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AP News in Brief at 11:04 p.m. EDT

| July 13, 2020 8:27 PM

US debates school reopening, WHO warns 'no return to normal'

MIAMI (AP) — The resurgence of the coronavirus in the United States ignited fierce debate Monday about whether to reopen schools, as global health officials warned that the pandemic will intensify unless more countries adopt comprehensive plans to combat it.

“If the basics aren’t followed, there is only one way this pandemic is going to go,”said the director of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. “It’s going to get worse and worse and worse.”

Debate over the risks the virus poses, and how best to fight it, were spotlighted in Florida after it shattered the record among U.S. states for the largest single-day increase, with more than 15,000 newly confirmed cases.

Officials and health experts in hard-hit Miami pushed back against pressure, both from Gov. Ron DeSantis and President Donald Trump, to bring students back to classrooms next month.

“We just absolutely cannot risk the health of children, their well-being and safety, or any of our colleagues,” said Karla Hernandez-Mats, president of the United Teachers of Dade union and a middle school teacher herself. “We’re probably going to have to go to a full shutdown mode. I can’t see the schools reopening except with the 100% virtual model.”

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Sheriff: 'Glee’ star Naya Rivera saved son before drowning

LOS ANGELES (AP) — “Glee” star Naya Rivera ’s 4-year-old son told investigators that his mother, whose body was found in a Southern California lake Monday, boosted him back on to the deck of their rented boat before he looked back and saw her disappearing under the water, authorities said.

“She must have mustered enough energy to get her son back on the boat, but not enough to save herself,” Ventura County Sheriff Bill Ayub said at a news conference.

The boy, Josey Hollis Dorsey, was found asleep and alone in a life vest on the drifting pontoon boat about three hours after they launched on Lake Piru northwest of Los Angeles, setting off a five-day search that ended with the discovery of the body of the 33-year-old floating near the surface early Monday, authorities said.

The mother and son had gone swimming, which was permitted in that part of the lake, Ayub said. She was not wearing a life vest.

Authorities believe that Rivera drowned accidentally, and that her body was most likely trapped in the vegetation under the lake for several days before floating to the top, Ayub said.

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White House turns on Fauci as Trump minimizes virus spike

WASHINGTON (AP) — With U.S. virus cases spiking and the death toll mounting, the White House is working to undercut its most trusted coronavirus expert, playing down the danger as President Donald Trump pushes to get the economy moving before he faces voters in November.

The U.S. has become a cautionary tale across the globe, with once-falling cases now spiraling. However, Trump suggests the severity of the pandemic that has killed more than 135,000 Americans is being overstated by critics to damage his reelection chances.

Trump on Monday retweeted a post by Chuck Woolery, once the host of TV's "Love Connection,” claiming that “Everyone is lying" about COVID-19. Woolery's tweet attacked not just the media and Democrats but the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and most doctors "that we are told to trust. I think it’s all about the election and keeping the economy from coming back, which is about the election."

At the same time, the president and top White House aides are ramping up attacks against Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation's top infectious diseases expert. Fauci has been increasingly sidelined by the White House as he sounds alarms about the virus, a most unwelcome message at a time when Trump is focused on pushing an economic rebound.

“We haven’t even begun to see the end of it yet," he said in a talk with the dean of Stanford's medical school Monday, calling for a “step back” in reopenings.

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US rejects nearly all Chinese claims in South China Sea

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration escalated its actions against China on Monday by stepping squarely into one of the most sensitive regional issues dividing them and rejecting outright nearly all of Beijing’s significant maritime claims in the South China Sea.

The administration presented the decision as an attempt to curb China’s increasing assertiveness in the region with a commitment to recognizing international law. But it will almost certainly have the more immediate effect of further infuriating the Chinese, who are already retaliating against numerous U.S. sanctions and other penalties on other matters.

It also comes as President Donald Trump has come under growing fire for his response to the COVID-19 pandemic, stepped up criticism of China ahead of the 2020 election and sought to paint his expected Democratic challenger, former Vice President Joe Biden, as weak on China.

Previously, U.S. policy had been to insist that maritime disputes between China and its smaller neighbors be resolved peacefully through U.N.-backed arbitration. But in a statement released Monday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said the U.S. now regards virtually all Chinese maritime claims outside its internationally recognized waters to be illegitimate. The shift does not involve disputes over land features that are above sea level, which are considered to be "territorial" in nature.

“The world will not allow Beijing to treat the South China Sea as its maritime empire,” Pompeo said. “America stands with our Southeast Asian allies and partners in protecting their sovereign rights to offshore resources, consistent with their rights and obligations under international law. We stand with the international community in defense of freedom of the seas and respect for sovereignty and reject any push to impose 'might makes right' in the South China Sea or the wider region.”

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US budget deficit hits all-time high of $864 billion in June

WASHINGTON (AP) — The federal government incurred the biggest monthly budget deficit in history in June as spending on programs to combat the coronavirus recession exploded while millions of job losses cut into tax revenues.

The Treasury Department reported Monday that the deficit hit $864 billion last month, an amount of red ink that surpasses most annual deficits in the nation's history and is above the previous monthly deficit record of $738 billion in April. That amount was also tied to the trillions of dollars Congress has provided to cushion the impact of the widespread shutdowns that occurred in an effort to limit the spread of the viral pandemic.

For the first nine months of this budget year, which began Oct. 1, the deficit totals $2.74 trillion, also a record for that period. That puts the country well on the way to hitting the $3.7 trillion deficit for the whole year that has been forecast by the Congressional Budget Office.

That total would surpass the previous annual record of $1.4 trillion set in 2009 when the government was spending heavily to lift the country out of the recession caused by the 2008 financial crisis.

The June deficit was driven higher by spending on various government relief programs such as an extra $600 per week in expanded unemployment benefits and a Paycheck Protection Program that provided support to businesses to keep workers on their payrolls.

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California shuts bars, indoor dining and most gyms, churches

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — Bars and inside restaurant dining are banned throughout California, while indoor religious services, gyms and hair and nail salons are again off-limits in most of the state, Gov. Gavin Newsom said Monday in issuing a sweeping set of closures to head off surging coronavirus cases and hospitalizations.

The order is part of the state's new strategy to control the spread of the virus by focusing on limiting indoor activities to reflect public health officials' evolving understanding of how the virus spreads.

Earlier in the pandemic California closed beaches, campgrounds and state parks as it sought to limit interactions of people from different households. But as data showed the virus was most likely to be transmitted indoors, the Newsom administration began modifying public health orders, including ordering people to wear face coverings and leaving outdoor activities alone.

Newsom has repeatedly implored people to refrain from social gatherings and he expressed frustration that many aren't following the guidance.

“COVID-19 is not going away anytime soon, until there is a vaccine and or an effective therapy,” Newsom said. “Limit your mixing with people outside of your household. It’s just common sense, but the data suggests not everyone is practicing common sense.”

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Indians, other teams pressured after Redskins drop nickname

CLEVELAND (AP) — The spotlight for change is shining on the Cleveland Indians.

Now that the NFL's Washington Redskins have retired their contentious nickname and logo after decades of objection and amid a nationwide movement calling for racial justice, the Indians appear to be the next major sports franchise that might assume a new identity.

Along with the Indians, who recently announced they are in the early stages of evaluating a name change for the first time in 105 years, the Atlanta Braves, Chicago Blackhawks and Super Bowl champion Kansas City Chiefs are among those facing backlash along with the potential of sponsors pulling their financial support.

For some, the time has come for widespread changes to sports nicknames, mascots and symbols as the country reckons with its legacy of racism.

“I understand people aren’t willing to change or so quickly, or they’re hoping this moment is going to pass. It’s not,” said activist Frances Danger, who is Muscogee (Creek) and Seminole from Oklahoma. ”And now that we’ve gotten what we needed on the Redskins side, we’re going to start working on the rest of them. We’re not going to let up.”

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4 charged in Los Angeles death of rising rapper Pop Smoke

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Two men and two teens have been charged in the death of rising rapper Pop Smoke, who was killed during a Los Angeles home-invasion robbery in February, the district attorney’s office said Monday.

Los Angeles County District Attorney Jackie Lacey said in a statement that Corey Walker and Keandre Rodgers were charged with murder that occurred during the commission of a robbery and burglary. The two boys, 15 and 17 years old, were also charged with murder and robbery while in juvenile court. Their names were not released due to their age.

The 20-year-old New York rapper, whose legal name is Bashar Barakah Jackson, was killed Feb. 19 at a home in the Hollywood Hills. A 911 call from a friend of someone in the house reported armed intruders inside the home, police previously said.

Walker, 19, and Rodgers, 18, could face the death penalty or life in prison without the possibility of parole if convicted. The arraignment for both men has been postponed until Tuesday.

Jaquan Murphy, 21, was also arrested in connection with the incident last week. The complaint includes gang and gun allegations.

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Victims' relatives most vocal opponents of man's execution

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — Family members of three people slain in Arkansas more than 20 years ago have been among the most vocal opponents to the federal government's plan to execute one of the men convicted of killing their loved ones.

That man, Daniel Lewis Lee, is first on the list of prisoners set to be killed as the Trump administration tries to bring back federal executions this week after an almost two-decade hiatus.

But relatives of William Mueller, his wife, Nancy, and her 8-year-old daughter, Sarah Powell, who were killed in 1996, say that's not what they want. They have pleaded for years that Lee, of Yukon, Oklahoma, should receive the same life sentence as the ringleader in a deadly scheme that aimed to establish a whites-only nation in the Pacific Northwest.

Hours after the scheduled time for Lee’s execution, it was unclear whether any of the executions would go forward. The family members say their grief is compounded by the push to execute the 47-year-old Lee in the middle of a pandemic.

“As a supporter of President Trump, I pray that he will hear my message: the scheduled execution of Danny Lee for the murder of my daughter and granddaughter is not what I want and would bring my family more pain," Earlene Peterson, Nancy's mother and Sarah's grandmother, said in a statement last month.

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Fly without flapping? Andean condors surf air 99% of time

WASHINGTON (AP) — A new study sheds light on just how efficiently the world’s largest soaring bird rides air currents to stay aloft for hours without flapping its wings.

The Andean condor has a wingspan stretching to 10 feet and weighs up to 33 pounds, making it the heaviest soaring bird alive today.

For the first time, a team of scientists strapped recording equipment they called “daily diaries” to eight condors in Patagonia to record each wingbeat over more than 250 hours of flight time.

Incredibly, the birds spent just 1% of their time aloft flapping their wings, mostly during take-off. One bird flew more than five hours, covering more than 100 miles (160 km), without flapping its wings.

“Condors are expert pilots — but we just hadn’t expected they would be quite so expert,” said Emily Shepard, a study co-author and biologist at Swansea University in Wales.