3 men die, 1 injured at Florida motorcycle club shooting
ORLANDO, Fla. — Three men died and one man was injured in an early Friday shooting sparked by a confrontation at a Florida warehouse used by a motorcycle club, officials said. The Orange County Sheriff’s office says deputies are looking for suspects who may have fled the area in Orlando,...
Cops: Cleveland teen fatally shoots mom’s fiance in domestic dispute
CLEVELAND — A 13-year-old boy shot and killed his mother’s fiance as the man argued with other children inside a Cleveland home, authorities said. The shooting occurred around 10:30 p.m. Wednesday. Authorities have not said what spurred the argument in the home or how many people were involved, but they...
Thai PM rejects calls to resign, faces renewed protests
BANGKOK — Thailand’s prime minister rejected calls for his resignation Friday, while his government failed to stop student-led protesters from rallying again in the capital in defiance of a strict state of emergency. More than 1,000 protesters gathered in torrential monsoon rains to push their core demands, including that Prime...
U.S. testing 3 drugs to tamp down coronavirus
WASHINGTON — U.S. government officials are launching a new study testing three drugs to tamp down an overactive response by the immune system that can cause severe illness or death in people with covid-19. The U.S. National Institutes of Health says the study will enroll 2,100 hospitalized adults with moderate...
Twitter changes hacked content rules after Biden story furor
Twitter said late Thursday it was changing its policy on hacked content after an outcry about its handling of an unverified political story that prompted cries of censorship from the right. The social media company will no longer remove hacked material unless it’s directly shared by hackers or those working...
AP-NORC poll: Voters see the nation as fundamentally divided
NEW YORK — The overwhelming majority of voters believe the nation is deeply divided over its most important values, and many have doubts about the health of the democracy itself. And supporters of President Donald Trump and Joe Biden alike think the opposing candidate will make things even worse if...
Avalanche of early votes transforming 2020 election
More than 17 million Americans have already cast ballots in the 2020 election, a record-shattering avalanche of early votes driven both by Democratic enthusiasm and a pandemic that has transformed the way the nation votes. The total represents 12% of all the votes cast in the 2016 presidential election, even...
Pennsylvania reports 1,566 new covid-19 cases, 25 new deaths
Pennsylvania on Friday reported 1,566 new cases of covid-19 and added 25 new deaths to its total. The cases are from a batch of 15,413 new test results, with 13,847 of those being negative. The state’s daily positivity rate is 10.16%, the highest it has been since May. The new...
Trump, Biden go at it — from a distance — in town halls
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump and Democrat Joe Biden squared off, in a way, Thursday night, their scuttled second debate replaced by dueling televised town halls that showcased striking differences in temperament, views on racial justice and approaches to the pandemic that has reshaped the nation. Trump was defensive about...
Giuliani targeted by Russian intelligence in his dubious probes over Bidens’ Ukraine links, report says
WASHINGTON — Intelligence officials warned President Donald Trump that Rudy Giuliani — hero of 9/11 and once New York’s and America’s mayor — was likely a Russian dupe, a bombshell Washington Post story reported Thursday. The report came as Giuliani came under fire over the authenticity of an “October surprise”...
Chris Christie says he was wrong not to wear mask in White House
WASHINGTON — Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said Thursday that he was wrong not to wear a mask at the White House, after he and President Donald Trump both came down with the coronavirus. Christie, in a statement, said he has recovered from covid-19 after a week-long stay in...
C-SPAN suspends Steve Scully after he admits to lie about hack
NEW YORK — C-SPAN suspended its political editor Steve Scully indefinitely Thursday after he admitted to lying about his Twitter feed being hacked when he was confronted about a questionable exchange with former Trump aide Anthony Scaramucci. The news came on the day of what was supposed to be a...
Colorado man described as neo-Nazi pleads guilty in synagogue plot
DENVER — A man described by U.S. prosecutors as a neo-Nazi and white supremacist pleaded guilty on Thursday to a hate crime for plotting to bomb a historic Colorado synagogue last year. Richard Holzer, 28, pleaded guilty to attempting to stop people from exercising their religion with an explosive or...
Man shot by 3-year-old daughter in car; passenger charged
MEMPHIS, Tenn. — A man has been charged in connection with the fatal shooting of a father by his 3-year-old daughter in a car in Memphis. Court documents said Allante Jones, 26, has been charged with reckless homicide and unlawful possession of a weapon in the death of Jerome Smith...
DOJ charges Texas billionaire in $2 billion tax fraud scheme
SAN FRANCISCO — Federal prosecutors charged Texas billionaire Robert Brockman on Thursday with a $2 billion tax fraud scheme in what they say is the largest such case against an American. Department of Justice officials said at a news conference that Brockman, 79, hid capital gains income over 20 years...
Report: Fox News owner Rupert Murdoch predicts landslide election win for Joe Biden
News Corp chairman Rupert Murdoch said recently the American public is ready to elect Joe Biden and that the Democratic presidential nominee could win in a “landslide,” according to a report Thursday from The Daily Beast. The Australian-born media mogul, who owns Fox News and the New York Post as...
‘A really destructive scenario’: Pennsylvania could hold up outcome of presidential election
PHILADELPHIA — Pennsylvania, one of the states most likely to decide the presidential election, is bracing for one of the slowest ballot counts in the country. The coronavirus pandemic has driven a record 2.6 million Pennsylvanians to request mail-in ballots. But state law bars the processing of those ballots until...
C-SPAN suspends Steve Scully after he admits to lie about Twitter hack
NEW YORK — C-SPAN suspended its political editor Steve Scully indefinitely Thursday because he admitted to lying about his Twitter feed being hacked when he was confronted about a questionable exchange with former Trump aide Anthony Scaramucci. The news came on the day of what was supposed to be a...
Talks on critical election legislation in Pennsylvania stall
HARRISBURG — Closed-door talks on legislation seen as crucial to producing a prompt election result in the presidential battleground state of Pennsylvania appeared stuck Thursday between the Democratic governor and the Legislature’s House Republican majority. In a statement to The Associated Press, Gov. Tom Wolf’s office said an offer extended...
Pennsylvania reports 1,598 new coronavirus cases, 21 new deaths
Pennsylvania on Thursday reported another day of over 1,000 new covid-19 cases, along with 21 new deaths attributed to the coronavirus. The state Department of Health reported 1,598 cases Thursday. October has seen all but two days of over 1,000 cases reported. The total number of cases climbed to 177,520...
Europe reels as it sets virus records, slaps on new rules
BERLIN — Fears rose Thursday that Europe is running out of time to control a resurgence of the coronavirus, as infections hit record daily highs in Germany, the Czech Republic, Italy and Poland. France slapped a 9 p.m. curfew on many of its biggest cities and Londoners faced new travel...
Kamala Harris suspends travel after staffer tests covid-19 positive
WILMINGTON, Del. — Joe Biden’s presidential campaign said Thursday that vice presidential nominee Kamala Harris will suspend in-person events until Monday after two people associated with the campaign tested positive for coronavirus. The campaign said Biden had no exposure, though he and Harris spent several hours campaigning together in Arizona...
Watch Live: Confirmation hearing for Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett
After the two days of questioning, the Senate Judiciary panel is scheduled to start considering the nomination Thursday morning. The meeting, which is a procedural formality, will be held ahead of a panel of law experts and advocates who will testify for and against Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett’s...
Senate Judiciary sets Oct. 22 vote on Barrett’s Supreme Court nomination
WASHINGTON — The Senate Judiciary Committee convened Thursday and set an Oct. 22 vote on Amy Coney Barrett’s Supreme Court nomination as Republicans race to confirm President Donald Trump’s pick before the Nov. 3 election. The session is without Barrett after two long days of public testimony in which she...
AP explains: Trump seizes on dubious Biden-Ukraine story
WASHINGTON — Looking to undermine rival Joe Biden 20 days before the election, President Donald Trump’s campaign has seized on a tabloid story offering bizarre twists to a familiar line of attack: Biden’s relationship with Ukraine. But the story in the New York Post raises more questions than answers, including...