October 17, 2019 4:23 pm
WASHINGTON (AP) – The White House is acknowledging that President Donald Trump asked Ukraine’s leader to investigate his country’s role in meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential campaign. Acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney said Thursday that Trump held up military assistance to Ukraine in part because of concern about corruption in that country. He said they also wanted Ukraine’s cooperation in investigating whether Democratic National Committee’s email servers were in Ukraine. They also were looking at levels of assistance European nations were providing to Ukraine, he said. Mulvaney denies there was a quid pro quo and says “we do that all the time with foreign policy.” He pointed to the example of the administration holding up aid to Central American countries to force them to change their policies on immigration. Trump ultimately released nearly $400 million in military and other aid to Ukraine.
October 17, 2019 1:59 pm
ANKARA, Turkey (AP) – Vice President Mike Pence says that Turkey has agreed to a cease-fire in Syria. Pence spoke after a high-level delegation of U.S. officials met with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (REH’-jehp TY’-ihp UR’-doh-wahn) in Ankara, Turkey. Pence says there will “a pause in military operations for 120 hours” to allow the U.S.-allied Syrian Kurds to withdraw. The vice president says the U.S. and Turkey have “mutually committed to peaceful resolution and future for the safe zone.”
October 17, 2019 1:48 pm
NEW YORK (AP) – The governors from several Northeastern states say they want to work together to regulate marijuana and vaping. Democratic governors from New York, Connecticut, New Jersey and Pennsylvania met Thursday in New York City with health and legislative officials. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo says a lack of federal action on pot and vaping regulations means it’s up to states to act. Several of the governors have unsuccessfully pushed for their states to allow recreational pot sales in the last year. Officials from the four states are conferring with each other as they consider next steps. Cuomo says marijuana is often vaped and that states should consider that when considering marijuana legalization.
October 17, 2019 1:13 pm
TRENTON, N.J. (AP) – Johnson & Johnson has agreed to a $117 million multistate settlement over allegations it deceptively marketed its pelvic mesh products, which support women’s sagging pelvic organs. Ohio’s attorney general said an investigation found J&J, the world’s biggest health products maker, violated state consumer protection laws by not fully disclosing the devices’ risks. Numerous women who had the once-popular, hammock-like devices implanted claim they caused severe pain, bleeding and infections. The settlement, which covers 41 states and the District of Columbia, requires the company to fully disclose risks and stop making inaccurate safety claims. It comes as J&J is swamped with thousands of lawsuits claiming patients were harmed by products including baby powder, opioid painkillers and prescription drugs. J&J said that the settlement doesn’t include admission of any misconduct.
October 17, 2019 12:53 pm
(AP) – A tentative four year contract with striking General Motors gives workers a mix of pay raises, lump sum payments and an $11,000 signing bonus. In return, the contract allows GM to proceed with factory closures in Lordstown, Ohio, Warren, Michigan, and near Baltimore. Details were posted Thursday on the union website as factory level union officials met to decide if they’ll approve the deal. No decision has been made. Workers went on strike Sept. 16, crippling the company’s U.S. production and costing it an estimated $2 billion.
October 17, 2019 12:48 pm
FAIRMONT, W.Va. (AP) – Authorities in West Virginia say a man charged with murder and arson in the death of a woman has pleaded not guilty. The Times West Virginian reports Clyde Dean Jr. appeared in Marion County Circuit Court on Wednesday to answer the charges in the death of Cheryl Willis, who was found in a burned Fairmont apartment on March 15. She died the next day. A grand jury indicted Dean on the charges on Oct. 7. According to a criminal complaint, the Fairmont Fire Department was dispatched for a structure fire and found Willis inside the apartment. The complaint says authorities determined that Willis was attacked and left unconscious, and that the fire was deliberately set.
October 17, 2019 6:18 am
BALTIMORE (AP) – Maryland Rep. Elijah E. Cummings died early Thursday at Johns Hopkins Hospital due to complications from longstanding health challenges, his congressional office said. He was 68. A sharecropper’s son, Cummings became the powerful chairman of a U.S. House committee that investigated President Donald Trump, and was a formidable orator who passionately advocated for the poor.
October 17, 2019 5:51 am
It has been 54 years since Air Force 1st Lieutenant James McEwen’s plane was shot down in Vietnam. On a gray and rainy Wednesday in Washington, local veterans, city leaders and others gathered to honor the Washington native. They took the wraps off of a sign along Duncan Avenue to honor McEwen who grew up on the street. His sister Jean Jacquin, who now lives in Michigan, was on hand for the ceremony which included a 21-gun salute and taps. Jacquin tells WJPA News she is “very grateful for the fact that after 54 years some people still want to honor my brother.” She says “he loved his country” and “he was defending the principles our country was built on”. He was a 1958 graduate of Washington High School. McEwen’s plane was shot down October 22, 1965 while on a classified night mission.
October 17, 2019 4:15 am
WASHINGTON (AP) – The White House says it has chosen President Donald Trump’s golf resort in Miami as the site for next year’s Group of Seven summit. The announcement Thursday comes as the president has accused Joe Biden’s family of profiting from public office because of Hunter Biden’s business activities in Ukraine when his father was vice president. The idea of holding the event June 10-12 at Trump’s resort has been criticized by ethics watchdogs. Trump has said the resort is close to the airport and offers plenty of hotel rooms and separate buildings for every delegation. When the United States has hosted the summit before, it has been held in Puerto Rico; Williamsburg, Virginia; Houston; Denver; Sea Island, Georgia; and Camp David, the presidential retreat in Maryland.
October 17, 2019 4:13 am
CLEVELAND (AP) – Major drug distributors and manufacturers are pressing to settle thousands of claims against them related to the nation’s persistent opioid crisis as their trial date draws closer. The companies are negotiating with state attorneys general as jury selection is expected to wrap up on Thursday in the first federal trial over an overdose epidemic that has claimed more than 400,000 American lives in the past two decades. Arguments are scheduled to begin Monday against some of the biggest names in the pharmaceutical industry unless they can strike a deal. A source familiar with the negotiations described the outlines of a tentative nationwide settlement as worth tens of billions of dollars. The talks involve the distributors AmerisourceBergen, Cardinal Health and McKesson, as well as drug makers Johnson & Johnson and Teva.
