Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont says the major traffic artery linking New England with New York will be closed for days around the area where a tanker fire damaged a bridge over Interstate 95. The tanker truck filled with gasoline burst into flames in a three-vehicle crash Thursday on I-95 in southwest Connecticut. The East Coast’s main north-south highway subsequently closed, causing major traffic jams. The crash caused damage to the bridge above it, which the governor said will need to be demolished and replaced. Lamont says the hope is to reopen the interstate by Monday morning.

Jurors in the hush money trial of Donald Trump have heard a recording of him discussing with his then-lawyer and personal fixer a plan to purchase the silence of a Playboy model who has said she had an affair with the former president. A visibly irritated Trump leaned forward at the defense table and jurors appeared riveted as prosecutors on Thursday played the September 2016 recording that attorney Michael Cohen secretly made of himself briefing his celebrity client on a plan to buy Karen McDougal’s story of an extramarital relationship. Testimony resumes Friday.

PHOENIX (AP) — Democratic Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs has relegated a Civil War-era ban on most abortions to the past by signing a repeal bill Thursday.

Police have arrested more than 2,000 people during pro-Palestinian protests at college campuses across the United States in recent weeks. That's according to a tally by The Associated Press. Demonstrations and arrests have occurred in almost every corner of the nation. But in the last 24 hours, they’ve drawn the most attention at the University of California, Los Angeles, where chaotic scenes played out early Thursday as officers in riot gear surged against a crowd of demonstrators. The California Highway Patrol has said at least 200 people were arrested in the crackdown at UCLA.