Associated Press stories, Page 1980

The NCAA says college football players should be tested for covid-19 at least 72 hours before a game, players with high-risk exposures to the coronavirus should be quarantined for 14 days and everybody on the sideline should wear a mask. The nation’s largest governing body for college sports on Thursday...

COLUMBUS, Ohio — A statue of Christopher Columbus will not be removed from in front of the Ohio Statehouse until at least 2025, officials said Thursday. The 9-foot-tall, copper statue of Columbus will remain erected in front of the Statehouse in the largest city that bears the explorer’s name until...

HONG KONG — A breach in Twitter’s security that allowed hackers to break into the accounts of leaders and technology moguls is one of the worst attacks in recent years and may shake trust in a platform politicians and CEOs use to communicate with the public, experts said Thursday. The...

NEW YORK — USA Today says that a column that the newspaper solicited and published from presidential trade adviser Peter Navarro criticizing Dr. Anthony Fauci was misleading and did not meet fact-checking standards. The newspaper explained the decision in a note by Bill Sternberg, editorial page editor, attached to the...

DES MOINES, Iowa — Men’s and women’s college basketball coaches are proposing the NCAA eliminate standardized testing requirements from initial-eligibility standards, calling exams such as the SAT and ACT “longstanding forces of institutional racism.” The proposal Thursday came out of the new committee on racial reconciliation formed by the National...

SAO PAULO — A thousand deaths a day. Since late May, three months after Brazil’s first reported case of the coronavirus, it has recorded more than 1,000 daily deaths on average in a gruesome plateau that has yet to tilt downward. The country hit at least 75,000 confirmed deaths Wednesday...

Bug spray, swollen welts, citronella. It’s mosquito season. And in a normal year, the health department serving Ohio’s Delaware County would be setting out more than 90 mosquito traps a week — black tubs of stagnant water with nets designed to ensnare the little buggers. But this year, because of...

IOWA CITY, Iowa — A ruthless Iowa meth kingpin who killed five people, including two young girls, in 1993 to thwart his prosecution for drug trafficking is set to become the third federal inmate to be executed this week. Dustin Honken, 52, would become the first Iowa defendant to be...

Major college football teams will be permitted to count two victories against second-tier Division I teams toward bowl eligibility this season. The NCAA Division I Council’s blanket waiver loosens current rules that allow Football Bowl Subdivision teams to count only one victory against Football Championship Subdivision schools toward bowl eligibility....

Mary L. Trump’s scathing memoir about her uncle, President Donald Trump, is nearly a million seller on preorders alone. Simon & Schuster said Thursday that Mary Trump’s “Too Much and Never Enough” had sold a company record 950,000 copies in combined print, digital and audio editions as of its date...

TEL AVIV, Israel — As restaurants worldwide struggle to stay open in the coronavirus era, a new Tel Aviv noodle chain offers a pandemic-friendly approach: meals on the go with no human contact. Fast food cafeterias where customers ordered from vending machines, known as automats, once flourished in New York...

Last year saw record representation of LGBTQ characters in the 118 films released by major studios, according to a new study by GLAAD. But for the third straight year, the racial diversity of LGBTQ characters has waned and transgender characters again went unseen. GLAAD called the decrease in non-white LGBTQ...

NEW YORK — Stocks opened broadly lower on Wall Street on Thursday, extending weakness in overseas markets. The S&P 500 index gave up 0.6% in the early going, led by losses in technology companies. Twitter sank after a breach in its security allowed hackers to break into the accounts of...

YEREVAN, Armenia — Clashes resumed between Armenian and Azerbaijani forces on the South Caucasus nations’ shared border Thursday morning, with both sides blaming each other for attacks that continue the worst outbreak of hostilities in years. Armenia’s Defense Ministry accused Azerbaijani forces of trying to infiltrate the country. Ministry spokeswoman...

BALTIMORE — U.S. retail sales climbed a solid 7.5% in June, a sign that the economy was healing right before infections from the coronavirus spiked again and dragged down hopes for a steady recovery. The Census Bureau reported Thursday that retail sales are 1.1% higher than their levels from a...

TERRE HAUTE, Ind. — The United States on Thursday carried out its second federal execution this week, killing by lethal injection a Kansas man whose lawyers contended he had dementia and was unfit to be executed. Wesley Ira Purkey was put to death at the Federal Correctional Complex in Terre...

Nick Cannon apologized to the Jewish community late Wednesday for his “hurtful and divisive” words, a day after ViacomCBS severed ties with him for the remarks made on a podcast. The Anti-Defamation league and some Jewish leaders had condemned what they called anti-Semitic theories expressed by Cannon and demanded the...

BRISTOL, Tenn. — Cue the siren at the Dawsonville Pool Room — another Elliott is an All-Star winner. Chase Elliott joined his father, Hall of Famer “Awesome” Bill Elliott, as winner of NASCAR’s annual All-Star race, earning the $1 million prize Wednesday in front of limited spectators at Bristol Motor...

ATLANTA — Georgia’s Gov. Brian Kemp is explicitly banning Georgia’s cities and counties from ordering people to wear masks in public places. He voided orders on Wednesday that at least 15 local governments across the state had adopted even though Kemp had earlier said cities and counties had no power...

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump shook up his campaign staff Wednesday, replacing campaign manager Brad Parscale with veteran GOP operative Bill Stepien. Trump and Parscale’s relationship had been strained since a Tulsa, Okla., rally that drew a dismal crowd, infuriating the president. The president’s poll numbers have also been sinking...

SAO PAULO — Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro said Wednesday he has tested positive for the new coronavirus for a second time, following his July 7 announcement that he had covid-19. “I did the test yesterday, and at night the result came back that I am still positive for coronavirus,” Bolsonaro...