Associated Press stories, Page 1718

WASHINGTON — Federal agents have seized more than 10 million fake 3M brand N95 masks in recent weeks, the result of an ongoing investigation into counterfeits sold in at least five states to hospitals, medical facilities and government agencies. The most recent seizures occurred Wednesday when Homeland Security agents intercepted...

MINEOLA, N.Y. — A 70-year-old man arrested Wednesday in the hit-and-run death of rapper Nicki Minaj’s father stopped briefly to ask the injured man if he was OK but didn’t call for help, police said. Charles Polevich faces charges of leaving the scene of an incident and tampering with physical...

COLUMBIA, S.C. — The South Carolina House on Wednesday passed a bill banning nearly all abortions, following the lead of other states with similar measures that would go into effect if the U.S. Supreme Court were to overturn Roe v. Wade. The proposal passed the Senate on Jan. 28. It...

WASHINGTON — How do you define success when it comes to reopening schools in the pandemic? President Joe Biden and his aides are having difficulty settling on an answer to that question. At his town-hall forum Tuesday night, Biden denied that his administration ever thought one day of classroom instruction...

MOSCOW — Europe’s top human rights court has ordered Russia to release jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny, a ruling quickly rejected Wednesday by Russian authorities who are bent on isolating the Kremlin’s most prominent foe. The decision by the European Court of Human Rights had demanded that Russia free Navalny...

PALM BEACH, Fla. — Rush Limbaugh, the talk radio host who ripped into liberals, foretold the rise of Donald Trump and laid waste to political correctness with a merry brand of malice that made him one of the most powerful voices on the American right, died Wednesday. He was 70....

Heeding the call of California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a state senator introduced legislation Wednesday that would ban all fracking in the nation’s most populated state by 2027 and halt the oil and gas extraction method around schools and homes by Jan. 1. Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, is a technique used...

The Detroit Lions have hired wide receivers coach Antwaan Randle El. Detroit coach Dan Campbell added the former NFL receiver to his staff Wednesday after he was with the Super Bowl champion Tampa Bay Buccaneers the past two seasons as an offensive assistant. Randle El was drafted by Pittsburgh in...

At least 11 people were rescued Tuesday evening after a large water main break in Philadelphia left cars submerged and the area completely flooded, authorities said. The 48-inch break occurred around 6 p.m. in the Nicetown area of North Philadelphia, news outlets reported. Flood waters consumed the streets, swamping cars...

LONDON — Britain’s 99-year-old Prince Philip has been admitted to a London hospital after feeling unwell, Buckingham Palace said Wednesday. The palace said the husband of Queen Elizabeth II was admitted to the private King Edward VII Hospital on Tuesday evening. It called the admission “a precautionary measure” taken on...

FRANKFURT, Germany — Ford announced a major push into electric vehicles in Europe, vowing to convert its entire passenger car lineup on the continent to electrics by 2030. Ford will spend $1 billion to revamp its factory in Cologne, Germany and make it a base for production of battery powered...

NEW YORK — The $600 stimulus checks got Americans shopping again. After three months of declines, retail sales soared a seasonally adjusted 5.3% in January from the month before, the U.S. Commerce Department said Wednesday. It was the biggest increase since June and much larger than the 1% rise Wall...

TOKYO — Japan launched its coronavirus vaccination campaign Wednesday, months after other major economies started giving shots and amid questions about whether the drive would reach enough people quickly enough to save a Summer Olympics already delayed by the pandemic. Despite a recent rise in infections, Japan has largely dodged...

New York is suing Amazon, claiming the company failed to provide workers with a safe environment at two warehouses in the state as covid-19 infections surged nationwide. The suit from New York Attorney General Letitia James landed just days after Amazon preemptively sued to block the suit over its coronavirus...

The winter weather that has overwhelmed power grids unprepared for climate change and left millions without electricity in record-breaking cold kept its grip on the nation’s midsection Wednesday. At least 20 people have died, some while struggling to find warmth inside their homes. In the Houston area, one family succumbed...

SEATTLE — A rare winter storm that dumped a foot of snow on Seattle couldn’t keep a 90-year-old woman from her first appointment for the coronavirus vaccine. The Seattle Times reports that Fran Goldman walked six miles round trip to get her shot. “I have been calling to get an...

Plant-eating dinosaurs probably arrived in the Northern Hemisphere millions of years after their meat-eating cousins, a delay likely caused by climate change, a new study found. A new way of calculating the dates of dinosaur fossils found in Greenland shows that the plant eaters, called sauropodomorphs, were about 215 million...

TEHRAN, Iran — The Iranian and Russian militaries have kicked off a joint naval drill in the Indian Ocean aimed at boosting security of maritime trade in the region, Iran’s state TV reported on Tuesday. The TV said units from Iran’s Navy and the powerful Revolutionary Guard’s naval forces will...

Stocks ended a tentative day of trading with mixed results as gains for energy companies and banks were offset by losses in other sectors. The S&P 500 ended down less than 0.1% Tuesday, and the Nasdaq lost 0.3%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average managed to eke out another record high...