Business and government officials are bracing for the possibility of a nationwide rail strike at the end of this week while talks carry on between the largest U.S. freight railroads and their unions. The railroads have already started to curtail shipments of hazardous materials and have announced plans to stop hauling refrigerated products ahead of Friday’s strike deadline. Now businesses that rely on Norfolk Southern, Union Pacific, BNSF, CSX, Kansas City Southern and other railroads to deliver their raw materials and finished products have started planning for the worst. Meanwhile, Biden administration officials are scrambling to develop a plan to use trucks, ships and planes to try to keep the most crucial chemicals and other goods moving if the railroads stop rolling. But the White House is also keeping the pressure on the two sides to settle their differences, and a growing number of business groups are lobbying Congress to be prepared to intervene and block a strike if they can’t reach an agreement. “We have made crystal clear to the interested parties the harm that American families, business and farmers and communities would experience if they were not to reach a resolution,” White House press secretary Jean-Pierre said Tuesday. She said a shutdown is “not acceptable.” In addition to all the businesses that rely on railroads to deliver their goods, passenger railroads are also affected because many of them operate on tracks owned by one of the freight railroads. Amtrak has already cancelled several of its long-distance trains because there wouldn’t be enough time for them to reach their destinations before a strike or lockout would be allowed to begin at 12:01 a.m. Friday. Amtrak already suspended its California Zephyr and Empire Builder lines that run from Chicago to the West Coast, and starting Wednesday it will stop running its City of New Orleans, Starlight and Texas Eagle lines along with several others. Commuter railroads would also be affected. In Chicago, Metra warned its riders that it wouldn’t be able to run most of its trains if there is a strike. The railroads have reached tentative agreements with most of their unions, including a ninth deal announced Tuesday, based on the recommendations of a Presidential Emergency Board Joe Biden appointed this summer that called for 24% raises and $5,000 in bonuses in a five-year deal that’s retroactive to 2020. The deal also includes one additional paid leave day a year and higher health insurance costs. But all 12 railroad unions must agree to prevent a strike. The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen union that represents engineers, and the Transportation Division of the International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Workers union that represents conductors want the railroads to address some of their concerns about unpredictable work schedules and strict attendance rules in addition to agreeing to the recommended wage increases. Ron Kaminkow, general secretary of the Railroad Workers United labor coalition that includes workers from a variety of railroad unions, said he doesn’t think the unions are demanding much at this point — just the kind of things most U.S. workers already enjoy like the ability to take time off without being penalized. “We have attendance policies that have gotten more and more and more draconian. That offer very, very little leeway for workers who need

A pilot declared over the loudspeaker on a cross-country Delta Air Lines flight that passengers were no longer required to wear masks, eliciting cheers from the cabin and prompting some on board to immediately toss their face coverings onto their seats. “Feel free to burn them at will,” a train conductor told New Jersey commuters Tuesday. Other passengers were confused, startled and angered by the abrupt change, however, especially those who booked trips in the belief that their unvaccinated children would be traveling in a masked environment. A federal judge’s decision Monday to throw out a mask requirement on public transportation did away with the last major vestige of federal pandemic rules and led to a mishmash of new locally created rules that reflected the nation’s ongoing division over how to battle the virus. Major airlines and airports in places like Dallas, Atlanta, Los Angeles and Salt Lake City quickly switched to a mask-optional policy. New York City, Chicago, Los Angeles and Connecticut continued to require them on mass transit. But a host of other cities ditched their mandates, even though the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention continued to recommend masking on transportation. Brooke Tansley, a television producer and former Broadway performer, boarded a flight with her 4-year-old and 8-month-old baby— neither old enough to be vaccinated — only to learn the mask mandate had ended mid-flight. “Very very angry about this,” she said in a tweet, noting that her baby was too young to wear a mask. For many, though, the news was welcome. A video showed some passengers on a Delta Air Lines flight cheering and applauding as they took off their masks upon hearing the announcement they were now optional. One man could be seen happily twirling his mask on his finger. On a Southwest Airlines flight Monday from Detroit to Nashville, the change to optional status was incorporated into the safety announcements, prompting murmurs and fist pumps from some passengers and no audible complaints. At the Seattle airport, Deb McLane continued to wear a mask because of the crowds but said she was “thankful that it’s not being forced on us anymore.” In Portland, Oregon, transit employees were immediately working on taking down “mask required” announcements and signs, but said it would likely take several days to remove everything. The city joined Atlanta, Boston, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., Kansas City, Missouri, and two of Alaska’s largest cities, Anchorage and Juneau, in making masking optional on mass transit. “We know our riders have mixed feelings about the mandate ending,” Portland’s public transit agency, TriMet, posted on social media. “We ask everyone to be respectful of others as we all adjust to this change.” Some passengers at Chicago’s Union Station said the rules were confusing. Both Amtrak and Metra, the regional commuter rail service, said masks still are required, but some passengers walking through the station didn’t wear them. “It’s like this patchwork of different rules and enforcement of it,” said Erik Abderhalden, who wore a mask as he waited for a Metra train to his home in suburban Naperville. “I mean, it’s like Swiss cheese … there’s no uniformity and it seems pretty laissez faire.” The Chicago Transit Authority also said it still will require masks on city trains and buses, for now. Subway rider Cooper Klinges

Vandals scrawled swastikas on the outside of Union Station, the central hub for regional train transportation in the nation’s capital. The graffiti was discovered Friday, one day after International Holocaust Remembrance Day, with crude Nazi symbols marked on columns across the front of the massive building and several clustered around the escalator entrance to the underground D.C. Metro. Metropolitan Police Department Chief Robert Contee said the investigation would be led by the Amtrak Police, who handle security for the building. But Contee indicated that investigators were looking at some of the several people experiencing homelessness who frequently camp around the building. “It appears it may be one of our unhoused residents who did this, based on some information that has been revealed,” Contee said. “The person who did this … could very well have some mental health challenges.” A security guard on the scene pointed out that several of the swastikas were in spots that were in full view of the building’s security video cameras. Amtrak spokeswoman Kimberly Woods said an investigation is underway. “Amtrak strongly condemns this act of hate and will work with our landlord, USRC and their lessor to remove these symbols as quickly as possible,” Woods said in a statement. By midday, staff had begun to cover the swastikas with sheets of white paper secured by blue tape. District of Columbia Mayor Muriel Bowser called the incident “both shocking and unsettling.” “This antisemitic and hateful symbol has no place in our city, and we stand united with the members of our Jewish community against antisemitism in all its forms,” she said. Bowser said Union Station had a team of experts working to remove the graffiti. The Jewish Federation of Greater Washington posted a statement on Instagram, calling the timing “particularly offensive” and added, “This anti-semitic and hateful symbol has no place in our society.” It is unclear whether the connection to International Holocaust Remembrance Day was intentional. Contee said his department had been in touch with local Jewish community leaders. (AP)

Virginia officials defending their response to a blizzard that stranded hundreds of motorists along a major interstate highway said conditions for the gridlock were caused by a combination of unusually heavy snowfall, plunging temperatures and a rainy start that kept them from pretreating the roads. There were no reported deaths or injuries from the calamity on Interstate 95, one of the nations busiest highways, but plenty of outrage from motorists, some of whom were stranded overnight Monday into Tuesday, posting pleas for help on social media. “We all need to be clear that this was an incredibly unusual event,” Gov. Ralph Northam said at a news conference, adding that he could understand drivers’ “frustration and fear.” Problems began Monday morning, when a truck jackknifed on Interstate 95 between Richmond and Washington, triggering a chain reaction as other vehicles lost control, state police said. They mounted throughout the day as snow fell at a rate of up to 2 inches an hour, said Marcie Parker, a Virginia Department of Transportation engineer leading the effort to clear the interstate. “That was entirely too much for us to keep up with,” she told reporters. “Consequently, with the amount of traffic that we had on the interstate, the trucks and the cars couldn’t make it up and down the hills because we had too much snow and ice out there.” Lanes in both directions eventually became blocked along an approximately 40-mile stretch of I-95 between Richmond and Washington, D.C. As hours passed and night fell, motorists posted messages on social media about running out of fuel, food and water. Truck driver Emily Slaughter said she was driving from New Jersey to Georgia to deliver vegetables to a FedEx facility and became stranded for five hours on the southbound side of I-95. She said everything on the road was fine until she hit Virginia. “All of a sudden you could no longer see lines. It got a little scary there,” she said. Meera Rao and her husband, Raghavendra, were driving home after visiting their daughter in North Carolina when they got stuck Monday evening. They were only 100 feet past an exit but could not move for roughly 16 hours. “Not one police (officer) came in the 16 hours we were stuck,” she said. “No one came. It was just shocking. Being in the most advanced country in the world, no one knew how to even clear one lane for all of us to get out of that mess?” Northam defended his decision not to activate the Virginia National Guard or declare a state of emergency. He said the issue facing state crews was not a lack of manpower but the difficulty of getting workers and equipment through the snow and ice to where they needed to be. And he said a state of emergency, which would typically be declared hours or days before an event to create extra flexibility in responding, would have done no good. Up to 11 inches (28 cm) of snow fell in the area during Monday’s blizzard, according to the National Weather Service, and state police had warned people to avoid driving unless absolutely necessary, especially as colder nighttime temperatures set in. The National Weather Service’s Washington-area office noted in a forecast discussion Sunday that snow could fall at a

Lawmakers racing to seal a bipartisan infrastructure deal early this coming week are hitting a major roadblock over how much money should go to public transit, the group’s lead Republican negotiator said Sunday. As discussions continued through the weekend, Ohio Sen. Rob Portman said both sides were “about 90% of the way there” on an agreement. “We have one issue outstanding, and we’re not getting much response from the Democrats on it,” he said. “It’s about mass transit. Our transit number is very generous.” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., has said he wants to pass a bipartisan package and an accompanying $3.5 trillion budget plan before the Senate leaves for its August recess. He held a procedural vote last week to begin debate on the broad framework, but all 50 Senate Republicans voted against it, saying they needed to see the full details of the plan. Democrats want to see more of the money in the roughly $1 trillion infrastructure agreement go toward boosting public transportation, which include subways, light-rail lines and buses, in line with President Joe Biden’s original infrastructure proposal. The bipartisan group originally appeared to be moving toward agreement on more money for transit before an objection by Pennsylvania Sen. Pat Toomey, the top Republican on the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee which oversees public transit. He cited, in part, previous COVID-19 federal relief money that had already been allocated to public transit. “Nobody’s talking about cutting transit,” Toomey said Sunday. “The question is, how many tens of billions of dollars on top of the huge increase that they have already gotten is sufficient? And that’s where there is a little disagreement.” Typically, spending from the federal Highway Trust Fund has followed the traditional formula of 80% for highways and 20% for transit. Republicans including Toomey want to change that, but Democratic Sens. Sherrod Brown of Ohio and Tom Carper of Delaware say they will oppose the deal if it does. The White House has declined to say whether Biden would push for the additional funding for transit. “Transit funding is obviously extremely important to the president — the ‘Amtrak President,’ as we may call him,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Friday. “But we believe that members can get this work done and can work through these issues quite quickly.” The final package would need the support of 60 senators in the evenly split 50-50 Senate to advance past a filibuster — meaning at least 10 Republicans along with every Democratic member. Last week’s test vote failed along party lines. Democrats also are seeking to hammer out a compromise to pay for the package after Republicans dashed a plan to boost the IRS to go after tax scofflaws, but Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, a Democratic negotiator in the group, said he remains optimistic about reaching a deal soon. “We’re down to the last couple of items, and I think you’re going to see a bill Monday afternoon,” Warner said Sunday. Three rounds totaling nearly $70 billion in federal COVID-19 emergency assistance, including $30.5 billion that Biden signed into law in March, pulled transit agencies from the brink of financial collapse as riders steered clear of crowded spaces on subway cars and buses. That federal aid is expected to cover operating deficits from

Hours from inauguration, President-elect Joe Biden paused on what might have been his triumphal entrance to Washington Tuesday evening to mark instead the national tragedy of the coronavirus pandemic with a moment of collective grief for Americans lost. His arrival coincided with the awful news that the U.S. death toll had surpassed 400,000 in the worst public health crisis in more than a century — a crisis Biden will now be charged with controlling. “To heal we must remember,” the incoming president told the nation at a sunset ceremony at the Lincoln Memorial. Four hundred lights representing the pandemic’s victims were illuminated behind him around the monument’s Reflecting Pool. “Between sundown and dusk, let us shine the lights into the darkness … and remember all who we lost,” Biden said. The sober moment on the eve of Biden’s inauguration — typically a celebratory time in Washington when the nation marks the democratic tradition of a peaceful transfer of power — was a measure of the enormity of loss for the nation. During his brief remarks, Biden faced the larger-than life statue of Abraham Lincoln, the Civil War president who served as more than 600,000 Americans died. As he turned to walk away at the conclusion of the vigil, he faced the black granite wall listing the 58,000-plus Americans who perished in Vietnam. Biden was joined by Vice President-elect Kamala Harris, who spoke of the collective anguish of the nation, a not-so-subtle admonishment of outgoing President Donald Trump, who has spoken sparingly about the pandemic in recent months. “For many months we have grieved by ourselves,” said Harris, who will make history as the first woman to serve as vice president when she’s sworn in. “Tonight, we grieve and begin healing together.” Beyond the pandemic, Biden faces no shortage of problems when he takes the reins at the White House. The nation is also on its economic heels because of soaring unemployment, there is deep political division and immediate concern about more violence following the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. Biden, an avid fan of Amtrak who took the train thousands of times between his home in Delaware and Washington during his decades in the Senate, had planned to take a train into Washington ahead of Wednesday’s Inauguration Day but scratched that plan in the aftermath of the Capitol riot. He instead flew into Joint Base Andrews just outside the capital and then motorcaded into fortress D.C. — a city that’s been flooded by some 25,000 National Guard troops guarding a Capitol, White House and National Mall that are wrapped in a maze of barricades and tall fencing. “These are dark times,” Biden told supporters in an emotional sendoff in Delaware. “But there’s always light.” Biden, who ran for the presidency as a cool head who could get things done, plans to issue a series of executive orders on Day One — including reversing Trump’s effort to leave the Paris climate accord, canceling Trump’s travel ban on visitors from several predominantly Muslim countries, and extending pandemic-era limits on evictions and student loan payments. Trump won’t be on hand as Biden is sworn in, the first outgoing president to entirely skip inaugural festivities since Andrew Johnson more than a century and a half ago. The White House released a farewell

Top Capitol Hill negotiators sealed a deal Sunday on a $900 billion COVID-19 economic relief package, finally delivering long-overdue help to businesses and individuals and providing money to deliver vaccines to a nation eager for them. The agreement, announced by congressional leaders, would establish a temporary $300 per week supplemental jobless benefit and a $600 direct stimulus payment to most Americans, along with a new round of subsidies for hard-hit businesses and money for schools, health care providers and renters facing eviction. It came after months of battling and posturing, but the negotiating dynamic changed in Republicans’ favor after the election and as the end of the congressional session neared. President-elect Joe Biden was eager for a deal to deliver long-awaited help to suffering people and a boost to the economy, even though it was less than half the size that Democrats wanted this fall. House leaders informed lawmakers that they would vote on the legislation on Monday, and the Senate was likely to vote on Monday, too. Lawmakers were eager to leave Washington and close out a tumultuous year. “There will be another major rescue package for the American people,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said in announcing the agreement for a relief bill that would total almost $900 billion. “It is packed with targeted policies to help struggling Americans who have already waited too long.” Democrats acknowledged it wasn’t as robust a relief package as they initially sought — or, they say, the country needs. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi vowed more to come once President-elect Joe Biden takes office. “It is a first step,” she said. “We have to do more.” A fight over Federal Reserve emergency powers was resolved Saturday night by the Senate’s top Democrat, Chuck Schumer of New York, and conservative Republican Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania. That breakthrough led to a final round of negotiations Sunday. Still, delays in finalizing the agreement prompted the House to pass a one-day stopgap spending bill to prevent a government shutdown at midnight Sunday. The Senate was likely to pass the measure Sunday night as well. The final agreement would be the largest spending measure yet. It combined $900 billion for COVID-19 relief with a $1.4 trillion government-wide funding plan and lots of other unrelated measures on taxes, health, infrastructure and education. The government-wide funding would keep the government open through September. Passage neared as coronavirus cases and deaths spiked and evidence piled up that the economy was struggling. The legislation had been held up by months of dysfunction, posturing and bad faith. But talks turned serious in recent days as lawmakers on both sides finally faced the deadline of acting before leaving Washington for Christmas. “This bill is a good bill. Tonight is a good night. But it is not the end of the story, it is not the end of the job,” Schumer told reporters. “Anyone who thinks this bill is enough does not know what’s going on in America.” The $300 per week bonus jobless benefit was one half the supplemental federal unemployment benefit provided under the $1.8 billion CARES Act in March and would be limited to 11 weeks instead of 16 weeks. The direct $600 stimulus payment to most people would also be half the March payment, subject to the same income limits

President-elect Joe Biden swung behind a bipartisan COVID-19 relief effort Wednesday and his top Capitol Hill allies cut their demands for a $2 trillion-plus measure by more than half in hopes of breaking a monthslong logjam and delivering much-sought aid as the tempestuous congressional session speeds to a close. Biden said the developing aid package “wouldn’t be the answer, but it would be the immediate help for a lot of things.” He wants a relief bill to pass Congress now, with more aid to come next year. Biden’s remarks followed an announcement by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Senate Democrat leader Chuck Schumer of New York in support of an almost $1 trillion approach as the “basis” for discussions. The announcement appeared aimed at budging Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., who so far has been unwilling to abandon a $550 billion Senate GOP plan that has failed twice this fall. The Democrats embraced a $908 billion approach from moderate Sens. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and Susan Collins, R-Maine, among others. It would establish a $300 per week jobless benefit, send $160 billion to help state and local governments, boost schools and universities, revive popular “paycheck protection” subsidies for businesses, and bail out transit systems and airlines. “In the spirit of compromise we believe the bipartisan framework introduced by Senators yesterday should be used as the basis for immediate bipartisan, bicameral negotiations,” Pelosi and Schumer said. They said they would try to build upon the approach, which has support in the House from a bipartisan “problem solvers” coalition. The statement was a significant concession by Pelosi and Schumer, who played hardball this fall during failed preelection discussions with the administration on a costlier bill. They wanted a more generous unemployment benefit and far more for state and local government. Their embrace of the $908 billion measure was a retreat from a secret $1.3 trillion offer the two Democrats gave McConnell just on Monday. It’s another sign of urgency for additional COVID aid and economic stimulus as the economy struggles to recover from being slammed by the novel coronavirus. While the jobless rate isn’t as high as was feared, the restaurant and airline industries are desperate for aid, as are other businesses, state and local officials, transit systems and the Postal Service, among others. The new plan includes a liability shield for businesses and other organizations that have reopened their doors during the pandemic. It’s the first time Pelosi and Schumer have shown a willingness to consider the idea, a top priority of McConnell, though there’s been no discussion on the details, which are sure to be tricky. McConnell had dismissed the bipartisan offer on Tuesday, instead aiming to rally Republicans around the $550 billion GOP proposal. But McConnell himself endorsed a $1 trillion-or so plan this summer, only to encounter resistance from conservatives that prompted him to retrench. He has acknowledged that another infusion of aid to states and local governments, a key Pelosi demand, probably will pass eventually. McConnell wouldn’t respond when asked about the Democratic statement. His top deputy, Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., said GOP leaders might agree to merging the bipartisan proposal with McConnell’s bill. “I think there’s still time, although it’s short, to put a bill together,” Thune said. Any relief package would be attached to

A bipartisan group of lawmakers is putting pressure on congressional leaders to accept a split-the-difference solution to the protracted impasse over COVID-19 relief in a last-gasp effort to ship overdue help to a hurting nation before Congress adjourns for the holidays. The group includes Senate centrists such as Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and Susan Collins, R-Maine, who hope to exert greater influence in a closely divided Congress during the incoming Biden administration. In Wilmington, Delaware, President-elect Joe Biden called on lawmakers to approve a down payment on COVID relief, though he cautioned that “any package passed in lame-duck session is — at best — just a start.” The proposal hit the scales at $908 billion, including $228 billion to extend and upgrade “paycheck protection” subsidies for businesses for a second round of relief to hard-hit businesses like restaurants. It would revive a special jobless benefit, but at a reduced level of $300 per week rather than the $600 benefit enacted in March. State and local governments would receive $160 billion, and there is also money for vaccines. Earlier, larger versions of the proposal — a framework with only limited detail — were rejected by top leaders such as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. But pressure is building as lawmakers face the prospect of heading home for Christmas and New Year’s without delivering aid to people in need. It comes after a split-decision election delivered the White House to Democrats and gave Republicans down-ballot success. At less than $1 trillion, the plan is less costly than a proposal meshed together by McConnell this summer. He later abandoned that effort for a considerably less costly measure that failed to advance in two attempts this fall. “It’s not a time for political brinkmanship,” Manchin said. “Emergency relief is needed now more than ever before. The people need to know that we are not going to leave until we get something accomplished.” Sen. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., a member of the GOP leadership, gave a tentative thumbs up to the idea, though he said time is running out and working against it. “I think $900 billion would do a lot more good right now than $2 trillion will do in March,” Blunt said. “This is an important time to step up if we can.” The pressure comes as Pelosi and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin are set to reconvene their conversations about COVID relief and other end-of-session items, including a $1.4 trillion catchall government funding bill, as the Trump administration comes to a close. Mnuchin told reporters as he arrived at a Senate Banking Committee hearing to assess earlier COVID rescue efforts that he and Pelosi are focused primarily on the unfinished appropriations bills, however. “I will be speaking to the speaker this afternoon. We’re going to talk about where we are on the appropriations issue. Keeping the government running, that is the first priority,” Mnuchin told reporters. “And I’m sure we’ll also be mentioning COVID Relief.” Pelosi and Mnuchin grappled over a relief bill for weeks before the election, discussing legislation of up to $2 trillion, but Senate GOP conservatives opposed their efforts and Pelosi refused to yield on key points. The compromise is virtually free of detail and includes a temporary shield against COVID-related lawsuits against businesses and

The number of laid-off Americans seeking unemployment benefits fell last week to 787,000, a sign that job losses may have eased slightly but are still running at historically high levels. Last week’s figure was down from 842,000 the previous week, the Labor Department said Thursday. The government also revised down the number of people who sought aid in the two weeks before that. The revised total for the week that ended Oct. 3 was 767,000, the fewest since the viral pandemic erupted in March, though still more than three times the levels that preceded the pandemic. Economists welcomed the declines as evidence that the job market is still recovering from the pandemic recession. But some cautioned that the improvement could prove short-lived. With confirmed infections having neared 60,000 in the past week, the most since July, consumers have been unable or reluctant to shop, travel, dine out or congregate in crowds — a trend that has led some employers to keep cutting jobs. Several states are reporting a record number of hospitalizations from the virus. “We doubt it will continue as COVID infections spread rapidly, pushing down demand for discretionary consumer services, especially in the hospitality sector,” said Ian Shepherdson, chief economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics, referring to the portion of the economy that includes hard-hit hotels, restaurants and bars. The downward revisions in applications for unemployment aid reflect a sharp decline in California, which in recent months has accounted for one-fourth of the nation’s total jobless claims. California stopped processing new applications for two weeks while it implemented anti-fraud technology and sought to process a huge backlog. The state’s workforce agency is now reporting a 30% drop in the number of new applications compared with its earlier levels. A drop that sharp suggests that the state’s previous figures had overstated layoffs and jobless claims in California. Many economists have grown skeptical of the accuracy of the government’s weekly figures. That’s because of fraud and the concern that some states may be double-counting applicants in their regular unemployment programs and in a new program that made contractors and gig workers eligible for jobless aid for the first time. In many states, contractors and gig workers must apply for aid under both the regular program and the new program to determine their eligibility. Applications fell broadly last week across the country, not just in California, declining in 39 states while rising in 11. They dropped nearly 12,000 in Florida, 10,000 in New York and 5,800 in Washington state. Thursday’s report also said the number of people who are continuing to receive unemployment benefits tumbled by 1 million to 8.4 million. The decline shows that some of the unemployed are being recalled to their old jobs or are finding new ones. But it also indicates that many jobless Americans have used up their state unemployment aid — which typically expires after six months — and have transitioned to a federal extended benefits program that lasts an additional three months. Many jobless recipients are now receiving only regular state unemployment payments because a federal weekly supplement of $300 has ended in nearly all states. And a $600-a-week federal benefit expired over the summer. The still-elevated number of jobless claims underscores that a full recovery from the pandemic recession remains far off. Job growth has

Bitter cold is setting in after a major winter storm blanketed a wide swath of the country in snow, sleet and rain this weekend, creating dangerously icy conditions that promise to complicate cleanup efforts and make travel challenging on Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Some of the coldest temperatures felt so far this season started to set in across the Midwest and Northeast Sunday and are expected to plunge further overnight. Wind chills will bring temperatures into teens in the New York City area and down to minus 40 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 40 degrees Celsius) in upstate New York, the National Weather Service predicted. In New England, they’ll fall to as low as 20 F (29 C) below zero around Boston and as low as 35 F (37 C) below zero in parts of Vermont, Maine and New Hampshire, the service said. Temperatures across the Great Lakes, Ohio Valley and the Mid-Atlantic will drop 10 to 20 degrees Fahrenheit below average, the service said. “It’s life-threatening,” said Ray O’Keefe, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Albany. “These are dangerous conditions that we’re going to be in and they’re prolonged, right through tomorrow.” The freeze will follow the weekend’s run-ins with power outages, canceled trains and planes, overnight stays at the airport and traffic jams. Local officials warned residents to limit their time outside to prevent frostbite and to avoid treacherous travel conditions. They also said places could see strong wind gusts, flooding and further power outages. Utilities in Connecticut reported more than 20,000 customers without power by Sunday afternoon. “We had more freezing rain and sleet than we expected,” Hartford Mayor Luke Bronin said Sunday as public works crews across the state raced to clear and treat major roadways before dangerous black ice could form. Amtrak canceled trains across the Midwest and Northeast over the weekend, but promised full service would resume Monday. Boston’s transit system urged commuters to allow 10 to 15 minutes of extra travel time and warned of icy conditions for pedestrians come Monday. The storm — caused by the clash of an Arctic high-pressure system with a low-pressure system coming through the Ohio Valley — wreaked havoc on air travel and other forms of transportation all weekend. More than 1,500 flights were canceled nationwide Sunday, according to FlightAware, a flight tracking company. Among the hardest hit was Boston’s Logan Airport, where stranded passengers lingered Sunday as typically bustling security lines, ticketing counters and baggage claims were largely deserted. Xavi Ortega, a 32-year old engineer from Spain, said he and his wife slept overnight at the airport after their Saturday night flight home to Barcelona was canceled. He said the couple hoped to board a flight Sunday night. “We’ve been sleeping, playing Candy Crush,” Ortega said when asked how’d they been passing the hours. A ferry service route across Lake Champlain between Vermont and New York was also closed Sunday and flights were mostly cancelled at major airports in Vermont and New Hampshire. In the Midwest, where it dumped 10 inches (25 centimeters) of snow in parts, the storm caused a plane to skid on a slick runway at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport on Saturday, though no injuries were reported. In Kansas, a snowplow driver was killed when his vehicle rolled over, and in southeastern