North America

WASHINGTON (AP) — Weeks after Robert Mueller was appointed special counsel in the Russia investigation, Roger Stone, a confidant of President Donald Trump, reassured WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in a Twitter message that if prosecutors came after him, “I will bring down the entire house of cards,” according to FBI documents made public Tuesday.

WASHINGTON (AP) — With the U.S. economy gripped by its worst crisis since the 1930s, Federal Reserve policymakers are expected to offer sweeping assurances Wednesday that they will act as needed to help prevent the damage from growing even worse.

Yet the Fed is unlikely to unveil any new emergency programs. Fed officials have already taken a range of extraordinary actions that have propelled them into new corners of the economy and elevated their bond-buying to new heights.

(AP) --- Hillary Clinton, the first woman to become a major party’s presidential nominee, endorsed Joe Biden’s White House bid on Tuesday, continuing Democrats’ efforts to coalesce around the former vice president as he takes on President Donald Trump.

Clinton made her announcement during a Biden campaign town hall to discuss the coronavirus and its effect on women. Without mentioning Trump by name, Clinton assailed the Republican president and hailed Biden’s experience and temperament in comparison.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said Tuesday his administration is considering requiring travelers on certain incoming international flights to undergo temperature and virus checks to help stop the spread of the coronavirus.

“We’re looking at doing it on the international flights coming out of areas that are heavily infected,” Trump said at the White House. “We will be looking into that in the very near future.”

(AP) --- Nearly 70 residents sickened with the coronavirus have died at a Massachusetts home for aging veterans, as state and federal officials try to figure out what went wrong in the deadliest known outbreak at a long-term care facility in the U.S.

While the death toll at the state-run Holyoke Soldiers’ Home continues to climb, federal officials are investigating whether residents were denied proper medical care and the state’s top prosecutor is deciding whether to bring legal action.

CHICAGO (AP) — Extended security and body-cam video released Tuesday shows Chicago police shooting an unarmed short-order cook at the foot of a subway escalator and then again with his back turned to officers after they tried to stop him for violating a city ordinance by walking from one train car to another.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. economy began 2020 riding the crest of a record-long expansion with every expectation that its 11th year of growth would not be its last.

Then the economy screeched to a sudden halt. And now it’s in free-fall.

On Wednesday, the government will offer a glimpse of how dark the picture has grown and how much worse it could get as the coronavirus pandemic inflicts ruinous damage.

BALTIMORE (AP) — Democrat Kweisi Mfume easily won a special election Tuesday to finish the term of the late Elijah Cummings, retaking a Maryland congressional seat he held for five terms before leaving to lead the NAACP.

Mfume defeated Republican Kimberly Klacik in the heavily Democratic 7th Congressional District, capping a race dramatically reshaped by the coronavirus. After winning what was largely a mail-in election, Mfume told supporters many people are “struggling at this hour to fight off the terrible disease of the coronavirus.”

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Joe Biden won Ohio’s presidential primary Tuesday, clinching a contest that was less about the Democratic nomination and more about how states can conduct elections in the era of the coronavirus.

The primary was the first major test of statewide elections via mail amid an outbreak.

There were reports of confusion but no widespread disruption. It wasn’t like Wisconsin earlier this month, when voters were forced to overlook social distancing guidelines to stand in line wearing masks to cast ballots.

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Vice President Mike Pence chose not to wear a face mask Tuesday during a tour of the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, an apparent violation of the world-renowned medical center’s policy requiring them.

Video feeds show that Pence did not wear a mask when he met with a Mayo employee who has recovered from COVID-19 and is now donating plasma, even though everyone else in the room appeared to be wearing one. He was also maskless when he visited a lab where Mayo conducts coronavirus tests.