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  • Joe Biden stops motorcade on return from church to buy bagels from trendy bakery

    First family orders sesame bagels with cream cheese

  • Sanders says Democrats will push coronavirus relief package through with simple majority

    Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), incoming chair of the Senate Budget Committee who caucuses with the Democrats, told CNN's "State of the Union" on Sunday that Democrats plan to push a coronavirus relief package through the chamber with a simple majority vote. Why it matters: "Budget reconciliation" would allow Democrats to forgo the Senate's 60-vote requirement and could potentially speed-up the next relief package for millions of unemployed Americans. Democrats hold the the 50-50 split in the Senate with Vice President Kamala Harris serving as the tie-breaking vote.Support safe, smart, sane journalism. Sign up for Axios Newsletters here.What he's saying: "What we cannot do is wait weeks and weeks and months to go forward. We have got to act now," Sanders said. * "We're going to use reconciliation — that's 50 votes in the Senate, plus the vice president — to pass legislation desperately needed by working families in this country right now." * When asked if he wants a relief bill passed before former President Trump's impeachment trial begins the week of Feb. 8, he said: "We've got to do everything. This is not — you don't have the time to sit around, weeks on impeachment and not get vaccines into the arms of people."Be smart: sign up FREE for the most influential newsletter in America.

  • Israel expands vaccination drive to include 16 to 18-year-olds in bid to save exams

    Israel will ban passenger flights in and out of the country from Monday for a week as it seeks to stop the spread of new coronavirus variants. "Other than rare exceptions, we are closing the sky hermetically to prevent the entry of the virus variants and also to ensure that we progress quickly with our vaccination campaign," said Benjamin Netanuahu, the Israeli prime minister. It came as a study in Israel reported a 60 per cent drop in over-60s being hospitalised with coronavirus three weeks after being vaccinated, in the latest sign that the jabs are effective. According to Maccabi, an Israeli healthcare provider, there was a significant decrease in hospitalisations from day 23 onwards, which was two days after patients received their second jab. Also on Sunday, Israel expanded its rapid vaccination drive to include 16-18 year-olds in an effort to get them back in schools to take their winter examinations. The winter matriculation certificate is a significant part of university and military admissions. At least one dose has been administered to around a quarter of Israel’s 9 million-strong population. The vaccine is generally available to over 40s or, with parental permission, those aged between 16 and 18. Israel struck a deal with Pfizer at the beginning of January that allowed them to expedite delivery of the vaccine, in return for sharing extensive data on their vaccination campaign with the rest of the world. Yuli Edelstein, the Israeli health minister, told The Andrew Marr Show on Sunday that the data from their vaccination programme suggests a first dose offered around 30 per cent protection from coronavirus.

  • California to lift stay-at-home orders on Monday: report

    California Governor Gavin Newsom's office has decided to lift the orders as ICU availability in the regions that remained under the stay-at-home order, including the Bay area and Southern California are projected to rise above the 15% threshold that triggered the lockdown measures, according https://bit.ly/3sSPOfp to San Francisco Chronicle. California has reported over 3.1 million cases and 36,745 deaths so far, a Reuters tally showed. Strict stay-at-home orders were renewed for much of California in December to avert a crisis in hospitals.

  • China pushes fringe theories on pandemic origins, virus

    Chinese state media have played up questions about Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine and whether it could be lethal to the very old. A government spokesperson suggests the coronavirus could have emerged from a U.S. military lab. As the ruling Communist Party faces growing questioning about China's vaccines and renewed criticism of its early COVID response, it is hitting back by encouraging fringe theories that some experts say could cause harm.

  • New CDC director said Biden administration is struggling with lack of vaccine data

    The Biden administration aims for 100 million vaccinations within his first 100 days as president.

  • Republican split widens as Donald Trump intervenes in party elections in Arizona

    The acrimonious split within Republican ranks widened over the weekend as Donald Trump made his foray back into politics, backing the re-election of a hard-line supporter as chair of the party in Arizona. His wholehearted support for Kelli Ward was seen by allies as the former president firing a warning shot across the bows of any Republican senators considering backing his impeachment. Underlining Mr Trump’s grip on the Republican grassroots, the Arizona party also voted to censure John McCain’s widow, Cindy, former senator Jeff Flake and governor Doug Ducey, who refused to back the former president’s claims of election fraud. Mr Trump’s intervention came amid reports that he is considering setting up a “Patriot Party” which would spearhead primary challenges to his opponents in the 2022 mid-term elections. The former president has already amassed a massive war chest with his Save America political action committee declaring last month that it had raked in $207.5 million in donations.

  • Grizzly, 34, confirmed as Yellowstone region's known oldest

    A 34-year-old grizzly bear captured in southwestern Wyoming has been confirmed as the oldest on record in the Yellowstone region, Wyoming wildlife officials said. Grizzly bear 168 was captured last summer after it preyed on calves in the Upper Green River Basin area. Biologists learned of the bear’s longevity after euthanizing the bruin, which had preyed on cattle and then finally, calves.

  • Trump shuns ex-presidents club

    It's a club Donald Trump was never really interested in joining and certainly not so soon: the cadre of former commanders in chief who revere the presidency enough to put aside often bitter political differences and even join together in common cause.

  • Ted Cruz's 'Pittsburgh over Paris' campaign shows us just how dumb the Biden years are going to be

    Barely any time has passed since President Biden's inauguration, and Republicans have already returned to their bag of shenanigans.

  • China says U.S. military in South China Sea not good for peace

    The United States often sends ships and aircraft into the South China Sea to "flex its muscles" and this is not good for peace, China's Foreign Ministry said on Monday, after a U.S. aircraft carrier group sailed into the disputed waterway. The strategic South China Sea, through which trillions of dollars in trade flows each year, has long been a focus of contention between Beijing and Washington, with China particularly angered by U.S. military activity there. The U.S. carrier group led by the USS Theodore Roosevelt and accompanied by three warships, entered the waterway on Saturday to promote "freedom of the seas", the U.S. military said, just days after Joe Biden became U.S. president..

  • Five people, including pregnant woman, killed in 'act of mass murder' in Indianapolis

    A motive wasn't immediately known. Mayor Joe Hogsett said the shooting had brought "terror to our community."

  • Growing number of GOP senators oppose impeachment trial

    A growing number of Republican senators say they oppose holding an impeachment trial, a sign of the dimming chances that former President Donald Trump will be convicted on the charge that he incited a siege of the U.S. Capitol. House Democrats, who will walk the impeachment charge of “incitement of insurrection” to the Senate on Monday evening, are hoping that strong Republican denunciations of Trump after the Jan. 6 riot will translate into a conviction and a separate vote to bar Trump from holding office again.

  • North Korea diplomat 'defects to South Korea': Reports

    South Korean reports say that Run Hyun-woo - an acting ambassador - fled to South Korea in September.

  • Biden wants to cancel $10k per person of student loan debt. But it won't address the root issue

    Data: New York Fed Consumer Credit Panel/Equifax; Chart: Axios VisualsThere’s a growing consensus among Americans who want President Biden to cancel student debt — but addressing the ballooning debt burden is much more complicated than it seems.Why it matters: Student debt is stopping millions of Americans from buying homes, buying cars and starting families. And the crisis is rapidly getting worse.Support safe, smart, sane journalism. Sign up for Axios Newsletters here.By the numbers: Student debt — which stands at $1.55 trillion — is the biggest category of debt Americans owe, aside from mortgages. * Most borrowers are white, but Black college graduates owe an average of $25,000 more than their white counterparts. * According to a new Harris Poll survey, 64% of Americans support canceling some student debt, and 55% support canceling all of it.What's happening: Biden has proposed immediately cancelling $10,000 of federal student loan debt for every borrower. The move would cost around $370 billion. * That would eliminate debt for the 15 million borrowers that owe $10,000 or less — a broad-based approach that would help all 42 million borrowers.Yes, but: Here's what that alone wouldn't do: * It wouldn't make much of a difference for the nearly 30 million borrowers who owe more than $10,000. Many of them went to graduate school and owe hundreds of thousands. * It wouldn't stimulate the economy. Student debt stops many from investing or buying property, which is a drag on the economy, but canceling a small amount of debt wouldn't change that, experts say. * It wouldn’t target the most vulnerable borrowers. Canceling the same amount of debt for all doesn’t account for the fact that many Americans with student debt are also among the most well-educated and high-earning individuals. * It wouldn't help future borrowers. “The problem with forgiving student debt is that every day we’re making new loans in this broken system,” says Adam Looney, an economist at the University of Utah. “You’ve not solved the problem.”Insurmountable student debt is a recent phenomenon, Looney says. It's been growing at six times the rate of the U.S. economy, and it's only getting worse. * There are no limits on how much students can borrow and few restrictions on how they spend the money. * And, on top of that, the cost of college and graduate school is skyrocketing. As a result, young people are borrowing sums of money they can’t possibly repay and many are using that money to pursue degrees at online or for-profit colleges with higher than average dropout rates.What we're watching: Among the American public, canceling debt isn't a fringe or far-left idea any more. * In the Harris Poll survey, 78% support putting restrictions on the price of a university education. And 59% support no tuition at public universities.Be smart: sign up FREE for the most influential newsletter in America.

  • China says coronavirus traces found in vaccination sites, but not infectious

    China has found harmless traces of the novel coronavirus in some COVID-19 inoculation sites potentially linked to vaccine liquid, its disease control centre said. Samples taken from tables, walls, doorknobs and hallways of the sites tested positive for the virus but were not infectious, Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (China CDC) said in a statement late on Sunday. The traces had identical genome sequences as the strain found in used vaccine vials but were different from the strains currently spreading, China CDC said.

  • Protests against Israeli PM Netanyahu continue nationwide

    Over a thousand protesters gathered in Jerusalem on Saturday for weekly demonstrations demanding Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu step down over corruption charges, as smaller protests were staged at intersections and bridges across the country. The protests have taken place each week since last summer, primarily at a Jerusalem square near Netanyahu’s official residence, and continued despite lower turnout in the cold winter nights. In March, Israel will hold its fourth national election in less than two years, and Netanyahu is facing further challenges from defectors within his Likud party.

  • Priest who attended pro-Trump rally ahead of Capitol insurrection is suspended from post and may be defrocked

    Reverend Mark Hodges described event as ‘joyful, positive and orderly’

  • Chinese fighter jets buzz Taiwan for second day as tensions rise days into Biden term

    China ramped up its pressure on democratic Taiwan over the weekend, with an unusually large number of fighter jets approaching the island in a "test" for the new administration of US President Joe Biden. On Sunday, 12 Chinese fighter jets entered Taiwan’s air defence identification zone, along with a reconnaissance aircraft and two anti-submarine aircraft, Taiwan’s defence ministry said. A day earlier, China sent eight bomber planes capable of carrying nuclear weapons and four fighter jets to the same area to the southwest of the island, as well as one reconnaissance aircraft. On both occasions, Taiwan sent up aircraft, issued radio warnings to the Chinese aircraft, and deployed air defence missile systems to monitor their activity. Beijing claims self-governing Taiwan as part of its territory, and has been angered by a show of increased US support for Taiwan during Donald Trump’s administration. In recent months, China has carried out frequent, at times daily, incursions aimed at pressuring President Tsai Ing-wen’s government to accept Beijing’s demand that it recognise Taiwan as part of China. These incursions have usually consisted of just one or two reconnaissance planes in recent weeks, rather than the warplanes seen over the weekend.

  • Fourth Zimbabwean Cabinet member dies of COVID-19 in surge

    Four Zimbabwean Cabinet ministers have died of COVID-19, three within the past two weeks, highlighting a resurgence of the disease that is sweeping through this southern African country. President Emmerson Mnangagwa said the coronavirus is reaping a “grim harvest” in the country. Then came the death of the transport minister.