The average long-term U.S. mortgage rate dipped back under 7% this week, one day after the Federal Reserve raised its benchmark borrowing rate to its highest level in 15 years as it tries to squelch four-decade high inflation.

Officials believe a 16-year-old girl who vanished on her way to Pontiac 28 years ago might have been forced to send a message to tell her friend she was OK.

Workers at the Gwinnett County Georgia elections headquarters process absentee ballots for Georgia's Senate runoff election in Lawrenceville, Ga. on Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2021. The call was made after an analysis of outstanding ballots showed there was no way for Perdue, who was seeking a second term, to overtake Ossoff’s lead. Many of the ballots left to be counted were mail votes, a form of voting that overwhelmingly favored Ossoff. The remaining votes left to be counted in Republican-leaning areas that favored Perdue were not enough for him to catch up. Until Warnock, a Democrat hadn't won a U.S. Senate contest in the state since former Georgia Gov.

(AP Photo/John Bazemore)WASHINGTON – WHY AP HASN'T CALLED GEORGIA'S CLOSE RACEA razor-thin margin and ongoing vote count are what’s making the Georgia contest between President Donald Trump and Joe Biden too early to call. Under Georgia state law, a candidate can request a recount if the margin is within 0.5 percentage points. The initial margins in those races were 137 votes, 215 votes and 261 votes. Among all 31 recounts, the largest shift in results was 0.1%, in the 2006 race for Vermont’s Auditor of Accounts. Trump and Biden were locked in a tight contest Friday to secure the 270 electoral votes needed to win the presidency.