Air Force One casts its shadow over a snow-covered field Wednesday as it approached Bellevue, Neb. President Obama was en route for a speech at the University of Nebraska at Omaha. (Carolyn Kaster/AP)

CALIFORNIA

Shooting victim’s widow files lawsuit

The widow of a man killed in last month’s mass shooting in San Bernardino, Calif., has filed claims seeking $58 million in damages on behalf of herself and her three minor children.

Renee Wetzel, whose husband, Michael, was among the 14 people fatally shot during an attack at the Inland Regional Center last month, filed four separate claims with San Bernardino County last month, records show. The claims seek $3 million from the county for lost wages and $25 million in “general damages.” In addition, they ask for $10 million in damages on behalf of each of her three children, who are not identified by name in the documents.

Michael Wetzel, 37, was a 15-year employee of the county and worked as a supervising environmental health specialist. He and more than a dozen co-workers were killed Dec. 2 when Syed Rizwan Farook and his wife, Tashfeen Malik — who had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State — opened fire on a holiday party for county employees. Nearly two dozen employees were wounded. Farook, a county employee, and Malik were later killed in a shootout with police.

— Brady Dennis

Winning Powerball ticket from Calif.

A winning ticket for the biggest-ever $1.59 billion Powerball lottery jackpot was sold in California, state lottery officials said Wednesday.

The six winning numbers were 8-27-34-4-19 and Powerball 10.

“We have a winner in California!” the state lottery announced on Twitter. It said the jackpot for the drawing was $1.586 billion.The first-known winning ticket was sold in Chino Hills, outside of Los Angeles. The jackpot is the world’s largest potential prize for a single winner.

Powerball is played in 44 states, Washington, and two U.S. territories.

— Reuters

HEALTH

Obama to extend states’ Medicaid deal

President Obama would extend the key financial enticement for states to expand Medicaid as part of his proposed fiscal 2017 budget, administration officials said.

Under the Affordable Care Act, the federal government has been paying 100 percent of the costs in states that expanded their Medicaid programs to include all non-elderly adults with incomes below 133 percent of poverty.

That support is set to begin tapering next year until states are covering 10 percent of expansion, but Obama wants to allow any future expansion state the same three years of full federal support, according to a posting on the White House blog.

“It is further evidence of the Administration’s willingness to work with states to build on recent progress in expanding health coverage and making Medicaid affordable to states and taxpayers alike,” wrote Shaun Donovan, director of the Office of Management and Budget, and Cecilia Muñoz, director of the Domestic Policy Council.

Although 30 states and the District have implemented expansion, Obama’s proposal has little prospect in a Republican-dominated Congress that remains hostile to many elements of the ACA.

— Susan Levine

LOUISIANA

Gunman praises man accused of S.C. deaths

The gunman responsible for a deadly rampage inside a Louisiana movie theater last summer left a journal thanking the man accused of killing nine black people in a Charleston, S.C., church.

In a rambling, handwritten 40-page journal released by police Wednesday, John Russell Houser described Dylann Roof as “green but good.”

“Had Dylan Roof reached political maturity he would have seen the word is not n-----, but liberal,” Houser wrote. “But thank you for the wake up call Dylann.”

Houser shot and killed two people and wounded nine others before fatally shooting himself inside an auditorium at the Grand 16 theater in Lafayette in July, police have said.

— Associated Press