Amazon, which was founded by Jeff Bezos, said that it would partner with South African internet provider Herotel to launch a new service in the country of 62 million people. Amazon said that it was its first satellite internet agreement on the African continent.

No financial details were initially disclosed.

Amazon's announcement follows Musk's bitter criticism of the government in his country of birth. The world's richest man has said that South African regulations have prevented him from launching Starlink there because he's white, and has accused the government of racism.

He was referring to South Africa's affirmative action policies, which require foreign companies operating in the communications sector to give a minority share of their local entities to Black or other non-white owners in order to acquire a license.

The regulations are meant to provide opportunities that were denied non-white people under the country's previous apartheid system of white minority rule.

The South African government has backed the Amazon deal, with Communications Minister Solly Malatsi joining Amazon and Herotel representatives to announce the agreement.

Amazon launched its first low orbit internet satellites last year and says it has more than 390 currently operational.

Starlink's first operational satellites were launched in 2019 and it now has more than 10,000 in orbit. Starlink's satellite internet has launched in around two dozen other African countries, but Musk has refused to follow South Africa's affirmative action regulations.

Amazon said Wednesday that the South African deal was the start of its effort to roll out across Africa, where it would also partner with Vanu Inc., a Lexington, Massachusetts-based company specializing in mobile internet in developing countries.

There's a large potential market for satellite internet in Africa, a continent of more than 1.5 billion people where many live in rural and other areas without fixed internet connections.

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AP Africa news: https://apnews.com/hub/africa

The Mozarteum Foundation on Wednesday unveiled 300 gold-colored statuettes of Mozart, which are barely 50 centimeters (less than 20 inches) tall. They were designed by German concept artist Ottmar Hörl.

Mozart was born on Jan. 27, 1756, in the Austrian city, where the Mozarteum Foundation offers concerts, maintains Mozart museums and supports research on him.

“I didn’t want to do a monument of Mozart. There are already enough of these. But I wanted to show his human side, that he was a normal human being despite his genius,” Hörl told The Associated Press.

To give the statues a human touch, Hörl depicted the composer with his favorite dog, Pimperl. Mozart and his family were known to take long walks with their dogs in the Mirabell Garden, next to where they lived.

The mini-Mozarts populate not only the garden, but also Mozart’s former living quarters as well as several pavilions. In all, 400 statues were made, but only 300 are on display at present. The rest are being kept in reserve in case of theft.

"Two already got stolen within the last few hours,” Linus Klumpner of the Mozarteum Foundation said. But the statues are meant to attract a broader range of visitors and get them hooked on Mozart’s Music.

“You come here, maybe you see the small golden heads shimmering in the sun on the horizon. And people become curious," Klumpner said. "And then a process begins which is very much in our interest. That is to bring new people in contact with Mozart."

For Hörl, the theft of his artworks in nothing new. At an installation in Bayreuth, Germany, a complete array of statues of Richard Wagner was stolen within 10 days.

“That’s just the nature of public space. That means when you work as an artist in a public space you mustn’t complain about what is happening there," Hörl said. "It ranges from destruction to theft. That’s just how it is.”

The Mozart statues are scheduled to remain on display until Aug. 30. People who would like to own one but would prefer not to steal it can purchase one for 100 euros ($114) – while supplies last.

Hörl is known for his sculptures made from polymer. In 2010 he displayed 10,000 plastic owls in Athens. A “Homage to Dürer” showcased oversized plastic copies of Albrecht Dürer’s hare at the Daegu art museum in South Korea.

In 2009, German prosecutors decided against investigating Hörl over a series of golden garden gnomes doing the Hitler salute, under a law that forbids using insignia forbidden by the German constitution. Hörl himself intended the gnomes as satire against the Nazis' ideology.

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“It’s really a race against time to identify what’s causing the outbreak so that it can be pulled from the shelves,” said Dr. Caitlin Rivers, an infectious disease epidemiologist.

Michigan’s chief medical executive said early findings have identified lettuce as a common food reported by patients during the investigation.

Officials cautioned that no specific type of lettuce, grower or supplier has been identified, and other foods have not been ruled out.

“There are thousands of people who need to be interviewed and to look back in their history and see what they have eaten that could be responsible,” Rivers said.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says 34 states have reported cases of Cyclospora.

More than 1,600 cases have been confirmed since May 1, when infections typically begin to increase seasonally, while another 5,100 cases remain under further analysis.

Health officials say the parasite can be difficult to trace because symptoms may not appear for up to two weeks after exposure, making it harder for patients to remember what they ate.

They say at least 44 people have been hospitalized in Michigan and at least 46 in Ohio.

“The longer that contaminated products are being sold, being served in restaurants, available to consumers, the more people who will become infected,” Rivers said.

Health officials also said Cyclospora does not usually spread from person to person.

Federal and state officials are also investigating a potential link between the recent cyclosporiasis outbreaks and Taco Bell, according to The Washington Post.

The newspaper reported that two sources familiar with the investigation said authorities are trying to determine whether the fast-food chain is connected to the parasitic foodborne illness, which has infected thousands of people and can cause explosive diarrhea.

Some Taco Bell restaurants have stopped serving certain ingredients since the outbreaks were reported.

Most of the reported cases have been in Michigan, though illnesses have also been identified in New York, Ohio, Colorado and Texas. Officials say the source of the outbreak has not been confirmed.

“Realmente es una carrera contra el tiempo identificar qué está causando el brote para poder retirar el producto de los estantes”, dijo la Dra. Caitlin Rivers, epidemióloga especializada en enfermedades infecciosas.

El principal funcionario médico de Michigan informó que los hallazgos preliminares identificaron la lechuga como un alimento consumido en común por los pacientes durante la investigación.

Las autoridades advirtieron que no se ha identificado un tipo específico de lechuga, productor o proveedor, y que otros alimentos no han sido descartados.

“Hay miles de personas a las que se debe entrevistar y revisar su historial para determinar qué comieron y qué podría ser responsable”, dijo Rivers.

Los Centros para el Control y la Prevención de Enfermedades (CDC) informaron que 34 estados han reportado casos de Cyclospora.

Se han confirmado más de 1,600 casos desde el 1 de mayo, cuando las infecciones suelen comenzar a aumentar por la temporada, mientras que otros 5,100 casos permanecen bajo análisis.

Las autoridades de salud señalaron que el parásito puede ser difícil de rastrear porque los síntomas pueden tardar hasta dos semanas en aparecer después de la exposición, lo que dificulta que los pacientes recuerden qué comieron.

También indicaron que al menos 44 personas han sido hospitalizadas en Michigan y al menos 46 en Ohio.

“Cuanto más tiempo se sigan vendiendo productos contaminados, sirviéndose en restaurantes y estando disponibles para los consumidores, más personas se infectarán”, dijo Rivers.

Las autoridades de salud también señalaron que Cyclospora generalmente no se transmite de persona a persona.

Funcionarios federales y estatales también investigan un posible vínculo entre los recientes brotes de ciclosporiasis y Taco Bell, según informó The Washington Post.

El periódico reportó que dos fuentes familiarizadas con la investigación dijeron que las autoridades intentan determinar si la cadena de comida rápida está relacionada con la enfermedad parasitaria transmitida por alimentos, que ha infectado a miles de personas y puede provocar diarrea intensa.

Algunos restaurantes Taco Bell han dejado de servir ciertos ingredientes desde que se reportaron los brotes.

La mayoría de los casos reportados se han registrado en Michigan, aunque también se han identificado enfermedades en Nueva York, Ohio, Colorado y Texas. Las autoridades afirmaron que el origen del brote aún no ha sido confirmado.

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It’s the first area to watch on National Hurrican Center’s Atlantic basin map in over two weeks.

As we’ve detailed in previous newsletters, the area we’re following is an elongated strip of low pressure that’s expected to form this weekend in the elbow of Florida’s Big Bend over the northeastern Gulf.

Unlike most tropical systems whose circulations form first at the surface, this disturbance will initially have spin focused higher up in the atmosphere (at around 20,000 feet) from a mid-level spin that’ll be pinwheeling into the eastern Gulf from the Florida Straits starting on Saturday.

The less conventional setup means that the system will need time to transition down from an initially non-tropical low to a defined surface area of low pressure.

Forecast models are at odds as to whether it’ll eventually do so, and NHC has opened with a low 20% chance of development over the next 7 days, consistent with what model guidance has been advertising this week.

Impediments along the way

As we covered in Tuesday’s newsletter, the atmosphere won’t be in a ripe configuration for quick or significant tropical organization next week.

The main impediment will be moderate to at times strong northerly wind shear from a weakening upper-level low centered over the Florida peninsula late this weekend.

The development window will begin to open up on Sunday and stay largely open through next Tuesday. Models diverge next week as to whether the system slides across northeastern Florida and along the coasts of southeastern Georgia and the Carolinas or peels back westward toward the central Gulf Coast.

It’s the westward path over the northern Gulf that would leave it over record to near-record warm waters and the scenario that would raise the specter of pure tropical development.

A system moving northeastward and up the U.S. east coast would lean toward hybrid-like organization, if at all, aided by jet stream winds next week.

In either case, moderate wind shear and bouts of dry, continental air should pump the brakes on organization.

For now, models continue to advertise only low development odds, but it’s worth checking in on the trends this week, mainly because of the outside westward-moving scenarios that loiter it over the northern Gulf into middle next week.

Signal for heavy rainfall next week regardless

The upshot regardless is the potential for heavy rainfall, starting along the northeastern Gulf and west coast of Florida next week.

It’s too soon to pinpoint any potential flood risk, but soaking rains could be beneficial to drought-stricken parts of Florida if spread out over several days.

Those along the northern Gulf Coast will want to check back in the days ahead as we refine the forecast and get a better sense of where the heaviest totals might land next week.

Es la primera zona que se debe vigilar en el mapa de la cuenca del Atlántico del Centro Nacional de Huracanes en más de dos semanas.

Como ya hemos detallado en boletines anteriores, la zona que estamos siguiendo es una franja alargada de baja presión que se espera que se forme este fin de semana en el codo de la Gran Curva de Florida, sobre el noreste del Golfo de México.

A diferencia de la mayoría de los sistemas tropicales, cuyas circulaciones se forman primero en la superficie, esta perturbación tendrá inicialmente un giro concentrado a mayor altitud en la atmósfera (a unos 20.000 pies) a partir de un giro de nivel medio que girará en espiral hacia el este del Golfo desde el Estrecho de Florida a partir del sábado.

Esta configuración menos convencional implica que el sistema necesitará tiempo para pasar de una baja presión inicialmente no tropical a una zona superficial definida de baja presión.

Los modelos de pronóstico discrepan sobre si finalmente ocurrirá, y el NHC ha abierto con una baja probabilidad del 20% de que se produzca en los próximos 7 días, en consonancia con lo que las previsiones de los modelos han estado anunciando esta semana.

Obstáculos en el camino

Como ya comentamos en el boletín del martes, la próxima semana la atmósfera no presentará las condiciones propicias para una organización tropical rápida o significativa.

El principal obstáculo será la cizalladura del viento del norte, de moderada a fuerte en ocasiones, procedente de una baja presión en niveles superiores que se debilitará y que se centrará sobre la península de Florida a finales de este fin de semana.

La ventana de desarrollo comenzará a abrirse el domingo y permanecerá prácticamente abierta hasta el próximo martes. Los modelos discrepan la próxima semana sobre si el sistema se desplazará por el noreste de Florida y a lo largo de las costas del sureste de Georgia y las Carolinas, o si retrocederá hacia el oeste, hacia la costa central del Golfo de México.

Es la trayectoria hacia el oeste sobre el norte del Golfo la que lo dejaría sobre aguas con temperaturas récord o casi récord, y el escenario que plantearía el espectro de un desarrollo puramente tropical.

Un sistema que se desplace hacia el noreste y a lo largo de la costa este de Estados Unidos tendería a organizarse de forma híbrida, si es que lo hace, favorecido por los vientos de la corriente en chorro la próxima semana.

En ambos casos, una cizalladura del viento moderada y episodios de aire continental seco deberían frenar la organización atmosférica.

Por ahora, los modelos siguen anunciando bajas probabilidades de desarrollo, pero vale la pena revisar las tendencias esta semana, principalmente debido a los escenarios externos que se desplazan hacia el oeste y que lo mantienen sobre el norte del Golfo hasta mediados de la próxima semana.

Señal de fuertes lluvias la próxima semana, independientemente de las circunstancias.

En cualquier caso, el resultado es la posibilidad de fuertes lluvias, que comenzarán la próxima semana a lo largo del noreste del Golfo y la costa oeste de Florida.

Todavía es pronto para determinar cualquier riesgo potencial de inundación, pero las lluvias intensas podrían ser beneficiosas para las zonas de Florida afectadas por la sequía si se distribuyen a lo largo de varios días.

Quienes residan en la costa norte del Golfo de México deberán consultar la información en los próximos días, ya que iremos ajustando el pronóstico para tener una mejor idea de dónde podrían caer las mayores cantidades de lluvia la próxima semana.

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The Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation temporarily closed CMX Brickell Stone Sports Bar, located at 701 S. Miami Ave., Suite 401A, on July 14 after inspectors documented 30 violations, including eight high priority violations.

Among the most serious findings, inspectors reported seeing one live rodent on a glue trap inside a cabinet in the upstairs bar. They also found more than 100 dead flies on the floor near an old bar area by the kitchen and two live flies in storage areas.

Inspectors also discovered the upstairs bar dish machine was not sanitizing dishes because it registered zero parts per million of chlorine sanitizer. The report ordered the restaurant to discontinue using the machine for sanitizing until it is repaired and to manually sanitize dishes instead.

Other violations included raw shell eggs stored over cooked peppers, chemicals stored above drinking straws, food stored on the floor, standing water on the cook line, torn refrigerator door gaskets, damaged ceiling tiles, missing floor tiles, exposed insulation inside a cooler, carbon dioxide tanks that were not secured, and expired food safety training certificates for multiple employees.

The closure marks the second time the restaurant has been ordered to stop operations this year.

On May 13, state inspectors also temporarily closed CMX Brickell Stone Sports Bar after finding a dead rodent on a trap near the bar area.

That inspection also cited an employee who failed to wash hands before putting on gloves to handle food, a handwashing sink with no soap, a soiled can opener blade, dirty walk-in cooler shelves, standing water in a hand sink and a slow draining sink.

Local 10 News visited the restaurant following the May closure, but management declined to comment.

Restaurants ordered closed by the state are allowed to reopen after correcting the violations and passing a follow-up inspection.

El Departamento de Regulación Comercial y Profesional de Florida ordenó el cierre temporal de CMX Brickell Stone Sports Bar, ubicado en el 701 de South Miami Avenue, Suite 401A, el 14 de julio, luego de que los inspectores documentaran 30 infracciones, incluidas ocho de alta prioridad.

Entre los hallazgos más graves, los inspectores informaron haber encontrado un roedor vivo en una trampa adhesiva dentro de un gabinete en el bar del segundo piso. También encontraron más de 100 moscas muertas en el piso cerca de un área antigua del bar junto a la cocina y dos moscas vivas en áreas de almacenamiento.

Los inspectores también descubrieron que la máquina lavavajillas del bar del segundo piso no estaba desinfectando los platos porque registró cero partes por millón de desinfectante de cloro. El informe ordenó al restaurante dejar de usar la máquina para desinfectar hasta que sea reparada y desinfectar los platos manualmente mientras tanto.

Otras infracciones incluyeron huevos crudos con cáscara almacenados sobre pimientos cocidos, productos químicos almacenados sobre pajillas para bebidas, alimentos almacenados en el piso, agua estancada en la línea de cocina, empaques de puertas de refrigeradores rotos, paneles del techo dañados, baldosas del piso faltantes, aislamiento expuesto dentro de un refrigerador, tanques de dióxido de carbono sin asegurar y certificados de capacitación en seguridad alimentaria vencidos para varios empleados.

El cierre marca la segunda ocasión en que el restaurante ha sido obligado a suspender operaciones este año.

El 13 de mayo, inspectores estatales también ordenaron el cierre temporal de CMX Brickell Stone Sports Bar tras encontrar un roedor muerto en una trampa cerca del área del bar.

Esa inspección también señaló a un empleado que no se lavó las manos antes de ponerse guantes para manipular alimentos, un lavamanos sin jabón, la cuchilla de un abrelatas sucia, estantes sucios en un refrigerador tipo walk-in, agua estancada en un lavamanos y un fregadero con drenaje lento.

Local 10 News visitó el restaurante tras el cierre de mayo, pero la gerencia declinó hacer comentarios.

Los restaurantes ordenados a cerrar por el estado pueden reabrir una vez que corrijan las infracciones y aprueben una inspección de seguimiento.

The two teams meet in Atlanta and the winner will play Spain in the final in East Rutherford, New Jersey, on Sunday.

“I mean the two shirts are just iconic and the historic matches are iconic,” England coach Thomas Tuchel said.

A fierce rivalry

The World Cup rivalry between the nations dates back to 1962, but it was England's 1-0 win in the quarterfinals four years later that saw it intensify. Argentina captain Antonio Rattin, whose death was announced on Saturday, was sent off in a bad-tempered match. England went on to win the World Cup for the first, and still the only time, in its history.

Twenty years on in Mexico, Diego Maradona scored the infamous “Hand of God” goal that helped Argentina to a 2-1 win in the quarterfinals on the way to becoming world champion for a second time.

That game also saw Maradona score what many believe to be the greatest World Cup goal ever when he dribbled the ball from the halfway line before beating England goalkeeper Peter Shilton.

“That will be forever in our hearts. It was just such a beautiful goal,” Argentina coach Lionel Scaloni said. “Anybody who loves football will remember that in the best way possible.”

England felt aggrieved again in 1998 when David Beckham was sent off for kicking out at Argentina midfielder Diego Simeone before losing the round-of-16 game on penalties.

Beckham got his revenge four years later by scoring a penalty in a 1-0 win that contributed to Argentina being eliminated at the group stage.

Given the heated rivalry, Tuchel has tried to manage the emotions of his players ahead of the semifinal.

“If a fixture provides so many iconic moments you cannot just say it’s just another football match, but as a coach we do exactly that,” he said. “We don’t speak about the historic events. We don’t speak about the iconic moments.”

Route to the semifinals

Neither team has had a smooth ride to the semifinals.

Argentina survived scares against Cape Verde and Egypt earlier in the knockout rounds and needed extra time to beat 10-man Switzerland 3-1 in the quarterfinals.

England had to rally for wins against Congo and Norway after going a goal down. It also endured a physically exhausting game played at altitude, and being down to 10 men, to beat co-host Mexico 3-2 in the round of 16.

Messi vs. Kane and Bellingham

The seemingly ageless Lionel Messi has been Argentina's talisman once again, scoring eight goals and also providing crucial assists.

England has relied on its big hitters in Harry Kane and Jude Bellingham. Both have six goals so far, with Bellingham scoring twice in each of England's last two games.

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James Robson is at https://x.com/jamesalanrobson

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See more of AP’s World Cup coverage here

Miami, which had been the ACC's most dominant team during the regular season, wound up being selected for the playoff and went on to reach the national title game, where it fell short to No. 1 Indiana 27-21.

Duke beat No. 20 Virginia in the ACC championship game last year for its first outright ACC title since 1962 but was not selected for the CFP, much to the dismay of Blue Devils coach Manny Diaz.

The new football championship tiebreaker policy will take effect beginning with the 2026 season, reflecting the league’s transition to a nine-game conference schedule and ensuring a fair and equitable process for determining participants in the ACC championship game, the league said.

The updated tiebreaking procedure is built on three guiding principles:

— Head-to-head results always will matter most.

— No team will be overly rewarded or penalized based on the number of conference games it played.

— When head-to-head competition cannot separate tied teams, the team with the strongest overall body of work will earn the opportunity to compete for the ACC championship and the conference’s automatic qualifier to the College Football Playoff.

“Our game will feature the two most deserving teams,” ACC Commissioner Jim Phillips said at ACC Kickoff on Wednesday in Charlotte.

Phillips said the third tier of that tiebreaker will be based on a SportSource Analytics metric used by the CFP.

The updated policy was developed to reward head-to-head results and account for the league’s teams playing an alternate number of conference games while also identifying the two most deserving teams to compete for the ACC championship and the conference’s automatic berth into the CFP.

The conference said the evaluation included more than 10,000 simulated season outcomes to ensure the model fairly addressed a wide range of championship scenarios.

The revised policy was approved following a comprehensive review by the ACC’s athletics directors.

In December, the ACC announced that 12 of its 17 football-playing members would be playing a nine-game football schedule beginning in 2026 while five teams would play eight games. That made the head-to-head tiebreakers even more complicated than in the past.

The policy will operate as a bridge to accommodate conference games already on the books, with the plan to have 16 of 17 teams playing nine football games regularly by 2027.

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AP college football: https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-college-football-poll and https://apnews.com/hub/college-football

For the Florida Panthers, they’ll kick off their home schedule on Oct. 10 when they host the Minnesota Wild at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise.

Thanks to the NHL expanding its regular season schedule to 84 games, the league is starting the season a little earlier than usual.

With that being the case, the Panthers are going to be quite busy ahead of their home opener.

First, Florida will be in Raleigh on Sept. 29 for the Carolina Hurricanes home opener, when they will raise their 2026 Stanley Cup Championship banner to the rafters at Lenovo Center.

Puck drop for that matchup is set for 5 p.m. and the game will be nationally broadcast on ESPN as part of their season-opening tripleheader.

The Panthers will then head across the country for not one, not two but three home openers in California.

The fun starts on Oct. 1 when Florida faces the San Jose Sharks, then three nights later on Oct. 4 the Cats will help the Anaheim Ducks open their home schedule.

Two nights later, the Panthers will make the short trip to Los Angeles for the Kings’ home opener on Oct. 6.

After playing four road games and traveling thousands of miles during the first week of the season, it would make sense that Florida would not play again until their home opener.

We wont know for sure until the full schedule is released by the NHL, which is expected to happen on Thursday.

“Hallowed turf,” is how a young, wide-eyed Fleetwood viewed the course in this golf-crazed corner of northwest England that, every few years, would welcome the world’s best players for the British Open.

His dream of making it there himself one day and lifting the claret jug — a scenario which, who knows, might just happen on the 18th green at Birkdale on Sunday evening — began a 10-minute drive down the road in more humble environs.

Southport Municipal, a club that proudly labels itself as England’s oldest municipal links course, staged a junior program on Monday nights and it was there where Fleetwood’s golfing journey launched around the age of 6.

And it’s why Will Burke, a 40-year-old from Birmingham, Alabama, pitched up there on Wednesday with his father, Randy. They paid 19 pounds ($25) each to play 18 holes under a gorgeous blue sky.

“We’re here for the golf this week,” Will said, “and we met with some locals who were really complimentary about the place and said it’s right down the street from where we’re staying.

“When you hear the story about Tommy Fleetwood’s origins and how he got started in the Southport area, that’s the cherry on top.”

Nothing inside this muni’s modest club shop, or indeed anywhere at the course, points to Fleetwood being its most famous son. Strangely, there's not a mention of him anywhere.

Look further afield around these parts, though, and it’s clear this popular golfer with distinctive flowing locks and a forever-friendly manner is a hometown hero.

Fleetwood sees huge support as ‘really positive fuel’

There’s a mural of Fleetwood — pumping his fists and wearing his blue Team Europe Ryder Cup uniform — on the wall of Southport & Birkdale Sports Club.

There’s the Tommy Fleetwood Academy at nearby Formby Hall golf club, where he first became a member and won his only club championship as a kid. Youngsters from the academy have lined up for autographs from Fleetwood next to the practice putting green this week.

There's been no bigger buzz during the practice days than when the 35-year-old Fleetwood has been on the course.

“It’s very rare to have an opportunity to play a tournament, let alone the Open, in the town where you grew up in front of fans that were all there to support you,” Fleetwood said.

“To see people emotionally invested in you … I think it’s very special. It definitely doesn’t go unnoticed by me.”

The natural question is, will it heap too much pressure on him?

Fleetwood sees it as “really, really positive fuel.”

“If I just go back to the original me being an 8-year-old kid, the thought of playing in an Open at Birkdale was unbelievably special,” he said. “So if you’re not going to enjoy it, then you’ve kind of let yourself down.”

Fleetwood has already had experience of playing in the Open at Royal Birkdale, in 2017 when he shot a first-round 76 to essentially drop him out of contention. He described a bounce-back 69 to make the cut as “one of the best rounds I ever played” and finished tied for 27th.

Fleetwood was tied for the first-round lead at the 2023 British Open staged nearby at Royal Liverpool, where he also was billed as the home favorite. He faded to a tie for 10th, nine shots back from champion Brian Harman.

Rory knows the feeling

Rory McIlroy knows what Fleetwood is going through. McIlroy was the guy most in the crowd were rooting for when the Open Championship made an emotional return to Royal Portrush in his native Northern Ireland in 2019 — after an absence of 68 years — and again last year.

McIlroy missed the cut the first time after a nightmarish first-round 79 but said he handled things better the second time, when he tied for seventh.

“You feel like you’re trying to play well for everyone else and not for yourself,” McIlroy said. “I think there’s already enough pressure on anyone in this field to play well for themselves, so to add that extra layer on top of that is always pretty difficult.

“But,” he added, “I feel like Tommy’s more level-headed than I am and won’t fall into that trap like I did in 2019.”

Away from the lofty expectations of the locals in this seaside town, Fleetwood comes back home under pressure to end his wait for a first major title.

Winning the Tour Championship last August was celebrated beyond English shores because it was his first PGA Tour title and he'd come so close so many times, handling each near-miss with dignity and grace.

Now it's time for Fleetwood to capture that elusive major and there'd be no more popular winner on Sunday, especially to the people of Southport, who keep welcoming back with open arms.

“Everybody loves him, everybody respects him, whether they've met him or not. We own a little bit of him,” said Patrick Hodgson, a 71-year-old member at Southport Municipal who has followed Fleetwood's rise from talented local kid to one of the world's best players.

“If he wins, it would be celebrated here for days and months and years.”

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AP golf: https://apnews.com/hub/golf

The 47-page bill, called a budget resolution, is a long-shot undertaking designed to supplement Pentagon funding for the Iran war and address Trump’s top priority of changing voter registration requirements. A more ambitious version of the bill was narrowed to address concerns of conservatives about how it would be paid for and adding to the deficit. The resolution does not seek any offsets to pay for the new spending.

The resolution calls for the Armed Services Committee to craft legislation that will not increase the deficit by more than $60 billion; the Select Committee on Intelligence, $13 billion; the Agriculture Committee, $12 billion; and the House Administration Committee, $10 billion. The latter funding would be focused on enacting an election law overhaul that requires those registering to vote to provide proof of citizenship.

Both the House and the Senate will have to pass the same resolution to launch the crafting of the party line bill. It could be a lengthy process, with much of the action taking place after lawmakers return from their August recess and during the heart of election season. Democrats are expected to overwhelmingly oppose whatever final product emerges and would force Republicans to take votes on scores of difficult amendments.

Still, House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., voiced confidence in the effort.

“Congressional Democrats continue OBSTRUCTING our attempts to secure our elections and fund our men and women in uniform,” Johnson said in a written statement. “Not any longer.”

Johnson said he applauded Budget Committee Chairman Jodey Arrington, R-Texas, and others on the panel for moving swiftly to advance the resolution and unlock what would be Republicans' third reconciliation bill this Congress. The panel will take up the resolution on Thursday, with the full House taking it up next week before lawmakers return to their districts for the next five weeks.

Trump has insisted that Republicans pass an elections overhaul bill, referred to as the SAVE Act, that has passed the House but does not have the votes to overcome the 60-vote threshold in the 100-member Senate. So Republicans are looking to get much of it through the arduous reconciliation process that allows both chambers to pass a bill with a simple majority.

The GOP's effort also incorporates the Trump administration's request to Congress last month to replenish the Pentagon from the Iran war. Trump asked for $67 billion at the time.

The additional aid for farmers dealing with higher gas and fertilizer prices and retaliatory tariffs has become an election year priority for many lawmakers with large rural constituencies.

The man was arrested Tuesday on suspicion of sending threatening communications to a member of Parliament, the Metropolitan Police said.

“I am going to shoot you in the head if you win,” he allegedly told Farage on X, according to the Telegraph newspaper.

The July 8 killing of Widdecombe, who was a member of the anti-immigration Reform UK, has led the party to call for better protection of its members.

The suspect was held overnight and released on bail, police said.

Farage recently resigned his seat in Parliament over an investigation into an undeclared 5 million pound ($6.7 million) gift he received from a cryptocurrency billionaire.

Farage said the money was to pay for his personal security. He quit but is seeking re-election next month to the same seat to show he still has the support of the people. Opponents have criticized that as a ploy to dodge a parliamentary probe.

The death of Widdecombe at her rural home in southwest England has shaken the British political establishment, where she was long known for blunt-spoken socially conservative views opposing abortion and the expansion of LGBTQ+ rights.

The investigation into her death is being handled by counterterror police who took over after new evidence was discovered.

Devon and Cornwall Police have been criticized for originally saying the killing was not believed to be a terror-related crime and there was nothing to suggest it was politically motivated.

El Servicio Meteorológico Nacional informó que un tornado tocó tierra en la parte noroeste de San Antonio, cerca de la Interestatal 10. Videos publicados en redes sociales mostraban lo que parecía ser un pequeño tornado. No hubo reportes de heridos.

Mientras tanto, se emitieron advertencias de inundaciones repentinas potencialmente peligrosas en algunas zonas, y el diluvio estaba previsto a continuar hasta la noche del jueves. El servicio meteorológico indicó que podrían caer entre 25 a 50 centímetros (10 y 20 pulgadas) de lluvia en algunas áreas para cuando las tormentas se alejen.

No se han reportado muertes ni lesiones por las inundaciones.

Se emitieron advertencias de inundaciones repentinas la mañana del miércoles para varios condados cerca de la frontera con México, incluidas partes del condado Kerr, donde inundaciones catastróficas a lo largo del río Guadalupe el año pasado causaron la muerte de más de 100 personas. Funcionarios del condado Kerr señalaron que han estado en contacto con campamentos de verano y centros de retiro donde podría ocurrir una crecida del río.

Los mayores acumulados de lluvia hasta ahora se han registrado en el condado Uvalde — hasta 40 centímetros (16 pulgadas) en algunas zonas—, informó el servicio meteorológico.

“Esto se considera un patrón típico de clima tropical de mediados de verano que ocurre en Texas", explicó Monte Oaks, meteorólogo del servicio meteorológico. "Aproximadamente una vez cada cinco años, nos golpea este tipo de lluvia intensa que, por lo general, es producida por un centro de baja presión estancado que no se mueve muy rápido”.

Oaks indicó que la lluvia está siendo alimentada por humedad tropical, principalmente del Golfo de México y algo del Océano Pacífico.

La mayor preocupación por inundaciones era para las zonas al oeste de San Antonio y al norte de la Ruta 90, precisó.

El gobernador de Texas, Greg Abbott, emitió declaraciones de desastre para decenas de condados.

Las autoridades publicaron videos el martes en los que se veía a un equipo de rescate en una embarcación navegando por calles inundadas y a un vehículo siendo arrastrado por las aguas. Cinco personas fueron rescatadas por el Equipo de Rescate de Texas y cuatro fueron rescatadas por un guardabosques local, informó Maggie Berger, portavoz de Parques y Vida Silvestre de Texas.

El servicio meteorológico indicó que la ciudad de Uvalde ha sido la más afectada. Funcionarios allí señalaron que se habían realizado al menos dos docenas de rescates acuáticos, y que un centro local de eventos estaba abierto para cualquiera que hubiera sido desplazado por las inundaciones. En Sabinal, los funcionarios también estaban haciendo planes para un refugio.

__________________________________

El corresponsal Dave Collins en Hartford, Connecticut, contribuyó con esta nota.

__________________________________

Esta historia fue traducida del inglés por un editor de AP con ayuda de una herramienta de inteligencia artificial generativa.

One person was plucked from the water by rescue crews but later died, and 16 people were saved after the vessel got into trouble Tuesday afternoon. A dog on board also died.

A captain of another boat who rushed to help said the waves were choppy at the time. Videos of the scene Tuesday showed boats deployed to help people who had been on the vessel, which was largely submerged with objects floating nearby.

The vessel's motor was still running and leaking fuel when rescuers arrived, San Francisco Fire Chief Dean Crispen said.

“Our understanding was there was some kind of memorial service that they were engaging in,” Crispen said at a news conference. “They were hit by a wave or took on water, and the boat capsized.”

A department spokesperson, Lt. Mariano Elias, described it as a 50-foot (15-meter) multilevel cabin cruiser.

Fire department boats “are still searching now,” Elias said in an email to The Associated Press on Wednesday morning.

By Tuesday evening, authorities had been searching in the open ocean on the western side of the Golden Gate Bridge. The efforts have involved divers, helicopters and vessels.

In July, the average temperature of the bay at 7 a.m. is around 59 degrees (15 degrees Celsius), according to the Pacific Open Water Swim Company. That's cold but not life-threatening.

All the people rescued Tuesday were taken to the Gashouse Cove Marina in San Francisco. A yellow tarp could be seen covering a body on a dock.

Alcatraz Island was once an infamously inescapable federal prison due to challenging waters that surround it. Now a tourist destination, it is located about a mile (about 1.6 kilometers) north of San Francisco's shoreline in an often windy area that attracts sailboats and other recreational vessels.

Elias said the vessel was about 600 yards (about 550 meters) from Alcatraz and the emergency call came in just after 3:30 p.m. Tuesday.

Crispen said the vessel was believed to have launched near the St. Francis Yacht Club in San Francisco. A person who answered the phone there said the club did not have any information on what happened.

___

Associated Press writers Kathy McCormack in Concord, New Hampshire; Sophie Austin in Sacramento, California; Claire Rush in Portland, Oregon; and Hallie Golden in Seattle; and photographer Noah Berger in San Francisco contributed to this story.

Schwartz, 54, is up for director of the Atlanta-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which is charged with protecting Americans from preventable health threats.

Her career has largely been spent in military uniform, including in a leadership position at the U.S. Coast Guard where she oversaw the organization’s system of 41 clinics and 150 sick bays — as well as policies promoting vaccinations of service members. She later served as deputy surgeon general, where she helped lead uniformed medical and health professionals posted at the CDC and government health agencies that serve the general public.

The CDC long enjoyed a sterling international reputation but has been in turmoil since Trump returned to office last year. Largely due to layoffs and resignations, the agency has lost more than 3,000 employees, or more than a quarter of its workforce. Morale has plummeted as a succession of mostly temporary leaders have come and gone — the front office filled with political appointees, many of them with little or no training in medicine or public health.

“There’s still really good people who work there (at the CDC). They are doing their best to navigate choppy waters,” said Dr. David Margolius, director of Cleveland's health department and a leader in a U.S. coalition of big city health departments. But CDC no longer seems to the authoritative and communicative lead that it was on outbreaks and other public health emergencies.

“Basically everybody’s got to kind of choose their own adventure, as opposed to being led by a national public health department,” Margolius said.

CDC has had several leaders

The agency is overseen by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who was a leading voice in the anti-vaccine movement before he was tapped to lead the CDC and other federal health agencies. Kennedy had promised not to change the nation’s vaccination schedule. But shortly after taking office, Kennedy said he was going to investigate the childhood vaccine schedule and went on to attempt a substantial rewrite of vaccine recommendations for kids. Some of those efforts were put on hold earlier this year by a federal judge.

The administration’s first pick to run the CDC was former Florida congressman Dr. David Weldon, but his March 2025 Senate confirmation hearing was canceled an hour before it was to begin. Weldon said at the time that he’d been told not enough senators were willing to vote for him.

The White House then moved on to Susan Monarez, who had been serving as the CDC’s acting director. Monarez was confirmed by the Senate, but she was ousted in less than a month. Trump administration officials said she wasn’t aligned with their agenda so they terminated her.

Several key CDC scientific leaders resigned in protest, saying Monarez’s dismissal dashed their hopes that a CDC director would be able to guard against political meddling in the agency’s scientific research and health recommendations.

Since then, there’s been a revolving door in agency leadership, with the short-term role of acting director being passed from one Washington-based HHS official to another. National Institutes of Health Director Jay Bhattacharya has been overseeing the CDC most recently.

Senators will also hear from nominee overseeing health emergency preparedness

In April, Trump nominated Schwartz, calling her “incredibly talented.” In a congressional hearing in April, Kennedy said he approved of the choice, but refused to commit to supporting whatever vaccine guidance she might issue.

Last month, Schwartz filed letters with the government that address her finances and potential conflicts of interest. She wrote that if confirmed, she will leave her current job with UnitedHealth Group, where she's making about $850,000 in salary and bonus money and cash out her stock options. She also will resign from the board of directors of Butterfly Network Inc., a Massachusetts company that makes ultrasound devices; from the board of Atlanta-based Aveanna Healthcare, a medical home care provider; and from the board of the Florida-based Searching for Solutions Institute.

Also at Wednesday's hearing, senators will consider the nomination of Sean Kaufman as the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response, or ASPR. That job entails overseeing preparations and response to public health emergencies and disasters.

Last year, the Trump administration announced a plan to bring those responsibilities under CDC, but the dramatic HHS restructuring has not happened.

The assistant secretary's office is involved in decisions about funding next-generation vaccines against pandemic flu or other infectious disease threats. In postings on LinkedIn, Kaufman has made comments cheered by vaccine skeptics, arguing against hepatitis B vaccinations for newborns and saying he served as an expert witness to advocate for people who refused the COVID-19 vaccine.

___

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.

Arison has officially held the title of “governor” since the NBA moved away from using the term “owner”in 2019. The league uses governor and “alternate governor” for controlling stakeholders in its official operations, while some teams use titles such as chairman or managing partner.

Arison will officially take over the role following the league’s Board of Governors meeting in September. He succeeds Toronto Raptors governor Larry Tanenbaum, who has served as chairman since September 2017.

Arison has been the Heat’s governor for 31 years, giving him the second-longest tenure among current NBA team governors.

“I am grateful for Larry’s nearly three decades of stewardship of the Raptors and his commitment to helping guide our league as NBA Board Chairman over the past nine years,” Silver said. “Micky’s long record of service on the Board, his strong relationships with his fellow team owners and his deep understanding of our game and business make him an exceptional choice to assume this important leadership role.”

Arison said he is eager to begin working with the league in his new position.

“I look forward to working closely in this new capacity with Adam, the league office and my fellow team governors to champion our teams and players, ensuring we continue to deliver exciting and unforgettable experiences for our fans,” Arison said.

During Arison’s tenure, the Heat has won three NBA championships and reached the NBA Finals seven times. He was inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame in 2025.

In addition to leading the Heat, Arison serves as chairman of the board of Carnival Corporation, the world’s largest cruise company.

And don’t forget, you can watch Miami Heat games on Local 10 next season as WPLG Local 10 and the Heat announced a newly expanded media rights agreement, making Local 10 the home of HEAT basketball across South Florida! CLICK HERE for more information on how to watch!

Heat fans can also call 786-777-4375 for more information on how to purchase tickets for the 2026-2027 season.

Blanche, according to prepared remarks released before the hearing, is expected to tell lawmakers that he and his team are “restoring trust” in the Justice Department. It’s a nod toward complaints from Democrats that he has weaponized the law enforcement institution by pursuing criminal investigations into Trump’s perceived adversaries.

Blanche, Trump’s former personal attorney, has run the department on an interim basis since April. During that time, he has accelerated investigations into Trump foes, functioned as the public face of a maligned fund meant to compensate the Republican president’s allies and alarmed press freedom advocates with an aggressive pursuit of news media leaks.

Here's the latest:

Blanche says he hasn’t been ‘celebrating’ Trump’s mass pardons for Capitol rioters

Sen. Chris Coons, a Delaware Democrat, told Blanche that it was a “shameful slap in the face” for Trump to pardon supporters who assaulted police officers during a mob’s Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.

Coons asked Blanche if he was proud of Trump’s decision.

“I wasn’t celebrating it,” Blanche said. But he added that he believes it was “very generous” for Trump to issue the blanket pardons to Capitol rioters.

Coons asked Blanche if he knew why Trump fired his predecessor, Pam Bondi, in April.

“I have no idea,” Blanche said. “We all serve at the pleasure of President Trump.”

Coons also asked Blanche whether he would resign if the president asked him to do something unethical.

“That would never happen, but yes,” Blanche replied.

Whitehouse asks how long Blanche will ‘put up with that Kash Patel character’

Enumerating criticism of Director Kash Patel ’s use of the FBI plane and his global travel, blurring professional responsibilities with leisure activities, Rhode Island Democratic Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse asked if the trips were “a pretext for activities like snorkeling and girlfriends.”

Blanche called the question “extraordinarily obnoxious,” going on to say he has “full faith” in Patel.

“Great, you get to own that,” Whitehouse quipped.

According to government emails obtained by The Associated Press, the FBI took pains to note Patel wasn’t on vacation when he visited Hawaii last summer, highlighting his walking tour of the bureau’s Honolulu field office and meetings with local law enforcement.

Left out of the FBI’s releases was an excursion Patel took days later when he participated in what government officials described as a “VIP snorkel” around the USS Arizona, an outing coordinated by the military.

‘I’m his lawy

er,’ Blanche says of Trump, before correcting himself

Sen. John Kennedy, a Louisiana Republican, asked Blanche a string of questions about the nature of his relationship with Trump, including whether he considered the president a friend. Blanche represented Trump in multiple cases, including the election fraud case in Washington, before joining the Justice Department under Trump’s second term.

Blanche referred to himself as Trump’s attorney in the present tense, saying, “I’m his lawyer” before correcting himself to say that he “was his lawyer.”

Kennedy also asked Blanche if the president had ever asked him to do something illegal. Blanche said Trump had not.

“Would you do it if he asked you?” Kennedy asked.

“Absolutely not,” Blanche said.

Questioned by Cornyn, Blanche says $1.8B weaponization ‘fund is dead’

That came during an exchange with Texas Sen. John Cornyn, who is among the Republicans concerned about Blanche’s nomination and who asked about the status of the settlement fund set up by the Trump administration for compensating people who claim to be victims of a weaponized government.

“I never started. No money went from the Treasury to any other account,” Blanche said. “There’s no commissioners. It’s not moving forward.”

Last month, a federal judge agreed to extend a court-ordered block on the fund indefinitely. Blanche previously told Congress the government was scrapping its plans in the face of fierce bipartisan backlash.

But plaintiffs’ attorneys haven’t been satisfied with Blanche’s assurances that the fund won’t move forward.

As Cornyn questioned that the agreement notes it remains “enforceable,” Blanche said he had discussed with Cornyn and others “about potentially codifying, so there’s no weaponization fund, which is certainly something that could be done.”

Blanche: ‘I don’t question President Trump’s authority’ on Jan. 6 pardons

Blanche didn’t endorse Trump’s move specifically, but said the U.S. Constitution gives presidents “the authority to pardon anybody for any federal crime.”

Just hours after returning to the White House last year, Trump pardoned, commuted the prison sentences or vowed to dismiss the cases of the 1,500-plus people charged with crimes in the riot.

Durbin took issue with the decision, saying that “someone should have grabbed him by the arm and said, ‘Stop, you can’t release all of those rioters.’”

“For the president to give a blanket pardon to these individuals is something that I don’t think you can explain to the American people,” Durbin added.

Blanche defends the settlement that granted Trump immunity from tax audits

Durbin pressed Blanche over a deal to end Trump’s lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service over his leaked tax returns. The Justice Department has faced intense scrutiny over part of the settlement that granted the president immunity from tax audits.

Blanche said such an agreement is “typical” in settlements like that one.

“Nobody is above the law,” Blanche told Durbin. “And when we enter the settlements like that … It doesn’t make any of those individuals above the law.”

Blanche says his heart ‘breaks’ for Epstein’s victims

Sen. Dick Durbin, an Illinois Democrat who is ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, repeatedly pressed Blanche about whether he would commit to meeting with Jeffrey Epstein’s victims.

Durbin noted that 10 victims of Epstein were in the room for Blanche’s confirmation hearing on Wednesday.

“I appreciate them being here today,” Blanche said. “I have never said I wouldn’t meet with survivors.”

“I hope you would do it immediately, or we’re going to hold you to it,” Durbin said.

Blanche said he would be willing to prosecute “anyone who did any harm to any of these victims.”

“My heart breaks for every survivor,” he said.

Blanche defends DOJ’s handling of the Epstein files

Under questioning from the committee’s Republican chair, Blanche acknowledged that the Justice Department made redaction mistakes when reviewing and releasing millions of files related to the Jeffrey Epstein sex trafficking investigation.

Blanche said he takes responsibility for the mistakes that were made, but also said department lawyers who reviewed the documents took pains to protect victims and quickly fixed any errors.

The fallout over the department’s handling of the Epstein files continues to plague the Trump administration.

Blanche said the administration has been “extraordinarily transparent” in releasing the files, despite the department agreeing to release more records only after Congress passed a law forcing it to do so.

‘We are restoring trust’ in the Justice Department, Blanche says

Blanche, Trump’s former personal lawyer, alluded in his opening statement to the criminal cases brought against Trump in the last administration.

Blanche said that “in recent years, Americans watched the Justice Department turn against many of you and a former president, and it damaged the public’s faith in justice.”

He added: “We are fixing that.”

While the Trump administration has said it is determined to end the “weaponization” of law enforcement that it said occurred under the Biden administration, critics argue it has instead turned the agency into a tool of retribution against Trump’s political opponents.

The department under Trump has opened investigations or brought prosecutions against numerous foes of the president, including former FBI Director James Comey.

Blanche highlights the Justice Department’s shifting priorities under Trump

In his opening statement, Blanche touted the Trump administration’s efforts to lower violent crime, stem the flow of illicit drugs, prosecute dangerous cartels and take down fraudsters taking advantage of American taxpayers.

The Justice Department under Trump has moved aggressively to prioritize immigration enforcement and turn up the pressure on cartels. It also created a new division dedicated to tackling fraud in taxpayer-funded programs.

Florida senator highlights Blanche’s pre-Trump career

As a counter to Democrats’ narrative portraying Blanche as loyal only to Trump, Sen. Ashley Moody reminded the committee that the acting attorney general began his career at the Department of Justice as a paralegal.

Moody also detailed Blanche’s years with the Southern District of New York, where she said, “He prosecuted drug traffickers and violent criminals.” She also detailed various awards and commendations he received while in that role.

Watch these 2 Republicans on the committee

The stakes are high for Blanche, who needs the support of every Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee for his nomination to advance.

Two of those Republicans — Sen. Thom Tillis and John Cornyn — haven’t committed to supporting him.

Tillis has been an outspoken critic of a $1.776 billion fund that the Trump administration created to compensate people who feel unjustly persecuted by the criminal justice system and then quickly withdrew.

Tillis and Cornyn are expected to grill Blanche over a separate element of the settlement that afforded Trump and members of his family protection from tax audits.

Durbin says Blanche still acts like Trump’s personal attorney

In his opening statement, Sen. Dick Durbin railed against actions taken by the Justice Department under Blanche’s watch, including a move to create a $1.8 billion fund meant to compensate allies of the president.

The top Democrat on the committee also condemned the purging of Justice Department employees deemed insufficiently loyal to Trump and the department’s handling of millions of investigative files related to Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking investigation.

Durbin accused Blanche of still acting like Trump’s personal lawyer, pursuing investigations against the president’s foes while taking steps to aid his allies.

“In less than 18 months at the Department of Justice, you’ve shown you’re still President Trump’s personal attorney,” Durbin said.

Attorney general confirmation hearing getting underway

Blanche is expected to face bipartisan scrutiny as he seeks the chance to serve out the duration of Trump’s term.

Blanche, Trump’s former personal attorney, has run the department on an interim basis since April, when Pam Bondi was fired after struggling to bring successful cases against Trump’s political foes.

Since taking the reins at the Justice Department, Blanche has accelerated investigations into Trump foes, functioned as the public face of a maligned fund meant to compensate the president’s allies and alarmed press freedom advocates with an aggressive pursuit of news media leaks.

Blanche faces Senate scrutiny, with Republican support key to his confirmation as attorney general

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche will confront questions Wednesday about his brief but turbulent tenure atop the Justice Department during a Senate confirmation hearing that will test President Donald Trump’s grip on Republican lawmakers whose support the nominee will need for the job.

Blanche, Trump’s former personal attorney, has run the department on an interim basis since April, during which time he’s accelerated investigations into Trump foes, functioned as the public face of a maligned fund meant to compensate the Republican president’s allies and alarmed press freedom advocates with an aggressive pursuit of news media leaks.

Those actions will receive fresh scrutiny at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing as Blanche testifies for the opportunity to serve out the duration of Trump’s term.

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According to the FBI, the robbery occurred on Monday at approximately 9:25 a.m. at a Wells Fargo branch located at 15615 NW 67 Ave. in Miami Lakes.

Photos released by the FBI show the robber, who they said entered the bank and demanded money from an employee.

No injuries were reported.

The robbery is being jointly investigated by the Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office, the South Florida Violent Crime and Fugitive Task Force and the FBI, the agency said.

Anyone with information is urged to call 1-800-CALL-FBI or go to tips.fbi.gov.

Según el FBI, el robo ocurrió el lunes aproximadamente a las 9:25 a.m. en una sucursal de Wells Fargo ubicada en el 15615 de Northwest 67 Avenue, en Miami Lakes.

Las fotografías divulgadas por el FBI muestran al ladrón, quien, según la agencia, entró al banco y exigió dinero a un empleado.

No se reportaron personas heridas.

El robo es investigado de manera conjunta por la Oficina del Sheriff de Miami-Dade, el Grupo de Trabajo contra Delitos Violentos y Prófugos del Sur de Florida y el FBI, informó la agencia.

Cualquier persona con información debe llamar al 1-800-CALL-FBI o visitar tips.fbi.gov.

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It was February of last year when Tina Sohdi, 51, was found dead in a sauna at the Sabia Wellness House off Flamingo Way in Miami Beach.

According to a lengthy arrest warrant, Lee told officers he was a “licensed medical doctor and an “elder” of the Eternal Life Tribe.”

He was staying at the wellness house to conduct something called a “heart protocol” for two clients.

The report says it is “a treatment, holistic in nature, that consists of the subject administering/ facilitating a GABA agonist, pure MDMA, and Ketamine.”

Treatment benefits include relief from depression, anxiety, addiction and more. Prosecutors say the alternative healing ceremony resulted in Sodhi’s death

According to the Eternal Life Tribe website, there are more than 4,000 members, with membership costing $55 a month.

Sohdi did sign a waiver acknowledging potential side effects and risks, and she had to have a parasite cleanse before the ceremony.

The medical examiners office ruled the sauna and use of MDMA and ketamine caused Sohdi to be severely dehydrated and dropped her sodium levels to dangerously low levels, which caused her death.

An attorney representing the owner of Sabia Wellness House sent Local 10 News a statement which read, in part:

“We are grateful that the police and the state attorneys office saw this case for what it is and what it is not and that my client was not liable in any way for this tragedy. There are some great effective alternatives to western medicine but tragedy unfolds when not performed to the utmost standards.”

-Richard Cooper

Lee has entered a not guilty plea and his medical license in Texas has been temporarily suspended, with a board calling his “practice of medicine a threat to public welfare.”

Fue en febrero del año pasado cuando Tina Sohdi, de 51 años, fue encontrada muerta en un sauna de Sabia Wellness House, ubicado en Flamingo Way, en Miami Beach.

Según una extensa orden de arresto, Lee dijo a los agentes que era un “médico con licencia” y un “anciano” de la Eternal Life Tribe.

Se hospedaba en el centro de bienestar para realizar un procedimiento denominado “heart protocol” para dos pacientes.

El informe señala que se trata de “un tratamiento de naturaleza holística que consiste en que el sujeto administre o facilite un agonista de GABA, MDMA puro y ketamina”.

Entre los beneficios del tratamiento se incluyen alivio para la depresión, la ansiedad, las adicciones y otros problemas. Sin embargo, los fiscales sostienen que la ceremonia de sanación alternativa provocó la muerte de Sohdi.

Según el sitio web de Eternal Life Tribe, la organización cuenta con más de 4,000 miembros y la membresía cuesta $55 USD al mes.

Sohdi firmó un documento de exención de responsabilidad en el que reconocía los posibles efectos secundarios y riesgos, y además tuvo que someterse a una limpieza de parásitos antes de la ceremonia.

La Oficina del Médico Forense determinó que el uso del sauna junto con el consumo de MDMA y ketamina provocó que Sohdi sufriera una deshidratación severa y que sus niveles de sodio descendieran a niveles peligrosamente bajos, lo que causó su muerte.

Un abogado que representa al propietario de Sabia Wellness House envió a Local 10 News un comunicado que, en parte, dice:

“Estamos agradecidos de que la policía y la Fiscalía hayan visto este caso por lo que es y por lo que no es, y de que mi cliente no fuera considerado responsable de ninguna manera por esta tragedia. Existen excelentes alternativas eficaces a la medicina occidental, pero las tragedias ocurren cuando no se realizan bajo los más altos estándares”.

—Richard Cooper

Lee se declaró no culpable y su licencia médica en Texas fue suspendida temporalmente, mientras una junta determinó que su “práctica de la medicina representa una amenaza para el bienestar público”.

The energy is high. You get a warmup, a run and then the real work begins.

The price tag? Zero.

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Head coach Chadwick Tyne says there is no catch. The goal is to simply build community.

That was the idea behind FTL Free Workout, which launched in 2023 as a way for people to burn calories while building connections.

“The main thing is just making sure the community has a place where they can meet a couple of times a week and see familiar faces. Make sure we make a big city feel a little bit smaller,” Tyne said. “It really is weird when you look up at 1,000 different boxes — with people in their own mini boxes — and nobody talks to each other. We know that people need a reason to get out of the house, and free is always a reason to get out of the house.”

The initiative grew out of a group of friends from First Baptist Fort Lauderdale who wanted to branch out and connect with more people in the community.

The first workout drew just a handful of people. Years later, the group has exploded in size.

The workouts include seven stations and several different movements, attracting people from all walks of life.

“It keeps me around people who are rooted and just going in the right direction,” said regular, Audra Bailey.

And to be clear, just because the workouts are free does not mean they are easy.

At FTL Free Workout, organizers say people grow in more ways than one. Every rep helps build something bigger, and everyone is welcome.

“We’ve had six-year-olds doing our ladder drills and we’ve had grandma’s doing our ladder drills. So long as you feel you need community, we are the community for you,” Tyne said.

FTL Free Workout meets three days a week. No registration or advance notice is required. Participants can simply show up and try a workout.

The group is also looking to grow its sponsorships as the initiative continues to expand.

FTL Free Workout is part of a broader lineup of free community events that also includes FTL Free Yoga and FTL Free Movies. Click here if you would like to learn more.

La energía es alta. Hay un calentamiento, una carrera y luego comienza el verdadero trabajo.

¿El costo? Cero.

El entrenador principal Chadwick Tyne asegura que no hay truco. El objetivo es simplemente crear comunidad.

Esa fue la idea detrás de FTL Free Workout, que comenzó en 2023 como una forma de que las personas quemaran calorías mientras creaban conexiones.

“Lo principal es asegurarnos de que la comunidad tenga un lugar donde pueda reunirse un par de veces por semana y ver caras conocidas. Queremos hacer que una gran ciudad se sienta un poco más pequeña”, dijo Tyne. “Realmente es extraño cuando miras hacia arriba y ves 1,000 apartamentos diferentes, con personas en sus propios espacios, y nadie habla con nadie. Sabemos que la gente necesita una razón para salir de casa, y que sea gratis siempre es una razón para salir de casa”.

La iniciativa surgió de un grupo de amigos de First Baptist Fort Lauderdale que quería ampliar su círculo y conectar con más personas de la comunidad.

El primer entrenamiento reunió apenas a un pequeño grupo de personas. Años después, el grupo ha crecido de manera significativa.

Los entrenamientos incluyen siete estaciones y varios tipos de ejercicios, lo que atrae a personas de todos los ámbitos de la vida.

“Me mantiene rodeada de personas con buenos valores y que van por el camino correcto”, dijo Audra Bailey, participante habitual.

Y para que quede claro, que los entrenamientos sean gratuitos no significa que sean fáciles.

En FTL Free Workout, los organizadores aseguran que las personas crecen en más de un sentido. Cada repetición ayuda a construir algo más grande, y todos son bienvenidos.

“Hemos tenido niños de 6 años haciendo nuestros ejercicios de escalera de agilidad y también abuelas haciéndolos. Mientras sientas que necesitas comunidad, nosotros somos la comunidad para ti”, dijo Tyne.

FTL Free Workout se reúne tres días a la semana. No se requiere inscripción ni aviso previo. Los participantes simplemente pueden llegar y probar un entrenamiento.

El grupo también busca aumentar sus patrocinios a medida que la iniciativa continúa expandiéndose.

FTL Free Workout forma parte de una oferta más amplia de eventos comunitarios gratuitos que también incluye FTL Free Yoga y FTL Free Movies. Haga clic aquí si desea obtener más información.

Basabe, republicano de Miami Beach, se representa a sí mismo en un caso presentado por dos ex empleados que acusan al legislador estatal de acoso sexual, agresión y difamación.

Basabe declaró el martes y respondió preguntas sobre su vida personal.

Abogado de los demandantes: “¿Está casado?”

Basabe: “Sí”.

Abogado de los demandantes: “¿Con una mujer?”

Basabe: “Sí”.

Posteriormente, un abogado de los demandantes mostró al jurado una fotografía de Basabe besando a un hombre.

Basabe: “Se llama Renato”.

Abogado de los demandantes: “¿Y vive con usted, correcto?”

Basabe: “No respondo por el lugar de residencia de otras personas”.

Abogado de los demandantes: “¿Es su novio?”

Basabe: “No creo en esas etiquetas”.

El lunes, ambas presuntas víctimas de Basabe testificaron ante el jurado.

Este martes, los miembros del jurado también escucharon el testimonio de la madre de una de las presuntas víctimas, quien acusó a Basabe de darle una bofetada en los glúteos y en el rostro.

“Noté que estaba muy, muy, muy alterado y tenía la cara roja”, dijo Janette Frevola, quien agregó entre lágrimas: “Que nos tratara así sin razón aparente, cuando no le hicimos absolutamente nada”.

El hecho de que Basabe se represente a sí mismo ha generado con frecuencia momentos de confusión durante el proceso.

Además de los testimonios de los testigos, capturas de mensajes de texto y publicaciones antiguas en X están siendo utilizadas como evidencia para intentar convencer al jurado del condado Leon de que Basabe es responsable de los presuntos hechos.

Abogado de los demandantes: “¿Es esta la primera vez que alguien presenta acusaciones de acoso sexual en su contra?”

Basabe: “Hay muchos rumores”.

Se espera que los testimonios continúen el miércoles.

Basabe ha enfrentado otras acusaciones en el pasado.

De hecho, una de ellas fue presentada por un futbolista profesional cuya identidad se mantiene en reserva.

Ese hombre compareció ante el tribunal para preservar su testimonio para un litigio futuro, pero lo hizo fuera de la presencia del jurado.

A continuación puede verse una transmisión de una parte de la audiencia del martes:

Los agentes informaron que respondieron poco antes de la 1 a.m. al área de Northwest 64th Street y Northwest 21st Avenue, en la zona de Gladeview del condado, donde encontraron tres vehículos impactados por disparos, incluido un Hyundai plateado.

“El auto estaba estacionado frente a la residencia con tres menores: la niña y sus dos hermanos estaban al interior del vehículo. La madre se encontraba fuera del vehículo en ese momento, así que el desenlace pudo haber sido muy diferente”, dijo la detective de la MDSO Samantha Choon.

Las autoridades informaron que paramédicos de Miami-Dade Fire Rescue trasladaron a la niña a un hospital cercano en condición estable.

Los familiares identificaron a la niña como Kaylina Anicie.

Un familiar de la víctima dijo a Jackie Pascale, de Local 10, que la niña ya está en casa y se encuentra bien.

Indicaron que ni sus hermanos ni su madre resultaron heridos en la balacera.

Según los investigadores, no se han realizado arrestos y los detectives no han divulgado información sobre algún sospechoso hasta el momento.

La vecina Marie Grimes dijo que quedó conmocionada tras escuchar múltiples disparos.

“Escuché los estruendos, boom, boom, boom, boom, y dije: “Dios mío, ¿qué está pasando?”. Tal vez fueron cinco o seis, porque mire eso ahí mismo. Me alegra que la niña esté bien”, dijo.

Los investigadores pidieron a los vecinos revisar las grabaciones de sus cámaras de vigilancia o cámaras Ring alrededor de la 1 a.m. y comunicarse con las autoridades si tienen alguna información.

Cualquier persona con información sobre la balacera debe comunicarse con Miami-Dade Crime Stoppers al 305-471-8477. Se aceptan denuncias anónimas.

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Deputies said they responded shortly before 2:30 a.m. Wednesday to a report of a shooting in the 2800 block of Northwest Sixth Court, near Fort Lauderdale.

Authorities said they found a shooting victim near Northwest Seventh Street and Northwest 29th Terrace after arriving at the scene.

Broward Sheriff Fire Rescue took the victim to a nearby hospital for treatment, according to investigators. The victim’s gender, age, identity and condition were not immediately released.

A Local 10 News crew was at the shooting scene on Wednesday morning, where a gold SUV with shattered windows and its doors open remained parked along Northwest Seventh Street.

About a block away on Northwest Sixth Street, detectives placed crime scene markers, photographed evidence and collected items from the roadway while deputies blocked off the area with crime scene tape.

Chris Pitman, who lives in the Washington Park neighborhood with his three young children, said he was awakened by the sound of gunfire.

“I was sleeping. All of a sudden my 4-year-old was like, ‘Daddy, fireworks,’ and I just heard, ‘Bow, bow, bow.’ My 2-year-old started crying, so I waited a little bit, tried to wait a bit, see what’s going on. Everything was taped off, so I just came back,” he said.

Pitman described the neighborhood as generally quiet.

“Further down not so much, but this side is historically known for being quiet. I grew up here,” he added.

He said the shooting hit close to home.

“First and foremost, sadness. I’m a father first. I hate to hear that. It doesn’t surprise me. This neighborhood has its good and bad. It doesn’t surprise me, but it doesn’t make it hurt less,” Pitman said.

BSO officials said their Crime Scene and Violent Crimes Unit are investigating the circumstances surrounding the shooting.

Anyone with information is asked to contact Broward Crime Stoppers at 954-493-8477.

Los agentes informaron que respondieron poco antes de las 2:30 a.m. del miércoles a un reporte de una balacera en la cuadra 2800 de Northwest Sixth Court, cerca de Fort Lauderdale.

Diccionario Local10.txt

Las autoridades indicaron que, al llegar al lugar, encontraron a una víctima de la balacera cerca de Northwest Seventh Street y Northwest 29th Terrace.

Según los investigadores, Broward Sheriff Fire Rescue trasladó a la víctima a un hospital cercano para recibir tratamiento. El género, la edad, la identidad y el estado de la víctima no fueron divulgados de inmediato.

Un equipo de Local 10 News estuvo el miércoles por la mañana en la escena de la balacera, donde una SUV dorada con las ventanas destrozadas y las puertas abiertas permanecía estacionada a lo largo de Northwest Seventh Street.

Aproximadamente a una cuadra de distancia, en Northwest Sixth Street, los detectives colocaron marcadores de la escena del crimen, fotografiaron evidencias y recolectaron objetos de la vía mientras los agentes acordonaban el área con cinta de la escena del crimen.

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Chris Pitman, quien vive en el vecindario Washington Park con sus tres hijos pequeños, dijo que se despertó por el sonido de los disparos.

“Estaba durmiendo. De repente, mi hijo de 4 años dijo: “Papá, fuegos artificiales”, y luego escuché: “Bang, bang, bang”. Mi hijo de 2 años empezó a llorar, así que esperé un poco, traté de ver qué estaba pasando. Todo estaba acordonado, así que regresé”, dijo.

Pitman describió el vecindario como generalmente tranquilo.

“Más adelante no tanto, pero este lado históricamente ha sido conocido por ser tranquilo. Yo crecí aquí”, agregó.

Dijo que la balacera le afectó de manera personal.

“Antes que nada, siento tristeza. Soy padre antes que cualquier cosa. Me duele escuchar eso. No me sorprende. Este vecindario tiene cosas buenas y malas. No me sorprende, pero eso no hace que duela menos”, expresó Pitman.

Funcionarios de la BSO informaron que la Unidad de Escena del Crimen y Delitos Violentos investiga las circunstancias que rodean la balacera.

Cualquier persona con información debe comunicarse con Broward Crime Stoppers al 954-493-8477.

The 84-page report issued jointly Wednesday by Human Rights Watch and the American Civil Liberties Union also says men and women held at Camp East Montana, located at the U.S. Army's Fort Bliss in El Paso, recounted being denied necessary medical care, forced to live in filthy conditions and fed inedible meals. Detainees also said they were prevented from contacting their lawyers or family members.

Of the 71 detainees contacted over a five month period, 64 — about 90% of those interviewed — said they had either personally been assaulted by the staff or had seen others physically abused, according to the report.

“ICE’s Camp East Montana is a human rights disaster,” said Angélica César, a fellow at Human Rights Watch and the ACLU who was a lead researcher for the report. “The U.S. government should shut it down, conduct independent investigations into all abuses and deaths in custody, and put an end to mass deportations and mandatory immigration detention.”

The Department of Homeland Security, which includes ICE, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The new accounts of violence and substandard living conditions inside Camp East Montana are consistent with earlier reports by The Associated Press and others. At least three detainees held at the facility since it opened in August have died, including a 55-year-old Cuban migrant who was handcuffed and stopped breathing earlier this year after being held down by guards.

A local medical examiner later ruled that death a homicide and a federal report issued last month said evidence in the case was “missing or destroyed." That report by the Government Accountability Office found mismanagement by the Department of Homeland Security had created unsafe conditions that contributed to detainee deaths and suffering even as millions of wasted tax dollars enriched contractors.

In March, ICE replaced Acquisition Logistics, LLC, the prime contractor that had been awarded a deal last year worth up to $1.3 billion to build and manage the camp. The Virginia company had no prior experience running an ICE detention facility, had never won a federal contract worth more than $16 million and lacked a functioning website.

The change came as an internal ICE review documented 49 deficiencies, which it defines as violations of detention standards or policies, in areas including the use of force and restraints, security and medical care.

Despite the change in contractors, interviews conducted by Human Rights Watch and the ACLU as recently as last month found serious problems at the camp have persisted.

Detainees recounted degrading and inhumane living conditions that included bathrooms covered in feces, flooded housing units and no access to soap or other basic hygiene supplies, according to the report. They also reported being held indoors for weeks without meaningful access to recreation, sunlight or fresh air.

People also described receiving spoiled food and inconsistent meal schedules, with delays of up to 12 hours between meals.

The report recounts detainees saying that guards beat detainees in response to hunger strikes, requests for medical attention and complaints regarding detention conditions. Several people said that guards imposed collective punishment, striking or assaulting multiple people after accusing one detainee of violating rules, according to the report.

Researchers found that staff pressured and coerced those held there into abandoning immigration claims and accepting removal to third countries if they could not be sent back to their own country. The detainees said they were threatened with violence, criminal prosecution, and indefinite detention if they refused deportation.

In some cases, the report concluded, the circumstances of ICE detention could amount to enforced disappearances, a potential violation of international human rights law.

Human Rights Watch and the ACLU called on the Trump administration to close Camp East Montana and to allow independent investigations into deaths in custody, excessive force, medical neglect and enforced disappearances.

“The abuses documented at Fort Bliss are the predictable outcome of the Trump administration’s mass deportation agenda, its brutal expansion of immigration detention, and the erosion of federal oversight mechanisms,” said César, the lead researcher. “People at Camp East Montana are human beings who deserve to be treated with dignity and protected from harm.”

Yzerman’s transition to an advisory role to owner and CEO Chris Ilitch comes several weeks after captain and No. 1 center Dylan Larkin’s trade request came to light. The Red Wings' decade-long playoff drought is the longest in the storied history of the organization and the longest active drought in the NHL.

The team said its search for a new head of hockey operations has begun and that Yzerman will continue to be in charge on a day-to-day basis until his successor is determined.

“Clearly, we are not where we and our fans expect to be as an organization,” Ilitch said in a statement. “Steve’s lifetime of contributions to the Red Wings has meant more to this franchise than words can truly express, and I have the highest level of respect for his continued commitment to our organization.”

Yzerman spent his entire 22-year Hall of Fame playing career with Detroit from 1983-2006, captaining it to the Stanley Cup three times. He has the three highest-scoring seasons in franchise history and is second only to Gordie Howe on the Red Wings' all-time points list.

“This organization has given me incredible opportunities, from my time as a player to the privilege of returning as general manager,” Yzerman said. “My commitment to the Red Wings and this community will never waver, and I look forward to supporting the organization in whatever role is needed to achieve our collective goals.”

But he did not get hired just for his on-ice performance. Yzerman was an accomplished GM with Tampa Bay, building the core group of players and leadership that eventually won back-to-back championships. He took over in Detroit in 2019, where success on the ice has not materialized.

Yzerman’s moves or lack thereof have contributed to the struggles, including failing to adequately address goaltending. Trading Tyler Bertuzzi to Boston and Filip Hronek to Vancouver for draft picks at the trade deadline in March 2023 and giving up a second-rounder to unload Jake Walman on a deal with San Jose 15 months later are among the questionable decisions.

Larkin also criticized Yzerman for not doing more at the 2024 deadline, and the team struggled down the stretch without reinforcements. Acquiring Justin Faulk and David Perron this past season also was not enough to get the Red Wings into the top eight in the Eastern Conference.

Larkin asking to be traded — with Minnesota, Florida and Vegas initially the only teams on his list — threatened the direction of the team at a time when it looked like Yzerman's position was safe. Yzerman last month said he could not guarantee granting Larkin's wish because the player is signed for five more seasons at an average annual salary of $8.7 million.

Figuring out that situation will now be someone else's call, as will improving a roster that has perennially underacheived expectations.

“I’m looking forward to bringing in new leadership to build the championship-caliber organization (Detroit) deserves," Ilitch said.

___

AP NHL: https://apnews.com/NHL

President Gitanas Nausėda said that authorities were monitoring the risk of attacks that could disrupt the country’s energy and transport systems, including facilities supporting Lithuania’s connections with the European electricity grid.

“I cannot deny that we have such information and that it concerns limited kinetic operations likely targeting critical infrastructure,” Nausėda told Lithuania's BNS news agency.

Nausėda said that the intelligence didn't identify a specific location or timing for the potential attacks. He said that such provocations could involve conventional or other means.

Russia dismissed the claim as an excuse to justify NATO’s military buildup in the Baltics.

Latvian President Edgars Rinkēvičs similarly warned on Wednesday that, with Ukraine increasingly effective at putting pressure on Russia, Moscow might respond with provocations against NATO’s eastern flank.

“Even without a total Ukrainian victory, Russia may indirectly test Article 5 and response mechanisms at the Alliance and European Union levels,” Rinkēvičs said, referring to NATO's common defense guarantee.

“The next few months, or even the next 12 months, will be crucial for Baltic security,” he said.

The three Baltic states — Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia — and Poland, all located on NATO's eastern flank, have strengthened security around key transport and energy infrastructure in recent months in response to the Russian threat.

The countries say they have long been targets of Russian hybrid attacks, a threat that has intensified since Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began on Feb. 24, 2022.

On Tuesday and Wednesday, Poland intercepted Russian aircraft over the Baltic Sea that, according to the Polish government, were conducting surveillance of Poland’s air defense systems, despite remaining outside Polish territorial waters.

In Moscow, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov dismissed the Lithuanian intelligence warning about Russia’s purported plans to launch attacks on infrastructure in the Baltics and elsewhere in Europe.

“It’s a fresh batch of bugaboos intended to continue the brainwashing and prepare the population for further militarization,” Peskov told reporters.

“To do this, they need to create an enemy image on the other side, our side in this case,” he said. “And use it as a pretext to continue moving NATO military infrastructure in all its forms into the Baltic states.”

Poland sent similar warnings

Nauseda's comments echo warnings issued in recent weeks by Polish politicians, following multiple media reports that Russia could carry out a limited military or hybrid provocation against Poland in the near future.

In late June, leading Polish outlet onet.pl reported that U.S. intelligence had warned its Polish counterparts about the possibility of a Russian attack. Citing its own sources, the outlet said that potential scenarios could include attacks on critical infrastructure, incursions by Russian soldiers near border areas and drone operations.

Prime Minister Donald Tusk said on July 3 that the warnings should be taken seriously and noted that he had been issuing similar alerts for weeks.

“Poland is preparing very intensively for various scenarios,” Tusk said. “I don’t want to scare anyone, but the coming months, also because of the changing nature of the war in Ukraine, could be critical.”

Tusk said that concerns were particularly pronounced in the Baltic states.

“We are not afraid; we are preparing for various scenarios, but we cannot take this lightly,” he said. “We are conscious of the dangers also because of information coming from our allies.”

Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski said that Poland had a message for Russian President Vladimir Putin: “We know what you are planning. Don’t do it.”

Countries deploy additional troops to protect infrastructure

Gen. Raimundas Vaikšnoras Lithuania's chief of defense, recently confirmed that the military had deployed additional forces to help protect strategic infrastructure in response to concerns over possible Russian provocations.

Vaikšnoras told reporters that Russia’s recent rhetoric targeting the Baltic states and Poland appears to serve a broader purpose, warning that Moscow has long sought to erode public trust in state institutions, the military and the government.

Poland had similarly intensified protection of key infrastructure following a November attack on rail infrastructure blamed on Russia.

On Monday, the European Union said that Russia’s FSB Center 16 had conducted cyberespionage and sabotage against defense industries and critical infrastructure across Europe, including a December attack against a Polish combined heat and power plant supplying heat to almost 500,000 customers.

A recent report from the International Institute of Strategic Studies think tank said that Russia likely used shadow ships to launch drones over Europe that repeatedly disrupted civilian aviation between 2024 and 2026.

The Baltic region is under additional strain from stray Ukrainian drones that have reached Baltic countries as Ukraine ramped up attacks on Baltic Sea ports used for Russian energy exports.

In mid-May, Latvian Prime Minister Evika Siliņa resigned over the government’s handling of multiple incidents involving stray drones suspected to be from Ukraine crossing into Latvian territory.

In late May, for the first time in a NATO and European Union capital, Lithuanians were pictured sheltering in underground parking garages in the capital, Vilnius, as authorities warned of unidentified drone activity.

___

Claudia Ciobanu reported from Warsaw, Poland.

Consider a used vehicle

One of the simplest ways to stretch your budget is to expand your search beyond brand-new models. Sure, new vehicles offer the latest technology features and are backed by a full warranty, but they also carry disproportionately higher prices.

You’ll find better value in the used market, particularly when shopping for vehicles that are just a few years old. A lightly used vehicle can often offer many of the same features as a new model while avoiding the steepest period of depreciation. According to Edmunds transaction data, the average price of a 3-year-old used vehicle in June 2026 was $32,553, compared to $48,899 for a new vehicle.

Expand your search area and loan options

Limiting your search to nearby dealerships can unnecessarily reduce your options. Shoppers willing to travel farther from home often find a greater selection of inventory and more competitive pricing. Prices can vary considerably from one county to another based on local demand and supply.

Something similar is true for a loan. Don’t wait until you’re in the dealership finance office to think about a loan. Unless you’re getting a promotional interest rate from the automaker’s finance company, there’s a good chance a credit union may offer you a better rate than the banks the dealership has partnered with.

Instead, get a preapproval from your bank, a credit union or an online lender and compare it against the dealer’s best loan offer. Comparison shopping for loans can often save thousands of dollars over the life of the loan, according to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

Get the most trade-in value from your current car

Your current vehicle may be worth more than you think, and maximizing its value can significantly reduce the amount you need to finance. Get multiple trade-in offers before visiting a dealership. Online appraisal tools and used vehicle retailers can provide baseline estimates that help establish a vehicle’s market value. Having several offers in hand can strengthen your negotiating position and help prevent unknowingly accepting a low trade-in value.

It’s also worth considering a private-party sale. While selling a vehicle yourself requires more time and effort, it often generates a higher return than a trade-in. Buyers who choose this route should gather maintenance records, clean the vehicle thoroughly, and address minor cosmetic issues that could affect perceived value.

Focus on total cost, not monthly payment

When a salesperson starts asking about a monthly payment you’d feel comfortable with, it’s easy to miss the big picture. But don’t let that distract you. Adjusting to a lower monthly payment might seem appealing, but it often comes at the cost of a longer loan, leading to more interest charges and a higher total paid over the life of the loan.

It’s best to examine the entire financing package, including your down payment, your trade-in, the interest rate, loan term and the total cost. A shorter loan with a slightly higher monthly payment can save thousands of dollars in interest. Comparing financing offers on this basis rather than on the monthly payment alone provides a clearer picture of the true expense.

Protect yourself from negative equity

Inflated vehicle prices during the pandemic, longer loan terms and impatient shoppers have increased the risk of negative equity, a situation in which a borrower owes more on a vehicle than it is worth.

According to Edmunds’ data, 30.9% of trade-ins toward a new vehicle purchase carried negative equity in the first part of 2026. Moving negative equity into a new loan may make a car purchase possible, but it increases the loan amount and makes it harder to build equity in the replacement vehicle.

A better strategy is to wait until you can make a 10% to 15% down payment, according to Edmunds. If you’re getting the itch for a new car and currently owe more than your car is worth, the smarter move is to keep it longer and pay down the loan balance before trading it in. This patient approach can help prevent a cycle of carrying debt from one vehicle to the next.

Edmunds says

Stretching your car-buying dollars in 2026 requires looking beyond the sticker price. Before signing any paperwork, ask to see a breakdown of all the fees. If you spot any fees or services you aren’t familiar with, be sure to ask the salesperson. Otherwise, you may overlook something that could prove costly in the long run.

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This story was provided to The Associated Press by the automotive website Edmunds. Josh Jacquot is a contributor at Edmunds.

The National Weather Service said a tornado touched down in the northwestern part of San Antonio near Interstate 10. Videos posted on social media showed what appeared to be a small twister. There were no immediate reports of injuries.

Warnings of potentially dangerous flash flooding, meanwhile, were posted in some areas as the deluge was expected to continue through Thursday evening. The weather service said 10 to 20 inches (25 to 50 centimeters) of rain was possible in some areas by the time the storms move out.

There have been no reports of deaths or injuries from the flooding.

The highest rainfall totals so far have been in Uvalde County — up to 16 inches (40 centimeters) in some areas, the weather service said. Uvalde was blanketed by dark clouds on Wednesday morning, the landscape lit at times with lightning far above. The typically calm Leona River was swollen and brown waters poured over some low bridges.

Debris, including branches and grass, plastic bags and a cactus, covered the bank from the day earlier, when the river was several feet higher.

The night had brought booming thunder through a steady rain, swelling the rivers and creeks that ran through or just around the town. The rain would abate, then pummel the small town with heavy drops, before lifting again.

Flash flood warnings Wednesday morning also covered parts of Kerr County, where catastrophic flooding along the Guadalupe River last year killed more than 100 people, Kerr County officials said they have been in contact with summer camps and retreat centers where river flooding could happen.

Forecasters warned that hilly terrain in some parts of the region could be especially vulnerable to heavy rain.

“This is called a typical mid-summer tropical weather pattern that happens in Texas,” said Monte Oaks, a meteorologist with the weather service. “About once every five years, we’ll get socked in with a daily recurrence of heavy rain chances that’s generally produced by a stagnant kind of a pattern with a low-pressure center that’s just not moving very fast.”

Oaks said the rain is being fueled with tropical moisture, mostly from the Gulf of Mexico and some from the Pacific Ocean.

The highest level of concern for potentially dangerous flooding Wednesday was for areas west of San Antonio and north of Route 90, he said.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott issued disaster declarations for dozens of counties.

Authorities posted videos on Tuesday showing a rescue crew in a boat navigating flooded streets and a vehicle being swept away by fast-moving waters. Five people were rescued by the Texas Game Warden Search and Rescue Team and four were rescued by a local game warden, said Maggie Berger, a Texas Parks and Wildlife spokeswoman.

The weather service said the city of Uvalde has been hardest hit. Officials there said there had been at least two dozen water rescues, and a local event center was open for anyone displaced by flooding. In Sabinal, officials were also making plans for a shelter.

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Associated Press writer Dave Collins in Hartford, Connecticut, contributed to this report.

In Florida on Tuesday, a third man in roughly a week died during an encounter with immigration officers. The 28-year-old was killed after he was hit by a tractor-trailer while running from immigration and other federal officers, authorities said.

Here's the latest:

There have been at least 10 deaths involving immigration agents since Trump began deportation push

At least four of those deaths involved people in vehicles, including the one last week in Houston, a trend so troubling that U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, said Tuesday that she had urged Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin “to cease all non-urgent vehicle stops.”

John Sandweg, who was acting director at ICE, which is part of DHS, during President Barack Obama’s Democratic administration, estimated recently that there have been roughly 18 traffic stop shootings during the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.

Questions surround the Maine shooting

Photos showed bullet holes in Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero’s car windshield, but the officers involved in the shooting didn’t have body cameras, leaving many questions. Among them are how close the officer was to the vehicle when shooting, whether officers told Durán Guerrero to stop and why ICE believes he had put the public in danger.

Border czar Tom Homan told reporters Tuesday the investigation needs to play out and that officers will be held accountable if they’re found to have acted inappropriately or illegally.

Maine’s attorney general’s office, which said it is working with federal agencies to investigate, said initial statements suggest the driver was trying to flee in the direction of the officer, whose name hasn’t been released and who was placed on leave.

Fatal shooting during immigration operation angers Maine

Hundreds of people in Maine protested Tuesday over the fatal shooting of Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, a 25-year-old Colombian national. Advocacy groups said Guerrero, who had a wife and a young daughter, was authorized to work in the United States.

DHS said Monday that an officer, “fearing for public safety,” shot and killed Durán Guerrero while officers were watching the home of someone they believed was in the U.S. illegally and facing a final order of removal from the country. It said in a post on X that when ICE tried to stop a car driven by someone who came from the home, the person attempted to flee in the vehicle and the officer fired.

In a scathing post on X, outgoing Colombian President Gustavo Petro called the shooting a targeted killing “at the hands of the U.S. government.”

Lindsey Graham’s Senate Judiciary Committee spot draped in black

As the committee convened Wednesday for a confirmation hearing, the late South Carolina Republican’s seat at the rostrum was also marked with a vase of white roses.

Graham had been set to chair the panel in the next Congress. He died over the weekend of a tear in his aorta.

On Tuesday, Graham’s sister, Darline Graham, was sworn in to serve out the remaining months of his term, which expires in January. South Carolina Republicans are standing up a special primary election to pick a new nominee for this fall’s midterms.

High-stakes attorney general confirmation hearing getting underway

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche is expected to face bipartisan scrutiny as he seeks the chance to serve out the duration of Trump’s term.

Blanche, Trump’s former personal attorney, has run the department on an interim basis since April, when Pam Bondi was fired after struggling to bring successful cases against Trump’s political foes.

Since taking the reins at the Justice Department, Blanche has accelerated investigations into Trump foes, functioned as the public face of a maligned fund meant to compensate the president’s allies and alarmed press freedom advocates with an aggressive pursuit of news media leaks.

Senate to hold hearing for Trump’s pick to head intelligence agencies after weekslong delay

Jay Clayton, President Trump’s pick to head the nation’s intelligence agencies, will testify before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Wednesday, weeks after Trump abruptly delayed his nomination.

Republicans and even some Democrats have been eager to quickly confirm Clayton, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York and a former Securities and Exchange Commission chairman, as they’ve expressed concerns about Trump’s interim appointee for the intelligence post, Bill Pulte. Pulte, who has been in the job since June 19, is a former housing official with no known intelligence experience and who used his previous administration perch to target perceived adversaries of the president.

Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Tom Cotton, a Republican, expressed frustration when Trump delayed Clayton’s nomination in a social media post last month, allowing Pulte to take office. Cotton said then that Clayton had been instructed not to appear at a scheduled confirmation hearing, but he rescheduled the hearing three weeks later, with apparent approval from the White House.

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Blanche faces Senate scrutiny with Republican support key to his confirmation as attorney general

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche will confront questions Wednesday about his brief but turbulent tenure atop the Justice Department during a Senate confirmation hearing that will test President Donald Trump’s grip on Republican lawmakers whose support the nominee will need for the job.

Blanche, Trump’s former personal attorney, has run the department on an interim basis since April, during which time he’s accelerated investigations into Trump foes, functioned as the public face of a maligned fund meant to compensate the Republican president’s allies and alarmed press freedom advocates with an aggressive pursuit of news media leaks.

Those actions will receive fresh scrutiny at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing as Blanche testifies for the opportunity to serve out the duration of Trump’s term.

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The Labor Department reported Wednesday that its producer price index — which captures inflation before it reaches consumers — dropped 0.3% from May, biggest decline since April 2025 and a reversal from a 0.6% uptick the month before. Compared to a year earlier, wholesale prices were up 5.5% in June, decelerating from a 6% increase the month before. Gasoline prices plunged 12% in June but are still up nearly 43% from June 2025, pushed higher by the Iran war. Food prices also dipped in June.

Excluding volatile food and energy prices, so-called core wholesale prices were up 4.7% from June 2025 and 0.2% from May.

The producer price report came out a day after the Labor Department said consumer prices dropped 0.4% from May to June, the biggest monthly drop in four years. Compared to a year earlier, they were up 3.5% last month, down from 4.2% in May. The June inflation numbers were much cooler than forecasters had expected, reducing pressure on the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates this year. Still, inflation is running above the Fed's 2% target.

In his first appearance before Congress since becoming Fed chair May 22, Kevin Warsh said Tuesday that the central bank has "no tolerance for persistently elevated inflation.''

Energy prices have ratcheted higher since President Donald Trump on Monday announced a new blockade in the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world's oil and natural gas passes. Many Americans are already frustrated with the high cost of living, dimming the prospects of Trump's Republican Party in November's midterm elections.

“There’s no near-term pressure on the Fed, but oil is in the driver’s seat over the longer term,” said David Russell, global head of market strategy at the online brokerage TradeStation. "Energy saved the day in June, but that might become ancient history if the Strait of Hormuz doesn’t open soon.''

Wholesale prices can offer an early look at where consumer inflation might be headed. Economists also watch it because some of its components, notably healthcare and financial services, flow into the Fed’s preferred inflation gauge — the personal consumption expenditures, or PCE, index.

Lindell established his national profile from his TV advertising campaign as the MyPillow Guy and has been one of Trump’s most outspoken supporters, echoing the president’s false claims that his 2020 election defeat to Democrat Joe Biden was fraudulent.

“Mike will be SPECTACULAR!!! He truly loves Minnesota, as do I, and wants to bring it back from oblivion and embarrassment. He can do it!” Trump posted Wednesday on his Truth Social platform, referring to Lindell as “the ‘Pillow Man.’”

Trump has hammered outgoing Gov. Tim Walz, Democrats’ 2024 vice presidential nominee, as incompetent and accused his administration of allowing rampant fraud in federal spending on childcare. Trump has employed racist rhetoric to target Minnesota’s Somali immigrant population as driving the alleged fraud.

Walz, who ended his bid for a third term earlier this year, disputes the Trump administration’s characterizations. There are ongoing investigations into the state's administration of federally supported childcare programs in the state.

Lindell is part of a crowded Republican field competing in an Aug. 11 primary. The GOP list includes state House Speaker Lisa Demuth. Lindell has attacked Demuth as responsible for federal spending fraud. Demuth has blamed the Democratic administration and executive agency leaders that oversee federal grants to childcare providers.

Longtime U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar headlines the Democratic field for governor.

There are 36 gubernatorial elections this November. There currently are 26 Republican governors and 24 Democratic governors, and Republicans view Minnesota as an opportunity to flip a seat despite a challenging national environment because of Trump’s lagging popularity and voters’ discontent over the economy.

While Trump and Republicans focus on the childcare fraud accusations, Democrats, including Klobuchar, have focused on the Trump administration's immigration crackdown that involved federal officers killing two Minnesotans, the assassination of a state legislative leader and a school shooting that killed multiple children — all within the past year. Klobuchar has mostly avoided direct mention of the childcare programs and fraud inquiries that Trump has made a political cudgel.

As he's made endorsements in Republican primaries this year, Trump has remained fixated on his lies about the 2020 election. In Georgia, recently, he made a late endorsement in a hotly contested U.S. Senate primary for Rep. Mike Collins, noting the congressman's stalwart support and referencing passing comments made by his opponent, former football coach Derek Dooley, affirming that Biden was legitimately elected in 2020.

Mientras tanto, bomberos franceses lograron controlar un incendio forestal en la histórica y muy visitada zona de Fontainebleau, al sur de París, mientras partes del continente seguían enfrentando temperaturas extremadamente altas.

Todos salvo uno de los fallecidos en el incendio forestal en España eran ciudadanos extranjeros. Había siete ciudadanos británicos —incluida una mujer de 93 años que murió en el hospital—, tres ciudadanos belgas, una mujer francesa, un ciudadano de Estados Unidos y un ciudadano español, señalaron las autoridades judiciales en un comunicado.

De las 13 víctimas, ocho eran mujeres y cinco eran hombres. Todos eran adultos.

Las autoridades regionales creyeron inicialmente que había 23 personas desaparecidas, pero más tarde indicaron que no quedaban personas por localizar una vez los investigadores identificaron a todas las víctimas del incendio.

El incendio de Los Gallardos afectó unos 70 kilómetros cuadrados (27 millas cuadradas) de bosque y tierras de cultivo. Fue uno de los incendios más mortíferos en años en España, un país propenso a los fuegos.

España está experimentando un calor extremo que, combinado con el viento y las escasas precipitaciones, está creando las condiciones ideales para que pequeños incendios forestales crezcan sin control.

Europa es el continente que se calienta más rápido del mundo, con temperaturas que aumentan al doble de la media mundial desde la década de 1980, según el Servicio de Cambio Climático Copernicus de la Unión Europea.

Controlado el incendio de Fontainebleau en Francia

Las temperaturas se mantuvieron excepcionalmente altas en toda Francia el miércoles, con máximas que alcanzaron los 39 grados Celsius (102 grados Fahrenheit) en algunos lugares.

La agencia meteorológica nacional, Météo-France, advirtió que la combinación de calor extremo y condiciones de suelo seco seguía representando un riesgo significativo de incendios forestales en todo el país.

Las autoridades locales informaron que el incendio que se propagó por el histórico bosque de Fontainebleau, al sur de París, y que obligó a evacuar varias zonas residenciales estaba controlado, aunque los bomberos continuaban combatiendo pequeños focos en las áreas afectadas.

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Esta historia fue traducida del inglés por un editor de AP con la ayuda de una herramienta de inteligencia artificial generativa.

Notably, more music is being streamed than ever before, both in the U.S. and globally.

In terms of genre: The combination of R&B/hip-hop remains on top in the U.S., but its dominance is being challenged by genre diversification, as other styles experience growth.

Latin and country music are surging thanks to artists like Bad Bunny and Ella Langley. Certain AI-generated tracks are also growing in popularity.

And in film and TV, Netflix continues its command in the U.S. in streams of original content.

In its midyear report, Luminate, an industry data and analytics company, provides insight into changing behaviors across music listenership as well as TV and film viewing behaviors.

Music streaming continues to climb

Music streams continued to grow globally and stateside. Global on-demand audio streams reached 2.8 trillion in the first half of 2026 — up from 2.5 trillion during the same period last year, and 2.29 trillion in 2024.

And in the U.S., on-demand audio song streams grew to 732.7 billion. That's up from 696.6 billion in 2025 and 665.8 billion in 2024.

R&B and hip-hop still rules, but competition nears

A combination of R&B/hip-hop is still the most popular streaming genre in the U.S., accounting for nearly 1 in 4 on-demand audio streams. However, its dominance is being challenged. In the first half of 2026, R&B/hip-hop made up 30% of U.S. album-equivalent consumption, based on analysis of the Billboard 200. Compare that to 41% in 2023, and it shows a decline.

“R&B/Hip-Hop remains a massive commercial force, but its historic dominance is leveling off as the streaming landscape diversifies. The genre was an early adopter of streaming, commanding nearly 30% of U.S. audio consumption by 2022, but the post-pandemic era has seen accelerated … growth from genres like Country and Latin,” wrote Jaime Marconette, Luminate’s vice president of music insights and industry relations in a statement to The Associated Press.

He says R&B/hip-hop's “standalone audio volume has dipped 1.7% so far in 2026 compared to last year. We aren’t seeing a collapse in popularity, but rather a shift toward a more balanced, multi-genre ecosystem where R&B/Hip-Hop’s profound creative influence is also seen in other styles.”

Any concerns about R&B/hip-hop's continued supremacy may be shortsighted. In the first half of 2026, the genres accounted for nearly 180.3 billion streams in the U.S., followed by rock with 137.2 billion, pop with 87.8 billion, country with 63.8 billion and Latin with 63 billion.

Latin and country are drawing more listeners

Latin music continues to grow in popularity in the U.S. That’s evidenced in a few different ways: First, Luminate found that nearly 1 in 10 streams in the U.S. was in Spanish for the first half 2026 — 9.4% of total streams.

Secondly, English-language consumption fell to a new low of 87.1% — still the overwhelming majority but evidence of a diverse listening market.

“Casual U.S. listenership of Latin music has hit an all-time high, with 54% — or more than one in two music listeners — now reporting that they engage with the genre,” said Marconette. “Latin music’s cultural footprint is rapidly widening far beyond its traditional core base into the broader American mainstream.”

And globally, Latin music streams reached a new high — accounting for 363.2 billion streams in the first half of 2026, compared to 335.3 billion the previous year.

Albums may be a good place to see the growth of both Latin and country in the U.S. The top albums of the year, so far, are Morgan Wallen’s “I’m the Problem” with 2.035 million album equivalent units, Ella Langley’s “Dandelion” with 1.638 million and Bad Bunny’s “Debí Tirar Más Fotos” with 1.543 million. (Both Wallen and Bad Bunny’s albums released early last year.)

Marconette points to Langley as a prime example of country music's growing audience — she's at the forefront of an increasing group of “younger, streaming-forward” fans.

A small number of AI-generated tracks are spiking

And more may very well be on the way. Chill77, Unjaps and Mikeeysmind’s “Papaoutai (Afro Soul)” had 210.7 million streams in all countries except the U.S. in the first half of 2026. In the U.S., it accounted for 17.6 million streams.

That’s followed by The Second Voice’s “Let Me Be,” which earned 75.6 million streams in all countries expect the U.S.; stateside, it earned 10.1 million streams.

The most-streamed AI-generated song in the U.S. is country act Breaking Rust’s “Livin’ on Borrowed Time,” which accounted for 19 million streams. In all countries except the U.S., it earned 13.4 million streams.

Previously, Breaking Rust had a song called “Walk My Walk” hit No. 1 on Billboard’s country digital song sales chart in November 2025. The vocal phrasing, melodic shape and stylistic DNA came from the Grammy-nominated country artist Blanco Brown, an artist who has worked with Britney Spears, Childish Gambino and Rihanna.

Breaking Rust is an example of the kind of generative AI that has begun upending the music industry, often using models trained on real artists’ voices and styles without their knowledge.

“A small number of breakout tracks at the head of the curve can drive temporary conversational and streaming spikes,” says Marconette. “At this stage, generative tools are actively transforming creative and production workflows, but individual AI-generated tracks have yet to make a profound, long-term impact on consumption behavior.”

Netflix dominates in original film and TV streaming

In the U.S., Netflix accounted for 57% of all original content viewing time, followed by Prime Video (11%), Hulu and Paramount (7% each), Peacock and Apple (5% each), HBO Max (4%) and Disney+ (2%), with 13.6 billion hours streamed in total. Original TV series are most popular, accounting for 11.5 billion hours of that total. Original movies make up the difference, accounting for 2.8 billion hours.

The most streamed original films of 2026 in the U.S., so far, are all courtesy of Netflix: “The Crash” with 39.6 million estimated views, “The Rip” with 39.5 million and “Apex” with 37.3 million.

When it comes to original series in the U.S., there's a bit more competition. HBO Max's “The Pitt” leads with 19.4 billion streams, followed by two Netflix titles: “The Lincoln Lawyer” with 16.9 billion and “Bridgerton” with 14 billion.

Overwhelmingly, however, people in the U.S. are streaming library content (older, preexisting and licensed shows and movies) over original programming. Original TV accounted for 11.5 billion hours streamed in the first half of 2026, and original film raked in 2.1 billion. But library TV totaled 42.2 billion hours, and library film had 10.8 billion, according to Luminate.

Luminate estimates there are nearly 19,000 library titles available on major streaming services compared to just 7,000 originals.

In an unusual twist, two groups working independently detected the cold gas giant a few days apart late last year using different telescopes. It's the dimmest planet ever directly imaged from Earth, scientists reported Wednesday.

A Scottish and German-led team spied the new planet around the star Beta Pictoris using the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope in Chile, then dug through archives to confirm its orbit. The planet had remained hidden in the data all this time, overshadowed by its considerably brighter star and two companion planets.

“It was very much playing hide-and-seek for 11 years,” said the European Southern Observatory’s Markus Bonse, co-leader of the first team.

The California-led team made the discovery with NASA’s Webb Space Telescope. Two observations were all it took with Webb, the biggest and most powerful telescope ever launched into space. Both teams reported their findings in the Astrophysical Journal Letters.

The find was serendipitous. Each team was studying one of the star’s already identified planets when they spotted a less massive one — 100 times fainter — lurking farther out. They deliberately kept their work from one another so as not to bias the results.

The new planet is slightly bigger than Jupiter and takes 91 years to orbit its star, a little longer than it takes Uranus to orbit our sun. Born into a star system that’s barely 20 million years old — a kid compared to the sun's 4.5 billion-year-old neighborhood — the planet is probably similar to a much younger Jupiter, said the University of California San Diego’s Aidan Gibbs, who led the second team.

“The giant planets have formed, but smaller terrestrial planets could still be forming,” Gibbs said in an email. Beta Pictoris “is probably our best look at a planetary system just after it has formed and is still in the process of stabilizing” from hurtling asteroids and comets.

Beta Pictoris is located in the easel-shaped southern constellation Pictor, or painter, and 63 light-years from Earth. A light-year is nearly 6 trillion miles (more than 9 trillion kilometers).

Fewer than 100 of the more than 6,000 confirmed exoplanets — planets around other stars — have been detected through direct imaging, according to NASA. Most were found while passing in front of their star, briefly dimming it.

“We’ve now built a picture of this planet,” the University of Edinburgh's Ben Sutlieff said in an email, “and we are very excited to see what more can be learned about it.”

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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.

ICE is “doing a GREAT job, one that has to be done,” Trump wrote on his social media site.

The Republican president said that to remove criminals he claims were let into the country under the previous Democratic administration “we must be strong, tough, and smart, and we CANNOT give up one of ICE’s most important and effective Crime Fighting tools, THE TRAFFIC STOP!” Trump said, “Once we do, we are playing right into the criminal’s hands.”

Trump administration officials have told Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers to suspend most vehicle stops after two deadly shootings within a week, people familiar with the decision said Tuesday.

The suspension was ordered after an ICE officer shot and killed a Colombian driver Monday in Maine and a week after another officer shot and killed a motorist in Houston, renewing criticism of the agency’s enforcement tactics that were widely condemned last winter after the killings of Alex Pretti and Renee Good in Minnesota.

In Florida on Tuesday, a third man in roughly a week died during an encounter with immigration officers. This time, a 28-year-old man was killed after he was hit by a tractor trailer while running from immigration and other federal officers, authorities said.

It’s a narrative that has been repeated again and again since the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown began, with federal officers confronting drivers and then saying they opened fire when the drivers' vehicles became a danger. That’s despite decades of warnings from policing experts that shooting into moving cars presents a danger of its own and should almost always be avoided.

There have been at least 10 deaths involving encounters with immigration agents since Trump launched his deportation campaign. At least four of those deaths involved people in vehicles, including the one last week in Houston, a trend so troubling that U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, said Tuesday that she had urged Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin “to cease all non-urgent vehicle stops.”

John Sandweg, who was acting director at ICE, which is part of DHS, during President Barack Obama's Democratic administration, estimated recently that there have been roughly 18 traffic stop shootings during the Trump immigration crackdown.

The office of Maine Sen. Angus King, an independent who caucuses with Democrats, was told by DHS that ICE was suspending traffic stops, office spokesperson Matthew Felling said.

ICE, which has been under pressure to beef up arrest and deportation numbers, often says people it's trying to arrest are increasingly resistant to leaving their homes. ICE officers blame immigration advocates who advise immigrants to stay in their homes unless ICE produces a warrant signed by an independent judge instead of the administrative warrants the agency generally uses that are signed by another ICE officer. So, ICE officers say, they’re forced to find other areas in which to make arrests.

Shooting angers Maine

Hundreds of people in Maine protested Tuesday over the fatal shooting of Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, a 25-year-old Colombian national. Advocacy groups said Guerrero, who had a wife and a young daughter, was authorized to work in the United States.

DHS said Monday that an officer, “fearing for public safety,” shot and killed Durán Guerrero while officers were watching the home of someone they believed was in the U.S. illegally and facing a final order of removal from the country. It said in a post on X that when ICE tried to stop a car driven by someone who came from the home, the person attempted to flee in the vehicle and the officer fired.

That was a shift from how King earlier described the encounter, when he said Mullin told him the officer opened fire after the man tried to use his vehicle as a weapon. King said Mullin told him the officers were trying to serve an arrest warrant but not for the man who was shot.

In a scathing post on X, outgoing Colombian President Gustavo Petro called the shooting a targeted killing “at the hands of the U.S. government.”

Petro, who has openly quarreled with Trump, urged Trump to provide an explanation and accused ICE officers of treating Durán Guerrero as “an inferior being without rights.”

In Wednesday's social media post, Trump told ICE to be “judicious, fair and smart, and go back and do your very important job.”

Maine’s congressional delegation on Tuesday demanded a “comprehensive, transparent, and expedited investigation.”

Questions surround the shooting

Photos showed bullet holes in Durán Guerrero’s car windshield, but the officers involved in the shooting didn’t have body cameras, leaving many questions. Among them are how close the officer was to the vehicle when shooting, whether officers told Durán Guerrero to stop and why ICE believes he had put the public in danger.

Border czar Tom Homan told reporters Tuesday that the investigation needs to play out and that officers will be held accountable if they are found to have acted inappropriately or illegally.

Maine’s attorney general’s office, which said it is working with federal agencies to investigate, said initial statements suggest the driver was trying to flee in the direction of the officer, whose name hasn’t been released and who was placed on leave.

Collins said Mullin told her the DHS inspector general is investigating in cooperation with the FBI.

Democrats seeking to unseat Collins in November have sought to connect her with ICE’s methods, which have drawn public scrutiny and derision. Collins later said in a statement that although ICE needs to improve, eliminating the agency would make the nation less safe.

Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, a Democrat who is vying for Collins’ seat, called the ICE officers at the shooting “thugs” during a vigil Tuesday in Lewiston.

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Whittle contributed from Biddeford, Maine; Brook from New Orleans; and Sisak from New York.

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According to police, Lorent Pion allegedly beat the 22-year-old victim, Nahomi Cittadini, on the side of Interstate 95 near the exit for Ives Dairy Road where she was fatally struck by a vehicle traveling at least 80 mph.

It happened on Dec. 18, 2024.

Authorities said Pion, 30, then led police on a pursuit that spanned both Miami-Dade and Broward counties and ended when he crashed into multiple vehicles at the intersection of Miramar Parkway and Red Road in Miramar.

He was then taken into custody while trying to run, police said.

Investigators said this incident was not the first time Pion was physical with Cittadini.

Video obtained by Local 10 allegedly shows Pion pulling Cittadini by the hair in Miami Beach in March.

At the time, the judge issued a no-contact order.

On Wednesday, three members of a family were killed in central Gaza, Al Aqsa Hospital officials said.

On Tuesday, woman and six police officers were among those killed in an airstrike on a police station in the densely populated Jabaliya refugee camp in northern Gaza, hospital officials said. A man died in the bombing of a tent camp in Khan Younis in the south, Nasser Hospital officials said. And Israeli forces shot and killed a child in the Muwasi area outside the southernmost city of Rafah, according to hospital officials.

The Israeli military did not immediately comment on the strikes in central and southern Gaza. In a statement on the attack in Jabaliya, it claimed that four of the slain police officers were Hamas militants, without providing evidence on how those killed were involved in planning or carrying out attacks.

One of the officers, Col. Mohamad Marwan Salem, was a senior police commander and head of the Jabaliya police station, the Hamas-run Interior Ministry said.

Hamas, which ruled Gaza for years, maintains an armed wing as well as civilian police and security services that are overseen by its Interior Ministry. Throughout the war, Israel has targeted local police, including those guarding humanitarian aid convoys.

Israel's military has claimed it considers police stations legitimate targets if they're “being used to advance military activities, or if those present are military operatives involved in advancing terrorist activities.”

It did not say what military activities it believed were taking place at the Jabaliya police station, nor did it provide evidence that attacks were being planned. Hamas says the police force is engaged in maintaining law and order.

Israeli attacks on Gaza’s police have been condemned by the United Nations human rights office, which said last month that police personnel had been attacked at least a dozen times in 2026, including “during ordinary law enforcement operations, including directing traffic and patrolling streets and markets.”

“The pattern of attacks raises concerns that Israeli forces apply no distinction between police personnel and fighters belonging to armed groups in Gaza,” it said in a June 3 statement.

Ofer Guterman, a researcher at Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies, said Israel’s targeting suggests that it regards parts of Hamas' policing apparatus as closely integrated with its military infrastructure, including through dual-role personnel and the use of facilities for weapons storage, operations and logistics.

The fragile ceasefire deal in October attempted to halt a two-year-long war between Israel and Hamas.

The heaviest fighting has subsided but at least 1,123 people have been killed in Gaza since the ceasefire took effect, according to the territory’s Health Ministry. The ministry, which has been 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 but says women and children make up most of the dead.

Militants have carried out shooting attacks on troops, and Israel says its strikes are in response to that and other violations. Five Israeli soldiers have been killed since the ceasefire.

The war began after the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killed around 1,200 people and saw 251 taken hostage. Israel’s retaliatory offensive in Gaza has killed more than 73,264 Palestinians, including those killed since the ceasefire, Gaza’s Health Ministry said. ___

Magdy reported from Cairo and Metz from Ramallah, West Bank.

The Penguin Random House imprint Crown has scheduled Brett McGurk's “Brink: Inside the Race to Free the October 7 Hostages” for Oct. 6, nearly three years to the day after the deadly Hamas siege that left more than 1,000 people dead and more than 200 taken captive.

McGurk, 53, is a longtime Middle East adviser and diplomat who had already served under three presidents when he was appointed by President Joe Biden in 2023 to oversee hostage talks between Israel and Hamas. According to Crown, McGurk will describe his frantic efforts to balance the competing and seemingly intractable demands of the two sides, traveling worldwide in pursuit of an agreement.

“On October 7, Hamas unleashed a devastating war and the largest hostage crisis in modern history,” McGurk said in a statement released Wednesday by Crown. “I wrote ‘Brink’ to bring readers inside the rooms as events unfolded in real time — from the Situation Room with hundreds of missiles in the air, to compounds across the Middle East where diplomacy teetered between breakthrough and collapse.”

According to Crown, McGurk will also disclose details of a near-deal before Oct. 7 that would have normalized relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia and will remember his unlikely alliance with President Donald Trump appointee Steve Witkoff as they handled talks during the transition time between the administrations of Biden, a Democrat, and Trump, a Republican. The remaining surviving hostages were freed in October 2025.

“'Brink' details the bipartisan front they forged when it mattered most, ultimately securing a deal that would save lives,” the publisher's announcement reads in part.

Blanche insisted that the $1.776 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund,” which was scrapped after fierce bipartisan backlash, was “not moving forward.” But lawmakers, including Republican Sen. John Cornyn, raised concerns that the Trump administration has yet to commit in writing that the fund is dead and that it could therefore conceivably be resurrected.

“Just to be clear, the president of the United States, who's a plaintiff in this lawsuit, has not agreed in writing to delete the ‘Anti-Weaponization Fund’ and there’s no guarantee that he won’t raise it in the future?” Cornyn asked. Blanche replied that Trump has no power over the fund, which was to have been administered by the Justice Department but never launched.

Cornyn's questions were closely watched given that Blanche requires the support of all Republicans on the Judiciary Committee and the Texas Republican has said he won't make up his mind until after the hearing.

Trump’s former personal attorney, Blanche has run the department on an interim basis since April, during which time he has accelerated investigations into Trump foes, functioned as the public face of the maligned and later-withdrawn fund and oversaw the release of files in the Jeffrey Epstein sex-trafficking investigation. Those actions received fresh scrutiny Wednesday as Blanche testified for the opportunity to serve out the duration of Trump’s term.

The stakes are high given the upheaval inside the department, where mass firings and resignations have hollowed out the workforce. More than 1,200 department alumni have come out against his nomination.

Sen. Dick Durbin, the committee’s top Democrat, told Blanche: “In less than 18 months at the Department of Justice, you’ve shown you’re still President Trump’s personal attorney. Your tenure can be summed up in the four words you said — ‘I love you, sir’ — to President Trump.” That was a reference to remarks Blanche made at an April news conference.

Blanche, for his part, insisted that he has presided over a course correction at the department following years of investigations into Trump during the Biden administration.

“In recent years, we watched the Justice Department turned against many of you and a former president, and it damaged the public’s faith in justice,” Blanche argued. “We are fixing that.

Blanche will need the support of each Republican on the panel

Blanche, who is expected to be uniformly voted down by Democrats on the committee, must win the support of all Republicans on the panel for his nomination to advance.

A particular focus is on Cornyn of Texas, who in May lost his primary and Sen. Thom Tillis, a North Carolina Republican who has opted not to seek reelection. Tillis, like Cornyn, has been an outspoken critic of the fund that the Trump administration created to compensate people who feel unjustly persecuted by the criminal justice system and then quickly withdrew.

Tillis has said he will not support for attorney general anyone who equivocates on the events of Jan 6, 2021, when pro-Trump rioters stormed the U.S. Capitol in a bid to halt the congressional certification of Trump's election loss to Democrat Joe Biden. The senator, however, recently said he doesn’t have any concerns about Blanche’s record regarding the events of that day.

With the death of South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, who was a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, there are 11 Republicans and 10 Democrats on the panel. If even one Republican on the committee votes against Blanche, it could scuttle his nomination.

Blanche insists that the fund is dead. Lawmakers aren't so sure

The fund created a particularly rocky moment for Blanche. He initially defended it during congressional appearances only to reveal later that it was being scrapped — even while resisting calls to give those reassurances in writing. The turnabout followed fierce bipartisan backlash that came to a head during a tense closed-door meeting he had with lawmakers.

The fund arose out of a settlement of Trump's $10 billion lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service over his leaked tax returns. The Florida judge overseeing that case issued a scathing ruling that said Trump and his lawyers had manipulated the court system in bringing the lawsuit in the first place. The judge, Kathleen Williams, said Monday she was troubled by Blanche's involvement in the settlement given that he previously represented Trump.

Blanche also face questioning over a separate element of the settlement that afforded Trump and members of his family protection from tax audits and that, he has said, remains on track despite outrage over it from even Republicans.

Epstein files are also under scrutiny

Other testimony focused on Blanche's handling of the Epstein files, especially after his predecessor Pam Bondi told lawmakers behind closed doors after her ouster as attorney general that Blanche was the department’s point person on the release of documents from the sex trafficking case into the late financier.

The staggered release, mandated by an act of Congress, was beset by problems, including redaction errors that left exposed nude photos showing the faces of potential victims. Some names, email addresses and other identifying information were either unredacted or not fully obscured. About 1 percent of the records had redactions that needed to be fixed, he said.

Blanche said that though “mistakes were made,” the disclosure of the documents was an exercise in unprecedented transparency.

“I want to make sure that the American people know that this administration, when it comes to Jeffrey Epstein, has been more transparent than any administration,” he said.

A former federal prosecutor and key member of Trump's defense team as the Republican battled four indictments between his first and second terms, Blanche arrived at the Justice Department last year as deputy attorney general. He then ascended to the top job after Trump ousted Bondi, who had frustrated the White House by struggling to bring successful cases against Trump's political opponents.

Blanche has tried to satisfy the president in that regard. He has appointed a new prosecutor to spearhead a Florida-based investigation centered on former government officials Trump dislikes. The Justice Department under Blanche's watch also secured an indictment of ex-FBI Director James Comey, another adversary of Trump, on charges of threatening the 47th president by posting a social media photograph of seashells in the numerical arrangement of “86 47.” Comey has said he assumed the numbers reflected a political message, not a call to violence.

Blanche has denied accusations that he has been weaponizing the department. But he has also insisted that he sees no problem with the president’s interest in Justice Department matters and that he feels no pressure to placate him.

“We have thousands of ongoing investigations and prosecutions," Blanche told a press conference in May. “And it is true that some of them involve men, women and entities that the president in the past has had issues with and believes should be investigated. That is his right, and indeed it is his duty to do that.”

Blanche has also presided over an aggressive enforcement of news media leaks, with prosecutors most recently issuing subpoenas demanding that a group of New York Times journalists testify before a federal grand jury after they reported on security concerns involving the new Qatari-gifted Air Force One. The Times' executive editor, Joseph Kahn, criticized the subpoenas, praised his journalists’ work and said: “We expect to prevail." ______

Associated Press writers Meg Kinnard and Michael Kunzelman contributed to this report.

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Experts say the technique is different from traditional deep tissue massage. Instead of applying heavy pressure, lymphatic drainage uses gentle movements designed to encourage the body’s natural lymphatic system.

“We are just incentivizing your body to do something that it naturally does 24/7,” said Camila Perez, owner of Mova Lymphatic Drainage.

Perez says the treatment helps move excess fluid produced through normal cellular metabolism back into the circulatory system, where it can be filtered by the liver and kidneys.

“It helps remove excessive fluid and bring it back to the circulatory system,” Perez said.

She says clients often seek lymphatic drainage massages to help with bloating and digestion.

“The lymph nodes that inside of the intestines are in charge of some fat removal, so in terms of digestion, important and specific working on the stomach helps digestion and reduces bloating,” Perez added.

Perez also says the treatment may help support people recovering after surgery by helping redirect fluid while the body heals.

“After an incision, you cut the pathways (and) capillaries that drain the areas,” she said. “(It’s the) right amount of pressure to redirect the fluid until it gets heeled.”

She says improving circulation can also help support a less congested system.

“In circulation in general and a less congested system is not distracted,” Perez said.

Perez says many clients schedule appointments before major events, including weddings, while others seek treatments during or after pregnancy.

“It’s a time where hormones are taking over. It’s safe. I recommend starting after the first trimester and coming back post-pregnancy,” she added.

The treatment is also popular among men, Perez said.

But Perez says one of the biggest misconceptions is that a stronger massage leads to better results.

“I think the biggest misconception is that a deeper, stronger massage will give you more results,” she said.

Instead, she says the technique relies on gentle pressure and slow movements.

“Lymphatic is not releasing fat. It’s not making you skinny, but you can look better and more slim because you’re not carrying too much water,” Perez said.

She says lymphatic drainage can be used for a wide range of clients, but each treatment is adjusted based on individual needs.

“One day I can have a cancer patient, a model, a post-surgery client. Each one, we have a different approach,” she added.

One client, Rudineia Villegas, says she receives regular lymphatic drainage massages while managing lipedema, a condition that can cause swelling, inflammation and fluid retention.

“It’s a condition it can affect your arms, your thighs, (and the) bottom part of your legs. You retain a lot of water, inflammation (and it) makes it look like a lot of cellulite,” Villegas said.

Villegas says she has received lymphatic drainage massages monthly for the past five years.

“It makes my skin feel smoother and I feel a lot lighter also,” she said.

She says the treatments have also helped while she goes through menopause.

”I feel like it helps with the mood swings. It helps regulate my digestion,” Villegas said.

While lymphatic drainage massages are considered safe for many people, Perez says some should avoid the treatment or speak with a doctor first.

“Lymphatic drainage has a few absolute contraindications: kidney failure, heart failure, deep vein thrombosis and other circulatory conditions. If you have an infection, it’s good to avoid (it),” Perez said.

For those looking to reduce swelling or improve how they feel, experts say lymphatic drainage may be an option — but it is important to understand what the treatment can and cannot do.

The organizations say in a lawsuit filed Wednesday that they have been forced to censor their own advocacy work to avoid scrutiny from the White House, which in an executive order last year not only targeted the Hague-based criminal court but prohibited providing or receiving services to or from entities that have been sanctioned.

The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Manhattan against top administration officials by DAWN and Taxpayers Alliance Against Genocide, seeks a court order that would strike down the restrictions on their advocacy and their ability to interact with Palestinian human rights groups and other sanctioned parties.

“The Trump administration is using the blunt instrument of economic sanctions not only to punish human rights defenders but to police the political expressions of millions of Americans,” said Omar Shakir, the executive director of DAWN, a U.S.-based group advocating for democracy and human rights in the Arab world that was founded by Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who was killed in 2018.

“The government is violating the constitutional rights of American citizens in order to shield officials of a foreign government who have committed a genocide," he said in a statement.

The White House did not immediately return an email seeking comment on the lawsuit.

The Hague-based ICC has been investigating allegations of war crimes in Gaza during the war that began after Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. A panel of judges issued arrest warrants in 2024 for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defense minister, Yoav Gallant. Netanyahu has called the warrants “absurd.”

The U.S. and Israel are not among the court’s members, and neither nation recognizes its authority.

In response to the arrest warrants, President Donald Trump, a Republican, issued an executive order last year that accused the ICC of engaging in “illegitimate and baseless actions targeting America and our close ally Israel” and warned of “tangible and significant consequences” on those responsible for the ICC’s “transgressions.”

The U.S. over the last year has slapped sanctions on Palestinian human rights groups, a series of ICC judges and staffers — including the court’s former chief prosecutor — and Francesca Albanese, the U.N. special rapporteur for the West Bank and Gaza. Her family sued in February, saying the penalties violated the First Amendment.

Already, the lawsuit says, DAWN has halted work on submissions to the ICC about Israel’s conduct during the war, stopped exchanging evidence and legal analysis with sanctioned non-government organizations and abstained from collaborating with them on advocacy campaigns. It has also been forced to “discontinue its professional engagements with Albanese.”

“The chilling effect on Plaintiffs has been profound,” the lawsuit states. “They now face prison terms and ruinous fines if, in their interactions with the designated parties, they provide or receive anything that Defendants could plausibly characterize as a ‘service’— an extraordinarily capacious term that potentially reaches any act that confers a benefit on its recipient. Fearing liability, Plaintiffs — and countless others like them —have turned to self-censorship.”

Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who is among the defendants in the lawsuit, denounced the court as recently as this week, pledging in a Wall Street Journal opinion piece that Trump's administration would “dismantle the ICC — brick by brick, if necessary.” He warned that the court's “overreach,” if left unchecked, could subject Border Patrol agents, federal prosecutors and U.S. Marines to the tribunal's jurisdiction.

“The ICC’s interfering with American military and law enforcement operations isn’t only a grave overreach of its purported authorities. It would mean the death of the U.S. as a sovereign and independent nation,” Rubio wrote. “Our decision and our people would be at the mercy of the ICC and its collaborators in the 'international community.' To accept the ICC is to surrender control of our national destiny.”

The State Department said the campaign against the court could include additional sanctions or visa revocations and travel bans for ICC employees as well as “increased scrutiny” of nations that don't reject ICC authority.

The forecast high in Miami is 94 degrees. The record high for July 15 is 96 degrees, so we could come close to tying or breaking that record on Wednesday.

Saharan dust continues to limit rain chances while contributing to hotter temperatures. Looking ahead, rain chances increase Friday as the Saharan dust finally begins to move out of the area, allowing showers and thunderstorms to return.

El Centro Nacional de Huracanes en Miami indicó que el centro del meteoro se encontraba en el mar, a unos 909 kilómetros (565 millas) al sur-suroeste del extremo sur de la península de Baja California, en México, el miércoles.

Elida tenía vientos máximos sostenidos que rondaban los 64 kilómetros/hora (40 mph), de acuerdo con un aviso del centro.

Se espera que la tormenta siga fortaleciéndose hasta convertirse en huracán para la noche del jueves y alcance su máxima intensidad el viernes, dijo el centro de huracanes. No hay alertas ni avisos costeros en vigor.

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Esta historia fue traducida del inglés por un editor de AP con la ayuda de una herramienta de inteligencia artificial generativa.

The memoir is scheduled to come out Nov. 17, publisher Little, Brown and Company told The Associated Press. The timing of the book — two weeks after midterm elections in which Democrats seek to regain control of Congress — could raise concerns within Biden's party by putting him back into the spotlight.

Democrats remain divided on Biden’s legacy, with many blaming his ill-fated determination to seek a second term for Republican President Donald Trump's return to the White House. Leaders hope to keep the fall campaign focused on Trump and his record, and any leaks or promotional efforts before votes are cast could draw frustration.

“'Promise Me, America' is about the challenges we faced as a nation. It’s about the decisions I made and why I made them,” Biden said in a video statement accompanying Wednesday's announcement. “It’s about why I chose to run for reelection and why I chose to step aside."

Reports of Biden's book have circulated for more than a year, and the former president himself has referred to it during public remarks, appearing to suggest it would be released before November's election.

Biden, who will turn 84 three days after the publication of “Promise Me, America," has long presented himself as an upholder of standards and traditions; presidential memoirs are one of them. With a handful of exceptions, modern presidents since Harry Truman in the 1950s have published books about their White House years. Little, Brown declined to release financial details for ”Promise Me, America," although presidents have usually reached deals worth at least seven figures.

The book's title echoes a 2017 memoir by Biden, “Promise Me, Dad,” which centered on the death of his son, Beau Biden.

Vowing as a candidate to “restore the soul” of his country, Biden was sworn into office in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic and in the aftermath of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters seeking to stop his certification as president. Biden's term was defined by a wide range of conflicts and achievements, from his handling of wars in Ukraine and the Middle East to the passage of ambitious infrastructure and economic aid bills. But many readers will likely want to know more about his health while president, including the disastrous debate in June 2024 against Trump that led to his giving up his reelection bid. Then-Vice President Kamala Harris, who ran instead, lost decisively to Trump.

Former first lady Jill Biden wrote in her own book that her husband seemed so weak and disoriented during the debate that she feared he was having a stroke. In “View from the East Wing,” published in June, she noted that the White House had initially said he was suffering from a cold.

“The biggest lesson for us, I think, was that if you don’t explain something well enough then the question won’t go away,” she wrote. “There was never a satisfying enough explanation offered for Joe’s debate performance, and a lot of people never got over it.”

Biden was the oldest man to serve as president and his health was a source of speculation for much of his term; Biden and his White House advisers have faced intense criticism from Democrats and Republicans for allegedly concealing the extent of his problems. A notable book release from 2025, Jake Tapper's and Alex Thompson's “Original Sin,” was subtitled “President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again.”

That year, Biden announced he had been diagnosed with prostate cancer.

Biden's previous books also include “Promises to Keep,” a campaign work published to boost his run for president in 2008, when Barack Obama was the eventual nominee and Biden his running mate. ”Promise Me, America" comes out during a year when nonfiction sales have declined and few political books have caught on, although recent bestsellers have included Vice President JD Vance's “Communion” and an inside account of Trump's second term, by New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan, “Regime Change.”

A Little, Brown spokesperson said that Biden plans to tour on behalf of the book and give interviews. In his video announcement, Biden said that many people had been asking him how he was doing.

“I’ve been spending a lot of time with my family. I’m dealing with a cancer diagnosis, been getting treatment, and it’s going really well,” he said. “I want to thank all those who have offered their prayers and support and well-wishes. It’s meant the world to me and to Jill.”

Just 11 days after facing Lionel Messi and Argentina in an epic World Cup round-of-32 game, Cape Verde defender Lopes led the Dublin club to a 5-1 second-leg win over Maltese champion Floriana.

Rovers advanced 5-3 on aggregate score and will now travel to face Ararat-Armenia next week. Rovers must advance through four qualifying rounds to enter the lucrative 36-team main phase starting in September.

The second qualifying round will see former European Cup winner Red Star Belgrade enter the competition against Larne, the champion of Northern Ireland. Larne advanced Tuesday beating Tre Fiori of San Marino 2-1 for a 3-1 aggregate score.

Vikingur of Iceland got a 2-2 draw in Hungary against Győri ETO to advance 3-2 on aggregate and will face Hapoel Beer-Sheva in the next round.

Vikingur could have to return to Hungary for the second leg on July 28 or 29. Israeli clubs cannot host their home games in UEFA competitions for security reasons, and Hapoel Beer-Sheva chose stadiums in Hungary as a neutral venue in European qualifying matches last season.

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AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer

Over the course of the war, Ukraine has gone from pleading for foreign military support to providing its cutting-edge and battle-tested weapons know-how to Europe, the United States and Middle East countries. But it still needs help expanding its domestic production, especially sophisticated air defenses that can stop Russia’s ballistic missiles.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, attending ceremonies marking Ukraine’s Statehood Day, and President Volodymyr Zelenskyy launched a new EU-Ukraine Defense Industrial Partnership.

The move reflects European worries about Russia’s broader intentions on the continent.

“Today, Ukraine’s fight is not only a fight for your own freedom. It is an existential fight for Europe’s freedoms — for its values, its self-determination,” Von der Leyen said in a speech in Kyiv's St. Michaels’ Square, where she received Ukraine's Order of Europe, a state honor.

“You are not only fighting for your own future but for the security of our entire continent,” she told a crowd.

The EU and Ukraine signed a letter of intent that aims to establish joint drone and anti-drone production by the end of this year and joint anti-ballistic missile production by 2028, as well as broader support for defense manufacturing.

Ukraine wants to bolster its security by joining the EU. It has started that process, which could take years to complete.

U.S. President Donald Trump said at the NATO summit last week that the U.S. will give Ukraine a license to build its own Patriot air defense systems, essential to countering ballistic missiles.

Zelenskyy said Wednesday he expects Ukraine will have the technical capability to produce the sophisticated missiles by the end of the year, even though experts say it could take years.

Ukraine celebrates its sovereignty amid Russia war

Von der Leyen and other dignitaries, including the presidents of Moldova and Romania, marked Ukraine’s Statehood Day, which celebrates the country’s sovereignty and is a public holiday.

Ukraine has been under threat since Russian forces illegally annexed the Crimean Peninsula in 2014, followed eight years later by the all-out invasion in 2022. Statehood Day, celebrating the country’s self-determination, is a public holiday in Ukraine.

The war has killed thousands of soldiers and civilians, forced millions to flee their homes, reduced some Ukrainian cities to rubble, and has fueled fears the confrontation could slide into an open conflict between Russia and NATO, whose member nations have supported Kyiv. No peace settlement is in sight.

Senior officials from southeastern European countries also were in Kyiv for a gathering focused on Black Sea and regional security. Last year’s meeting in the southern city of Odesa reaffirmed their support for Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.

Zelenskyy has recently won important pledges of further support, including from the Group of Seven leading industrialized nations and the so-called Coalition of the Willing countries.

EU official says the ‘tide is turning’ in the war

Von der Leyen said her trip to the Ukrainian capital was her 11th in wartime. The EU has provided billions of euros to Ukraine as well as diplomatic support.

She promised EU help in preparing Ukraine's air defenses for the colder months. That's when Russia, often launching ballistic missiles, usually tries to knock out essential services like electricity and heat in what Kyiv officials call “weaponizing winter.”

"Energy remains an unwavering priority,” Zelenskyy said.

Western officials and analysts say Ukraine’s drone and missile attacks are hitting high-profile targets deep inside Russia, severely disrupting Moscow's supply lines and causing civilian fuel shortages.

“It’s a special moment,” Von der Leyen said on social media. “Ukraine has built a strong military momentum. The tide is turning.”

Washington appeared poised to increase economic pressure on Moscow as a proposed Russia sanctions bill was unveiled in the U.S. Senate following Saturday’s death of Sen. Lindsey Graham, one of its chief backers.

The bill, which its authors had hoped to pass last summer but was held up by White House reservations, would impose steep tariffs on goods from countries that continue to buy Russian oil, gas and other exports.

Wednesday's official ceremonies came at a delicate political moment for Zelenskyy as he manages a major government reshuffle.

Meanwhile, Serbia’s Moscow-friendly president, Aleksandar Vucic, was taking part in the Southeast Europe Summit in Kyiv. Serbia, which relies almost fully on Russia for its energy supplies, has refused to join Western sanctions on Moscow, although it officially supports Ukraine’s territorial integrity.

Russian attacks kill 9 Ukrainian civilians

Ukrainian officials said Wednesday that at least nine civilians were killed and 13 others were injured in Russian aerial attacks.

Russian forces dropped six glide bombs mostly targeting infrastructure in the Sumy region of northern Ukraine, killing three people and wounding seven, said Oleh Hryhorov, head of the regional military administration.

Three people were killed and three others wounded in a Russian attack on Odesa, according to Serhii Lysak, the head of the city’s military administration.

In the Chernihiv region of northern Ukraine, Russian drones killed two people and seriously wounded an 18-year-old, while one person was killed and two injured in the southern Zaporizhzhia region, officials said.

The Russian Defense Ministry said its air defenses overnight intercepted 93 Ukrainian drones over several Russian regions, as well as over Crimea and the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea.

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Hatton reported from Lisbon, Portugal. Associated Press reporter Justin Spike in Budapest contributed.

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

Starmer, who leaves office next week, bid farewell to the boisterous weekly Prime Minister’s Questions sessions where he has traded barbs with opposition politicians and defended his government’s record. On Monday, he will step down as prime minister after losing the support of his Labour Party, handing over power to a new Labour leader, Andy Burnham.

“Every prime minister knows when they take up the torch that the day will come when they have to pass it on,” said Starmer, who has spent six years as leader of the Labour Party and two as prime minister.

“This is the end of my political journey,” he said, though he plans to remain a backbench lawmaker for now.

Britain’s parliamentary democracy allows governing parties to change leaders, and thus prime ministers, without the need for a general election. The next national election doesn't have to be held until 2029.

PMQs is a weekly ritual in British politics, where the prime minister answers questions, from opposition party leaders and others, on topics they don’t know in advance. A test of leaders’ ability to think on their feet, it is derided by some as political pantomime that generates more noise than insight.

Starmer's valedictory session was a gentler affair, mixing seriousness and political criticism with personal tributes and jokes about an upcoming special election pitting Reform UK leader Nigel Farage against the comedy candidate Count Binface.

Starmer opened by saying he was “horrified” at the killing last week of the former lawmaker Ann Widdecombe. Counterterrorism police are investigating it as murder.

Starmer called it “ chilling” that three serving or former members have been killed during his 11 years in Parliament, and urged politicians to “do more to defend our democracy.”

Instead of mentioning upcoming meetings with ministers, as he has every other week, Starmer said that he had “an important appointment with the television” later when England faces Argentina in a World Cup semifinal.

Kemi Badenoch — the fourth leader of the opposition Conservative Party since 2022 — cautioned Labour that changing leaders is no “silver bullet,” and recalled how Starmer had predicted she wouldn't last a year in charge.

“Life comes at you fast,” Badenoch said.

Starmer went from landslide to ouster in two years

Starmer was elected in a landslide in July 2024, but is quitting after two years in office marred by missteps and judgment errors that eroded his standing with his party and the public.

He struggled to deliver promised economic growth, repair tattered public services and ease the cost of living. And he was hamstrung by repeated missteps, including his decision to appoint Peter Mandelson, a scandal-tarnished friend of Jeffrey Epstein, as U.K. ambassador to the United States.

After Labour was hammered in May’s local elections, Starmer gave in to mounting pressure from the party and announced that he would step down. Burnham, the former mayor of Greater Manchester, is the only candidate in the contest to replace him and will be announced as the new Labour leader on Friday.

On Monday, Starmer will go to Buckingham Palace and announce his resignation as prime minister to King Charles III, who will then ask Burnham to take over.

At Prime Minister’s Questions, Starmer said that he was proud of his government’s domestic policy achievements, including stronger protections for working people, a reduction in child poverty, a law designed to stop official cover-ups after tragedies, and higher defense spending.

“I am proud to leave this country in better shape than I found it,” he said.

He got praise for supporting Ukraine

Starmer has been lauded for his role on the world stage, especially in repairing relations with Britain's European Union neighbors after Brexit and galvanizing international support for Ukraine's fight against Russia's full-scale invasion.

On Tuesday, Starmer attended Bastille Day celebrations in Paris with French President Emmanuel Macron, who awarded him the Legion of Honor in recognition of his work with France on European security. The two countries have led efforts to assemble an international coalition to underpin peace in Ukraine if there is a ceasefire.

Ukraine's cause has wide political support in Britain, and Badenoch praised Starmer for inviting President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to London immediately after the Ukrainian leader was berated by U.S. President Donald Trump and other administration officials in the White House last year.

Starmer recalled how people had gathered at the gates of Downing Street to see Zelenskyy, and “the moment he got out the car and hugged me, they cheered from the top of their voices, the British people, to tell President Zelenskyy exactly what they thought of him and the way he had been treated” in the Oval Office.

The rambunctious House fell silent as Starmer ended by thanking colleagues, staff, civil servants and all those “who struggle to be seen or heard — you’re the reason I came into politics.”

He said “I love you” to wife Victoria and two teenage children, who were watching from a viewing gallery, before a final: “Goodbye.”

Lawmakers from all sides of the chamber applauded, with many rising for a standing ovation. That drew a reprimand from Speaker Lindsay Hoyle, who reminded them that cheering is allowed in the House of Commons, but clapping is against the rules.

In its latest attempt to reduce the risks of online harm for children, Britain's Labour government also said that features that can keep users scrolling for longer, such as videos that automatically play one after another, will also be switched off by default for older teenagers.

The planned restrictions come a month after the government unveiled a social media ban for under-16s, which is expected to cover platforms including Snapchat, TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook and X, but not messaging services like WhatsApp and Signal, from next spring.

The measures, which are one of the final acts of the government of Prime Minister Keir Starmer, will have to be legislated upon. It is widely believed that his expected successor Andy Burnham will follow through with the plans.

Online Safety Minister Kanishka Narayan downplayed talk that teenagers would just turn off optional social media curfews, saying it is a “disservice” to them to suggest they would.

He pointed to a recent pilot program involving more than 300 teenagers and parents across the U.K. that saw social media usage drop dramatically overnight as well as helping improve sleep and concentration.

“In October, for example, some platforms introduced these defaults of this sort – 90%-plus teenagers said to us that they’ve maintained those defaults as well,” he told Sky News. “And so the evidence base is clear, the motivation is very clear and I wouldn’t do the disservice to teenagers of saying they’re all going to switch it off.”

Laura Trott, the education spokesperson for the main opposition Conservative Party, said the proposals make “no sense.”

“Either they think 16- and 17-year-olds should be on social media or they don’t, but curfews they can simply switch off won’t achieve anything,” she said.

The NSPCC, the U.K.'s leading children's charity, said the proposals will go some way to improving the experiences of young people on social media but won't be enough on their own.

“Unless they’re followed up with further, stronger measures, they will be a sticking plaster that fails to address the addictive design features which are driving high screentime and undermining children’s wellbeing,” said NSPCC chief executive Chris Sherwood.

Rachel de Souza, the Children’s Commissioner for England, said the move was a “positive step” as young people want to try to cut down social media use but find it hard.

“I want to know more about how the policies, such as a curfew, will be delivered and will be watching closely to make sure they are effective,” she said.

The November fire engulfed seven buildings of an apartment complex, killing 168 people and shattering the close-knit community of Wang Fuk Court, which housed thousands of people in the suburban Tai Po district.

Former residents and relatives of the deceased have been waiting for answers from the committee, which was established in December by the Hong Kong city government with an expectation that the work would take nine months.

Lawyers representing residents, the government and the committee are expected to lay out their arguments before the hearings conclude Friday.

The scope of the panel does not include possible legal liabilities for those linked to the fire’s outbreak, which will be handled by law enforcement authorities.

Committee has heard testimony about multiple factors in fire

The three-member committee is led by High Court Judge David Lok and includes Chan Kin-por, a member of the city’s Executive Council, and Rex Auyeung, who serves on the Hospital Authority Board.

When the hearings began in March, committee lead lawyer Victor Dawes said the evidence showed multiple factors contributed to the disaster, from fire alarms and hose systems being shut off to the use of non-fire-retardant scaffolding netting and covering windows with foam boards.

Lawyer Martin Ho, representing ISS EastPoint Properties, said the property management company's in-house electrician inadvertently switched off the fire alarm system when emptying water tanks.

The mistake was regrettable but could have been avoided if the complex's fire service installation contractor had been present during the process, Ho said.

Another installation contractor later noted the issue but did not follow up properly, Ho said, adding that a director of that contractor pointed to the industry’s mentality of not teaching other companies how to work. The lawyer called it “baffling.”

Aaron Chan, a lawyer for a director of one of the fire service installation contractors, said his client agreed the fire alarm system would help reduce casualties but hoped the committee could consider the window to escape might be very short and other factors.

Judge David Lok, who led the committee, stepped in and asked Chan not to tell him the alarms are useless. Chan quickly denied it but said he wanted to present other factors for consideration.

Residents say responsibility is being avoided

Some Wang Fuk Court residents who listened to Wednesday's arguments said part of those involved in the incident seemed to be trying to deflect responsibility.

Betty Ho was unsure if she could learn the truth, but said she hoped the committee could find justice for the deceased victims.

“I don’t think we’ll get what we hoped for in the end,” she said.

Patrick Liu said he doesn't have much expectation.

“Basically, everyone is just shirking responsibility. There’s no need to even think about it,” Liu said, adding that he learned about what had happened but he still needed to wait for the committee's report and a court trial to fully understand who should be accountable.

Panel also investigating systemic problems

The committee also is examining whether systemic problems such as bid-rigging have occurred in Hong Kong's large-scale building maintenance and renovation works. The panel is expected to give suggestions after reviewing the fire's cause, potential systemic problems and whether existing regulations and penalties are sufficient.

A representative of the Competition Commission, an antitrust organization, on Wednesday said bid-rigging groups existed in the city and in some cases were associated with criminal groups known as triads.

Former residents, government officers and experts have given evidence in previous rounds of hearings. CCTV footage, documents and records of text messages also were used as evidence.

Criminal charges filed over fire

Hong Kong authorities charged seven people and two companies in June with offenses including manslaughter and conspiracy to defraud over the fire.

The companies include Will Power Architects Company, a consultancy, and Prestige Construction & Engineering Co., the main contractor involved in a major renovation project at Wang Fuk Court at the time of the blaze.

Authorities alleged the people in charge of the renovation project and the relevant companies were seriously negligent in monitoring the materials used in the project and the procedures involved.

They also alleged the two companies and some defendants conspired to defraud Wang Fuk Court apartment owners by concealing previous Prestige litigation records and inflating the firm's score in a tender analysis report.

Health workers at Bunia General Hospital, the region's largest medical center, went on strike on Wednesday and are the latest group to have walked off their job at the epicenter over payment issues. Health professionals and other front line workers barricaded the entrance of the hospital, claiming they have not received any compensation despite working under difficult conditions.

The World Health Organization says more than 100 healthcare workers have been infected since the beginning of the outbreak.

The Central African nation has been battling the Ebola outbreak caused by the rare Bundibugyo virus since May 15. A total of 753 patients remain in isolation or in hospitals, while 366 have so far recovered, according to data from Congo’s Ministry of Health. Contact tracing remains a challenge, with coverage of those exposed still at 67%.

The outbreak continues to spread faster than health officials can track despite an expanding response. At least 80% of new cases are emerging from unknown chains of transmission, the WHO said Tuesday.

A key challenge is that health authorities have yet to identify the outbreak’s patient zero, while displacements from armed conflict as well as mining-related movements have made it difficult to trace thousands who have come in contact with infected individuals.

Many of the newly reported deaths are those who died in their communities without ever reaching a health facility and without receiving care, Dr. Chikwe Ihekweazu, the WHO health emergencies chief, said Tuesday after returning from Bunia in Ituri, the worst-hit province in the outbreak.

The health response is being hampered by a funding gap, attacks on health centers, an ongoing conflict in eastern Congo, and mistrust among local communities.

Dozens of healthcare workers at an Ebola virus treatment center in Rwampara, another hard hit city in the Ituri province, went on strike over unpaid salaries and bonuses on Monday. On Tuesday, they agreed to resume work under the condition that the government pays them within 72 hours.

Some have told The Associated Press they have not received any payment since they started work at the onset of the outbreak.

Response efforts have also been challenged by the lack of approved vaccines or treatments for the Bundibugyo virus, unlike the more common Zaire virus for which there is a vaccine and which was responsible for most of Congo’s past 16 outbreaks of the disease.

Enrollment for a highly anticipated study of two possible Ebola treatments recently started in Ituri.

The lower house of parliament is widely expected to approve the measure after backing it in three previous readings, completing parliament’s work on the legislation announced by French President Emmanuel Macron over three years ago.

According to various estimates, assisted dying is available to some 300 million people worldwide, with euthanasia legal under certain conditions in some countries and assisted suicide allowed in others and in several U.S. states.

France has an increasingly aging population, with growing numbers of patients who require care for chronic illnesses. The traditionally Catholic country has grappled with legal, medical, moral and religious questions about end-of-life options, including existing legislation that allows doctors to keep terminally ill patients sedated before death but stops short of allowing assisted suicide and euthanasia.

Many French people have traveled to neighboring countries where medically assisted suicide or euthanasia are legal. Medically assisted suicide generally involves a patient voluntarily taking lethal medication prescribed by a doctor. Euthanasia involves a doctor or other health care professional administering a lethal injection at the patient’s request.

End-of-life options are also being debated in the United Kingdom. A bill to legalize assisted dying in England and Wales will formally return to Parliament on Sept. 11, five months after it ran out of time in Parliament’s last session.

The bill sets strict conditions

The proposed measure in France primarily provides for medically assisted suicide, by allowing patients to receive and self-administer lethal medication under strict conditions. Only people whose physical condition prevents them from doing so would be allowed to receive assistance from a doctor or a nurse.

Patients seeking to end their lives would have to be at least 18 years old and either French citizens or legal residents of France.

A doctor would first have to consult a team of health care professionals and then confirm that the patient has a serious and incurable illness that is life-threatening. The patient must be in an advanced or terminal stage, experiencing pain that cannot be relieved or is unbearable, and seeking lethal medication of their own free will.

Lawmakers specified that psychological suffering alone would not qualify a person for medically assisted dying.

People with severe psychiatric disorders or neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s would not be eligible.

Patients would initiate the request, to be reviewed by health professionals within 15 days, and then confirm it after a period of reflection lasting at least two days.

If approved, they could take the lethal medication at the time and in the place of their choice, including at home or in a health care facility, in the presence of their loved ones if they wish.

On the chosen date, the doctor or nurse would have to verify that the person still wishes to proceed and remain nearby to intervene if complications arise.

France’s national health insurance system would cover all associated costs.

Many French people support the changes

A 2023 report found that most French people are in favor of legalizing end-of-life options, and opinion polls have shown support increasing over the past two decades.

The Association for the Right to Die With Dignity said the law would allow people “to choose to end unbearable suffering, freely and with full awareness.” Its president, Jonathan Denis, said in a statement that “a law that creates a new right never forces anyone to exercise it. It does, however, ensure that every person … can remain at the heart of medical decisions that concern them and have their wishes respected.”

Opponents argue the measure could put pressure on older people and those living with illness or disabilities.

In an open letter to Macron, the anti-euthanasia group Alliance Vita said “every effort must be made to ensure that people who are suffering have immediate access to palliative care and support. Presenting death as a desirable solution can never be an acceptable response to suffering and is contrary to human dignity.”

The vote caps a lengthy parliamentary process

The Senate, the upper house where conservatives hold a majority, rejected the bill. But under France’s legislative process, the National Assembly has the final say when the two houses of parliament disagree.

Senate President Gérard Larcher and Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu said they will refer the bill, once adopted, to the Constitutional Council, which will have up to a month to determine whether it complies with the Constitution. The law would only enter into force once that review has been completed.

“Extensive debates have taken place in the National Assembly on this bill. However, discussions in the Senate did not allow for such an in-depth examination, in order to produce legislation that addresses both the aspirations of its supporters and the concerns of those who are worried about how it will be implemented,” Lecornu said.

In the U.K., opponents of the bill to legalize assisted dying prevented it from passing in the House of Lords, the upper house, by filing more than 1,200 amendments on a range of concerns, including potential coercion of vulnerable people and a lack of safeguards for those with disabilities.

That was in April, after elected representatives in the House of Commons passed it.

The bill that is expected to be presented again proposes allowing adults in England and Wales, with fewer than six months to live, to apply for an assisted death subject to the approval of two doctors and an expert panel. One aim is so people no longer go to other countries, such as Switzerland, for an assisted death.

In Germany, parliament’s lower house, the Bundestag, in 2023 considered two proposals to regulate assisted dying and rejected both of them.

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Samuel Petrequin and John Leicester in Paris, Pan Pylas in London and Geir Moulson in Berlin contributed to this report.

Ruemmler is the latest prominent figure called before the House Oversight Committee as lawmakers investigate the network of powerful people connected with Epstein. The bipartisan inquiry has already included testimony from more than a dozen high-profile witnesses, including Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and former President Bill Clinton, as lawmakers examine how Epstein's wealth and influence may have helped shield him from scrutiny.

Entering Wednesday's hearing, Rep. Robert Garcia of California, the top Democrat on the committee, told reporters that Ruemmler will provide unique insight as one of the few people who was "very close in the last phase of Jeffrey Epstein’s life.”

“I think some of the emails that are in the files are very concerning about how she communicated with Jeffrey Epstein,” he added.

Thousands of documents released by the Justice Department showed that Ruemmler and Epstein had an extensive relationship. The files included personal emails, social plans and gifts that extended beyond formal legal work.

Ruemmler served as White House counsel under Obama from 2011 to 2014 and was briefly considered for attorney general. She served as Goldman Sachs’ general counsel for the past six years before announcing in February that she would step down amid backlash over her correspondence with Epstein.

“It doesn’t really matter if witnesses are Democrats or Republicans. I think we should be going after anyone that caused harm or knows information about the Epstein investigation,” Garcia added.

The released documents showed that the two were close years after Epstein’s 2008 conviction on sex crimes, when he became a registered sex offender. She tried to downplay her relationship in more recent statements, calling him a “monster.” But documents showed she had called Epstein “Uncle Jeffrey” in emails and said she adored him.

Although she said she would step down on June 30, she remains employed by Goldman Sachs.

Ruemmler is the 17th person to testify as part of their broader investigation. Billionaire investor Leon Black was subpoenaed last month after lawmakers said he refused to answer some questions about his yearslong relationship with Epstein.

House Oversight Chair James Comer said Wednesday that Black will appear for a formal deposition on Sept. 3 but that he expects to have Black's nondisclosure agreements by “the end of the week.”

The committee has also expressed interest in questioning acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, whose nomination to permanently lead the Justice Department is pending before the Senate. Former Attorney General Pam Bondi identified Blanche as the department’s point person on the release of the Epstein documents, a process that has drawn bipartisan scrutiny.

“Hopefully Blanche will come in as soon as his confirmation is over,” Comer said.

The S&P 500 added 0.2% and was on track for a fourth gain in five days. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 203 points, or 0.4%, as of 11 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.2% higher.

BlackRock helped lead the market with a rise of 7.4% after the company behind some of the most popular investment funds reported stronger profit and revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected. CEO Laurence Fink said its iShares funds topped $6 trillion in assets under management during the quarter, roughly doubling in three years.

Bank of New York Mellon rose 3.2%, and Morgan Stanley added 1.1% following their own profit reports. They followed a spate of strong earnings reports a day earlier from many of the biggest U.S. banks.

They helped offset a drop for Elevance Health, which fell 10% even though it reported stronger profit and revenue than analysts expected.

Expectations are high for U.S. companies’ profit growth during the spring. They’ll need to beat them to justify the big moves their stock prices have made, with indexes near their records.

The U.S. stock market, meanwhile, broadly got a lift from another report showing inflation slowed in the United States last month. This one said inflation at the wholesale level slowed to 5.5% last month from 6% in May, and it was a much better reading than the acceleration that economists expected.

The day before, a separate report said that inflation that U.S. consumers are feeling was also not as bad as economists expected last month.

Such numbers take pressure off the Federal Reserve, which is considering raising interest rates. Higher rates would keep a lid on inflation, but they also slow the economy and hurt prices for all kinds of investments.

Following the inflation report, traders see just a 12% chance that the Fed will raise its main interest rate at its next meeting in a couple weeks. That’s down from the nearly 42% probability they saw on Monday, before the inflation reports, according to data from CME Group.

That helped send the yield on the 10-year Treasury down to 4.55% from 4.58% late Tuesday and from 4.62% the day before.

Still, upward pressure on inflation remains because of the war with Iran, which has seen days of back-and-forth strikes by the United States and Iran across the Middle East.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guard threatened Wednesday to halt all energy exports from the Middle East because of the U.S. military's blockade to prevent tankers carrying Iranian oil from using the Strait of Hormuz.

“The export of oil and gas from the region will be either for everyone or for no one,” the Revolutionary Guard said.

The price for a barrel of Brent crude briefly topped $86 in the morning before falling back to $83.77 per barrel, down 1.1% from the day before.

In stock markets abroad, technology stocks helped lead the way as winners of the artificial-intelligence boom gather more strength following several shaky weeks.

In Asia, South Korea’s Kospi index jumped 6.2%. Its market is dominated by two huge tech companies, Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix, and the index has already had drops of 8.9%, 7.9% and 5.3% so far this month.

From Amsterdam, ASML, a bellwether of the chipmaking industry, reported stronger revenue growth for the latest quarter than it had forecast. CEO Christophe Fouquet said continuing progress in the AI boom has customers accelerating their expansions, and the maker of chipmaking machinery gave a forecast for revenue growth in the summer that topped analysts’ expectations.

The strength helped calm some of the worries that have sent AI-related stocks spinning recently. Chief among them is the possibility that their prices shot too high in the euphoria around AI. Worries have been rising that surging demand for AI chips and data centers may fizzle if they don’t produce enough profits and productivity to make all the investments worth it.

In China, stocks rose 1.4% in Hong Kong but fell 0.3% in Shanghai after the government said the world's second-largest economy expanded at a 4.3% annualized pace last quarter, down from the 5% growth rate at the start of the year.

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AP Business Writers Yuri Kageyama and Matt Ott contributed to this report.

Jay Clayton, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York and a former Securities and Exchange Commission chairman, did not mention Trump’s interim appointee for the intelligence post, Bill Pulte. But he worked to assure senators that he is prepared for the post as they work to replace Pulte, a former housing official with no known intelligence experience and who used his previous administration perch to target perceived adversaries of the president.

“I saw firsthand how a strong national security apparatus depends on decisive judgment, discipline, integrity, and effective communication and cooperation across different branches of the government,” Clayton said in his opening statement. “If confirmed as Director of National Intelligence, I will commit to upholding these principles every day.”

Clayton's nomination hearing was first scheduled for June as Republicans rushed to confirm him and prevent Pulte's appointment to temporarily replace outgoing intelligence director Tulsi Gabbard. But Trump delayed Clayton's confirmation just hours before his hearing was scheduled to begin, pushing back the process and allowing Pulte to take office.

Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Tom Cotton, R-Ark., expressed frustration last month when the hearing was delayed. He said in his opening statement Wednesday that Clayton has a reputation for operating with “morality, decency and integrity" in his previous positions and that he hopes his nomination will win bipartisan support.

Democrats grill Clayton on his role in elections

While Clayton has received some bipartisan praise, Democrats aggressively questioned him on how he would approach the issue of election interference ahead of November's midterm elections. They repeatedly asked if former President Joe Biden won the 2020 election that Trump has falsely claimed was stolen.

Like many of Trump's other nominees, Clayton answered that Biden's election was certified. But he would not say that Biden won.

“Saying Joe Biden was certified is not an answer,” said Sen. Angus King, I-Maine.

Democrats also asked Clayton about Trump's announcement that he will deliver a primetime address on Thursday with a focus on elections, after the president suggested he could revisit long-debunked conspiracy theories about his 2020 defeat.

Clayton said he had has no involvement with that speech.

Some Democrats praise Clayton, but bipartisan support is uncertain

Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, the panel’s top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said in June that he has “known and respected Jay Clayton for many years and believe he is a capable public servant.”

But he has stopped short of saying he would vote for him, and he said to Clayton at the hearing that the intelligence post is “a very different job than any that you have held.”

Warner said that the Trump administration has attempted to politicize the intelligence community, particularly in the area of election interference. “I hope that, should you be confirmed, you will make it clear that this kind of politicization has no place in the intelligence community,” Warner said.

Most Democrats are expected to vote against his nomination. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., said Tuesday that he expects to oppose Clayton, but he and other Democrats may not stand in the way if majority Republicans want to try and speed up his confirmation so that he can replace Pulte.

“I’m not going to vote for him,” Blumenthal said. “But I wouldn’t object to an accelerated vote.”

As US attorney in Manhattan, Clayton oversees vast portfolio

Clayton is currently the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, the most prestigious of the Justice Department’s prosecution offices. His cases have ranged from terrorism and espionage cases to security fraud and public corruption.

Democrats pressed Clayton on subpoenas of four New York Times journalists after they reported on security concerns involving the new, Qatari-gifted Air Force One. The Committee to Protect Journalists has called the subpoenas “an extraordinary escalation in President Trump’s efforts to threaten and intimidate independent news organizations and have a chilling effect on the work of journalists across the country."

Clayton said he was not able to discuss the details of the subpoenas and declined to elaborate on whether he spoke to the White House before they were issued. He said he is “confident in procedures we have in place to protect freedom of press.”

Under Clayton, the office also facilitated the unsealing of thousands of pages of court records from the prosecutions of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell — documents that were made public as part of the Justice Department’s release of records related to the late sex offender and his longtime confidant.

Clayton has also overseen the prosecution of former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and Maduro’s wife, Cilia Flores, on drug trafficking charges.

Confirmation vote could unlock renewal of surveillance authority

Clayton’s confirmation could potentially clear the way for bipartisan legislation to renew Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, which stalled last month when Democrats had said they would not provide the necessary votes to pass the bill unless Pulte’s temporary appointment was withdrawn.

The law, which aims to prevent terrorist attacks by monitoring the communications of targeted foreigners located outside the United States, expired in June.

Even if Democrats relent, though, it is unclear if Trump would sign it. He said in his June social media post delaying Clayton’s nomination that he would not sign the FISA renewal without his legislation to require proof of citizenship for all voters. That bill does not have enough support to pass the Senate.

Clearing Clayton’s nomination “would be a good first step” in moving the FISA renewal, said South Dakota Sen. Mike Rounds, a member of the intelligence panel.

Rounds said that Republicans hope to move Clayton’s nomination quickly through the process, if Democrats don’t object.

“We’re looking forward to getting him into that position as quickly as possible,” he said.

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Associated Press writer Eric Tucker contributed to this report.

That information could be reassuring or terrifying, but for now it's a potential tool to speed drug development by helping to identify and enroll high-risk people into studies of possible Alzheimer's treatments or preventive strategies.

Already large clinical trials are testing if certain drugs could prevent or at least delay the disease — and if any of those pan out, doctors will need an easy way to tell who should try them.

The scientists behind the new study stress that it’s too soon for healthy people to seek out the so-called p-tau217 test, which is currently used to help diagnose whether people experiencing cognitive problems have Alzheimer’s or another disorder.

“Wait and get tested when you can potentially do something about it,” stressed Dr. Reisa Sperling of the Mass General Brigham Neuroscience Institute, the study’s senior author. “At this point it wouldn’t change what I would tell someone to do. I’d still tell them to eat well, sleep well, exercise a lot and stay engaged.”

The new findings showed that symptom-free older adults who harbored very high levels of p-tau217 had a 38% risk of developing cognitive impairment over five years. That risk grew to 78% by 10 years.

The research was published in JAMA and presented at the Alzheimer’s Association International Conference in London.

It’s not clear exactly what causes Alzheimer’s, but its telltale markers are brain-clogging amyloid plaques and neuron-killing tau tangles. The p-tau217 test measures a form of tau that correlates with how much plaque buildup someone has and gives a hint about tangles, Sperling said.

The Mass General Brigham team analyzed data from 2,684 older adults who were healthy when they’d joined some long-running Alzheimer’s studies, receiving the p-tau217 blood test at enrollment and yearly cognitive checkups. Between the earliest enrollment in 2004 and last year, about 478 had developed cognitive impairment.

Study participants with very low p-tau217 levels likewise had a low risk of developing cognitive impairment over the five- to 10-year period.

There’s a conundrum in predicting Alzheimer’s: Lots of people harbor high levels of amyloid plaques yet never get dementia. A leading theory is that at some point amyloid buildup triggers an abnormal type of tau to form tangles, leading to symptoms.

Sperling said the blood test data offers some new clues. While different intermediate levels of p-tau217 signaled progressive risk, only the very highest level seemed to correlate with other evidence about that tipping point.

“This is a gradual process where amyloid and tau build up in the brain and this blood-based biomarker is telling you how far you are in that process,” she said.

Scientists not involved in the study praised it but also offered some reasons to be cautious. One is that only a small fraction of study participants had been tracked for a full decade, so there's less confidence in the 10-year risk estimate than the five-year risk estimate.

Also, the predictions could be clouded by other factors — older people may be at risk of dying from something else, or have heart-related problems that can cause vascular dementia rather than Alzheimer’s, noted Drs. Suzanne Schindler of Washington University in St. Louis and David Wolk of the University of Pennsylvania in a commentary published in JAMA.

The blood tests “are not yet precise enough to guide individualized prognosis,” wrote Schindler, who also studies p-tau217’s prognostic potential, and Wolk. Still, they said the new work has “provided a crucial piece of the puzzle.”

Already “we have people coming saying, ‘I want this blood test. I have a family history of Alzheimer’s disease,’” said Jessica Langbaum of the Banner Alzheimer’s Institute in Phoenix, something she strongly discourages — for now.

“These findings are quite strong,” Langbaum added, and a predictive blood test would be “really important” — but only if ongoing studies eventually find a drug that could help people before symptoms begin.

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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 gathering in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, is organized by Republican Sen. David McCormick. It has also featured Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth; Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; Army Secretary Dan Driscoll; CIA Director John Ratcliffe; and Mike Waltz, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

Trump has been a frequent visitor to the critical swing state of Pennsylvania, including last month, when he went to a Mack Trucks facility in Macungie, outside Allentown, hoping to boost Republican Rep. Ryan Mackenzie's reelection chances.

Trump carried Pennsylvania in 2016 and 2024, and McCormick is not up for reelection this cycle, but Republicans are increasingly concerned about the war and the persistently high cost of living as well as the president's low approval ratings as they look to maintain control of Congress during November's midterm elections.

The White House said the summit is bringing together key leaders in defense and some of the largest global investors to spotlight the importance of national security and identify investment opportunities.

Summit attendees include JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon, Blackstone President Jon Gray, Lockheed Martin CEO Jim Taiclet, General Dynamics CEO Phebe Novakovic, Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg, SpaceX director Antonio Gracias and artificial intelligence firm Palantir chief technology officer of analytics Shyam Sankar, McCormick's office said.

Trump spoke at a similar gathering organized by McCormick last year in Pittsburgh that sought to make the city a hot spot for advancement in energy technology and robotics. Then, the senator announced $90 billion in pledged investments in those sectors across Pennsylvania.

This year's summit began on Tuesday. Before Trump's arrival, multi-analytics threat detection leader ZeroEyes, which is based in Conshohocken, outside Philadelphia, announced a planned $10 million investment in artificial intelligence and machine learning research and development.

Pittsburgh-based Gecko Robotics says it plans to open a new 10,000-square-foot (930-square-meter) manufacturing facility designed to boost integration of robotics into defense manufacturing processes and better expand the nation's defense industrial base.

An analysis released in May found that U.S. military contractors will need at least three years to replenish stockpiles of Tomahawks, which are used to strike targets deep inside enemy territory, as well as Patriot and THAAD interceptors, which defend against incoming missiles and drones.

Stocks have dwindled as the U.S. has repeatedly fired strikes on Iran, adding to concerns that American forces would have limited firepower in any potential future conflict with China.

Chinese President Xi Jinping warned during Trump's recent visit to Beijing that if Washington mishandles its relations with Taiwan, the U.S. and China could end up clashing or even find themselves in open conflict.

Trump also recently pledged to give Ukraine a license to produce Patriot air-defense systems, which could be a major development in its war with Russia, though turning the idea into real weapons is also likely to take years.

Trump has sought to correct the shortfall by seeking a historic $1.5 trillion defense budget proposal for 2027. But a package authorizing such spending levels is stalled in Congress, and, even if it eventually moves forward, loads of additional time will still be required to expand production capabilities to accommodate such weapons systems.

Jake Loosararian, co-founder and CEO of Gecko Robotics, said U.S. defense companies have "got to supercharge supply chains” to reduce how long it takes for new technology to be ready for widespread production.

Days of back-and-forth strikes by the U.S. and Iran across the Middle East — and renewed threats to the waterway crucial to global energy supplies — have shredded the interim deal to end the conflict and the region could tip back into all-out war.

The U.S. first imposed a blockade in April and then lifted it last month after signing the interim deal that paused the fighting and set a 60-day period for negotiations over issues such as Iran’s nuclear program. Those talks have stalled as fighting over the Strait of Hormuz has intensified.

When the U.S. and Israel launched the war on Iran on Feb. 28, Tehran effectively closed the waterway to shipping traffic — a move that sent the price of oil, fertilizer and many other goods soaring far beyond the region and gave Iran major leverage in negotiations. Those rising prices pose a particular challenge to U.S. President Donald Trump and his Republican Party, which hopes to retain control of Congress in elections in November. But Washington has struggled to successfully reopen the waterway.

Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard threatened Wednesday to halt all energy exports from the Middle East over the blockade.

“The export of oil and gas from the region will be either for everyone or for no one,” it said.

Both the US and Iran launch attacks as the blockade is reimposed

The U.S. carried out a wave of strikes, hitting dozens of targets overnight, the military’s Central Command said Wednesday, and then resumed striking Iran during daylight — an unusual move that further signaled the increasing tempo of the attacks.

Within 17 hours of reimposing the blockade on Iranian ports, Central Command said U.S. forces had “redirected” two commercial vessels attempting to run the blockade.

“The U.S. military remains vigilant and prepared to ensure full compliance,” it said on social media.

Among the U.S. military's targets was Greater Tunb Island, which is viewed as a strategic point in the Strait of Hormuz. Central Command said the attack targeted Iranian defense and missile sites.

Iran took control of three islands — Abu Musa, Greater Tunb and Lesser Tunb — from what would become the United Arab Emirates in 1971. The UAE has sought to reclaim them.

Some analysts have suggested that if the U.S. seized the islands, they could allow it to control the strait.

Another strike targeted a barracks for Iran’s 388th Mechanized Infantry Brigade, which operates tanks and armored vehicles, in Sistan and Baluchestan province, Iranian state television reported. The report said the Americans fired at least 13 missiles in the attack and that the seven dead included conscripts and career soldiers. A number of troops were wounded.

Including those at the barracks, more than 30 people have been killed in recent days, Iranian government spokesperson Fatemeh Mohajerani said, without elaborating.

Hossein Kermanpour, a spokesperson for the Health Ministry, meanwhile, said over 260 people were wounded in overnight strikes alone — a figure far larger than for any other round of recent violence between Iran and the U.S. He did not say how many people were killed overnight.

The army said it would make “a decisive response to this aggressive action by the American enemy,” according to state TV.

Missile alert warnings sounded in Bahrain and Kuwait early Wednesday as they faced incoming Iranian fire — a daily occurrence in recent days. Jordan said it shot down three incoming Iranian missiles. Iran claimed attacks on the three nations, all of which host U.S. forces.

U.S. Navy Adm. Brad Cooper, who leads Central Command, said in a statement that Iran had launched dozens of missiles and drones at neighboring Gulf Arab countries.

Trump told the Fox News Channel on Tuesday night that more U.S. strikes against Iran would come over the next two days and that bridges and power plants could be targeted by next week unless negotiations resume. Already, the U.S. has struck at least one bridge.

“You better make a deal, or you’re not going to have anything left,” Trump warned.

Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations, Amir Saeid Iravani, criticized America’s attacks.

“The U.S. is the aggressor, not the victim,” he wrote to the world body’s leader, according to the state-run IRNA news agency.

The Strait of Hormuz remains at the heart of the fighting

The latest round of fighting is focused on the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world’s oil and natural gas trade passes during peacetime. How to reopen the strait has bedeviled the U.S. since Iran choked it off in the early days of the war.

During the interim deal, some ships began moving through the passage using a route near Oman overseen by the U.S. military that is outside Tehran’s control.

In recent days, Iran attacked ships using that route — and back-and-forth attacks ensued. The U.S. has threatened to reopen the strait by force — but experts say that would require a much bigger armada if not tens of thousands of ground troops. Imposing the blockade is another way to put pressure on Iran.

But in the meantime, oil prices are rising. The price for Brent crude oil, the international standard, traded above $85 a barrel on Wednesday — more than 15% higher than the price before the war, but still well below the nearly $120 reached at the height of the conflict.

Analysts with the International Monetary Fund warned Wednesday that while a surplus of oil had kept prices low, “much of that room has now been used up.”

“As tensions flare again in the Strait of Hormuz, that room is now smaller and shrinking further as spare capacity has been deployed, demand has compressed, and inventories have been drawn down,” Azim Sadikov and Jean-Marc Natal wrote in a blog post. “Unless inventories are replenished, the world will start from a weaker position when the next shock comes.”

Regional mediators are still trying to get the United States and Iran back to the negotiating table.

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Associated Press writer Nasser Karimi in Tehran, Iran, contributed to this report.

“I thought before the game about starting with a changeup and I thought it would be funny," he said.

He didn't. And the hitters were not laughing.

Cease struck out the side in the first inning, combining with 10 relievers on a three-hitter that led the American League over the National League 4-0 in Tuesday night's All-Star Game.

Cease fanned Kyle Schwarber, Juan Soto and CJ Abrams around a walk in the first inning, when he got six misses among 15 swings. He became just the seventh pitcher to strike out three in an All-Star opening inning after Carl Hubbell (1934), Warren Spahn (1949), Jim Palmer (1977), Dave Stieb (1983), Pedro Martinez (1999) and Brad Penny (2006) — four of them Hall of Famers.

After speaking with Justin Verlander, the senior AL All-Star, Cease gave up the idea of starting with a changeup and instead threw Schwarber a 96.9 mph four-seamer.

“Verlander talked me out of it," Cease said. “So we started with the heater and then I was glad we did.”

Pitchers struck out 27, a record for a nine-inning All-Star Game, 15 of them by AL hurlers.

“That’s the game now. Guys’ stuff is unbelievable,” said AL manager John Schneider, also Cease's skipper in Toronto. “I think the bullpen guys kind fed off of it. They were all excited coming off the mound. It speaks volumes to how good the pitching is, for sure.”

All-Star MVP Cody Bellinger hit a two-run single and Ben Rice followed with an RBI single in the first against Cristopher Sánchez of the host Philadelphia Phillies.

Miguel Vargas of the Chicago White Sox added an eighth-inning home run off the Los Angeles Dodgers' Justin Wrobleski, who was pitching on his 26th birthday, for the game's only extra-base hit. The AL won for the 18th time in 23 games and holds a 49-45-2 advantage overall.

“The pitching was just dominant today,” Bellinger said.

Singles by Soto in the fourth, Pete Crow-Armstrong in the eighth and Otto Lopez in the ninth were the only hits by the NL, which failed to advance a runner past first.

Parker Messick, Michael Wacha, Joe Ryan, Nick Martinez, Cade Smith, Drew Rasmussen, Jacob Latz, Louis Varland, Aroldis Chapman and Bryan Baker finished the 10th All-Star shutout and first since the AL’s 2-0 win in 2013 at New York’s Citi Field.

Some starting star power was missing, with Jacob Misoriowski, Paul Skenes and Shohei Ohtani all unavailable. Just six pitches reached 100 mph, the fewest in an All-Star Game since 2021.

Bellinger and Rice both singled on up sinkers from Sánchez, who struggled through a 34-pitch inning that included three hits and two walks.

“It just took me a little time to soak it all in and enjoy it,” Sánchez said through a translator.

Documenting the day

Managers and starters entered through replica Liberty Bells in front of each dugout, walked to home plate and used a feathered quill to sign an oversized lineup card, as if they were Founding Fathers affixing names to the Declaration of Independence. MLB donated the card to the Hall of Fame.

Dirt around the plate was surrounded by 13 stars, one for each of the Colonies.

After the fourth inning, a video was played of kids bicycling to a sandlot game with a narration by Oscar-winning actor J.K. Simmons. As footage was played of Ray Charles singing “America the Beautiful” at Game 2 of the 2001 World Series, the kids biked onto the field and started interacting with the All-Stars as fireworks went off above the ballpark.

“We were all one of those kids," NL manager Dave Roberts of the Dodgers said. "Some of these kids might never get a chance to be on a major league field. So for them to have that opportunity to be — have a conversation with an All-Star is something that they might never get that chance again, right?

Bellinger thought back to his youth.

“We’re all little kids at heart playing this game even though it’s a challenging game," he said. “We’re all still those little kids with big dreams.”

Early exit

Tampa Bay’s Junior Caminero was hit on the outside of his left hand by a 97.6 mph sinker from St. Louis closer Riley O’Brien in the third inning and immediately left the game. The 23-year-old, fourth in the major leagues with 28 home runs, stayed down for a few moments before he popped up and ran straight into the clubhouse. X-rays were negative.

Been a while

Mike Trout, a 12-time All-Star who hadn’t played in the game since 2019 because of injuries, went 0 for 3 with a strikeout.

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

It happened shortly before 7 p.m. Tuesday along the 2500 block of East Atlantic Boulevard in Pompano Beach.

According to the Broward Sheriff’s Office, deputies responded to the scene and found a man who had been stabbed.

Rescue crews rushed the man to Broward Health North where he was pronounced deceased.

Investigators said a suspect was detained, but did not provide any additional information.

Commissioner Adam Silver, speaking after the league's Board of Governors meeting on Tuesday night, said he and Deputy Commissioner Mark Tatum plan to talk to a number of groups interested in owning teams that will play in the new league.

And since many of those interested parties will be heading to the New York area for Sunday's World Cup final, it made sense to take meetings, Silver said.

“We’ve had tremendous interest from multiple cities in Europe, including cities that we didn’t ask for bids from," Silver said. "And we discussed with our board today that we’re in the process of finalizing those bids for an initial group of cities.”

The NBA and FIBA, the sport’s global governing body, announced plans last year to pursue a new European league — ending years of speculation about when or if such a move would happen. The plan remains in place for the new league to launch just over a year.

“Things are where I hope they would be,” Silver said.

NBA hoping Leonard investigation to wrap this summer

The lengthy probe into whether the Los Angeles Clippers circumvented salary cap rules related to an endorsement contract between Kawhi Leonard and a now-bankrupt California-based digital bank that touted itself as environmentally friendly remains active, and Silver said he wants it completed sometime this summer.

It is now a thornier issue, given that a trade is in place to send Leonard from the Clippers to the Toronto Raptors. The teams put that trade on hold last week pending the outcome of the probe, and that could take weeks to decide.

The teams made that decision and the issues “were well-known to the teams,” Silver said.

“They chose not to live with that uncertainty,” Silver said.

The NBA enlisted outside counsel — Wachtell Lipton, a New York-based firm — to conduct the investigation and Silver said he gets regular updates from the league's general counsel on certain elements of the probe.

“The investigation needs to run its course,” Silver said.

The probe, as detailed by the terms of the collective bargaining agreement, could lead to penalties that include a substantial fine, the loss of draft capital — and, potentially, even the voiding of a player contract — if the league finds there was a deliberate circumvention of cap rules.

Seattle, Las Vegas expansion update

The league's process of deciding on whether to expand to Seattle, Las Vegas, either or both continued with multiple conversations this week. Silver reiterated something he's said several times, that he's hopeful a decision will be made by the end of 2026.

A handful of potential ownership groups have declared interest publicly.

"Some groups have been public," Silver said. “The majority of groups have not been public.”

If the league expands, the likely target is for the 2028-29 season.

Silver defends CBA's ‘second apron’

Silver said he believes the collective bargaining agreement is working as intended, and defended the “second apron” — one of the salary-related elements of the deal between the league and its players.

“Every collective bargaining agreement is a result of a series of compromises," Silver said. "And that’s what this one is as well, but certainly from my standpoint, from a competitor’s standpoint, this is working very well.”

The current collective bargaining agreement includes aprons — payroll levels that, if exceeded, seriously limit a team’s options on player movement and acquisition. And they have come under fire in recent days, with newly installed National Basketball Players Association executive director David Kelly saying the union will fight it in the next collective bargaining agreement.

“We are not fans of the second apron,” Kelly said last week. “We did not propose the second apron. We should have done a better job of fighting back against the second apron, and in the future, we will have a much more unified union, and we will do a better of fighting it back against a second apron.”

Kelly was responding to a question surrounding something NBA veteran Kyle Kuzma wrote on social media earlier this month. Kuzma said “the first and second apron are starting to function like a hard cap on player value, team continuity, and player movement.”

The current CBA is scheduled to remain in place through at least the 2028-29 season. And for the record, not all players are up in arms about how the CBA is working.

“Thank God for second aprons and the first aprons,” Houston star Kevin Durant said during the regular season when asked about the league's run of parity — with eight different franchises having won titles in the last eight seasons.

Miami’s Micky Arison to chair Board of Governors

Miami Heat managing general partner and Basketball Hall of Famer Micky Arison was unanimously elected as the board’s next chairman. Arison will take over the role at the league’s September board meeting.

Arison — who has the second-longest tenure of any current NBA team governor at 31 years and is the longtime chair of the board of directors of Carnival Corporation — is assuming the role that outgoing Toronto governor Larry Tanenbaum has held since September 2017.

“I am grateful for Larry’s nearly three decades of stewardship of the Raptors and his commitment to helping guide our league as NBA Board Chairman over the past nine years,” Silver said. “Micky’s long record of service on the Board, his strong relationships with his fellow team owners and his deep understanding of our game and business make him an exceptional choice to assume this important leadership role.”

Tanenbaum thanked the league’s owners for their support and said he wishes Arison success.

“I look forward to working closely in this new capacity with Adam, the league office and my fellow team governors to champion our teams and players, ensuring we continue to deliver exciting and unforgettable experiences for our fans,” Arison said.

All-Star Game future

Silver said he's hoping to have a decision on the format of the All-Star Game by the start of the regular season.

The league tried a U.S. vs. World mini-tournament this past season, and it generally was well-received. Talks between the league and its players are ongoing on the format and if any potential tweaks are needed. "I think we're off to a good start," Silver said.

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AP NBA: https://apnews.com/NBA

Simple. A bike, a parking lot and an ice cream.

Tuchel said ahead of England’s World Cup semifinal against Lionel Messi's Argentina that he relaxes by reconnecting with his inner child.

“Sometimes you just go on a bike and then you just need a big parking lot, an ice cream in your hand for 15 minutes on a bike and then you feel like you're 15 years old,” Tuchel said Tuesday. “You enjoy your evening on a warm, summer evening for 15 minutes with the ice cream and you reconnect to the beauty of that feeling that we all have inside of us and that’s sometimes all it needs.”

German coach Tuchel was hired in 2024 and charged with the responsibility of leading England to its first trophy since winning the World Cup in 1966.

He is one win away to leading the team to only its second World Cup final.

England plays defending champion Argentina in Atlanta on Wednesday and it would be understandable if Tuchel was feeling the pressure — especially coming up against Messi and resuming one of the fiercest rivals in soccer between the Three Lions and Argentina.

While he said the tournament had been draining due to traveling to Mexico and playing at altitude and also a “roller coaster” due to comeback wins against Congo and Norway, Tuchel also said the experience had been energizing.

“I can tell you that it fuels me and it makes me feel alive,” he said. “I love it so much that it gives me energy every day.”

Tuchel, a serial trophy winner with Borussia Dortmund, Paris Saint-Germain, Chelsea and Bayern Munich, said he was grateful for the opportunity to coach at a World Cup.

As for ending England’s 60-year trophy drought?

“I don’t feel the burden,” he said. “You feel the tension and I will be nervous and of course that is normal. But I feel no burden.”

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James Robson is at https://x.com/jamesalanrobson

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See more of AP’s World Cup coverage here

For the Tampa Bay Rays slugging third baseman, Caminero considered himself fortunate the hit-by-pitch was more a scare than a season-ender.

“You are thinking the worst and honestly thought something may have been broken,” Caminero said through a translator. “But thank you to God, it’s fine and just a little bit sore. But we’re all good.”

Caminero was struck on the outside of his left hand by St. Louis Cardinals closer Riley O'Brien with the high hard one in the top of the third inning with the American League up 3-0 on Tuesday night.

The 23-year-old Caminero, fourth in the major leagues with 28 home runs, stayed down for a few moments before he popped up and ran straight into the clubhouse.

X-rays were negative.

“Sinker on hands that didn’t hit my bat at all,” Caminero said. “So look, it was a scary moment. But you know right now, we feel really good.”

The Rays resume their season Friday with a doubleheader in Boston.

O'Brien, who has 24 saves this season for the Cardinals, checked in with Caminero in the AL clubhouse.

“I told Ryan I really appreciate the gesture,” Caminero said. “He came into the clubhouse, and he took a few seconds to apologize, but I told him it was part of the game. He was really worried, but I told him look, these things happen. We are here to have fun, and we are here to enjoy the night.”

Caminero was replaced by Miguel Vargas of the Chicago White Sox. Vargas hit a solo homer for the American League in the eighth inning for game's first extra-base hit.

Caminero hit 17 total home runs a night earlier at Citizens Bank Park in the Home Run Derby. He hit 45 home runs with 110 RBIs last season, and this season has led the Rays to the top of the AL East.

He batted fourth on Tuesday and became the first Ray to start an All-Star game in two straight seasons. Caminero grounded out in his first at bat against Phillies' ace and NL starter Cristopher Sánchez.

Caminero — who advanced to the final round of last season's Home Run Derby before losing a close contest to Seattle slugger Cal Raleigh — this season become the youngest player since at least 1900 to homer in six straight games.

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

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Basabe, a Miami Beach Republican, is representing himself in a case against two former staffers who accuse the state lawmaker of sexual harassment, battery and defamation.

Basabe took the stand on Tuesday, answering questions about his personal life.

Plaintiff’s attorney: “You are married?”

Basabe: “Yes.”

Plaintiff’s attorney: “To a woman?”

Basabe: “Yes.”

An attorney for the plaintiffs then showed the jury a photo of Basabe kissing a man.

Basabe: “His name is Renato.”

Plaintiff’s attorney: “And he lives with you correct?”

Basabe: “I don’t answer for people’s residency.”

Plaintiff’s attorney: “Is he your boyfriend?”

Basabe: “I don’t believe in those labels.”

On Monday, both of Basabe’s alleged victims testified in front of the jury.

Jurors on Tuesday also heard from the mother of one of the victims, who accused Basabe of slapping him on the buttocks and the face.

“I noticed that he was very, very, very upset and his face was red,” said Janette Frevola, who added through tears, “For him to treat us like this for no apparent reason, when we did nothing at all to him.”

Basabe representing himself has often added a layer of confusion to the proceedings.

In addition to witness testimony, snapshots of text messages and old tweets are being used as evidence to try to convince the Leon County jury that Basabe is liable for the alleged incidents.

Plaintiff’s attorney: “Is this the first time that anyone has made allegations that you sexually harassed them?”

Basabe: “There’s a lot of gossip.”

Witness testimony is expected to continue on Wednesday.

Basabe has had other accusers in the past.

In fact, one of them is a professional soccer player whose identity is being kept private.

That man addressed the court to preserve his testimony for a future litigation, but it was outside of the presence of the jury.

A stream of a portion of Tuesday’s hearing can be seen below:

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Deputies said they responded just before 1 a.m. to the area of Northwest 64th Street and Northwest 21st Avenue in the county’s Gladeview area, where they found three vehicles struck by gunfire, including a silver Hyundai.

“The car was parked outside of the residence. It was occupied by three juveniles, so it was the girl and her two siblings that were in the vehicle. The mom was outside of the vehicle at the time, so this could have been a very different outcome,” MDSO Detective Samantha Choon said.

Authorities said Miami-Dade Fire Rescue medics transported the girl to a nearby hospital in stable condition.

Family members have identified the girl as Kaylina Anicie.

A family member of Anicie told Local 10’s Jackie Pascale that the girl is now home and doing OK.

They said neither her siblings nor their mother was injured in the shooting.

According to investigators, no arrests have been made, and detectives have not released any suspect information at this time.

Neighbor Marie Grimes said she was shaken after hearing multiple gunshots.

“I heard the booms — boom, boom, boom, boom — and I said, ‘Oh my God, what’s happening?’” she said. “Maybe five or six, ’cause look at that right there. I’m just glad the little girl is OK.”

Investigators asked neighbors to check their surveillance or Ring camera footage from around 1 a.m. and contact authorities with any information.

Anyone with information on the shooting is urged to contact Miami-Dade Crime Stoppers at 305-471-8477. Anonymous tips are accepted.

It’s a movement in tai chi, a physical and philosophical practice developed more than 300 years ago that continues to resonate in China today.

“The environment is great and the air is good too,” said Ye Guirong, 64. “You can see we’re surrounded by trees.”

Most practitioners are retirees in their 60s and beyond. Some exercise in groups while a speaker plays relaxing music in the background. Others move silently on their own.

Ye first encountered tai chi in 2010. Recently retired, she took walks across the city and one day spotted the group she now leads.

“I thought it looked good, so I started practicing,” Ye said.

Once a new member joins a group, its leader teaches the basic moves. The apprentice’s progress is reviewed and corrected periodically until a new level is achieved.

Among tai chi’s basic movements are “White Crane Spreads Its Wings,” in which one arm is raised while the other is lowered, and “Part the Wild Horse’s Mane,” a broad, fluid sequence in which the body weight shifts forward while the arms open gently in front of the chest.

“The movements have been passed down from one instructor to another,” Ye said.

Newcomers keep joining

Ye’s tai chi group, Cypress Grove, has around 30 people and recently welcomed its newest practitioner.

Zu Hong, 59, learned a 24-movement routine in about a month. Ye said she’s ready to take on the second set.

“I thought tai chi looked very beautiful,” Zu said. “I wanted to exercise, so I came here to the Temple of Heaven.”

Founded in the 15th century by a Ming dynasty emperor, the site is a complex of religious buildings symbolizing the relationship between heaven and earth.

Its most iconic building is the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests. It served as the ceremonial site where emperors acted as intermediaries between humans and heaven, offering sacrifices and prayers for good harvests.

Today it serves primarily as a tourist attraction and its surrounding gardens remain open to the public.

Ancient ideas endure

Tai chi carries two meanings in China. It refers both to the martial art, or Taijiquan, and to the philosophical ideas behind it, or Taiji.

One of its key concepts is qi, or vital energy, which is understood as a life breath that flows through the body.

In traditional Chinese medicine, health depends on qi circulating through a network of pathways known as meridians, which are believed to connect the body’s organs, limbs and other parts. Acupuncture and other traditional treatments aim to regulate that flow.

“Practices like tai chi and qigong are all about activating, regulating or improving the flow of qi in the body,” said James Miller, a professor of Humanities at Duke Kunshan University in China’s Jiangsu province. “That’s something very key to Daoism (Taoism), but it’s also part of the broader Chinese conception of the body and of the world.”

Beyond the human body, qi is also believed to exist in nature. Mountains and rivers are understood to be animated by its flow.

“This is also why it’s traditional to establish temples on mountains,” Miller said. “They’re understood not just as beautiful or remote places, but because they’re closer to nature.”

An ancient practice lives on

There are several styles of tai chi, each with its own forms.

Ye’s group gathers every morning at 7:40 a.m. to practice Yang-style for about an hour and a half. The group rotates through different sets. Some consist of 24, 42 or 48 movements, while others incorporate swords or fans.

“Through exercising, everyone’s health has improved,” Ye said. “Our spirits are especially good.”

Chen-style is widely recognized as the oldest form of tai chi. It was developed in the 17th century by Chen Wangting, a military commander who later in life changed paths to embrace spirituality.

“He practiced Daoist (Taoist) methods of self-cultivation including meditation,” said Tai Chi master Chen Haitao. “Then one day he experienced a sudden awakening: the meridians throughout his body all opened, his mind became enlightened, and wisdom suddenly emerged.”

Chen Wangting’s experience was life-changing, said Chen Haitao. Dreaming of sharing the sensation with others, he found in movement the means to do so.

Both the martial art and the philosophy behind tai chi are meant to work together, Chen said. The movements provide the method while the philosophy gives them meaning.

“One of the great benefits of Taijiquan is that it is suitable for everyone,” Chen said. “As long as you learn the basic principles correctly and maintain proper alignment, whoever practices it will benefit from it.”

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AP video journalist Wu Jia contributed to this report. ___

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.

Las tormentas dejaron caer hasta 30 centímetros (un pie) de lluvia en algunas zonas rurales de Texas, lo que llevó a que se realizaran decenas de rescates por aguas crecidas en toda la región y a que las autoridades cerraran durante horas varios tramos de una transitada autopista cerca de Uvalde, a unos 129 kilómetros (80 millas) al oeste de San Antonio. Una vigilancia por inundaciones también incluyó el condado de Kerr, donde las inundaciones catastróficas del año pasado a lo largo del río Guadalupe causaron la muerte de más de 100 personas.

Hasta el martes no se habían reportado muertes ni lesiones.

El Servicio Meteorológico Nacional advirtió que las tormentas nocturnas podrían dejar más de 30 cm (1 pie) adicionales de lluvia en algunos lugares hasta el miércoles, lo que generaría impactos potencialmente catastróficos por inundaciones repentinas en zonas al oeste de San Antonio. El gobernador de Texas, Greg Abbott, emitió una declaración de desastre para decenas de condados.

“El intenso ritmo de la lluvia y los efectos acumulativos de múltiples rondas de tormentas darán como resultado una peligrosa amenaza de inundaciones repentinas hasta el jueves”, señaló el Servicio Meteorológico Nacional.

Las autoridades difundieron el martes videos de equipos de rescate en botes navegando por calles inundadas y de un vehículo siendo arrastrado corriente abajo por aguas de rápido desplazamiento. Cinco personas fueron rescatadas por integrantes del Equipo de Búsqueda y Rescate de Guardabosques de Caza de Texas y cuatro por un guardabosques de caza local, informó Maggie Berger, portavoz del Departamento de Parques y Vida Silvestre de Texas.

En Uvalde, las autoridades indicaron que se habían realizado al menos dos docenas de rescates acuáticos. Abrieron un centro local de eventos para cualquier persona desplazada por las inundaciones.

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Esta historia fue traducida del inglés por un editor de AP con la ayuda de una herramienta de inteligencia artificial generativa.

Crews arriving on the scene near Alcatraz Island found a three-deck pontoon vessel almost fully under water with the motor still running and leaking fuel, San Francisco Fire Chief Dean Crispen said.

By Tuesday evening, authorities were searching for the missing in open ocean on the western side of the Golden Gate Bridge. The search, which involved divers, helicopters and vessels, was expected to continue all night, officials said.

Authorities updated the initial number of missing people from two to three after hearing from witnesses.

“Right now we are in full rescue mode,” Crispen said, adding that three people who suffered injuries falling from the boat were taken to a hospital and expected to be released Tuesday night.

Alcatraz Island, once a federal prison infamously inescapable due to the strong ocean currents and cold Pacific waters that surround it, is now a tourist destination. It is located in San Francisco Bay about a mile (about 1.6 kilometers) north of the city's shoreline, in an often windy area that attracts sailboats and other recreational vessels.

Videos of the scene showed boats deployed to rescue people who had been on the vessel, which was largely submerged with objects floating nearby.

The boating mishap was initially reported as a fire, “but we now don’t have any evidence of that,” Crispen said.

The person who died was alive when plucked from the frigid waters by rescue crews but later died. A dog onboard also died.

All those rescued were taken to Gashouse Cove Marina, a small craft harbor in San Francisco.

Aaron Anfinson, captain of the Bass-Tub, told the San Francisco Chronicle his boat was carrying guests toward the Golden Gate Bridge in “pretty windy, a little choppy” waters when a man on a smaller vessel flagged them down and pointed to a pontoon boat in the middle of the bay that appeared to be on fire.

By the time the Bass-Tub reached it, the flames were out, but the pontoon was sinking. Some people were already in the water while others remained aboard, Anfinson said, adding that they tried to hand out life jackets to the passengers.

One woman's head was injured.

“We figured we would get her first,” Anfinson said. A deckhand lowered a swim ladder and threw a life ring into the water to help pull her aboard.

“It was scary,” Anfinson said. “I don’t want to see anybody in that situation.”

Fire Lt. Mariano Elias said the vessel, described as a “pontoon pleasure boat,” was about 600 yards (about 550 meters) from Alcatraz and the emergency call came in just after 3:30 p.m.

Crispen said the vessel was believed to have launched near the St. Francis Yacht Club in San Francisco. A person who answered the phone there said the club did not have any information on what happened.

Live video from the scene showed a man and a woman wrapped in blankets and sitting on a curb before walking to a nearby ambulance. A yellow tarp covered a body on the dock.

The Coast Guard and Oakland police also helped in the rescue, Elias said.

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Associated Press writers Sophie Austin in Sacramento, California, Claire Rush in Portland, Oregon, and Hallie Golden in Seattle, and photographer Noah Berger in San Francisco contributed to this story.

Storms dumped up to a foot of rain in some rural areas of Texas, leading to dozens of high-water rescues across the region and officials shutting down portions of a busy highway for hours near Uvalde, about 80 miles (129 kilometers) west of San Antonio. A flood watch also included Kerr County, where catastrophic flooding last year along the Guadalupe River killed more than 100 people.

No deaths or injuries Tuesday were immediately reported.

The National Weather Service warned that storms overnight could dump more than a foot of additional rain to some places into Wednesday, creating potentially catastrophic impacts from flash flooding in areas west of San Antonio. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott issued a disaster declaration for dozens of counties.

“Intense rain rates and compounding effects from multiple rounds of storms will result in a dangerous flash flooding threat through Thursday,” the National Weather Service said.

Authorities on Tuesday posted videos of a rescue crew in a boat down flooded streets and one vehicle being swept away by fast-moving waters. Five people were rescued by members of the Texas Game Warden Search and Rescue Team and four were rescued by a local game warden, said Maggie Berger, a spokesperson for the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department.

In Uvalde, officials said there had been at least two dozen water rescues. They opened a local event center for anyone displaced by flooding. In Sabinal, officials were also making plans for a shelter.

President Donald Trump, standing alongside Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi at the White House, said “we don’t think we need the military there anymore” and noted Iraq’s growing relationships with oil companies.

“The relationship is a whole big relationship where we don’t need the military,” Trump said. “We’re there to help them. We’re there to protect them if need be. But we don’t think that’s going to be necessary.”

Speaking through an interpreter, al-Zaidi said “U.S. forces will be out of Iraq” by Sept. 30, “while U.S. companies will be inside Iraq.”

The Pentagon said in a subsequent statement that it was reaffirming a 2024 agreement with Iraq to end its mission against IS fighters. Many of the U.S. troops still serving in Iraq at the time of the deal, which was made during the Biden administration, already have departed.

The United States has been shifting the burden for combating IS in Iraq from American and coalition forces to Iraqi troops who have been trained by the U.S. military. American troops have been diminishing their footprint, withdrawing from areas and consolidating forces.

The U.S. invaded Iraq in March 2003 in what it called a massive “shock and awe” bombing campaign that lit up the skies, laid waste to large sections of the country and paved the way for American ground troops to converge on Baghdad. The invasion was based on what turned out to be faulty claims that Saddam Hussein had secretly stashed weapons of mass destruction. Such weapons never materialized.

The U.S. presence grew to more than 170,000 troops at the peak of counterinsurgency operations in 2007. The Obama administration negotiated the drawdown of forces, and in December 2011, the final combat troops departed, leaving only a small number of military personnel behind to staff an office of security assistance and a detachment of Marines to guard the embassy compound.

In 2014, the rise of the Islamic State group and its rapid capture of a wide swath across Iraq and Syria brought U.S. and partner nation forces back at the invitation of the Iraqi government to help rebuild and retrain police and military units that had fallen apart and fled.

After IS lost its hold on the territory it once claimed, coalition military operations ended in 2021. The U.S. had maintained about 2,500 troops in Iraq for training and to conduct partnered counter-IS operations with Iraq’s military. Many have withdrawn since the 2024 agreement to end the mission, with just a small contingent of military advisers and others still remaining in Iraq.

Fuel has been running out across Cuba since January, when U.S. President Donald Trump threatened tariffs on any country that sells or provides oil to the island, deepening the island’s ongoing economic and financial crisis. Public transportation has largely been halted, and officials have canceled tens of thousands of surgeries.

Cuba produces only 40% of the fuel it needs. A solution for fuel imports is not yet in sight.

The state-owned Electric Union reported that a problem with a generating unit in the eastern province of Holguín caused “a sudden frequency change,” resulting in the SEN blackout around midday.

Both the Ministry of Energy and Mines and the Electric Union indicated that “protocols for its restoration have been activated,” meaning that “micro-islands” are being established and then interconnected to provide power to priority locations, such as hospitals and food processing plants.

By the afternoon, some parts of the capital Havana had power restored, The Associated Press confirmed, while authorities indicated that 4% of the city had received electricity. The provinces of Guantánamo and Cienfuegos reported that they had begun distributing power to their hospitals, and Matanzas confirmed that power had been restored to the city’s historic center.

Last week, two nationwide blackouts — on Monday and Friday — left more than 9 million Cubans in the dark, adding to two others in March, as well as several regional outages.

The blackouts have a significant impact on the population and, combined with the energy embargo, have led to transportation limitations, reduced work hours and flight cancellations, in addition to serious public health consequences.

The power outages also affect basic activities such as cooking, water supply, and internet and telephone service.

On the streets of Havana, the blackout didn’t surprise residents.

“These blackouts are normal in Cuba now. If something else happened, it would be strange,” said Roberto Liana, 69, a retail store clerk.

Meanwhile, many were trying to adapt to the circumstances, like Sayli Aguilera, 25, a mother of two. “We’re improvising and doing what we can,” she said.

Many families have installed solar backup systems such as panels and portable batteries, and the main mode of transportation for the population consists of electric motorcycles and tricycles equipped with photovoltaic power.

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Esto ocurre después de que el estado de Florida anunciara a finales de junio el cierre del centro de detención para migrantes que operaba en el terreno conocido como “Alligator Alcatraz”.

El estado construyó rápidamente el centro de detención de inmigrantes en los Everglades, en un terreno tomado del condado Miami-Dade —aunque ubicado en el condado Collier— para apoyar el plan de deportaciones masivas de la administración del presidente Donald Trump y la necesidad relacionada de más camas de detención federales.

Ya no están las luces industriales, las carpas blancas, los generadores, los suministros de combustible ni el letrero azul de “Alligator Alcatraz” con el que algunos se detenían para tomarse fotografías.

Sky 10 captó lo que parece ser el retiro de la cerca alrededor de la pista de aterrizaje que anteriormente servía como instalación para el entrenamiento de pilotos.

Lo que permanece son las interrogantes sobre cuándo el condado Miami-Dade recuperará el control del lugar.

La División de Manejo de Emergencias de Florida había asumido previamente el control del Aeropuerto de Entrenamiento y Transición Dade-Collier.

“Estamos esperando la devolución formal de la propiedad”, dijo el martes la alcaldesa del condado Miami-Dade, Daniella Levine Cava, quien anunció planes para vender el terreno al Servicio de Parques Nacionales.

También existen dudas sobre el impacto que el centro pudo haber tenido en el medio ambiente.

“Aunque gran parte de la infraestructura ha sido retirada y los detenidos ya no están en el lugar, seguimos muy preocupados por los daños que permanecen, incluidos al menos 20 acres de nuevo pavimento que fueron colocados en el sitio sin ninguna revisión ambiental”, dijo Eve Samples, directora ejecutiva del grupo Friends of the Everglades.

Friends of the Everglades es uno de los grupos que presentó una demanda en un tribunal federal. Alegan que las entidades gubernamentales demandadas no realizaron un estudio de impacto ambiental antes de la construcción, en violación de la Ley Nacional de Política Ambiental, algo que los demandados sostienen que no aplicaba porque el sitio era operado y administrado por el estado.

“Nuestro trabajo no ha terminado, así que estamos muy ansiosos por regresar a los tribunales y estamos preparados para hacerlo”, dijo Samples.

Elise Bennett, directora para Florida y el Caribe y abogada principal del Center for Biological Diversity, otro de los demandantes, dijo: “Nos preocupa mucho cuáles serán los impactos a largo plazo sobre especies que están al borde de la extinción”.

“Desde la pantera de Florida hasta el murciélago bonneted de Florida y el milano caracolero de los Everglades, todas utilizaban esta zona antes de que el centro fuera construido y comenzara a operar”, dijo. “Más allá del nuevo pavimento, sabemos que hubo galones y galones de contaminantes en el lugar. No sabemos dónde terminaron esos contaminantes y será necesaria una investigación exhaustiva para comenzar a comprender el alcance total del impacto sobre estas especies tan vulnerables y sobre las aguas y tierras que habitan”.

Samples y Bennett dijeron que están decepcionadas, pero no desanimadas, por el fallo de un tribunal federal de apelaciones que revocó la orden de un tribunal de distrito que suspendía temporalmente las operaciones del centro. El caso fue devuelto al tribunal de distrito. Ambas consideran que varias de sus reclamaciones siguen vigentes.

“Nuestro equipo legal está evaluando todas nuestras opciones mientras nos preparamos para regresar al tribunal, ante la jueza Williams, para garantizar que el gobierno rinda cuentas por los daños ocurridos en el lugar, que se lleve a cabo la remediación y que se cumplan las leyes ambientales fundamentales de este país”, dijo Samples.

Bennett agregó que su organización utilizará “todas las herramientas a nuestra disposición para garantizar que el sitio sea restaurado y protegido de forma permanente, para que algo como esto nunca vuelva a ocurrir”.

Friends of the Everglades también envió a las autoridades del condado Miami-Dade lo que denomina un plan de cinco puntos posterior a “Alligator Alcatraz” para la remediación, restauración y protección del lugar, que incluye prohibir futuros desarrollos en el sitio y considerar la eliminación de la pista de aterrizaje existente.

El “plan de cinco puntos” del grupo:

“Solicitamos que se realizara un análisis de costo-beneficio sobre la eliminación de la pista de aterrizaje. Así que es muy posible que los beneficios de retirarla superen los costos”, dijo Samples. “Y una de las principales razones para considerar esa medida es garantizar que este tipo de operación perjudicial nunca vuelva a construirse en medio de Big Cypress National Preserve, la primera reserva nacional de nuestro país”.

Bennett calificó esa posibilidad como “un final realmente positivo para una historia verdaderamente aterradora que comenzó con una de las peores ideas de Estados Unidos”.

Local 10 News se comunicó con la División de Manejo de Emergencias de Florida, pero no había recibido respuesta al momento de la publicación de este artículo.

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While its northern neighbor, Deerfield Beach, is ending its relationship with BSO and reconstituting its own police and fire departments, Pompano Beach commissioners moved forward on Tuesday towards renewing their policing contract with the sheriff’s office.

A research firm said building and staffing an in-house Pompano Beach Police Department, which existed until 1999 when it was disbanded and folded into BSO, would cost more than $100 million and take nearly three years.

Officials said the vote to renew the contact doesn’t preclude Pompano Beach, the largest city in Broward County ― and possibly the state ― without a municipal police force, from going its own way in the future.

The city’s contract with BSO was expiring soon. The new three-year agreement with BSO will cost $70 million yearly.

“I think it’s a no-brainer,” Commissioner Darlene Smith said. “It’s got a 90-day get-out clause for either side and it just makes a lot of sense to protect our community.”

She added, “To start a new police force, it’s going to be a lot of work, and it’s probably going to take three years.”

Speakers at Tuesday’s commission meeting largely favored sticking with BSO.

“We’ve listened to the residents, and I think we still need to do a little more work on a comprehensive, long-term strategy for our city,” Pompano Beach Vice Mayor Alison Fournier said.

Sheriff Gregory Tony was also at the meeting, reinforcing the suggestion that an immediate decision not to renew with BSO would be unwise.

But Tony said if Pompano Beach does decide to create its own force down the road ― as Deerfield Beach and Pembroke Park have ― they have his support.

“We will make sure we do it the right way,” he said. “We will provide the transitional services that are needed.”

Tuesday’s vote was for a first reading of the new contract; a final vote still needs to happen, likely at the end of July.

One commissioner suggested waiting to see how the Deerfield Beach Police Department, slated to come back by September 2027, pans out before Pompano Beach considers having its own municipal force again.

While La Roja’s defense neutralized Les Bleus’ Kylian Mbappé, Mikel Oyarzabal scored the opening goal in the 22nd minute, and Pedro Porro followed in the 58th.

In true Miami Beach style, fans from both European teams met to watch the match at the city’s Bandshell, at 7275 Collins Ave., in the North Beach neighborhood.

Fans will be there again at 3 p.m. Thursday to watch Argentina and England play. La Albiceleste will dominate since the Bandshell is in the “Little Buenos Aires” area.

France and the losing team of the England vs. Argentina match are set to compete for third place at 5 p.m. on July 18 at the Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens.

Spain and the winner will compete in the FIFA World Cup 2026 final at 3 p.m. on July 19 at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey.

It will be Spain’s third time in a FIFA World Cup final. Spain won the 2010 final against the Netherlands in South Africa.

More World Cup coverage

• Spain pulls off 2-0 semifinal upset vs France to reach World Cup final
• Messi vs. Bellingham could be the story of the World Cup semifinal between England and Argentina
• Tom Cruise and IShowSpeed join the World Cup closing ceremony’s cast
• Related link: View the knockout bracket

Free local watch parties

SEMI-FINAL

Miami Beach: The Argentina vs. England watch party starts at 3 p.m. on Wednesday at The Bandshell, at 7275 Collins Ave., in North Beach’s Little Buenos Aires.

BRONZE FINAL

Miami Beach: Doors open at 3 p.m. on July 18 at The Sandbowl, behind The Bandshell, at 7275 Collins Ave., for the 5 p.m. bronze final.

Sunrise: The Amerant Bank Arena has free parking for FIFA World Cup ticket holders who ride Broward County’s free Express bus transportation to the Miami Stadium, also known as Hard Rock, in Miami Gardens.

FINAL

Miami Beach watch party: Doors open at 1 p.m. on July 19 at The Sandbowl, behind The Bandshell, at 7275 Collins Ave., for the 3 p.m. final.

Sunrise watch party: The indoor Amerant Bank Arena is hosting a free watch party for ticket holders for the final on July 19. Parking is free.

Mientras que su vecina del norte, Deerfield Beach, está poniendo fin a su relación con la BSO y reconstituyendo sus propios cuerpos de policía y bomberos, los concejales de Pompano Beach dieron un paso adelante el martes para renovar su contrato de servicios policiales con la oficina del sheriff.

Una empresa de estudios de mercado afirmó que crear y dotar de personal a un Departamento de Policía propio de Pompano Beach —que existió hasta 1999, cuando se disolvió y se integró en la Oficina del Sheriff de Broward— costaría más de 100 millones de dólares y llevaría casi tres años.

Las autoridades señalaron que la votación para renovar el contrato no impide que Pompano Beach —la ciudad más grande del condado de Broward, y posiblemente del estado, que carece de una fuerza policial municipal— siga su propio camino en el futuro.

El contrato de la ciudad con la Oficina del Sheriff de Broward (BSO) estaba a punto de expirar. El nuevo acuerdo de tres años con la BSO tendrá un coste anual de 70 millones de dólares.

“Creo que es una decisión obvia”, afirmó la concejala Darlene Smith. “Incluye una cláusula de rescisión de 90 días para cualquiera de las partes y tiene mucho sentido para proteger a nuestra comunidad”.

Añadió: “Crear una nueva fuerza policial supondrá mucho trabajo y probablemente llevará tres años”.

Los ponentes que intervinieron en la reunión de la comisión del martes se mostraron en su mayoría a favor de seguir con la BSO.

“Hemos escuchado a los residentes y creo que aún tenemos que trabajar un poco más en una estrategia integral y a largo plazo para nuestra ciudad”, afirmó la vicealcaldesa de Pompano Beach, Alison Fournier.

El sheriff Gregory Tony también estuvo presente en la reunión, lo que reforzó la idea de que no sería prudente tomar una decisión inmediata de no renovar el contrato con la Oficina del Sheriff del condado de Broward (BSO).

Sin embargo, Tony afirmó que, si Pompano Beach decide crear su propio cuerpo de policía en el futuro —tal y como han hecho Deerfield Beach y Pembroke Park—, contará con su apoyo.

“Nos aseguraremos de hacerlo como es debido”, afirmó. “Proporcionaremos los servicios de transición que sean necesarios”.

La votación del martes correspondió a la primera lectura del nuevo contrato; aún debe celebrarse una votación definitiva, probablemente a finales de julio.

Uno de los concejales sugirió esperar a ver cómo evoluciona el Departamento de Policía de Deerfield Beach —cuya reincorporación está prevista para septiembre de 2027— antes de que Pompano Beach se plantee volver a contar con su propia fuerza municipal.

The Republican president has been guarded about what he plans to say in the 9 p.m. Thursday speech, scheduled as he confronts a collapsing deal to end the war with Iran. He also faces numerous domestic issues, including recent deadly shootings by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers. Asked for a preview of the speech on Tuesday, Trump offered scant detail but said he has “really big news.”

“It doesn’t get bigger, because without free and fair elections, you don’t have a country,” Trump said in the Oval Office. He refused to go further, saying he wanted to “save it” for the moment, though he also hinted he would be talking about a hodgepodge of issues.

“We’ll be discussing other things, too,” Trump said, without elaborating. “It’s going to be a very big announcement.”

Trump has used the power of the primetime presidential address — typically reserved for milestones — to deliver politically charged speeches before, including one in December when he sought to blame the challenging economic climate on Democrats. But Thursday's address seems poised to go even further, using the moment to amplify election lies before an audience of millions in an effort to boost Republican prospects before midterms that threaten to hobble Trump for the remainder of his term.

On Monday, when asked about the speech, Trump repeated baseless claims of voter fraud in the Los Angeles primary race for mayor. During the interview with conservative outlet Newsmax, Trump said Republican Spencer Pratt lost his primary bid because of fraud, citing in part California's slow vote count.

Federal prosecutors said they were opening fraud investigations in the state last month after Trump drew attention to the claim.

The president's preoccupation with voting fraud and election security dates back at least to 2016, when he refused to say whether he would accept defeat to Democrat Hillary Clinton. After he won, he convened a voting integrity commission to support his claims that widespread voter fraud cost him the popular vote, though the commission disbanded without uncovering any such evidence.

Four years later, after he lost the 2020 election to Biden, Trump again claimed cheating and zeroed in on the Democrat's narrow win in Georgia. Trump called the state's secretary of state and pressured him to “find 11,780 votes,” just enough votes to overturn Biden's victory in the state. He, along with than a dozen allies, was indicted in the state though the charges were later dropped.

Repeated audits and reviews -- manyrun by Republicans, including Trump’s own then-attorney general -- have found no significant fraud occurred in 2020.

Before winning in 2024, Trump was again laying the groundwork to claim cheating if he lost. After returning to office, he stocked his administration with officials who back his false claims of 2020 election fraud.

Trump made voting regulation central in this term

Frequently declaring that he won the White House “three times,” Trump has made voting regulation a core issue during his second term, demanding legislation that would require voter ID and sharply limit mail-in voting. Facing midterm races that will decide control of Capitol Hill, Trump has stirred new claims to cast doubt on election results that could challenge his power in Washington.

Earlier this year, FBI agents raided elections offices in Fulton County, Georgia, seizing materials from the 2020 election. Tulsi Gabbard, then Trump’s director of national intelligence, traveled to Atlanta to oversee the execution of the search warrant.

Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, campaigning in Georgia for Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff and governor's candidate Keisha Lance Bottoms, smiled Tuesday when asked about Trump potentially rehashing the 2020 election in his national address.

He called it a strategy “for losers.”

“I think people are exhausted by having conversations about elections that happened six years ago, that we have the answer to,” Moore said. “He continues to bring this up because he cannot get out of his mind that he actually could have lost.”

Beyond Georgia, Trump has widely taken aim at states that allow voters to submit ballots by mail. Trump said he called a U.S. attorney in California and demanded scrutiny of the governor's primary last month as votes were being counted.

Last week, Trump ousted the remaining members of the federal Election Assistance Commission, a bipartisan panel that resisted his efforts to require would-be voters to document their U.S. citizenship before registering.

___

Barrow reported from Atlanta. Associated Press writer Nicholas Riccardi in Denver contributed to this report.

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Relatives said the 75-year-old matriarch, who was independent, suffered a head injury and bone fractures when the driver struck her as she walked to a store near her apartment in Opa-locka.

“Her bones were broken from her legs all the way up to her neck,” said Hunter’s daughter-in-law Tesia Hunter.

Shortly after 2:25 a.m., on July 6, a dispatcher reported a driver had struck the grandmother as she walked northbound on Northwest 27th Avenue near Sesame Street and Sharazad Boulevard.

Miami-Dade Fire Rescue personnel responded to 14471 NW 27th Ave. and took Agatha Hunter to Jackson Memorial Hospital’s Ryder Trauma Center, where doctors tried to save her.

“We are devastated,” Tesia Hunter said. “We are hurt; we are heartbroken.”

Agatha Hunter’s neighbors said drivers often speed on Northwest 27th Avenue, and there have been other pedestrians fatally struck in the area.

Tesia Hunter said she and her family had a message for the driver who struck her: “Why? Because if you slow down, no matter what time you are driving, there are still people out there that you have to look out for.”

The driver remained at the scene of the crash and cooperated with police officers, according to the Opa-locka Police Department. Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office deputies with the traffic homicide unit were investigating the cause of the crash.

Opa-locka Commissioner Luis B. Santiago said he is committed to making sure measures are taken to make Northwest 27 Avenue safer for pedestrians.

Related fundraiser

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It’s been 26 days since we’ve had an active system (short-timer Arthur on June 17) anywhere in the Gulf, Caribbean, or wider Atlantic and since June 30 – when we were monitoring an innocuous frontal low for negligible development odds – that the National Hurricane Center has outlined anything on its tropical outlook map.

July is often a quiet month so that alone isn’t terribly unusual. Even during what became busier hurricane seasons like in 2016, the National Hurricane Center had a blank outlook canvas for most of the month. Things get weirder when the quiet continues deeper into August (we know that feeling from recent hurricane seasons).

Still, it’s been an unusually slow start – the least active start to a hurricane season since 2009 – and as we’ve covered extensively in this newsletter, the factors are aligning to make this one of the least active seasons in over a decade. Even so, it only takes one bad hurricane to make a bad year, so we stay vigilant.

Already-low odds of Gulf mischief early next week trend lower

Over the weekend, some of the newcomer AI models – notably the European Centre’s AI modeling system – showed an uptick in development odds for an initially non-tropical low pressure over the northeastern Gulf.

The uptick garnered the typical frenzy among some social media circles (hopefully not yours!) mainly from the European’s deterministic (single-run) AI model, which advertised a hurricane-strength system for early next week over the northern Gulf in forecast runs beginning Sunday afternoon.

Of course, for regular readers of this newsletter, we know single-run models beyond a week aren’t credible sources unless they’re backed by strong evidence from multi-model ensembles (in this instance, it was undeniably not).

Additionally, as we’ve discussed in previous posts, the Euro AI model has shown is has exactly zero skill in forecasting intensity, so intensity forecasts from that model should be taken with a healthy dose of skepticism.

Since its very bullish forecast Sunday, the Euro AI has quickly backed off its initially overheated forecasts.

Even the more level-headed ensembles, which, as we discussed in Monday’s newsletter, only supported low odds of development the past few days have trended lower in development chances next week.

Overall the atmosphere over the northern Gulf just isn’t ripe for much development early next week and the system models are keying in on will start as an area of mid-level spin, which means if it develops, it would take some work for the spin to work its way down to the surface.

This less conventional top-down process presents a higher hurdle to clear than traditional bottom-up development (circulations that start at the surface and build as thunderstorms organize over warm water).

The mid-level disturbance will also be starting at the base of a fast-moving jet stream dip which won’t be doing it any favors from a development perspective.

All-in-all this isn’t an area where we should expect much development. Ensembles yesterday suggested development odds in the 10-20% range, which today have largely fallen to below 10%.

Given the near-record warmth over the northeastern Gulf and the positioning of the disturbance close to land, we’ll of course watch the trends (especially for the possibility of enhanced rainfall from mainly non-tropical processes later next week), but for now it’s not anything to worry about.

Otherwise, boatloads of wind shear will keep the deep tropics quiet for the foreseeable future.

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On Monday, in Broward County bond court, Scott N. Nida, who worked for BSO for more than 21 years, stood before Broward County Circuit Judge Corey B. Friedman, wearing an anti-suicide smock.

Nida shook his head and covered his face with both hands, as a prosecutor told Friedman that the law enforcement veteran had violated a judge’s orders to stay away from a domestic violence victim.

“I am ordering no victim contact,” Friedman told Nida in court. “I don’t know what else I can say.”

BSO deputies had arrested Nida on Jan. 7, April 20, May 17, and on Saturday —his fourth arrest in seven months, records show.

Records show the first two arrests were after Nida was accused of battering the same woman, and the last two arrests were after Nida was accused of violating a judge’s order to stay away from her.

“While strangling her,” Nida “pushed” the woman “to the ground and dragged her across the front lawn,” a deputy wrote, according to the Jan. 7 arrest report.

BSO hired Nida on Jan. 18, 2005, just two days after his 34th birthday. He had been working at Port Everglades when BSO placed him on administrative leave after the Jan. 7 arrest.

Nida “forcibly grabbed the back of her head and began to punch her face and head multiple times ... to the point she started bleeding,” a deputy wrote, according to the April 20 arrest report.

Nida’s employment with BSO ended on June 29, after his third arrest on May 17.

A deputy reported the woman, identified as the domestic violence victim on Jan. 7 and April 20, said she and her 16-year-old daughter had moved back in with Nida in Pompano Beach, records show.

Records show the evidence against Nida includes text messages that the woman sent her daughter with pictures of her injuries on Jan. 7, and surveillance video showing her “screaming for help” on April 20.

The woman “expressed she was extremely in fear” of Nida “and feared for her life ... she felt coerced into dropping the charges,” a deputy wrote, according to the arrest report on April 20.

After a welfare check on Saturday, deputies reported finding the woman and her teenage daughter were still living with Nida despite the judge’s order and his arrest on May 17, according to the arrest report.

On Tuesday, Nida faced a charge of violation of the injunction for protection against domestic violence. Friedman set his bond for the first-degree misdemeanor at $10,000.

Friedman denied Nida’s bond for five charges: Grand theft auto, battery, robbery, false imprisonment, and tampering with a witness, victim, or informant.

Read the Jan. 7 arrest report

Read the April 20 arrest report

Read the May 17 arrest report

Read the July 11 arrest report

Watch video of bond court on July 13

Related reports

• Now-former BSO sergeant in jail again after 4th arrest this year
• BSO sergeant bonds out of jail after second domestic violence arrest in 4 months
• BSO sergeant accused of attacking wife during argument over cheating

Local 10 News Assignment Editor Carson Merlo contributed to this report.

El lunes, en el tribunal de fianzas del condado de Broward, Scott N. Nida, que trabajó para la Oficina del Sheriff de Broward (BSO) durante más de 21 años, compareció ante el juez de circuito del condado de Broward, Corey B. Friedman, vestido con una bata antisuicidio.

Nida negó con la cabeza y se cubrió el rostro con ambas manos mientras un fiscal le explicaba a Friedman que este veterano de las fuerzas del orden había incumplido las órdenes judiciales que le prohibían acercarse a una víctima de violencia doméstica.

“Ordeno que no haya contacto alguno con la víctima», le dijo Friedman a Nida en la sala del tribunal. «No sé qué más puedo decir".

Los agentes de la BSO habían detenido a Nida el 7 de enero, el 20 de abril, el 17 de mayo y el sábado —su cuarta detención en siete meses, según muestran los registros.

Los registros indican que las dos primeras detenciones se produjeron después de que Nida fuera acusado de agredir a la misma mujer, y que las dos últimas tuvieron lugar tras ser acusado de incumplir la orden judicial que le obligaba a mantenerse alejado de ella.

“Mientras la estrangulaba”, Nida “empujó” a la mujer “al suelo y la arrastró por el jardín delantero”, escribió un agente, según el informe de detención del 7 de enero.

La BSO contrató a Nida el 18 de enero de 2005, apenas dos días después de que cumpliera 34 años. Llevaba trabajando en Port Everglades cuando la BSO lo suspendió de sus funciones tras la detención del 7 de enero.

Nida “la agarró con fuerza por la nuca y comenzó a golpearle la cara y la cabeza varias veces... hasta el punto de que empezó a sangrar”, escribió un agente, según el informe de detención del 20 de abril.

La relación laboral de Nida con la BSO finalizó el 29 de junio, tras su tercera detención el 17 de mayo.

Según muestran los registros, un agente informó de que la mujer, identificada como víctima de violencia doméstica el 7 de enero y el 20 de abril, dijo que ella y su hija de 16 años habían vuelto a vivir con Nida en Pompano Beach.

Los registros muestran que las pruebas contra Nida incluyen mensajes de texto que la mujer envió a su hija con fotos de sus lesiones el 7 de enero, y un vídeo de vigilancia en el que se la ve «gritando pidiendo ayuda» el 20 de abril.

Tras una visita de control el sábado, los agentes informaron de que la mujer y su hija adolescente seguían viviendo con Nida a pesar de la orden judicial y de su detención el 17 de mayo, según el informe de la detención.

El martes, Nida se enfrentó a un cargo por incumplimiento de la orden de protección contra la violencia doméstica. Friedman fijó su fianza por este delito menor de primer grado en 10 000 dólares.

Friedman denegó la fianza a Nida por cinco cargos: hurto de vehículo, agresión, robo, detención ilegal y manipulación de un testigo, víctima o informante.

Lea el informe de detención del 7 de enero

Lea el informe de detención del 20 de abril

Lea el informe de detención del 17de mayo

Lea el informe de detención del 11 de julio

Mira el vídeo de la vista sobre la fianza del 13 de julio

A Paramount-Warner merger “threatens the economic and creative health of the American entertainment industry,” reads Tuesday's federal complaint, which was filed by both the Writers Guild of America West and Writers Guild of America East (jointly the WGA).

The union argued that the merger would create less competitors and give the larger company “both the incentive and the ability” to lower wages and the number of projects that offer workers employment.

“This proposed combined entity would be the largest employer of writers, with tremendous power to suppress our wages, eliminate opportunities for emerging writers, cut jobs across the industry, and produce less programming," WGAE President Tom Fontana said in a statement.

A Warner-Paramount tie-up would bring together two of the five last legacy studios in Hollywood. It would also mean putting Warner’s HBO Max, its libraries filled with popular titles like “Harry Potter” and even CNN under the same roof of Paramount-owned CBS, movies like “Top Gun” and the Paramount+ streaming service.

Tuesday’s complaint alleges that the merger violates antitrust law by reducing competition in three markets for writers: writing for episodic TV and streaming series, TV writing deals overall and screenwriting for the biggest theatrical films.

In response, Skydance-owned Paramount maintained that a combined Warner-Paramount would allow the company to “expand opportunities for writers, not shrink them.” It also reiterated pledges to release at least 30 movies a year with a 45-day window exclusive to theaters — and said it would continue to commission from independent production companies while maintaining “two distinct film studios.”

“A stronger Hollywood only means something if it’s stronger for the writers who power it," the company said in a statement.

The WGA's complaint arrives a day after 12 states, led by California Attorney General Rob Bonta, filed a lawsuit challenging the deal, alleging that it would “extinguish competition” in Hollywood and lead to fewer choices for moviegoers and cable TV customers nationwide.

The coalition of states called on Warner and Paramount to not close the merger until after a court had time to “fully evaluate” their claims. But they said the companies quickly refused — and late Monday night, the group filed an emergency motion in federal court seeking a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction aimed at immediately halting the deal.

Paramount on Monday called the states' claims “wrong on both the facts and the law” and vowed to “vigorously defend” its Warner acquisition.

The growing list of legal challenges could become a roadblock in Paramount’s quest to complete its purchase of Warner. Other regulatory reviews are ongoing in the European Union and in the U.K., which has suggested it may intervene. But Paramount has also racked up effective green lights from a handful of other countries, including the Trump administration in the U.S., China, Canada and Australia.

Paramount and Warner have hoped to close their deal sometime in the third quarter of this year. In Monday night's motion seeking an immediate pause, the states said the companies may try to complete the process as early as July 22.

Including debt, Paramount’s proposed purchase of Warner is valued at nearly $111 billion based on outstanding shares.

“Los discursos de odio desde tribunas privilegiadas se responden con hechos de paz, a pesar de los casi 500 firmantes asesinados; y si nos toca ser el firmante 501 asesinado, bienvenida sea la muerte”, aseguró Rodrigo Londoño, llamado en los años de guerra “Timochenko”, en un video difundido en la red social X, recalcando que exguerrilleros han sido asesinados en su regreso a la vida civil.

Londoño se pronunció tras una advertencia realizada la víspera por De la Espriella, quien reprochó en una declaración transmitida por sus redes sociales que el último jefe de las extintas FARC hubiese salido de Colombia para asistir a un seminario en España, con permiso del Tribunal de Paz, el cual lo juzga por los crímenes cometidos en cinco décadas de conflicto interno. El martes Londoño reportó su arribo a Colombia.

“Hoy vemos al criminal de guerra, alias Timochenko, en gira internacional... ese bandido de Timochenko merece estar preso de por vida, voy a trabajar en ello. Ningún formalismo aparente puede esconder que los crímenes de guerra y contra la humanidad de los jefes de la FARC siguen impunes”, aseguró De la Espriella, de perfil conservador y apoyado por el presidente estadounidense Donald Trump.

Londoño y miles de exguerrilleros de las FARC entregaron las armas y se sometieron a la Jurisdicción Especial para la Paz (JEP), un tribunal de justicia transicional que, a cambio de confesar sus crímenes y aportar detalles para esclarecerlos, les da sanciones que no implican cárcel, sino participación en proyectos en beneficio de las víctimas.

El acuerdo de paz firmado en 2016 entre el Estado colombiano y las FARC ha generado división entre quienes lo defienden como un hito que desarmó a la temida guerrilla y quienes lo señalan de dejar en la impunidad los crímenes de guerra.

De la Espriella ha sido crítico con el acuerdo de paz y con las instituciones que han derivado de él. En campaña dijo que haría todo lo que estuviera a su alcance para desmontar el tribunal, pese a que no ha cumplido sus 15 años de mandato.

El presidente de la JEP, Alejandro Ramelli, dijo en una reciente entrevista con The Associated Press que el tribunal cuenta con un “blindaje” constitucional en Colombia y con el apoyo de organismos internacionales como la Corte Penal Internacional, por lo que no sería sencillo que se modifique o elimine.

Anunciando lo que será su plan de reforma estatal para reducir gastos, De la Espriella dijo la víspera que acabaría con varias oficinas, especialmente con las que tienen que ver con los procesos de paz como la Unidad de Implementación del Acuerdo Final con las exFARC y la Consejería Comisionada de Paz.

Para suprimirlas, agregó el presidente electo, se trasladarían sus funciones a otros ministerios. Sin embargo, el anuncio ha generado preocupación entre los defensores de los procesos de paz.

“Diez millones de víctimas y un país fracturado, son suficiente motivo para invitar al Señor Presidente electo a respetar la palabra dada por el Estado y el mandato constitucional que consagra la paz como un derecho y un deber de obligatorio cumplimiento”, señaló en un comunicado el colectivo civil Defendamos la Paz.

La Consejería Comisionada de Paz tiene actualmente a su cargo las mesas de negociación con otros grupos armados ilegales, incluidas disidencias de las FARC, y bandas criminales en el marco de la política de “paz total” del presidente Gustavo Petro.

De la Espriella anunció desde la campaña que cambiaría la estrategia de seguridad, aumentando la presión militar sobre los ilegales y acabando con la política de paz de Petro, muy cuestionada por falta de más resultados.

Según la policía, Lorent Pion golpeó a la víctima de 22 años, Nahomi Cittadini, a un costado de la autopista Interestatal 95, cerca de la salida hacia Ives Dairy Road, donde posteriormente fue atropellada mortalmente por un vehículo que circulaba a por lo menos 80 mph.

El hecho ocurrió el 18 de diciembre de 2024.

Las autoridades informaron que Pion, de 30 años, posteriormente condujo a la policía en una persecución que se extendió por los condados Miami-Dade y Broward y terminó cuando chocó contra varios vehículos en la intersección de Miramar Parkway y Red Road, en Miramar.

Posteriormente fue detenido mientras intentaba huir a pie, informó la policía.

Los investigadores dijeron que este incidente no fue la primera vez que Pion agredía físicamente a Cittadini.

Un video obtenido por Local 10 supuestamente muestra a Pion jalando a Cittadini por el cabello en Miami Beach en marzo.

En ese momento, el juez emitió una orden de no contacto.

A touch of Saharan dust lingers into Wednesday. The day will feature hazy sunshine and light, east-southeast winds during the afternoon. Temperatures will make a run for the mid 90s-- humidity will make it feel like the triple digits. The rain chance remains low.

The former actor who married Britain's Prince Harry in 2018 was nominated in the outstanding lifestyle program category for “With Love, Meghan" on Tuesday.

The show is competing against “A Different Breed,” “George to the Rescue,” “The Motherhood,” and “The Wizard of Paws.”

The 53rd annual Daytime Emmy Awards will be presented Oct. 30 at the Hollywood Palladium.

The Duchess of Sussex's show featured cooking, entertaining and gardening segments and included appearances by celebrities like Chrissy Teigen and Mindy Kaling, and a cameo by her husband, Prince Harry. The show aired for two seasons in 2025 and had a holiday special.

Then known as Meghan Markle, she starred in the legal drama “Suits” from 2011 to 2018, before leaving to marry into the royal family.

CBS received a leading 48 nominations.

The nominees for daytime drama series are: “Beyond the Gates,” “Days of Our Lives,” “General Hospital,” and “The Young and the Restless.”

The nominees for lead actress in a daytime drama series are Stacy Haiduk of “Days of Our Lives,” Karla Mosley of “Beyond the Gates,” Michelle Stafford of “The Young and the Restless,” Heather Tom of “The Bold and the Beautiful,” and Tamara Tunie of “Beyond the Gates.”

Eric Braden of “The Young and the Restless” is among the lead actor nominees. He's joined by Steve Burton of “General Hospital,” Scott Clifton of “The Bold and the Beautiful,” Thorsten Kaye of “The Bold and the Beautiful,” and Christian Jules Le Blanc of “The Young and the Restless.”

The daytime talk series nominees are “3rd Hour of Today,” “The Drew Barrymore Show,” “ The Kelly Clarkson Show,” “Live with Kelly and Mark,” “TODAY with Jenna & Friends,” and “The View.”

Clarkson is among the nominees for daytime talk series host. The others are Joy Behar, Whoopi Goldberg, Alyssa Farah Griffin, Sara Haines, Sunny Hostin & Ana Navarro of “The View,” Tamron Hall, Jennifer Hudson, and Sherri Shepherd.

Clarkson is ending her seven-season run this fall, while Shepherd's show was canceled in May after four seasons.

ABC's “The View” has been in the crosshairs of federal regulators who want to reopen the debate of whether it is subject to equal-time rules.

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That’s more than a billion dollars over prior estimates provided to the county by their consultant. A new incinerator would replace one that burned down in February 2023.

In a memorandum to commissioners issued on Monday, Levine Cava said she’s recommending that they pause negotiations with the joint developer consortium, which is made up of two companies, Florida Power and Light and FCC Environmental Services.

In the memo, Levine Cava said, “The administration has a responsibility to act as a careful steward of public funds and ratepayer dollars. To proceed in a non-competitive manner requires a finding that waiving competition is in the best interests of the county. It is not possible at this time to make that finding.”

Mayor’s memo:

The mayor also added that the county could reopen the bidding process “to ensure the county gets the best deal.”

In 2024, Levine Cava recommended building the new facility in Doral at the same site of the original incinerator.

But that plan fell apart after President Donald Trump returned to the White House, since the facility would be built close to his Doral golf club and would need approval from federal regulators.

But deciding against the Doral facility will cost the county between $300 and $400 million more to build it at an alternative site, according to a 2025 report from the county’s consultant.

The problem currently facing Miami-Dade is getting waste out of the county.

Right now, Miami-Dade is transporting its waste to landfills in other parts of the state because county landfills are full.

Miami-Dade produces 5 million tons of waste per year, a figure much higher than the national average. And building a new facility is a tall task, taking anywhere from seven to 10 years.

This means the county is continuing to transport their trash elsewhere, and, in the process, harming our planet even more.

Esa cifra supera en más de $1 mil millones USD las estimaciones anteriores proporcionadas al condado por su consultor. La nueva incineradora reemplazaría a la que se incendió en febrero de 2023.

En un memorando enviado el lunes a los comisionados, Levine Cava indicó que recomienda suspender las negociaciones con el consorcio desarrollador, integrado por Florida Power and Light y FCC Environmental Services.

En el memorando, Levine Cava escribió: “La administración tiene la responsabilidad de actuar como una cuidadosa administradora de los fondos públicos y del dinero de los contribuyentes. Proceder sin un proceso competitivo requiere determinar que renunciar a la competencia es lo más conveniente para el condado. En este momento no es posible llegar a esa conclusión”.

La alcaldesa también indicó que el condado podría reabrir el proceso de licitación “para garantizar que el condado obtenga la mejor oferta”.

En 2024, Levine Cava recomendó construir la nueva instalación en Doral, en el mismo terreno donde se encontraba la incineradora original.

Pero ese plan se vino abajo después de que el presidente Donald Trump regresó a la Casa Blanca, ya que la instalación se construiría cerca de su campo de golf en Doral y requeriría la aprobación de reguladores federales.

Sin embargo, descartar la instalación en Doral le costará al condado entre $300 millones USD y $400 millones USD adicionales para construirla en un sitio alternativo, según un informe de 2025 elaborado por el consultor del condado.

El problema que enfrenta actualmente Miami-Dade es cómo sacar los desechos fuera del condado.

En este momento, Miami-Dade está transportando sus desechos a vertederos en otras partes del estado porque los vertederos del condado están llenos.

Miami-Dade genera 5 millones de toneladas de desechos al año, una cifra muy superior al promedio nacional. Además, construir una nueva instalación es un proceso complejo que puede tardar entre siete y 10 años.

Esto significa que el condado seguirá transportando su basura a otros lugares y, en el proceso, continuará afectando aún más al medio ambiente.

En su segundo viaje de esta naturaleza desde noviembre pasado, la comisión de reparaciones del Caricom --el bloque comercial caribeño-- también tiene prevista una reunión con parlamentarios británicos como parte de una gira oficial de cuatro días al Reino Unido para solicitar reparaciones.

El grupo indicó que la comisión trabaja en un marco para iniciar negociaciones porque el momento de presentar argumentos a favor de la justicia de las reparaciones pasó hace tiempo.

“En el Caribe seguimos siendo la parte más colonizada del mundo, y esto tiene que parar”, subrayó Hilary 0Beckles, presidente de la comisión de reparaciones de Caricom y rector de la Universidad de las Indias Occidentales.

Las reuniones en Londres se producen después de que dignatarios del Caribe reaccionaron con molestia ante la reciente insinuación de un legislador del Reino Unido de que las antiguas colonias británicas deberían reembolsar al país por su inversión histórica.

La comisión señaló que el Caribe tiene al menos 20 territorios con vínculos con Reino Unido, Francia, Países Bajos y Estados Unidos.

“Estoy bastante seguro de que la gente del Caribe… estará pendiente de ver si su rey… va a impulsar esta conversación sobre soberanía, descolonización y justicia reparadora por estos crímenes que se han cometido”, indicó Beckles.

David Comissiong, embajador de Barbados ante Caricom, subrayó que el primer paso en las reparaciones debe ser la recuperación de la soberanía nacional y la autodeterminación.

Señaló que la comisión tuvo una “reunión productiva” con tres altos clérigos de la Iglesia de Inglaterra, a la que calificó como un “posible aliado”.

También elogió al rey Carlos III por haber expresado en los últimos años “pena personal por el sufrimiento de tantos”, al tiempo que reconoció “el impacto perdurable de la esclavitud”.

Sin embargo, Comissiong y otros criticaron al Reino Unido por haberse abstenido en una resolución que la ONU aprobó en marzo pasado en la que se pedía reparaciones y declaraba el tráfico de africanos esclavizados como “el crimen más grave contra la humanidad”. Los 27 miembros de la Unión Europea también se abstuvieron, mientras que Argentina, Israel y Estados Unidos votaron en contra de la resolución.

Comissiong señaló que algunos gobiernos europeos han ofrecido disculpas, monumentos, museos y la preservación de infraestructura vinculada a la esclavitud en la costa occidental de África.

“Estos son algunos gestos preliminares que apreciamos”, manifestó. “Pero esos gestos no son negociaciones. … El daño causado y que todavía existe hoy en día fue tan trascendental, tan profundamente arraigado, que va mucho más allá, mucho más allá de gestos de conmemoración”.

Se estima que naciones europeas tomaron a unos 12 millones de africanos por la fuerza entre los siglos XVI y XIX, y aquellos que sobrevivieron al viaje transatlántico fueron esclavizados en plantaciones del Caribe y otros lugares bajo condiciones brutales.

A la comisión se le preguntó en conferencia de prensa si publicaría normas sobre quiénes deberían recibir reparaciones.

Para el Caribe, la respuesta sigue sin estar clara, aunque Ron Daniels, titular de la Comisión Nacional de Reparaciones Afroamericanas, indicó que las conversaciones en Estados Unidos han girado en torno a la tierra, el desarrollo económico y la restauración o construcción de infraestructura de comunicaciones y salud.

“Las reparaciones avanzan con bastante eficacia en Estados Unidos como un modelo”, señaló Daniels.

Los líderes de Caricom buscan una disculpa formal; mejoras en educación y salud pública; programas de desarrollo para los pueblos indígenas; repatriación y reasentamiento para quienes deseen vivir en su tierra natal; cancelación de deudas; y compensaciones monetarias, entre otras cosas.

Se tiene previsto que el gobierno de Jamaica presente una petición formal en septiembre para pedir al rey Carlos III que remita cuestiones legales sobre reparaciones por la esclavitud al Consejo Privado, el máximo tribunal de apelaciones de la isla.

___

Esta historia fue traducida del inglés por un editor de AP con la ayuda de una herramienta de inteligencia artificial generativa.

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It comes after the state of Florida announced in late June that it was shutting down the migrant detention facility that had been operating on the land dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz.”

The state swiftly constructed the immigration detention facility in the Everglades on land commandeered from Miami-Dade County — but located in Collier County — to aid the Trump administration with its mass deportation plan and related need for more federal detention beds.

Gone now are the industrial lights and white tents, generators and gas deliveries, and the blue “Alligator Alcatraz” sign some stopped to snap selfies with.

Sky 10 captured what appears to be the removal of fencing around the airstrip that anchored its previous use as a pilot training facility.

What remains includes questions as to when Miami-Dade County will regain control of the site.

The Florida Division of Emergency Management previously took control of the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport.

“We are waiting for the formal return of the property,” Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava, who has announced plans to sell the site to the National Park Service, said on Tuesday.

There are also questions over what impact the facility may have had on the environment.

“Although much of the infrastructure has been removed and the detainees are no longer on site, we remain very concerned about the harm that remains, including at least 20 acres of new pavement that was laid out at the site without any environmental review,” Eve Samples, the executive director of the group Friends of the Everglades, said.

Friends of the Everglades is one of the groups suing in federal court. They claim government defendants failed to conduct an environmental impact study prior to construction, in violation of the National Environmental Policy Act, which the defendants said didn’t apply since the site was state-run and managed.

“Our work is not done, so we’re very eager to return to court and we are poised to do so,” Samples said.

Elise Bennett, the Florida and Caribbean director and a senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, another plaintiff, said, “We’re very concerned about what the long-term impacts are going to be to species that are hanging on the brink of extinction.”

“From the Florida panther to the Florida bonneted bat to the Everglades snail kite, they were using this area before the facility was put in place and stood up,” she said. “Beyond the new paving, we know that there were gallons and gallons of contaminants on the site. We don’t know where those contaminants ended up and there’s a real investigation that’s going to need to take place for us to even begin to understand the full extent of impacts on these really vulnerable species and the waters and lands that they call home.”

Samples and Bennett say they are disappointed — but not deterred — by a federal appeals court ruling overturning a district court’s order that temporarily hit pause on the facility. That case was remanded back to district court. They say they feel that several claims are still in play.

“Our legal team is assessing all of our options as we’re poised to return to court, to Judge Williams’ courtroom, to ensure that the government is held accountable for the harm that occurred at the site and to ensure that remediation occurs and that our bedrock environmental laws in this country are complied with,” Samples said.

Bennett added that her organization will be “using every tool at our disposal to ensure that the site is restored and that this site is protected in perpetuity, so something like this can never happen again.”

Friends of the Everglades has also sent Miami-Dade County leadership what they call a post-Alligator Alcatraz “five-point plan” for remediation, restoration and protection, which includes prohibiting future development of the site and considering the removal of the existing runway.

Group’s ‘five-point plan’:

“We asked for a cost-benefit analysis of the runway removal to be conducted. So it’s quite possible that the benefits of removing that runway will outweigh the costs,” Samples said. “And a big motivator for considering that is to ensure that this kind of damaging operation is never built again in the middle of Big Cypress National Preserve, our country’s first national preserve.”

Bennett called that a “really beautiful end cap to a really horrifying story that started with one of America’s worst ideas.”

Local 10 News reached out to the state’s Division of Emergency Management but did not hear back as of the publication of this article.

The official opening at midnight on Tuesday, after a border fence was removed, allows a new freedom of movement under a historic treaty between the European Union and the United Kingdom. It came after years of post-Brexit wrangling.

The contested British overseas territory of 38,000 people is perched at the southern end of the Iberian Peninsula, in a strategic location mere miles from Morocco where the Atlantic Ocean meets the Mediterranean Sea.

Soon after midnight, crowds crossed freely between La Línea de Concepción in Spain and Gibraltar in both directions. Many wore Spanish soccer jerseys after Spain’s victory against France in the World Cup semifinal on Tuesday, adding to the celebratory mood.

“What you feel here is the brotherhood between the two people,” Gibraltar's Chief Minister Fabian Picardo told Spanish broadcaster RTVE.

A deal that took years to realize

When Britain left the EU in 2020, the relationship between Gibraltar and the bloc had been left unresolved.

Previous talks on a deal to ensure people and goods could keep flowing across the border had made halting progress. In 2025, the EU and U.K. announced an agreement on those issues, with the two sides and Gibraltar’s government signing a treaty Tuesday that eases border crossings.

The U.K.’s Foreign Office Minister Stephen Doughty said Tuesday that the agreement secured Gibraltar’s long-term economic future and interests.

Maroš Šefčovič, the EU’s trade representative, praised the agreement, too.

“It has taken four years of patient, complex negotiation, but the outcome speaks for itself,” Šefčovič said. “It is a very special feeling to see a fence come down.”

Without a deal, Gibraltar could have a faced a hard land border with full passport checks, posing economic risks for the territory deeply dependent on some 15,000 Spaniards — almost half Gibraltar’s workforce — who cross the frontier every day for work.

Mendez Segura, 51, crossed into Gibraltar from Spain on Wednesday for work, unused to the newfound freedom of movement.

“I’ve been crossing over and working in Gibraltar all my life with my identity card,” the home care worker said. “I know you’ll be able to cross without it, but it’s just what I’m used to.”

Leisure visits by people crossing both sides of the border would have been affected, too.

“People who are visiting family in Spain, or whose Spanish family is visiting them in Gibraltar. Children who are going to football matches and extracurricular activities, either in Spain or in Gibraltar. They will be able to do that without having to worry about frontier queues,” Picardo told The Associated Press in an interview.

The deal in effect brings the territory into the EU’s Schengen free travel area. At Gibraltar’s airport and port, entry and exit checks will be conducted by both U.K. and Spanish border officials. The arrangement is similar to what’s in place at Eurostar train stations in London and Paris, where both British and French officials check passports.

Gibraltar was ceded to Britain in 1713, but Spain has maintained its sovereignty claim ever since. Relations between the two countries on the issue of Gibraltar have had their ups and downs over the centuries. The treaty that removed the border fence doesn't resolve the territory’s contested status.

In Britain’s 2016 Brexit referendum, 96% of voters in the Rock, as the territory is popularly known in English, supported remaining in the EU.

Travelers to Gibraltar from countries outside the Schengen Area, including the U.K., will have to contend with the EU Entry-Exit System, or EES, which was rolled out in Europe in April and replaced passport stamps with biometric data collected through photographs and digital fingerprints.

Facial recognition cameras at the Rock

With the border fence gone, Gibraltar officials have set up live facial recognition cameras at entry points and throughout the territory.

Chief Minister Picardo said the territory will have many more closed-circuit television cameras and that it has increased its police presence as well as resources for customs and coast guard agencies.

“The fortress has become a digital fortress now,” Picardo said.

Ahora, el hombre de 65 años enfrenta nuevamente problemas legales después de que la Policía de Aventura informara que estuvo involucrado en otros dos casos de fuga tras accidentes sobre Biscayne Boulevard el lunes. En esta ocasión, nadie resultó gravemente herido.

Los investigadores informaron que los accidentes más recientes ocurrieron poco antes de las 4:30 p.m., cerca de Northeast 203rd Street.

La Policía de Aventura indicó que Eismann, residente de Miami Beach, conducía una Ford Escape negra modelo 2020 cuando primero chocó contra un BMW rojo, empujándolo contra la parte trasera de una GMC, y continuó su marcha.

Según el informe de arresto, al acercarse a la intersección de 203rd Street mientras huía del primer accidente, “condujo sobre el separador central para rebasar el tráfico detenido” y rozó una Nissan Rogue en la que viajaban dos personas, para luego huir nuevamente. La Policía informó que las víctimas siguieron a Eismann hasta el centro comercial Aventura Mall, donde los agentes lo arrestaron.

Según el informe, ambas víctimas sufrieron lesiones menores y los agentes arrestaron a Eismann por dos cargos graves de abandonar la escena de un accidente sin causar lesiones graves.

Eismann, conocido por ser propietario del restaurante Pacific Time en Lincoln Road, acaparó titulares en 2012 por un accidente ocurrido en la cuadra 300 de Northwest 72nd Avenue, en el oeste de Miami-Dade.

Agentes de lo que entonces era el Departamento de Policía de Miami-Dade arrestaron a Eismann, de 51 años en ese momento, luego de que, según las autoridades, atropelló y mató a Jean Carlos Ruiz, de 29 años, mientras esperaba un autobús para ir a trabajar, aproximadamente a una cuadra de su casa, el 10 de octubre de 2012.

La Policía indicó que Eismann huía de la escena de otro accidente cuando perdió el control del vehículo y se subió a la acera.

El 17 de septiembre de 2019, después de llegar a un acuerdo con los fiscales, Eismann, de 58 años, se declaró culpable de conducción imprudente con resultado de muerte y abandonar la escena de un accidente que involucró lesiones, recibiendo un año de libertad condicional.

La viuda de Ruiz dijo a Local 10 News en ese momento que se sentía “traicionada” por el sistema de justicia.

Años después, Eismann nuevamente se encuentra en ese mismo sistema por más presuntas faltas al volante. Hasta la mañana del martes, los registros muestran que permanecía detenido en el Centro Correccional Turner Guilford Knight con una fianza de $5,000 USD.

No one has died in the outbreak on Manhattan's Upper East Side, but 49 patients have required hospitalization, though 34 so far have gone home, city Health Commissioner Dr. Alister Martin said. City data show two new cases were diagnosed from samples taken Sunday and Monday, compared to as many as 11 per day from earlier samples.

“All of these things together paint an encouraging sign,” Martin said at a virtual news briefing.

It came a day after City Council Speaker Julie Menin, a Democrat and Upper East Side resident, complained that the Health Department wasn't doing and disclosing enough. Menin said Wednesday she plans a Council hearing to examine the city's handling of the outbreak and “demand accountability.”

Legionnaires' disease is a form of pneumonia caused by Legionella bacteria, which grow in warm water and can spread in building cooling systems, hot tubs and showerheads. In many cases, people contract the disease by inhaling tiny droplets of contaminated water; Legionnaires’ disease doesn't spread person-to-person.

The illness is treatable, but it is fatal in about 10% of cases, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Seven people died and more than 100 were sickened during an outbreak last year in New York's Harlem neighborhood. The sources turned out to include cooling towers — devices sometimes used for cooling large buildings — at a city-run hospital and the site of the city's public health lab.

Health officials are working to identify the origin of the Upper East Side outbreak, which was first identified on July 2 from two cases in close proximity. The investigation expanded to encompass three heavily residential ZIP codes.

The city said Tuesday it has inspected all 183 cooling towers in the area, and about 75 of them came up positive on first-round tests that don't distinguish between live and dead bacteria.

Those buildings include the Metropolitan, according to a list the city released Tuesday. The storied museum said it was working on the required cleanup and follow-up testing. It's normally closed Wednesday and canceled the day's few activities to ease the cleaning.

City officials said last week that they got positive tests at the Guggenheim Museum, private schools, Park and Fifth Avenue apartment houses, and more.

Most already finished the required cleanups, which entail draining and disinfecting the cooling towers, Martin said. The remaining buildings are to be done by Thursday.

Martin said the city acted with unprecedented speed in ordering cooling tower cleanups after the first-round tests. In the past, he said, officials awaited results from second-round tests for live bacteria. Those tests take about two weeks.

Menin, the Council speaker, contends the city should have demanded cleanups throughout the area right away, without waiting for any tests.

The opportunity with a cost of two proven power forwards and multiple draft picks was deemed worthwhile by the Timberwolves in their ongoing attempt to make the last and most difficult step toward an NBA title.

“I think he’ll elevate us,” president of basketball operations Tim Connelly said, "and our environment will be conducive to his continued growth as well.”

Eager to gain one of the league's true point guards and lessen the ballhandling and playmaking burden on superstar Anthony Edwards, the Wolves had to swallow hard and surrender valuable assets.

Completing a complicated four-team trade with Brooklyn, Charlotte and Chicago, Minnesota acquired Ball and guard Josh Green and sent fan favorite Naz Reid and a package of draft picks — a 2033 unprotected first-rounder, first-round swaps in 2028, 2029 and 2030, and second-rounders in 2029, 2032 and 2033 — to the Hornets.

Second-leading scorer Julius Randle went to the Nets, who swapped the 28th overall selection in the draft last month for No. 33 that landed the Wolves guard Isaiah Evans. That first part of the trade also created the salary cap space necessary for the Wolves to re-sign guard Ayo Dosunmu.

Edwards was the first overall pick in the 2020 draft. Ball went third. Green was the 18th selection by Dallas and McDaniels was 28th, giving the Wolves four first-round picks from that year.

“Well, we have none for the next 10 years,” Connelly quipped at the introductory news conference for Ball and Green on Tuesday at Target Center. “It’s all about quality, not quantity, right?”

All four of those 2020 draftees are still 25 and younger, giving the Wolves confidence they'll continue to contend — “bites at the apple” is Connelly's description — as long as Edwards is on their roster.

“I’ve known Ant for a minute, so we’ve been talking,” Ball said. “Everybody’s excited, and we’re ready to get to work.”

Ball played in only 43% of the games over a three-year stretch from 2022-25 before a promising 2025-26 season that helped propel the Hornets into the play-in games. He has shown a recklessness on and off the court at times, too. But the Wolves will give him a stronger team around him than he ever had with the Hornets, and six years into his NBA career the 6-foot-7 Ball is still just 24.

“You’ve got to have a big backcourt. We learned that through the playoffs this year,” Wolves coach Chris Finch said.

The flip side of Ball's penchant for undisciplined or flashy plays is a carefree style the Wolves could use. One of the undercurrents of their underachieving season that ended with a second-round loss to San Antonio was a moodiness that became part of their collective personality. Too many players took too long to shake off unproductive games or frustrating stretches.

“This is supposed to be fun,” Connelly said. “He enjoys life. He enjoys playing. You don’t want to make this anything but where it’s a joyous atmosphere.”

Minnesota's long-shot pitch for LeBron

The void left by the departure of Randle and Reid could be filled rather neatly by a certain free agent who has included the Wolves on his list of teams worth considering. Meet Minneapolis, the city's tourism arm, even took out digital billboards in Los Angeles to add a light-hearted element to the pitch for LeBron James.

But even if the NBA's all-time leading scorer is unlikely to land in Minnesota for his 24th season, the Wolves have found satisfaction in the widespread notion around the league they might well provide the best on-court fit for James next to Edwards, Ball and McDaniels with veteran defensive whiz Rudy Gobert at the rim.

“This is a place where you’re going to have a lot of fun and win a lot of games. We’re trying to change the narrative of how this organization is viewed. We’re kind of proud of who we are, and certainly, wherever LeBron ends up, he’s going to make that place much, much better,” Connelly said. "I like who we are and we’re pretty proud of who we are. Hopefully that’s appealing, not just to LeBron, but to any free agent.”

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AP NBA: https://apnews.com/hub/NBA

Sus familiares dijeron que la mujer de 75 años, quien era independiente y considerada el pilar de la familia, sufrió una lesión en la cabeza y múltiples fracturas cuando el conductor la atropelló mientras caminaba hacia una tienda cercana a su apartamento en Opa-locka.

“Tenía huesos rotos desde las piernas hasta el cuello”, dijo Tesia Hunter, nuera de la víctima.

Poco después de las 2:25 a.m. del 6 de julio, un operador del servicio de emergencias recibió el reporte de que un conductor había atropellado a la mujer mientras caminaba hacia el norte por Northwest 27th Avenue, cerca de Sesame Street y Sharazad Boulevard.

Paramédicos de Miami-Dade Fire Rescue respondieron al 14471 NW 27th Ave. y trasladaron a Agatha Hunter al Ryder Trauma Center del Hospital Jackson Memorial, donde los médicos intentaron salvarle la vida.

“Estamos devastados”, dijo Tesia Hunter. “Estamos dolidos; tenemos el corazón roto”.

Tesia Hunter dijo que ella y su familia tenían un mensaje para el conductor: “¿Por qué? Porque si reduce la velocidad, sin importar la hora a la que conduzca, todavía hay personas afuera por las que debe estar atento”.

Según el Departamento de Policía de Opa-locka, el conductor permaneció en el lugar del accidente y cooperó con los agentes. Detectives de la unidad de homicidios de tránsito de la Oficina del Sheriff de Miami-Dade investigaban la causa del accidente.

Recaudación de fondos relacionada.

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Now, the 65-year-old is back in legal trouble after Aventura police said he committed two more hit-and-runs on Biscayne Boulevard on Monday. This time, no one was seriously hurt.

Investigators said the latest crashes happened just before 4:30 p.m. near Northeast 203rd Street.

Aventura police said Eismann, of Miami Beach, was driving a black 2020 Ford Escape when he first hit a red BMW, pushing it into the rear of a GMC, and kept driving.

According to an arrest report, as he approached the 203rd Street intersection while fleeing the first crash, “he drove onto the center median in order to pass stopped traffic” and sideswiped a Nissan Rogue with two people inside and took off yet again. Police said the victims followed Eismann to the Aventura Mall, where officers took him into custody.

Both victims suffered minor injuries, according to the report, and officers arrested Eismann on two felony charges of leaving the scene of a crash causing no serious injury.

Eismann, who was known as the owner of the Pacific Time restaurant on Lincoln Road, made headlines in 2012 for a crash in the 300 block of Northwest 72nd Avenue in west Miami-Dade.

Officers with what was then the Miami-Dade Police Department arrested Eismann, then 51, after they said he struck and killed Jean Carlos Ruiz, 29, as he waited for a bus to work about a block away from his home on Oct. 10, 2012.

Eismann, police said, had been fleeing the scene of another crash when he lost control and jumped the curb.

On Sept. 17, 2019, after making a deal with prosecutors, the 58-year-old pleaded guilty to careless driving involving death and and leaving the scene of a crash involving injury, getting a year of probation.

Ruiz’s widow told Local 10 News at the time that she felt “betrayed” by the justice system.

Years later, Eismann again finds himself in that very same system for more alleged misdeeds behind the wheel. As of Tuesday morning, records show he was being held in the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center on a $5,000 bond.