North America

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Social media companies are offering few specifics as they share their plans for safeguarding the U.S. midterm elections.

Platforms like Facebook and Twitter are generally staying the course from the 2020 voting season, which was marred by conspiracies and culminated in the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.

JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — Alaska Republican U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski advanced from her primary along with Kelly Tshibaka, her GOP rival endorsed by former President Donald Trump, while another Trump-backed candidate, Republican Sarah Palin, was among the candidates bound for the November general election in the race for Alaska’s only House seat.

ATLANTA (AP) — Rudy Giuliani arrived at an Atlanta courthouse Wednesday under a judge’s order to appear before a special grand jury that is investigating attempts by former President Donald Trump and others to overturn his 2020 election defeat in Georgia.

News cameras swarmed Giuliani as he stepped out of a limousine Wednesday morning with his attorney, Bob Costello, and walked up the steps into the Fulton County courthouse. Giuliani told reporters that he wouldn’t talk about his testimony.

CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) — Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney, Donald Trump’s fiercest Republican adversary in Congress, soundly lost a GOP primary, falling to a rival backed by the former president in a rout that reinforced his grip on the party’s base.

UNITED NATIONS, Aug 16 (Reuters) - U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres will meet Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan in Ukraine on Thursday, a U.N. spokesman said, and on Friday visit the Black Sea port of Odesa, where grain exports have resumed under a U.N.-brokered deal.

U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said on Tuesday that Guterres would meet Zelenskiy in Lviv in western Ukraine and discuss the situation at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, along with finding a political solution to the conflict with Russia.

WASHINGTON, Aug 16 (Reuters) - The United States military on Tuesday said it carried out a test of a Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missile that had been delayed to avoid escalating tensions with Beijing during China's show of force near Taiwan earlier this month.

China deployed scores of planes and fired live missiles in the Taiwan Strait after U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi made a trip to the self-ruled island. China considers Taiwan part of its territory and has never renounced using force to bring it under its control.

KIAWAH ISLAND, S.C. (AP) — President Joe Biden will sign Democrats’ landmark climate change and health care bill on Tuesday, delivering what he has called the “final piece” of his pared-down domestic agenda, as he aims to boost his party’s standing with voters less than three months before the midterm elections.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Top congressional Democrats are demanding that the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general hand over information on deleted Secret Service text messages related to the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol, accusing him of using delay tactics to stonewall their investigation.

In a letter released Tuesday, the leaders of the House Oversight and Homeland Security committees signaled they are willing to subpoena Inspector General Joseph Cuffari if he does not comply with their requests.

(AP) --- A former Virginia police officer who testified against a friend and former supervisor he joined at the Capitol in the Jan. 6 insurrection avoided prison time on Tuesday for his role in it.

Former Rocky Mount Police Officer Jacob Fracker pleaded guilty to conspiring with his fellow officer to obstruct Congress from certifying Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory over then-President Donald Trump and was sentenced to one year of probation, with 59 days in home confinement.

KIAWAH ISLAND, S.C. (AP) — First lady Jill Biden tested positive for COVID-19 and was experiencing “mild symptoms,” the White House announced Tuesday. President Joe Biden continues to test negative after recently recovering from the virus but will wear a mask indoors for 10 days as a precaution.