VOL. 44 | NO. 16 | Friday, April 17, 2020
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. home-building activity collapsed in March as the coronavirus spread, with housing starts tumbling 22.3% from a month ago.
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. long-term mortgage rates hovered near all-time lows for the third straight week amid fresh signs of severe damage to the economy and the housing market from the shutdown spurred by the coronavirus pandemic.
RICHARD COURTNEY: REALTY CHECK
First quarter sales in the Nashville area increased a whopping 9.1% compared to 2019, Greater Nashville Realtors sales data reveals.
JOE ROGERS: MY TAKE
Whatever else might be said about Mayor John Cooper, it would be putting it kindly to observe that his political timing stinks.
NONPROFITS
The Community Foundation of Middle Tennessee has announced 15 additional grants of $592,000 to nonprofits and organizations helping victims affected by the March 3 tornadoes, including those in the Nashville area and in Putnam County.
BEHIND THE WHEEL
With the country effectively shut down and the economy upended by the coronavirus pandemic, buying a car is likely a low priority.
BUSINESS BOOK REVIEW
Take a right turn at the church. If you’ve ever gotten those words in the directions to some business, you know what comes following them: A feeling of being totally, inescapably lost. That’s because there were two churches. And you’re angry your GPS app took you somewhere ridiculous.
PERSONAL FINANCE
In an ideal world, your retirement accounts would be left alone for retirement. You’ve probably noticed that we’re not living in an ideal world.
MILLENNIAL MONEY
A few months ago you might not have thought much about strategies for managing credit balances or how much of an emergency fund you really need. But with finances strained by the coronavirus pandemic, making smart money decisions is crucial.
CAREER CORNER
Remember last year’s great job market? We all knew it would slow at some point, but who could have imagined the economy would come to a screeching halt because of a global pandemic?
MUSIC INDUSTRY
JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — Symptoms of the new coronavirus have subsided for Blues legend Bobby Rush, and now he's warning others about the seriousness of COVID-19.
STATEWIDE
NASHVILLE (AP) — President Donald Trump has nominated an expert with Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee for a seat on the National Science Board.
MEMPHIS (AP) — Four Tennessee counties have been chosen to participate in a program that seeks to improve the inventory of industrial sites and buildings across the state.
NASHVILLE (AP) — Tennessee officials on Wednesday finally released more detailed information surrounding confirmed cases and COVID-19 related deaths in its long-term care facilities after open government advocates, Democratic lawmakers and others urged for its release.
REAL ESTATE
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. new home sales plunged 15.4% in March as a winding down in the middle of the month due to the coronavirus began to rattle the housing market.
VIRUS OUTBREAK
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump on Wednesday played down the possibility that the coronavirus could be worse this winter despite medical experts' warnings that COVID-19 could combine with the flu to make a more complicated return to the United States.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The head of a government agency combating the coronavirus pandemic is alleging that he was ousted for opposing politically connected efforts to promote a malaria drug that President Donald Trump touted without proof as a remedy for COVID-19.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
WASHINGTON (AP) — More than 4.4 million laid-off workers applied for U.S. unemployment benefits last week as job cuts escalated across an economy that remains all but shut down, the government said Thursday.
CHICAGO (AP) — A once-bustling bar and grill tucked below a Michigan Avenue overpass famously inspired a "Saturday Night Live" skit starring John Belushi and Bill Murray. But the money the Billy Goat Tavern is losing during the coronavirus outbreak is no joke.
NEW YORK (AP) — The more than $300 billion set aside to replenish the emergency loan program for small businesses impacted by the coronavirus pandemic is likely already all spoken for, banking industry groups said Wednesday.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Congress is on the verge of passing an almost $500 billion coronavirus relief bill, but battle lines already are forming over the next measure amid growing demands to approve additional billions for state and local governments, the Postal Service and even infrastructure.
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.
LONDON (AP) — Europe's economies are heading for unprecedented recessions as a result of the lockdown measures put in place by governments to get a grip on the coronavirus pandemic, closely watched surveys indicated Thursday.
BRUSSELS (AP) — European Union leaders are set to weigh Thursday the damage the coronavirus has inflicted on health care systems and the lives of around half a billion citizens across the bloc as they struggle to devise a more robust plan to resuscitate their ravaged economies.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
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.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump claimed Wednesday that he had signed an executive order "temporarily suspending immigration into the United States." But experts say the order will merely delay the issuance of green cards for a minority of applicants.
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 22
NASHVILLE AREA
WASHINGTON (AP) — Preparations for the 2020 general election debates are proceeding "according to schedule" despite the coronavirus outbreak.
NASHVILLE (AP) — Nashville is adding 20 tornado sirens in a system upgrade that will let the warnings go off in specific areas, instead of throughout all of the city.
STATEWIDE
NASHVILLE (AP) — Some of Tennessee's biggest cities are not making any promises about starting to reopen their economies by Gov. Bill Lee's stated goal of May 1, saying they are going to let data, not dates, dictate their roll-outs.
COURTS
NASHVILLE (AP) — Nashville will settle a lawsuit with the family of one of four victims shot to death inside of a Waffle House restaurant.
WASHINGTON (AP) — This is how the Supreme Court embraces technology. Slowly.
MEDIA
OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) — Facebook said Wednesday it will label posts from popular accounts with their geographic origin in an attempt to curb political misinformation by foreign-based pages that mimic legitimate groups and political parties.
VIRUS OUTBREAK
WASHINGTON (AP) — To fight the spread of coronavirus, Americans are confined to their homes and public life is all but shuttered — and a majority say that's the right call. A new survey from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research also finds that a wide majority approve of how their state and local governments are responding to the pandemic.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Despite pockets of attention-grabbing protests, a new survey finds Americans remain overwhelmingly in favor of stay-at-home orders and other efforts to slow the spread of the coronavirus. A majority say it won't be safe to lift such restrictions anytime soon, even as a handful of governors announce plans to ease within days the public health efforts that have upended daily life and roiled the global economy.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration announced a plan Wednesday to start paying hospitals and doctors who care for uninsured COVID-19 patients, but Democratic lawmakers and health industry groups are likely to press for more.
The outbreak of the coronavirus has dealt a shock to the global economy with unprecedented speed. Following are developments Wednesday related to the global economy, the work place and the spread of the virus.
BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — Governors in 17 states have committed to regional coordination to reopen their economies during the coronavirus outbreak — but none are in the South, where leaders are going it alone, just as they did in imposing restrictions.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Setting aside their differences for at least an afternoon, President Donald Trump and New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo agreed in an Oval Office meeting to work to double coronavirus testing in the hard-hit state over the next few weeks.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks rallied on Wednesday, and the S&P 500 clawed back a chunk of this week's sharp losses as a bit of oxygen pumped through markets around the world.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Some small businesses that obtained a highly-coveted government loan say they won't be able to use it to bring all their laid-off workers back, even though that is exactly what the program was designed to do.
IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) — Tyson Foods suspended operations Wednesday at an Iowa plant that is critical to the nation's pork supply but had been devastated by a growing coronavirus outbreak.
DETROIT (AP) — Those lightly traveled freeways and streets could be putting a few dollar bills into your wallet.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Congress is sprinting to approve a $483 billion coronavirus aid package, as the White House and lawmakers begin scoping out the next rescue deal for health care providers and an economy battered by the crisis.
Companies with thousands of employees, past penalties from government investigations and risks of financial failure even before the coronavirus walloped the economy were among those receiving millions of dollars from a relief fund that Congress created to help small businesses through the crisis, an Associated Press investigation found.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump announced what he described as a "temporary suspension of immigration into the United States." But an executive order he is expected to sign Wednesday to implement the change would bar only those seeking permanent residency, not temporary workers.
Delta Air Lines, the biggest and most profitable U.S. airline, lost $534 million in the first quarter, a setback that will appear trivial when the full force of the pandemic is revealed in the current quarter.
CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — The Trump administration on Tuesday ordered Chevron Corp. to "wind down" operations in Venezuela by Dec. 1, barring the California-based oil giant in the meantime from drilling or exporting, as the U.S. increases pressure on President Nicolás Maduro to give up power.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — The financial condition of the government's two biggest benefit programs remains shaky, with Medicare expected to become insolvent in just six years, while Social Security will be unable to pay full benefits starting in 2035, the government said Wednesday.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Speaker Nancy Pelosi has called off a Thursday vote on whether to allow House members to cast votes by proxy and is instead forming a bipartisan group to review options for reopening the House during the coronavirus pandemic.
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.
WASHINGTON (AP) — America's entrenched political divide is now playing out over matters of life and death.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Seeking to unite Democrats, Joe Biden has raced to line up supporters ranging from progressive icon Bernie Sanders to former President Barack Obama, whose administration sometimes irked liberals. But the person with the most influence may be Michelle Obama.
TUESDAY, APRIL 21
STATEWIDE
NASHVILLE (AP) — When Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee ordered a halt to non-emergency medical services last month due to the coronavirus, GOP lawmakers peppered his office with the same question: What about abortion?
Tennessee will reopen most of its 56 state parks on Friday for day use only. Specific details on which parks will reopen will be available on tnstateparks.com this week.
NASHVILLE (AP) — Tennessee saw a boost in tax revenues in March ahead of the stark budget realities that await the state due to the coronavirus pandemic.
EDUCATION
KNOXVILLE (AP) — The University of Tennessee's Board of Trustees is planning a special meeting on Friday to discuss the system's response to COVID-19.
REAL ESTATE
BALTIMORE (AP) — U.S. sales of existing homes cratered 8.5% in March with real estate activity stalled by the coronavirus outbreak.
AUTO INDUSTRY
BERLIN (AP) — Volvo and the truck division of Daimler have agreed to set up a joint venture to develop and produce fuel cell systems for heavy vehicles, the Swedish and German companies said Tuesday.
MEDIA
PARIS (AP) — Media watchdog Reporters Without Borders is sounding the alarm that the coronavirus pandemic poses a threat for press freedom around the world.
VIRUS OUTBREAK
A malaria drug widely touted by President Donald Trump for treating the new coronavirus showed no benefit in a large analysis of its use in U.S. veterans hospitals. There were more deaths among those given hydroxychloroquine versus standard care, researchers reported.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Reopening the U.S. economy is complicated by some troubling scientific questions about the new coronavirus that go beyond the logistics of whether enough tests are available.
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. health regulators on Tuesday OK'd the first coronavirus test that allows people to collect their own sample at home, a new approach that could help expand testing options in most states.
HOUSTON (AP) — Secrecy surrounding executions could hinder efforts by a group of medical professionals who are asking the nation's death penalty states for medications used in lethal injections so that they can go to coronavirus patients who are on ventilators, according to a death penalty expert and a doctor who's behind the request.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Americans are increasingly hostile to China as the coronavirus pandemic wreaks havoc on the U.S. and global economies and after three years of Trump administration antagonism toward the country, according to a nationwide poll released on Tuesday.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Testing is critical to controlling the coronavirus and eventually easing restrictions that have halted daily life for most Americans. But there's been confusion about what kinds of tests are available and what they actually measure.
WASHINGTON (AP) — A chorus of governors from both parties pushed back hard after President Donald Trump accused Democrats of playing "a very dangerous political game" by insisting there is a shortage of tests for the coronavirus. The governors countered that the White House must do more to help states do the testing that's needed before they can ease up on stay-at-home orders.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
WASHINGTON (AP) — Congress and President Donald Trump reached agreement Tuesday on a nearly $500 billion coronavirus relief bill that would replenish a small business rescue program and provide new funds for hospitals and a virus testing program.
WASHINGTON (AP) — A $483 billion coronavirus relief bill — the fourth coronavirus response legislation so far — is moving through Congress. The legislation is likely to pass the Senate on Tuesday and has the support of House Democrats and Republicans and President Donald Trump.
NEW YORK (AP) — Oil prices are continuing to collapse, inflicting more damage on stock markets around the world as shutdowns related to the coronavirus pandemic bring economies to a halt.
BERKELEY, Calif. (AP) — Netflix picked up nearly 16 million global subscribers during the first three months of the year, helping cement its status as one of the world's most essential services in times of isolation or crisis.
NEW YORK (AP) — The Small Business Administration reported a potential data breach last month in its website that handles disaster loan applications.
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc. agreed Tuesday to pay a record $25 million fine to resolve criminal charges that it served tainted food that sickened more than 1,100 people in the U.S. from 2015 to 2018, federal prosecutors said.
Small businesses have, like much of the U.S. economy, been walloped by the coronavirus. In response, Congress created the Paycheck Protection Program to infuse small businesses, which typically have less access to quick cash and credit, with hundreds of billions of dollars in emergency loans so they can keep workers employed.
NEW YORK (AP) — As state and federal leaders tussle over when and how fast to "reopen" the U.S. economy amid the coronavirus pandemic, some corporations are taking the first steps toward bringing their employees back to work. Which in many cases is easier said than done.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Damon West was hoping the government's coronavirus rescue package for small business owners would help replace the income he's lost now that he can't travel the country as a keynote speaker.
HALLE, Belgium (AP) — The European Union says its vaunted tourist industry is facing "staggering" figures of decline because of the coronavirus crisis and the bloc's internal market commissioner wants the sector to be first in line when it comes to recovery funds.
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Ten years after an oil rig explosion killed 11 workers and unleashed an environmental nightmare in the Gulf of Mexico, companies are drilling into deeper and deeper waters, where the payoffs can be huge but the risks are greater than ever.
Coca-Cola's global volume tumbled 25% in April as the coronavirus pandemic gripped large swaths of the world population.
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — After enduring extended trade disputes and worker shortages, U.S. hog farmers were poised to finally hit it big this year with expectations of climbing prices amid soaring domestic and foreign demand.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — A bipartisan Senate report released Tuesday affirms the U.S. intelligence community's conclusions that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election in a far-ranging influence campaign approved by Russian President Vladimir Putin and aimed at helping Donald Trump win the White House.
DETROIT (AP) — The United Auto Workers union is endorsing Democrat Joe Biden for President.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said that he will sign an executive order "to temporarily suspend immigration into the United States" because of the coronavirus.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Well-to-do donors gathered last August at the sprawling Charlotte, North Carolina, home of Erskine Bowles, a former chief of staff to President Bill Clinton, where they nibbled finger food, sipped wine and listened to Joe Biden.
MONDAY, APRIL 20
STATEWIDE
NASHVILLE (AP) — Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee announced Monday that businesses across the majority of the state will begin reopening as early as next week.
NASHVILLE (AP) — Tennessee has launched a third round of mass testing inside the state's prisons after 150 inmates tested positive for COVID-19 over the weekend.
NASHVILLE (AP) — Applicants for the Tennessee bar exam will have an additional opportunity to take the test this year.
NASHVILLE (AP) — Tennessee is offering free child care to essential workers during the coronavirus pandemic.
MEDIA
CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Global digital platforms Google and Facebook will be forced to pay for news content in Australia, the government said Monday, as the coronavirus pandemic causes a collapse in advertising revenue.
VIRUS OUTBREAK
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump accused Democrats on Monday of playing "a very dangerous political game" by insisting there is a shortage of tests for the coronavirus. But Democratic Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly, expressing the frustration of many state leaders, said the federal response has simply not been "good enough."
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — JBS USA said it is temporarily shutting down its big pork processing plant in southwestern Minnesota because of an outbreak of COVID-19 among workers, the latest closure of a major U.S. food processing plant due to the pandemic.
NEW YORK (AP) — As residents at a nursing home in Kirkland, Washington, began dying in late February from a coronavirus outbreak that would eventually take 43 lives, there was little sign of trouble at the Cobble Hill Health Center, a 360-bed facility in an upscale section of Brooklyn.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is falsely assigning blame to governors and the Obama administration for shortages in coronavirus testing.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
NEW YORK (AP) — Oil futures plunged below zero on Monday, the latest never-before-seen number to come out of the economic coma caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration and Congress indicated Monday they were working toward agreement on a coronavirus aid package the Senate could take up as soon as Tuesday, with more than $450 billion to boost a small-business loan program that's out of money, help for hospitals and virus testing.
Some big restaurant chains have obtained loans under a small-business relief program, leading business groups to cry foul even though the loans are within the guidelines of the lending program.
The burger chain Shake Shack says it has obtained new funding and will return a small-business loan it got to help weather the coronavirus crisis.
LOS ANGELES (AP) — The unofficial holiday celebrating all things cannabis arrives Monday as the nation's emerging legal marijuana market braces for an economic blow from the coronavirus crisis, with many consumers reducing spending or going underground for deals.
TOKYO (AP) — Japan's exports sank 11.7% in March as the coronavirus pandemic slammed auto shipments to the U.S. and China, generally its two biggest markets.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
ATLANTA (AP) — Scrambling to address voting concerns during a pandemic, election officials across the country are eliminating polling places or scaling back opportunities for people to cast ballots in person — a move raising concerns among voting rights groups and some Democrats who say some voters could be disenfranchised.
FRIDAY, APRIL 17
COURTS
NASHVILLE (AP) — A Tennessee church is challenging a local ban on drive-in church services, joining a growing list of lawsuits seeking to push back against limitations on religious gatherings that have been enacted to help prevent the spread of coronavirus.
NASHVILLE (AP) — A federal judge says he will rule before Monday on an emergency motion to allow abortions to continue in Tennessee in spite of a temporary ban on nonessential medical procedures to slow the spread of COVID-19.
STATE GOVERNMENT
NASHVILLE (AP) — Gov. Bill Lee named a new head of Tennessee's finance agency this week after the previous commissioner stepped aside to spearhead efforts to combat the coronavirus outbreak in the state.
ENVIRONMENT
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.
VIRUS OUTBREAK
WASHINGTON (AP) — The United States is struggling to test enough people to track and control the spread of the novel coronavirus, a crucial first step to reopening parts of the economy, which President Donald Trump is pushing to do by May 1.
WASHINGTON (AP) — China is pushing back against President Donald Trump and some of his officials, who've flirted in recent days with an outlier theory that the coronavirus was set loose by a Chinese lab that let it escape.
BRUSSELS (AP) — As European countries develop coronavirus tracing apps, the European Union is urging its 27 member states them to make them voluntary and ensure that the many national systems can work together.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump and some of his officials are flirting with an outlier theory that the new coronavirus was set loose on the world by a Chinese lab that let it escape. Without the weight of evidence, they're trying to blame China for sickness and death from COVID-19 in the United States.
AUTO INDUSTRY
MILAN (AP) — European car sales tanked last month amid strict lockdown measures to contain the coronavirus that shut down dealerships for at least half of March and dried up consumer spending.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
NEW YORK (AP) — In Wall Street's tug of war between hope and pessimism about the coronavirus pandemic, hope is pulling 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.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Republicans signaled Friday they are willing to accept Democratic demands for additional federal funding for hospitals as part of an effort to break a stalemate over the Trump administration's $250 billion emergency request for a small-business paycheck subsidy program that's out of money.
The days of standing shoulder-to-shoulder at a bar or sharing a meal at a table for 10 are gone for now — and could take a long time to return even after the coronavirus pandemic ends.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The 189-nation International Monetary Fund and its sister lending agency, the World Bank, on Friday pledged to step up their efforts to cushion the blow to the global economy from the coronavirus pandemic.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Congress unleashed about $2 trillion to deal with the coronavirus crisis. So far, only two people are working to oversee how it is spent.
Millions of Americans received government relief checks this week, and more are on the way. For some, the payment gets them to a more comfortable place financially; for others, the money just gets them to next month.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump has given governors a road map for recovering from the economic pain of the coronavirus pandemic, laying out "a phased and deliberate approach" to restoring normal activity in places that have strong testing and are seeing a decrease in COVID-19 cases.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration has issued new guidelines for states, individuals and employers on how to gradually revive activity and ease up on social distancing in areas where coronavirus cases are on the decline.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz is paying a former legal client and donor $5,000 a month to rent space for his district office, a possible violation of U.S. House rules that dictate that lawmakers should not lease from people with whom they have had a professional or legal relationship.
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.
WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge on Thursday denied a request for a new trial made by Trump ally Roger Stone following his conviction on charges related to the Russia investigation.
THURSDAY, APRIL 16
MUSIC INDUSTRY
MEMPHIS (AP) — Knox Phillips, the son of renowned music producer Sam Phillips and an enthusiastic ambassador of Memphis music who worked on records by Jerry Lee Lewis, Willie Nelson and John Prine during more than 50 years in the industry, has died. He was 74.
MIDSTATE
FRANKLIN (AP) — Brooklyn Dotson needed food. Her first unemployment check had yet to arrive after she was let go by the warehouse where she used to work.
STATEWIDE
Nashville and Davidson County Mayor John Cooper, Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland, Knoxville Mayor Indya Kincannon and Chattanooga Mayor Andy Berke today announced the formation of the Tennessee Major Metros Economic Restart Task Force to plan and coordinate the restoration of business activity currently suspended due to COVID-19.
NASHVILLE (AP) — Republican Bill Hagerty injected $2.5 million of his personal wealth into Tennessee's open race for U.S. Senate last quarter, while his main GOP rival, Manny Sethi, added $400,000 of his own, bringing his personal stake in the contest to more than $1.9 million.
MEMPHIS (AP) — The Tennessee Democratic Party has rejected an appeal by a longtime state representative to remain on the primary ballot.
COURTS
NASHVILLE (AP) — The Tennessee Attorney General's Office on Wednesday defended an order that restricts abortions to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
ENVIRONMENT
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration is gutting an Obama-era rule that compelled coal plants to cut back emissions of mercury and other human health hazards, limiting future regulation of air pollutants by petroleum and coal plants.
BERLIN (AP) — Energy company Royal Dutch Shell told investors Thursday that it aims to stop adding greenhouse gases to the atmosphere by 2050, a move that was welcomed by some climate campaigners even as others called it "corporate greenwash."
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — American Indian tribes and environmental groups are pressuring a federal judge to shut down work on the disputed Keystone XL pipeline from Canada to Nebraska less than two weeks after it started, because of fears over workers spreading the coronavirus and worries about a future spill.
VIRUS OUTBREAK
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump faced international resistance Thursday to his plan to cut U.S. payments to the World Health Organization over its handling of the coronavirus pandemic.
Nurse Mike Gulick was meticulous about not bringing the coronavirus home to his wife and their 2-year-old daughter. He'd stop at a hotel after work just to take a shower. He'd wash his clothes in Lysol disinfectant. They did a tremendous amount of handwashing.
NEW YORK (AP) — Have you liked or commented on a Facebook post about the COVID-19 pandemic?
WASHINGTON (AP) — In late February when President Donald Trump was urging Americans not to panic over the novel coronavirus, alarms were sounding at a little-known intelligence unit situated on a U.S. Army base an hour's drive north of Washington.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
NEW YORK (AP) — Stock indexes ended a wobbly day with modest gains Thursday, while the biggest increases went to Amazon, Netflix and other companies poised to do the best during the coronavirus crunch.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump prepared to unveil national guidelines Thursday on when and how the country starts to recover from the sharp economic pain of the coronavirus pandemic as a bipartisan panel of lawmakers urged him to heed the advice of public health experts.
WASHINGTON (AP) — First, it was bars, restaurants, hotels. And clothing stores, movie theaters, entertainment venues. And countless small businesses, from bookstores to barber shops.
WASHINGTON (AP) — With a key coronavirus rescue fund exhausted, lawmakers faced new pressure Thursday to break a stalemate over President Donald Trump's $250 billion emergency request to replenish the program that helps small businesses keep workers on their payroll.
WASHINGTON (AP) — With a key coronavirus rescue fund exhausted, negotiations are accelerating in Washington over President Donald Trump's $250 billion emergency request to help smaller employers across the country keep workers on their payroll.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The wave of layoffs that has engulfed the U.S. economy since the coronavirus struck forced 5.2 million more people to seek unemployment benefits last week, the government reported Thursday.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The ranks of America's unemployed swelled toward Great Depression-era levels Thursday in an unprecedented collapse that intensified the push-pull from the White House on down over how and when to lift the coronovirus restrictions that have crippled the economy.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said he's prepared to announce new guidelines allowing some states to quickly ease up on social distancing even as business leaders told him they need more coronavirus testing and personal protective equipment before people can safely go back to work.
NITRO, W.Va. (AP) — The sweet peppers were picked over, the tomatoes were taken and the flowers were fixing to be next. The empty spots on the store's display were starting to outnumber the full ones.
LONDON (AP) — The British government says a nationwide lockdown imposed to slow the spread of the new coronavirus will remain in place for at least three more weeks.
The outbreak of the coronavirus has dealt a shock to the global economy with unprecedented speed. Following are developments Thursday related to the global economy, the work place and the spread of the virus.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — With Congress essentially closed, House Democrats are proposing a temporary rules change during the coronavirus crisis that would allow lawmakers to vote remotely via another lawmaker physically present at the U.S. Capitol.