December 12, 2020 4:31 am
MEXICO CITY (AP) – Press groups are demanding authorities in Mexico investigate the killing of a news photographer who was shot to death, reportedly after taking photos of dead bodies. The Committee to Protect Journalists says photojournalist Jaime Castaño was shot to death Wednesday in the northern state of Zacatecas. The CPJ said Friday that authorities should “swiftly and credibly investigate the murder.” The CPJ lists Mexico as the deadliest country in the world for journalists in 2020. The Inter American Press Association says that prior to Castaño’s death, 10 media workers had been killed in Mexico so far this year.
December 12, 2020 4:31 am
Some Americans are now falling sick with COVID-19 after celebrating Thanksgiving with people outside their households. Health officials are warning people not to make the same mistake during this month’s celebrations. The coronavirus was already raging across the nation before Thanksgiving. It has picked up steam since, with new cases regularly climbing past 200,000 a day. Contact tracers and emergency room doctors are hearing repeatedly from new coronavirus patients that they socialized during Thanksgiving. The next round of festivities could yield even more cases. It comes as the Food and Drug Administration on Friday gave the final go-ahead to the nation’s first COVID-19 vaccine.
December 12, 2020 4:30 am
ROME (AP) – Italy could soon reclaim a record that nobody wants – the most coronavirus deaths in Europe – and is still trying to figure out how to protect its vulnerable elderly. This wasn’t supposed to happen. Italy, the first country in the West slammed by COVID-19, saw its death toll spike in the spring amid public health shortfalls and lockdown restrictions that came too late. Yet it had the benefit of time and experience heading into the fall outbreak, trailing Spain, France and Germany in recording big new infection clusters. Still, Italy failed to keep the virus under control, adding more than 27,000 dead since Sept. 1. It now has over 62,600 virus-related deaths, a few hundred less than Britain.
December 12, 2020 4:27 am
WASHINGTON (AP) – Four large veterans groups are calling for the immediate dismissal of Veterans Affairs Secretary Robert Wilkie following a scathing report he had acted unprofessionally if not unethically in the handling of a congressional aide’s allegation of sexual assault at a VA hospital. Veterans of Foreign Wars, Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, Disabled American Veterans and AMVETS say Wilkie breached the trust of veterans and they no longer have confidence he can effectively lead the department. VFW’s B.J. Lawrence says: “Trust is lost and our veterans cannot wait until Jan. 20, 2021, for a leadership change. Secretary Wilkie must resign now.”
December 12, 2020 4:26 am
TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) – Employees and supporters have rallied for a Taiwanese pro-China cable news channel as it was taken off air Saturday. The government refused to renew the license for CTiTV’s channel 52, citing accuracy issues. A large crowd chanted “Hang on, CTiTV” and held up signs reading “Thank you CTiTV, we will see you again.” The cable network plans to continue putting news on YouTube and other digital platforms. CTiTV has long been associated with a Beijing-friendly political view. It accused the Taiwanese government of endangering media freedom. The station has been fined 25 times in the past six years for spreading inaccurate information. China regards democratic Taiwan as a breakaway province.
December 12, 2020 4:25 am
TERRE HAUTE, Ind. (AP) – The Trump administration has carried out its 10th execution of the year, putting to death a Louisiana truck driver who killed his 2-year-old daughter by slamming her head against a truck’s windows and dashboard. Alfred Bourgeois was pronounced dead at 8:21 p.m. Eastern time. His lawyers had argued that the 56-year-old had an IQ that put him in the intellectually disabled category, which they say should have meant he was eligible for a life prison sentence but not the death penalty. His execution Friday night was the second this week at a prison in Terre Haute, Indiana. Three more executions are planned in January.
December 12, 2020 4:24 am
WASHINGTON (AP) – President Donald Trump has signed a temporary government-wide funding bill into law, averting a federal shutdown at midnight and buying Congress time for on-again, off-again talks on COVID-19 aid. The short-term measure passed the Senate just hours earlier by a unanimous voice vote without much drama and sent senators home for the weekend without a clear picture of what awaits next week. The bill sets a new deadline of midnight next Friday. The House passed the bill Wednesday. COVID-19 relief talks remain stalled but there is universal agreement that Congress won’t adjourn for the year without passing a long-delayed round of pandemic relief.
December 12, 2020 4:23 am
WASHINGTON (AP) – The Supreme Court has rejected a lawsuit backed by President Donald Trump to overturn Joe Biden’s election victory, ending a desperate attempt to get legal issues rejected by state and federal judges before the nation’s highest court and subvert the will of voters. Trump is bemoaning the decision, tweeting: “The Supreme Court really let us down. No Wisdom, No Courage!” The high court’s order was a stark repudiation of a legal claim that was widely regarded as dubious, yet embraced by many Republicans. Trump had insisted the court would find agree with his baseless position that the election was the product of widespread fraud and should be overturned. But the nation’s highest court emphatically disagreed.
December 12, 2020 4:22 am
MADISON, Wis. (AP) – The Wisconsin Supreme Court is meeting in a rare weekend session to consider President Donald Trump’s lawsuit seeking to overturn his loss to Democrat Joe Biden in the battleground state. The high court agreed to take the case at Trump’s urgent request Friday, soon after a state judge ruled against him and with Monday’s Electoral College vote bearing down. The court is controlled 4-3 by conservatives, but its willingness to hear arguments in the case Saturday isn’t necessarily an indicator of how it will rule. The court previously refused to hear the case before it went through lower courts, and a majority of justices have openly questioned whether the remedy Trump seeks is appropriate.
December 12, 2020 4:21 am
WASHINGTON (AP) – The U.S. has given the final go-ahead to the nation’s first COVID-19 vaccine, launching emergency vaccinations in a bid to end the pandemic. Shots will begin in a few days after Friday’s decision by the Food and Drug Administration. The FDA called the vaccine from Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech safe and strongly protective. But initial doses are scarce and rationed, with health workers and nursing home residents first in line. Enough for the general population isn’t expected until spring, and experts urge people to mask up and keep their distance during a long, grim winter.
