NPR News

Illinois has become the 11^th state in the country to legalize the recreational use and purchase of marijuana.

Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker, who was elected last year, signed the bill into law on Tuesday, fulfilling a key campaign promise. The state joins 10 others and the District of Columbia in allowing recreational use. The legislation takes effect on Jan. 1, 2020.

UPDATE (2:20 p.m. PT) — Senate President Peter Courtney, D-Salem, says Oregon's sweeping plan for addressing climate change this legislative session does not have the votes to pass.

But it's not clear whether that will be enough to bring Senate Republicans back to work. 

In 2004, on the day he turned 29, then-Army Staff Sgt. David Bellavia charged into a darkened house in Fallujah, Iraq and fired his weapon at lurking insurgents as the squad he led scrambled outside.

"Staff Sgt. Bellavia single-handedly saved an entire squad, risking his own life to allow his fellow soldiers to break contact and reorganize when trapped by overwhelming insurgent fire."

Uruguayan officials have launched a manhunt for an Italian organized crime boss known as the Cocaine King of Milan who escaped on Sunday from a detention center where he was awaiting extradition to Italy, the Uruguayan Ministry of Interior said in a statement.

Europe's top human rights organization is reinstating Russia's voting rights, a major step in removing penalties for a country accused of grave human rights violations.

Russia was stripped of its rights in 2014, after it annexed the Crimean Peninsula from Ukraine. The seizure triggered international condemnation.

After a crash that killed seven motorcyclists in New Hampshire, lawyers for the man charged with seven counts of negligent homicide have entered a plea of not guilty.

According to the criminal complaint, 23-year-old Volodymyr Zhukovskyy was driving erratically in a Dodge pickup truck and trailer on Friday night. He allegedly crossed the center line of a rural road in the small town of Randolph, colliding with a group of motorcyclists.

There's been some question about whether Avengers: Endgame will knock global box-office champ Avatar out of first place in Hollywood's record books.

Endgame now stands at nearly $2.75 billion dollars, putting it just shy of Avatar's $2.79 billion, and limping toward a finish line it may not quite cross, but hey, what's a few million dollars among blockbusting pals, right?

Avatar's held the top spot since knocking Titanic down a peg a decade ago.

In India's sixth-largest city, lines for water snake around city blocks, restaurants are turning away customers and a man was killed in a brawl over water. Chennai, with a population of almost 10 million, is nearly out of water.

In much of India, municipal water, drawn from reservoirs or groundwater, typically runs for only a couple of hours each day. That's the norm year-round. The affluent fill tanks on their roofs; the poor fill jerrycans and buckets.

The Fredericksburg General District Court is a red-brick courthouse with Greek columns in a picturesque, Colonial Virginia town. A horse and carriage are usually parked outside the visitor center down the street.

Federal prosecutors say a lenient plea deal struck more than a decade ago with multimillionaire and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein should be allowed to stand.

Updated at 6:15 p.m. ET

San Francisco's Board of Supervisors voted unanimously Tuesday to ban the sale and distribution of e-cigarettes in the city. The city is the corporate home of Juul Labs, the biggest producer of e-cigarettes in the United States.

City Attorney Dennis Herrera co-authored the ordinance, and celebrated the final vote. "This is a decisive step to help prevent another generation of San Francisco children from becoming addicted to nicotine," he says.

Updated at 3:40 p.m. ET

First lady Melania Trump announced Tuesday that her own spokeswoman, Stephanie Grisham, will take over for Sarah Sanders as White House press secretary.

Updated at 3:13 p.m. ET

Oregon's sweeping plan for addressing climate change this legislative session is dead, Senate President Peter Courtney, a Democrat, announced on the state Senate floor Tuesday morning.

As a walkout by Republican senators over the cap-and-trade bill entered its sixth day — and in an apparent attempt to bring them back — Courtney gave assurances that the bill would die in the Senate chamber.

A Catholic high school in Indianapolis says it has decided to fire a gay teacher to remain in the local archdiocese.

In a letter to the community, leaders of Cathedral High School said they had been in talks with the Archdiocese of Indianapolis for 22 months before deciding to cut ties with the teacher.

Nothing is permanent — these meat sacks we call bodies, the weekly Viking's Choice playlist available on Spotify and Apple Music. Seriously, if you'd been sitting on last week's mix of metal, punk, drone and other misfit music for a late-night sesh, it's gone — like dust in the wind, dude.

Updated at 5:07 p.m. ET

The acting commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection plans to step down in the coming weeks, according to two agency officials, amid a public furor over the treatment of migrant children in U.S. facilities.

John Sanders is expected to make his resignation effective July 5, according to the officials, who spoke to NPR on condition of anonymity because an official announcement had not been made to agency employees.

In the semi-autobiographical Hulu series Ramy, comic Ramy Youssef plays a first-generation Muslim American who follows some — but not all — of the rules of his religion. Youssef, whose parents immigrated from Egypt, also co-created the series. He says he can relate to his character's "picking and choosing" approach to his faith.

Updated at 4:35 p.m. ET

President Trump is threatening to use "overwhelming force" against Iran, after Tehran lashed out at the U.S. over the latest round of sanctions against the regime.

"Any attack by Iran on anything American will be met with great and overwhelming force. In some areas, overwhelming will mean obliteration," Trump tweeted.

Later at a White House event, Trump said he's prepared for whatever happens next with Iran.

FedEx has been caught in the crossfire in the conflict between the Trump administration and China's Huawei Technologies. Now, the giant shipper is suing the U.S. Commerce Department to block the agency from enforcing export regulations against FedEx.

"FedEx is a transportation company, not a law enforcement agency," the company said in a statement announcing the lawsuit on Monday.

They are early risers and hard workers. They have a "talent for struggling through" and the determination that follows. Some are the first in their family to go to college — or even graduate from high school — and many are financially independent from their parents. They're often struggling to pay for rent, groceries and transportation while taking classes. And that means working while in school — in retail, on campus or even with a lawn care business.