O.J. Simpson could be released on parole as soon as Monday in Las Vegas, Nevada, prison officials said Wednesday. Under the plan, still being finalized, the former football player, actor and TV pitchman would move from the Lovelock Correctional Center in northern Nevada to High Desert State Prison outside Las Vegas, where he would be freed. Simpson has spent nine years behind bars on charges of armed robbery and kidnapping following a 2008 confrontation between Simpson and two sports memorabilia dealers at a hotel in Las Vegas. He had been ordered to spend up to 33 years in prison, but a state parole board ruled earlier this year that he could be released after October 1. The 70-year-old former football player was acquitted in 1995 of murder charges arising from the stabbing deaths a year earlier of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend, Ronald Goldman. Simpson subsequently lost …

President Donald Trump’s administration is ending a program that allowed children fleeing violence in El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras to apply for refugee status in the United States before leaving home. The administration will phase out the Central American Minors (CAM) program during fiscal year 2018, according to a report provided to Congress and obtained by Reuters. That report also sets the overall refugee cap for the year at its lowest level in decades. The CAM program started at the end of 2014 under the administration of former President Barack Obama as a response to tens of thousands of unaccompanied minors and families from Central America who arrived at the U.S.-Mexico border seeking asylum in the United States. Dangerous trip avoided The program allowed vulnerable young people with parents in the United States to process their applications in their home region and avoid making the dangerous trip through Mexico to …

An American student who had been imprisoned in North Korea for 17 months died from lack of oxygen and blood to the brain, an Ohio coroner said on Wednesday. Otto Warmbier’s death on June 19 was due to an unknown injury that occurred more than a year before his death, Hamilton County Coroner Dr. Lakshmi Sammarco said at a news conference. “We don’t know what happened to him and that’s the bottom line,” Sammarco said. Warmbier’s parents could not be reached for comment on the coroner’s report. The University of Virginia student was held by North Korea from January 2016 until his release on June 15. Warmbier, 22, returned to the United States in a coma. Both the investigator and the coroner’s report cited complications of chronic deficiency of oxygen and blood supply to the brain in Warmbier’s death. Only an external examination of the body rather than a full …

President Donald Trump said on Wednesday a foreign leader told him at the United Nations last week that the country would soon announce plans to build or expand five automobile industry factories in the United States. “I just left the United Nations last week and I was told by one of the most powerful leaders of the world that they are going to be announcing in the not too distant future five major factories in the United States, between increasing and new, five,” Trump said in a speech on tax reform in Indianapolis. He added the factories were in the automotive industry. He did not name the country. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Automakers in Japan and Germany have both announced investments in the United States this year, with companies coming under pressure from Trump’s bid to curb imports and hire more workers …

As Puerto Rico struggles with a lack of fuel, water and medical supplies following the devastation of Hurricane Maria, it is pressing the Trump administration to lift a prohibition on foreign ships delivering supplies from the U.S. mainland. The island’s governor is pushing for the federal government to temporarily waive the Jones Act, a law requiring that all goods shipped between U.S. ports be carried by U.S. owned-and-operated ships. President Donald Trump’s administration has so far not granted his request. “We’re thinking about that,” Trump told reporters when asked about lifting the Jones Act restrictions on Wednesday. “But we have a lot of shippers and … a lot of people that work in the shipping industry that don’t want the Jones Act lifted, and we have a lot of ships out there right now.” Many of the U.S. territory’s 3.4 million inhabitants are queuing for scarce supplies of gas and …

The Trump administration on Wednesday proposed admitting a maximum of 45,000 refugees next year, the lowest cap in decades, which officials said was necessary to ensure U.S. security as the government tightens its screening and vetting processes. That figure is the lowest cap since the modern U.S. refugee admissions system was established in 1980, and the administration’s decision was harshly criticized by refugee advocates who say it ignores growing humanitarian crises around the world. The report also projects slashing funding to the refugee resettlement program by 25 percent. “The security and safety of the American people is our chief concern,” a U.S. official said in a call with reporters Wednesday, speaking on condition of anonymity. “We have every plan to process as many refugees as we can under this ceiling.” A second U.S. official said the administration is considering a “wide range of potential measures and enhancements” to refugee vetting, …

The latest executive order signed by President Donald Trump would, in effect, amount to a full trade and financial embargo, squeezing all the revenue channels North Korea maintains to finance its weapons programs, a former senior counterterrorism official said. On Sept. 21, less than two weeks after the U.N. Security Council approved new sanctions, Trump turned up the heat on the Kim Jong Un regime with an executive order that widens U.S. authority to sanction any bank and company that finance or facilitate trade with the communist country or any individual involved in the North Korean industries, ports and trade. “To prevent sanctions evasion, the order also includes measures designed to disrupt critical North Korean shipping and trade networks,” said Trump, in reference to a 180-day ban on ships that have visited North Korea or have been involved in a ship-to-ship transfer with a vessel that has visited North Korea from …

The United States, Canada, and Mexico said on Wednesday they had made some progress in talks to modernize NAFTA, but acknowledged that relations between Washington and Ottawa had become strained over a U.S. decision to impose preliminary subsides on Canadian jet manufacturer Bombardier. U.S. trade envoy Robert Lighthizer said Canada “mentioned” the U.S. ruling on Tuesday against Bombardier after rival Boeing accused Canada of unfairly subsidizing the aircraft. Asked whether the dispute could affect NAFTA talks, Lighthizer told reporters: “I’m not saying it doesn’t have an effect on relationships, it does, but not on this negotiation.” Much work remains The countries acknowledged at the five-day session in Ottawa that much work remained to conclude the NAFTA discussions by the end of the year, as planned. Negotiators said they had wrapped up one chapter on small and medium-sized enterprises in Ottawa and expected to finish another on competition before the next …

The anticipated public release of thousands of secret government documents related to President John F. Kennedy’s assassination has scholars and armchair detectives buzzing. Now, they’re waiting to see whether President Donald Trump will block the release of files that could shed light on a tragedy that has stirred conspiracy theories for decades. The National Archives has until October 26 to disclose the remaining files related to Kennedy’s 1963 assassination, unless Trump intervenes. The CIA and FBI, whose records make up the bulk of the batch, won’t say whether they’ve appealed to the Republican president to keep them under wraps.   “The American public deserves to know the facts, or at least they deserve to know what the government has kept hidden from them for all these years,” Larry Sabato, director of the University of Virginia Center for Politics and author of a book about Kennedy, said in an email to …

Southern California’s Occidental College, where Barack Obama studied from 1979 to 1981, is offering scholarships in honor of the former president. The school in Los Angeles says Wednesday that the Barack Obama Scholars Program will launch in the fall of 2018.   It will initially endow two scholarships, and with the support of donors, eventually offer up to 20.   Each Obama Scholar will be awarded loan-free funding for the entire cost of a four-year Occidental education.   In a statement, Obama says his years at the liberal arts college sparked his interest in social and political causes.   The private school in northeast Los Angeles has about 2,000 undergraduates. …

The U.S. Department of the Treasury announced new sanctions Tuesday targeting eight North Korean banks, as well as 26 DPRK banking officials. The Treasury Department’s release said the action “targets North Korean use of the international financial system to facilitate its WMD and ballistic missile programs.” “This further advances our strategy to fully isolate North Korea in order to achieve our broader objectives of a peaceful and denuclearized Korean peninsula,” said Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin. “This action is also consistent with United Nations Security Council resolutions.” Earlier this month the UN Security Council adopted a new round of economic sanctions against North Korea following Pyongyang’s test of what may have been a hydrogen bomb. If fully implemented, the new sanctions would cut a third of North Korea’s oil imports, and reduce by more than half, the country’s gas, diesel and heavy fuel oil imports, while completely banning the import of …

The top U.S. military officer said on Tuesday Iran was complying with the pact curbing its nuclear program and warned that any American decision to walk away from it would make other nations less likely to enter into agreements with the United States. President Donald Trump is considering whether to withdraw from the 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and six world powers including the United States, calling the accord an “embarrassment.” Marine Corps General Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the Senate Armed Services Committee that Iran was complying with its obligations under the nuclear deal, but had increased its activity in other areas. “Iran is projecting malign influence across the Middle East, threatening freedom of navigation, while supporting terrorist organizations in Syria, Iraq and Yemen,” Dunford said. Ability of negotiate The committee’s top Democrat, Senator Jack Reed, asked Dunford whether walking away from the Iran …

Miami is a city that lives on air conditioning. When it fails, people can die. After Hurricane Irma knocked down power lines and disconnected the cooling system at a nursing home north of Miami this month, 11 residents perished when temperatures inside soared. Florida Governor Rick Scott blamed management at the facility for allowing patients to endure sweltering conditions as the heat index — a measure of combined heat and humidity — passed 100 degrees Fahrenheit. But public outrage has also targeted the local utility company for not restoring electricity fast enough, and the city for not ordering and assisting with an evacuation. In this often sweltering southern city, widespread use of air conditioning makes it easy to overlook the growing risks of extreme heat. But the risks are there — and they can be just one power failure away. Around the world, a surge in extreme weather events, including …

Firebrand jurist Roy Moore won the Alabama Republican primary runoff for U.S. Senate on Tuesday, defeating an appointed incumbent backed by President Donald Trump and allies of Sen. Mitch McConnell.   In an upset likely to rock the GOP establishment, Moore clinched victory over Sen. Luther Strange to take the GOP nomination for the seat previously held by Attorney General Jeff Sessions. Moore will face Democrat Doug Jones in a Dec. 12 special election.   Throughout the campaign, Moore argued the election was an opportunity to send a message to the “elite Washington establishment” that he said was trying to influence the race. The Senate Leadership Fund, a group with ties to McConnell, had spent an estimated $9 million trying to secure the nomination for Strange.   Moore was twice elected chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court and twice removed from those duties. In 2003, he was removed from …

The acting chief of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration is stepping down while the agency awaits the Trump administration’s nomination of its permanent leader. A person familiar with the move said Chuck Rosenberg would leave the post October 1. The person, who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity to discuss personnel matters, said Rosenberg notified employees of his decision in a short email Tuesday in which he thanked them for their hard work. Rosenberg, a longtime ally of fired FBI Director James Comey, had been running the agency in a temporary capacity since 2015. He made news last month when he rejected President Donald Trump’s comments suggesting police shouldn’t be “nice” to suspects by shielding their heads as they are lowered, handcuffed, into police cars. He told employees the comment “condoned police misconduct” and reminded them of the drug agency’s operating principles, which include the rule of …

The top U.S. general said on Tuesday he has urged the Trump administration not to kick transgender service members out of the military despite President Donald Trump’s ban on transgender people serving in the armed forces. Marine Corps General Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was asked by Democratic Senator Kirsten Gillibrand during a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing whether he agreed that the thousands of transgender men and women now in the military have served with honor and valor. “I do, Senator,” Dunford responded. “I would just probably say that I believe any individual who meets the physical and mental standards, and is worldwide-deployable and is currently serving, should be afforded the opportunity to continue to serve.” Trump in July said he would ban transgender people from the military in a move that would reverse Democratic former President Barack Obama’s policy and halt years of efforts …