AP News in Brief at 6:04 a.m. EST

Congress averts shutdown; fight continues over pandemic aid

WASHINGTON (AP) — Congress passed a two-day stopgap spending bill Friday night, averting a partial government shutdown and buying yet more time for frustratingly slow endgame negotiations on an almost $1 trillion COVID-19 economic relief package.

The virus aid talks remained on track, both sides said, but closing out final disagreements was proving difficult. Weekend sessions were on tap, and House leaders hoped for a vote on Sunday on the massive package, which wraps much of Capitol Hill's unfinished 2020 business into a take-it-or-leave-it behemoth that promises to be a foot thick — or more.

The House passed the temporary funding bill by a 320-60 vote. The Senate approved it by voice vote almost immediately afterward, and President Donald Trump signed it late Friday.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said both sides remain intent on closing the deal, even as Democrats launched a concerted campaign to block an effort by Republicans to rein in emergency Federal Reserve lending powers. The Democrats said the GOP proposal would deprive President-elect Joe Biden of crucial tools to manage the economy.

Negotiations continued into Friday night but an agreement wasn't likely before Saturday, lawmakers and aides said. House lawmakers were told they wouldn’t have to report to work on Saturday but that a Sunday session was likely. The Senate will be voting on nominations.

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Analysis: For Republicans, profanity is suddenly scandalous

WASHINGTON (AP) — The definition of a scandal changes quickly in Washington.

Over the course of four years, the nation's capital has careened from crisis to crisis. There was the travel ban, the investigation into Russian interference in an election, the firing of an FBI director, a 35-day government shutdown, dismissals of Cabinet secretaries via tweet, impeachment and a historic pandemic that forced the president to be hospitalized.

And then there was the Glamour interview.

Jen O'Malley Dillon, President-elect Joe Biden's campaign manager and incoming deputy chief of staff, referred to congressional Republicans as “f——ers” in a conversation with the magazine. And Washington was again in a tizzy.

The hand-wringing is a preview of one of the political shifts ahead once Biden takes office. Democrats preparing to take power are furious at any sign of a double standard from Republicans who looked past — or encouraged — President Donald Trump's profane and divisive behavior in office.

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Emails: WHO was warned of fallout over yanked Italy report

ROME (AP) — An author of a withdrawn World Health Organization report into Italy's coronavirus response warned his bosses in May that people could die and the U.N. agency could suffer “catastrophic” reputational damage if it allowed political concerns to suppress the document, according to emails seen by The Associated Press.

The comprehensive report examined how the Italian government and health system reacted after the country became the epicenter of the European outbreak in late February — with real-time data and case studies of what worked and what didn’t aimed at helping other countries prepare as the virus spread.

The agency took it down a day after it was posted on its website, prompting the official who coordinated the work to appeal directly to WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on May 28 and warn that the report's disappearance was undermining WHO’s credibility. He cautioned that any further attempts at censorship would compromise the agency's independence and its relations with donor nations that funded the research.

The handling of the report could cause a “scandal of huge proportion — in a delicate moment for the U.N. health agency with the forthcoming COVID-19 investigation,” wrote Francesco Zambon, WHO's chief field coordinator for Italy and its regions during the pandemic.

WHO did not immediately respond to a request, sent late Friday, for comment on Zambon’s email to headquarters.

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Myon Burrell enjoys 1st days of freedom after prison release

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — For nearly two decades, Myon Burrell had nothing but time.

Locked up for life at 16 for a high-profile murder he swore he had nothing to do with, he was stuck in a tiny cell without even a window to watch the seasons change. The years dragged on slowly, and he saw the bodies of once-robust men age and decay.

Still, he couldn’t help wishing that the outside world would slow down. In the Stillwater prison visiting room and in family photographs, his own son seemed to grow overnight from toddler to teen to man.

Then, on Tuesday afternoon, everything changed. In the wake of an investigation by The Associated Press and APM Reports that raised grave doubts about his conviction, the Minnesota Board of Pardons said Burrell could go home.

With no opportunity for real goodbyes, men in his unit rattled their bars or reached out their hands, wishing him well as he passed. Within hours, he walked out the prison’s front door into the frigid air, relatives and supporters swarming around him and chanting “Myon’s free! Myon’s free!”

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Asia Today: Sydney beach suburbs in lockdown as cases rise

SYDNEY (AP) — Sydney’s northern beaches will enter a lockdown similar to the one imposed during the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in March as a cluster of cases in the area increased to 41.

From late Saturday afternoon until midnight Wednesday, residents will only be permitted to leave their homes for five basic reasons: medical care, exercise, grocery shop, work or for compassionate care reasons.

An additional 23 cases were recorded in the 24 hours, including 10 already announced, taking the new cases to 41. All but two of those are from the so-called Avalon cluster, named after a community of about 10,000 people on the northern beaches about 40 kilometers (25 miles) from downtown Sydney.

New South Wales state Premier Gladys Berejiklian says the restrictions are essential if Sydney has any hope of a semi-normal Christmas.

“We’re hoping that will give us sufficient time to get on top of the virus, so that we can then ease up for Christmas and the New Year,” she said.

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India’s virus cases cross 10 million as new infections dip

NEW DELHI (AP) — India’s confirmed coronavirus cases have crossed 10 million with new infections dipping to their lowest levels in three months, as the country prepares for a massive COVID-19 vaccination in the new year.

Additional cases in the past 24 hours dropped to 25,152 from a peak of nearly 100,000 in mid-September. The epidemic has infected nearly 1% of India’s more than 1.3 billion people, second to the worst-hit United States.

The Health Ministry on Saturday also reported 347 deaths in the past 24 hours, taking total fatalities to 145,136.

Dr. Randeep Guleria, a government health expert, said India is keeping its fingers crossed as the cases tend to increase in winter months.

“If we can sustain our declining trend for the next two to three months, we should be able to start the vaccination program and start moving away from the pandemic,” Guleria told The Associated Press.

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Biden transition team criticizes cooperation from Pentagon

WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) — President-elect Joe Biden's transition team expressed frustration Friday with the level of cooperation they're getting from political appointees at the Department of Defense, saying there has been “an abrupt halt in the already limited cooperation there."

Biden's transition team has been meeting with officials at various agencies to get detailed reviews of the programs and challenges the new administration will inherit, a process that was delayed when the General Services Administration declined to issue an official ascertainment that Biden had won the election. The delay occurred as President Donald Trump, whose appointee ran the GSA, refused to concede.

Yohannes Abraham, executive director of the transition, told reporters that Biden agency review teams at DOD learned Thursday of meetings “being pulled down" and immediately reported it. Abraham called for meetings and requests for information to resume immediately.

“A failure to work together can have consequences well beyond January," Abraham said.

The Pentagon on Friday offered a different assessment. It issued a statement saying there was a “mutually-agreed upon holiday pause,” which begins Saturday.

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California hospitals struggling as coronvirus cases explode

LOS ANGELES (AP) — California hospitals are battling to find beds to house patients amid fears that the exploding coronavirus infection rate will exhaust resources and health care workers.

As of Friday, nearly 17,000 people were hospitalized with confirmed or suspected COVID-19 infections — more than double the previous peak reached in July — and a state model that uses current data to forecast future trends shows the number could reach an unfathomable 75,000 by mid-January.

More than 3,500 confirmed or suspected COVID-19 patients were in intensive care units.

Some areas of California are “just right at that cusp of getting overrun,” Dr. Anthony Fauci, the country’s top infectious-disease expert, said during an event organized by the California State University system.

Corona Regional Medical Center southeast of Los Angeles has converted an old emergency room to help handle nearly double the usual number of ICU patients. It’s using space in two disaster tents to triage ER patients because the emergency room is filled with patients who need to be hospitalized.

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Portugal's armed forces help nursing homes battle the virus

AMADORA, Portugal (AP) — Tears well up in Diana Correia’s eyes as she recalls the October day that 24 of the 55 residents of her nursing home in Portugal tested positive for COVID-19.

The stunning discovery set off a scramble to enact the home’s contingency plan and stiffen safety procedures. With some staff sent into isolation, others worked double shifts of up to 16 hours in full protective equipment, leaving them lathered in sweat and bone-weary. Some of the home’s residents, suddenly confined to their rooms or their floor, were bewildered and chafed at restrictions, even trying to take the elevator and escape confinement.

“They were hard times,” Correia says, trying hard to keep her composure. “Very hard times.”

As a resurgence of the pandemic in the fall looked set to overwhelm Portuguese nursing homes like Correia’s, and the country’s public health service struggled to cope, the government mobilized all the resources it could. That included deploying military units.

The soldiers’ mission: fan out across the country to visit hundreds of nursing homes and help shore up their defenses against the pandemic.

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AP Week in Pictures, Global

DEC. 12 - 18, 2020

This photo gallery highlights some of the most compelling images from around the world, made or published in the past week by The Associated Press.

The selection was curated by AP photo editor Patrick Sison in New York.

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