North America

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — NASA and SpaceX have picked May 27 for resuming astronaut launches from the U.S. after nine years of complete Russian dependence.

NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine announced the launch date Friday. Astronauts haven’t launched into orbit from the U.S. since NASA’s last space shuttle flight in 2011. SpaceX aims to end the drought by sending two NASA astronauts to the International Space Station.

“On May 27, @NASA will once again launch American astronauts on American rockets from American soil!” Bridenstine tweeted.

(AP) --- The outbreak of the coronavirus has dealt a shock to the global economy with unprecedented speed. Following are developments Friday related to the global economy, the work place and the spread of the virus.

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CENTRAL BANKS AND GOVERNMENT: The coronavirus pandemic has skewered almost all economic models.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Congressional oversight of about $2 trillion for the coronavirus crisis began to take shape Friday as three members were appointed to a congressional commission that will monitor how the money is spent.

Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Penn. and Reps. French Hill, R-Ark., and Donna Shalala, D-Fla., were added to the five-member Congressional Oversight Commission by congressional leaders. They join Bharat Ramamurti, a former Democratic Senate aide who until Friday has been the panel’s sole appointee.

BON AIR, Va. (AP) — Coronavirus has erupted inside a juvenile detention center in Virginia with 25 kids testing positive, accounting for a quarter of all cases reported at youth facilities nationwide, officials said Friday.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Navy’s top admiral will soon decide the fate of the ship captain who was fired after pleading for commanders to move faster to safeguard his coronavirus-infected crew on the USS Theodore Roosevelt.

NEW YORK (AP) — President Donald Trump held a call with faith leaders on Friday that included discussion about a phased-in return to broader in-person worship after weeks of religious services largely shifting online in response to the coronavirus pandemic.

Trump’s call with faith leaders came one day after the White House included houses of worship among “large venues” that could be able to reopen while observing “strict physical distancing protocols” in the first stage of a three-part plan to reopen a U.S. economy that’s been frozen by the toll of the highly contagious virus.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump’s former lawyer and longtime fixer Michael Cohen will be released from federal prison to serve the remainder of his sentence in home confinement because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Cohen is currently locked up at FCI Otisville in New York after pleading guilty to numerous charges, including campaign finance fraud and lying to Congress. He will remain under quarantine for 14 days before he is released. Federal statistics show 14 inmates and seven staff members at the prison have tested positive for the coronavirus.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Frustration boiled over into anger on a private call with Vice President Mike Pence as Democratic senators questioned administration officials about coronavirus testing plans but left without adequate answers.

At one point in the Friday call, Maine Sen. Angus King, an independent and former governor, told Pence the administration’s failure to develop an adequate national testing regime is a “dereliction of duty,” according to a person who joined the hour-long call but was unauthorized to discuss it and granted anonymity.

NEW YORK (AP) — In Wall Street’s tug of war between hope and pessimism about the coronavirus pandemic, hope is fighting back.

U.S. stocks joined a worldwide rally Friday and closed out their first back-to-back weekly gain since the market began selling off two months ago. The S&P 500 jumped 2.7% for the day, following up on even bigger gains in Europe and Asia.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump White House intervened to weaken one of the few public health protections pursued by its own administration, a rule to limit the use of a toxic industrial compound in consumer products, according to communications between the White House and Environmental Protection Agency.