Good Morning.
Joe Biden accused Donald Trump of blocking his access to national security information, saying his security team was faced with obstructions from political leaders in the Pentagon. The president-elect warned that he and his team “just aren’t getting all the information we need” in the main areas of national security, describing it as “nothing less … irresponsibility”. Earlier this month, the Pentagon unexpectedly suspended briefings with Biden’s transition team.
Trump was humiliated yesterday when more than 100 Republicans joined Democrats in the House of Representatives to overturn his veto on a $ 741 billion defense bill. If the Senate follows suit next week, what is expected to happen will be Congress’ first reprimand against its presidency.
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Stock markets worldwide made gains after Trump signed a $ 900 billion aid package to boost the US economy during the coronavirus pandemic, after its threats to reject it. On the first trading day since Christmas, and following the UK’s Brexit deal 24 hours earlier, US stock indexes reached intraday peaks.
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What does the coronavirus help package offer? From $ 600 stimulus checks for individuals to funds for schools, Amanda Holpuch explains what the package has to offer.
Why was California hit so hard by coronavirus?
Each of California’s 35 prisons is battling coronavirus cases, with nearly 9,500 people incarcerated with the virus across the state. In Los Angeles, companies are being criticized for hosting New Year’s Eve events, although one of the 95 residents is considered contagious with the coronavirus. In total, California lost more than 24,000 lives, with ICU capacity dropping to 0% in the southern part of the state this month. But Golden State was the first to go into blockade and managed to avoid overloading its hospitals in the first wave of the coronavirus pandemic. From leaders’ inactivity to institutional inequalities, Maanvi Singh looks at California’s battle with Covid and asks why she seems to be losing.
As the death toll in the United States increases, what can we learn from the countries that have handled the pandemic best? Laura Spinney argues that Vietnam learned from the 2003 SARS pandemic and Senegal from the battle against Ebola to produce far more competent responses than the United States and the United Kingdom. Here, she analyzes what the country did right and where the United States and the United Kingdom went wrong.
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Public health experts have warned the US to prepare for another wave of coronavirus after travel while on vacation. The Transportation Security Administration said more than 1.28 million travelers were screened at U.S. airports across the country on Sunday, the highest number since mid-March.
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The World Health Organization has warned that a major pandemic may follow, saying that although the coronavirus was “very serious”, “it is not necessarily the greatest”. The authorities also said that, instead of being eliminated, the coronavirus is likely to become an endemic virus that poses a constant low-level threat, administered by vaccines.
There is still no known reason for the Christmas attack in Nashville
Federal authorities are working together in an attempt to discover the reason behind the Christmas Day bombing in Nashville, which damaged dozens of buildings and injured three people. Anthony Quinn Warner, 63, was named as responsible for the attack, in which he died. The authorities said hundreds of tips and clues were sent to the authorities. David Rausch, director of the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, said that while officials expected to get an answer as to why Warner decided to detonate the explosion, “sometimes it just isn’t possible.”
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Ghislaine Maxwellthe last bail request for was denied, new lawsuits unveiled yesterday. Maxwell, a socialite who was arrested in July for allegations that she helped poor financial financier Jeffrey Epstein get sex from underage girls, made several bail requests to no avail.
In other news …
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The actor Lori Loughlin was released from prison yesterday after spending two months behind bars after admitting to paying half a million dollars in bribes to put his two daughters in college as part of a high-profile bribery scheme.
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The jazz trumpeter Keyon Harrold claimed a woman assaulted her son after falsely accusing him of theft. In a widely viewed video posted by Harrold online, a white woman appears to become aggressive after accusing her son of stealing his phone, which Harrold claims was later returned by an Uber driver.
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A white Ohio police officer was fired after a camera showed he was shooting deadly Andre Hill, a black man who held a cell phone and refused to help him. Adam Coy remains under criminal investigation for last week’s incident.
Statute of the day: only 9% of all plastic ever produced has been recycled
New international rules are being introduced to reduce the global plastic trade, in which waste is often dumped by the richest countries into the poorest. Only 9% of all plastic ever produced has been recycled, with about 12% incinerated. The rest, 79% of watering the eyes, accumulated in landfills, dumps and the environment. The UN hopes the rules will lead to cleaner oceans in five years.
Don’t miss it: Newt Gingrich accuses Democrats of trying to “brainwash” the next generation
Former Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich has long been accused of planting the seeds of the division that were responsible for Trump’s rise. In this interview with our Washington DC branch chief, David Smith, he accuses Democrats of using cultural wars to brainwash people, describes the presidential election as an anomaly and restricts his bets that Trump will be around for years to come.
Last thing: Roman relics returned in a wave of regret
Italian museum curators noticed a trend in tourists sending back artifacts they stole from cultural sites in Rome years later, with sincere letters of confession. So many relics have been returned that a museum that displays them has been established. Angela Giuffrida tells some of the most memorable stories.
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