7 h. ago Trump administration suspends $129m in benefit payments to Minnesota

USDA notified state’s governor of decision, citing inquiries into alleged fraud by local non-profits and businessesThe Trump administration announced it is suspending $129m in federal benefit payments to Minnesota amid allegations of widespread fraud in the state.The secretary of the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), Brooke Rollins, shared a letter on Friday on social media that was addressed to Minnesota’s governor, Tim Walz, and the mayor of Minneapolis, Jacob Frey, notifying them of the administration’s decision and citing investigations into alleged fraud conducted by local non-profits and businesses. Continue reading...

Economics

7 h. ago Man, 26, ‘gutted’ as epic cycle ride from Cheshire to Thailand cut short by horror injury

Olly Hargreaves left the UK in April and cycled 120km daily with the goal of reaching Thailand by bike

Events

15 h. ago Mass surveillance, the metaverse, making America ‘great again’: the novelists who predicted our present

From Jorge Luis Borges to George Orwell and Margaret Atwood, novelists have foreseen some of the major developments of our age. What can we learn from their prophecies?This year marks 100 years since the first demonstration of television in London. Elizabeth II sent the first royal email in 1976. The first meeting of the Lancashire Association of Change Ringers took place in 1876. All notable anniversaries. But I’m going with 2026 as the 85th anniversary of a great short story: Jorge Luis Borges’s The Garden of Forking Paths (1941). It’s about chance, labyrinths and an impossible novel. Ts’ui Pên, an ancestor of the narrator, sets himself the task of writing a novel with a cast of thousands: “an enormous guessing game, or parable, in which the subject is time”. In most novels, when a character reaches a fork in the path, they must choose: this way, or that way. Yet in Ts’ui Pên’s novel, all possible paths are chosen. This creates “a growing, dizzying web of divergent,...

Politics

18 h. ago Quebec’s Lake Rouge vanished – but was it a freak natural event or caused by human actions?

Experts and community trying to untangle mystery of outburst that saw water travel almost 10km overland into a bigger lakeManoel Dixon had just finished dinner one night last May when a phone dinged nearby with a Facebook message.Dixon, 26, was at his family’s hunting camp near their northern Quebec home town of Waswanipi. They knew the fellow hunter who was messaging Dixon’s father, but what he wrote didn’t make sense. Continue reading...

Politics

18 h. ago Tim Dowling: I have a new mystery ailment but sympathy is in short supply

I can’t tell the GP ghosts are pulling my hair. That’s even more embarrassing than my previous ailments – ‘hot hand’ and ‘phantom phone’I wake up with a headache. Not a headache, really – more of a head pain, and not exactly that either. I am sitting in the kitchen opposite the middle one, who is staring at his computer. My wife is wandering in and out, not really listening to the symptoms I’m trying to describe.“It’s like I walked through a low doorway and cracked my skull on the frame,” I say. Continue reading...

Politics

19 h. ago My favourite family photo: ‘It’s a snapshot of our goofy bond’

Since my mum died, family photos can be painful to look at. But this one of me and my brother is a reminder we still have each otherMy only sibling is seven years older than me. That means he has forever been seven years ahead of me in life, sitting somewhere between a willing co-conspirator and knowledgable surrogate parent – protective but fun, and always aware of the secrets of existence I am yet to discover. It was his aside that spoiled the secret identity of Santa Claus; he who laughingly revealed the mechanics of sex; he who gave me my first sip of beer. Yet, when he found out I was sneaking cigarettes from my dad’s stale dinner party supply, he chastised me before either of my parents could, and when my mum was diagnosed with cancer and I was just 15, he was already a 22-year-old medical student, able to speak in a doctor’s shorthand and advocate for her care while my father and I floundered.Ever since my mum died in 2013, family photos have been a source of bittersweet pain...

Culture

22 h. ago Prince Harry 'desperately wants King Charles to open the Invictus Games' when it returns to the UK next year

The King has hosted just two short meetings with his youngest son in recent years and is not believed to have seen his grandchildren, Archie, six, and Lilibet, four, since June 2022.

Politics

22 h. ago More than 100 buildings destroyed and 300,000 hectares burned as Victoria’s bushfires rage

Fires may continue for ‘weeks’, authorities warn, as three missing people found safeFollow our Australia news live blog for latest updatesGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastAt least 119 structures are believed to be lost in bushfires across Victoria and more than 300,000 hectares of bushland has been burned as the state continues to battle blazes that may rage for “weeks”.Emergency management commissioner, Tim Wiebusch, told the media on Saturday that about 50 homes had been lost in the Ravenswood and Harcourt fire, which was believed to be a “conservative number”. The Bendigo railway line had also been damaged by fire and was closed. Continue reading...

Events

23 h. ago More than 100 buildings destroyed and 300,000ha of bushland burned as Victoria’s bushfires rage

Fires may continue for ‘weeks’, authorities warn, as three missing people found safeFollow our Australia news live blog for latest updatesGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastAt least 119 structures are believed to be lost in bushfires across Victoria and more than 300,000 hectares of bushland has been burned as the state continues to battle blazes that may rage for “weeks”.Emergency management commissioner, Tim Wiebusch, told the media on Saturday that around 50 homes had been lost in the Ravenswood and Harcout fire, which was believed to be a “conservative number”. The Bendigo railway line had also been damaged by fire and was closed. Continue reading...

Events

31 h. ago Rainforest that's 'one of UK's most magical places' just short drive from Wales

Visitors are astonished to discover a magical woodland, with many wondering how such a beautiful place has managed to remain a ‘secret’ from some people for so long

Politics

32 h. ago Mystery of Birmingham’s dazzling pink sky during Storm Goretti solved

Residents in and around Birmingham were left baffled on Thursday evening (8 January) as the sky turned neon pink during severe winter weather caused by Storm Goretti.

Events

32 h. ago Did Leonardo da Vinci paint a nude Mona Lisa? I may have just solved this centuries

It is one of the most tantalising – and entertaining – puzzles in art, stretching from the Louvre to the Loire via, well, Norfolk. And our critic thinks he has just worked it outIncreased security after the recent heist has made the queues at the Louvre even slower, yet on this rainswept, very wintry morning, no one grumbles. After all, the Mona Lisa is waiting inside for all these tourists who have come from the world over. Leonardo da Vinci’s woman – swathed in dark cloth and silk, smiling enigmatically as she sits in front of a landscape of rocks, road and water – draws crowds like no other painting. But if the Mona Lisa can attract such attention fully clothed, what would the queues be like if she was nude?Strangely, this is not just amusing speculation – because in 18th-century Britain, she was. An engraving issued by a publisher called John Boydell gave libertine Georgians the opportunity to hang “Joconda” in their boudoir. It must have been popular because many copies survive...

Politics

32 h. ago Man Utd's key criteria for next manager laid out after Ruben Amorim and Erik ten Hag fell short

Ruben Amorim has departed Manchester United and the club have their sights on recruiting a new boss

Politics

32 h. ago Sinitta, 62, reveals she has split from her boyfriend and says she isn't 'afraid of being alone' as she strips down to her lingerie

Sinitta has revealed she has split from her mystery boyfriend as she took to Instagram to share a racy mirror picture in her lingerie on Thursday.

Politics

35 h. ago Gabby Logan shares final moments with dad Terry Yorath before his death in heartbreaking tribute

Wales and Leeds United legend Terry Yorath has died aged 75 following a short illness, with daughter Gabby Logan paying emotional tribute and revealing their final conversation

Events

36 h. ago New Stonehenge sound and light theory why huge boulders were hauled from Wales to Wiltshire

The mystery of the 'Bluestones' of Stonehenge has puzzled historians and scientists for generations

Politics

36 h. ago The best recent science fiction, fantasy and horror – review roundup

Godfall by Van Jensen; The Salt Bind by Rebecca Ferrier; The Poet Empress by Shen Tao; A Hole in the Sky by Peter F Hamilton; Hello Earth, Are You There? by Brian AldissGodfall by Van Jensen (Bantam, £20)The debut novel by a popular comic-book writer is set in a small town in Nebraska, after the landing of a three-mile-long alien figure dubbed “the Giant”. Local sheriff David Blunt is struggling to do his job following the sudden boom in population: in addition to scientists, government agents and soldiers at the highly classified research area established around the mystery from outer space, many more enthusiasts flood to the town, possibly including a serial killer. Two people have been killed in a horrifically brutal way when the FBI takes over and tries to shut him out. But when the next victim is a man he’s known all his life, Blunt is more determined than ever to catch the killer. His investigation draws him to infiltrate a doomsday cult and to discover more about the tangled ...

Events

36 h. ago Topless drug dealer asked police 'can I put clothes on' after unexpected visit

Cameron Lloyd, 21, was caught after messages relating to the supply of class A drugs were found on the phone of an associate

Events

37 h. ago Birmingham's sky turns purple as mystery behind strange glow is solved

Aerial views of the show a light over Birmingham city centre that appeared to turn the sky purple and leave locals baffled by the bizarre glowing phenomenon last night

Politics

37 h. ago NASA forced to end space station mission early due to astronaut's 'serious medical condition'

In a rare move, NASA is cutting short an International Space Station mission

Technology