Norfolk Southern apologizes at hearing; Visa, Mastercard won’t track gun shops purchases; mortgage rates rise | Hot off the Wire podcast

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On this version of Hot off the Wire:

» Norfolk Southern’s CEO is apologizing to Congress and pledging millions of dollars to help East Palestine, Ohio, recover from last month’s fiery train derailment. But he stopped short on Thursday of fully endorsing a Senate bill that would toughen safety regulations.

» President Joe Biden chose a union training center in Philadelphia to lay out his new 10-year budget proposal and challenge congressional Republicans to release their own spending blueprint.

» Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell suffered a concussion after a fall at a local hotel and remains hospitalized “for a few days of observation and treatment,” a spokesman said Thursday.

» A former Goldman Sachs banker has been sentenced to 10 years in prison for his role in looting a Malaysian development fund.

» Former state House Speaker Larry Householder and former Ohio Republican Party Chair Matt Borges have been convicted in a $60 million bribery scheme that federal prosecutors have called the largest corruption case in state history.

» Israeli leaders say the award-winning Israeli actor known for portraying Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof has died in Tel Aviv. Chaim Topol’s death at 87 was confirmed Thursday by Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid and other leaders who tweeted their condolences to Topol’s family.

» A New York jury has begun deliberating whether to impose the death penalty on a Uzbekistan citizen who killed eight people on a Manhattan bike path in a terrorist attack five years ago.

» Visa and Mastercard paused their decision to start categorizing purchases at gun shops, a significant win for conservative groups and Second Amendment advocates who felt that tracking gun shop purchases would inadvertently discriminate against legal firearms purchases.

» U.S. women getting mammograms will soon receive information about their breast density because of new government rules.

» The average long-term U.S. mortgage rate rose for the fifth straight week to its highest level since breaching 7% in November, just as the spring buying season gets ready to kick off.

» The number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits last week jumped by the most in five months, but layoffs remain historically low as the labor market continues to be largely unaffected by the Federal Reserve’s interest rate hikes.