In the News

The auditorium at Torrance City Hall was nearly full Thursday night as several state senators heard testimony related to a Feb. 18 explosion at a nearby oil refinery.

A local resident described her husband entering their house, three miles from Exxon Mobil Corp.'s plant in Torrance, covered in white ash after the blast. A representative of the fire department said the ash fell like snow as far as Redondo Beach.

Dave Campbell, secretary-treasurer of United Steelworkers Local 675, said union members were angered by the incident, which left four contractors with minor injuries.

Well before the recent superbug outbreaks at UCLA and Cedars-Sinai hospitals, federal health officials had labeled deadly CRE bacteria an urgent threat.

Yet there are still no national reporting requirements for the antibiotic-resistant superbug, and only 20 states have imposed any rules. California is not among them.

When L.A. County officials examined the problem in 2011, they found 675 cases of CRE among patients at hospitals, nursing homes and long-term acute-care facilities over a one-year period.

Do Californians have the right to "instruct" their elected representatives through the ballot?

By the time 18-year-old Aaron Young wound up at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles last October, he'd been wrestling for months with excruciating stomach pain and vomiting that repeatedly sent him to the emergency room.

Diagnosed with acute pancreatitis, he underwent what is typically a low-risk procedure in which doctors inserted a special device down his throat to treat his digestive system.

After local and state officials praised new U.S. Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) on Sunday afternoon, the stage was set for the congressman to have his official district swearing-in — but then the fire alarm went off at UCLA's Royce Hall.\

Upon having the packed crowd seated again, Lieu joked that he was told the audience had made record time leaving and re-entering the building in 12 minutes, and he had no problem waiting for a moment he is still relishing — the confluence of his American dream. After he was sworn-in by Judge Jacqueline Nguyen, Lieu reflected on his journey.

Saying a study of the Rim of the Valley Corridor's future is months overdue and stuck in "bureaucratic limbo," three local members of Congress are urging the National Park Service to release the report.

Reps. Adam B. Schiff (D-Burbank), Judy Chu (D-Pasadena) and Ted Lieu (D-Torrance) used a recent letter to express their "strong concern over repeated and lengthy delays" in releasing the Rim of the Valley Corridor Special Resource Study and the failure of the park service "to meet its own deadlines."

A medical device called a duodenoscope that's been linked to recent deadly superbug infections across the country was also connected to a 2013 outbreak at a Wisconsin medical facility that infected five people, America Tonight has learned.

"I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation, or purpose of evasion, and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter."

So went the oath of office of Representative Ted Lieu at his Los Angeles swearing-in ceremony – but not before a fire alarm at UCLA's Royce Hall on Sunday, March 1, forced nearly 1,000 people out into the rain while firefighters investigated.

Directly after "God Bless America," the fire alarm went off and everyone was told to evacuate the building.