IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) — After facing a workforce shortage for months, Iowa awarded an emergency $2.3 million contact-tracing contract to a company that has worked for the campaigns of President Donald Trump and Gov. Kim Reynolds and is owned by a Republican insider. The Iowa Department of ...

A New Jersey restaurant that hosted a political gala put on by a New York Republican club was ordered temporarily closed Friday over potential violations of coronavirus guidelines. Photos and video posted on Twitter showed dozens of maskless partiers at the New York Young Republican Club event ...

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The snapshots tell the story of a big man with a big, beaming grin. The McIlvain family passes around the pictures, laughing over their son Charlie's antics captured through the years: Charlie as a youngster camping with a backpack bigger than him, Charlie cheesing for the ...

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — The health officers in five San Francisco Bay Area counties issued a new stay-at-home order Friday requiring some businesses to close and banning all gatherings, as the number of virus cases surge and hospitals fill. The changes take effect for most of the area at 10 ...

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Much of California is on the brink of sweeping new restrictions on businesses and activities, a desperate attempt to slow the frighteningly rapid escalation of coronavirus cases that threatens to overwhelm hospitals. Five San Francisco Bay Area counties imposed a new ...

WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) — On a day of grace and grievance, President-elect Joe Biden summoned Americans to join in common purpose against the coronavirus pandemic and their political divisions while the man he will replace stoked the fading embers of his campaign to "turn the election ...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Gripped by the accelerating viral outbreak, the U.S. economy is under pressure from persistent layoffs, diminished income and nervous consumers, whose spending is needed to drive a recovery from the pandemic. A flurry of data released Wednesday suggested that the spread of ...

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said Thursday that he will leave the White House if the Electoral College formalizes President-Elect Joe Biden's victory — even as he insisted such a decision would be a "mistake" — as he spent his Thanksgiving renewing baseless claims that ...

NEW YORK (AP) — After months of slumping sales and businesses toppling into bankruptcy, Black Friday is offering a small beacon of hope. In normal times, Black Friday is the busiest shopping day of the year, drawing millions of shoppers eager to get started on their holiday spending. But ...

LIBOURNE, France (AP) — Jim, from Taiwan, slipped a face mask inside the greeting card he sent to Santa and marked "I (heart) u." Alina, 5, asked in her Santa letter written with an adult's help that he please use the front door when he drops in, because the back door is reserved for Grandma ...

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. consumer confidence fell to a reading of 96.1 in November as rising coronavirus cases pushed American optimism down to the lowest level since August. The November reading released Tuesday by the the Conference Board said represents a drop from a revised 101.4 in ...

In Pennsylvania, if you're having friends over to socialize, you're supposed to wear a mask — and so are your friends. That's the rule, but Barb Chestnut has no intention of following it. "No one is going to tell me what I can or not do in my own home," said Chestnut, 60, of Shippensburg. ...

MILWAUKEE (AP) — Election officials in Wisconsin's largest county accused observers for President Donald Trump on Saturday of seeking to obstruct a recount of the presidential results, in some instances by objecting to every ballot tabulators pulled to count. Trump requested the recount in ...

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — A federal judge issued a scathing order Saturday dismissing the Trump campaign's futile effort to block the certification of votes in Pennsylvania, shooting down claims of widespread irregularities with mail-in ballots. The case was always a long shot to stop ...

President Donald Trump's campaign requested a recount of votes in the Georgia presidential race on Saturday, a day after state officials certified results showing Democrat Joe Biden won the state, as his legal team presses forward with attacks alleging widespread fraud without proof. Georgia's ...

NEW YORK (AP) — Four accusers of former Cardinal Theodore McCarrick have filed a lawsuit against the Vatican, arguing it should be held liable for allowing the now-disgraced cleric to serve in multiple positions in New York and New Jersey when it knew of numerous allegations of sexual abuse ...

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — California is imposing an overnight curfew for nearly all residents as the most populous state tries to head off a surge of coronavirus cases that threatens to overwhelm its health care system, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced Thursday. What officials are calling a ...

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) — A Nebraska pharmacist and a Maryland drug dealer could each face a decade or more in prison when they are sentenced for a convoluted plot to firebomb a competing pharmacy so they could divert more prescription narcotics to the black market. William Burgamy, of Hanover, ...

A few miles south of the namesake tower where Donald Trump began his run for president, New York prosecutors are grinding away at an investigation into his business dealings that could shadow him long after he leaves office in January. The probe led by Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance ...

WASHINGTON (AP) — In response to rising COVID-19 infection numbers, the Smithsonian Institution is indefinitely shutting down operations at all its facilities, effective Monday and affecting seven museums, plus the National Zoo. The Smithsonian said in a statement that its "top priority is ...