Tag Archives: News Stories

News: Top 5 Stories For July 29, 2021 (Reuters)

Five stories to know for July 29: $1 trillion infrastructure bill, Federal workers, Big Tech, COVID-19, Tunisia

1. A roughly $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure investment bill advanced in the U.S. Senate, passing a key milestone that moves the emerging legislation toward formal debate and possible passage.

2. President Joe Biden is expected to announce that all civilian federal workers will need to be vaccinated against the coronavirus or face regular testing, social distancing, mask requirements and travel limits, a source said.

3. Twitter is shutting its reopened offices in the U.S., while other big tech companies are making vaccination mandatory for on-campus employees, as the highly infectious Delta COVID-19 variant drives a resurgence in cases.

4. Australia’s military will help enforce a lockdown in Sydney after the city of 6 million posted a record daily rise in COVID-19 cases and state authorities said the outbreak was likely to get worse.

5. Tunisia’s president said he was addressing the dire economic and COVID-19 situation and probing widespread corruption after invoking emergency powers to seize control of government in a move his foes called a coup.

News: Top 5 Stories For July 22, 2021 (Reuters)

Five stories to know for July 22: Pelosi blocks GOP, infrastructure debate, Oregon wildfire, China floods, Pfizer and AstraZeneca shots

1. The top Republican in the U.S. House of Representatives withdrew his five nominees to serve on the special committee probing the Capitol attack after Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi rejected two of them.

2. Senate Republicans blocked a move to open debate on a $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure measure that is a top priority for Democratic President Joe Biden, but the chamber was poised to take it up again as early as Monday.

3. A destructive Oregon wildfire that ranks as the largest among dozens raging across the drought-parched Western United States in recent weeks was ignited by lightning.

4. Tens of thousands of people were being evacuated from flood-hit regions of central China as officials raised the death toll from heavy rain that has deluged Henan province for almost a week to 33 people.

5. Two doses of Pfizer or AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine are nearly as effective against the highly transmissible Delta coronavirus variant as they are against the previously dominant Alpha variant, a study showed.

News: Top 5 Stories For June 23, 2021 (Reuters)

Five stories to know for June 23:

1. The U.S. Senate failed to advance legislation that would have opened up a protracted debate over voting rights after Republicans blocked the move, leaving the effort in limbo.

2. Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams was leading a field of 13 Democratic candidates in Tuesday’s primary election, though the outcome likely won’t be known for weeks. The totals were enough to force a concession from former presidential candidate Andrew Yang.

3. President Joe Biden plans to unveil new steps to curtail U.S. gun violence including measures aimed at stemming the flow of firearms used in crimes, after pledging to push for sweeping changes to firearms laws.

4. Hong Kong’s pro-democracy tabloid Apple Daily will print its last edition, the paper said, after a stormy year in which it was raided by police and its tycoon owner and other staff were arrested under a new national security law.

5. Iran said that Washington had agreed to remove all sanctions on Iran’s oil and shipping, and take some senior figures off a blacklist, at talks to revive Tehran’s 2015 nuclear deal with global powers which are now on a pause.

News: Top 5 Stories For June 18, 2021 (Reuters)

Five stories to know for June 18, 2021:

1. The U.S. Supreme Court has rejected a Republican bid to invalidate the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, preserving the landmark healthcare law for the third time since its 2010 enactment.

2. Juneteenth is now a federal holiday. Joe Biden signed into law a bill making June 19 a national holiday commemorating the emancipation of enslaved Black Americans.

3. China launched three astronauts up to its unfinished space station on the Shenzhou-12 spacecraft. The astronauts will live in a module called ‘Tianhe’ for three months.

4. Israeli aircraft struck Hamas sites in Gaza on Thursday night after incendiary balloons were launched from the Palestinian enclave, for the second time this week, since a fragile ceasefire ended 11 days of deadly fighting last month.

5. Iranians voted in a presidential election likely to be won by a hardline judge subject to U.S. sanctions.

News: Top 5 Stories For June 17, 2021 (Reuters)

Five stories to know for June 17, 2021:

1. The Biden-Putin summit in Geneva highlighted huge differences but also small gains. Russia said arms control talks agreed with the U.S. should start within weeks.

2. U.S. Senate Democrats are scrambling to unite around a sweeping election reform bill that they aim to bring to a vote next week, in the face of Republican opposition and state moves to pass laws placing new restrictions on voting.

3. Biden is set to sign a bill declaring Juneteenth a federal holiday commemorating the end of legal enslavement of Black Americans.

4. Chinese state media quoted a disease expert saying the COVID-19 origins probe should shift to the United States after a study showed the disease could have been circulating there as early as December 2019. China’s top diplomat, said the idea that coronavirus escaped from a Wuhan laboratory is an “absurd story.”

5. Five hundred Hong Kong police officers sifted through reporters’ computers and notebooks at pro-democracy tabloid Apple Daily, alleging that Apple Daily articles violate the national security law

News: Top 5 Stories For June 4, 2021 (Reuters)

Five stories to know for June 4: Infrastructure deal, COVID vaccines, George Floyd Square, Tiananmen and Tokyo Games

1. President Joe Biden offered to scrap his proposed corporate tax hike during negotiations with Republicans, sources say, in what would be a major concession by the Democratic president.

2. The White House laid out a plan for the United States to share 25 million surplus COVID-19 vaccine doses to the world.

3. Work crews in Minneapolis took down barricades that had stopped most vehicles from driving through the intersection where George Floyd was murdered, though activists quickly replaced them with makeshift barriers.

4. Hong Kong sealed off a park where tens of thousands gather annually to commemorate China’s 1989 Tiananmen crackdown and arrested the vigil’s organizer.

5. A Japanese Olympic Committee board member blasted organizers of the Tokyo Games for ignoring public concerns about holding the global sporting showpiece amid a pandemic.

News: Top 5 Stories For June 3, 2021 (Reuters)

Five stories to know for June 3: Biden’s vaccine incentive, Derek Chauvin, Israeli politics, 12 and 14 year olds shootout with police and Sri Lanka braces for a potential oil spill.

1. From free beer to free childcare, President Joe Biden touted new efforts to get 70 percent of U.S. adults at least one shot of vaccination against COVID-19 by the July 4.

2. Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin asked a judge for probation after being convicted for the murder of George Floyd, while the prosecution said he should be imprisoned for 30 years.

3. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu fought back against an agreement by his political opponents for a government of left-wing, centrist and right-wing parties aimed at unseating him.

4. Two children in Florida ran away from a group home, broke into a house and engaged in a shootout with law enforcement officers responding to the scene, authorities said on Wednesday.

5. Sri Lanka braced for the possibility of an oil spill after a cargo ship laden with chemicals sank off its western coast, in what is already the country’s worst ever man-made environmental disaster.

News: Top 5 Stories For June 2, 2021 (Reuters)

Five stories to know for June 2: June 2: Biden on Tulsa massacre, Harris’ voting efforts, Dems on Texas, Florida’s ban on transgender athletes and Netanyahu faces uncertain future.

1. Joe Biden became the first sitting U.S. president to visit the site in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where hundreds of Black Americans were massacred by a white mob in 1921.

2. President Joe Biden announced Vice President Kamala Harris will lead the administration’s efforts on voting rights as Republican state lawmakers across the country attempt to enact voting restrictions.

3. Democrats celebrated the boycott by Texas state lawmakers that prevented sweeping new Republican-backed voting restrictions from becoming law over the weekend.

4. Florida became the latest and largest U.S. state to ban transgender girls and women from participating in female sports at schools.

5. Israel’s opposition leader moved closer to unseating Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and forming a new government after agreeing terms with several parties, a spokesman said.

News: Top 5 Stories For June 1, 2021 (Reuters)

June 1, 2021: Biden to visit Tulsa massacre site, Texas voting bill, assailants open fire on a crowd in Florida, indigenous groups in Canada demand a nationwide search for further graves

1. Joe Biden will be the first sitting U.S. president to visit the site of the Tulsa massacre, where hundreds of Black Americans were killed by a white mob. Biden’s trip is a sharp contrast to a year ago, when then-President Donald Trump, a Republican who criticized Black Lives Matter and other racial justice movements, planned a political rally in Tulsa on June 19, the “Juneteenth” anniversary that celebrates the end of U.S. slavery in 1865. The rally was postponed after criticism.

2. Democrats in the Texas House of Representatives boycotted a legislative session, blocking a vote on an election reform bill critics say would make it harder for Blacks and Hispanics to vote.

3. A shooting in Miami early on Sunday, killed two people and wounded more than 20, police and media reported. Assailants opened fire on a crowd outside a concert.

4. Indigenous groups in Canada are calling for a nationwide search for mass graves at residential school sites after the discovery of the remains of 215 children at one former school last week shocked the country.

5. China’s decision to allow families to have up to three children was met with skepticism, with doubts expressed on social media whether it would make much difference.