US Domestic News Roundup: Multistate E.coli infection outbreak appears to be over, says CDC; Trump threatens wildfire aid

Following is a summary of current US domestic news briefs.

Trump storms out of talks on shutdown, bemoans 'total waste of time'

U.S. President Donald Trump stormed out of talks with Democratic congressional leaders on Wednesday over funding for a border wall with Mexico and reopening the government, complaining the meeting in the White House was "a total waste of time." On the 19th day of a partial government shutdown caused by the dispute over the wall, a short meeting that included Trump, Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer and House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi ended in acrimony with no sign of a resolution.

California Republicans object after Trump threatens wildfire aid

U.S. President Donald Trump lashed out once more at California on Wednesday for a series of devastating wildfires he blames on poor forest management, threatening to withhold federal disaster aid in a Twitter blast that drew rebukes from lawmakers in his own party. Trump's tweet, the latest of several in recent months accusing California of bringing wildfires on itself, came two days after newly elected Governor Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, used the occasion of his swearing-in to critique "corruption and incompetence" of the Republican president.

Error in U.S. prisons law means well-behaved inmates wait longer for release

U.S. prisoners who were expecting earlier release for good behavior, thanks to a new criminal justice law enacted last month, must keep waiting due to an error in the bill, said activists working with the White House to fix the mistake. Potentially thousands of inmates could be affected by the error in the First Step Act, signed into law on Dec. 21 by Republican President Donald Trump in a rare example of bipartisanship in Washington, with both Democrats and Republicans backing it.

As U.S. Catholic churches struggle, their foundations' investments thrive

Assets managed by U.S. Catholic foundations have more than doubled over the last three years, propelled by increased donations and stable market performance, according to a study by wealth advisory firm Wilmington Trust. The study showed U.S. Catholic foundations, set up by archdioceses and dioceses across the country, managed $9.5 billion as of the end of 2018, up 106 percent from $4.6 billion in 2016 when Wilmington Trust released its first report on the sector.

'My mortgage is due' Some U.S. federal workers seek shutdown cash

About 1,000 furloughed federal workers have turned to online fundraising to help cover their expenses as a partial shutdown of the U.S. government drags on for nearly three weeks, a spokeswoman for GoFundMe.com said on Wednesday. Some 800,000 federal employees have been ordered to stay home or work without pay because of the standoff between U.S. President Donald Trump and Congress over Trump's demand for $5.7 billion to build a wall on the southern U.S. border - a promise he made in his 2016 campaign that he said at the time would be paid for by Mexico.

'El Chapo' jurors see intimate texts caught by drug lord's spyware

Prosecutors in the U.S. trial of Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman on Wednesday shared with jurors text messages they said the accused Mexican drug lord sent to his wife and apparent mistress in which he discussed narrowly escaping from a raid and joked about arming his 18-month-old daughter with an assault rifle. The messages from early 2012 were read by FBI special agent Steven Marston, on his second day testifying in Brooklyn federal court. Marston explained U.S. authorities were able to obtain them by searching records collected by a spy software Guzman himself had ordered installed on phones used by his wife, Emma Coronel, and by another woman, Agustina Cabanillas.

Los Angeles teachers postpone strike over legal snag

A union representing more than 30,000 Los Angeles teachers on Wednesday postponed until next week a threatened strike over lingering contract negotiations with the country's largest school district, citing a last-minute legal snag. United Teachers Los Angeles had called a strike for its members in the city's 900 public schools for Thursday if an agreement was not reached before then over such issues as pay, staffing, and class sizes.

U.S. air travel concerns surface as government shutdown drags on

U.S. airport security workers and air traffic controllers working without pay have been warning that security and safety could be compromised if the government shutdown continues, but the Trump administration said on Wednesday that staffing is adequate and travelers have not faced unusual delays. Union officials said some TSA officers have already quit because of the shutdown and many are considering quitting.

Multistate E.coli infection outbreak appears to be over: CDC

The multistate outbreak of E. coli infections linked to romaine lettuce from the Central Coastal growing regions in northern and central California appears to be over, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said on Wednesday. Sixty-two people infected with the outbreak strain of E. coli were reported from 16 states and the District of Columbia, the CDC said in an update https://www.cdc.gov/ecoli/2018/o157h7-11-18/index.html on its investigation into the outbreak.

DNA test clears Golden State Killer suspect of 1975 murder: prosecutor

DNA evidence has cleared a former policeman accused of being the "Golden State Killer," who terrified a swath of California with dozens of rapes and murders in the 1970s and 1980s, in one murder case from 1975 in which he was a suspect, prosecutors said. More than three decades after the spate of killings and home invasions ended, investigators last year tracked down and arrested former police officer Joseph DeAngelo, 73, after comparing DNA found at crime scenes to data on commercial genealogy websites. So far they have charged him with 13 counts of murder and kidnapping from 1975 through 1986.

(With inputs from agencies.)