AP News in Brief at 12:02 a.m. EDT
Biden vows to evacuate all Americans - and Afghan helpers
WASHINGTON (AP) - President Joe Biden has pledged firmly to bring all Americans home from Afghanistan - and all Afghans who aided the war effort, too - as officials confirmed that U.S. military helicopters flew beyond the Kabul airport to scoop up 169 Americans seeking to evacuate.
Biden´s promises came Friday as thousands more Americans and others seeking to escape the Taliban struggled to get past crushing crowds, Taliban airport checkpoints and sometimes-insurmountable U.S. bureaucracy.
"We will get you home," Biden promised Americans who were still in Afghanistan days after the Taliban retook control of Kabul, ending a two-decade war.
The president's comments, delivered at the White House, were intended to project purpose and stability at the conclusion of a week during which images from Afghanistan more often suggested chaos, especially at the airport.
His commitment to find a way out for Afghan allies vulnerable to Taliban attacks amounted to a potentially vast expansion of Washington´s promises, given the tens of thousands of translators and other helpers, and their close family members, seeking evacuation.
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New England preps for 1st hurricane in 30 years with Henri
PLYMOUTH, Mass. (AP) - New Englanders bracing for their first hurricane in 30 years began hauling boats out of the water and taking other precautions Friday as Tropical Storm Henri barreled toward the Northeast coast.
Henri was expected to intensify into a hurricane by Saturday, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said. Impacts could be felt in New England states by Sunday, including on Cape Cod, which is teeming with tens of thousands of summer tourists.
Henri's track was imprecise, but as of 5 p.m. EDT Friday, the National Weather Service suggested it might make landfall first in eastern Long Island before careening further north. The White House said President Joe Biden was briefed on the storm´s track.
Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker on Friday urged people vacationing on the Cape to leave well before Henri hits, and those who planned to start vacations there to delay their plans. "We don't want people to be stuck in traffic on the Cape Cod bridges when the storm is in full force on Sunday," he said.
Baker said up to 1,000 National Guard troops were on standby to help with evacuations if needed.
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Texas GOP voting bill on fast track after standstill ends
AUSTIN, Texas (AP) - The sudden end of Texas Democrats' 38-day walkout has put Republicans back on a fast track to pass a sweeping voting bill and is causing rifts among some Democrats who said Friday they felt "betrayed" by colleagues who returned to the state Capitol.
Texas is the last big GOP-controlled state that has not passed more restrictive voting laws driven by former President Donald Trump's false claims that the 2020 election was stolen. But it is now likely only a matter of weeks after enough Democratic lawmakers ended their holdout Thursday to restore a quorum - by the slimmest of margins - in the state House of Representatives.
It broke a stalemate that brought the Texas Capitol to a standstill, and already Republicans are working fast to advance a sweeping bill to the House floor as early as Monday. The collapse of Democrats' holdout frustrated a faction that appeared ready to torpedo the bill for a third time in Texas, even though a commanding GOP majority in the Texas statehouse made it unlikely that Democrats could permanently stop the bill from passing.
Nearly three dozen Democrats - which amounts to more than half the group that fled to Washington, D.C., in July - signed onto a statement that did not say whether they would now return but took aim at the few who already did.
"We are disappointed that a few Democrats chose to return to the floor. We feel betrayed and heartbroken, but our resolve is strong and this fight is not over," the statement read.
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Biden's view of job comes into focus after Afghan collapse
WASHINGTON (AP) - President Joe Biden made up his mind about Afghanistan months - really years - ago.
For more than a decade, Biden advocated for an end to American involvement in Afghanistan. But he did so as something of an outsider, a senator whose ultimate power came in the form of a single vote on Capitol Hill or a vice president who advised another president.
But authority over America's longest war finally fell into Biden's hands this year and he insisted that the U.S. withdraw from Afghanistan, settling on an August 31 deadline. And despite the rapid collapse of the Afghan government, spurring a humanitarian crisis and searing criticism at home and from traditional allies, he was resolute, at times defiant. He took responsibility and in turns leveled blame at his predecessor.
After months of largely focusing on quelling the pandemic and stimulating the economy, the chaos in Afghanistan triggered the first foreign policy crisis of Biden's presidency, temporarily drowning out his other priorities. His response offers a fuller picture of how Biden approaches his job, relying on a political sensibility he built as a veteran of the Senate who has weathered decades of Washington tumult and scandal.
How Biden is handling the weight of his decision to end the war is a product of his 40 years in public life, many of them spent studying the world. He sold voters on his experience and this is the first time he is offering decisions, not mere opinions in a Senate hearing - and he will be judged by the outcome, which is far from clear at this point. Americans are seeing a different side of Biden during this crisis, a sterner, sometimes testy man known much better for his empathy.
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Haitian quake victims rush aid sites, take food and supplies
LES CAYES, Haiti (AP) - Haitians left hungry and homeless by a devastating earthquake swarmed relief trucks and in some cases stole desperately needed goods Friday as leaders of the poor Caribbean nation struggled to coordinate aid and avoid a repeat of their chaotic response to a similar tragedy 11 years ago.
The attacks on relief shipments illustrate the rising frustration of those left homeless after the Aug. 14 magnitude 7.2 earthquake, which killed nearly 2,200 people, injured more than 12,000 and destroyed or damaged more than 100,000 homes.
"I have been here since yesterday, not able to do anything," said 23-year-old Sophonie Numa, who waited outside an international aid distribution site in the small city of Camp-Perrin, located in the hard-hit southwestern Les Cayes region. "I have other people waiting for me to come back with something."
Numa said her home was destroyed in the quake and that her sister broke her leg during the temblor.
"The food would help me a lot with the kids and my sister," she said.
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Judge: California ride-hailing law is unconstitutional
LOS ANGELES (AP) - A judge Friday struck down a California ballot measure that exempted Uber and other app-based ride-hailing and delivery services from a state law requiring drivers to be classified as employees eligible for benefits and job protections.
Alameda County Superior Court Judge Frank Roesch ruled that Proposition 22 was unconstitutional.
Voters approved the measure in November after Uber, Lyft and other services spent $200 million in its favor, making it the most expensive ballot measure in state history.
Uber said it planned to appeal, setting up a fight that could likely end up in the California Supreme Court.
"This ruling ignores the will of the overwhelming majority of California voters and defies both logic and the law," company spokesman Noah Edwardsen said. "You don´t have to take our word for it: California´s attorney general strongly defended Proposition 22´s constitutionality in this very case."
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Explosive California wildfires could burn into December
LOS ANGELES (AP) - Smoke from California´s wildfires choked people on the East Coast. Flames wiped out a gold rush-era town. Ash covers area that would dwarf Rhode Island.
Images of homes engulfed in flames and mountains glowing like lava would make it easy to conclude the Golden State is a charred black landscape.
That´s hardly the case, but the frightening reality is that the worst may be yet to come.
California has already surpassed the acreage burned at this point last year, which ended up setting the record. Now it´s entering a period when powerful winds have often driven the deadliest blazes.
"Here we are - it´s not the end of August and the size and distribution and the destruction of summer 2021 wildfires does not bode well for the next months," said Bill Deverell, a University of Southern California history professor who teaches about fire in the West. "The suggestion of patterns across the last two decades in the West is deeply unsettling and worrisome: hotter, bigger, more fires."
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Senators question DOJ funding for AI-powered policing tech
CHICAGO (AP) - A Democratic senator said the U.S. Justice Department needs to look into whether the algorithm-powered police technologies it funds contribute to racial bias in law enforcement and lead to wrongful arrests.
Sen. Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat, was responding to an investigation by The Associated Press published Thursday about the possibility of bias in courtroom evidence produced by an algorithm-powered gunshot detection technology called ShotSpotter. The system, which can be funded by Justice Department grants, is used by law enforcement in more than 110 U.S. communities to detect gunfire and respond to crime scenes faster.
"While there continues to be a national debate on policing in America, it´s become increasingly clear that algorithms and technologies used during investigations, like ShotSpotter, can further racial biases and increase the potential for sending innocent people to prison," Wyden said.
Chicago prosecutors relied on audio evidence picked up by ShotSpotter sensors to charge 65-year-old Michael Williams with murder last year for allegedly shooting a man inside his car. ShotSpotter has said their system has trouble identifying gunshots in enclosed spaces. Williams spent nearly a year in jail, until late last month a judge dismissed the case against him at the request of prosecutors, who said they had insufficient evidence.
"Fundamentally, these tools are outsourcing critical policing decisions, leaving the fate of people like Michael Williams to a computer," Wyden said.
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GM extends recall to cover all Chevy Bolts due to fire risk
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (AP) - General Motors said Friday it is recalling all Chevrolet Bolt electric vehicles sold worldwide to fix a battery problem that could cause fires.
The recall and others raise questions about lithium ion batteries, which now are used in nearly all electric vehicles. Ford, BMW and Hyundai all have recalled batteries recently.
President Joe Biden will need electric vehicles to reach a goal of cutting greenhouse gas emissions in half 2030 as part of a broader effort to fight climate change.
The GM recall announced Friday adds about 73,000 Bolts from the 2019 through 2022 model years to a previous recall of 69,000 older Bolts.
GM said that in rare cases the batteries have two manufacturing defects that can cause fires.
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Country singer Tom T. Hall dies; wrote `Harper Valley PTA´
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) - Tom T. Hall, the singer-songwriter who composed "Harper Valley P.T.A." and sang about life´s simple joys as country music´s consummate blue collar bard, has died. He was 85.
His son, Dean Hall, confirmed the musician's death on Friday at his home in Franklin, Tennessee. Known as "The Storyteller" for his unadorned yet incisive lyrics, Hall composed hundreds of songs.
Along with such contemporaries as Kris Kristofferson, John Hartford and Mickey Newbury, Hall helped usher in a literary era of country music in the early ´70s, with songs that were political, like "Watergate Blues" and "The Monkey That Became President," deeply personal like "The Year Clayton Delaney Died," and philosophical like "(Old Dogs, Children and) Watermelon Wine."
"In all my writing, I´ve never made judgments," he said in 1986. "I think that´s my secret. I´m a witness. I just watch everything and don´t decide if it´s good or bad."
Singer-songwriter Jason Isbell performed Hall's song "Mama Bake A Pie (Daddy Kill A Chicken)" when Hall was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2019.
