- U.S.NBC News
Mom and son charged 25 years later in killings of her husband and sister
A former New Jersey woman and her son face murder and conspiracy charges in the killings 25 years ago of her husband and sister. Dolores Morgan, 66, and Ted Connors, 47, both of Delray Beach, Florida, were indicted Wednesday for the 1994 and 1995 killings of Ana Mejia and Nicholas Connors, said the Monmouth County Prosecutor's Office in New Jersey. Prosecutors allege Ted Connors carried out the murders with his best friend, Jose Carrero, who has admitted to conspiring with the mother and son in the two killings 25 years ago.
- WorldBusiness Insider
The US Navy orders ships in the Pacific to stay at sea at least 14 days between port calls over coronavirus concerns
U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Erick A. Parsons The US Navy has given ships operating in the Pacific new port-call guidance amid concerns over the coronavirus, US Pacific Fleet told Insider on Thursday. Ships have been instructed to remain at sea for at least 14 days, the maximum incubation period for the novel coronavirus, between port calls and monitor their sailors. A US Navy spokesperson told CNN's Ryan Browne, who first reported the news on Twitter, that "there are no indications that any US Navy personnel have contracted" the coronavirus.
- PoliticsThe National Interest
Critic Says Trump Is 'Ignorant' and 'Incoherent' On Coronavirus. Others Call It 'Trump' Virus.
Yesterday evening President Donald Trump addressed the public from the White House to explain what actions the government was taking in response to the coronavirus and offer assurances. “I have just received another briefing from a great group of talented people on the virus that is going around to various parts of the world,” Trump said, before a defense of his administration's timetable of actions including restricting flights from infected areas. The President said most of the Americans currently infected with coronavirus were improving, and that they were being well taken care of.
- WorldBloomberg
Iran Can’t Be Trusted to Deal With Coronavirus
If the leadership of the World Health Organization can spare a moment from their genuflecting to Beijing, they should direct their attention to another authoritarian state struggling to contain the coronavirus: Iran. The Islamic Republic's mismanagement of the contagion represents an imminent threat not only to Iranians but to all of the Middle East and Central Asia — and possibly, given the menacing nature of the microbe, the larger world. Iran already accounts for more deaths from the virus than any country outside China.
- U.S.The Daily Beast
Tucker Carlson Turns to AOC Creepshot Guy for Coronavirus Expertise
Amid growing fears of a coronavirus outbreak and U.S. financial markets hitting a record drop on Thursday, Fox News host Tucker Carlson turned to a conservative columnist best known for taking creepy photos of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) as his expert on the crisis on Thursday night. It should perhaps come as no surprise that Carlson's guest, Washington Examiner columnist Eddie Scarry, used his primetime cable news appearance to talk about the “Commie cough” and to claim that Chinese people eating skunks are responsible for the rise of the virus. In kicking off his Fox News program, Carlson argued that it is liberals' “attitude” towards diversity that has “left us vulnerable to the coronavirus” before welcoming on Scarry to enlighten viewers on the health crisis horrors caused by political correctness.
- WorldReuters
Kremlin plays down hammer attack on exiled Chechen critic in Poland
MOSCOW/WARSAW (Reuters) - The Kremlin on Thursday played down the significance of an attack on a Chechen blogger living in Poland who has been highly critical of Chechnya's Kremlin-backed leader Ramzan Kadyrov, the third such incident this month. Tumso Abdurakhmanov, who fled Russia after an altercation in Chechnya, was taken to hospital on Wednesday after a man broke into his home and attacked him with a hammer, a Chechen rights group said. It was the third attack on a Kadyrov critic this month, after the murder of Chechen blogger Imran Aliyev in France and an assault on Russian journalist Yelena Milashina in the Chechen capital Grozny.
- U.S.USA TODAY
Betsy DeVos orders probe after USA TODAY finds college evidently without faculty, students
The U.S. Department of Education has launched an investigation after a USA TODAY report showed an accredited college apparently had no faculty or students. The college investigated by USA TODAY, Reagan National University, was approved by the Accrediting Council for Independent Colleges & Schools. It has a history of approving several for-profit universities that suddenly closed, such as ITT Tech and Corinthian Colleges in the mid-2010s.
- U.S.The Independent
Right-wing extremists killed 330 in the US in last decade, figures show
A new report shows that right-wing extremists were responsible for 330 murders in the United States in the past decade, or 76 percent of all domestic extremist-related murders in that time. The annual Murder and Extremism report published by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) shows that out of the 42 extremist-related murders in the US in 2019, 38 were committed by individuals subscribing to various far-right ideologies, including white supremacy. The deadliest, by far, was the August white supremacist shooting spree at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, which left 22 people dead and at least 24 more wounded.
- PoliticsNational Review
Over 200 Native Americans Ask Elizabeth Warren to ‘Make Clear Public Statement’ Disavowing Past Claims of Heritage
More than 200 Cherokees and other Native Americans sent a letter to Senator Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.) urging her to issue a public apology after “vague and inadequate” past steps to apologize for her claims of Cherokee ancestry. “Your history of false claims to American Indian identity and the defense of these claims with a highly publicized DNA test continue to dog your political career,” the letter reads. The letter cites reporting detailing how white people have scammed more than $800 million in no-bid federal contracts intended to support minority business owners by falsely claiming Native American and other minority heritages.
PoliticsYahoo News VideoBiden says he's not worried about Trump refusing to leave if defeated in November
Joe Biden says he isn't worried about the prospect of President Trump refusing to leave his post if he's defeated in November.
- U.S.Associated Press
Mom of missing kids waives extradition; bail stays at $5M
Bail will remain at $5 million for a mother arrested in Hawaii over the disappearance of her two Idaho children, a judge ruled Wednesday. Lori Vallow wore an orange jumpsuit in court on the Hawaiian island of Kauai for a hearing on her request to reduce bail. After the judge denied the request, her defense attorney, Craig De Costa, said she is waiving an extradition hearing, which had been scheduled for March 2.
- U.S.NBC News
'He fought us every single step of the way': How Bloomberg embraced stop-and-frisk as mayor
Bloomberg scorned the critics. "I think we disproportionately stop whites too much and minorities too little," Bloomberg told a radio interviewer early that summer, arguing that stop-and-frisk targeted the people who were committing most of the city's gun violence. When a federal judge ruled that the police department's use of stop-and-frisk violated minorities' rights and ordered oversight by a court-appointed monitor, Bloomberg — a lifelong Democrat who became a Republican to run for mayor and switched to independent while in office — vowed to keep stop-and-frisk going through his final days in office.
- WorldTime
Doctors Inside Iran Believe Coronavirus Is More Serious Than Reported, and Getting Worse
Right now in Iran we are facing a coronavirus epidemic,” said a senior medical doctor at the Masih Daneshvari hospital in Tehran, the country's top pulmonary public hospital and the main facility overseeing coronavirus patients. Public officials have not confirmed how the disease arrived in Iran, but it appears to be the locus for the regional outbreak. So far, Afghanistan, Georgia, Bahrain, Iraq, Kuwait, Lebanon, and Oman reported their first cases of coronavirus, all linked to passengers traveling from Iran.
- PoliticsThe Guardian
Trevor Noah on coronavirus: 'Trump is the worst person to reassure the nation'
Late-night hosts discussed the US response to the coronavirus and how Donald Trump responded to this week's Democratic debate. Trevor Noah On The Daily Show, Trevor Noah called the coronavirus “the worst global pandemic since Baby Shark” before discussing the announcement that the vice-president, Mike Pence, will be overseeing efforts to deal with any outbreak in the US. I think this is great because Mike Pence has a lot of experience in this area,” he said.
- WorldReuters
Nigeria's Islamists targeting Christians to provoke religious war, says minister
Islamist militant groups in Nigeria have begun targeting Christians in an attempt to provoke a religious war, the information minister said on Thursday. Islamist insurgents in Nigeria have killed around 35,000 people and displaced at least two million in the past decade, driven first by Boko Haram and more recently by its offshoot, the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP). Information Minister Lai Mohammed said jihadist groups in the northeast of the country have now adopted a "deliberate policy of attacking Christians."
- WorldBloomberg
EU Walks Turkey Tightrope With Limited Sanctions on Drilling
The EU asset freezes and travel bans on two employees of Turkish Petroleum Corp. make good on the bloc's months-long vow to counter Turkey's oil and natural-gas exploration in waters that are part of the exclusive economic zone of member country Cyprus. The sanctions also are the first of their kind in response to the actions of a nation seeking to join the EU. “Hanging in the balance is a possible influx of Syrian refugees into Europe,” said Michael Emerson of the CEPS think tank in the Belgian capital.
- HealthThe Independent
Coronavirus: Four maps and charts that show how serious the deadly virus is
As coronavirus continues to spread to countries across the globe, health organisations are urging governments to prepare for the worst. Currently, there are 81,191 confirmed cases of coronavirus and 2,768 people have died from the respiratory virus. "It's not so much a question of if this will happen anymore, but more really a question of when it will happen - and how many people in this country will have severe illness," Dr Nancy Messonnier of the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said.
- BusinessBusiness Insider
Sheryl Sandberg said she worries about TikTok because it got huge faster than Facebook did
Richard Bord/Getty Images for Cannes Lions Facebook COO Sheryl told NBC's Dylan Byers she worries about the threat posed to the company by TikTok. "They're huge, they're growing really quickly, they've gotten to bigger numbers faster than we ever did," she said. Sandberg also said people have reason to worry about their privacy on the app because TikTok is a Chinese company.
- WorldThe Telegraph
Pope cancels second day of engagements after falling ill
It did not reveal what the pontiff is suffering from, but he was coughing and blowing his nose during Ash Wednesday Mass this week. On Thursday, he cancelled a planned trip across the city to celebrate Mass with Rome priests. His illness comes amid an outbreak of coronavirus which has infected 650 people in Italy and caused disruption across the north of the country.
- U.S.INSIDER
Harvey Weinstein's attorney says she's 'sickened' by the verdict and blames 'public pressure' for the jurors' decision
Harvey Weinstein's attorney told Insider she's "sickened" by the verdict against her client and denounced the public pressure she believed the jury faced. Weinstein was convicted of the 2006 sexual assault of Mimi Haleyi and the 2013 rape of Jessica Mann. Rotunno's team intends to appeal the conviction, and will likely bring up previous disputes in court over the trial's location, their efforts to remove one of the jurors, and a complicated verdict sheet that may have confused the jury.
- PoliticsNBC News
This time, Sanders 'rigged' the system against himself
There's nothing Bernie Sanders hates more than a "rigged" system — especially if he rigged it for his own benefit and then watched his handiwork backfire. Sanders and his allies want Democrats to ignore the rules he helped rewrite and coronate him at the party's convention this summer if he arrives with a plurality — but not a majority — of delegates. Even though Sanders has long been wary of the role party leaders can play in hand-picking a nominee, his position now is a reversal from the one he took in 2016, when he looked to so-called superdelegates to overcome Hillary Clinton's lead in regular delegates at the end of their primary race.
- WorldAssociated Press
Belarus leader says nation being forced to merge with Russia
The president of Belarus said Thursday that his country is "being forced into integration” with Russia and insisted that real integration of the two countries' economies implied “sovereignty and independence” for Belarus. We remain committed, as always, to real integration without being forced into integration,” President Alexander Lukashenko said at a meeting with Mikhail Myasnikovich, chair of the Eurasian Economic Commission. His statement comes as tensions are running high between the neighboring ex-Soviet states.
- U.S.USA TODAY
CDC confirms first 'unknown' coronavirus case in California that could raise concerns about the threat of the virus
Even as President Donald Trump sought to reassure the public that the risk of coronavirus in the U.S. remains low, ominous news emerged that could heighten the level of concern. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Wednesday confirmed an infection in California that would represent the first U.S. person to contract the virus despite not visiting a foreign country recently or coming in contact with an infected patient. "At this time, the patient's exposure is unknown,'' the CDC said in a statement.
- PoliticsReuters
Bloomberg would not ban U.S. oil exports in climate plan, unlike rival Democrats
Media billionaire Michael Bloomberg would allow the United States to keep exporting crude oil overseas if he is elected president, his campaign says, unlike his top Democratic rivals who have pledged to ban oil exports immediately to fight climate change. The stance could help the former New York City mayor gain votes in states like Texas, New Mexico and Louisiana that have benefited from booming U.S. oil exports since the Obama administration lifted a 40-year ban in 2015. But it risks upsetting the Democratic party's progressive wing, which is pushing for sweeping measures to quickly reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
- PoliticsBloomberg
Native Americans Ask Warren to Fully Retract Ancestry Claims
“For Native Americans, this moment is more than an annoyance; it represents the most public debate about our identity in a generation,” the letter read. Warren has apologized several times for identifying as Native American during her career as a law professor and for later making public a DNA test that showed she had a native ancestor. The letter from the Cherokee Nation said Warren has set a “harmful example,” citing a L.A. Times investigation showing that more than $800 million in no-bid federal contracts for minority business owners had been obtained by white people falsely claiming to belong to native tribes.
