Three months on, he still has no force to lead as none of the five countries that pledged troops have come through with any significant contributions.

Efforts to shore up the fragile ceasefire have stalled as Hamas has refused to disarm and Israel has seized more territory while continuing to strike what it says are militant targets, often killing civilians.

The Iran war has meanwhile made it more difficult for Arab and Muslim leaders to openly cooperate with the United States and Israel, which many in the region view as aggressors, and the resulting global energy crisis has sapped their resources.

Indonesian commitment of 8,000 troops on indefinite hold

The biggest blow to the planned force came about a week after the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran on Feb. 28, when Indonesia put its commitment of 8,000 troops on indefinite hold. Some 1,000 were to have been sent in April, followed by the remainder in June.

Indonesian's pledge was by far the largest of the group, which also includes Morocco, Kazakhstan, Kosovo and Albania. U.S. Maj. Gen. Jasper Jeffers, who spoke at the Board of Peace event, was to command the force.

Indonesia suspended its plans over what Defense Minister Sjafrie Sjamsoeddin said last week seemed to be a lack of commitment from a distracted Washington, saying “we have not yet received any implementation guidelines.”

“New dynamics have emerged,” he told parliament. “Because the intensity of the conflict between U.S. and Iranian forces remains very high, the BoP has tended to be left behind. Since the BoP has been left behind, the ISF has also been left behind.”

US attack on Iran influenced Indonesia's decision

Domestic issues may have factored into Indonesia's decision, said Muhammad Zulfikar Rakhmat, director of the Indonesia-Middle East/North Africa desk at Jakarta's Center for Economic and Law Studies.

The Iran war is extremely unpopular in Indonesia, the most populous Muslim country. The economy is suffering from soaring prices as a result of the conflict, and there is widespread skepticism of the Board of Peace.

“If you talk to the people on the street, I don’t think they believe that the Board of Peace will actually help the people of Gaza,” Rakhmat said. There are also concerns about sending troops to the Middle East when the economy is faltering, he added.

Indonesia lost four peacekeepers who were part of the United Nations mission in Lebanon during fighting between Israel and the Iran-backed Hezbollah. That has further soured public opinion on such international commitments, he said.

Board of Peace blames stalled ceasefire on Hamas

The U.S. military’s Central Command declined to comment or make Jeffers available for an interview, referring all queries to the Board of Peace.

Board of Peace spokesman Brad Klapper also declined to comment on Indonesia's decision or the future of the stabilization force, pointing instead to May 21 remarks made at the U.N. by Nickolay Mladenov, a former Bulgarian defense minister who Trump appointed director of the Board of Peace.

Mladenov said the international force would not be able to begin operations until there was agreement and implementation of a second phase of the ceasefire, which would see Hamas disarm and Israel begin to withdraw. Israeli troops control some 60% of Gaza.

Mladenov has blamed the deadlock on Hamas, saying its disarmament is “non-negotiable” and is holding up progress on other fronts, including Israel's withdrawal and reconstruction.

“You cannot build a future with armed groups running the streets, hiding in tunnels and stockpiling weapons,” Mladenov said in Jerusalem this month. “You cannot deliver reconstruction with militias on every corner.”

Hamas blames delays on Israel

Hamas says Israel has repeatedly violated the ceasefire, holding up its further implementation, and has accused Mladenov of siding with Israel.

Israeli strikes have killed more than 880 Palestinians since the ceasefire, according to local health officials. Israel says it was responding to violations of the truce.

Hamas is also demanding Israel withdraw from areas seized since the start of the ceasefire, according to an Egyptian official with knowledge of the discussions, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss closed-door talks. Egypt has long served as a mediator with Hamas.

Many of the countries that have pledged forces have refused to send troops without a deal on Hamas disarming, the official said.

Token forces committed and none yet known to be on the ground

Kazakhstan has said its support for the stabilization force would be limited to “the humanitarian component,” including sending medical units with a field hospital. Its Foreign Ministry did not respond to a request for comment.

Albania's Defense Ministry also declined to comment on its troop commitment, saying it was a “dynamic and ongoing process.”

Earlier this month, its chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Arben Kingji, told reporters that while the military had “participated in reconnaissance activities,” no troops had yet been sent. He said only a few would be dispatched as part of the stabilization force headquarters, without giving numbers, adding that further contributions would be considered.

Kosovo, which is expected to send 20 troops, said in April that it was in the “final phase of preparations.” The Defense Ministry did not reply to a request for an update.

Morocco's Foreign Ministry also did not reply. At the inaugural meeting of the Board of Peace, Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita said it would deploy “high-level military officers to the joint military command of the ISF.”

Indonesian turnaround can't be ruled out

Despite the delays from Indonesia, Rakhmat said it was too early to rule out eventual participation in the stabilization force.

President Prabowo Subianto is a former army general who has been keen to raise Indonesia’s profile on the world stage and wants to avoid jeopardizing economic ties with the U.S., Rakhmat said.

“Prabowo wants to strengthen ties to Washington and sign different agreements with the U.S., so to completely withdraw and completely cancel the plan, I don't think it's on the table,” he said.

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Associated Press reporters Samy Magdy in Cairo, Edna Tarigan in Jakarta, Yuras Karmanau in Tallinn, Estonia, Akram Oubachir in Casablanca, Morocco, and Zana Cimili in Pristina, Kosovo, contributed.

The World Meteorological Organization also forecasts an overheating Arctic that warms nearly 3 degrees Fahrenheit (1.66 degrees Celsius) between now and 2030 and a dangerous drought with potential wildfires for the Amazon, a crucial part of Earth's natural defenses to lessen human-caused climate change. A hotter globe from the burning of coal, oil and gas means more extreme weather including floods, droughts and heat waves, scientists said.

The projections by the U.N. climate agency and the United Kingdom's Meteorological Office said there's a 75% chance that the average global temperature between 2026 and 2030 will exceed 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) since pre-industrial times. That threshold is the agreed-upon limit of warming — averaged over 20 years — set in 2015 by the Paris climate agreement.

A U.N. science report a few years later detailed how exceeding that 1.5 mark means more likely death, danger and species loss. Even though it's only a few tenths of a degree, some of the planet's ecosystems, such as coral and glaciers, can't handle the strain.

Passing warming limit has consequences, but no cliff

There’s a 91% chance that at least one of the next five years will shoot past the 1.5 degree threshold and an 86% chance that one of those years will smash the record for Earth’s hottest year set in 2024, the WMO report said. The WMO projects each year between now and 2030 to be between 1.3 degrees Celsius (2.3 degrees Fahrenheit) and 1.9 degrees Celsius (3.4 degrees Fahrenheit) since the late 1800s.

“It’s important to note that (1.5) is not kind of a cliff edge that we’re going to fall off,” said report co-author Melissa Seabrook, a climate scientist at the U.K. Meteorological Office. “Every kind of 0.1 of a degree has more and more severe impact.”

She pointed to unprecedented May heat in Europe this week.

An entire year or more above the 1.5 degree mark “means a whole range of extreme weather events, probably many so hot/wet/dry that it exceeds anything we’ve experienced in the past and thus crucially, anything our city planning, agriculture etc. has anticipated,” Imperial College of London climate scientist Friederike Otto, who wasn’t part of the report, said in an email. “This will mean many people will lose their lives, we are in for a lot of food price shocks, and more intense wildfires.”

Nearly all the shorter-term forecasts call for a strong El Nino — a natural warming of parts of the central Pacific that alters weather worldwide and spikes global temperatures — to form soon. The WMO report said it could stretch all the way to 2028. Because of that, Seabrook said 2027 will likely break the 2024 heat record.

And if the next five years do average more than 1.5 degrees Celsius since pre-industrial times, that means Earth will have warmed a quarter of a degree Celsius (0.45 degrees Fahrenheit) in a decade, which is faster than the previous rates of warning. Those were closer to two-tenths of a degree Celsius per decade.

Climate scientists are debating whether global warming is accelerating, “which obviously is quite scary,” and if these projections come true it would give additional evidence to those who see a speeded up rate of change, Seabrook said.

Accelerating warmth forecast in the Arctic

The projections, based on the averaging of about 200 runs of computer simulations using 13 different climate models from various countries, show warming in the Arctic rising 3.5 times faster than the rest of the globe, because there's less ice and snow that had been reflecting solar radiation to space, Seabrook said. It becomes a vicious cycle.

“As the temperature warms, more sea ice melts, the worse this makes it,” Seabrook said.

Winters in the Arctic from 2020 to 2025 on average were 2.1 degrees Fahrenheit (1.2 degrees Celsius) warmer than the 1991-2020 average. The WMO projects the next five winters will average 5.1 degrees Fahrenheit (2.8 degrees Celsius) warmer than that recent normal, Seabrook said.

The report also forecasts Arctic sea ice to continue to shrink in the summer.

Amazon may get drier, sparking fire worries

The report calls for even warmer and unusually dry conditions in the Amazon basin, and that could be devastating for both local residents and the planet as a whole, Seabrook said.

People rely on the Amazon for water and the hotter, drier conditions should increase wildfire risk, Seabrook said, threatening to turn the Amazon, which now sucks heat-trapping carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere, into a region that worsens the problem.

Africa's Sahel area, which has been extra dry, is likely to get more than normal rain and that could lead to flooding, Seabrook said.

United Nations officials said efforts to curb climate change haven't been enough.

“Despite the progress of recent years, it’s clear that global heating is still outpacing global efforts to contain it, and the baking temperatures in Europe, India and elsewhere show yet again the brutal human and economic impacts of humanity still burning colossal amounts of coal, oil and gas,” U.N. climate chief Simon Stiell said about the WMO report.

“Whether it’s extreme heat, mega-storms, floods, massive wildfires or droughts hitting food supply and prices,” he said, “every nation is already paying a huge price from this global climate crisis.”

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The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

Kepner, 18, was found dead on the Carnival Horizon in November, one day before the cruise ship returned to Miami.

A federal grand jury recently indicted Kepner’s 16-year-old stepbrother, Timothy Hudson, on homicide and aggravated sexual abuse charges. He has pleaded not guilty to the charges.

Now that Hudson is being prosecuted as an adult, government lawyers have asked a magistrate judge to order Hudson detained until his trial. Hudson has been living with an uncle in Hernando County under GPS monitoring since he was first charged with juvenile delinquency in February.

[WATCH: Anna Kepner’s father wants stepbrother in custody until trial]

Hoping to convince the magistrate that Hudson is a danger to others and should be detained, Assistant U.S. Attorney Alejandra L. Lopez detailed some of the government’s evidence against the 16-year-old during a hearing Wednesday.

According to Lopez, surveillance cameras on the cruise ship confirmed Hudson and Kepner entered the stateroom they shared a little after 7:30 p.m. on the night before housekeepers found Kepner’s body hidden underneath a bed.

Prosecutors believe Kepner was still alive around 8:14 p.m. when she reportedly communicated with someone using the social media platform Snapchat.

Surveillance cameras showed Hudson poke his head out of the stateroom door at 10:13 p.m., look both ways down the hallway, and then leave, Lopez said. Kepner never emerged from the room.

WiFi routers located throughout the ship indicated Hudson took Kepner’s phone out of the room and carried it to another deck, where he likely disposed of it in an area where a trash can is located, the government alleged. The phone was later recovered from a trash collection bin by a cruise ship employee, according to Lopez.

When Kepner’s body was discovered, the prosecutor said Kepner’s pants were on but that her underwear was twisted and partially inserted into her vaginal canal, suggesting she was the victim of non-consensual sexual intercourse.

Semen found inside Kepner’s vagina contained DNA that Lopez said had a “high probability” of belonging to Hudson.

According to court records unsealed Wednesday, a different minor who lives outside of Florida had sexual intercourse with Kepner during the cruise. His DNA was tested and determined not to be a contributor of the DNA found in Kepner’s body, investigators said.

An autopsy concluded that Kepner died from mechanical asphyxiation, which Lopez said was “likely” caused by Hudson placing her in a chokehold and squeezing for three to five minutes.

“He squeezed so hard her eardrum burst,” Lopez told federal magistrate judge Edwin G. Torres.

Torres said he is considering the government’s request to detain Hudson before trial, but before needed additional information from the U.S. Marshal’s Office about potential juvenile facilities where Hudson could be held.

Hudson’s attorney, federal public defender Evan Kuhl, did not address most of the prosecution’s allegations during Monday’s hearing but argued that Hudson should remain free.

“He’s going to show up in court and he’s not going to hurt anyone while he’s out,” Kuhl told the magistrate.

The national survey results, released Thursday, show the all-ages uninsured rate has stayed significantly down from where it was several years ago, but the ranks of the uninsured could soon expand as the Trump administration’s sweeping changes to the health landscape begin to take hold.

Massive changes to Medicaid, the government’s safety-net health program for low-income Americans, passed into law last year could result in 10 million more uninsured individuals over a decade, according to Congressional Budget Office estimates.

And the expiration this year of certain Affordable Care Act subsidies — which had offset premium costs — is also contributing to reduced participation in marketplace health programs. Around 5 million fewer people are expected to enroll in those plans in 2026 compared with 2025, according to the healthcare research nonprofit KFF.

The government has multiple programs for tracking Americans’ insurance status, which can give different numbers depending on factors like timing and question wording. Many researchers consider the U.S. Census Bureau to be “the official scorekeeper,” said David Howard, an Emory University health policy and management professor.

But the CDC survey results tracks closely with that, and they offer the first complete data for all of 2025 — the first year of President Donald Trump’s second term in office.

The Trump administration has sought to expand access to low-premium catastrophic health insurance plans and lower drug prices for Americans who don’t have health insurance. It has also suggested that projected insurance enrollment declines indicate a drop-off of fraudulent and ineligible enrollees, rather than eligible Americans.

Although the share of insured and uninsured stayed roughly the same in 2025 as the year before, the number of uninsured grew by about 800,000 — 300,000 of them children. The growth of the overall U.S. population helps explain that.

The survey results also suggest a possible increased insured rate among Hispanic Americans. But that may in part reflect the effects of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, if uninsured members of that group left the country, Howard said.

Most Americans 65 and older have health insurance through the federal Medicare program. It's different for younger Americans, many of whom are covered through a patchwork of public and private insurance programs.

The percentage of Americans under 65 who were uninsured rose in the 1980s, 1990s and early 2000s — from 12% in 1980 to more than 18% in 2010. It fell following passage of the Affordable Care Act in 2010, which expanded Medicaid programs and enacted measures to make affordable health insurance available to more people.

By 2016 it dropped nearly to 10%, before rising to 11 to 12% during Trump’s first administration, according to historical survey data from the CDC's National Center for Health Statistics.

The COVID-19 pandemic saw the rate of uninsured fall again, as a result of government policies put in place to preserve coverage as people faced disruptions related to the pandemic. The rate hit an all-time low in 2023, falling below 9%.

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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

The new nonprofit, Stop AAPI Hate Action, will be a political and advocacy arm dedicated to getting more Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders registered to vote — and to mobilize current voters, ensuring they make it to the polls. The initiative was sparked in part by President Donald Trump's pressure — and moves by Republican lawmakers — to redraw voting maps and strip parts of the Voting Rights Act.

The organization announced Thursday this initiative will build on Stop AAPI Hate's name recognition and reputation for elevating conversations about racism, discrimination and allyship. It's a major step for the group, which has also done policy work and advocacy over the past six years, Manjusha Kulkarni, the organization's co-founder, exclusively told The Associated Press.

“Those pieces — alongside what we're seeing from our community in terms of data — really motivated and inspired us to make this move," Kulkarni said. "Because we see how our communities are being harmed and exactly what needs to be done to address the harm, and prevent it in the future.”

Stop AAPI Hate Action was established as a social welfare organization so leaders can lobby in political campaigns within certain parameters.

Trump's immigration policies fuel more anti-Asian racism since COVID-19

A majority of Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders believe President Donald Trump has done more harm than good on immigration and border security in his second term, according to an AAPI Data/AP-NORC poll.

Stop AAPI Hate's annual report — released in May, AAPI Heritage Month — found roughly half of AAPI adults said they or someone they personally know were negatively impacted by immigration policies or anti-immigrant attitudes in 2025. Last year, Trump signed an order restricting H-1B visa holders — thousands of whom come from Asian countries — and added a $100,000 annual fee for highly skilled foreign workers.

Plus, Chinese nationals face a plethora of anti-China laws in various states.

Navia Gutta, 28, was rattled by an encounter last summer at a Chipotle restaurant in Atlanta, where a woman approached her and a friend, calling the two — who are Indian American — “murderers” and “rapists." It escalated and she threatened to call U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to deport them “back” to India, which the woman called a “dirty country.” Both of them were born in the U.S.

“Our hands were shaking and we full-on cried in the car,” Gutta said. “It made me realize that I grew up still very privileged, and I felt like I lived in a bubble up until then, because nothing like that had ever happened to me."

She later shared the experience with Stop AAPI Hate, and after talking at great length with a staff member was emboldened to volunteer with the group.

“It made me realize I would love to be a part of this solution,” Gutta said. “I would love to educate people. I would look at these issues and continue educating myself further because I think politics can be really scary.”

Reaching AAPI voters in red states, too

Stop AAPI Hate Action is ready to dive head first into the November midterms. That does not mean blindly advocating for all Democratic candidates, Kulkarni said. The group's main goal is to support candidates who share core values on immigration policies and civil rights.

“It is really, at its core, about harnessing the pain felt at an individual level and turning it into a collective power,” Kulkarni said. “This really has been an existential threat to our community."

The nonprofit is also not trying to compete or duplicate other AAPI-focused civic engagement organizations. The group is looking beyond blue states and swing states. A primary goal is to flip red districts with a significant presence of Asian American voters, and turn them blue. There are areas in Republican-run states “that deserve to be reached out to,” said Andy Wong, Stop AAPI Hate Action managing director of advocacy.

“The ones in Iowa and Nebraska and Alaska and other places where there are competitive purple districts — many of them with GOP incumbents," Wong said. “We are going to reach voters in those places,” by enlisting phone bank volunteers who speak Korean, Vietnamese, Cantonese and Mandarin.

That effort starts in July, and they plan to focus on reaching people who only turn out to vote in big general elections. To help build rapport, they also plan to match volunteers with voters of the same ethnicity.

Building longevity as a voting bloc

This new political entity is not a one-and-done operation, Stop AAPI Hate staffers say. The Asian American and Pacific Islander community is one of the fastest growing populations in the U.S., which means with each election year, there's potential for new voters.

But the political parties have overlooked this fact, and failed to invest in voter outreach and other civic engagement, Kulkarni said. “We’ve really been an afterthought. We're 24 million people."

Stop AAPI Hate sees the next few years not just as an opportunity to win over voters but also to increase AAPI power as an entire voting bloc. Kulkarni says some data indicates Latino, Black and Asian Americans who moved somewhat to the right during the 2024 election are edging back to the left.

“Where you see that especially is the South Asian or Indian American community specifically. You've seen that in some of the others, in the Japanese American community," she said. "How do we harness that?”

The group needs to build an infrastructure to get people involved not just when there's a major election, Wong said. They also hope to empower Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders who are already doing the work to become leaders in their patches.

“They're putting in the phone calls. They're showing up at public hearings, delivering comments,” Wong said. “It’s about building long-term civic and political power.”

Those processes can require significant amounts of water, energy and chemicals — part of the reason denim has become a growing target for sustainability efforts across the fashion industry, which is among the world’s biggest producers of greenhouse gas emissions.

Brands are responding to wider awareness by marketing their jeans as “sustainable,” touting regenerative cotton, recycled fibers and low-water manufacturing techniques. But figuring out if that's true is far more complicated. For one, sustainability is difficult to define — and there isn't a universal set of standards.

Last week, Chinese fast-fashion giant Shein acquired Everlane, a brand known for transparency and sustainability efforts, highlighting broader tensions over scale and affordability. Improvements in sustainable processes typically cost more, making it difficult for companies with fast production cycles and low prices to adopt them widely. Consumers are left to navigate a complicated web of tradeoffs involving farming practices, chemical processes, labor ethics and a wide range of prices.

Experts say people can find sustainable denim by learning how jeans are actually made.

It all starts with cotton farming

Most jeans are made from cotton, a crop that can require large amounts of water, fertilizer and pesticides.

Beth Jensen, chief impact officer at the nonprofit Textile Exchange, said many brands still lack full visibility into where their cotton comes from. Because denim production often spans multiple countries and suppliers, it can also be difficult to track labor conditions.

“We as an industry, collectively, have a long way to go on this,” she said.

As concern grows over fashion’s environmental impact, some brands have looked to solutions like regenerative cotton, which focuses on soil health, biodiversity and reducing synthetic chemical use. But as Jensen said, what’s feasible on a farm in California might not be in a place like India or Australia because of their different climates.

Why producing denim is labor and energy-intensive

After cotton is harvested, it is spun into yarn and dyed — typically with indigo, a process that can involve significant water use and chemical treatments. It's then woven into denim fabric, and cut and sewn into jeans.

Jeans then usually go through finishing treatments to create different shades, fades and distressed textures. Bill Curtin, owner of New Jersey-based BPD Washhouse, said denim-finishing is divided into “wet” and “dry” processes.

The wet process involves washing jeans with water, chemicals and treatments that lighten or tint the denim. Historically, brands have used pumice stones to achieve a worn, stonewashed look — with stones often shipped from Mexico, adding transport emissions and cost to the process. Many facilities are now switching to enzyme-based alternatives and ozone technologies that use less water.

The dry process creates abrasions, whiskers and ripped details either by hand or with laser technology, which Curtin said is more efficient and less labor-intensive.

Many stretchy jeans also contain fabrics like polyester or elastane — fossil fuel-derived synthetics that can shed microplastics over time.

But making sustainable denim is challenging

Fashion designer Maria McManus spent years wanting to add denim to her low-impact line but couldn’t find a way to do it that aligned with her values. The culprit, she said, was always the washing process.

“From a water and chemical perspective, it’s very invasive,” she said.

So instead she sourced dark, raw denim from Japan — indigo, minimal processing — and skipped the wash stage altogether, avoiding the faded and distressed look that define most commercial jeans. It was a deliberate constraint, and it held for years.

A breakthrough came when she collaborated on a collection with Agolde, a larger denim brand. Along with its parent company Citizens of Humanity, it's respected in the fashion industry for its focus on regenerative cotton farming.

Working with the company gave McManus access to infrastructure her small brand couldn’t build alone — a consulting agency that connected her with regenerative cotton farmers, a vetted indigo-dyeing process using biochemical rather than petrochemical dyes, and rigorous supply chain traceability.

But even that process, she said, isn’t simple. Organic and regenerative cotton crops can fail. Supply chains are hard to verify. “You know when they tell you their harvest failed” that they're honest, she said of one supplier. “I know I can trust them because really, what they should have done as business people or capitalists was just get regular cotton — because nobody is testing this stuff.”

But that often leads to higher prices. A pair of jeans from McManus’ brand is nearly $700 — a function of small production runs, she said. “It’s truly a units game.”

Finding the most sustainable pair of jeans

Experts say consumers should be wary of vague sustainability claims and instead look for brands that provide detailed information about their sourcing and manufacturing processes.

Dana Davis, a strategic fashion adviser who led sustainability efforts for the label Mara Hoffman, encouraged shoppers to look beyond a single product page and examine whether brands discuss labor rights, textiles and manufacturing sites across their entire business — not just in a capsule collection.

“If a brand really explains the whys behind why they’re doing these things, then you can get a sense of, ‘OK, this feels authentic,’” Davis said. But she added that “greenwashing” — overstating sustainability claims — can make it difficult for consumers to figure out what's legitimate.

Certifications can help, though Davis cautioned there is no single label that guarantees sustainability. One worth seeking out is the B Corp certification, which evaluates companies’ social and environmental performance. Some tree-based fibers like lyocell, a material commonly blended into jeans, may come from sources vetted by Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), indicating the wood pulp was sourced from responsibly managed forests.

But one of the simplest ways to reduce denim’s environmental footprint is also the least glamorous: To buy fewer jeans, wear them longer, wash them less and shop secondhand.

According to a life cycle assessment by Levi Strauss & Co., if 34.2 million people — or the equivalent of 1 in 10 Americans — bought a pair of secondhand jeans this year instead of new ones, it would avoid roughly 1.5 billion pounds (roughly 0.7 million metric tons) of carbon dioxide, equivalent to the emissions of about 150,000 gasoline cars.

“The most sustainable thing you can do,” Jensen said, “is use a product that’s already been made.”

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The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

The proposal is widely popular in Brazil ahead of presidential elections in October, and President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva sponsored the move and has repeatedly promoted it. The amendment is also part of a push within the region has been lauded by labor rights groups but highly criticized by the business sector.

Currently, Brazilians work five eight-hour days and four hours on a sixth day for 44 hours total. The amendment ends the six-day workweek without reducing pay for at least 37 million people and establishes a 40-hour weekly work limit. It guarantees two consecutive 24-hour rest days each week, preferably Saturdays and Sundays.

“People who have this workweek from Monday to Saturday are the ones that have to work the hardest and are paid the least,” lawmaker Paulo Pimenta, Brazil’s government whip in the lower house, told his peers as they voted. “We need to be brave and do justice.”

Many opposition lawmakers voted for it after months of pressure from their constituents, but some continued to criticize the initiative.

“I don't care this is an election year. I think we need to be responsible. This will be a problem for many companies," lawmaker Kim Kataguiri said. “We are doing this in a rush and workers should know they might end up worse than they are now if business leaders stop hiring.”

The amendment gives businesses 14 months to adapt, which was a key point in negotiations. Many business leaders and lawmakers wanted the changes to be made gradually over 10 years.

“This was built with a lot of responsibility, thinking about workers and families in Brazil,” said lawmaker Leo Prates, who drafted the amendment in the lower house. “We need to accomplish this for the Brazilian people.”

The lower house votes late Wednesday sent the amendment to the upper house. Brazil’s Senate has not set a date for its vote and could make changes before Lula’s approval for the constitution to be amended.

Lula's main rival in the election, Sen. Flávio Bolsonaro, wants to replace the current workweek system with a more flexible payment-by-the-hour strategy, which so far seems to be popular only among some business leaders.

Other Latin American nations have also recently shortened the workweek.

In February, Mexican lawmakers approved a proposal by President Claudia Sheinbaum to trim the 48-hour workweek. Working hours will be shortened gradually to a 40-hour workweek by 2030.

Chile in 2023 passed the so-called 40-Hour Law, which reduced its workweek to 40 hours as of last year. It applies to all workers under Chile’s Labor Code, without reducing pay.

But Argentina has bucked that trend under libertarian President Javier Milei and may extend its 48-hour workweek. A labor overhaul package passed earlier this year extends the maximum workday from eight to 12 hours and scraps overtime pay, among other measures that Argentine labor unions say favor companies over employees.

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AP journalists Megan Janetsky, Isabel DeBre and Nayara Batschke contributed to this report from Mexico City, Buenos Aires, Argentina, and Santiago, Chile.

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Follow AP’s coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america

Talarico has given Democrats their best chance in years of winning a Senate race in Texas and has boosted their still-uphill chances of retaking the majority in the U.S. Senate in November. Talarico, a former middle school teacher and a state lawmaker from Austin, laid out a clear strategy for the months ahead: Litigating Paxton’s scandals to a weary electorate.

“Ken Paxton is the most corrupt politician in America,” Talarico told a crowd of about 1,000 supporters who packed a dance club in downtown Houston. “He has failed the character test. He has put his own interests above the laws of Texas. Those are not my words, those are the words of Ken Paxton’s fellow Republicans.”

He also sought to tie what he called the “rot” at the heart of the nation's political system to the everyday problems faced by many voters, driving home the concerns over rising costs that have been part of Democrats' wider messaging strategy for this year's midterm elections.

"In America, we have an affordability crisis because we have a corruption crisis," Talarico told the crowd.

Talarico's messaging is tougher than in the primary

It was a stark pivot from the more sunny, spiritual theme of Talarico's Democratic primary campaign. Now, he's leaning into the same arguments against Paxton that Republican Senate leaders feared would make the attorney general a weaker candidate than Sen. John Cornyn, who Paxton beat in Tuesday's Republican runoff.

The diverse crowd in Houston held signs emblazoned with “Talarico,” but with a new twist. On the flipside was the campaign's new theme: “THE PEOPLE vs. KEN PAXTON.”

Phrased like a court case aimed at the state's chief law enforcement officer, the theme was launched on the day that also marked the third anniversary of Paxton's impeachment on allegations he used his office to benefit a wealthy political donor.

Paxton was acquitted on all 20 articles of impeachment, which has emboldened him and fueled his supporters. Many of them have long held that he and President Donald Trump, who endorsed him, have been victims of political persecution.

But the message seemed to resonate with many at Talarico's rally.

Monique Green, a retired elementary school teacher from Houston, said the most important part of the “The People vs. Ken Paxton” sign she clutched to her chest while standing in line to meet Talarico were its first two words.

“It’s a declaration that it’s about us," she said. "We are the ones, all of us, what we can definitely do together. And he inspires us to act. He doesn’t just talk — he believes.”

Campaign aides said Talarico had raised $600,000 in small, on-line donations within two hours of Paxton’s win in the Republican Texas runoff Tuesday, the most lucrative two hours for his campaign since he announced he was running in September 2025.

Turning personal attacks into campaign slogans

One of the first speakers at the rally was the Democratic state representative who co-led Paxton’s impeachment, Ann Johnson, alongside a Republican lawmaker.

Talarico emphasized that the impeachment over corruption allegations was brought by the Republican majority in the Texas statehouse, Paxton's own party. After his rally, he said he is making the campaign about Paxton’s record because “he has escaped accountability for years.”

Paxton's campaign declined to comment. But after Talarico finished speaking, Paxton posted a link to his campaign's donation page on the social platform X with a personal attack on his opponent: “James Talarico and his big vegan allies have raised a fortune trying to stop the America First agenda. I need your help!” he wrote.

It echoed a line from Paxton after his runoff victory on Tuesday, and Talarico had a response ready for his supporters at the Houston rally: "I’ve been eating barbecue since before Ken Paxton’s first indictment,” he said.

The vegan jab is part of Paxton’s attempt to seek out what he considers weak points in Talarico’s campaign, including past statements in which Talarico said God is nonbinary and that there were six biological sexes. And in a strategy reminiscent of Trump, Paxton also has been testing nicknames for his opponent.

They included “TalaFreako," which Talarico turned to his advantage Wednesday night. He told his supporters they could go to his campaign website and buy T-shirts stamped with the new nickname.

In an interview with CBS News ahead of Wednesday's rally, Talarico responded to the claims about his beliefs on gender, saying that what he means is that “God cannot be defined by human categories" and there were “two sexes, men and women."

“I also know there’s a very small percentage of people who have these chromosomal abnormalities, and I believe that they deserve to be treated with dignity and respect,” he said.

The 2 1/2-year investigation and prosecution that followed came to a close Wednesday with the sentencing of his personal assistant Kenneth Iwamasa, who bought him the drugs, gave him injections, and found him dead in the hot tub of the house they shared on Oct. 23, 2023. The 54-year-old “Friends” star had told Iwamasa to shoot him up “with a big one.”

Here’s a chronological look at the end of Perry’s life, drawn from federal court documents, a medical examiner’s investigation and law enforcement reports.

The final month

Sometime in September of 2023 — Perry asks Iwamasa to help him get illegal ketamine. Working with his regular doctor, Perry had been receiving legal ketamine treatments for depression — an increasingly common off-label use of the surgical anesthetic. But he wanted more. Perry’s family members would later say they had known Iwamasa for decades, and trusted him to help keep the actor sober.

Sept. 30, 2023 — Told by a patient that he knew a prominent person willing to pay big money for ketamine, Dr. Salvador Plasencia meets with Perry and Iwamasa at their home in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood of Los Angeles. Plasencia texts a doctor friend, Mark Chavez, who agrees to obtain ketamine for him. “I wonder how much this moron will pay,” Plasencia texts Chavez. Later the same day, Plasencia returns to Perry’s house, where Iwamasa pays him $4,500 in cash for four vials. Plasencia gives Perry two injections, and teaches Iwamasa how to do it.

Oct. 2, 2023 — Iwamasa texts Plasencia seeking more ketamine, referring to it in code as “dr pepper.” Plasencia appears, gives Perry the injections, and leaves behind more vials.

Oct. 4. 2023 — Iwamasa injects Perry without help for the first time. He texts the doctor that he had found “the sweet spot” to put the needle into his boss, but that trying different spots on Perry had led to them running out of ketamine and says they need more. Plasencia texts Chavez asking if he can keep supplying the drug so they can become Perry’s “go-to.”

Oct. 8, 2023 — In a late night meetup at a Santa Monica shopping plaza, Plasencia sells Iwamasa four vials of ketamine for $6,000 in cash.

Oct. 10, 2023 — Iwamasa drives Perry to a public parking lot in Long Beach to meet with Plasencia. The doctor sells them more ketamine and gives an injection to Perry as he sits in a car. The same day, Perry asks a friend about other sources. She sends him to Erik Fleming, a licensed drug counselor she knows who has relapsed into addiction.

Oct. 11, 2023 — Fleming messages Iwamasa that he can get ketamine from a dealer he knows, Jasveen Sangha, who prosecutors dub “The Ketamine Queen.” Fleming says she only deals “with high end and celebs.”

Oct. 12, 2023 — Plasencia goes to Perry’s house, where he is paid $21,000 in cash, some of it owed to him for previous ketamine buys. While there, he injects Perry. The actor immediately freezes up and his blood pressure spikes. The assistant said the doctor told him, “let’s not do that again.”

Oct. 13, 2023 — Perry gets a sample of Sangha’s ketamine and tries it. He and Iwamasa ask for 25 vials of it, for which they pay $5,500 to Sangha and another $500 to Fleming. Fleming drops it off at Perry’s house a day later.

Around Oct. 20, 2023 — Perry receives his last legal ketamine treatment from his regular physician.

The final week

Oct. 23, 2023 — Iwamasa pays $6,000 to Fleming and Sangha for 25 more vials of ketamine.

Oct. 24, 2023 — Iwamasa gives Perry six to eight injections, a daily dosage that would continue until the actor’s death.

Oct. 25, 2023 — Fleming makes a third and final delivery of another 25 vials of ketamine for another $6,000. This batch includes the fatal dose.

Oct. 27, 2023 — With the supply coming from Sangha, Perry and Iwamasa had been out of touch with Plasencia for about two weeks. Plasencia texts Iwamasa, saying he had more to offer: “I know you mentioned taking a break. I have been stocking up.”

The final day

Oct. 28, 2023, about 8:30 a.m. — Using syringes from Plasencia and ketamine from Sangha, Iwamasa gives Perry an injection.

About 11 a.m. — Perry plays pickleball.

About 12:45 p.m. — Iwamasa gives Perry his second shot of the day, and the actor begins watching a movie.

About 1:30 p.m. — Iwamasa gives Perry his third and final injection of the day while Perry sits in or near his backyard Jacuzzi. “Shoot me up with a big one,” Iwamasa remembers Perry telling him. Iwamasa leaves to run errands.

About 4 p.m. — Iwamasa returns home to find Perry face down in the Jacuzzi. Paramedics arrive minutes later and declare Perry dead. When Iwamasa talks to police, he does not mention Perry’s illegal ketamine consumption, or his role in it, and hides evidence of it. Sangha and Fleming learn of Perry’s death and delete their message history.

The aftermath

Dec. 15 — An autopsy report is released, saying the acute effects of ketamine were the primary cause of Perry’s death, with drowning as a secondary cause.

January 2024 — A search warrant is served at Perry and Iwamasa’s home. Over the course of several interviews, the assistant admits to his role in Perry's illegal drug use. He points investigators to Fleming and gives them information on Plasencia, whom they have already identified.

March 2024 — A search warrant is served on Fleming's sister's home, where he was staying. He gave up Sangha to prosecutors and became an essential witness along with Iwamasa.

Aug. 7, 2024 — Iwamasa pleads guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute ketamine causing death. He will be sentenced to 3 1/2 years in prison.

Aug. 8, 2024 — Fleming pleads guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute ketamine and one count of distribution of ketamine resulting in death. He will be sentenced to two years in prison.

Oct. 2, 2024 — Chavez pleads guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute ketamine. He will get eight months of home detention.

July 23, 2025 — Plasencia pleads guilty to four counts of distribution of ketamine. He will get 2 1/2 years in prison.

Sept. 3, 2025 — Sangha pleads guilty to three counts of distribution of ketamine, one count of using her home for a drug operation and one count of distribution of ketamine resulting in death. She will get 15 years in prison.

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A version of this story first moved on Aug. 16, 2024.

The seven villagers entered the cave in Xaisomboun province on May 19, but heavy rain triggered flash flooding that blocked the exit, according to Lao and Thai rescue teams involved in the operation.

Thai rescuer Chakkit Taengtang posted video of himself in the cave saying divers were delivering food and water to the five and planning to extract them as soon as possible.

All of the villagers are men, according to a Facebook post by the Lao group Rescue Volunteer for People.

“I’m still shaking. Our team made it happen,” Bounkham Luanglath, a member of the Lao rescue team, said in a voice message to The Associated Press. He said the search for the missing would continue.

A video posted by the rescue group appeared to show the moment divers emerged from the water and discovered the trapped men. In the footage, the men are wearing headlamps and sitting on a rock surrounded by floodwater.

Other videos showed rescuers inside and outside the cave cheering, jumping and hugging each other in joy after the discovery.

Another villager who went into the cave with the seven was able to escape when the flooding began, and he raised the alarm about the trapped men.

Rescue workers from neighboring Thailand arrived at the site over the weekend. Those helping out included several divers who took part in the complicated 2018 rescue in northern Thailand of 12 schoolboys and their soccer coach who were trapped for more than two weeks in a cave.

Miiko Paasi, a Thai-based Finnish diving instructor who participated in the rescue of the schoolboys and joined the search effort in Laos, said in a social media post that the men were “healthy and in good spirits,” but he warned that the extraction would not be easy.

The cave is in a rugged, remote area in Xaisomboun province’s Longcheng district, about 120 kilometers (75 miles) north of the capital, Vientiane. Rescuers have detailed on social media the challenging mountainous terrain and heavy rain that has hampered their work.

Videos shared online by Thai rescuers showed that reaching the cave’s entrance requires a steep hike of roughly 4 kilometers (2.5 miles). The entrance is also steep and rocky and barely wide enough for a single person.

It's not clear why the villagers went into the cave. Bounkham has said that the cave was frequented by local residents looking for gold, despite repeated warnings about safety.

___

Associated Press journalists Tian Macleod Ji and Haruka Nuga in Bangkok contributed to this report.

The incident originally happened along Blue Bonnet Drive in Sharpes, where Sheriff Wayne Ivey said a pair of large dogs attacked the woman, identified as Jodi Cowan, 50.

“Cowan attempted to protect her own dog while running from the animals in an effort to keep from being attacked,” Ivey said. “But (she) was eventually overwhelmed and pulled to the ground.”

Eventually, Cowan’s spouse heard her screaming and came outside to stop the attack by swinging a knife at the dogs, Ivey added. However, Cowan was taken to a hospital, where she died just hours after the attack.

Afterward, detectives investigated the death, leading to the arrest of owner Linda Cutler, 29, whom Ivey said had taken “minimal action” to prevent her dogs from getting out of her yard, even after being cited by animal services numerous times in the past.

Cutler now faces a charge of manslaughter.

Ivey also addressed concerns that animal services hadn’t done enough to prevent the incident, as neighbors had called several times previously about the loose dogs.

“While you might think that animal services has the authority to seize dogs that routinely escape from yards, or that have even bitten someone, the unfortunate reality is they don’t,” Ivey explained. “In fact, even if a dog has previously bitten someone, and it’s not a severe bite, the most action our animal enforcement officers are allowed by law to take is the issuance of a citation and a fine.”

Furthermore, Ivey said that animal service calls related to Cutler’s home stem back to 2024.

“It’s also important to note that during the early calls from 2024 through November of ‘25, the calls at Cutler’s residence were related to other dogs, as the two dogs involved in this attack were puppies back then,” Ivey continued.

[RELATED: Florida neighbors say loose dogs reported to animal services before woman killed in street]

Ivey said that Cutler was arrested on Wednesday by Melbourne police, who responded to a Hilton hotel near the beach for a disturbance involving Cutler and others.

“Are you kidding? Folks, an innocent woman is dead, and two dogs are about to be euthanized because of this woman’s inactions and failure to be a responsible pet owner,” Ivey declared. “And she and her little honey are hanging out at the beach.”

Ivey added that during her arrest, Cutler feigned having a heart attack, though she was ultimately cleared into law enforcement custody.

Meanwhile, Cowan’s partner, Donnell Smith, told News 6 after Cowan’s death that he was friends with the dog owner, so he has mixed feelings about the degree of punishment he thinks his neighbor should face.

“Do I want her to rot in jail? No,” Smith said. “Do I want accountability? Yeah. There’s some other individuals that need to be looked at, some other entities that need to be looked at.”

Kuwait’s military made the announcement, without providing further details on what had been targeted.

Kuwait repeatedly came under fire from Iran and Iranian-backed Shiite militias in Iraq during the war. No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack.

The announcement by Kuwait's military comes as the Middle East remains on the edge over the ceasefire and ongoing negotiations between Tehran and Washington which as of yet have not reopened the Strait of Hormuz.

The strait is the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf through which about a fifth of all oil and natural gas traded once passed. Its closure has sparked a global energy shortage that experts warn only will intensify in the coming weeks. Meanwhile, the U.S. is trying to get Iran to give up its stockpile of highly enriched uranium while the Islamic Republic seeks the lifting of economic sanctions and the release of frozen assets to aid its shattered economy.

Earlier Thursday morning, U.S. officials said that U.S. Central Command forces shot down four Iranian one-way attack drones that posed a threat around the Strait of Hormuz, according to U.S. officials who were not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity. The U.S. military also struck an Iranian ground control station in Bandar Abbas that was about to launch a fifth drone, the officials said.

Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard via the state-run IRNA news agency acknowledged the attack around Bandar Abbas International Airport, a dual-use airport on the strait, and said it launched its own retaliatory attack on the air base that launched the assault. It did not elaborate on the target and it wasn't clear whether the attack on Kuwait was directly related.

___

Associated Press writer Konstantin Toropin in Washington contributed to this report.

Oil prices gained more than $1 a barrel after having dropped sharply a day before. U.S. futures inched lower.

U.S. officials said Central Command forces shot down four Iranian one-way attack drones that posed a threat near the Strait of Hormuz. The U.S. military also hit an Iranian ground control station in Bandar Abbas that was about to launch a fifth drone.

Meanwhile, President Donald Trump asserted that Iran is “negotiating on fumes” and said November’s midterm elections in the United States won’t make him rush into a deal to end the nearly three-month-old conflict.

In early Asian trading, Japan's Nikkei 225 edged less than 0.1% higher to 65,039.78, while the Kospi in South Korea lost 1.2% to 8,126.67.

Hong Kong's Hang Seng index shed 1.9% to 24,855.86 and the Shanghai Composite index fell 0.3% to 4,080.00.

In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 declined 0.8% to 8,646.30, while Taiwan's Taiex gained 0.6%.

“Conflicting reports on the contours of a U.S.-Iran deal dampened risks sentiments as markets grow increasingly wary about the possibility of a deal,” Tan Boon Heng of Mizuho Bank in Singapore said in a commentary.

“While there is desire to maintain the ceasefire with both Iran and (asterisk)the) U.S. toning down language on renewed attacks and persisting with indirect channels of communication, it remains remarkably hard to envisage how a compromise can be reached on key issues,” he said.

On Wednesday, U.S. stocks inched to more records after oil prices declined more than 4%, easing pressure on consumers and businesses worldwide.

The S&P 500 edged up by less than 0.1% to 7,520.36 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.4%, to 50,644.28. The Nasdaq composite gained 0.1% to 26,674.73. All three indexes set all-time highs.

Stocks of companies with big fuel bills helped lead the way on hopes that lower oil prices will remove a big drag on their profits. Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings climbed 6.1%, and United Airlines rallied 6.3%. Delta Air Lines rose 3% and set an all-time high.

The price for a barrel of Brent crude oil fell 4.6% to $92.25 after the ceasefire between the United States and Iran appeared to hold despite the U.S. military launching what it called “self-defense” strikes in southern Iran.

However, after further strikes, in early Thursday trading Brent was up $1.70 at $93.95 a barrel.

A barrel of benchmark U.S. crude gained $1.68 to $90.36. On Wednesday, it had fallen 5.5%, to settle at $88.68, back to where it was in mid-April.

Prices have moderated, after surging well over $100 a barrel, on hopes that the United States and Iran can reach an agreement to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and allow oil tankers to exit the Persian Gulf for deliveries again.

Stocks have been able to run to records despite the painful inflation and uncertainty caused by high oil prices largely because companies have reported surprisingly strong profits for the start of 2026, and the forecast is for them to continue.

In other dealings early Thursday, the U.S. dollar rose to 159.57 Japanese yen from 159.51 yen. The euro slipped to $1.1611 from $1.1626.

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AP Business Writer Stan Choe.

“Small sample size,” the former Cy Young winner said.

What a sample, though.

After allowing two hits over six scoreless innings against Tampa Bay in his first major league start since Game 5 of the 2024 World Series against the Dodgers, the 35-year-old Cole did even better against struggling Kansas City. He allowed four hits while striking out 10 without a single walk, sending the Yankees to a 7-0 victory — their 14th straight win over the Royals.

“I feel like maybe the first game was the appetizer,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said, “and that was the main course right there. That was surgical. You saw everything, like, good fastball, both breaking balls going, mixed in the cutter a little bit, made some really good change-ups along the way. There was good defensive plays behind him early and then he kind of cruised.”

Cole (1-0) needed only 79 pitches to get through 6 2/3 innings, and he probably could have gone deeper into the game against Kansas City. But at this point in what the Yankees hope is a long season, there was no reason to push Cole's once-ailing right elbow.

The closest the Royals came to scoring off him came in the third, when Michael Massey hit a one-out double. Cole bounced back to strike out Isaac Collins, bringing Maikel Garcia to the plate. He ripped a single to right field, Aaron Judge fielded a tough hop cleanly, and then made a perfect throw to catch Massey at the plate for the final out of the inning.

Cole also stranded Garcia at second base after a two-out double in the sixth. Salvador Perez singled off him in the seventh.

And that was it. All the runners Kansas City managed against him.

“I think it just reminds you of who he is, and how great a consistent pitcher he is,” Boone said. “And to see him go through the process the last several months to get back to this, and go out there and execute like he is here to start, it's fun to watch.”

Cole was brutally efficient, especially with his 96 mph fastball. He threw first-pitch strikes to 16 of the 23 batters he faced, and only a couple of batters even managed to drive the count to three balls against him the entire night.

“I expect to execute pitches. I don’t necessarily expect to not give up any runs, especially on 75 percent strikes. You’re putting a lot of pressure on guys,” Cole said. “So you have to play good defense, which is what we did tonight."

There was pressure on Cole to execute, too, because the Yankees never really gave him a cushion. They managed a pair of runs on a single by Paul Goldschmidt, a triple by Ben Rice and Judge's sacrifice fly, but the rest of their offense came after Cole departed.

It wasn't nearly as prolific as the Yankees' memorable 15-1 win Tuesday night in which they belted six homers and had 24 hits — and, in a first for one of the game’s historic franchises, every player in the New York starting lineup had at least two hits.

But with Cole back on the mound, they only needed a fraction of that offense Wednesday night.

“It's two games. Small sample size,” Cole said. “We still have stuff to improve, and just have to keep the same mindset that we have right now, and that's to take it one outing at a time.”

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AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/mlb

“It’s really frustrating. We kinda have a moving target,” Mayor Megan Sladek said Wednesday. “How do you make a plan to do what’s right and prudent for the city when we can’t be guaranteed a way to consistently fund what we need to do?”

Oviedo leaders have been working to expand and renovate the city’s small, aging police station, built in the 1990s. Sladek said the newest concern comes after the governor released another proposal that could reduce property taxes.

“Well just today this afternoon the Governor put out a plan to talk about again reducing property taxes,” Sladek said. “So that kinda begs the question: if we have a new building, will we have the means to fund the operational costs?”

A video posted by Oviedo city government shows a tour of the police station from last year. One area described as a training space was previously used as a bunker where personnel could sleep.

The current plan to fund the expansion and renovation is $18.2 million, and some residents say that’s a more reasonable figure than earlier versions of the proposal.

“If it’s gonna go toward them being able to do their job better then that’s fine,” said Oviedo resident Jada Anderson. Anderson added that when the project was first proposed at more than $40 million, the price tag felt too high.

Under the latest proposal, the city would build a two-story brick police annex connected to the existing department. Plans include:

• A multi-purpose room
• A K-9 space
• A physical training facility
• Project manager Johnnie Lohum said the project is now moving into the 60% construction document phase.

“The building breaks down percentage-wise: 78% of that need for the police department, about 10% for the EOC, and about 12% for IT needs,” Lohum said.

The current plan would also relocate the city’s IT department to the police station complex.

Police leadership argues that move makes sense for security and reliability.

“The police department is very heavily dependent on IT,” the police chief said. “So why is it in a building that’s more susceptible for a roof being torn off than put it in the most secure building the city has?”

Ocasio, 27, was last seen May 26, 2009, leaving the Florida Tap Room on Raleigh Street with James Hataway, who remains the only suspect identified in her disappearance. Her car was later found abandoned on Franklin Street in Ocoee.

Hataway was sentenced to life in prison in 2011, but he has never been charged in connection with Ocasio’s disappearance.

In an arrest affidavit, deputies said that the incident happened on Tuesday around 8 p.m.

At the time, deputies said they were called to Country Club Drive, where they met with the boy and his grandfather.

There, investigators learned that the boy had been riding his bicycle around the nearby clubhouse, but he became tired, so he sat down near the tennis court, the affidavit shows.

“[REDACTED] stated he noticed a male, later identified as Paul Holmes, staring at him and making an odd facial expression,” the affidavit reads. “[REDACTED] stated he then decided to leave and raised his middle finger toward Paul.”

Afterward, the boy reportedly explained that Holmes approached him, pushed him to the ground, and yelled, “Do you know who I am? I’m the president of the HOA.”

Per the boy, Holmes then took his bicycle, placed it in his vehicle and drove away.

Deputies said they spoke with Holmes, who initially refused to return the bicycle before eventually giving in.

“Paul stated there had been ongoing issues with juveniles gathering around the clubhouse late at night when the club was closed,” the affidavit continues. “Although the juveniles had not been observed committing criminal activity, Paul stated they were not members of the club and therefore had no business being there.”

Furthermore, Holmes claimed he took the bicycle so that security could identify the boy and his parents, though the HOA president denied intentionally placing his hands on the boy, investigators noted.

Regardless, Holmes was arrested and now faces charges of child abuse and petit theft. He was released on Wednesday evening on bond.

You can read the full affidavit below:

26-11273 Holmes Redacted by Anthony Talcott

The Asian elephant was put to sleep Tuesday at the zoo where she lived for almost a half-century. Zoo officials said some age-related conditions accelerated in recent weeks, and she showed signs of a falloff in kidney or liver function. A necropsy revealed arthritis and large, inoperable uterine tumors that are impossible to diagnose in elephants through exams or imaging, the zoo said.

“She was a wonderful elephant,” interim zoo director Craig Piper said in an interview Wednesday, as heavy-hearted staffers absorbed the loss of an animal some had tended for over 30 years. “She served as a tremendous ambassador for elephants and for elephant conservation.”

Since Happy’s death, the zoo's 57-year-old Patty is the last elephant on exhibit in the United States’ largest city. The zoo’s parent institution, the Wildlife Conservation Society, decided 20 years ago to stop acquiring pachyderms.

Born in the wild in Asia, Happy was brought to the U.S. as a 1-year-old. She was named for a character from “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” before arriving at the zoo in 1977.

Happy keenly engaged with her keepers and was easy to motivate with favorite treats, such as watermelon or strawberries, said Keith Lovett, the zoo’s director of animal programs. Piper said she sometimes stashed treats in her ear to save for later.

In 2005, she showed researchers that elephants can recognize themselves in a mirror — a sign of self-awareness seen in only a few other species. During the experiment, Happy faced her reflection and repeatedly used her trunk to touch an "X" painted above her eye, a mark she could see only in the mirror.

She was paired with other elephants until her last partner died in 2006. Happy then lived separately from Patty and a third elephant out of concern that they wouldn't get along, though Lovett said the animals could see, smell and touch each other over a divider. The third elephant, called Maxine, died in 2018.

Zoo officials said the median life expectancy for Asian elephants in U.S. zoos is about 45 years. Their life expectancy in the wild is more difficult to pinpoint.

During Happy’s lifetime, zoo elephant exhibits came under increased scrutiny. Some experts said urban animal parks were too small for creatures that roam extensive distances in the wild. Animal rights activists argued that zoo enclosures were no place for big-brained, social pachyderms.

Some zoos phased out their exhibits and sent elephants to sanctuaries, though some other zoos remain committed to keeping and breeding the creatures, arguing that they help keep people interested in saving wildlife.

One activist group, the Nonhuman Rights Project, sued the Bronx Zoo in 2018, seeking to have Happy declared a “person” for legal purposes and moved to a large animal sanctuary. It was the first such case about an elephant, according to the group.

Citing a principle that’s used to challenge the legality of a person’s imprisonment, the activist group said Happy was “an extraordinarily cognitively complex and autonomous nonhuman being” who was unlawfully deprived of her liberty and suffered from being pent up in a exhibit without other elephants.

Zoo officials said Happy was assiduously cared for and had space for swimming, foraging and other natural behavior. Uprooting her from her longtime home could harm her, the zoo said.

New York’s top court ultimately rejected the activists’ claim, by a 5-2 majority. Colorado's highest court later issued a similar ruling about five elephants in a zoo there.

Still, two of the New York high court judges wrote pointed dissents. One called Happy’s captivity “inherently unjust and inhumane” and “an affront to a civilized society.”

The Nonhuman Rights Project has continued pursuing cases about elephants in various other states.

Happy spent her final weeks, by her choice, in an off-exhibit barn and yard within her enclosure, Piper said. In a zoo version of hospice care, staffers provided hydration, nutrition and pain management, he said.

Meanwhile, Patty is doing well, the zoo said.

The Wildlife Conservation Society said in 2006 that once there was only one elephant, the animal might be moved to another zoo if circumstances were right. Piper said the zoo will be “really thoughtful and careful” in contemplating whether to move Patty from her home of 53 years.

U.S. Southern Command posted video on social media showing a boat resting on the water before being struck by an explosion. The last few seconds of the video show smoke and fire rising from the boat.

A day earlier, U.S. forces had launched a strike on an alleged drug vessel in the eastern Pacific, killing one man and leaving two survivors. Southern Command said it “immediately notified the U.S. Coast Guard to activate the Search and Rescue system for the survivors.”

The Trump administration’s campaign of blowing up alleged drug-trafficking vessels in Latin American waters, including the eastern Pacific and the Caribbean Sea, has gone on since early September and killed at least 196 people in total. The military has not provided evidence that any of the vessels were carrying drugs.

The Pentagon watchdog said last week that it will evaluate whether the U.S. military followed an established targeting framework when carrying out the attacks on alleged drug-smuggling boats. The six-phase Joint Targeting Cycle include a military commander’s intent, target development, analysis, decision, execution and assessment.

The Pentagon inspector general’s office said the review was “self-initiated.” It will not probe the legality of the strikes, which have drawn intense scrutiny from some Democratic lawmakers and military legal scholars.

The Trump administration says the U.S. is at war against the Latin American drug cartels, which it says are responsible for the scourge of fatal drug overdoses plaguing many American communities.

U.S. Central Command forces shot down four Iranian one-way attack drones that posed a threat around the Strait of Hormuz, according to U.S. officials who were not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The U.S. military also struck an Iranian ground control station in Bandar Abbas that was about to launch a fifth drone, the officials said.

Details about the strikes emerged after Trump, at a Cabinet meeting earlier Wednesday, expressed confidence that his administration was making headway on settling the war, even though the talks still remain very much in flux.

The president is looking for a settlement that will reopen the Strait of Hormuz and provide him with a credible argument that Iran’s nuclear capability has been diminished enough to declare victory, winding down a conflict that's been politically unpopular for Republicans.

But as things stand, Trump also risks finding that closure to his war of choice comes with an unsatisfactory ending.

The emerging deal puts off many critical issues to be resolved later and has already exposed the Republican president to fierce criticism — even from some of his own supporters — that Iran's hardline leaders will emerge from the conflict battered but emboldened. It all comes to a head just as the midterm elections to determine control of Congress come into focus and as Republicans worry that rising costs and fuel prices are darkening the American electorate's mood.

But Trump on Wednesday dismissed the idea that the upcoming elections would shape his Iran strategy.

“They thought they were gonna outwait me. You know, 'We’ll outwait him. He’s got the midterms,'” Trump said. “I don’t care about the midterms.”

Trump acknowledged there's still work to do, but he spoke with a measure of certainty that the two sides would get there.

“They want very much to make a deal,” Trump said. “So far, they haven’t gotten there. We’re not satisfied with it, but we will be — either that or we’ll have to just finish the job.”

The new strikes came after U.S. forces carried out what the Pentagon called “defensive” strikes on missile launch sites and minelaying boats in southern Iran on Monday. The U.S. has said it has acted with restraint with both of this week's military actions in light of the fragile, weekslong ceasefire that continues to hold.

Some Trump backers are skeptical

While Trump insists a deal is within reach, there appears to be daylight between the U.S. and Iran on several key issues. The president is also facing scrutiny from Republican allies, including Sens. Roger Wicker of Mississippi, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Ted Cruz of Texas, who have said the terms seem too favorable to Tehran.

They're balking at aspects of the deal that have emerged publicly that they say too closely resemble the nuclear agreement reached with Iran by Democratic President Barack Obama, which Trump scrapped during his first term.

Under the potential deal, Tehran would agree to give up its stockpile of highly enriched uranium — a key Trump demand — in return for sanctions relief. That's according to two regional officials and one senior Trump administration official, all of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive negotiations.

One regional official, with direct knowledge of the negotiations, said how Iran would give up the uranium would be subject to further talks during a 60-day period. Some would likely be diluted, while the rest would be transferred to a third country, the official said.

But Trump said Wednesday that he “wouldn’t be comfortable” with either Russia or China taking Iran’s stockpile of highly enriched uranium. The two countries have the closest relations with Tehran, and nuclear analysts have said they could be a potential acceptable third party to the Iranian Republic to take possession of the enriched uranium as part of a potential deal.

Iran has 440.9 kilograms (972 pounds) of uranium that is enriched up to 60% purity, a short, technical step from weapons-grade levels of 90%, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency. Iran has not publicly committed to giving up its uranium.

How Trump's plan affects Israel's war in Lebanon

Another key issue unresolved is whether the ceasefire will also cover Israel’s operations against Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed militant group in Lebanon. Iran has insisted that Lebanon must be covered by any ceasefire agreement negotiated with the United States.

The administration appears to leave some wiggle room on the Lebanon question. The emerging memorandum of understanding calls for a ceasefire between the U.S. and its allies against Iran and its proxies, such as Hezbollah, but also underscores Israel's right to act against imminent threats and in self-defense.

Israel's military and Iran-backed militant Hezbollah group continue to clash along a strategic river in southern Lebanon as Israeli troops pushed farther north.

Jonathan Conricus, a former spokesperson for the Israel Defense Forces, said Israel expects that Iran would quickly move to direct any sanctions relief to restore its military capability and boost proxy groups, including Hezbollah and Hamas in Gaza.

“We’re not done fighting, because the Iranian regime isn’t done,” said Conricus, who is a senior fellow with the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a hawkish Washington think tank.

‘Stunned silence’ as Trump ties Abraham Accords to Iran deal

Trump on Wednesday also reinforced his call that the deal should include a requirement for several additional countries, including Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Pakistan, to join the Abraham Accords, the U.S.-brokered agreements from Trump’s first term aimed at normalizing diplomatic and economic relations with Israel.

“We’re, you know, requesting strongly that they join,” Trump said.

Trump’s optimism that the other Middle Eastern and majority-Muslim countries could soon sign on to the accords might be overly ambitious.

For example, Saudi Arabia, the most significant power in the Arab world and long seen as the biggest prize for the normalization effort, has insisted that establishing a guaranteed path to a Palestinian state remains a precondition. It's something that Israel vehemently opposes.

Trump pushed for the Abraham Accords during a call with leaders of Mideast allies over the weekend.

Barbara Leaf, a retired U.S. ambassador to the United Arab Emirates and senior State Department official during President Joe Biden’s Democratic administration, said officials from Gulf countries who were on the call told her that Trump’s pitch was greeted by “stunned silence.”

A person familiar with the call disputed that characterization and said that some regional allies responded positively to the president’s call to join the accords. The person spoke on the condition of anonymity about the private conversation.

___

AP writers Matthew Lee, Michelle L. Price and Darlene Superville in Washington, Bill Barrow in Atlanta, Meg Kinnard in Columbia, S.C., Samy Magdy in Cairo and Melanie Lidman in Jerusalem contributed to this report.

A 16-year-old and her daughter were reported missing by the teen’s mother on Wednesday, according to the Osceola County Sheriff’s Office.

In a release, deputies said they received a report from the teen’s mother that they’d gotten into an argument while checking out of a local Extended Stay Hotel.

The teen — identified as Izaira Eason, 16 — picked up her 1-year-old daughter, Zylone Eason, as well as the child’s diaper bag, and walked toward West Irlo Bronson Memorial Highway, deputies added.

“Izaira’s mother believed she just needed time to cool off,” the release reads. “However, after approximately one hour, Izaira had not returned.”

Izaira Eason isn’t diagnosed with any mental illnesses and didn’t threaten to harm herself or others, deputies noted. That said, she reportedly has no friends or family in Kissimmee.

She was last seen wearing a black shirt, and white and black pants, along with a blue bonnet. Meanwhile, the 1-year-old was wearing a red-and-black shirt and black pants.

No additional information has been provided at this time.

Video submitted by a News 6 viewer shows the monkey wandering through an open field not far from Wekiva Springs State Park.

At one point, the primate rises up on its hind legs, giving onlookers a clear view of the unexpected visitor.

Catherine Castillo told News 6 she spotted what appeared to be a rhesus macaque near the preserve behind her Longwood home on Monday morning and quickly grabbed her phone to record it.

“At first I thought it was like a large cat,” Castillo said. “And then it processed and I was like, ‘Oh my goodness, that’s a monkey.’”

[RELATED: Rhesus macaque sighting in Longwood sparks FWC warning]

Castillo said she called the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission right away.

“They said no, it’s okay, just don’t approach it, don’t feed it,” Castillo said. “They said they would do unofficial documentation of the sighting.”

The rhesus macaques are an invasive species that were introduced to Florida by a tour boat operator in the 1930s and have thrived at Silver Springs ever since.

In 1938, a tour boat operator, Colonel Tooey, released just 6 Rhesus macaque monkeys onto a small island, later converted to Silver Springs Park. His motive was to create a park closely resembling the Tarzan story; therefore, he procured the monkeys from New York City. 

But what Colonel Tooey didn’t know is that this particular species of monkeys are excellent swimmers – they escaped the premises within minutes of releasing them. Thus, to replace them, six more monkeys were bought. They, too, escaped like the previous batch. By the early 1980s, these monkeys had already spread across what now is the 5000-acre Silver Springs Park.

Silver Springs blog: "Why Are There Monkeys At Silver Springs?" (excerpt)

[RELATED: ‘It’s raining monkeys:’ Florida kayaker records crazy video of paddling primates]

The Longwood sighting happened roughly 70 miles from Silver Springs.

News 6 also obtained video from Castillo’s neighbor showing the monkey from another angle as it moved through the neighborhood.

Castillo says the monkey hasn’t returned since Monday — but after this week, she says she’ll definitely be keeping an eye on the trees.

Beyond environmental concerns, the monkeys also pose a public health risk — rhesus macaques in Florida have tested positive for herpes B.

The FWC provides these tips for rhesus macaque encounters:

• Never approach or offer food to wild monkeys
• If a monkey is encountered, keep children close and pets leashed
• Dispose of uneaten food and garbage in closed trash containers
• If bitten or scratched by a wild monkey, immediately wash the wound and seek medical attention. Call the National B Virus Resource Center for emergency information at (404) 413-6550.
• If you observe a wild monkey that poses a threat to people, call the FWC’s Wildlife Alert Hotline at (888) 404-3922
• Any rhesus macaque observations seen outside of the core population near Silver Springs should be reported by calling the Exotic Species Hotline at (888) 483-4681 or by clicking here

The sanctions were announced late Wednesday after U.S. forces carried out strikes on an Iran military facility after downing Iranian attack drones, according to U.S. officials who were not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The sanctions move, first reported by The Associated Press, is the latest U.S. effort to use economic leverage on top of military action to push Iran’s leadership into an agreement to end the war and open the waterway where a fifth of the world’s oil and natural gas normally passes. President Donald Trump has said a deal is imminent, but talks are ongoing.

Rising energy prices and other costs stemming from Iran’s effective closure of the strait have heaped political pressure on Trump and other Republicans ahead of the midterm congressional elections.

“The Iranian military’s latest attempt to extort global maritime trade is proof that Economic Fury has left the regime desperate for cash,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a statement.

The sanctions target Iran’s Persian Gulf Strait Authority and any person or entity cooperating with the agency, announced earlier this month, that approves transit in the strait and charges tolls that could reach as high as $2 million per vessel.

Iran’s powerful paramilitary Revolutionary Guard has defended this oversight effort, saying the only safe route for transit through the critical waterway is through the corridor it has designated and saying any ships that deviate from that path face a series of attacks and risks.

Iran’s chokehold on the strait has caused worldwide energy shocks and followed the U.S. and Israel launching the war on Feb. 28. Prices have spiked for oil, gas and related products, and experts say it would take several weeks or even months for shipping and prices to recover once the waterway reopens.

In turn, the U.S. has blockaded Iranian ports for over a month, and Trump said it “will remain in full force and effect until an agreement is reached, certified, and signed.”

The latest economic penalties come as Washington and Tehran have been engaged in some of the most intense diplomacy and negotiations in years, aimed at bringing an end to the war and a pathway for a longer-term solution to issues between the longtime adversaries.

Trump said Wednesday that Iran is “negotiating on fumes” and said the sides are closing in on a deal even after the U.S. military said Monday that it had carried out “self-defense” strikes on missile launch sites and boats placing mines. Wednesday’s strikes are likely to cause more complications.

“They want very much to make a deal,” Trump said at a Cabinet meeting Wednesday. “So far, they haven’t gotten there. We’re not satisfied with it, but we will be — either that or we’ll have to just finish the job.”

The Republican president also has reiterated his warning that fighting would resume if no deal is reached but has pulled back from those threats several times now in the last few months.

Coventry’s reassurance to the annual meeting of Summer Games sports bodies came after she warned in February of “uncomfortable” talks ahead to make future Olympic hosting more efficient.

The International Olympic Committee aims to finalize within months the list of sports on the Brisbane program that Coventry previously told their leaders will be fewer than the 36 being played at the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.

“There is a path (back), it’s not just an end,” the IOC president told The Associated Press on Wednesday on the sidelines of the assembly of the summer sports group known as ASOIF.

Brisbane also could have fewer than the 353 medal events being competed for at Los Angeles.

“I know that not everyone will be happy,” Coventry acknowledged to ASOIF members Wednesday, adding "the goal is not to destroy any sport.”

Coventry also met Tuesday with ASOIF members and assured them “we don’t have specific numbers” as targets for the sports and events program for Brisbane.

The most important metric shapes to be the number of venues needed as the IOC looks to manage costs for hosts.

“The cost and complexity comes when you start adding additional venues for single purpose events,” Coventry told the AP. “That’s where we need to look and say: ‘How could we change that?’”

A major step toward streamlining the program for Brisbane and beyond is a June 24 meeting of the full IOC membership in Lausanne that should agree on a process for evaluating sports and events.

A list of sports at Brisbane could be confirmed in December, with a longer timeline into 2029 to confirm the detailed program of medal events.

The 36 sports in Los Angeles is up from just 26 at the 2012 London Olympics, and ASOIF President Ingmar De Vos later acknowledged, “It has grown too much and needs to be brought back into proportion.”

Sports at risk?

Modern pentathlon has long been seen as vulnerable to losing its historic Olympic status, while canoe slalom has a very specific venue demand. Sports added to the LA program — including flag football, lacrosse and squash — will be competing for their place in Brisbane before having their showcase in 2028.

The 2036 Olympics hosting contest was paused by Coventry last year in the first big decision of her new presidency. Qatar is widely seen as a strong contender for a project likely to be spread in the Middle East region, which has been targeted during the conflict between the United States and Israel against Iran.

Los Angeles update

Organizing committee officials overseeing sports and venues came to Lausanne to update federation leaders ahead of a big week in Los Angeles.

Incumbent LA Mayor Karen Bass is trying to secure another term until beyond the Olympics, and there is the annual in-person visit by the IOC panel — known as “cocom” for coordination commission — overseeing games preparations.

“Certainly we are paying attention to it,” Shana Ferguson, LA 2028’s head of sport and games delivery, told the AP about Tuesday's primary election.

One big reveal will be announcing where cycling road races will finish — always a key Olympic event to showcase the city. Paris set a high bar with finish lines framed beneath the Eiffel Tower.

“We are ready — buckle up,” Ferguson said.

Shares of LA revenues

ASOIF members are anxious to learn what the IOC will give them as a collective share of Los Angeles Olympics revenues worth several billions of dollars.

With IOC President Coventry sitting in the front row, ASOIF President De Vos called for “fair and sustainable models” to recognize his members’ work and value at the Summer Games.

The IOC paid $590 million from Paris Olympics revenues which was a 9% collective rise on $540 million from the Tokyo Olympics held in 2021.

ASOIF members agree their formula to distribute it, with track and field’s World Athletics typically paid the most. That was $39.6 million for Paris, a slight raise from Tokyo and Rio de Janeiro in 2016.

“We are increasingly being asked to do more with the same resources,” De Vos cautioned, later noting ASOIF has “three more mouths to feed,” with the governing bodies of skateboarding, sport climbing and surfing now eligible for a revenue share.

De Vos, the International Equestrian Federation president, suggested each Olympic sport could make cost efficiencies and it was "for the IOC also to look into its own operations.”

___

More AP Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics

It’s unclear whether prosecutors had implicated Rodríguez in any crimes or whether investigators were moving toward an indictment. A Justice Department spokesperson said in an email “there was never an investigation into her to shut down.”

But DEA records obtained by The Associated Press earlier this year show she consistently surfaced on the radar of federal law enforcement dating to at least 2018, though she has never been criminally charged in the U.S. like several other senior Venezuelan officials.

The directive to pause scrutiny into Rodríguez was meant to avoid upsetting the administration’s efforts to stabilize Venezuela after the capture of her predecessor, Nicolás Maduro, among other reasons, the official said. It was not clear whether the White House, which deferred comment to the Justice Department, was involved in the decision.

“Everybody has been told to stand down,” one of the former officials said.

The former officials, who had been briefed on the development, as well as the current official all spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss internal deliberations.

Rodríguez, a U.S. attorney representing her and the Venezuelan Communications Ministry didn’t respond to requests for comment.

The move eases pressure on Rodriguez

Removing the threat of potential indictment, even temporarily, eases pressure on Rodríguez as the Trump administration seeks to work with the acting leader to stabilize Venezuela after Maduro’s ouster and open the country to U.S. investment.

President Donald Trump praised Rodríguez as a “terrific person” shortly after the U.S. military took Maduro and his wife to New York to face federal narcotics charges. Both have pleaded not guilty.

In recent months, the U.S. has lifted sanctions against Rodríguez and recognized her as Venezuela's sole head of state, allowing her to re-establish ties with western banks and more freely work with U.S. investors seeking to tap into the world's largest petroleum reserves. As ties between the two governments have deepened, some have held out the Venezuelan playbook — characterized by oil blockades, indictments of top leaders, and threats of military intervention — as a model to drive regime change from within as the U.S. pressures other longtime adversaries in Iran and Cuba.

Rodríguez and her brother, Jorge Rodríguez, the head of the National Assembly, were hit with U.S. sanctions during Trump’s first term for their role in undermining Venezuelan democracy and cementing Maduro's authoritarian rule.

Rodríguez “is doing a great job,” Trump wrote on social media in early March. "The Oil is beginning to flow, and the professionalism and dedication between both Countries is a very nice thing to see!”

In recent months, Rodríguez has hosted ceremonies with a steady stream of American oilmen, some of them partaking in high-profile delegations led by U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright and Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum.

Election talk deferred amid Trump's praise

Missing in all the mutual backslapping is any talk of elections, even as Rodríguez last month blew through a 90-day limit set by Venezuela's high court to fill Maduro's position on a temporary basis.

“I don’t know,” she responded in English when a visiting U.S. journalist earlier this month shouted out a question about her time frame for holding elections. “Some time.”

Sen. Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, has demanded the administration explain its favorable treatment of Rodríguez, calling her a “central figure in Nicolás Maduro's repressive regime.”

“Sanctions have been lifted on Ms. Rodríguez without any indication that she has taken concrete and meaningful actions to restore democratic order,” Sheehan, joined by Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, wrote in a letter to Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of Treasury Scott Bessent last week.

Rick de la Torre, a former CIA chief of station in Caracas, said that the decision to shield Rodríguez fits well with the Trump administration’s foreign policy goals in Venezuela.

“She’s a lifelong Marxist and was a senior leader of one of the world’s most corrupt regimes but the U.S. is providing her with breathing space and carrots to lay the foundation for democracy and U.S. investment,” said de la Torre, the CEO of Tower Strategy, which advises companies on Venezuela.

“There’s a shelf life to her utility, however. At some point she will face justice.," he added.

Rodríguez has been on DEA's radar since 2018

The DEA had amassed a detailed intelligence file on Rodríguez dating to at least 2018, and has received allegations about her ranging from drug trafficking to gold smuggling, the AP reported earlier this year. One confidential informant told DEA in early 2021 that Rodríguez was using hotels in the Caribbean resort of Isla Margarita “as a front to launder money,” the records show.

Her name has surfaced in nearly a dozen DEA investigations — several of which remained ongoing as recently as this year — involving field offices from Paraguay and Ecuador to Phoenix and New York. She had even been linked to Maduro’s alleged bag man, Alex Saab, whom U.S. authorities first arrested in 2020 on money-laundering charges, the records show.

Rodríguez deported Saab this month as part of a purge of insider businessmen who are accused of having enriched themselves through corrupt dealings with Maduro.

It's unclear in which Miami investigations Rodríguez's name surfaced. Two of the former officials said Rodríguez has also come up in meetings with investigators in Tampa tasked last year by former Attorney General Pam Bondi with looking into financial crimes in Venezuela.

At the time, Rodríguez was serving as Maduro's vice president. Justice Department policy requires the attorney general to personally approve the charging of any foreign head of state, who are normally immune from prosecution under international and U.S. law.

Halting high-profile criminal probes of foreign leaders

The pausing of the investigations into Rodríguez comes as the Trump administration has similarly tapped the brakes on ongoing federal investigations into another prominent Latin American leftist, Colombian President Gustavo Petro.

The DEA had also designated Petro a “priority target” over alleged ties to drug traffickers that had been probed for months by federal prosecutors. The New York Times reported in March that U.S. officials recently assured the Colombian government Petro does not face charges in those cases.

Duncan Levin, a former prosecutor who worked for the U.S. attorney’s office in Brooklyn, said it would be “deeply troubling” for law enforcement to be “told to stand down from a legitimate investigation for political or transactional reasons.”

“The White House cannot use criminal enforcement as a diplomatic light switch,” Levin told AP. “DOJ decisions are supposed to be based on law, evidence, policy and public safety — not on whether a foreign official is useful to the administration at a given moment.”

___ Durkin Richer reported from Washington and Mustian from New York. AP Writer Regina Garcia Cano in Mexico City contributed to this report.

___

This story is part of an investigation that includes the FRONTLINE documentary “Crisis in Venezuela,” which aired Feb. 10, 2026, on PBS. Watch the documentary at pbs.org/frontline, in the PBS App and on FRONTLINE’s YouTube channel.

Tsering, 58, has led the exile government based in Dharamshala, India, since 2021. He secured another five-year term in elections held in February among Tibetans living in India and overseas. Tsering was first elected to the Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile in 1996 and served as speaker from 2008 until he rose to the top executive post.

Formed in 1959, Tibet’s government-in-exile, now called the Central Tibetan Administration, has executive, judicial and legislative branches.

Tsering said Wednesday that the Central Tibetan Administration “remains firmly committed to the ‘Middle Way Policy’ envisioned by His Holiness the Dalai Lama,” adding that the policy seeks resolution through nonviolence, dialogue and lasting mutual benefit.

“Until a resolution is achieved, we will continue the back-channel communications with caution and steadiness with the Chinese government,” he said.

Tsering's swearing-in ceremony took place in the presence of the Dalai Lama, who was escorted to the venue by red-robed monks among the sounds of beating drums and chanted prayers. The audience included hundreds of monks and Tibetans who looked on as the Chief Justice Commissioner Yeshi Wangmo of the Tibetan Supreme Justice Commission administered the oath of office.

The February vote marked the fourth direct election of the Tibetan exile leadership since the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan spiritual leader, formally ended his role in the administration’s governance in 2011.

China says Tibet has been part of its territory since the mid-13th century and its Communist Party has governed the Himalayan region since 1951. But many Tibetans say they were effectively independent for most of their history and the Chinese government wants to exploit the resource-rich region while crushing its cultural identity.

China does not recognize the Central Tibetan Administration and hasn’t held dialogue with the Dalai Lama's representatives since 2010. India considers Tibet as part of China, but hosts the Tibetan exile government.

Beijing accuses the Dalai Lama of seeking to separate Tibet from China, which he denies. Some Tibetan groups advocate independence for Tibet, since little progress has been made in talks with China.

Yu Jing, a spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in India, on Sunday dismissed the legitimacy of the exile administration, saying it was “not recognized by any sovereign country” and had no authority to represent Tibetans or oversee the reincarnation process of the Dalai Lama.

On his 90th birthday last year, the Dalai Lama insisted Chinese authorities would have no role in identifying his successor and the institution of the Dalai Lama would continue after his death.

The search of the office in central Madrid is another blow to the party of Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, whose Socialists have been hammered by a series of corruption scandals to his some of its leader's closest confidants, his wife and brother and the previous Socialist to hold his office.

“We respect the justice system, we will collaborate with the courts and there is the commitment in the Socialist Party that if there are new episodes of improper behavior, we will act with the same firmness we always have,” Sánchez told a news conference in Rome.

Sánchez, who has been Spain's leader since 2018 and is a major critic of U.S. President Donald Trump, has not been directly named in any investigation.

A court statement issued on Wednesday said that judge Santiago Pedraz ordered the Civil Guard to “confiscate diverse documentation and electronic archives in an investigation of a ring designed to destabilize judicial processes that were affecting the ruling party.”

The searches were strictly limited to that case, and not a wholesale raid of the offices, the police said.

The case against started in 2025 when audio recordings appeared in Spanish media of then party member Leire Díez apparently involved in attempts to discredit a member of the Civil Guard’s anti-corruption unit. Further reports linked Díez to alleged attempts to influence the work of state prosecutors. The judge's probe is targeted on seeing if she received payments to allegedly carry out these efforts.

The Socialist party said she was acting on her own. Diez, who has left the party, has denied wrongdoing.

The judge said that in addition to Díez, he is now also probing the alleged involvement of former Socialist heavyweight Santos Cerdán — who is already under investigation in a separate corruption case — as well as a former member of the regional government of Andalusia, a police officer, a business owner and two lawyers. The judge is investigating them on suspicions of bribery, making false testimony, forging commercial documents, influence peddling, and corruption.

Legal woes mount

The searches add to a growing list of legal cases that are hounding Spain's Socialists.

A separate court said last week it was investigating former Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero in connection with a government airline bailout. Zapatero, who was in power from 2004-2011 and is a major backer of Sánchez, has denied any wrongdoing.

Cerdán and José Luis Ábalos, who held two ministerial posts under Sánchez, were placed under investigation in 2025 on allegations they played a part in a kickback ring that started during the COVID-19 pandemic, which they have denied.

Ábalos has been tried for one case of alleged corruption along with two other cohorts. A verdict is expected to come soon.

Ábalos and Cerdán were early Sánchez supporters inside the party and both rose to be the party’s No. 3 ranked official before they were forced out of the party when their scandals broke.

Sánchez’s wife, Begoña Gómez, has been charged by an investigative judge for inappropriately using her position to be named to an academic post at a university, while his brother, David Sánchez, and other local officials in Badajoz have been charged with having created a civil service post for him to occupy unrightfully. Gómez and David Sánchez, whose trial starts on Thursday, deny any wrongdoing.

Cases ‘do nothing to stain the work of government ’

Sánchez has called the cases against his family a “smear campaign.” But the corruption case against his former cohorts led him to ask the nation for “forgiveness.”

His minority government depends on the support of a junior coalition partner, which for now has stuck with it despite the judicial actions.

The search of his party's offices came while Sánchez was in the Vatican for an audience with Pope Leo XIV, who is set to visit Spain from June 6-12. The prime minister said he delayed his news conference so that he could be informed of the searches before speaking to reporters.

The leader of Spain’s leading opposition party, conservative Alberto Núñez Feijóo called for snap elections. “There is no other solution other than immediately letting the Spanish people voice their opinion,” the Popular Party leader said.

Sánchez brushed off calling early elections, which will have to take place next year at the latest.

While acknowledging the “seriousness” of the events in Madrid, Sánchez insisted that the cases of corruption “do nothing to stain the work of this government that, with progressive parties, is working for a social and economic transformation.”

Thursday, Sept. 3 - Home vs. Bethune-Cookman - 7 p.m. on ESPN+

Saturday, Sept. 12 - Away at Pittsburgh - 3:30 p.m. on ESPN2

Saturday, Sept. 19 - Home vs. Georgia State - 7 p.m. on ESPN+

Saturday, Sept. 26 - Home vs. TCU*

Saturday, Oct. 3 - Away at Houston*

Saturday, Oct. 10 - Away at Oklahoma State*

Saturday, Oct. 24 - Home vs. BYU*

Friday, Oct. 30 - Home vs. Baylor (Space Game)* - 7:30 p.m. on ESPN

Saturday, Nov. 7 - Away at Kansas*

Saturday, Nov. 14 - Home vs. Arizona State*

Friday, Nov. 20 - Home vs. Iowa State* - 6 p.m. on FS1

Saturday, Nov. 28 - Away at Colorado*

Authorities justified the outage as a military imperative after the United States and Israel attacked Iran on Feb. 28. Their decision to lift some restrictions this week came as negotiators appeared to be closing in on a more permanent truce. But many Iranians feared access could be cut off again at a moment's notice.

Internet tracking company Netblocks said Iran’s connectivity, which measures the ability of devices to connect to the internet, is at around 86% of capacity from before the cutoff. Internet analysis firm Kentik said internet traffic, which measures the amount of data transferred and is a good illustration of usage, was at around 40%.

Amir Rashidi, an Iranian cybersecurity analyst, said there were still widespread disruptions. “It's too early to say the shutdown is over,” he wrote on X.

An unprecedented shutdown

Iran’s roughly 90 million people have been cut off from the internet for most of 2026, one of the world’s longest and strictest national shutdowns. Young people with online careers saw their incomes evaporate. Job losses and the closure of online businesses added to the war's steep economic costs.

The cutoff made it difficult for Iranian families to communicate through months of unrest and war. At some points, phone lines were also cut off, though they were later restored.

A woman living in Tehran said that for months she was barely able to speak to her sons living abroad. She couldn't believe authorities had restored access, saying she had assumed they would find some justification to prolong the outage.

A taxi driver said service was restored but weak. He expressed hope it would improve so he could use messaging apps with family and friends. Both spoke on condition of anonymity for security reasons.

Prices spiked during the shutdown, with residents in Tehran at times paying around $7.50 per gigabyte. Prices are back down to around $2.25 for 30 gigabytes, roughly where they were before the protests.

Even then, Iran tightly controlled access to popular social media sites, leading many to rely on virtual private networks, or VPNs. The cost of those workarounds soared during the shutdown, making them unaffordable for many as the economy was battered.

A slow return to service

Businesses have started reappearing online, announcing their return with posts on sites like Instagram and Telegram.

A gamer and tech influencer in the central city of Isfahan said the shutdown had caused him to lose a lot of his audience on YouTube and Instagram, where he had spent years building up a large following.

“All my views and interactions are way down. I’ve been erased from the algorithm,” he said in a voice note sent by WhatsApp, adding that his internet connection was still slower than before the shutdown.

“The situation is such that many content producers have had their income reduced to zero, have moved on to other jobs, or have been forced to sell their equipment to survive,” he said. He spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal.

Iran claimed the shutdown was a wartime necessity

Iranian authorities first shut down the internet in January during mass anti-government protests that were eventually stamped out in a violent crackdown. Thousands of people were killed and tens of thousands detained.

That cutoff was just starting to ease when the government imposed a complete internet blackout after the start of the war, when U.S. and Israeli strikes killed Iran's supreme leader and other top officials.

The government faced criticism for the prolonged shutdown, which caused even more harm to an economy devastated by inflation, strikes on key industries and a U.S. blockade on Iranian ports.

The internet cutoff cost an estimated $30-40 million daily, with indirect losses likely twice that much, a member of Iran’s Chamber of Commerce, Afshin Kolahi, told a local newspaper last month. About 10 million people have jobs that depend on internet connectivity, according to Communications Minister Sattar Hashemi.

Iranians still had access to a national net, but that has a far narrower reach, and users complained of poor service and heavy censorship. Senior government officials are given SIM cards granting them access to the global internet. Under pressure, the government expanded access to the SIM cards to some professions during the shutdown.

Sánchez extended his scoreless innings streak to 44 2/3 innings on Wednesday to set the Phillies franchise record by passing Hall of Famer Grover Cleveland Alexander in a 3-0 win Wednesday against the San Diego Padres for a three-game sweep.

Sánchez reached the milestone by getting through the four full innings he needed to pass Alexander, who had a 41-inning scoreless streak in 1911. He kept going through three more scoreless innings before leaving after throwing 100 pitches. He allowed six hits, struck out nine and walked none.

He left his brilliant outing with a 2-0 lead, pumping his fists after striking out pinch-hitter Ty France to end the seventh.

“I just went out to compete and give the best of myself," he said through an interpreter.

He didn't think he had his best stuff, but he dominated a Padres lineup that went 0 for 20 with runners in scoring position and stranded 19 in the series, while striking out 32 times.

Interim manager Don Mattingly said the team acknowledged the record afterward, and Sánchez addressed the team.

“I just told them it was something special for me," Sánchez said. "First I thanked God and then I thanked all my teammates and everyone around me for their support. It’s really special to have their support, in the good times and through the rough times as well. That’s something I admire with this group.

“This is a game that it’s not only about me or about what I do on the mound, it’s about our group and I think it’s really something special and beautiful to feel the support of the team as a whole,” he added.

With Sánchez an inning away from the record, there was a heart-stopping moment as Manny Machado lifted a fly ball to left that Edmundo Sosa caught just in front of the wall leading off the fourth. Sánchez struck out Xander Bogaerts, Ramon Laureano doubled to left and then the lefty got Jackson Merrill to ground out to second base to set the record.

Machado had homered in Tuesday night's 4-3 Phillies win.

The Padres stranded runners in scoring position in the first and second innings, and Gavin Sheets lifted a fly ball just in front of the warning track in right to end the third.

“There were a couple of hits that I thought were gone off the bat, but thank God they didn’t," he said.

Center fielder Justin Crawford made a nice running catch of Machado's fly ball with one out in the sixth to save an extra-base hit before crashing into the padded wall.

Sánchez's streak dates to the second inning of the first game of a doubleheader against San Francisco on April 30.

He set another franchise record by going at least seven scoreless innings for the fifth straight start, becoming the sixth to so in MLB history.

He also now has the longest single-season scoreless innings streak by a left-hander in the Expansion Era after passing former Los Angeles Dodgers great Clayton Kershaw, who had a 41-inning scoreless streak in 2014.

“You just don't expect him to give up any runs,” said Mattingly, who managed Kershaw with the Dodgers in 2014. "I thought he was a little rough early. I don't know if this thing's on his mind at all, you know, he knew he had to get through four. He seemed to settle down a little more after that.

“He's been amazing from the standpoint of, it just seems like every time out, no matter what team or who it is, he just kind of keeps going.”

___

AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/mlb

Instead of trying to copy symmetrical shapes from nature by building robots that look like people, dogs or insects, engineering professor Boyuan Chen and his team focused on uniformity in action, or what he calls “dynamic symmetry.”

The result was Argus. The roly-poly robot named after a mythological many-eyed giant has depth-sensing cameras attached to 20 telescoping legs that radiate from a central core. With no front, back, top or bottom, it can see and move in any direction instantly.

“Instead of measuring how your legs are arranged around a different part of your body, we’re measuring how fast you can move in any direction,” Chen said. “Who said, you know, if you have a robot to help us in a most effective way, it has to look like us?”

In experiments, Argus has navigated sandy beaches and forest undergrowth, rolling over obstacles and stabilizing itself after being pushed. It can climb between parallel brick walls by alternating bracing and thrusting motions with its legs. If one or more motor dies or a leg breaks, it continues to function.

“Watching Argus move is unlike watching any other robot we’ve worked with,” said Jiaxun Liu, a graduate student and co-author of a study about Argus published online Wednesday in the journal Science Robotics. “The first time we saw it navigate among trees and rough terrain, even under heavy collisions, we knew this was something different.”

As part of their work, researchers developed a new design principle called dynamic isotropy that rates robots on a scale of 0 to 1 based on how uniformly they can accelerate in every direction. Most robots in use today, including humanoids and drones, score below 0.6. Argus scores 0.91.

“When a robot can accelerate equally well in every direction, it stops needing to face the world in any particular way,” said Chen, who hopes the same principle could guide the development of search and rescue robots, underwater or aerial vehicles or robots with the ability to grip objects.

“Instead of building a robot hand that looks like a human hand … one idea is to think about having Argus be the hand itself, and it can manipulate objects in any direction,” he said. “The knowledge we can transfer to the rest of the world is much more deeper than building an existing robot or copying an existing species.”

____

Ramer reported from Concord, New Hampshire.

Yet this past week, there were two major hazardous chemical emergencies on the West Coast. A large tank containing a corrosive chemical at a Longview, Washington, paper mill ruptured on Tuesday, killing two and possibly nine others. And late last week about 50,000 people were evacuated in Southern California after a chemical tank overheated and threatened the area with a catastrophic explosion. Authorities mitigated that risk, and people have been able to return home.

The incidents have raised questions about who is responsible for regulating companies that handle dangerous materials. An Associated Press review has found that officials at the local, state and federal levels all play a part in keeping these facilities safe.

Here's what to know:

Tanks typically have robust safety standards

Chemical engineering professor Stephen Kmiotek said almost every industry uses chemical tanks. They are common because most manufacturers will use chemicals at some point of their process.

Kmiotek said there might be millions of tanks across the country, but they are generally safe as long as companies are following the standards for how they are built, maintained and inspected. The Worcester Polytechnic Institute professor said the failure rate of chemical tanks is about 1 failure per 1 million tanks per year.

“There are a lot of measures in place to keep people safe,” said Kmiotek, who has tracked the Washington incident closely.

But it is important that companies keep up proper maintenance and inspections, particularly after the tanks get older. Inspections should be increased after a tank passes 10 years, he said. That is especially true for tanks that use highly caustic substances, like the white liquor in the Washington tank. Valves on the tank will need to be replaced more often.

Authorities in Washington said they don’t yet know how old the tank was or how recently valves had been replaced.

After the Bhopal, India, disaster at a pesticide plant in 1984 that killed at least 3,800 people, the chemical industry took a number of steps to improve safety, including making sure chemical tanks are built right and inspected, informing workers about the risks and analyzing what could go wrong if the tank fails and who is at risk.

State agencies are responsible for inspections

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency was involved in the response to both situations, and the U.S. Chemical Safety Board said Wednesday it was opening an investigation into the Washington incident. It is an independent federal agency that investigates incidents that could cause “the catastrophic release of extremely hazardous substances.”

But it was state agencies in Washington and California that oversaw the safety at the two companies, along with local fire marshals and hazardous materials teams, said Marissa Baker, an associate professor in the University of Washington, Department of Environmental & Occupational Sciences. The California Division of Occupational Safety and Health and the Washington state Department of Labor and Industries would have been responsible for conducting inspections, she said.

In Washington state, where there are far more chemical sites than there are inspectors, the state labor agency generally opens investigations based on complaints or incidents, Baker said.

Baker noted that the Washington company, Nippon Dynawave, was the subject of two investigations by the state labor and industries agency, although the issues were not related to the current situation, and it had fires in recent years.

Federal agencies provide some oversight

Federal regulators require facilities that store or use hazardous chemicals to maintain a “safety data sheet” that details the hazards and offers guidance on the emergency response. Businesses must share that information with state, tribal and local officials. Under an EPA right-to-know rule, the companies must allow fire departments to conduct inspections upon request.

The federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration has established protocols for industries that use or store highly dangerous chemicals, known as Process Safety Management standards. They involve inspections, training, special work permits, operating procedures and emergency planning and response.

While the GKN Aerospace plant in Garden Grove, California, would fall under this type of regulation due to the materials it used in its manufacturing process, it was not immediately clear whether the Longview paper mill had to follow the Process Safety Management protocols.

The public danger from some chemicals isn't always clear

Stephen Lester, a public health expert and the former science director of the Center for Health, Environment & Justice, said he is concerned that there aren’t clear standards for exposure levels. One of the primary standards is for workplace exposure, and there isn’t a proven standard for how much of a chemical it is safe to be exposed to after a spill or explosion.

“Without these health-based guidelines, you’re ending up with some person making the judgment about what’s acceptable and what’s not,” said Lester, who has spent more than 40 years helping communities assess their health risks.

And the workplace standards are based on an average man, so they don’t account for children or the elderly or anyone with a compromised immune system.

“It’s a very tough situation. I don’t envy the scientists and the toxicologists in the position of advising the decision makers because that person’s going to have to make a judgment call in their best opinion based on what information he knows and he’s been able to research and generally accept it about the exposure to these chemicals,” Lester said.

The likely death toll rose to 11, including the missing, after another person who was injured died, authorities said Wednesday.

Authorities said there was no hope of finding more survivors following Tuesday's tank failure at the Nippon Dynawave Packaging Co. in Longview, which also injured another eight people, including a firefighter who was treated and released by a hospital.

If the 11 deaths are confirmed, it would be one of the deadliest industrial accidents in the U.S. in recent decades — alongside a series of blasts that killed 16 people at an explosives plant in Tennessee last fall; a fire and detonation that killed 14 people at a fertilizer plant in Texas in 2013; the Deepwater Horizon oil rig explosion that killed 11 people in 2010; and an explosion at a West Virginia coal mine that killed 29 people in 2010.

Officials said Wednesday that the paper mill tank spilled more than 500,000 gallons (1.9 million liters) of “white liquor,” a highly destructive chemical mixture used in paper manufacturing.

After delaying the search over concerns that the tank might collapse further, crews determined it contained less liquid than initially thought and that the tank was stable enough to resume efforts to find the missing. Fire officials said the search will be slow and methodical.

“We do not know where all nine are," said Scott Goldstein, a Cowlitz County fire chief.

Authorities said the rupture hasn't affected the safety of the air and drinking water in Longview, a Columbia River city of about 40,000 people with long ties to the Washington and Oregon paper and lumber industries.

Some contamination had reached the Columbia River, one of North America’s largest waterways, but the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency reported that no effects on the river had been observed. Officials warned residents to keep away from ditches and dikes.

It was the second notable issue with a chemical tank in days on the West Coast, following the evacuation of thousands of Southern California residents due to an overheated tank at an aerospace plant before those orders were lifted Tuesday night.

The paper mill tank could hold about 900,000 gallons (3.4 million liters) and was more than half full when it ruptured, Goldstein said. White liquor, which is made mostly of sodium hydroxide and sodium sulfide, is used with heat to break down wood to make kraft paper, a durable material used in packaging, shopping bags and other products.

The sprawling plant, which employs about 1,000 people, makes material for tissues, printing paper, cups, plates, and cartons. It sits along the river next to other timber, paper and chemical businesses.

Paper mill worker was always there to help, friend says

The rupture happened at shift change Tuesday morning, causing the huge circular tank to buckle on one side. The cause remained unclear.

Authorities haven't released the names of the dead or missing, but some have begun to trickle out.

Todd Cornwell said his friend, Gilbert Bernal, was an electrician at the plant and was the first confirmed death. They knew each other through church and were in the same Bible study group, he said.

“We actually had our group last night and instead of doing Bible study, we talked about him,” Cornwell said. “He was always there willing to help in whatever needed to be done. When the local church school started flooding, he was one of the people there.”

Brian Williquette, a chemical supplier for the region’s mills, was at the plant Tuesday morning when he heard an alarm over the intercom and first wondered if it was drill. He was able to get out safely and didn’t see any of the damage.

“It’s just unfathomable,” he said at a community vigil Tuesday. “There’s not anybody that lives here that doesn’t know somebody at a paper mill.”

Crystal Moldenhauer, a Longview resident, said she has friends at the plant who remained unaccounted for. She said people called and texted each other all day trying to figure out what happened.

“We’re all still waiting for answers,” she said. “There’s families that have been torn apart, and we don’t know why.”

Authorities press for answers about the rupture

Nippon Paper Group in a statement said Wednesday that it was offering its “deepest condolences and heartfelt sympathies to the bereaved families.”

Some of those who were injured suffered burns or inhalation injuries, authorities said.

Following the tank's rupture, the liquid spilled into a drainage ditch, said Brittny Goodsell, a state Ecology Department spokesperson.

Almost every industry uses chemical tanks like this and they are generally quite safe, said Stephen Kmiotek, a chemical engineering professor at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. But it’s important that companies keep up proper maintenance and inspections, particularly after the tanks get older, he said.

The U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board on Wednesday announced an investigation. Its chairperson, Steve Owens, said the goal was to “determine how it happened and what can be done to prevent something like this from happening again.”

___

Associated Press reporters Gene Johnson and Hallie Golden in Seattle, Kathy McCormack in Concord New Hampshire, Rebecca Boone in Boise, Idaho, John Seewer in Toledo, Ohio, and Christopher L. Keller in Albuquerque, New Mexico, contributed.

The nightclub posted the announcement Tuesday afternoon on Instagram, prompting an outpouring of reactions online from longtime customers who described the closure as the end of an era for downtown Orlando nightlife.

Matty Bullitt, one of the owners of The Attic and Treehouse nightclub, said operating costs and changes downtown have made it increasingly difficult to stay open.

“We put a lot of money into this place to keep it open,” Bullitt said. “But with another dreadful summer that’s about to come with all the college kids gone, we just gotta stop the bleed.”

Bullitt said expenses including insurance, rent and operational fees have become too difficult to manage.

“We can’t afford operational cost, right? We can’t afford the AMS fees. We can’t afford insurance, rent, all the things that make it impossible to operate,” Bullitt said. “So for now, it’s just closing operations.”

Bullitt added the closure impacts not only ownership, but employees as well.

“Everybody’s out of a job,” Bullitt said. “So it’s not just Attic closing and the ownership taking the loss — it’s everybody included that make this place great.”

The Attic is not the only longtime downtown venue to recently close.

Just blocks away, Tanqueray’s underground jazz bar closed in December 2025. The building manager for the historic Metcalf building told News 6 the space is expected to transition into a coffee shop and light bites eatery. The former TD Bank space above Tanqueray is also expected to become a restaurant called Tropixs under a 10-year lease agreement.

At the same time, downtown Orlando is undergoing broader redevelopment efforts.

Construction is ongoing along Magnolia Avenue, while Orange Avenue and Rosalind Avenue are also expected to transition from one-way streets into two-way roads.

According to meeting documents from Orlando’s Community Redevelopment Agency, the changes are intended to improve pedestrian accessibility downtown.

City leaders have also announced plans to increase parking rates at downtown parking meters and garages beginning this summer.

The combination of business closures, redevelopment projects and rising costs has left some wondering what the future of downtown Orlando will look like as the area continues to evolve.

Chikei Rick Chow, 61, who is Asian, shot Cyrus Carmack-Belton in the back during a foot chase in Columbia, believing — wrongly, prosecutors say — that he had stolen four bottles of water from the gas station convenience store. The killing sent waves of anguish and grief through the African American community in Richland County, where nearly half the population is Black.

While prosecutors acknowledge Carmack-Belton had a semiautomatic pistol, they say it fell on the ground during the chase and he never threatened anyone with it. But defense lawyers said the teen pointed the pistol at Chow's son, Andy, and Chow fired one shot in his son's defense. Chow had a concealed weapons permit.

“Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, what is the value of a human life?” prosecutor Byron E. Gipson asked. “To grieving parents who lost a 14-year-old to senseless acts of violence, a human life is priceless.”

Gipson added: "But on May 28, 2023, Chikei Rick Chow, the defendant in this case, determined that Cyrus Carmack-Belton's life was worth less than four bottles of water.”

Prosecutor disputes defense claim

Gipson then tried to cast doubt on Chow's claim of defending his son.

“In what world do you get to falsely accuse a 14-year-old of stealing, chase a 14-year-old 130-plus yards down a road while you’re armed with a pistol, shoot that person in the back, then claim you’re defending your son?” he said, calling the shooting “senseless” and “heinous.”

Defense lawyer Jack Swerling began his opening statements questioning why the teen was carrying a pistol equipped with a laser sight around the streets of Columbia.

“If he didn’t have that weapon, he never would have had a weapon to draw on Andy Chow," Swerling said. "He never would have had a weapon to put Andy Chow in danger. And he never would have had a weapon that would cause Mr. Chow to believe his son was going to be shot and have to make a split-second decision — a split-second decision — as to whether or not to go ahead and fire that gun and protect his son.”

Afterward, Chow performed CPR on Carmack-Belton, which Swerling said helps prove Chow acted without malice — a required element of a murder charge in South Carolina.

Defense lawyer calls shooting tragic but justified

“Nobody’s saying everybody’s happy about this, but unfortunately there are occasions in human life when someone has to exercise that right of self-defense or defense of others," Swerling said. “It’s sad. It's tragic. There’s no question about that."

Chow sat between his lawyers at the defense table, wearing a dark suit, white-collared shirt and no tie with his legs shackled, occasionally writing on a notepad.

Operating a business was a dream for Chikei Rick Chow, Swerling said. Chow was born in Hong Kong and his wife was born in Malaysia. Both became U.S. citizens and had two sons, he said.

Protesters came to Chow’s store the day after the shooting demanding justice and saying Chow mistreated Black customers. Police records showed he shot at shoplifters twice in the past eight years but did not face charges after investigators said he acted in self-defense. After the protests, Chow’s store was vandalized and broken into and cigarettes and beer were stolen, police said.

After opening statements, a police officer who responded to the shooting was the first witness to take the stand in the trial that is expected to last several days.

Witness testifies that teen looked scared

Witness Lori Carson testified that she saw Carmack-Belton running away from the store with Chow and his son in pursuit. She said she never saw a gun or anything else in the teen's hands.

“He just looked frightened, scared. He looked like he needed help," Carson said of the teen. "Just like a young child just in trouble, just needed help.”

She said that after they ran down the street, she saw Chow in a shooting position while the teen was on the ground. She became emotional as she described trying to help Carmack-Belton by removing leaves from his mouth while Chow performed mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.

Authorities said the shooting happened about 130 yards (120 meters) from the store. A gun was found near Carmack-Belton's body, but investigators have said there is no evidence the teen ever directed the firearm at Chow or his son.

Carmack-Belton had entered the store about 8 p.m. and quickly drew suspicion from the Chows, prosecutors said. He took four water bottles out of a cooler but put them back, they said. He got into an argument with the Chows and denied their allegations of stealing, then left the store, authorities said.

A Weather Aware Day is when we expect the weather pattern to impact your day-to-day life more than a typical day in Central Florida. However, we are not anticipating a significant severe weather threat. Expect rounds of heavy rainfall with gusty winds at times and the potential for frequent lightning over the next few days.

Your Thursday will start off with more cloud cover but mainly dry conditions with temperatures holding around 80ºF for the morning drive. With our steering flow flipped, flowing from west to east, the storms will develop around the I-75 corridor around lunch time. These storms will traverse eastward, hovering over the I-4 corridor around 2-4pm, and favoring the I-95 corridor and coastline from 5-8pm. Rain chances are as high as 80%.

Our rain chances stay elevated through the weekend and into early next week as this river of tropical moisture remains locked over Central Florida.

Through Sunday, we expect area-wide rain totals amounting to 3-5″ with localized areas potentially seeing higher than that. Localized flooding is a concern we will monitor pushing into the weekend.

“It's all so funny,” she says. “When I tell them I run the trade association for independent stores, they'll say, 'It's just so sad that they're disappearing.' I don't think they're really keeping track, or they just know about a store that closed or heard about one closing.”

The decline of physical bookstores remains so embedded in popular culture that the man dating Anne Hathaway's character in “ The Devil Wears Prada 2 ” laments that bookstores are “getting downsized and consolidated.” But the decline actually ended years ago, and the latest numbers from the American Booksellers Association show independent stores expanding at a pace not seen this century.

Membership in the ABA grew by more than 500 over the past year, to a total of 3,417 (at 3,783 locations), nearly triple what it was a decade ago and the highest level since the late 1990s. The surge included stores of various kinds — general interest shops like Hey Books! in San Diego; mobile stores like the Wandering Quills Bookshop in Westerville, Ohio; pop-up stores like Banyan Books in St. Petersburg, Florida.

Many of the new members reflect the current boom in romance, fantasy and their hybrid, romantasy, whether the Spicy Librarian in Denver or the Flutter Romance Bookstore in Austin, Texas: “Where butterflies begin. And every story ends in happily-ever-after,” according to its website.

Both a business and a calling

Independent bookselling, rarely a way to get rich, is a meeting ground for idealists — for young people with a sense of mission, retirees embarking on a new life or middle-aged people no longer satisfied with their careers. “I think people want to realign their lives with their values,” Hill says.

In Wentzville, Missouri, 55-year-old Kelley Hartnett is a marketing consultant and copywriter who had always wanted to run a bookstore. Her husband's concerns included competing against Amazon, but Hartnett went ahead and opened Double Dog Bookshop in 2025 as a mobile store. She rode about the area in a converted cargo trailer, joined by two Australian Cattle Dog mutts, and has since opened a storefront downtown.

“For me, Double Dog is about maybe 50% books and 50% community,” says Hartnett, who hopes to find a larger space that would make it easier for customers to gather and “just be.”

“People are craving connection, especially in-person connection,” she said. “People are over the internet and virtual meetings and algorithms. They're not the same as having a human to human connection. It feels really healing.”

Hill can joke about the mistaken elegies for bookselling, while expressing concern that the state of independent stores is healthy but “precarious.” Costs are high, and schools and libraries face budget cuts that limit their purchases from local stores.

Is there room for indies and giants?

Independent owners also find themselves worrying about a onetime competitor which itself had seemed endangered, Barnes & Noble.

The superstore chain was the dominant seller in the 1980s and 1990s, and was widely seen as the leading cause for hundreds — maybe thousands — of independent stores shutting down. But by the 2010s, Barnes & Noble had been surpassed by Amazon. It began shutting down stores instead of opening new ones and struggled for years to find a new owner before the hedge fund Elliott Management Corp. bought it in 2019.

Under the leadership of CEO James Daunt, Barnes & Noble is expanding again, adding more than 100 stores over the past two years. In Chicago, the owner of the decade-old Volume Books has blamed a new Barnes & Noble for putting her out of business, while Hill added that “even a small decrease in sales can make or break a bookstore’s year in an industry with paper-thin margins.”

Daunt denies any intent to take business from independent sellers, saying it's not in his “DNA.”

“I'm an independent seller myself,” he says, noting that he founded Daunt Books in London. Daunt says he has customers who shop at his store and the British chain Waterstones (where he's also managing director). “I never thought of the market as finite.”

The owners of The Book Loft Oak Park, another Chicago-area store that opened last summer, acknowledge some nerves about a nearby Barnes & Noble coming soon. But Heather Nelson and Sophie Schauer Eldred hope the stores ultimately complement each other.

“We’re hoping people whose curiosity is piqued by the new Barnes and Noble will walk down the street,” Schauer Eldred said, “and pop into our bookstore.”

The federal lawsuit, filed in Washington, D.C., takes aim at a change made earlier this year by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, which bars lenders from discriminating against credit applicants. Among the changes being challenged is that lenders will no longer have to consider “disparate impact” — policies that appear neutral but tend to cause disproportionate harm to certain groups.

Plaintiffs also argue the rule would make it easier for lenders to market loans to predominantly white neighborhoods, forcing minority communities to rely on risky, high-cost lenders that offer predatory loans with exorbitant interest rates.

“This is the deliberate dismantling of 50 years of legal jurisprudence, regulatory guidance, and bipartisan consensus that lending discrimination has no place in America,” Lisa Rice, the CEO and president of the National Fair Housing Alliance, one of the plaintiffs that filed the lawsuit, said in a statement.

“This reversal by the CFPB is a continuation of this Administration’s efforts to gut fair housing and lending protections,” she said. “Eviscerating these guardrails will ultimately result in less credit access for many people, make our markets less sound, and cause our economy to be less productive.”

Paulina Gonzalez-Brito, the CEO of another plaintiff, Rise Economy, a California nonprofit that advocates for economic justice, accused the CFPB of ignoring “public comments, common sense, and decades of precedent in its misguided attempt to turn anti-discrimination law on its head.”

“The CFPB was created to protect consumers and small businesses from financial abuse and discrimination, and this final Reg B rule would do real harm, setting us back in our collective efforts to ensure that all families and small businesses have a fair chance to achieve the American Dream,” Gonzalez-Brito said.

The CFPB did not respond to a request for comment.

Plaintiffs argue that the rule change is part of a broader campaign by the Trump administration to dismantle regulations related to fair housing and lending protections.

The administration, the National Fair Housing Alliance said, has proposed eliminating the budget for the Fair Housing Initiatives Program, which funds nonprofits to ensure access to housing for seniors, disabled veterans, families with children and other groups. It also has cut staffing in half at the Department of Housing and Urban Development's Office of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity.

Several high-profile settlements in recent years indicate housing discrimination remains a significant problem.

In 2023, the Justice Department accused Los Angeles-based City National Bank of discrimination by refusing to underwrite mortgages in predominately Black and Latino communities, requiring the bank to pay more than $31 million in the largest redlining settlement in department history. In 2016. the Justice Department and the CFPB fined Mississippi-based BancorpSouth $10.6 million, alleging the bank deliberately discriminated against minorities in its lending practices.

Plaintiffs are asking court to vacate the rule, which they contend is arbitrary and capricious, in excess of statutory authority, and issued outside the procedures required by Congress.

“The Final Rule does not reflect reasoned decision-making or an expert, good-faith effort to implement our nation’s foundational credit antidiscrimination statute,” plaintiffs wrote. “Quite the opposite: The Final Rule is a drastic turn, without justification, from the CFPB’s (and its Federal Reserve Board predecessor’s) longstanding interpretation and enforcement of key ECOA provisions.”

Sens. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., the chair and ranking member of the Senate Commerce Committee that oversees college sports, briefed The Associated Press on details of the bill they crafted in hopes it can get the 60 votes needed to clear the Senate.

“This is a stability bill, not just an NIL bill,” Cruz said, referencing the name, image and likeness payments that have led to football rosters with $30 million payrolls and reshaped the industry.

Cantwell said she and Cruz teamed up on the legislation "because he and I really do believe the college sports system is in a bit of chaos.”

The bill looks very much like the “best of” from a pair of legislative proposals — one called SCORE, another called SAFE — that have gone nowhere over the past several months. It contains two elements the NCAA has supported: a limited antitrust exemption and a clause that would preempt much of the patchwork of state laws currently regulating NIL.

Meredith Page, the chair of the NCAA Division I Student Athlete Advocacy Committee and a former volleyball player at Radford, called the bill “a phenomenal step,” especially after the latest setback for the SCORE Act, which the SAAC also supported.

“I think this has lots of great protections and gives the ability for us to stablize the field that is so, so unstable right now,” Page said.

NCAA President Charlie Baker said the association was reviewing the bill and looked forward to “further productive dialogue with members of Congress.”

Antitrust help

College sports has been looking to Washington for help as it grapples with rising costs of paying players and an out-of-control transfer portal that have threatened smaller sports, many involving women, that make up the backbone of the U.S. Olympic pipeline.

This bill, called the Protect College Sports Act, would offer what Cruz and Cantwell said was targeted antitrust protection for the likes of the NCAA and the College Sports Commission, which was part of the largely Republican-backed SCORE Act that many Democrats opposed. That would be in exchange for what Cruz said would be “public-facing protections" for athletes in several areas, including guarantees for health insurance and scholarships, more stringent regulations for NIL deals from third parties and agents who broker their deals.

“I think it's better predictability,” Cantwell said. “Why did we do it? Because when you've got thousands of athletes being cut, hundreds of programs being cut, the risk to the whole infrastructure was too high to not try to get better predictability.”

Rules for players and coaches

The bill would limit players to one unrestricted transfer over the course of their college careers — a widely supported idea across the country — and would adopt something close to the five-year eligibility period that the NCAA appears ready to enact next month.

The bill also tries to regulate coaching movement. Kiffin's sudden move to LSU from rival Mississippi while the Rebels were preparing for the College Football Playoff last season put a fine point on an issue that has only gotten worse in an era where teams spend millions to fill out rapidly shifting football rosters: Schools have less patience (and more money) to devote to hiring coaches for a quick fix.

Under terms of the bill, midseason coaching changes would be prohibited.

“It's not fair or right to poach a coach in the middle of the season while the team is still competing," Cruz said. "There’s a reason the NFL has a rule that you can’t do that. Obviously, NFL teams hire coaches away from each other but they don’t do so in the middle of the season.”

Media rights money

The bill would rework the Sports Broadcasting Act to allow conferences to pool their TV rights — a move proponents have said could add billions of dollars to the ecosystem in a conclusion the Southeastern and Big Ten Conferences believe is inaccurate.

The senators said leagues wouldn't be required to join the media pooling but those that do would have to use a percentage of any increase from that to support women's and Olympic sports. That alone could be a dealbreaker for the SEC, which has reportedly been discussing topics including breaking away from the NCAA and allowing collective bargaining for athletes at its league meetings in Florida this week.

SEC commissioner Greg Sankey, along with Jim Phillips of the Atlantic Coast and Brett Yormark of the Big 12 all said they were reviewing the bill, with Sankey saying “bipartisan engagement in Washington on these issues is critical.”

Can the measure pass?

The SCORE Act, which garnered little support from Democrats, was on the House schedule last week but was abruptly pulled off when the Congressional Black Caucus and NAACP came out against it. Even if it had squeaked by in the razor-tight House, it had virtually no chance of passing as written in the Senate, where it would need 60 votes to break a possible filibuster.

“The Congressional Black Caucus and I have the same objective: stop the ‘SEC SCORE Act,’” said Cantwell, referencing the SEC as one of dozens of conferences who have supported that bill.

Some Democrats were reluctant to support a bill, like SCORE, that prohibited college athletes from being classified as employees of their schools. The new bill takes what Cantwell said was a neutral stance on the issue of employment.

But it does not resolve all of Democrats' complaints, as Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., explained in a news release shortly after news of the bill hit.

“It gives the NCAA an antitrust exemption that no other industry gets just so they can keep underpaying the athletes,” he said. "Sure, there are some good things for players in this bill, but this seems like a great deal for the NCAA and the rich guys who run college sports, and a bad deal for athletes.”

Mit Winter, a Missouri attorney who specializes in sports law, said the proposal was so sprawling he was skeptical it will pass as is.

“When you start getting into the stuff about giving the CSC and NCAA antitrust exemptions and liability protection from enforcing rules on athlete denial of compensation, I think that’s where things get a little more dicey,” he said.

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AP College Sports Writer Eric Olson contributed.

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AP college sports: https://apnews.com/hub/college-sports

A day before Major League Baseball is expected to make a salary cap proposal, the union outlined its initial economic proposals during a bargaining session at the players' association office in Manhattan. It included what it called a “competitive integrity tax” that would penalize teams dropping below a payroll floor and called for the luxury tax threshold to rise to $300 million next year.

Baseball’s labor contract expires Dec. 1 and MLB is expected to institute a lockout, management’s equivalent of a strike under federal labor law. Players have vowed they never will accept a salary cap.

“Attendance, viewership, interest — by any measure you want to use, our game is moving in a positive direction,” Baltimore pitcher Chris Bassitt, a member of the union's eight-man executive subcommittee, said in a statement. “We’ve put forward proposals designed to continue that trend. Support, incentivize, and reward clubs who are committed to competing, especially small-market clubs. Compensate players fairly for the work they are doing.”

MLB clearly is not in favor of what the union presented and maintains the players' plan would decrease revenue sharing.

“We understand their proposals are designed to benefit players. Unfortunately, they do not address and in fact exacerbate the competitive balance problem our fans are telling us we must address,” MLB spokesman Glen Caplin said in a statement. "The MLBPA’s proposal would reduce the amount transferred to lower-revenue clubs, weaken the competitive balance tax and lead to even more payroll disparity than exists today. For example, under the union’s proposal, the Dodgers would pay less in luxury tax payments, giving them an additional $70 million to spend on payroll.”

Marcus Semien and Sean Manaea of the Mets and Eugenio Suárez of Cincinnati attended the session while other players participated online.

“The players’ proposals provide increased revenue sharing initially guaranteeing every small-market club a minimum of $240 million in revenue every season,” interim union head Bruce Meyer, who replaced Tony Clark in February, said in a statement. “This enhanced revenue sharing includes added protections to ensure clubs prioritize winning over profiteering.”

According to details obtained by The Associated Press:

— The luxury tax threshold, which starts at $244 million this season, would rise to $300 million in 2027 and then increase by $15 million annually. Penalties such as moving back a team’s pick in the amateur draft would be eliminated. Surcharge levels, currently as much as 110%, would drop to 10% above the preceding level.

— Free agent eligibility, which has been six seasons of major league service since the 1976 agreement would drop to five for players who have reached age 30 by Nov. 1. A team could retain the player by making a qualifying offer. If a player in that group refuses the qualifying offer, he would become arbitration eligible.

— The minimum salary would rise from $780,000 this year to $1.5 million next season, $1.65 million in 2028, $1,825,000 in 2029, $2 million in 2030 and $2.2 million in 2031.

— Salary arbitration eligibility would expand and teams would have to offer at least $3 million to eligible players. The threshold increased from two years to three years in 1986 and the so-called super 2 class with those of two to three years began in 1991 at 17% and it increased to 22% in 2013. The union proposed it be expanded to 44%. In addition, salaries in cases decided by arbitration panels would be guaranteed and the union asked that some salaries used for comparisons be given 120% of their value.

— The pre-arbitration bonus pool, established at $50 million in the 2022-26 deal, would increase to $180 million next year and then rise by $15 million annually. Players coming up to the major leagues for the first time who sign multiyear deals either before opening day or during the first 21 days of the season would become ineligible.

— The qualifying offer for players with six years of service would be eliminated. It has diminished the markets of some free agents since it began after the 2012 season because of penalties on signing teams.

— The amateur draft lottery would expand from six teams to eight.

— Rules instituted in 2022 designed to decrease service time manipulation would be expanded, such as ensuring a full year of service to eligible prospects who finish among the top five in MVP voting.

— Lower-revenue teams who lose players as free agents would get increased benefits and low-revenue teams would get more draft selections.

— A competitive integrity tax would be imposed on teams who do not reach 50% of the lowest tax threshold and teams further below would face surcharges. Teams would be penalized for not spending revenue-sharing money they receive on payrolls.

— Each small-market team would be guaranteed at least $240 million in revenue annually and teams would keep more ballpark-related revenue.

— Low-revenue teams with winning records or reaching the playoffs would get more revenue sharing money and local media revenue would be shared among teams more extensively.

A five-year deal was reached on March 10, 2022, the 99th day of a lockout, preserving a 162-game regular-season schedule. That was the sport’s ninth work stoppage and first since a 7 1/2-month strike in 1994-95 caused cancellation of the World Series for the first time since 1904.

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AP MLB: https://apnews.com/MLB

Stanton has been sidelined since April 24, after he experienced some stiffness while running the bases in a game against Houston.

“I think he wants it fully clear, and I think we got enough news today that allows us to take that step to hopefully the running goes in line with how he's feeling, and we can start to ramp up,” Boone said before the Yankees' series finale against the Royals.

Stanton's was off to a good start through the first 24 games of the season, hitting .256 with three homers and 14 RBIs. The availability of the five-time All-Star's right-handed bat in the middle of the lineup is especially valuable on nights in which Boone has a lineup that is loaded with left-handers, such as Ben Rice, Trent Grisham, Jazz Chisholm Jr., Cody Bellinger and Austin Wells.

“Having him in the middle, his presnce is massive,” Boone said. “So you know, hopefully not too much longer.”

Jasson Dominguez was recalled from Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre when Stanton got hurt, only for the young outfielder to join him on the injured list when he strained the AC joint in his left shoulder May 7 while colliding with the outfield wall at Yankee Stadium.

He received an injection in his shoulder on May 11 and has been hitting off a tee for about a week.

The plan for Dominquez is to begin ramping up baseball activities this week, while the Yankees are completing their series in Kansas City and heading to Sacramento for three games against the Athletics to conclude their six-game, seven-day road trip.

“Hopefully when we get back next week,” Boone said, “there may be some live (batting practice) situations for him.”

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AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/mlb

“I was frightened, because I had never ever seen Joe like that before or since. Never,” Jill Biden told CBS News in an interview scheduled to air Sunday.

Joe Biden's shaky, mumbling and sometimes confused delivery against Donald Trump in June 2024 gave fuel to questions voters already had about his fitness for a second term. His attempts to explain away his performance and offer reassurance that he could handle four more years of the demanding job did little to assuage voters. Under mounting pressure from within his party, he stepped aside, and Democrats nominated Vice President Kamala Harris.

“I don’t know what happened,” Jill Biden said in the interview. “As I watched it, I thought, ‘Oh, my God, he’s having a stroke.’ And it scared me to death.”

The former first lady is promoting a book due out next week, “View from the East Wing: A Memoir.”

The 14-year-old from Rancho Cucamonga, California, works with three coaches. He pays for word lists and study guides. He tries to learn every Greek and Latin root, every language pattern, every spelling bee-worthy word he can find. And he competes throughout the year in online bees that pit him against the country's other top spellers.

Shrey's approach has proven effective for spellers seeking to hold the trophy, and on Wednesday he became one of nine spellers who got through the semifinals and will compete in the finals Thursday night.

But at least one other finalist has gone old-school, shunning outside help and using the dictionary as his guide.

Their opposing strategies have revived a long-running if good-natured debate in spelling circles: Which is more important, mastery of languages or rote memorization?

“At the end of finals, most of the words aren’t going to have a really clean-cut language pattern or rule that you can pull from. So I think memorization is really important,” said Sam Evans, who coached each of the past two champions. “Sometimes it gets a bad reputation, but you have to do it.”

Every word is in the dictionary, if you can find it

It’s all but impossible to reach the finals without knowing the components that make up words absorbed into English: roots and languages of origin. But some champions have stood out for their incredible recall, the ability to instantly visualize any word they’ve run across or even recite dictionary definitions verbatim: Nihar Janga in 2016, Zaila Avant-garde in 2021 and Bruhat Soma in 2024.

Sarv Dharavane might be the next of that group.

Sarv finished third in 2025 as a relative unknown in the spelling community. There’s a reason for that. The 12-year-old sixth-grader from Dunwoody, Georgia, has no coach. He doesn’t participate in online bees. And his only study guide is the source for every word in the competition: Merriam-Webster’s Unabridged dictionary.

“The book is my coach,” Sarv said.

Given his past success, he saw no reason to change it up. And he's back in the finals.

“I didn't really change anything because my strategy got me far last year, but I did more of what I did before,” Sarv said.

“I used to read the dictionary and set aside difficult words to study later,” he explained. “I did it a lot, so I got a lot of words and it was really easy just to go through them. I've always been able to remember pretty well, and I can read through long lists without getting tired, so this strategy works pretty well for me.”

Simple, right?

Many spellers think there's a better way.

Master the roots, and you don't need to memorize as much

Dev Shah, the 2023 champion, advocates an artistic approach to spelling — the one also championed by his coach, Scott Remer. Master roots, master language patterns, and learn how to spot the exceptions, and you can spell a word that you’ve never seen or don’t remember.

Shah accepted that he could never memorize the dictionary — “No one can,” he said — and he believed if he got a word he didn't know, he could figure it out.

“The skill of guessing is everything,” he wrote in a Washington Post op-ed after his victory.

In an interview Wednesday, Shah said memorization was important, especially for quirky words with obscure origins. He said the best spellers, including Avant-garde, found a balance between memorization and mastery.

Having a conceptual understanding of how words are spelled can also help spellers perform under pressure when their memory fails them, said Shah, who admitted he finds it daunting to memorize a huge volume of words.

Former champion Sohum Sukhatankar, who coaches Shrey, said spellers need to fill their brains with the most useful information.

“When you’re at the highest level, you have to be prepared for hundreds of thousands of words,” he said. “You want to do as little memorization as possible to avoid the chance that you just forget it, so it’s all about efficiency.”

After a catastrophic school bee, one speller seeks every edge

Shrey knows he might have to guess when he's at the microphone, but he wants to eliminate variables. That makes sense, given that a year ago, he wasn't even the top speller at his school.

“I had a fever at my school bee last year, and I just blanked on the word ‘calipers’ ... and I missed it,” he said. “I was really devastated.”

It took a few months before Shrey was motivated to start studying again. Once he did, he added Sukhatankar to his coaching team. He's learned how to slow down when he's at the microphone because of a bad experience in 2023, when he rushed through a word, didn't enunciate it clearly and judges determined he got it wrong.

He's also a believer in study guides. Shrey said an interactive, AI-assisted platform called Onyma that offers personalized learning and competition with other spellers — launched this month by Sukhatankar and Evans — has helped with his preparation.

He also uses SpellPundit, an online resource created by two former spellers and their parents that made a splash at the 2019 bee when the majority of that year’s eight co-champions used it. The company claims every champion since as a customer.

Shrey won the annual SpellPundit bee, the South Asian Spelling Bee and several other online bees, which he doesn't necessarily see as an advantage.

“I feel like it (creates) more pressure to perform,” he said.

Evans believes spellers who want to win should use their study time efficiently, but there's no barrier to learning every possible word.

“There's a common joke among spellers that says everything's in the dictionary, so it's all ‘on-list,’” he said. “The dictionary is the most basic thing that spellers need to know.”

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Ben Nuckols has covered the Scripps National Spelling Bee since 2012. Follow his work here.

Meanwhile, Russian lawmakers have backed a draft bill to have bank employees join the fight against Ukraine’s long-range drones that strike deep inside Russia — with trained bank staff shooting down the unmanned aircraft.

The steps came after a recent escalation in aerial attacks by both sides in the more than four-year war that followed Russia’s all-out invasion of its neighbor. Neither side has been able to make much progress on the 1,250-kilometer (780-mile) front line.

Also on Wednesday, Anne Keast-Butler, head of U.K.’s intelligence agency GCHQ, asserted that Russian President Vladimir “Putin is going backwards on the battlefield." New data shows that "almost half a million Russian soldiers have now been killed since the conflict began,” she added.

Ukraine has pounded Russian targets, especially oil facilities and manufacturing plants, with its domestically produced drones. At the same time, the Russian military has intensified its aerial attacks, firing almost 90 missiles as well as hundreds of drones at Kyiv last weekend in an effort to overwhelm air defenses.

Zelenskyy seeks more Patriot defense systems

The Ukrainian leader urged Trump and Congress in a letter, which was obtained by The Associated Press, to supply more Patriot PAC-3 missiles and other air defense systems, warning that deliveries to Ukraine are falling dangerously short as the Iran war diverts U.S. stocks.

Ukraine has raised its drone interception rate to more than 90%, the letter says, and Ukrainian specialists have helped countries in the Middle East — specifically the Gulf Arab region — strengthen air defenses. They have also helped at American military bases in the Mideast, the letter says.

But Ukraine cannot yet produce its own anti-missile defense systems, Zelenskyy said, and for that relies “almost exclusively on the United States.”

“For us — for a nation fighting for its survival — there is hardly anything more painful to see than Patriot batteries with no missiles loaded,” Zelenskyy wrote.

Deliveries, he says, are “no longer keeping up with the reality of the threat we face.”

Washington did not immediately comment on the letter.

The U.S. weapons that European nations and Canada buy to donate to Ukraine are a vital component of the country’s air defenses, but only a few NATO allies are investing significant sums in the arrangement, alliance officials say.

Russia wants bank employees to join the fight against Ukrainian drones

In Russia, an ambitious plan approved by the country’s lower house of parliament on Tuesday envisages banks installing electronic jamming systems on their premises while selected employees would be trained to shoot down incoming drones.

And with banks in almost every town, their incorporation into Russia's air defenses could help expand its cover.

The bill, which state news agency Interfax said was first presented last August and later expanded in scope, must still be approved by the upper house Federation Council and signed by Putin before coming into force.

Russia is finding it hard to protect its large land mass from a growing number of attacks by increasingly sophisticated Ukrainian long-range drones. Smaller drones are also holding back Russian troops along the front line, Western analysts and officials say.

As the intensity and depth of Ukrainian drone attacks have increased, Russian authorities have encouraged businesses to contribute to protective measures against aerial strikes.

Russian banks are not known to have been a prime target for Ukrainian drones in the war that followed Moscow’s 2022 invasion. The plan encompasses Russia’s central bank and other top institutions, including majority state-owned Sberbank.

With little details included in the bill, it has raised questions about how such a project would work. The widespread installation of equipment and training of staff in how to use it would require a huge organizational effort.

With Putin keen to shield Russians from the war, the plan could work against his efforts by involving regular citizens in it and making the consequences of the invasion more visible.

Russia's need for drone help suggests its defense are failing, analyst says

The proposed measure reflects growing problems for Russia against Ukraine’s increasingly sophisticated drones, according to Thomas Withington, an associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute in London.

The draft bill “seems to indicate that … military-level drone defense capabilities in Russia are failing, because if they were working you wouldn’t need to do that,” Withington told The Associated Press.

“This situation is not improving for Russia,” he said, noting that Moscow is battling to keep up with Ukrainian drone innovations.

The measure seeks to “try and offload some of the burden of drone protection to the non-military, non-law enforcement sectors,” which are under strain, he said.

The bill says bank employees may jam or intercept drone control signals, and damage or destroy uncrewed aerial, underwater and ground vehicles threatening their facilities, without waiting for a response from security services.

“Jamming will be used to make it more difficult for (the drones) to target and attack the relevant targets,” Anatoly Aksakov, chairman of the State Duma Committee on Financial Markets, told Russian media outlet RBK. “Plus, we’ll also use means to shoot down these drones, thereby protecting the relevant targets.”

Each organization would determine which employees would be trained to deploy the measures.

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Follow the AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

In an arrest affidavit, police said the incident happened outside the West Oaks Mall around 12:39 a.m.

Upon arrival, police met with the security guard, who advised that his patrol car was on fire in front of the food court entrance.

“I observed a small flame emanating form the rear left side trunk bed area of a white Ford Maverick pickup,” the affidavit reads.

The fire was ultimately extinguished, but police said that firefighters were able to retrieve an item that had been set on fire, which was described as having a “black paper backing” and some writing that read “gofireproducts.”

Investigators said they later used security footage to reveal that a man had approached the vehicle before walking away toward a drain, where he apparently threw an item into the drain.

“The subject also appeared to have a noticeable bump underneath the hoodie near the back of his head,” the affidavit continues. “A pair of orange gloves was later recovered from the drain.”

Eventually, police tracked the suspect down, and he was identified as 19-year-old Daniel Wright, whom officers listed as a “transient.”

Wright was taken into custody and now faces charges of second-degree arson and criminal mischief. He is held without bond.

Crews filled the sinkhole and, on Wednesday, drilled test borings to make sure the area was compact enough to support a new roadway. Those boring holes go as deep as 85 feet, allowing engineers to look for any underground openings.

[WATCH: Sinkhole in Maitland stabilized after shutting down Wymore Road]

The sinkhole opened on May 15 in Wymore Road near Maitland Boulevard, just east of I-4.

It took several days and thousands of gallons of water to get the hole stabilized.

Once engineers are satisfied with the boring test, each boring hole will be filled with concrete grout. After that dries, crews will be able to rebuild the road itself.

Until then, Wymore Road will remain closed between Maitland Boulevard and Brightwater Circle.

The first bee was held in 1925, when the Louisville Courier-Journal invited other newspapers to host spelling bees and send their champions to Washington. After a long run at a convention center in suburban Maryland, the bee returns to the nation's capital this year at Constitution Hall, a few blocks from the White House.

Another change for this year: ESPN NFL analyst and recent “Celebrity Jeopardy!” champion Mina Kimes joined the bee as its television host.

This is the 98th bee; it was canceled from 1943 to 1945 because of World War II and again in 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic. This year’s champion will be the 111th, because the bee ended in a two-way tie several times and an eight-way tie in 2019.

Thirty of the past 36 champions have been of Indian heritage, including last year’s winner, Faizan Zaki.

How can I watch the Scripps National Spelling Bee?

The bee is broadcast and streamed on channels and platforms owned by Scripps, a Cincinnati-based media company.

Wednesday's semifinals were streamed live on Scripps Sports Network and spellingbee.com, and a tape-delayed broadcast was set to air on ION from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. EDT.

The finals will be broadcast Thursday on ION from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. They will also air or be streamed on these Scripps-owned channels or services: ION Plus, Bounce, Grit, Laff, The Spot, Bounce XL, Grit Xtra, Laff More, Scripps News and Scripps Sports Network.

What are the rules of the Scripps National Spelling Bee?

Spellers qualify by advancing through regional bees hosted by sponsors around the country. In order to compete, spellers must not have advanced beyond the eighth grade or be older than 15.

Competitors must get through two preliminary rounds, where they are quizzed on words from a list provided in advance. There is one spelling round and one multiple-choice vocabulary round.

Those who make it through the preliminaries sit for a written spelling and vocabulary test, with the top 100 or so finishers advancing to the quarterfinals. The words for the test, and for all subsequent rounds, are taken from the Merriam-Webster Unabridged dictionary.

Throughout the quarterfinals and semifinals, spellers are eliminated at the microphone through oral spelling or vocabulary questions.

About a dozen spellers typically make it to the finals, although this year only nine made it. When only two remain, Scripps has the option to use a lightning-round tiebreaker known as a “spell-off” to determine the champion.

Who is competing in the Scripps National Spelling Bee?

This year's bee had 247 spellers representing all 50 states, the District of Columbia, three U.S. territories and five other countries: The Bahamas, Canada, Ghana, Nigeria and the United Arab Emirates. After the preliminary rounds, 167 were left, and that field was cut to 95 quarterfinalists after a written spelling and vocabulary test.

The top returning finisher from 2025 is Sarv Dharavane of Dunwoody, Georgia, who finished third last year as an 11-year-old fifth-grader. This year, he got a perfect score on the written test, and he's one of the spellers to qualify for Thursday's finals.

Here are the other finalists:

— Shrey Parikh, a 14-year-old eighth-grader from Rancho Cucamonga, California, who finished third in 2024. He lost at the school level in 2025 but has dominated the bee circuit since, winning the South Asian Spelling Bee, the SpellPundit National Spelling Bee and the Words of Wisdom Spelling Bee.

— Oliver Halkett, a 14-year-old eighth-grader from Los Angeles who finished in a tie for seventh last year.

— Zwe Spacetime, a 14-year-old eighth-grader from Fort Washington, Maryland, and the younger brother of 2021 champion Zaila Avant-garde.

— Aiden Meng, a 13-year-old seventh-grader from Orinda, California, who bowed out in the quarterfinals last year.

— Ishaan Gupta, a 12-year-old seventh-grader from Jersey City, New Jersey, who was a semifinalist last year.

— Kushi Gottimukkala, a 13-year-old seventh-grader from Morrisville, North Carolina, a semifinalist last year.

— Avishka Dudala, a 13-year-old eighth-grader from Prosper, Texas, a semifinalist last year.

— Logan Bailey, a 12-year-old sixth-grader from Houston. The winner of the North South Foundation spelling bee, he is making his debut on the national stage.

What are the prizes for the Scripps National Spelling Bee champion?

The winner receives a custom trophy and more than $50,000 in cash and prizes. Here are the prize payouts:

— First place: $52,500 in cash, reference works from Encyclopaedia Britannica and Merriam-Webster, a custom trophy and commemorative medal, and $1,000 in flight credits from Delta Air Lines.

— Second place: $25,000.

— Third place: $15,000.

— Fourth place: $10,000.

— Fifth place: $5,000.

— Sixth place: $2,500.

— All other finalists: $2,000.

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Ben Nuckols has covered the Scripps National Spelling Bee since 2012. Follow his work here.

The measure, which goes against the guidance by the World Health Organization, underscores growing fears of contagion in East Africa from Bundibugyo, a rare type of the Ebola virus that is behind this outbreak and that has no approved medicines or vaccines.

Like Congo, Uganda has faced Ebola outbreaks in the past. A local Ugandan task force made the decision on the border closure. The Ugandan health workers were exposed to the virus by Congolese patients who had crossed the border before the outbreak was declared in eastern Congo on May 15.

The border closure was temporary, with “immediate effect,” Dr. Diana Atwine of the Ugandan Ministry of Health, told journalists. Border crossings will be authorized only in emergency cases, including for the outbreak response, humanitarian, cargo or security reasons, she added.

Anyone entering from Congo under emergency circumstances will be taken into mandatory isolation for 21 days.

Congo says over 100 cases have been confirmed

Tracing and isolating Ebola contacts is seen as key to stopping the spread of the disease, which usually manifests as hemorrhagic fever. The virus is spread through close contact with sick or deceased patients’ bodily fluids. Experts say healthcare workers and family members caring for patients face the highest risk.

The number of suspected cases in eastern Congo is nearing 1,000, with at least 220 suspected deaths. Congo’s health ministry on Tuesday said 101 cases have been confirmed, and they are looking into over 3,000 possible contacts.

On Wednesday, Congolese authorities said that the first person who recovered from the Bundibugyo virus has been released home from a treatment center in Rwampara, one of the towns in eastern Congo at the heart of the outbreak.

WHO has discouraged border closures with Congo while acknowledging that neighboring countries are at high risk of contagion. The U.N. health agency has declared this outbreak a public health emergency of international concern.

Closures "push the movement of people and goods to informal border crossings that are not monitored, thus increasing the chances of the spread of disease," the agency said.

The Uganda-Congo border is several hundred miles long and crossed by numerous footpaths beyond formal border posts. Many people come and go in the course of a day to visit families or to trade.

Congolese health authorities are struggling to contain the outbreak, which WHO says is outpacing them. The rare type of Ebola was confirmed weeks late as tests were carried out for a more common type. Challenges also include the threat from armed groups in eastern Congo, a large number of displaced people and poor infrastructure.

WHO's Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus called on Wednesday for a ceasefire in eastern Congo to allow safe access for responders and others, saying on social media that “attacks on health facilities make tracking cases and their contacts nearly impossible.”

Responders in Congo have said they are underprepared and under-protected for this outbreak, while conflict-traumatized residents, long wary of outsiders, have attacked a number of clinics and hurled stones and abuse at volunteers trying to make people aware of the virus and its risks.

Infected people or those have been in contact should not undertake international travel unless it’s a medical evacuation, WHO has said. On Wednesday, the Trump administration said it is planning to send Americans who are exposed to Ebola to a new facility in Kenya instead of flying them to the United States.

Uganda is concerned about exposed health workers

Uganda has reported seven cases of Ebola, including the first case of a 59-year-old man who died in Kampala, the country's capital, on May 14. While the Ebola case load is not spiking, the number of locals exposed to infection via health workers has been rising.

“They have families, and so the number has been increasing,” Atwine, the Ugandan health official, said of the health workers.

She also said she was dismayed to see some Ugandans forming crowds to celebrate Arsenal as British Premier League champions. The team has a large following in Uganda. Atwine urged people to be vigilant, avoid shaking hands and use sanitizer.

Congo has had 17 Ebola outbreaks. Health experts say aid cuts last year by the U.S. and other rich nations are devastating for eastern Congo, in part because of the region’s unique problems.

Aid groups fighting this outbreak say they don’t have the equipment they need, including face shields and suits to protect health workers from infection, testing kits and body bags needed to safely bury victims.

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Associated Press writer Jean-Yves Kamale in Kinshasa, Congo, contributed to this report.

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For more on Africa and development: https://apnews.com/hub/africa-pulse

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The Associated Press receives financial support for global health and development coverage in Africa from the Gates Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

The session is expected to start on Monday.

The Florida Legislature considered several different amendments to make changes to local property taxes during the regular session, but all of them died in committee.

DeSantis said he wants to increase the homestead property tax exemption to $250,000 initially and then grow the exemption from there.

Any legislation to reform property taxes would have to be put on the November ballot and pass with 60% of the vote.

In the past, the governor has called for eliminating non-school property taxes, or at least a reduction in the taxes. Regardless of what the governor wants, it will be up to the legislature to decide what the final amendment or amendments look like.

Today in Tampa, I outlined the Save Our Homes from Excessive Property Taxes plan that will eliminate taxes on homesteads. 

Property tax revenue collected by local governments has nearly doubled in the past seven years (from $32 billion to $60 billion) and is expected to reach an… pic.twitter.com/3ZcexD9L7X

— Ron DeSantis (@GovRonDeSantis) May 27, 2026

Local governments say such a move would decimate their ability to maintain services ranging from building and maintaining roads to police, fire, and EMS services, though the governor says any cuts to property taxes would not hurt first responders.

DeSantis said his proposal would create a state trust fund to assist with core local services.

In a memorandum sent to state senators after DeSantis’ announcement, Senate President Ben Albritton threw his support behind the proposal.

“I can’t think of a more meaningful way to celebrate America’s 250 then the passage of $250,000 in tax relief for every Florida homeowner,” Albritton wrote. “I believe this amendment will provide meaningful relief for Florida families, while protecting businesses from extreme tax increases and safeguarding local funding for public safety, education and our clean water infrastructure.”

Lawmakers are currently in Tallahassee for a special session on the state budget. A vote is set for Friday.

This is a developing story. Check back for updates.

A valve on the tank's cooling system failed and forced 50,000 people to evacuate in and around the Orange County city of Garden Grove last week as officials warned of the potential for a catastrophic explosion. The tank cracked by chance, relieving pressure and eventually allowing residents to return home after the temperature remained stable without intervention.

Bobbi-Lee Smart returned home Monday but still has her suitcase, cat carriers and important documents ready so she can leave at a moment's notice.

“I won’t even open the doors and windows in my house because I don’t know for sure that the air is safe,” said Smart, who lives in Anaheim, next to Garden Grove. “How do we know it is stable?”

Tuesday, when the final evacuation orders were lifted in California, a chemical tank ruptured at a Washington state mill in another hazardous chemical emergency, killing people and leaving others still missing a day later.

Tank contains highly flammable chemical

The tank at GKN Aerospace Transparency Systems, which makes cockpit windows, canopies and windshields, contains 6,000 to 7,000 gallons (22,700 to 26,500 liters) of methyl methacrylate, which is highly flammable. Exposure to the chemical can cause serious respiratory problems, neurological issues and irritation to the skin, eyes and throat, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

On Wednesday, the temperature on the tank still remained at a stable 91 degrees (32.8 C) without being sprayed by sprinklers, said Orange County Fire Capt. Brian Yau.

“The team will continually monitor the temperature,” Yau said.

Health officials have assured residents that no contamination or fumes were released, and that they will keep monitoring the air for several months and checking the sewer and storm drains.

Smart said the company should have been scrutinized earlier because it had a record of violations. She feels the company needs to leave the densely populated, working class neighborhood that’s home to family-owned shops, but not before compensating residents and business owners.

“The reality is the company has broken the public trust,” Smart said.

Based in the United Kingdom, GKN Aerospace said it was cooperating with authorities and working with nonprofit organizations to help the community recover.

Angry residents call for accountability

A lawsuit filed on behalf of a couple who live near GKN says the company failed to protect neighbors from “foreseeable chemical releases, toxic vapor migration, evacuation conditions, and catastrophic industrial failures.”

The lawsuit says residents reported strong odors, respiratory irritation, headaches and dizziness and are worried.

At a city council meeting Tuesday night, residents questioned why the chemical plant was allowed to operate so close to homes.

The Orange County District Attorney’s office is investigating. Mayor Stephanie Klopfenstein pledged the company would be held accountable.

Last year, GKN agreed to pay state regulators more than $900,000 to settle violations involving recordkeeping, permitting issues and nitrogen oxide emissions, according to a report on the South Coast Air Quality Management District website.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration has inspected the company’s Garden Grove facility four times since 2018, which resulted in 10 violations, according to public records obtained by the Los Angeles Times. More information about those violations was not immediately available.

In 2019, the California Department of Industrial Relations filed a request in Orange County Superior Court that a judge order the company to pay $2,898 in unpaid civil penalties.

The citation, outlined in court records obtained by the Times, alleged the company in April 2018 “failed to ensure that all machinery and equipment in service were inspected or maintained as recommended by the manufacturer.”

It doesn’t appear that any of the violations were related to the overheated tank.

Expert says companies can face consequences

Purdue University engineering professor Andrew Whelton said the tank would likely have to be replaced.

Whelton said the California crisis is reminiscent of a 2014 chemical spill in Charleston, West Virginia, when storage tanks failed at a facility owned by Freedom Industries. The spill prevented the capital city and surrounding areas from using their tap water for several days. Businesses were temporarily shut down and hundreds of people headed to emergency rooms for issues from nausea to rashes.

That disaster inspired a new state law requiring more inspections and registrations of aboveground storage tanks. Freedom later declared bankruptcy and two company officials were sent to prison on federal pollution charges.

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Weber reported from Los Angeles.

The Federal Aviation Administration announced Wednesday that the hourlong spaceflight resulted in a mishap based on the performance of the mega rocket's first-stage booster.

Minutes after Starship blasted off from Texas on Friday, the booster separated as normal but engines conked out as it made its way back to Earth. Instead of a controlled splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico, the booster came in hard. There were no reports of injury or property damage, according to the FAA, which will oversee the company's investigation.

The spacecraft continued around the world, releasing 20 mock satellites before ending the mission as planned with a fiery splashdown in the Indian Ocean.

The 407-foot (124-meter) rocket is SpaceX CEO Elon Musk’s biggest and most powerful Starship yet, designed to carry crews to Mars. NASA is looking for it to land astronauts on the moon as soon as 2028 and help build a lunar base.

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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

“You were privy to his struggle with addiction,” said Judge Sherilyn Peace Garnett, who handed down the sentence to the 60-year-old Kenneth Iwamasa in federal court in Los Angeles. “Your conduct was reckless, not just on the day of his death but in the days leading up to his death.”

Iwamasa was the last person sentenced of the five who pleaded guilty in the investigation and prosecution that followed Perry's death at age 54 on Oct. 28, 2023. The group included corrupt doctors and a major street dealer, “Ketamine Queen” Jasveen Sangha, whose 15-year sentence was the only one longer than Iwamasa's.

The assistant was constantly at Perry’s side in his final days, acting as the actor’s enabler, drug messenger and de facto doctor. He was the last person to see Perry alive, and he was the one who found him dead in his Jacuzzi. He would eventually become prosecutors' most important informant.

How much blame for an assistant to an addict?

Wednesday's nearly three-hour hearing was largely a debate between lawyers for both sides, the judge and Perry's loved ones over the level of responsibility that can be put on the employee of a powerful person when addiction is in the mix.

“His loyalty to Mr. Perry was paramount,” Iwamasa's lawyer, Alan Eisner, told the judge. “He worshipped Mr. Perry, he looked up to Mr. Perry. All he did was please and accommodate Mr. Perry.”

Eisner argued for a six-month prison term with six months of home confinement.

“Mr. Perry was not blameless,” the lawyer said. “Nobody likes to hear that.”

When Eisner said Iwamasa was unable to act differently than he did, the judge cut him off and said: “Unwilling. Not unable. He could have said no.”

Perry’s mother and sisters made it clear in letters to the judge that there is no one, not even Perry himself, who they blame for his death more than Iwamasa — a longtime friend they thought would help the actor maintain sobriety.

Perry’s stepfather, longtime “Dateline” journalist Keith Morrison, spoke for the family at the sentencing.

“We really felt that he was part of the family,” Morrison said. “We trusted him implicitly.”

Morrison acknowledged the power imbalance, but said Iwamasa still had a choice.

“You did the injections. You could have made the phone call,” he said. “But you didn’t. Because you were living a dandy life.” He added, “You were in control of one of the most famous people in the world.”

‘The monster that killed him’

Lisa Ferguson, Perry’s business manager for most of his career and now his estate executor, painted a darker picture, saying Iwamasa deliberately drove out everyone else surrounding Perry, including sober-living companions and medical workers, to shore up his own power and influence. She angrily said he used Perry’s addiction to his own advantage.

“What you are is the monster that killed him,” Ferguson said. She said he had shown “not a shred of guilt or remorse” since Perry’s death, and that he ought to “rot in prison.”

“Matthew deserved to live,” she said. “You don’t.”

Iwamasa looked right at Morrison and Ferguson throughout their remarks, and made the unusual move of facing Perry's family and friends in the audience when he spoke.

“I’m horribly, horribly sorry, and I offer my condolences to you,” he said. “I’m just so sorry to have done these illegal acts that I will forever regret.”

Iwamasa wore a charcoal-gray suit, with his long white hair combed back. He had no visible reaction to the sentence. His father and brother sat in the audience with other supporters.

Iwamasa comes clean to police, faces the spotlight

Perry had hired Iwamasa in 2022, and he was paying him $150,000 a year. The broad criminal investigation began not long after Iwamasa returned from running errands to find Perry dead. The LA County Medical Examiner found that ketamine was the primary cause of death. Drowning was a secondary cause.

At first, Iwamasa lied to police and got rid of evidence of ketamine use. But after investigators served a search warrant on the house in January of 2024, he began coming clean. By that August he had pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute ketamine resulting in death.

That came quietly before any Perry-related indictments were announced, and Wednesday was Iwamasa's first time under the intense public spotlight surrounding the case. He stood in front of dozens of cameras outside the courthouse as Eisner spoke for him, saying that the sentence was excessive and didn't reflect the dynamic between the two men.

“One person had the power. One person had no power,” the lawyer said.

Morrison said outside court he was satisfied that the family could get the sentencing behind them.

But, he added, “It doesn’t change the fact that we’ve lost him, that he’s dead, and that my wife is broken.”

The sentence was exactly what prosecutors sought, though Garnett disagreed with them on the details. She found Iwamasa did not abuse a position of trust, which could’ve brought more prison time, saying that category was generally reserved for professionals and experts. She found that he had not benefited financially from the crime, though acknowledged he did from the relationship with Perry.

She also told Iwamasa, “there is no hard evidence that you acted with malicious intent, though some would disagree.”

His sentence also included a $10,000 fine and two years of probation. He was ordered to return to go to prison on July 17.

Perry became a major TV star along with Courteney Cox, Jennifer Aniston, Matt LeBlanc, David Schwimmer and Lisa Kudrow on “Friends,” NBC’s megahit sitcom that ran from 1994 to 2004.

According to a Hamas statement, Mohammed Odeh died in an airstrike on Tuesday, along with his wife and two of his children. Previously, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz announced that the Israeli military had targeted and killed Odeh.

At least five people — including Odeh and his family members — were killed and 12 were injured in Tuesday’s strike on a market in Gaza City, local hospitals said. The attack came on the eve of Eid al-Adha, a major Muslim holiday.

More strikes in the city on Wednesday evening killed at least seven people, including two children and a woman. More than 20 people were wounded, including several children, according to Shifa hospital.

Video from the scene showed flames pouring from an upper-floor window of a building and bystanders rushing to carry injured people, including some children, to waiting ambulances.

The Israeli military said Wednesday evening it had launched strikes in the northern Gaza Strip, targeting two Hamas militants.

Thousands of people gathered Wednesday for the joint funeral of Odeh's family in Gaza City. Mourners covered the four bodies with green Hamas flags and marched from a mosque through the city, chanting and firing shots in the air. Some carried posters with Odeh's photo, emblazoned with the words “one of the chiefs of staffs of the Qassam Brigades,” referring to Hamas' military wing.

Hamas condemned the strike, and said Odeh had been active with the group for more than three decades and was part of the first generation that helped establish the movement’s military and armed wing.

Katz called Odeh “one of the architects” of the Oct. 7, 2023 attack on southern Israel that triggered the more than two-year war in Gaza. He said it was the fourth time Israel has killed the head of Hamas’ military wing since the start of the war. Izz al-Din al-Haddad, the previous head, was killed on May 16.

Katz said that Israel would continue to target Hamas leaders involved in the Oct. 7, 2023 attack. “We pledged that Hamas will not hold civilian or military rule,” he wrote on X.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is preparing for elections in the fall, also warned that Israel will target everyone involved in the Oct. 7, 2023 attack.

A grim Eid al-Adha in Gaza

The attack that killed Odeh came as Muslims prepared for Eid al-Adha, normally a joyous time of family gatherings and large meals.

The holiday is again subdued this year in Gaza, where the vast majority of people remain displaced and live in tents or temporary shelters after a devastating war. Around 90% of Gaza’s more than 2 million people have lost their homes, according to U.N. estimates, with most of them now sheltering in huge tent camps with rat infestations and pools of sewage. They are dependent on aid to survive.

Eid al-Adha, or “Feast of Sacrifice,” is an Islamic holiday celebrated by millions of Muslims across the globe. The four-day holiday, which begins during the Hajj pilgrimage, is also known as a time when children are given new clothes and gifts.

“This is not Eid ... we’re dead,” said Mahmoud Saqer, a displaced man from Khan Younis, who described people as being distressed by the ongoing human suffering and killings in the territory.

In Khan Younis and Gaza City, amid destroyed buildings, including a ruined mosque, people gathered for Eid prayers with few signs of celebration beyond a few clusters of balloons lining one street.

“There’s no Eid. My children were killed. Eid is only for the people who lost no one,” said Ayda Al-Banna, a displaced women from Gaza City, who prayed Eid prayers with her granddaughter.

Fragile ceasefire holds in Gaza

A ceasefire reached between Israel and Hamas in October remains fragile. Israeli attacks have killed more than 900 Palestinians since the ceasefire took effect. Israel says its attacks are in response to violations by Hamas or threats to its soldiers, but Palestinian health officials say scores of civilians have been among the dead. Four Israeli soldiers have also been killed during this period in Gaza.

Israel launched its offensive in Gaza in response to the Hamas October 2023 attack that killed some 1,200 people and took 251 others hostage.

The Gaza Health Ministry says more than 72,803 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire. The ministry is part of Gaza’s Hamas-run government, but staffed by medical professionals who maintain and publish detailed records that are viewed as generally reliable by the international community.

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Associated Press writer Sally Abou AlJoud in Beirut and Fatma Khaled contributed from Cairo.

A season which began with pleas to play in a higher competition ended with Palace’s first-ever European trophy as Mateta’s goal lifted his team to a 1-0 win over Rayo Vallecano in the final.

The French forward, who was close to leaving in January before a transfer collapsed, scored on a rebound in the 51st minute after Rayo goalkeeper Augusto Batalla parried Adam Wharton’s long-range shot.

“I feel fantastic! ... First time in Europe, we did it! Now I just want to celebrate, I just want to party," Mateta told TNT Sports. “It’s incredible. We did everything. I told you about the intensity we’re going to put. I’m tired right now. I gave everything.”

Along with giving outgoing coach Oliver Glasner the perfect send-off, Palace's win, which came in its first season playing in Europe, keeps English teams on track for a sweep of the three main European men’s club competitions.

Aston Villa won the Europa League last week and Arsenal will face Paris Saint-Germain in the Champions League final on Saturday.

From appeals to celebrations

It was a triumphant end to a season which began with Palace in court appealing in vain against being demoted from the second-tier Europa League, the competition it had originally qualified for by winning the FA Cup, in a dispute over ownership rules. Palace fans spent the season chanting against UEFA and getting fined for it.

Mateta said of the traveling Palace fans at Red Bull Arena: "I’m always with them. They support me as a player a lot, and as a team. They’re always behind us and we did that for them too.”

Palace’s win lands it a Europa League spot for next season, much to the delight of Glasner, who said Wednesday he wanted to watch the team’s progress on TV next season.

Palace fans set the tone before kickoff with a giant banner like an airport departures board. Europa League: Boarding.

Glasner announced in January he’d leave at the end of the season when his contract expires. The Austrian has been in charge since February 2024 and led Palace to its first major trophy last season in the FA Cup. It’s not clear yet where he’ll go next.

Glasner bid his farewell in unique style, sliding on his stomach between two lines of his players in Slip ’N Slide style ahead of the presentation.

It was the third time in the Conference League’s five-season history that an English team lifted the trophy after West Ham in 2023 and Chelsea a year ago. Some Rayo fans were seen in tears at the final whistle after a first major final for a team so often in the shadow of its neighbors Real Madrid and Atletico Madrid.

A shot bouncing off both posts

Mateta's goal lit up the final after a cagey first half with no shots on target from either team.

He showed lightning-quick reactions to knock in the rebound after an initial long-range shot from Wharton, who returned to Palace's lineup after an ankle knock against Arsenal last week and was a commanding presence in midfield.

Yeremy Pino came within a whisker of making it 2-0 soon after when he hit a free kick that bounced off one goal post, along the goal line and away off the second post.

Rayo's best chance came early on when Alemão skewed a volley wide of the post off a cross from Pep Chavarria. Tyrick Mitchell missed the target with a diving header for Palace at the end of the first half.

Fan clashes ahead of game

German police said earlier Wednesday that there had been clashes between Palace and Rayo fans. Two people were detained and two police officers sustained minor injuries, police added.

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AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer

U.S. Rep. Jerry Nadler, a Manhattan Democrat, said detainees at Delaney Hall in Newark are being given small portions of food that “very often” contain maggots and that the only medication they receive is Tylenol.

One woman, he said, had a lump in her breast but was still waiting on a mammogram more than a month into her detention. Another detainee was suffering from colon cancer but wasn’t receiving any treatment.

“The bottom line is, if you are human, if you are American, you cannot support what is going on here,” said U.S. Rep. Dan Goldman, another Manhattan Democrat who toured the facility Wednesday. “They’re living in jail conditions, and none of these people are criminals.”

U.S. Rep. Adriano Espaillat, another Manhattan Democrat, described conditions as “inhumane" after spending about an hour inside the facility,

“We will shut this center down," he vowed. “We will shut it down.”

The lawmakers addressed protesters and family members of detainees demonstrating outside the facility’s security gate after their visits.

More than 50 people held signs saying “Stop Family Separation” and chanted “Free Them All” and other slogans. Some shouted directly at the armed and helmet-wearing Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers standing outside, calling them “cowards” and “idiots.”

The protests began Friday and have been tense at times.

On Monday, U.S. Sen. Andy Kim, a New Jersey Democrat, said he was pepper-sprayed as he and New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill led a delegation of Democratic officials who tried to visit detainees at Delaney Hall but were denied entry.

“Instead of engaging with me and others about the poor conditions, ICE sent in an armored vehicle and a line of armed agents that only poured gasoline on the fire,” Kim posted on social media after Monday’s clashes. “Civilians were tackled and restrained, and agents fired pepper balls and spray into the crowd.”

Gabriela Soto said Wednesday that her husband was among the detainees who participated in the hunger strike before he was transferred to another facility.

“At first it was just 300. Then it became a little bit more. Now, every single detainee inside there is participating. Every single one,” she said, wearing a black shirt that said “Abolish ICE.”

Amol Sinha, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey, said his organization has heard “horror stories” of detainees, including pregnant women, not getting the proper medical treatment for their health conditions.

“Cruelty is the point,” he said.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, has denied any hunger strike, abuse or poor conditions inside the center and dismissed the criticisms as political posturing.

“The fact is, we’re giving them the calories they want,” Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said Wednesday of detainees at Delaney Hall. “This isn’t Holiday Inn.”

In a follow-up statement, DHS said two protesters were arrested for assaulting, resisting and impeding federal officers after ICE officers were sprayed “with an unknown chemical substance” Tuesday night.

“These rioters have OBSTRUCTED law enforcement operations — a felony and a crime,” the statement read. “Local police have refused to answer calls to help our law enforcement. We will not allow violent rioters to slow ICE down. Law and order will be restored.”

President Donald Trump defended the center's operations and criticized opponents.

“We run the finest facilities anywhere in the world of their type,” Trump said during a Cabinet meeting with Mullin. “There’s nobody that runs a facility like we do.”

Located along an industrial stretch of Newark Bay and run by a private prison company, Delaney Hall has been a frequent flashpoint of protests and clashes between immigrant rights advocates and immigration enforcement officials.

Newark Mayor Ras Baraka and U.S. Rep. LaMonica McIver, a New Jersey Democrat, were among those arrested during protests when the 1,000-bed facility opened last May.

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Marcelo reported from New York. Associated Press photographer Seth Wenig in Newark contributed to this story.

The attorneys general in New York and New Jersey, which is hosting eight World Cup matches including the final, announced Tuesday that they are investigating whether FIFA's ticketing practices violated consumer protection laws.

They have sent subpoenas to soccer’s global governing body demanding information on a range of ticketing issues, including FIFA's use of “variable pricing” models that sent ticket prices soaring for most matches and redrawn stadium maps that fans say relocated their seats far from the pitch.

The attorneys general, working with the New York City Department of Consumer and Worker Protection, said they are focused primarily on ticketing practices for matches at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey.

“New Yorkers have been waiting years for the World Cup to come to their backyard, and they deserve a fair shot at affordable tickets," New York Attorney General Letitia James said. “No one should be manipulated into paying sky-high prices for seats, and fans should be able to trust that the tickets they purchase will be the ones they receive."

New Jersey Attorney General Jennifer Davenport accused FIFA of turning the act of buying a World Cup ticket “into a gauntlet of confusion, fake scarcity, and impossibly high prices.” It's an honor for New Jersey to host the World Cup, she said, "but the event is not an invitation to exploit our residents and visitors."

FIFA declined to comment.

The World Cup kicks off June 11 with matches in Mexico City and Guadalajara, Mexico. The first match at the roughly 82,000-seat MetLife Stadium — temporarily renamed New York New Jersey Stadium for the event — pits Brazil and Morocco on June 13.

Some seats for the July 19 final are going for nearly $33,000.

Last week, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani announced that 1,000 tickets — about 150 tickets for each MetLife Stadium game, excluding the final — will be made available to city residents via a lottery system at a cost of $50 each.

FIFA previously made some $60 tickets available for every match, distributing them through the national federations of the teams playing in the games.

Ryan Boufakeer of Orlando was taken into custody by the Orange County Sheriff’s Office Tuesday night, according to an arrest affidavit obtained by News 6.

According to the affidavit, the incident occurred between approximately 7:05 and 7:15 p.m. while the victim was waiting in the Tron ride line. The victim told deputies she heard noises behind her, turned around and saw Boufakeer crouched on his hands and knees, holding a black iPhone with the camera angled upward toward her skirt.

The victim confronted Boufakeer and demanded he delete the video. According to the affidavit, Boufakeer showed her what appeared to be a deletion of the video, though the victim told deputies she could not confirm whether he deleted the recording of her or a different video.

Disney security later spotted a man matching the victim’s description on property. Boufakeer was detained and brought to the security office, where deputies read him his Miranda rights, and he agreed to speak with investigators.

The affidavit says Boufakeer said he was a chaperone for students at South Creek Chorus. When he was asked about “recording a lady,” the affidavit says Boufakeer told deputies he had crouched near an outlet to charge his phone and started recording while in that position. Boufakeer described the video as approximately 15 seconds long and told deputies he intended to keep it for sexual gratification, according to the affidavit.

When asked whether there were additional concerning images or videos on his phone, Boufakeer declined to answer without an attorney present, the affidavit states.

Boufakeer faces one count of video voyeurism, a felony under Florida law.

Steyer — a former hedge fund manager turned liberal activist — has spent or booked more than $195 million in ads for broadcast TV, cable and radio with the tally still growing, according to data compiled by advertising tracker AdImpact.

His torrent of ads has opened the one-time presidential candidate to criticism that he is trying to buy the governor's chair, and his ad total represents more than 20 times the amount spent by his nearest rival, fellow Democrat Xavier Becerra, as the two duel for a spot in the November election.

Nationally, his spending is unparalleled — no one is even close.

In Georgia, Republican health care executive Rick Jackson has spent about $83 million on advertising in his primary race for governor, which is headed for a June runoff, ranking him second. The third place spot is held by his Republican rival, Lt. Gov. Burt Jones, who has President Donald Trump’s endorsement and has spent nearly $31 million on ads, according to AdImpact.

Following Jones was Democratic U.S. Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi of Illinois, who spent over $28 million on advertising in a failed bid for U.S. Senate.

Trying to ‘buy the governor’s office?’

Katie Porter, a former U.S. House member who is among seven established Democrats in the California race, has repeatedly criticized Steyer for dipping into his personal fortune to keep ads in front of voters with scant competition from rivals.

“He’s not earning support — he’s buying this seat,” her campaign wrote in an email to supporters Wednesday.

In raw numbers, Steyer's ad blitz has eclipsed the 2010 record set by Republican Meg Whitman, who spent $178.5 million in total on a losing bid for governor, much of it her own money. At the time, it was the costliest campaign for statewide office in the nation’s history. When adjusted for inflation, however, Whitman still holds the state record, but that represented spending for the full election, not just the primary.

A crowded field with no clear leader

Steyer's record-level output has lifted him into contention in the crowded race, but he's not breaking away from the field. He's among a leading group of several candidates — including Becerra and Republican Steve Hilton — as the campaign heads toward a June 2 primary. Mail voting started earlier this month.

Still, Steyer's cash advantage is giving him a publicity edge as the contest enters its crucial final days. He's maintained a steady flow of advertising and online posts questioning Becerra's credentials and record, with Becerra, a former state attorney general and Biden administration health secretary, lacking the funds to reply in kind.

One Becerra ad sought to connect with voters who might be getting bleary-eyed from the cascade of Steyer advertising. It used tranquil scenes of Joshua trees, waves curling on a beach and soaring redwoods, with a gentle prod: “You can stop the endless Tom Steyer ads. Vote Xavier Becerra.”

Steyer’s financial edge has allowed him to stretch the boundaries of his campaign far beyond traditional TV and radio ads, with steady posts on online platforms like YouTube and Instagram. The New York Times reported that his campaign paid a progressive Texas influencer $100,000 to help Steyer win the election. The Sacramento Bee reported that Becerra, too, had hired an influencer.

In a statement, Steyer spokesperson Kevin Liao did not directly address the campaign's spending but pointed to millions of dollars pumped into ads by independent groups backed by Pacific Gas and Electric Co., real estate agents and others seeking to defeat the billionaire, who has promised to “break up the electric monopolies in California.”

Speaking to reporters Wednesday in Berkeley, Steyer defended his spending in the race, saying he was fighting against powerful corporate interests that are driving up the price of living in the state.

“The corporations and billionaires have spent a record amount against me,” Steyer said. “I'm only working for the people of California.”

Many voters have been slow to vote in a race without a star candidate and no clear leader. More than 50 names will be on the ballot. California uses a “top two” primary system that puts all candidates on one ballot, with only the top two vote-getters advancing to November, regardless of party.

“In a race this close, it all matters,” said Democratic consultant Andrew Acosta.

Money doesn't always make the difference

History shows that money doesn’t always translate into votes.

Billionaire developer Rick Caruso spent over $100 million in 2022 in his bid to become Los Angeles mayor, much of it his own money, but he was handily defeated by Mayor Karen Bass, who spent a fraction of Caruso’s total. Billionaire former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg spent more than $1 billion of his own money on his 2020 presidential bid before dropping out. And Steyer’s money was unable to lift him into contention in the 2020 presidential contest, from which he dropped out early in the year after a poor finish in the South Carolina primary.

Democratic San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan's campaign for governor was supported by independent committees bankrolled by millions of dollars from tech leaders and venture capitalists, yet he failed to gain traction in the race.

Steyer has never held elected office.

In a 2019 interview with The Associated Press, Steyer was asked what he would say to people who think he’s trying to buy the presidency.

“I don’t think that’s possible,” Steyer said at the time, before adding, “I’m never going to apologize for succeeding in business. That’s America, right?”

The contest is unfolding as California struggles with a long-running homeless crisis, wildfire insurance shortages, projected budget shortfalls and housing costs that are out of reach for many working-class families. Voters, meanwhile, are saddled with growing everyday bills for groceries, utilities and gas.

The AdImpact data does not include ads on some popular streaming services, like Hulu and YouTube, or mail advertising.

The warning — which fell on the Islamic holiday of Eid al-Adha — came a day after Israeli troops clashed with the Iran-backed Hezbollah along a strategic river in southern Lebanon, with Israeli forces pushing farther north, days ahead of talks in Washington between Lebanese and Israeli delegations.

Wednesday's warning is the first that orders the Lebanese to relocate from the south since a ceasefire went into effect on April 17 and follows an escalation in the Israel-Hezbollah war.

Israeli troops have crossed the Litani River, edging closer to the southern city of Nabatiyeh. Fighting between Israel and Hezbollah has also intensified in the town of Zawtar al-Sharqieh, along the strategic river. Israel has not struck Beirut or areas near the capital since the truce started.

The war started on March 2 after Hezbollah fired rockets towards northern Israel in solidarity with Iran. Over one million people in Lebanon have since been displaced, and over 3,200 people killed in Israeli strikes according to Lebanon’s health ministry. Many displaced people are sleeping in public schools that have turned into makeshift shelters or in tents pitched in encampments across the Lebanese capital.

Earlier, the Israeli military had called on the residents of Nabatiyeh and the city of Tyre along the Mediterranean coast to leave and stay away, saying there were Hezbollah members and military posts there.

Roads have been jam-packed with cars fleeing Tyre and surrounding neighborhoods heading north, seeking shelter. Strikes in the southwestern region have intensified in recent days.

Those who have nowhere to go are staying in the city, said Moussa Nasrallah of Lebanon's Civil Defense. He and other first-responders have been helping move the elderly and others living further out in the province to the city.

At least four Israeli strikes hit near Tyre since the warning was announced, Nasrallah said. The Israeli military said it has been targeting what it called “command centers” belonging to Hezbollah without giving further details.

“We can’t use our vehicles to evacuate people out of the area and not be available for the wounded,” Nasrallah told The Associated Press, fearing his colleagues would be stuck in the traffic, and unable to return to the front lines to help civilians.

Hezbollah has claimed responsibility for several attacks on both Israeli troops in Lebanon and northern Israeli border villages.

Also, amid a surge in Hezbollah attacks with exploding drones, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced that the Israeli military will expand the scope of its attacks against Hezbollah. The Israeli military said it has struck 550 targets since the beginning of the week, a significant increase in the number of attacks.

Hezbollah has vowed to fight until the war ends in Lebanon and Israel withdraws its troops that operate across large swaths of the country's south. The Iran-backed group has dismissed Lebanon's direct talks with Israel and has backed Iran's talks with Washington to their war. Among Tehran's conditions is ending the war in Lebanon as well.

Israel's widened attacks in recent days have struck areas in eastern Lebanon along the Bekaa Valley, near the border with Syria. On Tuesday, Israel struck near the Qaraoun Dam, Lebanon's largest, on the Litani River.

The sheriff’s office and Daytona Beach police are looking for Xavion Perry III, who is described as a Black male standing 6 feet, 1 inch tall. He was last seen wearing all black clothing, white socks, and white sneakers.

Authorities consider him dangerous.

According to Daytona Beach Police Chief Jakari Young, just before 10 p.m., authorities in Alachua County responded to a shots-fired call and discovered a victim who had been killed. Perry was later identified as the suspect.

At 11:30 p.m., Daytona Beach police were alerted through technology that Perry was in the area and attempted a traffic stop. Perry fled, prompting a pursuit.

According to Young, Perry stopped at the Main Street beach approach, jumped from the vehicle, ran to the Main Street Pier, and then jumped from the pier onto the beach below. The Volusia County Sheriff’s Office joined the search shortly after.

Young said Perry was also seen streaming live on Facebook during the incident and made suicidal statements during that broadcast.

Young added that while it is possible Perry is no longer in the area, authorities are treating the search as though he is still present.

Authorities have not yet recovered Perry’s firearm.

Anyone who sees Perry is urged to call 911 immediately. Do not approach him.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth celebrated the U.S. military’s strength, even as a new analysis shows it could take three years for defense contractors to replenish the key weapons systems used in the Iran war. Trump also praised his administration’s work to stamp out fraud, saying his administration is “bringing our country back to honesty.”

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House Dems introduce bill to block Trump’s proposed Arch

House Democrats are introducing a bill to block construction of Trump’s proposed “ triumphal arch ” near the Lincoln Memorial. The bill comes after a federal commission approved the design for the project, which Trump wants to serve as an entrance to the nation’s capital.

Reps. Don Beyer of Virginia and Dina Titus of Nevada called the arch a “vanity project,” saying it relies on illegal funding manipulations without congressional authorization and violates the Commemorative Works Act.

Beyer’s district includes Arlington National Cemetery, adjacent to the arch site. He called the cemetery sacred ground, adding: “It is unthinkable that we would desecrate this hallowed space to build a monument to Donald Trump’s ego.”

The 250-foot arch is one of several projects the Republican president is pursuing alongside a White House ballroom to leave his imprint on Washington.

Wall Street hangs near its records as oil prices sink

U.S. stocks are hanging near their records on Wednesday as oil prices fall, easing pressure on households and businesses worldwide.

The S&P 500 rose 0.1% and added to its all-time high set the day before. The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 243 points, and the Nasdaq composite gained 0.1%.

Bath & Body Works and Abercrombie & Fitch both rallied after becoming the latest companies to deliver stronger profit reports for the start of 2026 than analysts expected. That’s even though U.S. consumers have been getting more discouraged about inflation.

Stocks of oil-and-gas companies fell after the price of Brent crude dropped more than 4%. Treasury yields eased.

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Trump uses Cabinet meeting to play mayor and offer lengthy update on Washington construction

The president took on a new role during his latest Cabinet meeting, acting more like a small-town mayor than commander-in-chief.

He spent 10 minutes describing in great detail helping lead his administration’s efforts to fix fountains and spruce up the Lincoln Memorial’s Reflecting Pool, which Trump mistakenly called the “reflecting lake” and “reflecting pond.”

Workers “sandblasted it, and then we pebble-blasted,” Trump said, explaining it as “a bigger version of sand.”

His comments were far more extensive than what was said on meatier issues like the war in Iran, the economy or the upcoming midterm elections.

Trump even talked about fixing “the floor” of an outdoor park near the White House – meaning brick walkways in Washington’s Lafayette Park.

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South African government and Afrikaners reject US claim of a humanitarian emergency for white people

The South African government and advocacy groups for the country’s Afrikaner white minority on Wednesday rejected the Trump administration’s position that there’s a humanitarian emergency affecting white people in South Africa.

The argument served as the administration’s rationale for raising the U.S. refugee cap by 10,000, but only for white South Africans. The Trump administration announced the increase on Tuesday and cited “an unforeseen emergency refugee situation.”

The South African government calls these allegations unfounded, saying some beneficiaries of the refugee program have chosen to return to South Africa. Around 6,000 South Africans have moved to the U.S. since the Afrikaner program started last year, according to the U.S. government.

Afrikaner groups such as Solidariteit and AfriForum say that refugee status isn’t a solution, and they aim to improve conditions in South Africa. Critics argue the U.S. decision prioritizes white South Africans over refugees from war-torn regions.

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Iran insists on peace in Lebanon as part of a US deal as Israeli-Hezbollah fighting expands

The Israeli military on Wednesday told residents across southern Lebanon to leave as it expands its operations and applies “extreme force” against Hezbollah militants. Already, Israeli troops clashing with Iran-backed Hezbollah fighters have pushed north of the strategic Litani river as Lebanon and Israeli delegations head to talks in Washington. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced the expansion amid a surge in Hezbollah’s exploding drone attacks.

More than one million people in Lebanon have been displaced, and over 3,200 people have been killed in Israeli strikes, according to Lebanon’s health ministry, since open warfare began on March 2 with Hezbollah rockets fired toward Israel in solidarity with Iran. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said 23 Israeli soldiers and a defense contractor have been killed, along with two civilians.

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Alabama attorney general says state did not intentionally discriminate against Black voters

Steve Marshall also said Alabama should be allowed to hold new elections this year under a map chosen by lawmakers, not judges.

More than 879,000 voters cast ballots statewide in Alabama’s May 19 primaries, using a court-ordered map that led to the 2024 election of U.S. Rep. Shomari Figures, a Black Democrat. State Republicans want voters to return to the polls and use their map instead. It would reduce the Black voting age population in his district from 48% to 39% to reclaim the seat for the GOP.

Alabama’s GOP-controlled legislature already voided the May 19 results in the four districts affected by the map switch. Marshall is asking for Supreme Court action by Monday as the state prepares for new special primaries for Aug. 11 in those districts.

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Trump ends public portion of latest Cabinet meeting

Trump wrapped up the public portion of his latest Cabinet meeting after roughly 1 hour and 20 minutes.

The U.S. president started the meeting shortly before noon. He talked about his renovation and architectural plans for Washington, as well as the Iran war, efforts to lower prescription drug prices and the vice president’s task force on fraud, among other subjects.

“We’re doing great,” Trump said before dismissing the reporters in attendance. “Our country is doing fantastically well, and this group of people is outstanding.”

Trump says he opposes Russia or China retrieving Iran’s highly enriched uranium stockpile

“That would not make me comfortable,” the president said.

The two countries have the closest relations with Tehran. Nuclear analysts have said either country could serve as a potentially acceptable third party to the Iranian Republic to take possession of the enriched uranium, which could be used to make a nuclear weapon, as part of a potential deal with the U.S. to end the war.

But Trump seemed to shut down that possibility Wednesday.

Under a 2015 deal negotiated by President Barack Obama, Russia took a stockpile of highly enriched uranium that Iran had at the time.

Trump spends 5 minutes talking about Reflecting Pool project

The president elaborated on the project with painstaking detail. He introduced his lengthy tangent as “a slightly smaller subject,” then walked through work on the 2,400-foot pool between the Lincoln Memorial and Washington Monument, saying it’ll be done by July 4.

“We cleaned it. We fumigated it. We had 10 major truck – dumpsters of garbage taken out. Can you believe it?” Trump said, blaming his Democratic predecessors for the “disgusting” conditions and disrepair.

“We made the surface as good as it can be,” Trump said. “And we’re now covering it with the most beautiful blue, very thick – you can think of it as a very sophisticated form of rubber. No leaks. No problems. And it’s beautiful. It’s called American flag blue.”

Trump at one point justified his intense oversight: “I’ve built hundreds of pools,” he said, later adding, “It’s not as simple as people think.”

Trump says deal on Iran has ‘got to be perfect’

Saying “I’m not sure we should make the deal” on Iran if additional countries don’t join the Abraham Accords — the U.S.-brokered agreements from Trump’s first term aimed at normalizing relations with Israel — Trump said he’s “requesting strongly” that others, like Saudi Arabia and Qatar sign on.

But asked by reporters at the Cabinet meeting if an Iran deal were contingent on that act, Trump added, “I don’t want to say that.”

Trump also said that, while he felt a “good deal” with Iran could be achieved now, he preferred “a great deal,” and then said the agreement must be even better than that.

“It’s got to be perfect,” Trump said. “I didn’t do this to get a crummy agreement.”

Trump defends New Jersey detention center where protesters and federal officers have clashed

“We run the finest facilities anywhere in the world — of their type — but we have some horrible killers,” Trump said Wednesday when asked about an immigration detention center where some detainees have been on a hunger strike to protest conditions.

Recent protests at the center have drawn elected Democrats including Sen. Andy Kim, who said officers shot pepper spray at him and others this week.

Asked by Trump to weigh in, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said Kim “probably shouldn’t have been there.”

“The fact is, we’re giving them the calories they want,” Mullin said of the detainees. “This isn’t Holiday Inn.”

Trump says ‘Oman will behave just like everybody else or we’ll have to blow them up’

The president made the comment Wednesday after being asked whether he would accept a deal allowing Iran and Oman to share control the Strait of Hormuz.

Speaking at his Cabinet meeting, he said the strait must be open to everyone and that no one can control it, though he said the U.S. will “watch over it.”

After issuing the threat to Oman, Trump added: “They understand that. They’ll be fine.”

Bessent channels Biden era and calls higher inflation ‘transitory’

Bessent just dropped a “T” word to describe inflation — echoing past remarks by two of Trump’s favorite targets, former President Joe Biden and former Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, that higher prices would soon fade.

“In terms of prices, I believe the prices are transitory,” Bessent said. “Oil will be lower than preconflict levels when this ends.”

He was repeating an administration talking point that energy prices will plummet once the Iran war comes to a close. But his remarks contained a degree of irony.

Powell’s past use of “transitory” and Biden’s use of “temporary” came to haunt them. That’s because inflation remained persistently high as the economy emerged from the pandemic and was slower to ease than the public expected. The words formed the basis of attacks by Republicans and helped return Trump to the White House.

Bessent says Trump Accounts app coming Thursday

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said during the Cabinet meeting that the app would launch “on all major platforms.”

A provision of Trump’s tax legislation, Trump Accounts are meant to give $1,000 to every newborn, so long as their parents open an account. That money is then invested in the stock market by private firms, and the child can access the money when they turn 18.

Calling it a “great symbol of the 250th anniversary,” Bessent said that “nearly 6 million kids” had been signed up for the accounts, which officially launch July 4.

Trump says World War II Memorial fountain is next in line for renovation

The president said his administration will turn to the war memorial after finishing an overhaul of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.

“Now we’re looking at the World War II fountain, because that’s also in pretty bad shape on the bottom,” Trump said Wednesday at his Cabinet meeting. “We’re going to duplicate it, I think with the — maybe with a slightly different color. Actually, we’ll go with a lighter color.”

Trump ordered the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool to be resurfaced in what he calls “American flag blue” after he said a friend complained about the condition of the pool.

The World War II Memorial sits at the east end of the reflecting pool, featuring stone pillars and arches surrounding an oval fountain.

Trump said he and Interior Secretary Doug Burgum “have a lot of fun” with the renovations.

Trump says anti-fraud work is ‘bringing our country back to honesty’

The president devoted a long stretch of his Cabinet meeting to a recap of the vice president’s anti-fraud task force, which officials see as a winning issue ahead of midterm elections.

Vance highlighted efforts to stop fraud and misuse in social programs from Medicare and Medicaid to federal student aid. Vance said officials have found tens of billions of dollars in Medicaid and Medicare fraud, adding that “we’re going to find a lot more.”

Trump congratulated officials on the effort, saying it’s a “tremendous amount of money.”

Rubio: No Ebola patients allowed in the US

The Trump administration “cannot and will not allow any cases of Ebola to enter the United States” amid the ongoing outbreak overseas, Rubio said in the Cabinet meeting.

Rubio said the State Department and other agencies are working “very, very hard to contain this crisis to the countries where it’s currently located, particularly the Democratic Republic of the Congo.”

The comments come as the Trump administration has said it is setting up a facility in Kenya where Americans exposed to Ebola can be sent for quarantine and treatment.

Rubio says having ‘failed state’ Cuba so close to the US is a ‘national security threat’

The secretary of state said “Cuba’s in a lot of trouble” and being run by “incompetent communists.”

He didn’t offer any details on U.S. actions related to the island, including a possible intervention, which Trump has hinted might be coming.

But Rubio said of Cuba: “Having a failed state 90 miles from our shores is a threat to the national security of the United States.”

Rubio says ‘diplomacy is always the first option’ on Iran

Asked to give an update on negotiations, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said he felt “there’s been some progress” on discussions with Iran and said the “next few hours and days” would yield more information.

Seated at Trump’s right hand, the country’s chief diplomat stressed that, while the president has “other options” if talks don’t yield the U.S.’ desired outcome, Rubio added, “We prefer the negotiated, diplomatic route, and we’re going to give it every chance to succeed.”

Trump said Rubio had been “all over the place” in recent days. The secretary of state returned to the U.S. last night after a five-day trip that included stops in Sweden and India.

Zelenskyy asks Trump for more US air defense help against Russian missile attacks, Kyiv says

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has written to Trump and Congress asking for more American-made air defense ammunition to counter intensifying Russian ballistic missile attacks, Kyiv said Wednesday.

Meanwhile, Russian lawmakers have backed a bill to draft bank employees to fight against Ukraine’s long-range drones that strike deep inside Russia — with trained bank staff shooting down the unmanned aircraft.

As aerial attacks by both sides escalate in the more than four-year war, Anne Keast-Butler, head of U.K.’s intelligence agency GCHQ, asserted that Russian President Vladimir “Putin is going backwards on the battlefield,” and new data shows “almost half a million Russian soldiers have now been killed since the conflict began.”

Zelenskyy’s letter, obtained by The Associated Press, says deliveries of Patriot PAC-3 missiles and other air defense systems are falling dangerously short as the Iran war diverts U.S. stocks.

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Trump, looking to move his Cabinet meeting along, suggests not all officials will speak

The president said he’d limit speaking roles in the Cabinet meeting to Vance, Attorney General Todd Blanche, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Kelly Loeffler, small business administrator.

“And maybe, if you have some questions, we’ll go to others,” he told reporters.

“But everybody around here has got a lot to say,” Trump said. “But we did that once, and it lasted for like four or five hours. It was a little much.”

Trump’s Cabinet meetings often feature top officials spending long periods of time praising him. That’s led to marathon sessions, though not quite as long as he suggested.

Last summer, one such meeting exceeded three hours.

Trump says his fraud task force will save Social Security. The numbers say otherwise

The U.S. president said at his Cabinet meeting that Social Security payments will be rescued by the crackdown on fraud by a task force led by Vice President JD Vance — a claim undermined by the numbers for the social insurance program.

“I think we have a chance to save Social Security without doing anything to it,” Trump said. “We’re going to make our Social Security so strong.”

The government said last year that Social Security’s trust funds — which cover old age and disability recipients — will be unable to pay full benefits beginning in 2034. That’s because the cost of the benefits for an aging population are exceeding payroll tax revenues.

There is no sign that stopping improper payments would be sufficient to close the gap, as the government estimated they were 3.8% of Social Security expenditures in fiscal 2025.

Despite Social Security’s deteriorating finances under his watch, Trump said it “would be bankrupt” if Democrats were in power.

Trump doubles down that midterms don’t affect his Iran strategy

The president suggested that Iranian leaders think upcoming U.S. elections give them leverage over Trump because of his lagging approval ratings. If so, they’re flat wrong, Trump said.

“They thought they were gonna out-wait me. You know, ’We’ll out-wait him. He’s got the midterms,” Trump said. “I don’t care about the midterms.”

The president alluded to his preferred Texas GOP Senate nominee, Ken Paxton, trouncing Sen. John Cornyn.

“That was the prelude to the midterms,” the president insisted.

To be clear, Trump’s hold over the GOP is unquestioned at this point. But that doesn’t seamlessly translate to November victories – and even many Republicans are nervous that Trump’s standing and GOP nominees like Paxton will drag the party down in the fall as Democrats try to flip control of Capitol Hill.

Trump mixes up U.S. military operations, saying Venezuela when he meant Iran

Early in his Cabinet meeting, the president was trying to downplay the war in Iran, saying, “I don’t call it a war. I call it a conflict.”

“Despite the conflict with Venezuela, who no longer has a navy, no longer has an air force, no longer has a lot of people that were leading the country into very bad places,” Trump said, mixing up that South American country with Iran.

U.S. forces ousted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro to face drug charges. before the U.S. and Israel began airstrikes on Iran.

He later added of Iran and talks about the ongoing ceasefire, “They’re negotiating on fumes,” but also renewed threats to renew major U.S. attacks, “Maybe we have to go back and finish it, maybe we don’t.”

Trump Cabinet meeting begins

It’s the first meeting of the president’s Cabinet since Tulsi Gabbard announced that she would step down as director of national intelligence, effective June 30, due to her husband’s health.

Gabbard is the fourth Cabinet member to depart during Trump’s second term, all of them women.

The meeting also comes at a precarious moment for talks aimed at ending the war with Iran, just days after Trump insisted that his administration and Tehran had “largely negotiated” a settlement but with the negotiations still in a state of flux.

The S&P 500 edged up by less than 0.1% and added to its all-time high set the day before. The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 182 points, or 0.4%, and the Nasdaq composite gained 0.1% as both indexes also set records.

Stocks of companies with big fuel bills helped lead the way on hopes that lower oil prices will remove a big drag on their profits. Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings climbed 6.1%, and United Airlines rallied 6.3%. Delta Air Lines rose 3% and set an all-time high.

The price for a barrel of Brent crude oil fell 4.6% to $92.25 after the ceasefire between the United States and Iran appeared to hold despite the U.S. military launching what it called “self-defense” strikes in southern Iran. A barrel of benchmark U.S. crude fell even more, 5.5%, to settle at $88.68 and is back to where it was in mid-April on hopes that the United States and Iran can reach an agreement to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and allow oil tankers to exit the Persian Gulf for deliveries again.

Stocks have been able to run to records despite the painful inflation and uncertainty caused by high oil prices largely because companies have reported surprisingly strong profits for the start of 2026, and the forecast is for them to continue.

Bath & Body Works rallied 9.7%, and Abercrombie & Fitch climbed 8.9% after both reported bigger profit for the latest quarter than analysts expected. That’s even as U.S. consumers continue to say they’re feeling discouraged about the economy and inflation.

Lululemon Athletica rose 2.9% after reaching a deal with its founder, Chip Wilson, where it will add a former chief marketing officer of ESPN and a former co-CEO of On to its board of directors.

On the losing side of Wall Street was Dick’s Sporting Goods, which dropped 6% despite delivering a profit for the latest quarter that edged past expectations. Analysts pointed to how much profit it wrung out of each $1 in revenue, which some called a bit weak.

Oil-and-gas stocks also sank, hurt by the dropping prices for crude. Exxon Mobil fell 1.3%, and Chevron slipped 1.3%. Halliburton dropped 3.6% to bring its gain for the year so far back toward 40%.

All told, the S&P 500 rose 1.24 to 7,520.36. The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 182.60 points to 50,644.28, and the Nasdaq composite gained 18.55 to 26,674.73.

In the bond market, Treasury yields eased after falling oil prices took pressure off inflation. The yield on the 10-year Treasury slipped to 4.48% from 4.50% late Tuesday and from 4.67% roughly a week ago.

It’s a respite following recent gains for yields in bond markets worldwide, which threatened to slow economies and undercut prices for stocks and all kinds of other investments. High yields have already forced the average long-term U.S. mortgage rate to its most expensive level since last summer, and they could curtail companies’ borrowing to build the artificial-intelligence data centers that have supported the U.S. economy’s growth recently.

In stock markets abroad, indexes were mixed across Europe and Asia. South Korea’s Kospi was one of the world’s best performers and jumped 2.3% after SK Hynix, which is a big beneficiary of the AI boom, soared 9.3%.

A day before, Micron Technology surged to become the latest Big Tech company to be worth more than $1 trillion because of AI excitement. Its stock has more than tripled already in 2026, and analysts at UBS said Tuesday it could soar even more because of how fundamentally AI has improved demand for computer memory. It rose another 3.6% Wednesday.

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AP Business Writer Elaine Kurtenbach contributed to this report.

Jacobs was arrested Tuesday in Brown County on allegations of strangulation and suffocation and other offenses over the weekend. His lawyers said he denies wrongdoing.

District Attorney David Lasee said it's too soon to make a formal charging decision.

“Our office has requested additional investigation, as there is reason to believe that additional evidence may exist that would impact whether criminal charges are appropriate, and what charges would be issued. ... The investigation remains open and is ongoing," Lasee said.

Jacobs' lawyers — David Chesnoff, Richard Schonfeld and Clarence Duchac — said they're pleased that he's out of jail.

“We encourage everyone to keep an open mind while the matter is fully reviewed. We remain confident that, once all of the evidence is gathered and evaluated, it will confirm that no charges should be brought against Josh in the future,” they said.

Hobart/Lawrence Police Chief Michael Renkas said police responded to a complaint about Jacobs around 8:30 a.m. Saturday.

Jacobs is the Packers’ top returning rusher after running for 929 yards and 13 touchdowns in 2025. That followed a 2024 season in which he ran for 1,329 yards and 15 touchdowns while earning his third Pro Bowl selection.

The Packers, who started organized team activities this week, had issued a statement Tuesday saying that they were aware of the matter and that “as it is an ongoing legal situation, we will withhold further comment.”

“I know there’s going to be a lot of questions about Josh,” Packers coach Matt LaFleur said before the Packers' practice on Wednesday. “I’m going to stick with the statement that we put out as an organization and just let the process play out.”

LaFleur declined comment on his reaction to the arrest, how he addressed the matter with the team and whether the Packers had communicated at all with Jacobs over the past few days. He also was asked about whether he has to prepare for the possibility the Packers might have to play part of the season without Jacobs.

“I think a lot’s going to happen between now and then,” LaFleur said.

The Packers canceled a scheduled post-practice availability for reporters with players Wednesday.

Jacobs, 28, has rushed for 7,803 yards and 74 touchdowns in his seven-year career, which included five seasons with the Raiders. He earned All-Pro honors and had an NFL-leading 1,653 yards rushing with Las Vegas in 2022.

The only active players with more career touchdown runs are Baltimore’s Derrick Henry (122) and Buffalo’s Josh Allen (79).

Green Bay lacks proven running backs aside from Jacobs.

The Packers' second-leading rusher last season was Emanuel Wilson, who has since signed with the Seattle Seahawks. The Packers didn’t draft any running backs this year.

Green Bay's second-leading returning rusher is quarterback Jordan Love, who ran for 199 yards last season. The Packers did re-sign running back Chris Brooks, who rushed for 106 yards on 27 carries last season and ran for 183 yards and a touchdown on 36 attempts in 2024.

MarShawn Lloyd, a 2024 third-round pick from Southern California, didn’t play at all last year and appeared in only one game as a rookie because of injuries.

“I think he’s done everything he can in his power to put him in the best possible position," LaFleur said of Lloyd. "He’s just going to have to go out there and prove it.”

Other running backs on Green Bay’s roster include Damien Martinez, Pierre Strong and rookie undrafted free agent Jaden Nixon.

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White reported from Detroit.

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AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/nfl

Trump told reporters on Wednesday that New York Knicks owner James Dolan has invited him to the NBA Finals, when the Eastern Conference champion Knicks host either the Oklahoma City Thunder or the San Antonio Spurs next month at Madison Square Garden.

New York, which is riding an 11-game postseason winning streak after sweeping the Cleveland Cavaliers in the conference finals, is scheduled to host Game 3 on June 8 and Game 4 on June 10.

Trump, a New York native, said he initially planned to attend Game 5 of the conference finals at MSG before the Knicks finished off the Cavaliers in four games. The president called Dolan a “great guy” and marveled at New York's run.

“Boy, what a team,” Trump said. “They have some really great players.”

Trump called the club's return to the finals for the first time since 1999 “great to see.”

“The Knicks have really suffered for years," Trump said to laughter. “They're doing (well) right now.”

Trump has routinely dropped in on prominent sporting events during his time in politics. He's taken in the College Football Playoff championship and caught a prime-time NFL game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the New York Jets just days before the 2024 election.

The Knicks have a history of having high-profile celebrities sit courtside at MSG, including filmmaker Spike Lee, who has clashed with Trump in the past.

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AP NBA: https://apnews.com/hub/nba

The state's Republican leadership filed an emergency appeal with the justices a day after a three-judge court refused to let the state use a map it adopted three years ago that has a majority Black population in just one of its seven congressional districts.

The judges instead required Alabama to continue using a court-ordered map that was put in place for the 2024 elections that includes two districts where Black residents comprise a majority or close to it.

Attorney General Steve Marshall told the court that the state did not intentionally discriminate against Black residents and should be allowed to hold elections this year under a map chosen by lawmakers, not judges.

The appeal is the latest development in the fallout from last month's Supreme Court ruling that struck down a Black-majority district in Louisiana and weakened the federal Voting Rights Act. That ruling has led Republicans in several Southern states, including Alabama, to take steps to reshape voting districts with large minority populations that have elected Democrats.

The redistricting frenzy is part of a broader push by President Donald Trump to try to hold on to Republicans’ slim House majority in the November elections.

Trump's Justice Department backed Alabama's appeal, noting that Alabama is “highly likely to succeed” in its bid to implement a map the administration says would favor Republicans 6-1 in place of a court-ordered “racial gerrymander.”

The Alabama case stretches back several years. The three-judge panel in 2023 ruled that a map drawn by Republican state lawmakers intentionally diluted the voting power of Black citizens. The court said the state, which is about 27% Black, should have two districts where Black voters are the majority or close to it. The court-selected map was used in 2024.

After the Supreme Court’s recent ruling in the Louisiana case, Alabama officials moved to implement the 2023 state-drawn map. The Supreme Court’s conservative majority agreed to lift the injunction that had blocked the map’s use and sent the case back to the three-judge panel for reconsideration in light of the Louisiana ruling.

In the meantime, voters cast ballots in Alabama’s May 19 primaries, and Republican Gov. Kay Ivey set new special primaries for Aug. 11 in four congressional districts affected by the map switch.

Upon further review, the judicial panel said it was standing behind its initial finding that there was “undisputed evidence” of intentional racial discrimination, a holding that was independent of and unaffected by the Supreme Court ruling on the Voting Rights Act.

It said the special congressional primaries should instead proceed under the previous court-approved districts.

The use of the court-ordered map led to the 2024 election of U.S. Rep. Shomari Figures, a Black Democrat. State Republicans are seeking to use a map that would give the GOP an opportunity to reclaim the south Alabama seat.

The state is asking for Supreme Court action by Monday as it makes preparations for the special vote in August.

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This story has been corrected to show the Alabama primaries were May 19, not May 11.

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Associated Press writer Kim Chandler contributed to this report from Montgomery, Ala.

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Follow the AP’s coverage of the U.S. Supreme Court at https://apnews.com/hub/us-supreme-court.

Timothy Hudson was initially arrested and charged as a juvenile, and U.S. Magistrate Judge Edwin Torres ruled in February that the 16-year-old could live with an uncle and be electronically monitored. But after the case was transferred to adult court, prosecutors wanted Hudson in custody.

Minors are rarely prosecuted in federal court, and this case landed there because Kepner apparently died in international waters, outside any state’s jurisdiction.

The judge ended Wednesday morning's hearing without making a final decision, saying he wanted to speak with the U.S. Marshals Service about the logistics of detaining Hudson in central Florida, closer to his family, rather than South Florida, where the trial is taking place.

It's unknown when Torres will announce his decision. In the meantime, Hudson walked out of the courthouse after the hearing, rather than being immediately taken into custody.

Hudson has pleaded not guilty to charges of first-degree murder and aggravated sexual abuse. His federal public defenders have declined to comment on the charges.

Hudson's stepsister, Anna Kepner, had been traveling on the Carnival Horizon ship in November with her family, including Hudson. Before the ship was scheduled to return to Florida, her body was found concealed under a bed in a room she was sharing with Hudson and another teen, a criminal complaint said.

The cause of Kepner's Nov. 6 death was determined to be mechanical asphyxia, which is when an object or physical force stops someone from breathing.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Alejandra Lopez argued Wednesday that the crimes Hudson is accused of are so serious that the court shouldn’t risk another violent attack. An autopsy determined that Kepner had been pinned down and forcibly raped, the prosecutors said. She also noted that it likely took 3-5 minutes for Hudson to strangle Kepner until she was dead.

“I believe there is clear and convincing evidence that this defendant is a danger to the community,” Lopez said.

The prosecutor also argued that Hudson was a much greater flight risk because he now faces a possible life sentence if convicted of the adult charges. As a juvenile, he would have been released at age 21, regardless of what counts he was found delinquent on.

Evan Kuhl, with the Federal Public Defender’s office, told the judge that Hudson has abided by the conditions of his release for months without issue.

The judge acknowledged that an adult facing these charges would almost certainly be detained until trial, but he still needed to consider the reality of Hudson's age, despite the adult charges. While the judge said he agreed with the defense that Hudson was a low flight risk, he still hadn't decided whether the teen posed a threat to the community if certain pre-trial restrictions remained in place.

Kepner's father, Christopher Kepner, previously released a statement, saying the family was placing “trust in the justice system to pursue the truth with care and integrity.”

“The situation is deeply painful and complex for the entire family,” Kepner said.

Anna Kepner was a high school cheerleader at Temple Christian School in Titusville, Florida, about 40 miles (65 kilometers) east of Orlando. At her memorial service in November, family members encouraged people to wear bright colors instead of the traditional black “in honor of Anna’s bright and beautiful soul.”

The more than 300-acre project planned near Williams Road and Marsh Road would include more than 600 homes, retail space, an event venue and a 40-room bed-and-breakfast.

The Winter Garden City Commission approved the proposal on first reading after making changes in response to community concerns. Among those changes was removing a proposed school from the plans and replacing it with a park.

City leaders are also discussing several road improvements aimed at easing congestion, including a traffic signal, a roundabout, additional road connections and a turn lane leading from the development toward a nearby neighborhood.

Still, some residents say the planned improvements will not be enough.

“Take a look at what you’re building, and once you build, you can’t go back,” resident Adam Garcia. “That development is going to cut through our neighborhood for some to get out, and it’s going to cause more traffic,” he said.

Garcia, whose backyard would face the development, said he worries the project will overwhelm nearby roads.

“This is just a residential area, and I think the traffic will be overwhelming,” Garcia said.

He also questioned the scope of the proposed bed-and-breakfast.

“This is not a bed and breakfast,” Garcia said. “A bed and breakfast is a grandma house, but this is a hotel.”

Not all residents are completely opposed to the project. Some neighbors living across from the proposed site said they remain open to the development if road improvements are made.

“I am very open to it. My only concern is the traffic situation,” one resident said.

The resident added that the proposed upgrades could help ease congestion.

“Hopefully that helps,” the resident said. “I have concerns about that, but it sounds like it will be a beautiful community, so I’m going to stay positive.”

The city commission is expected to hold a second reading and final vote on the proposal Thursday night. Residents opposed to the project say they plan to attend the meeting and voice their concerns.

Lemon pleaded not guilty in February to federal civil rights charges, following a protest at a Minnesota church where an Immigration and Customs Enforcement official is a pastor. He is one of 39 people charged in the January incident.

Lemon insists he was at the Cities Church in St. Paul to chronicle the Jan. 18 protest but was not a participant.

Lemon and another independent journalist, Georgia Fort, filed a motion in February seeking transcripts of the grand jury proceedings that resulted in the indictments against them and seven others.

In the latest filing in U.S. District Court in Minneapolis, Lemon's attorneys argue that “the past 15 months have seen an unprecedented and growing distrust in the Justice Department’s use of the grand jury process.” For that reason, the transcripts from Lemon's grand jury should be released, his attorneys said.

“In the past two weeks alone, several courts have chastised Justice Department prosecutors for irregularities in the grand jury process and gone so far as to dismiss indictments for grand jury misconduct,” Lemon's attorneys said in the Wednesday filing.

A spokesperson for the Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Lemon cites the May 21 dismissal of all pending charges against four remaining activists who protested outside a federal building during last year’s immigration crackdown in Chicago. The dismissal came after a judge scrutinized allegations of grand jury misconduct by the prosecutor’s office.

Lemon also cites the May 15 dismissal of nine felony grand jury indictments by three federal judges in Wyoming. The judges cited misconduct by the interim U.S. attorney that could have prejudiced the jurors, including comments he made to the grand jurors.

Lemon cites a third case out of Rhode Island where a federal judge on May 13 blocked the Trump administration’s sweeping demands for confidential transgender patient information from the state's largest hospital that provides gender-affirming care to minors.

In that case, the judge rebuked actions by prosecutors, saying the Justice Department can no longer be trusted to enforce its power fairly and honestly.

Finally, Lemon’s attorneys referenced the denial of search warrants sought by the Justice Department related to Lemon’s YouTube channel and YouTube account and cellphone information related to four other defendants. The magistrate judge held that the government did not establish probable cause to believe that evidence of a crime would be found in what the Justice Department wanted to search.

The search warrants were rejected in February, but the court record was unsealed on Tuesday.

Several judges — including the chief federal judge for Minnesota — found no probable cause to support the complaints that prosecutors first tried to file against the two journalists, so they refused to sign arrest warrants for Lemon or Fort before the government turned to the grand jury.

Lemon's attorneys argue they should be allowed to see the grand jury records because of the “checkered history of this case” and “numerous examples of grand jury misconduct by DOJ around the country.”

Lemon is “entitled to see whether the government allowed the grand jury to serve its role or whether, as elsewhere, the government interfered with the proper function of the grand jury,” his attorneys argued.

Outside Temple Christian School, a cross still marks where Kepner parked her car up right until the family cruise last November when federal prosecutors say her stepbrother raped and strangled her in the room they were sharing.

While Hudson was in Miami Wednesday for a bond hearing, your Titusville Community Correspondent James Sparvero called Kepner’s dad, Chris Kepner, who told Sparvero he wanted the judge to hold Hudson until trial.

Instead, Hudson was allowed to go home to his family in Hernando County, Florida where he’s been staying for months.

“I want him in custody,” Kepner said. “I think that if he was in custody, we would possibly get more out of this kid, considering that he’s saying that he doesn’t remember. With him being free and being able to do what he wants, he’s put it in the back of his mind like there’s no consequences for his actions.”

Anna Kepner’s actions left a lasting impact on her community.

Since November, students and parents at her school have said how much they adored her.

“She was full of hope,” Temple Christian School parent Rosa Pissanos said. “She would turn a sad room into a happy room. She was just a light.”

That light shined at the school’s graduation ceremony this month.

Kepner talked about accepting his daughter’s diploma.

“It was very nice what the school did for us,” the father said. “The school gave us the yearbook, and they made a whole page about Anna.”

Kepner said the school’s making his daughter’s parking spot a permanent memorial for Anna, and one that never chips or fades.

Like her grandfather, Kepner said his daughter wanted to join the Navy after graduation.

The 39-year-old Djokovic was pushed by 74th-ranked French player Valentin Royer — who is 15 years younger than him — for more than 3½ hours before he reached the third round with a 6-3, 6-2, 6-7 (7), 6-3 victory.

For the fourth straight day of this year’s tournament, the temperature rose above 32 degrees Celsius (90 Fahrenheit).

“When you play a three-and-a-half hour match on clay, it’s long and very exhausting,” Djokovic said. “These days have been really, really very challenging for a lot of players.”

When Djokovic won a key point early in the fourth set with a forehand that he whipped around the net post from far off the court, the 24-time Grand Slam champion waved his arms toward the crowd inside Court Philippe-Chatrier.

Djokovic wasted a chance to close the match out earlier when he missed a backhand long in the third-set tiebreaker then required four more match points in his final service game before a forehand from Royer landed in the net to conclude a long rally.

When it was finally over after 3 hours and 44 minutes, Djokovic first nearly stumbled to the clay. Then he performed his violin celebration, acting as if he were playing the strings on his racket like the musical instrument.

Before arriving in Paris, Royer had earned only one tour-level win across 11 tournaments he played this season.

Djokovic came to Roland Garros with questions over his form after getting beat in his only clay-court match before the tournament. He lost to Croatian qualifier Dino Prizmic at the Italian Open after two months out due to a right shoulder injury.

But Djokovic is playing himself back into form after coming back from a set down to beat Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard, another Frenchman, in a first-round match that lasted nearly three hours.

Djokovic improved to 14-0 in his career against Frenchmen at Roland Garros and reached the third round in Paris for a 21st straight year. He raised the Coupe des Mousquetaires trophy in 2016, 2021 and 2023.

“Hopefully I won’t face another Frenchman until the end of the tournament,” Djokovic said with a laugh during his on-court interview. “Oh my God, I’ve had enough.”

One duo of Djokovic fans inside the main stadium held up a sign with a goat on it — for “Greatest of All Time” — that read “39 is the new 29.”

Up next for Djokovic is potentially a bigger test against 19-year-old Brazilian Joao Fonseca, who came back from two sets down for a 3-6, 4-6, 6-3, 6-1, 6-2 victory over the 20-year-old Prizmic. Fonseca has been touted as a future Grand Slam contender.

Meanwhile, Jakub Mensik collapsed to the clay because of cramps and had a tough time getting up after edging Mariano Navone in a fifth-set tiebreaker. That match lasted 4 hours, 41 minutes.

Then in the next match on Court 6, Hailey Baptiste was forced to retire while facing a set point against Wang Xiyu after landing awkwardly on her left leg.

Djokovic suggested that French Open organizers should consider moving more matches later in the day and night on days with extreme heat.

“With Grand Slams it shouldn’t be an issue, because we have so many courts,” Djokovic said. “If you have certain days that you have extreme heat and conditions, then maybe that’s something to consider.”

In the night session, second-seeded Alexander Zverev beat Tomas Machac 6-4, 6-2, 6-2.

Ukraine gets 3 wins

Elena Rybakina, this year’s Australian Open winner, was beaten by Ukrainian opponent Yuliia Starodubtseva 3-6, 6-1, 7-6 (4).

Also advancing were Ukrainians Elina Svitolina and Marta Kostyuk, who are coming off trophies at the Madrid Open and Italian Open, respectively.

The seventh-seeded Svitolina beat Kaitlin Quevedo 6-0, 6-4 to extend her winning streak to eight matches. The 15th-seeded Kostyuk beat Katie Volynets 6-7 (4), 6-3, 6-3 to extend her winning streak to 13 matches.

“I’m most pleased that I didn’t cramp to death or didn’t pass out during this match,” Kostyuk said after her match, which lasted nearly three hours. “It was not easy for everyone.”

Swiatek improves Paris record to 42-3

Four-time champion Iga Swiatek improved her career record at Roland Garros to 42-3 by eliminating 35th-ranked Sara Bejlek 6-2, 6-3.

Swiatek won Roland Garros in 2020, 2022, 2023 and 2024.

Swiatek next faces Magda Linette in the first all-Polish meeting at Roland Garros in the professional era (since 1968). Linette eliminated 2017 champion Jelena Ostapenko 6-2, 2-6, 6-2.

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AP Sports Writer Samuel Petrequin contributed to this report.

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AP tennis: https://apnews.com/hub/tennis

Perry Carpenter calls himself a Chief Deception Strategist with security company KnowBe4. When Austin joked that it sounded like a politician’s title, Carpenter didn’t disagree.

What Carpenter demonstrated next was unsettling. He pulled up Austin’s Instagram account mid-interview and began harvesting real videos the anchor had posted publicly. He dropped them into programs designed to clone a person’s voice and face, then used that data to generate a new version of Austin — one with very different intentions.

[WATCH BELOW: Real and deepfake Matt Austin]

In the fake video, “Austin” promoted a meme coin to his Instagram followers.

“Hey there, Instagram fam, Matt Austin here. Coming to you today with an offer you will not believe. It’s my new meme coin.”

The whole thing took about 45 minutes.

The fabricated Austin looked very convincing. He sounded fairly convincing. The real Austin knew it wasn’t him — but wasn’t sure a viewer would.

Carpenter says that’s exactly the point. He describes the most dangerous type of deepfake as taking a video of someone found online and making them say something they never said, to an audience they never intended to reach.

Then Carpenter went further. He wore Austin’s face in real time — a digital skin suit, the kind a scammer could use in a live video call to fully impersonate someone to their friends, family, or followers.

Carpenter even turned himself and News 6 producer Robert Breuer into Gandalf from The Lord of the Rings in real time.

These live deepfakes can be especially damaging as part of romance, investment, blackmail, or celebrity schemes.

News 6 recently reported that a Leesburg couple lost $45,000 to an alleged car giveaway from billionaire Elon Musk. The scheme included a deepfake video of Musk.

Public-facing people like Musk are especially exposed. Journalists, influencers, anyone who posts regularly online — every video is raw material waiting to be harvested.

Carpenter says bad actors could then make you say something - that you never said - to your audience that could end up costing them money or cause them to lose faith in you.

AI-generated videos can also be used as pranks, which can be criminal if they cross the line.

For example, in April, the Seminole County Sheriff’s Office announced a man was arrested on multiple charges after he reportedly showed an AI-generated video to a deputy and falsely reported a crime.

So what’s the takeaway?

“The lesson to learn is to realize that our reality is already so warped that we do not know what’s real and what’s not,” Carpenter said. “Healthy skepticism without giving in to cynicism, I think, is good.”

When asked if our viewers could use software or an AI tool to determine if a video is AI-Generated, Carpenter replied:

“It’s important that your viewers know that even though some sites say they can determine if a video is AI or not, they all have fundamental flaws that can lead people to a false sense of reality. I’ve been able to trick every single “deepfake detector” that I’ve ever tried. There is no reliable “easy button” for determining if something is AI-generated or not. As AI gets better, it’s getting harder and harder for both humans and machines to tell what’s real from what is not.”

It’s not a reassuring answer. But given what he just demonstrated with another person’s face in under an hour, it might be the honest one.

Hope for Humanity?

A new University of Florida study found humans still outperform artificial intelligence at detecting deepfake videos, correctly identifying fake clips about two-thirds of the time, even as AI programs struggled.

Researchers say the findings offer some hope as deepfake technology evolves, suggesting people can still recognize subtle inconsistencies in movement, expressions and timing that machines often miss.

What is Washington doing about deepfakes?

Members of Congress are pushing new federal protections against deepfakes and AI-generated impersonations through the bipartisan NO FAKES Act, legislation reintroduced last week by U.S. Reps. María Elvira Salazar and Madeleine Dean, along with Sens. Marsha Blackburn and Chris Coons

The bill would create federal protections for a person’s voice and likeness, allowing victims to take action against people or companies that create or profit from unauthorized digital replicas.

“In this new era of AI, bad actors are quickly and easily profiting from the creativity of others. Our laws must catch up,” Rep. Salazar said.

The Council for Innovation Promotion (C4IP), a bipartisan intellectual property advocacy coalition, also voiced support for the No Fakes Act, noting that the updated version of the bill includes additional protections for legitimate AI users, such as libraries and research institutions, while still targeting deceptive digital replicas.

“The growing sophistication of AI-generated deepfakes underscores the need for robust, clear, and consistent federal safeguards,” said Frank Cullen, executive director of C4IP.

Meanwhile, the Take It Down Act, signed by President Trump last month, mandates that social media platforms remove non-consensual intimate images and AI-generated deepfakes within 48 hours of notification. This federal law aims to combat the online publication of intimate content, with violations resulting in penalties.

Federal prosecutors have already charged two men with using artificial intelligence to create nude videos and photos of female celebrities under the new law.

More about KnowBe4 and KB4-CON

Staying ahead of security dangers like AI-generated deepfakes, is part of the reason why KnowBe4 launched KB4-CON in 2018.

Their website says, “It is the human risk management industry’s premier event, bringing together KnowBe4 customers, channel partners, prospects, plus security advocates and industry professionals.”

While News 6 was there for the deepfake demonstration, we observed hundreds of people in attendance. Many were on their way to and from the various security and product sessions.

In an arrest affidavit, deputies said they responded to 5300 Pointe Vista Circle shortly before 3 a.m. after being called about a hit-and-run.

Upon arrival, the responding deputy wrote he found an SUV with a missing tire parked over the curb.

The deputy said he then spoke with the driver — identified as 22-year-old Winny Exume — and the victim, who claimed he’d been hanging out a group of his friends.

During the conversation, the deputy learned that Exume had approached the victim and accused him of “trying to talk to her girlfriend,” the affidavit shows.

“(The victim) advised he never tried to speak to her in a romantic (way) and that he just wants to keep hanging out with everyone,” the affidavit reads. “Winny began to argue with (the victim) while getting into her vehicle.”

Exume reportedly began yelling “I’m going to kill you” as she got into the SUV, and once in the driver’s seat, she stated, “If you don’t move out of the way, I’m going to hit you,” the affidavit states.

Afterward, Exume reversed out of the parking lot before putting the SUV in drive and accelerating toward the victim, hitting both him and two other parked vehicles before fleeing, the deputy added.

Exume was later arrested and now faces charges of aggravated battery with a motor vehicle and leaving the scene of a hit-and-run crash with property damage.

A memo filed on Friday shows that a special committee for the Eleventh Circuit — which covers Florida, Georgia and Alabama — issued an order against the judge back in February, finding that the judge engaged in “judicial misconduct” due to the following:

• Engaging in an extramarital affair with a high-ranking law enforcement officer and having sexual intercourse in the judge’s chambers during business hours within hearing distance of staff
• Attending a partisan political event
• Making false statements to the Chief Circuit Judge and Chief District Judge that were material to the investigation of the allegations

Court records reveal that complaints about the judge surfaced back in September, stemming from a law clerk who accused the judge of having sex with the officer multiple times prior in chambers during work hours — all within earshot of the judge’s staff.

While neither the judge nor the officer are explicitly named, records do reveal that the officer held a high rank in “a certain police department.”

“The law clerk also reported that the subject judge failed to mentor the law clerks and edit their work, displayed visible anger to the law clerks, including yelling and cursing, and, on one occasion, told staff that the judge had ‘too many martinis the night before’ at an event for a District Attorney,” the complaint reads.

Shortly thereafter, the judge in question called the allegations “outrageous” and “baseless,” implying that the clerk had made up the accusations in retaliation after being repeatedly chastised for performance issues, court records show.

However, a special committee was formed to look into the issues, and it found that the judge’s conduct surrounding the affair “demonstrated a gross lack of judgment,” creating a troubling environment for the judge’s staff.

“Moreover, the special committee noted that the affair made the subject judge vulnerable to potential extortion or blackmail...” the complaint continues. “As to the subject judge’s attendance at a partisan political event, the special committee found that the subject judge knowingly attended an event hosted by a district attorney’s campaign.”

Furthermore, the committee determined that the judge had made “numerous, material false statements” when initially responding to the allegations, such as denying the sexual affair at the courthouse.

As such, the committee suggested a private reprimand, and the judge agreed not to oppose the sanction, as well as write apology letters to the former law clerks and refrain from serving on any Judicial Conference committee.

The special committee also decided against a more severe sanction due to the judge correcting the false statements and being unlikely to engage in similar misconduct in the future.

You can read through the full memo below:

Judicial Complaint by Anthony Talcott

Woodensky Pierre is a defensive midfielder who plays for Violette AC in Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince. An estimated 70% of that city is under siege by violent gangs.

The other 25 players on the World Cup squad play outside the country, coming from leagues in places like England, France, Portugal, Canada and the United States.

This year's World Cup will be only the second for Haiti in its history — the country’s only other appearance on soccer’s biggest stage was in 1974.

Haitian soccer federation spokesman Thecieux Jeanty said all but one player on the 1974 World Cup team was living and playing in Haiti at that time.

The U.S. visas for Pierre and nearly a dozen other officials with the Haitian soccer federation have yet to come through as the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump continues to expand travel restrictions from countries including Haiti.

Pierre continues to train at a field with synthetic grass in Pétion-Ville, an upscale area of Port-au-Prince, as he awaits his visa, “in hopes of being with his team as soon as possible,” Jeanty told The Associated Press in a phone interview Wednesday.

“I hope he doesn’t have to live in (Haiti) after the World Cup,” Jeanty said. “It’s an opportunity to present himself to the world and await a contract.”

The team’s home stadium in Port-au-Prince — not far from the neighborhood where Pierre is from — was deemed too dangerous, forcing Haiti to play its “home” World Cup qualifiers in Curaçao.

Pierre is from Cite Soleil, a seaside slum that has endured violence and hunger for years and serves as a base for powerful gang leaders. Cite Soleil has seen multiple massacres and gang rapes, with violence recently displacing more than 5,300 people, according to the latest report from the U.N.’s International Organization for Migration.

“It’s a source of pride for him,” Jeanty said of Pierre being able to play in the World Cup. “It’s satisfying for (soccer) officials and for the public, too. As you know, Haiti is in crisis.”

Pierre did not return messages seeking comment, and neither did the team’s coach.

Officials for Haiti’s squad arrived in Florida on Sunday, and players began training in Port St. Lucie on Tuesday. Three other players are scheduled to arrive on Wednesday, Jeanty said.

There is still time to resolve Pierre’s situation. Haiti will play two World Cup warmup matches, first against New Zealand on Tuesday and then against Peru on June 5, in South Florida.

Haiti opens World Cup play on June 13 in Foxborough, Massachusetts, against Scotland, then plays five-time champion Brazil on June 19 in Philadelphia and Morocco on June 24 in Atlanta.

Jeanty said he first made contact with Pierre in 2022, when they traveled together to Honduras for a under-20 match.

“I saw him as a top-level player,” Jeanty said, adding that “everybody’s very happy” to have Pierre on the team.

“There is soccer in Haiti,” Jeanty said. “It’s a country that wants to live.”

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AP Sports Writer Tim Reynolds in Miami contributed to this report.

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AP World Cup: https://apnews.com/hub/fifa-world-cup

In a report, deputies said they responded to the incident along Northwest 18th Place in Dunnellon on Saturday afternoon.

Upon arrival, deputies learned that the toddler and his family members had gone outside to feed the animals on the property, the report shows.

“(His uncle) advised he did not notice the juvenile decedent was not with him, and then he observed the juvenile decedent’s father... pulling the juvenile decedent from the pool,” the incident report reads.

The father then reportedly provided CPR to the toddler before the child was taken to the hospital, according to investigators.

However, the sheriff’s office revealed that the child ultimately died.

The Florida Department of Health warns families to keep their infants safe when around bodies of water, as drowning is the leading cause of unintentional death to children ages 1-4.

“Most infant drownings occur in just a few inches of water, such as a bathtub or bucket,” state officials caution. “Home swimming pools are where most children are likely to drown. However, natural bodies of water still pose threats to older children and adults.”

The quarantine and treatment center being set up by the Departments of Defense, State and Health and Human Services will be designed for Ebola patients who need to get out of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and receive care quickly, said the official, who insisted on anonymity to share the Republican administration’s plans. The person said the plan would help patients avoid an hourslong medical evacuation to the U.S.

It was unclear where in Kenya the new facility will be built or whether the Kenyan government has signed off on the plan.

The official said the facility will be able to care for the full spectrum of Ebola, a rare but severe disease that is often fatal in people. But the official said people may be transported elsewhere for more advanced care as appropriate.

Kenya’s health minister confirmed officials there were talking with the U.S. about “preparedness and response mechanisms for Ebola” but didn’t address whether the country would establish a treatment facility for Americans.

“Any arrangements regarding international health cooperation will be guided by Kenya’s national laws, public health regulations, biosafety and biosecurity standards, and the government’s responsibility to safeguard the health and welfare of Kenyans,” Health Minister Aden Duale said in a statement.

For decades, medical experts have suggested moving patients suffering from Ebola and similar illnesses as little as possible in case their condition worsens, said Dr. Ali Khan, the public health college dean at the University of Nebraska Medical Center. But, he added, the quality of care must be equivalent to what someone would receive in American facilities.

“You’ve got to make sure the patient gets the best quality care, and you need to ensure excellent infection control,” said Khan, who earlier in his career led international responses to Ebola and other outbreaks for the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Dr. Craig Spencer, a public health professor and emergency medicine doctor at Brown University who survived Ebola in 2014, said he doesn’t expect the facility in Kenya to provide the same quality of care that dedicated facilities in the United States do. He said refusing to consider bringing American Ebola patients home for treatment is “a moral abdication of what this country owes its own.”

An earlier outbreak

During a massive Ebola outbreak in west Africa in 2014 and 2015, more than a half dozen infected Americans were brought back to the United States. That experience prompted the establishment of a U.S. network of quarantine and isolation facilities across the country.

But during that earlier outbreak, Trump, then a businessman and reality TV star, repeatedly criticized then-President Barack Obama, a Democrat, for bringing infected Americans home for care.

“The U.S. cannot allow EBOLA infected people back. People that go to far away places to help out are great — but must suffer the consequences!” he wrote in a 2014 tweet.

He also suggested a plan similar to the one described to the AP by the administration official: “Treat them, at the highest level, over there,” Trump wrote in July 2014.

During a Cabinet meeting on Wednesday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the State Department and other agencies were working “very, very hard to contain this crisis to the countries where it’s currently located, particularly the Democratic Republic of the Congo.”

“We cannot and will not allow any cases of Ebola to enter the United States,” he said.

Americans who've been exposed to Ebola

Earlier this month, an American doctor working in Congo tested positive for Ebola and was sent to Germany for medical care. Serge, a Christian missionary organization, identified him as Dr. Peter Stafford. Stafford’s wife and four children did not have symptoms but also were flown to Germany and placed in isolation at Berlin’s Charite University Hospital.

On Wednesday, the hospital said the patient was in stable condition.

“The viral load measured in the patient has dropped very, very rapidly over the course of the week," likely thanks to antiviral therapy, Dr. Leif Erik Sander, director of the hospital’s infectious diseases department, told reporters.

Another American medical missionary, Dr. Patrick LaRochelle, was transported to the Czech Republic for isolation after he was exposed to Ebola, though he did not have any symptoms, according to the missionary organization.

Health authorities in Congo have been struggling to contain the outbreak, which the World Health Organization has said is outpacing them.

The number of suspected Ebola cases in eastern Congo is nearing 1,000, with at least 220 suspected deaths. Congo’s health ministry on Tuesday said 101 cases have been confirmed and it's looking into more than 3,000 possible contacts.

Challenges include the threat of armed groups in eastern Congo, a large number of displaced people and poor infrastructure.

The Wall Street Journal was first to report the Trump administration's plan for the Kenya facility.

US officials expand airport screening

Meanwhile, officials have been expanding the number of U.S. airports where CDC staffers are screening and monitoring incoming passengers from outbreak countries. Enhanced screenings began last week at Washington Dulles International Airport and Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. CDC staff began screenings at George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston this week, and are being dispatched to start screenings Friday at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport.

The CDC’s acting director, Jay Bhattacharya, sent an email Monday to CDC employees asking for volunteers from across the agency to work the screening stations. CDC veterans say it’s not unusual to see a call for volunteers for staffing major epidemic responses.

The government also has temporarily banned the entry of people without U.S. passports, as well as U.S. green-card holders, who have visited Congo, Uganda or South Sudan in the last 21 days.

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AP journalists Evelyne Musambi in Nairobi, Julie Walker in New York and Kerstin Sopke in Berlin contributed to this report.

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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

Pilgrims in Mina chanted “Allahu akbar,” or “God is great,” in the ritual seen as a symbolic stoning of the devil. The act is also seen as rejecting evil and a commemoration of the Prophet Ibrahim’s rejection of temptation when the devil tried to dissuade him from submitting to God’s will.

The physically demanding Hajj is occurring in intense heat. Many pilgrims poured water over their heads to cool themselves or carried umbrellas. Saudi authorities have highlighted the importance of drinking water and reducing direct exposure to sunlight. The National Center of Meteorology shared the high temperatures.

Aamar Shakur, a pilgrim from Pakistan, said he saw the pebble throwing as a symbol of confronting personal struggles in which he was “throwing the stone to my own devil.”

Crowds moved through the sprawling Jamarat complex after arriving from Muzdalifah, following a day of worship and prayer at Arafat on Tuesday.

The last days of the Hajj coincide with Eid al-Adha, or “Feast of Sacrifice,” marking the willingness of Ibrahim, known as Abraham to Christians and Jews, to sacrifice his son. During the holiday, Muslims typically slaughter sheep or cattle and distribute part of the meat to the poor.

The Hajj, one of the Five Pillars of Islam, is required once in a lifetime of every Muslim who can afford it and is physically able. Performed over several days, the Hajj can be a deeply moving spiritual experience and a chance to seek God’s forgiveness. Rituals on its final days also include circling the cube-shaped Kaaba.

The joyous occasion is subdued for some

The Hajj brings together Muslims of diverse races, ethnicities, languages and socioeconomic classes, creating a sense of unity for many. More than 1.5 million pilgrims have arrived from abroad, a Saudi official said Friday.

This year's Hajj takes place against the backdrop of a tenuous ceasefire in the Iran war and related uncertainty throughout the region. Eid al-Adha is typically joyous, marked with communal prayers, food and festive gatherings. In some places, though, conflicts and economic pressures are dampening festivities.

Lebanon is observing Eid al-Adha amid a conflict between Israel and the Hezbollah militant group. Many displaced people are sheltering in tented settlements or public schools repurposed as shelters.

“There is no Eid for us. We are displaced, forced to leave our land, our homes, our livelihoods, while our memories are being destroyed,” said Rabee Khreis, who fled the village of Khiyam, where intense fighting has taken place.

A U.S.-brokered ceasefire in the Israel-Hezbollah conflict appears more nominal by the day, complicating efforts at a broader peace.

‘Eid is only for the people who lost no one’

In the Gaza Strip, where the Israel-Hamas war has devastated the territory and displaced most of its people, Palestinians are observing a subdued Eid al-Adha under a fragile ceasefire and rampant suffering.

“This is not Eid ... we’re dead,” said Mahmoud Saqer, a displaced man from Khan Younis.

In Khan Younis and Gaza City worshippers gathered for prayers amid destroyed buildings and with few signs of celebration.

“There’s no Eid. My children were killed,” said Ayda Al-Banna, a displaced woman from Gaza City, who prayed with her granddaughter. “Eid is only for the people who lost no one.”

Israel’s military offensive in Gaza has killed more than 72,803 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry. The ministry, part of the Hamas-led government, maintains detailed casualty records that are seen as generally reliable by U.N. agencies and independent experts. It does not give a breakdown of civilians and militants.

Israel launched the offensive after Hamas-led militants killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took another 251 hostage on Oct. 7, 2023. While the heaviest fighting has mostly subsided since a fragile ceasefire took effect on Oct. 10, deadly Israeli strikes have repeatedly disrupted the truce. Hamas and Israel have accused each other of violating the ceasefire.

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Fam reported from Winter Park, Florida. Associated Press journalists Wafaa Shurafa in Deir al-Balah, Gaza Strip, and Ali Sharafeddine in Beirut contributed.

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Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

But this wasn't a small-town mayor assuring a few dozen community members at a town hall that municipal improvement efforts would be completed in time for Little League season.

This was President Donald Trump — channeling his decades as a high-profile real estate developer — regaling his assembled Cabinet and a nationally televised audience on Wednesday with the ins and outs of beautification projects around Washington.

“I love construction. It's very exciting,” Trump said, maintaining that the face-lift he's helped oversee to the nation's capital means “D.C. is looking beautiful.”

His aside lasted 10 minutes and was far more comprehensive than anything said about the other major issues discussed during the meeting, including the war in Iran. There were also only passing references to gas prices nationwide that have spiked and fears about a weakening economy that could hurt Trump's Republican Party in its push to retain control of Congress after November's midterm elections.

He offered new details of his construction plans, suggesting for the first time that they'd extend to the fountain at the World War II Memorial.

The president also said that, under his watch, construction crews were working to improve 28 fountains, then bragged about a push to renovate the “reflecting lake” or “reflecting pond” — actually the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool — which he said had been steam-cleaned, fumigated and coated with “American flag blue” paint.

“Over the years, I built hundreds of pools,” Trump said, recalling his days as a construction mogul in 1970s and '80s New York. “I always like to build Olympic-sized swimming pools.”

The president noted that, as part of the revamp, cleaning crews had removed “more than 10 dumpsters of garbage.”

“Every corner had massive amounts,” he said, before offering, “I guess that’s the way the tide goes” — even though no tide flows into the pool.

Trump said the idea was to complete the project by Independence Day and it was mostly on track, except that recent rains in Washington had presented delays.

But the most detail came when the president turned to power-washing.

Workers “sandblasted it, and then we pebble-blasted,” Trump said, explaining it as “a bigger version of sand.”

He said that, to guard against leaks, crews were using “a very sophisticated form of rubber.”

The president also said he'd been responsible for a rebuild of the park across Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House.

“I made a contribution to redoing Lafayette Park. That’s the entrance to the White House. And it was an embarrassment that floors were broken,” Trump said, meaning the park's brick walkways.

Through it all, most Cabinet members listened intently with little emotion, except Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick — already known for conspicuously laughing loudest at such meetings — who nodded frequently and enthusiastically along this time. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum also offered comments about some of the renovation projects when prompted.

Before turning his attention to city improvements, the president opened the meeting by saying only a few select Cabinet members would be allowed to speak in hopes of moving things along more quickly.

“Everybody around here has got a lot to say. But we did that once, and it lasted for like four or five hours. It was a little much,” Trump said.

That was an exaggeration, though his past Cabinet meetings have indeed featured lengthy comments — often highly laudatory of Trump — from top officials. One such meeting last summer pushed the public portion past the three-hour mark.

In the end, Trump's construction update took up about one-eighth of an 80-minute meeting. It was up to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to help get things back on track and steered toward Iran. “I think, actually, your efforts on the reflecting pool are actually a great segue,” Hegseth offered.

“If you look at Washington and Lincoln, these are two men that faced monumental tasks and stood up in historic fashion and delivered for the American people,” the defense secretary said. “And, when you step back and look at 47 years of what Iran waged — war against us and our people — there’s only one man, over the course of both presidencies, who has stood up and said they will never get a nuclear weapon.”

Judge Pamela K. Chen accepted the explanation provided by U.S. Attorney Joseph Nocella Jr. about why the government wanted to dismiss the indictment against Hernan Lopez.

A smiling Lopez, the former CEO of Fox International Channels, later left the Brooklyn federal courthouse, telling reporters he was relieved that “a case that never should have started is finally over.”

Nocella told Chen that the administration preferred to focus on domestic and foreign terrorist organizations, national security, narcotics trafficking, human trafficking and violent gangs.

The judge said Nocella's stated reason, along with an explanation in a written document submitted to the court, “does provide sufficient justification” to accept the request to dismiss the indictment.

Lopez and Full Play Group SA, a South American sports media company, were convicted in 2023 of paying tens of millions of dollars in bribes to nab broadcasting rights to the World Cup and other top soccer matches. But they were subsequently granted an acquittal by Chen.

An appeals court reinstated the convictions in July, but additional appeals followed and the fate of the prosecution had been uncertain.

Chen said during Wednesday’s hearing that she was not basing her decision to dismiss the indictment “in any way” on her prior decision granting the acquittal.

Prosecutors told the Supreme Court in December that the government has now determined that “dismissal of this criminal case is in the interests of justice,” though they did not expand on their rationale.

Before ruling Wednesday, Chen asked the various parties to say how a broader decade-old corruption case related to TV rights for international soccer tournaments, including numerous convictions, would be affected by the indictment dismissal.

FIFA, soccer's governing body, said in a court filing two weeks ago that it agreed with the U.S. government that dismissing charges against Lopez and Full Play “would have no direct effect on the convictions of other defendants.”

FIFA said it has worked closely with the Department of Justice “in its efforts to root out corruption in football” and had taken disciplinary action, including lifetime bans to address misconduct the United States had unearthed.

The Justice Department told the judge in a March 12 letter that every other prosecution in the case had its own particular facts and circumstances.

In its filing, FIFA said the U.S. government had already turned over $201 million to FIFA and other organizations to disburse funds to support soccer-related projects with community impact worldwide.

Among projects FIFA cited were those establishing after-school soccer leagues in poor neighborhoods in Miami, the refurbished of community soccer fields in Ohio, Tennessee and Washington, D.C., the establishment of training programs for teachers and coaches in the Caribbean, and the hosting of children's soccer tournaments in South America.

Lloyd wasn't sure what to tell them, but she knew the confusing new policy would slow down applications.

“It has a chilling effect because we have some cases that we were going to proceed and I can tell already, we should wait and see what’s going on," she said.

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services announced Friday that foreigners in the U.S. who want a green card will need to leave and apply in their home country, barring some unspecified exceptions.

The announcement, which potentially affects hundreds of thousands of green card applicants a year, was the latest immigration policy unveiled by Trump's Republican administration to stun and confound lawyers, advocates and immigrants. It's also part of a pivot by the administration to target legal pathways to immigration, after focusing since last year mostly on migrants in the U.S. illegally.

“This is simply an attempt to try to limit and scare people away from the legal immigration process,” immigration attorney Charles Kuck said, adding that he expected legal action against the change. “This is a scare tactic.”

As worried immigrants and their employers flood immigration law offices with questions, it's unclear what the effect will be, what exceptions might be allowed and how the policy will play out on the ground.

Some green card seekers were already facing questions about why they should be allowed to apply from the U.S.

A confusing rollout for the new policy

For more than half a century, foreign nationals with legal status have been able to apply for and complete the process for permanent residence in the United States — including people married to U.S. citizens, holders of work and student visas, and refugees and political asylum-seekers, among others.

That appeared to change suddenly on Friday, when USCIS announced the shift on its website.

“From now on, an alien who is in the U.S. temporarily and wants a Green Card must return to their home country to apply, except in extraordinary circumstances," the agency said.

USCIS also issued a more detailed policy memo designed as guidance for its staffers who decide these cases. Immigration experts who were trying to decipher the news said the memo was more nuanced, leading to confusion over what the change actually entailed.

In response to questions from The Associated Press, the Department of Homeland Security said Wednesday the shift wouldn't prevent anyone “who legitimately and properly” qualifies from obtaining a green card although it will result in some people having to apply overseas with the State Department. The department said the policy would have “no noticeable impact on highly qualified applicants and skilled professionals who have followed the law.”

One immigration law firm, Boundless Immigration, in a blog post on its website stating its interpretation of the policy, said officers were being instructed to “apply existing discretionary standards more rigorously” but surmised that the policy doesn't completely stop the adjustment of status process for “eligible applicants” depending on the category of visa they have.

The company cited previous policy memos about citizenship acquisition that had not prompted harsher steps in practice.

Immigration firms and advocates left guessing who'll be impacted

Shev Dalal-Dheini, senior director of government relations at the American Immigration Lawyers Association, said the guidance may be targeting people who overstayed their visas, such as the parent of a U.S. citizen who remained after a visa expired, an employee of a company who transferred to the U.S. or people in the country on visas specific to clergy and other religious workers.

“It seems like maybe who they’re targeting is potentially those whose period of stay lapsed while they were here,” she said.

Kevin Miner, a partner with the immigration law firm Fragomen, said he expected that people on employment-based visas, like H-1Bs, would be exempt. Known as dual-intent, these visas allow people on nonimmigrant visas in the U.S. to seek a green card. Those dual-intent visas were specifically mentioned in the memo as areas of possible exception.

“Those probably are cases that will continue to precede business as usual and that we won’t see a significant impact,” said Miner, who said the announcement Friday took people by surprise.

Matthew Soerens, the U.S. director of church mobilization for World Relief, an organization that helps resettle refugees in the U.S., said language in the memo referring to cases in which immigrants have to adjust their status in the U.S. gives the organization “hope” and “expectation” that the guidance doesn't apply to refugees.

Refugees are people who are fleeing their homeland who meet a specific set of criteria to be admitted to the U.S. after lengthy vetting. They are required to do that green card processing a year after arriving in the U.S. and can't go home because of the risks they'd face there, Soerens said.

Trump's administration has slashed the number of refugees admitted into the U.S. this year and limited them to white South Africans.

People who entered the country under humanitarian parole, which allows presidents to admit people for humanitarian reasons and which President Joe Biden's Democratic administration expanded dramatically, could also be impacted, Soerens said.

Many of those people might have already had family in the U.S. or they married a U.S. citizen — both of which potentially give them pathways to apply for a green card that could now be complicated.

All of these nuances make it difficult to provide general legal advice to people, said Dalal-Dheini.

“It’s going to be a very case by case specific thing," she said.

Immigrants facing questions about their applications, group says

The American Immigration Lawyers Association said several people in green card interviews under the new guidance faced questions Tuesday that haven’t previously been asked of applicants.

One person who was applying to get a green card based off their marriage to a U.S. citizen was asked why they applied to adjust their status in the U.S. instead of going back to their home country and applying at the embassy there. They were asked if there were any factors that would prevent them from applying back at their home country and if they still had family there.

Another person was asked to file a form demonstrating why they should be allowed to apply from the U.S. and were told evidence should prove they wouldn't be a financial burden or a “public charge” on the U.S. and could include their 2025 tax return, a letter from an employer stating their salary and bank statements.

Lloyd, the immigration attorney, said she has sent emails to her corporate and noncorporate clients telling them that she is monitoring the situation and she will reach out to them as soon as she has more guidance and practical applications.

She said she thinks the policy will deter some companies from pursuing green cards for their clients.

“I don’t want everybody to panic,” she said. “My advice to them is wait and see.”

The president bragged at his Cabinet meeting Wednesday that Paxton's romp “was a prelude” for success in the November midterms. But Trump's tightening grip on his party could make it harder to hold back Democratic advances as Republicans face a broader electorate that has soured on his second term and the economy.

The risk is compounded, Republican operatives say, by how cavalier the billionaire president has been in addressing Americans’ financial worries, which have been exacerbated by Trump's trade roller coaster and his ongoing war against Iran. And the president gave them new material to worry about when he said concerns about November are playing no part in his negotiations with Tehran.

“They thought they were going to out-wait me. You know, ’We’ll out-wait him. He’s got the midterms,” Trump said while surrounded by top administration officials. “I don’t care about the midterms.”

The only priority, he said, was keeping Iran from developing a nuclear weapon.

Republican strategist David Urban, a Trump ally, acknowledged the president’s approach is making things harder for his party.

“It’s going to be a tough fall unless things dramatically change,” Urban said.

He warned that Trump cannot afford a haphazard exit from Iran to resolve a conflict that has created a chokehold on global oil supplies and driven gas prices higher for Americans.

“You do not want to give the Iranians a win just because of the midterms,” he said.

Trump, meanwhile, offered no second thoughts about backing Paxton over Cornyn. Senate Republican leaders have feared that Paxton would be the more vulnerable nominee because of years of scandals, but the president insisted on social media that the Texas attorney general will “become a fantastic, common sense Senator, one who is respected by all.”

Still, Trump hinted he may be aware that Paxton will need an extra boost in a state that hasn't elected a Democratic senator since 1988.

“I will do some nice, big, beautiful rallies for Ken. Texas, this will be FUN!” Trump wrote.

Trump brushes off economic troubles

Not only are prices higher after Trump’s tariffs and his Iran war, but the president has repeatedly described affordability concerns as a “hoax.”

Trump has mused that increases in gas prices — up more than 50% in the U.S. since Trump and Israel launched attacks on Iran — amount to “peanuts.” He previously said he does not consider Americans’ personal finances “even a little bit” when mulling his options on the war.

All of that comes as Trump badgers Congress to spend $1 billion on his White House ballroom project and allocate $1.8 billion to pay restitution to people who believe they were prosecuted for political purposes — potentially including those who violently attacked the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

It’s a cascade that Republicans in every battleground House district, Senate election or statewide contest will have to navigate in the fall.

“You keep the House and Senate by having a message, by dealing with the issues voters are clearly complaining about,” said Republican strategist Rick Tyler, a Trump critic. “The administration has utterly failed to do this.”

It has been more than two weeks since the Republican National Committee distributed talking points to surrogates that mention the economy, according to messaging documents reviewed by The Associated Press.

The only talking points sent out last week focused on defending Trump’s $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization fund.”

“Democrats and the fake-news media are deliberately ignoring the fact that this fund is not limited to Republicans or Trump supporters,” said the message on May 23.

Democrats see opportunity in Trump’s struggles

Republicans began Trump’s second presidency with a 220-215 advantage in the House. They’ve boosted their chances to hold the majority by redrawing congressional maps in several Republican-run states. But Democrats are still confident they can flip enough seats to reclaim a majority.

Republicans have a more significant 53-47 advantage in the Senate. However, leaders of both parties agree that control of the chamber is in play. Some Republicans blame Trump for backing candidates such as Paxton, who has faced years of scandals and could prove more vulnerable against Democratic nominee James Talarico.

Trump hails Paxton as a “true MAGA warrior.” But the state attorney general also carries the weight of a yearslong criminal securities fraud case and disclosure of marital infidelity. He was indicted and impeached, but survived efforts to remove him from office and was reelected twice during the investigation. However, he ultimately agreed to pay $300,000 in restitution to avoid a felony trial.

Paxton's baggage was enough that Senate Republicans' campaign arm, which backed Cornyn, accused him of “repulsive and disgusting” behavior and quoted his ex-wife saying she filed for divorce “on biblical grounds.”

Viet Shelton, a spokesman for House Democrats’ campaign committee, pointed to Trump’s redistricting push as proof he understands his party’s tenuous hold on the House majority.

“They’ve given up on trying to win over voters fair and square, so they’re resorting to rigging the midterms through illegal gerrymanders and voter suppression,” Shelton said.

Democrats plan to feature Trump's comments on the economy in advertising this fall, as well as more specific local concerns — even in places the president carried by double digits in 2024.

In U.S. House districts in Iowa, for example, that means emphasizing how tariffs have affected the farm economy and how the war in Iran has increased the prices of diesel fuel and fertilizer. In the Rio Grande Valley of Texas, that means talking about how Trump’s immigration crackdown has roiled the local economy in Latino communities.

Republicans are frustrated behind closed doors

Republican strategists are worried by Trump’s lack of focus on the economy — and the lack of transparency from Trump’s team about how it plans to deploy its massive campaign accounts.

The pro-Trump super PAC known as MAGA Inc. held more than $356 million at the end of April. Yet many Republican strategists say they’ve received no clear indication of how, where and when Trump’s team plans to spend the money, according to several operatives who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations.

They see one bright spot in James Blair, Trump's political general, leaving the White House to focus on the midterms.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment on the president’s strategy and confidence about the midterms.

Mike Marinella, spokesperson for the National Republican Congressional Committee, said Trump “puts House Republicans in the strongest possible position to defy history and win in November.”

Of course, a candidate must win the Republican nomination to even be around for the fall campaign.

“The president has chosen to be aggressive in endorsing candidates he believes are the best advocates for his agenda and have been loyal to him,” Republican campaign veteran Chip Lake said.

Lake is leading an independent expenditure effort on behalf of Georgia Republican Burt Jones, the Trump-endorsed candidate in a June 16 primary runoff for governor.

“It’s difficult, if not impossible,” Lake said, “to win a primary in today’s environment if the president is working against you.”

___ Barrow reported from Atlanta. Peoples reported from New York.

Anne Keast-Butler, director of the communications intelligence agency GCHQ, said that Britain and its allies are in “a space between peace and war” as Russia increases its “daily hybrid activity” against the West — even as Russian combat deaths in Ukraine approach 500,000.

She said that the West risks losing the conflict in cyberspace against Russia and other adversaries, unless citizens, companies and governments treat cybersecurity with much greater urgency.

“I’ve spent three decades working in national security, and the risk of miscalculation is as high as I’ve ever seen it,” Keast-Butler said in a speech at a World War II code-breaking center near London.

She said that “tech companies are releasing AI-driven innovations at a remarkable pace, with untold consequences, as algorithms are weaponized often just below the threshold of traditional warfare.

“AI is an unstoppable force with great opportunity,” she added. “But it is also a force with risks.”

Keast-Butler singled out Russia as a threat, accusing Moscow of “relentlessly targeting critical infrastructure, democratic processes, supply chains and public trust,” as well as stealing technology and plotting sabotage and assassination attempts.

“Russia is scaling up its daily hybrid activity against the U.K. and Europe, stretching from the seabed to cyberspace,” she told an audience of computing experts, diplomats, journalists and senior officials.

She said that one focus for British spies is “exposing Russia’s intent, motive and underwater capabilities” to target undersea telecoms cables and energy pipelines.

At the same time, she said that Russian troops are “going backwards on the battlefield,” with new intelligence suggesting “almost half a million Russian soldiers” have been killed since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022.

The speech is the latest in a string of warnings from Western spies and intelligence experts that Russia is stepping up hostile activity in a “gray zone” that falls just below the threshold of war.

In recent months, authorities in countries including Sweden, Poland, Denmark and Norway have alleged that hackers linked to Russia targeted their critical infrastructure, including power plants and dams.

The head of the U.K.’s National Cyber Security Centre, Richard Horne, warned last month that hostile states including Russia, China and Iran are behind the most serious cyberattacks the country faces. He said such attacks could increase dramatically if Britain becomes involved in an international conflict.

Keast-Butler said that rapid advances in artificial intelligence mean that “the ground beneath our feet is shifting” and there is a “narrowing window for the U.K. and allies to stay ahead” of countries such as China, a science and technology “superpower.”

She said that the threat extends to space, where thousands of satellites have been launched in the last few years, and “both China and Russia are investing heavily ... to support both peace and war ambitions.”

The spy chief said that GCHQ is developing a plan to use cutting-edge agentic AI for a national cybershield that could protect U.K. infrastructure and businesses from cyberattacks — though it's thought to be several years from completion.

Harnessed responsibly, she said, AI can help spies “enhance algorithms, translate foreign languages, and find needles in haystacks quicker than ever before.”

Keast-Butler also said that the U.K.-U.S. intelligence partnership is “fundamental for the security of both our nations.” She spoke as U.S. President Donald Trump’s “America First” foreign policy platform and disregard for longtime allies strain the relationship between London and Washington.

GCHQ, short for Government Communications Headquarters, is the U.K.’s electronic and cyberintelligence agency. It works alongside the domestic security service MI5 and the foreign intelligence agency MI6.

Keast-Butler, the first woman to head the agency, delivered the GCHQ director’s annual lecture speech at the agency’s World War II headquarters of Bletchley Park, a manor house 45 miles (72 kilometers) northwest of London where hundreds of mathematicians, cryptographers, crossword puzzlers, chess masters and other experts worked to crack Nazi Germany’s supposedly unbreakable secret codes.

Their work both shortened the war and hastened the birth of modern computing.

The trio of Trinity Rodman, Mallory Swanson and Sophia Wilson, nicknamed Triple Espresso at the 2024 Olympics, were named on Tuesday to the U.S. training camp roster for a pair of June matches against the Brazilian national team in Brazil. The three have not played together since the gold medal match at the Paris Games.

Swanson was included on the U.S. roster for the first time since October 2024. She recently returned to her club team, the Chicago Stars, after taking time off for the birth of her daughter in November.

The 28-year-old Swanson has 38 goals in 103 appearances with the national team and scored the lone goal in the 1-0 victory over Brazil for the gold medal in Paris.

Wilson had returned to the national team in April after taking maternity leave last year for the birth of her daughter. She has 24 goals in 61 appearances for the United States.

“That front three haven’t been together since the Olympic gold medal match, that’s a long time, and we cannot waste a single minute," U.S. coach Emma Hayes said. “We absolutely have to put the very best players together with every opportunity that we have. But the circumstances are slightly different. We have Mal, who is coming back last, and yes, she is competing and contributing to Chicago, but like Soph last camp, it is so important to get them into the environment to reconnect with their teammates.”

The United States will play Brazil on June 6 in Sao Paulo and June 9 in Fortaleza.

Because the national team does not play many friendly matches away from the United States, the games in Brazil give the younger players an opportunity to experience travel routines.

Additionally, Brazil is hosting next year's Women's World Cup. The United States will attempt to qualify for the tournament starting in late November at the CONCACAF W Championship.

“This is another moment where we get to see how we cope with all of the environmental conditions that come with going to Brazil, whether that’s adapting to different cultures, different training facilities, different hotels, different experiences, fan experience, feeling like the away team, but with the pressure cooker of a top opponent. All of these things really, really matter," Hayes said.

Hayes named 26 players to the camp roster for the international window, with 23 players to be designated as available for each match.

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Goalkeepers: Claudia Dickey (Seattle Reign), Mandy McGlynn (Utah Royals), Phallon Tullis-Joyce (Manchester United)

Defenders: Tierna Davidson (Gotham), Emily Fox (Arsenal), Avery Patterson (Houston Dash), Lilly Reale (Gotham), Tara Rudd (Washington Spirit), Emily Sonnett (Gotham), Gisele Thompson (Angel City), Kennedy Wesley (San Diego Wave)

Midfielders: Croix Bethune (Kansas City Current), Lindsey Heaps (OL Lyonnes), Claire Hutton (Bay FC), Riley Jackson (North Carolina Courage), Rose Lavelle (Gotham), Olivia Moultrie (Portland Thorns), Jaedyn Shaw (Gotham), Lily Yohannes (OL Lyonnes)

Forwards: Michelle Cooper (Kansas City Current), Trinity Rodman (Washington Spirit), Emma Sears (Racing Louisville), Ally Sentnor (Kansas City Current), Mallory Swanson (Chicago Stars), Alyssa Thompson (Chelsea), Sophia Wilson (Portland Thorns)

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AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer

One humanitarian duo wants to ensure conflict-stricken children get funding for an often-overlooked need: education. Under an agreement announced Wednesday, the LEGO Foundation committed $97 million to expand International Rescue Committee programs that use play to help millions of children learn and recover.

“Children who are born in conflict have their childhood stolen from them," IRC President David Miliband told The Associated Press. “But what’s remarkable about children is that if you give them a bit of their childhood back, they make the most of it. And this is about giving the best of childhood back.”

The five-year partnership aims to reach 5 million children across East Africa and the Middle East. Who, exactly, they serve will change as conflicts evolve. LEGO Foundation CEO Sidsel Marie Kristensen pledged to focus on those “in the most dire contexts." Currently under consideration are Ethiopia, Lebanon, the Palestinian territories, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria and Uganda.

Kristensen said the “truly agile” framework is designed to bring play-based learning wherever it’s needed most, rather than funding individual place-based grants that might become outdated as conflicts evolve in real time.

“In the world we are living in right now, nobody knows honestly what is happening tomorrow or in two months,” Kristensen said. “That (flexibility) is what we need right now.”

The investment will introduce more classrooms to an IRC-led program called PlayMatters that offers training for teachers of 3-to 12-year-olds to integrate what they call “playful learning" into lessons. The goal is not to tell educators what they should teach but help tailor instruction to the needs arising in schools serving children traumatized by crises. Program leaders also act as a policy advocates for education funding at the national level, working with government officials to embed their materials into their curriculum.

Engaging kids to process their experiences with ‘playful learning’

At a primary school serving refugees in western Uganda’s Nakivale settlement, one teacher credits PlayMatters with reducing absenteeism. Sister Kasingye Secunda said attendance used to be an issue. Teachers try their best to make students "feel at home,” she said. But many students don’t understand both the local language and English, the language of instruction.

Children learn colors through a game where they select mangoes, bananas and other fruits to share with their classmates. They build confidence through class presentations and develop leadership as they take turns guiding small groups through activities.

“Learners enjoy the lessons,” Secunda said. “They are eager to come to school.”

From Ethiopia to Tanzania, a radio show helps children name their emotions through episodes offered in multiple languages featuring culturally familiar characters. PlayMatters Project Director Martin Omukuba said they are expanding such digitally delivered multimedia lessons. The radio show, for example, helps them remotely reach schools in South Sudan that are made inaccessible by flooding for half the year.

The LEGO Foundation provides flexible funding so that IRC can respond to the fluid nature of conflicts. A refugee class size can quickly jump from 25 to 150 students, Omukuba noted, creating new demands for sanitation, nutrition or other classroom needs not traditionally classified under education. Omukuba credited the LEGO Foundation for trusting them to move grant money around in emergencies.

“We need first to make sure that children are alive,” he said. “We can introduce the education when they are stabilized.”

‘Trust-based’ collaboration aims to inspire others amid aid cuts

The partners first collaborated in 2019 when the LEGO Foundation committed $100 million to “Ahlan Simsim," the educational programming launched by IRC and the nonprofit Sesame Workshop with MacArthur Foundation support to help kids affected by the Syrian refugee crises and other regional conflicts.

Kristensen, who leads the Denmark-based corporate foundation that funds early childhood development, said they've been scaling up their donations in these settings. The LEGO Foundation recently announced a separate $30 million partnership with global funding collaborative Co-Impact to support locally led solutions to issues of learning and wellbeing among children impacted by conflict and crisis.

She wants Wednesday's announcement to inspire greater collaboration among governments, civil society and the private sector. “That is so needed in a world right now where the development aid is decreasing,” she said, referring to international assistance cuts by the United States and many European nations.

Those cuts have stretched the humanitarian system's capacity over the past year. Already, Miliband said, the ongoing Ebola outbreak in Congo provides “a graphic demonstration of the short-sightedness of aid cuts for activities that are considered marginal." He pointed to sanitation and handwashing programs in the Congo's Ituri province, where the global health emergency is centered, that lost U.S. funding last year as part of the Trump administration's dismantling of international development.

“We warned at the time what the risk was,” he said. “And sure as night follows day, we end up with an under-detected Ebola outbreak.”

International Rescue Committee officials similarly see early childhood development not as a luxury, but a necessary intervention to toxic stress that alters brain development and delays learning.

Education was an underfunded part of humanitarian responses even before wealthy countries slashed their aid budgets, according to Patty McIlreavy, the president and CEO of the Center for Disaster Philanthropy. “Life saving” assistance was too narrowly limited to “what do you actually need to keep the body alive,” she said," a definition that excluded “life sustaining” efforts such as children's education.

She pointed to Wednesday's announcement as an example for donors, who often ask her how they can actually help in complex conflicts without clear ends in sight.

“It's not our role as philanthropy to fix what's broken in a country," she said. "That's politics. That's bigger than us. But there's so much we can do — even by offering six months or a year of education.”

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Associated Press coverage of philanthropy and nonprofits receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content. For all of AP’s philanthropy coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/philanthropy.

The directive, issued on Tuesday to international news outlets based in the capital, Tehran, specified that mandatory language be included on “all submitted content, including photos, videos, reports, and other media productions.”

The instructions were sent to a number of news organizations, including The Associated Press, from the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance, which oversees media activity. “Responsibility for failing to comply with this directive rests with the submitting media outlet,” said the instructions, translated from Farsi.

The new restrictions come three months after the United States and Israel launched attacks on Iran that grew into a continuing, occasionally flaring war in the region. President Donald Trump insisted a peace deal is close on the 88th day of the war, even as Iran on Tuesday denounced the most recent U.S. strikes as a sign of “bad faith and unreliability."

Under the new measures, international news outlets are required to say that the content in question cannot be used by Israeli media, and also Farsi-language TV stations based outside Iran. For years, Iran has banned international media from sharing some material with BBC Persian, VOA Persian, Manoto TV and Iran International at the risk of having their operations shut down in the country.

Despite the restrictions, many Farsi-language media outlets abroad still access images and videos released by Iranian state media through a variety of websites and messaging apps.

The Washington-based group Freedom House ranks Iran as not having a free and independent media, noting that all television channels are controlled by hard-liners within its theocracy and those working in other outlets face harassment and arrest.

Satellite dishes are banned, though many have them to watch Farsi-language channels broadcasting from abroad. Iranians began to regain internet access on Wednesday, after authorities ended a monthslong shutdown. But users said service was slow and spotty in some areas, with apps like YouTube and Instagram heavily restricted.

In a statement, Associated Press spokesman Patrick Maks said that the "AP, like all international news media operating inside Iran, are subject to their new restriction.

“Our team there," Maks added, “continues to produce strong, independent journalism under challenging conditions, ensuring the world has access to factual, eyewitness reporting about what’s happening on the ground.”

Jeffrey Donaldson, 63, former leader of the Democratic Unionist Party, or DUP, pleaded not guilty to one count of rape, four counts of gross indecency and 13 indecent assault charges involving two alleged victims between 1985 and 2008.

Prosecutor Rosemary Walsh told jurors in Newry Crown Court that the alleged victims complained to police more than two years ago about “difficult and traumatic incidents they say happened when they were children.”

Donaldson resigned as leader of the DUP and quit as a lawmaker in the U.K. Parliament, after he was arrested in March 2024.

Donaldson’s resignation shocked the DUP shortly after the party ended its boycott of Northern Ireland’s semiautonomous government and returned to a power-sharing agreement, after he won concessions on Britain’s post-Brexit trading arrangements with the European Union.

As leader of the DUP between 2021 and 2023, he was the most powerful figure in Northern Ireland’s unionist movement, which seeks to maintain the region’s historic ties to the United Kingdom.

The two alleged victims told police that Donaldson groped them when they were around primary school age, and the older of the two, referred to in court as Complainant B, said that the abuse continued for several years, Walsh said.

Years later, Complainant B said that a meeting was arranged through a church and Donaldson apologized “for what had happened in the past.”

When Donaldson was interviewed by police, he said that it was “unbelievable” that he would have touched her sexually.

His wife, Eleanor Donaldson, has denied charges of aiding and abetting her husband’s alleged offenses, but she's not in court because Judge Paul Ramsey ruled her unfit to stand trial for mental health reasons.

Jurors will decide her case on facts, but she can't be convicted of a crime or punished. The trial is expected to last up to a month.

Monique Verdieux, 56, fled to the highway after watching armed men burning houses in her neighborhood. Her family scattered in different directions and she said she's not sure where they are.

“I am now sleeping in the street,” Verdieux said, noting it was unsafe to return.

Gangs have overtaken more than 70% of Port-au-Prince since the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse in July 2021 at his home. That number was as high as 90% but has dropped. Police say they have expanded their activities — including looting, kidnapping, sexual assaults and rape — into the countryside. Haiti has not had a president since the assassination.

In a statement released Monday, the humanitarian group Doctors Without Borders announced the evacuation of its hospital in Cité Soleil following intense clashes in the Port-au-Prince neighborhood on Sunday. The organization, known by its French acronym MSF, reported treating over 40 gunshot victims within 12 hours while providing temporary shelter to 800 people fleeing the violence. One of those injured was a security guard who was hit by a stray bullet in the hospital's grounds.

“We managed to evacuate him and his condition is now stable,” said Davina Hayles, MSF’s head of mission in Haiti. “But it is unthinkable that our teams and civilians should become victims of these clashes.”

For the past two weeks, Haitian rum maker Barbancourt and two of the nation's largest bottlers have also warned about deteriorating security conditions near Port-au-Prince's Toussaint Louverture International Airport, where operations are now severely restricted.

In a statement released on Sunday, the companies said that the government's response to the crisis has been “largely insufficient,” and noted that the poor state of the roads leading to the airport makes it difficult for Haitian security forces to patrol the area. The companies are among Haiti’s main fiscal contributors.

“You cannot secure an airport if you allow the roads around it to degrade,” the statement read.

In April, the first foreign troops linked to a U.N. force arrived in Haiti to help quell ongoing violence.

The U.N. Security Council in late September approved a plan to authorize a 5,550-member force, which has not fully arrived in the island nation. An unknown number of troops from Chad have so far been deployed.

A report published earlier this year by the International Organization for Migration found that gang violence has displaced more than 1.4 million people in Haiti, with approximately 200,000 of them now living in crowded and underfunded sites in the nation's capital.

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This story was first published on May. 12, 2026. It was updated on May. 27, 2026 to correct the spelling of Jovenel Moïse.

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Follow AP’s coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america

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This story clarifies that gangs control 70% of Port-au-Prince, down from 90% previously.

In March, Lake County deputies responded to a home in Leesburg after someone reported that a child disclosed she was being abused by 41-year-old Schubert Macarat. Macarat was arrested that same night.

The victim, a girl under 12 years old, told investigators she used her own cellphone to document the assault. State Attorney Bill Gladson said the child’s decision to record the abuse was deliberate.

“She recorded it because she knew that she would need it as evidence,” Gladson said.

Gladson said the abuse had been ongoing for years and that investigators found physical evidence that coincided with interviews the child gave.

“When I say ongoing, we’re talking years of abuse for this particular child,” he said. “Sexual devices that the child described that were used during the sexual assault, condoms, lubricant [were found].”

A grand jury has since indicted Macarat on 47 charges, including 12 counts of capital sexual assault, as well as possession of child pornography. Investigators say the evidence collected is extensive.

“[Searches] resulted in a four-terabyte external hard drive that has 3,000 videos, 700 of which are confirmed child sexual abuse material,” Gladson said. “Some of the videos had been shown to the child prior to, and sometimes during, assault.”

Because of the severity of the case and the volume of evidence, prosecutors say they believe Macarat abused the girl for at least three years, the Fifth Judicial Circuit State Attorney’s Office has filed a notice that it intends to seek the death penalty.

“We are seeking to prematurely end this defendant’s life because the crimes he committed are so heinous that no other punishment is fitting,” Gladson said.

“In this state we protect our children, in this state we protect our vulnerable, in this state we have zero tolerance for child predators.”

Macarat was arrested and remains in custody on no-bond status at the Lake County Detention Facility. He is due back in court next month.

Roselaine Jean-Pierre, 67, was among two dozen people who gathered at an intersection in Cite Soleil holding tree branches and demanding that police intervene in the area, even as gunshots were ringing nearby.

“I did not do anything to deserve this,” said Jean-Pierre, who fled her home on Sunday, and is now sleeping in the streets of the capital, Port-au-Prince.

Some of the protesters said they saw people getting killed over the weekend in Cite Soleil, where burned cars and dead cows could also be observed. Haitian authorities have not released any information on casualties.

“I know of seven people that have been killed and also people that have been shot,” said Michel-Ange Toussaint, who had returned briefly to her home in Cite Soleil to gather some clothes.

She said the attacks on civilians began Sunday around 6 p.m., prompting many people to flee the area in search of safety. “It is our good feet that saved us,” Toussaint said.

Gangs have overtaken Port-au-Prince since the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse in July 2021 at his home. Police say they control about 70% of the capital — down from 90% — and have expanded their activities — including looting, kidnapping, sexual assaults and rape — into the countryside. Haiti has not had a president since the assassination.

In a statement released Monday, the humanitarian group Doctors Without Borders announced the evacuation of its hospital in Cite Soleil following the intense clashes Sunday.

The Centre Hospitalier de Fontaine, another hospital that operates in Cite Soleil, said on Tuesday that it had also suspended operations due to the outbreak of violence that began Sunday, and had to evacuate all of its hospitalized patients, including 11 newborns.

In April, the first foreign troops linked to a U.N. force arrived in Haiti to help quell ongoing violence.

The U.N. Security Council in late September approved a plan to authorize a 5,550-member force, which has not fully arrived in the island nation. An unknown number of troops from Chad have so far been deployed.

A report published earlier this year by the International Organization for Migration found that gang violence has displaced more than 1.4 million people in Haiti, with approximately 200,000 of them now living in crowded and underfunded sites in the nation’s capital.

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This story was first published on May. 12, 2026. It was updated on May. 27, 2026 to correct the spelling of Jovenel Moïse

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Follow AP’s coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america

As public school students wrapped up the year, seven Orange County campuses marked their final day before closing as part of a district consolidation plan tied to low enrollment. District leaders have said the enrollment drop made it financially unsustainable to keep the schools operating.

Those schools include Bonneville Elementary, Chickasaw Elementary, Eccleston Elementary, Meadow Woods Elementary, Orlo Vista Elementary, Union Park Middle, and McCoy Elementary.

The move will force thousands of students to transition to new campuses.

At McCoy Elementary, News 6 was there as the final morning announcement came on over the intercom.

“Very, very happy last day of school, everybody have a terrific, wonderful last day,” the announcement said.

Parents at McCoy fought the decision, even creating a petition that collected more than 1,700 signatures. The effort did not stop the closure, and Wednesday is the last day students will walk through the doors.

For Graci Guillen, whose 7-year-old daughter attends McCoy, the change has been emotional.

“It is a huge emotional shock for them. Their school is their second home,” Guillen said. “She asked me, ‘Why, Mom? I like my school. I like my teacher, my classmates, and my little friends.’”

Guillen, who lives near the school, said the closure will change the feel of the neighborhood.

“I will no longer hear the children playing in the park, the principal giving directions, or the daily activities happening at the school,” she said. “Now it is going to feel much quieter.”

Families across the district have criticized the consolidation plan and raised concerns about disruptions to daily routines. Amanda Webber, whose child attends Bonneville Elementary — another school that is closing — previously told News 6 the changes affect nearly every part of a family’s schedule.

“We are changing their before-school care, we are changing their after-care, we are changing their teachers — we are literally changing everything,” Webber said.

Guillen said McCoy leaders have provided information and resources to help families navigate what comes next as students prepare to start over at new schools.

But after a court hearing on Wednesday, the teen will remain free while the judge makes a decision on whether he should be detained.

Timothy Hudson, 16, is charged with the murder of Anna Kepner, whose body was found on the Carnival Horizon in November.

Kepner’s body was discovered stuffed under a bed in the stateroom she shared with Hudson the day before the ship was set to return to Miami, according to family members. She had been asphyxiated.

Federal investigators suspected Hudson from the beginning. The government originally charged him with delinquency because of his age, and a judge allowed him to remain free and live with a relative while the case was handled as a juvenile matter.

Earlier this year, however, the government announced it would prosecute Hudson as an adult after a grand jury indicted him for his stepsister’s murder.

Prosecutors are now asking a judge to detain Hudson or, at minimum, require him to pay a bond — consistent with how other adults facing sexual abuse and murder charges are treated.

“(The) defendant is a danger to others and should be held in pretrial detention,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Alejandra L. Lopez wrote in a motion seeking revocation of Hudson’s prior release order.

Unlike juvenile delinquents, who must be released from custody by the time they turn 21, Hudson now faces life in prison if convicted.

“(The) Defendant’s exposure to punishment has changed substantially,” Lopez said.

Hudson’s public defender has not filed court papers responding to the government’s request.

The weapons systems are Tomahawk cruise missiles, which are used to strike targets deep inside enemy territory, and Patriot and THAAD interceptors that defend against incoming missiles and drones.

“The United States has enough munitions for any plausible scenario in the Iran war, but the depleted inventories have created a window of vulnerability for a potential Western Pacific conflict,” the Center for Strategic and International Studies said in its new report, provided to The Associated Press. “The time needed to rebuild those inventories has thus become a major concern.”

China has a stated goal of ensuring its military is capable of taking Taiwan by force if necessary by 2027, which experts see as more aspirational than a hard deadline. But Chinese President Xi Jinping warned this month that if Washington mishandles its relations with the self-governing island, the U.S. and China could end up clashing or even in open conflict.

Trump administration is boosting funding, but production takes time

The analysis by the Washington think tank factors in the Republican Trump administration's historic $1.5 trillion defense budget proposal for 2027, which significantly accelerates spending on high-end munitions that began under the Democratic Biden administration. While there's bipartisan agreement in Congress to boost inventories, “the problem today isn’t money; it’s time,” the report said.

“It takes time to expand production capacity and to build these complex systems,” the report said, adding that the window of vulnerability will last “for several years until inventories return to their previous levels and another several years before they get to the levels that war planners desire.”

Although munitions inventories are classified, CSIS said sufficient public information exists in Pentagon budget materials to estimate production timelines.

President Donald Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth have insisted the U.S. is capable of fighting any war. They have pushed defense contractors to speed up munitions production, with Hegseth telling lawmakers last month that military spending under Trump will help manufacturers double or even triple their capacities.

During Trump’s Cabinet meeting Wednesday, Hegseth lauded the president’s efforts to expand the nation’s defense manufacturing sector, with private contractors investing in new plants and production lines “so that we’re getting weapons faster than ever.”

Chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said in a statement that the military “has everything it needs to execute at the time and place of the President’s choosing.”

“We have executed multiple successful operations across combatant commands while ensuring the U.S. military possesses a deep arsenal of capabilities to protect our people and our interests,” Parnell said.

Some military experts have pushed back. Pentagon officials “knew the reality of our military stockpiles and hopefully told someone, ‘Hey, if we go to this fight, even in the most conservative estimates, we are drawing down our stockpiles to a critical level,’” said Virginia Burger, a senior defense policy analyst at the Project On Government Oversight watchdog group and a former Marine officer.

Concerns about diminished stockpiles were a theme at recent congressional hearings. For Democrats, the munitions supply is a damning metric against the Iran war, which Trump launched without lawmakers' approval. Some Republicans argue that the problem stems from the U.S. sending Patriot missile defense systems to Ukraine after Russia invaded in 2022, although several American allies use those systems.

The roots of the predicament can be traced to the end of the Cold War, said Mark Cancian, a retired Marine colonel and senior adviser at CSIS who co-authored the study with research associate Chris H. Park.

After the fall of the Soviet Union in late 1991, the U.S. assumed future wars would be short and regional with little need for large numbers of such high-end weapons, Cancian said in an interview. The Pentagon ordered relatively low numbers, assuming the military would not need many of them. Military contractors responded in kind, relying on a relatively small manufacturing footprint to build them.

Russia’s war with Ukraine showed that wars could be protracted and require deep inventories of advanced weapons, Cancian said. At the same time, U.S. military strategists were war-gaming possible conflicts in the western Pacific.

“The thinking started to change, but it just takes time to build inventories,” Cancian said, adding that part of the challenge is bringing up to speed a complicated web of supply chains and subcontractors that produce very novel components.

President Joe Biden's administration should get some credit for starting conversations with the defense industry, putting money into the industrial base and ramping up production, said Cancian, who oversaw acquisitions of military hardware at the Office of Management and Budget under Presidents George W. Bush, a Republican, and Barack Obama, a Democrat.

“A lot of people in the Trump administration are inclined to say that everything was terrible until they arrived, and that’s not true,” Cancian said. “Now, it is true that the Trump administration really increased funding.”

How long it will take to rebuild key stockpiles

The U.S. fired 1,000-plus Tomahawk missiles at Iran, and it could take until late 2030 to fully replenish the prewar inventory, CSIS estimates show.

Fewer than 200 Tomahawks are made a year because of small orders in the past, the report says. However, manufacturer Raytheon has a goal of ramping up capacity to more than 1,000 per year.

RTX, Raytheon's parent company, declined to comment on the CSIS findings because it had not yet seen the report. But RTX pointed to investments of several billion dollars to boost production, including expanding facilities in Alabama and Arizona.

For in-demand air defense systems, replacing as many as 290 THAAD, or Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, interceptors that shot down incoming Iranian drones and missiles could take until the end of 2029, CSIS estimates. Replenishing more than 1,000 Patriot interceptors should wrap up in mid-2029.

Lockheed Martin is significantly boosting production of rounds for both systems, while deliveries of THAADs “were apparently re-sequenced to prioritize U.S. needs over those of allies and partners,” CSIS noted.

"Patriot deliveries pose a dilemma for the United States because of the need to replenish its own inventories, help Ukraine defend against Russian missile attacks, and meet the needs of 17 other countries that use the interceptor," the report said.

Lockheed Martin said in a statement that it's investing $9 billion through 2030 and “is already delivering tangible results to meet heightened munitions demand, including a new facility in Alabama announced last week along with more than 20 others across the United States.”

In the meantime, CSIS said a potential conflict with China is “not all bleak,” with the U.S. military recently displaying its capabilities against Iran, Venezuela and the Houthi rebels in Yemen.

“China is deeply aware that it has no recent combat experience and that it performed poorly in its last war — against Vietnam in 1979," the report said. "That difference in experience may preserve deterrence until munitions inventories are restored.”

The arrests took place at the Retiro bus station in Buenos Aires, the Argentine Federal Police confirmed in a statement Monday.

The two detainees, who were not identified, remained in custody awaiting extradition proceedings requested by the United States.

According to local police, the two Chilean citizens were part of a crime ring that targeted the homes of prominent athletes in the U.S. and Argentina, including NFL stars Patrick Mahomes and Travis Kelce and former tennis player Juan Martín Del Potro.

Targets also included the homes of NBA players Luka Doncic and Mike Conley Jr.

In 2024, the NFL issued a security alert to teams and the players’ union following the burglaries involving the homes of Mahomes and Kelce.

According to the FBI, organized crime groups from South America used publicly available information and social media to track athletes’ habits and travel. The groups used technology allowing them to bypass alarm systems, block wireless internet connections and disable devices, cover security cameras and hide their identities.

Jewelry, millions of dollars in cash, trophies and medals were among items stolen from residences while the athletes were out of town.

In February, seven Chilean citizens were charged in a federal court in Florida with conspiracy to transport stolen property across state lines, a crime that carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison.

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AP NBA: https://apnews.com/hub/NBA and AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/nfl

On Wednesday he added minority investor in the Cleveland Guardians to his resumé.

The Guardians announced before their game against the Washington Nationals that the Kansas City Chiefs tight end has purchased a minority share in the franchise.

The Cleveland Heights native bought a small share of David Blitzer's 35% stake. Blitzer can become the controlling owner after the 2027 season or he can wait to exercise that option later.

“The opportunity came across my desk and I just couldn’t say no,” Kelce said on the “New Heights” podcast with his brother, Jason Kelce. “These guys (Blitzer and majority owner Paul Dolan) gave me the opportunity to show my Cleveland love and plant my roots in Cleveland forever, no matter what. It’s an awesome feeling knowing that a childhood kid that grew up on the east side is now part owner of his favorite baseball team.”

Kelce lettered in football, basketball and baseball at Cleveland Heights High School. He was a Cleveland Plain Dealer baseball player of the week after going 14 for 22 with two home runs and 12 RBIs during one stretch in May 2008, his senior year. He also played on a collegiate summer team in 2010 while attending the University of Cincinnati.

“Travis Kelce knows what it takes to win at the highest levels and he’s exemplified that throughout his playing career and in the way he shows up as a community leader and businessman,” Dolan and Blitzer said in a joint statement. “He cares deeply for Cleveland and Northeast Ohio and is committed to supporting our mission of building out a world-class organization that helps uplift the communities we serve. It’s great to welcome Travis home and we know he’ll make a lasting impact here."

Kelce was wearing a Guardians' City Connect jersey during the podcast and recounted going to games growing up. The brothers said their favorite players during childhood were Albert Belle and Jim Thome.

“There’s so many countless memories of the 1990s and then early 2000s where it’s in me to always root for the Guards and always wanted to be a part of them from,” he said. “It’s a dream come true for a Cleveland kid. Any Cleveland kid would be through the roof right now, and I’m happy to be the honorable one to get to do it for us.”

Kelce and Swift were in Cleveland last weekend and attended Game 3 of the Eastern Conference finals between the Cavaliers and New York Knicks.

Kelce's first act as part of the Guardians will be to throw a first pitch on June 14 against the Detroit Tigers. He tried to throw the first pitch during Cleveland's 2023 home opener against Seattle but ended up throwing a ball that spiked near the plate and skipped to the backstop.

Guardians manager Stephen Vogt was mostly thrilled to hear about Kelce joining the organization. Vogt is a die-hard San Francisco 49ers fan and hasn’t forgiven Kelce for the Super Bowl wins over his favorite football team.

“I’m still a little bit bitter because the Chiefs beat the Niners twice in the Super Bowl,” Vogt said before the series finale against the Nationals. “But outside of that, it’s pretty cool to have Kelce on board.”

Kelce becomes the second member of the Chiefs to have a stake in a baseball team. Patrick Mahomes has a share in the Kansas City Royals and tweeted a video of Kelce's first pitch in congratulating him.

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AP freelance writer Tom Withers contributed to this report.

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AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/mlb

At a work session on Wednesday, the city council will get an update on the progress of the police department annex and renovation project.

The proposed two-story annex building would add more than 15,000 square feet to the current police headquarters, and a preliminary estimate of the project cost is $18.2 million.

“We have a floor plan, we’ve got some very specific documents, but now it really is time to get into the nitty gritty and permitting,” Mayor Megan Sladek said.

In 2016, Oviedo residents voted to allow the city to borrow $11.4 million to build a new public safety building, but the project never moved forward.

In 2023, more than two-thirds of voters rejected a plan to build a $49 million police headquarters.

For the annex and renovation project, the city has nearly $17 million in available potential funding, with a $1.2 million shortfall.

“I think it’s a discussion the council needs to have, whether this reflects the will of the residents or if maybe we are getting a little bit bigger than we meant to,” Sladek said.

The potential for statewide property tax reform could also have an effect on how Oviedo moves forward with a potential expansion to police headquarters.

“If the tax situation should change from Tallahassee, how are we going to pay for police? I don’t know. I truly don’t know,” Sladek said.

City leaders will get an update on the annex and renovation project during a work session on Wednesday at 5:30 p.m.

Green, known for his protests during President Donald Trump's speeches, has served in Congress since 2005. He became a standard-bearer of progressive legislation on racial justice, often drawing the ire of Republicans.

“I am so honored to have served for these many years, more than twenty. And I’m honored to have done some things that I’m very proud of,” Green told his supporters during an election night event.

“You probably see me smiling and it’s because it’s because this is not the end,” he added as the audience cheered. “This is the beginning of a new chapter.”

In his primary contest, Green, 78, became a target of the cryptocurrency industry for his opposition to the emerging technology.

“Rep. Green’s defeat proves that anti-crypto hostility carries real electoral consequences, making him the first Democratic incumbent this cycle to lose his seat,” said Geoff Vetter, a spokesperson for Fairshake, a pro-cryptocurrency super PAC that spent millions in the runoff to unseat Green. “Fairshake was the difference-maker in this race, and we will continue to aggressively back leaders like Rep. Menefee across the country.”

The former top attorney for Texas’ largest county, Menefee, 38, was sworn into Congress in February after winning a January special election to succeed the late Rep. Sylvester Turner. Turner had died in February of last year and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott did not set a special election for the seat for months. Democrats denounced the delay as an effort to protect Republicans' razor-thin majority in Congress.

Menefee lauded Green’s career in a statement following his win over the congressman, calling Green an “icon” and vowed to carry on his work in Congress.

“For decades, Congressman Green has done what so few in public life are willing to do: he has spoken truth to power, directly to their faces, without flinching,” said Menefee. “He protested with his body, his voice, and his career on the line. He stood in the well of the United States House of Representatives and called President Trump out to his face, even when he stood alone. That is a legacy that will outlast any election.”

Menefee also condemned the state’s electoral process.

Under previous maps, Green and Menefee had served in neighboring districts before the state’s Republican lawmakers redrew the state’s congressional maps in an effort to create more Republican-leaning seats.

“Republicans have made this hard on purpose,” Menefee told his supporters. “They delayed this election. They drew maps designed to dilute our power. They made you come back to the polls over and over again because they were hoping you would get tired and give up. You didn’t. Now it’s time to finish the job.”

Green in 2017 became the second Democrat to file an article of impeachment against Trump during the president’s first term and has continued to call for the president’s removal. Last year, Green filed three separate articles of impeachment against Trump, including for abuses of power and allegedly inciting death threats against lawmakers and judges.

Following Tuesday's runoff, Trump called Green “one of the most mentally deficient Congressmen in the history of our Country” in a social media post cheering the results.

“But I will miss that lunatic not screaming and violently waving his cane at me during my next State of the Union Speech,” Trump wrote.

The median employee at companies in the S&P 500 earned $89,744, reflecting a 4.7% increase year over year. While that gain outpaced the rate of inflation in 2025, many workers were still feeling pinched by the accumulation of higher prices over the past few years and had to cut corners to make ends meet and run up credit card debt to pay for everyday necessities.

The Associated Press’ CEO compensation survey, which uses data analyzed for The AP by Equilar, included pay data for 337 executives at S&P 500 companies who have served at least two full consecutive fiscal years at their companies, which filed proxy statements between Jan. 1 and April 30.

Here's a look at some highlights from the survey.

The pay gap

At half the companies in AP’s survey it would take the worker at the middle of the company’s pay scale 200 years to make what the CEO did in one, up from 192 years in last year's survey. Companies have been required to disclose this so-called pay ratio since 2018.

While the biggest gaps occur at companies where the CEO received compensation loaded with one-time awards of stock, the pay ratio also tends to be highest at companies in industries where wages are typically low. For instance, at Coca-Cola, its CEO earned nearly 1,739 times the median pay of $17,947 for its workers. The CEO at the retailer TJX Cos. makes about 1,774 times what a worker making the company’s median pay does.

Sarah Anderson, who directs the Global Economy Project at the progressive Institute for Policy Studies, noted in an email that there are ballot initiative campaigns in San Francisco and Los Angeles to raise taxes on companies with sizable gaps between CEO and worker pay.

“At a time when working families are struggling with rising costs, it’s obscene to see CEO pay continuing to skyrocket,” Anderson wrote.

Overall, wages and benefits netted by private-sector workers in the U.S. rose 3.4% through 2025, according to the Labor Department. The average worker in the U.S. makes $67,000 a year. That figure rises to $96,000 when benefits such as health care and other insurance are included.

The nature of CEO pay

While many people may think of a pay package as consisting of salary, bonus and some perks, those components make up only a small percentage of pay for the modern CEO.

Many companies have heeded calls from shareholders to tie CEO compensation more closely to performance. As a result, a large proportion of pay packages consist of stock awards, which the CEO often can’t cash in for years, if at all, unless the company meets certain targets, typically a higher stock price or market value or improved operating profits. And if the CEO delivers on those metrics, companies often give them one-time rewards as incentives to stay on and not look for a bigger payday elsewhere.

Shareholders can weigh in on a CEO's pay package through “say on pay” votes at a company's annual meeting. But the votes are non-binding and most pay plans pass with overwhelming support. The average “yes” vote at companies in this year's survey was around 90%.

Big rewards, lofty goals

As CEO pay has grown significantly over the past few decades, criticism of the lofty payouts has largely come from worker advocates and certain members of Congress.

Elon Musk's pay package is so extraordinary that even the pope weighed in.

Musk, the CEO of Tesla, received compensation valued at $132.3 billion, all in the form of stock awards. To actually get the shares, Musk must meet ambitious targets over the next 10 years for the company's market value and Tesla's electric vehicles, as well as his futuristic goals of developing a fleet of robotaxis and an army of humanoid robots.

Tesla did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Shankh Mitra of Welltower received the second-largest compensation package in the survey at $821.1 million, the bulk of it in stock awards. Since October 2020, when he became CEO of the healthcare real estate investment trust, and October 2025, Welltower's stock price tripled. Mitra can only receive the full compensation, beyond a $110,000 annual salary, after a 10-year period.

CEO Hock Tan's pay package at Broadcom, valued at $205.3 million, covers the years 2028-2030 — companies assign a value at the time the package is awarded — and is tied to Tan's ability to greatly increase the revenue Broadcom generates from artificial intelligence, making it one of the few companies at this time to use AI as a benchmark in its compensation plans.

“Use of AI considerations or metrics in incentive plans has not yet taken hold as a majority practice,” said Kelly Malafis, founding partner at Compensation Advisory Partners, in an email, although she expects that could change going forward.

David Zaslav was at the center of a takeover battle that ended with him selling Warner Bros. to Paramount Skydance for $31 a share, up from $12.54 before reports of Paramount’s interest in a deal came out. For negotiating the deal at a premium and also exceeding certain financial and strategic goals, Warner gave Zaslav a pay package valued at $165 million, fourth largest in the survey. Since becoming CEO in 2007, Zaslav's compensation has totaled $1.1 billion, according to Equilar.

Big payouts for bankers

CEOs of three the nation's biggest banks got rewarded for yearslong efforts to retool their companies and revive a stagnant stock price.

Goldman Sachs’ David Solomon's pay package totaled almost $119 million — including stock valued at $80 million he can receive after five years. Goldman's board pointed to the 57% gain in the company's shares, as well as a hefty increase in its earnings per share. Solomon also sold off the company's Apple Card portfolio after an unsuccessful effort to expand Goldman's consumer-focused business.

Jane Fraser of Citigroup received a pay package valued at $95.8 million — tops among the 27 women CEOs in this year's survey and the highest-ever for a woman CEO in the survey's history. Fraser received a one-time award valued at $25 million in restricted stock and options after being elected Citi's chairman. She also got a one-time award for overseeing a wholesale reorganization of Citi into a leaner company, including laying off thousands of workers.

Overall, the median compensation for women CEOs in the survey fell 2.6% to $18.1 million, compared to a 6.4% increase for their male counterparts to $17.7 billion.

Wells Fargo gave CEO Charles Scharf a pay package worth $94.5 million after his yearslong effort to lead the bank back from a scandal involving fake bank accounts that landed Wells under federal supervision. And new scandals emerged along the way. The Federal Reserve finally let Wells leave the penalty box last year.

Other notables

In his last year as CEO of the conglomerate Berkshire Hathaway, Warren Buffett received compensation worth $389,488 — down 4% from the year prior.

Meta Platforms CEO Mark Zuckerberg's compensation was valued at $25.1 million and almost all of it involved costs for the company to provide security for him and his family, as well as the use of corporate aircraft.

Jensen Huang of Nvidia, the most valuable publicly traded company, got a pay package valued at $36.3 million. He didn't make the AP survey because Nvidia filed its proxy after April 30.

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Editors Dorothea Degen and Paul Harloff, and reporters Bernard Condon, Matt Ott, Alex Veiga, Ken Sweet and Chris Rugaber contributed.

Gov. Jenniffer González said the executive order would allow her administration to accelerate projects to protect natural resources and vulnerable coastal communities. The government said in a statement that rising sea levels, storm surges and other factors have intensified coastal erosion in Puerto Rico.

González pledged to help northern towns including Loiza, where people have been evacuated and chunks of asphalt from coastal roads have tumbled into the ocean following heavy swells.

The order was signed just days before the start of the Atlantic hurricane season, which runs from June 1 to Nov. 30.

The cost of the projects has not yet been determined.

This week, the “Alligator Capital of the World” opened its first-ever beverage venue, the Guzzlin’ Gator Beverage Barn.

The new spot offers more than 25 options, including craft beers, ciders, seltzers, canned cocktails, wine on tap, and non-alcoholic beverages, with bar seating, picnic tables, and a to-go area — all with views of the park’s zipliners and rock climbers.

The barn’s signature pour is the Grinnin’ Gator Lager, brewed exclusively for Gatorland by Winter Garden’s Crooked Can Brewing Company. The Munich-style Helles lager is made with Pilsen Malt, delivering a smooth, easy-drinking beer built for hot Florida days.

“Crooked Can Brewing Company was the perfect choice for our Grinnin’ Gator Lager,” said Mark McHugh, Gatorland president and CEO. “Our new Grinnin’ Gator craft beer is a good combination of an easy-drinking lager style that is fun and playful, just like we are right here at Gatorland.”

Paul Bishop, general manager of Crooked Can Brewing Company, said the partnership is a natural fit.

“What happens when you mix hometown brews with world-famous gators? You get something worth grinnin’ about,” Bishop said.

Guzzlin’ Gator Beverage Barn is open daily from 11 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Guzzlin’ Gator merchandise is available at the park’s main gift shop.

The victory could provide a model for similar campaigns gaining traction in states including California and Illinois, where labor organizers are increasingly targeting app-based industries as drivers also grapple with the rapid expansion of self-driving technology.

As drivers waved signs and chanted with the gold dome of the Massachusetts State House providing a backdrop, labor leaders described Friday's certification as the largest private-sector organizing win since Ford autoworkers unionized in 1941.

Jean Fredo, who has driven for Uber for more than seven years, said he hopes the union will bring better pay, stronger protections against sudden deactivations and more stability for drivers.

“With the union, it will not feel like we’re working for nothing,” he said in French through a translator. “Now the money will not only stay in the billionaire’s pockets. The money will actually come to the workers who work very hard.”

Uber and Lyft said they planned to work with the new bargaining framework as negotiations move forward. Uber said it would work with the union and regulators while preserving “driver flexibility and hard-won benefits,” while Lyft said it was committed to “engaging in good faith” and “helping drivers succeed while keeping rideshare affordable and dependable for everyone who counts on it.”

The certification became possible after the state’s voters approved a 2024 ballot measure creating a first-in-the-nation framework allowing ride-hailing drivers to unionize and bargain collectively while remaining independent contractors — a model some business groups and legal scholars argue could face antitrust challenges under federal law. Organizers say the union will ultimately represent nearly 70,000 drivers statewide.

Drivers hope for relief on wages, deactivations

“Without the support of the drivers, we wouldn’t be here,” Victoria Acosta, a mother who drives for both Uber and Lyft, said in Spanish through a translator. She said she hopes the victory inspires drivers in other states.

Uber and Lyft drivers are generally classified as independent contractors rather than employees, meaning they are not covered by many traditional labor protections under federal law. Drivers typically use their own vehicles, pay for expenses such as gas and maintenance themselves and can choose when and how long they work through the apps.

Fredo said when he started driving for Uber he appreciated the flexibility and the ability to make his own schedule while still being present for his family. But over time, he said, he found himself working longer hours while earning less as gas and maintenance costs climbed.

Drivers can also lose access to the apps with little warning, he said.

“I live with stress — always scared to lose my app. This is not a way to live," said Fredo, who helped sign up hundreds of other drivers at airports and gathering spots around the Boston area.

“This is my family,” he said, holding up a photo of his four children. “I’m fighting for a better life for them — just like everyone else is fighting for their families. My dream is to save and send my kids to college, and I believe we will get there.”

A labor fight shadowed by automation fears

Supporters say rising vehicle costs, fluctuating pay and opaque app algorithms have fueled frustration among drivers who pay many work expenses themselves. Uber and Lyft have argued that drivers value the flexibility of app-based work and have opposed efforts that could reclassify workers or alter the industry’s business model.

Massachusetts regulators are considering new ride-hailing rules involving safety standards and driver oversight. Days before the union certification, Uber warned in a blog post that some of the proposals could raise costs and reduce flexibility for drivers, while supporters said the changes are intended to strengthen safety and accountability.

The organizing effort has also unfolded alongside the rapid expansion of autonomous vehicle technology. Massachusetts still requires a licensed human operator inside autonomous vehicles tested on public roads.

Waymo has expanded driverless taxi operations in cities including San Francisco, Los Angeles and Phoenix, heightening anxiety among some ride-hailing drivers about the future of their jobs.

Autumn Weintraub, executive director of the App Drivers Union, said drivers across the country regularly communicate with one another about changing conditions in the industry, including the expansion of autonomous vehicles.

“Drivers now have an official organization and can speak with one voice about what’s happening in this industry,” Weintraub said. “We cannot let billions of dollars leave Massachusetts and go to Silicon Valley. That money feeds people’s families, that money pays the rent."

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This story was first published on May 26, 2026. It was updated on May 27, 2026, to correct a quote’s attribution to the union's executive director, Autumn Weintraub, not spokesperson Julie Blust.