AP National News

By MORGAN LEE and CEDAR ATTANASIO Associated Press SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) — New Mexico is asking National Guard troops and state bureaucrats to volunteer to serve as substitute teachers as preschools and K-12 public schools struggle to keep classrooms open amid surging COVID-19 infections. Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham on Wednesday announced an unprecedented effort

By MATTHEW BARAKAT Associated Press FALLS CHURCH, Va. (AP) — Police say that a man serving a life sentence in Virginia on a murder conviction has now confessed to two additional slayings, one of which goes back 35 years. Fairfax County Police said at a press conference that Charles Helem has been charged with murder

NEW YORK (AP) — A federal judge has ruled that the parents of Otto Warmbier, a U.S. student who died after being taken hostage by North Korea and released by the country in a coma in 2017, should receive about $240,000 seized from a North Korean bank account. The amount would be a partial payment

By MICHAEL R. SISAK and MICHAEL BALSAMO Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — A fourth worker at a federal women’s prison in California has been charged with sexually abusing an inmate. His arrest comes months after the prison’s warden was arrested on similar charges. James Theodore Highhouse was charged Tuesday with sexual abuse of a ward,

By ED WHITE Associated Press DETROIT (AP) — Suspicions that a University of Michigan sports doctor was committing sexual assault went back decades, long before a $490 million settlement with victims. But no one stepped forward to ensure that Robert Anderson would be kicked off campus. The many missed opportunities were described in detail last

By COREY WILLIAMS Associated Press A financial payout for more than 1,000 people — mostly men — who say they were sexually assaulted by former University of Michigan sports doctor Robert Anderson is the latest multimillion-dollar settlement involving schools faced with sexual misconduct scandals. The $490 million settlement announced Wednesday by the Ann Arbor school

ALGIERS, Algeria (AP) — Algeria’s president has ordered all schools closed for 10 days because of a surge of COVID-19 infections in the North African country.  Algeria has also tightened rules for entering the country through its airports. Algeria reported 1,359 new omicron cases on Wednesday alone. The president has urged health authorities to establish

By COLLEEN SLEVIN Associated Press DENVER (AP) — Authorities say investigators are working to determine whether some small bone fragments found during the search for a 91-year-old woman who tried to save her dogs from a wildfire in suburban Denver could belong to her. The Boulder County Sheriff’s Office said Wednesday that scientific testing is

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — Dutch media report that a man who stood outside the home of a former Dutch foreign minister shouting and waving a burning torch has been sent to prison for six months. Threats aimed at Dutch politicians have increased in recent years amid a polarization that has been fueled by the

NEW YORK (AP) — Fred Parris, the lead singer of the 1950s harmony group the Five Satins and composer of the classic doo-wop ballad “In the Still of the Night,” has died at age 85. Released in 1956, “In the Still of the Night” only reached No. 24 on the Billboard pop charts but became

By LISA RATHKE Associated Press The wife of a former Vermont legislator and House majority leader says he has died with the help of a law he himself helped pass that allows the terminally ill to end their own lives. Ellen McKay Jewett says husband Willem Jewett died Jan. 12 at his home in Ripton

By MATTHEW LEE AP Diplomatic Writer KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — The United States and Russia are showing no sign either will relent from entrenched positions on Ukraine that have raised fears of a Russian invasion and a new war in Europe. Speaking in Kyiv, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken accused Russia of planning to

By COLLEEN SLEVIN Associated Press DENVER (AP) — Authorities say investigators are working to determine whether some small bone fragments found during the search for a 91-year-old woman who tried to save her dogs from a wildfire in suburban Denver could belong to her. The Boulder County Sheriff’s Office said Wednesday that scientific testing is

By DAMIAN J. TROISE AP Business Writer Stocks edged lower in afternoon trading on Wall Street as investors review the latest corporate earnings and prepare for higher interest rates. The S&P 500 fell 0.3%, the Nasdaq fell 0.3% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.5%. The major indexes bounced between gains and losses throughout

By MORGAN LEE Associated Press SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) — New Mexico is asking National Guard troops and state bureaucrats to volunteer to serve as substitute teachers as preschools and K-12 public schools struggle to keep classrooms open amid surging COVID-19 infections. Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham on Wednesday announced an unprecedented effort to reopen classrooms

WASHINGTON (AP) — Two Supreme Court justices say a media report they were at odds over the wearing of masks during the surge in coronavirus cases is false. NPR’s longtime Supreme Court correspondent Nina Totenberg reported on an alleged conflict between Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Neil Gorsuch. Sotomayor has diabetes and has been attending arguments

By KATHLEEN RONAYNE Associated Press The local water district for wealthy Southern California communities in an enclave nestled in the Santa Monica Mountains is taking a more aggressive approach to conservation as the drought drags on despite a wet winter start. The Las Virgenes Municipal Water District is installing a new metering system that gives

By ED WHITE Associated Press DETROIT (AP) — Suspicions that a University of Michigan sports doctor was committing sexual assault went back decades, long before a $490 million settlement with victims. But no one stepped forward to ensure that Robert Anderson would be kicked off campus. The many missed opportunities were described in detail last

By STEPHEN GROVES Associated Press PIERRE, S.D. (AP) — South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem is slamming how fellow Republicans are handling an impeachment probe of the state’s attorney general for his role in a fatal car crash. Noem told The Associated Press on Wednesday that a South Dakota House investigative committee is “attacking the integrity