AP News in Brief at 6:04 a.m. EST
Biden defends health care law as high court mulls its fate
WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) — President-elect Joe Biden is championing the Obama administration's signature health law as it goes before the Supreme Court in a case that could overturn it.
He will deliver a speech on the Affordable Care Act on Tuesday, the day the high court will hear arguments on its merits. The court ruled eight years ago to leave the essential components of the law known as Obamacare intact, but it is now controlled 6-3 by a conservative majority after President Donald Trump's appointment of Justice Amy Coney Barrett.
Biden's speech reflects the importance he is putting on health care as he prepares to take office in January amid the worst pandemic in more than a century. He's launching his transition process this week as the coronavirus surges across the country. The U.S. surpassed 10 million cases on Monday.
Biden also focused on health care Monday as he pleaded with Americans to put aside their political differences and wear masks to protect themselves and their neighbors from the virus.
“We could save tens of thousands of lives if everyone would just wear a mask for the next few months. Not Democratic or Republican lives, American lives,” Biden said. “Please, I implore you, wear a mask.”
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GOP tries again to get high court to ax health care law
WASHINGTON (AP) — A week after the 2020 election, Republican elected officials and the Trump administration are advancing their latest arguments to get rid of the Affordable Care Act, a long-held GOP goal that has repeatedly failed in Congress and the courts.
In arguments scheduled for Tuesday, the Supreme Court will hear its third major fight over the 10-year-old law, popularly known as “Obamacare.” Republican attorneys general in 18 states and the administration want the whole law to be struck down, which would threaten coverage for more than 23 million people.
It would wipe away protections for people with preexisting medical conditions, subsidized insurance premiums that make coverage affordable for millions of Americans and an expansion of the Medicaid program that is available to low-income people in most states.
California is leading a group of Democratic-controlled states that is urging the court to leave the law in place.
The case comes to a court that now has three justices appointed by President Donald Trump: Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett, who joined the court late last month following her hurried nomination and confirmation to replace the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
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As virus spikes, Europe runs low on ICU beds, hospital staff
PARIS (AP) — In Italy lines of ambulances park outside hospitals awaiting beds, and in France the government coronavirus tracking app prominently displays the intensive care capacity taken up by COVID-19 patients: 92.5% and rising. In the ICU in Barcelona, there is no end in sight for the doctors and nurses who endured this once already.
Intensive care is the last line of defense for severely ill coronavirus patients and Europe is running out — of beds and the doctors and nurses to staff them.
In country after country, the intensive care burden of COVID-19 patients is nearing and sometimes surpassing levels seen at last spring's peak. Health officials, many advocating a return to stricter lockdowns, warn that adding beds will do no good because there aren't enough doctors and nurses trained to staff them.
In France, more than 7,000 health care workers have undergone training since last spring in intensive care techniques. Nursing students, interns, paramedics, all have been drafted, according to Health Minister Olivier Veran.
“If the mobilization is well and truly there, it is not infinite,” he said last week, when the ICU units were filled to 85% capacity. “It is not enough.”
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GOP backs Trump as he fights election results, transition
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration threw the presidential transition into tumult, with President Donald Trump blocking government officials from cooperating with President-elect Joe Biden’s team and Attorney General William Barr authorizing the Justice Department to probe unsubstantiated allegations of voter fraud.
Some Republicans, including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, rallied behind Trump's efforts to fight the election results. Few in the GOP acknowledged Biden's victory or condemned Trump's other concerning move on Monday: his firing of Defense Secretary Mark Esper.
The developments cast doubt on whether the nation would witness the same kind of smooth transition of power that has long anchored its democracy. The Electoral College is slated to formally confirm Biden's victory on Dec. 14 and the Democrat will be sworn into office in late January.
On Monday, Barr authorized U.S. attorneys to probe “substantial” allegations of voter irregularities and election fraud, though no widespread instances of that type of trouble in the 2020 election exist. In fact, election officials from both political parties have publicly stated that voting went well and international observers also confirmed that there were no serious irregularities.
Biden campaign lawyer Bob Bauer said Barr’s memorandum authorizing investigations “will only fuel the ‘specious, speculative, fanciful or far-fetched claims’ he professes to guard against.”
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Candidate concessions have been colorful, funny — or absent
WASHINGTON (AP) — Losing presidential candidates have conceded to their opponents in private chats, telegrams, phone calls and nationally televised speeches. Al Gore conceded twice in the same race. President Donald Trump isn't expected to concede at all — not even with a tweet.
There's no law that says he has to concede, but if he doesn’t, Trump will be the first presidential candidate in modern times to ignore a tradition that has marked peaceful transitions throughout American history.
Most concessions are gracious — less about the loser and more about closure for the country. Others have a little dry humor mixed in.
After failing to win reelection in 1992, George H.W. Bush quoted Winston Churchill and said he had been given the "Order of the Boot," according to presidential historian Michael Beschloss. Bush said he could accept defeat because of his "deep devotion to the political system under which this nation has thrived for two centuries.”
The concession tradition had a hiccup in 2000 when Gore called George W. Bush to concede and then called him back to recant as the results from Florida went sideways.
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Barr tells DOJ to probe election fraud claims if they exist
WASHINGTON (AP) — Attorney General William Barr has authorized federal prosecutors across the U.S. to pursue “substantial allegations” of voting irregularities, if they exist, before the 2020 presidential election is certified, despite no evidence of widespread fraud.
Barr’s action comes days after Democrat Joe Biden defeated President Donald Trump and raises the prospect that Trump will use the Justice Department to try to challenge the outcome. It gives prosecutors the ability to go around longstanding Justice Department policy that normally would prohibit such overt actions before the election is certified.
Trump has not conceded the election and is instead claiming without evidence that there has been a widespread, multi-state conspiracy by Democrats to skew the vote tally in Biden’s favor.
Biden holds a sizable lead in multiple battleground states and there has been no indication of enough improperly counted or illegally cast votes that would shift the outcome. In fact, election officials from both political parties have publicly stated the election went well, though there have been minor issues that are typical in elections, including voting machines breaking and ballots that were miscast and lost.
In a memo to U.S. attorneys, obtained by The Associated Press, Barr wrote that investigations “may be conducted if there are clear and apparently-credible allegations of irregularities that, if true, could potentially impact the outcome of a federal election in an individual State.”
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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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Erekat, longtime spokesman for the Palestinians, dies at 65
JERUSALEM (AP) — Saeb Erekat, a veteran peace negotiator and prominent international spokesman for the Palestinians for more than three decades, died on Tuesday, weeks after being infected by the coronavirus. He was 65.
The American-educated Erekat was involved in nearly every round of peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians going back to the landmark Madrid conference in 1991. Over the years, he was a constant media presence. He tirelessly argued for a negotiated two-state solution to the decades-old conflict, defended the Palestinian leadership and blamed Israel — particularly hard-line leader Benjamin Netanyahu — for the failure to reach an agreement.
As a loyal aide to Palestinian leaders — first Yasser Arafat and then Mahmoud Abbas — Erekat clung to this strategy until his death, even as hopes for Palestinian statehood sank to new lows.
In the weeks leading up to his death in an Israeli hospital, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain had normalized ties with Israel, breaking with the long-held Arab position that a deal on Palestinian statehood must precede normalization. Abbas and members of his inner circle, including Erekat, found themselves internationally sidelined and deeply unpopular among Palestinians. And decades of unfettered Israeli settlement expansion had made a statehood deal based on the partition of territory increasingly unlikely.
His son Ali confirmed that he passed away. Hadassah Medical Center, the Israeli hospital where he had been receiving intensive care for three weeks, also announced his passing. Erekat has received a lung transplant in 2017 and was at especially high risk from the virus.
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Experts say no need to cancel Thanksgiving, but play it safe
A safe Thanksgiving during a pandemic is possible, but health experts know their advice is as tough to swallow as dry turkey: Stay home. Don’t travel. If you must gather, do it outdoors.
With a fall surge of coronavirus infections gripping the U.S., many Americans are forgoing tradition and getting creative with celebrations.
For the first time in five years, Atlanta nutrition consultant Marisa Moore won’t travel to South Carolina to see her large extended family. Instead, she plans to video chat with them as she attempts her first home-baked apple pie. When it’s time to eat, they’ll compare plates.
“We’ll talk all day,” Moore said.
On Monday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention updated its holiday guidance, noting the virus crisis is worsening and that small household gatherings are “an important contributor." The CDC said older adults and others at heightened risk of severe illness should avoid gathering with people outside their households.
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Florida cities mop up after deluge from Tropical Storm Eta
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — Cities in South Florida mopped up after Tropical Storm Eta flooded some urban areas with a deluge that swamped entire neighborhoods and filled some homes with rising water that did not drain for hours.
It was the 28th named storm in a busy hurricane season, and the first to make landfall in Florida. This year tied the record with 2005, when Hurricanes Katrina, Rita and Wilma struck the Gulf Coast. But that was before Theta formed late Monday night over the northeast Atlantic, becoming the basin's 29th named storm to eclipse the 2005 record.
After striking Nicaragua as a Category 4 hurricane and killing nearly 70 people from Mexico to Panama, Eta swept over South Florida, then moved Monday into the Gulf of Mexico near where the Everglades meet the sea, with maximum sustained winds of 50 mph (85 kph).
Broward County, which includes Fort Lauderdale, was among the harder hit areas.
"It’s very bad. In the last 20 years, I've never seen anything like that," said Tito Carvalho, who owns a car stereo business in Fort Lauderdale and estimated the water was 3 feet (less than a meter) deep in some places. Some items in his business were damaged from the flooding, he added.