White House still planning holiday parties, despite warnings
WASHINGTON — Public health officials are sounding alarms and urging Americans not to travel and limit gatherings this holiday season amid a new surge in coronavirus cases. But that isn’t stopping the White House from planning a host of festivities, including holiday parties, which kicked off Monday with the arrival...
Suspect arrested in fatal stabbings at California church
SAN JOSE, Calif. — A suspect has been arrested in connection with the fatal stabbings of two people and the wounding of three others at a church in California’s Silicon Valley that was being used as a homeless shelter, police said Monday. “We have one suspect in custody for last...
Gun-toting congresswoman-elect may carry Glock at Capitol
WASHINGTON — A firearms-toting congresswoman-elect who owns a gun-themed restaurant in Rifle, Colorado, has already asked Capitol Police about carrying her weapon on Capitol grounds, her office has acknowledged. If she does so, she apparently won’t be alone. The practice is allowed for lawmakers, with some limitations, under decades-old congressional...
Biden signals shift from Trump with national security picks
WASHINGTON — President-elect Joe Biden is moving to fill out his national security team with a raft of appointments to top positions that signal his intent to repudiate the Trump administration’s “America First” doctrine. The six picks announced on Monday, almost all of them alumni of the Obama administration, represent...
Pennsylvania adds nearly 12,000 new covid cases in 2 days
Since Saturday, Pennsylvania has added 11,837 new cases of coronavirus, the state’s Department of Health said Monday. On Sunday 7,075 cases were added, while Monday saw an addition of 4,762 cases. The statewide total stands at 314,401. The seven-day average of new cases rose to a record 6,398 cases; over...
Feds charge 15 alleged Philly mobsters with racketeering, drug dealing and extortion
The Philadelphia mob has limped along on life support for the past decade, its former leaders, Joseph “Uncle Joe” Ligambi and Joseph “Skinny Joey” Merlino, out of the picture after high-profile federal prosecutions. But reports of La Cosa Nostra’s demise have been greatly exaggerated, according to a federal grand jury...
EU, U.K. still have ‘fundamental’ differences in trade talks
BRUSSELS — With the European Union’s chief negotiator Michel Barnier in quarantine, trade talks with the United Kingdom continued by videoconference this week, though the optimism expressed last week seemed to have faded. Barnier stressed on Monday that negotiators were running out of time to make a Jan. 1 deadline...
Wisconsin presidential recount in 4th day, with few changes
MADISON, Wis. — Wisconsin’s partial presidential recount entered its fourth day Monday, with very few changes in vote totals as President Donald Trump’s attorneys appeared to be focused on a legal challenge seeking to toss tens of thousands of ballots, including the one cast by an attorney for the campaign....
Boris Johnson to end England’s coronavirus lockdown
LONDON — British Prime Minister Boris Johnson says shops, hairdressers, beauty salons and gyms in England will reopen and some fans will be allowed back into sports stadiums when a four-week lockdown comes to an end next week. Johnson confirmed to lawmakers Monday the government will lift the stay-at-home instruction...
Man leaves $3K tip for a beer as Cleveland restaurant closes for virus
A customer left a $3,000 tip for a single beer as a restaurant voluntarily closed because of the covid-19 pandemic. The man walked in Sunday, ordered the beer and asked for the check, which came to $7.02, Nighttown owner Brendan Ring wrote on Facebook. Ring said the man wished him...
Pope Francis’ book explores George Floyd, virus skeptics
ROME — Pope Francis is supporting demands for racial justice in the wake of the U.S. police killing of George Floyd and is blasting covid-19 skeptics and the media that spread their conspiracies in a new book penned during the Vatican’s coronavirus lockdown. In “Let Us Dream,” Francis also criticizes...
China tests millions after coronavirus flareups in 3 cities
Chinese authorities are testing millions of people, imposing lockdowns and shutting down schools after multiple locally transmitted coronavirus cases were discovered in three cities across the country last week. As temperatures drop, widescale measures are being enacted in Tianjin, Shanghai and Manzhouli, even though the number of new cases remains...
New Zealand leader Ardern offers virus know-how to Joe Biden
WELLINGTON, New Zealand — New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern on Monday became the latest world leader to congratulate President-elect Joe Biden on his election victory, saying she offered to share her nation’s expertise on dealing with the coronavirus. Ardern said the tone of the 20-minute phone call was warm...
Schools’ Thanksgiving lessons jettison Pilgrim hats, welcome truth
BOSTON — A friendly feast shared by the plucky Pilgrims and their native neighbors? That’s yesterday’s Thanksgiving story. Students in many U.S. schools are now learning a more complex lesson that includes conflict, injustice and a new focus on the people who lived on the land for hundreds of years...
Yusef Salaam of Central Park Five penning memoir on his wrongful imprisonment
NEW YORK — One of the five teens wrongly imprisoned for the assault on a Central Park jogger has a memoir coming out in the spring. Grand Central Publishing announced Monday that it had acquired Yusef Salaam’s “Better, Not Bitter: Living On Purpose in The Pursuit of Racial Justice.” The...
French ex-President Sarkozy’s trial for corruption suspended
PARIS — The trial of former French President Nicolas Sarkozy for corruption and influence peddling was suspended Monday less than two hours after it started, to allow a medical report on one of the defendants. Sarkozy is accused of having tried to illegally obtain information from a magistrate about an...
Third major covid-19 vaccine shown to be effective — and cheaper
LONDON — Pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca said Monday that late-stage trials showed its coronavirus vaccine was up to 90% effective, giving public health officials hope they may soon have access to a vaccine that is cheaper and easier to distribute than some of its rivals. The results are based on interim...
Tourists few, N.Y. gift shops struggle but don’t lose (heart)
NEW YORK — In souvenir shops from Times Square to the World Trade Center, shelves full of T-shirts and trinkets still (heart) New York. But the proprietors wonder when their customers will, again. The coronavirus pandemic has taken a voracious bite out of a slice of New York life as...
Speedboat taking migrants to Greece partially sinks; 1 dead
ATHENS, Greece — A speedboat that appeared to have been smuggling migrants to the Greek island of Rhodes from nearby Turkey partially sank before reaching land, leaving one person dead, Greece’s coast guard said Monday. The coast guard said it received information about the speedboat near the northwestern coast of...
Hong Kong’s Joshua Wong to plead guilty to protest charges
HONG KONG — Prominent Hong Kong pro-democracy activist Joshua Wong said Monday that he plans to plead guilty to charges related to a demonstration outside police headquarters during anti-government protests last year. Ahead of a court hearing Monday, Wong said that he and fellow activist Ivan Lam would both plead...
Pat Quinn, co-founder of viral ALS Ice Bucket Challenge, dies at 37
YONKERS, N.Y. — A co-founder of the social media ALS ice bucket challenge, which has raised more than $200 million worldwide for Lou Gehrig’s disease research, died Sunday at the age of 37, according to the ALS Association. Pat Quinn was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s disease, also known as amyotrophic...
Biden to name longtime aide Antony Blinken as secretary of StateVideo
WASHINGTON — President-elect Joe Biden intends to name his longtime adviser Antony Blinken as secretary of State, according to three people familiar with the matter, setting out to assemble his Cabinet even before Donald Trump concedes defeat. In addition, Jake Sullivan, formerly one of Hillary Clinton’s closest aides, is likely...
Trump appeals rejection of effort to block Pennsylvania vote
HARRISBURG — President Donald Trump is appealing a federal judge’s dismissal of his campaign’s effort to block the certification of votes in Pennsylvania. The president and other plaintiffs filed notice of appeal to the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Sunday, a day after the judge issued a scathing...
Trump campaign legal team distances itself from Sidney Powell
WASHINGTON — Perhaps Sidney Powell has gone too far for even Rudy Giuliani this time. The Trump campaign’s legal team moved to distance itself Sunday from the firebrand conservative attorney after a tumultuous several days in which Powell made multiple incorrect statements about the voting process, unspooled unsupported and complex...
Texas family that got coronavirus warns public to spend holidays at home
ARLINGTON, Texas — Arlington is using one family’s brush with the coronavirus as a warning to others who might be considering big get-togethers this Thanksgiving. Alexa Aragonez told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram that her family weighed the risks of catching the virus but decided to get together for a birthday...
