By JOHN RABY and ERIK VERDUZCO, Associated Press

NEWPORT NEWS, Va. (AP) — A jury in Virginia on Thursday awarded $10 million to a former teacher who was shot by a 6-year-old student and later accused an ex-administrator in a lawsuit of ignoring repeated warnings that the child had a gun.

The jury returned its decision against Ebony Parker, a former assistant principal at Richneck Elementary School in Newport News.

Abby Zwerner was shot in January 2023 as she sat at a reading table in her first-grade classroom. She had sought $40 million against Parker in the lawsuit.

Zwerner spent nearly two weeks in the hospital, required six surgeries and does not have the full use of her left hand. A bullet narrowly missed her heart and remains in her chest.

Parker was the only defendant in the lawsuit. A judge previously dismissed the district’s superintendent and the school principal as defendants.

The shooting sent shock waves through this military shipbuilding community and the country at large, with many wondering how a child so young could gain access to a gun and shoot his teacher.

The lawsuit said Parker had a duty to protect Zwerner and others from harm after being told about the gun. Zwerner’s attorneys said Parker failed to act in the hours before the shooting after several school staff members told her that the student had a gun in his backpack.

“Who would think a 6-year-old would bring a gun to school and shoot their teacher?” Zwerner’s attorney, Diane Toscano, told the jury. “It’s Dr. Parker’s job to believe that that is possible. It’s her job to investigate it and get to the very bottom of it.”

Parker did not testify in the lawsuit. Her attorney, Daniel Hogan, had warned jurors about hindsight bias and “Monday morning quarterbacking” in the shooting.

““You will be able to judge for yourself whether or not this was foreseeable,” Hogan said. “That’s the heart of this case.

“The law knows that it is fundamentally unfair to judge another person’s decisions based on stuff that came up after the fact. The law requires you to examine people’s decisions at the time they make them.”

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The shooting occurred on the first day after the student had returned from a suspension for slamming Zwerner’s phone two days earlier.

Zwerner testified she first heard about the gun prior to class recess from a reading specialist who had been tipped off by students. The shooting occurred a few hours later. Despite her injuries, Zwerner was able to hustle her students out of the classroom. She eventually passed out in the school office.

Zwerner testified she believed that she had died that day.

“I thought I was either on my way to heaven or in heaven,” Zwerner said. “But then it all got black. And so, I then thought I wasn’t going there. And then my next memory is I see two co-workers around me and I process that I’m hurt and they’re putting pressure on where I’m hurt.”

Zwerner no longer works for the school district and has said she has no plans to teach again. She has since become a licensed cosmetologist.

Parker faces a separate criminal trial this month on eight counts of felony child neglect. Each of the counts is punishable by up to five years in prison in the event of a conviction.

The student’s mother was sentenced to nearly four years in prison for felony child neglect and federal weapons charges. Her son told authorities he got his mother’s handgun by climbing onto a drawer to reach the top of a dresser, where the firearm was in his mom’s purse.

Raby reported from Cross Lanes, West Virginia.

By KONSTANTIN TOROPIN

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Washington D.C. National Guard will be deployed to the nation’s capital through the end of February, according to formal orders reviewed by The Associated Press.

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The formal order, dated Nov. 4, extends the original order from Aug. 11 and says the Guard members will be in the city at least through Feb. 28. The order states the additional duty is in response to the emergency declared in August by President Donald Trump and under directions from the “Secretary of War to protect federal property and functions in the District of Columbia and to support federal and District law enforcement.”

Hundreds of National Guard troops have been in Washington since August, which launched what Trump said was a crime-fighting mission that also included the federal takeover of the local police department. That order expired in September, but the roughly 2,000 National Guard troops from D.C. and at at least eight states remain in the city, with most contingents saying they plan to withdraw by the end of November.

The D.C. National Guard is the single largest contributor of troops with 949 soldiers that make up the task force that totals 2,375 troops. West Virginia is the next largest state to contribute troops to the task force with 416 guardsmen.

Some have been armed and providing a military presence in public spaces, especially in the federal parks around the city and at subway stations as well as the Amtrak train station.

The National Guard task force appears to have spent a large portion of its time on yardwork and landscaping efforts around the nation’s capital. In an update provided in early October, task force officials boasted that troops cleared 1,150 bags of trash, spread 1,045 cubic yards of mulch, removed 50 truckloads of plant waste, cleared 7.9 miles of roadway, painted 270 feet of fencing and pruned 400 trees. Since then, most daily updates from the task force only offered new troop figures and no summaries of beautification efforts.

One segment of the D.C. Guard has worked with various neighborhoods on beautification efforts at the request of local neighborhood officials and residents.

D.C. National Guard members clean up the park around Fort Stevens Recreation Center, Saturday, Oct. 11, 2025, in Washington. News of the cleanup sparked a community debate over the presence of the Guard. (AP Photo/Gary Fields)

The presence of guard members in the city is the subject of an ongoing lawsuit, filed Sept. 4 by D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb challenging the Trump administration’s use of the National Guard in the heavily Democratic city. That lawsuit sparked filings by 45 states with 23 supporting the Trump administration and 22 aligning with Washington. The Trump administration has argued that he has full authority to deploy guard troops in Washington because he is the designated commander of the D.C. Guard.

In court papers filed by Schwalb seeking to have the guard removed from the city, the documents indicated that there were plans for the D.C. Guard to potentially remain in the city at least through next summer. U.S. District Judge Jia Cobb, an appointee of former President Joe Biden, heard arguments Oct. 24 on Schwalb’s request but reached no decision.

It’s unclear how long the other states, which currently include Louisiana, Mississippi, Ohio, South Carolina, West Virginia, Georgia and Alabama, will keep their troops deployed to the task force in Washington. Several of the states told the AP they planned to end their deployments by Nov. 30 but indicated that also depended on whether orders were issued extending their deployments. The order does not mention the other states.

By MATT OTT, AP Business Writer

The average rate on a 30-year U.S. mortgage ticked up for the first time in five weeks after falling to its lowest level in more than a year last week.

The average long-term mortgage rate moved up to 6.22% from 6.17% last week, mortgage buyer Freddie Mac said Thursday. A year ago, the rate averaged 6.79%.

Last week’s average rate the lowest since Oct. 3, 2024, when it was 6.12%.

Borrowing costs on 15-year fixed-rate mortgages, popular with homeowners refinancing their home loans, also rose this week. The average rate rose to 5.5% from 5.41% last week. A year ago, it was 6%, Freddie Mac said.

Mortgage rates are influenced by several factors, from the Federal Reserve’s interest rate policy decisions to bond market investors’ expectations for the economy and inflation. They generally follow the trajectory of the 10-year Treasury yield, which lenders use as a guide to pricing home loans.

The 10-year yield was at 4.09% at midday Thursday, down from 4.16% Wednesday.

Lower mortgage rates boost homebuyers’ purchasing power and benefit homeowners eager to refinance their current home loan to a lower rate.

The average rate on a 30-year mortgage has been stuck above 6% since September 2022, the year mortgage rates began climbing from historic lows. The housing market has been in a slump ever since.

Sales of previously occupied U.S. homes sank last year to their lowest level in nearly three decades. Sales have been sluggish this year, but accelerated in September to their fastest pace since February as mortgage rates eased.

Mortgage rates began declining in July in the lead-up to the Federal Reserve’s decision in September to cut its main interest rate for the first time in a year amid growing concern over the U.S. labor market.

The Fed lowered its key interest rate again last week in a bid to help boost the wobbling job market. However, Fed Chair Jerome Powell warned that there is no guarantee the U.S. central bank will cut again at its final meeting of 2025 in December.

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The Fed could also pump the brakes on more rate cuts if inflation climbs further amid the Trump administration’s expanding use of tariffs, because lower rates can worsen inflation.

Bond investors demand higher returns as long as inflation remains elevated, so if inflation ticks upward that could translate into higher yields on the 10-year Treasury note, pushing up mortgage rates.

The central bank doesn’t set mortgage rates, and even when it cuts its short-term rates that doesn’t necessarily mean rates on home loans will necessarily decline.

Last fall after the Fed cut its rate for the first time in more than four years, mortgage rates marched higher, eventually reaching just above 7% in January this year. At that time, the 10-year Treasury yield was climbing toward 5%.

The broader pullback in rates has helped spur homeowners who bought in recent years after rates climbed above 6% to refinance their home loan to a lower rate.

Mortgage rates would have to drop below 6% to make refinancing an attractive option for many homeowners. That’s because about 80% of U.S. homes with a mortgage have a rate below 6% and 53% have a rate below 4%, according to Realtor.com.

By TOM MURPHY, AAMER MADHANI and JONEL ALECCIA, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump unveiled a deal Thursday with drugmakers Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk to expand coverage and reduce prices for their popular obesity treatments Zepbound and Wegovy.

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The drugs are part of a new generation of obesity medications known as GLP-1 receptor agonists that have soared in popularity in recent years.

But access to the drugs has been a consistent problem for patients because of their cost — around $500 a month for higher doses — and insurance coverage has been spotty.

Coverage of the drugs for obesity will expand to Medicare patients starting next year, according to the administration, which said some lower prices also will be phased in for patients without coverage. Starting doses of new, pill versions of the treatments also will cost $149 a month if they are approved.

Thursday’s announcement is the latest attempt by the Trump administration to rein in soaring drug prices in its efforts to address cost-of-living concerns among voters. Drugmakers Pfizer and AstraZeneca recently agreed to lower the cost of prescription drugs for Medicaid after an executive order in May set a deadline for drugmakers to electively lower prices or face new limits on what the government will pay.

As with the other deals, it’s not clear how much the price drop will be felt by consumers. Drug prices can vary based on the competition for treatments and insurance coverage.

Obesity drugs have become increasingly popular, but are costly

The obesity drugs work by targeting hormones in the gut and brain that affect appetite and feelings of fullness. In clinical trials, they helped people shed between 15% and 22% of their body weight — up to 50 pounds or more in many cases.

Patients taking these drugs usually start on smaller doses and then work up to larger amounts, depending on their needs. Because of obesity being considered a chronic disease, they need to take the treatment indefinitely or risk regaining weight, experts say.

The fast-growing treatments have proven especially lucrative for drugmakers Eli Lilly and Co. and Novo Nordisk. Lilly said recently that sales of Zepbound have tripled so far this year to more than $9 billion.

But for many Americans, their cost has made them out of reach.

Medicare, the federally funded coverage program mainly for people ages 65 and over, hasn’t covered the treatments for obesity. President Donald Trump’s predecessor, Joe Biden, proposed a rule last November that would have changed that. But the Trump administration nixed it last spring.

Few state and federally funded Medicaid programs, for people with low incomes, offer coverage. And employers and insurers that provide commercial coverage are wary of paying for these drugs in part because of the large number of patients that might use them.

The $500 monthly price for higher doses of the treatments also makes them unaffordable for those without insurance, doctors say.

Medicare now covers the cost of the drugs for conditions such as type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease, but not for weight loss alone.

Trump showing he is in touch with cost-of-living concerns

The effort to lower costs barriers to popular GLP-1 drugs comes as the White House is looking to demonstrate that Trump is in touch with American’s frustrations with rising costs for food, housing, health care and other necessities.

Republican gubernatorial candidates in New Jersey and Virginia faced a drubbing in Tuesday’s election in which dour voter outlook about the economy appeared to an animating factor in the races.

Roughly half of Virginia voters said “the economy” was the top issue, and about 6 in 10 of these voters picked Democrat Abigail Spanberger for governor, powering her to a decisive win, according to an AP voter poll.

In New Jersey, Democrat Mikie Sherrill won about two-thirds of voters who called “the economy” the top issue facing the state, the poll found. She defeated a Trump-endorsed Republican candidate Jack Ciattarelli. More than half of New York City voters said the cost of living was the top issue facing the city. The Democratic mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani won about two-thirds of this group.

The White House sought to diminish the effort by the previous Democratic administration as a gift to the pharmaceutical industry because the proposal did not include adequate price concessions from the drug makers.

Trump, instead, consummated a “belt and suspenders” deal that ensures that Americans aren’t unfairly financing the pharmaceutical industry’s innovation, claimed a senior administration official, who briefed reporters ahead of Thursday’s Oval Office announcement by Trump.

Another senior administration official said coverage of the drugs will expand to Medicare patients starting next year. Those who qualify will pay $50 copays for the medicine.

Lower prices also will be phased in for people without coverage through the administration’s TrumpRx program, which will allow people to buy drugs directly from manufacturers. starting in January.

The officials said lower prices also will be provided for state and federally funded Medicaid programs. And starting doses of new, pill versions of the obesity treatments will cost $149 a month if they are approved.

The officials briefed reporters on the condition of anonymity under ground rules set by the White House.

Doctors applaud the price drop

Dr. Leslie Golden says she has roughly 600 patients taking one of these treatments, and 75% or more struggle to afford them. Even with coverage, some face $150 copayments for refills.

“Every visit it’s, ‘How long can we continue to do this? What’s the plan if I can’t continue?,’” said Golden, an obesity medicine specialist in Watertown, Wisconsin. “Some of them are working additional jobs or delaying retirement so they can continue to pay for it.”

Both Lilly and Novo have already cut prices on their drugs. Lilly said earlier this year it would reduce the cost of initial doses of Zepbound to $349.

The potential to cover the medication for the 30 million people on Medicare who have obesity would be welcome, said Dr. Fatima Cody Stanford, an obesity expert at Massachusetts General Hospital. But until details are released, she remains skeptical.

“I would have to see it to believe it,” she said. “I need to see something that is more definitive for Medicare beneficiaries. I need to see something that is tangible and sustainable.”

Dr. Angela Fitch, who also treats patients with obesity, said she hoped a deal between the White House and drugmakers could be the first step in making the treatments more affordable.

“We need a hero in obesity care today,” said Fitch, founder and chief medical officer of knownwell, a weight-loss and medical care company. “The community has faced relentless barriers to accessing GLP-1 medications, which has ultimately come down to the price, despite the data we have supporting their effectiveness.”