Author: pbmatt

onurdongel/iStockBY: IVAN PEREIRA, ABC NEWS (NEW YORK) — New York City high school students who chose in-person learning in the beginning of the school year will return to their classrooms on March 22, more than five months after officials temporarily switched all students to remote learning when COVID-19 cases rose. Mayor Bill de Blasio announced Monday that the city’s Department of Education has undertaken several recommendations by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, including testing, mask mandates and social distancing, to ensure that students and staff will be…

The Black Conservative PreacherBY: OLIVIA RUBIN, AARON KATERSKY, AND ALEXANDER MALLIN, ABC NEWS (NEW YORK) — A New York man with ties to the Oath Keepers militia group and former President Donald Trump’s longtime adviser Roger Stone has been arrested and charged in connection with the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. Roberto Minuta, of Newburgh, New York, was seen in a video first unearthed by ABC News flanking Roger Stone on the morning of Jan. 6 outside a Washington, D.C., hotel. In the video, Minuta can be seen standing with Stone…

DNY59/iStockBy BILL HUTCHINSON and WHITNEY LLOYD (MINNEAPOLIS) — The murder trial of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin in the death of George Floyd kicked off Monday with prosecutors asking the judge to put jury selection on hold. Before jury selection could begin, Chauvin’s defense attorney, Eric Nelson, told the court that he will file a petition for the Minnesota Supreme Court to review a Court of Appeals decision issued on Friday asking that trial Judge Peter Cahill consider reinstating a third-degree murder charge against Chauvin. State prosecutor Matthew Frank…

MarianVejcik/iStockBY: DANIEL MANZO, ABC NEWS (NEW YORK) — A polar vortex in February delivered the coldest temperatures in that month to the lower 48 states since 1989, according to a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration report released Monday. Temperatures in the contiguous U.S. were about 3.2 degrees F colder than the average for that month in the 20th century, NOAA said. It was the 19th-coldest February among 127 years of record keeping, and for December through February, the three months that constitute meteorological winter, temps in the contiguous U.S. actually…

guvendemir/iStockBY: STEPHANIE EBBS, ABC NEWS (WASHINGTON) — Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky on Monday defended her agency’s decision not to endorse travel for vaccinated Americans, saying that, even as the CDC says they can socially gather without masks, increasing travel would add to the number of COVID-19 cases and pose a risk to the majority of the country not yet vaccinated. Walensky said the agency’s guidance has not changed, saying that travel has increased COVID-19 cases and that, even though people who are vaccinated are…