AP Network News. I’m Lisa Meyer.
--- I submitted a formal letter of resignation to the president.
Homeland security secretary Tom Ridge made that announcement just minutes ago.
--- The president has given me an extraordinary opportunity to serve my country in this incredible period since September 11th, 2001. I will always be grateful for his call to service.
Ridge’s resignation is not unexpected. He told associates for some time now that he wanted to return to private life. David Heyman, a senior fellow at Washington Center for Strategic and International Studies, says Ridge took a tough job, made it his own, and kept the nation safe.
--- He set the standard. There were no attacks during his watch.
I’m Lisa Meyer in Washington. Now with more news, here’s John Belmont.
As he tried to smooth over differences between the US and Canada, President Bush says he’s made some decisions that some in Canada obviously did not agree with. And he singled out the Iraq War as one of those decisions. Bush met today in Ottawa with PM Paul Martin who spoke of differences on foreign policy and trade.
The Minnesota man accused in the shooting deaths of six deer hunters in the north woods of Wisconsin made his first court appearance today in the basement of a county jail. Why down there?
--- They felt they couldn’t make the normal courtroom secure without a massive effort. And he felt for this very brief hearing, that wasn’t worth it. He did make no mention that there are any threats against anyone.
That’s correspondent Bob Emery in Hayward, Wisconsin. The man was charged with six counts of murder, two of attempted murder.
After a delay, the penalty phase in the Scott Peterson murder trial is now underway. A defense source tells the Associated Press that a bartender claimed he overheard a juror discussing the case.
The Ukraine’s supreme court has ended a second day of hearings without deciding what to do about the disputed election more than a week ago now.
Wall Street, the Dow down 41. NASDAQ off nine points.
This is AP Network News.
The nation’s top hurricane forecaster says this year’s deadly storm season was a case of the nation’s luck just running out, adding that future years will likely bring more frequent and more powerful storms. National Hurricane Center director Max Mayfield says a block of high pressure in the Atlantic was responsible for steering storms into Florida. The state was battered by Charley, Francis, Ivan and Jean, killing more than 100 in the US and thousands in Haiti. Mayfield says it’s not only been a busy year, but an amazing decade for hurricane trackers.
--- We had more tropical storms and more hurricanes since, in the Atlantic Basin, since 1995 than any other 10 consecutive period on the record.
Federal officials investigating the crash of a jet carrying the head of NBC Sports say they want to know if the plane was de-iced before it tried to take off. Three people were killed in Sunday’s crash, including Dick Ebersol’s youngest son. Ebersol himself was injured along with another of his sons.