AP News in Brief at 9:04 p.m. EST
Biden targets virus as his White House transition begins
WILMINGTON, Delaware (AP) — President-elect Joe Biden signaled strongly on Monday that fighting the raging pandemic will be the immediate priority of his new administration, an abrupt shift from President Donald Trump's more unworried approach to the virus, as the nation surpassed 10 million COVID-19 cases.
Biden began with a direct appeal to all Americans to wear masks, a departure from Trump, who has mocked Biden and others who make a point of always wearing protective face coverings when around others. In an official move, the president-elect formed a coronavirus advisory board dominated by scientists and doctors, while Trump has had a falling out with the medical experts on his own virus task force.
The swift actions come at a critical moment in the U.S. effort to combat the coronavirus. Pharmaceutical giant Pfizer announced progress with its vaccine trial, helping send financial markets soaring. But surging caseloads, including new infections among leading figures in Trump's administration, offered a fresh reminder that the nation is still in the grip of the worst pandemic in more than a century.
“The challenge before us right now is still immense and growing, and so is the need for bold action to fight this pandemic,” Biden said after being briefed on the virus. “We are still facing a dark winter.”
He called on Americans to separate politics from the virus and embrace mask-wearing.
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Testing timeline: What’s ahead for COVID-19 vaccines
Pfizer's surprising news that its COVID-19 vaccine might offer more protection than anticipated — an announcement right after a fraught U.S. presidential election campaign — is raising questions about exactly how the different shots will make it to market.
Pfizer Inc. and the maker of the other leading U.S. vaccine candidate, Moderna Inc., have been cautioning for weeks that the earliest they could seek regulatory approval for wider use of their shots would be late November. In Britain, AstraZeneca recently said it hoped to prove its own vaccine was effective by year’s end.
Late on Monday in a series of tweets President Donald Trump accused the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and Pfizer of waiting until after the election to announce its positive vaccine news for political reasons. Pfizer did not receive data from independent trial monitors until Sunday, however. The FDA was not involved in Pfizer’s decision to announce its early results and made no announcements of its own.
The hard truth: Science moves at its own pace. While COVID-19 vaccines are being developed at record speeds in hope of ending the pandemic, when they’re ready for prime time depends on a long list of research steps including how many study volunteers wind up getting the coronavirus — something scientists cannot control.
Here’s a look at the process:
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Trump fires Esper as Pentagon chief after election defeat
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump fired Defense Secretary Mark Esper on Monday, an unprecedented move by a president struggling to accept election defeat and angry at a Pentagon leader he believes wasn't loyal enough.
The decision was widely expected as Trump had grown increasingly unhappy with Esper over the summer, including sharp differences between them over the use of the military during the civil unrest in June. But the move could unsettle international allies and Pentagon leadership and injects another element of uncertainty to a rocky transition period as Joe Biden prepares to assume the presidency.
Presidents who win reelection often replace Cabinet members, but losing presidents have kept their Pentagon chiefs in place until Inauguration Day to preserve stability in the name of national security.
Trump announced the news in a tweet, saying that “effective immediately” Christopher Miller, the director of the National Counterterrorism Center, will serve as acting secretary, sidestepping the department’s No.2-ranking official, Deputy Defense Secretary David Norquist.
“Chris will do a GREAT job!” Trump tweeted. “Mark Esper has been terminated. I would like to thank him for his service.”
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Refusing to concede, Trump blocks cooperation on transition
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration threw the presidential transition into tumult on Monday, with Attorney General William Barr authorizing the Justice Department to probe allegations of voter fraud and President Donald Trump firing the Pentagon chief and blocking government officials from cooperating with President-elect Joe Biden’s team.
Barr signed off on investigations into unsubstantiated claims of widespread fraud made repeatedly by Trump. Even as Biden began assembling experts to face the surging pandemic, the federal agency that needs to green light the beginnings of the transition of power held off on taking that step. And the White House moved to crack down on those not deemed sufficiently loyal as Trump continued to refuse to concede the race.
Top Republicans largely refused to put widespread pressure on Trump to accept his election loss. He remained out of sight at the White House, conversations ongoing about how the defeated president would spend the coming days and weeks as he challenged the people's verdict.
The ouster of Defense Secretary Mark Esper was expected by some aides to be the first of several firings by Trump, now freed from having to face voters again and angry at those in his administration perceived to be insufficiently loyal. Others believed to be vulnerable: FBI Director Christopher Wray, CIA head Gina Haspel and infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci.
Out of sight but not unheard, Trump took to Twitter to again dispute the result of the election, making baseless accusations of widespread “unthinkable and illegal” activity in the vote.
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'This is proof': Biden's win reveals power of Black voters
DETROIT (AP) — Power. Respect. Finally.
When Eric Sheffield first saw Joe Biden take the lead in the vote count in Georgia, the 52-year-old Black man immediately thought about all the years he spent urging his Black friends and family to vote and all the times he saw his preferred candidate lose.
“Over the years, a lot of Black people have said, ‘Well, my vote doesn’t matter,'" the real estate development analyst in Atlanta said Friday. “This is proof that our vote does matter.”
Even as votes are still tallied, there's little dispute that Black voters were a driving national force pushing the former vice president to the winner’s column. By overwhelmingly backing Biden and showing up in strong numbers, Black voters not only helped deliver familiar battleground states to the Democrat, but they also created a new one in the longtime GOP bastion of Georgia — potentially remaking presidential politics for years to come.
Activists pointed to the results as a repudiation of the racist rhetoric of President Donald Trump and an endorsement of Biden's choice of Kamala Harris, the first Black woman on a major party presidential ticket, as his running mate. But they also credited their years of work organizing voters and signaled they intended to seek a return on their investment.
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As cases rise, states say they'll work with Biden on virus
The incoming Biden administration is promising a cohesive national strategy to combat the worsening coronavirus outbreak, something many public health officials and Democratic governors say they welcome after months of mixed messaging under the Trump administration.
Consistency about the need to wear a mask to reduce the virus spread is just a start. Among other things, they say they need help with testing and contact tracing, deploying an eventual vaccine and more money to shore up their budgets, including to help keep schools open.
Biden on Monday announced members of a coronavirus task force and his staff started reaching out to governors. In New Mexico, Democratic Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham praised Biden for “leading with science and de-politicizing the federal government’s pandemic response.”
Lujan Grisham was an early adopter of aggressive pandemic restrictions that included a mask mandate, self-quarantine orders for travelers and a ban on public gatherings -- now capped at five people. Despite that approach, daily statewide infections and deaths have surged steadily to new heights in October and November.
“New Mexico is an example of the fact that even the best state-level policies are insufficient on their own,” she said in a statement. “The entire country, including the people of New Mexico, deserves the full force of the federal government to address the ongoing emergency and it is encouraging to see President-elect Biden preparing to do exactly that.”
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US allows 1st emergency use of a COVID-19 antibody drug
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. health officials have allowed emergency use of the first antibody drug to help the immune system fight COVID-19, an experimental approach against the virus that has killed more than 238,000 Americans.
The Food and Drug Administration on Monday cleared the experimental drug from Eli Lilly for people 12 and older with mild or moderate COVID-19 not requiring hospitalization. It's a one-time treatment given through an IV.
The therapy is still undergoing additional testing to establish its safety and effectiveness. It is similar to a treatment President Donald Trump received after contracting the virus last month.
Lilly's studies of the antibody drug are continuing. Early results suggest it may help clear the coronavirus sooner and possibly cut hospitalizations in people with mild to moderate COVID-19. A study of it in hospitalized patients was stopped when independent monitors saw the drug did not seem to be helping in that situation.
The government previously reached an agreement to buy and supply much of the early production of Lilly's drug.
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Stocks rally worldwide with hopes for a return to “normal”
NEW YORK (AP) — Brimming hopes that people will again return to office buildings, shopping centers and normal life sent markets rallying worldwide on Monday, following encouraging data about a potential coronavirus vaccine.
The S&P 500 rose 41.06, or 1.2%, to 3,550.50 after Pfizer said an early peek at its vaccine data suggests the shots may be 90% effective at preventing COVID-19, though that doesn’t mean its release is imminent. The index at the heart of many 401(k) accounts had been up as much as 3.9% earlier in the day, though it pared its gain in the last hour of trading amid drops for the Big Tech stocks that dominate the market.
Markets worldwide also got a boost from a resolution to the long, market-bruising battle for the White House. Democrat Joe Biden over the weekend clinched the last of the electoral votes needed to become the next president. Investors say they just wanted a clear winner to emerge, instead of rooting for one of the two, but a Biden administration constrained by a Congress under split control will likely offer a balance of more predictable policies.
Treasury yields and oil prices burst higher as the vaccine news allowed investors to feel confident about a stronger economic recovery on the way. The yield on the 10-year Treasury shot up from 0.81% before the announcement to 0.93%, a big move for the bond market. The key rate touched its highest level since March earlier in the morning, according to Tradeweb. U.S. oil jumped 8.5%.
Stocks of companies that most need the economy and the world to return to normal for their profits to heal led the way. An 11.6% surge for Chevron and 11.9% jump for The Walt Disney Co. amid hopes that people will start driving and flying to theme parks again helped the Dow Jones Industrial Average climb 834.57 points, or 2.9%, to 29,157.97.
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Armenia, Azerbaijan agree to end fight in Nagorno-Karabakh
YEREVAN, Armenia (AP) — Armenia and Azerbaijan announced an agreement early Tuesday to halt fighting over the Nagorno-Karabakh region of Azerbaijan under a pact signed with Russia that calls for deployment of nearly 2,000 Russian peacekeepers and territorial concessions.
Nagorno-Karabakh has been under the control of ethnic Armenian forces backed by Armenia since a 1994 truce ended a separatist war in which an estimated 30,000 people died. Sporadic clashes occurred since then, and full-scale fighting began on Sept. 27.
Several cease-fires had been called but were almost immediately violated. However, the agreement announced early Tuesday appeared more likely to take hold because Azerbaijan has made significant advances, including taking control of the strategically key city of Shushi on Sunday.
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian said on Facebook that calling an end to the fight was “extremely painful for me personally and for our people.”
Soon after the announcement, thousands of people streamed to the main square in the Armenian capital Yerevan to protest the agreement, many shouting, “We won't give up our land!” Some of them broke into the main government building, saying they were searching for Pashinian, who apparently had already departed..
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Kamala Harris win inspires women and girls nationwide
DETROIT (AP) — When Ashley Richardson-George’s 5-year-old daughter saw Kamala Harris wearing a white suffragette suit during her prime-time victory speech on Saturday, she ran into her room and came back minutes later wearing a white dress and sweater.
Not only did her daughter, Andrea, want to be like the Vice President-elect, she wanted to look like her, too. And on that night, it was more possible than ever.
“I was just really happy for her because you really don’t believe that you can be anything that you want unless you see it,” said Richardson-George of New York. “So for her, she was like, ‘I can be the president.’ So to see that glimmer in her eyes as a parent, it really is powerful to me as her mom.”
For countless women and girls, Harris' achievement of reaching the second highest office in the country represents hope, validation and the shattering of a proverbial glass ceiling that has kept mostly white men perched at the top tiers of American government.
“She’s literally the blueprint to women’s political possibility and now she is stepping literally into the Oval Office and she’s going to put an intersectional lens on everything this administration does from a gender or race lens,” said Glynda Carr, the president and CEO of Higher Heights, which focuses on electing Black women into political offices.