USA

UPPER DARBY, Pa. (AP) — Federal investigators pored over the wreckage of a medical helicopter a day after it crash-landed without loss of life next to a church in a residential area of suburban Philadelphia, somehow avoiding a web of power lines and buildings.

Brian Rayner, senior safety investigator with the National Transportation Safety Board, told reporters Wednesday investigators hoped to be able to remove the wreckage from the scene at Drexel Hill United Methodist Church in Upper Darby later in the day for more detailed examination off-site.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden is set to meet with Senate Democrats at the Capitol on Thursday, a visit intended to deliver a jolt to the party’s long-stalled push for voting and elections legislation.

Biden is expected to discus potential changes to Senate rules that will be needed to overcome repeated Republican filibusters that have blocked the measures, according to a senior Democratic aide who was familiar with the private meeting and granted anonymity to discuss the visit.

(AP) --- When Chicago teachers went on strike last week to protest COVID-19 safety protections in the nation’s third-largest school district, Democratic Party officials leapt into action.

Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker pushed for a quick end to the job action and helped secure rapid tests to entice teachers back to work. Mayor Lori Lightfoot said the strikers “abandoned their posts” in “an illegal walkout.” White House press secretary Jen Psaki stressed that students should be in school. The standoff ended with a tentative agreement late Monday.

NEW YORK (AP) — A judge has — for now — refused to dismiss a lawsuit against Britain’s Prince Andrew by an American woman who says he sexually abused her when she was 17.

Stressing Wednesday that he wasn’t ruling on the truth of the allegations, U.S. District Judge Lewis A. Kaplan rejected an argument by Andrew’s lawyers that Virginia Giuffre’s lawsuit should be thrown out at an early stage because of an old legal settlement she had reached with Jeffrey Epstein, the financier she claims set up sexual encounters with the prince.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Inflation jumped at its fastest pace in nearly 40 years last month, a 7 percent spike from a year earlier that is pushing up household expenses, eating into wage gains and heaping pressure on President Joe Biden and the Federal Reserve to address a growing threat to the U.S. economy.

Prices have risen sharply for cars, gas, food and furniture during a rapid recovery from the pandemic recession. Americans have ramped up spending amid shortages of workers and raw materials that have squeezed supply chains.

11 Jan 2022; MEMO: A group of US lawmakers from both the Senate and the House of Representatives have launched the Abraham Accords Congressional Caucus to encourage more Arab countries to normalise relations with Israel. The caucus will be co-chaired by Senators James Lankford, Jacky Rosen, Joni Ernst and Cory Booker, as well as Representatives Cathy McMorris Rogers, Brad Schneider, Anne Wagner and David Trone.

11 Jan 2022; MEMO: Afghans in the US have demanded that the Biden administration lift restrictions on the Afghan banking sector and release financial assets belonging to the Afghan people, Anadolu News Agency reports.

The humanitarian situation is worsening in Afghanistan after the US withdrew troops from the conflict-hit country and the Taliban took control of the government by seizing Kabul on 15 August.

11 Jan 2022; MEMO: The first high-level detainee at the controversial US military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, has been cleared for transfer with security guarantees, according to a recently published report and also reported by Anadolu News Agency.

WASHINGTON, Jan 10 (Reuters) - U.S. President Joe Biden on Tuesday will begin an effort to weaken rules that allow a minority group of senators to kill proposed laws, arguing democracy is in peril unless new voting-rights legislation passes, the White House said. Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris on Tuesday will speak in Atlanta, a city with a majority Black population and capital of the battleground state of Georgia, where Democrats won two crucial U.S. Senate seats in January 2021.

WASHINGTON, Jan 10 (Reuters) - The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and U.S. State Department on Monday advised against travel to neighboring Canada because of a rising number of COVID-19 cases as the Omicron variant spreads.

The CDC elevated its travel recommendation to "Level Four: Very High" for Canada, telling Americans they should avoid travel, while the State Department also on Monday issued its "Level Four: Do Not Travel" advisory for Canada citing COVID-19 cases.