North America

WASHINGTON (AP) — The House is reassembling to send President Donald Trump a fourth bipartisan bill to help businesses crippled by the coronavirus, an almost $500 billion measure that many lawmakers are already looking beyond.

Anchoring the latest bill is a request by the administration to replenish a fund to help small- and medium-size businesses with payroll, rent and other expenses.

MEXICO CITY (AP) — The COVID-19 pandemic could have been a fraught moment for U.S.-Mexico relations — two leaders from opposite ends of the political spectrum facing the largest crisis ever confronted by either administration.

Instead, presidents Donald Trump and Andrés Manuel López Obrador are carrying on like old pals.

SAN DIEGO (AP) — The Trump administration has been quietly adding military surveillance cameras at the U.S.-Mexico border in response to the coronavirus pandemic, though fewer people appear to be crossing illegally. It’s the latest move as operations at the U.S.-Mexico border have become increasingly militarized and secretive.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Tensions between Washington and Tehran flared anew Wednesday as Iran’s Revolutionary Guard conducted a space launch that could advance the country’s long-range missile program and President Donald Trump threatened to “shoot down and destroy” any Iranian gunboats that harass Navy ships.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (AP) — Harvard University announced Wednesday it will turn down $8.7 million in federal coronavirus relief, a day after President Donald Trump excoriated the wealthy Ivy League school over taxpayer money it stood to receive.

Similar action was taken at Stanford, Princeton and Yale universities, which said they too will reject millions of dollars in federal funding amid growing scrutiny of wealthy colleges.

NEW YORK (AP) — Air Force One is mostly grounded. Fundraisers are canceled. And the closest thing to a campaign rally is President Donald Trump’s nightly coronavirus briefing.

The president’s reelection campaign has been thoroughly upended by the coronavirus. But Trump’s team has revived a plan to quickly define Joe Biden, painting the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee as a Washington lifer, focusing on his links to China and insinuating that he is not up to the job.

(AP) --- The Latest on the coronavirus pandemic. The new coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms for most people. For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness or death.

TOP OF THE HOUR:

— UN Secretary-General says pandemic is becoming human rights crisis

— Japan: 14 more crew members on Italian cruise ship test positive for coronavirus

— New Zealand announces just three new virus cases, two deaths

— China again reports no new virus deaths

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Joe Biden’s tenure as Barack Obama’s vice president is complicating his efforts to deepen ties with Latinos who could be critical to winning the White House.

For many Latinos, Biden’s embrace of the Obama years is a frightening reminder of when the former president ejected about 3 million people living in the U.S. illegally, earning him the moniker of “deporter in chief.”

MADILL, Okla. (AP) — One person was killed Wednesday when an apparent tornado that damaged at least two businesses tore through Marshall County in southern Oklahoma.

Another damaging storm, also an apparent tornado swept, through a Southeast Texas county, causing widespread damage.

The Oklahoma storm hit Madill, near the Red River, about 4:30 p.m. Wednesday, causing widespread damage to the town, including its residential neighborhoods, said Donny Raley, the city’s emergency manager.

ATLANTA (AP) — President Donald Trump said Wednesday that he “disagreed strongly” with the decision by Georgia’s Republican governor to reopen salons, gyms and other nonessential businesses that had been shuttered to contain the coronavirus, saying, “It’s just too soon.”

During the daily White House briefing, the president indicated that while he is in favor of states reopening their economies, Gov. Brian Kemp is moving a little too fast.