FEMA is aiding Roswell's effort to recover from historic flooding - Associated Press
Federal officials went door to door in Roswell on Thursday to assess the damage from historic flooding last weekend in the southeastern New Mexico community.
The National Guard rescued more than 300 people over the weekend after 5.78 inches (about 14.7 centimeters) of rain fell Saturday, breaking Roswell's previous daily record of 5.65 inches (about 14.6 centimeters) set on Nov. 1, 1901.
Mayor Tim Jennings called it "a 500-year flood" and said Thursday that the death toll remained at two. He declined to release the names and ages of the dead.
"One man drowned and the other person, a woman, was in a car and was rescued but had a fatal heart attack," Jennings said. "We don't have anybody missing. At least, I hope not."
Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham declared an emergency, clearing the way for $1 million in state funding to bolster relief efforts.
Jennings said the Federal Emergency Management Agency arrived on the scene Thursday to assess the damage, which he estimated at $500 million.
"We have lots of damaged homes. They might have to be torn down," Jennings said. "We also lost four huge work trucks that cost $1 million or so each."
City officials said the Roswell Museum sustained at least $12 million in water damage and that pieces of artwork were being sent out of state to be repaired.
President Biden to apologize for 150-year Indian boarding school policy - By Graham Lee Brewer Associated Press
President Joe Biden said he will formally apologize on Friday for the country's role in forcing Indigenous children into boarding schools, where many were physically, emotionally, and sexually abused and nearly 1,000 died.
"I'm doing something I should have done a long time ago: To make a formal apology to the Indian nations for the way we treated their children for so many years," Biden said as he left the White House on Thursday for Arizona.
"I would never have guessed in a million years that something like this would happen," Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, a member of the Pueblo of Laguna in New Mexico, told The Associated Press. "It's a big deal to me. I'm sure it will be a big deal to all of Indian Country."
Haaland launched an investigation into the boarding school system shortly after she became the first Native American to lead the Interior Department. It found that at least 18,000 children 鈥� some as young as 4 鈥� were taken from their parents and forced to attend schools that sought to assimilate them into white society while federal and state authorities sought to dispossess tribal nations of their land.
The investigation also documented nearly 1,000 deaths and 74 gravesites associated with the more than 500 schools.
No president has ever formally apologized for the forced removal of these children 鈥� an element of genocide as defined by the United Nations 鈥� during the more than 150 years when the U.S. government worked to decimate Native American, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian peoples.
The Interior Department conducted listening sessions and gathered the testimony of survivors. One of the recommendations of the final report was an acknowledgement of and apology for the boarding school era. Haaland said she took that to Biden, who agreed that it was necessary.
The White House said Biden believes that "to usher in the next era of the Federal-Tribal relationships we need to fully acknowledge the harms of the past."
"In making this apology, the President acknowledges that we as a people who love our country must remember and teach our full history, even when it is painful. And we must learn from that history so that it is never repeated," its statement said.
The forced assimilation policy launched by Congress in 1819 as an effort to "civilize" Native Americans ended in 1978 after the passage of wide-ranging law, the Indian Child Welfare Act, which was primarily focused on giving tribes a say in who adopted their children.
Haaland will join Biden during his first diplomatic visit to a tribal nation as president on Friday as he delivers his speech at the Gila River Indian Community outside Phoenix. It comes as the Harris campaign spends hundreds of millions of dollars on ads targeting Native American voters in battleground states including Arizona and North Carolina.
"It will be one of the high points of my entire life," Haaland said.
It's unclear what, if any, action will follow the apology. The Interior Department is still working with tribal nations to repatriate the remains of children on federal lands. Some tribes are still at odds with the U.S. Army, which has refused to follow federal law regulating the return of Native American remains when it comes to those still buried at Carlisle Indian School in Pennsylvania.
"President Biden's apology is a profound moment for Native people across this country," Cherokee Nation Principal Chief Chuck Hoskin Jr. said in a statement to The Associated Press.
"Our children were made to live in a world that erased their identities, their culture and upended their spoken language," Hoskin said in his statement. "Oklahoma was home to 87 boarding schools in which thousands of our Cherokee children attended. Still today, nearly every Cherokee Nation citizen somehow feels the impact."
Friday's apology could lead to further progress for tribal nations still pushing for continued action from the federal government, because it's an acknowledgement of past wrongs left unrectified, something "known and buried," said Melissa Nobles, chancellor of MIT and author of "The Politics of Official Apologies."
"These things have value because it validates the experiences of the survivors and acknowledges they've been seen and we heard you, and also there's a lot of historical evidence to suggest this happened," Nobles said.
Canada has a similar history of subjugating Indigenous peoples and forcing their children into boarding schools for assimilation. Pope Francis issued a historic apology in 2022 for the Catholic Church's cooperation with Canada's "catastrophic" policy of Indigenous residential schools, saying the forced assimilation of Native people into Christian society destroyed their cultures, severed families and marginalized generations.
"I am deeply sorry," Francis said to school survivors and Indigenous community members gathered in Alberta. He called the school policy a "disastrous error" that was incompatible with the Gospel. "I humbly beg forgiveness for the evil committed by so many Christians against the Indigenous peoples," Francis said.
In 1993, President Bill Clinton signed a law apologizing to Native Hawaiians for the overthrow of the Hawaiian monarchy a century prior. In 2008, Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd formally apologized to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples for his government's past policies of assimilation, including the forced removal of children. New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern made a similar concession in 2022.
Hoskin said he is grateful to both Biden and Haaland for leading the effort to reckon with the country's role in a dark chapter for Indigenous peoples, but he emphasized that the apology is just "an important step, which must be followed by continued action."
"This is a beautiful beginning to see the honoring of these children whose stories were never told," said Deborah Parker, CEO of the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition, which worked on the Interior Department. Parker, a citizen of the Tulalip Tribes, hopes this acknowledgement will lead to many more steps to address the needs of impacted Native communities. ___ Associated Press writer Peter Smith in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and Josh Boak at the White House contributed to this report.
Forced assimilation and abuse: How US boarding schools devastated Native American tribes - By Matthew Brown Associated Press
The White House says President Joe Biden will apologize on behalf of the U.S. government Friday for its 150-year campaign to break up Native American culture, language and identity by forcing children into abusive Indian boarding schools.
More than 900 children died at the government-funded schools, the last of which closed or transitioned into different institutions decades ago. Their dark legacy continues to be felt in Native communities where survivors struggle with generational trauma from the torture, sexual abuse and hatred they endured.
Biden is expected to formally acknowledge the federal government's role and apologize for it during an appearance at the Gila River Indian Community outside Phoenix.
A closer look at the federal boarding school system:
150 years of forced assimilation
Congress laid the framework for a nationwide boarding school system for Native Americans in 1819 under the 5th U.S. President, James Monroe, with legislation known as the Indian Civilization Act. It was purportedly aimed at stopping the "final extinction of the Indian tribes" and "introducing among them the habits and arts of civilization."
Central to that effort was dissolving Native families and severing generational ties that had kept their cultures alive despite being forced onto reservations.
Over the next 150 years, government and religious institutions backed by taxpayer money operated at least 417 schools in 37 states. Staff at the schools worked to strip Native children of their traditions and heritage. Teachers and administrators cut their hair, forbade them from speaking their own languages and forced them into manual labor.
By the 1920s, most Indigenous school-age children 鈥� some 60,000 at one point 鈥� were attending boarding schools that were run either by the federal government or religious organizations, according to the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition.
The heaviest concentrations of the schools were in states with some of the largest Native populations: Oklahoma, Alaska, Arizona, New Mexico, Minnesota and the Dakotas. But the schools were in every region of the U.S. and students 鈥� some as young as 4 鈥� were often sent to schools far from their homes.
The last of the schools opened in 1969, the same year that a Senate report declared the boarding school system a national tragedy. It found they were grossly underfinanced, academically deficient and had a "major emphasis" on discipline and punishment.
The forced assimilation policy was finally and officially rejected with the enactment of the Indian Child Welfare Act in 1978. Despite this policy shift, however, the government never fully investigated the boarding school system, until the Biden administration.
Survivors recount abuse
A nationwide re-examination of the system was launched in 2021 by Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, a member of Laguna Pueblo in New Mexico and the country's first Native American Cabinet secretary.
She and other Interior officials held listening sessions over two years on and off reservations across the U.S. to allow survivors of the schools and their relatives to tell their stories.
Former students recounted harmful and often degrading treatment they endured at the hands of teachers and administrators while separated from their families. Their descendants spoke about traumas that have passed down through generations and are manifest in broken relationships, substance abuse and other social problems that plague reservations today.
Haaland's grandparents were among them 鈥� taken from their community when they were 8 years old and forced to live in a Catholic boarding school until they were 13.
"Make no mistake: This was a concerted attempt to eradicate the quote, 'Indian problem' 鈥� to either assimilate or destroy Native peoples altogether," Haaland said in July when findings of the agency's investigation were released. The top recommendation from the agency was for the government to formally apologize.
Unmarked graves and repatriations
At least 973 Native American children died in the boarding system. They included an estimated 187 Native American and Alaska Native children who perished at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in southeastern Pennsylvania. It's now the site of the U.S. Army War College. Its officials continue repatriations 鈥� just last month, the remains of three children who died at the school were disinterred and returned to the Fort Belknap Indian Reservation in Montana.
The Interior Department's investigation found marked and unmarked graves at 65 boarding schools. The causes of death included disease and abuse. More children may have died away from the campuses, after they became sick at school and were sent home, officials said.
The schools, similar institutions and related assimilation programs were funded by a total of $23.3 billion in inflation-adjusted federal spending, officials determined. Religious and private institutions that ran many of the schools received federal money as partners in the campaign to "civilize" Indigenous students.
More than 200 of the schools supported by the government had a religious affiliation. The boarding school coalition has identified more than 100 additional schools not on the government list that were run by churches, with no evidence of federal support.
U.S. Catholic bishops in June apologized for the church's role in trauma the children experienced.
See where state legislative fundraising stands with less than two weeks until Election Day - By Patrick Lohmann,
Candidates seeking 112 state legislative seats on the ballot this Election Day, including the 63 who are running unopposed, reported raising more than $3 million since mid-September.
All 70 House seats and 42 Senate seats are on the ballot Nov. 5. All told, candidates on the ballot have raised about $10 million and spent $6 million of it, according to a Source New Mexico analysis. That includes long-time, unopposed powerful lawmakers who have amassed hundreds of thousands of dollars in their war chests and hotly contested cases where both candidates are going door-to-door seeking donations.
Candidates were required to submit financial disclosures last week. They鈥檒l also have to report their fundraising activity on Halloween. That鈥檚 the last time the public will know where candidates stand, in terms of fundraising, before voting ends in 12 days.
The biggest Senate fundraiser since mid-September was , a Democrat seeking to represent District 9, which covers the area north of Albuquerque, including Placitas and Bernalillo. Her opponent, Republican , reported raising about $19,000 in the same period. According to Secretary of State data, Trujillo has about $33,867 remaining to spend before Nov. 5, and Nava has $76,000.
In the House, Democrat raised the most in the last reporting period, according to the Secretary of State鈥檚 Office. She鈥檚 reported more than $120,000 raised for a contentious House race in Las Cruces. Her opponent, Republican , raised a little more than $27,000.
After the election, candidates will again have to report their final-stretch fundraising activity. Those reports are due in January 2025.
Find charts from Source New Mexico showing where things stand
Petition calls on Lujan Grisham to ban PFAS in oil and gas operations - Hannah Grover,
A coalition of advocacy groups delivered a petition to Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham this week that requests a state ban on the use of PFAS chemicals in oil and gas extraction.
There are tens of thousands of PFAS chemicals in existence and these are used in a variety of applications including in cosmetics, firefighting foam, stain-resistant furniture, carpets, space heaters and, in some instances, the frack fluid that is used to break open rock formations underground during oil and gas extraction.
These man-made substances are sometimes referred to as forever chemicals because of the length of time it takes them to degrade in the natural environment.
Not all frack fluid recipes require PFAS chemicals and has already implemented regulations that prohibit PFAS in oil and gas extraction. The advocacy groups say they do not know if any companies in New Mexico are currently using PFAS chemicals when engaging in hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. However, they say there is evidence that PFAS has been used in fracking in New Mexico in the past.
Fracking is also not the only way that oil can be extracted and in parts of the Permian Basin companies are using carbon dioxide extracted from the McElmo Dome formation in southwest Colorado. This carbon dioxide is piped to the Permian Basin where it is injected into the ground to force oil out.
The use of PFAS in the extractive industry gained attention following a released in 2021 by the group Physicians for Social Responsibility. The organization issued another in 2023 that documented PFAS use in fracking operations in New Mexico.
This prompted WildEarth Guardians to ask the New Mexico Oil Conservation Commission to consider banning PFAS in oil and gas operations. WildEarth Guardians also led the petition effort and delivered it to the governor鈥檚 office on Monday. That petition was signed by more than 4,000 people.
The petition comes in the weeks leading to the Oil Conservation Commission鈥檚 hearing on the subject. That multi-day hearing will start Nov. 12.
While the hearing could result in regulations that prevent PFAS use in oil and gas operations, the advocates say the governor could also issue an executive order that would accomplish the same thing.
鈥�(PFAS) chemicals are highly persistent, linked to severe health risks like cancer and threaten long-term contamination, and thanks to trade secret loopholes, companies aren鈥檛 required to disclose the full list of chemicals they inject into the ground, leaving us in the dark about what鈥檚 being released in our water,鈥� Rebecca Sobel, an organizing director with WildEarth Guardians, said during a press conference on Monday.
Lujan Grisham has been a leader in pushing for stricter regulations of PFAS chemicals and her efforts have even led to national changes. But advocates say that one area she has been weak on when it comes to PFAS regulation is oil and gas.
Sobel said the Nov. 12 hearing will be a 鈥渃rucial moment for change.鈥�
鈥淲e鈥檒l push for new rules to ban PFAS and to ensure that companies can no longer hide behind trade secrets,鈥� Sobel said. 鈥淥ur proposed rule also mandates community notification when chemicals or spills occur in your local neighborhoods because the public has the right to know what鈥檚 happening in their communities.鈥�
Dr. Robert Bernstein, New Mexico chapter president of Physicians for Social Responsibility, said that while advocates do not know if operations in the state, there is nothing currently in place to prevent the use.
鈥淚t takes only one tablespoon of these chemicals to contaminate the volume of water that would fill Elephant Butte reservoir,鈥� he said. 鈥淣ot only are they extremely toxic, but they鈥檙e extremely toxic in very, very minute amounts.鈥�
He said that a study led by the U.S. Geological Survey found PFAS chemicals in the Pecos River downstream from some of the Permian Basin oil and gas operations. Bernstein was not involved in the study and, when questioned by NM Political Report, he said that the study cannot conclusively tie the PFAS contamination to the oil and gas operations.
鈥淚t鈥檚 not absolutely conclusive proof or an absolute smoking gun, but I think that the probability is very high,鈥� he said.
sampled 117 groundwater sites and 18 surface water locations throughout the state looking for the presence of PFAS. The study found that locations downstream of urban areas tended to have higher levels of PFAS.
The study listed oil and gas as potential sources of PFAS contamination along the Pecos River as well as in the San Juan and Animas rivers of northwest New Mexico.
The Pecos River is not the only place in New Mexico where PFAS contamination has been found and many of the locations have no oil and gas extraction. PFAS contamination of aquifers is common around airports and military bases where certain types of firefighting foam was used in training exercises. PFAS can also be found downstream of landfills.
In the Clovis area where firefighting foam used at Cannon Air Force Base contaminated groundwater, the New Mexico Environment Department is testing people鈥檚 blood to see what levels of PFAS are in their bodies.
Other than the USGS study, Bernstein said he is not aware of any studies looking into levels of PFAS contamination in the Permian or San Juan basins of New Mexico where the majority of the oil and gas production occurs.
WildEarth Guardians, Youth United for Climate Crisis Action and New Energy Economy say they are also working to address other ways that PFAS enters the environment. The three advocacy groups are pushing for legislation that would ban non-essential use of PFAS chemicals.
While there are many sources of PFAS contamination, Sobel said addressing the use in oil and gas operations is important because the fracking fluids are being injected into the ground.
鈥淧FAS in oil and gas activities and its ability to contaminate the entire state鈥檚 water supply makes regulating PFAS in the oil and gas industry a priority,鈥� she said.
County asking voters for $10.7M in transportation bonds - Rodd Cayton,
Safety improvements, traffic congestion relief and economic development are among the goals of a transportation bond package on the ballot this election.
The ballot question seeks authorization for almost $10.7 million in spending on more than a dozen .
The largest amount for any of the items is $2 million for the third phase of the Bridge Boulevard construction project. This phase includes planning, design, right-of-way and other improvements between Lura Place and Young Avenue SW.
The second phase of the project is underway. It includes reconstruction of the road surface from Young Avenue to La Vega Drive SW, new lighting and drainage and Americans with Disabilities Act-compliant sidewalks and ramps.
That work is expected to be done by Jan. 21. Brian Lopez, the county鈥檚 technical services director, earlier this month the project was delayed by 323 days, mostly due to the failure of New Mexico Gas Co. to get its complementary projects done on time. The utility has rejected the assertion it鈥檚 to blame for project delays.
Lopez told CityDesk ABQ that the county will require all utilities to perform any replacement work or line relocations before the county鈥檚 contractor will begin its project. He said the change was made 鈥渄ue to the issues with the utilities experienced on Bridge Phase 2 and the poor communication by New Mexico Gas Company,鈥� both with the public and with the county鈥檚 project team.
Commissioner Steven Michael Quezada, whose district includes the project area, said he welcomes the change.
鈥淚 support the approach of requiring utility providers to relocate their infrastructure in advance of the project beginning,鈥� Quezada said. 鈥淭his will enable our Public Works team to better manage the project schedule and avoid delays.鈥�
Lopez said the third and final phase of the project will leave the Bridge Boulevard corridor between Coors Boulevard and the Rio Grande safer for all modes of travel and more effective at moving traffic.
Another major item is $1.9 million for local connections to the I-40 TradePort Corridor, a federal project designed to upgrade the country鈥檚 logistics and supply chain systems over more than 800 miles between Albuquerque and California seaports.
Lopez said the long-term development plan is for a 6,000-acre site with clean energy infrastructure and multicomponent manufacturing zones with direct access to Interstate 40. He said it鈥檚 being developed with sustainability in mind.
He said improvements will be made to Atrisco Vista Boulevard, connecting arterial roads and utilities, and that the project 鈥� with a grand total of $30.4 million 鈥� will help the county take advantage of its position on the I-40 corridor, as well as enhance regional connectivity, improve traffic flows, and create access to crucial industrial sectors.
鈥淐oncurrently, the effort is designed to promote economic growth and environmental stewardship in the targeted regions while grounded in a commitment to community engagement and responsive development,鈥� Lopez said.
The package also includes $815,000 for improvements to Second and Fourth streets. The latter, Lopez said, is under-capacity in terms of current and future traffic volumes, and will be rebuilt to add designated spaces for pedestrians and bicyclists.
Other transportation projects included in the bond question include:
Isleta Boulevard improvements ($1,018,000).
Barcelona Road storm drain project ($838,000).
Coors Boulevard SW safety project ($800,000).
Alameda Drain Trail, Phases 4 and 6 ($553,000).
Street construction in the Mountain View neighborhood ($500,000).
The transportation bond question is one of six on the general election ballot, which in total would authorize about $40.5 million in spending.
The other bond questions are for , , storm drainage and utilities, libraries and public housing.
BernCo Commission could allow elected officials to become staffers - Rodd Cayton,
A proposal to allow former Bernalillo County elected officials to get a job with the county immediately after leaving office might have a rocky road to passage.
County commissioners Tuesday agreed to publish a possible amendment to the county code that would do away with the current one-year 鈥渃ooling-off period鈥� 鈥� that鈥檚 how long a former elected official must wait becoming a county employee or consultant.
Commissioner Steven Michael Quezada sponsored the proposal. He鈥檚 leaving office at the end of the year, but said he has no intentions of working for the county after stepping down.
Quezada said his idea is that newly elected officials such as a sheriff, treasurer or assessor should have the option to add former officials to their staff, to take advantage of the expertise they may have.
Other commissioners, notably Vice Chair Eric Olivas, raised concerns about the possibility of the appearance of impropriety. He said concerns are often raised on the national level when members of Congress end up as lobbyists.
鈥淭his isn鈥檛 exactly the same thing, but it鈥檚 on the same path,鈥� he said.
Olivas said 12 months is not a long time, and that the state鈥檚 largest county has a lot of individuals who are able to serve in different capacities
Quezada argued it can be difficult for an official to assemble a staff that meets his or her needs.
鈥淵ou could just look at the mayor鈥檚 office and how many people have revolved through that,鈥� he said. 鈥淏ecause they cannot seem to put the right team together.鈥�
Quezada said he was hoping to have new rules in place by the time new officials are sworn in next year.
Commissioner Walt Benson said he understands concerns about the appearance of favoritism, but that he could support an amendment in some form. Benson noted that a county-level elected official can now take a job in state government immediately after leaving office.
Commissioners Benson, Quezada and Adriann Barboa voted to publish the code change. Olivas and Commission Chair Barbara Baca voted against it.
The rule change proposal will be publicly posted for at least 30 days and brought back for possible final adoption consideration on or after Dec. 10.
Quezada said he plans to work with county legal staff and clarify the language in the proposal to address his colleagues鈥� concerns.
HOW TO PARTICIPATE:
WHEN: 5 p.m. Nov. 12
WHERE: Ken Sanchez Commission Chambers in BernalilloCounty@Alvarado Square, 415 Silver Ave SW
VIRTUAL: , on or on Bernalillo County鈥檚
Quarter Pounders are off the menu at 20% of McDonald's in US amid an E. coli investigation 鈥� Dee-Ann Durbin, AP Business Writer, 九色网 News
McDonald's worked Wednesday to reassure customers that its U.S. restaurants are safe as federal investigators tried to pinpoint the cause of a deadly E. coli outbreak linked to the fast-food giant's Quarter Pounder hamburgers.
McDonald's pulled Quarter Pounders from one-fifth of its U.S. stores Tuesday as a result of the outbreak, which the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said had sickened at least 49 people in 10 states. One person died and 10 were hospitalized, according to the CDC.
So far five New Mexicans have fallen ill with E. coli, with one person requiring hospitalization,, formerly the Department of Health.
Secretary Patrick Allen said the department is taking the outbreak seriously, and is 鈥渢aking part in a multi-state investigation being led by the CDC.鈥�
Although officials have not yet identified which specific ingredient is contaminated, McDonald鈥檚 has stopped using fresh slivered onions and quarter pound beef patties while the investigation is ongoing.
A preliminary investigation by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration suggested fresh slivered onions that are served raw on Quarter Pounder hamburgers were a likely source of the contamination.
McDonald's also serves raw, slivered onions on one of its breakfast sandwiches, but that sandwich isn't available at the impacted stores. Other burgers, like the Big Mac, use diced, cooked onions.
McDonald's said it was searching for a new regional supplier for fresh onions. In the meantime, Quarter Pounders were removed from menus in Colorado, Kansas, Utah, Wyoming, and portions of Idaho, Iowa, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, and Oklahoma.
Adriean Madden, 37, pulled up outside a McDonald's in Denver on Wednesday for his usual afternoon snack but then decided against it. He said he was unsure how E. coli spreads or contaminates other foods, and he thinks McDonald's should be more forthcoming.
"This affects my decision with coming to McDonald's in the future," Madden said. "I feel like the information isn't as widely spread. I didn't see any notices on the door, and then I saw vehicles going through the drive through just as if nothing was going on."
Colorado has had the most reported cases of any state so far, and it's where the one death involving an older adult occurred.
McDonald's said it has worked closely with federal food safety regulators since late last week, when it was alerted to the potential outbreak. The company said the scope of the problem and the popularity of its products have complicated efforts to identify the contamination source.
McDonald's has more than 14,000 U.S. stores and serves 1 million Quarter Pounders every two weeks in the affected 12-state area.
McDonald's is known for its stringent food safety guidelines and protocols, said Chris Gaulke, a professor of food and beverage management at Cornell University's Nolan School of Hotel Administration. The company said Wednesday that the supplier regularly tested its onions for E. coli, for example.
"Given the volume of food that they go through, how infrequently this happens to McDonald's is a testament to the effort that they take," Gaulke said.
But some experts questioned why McDonald's simply stopped selling one sandwich and didn't close restaurants for further investigation.
"Good practice would have been to close all the restaurants," Bill Marler, a Seattle lawyer who specializes in food safety cases, said. "Until we know definitively what the product was that made people sick, consumers should be aware."
Marler said cross-contamination remains a potential possibility at the affected restaurants until they are thoroughly cleaned.
Asked why it didn't close any stores, McDonald's said nothing in the government's investigation indicated there were issues with its food preparation practices. In an interview on the "Today" show Wednesday, McDonald's U.S. President Joe Erlinger also said it's likely that whatever product was contaminated has already passed through the company's supply chain.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported the outbreak late Tuesday. It said infections were reported between Sept. 27 and Oct. 11 in Colorado, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Oregon, Utah, Wisconsin and Wyoming.
State and local public health officials were interviewing people about the foods they ate in the week before they got sick. Of the 18 people interviewed as of Tuesday, all reported eating at McDonald's, and 16 people reported eating a beef hamburger. Twelve reported eating a Quarter Pounder.
McDonald's said it's unlikely the beef in the Quarter Pounder was the source, since it comes from multiple suppliers and is cooked at a high enough temperature to kill E. coli.
McDonald's said its initial findings suggest that some of the reported illnesses were linked to onions from a single supplier, which the company didn't name. McDonald's said the onions are cleaned and sliced by the supplier and then packaged for use on individual Quarter Pounders.
The incubation period for E. coli is only a couple of days, so illness would be quickly apparent to anyone affected, said Donald Schaffner, a food safety expert at Rutgers University. "If you ate these burgers in September and now it's the middle of October and you didn't get sick, you're probably OK," he said.
are harbored in the guts of animals and found in the environment. Infections can cause severe illness, including fever, stomach cramps and bloody diarrhea. People who develop symptoms of E. coli poisoning should seek health care immediately and tell the provider what they ate.
The type of bacteria implicated in the McDonald's case causes about 74,000 infections in the U.S. annually, leading to more than 2,000 hospitalizations and 61 deaths each year, according to the CDC. In general, E. coli infections were lower in 2023 than in recent years and cases of severe kidney injury caused by the bacteria remained stable, according to latest federal data.
Outbreaks at restaurant chains are rare,
In 2020, agreed to pay a record $25 million fine to resolve criminal charges that it served tainted food that sickened more than 1,100 people with E. coli between 2015 and 2018. In that case, poor safety practices, such as not keeping food at proper temperatures to prevent pathogen growth, were to blame.
In 2006, Taco Bell ordered the removal of green onions from its restaurants nationwide after samples taken by investigators appeared to contain a harsh strain of E. coli. The outbreak sickened at least 71 people.
"The worst thing you can have at a restaurant is a food safety problem. It's the equivalent of an airline losing the plane," said Aaron Allen, a restaurant consultant and founder of Aaron Allen and Associates.
But Allen said McDonald's has enough experience and safety protocols in place that it won't suffer long-term damage from the outbreak.
"No one would be better equipped to mitigate and respond to this than McDonald's," he said.
McDonald's shares fell 4.7% in late trading Wednesday.
___
AP Health Writer JoNel Aleccia contributed from Temecula, California.
New NM polls show Dems outpacing GOP candidates for US House, Senate and President - Albuquerque Journal, 九色网 News
New polling from the Albuquerque Journal has Democratic candidates ahead in every federal election in New Mexico, which include the U.S. House, Senate and the Presidency.
Vice President Kamala Harris has a 9-point lead over former President Donald Trump in, conducted for the Journal by Research & Polling Inc. That鈥檚 held pretty steady from last month, but the number of undecided voters dropped by more than half. It鈥檚 now at just 4%. Another 3% of voters told the pollsters that they鈥檙e backing Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who is no longer running but does appear on the state鈥檚 ballot.
Meanwhile, Democratic U.S. Senator Martin Heinrich has maintained a double-digit lead over Republican challenger Nella Domenici in. Of likely voters polled, 51% said they鈥檙e backing the two-term Senator over 40% who support the daughter of former Sen. Pete Domenici. Still, the race is closer than Heinrich鈥檚 2018 reelection bid.
For the U.S. House, the Democratic candidates are up in the polls for all three contests. The tightest by far is in, where Democratic Rep. Gabe Vasquez has only a 4% lead over former Republican Rep. Yvette Herrell. That鈥檚 within the poll鈥檚 margin of error. Vasquez eked out a win over Herrell two years ago by just 1,300 votes. have the Democratic incumbents up by 17 points.
State releases new unemployment report 鈥� 九色网 News
New Mexico鈥檚 unemployment numbers increased over the last month, jumping from 4.1 in August to 4.2% in September, and from 3.9% the previous year.
The Department of Workforce Solutions.
The total labor force is more than 977 million workers strong, with almost 50,000 workers unemployed, according to the update.
Total nonagricultural employment grew by almost 14,000 jobs, with more than 10,000 of those jobs being added in the private sector.
Mining and construction employment saw a slight uptick and manufacturing. Private education and health services also gained jobs.
Public sector jobs increased by a little more than 3,000 jobs during the same period. Just over half of those were in state government.
Further analysis on the jobs report will be released with the Labor Market Review to be released October 29.