Associated Press stories, Page 2129
Oklahoma State’s Mike Gundy apologizes for covid-19 comments
STILLWATER, Okla. — Oklahoma State football coach Mike Gundy apologized Saturday for comments this week about the COVID-19 pandemic. “I have been made aware that comments from my press conference have offended some,” Gundy said in a statement. “It was never my intention to offend anyone and I apologize. My...
U.S. death toll overtakes Italy’s as Midwest braces
CHICAGO — The U.S. death toll from the coronavirus eclipsed Italy’s for the highest in the world Saturday, surpassing 20,000, as Chicago and other cities across the Midwest braced for a potential surge in victims and moved to snuff out smoldering hot spots of contagion before they erupt. With the...
Pope: Easter gives hope in our ‘darkest hour,’ despite fear
VATICAN CITY — Easter offers a message of hope in people’s “darkest hour,” Pope Francis said, as he celebrated a late-night vigil Mass on Saturday in St. Peter’s Basilica, with the public barred because of the covid-19 pandemic. The pontiff in his homily likened the fears of current times to...
Broncos star Von Miller polishing deejay and pass rush skills
Von Miller longs to make a name for himself scratching vinyl just like he has sacking quarterbacks. DJ Sauce Von the Don is the Denver Broncos star linebacker’s alter ego, one whose fledgling club concert career has been thwarted by the coronavirus outbreak. Miller said he spends part of each...
Chicago mayor takes hard line fighting coronavirus outbreak
CHICAGO — As large American cities try various strategies to keep people home to limit the coronavirus’s spread, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot has balanced a blend of stern — and occasionally scolding — news conferences with lighthearted social media to drive home her point. Lightfoot’s hard-line approach began with an...
New coach Ron Rivera aims to start changing culture around RedskinsVideo
WASHINGTON — Ron Rivera made plenty of mistakes as a first-time NFL head coach that he hopes not to repeat this time around. Rivera also did enough good things early on with Carolina in 2011 that he’s trying to duplicate now with Washington. The new Redskins coach took some big...
Judge releases Michael Avenatti from jail over virus threat
LOS ANGELES — A judge has allowed Michael Avenatti to be temporarily freed from a federal jail in New York City and to ride out the coronavirus scare at a friend’s house in Los Angeles. The attorney, who rose to fame representing porn star Stormy Daniels in lawsuits against President...
Are schools open? Governor, NYC mayor give different answers
NEW YORK — Governor and mayor locked horns again Saturday, this time over whether school buildings in the nation’s largest district would close for the rest of the year, with classes continuing online. New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said in a news briefing that public school sites in...
Kansas’ high court weighs virus limits on religious services
BELLE PLAINE, Kan. — An attorney for Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly told the state Supreme Court on Saturday that a Republican-dominated legislative panel exceeded its authority when it overturned the Democratic governor’s executive order banning religious and funeral services of more than 10 people during the coronavirus pandemic. Lawmakers countered...
‘Undrafted but undaunted’: Oilers’ Colby Cave dies at 25Video
Colby Cave, an excellent teammate whose lone goal for the Edmonton Oilers this season came on an “awesome” rush down the ice, died Saturday after a brain bleed this week. He was 25. The NHL club did not say what caused the bleed. Cave’s agent, Jason Davidson, has said the...
6 hospitalized after shooting breaks out at California party
BAKERSFIELD, Calif. — A shooting broke out at a party in central California, sending six people to the hospital on Saturday and launching a search for four suspects, authorities said. The party, happening amid statewide stay-at-home orders intended to slow the spread of the coronavirus, might have gone unnoticed until...
Covid-19 and AIDS crisis: NYC gays see parallels, contrasts
NEW YORK — LGBT New Yorkers who lived through the AIDS crisis of the 1980s see some bleak parallels in the COVID-19 pandemic now wracking their city. But more so, they stress the differences. Now, they share the same plight as their fellow citizens while the federal government is pledging...
New York area walloped as global virus deaths pass 100,000
NEW YORK — The worldwide death toll from the coronavirus surged past 100,000 Friday as the epidemic in the U.S. cut a widening swath through not just New York City but the entire three-state metropolitan area of 20 million people connected by a tangle of subways, trains and buses. In...
Crime drops around the world as covid-19 keeps people inside
CHICAGO — The coronavirus pandemic that has crippled big-box retailers and mom and pop shops worldwide may be making a dent in illicit business, too. In Chicago, one of America’s most violent cities, drug arrests have plummeted 42% in the weeks since the city shut down, compared with the same...
Libertarians debate: How to respond to coronavirus pandemic?
NEW YORK — Steve Baker, one of the British parliament’s leading libertarians, was nearly in tears as he addressed the House of Commons in support of a bill that once seemed unthinkable: a massive economic aid package in response to the coronavirus pandemic. “Libertarian though I may be, this is...
Coronavirus ravages storied New Orleans Mardi Gras group
NEW ORLEANS — On Fat Tuesday, 51-year-old Cornell Charles was taking part in a storied New Orleans Mardi Gras tradition central to the city’s African American community — driving a car in the Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club’s parade. A month later his wife of three decades was watching...
Masters heartaches walk the fairways with green jacketsVideo
For every fist pump from Tiger Woods, there are images of Greg Norman’s lonely walk across Hogan Bridge as he loses the last of his six-shot lead and heads for more heartache at the Masters. Jack Nicklaus had his famous charge on the back nine. Ed Sneed infamously lost a...
‘Hope’ the calf arrives in New Orleans amid pandemic
NEW ORLEANS — The Audubon Nature Institute in New Orleans welcomed a new resident, a baby giraffe named Hope. Sue Ellen, a middle-aged giraffe at the Freeport-McMoRan Audubon Species Survival Center, gave birth Monday, according to a Friday news release. Audubon Nature Institute President and CEO Ron Forman said Hope...
Advocates furious after outbreak at San Francisco shelter
SAN FRANCISCO — In the biggest outbreak at a homeless shelter in California to date, San Francisco’s mayor announced Friday that 70 people have tested positive for the coronavirus, infuriating advocates who had sought more aggressive action to protect homeless people. Mayor London Breed said that the outbreak involving 68...
Court lifts part of order blocking Texas abortion ban
AUSTIN, Texas — A federal appeals court on Friday partially rescinded a lower-court order that had largely blocked the enforcement of an abortion ban in Texas during the coronavirus pandemic. By a 2-1 vote, the three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld enforcement of an executive...
Airlines and Trump administration haggle over payroll grants
The Trump administration is proposing that a significant amount of the $25 billion in cash that airlines expected to keep workers on the job will instead be low-interest loans that big airlines will have to repay, according to two people familiar with the matter. The Treasury Department began sending proposals...
Browns new GM Andrew Berry prepared for unique, ‘virtual’ draftVideo
CLEVELAND — With degrees from Harvard in economics and computer science, Browns general manager Andrew Berry would seem perfectly suited to handle any pitfalls or problems he might encounter in his first NFL Draft — a draft like no other. He’s a one-man IT department. Cleveland’s new general manager said...
‘The Last Dance’ director talks project on Michael Jordan’s BullsVideo
Jason Hehir was a kid in the stands in Boston Garden on April 20, 1986, the day Michael Jordan scored a playoff-record 63 points. It was a Christmas gift from his father, who stuck a note promising “Two tickets to the Air Jordan Show” in his stocking that holiday season....
MLB players, including Pirates’ Cole Tucker, to play video game tourneyVideo
NEW YORK — Blake Snell, Juan Soto and Bo Bichette are among the baseball stars switching over to PlayStation with America’s pastime on hold. Thirty big leaguers — one from each team — have signed on to play a round-robin regular season on the “MLB The Show” video game with...
Dallas Cowboys sign cornerback Saivion Smith, former XFL player
FRISCO, Texas — The Dallas Cowboys signed cornerback Saivion Smith on Friday, adding the former XFL player about the same time the spring league announced it was suspending operations. Smith played for Houston, which was the only undefeated team in the XFL when the league stopped playing last month after...
