National News

Tens of thousands of striking Los Angeles teachers were joined by parents and students in a rally near City Hall on Friday, as contract talks mediated by the mayor resumed behind closed doors after a marathon negotiating session the day before. Some 30,000 teachers walked off the job on Monday in their first strike against the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) in 30 years, demanding higher pay, smaller classes and more support staff. LAUSD officials have argued that the teachers' demands would place too great a strain on the district's budget if they were fully met.

After a jury convicted Van Dyke, 40, of second-degree murder last fall, Cook County Circuit Court Judge Vincent Gaughan sentenced him to 81 months in prison and said he would have to serve at least two years before he was eligible for parole. Van Dyke could have received up to 20 years in prison for second-degree murder and up to 30 years for each of 16 counts of aggravated battery - one count for each shot he fired at 17-year-old McDonald, who was carrying a knife. During sentencing, Van Dyke sat expressionless, unshaven and wearing a yellow-orange jail uniform.

U.S. Special Counsel Robert Mueller's office issued a statement late on Friday taking issue with a report in Buzzfeed that President Donald Trump's former lawyer Michael Cohen said Trump told him to lie to Congress. “BuzzFeed’s description of specific statements to the Special Counsel’s Office, and characterization of documents and testimony obtained by this office, regarding Michael Cohen’s Congressional testimony are not accurate,” Peter Carr, a spokesman for Mueller office, said in the statement.

A judge on Friday sentenced white former Chicago police officer Jason Van Dyke to nearly seven years in prison after a landmark verdict last fall found him guilty of murder in the 2014 shooting of black teenager Laquan McDonald. Cook County Circuit Court Judge Vincent Gaughan sentenced Van Dyke to 81 months in prison and said he would have to serve at least two years before he was eligible for parole. Van Dyke, 40, appearing unshaven and wearing a yellow-orange jail uniform in court, faced up to 20 years in prison for his second-degree murder conviction and up to 30 years for each of 16 counts of aggravated battery - one count for each shot he fired at McDonald, who was carrying a knife.

Tens of thousands of striking Los Angeles teachers rallied near City Hall on Friday, joined by parents and students as contract talks the mayor called "productive" resumed behind closed doors after a marathon negotiating session the day before. Some 30,000 teachers walked off the job on Monday in their first strike against the Los Angeles Unified School District in 30 years, demanding higher pay, smaller classes and more support staff. "We are willing to go as long as it takes and work as hard as we need to to get a fair contract," union bargaining chair Arlene Inouye told supporters at City Hall, adding that talks were expected to last through the three-day holiday weekend.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Bell Helicopter Textron Inc, a unit of Textron Inc, has been awarded a $440 million U.S. defense contract for the production 16 AH-1Z helicopters and 25 stores control units, the Pentagon said on Friday.

Singer Gladys Knight has defended her decision to perform the U.S. national anthem after receiving criticism from supporters of former quarterback Colin Kaepernick, who used the pre-game tradition to protest racial injustice. Knight, a 74-year-old native of Atlanta, where the game will be played, agreed to sing "the Star Spangled Banner." Her decision was blasted on social media by supporters of the "take a knee" stance championed by NFL players who kneel during the anthem to protest racial injustice. U.S. President Donald Trump and other conservatives have called the players unpatriotic.

A major winter storm was expected to clobber a large swath of the northern United States with heavy snow, gusty winds and frigid temperatures making travel difficult and dangerous starting on Friday and through the weekend, forecasters said. The storm system will dump 6 to 10 inches (15 to 25 cm) of snow in the Plains and Midwest on Friday night and Saturday and as it moves east at least a foot of snow in parts of the Northeast on Saturday and Sunday, the National Weather Service (NWS) said in several advisories. The system was expected to also bring freezing rain, wind gusts of 35 miles (56 km) per hour and quickly dropping temperatures that will to dip into the teens and even below zero Fahrenheit in several areas, the service said.

At the request of the Justice Department, U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell issued the order, the first official U.S. confirmation of reports of the arrest of Marzieh Hashemi, an anchor for Iran's English-language Press TV news channel. The order, which approved the partial unsealing of information in the case, said Hashemi was arrested on a material witness warrant issued by a federal judge and that she was assigned an attorney but "has not been accused of any crime." Hashemi has made two court appearances, and the U.S. government expects her immediate release after she finishes testifying before a federal grand jury investigating violations of U.S. criminal law, the order continued. It did not disclose further details of the case, which has added to tensions between the Iranian and U.S. governments over the U.S. withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal, the reimposition of harsh U.S. sanctions, and the detention of Iranian-American dual nationals by Iran.

An Iranian-American businessman who gave money to Democrats including former President Barack Obama should be released early from his 12-year prison term for a $292 million bank fraud and moved to home confinement, his lawyers said on Friday. Lawyers for Hassan Nemazee, 68, who has spent nearly 8-1/2 years in prison, said he qualified for early release under a prison reform law signed by President Donald Trump last month. Nemazee's lawyers said their client has been a model prisoner, has a job and housing lined up for after his release, and "embodies the very paradigm" of the type of person Congress intended for home confinement.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump spoke in a prerecorded video to thousands of anti-abortion activists in Washington on Friday for the 46th March for Life, vowing to veto any legislation that "weakens the protection of human life."

NEW YORK/SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Detained in a California lockup with hundreds of other immigrants seeking asylum, Duglas Cruz faced a choice. Or he could labor in the prison's kitchen to earn money to buy extra food at the commissary. Cruz went to work.

PayPal Holdings Inc said on Friday it will offer $25 million in interest-free credit to its users who work with the U.S. federal government and are impacted by the shutdown. Employees who use PayPal Credit will be able to avail an advance of up to $500 each, without having to pay any interest, and the program will last until the government reopens and employees receive their first paycheck, the company said on its website http://bit.ly/2Cs7xAY. The partial shutdown, which hit the four-week mark on Friday, is the longest in U.S. history.