer, who was one of the best-paid actors in the 1990s, will play a priest in the forthcoming movie As Deep As The Grave, alongside a Harry Potter actor. Val Kilmer is to posthumously appear in an action-adventure film, a year after his death from pneumonia. The company behind the movie, First Line Films, say it is the first-ever performance enabled by generative artificial intelligence . ...
Source: news.sky.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
Dino Geromella / iStock Share Nearly 156,000 more Americans may have died of COVID-19 in the first year of the pandemic than officially reported, with disparities by race, education, and other factors, a machine-learning estimates. For the study, published yesterday in , a team led by a Stanford University investigator used machine learning (artificial intelligence) trained on US death certificates to ...
Source: cidrap.umn.edu
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
Stay up to date with notifications from The Independent Notifications can be managed in browser preferences. Immigrant parents say they were ripped from their children. ICE ignored policy to keep them together, researchers say Removed from bookmarks A 22-year-old woman was five months pregnant when she arrived on a deportation flight to Honduras. She said she never had a chance to tell Immigration and Customs ...
Source: independent.co.uk
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
Apple has released a Background Security Update that addresses a newly uncovered flaw tracked as CVE-2026-20643 , the effects of which span its smartphone, tablet, desktop and notebook product ecosystems. CVE-2026-20643, credited to security researcher Thomas Espach, affects the WebKit browser engine, specifically its Navigation application programming interface (API). According to Apple, the CVE-2026-20643 ...
Source: computerweekly.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
Tax the "Rich" – Controversial New York City Tax Proposals and What They Could Mean for Taxpayers When Zohran Mamdani was elected Mayor of New York City, it was presumed that his proposals for progressive reform and social service program enhancements would be accompanied by a significant need for available revenue. Tax increases affecting wealthier New Yorkers, corporations, and high earners were anticipated ...
Source: jdsupra.com
Thursday, Mar 19th, 2026 -
The states are forcing health plans to provide coverage for abortions as a condition of offering coverage in the state, OCR says. Policy and Legislation Susan Morse The Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights today announced it is investigating 13 states under a federal healthcare conscience law called the Weldon Amendment. The investigation is based on information that the states are ...
Source: healthcarefinancenews.com
Wednesday, Mar 18th, 2026 -
President Trump has called news coverage of the Iran war "criminal" and "unpatriotic," while his FCC chairman threatens broadcasters' licenses. Support journalism that holds power accountable. Become a HuffPost member today. Already a member? WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. government's top intelligence official told lawmakers Wednesday that Iran's regime "appears to be intact but largely degraded" yet repeatedly ...
Source: huffpost.com
Wednesday, Mar 18th, 2026 -
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready... By ALANNA DURKIN RICHER WASHINGTON (AP) — Democratic lawmakers on Wednesday stormed out of a closed-door briefing on the Jeffrey Epstein files by Justice Department leaders, and said they would push to force Attorney General Pam Bondi to answer questions under oath about the case that has plagued the Trump administration. Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd ...
Source: orlandosentinel.com
Wednesday, Mar 18th, 2026 -
After 17 months of negotiations, the WNBA and its players have agreed to a new CBA. From salaries to revenue sharing, here's what's changing and why it matters The WNBA and its players' union (WNBPA) have reached a verbal agreement on a new collective bargaining agreement, ending 17 months of negotiations after players opted out of the previous deal and averting mounting fears of a strike. The agreement would be ...
Source: theguardian.com
Wednesday, Mar 18th, 2026 -
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes (D) on Tuesday filed criminal charges against Kalshi, accusing the online prediction marketplace of "running an illegal gambling operation and taking bets on Arizona elections, both of which violate Arizona law." The 20-count indictment accepted bets on sporting outcomes, ...
Source: theweek.com