Fire whips through historic Poconos resort; guests evacuate
OkPOCONO MANOR, Pa. (AP) — A wind-whipped fire has destroyed much of a century-old Poconos resort that’s on the National Register of Historic Places.
General Manager Don Snyder calls the damage Friday to the Pocono Manor Resort “heartbreaking.”
No injuries have been reported in the 6 a.m. blaze, which burned throughout the day and toppled the inn’s clock tower.
Officials say guests in about 25 rooms safely evacuated. They believe the fire started in a dining area and quickly spread.
The Monroe County resort is known locally as “the grand lady of the mountains.” Neighbors say it’s one of the last grand resorts in the Poconos.
The inn had been set to close later this month for a two-year renovation.
Pocono Manor was built by Quakers in 1902 and designated a historic site in 1977.
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This story has been corrected to say the inn is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, not the National Registry of Historic Places.

Beto O’Rourke announces he’s dropping 2020 presidential bid
By WILL WEISSERT and JULIE PACE Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) — Beto O’Rourke, the former Texas congressman, announced Friday that he was ending his Democratic presidential campaign, which failed to recapture the enthusiasm, interest and fundraising prowess of his 2018 Senate race.
In an online post, O’Rourke said, “My service to the country will not be as a candidate or as the nominee.” He was scheduled to address supporters later Friday at an event in Iowa.
O’Rourke was urged to run for president by many Democrats, including supporters of former President Barack Obama, who were energized by his narrow Senate loss last year in Texas, a reliably Republican state. He raised an astonishing amount of money from small donors across the country, visited every county in Texas and used social media and livestreaming video to engage directly with voters. He ultimately lost to incumbent Republican Sen. Ted Cruz by 3 percentage points.
But O’Rourke struggled to replicate that model in the presidential primary, and both his polling and his fundraising dwindled significantly in recent months.
“Though it is difficult to accept, it is clear to me now that this campaign does not have the means to move forward successfully,” he wrote on Medium. “Acknowledging this now is in the best interests of those in the campaign; it is in the best interests of this party as we seek to unify around a nominee; and it is in the best interests of the country.”
O’Rourke’s decision comes as the Democratic primary enters a critical stretch. With three months until the kickoff Iowa caucuses, polls consistently show a trio of candidates leading the way: former Vice President Joe Biden, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, with Pete Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, showing strength in Iowa, as well. Lower polling candidates face difficult questions about whether they have the money to sustain a campaign through the first primary contests.
Earlier this week, Kamala Harris, another candidate who entered the race to much fanfare, announced she was downscaling her campaign, laying off some staffers and reorienting almost exclusively to focus on Iowa.
O’Rourke entered the race as the feel-good, dynamic candidate who had the ability to appeal to both Republicans and Democrats and work across the aisle in Washington. But he immediately faced criticism that he had a sense of entitlement, particularly after the release of a Vanity Fair interview on the eve of his campaign launch in which he appeared to say he was “born” to be in presidential politics.
He also struggled with consistent vision and messaging as a presidential candidate.
He spent several weeks trying to build his campaign around climate change, calling global warming the greatest existential threat the country had ever faced. After a gunman opened fire at a Walmart in his hometown of El Paso, killing 22 people, O’Rourke more heavily embraced gun control, saying he would take assault weapons away from existing owners.
O’Rourke did not endorse another Democrat for the nomination, saying the country will be well served by any of the other candidates, “and I’m going to be proud to support whoever that nominee is.”
President Donald Trump quickly weighed in on O’Rourke’s exit, saying in a tweet: “Oh no, Beto just dropped out of race for President despite him saying he was “born for this.” I don’t think so!”
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Weissert reported from Des Moines, Iowa.

Two buildings at CCBC were evacuated this morning.  A 9-1-1 dispatcher said smoke was discovered in the buildings, possibly from the heating system as of  noon the buildings were cleared. Friday morning workers cutting down trees at the college struck a power line.’ Beaver County 9-1-1 reported that the incident caused smoke in 2 buildings  and  cleared before noon.  No other information was available, firefighters were called to the scene .

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump says he will be making Palm Beach, Florida, his permanent residence after he leaves the White House, rather than returning to Trump Tower in New York. Trump tweeted late Thursday that he cherished New York. But he complained that he had been “treated very badly” by New York political leaders despite paying millions of dollars in city, state and local taxes each year. Trump was born in New York and his developer-turned-reality-star persona was honed there.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Joe Biden’s campaign is dismissing as “mathematical gymnastics” Elizabeth Warren’s promise of financing a single-payer government insurance system without a middle-class tax hike. A top Biden presidential campaign deputy said Warren’s plan understates the cost and overstates savings while obscuring the costs to the middle class.

WASHINGTON (AP) — More Americans say House members are motivated mainly by politics rather than by duty in their impeachment inquiry. That’s according to a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. The poll shows more Americans approve of the impeachment investigation into President Donald Trump than disapprove of it, though only about a third say the inquiry should be a top priority for Congress.

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will speak at a first annual Pennsylvania Democratic Party dinner fundraiser, three years after Donald Trump’s victory in the state stunned Democrats into trying to fix what went wrong in 2016’s presidential election. Friday’s dinner is part of what state Democrats are doing to prepare for 2020 in the presidential battleground. The party is employing perhaps its largest field staff ever in an off-year election to build relationships with local candidates and activists.