‘This IS INSANE’: Africa desperately short of covid vaccine
CAPE TOWN, South Africa — In the global race to vaccinate people against covid-19, Africa is tragically at the back of the pack. In fact, it has barely gotten out of the starting blocks. In South Africa, which has the continent’s most robust economy and its biggest coronavirus caseload, just...
Amid covid pandemic, U.S. deaths from heart disease and diabetes spiked to highest level in 20 years
NEW YORK — The U.S. saw remarkable increases in the death rates for heart disease, diabetes and some other common killers in 2020, and experts believe a big reason may be that many people with dangerous symptoms made the lethal mistake of staying away from the hospital for fear of...
FBI: Perceived grievances drove Virginia Beach mass shooter
NORFOLK, Va. — A city engineer who fatally shot 12 people in a Virginia Beach municipal building in 2019 “was motivated by perceived workplace grievances” that “he fixated on for years,” according to findings released by the FBI on Wednesday. The investigation, conducted by the FBI’s Behavioral Analysis Unit, found...
Jobless in Pa. livid over new unemployment system errors as state declares victory
Spotlight PA is an independent, non-partisan newsroom powered by The Philadelphia Inquirer in partnership with PennLive/The Patriot-News, TribLIVE/Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, and WITF Public Media. Sign up for our free newsletters. A long-delayed upgrade of Pennsylvania’s computer system for unemployment benefits made a glitch-filled debut Tuesday, frustrating some jobless workers and confirming...
White House drops Trump orders trying to ban TikTok, WeChat
WASHINGTON — The White House has dropped Trump-era executive orders that attempted to ban the popular apps TikTok and WeChat and will conduct its own review aimed at identifying national security risks with software applications tied to China, officials said Wednesday. A new executive order directs the Commerce Department to...
Wedding boom is on in the U.S. as vendors scramble to keep up
NEW YORK — Couples in the U.S. are racing to the altar in a vaccination-era wedding boom that has venues and other vendors in high demand. With restrictions on large gatherings loosening, wedding planners and others who make the magic happen said they’ve started pushing their bookings into late 2022...
Pennsylvania’s new unemployment claims system goes live, glitches and all
Pennsylvania’s long-awaited overhaul of its rickety unemployment claims filing system went live on Tuesday, with some users immediately complaining about glitches and the state agency that runs the program reporting a phone outage that temporarily prevented it from making or receiving calls. More than a year after the coronavirus pandemic...
3 girls killed, 1 badly injured in California hit-and-run
LUCERNE VALLEY, Calif. — Authorities on Tuesday were looking for a hit-and-run driver who killed three young girls — two of them wheelchairs — and left a fourth with life-threatening injuries as they walked along a Southern California desert highway. Willow Sanchez, 11, Daytona Bronas, 12, and Sandra Mizer, 13,...
Pa. House votes to end Wolf’s pandemic disaster declaration
HARRISBURG — Pennsylvania’s House of Representatives voted on party lines Tuesday to put an end to the governor’s pandemic disaster emergency declaration, less than a month after voters dramatically expanded lawmakers’ powers to control such declarations. The 113-90 vote sent the Republican-penned measure over to the Senate, where the GOP...
Biden gives video address to graduating Parkland students
PARKLAND, Fla. — President Joe Biden, in a surprise video address to a Tuesday commencement ceremony, said graduating seniors who were freshmen when a mass shooting left 17 people dead at their Florida high school have turned pain into purpose and darkness into light. Besides surviving the most deadly high...
Los Angeles nun to plead guilty to $835,000 school theft
LOS ANGELES — A Los Angeles nun who took a vow of poverty has agreed to plead guilty to federal charges for stealing more than $800,000 to pay for a gambling habit, prosecutors announced Tuesday. Mary Margaret Kreuper, 79, of Los Angeles was charged Tuesday with one count of wire...
Terry McAuliffe wins Democratic nomination for Virginia governor
RICHMOND, Va. — Terry McAuliffe, the exuberant former Virginia governor and longtime fixture of Democratic politics, won the party’s nomination Tuesday in his quest for a second term in office. McAuliffe will go on to face GOP nominee and political newcomer Glenn Youngkin in the November general election. Virginia is...
Pa. House sends local gun law pre-emption bill to state Senate
The Pennsylvania House of Representatives passed a bill Tuesday that would leave cities and towns that have tried to craft local gun control laws on the hook for all court costs associated with a successful court challenge to those ordinances. Carried by 112 of the 113 Republican votes and 12...
Pa. House advances ban on abortions over Down syndrome diagnoses
HARRISBURG — Republicans in the Pennsylvania House pushed through a bill Tuesday that would ban abortions that are prompted by a prenatal Down syndrome diagnosis, although the Democratic governor has vowed to veto it. State representatives voted 120-83 for legislation that the prime sponsor, Republican Rep. Kate Klunk of York...
U.S. education secretary promotes vaccine efforts at colleges
DEARBORN, Mich. — U.S. Education Secretary Miguel Cardona visited a covid-19 vaccine clinic at a suburban Detroit community college Tuesday to highlight the White House’s efforts to encourage similar efforts across the country. “We’ve been talking about how we’re going to recover as a country and all hands on deck,”...
2 face arraignment in road-rage shooting that killed boy, 6
SANTA ANA, Calif. — A Southern California couple could face a murder charge over a road rage shooting that killed a 6-year-old boy last month on a freeway, authorities said. Marcus Anthony Eriz, 24, and Wynne Lee, 23, were expected to be arraigned Tuesday in the death of Aiden Leos,...
Ex-Wisconsin pharmacist gets prison for ruining vaccine
MILWAUKEE — A former pharmacist in Wisconsin who purposefully ruined more than 500 doses of covid-19 vaccine was sentenced to three years in prison on Tuesday. Steven Brandenburg, 46, of Grafton pleaded guilty in February to two felony counts of attempting to tamper with a consumer product. He had admitted...
Crews work to reopen Floyd square, activists close it again
MINNEAPOLIS — City crews returned early Tuesday to a Minneapolis intersection where a memorial to George Floyd was assembled after his death last year and worked to reopen it to traffic by removing debris and makeshift barriers, only to have activists barricade the area again. Workers using front-end loaders and...
French leader Macron slapped in face on visit to small town
PARIS — French President Emmanuel Macron was slapped Tuesday in the face by a man during a visit to a small town in southeastern France, an incident that prompted a wide show of support for the head of state from politicians across from the ideological spectrum. The French president was...
Biden’s Justice Dept. to defend Trump in defamation lawsuit
NEW YORK — Donald Trump cannot be held personally liable for “crude and disrespectful” remarks he made about a woman who accused him of rape because he made the comments while he was president, U.S. Justice Department lawyers told an appeals court late Monday. Responding to misconduct allegations is part...
With $10B to spend, advocates press Wolf, Pa. lawmakers to prioritize poor people
Spotlight PA is an independent, nonpartisan newsroom powered by The Philadelphia Inquirer in partnership with PennLive/The Patriot-News, TribLIVE/Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, and WITF Public Media. Sign up for our free newsletters. HARRISBURG — As Gov. Tom Wolf and the Republican-led legislature begin the final month of budget negotiations, a coalition of groups...
Pennsylvania man accused of fatally stabbing woman, gambling with her money
Police had little to go on at first as they investigated the stabbing death of a Lackawanna County woman in March, but they announced on Monday that an arrest has been made. The Pennsylvania State Police say Jerry Koezeno of Mayfield has been charged in connection with the killing of...
Senate report details sweeping failures around Jan. 6 attack
WASHINGTON — A Senate investigation of the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol has uncovered broad government, military and law enforcement missteps surrounding the violent attack, including a breakdown within multiple intelligence agencies and a lack of training and preparation for Capitol Police officers who were quickly overwhelmed by...
Biden to get warm welcome from relieved but wary allies
LONDON — When U.S. President Joe Biden flies to Europe this week, he will find his hosts welcoming but wary. His predecessor Donald Trump may be gone, but he leaves a long shadow. Biden’s first foreign trip as president starts Wednesday and includes a gathering of the Group of Seven...
China’s wandering elephants becoming international stars
BEIJING — Already famous at home, China’s wandering elephants are now becoming international stars. Major global media are chronicling the herd’s more than yearlong, 300-mile trek from their home in a wildlife reserve in mountainous southwest Yunnan province to the outskirts of the provincial capital of Kunming. Twitter and YouTube...
