U.S./World category, Page 948
Leader of Belarus rejects calls to rerun presidential voteVideo
MINSK, Belarus — The embattled president of Belarus tried to put on a show of strength Sunday, holding a rally with tens of thousands of supporters and rejecting any possibility of repeating the vote that gave him a sixth term. But opponents countered with a far larger demonstration that attracted...
Officer minimized role in Floyd’s death to investigators
A former Minneapolis police officer involved in George Floyd’s arrest told investigators that he was focused on crowd control and minimized his role in the actions that led to Floyd’s death, video of the interview shows. Tou Thao, one of four former officers charged in Floyd’s death, described himself as...
Post Office warns states across U.S. about mail voting
WASHINGTON — The U.S. Postal Service is warning states coast to coast it cannot guarantee all ballots cast by mail for the November election will arrive in time to be counted, even if mailed by state deadlines, raising the possibility millions of voters could be disenfranchised. Voters and lawmakers in...
Protests in Belarus focus on spot where demonstrator died
MINSK, Belarus — Thousands of demonstrators in Belarus gathered Saturday at the spot in the capital where a protester died in clashes with police, calling for authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko to resign after 26 years in power. It was the seventh consecutive day of large protests against the results of...
Testing drops in Texas, as schools reopen, football resumes
SAN ANTONIO — Anyone can get a coronavirus test at the CentroMed clinic in San Antonio, but on a recent day, the drive-thru was empty. Finally two masked people in a maroon SUV pulled straight on through with no wait. With hundreds of deaths reported each day, students returning to...
Pompeo inks deal for U.S. troop move from Germany to Poland
WARSAW — U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo sealed a defense cooperation deal Saturday with Polish officials that will pave the way to redeploy American troops from Germany to Poland. Pompeo, in Warsaw at the end of a four-nation tour of central and eastern Europe, signed the deal with Polish...
Georgia House member loses post over John Lewis criticism
ATLANTA — Georgia’s House speaker on Friday took away a committee leadership post from a fellow Republican who said in a radio interview that the late U.S. Rep John Lewis’ “only claim to fame was that he got conked on the head.” Rep. Tommy Benton, who was chairman of the...
New border wall near unique wetlands endangered water supply
PHOENIX — The agency in charge of building the border wall received repeated warnings: tap water from nearby wells, and the unique wetlands of southeastern Arizona — yes, Arizona — home to a variety of wildlife and endangered fish will go dry. Immigration officials didn’t head those warnings. Then, several...
Georgia trooper charged with murder in traffic stop shooting
SAVANNAH, Ga. — A Georgia state trooper was fired and charged with murder Friday a week after he shot a 60-year-old man who tried to flee a rural traffic stop, authorities said. The president of Georgia’s NAACP chapter called the slaying of Julian Edward Roosevelt Lewis another chilling example of...
Mississippi flag could have Choctaw-inspired diamond shape
JACKSON, Miss. — The new Mississippi flag could include a magnolia or stars or representations of rivers. Or it could reflect the state’s Native American heritage with a diamond shape that is important to the Choctaw community. A group that will recommend a new flag met Friday and narrowed the...
Indiana police to stop blocking roads during executions
CHICAGO — Indiana State Police agreed Friday to stop blocking roads to a prison where federal executions resumed last month and are set to continue, backing down after anti-death penalty activists said in a lawsuit the roadblocks impeded their free speech rights. During the first three federal executions in July...
California becomes first state to pass 600,000 coronavirus cases
LOS ANGELES — California has become the first state in the nation to surpass 600,000 confirmed coronavirus cases. As of Friday morning, there were more than 603,000 recorded cases. The state also has now reported more than 11,000 deaths. Yet despite the grim numbers, there is growing evidence that the...
Hundreds of sea lions to be killed in Northwest in effort to save endangered fish
SEATTLE — Approval to kill up to 840 sea lions in a portion of the Columbia River and its tributaries over the next five years to boost the survival of salmon and steelhead at risk of extinction is expected from federal officials Friday. The kill program has been in the...
Mourners gather in Houston to remember slain soldier
HOUSTON — Flags from the U.S., Texas and Mexico flew at half staff Friday as a white, horse-drawn carriage embellished with white flowers brought in the custom green casket that carried the remains of a slain soldier. Vanessa Guillen, who was last seen on April 22, was memorialized nearly four...
Trump gets endorsement of NYC police union
BEDMINSTER, N.J. — Seeking to amplify his law-and-order message, President Donald Trump on Friday told hundreds of New York Police Department officers that “no one will be safe in Biden’s America” if the former Democratic vice president defeats him in November . “This guy has been taking your dignity away...
Sens. Casey, Toomey demand U.S. Health Secretary Azar take action to protect nursing homes
Sens. Bob Casey and Pat Toomey are giving U.S. Health Secretary Alex Azar until the end of the month to respond to their calls for urgent federal actions to protect residents of nursing homes during the pandemic. The bipartisan pair of Pennsylvania lawmakers requested that the Trump administration’s top public...
9th Circuit ends California ban on high-capacity magazines
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — A three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday threw out California’s ban on high-capacity ammunition magazines, saying the law violates the U.S. Constitution’s protection of the right to bear firearms. “Even well-intentioned laws must pass constitutional muster,” appellate Judge Kenneth Lee wrote...
Governor: New Jersey election will be done mostly by mail
TRENTON, N.J. — New Jersey will move to a nearly all-mail election this November, following the model the state used in its July primary, Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy said Friday. Murphy, a Democrat, said during an interview with CNN that all voters would get a ballot, but it’s not clear...
Palestinians say UAE deal hinders quest for Mideast peace
JERUSALEM — Israel’s agreement to establish diplomatic ties with the United Arab Emirates marks a watershed moment in its relations with Arab countries, but the Palestinians say it puts a just resolution of the Middle East conflict even farther out of reach. The UAE presented its decision to upgrade longstanding...
Pompeo to meet head of UN nuclear watchdog as council votes
VIENNA — U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is in Austria, where he will see the head of the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog as members of the U.N. Security Council vote on a long-shot American bid to extend an arms embargo on Iran. The vote in New York will likely...
TikTok and its employees prepare to fight Trump over app ban
TikTok and its U.S. employees are planning to take President Donald Trump’s administration to court over his sweeping order to ban the popular video app, according to a lawyer preparing one of the lawsuits. The employees’ legal challenge to Trump’s executive order will be separate from a pending lawsuit from...
More U.S. churches sue to challenge covid-19 restrictions
Churches in California and Minnesota, backed by a conservative legal group, filed lawsuits this week against the governors of their states challenging restrictions imposed due to the coronavirus outbreak that they contend are violations of religious liberty. They’re the latest in a long series of legal challenges, many of them...
Death toll from storm rises in Iowa as power outages persist
DES MOINES, Iowa — It will take five days or longer to restore power to some Iowa homes and businesses that have been without electricity since Monday’s wind storm left damage across the Midwest and killed at least four people, officials said Thursday. The straight-line winds that toppled trees and...
Prince Harry, Meghan Markle move into new California home
LOS ANGELES — Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have moved into a new family home, a representative for the couple said Thursday without providing its location or other details. Real estate agents and tax records point to a seven-acre estate in Santa Barbara County, according to The Los Angeles Times....
Mazda-Toyota boosts investment in Alabama plant by $830M
HUNTSVILLE, Ala. — Mazda Toyota Manufacturing, the new joint-venture between the two auto companies, on Thursday announced an additional $830 million investment in its new Alabama plant. Gov. Kay Ivey said in a news release that the investment in the new auto facility is now $2.3 billion, up from the...
