December 9, 2020 3:59 am
WASHINGTON (AP) – The Supreme Court has rejected Republicans’ last-gasp bid to reverse Pennsylvania’s certification of President-elect Joe Biden’s victory in the electoral battleground. The court without comment Tuesday refused to call into question the certification process in Pennsylvania. Gov. Tom Wolf already has certified Biden’s victory over President Donald Trump and the state’s 20 electors are to meet on Dec. 14 to cast their votes for Biden. Biden won 306 electoral votes, so even if Pennsylvania’s results had been in doubt, he still would have more than the 270 electoral votes needed to become president.
December 9, 2020 3:56 am
North Franklin Township Supervisors met for the final time in 2020 and delivered a tax cut to residents. Supervisors unanimously approved a measure cutting the township tax from 1.45 mills to 1.25 mills. Supervisors approved the 2021 balanced budget of $1,985,620 unanimously. Items that will be of most interest to residents will be the nearly $500,000 road paving program. Supervisors will also be supplementing the fire department with a pay per call system. Firemen responding to calls will receive a twenty dollar stipend for their efforts on any call. Supervisors also are looking to break ground on a new municipal building in 2021. The tax cut is a 13.8% reduction in taxes. That will translate into roughly a forty dollar savings on a house assessed at $200,000. In other business, supervisors approved a subdivision in the Washington Crown Center to allow for a car dealership to take over the former Sears store. The next meeting for supervisors will be the reorganization meeting scheduled for Monday January 4, 2021 at 5:30 PM. The regular meeting of supervisors will immediately follow the reorganization meeting. All other supervisor meetings will be scheduled for the second Tuesday of each month at 5:30 PM.
December 8, 2020 3:58 pm
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) – President Donald Trump’s campaign has lost another round in lawsuits over Pennsylvania’s election. The state Supreme Court refused Tuesday to hear its appeal over nearly 2,000 mail-in ballots in Bucks County in which voters failed to handwrite their name, address or date on the outside ballot-return envelope, or enclosed their ballot in an inner unmarked secrecy envelope that became unsealed. The Trump campaign maintains the ballots should be thrown out. The court has refused previous such Republican requests in other counties. Bucks County’s lawyers contended that Trump’s campaign shouldn’t be allowed to appeal. The number of ballots in question are far too few to overturn President-elect Joe Biden’s win in Pennsylvania.
December 8, 2020 3:39 pm
WASHINGTON (AP) – President Donald Trump celebrated the expected approval of the first U.S. vaccine for the coronavirus, as the White House worked Tuesday to instill confidence in the distribution that will largely be executed by President-elect Joe Biden. Trump sought to emphasize that the expected approvals came before most people thought possible. “They say it’s somewhat of a miracle and I think that’s true,” Trump said. Biden officials were not invited, and representatives from the drug companies also didn’t plan to attend. They’re concerned about politicization of the vaccine effort. Meanwhile, the Trump administration’s coronavirus vaccine effort is coming under new scrutiny after failing to lock in a chance to buy millions of additional doses of Pfizer’s vaccine last summer.
December 8, 2020 9:38 am
WASHINGTON (AP) – President Donald Trump is continuing his futile appeal to battleground state lawmakers to subvert the votes of their constituents. The president has reached out twice to Pennsylvania House Speaker Bryan Cutler, a Republican, to see what might be possible for the president to do about “legal votes.” A person briefed on the matter says Trump pressed for the state’s legislature to replace the electors for President-elect Joe Biden with those loyal to Trump. The person was not authorized to speak publicly and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity. Cutler’s spokesperson says Trump did not pressure Cutler to take any sort of action.
December 8, 2020 4:25 am
Cecil Township Supervisors met Monday and passed their budget for 2021. The tax millage rate will remain at 1.5 mills with 1.05 being dedicated for general purpose, .27 for fire protection and .18 m for road machinery. The general budget total is $9,797,126. Resolutions for the millage rate and the budget total both passed unanimously. Supervisors also approved a measure to award a contract to Kukurin Contracting to replace 3 bridges in Cecil Twp. Park. The $139,850 contract will replace one drivable bridge and two pedestrian bridges.
December 8, 2020 4:21 am
SEATTLE (AP) – A federal judge has found the Seattle Police Department in contempt of court for the indiscriminate use of pepper-filled “blast balls” and pepper spray during Black Lives Matter protests. The Seattle Times reports U.S. District Judge Richard Jones issued a 27-page order Monday in response to a motion by BLM Seattle-King County to find the police department in contempt of his earlier injunction preventing police from using force against peaceful protesters. Jones found four “clear violations” of his order: one involving the use of pepper spray and the other three involving blast balls, a grenade-like device that explodes and spews pepper gas.
December 8, 2020 4:19 am
WASHINGTON (AP) – President-elect Joe Biden will nominate retired four-star Army general Lloyd J. Austin to be secretary of defense. That’s according to four people familiar with the decision who spoke on condition of anonymity because the selection hadn’t been formally announced. If confirmed by the Senate, Austin would be the first Black Pentagon chief. Austin retired from the Army in 2016, which means he would require a congressional waiver to take the job. One of the people who confirmed the pick said Austin’s selection was about choosing the best possible person but acknowledged that pressure had built to name a candidate of color and that Austin’s stock had risen in recent days.
December 8, 2020 4:18 am
WASHINGTON (AP) – The Trump administration opted last summer not to lock in a chance to buy millions of additional doses of one of the leading coronavirus vaccine contenders. That decision could delay the delivery of a second batch of doses until manufacturer Pfizer fulfills other international contracts. The revelation was confirmed Monday by people familiar with the matter. It came a day before President Donald Trump aimed to take credit for the speedy development of forthcoming coronavirus vaccines at a White House summit Tuesday. Pfizer’s vaccine is expected to be endorsed by a panel of Food and Drug Administration advisers as soon as this week.
December 8, 2020 4:16 am
WASHINGTON (AP) – A deadline set Tuesday under federal law essentially locks in President-elect Joe Biden’s victory, even though President Donald Trump is still falsely claiming he won reelection. Other than Wisconsin, every state appears to have met the safe harbor deadline, which means Congress has to accept the electoral votes that will be cast next week and sent to the Capitol for counting on Jan. 6. Those votes will elect Biden as the country’s next president. It’s called a safe harbor provision because it’s a kind of insurance policy by which a state can insulate its electoral votes against challenges in Congress by finishing up certification of the results and any state court legal challenges by the deadline.
