June 21, 2021 4:17 am
CIUDAD VICTORIA, Mexico (AP) – Fear has invaded the Mexican border city of Reynosa after gunmen in vehicles killed 14 people, including taxis drivers, workers and a nursing student, and security forces responded with operations that left four suspects dead. While this city across the border from McAllen, Texas is used to cartel violence as a key trafficking point, the 14 victims in Saturday’s attacks appeared to be what Tamaulipas Gov. Francisco García Cabeza de Vaca called “innocent citizens.” Local businessman Misael Chavarria Garza said many businesses closed early after the attacks. On Sunday, he said there was “a feeling of anger because now crime has happened to innocent people.”
June 21, 2021 4:16 am
WASHINGTON (AP) – The Supreme Court has decided unanimously that the NCAA cannot enforce rules limiting education-related benefits that colleges offer to student athletes – things like computers and paid internships. Monday’s ruling will help determine whether schools decide to offer athletes tens of thousands of dollars in those benefits for things including tutoring, study abroad programs and graduate scholarships. The case doesn’t decide whether students can be paid salaries. Under current NCAA rules, students cannot be paid, and the scholarship money colleges can offer is capped at the cost of attending the school. The NCAA had defended its rules as necessary to preserve the amateur nature of college sports.
June 21, 2021 4:16 am
ATLANTA (AP) – Tropical Depression Claudette is regaining strength and expected to return to tropical storm status as it nears the coasts of North and South Carolina. The system had maximum sustained winds of 35 mph early Monday, less than two days after Claudette was blamed for 13 deaths in Alabama. A multi-vehicle crash killed eight children who were riding in a van for a youth home for abused or neglected kids. The wreck also claimed the lives of a Tennessee man and his infant daughter. Separately, a tree fell on a home killing an adult and a toddler, and a woman whose car ran off the road into a swollen creek died in north Alabama.
June 20, 2021 7:59 am
WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) — The Department of Veterans Affairs is moving to offer transgender veterans gender confirmation surgery, Secretary Denis McDonough announced at a Pride Month event in Orlando Saturday. McDonough said in prepared remarks that the move was “the right thing to do,” and that it was part of an effort to overcome a “dark history” of discrimination against LGBTQ service members. The move is just the first step in what’s likely to be a yearslong federal rulemaking process to expand VA health benefits to cover the surgery, but McDonough said the VA will use the time to “develop capacity to meet the surgical needs” of transgender veterans. The decision, he said, will allow “transgender vets to go through the full gender confirmation process with VA by their side.” McDonough also referenced what he said were higher rates of mental illness and suicidal thoughts among LGBTQ veterans, and a fear of discrimination that prevents those veterans from seeking care.
June 20, 2021 7:57 am
TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) — The U.S. sent 2.5 million doses of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine to Taiwan on Sunday, tripling an earlier pledge in a donation with both public health and geopolitical meaning. The shipment arrived on a China Airlines cargo plane that had left Memphis the previous day. Health Minister Chen Shih-chung and Brent Christensen, the top U.S. official in Taiwan, were among those who welcomed the plane on the tarmac at the airport outside of the capital, Taipei. Chen said that America was showing its friendship as Taiwan faces its most severe outbreak. “When I saw these vaccines coming down the plane, I was really touched,” he said over the noise inside a building where the boxes of vaccines, some with U.S. flags on them, had been brought on wheeled dollies. Taiwan, which had been relatively unscathed by the virus, has been caught off guard by a surge in new cases since May and is now scrambling to get vaccines. The COVID-19 death toll on the island of 24 million people has jumped to 549, from only about a dozen prior to the outbreak. The U.S. donation also signals its support for Taiwan in the face of growing pressure from China, which claims the self-governing island off its east coast as its territory. The U.S. does not have formal diplomatic ties with Taiwan under what is known as the one-China policy, but is legally bound by its own laws to ensure that Taiwan can defend itself.
June 20, 2021 7:56 am
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Forecasters warned of life-threatening flash flooding in parts of the Deep South, particularly across central Alabama, as Tropical Depression Claudette traveled over coastal states early Sunday. Heavy rain led to high water late Saturday into early Sunday in the Birmingham and Tuscaloosa metropolitan areas. More than 20 people were rescued by boat due to flooding in Northport, Alabama, WVUA-TV reported. The Tuscaloosa County Emergency Management Agency tweeted that local Red Cross volunteers were on hand to help those who were affected. And, Birmingham Fire and Rescue Service Capt. Bryan Harrell told news outlets that a search was underway for a man who was possibly swept away by flooding. Village Creek in nearby Ensley rose above flood stage to 13 feet (4 meters), the National Weather Service in Birmingham tweeted. The rapidly changing conditions came as Claudette was beginning to batter parts of Georgia and the Carolinas early Sunday.
June 20, 2021 7:55 am
VIENNA (AP) — Further talks between Iran and global powers were planned Sunday to try to negotiate and restore a landmark 2015 agreement to contain Iranian nuclear development that was later abandoned by the Trump administration. Senior diplomats from China, Germany, France, Russia, and Britain were due to meet at a hotel in the Austrian capital. Top Russian representative Mikhail Ulyanov wrote in a tweet Saturday that the members of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA, “will decide on the way ahead at the Vienna talks. An agreement on restoration of the nuclear deal is within reach but is not finalized yet.” Iran’s deputy foreign minister for political affairs said Sunday that almost all JCPOA agreement documents had been readily negotiated and that the diplomats involved would shortly return to their home countries — not only for further consultations with their respective governments but also for final decision-making.
June 20, 2021 1:54 am
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) – VP Vice President Kamala Harris will travel to Pittsburgh on Monday with Labor Secretary Marty Walsh. The visit to the presidential battleground state comes as President Joe Biden’s administration pushes a massive infrastructure plan in Congress. Biden originally went to Pittsburgh on March 31 to unveil a $2.3 trillion plan in what he billed as “a once-in-a-generation investment in America” that would also undo tax cuts for corporations under Biden’s predecessor, Republican Donald Trump. Biden is hoping for a deal with Republicans who are resisting his big ideas and trimming the potential spending, but he also is trying to assure Democrats that he won’t leave behind their priorities. (Photo: Twitter)
June 20, 2021 1:46 am
UPPER ST. CLAIR, Pa. (WPXI) — A South Fayette woman was hiking with her husband Thursday evening when she was struck by a fallen tree branch. Kara Leo, a beloved wife, mom of two boys and local business owner passed away Friday after a tragic accident. Leo was hiking along the Morton Ravine Trail in Upper St. Clair’s Boyce Mayview Park with her husband Thursday night when a tree branch fell and struck them. Kara didn’t survive her injuries. Her husband is in critical condition. On Beverly Road in Mt. Lebanon, the storefront of Kara’s bakery has a sign reading ‘closed until further notice.’ Employees and neighboring business owners fought through tears telling our newspartners at Channel 11 what Leo meant to them and the community. While her friends work to process this sudden news, they’re praying for Kara’s two little boys, Oliver and Owen, and for Kara’s husband who is still fighting for his life in the hospital. Those who knew Kara best say they want to be more like her and lead with kindness and joy.
June 19, 2021 4:23 am
BERLIN (AP) – The leaders of Germany and France have called for vigilance to prevent the spread of a coronavirus variant that this week prompted Britain to delay the planned relaxation of pandemic restrictions in England. Chancellor Angela Merkel said Friday that while Germany has very low numbers of new COVID-19 infections at present, the “aggressive” delta variant could lead to a rise in new cases. Merkel spoke ahead of a working dinner with French President Emmanuel Macron, the first time she has hosted a foreign leader in Germany since last year. Macron said the European Union would discuss at an upcoming summit how to better harmonize travel restrictions during the pandemic.
