US Domestic News Highlights: Politics, Health, and Economic Shifts

This summary covers a range of US domestic news including scrutinized collaborations between a drugmaker and Chinese scientists, migrants crossing into California, a failed contraception access bill in the Senate, the Hunter Biden gun trial, and a Trump fundraiser in San Francisco. It also discusses the impact of Biden's emissions rules on hybrid vehicles, a potential solar project boom, a bird flu death in Mexico, inmate firefighters in Washington state, and rising jobless claims.

Following is a summary of current US domestic news briefs.

Staff at drugmaker under U.S. scrutiny worked with Chinese military scientists

Employees of drugmaker WuXi AppTec, under U.S. scrutiny for its links to the Chinese military, co-invented altitude sickness treatments with People's Liberation Army (PLA) scientists, according to public patent records and science papers reviewed by Reuters. The news agency identified 10 patent filings that list six of WuXi AppTec's staff as co-inventors of altitude sickness drugs with six scientists from the PLA General Hospital in Beijing - China's top military medical school and research centre. The filings, which Reuters is reporting for the first time, were made in the U.S., Europe and China between 2018 and 2023.

Migrants from around the world traverse California desert to reach US

Propped up against the rusty steel slats of the border wall, migrant families who hours before crossed the U.S.-Mexico border rest under tarps and tents and await Border Patrol officers. Some of the families along this remote desert stretch in San Diego County have brought their children with them, including small infants.

Democratic contraception access bill fails in US Senate

A bill to safeguard access to contraceptives failed to advance in a U.S. Senate vote on Wednesday, after congressional Democrats forced the vote in a bid to focus public attention on reproductive rights ahead of the November election. The Right to Contraception Act, which would protect birth control access nationwide, got 51 votes in support and 39 against, but fell short of the chamber's 60-vote threshold for advancing to a full debate.

Prosecution expected to rest case in Hunter Biden's gun trial

Prosecutors are expected to rest their case against President Joe Biden's son Hunter Biden on Thursday, after presenting evidence aimed at showing that he lied about his drug use to illegally buy a gun in 2018. The jury in the first criminal trial of a U.S. president's child has heard testimony from witnesses including his ex-wife and a former girlfriend about 54-year-old Hunter Biden's past prolific drug use, which he has publicly acknowledged.

Trump in liberal San Francisco for high-dollar tech fundraiser

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump will attend a fundraiser hosted by two tech venture capitalists in San Francisco on Thursday, a high-dollar event expected to draw Silicon Valley investors turned off by the Biden administration's policies. Venture capitalists David Sacks and Chamath Palihapitiya, as well as Sacks' wife Jacqueline, will host the reception and dinner with Trump, according to an invitation seen by Reuters.

Plug-in polluters? How Biden's emissions rules go soft on hybrid trucks, SUVs

When the Biden administration announced new U.S. auto-emissions regulations in March, it made concessions to industry allowing for a much slower electric-vehicle transition than it had proposed a year earlier. Instead of aiming to convert two-thirds of new vehicles to EVs by 2032, it lowered that target and said automakers could comply by producing more gas-electric hybrids.

US solar projects could boom amid deadline to use up tax-exempt panel glut

A two-year U.S. tariff holiday on solar panels from Southeast Asia expires on Thursday, starting the clock ticking for American project developers to use the huge amount of equipment they stockpiled duty-free over that period by the end of this year. The dynamic could result in a mini-boom in already red-hot U.S. solar installations, while also annoying the nascent domestic manufacturing industry which is keen to see developers make the switch to American-made gear.

Person with bird flu died in Mexico, WHO says

A person with prior health complications who had contracted bird flu died in Mexico in April and the source of exposure to the virus was unknown, the World Health Organization said on Wednesday. WHO said the current risk of bird flu virus to the general population is low.

Washington state pioneers program to turn inmates into wildland firefighters

The inmates of Washington state's prison system tramp through the forest, their yellow uniforms and helmets bright against the brown branches and green leaves. They are Arcadia 20, or ARC 20, an elite group of firefighters based in Spokane who have been recruited from existing firefighting prison camps.

US weekly jobless claims rise in latest week

The number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits increased last week, but underlying strength in the labor market should continue to support the economy. Initial claims for state unemployment benefits rose 8,000 to a seasonally adjusted 229,000 for the week ended June 1, the Labor Department said on Thursday. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast 220,000 claims in the latest week.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)