States charge more for electric cars as new laws take effect
The new year will bring new charges for some owners of electric vehicles, as an increasing number of states seek to plug in to fresh revenue sources to offset forgone gas taxes.
In Hawaii, the charge will be $50. In Kansas, $100. In Alabama and Ohio, $200.
New or higher registration fees go into effect Wednesday for electric vehicle owners in at least eight states. For the first time, a majority of U.S. states will impose special fees on gas-free cars, SUVs and trucks — a significant milestone as the trend toward green technology intersects with the mounting need to pay for upgrades and repairs to the nation’s infrastructure.
Though electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles comprised less than 2% of new vehicle sales in 2018, their market share is projected to rise substantially in the coming decade. State officials hope the new fees will make up for at least part of the lost gas tax revenue that is essential to their road and bridge programs.
“I think states are still trying to determine what is a fair or equitable fee on these electric vehicle owners,” said Kristy Hartman, energy program director at the National Conference of State Legislatures.
5 stabbed at Hanukkah celebration in latest attack on Jews
MONSEY, N.Y. — A knife-wielding man stormed into a rabbi’s home and stabbed five people as they celebrated Hanukkah in an Orthodox Jewish community north of New York City, an ambush the governor said Sunday was an act of domestic terrorism fueled by intolerance and a “cancer” of growing hatred in America.
Police tracked a fleeing suspect to Manhattan and made an arrest within two hours of the attack Saturday night in Monsey. Grafton E. Thomas had blood all over his clothing, smelled of bleach but said “almost nothing” when officers stopped him, officials said.
An automated license plate reader alerted officers that the suspect’s car had crossed over the George Washington Bridge into New York City about an hour after the attack. Thomas was stopped and taken into custody about 20-30 minutes later, NYPD commissioner Dermot Shea said.
Security camera footage the NYPD made public Sunday night showed two officers approaching Thomas’ sedan with guns drawn before the suspect placed his hands on the roof of the car and he was put in handcuffs.
President Donald Trump condemned the “horrific” attack, saying in a tweet Sunday that “We must all come together to fight, confront, and eradicate the evil scourge of anti-Semitism.”
Police: Parishioners kill man who fatally shoots 2 at church
WHITE SETTLEMENT, Texas — Congregants returned fire and fatally shot a gunman who killed two people in a church near Fort Worth, Texas, on Sunday, police said.
The death of the second person was confirmed Sunday evening by FBI spokesman Jason Wandel. He also said the two congregants who opened fire on the suspect were part of a security team at the West Freeway Church of Christ in White Settlement.
The assailant fired at least once before the “heroic actions” of the congregants cut his assault short, White Settlement Police Department Chief J.P. Bevering said during a news conference Sunday afternoon.
“Unfortunately, this country has seen so many of these that we’ve actually gotten used to it at this point. And it’s tragic and it’s a terrible situation, especially during the holiday season,” Jeoff Williams, a regional director with the Texas Department of Public Safety, said at the news conference. “I would like to point out that we have a couple of heroic parishioners who stopped short of just anything that you can even imagine, saved countless lives, and our hearts are going out to them and their families as well.”
Authorities have released scant details about the victims, the shooter and what led to the attack.
From wire sources
Taliban council agrees to cease-fire in Afghanistan
KABUL, Afghanistan — The Taliban’s ruling council agreed Sunday to a temporary cease-fire in Afghanistan, providing a window in which a peace agreement with the United States can be signed, officials from the insurgent group said. They didn’t say when it would begin.
A cease-fire had been demanded by Washington before any peace agreement could be signed. A peace deal would allow the U.S. to bring home its troops from Afghanistan and end its 18-year military engagement there, America’s longest.
The White House said it would have no comment.
The U.S. wants any deal to include a promise from the Taliban that Afghanistan would not be used as a base by terrorist groups. The U.S. currently has an estimated 12,000 troops in Afghanistan.
The Taliban chief must approve the cease-fire decision but that was expected. The duration of the cease-fire was not specified but it was suggested it would last for 10 days. It was also not specified when the cease-fire would begin.
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US strikes hit Iraqi militia blamed in contractor’s death
WASHINGTON — The U.S. carried out military strikes in Iraq and Syria targeting an Iranian-backed Iraqi militia blamed for a rocket attack that killed an American contractor, Defense Secretary Mark Esper said Sunday.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said the strikes send the message that the U.S. will not tolerate actions by Iran that jeopardize American lives.
“Precision defensive strikes” were conducted against five sites of Kataeb Hezbollah, or Hezbollah Brigades, Defense Department spokesman Jonathan Hoffman said in a statement earlier Sunday.
The U.S. blames the militia for a rocket barrage Friday that killed a U.S. defense contractor at a military compound near Kirkuk, in northern Iraq. Officials said as many as 30 rockets were fired in Friday’s assault.
Esper said the U.S. hit three of the militia’s sites in western Iraq and two in eastern Syria, including weapon depots and the militia’s command and control bases.
Buttigieg critiques Biden’s ‘judgment’ on Iraq War vote
KNOXVILLE, Iowa — Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg on Sunday called former Vice President Joe Biden’s vote to authorize the Iraq War part of the nation’s “worst foreign policy decision” of the millennial mayor’s lifetime.
Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, was responding to a question about how his foreign policy experience measured up to others’ in the Democratic race, specifically Biden, who was a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee when the U.S. went to war.
“This is an example of why years in Washington is not always the same thing as judgment,” Buttigieg said while recording the program “Iowa Press” on Iowa Public Television, according to a transcript. “He supported the worst foreign policy decision made by the United States in my lifetime, which was the decision to invade Iraq.”
As Buttigieg has risen to the top of voter preference polls in Iowa, where the presidential nominating contests begin in a little more than a month, some of his rivals have pointed to his governing experience being limited to a city of about 102,000 as a liability.
Biden, who represented Delaware in the Senate, voted in October 2002 for the resolution to authorize the use of force in Iraq. The U.S.-led invasion the following March became a point of Democratic criticism for those in the party who supported the resolution.
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Denied asylum, migrants return to place they fear most: home
SAN PEDRO SULA, Honduras — By now, the young couple thought they’d be in the United States. Somewhere, anywhere, in the United States. They thought they’d have jobs — he’d work construction, maybe she’d be a waitress. They thought they’d be safe. They thought they’d have asylum.
Instead, an American judge swiftly denied their asylum requests. The Trump administration, in making asylum an increasingly remote possibility for everyone, had closed the door on them.
In early August, immigration officials escorted the couple onto a chartered airliner packed with deportees that flew them back to this industrial city in one of the world’s most dangerous countries.
They were home, back in a two-room apartment in the dusty San Pedro Sula neighborhood of Rivera Hernandez.
There was nowhere more frightening.
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