John Fetterman offers his office bathroom to Sarah McBride as she says she’ll follow GOP rules on restroom usage

Sen. John Fetterman, D.-Pa., has offered his office’s bathroom to Delaware State Sen. Sarah McBride, elected this month as the first openly transgender member of Congress, as House Republicans prepare to block her from using the women’s restrooms at the Capitol.

McBride said Wednesday that she will follow the rules though she disagrees with them.

“I’m not here to fight about bathrooms,” McBride said. “I’m here to fight for Delawareans and to bring down costs facing families.”

Fetterman’s offer comes as the incoming Delaware lawmaker faces attacks from Republican lawmakers, including a bill from U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace, R.-S.C., that would restrict lawmakers from using single-sex facilities “other than those corresponding to their biological sex,” which was clearly aimed at McBride.

—The Philadelphia Inquirer

How many Americans have guns? New poll finds spike in ownership among one group

The gun ownership rate among Republican women has increased significantly in recent years, new polling reveals.

According to Gallup’s annual gun ownership survey — which groups results in six-year clusters — 33% of GOP women owned guns between 2019 and 2024. That is a 14-point increase from 2007 to 2012, when 19% of Republican women owned firearms.

The poll, which sampled 6,425 adults from around the country, has a margin of error of about 1 percentage point. The overall gun ownership rate, meanwhile, has held steady at about 30% because of decreases in ownership among several demographics.

For example, 29% of Democratic men owned firearms between 2019 and 2024, representing a 7-point decrease from 2007 to 2012. Similarly, 39% of independent men owned guns during the most recent survey period, marking a 5-point decline from 2007 to 2012.

—The Charlotte Observer

Study: Maryland women must save $364,337 more than men for comfortable retirement

BALTIMORE — Maryland falls in the top five states where women must save more than men to have a comfortable retirement, a new study shows. Women tend to live longer and earn less than men, the Nov. 11 study by NetCredit showed.

In Maryland, women need to save $969,506 to retire comfortably, or about $364,337 more than men, according to data from the U.S. Census Bureau and MIT’s Living Wage Calculator.

NetCredit, an online financial services provider, compared the average length of retirement in the U.S. to life expectancy and wages by gender by state. The findings showed that the additional amount women in Maryland need to save would be equivalent to working more than seven years extra, with no spending.

NetCredit said about 4.1 million Americans will end up retiring this year. About two-thirds of retirees live on savings or pensions, while about 92% draw on Social Security.

—The Baltimore Sun

42 dead in Pakistan as gunmen attack convoy of Shiite Muslims

ISLAMABAD — Gunmen intercepted and fired at a convoy of vehicles carrying Shiite Muslims in Pakistan on Thursday, killing 42 people in one of the worse sectarian attacks in recent times amid a surge in deadly violence, an official said.

Around a dozen gunmen armed with automatic weapons targeted the convoy on a highway in the northwestern Kurram region near the Afghan border, local police chief Saleem Shah told dpa.

At least six women were among the dead while nearly a dozen injured people were being treated in hospital, another official, Wajid Hussain, said.

Kurram is a mountainous region near the country’s border with Afghanistan, and is predominantly home to Shiite Muslims. The community faces frequent attacks by Sunni extremist groups.

—dpa