U.S. Justice Department

President Joe Biden’s nominee for attorney general is set for his confirmation hearing vowing to prioritize civil rights, combat extremist attacks and ensure the Justice Department remains politically independent

Top former Justice Department officials, including U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions and deputy Rod Rosenstein, helped drive a Trump administration policy that resulted in the separation of children from their parents, a draft inspector general report shows.

Attorney General William Barr is taking aim at his own Justice Department, criticizing prosecutors for behaving as “headhunters” in their pursuit of prominent targets and politically charged cases.

Five officers are dead — four Dallas police officers and one Dallas Area Rapid Transit officer — in what authorities called a sniper ambush on police officers at the end of a peaceful protest against nationwide officer-involved shootings Thursday night.

The U.S. Department of Justice opened a sweeping antitrust investigation of major technology companies and whether their online platforms have hurt competition, suppressed innovation or otherwise harmed consumers. It said the probe will take into account “widespread concerns” about social media, search engines and online retail services. Its antitrust division is seeking information from the public, including those in the...

Ecuador has denied WikiLeaks’ claims that it is set to expel Julian Assange from its embassy in London, rejecting what it called “an attempt to stain the dignity of the country,” NBC News reported. Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, hasn’t left the embassy since 2012. He sought refuge there to avoid arrest and potential extradition to the United States for...

An internal team at the Census Bureau found that basic personal information collected from more than 100 million Americans during the 2010 headcount could be reconstructed from encrypted data, but with lots of mistakes, a top agency official disclosed Saturday. The age, gender, location, race and ethnicity for 138 million people were potentially vulnerable. So far, however, only internal hacking...

The Supreme Court will decide whether the 2020 census can include a question about citizenship that could affect the allocation of seats in the House of Representatives and the distribution of billions of dollars in federal money. The justices agreed Friday to a speedy review of a lower court ruling that has so far blocked the Trump administration from adding...

The U.S. government is allocating nearly $17 million to help people affected by the Las Vegas Strip mass shooting that became the deadliest in the nation’s modern history, Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker said Friday. The money from the Justice Department will defray costs of counseling, therapy, rehabilitation, trauma recovery and legal aid for thousands of people affected by the...

Reports of long lines, broken machines and power outages at polling locations throughout the region greeted voters Tuesday.

Rain isn’t the only thing causing delays at the polls this Nov. 6. Would-be morning voters faced issues with late or absent election officials, electrical problems, and downed voting machines. However, by mid-afternoon, problems had been found and fixed… now, NBC10 says, polling experts expect the major complications are mostly over.

The U.S. Justice Department has opened an investigation of child sexual abuse inside the Roman Catholic Church in Pennsylvania, using subpoenas to demand confidential files and testimony from church leaders, according to two people familiar with the probe.

Federal investigators have begun serving subpoenas to Pennsylvania diocese requesting sensitive documents related to the abuse of children by clergy.

Malaysia’s parliament on Monday passed a new law prohibiting fake news that critics fear will be abused to silence dissent ahead of a general election. Despite criticism from opposition lawmakers that the anti-fake news legislation will lead Malaysia closer to dictatorship, the bill was approved after a heated debate with 123 lawmakers voting for it and 64 against. The bill...

New Jersey governor-elect Phil Murphy doesn’t succeed Chris Christie until next week, but already his fellow Democrats have introduced legislation to achieve one of his campaign promises, legalizing marijuana.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed a bill allowing Russia to register international media outlets as foreign agents — a move largely seen as retaliation against the U.S. for similar crackdowns on Kremlin-funded media outlets, NBC News reported. Putin signed the bill into law Saturday after the upper chamber of the Russian parliament adopted it Wednesday. The move is seen...

At least 25 transgender people in the United States have been homicide victims so far this year, the highest annual total on record, according to advocacy groups that have been monitoring the grim phenomenon and seeking ways to reduce the toll. The Human Rights Campaign, in a report released Friday, calculated that 102 transgender people have been killed in the...

In the blink of an eye a peaceful protest in downtown Dallas turned to panic, as hundreds of people ran for their lives Thursday night.

An FBI agent pleaded not guilty on Wednesday to charges that he lied about shooting at a key figure in last year’s armed occupation of a national wildlife refuge just before the man was killed by Oregon police.
W. Joseph Astarita said nothing during a brief court hearing and was released on his own recognizance.

A federal judge on Tuesday approved a settlement in the wrongful-death lawsuit filed by the parents of Michael Brown, an unarmed, black 18-year-old, whose fatal shooting by a white police officer nearly three years ago in Ferguson, Missouri, set off months of protests. Financial terms of the settlement approved by U.S. District Judge E. Richard Webber were not disclosed. Anthony...