Author: chicagoinquirer

by Joseph Ax, Andy Sullivan and Jeff Mason MILWAUKEE, July 19 (Reuters) – Democratic President Joe Biden weighed his political future at his Delaware beach house on Friday, one day after Donald Trump accepted the Republican presidential nomination in a rambling speech that featured his familiar mix of grievance and bombast. The 81-year-old incumbent’s schedule was in flux as he isolated at home following a COVID-19 diagnosis, with no public events scheduled for Friday, but a top adviser said he would return to the campaign trail next week. “He is absolutely in it,” Biden campaign chairwoman Jen O’Malley Dillon told…

by Jamey Keaten and Edith A. Lederer GENEVA — Sudan’s warring parties have arrived in Geneva at the invitation of the United Nations to discuss the protection of civilians through possible local cease-fires, U.N. officials said Thursday. But one side did not show up for the talks on the first day. Senior representatives from the Sudanese army and rival paramilitary Rapid Support Forces accepted invitations to meet separately with the U.N. secretary-general’s personal envoy, Ramtane Lamamra, Stephane Dujarric, the spokesman at U.N. headquarters in New York, told reporters. Lamamra invited both parties to separate “proximity talks” on Thursday morning but…

LAS VEGAS — USA Basketball intended to bring Kawhi Leonard to the Paris Olympics. After watching him play in a four-day training camp, they and the Los Angeles Clippers realized that the plan needed to change. Derrick White of the NBA champion Boston Celtics is replacing Leonard on the U.S. team for the Paris, the first shakeup to a roster that was announced in the spring. The decision was made Tuesday, White accepted the invitation Tuesday night and USA Basketball announced the move Wednesday morning. “He wanted to be here like all these guys want to be here,” USA Basketball…

WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden’s imperiled reelection campaign hit new trouble Wednesday as House Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi said merely “it’s up to the president to decide” if he should stay in the race, celebrity donor George Clooney said he should not run and Democratic senators and lawmakers expressed fresh fear about his ability to beat Republican Donald Trump. Late in the evening, Vermont Sen. Peter Welch called on Biden to withdraw from the election, becoming the first Senate Democrat to do so. Welch said he is worried because “the stakes could not be higher.” The sudden flurry of grave…

by Bill Barrow NEW ORLEANS — As President Joe Biden tries to revive his embattled reelection bid, Vice President Kamala Harris led a parade of Black Democrats who warned Saturday that the threat of another Donald Trump presidency remains the most important calculation ahead of November. Yet in more than 20 minutes on stage at the Essence Festival of Culture, Harris did not acknowledge Biden’s dismal debate performance or calls for the 81-year-old president to end his reelection bid. In fact, she barely mentioned Biden at all – a stark contrast to the Congressional Black Caucus members who forcefully and…

by Chinedu Asadu ABUJA, Nigeria — West Africa’s divided regional bloc Sunday asked Senegal’s President Basirou Diomaye Faye to have a dialogue with the three military junta-led member states to try to reunite the region whose stability has been under threat following their decision to leave the group in January. At its summit in Nigeria’s capital Abuja, the bloc — known as ECOWAS — appointed Faye as its envoy to meet with Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso, which formed their separate union after their respective coups fractured relations with neighbors. It was not immediately clear what the terms of the…

by Tim Reynolds Antetokounmpo is heading to the Olympics for the first time, after he scored 23 points and Greece held off Croatia 80-69 on Sunday in one of the four men’s basketball qualifying tournament finals being held to determine the final spots in the 12-team field for the Paris Games. “The best athletes in the world compete in the Olympic Games,” Antetokounmpo said. “We have nothing to lose. … I really believe we have an incredible team and we can accomplish something special.” Georgios Papagiannis scored 19 points for Greece, which got 14 from Nick Calathes and earned an…

by Tim Reynolds LAS VEGAS — He first played on the U.S. Olympic team as a 19-year-old. He did it again in his 20s, twice. And now, a few months from turning 40, he’s back for one more run. LeBron James didn’t need another Olympic experience to complete some missing box on his resume or add to a legacy that was secured long, long ago. He decided to play this summer for one simple reason — because he wants to. Taking his first steps toward becoming the first U.S. men’s basketball player to compete at the Olympics in three different…

by John Raby CHICAGO – The Fourth of July historically is one of the nation’s deadliest days of the year. A flurry of shootings around the holiday a year ago left more than a dozen people dead and over 60 wounded. And a year before that, seven people died in a mass shooting at a Fourth of July parade near Chicago. Violence and mass shootings often increase in the summer months, with more people gathering for social events, teens out of school and hotter temperatures. Chicago ‘in state of grief’ In Chicago alone, 11 people had been killed and 55…

by Jade Lozada UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Haitian Prime Minister Garry Conille told the U.N. Security Council on Wednesday that recently deployed Kenyan police will be crucial to helping control the country’s gangs and moving toward democratic elections — and he called feedback from their initial days in the capital “extremely, extremely positive.” He said his government will focus on addressing gang violence and food insecurity, ensuring free elections through constitutional and political reform, and rebuilding public trust in the police. On June 25, the initial contingent of 200 Kenyan police arrived in Port-au-Prince. Kenya has pledged 1,000 police to…