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The Latest: Trump attends re-election fundraiser in Ohio

LIMA, Ohio (AP) — The Latest on President Donald Trump's visit to Ohio (all times local):

Justice Thomas speaks as U.S. top court confronts racial bias in jury selection

U.S. Supreme Court justices appeared poised to side with a black Mississippi death row inmate put on trial six times for a 1996 quadruple murder who accused a prosecutor of repeatedly blocking black potential jurors, though the court's only black member sounded skeptical. Justice Clarence Thomas, who had not posed a question during an oral argument in three years, asked several in the case involving Curtis Flowers, 48, who has argued that his constitutional right to a fair trial was violated. Thomas, an idiosyncratic conservative and only the second African American ever appointed to the court, signaled through his questions he might vote against Flowers, who otherwise drew broad support among the other justices, both liberal and conservative.

'Change Is Closer Than We Think.' Inside Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's Unlikely Rise

Every 10 minutes or so, someone knocks on the big wooden door of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s office on Capitol Hill. The noise makes staffers stiffen. It’s…

FBI joins criminal probe into Boeing 737 Max 8 safety certification in wake of crashes

The FBI has joined the widening criminal probe into how Boeing's 737 Max 8 jets were deemed as safe in the months before two of them crashed in Indonesia and Ethiopia,

Citigroup to sell Venezuelan gold in setback to President Maduro: sources

Maduro's government has since 2014 used financial operations known as gold swaps to use its international reserves to gain access to cash after a slump in oil revenues left it struggling to obtain hard currency. Under the terms of the 2015 deal with Citigroup's Citibank, Venezuela was due to repay $1.1 billion of the loan on March 11, according to four sources familiar with the situation. Citibank plans to sell the gold held as a guarantee - which has a market value of roughly $1.358 billion - to recover the first tranche of the loan and will deposit the excess of roughly $258 million in a bank account in New York, two of the sources said.

CNN takes over a week to report Covington lawsuit

What happened to 'facts first'? Reaction from former Secret Service agent Dan Bongino.

Sanders: ‘We Must Follow New Zealand’s Lead’ on Assault-Rifle Ban

Senator Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.) on Thursday praised New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Ardern for immediately banning military-style semi-automatic weapons in response to the Christchurch mosque shootings, and suggested the executive action should serve as a blueprint for the U.S.> This is what real action to stop gun violence looks like. We must follow New Zealand's lead, take on the NRA and ban the sale and distribution of assault weapons in the United States. https://t.co/lSAisDG9Ur> > -- Bernie Sanders (@BernieSanders) March 21, 2019The ban, which applies to semi-automatic rifles and shotguns that can be equipped with detachable magazines capable of holding more than five rounds, went into immediate effect Thursday to prevent stockpiling, and legislation codifying it is expected to pass Parliament in the coming days. Once the bill passes, New Zealanders will be granted a buyback period, after which they will be fined and jailed for up to three years if found in possession of a banned weapon.“On 15 March, our history changed forever. Now, our laws will, too,” Ardern said Thursday. “We are announcing action today on behalf of all New Zealanders to strengthen our gun laws and make our country a safer place.”Gun ownership is popular in New Zealand but there is no right to self defense codified in the country's laws.The announcement comes just six days after a 28-year-old Australian man killed 50 people and injured 40 others while rampaging through two mosques in Christchurch. The second shooting, at the Linwood mosque, was interrupted after one congregant retrieved his firearm from his house and returned to confront the attacker.While the exact weapon used in the attack remains unknown, images of the weapon appear to show an AR-15, a widely available semi-automatic rifle.Prior to the attack, the shooter published an extensive manifesto online that was replete with white-nationalist propaganda and mentioned stirring controversy around the U.S. gun-control debate as one motive for the massacre.Sanders, who was criticized by Hillary Clinton during the 2016 Democratic primaries for being too moderate on the issue of gun control, has in recent years embraced the Democratic establishment's insistence on banning assault rifles outright.Senator Chris Murphy (D., Conn.), who has helped lead Democrats' gun-control efforts since the Sandy Hook massacre, also praised Ardern's swift action in a Thursday tweet.> See. It’s not that hard. https://t.co/6nTAYmHjnb> > -- Chris Murphy (@ChrisMurphyCT) March 21, 2019

Bringing the Sting: The U.S. Navy Is Getting New F/A-18E/F Super Hornets

The Super Hornets would be the first new-build examples of the Block III variant of the F/A-18E/F. The Block III flies farther and carries more weapons than an older F/A-18E/F can do and also is stealthier than earlier Super Hornet models are.

Some Pickups Lag in Passenger Crash Protection

Crash Tests Show Some Pickup Trucks Lag in Passenger Protection Most pickup trucks fall short when it comes to protecting passengers in certain types of crashes, according to new findings from t...

Ex-cop says he thought he saw a gun when he shot black teen

PITTSBURGH (AP) — A white former police officer said Thursday he thought a weapon was pointed at him when he shot and killed an unarmed black teenager outside Pittsburgh last summer.

President Trump's latest executive order is a shot in the campus free speech wars

But while Trump’s order is a clear declaration he agrees with conservative concerns about America’s colleges, it’s not clear what actual effect the move will have in academia.

Who was Renty? The story of the slave whose racist photos have triggered a lawsuit against Harvard

The photos of Renty and his daughter Delia, taken in nude in 1850 against their will for a Harvard University professor, are now the subject of a lawsuit that Tamara Lanier has filed this week.

Missouri towns prepare for deluge as floods move downstream

A string of small Missouri towns on Wednesday prepared for the next deluge along the snow-melt-swollen Missouri River after flooding wreaked nearly $1.5 billion in damage in Nebraska, killing at least four people and leaving another man missing. High water unleashed by last week's late-winter storm and swiftly melting snow this week has already inundated a large swath of Missouri, Nebraska and Iowa along the Missouri River, North America's longest river. The Missouri River's next big flood crest was due to hit St. Joseph, Missouri, about 55 miles (89 km) north of Kansas City, Missouri, and Atchison, Kansas, a short distance downstream, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers spokesman James Lowe said on a briefing call.

Jury finding upends Bayer's Roundup defense strategy: experts

Bayer shares tumbled more than 12 percent on Wednesday after a unanimous jury in San Francisco federal court found Roundup to be a "substantial factor" in causing California resident Edwin Hardeman's non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. The jury decision was a blow to Bayer after the judge in the Hardeman case, at the company's request, had split the trial, severely limiting evidence plaintiffs could present in the first phase. Tuesday's defeat on terms considered advantageous to Bayer sets up the second phase to be even tougher and limits the grounds on which the company could appeal any final verdict, the experts said.

2020 election: Kamala Harris and Beto O’Rourke jump in new poll, but Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders tie as frontrunners

A new poll has revealed early gains for Kamala Harris and Beto O’Rourke in the growing field of 2020 Democratic presidential candidates — but they’re still far from being the frontrunners at this stage in the game. Joe Biden, the former vice president who has yet to formally announce his candidacy, has been leading the pack in a slate of polls putting him ahead of his lesser known potential opponents. Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders is now tied with Mr Biden at 26 per cent of total support from Democratic voters, however, according to a new Emerson poll released on Wednesday.

Brexit End Likely to Be Based on a Customs Union, JPMorgan Says

(Bloomberg) -- The realities of the Brexit situation indicate that the U.K. is going to end up with “something that’s founded on a customs union” with the European Union, according to Karen Ward, chief market strategist for Europe, Middle East and Africa at JPMorgan Asset Management.

Indonesia's Garuda says to cancel 49-jet Boeing 737 deal after crashes

Indonesia's national carrier Garuda has told Boeing it will cancel a multi-billion-dollar order for 49 Boeing 737 Max 8 jets after two fatal crashes involving the plane, in what is thought to be the first formal cancellation for the model. "We have sent a letter to Boeing requesting that the order be cancelled," Garuda spokesman Ikhsan Rosan said. "The reason is that Garuda passengers in Indonesia have lost trust and no longer have the confidence" in the plane, he said, adding that the airline was awaiting a response from Boeing.

USC Just Named a New President. Here's What She Said About the Admissions Scandal

"I am not afraid about taking on challenges," Carol Folt said.

Ex-President Temer to give testimony in Brazil after arrest

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Brazilian federal police expect to take testimony from ex-President Michel Temer and his former Cabinet minister Wellington Moreira Franco on Friday, a day after both were arrested as part of the country's sprawling Car Wash corruption probe.

Kellyanne Conway says Trump is 'protective of me' in feud with her husband

White House counselor Kellyanne Conway on Thursday continued to defend her boss, President Trump, who called her husband, George, a “whack job” whose feud with Trump is “doing a tremendous disservice to a wonderful wife.”

Robert Kraft's plea deal offer for prostitution charges hinders real progress on sex trafficking

Those who buy sex have more power and privilege than those who sell it. There's a disgusting imbalance in every commercial sex interaction.

Druze on Golan Heights reject Trump backing for Israeli sovereignty

The fertile hillsides of the Israeli-occupied Golan are scattered with villages inhabited by 22,000 Druze, an Arab minority who practice an offshoot of Islam. Many still have relatives on the Syrian side of the fortified boundary. In Majdal Shams, older residents remember being part of Syria before Israel captured most of the heights in the 1967 Middle East war, occupying and later annexing it in 1981.

Facebook Stopped Bangladeshi Ad Farm Targeting Utah in Midterms

Political news in a Utah congressional district wasn’t coming from inside the U.S. -- a mismatch Facebook had tuned its software algorithms to detect. A data scientist in the election-monitoring center at Facebook headquarters in Menlo Park, California, inspected the activity manually and discovered, at 11:47 a.m., that the source spreading the content was an ad farm in Bangladesh. The slides, viewed by Bloomberg News, show in detail how Facebook has improved its process for rooting out bad actors using tactics similar to those Russian operatives used in 2016.

Energy giants spent $1bn on climate lobbying, PR since Paris: watchdog

The five largest publicly listed oil and gas majors have spent $1 billion since the 2015 Paris climate deal on public relations or lobbying that is "overwhelmingly in conflict" with the landmark accord's goals, a watchdog said Friday. Despite outwardly committing to support the Paris agreement and its aim to limit global temperature rises, ExxonMobil, Shell, Chevron, BP and Total spend a total of $200 million a year on efforts "to operate and expand fossil fuel operations," according to InfluenceMap, a pro-transparency monitor. Two of the companies -- Shell and Chevron -- said they rejected the watchdog's findings.

The Pentagon's Watchdog Is Investigating Whether the Acting Defense Secretary Boosted Boeing

The Department of Defense Office of Inspector General has launched an investigation into Acting Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan.

More Misconceptions about College

Now that we’ve all had a good airing of grievances about elite colleges and their attendant injustices, let’s get some perspective.While the numbers of high-school graduates heading off to college have increased in recent years, the percentages graduating with a four-year degree have not increased much. Many students, especially those who are the first in their families to attend college, drop out before receiving a degree. (They cannot drop out of student-loan payments, though.)Data from the Lumina Foundation show that among Americans aged 25–64, 52.4 percent have no more than a high-school diploma (though 15.4 percent of them attended college for a while). An additional 5.2 percent received a certificate of some kind, and 9.2 percent obtained an associate’s degree. What most people think of when you say “college” is a four-year institution. Only 21.1 percent received bachelor’s degrees, and another 12.2 percent also earned graduate degrees. Adding the last two categories brings the fraction of Americans with college or graduate degrees to just over one-third.While most of the conversation in the past week has focused on highly selective colleges such as Yale and Penn, it’s important to remember that only a small number of America’s colleges are selective. As FiveThirtyEight has reported, more than 75 percent of undergrads attend colleges that accept at least half of all applicants. The number who attend selective colleges -- i.e., schools that accept 25 percent or fewer — is just 4 percent. And the number who attend schools in the very top tier, colleges that reject 90 percent or more, can be counted on your fingers and toes. You can probably guess most of them. (Though not all. On this U.S. News list, Pomona College came in at No. 11, and the Minerva Schools at Keck Graduate Institute came in first.) Less than 1 percent of college students attend these elite schools.Most students attend commuter schools, which tend to be community colleges. Even among those at four-year institutions, almost 25 percent attend part-time. Half of college students are also working, not getting plastered at frat parties.There’s a healthy debate in policy circles about whether our current cultural preoccupation with college for all is a good thing. Some people who are funneled toward college might be a better fit for vocational training, apprenticeships, or other life paths; and while there is no doubt about the association between college completion and higher income, there is uncertainty about the causal relationship.Rather than gnash our collective teeth about whether Jason or Jessica can get into MIT, we might want to focus on all students, those who are headed for college and those who are not. Every student in elementary and high school should be learning about the “success sequence.” The phrase was introduced by Isabel Sawhill and Ron Haskins of the Brookings Institution and has lately been reinforced with a study by W. Bradford Wilcox and Wendy Wang of the Institute for Family Studies.What they’ve found is that students have it within their power to virtually guarantee a middle- or upper-class income if they follow three steps. Those three basics are 1) finish high school, 2) get a full-time job, and 3) get married before having children. Young people who follow all three steps have only a 3 percent likelihood of living in poverty when they reach young adulthood. Eighty-six percent of Millennials who put marriage first had incomes in the middle or upper third, compared with 53 percent who had children before marriage. The success sequence works for those born into poverty, too. Seventy-one percent of Millennials who grew up in the bottom third of the income distribution were in the middle or upper third by young adulthood if they followed the three steps. Among African Americans, 76 percent who followed the success sequence achieved the middle class or above, and among Hispanics, the percentage was 81 percent.With all of the emphasis on a tiny sliver of the top 1 percent of students, most young people can get the impression that they are doomed to a lesser life. In fact, avoiding a few pitfalls like dropping out of high school, having a baby out of wedlock, and failing to find employment is a ticket to success.There’s a bias among writer types to pay attention to Princeton and Columbia. But that’s not really where the action is in helping most Americans.© 2019 Creators.com

The Latest: UN calls on Venezuelan parties to lower tensions

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — The Latest on the political crisis in Venezuela (all times local):

Midwest flooding makes a dent in farmers' wages

Record flooding has devastated a wide swath of the Midwest Farm Belt where many farmers have been struggling due to a U.S.-China trade war. Early estimates of lost crops and livestock, in the aftermath of the floods, are approaching $1 billion in Nebraska alone. Jillian Kitchener reports.

Catholic Church scandal: 395 Illinois priests, deacons accused of sexual misconduct

A report identifies 395 Catholic clergy members in Illinois who have been accused of sexual misconduct.

T-Mobile unveils home broadband service that could expand after Sprint merger

T-Mobile on Thursday unveiled a limited home internet service that it plans to pilot for 50,000 mobile customers at $50 a month, with the company promising it could build on that, and eventually offer a lot more once its $26.5 billion merger with Sprint finally goes through.For now, the new invitation-only service will focus on areas where the carrier can deliver high-speed internet access to connect up to 50,000 homes in rural and underserved parts of the country. Once it merges with Sprint, however, T-Mobile says it should be able to cover more than half of the US with broadband service by 2024.This seems to be one attempt by T-Mobile to push back against critics of the proposed merger who worry it will leave customers with less choice and the potential for prices to rise. "We're walking the walk and laying the foundation for a world where we can take the fight to Big Cable on behalf of consumers and offer real choice, competition and savings to Americans nationwide," T-Mobile CEO John Legere about the home broadband pilot.The service will be offered only in areas where T-Mobile expects to deliver speeds of around 50 Mbps through fixed unlimited wireless service over LTE, with no data caps. The carrier points to one economist's estimate that showed while customers today pay around $80 a month for wired in-home broadband service, "the new T-Mobile will save customers up to $13.65 billion a year on home broadband by 2024".As context for why it decided to pursue the new service, T-Mobile went on to note in its announcement that almost half of Americans today have no competitive choice for high-speed in-home broadband. "The New T-Mobile," the company declares, "will be armed with spectrum and network assets that will build the highest capacity wireless network in US history, covering millions with 5G, not just a few people in a few blocks of a few cities like the other guys."If you're eligible to participate in the home broadband pilot, T-Mobile plans to start sending out invitations by email and regular mail this week.We mentioned T-Mobile's pending merger with Sprint, and it's also worth pointing out, as a reminder, that it's still under review by federal regulators. T-Mobile has said it feels optimistic everything will be approved in the first half of this year.

Battle for last Islamic State enclave edges toward its end

The operation to take Islamic State's last enclave in eastern Syria looked close to an end on Wednesday, with no sign of clashes as U.S.-backed fighters said they were combing the area for hidden jihadists. Reuters reporters overlooking Baghouz from a hill on the bank of the Euphrates at the Iraqi border said the area was calm, and the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) militia searched for tunnels and landmines, an SDF official said. The SDF on Tuesday captured an encampment where the jihadists had been mounting a last defense of the tiny enclave, pushing diehard fighters onto a sliver of land at the Euphrates riverside.

Seats aboard JetBlue now feature most legroom of any US airline

Long-legged flyers may be interested to learn that JetBlue's newest cabin redesign now features the most legroom of any US airline for economy-class cabins. 

Police, tradesmen rush to prepare ravaged mosque for Friday prayers

New Zealand police and tradesmen are working intensively in the hope of readying the Al Noor mosque to hold Friday prayers, just a week after it was the centre of a racist shooting which left 50 dead. "Police have been working relentlessly, doing everything in our power to gather all appropriate evidence from what are active crime scenes so we can allow people to return to the mosques as quickly as possible," a police spokesman said, referring to Al Noor and a second mosque in Christchurch attacked by the gunman. An army of carpenters, glaziers, gardeners and carpet layers could be seen entering the Al Noor grounds Thursday and the police spokesman said they were trying to return the mosque to its original state.

Watchdog Probing Boeing, FAA to Testify to Senate Aviation Panel

Calvin Scovel, the Transportation Department’s inspector general, will testify along with FAA Acting Administrator Daniel Elwell and National Transportation Safety Board Chairman Robert Sumwalt, the Senate Commerce Committee said on its website. The committee also intends to hear from Boeing executives, pilots and other aviation industry groups in a second hearing in the near future, the panel said.

US' Pompeo boosts Israel prime minister ahead of election

JERUSALEM (AP) — U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Wednesday lauded the White House's warm ties with Israel during a visit to the country and promised to step up pressure on Iran, giving a public boost to Israel's prime minister at the height of a tight re-election campaign.

Midwest flooding shuts down nearly a sixth of U.S. ethanol production

Rail lines are washed out, and corn in storage is flood-damaged.

Home loan applications rise as wealthier shoppers hunt for more expensive houses

Mortgage interest rates are now lower than a year ago, and home shoppers are buying in, but most are wealthier and purchasing more expensive homes.

Samantha Bee skewers Democratic 2020 hopefuls on late-night talk show

Late-night TV host Samantha Bee ripped into the growing field of Democratic 2020 presidential hopefuls Wednesday night. The 'Full Frontal' host commented on everything from Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand's campaign slogan, to former Vice President Joe Biden not making a decision on his third potential presidential run. The TBS star also went after former Texas congressman Beto O'Rourke, Sen. Cory Booker and Sen. Amy Klobuchar.

Love it or Hate it?: China Is Studying Russia's New Su-57 Stealth Fighter

The Su-57's overall capability is "not bad at all," Global Times paraphrased Wang as saying.

Google, Facebook, Amazon: Warren's toothless break-up plan ignores real Big Tech threats

Surveillance and manipulation are the real threats these companies pose. They'd still have more unchecked power than any dictator under Warren's plan.

Correction: Mob Shooting story

TOMS RIVER, N.J. (AP) — In some versions of a story March 18 about a court hearing over the killing of a reputed Gambino crime boss, The Associated Press erroneously reported where the victim was born. Francesco Cali was born in New York City, not in Sicily.

Kentucky Governor Signs Law Prohibiting Abortions Based on Unborn’s Sex, Race, or Disabilities

Kentucky governor Matt Bevin on Tuesday signed a bill that bans abortions chosen on the basis of an unborn child's sex, race, or disability.A court filing in the U.S. District Court in Louisville indicated that the governor has signed the bill, which included an "emergency clause" stipulating that it would go into effect immediately.Physicians must now certify in writing that the patient did not request the abortion for a reason related to the baby's sex, race, or disabilities. Flouting the new law puts doctors at risk of losing their medical license or being prosecuted for a felony, although the mother of the unborn child would not be targeted.The American Civil Liberties Union is challenging the bill in federal court as an unconstitutional restriction on a woman's right to abortion.“Instituting laws that instantly affect critical patient care should not be a cat-and-mouse game,” the group said, asking that it be notified when the bill is signed.Another new law that bans abortions after about six weeks or when a heartbeat can be detected forced Kentucky's sole abortion clinic, EMW Women's Surgical Center in Louisville, to cancel some appointments on Friday until a federal judge intervened.“EMW and its abortionists have responded with a novel claim: Women have a constitutional right to undergo race-based abortions, gender-based abortions, and disability-based abortions. In plaintiffs’ view, somewhere in the Fourteenth Amendment’s penumbra lies a protection for eugenics,” the governor's lawyer M. Stephen Pitt wrote in defending the ban on eugenics-based abortions. “This is a perverse distortion of Roe v. Wade.”

Who is running for president? Here's a list of the candidates so far

The 2020 field has become crowded in recent weeks. Here's a look at who has announced their candidacy or opened an exploratory committee in the hunt for the presidency.

Trump Lauds Ohio Military Plant And Blasts GM for Closed Factory

The Lima factory, which is set to grow from 400 employees before Trump’s presidency to 1,000 by year’s end, builds Abrams tanks and Stryker combat vehicles. It stands in stark contrast to another nearby symbol of American manufacturing: General Motors Co.’s Lordstown plant, which has been idled due to slow sales of the car that’s built there.