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Negotiators trying to produce a nuclear accord with Iran will fail to meet their self-imposed March 31 deadline to come up with a broad political understanding about eliminating Iran’s pathway to a bomb, the State Department said today. “We’ve made enough progress in the last days to merit staying until Wednesday,” State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said in a statement to reporters in Lausanne, Switzerland, where the talks are being…

In this courtroom sketch, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, center, is depicted between defense attorneys Miriam Conrad, left, and Judy Clarke, right, during his federal death penalty trial, March 5, 2015, in Boston. Jane Flavell Collins/AP Photo In the Boston Marathon bombing trial the prosecution took 92 witnesses and more than three weeks to present their case, but today the defense for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev rested after just four witnesses and about six hours….

(CNN)Gov. Mike Pence pledged Tuesday to “fix” Indiana’s controversial religious freedom law to clarify that it does not allow discrimination against gays and lesbians. But he insisted the problem isn’t the law itself but how it’s being perceived, saying a fix is needed only because of “frankly, the smear that’s been leveled against this law.” And he said the fix won’t involve statewide anti-discrimination protections for LGBT Hoosiers. The first-term…

The U.S. and five other world powers moved Tuesday toward annoucing a preliminary agreement that would enable them to continue negotiations to curb Iran’s nuclear program for the next three months, though with many key issues unresolved. In six days of intense high-level talks, the group has been able to avoid a breakdown that would have imperiled an 18-month effort to reach a deal curbing Iran’s nuclear activities. But negotiators…

New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft took the stand at the Aaron Hernandez murder trial in Bristol Superior Court today, telling the jury that he met with the former Patriots tight end two days after Hernandez’s friend Odin Lloyd was murdered. Both the prosecution, led by William McCauley, and defense questioned Kraft as a witness, asking about the details of the June 19, 2013 meeting, and whether or not Kraft…

Immigration activists disillusioned with Obama, Democrats as amnesty afterglow fades

LAUSANNE, Switzerland—With a key deadline just hours away, U.S. and European officials said nuclear negotiations were imperiled by deep uncertainty over whether Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei would sign off on the necessary concessions for a deal. All parties to the talks have set March 31 as the date for concluding a framework agreement that would outline all the main elements of a deal constraining Iran’s nuclear program in…

Republican legislators in Indiana said Monday that they were working on adding language to the state’s controversial new religious freedom law that would make clear that the measure does not permit discrimination against gays and lesbians.  The effort is the latest attempt to quell a firestorm that has led two governors to ban publicly funded travel to the Hoosier State and threatens to overshadow this weekend’s NCAA men’s basketball Final…

(CNN)Indiana is the new ground zero in the battle over the Republican Party’s future. The GOP’s years-long existential debate over how to expand the party’s reach is exploding in the Hoosier State after Republican Gov. Mike Pence signed a controversial religious freedom bill into law last week. The measure, which is being criticized for allowing companies to deny services to gay customers in the name of religious belief, is catching…

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A German pilot who recently flew with the co-pilot accused by French prosecutors of deliberately crashing a Germanwings plane said he seemed like a “normal guy,” and he “had plans for the future.” French prosecutors have said co-pilot Andreas Lubitz deliberately slammed the passenger plane into a mountain on Tuesday. Authorities have since said he hid evidence of an illness from his employers, including a sick note that was found…