Cold weather fatal in Plains, Northeast
CONCORD, N.H. -- Falling temperatures replaced the weekend's falling snow Monday as bitter cold and gusty winds swept across the eastern United States.
The National Weather Service had forecast that temperatures would be more than 20 degrees below normal across the Northeast, with wind gusts up to 30 mph and wind chills approaching minus 40 degrees Fahrenheit in northern New York and Vermont.
Atop the Northeast's highest mountain, the temperature fell to minus 23 degrees Monday morning and dropped to minus 31 degrees later in the afternoon, according to the Facebook page for Mount Washington Observatory in New Hampshire. Wind chills were hovering around minus 80 degrees.
The weather contributed to multiple deaths over the weekend.
Police in Arlington Heights, Ill., said a 12-year-old girl died Sunday after a snow fort collapsed on her. In Connecticut, a utility company subcontractor died Sunday after being struck by a falling tree while working on a power line in Middletown.
In Kansas, a snowplow driver was killed when the plow went onto the shoulder of a road and rolled over, throwing him under the vehicle. And in Wisconsin, the Milwaukee County medical examiner's office said a 59-year-old man and a 91-year-old man collapsed and died Sunday in separate incidents after removing snow.
A man in charge of transportation at a southwestern Michigan school district also died while shoveling snow.
Biden rues support for crack sentencing
WASHINGTON -- Former Vice President Joe Biden said Monday that he made a mistake in supporting the tough-on-crime drug legislation of the 1980s and 1990s, expressing regret in particular over a bill that created different legal standards for powdered cocaine and street crack cocaine.
"It was a big mistake that was made," Biden said of the measure, which was criticized as disproportionately affecting black Americans. "We were told by the experts that 'crack you never go back,' that the two were somehow fundamentally different. It's not. But it's trapped an entire generation."
The former vice president appeared along with former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg at a breakfast in Washington celebrating Martin Luther King Jr. Day. The two men, both of whom are considering whether to seek the Democratic nomination for president, have been criticized for their mixed record on issues of racial equality and criminal justice.
Biden, who as a senator helped pass a 1994 crime bill that is now cited as having led to an era of mass incarceration, admitted that he "may not have always gotten things right" in regards to criminal justice.
Bloomberg on Monday avoided any mention of the contentious policing tactic he implemented in New York called stop-and-frisk, which gave police officers sweeping powers to detain -- and sometimes harass -- those suspected of committing crimes.
LA teachers union says strike won't stop
LOS ANGELES -- The union representing striking teachers in Los Angeles said the strike would continue into today regardless of the outcome of negotiations Monday.
The United Teachers Los Angeles said Monday that even if a tentative agreement were reached as negotiations continued late in the day, teachers would not report to work before ratifying a deal.
The union said it has a process to inform voting members over a few hours but that ratification still takes time.
Teachers in the nation's second-largest school district walked off the job and onto picket lines Jan. 14 for the first time in 30 years.
The union and the Los Angeles Unified School District are at odds over issues including salary, class size and support staff.
Schools have stayed open during the strike with skeleton staffs, and the district said classes would continue today.
N. Korea missile base ID'd, report says
Days after the White House announced plans for a second summit between the leaders of the U.S. and North Korea, a think tank report has identified a secret North Korean ballistic-missile base about 160 miles northwest of Seoul that is reportedly the headquarters of the country's strategic missile force.
The report, released Monday by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said the base is one of about 20 undeclared operating facilities under North Korea's ballistic-missile program. Researchers at the center's Beyond Parallel project said the latest report provides more evidence that North Korea is not dismantling its weapons facilities.
"While diplomacy is critical, and should be the primary way to resolve the North Korean nuclear problem, any future agreement must take account of all of the operational missile base facilities that are a threat to U.S. and South Korean security," the report said.
-- Compiled by Democrat-Gazette staff from wire reports
A Section on 01/22/2019