| As Biden fends off sexual assault charge, National Archives says it has no relevant records Posted: 01 May 2020 01:16 PM PDT  The National Archives said it has no record of any files that might contain evidence of a sexual misconduct complaint against Joe Biden from 27 years ago.
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| Florida curtails reporting of coronavirus death numbers by county medical examiners Posted: 01 May 2020 10:35 AM PDT  Florida health officials have halted the publication of up-to-the-minute death statistics related to the coronavirus pandemic that have, by law, been compiled by medical examiners in the state.
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| Trump wants to deliver 300 million doses of coronavirus vaccine by the end of the year. Is that even possible? Posted: 01 May 2020 07:11 AM PDT  The expectation is the U.S. won't return to normal until there's an effective vaccine against COVID-19 — and almost everyone in the country has been vaccinated.
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| Iran says Germany to face consequences over Hezbollah ban Posted: 01 May 2020 12:53 AM PDT  Iran has slammed Germany's ban on the activities of Lebanon's Hezbollah movement on its soil, saying it would face consequences for its decision to give in to Israeli and US pressure. Germany branded Hezbollah a "Shiite terrorist organisation" on Thursday, with dozens of police and special forces storming mosques and associations across the country linked to the Lebanese militant group. In a statement issued overnight, Iran's foreign ministry said the ban ignores "realities in West Asia".
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| Unmasked Protesters Storm Huntington Beach After California Governor’s Closure Posted: 01 May 2020 05:18 PM PDT  Give them Vitamin D or give them death.Hundreds of demonstrators swarmed Huntington Beach, south of Los Angeles, on Friday to protest California Gov. Gavin Newsom's closure of the Golden State's sandy shores—an anti-lockdown display organized in part by the owner of a "health and wellness center."Reporters on the scene captured footage of banners for President Donald Trump's campaign, "Don't Tread on Me" flags, and homemade signs with slogans such as "Freedom is Essential." Overhead shots showed mounted cops corralling the demonstrators onto sidewalks and out of the road. It was clear that many protesters were not wearing masks that health officials say can help curb the spread of COVID-19.One of the organizers behind Friday's event is Vivienne Reign of an organization called "We Have Rights." She is also owner of the East Bay Health and Wellness Center and multiple companies marketing medical devices, corporate records show. Reign, however, refused to confirm her ties to the clinic, which specializes in chiropractic treatment and "regenerative medicine." In an interview hours before the protest began, Reign said she was not connected to Freedomworks, the right-of-center advocacy network which has backed other protests demanding shuttered states reopen, or to any groups bankrolled by libertarian billionaire Charles Koch, who has ties to Freedomworks.'Very, Very Scary': Officials Dumbfounded as Florida Beaches Reopen, 3 Days After Death SpikeShe claimed that We Have Rights had simply capitalized on the grassroots outrage Newsom provoked with his order, which he issued after crowds packed the coastline last weekend in defiance of the need for social distancing amid a global pandemic that has killed more than 2,000 Californians and another 60,000 Americans."'When that came out, people were pissed," she said, arguing the war with COVID-19 is effectively over, even though health experts say reopening could trigger a second wave. "The curve has essentially been beaten, so we decided we've gotta go do something about this."WeHaveRights.com, which calls itself without any backup "the biggest movement in California," was first registered just two weeks ago.Reign claimed her organization, which she characterized as an umbrella group encompassing multiple pro-reopening factions in California, has a wealthy benefactor—though she would not say who. "There's a lot of powerful people behind this, and we can get things done," she insisted.The East Bay Health and Wellness Center attracted criticism last year for marketing unproven stem cell injections as a treatment for joint pain.Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| Man arrested after camping on Disney World's Discovery Island during coronavirus pandemic Posted: 02 May 2020 07:18 AM PDT  Richard McGuire, 42, from Mobile, Alabama was arrested after camping on Walt Disney World's Discovery Island.
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| New Yorkers cannot be evicted for not paying rent through June, says Cuomo Posted: 02 May 2020 07:35 AM PDT  New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has said that no one in the state can be evicted for non-payment of rent through June.In his daily coronavirus response press briefing, the governor said: "A landlord cannot evict a person for non payment of rent ... that is a law in place through June."
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| Tara Reade is disputing a report that says her complaint against Joe Biden didn't refer to sexual assault or harassment Posted: 02 May 2020 01:49 PM PDT  Reade alleges Biden assaulted her in a Senate corridor in 1993 when he put his hands under her skirt and underwear without her consent.
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| Georgia businesses reopen and customers start returning, but only time will tell if it's the right decision Posted: 01 May 2020 09:05 AM PDT  Exactly one week since Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp began reopening the state's economy, small businesses shared early success stories as customers welcomed their return. But at what cost? Business owners say only time will tell.
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| North Korea tries to end speculation over supreme leader's health with ribbon cutting pictures Posted: 02 May 2020 05:57 AM PDT  Most ribbon cutting ceremonies are unremarkable affairs, the stuff of local newspaper photographs at most. But this one was different. It involved North Korea's supreme leader Kim Jong-un in his first reported appearance in 20 days, during which there has been intense speculation about his health and even whether he was still alive. The newly released footage of Kim glad-handing at a North Korean fertilizer production plant north of Pyongyang on Friday would appear to have put an end to that. He was even pictured standing in front of a banner reading May 1, to drive home the point, much in the way hostages are forced to hold up that day's newspaper for the camera as proof of life. The date is also written in the Latin alphabet, in case there were any doubts about which audience this 'proof ' is for (see picture below).
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| 'Everybody is scared': Some Texas cities nervous as governor reopens state Posted: 02 May 2020 03:07 PM PDT  "Today marks our highest day so far in new COVID19 cases," Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins said. "Our highest three days have all been this week."
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| Trump Approval Rating Hits All-Time High in New Gallup Poll Posted: 01 May 2020 07:32 AM PDT  President Trump's approval rating hit an all-time high in a Gallup survey released on Friday, with 49 percent of respondents approving of his performance versus 47 percent disapproving.The results continue a wide swing in polling for Trump, who garnered a 43 percent approval rating two weeks ago."Most of the variation in Trump's recent job approval rating is among independents," Gallup said. "In the current poll, 47% of independents approve of the job he is doing as president, the highest Gallup has measured for the group to date. 93% of Republicans and 8% of Democrats approve of the job Trump is doing."However, RealClearPolitics polling averages place the president at 44.3 percent approval versus 50.6 percent disapproval as of Friday. Averages of general election polls give Trump 42.1 percent to Joe Biden's 47.4 percent.Last week officials including Trump-campaign manager Brad Parscale, adviser Jared Kushner, and Republican National Committee chairwoman Ronna McDaniel presented the president with internal campaign polls showing him falling behind Biden in key swing states, the Washington Post reported. Advisers showed Trump the polls as part of an effort to convince him to stop or scale back his presence in the daily White House coronavirus briefings.
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| Russia's coronavirus cases hit new high, Moscow warns of clampdown Posted: 02 May 2020 01:47 AM PDT  Russia reported 9,623 new cases of coronavirus on Saturday, its highest daily rise since the start of the pandemic, bringing the total to 124,054, mostly in the capital Moscow, where the mayor threatened to cut the number of travel permits. The death toll nationwide rose to 1,222 after 57 people died in the last 24 hours, Russia's coronavirus crisis response centre said, after revising the previous day's tally. Russia has been in partial lockdown, aimed at curbing the spread of the novel coronavirus, since the end of March.
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| After Decades of Service, Five Nuns Die as Virus Sweeps Through Convent Posted: 01 May 2020 05:26 AM PDT  CHICAGO -- Our Lady of the Angels Convent was designed as a haven of peace and prayer in a suburb of Milwaukee, a place where aging, frail nuns could rest after spending their lives taking care of others.Songbirds chirped in the sitting area. A courtyard invited morning prayers and strolls for the several dozen nuns who lived in the facility, a low-slung cream-colored building with a turret.The quiet convent has become the site of a deadly cluster of the coronavirus. Four staff members have tested positive, a health official said. Since April 6, five nuns have died from the virus.COVID-19, difficult to contain in any circumstance, has spread within Our Lady of the Angels with a particular invisibility. All five nuns who died were only discovered to have the virus after their deaths.The women had moved into the convent after decades of service in Wisconsin, Illinois, Iowa and Nebraska. They worked in parishes, schools and universities, teaching English and music, ministering to the aged and the poor and nurturing their own passions for literature and the fine arts. Our Lady of the Angels, which specializes in caring for people with dementia, was meant to be their final home.Officials say that this week, as alarm has grown surrounding the outbreak in the convent, medical staff quickly increased testing, ensuring that every resident was tested for the coronavirus. Earlier in April, the facility had temporarily stopped testing nuns for the coronavirus, according to investigative reports by the Milwaukee County medical examiner.Records show that administrators at the convent had reasoned that the process of testing the nuns, by inserting a long nasal swab through a nostril into the back of the throat, was too difficult for them to endure.In early April, Sister Mary Regine Collins was several weeks away from her 96th birthday. She had retired to Our Lady of the Angels after a life filled with religious service and education, according to a biography provided by her ministry, the School Sisters of Notre Dame.She taught in Catholic schools and at a university in Milwaukee; she earned a master's degree in art at the University of Notre Dame in 1962 and was known for her wood carvings.On April 3, she developed a mild cough. The next day she was short of breath. On April 6, she died.The convent staff had attempted to test Collins for the virus, but she had dementia and was "too combative to tolerate" the process, an investigator's report from the medical examiner's office said."Staff is treating her death as if she had COVID," the report said.A post-mortem coronavirus test, conducted by the medical examiner's office, came back positive.There have been at least 6,854 confirmed cases of coronavirus in Wisconsin, according to a New York Times database, and as of Thursday, at least 316 people had died.Most of the deaths have occurred in Milwaukee County, the most populous county in the state. In March, local health officials hosted conference calls with administrators of nursing homes and long-term care facilities, warning them that their residents -- in advanced age, with underlying medical conditions -- would be especially vulnerable."The convent administrator and staff have been following, and continue to follow, all the guidelines and recommendations of the local health department, the facility's infection control coordinator, and the sisters' primary care physician," said Michael O'Loughlin, a spokesman for the School Sisters of St. Francis, a co-sponsor of the convent."They are very aware that the convent's residents, who are elderly and receive specialized memory care, are a vulnerable population, which is why the convent suspended all communal activities and enforced social distancing long before any of the residents tested positive for COVID-19."Darren Rausch, director and health officer for the Greenfield Health Department, said Our Lady of the Angels was among the facilities in the small suburb of Milwaukee that had kept in close touch with his office.From the beginning of the outbreak, the convent staff followed the advice of his department, he said. Isolate positive cases. Make sure staff members are wearing personal protective equipment. Monitor the temperatures and symptoms of residents."It's definitely very challenging," Rausch said, noting that it can be more difficult for medical staff to detect symptoms of the coronavirus in patients with dementia. "They can't always vocalize what's going on."Health officials say that monitoring for COVID-19 is especially crucial in a residential setting full of older, medically vulnerable patients; about one-fifth of coronavirus deaths in the United States have been linked to nursing facilities.Nursing homes and long-term care facilities, which struggled with a widespread lack of tests in the early days of the outbreak, have significantly ramped up testing in recent weeks, even for residents who are asymptomatic.The Wisconsin Department of Health Services has asked long-term care facilities with an outbreak to test residents who appear sick; the specimens can then be sent to a state lab for free COVID-19 testing.Many people who undergo coronavirus tests using the most common method -- swabbing through the nose -- find the test uncomfortable or even painful. Other methods, using a sample of saliva that is spit into a vial, are being introduced in a small number of states but are not widely available yet.O'Loughlin, a spokesman for the ministry, said that since testing at the convent resumed, all of the residents have now been tested, some multiple times.As the convent staff fought to contain the coronavirus outbreak in early April, it took steps to protect the women inside, locking down the facility to visitors and keeping patients who had tested positive for the virus away from others. Each sister has a private room and bathroom, an arrangement that has helped to isolate the sick.But it was too late to stop the spread. A day after the first coronavirus death, another nun died: Sister Marie June Skender, 83, a former elementary schoolteacher and musician whose symptoms had begun with a fever a few days earlier.Sister Mary Francele Sherburne, 99, died two days later. Before retirement, she was a full-time college professor, a music teacher to elementary students and a volunteer instructor for decades to Milwaukeeans learning English as a second language. "Sister Francele had a passion for kite flying," said a biography provided by her ministry.When a doctor at the convent called the medical examiner's office in Milwaukee to report the death, she noted that no COVID-19 test had been performed.The facility "stopped testing as the patients are mostly dementia patients and it was too traumatic," an investigator wrote in the report. "Several other patients had tested positive before they stopped testing."Sister Annelda Holtkamp, 102, the fourth nun at the convent to die of the coronavirus, had been exposed to three people who had already tested positive, records show.Even when testing was performed, it was sometimes difficult to understand which patients were at risk. Early in April, Sister Bernadette Kelter, 88, tested negative for the coronavirus.She later developed a cough, fever and body aches, and lost her appetite. On Sunday, Kelter, a teacher and home health aide before retirement, became the fifth nun at the convent to die of COVID-19.Jane Morgan, the administrator of the convent, said in a statement that she was cooperating with health authorities to prevent further spread of the virus."We welcome prayers for the health and comfort of our residents and staff as we grieve the loss of our sister," Morgan said.This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2020 The New York Times Company
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| 4 women arrested after Arizona mom found dead, blood found in bathroom Posted: 01 May 2020 04:36 AM PDT  Detective Jason Flam, a department spokesperson, confirmed in an email the arrest of the four women is related to Melissa Valenzuela's case.
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| Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin tells tells President Vladimir Putin he has the coronavirus Posted: 01 May 2020 06:48 AM PDT  Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin told President Vladimir Putin on Thursday that he had been diagnosed with the coronavirus and was temporarily stepping down to recover.
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| Biden Asks Secretary of Senate to Locate and Make Public Tara Reade Sexual Harassment Complaint Posted: 01 May 2020 03:22 PM PDT  Presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden said Friday that he wishes to make public the sexual harassment complaint filed by Tara Reade, the woman who says he sexually assaulted her decades ago when she worked for him in the Senate.Biden wrote to Secretary of the Senate Julie Adams requesting "assistance in determining whether 27 years ago a staff member in my United States Senate office filed a complaint alleging sexual harassment.""I request that you take or direct whatever steps are necessary to establish the location of the records of this Office, and once they have been located, to direct a search for the alleged complaint and to make public the results of this search," the former vice president wrote."I would ask that the public release include not only a complaint if one exists, but any and all other documents in the records that relate to the allegation," Biden's letter read.> New: Joe Biden writes a letter asking the Secretary of the Senate to "take or direct whatever steps are necessary" to locate the complaint by @ReadeAlexandra, and to publicly release it along with "any and all other documents in the records that relate to the allegation." pic.twitter.com/tQcEd1SWI8> > -- Sahil Kapur (@sahilkapur) May 1, 2020Biden's letter added that the National Archives had informed him that the record, if it exists, would have remained with the Senate. He had originally said he believed such a record would be housed in the National Archives.Reade went public with graphic details of her claim on March 25. She alleges that in 1993 when she was a staff assistant working for Biden, she was told by a top staffer to bring the Delaware senator a duffel bag in a Senate building. When she met with him he pinned her against a wall and penetrated her with his fingers while forcibly kissing her.In early April of last year, before he announced his run for the Democratic nomination, Reade alleged along with several other women that Biden had touched her inappropriately. She says she filed a complaint with a congressional personnel office that mentions sexual harassment she was subjected to by Biden but not the alleged assault.Facing mounting pressure from both sides of the aisle to address the allegation directly, Biden appeared on MSNBC on Friday morning and denied the claims."No, it is not true," Biden said. "I'm saying unequivocally it never, never happened."
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| Cuomo announces New York City will disinfect every subway train every 24 hours in an 'unprecedented step' Posted: 02 May 2020 10:10 AM PDT  New York City subways will be shut down between 1 a.m. and 5 a.m. starting May 6 and every train will be disinfected every day, Gov. Cuomo said
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| Former Green Beret led failed attempt to oust Venezuela's Maduro Posted: 02 May 2020 09:11 AM PDT  About 300 heavily armed volunteers had planned to sneak into Venezuela from South America. Along the way, they would raid military bases in the country and ignite a rebellion that would end in President Nicolás Maduro's arrest.
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| Could These Rivals Stop Kim Jong Un’s Little Sister From Taking Power? Posted: 01 May 2020 01:43 AM PDT  SEOUL—Whatever the condition of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un at the moment—and supposedly informed speculation ranges from dead, to comatose, to just chilling at his personal resort in Wonsan—his absence from public view for more than two weeks now is a reminder that his demise could plunge his country and the region, maybe even the world, into a huge new geopolitical crisis. For now his younger sister, Kim Yo Jong, looks like the understudy waiting in the wings to take the lead if her brother cannot function. He's positioned her for that role, and groomed her for it. But if Kim Jong Un dies, it's fair to say all hell could break loose.Many analysts believe China would move swiftly to consolidate control over North Korea if Kim Jong Un is no longer able to govern effectively. Chinese concerns, like those of the U.S. and just about every other country with a stake in the region, focus not only on who's in charge of North Korea but more specifically on what happens to North Korea's nukes. If there is a chaotic battle for succession, who will secure them?A Chinese medical team known to be in the North right now presumably is looking after Kim, and looking out for Beijing's interests. If Kim is indeed in grave condition, Chinese Leader Xi Jinping will be the first to know.And then what? "I'm very sure the Chinese will send their army into North Korea," says defector Ken Eom, who served 10 years in Pyongyang's military and is now a prominent analyst in the South. "They have already planned what they will do."Chinese concern about Korea goes deep into history, and was never more evident than in the Korean War, when half a million Chinese died driving U.S. and South Korean troops out of North Korea after they reached the Yalu River border between Korea and China in the early months of the war in 1950.It's not as though North Korea would threaten China, the source of all its oil and half its food, but the Chinese want to be sure the Americans don't get there first in the confusion of a power vacuum if Kim is no longer around, factions compete to succeed him, and the fate of his nuclear missile arsenal hangs in the balance.The results could be very bloody.Choi Jin-wook, former director of the Korea Institute of National Unification, believes it's "very unlikely" that North Korean authorities would invite the Chinese into their country as in the Korean War. "That is very dangerous," he says. "They will face a tough response from the North Korean side, probably an exchange of fire," he predicts, but if U.S. or South Korean troops enter North Korea, "that is a different story."It's been more than eight years since Kim Jong Un inherited the family dynasty, and North Korea's relations with China may never have been better since Kim first journeyed to Beijing—his first trip outside the country as North Korea's leader—in March of 2018. With sister Yo Jong always hovering nearby, he spent three days seeing President Xi Jinping and other top officials on a mission that set the course for future close ties.The encounter had much to do with Kim agreeing to see President Donald Trump for the first U.S.-North Korean summit in Singapore in June 2018. Xi hosted Kim again in May, a month before the summit, in the industrial port city of Dalian, agreeing to send him and his entourage to Singapore on a Chinese plane. And one week after the summit, as if reporting back to his patron, Kim again called on Xi in Beijing.The presence of Kim Yo Jong, present for many of these encounters, would seem to guarantee continuity. She could pick up where her brother left off, but it's likely that long-suppressed rivalries will explode if Kim Jong Un is not, in fact, on one of his yachts lying low during the COVID-19 pandemic, and really is at death's door, or through it."If factions face off, a vicious internal conflict is certain, and a civil war not unthinkable," writes Michael Auslin at Stanford University's Hoover Institution in the journal Foreign Policy. "With North Korea's nuclear and ballistic missile sites potentially falling into the hands of whoever acts most quickly, Asia could face an unprecedented nuclear crisis."Kim Yo Jong now owes her role as number two to him and to the authority that she's believed to exert over the North's Organization and Guidance Department, the entity with life-or-death power over all aspects of North Korean society. She's the de facto leader of the OGD as well as Bureau 39, the office that controls the North's money, including counterfeit U.S. currency printed on a press imported from Switzerland."She's in charge," says Ken Eom, but "that doesn't mean she'll be in charge when her brother is no longer around."Assuming Kim Yo Jong will face trouble from powerful men who just can't accept the notion of a woman dominating them, at least two other figures are to be reckoned with.One is Kim Pyong Il, the much younger half brother of the late North Korean leader Kim Jong Il. That makes him not only Yo Jong and Jong Un's uncle but also the son of Kim Il Sung, who founded the North Korean state after the Japanese surrender in 1945. At 65, he's still theoretically capable of carrying on the dynasty's bloodline.Kim Pyong Il faces, however, what may be insurmountable problems. He spent nearly 40 years in a kind of exile as ambassador to eastern European countries before he was summoned back to Pyongyang last November."Nobody knows him," says Shim Jae-hoon, who writes about Korea for Yale Global. "He's been away too long." But he still could serve as figurehead leader over restive, quarreling subordinates. "It's almost possible," says Ken Eom, "but he might not last long."And then there's the top non-family contender, Choe Ryong Hae, whose title as President of the Presidium of the Supreme People's Assembly makes him North Korea's titular head of state. Choe, who also is first vice chairman of the state affairs commission, through which Kim as chairman wields his power, has his own bloodline—his father fought with Kim Il Sung against Japanese rule as a guerilla in Manchuria.Choe, however, has had an up-and-down career, once having been forced out of the hierarchy for "reeducation" as a laborer for involvement in a scheme to sell scrap metal—a crime that sometimes merits execution. In his case, his father's old-time bond with Kim Il Sung saved him.On the plus side, Choe's son is rumored to have been married to Kim Yo Jong."Choe is next at the moment," says Choi Jin-wook, "but he is not a Kim, though from a guerrilla family." But would that lineage do the trick?"I cannot find any alternative to this Stalinist dynasty," says Choi. "This will lead to the end of the Kim dynasty. Enough is enough.There is no legitimate person, and it is going to be anybody's game. Maybe big chaos."Xi Jinping would like to stand above the fray, pressuring competing factions to get along.In that spirit Xi received Kim for the fourth time in extraordinary pomp and circumstance in Beijing in January last year, six weeks before Trump's second summit with Kim in Hanoi. Then, last June, after the failure of the Trump-Kim summit in February, Kim received Xi in Pyongyang—the first visit by a Chinese leader to the North Korean capital in 14 years.All those displays of mutual good-will, however, may have been for naught if Kim Jong Un is no longer around. "I do not think Kim is yet dead," says Ken Eom, but, "I think he's got a serious problem."Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| Rare unity in US Congress on refusing Trump virus tests Posted: 02 May 2020 04:42 PM PDT  In a rare joint message, Democratic and Republican congressional leaders on Saturday rejected the Trump administration's offer to conduct rapid coronavirus screening on senators who will return to Washington next week, stating that the tests should be reserved for the public. Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, normally fierce political rivals, issued a statement announcing that Congress was "grateful" for the offer, but that they would "respectfully decline." "Congress wants to keep directing resources to the front-line facilities where they can do the most good the most quickly," they said.
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| A fifth of French think Le Pen would do better job than Macron: poll Posted: 02 May 2020 03:07 PM PDT  Only 20% of French people think far-right leader Marine Le Pen would handle the coronavirus crisis better than President Emmanuel Macron, according to an opinion poll for Le Journal du Dimanche newspaper published on Sunday. Macron's government has faced criticism for flip-flopping messages on whether, when and where citizens should wear masks, for failing to replenish the stock of masks before the crisis and for carrying out far fewer tests than neighbouring Germany. Le Pen in particular has relentlessly criticised the government, saying ministers had lied about "absolutely everything".
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| ICE detainees clash with Massachusetts jail officials over coronavirus Posted: 02 May 2020 03:00 PM PDT  It is the ninth time since a national emergency was declared that staff at detention centers used pepper spray on protesting ICE detainees.
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| Sajid Hussain: Swedish police find body of missing Pakistani journalist Posted: 01 May 2020 07:55 AM PDT  Sajid Hussain fled Pakistan for Sweden in 2012 after receiving death threats connected to his work.
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| U.K.s Johnson names new son with tribute to doctors who treated him for COVID-19 Posted: 02 May 2020 07:38 AM PDT  Nicholas was inspired by the names of two doctors who had treated Johnson in hospital, his fiancée Carrie Symonds said.
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| 2,800 Indians are trying to evacuate the US, but they can't get flights home because of India's strict coronavirus lockdown Posted: 01 May 2020 08:38 AM PDT  More than 2,800 people have joined a Facebook group called "USA TO INDIA EVACUATION FLIGHTS," to discuss how they'll return home.
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| Prominent Democratic women are standing by Joe Biden amid Tara Reade's sexual assault claim Posted: 01 May 2020 07:35 AM PDT  Some of Joe Biden's potential picks for a running mate have stood by him amid allegations of sexual assault by his former Senate staffer Tara Reade.
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| Intelligence officials and disease experts are shooting down Trump's claim that the US has good reason to believe the coronavirus originated in a Wuhan lab Posted: 01 May 2020 04:35 AM PDT  Intelligence officials and disease experts told The Washington Post that there's no evidence to back up Trump's theory.
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| McConnell Was Warned D.C. Hadn’t Hit COVID Benchmarks Prior to Reconvening Senate Posted: 01 May 2020 10:14 AM PDT  At least one official with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's (R-KY) office was on a call last week with the Capitol's attending physician during which that physician, Dr. Brian Monahan, said Washington, D.C. had not yet cleared coronavirus-related benchmarks needed to safely reopen. According to two sources familiar with the call, McConnell's chief of staff, Sharon Soderstrom, stressed to individuals on the call that they should take seriously the likelihood that the Majority Leader would reconvene the Senate on May 4 even amid the pandemic. A third source who was informed of the call's exchanges confirmed that account.Despite Monahan's warnings, McConnell did just that, telling lawmakers this week that they would be called back next Monday.McConnell has defended his position by noting that the government is asking and demanding a host of essential workers to remain on the job during the spread of coronavirus and, therefore, that federal lawmakers should be prepared to do the same. But his decision to call back the Senate has been met with criticism by some of its own members, who say it defies basic public safety guidelines to make lawmakers (many elderly) and their staffs—not to mention the hundreds of workers needed to keep the Capitol and Senate offices running—cram into the buildings when COVID-19 cases in Washington, D.C. are just about peaking. McConnell to Move Quickly on Confirming His 38-Year-Old Protégé to the BenchThose warnings took on additional urgency this Thursday when Monahan held a separate call with top GOP officials during which he relayed that his office lacked the capacity to test all 100 senators for coronavirus and that the tests they did possess could take two or more days to process. It is unclear if the state of testing was discussed on Monahan's call the week prior. A request for comment to his office was not returned. One source also said that Monahan made no actual recommendation as to whether the Senate should or should not reconvene as his job is not to advise on those matters but to give lawmakers "the lay of the land." "He gave a nearly 20 minute update on the situation in D.C.," said the source. "He did outline that they didn't expect the benchmarks to be met by May 4." According to the source, the call featured at least one aide to Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer's office, the Senate parliamentarian, the Architect of the Capitol, the Senate's Sergeant at Arms, the Secretary of the Senate, top Republican and Democratic floor staff, and the Rules Committee Chair and ranking members as well as their staffs. Schumer's office declined to comment. David Popp, a spokesman for McConnell, said, "I do not have any readouts or guidance to provide from any recent calls at the member or staff level."Washington, D.C. authorities have extended the city's stay-at-home order through May 15 as the coronavirus' spread has yet to abate sufficiently to reasonably relax social distancing restrictions. On Thursday, the District had its deadliest date yet, while the greater metro region recorded 2,000 new COVID cases. Officials have warned that businesses may not be able to open for another two to three months under the current trajectory.Earlier in the week, House Democratic leadership reversed course on their own scheduled return to business on May 4, apparently based on similar warnings. After announcing on Monday that the House would reconvene on that day, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) said Tuesday they would in fact not return, citing guidance from the attending physician and backlash from rank-and-file members. As the Senate reconvenes next week, some precautions are being taken. According to Politico, staff is being encouraged to telework and Senate offices are being asked to screen staffers who have to come to the Hill. Both lawmakers and aides are also being asked to wear masks at all times.Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| Venezuela prison riot death toll rises to 47 Posted: 02 May 2020 04:32 PM PDT  The death toll from a prison riot in western Venezuela has risen to at least 47, with 75 wounded, an opposition politician and prisoners' rights group said Saturday. "At the moment we have been able to confirm 47 dead and 75 wounded," deputy Maria Beatriz Martinez, elected from Portuguesa state where the Los Llanos prison is located, told AFP. The Venezuelan Prison Observatory (OVP) rights group also gave the same tally, calling the violence a "massacre," and both confirmed that all of the dead were detainees.
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| Mitt Romney sides with Democrats calling for $12 hourly raises for essential workers Posted: 01 May 2020 12:26 PM PDT  Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) has followed demands of pay raises for essential workers with a proposal of his own.Romney proposed Friday that essential workers "who are necessarily subject to greater risk of COVID-19" receive hourly bonuses of up to $12 in the form of a tax credit. His proposal comes a month after several Democratic senators suggested $13/hour raises for essential workers that would be retroactive from the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.Employers would have to opt in to what Romney is calling "Patriot Pay" and start paying workers a bonus for the government funding to activate. The federal government would triple what the employer offers and add it to the worker's paycheck as an additional bonus, up to a total of $12; For example grocery workers getting a $3/hour bonus from worker would get an extra $9/hour from the government.Workers would have to collect the payments by submitting a claim to the IRS; Romney did suggest the IRS partner with payroll companies to distribute the money faster. Those bonuses start phasing out if a person makes $50,000 annually, and end entirely at $90,000. Payments also would only start in May and last through July.Senate Democrats proposed a COVID-19 "heroes fund" in early April that was a bit simpler than Romney's Patriot Pay. It would extend a "$25,000 premium pay increase for essential workers, equivalent to a raise of $13 per hour from the start of the public health emergency" through the end of the year. It would also offer a $15,000 essential worker recruitment incentive to hire and maintain health care workers.More stories from theweek.com The angst over Joe Biden's assault allegation has an easy resolution 5 scathingly funny cartoons about Mike Pence's unmasked hospital visit Law professor says response to Biden allegation could signal 'end of MeToo' movement
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| California governor says coronavirus easing 'days away' as protesters throng beach Posted: 01 May 2020 03:52 PM PDT  California is days away from announcing a meaningful loosening of its coronavirus-related restrictions, Governor Gavin Newsom said on Friday, as protesters sneaked on to closed beaches and crowded the lawn outside the state Capitol in Sacramento. Newsom hinted that restaurants would soon be allowed to re-open for table service with some restrictions, and promised additional relief as stay-at-home orders in place since March 19 wore on residents' nerves and pocketbooks. "Know that I am looking forward to answering your call and addressing your anxiety," Newsom said in his daily press briefing.
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| A woman fell 115-feet to her death after posing for a cliffside photo to celebrate the end of a lockdown Posted: 02 May 2020 12:40 AM PDT  Tour guide Olesya Suspitsyna, from Kazakhstan, died after slipping on grass and falling off a cliff in the Duden Park in Antalya, Turkey.
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| Wages Seized. Bank Accounts Frozen. The Poor Are Getting Poorer as Creditors Pursue Debts Posted: 01 May 2020 10:22 AM PDT  'Things were bad before the COVID emergency, they got worse with COVID, and they're going to get even worse.'
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| Fact Check: Reps. Omar and Ocasio-Cortez are not trying to ban Pledge of Allegiance Posted: 01 May 2020 05:30 AM PDT  There is no evidence in any public record or legitimate news report of either member of Congress regarding a purported Pledge of Allegiance ban.
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| Kim reappears in public, ending absence amid health rumors Posted: 01 May 2020 02:49 PM PDT  North Korean leader Kim Jong Un made his first public appearance in 20 days as he celebrated the completion of a fertilizer factory near Pyongyang, state media said Saturday, ending an absence that had triggered global rumors that he may be seriously ill. The North's official Korean Central News Agency, or KCNA, reported that Kim attended the ceremony Friday in Sunchon with other senior officials, including his sister Kim Yo Jong, who many analysts predict would take over if her brother is suddenly unable to rule.
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| Missing Idaho kids: Judge won't lower Lori Vallow's $1 million bond Posted: 01 May 2020 05:40 PM PDT  The defense believes attorney-client conversations are being recorded in jail.
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| President's 'So what?' as 5,000 die sparks fury in Brazil Posted: 01 May 2020 06:29 PM PDT  "So what?" said Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro on Tuesday when a journalist asked him about the fact that more than 5,000 Brazilians had died of the coronavirus. The far-right leader's off-the-cuff comment has been sparking anger ever since, with governors, politicians, healthcare professionals and media figures all weighing in to express their outrage at his lack of empathy. Bolsonaro is no stranger to controversy.
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| Italy's daily coronavirus death toll jumps, new cases stable Posted: 02 May 2020 09:11 AM PDT  Deaths from the COVID-19 epidemic in Italy jumped by 474 on Saturday, against 269 the day before, the Civil Protection Agency said, posting the largest daily toll of fatalities since April 21. The steep increase in deaths followed a long, gradual declining trend and was due largely to Lombardy, the country's worst affected region, where there were 329 deaths in the last 24 hours compared with just 88 the day before.
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| DOJ began investigating a doctor promoting unproven COVID-19 treatments after Roger Stone's former associate accidentally emailed a federal prosecutor instead of the doctor Posted: 01 May 2020 08:12 AM PDT  Corsi meant to email the doctor and instead emailed Aaron Zelinsky, one of the prosecutors who spent months investigating him in the Russia probe.
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| If flu deaths were counted like COVID-19 deaths, the worst recent flu season evidently killed 15,620 Americans Posted: 30 Apr 2020 10:34 PM PDT  The U.S. now has more than 63,000 confirmed COVID-19 deaths, and most experts say that's almost certainly an undercount. Still, if you compare that number to the 2017-18 flu season, which the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates killed 61,000 people, it looks like COVID-19 might be similar to a bad flu — President Trump has made this point, as have many conservative media personalities. But the data so far show that this new coronavirus is much more lethal than the flu, and Dr. Jeremy Samuel Faust has an explanation.Faust, a Harvard Medical School instructor and emergency physician at Brigham & Women's Hospital in Boston, wrote in Scientific American that he started wondering about the flu-to-COVID comparisons when it occurred to him that in nearly eight years of hospital work, "I had almost never seen anyone die of the flu." Neither had any of the colleagues he called around the country. So he did some research, and this is what he found:> The 25,000 to 69,000 numbers that Trump cited do not represent counted flu deaths per year; they are estimates that the CDC produces by multiplying the number of flu death counts reported by various coefficients produced through complicated algorithms. These coefficients are based on assumptions of how many cases, hospitalizations, and deaths they believe went unreported. In the last six flu seasons, the CDC's reported number of actual confirmed flu deaths — that is, counting flu deaths the way we are currently counting deaths from the coronavirus — has ranged from 3,448 to 15,620. [Jeremy Faust, Scientific American]So in an apples-to-apples comparison, matching the second week of April's COVID-19 deaths to the worst week of the past seven flu seasons, "the novel coronavirus killed between 9.5 and 44 times more people than seasonal flu," Faust writes. Read his entire essay at Scientific American.More stories from theweek.com The angst over Joe Biden's assault allegation has an easy resolution Mitt Romney sides with Democrats calling for $12 hourly raises for essential workers 5 scathingly funny cartoons about Mike Pence's unmasked hospital visit
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| WH press secretary says she will 'never lie' to the media Posted: 01 May 2020 12:16 PM PDT  At her first briefing as White House press secretary, Kayleigh McEnany said she will never lie to reporters.
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