USA

WASHINGTON (AP) — Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg has nabbed the endorsement of New Hampshire’s lone congresswoman.

Rep. Annie Kuster announced Wednesday that she was backing the former South Bend, Indiana, mayor for president, saying he had the ability to unite the country and had bold solutions to the country’s problems.

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — China’s U.N. ambassador warned Wednesday against further escalation between India and Pakistan over the disputed Kashmir region and expressed hope that a Security Council meeting called by Beijing will encourage both countries to seek a solution through dialogue.

Zhang Jun, whose country supports Pakistan, told several reporters after the closed meeting that China remains “concerned about the situation on the ground” in Kashmir.

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — Before emerging as a figure in the impeachment proceedings, Robert F. Hyde was known best in Connecticut as an obscure Republican candidate for Congress censured by his own party’s leaders for offensive and misogynistic tweets.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Millions watching on television, 100 senators seated silently in the Capitol, one man in the Oval Office with a twitchy Twitter finger. President Donald Trump’s impeachment team will be trying to appeal to multiple audiences when it mounts a defense of the president in his Senate trial.

Proceedings in the staid Senate are expected to run cooler than the fiery partisanship that was on display in the House, which voted to impeach Trump in December.

HOUSTON (AP) — A 16-year-old student mistakenly shot his friend in their Houston-area high school’s ROTC room before fleeing and being arrested several hours later, officials said Wednesday.

The two were in a room at Bellaire High School with four other students but no adult Tuesday afternoon when the 16-year-old took a semi-automatic pistol out of his waistband and pulled the trigger, killing 19-year-old Cesar Cortes, said Lt. Greg Bartlett.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The United States and China reached a trade deal Wednesday that eases tensions between the world’s two biggest economies, offers massive export opportunities for U.S. farms and factories, and promises to do more to protect American trade secrets.

Still, the Phase 1 agreement leaves unresolved Washington’s fundamental differences with Beijing, which is relying on massive government intervention in the economy to turn China into a technological power.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. military is resuming operations against Islamic State militants in Iraq and is working to soon restart training Iraqi forces, U.S. officials said Wednesday, despite deep divisions over the American drone strike that killed an senior Iranian commander in Baghdad and the resulting missile attacks by Iran on Iraqi bases.

WASHINGTON (AP) — One by one, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi picked up pens lined up beside her and used them to sign a bit of her name on the impeachment articles against President Donald Trump. Then she handed each signing pen to the assembled chairmen and House managers who will prosecute the case in the Senate.

Signing pens are swag in Washington, often doled out on more celebratory occasions. They can be seen framed and hung in lobbies across the city as trophies of proximity to power. Trump has engaged in the tradition himself.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Elizabeth Warren accused Bernie Sanders of calling her a liar before a national television audience during a tense, post-debate exchange in which she refused to shake his outstretched hand, according to audio released Wednesday by CNN.

The Democratic presidential rivals are strong progressives who had steadfastly refused to attack each other for more than a year on the campaign trail. But that changed Monday, when Warren said that, during a private meeting between the two in 2018, he disagreed with her that a woman could win the presidency.

WASHINGTON (AP) — A close associate of President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer says he delivered an ultimatum in May to the incoming president of Ukraine that no senior U.S. officials would attend his inauguration and all American aid to the war-torn country would be withheld if an investigation into Joe Biden wasn’t announced.