Pence to keep up travel despite contact with infected aides
WASHINGTON — Vice President Mike Pence plans to maintain an aggressive campaign schedule this week despite an apparent outbreak of the coronavirus among his senior aides, the White House says. Pence’s chief of staff, Marc Short, and “a couple of key staff surrounding the vice president” have tested positive for...
Pa. Attorney General Josh Shapiro seeks second term in race against Republican Heather Heidelbaugh
Attorney General Josh Shapiro calls himself “the people’s lawyer.” Heather Heidelbaugh, his Republican challenger in the Nov. 3 election, refers to herself as “a lawyer’s lawyer.” While Shapiro has garnered national headlines for his impassioned challenges against the Trump administration, Heidelbaugh says the office is one that should focus on...
1 million could lose power as California winds whip up
SAN FRANCISCO — Northern California officials urged residents to leave homes in the hills, secure backyard furniture and other loose items and have an evacuation plan ready ahead of powerful winds that could lead to widespread electricity outages and leave more than 1 million people in the dark. Pacific Gas...
Eyes turn to Texas as early voting surge surpasses 2016
AUSTIN, Texas — Texas has already cast nearly 7 million votes, more than anywhere in America, and Glen Murdoch couldn’t get his ballot in fast enough after becoming a U.S. citizen this summer. “I was champing at the bit,” said Murdoch, who moved to Austin from Australia shortly after President...
GOP asks Supreme Court again to block Pa. ballot extension
HARRISBURG — The Pennsylvania Republican Party is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to speedily take up its case to block counties in the presidential battleground state from counting mailed-in ballots received up to three days after the Nov. 3 election. The Republican Party’s late Friday filing came four days after...
Surging coronavirus colors White House race in closing days
LUMBERTON, North Carolina — President Donald Trump on Saturday mocked Democrat Joe Biden as “an inspiring guy” for raising alarm about the pandemic even as the president attracted sizable campaign crowds with coronavirus cases surging across the country in the closing days of the race. Biden, pressing the case that...
Stressed freshmen missing quintessential college experience
It’s a major life milestone, the first time many U.S. teens have ever been on their own. Even in normal times, freshman year in college can be a jumbled mix of anticipation, uncertainty and emotional highs and lows. In these hardly normal times, when the quintessential college experience exists only...
Pennsylvania reports 3rd consecutive day of more than 2,000 coronavirus cases; 29 new deaths
Pennsylvania on Saturday reported 2,043 new coronavirus cases — a dip from yesterday’s record-setting 2,219 — but still the third consecutive day the state has posted more than 2,000 cases. The state Department of Health reported 29 new deaths attributed to the coronavirus after posting 33 Friday, which matched the...
Attack, then pandemic: Pittsburgh Jewish congregations cope
Two years ago, the three congregations sharing space at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue relocated after an anti-Semitic gunman killed 11 worshippers. Last March, the congregations dispersed from their new locations due to the coronavirus pandemic and switched to virtual services. On Tuesday, as they again mourn those killed on...
Chief: Illinois officer who shot Black couple in car fired
WAUKEGAN, Ill. — A suburban Chicago police officer who shot a Black couple inside a vehicle — killing a 19-year-old man and wounding his girlfriend — has been fired, the police chief announced late Friday. The officer who fatally shot Marcellis Stinnette and the wounded Tafara Williams following what authorities...
California prosecutors again seek death for Scott Peterson
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — California prosecutors said Friday they again will seek the death penalty for Scott Peterson even as a county judge considers throwing out his conviction for murdering his pregnant wife, Laci Peterson, because of juror misconduct during a 2005 trial that riveted the nation. Stanislaus County Assistant District...
New tools are transforming breast cancer treatment in Pittsburgh
Lissa Yanak had been cancer-free for four years when doctors diagnosed her — again — with the same type of cancer. This time around, in early 2019, the triple negative breast cancer, spread to the lymph nodes above the collarbone. Yanak and her husband didn’t know what the future held,...
How a Kevin Bacon video (and other things) helped reporter survive breast cancer
I can’t really have breast cancer. That is the shock every woman goes through when hit with the diagnosis. Then comes the fear, the fight, the treatment, maybe more fear — all of which I knew about — but the post-cancer treatment, not so much. As a breast cancer survivor...
Family of slain Utah college student confronts her killer
SALT LAKE CITY — Family members of a Utah college student who was found strangled and burned last year following a search for her that captured the nation’s attention called the man who pleaded guilty to her murder a “monster” Friday as they confronted him before he was sentenced to...
Navy training plane crashes in Alabama; injuries unclear
FOLEY, Ala. — A U.S. Navy training plane that took off from Florida crashed Friday in an Alabama residential neighborhood near the Gulf Coast, authorities said. Officials did not immediately release information about possible fatalities, but said no one on the ground was hurt. Foley Fire Chief Joey Darby said...
FBI joins investigation into fatal Illinois police shooting
WAUKEGAN, Ill. — The FBI will join Illinois State Police in investigating a police shooting in suburban Chicago that killed a Black man who was a passenger in a vehicle and wounded the Black female driver, a prosecutor announced Friday. Lake County State’s Attorney Michael Nerheim said he asked the...
Asteroid samples escaping from jammed NASA spacecraft
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — A NASA spacecraft is stuffed with so much asteroid rubble from this week’s grab that it’s jammed open and precious particles are drifting away in space, scientists said Friday. Scientists announced the news three days after the spacecraft named Osiris-Rex briefly touched asteroid Bennu, NASA’s first...
Judge: Michigan agency can evaluate Great Lakes tunnel plan
TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. — The Michigan Public Service Commission has some authority over Enbridge’s plans to build an oil pipeline tunnel beneath the channel that connects two of the Great Lakes, a state administrative law judge ruled Friday. The agency can evaluate the need for the project and whether it...
Some hospitals in crisis as U.S. nears high for covid-19 cases
BOISE, Idaho — The United States is approaching a record for the number of new daily coronavirus cases in the latest ominous sign about the disease’s grip on the nation, as states from Connecticut to the Rocky Mountain West reel under the surge. The impact is being felt in every...
Poles vent fury at court’s further restrictions on abortions
WARSAW, Poland — Throngs of protesters vented anger Friday across Poland over a top court ruling that declared abortions of fetuses with congenital defects unconstitutional, effectively narrowing one of Europe’s strictest abortion laws. Police vans and units in riot gear were dispatched to guard the Warsaw home of the leader...
Ohio announces pandemic grants, governor denounces threats
COLUMBUS, Ohio — Small businesses, bars and restaurants, low-income renters, arts groups, and colleges and universities are among those eligible for $429 million in federal pandemic dollars being released by the state next week, Gov. Mike DeWine and his fellow Republican legislative leaders announced Friday. The aid package, which the...
Washington state discovers 1st ‘murder hornet’ nest in U.S.
SPOKANE, Wash. — Scientists in Washington state have discovered the first nest of so-called murder hornets in the United States and plan to wipe it out Saturday to protect native honeybees, officials said. Workers with the state Agriculture Department spent weeks searching, trapping and using dental floss to tie tracking...
Pa. ballots can’t be tossed out over voter signature, court says
Pennsylvania’s Supreme Court ruled unanimously Friday on a key concern surrounding an avalanche of mail-in ballots in the presidential battleground state, prohibiting counties from rejecting ballots because the voter’s signature on it may not resemble their signature on their registration form. Two Republican justices joined five Democratic justices in the...
U.S. suicide rate fell last year after decade of steady rise
The U.S. suicide rate fell slightly last year, the first annual decline in more than a decade, according to new government data. It’s a small decrease and the data is preliminary, but the decline is “really exciting,” said Dr. Christine Moutier, chief medical officer of the American Foundation for Suicide...
Pennsylvania reports record 2,219 new covid-19 cases for a single day
Pennsylvania on Friday reported a record-high 2,219 coronavirus cases in a single day. It is the second consecutive day with new reported cases above 2,000. The state’s 7-day average has risen to a high of 1,642 cases with a 7-day total of 11,493. With 18,008 test results, the daily positivity...
