Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina on Monday praised Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for showing what he called “restraint” after Hamas attacked Israel over a week ago. The Republican presidential candidate said Netanyahu “waited” and showed “patience” and “humanity” in response to the Oct. 7 attack. Israel launched airstrikes in Gaza the day of the attack and Netanyahu declared war with Hamas, vowing to inflict an “unprecedented price.” The war has become the deadliest of five Gaza wars for both sides, with more than 4,000 dead. “One of the first things that Israel’s done is they waited,” Scott said about Israel as he spoke at an event focused on U.S. foreign policy and national security at Georgetown University in Washington. “Now how Prime Minister Netanyahu had the kind of restraint to refrain from immediate action, it just talks about the morality and the humanity that we see coming from Netanyahu into Gaza,” the senator said. Hamas militants’ surprise attacks on Israel have left 1,400 dead and retaliatory strikes have killed at least 2,778 Palestinians. Scott also underscored the importance of America’s allyship with Israel and said “America should stand shoulder-to-shoulder, back-to-back, with no daylight with Israel.” He said the U.S. should move more firepower into the region to “be responsive” and said that U.S. special forces should be prepared to help rescue American hostages in Gaza. Scott also criticized front-runner Republican candidate Donald Trump for his criticism of Netanyahu days after the attack. He said the former president’s comments were “terrible,” “not helpful” and “heading in the wrong direction.” “We should be loyal to our allies while being lethal to our adversaries. Anything less than that jeopardizes life,” he said. The senator said he somewhat agreed with GOP rival candidate Ron DeSantis, who said the United States should not take in any Palestinian refugees if they flee the Gaza Strip. DeSantis, the Florida governor, said the U.S. should not accept any refugees if they can escape Gaza because they “are all antisemitic.” Scott said not accepting refugees from Gaza is “the right decision” because the president cannot determine in the middle of the conflict “who is safe to bring in, who’s not safe to bring in.” “I don’t think that they’re all antisemitic. I just can’t tell you who’s who,” he said. Scott was asked about the killing of a 6-year-old Muslim boy in Illinois who was stabbed to death in an alleged hate crime. Authorities said the boy and his mother were attacked by the family’s landlord who was upset over the Israel-Hamas war. “Disgusting,” Scott said quickly. “It sounds like murder. Lock him up.” After he was asked to elaborate, the senator, who often takes on the mannerism of a preacher, then leaped up in to the aisles. Scott, who is Black, spoke about having grown up in the Deep South and said he understands racism and discrimination. “Thankful that our country has made tremendous progress in my lifetime,” he said. But of the man accused of the Illinois attack, he said, “I can’t imagine that level of hate.” Scott was sitting for the conversation at an event co-hosted by The Associated Press and Georgetown’s Institute of Politics and Public Service. The event marks the second in a series of talks the organizations are hosting on the

Attorney General Jeff Landry, a Republican backed by former President Donald Trump, has won the Louisiana governor’s race, holding off a crowded field of candidates. The win is a major victory for the GOP as they reclaim the governor’s mansion for the first time in eight years. Landry will replace current Gov. John Bel Edwards, who was unable to seek reelection due to consecutive term limits. Edwards is the only Democratic governor in the Deep South. “Today’s election says that our state is united,” Landry said during his victory speech Saturday night. “It’s a wake up call and it’s a message that everyone should hear loud and clear, that we the people in this state are going to expect more out of our government from here on out.” By garnering more than half of the votes, Landry avoided an expected runoff under the state’s “jungle primary” system. The last time there wasn’t a gubernatorial runoff in Louisiana was in 2011 and 2007, when Bobby Jindal, a Republican, won the state’s top position. The governor-elect, who celebrated with supporters during a watch party in Broussard, Louisiana, described the election as “historic.” Landry, 52, has raised the profile of attorney general since taking office in 2016. He has used his office to champion conservative policy positions. More recently, Landry has been in the spotlight over his involvement and staunch support of Louisiana laws that have drawn much debate, including banning gender-affirming medical care for transgender youths, the state’s near-total abortion ban that doesn’t have exceptions for cases of rape and incest, and a law restricting youths’ access to “sexually explicit material” in libraries, which opponents fear will target LGBTQ+ books. Landry has repeatedly clashed with Edwards over matters in the state, including LGBTQ rights, state finances and the death penalty. However the Republican has also repeatedly put Louisiana in national fights, including over President Joe Biden’s policies that limit oil and gas production and COVID-19 vaccine mandates. Landry spent two years on Capitol Hill, beginning in 2011, where he represented Louisiana’s 3rd U.S. Congressional District. Prior to his political career, Landry served 11 years in the Louisiana Army National Guard, was a local police officer, sheriff’s deputy and attorney. During the gubernatorial election season, Landry had long been considered the early frontrunner, winning the endorsement of high profile Republicans — Trump and U.S. Rep Steve Scalise — and a controversial early endorsement from the state GOP. In addition, Landry has enjoyed a sizable fundraising advantage over the rest of the field throughout the race. Landry has made clear that one of his top priorities as governor would be addressing crime in urban areas. The Republican has pushed a tough-on-crime rhetoric, calling for more “transparency” in the justice system and continuing to support capital punishment. Louisiana has the nation’s second-highest murder rate per capita. Along the campaign trail, Landry faced political attacks from opponents on social media and in interviews, calling him a bully and making accusations of backroom deals to gain support. He also faced scrutiny for skipping all but one of the major-televised debates. Among other gubernatorial candidates on the ballot were GOP state Sen. Sharon Hewitt; Hunter Lundy, a Lake Charles-based attorney running as an independent; Republican state Treasurer John Schroder; Stephen Waguespack, the Republican former head of a powerful

Since Federal Reserve officials last met in July, the economy has moved in the direction they hoped to see: Inflation continues to ease, if more slowly than most Americans would like, while growth remains solid and the job market cools. When they meet again this week, the policymakers are likely to decide they can afford to wait and see if the progress continues. As a result, they’re almost sure to leave their key interest rate unchanged when their meeting ends Wednesday. The cooling of inflation suggests that the Fed is edging toward a peak in the series of rate hikes it unleashed in March of last year — the fastest such pace in four decades, one that has made borrowing much costlier for consumers and businesses. The focus for Wall Street investors and analysts now is shifting toward what comes next. Some clues could come in the updated interest rate projections it releases each quarter and at a news conference with Chair Jerome Powell. Another rate hike this year will likely remain on the table, and Fed officials may project fewer cuts in their key rate next year than they did in June. This would underscore the Fed’s determination to keep rates elevated well into next year as it strives to get inflation down to its 2% target. Inflation pressures showed signs of persistence in two government reports last week, adding some uncertainty to the outlook. Claudia Sahm, a former Fed economist, said she thinks a “soft landing,” in which the Fed manages to curb inflation without causing a recession, remains possible. But she cautioned that inflation might stay higher for longer than the central bank expects. Or, she suggested, the cumulative effects of the Fed’s 11 rate hikes could ultimately tip the economy into recession. “We are at a point where things could plausibly go in a lot of different directions,” Sahm said. “They’re going to react as it unfolds.” Still, most economic data in the past two months has pointed in a positive direction. Inflation in June and July, excluding volatile food and energy prices, posted its two lowest monthly readings in nearly two years. And signs have grown that the job market isn’t as robust as it had been, which helps keep a check on inflation: The pace of hiring has moderated. The number of unfilled openings fell sharply in June and July. And the number of Americans who have started seeking work has jumped. This has brought labor demand and supply into better balance and eased the pressure on employers to raise pay to attract and keep workers, which can lead them to raise prices to offset higher labor costs. “That was a hell of a good week of data we got last week,” Christopher Waller, a member of the Fed’s Board of Governors who is close to Powell, said in an interview on CNBC this month. “It’s going to allow us to proceed carefully. There is nothing saying that we need to do anything imminent anytime soon.” Powell’s own speech late last month at the Fed’s annual conference of central bankers in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, stressed his belief that the Fed can act in a measured fashion. “We will proceed carefully,” he said, “as we decide whether to tighten further or instead to hold the

CNN is bringing in a former chief executive of the BBC and The New York Times in an attempt to turn around a news organization that has burned through two leaders and bled viewers over the past two years. Mark Thompson was appointed as chair and CEO of CNN by David Zaslav, head of the network’s parent company, Warner Bros. Discovery, which made the announcement Wednesday. Thompson replaces Chris Licht, who was fired in June, and a four-person team that had been running CNN in the interim. Thompson, who left the Times in 2020 after eight years as that company’s president and CEO, is credited with transforming it to a digital-first organization more dependent on paid subscribers than the collapsing advertising market that has doomed many newspapers. The England native was director-general of the BBC from 2004 to 2012. Zaslav called him a “true innovator” who pushed two of the world’s most respected news organizations into the digital age. “His strategic vision, track record in transformational leadership and sheer passion for news makes him a formidable force for CNN and journalism at this pivotal time,” he said. In a statement, Thompson — who has been knighted by the British government — said that “where others see disruption, I see opportunity.” Licht was let go after a stormy 13 months that saw CNN fall well behind Fox News and MSNBC in popularity, with opinionated news connecting more with viewers in a politically polarized time. He had encouraged CNN to find a middle ground and flex its newsgathering muscles. He was doomed at the end by a damning Atlantic magazine profile that showed his failure to connect with many employees, many loyal to his predecessor, Jeff Zucker. Zucker was pushed out in February 2022 after failing to disclose to his bosses a romantic relationship with a fellow network executive. Besides ratings, CNN’s finances have suffered. The network earned $892 in profit in 2022, down from $1.08 billion in 2020, according to S&P Global Market Intelligence. Shortly after Licht was named to his new job, CNN’s new corporate masters pulled the plug on a well-publicized streaming service after only weeks in operation. Just this month, it announced that CNN news would be part of its Max streaming service. CNN also fired two popular prime-time hosts over the past two years, Chris Cuomo and Don Lemon, the latter after an ill-fated move to a new morning show. Licht never settled on a new prime-time lineup in his tenure. The four-person interim leadership team — Amy Entelis, David Leavy, Virginia Moseley and Eric Sherling — recently set a new lineup that includes Kaitlan Collins, Abby Phillip and Laura Coates in weeknight roles, with veteran Christiane Amanpour and Chris Wallace getting new weekend gigs. Thompson’s selection was first reported Tuesday night by Puck. (AP)

The loop Donald Trump’s private jet made above the Iowa State Fair before his visit last weekend was more than just a gesture to the hundreds of supporters — and a few rival candidates — on the ground. It was a reminder that the four-time indicted former president casts a Boeing 757-sized shadow over the race for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination. That’s where agreement about Trump seems to end. With less than five months before Iowans cast the first votes in the GOP contest, conversations with more than 40 Republicans at the time-honored presidential campaign ritual suggest the party is far from unified on much of anything else. Most voters say that until the winter chill sets in, they’re keeping an open mind, honoring the state’s tradition of vetting all candidates. Still, many GOP voters say they can’t help but weigh their intense feelings about Trump as they consider their choices. In line to view the life-sized cow sculpted from butter, around booths selling deep-fried Twinkies and Oreos and throughout this annual tribute to Midwestern agriculture, some Republicans who plan to attend the Jan. 15 caucuses said they will support Trump even if he’s a convicted felon. Others are just as adamant that the time has come to pivot from the figure who reshaped their party. Many are conflicted, yearning to turn the page but not disowning the former president. They like what he did in office and support his policy priorities — and yet they worry that what they view largely as political persecution could hobble him both as the Republican nominee and as president. “President Trump – he’s just got a lot of distractions, and you know his bedside manner’s not good,” said Des Moines Republican Frank Miller, who was excited about the candidates he heard from at a barbecue stop near the animal barns. “There’s a lot of people in this country that think that’s more important than the policy,” added Miller, who works for an insurance company and is undecided on whom he’ll support. “I’m not one of those.” Loyalty to Trump runs deep in Iowa, a state he comfortably carried twice and where he is the heavy favorite in early polls for the Republican caucuses. Still, it’s apparent from talking to voters that already-complicated assessments of Trump could shift during months of televised debates, relentless advertising and more intense campaigning — never mind court proceedings in the series of criminal indictments he faces from New York to Florida. And GOP voters in this predominantly white, largely rural state are paying attention. The only circumstances that would keep Connie Lamberti from again supporting Trump in the caucuses are his withdrawal or a physical ailment that makes him unable to run. Not on her list: a conviction in any of four criminal indictments Trump faces. Lamberti thinks they’re all politically motivated. “I believe I would still caucus for him,” said the 70-year-old retired communications administrator from Ankeny while attending a candidate interview series led by Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds. “I believe it’s intentional on his opponents’ part.” Trump’s brief Aug. 12 stop at the fair only stoked his celebrity status. He waved a porkchop as he waded through a crush of fans and media. He introduced Florida U.S. House members who had endorsed him, a shot

Jury selection began Tuesday in the trial of two white men in Mississippi who are accused of chasing and shooting at a Black FedEx driver who had dropped off a package at a home. Brandon Case and his father, Gregory Charles Case, were indicted in November on charges of attempted first-degree murder, conspiracy and shooting into the vehicle of D’Monterrio Gibson in January 2022. Gibson, who was 24 at the time, was not injured. But the chase and gunfire led to complaints on social media of racism in Brookhaven, about 55 miles (90 kilometers) south of the state capital, Jackson. The trial will take place in Brookhaven. During a news conference days after the confrontation, Gibson said he was wearing a FedEx uniform and driving an unmarked van FedEx had rented when he dropped off a package at a house. He said that as he was leaving, he noticed a white pickup truck pulling away from another house on the same large lot. Gibson said the pickup driver tried to cut him off as he left the driveway. He said he swerved around the driver and then encountered a second man who had a gun pointed at the van and was motioning for him to stop. Gibson said the man fired as he drove away, damaging the van and packages inside. The white pickup chased him to Interstate 55 near Brookhaven before ending the pursuit, he said. Carlos Moore, an attorney who represented Gibson in a lawsuit in federal court, compared the episode to the killing of Ahmaud Arbery, a 25-year-old Black man who was running empty-handed through a Georgia subdivision in 2020 when three white strangers chased him down and blasted him with a shotgun. Moore said Tuesday that Gibson’s family “is cautiously optimistic that they’ll get justice here in Lincoln County.” On Thursday, U.S. District Judge Daniel P. Jordan III dismissed the $5 million lawsuit Moore filed on behalf of Gibson in January 2023. The suit was against FedEx, the city of Brookhaven, Brookhaven Police Chief Kenny Collins, Brandon Case and Gregory Charles Case. Jordan wrote that Gibson’s attorney failed to prove FedEx discriminated against Gibson because of his race. “The Cases’ alleged conduct is deplorable,” Jordan wrote. “But Gibson fails to state a viable claim against FedEx for which the Court would have original jurisdiction.” Moore said Friday that he plans to sue in state court. He also said Gibson is still employed by FedEx and is out on workers’ compensation leave. (AP)

Most taxpayers will be able to digitally submit a slew of tax documents and other communications to the IRS next filing season as the agency aims to go completely paperless by 2025. The effort to reduce the exorbitant load of paperwork that has plagued the agency — dubbed the “paperless processing initiative” — was announced Wednesday by Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and IRS Commissioner Daniel Werfel. The effort is being financed through an $80 billion infusion of cash for the IRS over 10 years under the Inflation Reduction Act passed into law last August, although some of that money already is being cut back. “Thanks to the IRA, we are in the process of transforming the IRS into a digital-first agency,” Yellen said in remarks prepared for delivery during a visit to an IRS paper processing facility in McLean, Virginia. “By the next filing season,” she said, “taxpayers will be able to digitally submit all correspondence, non-tax forms, and notice responses to the IRS.” “Of course, taxpayers will always have the choice to submit documents by paper,” she added. Under the initiative, most people will be able to submit everything but their tax returns digitally in 2024. And as the IRS pilots its new electronic free file tax return system starting in 2024, the agency will be able to process everything, including tax returns, digitally by 2025. The processing change is expected to cut back on the $40 million per year that the agency spends storing more than 1 billion historical documents. The federal tax administrator receives more than 200 million paper tax returns, forms, and pieces of mail and non-tax forms annually, according to the IRS. Roughly 213.4 million returns and other forms were filed electronically in fiscal year 2022, which represents 81.2 percent of all filings, according to IRS data. Coupled with decades of underfunding, an overload of paper documents has prevented the agency from processing tax forms at a faster pace in years past, agency leaders have said. The new initiative should allow the agency to expedite refunds by several weeks, according to the IRS. In June, National Taxpayer Advocate Erin M. Collins said the IRS cut its backlog of unprocessed paper tax returns by 80%, from 13.3 million returns at the end of the 2022 filing season to 2.6 million at the end of the 2023 filing season. The federal tax collector’s funding is still vulnerable to cutbacks. House Republicans built a $1.4 billion reduction to the IRS into the debt ceiling and budget cuts package passed by Congress this summer. The White House said the debt deal also has a separate agreement to take $20 billion from the IRS over the next two years and divert that money to other non-defense programs. (AP)

A Northern California man who was left paralyzed after he was slammed to the ground during a traffic stop won a $20 million settlement, one of the largest in the state’s history, officials announced Tuesday. Gregory Gross, an Army veteran who lives in Yuba City, sued the police department in 2022 after police officers used “pain compliance” techniques and expressed disbelief when he repeatedly cried out, “I can’t feel my legs.” Police officers also dismissed Gross when he said, “I can’t breathe,” while being held facedown on the lawn outside a hospital, video released by Gross’s lawyers shows. Gross was accused of driving drunk and causing a slow-speed collision in April 2020. Gross was left with a broken neck, and he underwent two surgeries to fuse his spine. He said the officers’ use of force left him unable to walk or care for himself, and he now needs round-the-clock nursing care for the rest of his life. “We are not against the police,” said Attorney Moseley Collins, who represents Gross. “We are for the police, but we are against police brutality when it occurs.” The settlement is among one of the largest police misconduct settlements in California history. In May, the state agreed to pay $24 million to the family of a man who died in police custody after screaming, “I can’t breathe,” as multiple officers restrained him while trying to take a blood sample. As part of the settlement, Yuba City will also start randomly auditing officers’ bodycam footage and reviewing use of force incidents, police Chief Brian Baker said. He apologized to Gross at a news conference Tuesday. “You’ve been in my thoughts since this tragedy was brought to my attention,” Baker said to Gross. “On April 12th, 2020, we missed the mark. And for that, Mr. Gross, I’m sorry.” Gross said the police reforms are important to make sure what happened to him isn’t repeated. He’s donating $20,000 to California Peace Officers’ Memorial Foundation. “I’m glad that they did something and took it serious,” Gross said Tuesday. “I couldn’t understand how someone could be in a position of authority and was acting like that and treating another human being like that.” Deronda Harris, Gross’ partner of 13 years, said she’s grateful to see the settlement finalized. “It’s nice to finally have closure,” Harris told The Associated Press. Gross also filed separate lawsuits in 2021 against Rideout Memorial Hospital in Marysville, along with the University of California, Davis Medical Center, alleging their actions contributed to his condition. Collins declined to comment on the status of the lawsuits, citing confidentiality. In the police body camera video supplied by Gross’ lawyers, an officer is seen twisting Gross’ already handcuffed arms and forcibly seating him on a lawn. At one point, officers slammed him on the ground and held him facedown as Gross repeatedly cried out that he couldn’t feel his legs and he couldn’t breathe. “Mr. Gross, we are done with your silly little games,” an officer tells him. In September 2021, Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a law barring police from using certain facedown holds that have led to multiple unintended deaths. The bill was aimed at expanding on the state’s ban on chokeholds in the wake of George Floyd’s murder. (AP)

The IRS has processed tens of millions of tax returns faster this year compared with past years while getting through to customer service on the phone is slowly improving, according to a report to Congress released Wednesday. But there is a huge need to update the agency’s information technology services and have more workers answering calls. Still, it’s a vast improvement after years of backlogs and decades of underfunding. The latest update on the IRS from National Taxpayer Advocate Erin M. Collins said the agency cut its backlog of unprocessed paper tax returns by 80%, from 13.3 million returns at the end of the 2022 filing season to 2.6 million at the end of the 2023 filing season. And now 35% of calls are answered, compared with 11% before. “Overall, the difference between the 2022 filing season and the 2023 filing season was like night and day,” Collins said. “It marks a return to pre-pandemic levels.” Through the climate, health care and tax legislation signed into law by President Joe Biden last year, the IRS received $80 billion for tax collection efforts. Agency leaders started using that money immediately to add employees to the IRS workforce, which had dwindled to 1970s levels through retirements, attrition and low pay that has not caught up with inflation. Most recently, the agency lost some of that money after the president and Congress agreed to claw back more than $20 billion in exchange for suspension of the country’s $31.4 trillion debt ceiling. Biden administration officials have offered assurances that the spending cuts will have minimal impact on the agency’s operations over the next few years. Collins’ report said the IRS has tried to make do with the workers it has to achieve the Treasury Department’s goals for customer service, and that has led to other problems. For instance, now it takes an average of 15 months for the number of identity theft victim assistance cases to be closed. That is because the IRS in the pandemic years shifted workers assigned to the identity theft segment to accounts management to answer those phone lines. With fewer workers to answer identity theft calls, the IRS is “causing harm to taxpayers who were victims of identity theft.” There are other nontax issues caused by identity theft that may take even longer to resolve, the report said. “The pandemic undoubtedly played a big role in delays, but policy decisions have also contributed to the problem,” it said. Earlier this year t he IRS, led by new Commissioner Daniel Werfel, released details on how it planned to use its influx of money for improved operations, pledging to invest in new technology, hire more customer service representatives and expand its ability to audit high-wealth taxpayers. In the report, Collins’ office urged the IRS to focus its efforts on modernizing outdated technology meant to improve the taxpayer experience. “With adequate funding, leadership prioritization, and appropriate oversight from Congress, I believe the IRS will make considerable progress in the next three to five years in helping taxpayers comply with their tax obligations as painlessly as possible,” she said. (AP)

Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s bid to appease Republican hard-liners and get the House moving again after a recent party rebellion on the floor has some Democrats warning of a difficult road ahead when it comes to passing legislation that will keep the government running. Republicans teed up votes this past week on guns and on censuring one of former President Donald Trump’s most prominent critics, Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif. Those votes helped get the House moving again, though the latter effort failed, with Schiff helped by some 20 Republicans. The most consequential move of the week, however, was an announcement from GOP leadership that arrived with little fanfare. Republicans said they plan to pursue appropriations bills, which fund government programs and agencies, with less spending than the top-line numbers they agreed to in a deal with the White House last month. That compromise avoided what would have been an unprecedented federal default. McCarthy argued that the numbers he negotiated with the White House amount to a cap and “you can always do less.” GOP Rep. Kay Granger of Texas, who leads the House Appropriations Committee, followed with a statement that said she would seek to limit nondefense spending at 2022 budget levels, saying the debt agreement “set a top-line spending cap -– a ceiling, not a floor.” The announcements delighted Republicans who had criticized McCarthy, R-Calif., and opposed the debt ceiling legislation because they felt that agreement allowed too much spending. But it drew immediate pushback from Democrats who say an attempt to circumvent the debt ceiling agreement’s top-line numbers effectively guarantees a standoff with the Senate and White House and possibly even a damaging government stoppage when funding expires this fall. “It is a prelude to a shutdown — what they are engineering,” said Connecticut Rep. Rosa DeLauro, the top Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee. The emerging dynamic raises the potential for another round of economy-rattling brinkmanship in Washington just months after lawmakers narrowly avoided a damaging federal default. Partial government shutdowns have become increasingly common in the modern era, with the longest coming under President Donald Trump as he demanded money for a U.S.-Mexico border wall. With President Joe Biden facing down the Republican-controlled House as he runs for reelection in 2024 and some conservatives openly dismissive of the damage a shutdown can cause, the spending fight appears nearly certain to escalate. The tension created by the GOP’s pursuit of more non-defense spending cuts was evident during hearings held Wednesday and Thursday of the House Appropriations panel. Democrats accused House Republicans of going back on their word. “Do you think any of us would have made a deal if we thought your ’22 number was the deal?” said Rep. Steny Hoyer, D-Md. “What kind of deal is that? What kind of respect for yourselves is that? “You knew that wasn’t a ceiling,” said Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla. “Traditionally, that’s where we are starting. Caps are not ceilings in our world. They are a starting point and then we negotiate from those numbers we have agreed to. That’s how it has always been.” But Republicans said McCarthy was clear during negotiations that spending had to come down from current levels. “We can try to fool the American people with smoke and mirrors and pretend, but the speaker was

The Department of Energy and several other federal agencies were compromised in a Russian cyber-extortion gang’s global hack of a file-transfer program popular with corporations and governments, but the impact was not expected to be great, Homeland Security officials said Thursday. But for others among what could be hundreds of victims from industry to higher education — including patrons of at least two state motor vehicle agencies — the hack was beginning to show some serious impacts. Jen Easterly, director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, told reporters that unlike the meticulous, stealthy SolarWinds hacking campaign attributed to state-backed Russian intelligence agents that was months in the making, this campaign was short, relatively superficial and caught quickly. “Based on discussions we have had with industry partners … these intrusions are not being leveraged to gain broader access, to gain persistence into targeted systems, or to steal specific high value information— in sum, as we understand it, this attack is largely an opportunistic one,” Easterly said. “Although we are very concerned about this campaign and working on it with urgency, this is not a campaign like SolarWinds that presents a systemic risk to our national security or our nation’s networks,” she added. A senior CISA official said neither the U.S. military nor intelligence community was affected. Energy Department spokesperson Chad Smith said two agency entities were compromised but did not provide more detail. Known victims to date include Louisiana’s Office of Motor Vehicles, Oregon’s Department of Transportation, the Nova Scotia provincial government, British Airways, the British Broadcasting Company and the U.K. drugstore chain Boots. The exploited program, MOVEit, is widely used by businesses to securely share files. Security experts say that can include sensitive financial and insurance data. Louisiana officials said Thursday that people with a driver’s license or vehicle registration in the state likely had their personal information exposed. That included their name, address, Social Security number and birthdate. They encouraged Louisiana residents to freeze their credit to guard against identity theft. The Oregon Department of Transportation confirmed Thursday that the attackers accessed personal information, some sensitive, for about 3.5 million people to whom the state issued identity cards or driver’s licenses. The Cl0p ransomware syndicate behind the hack announced last week on its dark web site that its victims, who it suggested numbered in the hundreds, had until Wednesday to get in touch to negotiate a ransom or risk having sensitive stolen data dumped online. The gang, among the world’s most prolific cybercrime syndicates, also claimed it would delete any data stolen from governments, cities and police departments. The senior CISA official told reporters a “small number” of federal agencies were hit — declining to name them — and said “this is not a widespread campaign affecting a large number of federal agencies.” The official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the breach, said no federal agencies had received extortion demands and no data from an affected federal agency had been leaked online by Cl0p. U.S. officials “have no evidence to suggest coordination between Cl0p and the Russian government,” the official said. The parent company of MOVIEit’s U.S. maker, Progress Software, alerted customers to the breach on May 31 and issued a patch. But cybersecurity researchers say scores if not hundreds of companies could by then have

Chris Licht, the embattled chief executive of CNN, apologized to network employees on Monday for distracting from their work and promised to “fight like hell” to earn their trust amid criticism of his year at the helm. Licht’s tenure hit a low point last week with publication of a lengthy, damaging profile of him in Atlantic magazine and the appointment of a new executive from parent company Warner Bros. Discovery to help manage CNN. Licht said on an editorial conference call that he was sorry that his role in the news cycle overshadowed the work of CNN’s journalists, according to a transcript of the call. He described it as a humbling experience. Licht said he would work to win their trust, “because you deserve a leader who will be in the trenches, fighting to ensure CNN remains the world’s most trusted name in news.” “CNN is not about me,” he said. “I should not be in the news.” A CNN spokesperson had no further comment on Monday. Licht replaced a popular leader, Jeff Zucker, with a mandate to win back some of the viewers alienated from CNN by former President Donald Trump’s attacks. That has caused some internal resentment and, for many, Trump’s town hall meeting last month was a misstep. The executive’s revamp of CNN’s morning show fell flat, leading to the firing of longtime personality Don Lemon. Licht’s plans to restructure the network’s prime-time lineup have moved slowly. Kaitlan Collins is to begin a new show later this month, and CNN has signed Charles Barkley and Gayle King to host a once-a-week program. In his Atlantic profile, writer Tim Alberta wrote that Licht had “swaggered” into his new job, telling employees their hostility toward Trump had alienated viewers who saw CNN as the safe center. This put him in the position of fighting to win over Republicans as well as some CNN journalists who believed they were being made scapegoats by Licht’s efforts to please his boss, Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav. “One year into the job, Licht was losing both battles,” Alberta wrote. CNN’s prime-time viewership averaged 494,000 in May, the Nielsen company said. That’s less than half of what MSNBC gets, and down 16% from April. An accelerating trend of cord-cutting isn’t helping cable networks hold viewers, either. CNN reached 3.3 million people for its Trump town hall on May 10, yet two nights later its prime-time viewership plunged to 335,000 people, Nielsen said. One of Zaslav’s top aides at Warner Discovery, David Leavy, was appointed last week as chief operating officer of CNN Worldwide, reporting to Licht. Leavy will be responsible for commercial, operational and promotional activities at CNN, the network said. (AP)

Protecting a narrow, four-vote majority, Republican leaders in the House are making clear that they intend to let the legal process play out with New York Rep. George Santos before they take steps to force his resignation or expel him. The freshman congressman was accused Wednesday by federal prosecutors of embezzling money from his campaign, falsely receiving unemployment funds and lying to Congress about his finances and could face up to 20 years in prison if convicted. Santos pleaded not guilty. Republican leaders, who for months have faced mounting questions about Santos after most of his campaign biography was exposed as a lie, were unmoved and brushed aside calls — including from some colleagues — that they take immediate action to push Santos out of Congress. “In America, there’s a presumption of innocence. But they’re serious charges. He’s going to have to go through the legal process,” said House Majority Leader Steve Scalise of Louisiana. Scalise was seconded by Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York, the No. 3 House Republican, who sidestepped the question of whether Santos should resign. “As I’ve said from the very beginning on questions on this subject, this legal process is going to play itself out,” she said. The position Republican leaders have staked out generally follows the precedent that Congress has set in similar criminal cases over the years. The House has expelled just two members in recent decades, and both votes occurred after the lawmaker had been convicted on federal charges. But many say the narrow majority that Republicans won in the House is surely another factor in the GOP leadership’s thinking. “There are a few members of the New York delegation and a few others calling for his immediate expulsion on the Republican side, which could tilt the leadership’s hand. But given where we’re at with the debt limit and a four-vote majority, they don’t want to lose any of those votes right now,” said Casey Burgat, an assistant professor who leads the legislative affairs program at George Washington University. Santos is adamant that he will stay in Congress and seek reelection. In a press conference outside a Long Island federal courthouse, he spoke Wednesday of getting back to Washington so he could vote on a top House GOP priority, a border bill that would restrict some asylum seekers and boost border enforcement. It’s expected to be a close vote. Santos also voted last month for the House GOP bill that ties a debt limit extension to an estimated $4.8 trillion in deficit reduction over 10 years. In a dramatic flourish, Santos was the last Republican to cast a vote in favor of that bill, helping it win passage by a paper-thin margin — 217-215. While GOP leaders say the legal system needs to run its course, a few Republicans have seen enough. “The people of New York’s 3rd district deserve a voice in congress,” tweeted Rep. Tony Gonzales, R-Texas. “George Santos should be immediately expelled from Congress and a special election initiated at the soonest possible date.” The House and the Senate have the power to punish members of their chamber for misconduct, including through expulsion. To date, according to the Congressional Research Service, 20 members have been expelled, but the large majority of them occurred at the outset of the

A jury is to resume deliberations Monday with only 11 members in the trial of a former Philadelphia police officer seen on video lowering the face covering of at least one protester before dousing a group with pepper spray as they knelt on a city interstate during a summer 2020 demonstration. Officials say one juror in the trial of ex-SWAT officer Richard Paul Nicoletti was dismissed Friday afternoon and two alternates were unavailable for medical reasons. Prosecutors and defense attorneys then agreed to move on with an 11 member panel. Jurors earlier told the judge they were at an impasse but were urged to keep working. Nicoletti faces charges including simple assault and reckless endangerment for his actions on June 1, 2020 after demonstrators made their way onto Interstate 676 during the protests that followed the death of George Floyd. Video circulated widely on social media that showed Nicoletti in riot gear approach three protesters kneeling on the highway and pull down at least one protester’s mask or goggles before pepper-spraying them. He was fired several weeks later. After the city and state police use of tear gas gained national attention, Mayor Jim Kenney and police commissioner Danielle Outlaw apologized, calling the use of force that day “unjustifiable.” In March, the city agreed to pay $9.25 million to hundreds of plaintiffs who sued over police use of force during several days of protests. Assistant District Attorney Brian Collins told jurors during his opening statement that Nicoletti’s actions were unnecessary, harmful, and beyond the scope of his duties as a police officer, adding that his badge “was a responsibility, not a license,” The Philadelphia Inquirer reported. Nicoletti’s defense attorneys have argued that he broke no law and acting on the orders of his superiors on the police force. Attorney Fortunato Perri Jr., said Nicoletti had been ordered to clear the highway and was authorized to use pepper spray to do so — and “he did that, nothing more.” A state police officer testified Wednesday that SWAT officers, including Nicoletti, protected him from an angry crowd, WTXF-TV reported. Several people who were sprayed or witnessed the events testified. One person who was sprayed in the eyes choked up as she recalled what happened. Another protester said that after she was pepper sprayed she “lost all sense of herself, crying and screaming for help.” A municipal court judge in 2021 dismissed all charges against Nicoletti, saying prosecutors had failed to show that his actions were criminal. A Common Pleas court judge later reversed that decision and reinstated the charges. (AP)

The IRS released details Thursday on how it plans to use an infusion of $80 billion for improved operations, pledging to invest in new technology, hire more customer service representatives and expand its ability to audit high-wealth taxpayers. While some Republicans have suggested without evidence that the money from the Democrats’ landmark climate change and health care bill would help create a mob of armed auditors to harass middle-class taxpayers, new IRS Commissioner Daniel Werfel said it will not include spending for new agents with guns. The agency’s newly released strategic operating plan lays out the specifics of how the IRS will allocate the $80 billion, through fiscal year 2031, that was approved in that legislation. Some improvements have been long expected, such as bringing more paper-based systems online and answering taxpayers’ phone calls promptly. Others are more ambitious: continuing to explore ways to create a government-operated electronic free-file tax return system, for example. No hiring boost is foreseen for the criminal investigation unit, which represents 3% of the agency’s workforce and employed roughly 2,077 special agents as of the 2022 budget year, according to the IRS’ annual report. Those are the agents who may be armed. There are “no plans to increase” that division, Werfel said during a call with reporters. “That will stay at its current rate.” Since President Joe Biden signed the measure, known as the “ the Inflation Reduction Act, ” in August, some Republicans have claimed the IRS would use the new money to hire an army of 87,000 tax agents with weapons. That claim comes from a plan the Treasury Department proposed in 2021 to bring on that many IRS employees over the next decade if it got the money. At least 50,000 IRS employees are expected to retire over the next five years. The strategic plan does not include final numbers on long-term hiring. During the call with reporters, Treasury Deputy Secretary Wally Adeyemo said the plan “is heavily driven by the fact that we need to make technology investments that will improve productivity, which will mean that over time the number of employees and the mix of employees at the IRS will change.” After Congress passed the legislation last summer, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen directed the IRS to develop a plan outlining how the tax agency would overhaul its technology, customer service and hiring processes. Her memo sent instructions to IRS leadership not to increase audit rates on people making less than $400,000 a year annually. Officials are promising not “to raise audit rates on small businesses and households making under $400,000 per year, relative to historic levels.” The report says more than half of the new money — $45.6 billion — will be devoted to pursuing high-wealth individuals and companies. “Given the size and complex nature of these tax filings, this work often requires specialized approaches, and we will make these resources available,” the report said. “We will use data and analytics to improve our understanding of the tax filings of high-wealth individuals.” Treasury and IRS officials have in recent months promoted the impact of the new spending on internal processes. Robert Nassau, director of the Low Income Taxpayer Clinic at Syracuse University College of Law, said he has seen some noticeable differences. “The phone line is amazingly improved, that part

CNN’s leadership is preaching patience even though thousands of viewers are abandoning the network during its attempted turnaround, with no indication yet whether it will be rewarded. Cable news ratings are down across the board compared to 2022, when Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was fresh in the news. CNN’s dip is most dramatic — 61% in prime time in March, with Fox News Channel down 27% and MSNBC off by 12%, according to the Nielsen company. Fox averaged 2.09 million viewers in prime time in March, with MSNBC at 1.14 million and CNN at 473,000, Nielsen said. In the key 25-54 age demographic for advertisers, CNN is seeing some of its lowest numbers in decades. CNN is a year into new corporate management with Warner Bros. Discovery, which hired ex-CBS producer Chris Licht to run the network. The chief goal has been to rebuild trust as a non-partisan news brand after years of criticism by former President Donald Trump and his followers, at a time Fox and MSNBC have profited handsomely by appealing to specific points of view. Licht’s biggest programming move to date, a revamp of “CNN This Morning,” hasn’t borne fruit in the ratings and has been beset by bad publicity, including co-host Don Lemon’s ham-fisted reference to a woman’s prime years. Changes to CNN’s daytime look are imminent. Licht’s vision for prime time is months away, though, and only beginning to take shape. His plans are to couple news coverage with hosts from different worlds, including entertainment, who can talk about the news without a specific partisan take. Licht is exploring several possibilities, and CNN is reportedly close to deals with CBS’ Gayle King and former NBA star turned sportscaster Charles Barkley for shows that will air once a week, although the network wouldn’t confirm that. If Licht’s bet pays off, CNN will strengthen its reputation as a news brand while also attracting viewers who are now watching Netflix or HGTV — not just competing news networks. As those plans develop, CNN’s prime-time lineup has largely been in flux after Anderson Cooper’s hour at 8 p.m. Eastern. The network has experimented with some interviews, events and subject-focused hours at 9 p.m. Eastern. They include talks with first lady Jill Biden and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and town halls with Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin and one focused on the Ohio train derailment. The news hours that follow, at least for now, are led by Alisyn Camerota and Laura Coates. “Viewers are a bit confused with all of the changes, particularly in the prime-time lineup,” said Jennifer Thomas, a former CNN producer who now teaches journalism at Howard University. She said CNN needs more news that impacts viewers and less analysis. CNN expresses pride in some of the efforts, while admitting some are duds. Last Friday, for example, only 295,000 people watched Jake Tapper’s interview with “Ted Lasso” star Jason Sudeikis. It was less than a quarter of the people who saw Alex Wagner’s MSNBC show at the same 9 p.m. Eastern time slot, Nielsen said. David Zaslav, president and CEO of Warner Bros. Discovery, delivered a pep talk to hundreds of CNN managers earlier this month to reinforce the message that he wanted to see a network focused on the news that didn’t lean any way politically. CNN

Google announced Tuesday it’s allowing more people to interact with “ Bard,” the artificially intelligent chatbot the company is building to counter Microsoft’s early lead in a pivotal battleground of technology. In Bard’s next stage, Google is opening a waitlist to use an AI tool that’s similar to the ChatGPT technology Microsoft began deploying in its Bing search engine to much fanfare last month. And last week, Microsoft embedded more AI-powered technology in its word processing, spreadsheet and slide presentation programs with a new feature called Copilot. Until now, Bard had only been available to a small group of “trusted testers” hand-picked by Google. The Mountain View, California, company, which is owned by Alphabet Inc., isn’t saying how many people will be given access to Bard in the next step of the technology’s development. Initial applicants will be limited to the U.S. and the U.K. before Google offers Bard in more countries. Google is treading carefully with the rollout of its AI tools, in part because it has more to lose if the technology spits out inaccurate information or takes its users down dark corridors. That’s because Google’s dominant search engine has become a de facto gateway to the internet for billions of people, raising the risk of a massive backlash that could tarnish its image and undercut its ad-driven business if the technology behaves badly. Despite the technology’s pitfalls, Bard still offers “incredible benefits” such as “jumpstarting human productivity, creativity and curiosity,” Google said in a blog post that two of its vice presidents — Sissie Hsiao and Eli Collins — wrote with assistance from Bard. As a precautionary measure, Google is limiting the amount of interaction that can occur between Bard and its users — a tactic Microsoft has imposed with ChatGPT after media coverage detailed instances when the technology likened an Associated Press reporter to Hitler and tried to persuade a New York Times reporter to divorce his wife. Google also is providing access to Bard through a separate site from its search engine, which serves as the foundation for the digital ads that generate most of its profits. In a tacit acknowledgement that Bard may be prone to straying into manufacturing falsehoods, which are being called “hallucinations” in technology circles, Google is providing a query box connected to its search engine to make it easier for users to check on the accuracy of the information being displayed by the AI. Bard made an embarrassing blunder shortly after Google unveiled the tool by prominently displaying a wrong answer about a scientific milestone during a presentation that was supposed to show how smart the technology could be. The gaffe contributed to a nearly 8% drop in Alphabet’s stock in a single day, wiping out about $100 billion in shareholder wealth and underscoring how closely investors are watching how Google handles the transition to AI. (AP)

Former Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti was confirmed Wednesday by a divided Senate as the nation’s next ambassador to India, 20 months after he was first nominated by President Joe Biden and after weathering doubts about his truthfulness in a sexual harassment scandal involving a top adviser during his time at City Hall. The 52-42 vote gave the administration a long-sought victory in filling one of the country’s highest profile diplomatic posts. The president “believes that we have a crucial and consequential partnership with India and that Mayor Garcetti will make a strong and effective ambassador,” White House spokesperson Olivia Dalton said after the vote. The session began with uncertain prospects for Garcetti, a two-term, progressive Democrat first nominated to the prominent diplomatic post by President Joe Biden in July 2021. With several Democratic defections, Garcetti’s fate rested with enlisting Republicans in a chamber often divided along partisan lines He secured seven GOP votes to advance the nomination to a final vote. Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine said, “I met with him personally. He clearly has an enormous amount of expertise about India. India’s been two years without an ambassador, and that is far too long. And I am going to support him.” Sen. Todd Young, R-Ind., who backed Garcetti in a committee vote, said that he, too, would be voting in favor. “It’s a national security imperative to immediately have an ambassador in place in India. We can’t afford to wait any longer,” Young said. The vacancy in the ambassadorship has left a significant diplomatic gap for the administration at a time of rising global tensions, including China’s increasingly assertive presence in the Pacific region and Russia’s war with Ukraine. India, the world’s most populous democracy, is continuing to buy oil from Russia, while Western governments move to limit fossil fuel earnings that support Moscow’s budget, its military and its invasion of Ukraine. Russia also provides the majority of India’s military hardware. The nomination has been freighted with questions about what the former mayor knew, and when, about sexual harassment allegations against his friend and once-close adviser, Rick Jacobs. A lawsuit alleges that Jacobs frequently harassed one of the then-mayor’s police bodyguards while Garcetti ignored the abuse or laughed it off. Garcetti, the son of former Los Angelese district attorney Gil Garcetti, has repeatedly denied the claims. Jacobs has called the allegations against him “pure fiction.” The case is scheduled to go to trial later this year. At a Senate committee hearing in December 2021, Garcetti said, “I never witnessed, nor was it brought to my attention, the behavior that’s been alleged. … If it had been, I would have immediately taken action to stop that.” Wednesday’s vote tested Democratic loyalty to Biden, and also measured assessments of Garcetti’s judgment and trustworthiness, stemming from the City Hall allegations that shadowed him in the #MeToo era. “I think we can find somebody that will do the job better,” said Sen. Sherrod Brown of Ohio, one of the Democrats who signaled opposition to Garcetti. Garcetti also failed to win over Democrat Mark Kelly of Arizona, who said he had “serious concerns.” Rachel Rizzo, a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, said she sensed frustration about the lack of an ambassador during a recent trip to India. She said it

When Joe Biden stepped to the lectern in the shadow of the Brent Spence Bridge in northern Kentucky this month, he couldn’t stop showering praise on the state’s senior Republican senator, who had fought to repair the ramshackle span for decades. It was quite a contrast to the clipped introduction delivered just a few minutes earlier by that senator, Mitch McConnell, who referenced Biden only in noting that the president had signed the bill to finally fix the aging bridge. By temperament and manner, the two men — whose relationship in Washington has been scrutinized, analyzed and satirized for years — are decidedly mismatched. Biden is tactile, gregarious and gaffe prone; McConnell is tactical, often grim-faced and rarely utters an unscripted word. But with the new days of divided government underway, the Biden-McConnell relationship will become more important. McConnell’s experience in cutting deals and the political capital he retains among Republican members could leave him much freer to negotiate with the White House on thorny matters such as government spending and the debt ceiling than new House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., whose ranks have already issued hardline demands on the debt that the White House says are nonstarters. Both Biden and McConnell see political imperatives in strategically cooperating. McConnell, who fell short of regaining the Senate majority last November, will have a far more advantageous political map in the 2024 election cycle and wants to demonstrate that Republicans can govern responsibly. Meanwhile, central to Biden’s case for reelection is promoting his policy accomplishments and selling a record of competent governing — punctured somewhat by recent discoveries of classified documents at his former office and Delaware home. “Look, I got elected by the people of Kentucky,” McConnell said in a radio interview Tuesday with Louisville’s 840 WHAS. “I don’t view my job, even though I’m the Republican leader of the Senate, as objecting to everything just because Joe Biden might sign the bill.” When asked about McConnell after the Kentucky bridge visit, Biden pointed to their joint efforts in the Obama administration to ward off federal fiscal calamities. “I’ve had a relationship with Mitch McConnell for years,” Biden said. “We’ve always been able to work together.” McConnell’s acceptance of the White House invitation to attend the bridge event surprised even some of those close to him. He was among those who greeted Biden on the tarmac at the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport. Then McConnell joined Biden in the armored presidential limousine, known as the “beast,” where the two men talked foreign policy and how to keep the international coalition united on Ukraine. Having McConnell ride with the president was not planned in advance, according to an official familiar with the interaction, but it wasn’t a surprise, either. “On the one hand, it’s easy to overread it,” said Scott Jennings, a veteran Kentucky-based party strategist with close ties to the Republican leader. “McConnell had long said he would be more than happy to work with Biden on policy things that are within what he considers the 40-yard line in American politics and building a bridge in Kentucky is right in the middle of that field.” Jennings continued: “On the other hand, I do think there’s a message in that whole event, that there is a basic threshold of governing responsibility that people

Growing evidence that high inflation is finally easing shows that the Federal Reserve’s sharp interest rate hikes are working as intended, says Loretta Mester, a key Fed policymaker. But further rate hikes are still needed, she says, to decisively crush the worst inflation bout in four decades. “We’re beginning to see the kind of actions that we need to see,” Mester, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, said in an interview with The Associated Press. “Good signs that things are moving in the right direction … That’s important input into how we’re thinking about where policy needs to go.” Other Fed officials, too, have said recently that they were encouraged by a series of milder readings on inflation and wage growth. But Mester’s comments are notable because she is among the more consistently hawkish members of the Fed’s 19-person interest-rate-setting committee. (“Hawks” typically support higher rates to fight inflation, while “doves” tend to favor lower rates to boost employment.) “She has been ahead of the curve on a lot of the arguments that have pushed the Fed to act more hawkishly over the past year,” said Matthew Luzzetti, chief U.S. economist at Deutsche Bank. As a result, Mester’s views provide a measure of how far the Fed’s more hawkish policymakers might be willing to go in their drive to tame inflation. Consumer price increases, as calculated by the government, have steadily eased from a four-decade high of 9.1% in June to 6.5% in December. Yet because the Fed’s own inflation target is much lower — 2% — its policymakers have penciled in further rate increases. The rate hikes the Fed has already imposed have contributed to a near doubling of mortgage rates and to sharply higher costs for auto loans and other consumer and business credit. They have also elevated the risk of a recession. How high the Fed will raise its benchmark short-term rate and how long it keeps it there will likely determine whether it ultimately curbs inflation — and at what price to the economy. The Fed’s rate is now in a range of 4.25% to 4.5%, the highest level in 15 years. In her interview Tuesday with the AP, Mester, 64, stressed her belief that more hikes are needed and that the Fed’s key rate should rise a “little bit” above the 5% to 5.25% range that policymakers have collectively projected for the end of this year. Mester, who has been president of the Cleveland Fed for eight years, didn’t say how large a rate hike she favored when the Fed’s next meeting ends on Feb. 1. Most economists expect the central bank to announce a smaller quarter-point hike. But Mester noted that the economy and the financial markets “were able to handle” the half-point hike that the Fed carried out in mid-December. “We’re not at 5% yet, we’re not above 5%, which I think is going to be needed given where my projections are for the economy,” she said. “I just think we need to keep going, and we’ll discuss at the meeting how much to do.” Mester’s comments follow remarks from other Fed officials last week that seemed to indicate a likely quarter-point hike at the Feb. 1 meeting. That move would follow a half-point rate increase in December and four three-quarter-point

Even as 7,000 nurses return to work at two of New York’s busiest hospitals after a three-day strike, colleagues around the country say it’s just a matter of time before frontline workers at other hospitals begin walking the picket line. Problems are mounting at hospitals across the nation as they try to deal with widespread staffing shortages, overworked nurses beaten down by the pandemic and a busted pipeline of new nurses. That’s led to nurses juggling dangerously high caseloads, said Michelle Collins, dean at the college of nursing and health at Loyola University New Orleans. “There’s no place that’s immune from what’s happening with the nursing shortage,” Collins said. “It’s everywhere.” Union leaders say the tentative contract agreement ending the strike by nurses at Mount Sinai Hospital and Montefiore Medical Center, each privately owned, nonprofit hospitals that hold over 1,000 beds in New York City, will relieve chronic short staffing and boost pay by 19% over three years. The walkout, which ended Thursday, was just the latest dispute between nurses and their employers. Last year, six unions representing a total of 32,000 nurses launched strikes outside of hospital systems around the country, according to the Bureau of Labor and Statistics. Those strikes represented about a quarter of all the major strikes in the U.S. last year, an increase from the year before. Describing hospital environments where nurses are unable to take breaks because they are assigned too many patients — some of whom are pleading for care from frontline workers — the president of the American Nurses Association, Dr. Jennifer Mensik Kennedy, said some nurses may think their only option is to strike. “Nurses don’t feel like their voices have been heard with this exact topic,” she told The Associated Press Wednesday. “Nurses are now feeling like they need to strike. That could continue.” In California, nurse unions at two hospitals are likely to strike this year when their contract expires, said former nurse Peter Sidhu, who now works for the state union. Sidhu, who fields objections from nurses across the state who say their caseloads are unsafe, has received 7,000 such complaints in Los Angeles County hospitals since December. He said objections have at least doubled since before the pandemic began. “What I’ve seen is that in areas where we’ve traditionally had good staffing, even they are getting bombarded with patients and a lack of resources,” Sidhu said. Nurse shortages were plaguing some hospitals years before COVID-19 hit, and signs of a crisis loomed, with a large swath of the workforce nearing retirement age. A policy brief from the Department of Health and Human Services last year found that over half of nurses were over the age of 50, a much higher percentage compared with the overall U.S. labor workforce, where only a quarter of people are 55 or older. Aspiring nurses are lining up to replace those retirees but even that silver lining has hit a snag, with widespread faculty shortages at nursing colleges. In 2021, nearly 92,000 qualified nursing school applicants were denied entry into a program, largely because of a shortage of educators, according to the American Association of Colleges of Nursing. The American Nurses Association asked Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra to declare the nursing shortage a national crisis in late 2021. “Nurses

The IRS is beginning to see “a light at the end of the tunnel” of its customer service struggles, thanks to tens of billions of new money from the Democrats’ climate and health law and the authority to hire more people, according to an independent watchdog within the agency. But that upbeat assessment from the National Taxpayer Advocate is tempered by an early move by the new House Republican majority to rescind nearly $71 billion that Congress had provided the IRS, even though the bill approved Monday is unlikely to advance in the Democratic-run Senate. In the report Wednesday to Congress from Erin M. Collins, who leads the office assigned to protect taxpayers’ rights under the Taxpayer Bill of Rights, cited “more misery” for taxpayers last year and spoke of the challenges still ahead. “I am just not sure how much further we need to travel before we see sunlight,” she said. The report outlines how the 2022 tax filing season was a continuation of the yearslong struggle to process paper and electronic tax forms, answer taxpayer phone calls and distribute tax refunds in a timely manner. The IRS was more successful in chipping away at its mountain of unprocessed returns. The agency began 2022 with a backlog of 4.7 million individual returns and 3.6 million amended returns. By mid-December 2022, the tax collector reduced that backlog to 1 million individual returns and 1.5 million amended returns. By Dec. 23, the IRS had further reduced its unprocessed backlog of individual returns to about 400,000. “Taxpayers and tax professionals experienced more misery in 2022,” the report said. “The good news is that since the close of the 2022 filing season, the IRS has made considerable progress in reducing the volume of unprocessed returns and correspondence.” One reason for the optimism is the infusion of billions from the Democratic-powered legislation signed into law this summer. It is meant to help rebuild an agency that hadn’t seen additional funding in decades. House Republicans, however, want to rescind the money, saying it would bankroll an army of 87,000 auditors who will harass middle-class taxpayers rather than help them — claims that are generally alarmist and misleading. Another boon to the agency is that IRS officials used direct hiring authority to most recently add 5,000 customer service representatives who were trained in taxpayer rights and technical account management issues. “We have been unable to provide the help that IRS employees want to give and that the nation’s taxpayers deserve,” then-Commissioner Chuck Rettig said at the time of the October hiring announcement, “but help is on the way for taxpayers.” Shortly after the new money was secured, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen directed the IRS to develop a plan within six months outlining how the tax agency would overhaul its technology, customer service and hiring processes. That report is due in the coming weeks. Looking forward to the 2023 filing season, Collins’ report said the IRS will be starting “in much better shape than the last two years.” Deputy Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo said in a statement that the additional resources “will enable the IRS to provide better service this filing season so taxpayers can get issues resolved and phone calls answered” so they have the information “they need to file an accurate return.” (AP)

Lindsy Doan didn’t think the water flowing over the creek crossing on San Marcos Road was deeper than normal when she tried navigating it in her SUV while driving her 5-year-old son to school. But the creek, swollen with rain from California’s epic winter storms, was much higher and flowing stronger than she anticipated. Doan cursed as she lost control of the steering and the 4,300-pound (1,950-kilogram) Chevy Traverse was carried off the road and pinned against a large sycamore tree. “Mom, it’s OK,” her son, Kyle, reassured her from the back seat. “Just be calm.” They were the last words the little boy said to his mother before his fingers slipped away from hers and he was swept away Monday on California’s central coast near Paso Robles. “Yesterday I got to the point where I think I ran out of tears,” Doan told The Associated Press. “I just don’t know what to expect anymore. I mean, I’ve tried to do a Google search: How long can a child not eat? How long can they be in wet clothes? … We’re worried because I don’t know if they’re going to be able to find him.” More than 100 people, including National Guard troops, dive teams, searchers using dogs and drones and people picking through shoulder-high piles of driftwood on the banks of San Marcos Creek searched for a third day Wednesday for Kyle. So far, they’ve found only one of his blue and gray Nike shoes. The storms that have relentlessly pounded California since the end of last year have claimed at least 18 lives. Most of the deaths have been caused by falling trees and people driving on flooded roads. Kyle was listed as missing. With a sister in high school and brother in college, he is the baby in his family and loves being the center of attention. “He definitely capitalized on it,” his mother said. “He loves making everyone laugh. He wanted to make everyone smile. He loves to please people.” As vacation came to an end, Kyle was excited to return to kindergarten Monday at Lillian Larsen Elementary School, his mother said. It was the first day he was going to be allowed to play without restrictions after recovering from a broken leg that required three surgeries and he was looking forward to seeing his friends. Doan, a special education teacher at the school, was less enthusiastic, wishing she had a few more days off as she took the back road from their home near Paso Robles. For most of the year, the creek running along San Marcos Road is like so many California rivers and streams — a sinuous band of sand that only flows with winter and spring rains. When it is flowing, it’s often easy enough to drive through the shallow waters that course over the road in places. The Doan family drove the same route Sunday to a truck stop on Highway 101, splashing through the waters without incident. When Doan approached Monday in light rain, there were no road closures and she didn’t think it looked any different from the day before. “But as soon as I hit the bottom, my car started to drift and I realized that it wasn’t the same,” she said. “It was completely different.” Scotty Jalbert,