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| Good morning, Daily Briefing readers! Vice President Kamala Harris is in Warsaw on a clean-up mission after the U.S. declined Poland's proposal to provide Soviet-built fighter jets to give to Ukraine. An inflation report is expected to show that prices for American consumers jumped nearly 8% – the biggest gain in four decades. And if you're a Nintendo fan, it's time to rejoice. Scroll down to find out why. |
| It's Jane, with Thursday's news. |
| 🛢 In a rare show of bipartisanship, the House voted to write into law a ban on U.S. imports of Russian oil and energy products to punish Moscow for its invasion of Ukraine. |
| 💰 President Joe Biden signed an executive order mobilizing the federal government to create a strategy for digital assets like cryptocurrencies that promotes innovation while minimizing risks. |
| 🎤 To list Lionel Richie's career accomplishments would take, well, all night long. The 72-year-old superstar is the 2022 recipient of the Library of Congress Gershwin Prize for Popular Song. |
| ⚾️ MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred canceled the second week of regular-season games, pushing Opening Day back after negotiations with the players union fell apart. Think it's ugly now? You ain't seen nothing yet. |
 | | Major League Baseball canceled another slate of regular season games Wednesday as its lockout neared Day 100. | | USA TODAY | |
| 📺 "Pam & Tommy": Lily James required four hours each day in the makeup chair to complete Pamela Anderson's iconic look. |
| 🕷 By USA TODAY Opinion columnist Rex Huppke: Giant spiders are invading the East Coast! This is not a drill! Evacuate to Toledo! Now! |
| 🎧 On today's 5 Things podcast, White House reporter Matthew Brown talks about the Biden administration's efforts to regulate cryptocurrency. You can listen to the podcast every day on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or on your smart speaker. |
| Here's what's happening today: |
Harris' trip to Poland is now a clean-up mission after US rejects jet plan |
| Vice President Kamala Harris' trip to the Polish capital has taken an unexpected turn as she's parachuting into the middle of unexpected diplomatic turbulence over fighter jets. A day after the United States declined Poland's surprise proposal to provide Soviet-built MiG-29 fighter jets to the U.S. to give to Ukraine, Harris is meeting with the country's top leaders in Warsaw, where she will need to try to smooth over the controversy. A major aim of the trip is to show unity among NATO allies in response to Russia's war on Ukraine. On Wednesday, a Russian airstrike devastated a maternity hospital in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol, killing three people, including a child, and wounding 17, officials said. Harris, who arrived in Poland on Wednesday, was meeting with Polish President Andrzej Duda and Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki. She will also confer with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who is also visiting Poland. |
| 📩 Ukraine-Russia crisis: The latest news straight to your inbox. Sign up for the newsletter here. |
Dying for care |
| In a first-of-its-kind analysis, USA TODAY has identified nursing home ownership webs invisible to consumers. Problems across chains eluded the federal officials overseeing nursing homes, who focused on failures at individual facilities during the pandemic. |
| Reporters scored the performance of every nursing home in America to probe questions of corporate responsibility left unanswered by dozens of research papers on COVID's more than 140,000 nursing home deaths. The investigation found a nursing home chain that reported that its residents had died of COVID-19 last winter at rates well above the national average. |
Just for subscribers: |
| 🔵 "Fix the breach": Kamala Harris is on a clean-up mission with Poland after the U.S. rejected its fighter jet plan for Ukraine. |
| 🏥 Dying for care: This nursing home chain logged among nation's highest death rates as the coronavirus pandemic peaked. |
| ⛽️ President Biden says Americans will feel the pain of high gas prices. Will they be OK paying more to support Ukraine? |
| 💊 Lawmakers are pushing legislation to protect doctors who prescribe ivermectin for COVID-19. Can they do that? |
| 💰 The Biden administration looks to regulate cryptocurrency with new executive order. What does it mean? |
| These articles are for USA TODAY subscribers. You can sign up here. |
| Are you already a subscriber and want all of the subscriber-only content emailed to you directly every day? We can do that! Sign up for that here. |
Labor Department is set to issue new inflation report |
| On Thursday, the Labor Department will issue its inflation report, which economists expect will show that prices for U.S. consumers leapt 7.9% in February compared with a year ago, according to data provided by FactSet to the Associated Press. That would be the biggest gain in four decades. Consumer prices jumped 7.5% in January from a year earlier. Shortages of supplies and workers, heavy doses of federal aid, ultra-low interest rates and robust consumer spending combined to send inflation accelerating in the past year. Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said in congressional hearings last week that it wasn't yet clear what impact Russia's invasion of Ukraine would have on the U.S. economy. It has already pushed up gas prices above $4.25 a gallon, on average, across the country, according to AAA. But he said the Fed had planned before the war to initiate a series of rate hikes next week, and for now would "carefully" follow that plan. |
Puerto Rico to drop travel-related COVID restrictions as cases fall |
| Starting Thursday, visitors going from the U.S. to Puerto Rico will no longer need to show proof of vaccination or a negative coronavirus test to enter. The island is dropping nearly all travel-related COVID-19 restrictions for domestic travelers as case counts continue to fall. Businesses like restaurants and bars will no longer need to screen customers for proof of vaccination or a negative coronavirus test before allowing entry. Certain areas, such as health facilities, will still require masks. Travelers will also still need to wear a mask on the plane ride to Puerto Rico because the U.S. federal mask mandate is in effect until at least March 18. |
Jussie Smollett to receive sentence after staged attack conviction |
| The legal saga surrounding ex-"Empire" actor Jussie Smollett's claim in 2019 that he was the target of a racist and homophobic attack in Chicago will culminate Thursday with his sentencing . Smollett, 39, was found guilty on five counts of disorderly conduct in December 2021 – one count for each separate time he was charged with lying to police in the days immediately after the alleged attack, which Smollett reported in January 2019. He was acquitted on a sixth count of lying to a detective in February 2019, weeks after Smollett said he was attacked. Disorderly conduct is a class 4 felony that carries a sentence of up to three years in prison, but experts predicted Smollett would likely be placed on probation and perhaps ordered to perform community service. |
Golf's best on display at Players Championship |
| Forty-seven of the world's top 50 men's golfers are at Ponta Vedra Beach, Florida, on Thursday for the start of The Players Championship at TPC Sawgrass. The stellar field includes Jon Rahm, the No. 1-ranked player in the world; Justin Thomas, last year's winner; and Adam Scott, with three Top 10 finishes in his last five worldwide starts. A $20 million purse is up for grabs, with $3.6 million going to the winner. The weather forecast is looking grim, which could make things interesting on the Players Stadium Course. NBC and Golf Channel will handle the TV coverage; live streaming will be on ESPN+. |
ICYMI: Some of our top stories yesterday |
| 🏥 The first person to receive a gene-edited pig heart has died, two months after the historic transplant. |
| ⛽️ One day after the record for the average cost of gas nationwide was broken, prices at the pump continued to climb, jumping an average of 8 cents. |
| 🚙 Why are gas prices rising so quickly? And how high are they expected to get? |
| 🕷 A spider as big as the palm of your hand could soon invade the East Coast, scientists say. |
 | | The predominately yellow spider, called the Joro spider, was first spotted in the U.S. in Georgia in 2013. | | USA TODAY | |
Celebrate an iconic video game character on 'Mario Day' |
| Nintendo fans rejoice: Thursday is Mario Day, also known as Mar10 Day, which is an annual celebration of all things Mario. On the gaming holiday, many retailers are letting you score big with tons of can't miss Nintendo Switch deals. If there are some nostalgic Mario titles you're looking to play, this is your chance to buy them for wallet-friendly prices with Amazon's deal on Nintendo eShop credit. |
📸 Treasures, lost ships found at the bottom of the sea 📸 |
 | | In this handout photo provided by Falklands Maritime Heritage Trust, a view of the taffrail and ship's wheel, aft well deck of the wreck of Endurance, polar explorer's Ernest Shackleton's ship. | | Falklands Maritime Heritage Trust/National Georgraphic | |
| A team has found the wreck of explorer Ernest Shackleton's ship Endurance more than 100 years after the vessel was crushed by ice and sank near Antarctica. |
| The Falklands Maritime Heritage Trust confirmed on Wednesday that the search expedition, known as Endurance22, located the wreck of Endurance at nearly 10,000 feet underwater in the Weddell Sea, located east of the Antarctic Peninsula. |
| "We are overwhelmed by our good fortune in having located and captured images of Endurance," Mensun Bound, director of exploration on the expedition, said in a news release. |
| "This is by far the finest wooden shipwreck I have ever seen... This is a milestone in polar history." |
| Scroll through the gallery to see what other ships and treasure have been lost – and then found – in the sea. |
| Contributing: The Associated Press |
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