New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo says Pfizer’s COVID vaccine progress is “bad news” because Joe Biden is not yet sworn in as President #facepalm

Russian president Vladimir Putin will not be congratulating President-elect Joe Biden for his election win until the “official vote count” is in and “legal processes” are resolved, his spokesman said Monday. Putin has remained mum on the issue since Biden clinched the presidency on Saturday, four days after the Nov. 3 election, clearing the threshold of 270 Electoral College votes needed for the win. “We think it appropriate to wait for the official vote count,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. “I want to remind you that President Putin repeatedly said he will respect the choice of the American people.” Asked why Putin had congratulated President Trump soon after he had won the Electoral College and beaten Democrat Hillary Clinton in 2016, Peskov said there was an obvious difference this time.

BREAKING: Austrian press reporting EU Council of Ministers have an 'almost complete' resolution on the table to ban end to end encryption on apps like Whatsapp and Signalapp.

A St. Louis couple facing felony charges for waving guns at racial injustice protesters who marched near their home allege in a lawsuit that a news photographer trespassed to capture an image of the confrontation. Mark and Patricia McCloskey, lawyers in their 60s, filed the lawsuit Friday in St. Louis Circuit Court against United Press International photographer Bill Greenblatt and the wire service, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports.

At issue was a protest on June 28, when a few hundred marchers veered onto the private street near the McCloskeys’ $1.15 million home in St. Louis’ posh Central West End area. Mark McCloskey emerged with an AR-15 rifle and his wife displayed a semiautomatic handgun. Newspaper photographers are allowed to capture images from public rights of way. The McCloskeys live on a private street and have argued that protesters were trespassing. No one was hurt, and the McCloskeys have pleaded not guilty to unlawful use of a weapon and evidence tampering. The couple said Greenblatt’s photo has contributed to their “significant national recognition and infamy.” In addition to Greenblatt and the news service, the McCloskeys are suing Redbubble Inc., a San Francisco-based online marketplace for print-on-demand products.

The McCloskeys allege that Greenblatt, UPI, and Redbubble are all profiting from “t-shirts, masks, and other items, and licensing use of photographs bearing Plaintiffs’ likenesses, without obtaining Plaintiffs’ consent.”

Often their image on merchandise sold by Redbubble is accompanied with “mocking and pejorative taglines or captions,” causing them “humiliation, mental anguish, and severe emotional distress,” the suit alleges.

Meanwhile, UPI said recently it was considering whether to send a “cease and desist” order to the couple because of their use of the UPI photo as part of a personal greeting card.

Greenblatt referred all questions to the UPI director of photography in Washington, D.C., who could not be reached for comment. Redbubble didn't immediately respond to an email from The Associated Press. No attorney is listed for any of the defendants in online court records.

Eight people and a dog were injured early Sunday in downtown Nashville after an argument over the canine resulted in a shooting, according to officials. The Metro Nashville Police Department said the incident happened around 1 a.m. at the corner of Second Avenue North and Commerce Street, just a block from the city's famed Broadway district. A small crowd was in the area when two men started arguing over a dog that belonged to one of them. The dog's owner allegedly pulled out a handgun, police said, while the other man left and returned a few minutes later with a group of other men and his own firearm. The two groups then began fighting, exchanging gunfire in the downtown area. A total of eight people, all adults, were struck or grazed by bullets. All people were transported to local hospitals for nonlife-threatening injuries.

It’s time. Show up. Peacefully.

Chicago authorities on Monday said that 41 people were shot and seven were killed amid another violent weekend in the city. The Illinois city saw 33 shootings over the weekend, with 41 shooting victims and seven murders from 6 p.m. Friday to 11:59 p.m. Sunday, the Chicago Police Department said early Monday. Gunfire this weekend in Chicago left at least four teenagers shot. Three boys, ages 15, 15 and 17, were shot and injured in separate incidents early Sunday. A 16-year-old boy was struck by gunfire on Friday night. The Sun-Times reported slightly different numbers, finding that there were 43 people shot and six murdered through Monday morning,

Miami PD: please avoid the area of North Miami Avenue on 29th Street due to a possible building collapse.