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Source: Army booted Texas mall gunman over mental health

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 16:02:45 GMT

DALLAS (AP) — The man accused of killing eight people and wounding several others in a mass shooting at a suburban Dallas shopping mall over the weekend apparently had been working as a security guard and was discharged from the U.S. Army in 2008 because of mental health issues, according to neighbors and an Army official.Mauricio Garcia, 33, was killed by police, ending the attack Saturday at the outlet mall in Allen.Garcia joined the Army in 2008 but was terminated three months later without completing his initial training, said Army spokeswoman Heather J. Hagan, who said the Army doesn’t “provide characterization” for any soldier’s discharge.According to an Army official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss personnel issues, though, Garcia was kicked out of the Army due to mental health issues. Federal officials are looking into whether Garcia expressed an interest in white supremacist ideology, a law enforcement official told The Associated Press. The o...

See more about the 2023 Pulitzer winners in journalism, arts

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 16:02:45 GMT

The Pulitzer Prizes recognizing the best of journalism and the arts in 2022 were announced Monday. The Associated Press will update the list of winners with more information — including any specific citations for journalists — and reaction as we learn more.___PUBLIC SERVICE AWARD: Mstyslav Chernov, Lori Hinnant, Evgeniy Maloletka, Vasilisa Stepanenko, The Associated PressYou can find a list of stories the team produced on our “Erasing Mariupol” page. BREAKING NEWS REPORTING: The Los Angeles TimesThe staff of the Los Angeles Times published a secretly recorded conversation among city officials that included racist comments and followed up with in-depth coverage of the aftermath.INVESTIGATIVE REPORTING: The Wall Street Journal The Wall Street Journal’s “Capital Assets” series analyzed the investments of about 12,000 federal officials and their families between 2016 and 2021. The Journal collected and analyzed data on about 850,000 financial assets and more than 315,000 transactions. T...

‘Persona non grata:’ Canada expelling Chinese diplomat after threats to Tory MP

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 16:02:45 GMT

OTTAWA — The Liberal government is expelling Chinese diplomat Zhao Wei, whom Canada’s spy agency alleged was involved in a plot to intimidate Conservative MP Michael Chong and his relatives in Hong Kong.Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly says in a statement that Canada has declared the Toronto-based diplomat as persona non grata, over what she calls “foreign interference in our internal affairs.”Joly, who warned last week that Beijing would retaliate if Ottawa did expel diplomats, says the decision followed “careful consideration of all factors at play.”She says that “defending our democracy is of the utmost importance,” after saying China could threaten the safety of Canadians and the prosperity of the country.The federal government has confirmed a report in the Globe and Mail that CSIS had information in 2021 that the Chinese government was looking at ways to intimidate Chong and his relatives in Hong Kong over his criticism of Beijing&...

Teachers earn $67K on average. Is push for raises too late?

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 16:02:45 GMT

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — As schools across the country struggle to find teachers to hire, more governors are pushing for pay increases, bonuses and other perks for the beleaguered profession — with some vowing to beat out other states competing for educators.Already in 2023, governors in Georgia and Arkansas have pushed through teacher pay increases. Ahead of Monday’s start of national Teacher Appreciation Week, others — both Republican and Democratic — have proposed doing the same to attract and retain educators.More than half of the states’ governors over the past year — 26 so far — have proposed boosting teacher compensation, according to groups that track it. The nonprofit Teacher Salary Project said it is the most it has seen in nearly two decades of tracking.“Today we have governors left and right from every political party and then some who are addressing this issue because they have to,” said founder and CEO Ninivé Caligari. “We’ve never seen what we are seeing right now. Neve...

Veteran ‘enamored’ with Hitler gets 4 years for Capitol riot

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 16:02:45 GMT

A military veteran who told an undercover FBI agent about his admiration for Adolf Hitler and discussed a plan to “wipe out” the nation’s Jewish population was sentenced on Monday to four years in prison for storming the U.S. Capitol.U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden ordered Virginia resident Hatchet Speed to serve the four-year sentence after he completes a separate three-year prison term for a conviction on firearms offenses, court records show.The FBI recorded Speed’s conversations with the undercover agent more than a year after the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the Capitol. The agent posed as “a like-minded individual” while meeting with Speed at least three times in 2022. Speed, 41, was “deeply worried” about Democrat Joe Biden’s presidency and believed false claims that the 2020 presidential election had been stolen from Donald Trump, the Republican incumbent, prosecutors wrote in a court filing. He told the undercover agent that he believes Jewish people control ...

TB screening planned for Nunavut hamlet battling outbreak since 2021

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 16:02:45 GMT

PANGNIRTUNG, Nunavut — The Nunavut government and Nunavut Tunngavik Incorporated, a group representing Inuit in the territory, are holding a community-wide screening clinic for tuberculosis in Pangnirtung later this year. The screening is to begin in September and continue through November. A tuberculosis outbreak was declared in the hamlet in November 2021.As of late February, 39 people in the community had been diagnosed with active TB and 167 with latent TB.The last community-wide screening in the territory took place in Whale Cove in 2018.The federal government and Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, a national advocacy group, have pledged to reduce active tuberculosis across Inuit communities by half by 2025 and eliminate it entirely by 2030. This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 8, 2023. The Canadian Press

Maybe investors shouldn’t worry about Buffett’s successor

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 16:02:45 GMT

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Many investors worry about the future of Berkshire Hathaway after its legendary CEO Warren Buffett is gone, but most of the conglomerate’s companies have already made the transition to reporting to the man who will eventually replace the 92-year-old.Buffett himself and executives at Berkshire Hathaway companies like See’s Candy and Dairy Queen say they don’t have any qualms about Vice Chairman Greg Abel’s ability to lead the conglomerate. Abel already oversees all of Berkshire’s noninsurance businesses. So the main parts of the CEO job he’s not already doing are overseeing the insurance side of the company and deciding how to invest Berkshire’s nearly $131 billion in cash.Buffett reassured investors at Saturday’s annual meeting that he believes Abel is the right man for the job and that he does know how to allocate capital following the same model Buffett uses even if he’s not making those spending decisions no...

Texas lawmaker resigns ahead of misconduct expulsion vote

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 16:02:45 GMT

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — A Republican Texas state lawmaker resigned Monday ahead of an expected vote to expel him after an investigation found he had inappropriate sexual conduct with a 19-year-old intern. Rep. Bryan Slaton, 45, had faced mounting calls from the state Republican party and conservative groups to resign after the House investigation determined last week that he gave the intern and another young staffer alcohol at his home, had sex with the intern after she was intoxicated, and later showed her a threatening email but said everything would be fine if the incident was kept quiet. Slaton also asked a fellow lawmaker to keep his behavior secret, the House General Investigating Committee report noted. The chairman of the investigating panel, Rep. Andrew Murr, said he still plans to call for a vote to expel Slaton because he remains an officer of the state until a successor is elected and sworn in.Slaton’s resignation letter did not address the allegations, which his atto...

Barbara Kingsolver, Hernan Diaz share fiction Pulitzer Prize

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 16:02:45 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — The Pulitzer Prize for fiction was awarded Monday to two class-conscious novels: “Demon Copperhead,” Barbara Kingsolver’s modern recasting of the Dickens classic “David Copperfield,” and Hernan Diaz’s “Trust,” an innovative narrative of wealth and deceit set in 1920s New York. Beverly Gage’s “G-Man,” her widely acclaimed book on longtime FBI leader J. Edgar Hoover, was given the Pulitzer for biography. “ His Name Is George Floyd: One Man’s Life and the Struggle for Racial Justice,” by Robert Samuels and Toluse Olorunnipa, won for general nonfiction. Sanaz Toossi’s play “English” won for drama and Jefferson Cowie’s “Freedom’s Dominion: A Saga of White Resistance to Federal Power” was honored for history. The Pulitzer board hailed “English” as “a quietly powerful play about four Iranian adults preparing for an English language exam in a storefront school near Tehran, where family separations and travel restrictions drive them to learn a ne...

AP and Alabama’s AL.com win 2 Pulitzer Prizes each

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 16:02:45 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — The Associated Press won two Pulitzer Prizes for journalism Monday, in public service and breaking news photography, for coverage of the Ukraine War that included startling images of Russia’s siege of Mariupol.The New York Times was also honored with an international reporting award for its coverage of Russian killings in the Ukranian town of Bucha. Additional Pulitzers were given for work surrounding the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision overturning the Roe v. Wade abortion standard, the government’s policy of child separation at the border, and welfare spending in Mississippi.AL.com, of Birmingham, Alabama, won two Pulitzers, in local reporting and commentary. The Los Angeles Times, The New York Times and the Washington Post also won two awards each.For its public service award, the Pulitzers cited the work of AP’s videojournalist Mstyslav Chernov, photographer Evgeniy Maloletka, video producer Vasilisa Stepanenko and reporter Lori Hinnant. For nearly three weeks, AP h...