Asheville and other parts of western North Carolina were cut off from the world on Saturday, with no roads open into or out of the most populous city in the region and electricity and cell towers limited or inoperable.

Early voting for the Tuesday, Nov. 5 general election begins Tuesday, Oct. 8, and addition to the presidential, congressional and Supreme Court elections, there are a number of local issues for Highland County voters to consider, plus a judicial race in Madison Township.

Tropical Storm Helene brought strong winds, power outages in parts of the county and much-needed rain (but also flash flooding) to Highland County Friday, Sept. 27, with rain expected to continue over the coming days.

On Saturday morning, Ohio Governor Mike DeWine and first lady Fran DeWine traveled to New Boston in Scioto County to view areas impacted by flooding and meet with local law enforcement and emergency management officials.

In the last year, terrorist threats have increased to a level not seen since the Sept. 11, 2021, terrorist attack, only worsening after the Oct. 7, 2023, attack against Israel, federal officials say. “We are living on borrowed time,” U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, told The Center Square in an exclusive interview. “I believe that today we're at a greater risk for a major terrorist attack than we have been at any point since Sept. 11, 2001."

A coalition of small businesses are calling on Congress to make the 20-percent small business tax deduction permanent.

More than 660,000 criminal foreign nationals identified to be deported by U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement are freely living in communities nationwide. Among them are those convicted or charged with violent crimes, including homicide, sexual assault and kidnapping, according to information released in response to a congressional request.

Since April, the U.S. House Ways and Means Committee Tax Teams have held over 100 events and traveled to 18 states to learn how Congress can not only extend the expiring provisions of President Donald J. Trump’s signature 2017 tax law and avert the Biden-Harris Administration’s promised $7 trillion tax hike on all Americans, but also expand on that success to reform our tax code to the benefit of American workers, manufacturers, small businesses and farmers.

Ohio Governor Mike DeWine announced a list of appointments Friday, Sept. 27, with two Southern State Community College trustees among those reappointed.

Southern Ohio is under a high wind warning until 10 p.m. Friday, with wind gusts as high as 55 mph.

House Committee on Oversight and Accountability Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) and Rep. Nick Langworthy (R-N.Y.) are taking action to investigate potential politicization and apparent attempts to interfere in the 2024 election by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). 

"The Harris-Biden Administration has been caught fraudulently manipulating job statistics to hide the true extent of the economic ruin they have inflicted upon America," Donald Trump said in a statement after BLS revised the numbers, as The Center Square previously reported. "New Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that the Administration PADDED THE NUMBERS with an extra 818,000 Jobs that DO NOT EXIST, AND NEVER DID."

A Butler Township police officer said he’d warned the U.S. Secret Service about security concerns arising from the unguarded building where a would-be assassin shot and nearly killed former President Donald Trump during a July 13 rally in Pennsylvania.

Highland County commissioners David Daniels, Brad Roades and Terry Britton received the latest permissive sales tax receipt report, as well as an update on several upcoming events sponsored by the Highland County Health Department, during their Wednesday, Sept. 25 meeting.

An indictment was unsealed Tuesday charging two Ohio men with a bribery scheme in which a municipal prosecutor allegedly agreed to help a criminal defendant with his pending cases in exchange for auto repair work.