Alabama

SELMA, Ala. (AP) — An emboldened Joe Biden tried to cast himself as the clear moderate alternative to progressive Bernie Sanders on Sunday as the Democrats’ shrinking presidential field raced toward Super Tuesday.

One of Biden’s leading moderate rivals, former South Bend, Indiana, mayor Pete Buttigieg, dropped out of the campaign just 24 hours after Biden scored a resounding victory in South Carolina, his first of the 2020 rollercoaster nomination fight.

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (AP) — A powerful winter storm raked the Southeast on Thursday with high winds, rain and floods that killed at least four people and injured several more across a dozen states. Rescue crews repeatedly pulled people from cars that got stuck in high water, but couldn’t reach a person whose vehicle disappeared into a rain-swollen creek.

SCOTTSBORO, Ala. (AP) — A massive fire that killed at least eight people and destroyed dozens of boats in an Alabama marina early Monday was spread so rapidly by the wind that “we didn’t have time to do nothing,” said one resident who survived but lost his brother in the cold water.

Tommy Jones, a Jackson County Park Marina resident, said he also watched helplessly as a small boat containing a woman and her children was engulfed in flames.

“There was nothing we could do,” he said.

AUBURN, Ala. (AP) — An Alabama district attorney said Monday that authorities have “good reason” to believe human remains found in a wooded area belong to the missing stepdaughter of a UFC heavyweight fighter.

The remains were found on a county road in neighboring Macon County, Lee County District Attorney Brandon Hughes told The Associated Press.

“I can confirm that human remains have been found in Macon County on County Road 2 and we have good reason to believe they are that of Aniah Blanchard,” Hughes said.

HAYNEVILLE, Ala. (AP) — Law enforcement agencies in Alabama and beyond posted messages of condolences on social media Sunday in the aftermath of the fatal weekend shooting of a sheriff in the state.

Few details were immediately available about the circumstances surrounding Saturday evening’s shooting and the capture of an 18-year-old suspect hours later.

HAYNEVILLE, Ala. (AP) — An Alabama sheriff was fatally shot Saturday evening in a community near the state’s capital, authorities announced, and an 18-year-old suspect was taken into custody after an hourslong manhunt.

Gov. Kay Ivey tweeted that Lowndes County Sheriff John Williams had been “tragically killed” in the line of duty and that she offered her prayers and sympathy to his family and the county sheriff’s department.

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. (AP) — An Alabama hospital system that quit accepting new patients after a ransomware attack said Saturday it had gotten a key to unlock its computer systems.

A statement from DCH Health Systems didn’t say how the three-hospital system got the information needed to unlock its data. But The Tuscaloosa News quoted spokesman Brad Fisher as saying the hospital system paid the attackers.

“For ongoing security reasons, we will be keeping confidential specific details about the investigation and our coordination with the attacker,” Fisher told the newspaper.

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (AP) — Visiting a black church bombed by the Ku Klux Klan during the civil rights era, Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden on Sunday framed current racial tensions as part of an enduring struggle that is older than the nation.

MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey apologized Thursday for wearing blackface decades ago, becoming the latest politician to face scrutiny over racially insensitive photos and actions from their university days.

Ivey, 74, issued the apology after a 1967 radio interview surfaced in which her now-ex-husband describes her actions at Auburn University, where she was vice president of the student government association.

29 Aug 2019; MEMO: Alabama Republicans approved a resolution calling for expelling Congresswoman Ilhan Omar from Congress, USA Today reported.

Citing controversial statements on the 9/11 attacks, anti-Semitism and strong support for the Palestinian people in the face of the Israeli occupation, the Republicans called for the state’s congressional delegation to begin the process of seeking Omar’s expulsion from Congress.