AP News in Brief 11-16-18

Bitter battle for Florida Senate seat goes to hand recount

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Florida’s acrimonious battle for the U.S. Senate headed Thursday to a legally required hand recount after an initial review by ballot-counting machines showed Republican Gov. Rick Scott and Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson separated by less than 13,000 votes.

But the highly watched contest for governor between Republican Ron DeSantis and Democrat Andrew Gillum appeared to be over, with a machine recount showing DeSantis with a large enough advantage over Gillum to avoid a hand recount in that race.

Gillum, who conceded the contest on Election Night only to retract his concession later, said in a statement that “it is not over until every legally casted vote is counted.”

The recount so far has been fraught with problems. One large Democratic stronghold in South Florida was unable to finish its machine recount by the Thursday deadline due to machines breaking down. A federal judge rejected a request to extend the recount deadline.

“We gave a heroic effort,” said Palm Beach Supervisor of Elections Susan Bucher. If the county had three or four more hours, it would have made the deadline to recount ballots in the Senate race, she said.

AP source: Whitaker told Graham that Mueller probe to go on

WASHINGTON — Acting Attorney General Matt Whitaker told Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham in a meeting on Thursday that special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation will proceed, according to a person familiar with the meeting.

The meeting with Graham and Whitaker comes as a bipartisan group of senators is pushing legislation to protect Mueller’s job. The senators are concerned about Whitaker’s past criticism of the Mueller probe, which is looking at Russian interference in the 2016 election and ties to President Donald Trump’s campaign. Those concerns were only amplified after Trump appointed Whitaker as acting attorney general last week.

Whitaker told Graham the investigation would be allowed to proceed, the person said. The person wasn’t authorized to speak publicly about the meeting and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.

Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer and other Democrats have called for Whitaker to recuse himself from overseeing the Mueller investigation.

A Justice Department spokeswoman said earlier this week that Whitaker will follow Justice Department protocols and consult with senior ethics officials “on his oversight responsibilities and matters that may warrant recusal.”

North Korea says it has tested ‘ultramodern tactical weapon’

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korean leader Kim Jong Un observed the successful test of “a newly developed ultramodern tactical weapon,” the nation’s state media reported Friday, though it didn’t describe what sort of weapon it was.

It didn’t appear to be a nuclear or missile-related test, a string of which last year had many fearing war before the North turned to engagement and diplomacy early this year. Still, any mention of weapons testing could influence the direction of currently stalled diplomacy between Washington and Pyongyang that’s meant to rid the North of its nuclear weapons.

The North hasn’t publicly tested any weapons since November of last year, but in recent days Pyongyang reportedly expressed anger at South Korea’s resumption of small-scale military drills with the United States, and Friday’s announcement could be in response to those drills.

Even if the test was a message for Washington and Seoul, Friday’s report from the North was noticeably less belligerent than past announcements of weapons tests, and didn’t focus on North Korean claims of U.S. and South Korean hostility.

It’s the first publicly known field inspection of a weapons test by Kim Jong Un since he observed the testing of the Hwasong-15 intercontinental ballistic missile in November of last year, according to South Korea’s Unification Ministry.

Homeless Samaritan tale raised $400K. Police say it’s a lie

MOUNT HOLLY, N.J. — A feel-good tale of a homeless man using his last $20 to help a stranded New Jersey woman buy gas was actually a complete lie, manufactured to get strangers to donate more than $400,000 to help the down-and-out good Samaritan, a prosecutor said Thursday.

Burlington County prosecutor Scott Coffina announced criminal charges against the couple who told the story to newspapers and television stations along with the homeless man who conspired with them to tell the story.

Coffina said the money, donated to homeless Marine veteran Johnny Bobbitt, will be refunded to people who saw the story and contributed to him through a GoFundMe page set up by the couple, Mark D’Amico and Katelyn McClure.

From wire sources

“The entire campaign was predicated on a lie,” Coffina said. “It was fictitious and illegal and there are consequences.”

Coffina said almost no part of the tale was true. McClure didn’t run out of gas. Bobbitt didn’t spot her in trouble and give her money.

___

FDA to crack down on menthol cigarettes, flavored vapes

NEW YORK — In a major new effort to curb smoking, a top U.S. health official pledged Thursday to try to ban menthol cigarettes and flavored cigars and tighten rules governing the sale of most flavored versions of electronic cigarettes.

The proposed restrictions were aimed mainly at reducing smoking in kids: About half of teens who smoke cigarettes choose menthols, and flavored e-cigarettes have been blamed for a recent increase in teen vaping rates.

“I will not allow a generation of children to become addicted to nicotine through e-cigarettes,” Scott Gottlieb, commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, said in a statement.

Health advocates say a menthol ban would have greater impact on the health of Americans, but it would probably take years to put in place. The changes for e-cigarettes could kick in within a few months.

Battery-powered e-cigarettes are more popular among teens than regular smokes and are considered safer. But many versions contain potentially addictive nicotine, and health officials believe they set kids who try them on a path toward regular cigarettes.

___

California town’s wildfire evacuation plan raises questions

MAGALIA, Calif. — Ten years ago, as two wildfires advanced on Paradise, residents jumped into their vehicles to flee and got stuck in gridlock. That led authorities to devise a staggered evacuation plan — one that they used when fire came again last week.

But Paradise’s carefully laid plans quickly devolved into a panicked exodus on Nov. 8. Some survivors said that by the time they got warnings, the flames were already extremely close, and they barely escaped with their lives. Others said they received no warnings at all.

Now, with at least 56 people dead and perhaps 300 unaccounted for in the nation’s deadliest wildfire in a century, authorities are facing questions of whether they took the right approach.

It’s also a lesson for other communities across the West that could be threatened as climate change and overgrown forests contribute to longer, more destructive fire seasons .

Reeny Victoria Breevaart, who lives in Magalia, a forested community of 11,000 people north of Paradise, said she couldn’t receive warnings because cellphones weren’t working. She also lost electrical power.

___

Snowstorm slows evening commute in New York City

NEW YORK — The first snowstorm of the season to hit the New York City area brought several inches of snow, slowing Thursday’s evening commute to a crawl, after contributing to at least seven deaths as it swept across the country.

From St. Louis to the South and into the Northeast, snow, freezing rain, and in some parts, sleet, made driving tricky and closed schools Thursday.

In New York City, the wet snowfall and wind gusts Thursday downed numerous tree branches. Police advised people to stay indoors and avoid the roads. Commuters also were advised to avoid the Port Authority Bus Terminal – which is also used by some to travel to New Jersey – due to overcrowding. The poor weather made it difficult for buses to reach the terminal, officials said. And a multi-vehicle accident on the George Washington Bridge added to the traffic nightmare.

There were scattered delays on the Long Island Rail Road and New Jersey Transit reported 30-minute delays system wide. Flight delays of up to an hour were reported at JFK, LaGuardia and Newark airports.

Forecasters said the snow should turn to mostly sleet and rain before changing to rain overnight.

___

Facebook says it’s better at detecting rule violations

NEW YORK — Facebook said it’s making progress on detecting hate speech, graphic violence and other violations of its rules, even before users see and report them.

Facebook said that during the April-to-September period, it doubled the amount of hate speech it detected proactively, compared with the previous six months.

The findings were spelled out Thursday in Facebook’s second semiannual report on enforcing community standards. The reports come as Facebook grapples with challenge after challenge, ranging from fake news to Facebook’s role in elections interference, hate speech and incitement to violence in the U.S., Myanmar, India and elsewhere.

The company also said it disabled more than 1.5 billion fake accounts in the latest six-month period, compared with 1.3 billion during the previous six months. Facebook said most of the fake accounts it found were financially motivated, rather than aimed at misinformation. The company has nearly 2.3 billion users.

Facebook’s report comes a day after The New York Times published an extensive report on how Facebook deals with crisis after crisis over the past two years. The Times described Facebook’s strategy as “delay, deny and deflect.”

___

Roy Clark, country guitar virtuoso, ‘Hee Haw’ star, has died

Country star Roy Clark, the guitar virtuoso and singer who headlined the cornpone TV show “Hee Haw” for nearly a quarter century and was known for such hits as “Yesterday When I was Young” and “Honeymoon Feeling,” has died. He was 85.

Publicist Jeremy Westby said Clark died Thursday due to complications from pneumonia at home in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Clark was “Hee Haw” host or co-host for its entire 24-year run, with Buck Owens his best known co-host. Started in 1969, the show featured the top stars in country music, including Loretta Lynn, Tammy Wynette, Charley Pride, Johnny Cash, Merle Haggard, Dolly Parton, as well as other musical greats including Ray Charles, Chet Atkins and Boots Randolph. The country music and comedy show’s last episode aired in 1993, though reruns continued for a few years thereafter.

“‘Hee Haw’ won’t go away. It brings a smile to too many faces,” he said in 2004, when the show was distributed on VHS and DVD for the first time.

“I’ve known him for 60 years and he was a fine musician and entertainer,” Charlie Daniels tweeted on Thursday. “Rest In peace Buddy, you will be remembered.”