Trump on defense, courting voters in 2 must-win states
FORT MYERS, Fla. — Backed into a corner and facing financial strains, President Donald Trump fought to defend his sagging reelection bid Friday in a state Republicans haven’t lost in nearly three decades. With Election Day looming, Democrat Joe Biden pushed to keep voters focused on health care in the...
First lady Melania Trump lashes out at reports about friend who tell-all
DORAL, Fla. — Melania Trump lashed out Friday at “self-serving adults” for focusing on her falling out with a friend and adviser, writing that the attention paid to “salacious claims” about the broken relationship comes at the expense of her work on behalf of children. Mrs. Trump also sharply criticized...
Judge finds cases against 5 in Gov. Whitmer plot can move forward
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Prosecutors provided enough evidence to move toward trial for five Michigan men accused of plotting to kidnap the state’s governor, a federal judge ruled Friday in Grand Rapids. A two-day preliminary hearing this week featured testimony by one of the FBI agents who ran the investigation,...
Thousands arrive in Hawaii on 1st day pre-travel testing
About 8,000 people landed in Hawaii on the first day of a pre-travel testing program that allowed travelers to come to the islands without quarantining for two weeks if they could produce a negative coronavirus test. Angela Margos was among the first passengers in San Francisco to get on a...
France: Teacher decapitated, suspect shot dead by police
A history teacher who opened a discussion with students on caricatures of Islam’s Prophet Muhammad was beheaded in a French street on Friday and police have shot dead the suspected killer, authorities said. The French anti-terrorism prosecutor opened an investigation for murder with a suspected terrorist motive, the prosecutor’s office...
News that Wabtec will anchor Pittsburgh area development comes as company lays off 150 in Erie
The same ideas that propelled companies like the Westinghouse Air Brake Company to flourish during the Gilded Age are being used more than a century later by the company’s successor, Wabtec Corp., in its latest venture near Pittsburgh International Airport. In the 1880s, Westinghouse pioneered the railway airbrake and its...
FBI searches headquarters of labor union in Philadelphia
Federal agents have searched two sites connected to a Philadelphia-based union, apparently as part of an ongoing investigation of an indicted powerful labor boss. The Philadelphia Inquirer reported that the FBI served search warrants Friday at the headquarters of Local 98 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers and its...
Pennsylvania breaking records in voter registration by mail and in person
More than 2.7 million Pennsylvanians are approved to vote by mail in the upcoming election, and about a quarter have mailed in their ballots, state officials said Friday. “We are right on track to end up right around 3 million, which was our estimate after the primary (election),” Secretary of...
5 takeaways from the dueling presidential town hallsVideo
Voters got to see a presidential debate after all Thursday night. But it wasn’t between President Trump and his Democratic challenger, former Vice President Joe Biden. It was between Trump and NBC News’ Savannah Guthrie, who moderated one of the dueling town hall meetings held simultaneously in place of a...
Biden out-raises Trump $383M to $248M in September
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump was out-raised by Democrat Joe Biden in September and is being outgunned financially by his rival with just weeks to go until Election Day. Trump’s campaign, along with the Republican National Committee and associated groups, raised $247.8 million in September, well short of the $383...
Deadline looms to defuse Pennsylvania’s budget time bomb
HARRISBURG — Months after passing a partial budget that avoided some hard decisions, Pennsylvania’s Legislature and governor face a deadline at the end of November to finish the job and plug a multibillion-dollar deficit. The partially funded budget that Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf signed in May was incomplete by design....
Virus at ‘turning point’ in Europe, hitting at-risk groups
MILAN — Doctors are warning that Europe is at a turning point as the coronavirus surges back across the continent, including among vulnerable people, and governments try to impose restrictions without locking whole economies down. With newly confirmed cases reaching records, the Czech Republic has shut schools and is building...
U.K. says EU trade talks ‘over’ after EU says they’ll continue
LONDON — British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Friday that the U.K. must prepare for a no-deal break with the European Union unless there is a “fundamental” change of position from the bloc, as the two sides swapped blame for failing to strike a deal with just weeks until the...
WHO: Study finds 4 drugs have little to no effect on covid
GENEVA — The U.N. health agency says the world’s largest randomized trial of covid-19 treatments found “conclusive evidence” that remdesivir, a drug used to treat U.S. President Donald Trump when he fell ill, has little or no effect on severe cases. The World Health Organization announced Friday the long-awaited results...
3 men die, 1 injured at Florida motorcycle club shooting
ORLANDO, Fla. — Three men died and one man was injured in an early Friday shooting sparked by a confrontation at a Florida warehouse used by a motorcycle club, officials said. The Orange County Sheriff’s office says deputies are looking for suspects who may have fled the area in Orlando,...
Cops: Cleveland teen fatally shoots mom’s fiance in domestic dispute
CLEVELAND — A 13-year-old boy shot and killed his mother’s fiance as the man argued with other children inside a Cleveland home, authorities said. The shooting occurred around 10:30 p.m. Wednesday. Authorities have not said what spurred the argument in the home or how many people were involved, but they...
Thai PM rejects calls to resign, faces renewed protests
BANGKOK — Thailand’s prime minister rejected calls for his resignation Friday, while his government failed to stop student-led protesters from rallying again in the capital in defiance of a strict state of emergency. More than 1,000 protesters gathered in torrential monsoon rains to push their core demands, including that Prime...
U.S. testing 3 drugs to tamp down coronavirus
WASHINGTON — U.S. government officials are launching a new study testing three drugs to tamp down an overactive response by the immune system that can cause severe illness or death in people with covid-19. The U.S. National Institutes of Health says the study will enroll 2,100 hospitalized adults with moderate...
Twitter changes hacked content rules after Biden story furor
Twitter said late Thursday it was changing its policy on hacked content after an outcry about its handling of an unverified political story that prompted cries of censorship from the right. The social media company will no longer remove hacked material unless it’s directly shared by hackers or those working...
AP-NORC poll: Voters see the nation as fundamentally divided
NEW YORK — The overwhelming majority of voters believe the nation is deeply divided over its most important values, and many have doubts about the health of the democracy itself. And supporters of President Donald Trump and Joe Biden alike think the opposing candidate will make things even worse if...
Avalanche of early votes transforming 2020 election
More than 17 million Americans have already cast ballots in the 2020 election, a record-shattering avalanche of early votes driven both by Democratic enthusiasm and a pandemic that has transformed the way the nation votes. The total represents 12% of all the votes cast in the 2016 presidential election, even...
Pennsylvania reports 1,566 new covid-19 cases, 25 new deaths
Pennsylvania on Friday reported 1,566 new cases of covid-19 and added 25 new deaths to its total. The cases are from a batch of 15,413 new test results, with 13,847 of those being negative. The state’s daily positivity rate is 10.16%, the highest it has been since May. The new...
Trump, Biden go at it — from a distance — in town halls
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump and Democrat Joe Biden squared off, in a way, Thursday night, their scuttled second debate replaced by dueling televised town halls that showcased striking differences in temperament, views on racial justice and approaches to the pandemic that has reshaped the nation. Trump was defensive about...
Giuliani targeted by Russian intelligence in his dubious probes over Bidens’ Ukraine links, report says
WASHINGTON — Intelligence officials warned President Donald Trump that Rudy Giuliani — hero of 9/11 and once New York’s and America’s mayor — was likely a Russian dupe, a bombshell Washington Post story reported Thursday. The report came as Giuliani came under fire over the authenticity of an “October surprise”...
Chris Christie says he was wrong not to wear mask in White House
WASHINGTON — Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said Thursday that he was wrong not to wear a mask at the White House, after he and President Donald Trump both came down with the coronavirus. Christie, in a statement, said he has recovered from covid-19 after a week-long stay in...
