Dark days: Experts fear the holidays will fuel the US crisis

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Hard-hit California eclipsed 2 million coronavirus cases on Christmas Eve as the U.S. headed into a holiday season of travel and family gatherings that threaten to fuel the deadly outbreak across the nation.

Despite warnings from public health experts to stay home, over 1.19 million travelers passed through U.S. airport security checkpoints Wednesday — down by about 40% from a year ago, but the highest one-day total since the crisis took hold in mid-March.

Airports also recorded around 1 million travelers on each of the five days between last Friday and Tuesday.

Ember McCauley, a 21-year-old nursing student at Missouri Western in St. Joseph, was headed Tuesday from Kansas City, Missouri, to Austin, Texas, to go wedding dress shopping with a cousin, who is getting married in November. She was returning home on Christmas Eve.

She said she was “kind of” anxious about traveling during the pandemic. But she added: “I feel like I eat healthy and I take a lot of precautions, like sanitizing and washing my hands and wearing my mask all the time. I feel like I will be OK, even if something does happen.”

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'We are struggling': A bleak Christmas for America's jobless

NEW YORK (AP) — Last Christmas, Shanita Matthews cooked up a feast for her family of three: Roast chicken, barbecue spareribs, spinach, macaroni and cheese.

This year? They’ll stick with tuna fish and crackers, among the few items she can afford at the supermarket.

“We’re not really doing Christmas — I guess you can say it that way,” said Matthews, who lives in Suwanee, Georgia. “We are struggling. We are tired, and all I have is my faith."

Like nearly 10 million other Americans, Matthews has been jobless since the viral pandemic ripped through the U.S. economy in March, triggering a devastating recession and widespread unemployment. Now, many months later, they face a holiday season they hardly could have foreseen a year ago: Too little money to buy gifts, cook large festive meals or pay all their bills.

Nearly 8 million people have sunk into poverty since June after having spent $1,200 checks that the government gave most Americans in the spring and a $600-a-week supplemental jobless benefit expired in July, according to research by Bruce Meyer at the University of Chicago and two other colleagues. And finding a job is getting even harder: Hiring in November slowed for a fifth straight month, with U.S. employers adding the fewest jobs since April.

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Breakthrough: UK and EU reach post-Brexit trade agreement

BRUSSELS (AP) — Just a week before the deadline, Britain and the European Union struck a free-trade deal Thursday that should avert economic chaos on New Year's and bring a measure of certainty for businesses after years of Brexit turmoil.

Once ratified by both sides, the agreement will ensure Britain and the 27-nation bloc can continue to trade in goods without tariffs or quotas after the U.K. breaks fully free of the EU on Jan. 1.

Relief was palpable all around that nine months of tense and often testy negotiations had finally produced a positive result.

The Christmas Eve breakthrough was doubly welcome amid a coronavirus pandemic that has left some 70,000 people in Britain dead and led the country's neighbors to shut their borders to the U.K. over a new and seemingly more contagious variant of the virus circulating in England.

“We have taken back control of our laws and our destiny,” declared British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who posted a picture of himself on social media, beaming with thumbs up.

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GOP blocks $2,000 checks as Trump leaves COVID aid in chaos

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump’s sudden demand for $2,000 checks for most Americans was swiftly rejected by House Republicans on Thursday as his haphazard actions throw a massive COVID relief and government funding bill into chaos.

The rare Christmas Eve session of the House lasted just minutes, with help for millions of Americans awaiting Trump's signature on the bill. Unemployment benefits, eviction protections and other emergency aid, including smaller $600 checks, are at risk. Trump’s refusal of the $900 billion package, which is linked to $1.4 trillion government funds bill, could spark a federal shutdown at midnight Monday.

“We’re not going to let the government shut down, nor are we going to let the American people down,” said Rep. Steny Hoyer, D-Md., the majority leader.

The optics appear terrible for Republicans, and the outgoing president, as the nation suffers through the worst holiday season many can remember. Families are isolated under COVID precautions and millions of American households are devastated without adequate income, food or shelter. The virus death toll of 327,000-plus is rising.

Trump is ending his presidency much the way he started it — sowing confusion and reversing promises all while contesting the election and courting a federal shutdown over demands his own party in Congress will not meet.

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Kushner pardon revives 'loathsome' tale of tax evasion, sex

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie called it “one of the most loathsome, disgusting crimes” he ever prosecuted as U.S. attorney.

After Charles Kushner discovered his brother-in-law was cooperating with federal authorities, the wealthy real estate executive and father of President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared, hatched a scheme for revenge and intimidation.

Kushner hired a prostitute to lure his brother-in-law, then arranged to have the encounter in a New Jersey motel room recorded with a hidden camera and the recording sent to his own sister, the man’s wife.

The scheme didn't work. Kushner later pleaded guilty to tax evasion and making illegal campaign donations in a case tailor-made for tabloid headlines.

On Wednesday Trump pardoned Kushner as part of a late-hour clemency spree during the final days of his presidency that has included a slew of campaign aides and allies, among them four of the six Trump associates convicted in the Mueller investigation. He has granted clemency to nearly 50 people in the last week.

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Democrats face a turnout test in Georgia's Senate runoffs

ATLANTA (AP) — In the first week of early voting for Georgia’s Senate runoff election, Casie Yoder parked at a polling location in Cobb County and loaded miniature hand sanitizer bottles, knitted hats, hand warmers and face masks into a collapsible wagon cart.

Her goal: to help voters stay in line in frigid temperatures and cast their ballots in a pair of high-stakes runoff contests that will determine which political party controls the Senate next year. The runoffs will also test whether Democrats can again pull together the diverse coalition that propelled President-elect Joe Biden to victory in Georgia in November and cemented the state's status as a political battleground.

“We’ve never had an election happen like this in December,” said Yoder, the Georgia state captain for the Frontline, a nonpartisan electoral justice project of the Movement for Black Lives and other partner organizations.

For Democrats to win control of the Senate, Georgia’s Black communities, as well as the state's smaller Hispanic and Asian communities, likely need to vote in the Jan. 5 runoff election by history-making margins. There is hope that the candidacy of the Rev. Raphael Warnock, the Black senior pastor of the church where Martin Luther King Jr. once preached, might help spur Black votes for both him and fellow Democratic candidate Jon Ossoff over the Republican incumbents, Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue.

An Associated Press VoteCast survey of Georgia voters in November found that 22% of white voters chose Warnock and 28% chose Ossoff, compared to the 90% of Black voters who chose Ossoff and 73% who chose Warnock. Democrats also have an opportunity to capture the 15% of Black voters who chose Matt Lieberman, another Democratic candidate who competed against Warnock in last month’s race.

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US military confirms pandemic won’t sideline Santa Claus

DENVER (AP) — The U.S. military is tracking an elderly man with a white beard and a large belly who goes by the name of Saint Nicholas.

There's no reason for alarm though, Air Force Gen. Glen D. VanHerck said.

In fact, this is a Christmas tradition going on its 65th year. The North American Aerospace Defense Command, a joint U.S.-Canadian operation that protects the skies over both countries, has tracked the fabled jolly old man since a child mistakenly called the base in 1955, asking to speak to Santa.

The base in Colorado Springs, Colorado, used to monitor for signs of a nuclear attack. But this year, officers at the base are making sure the coronavirus pandemic won’t sideline Santa Claus and his reindeer from, as the storybooks say, delivering gifts to children around the world.

While the Santa tracking operations center usually has around 1,500 volunteers fielding calls from around the world, this year they have scaled back because of COVID-19 concerns with few people in the center and many taking calls remotely. With the smaller operation, they have also added a voicemail for callers who don't reach an operator.

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NOT REAL NEWS: A look at what didn't happen this week

Here’s a look at false and misleading claims circulating online as news about COVID-19 vaccines and uncertainty around coronavirus relief in the U.S. dominate headlines. None of these are legit, even though they were shared widely on social media. The Associated Press checked them out. Here are the facts:

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No, a Tennessee nurse didn’t die after getting the vaccine

CLAIM: Tiffany Dover, a nurse manager in Chattanooga, Tennessee, who fainted after receiving her first dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine on Thursday, is now dead.

THE FACTS: Claims of Dover’s death have no basis in reality. She is alive and worked a shift at CHI Memorial Hospital on Monday, according to Lisa McCluskey, the hospital’s vice president of marketing communications. The claim emerged on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube over the weekend following videos that showed the nurse fainting on Dec. 17 several minutes after receiving the vaccine. It also appeared on Reddit, on a subreddit devoted to conspiracy theories, and on a website claiming to show obituaries of deceased people. Some posts used screenshots of Dover’s Facebook and Instagram accounts to claim she must be dead because she hadn’t posted in several days. Others shared screenshots from a public records website, suggesting the appearance of Dover’s name in search results somehow indicated she had died. These claims are bogus, McCluskey confirmed to The Associated Press. Dover told reporters after the fainting episode that she has a condition that can cause her to faint when she feels pain. “It’s common for me,” she told reporters. “I feel fine now.” In the days since then, CHI Memorial Hospital has confirmed Dover is doing well, sharing multiple tweets and a video of the nurse posing with colleagues on Monday afternoon. The CDC offers guidance on fainting after vaccination, which can be common. It says that although fainting has a variety of possible causes, “it is usually triggered by pain or anxiety.”

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Coronavirus dampens Christmas joy in Bethlehem and elsewhere

BETHLEHEM, West Bank (AP) — Bethlehem on Thursday ushered in Christmas Eve with a stream of joyous marching bands and the triumphant arrival of the top Catholic clergyman in the Holy Land, but few people were there to greet them as the coronavirus pandemic and a strict lockdown dampened celebrations in the traditional birthplace of Jesus.

Similar subdued scenes were repeated across the world as the festive family gatherings and packed prayers that typically mark the holiday were scaled back or canceled altogether.

In Australia, worshippers had to book tickets online to attend socially distanced church services. The Philippines prohibited mass gatherings and barred extended families from holding traditional Christmas Eve dinners. Traditional door-to-door children's carols were canceled in Greece.

On Christmas Eve in Italy, church bells rang earlier than usual. The Italian government’s 10 p.m. curfew prompted pastors to move up services, with “Midnight” Mass starting Thursday evening in some churches as early as a couple hours after dark. Pope Francis, who has said people “must obey” civil authorities’ measures to fight the spread of COVID-19, fell in line. This year, the Christmas vigil Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica was moved up from 9:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.

Normally, seats at the vigil Mass are quickly snapped up, by Romans and by tourists, but the pandemic has reduced tourists in Italy to a trickle. In keeping with social distancing measures, barely 200 faithful — instead of several thousand — spaced out in the basilica's pews and wearing masks, attended Francis’ celebration of the Mass. A row of fiery red poinsettia plants warmly contrasted with the sumptuous cold marble of the basilica.

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People yearn to connect across borders amid pandemic holiday

To slow the spread of COVID-19, the United States, Canada and Mexico agreed in March to close their shared borders to nonessential travel.

Nine months later, it's Christmas. Families across the world are disconnected, but perhaps none more than those trapped on opposite sides of an international border. Some legally can’t cross, and others can’t afford to endure quarantines if they do.

Yet, the holiday spirit survives. Along both borders, AP photographers found families connecting in smaller, more intimate ways, overcoming unusual obstacles for shared celebrations.

At the U.S.-Mexico border, most years bring festive Las Posadas celebrations; the centuries-old tradition practiced in Mexico reenacts through song Mary and Joseph’s search for refuge in Bethlehem.

Not this year. In addition to virus-related restrictions, people face another barrier: President Donald Trump’s border wall that stretches hundreds of miles and is still under construction.