Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a measure Thursday prohibiting local governments from adding fluoride to their water systems, making it the second state in the country after Utah to implement a statewide ban on the mineral.

DeSantis signed the bill at a public event in Dade City, Florida, over the concerns of dentists and public health advocates.

“Yes, use fluoride for your teeth, that’s fine, but forcing it in the water supply is basically forced medication on people,” DeSantis said Thursday. “They don’t have a choice, you’re taking that away from them.”

State lawmakers approved the bill last month, requiring the mineral and some other additives be removed from water sources across the state. Utah was the first state to ban fluoride in late March, and its prohibition went into effect last week, while Florida’s provision is effective July 1.

Some local governments in Florida have already voted to remove fluoride from their water, ahead of the statewide ban. Earlier this month, Miami-Dade County commissioners voted to override a veto by Mayor Daniella Levine Cava and move forward with plans to remove fluoride from the county’s drinking water.

Feds investigating Comey’s seashell post

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said Thursday that federal law enforcement is investigating a social media post made by former FBI Director James Comey that she and other Republicans suggest is a call for violence against President Donald Trump.

In an Instagram post, Comey wrote “cool shell formation on my beach walk” under a picture of seashells that appeared to form the shapes for “86 47.”

Numerous Trump administration officials, including Noem, said Comey was advocating for the assassination of Trump, the 47th president. “DHS and Secret Service is investigating this threat and will respond appropriately,” Noem wrote.

Merriam-Webster, the dictionary used by the Associated Press, says 86 is slang meaning “to throw out,” “to get rid of” or “to refuse service to.” It notes: “Among the most recent senses adopted is a logical extension of the previous ones, with the meaning of ‘to kill.’ We do not enter this sense, due to its relative recency and sparseness of use.”

The post has since been deleted.

Comey subsequently wrote, “I posted earlier a picture of some shells I saw today on a beach walk, which I assumed were a political message. I didn’t realize some folks associate those numbers with violence.

“It never occurred to me,” Comey added, “but I oppose violence of any kind so I took the post down.”

Custom gene therapy treats newborn baby

A baby born with a rare and dangerous genetic disease is growing and thriving after getting an experimental gene editing treatment made just for him.

Researchers described the case in a new study, saying he’s among the first to be successfully treated with a custom therapy that seeks to fix a tiny but critical error in his genetic code that kills half of affected infants. Though it may be a while before similar personalized treatments are available for others, doctors hope the technology can someday help the millions left behind even as genetic medicine has advanced because their conditions are so rare.

“This is the first step towards the use of gene editing therapies to treat a wide variety of rare genetic disorders for which there are currently no definitive medical treatments,” said Dr. Kiran Musunuru, a University of Pennsylvania gene editing expert who co-authored the study published Thursday in the New England Journal of Medicine.

The baby, KJ Muldoon of Clifton Heights, Pa., is one of 350 million people worldwide with rare diseases, most of which are genetic. He was diagnosed shortly after birth with severe CPS1 deficiency, estimated by some experts to affect around one in a million babies.

Those infants lack an enzyme needed to help remove ammonia from the body, so it can build up in their blood and become toxic. A liver transplant is an option for some.

Smokey Robinson facing criminal probe

The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department said Thursday that it has opened a criminal investigation into rape and sexual assault allegations against Motown music luminary Smokey Robinson.

The department said in a statement that its Special Victims Bureau is “actively investigating criminal allegations” against Robinson.

Last week, four former housekeepers of Robinson filed a lawsuit alleging that he repeatedly raped and sexually assaulted them, in some cases for years, while they worked for him.

The suit filed in Los Angeles Superior Court seeks at least $50 million in damages over the alleged assaults, which the women say took place between 2007 and 2024.

Robinson’s lawyer said there was no merit to the allegations against the 85-year-old musical icon.

Man charged with Starmer arson fires

A 21-year-old man was charged Thursday with three counts of arson for fires that targeted two properties and a car linked to British Prime Minister Keir Starmer.

The Metropolitan Police force said Roman Lavrynovych, who was arrested Tuesday, was charged with arson with intent to endanger life.

The charges are linked to three incidents over the past week — a car fire on May 8, a fire Monday at Starmer’s private home that damaged the door of the house, and a fire Sunday outside a north London house converted into apartments connected to the U.K. leader. No injuries were reported from any of the fires.

Lavrynovych, a Ukrainian national, is due to appear in court on Friday.

Charges: Guard aviators stole Mont. elk antlers

Three Montana Army National Guard members face trespassing charges after authorities said they landed a Black Hawk helicopter in a mountain pasture on a private ranch to take several prized elk antlers before flying away.

A witness saw the May 4 landing and the person who owns the property reported it to officials, who tracked down the three guard members, Sweet Grass County Sheriff Alan Ronneberg said Thursday.

The guardsmen had been on a training flight from the city of Billings to Helena, the state capital, said Major Ryan Finnegan with the Montana National Guard. The helicopter landed briefly in the pasture located in the foothills of the Crazy Mountains, where the crew members picked up two individual antlers and an old elk skull with antlers still attached, the sheriff said.

Decapitated dolphin brings federal reward

Federal authorities want to know who decapitated a dolphin that had been stranded on an island off the coast of North Carolina last month, and they are offering a reward of up to $20,000 for information that could help them find out.

The 8-foot-long bottlenose dolphin was found dead on Lea-Hutaff Island, North Carolina, on April 15, according to a statement from the Office of Law Enforcement of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The reward notice included a photo of the dolphin, which was missing its head, as it lay on the shore of the remote, undeveloped barrier island, which is north of Wilmington, N.C., and only accessible by boat, the agency said.

Joe Don Baker, star of ‘Walking Tall,” dies

Joe Don Baker, the tall, broad-shouldered character actor who found overnight fame when he starred as a crusading Southern sheriff in “Walking Tall,” a surprise hit both at the box office and with critics, and who went on to an impressive range of screen roles over the next four decades, died May 7. He was 89.

The death was announced by his family Tuesday. The announcement did not say where he died or cite a cause.

Released in the era of “Dirty Harry” and “Billy Jack,” “Walking Tall” (1973) is the story of a Tennessee man who moves back to his hometown and finds it hopelessly changed by illegal gambling, prostitution and careless moonshiners. The movie, as Dave Kehr described it almost 40 years later in The New York Times, is “a wild-eyed fantasy about an incorruptible leader who finds it necessary to subvert the law in order to save it.”

— News service reports