First Run News

MORE on Sunday night is hosting family, celebrities and members of his Cabinet at his Mar-a-Lago estate for a New Year's Eve celebration. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, former New York Mets great Keith Hernandez and Trump's children are among those in attendance, according to reporters. Reporters tweeted out photos of people arriving at the gathering. The menu for the event includes lobster ravioli and "7x sliced tenderloin and pan seared sea bass," according to pool reports. Guests wore formal attire, with some women wearing full length gowns and fur stoles. Trump

Minutes before Sunday Mass at St. Martin of Tours Roman Catholic Church in the Bronx, as the music began, a man approached the Rev. Cosme Fernandes. “Good morning, Father,” the man said. “I used to live in this neighborhood and I just drove in a truck full of clothes, but they told us they can’t take any more donations. What do I do?” Father Fernandes had no answer for the man, who had brought the donations for the survivors of a fire that killed 12 people on Thursday.

When the police surrounded a house in Wichita, Kan., late Thursday, they expected to find a gunman who told a 911 dispatcher that he was holding his mother and brother at gunpoint after shooting his father in the head. But no crime had been committed at that house, and the man who would be fatally shot by an officer moments later was not the person who had called.

They rehearse at night and learn choreography with breathtaking speed. They dance for crowds that extend into the thousands. Sure, New York City is home to lots of dance troupes, but if you’re a dance fan these two groups may not even be on your radar. Don’t be a snob. The Brooklynettes and the Knicks City Dancers perform intricate choreography during the breaks between quarters of pro-basketball games, in arenas with 360-degree views.

POLICE, Poland — At an isolated shipyard on Poland’s Baltic coast, men in coveralls used welding torches under a cold drizzle, forging an oil tanker for a customer in the Netherlands. The scene was unremarkable, save for the provenance of a dozen of the workers. “Yes, we are from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea,” one of them said. “We have been here quite a while.” Then he hurried away, alarm seizing his face. Four other welders confirmed that they were also from North Korea, the pariah state threatening the United States and much of East Asia with nuclear weapons.

BAR HARBOR, Me. — Residents of this scenic coastal town have struggled for the last several years with a conundrum familiar to anyone living in a beautiful place that attracts tourists: How do you maintain its essence when crowds threaten the very qualities they come to enjoy? Since the late 1990s, Bar Harbor has been a popular port of call for cruise ships.

In Sydney, rainbow fireworks sparkled off the Harbour Bridge in celebration of Australia’s recent legalization of gay marriage.

The new tax law is likely to accelerate a hotly disputed trend in the American economy by rewarding workers who sever formal relationships with their employers and become contractors. Management consultants may soon strike out on their own, and stockbrokers may hang out their own shingle. More cable repairmen and delivery drivers, some of whom find work through gig economy apps like Uber, may also be lured into contracting arrangements. That’s because a provision in the tax law allows sole proprietors — along with owners of partnerships or other so-called pass-through entities — to deduct 20 p

It began as a predawn call for the police to a disturbance at an apartment complex in a Denver suburb on Sunday. It ended, officials said, in a fusillade of more than 100 rounds fired by a barricaded gunman who shot five law enforcement officers, killing one of them. The gunman was killed by officers. Killed in the attack was Zackari Parrish, a 29-year-old deputy who had worked for the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office for seven months, Sheriff Tony Spurlock said at a news conference on Sunday afternoon.

In the weeks before their family trip to Costa Rica, Bruce and Irene Steinberg of Scarsdsale, N.Y., told friends and family how excited they were to take their three sons on an adventure through that country’s lush forests and tropical beaches. After visiting the Pacific coast, the Steinbergs were headed on Sunday to Costa Rica’s capital for the last stop of their trip.