Archives for April 2021

WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) — President Joe Biden has taken his first swing at a presidential pastime: golf.

Biden, once an avid golfer, played Saturday at the Wilmington Country Club, not far from his Delaware home where he was spending the weekend. It was his first time playing golf since taking office in January.

The president played with senior advisor Steve Ricchetti and Ron Olivere, father-in-law of Biden’s late son Beau, the White House said. Biden’s handicap index is just over 6, according to the United States Golf Association. But he has not logged a round since 2018.

Biden is a member of the country club and played golf frequently as vice president. But his ability was mocked by former Ohio Gov. John Kasich, who said once at the GOP convention that “Joe Biden told me that he was a good golfer.”

“And I’ve played golf with Joe Biden,” Kasich continued. “I can tell you that’s not true.”

Golf has always been a favorite of presidents; Dwight Eisenhower, George W. Bush and Barack Obama all played often.

Biden’s predecessor, Donald Trump, played frequently, totaling over 300 rounds in his four years at office including during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic last year. Trump also would only play at country clubs he owned in Florida, Virginia and New Jersey.

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LONDON (AP) — A year after they last saw one another, Prince William and his brother Prince Harry put their fraught relationship aside as they said farewell to their grandfather at his funeral on Saturday.

The brothers were somber and silent as they walked together in a procession behind Prince Philip’s coffin before his funeral at Windsor Castle along with their father, Prince Charles, and other close relatives. They were seen chatting and walking together after the service concluded.

It was the first time the brothers had been together in public since Harry stood down from royal duties and moved to the U.S. with his wife Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, and their son Archie in early 2020.

Tensions between Harry, 36, and William, 38, came to the fore after Harry and Meghan gave a revealing interview to U.S. talk show host Oprah Winfrey last month. The couple portrayed the royal family as indifferent to Meghan’s mental health struggles, and Harry described his relationship with William as “space at the moment.”

On Saturday, William and Harry walked in silence on either side of their cousin, Peter Phillips, as they joined other senior royals in Philip’s funeral procession. At one point Phillips fell behind slightly to allow the brothers to walk side by side — a visual echo of the moment the pair, as boys in 1997, walked behind the coffin of their mother Princess Diana in another royal funeral televised around the world.

The brothers sat opposite each other in St. George’s Chapel for the funeral, which was attended by only 30 people because of coronavirus restrictions. While William sat next to his wife Kate, Harry was on his own because Meghan is pregnant with their second child and was advised by her doctor not to make the long trip.

Afterwards, Harry, William and Kate strolled together outside the chapel. Moments later, the brothers walked together alone while Kate spoke to Zara Tindall, another of Queen Elizabeth II’s eight grandchildren who is William and Harry’s cousin.

Rumors of a rift between the brothers — William, the heir, and Harry, the “spare” — have rumbled at least since 2019. That’s when Harry and Meghan separated from the Royal Foundation, originally set up as the brothers’ joint charitable venture, to set up their own platform. That year, Harry said he loved his brother dearly but they were “on different paths” and have “good days” and “bad days.”

Many believe that William was angered and hurt by Harry’s decision to speak so publicly about the royal family’s issues during the Winfrey interview. In one explosive allegation, they said a family member — not the queen or Philip — had expressed “concerns” about Archie’s possible skin color before he was born. Meghan has a Black mother and a white father.

Days after the interview aired, William insisted “we are very much not a racist family,” and said he had not spoken to Harry since the broadcast.

It’s unclear whether the passing of their grandfather will help the brothers heal their rift. It wasn’t immediately clear how long Harry, who has been self-isolating in line with the U.K.’s coronavirus restrictions since arriving from California early this week, will stay in his home country.

Saturday’s funeral was limited to only 30 people, who all had to wear masks, sit in family bubbles and remain socially distanced in the same church that had hosted hundreds of people for Harry and Meghan’s royal wedding in 2018. And Britain’s continued coronavirus restrictions may limit how much opportunity the brothers will get to smooth over their differences.

“Because of the restrictions of COVID, it’s difficult to get down to decent conservations,” said royal biographer Penny Junor. “It’s probably quite difficult to sit down as they normally would over a beer and discuss things.”

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Follow AP’s full coverage of the death of Prince Philip at https://apnews.com/hub/prince-philip

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MANSFIELD, Conn. (AP) — A Connecticut middle school teacher who raised $41,000 to help hundreds of his struggling neighbors during the COVID-19 pandemic got an unwelcome surprise for his charitable efforts: a form stating he could owe $16,031 in income taxes.

Louis Goffinet, 27, of Mansfield, began picking up groceries for elderly neighbors afraid to go to the store during the early days of the pandemic, often spending his own money. Given the great need, he later organized two fundraisers on Facebook over a year and helped hundreds of families with groceries, rent money and holiday gifts, the Hartford Courant reported, setting a $200 limit.

Goffinet said both financial support for his efforts and demand for assistance ended up becoming higher than he first expected. He tracked 140 grocery trips on a spreadsheet, noting he also provided Friday night dinners to 125 families, holiday gift cards for 20 families so they could buy gifts for their children, 31 Thanksgiving dinners and rental assistance to five families. Some local businesses donated food.

“It became dramatically bigger than I thought,” he said. “My original goal was to raise $200 to help one family with groceries. I was already doubting myself when I set that up, that people in town are not going to want to pay for someone else’s groceries.”

In January, Facebook sent Goffinet a 1099 form that stated he owed taxes on the money he had raised. Facebook warns users that money generated from a fundraiser on the social media platform may be taxable if more than $20,000 is raised and that a 1099 tax form will be issued.

“I was so shocked,” Goffinet told the Courant. “When I think about the mental spot I was in at the end of January, coming off a second fundraiser that was quite a lot of work — busy weekends coordinating Thanksgiving, holiday gifts — to get what I perceived as a bill in the mail for $16,000 was just shocking.’′

Goffinet is now working with a local accountant to determine how best to handle the situation. His bill is due May 17 and he expects to pay “some sort of tax burden” but isn’t sure exactly how much. Meanwhile, some people in the community are now trying to help him out with the tax bill, so far sending $2,000 in checks to a post office box — not through Facebook.

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Players on five more NFL teams will be skipping in-person voluntary workouts because of the pandemic: the Los Angeles Rams and Chargers, the Atlanta Falcons, Miami Dolphins and San Francisco 49ers.

The players posted through their union that they are joining 11 other groups who previously said they would not be on hand for the sessions.

This weekend players from the other 16 clubs are expected to announce plans. The offseason sessions begin Monday, and on Wednesday the league sent a memo to all 32 teams saying the first four weeks of the voluntary program will be virtual. The plan is to then transition to in-person work at team facilities.

Last year, the offseason programs were all done virtually and training camp was pushed back because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Saying no to in-person workouts earlier this week were players from the Super Bowl champion Buccaneers, Broncos, Seahawks, Giants, Bears, Raiders, Lions, Browns, Steelers and Patriots. The Jets said “many” of their players would skip them.

The 49ers issued a similar statement Saturday, saying “many in our locker room have chosen not to attend some or all phases of the voluntary in-person workouts” because of concerns about COVID-19.

Following the lead of Browns center JC Tretter, the NFL Players Association’s president, the Dolphins noted they would “stand in solidarity with players across the league who are making informed decisions to exercise their right to not attend voluntary in-person workouts this offseason.”

Added the Chargers: “We had a virtual offseason last year that protected us and our families from a pandemic, but also showed beneficial to our overall health and safety.”

Late last month, Tretter issued a strong statement on the NFLPA website calling for the elimination of such things as organized team activities and minicamps.

“The good news for our sport is that while the NFL season looked and felt noticeably different from previous years,” he wrote, “we learned that the game of football did not suffer at the expense of protecting its players more than ever before.

“Our process is to follow the science on what is safest for our guys, and many of the changes this past year — like no in-person offseason workouts/practices, the extended acclimation period before training camp and no preseason games — gave us a year of data that demonstrates maintaining some of these changes long term is in the best interest of the game.”

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More AP NFL coverage: https://apnews.com/hub/NFL and https://twitter.com/AP_NFL

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