The fire and explosion at a hazardous waste center in Bridgeport​ forced people to evacuate their homes. Source

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine vetoed a bill Friday that would have banned gender-affirming care for minors. The bill would have also blocked transgender athletes from participating in girls’ and womens’ school and college sports. Source

The NYPD and FBI are preparing to secure Times Square for the hundreds of thousands of visitors expected at Sunday’s New Year’s Eve celebration. Source

Prosecutors wrote in a letter that evidence presented at a second trial would duplicate evidence already shown to the jury in the first trial. Source

A Spirit Airlines employee has been fired after a 6-year-old boy who was traveling alone from Philadelphia to Fort Myers, Florida, last week was instead mistakenly placed on a flight to Orlando. Source

When Blossom lost her mate Bud earlier this year, the staff at the Iowa cemetery pond where the two geese had been living took out a personal ad to find Blossom a new partner. And it surprisingly worked. Steve Hartman has more on how the new couple are faring in “On the Road.” Source

Twenty-five states and dozens of U.S. cities are planning minimum wage increases in 2024, including California, which will boost minimum wage for fast-food workers to $20 per hour beginning Jan. 1. This week, Pizza Hut announced that it will lay off hundreds of delivery drivers as a result, one of the unintended economic consequences that experts say could result from the increases. Carter Evans reports. Source

Maine’s secretary of state on Thursday ruled that former President Donald Trump is unqualified to be on the state’s primary ballot due to his role in the Jan. 6 insurrection, while her counterpart in California ruled the opposite, declining to remove Trump’s name from the ballot there. There are similar pending challenges from Trump critics in several other states. Scott MacFarlane has the latest. Source

Russia launched 122 missiles and numerous drones on cities across Ukraine Friday. Apartments, a shopping mall and a maternity hospital were among the locations struck. Ukraine said its air defense systems shot down most of the missiles and drones, but dozens of people were still killed. David Martin has the latest. Source

An estimated one million revelers are expected to ring in 2024 in New York City’s Times Square. Amid daily protests over the Israel-Hamas war, and U.S. intelligence agencies warning of heightened threats of violence, the New York City Police Department will have thousands of officers on alert for one of the biggest New Year’s Eve parties in the world. Tom Hanson reports. Source