Florida | featured news

There may be some terrible news to report out of Florida today, depending on how the state's residents have collectively decided to apply the basic science of biological classification to their lives. Last week, we noted some good news: The Florida legislature had finally passed a law that would outlaw bestiality and preserve the innocence of Florida's native fauna.

The Obama administration is giving Amtrak and rail projects in 15 states the $2 billion that Florida lost after the governor canceled plans for high-speed train service.

A Florida homeowner received quite a shock when she returned home on Saturday to find a 6-foot alligator in one of her bedrooms, according to reports from Bay News 9.

The wife of Miami Dolphins star receiver Brandon Marshall has been charged with stabbing him in the abdomen with a kitchen knife during a domestic violence incident, according to a report from the Broward County, Florida, sheriff's office.

The British tourist who caught a 1-year-old child as she fell from the fourth-floor balcony of an Orlando, Florida, hotel was honored by government and business leaders Friday.

Republicans Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee hold a slight lead over President Barack Obama in a new poll of Florida residents on next year's presidential election. If the election were held now, 48 percent said they would vote for Romney while 43 percent preferred Obama. Huckabee was favored 49 percent to 44 percent in the same matchup. The two former governors were the only Republicans leading the incumbent president in a survey of 800 likely voters taken between April 4 and April 7 by Washington-based Mason-Dixon Polling and Research. The random telephone survey, which had a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points was completed the day before Obama and Congress announced their compromise on the federal budget.

The man extradited to Florida for writing, publishing and selling a controversial book considered a "how-to" for pedophiles pleaded no contest to criminal charges in exchange for two years' probation, authorities said Thursday.

Large portions of the Southwest, southern Plains, Florida and the Southeast are all still enduring severe to extreme drought conditions.

A provincial spokesman in Afghanistan said more than 100 people were demonstrating against the the burning of a Quran by a American pastor in Florida.

Severe weather tore across central Florida on Thursday, causing damage and spawning an apparent tornado in Tampa, the National Weather Service said.