January 29, 2022 9:24 am
The highly contagious omicron variant of the coronavirus is driving the daily American death toll higher than during last fall’s delta wave. Deaths are likely to keep rising for days or even weeks. The seven-day rolling average for daily new COVID-19 deaths in the U.S. has been climbing since mid-November. It reached 2,267 on Thursday. That surpasses a September peak of 2,100 when delta was the dominant variant. Now omicron is estimated to account for nearly all the virus circulating in the nation. Andrew Noymer is a public health professor at the University of California, Irvine. He says omicron will push the U.S. over a million deaths.
January 29, 2022 9:21 am
BOSTON (AP) – People from New York City to Maine are awakening to deep snow and high winds as a powerful nor’easter kicks up blizzard conditions. There is potential with Saturday’s storm for widespread power outages and coastal flooding. Parts of 10 states and the population centers of Philadelphia, New York and Boston are in the path of the storm. Boston could get as much as 2 feet of snow. Airlines canceled more than 4,500 flights. Officials warned people to stay off the roads. The storm’s saving grace is its timing. It is hitting on a weekend when schools are closed and few people are commuting to work.
January 29, 2022 3:45 am
PITTSBURGH (AP) – Rescuers had to rappel nearly 150 feet down a Pittsburgh ravine and form a human chain to reach a few people after a bridge collapsed and took a municipal bus down with it. The collapse early Friday came hours before President Joe Biden visited the city to promote his $1 trillion infrastructure law. At least four people were injured, but there were no deaths. The bridge in a park over Fern Hollow Creek came down just before 7 a.m. The cause was being investigated. The bus driver told WPXI-TV that he believed the bridge was collapsing as soon as he reached it.
January 29, 2022 3:44 am
South Strabane Township will get what they need to formally dissolve the South Strabane Township Sanitary Authority (SSTSA). A hearing on Friday answered debt questions from the Washington-East Washington Joint Authority (WEWJA). In a hearing earlier this week WEWJA made it clear that any further expanded partnership with South Strabane Township would be dependent upon the pay off of all debts from the SSTSA. Township solicitor Dennis Makel presented testimony indicating that a nearly $22,000 loan to PennVest would be paid early next week. Another $600,000 listed as debt is actually two agreements to repay based on sewer tap in fees and not general obligation debts. Makel enlisted testimony from the Washington County Redevelopment Authority’s solicitor to back up that information. Judge Gary Gilman will be granting a permanent injunction against the SSTSA preventing it from any further operation.
January 29, 2022 3:09 am
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) – A statewide court says Pennsylvania’s expansive two-year-old mail-in voting law is unconstitutional, agreeing with challenges by Republicans who soured on mail-in voting after then-President Donald Trump began baselessly attacking it as rife with fraud in 2020’s campaign. Friday’s decision by a five-judge Commonwealth Court panel was deemed to on hold immediately by an appeal from Gov. Tom Wolf’s administration to the state Supreme Court. Still, the decision throws the state’s voting laws into doubt in a big election year. The three Republican judges agreed with Republican challengers. The two Democrats on the panel dissented. The state Supreme Court has a 5-2 Democratic majority.
January 28, 2022 4:17 am
MIAMI BEACH, Fla. (AP) – The Coast Guard says it has suspended its rescue operations in the search for dozens of migrants lost at sea off Florida. The maritime security agency called off its active search for survivors at sunset Thursday. Homeland Security Investigations officials say they are treating the case as a human smuggling operation. A lone survivor was found clinging to the hull of the overturned boat on Tuesday. He said the boat capsized late Saturday after he and 39 others had set out for Florida from Bimini, a chain of islands in the Bahamas. Authorities have now found a total of five bodies, leaving 34 missing five days after the vessel capsized.
January 28, 2022 4:16 am
HOUSTON (AP) – Authorities say a suspect led Houston police on a chase Thursday that ended with him wounding three officers in a shootout, hijacking a car and barricading himself inside a home for hours before surrendering. The incident began about 2:40 p.m. when a car police were pursuing crashed at a residential intersection on the southeastern edge of downtown Houston. Police said the suspect carjacked at gunpoint a white Mercedes and fled to a home several miles away. Police say the man surrendered about 7:30 p.m. Thursday. The officers are hospitalized in stable condition. The suspect surrendered about 7:45 p.m.
January 28, 2022 4:14 am
MOSCOW (AP) – The White House says President Joe Biden warned Ukraine’s president on Thursday that there is a “distinct possibility” Russia could take military action against Ukraine in February. The Kremlin, for its part, said it saw “little ground for optimism” in resolving the crisis after the U.S. this week again rejected Russia’s main demands. Russian officials said dialogue was still possible to the end the crisis, but Biden again offered a stark warning amid growing concerns that Russian President Vladimir Putin will give the go-ahead for a further invasion of Ukrainian territory in the not-so-distant future.
January 28, 2022 4:11 am
WASHINGTON (AP) – In a Senate where bitter Supreme Court battles have left a lasting imprint, the confirmation of President Joe Biden’s pick for Supreme Court has the potential to be much less combative and toxic. Biden is expected nominate a liberal judge to replace liberal Justice Stephen Breyer, who is retiring. So confirming his nominee will not change the ideological balance of the court. Most Republicans are expected to oppose Biden’s nominee, no matter who it is. But having changed the rules to prevent a filibuster of Supreme Court picks, Republicans are essentially powerless to stop the Democratic majority from confirming Biden’s choice.
January 28, 2022 4:11 am
WASHINGTON (AP) – The Biden administration and its allies are taking an unusually proactive approach to publicizing intelligence findings and trying to defuse influence campaigns by Russia as they raise alarms about a possible new Russian invasion of Ukraine. The U.S. has mounted a concerted campaign to counter disinformation, which has long been a tactic of Moscow to create confusion and sow discord in conflicts. White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki says the administration is taking lessons learned from 2014, when Russia mounted a massive disinformation campaign to build local support for its annexation of Crimea.
