Category: National News

WASHINGTON (AP) — A career Army officer. A career foreign service official. Both had a consistent message during Day 3 of the House impeachment inquiry, and each was troubled by the phone call between President Donald Trump and the president of Ukraine.

Here are some takeaways from Tuesday’s testimony:

‘CONCERNED BY THE CALL’

Republicans have consistently criticized the House impeachment inquiry by saying witnesses didn’t have firsthand knowledge of President Donald Trump’s role in trying to persuade Ukraine to investigate a chief political rival.

On Day 3 of the proceedings, that posture is suddenly more difficult to maintain.

The two witnesses in Tuesday morning’s session each listened to the July 25 phone call in which Trump prodded his Ukrainian counterpart to investigate Democratic rival Joe Biden.

Jennifer Williams, an adviser to Vice President Mike Pence, said she considered the call “unusual” since it “involved discussion of what appeared to be a domestic political matter.”

Army Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, who arrived for the hearing in military uniform adorned with medals, went even further. He considered it “improper,” and, acting out of “duty,” reported his alarm to a lawyer for the National Security Council.

“I privately reported my concerns, in official channels, to the proper authorities in the chain of command. My intent was to raise these concerns because they had significant national security implications for our country,” Vindman said.

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ATTACKS ON VINDMAN

Republicans leveled early and frequent attacks on Vindman’s credibility, even lacing an occasional nicety with a not-so-veiled barb.

Republican Rep. Chris Stewart thanked Vindman, who was wounded by a roadside bomb in Iraq and awarded the Purple Heart, for his service. Yet Stewart also wondered aloud why Vindman felt it necessary to wear his uniform rather than a suit to the hearing.

He wanted to know, too, if Vindman always insisted on being referred to by military rank rather than “Mr.” as he did in an exchange earlier with Rep. Devin Nunes, the top Republican on the committee.

The committee attacks on the current NSC official mirrors the combative approach of the White House and other Trump allies, who have repeatedly derided Vindman.

Some Republican attacks struggled to land. After Rep. Jim Jordan suggested that Vindman’s peers questioned his judgment, Vindman read aloud from a glowing performance review that called him “brilliant” and “unflappable.”

Some attacks even sought to imply that Vindman, a naturalized American citizen who was a toddler when his family fled Ukraine, may have dual loyalties toward the former Soviet Republic.

Under questioning from GOP impeachment counsel Steve Castor, Vindman revealed that he was offered three times the post of Ukraine’s defense minister while attending the inauguration of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy but “immediately dismissed these offers.”

He says two American officials witnessed the exchange with a top adviser to Zelenskiy, and that he notified his chain of command and counterintelligence officials upon returning to the U.S.

Castor questioned whether that created the impression of a conflict, to which Vindman replied, “It’s more important what my American chain of command thinks.”

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PENCE ROLE?

Pence has been portrayed largely as out of the loop about Trump’s request that Ukraine investigate Biden. The public testimony by Williams refocused attention on what Pence knew about the events that sparked the House impeachment investigation.

But Pence’s office says the vice president and Williams barely interacted.

Williams, a career foreign service officer who was detailed to Pence’s office from the State Department, compiled briefing materials for Pence on Ukraine. She was in the room when he met with Zelenskiy in September and was among the staffers in the Situation Room who listened and took notes during the July 25th call.

Katie Waldman, a Pence spokeswoman, noted that Williams’ appointment began April 1 and said she “she doesn’t directly report to the Vice President.”

Pence failed to come to Williams’ defense when Trump recently tweeted that she should meet with “the other Never Trumpers, who I don’t know & mostly never even heard of, & work out a better presidential attack!”

Williams said she was confused by the attack and “would not” consider herself a “Never Trumper.”

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WHITE HOUSE REAL-TIME RESPONSE

The White House reacted to the impeachment inquiry in real time Tuesday, stepping up its engagement after facing persistent complaints from Republican allies that it wasn’t doing enough to counter allegations against the president.

The White House sent out five “rapid response” emails to reporters before the witnesses were even sworn-in. The messages sought to defend Trump and undermine the credibility of the witnesses.

“The President of the United States determines American foreign policy – not unelected bureaucrats,” said one email, as the White House argued that the career officials testifying had a policy dispute with Trump about Ukraine. “It’s the job of bureaucrats to implement that agenda set by the President – not leak and undermine him at every turn.”

“Williams’ prior testimony offered nothing but personal opinion and conjecture over a call that all Americans can see for themselves was perfectly appropriate,” the White House said.

Trump was criticized by Democrats for his push-back efforts last week, when he tweeted out an attack on another witness, former Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch, as she was speaking.

CONWAY, Ark. (AP) — A former high school student in Arkansas has been sentenced to seven years in prison for devising a plan to shoot up a school.

Circuit Judge Charles Clawson sentenced 20-year-old Daniel Croslin on Friday. Croslin pleaded guilty to making a terrorist threat in September.

Croslin made plans to shoot up Conway High School on the 20th anniversary of the Columbine massacre. Croslin was 19 when he told a counselor that he was bullied in school and wanted to get revenge, court documents show.

Police found Croslin’s notes that included a diagram of the school and evidence that he recruited friends asking them to help him buy an assault rifle and items needed for a pipe bomb. He was described as seeking attention, even if negative, according to court documents.

Clawson said he found clinical psychologist’s Hugo B. Morais testimony last week to be concerning. Morais testified that Croslin showed signs of malingering, which is exaggerating physical or psychological symptoms. Clawson also found the level of planning put into creating detailed diagrams of Conway High School to be alarming.

“It’s my judgment these are serious issues that require the court to take serious action,” Clawson said.

Before the hearing, prosecutor Hugh Finkelstein wrote a letter to the judge requesting Croslin receive a 15-year sentence accompanied by a 15-year suspended sentence. He also included a list of the 125 school shootings that have occurred following the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre that left 28 dead and two injured.

“I will stop here at Sandy Hook Elementary because even though there are dozens of other school shootings that occurred before this event, this is where most of the country took notice of these atrocities,” Finkelstein said in the note. “It should be noted, however, that Faulkner County was well aware of school shootings long before Sandy Hook. On October 26, 2008, two students were murdered, and another person was wounded at the University of Central Arkansas.”

The seven-year sentence also carries a two-year suspended sentence upon Croslin’s release from prison.

Finkelstein said they are lucky the professionals who encountered Croslin took his threats seriously.

AUBURN, Ala. (AP) — Media companies are asking a judge to lift a gag order in the kidnapping case against a man charged in the disappearance of a missing Alabama college student.

Ten companies and organizations representing multiple news outlets filed the request Monday in the case of 29-year-old Ibraheem Yazeed.

Yazeed is charged in the disappearance of 19-year-old Aniah Blanchard, the stepdaughter of UFC heavyweight Walt Harris. Blanchard was last seen Oct. 23 in Auburn, Alabama.

The media request says Lee County District Judge Russell Bush’s order banning lawyers and potential witnesses from speaking with reporters about the case is too broad.

The motion says the order could even bar authorities from seeking help in pursuing information about Blanchard’s whereabouts.

A preliminary hearing is scheduled Wednesday in Opelika.

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Information from: Opelika-Auburn News, http://www.oanow.com/

DUNCAN, Oklahoma (AP) — Two men and a woman were fatally shot Monday morning outside a Walmart store in southwestern Oklahoma, and the shooter is among the dead, authorities said.

Two victims were shot inside a car and the third was killed in the parking lot just before 10 a.m. outside the store in Duncan, Police Chief Danny Ford said.

Authorities did not immediately describe a motivation for the shooting. Stephens County District Attorney Jason Hicks authorities said during a news conference Monday afternoon that there was never an active shooter inside the store and he described the shooting as an isolated incident. He did not further explain.

Two bodies covered with sheets were visible in the parking lot Monday afternoon. One body was in the driver’s seat of a red, two-door car. The other body was lying on the ground next to the vehicle.

Bullet holes were visible in the car’s windshield. Police said in a Facebook post that a handgun was found at the scene. At the news conference, Ford described the gun as semi-automatic but said he had no further details. He said the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation was still processing the scene.

He said he believed nine shots were fired.

Authorities have not released the identities of those killed but did confirm the shooter was among the dead. Ford said all three knew each other but declined to describe their relationships or other identifying information pending notification of immediate family.

Police have also interviewed witnesses to the shooting, Ford said.

Aaron Helton, of Duncan, said he was parking outside the Walmart where he planned to buy groceries when he heard about nine gunshots.

“I arrived and there were three bodies,” Helton said.

Walmart spokeswoman LeMia Jenkins said in an email that no staff members were involved in the shooting and the store was not evacuated. Ford told The Associated Press that based on the social media posts of the woman who was killed, he believed she may have been a Walmart employee at some time.

Duncan is about 80 miles (130 kilometers) south of Oklahoma City. The Walmart is in a commercial center that includes a sporting goods store and a dollar store along U.S. Highway 81, the main road that passes through Duncan heading south toward Texas.

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Associated Press reporter Cedar Attanasio in El Paso, Texas, contributed to this report.

BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — A crude oil spill from the Keystone pipeline in eastern North Dakota has turned out to have affected almost 10 times the amount of land as first reported, a state regulator said Monday.

North Dakota environmental scientist Bill Suess said the leak reported on Oct. 29 is now estimated by state regulators to have affected about 209,100 square feet (19,426 square meters) of land near Edinburg. State regulators had said the leak affected about 22,500 square feet (2,090 square meters) of land.

Calgary, Alberta-based TC Energy, formerly known as TransCanada, estimated its pipeline leaked an estimated 383,000 gallons (1.4 million liters) of oil. Suess said that estimate has not changed.

The cause of the spill is still unknown. An affected portion of the pipe has been sent to a third-party laboratory for inspection, as required by federal regulators.

TC Energy said the pipeline returned to service on Nov. 10 after approval of a repair and restart plan by the U.S. Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.

The company has not given an estimate on the land that was affected, Suess said. The initial estimate by state regulators was “a quick and dirty look at it,” he said. “We did have some surface expansion since then.”

The company reported late Sunday that it had recovered about 337,550 gallons (1.2 million liters) of oil, along with 141,834 gallons (536,900 liters) of oily water, Suess said.

Cleanup crews and state regulators remained at the site on Monday. Some wetlands were affected, but not any sources of drinking water, he said.

TC Energy has said people were at the site working around the clock to clean up the spill. Suess said the cleanup work was cut to daylight hours on Monday.

The company has referred questions to its website but has not updated it in more than a week.

TC Energy has put up berms around the affected area and is excavating contaminated soil from the entire site, at depths of up to 6 feet (1.8 meters), Suess said. The oily soil is being stockpiled and will be taken to a landfill in Sawyer, North Dakota, he said.

“We really don’t have any risk of anything spreading at this point,” he said.

Crude began flowing through the $5.2 billion pipeline in 2011. It’s designed to carry crude oil across Saskatchewan and Manitoba, and through North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas and Missouri on the way to refineries in Patoka, Illinois and Cushing, Oklahoma. It can handle about 23 million gallons (87 million liters) daily.

It is part of a system that also is to include the proposed $8 billion Keystone XL pipeline designed to transport the oil from western Canada to terminals on the Gulf Coast.

The proposed Keystone XL pipeline has drawn opposition from people who fear it will cause environmental damage.

SANTA CLARITA, Calif. (AP) — A student pulled a gun from his backpack and opened fire at a Southern California high school, killing two students and wounding three others before shooting himself in the head on his 16th birthday, authorities said.

The attacker was hospitalized in critical condition, officials said, and investigators offered no immediate motive for Thursday’s shooting.

The gunfire began around 7:30 a.m. at Saugus High School in the Los Angeles suburb of Santa Clarita. Authorities estimated that the suspect took just 16 seconds to pull out the weapon, shoot five classmates and turn the gun on himself.

At the time, students were “milling around” and greeting each other in an outdoor quad area, sheriff’s homicide Capt. Kent Wegener said. Surveillance video showed the shooter standing still while “everyone is active around him.”

“He just fires from where he is. He doesn’t chase anybody. He doesn’t move,” Wegener said.

The suspect appeared to fire at whoever was in front of him. He had no known connection to those he shot, Wegener said.

Video showed the last thing the assailant did was shoot himself with the final bullet in the .45-caliber handgun, Wegener said. The weapon was empty when it was recovered.

A 16-year-old girl and a 14-year-old boy died.

Two girls, ages 14 and 15, were each in good condition after being treated for gunshot wounds, according to Patricia Aidem, a spokeswoman for Providence Holy Cross Medical Center.

A 14-year-old boy was treated and released from another hospital, authorities said.

Sheriff Alex Villanueva said the shooter was a student at the school but did not identify him.

The sheriff said a biography on an Instagram account reported as possibly belonging to the teen contained the posting: “Saugus, have fun at school tomorrow.”

The message was discovered Thursday morning after the shooting. It was unclear when it was made and by whom, the sheriff said.

It was later removed, and investigators do not know who made the change, Wegener said.

Investigators were searching the suspect’s home. Wegener said the sheriff’s department had not received any recent calls to the boy’s house “that would indicate that there was turmoil” there.

The teen’s father died two years ago. Two years before that, the father had been arrested amid a domestic dispute with the boy’s mother.

Fellow students and a neighbor say he was a Boy Scout who was smart, quiet and gave no indication he would become violent. One girl who knew him for years said he wasn’t bullied and had a girlfriend.

“At this point in time, we have no indication of motivation or ideology,” said Paul Delacourt, the agent in charge of the FBI’s Los Angeles field office. Santa Clarita is a city of more than 200,000 about 30 miles (48 kilometers) northwest of downtown LA.

The sound of gunfire sent some students running while others and staff followed recently practiced security procedures.

Kyra Stapp, 17, was watching a documentary in class when she heard two gunshots. Panicked students ran in and reported the shooting.

Stapp’s class and others were herded into a teacher break room where they locked the door and turned off the lights.

Kyra texted her mother and tried not make any noise. They exchanged messages as sirens screamed and helicopters and deputies carrying rifles and shotguns swarmed the campus. Then Kyra fell silent while officers escorted students out.

“She’s been texting me and all of a sudden she’s not,” Tracy Stapp said. “That was like the worst 10 minutes of my life, I swear.”

Shauna Orandi, 16, said she was in her Spanish class doing homework when she heard four gunshots that she initially mistook as instruments from a band class. She said a student burst into the room saying he’d seen the gunman, and her classmates were stunned into silence.

“My worst nightmare actually came true,” she said later as she left a nearby park with her father. “This is it. I’m going to die.”

Freshman Rosie Rodriguez said she was walking up the library stairs when she heard noises that sounded like balloons popping. She realized they were gunshots when she saw other students running.

Still carrying a backpack laden with books, she ran across the street to a home, where a person she didn’t know gave shelter to her and about 10 other students.

“I just heard a lot of kids crying. We were scared,” Rodriguez said.

A huge crowd of anxious parents gathered in the park, waiting to be reunited with their children.

Undersheriff Tim Murakami tweeted an apology to the parents, saying investigators needed to interview the students before they could be released.

Orandi said she has heard about so many school shootings that she always assumed she’d panic. But she stayed calm with the help of her teacher, who locked down the classroom.

Saugus High’s security is provided by one unarmed sheriff’s deputy and nine “campus supervisors” who act as guards, said to Collyn Nielson, chief administrative officer for the William S. Hart Union High School District.

The campus is surrounded by a fence, and students enter through a limited number of gates each morning. There are a dozen security cameras but no metal detectors.

All district schools hold lockdown drills three times a year, including two in the fall that have already occurred, Nielson said.

“In speaking with staff and hearing reports, students reported they knew what to do and immediately went into lockdown mode,” he said.

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Antczak reported from Los Angeles. Associated Press writers Christopher Weber, Brian Melley and Justin Pritchard in LA also contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Latest on President Donald Trump and House impeachment hearings (all times local):

10:35 a.m.

Former Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch says she was told by a colleague that “the color drained from my face” as she read a rough transcript of a phone call between President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in which Trump said Yovanovitch was “going to go through some things.”

The rough transcript was released in September, months after Yovanovitch was ousted from the job at Trump’s direction. She told lawmakers at the second House impeachment hearing Friday that it felt like a vague threat.

Yovanovitch said it was a “terrible moment” and that words fail her even now to describe it.

She said it was hard to believe “the president would talk to any ambassador like that to a foreign head of state, and it was me. I mean, I couldn’t believe it.”

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10:30 a.m.

Former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch says she was devastated when she learned President Donald Trump wanted to remove her from her post.

A top State Department official told Yovanovitch in April to come back to Washington from Ukraine “on the next plane.’’

Yovanovitch told Congress Friday that Deputy Secretary of State John Sullivan “said the words that every foreign service officer” fears: “‘The president has lost confidence in you.’ That was a terrible thing to hear.”

Sullivan told her that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo “was no longer able to protect” her from attacks led by Trump’s personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani.

Yovanovitch said the call “made me feel terrible. After 33 years of service to our country … it was not the way I wanted my career to end.”

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10:20 a.m.

Former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch says she was told last April by a State Department official to return to the United States “on the next plane” because of concerns “up the street” — a phrase she understood to mean the White House.

Yovanovitch said she received the call at 1 a.m. from an official who said she needed to come home right away. The person said there were concerns about her security.

She asked if that meant her physical security. The person said no.

Yovanovitch said this was “extremely irregular” and she argued. But she eventually returned, where she learned that President Donald Trump no longer wanted her to serve.

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10:15 a.m.

Marie Yovanovitch says she had a reputation for championing anti-corruption interests in Ukraine.

Yovanovitch, who was recalled last spring from her job as U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, said under questioning from Rep. Adam Schiff that that work may have upset certain officials in Ukraine.

She says State Department officials tried to produce a statement of support for her after her abrupt recall from her post, but she was told that effort was unsuccessful because the officials feared their message would be undercut by the president.

She says she was told that she had lost the president’s confidence and flew from Ukraine on the same day as the inauguration of Ukraine’s president.

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10:10 a.m.

President Donald Trump is attacking a witness in House Democrats’ impeachment inquiry while she is testifying before lawmakers.

Trump tweets that “everywhere” that former Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch went “turned bad.”

Noting her postings in the foreign service, Trump says: “She started off in Somalia, how did that go?”

Trump says he has the “absolute right” to appoint ambassadors.

Yovanovitch is a career foreign service officer with a solid reputation. She testified Friday that she was the victim of “a campaign of disinformation” that used “unofficial back channels” leading to her removal from Ukraine.

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9:45 a.m.

Former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch has told Congress that attacks from corrupt interests have created a crisis at the State Dept.

Yovanovitch is testifying openly before the House Intelligence Committee in its impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump.

She told lawmakers that she was the victim of “a campaign of disinformation” that used “unofficial back channels” leading to her removal from Ukraine. She says it “continues to amaze” her that Americans partnered with “Ukrainians who preferred to play by the old corrupt rules” in pushing for her removal.

Yovanovitch is also sounding alarm that senior State Department officials did not defend her from attacks from the president’s allies, including former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani. She is telling lawmakers about a “crisis in the State Department.”

She says: “The State Department is being hollowed out from within at a competitive and complex time on the world stage.”

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9:35 a.m.

The top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee has read aloud a memo circulated by the White House that summarizes the first conversation between President Donald Trump and his newly elected Ukrainian counterpart.

The first conversation took place in April after the election of Volodymyr Zelenskiy. It consists largely of pleasantries and words of congratulations.

The White House made a record of the conversation public at the start of the House impeachment hearing on Friday.

Rep. Devin Nunes, the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, read the document aloud to suggest that there was nothing untoward in the conversation.

Rep. Adam Schiff, the committee chairman, said Trump should also “release the thousands of other records that he has instructed the State Department not to release.”

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9:30 a.m.

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff says former Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch was “smeared and cast aside” by President Donald Trump because she was considered an obstacle to his personal and political agenda.

Opening the second public House impeachment hearing, Schiff said the question isn’t whether Trump could recall Yovanovitch but “why would he want to?”

Yovanovitch testified behind closed doors last month that she was told to “watch her back” before she was ousted in May as Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani led a shadow foreign policy.

Schiff said pushback at the State Department failed when it became clear that Trump wanted her gone.

Republican Rep. Devin Nunes said the hearings were “spectacles” for Democrats to “advance their operation to topple a duly elected president.”

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9 a.m.

The House has opened a second day of Trump impeachment hearings with Marie Yovanovitch, the former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine who was suddenly recalled back to the U.S. by President Donald Trump.

Yovanovitch is expected to testify about her ouster, which another diplomat has called a “smear” campaign against her by Trump allies.

The live public hearings by the House Intelligence Committee are being held to determine whether Trump should be removed from office over his actions toward Ukraine.

The investigation centers on Trump’s July 25 phone call when he asked the new Ukraine president for a favor — to investigate Democrats and potential 2020 rival Joe Biden — as the White House was withholding military aid to the Eastern European nation.

Yovanovitch and others have described Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s personal lawyer, as leading what one called an “irregular channel” outside the diplomatic mainstream of U.S.-Ukraine relations.

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8:35 a.m.

The former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine has arrived on Capitol Hill to testify in the Trump impeachment inquiry.

Marie Yovanovitch is the witness for the second day of public hearings. She’s expected to tell lawmakers about her sudden ouster as President Donald Trump recalled the career ambassador back to the United States.

Other diplomats testifying in the investigation have defended Yovanovitch, saying she was the target of “smear” campaign by the president’s allies. She has served both Democratic and Republican presidents.

The rare impeachment inquiry is focused on Trump’s actions toward Ukraine. Democrats say it amounts to bribery, as the president withheld military aid to Ukraine while he pushed the country to investigate rival Democrats, including Joe Biden.

Trump calls the probe a hoax and says he did nothing wrong.

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12:15 a.m.

The House will hear from a singular witness Friday in the Trump impeachment hearings: Marie Yovanovitch, the former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine who was targeted by the president’s allies in a “smear” campaign now central to the probe.

The career diplomat, who served both Republican and Democratic presidents, is expected to relay her striking story of being suddenly recalled by Donald Trump and told to “watch my back.” It was all part of a swiftly developing series of events that sounded alarms about the White House’s shadow foreign policy.

Friday is the second day of public hearings to consider removing America’s 45th president. Democrats and Republicans are hardening their messages to voters as they try to sway voter opinion amid a deeply polarized public.

The House will hear from a singular witness Friday in the Trump impeachment hearings: Marie Yovanovitch, the former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine who was targeted by the president’s allies in a “smear” campaign now central to the inquiry.

our daily look at late-breaking news, upcoming events and the stories that will be talked about today:

1. A NEW REVEAL FROM A DIPLOMAT AS IMPEACHMENT GOES PUBLIC

Democrats say the public session in the House revealed a striking account of Donald Trump abusing his office, something Republicans say the hearing showed none of.

2. WHAT’S NEXT IN IMPEACHMENT HEARINGS

Several more witnesses are expected to say they too worried about Trump’s push for Ukraine to investigate Democrats as the U.S. withheld military aid from the country.

3. SHAKY CEASE-FIRE INTERRUPTED BY ROCKET SALVO

Gaza militants fire a barrage of rockets into Israel, hours after a cease-fire was declared to end two days of intense fighting between Israel and the Islamic Jihad group.

4. CALIFORNIA BLACKOUTS SEEMINGLY HERE TO STAY

Most experts say that even under the best scenarios, the fires and widespread power shutoffs will be here for years to come and Californians will pay higher prices for less reliable energy.

5. WHY IRAQI OIL RICHES DON’T TRICKLE DOWN

Analysts and officials say bloated public sector budgets to maintain political patronage networks are to blame for everyday people not seeing the fruits of this wealth.

6. WHO HAS BACKING IN BOLIVIA

Jeanine Añez, who has claimed the interim presidency, seems to have the backing of the police, the military and the Roman Catholic Church. But supporters of the ousted Evo Morales are not backing down as clashes continue.

7. TRUMP TRYING TO SWAY TIGHT LOUISIANA RACE

Though the president won the deep red state by 20 percentage points, the governor’s race has reached its final days ahead of Saturday’s election as a tossup.

8. HOW TANKERS ARE AVOIDING DETECTION

Experts say some oil tankers are ignoring international rules on reporting their location so they can illicitly transport petroleum for Venezuela in violation of international sanctions.

9. GARTH BROOKS SHINES AT CMAS

The “Friends in Low Places” singer wins the top prize over Carrie Underwood, who many had hoped would be the first female to win entertainer of the year since 2011.

10. WHAT THE ASTROS CAN ACCOMPLISH

If Alex Bregman is the AL’s Most Valuable Player, Houston will become the first team to have an MVP, Cy Young Award winner and Rookie of the Year in the same season.

WASHINGTON (AP) — With historic impeachment hearings underway, Democrats and Republicans are hardening their arguments over the actions of President Donald Trump as they set out to win over a deeply polarized American public.

Democrats say Wednesday’s extraordinary public session in the House revealed a striking account of Trump abusing his office by pressing the newly elected president of Ukraine for political investigations of rival Democrats, all while holding up needed military aid. “Bribery,” they said, and “extortion.”

Republicans counter that the hearing showed none of that. They say the two seasoned diplomats at the witness table had, at best, secondhand accounts of Trump’s July 25 call that’s central to the impeachment inquiry. There was no pressure on the young Ukraine leader, they argue, and eventually the aid flowed, though only after Congress intervened.

Day One of the rare public hearings in the House — part of only the fourth formal impeachment effort in U.S. history — set the contours for a once-in-a-generation political struggle. Images and audio from the hearing popped up on television, in earbuds and on the partisan silos of social media, providing the first close-up look at the investigation.

“The president sought to advance his political and personal interests at the expense of U.S. national security,” said Rep. Adam Schiff of California, the Democratic chairman of the House Intelligence Committee leading the probe.

“Is this now going to be the new normal?” Schiff asked.

Hosting the president of Turkey at the White House, Trump insisted he was too busy to watch the hearings being broadcast live across the country and the world. He denied a fresh detail from one of the witnesses about a phone call in which he was overheard asking about “the investigations.”

“First I’ve heard of it,” Trump told reporters during a news conference.

A different conversation sparked the impeachment investigation, Trump’s July 25 phone call with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, heard by several government officials and detailed in a partial transcript released to the public weeks ago. The core moment came when Trump asked the newly elected leader for “a favor.”

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., said Wednesday that the Democrats’ first witness “wasn’t on the phone call, never met with the president, never talked to the chief of staff. And he’s their star witness?”

Trump wanted Ukraine’s government to investigate Democrats’ activities in the 2016 election and his potential 2020 rival Joe Biden — all while the administration was withholding military aid for the Eastern European ally as it confronted an aggressive neighbor, Russia.

All day, the two diplomats delivered a dramatic, though complicated, account. They testified about how an ambassador was fired, the new Ukraine government was confused and they discovered an “irregular channel” — a shadow U.S. foreign policy orchestrated by the president’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, that raised alarms in diplomatic and national security circles.

Trump restated his aggressive defense with rapid-fire tweets, a video from the Rose Garden and a dismissive retort from the Oval Office: “It’s a witch hunt. It’s a hoax.”

Career diplomat William Taylor, the charge d’affaires in Kyiv, offered new testimony that a staff member recently told him of overhearing Trump when they were meeting with another diplomat, U.S. Ambassador Gordon Sondland, at a restaurant the day after Trump’s July 25 phone call.

The staff member explained that Sondland had called the president and they could hear Trump on the phone asking about “the investigations,” Taylor said. Sondland told the president the Ukrainians were ready to move forward, Taylor testified as he repeated the staff member’s account.

In the face of Trump’s denial, Schiff expects the person to appear before investigators for a closed-door deposition. He is David Holmes, the political counselor at the embassy in Kyiv, according to an official unauthorized to discuss the matter and granted anonymity.

Across the country, millions of Americans were tuning in — or, in some cases, deliberately tuning out.

Viewers on the right and left thought the day underscored their feelings. Anthony Harris, cutting hair in Savannah, Georgia, had the hearing on in his shop, but he said, “It’s gotten to the point now where people are even tired of listening.”

The hours of partisan back-and-forth did not appear to leave a singular moment etched in the public consciousness the way the Watergate proceedings or Bill Clinton’s impeachment did generations ago.

“No real surprises, no bombshells,” said committee member Rep. Chris Stewart, R-Utah.

Still, the session unspooled at least partly the way Democrats wanted with the somber tones of career foreign service officers telling what they knew. They sounded credible.

The witnesses, the graying Taylor and Deputy Assistant Secretary of State George Kent in his bow tie, defied White House instructions not to appear. Both had received subpoenas.

They are among a dozen current and former officials who already testified behind closed doors. Days of public hearings will stretch into next week.

Both Kent and Taylor, who was asked by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to return to Ukraine as Trump was firing Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch, defended their ousted colleague. She is set to testify Friday.

A Trump ally on the panel, Republican Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, mockingly called Taylor the Democrats’ “star witness” and said he’d “seen church prayer chains that are easier to understand than this.”

Taylor, a West Point graduate and an Army infantry officer in Vietnam, responded: “I don’t consider myself a star witness for anything.”

The top Republican on the panel, Rep. Devin Nunes of California, said Trump had a “perfectly good reason” for wanting to investigate the role of Democrats in 2016 election interference, giving airtime to a theory that runs counter to mainstream U.S. intelligence which found that Russia intervened and favored Trump.

Nunes accused the Democratic majority of conducting a “scorched earth” effort to take down the president after the special counsel’s Russia investigation into the 2016 election failed to spark impeachment proceedings.

The veteran foreign service officers delivered heartfelt history lessons about Ukraine, a young and hopeful democracy, situated next to Russia but reaching out to the West.

Republicans sought to hear from the anonymous whistleblower whose official complaint alerted officials to the July 25 call by subpoenaing him for a closed session. The panel voted down the request and Schiff repeatedly denied the GOP claim that he knows the person.

“We will do everything necessary to protect the whistleblower’s identity,” Schiff declared.

The Constitution sets a dramatic but vague bar for impeachment. There’s no consensus yet that Trump’s actions at the heart of the inquiry meet the threshold of “high crimes and misdemeanors.”

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was initially reluctant to launch a formal impeachment inquiry. But she pressed ahead after the whistleblower’s complaint. She said Wednesday it was sad that the country has to undergo the inquiry with Trump but “he will be held accountable.”

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Associated Press writers Colleen Long, Mike Balsamo, Eric Tucker, Laurie Kellman, Alan Fram, Zeke J. Miller and Matthew Daly contributed to this report.