June 16, 2021 4:03 am
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) – Gov. Tom Wolf’s administration has certified the results of the May primary election, bringing a formal end to the disaster emergency declaration that the Democrat first issued at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. Tuesday’s certification formalizes the results of the May 18 primary election. That’s when voters approved Republican-backed constitutional amendments giving lawmakers broad new power over extending and ending disaster emergency declarations. The Republican-controlled Legislature voted last week to end the disaster emergency declaration. But it also extended hundreds of regulatory waivers that Wolf’s administration approved under the authority of the declaration. The bill allows the waivers to last through Sept. 30, unless Wolf’s administration ends them sooner.
June 16, 2021 4:01 am
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) – Gov. Tom Wolf is suggesting that he’ll veto a bill that would allow thousands of retailers with licenses to sell beer and wine to begin selling cans of mixed hard alcohol drinks to-go. Wolf’s office said Tuesday he supports the original intent of the bill: to allow hotels, restaurants and bars to continue making mixed hard alcohol drinks and selling them in to-go containers. Legislation signed by Wolf last year legalized those drinks as a way for hotels, bars and restaurants hit hard by COVID-19 restrictions to make extra money. But Republican lawmakers inserted provisions expanding the sale of mixed drinks in cans that Wolf opposes.
June 15, 2021 2:52 pm
NEW YORK (AP) – “Gone Girl” actor Lisa Banes has died 10 days after being áinjured by a hit-and-run driver in New York City. A police spokesperson says the 65-year-old Banes died Monday at Mount Sinai Morningside Hospital. She was struck by a scooter or motorcycle while crossing a street on June 4. Banes appeared in numerous television shows and movies, including “Gone Girl” starring Ben Affleck in 2014 and “Cocktail” with Tom Cruise in 1988. Her manager says Banes was hit as she was crossing Amsterdam Avenue on the way to visit the Juilliard School, her alma mater. Police have made no arrests.
June 15, 2021 2:47 pm
UNDATED (AP) – The U.S. death toll from COVID-19 has topped 600,000, even as the vaccination drive has slashed daily cases and deaths and allowed the country to emerge from the gloom. That’s according to the toll recorded by Johns Hopkins University. The number of lives lost is greater than the population of Baltimore or Milwaukee. It is about equal to the number of Americans who died of cancer in 2019.
June 15, 2021 12:51 pm
ALBERTVILLE, Ala. (AP) – Police in Alabama say a worker who killed two people and wounded two more at a fire hydrant factory has been found dead. Albertsville Police Chief Jamie Smith says the suspect apparently killed himself in a car found in Guntersville, about 15 miles from the factory. Gunfire broke out at about 2:30 a.m. Tuesday at a Mueller Co. plant in Albertville. Smith says it’s not immediately known what prompted the shooting. The factory has more than 400 workers, giving the town its nickname of “Fire Hydrant Capital of the World.”
June 15, 2021 12:48 pm
The southbound lanes of Interstate 79 were shutdown for several hours Tuesday morning after a tractor trailer accident near mile-marker 38 just before the Interstate 79/70 split. Authorities say the accident happened just before three o’clock. The big-rig, which was carrying 70,000 pounds of groceries from Michigan, ended up on its side. There were no injuries and no word on the cause of the crash. Traffic was getting by slowly, on the shoulder of the interstate. The highway reopened just before eleven o’clock.
June 15, 2021 12:42 pm
Washington County 911 dispatchers tell WJPA News that police from Washington and South Strabane Township were called out around nine o’clock Monday night, to a home in the 500 block of West Chestnut Street for reports of “shots fired.” Dispatchers say a man was detained and there were no injuries, but no further information was made available.
June 15, 2021 4:14 am
(AP) – Hawaii says a vaccinated Oahu resident who traveled to Nevada last month has tested positive for the delta variant of COVID-19. The delta variant was first detected in India and is a more transmissible version of the disease. The variant currently makes up 6% of all cases in the U.S. Hawaii Health Director Dr. Libby Char says this is a “very rare breakthrough” case in which a COVID-19 vaccine didn’t prevent infection. New analysis from researchers in the U.K. shows the Pfizer vaccine is 96% effective against hospitalization from the delta variant.
June 15, 2021 4:12 am
An Associated Press investigation has found that at least 1,900 U.S. military firearms were lost or stolen over the last decade. These weapons are intended for war — but some have ended up on America’s streets. Army pistols, for example, were used in violent crimes including shootings and robbery. Pistols, machine guns and automatic assault rifles vanished from military armories, supply warehouses, Navy warships and elsewhere. Security lapses included unlocked doors, sleeping troops and a surveillance system that didn’t record. The Pentagon and armed services say that missing firearms are a tiny fraction of the military’s stockpile, and note that some weapons are recovered.
June 15, 2021 4:11 am
WASHINGTON (AP) – The Justice Department will tighten its rules around obtaining records from members of Congress. The news comes amid revelations the department under former President Donald Trump had secretly seized records from Democrats and members of the media and amid the news that the Justice Department’s top national security official is resigning. John Demers will leave his position by the end of next week. That’s according to a Justice Department official who spoke Monday to The Associated Press. The resignation comes amid questions about what Demers knew about the Justice Department’s efforts to confiscate phone data from House Democrats and reporters as part of the aggressive investigations into leaks.
