Author: Joe Mason

A police officer in Waukegan, Illinois, was fired after he shot and killed an unarmed Black teenager and wounded the young man’s 20-year-old Black girlfriend during a traffic stop earlier this week. The unidentified officer was terminated from his job on Friday night for multiple policy and procedure violations, the Waukegan Police Department said in a statement, three days after the incident left 19-year-old Marcellis Stinnette dead and his girlfriend Tafarra Williams wounded. Some 200 to 300 people were expected to hold a demonstration calling for justice on Saturday in the city of 85,000 people in Lake County about 45…

NEW YORK (Reuters) – More than 84,000 people were diagnosed with COVID-19 across the United States on Friday, according to a Reuters tally, a record one-day increase in infections during the pandemic as the virus surges again nationwide. The spike to 84,218 cases, breaking the record of 77,299 set on July 16, comes as University of Washington researchers forecast that the U.S. death toll from COVID-19 could reach a total of 500,000 by February. Sixteen U.S. states also hit one-day records for new infections of the virus that causes COVID-19 on Friday, including five considered key in the Nov. 3…

The U.S. probe that collected a sample from an asteroid earlier this week retrieved so much material that a rock is wedged in the container door, allowing rocks to spill back out into space, NASA officials said on Friday. The robotic arm of the probe, OSIRIS-REx, on Tuesday night kicked up a debris cloud of rocks on Bennu, a skyscraper-sized asteroid some 200 million miles (320 million km) from Earth and trapped the material in a collection device for the return to Earth. But images of the spacecraft’s collection head beamed back to ground control revealed it had caught more…

Residents remaining in Estes Park, in Colorado’s Rocky Mountain National Park, were told to evacuate their homes on Saturday as wind gusts fanned the second largest wildfire in state history and the blaze claimed the lives of an elderly couple. Officials issued a mandatory evacuation order for eastern Estes Park as wind gusts pushed the 188,300-acre (76,200-hectare) East Troublesome Fire east, threatening the town of 6,300 people that serves as a base camp for the popular national park. “We tried to get ahead of it to get everyone safely out in an orderly fashion,” said Larimer County Sheriff’s Office spokesman…

U.S. President Donald Trump voted in his new home state of Florida on Saturday, casting his ballot for his re-election at a public library across the street from one of his golf clubs. Trump, wearing a mask to prevent the spread of coronavirus, voted using a paper ballot. Supporters gathered in the library parking lot chanted “four more years” as he voted inside. “It was a very secure vote, much more secure than when you send in a ballot,” Trump said, repeating unfounded allegations that mail-in voting is more susceptible to fraud. “I voted for a guy named Trump,” he…

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Saturday reported 8,469,976 cases of new coronavirus, an increase of 82,929 cases from its previous count, and said that the number of deaths had risen by 946 to 223,393. The CDC reported its tally of cases of the respiratory illness known as COVID-19, caused by a new coronavirus, as of 4 pm ET on Oct. 23 versus its previous report a day earlier. The CDC figures do not necessarily reflect cases reported by individual states. Thank you for your time. We really appreciate if you share this article with your…

The Effingham St. Anthony basketball season will start on time. The move was approved by the Diocese of Springfield, school pastor and school board, according to Bulldogs athletic director Kevin Palmer. St. Anthony is in the minority so far, with most area schools voting to either put their season on hold or cancel all together. That latter group includes fellow Catholic schools, Schlarman and St. Thomas More in Champaign. Those two schools are under the Diocese of Peoria, which made its decision last week. Fellow National Trail Conference school Altamont is also planning to play this season, after the IHSA…

U.S. President Donald Trump said on Thursday he would agree to go higher than the $1.8 trillion that the White House has offered in coronavirus stimulus funding to strike a deal with House Democrats, who are seeking $2.2 trillion. In an interview with Fox Business Network, Trump said there was a chance of getting a COVID-19 stimulus package passed before the November 3 presidential elections, though hopes for a deal have dimmed. Ladies and gentlemen, we really appreciate your time. Thank you and enjoy the rest of your day. And yes, don’t hesitate to share this article with your friends…

The Republican-led U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday scheduled an Oct. 22 vote to advance conservative appellate judge Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination to the Supreme Court to the full Senate for confirmation, rejecting Democratic objections. The last day of the four-day confirmation hearing for President Donald Trump’s nominee began with committee Democrats protesting what they called the needlessly rushed nature of proceedings and complaining that Barrett sidestepped questions about presidential powers, abortion, voting rights and Obamacare. “I believe that this rushed, sham process is a disservice to our committee,” Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal said. “She has been rushed in a…

President Donald Trump is lagging his Democratic challenger Joe Biden in fundraising in the final weeks before the Nov. 3 election, according to figures released by his campaign manager. Trump’s re-election campaign and the Republican National Committee started the last full month before the Nov. 3 election with $251.4 million cash on hand after raising $247.8 million in September, campaign manager Tim Murtaugh tweeted late on Thursday. The intake was around $135 million less than former Vice President Biden raised in September. But it was greater than the $210 million raised in August as Trump seeks a second term. “President…

A security guard hired to protect a Denver television news crew covering dueling rallies by right-wing and left-wing groups will be charged with second-degree murder in the fatal shooting of a protester, the city’s top prosecutor said on Thursday. Denver District Attorney Beth McCann said in a written statement that she will file the murder charge against Matthew Dolloff, 30, in the shooting death of Lee Keltner on Saturday. Dolloff has been held without bond in the Denver County jail since his arrest, jail records show. A lawyer for the Dolloff family said he acted in self-defense, local media reported…

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday agreed to hear oral arguments over President Donald Trump’s effort to exclude illegal immigrants from the population totals used to allocate congressional districts to states. The court, likely to soon have a 6-3 conservative majority if the Republican-controlled Senate confirms Trump nominee Amy Coney Barrett, will hear the case on Nov. 30. The challengers to Trump’s July directive, including various states led by New York, cities, counties and immigrant rights groups, said it could leave several million people uncounted and likely cause California, Texas and New Jersey to lose seats in…

U.S. President Donald Trump on Saturday attacked a longtime congressional critic who warned this week that his handling of the coronavirus pandemic and authoritarian leaders could cause a “Republican bloodbath in the Senate” in the Nov. 3 elections. U.S. Senator Ben Sasse is the least effective of the 53 Republican senators, Trump wrote on Twitter, calling him “a liability to the Republican Party, and an embarrassment to the Great State of Nebraska. Other than that, he’s just a wonderful guy.” Sasse criticized Trump in a town hall with constituents on Wednesday, and questioned whether the president would ultimately drive the…

Japan is looking into using satellite images to further research on the natural environment of islets in the East China Sea claimed by China, the top government spokesman said, though the plans will not involve anyone actually setting foot there. Japan’s ties with China have long been plagued by a territorial row over the uninhabited islands controlled by Tokyo, which are known as the Senkaku in Japan, but called Diaoyu in China. “The Environment Ministry is considering conducting research into the natural environment of the Senkaku islands as early as by the end of the year,” Chief Cabinet Secretary Katsunobu…

A late night shooting at a midtown club in the Texas city of Houston killed three men and injured a fourth critically, the police said, just hours after another incident in which a police officer was killed with shots to the head. On Twitter, police said the injured man was taken to hospital after the nighttime attack at the 2100 block of the city’s Chenevert Street, but they did not immediately release further details or respond to requests for comments. Media said a person with a gun entered the club and opened fire just before 10 p.m. An affiliate of…

The number of COVID-19 patients in U.S. hospitals hit 40,000 for the first time since August on Wednesday, according to a Reuters tally, as the nation battles a surge in infections led by Midwest states. Hospitals have seen a 36% rise in coronavirus patients over the past four weeks and Midwest hospitals are setting new records every day. So far in October, 16 states have reported their highest daily numbers of hospitalized COVID-19 since the pandemic started, including the Midwest states of Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wisconsin. Hospitalizations of virus-stricken patients have set records in…

President Donald Trump gets a final chance to make his case for re-election before a vast audience of Americans when he squares off against Democratic rival Joe Biden on Thursday in their last debate before the Nov. 3 vote. The televised meeting comes as Trump badly needs to alter the trajectory of the race. He trails Biden significantly in national polls less than two weeks before Election Day, though the contest is much tighter in some key battleground states. Opinion polls show there are relatively few undecided voters. A record 42 million Americans have already cast ballots ahead of the…

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Six U.S. states reported record day-over-day increases in COVID-19 deaths on Wednesday, according to a Reuters analysis, as infections rose across the Midwest and elsewhere, prompting new clampdowns on residents, schools and businesses. Deaths attributed to COVID-19 hit daily records in Iowa, Minnesota, Montana, Kansas, Hawaii and Wisconsin, Reuters found. Wisconsin, Illinois, Kentucky, Colorado and Ohio reported record daily increases in new infections, the tally showed. The number of patients in U.S. hospitals suffering from the virus hit 40,000 for the first time since August on Wednesday, according to the analysis. “Folks, please stay home,” Wisconsin Governor…

PHILADELPHIA/GASTONIA, N.C. (Reuters) – Former President Barack Obama returned to the campaign trail on Wednesday with a blistering attack on Donald Trump with less than two weeks to go before the Republican president’s Election Day face-off with Democratic nominee Joe Biden. Speaking at a drive-in rally in Philadelphia on behalf of Biden, his former vice president, and Democratic running mate Kamala Harris, Obama offered his fiercest critique yet of his successor. He took aim at Trump’s divisive rhetoric, his track record in the Oval Office and his habit of re-tweeting conspiracy theories. “With Joe and Kamala at the helm, you’re…

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe has accused both Russia and Iran of trying to interfere with the 2020 presidential election, drawing swift denials from Moscow and Tehran. The announcement two weeks before the Nov. 3 election showed the level of alarm among top U.S. officials that foreign actors were seeking to undermine Americans’ confidence in the integrity of the vote and spread misinformation in an attempt to sway its outcome. Ratcliffe made the announcements at a hastily arranged news conference on Wednesday that also included FBI Director Chris Wray. “We have confirmed that some voter…