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Countries in the Gulf States have some of the highest levels of immigration as a percentage of their population in the world.
Baymont Inn & Suites is one of more than 250 in Florida that entered agreements with the Federal Emergency Management Agency to provide rooms for Puerto Rican evacuees. (Stavros Agorakis)
At least 60 percent of Puerto Ricans receiving TSA assistance in the United States don’t plan to return to the island when funding expires, a FEMA representative said, although that could change in the future as the island rebuilds.
A house destroyed during Hurricane Maria in September 2017 is seen in Utuado, Puerto Rico February 1, 2018. Picture taken February 1, 2018. REUTERS/Alvin Baez
In Washington, many lawmakers have criticized FEMA as having too lenient standards for determining whether Puerto Ricans’ homes damaged by the hurricane are livable. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said one home FEMA defined as “hospitable” doesn’t have a secure roof, doors, or windows, and may not have access to power or clean water.
Hillsborough County, where Sickles High School is located, serves about 260,000 students and is the eighth largest school system in the United States. (Stavros Agorakis)
Carlos Velazquez, 14, who attends Howard W. Blake High School in Hillsborough County, doesn’t read or write in English. But all of his courses, including physics, math, and literature, are taught by English-speaking teachers, while only one teacher is available to help Spanish-speaking students understand their coursework.
Authorities maintain a cordon near the site of an incident reported as an explosion in southwest Austin, Texas, U.S. March 18, 2018. REUTERS/Tamir Kalifa
"With this tripwire, this changes things," Christopher Combs, special agent in charge of the FBI's San Antonio division, said. "It's more sophisticated, it's not targeted to individuals ... a child could be walking down a sidewalk and hit something."
The Bibles for the presidential inauguration are carried out the West Front of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. on Jan 20, 2017. Image via RNS/Win McNamee/AP.
The Bible also has the Trump name etched on the front cover. Upon his graduation from Sunday school — in 1955 at age 9 — it was signed by his pastor and Sunday school teachers. At his inauguration, the president also took the oath of office on the Lincoln Bible, which was also used by President Obama at his 2009 inauguration.
Image via Heather Wilson
Solidarity Cville, a “community defense network” of multiple local activist groups, is pressing Charlottesville Commonwealth Attorney, Joe Platania, to drop all charges against Harris. In addition to holding a vigil outside the police department in the District Courthouse on Thursday evening, the group is preparing a sustained response to Harris’ trial on Friday.
Image via Emily McFarlan Miller / RNS
Another issue that we know: In a number of states, pregnant women, when they give birth in the midst of their sentences, they’re forced to be shackled to a gurney in the midst of their delivery process. We know being born into that stress-induced state has irreversible cognitive impacts on the child, but we still haven’t changed the law in light of that.
British physicist Stephen Hawking delivers a lecture on "The Origin of the Universe" at the Heysel conference hall in Brussels May 20, 2007. REUTERS/Francois Lenoir/File photo
“What could define God [is thinking of God] as the embodiment of the laws of nature. However, this is not what most people would think of that God,” Hawking told Diane Sawyer in 2010. “They made a human-like being with whom one can have a personal relationship. When you look at the vast size of the universe and how insignificant an accidental human life is in it, that seems most impossible.”
Image via JP Keenan/Sojourners
There were more than 3,136 demonstrations across the country, according to the Women's March Youth Empower website. Students and supporters in states like Florida, New York, Michigan, and Virginia walked out of their schools with signs and chants.
On March 14, one month since a mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla. left 17 dead, thousands of students around the country staged a walkout from their schools. These are photos from the Washington, D.C., walkout that ended outside the White House.
A worshipper holds a cross during a protest in front of the closed doors of the Church of the HolySepulchre in Jerusalem's Old City, February 27, 2018. REUTERS/Ammar Awad
“It is absurd for Jerusalem residents to fund municipal services for the churches … on their own, and for the municipality to be prevented from collecting enormous sums that could significantly improve the city’s development and services,” Barkat said.
Image via Kit Doyle / RNS
“The internet is public space,” said John Kutsko, executive director of the Society of Biblical Literature, the oldest and largest learned society devoted to the critical investigation of the Bible, with about 8,500 members, mostly scholars. “It’s our understanding that .bible was registered to be public space and not have the kind of restrictions that you would expect of a domain that was proprietary or brand-oriented.”
Activists install 7000 shoes on the lawn in front of the U.S. Capitol on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S. March 13, 2018. REUTERS/Eric Thayer
Organized by Avaaz, a U.S.-based civic organization that emphasizes global activism, intends for the "Monument for our Kids" to put pressure on Congress to take action on gun control. Images of the striking visual have been widely shared on social media, with the hashtag #NotOneMore.
Image via JuliusKielaitis / Shutterstock.com
Mason found that the magazine virtually ignored people of color in the U.S. until the 1970s who were not laborers and domestic workers, and consistently perpetuated people of color from foreign lands as "exotics, famously and frequently unclothed, happy hunters, noble savages—every type of cliché."
Pope Francis (L) meets Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI at the Vatican June 28, 2017. Picture taken June 28, 2017. Osservatore Romano/Handout via Reuters
In his letter, former Pope Benedict disputed suggestions by conservatives that Francis' academic qualities were lacking, praising his successor as a "man of deep philosophical and theological formation" and praising an "interior continuity between the two pontificates".
Since 26 students and teachers were murdered and two injured by a gunman at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., there have been 10 more fatal shootings at American elementary, middle, and high schools. In all, 57 people were killed, excluding the shooters.
Activists and DACA recipients march up Broadway during the start of their 'Walk to Stay Home,' a five-day 250-mile walk from New York to Washington D.C., to demand that Congress pass a Clean Dream Act, in Manhattan, New York, U.S., February 15, 2018. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton
In the wake of the Supreme Court ruling that delayed the Trump administration's March 5 deadline, leaders from the National Latino Evangelical Coalition, Esperanza, Christian Community Development Association, Bread for the World, as well as U.S. Catholic bishops referenced Matthew 25 to address the biblical calling to "treat the immigrant with dignity, respect and love, providing the same welcome that we ourselves would hope for."
Image via Michael Wuensch/Creative Commons
“I am sure the largest currency used on the black market, for [buying] haram things, is the U.S. dollar. So if the question of a currency being haram is what it is used for, the dollar would be the most haram,” Sabree said. “Just because a tool is used for something haram, doesn’t mean the tool is haram.”
Image via Catherine Bebbington/Creative Commons
Speaking to members of Parliament on Wednesday, Spielman reiterated her concerns about religious extremism in English schools and said her inspectors had found in some private Islamic schools that children had been shown films of people being beheaded and that they had been taught that it is acceptable for men to beat their wives.