November 1, 2020 8:09 am
NEW YORK (AP) — Television networks are adding experts in election law to their election night coverage teams so they’re prepared to explain legal challenges or irregularities that may come up during the vote. Veteran attorney Ben Ginsberg, who represented George W. Bush when the 2000 presidential race was decided in the Supreme Court, has joined CNN for this purpose. CBS News hired David Becker, founder of the Center for Election Innovation & Research. ABC and NBC have made similar arrangements, although some of those experts will have more offscreen roles. “If the country is going to war, you want an admiral or general to help you figure out what is going on,” said David Bohrman, executive producer of CBS’ coverage.
November 1, 2020 8:08 am
FLINT, Mich. (AP) — Barack Obama is hitting President Donald Trump right where he thinks it’ll hurt most: His ego. Campaigning for Joe Biden on Saturday, the former president painted Trump as insecure and self-absorbed, describing him as a failed president who cares more about himself than the country. “Trump cares about feeding his ego. Joe cares about keeping you and your family safe,” Obama said in Flint, Michigan. In a scathing speech, Obama mocked and belittled Trump for everything from the president’s criticism of the media coverage of the coronavirus pandemic — Trump, he said, was “jealous of COVID’s media coverage” — to his “obsession with crowd size.” “He’s still worried about his inauguration crowd being smaller than mine. It really bugs him. He’s still talking about that. Does he have nothing better to worry about?” Obama said. “Did no one come to his birthday party as a kid? Was he traumatized?” After delivering a sober indictment of Trump’s presidency and warning that America’s democracy is at stake this election at the Democratic National Convention, Obama has taken on a more lighthearted approach since returning to the campaign trail earlier this month for Biden. The personal attacks on Trump have been a centerpiece of Obama’s campaign pitch, and he seems to relish the opportunity to needle his successor. On Saturday, Obama at times smiled as he jabbed the president and often sounded incredulous at the state of his administration.
November 1, 2020 8:06 am
IZMIR, Turkey (AP) — Rescue workers extricated a 70-year-old man from a collapsed building in western Turkey on Sunday, some 34 hours after a strong earthquake in the Aegean Sea struck Turkey and Greece, killing at least 60 people and injuring more than 900. It was the latest series of remarkable rescues after the Friday afternoon earthquake, which was centered in the Aegean northeast of the Greek island of Samos. Search-and-rescue teams were working in nine toppled or damaged buildings in Izmir, Turkey’s third-largest city, but appeared to be finding more bodies Sunday than survivors. Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan raised the death toll Sunday in Izmir to 58. Two teenagers were killed Friday on Samos and at least 19 others were injured. There was some debate over the magnitude of the earthquake. The U.S. Geological Survey rated it 7.0, while the Istanbul’s Kandilli Institute put it at 6.9 and Turkey’s Disaster and Emergency Management Presidency (AFAD) said it measured 6.6.
November 1, 2020 8:01 am
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — More than 80 tenured and tenure-track faculty members at a western Pennsylvania university have been told they may lose their jobs at the end of the 2020-21 academic year, part of more than 100 possible job cuts at five universities in the commonwealth, union officials said. Faculty union officials said retrenchment letters, or furlough letters, were sent to 81 faculty members at Indiana University of Pennsylvania and 21 at Edinboro University. Also receiving letters were six members at Cheyney University, three at Mansfield University and two at Lock Haven University. California and Clarion universities had earlier warned of possible retrenchments but none of their professors were notified by Friday’s deadline. Although Indiana University of Pennsylvania had previously announced possible job cuts, David Chambers, a political science professor who is vice president of the faculty union’s IUP chapter, told the Tribune-Review that officials were “still kind of absorbing the shock” of members receiving actual notices.
November 1, 2020 7:59 am
BUTLER CO., Pa. (WPXI) — President Donald Trump came to the Butler County area for an event Saturday. The president spoke for about an hour outside the Pittsburgh-Butler Regional Airport to a large crowd of supporters, who were very eager to see him. During the event, Trump said he had just signed an order that would prevent lawmakers from banning fracking in Pennsylvania. However, officials have not confirmed this announcement as of yet. While all the voters in attendance said they had already decided who they are voting for on Nov. 3, they came to show support for the president. This was the first visit he made to western Pennsylvania since his bout with COVID-19 earlier this month.
November 1, 2020 7:42 am
WASHINGTON, Pa. — Former Mayor and Presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg made a stop in Washington on Saturday afternoon. As part of the barnstorming efforts of Democratic candidate for President Joe Biden, Buttigieg spoke at a Get Out The Vote rally in front of the Washington County Democratic Committee headquarters. In his nearly 10 minute speech, Buttigieg drove home points of job
loss, racism, health care, and pride of being an American. Nearly 100 people turned out on a sunny afternoon. Several were seen signing up to volunteer to knock on doors and perform other campaign-related tasks.
November 1, 2020 2:16 am
LONDON (AP) – Scottish actor Sean Connery, considered by many to have been the best James Bond, has died, aged 90. Bond producers EON Productions confirmed his death, first reported by the BBC. Producers Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli said they were “devastated by the news.” In a varied career, Connery played James Bond seven times, starting with “Dr. No” in 1962. His portrayal defined the suave secret agent for a generation of fans. He also had major roles in films including “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade,” “Highlander” and “The Hunt for Red October.” Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said she was “heartbroken” at the news.
October 31, 2020 10:27 am
LONDON (AP) – British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is holding an unscheduled Cabinet meeting to discus a new national lockdown for England, after scientific advisers warned that hospitalizations and deaths from the coronavirus could soon surpass the levels seen at the outbreak’s spring peak. Johnson’s office said Saturday’s meeting would discuss “the government’s coronavirus response.” áIt came after the Times of London reported that Johnson could announce a month-long lockdown as soon as Monday, though the government said no final decisions had been made. Epidemiologist John Edmunds said coronavirus cases were running “significantly above” a reasonable worst-case scenario drawn up by modelers. He said there needs to be “radical action” to avoid deaths in the high tens of thousands.
October 31, 2020 10:25 am
JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) – Indonesian President Joko Widodo has strongly condemned terrorist attacks in Paris and Nice and comments by French President Emmanuel Macron that were deemed offensive toward Islam and the global Muslim community. Widodo, the leader of the world’s most populous Muslim nation, told a televised news conference Saturday that his government strongly condemns the recent vigilantism in France against a teacher who was beheaded near Paris and a knife attack at a church in Nice that killed three people. Flanked by religious leaders and Cabinet ministers, Widodo also condemned comments made by Macron at an Oct. 21 national memorial for the teacher as an insult to Islam.
October 31, 2020 10:23 am
SFAX, Tunisia (AP) – A third suspect is in French custody Saturday in the probe into an Islamic extremist knife attack that killed three people in a Nice church. Meanwhile the family of the suspected Tunisian assailant is demanding to see video footage of what happened and is pleading for peace. Investigators in France, Tunisia and Italy are trying to determine the chief suspect’s motive, whether he acted alone and whether Thursday’s attack on the Notre Dame Basilica was premeditated. Authorities have labeled it an Islamist terrorist attack, which hit France amid growing global tensions around cartoons published by a French newspaper mocking Islam’s prophet.
