Reuters US Domestic News Summary

“But what we can do is begin the process of reducing the catastrophic nature of those fires.” U.S. Supreme Court leans toward Christian group in Boston flag dispute U.S. Supreme Court justices on Tuesday appeared inclined to rule in favor of a Christian group that sued on free speech grounds over a refusal by Boston officials to fly a flag bearing the image of a cross at City Hall in a challenge backed by Democratic President Joe Biden's administration.

Following is a summary of current US domestic news briefs.

U.S. website to order free COVID-19 tests up and running

The U.S. government's new COVIDTests.gov website, set up for American households to order four free COVID-19 tests amid the Omicron variant surge, is up and running ahead of its official launch on Wednesday, the White House said. U.S. households can secure four tests at no cost when ordering from the website, with shipping expected within seven to 12 days of ordering, the White House said on Friday.

Texas synagogue hostage-taking suspect entry in U.S. did not raise security flags - White House

The Texas synagogue hostage-taking suspect was checked against U.S. government databases but it did not show any derogatory information, White House spokesperson Jen Psai said on Tuesday. Malik Faisal Akram, the suspected gunman who took four people hostage at a Dallas-area synagogue and was himself killed, was known to British intelligence and assessed to no longer be a threat at the time he traveled to the United States, the BBC reported.

How the White House hopes to save Biden's Build Back Better bill

The White House is seeking to "reset" talks on its $1.75 trillion spending bill, aiming to salvage climate change measures but pare down or cut items like the child tax credit and paid family leave to appeal to U.S. Senator Joe Manchin and other Democrats as soon as this week, said two people working on the plan. Democratic President Joe Biden's administration is expected to pivot from a long-shot attempt to pass voting rights legislation through the Senate https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-voting-rights-bill-passes-house-senate-prospects-remain-unclear-2022-01-13, which begins on Tuesday, to renew talks in earnest with lawmakers on a slimmed-down version of the Build Back Better https://www.reuters.com/business/cop/whats-bidens-175-trillion-build-back-better-package-2021-11-05 bill, the sources said.

One person killed, 8 hurt in row house blast and fire in New York's Bronx

An explosion and fire, apparently triggered by a gas leak, demolished several row house apartment units in New York City's Bronx borough on Tuesday, killing one resident and injuring at least eight other people, authorities said. Five of those injured were police officers who raced into the burning structure to help usher residents to safety, and one was a woman who was rescued by police, officials said.

Biden administration unveils plan to combat worsening US wildfires

The Biden administration on Tuesday unveiled a 10-year plan to treat and maintain millions of additional acres of forests in the western United States to reduce the severity of seasonal wildfires. “We’re not going to stop fires,” U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said at a press event in Arizona alongside Forest Service chief Randy Moore. “But what we can do is begin the process of reducing the catastrophic nature of those fires.”

U.S. Supreme Court leans toward Christian group in Boston flag dispute

U.S. Supreme Court justices on Tuesday appeared inclined to rule in favor of a Christian group that sued on free speech grounds over a refusal by Boston officials to fly a flag bearing the image of a cross at City Hall in a challenge backed by Democratic President Joe Biden's administration. The justices heard oral arguments in an appeal by the group, Camp Constitution, and its director, Harold Shurtleff, over Boston's 2017 denial of their application to raise the Christian cross flag due to concerns that it could appear as an unconstitutional government endorsement of a particular religion. Lower courts sided with the city.

Drugmaker Endo signs $65 million opioid settlement with Florida

Drugmaker Endo International plc said on Tuesday it had agreed to pay up to $65 million to resolve claims by the state of Florida and local governments that the drugmaker helped fuel the U.S. opioid epidemic. The deal is the latest in a string of settlements that Endo has struck in recent months to resolve similar cases, including a $63 million settlement with Texas in December.

Explainer-Do 5G telecoms pose a threat to airline safety?

The chief executives of major U.S. passenger and cargo airlines have warned of a "catastrophic" aviation crisis this week as AT&T and Verizon deploy new 5G services. They said the new C band 5G service set to begin on Wednesday could render a significant number of aircraft unusable, causing chaos for U.S. flights and potentially stranding tens of thousands of Americans overseas.

U.S. CDC warns against travel to 22 destinations over COVID-19

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Tuesday advised against travel to 22 nations and territories because of a rising number of COVID-19 cases, including for Israel, Australia, Egypt, Albania, Argentina and Uruguay. The CDC elevated its travel recommendation to "Level Four: Very High," telling Americans they should avoid travel to those destinations, which also include Panama, Qatar, the Bahamas, Bahrain, Bermuda, British Virgin Islands, Turks and Caicos Islands, Suriname, Saint Lucia and Bolivia.

Texas rejects hundreds of mail ballot applications under new voting limits

Texas election officials have rejected hundreds of mail-in ballot applications, abiding by a new Republican-backed law just weeks before a March 1 primary kicks off this year's U.S. election cycle. "My friends, this is what voter suppression looks like," Democrat Dana DeBeauvoir, the Travis County clerk, told reporters on Tuesday.