Month: September 2021

Meteorologists with the U.S. National Hurricane Center say Hurricane Sam has again strengthened to a Category 4 storm but remains far from land, although it could threaten Bermuda later in the week.  

In its latest report, forecasters said Sam was 935 kilometers east of the northern Leeward Islands, with maximum sustained winds of 215 kilometers per hour. The storm had weakened late Monday, though the hurricane hunter plane flew into the storm earlier Tuesday to confirm it was intensifying.

Forecasters expect Sam to take a turn toward the north later in the week and say the storm will pass well to the east of the Caribbean islands. It will likely generate swells that could create life-threatening surf and rip current conditions throughout the area.

The hurricane center expects Sam to maintain its major hurricane status over the next three to five days. It could affect Bermuda and even the Atlantic coast of Canada later this week.  

Meteorologists with The Washington Post’s Capital Weather Gang report Sam reached its peak strength Sunday when it reached nearly 250 kilometers per hour, just shy of a Category 5 hurricane, making it the strongest storm of the season so far.   

They say it also was the fifth storm of the Atlantic hurricane season to rapidly intensify – that is, see its peak winds increase at least 56 kilometers per hour in 24 hours. And it marked the fourth major hurricane – rated Category 3 or higher – this season.  

They report 2021 is the sixth consecutive year with above-average tropical activity. The Atlantic hurricane season runs from June through November.
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A Maryland judge on Tuesday sentenced the gunman who killed five people at the Capital Gazette newsroom in Annapolis in 2018 to five life prison sentences without the possibility of parole, the office of the state’s attorney for Anne Arundel County said.

A jury in July found Jarrod Ramos, 41, criminally responsible for the massacre, one of the deadliest attacks on a U.S. media outlet.

Ramos pleaded guilty in October 2019 to 23 felony counts, including five counts of first-degree murder, but argued that he was not criminally responsible due to a mental disorder. The jury rejected his insanity defense after just a few hours of deliberation.

The mass shooting took place on June 28, 2018, when Ramos walked into the Gazette’s Annapolis newsroom and killed the newspaper’s assistant editor, Rob Hiaasen, 59; journalists Wendi Winters, 65, Gerald Fischman, 61, and John McNamara, 56; and sales assistant Rebecca Smith, 34.

Ramos had waged a long legal battle with the paper over a column it published about him, and his lawsuit was eventually dismissed.

The trial had been postponed several times, in part because of the coronavirus pandemic. Had the jury found that Ramos was suffering from a mental disorder at the time, he could have received a sentence committing him to a mental health institution.

 
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R. Kelly, the superstar American R&B singer known for his anthem “I Believe I Can Fly,” was convicted Monday in a sex-trafficking trial after decades of avoiding criminal responsibility for numerous allegations of misconduct with young women and children. 

A jury of seven men and five women found Kelly guilty of racketeering on their second day of deliberations. Kelly remained motionless; eyes downcast as the verdict was read. The charges were based on an argument that the entourage of managers and aides who helped the singer meet girls amounted to a criminal enterprise. Kelly’s lawyer plans to file an appeal.

“Of course, Mr. Kelly is disappointed,” said Deveraux Cannick, R. Kelly’s attorney. “He did not anticipate this verdict because based on the evidence, why should he anticipate this verdict? When you go with the discovery you saw witness after witness is giving three, four, five different versions as to what they said happened here. 

Widespread public condemnation didn’t come until a widely watched docuseries “Surviving R. Kelly” helped make his case a signifier of the #MeToo era, and gave voice to accusers who wondered if their stories were previously ignored because they were Black women.

Tarana Burke, founder of the “#MeToo” Movement, says Kelly’s conviction shows women of color that they matter.   

“This has been a very long time coming,” said Burke. “So, not only the survivors, but for the organizers and activists and writers. And just like, plethora of Black women and some of our allies who have been at this for the longest time, who have been ringing the alarm for the longest time. It felt like, gosh, this is not always the way justice will be served if we can call it justice, but at least it feels like something.”

Kelly was also convicted of criminal counts accusing him of violating the Mann Act, which makes it illegal to take anyone across state lines “for any immoral purpose.”

For years, the public and news media seemed to be more amused than horrified by allegations of inappropriate relationships with minors, starting with Kelly’s illegal marriage to the R&B phenom Aaliyah in 1994 when she was just 15 years old.

 
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U.S. President Joe Biden received a COVID-19 vaccine booster shot on Monday, days after his administration approved a third shot of Pfizer’s vaccine for certain populations.  

Before receiving his shot, Biden told reporters at the White House that “boosters are important, but the most important thing we need to do is get more people vaccinated” with their initial shots.

“The vast majority of Americans are doing the right thing,” Biden said. “Over 77% of adults have gotten at least one shot. About 23% haven’t gotten any shots. And that, that distinct minority is causing an awful lot of us, an awful lot of damage for the rest of the country. This is a pandemic of the unvaccinated. That’s why I’m moving forward with vaccination requirements wherever I can.” 

Biden received his booster eight months after his second shot in January, before he was sworn into office. 

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell said he also received a booster shot Monday and encouraged Americans to get vaccinated against COVID-19. 

The booster shot is available for those who received the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine at least six months ago. 

 
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The U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan did little to reduce tensions between India and Pakistan. Anita Powell reports from the White House on how President Biden, fresh from a historic meeting with India’s leader, is approaching relations with the two South Asian rivals.  
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Top U.S. military officials are set to face questioning Tuesday about the end of the war in Afghanistan and the chaotic final weeks leading up to the withdrawal of U.S. forces from the country after 20 years. 

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Mark Milley and the head of U.S. Central Command Gen. Kenneth McKenzie are due to appear before the Senate Armed Services Committee for a hearing about the end of military operations in Afghanistan as well as the military’s future counterterrorism plans. 

The Pentagon has defended the withdrawal operation, which included an evacuation effort that brought more than 120,000 people out of Afghanistan as the Taliban seized control of the country once more. 

The operation featured many chaotic days at the Kabul international airport, including a suicide bombing that killed 13 U.S. service members and 169 Afghans. 

The officials are likely to face questioning about the Biden administration’s planning for the withdrawal effort and the decision to end the U.S. mission in Afghanistan, as well as specific events from those final days such as an airstrike that killed 10 civilians.

Austin, Milley and McKenzie are all due to appear again Wednesday before the House Armed Services Committee. 

Some information for this report came from the Associated Press and Reuters 

 
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Federal investigators examined overturned rail cars and a stretch of tracks Monday as they worked to figure out why an Amtrak train derailed in rural Montana over the weekend, killing three people. 

The westbound Empire Builder was traveling from Chicago to Seattle when it left the tracks Saturday afternoon near Joplin, a town of about 200. The train, carrying 141 passengers and 16 crew members, had two locomotives and 10 cars, eight of which derailed, with some tipping onto their sides. Seven people were hospitalized. 

The derailment occurred near a switch in the line, where one set of tracks turned into two, on a stretch of track that had just been inspected two days earlier, said BNSF Railway spokesperson Matt Jones at a news conference on Sunday. 

Officials from the National Transportation Safety Board were expected to provide an update later Monday. The identities of the victims had not been released. 

Investigators will look at “everything” including the switch, wheels, axles and suspension systems, as well as the track geometry and condition, including any cracks, said Steven Ditmeyer, a rail consultant and former senior official at the Federal Railroad Administration. He said a switch such as the one in Joplin would be controlled by the BNSF control center in Fort Worth, Texas. 

Sun kinks 

Rail lines can sometimes become deformed by heat, creating buckles known as sun kinks in the tracks, Ditmeyer said. That was the cause of another derailment in northern Montana in August 1988, when an Empire Builder train derailed about 170 miles (274 kilometers) east in Saco, Montana. 

The NTSB concluded that an inspection had failed to catch a problem in the track and officials had not warned trains to slow down on that stretch. The crew saw the track had shifted, but the train was going full speed and could not stop before derailing. 

Temperatures were in the upper 80s Saturday near Joplin, according to the National Weather Service. 

Russ Quimby, a former rail accident investigator for the NTSB, said the most likely explanation was that the train hit a section of track that had buckled in the heat, as had been the case in the 1988 accident. He is convinced of this because the locomotives in front did not derail, but the eight lighter coach cars behind them did.

“This has all the earmarks of a track buckle also,” Quimby said. “Sometimes a locomotive, which is heavier, will make it through” a buckled track, “but the cars following won’t. You saw that in this accident,” he said. 

Quimby said a malfunction of the switch seemed less likely because, he believes, the switch would have been inspected when the track in the area had been checked last week. 

Another possibility was a defect in the rail, said railroad safety expert David Clarke, director of the Center for Transportation Research at the University of Tennessee. He noted that regular testing does not always catch such problems. 

Speed was not a likely factor because trains on that line have systems that prevent excessive speeds and collisions, which appear to have worked in this case, Clarke said. 

The speed limit on that stretch of track is 79 mph, said John Hiatt, a former BNSF engineer who is with the Bremseth law firm, based in Minneapolis, that provides representation for railroad accident injuries. Hiatt, who is on the scene in Montana, said the railroad employees he spoke with said there was a soft spot, a low spot on the track, in that area. 

Examining the switch 

Two locomotives and two cars at the front of the train reached the switch and continued on the main track, but the remaining eight cars derailed. He said it was unclear whether some of the last cars moved onto the second track. 

“Did the switch play some role? It might have been that the front of the train hit the switch and it started fishtailing, and that flipped the back part of the train,” Clarke said. 

The site of the derailment is about 150 miles (241 kilometers) northeast of Helena, Montana, and about 30 miles (48 kilometers) from the Canadian border. The tracks roughly parallel U.S. Highway 2 and cut through recently harvested wheat fields. 

A 14-member NTSB team that includes railroad signal specialists will look into the cause of the accident, board spokesperson Eric Weiss said. 

Allan Zarembski, director of the University of Delaware’s Railway Engineering and Safety Program, said he did not want to speculate but suspected the derailment stemmed from an issue with the track, train equipment or both. 

Railways have “virtually eliminated” major derailments by human error after the implementation of a nationwide system designed to stop trains before an accident, Zarembski said. 

The derailment comes as Congress works toward final passage of a $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure package that includes $66 billion to improve Amtrak service. That’s less than the $80 billion that President Joe Biden — who famously rode Amtrak from Delaware to Washington during his time in the Senate — originally asked for, but it would be the largest federal investment in passenger rail service since Amtrak was founded 50 years ago. 

The biggest chunk of money would go toward repairs and improvements along the rail service’s congested 457-mile-long Northeast Corridor as well as to intercity routes with higher commuter traffic. About $16 billion is also aimed at building out Amtrak’s national service to wider America, particularly in rural regions. 

Amtrak CEO Bill Flynn said the company was working with the NTSB, Federal Railroad Administration and local law enforcement, sharing their “sense of urgency” to determine what happened in Montana. 

Most of those on the train were treated and released for their injuries, but five who were more seriously hurt were in stable condition at the Benefis Health System hospital in Great Falls, Montana, Benefis spokesperson Whitney Bania said. 

Two more people were at Logan Health, a hospital in Kalispell, Montana, spokeswoman Melody Sharpton said. 

 
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Homicides in the U.S. increased nearly 30 percent last year compared to 2019, part of an overall increase in violent crime in the country, the Federal Bureau of Investigation reported Monday.

In its annual crime statistics report, the FBI said nearly 1.3 million violent crimes were committed in the U.S. last year, up 5.6 percent from 2019 and the first time the figure had risen in four years. Nearly 18,000 killings were reported, the FBI said.

The FBI report underscored the correlation between shootings and killings. Gun-related homicides accounted for more than two out of every three such deaths, according to the data.

The FBI, the country’s top criminal investigative agency, said there were more than 6.4 million property crimes committed, down 7.8 percent from the year before and the 18th straight year the figure has fallen.

Although the number of murders and non-negligent manslaughter offenses increased, the FBI said the number of robberies dropped 9.3 percent and rapes by 12 percent, while the estimated number of aggravated assault offenses rose 12.1 percent.

Among property crimes, the FBI said the number of burglaries dropped 7.4 percent and larceny-thefts fell by 10.6 percent, but motor vehicle thefts rose 11.8 percent.

Collectively, victims of property crimes, excluding arson, suffered losses estimated at $17.5 billion in 2020, the report said. Law enforcement agencies throughout the U.S. arrested 7.6 million people last year, excluding those for traffic violations, the report stated.
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U.S. President Joe Biden received a COVID-19 vaccine booster shot Monday, days after his administration approved a third shot of Pfizer’s vaccine for certain populations. 

Before receiving his shot on camera, Biden told reporters at the White House that “boosters are important, but the most important thing we need to do is get more people vaccinated” with their initial shots.

He said 77% of the U.S. adult population has received at least one dose of a coronavirus vaccine. 

“A quarter of the country can’t go unvaccinated,” he said, after getting his booster shot.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) approved the boosters last week for three categories of Americans: those age 65 and older; frontline workers such as teachers, health care workers and others whose jobs place them at risk of contracting COVID-19; and those ages 50 to 64 with underlying conditions. 

The booster shot is available for those who received the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine at least six months ago. The White House said Friday 20 million Americans are eligible for the shot immediately, while 60 million Pfizer-shot recipients will be eligible for boosters once they reach the six-month mark. 

Biden, 78, received his first dose of the Pfizer vaccine in December and a second shot in January, before he was sworn into office.

In comments from the White House Friday, Biden encouraged those eligible to get an additional vaccine dose.

“Like your first and second shot, the booster shot is free and easily accessible,” he said.

Biden announced in August that he wanted to see all Americans receive booster shots as the country experienced a wave of new coronavirus cases from the highly transmissible delta variant.

His plan was put on hold earlier this month, however, when an advisory panel for the U.S Food and Drug Administration rejected the widespread use of the boosters, citing a lack of data on their safety and value. The independent panel did endorse extra vaccine doses for those age 65 and older or at high risk of severe illness.

The CDC recommended that another category of Americans receive a booster shot: those whose jobs put them at a high risk of exposure to COVID-19. That recommendation by agency officials last week overruled the CDC’s own panel of health experts, triggering further debate about who should receive a booster shot. 

The World Health Organization has also weighed in on the matter, calling on the United States and other countries to pause the booster shot rollout to increase supplies for global vaccination distribution. 

When asked about the WHO’s stance Monday, Biden said the United States is “doing more than every other nation combined” to get vaccines to countries around the world.

Biden announced last week that the United States was purchasing another 500 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine to donate internationally, for a total of one billion doses over the coming year.

The FDA has not yet considered the use of boosters by drugmakers Moderna or Johnson & Johnson.

The European Union’s drug watchdog said last week it plans to decide in early October whether to approve a third dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for those over age 16.
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President Joe Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan is traveling to Saudi Arabia on Monday to meet with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman as the U.S. presses for a cease-fire in the yearslong war between the kingdom and Houthi rebels in Yemen. 

Sullivan will be the highest-ranking Biden administration official to visit Saudi Arabia. Besides seeing the crown prince, often referred to by his initials, MBS, Sullivan is expected to meet with deputy defense minster Khalid bin Salman, a brother to the crown prince, according to two senior administration officials. The officials were not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The Biden White House has largely steered clear of the crown prince since making public in February a CIA report that showed MBS likely approved the killing of Washington Post columnist and Saudi critic Jamal Khashoggi in a 2018 operation at the kingdom’s consulate in Istanbul. 

But the White House has resolved that bringing an end to perhaps the world’s most complex conflict can’t be done without engaging with the most senior Saudi officials face to face, one senior administration official said. 

National Security Council spokesperson Emily Horne said Sullivan was traveling to Riyadh on Monday and would also visit the United Arab Emirates, a Saudi ally in the war, but did not provide additional details. Axios first reported that Sullivan was planning on traveling to the region. 

Sullivan is being dispatched at a moment when the situation in Yemen, the Arab world’s poorest country, has further deteriorated. Fighting has intensified in the key city of Marib, as Iran-backed rebels have sought to oust the Saudi-backed government from the oil-rich city in the country’s north. 

International efforts to end the war have been fruitless. Tim Lenderking, the U.S. special envoy for Yemen, called out the Houthis in July for continuing “to refuse to engage meaningfully on a cease-fire and political talks.” Saudi Arabia offered a cease-fire proposal to Yemen’s Houthi rebels earlier this year as it looked to rehabilitate its image with the Biden administration.

The Saudis have drawn international criticism for airstrikes killing civilians and embargoes exacerbating hunger in a nation on the brink of famine. 

The new U.N. special envoy to Yemen, Hans Grundberg, recently declared that the country is “stuck in an indefinite state of war” and resuming negotiations to end the more than six-year conflict won’t be easy. 

Yemen’s war began in September 2014, when the Iranian-backed Houthis seized Sanaa and began a march south to try to seize the entire country. Saudi Arabia, along with the United Arab Emirates and other countries, entered the war alongside Yemen’s internationally recognized government in March 2015. 

The U.S. sold bombs and fighter jets to Saudi Arabia that the kingdom later used in strikes on Yemen that also killed civilians. The Obama administration in 2015 initially offered U.S. targeting assistance to Saudi Arabia’s command-and-control operations that was supposed to minimize civilian casualties in airstrikes. It didn’t, and Obama ultimately cut back on the program.

Under President Donald Trump, targeting assistance continued although his administration later stopped U.S. refueling operations for Saudi jets. 

Biden announced weeks into his administration that he was ending all American support for “offensive operations in the war in Yemen, including relevant arms sales.” But there has been little progress on the ground in resolving what the United Nations says is the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. 

White House officials are hopeful that the appointment of Grundberg will bring a new dynamic and put pressure on all sides to bring an end to the conflict, according to two senior administration officials.

Sullivan is being joined for the talks with the Saudis and the UAE by Lenderking and NSC senior director for the Middle East Brett McGurk. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin planned to travel to Saudi Arabia earlier this month while he was in the region but postponed due to what the administration said were scheduling issues. 

The high-level White House push comes after Lenderking traveled to Saudi Arabia and Oman, which has pressed for an end to the war. In addition, Secretary of State Antony Blinken had talks with his counterpart members of the Gulf Cooperation Council on the margins of the U.N. General Assembly. 

Sullivan’s visit to Saudi Arabia also comes as the administration is looking for ways to resurrect the Iran nuclear deal. The Saudis and the UAE fiercely oppose returning to the deal with Iran that was originally brokered in 2015 by the Obama administration only to be scrapped by Trump in 2018.

Addressing the U.N. General Assembly on Friday, Iran’s new foreign minister Hossain Amir Abdollah said the country will return to nuclear negotiations in Vienna “very soon.” But he accused the Biden administration of sending contradictory messages by saying it wants to rejoin the pact while slapping new sanctions on Tehran and not taking “an iota of positive action.” 

Biden and his team have made a U.S. return to the deal — to which Britain, France, Russia, China, Germany and Iran are signatories — one of their top foreign policy priorities. But the U.S. has made limited headway in indirect talks, and Tehran has bristled at Biden administration officials’ call for a “longer and stronger” deal than the original, which expires at the end of 2030. 
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“Moulin Rouge! The Musical,” a jukebox adaptation of Baz Luhrmann’s hyperactive 2001 movie, won the best new musical crown at the Tony Awards on a Sunday night when Broadway looked back to honor shows shuttered by COVID-19, mourn its fallen and also look forward to welcoming audiences again.

The show about the goings-on in a turn-of-the-century Parisian nightclub, updated with tunes like “Single Ladies” and “Firework” alongside the big hit “Lady Marmalade,” won 10 Tonys. The record is 12, won by “The Producers.”

Producer Carmen Pavlovic struck a philosophical note in her acceptance speech, sharing the award with all the shows that struggled in the past 18-month shutdown.

“It feels a little odd to me to be talking about one show as best musical. I feel that every show of last season deserves to be thought of as the best musical,” she said. “The shows that opened, the shows that closed not to return, the shows that nearly opened. And of course, the shows that paused and are fortunate enough to be reborn — best musical is all of those shows.”

“The Inheritance” by Matthew Lopez was named the best new play and won three other awards, and Charles Fuller’s “A Soldier’s Play” won best play revival and an acting award. 

Lopez’s two-part, seven-hour epic uses “Howards End” as a starting point for a play that looks at gay life in the early 21st century. It also yielded wins for Andrew Burnap as best actor in a play, Stephen Daldry as best director, and Lois Smith as best performance by an actress in a featured role in a play. 

Thomas Kirdahy, a producer, dedicated the award to his late husband, the playwright Terrence McNally. Lopez, the first Latino writer to win in the category, urged more plays to be produced from the Latin community. “We have so many stories inside us aching to come out. Let us tell you our stories,” he said.

The pandemic-delayed telecast kicked off with an energetic performance of “You Can’t Stop the Beat” from original Broadway cast members of “Hairspray!” Ali Stroker sang “What I Did for Love” from “A Chorus Line.” Jennifer Holliday also took the stage to deliver an unforgettable rendition of “And I’m Telling You I’m Not Going” from the musical “Dreamgirls.”

The singers performed for a masked and appreciative audience at a packed Winter Garden Theatre. Host Audra McDonald got a standing ovation when she took the stage. “You can’t stop the beat. The heart of New York City!” she said.

“Moulin Rouge! The Musical” won for scenic design, costume, lighting, sound design, orchestrations and a featured acting Tony for Broadway favorite Danny Burstein. Sonya Tayeh won for choreography in her Broadway debut, and Alex Timbers won the trophy for best direction of a musical.

In a surprise to no one, Aaron Tveit won the award for best leading actor in a musical for “Moulin Rouge! The Musical.” That’s because he was the only person nominated in the category. He thanked a long list of people, including his parents, brother, agents, manager and the cast and crew. “We are so privileged to get to do this,” he said, tearing up. “Because what we do changes peoples’ lives.”

Burstein, who won for featured actor in a musical and had not won six previous times, thanked the Broadway community for supporting him after the death last year of his wife, Rebecca Luker. “You were there for us, whether you just sent a note or sent your love, sent your prayers — sent bagels — it meant the world to us, and it’s something I’ll never forget.”

David Alan Grier won featured actor in a play for his role in “A Soldier’s Play,” which dissects entrenched Black-white racism as well as internal divisions in the Black military community during World War II. “To my other nominees: Tough bananas, I won,” he said. On stage, the director, Kenny Leon recited the names Breonna Taylor and George Floyd, killed by police. “We will never, ever forget you.”

Adrienne Warren won the Tony for best leading actress in a musical for her electric turn as Tina Turner in “Tina — The Tina Turner Musical.” Warren was considered the front-runner thanks to becoming a one-woman fireball of energy and exhilaration. She dedicated the win to three family members she lost while playing Turner — and thanked Turner herself.

Mary-Louise Parker won her second best lead actress Tony Award, winning for playing a Yale professor who treasures great literature but has made no room in her life for someone to share that love with in “The Sound Inside.” She thanked her dog, whom she was walking in the rain when she bumped into Mandy Greenfield from the Williamstown Theatre Festival, who told her about the play.

Burnap made his Broadway debut in “The Inheritance.” He thanked his mom, and the University of Rhode Island and joked that he felt grateful because “I got to act for seven hours.”

The sobering musical “Jagged Little Pill,” which plumbs Alanis Morissette’s 1995 breakthrough album to tell a story of an American family spiraling out of control, came into the night with a leading 15 Tony nominations. It left with wins for best book, and Lauren Patten won the award for best featured actress in a musical.

“A Christmas Carol” cleaned up with five technical awards: scenic design of a play, costumes, lighting, sound design and score. But no one from the production was on hand to accept any of the awards. 

“Slave Play,” Jeremy O. Harris’ ground-breaking, bracing work that mixes race, sex, taboo desires and class, earned a dozen nominations, making it the most nominated play in Tony history. But it won nothing.

Sunday’s show was expanded from its typical three hours to four, with McDonald handing out Tonys for the first two hours and Leslie Odom Jr. hosting a “Broadway’s Back!” celebration for the second half with performances from the three top musicals.

The live special also included David Byrne and the cast of “American Utopia” playing “Burning Down the House” to a standing and clapping crowd. Byrne told them they might not remember how to dance after so long but they were welcome to try.

John Legend and the cast of “Ain’t Too Proud” performed “My Girl” and “Ain’t Too Proud to Beg” and Josh Groban and Odom Jr. sang “Beautiful City” from “Godspell,” dedicating it to educators. And Ben Platt and Anika Noni Rose sang “Move On” from “Sunday in the Park with George.” Idina Menzel and Kristin Chenoweth reunited for the “Wicked” song “For Good.”

Members of Broadway’s royalty — Norm Lewis, Kelli O’Hara and Brian Stokes Mitchell — mourned the list of those who have died, which included icons like McNally, Harold Prince and Larry Kramer.

This season’s nominations were pulled from just 18 eligible plays and musicals from the 2019-2020 season, a fraction of the 34 shows the previous season. During most years, there are 26 competitive categories. This year there are 25 with several depleted ones.

The last Tony Awards ceremony was held in 2019. The virus forced Broadway theaters to abruptly close on March 12, 2020, knocking out all shows and scrambling the spring season. Several have restarted, including the so-called big three of “Wicked,” “Hamilton” and “The Lion King.”
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A time of intensity. That’s what House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat, is calling this coming week in Congress as lawmakers are expected to vote on a $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill, but also consider the Democrat-backed $3.5 trillion sweeping social spending package, core to the Biden administration agenda. Michelle Quinn reports.   

Produced by: Henry Hernandez 
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The U.S. House of Representatives is due to begin debate Monday on a $1 trillion infrastructure bill ahead of a planned vote Thursday on the measure that is a major part of President Joe Biden’s domestic agenda.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced the dates in a letter to Democratic lawmakers Sunday, and in television interviews she expressed confidence the bill will pass. 

“Let me just say that we’re going to pass the bill this week,” Pelosi said on ABC News’ “This Week” show.

She added that she would not bring a bill to the House floor for consideration unless it has enough support to pass. 

Biden also expressed confidence when asked about the bill, telling reporters Sunday “it’s going to take the better part of this week.”

The Senate approved the infrastructure plan in a vote last month that saw 19 Republicans join all 50 members of the Democratic caucus.

The infrastructure spending, with nearly half of it in new government funding, would repair aging roads and bridges and expand broadband, pay for replacement of dangerous lead-piped drinking water systems, add new sewer infrastructure, expand passenger rail and transit systems, and make airport improvements.

Pelosi said in her letter that House leaders are also working with the Senate and White House on a separate $3.5 trillion proposal involving social safety net and climate change programs. That measure includes plans to provide universal pre-kindergarten instruction, free community college classes, expanded health care for older Americans, childcare funding, money to combat the effects of climate change, and make immigration law changes and attempt to lower prescription drug prices.

But the larger bill, which advanced in the House Budget Committee on Saturday, faces more opposition, including from some Senate Democrats who say they will not support that much spending. 

Pelosi told ABC’s “This Week” that the negotiations would certainly result in a lower price tag, calling such a development “self-evident.” 

Some information for this report came from the Associated Press and Reuters. 

 
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The surge in coronavirus cases in the United States is overwhelming the capacity to provide normal health care at hospitals in some states, one of the country’s top health officials said Sunday.

Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told CBS News’ “Face the Nation” show that in some parts of the country, “Their health care systems are in dire straits.”

“They are running out of beds,” she said. “And when you see that, you worry that people may not be able to come in and get the proper care if they have a motor vehicle accident or if they’re having a heart attack.”

“And that is why we are working so hard in areas that have high levels of disease” to get people vaccinated, she said, noting that people who are not vaccinated are 10 times more likely to be in the hospital than those who have been inoculated. “Our hospitals are filled with unvaccinated people.”

In addition, she said the unvaccinated in the U.S. are 11 times more likely to die.

Three months ago, the U.S. seemed on the verge of controlling the virus that causes the COVID-19 disease, but the delta variant has led to a surge of new cases, 120,000 to 160,000 a day in recent weeks and about 2,000 deaths a day.  

Even though more than 183 million people in the U.S. are fully vaccinated, about 70 million are not, with many of them refusing to get inoculated for one reason or another. Some say they remain skeptical of the safety of the shots or say they do not think they will become sick.

According to Johns Hopkins University, the U.S. currently has around 43 million confirmed cases and nearly 700,000 deaths. The U.S. leads the world in both categories.
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A new era of American golfers sent a message Sunday with a record-setting Ryder Cup blowout of Europe, their young, talented core players looking ready to dominate for years.

With eight under-30 players and six Ryder Cup rookies, the Americans completed a 19-9 rout of Europe at Whistling Straits that signaled a generational change to the world.

Farewell Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson. Say hello to Tokyo Olympic champion Xander Schauffele, two-time major winner Collin Morikawa, U.S. PGA playoff champion Patrick Cantlay and Scottie Scheffler, 20-something stars.

“We have a lot of young guys, they’re going to be on teams for a long time and I wanted to send a message,” said Cantlay. “Everyone has that killer instinct and we’re going to bring that to future Cups.”

The most lopsided victory since the U.S.-Europe format began in 1979 served notice that a squad with nine of the world’s 11 top-ranked players was on a mission.

“This is a new era for USA golf,” U.S. captain Steve Stricker said. “They are young. They are motivated. They wanted it. They come with a lot of energy, a lot of passion, a lot of game. It’s exciting to see. This is a very special group of guys.”

Third-ranked Morikawa, 24, and fourth-ranked Cantlay, 29, each delivered 3.5 points. Fifth-ranked Schauffele, 27, had 3 points and world number 21 Scheffler, 25, had 2.5, the last in a singles win over world number one Jon Rahm of Spain.

And they were all rookies along with 11th-ranked Harris English, 32, and 16th-ranked Daniel Berger, 28.

“We showed the world what we can do as a team and I think it’s the precedent for the future of American golf,” said US veteran Tony Finau.

Pals Cantlay and Schauffele figure to be a U.S. pairs powerhouse for years, and the clubhouse chemistry promises a tighter bond than prior eras.

“I think the young guys on this team get along really well,” Cantlay said. “We sent out rookies four out of the first five (singles) matches. That’s unheard of. Everybody gets along.”

Morikawa delivered the Cup clinching half-point in a tie with Norway’s Viktor Hovland, and Cantlay beat Ireland’s Shane Lowry, while Scheffler’s upset, and Bryson DeChambeau’s win over Sergio Garcia silenced Europe’s winningest players for the week when it mattered most.

Europe veteran Lee Westwood delivered high praise to the conquerors.

“It’s not just the strongest U.S. team I’ve seen, but they all played well, to a man,” he said. “Everybody performed and turned up this week. Looks like they are a team.”

At the next Ryder Cup in 2023 in Italy, the new-look Americans will try to win the trophy on foreign soil for the first time since 1993.

“We’ve lost a lot looking back at the past. But that’s the past. We’re hopefully what the future is going to be like,” Morikawa said. “Hopefully we can turn that tide in our favor for however many years I’m able to play this.”
…

The EU and U.S. will this week embark on a tricky effort to deepen ties on tech regulation, but with France resisting the project in the wake of a falling out with Washington over a submarine deal.

High-level talks will begin in the U.S. city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, on Wednesday despite efforts by Paris to delay the meeting in retaliation for a pact among the U.S., Australia and Britain, dubbed AUKUS, that saw Canberra scrap a multibillion-dollar submarine order from France.

The EU-U.S. Trade and Tech Council was set up after a summit in June to look at issues including trying to attune their strategies on regulating internet giants and defend democratic values.  

The council came at the request of the Europeans, who are seeking concrete signs of increased transatlantic cooperation after years of tension under former President Donald Trump, especially over trade.

President Joe Biden’s administration will be represented by U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai and Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo.

On the European side, EU executive vice presidents Margrethe Vestager and Valdis Dombrovskis will lead talks.

Vestager, the EU’s tech policy expert, said the talks would attempt to enhance cooperation “in the areas where there is a shared sense of values being two big, old democracies.”

Unspoken in her comments was the rise of China, with Washington understood to be pressing its EU partners to join forces in isolating Beijing on the global stage.

This is being resisted in Europe, where powerful member states France and Germany are reluctant to blindly follow Washington’s increasing assertiveness.

“European officials want to avoid the TTC simply becoming an unproductive exercise at China-bashing,” said former EU trade boss Cecilia Malmstrom and analyst Chad Bown in a paper for the Peterson Institute in Washington.  

The talks in Pittsburgh, a rust-belt city that has grown into a tech hub, are the first installment of the Trade and Tech Council, with another round expected in the spring, Vestager said.

EU diplomats said France sharply criticized the talks at a meeting on Friday, reminding member states that previous attempts to deepen trade ties with Washington led nowhere.

‘No place in a democracy’

Dombrovskis, who is also the EU’s trade commissioner, cautioned that the new effort was not an attempt to clinch a trade deal, with memories still fresh of the failed attempt to strike an ambitious accord during the Obama administration.

The European Commission, which handles trade policy for the EU’s 27 member states, also failed to finalize a smaller scale deal with former U.S. President Donald Trump, beyond a zero-tariff pact on lobsters.

“It’s not like a free trade agreement,” the former Latvian prime minister told reporters. “It’s more about long-term benefits.”  

Dombrovskis pointed to potential cooperation on banning unwanted foreign investments or tackling supply chain problems, such as with microchips.

The talks will be broken into 10 working groups on a wide range of issues, with Vestager looking to find common ground on how to curb Big Brother, such as in preventing excesses in artificial intelligence.

“We do not find that these practices should have a home in a democracy,” she said. “I have a strong feeling that this is something that is really shared with the Americans.”

The talks will take place while both sides remain at loggerheads over the steel and aluminum tariffs that were imposed by Trump, but which Biden has yet to remove.

On the tariffs, Dombrovskis said, “We are engaging very seriously with the U.S., and we are mindful also (of the) timelines, that by December 1, this issue should be solved.”
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U.S. Homeland Security chief Alejandro Mayorkas and Texas Governor Greg Abbott clashed Sunday over enforcement of the country’s immigration laws after thousands of Haitian migrants massed – and then were cleared – from the U.S.-Mexican border city of Del Rio, Texas. 

Mayorkas, in an interview on the “Fox News Sunday” show, defended the national government’s response to the chaos at the border as complying with federal laws and in line with what he said was “one of our proudest traditions” to permit foreign migrants to enter the U.S. to seek asylum and safety from turmoil in their homelands. 

But Abbott, a long-time critic of Washington’s response to thousands of migrants from Haiti and Central America crossing the southwestern border into his state, said Mayorkas and President Joe Biden have “abandoned any pretense” of securing the border and instead “sent a message to the world” that the border is open. Abbott spoke in a separate interview on the same program. 

About 30,000 Haitians massed at the border in a 17-day period starting September 9, many of them trekking through Mexico after escaping the rubble from the massive 2010 earthquake in Haiti and living in South American countries for the last decade.

While several thousand Haitians eventually returned to Mexico, the U.S. sent more than 2,000 on deportation flights back to the Caribbean nation.

Mayorkas said another 12,000 were released into the U.S. on the promise of appearing at immigration offices within 60 days for the start of asylum hearings, while the U.S. is holding 5,000 migrants as it determines whether they should be deported or allowed to make asylum claims. 

Government statistics show that 44% of migrants released on the promise to appear at asylum hearings fail to show up and often blend into life in the United States even as they are subject to arrest and deportation if immigration agents catch them. About 11 million undocumented migrants live in the U.S., officials estimate. 

Mayorkas said, “It is our intention to remove” migrants ineligible to stay in the country. But he acknowledged, “Our immigration system is broken and speaks to the need for legislative reform.” In politically fractious Washington, however, congressional attempts to revamp immigration laws have for years been stalemated. 

Abbott said Mayorkas and Biden are “in dereliction of duty” in enforcing U.S. border laws. 

With the influx of migrants, he said his state troopers and agents are “going to have to (take it upon themselves) to enforce immigration laws.” Abbott ordered officials to line up dozens of state-owned vehicles side-by-side at the border to create a “steel barrier” to try to keep out more migrants. 

“They have left us in a position to do what we have to do,” Abbott said, alleging the Biden administration “cares more for people who are not in this country” than Americans. 

A week ago, photographs and videos were captured of horseback-mounted federal agents corralling Haitian migrants and pushing them back toward Mexico. Top U.S. officials, including Biden, deplored the actions of the agents and an investigation was launched, although conclusions about the agents’ performance on the job have yet to be reached. 

Biden has promised the actions of the border agents will not tolerated and they will be disciplined. 

But Abbott vowed if the agents are fired, “I will hire you to help Texas secure the border.” 
…