Sotheby's said the 67-million-year-old fossil, nicknamed “Gus,” is now the most expensive set of dinosaur bones ever auctioned off, besting the almost $45 million price tag for a nearly complete stegosaurus sold by the same New York auction house in 2024. The previous record holder had been a Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton nicknamed “Stan” that sold for nearly $32 million in 2020.

“Gus is not only an exceptional find, but a specimen that’s been excavated, documented, prepared, and cared for with real excellence,” Cassandra Hatton, Sotheby’s vice chair, said after the sale was completed. “The market responds when great specimens are taken care of in the right way.”

Why the bidding for this T. rex was intense

Standing upright with its tail extended and right foot slightly raised, “Gus” is an adult dinosaur specimen measuring about 12 ½ feet (3.8 meters) tall and 38 feet (11.5 meters) long.

He's about 63% complete, with what Sotheby's describes as an “exceptionally preserved” skull including a gaping jaw of powerful teeth, two “well represented” feet and a number of rarely found bones, including a furcula, or wishbone.

The fossil was discovered in 2021 on a ranch in South Dakota and named in honor of property owner Gary Licking, who died during the roughly five year excavation, restoration and mounting process.

The auction house said the mystery winner outbid six other prospective buyers during Tuesday's 10-minute bidding battle.

“Try a bigger bite,” auctioneer Phyllis Kao cajoled the bidders at one point as the auction was conducted live and online. “It’s a T. rex, after all.”

Spokespersons didn't respond to an email seeking more information about the winning bidder or their plans for the piece, which had been estimated to fetch anywhere from $20 to $30 million ahead of the sale.

Scientists want ‘Gus’ on public display

The Society of Vertebrate Paleontology, an advocacy group of scientists, scholars and students, said ahead of Tuesday's sale that scientifically significant fossils such as “Gus” should be publicly displayed in museums and other research institutions so that they can be “preserved, documented, and accessible for future generations.”

“The discovery of an important fossil is only the beginning of its scientific story,” Kristina Curry Rogers, the society's vice president, explained in a statement. “Many of the most significant advances in paleontology have come years or even decades after a fossil was collected, as new analytical methods and technologies allowed scientists to ask entirely new questions of specimens already housed in museum collections.”

Indeed, “Apex,” the stegosaurus, the previous dinosaur fossil record-holder, is currently on long-term loan to the American Museum of Natural History in Manhattan. “Sue” the T. rex, the first dinosaur ever sold at auction in 1997, also by Sotheby's, is a centerpiece of the Field Museum in Chicago.

And “Stan” is on display at the Natural History Museum Abu Dhabi, posed in combat with another fossilized T. rex over the remains of a triceratops.

A Cretaceous king and Hollywood staple

Tyrannosaurus rex, whose name roughly translates to “King of the Tyrant Lizards,” stood firmly at the top of the food chain when it ruled during the late Cretaceous period.

With its fearsome jawline and comically stubby arms, it has become the most recognizable and beloved of the dinosaurs, depicted in everything from children’s programs like Barney, the purple T. rex, to the enduring “Jurassic Park” movie franchise.

The great beasts roamed what is today western North America, during a time when the region boasted “warm climates, high sea levels, and rich coastal floodplains” that allowed their primary prey, giant herbivores like the triceratops, to flourish, according to Sotheby’s.

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.

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 for allegedly battering a woman he has been in a relationship with for more than a decade, and the last two were for a judge’s order to stay away from her.

In January, the woman reported Nida had “grabbed her face and neck to the point she felt she could not breathe and pushed her to the ground, dragging her across the lawn,” according to a deputy’s arrest report.

In April, the woman later reported that she was driving when Nida grabbed her head and punched her until she was able to get away and ask for help, according to a deputy’s 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 first arrest. His employment with BSO ended on June 29, after his third arrest.

On Tuesday, Nida faced a charge of violation of the injunction for protection against domestic violence. His bond for the first-degree misdemeanor was $10,000.

Records showed Nida also faced five charges: Grand theft auto, battery, robbery, false imprisonment, and tampering with a witness, victim, or informant. A judge denied him bond for these.

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“I’m Joe Lombardo,” he said as the officer arrived at the passenger-side window, police body camera video obtained by The Associated Press shows.

Gov. Joe Lombardo was pulled over May 15 by an officer from the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department, the agency Lombardo led as sheriff for eight years. The officer walks up to the passenger side of a light-gray Ford pickup truck and says, “hello, how are you doing, sir?” according to the video.

Lombardo is in the driver's seat, with his wife Donna Lombardo in the passenger seat.

The officer begins to explain the reason for the stop, and Lombardo interrupts to say, “I’m Joe Lombardo.” The officer says, “I’m aware,” and continues to explain the stop was initiated because he did not see Lombardo stop at a red light before making a right turn.

“Come on, man,” Lombardo says.

The officer replies, “You’re good to go, sir. Appreciate ya. Have a good day,” and then walks away.

The whole interaction lasts about 15 seconds of the 1 minute and 10 second video.

The police department said the governor did not receive a citation but did not say why, however law enforcement officers say it is common to not give a citation over a minor violation.

Lombardo's campaign said the governor and his wife were headed to the airport when they were pulled over.

“Governor Lombardo spoke with the officer, fully complied with all instructions, and was promptly on his way,” the campaign said in a statement Tuesday. “He remains grateful for the professionalism of the officer involved and for the service of law enforcement officers across Nevada.”

Steve Grammas, the president of the Las Vegas Police Protective Association, said the interaction wasn't uncommon. Officers stop drivers, explain why drivers are stopped and then let them go on their way.

“It really is a big nothing in my opinion,” he said.

Grammas, whose union endorsed the Republican governor, denied Lombardo received any special treatment. Typically officers ask for the driver’s license in order to identify them, but the officer already knew who the governor was, he said.

“Being that it is the governor, the former sheriff, odds are he doesn’t have warrants, does not have a suspended driver’s license, and so there’s no need to run that person,” Grammas said.

Grammas added that the governor didn’t identify himself as the governor, and simply said his name.

Edward Obayashi, a deputy sheriff and policy adviser who teaches an ethics and policing class in California, said there is nothing unethical about what the governor or the officer did.

“We let motorists off with a warning all the time,” Obayashi said.

Obayashi said that it was obvious the officer already knew who he was stopping because he ran the license plate, and the governor identifying himself is a common courtesy.

More than 30 states have reported infections this year, and current data from them shows the number of infections surpassing the record U.S. mark of about 4,700 set in 2019. The illness is not usually life threatening and is typically treated with antibiotics.

Health officials have not yet definitively identified what is causing the infections. But in Michigan — where more than 3,300 cases have been reported — officials say early information points to lettuce or salad greens as a possible culprit.

After conducting more than 1,000 interviews with patients, “early information has shown lettuce as a common product that regularly comes up during the investigation,” said Natasha Bagdasarian, the Michigan health department's chief medical executive.

Because of that commonality and because produce has been behind some past cyclospora outbreaks, Michigan officials advised consumers to buy whole heads of lettuce, discard the outer layers and thoroughly wash what's left. They also suggested people avoid bagged lettuce and pre-mixed salad kits.

On Tuesday, the Taco Bell restaurant chain issued a statement saying it had “voluntarily and temporarily removed limited ingredients at select restaurants as a precautionary measure. We will continue to closely monitor the situation and follow the guidance of public health authorities."

Cyclospora is a microscopic, spherical parasite that commonly causes watery diarrhea “with frequent and sometimes explosive bowel movements,” according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Outbreaks tend to occur most often in the late spring and summer.

The heat-loving parasite infects the bowels and spreads through feces. In the past, people have been infected by consuming fruits or vegetables that were exposed to feces-contaminated irrigation water.

The illness, called cyclosporiasis, is less common than foodborne illnesses caused by other germs, including salmonella and E. coli. Many cases are never linked to a specific food or other source and, for years, few U.S. cyclospora outbreaks were reported. But the number started rising about a decade ago, with a particularly notable spike in 2018 and 2019.

Experts say it's likely that cyclospora cases historically were underreported, in part because some common tests used to check for food poisoning have not been geared to detect cyclospora. They attribute the increasing trend in cases to climate change and better detection.

The worst year in the U.S. for infections was 2019, when about 4,700 illnesses were reported, according to federal data on confirmed and suspected cases.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention keeps those numbers, but they traditionally lag what's posted by individual city and state health departments dealing with local outbreaks in real time. On Tuesday, CDC officials issued a health alert that said that since May 1, the agency is aware of 1,645 confirmed domestic cases and more than 5,100 that require further analysis to confirm whether the infections were acquired in the U.S. The reports come from 34 states, the CDC said.

The federal alert did not detail how many reports came from each state. But Michigan officials have reported more than 3,300 cases, officials in northwest Ohio said they have seen more than 1,100, New York City officials counted more than 400 and Illinois reported more than 200.

Officials do not think all can be tied to a common source. In Illinois, for example, more than half the people with infections said they had travel outside the United States, and at least some may have been infected elsewhere.

But Michigan officials believe a large share of their total is likely due to a linked domestic outbreak.

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Associated Press reporter Dee-Ann Durbin in Detroit contributed to this report.

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

Graham was appointed by South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster on Monday to fill the remaining months of her brother’s current term. A separate special election will be held next month to pick a new Republican nominee in the general election for Lindsey’s Graham’s seat, as he had been seeking a fifth term this year.

Darline Graham, who will be the state’s first female senator, has not previously held public office. She has worked as an optician and at various state agencies, including the South Carolina Commission for the Blind and the Department of Employment and Workforce. She is married to Larry Nordone but will be known in the Senate as Darline Graham, her legal name.

She said on Monday that her older brother, who raised her after their parents died, had always been there for her. “And now, I will be there for him,” she said.

Graham, 71, died unexpectedly on Saturday in Washington. A preliminary report from the medical examiner said he suffered a tear in his aorta, known as an aortic dissection. One of President Donald Trump’s closest allies in the Senate, he was the chairman of the Senate Budget Committee and was set to become the top Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee in the next Congress.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said before the swearing in Tuesday that he knows Darline Graham “will carry on Lindsey’s tireless service to South Carolina.”

Graham has often been by her brother’s side

Lindsey Graham, who was not married and did not have children, was exceptionally close to his sister. He became her legal guardian after their parents died, when he was 22 and she was 13. She often appeared at his campaign events and supported him in speeches and campaign ads, and she was there as he filed reelection paperwork earlier this year, along with her children and grandchildren.

“To Lindsey, I miss you more than I can even put into words,” his sister said as McMaster announced her appointment. “But I’m going to do this. I got it.”

McMaster said the two had spoken “in the wee hours of Sunday morning” after Graham’s death, and he asked her to serve.

“I had wondered what you would say, and I was humbled by your quickness to see the duty that you had to serve,” McMaster said. He added that President Donald Trump “thought it was a great idea” when he later told him of his pick. Trump announced his support for Graham to fill the seat earlier Monday.

South Carolina holds a special primary in August

According to South Carolina law, a one-week filing period for a special primary election begins on the second Tuesday after the candidate’s death, or July 21.

The special primary election would be held on the second Tuesday after that filing period closes, or Aug. 11. Any necessary runoff would follow two weeks after that, or Aug. 25.

From that point, the new nominee would have just over two months to campaign for the general election on Nov. 3.

Several Republicans are potentially eyeing a run, including Lt. Gov. Pamela Evette and Republican Reps. Russell Fry, Nancy Mace and Ralph Norman.

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Associated Press writer Meg Kinnard contributed to this report from Columbia, South Carolina.

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The recall, which was first announced on Thursday, covers Insignia front-control gas ranges with knobs that can be turned on accidentally, posing a risk of fire, according to the CPSC.

They said the ranges were sold in the United States from 2020 through March 2026.

They also advised that consumers should stop using the ranges immediately and contact Best Buy for a free replacement knob kit.

Mbappé scored his eighth goal against Morocco and enters the semifinals even with Argentina superstar Lionel Messi in the race for the Golden Boot. The 39-year-old Messi has a World Cup-record 21 goals in his career, one more than the 27-year-old Mbappé.

France coach Didier Deschamps said Mbappé was fine physically after the early exit against Morocco with what was described as a “slight” right ankle injury.

The France captain is among six players to start all seven World Cup matches for the team, along with fellow forward Ousmane Dembele and goalkeeper Mike Maignan.

For the sixth time in seven games, Spain forward Mikel Merino will come off the bench. The versatile Arsenal player scored the winning goals within minutes of coming on as a late substitute in a 1-0 victory over Portugal in the round of 16 and a 2-1 quarterfinal win over Belgium.

Lamine Yamal will start his sixth consecutive game for Spain a day after his 19th birthday. The Barcelona forward came off the bench in a 0-0 draw in the team's opener against Cape Verde, the tiny island nation that turned into one of the World Cup's biggest surprises.

Spain forward Nico Williams, who has been battling a muscle injury since the group stage finale against Uruguay, wasn't in the lineup. He came off the bench in all three group matches before missing the first two knockout games. Williams entered in the 79th minute against Belgium.

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See more of AP’s World Cup coverage here

El retiro, anunciado por primera vez el jueves, incluye estufas a gas Insignia con controles frontales cuyos perillas pueden activarse accidentalmente, lo que representa un riesgo de incendio, según la CPSC.

Indicaron que las estufas fueron vendidas en Estados Unidos desde 2020 hasta marzo de 2026.

También recomendaron que los consumidores dejen de usar las estufas de inmediato y se comuniquen con Best Buy para obtener un kit de reemplazo de perillas gratuito.

One South Florida man now has the answer after winning big on a Netflix competition show.

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Contestants from across the country walked into a luxury lakeside estate in British Columbia with one goal: keep secrets, hide in plain sight and compete for a chance at a million-dollar prize.

But one South Florida man outplayed the rest.

Nick Pellecchia, who lives in the heart of Brickell, is the winner of Season 2 of Netflix’s “Million Dollar Secret.”

“I come from a completely different background than reality TV,” Pellecchia said.

He studied finance at the University of Miami and worked at a commercial loans lender before turning his attention toward entertainment.

“I always liked entertaining people and being funny,” he said. “I knew how powerful it was to have a brand and audience online, so I was always applying.”

Eventually, that led him to Million Dollar Secret and a spot in the competition.

From the beginning, Pellecchia said his strategy was to avoid becoming a target.

“My plan going into it was (to) be kind of a funny, fratty type kid that doesn’t have a target on his back, that people just like being comfortable around,” Pellecchia said.

But that plan quickly changed when he identified who he believed was hiding the million-dollar secret.

“I ended up being the only one clocking Altie as the millionaire and felt the need to speak up at the first dinner,” he said.

After that, other contestants started looking to him for answers.

“So that whole plan went to the wayside and then it turned more into a situation where people were coming to me about what I thought was going on,” he added.

Along the way, Pellecchia found himself holding the million-dollar briefcase, meaning he had to complete secret agendas without the other contestants finding out.

Pellecchia survived multiple rounds, eventually moving the money out of his briefcase before the attention became too much.

He made it to the final three, where the prize ended up back in his hands.

For Pellecchia, becoming a millionaire still feels surreal.

“It’s a pretty surreal feeling, because it all still feels like it was made up, and it’s crazy because it’s filmed nine months before it comes out,” he said.

“To my parents, I said I’m pretty sure there’s money on the way, maybe it was a fever dream or something,” he added, “I’m just grateful.”

Now, with a million dollars to his name, Pellecchia says he plans to keep investing in himself.

“I mean I want that million dollars to be $10 (million) in the next few years, so I’m gonna keep building businesses, being entrepreneurial with it and keep investing in myself a lot of it,” he said. “But most of it, I’m just gonna keep betting on myself, dude.”

Pellecchia’s Netflix journey didn’t end with Million Dollar Secret. He also searched for love on Netflix’s “Perfect Match.”

To see what he’s been up to since those shows ended, find his Instagram page by clicking here.

Un hombre del sur de Florida ahora tiene la respuesta después de ganar en grande en un programa de competencia de Netflix.

Concursantes de todo el país llegaron a una lujosa propiedad frente a un lago en Columbia Británica con un objetivo: guardar secretos, pasar desapercibidos y competir por la oportunidad de ganar un premio de un millón de dólares.

Pero un hombre del sur de Florida superó al resto.

Nick Pellecchia, quien vive en el corazón de Brickell, es el ganador de la temporada 2 de “Million Dollar Secret” de Netflix.

“Vengo de un entorno completamente diferente al de los programas de televisión de realidad”, dijo Pellecchia.

Estudió finanzas en la Universidad de Miami y trabajó en una empresa de préstamos comerciales antes de enfocar su atención en el entretenimiento.

“Siempre me gustó entretener a la gente y ser divertido”, dijo. “Sabía lo poderoso que era tener una marca y una audiencia en línea, así que siempre estaba aplicando”.

Eventualmente, eso lo llevó a “Million Dollar Secret” y a un lugar en la competencia.

Desde el principio, Pellecchia dijo que su estrategia era evitar convertirse en un objetivo.

“Mi plan al entrar era ser como un chico divertido, tipo universitario, que no tuviera un objetivo en la espalda, alguien con quien la gente simplemente se sintiera cómoda”, dijo Pellecchia.

Pero ese plan cambió rápidamente cuando identificó a quien creía que ocultaba el secreto del millón de dólares.

“Terminé siendo el único que identificó a Altie como la persona con el millón y sentí la necesidad de hablar en la primera cena”, dijo.

Después de eso, otros concursantes comenzaron a buscar sus respuestas.

“Así que todo ese plan quedó a un lado y luego se convirtió más en una situación donde la gente venía a mí para saber qué pensaba que estaba pasando”, agregó.

En el camino, Pellecchia se encontró con el maletín del millón de dólares, lo que significaba que tenía que completar agendas secretas sin que los otros concursantes se enteraran.

Pellecchia sobrevivió a varias rondas y finalmente sacó el dinero de su maletín antes de que la atención se volviera demasiada.

Llegó a los tres finalistas, donde el premio terminó nuevamente en sus manos.

Para Pellecchia, convertirse en millonario todavía se siente surrealista.

“Es una sensación bastante surrealista, porque todavía parece que todo fue inventado, y es una locura porque se filmó nueve meses antes de que saliera”, dijo.

“A mis padres les dije que estaba bastante seguro de que había dinero en camino, tal vez fue un sueño extraño o algo así”, agregó. “Estoy agradecido”.

Ahora, con un millón de dólares a su nombre, Pellecchia dice que planea seguir invirtiendo en sí mismo.

“Quiero que ese millón de dólares se convierta en $10 millones en los próximos años, así que voy a seguir construyendo negocios, siendo emprendedor con eso y seguir invirtiendo mucho en mí mismo”, dijo. “Pero la mayor parte, simplemente voy a seguir apostando por mí mismo, amigo”.

El camino de Pellecchia en Netflix no terminó con “Million Dollar Secret”. También buscó el amor en “Perfect Match” de Netflix.

Para ver qué ha hecho desde que terminaron esos programas, encuentre su página de Instagram haciendo clic aquí.

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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.

It was a list of things to do on the weekend after missing the cut.

“He was like: ‘Hey, you can practice at the facilities. You can still go to the gym. You can also go to the next tournament.’ It was basically all my options,” Scheffler said Tuesday. “He never sent it to me, but he told me about it.”

The reason the text was created — without being sent, to Scheffler's disappointment — was missing the cut at the Scottish Open, his first missed cut in nearly four years, a streak of 78 consecutive cuts that was the longest since Tiger Woods set the record (142) from 1998 to 2005.

Frustrating, yes. Despair? Hardly.

“You never want to have a weekend off, but going into a tournament when you're defending, there's always a bit more stuff to do,” Scheffler said. “So it wasn't the world thing in the world.”

Among his duties was officially returning the claret jug he won last year at Royal Portrush, a ritual the Royal & Ancient has turned into a ceremony. Then, it was playing an exhibition with Jordan Spieth, Tommy Fleetwood, Justin Rose and others.

But key to Scheffler's early arrival was Royal Birkdale, which has hosted the British Open more than any other links course in England since it first joined the rotation in 1954.

He had never seen it. Scheffler had not seen conditions like this — a combination of yellow and brown, which translates to firm and fiery in a links vocabulary. St. Andrews came close in 2022, but Jon Rahm recalls the greens still being soft enough to allow for low scoring.

Scheffler ticked off two items on his friend's list — he went to the gym in Scotland and then headed to the next tournament. That allowed him time to play 18 holes on Sunday, and to limit his energy in sunbaked Blighty to nine holes on Monday and Tuesday.

His general assessment: “The ball is just going to run forever.”

Is it driver to take it over the bunkers and possibly reach the green on the 393-yard, downwind 16th hole, or hit iron off the tee? Is the redesigned fifth hole at 321 yards worth trying to reach with a pond to the right, a series of bunkers short and a wee part of a wee burn to the left?

“On each hole there's a good bit of strategy. There's a decent amount of thinking,” Scheffler said. “If it wasn't as firm as it is now, there would be as much decision-making. But I think with the firmness, it creates a whole lot more challenges.”

Rose is among four players — and at 45, the youngest — to have played Royal Birkdale three times in the Open dating to 1998. He was a 17-year-old amateur that year, full of joy and optimism when he holed out a wedge for birdie on the 18th to tie for fourth. He didn't finish in the top 50 his two times as a professional.

Rose certainly has more experience than Scheffler, but only to a point.

“A links course is interesting because you never really get to know them that well,” Rose said. "Like 2008 I think it was, weather was dreadful. It was wet. You might have been hitting 2-irons and 3-woods into par 4s, and now you could be flicking 52-degree wedges.

“A golf course can play so differently decade to decade when we come back that you never really get to know the course that well.”

Scheffler said he felt at peace about his game, and he certainly looked the part. His game didn't look deplorable in the Scottish Open, just a matter of not hitting it terribly close and not making many putts and then moving on.

It was no less frustrating — Scheffler is a killer when it comes to competing, which is one reason he has been No. 1 longer than anyone since Woods — but it was filled with perspective.

“I don’t think it hurts as much as coming close to winning and finishing second,” Scheffler said. “I felt like coming in second at Travelers hurt more than missing the cut, but missing the cut is significantly more frustrating is how I would describe it.”

He's had plenty of experience finishing second. Scheffler's lone victory this year was his first tournament in January at The American Express. Since then, he has had four runner-up finishes, including the Masters. The most recent was a playoff loss to Viktor Hovland at the Travelers Championship two weeks ago when Scheffler missed a 4-foot slider.

“I think just towards the end of the season, you get a little tired,” Scheffler said. "I got a couple days off, reset the mind, reset the body, and just kind of get back to feeling even and at peace. I've had a very solid year, but like I said, frustrating at times because I’ve been close and I haven’t been able to get it done like I have been in years past.

“I'm excited to try and defend my title this week.”

That hasn't been done at the British Open since 2008 when Padraig Harrington won at Royal Birkdale. One week could change Scheffler's outlook on the year. But it's a week that presents a test the likes of which he hasn't seen all year.

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

Federal authorities initially used that language Monday when talking to state officials about the actions of a Maine driver who was fatally shot by immigration officers. In public statements, Department of Homeland Security officials shifted their description to say officers fired into the vehicle “fearing for public safety.”

It was the second time in a week that federal immigration authorities shot and killed someone behind the wheel of a car, initially accusing the driver of attempting to ram into immigration officers.

But while the weaponization of a car is often used to justify the use of deadly force against a driver, the legal definition is a lot less clear cut.

Courts agree cars can be considered weapons

In numerous state and federal courts, judges have agreed that vehicles can be considered weapons when they are used to inflict harm. But many of those cases have been considerations of whether enhanced charges such as aggravated assault with a deadly weapon can be levied against a person after an injury or death was already caused by a vehicle.

Many state laws that address assault with a vehicle are designed to enhance manslaughter or other charges against people violating traffic laws or driving requirements. Judicial opinions have largely focused on crimes of negligence, road rage or driving while intoxicated, and in rare instances, cases where someone purposefully drove their car into a crowd of people.

They rarely deal with the question faced by police or federal law enforcement officials of when a moving vehicle should be considered a dangerous weapon, and when that allows for the use of deadly force.

Training often says to move rather than shoot

Many law enforcement departments and agencies weigh the potential for unintended harm heavily when instructing officers or agents on when it's acceptable to fire a weapon at a moving vehicle.

Many department policies tell officers to move out of the way of a vehicle rather than shoot because of the potential harm to bystanders who could be struck by unintended gunfire or by a careening vehicle if the driver is incapacitated.

Policies often say a suspect fleeing is not enough justification for using deadly force. Some require another weapon such as a firearm being used as a threat from the person in the vehicle to establish a clear threat to public or officer safety.

Experts say many factors determine when a car is weaponized

Exceptions exist in many use-of-force policies for what became a familiar scene abroad and at times in the U.S. — a person driving a vehicle into crowded public streets to inflict as much damage as possible.

But, experts say those exceptions have been used as a defense in situations where a person was not posing the same level of threat.

They say officers and juries should consider factors such as the speed of the vehicle, whether there are large gatherings of people on the sidewalks or nearby, and the reason for the initial police interaction. For example, a person fleeing an armed robbery at a bank might pose a higher danger than someone fleeing a traffic stop.

Los expertos afirman que esta técnica difiere del masaje tradicional de tejido profundo. En lugar de aplicar una presión intensa, el drenaje linfático utiliza movimientos suaves diseñados para estimular el sistema linfático natural del cuerpo.

“Simplemente estamos estimulando al cuerpo para que haga algo que ya hace de forma natural las 24 horas del día, los 7 días de la semana”, explica Camila Pérez, propietaria de Mova Lymphatic Drainage.

Pérez afirma que el tratamiento ayuda a devolver al sistema circulatorio el exceso de líquido producido por el metabolismo celular normal, donde puede ser filtrado por el hígado y los riñones.

“Ayuda a eliminar el exceso de líquido y a devolverlo al sistema circulatorio”, explica Pérez.

Según ella, los clientes suelen recurrir a los masajes de drenaje linfático para aliviar la hinchazón y mejorar la digestión.

“Los ganglios linfáticos situados en el interior de los intestinos se encargan de eliminar parte de la grasa, por lo que, en lo que respecta a la digestión, un trabajo específico y minucioso en la zona del estómago favorece la digestión y reduce la hinchazón”, añade Pérez.

Pérez también afirma que el tratamiento puede ayudar a las personas que se están recuperando tras una intervención quirúrgica, ya que contribuye a redirigir los líquidos mientras el cuerpo se cura.

“Tras una incisión, se cortan las vías y los capilares que drenan esas zonas”, explicó. “Se aplica la presión adecuada para redirigir el líquido hasta que se cure”.

Afirma que mejorar la circulación también puede contribuir a que el sistema esté menos congestionado.

“En general, la circulación mejora y un sistema menos congestionado no se ve afectado”, afirmó Pérez.

Pérez explica que muchas clientas conciertan citas antes de eventos importantes, como bodas, mientras que otras solicitan tratamientos durante o después del embarazo.

“Es un momento en el que las hormonas toman el control. Es seguro. Recomiendo empezar después del primer trimestre y volver tras el embarazo”, añadió.

El tratamiento también es popular entre los hombres, señaló Pérez.

Sin embargo, Pérez afirma que uno de los mayores errores es pensar que un masaje más fuerte conduce a mejores resultados.

“Creo que el mayor error es pensar que un masaje más profundo y fuerte te dará mejores resultados”, afirmó.

En cambio, explica que la técnica se basa en una presión suave y movimientos lentos.

“El drenaje linfático no elimina la grasa. No te hace adelgazar, pero puedes tener mejor aspecto y parecer más delgada porque no retienes demasiada agua”, explicó Pérez.

Afirma que el drenaje linfático se puede aplicar a una amplia variedad de clientes, pero cada tratamiento se adapta en función de las necesidades individuales.

“Un mismo día puedo atender a una paciente con cáncer, a una modelo o a una clienta que acaba de someterse a una intervención quirúrgica. Para cada una de ellas, adoptamos un enfoque diferente”, añadió.

Una clienta, Rudineia Villegas, afirma que recibe masajes de drenaje linfático de forma regular como parte del tratamiento del lipedema, una afección que puede provocar hinchazón, inflamación y retención de líquidos.

“Es una afección que puede afectar a los brazos, los muslos y la parte inferior de las piernas. Se retiene mucha agua, y la inflamación hace que parezca que hay mucha celulitis”, explicó Villegas.

Villegas afirma que lleva cinco años recibiendo masajes de drenaje linfático una vez al mes.

“Hace que mi piel esté más suave y también me siento mucho más ligera”, afirma.

Añade que los tratamientos también le han ayudado durante la menopausia.

“Siento que me ayuda con los cambios de humor. Me ayuda a regular la digestión”, explica Villegas.

Aunque los masajes de drenaje linfático se consideran seguros para muchas personas, Pérez señala que algunas deberían evitar el tratamiento o consultar primero con un médico.

“El drenaje linfático tiene algunas contraindicaciones absolutas: insuficiencia renal, insuficiencia cardíaca, trombosis venosa profunda y otras afecciones circulatorias. Si tienes una infección, es mejor evitarlo”, explicó Pérez.

Para quienes buscan reducir la hinchazón o mejorar cómo se sienten, los expertos afirman que el drenaje linfático puede ser una opción, pero es importante comprender qué puede y qué no puede hacer el tratamiento.

Soccer's governing body released the lineup for the closing ceremony, which will take place 90 minutes before Sunday's final. The show is meant to “celebrate the 48 teams’ unforgettable journey” through 16 host cities across three countries, FIFA said in a statement.

IShowSpeed — who has streamed multiple matches — is listed as a performer, while Cruise — who's also been spotted in the stands and performed a stunt at the Paris Olympics' closing ceremony — is billed as making a “special appearance.” The ceremony will also include performances from Laura Pausini, the Italian singer who helped open the Milan Cortina Olympics in February; Tony winner and Pussycat Dolls member Nicole Scherzinger; and Robbie Williams, the British singer and former Take That member.

Jennifer Hudson, who boasts the coveted EGOT title with an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony, will perform the U.S. national anthem.

“Echoing the spirit of the opening ceremonies, which welcomed the world to the greatest stage in Canada, Mexico and the United States, the closing ceremony will bring the FIFA World Cup 2026 full circle through music, culture and football, before we kick off the highly anticipated match that will crown the champions of this groundbreaking tournament,” said Heimo Schirgi, the World Cup's chief operating officer.

While Sunday will also feature the tournament's first halftime show, with a bevy of additional A-list performers, closing ceremonies are not exactly new to the World Cup. The closing ceremony is being produced in partnership with Balich Wonder Studio, led by Marco Balich, who orchestrated the 2022 World Cup's opening and closing ceremonies in Qatar.

FIFA has encouraged ticketholders to arrive early, promising that fans “will have an active role to play in the show.” The show begins at 1:30 p.m. at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, and kickoff is at 3 p.m.

___

See more of AP’s World Cup coverage here

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Basabe is a Republican in the Florida state House of Representatives based in Miami Beach, but he is being sued by two former employees, a legislative aid and an intern.

Both men say they were victims of sexual harassment, battery and defamation at the hands of Basabe.

The lawsuit was first filed about three years ago but is now making its way in front of a jury.

Basabe, who is up for re-election later this year, is actually representing himself during the trial, moving forward without a lawyer.

There was also witness testimony Monday, which was tense at times as a former legislative aide was questioned by the very man accused of sexually assaulting him.

“Did you notice any oversized children who may have obstructed anyone’s view from the front of the classroom?” Basabe asked.

“I don’t know Mr. Basabe, like I said before, I was more shocked and frozen that you slapped my buttocks in a room full of children,” replied former legislative aid Nicholas Frevola.

At one point, Basabe asked Frevola to demonstrate how he was slapped on the backside.

Another man, Basabe’s former intern, alleges unsolicited sexual advances from the state lawmaker as he drove his boss home.

“He was in the passenger seat, and it started off with him getting his face close to my neck and whispering in my ear,” said former intern Jacob Cuthbirth. “And he put his hand on my thigh and he made comments about sex with men, and was, as I said previously, he did seem pretty drunk. I told him that I’m happily engaged.”

Basabe has long denied the allegations, pointing to a pair of prior investigations brought on by the Florida House of Representatives to look into the claims, both of which were dismissed after findings of no wrongdoing.

The victims have also sued the Florida House of Representatives.

A stream of a portion of Monday’s hearing can be seen below:

Basabe es republicano en la Cámara de Representantes del estado de Florida con sede en Miami Beach, pero está siendo demandado por dos ex empleados, un asistente legislativo y un pasante.

Ambos hombres afirman haber sido víctimas de acoso sexual, agresión física y difamación por parte de Basabe.

La demanda se presentó por primera vez hace unos tres años, pero ahora se está tramitando ante un jurado.

Basabe, que se presenta a la reelección a finales de este año, se está defendiendo a sí mismo durante el juicio, sin contar con la asistencia de un abogado.

El lunes también se escucharon testimonios de testigos, en un ambiente que se tornó tenso en algunos momentos, ya que un antiguo asistente legislativo fue interrogado precisamente por el hombre acusado de haberle agredido sexualmente.

«¿Se fijó en algún niño de gran corpulencia que pudiera haber obstaculizado la visión de alguien desde la parte delantera del aula?», preguntó Basabe.

«No lo sé, señor Basabe; como ya he dicho antes, estaba más bien conmocionado y paralizado porque usted me dio una palmada en las nalgas en una sala llena de niños», respondió el antiguo asistente legislativo Nicholas Frevola.

En un momento dado, Basabe pidió a Frevola que demostrara cómo le habían dado una palmada en el trasero.

Otro hombre, un antiguo becario de Basabe, alega que el diputado estatal le hizo insinuaciones sexuales no deseadas mientras llevaba a su jefe a casa en coche.

«Estaba en el asiento del copiloto, y todo empezó cuando acercó la cara a mi cuello y me susurró al oído», explicó el antiguo becario Jacob Cuthbirth. «Luego me puso la mano en el muslo e hizo comentarios sobre el sexo entre hombres y, como ya he dicho, parecía bastante borracho. Le dije que estaba felizmente comprometido».

Basabe lleva mucho tiempo negando las acusaciones, y ha señalado dos investigaciones previas iniciadas por la Cámara de Representantes de Florida para examinar las denuncias, ambas desestimadas tras concluirse que no se había cometido ninguna irregularidad.

Las víctimas también han demandado a la Cámara de Representantes de Florida.

A continuación se puede ver retransmisión parcial de la vista celebrada el lunes:

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Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office deputies arrested Guanghui Zhang, Weiling Dong, Qiaozhen Qin, and Wei Men on Monday at 7930 NW 36 St., according to deputies’ arrest reports.

Zhang, 61, whose permanent address is in Freshmeadows, New York, told an undercover officer that “a hand job” would cost $45, according to the arrest report.

Dong, 53, whose permanent address is in Doral, told an undercover officer that “a hand job” would cost $10, according to the arrest report.

Qin, 51, whose permanent address is in Miami-Dade’s West End, told an undercover officer that “a hand job” would cost $70, according to the arrest report.

A sergeant saw Men, 41, whose permanent address is Flushing, New York, “giving a patron a massage,” according to the arrest report.

Miami-Dade corrections booked Men and Dong shortly after midnight on Tuesday at the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center, according to inmate records.

Corrections booked Zhang shortly after 1:30 p.m., and Qin shortly after 11:50 p.m. on Monday at the TGKCC, according to inmate records.

Men faced charges of operating a healthcare practice or profession without an active, valid license; and practicing massage therapy without a license.

Zhang, Dong, and Qin faced charges of operating a healthcare practice or profession without an active, valid license; practicing massage therapy without a license; engaging in prostitution; and committing an unnatural and lascivious act.

Dong and Men also had U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement holds.

Local 10 News Assignment Editor Mercedes Cevallos contributed to this report.

Related story

• Miami-Dade deputies arrest 12 women at 10 massage parlors in 2 days, records show

Agentes de la Oficina del Sheriff de Miami-Dade arrestaron el lunes a Guanghui Zhang, Weiling Dong, Qiaozhen Qin y Wei Men en 7930 NW 36 St., según los informes de arresto de los agentes.

Zhang, de 61 años, cuya dirección permanente está en Freshmeadows, Nueva York, le dijo a un agente encubierto que “un acto sexual manual” costaría $45, según el informe de arresto.

Dong, de 53 años, cuya dirección permanente está en Doral, le dijo a un agente encubierto que “un acto sexual manual” costaría $10, según el informe de arresto.

Qin, de 51 años, cuya dirección permanente está en West End de Miami-Dade, le dijo a un agente encubierto que “un acto sexual manual” costaría $70, según el informe de arresto.

Un sargento vio a Men, de 41 años, cuya dirección permanente es Flushing, Nueva York, “dándole un masaje a un cliente”, según el informe de arresto.

El Departamento de Correcciones de Miami-Dade ingresó a Men y Dong poco después de la medianoche del martes en el Centro Correccional Turner Guilford Knight, según los registros de reclusos.

Según los registros de reclusos, el servicio penitenciario ingresó a Zhang poco después de las 13:30 y a Qin poco después de las 23:50 del lunes en el TGKCC.

Wei Men enfrentó cargos por operar una práctica o profesión de atención médica sin una licencia activa y válida; y practicar terapia de masaje sin licencia.

Zhang, Dong y Qin enfrentaron cargos por operar una práctica o profesión de atención médica sin una licencia activa y válida; practicar terapia de masaje sin licencia; dedicarse a la prostitución; y cometer un acto antinatural y lascivo.

Dong y Men también tenían órdenes de retención del Servicio de Inmigración y Control de Aduanas de Estados Unidos.

La editora de asignaciones de Local 10 News, Mercedes Cevallos, contribuyó a este informe.

Historia relacionada

Arrestan a 12 mujeres en 10 salones de masajes de Miami Dade en dos días, muestran registros.

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.

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.

The relatives of Youlin Chen of Boston broke their silence this week, apparently after they saw no sign from the Chinese government that it was planning to release Chen — even after President Donald Trump brought up the case when meeting Xi in Beijing in May, according to Global Reach, a Washington-based nonprofit organization dedicated to bringing home Americans wrongly detained abroad.

“I have not been able to speak with my husband for over 600 days and am concerned for his health and well-being," Yufang Rong, Chen's wife, said in a statement released by Global Reach, which has been advising the family since Chen's detention.

“President Trump has taken a personal interest in freeing Youlin. Since taking office, he has already freed 106 people and I know that he and his team will bring Youlin home to us," Rong said.

Chen is the only U.S. citizen determined by the State Department to be wrongfully detained in China, Global Reach said. The designation means those cases are of high priority to the U.S. government and can lead to intense diplomatic efforts to secure releases. The Biden administration in 2024 secured the release of three wrongfully detained Americans from China.

“President Trump has been clear that he wants every American detained abroad to return home, and he has reunited over 100 individuals with their families since taking office this term," Anna Kelly, a White House spokesperson, said when asked about Chen's case.

If not resolved, Chen's case could “figure prominently” when Xi is expected to meet Trump in Washington in September, said Eric Lebson, a Global Reach adviser to Chen’s relatives. The family decided to speak out now because Chinese officials do not appear to be acting on Xi's commitment to Trump after the U.S. president raised Chen's detention in May, Lebson said.

The seismologist was detained in November 2024 by state security agents during a personal trip to visit his parents in Beijing, and he has been charged with espionage, Global Reach said.

Chen has worked as a U.S. government contractor for the State Department and Air Force Research Lab, with much of his work involving collaborating with Chinese colleagues to analyze seismological data, Global Reach said.

Chen’s arrest is “likely an effort by Chinese officials to learn about the techniques the U.S. uses to detect nuclear tests using seismic data,” the group said.

U.S. Embassy personnel have been allowed to visit Chen several times but are not allowed to discuss the case with him, the group said.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio designated Chen as a wrongful detainee in March. The State Department didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.

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Lauderhill police identified the suspect as 23-year-old Keysean Mash. They said the investigation was conducted in partnership with the South Florida Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force.

Police said the investigation began in April after the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children received an online tip from Snapchat regarding suspected child sexual abuse material that had been uploaded through a user account.

Investigators said they identified the account as belonging to Mash and executed multiple search warrants and subpoenas during the investigation.

According to police, investigators identified six child victims in multiple states “who had communicated with Mash through social media platforms.”

They said Mash used online applications to engage minors in “sexually explicit conversations, solicit sexually explicit images and videos, transmit material harmful to children and possess child sexual abuse material.”

Jail records show Mash was arrested on 27 felony charges, including 10 counts of possession of child pornography, one count of computer pornography, and four counts each of harmful communication to a minor, transmitting material harmful to a minor by electronic device, lewd or lascivious exhibition using a computer, and solicitation of a child to engage in unlawful sexual conduct.

During a Broward bond court hearing on Tuesday, Mash’s bond was set at $215,000.

A Broward County judge also ordered Mash to remain on house arrest, have no contact with the victims or any children and refrain from using any device with internet access if released.

Police said the investigation remains active.

They said no additional information is being released to protect the privacy of the victims and “preserve the integrity of the investigation.”

Anyone with information on the case is urged to call Broward Crime Stoppers at 954-493-8477.

Local 10 has requested Mash’s arrest report from the Lauderhill Police Department.

Es el tercer incidente de este tipo en dos semanas en un contexto de extrema vulnerabilidad de la red de la isla, bajo un cerco petrolero de Estados Unidos que impide la llegada del crudo usado para impulsar la generación eléctrica y la economía.

La estatal Unión Eléctrica informó que un problema en una unidad generadora en la oriental provincia de Holguín ocasionó “un brusco cambio de frecuencia” ocasionando la desconexión del SEN.

Tanto el Ministerio como la Unión Eléctrica indicaron que “se activaron los protocolos para su recuperación”, lo que significa que se establecen “microislas” que luego se van interconectando y brindando energía a lugares prioritarios como hospitales y fábricas de elaboración de alimentos.

La semana pasada se produjeron dos caídas nacionales —el lunes y el viernes— que dejaron a los más de nueve millones de cubanos a oscuras y se sumaron a otras dos en el mes de marzo, así como a varias de tipo regional.

Los cortes tienen un fuerte impacto en la población que, sumados al cerco energético, han provocado limitaciones en el transporte, recortes en las jornadas laborales y cancelación de vuelos; además de serios impactos en la salud pública. Cuba apenas produce el 40% del combustible que necesita.

Los cortes de energía eléctrica también afectan actividades básicas como la cocción de alimentos, el abastecimiento de agua y las conexiones de internet y telefonía.

The payment — representing the $5 million jury award, plus interest — was made Monday from an account where it had been held in escrow since the 2023 verdict, according to court records. Carroll’s lawyer, Roberta Kaplan, confirmed the payment Tuesday.

“We are pleased to report that she has received the damages payment,” Kaplan said in a statement. Carroll herself later wrote on Substack that “the eagle has landed."

Trump's lawyers have vowed to continue appealing.

Trump deposited the money in an escrow account shortly after the jury ruled against him. The U.S. Supreme Court recently let the civil verdict stand, clearing the way for Judge Lewis A. Kaplan to release the money.

Trump’s lawyers then sought but were denied an emergency order to block the payment. The one-sentence denial set no conditions on how Carroll may use the money. Her lawyers have said in court papers that she plans to put it in a retirement account.

Trump's attorneys have since filed another appeal seeking to stop or reverse the payment.

The jury found Trump attacked Carroll in 1996 in a New York luxury department store dressing room and defamed her after she told the story publicly in a memoir in 2019, during his first term as president.

Trump insisted nothing sexual happened between him and Carroll, now 82, a former advice columnist. Trump claimed she was “totally lying” and “ not my type ” in a 2019 interview. He said he didn't know her, dismissing a 1987 photo of them and their then-spouses at a party as inconsequential, and he accused her of harboring political motives and trying to sell books at his expense.

Trump didn't attend the trial, where Carroll testified that their flirtatious and friendly chance encounter at the department store turned violent.

Carroll sued Trump after New York changed its laws to give sexual abuse survivors a fresh chance to sue over attacks that happened in the distant past.

Trump is also appealing $83 million in defamation compensation granted to Carroll by a separate Manhattan jury after a 2024 trial where Trump briefly testified.

The Associated Press generally does not identify people who say they have been sexually abused. Carroll has agreed to be named.

___

Associated Press writer Michael R. Sisak contributed.

___

This story has been corrected to show that Carroll collected over $5.6 million, not $5.8 million.

La policía de Lauderhill identificó al sospechoso como Keysean Mash, de 23 años. Según indicaron, la investigación se llevó a cabo en colaboración con el Grupo de Trabajo contra los Delitos contra Menores en Internet del Sur de Florida.

La policía indicó que la investigación comenzó en abril, después de que el Centro Nacional para Niños Desaparecidos y Explotados recibiera una denuncia en línea procedente de Snapchat sobre material sospechoso de abuso sexual infantil que se había subido a través de una cuenta de usuario.

Los investigadores afirmaron que identificaron la cuenta como perteneciente a Mash y que ejecutaron múltiples órdenes de registro y citaciones durante la investigación.

Según la policía, los investigadores identificaron a seis menores víctimas en varios estados «que se habían comunicado con Mash a través de plataformas de redes sociales».

Afirmaron que Mash utilizaba aplicaciones en línea para entablar con menores «conversaciones sexualmente explícitas, solicitar imágenes y vídeos sexualmente explícitos, transmitir material perjudicial para los menores y poseer material de abuso sexual infantil».

Los registros penitenciarios muestran que Mash fue detenido por 27 delitos graves, entre los que se incluyen 10 cargos por posesión de pornografía infantil, un cargo por pornografía informática y cuatro cargos por cada uno de los siguientes delitos: comunicación perjudicial a un menor, transmisión de material perjudicial para un menor mediante un dispositivo electrónico, exhibicionismo lascivo mediante un ordenador y incitación a un menor a participar en conductas sexuales ilícitas.

D

El anuncio se produjo casi cuatro semanas después de una reunión en Caracas entre el presidente de la Asamblea Nacional, Jorge Rodríguez —hermano de la presidenta encargada Delcy Rodríguez— y la exdiputada Dinorah Figuera, que regresó brevemente luego de casi ocho años en el exilio.

En un comunicado publicado en sus redes sociales la Asamblea Nacional resaltó que el inicio de la “hoja de trabajo conjunta” es también parte de “la convocatoria a la unidad nacional para enfrentar todos juntos las consecuencias del doblete sísmico que nos enluta”.

Los dos poderosos sismos que sacudieron Venezuela del 24 de junio dejaron al menos 4.561 fallecidos, 16.740 heridos y más de 20.00 personas sin hogar, según el más reciente reporte difundido por las autoridades.

“El apoyo internacional unánime a nuestro pueblo y el gobierno nacional para enfrentar la tragedia destacan que sólo en unión podremos avanzar en la reconstrucción y en el mantenimiento de la paz”, agregó el escrito.

Estados Unidos fue el principal impulsor de la iniciativa. Se espera que la agenda sirva de "hoja de ruta para un diálogo político orientado a una transición democrática”, indicó en junio en un comunicado el vocero del Departamento de Estado, Tommy Pigott.

Washington entiende que la agenda debe contemplar prioridades tales como la reconstrucción de las instituciones democráticas de Venezuela, el fortalecimiento del Consejo Nacional Electoral (CNE), el restablecimiento de garantías duraderas para la participación política y la salvaguardia de las libertades cívicas "esenciales para un debate político abierto”, destacó el escrito publicado en la página del Departamento de Estado luego de la reunión entre Rodríguez y Figuera.

Después de que fuerzas estadounidenses capturaron a Maduro y a su esposa en una operación militar la madrugada del 3 de enero, el gobierno de Donald Trump propuso un plan de “tres fases” para Venezuela que incluye la estabilización, recuperación y transición democrática.

En una reunión virtual en 2023 Figuera fue escogida para ser representante de los exlegisladores opositores de la Asamblea Nacional de 2015, cuyo mandato de cinco años concluyó a fines de 2020. Ese poder legislativo, de mayoría opositora, fue considerado ampliamente en su momento la última institución de Venezuela elegida democráticamente.

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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.

A family member of the victim 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.

The civil rights suit, filed Tuesday, names the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, as the architect of what it describes as a conspiracy to target members of the pro-Palestinian movement by smearing them as antisemites.

Those efforts were furthered by Canary Mission and Betar, two pro-Israel groups that maintain online lists of Israel's critics, often alongside unsubstantiated claims that they are affiliated with Hamas, according to the lawsuit.

Those “selected for state targeting” by the private actors, the suit states, “were nearly automatically targeted by the Federal Defendants for arrest and removal.”

Lawyers for Khalil argue this “public-private partnership” could violate the Ku Klux Klan Act, a Reconstruction-era law that sought to restrict government coordination with vigilante groups.

Emailed inquiries to the Heritage Foundation, Canary Mission and Betar were not immediately returned on Tuesday.

Abigail Jackson, a White House spokesperson, did not comment on the lawsuit, but said in an email that the executive branch “has the lawful authority to take actions that will protect the public and to ensure the integrity of our immigration system.”

The lawsuit comes as Khalil's ongoing deportation case appears likely to be heard before the U.S. Supreme Court. Many of the details included in the complaint were first brought to light in a separate trial last year.

At a news conference on Tuesday, he said the lawsuit was “about exposing the network of organizations, particular actors and institutions that work together to criminalize solidarity with Palestine and to make an example of those who refuse to stay silent."

“If constitutional protections can be cast aside under political pressure today, they can be cast aside tomorrow against anyone,” he added.

A former graduate student at Columbia University, Khalil gained prominence as a spokesperson and leader for student activists protesting against Israel and its actions in Gaza.

He was arrested in March 2025 by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in his campus apartment. He quickly became the face of the Trump administration crackdown on pro-Palestinian demonstrators.

Khalil then spent 104 days in a Louisiana immigration jail, missing the birth of his first child, before a federal judge in New Jersey ordered his release.

Khalil has forcefully denied that his role in pro-Palestinian protests amounts to antisemitism.

“My beliefs are not wanting my tax money or tuition going toward investments in weapons manufacturers for a genocide,” he previously told The Associated Press. “It’s as simple as that.”

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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.

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.

Las acciones se formalizaron una semana después del deceso del inmigrante mexicano Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, quien murió tras ser tiroteado por un agente de ICE en Houston. Desde el inicio del segundo mandato de Donald Trump han muerto 17 migrantes mexicanos de los cuales 14 estaban bajo custodia de ICE y tres en operativos de esa dependencia.

La Secretaría de Relaciones Exteriores indicó el martes en un comunicado que la embajada de México en Estados Unidos y sus consulados presentaron denuncias ante las fiscalías estatales competentes, pero no ofreció detalles.

La cancillería mexicana también tiene previsto presentar una denuncia ante el Departamento de Justicia de Estados Unidos.

Alterno a esas acciones, el gobierno mexicano inició el envío de escritos a los centros de detención estadounidenses donde han fallecido migrantes mexicanos para que “cesen de inmediato las acciones u omisiones que derivaron en estas muertes, tales como impedir el acceso a atención médica pronta y expedita, así como la aplicación de políticas incompatibles con los estándares médicos y penitenciarios”, refirió el comunicado.

El primer centro al que se envió el documento fue el de Adelanto, en el estado de California, donde fallecieron cuatro migrantes mexicanos.

Según explicó la Secretaría de Relaciones Exteriores los escritos constituyen el primer paso para “la eventual presentación de acciones civiles”.

Al explicar los alcances de las acciones, el canciller mexicano Roberto Velasco dijo la semana pasada que México acudiría directamente ante las instancias estadounidenses para presentar denuncias sobre los casos y solicitar que “se investigue en el ámbito penal” los hechos.

Añadió que el gobierno mexicano también ejercería acciones civiles contra las empresas que operan los centros de detención para que cesen las violaciones a los derechos humanos en esos lugares.

Según el Departamento de Seguridad Nacional, que supervisa al ICE, Salgado Araujo, de 52 años, embistió un vehículo del ICE y un agente federal disparó un arma en defensa propia.

El migrante fallecido, que no tenía antecedentes penales y vivía en Estados Unidos desde hace 35 años, fue baleado mientras llevaba a su cuadrilla de construcción a una obra en Houston.

Su muerte desató protestas en Houston y exigencias de una investigación independiente por parte de los demócratas y de la familia de Salgado Araujo.

La cancillería informó que Velasco envió un escrito al Alto Comisionado de las Naciones Unidas para los Derechos Humanos, Volker Türk, para que se recabe la información de las autoridades estadounidense sobre la muerte de los migrantes mexicanos que estaban bajo custodia de ICE y se analice la “compatibilidad de estos hechos con las obligaciones internacionales en la materia”.

Asimismo, el canciller mexicano solicitó a Türk que formule las recomendaciones respectivas y se tramiten los casos como los procedimientos especiales del Consejo de Derechos Humanos.

La policía de Hialeah dijo que Yashira Marie Maldonado, de 34 años, hizo esto en el apartamento tipo estudio de su madre antes de irse en su auto. Según un informe de arresto, todo indica que dejó a la niña encadenada afuera durante casi una hora el sábado por la mañana antes de que la policía se enterara.

La edad exacta de la menor fue censurada en el reporte del Departamento de Policía de Hialeah (HPD), pero según el año de nacimiento incluido, tendría 13 o 14 años.

El reporte del HPD indica que los oficiales respondieron a la casa de Maldonado, cuya dirección fue censurada, alrededor de las 10 a.m. del sábado tras recibir reportes de un disturbio.

La policía dijo que la madre de Maldonado les contó que había ido a la casa de su hija para “rogarle” que regresara y liberara a la niña.

Las autoridades indicaron que volvieron a la casa de la madre de Maldonado y encontraron a la menor “todavía encadenada a la cerca, pero en buen estado de salud”.

Según el reporte, la madre de Maldonado explicó que poco después de recibir un mensaje de texto de su hija a eso de las 9:10 a.m. que decía “¡Me despidieron de mi trabajo!!!!!!”, abrió la puerta de su casa y, “sin poder creerlo”, la cerró al ver a su nieta encadenada afuera.

El reporte señala que luego salió e “intentó liberar a la víctima de la cadena, pero no lo logró”.

Según el informe, la madre de Maldonado les dijo a los oficiales que “no llamó a la policía porque teme que su casero la desaloje”.

El reporte indica que las cámaras de seguridad mostraron a Maldonado atando a la niña a la cerca alrededor de las 9:05 a.m.

La policía dijo que el video mostraba a Maldonado “amarrar una cadena de metal alrededor de la cintura de (su hija) y atar el otro extremo a la cerca de la casa, impidiéndole moverse”.

“(Ella) dejó a (su hija) con una mochila transparente, algo de ropa y su medicamento”, indica el reporte. “(Maldonado) dejó a (su hija) afuera, sin protección contra el sol y sin comida ni agua”.

La policía dijo que el video mostró después a Maldonado “subir a su vehículo y abandonar el lugar”.

Agregaron que trasladaron a Maldonado a la sede del HPD, donde habló con los investigadores. Las declaraciones que habría hecho fueron censuradas en el reporte.

Enfrentando cargos de abuso y negligencia infantil, a Maldonado se le fijó una fianza de $10,000.

Hasta el lunes a media mañana, ya no aparecía en los registros de la cárcel de Miami-Dade.

“You never know how long it lasts,” said Pogačar, who is on course to equal the record for Tour wins. Only Belgian Eddy Merckx, Spaniard Miguel Indurain and Frenchmen Jacques Anquetil and Bernard Hinault have five Tour victories to their names.

“We just need to be grateful for this moment to be riding in the biggest race of the world,” the 27-year-old Pogačar said.

Pogačar, who had already sapped his rivals’ morale with victory on the iconic Col du Tourmalet on Thursday, again stamped his authority with a break just over 900 meters from the summit of the Col de Pertus, the penultimate climb on Tuesday’s hilly stage.

Pogačar’s main challenger Jonas Vingegaard couldn’t follow and Pogačar quickly made ground on Richard Carapaz before powering past him 200 meters before the summit. The Slovenian rider didn’t slow down. Pogačar was 5 seconds ahead of Carapaz at the summit, and 18 ahead of Vingegaard, Remco Evenepoel, Florian Lipowitz, Juan Ayuso and Paul Seixas.

He then increased that lead.

At the finish line, Pogačar was 32 seconds ahead of Evenepoel for his 24th stage victory altogether – his third on Bastille Day, France’s national holiday – and the third already at this Tour.

Seixas, French fans’ greatest hope, was third, 34 seconds behind.

Vingegaard could only finish 44 seconds behind Pogačar, leaving the yellow jersey holder with a lead of 3 minutes, 36 seconds after 10 stages.

Pogačar already had the biggest lead he has ever had at this stage of the race.

Teamed to perfection

Pogačar's UAE Emirates-XRG teammates controlled Tuesday's stage even when Mathieu van der Poel, the winner of the previous stage, was among a group of 31 riders that pulled away before the first climb of the day on Côte de Pailherols.

Javier Romo emerged to lead alone but he was never allowed to get too far ahead. Carapaz attacked after the Spanish rider was caught by the peloton and he in turn was powerless to prevent Pogačar surging past on the Col de Pertus.

“The team did a super good job. We targeted this stage a long time ago,” said Pogačar, who remembered being beaten by Vingegaard “fair and square” at Le Lioran two years earlier. That was the Dane's last stage win over his rival.

“Today I had similar legs in the finish, completely destroyed,” said Pogačar, who added he couldn't hear anything over his radio because of the noise from fans. “I didn’t know I was going to win until the last kilometer.”

Some fans booed, but Pogačar said he didn't mind.

“To all the guys that were booing, they give us more power,” he said.

___

AP sports: https://apnews.com/sports

Registros de la cárcel de BSO muestran que el sargento Scott Nelson Nida, de 55 años, fue arrestado por agentes en Pompano Beach el sábado. Se le acusa de violar una orden de protección por violencia doméstica.

El primer arresto de Nida ocurrió en enero, luego de ser acusado de atacar a su pareja de muchos años por un caso de infidelidad. La víctima posteriormente renunció a la acusación y se desestimó una orden de no contacto. Ella declaró a los investigadores que “sintió que la coaccionaron para retirar los cargos”, ya que Nida supuestamente le dijo que “perdería su trabajo y su pensión”.

Pero Nida fue arrestado nuevamente en abril, acusado de atacar a su pareja por segunda vez y de robar su vehículo. Los registros muestran que esos cargos siguen pendientes, con una audiencia programada para el 30 de julio.

Fue arrestado un mes después por un cargo de violación de una orden de protección por violencia doméstica. Un reporte de BSO indica que permitió que su novia viviera con él “porque ella y su hija fueron desalojadas de su residencia anterior” y que ambas recurrieron a Nida “porque no tenían adónde ir”.

Registros judiciales muestran que los fiscales de Broward decidieron no presentar cargos en ese caso.

Su informe de arresto más reciente indica que esa es la misma razón por la que nuevamente terminó tras las rejas.

Según las autoridades, un conocido de Nida solicitó una verificación de bienestar el 11 de julio tras recibir mensajes preocupantes de su parte.

Cuando las autoridades llegaron, informaron que Nida entró a la vivienda y se desplazó por el interior de la casa antes de volver a salir.

Un dron de la Policía encontró a la mujer y a su hijo escondidos en un área de almacenamiento. El informe indica: “Ambos admitieron que él había ideado un plan para que se escondieran en el patio trasero si las autoridades llegaban a la vivienda, plan que ejecutaron esa noche”.

La mujer dijo a la Policía que ella y su hijo habían permanecido durante varias semanas en la casa de Nida debido a una crisis financiera y que incluso tenían una llave de la vivienda.

Hasta la mañana del lunes, Nida permanecía detenido en la cárcel principal de la BSO, a la espera de una audiencia judicial programada.

Nota del editor: Esta historia fue actualizada después de que Local 10 News recibiera una aclaración sobre la situación laboral de Nida y una copia de su informe de arresto.

Bruce Meyer, who took over when Tony Clark was forced out in February, said the sport was thriving despite assertions by Major League Baseball that massive change is needed.

“I have watched over the last few years the owners, the commissioner’s office, try to convince fans, the consumers of their product, that the product is broken,” Meyer said ahead of the All-Star Game. "The supposed stewards of the game have spent an inordinate amount of time trying to convince those same fans that they don’t have hope or they shouldn’t have hope or that the product that they’re paying to consume in record numbers is somehow broken. I think it’s perverse.”

Attendance has averaged 29,230 this season, up 1.2% from 28,895 through similar dates last year. MLB is on pace for its highest attendance since 2017.

Management in May proposed a salary cap system, which players say they will never accept. MLB launched a “Level the Field” campaign claiming fans support a cap that contains a floor.

“In order for this game to reach its full potential we need to continue to address concerns that our fans have, particularly concerns that go to the core of what we’re about, that is competitive balance,” Manfred said in a separate question-and-answer session.

“We need to make sure that fans in markets at the beginning of the season have a realistic belief that their team has a chance to win," he added. "I think that we need a system where fans, particularly in smaller markets, can have some hope that the players that are signed and developed by their organizations can actually stay there through free agency and honestly I think we need a system where there is a more robust free agent market, so if you don’t want to go to New York or Los Angeles, you have a realistic opportunity to get a viable free agent contract.”

Fans have responded positively to MLB's changes in the 2020s, which include expanded playoffs in 2022, a pitch clock in 2023 and an appeals system to robot umpires for strike zone decisions this year.

“We got that momentum by listening to our fans and making changes that, candidly, the MLBPA was not interested in,” Manfred said. “Those changes have paid off in terms of creating that momentum, and the best way to lose momentum is to stand still.”

No small-market team has won the World Series since the 2015 Kansas City Royals. The Los Angeles Dodgers, coming off their second straight title, had a $323.3 million opening-day payroll for their 40-man roster and a $163.7 million tax for a $487.1 million total. Cleveland had the lowest payroll at $75.5 million.

“It defies human experience to ask a fan to think that the bottom end of that gap has the same opportunity to win as the top,” Manfred said. “There is no question, OK, that everybody in any sport is not going to win once every 30 or 32 years depending on how many teams you have, but the data in our sport is stark. Your opportunity to make the playoffs if you are a larger-market team is dramatically higher and your opportunity to proceed to the subsequent rounds, that advantage grows with each round.”

Meyer said unions for players in the NFL, NBA and NHL agreed to caps under duress.

“In one way or the other they were broken or forced into it,” he said. “I believe that this system is bad for players and would be for generations to come."

Baseball’s five-year labor contract expires Dec. 1 and management is expected to immediately start a lockout, the sport’s 10th work stoppage since 1972. No games have been lost since a 7 1/2-month strike in 1994-95 caused the World Series to be canceled for the first in 90 years.

“Teams in every market across the league can afford to compete," Meyer said. “Many of them are choosing not to. From our standpoint, that’s the biggest problem in the game right now."

Meyer said owners want a cap to guarantee profits and increase franchise values, a system he called “subsidized mediocrity.”

“They don’t want it because they’re just so concerned about the fans,” he said. “If they were so concerned about the fans, they would listen to the fans all across baseball who are literally chanting 'Sell the team.' They want their owners to sell the team because they feel they're not competing."

Manfred did not want to comment on whether he thought President Donald Trump, who said he supports a cap, would attempt to intervene in bargaining.

“It would be wildly, wildly inappropriate for me to speculate about what the president of the United States might do or not do in a hypothetical situation,” he said.

Manfred defended MLB's advertising campaign supporting a cap.

“Sometimes the other side may not be completely accurate or fair in terms of their recitation and what’s going on,” he said.

___

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

A 28-year-old man arrested on suspicion of murder and terror crimes remains in custody on an extended detention warrant under the Terrorism Act that allows police to question him for up to another week.

“It is clear that this was a targeted attack,” Laurence Taylor, head of National Counter Terrorism Policing told reporters. “We are still working to understand the extent of any planning or preparation, and the motivation that sits behind that attack.”

The death of Widdecombe, 78, a former member of Parliament, shocked the British political establishment, where she was long known for blunt-spoken socially conservative views opposing abortion and the expansion of LGBTQ+ rights.

Counterterror police took over the investigation Monday 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.

Devon and Cornwall Police and Crime Commissioner Alison Hernandez defended her agency Tuesday, saying new information often changes the nature of a fast-paced investigation.

Police believe Widdecombe was attacked on Wednesday just past noon. She failed to show up for a scheduled TV interview about an hour later and was found dead the next day in her isolated rural home in a village in southwest England.

Police did not disclose a cause of death, saying only that she had sustained “serious injuries.” Taylor called it a “brutal attack on a 78-year-old lady in her own home.”

The suspect was arrested Saturday in South Yorkshire county in northern England, more than 200 miles (320 kilometers) from the village of Haytor on the edge of Dartmoor National Park, where Widdecombe died.

Police have conducted extensive searches at his home and Taylor said they found evidence of planning, but he declined to provide details.

The man was arrested Saturday on suspicion of murder, but additional evidence found while he was in custody led police to rearrest him on suspicion of commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism.

The suspect has not been named because he has not been charged.

Widdecombe was in the House of Commons from 1987 to 2010, serving in roles including prisons minister in Prime Minister John Major’s 1990s Conservative government.

She found fame after leaving Parliament as a contestant on the reality television shows “Strictly Come Dancing” and “Celebrity Big Brother.”

She later joined the Brexit Party, briefly serving as a member of the European Parliament before Britain left the European Union in 2020. Most recently, she joined the anti-immigration Reform UK party, often appearing in the media as a spokesperson.

The killing renewed concerns for politicians about security, which was tightened in the past decade after the murders of two serving members of Parliament. Labour lawmaker Jo Cox was shot and stabbed in 2016 by a far-right extremist, and Conservative David Amess was stabbed in 2021 by an attacker inspired by the Islamic State group.

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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.

Han pasado 26 días desde que tuvimos un sistema activo (Arthur, de corta duración, el 17 de junio) en cualquier parte del Golfo, el Caribe o el Atlántico, y desde el 30 de junio —cuando monitoreábamos una débil baja presión asociada a un frente con probabilidades mínimas de desarrollo— el Centro Nacional de Huracanes (NHC) no ha incluido ningún sistema en su mapa de perspectivas tropicales.

Julio suele ser un mes tranquilo, por lo que esto, por sí solo, no es algo fuera de lo común. Incluso durante temporadas de huracanes que terminaron siendo más activas, como la de 2016, el Centro Nacional de Huracanes mantuvo su mapa de perspectivas vacío durante gran parte del mes. La situación se vuelve más inusual cuando la calma se prolonga hasta agosto (algo que ya hemos visto en temporadas recientes).

Aun así, ha sido un inicio de temporada inusualmente lento, el menos activo desde 2009, y como hemos explicado ampliamente en este boletín, las condiciones apuntan a que esta podría ser una de las temporadas menos activas en más de una década. Sin embargo, basta con un solo huracán de gran impacto para convertirla en una mala temporada, por lo que seguimos atentos.

Disminuyen aún más las ya bajas probabilidades de actividad tropical en el Golfo a principios de la próxima semana

Durante el fin de semana, algunos de los nuevos modelos de inteligencia artificial, en particular el sistema de modelación del Centro Europeo, mostraron un aumento en las probabilidades de desarrollo de un área de baja presión inicialmente no tropical sobre el noreste del Golfo.

Ese aumento provocó la reacción habitual en algunos sectores de las redes sociales (¡esperemos que no en los suyos!), principalmente por el modelo determinista (una sola ejecución) de inteligencia artificial del Centro Europeo, que proyectó un sistema con fuerza de huracán sobre el norte del Golfo a principios de la próxima semana en los pronósticos emitidos desde la tarde del domingo.

Por supuesto, quienes siguen regularmente este boletín saben que los modelos de una sola ejecución con pronósticos de más de una semana no son una fuente confiable, a menos que estén respaldados por evidencia sólida de conjuntos de múltiples modelos (algo que, en este caso, claramente no ocurrió).

Además, como hemos explicado en publicaciones anteriores, el modelo de inteligencia artificial del Centro Europeo ha demostrado no tener capacidad para pronosticar la intensidad de los sistemas, por lo que sus proyecciones de intensidad deben interpretarse con mucho escepticismo.

Desde ese pronóstico muy optimista emitido el domingo, el modelo de inteligencia artificial del Centro Europeo ya redujo significativamente sus proyecciones iniciales.

Incluso los modelos por conjuntos más conservadores que respaldaban bajas probabilidades de desarrollo durante los últimos días, tal como comentamos en el boletín del lunes, ahora muestran una tendencia con probabilidades aún menores de desarrollo para la próxima semana.

En términos generales, la atmósfera sobre el norte del Golfo no presenta condiciones favorables para un desarrollo significativo a principios de la próxima semana, y el sistema en el que se enfocan los modelos comenzará como un área de rotación en niveles medios de la atmósfera, lo que significa que, si llega a desarrollarse, esa circulación tendría que extenderse hasta la superficie.

Este proceso menos convencional, de arriba hacia abajo, representa un obstáculo mayor que el desarrollo tradicional de abajo hacia arriba (circulaciones que comienzan en la superficie y se fortalecen a medida que las tormentas se organizan sobre aguas cálidas).

La perturbación en niveles medios también comenzará en la base de una vaguada de la corriente en chorro de rápido desplazamiento, lo que tampoco favorecerá su desarrollo.

En conjunto, no es una zona donde debamos esperar un desarrollo significativo. Ayer, los modelos por conjuntos sugerían probabilidades de desarrollo de entre un 10% y un 20%, pero hoy esas probabilidades han disminuido en su mayoría a menos del 10%.

Debido al calor casi récord en las aguas del noreste del Golfo y a la cercanía de la perturbación a tierra, por supuesto seguiremos monitoreando las tendencias, especialmente por la posibilidad de lluvias más intensas asociadas principalmente a procesos no tropicales hacia finales de la próxima semana, pero por ahora no hay motivo de preocupación.

Por lo demás, la abundante cizalladura del viento mantendrá tranquilos los trópicos durante el futuro previsible.

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Investigators say 28-year-old Michael-Anthony Leones Espino, known to friends as Mykee, was last seen Sunday afternoon leaving a home along Southwest 161st Court and 142nd Terrace in west Miami-Dade County.

Detectives and family members released several missing person flyers that indicate he may be in need of services.

Videos from his Instagram page show Espino doing what he loved, dancing, after performing with major Latin artists including Rauw Alejandro and Rosalía.

His friends are now hoping for his safe return.

“I met him during college at FIU,” said friend Camilo Restrepo. “Incredible guy, he was always so far into dancing, so while everybody else was busy and wanted to party and wanted to do other things, he was just so into the dancing. That’s all he ever wanted to do.”

Earlier on Monday, Local 10 News cameras captured deputies blocking off the street outside his family’s home with crime scene tape.

Detectives say his family is now asking for privacy and have not released any further details about Espino’s disappearance.

Anyone with information on his whereabouts Is asked to contact the Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office or Miami-Dade Crime Stoppers at 305-471-TIPS.

The United States on Monday introduced new sanctions targeting companies controlled by GAESA, Cuba’s military economic conglomerate, as well as some of the military brigades responsible for suppressing protests like the ones we saw the other day.

How much longer can the Cuban government hold on? Information continues to reach U.S. officials indicating that there are sectors within the Cuban government that are increasingly concerned about how much longer they can survive without negotiating with the U.S. government before facing a complete collapse of their system.

July 10 update: Does Raul Castro’s grandson have the full authority to negotiate for the Cuban government?

As I expected, there seems to be a small crack within the inner circle of the Cuban government. Some have criticized Raulito (Raul Castro’s grandson) for offering to negotiate directly with President Trump. The criticism comes as to whether he has the full authority to negotiate for the Cuban government or is he just negotiating for the Castro family?

Yesterday, the Cuban Communist Party (PCC) backed Raulito’s efforts, but the military leadership has remained quiet.

July 8 update: United Nations has no legal right to lift U.S. embargo on Cuba

Every year, Cuba argues in front of the United Nations that the U.S. economic embargo is the cause for their economic problems. Each year, Cuba loses more support for their argument. The United Nations has no legitimate or legal right to lift the embargo. The U.S. Congress can only lift the embargo.

The Cuban government propaganda machine has failed. Most Cubans on the island, including economists on the island, blame the Cuban government for their current poor economic conditions.

July 6 update: Raul Castro’s grandson says Cuba is willing to negotiate with US

Reuters reported earlier this morning that Raul Castro’s grandson Raulito, known as “El Cangrejo,” announced that Cuba is willing to negotiate with the U.S. The question we need to ask ourselves is whether Raulito is negotiating on behalf of the Castro family or the Cuban government?

We know that Cuba has been selling some of their assets, including some belonging to the military economic conglomerate GAESA in the last couple of weeks. Cuba’s attempt to invite foreign investment has not attracted many takers for the fear of losing their money.

July 2 update: Cuba’s culture of fear complicates a Democratic transition

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When we talk about Cuba, we usually concentrate on their centralized political and economic system. However, we fail to recognize that individuals that have lived under totalitarian regimes have had to survive under a culture of fear. Such system of government creates a psychological set of attitudes and values that help define the daily behavior in order to align the people’s wants and needs to the restrictions imposed by the government.

To break such behaviors could take years of psychological training and change. Therefore, transitioning a totalitarian state to support a transition to some form of a Democratic government could take time.

Dr. Andy S. Gomez’s June updates can be viewed by clicking here.

Dr. Andy S. Gomez is Local 10’s Cuba Analyst. Gomez is considered one of the leading scholars on Cuba. He worked in higher education for 32 years before retiring from the University of Miami in 2012.

A la niña se le diagnosticó “autismo de leve a moderado”, y el abuso “comenzó cuando ella tenía 10 años, y cumplirá 13 este año”, escribió un oficial de la policía de Hallandale Beach, según un informe policial.

Durante la investigación policial, una analista de ADN de la Oficina del Sheriff de Broward reportó en abril que se halló ADN perteneciente a Daley, de 56 años, en “la zona exterior de la entrepierna” del pantalón de pijama de la niña, según un informe policial.

La investigación comenzó después de que la niña le contara a su madre que Daley había abusado sexualmente de ella el 17 de febrero, y oficiales de la policía de Hallandale Beach se reunieron con ellas en el supermercado Publix de Hallandale Beach, donde Daley trabajaba como empleado de bodega en el departamento de congelados desde hacía unos cuatro años, según el informe policial.

“Ella solo lleva a la víctima al trabajo cuando no tiene quién la cuide... la víctima se queda sentada en el cuarto de descanso”, escribió un oficial de policía, según el informe de arresto.

Un detective que investigaba el caso encontró, el 23 de febrero, un video de vigilancia que mostraba a Daley “mirar a su alrededor antes de entrar al cuarto de descanso” poco después de las 9:55 p.m., y salir a las 10 p.m. del 17 de febrero, según la policía.

La niña participó en una entrevista forense en el Nancy J. Cotterman Center, en Oakland Park, y relató que Daley había abusado de ella unas 30 veces en el Publix ubicado en el 1400 East Hallandale Beach, según el informe de arresto del oficial.

“Ella siempre le dice ‘¡No!’. Pero él sigue tocándola en contra de su voluntad... le dolía... ella se sintió amenazada”, escribió un oficial de policía sobre el relato de la niña durante la entrevista, según el informe.

Registros judiciales del condado de Broward muestran que los fiscales presentaron el 29 de junio un caso por delito grave de primer grado contra Daley, residente de Miramar. Enfrenta cuatro cargos de actos lascivos o lascivia con una menor.

Los oficiales de policía ejecutaron la orden de arresto el domingo, y el personal de BSO Corrections ingresó a Daley en la Cárcel Principal del Condado de Broward, en Fort Lauderdale. Compareció en corte el lunes, y un juez le negó la fianza.

La jueza del Tribunal Circuito del Condado de Broward, Barbara Duffy, presidirá el caso.

Un portavoz de Publix emitió un comunicado el lunes por la tarde en el que informaba de que Daley ya no trabajaba en Publix.

Los investigadores informaron que Michael-Anthony Leones Espino, de 28 años, conocido por sus amigos como Mykee, fue visto por última vez el domingo por la tarde al salir de una vivienda ubicada en Southwest 161st Court y 142nd Terrace, en el oeste del condado Miami-Dade.

Los detectives y familiares difundieron varios volantes de persona desaparecida que indican podría necesitar asistencia.

Videos publicados en su cuenta de Instagram muestran a Espino haciendo lo que más le gustaba: bailar, tras presentarse con importantes artistas latinos como Rauw Alejandro y Rosalía.

Ahora, sus amigos esperan su regreso sano y salvo.

“Lo conocí durante la universidad en FIU”, dijo su amigo Camilo Restrepo. “Era una persona increíble. Siempre estuvo completamente dedicado al baile, así que mientras los demás estaban ocupados, querían ir de fiesta o hacer otras cosas, él solo pensaba en bailar. Eso era todo lo que siempre quiso hacer”.

Más temprano el lunes, las cámaras de Local 10 News captaron a agentes bloqueando la calle frente a la casa de su familia con cinta de escena del crimen.

Los detectives informaron que la familia pidió privacidad y no ha divulgado más detalles sobre la desaparición de Espino.

Cualquier persona con información sobre su paradero debe comunicarse con la Oficina del Sheriff de Miami-Dade o con Miami-Dade Crime Stoppers al 305-471-TIPS.

Mike Sargis, administrador de la ciudad de North Lauderdale, dijo que una cámara de vigilancia Ring grabó el video en una casa ubicada en Pebble Beach Road, cerca del Bulevar de los Campeones.

“La familia comenzó a hacerle RCP”, escribió Sargis en un comunicado el lunes por la mañana.

Personal de Bomberos y Rescate de la Oficina del Sheriff de Broward y agentes de la BSO respondieron a la piscina de la vivienda alrededor de las 10:30 a.m. del domingo.

El niño fue trasladado al Broward Health Medical Center y su estado era crítico, según agentes de la Oficina del Sheriff de Broward.

“Lo último que supimos es que el niño estaba en condición muy grave”, escribió Sargis en el comunicado.

Al menos tres niños se han ahogado este verano en el condado de Broward.

Un niño de 2 años murió ahogado el 12 de julio en un lago de Plantation.

Cerca de ahí, una niña de 4 años murió ahogada el 5 de julio en un lago de Plantation.

Un niño de 4 años murió ahogado el 19 de junio en una piscina de North Lauderdale.

Niños de entre 1 y 4 años fallecen más por ahogamiento que por cualquier otra causa de muerte, según los Centros para el Control y la Prevención de Enfermedades (CDC) de Estados Unidos.

Algunas de las formas de reducir el riesgo incluyen clases formales de natación para los niños e instalar una cerca de cuatro lados de al menos cuatro pies de altura que rodee completamente la piscina de la vivienda.

La Cruz Roja cuenta con recursos educativos para los niños y sus cuidadores.

El Departamento de Salud de Florida en el condado Broward tiene un programa de vales para cubrir el costo de las clases para niños desde bebés hasta los 17 años. Para más información, visite esta página.

Área de Pebble Beach en North Lauderdale.

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The new daily route becomes the airline’s second connection between the U.S. and Venezuela and comes at a critical time, as Venezuela continues to recover from recent earthquakes and flights to and from Caracas (CCS) remain temporarily suspended.

According to airport officials, the flight will be operated by Envoy Air, a wholly owned subsidiary of American Airlines, using an Embraer E-175 aircraft.

Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava is expected to attend the event, along with Vice President of MIA Operations Juan Carlos Liscano and Miami International Airport Director and CEO Ralph Cutie for remarks ahead of the inaugural departure.

Click here for a list of locations where you can drop off donations for Venezuela.

La nueva ruta diaria se convierte en la segunda conexión de la aerolínea entre Estados Unidos y Venezuela, asimismo, llega en un momento crítico, mientras Venezuela continúa recuperándose de los recientes terremotos y los vuelos hacia y desde Caracas (CCS) permanecen suspendidos temporalmente.

Según funcionarios del aeropuerto, el vuelo será operado por Envoy Air, una subsidiaria de propiedad total de American Airlines, con una aeronave Embraer E-175.

Se espera que la alcaldesa del condado Miami-Dade, Daniella Levine Cava, asista al evento, junto con el vicepresidente de Operaciones de MIA, Juan Carlos Liscano, y el director y CEO del Aeropuerto Internacional de Miami, Ralph Cutie, quienes ofrecerán unas palabras antes de la salida del vuelo inaugural.

Haga clic aquí para consultar una lista de lugares donde puede entregar donaciones para Venezuela.

Los documentos judiciales más recientes muestran que el pueblo de Pembroke Park citó a la esposa de Jacobs, Angela Jacobs, para una declaración jurada y solicitó numerosos documentos como parte del proceso de descubrimiento de pruebas.

El pueblo también solicitó registros a varias terceras partes, entre ellas a Verizon Communications, la División de Elecciones del Departamento de Estado de Florida, el condado Broward y el Distrito Escolar del condado St. Lucie.

El descubrimiento de pruebas es la etapa de una demanda en la que ambas partes recopilan evidencia antes de que un juez decida los asuntos en disputa.

Los documentos representan el capítulo más reciente de una disputa que comenzó después de que una investigación de Local 10 News descubriera registros públicos que muestran que Jacobs y su esposa son propietarios de una vivienda en Fort Pierce, en el condado St. Lucie.

Local 10 News también informó que los registros públicos mostraban que la propiedad recibió una exención de vivienda principal de Florida y una exención de impuestos para veteranos con discapacidades permanentes y totales relacionadas con el servicio militar, lo que redujo el valor imponible de la propiedad en aproximadamente $535,000 USD.

Según la ley de Florida, esas exenciones generalmente solo se aplican a propiedades que sirven como residencia permanente del propietario.

Local 10 News también revisó documentos hipotecarios que muestran que la vivienda fue comprada con un préstamo respaldado por el Departamento de Asuntos de Veteranos (VA). Los documentos del préstamo incluían una certificación de ocupación en la que el prestatario manifestaba su intención de ocupar la propiedad como residencia principal, de acuerdo con los requisitos de ocupación de la VA.

Tras el reportaje de Local 10 News, los registros públicos de la Oficina del Tasador de Propiedades del condado St. Lucie muestran que la exención para veteranos con discapacidad fue eliminada de la propiedad.

Jacobs ha sostenido de manera constante que vive en Pembroke Park y cumple con los requisitos para desempeñarse como alcalde.

Tras la investigación de Local 10 News, varios comisionados de Pembroke Park cuestionaron si Jacobs seguía cumpliendo con los requisitos de residencia establecidos en la carta constitutiva del pueblo y buscaron realizar una votación sobre su elegibilidad para permanecer en el cargo.

Antes de que esa votación pudiera realizarse, Jacobs presentó una demanda y obtuvo una orden de restricción temporal que bloqueó la reunión.

En marzo, la jueza del Circuito de Broward Shari Africk Olefson dictaminó que la comisión del pueblo no tenía autoridad legal para determinar la elegibilidad de Jacobs mediante una votación de la comisión.

En su orden por escrito, Olefson concluyó que la comisión “carece de autoridad legal para votar sobre la elegibilidad del alcalde”.

La jueza prohibió a la comisión votar sobre la elegibilidad de Jacobs y determinó que el asunto debía resolverse a través de los tribunales.

La orden no determinó dónde vive Jacobs ni si finalmente cumple con los requisitos de residencia para seguir siendo alcalde. En cambio, el fallo abordó quién tiene la autoridad legal para tomar esa determinación.

Tras el fallo, el pueblo de Pembroke Park cambió su estrategia legal.

En lugar de pedir a los comisionados que determinaran la elegibilidad de Jacobs, el pueblo presentó una contrademanda solicitando al tribunal una sentencia declaratoria sobre si Jacobs cumple con los requisitos de residencia establecidos en la carta constitutiva del pueblo.

Jacobs pidió al tribunal que desestimara esa contrademanda.

En mayo, Olefson negó la moción de Jacobs, permitiendo que la contrademanda del pueblo continuara.

Desde entonces, el caso ha entrado en la etapa de descubrimiento de pruebas.

Según los documentos judiciales más recientes, el pueblo presentó interrogatorios, solicitudes de producción de documentos y citaciones en busca de información que considera relevante para determinar la residencia de Jacobs.

Entre los documentos más recientes figura una citación que obliga a Angela Jacobs a comparecer para una declaración bajo juramento y presentar los documentos solicitados por el pueblo.

Los documentos judiciales también muestran que el pueblo busca registros relacionados con la propiedad de Fort Pierce, documentos de la exención de vivienda principal, correspondencia con la Oficina del Tasador de Propiedades del condado St. Lucie, registros hipotecarios, registros de servicios públicos y otros documentos que considera relevantes para la disputa sobre la residencia.

Los documentos por sí mismos no establecen ninguna irregularidad ni determinan dónde vive Geoffrey Jacobs. Más bien, reflejan la evidencia que el pueblo busca obtener a medida que el caso avanza hacia una decisión sobre el fondo del asunto.

Local 10 News contactó al abogado de Jacobs, Michael Pizzi, para obtener comentarios sobre los acontecimientos más recientes.

“Tenemos más confianza que nunca en que esta es una cacería de brujas interminable y con motivaciones políticas contra el alcalde Jacobs”, dijo Pizzi.

Pizzi también afirmó que no le preocupan los más recientes esfuerzos del pueblo durante el proceso de descubrimiento de pruebas.

“No nos preocupan las solicitudes más recientes de descubrimiento de pruebas porque el alcalde Jacobs siempre ha vivido en Pembroke Park y nunca se ha mudado fuera del pueblo”, afirmó.

Pizzi también criticó el litigio y dijo: “Algún día el pueblo tendrá que rendir cuentas por este desperdicio de dinero de los contribuyentes. El alcalde Jacobs seguirá sirviendo a la comunidad mientras algunos en el pueblo gastan dinero en política”.

La cuestión legal sobre quién tiene la autoridad para decidir la elegibilidad de Jacobs surgió antes de que se presentara la demanda.

En un memorando entregado previamente al alcalde y a los comisionados del pueblo, el abogado de Pembroke Park, Jacob Horowitz, escribió que “el foro adecuado para impugnar la elegibilidad de una persona para ocupar el cargo de comisionado del pueblo de Pembroke Park es el Tribunal del Circuito del condado Broward”.

Horowitz también escribió que, aunque la comisión podría celebrar una audiencia pública y considerar las pruebas, “el Tribunal del Circuito es, en última instancia, la autoridad legal facultada para determinar si un miembro de la comisión es elegible para ocupar el cargo”.

Olefson finalmente llegó a la misma conclusión cuando dictaminó que la comisión carecía de autoridad legal para decidir la elegibilidad de Jacobs mediante una votación.

Sin embargo, la cuestión de fondo sigue sin resolverse.

Meses después de que Local 10 News planteara por primera vez dudas sobre la residencia del alcalde mediante registros públicos, registros tributarios y documentos hipotecarios, los tribunales aún deben determinar la cuestión central que continúa dividiendo al pueblo: si Geoffrey Jacobs cumple con los requisitos de residencia para seguir desempeñándose como alcalde de Pembroke Park.

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The latest court filings show the Town of Pembroke Park has subpoenaed Jacobs’ wife, Angela Jacobs, for a sworn deposition and has requested numerous documents as part of the discovery process.

The town has also sought records from several third parties, including Verizon Communications, the Florida Department of State’s Division of Elections, Broward County and the St. Lucie County School District.

Discovery is the stage of a lawsuit in which both sides gather evidence before a judge decides the disputed issues.

The filings mark the latest chapter in a dispute that began after a Local 10 News investigation uncovered public records showing Jacobs and his wife own a home in Fort Pierce in St. Lucie County.

Local 10 News also reported that public records showed the property received a Florida homestead exemption and a tax exemption for veterans with total and permanent service-connected disabilities that reduced the property’s taxable value by approximately $535,000.

Under Florida law, those exemptions generally apply only to property that serves as the owner’s permanent residence.

Local 10 News also reviewed mortgage documents showing the home was purchased with a VA backed loan. The loan documents included an occupancy certification stating the borrower intended to occupy the property as a primary residence, consistent with VA occupancy requirements.

Following Local 10 News’ reporting, public records from the St. Lucie County Property Appraiser’s Office show the disabled veteran exemption was removed from the property.

Jacobs has consistently maintained that he lives in Pembroke Park and is eligible to serve as mayor.

Following the Local 10 News investigation, several Pembroke Park commissioners questioned whether Jacobs continued to satisfy the residency requirements contained in the town charter and sought to hold a vote on his eligibility to remain in office.

Before that vote could occur, Jacobs filed suit and obtained a temporary restraining order blocking the meeting.

In March, Broward Circuit Judge Shari Africk Olefson ruled that the town commission did not have the legal authority to determine Jacobs’ eligibility through a commission vote.

In her written order, Olefson concluded that the commission “lacks legal authority to vote on the Mayor’s eligibility.”

The judge prohibited the commission from voting on Jacobs’ eligibility and ruled that the issue must instead be resolved through the courts.

The order did not determine where Jacobs lives or whether he ultimately satisfies the residency requirements to remain mayor. Instead, the ruling addressed who has the legal authority to make that determination.

After the ruling, the Town of Pembroke Park changed its legal strategy.

Rather than asking commissioners to determine Jacobs’ eligibility, the town filed a counterclaim asking the court for a declaratory judgment on whether Jacobs meets the residency requirements contained in the town charter.

Jacobs asked the court to dismiss that counterclaim.

In May, Olefson denied Jacobs’ motion, allowing the town’s counterclaim to proceed.

The case has since entered discovery.

According to recent court filings, the town has served interrogatories, requests for production of documents and subpoenas seeking information it contends is relevant to determining Jacobs’ residency.

Among the latest filings is a subpoena requiring Angela Jacobs to appear for a deposition under oath and produce documents requested by the town.

The court filings also show the town is seeking records relating to the Fort Pierce property, homestead exemption documents, correspondence with the St. Lucie County Property Appraiser, mortgage records, utility records and other documents the town contends are relevant to the residency dispute.

The filings themselves do not establish wrongdoing or determine where Geoffrey Jacobs lives. Rather, they reflect the evidence the town is seeking to obtain as the case moves toward a decision on the merits.

Local 10 News reached out to Jacobs’ attorney, Michael Pizzi, for comment on the latest developments.

“We are more confident than ever that this is a never ending and politically motivated witch hunt against Mayor Jacobs,” Pizzi said.

Pizzi also said he is not concerned about the town’s latest discovery efforts.

“We are not concerned about any of the latest discovery requests because Mayor Jacobs has always lived in Pembroke Park and he has never moved out of the Town,” he said.

Pizzi further criticized the litigation, saying, “One day the Town will have to be accountable for this waste of tax dollars. Mayor Jacobs will continue serving the people while some in the Town spend money on politics.”

The legal question over who has the authority to decide Jacobs’ eligibility surfaced before the lawsuit was filed.

In a memorandum previously provided to the mayor and town commissioners, Pembroke Park Town Attorney Jacob Horowitz wrote that “the proper venue to challenge the eligibility of an individual to hold office as a Commissioner of the Town of Pembroke Park is the Circuit Court in Broward County.”

Horowitz also wrote that while the commission could conduct a public hearing and consider evidence, “the Circuit Court is ultimately vested with the legal authority to determine whether a commission member is eligible to hold office.”

Olefson ultimately reached the same conclusion when she ruled that the commission lacked the legal authority to decide Jacobs’ eligibility through a vote.

The underlying question, however, remains unresolved.

Months after Local 10 News first raised questions about the mayor’s residency through public records, tax records and mortgage documents, the courts are still being asked to determine a central issue that continues to divide the town: whether Geoffrey Jacobs satisfies the residency requirements to continue serving as mayor of Pembroke Park.

The Department of Homeland Security said an ICE officer, “fearing for public safety,” shot and killed the man Monday in Biddeford while officers were watching the home of someone they believed was in the U.S. illegally and had a final order of removal from the country.

The department said in a post on X that when ICE tried to stop a car driven by someone coming from the home, the vehicle attempted to flee and the officer fired his weapon.

That was a change from how Maine Sen. Angus King described the encounter hours earlier, when he said Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne 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.

The driver was Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, a 26-year-old Colombian national, the Colombian Embassy told The Associated Press in a statement.

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 U.S. President Donald Trump, urged Trump to provide an explanation and accused ICE officers of treating Durán Guerrero as “an inferior being without rights.”

The shooting has sparked outrage in Biddeford and the wider area. Protesters gathered Tuesday outside of an ICE detention center in Scarborough, which is just up the coast between Biddeford and Portland.

“These people are killers and they must leave our state now,” organizer Todd Chretien told the gathering, including some who held signs reading "Stop the murder” and “End this terror.”

Questions surround the shooting

Durán Guerrero's shooting marked the second time in a week that ICE used deadly force and at least the ninth death since Trump began his immigration crackdown.

The officers involved in shooting in Biddeford, which is just southwest of Portland, didn’t have body cameras, leaving many questions about what transpired. Among them are how close the officer was to the vehicle when they fired, whether officers told Durán Guerrero to stop, and how ICE believes he had put the public in danger.

“We are always evaluating our procedures to keep our officers safe and criminals off our streets. We will not disclose or discuss law enforcement tactics,” an ICE spokesperson said in a statement.

Maine’s other senator, Republican Susan Collins, said Mullin told her that DHS’ Office of Inspector General is investigating in cooperation with the FBI.

Photos showed bullet holes in the car’s windshield.

The Maine attorney general’s office, which said it's working cooperatively 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.

Video shows the shooting's aftermath

Video from a nearby business' security camera obtained by the AP shows a white car slowly approaching an intersection before making several circles. A law enforcement SUV blocked its path and two officers opened the driver’s door and dragged out a limp body.

It isn't clear from the video when the shots were fired.

Daniel Boucher, who lives nearby, said he heard a “pop, pop, pop” and ran to the intersection.

“His face was bloody. His head was bloody,” Boucher said. “I clearly heard the victim say, ‘I tried to stop.’”

At one point, Boucher said, the officer who shot Durán Guerrero walked close to him.

“He looked at me and said, ‘He tried to run me over,’ or something to that effect,” Boucher said. “I don’t remember his exact words.”

Durán Guerrero is survived by his wife and young daughter

Two advocacy groups — the Maine Immigrants’ Rights Coalition and Presente! — said Durán Guerrero was authorized to work in the U.S.

Neighbors say Durán Guerrero was a friendly and familiar face even though they rarely chatted because he didn’t appear to speak English.

Sadie Dilboy and Cory Poulin, who own a laundromat near the intersection where the car came to a stop, said they saw Durán Guerrero all the time.

“Everyone knows him,” said Dilboy, who remembered that he often came to their store with his daughter and gave her quarters to buy candy.

Claudia Morton, who lives near Durán Guerrero and his family and often waved to him, was distraught over the shooting. “The whole world should be crying,” she said Tuesday.

Last week in Houston, an ICE officer fatally shot 52-year-old Lorenzo Salgado Araujo after federal authorities driving unmarked vehicles pursued him while he was driving to a construction job site.

The two shootings come amid a Trump administration push to carry out its mass deportations agenda. Over five days at the end of June, ICE arrested more than 10,000 people.

The figures indicate that while the administration is no longer cracking down on individual cities, arrests are surging. The administration’s enforcement efforts were widely condemned last winter after the killings of Alex Pretti and Renee Good in Minnesota.

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Brook reported from New Orleans and Sisak from New York. Associated Press reporters Astrid Suarez in Bogota, Colombia, Rebecca Santana in Washington and John Seewer in Toledo, Ohio, contributed.

Buffett also said in his statement that he wants all of his remaining Berkshire Hathaway stock worth more than $140 billion donated to charity by the end of 2034. Previously the plan was for his three children to distribute his remaining fortune within 10 years of the 95-year-old investor’s death.

“Of course, mortality is unpredictable, but my remaining shares will be donated to the four foundations one way or the other by December 31, 2034,” Buffett said in a statement. “The goal is to have the grants grow annually to each of the three foundations managed by each of my children and the annual grant to the Susan Thompson Buffett Foundation grow at a somewhat greater rate.”

Buffett and the Gates Foundation did not immediately respond Tuesday to questions. CNBC said Buffett is scheduled to give the channel an exclusive interview on this topic Wednesday morning.

Buffett's latest gifts are roughly equal to last year's donations

The majority of Buffett’s charitable gifts — worth more than $61 billion — have gone to the Gates Foundation since he announced the plan to give away his fortune in 2006. He has been giving blocks of Berkshire Hathaway stock to the Gates Foundation and the four foundations run by his three children regularly.

Buffett plans to give about $4.5 billion in stock to the Susan Thompson Buffett Foundation this year and about $500 million in shares each to the Sherwood Foundation, Howard G. Buffett Foundation and Novo Foundation, which are run by his children.

So the total amount of donations announced Tuesday is similar to the roughly $6 billion in donations he made last summer, with Buffett’s family foundations getting significantly more than in previous years that would seem to account for the money that would have gone to the Gates Foundation.

Gates has denied any ties to Epstein's crimes

Gates denies any knowledge of Epstein’s crimes and has not been accused of any wrongdoing. He said he only met with Epstein because he thought it might help him raise money for charitable causes.

Epstein, who was accused of sexually abusing dozens of underage girls, was found dead at the Manhattan federal lockup in August 2019 and his death was later ruled a suicide by New York City’s medical examiner.

Buffett already said in 2024 that he planned to cut off donations to the Gates Foundation after his death and let his three children decide how to distribute the rest of his fortune. The decision he announced Tuesday will accelerate that plan.

The two billionaires were the best of friends

Buffett and Gates used to be exceptionally close friends who talked often, played bridge online and even took vacations together. Gates also served on the board of Buffett’s conglomerate for years and the legendary investor sat on the board of the Gates Foundation. But Buffett told CNBC in March that he hadn’t talked to Gates for months since before the Epstein files were released in the fall of 2025.

In the past, Buffett stood up for Gates. Three years ago, Buffett cut off a man who was presenting a resolution at the Berkshire Hathaway shareholder meeting after he questioned Gates’ character because of his ties with Epstein. Peter Flaherty was arrested that day for trespassing even though he had been approved to make the presentation beforehand. The charge was later dropped, but the incident led to a lawsuit, which is still pending in the courts.

Buffett can't believe how many people Epstein fooled

Buffett said to CNBC “it is astounding to me that anybody could be that successful as a con person” but Epstein found a way to exploit the weaknesses of others. Buffett would not discuss Gates’ involvement, but said he doesn’t want to be involved with anything that could be investigated later.

Gates discussed his ties to Epstein with the staff of his foundation recently. Gates appears multiple times in the Justice Department’s release of documents connected to its investigation of the late financier. The Justice Department’s files include email correspondence between Gates and Epstein about philanthropic projects, calendar entries documenting dates they got together, and photos of Gates at events the two men attended.

The foundation announced that it hired someone in March to assess the foundation’s past engagement with Epstein and review its policies to vet any future philanthropic partnerships. Gates and the rest of the foundation’s board expect to get an update on that investigation sometime this summer.

Buffett told CNBC that he’s amazed at how many wealthy and powerful people have been caught up in the Epstein scandal.

“I mean, it, here you had a guy that was a convicted guy, a sensational con man, and the percentage of people that he knocked off,” Buffett said. “I mean, whether it was, he found their weakness. It might have been sex. It might be power, it might be, whatever it might be. And I don’t see how anybody could have pulled that off.”

Buffett said he’s glad Epstein never came to Omaha, where he has lived for more than six decades. Buffett is regarded by many as the world’s greatest investor who built up Berkshire over the years by buying insurance companies like Geico, major utilities, manufacturers and well-known brands like Dairy Queen and the BNSF railroad.

Buffett stepped down as Berkshire CEO in January after 60 years of leading the company, but he remains as chairman and the largest shareholder. Greg Abel is now CEO of Berkshire Hathaway.

Blanche will need the support of all GOP lawmakers on the Senate Judiciary Committee in order to advance his nomination to lead the Justice Department, which he has done in an acting capacity since April.

Blanche is expected to face scrutiny over issues including the department's investigations into President Donald Trump's foes, a contentious deal to settle Trump's IRS lawsuit and its handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files when he appears before the committee for his confirmation hearing on Wednesday.

Here's a look at key topics likely to dominate the hearing:

‘I love you, sir:' Blanche & Trump's close relationship from the courtroom to DOJ

Blanche came into the public spotlight as the lead attorney defending Trump in his hush money trial in New York. The close relationship they forged then — and the unwavering loyalty Blanche has shown to Trump since joining the Justice Department last year — is likely to command the spotlight at the hearing.

Trump has made clear his desire to use the Justice Department to pursue his political opponents. And Blanche has accelerated investigations into perceived foes of the president since Pam Bondi was fired after failing to deliver criminal cases against Trump's political enemies.

Democrats say Blanche is acting as if he were still Trump's personal attorney.

Blanche has strongly rejected accusations that the administration has weaponized the department for political purposes, saying in an ABC interview in February that "there’s not a whiff of political partisanship in what we’re doing.”

The Justice Department has historically prided itself on independence from the White House when it comes to prosecutorial decisions. But Blanche has insisted he sees no problem with the president’s interest in Justice Department matters and says he has felt no pressure to placate Trump.

“We have thousands of ongoing investigations and prosecutions going on in this country right now," Blanche said at 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.”

When asked at the time about his potential nomination for attorney general, Blanche said that if Trump chose someone else for the job he would say: “Thank you very much. I love you, sir.”

Blanche has tried to walk a fine line when discussing Jan. 6

Blanche's past comments surrounding the attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, could face renewed scrutiny.

Blanche has said he was not consulted on Trump's sweeping clemency grant for some 1,500 people charged in the riot, including people convicted of attacking police. Pressed on the matter during his confirmation hearing for deputy attorney general last year, Blanche said that people who commit violence against law enforcement “should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”

Asked whether he would advise the president in the future against pardoning violent offenders, Blanche told lawmakers last year that “violence against law enforcement is never something that should be tolerated.”

But in front of a crowd at the Conservative Political Action Conference in May, Blanche touted the Jan. 6 pardons as an accomplishment for the administration, saying to cheers in the audience that “by 5 p.m. on Jan. 20, every one of them was either pardoned or had their sentence commuted."

“So when folks say we’ve done nothing, I say ‘you have a very short memory,’" Blanche told the crowd.

Republican Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina, whose vote is likely to be crucial for Blanche's nomination, has said he will not support anyone for attorney general who equivocates on the events of Jan 6. Tillis, however, recently said he doesn't have any concerns about Blanche's record regarding Jan. 6.

With the death of South Carolina 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.

‘We are not moving forward with the fund, period.’ Will that assurance be enough?

Arguably the rockiest stretch of Blanche’s tenure atop the Justice Department has been a $1.776 billion fund meant to compensate allies of the president who feel mistreated by the criminal justice system.

Blanche was the public face of the initiative, which emerged from a settlement of Trump’s $10 billion lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service over the leak of his tax returns. The fund faced instant bipartisan congressional backlash, exemplified by a tense closed-door meeting at which shouting Republicans confronted Blanche over the planned payouts.

Weeks later, he revealed on behalf of the administration that the idea had been scrapped, saying at a hearing, “We are not moving forward with the fund, period.”

Nonetheless, expect Democrats to press Blanche on whether he has truly foreclosed the possibility of reviving the fund, especially since Trump remains vocal about his desire for compensation for his supporters and since the Justice Department has balked at a judge’s insistence that it assert in writing that it won’t bring back the compensation.

Tillis has been sharply critical of not only the fund but a separate aspect of the IRS that guarantees Trump and members of his family immunity from audits. Blanche has repeatedly said that the IRS protection remains intact, something that Tillis and others are expected to demand answers about. A federal judge on Monday stopped short of voiding the audit immunity deal but called into question its legal legitimacy.

Questions over the Epstein files have never gone away

Blanche was deputy attorney general when the Justice Department in the summer of 2025 found itself besieged by crisis over its handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files. A year later, questions remain, despite the department's release last January of what it said were more than 3 million pages of records from its sex-trafficking investigation of the late financier.

Blanche will unquestionably be grilled about the case, especially after Bondi told lawmakers behind closed-doors after her ouster as attorney general that Blanche was the department’s point person on the release of the Epstein documents.

Trouble began in February 2025 when Bondi presented far-right influencers at the White House with white binders that she said contained the Epstein files but in reality actually consisted of largely public materials.

Things worsened last July when the department said in an unsigned statement that it would not release any additional records from the investigation, only to be forced into a reversal by an onslaught of criticism across the political spectrum and legislation from Congress that mandated the records’ disclosure.

But the staggered release 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 was either unredacted or not fully obscured.

Blanche has faced additional scrutiny over his unusual trip to a Florida prison to interview Epstein’s former girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell, as she serves a 20-year sentence for luring teenage girls to be sexually abused by Epstein. After the interview, Maxwell was moved from the low-security federal prison in Florida to a minimum-security prison camp in Texas.

Tau is one part of a toxic duo fueling Alzheimer’s but prior attempts to develop drugs that can target the protein have failed. Two Alzheimer’s drugs, lecanemab and donanemab, try to clear buildup of the better-known amyloid protein and can modestly slow cognitive decline.

The new findings suggest Biogen's diranersen did more than lower tau levels. The study of about 400 people found signs that it also slowed cognitive decline, in one small subset enough to be comparable to amyloid therapy, according to results presented at the Alzheimer's Association International Conference in London. Biogen is planning a larger study to try to prove the drug’s benefit.

“This is really quite promising if it were to hold up” in that next-step testing, said Jessica Langbaum of the Banner Alzheimer’s Institute in Phoenix, who wasn’t involved with Biogen’s study.

“This is early days,” cautioned Dr. Reisa Sperling of Mass General Brigham, who also wasn’t involved in the study. But “I think it will reinvigorate interest and investment in lots of tau mechanisms, and the field needs that.”

It’s one of multiple novel attempts to fight the mind-destroying disease, including a possible tau vaccine, an experimental heart drug that might do double-duty for some people at high risk of Alzheimer's, and ways to help medicines more easily get across the so-called blood-brain barrier.

New approaches are needed to fight the leading cause of dementia

It’s not clear exactly what causes Alzheimer’s, which affects more than 7 million Americans and tens of millions worldwide. That sticky amyloid protein starts building up to form plaques in the brain about two decades before symptoms appear. But amyloid alone isn’t enough to cause Alzheimer's. Many scientists believe that amyloid buildup eventually triggers an abnormal form of tau to form tangles in neurons, setting off symptoms.

Diranersen is what’s called an antisense oligonucleotide that doesn't attack tau buildup but instead instructs a tau-producing gene to produce less.

“If you lower tau production, you are lowering the amount of the abnormal tau that needs to be cleared by the microglia, by the clearance mechanism in the brain. And so you are enabling the normal clearance mechanism to have more capacity to clear the tau,” said Dr. Cath Mummery of University College London, who led the new study.

Today’s anti-amyloid drugs are given through the bloodstream via infusions or injections. Diranersen is injected into the fluid surrounding the spinal cord, a straighter path to the brain.

Biogen's tau drug missed a key study goal — but was still encouraging

Biogen’s study included people with mild cognitive impairment or mild Alzheimer’s, randomly assigning them to different doses of diranersen or a placebo. Back in May, Biogen and partner Ionis Pharmaceuticals announced that the lowest dose — given every six months — had the strongest effect. That was a counterintuitive surprise and meant the study didn't meet its planned goal of showing that higher doses brought greater benefits.

Still, scientists had been anxiously awaiting details about how much that twice-a-year spinal shot really helped. Five of six different brain tests showed diranersen recipients’ memory and other cognitive abilities still worsened but more slowly than those given dummy shots, Mummery said. In one test of the lowest dose, that translated to a 26% reduction in cognitive decline — “approximately the same” change seen in earlier tests of amyloid drugs, she said.

Side effects included injection site pain and a temporary state of confusion that could appear a few days after the shot and last about a week, she said. But there were no signs of brain inflammation, which can affect recipients of anti-amyloid drugs.

Alzheimer's researchers also target tau in a broad new study

The University of California, San Francisco, last week opened a first-of-its-kind study known as the Alzheimer’s Tau Platform. Funded by the National Institutes of Health, it will test a variety of experimental anti-tau therapies against and in combination with today’s amyloid treatments. First up is a vaccine called AADvac1 designed to train the immune system to recognize and fight a specific worrisome portion of the tau protein, said UCSF's Dr. Adam Boxer.

The “platform” approach will expand to locations around the country, allow addition of other tau drugs to test and include people with Alzheimer’s-related protein buildup who aren’t yet showing symptoms, he said.

Other studies hint at new ways of attacking Alzheimer's

Researchers told the Alzheimer’s meeting that an experimental cholesterol-lowering drug called obicetrapib might do more than help heart health. They're exploring if it also might lower buildup of Alzheimer's-related proteins in people who carry a genetic risk for the disease.

Why? That gene, called APOE4, also affects how the body processes cholesterol. Obicetrapib maker NewAmsterdam Pharma plans to begin a study soon to test if the drug's cholesterol effects also can mitigate the Alzheimer's risk in people carrying one or two copies of that gene.

Companies also are trying to get Alzheimer’s drugs into the brain faster and at higher volumes, by penetrating the protective lining meant to protect the brain from harm. Denali Therapeutics' CEO Ryan Watts describes it as “hitching a ride” with iron that naturally gets into the brain. His company is pursuing drugs that target tau and amyloid using that “transport vehicle” technology.

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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.

Congo has been battling an outbreak of a rare type of Ebola since May, with no approved treatment or vaccine. The Africa Centre for Disease Control says it is the fastest-growing Ebola outbreak on the continent.

“Perhaps the most alarming finding is that many of the newly reported deaths are people who died in their communities without ever reaching a health facility and without receiving care,” Chikwe Ihekweazu said after returning from Bunia, in Ituri province, one of the worst-hit cities. “And as of today, 80% of new cases are outside our contact lists and so are coming to us from unknown chains of transmission.”

As of Monday, at least 1,926 people have been infected, of whom 702 have died, in three provinces in Congo from the rare Bundibugyo virus, Congolese authorities said. Cases have also been confirmed in neighboring Uganda.

Ihekweazu told reporters in Geneva that his visit to Bunia had been “quite encouraging on many fronts, but also deeply concerning.”

Treatment capacity in Bunia is now close to 800 beds, with capacity increasing every week, and lab capacity has grown from 1 to 14 labs, an effort the emergency chief lauded.

However, Ihekweazu said that despite “our best efforts ... we have not caught up in the race.”

A funding gap, attacks on health centers, an ongoing conflict in eastern Congo, and mistrust among local communities have hampered the response.

On Monday, dozens of people working at an Ebola virus treatment center in northeast Congo went on strike over unpaid salaries and bonuses.

The Congolese authorities declared a fresh Ebola outbreak on May 15 after the disease had been transmitting for weeks without official detection, according to the WHO. Clinical trials for treatment began last week after researchers launched a highly anticipated study in the hope of fighting the virus.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said on July 11 that a U.S. citizen working for a humanitarian organization in Congo has tested positive for the Ebola virus, without providing further details.

Down the street, U.S. President Donald Trump welcomed new Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi to the White House after strongly backing the political novice’s bid for office. Iraq has been under pressure to disarm Iran-backed militias that attacked U.S. bases and diplomatic facilities after the U.S. and Israel instigated the Iran war.

The U.S. launched more strikes on Iran early Tuesday after Trump vowed to blockade Iranian ports and charge 20% of their cargo for ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz. Later Tuesday, he said he was backing away from the tolls and pursuing another arrangement following discussions with Gulf allies.

And in Maine, protesters are raising unanswered questions about the ninth fatal shooting by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents since Trump's immigration crackdown began.

The Latest:

New York City’s mayor calls for abolishment of ICE

Zohran Mamdani made the demand in a post Tuesday on X in response to the fatal shooting of a man in Biddeford, Maine.

“ICE is killing our neighbors,” Mamdani wrote. “ICE cannot be reformed. Abolish ICE.”

Outgoing Colombian president slams fatal shooting of citizen in Maine

In a scathing post on X, Gustavo Petro of Colombia described the fatal shooting of a Colombian citizen in Biddeford as a targeted killing “at the hands of the U.S. government.”

Petro, who has openly quarreled with Trump, called on him to provide Colombia with an explanation for the killing. He accused ICE officers of shooting the Colombian national “for believing him to be an inferior being without rights.”

Petro, who will leave office in less than a month, said he expects Colombia’s foreign service to pursue legal action against those responsible for the shooting.

Abelardo de la Espriella, Colombia’s Trump-backed president-elect, has not commented publicly on the case.

Official vying for Pentagon budget job skirts questions about Iran war costs

Prime Minister al-Zaidi noted that it’s “my first visit to the United States of America” and it’s “not just like any visit.”

He said from the Oval Office that the visit is about announcing an “economic partnership” with the United States. Al-Zaidi said all remaining U.S. forces will be out of Iraq come Sept. 30 “while U.S. companies will be inside Iraq” and investing in the country.

He also thanked Trump for extending a “warm welcome,” which included a last-minute offer of lunch.

“I have no idea what we’re going to be eating, but it will be fine,” Trump said before ending the joint press availability.

Iraqi leader al-Zaidi says his first US visit is about ‘economic partnership’

Prime Minister al-Zaidi noted that it’s “my first visit to the United States of America” and it’s “not just like any visit.”

He said from the Oval Office that the visit is about announcing an “economic partnership” with the United States. Al-Zaidi said all remaining U.S. forces will be out of Iraq come Sept. 30 “while U.S. companies will be inside Iraq” and investing in the country.

He also thanked Trump for extending a “warm welcome,” which included a last-minute offer of lunch.

“I have no idea what we’re going to be eating, but it will be fine,” Trump said before ending the joint press availability.

Trump says his Thursday address will touch on ‘free and fair elections’ but reveals little else

Asked for a sneak peek of his scheduled national address, the president said it will be “really, really big news” but added he’d “rather save it.”

“It doesn’t get bigger, because without free and fair elections you don’t have a country,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on Tuesday. “We’ll be discussing other things too. But it’s going to be a very big announcement.”

The Republican president has said little else about the address, which he announced on social media on Monday. His post said only that he will be “making a Speech to the Nation on Thursday evening” at 9 p.m. Eastern.

Asked about it on Monday, Trump quickly pivoted to discussing what he called a “busy news day,” talking about the death of Sen. Lindsey Graham and other topics.

Trump hails report showing inflation declining

The president blamed his predecessor, Democrat Joe Biden, for the rate of inflation having spiked to three-year high just last month. Biden, Trump said, “could create inflation like anybody.”

But Trump cheered a report Tuesday showing that prices dropped 0.4% from May to June, the largest monthly drop in four year and way down from a year-over-year gain of 4.2% in May.

Trump added of inflation, “It’s not my fault. We are putting it to sleep.”

“The report was incredible. Inflation is way down,” Trump said, before urging voters, “Remember that for the midterms.”

“Nobody else could do it,” Trump said.

Trump says FBI is ‘wasting their time’ on Sen. Graham’s death

Trump said he doesn’t know why the FBI is looking into Graham’s death.

The president said the late South Carolina senator had “a problem” and that what ultimately took his life “is actually something that’s very hard to detect.”

A preliminary medical examiner’s report said Graham suffered a tear in his aorta.

Trump said he’s watched medical reports about Graham’s case and had White House doctors explain to him what happened. “And this is something that is very almost undetectable,” Trump said, adding that there’s not much that can be done about a torn aorta.

“So I don’t see a lot of evil there. I know there’s all sorts of conspiracy theories going along, and I don’t think the FBI, I think the FBI is wasting their time if they’re doing it,” Trump said of an investigation.

Trump says Gulf allies asked him to move from tolls to trade deals in Strait of Hormuz

The president explained his thinking in backing away from a 20% toll on cargo passing through the Strait of Hormuz, saying he was called by “kings and emirs” and other leaders who suggested an alternate arrangement.

“They said we’d love to do it a different way. We’d love to invest in the United States with billions and billions of dollars,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on Tuesday.

Trump said he prefers that arrangement to the tolls he previously said the U.S. would impose. “I like that actually, because I don’t think anybody should be able to charge a fee for the strait,” Trump said.

Trump praises Iraqi PM, says he’s a ‘great leader’ who will hold office for a ‘long time’

Trump said he and Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi had a “great meeting” in the Oval Office and will now have lunch together because of their “tremendous chemistry.” Lunch wasn’t on the original schedule.

“We’re going to do it on the fly,” Trump told reporters about the meal.

Trump heaped praise on al-Zaidi in front of reporters, calling him a “great fan of America.”

“He’s a great leader. I think he’s going to be there for a long period of time,” Trump said, emphasizing “long.”

“He’s changed that country so much, especially toward their thinking about the United States,” the president said.

Trump also commented on the prime minister’s youth and looks.

“He’s young and he’s handsome, which I don’t like. I’m not happy about that,” Trump joked.

Justices Kagan, Barrett split on enforcement mechanism for Supreme Court’s new code of ethics

All nine justices agreed to the code in 2023 amid a storm of criticism over undisclosed trips and gifts from wealthy benefactors to some justices.

Kagan and Barrett both said the court is taking the code seriously, but Kagan also supported creating a way to enforce it. The liberal-leaning justice acknowledged it could be tricky since any enforcement would have to come from the judicial branch and the Supreme Court sits at its head.

Barrett, who is part of the court’s conservative majority, said she wasn’t so sure. There are significant questions over who would do the enforcing and how, and it’s not clear whether there is a way to address them effectively, she said.

How does the court decide emergency appeals?

The relatively quick process of deciding emergency docket cases centers on whether the petitioner will eventually win, and how they could be legally harmed if the court doesn’t step in, Barrett said.

The justices declined to talk about specific cases, including suits where the court sided with the Trump administration and allowed cuts to the federal workforce to proceed.

The court often begins by considering the case from the petitioner’s point of view, Barrett said, though Kagan pointed out the court can also consider how the other side might be affected if the court intervenes.

Supreme Court justices address rise in ‘shadow docket’ appeals

Kagan and Barrett address the rise in appeals on the Supreme Court’s emergency docket.

While the court can’t control how many are filed, Kagan points out that some high-profile decisions may have encouraged attorneys to file more appeals. Those appeals are decided without full briefing or arguments, Kagan said, and “we should consider those downsides.”

Iraqi PM arrives for White House meeting with Trump

Trump was waiting outside the entrance to the West Wing to greet the prime minister when he arrived. They shook hands and exchanged small talk before entering the White House with their arms around each other’s backs.

“Love Iraq,” Trump replied to a reporter’s question about his message to the people of Iraq.

The leaked Dobbs opinion’s shadow on the Supreme Court’s security concerns

Kagan said threats against the Supreme Court increased after the leak of a draft of the opinion that later overturned the Roe v. Wade abortion decision, and have continued to grow since then.

In 2022, shortly after the leak, a would-be assassin was arrested near the home of Justice Brett Kavanaugh with weapons and zip ties. Chief Justice John Roberts has condemned the threats to all U.S. judges, saying during a speech in March that criticism of judicial opinions is understandable, but personally directed hostility is “dangerous, and it’s got to stop.”

Supreme Court justices testify before Congress on increasing security funding in rare appearance

Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett said Tuesday that a sharp increase in threats targeting her and other justices has increasingly encroached on their personal and family lives.

During a rare appearance before Congress, Barrett said she had to wear a bulletproof vest home a few years ago, something she struggled to explain to her 12-year-old son.

“I didn’t expect that performing this service would put me in the position of explaining to my children what a bulletproof vest was, why I had to wear one,” she said. The hearing marks the first time justices have testified before Congress since 2019.

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Warsh vows to crush inflation but offers no hint on the Fed’s next move

Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh’s written testimony to Congress says the Fed will make high inflation “a thing of the past,” but provides no signal about the central bank’s next steps.

Fed policymakers “have no tolerance for persistently elevated inflation,” Warsh will say when he testifies Tuesday before a House committee. “And we share a resolute commitment to restoring price stability.”

Yet about half of the 19 members of the Fed’s interest rate-setting committee expect they will have to raise the central bank’s key rate by the end of the year to defeat inflation, while nearly half have penciled in no change or even a rate cut. Warsh faces a stiff challenge in reconciling the divided committee while navigating a rapidly-changing economic outlook.

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Lindsey Graham’s sister prepares for her Senate swearing-in

Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Lindsey Graham’s sister, Darline Graham, will be sworn in Tuesday afternoon as his temporary replacement after his unexpected death over the weekend, and will serve out the rest of his term ending in January.

Graham earned a master's degree in rehabilitation counseling and has worked as an optician and at various state agencies. She’ll be the first woman to represent South Carolina in the Senate.

“It is such an honor,” she said, as dozens of Graham staffers and campaign advisers stood behind her during a statehouse news conference. “Lindsey has always been there for me. And now, I will be there for him.”

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Trump to welcome Iraq’s new prime minister to the White House

Al-Zaidi has been under pressure to disarm a network of Iran-backed militias operating in the country, some of which launched attacks on U.S. bases and diplomatic facilities after the U.S. and Israel launched their war against Iran.

Trump is scheduled to greet the Iraqi leader Zaidi at 11 a.m., followed by an Oval Office meeting.

Renad Mansour, director of the Iraq Initiative at the Chatham House think tank, expects that “the U.S. will put significant pressure on al-Zaidi” to move ahead with disarmament “and Zaidi will respond by saying, ‘But I need support — intelligence support, technical support, armed support.’”

“There is a scenario in which, if the Iraqi government starts going after these groups, they will also go after the government,” Mansour said. “And this is a scenario that I think that the Iraqi government is apprehensive about.”

‘Dangerous.’ ‘Brazen.’ ‘Unprecedented.’ ‘Uncharted territory’

Reaction has been swift and severe to the issue of subpoenas to five New York Times journalists who reported on security questions involving Trump’s new Qatari-gifted Air Force One.

“The subpoenas are 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,” said Jodie Ginsberg, CEO of the Committee to Protect Journalists.

The White House Correspondents Association holds its rescheduled dinner celebrating the First Amendment in less than two weeks, with Trump planning to attend. The first was scuttled when a shooter opened fire in what prosecutors say was an attempt to kill the president.

“The WHCA condemns any act of intimidation against journalists, including attempts to pressure them into revealing sources,” said a statement from the group’s president, Weijia Jiang.

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What does the Supreme Court want from Congress?

Security is central to the court’s budget request of $228 million — roughly 10% more than the last fiscal year.

Nearly $15 million of that would go to expanding personal protection for justices, with six more agents for each.

Another $2 million would fund more Supreme Court police officers and an off-site residential security post to speed emergency responses.

The U.S. Marshals Service reported 564 threats to the hundreds of federal judges around the country during the last fiscal year, and justices have not been immune: Barrett’s security detail had to defuse a fake 911 call at her house, and her sister was the victim of a bomb threat. A would-be assassin was arrested near the home of Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

Chief Justice John Roberts has condemned the threats, saying it’s “dangerous, and it’s got to stop.”

June inflation report shows complicated outlook for Trump on economy

The White House will have reasons to rejoice in the June release of the consumer price index, as prices fell 0.4% on a monthly basis in large part because of tumbling oil prices tied to the now deteriorated ceasefire with Iran.

But prices still rose 3.5% over the past 12 months, well above the Federal Reserve’s inflation target of 2%.

And the monthly decline could be short-lived, with oil prices jumping again as fighting intensifies in the Middle East.

Prices for the global benchmark of Brent crude oil have risen nearly 8% in the past five days of trading to about $81 a barrel on Tuesday, a sign that inflation could soon pick up again as the American public begins to focus on the November midterm elections.

Attacks resume across the Mideast

The U.S. military’s Central Command said it struck several areas in Iran, targeting “coastal defense systems, missile and drone sites and maritime capabilities.” Iran acknowledged the strikes, but provided no immediate casualty or damage assessments.

“These strikes will continue imposing a heavy cost on Iranian forces and degrade their ability to attack innocent civilians and commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz,” the U.S. military said.

Moments after the military announced the new strikes, Trump called it “another major attack” and said the U.S. was “putting the blockade back.”

Iran responded with attacks targeting Bahrain, Jordan and three tankers that traveled through the strait.

Here's Trump's rationale for charging tolls in the strait

U.S. Central Command said on social media that it “will enforce the blockade against vessels transiting to or from Iranian ports and coastal areas” beginning Tuesday at 4 p.m. EDT, and will “support traffic flow through regional waters for all vessels not violating the blockade.”

A notice to mariners released Monday by the U.S. military warned of using force if ships don’t comply. It also said the military will let through humanitarian shipments.

The statement follows Trump declaring that the U.S. would be reinstating the naval blockade and charging a 20% toll on eligible cargo.

“We’re protecting a very rich portion of the world,” Trump said. “We’re spending money. And so, what we’ve done is, we are going to be reimbursed for protection.”

Capt. Tim Hawkins, a spokesman for U.S. Central Command, would not say whether the military would be collecting tolls, and referred questions to the White House.

Trump to address the nation on Thursday

The president posted on social media that he would be “making a Speech to the Nation” at 9 p.m. EDT on Thursday.

Trump appeared to refer to himself in the third person in the post.

He did not disclose the details of his planned speech, but the announcement comes after Trump said he would block Iran-related ships from traveling through the Strait of Hormuz and that the U.S. would charge a 20% fee on all cargo going through the waterway.

Asked in an interview with Hugh Hewitt what his Thursday address will be about, Trump made it sound like nothing out of the ordinary.

“It’s just going to be a speech like a lot of my speeches,” he said, without offering any more detail.

Fed policymakers “have no tolerance for persistently elevated inflation,” Warsh said in his first appearance before Congress since becoming chair May 22, replacing former chair Jerome Powell. “And we share a resolute commitment to restoring price stability.”

Still, Warsh heads a sharply divided rate-setting committee, with about half of the 19 policymakers penciling in higher interest rates by the end of the year in forecasts released last month. Another half have signaled that they support keeping rates unchanged or even cutting them. Warsh faces a stiff challenge in reconciling the divided committee while navigating a rapidly-changing economic outlook.

Warsh spoke to the House Financial Services Committee soon after the government reported that inflation fell 0.4% from May to June, driven down mostly by cheaper gas prices. Core inflation — which excludes the volatile energy and food categories — was unchanged last month, a broader slowdown in price increases than economists expected.

Compared with a year ago, inflation dropped to 3.5% from 4.2% in May. Core inflation rose just 2.6% in June from a year earlier, down from 2.9% in May, a positive sign that higher gas costs haven't yet lifted broader prices. Still, the core figure is above the Fed's 2% target.

The cooling inflation figures reduce pressure on the Fed to combat higher prices by hiking interest rates. Still, the renewed conflict in the Middle East has already driven up oil prices and could reverse some of the progress on inflation in coming months.

Warsh, asked about the price figures, said they represented just one month of data and suggested he does not see inflation as defeated.

“There might be some that look at this morning's data and say, ‘mission accomplished,'" he said. “That is not my view.”

Guidance on next steps

In keeping with his stated policy of providing less guidance about the Fed's policies, Warsh did not signal whether rate increases would be necessary to combat inflation. The next meeting of the Fed's rate-setting committee is July 28-29.

Under questioning from members of the House committee, he explained a bit more his thinking about pulling back on what Fed-watchers refer to as “forward guidance.”

“If we were to give you my projection today about what we’ll do when we meet in two weeks,” Warsh said, Fed officials are more likely to accept information “consistent with our priors and rejecting information that’s inconsistent.”

“When we have news for you about exactly the methods of solving this problem, we’ll be very clear about what they are,” he added later.

Warsh was pressed by Democrats on the committee to explain how he would react if President Donald Trump, who repeatedly attacked his predecessor, demanded that he cut rates or take other steps that weren't justified by the economic data.

“Are you ready for that?” Rep. Gregory Meeks, a Democrat from New York, asked.

“My commitment to you is to follow the law and follow the data, follow our very best judgment,” Warsh said.

Warsh also cited the Supreme Court's recent decision to allow Fed governor Lisa Cook to remain on the central bank's board, thwarting Trump's attempt to fire her for now, as a sign the high court sees the Fed as independent.

“To the extent there were questions about it, the court has answered those questions,” he said.

The renewal of the Iran war has caused oil prices to climb again after they had fallen back to nearly their prewar level. Gas prices had fallen about 20% from their peak but have also increased in the past week and are still about 35% higher than they were when the U.S. attacked Iran Feb. 28.

Some Fed officials have argued that underlying inflation, even excluding the impact of gas prices, remains elevated and may require higher interest rates to defeat.

Impact of technology investments

Another factor that could boost inflation for the rest of this year is the massive investment in artificial intelligence infrastructure by the so-called “hyperscalers,” such as Google parent Alphabet, Microsoft, Amazon, and Meta Platforms. The spiking demand for memory chips and processors has sent semiconductor prices soaring, leading to price hikes for laptops, tablets, and video game consoles.

Warsh said Tuesday that AI investment is “the most striking feature of the economy right now" and added that the Fed is “monitoring the implications” for inflation and jobs.

Other Fed officials have stepped in to provide guidance as Warsh has declined to do so. Fed Governor Christopher Waller on Monday said that another “hot” inflation report Tuesday would mean the Fed would have to consider raising rates “in the near term.”

But last week John Williams, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, said that if core inflation stays at a 0.2% monthly pace for the rest of this year, the Fed could avoid hiking rates. Williams' approach implies the Fed would keep rates steady for some time while it monitors incoming data.

“Seeing my grandma and all these people affected made me feel like I had to do something, even if it was from the U.S.," said the 18-year-old, who has spent the last couple weeks preparing food for volunteers at the Doral, Florida headquarters of the nonprofit Global Empowerment Mission.

Izaguirre is one of thousands of people who have participated in an exceptionally large grassroots humanitarian effort based at GEM, supported by donations from across the U.S. and beyond and still going strong nearly three weeks after the catastrophe.

Hundreds of volunteers still show up each day at GEM's warehouses in Doral, where about half the population is of Venezuelan descent. They sort donated supplies –– curated to address the latest needs –– and prepare them for transport to Caracas on daily flights.

GEM's system, facilitated by the U.S. State Department, has given members of the Venezuelan diaspora and others an outlet to support the ongoing crisis, and a trusted mechanism to send aid amid widespread concern about theft and corruption on the part of Venezuelan officials.

“Whatever we can get to the Venezuelan public is what counts,” said Izaguirre.

The effort also underscores the stunning dynamic shift between the U.S. and Venezuela since President Donald Trump ordered then-Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro’s capture in an early morning raid on Jan 3. With military personnel again on the ground, the U.S. has assumed a response role that would have been unimaginable before January, when Trump said the U.S. would “run” the country and seized control of its oil exports.

“This is a whole different animal,” said GEM founder and president Michael Capponi, who was denied entry to Venezuela while trying to deliver aid during the reign of Maduro, who long rejected humanitarian help, equating it to foreign intervention. “We land a private plane, it gets unloaded by U.S. soldiers, it goes in a truck we pay for and to a warehouse that we completely control. It doesn’t touch the hands of the Venezuelan government.”

GEM quickly activated a supply chain

The 7.2- and 7.5-magnitude earthquakes struck 39 seconds apart on June 24, killing at least 4,500 people with thousands more still missing. They destroyed 190 buildings and damaged over 850, Venezuelan officials said, leaving 17,000 displaced and ravaging critical infrastructure providing electricity, clean water and sanitation.

GEM's headquarters became a donation collection point almost immediately. Some donors were initially skeptical that aid could reach those who needed it without being stolen or misused by a notoriously corrupt government, Capponi said. After GEM made its first successful aid distribution, the movement grew bigger than he'd seen in decades of global response.

Companies like Goya, Walmart and Amazon contribute supplies while professional sports teams have donated funds. But much of the aid is still amassed from thousands of individuals' contributions.

“They’re going to Walmart with their credit card, buying 15 cans of food and bringing it in a shopping bag,” said Capponi. “It doesn’t sound like a lot, but when it’s 2,000 people... it’s an enormous amount of aid.”

Lines to drop off aid at GEM have at times been so long police had to help manage traffic. Supplies arrive from across North America: Two brothers drove a U-Haul of goods from Canada. Another group arrived from Mexico. Trucks have rolled in from Nevada, Texas and California.

As many as 1,000 volunteers across three warehouses sort and pack. They fill pallets with essentials like diapers, and assemble individual care packages with enough sustenance and hygiene items to last two people about five days. They also tuck in notes of encouragement: “Te queremos Venezuela,” one reads. “We love you, Venezuela.”

GEM aims to deliver at least 100,000 care packages monthly for the next three-to-six months, while also addressing upcoming needs, like longer term housing.

Volunteers have taken vacations from work to put in hours at the warehouses, said Billy Richardson, director of U.S. logistics. Others arrive after work. “We almost have to kick them out at the end of the day,” Richardson said.

Mariela Vila showed up because she remembers how affected she was when Hurricane Maria pummeled her homeland of Puerto Rico in 2017. “The Latino community in general gathered together to help Puerto Rico, and that made me feel really well,” said Vila, 25, who has worked full-day shifts at GEM since the effort began. “So I felt the need to help Venezuela.”

U.S. assumes a complicated role

Nearly one million pounds (454,000 kilograms) of supplies have been deployed so far from GEM headquarters to its recently leased Caracas warehouses. GEM collaborates with local nonprofits and trusted community members to organize distributions in the hardest hit areas, often twice daily.

But it is the U.S. State Department that facilitates the shipments with the Venezuelan government, making it possible for GEM to operate in the country, even getting help from the U.S. military. On Saturday, U.S. Marines maneuvered an amphibious landing craft onto a Venezuelan beach and unloaded GEM packages that were then passed to 2,000 people lined up for aid.

Partnerships with GEM and other nonprofits allow the U.S. to tap into existing logistics and donation mechanisms, a State Department spokesperson told The Associated Press, adding that the effort with GEM leverages “the Venezuelan American diaspora and private partners who want to donate.”

Several other U.S.-based humanitarian groups told The Associated Press they also have been able to operate without interference from Venezuelan officials. Some depend on collaborations with established local nonprofits.

Despite the U.S. response, questions remain over its influence in Venezuela, especially while it controls billions of dollars in oil revenue.

“There are a lot of transparency questions that linger on the use of that fund in a moment in which Venezuelans really need that money to be used for the protection of Venezuelans,” said Laura Cristina Dib, Venezuela program director at the human rights organization Washington Office on Latin America.

John M. Barrett, U.S. charge d’affairs for Venezuela, told reporters last week that revenue from Venezuelan oil production, currently controlled by the U.S. Treasury, is being made available for relief efforts.

Asked for further details, a State Department spokesperson said the U.S. was "supporting the Venezuelan interim government’s budgetary operations, improving Venezuela’s liquidity and access to capital during the recovery," adding that the U.S. has contributed over $386 million to earthquake response independent of the oil revenue.

In the coastal city of Maiquetía last week, Yoniel Reyes sat inside a tent, examining the contents of a GEM package he’d just received during an aid distribution, packed and sealed 1,300 miles away in Doral. There were instant meals, bottles of water, canned food, hydration powder and hygiene kits.

“I never imagined I would be receiving aid from the U.S.,” said Reyes. “We Venezuelans are thankful, very thankful.”

——

Associated Press videojournalist Juan Pablo Arraez contributed to this report from Maiquetía, Venezuela.

——

Associated Press coverage of philanthropy and nonprofits receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content. For all of AP’s philanthropy coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/philanthropy.

Incendios más grandes han estado devastando zonas del sur de Francia, pero el de Fontainebleau está excepcionalmente cerca de la región densamente poblada que rodea la capital francesa.

Aviones cisterna se zambulleron repetidamente en el río Sena para recoger agua y sofocar las llamas — la primera vez que se han utilizado aeronaves de este tipo para combatir incendios en la región de París, señaló el jefe regional de bomberos.

El humo cubrió las copas de los árboles y quedó suspendido en el aire el martes, mientras las autoridades intentaban controlar los incendios.

No se han reportado muertes ni heridos.

Dos detenidos en relación con los incendios de Fontainebleau

Dos personas han sido detenidas en relación con los incendios de Fontainebleau, y otras dos detenidas por incendios en otras partes de Francia, dijo el martes el ministro del Interior, Laurent Nunez, en la televisión BFM. No proporcionó detalles.

La ola de calor que ha abrasado Francia en los últimos días, la tercera ya este año, está empezando a remitir. El servicio meteorológico nacional espera poner fin a sus advertencias de alerta roja por ola de calor a partir del miércoles, aunque ahora hay advertencias de tormentas eléctricas en varias regiones.

España identifica a víctimas de incendio

Cuatro días después de que un incendio arrasó una remota comunidad de ciudadanos extranjeros en el sur de España, las autoridades judiciales han identificado a 10 de las 13 víctimas mortales mediante muestras biológicas.

La mayoría de los fallecidos, todos adultos, son extranjeros. Entre ellos hay cinco británicos —incluida una mujer que murió en el hospital—, tres belgas, una mujer francesa y un ciudadano español, indicaron las autoridades judiciales en un comunicado emitido a última hora del lunes.

Diez personas siguen desaparecidas.

El incendio de Los Gallardos afectó unos 70 kilómetros cuadrados (27 millas cuadradas) de bosque y tierras de cultivo, un área mayor que la isla de Manhattan.

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

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

_______

Las periodistas de The Associated Press Teresa Medrano y Suman Naishadham en Madrid y Angela Charlton en París contribuyeron a este reporte.

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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.

NASA astronaut Anil Menon and Russian crewmates Pyotr Dubrov and Anna Kikina lifted off from the Russia-leased Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan aboard the Roscosmos Soyuz MS-29 for an eight-month stint on the orbiting outpost. Their spacecraft entered the designated orbit and is set to dock at the station three hours after the launch.

NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman attended the launch, the first visit to Baikonur by a NASA chief in eight years that highlighted the ongoing cooperation in orbit between Moscow and Washington despite tensions over Russia’s military action in Ukraine.

Before the launch, Isaacman met with the head of Russia's state corporation Roscosmos, Dmitry Bakanov. Speaking during Monday’s meeting with the crew, Isaacman thanked Roscosmos, for its efforts to prepare for the mission, saying that “the integrated work performed over the past several months reflects the professionalism and dedication of everyone involved.”

The mission is Menon’s first space flight and the second for Dubrov and Kikina.

The trio will join NASA astronauts Jessica Meir, Jack Hathaway and Chris Williams, European Space Agency astronaut Sophie Adenot and Roscosmos cosmonauts Sergei Kud-Sverchkov, Sergei Mikaev and Andrei Fedyaev.

Once bitter rivals in the space race during the Cold War, Russia and the U.S. cooperate on the space station and other projects. That relationship was marred by tensions after Moscow sent troops into Ukraine in 2022, but Washington and Moscow have continued to work together, with U.S. and Russian crews flying to the orbiting outpost on each country’s spacecraft.

Plans for broader cooperation, including possible Russian involvement in NASA’s Artemis program of lunar research, have fallen apart. As Russia has become increasingly reliant on China for its energy exports and imports of key technology amid Western sanctions, Roscosmos has started cooperation with China on its prospective lunar mission.

Bigger fires have been ravaging areas of southern France, but the Fontainebleau fire is exceptionally close to the densely populated region surrounding the French capital.

Water-dumping planes repeatedly dived into the Seine River to scoop up water and douse the fires — the first time such aircraft had ever been used to fight fires in the Paris region, the regional fire chief said.

Smoke blanketed the treetops and hung in the air Tuesday as authorities sought to get the fires under control.

No deaths or injuries have been reported.

Two arrested in connection with Fontainebleau fires

Two people have been arrested in connection with the Fontainebleau fires, and two others arrested for fires elsewhere in France, Interior Minister Laurent Nunez said Tuesday on BFM television. He didn’t provide details.

The heat wave that has scorched France in recent days, the third already this year, is starting to subside. The national weather service expects to end its heat wave red alert warnings starting Wednesday, though thunderstorm warnings are now in place in several regions.

Spanish authorities identify some victims of deadly fire

Four days after a fire ravaged a remote expat community in southern Spain, judicial authorities have identified 10 of the 13 fatalities using biological samples.

Most of the deceased, all of whom were adults, are foreign nationals. They include five British citizens — including a woman who died in the hospital — three Belgian nationals, a French woman, and a Spanish national, judicial authorities said in a statement late Monday.

Ten people remain unaccounted for.

The Los Gallardos fire affected some 70 square kilometers (27 square miles) of forest and farmland — an area larger than Manhattan.

Spain is experiencing extreme heat, which, combined with wind and little rainfall, is creating the ideal conditions for small wildfires to grow unchecked.

Europe is the world’s fastest-warming continent, with temperatures increasing twice as fast as the global average since the 1980s, according to the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service.

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Associated Press writers Teresa Medrano and Suman Naishadham in Madrid and Angela Charlton in Paris contributed to this report.

“To ask whether AI is a bubble is a foolish question,” Son told executives at an annual company event in Tokyo. “AI will transform our lives completely, and do so in a way that generates profits.”

“Those who refuse to evolve are closing down their world. Those who condemn AI are themselves spitting upward,” Son added.

Financial markets have recently been swept by waves of concern that the meteoric rise in share prices of companies like Nvidia, and massive investments in data centers, might not yield returns that match hopes for huge profits from AI.

Son founded SoftBank more than four decades ago and is a pioneer in Japan’s technology investments. He was an early supporter of AI and has invested tens of billions of dollars in related companies.

Son said he estimates that almost $5 trillion in investments will be needed annually and globally to expand data centers, increase production of computer chips and provide energy systems and other infrastructure for AI.

“In 2040, approximately 20% of the world’s GDP will be replaced by AI-related industries, the world of superintelligence,” he said.

SoftBank oversees a sprawling collection of businesses through what it calls Vision Funds. Its other businesses include telecommunications and energy.

Tokyo-based SoftBank Group Corp. earlier reported its profits for the fiscal year through March soared nearly five-fold to 5 trillion yen ($32 billion) from a year earlier as its AI investments paid off.

The tech giant has invested $34.6 billion in OpenAI. It sold its stake in computer chip maker Nvidia last year to free up funds for more investments in AI and data centers.

SoftBank recently started a battery business in Japan to build next-generation electric power infrastructure in anticipation of growing electricity demand driven by AI use.

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AP Business Writer Elaine Kurtenbach in Bangkok contributed.

Kent Carpenter, 73, was with his Filipina companion in a house in the coastal town of Sibulan, in Negros Oriental province, on Sunday night when the masked men forced their way in.

One drew a gun and shot Carpenter in the head, killing him instantly, police said his companion told them. The men took a laptop, an unspecified amount of cash and a backpack before fleeing, national police spokesperson Col. Allen Rae Co told reporters.

Regional police spokesperson Lt. Col. Joem Malong told The Associated Press that Carpenter's companion sustained unspecified injuries and was being treated. Investigators were trying to determine the motive for the killing and identify the attackers.

Carpenter was a marine biologist who had worked as a lecturer at the Silliman University, in Dumaguete city, Negros Oriental, Malong said.

The U.S. Embassy in Manila did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

“We assure the victim’s family, the community and our foreign visitors that this case is being treated with utmost urgency and no effort will be spared until justice is served,” regional police director Brig. Gen. Romano Cardiño said.

Carpenter had been a biological sciences professor at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia, since 1996. His research — which focused on the Philippines and the Coral Triangle between the Indian and Pacific oceans — shaped conservation efforts around the world, university officials said. They said he was on an extended research assignment in the Philippines and planned to retire in September.

“He dedicated his career to expanding our understanding of the world’s bodies of water and protecting some of its most vulnerable ecosystems,” Old Dominion President Brian Hemphill said in a statement. He described Carpenter's killing as sad and devastating. “His scholarship and passion impacted and inspired many individuals locally, nationally, and internationally.”

On his university webpage, Carpenter wrote that his research in marine conservation biology centered on assessing the extinction risks to fish species and plants. In 2010, he told the AP that unchecked global warming could lead to the extinction of all coral reefs on the planet within 100 years.

“You could argue that a complete collapse of the marine ecosystem would be one of the consequences of losing corals,” he said. “You’re going to have a tremendous cascade effect for all life in the oceans.”

Carpenter's interest in the Philippines stemmed from his Peace Corps assignment there in the 1970s, according to a 2007 Old Dominion newsletter.

Several Philippine environment and biodiversity centers mourned Carpenter's death. Silliman University said Carpenter was an exceptional scientist, who had collaborated with the university on marine research work and studies since 1976.

“Dr. Carpenter made ground-breaking contributions that transformed global understanding of Philippine marine biodiversity,” the university said.

It marks the second straight quarter of strong results from the banks, which have benefited from market volatility since the Iran war began in late February.

Both consumer-facing and market-focused banks reported top- and bottom-line growth that beat even the most optimistic Wall Street expectations.

Here's a look at how and why banks have continued to thrive despite a clouded economic future.

JPMorgan hits records

JPMorgan Chase logged $16.9 billion in second-quarter profit as its equities trading division again took advantage of market volatility triggered by the war in Iran.

The nation's largest bank by asset size, JPMorgan said that revenue in every line of its business hit record levels in the quarter, including its markets division, where revenue grew 35% over the same period last year. Revenue in its equity markets division skyrocketed 86%.

JPMorgan earned $6.14 per share in the period, beating analyst estimates of $5.59 per share. Managed revenue came in at $58 billion, also topping the estimates of analysts surveyed by FactSet.

JPMorgan shares rose 1.8% by midday.

The consumer stays strong

Bank executives highlighted a surprisingly strong U.S. consumer even as inflation remains elevated, in part due to the higher oil prices brought about by the war in Iran.

Bank of America said that consumer spending expanded, outperforming expectations. Consumer investment assets grew 18% year-over-year and average deposits and spending all increased from the first quarter, the bank said.

JPMorgan reported revenue of $20.3 billion from its consumer banking division in the period, a year-over-year increase of 8%.

Wells Fargo also reported improved consumer activity, reflecting a broadly healthy U.S. economy.

“Consumer spending is higher, charge-offs and delinquencies are lower, and savings and investments are growing across consumer segments,” Wells CEO Charlie Scharf said.

The unresolved conflict in the Middle East, however, remains a potential economic hurdle for consumers and businesses alike.

Oil prices fell back near prewar levels earlier this month, but they’re back up more than 10% this week after the U.S. renewed attacks on Iran and President Donald Trump announced a new blockade in the Strait of Hormuz, a key shipping route for about one-fifth of the world’s oil. At $3.86 per gallon, gas prices remain well above prewar levels but below their peak of around $4.50 in May.

Dimon said on a conference call that JPMorgan remains “appropriately cautious” in light of the current global economic risks.

“We cannot predict how these forces will ultimately play out,” Dimon said. “They may remain manageable, but they could also cause meaningful disruptions when they shift or collide.”

IPOs and mergers expected to stay hot through 2026

Dimon said that revenue from the New York bank's investment banking division rose 30%, accelerating to the highest level since 2021 as the thirst for initial public offerings and mergers and acquisitions remained strong.

All the major banks played a role in SpaceX's record-setting IPO in June, with Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley acting as lead underwriters. The offering brought in $75 billion, more than all U.S. IPOs combined in 2024 and 2025, according to Renaissance Capital.

Renaissance expects the IPO market to extend its hot streak into the second half of this year, also driven by larger deals such as Korean memory chip giant SK Hynix’s “mega-listing” on Friday that raised $26.5 billion.

Global mergers and acquisition activity also accelerated in the second quarter of 2026, with announcements up 64% year-over-year and closings up 33%, according to Morgan Stanley.

Goldman Sachs said revenue from advising on mergers and acquisitions in the second quarter rose 17%.

Iran war the main source of market volatility

Markets have been swinging up and down since the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran in late February, with military strikes from both sides interspersed with pauses in fighting and vague temporary truces.

Investors’ concerns that the war will last a long time has triggered high volumes of selling in financial markets, while hopes for a resolution and a freer flow of crude oil has inspired optimism and buying.

Though volatile markets can cause anxiety for individual investors, high-speed Wall Street trading desks can take advantage of the wild gyrations. Big swings in markets tend to increase activity on trading desks, leading to higher commissions and fee revenue for the banks.

Goldman Sachs said it brought in $15.52 billion in revenue from its banking and markets division in the period, 53% higher than last year's second quarter and a 22% increase over 2026's first quarter.

Citigroup's market revenue also topped its first quarter figure and was up 45% over the same period last year.

Overall strong second-quarter results

Wells Fargo reported a 22% jump in net income for the quarter to $6,4 billion. Revenue of $22.6 billion topped Wall Street estimates.

Scharf said the San Francisco bank benefited from a strong economy and its newly unleashed ability to invest after years of government oversight. Shares of Wells Fargo fell 2.6% at midday.

Goldman Sachs earned $6.6 billion in the quarter, or $20.98 per share, on $20.3 billion in revenue. Its shares rose more than 7%.

Bank of America’s profit rose to $9.1 billion, up 27% from a year ago. Bank of America’s shares climbed 1.7%.

Citigroup also beat Wall Street's projections for revenue and profit but its shares fell 4.5%.

The Public Office (Accountability) Bill imposes a legal duty of candor on public officials to tell the truth about public tragedies whatever the impact on their reputation.

The legislation is more commonly known as the Hillsborough Law, after the 1989 disaster in which 97 Liverpool soccer fans were killed in a crush at Hillsborough Stadium in Sheffield. An independent inquiry in 2012 found police had covered up their own mistakes and blamed the deaths on unruly supporters.

The bill is due to complete passage through the House of Commons on Tuesday after a delay caused by wrangling over whether it would apply to Britain’s spies. After pressure from bereaved families, the government has agreed that intelligence services will be covered by the duty of candor, but with a “secure process” for disclosing information if it could affect national security.

The bill will become law after being approved by the House of Lords, Parliament's upper chamber.

Outgoing Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who promised to bring in the law during his 2024 election campaign, is due to open debate on the bill in the Commons on Tuesday in one of his final acts as leader.

His successor Andy Burnham, who is due to take over as prime minister on Monday, has long campaigned on behalf of the bereaved families.

“We owe this moment to the Hillsborough families,” Burnham wrote in the Liverpool Echo. “For 37 years, they refused to accept a lie. They stood firm when powerful institutions closed ranks against them.

“They have shown extraordinary courage, and because they never gave up, they will leave a legacy that reaches far beyond Hillsborough. They are helping to reshape the relationship between the public and the state for generations to come.”

The 54,000-capacity Hillsborough stadium was nearly full for a match against Nottingham Forest on April 15, 1989 when more than 2,000 Liverpool fans were allowed to pour into a standing-only section behind a goal. The victims were smashed against metal fences or trampled underfoot, and many suffocated.

The death toll includes one fan who died in 2021 as a result of his injuries.

With hooliganism rife in English soccer in the 1980s, a narrative blaming drunken, ticketless and rowdy Liverpool fans was created by police, and was only overturned by years of campaigning by victims’ families.

An original inquest in 1991 found the deaths were accidental, a conclusion victims’ families refused to accept. Those findings were overturned in 2012 after a far-reaching inquiry into the disaster that examined previously secret documents and exposed wrongdoing and mistakes by police.

In 2016, a jury at a second inquest found the victims had been “unlawfully killed” as a result of failings by police, the ambulance service and Sheffield Wednesday Football Club, which ran the stadium. It found the behavior of fans did not contribute to the deaths.

In 2023 the government apologized for the way the families were treated over the decades and for the delay in its response to the report.

An investigation by the police watchdog concluded last year that 12 officers would have faced gross misconduct proceedings, were they not dead or long retired.

Assess spending rate

People who have just retired or are about to are particularly vulnerable to sequence-of-returns risk, which means that a bad market shows up early in your retirement. Not only does that early retirement sell-off feel bad, it actually is bad because it imperils your portfolio’s ability to last throughout your retirement years. In  Morningstar’s 2025 retirement spending research, we found that the people most likely to run out of money in retirement were  the ones whose portfolios lost value in the first five years of their retirements.

Retirees who are pulling cash flows from their portfolios can address that risk by adjusting their spending down to ensure that more of their portfolios are in place to recover when the market eventually does. And those adjustments don’t need to be radical to make an impact. In  our retirement income research, we found that even small tweaks like forgoing an inflation adjustment following a bear market help ensure that spending lasts over a whole 30-year period and can lead to more lifetime income than a strategy that ignores market movements.

If you haven’t yet retired, assess your planned in-retirement spending and identify where you would be willing to make cutbacks. Turbocharge savings if you can afford to do so. Catch-up contributions are available to all retirement savers over age 50. And if you’re between 60 and 63, you can make a “super-catch-up” contribution to your company retirement plan, for a total of $35,750 in 2026. High-income heavy savers may also be able to take advantage of after-tax 401(k) contributions, which enable them to stash even greater amounts in their company retirement plans.

Pull cash flows from safer assets

In a turbulent market environment in which equities have declined, it’s best to pull any portfolio cash flows from safer assets and leave your stock positions undisturbed. That’s the general logic behind  the Bucket approach to portfolio construction. In good years for the stock market, like 2023-25, you’d be harvesting appreciated equity assets to supply your income needs. In bad ones, like 2022, you’re not touching stocks but instead sourcing cash flows from high-quality bonds, cash, or a combination of the two.

If your portfolio is riskier than it should be, it’s not too late to shift into a more situation-appropriate asset allocation.

Play the long game with Social Security

Social Security is a secure, inflation-protected source of income, much like a paycheck. But the lifetime benefits of delaying Social Security are hard to ignore: a higher income stream that also happens to be fully inflation-protected and will last as long as you do. Delayed filing can be particularly impactful if you’re the higher earner in your family and you have a younger spouse who will receive that higher benefit for their lifetime.

In  our retirement income research, we found that delaying filing up until age 70 did enlarge lifetime income, but the benefits are greatest if you have some other source of funds to draw from until your benefits start. And the benefits are also obviously more valuable for people with above-average life expectancies, in that they stand to receive those higher streams of inflation-protected income for a longer period of time.

Revisit inflation protection

Inflation is a key risk for retiree portfolios because the income from your safe investments is going to buy you less and less as you age. Moreover, retirees tend to spend more on healthcare, where prices have historically increased faster than the general inflation rate.

Many retirees focus on nominal bonds and underrate the value of inflation-protected bonds as a component of their retirement plans. You can address that by adding an inflation-protected bond fund to your portfolio; most of the better target-date series allocate roughly one-fourth of their bond portfolios to inflation-protected bonds. Alternatively, you could build a laddered portfolio of Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities that will mature and supply you with living expenses throughout your retirement.

Investigate tax-saving strategies

The early retirement years are typically an excellent time to consider strategies like converting traditional IRA balances to Roth or accelerating withdrawals on traditional IRAs and 401(k)s. Without income from work and because you won’t be subject to required minimum distributions until you’re 73, your income, and in turn the taxes you’ll owe on those conversions and withdrawals, will be lower.

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This article was provided to The Associated Press by Morningstar. For more retirement content, go to https://www.morningstar.com/retirement.

Christine Benz is director of personal finance and retirement planning for Morningstar and co-host of The Long View podcast. Subscribe to her free newsletter, Improving Your Finances.

Related Links:

Your Retirement Countdown, With Christine Benz

https://www.morningstar.com/retirement/your-retirement-countdown-with-christine-benz

5 Things You Need to Know About RMDs This Year

https://www.morningstar.com/retirement/5-things-you-need-know-about-rmds-this-year

Retirees Don’t Need to Fear a Lost Decade. They Need a Plan

https://www.morningstar.com/retirement/retirees-dont-need-fear-lost-decade-they-need-plan

Gov. Kathy Hochul signed an executive order Tuesday imposing the country's first statewide moratorium on hyperscale data centers, which house thousands of computer servers and require massive amounts of energy and a steady supply of water to keep cool.

The move pushes the state into a raging debate over how to regulate the AI industry, as concerns over rising electric bills and environmental risks collide with a desire to stimulate local economies and foster the U.S. tech sector.

“The bottom line is that progress shouldn't arrive with a higher utility bill, deleted water supply or noise pollution, so we have no choice but to address these challenges created by these massive facilities,” Hochul said at a celebratory signing ceremony in Brooklyn.

President Donald Trump has warned states not to slap regulations on the AI industry, echoing tech companies in arguing such moves hamper job growth and cede ground to China in a race to lead in the rapidly growing field.

Earlier this year, Maine seemed poised to establish a similar moratorium. But the measure was vetoed by Democratic Gov. Janet Mills because it would have blocked a proposed data center in a town that has struggled after a mill closed.

Moratoriums have been proposed in at least a dozen states but have not gotten far, though some counties and municipalities have imposed their own temporary bans.

New York's executive order pauses state permitting for new large data centers and directs state regulators to create standards that address environmental impacts, energy demand, water usage and other factors, the governor’s office said.

The decision in New York also carries political significance for Hochul's reelection campaign and the state's tight congressional races this fall, as Democrats move to address affordability concerns over high utility bills. In addition, the governor this year softened New York's ambitious goals to reduce greenhouse gases, citing rising energy costs for consumers.

Hochul’s Republican opponent in the governor’s race, Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman, opposes a statewide moratorium and says local governments should be allowed to strike deals with tech companies for data center projects that promise enough economic benefits.

In a statement Tuesday, Blakeman said the governor “doesn’t work with local governments and business leaders to figure out how to get things done,” while pledging to “modernize our economy to bring costs down and create good jobs.”

The state Legislature this year approved its own moratorium bill, but Hochul's office described the legislation as complex and said it needed additional work. Instead, the governor opted for an executive order that would take effect immediately.

State Sen. Kristen Gonzalez, a Democrat who sponsored the legislation, joined the governor during the signing ceremony. “If Big Tech is coming onto our turf, it should be on our terms,” she said.

New York, at this stage, has not been a destination for the largest hyperscale data centers.

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

Intergovernmental conferences were being held in Brussels to ceremonially open or close negotiating tracks for the top four candidates to join the 27-nation EU: Albania, Montenegro, Moldova and war-ravaged Ukraine. But it could still be years before any of them join.

“We have not seen this in more than two decades. The last time, it was in 2002. This is a Super Tuesday for EU enlargement and Ukraine is part of it,” Enlargement Commissioner Marta Kos told reporters.

While holding four meetings in one day is a rarity, 10 countries — most of them from central Europe — joined the EU in 2004. Croatia, the last country to be welcomed into the world’s biggest trading bloc, joined in 2013.

Changing times force a change of policy

Tuesday’s move is a sign of the important political and geostrategic changes happening in Europe. In 2019, French President Emmanuel Macron insisted that he would block any attempt at enlargement until the EU itself had undergone deep reforms.

But Europe’s biggest land war in decades and its fallout have altered that calculus. The EU has sought to encourage reform in the candidate nations, fearing the growing influence of Russia and China.

Ukraine’s progress has been impressive. It only applied for membership in 2022, four days after Russia launched a full-scale invasion. Moldova too has been under heavy Russian pressure.

Ukraine sees EU membership as one “security guarantee” for a stable future once the war ends. Its best guarantee would be NATO membership, but the Trump administration insists that cannot happen, and other NATO members are wary of it joining while fighting continues.

European countries see the war as an existential threat, and fear that Russian President Vladimir Putin could target them in coming years, especially if he wins in Ukraine.

“The case for Ukraine’s EU membership is very strong,” Kos said.

“The future security architecture of our continent is unimaginable without Ukraine,” she said. “Ukrainians have turned their country into a military powerhouse with capabilities few other nations can match, especially with its rapidly evolving drone technologies.”

The benefits of EU membership

The prospect of EU membership is a powerful driver for pro-democratic reform, and joining has boosted trade and creates jobs, notably in the volatile Balkans region, where a series of wars in the 1990s tore apart the former nation of Yugoslavia. Most candidates for EU member are Balkan states.

Countries hoping to join the EU must complete negotiations in 35 policy areas, known as chapters, from agriculture to taxation and energy to trade. That process can take years.

Last month, Ukraine and Moldova opened negotiations on a cluster of five chapters linked to the values and principles on which the EU was founded, such as the rule of law, respect for fundamental rights and the functioning of democratic institutions.

They each opened a second cluster on Tuesday focused on foreign relations, security and defense policies, as well as trade policy, development cooperation and humanitarian aid.

Albania’s meeting will serve to provisionally close negotiating tracks on science and research, education and culture, and external relations. Montenegro – which hopes to join in 2028 – is doing the same with competition policy and customs rules.

Hungary's Orbán leaves and things start moving

An important factor that has led to the EU's new-found speed is a change of government in Hungary.

Ukraine’s accession process was long stymied by Hungary’s stridently nationalist former prime minister Viktor Orbán, who was considered Russia’s strongest ally in Europe and possible threat to the EU project. The candidacies of Ukraine and Moldova were linked and neither could progress.

But U.S. President Donald Trump's friend was ejected by voters in April in spectacular fashion after 16 years in power.

Orbán routinely exploited voting rules that require all 27 member countries to agree on certain rules, sanctions and even political statements. Unanimous agreement is required for each negotiating chapter to be opened, and then again for it to be closed.

Nine countries are officially candidates to join the EU: Albania, Bosnia, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia, Georgia, Moldova, Ukraine and Turkey. Accession talks for Georgia and Turkey are on hold due to concerns about democratic standards.

Kosovo has also applied to join but has not been granted candidate status.

It was the first time in almost two weeks that Ukraine said it had downed Russian ballistic missiles, which are harder to stop than drones or cruise missiles and have pummeled the country in Moscow's 4-year-old full-scale invasion.

Ukrainian air defenses likely used the U.S.-made Patriot surface-to-air guided missile system that is the most effective way of countering ballistic missiles, but ammunition for it has been in short supply amid the Iran war despite European efforts to make up for the shortfall.

Paris cheers Ukraine along the Champs-Elysees

Along the cobblestoned Champs-Elysees in Paris, crowds cheered Ukrainian troops marching in the annual Bastille Day parade, and President Volodymyr Zelenskyy received an ovation from European leaders who showed solidarity with Kyiv. Ukrainian aviators trained in France flew aboard two Mirage 2000B fighter jets alongside French air force pilots.

Zelenskyy was in France seeking a remedy to his country's air defense problem, and he announced Monday that Ukraine is joining with nine other nations to form a coalition that will build a shared ballistic missile shield for Europe. Ukraine and its partners could jointly develop a mass-produced, low-cost system in the next 12 months, he said.

The Bastille Day parade featured about 500 troops from the ″coalition of the willing″ group of countries that have pledged to help with Ukraine’s postwar security. French President Emmanuel Macron called it a ″great honor″ to welcome them to the parade.

Tuesday's attack in Kyiv caused fires at two warehouses and also damaged a school, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said.

The Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement it targeted military manufacturing facilities that produce long-range missiles and drones.

Moscow is seeking to choke off Ukrainian strikes on oil facilities deep inside Russia that have caused critical fuel shortages, frustrating the public and, Western analysts say, are hindering the Russian army’s advance on the front line.

Ukraine’s air force said one ballistic missile and 25 drones struck 17 locations, while falling debris was reported in 10 locations.

Ukraine seeks to bolster air defenses ahead of winter

Ukraine urgently needs to improve its air defense shield before winter. Much of the country is at the mercy of Russian missiles that have hammered its power grid since 2022, making winters almost unbearable.

President Donald Trump said at the NATO summit last week that the U.S. will give Ukraine a license to make Patriot systems itself. However, they are expensive, in high demand and take a long time to produce, so it will likely be years before any Ukrainian-made systems are ready to deploy.

Ukraine strikes more Russian oil facilities

Ukraine, meanwhile, kept up its long-range onslaught on Russian targets, especially oil facilities.

An attack in southern Russia's Krasnodar region caused a fire at the Afipsky Oil Refinery that was later put out, authorities there said.

Zelenskyy said Ukraine also hit an oil refinery in the city of Salavat in the Bashkortostan region, some 1,400 kilometers (900 miles) from the Ukrainian border. Bashkortostan Gov. Radiy Khabirov confirmed an attack on an industrial area in Salavat, but didn’t say what was hit.

In addition, the Ukrainian navy struck four Russian tankers operating as part of Moscow's so-called shadow fleet of aging tankers of uncertain ownership and safety practices that are dodging international oil sanctions and a patrol boat, Zelenskyy said.

Ukraine claimed Monday it struck 105 Russian vessels in the Sea of Azov next to the Crimean Peninsula between July 6-13.

The Russian Defense Ministry said its air defenses overnight intercepted 288 Ukrainian drones.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has rebuffed ceasefires offered by Zelenskyy.

“This war must be brought to an end, and all reasonable diplomatic proposals are on the table,” Zelenskyy said on social media.

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Eva Van Dam contributed from Paris.

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

The report identified the men as Mohieddin Abdollahi and Hossein Palani. It said they belonged to an Islamic State cell that formed after the group’s territorial defeat in Iraq and Syria and had planned attacks inside Iran.

According to the report, Iranian security forces identified the cell’s hideout in the Bamo mountain area near the Iraqi border before it could carry out its plans. Several militants were killed and others arrested during the operation, in which three members of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard were also killed. Authorities said they also seized weapons, ammunition and other equipment.

The two men were convicted of armed rebellion against the Islamic Republic, and were hanged after the Supreme Court upheld their death sentences. The judiciary did not disclose where the executions were carried out.

The billionaire businessman has been keeping up, and he plans for the final World Cup game at AT&T Stadium this year to be his first: the semifinal between France and Spain on Tuesday.

“I think first and foremost, he’s just a big event guy,” said Chad Estis, the Cowboys' executive vice president of business operations. “He loves the NFL. He loves the Dallas Cowboys. But he has a passion for events as much as anybody that I know. He very much wanted to ensure that the stadium was operating well.”

Judging by fans who eagerly anticipate seeing themselves on the giant video board that hangs above the center of the field and under the retractable roof — and then jump and wave for joy when they do — the venue temporarily renamed Dallas Stadium by FIFA has been a hit.

The Jones family has a suite for the World Cup, and has been using it. But Jones and some family members often leave the country on his yacht this time of year — between the end of offseason workouts for the Cowboys in June and the start of training camp in California in late July.

As a result, Jones wasn't there in person for a pair of record-setting performances from Argentina superstar Lionel Messi. Or Japanese fans leaving entire sections spotless by picking up after themselves — twice. Or Portugal star and career men's international scoring leader Cristiano Ronaldo's final World Cup game.

Those types of seminal moments were what Jones had in mind with the design and building of a stadium that opened in 2009 and in barely more than five years had hosted a Super Bowl and NCAA championship games in football and men's basketball.

Jones also was thinking about the fan experience, having used his own lessons from touring stadiums in Europe to include large standing-room viewing areas on three levels at each end.

An extensive art collection is punctuated by Anish Kapoor's stainless steel sculpture dubbed “sky mirror” outside on the east plaza. Kapoor is the creator of a similar sculpture in Chicago nicknamed “the bean.”

To prepare for the World Cup, the Cowboys pumped another $350 million into a stadium with an original price tag of $1.2 billon. The video board looks the same, but there were upgrades in the guts of that, along with new carpeting and furniture mostly in premium areas and an overhaul of the fan shop.

“I cannot tell you how many people come to our stadium and say, ‘I can’t believe this is 17 years old,’” Estis said. “People think it feels new. The whole thing’s been great, but it feels like it culminates in this phenomenal match tomorrow.”

FIFA's in charge

Jones had to turn the stadium over to FIFA, which means the governing body got to put up curtains on the huge sliding glass doors on the west end for the only game where the setting sun could have shined into the eyes of the players.

NFL players, including Cowboys, losing footballs in the sun has been an occasional issue each fall. Each time the topic comes up, Jones flatly refuses to consider curtains. He prefers the asthetics and expects coaches and players to make game plans around the setting sun.

It will be too early in the day for the sun to be an issue when Spain and France play for a spot Sunday in the World Cup final at the home of the New York Jets and Giants in East Rutherford, New Jersey.

Jones wanted that final, but settled for the consolation prize of the most games, including sharing the semifinals with the home of the Atlanta Falcons, where Argentina and England play Wednesday.

“It’s just another great moment in an unbelievable sports legacy,” said Dan Hunt, co-chair of the local organizing committee and son of the late Lamar Hunt, who was one of Jones' rivals as owner of the Kansas City Chiefs.

“He’s been a world champion,” Dan Hunt said. “He’s a Pro Football Hall of Famer. He’s hosted Super Bowls, hosted almost everything you can at AT&T Stadium. And this is just another moment.”

That suite spot

Oh, one other thing Jones had to give up — his personal suite at the 50-yard line. Estis said FIFA thought it was perfect for a VIP area.

“We're like, ‘Wait a minute. Are you serious?’” Estis said with a chuckle. “I mean, I understand it. That's why Jerry's suite is there. It's the prime spot.”

Jones is giving up his prime spot for arguably the biggest single global sporting event to come to his venue. He'll just be in a different suite.

“I think I could imagine him being a little emotional about it,” Estis said. “To see him in design meetings and his attention to detail and his care for what the stadium looked and felt like to people, what it looked like from different angles walking up to it. He just he was so involved in the creation of what it is.”

Jones is set to feel the soccer vibe — finally.

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See more of AP’s World Cup coverage here

Alexander, who signed a two-way deal with Utah last week, made contact with the Bulls' Caleb Wilson while driving toward the basket and, after tossing the ball toward the hoop, went behind the basket clutching his side. He then dropped to the ground, seemingly in great pain.

The 23-year-old Alexander was taken from the Thomas & Mack Center court on a stretcher. The incident occurred with just over two minutes left in the fourth quarter.

The Jazz said Tuesday that Alexander had a left rib contusion.

Alexander played three seasons at Creighton and skipped his final year of eligibility to turn pro. The G League rookie of the year for the 2024-25 season played 24 games for the Denver Nuggets the same season and nine game for the New Orleans Pelicans last season.

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AP NBA: https://apnews.com/NBA

That agreement was supposed to reopen a waterway that is key to world energy supplies and give negotiators time to hammer out a permanent end to the war. Instead, fighting has once again engulfed the region, threatened the global economy and brought warnings to commercial airlines.

The focus of the conflict now is the strait, through which a fifth of all traded crude oil and natural gas passed in peacetime. Iran effectively shut the passage during the war by attacking and threatening ships — a tactic that proved its greatest strategic advantage. It sent the price of oil, fertilizer and other goods soaring at a time when world leaders were already struggling to address rising costs.

Iran has more recently attacked ships moving through the strait on a route overseen by the U.S. military that is outside Tehran’s control, setting off tit-for-tat strikes. 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.

Trump says he's replacing the fees with Gulf investments

On Monday, Trump said the U.S. would reimpose a blockade on Iranian ports and begin charging ships fees equivalent to 20% of their cargo to defray the costs of securing the strait. He backed off on the fees a day later, while the blockade is set to come back into force in the coming hours.

“Based on highly productive conversations with Middle East leadership, I have decided to replace the 20% United States Reimbursement Fee with Trade and Investment Deals that the various Gulf States will be making into the United States,” Trump said on social media.

The president said the investments “will be MASSIVE,” though it’s unclear if these would be new commitments relative to what Trump announced after a visit last year to the Middle East.

Strikes and counterstrikes resume across the Mideast

The U.S. military’s Central Command said it struck several areas in Iran, targeting “coastal defense systems, missile and drone sites and maritime capabilities.” Iran acknowledged the strikes but provided no immediate casualty or damage assessments.

“These strikes will continue imposing a heavy cost on Iranian forces and degrade their ability to attack innocent civilians and commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz,” the U.S. military said.

Iran responded with attacks targeting Bahrain, Jordan and three tankers that traveled through the strait. Kuwait's military said it was responding to an aerial attack without providing further details.

Two of the ships were associated with the United Arab Emirates and were set ablaze for a time. The International Maritime Organization said the attack on the tankers Mombasa and Al Bahiyah killed two mariners and wounded 14 others. The Emirates threatened to retaliate.

Dutch shipping firm Stolt Tankers said that one of its ships came under attack. The attack on the Stolt Magnesium off Oman sparked a fire in the engine room, but the company said all the mariners were safe.

Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard said the Mombasa and Al Bahiyah “ignored repeated warnings.” Iran has targeted ships that use a route through the strait that passes near Oman outside of its territorial waters.

Hours after the U.S. said it ended its campaign of strikes, the Iranian city of Bushehr on the Persian Gulf was hit in at least four locations, the state-run IRNA news agency reported. The attacks again raised the possibility that Gulf Arab states were retaliating against Iran without discussing it in public.

In Bahrain, which hosts the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet, air raid sirens sounded on four occasions Tuesday as authorities told people to seek shelter. There were no immediate reports of casualties or damage.

The European Union Aviation Safety Agency warned airlines against operating in the airspace of Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, as well as over the Gulf of Oman.

It said in a bulletin that “unpredictable military developments, combined with the possible use of missiles, drones, combat aircraft and air-defense systems, create a high risk to civil flights.”

The interim peace deal is in peril

Exchanges of fire in recent days had already cast doubt on the interim peace deal — now almost halfway through the 60-day period in which negotiators were supposed to agree to a final accord, which also was meant to address Iran’s disputed nuclear program and other issues.

But Trump's vow to impose a blockade further imperils it. Washington lifted a blockade it imposed in mid-April as part of the deal. The U.S. military said it will resume it at midnight Wednesday in Dubai.

Trump's plan to charge fees would have been a change to longstanding U.S. policy and a departure from recent U.S. promises that the strait would remain open to all without tolls — recently offered by U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio on a trip to the region.

Under the interim deal, Iran agreed that passage through the strait would remain free of charge for 60 days — but the agreement left open what would happen after. Iran asserts it has the right to manage traffic through the strait and potentially charge fees. The U.S. has disputed that.

The price for a barrel of Brent crude oil, the international standard, briefly topped $87 early Tuesday, still well below the nearly $120 reached at the height of the war but threatening to raise costs everywhere. The price dipped to $78 in the aftermath of Trump’s announcement that he had changed course.

Mediators are trying to prevent a return to full-scale war

Regional mediators are still trying to get the United States and Iran back to the negotiating table, according to two regional officials.

The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the delicate diplomatic process, said Pakistan-led mediation was working around the clock to reactivate the ceasefire.

Meanwhile, Lebanese and Israeli delegations were expected to meet in Rome on Tuesday to continue U.S.-mediated negotiations. Shortly after the U.S. and Israel launched the war on Feb. 28, the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah joined the conflict in support of its ally, Iran, and began attacking Israel. Israel responded with a ground invasion of Lebanon.

Last month, Lebanon and Israel announced a “framework agreement” outlining the withdrawal of Israeli forces from southern Lebanon in exchange for the disarmament of Hezbollah. Implementation has stalled.

Before the fighting around the strait intensified, Israel’s war against Hezbollah in Lebanon repeatedly threatened to derail the interim deal. A truce now exists in Lebanon, but it remains unclear whether it will hold if the U.S. and Iran return to full-scale war.

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Boak reported from Washington. Associated Press writer Samy Magdy in Cairo contributed to this report.

Reaction in the media world has been swift and severe to the issue of subpoenas to five New York Times journalists who reported on security questions involving the new Qatari-gifted Air Force One — a legal maneuver seen as a troubling escalation of the Trump administration’s campaign to control and intimidate independent media outlets.

“The subpoenas are 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,” said Jodie Ginsberg, CEO of the Committee to Protect Journalists.

Media advocates and analysts expressed dismay at the tactic, even after months in which news organizations drawing President Donald Trump’s ire have been attacked both in courtrooms and in the court of public opinion; media access to corridors of power has been blocked; and a Washington journalist’s home has been searched by federal agents.

“They have used the levers of power to intimidate and demonize professional journalists who report stories that are unfavorable to the administration’s desired narrative,” said Frank Sesno, a former CNN White House bureau chief who is now a media and public affairs professor at George Washington University.

He called Friday’s subpoenas “dangerous and uncharted territory, but merely an extension of what we have seen from this administration and president.”

“Don’t like a poll? Sue the Des Moines Register," he said. "Don’t like the way an interview is edited? Sue ‘60 Minutes.’ Don’t like the coverage of the gifted Air Force One? Order the FBI to investigate and subpoena the journalists for what is, by the way, a story that is in the public interest.”

Some of the subpoenas were delivered to reporters at home

Some of the subpoenas were delivered to reporters at their homes, the Times said. Sought by Jay Clayton, the U.S. attorney in Manhattan, they seek to force the reporters to testify before a federal grand jury in Manhattan this week.

The new jet in question, a present from Qatar that Trump's administration spent $400 million to retrofit and upgrade, entered service last week. But the Republican president used an older model Air Force One jet to leave a NATO summit in Turkey.

The Times, citing anonymous sources, reported that the switch had come at the urging of the Secret Service and that the newer plane lacked some of the advanced security features of the older aircraft, including antimissile capabilities. On social media, Trump denied security concerns.

The subpoenas were issued after FBI Director Kash Patel and other Justice Department officials met at the White House on Friday to talk about the matter, according to a person familiar with the discussions who was not authorized to discuss the issue publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity. The Times said the meeting lasted around eight hours.

The fact that the operation was conducted from the White House itself was particularly egregious to analysts like Sesno, who called the coordination “unprecedented.”

“This graphically illustrates the pressure and influence the White House and president have brought to bear on law enforcement that is supposed to be independent and driven by facts, not politics,” he said.

The Justice Department has justified the subpoenas by saying that “to be clear, reporters are not the targets, those leaking classified information are.”

“We value and appreciate the important role that the press plays in this country,” the department said in a weekend statement. "But DOJ also plays an important role to make sure that the people entrusted with our nation’s secrets do what they’re supposed to do with that information, which means not sharing classified information.”

The National Press Club called on the Justice Department to immediately withdraw the subpoenas.

“Every American should understand what is at stake,” Mark Schoeff Jr., the club’s president, said in a statement. “When federal agents arrive at the homes of journalists with subpoenas, it is not ordinary law enforcement. It is an extraordinary assault on the freedom of the press that strikes at the heart of the First Amendment.”

Also expressing solidarity with the Times journalists was the White House Correspondents' Association — which, in less than two weeks, holds its rescheduled dinner, with Trump planning to attend the event that celebrates the First Amendment. The first dinner was scuttled when a shooter opened fire in what prosecutors say was an attempt to kill the president.

“The White House Correspondents’ Association stands with the New York Times reporters who were targeted for doing their jobs to uphold the public’s right to know how its government operates,” said a statement from the group’s president, Weijia Jiang. “The WHCA condemns any act of intimidation against journalists, including attempts to pressure them into revealing sources.”

Trump's administration has initiated multiple lawsuits against media outlets

Trump’s animosity toward news outlets whose agenda runs counter to his own isn't new. But in his second presidential term, he has launched an escalation, often harnessing the levers of the federal government or attempting to do so. These efforts have taken place both in actual courtrooms and in the court of public opinion.

The president has sued various news organizations whose coverage he dislikes. He has also threatened to revoke TV broadcast licenses. His Federal Communications Commission chairman is seeking to penalize shows like ABC’s “The View,” where some hosts speak out against Trump, by having the FCC explore revoking its exemption from equal-time rules.

The legal skirmishes include an escalating dispute between the media and Trump’s Defense Department over reporters’ access to the Pentagon. The Times has filed two lawsuits over a policy requiring journalists to be accompanied by escorts at the military complex.

The White House has also battled with The Associated Press over the news organization's refusal to follow Trump’s executive order renaming the Gulf of Mexico. And it has battled with The Wall Street Journal over reporting about Jeffrey Epstein and his ties to the president — including an article that described a sexually suggestive letter that the newspaper said bore Trump’s signature.

Last month, the Justice Department withdrew subpoenas it had issued that sought to compel reporters at The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal to testify before a grand jury, according to people familiar with the matter.

The Post confirmed that one of its journalists received a subpoena from the Trump administration as part of a broader crackdown on media leaks that in January also included the extraordinary step of an FBI search of the home of another journalist at the newspaper and the seizure of her electronic devices. The media world was stunned by the search of the home of reporter Hannah Natanson, who was covering Trump’s transformation of the federal government.

The Times is now gearing up for battle against what its lawyer David McCraw has called “this brazen act.”

In an internal memo seen by the AP, the newspaper's executive editor, Joseph Kahn, criticized the subpoenas, praised his journalists' work and said: “We expect to prevail. We have the best legal team in the business. ... The law protects news gatherers from this sort of retaliatory abuse of prosecutorial power. It is essential that the courts reaffirm that protection and quash this overreach. We are confident they will in this case.”

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Jocelyn Noveck covers the intersection of media and entertainment for The Associated Press.

More than 70 people were injured in the Sunday night tragedy, with 24 of them still in critical condition, according to a statement by the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration.

Initial details about the victims, which have not been updated since Monday, said 18 of the dead were women and nine were men, all Thai except one bar employee from Laos. The injured included 41 women and 34 men.

The blaze at the Rong Beer Na Ladprao bar, the city’s deadliest in 17 years, broke out shortly before midnight in a northern part of the Thai capital. Firefighters needed half an hour to bring it under control.

The bar, which in Thai calls itself a brewery or beer hall, claimed to accommodate as many as 600 customers. It was not clear how many were present Sunday night.

An investigation into the cause of the fire and whether the bar was following safety regulations is ongoing. Most of the people who were killed were found trapped in windowless bathrooms where they may have sought to escape the flames, police said.

Bangkok governor orders safety survey and better enforcement

Bangkok Gov. Chadchart Sittipunt said Tuesday he has ordered the city’s administration to conduct a sweeping survey of such establishments to assess risks. The city will also step up enforcement of existing laws to improve safety standards, he said.

Former patrons of the bar and other mourners visited the site Tuesday, adding to the growing pile of flowers leaning on the guardrails cordoning off the location of the blaze.

Handwritten messages in Thai and other languages, including Korean, were left alongside white flowers, expressing condolences to the victims.

Debris from the bar, including melted musical instruments and blackened chairs, lay scattered along the sidewalk, moved there Monday by officials investigating the cause of the fire.

University student Thanakon Phoklang said he was passing by and wanted to pay his respects.

“It was regrettable,” he said. “It’s impossible to feel anything else.”

The public clamor for answers and action concerning the tragedy has included relatives of the dead who went to Bangkok’s Institute of Forensic Medicine to collect their bodies on Tuesday.

Families weep as they retrieve bodies

Gathering at a loading area for vehicles, family members wept as they walked with coffins that were then loaded into an ambulance and taken away.

Namthip Tubsuk, a mother of two and teacher nicknamed “Ice,” died in the fire, according to her aunt Jittiya Phaiklaw, who focused on reports alleging exit doors had been locked.

“They shouldn’t have locked the doors,” Jittiya said. “If they were afraid the customers would get away, they could have had the security guard staff minding them away.

Jutatip Surakumhang, a friend of Namthip, said an apology was owed.

“I feel there must be someone coming out to apologize to everyone who died. There were deaths deserving an apology. It was heartbreaking,” Jutatip said.

The bar issued an apology and condolences Monday on Facebook and vowed to cooperate with investigations into the fire.

The relatives and friends of another deceased victim, 35-year-old Bangkok native Top Sarobol, also came to the forensic institute to accompany his body. They wept as his coffin was brought out and loaded into the van to be returned home.

“For his family, it is hard to accept it. His grandmother is old. She always said let her grandson cremate her,” his friend Nuttakarn Sevoy said. “But the reality is opposite of what we wanted.”

Speculation about the causes of the tragedy has been rampant but mostly unconfirmed, while experts have drawn general conclusions about fire safety in Thailand.

Engineering expert suggests problems should be probed

On Monday, the president of the Thailand Structural Engineers Association, Amorn Pimanmas, told reporters outside the bar that, while he had not inspected the venue, he observed some risk factors that could worsen fire hazards.

He said the building is enclosed, has low ceilings and may have used foam as decorative materials, without adequate flame-retardant treatment. Combined with limited air ventilation, smoke would accumulate quickly, he said, creating toxic air that could be the main cause of death for many victims.

He also noted that officials said the bar was licensed as a restaurant with a live music venue rather than an entertainment venue because it was located outside the designated zoning for such businesses. Amorn said that would exclude it from the stricter fire safety requirements for entertainment venues.

“There must be some kind of revolution regarding fire safety procedures, and I think law enforcement is also very important,” he said. “It’s not that we don’t have the law, but it’s the problem of how the law could be strictly enforced from now on. I think the government should answer this question.”

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Pimuk Rakkanam in Bangkok contributed to this report.

During a rare appearance by justices before Congress, Barrett said she had to wear a bulletproof vest home a few years ago, something she struggled to explain to her 12-year-old son.

“I didn't expect that performing this service would put me in the position of explaining to my children what a bulletproof vest was, why I had to wear one,” she said.

She and Justice Elena Kagan testified before a House appropriations panel in support of a request to increase security funding for members of the nation’s highest court.

Judges around the country have seen a rise in threats of violence and intimidation. Barrett's home was also targeted by a fake swatting call to police in May.

The hearing comes two weeks after the conservative-majority court finished handing down a series of major opinions, including a decision that increased President Donald Trump’s power over federal regulatory agencies and another that rejected his wide-ranging tariffs, sparking harsh personal criticism.

It's the first time justices have testified before Congress since 2019, and the two justices are faced wide-ranging questions about the court's work.

Security is central to the Supreme Court's budget request

The Supreme Court requested a total of $228 million for next fiscal year, a roughly 10% increase over the year before. About $18 million of that is for maintaining the building and grounds.

Much of the requested increase, $14.6 million, would go to expanding personal protection for justices, with six more agents for each.

An additional $2 million would fund an off-site residential security post aimed at making emergency responses faster, as well as increasing the number of Supreme Court police officers.

The U.S. Marshals Service, responsible for protecting judges, reported 564 threats in the government fiscal year that ended in September, an increase from the year before.

That total includes threats to the hundreds of federal judges around the country, though the nine-member Supreme Court has not been immune.

In May, Barrett’s security detail worked with police to quickly deal with the call determined to be swatting, or a fake 911 call designed to provoke a police response. Last year, her sister was the victim of a bomb threat in Charleston, South Carolina, police said. No bomb was found.

In 2022, shortly after the leak of a draft opinion overturning the Roe v. Wade abortion decision, a would-be assassin was arrested near the home of Justice Brett Kavanaugh with weapons and zip ties. Threats to the Supreme Court increased after that leak, and have continued to grow, Kagan said.

Chief Justice John Roberts has condemned the threats to all U.S. judges, saying during a speech in March that criticism of judicial opinions is understandable, but personally directed hostility is “dangerous, and it’s got to stop.”

The S&P 500 added 0.4% to recover some of its 0.8% loss from the prior day. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 56 points, or 0.1%, as of 1:51 p.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 1.1% higher.

Stocks got help from easing yields in the bond market, which fell after a report said U.S. consumers had to pay prices for gasoline, food and other costs of living that were 3.5% higher last month than a year earlier.

While that’s more than nearly everyone would like, it wasn’t as bad as May’s 4.2% inflation rate or the 3.9% that economists expected for June. Less bad inflation could take pressure off the Federal Reserve, which is considering raising interest rates.

Higher rates can 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 less than a 13% chance that the Fed will raise its main interest rate at its next meeting later this month. That’s down from the nearly 42% probability they saw the day before, according to data from CME Group.

Rebounds for big, influential tech stocks also helped steady the market. They’ve been swinging sharply in recent weeks on worries that they shot too high in the euphoria around artificial-intelligence technology and that the voracious demand for AI chips and data centers may fade if they don't produce the promised profits and productivity.

Micron Technology rose 4.8%, and Nvidia added 3.7%. A day before, they were two of the heaviest weights on the S&P 500 after falling 4.4% and 3.5%, respectively.

To be sure, big risks remain for inflation. Fighting in the Middle East is threatening to close or slow traffic in the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterway that oil tankers use to exit the Persian Gulf and deliver crude to customers worldwide.

The price for a barrel of Brent crude, the international standard, briefly topped $87 in the morning. Following its leap of nearly 10% on Monday, that brought it back to where it was before the United States and Iran signed their interim deal to halt their fighting in the middle of last month.

Brent's price later pared its gain and was sitting at $84.48, up 1.4% from Monday's settlement. President Donald Trump backed away from his threat made a day before to charge 20% on all cargo going through the strait to reimburse the U.S. military for its protection.

Wall Street’s other big focus this week is the start of earnings reporting season, as companies tell investors how much profit they made from April through June. The pressure is on companies to deliver big growth to justify how high their stock prices have jumped. Indexes are near records despite the recent swings caused by worries about AI stocks.

Bank of America, Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs and Wells Fargo all on Tuesday reported fatter profits for the latest quarter than analysts expected. Their reports showed strength for their trading desks and suggested spending by U.S. consumers remains resilient.

Their stocks mostly rose following the results. Goldman Sachs jumped 7.7%, but Citigroup fell 5.6%.

IBM was the single heaviest weight on the S&P 500 and the biggest reason the Dow lagged behind other indexes after dropping 24.5%. It’s potentially heading for its worst day since at least 1972, according to data provider FactSet.

CEO Arvind Krishna said performance for IBM's software and infrastructure businesses fell short of expectations last quarter after customers shifted their spending toward servers, storage and memory to get ahead of expected price increases caused by the AI boom.

“These conditions require our teams to execute perfectly, and this quarter we faltered,” Krishna wrote in a letter to investors. “We did not adapt and move quickly enough, and numerous large deals failed to close on the timelines we expected, driving the majority of our shortfall.”

In the bond market, the yield on the 10-year Treasury dropped to 4.58% from 4.62% late Monday. It's a notable move, and it halts a run higher from 3.97% before the war with Iran began.

Fed Chair Kevin Warsh testified before lawmakers on Capitol Hill for the first time since taking over leadership of the central bank. He pledged to make high inflation “a thing of the past” but offered no signal about the Fed’s next steps.

In stock markets abroad, indexes edged higher in Europe following a stronger finish in Asia.

Japan’s Nikkei 225 added 0.7% after SoftBank Group Corp. rose 3.3%. It’s a big investor in AI, and Chairman Masayoshi Son gave a speech in Tokyo where he derided the idea that there is a bubble in investments in capacity for AI.

Stocks rose 1.4% in Shanghai after the government reported China’s exports jumped 27% in June from a year earlier as AI drove strong demand for computer chips and other technology.

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AP Business Writer Elaine Kurtenbach contributed to this report.

Ali al-Zaidi emerged as a consensus candidate in Iraq after months of deadlock over the premiership following last year’s parliamentary elections. Trump endorsed al-Zaidi for the job after he threatened to cut off U.S. support for Iraq if another candidate became the country's next prime minister.

“Mark my words, I knew what I was doing,” Trump said in the Oval Office as he sat alongside al-Zaidi for his first visit outside Iraq as prime minister. “This man is going to be a great leader in the Middle East, beyond Iraq. His influence is going to spread all throughout the Middle East.”

Speaking through an interpreter, al-Zaidi said that he was conveying his greetings from the “oldest civilization in the world” and that the focus of his U.S. visit would be to announce an “economic partnership” between the two countries.

The issue of Iran loomed large in the discussions Tuesday. Iraq has been under pressure to disarm a network of Iran-backed militias operating in the country, some of which launched attacks on U.S. bases and diplomatic facilities after the U.S. and Israel launched their war against Iran in February. Officially, the Iraqi government has given non-state armed groups until the end of September to disarm, but some of the most powerful militias have said they have no intention of doing so.

Al-Zaidi stressed on Tuesday that there will be no justification for their existence after Sept. 30. A Trump administration official said ahead of the Oval Office meeting that the U.S. will make “informed” decisions based on Iraq’s efforts to disarm Iranian-backed militias inside its borders. The official insisted on anonymity to discuss the administration’s strategy ahead of al-Zaidi’s visit.

Al-Zaidi has been called ‘Trump of the Middle East’

Iraq’s dominant parliamentary bloc called the Coordination Framework, a coalition of Shiite parties allied with Iran, initially said it would back former Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, whom the Trump administration viewed as too close to Tehran. Trump, a Republican, got personally involved, threatening to block support if al-Maliki returned to power.

Since al-Zaidi's formal installation as prime minister-designate in April, the Trump administration has kept up its outreach to ensure the U.S. can wield significant sway in Iraq, particularly in extricating the Iranian influence that is deeply entrenched inside the country.

The parallel backgrounds of Trump and al-Zaidi have also bolstered their rapport. Victoria Taylor, director of the Iraq Initiative at the Atlantic Council, noted that al-Zaidi has been likened to “Trump of the Middle East” considering his business background and lack of political experience.

“When you value business success, I think then it’s very appealing to look at an Iraqi prime minister who is likely a billionaire and can be really pointed to as a political outsider,” she said.

But Taylor added that “the reality is much more complicated,” noting that al-Zaidi was chosen by the current political infrastructure in Iraq and will be “beholden in some way to that system.”

“I’m not always sure that there’s a full appreciation of the challenge that this prime minister will face in actually trying to really dismantle core parts of the political system,” she said, noting the obstacles that al-Zaidi will face as he tries to disarm the Iran-backed militias or challenge political corruption.

Underscoring the complicated competing interests that al-Zaidi is confronting in Iraq, the new prime minister sidestepped a question about Trump's remarks on the 2020 killing of Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani.

“At that time, I wasn’t involved in politics," al-Zaidi said. "Let’s talk about the future.”

Renad Mansour, director of the Iraq Initiative at the Chatham House think tank, said he expects that “the U.S. will put significant pressure on al-Zaidi” to move ahead with disarmament during his Washington visit “and Zaidi will respond by saying, ‘But I need support — intelligence support, technical support, armed support.’”

“There is a scenario in which, if the Iraqi government starts going after these groups, they will also go after the government,” Mansour said. “And this is a scenario that I think that the Iraqi government is apprehensive about.”

Oil pipeline deal is set to be signed, Iraqi officials say

The two governments are also poised to finalize a significant energy deal.

Two Iraqi officials said an agreement is slated to be signed Friday between Iraq, U.S. companies Chevron and TI Capital, and Qatar’s UCC for construction of an oil pipeline that will connect southern Iraq’s Basra to western Iraq's Haditha and from there to the Ceyhan port in Turkey and the port of Baniyas on Syria’s coast. The pipeline is projected to carry about 2 million barrels of oil per day. The officials spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly.

Neither Trump nor al-Zaidi elaborated on the pending deal publicly during their Oval Office meeting, but the U.S. president said Iraq has “tremendous potential" because of its oil.

Al-Zaidi cracks down on corruption

Al-Zaidi received Trump’s blessing, despite the fact that he was chairman of a bank, Al-Janoob Islamic Bank, that was among the financial institutions banned by Iraq’s central bank in 2024 from dealing in dollars amid pressure from the U.S. to crack down on money laundering and funneling of funds to Iran.

Since taking office, al-Zaidi has made a public show of cracking down on corruption. His government has conducted raids and arrested dozens of current and former lawmakers and government officials accused of corruption, including some affiliated with former Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani.

The Iraqi premier’s delegation to Washington includes a number of Iraqi businessmen and government officials, and al-Zaidi’s office said in a statement that the aim of the visit is to “strengthen economic and development partnerships, attract investment, and expand the role of U.S. companies in implementing infrastructure projects” and to further develop the oil-rich country’s energy sector.

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An earlier version of this story was corrected to show Trump said “if we are not there to help,” not “if we are there to help.”

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Follow the AP's coverage of Iraq at https://apnews.com/hub/iraq.

Fire managers try to anticipate nature's next move, placing thousands of firefighters, hundreds of engines, batteries of bulldozers, and fleets of helicopters and air tankers where they'll make the biggest difference.

This year, they're dealing with persistent drought made worse by record-low snowpack levels and consecutive days of hot, dry and windy weather. Hundreds of homes have burned, three firefighters were killed battling flames in Colorado, and a helicopter helping with another Colorado fire crashed into a reservoir, killing the pilot.

National preparedness has yet to reach its highest level, but resources are getting stretched as new fires pop up daily.

“The U.S. Wildland Fire Service is prioritizing pre-positioning of crews, engines and aircraft in areas with the highest likelihood of wildfire activity,” the agency said in an email to The Associated Press when asked about available resources. “This allows for quicker initial attack when new wildfires ignite, which is often the most effective way to keep fires small.”

US preparedness level ratchets up

The National Interagency Fire Center, a collection of federal and state agencies that support on-the-ground wildfire fighting efforts, sets the preparedness level at 1 to 5 based on fire activity, resource demands, weather and conditions on the ground that can be fuel for a fire. By late June, surging wildfire activity prompted coordinators to move the needle to level 4 and begin funneling more crews to the hottest spots.

The national fire center has confirmed more than 2,100 fires since the beginning of July. The explosion of fire activity across the West led to the assignment of more highly skilled and experienced incident management teams. Some have traveled from Alaska and California to help with fires in the Great Basin region.

As of Tuesday, 17 such teams were overseeing nearly 17,000 people spread across more than a dozen states.

It’s typical to see preparedness increase in July and August, but fire managers are hopeful they can juggle resources to avoid maxing out.

Over the past decade, fire managers have reached the top preparedness tier an average of 25 days annually, with the longest stretch happening in 2021, according to federal statistics. The earliest the designation ever occurred was June 21, 2002.

Firefighters hit the road to help

The U.S. has 10 geographic area coordination centers — or GACCs — that mobilize firefighters and other resources.

Mike Morgan, director of the Colorado Division of Fire Prevention and Control, noted during a news conference in early July that his state was getting help from an Alaska team.

“Thank God that they have the ability to free those resources up,” he said. “So I think at the moment I would say I feel pretty good about where we’re at. But I’m very concerned about where we go.”

In southeastern Utah, more crews arrived to help with the Babylon Fire, the largest active blaze in the U.S. at 166 square miles (430 square kilometers) — an area larger than Seattle.

In all, more than 5,650 square miles (14,633 square kilometers) have burned in the U.S. so far this year — more than the size of Yellowstone and Grand Canyon national parks combined — outpacing the average for the past decade.

Sharing resources requires balance

The most recent outlook shows above normal wildfire potential in July from the Four Corners region — where New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado and Utah meet — north to Oregon, Idaho and Washington. It's not expected to simmer down until September.

Christopher Dunn, an assistant professor of wildfire risk science at Oregon State University, said those outlooks help determine how and where to mobilize resources. Those resources shift as the fire season moves from region to region.

In a busy year, states must weigh whether to free up resources to help elsewhere or pressure federal officials to keep crews in reserve in case of increased risk. That's what Dunn describes as hoarding resources.

“So there is sort of this delicate balance that has to be walked there, where you share, they share, everybody shares,” he said, “and everybody benefits from that sharing while not overextending your resources so much that you find yourself in a losing position.”

But along with sharing comes added exposure for firefighters who are in the field longer. That means more overtime and greater opportunities for burnout.

“With all this sharing and all of this increase in fire everywhere, we’re just going to see increased pressure on them to work more and work harder and essentially burn out quicker,” Dunn said.

Each fire season reignites debate over public investment in a permanent wildland firefighting workforce and what agencies can do to retain their most experienced personnel.

“More experience is critical when dealing with extreme conditions,” said Camille Stevens-Rumann, a former wildland firefighter and an associate professor at Colorado State University.

Red flag warnings determine strategy

Even with more resources, there's little firefighters can do when facing multiple days of strong winds, low humidity and warm temperatures. Stevens-Rumann said that's where the advance strategic positioning of resources comes in.

“They can be available for when those conditions die down, like in the evening,” she said. “But when we have day after day of red flag warnings and high winds, it’s really hard to control a fire.”

Even though Stevens-Rumann has been on the front lines and studies wildfires, it's unsettling when flames are close to home.

“There’s no denying it. It’s easy to disassociate that when you’re on a fire crew and you’re arriving to a place that you don’t have a connection to, per se, to fight a fire. You know, you’re there to do a job,” she said. “But when you see it in your own backyard, it’s definitely a totally different experience.”

This year, firefighters are being directed to attack every blaze as quickly as possible to limit growth, reversing a decades-long trend in which managers let some fires burn to clear brush and dead vegetation to reduce future risks. Stevens-Rumann said there are concerns about what that means for firefighter safety and work done on the landscape to slow the flames.

“It doesn’t do us any good to build miles and miles of line that just get burnt over, over and over again,” she said, noting newer strategies are helping managers figure out where best to take a stand.

Volunteers watch for smoke

Having eyes on the ground — or rather above the tree canopy — can help spot fires early. Despite once numbering in the thousands, there are just 350 lookout towers left in the U.S., with many staffed by volunteers due to dwindling budgets, said Michael Guerin, chair of the Forest Fire Lookout Association.

They're not just in the West. New Jersey opened a new one this year, and they're also used in Pennsylvania, Maine and other eastern states.

The recent fires have forced the evacuation of some towers in Colorado. Meanwhile, Guerin and fellow volunteers in California are ready for things to pick up in their state when the Santa Ana winds arrive.

Satellites could help in the future. The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection announced in early July that the first satellites had been launched into orbit as part of a space-based wildfire detection system.

For now, the lookout volunteers use a map, compass and familiarity with landmarks to pinpoint the location for initial attack crews. But their job isn't done, Guerin said.

“We then become the overwatch — the people that keep them safe while they’re doing the hard work on the ground.”

Graham, who had turned 71 just two days before dying on Saturday, was far younger than many of his Senate colleagues and appeared to have been in good health. He suffered a tear in his aorta, according to a preliminary report from the medical examiner.

It was the second time in less than a month that emergency personnel were dispatched to the home of a U.S. senator. In early June, Mitch McConnell, the former Republican Senate leader, was hospitalized for undisclosed reasons.

After weeks of increasingly dire speculation about his health, he finally revealed on Sunday that he had fallen and suffered from mild pneumonia. He released a photo, complete with a copy of the day’s newspaper.

Graham’s death and McConnell’s hospitalization have come amid an ongoing reckoning about the nation’s aging leaders, two years after the disastrous presidential debate that sparked widespread panic among Democrats about then-81-year-old President Joe Biden’s capacities and accusations of a cover-up.

Some politicians have continued to obscure details about their health challenges, asking for privacy despite their public positions, and fueling conspiracy theories.

“I think we need some transparency,” Sen. John Cornyn of Texas said Monday. “I wish Sen. McConnell and his team would have done that earlier, I think it would have resolved a lot of questions.”

McConnell is admitted to a hospital

McConnell, who at 84 is only the third-oldest member of the Senate, was admitted to the hospital on June 14 with barely any explanation. Aides said he was “receiving excellent care" but offered no details about his condition.

The dearth of information fueled a wave of speculation about his prognosis, with Laura Loomer, a Trump ally and conspiracy theorist, claiming on social media that a "high level source close to the White House” had told her he was “officially brain dead.”

But McConnell, who will retire from Congress at the end of January after serving as the longest-ever Senate leader, said in a statement that he is on the mend. He said a fall had led to his hospitalization and that he was “briefly unconscious" and treated for mild pneumonia.

“You all know how folks of my generation often hesitate to share the vulnerability that comes with growing older," he said. “Even in the public eye, I feel that same instinct – I can’t help it.”

That wasn't enough to put speculation to rest. On social media, many refused to believe the veracity of a photo his office released that included the front page of the “Sports” section of The Washington Post.

Conspiracy theories about McConnell’s health are “a symptom of our times," said Sen. Rand Paul, who is also from McConnell's home state of Kentucky. Paul said people should “give him a break.”

“People think they have a right to know everyone’s medical problems," he said, "but I don’t know, where does it begin and where does it end?”

Trump's medical reports offer limited details

The oldest person ever elected president, at age 78, has long offered only the rosiest picture of his health.

“Everything checked out PERFECTLY," he boasted after his last physical in May, adding that he took yet another cognitive test aimed at detecting early dementia and has “aced them all.”

His past medical reports have been criticized for offering limited detail and including statistics that some health professionals have viewed with skepticism.

When he first ran for president in 2016, Trump declined to release his health records, breaking with longtime precedent. He instead offered a four-paragraph note from his doctor declaring that he would be “the healthiest individual ever elected to the presidency.” Rep. Ronny Jackson, White House doctor during Trump's first term, later drew headlines when he extolled the president's “incredibly good genes."

When he was infected with COVID-19 in the midst of his 2020 reelection campaign, Trump's doctors and aides withheld key details of his treatment and tried to downplay the severity of his illness.

And after an attempted assassination at a Pennsylvania rally, Trump aides kept the public in the dark for days, declining to discuss the extent of his injuries or release medical records after assuring he was “fine.”

Kean Jr. goes absent for months

The obfuscation extends beyond the septuagenarian and octogenarian set. New Jersey Republican Rep. Tom Kean Jr. spent four months missing without explanation before he finally disclosed late last month that he had been in treatment for depression.

He said in a brief floor speech after his return that he had remained silent about his condition because he is a “private person by nature."

He won an uncontested primary during his absence, despite missing more than 100 votes in the House, and is running for reelection.

The approach stood in contrast to Sen. John Fetterman, a Pennsylvania Democrat, who disclosed his hospitalization for clinical depression the day after he was admitted to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center for treatment. He also suffered a stroke while running for office.

Biden's stumbles doom his reelection effort

Biden's halting gait, frail appearance and frequent verbal stumbles eventually doomed his 2024 reelection campaign. After a debate in which he frequently lost his train of thought, he chose to withdraw from the race, sparking an unprecedented swap at the top of the Democratic ticket that ultimately paved the way for Trump's return to office.

Many others have refused to retire. California Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a Democrat, died in office in 2023 at the age of 90, after years of declining health, including a bout of shingles. Though she returned to the Senate after her illness, she appeared frail and confused at times. It was later revealed that her office had failed to disclose in real time that she had contracted encephalitis while recovering.

Longtime Republican Rep. Kay Granger of Texas spent the final months of her more than two decades in Congress, when she was in her early 80s, suffering from what her office called “unforeseen health challenges” that made travel to Washington difficult.

Eleanor Holmes Norton, 88, the longtime House delegate for the District of Columbia, announced earlier this year that she would not run for reelection amid questions about her competency.

___ Associated Press writers Mary Clare Jalonick and Lisa Mascaro in Washington contributed to this report.

Dennis Sochor, who has been on death row since the 1980s, would become the oldest inmate Florida has executed in history — at least for now. Later this month, Florida is also set to execute an 80-year-old prisoner who would be the state’s first octogenarian to receive the death penalty.

The executions highlight the nation’s aging death row population and the busy death row chamber in Florida, which has already carried out nine executions this year, more than every other state combined.

Sochor is scheduled to receive a three-drug injection starting at 6 p.m. at Florida State Prison near Starke. He was convicted of killing a woman on Jan. 1, 1982, just hours after meeting her at a New Year’s Eve party.

Just weeks earlier, Florida executed another 74-year-old inmate, Dusty Ray Spencer, over the killing of his estranged wife. He is currently the oldest inmate to ever die by lethal injection in Florida, and Sochor will be exactly one week older if Tuesday’s execution is carried out as scheduled.

It’s unclear why Florida set the executions for the three prisoners consecutively.

Maria DeLiberato, legal director of Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, noted that in Florida, the governor has practically sole discretion when it comes to the scheduling of executions. In many other death penalty states, the scheduling is up to the courts.

The office of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, did not respond to an email seeking comment about the state’s recent executions.

A New Year's Day killing

According to court records, 18-year-old Patricia Gifford was celebrating the upcoming New Year with a friend at a Fort Lauderdale area bar when they met Sochor and his brother.

The four spent several hours talking, but after the friend became ill and went to sleep in her car, Gifford left with Sochor and his brother to get breakfast. But instead of going for food, Sochor stopped his truck in a secluded area and attacked Gifford when she refused to have sex with him, according to investigators.

Sochor was later arrested in Georgia in 1986 on unrelated charges and extradited to Florida. Sochor’s brother told police that Sochor was responsible for Gifford’s disappearance, and Sochor himself confessed on tape to choking Gifford and disposing of her body, which was never found. A jury found him guilty of first-degree murder and kidnapping in 1987, and he was sentenced to death.

Last week, the state Supreme Court denied Sochor’s appeals. His attorneys had argued that the state violated his right to a fair trial by failing to disclose a 2022 letter sent to Sochor’s brother from a South Florida detective asking for information about the location of Gifford’s body. The attorneys also claimed that the execution drugs wouldn’t effectively keep Sochor sedated.

A final appeal was still pending before the U.S. Supreme Court.

Oldest inmates executed in Florida

According to Florida Department of Corrections records, the oldest inmates previously executed by the state were both 72: Samuel Lee Smithers on Oct. 14, 2025, for the 1996 killings of two women and R. Charlie Gifford on Feb. 21, 1951, for the 1950 shooting of a state representative, Charles Schuh Jr.

Nationwide, the oldest U.S. inmate executed in modern times was Walter Leroy Moody Jr., 83. He was put to death in Alabama in 2018 for a wave of Southern mail bombs that killed a federal judge and a Black civil rights attorney in 1989.

A total of 16 executions have been carried out this year in the U.S., with Florida, so far, carrying out more than all other states combined.

But restoring oil tanker traffic in the vital Middle East shipping corridor to prewar flows likely will require a much bigger armada of U.S. warships if not tens of thousands of American troops on Iranian soil, experts say. Despite on-and-off fighting, Iran can still target vessels in the narrow Persian Gulf waterway with drones and missiles that have been hidden in a country a third of the size of the continental United States.

“Iran has been preparing for this type of asymmetric conflict for decades now,” said Jason H. Campbell, a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute and a former Pentagon official. “I think they’re starting to demonstrate why no other U.S. president since Reagan has elected to engage at this level of conflict with Iran, because they have that ability to completely disrupt the Strait of Hormuz.”

Trump said Monday that the U.S. is reimposing its blockade on Iran's ports and will charge other ships for safe passage through the strait. Iran has insisted it controls the waterway, through which 20% of the world's oil normally flows, while both sides have exchanged fire over the past week in a series of skirmishes that threaten a return to all-out war.

It underscores the bind that Trump is in as commercial shipping remains stifled in the strait, oil prices are rising again and Iran has shown no sign of capitulating. The war has been unpopular with many Americans and could factor into the upcoming midterm elections with gas prices high.

“They thought the situation was under control, and now they’re seeing renewed escalations, and the markets responding negatively to this,” said Eric Lob, a nonresident scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace's Middle East program and a professor of politics and international relations at Florida International University.

“It's really a kind of test of wills to see how much economic pain the Iranians are willing to absorb and then how much economic pain and even political liability this could be for Trump and the Republicans heading into November," Lob said.

Securing the strait could require ground troops

Before he was a scholar at the Middle East Institute in Washington, Campbell was a researcher at RAND, where he worked in coordination with the U.S. military to simulate war-game scenarios against Iran.

“The things they’re doing now are precisely the types of things that were discussed and came up in really all of these types of situational scenarios,” Campbell said.

Iran produces parts for its weapons across different facilities to reduce their risk of being attacked, Campbell said. Its military units are often allowed to operate without waiting for orders from Tehran. They don't often mass in one place, making airstrikes less effective.

“It's very difficult to envision any scenario where you could satisfactorily secure the Strait of Hormuz absent ground forces,” Campbell said.

Doing so would require tens of thousand of troops, Campbell said, not only to take out Iran's hidden munitions but to secure hundreds of miles of coastline and large swaths of inland territory. The U.S. troops would likely face insurgent attacks.

Standing up that kind of force would take a few months and include “very high costs," Campbell said.

Trump insisted Monday evening that “the strait is open. It will be open,” and that the U.S. has made significant progress degrading Iran's capabilities in just a few months. Iran vowed to fight back against any U.S. interference in the strait.

Risk of US losses goes up with an increased presence

Another way to facilitate commercial traffic safely through the strait would be the continuation — and escalation — of U.S. warships guiding civilian vessels, experts say. But it comes with its own challenges and costs.

The U.S. conducted an escort operation in the 1980s when Iran had targeted shipping as part of its war with neighboring Iraq. The U.S., which supported Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein with intelligence, weaponry and other aid, escorted Kuwaiti oil tankers — which were reflagged as American.

Such an effort today would require a substantial number of U.S. warships at a time when the fleet is smaller than it was in the 1980s, said Michael Eisenstadt, a former U.S. military analyst.

“You’d still need a very large chunk of the U.S. fleet being dedicated to this on an open-ended basis,” said Eisenstadt, who now directs the Military and Security Studies Program at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

He said it is a much more complicated environment today as Iran has amassed advanced capabilities, including its ability to launch drone and missile strikes.

“If we were to do what we need to do in order to make this work, which might involve putting people ashore in order to clear anti-cruise missile and drone launch sites, the losses of U.S. service members can go up, and if you’re going to do an escort operation also, the losses can potentially go up,” Eisenstadt added.

Iran's threats alone can scare away ships

Commercial vessels have been avoiding traditional routes through the strait out of fear of Iranian mines. Iran has demanded that ships use a route near its coastline and that it can potentially charge fees under an interim deal to end the war. Ships have been increasingly navigating a southern route along the coast of Oman under a U.S. overwatch operation that guided them using drones and aircraft.

Capt. Tim Hawkins, U.S. Central Command spokesman, said mine clearance operations are ongoing for some traditional routes through the strait but that “alternative pathways have been open.”

The southern route hasn't stopped Iranian attacks on ships, leading the U.S. military to strike Iranian air defense systems, radar sites, missile and drone equipment, and small boats.

But Iran's threats alone can be enough to halt commerce in the strait, said Noam Raydan, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy focused on energy and maritime risks in the Middle East.

“They don’t need to launch drones and missiles — they can just use the marine radio channel to make some threats,” Raydan said. “And this in itself is enough to scare off a lot of seafarers.”

Clayton Seigle, a nonresident scholar in energy security at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said the Trump administration has not followed through on promises it made early on in the war to militarily assist shipments that became a liability of the conflict.

“Those naval escorts, U.S. warships, larger commitments like boots on the ground never came because I think that the rhetoric got a little ahead of our risk tolerance,” Seigle said. “And when push came to shove, the United States was not ready to deploy its Navy, to deploy its other military forces in the capacity that would be needed to even have a shot at neutralizing those threats.”

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Amiri reported from New York.

The increase in exports in June was much better than economists had expected. Exports rose 19.4% year-on-year in May.

Imports in June surged 36%, better than May’s 27.4% year-on-year growth, with analysts attributing the expansion in part due to the Iran war driving up import costs.

China recorded a trade surplus of $125.6 billion in June, widening from $105.4 billion in the previous month.

“With the rapid growth of AI, our imports and export of products in this field are robust," Wang Jun, vice minister of China’s General Administration of Customs, said at a news conference in Beijing.

He said trade in electronic components, computer spare parts, and other computing hardware jumped nearly 57% to 5.1 trillion yuan ($760 billion) in the first half of the year. Other products such as AI glasses, AI translating devices, powered exoskeletons and other smart products are also evolving.

“Trade values took another big leg up in June,” Julian Evans-Pritchard, head of China Economics at Capital Economics, wrote in a note Tuesday. “This predominantly reflects the recent surge in semiconductor prices on the back of the AI boom. But even putting that aside, foreign demand for Chinese goods remains robust.”

China's exports of vehicles, especially EVs, and other tech-related products have boomed as rapid adoption of AI increases the need for semiconductors and other electronic equipment.

The strength in export manufacturing has helped to offset prolonged weakness in domestic spending and investmentdue to a prolonged downturn in the property industry.

In January-June, China’s exports climbed 17.6% from a year earlier, while imports jumped 26.6%, according to the customs data.

Policymakers including those in the U.S. and in Europe have express alarm over rising trade deficits with China. In order to bypass barriers such as higher tariffs, Chinese businesses have been moving factories to regions like Europe. China has also been exporting more to Southeast Asia, Latin America and Africa.

Wang, the customs official, acknowledged the threat from rising trade barriers.

“We still face serious risks and challenges in the second half of the year,” he said.

While China's export growth is likely to continue, it is becoming increasingly fragile, said Wei Li, head of Multi-Asset Investments at BNP Paribas Securities (China). Robust shipments in autos and AI-related items will remain dependent on global demand and regulatory barriers, he said.

Exports to Southeast Asia in June surged nearly 35% from a year ago, while those to the European Union and Latin America increased more than 18% and 28%, respectively.

Exports to the United States climbed almost 14% from a year earlier. China's shipments to the U.S. have risen in recent months, partly due to declines in shipments a year earlier after President Donald Trump returned to office last year and implemented higher tariffs.

China is set to announce its economic growth data for the April-June quarter on Wednesday. Chinese leaders have set an annual growth target of 4.5% to 5% for this year, slightly lower than the 5% growth in 2025.

Last week, the International Monetary Fund raised China’s annual growth forecast by 0.2 percentage point to 4.6%. But it said it expects China’s economy to expand just 4.1% in 2027.

Chinese leaders have sought to boost consumer spending through various initiatives, including trade-in subsidies for autos and home appliances. But many ordinary Chinese have been feeling the pressure from a slowing economy and avoiding big-ticket purchases.

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AP Videographer Borg Wong contributed from Beijing.

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BSO jail records show that Scott Nelson Nida, 55, was arrested by deputies in Pompano Beach on Saturday. He’s accused of violating a domestic violence injunction. According to the agency, he “separated from BSO” on June 29, a little more than a month after his third arrest.

Nida’s first arrest came in January after being accused of attacking his longtime partner over infidelity. The victim later waived prosecution and a no-contact order was dismissed. She told investigators she “felt coerced into dropping the charges” because Nida allegedly said he would “lose his job and pension.”

But Nida was arrested again in April after being accused of attacking his partner for a second time and stealing her vehicle. Records show those charges are still pending with a court hearing scheduled for July 30.

He was arrested one month later on a domestic violence injunction violation charge. A BSO report states that he allowed his girlfriend to live with him “because she and her daughter were forced out of their previous residence” and reached out to Nida “because they had no place to go.”

Court records show Broward prosecutors declined to pursue charges in that case.

His latest arrest report indicates its the same reason he again found himself behind bars.

According to officials, a concerned acquaintance of Nida’s called in a wellness check on July 11 after receiving concerning messages from him.

When authorities arrived, they said Nida went inside the home and moved around his house before coming back outside.

A police drone found the woman and her child hiding in a storage area, with the report stating, “The pair went as far as to admit he had formed a plan for them to hide in the backyard if law enforcement came to the house for which they executed tonight.”

The woman told police they were at Nida’s home for weeks because of a financial crisis, and even had a key.

As of Monday morning, Nida was being held in the BSO Main Jail pending a scheduled court appearance.

Editor’s note: This story has been updated after Local 10 News received clarification on Nida’s employment status and a copy of his arrest report.

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The girl was diagnosed with “mild to moderate autism,” and the abuse “started when she was 10 years old, and she will be turning 13 this year,” a Hallandale Beach police officer wrote, according to a police report.

During the police investigation, a Broward Sheriff’s Office DNA analyst reported in April that DNA belonging to Daley, 56, was on “the exterior crotch area” of the girl’s pajama pants, according to a police report.

The investigation started after the girl told her mother that Daley had sexually molested her on Feb. 17, and Hallandale Beach police officers met them at the Publix Supermarket in Hallandale Beach, where Daley worked as a stock clerk in the freezer department for about four years, according to the police report.

“She only brings the victim to work with her when she does not have a babysitter to watch her ... the victim sits in the break room,” a police officer wrote, according to the arrest report.

A detective investigating the case on Feb. 23 found surveillance video showing Daley “looks around before entering the breakroom” shortly after 9:55 p.m. and walks out at 10 p.m. on Feb. 17, according to police.

The girl participated in a forensic interview at the Nancy J. Cotterman Center in Oakland Park, and she reported Daley had abused her about 30 times at the Publix at 1400 East Hallandale Beach, according to the police officer’s arrest report.

“She always tells him ‘No!’ But he continues to keep touching her against her will ... it hurt her ... she felt threatened,” a police officer wrote about the girl’s report during the interview, according to the report.

Broward County court records show prosecutors filed a first-degree felony case against Daley, of Miramar, on June 29. He faced four counts of lewd or lascivious molestation charges.

Police officers served the arrest warrant on Sunday, and BSO corrections booked Daley at the Broward County Main Jail in Fort Lauderdale. He appeared in court on Monday, and a judge denied him bond.

Broward County Circuit Judge Barbara Duffy is set to preside over the case.

A spokesperson for Publix released a statement on Monday afternoon reporting that Daley was no longer employed at Publix.

Local 10 News Assignment Editor Carson Merlo contributed to this report.

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Mike Sargis, the city of North Lauderdale manager, said a Ring surveillance camera recorded the video at a house on Pebble Beach, near the Boulevard of Champions.

“The family started CPR,” Sargis wrote in a statement on Monday morning.

Broward Sheriff Fire Rescue personnel and BSO deputies responded to the house pool at about 10:30 a.m. on Sunday

The toddler was at the Broward Health Medical Center, and his condition was critical, according to Broward Sheriff’s Office deputies.

“The last we heard, the child was in very grave condition,” Sargis wrote in the statement.

At least three children have drowned this summer in Broward County.

A 2-year-old boy drowned on July 12 in a lake in Plantation.

Nearby, a 4-year-old girl drowned on July 5 in a lake in Plantation.

A 4-year-old boy drowned on June 19 in a pool in North Lauderdale.

More children ages 1 to 4 die from drowning than any other cause of death, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Some of the ways to reduce the risk include formal swimming lessons for kids and installing a four-sided fence that is at least four feet high and fully encloses the house pool.

The Red Cross has educational resources for children and their caregivers.

The Florida Department of Health in Broward County has a voucher program to cover the cost of lessons for children as young as babies and as old as 17. For more information, visit this page.

North Lauderdale’s Pebble Beach area

The picture of Cardinals cool, Walker chased down Kyle Schwarber, shut up a rambunctious Philly crowd and introduced himself to a much wider baseball world.

Walker used six swings to swat six homers, besting Schwarber in a dramatic final round that silenced all those boo birds and made him the first St. Louis Cardinal to win the Home Run Derby on Monday night.

Schwarber hit 11 homers during his 15-swing turn in the final round. Philly fans, who jeered everyone but Schwarber and Bryce Harper throughout the night, quietly headed toward the exits when Walker’s winning shot soared over the left field wall.

“I was once told you don’t boo nobodies,” Walker said. “So it feels pretty good.”

The 24-year-old Walker sported the Derby champions' chain, slipped on a leather jacket and still wore his batting gloves as he broke down what it took to take down Schwarber on his home turf. He earned a $1 million prize for winning the Derby, which is more than his 2026 salary of $799,400.

“My thought was Philly is brutal,” Walker said. "I mean, honestly. But I think it’s pretty special because they love their players and that’s what you want from your home, like, where you play. I mean, I’d never hear people cheer so loud for, like, Schwarber and Harper. And those guys did their thing, for sure.

“But, you know, I can’t hate them, because that’s their guy, so I just got to play the game.”

Walker played a pretty great game in the first half for the Cardinals.

Walker is a first-time All-Star and having a breakout season in St. Louis. He already has a career-high 22 homers this season after struggling with a combined 11 over the previous two years.

Those final six in Philly all flying high with Iron Man on his bat are now stamped on the Derby highlight reel.

His cap backward just like Hall of Famer and Derby great Ken Griffey Jr., Walker celebrated with his family immediately on the field. His father rejoiced in recalling how Walker started hitting long home runs when he was 6 years old.

“When things got tough, they were always there in my corner to talk to them about it,” Walker said of his family. “They kept the energy levels high. They kept the feelings high.”

He fulfilled this childhood dream in striking fashion. Walker hit his seventh homer with two swings remaining and his eighth on the next swing to earn bonus swings. Needing to hit four straight homers to win, the right-handed Jordan knocked one off the top of the center field fence 401 feet away. He reached 10 homers and Philly fans booed with all their might, only for Jordan to finish the sensational surge and celebrate as fireworks shot off around him.

"You can’t say enough about how he was able to kind of slow the moment down, too, and lock it in,” said Schwarber, a Derby runner-up for the second time. “All of our fans were we’re raring and trying to will me to it.”

A revamped Derby format delivered great drama

MLB ditched its timed clock this season and returned to a swing format, with each hitter continuing to swing if he went deep on his final one.

The extra time between swings gave hitters time to track their home runs — and Philly a smidge more time to unleash those throaty boos at Contreras and Walker.

Each player had 20 swings in the first round and the top four advanced. Hitters were seeded for the second round, where No. 1 faces 4 and 2 meets 3.

Each player got 15 swings in the second round, with batters homering on their final swings continuing until not homering.

Boston’s Willson Contreras, Tampa Bay’s Junior Caminero, New York's Ben Rice and Kansas City's Jac Caglianone, and Chicago White Sox first baseman Munetaka Murakami also participated.

Philly came ready to celebrate its slugging stars

Phillies fans were wildly optimistic that Schwarber and Harper could somehow reach the final and crown the franchise's third Derby champion.

Harper hit only eight in the first round and was the final slugger to try and advance. Schwarber could only watch as Harper failed to join him. Schwarber, then with the Chicago Cubs, made the finals in 2018 at Nationals Park before losing to Harper when he played with the Nationals.

Schwarber and Harper — the first pair of teammates to participate in the Derby since 2018 — received roaring ovations when famed ring announcer Michael Buffer introduced them ahead of the competition.

As for the other six sluggers in the field, all wearing their home jerseys with red, white and blue uniform numbers?

Yeah, they were about booed out of the ballpark, with the loudest jeers saved for Rice. He gamely laughed as he walked out of his Liberty Bell entrance.

Harper — who said earlier Monday this would be his last Derby — waved his arms and exhorted the crowd to get louder as he walked to the home plate platform placed at second base. Harper about broke the ring ropes as he shook them like a pro wrestler, and the Philly crowd went bonkers for the star known as The Showman.

The ball-shagging kids in the outfield were even booed.

The Derby’s public address announcer implored the fans to cheer during some quiet stretches when homers — non-Phillies edition — were hit.

The fans did get a rise when Caglianone smoked one into Ryan Howard territory into the third deck in right field. Contreras socked ’em into the rarified air of the left field upper deck. One homer cleared the last row of stands in that section and bounced off the concourse in front of a bar. His 490-footer was the longest of the first round.

This was the first Home Run Derby and All-Star Game held at Citizens Bank Park since it opened in 2004 and the first derby in Philadelphia since Barry Bonds outslugged Mark McGwire in 1996 to win an afternoon event in front of thousands of empty seats at Veterans Stadium.

This derby was sold out and aired on Netflix for the first time, with the streamer getting into the game this season with a three-event package. Netflix already aired the opening night game, and the third attraction is the Field of Dreams game between the Minnesota Twins and Philadelphia Phillies on Aug. 13.

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

The process that top athletes go through to heal physically, mentally and emotionally highlights what a recovery might demand of athletes at all levels, as well as people experiencing chronic pain, recuperating from surgery or facing other setbacks. Because progress is rarely linear, patience and the ability to reset expectations can be as valuable as perseverance, consistency and motivation, according to experts.

“Sport has always mimicked life," said Ross Flowers, a sports and performance psychologist in Los Angeles. "You’re going to face challenges, bumps and bruises. You got to figure out how to work through them and overcome them.”

Here’s what some sports psychologists and former athletes say about confronting the unknown and coming through injuries:

Learn to recognize your body's physical limits

Fans are accustomed to watching athletes compete at the Olympics, the World Cup and other sporting events with broken bones, torn ligaments and dislocated joints. Comeback stories like Alpine skier Lindsey Vonn 's, after multiple injuries and another serious injury this year at the Winter Olympics, are an enduring element of sports.

While discomfort is expected during intense training, and pushing through pain becomes more critical during competition, even seasoned competitors need to know when to listen to their bodies, experts say.

“There’s a relationship with pain and understanding how to work with it, if it’s possible to work through it, but also knowing how to back off of it so the pain does not persist," Flowers said, adding that training to the point of physical fatigue or in conditions that build endurance is the sweet spot for improvement.

Liv Paxton, 28, learned this lesson firsthand after dealing with shin splints, quadricep strains and a partially torn Achilles tendon. As a runner at Winthrop University and the College of William & Mary, she pushed herself until her body forced her to stop. Since recovering from Achilles surgery, she said she has a better understanding of when to slow down.

“I’m so much better about keeping in tune with my body,” Paxton said, explaining that she prioritizes eating and sleeping well. “That’s not something that I focused on in college. I just thought I was bulletproof.”

Injuries can happen suddenly or develop from a nagging but manageable nuisance into a debilitating condition over time. Whether it’s a soccer player sidelined after a collision or a worker who can’t stand after months of chronic back pain, the outcome is similar: a forced pause and learning to heal once pushing through pain no longer works.

“So how do we know our limits? It is definitely an experimental process,” said Lisa Miller, a health and sport sciences professor who teaches at the online American Public University System from her home in Columbus, Ohio. “We have plenty of athletes who still don’t know. But we have also had more examples of athletes saying this is too much, I’m burned out and I’m going to take a break, bringing much more attention to the psychological side of sport.”

Honestly assessing whether an injury is affecting daily life and long-term well-being is part of recognizing one's physical limits. Miller said she has seen athletes of all levels return to competition thinking they are ready to excel, but not all can or do.

Tennis great Serena Williams made the difficult decision to withdraw from a doubles match this month because of a knee injury.

Take time to grieve losses and adapt to new challenges

Even after bones heal and surgeries succeed, experts say recovery can mean coming to terms with what injuries have changed and giving yourself permission to grieve those losses.

Former Baltimore Ravens cornerback Kyle Arrington, who is now a community activist in Maryland, spent nearly two decades with every hour of his day organized around football. After a severe concussion ended his career, that structure disappeared almost overnight.

“I knew what everything looked like year in and year out for the past almost 20 years,” said Arrington, who was a Super Bowl champion during his tenure with the New England Patriots. “To have that stripped away in a blink of an eye was a real upheaval.”

Grief and depression are common after season- or career-ending injuries and other life-altering experiences. People making a physical recovery may also mourn lost friendships, missed opportunities, unmet goals and a sense of purpose. The emotional pain can be especially acute when someone’s self-identity rested on excelling in a sport or a professional role.

Arrington, 39, said his post-concussion retirement took him to a dark place. He credits family and friends with helping him through the transition; with their encouragement, he committed to healing mentally, emotionally and spiritually. Arrington said he now puts his energy toward the E.V.O.L.V.E. Foundation, which he founded to mentor young people.

Experts say a support system can help people stay grounded when they have to make major medical and career decisions.

“Having a team around you is incredibly important to get good advice, be objective, but also positively push you, not just for your sport and your performance, but for life,” Flowers said.

Look beyond returning to who you were

Sports psychologists say recovery often turns a corner when people stop trying to reclaim the past and begin building a new future.

American freestyle skier Jamie MoCrazy, who at the 2013 Winter X-Games became the first woman to land a double backflip during a slopestyle ski run, confronted that reality after a traumatic brain injury left her in a coma at age 22. For her, recovery meant letting go of elite competition and accepting a new future.

“I realized that I didn’t want to compete if I wasn’t at the level that I had previously been competing,” said MoCrazy, 33, who is now a motivational speaker and lives in Salt Lake City.

She still chased the exhilaration she got from sports. Few things compare to the applause, trophies and recognition, but public speaking gives her a taste of that adrenaline.

“I take some deep breaths and then walk out on stage,” she said. “That’s the closest of a mimic for me.”

Former professional boxer Patricia Alcivar, 46, also had to rethink her next steps after suffering injuries that included a hyperextended elbow, broken toes and multiple stitches above her eye. She now runs marathons and climbs mountains to stay active. She said despite the physical challenges boxing put her through, she wouldn't change the experience.

“I will never regret boxing because it taught me that I am a fighter inside and outside the ring,” Alcivar said, adding that climbing Utah's Mount Superior was the first time she felt equally challenged. She recalls smiling during an arduous hike up Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania because “nobody’s punching me in the face. Nobody’s trying to kill me.”

When returning to the life you had before isn't possible, experts recommend exploring goals and sources of meaning that could become the foundation for a new sense of identity.

“There is hope that something else can replace this,” Miller said. "And when we can find that daily rejuvenation of hope, we can also find new sources of happiness as well.”

El Servicio Meteorológico Nacional pronostica que más de 90 récords de temperatura en el país serán igualados o rotos esta semana hasta el miércoles, y la mayoría de ellos serán récords de calor nocturno.

Expertos en salud señalan que las temperaturas nocturnas que no logran bajar son aún más peligrosas que las temperaturas diurnas que se disparan.

El verano ya ha comenzado de forma sofocante en gran parte de Estados Unidos debido a la persistente cúpula de calor que se prevé cubra buena parte del territorio esta semana. Las temperaturas abrasadoras de las últimas semanas han provocado muertes relacionadas con el calor en Nueva Jersey y han contribuido a avivar incendios forestales en el oeste del país.

Sin alivio del calor por la noche esta semana

El Servicio Meteorológico Nacional indicó que no se preveía que las temperaturas bajaran de 27 grados Celsius (80 grados Fahrenheit) por la noche en Fort Lauderdale, Miami y Tampa, Florida; Galveston, Texas; y Charleston, Carolina del Sur.

En los próximos días, lugares de la región centro-norte y el noreste conocidos por sus inviernos gélidos verán que las temperaturas nocturnas se mantienen por encima de 21 ºC (70 ºF), incluidos Fargo, Dakota del Norte; International Falls, Minnesota; y Portland, Maine.

Las altas temperaturas nocturnas suponen un peligro mayor

Expertos en salud explican que las altas temperaturas durante la noche son especialmente peligrosas porque no hay tiempo para que la temperatura central del cuerpo se enfríe y se recupere del calor diurno.

“Ahí es donde se agravan los efectos en la salud, en particular para las personas mayores y las comunidades vulnerables”, manifestó Marshall Shepherd, profesor de meteorología de la Universidad de Georgia.

Un aumento de tan sólo unos pocos grados en la temperatura corporal puede provocar un golpe de calor o sobrecargar el corazón.

Los peligros del calor pueden presentarse furtivamente

Si las temperaturas nocturnas no enfrían el cuerpo, los riesgos para la salud suelen manifestarse con mayor frecuencia al día siguiente, explicó Kristie Ebi, científica de salud pública y clima en la Universidad de Washington.

“La mortalidad comienza al segundo o tercer día” porque el cuerpo no puede enfriarse, expresó el lunes.

Ser proactivo es crucial durante una ola de calor

Las señales tempranas de advertencia incluyen sudoración intensa, calambres musculares y dolor de cabeza. “Es difícil saber que uno está empezando a tener problemas con el calor. Por eso necesitamos ser más proactivos”, señaló Ebi.

Es importante encontrar una manera de refrescarse, ya sea entrando a un lugar con aire acondicionado o envolviéndose el cuello con una toalla fría.

Y los expertos en salud dicen que no hay que olvidar comunicarse con amigos y familiares, especialmente con quienes son de avanzada edad, están embarazadas o tienen problemas de salud que podrían dificultarles soportar el calor.

Cómo combatir el calor sin aire acondicionado

Incluso sin aire acondicionado en casa, hay maneras de encontrar alivio.

Ingrese a una biblioteca o un centro comercial. Siéntese frente a un ventilador y rocíe agua sobre la piel. Ponga los pies en agua fría. Empape la ropa en agua. Y, por supuesto, beba mucha agua.

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El reportero de The Associated Press Seth Borenstein en Washington contribuyó a este despacho.

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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 U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control announced the U.S. State Department had also issued a ban on transactions with Grupo Empresarial del Comercio Exterior, or GECOMEX, and Grupo Empresarial de Transporte Marítimo Portuario, or GEMAR.

The sanctions are part of a “comprehensive push to end the Cuban regime’s malign activities, both in Cuba and across our hemisphere,” a spokesperson for the U.S. State Department said in a statement on Monday.

The list includes two Havana-based state-owned companies in the energy sector, Enetec and Coreydan, and the Grupo Caudal S.A., which has subsidiaries involved in audits and insurance.

The list also included four enforcement organizations: Asociación de Combatientes de la Revolución Cubana, Milicias de Tropas Territoriales, Brigadas de Respuesta Rápida, and Comités de Defensa de la Revolución.

In a statement on X, U.S. Rep. Carlos Giménez described the organizations on Monday as “everyone who has participated in repressing the people in a ‘rapid response brigade’ or any militarized group.”

A group of Democrats — U.S. Reps. Delia Ramírez, Teresa Leger-Fernández, Maxine Dexter, and Mark Pocan — traveled to Cuba on Thursday with an itinerary that included a meeting with Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel.

Ramírez, of Illinois; Leger-Fernández, of New Mexico; Dexter, of Oregon; and Pocan, of Wisconsin, were critical of the Trump administration’s pressure for change on the Communist island.

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🚨ÚLTIMA HORA —> El Secretario de Estado Marco Rubio acaba de sancionar a todo aquel que ha participado en reprimir al pueblo en una “brigada de respuesta rápida” o cualquier grupo militarizado.

Los represores enfrentarán todo el peso de la ley americana.https://t.co/IdOoXv8mQ0

— Rep. Carlos A. Gimenez (@RepCarlos) July 13, 2026

Bukele's party Nuevas Ideas, which holds a supermajority in the legislative assembly, held its internal elections Sunday and announced the results on Twitter on Monday. Vice President Félix Ulloa will once again be Bukele’s running mate.

Bukele, 44, took office in June 2019 as the region's youngest president and has continued to enjoy high approval ratings.

His February 2024 reelection — with nearly 85% of the valid votes — was highly criticized by constitutional scholars for violating a ban on consecutive reelection. They accuse Bukele of illegally replacing the country's constitutional Court judges and attorney general to concentrate his power.

“Remaining in power is to avoid accountability for grave acts of corruption and crimes against humanity,” said Ingrid Escobar, lawyer and director of Salvadoran group Humanitarian Legal Aid, who called seeking a third term unconstitutional.

A September 2021 ruling by the constitutional Court allowed presidential reelection “for one term only.”

The ruling-party controlled Legislative Assembly then approved a constitutional reform in July 2025 to allow indefinite presidential reelection. The reform eliminated the penalty of loss of citizenship rights for those who promoted presidential reelection and the ban on presidential candidacy for those who had served as president in the previous term.

This constitutional reform also extended the presidential term from five to six years and moved up the presidential elections to 2027. The constitution previously allowed reelection of a past president after 10 years out of office.

The president has defended the constitutional reforms approved by the legislative assembly.

Bukele stated that “90% of developed countries allow the indefinite reelection of their head of government and nobody bats an eye.” He added that when a small, poor country like El Salvador tries to do the same, “it suddenly becomes the end of democracy.”

Salvadorans credit the president's security policies, including a four-year state of emergency that has imprisoned more than 90,000 Salvadorans, for drastically reducing homicide rates and making them feel safer in the country.

In 2015, El Salvador registered one of its most violent years, with 6,656 murders and a homicide rate of 106 per 100,000 inhabitants.

The country ended 2025 with a record low in homicides — 82 cases — according to government statistics.

More than 500 people have died in prison since the state of emergency, mainly for health reasons but some related to violence, according to human rights organizations.

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

Una van y una camioneta tipo SUV chocaron en Powerline Road, cerca de Northwest 49 Court.

Personal de Bomberos y Rescate de la Oficina del Sheriff de Broward respondió al lugar y trasladó a las 12 personas a hospitales cercanos.

Over the past 60 years, about 66% of all tropical activity has been generated from storms born out of the MDR. In strong El Niño years, like this one, only about half of all tropical activity comes from storms originating in the MDR. The other half comes with their beginnings in the subtropics, the zone just north of the deep tropics that includes both Gulf waters and Atlantic waters directly east of Florida and the Bahamas.

That, of course, doesn’t mean we stop looking to the MDR for tropical seedlings with hurricane ambitions, but the subtropics tend to count a little more toward overall activity in big El Niño years like this one, so we pay closer attention to those areas farther north that we might otherwise overlook.

We can find lots of powerful and impactful hurricanes that had their birth in the subtropics over the years. They can happen in both very inactive hurricane seasons (see Alicia in 1983 or Joaquin in 2015) or during gang buster hurricane seasons (see Katrina in 2005 or Milton in 2024). The area that tends to churn out the stronger and longer-lived hurricanes of subtropical origins tends to be the western Atlantic waters just east of Florida and northeast of the Caribbean.

So don’t sleep on systems that fester in these waters this hurricane season, especially since it’s here that waters are well above average and at record or near-record warmth for the time of year (this includes the Gulf, which sits at record warmth for the time of year).

It’s also an area of the Atlantic that’s protected from the intense wind shear conveyor belt that helps to reduce the contribution to tropical activity from the Main Development Region during El Niño years.

Nothing brewing this week but watching the trends in the northern Gulf early next week

The Atlantic’s in store for another sleepy week. Last week we mentioned a stalled front over western Atlantic waters later this week along which we’d follow for outside development odds. Models remain unenthusiastic to say the least, and any low-pressure candidates should stay both non-tropical and weak east of the Carolinas this week.

Beyond that in the subtropics, we’ve seen a small tick up from forecast models in the possibility of tropical mischief over the northern Gulf next week. The European AI camp, in particular, has trended more bullish, but beware of overheated forecasts from the Euro AI (its deterministic or single-run model forecast late Sunday was advertising a hurricane in the northeastern Gulf for early next Tuesday) as that model has shown zero skill in intensity forecasting so far (see our AI model post from late last month where we discussed the reasons behind this).

For now environmental conditions early next week in the northern Gulf don’t appear especially ripe for development, with a decent amount of northerly wind shear settled over the area. Google’s DeepMind machine learning-based 1000-member ensemble as well as the traditional physics-based European ensemble system both indicate development odds at around 10-20% from next Sunday (July 19^th) to next Wednesday (July 22^nd). That seems like a reasonable starting place.

It’s nothing to worry about at this point, but it’s worth checking back on the trends later this week.

The number of wounded troops from the conflict also has grown to more than 400 as of Monday. Capt. Tim Hawkins, spokesman for U.S. Central Command, said the majority of them suffered traumatic brain injuries.

The Navy initially described the July 1 crash as an emergency landing and said there was “no indication the emergency was caused by hostile action.” The remaining three sailors aboard the helicopter were rescued shortly after the mishap.

The Pentagon’s war casualty count added one non-hostile death in July. It is the first death recorded since 13 service members were killed in separate incidents in March at the beginning of the war.

The first was an Iranian drone strike on a command center in Kuwait that killed six soldiers. Then one soldier died more than a week after initially being wounded in an attack on the Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia. Six more service members were killed when a KC-135 refueling aircraft supporting U.S. military operations against Iran crashed in Iraq.

A total of 414 service members have been wounded, including a U.S. Air Force member added Monday. While Iran and the U.S. have resumed strikes, it is unclear if that is what led to the airman’s injury.

U.S. Central Command didn’t offer any details on the specific airman. But traumatic brain injuries that have defined most of the injuries in the war are an increasingly persistent problem among combat forces, especially those subjected to missile strikes and explosions that hit nearby.

While the injury, along with post-traumatic stress disorder, has become one of the signature wounds among veterans of the post-9/11 era, the impact on troops, especially long-term, are still poorly understood.

When asked Monday for the latest figures of seriously wounded troops, Maj. Emma Thompson, a U.S. Central Command spokeswoman, said she had no update and reiterated that “almost all” of those injured have returned to duty. She also didn’t say how many service members have been wounded enough to need evacuation from the region.

In the past, the top four teams in a conference would be placed in different regions to protect them from playing each other until the Final Four. For example, the tournament this past season had four SEC teams in the top eight overall seeds. Texas was third, South Carolina fourth, LSU fifth and Vanderbilt seventh. LSU was dropped down to seventh and Vanderbilt eighth in the bracketing to avoid having them be in the same regions.

Now if that happened going forward, the teams would remain where their seeds should have them.

“We put a lot of time into establishing those top 16 teams in the order they go in,” NCAA women's basketball committee chair Amanda Braun said in a phone interview. “You're splitting hairs to decide who has the edge and some of that is undone by those principles. To all of us, the work we did and the work those teams did justifies keeping them where they are in that group of 16.”

The men's selection committee will still separate out the top four seeds in each conference and put them in different regions.

The change would potentially only really affect the SEC, ACC, Big Ten and Big 12 as those were the only conferences that had four or more teams in the NCAA field.

The women's tournament has started giving financial incentives — units — to teams for each round they advance in the tournament the past two seasons. Braun said that it wasn't brought up at all during the entire week of meetings that the committee had.

The change comes on the heels of the NCAA expanding its tournament field to 76 teams starting in 2027.

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Hialeah police said Yashira Marie Maldonado, 34, did so at her mother’s efficiency before driving off. According to an arrest report, it appears she left the girl chained up outside for almost an hour on Saturday morning before police became aware.

The girl’s exact age was redacted from the Hialeah Police Department report, but she is either 13 or 14 according to an included year of birth.

The HPD report states that officers responded to Maldonado’s home, the address of which was redacted, at around 10 a.m. Saturday after receiving reports of a disturbance.

Police said Maldonado’s mother told them that she had gone to her daughter’s home to “plea” with her to go back and free the girl.

Authorities said they went back to Maldonado’s mother’s house and found the girl “still chained to the fence, but in good health.”

According to the report, Maldonado’s mother explained that soon after getting a text message from Maldonado at around 9:10 a.m. stating, “I got fired from my job!!!!!!,” she had opened her front door and, “in disbelief,” closed it after seeing her granddaughter chained up outside.

The report states that she then went outside and “attempted to release the victim from the chain but was not successful.”

According to the report, Maldonado’s mother told officers that “she did not call (the) police because she fears (her) landlord will evict her.”

The report states that CCTV footage showed Maldonado tying the girl to the fence at around 9:05 a.m.

Police said it showed Maldonado “wrap a metal chain around (her daughter’s) waist and (tie) the other end to the house fence, restricting her from moving around.”

“(She) dropped (her daughter) off with a clear bookbag, some clothing and her medication,” the report states. “(Maldonado) left (her daughter) outside where she had no cover from the sun and no food or water.”

Police said the video then showed Maldonado “entering her vehicle and (leaving) the scene.”

They said they took Maldonado to the HPD headquarters, where she spoke with investigators. Alleged statements she made were redacted from the report.

Facing charges of child abuse and child neglect, Maldonado had been ordered held on a $10,000 bond.

As of late Monday morning, she no longer appeared in Miami-Dade jail records.

Tuesday will yield more of the same: hot, hazy and humid conditions. Temperatures will make a run for the low and mid-90s – factor in humidity, it will feel like triple digits. Afternoon showers and storms that develop will tend to favor the Everglades.

El número de heridos, por su parte, se mantiene en 16.740 desde hace siete días, según el más reciente reporte divulgado por Jorge Rodríguez, presidente de la Asamblea Nacional venezolana y hermano de la presidenta encargada Delcy Rodríguez, mediante su canal de Telegram.

La cifra de muertes ha ido en aumento en la medida que se desarrollan las labores de remoción de escombros.

La mayoría de las muertes ocurrieron en el estado costanero de La Guaira, la zona más afectada por los sismos, ubicada a unos 20 kilómetros al norte de Caracas. Después de los dos potentes sismos se contabilizaron 1.254 réplicas.

De acuerdo con el reporte, 856 edificios sufrieron daños y de ellos 190 colapsaron totalmente. Más de 1.600 estructuras de otra índole, como puentes y carreteras, también fueron afectadas.

El gobierno ha estimado que los terremotos dejaron decenas de miles de personas sin hogar. Más de 20.000 permanecen en 107 refugios temporales instalados en la capital venezolana, Caracas, y los estados vecinos de La Guaira y Miranda.

Los sismos de magnitud 7,2 y 7,5 ocurrieron con 39 segundos de diferencia a lo largo de la cordillera de la costa norte de Venezuela, según el Servicio Geológico de Estados Unidos. Fueron de los más fuertes registrados en el país sudamericano en más de un siglo.

A van and a sports utility vehicle crashed on Powerline Road near Northwest 49 Court.

Broward Sheriff Fire Rescue personnel responded and took the 12 people to nearby hospitals.

Location

“Both sides kind of have their line that they’re not going to cross," Skenes, the Pittsburgh Pirates ace who is also a member of the union's eight-man negotiating committee, said Monday. “Whether that results in missing games or missing a season, we’ll see.”

Baseball's five-year labor contract expires Dec. 1 and MLB is expected to immediately lock out players. The more consequential deadline is in late February or early March, when Major League Baseball would announce whether it was postponing opening day.

Owners proposed a salary cap for the first time since the union fought off MLB's cap plan with a 7 1/2-month strike in 1994-95 that caused the first cancellation of the World Series since 1904. Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred says a cap is needed to lessen payroll disparity.

Soto, who signed a record $765 million, 15-year-old contract with the New York Mets as a free agent after the 2024 season, would be limited to a $265 million, six-year deal under MLB's proposal.

“Yeah, that sucks,” Soto said. “It shouldn’t be there.”

MLB’s proposal would cap spending in 2027 at $245.3 million, using figures for luxury tax payrolls that include $20.1 million for benefits and the pre-arbitration bonus pool. It also would establish a payroll floor of $171.2 million, forcing some teams to spend more.

The Los Angeles Dodgers, baseball’s biggest spenders, had a $415.2 million payroll on opening day this year. MLB has not made a proposal on how to phase in a cap, a process that would be key for high-spending clubs such as the Dodgers.

Los Angeles Angels outfielder Mike Trout, at 34 in the eighth season of a $426.5 million, 12-year contract, said players are aware of the proposal's intent.

“It’s trying to minimize the years and obviously the totals. For sure, we see that,” he said. “I think baseball's in a good spot right now and we can’t mess this up."

Harper, in the eighth season of a $330 million, 13-year contract with Philadelphia, said he couldn't conceive of any scenario in which the players' association would agree to a cap.

“The opportunity for players to get paid is what this is all about,” Harper said, citing the union's legacy of fighting MLB since Curt Flood helped unite players in the 1970s. “We owe it to the guys that have come before us to do the same thing.”

Harper, who signed his first major league contract at age 17, also vowed to fight MLB's proposal to ban a player from signing until he was at least 20 years old by the Sept. 1 of his signing year and two years removed from the graduating year of his high school class. MLB says college baseball provides a better development path.

“If you’re in the top three rounds as a high school kid, I think you should be able to do whatever you want,” Harper said. “It would really be tough for a guy like Jackson Holliday to not be the number one pick and not get the chance to go to the big leagues at 19 or 18 if he’s able to.”

Bargaining began in May and is expected to resume after the All-Star break. The union has asked for expanded free agency and salary arbitration rights along with almost doubling the major league minimum.

Pirates pitcher Braxton Ashcraft viewed the early negotiations as “back-and-forth proposals that may or may not be unrealistic.”

Skenes, a 24-year-old right-hander in his second full big league season, could see a sharp decrease in potential contract offers under MLB's system. He currently is on track to become a free agent after the 2029 season and has a $1,085,000 salary in his last season before arbitration eligibility. He also has earned nearly $5.6 million from the pre-arbitration bonus pool that started in 2022.

“MLB is kind of presenting their perfect-world offers and we’re kind of presenting our perfect-world offers," Skenes said. “So there’s a lot of time before there’s any real movement, I think.”

San Diego's Mason Miller, baseball's top closer, also could become a free agent following the 2029 season. A 27-year-old right-hander, he is earning $4 million this season.

“I still have some optimism,” he said. “The place that the game's at right now, I think killing that momentum is kind of fruitless for everybody.”

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AP Assistant Sports Editor Jake Seiner contributed to this report.

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

Now that plans to revive Miami’s historic playhouse are moving forward, Local 10 News got a look inside the iconic building that opened its doors in 1927.

“Phase one was the shoring up and the beginning of the restoration,” said Miami-Dade Commissioner Raquel Regalado. “The third floor isn’t in as bad of shape, the second floor was in worse shape because there were some leaks in the bathroom there. Back in the day the actors lived up there.”

There has also been preservation work during the construction.

“We also gathered all the historical pieces and we have them stored,” said Regalado. “A lot of people have asked us about the markers, the arch; that is all put away, and now we will start building the second piece of it which is the corridor that goes between the two buildings.”

Regalado said the next phase will be the construction of a new 300-seat state-of-the-art theater.

“Theater is part of the fabric of any community that is thriving and wants to attract the kind of talent we want here in Miami-Dade, so it is important to have a theater like the Coconut Grove Playhouse,” said Coconut Grove Playhouse Executive Director Juan Jose Escalante.

The award-winning theater company GableStage will operate the restored theater.

It’s a reopening that will also be a bit of a homecoming for Escalante, who once worked at the theatre’s box office.

“I saw so many plays, I saw so many people who are now Oscar winners now, who started their work on the craft right here on this stage,” he said. “We are going to have five productions a year, but most importantly we are going to have a very robust community engagement and education program here.”

Regalado spoke regarding who owns the land, how the restoration is being funded and who is responsible for its operation and maintenance.

“The land belongs to the state of Florida but all the funding is Miami-Dade County,” she said. “The city of Miami, when my father was the mayor, actually earmarked $10 million, but then they took it away. So this is all county cultural affairs funding, and one of the things that we tried to explain to everyone is that it needs to be completely self-sustaining. So there’s pockets of it that have a little bit of commercial, and the reason for that is the county is not committed to the operation and maintenance of this building. So we created it in a way where GableStage and the little retail that we allowed is going to make it completely self-sustainable.

“The next phase is $40 million,” she continued. “That’s going to get us to the opening, but the county is not committed to (Operations and Management). When you start adding the litigation and the time and the cost and everything, it’ll probably end up being closer to $60 million when we’re all done. But it’s a beautiful historic building and we’re committed to restoring it and really bringing something lovely into the portfolio of Miami-Dade County Cultural Affairs.”

According to the Miami-Dade Beacon Council, “Miami’s world-renowned creative sector is one of the cornerstones of the city’s economy.”

In 2023, Miami-Dade’s Department of Cultural Affairs said a “groundbreaking nationwide study” found that the county’s “Arts and cultural sector generates $2.1 billion in economic activity and supports over 31,000 jobs in Miami-Dade County.”

Back in 2012, the county said a landmark study found “Miami-Dade County’s nonprofit arts and cultural organizations represent a significant business industry in Miami-Dade County--one that generates almost $1.1 billion in local economic activity, an almost 17% increase over the last study released five years ago.”

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