AP News in Brief at 9:04 p.m. EST
House leaders march Trump impeachment articles to the Senate
WASHINGTON (AP) — In a dramatic procession across the U.S. Capitol, House Democrats carried the formal articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump to the Senate late Wednesday, setting the stage for only the third trial to remove a president in American history.
Trump complained anew it was all a “hoax,” even as fresh details emerged about his efforts in Ukraine.
The ceremonial pomp and protocol by the lawmakers prosecuting the case against Trump moved the impeachment out of Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s Democratic-run House to the Republican-majority Senate, where the president’s team is mounting a defense aiming for swift acquittal.
“Today we will make history,'' Pelosi said as she signed the documents, using multiple pens to hand out and mark the moment. “This president will be held accountable."
Moments later the prosecutors walked solemnly through the stately hall, filing into the Senate back row as the Clerk of the House announced the arrival: “The House has passed House Resolution 798, a resolution appointing and authorizing managers of the impeachment trail of Donald John Trump, President of United States.”
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Trump's defenders to play to many audiences in Senate trial
WASHINGTON (AP) — Millions watching on television, 100 senators seated silently in the Capitol, one man in the Oval Office with a twitchy Twitter finger. President Donald Trump’s impeachment team will be trying to appeal to multiple audiences when it mounts a defense of the president in his Senate trial.
Proceedings in the staid Senate are expected to run cooler than the fiery partisanship that was on display in the House, which voted to impeach Trump in December.
People familiar with the White House legal strategy acknowledged that the tone of those making Trump's case in the Senate trial presided over by Chief Justice John Roberts would be more subdued than a typical Trump supporter's appearance on Fox News or written broadsides leveled against Democrats. But finding the right approach will be a moving target.
Different constituencies have diverging aims:
—The White House hopes to move past the months-long impeachment saga with a swift acquittal in the Senate.
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US military resumes counter-Islamic State operations in Iraq
WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. military is resuming operations against Islamic State militants in Iraq and is working to soon restart training Iraqi forces, U.S. officials said Wednesday, despite deep divisions over the American drone strike that killed an senior Iranian commander in Baghdad and the resulting missile attacks by Iran on Iraqi bases.
One official said some joint operations between the U.S. and Iraqi forces have already begun, but there are not yet as many as before. The official said details are still being worked out to restore the training of Iraqi forces, but that could happen relatively soon.
Relations with Iraq were fractured after the U.S. launched a drone strike near Baghdad's international airport on Jan. 3 that killed Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani. The Parliament later voted to expel U.S. forces from the country and Prime Minister Adel Abdul-Mahdi asked Washington to work out a road map for a troop withdrawal. The U.S. flatly rejected that request and has not moved to pull the more than 5,000 troops out.
Officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss decisions not yet made public.
One official said military leaders have discussed the resumption of operations with the Iraqis, but it's not clear who was involved in those talks or whether Iraqi government leaders are publicly endorsing the move.
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Virginia moves to brink of becoming 38th state to ratify ERA
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — Virginia on Wednesday moved to the brink of becoming the crucial 38th state to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment in what was seen as a momentous victory for the women's rights movement even though it is far from certain the measure will ever be added to the U.S. Constitution.
The state House and Senate approved the proposed amendment with bipartisan support, well over a generation after Congress sent the ERA to the states for ratification in 1972. Each chamber now must pass the other's resolution, but final passage is considered all but certain.
Amendments to the Constitution must be ratified by three-quarters of the states, or 38. But whether this one will go on to become the 28th Amendment may have to be decided in court because the deadline set by Congress for ratification of the ERA ran out in 1982 and because five states that approved it in the 1970s have since rescinded their support.
Still, the twin votes carried symbolic weight and showed how much once-solidly conservative Virginia, a place that defeated the ERA time and again, has changed.
Del. Jennifer Carroll Foy, a sponsor of the House ERA measure, told her colleagues they were taking “the vote of a lifetime.”
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Aviation experts puzzled after airliner dumps fuel over city
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Some aviation experts said Wednesday that they were puzzled after the crew of a commercial airliner decided to dump fuel at low altitude during an emergency landing, causing a vapor to fall on schoolyards and neighborhoods east of Los Angeles International Airport.
“No one is going to dump fuel where these guys did it over populated areas and schools. It's a pretty outrageous thing,” said Ross Aimer, CEO of Aero Consulting Experts and a retired United Airlines pilot. “They should have gone over the ocean or landed heavyweight.”
Delta Air Lines said Flight 89 to Shanghai had an engine problem after takeoff Tuesday and needed to quickly return. The Boeing 777-200 landed safely after circling back over Los Angeles while dumping fuel to reach a safe landing weight, the airline said in a statement.
Los Angeles County firefighters were called to schools where nearly 60 children and adults were examined for minor skin and lung irritations, but none required hospitalization. Fire Inspector Sky Cornell also said monitoring showed the vapor wasn't flammable.
When a plane is forced to turn back after takeoff, the weight of a full load of fuel carries a risk of damaging the jet during landing. That can be costly for airlines to fix. And even if there isn’t damage, airlines try to avoid overweight landings because they are required to inspect planes, which puts them out of service.
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Student fatally shot at Texas high school; suspect arrested
BELLAIRE, Texas (AP) — A 19-year-old student was shot to death Tuesday at a Texas high school, and a suspect was arrested hours later, officials said.
Grenita Lathan, interim superintendent of the Houston Independent School District, confirmed the shooting victim at Bellaire High School had died. She gave no other information and took no questions.
A suspect and another person police said was connected to the case were arrested about 3 1/2 hours after the shooting Tuesday night, according to statements from the school district and Bellaire police. They said no other information would be released for now, including further details about where the shooting occurred in the school complex, whether the suspect was a student or what led to the arrest.
The district announced classes had been canceled Wednesday, after Latham originally said they were going on as scheduled.
Emergency crews were seen performing CPR as the student was carried on a stretcher to an ambulance outside the school, KPRC-TV reported. There were conflicting media reports about whether the shooting happened inside or outside the school.
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Putin engineers shake-up that could keep him in power longer
MOSCOW (AP) — President Vladimir Putin engineered a surprise shake-up of Russia's leadership Wednesday, proposing changes to the constitution that could keep him in power well past the end of his term in 2024.
Hours after he made the proposals, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev resigned and Putin named the little-known head of Russia's tax service to replace him.
Putin kept his longtime ally Medvedev in the Kremlin's leadership structure by appointing him to the newly created post of deputy head of the presidential Security Council. But the duties and influence of that position are unclear.
The shakeup sent shock waves through Russia's political elites who were left pondering what Putin's intentions were and speculating about future Cabinet appointments.
Putin’s proposed constitutional reforms, announced in a state of the nation address, indicated he was working to carve out a new governing position for himself after his term ends, although the suggested changes don’t immediately specify what path he will take to stay in charge.
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Weinstein lawyers: 'Circus' atmosphere, juror tweets unfair
NEW YORK (AP) — As if picking a jury for Harvey Weinstein’s rape trial wasn’t complicated enough, some potential jurors have been posting on social media about their involvement in the case, violating court rules that could land them behind bars, the judge said Wednesday as the selection process stretched into a seventh day.
Meanwhile, Weinstein’s lawyers are renewing their demand that the trial be moved out of New York City, citing “flash mob” protests in the streets whose chants can be heard 15 stories up in the courtroom and a crush of reporters and photographers that have turned the case into “a “media and entertainment circus.”
The defense, having lost an earlier change of venue request, said the “carnival-like atmosphere” surrounding jury selection, coupled with the frenzy over supermodel Gigi Hadid's appearance in the jury pool and social media comments by prospective jurors showed Weinstein won't get a fair shake in his hometown.
In the last few days, Judge James Burke has been amplifying his warnings about social media, turning last week's posts into a cautionary tale as he's welcomed groups of 120 or so potential jurors into his Manhattan courtroom.
“The court was alerted recently that a few prospective jurors from last week went on Facebook and Twitter as if I hadn’t just said not to, what was it, a hundred times? A thousand times? Was anything I said ambiguous?" Burke said, warning the latest batch of prospective jurors not to do the same.
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Virgin Islands suit alleges decadeslong abuse by Epstein
HAVANA (AP) — A lawsuit filed by prosecutors in the Virgin Islands says multimillionaire sex offender Jeffery Epstein used two private islands in the U.S. territory to engage in a nearly two-decade conspiracy to traffic and abuse girls.
At one point, the suit filed Wednesday alleges, Epstein and associates organized a search party to catch a 15-year-old victim trying to swim away, and kept her passport to keep her captive.
The lawsuit seeks to confiscate hundreds of millions of dollars from Epstein's estate in the Virgin Islands, including private islands Little St. James and Great St. James, which the suit values at $86 million.
“The complaint speaks for itself and lays out allegations of a pattern and practice of human trafficking, sexual abuse and forced labor of young women and female children as young as 13 years old,” Virgin Islands Attorney General Denise N. George told reporters Wednesday.
The lawsuit alleges that even after Epstein's August suicide in federal detention in New York, his associates “continued to conspire to prevent detection of the Epstein Enterprise's criminal wrongdoing and to prevent accountability.”
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Democrats differ on US-Mideast wars, with no clear exit plan
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Democratic presidential field is united in lambasting President Donald Trump’s handling of America’s military presence in the Middle East, but the candidates are sharply divided on how to do it better. Their solutions range from pulling out to cutting back.
Aside from relying more heavily on allies and diplomacy, the Democrats are imprecise about ending America's “endless wars.” They spoke in unusual detail about their Mideast policy views in Tuesday night's debate in Des Moines, Iowa.
Sens. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Bernie Sanders of Vermont took the more aggressive stances on reducing the U.S. military role in the Mideast. Former Vice President Joe Biden and Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota called for a continued though curtailed presence. Pete Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, broadly spoke of remaining “engaged without having an endless commitment of ground troops.”
Warren says it's time to stop asking the military to solve problems that require political solutions, including in Afghanistan, where about 13,000 U.S. troops are performing two main missions: training and advising Afghan forces in their fight against the Taliban and conducting direct combat against an affiliate of the Islamic State group.
The war in Afghanistan, which the U.S. started by invading in 2001, has lasted longer than any in American history.