Google and the McClatchy publishing company say they will work together on an experiment launching three digital-only outlets to provide local news in U.S. communities that are currently news "deserts." Besides providing news to the three communities, which the companies haven't named yet, the idea is to test business approaches that could revive local journalism. More than 1,800 U.S. newspapers have closed over the past 15 years, most of them in small towns, according to a University of North Carolina study. Big-city newspapers also suffering declines in staff and circulation.

A 13-year-old girl is missing after her parents were found dead. So far, police have no leads.

President Donald Trump starts the new year knee-deep in daunting foreign policy challenges at the same time he'll have to deal with a likely impeachment trial in the Senate and the demands of a reelection campaign. American troops are still engaged in America's longest war in Afghanistan. North Korea hasn't given up its nuclear weapons. Add to that simmering tensions with Iran, fallout from Trump's decision to pull troops from Syria, ongoing unease with Russia and Turkey, and erratic ties with European and other longtime Western allies.

China reacted furiously to President Donald Trump's signing of two bills on Hong Kong human rights and said the U.S. will bear the unspecified consequences. A foreign ministry statement Thursday repeated heated condemnations of the laws and said China will counteract. It said all the people of Hong Kong and China oppose the move. It's still unclear, however, how China will respond exactly.

A House freshman from New Jersey who was planning to break with his party and vote against impeaching President Donald Trump will become a Republican, a GOP official said Saturday. Top House Republicans have been told of Rep. Jeff Van Drew's decision, according to a GOP official familiar with the conversations. The lawmaker had discussed switching parties in a meeting with Trump at the White House on Friday, an administration official said Saturday.

Conservation specialists at the Phoenix Zoo say they are flying high over the arrival of four big-eyed baby pygmy owls. The cactus ferruginous pygmy owls hatched three weeks ago and are being raised by two pairs of adult owls.

Disruptions from last month’s partial government shutdown caused a “shocking” deterioration in the IRS’ telephone help for taxpayers in the first week of the filing season, the agency’s watchdog said in a report released Tuesday.

President Donald Trump is prepared to issue the first veto of his term if Congress votes to disapprove his declaration of a national emergency along the U.S.-Mexico border, a top White House adviser said on Sunday.

Suicides and drug overdoses helped lead a surge in U.S. deaths last year, and drove a continuing decline in how long Americans are expected to live. U.S. health officials released the latest numbers Thursday. Death rates for heroin, methadone and prescription opioid painkillers were flat. But deaths from the powerful painkiller fentanyl and its close opioid cousins continued to soar in 2017.

U.S. Rep. Joe Kennedy III formally declared his candidacy for the U.S. Senate on Saturday, becoming the first member of the Kennedy political dynasty to run for the upper chamber of Congress from Massachusetts since Edward M. Kennedy in 1962. The Democrat spoke to supporters gathered in a community center during a kickoff event in East Boston, where the Kennedy clan first settled after arriving from Ireland well over a century ago.