Perez, de 46 años, se declaró culpable en marzo.

“Ella estuvo en el tribunal declarándose culpable de todos los cargos y, al hacerlo, pude ver que estaba bastante afectada y es comprensible”, dijo a Local 10 News Frank Urrutia, padre de la víctima. “Seguimos devastados por la pérdida de nuestro hijo. Es algo que hemos tenido que soportar y encontrar la manera de seguir con nuestras vidas”.

Según las autoridades, Perez conducía bajo los efectos del alcohol y en sentido contrario por la autopista Turnpike de Florida, cerca de Red Road, en el condado Broward, el 9 de enero de 2025, antes de chocar contra el vehículo de Ezequiel Urrutia, lo que provocó la muerte del joven, conocido por sus amigos y seres queridos como Zeke.

Sus seres queridos dijeron que Ezequiel soñaba con convertirse en bombero y estaba a punto de terminar sus clases.

Según los registros judiciales, se espera que este viernes se lean en el tribunal 15 declaraciones sobre el impacto en las víctimas antes de que Perez reciba su sentencia.

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Perez, 46, pleaded guilty in March.

“She was at the courthouse pleading guilty to every charge, and in doing so I did see she was pretty shaken and understandably so,” the victim’s father, Frank Urrutia, told Local 10 News. “We’re still devastated by the loss of our son. It’s something we’ve had to endure and figure out how to live our lives.”

According to authorities, Perez was driving drunk and going the wrong way on the Turnpike near Red Road in Broward County on Jan. 9, 2025, before crashing into Ezequiel Urrutia’s vehicle, killing the young man known to his friends and loved ones as Zeke.

Loved ones said Ezequiel had dreams of becoming a firefighter and was close to finishing his classes.

According to court records, 15 victim impact statements are expected to be read in court Friday before Perez is sentenced.

El republicano de Texas, que presentó un proyecto de ley para restringir la ciudadanía por derecho de nacimiento, forma parte de los comités de la Cámara de Representantes de Asuntos Judiciales, Supervisión y Reforma Gubernamental, y Presupuesto.

“El objetivo es remitir el caso al Departamento de Justicia como denuncia penal”, dijo Gill en referencia a la investigación en curso de un comité de la Cámara de Representantes.

El canal Local 10 News informó por primera vez en octubre sobre un servicio de conserjería ofrecido por el Dr. Wladimir Lorentz, el pediatra detrás de Have My Baby en Miami .

“No se puede entrar en Estados Unidos y obtener un visado de inmigración con el único propósito de dar a luz”, dijo Gill.

La publicidad de la empresa, con sede en North Miami Beach, promete “estar encantada de ayudarte a ser madre en los Estados Unidos”.

Según la Decimocuarta Enmienda de la Constitución de los Estados Unidos, los bebés nacidos en EE. UU. obtienen automáticamente la ciudadanía por derecho de nacimiento, independientemente del estatus migratorio de sus padres.

Investigadores del Congreso enviaron recientemente una carta a Lorentz advirtiéndole que “falsear deliberadamente las intenciones de ingresar al país con una visa de visitante temporal constituye una violación de la ley vigente y se considera fraude de visa”. Gill está familiarizado con las pruebas.

“Creo que las pruebas, al menos para mí, son bastante claras: si anuncias servicios de parto en el extranjero, intentando obligar o animar a la gente a venir a Estados Unidos para dar a luz”, dijo Lorentz, “estás haciendo algo que no deberías hacer”.

El Departamento de Estado de EE. UU. ha advertido que viajar a EE. UU. con el propósito principal de dar a luz para obtener la ciudadanía es un uso inadmisible de una visa de turista B-2 .

“Diría que entre 20.000 y 26.000 nacimientos al año en Estados Unidos no es una cifra insignificante… Entre 20.000 y 26.000 personas recibirán la ciudadanía estadounidense, podrán votar e influir en las elecciones de Estados Unidos y disfrutarán de todos los privilegios que conlleva la ciudadanía estadounidense”, dijo Gill.

No existen regulaciones específicas que prohíban la entrada a Estados Unidos a mujeres extranjeras embarazadas, pero los agentes del Servicio de Aduanas y Protección Fronteriza de EE. UU. pueden denegar la entrada a mujeres embarazadas.

Los agentes de la CBP pueden preguntar sobre si se cuenta con un “seguro médico suficiente para cubrir cualquier necesidad médica durante la estancia” en los EE. UU., y sobre pruebas de la intención de regresar a casa, que pueden incluir “un billete de vuelta, una carta de trabajo o escrituras de propiedad”.

Los agentes de la CBP también pueden solicitar “pruebas médicas”, como un certificado médico con la fecha prevista de parto, un certificado de aptitud para viajar en avión y pruebas de que “la atención médica no es el objetivo principal del viaje”.

El Departamento de Justicia de Estados Unidos ha procesado a redes comerciales de “turismo de maternidad”.

Documento relacionado : Informe del personal perteneciente a minorías sobre el turismo de maternidad.

Algunas aerolíneas estadounidenses exigen a las mujeres embarazadas un certificado médico. American Airlines y JetBlue lo exigen para las mujeres embarazadas que viajen dentro de las cuatro semanas previas a la fecha prevista de parto.

Delta Air Lines no lo exige, pero recomienda consultar con un médico si se viaja después de las 32 semanas de embarazo. United Airlines exige un certificado médico después de las 36 semanas y sugiere una nota del médico con fecha de no más de 72 horas antes de la salida.

No fue posible contactar con Lorentz para obtener comentarios.

Historias relacionadas

• Ava DuVernay anuncia su decimocuarto documental sobre la enmienda del derecho de nacimiento impugnada por Trump.
• El bisnieto de Wong Kim Ark elogia el fallo de la Corte Suprema que reafirma la ciudadanía por derecho de nacimiento.
• La Corte Suprema ratifica la ciudadanía por derecho de nacimiento, rechazando las restricciones de Trump.
• Un comité de la Cámara de Representantes investiga a una empresa del sur de Florida acusada de promover el “turismo de maternidad”.
• Una empresa del sur de Florida ofrece servicios de conserjería para extranjeros que desean tener un bebé en territorio estadounidense.

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The Republican from Texas, who introduced legislation to restrict birthright citizenship, serves on the House committees on the Judiciary, Oversight and Government Reform, and the Budget.

“The goal is to make a criminal referral to the Department of Justice,” Gill said about a House committee’s ongoing investigation.

Local 10 News first reported on a concierge service by Dr. Wladimir Lorentz, the pediatrician behind Have My Baby in Miami, in October.

“You cannot come into the United States and get an immigration Visa for the sole purpose of giving birth,” Gill said.

The North Miami Beach-based company’s advertising promises to “love helping you be a mom in the United States.”

Under the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, babies born in the U.S. are automatically granted birthright citizenship, regardless of their parents’ immigration status.

Congressional investigators recently sent a letter to Lorentz warning that “willfully misrepresenting one’s intentions to enter the country on a temporary visitor visa is a violation of current law and considered visa fraud.” Gill is familiar with the evidence.

“I think the evidence, at least to me, seems quite clear that if you’re advertising birth services in foreign countries, trying to compel people or trying to encourage people to come into the United States in order to give birth,” Lorentz said. “You’re doing something that you shouldn’t be doing.”

The U.S. State Department has warned that traveling to the U.S. with the primary purpose of giving birth to obtain citizenship is an impermissible use of a B-2 tourist visa.

“I would say 20,000 to 26,000 births every year in the United States is not an insignificant number … 20,000 to 26,000 are going to be given American citizenship and be able to vote and influence elections in the United States and have all of the privileges that come with American citizenship,” Gill said.

There aren’t specific regulations prohibiting pregnant foreign nationals from entering the U.S., but U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers can deny pregnant women entry.

CBP officers may inquire about “sufficient medical insurance to cover any medical necessities while” in the U.S., and evidence of intent to return home, which may include “a return ticket, job letter, or property deeds.”

CBP officers may also ask for “medical evidence” such as a doctor’s note with the due date, fitness for air travel, and evidence that “care is not the primary trip goal.”

The U.S. Department of Justice has prosecuted commercial “birth tourism networks.”

Related document: Minority staff report on birth tourism

Some U.S. airlines require pregnant women to provide a doctor’s medical clearance note. American Airlines and JetBlue require it for pregnant women traveling within four weeks of their due date.

Delta Air Lines doesn’t require it, but recommends checking with a doctor if traveling past 32 weeks. United Airlines requires a medical certificate past 36 weeks and suggests a doctor’s note dated within 72 hours of departure.

Lorentz couldn’t be reached for comment.

Related stories

• Ava DuVernay announces ’14th’ documentary on birthright amendment contested by Trump
• Great-grandson of Wong Kim Ark praises Supreme Court ruling affirming birthright citizenship
• Supreme Court upholds birthright citizenship, rejecting Trump’s restrictions
• House committee investigates South Florida company accused of promoting ‘birth tourism’
• South Florida company offers concierge services for foreigners wanting to have baby on US soil

El choque ocurrió cerca de Northeast 34th Avenue.

Según Miami-Dade Fire Rescue, tres de las víctimas fueron trasladadas al centro de trauma del Hospital HCA Florida Aventura, mientras que otras dos con lesiones menores fueron llevadas a un hospital local cuyo nombre no fue revelado.

Otras dos personas fueron evaluadas en el lugar y no presentaban lesiones, informó un portavoz de Miami-Dade Fire Rescue.

Una de las víctimas quedó atrapada dentro de uno de los vehículos, según Miami-Dade Fire Rescue.

Video de Sky 10 mostró dos vehículos involucrados, con personal de Miami-Dade Fire Rescue y agentes de la Policía de North Miami Beach en el lugar.

Las imágenes también mostraron el cierre de los carriles en dirección oeste de la vía.

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The crash happened near Northeast 34th Avenue.

According to Miami-Dade Fire Rescue, three of the victims were taken to HCA Florida Aventura Hospital’s trauma center, while two victims with minor injuries were taken to an unnamed local hospital.

Two others were “were assessed on scene and had no complaints,” an MDFR spokesperson said.

One of the victims had been trapped in one of the vehicles, according to MDFR.

Video from Sky 10 showed two vehicles involved, with MDFR and North Miami Beach police at the scene.

It also showed traffic shut down on the westbound lanes of the road.

The lawsuit comes amid growing concerns about how quickly the United States Postal Service will be able to deliver ballots ahead of the November midterms. Control of Congress is at stake, and Wisconsin voters will be electing a new governor as well as determining control of the Legislature.

The bipartisan Wisconsin Elections Commission warned the U.S. postmaster general in May that any delay could deprive citizens of their fundamental right to vote. In January, a group of mostly Democratic U.S. senators also wrote the postal service, raising concerns that a change in how it postmarks mail could invalidate many mail-in ballots.

The lawsuit comes after the mail-in ballots of nearly 150,000 California voters were rejected, the vast majority of them because of late postmarks, despite the state's efforts to count every valid vote in the June primary.

In Wisconsin, at least hundreds of ballots were not counted in the April election because they arrived late, based on an elections commission survey of election clerks. More than 300 ballots in Milwaukee and more than 100 in Fond du Lac were rejected for arriving too late.

The lawsuit was filed in Dane County circuit court by the liberal Madison-based Law Forward firm and Washington, D.C.-based Fair Elections Center on behalf of a voter and the League of Women Voters of Wisconsin.

A spokesperson for the elections commission had no immediate comment.

“Every voter in Wisconsin that puts an accurately requested absentee ballot in the mail on time expects their vote will be counted,” said Debra Cronmiller, executive director of League of Women Voters of Wisconsin, in a statement. “Delays in mail delivery prevent that. It is time to have a remedy for these eligible voters.”

Currently in Wisconsin, voters are prohibited from casting a provisional ballot in person on Election Day. The lawsuit is asking a judge to rule that if a voter's absentee ballot has not arrived, they can then cast a provisional ballot. Absentee voters in the state can track the status of their ballots, so they would know on Election Day whether it has been received.

Provisional ballots are set aside by election officials and only counted if a voter's absentee ballot is not delivered on time. If the absentee ballot does arrive on time, the provisional ballot would not be counted.

In Wisconsin, ballots must arrive at the clerk's office by the end of voting on Election Day in order to be counted.

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Miami-Dade County has the most in the state at 33. Broward has 13 confirmed cases and Monroe County has one.

Florida health officials say 98 of these infections were acquired in state while the rest were either acquired out-of-state, but in the U.S., or outside of the country.

The update comes a week after Taylor Farms expanded a voluntary recall of its iceberg lettuce products sourced from central Mexico because of a potential link to the multistate cyclospora outbreak that has sickened people across the country.

Products with the potential to be contaminated with the diarrhea-causing parasite were shipped to 27 states including Texas, Florida, Pennsylvania, Illinois and New Jersey, the California-based company said in a statement last week.

The Taylor Farms recall announcement listed 25 shredded lettuce and salad mix products sold under eight different brand codes. Taylor Farms did not respond to an emailed request from the Associated Press for the full names of those brands or retailers. The recalled products were shipped as recently as July 16 and have “best by” dates as late as Aug. 3.

Remember, to prevent contamination, wash your hands and fresh produce thoroughly before eating.

El condado Miami-Dade registra la mayor cantidad en el estado, con 33 casos. Broward tiene 13 casos confirmados y el condado Monroe tiene uno.

Funcionarios de salud de Florida informaron que 98 de estas infecciones fueron adquiridas dentro del estado, mientras que el resto se contrajeron en otros estados de Estados Unidos o fuera del país.

La actualización se produce una semana después de que Taylor Farms ampliara el retiro voluntario de sus productos de lechuga iceberg provenientes del centro de México debido a un posible vínculo con el brote multiestatal de Cyclospora que ha enfermado a personas en todo el país.

La empresa con sede en California informó la semana pasada que los productos potencialmente contaminados con el parásito que provoca diarrea fueron distribuidos a 27 estados, incluidos Texas, Florida, Pensilvania, Illinois y Nueva Jersey.

El anuncio del retiro de Taylor Farms incluye 25 productos de lechuga rallada y mezclas para ensalada vendidos bajo ocho marcas diferentes. Taylor Farms no respondió a una solicitud enviada por correo electrónico por The Associated Press para conocer los nombres completos de esas marcas o de los comercios que los vendían. Los productos retirados fueron distribuidos hasta el 16 de julio y tienen fechas de consumo preferente de hasta el 3 de agosto.

Recuerde que, para prevenir la contaminación, debe lavarse bien las manos y lavar cuidadosamente los productos frescos antes de consumirlos.

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The disaster has also mobilized South Florida’s large Venezuelan community, with volunteers and humanitarian groups working around the clock to send aid overseas.

At the Global Empowerment Mission warehouse in Doral, the pace has not slowed since the earthquakes struck.

“What started as a large-scale relief effort, one month later is still exactly that,” said Billy Richardson, the organization’s director of logistics.

According to Richardson, GEM has shipped 2,433 pallets of humanitarian aid to Venezuela, totaling more than 3 million pounds of emergency supplies and more than $12 million in humanitarian assistance.

“We’ve sent over 2,400 pallets so far,” Richardson said. “It’s about 1,440 metric tons of aid — over $12 million worth of aid.”

The organization also has teams on the ground in Venezuela working to distribute supplies directly to survivors.

“Over in Venezuela, we have a team with two warehouses, and we’re doing distributions almost on a daily basis,” Richardson said.

Volunteers have played a critical role in sustaining the relief operation, with many making significant personal sacrifices to help.

“It’s been amazing,” Richardson said. “There’s been people that have taken their entire PTO to come volunteer. I’ve heard people have quit their jobs to volunteer.”

Despite the massive response, Richardson said the humanitarian crisis is far from over.

“It’s still the beginning,” he said. “We still have a really high need for basic needs — canned goods, canned protein, canned vegetables, canned fruits.”

GEM is continuing to accept donations and recruit volunteers as recovery efforts in Venezuela move into their second month, with organizers saying the need for food, supplies and financial support remains urgent.

Click here for more information on how to volunteer or donate.

El desastre también ha movilizado a la numerosa comunidad venezolana del sur de Florida, con voluntarios y grupos humanitarios trabajando sin descanso para enviar ayuda al extranjero.

En el almacén de Global Empowerment Mission (GEM) en Doral, el ritmo no ha disminuido desde que ocurrieron los terremotos.

“Lo que comenzó como una operación de ayuda a gran escala, un mes después sigue siendo exactamente eso”, dijo Billy Richardson, director de logística de la organización.

Según Richardson, GEM ha enviado 2,433 palés de ayuda humanitaria a Venezuela, con un total de más de 3 millones de libras de suministros de emergencia y más de $12 millones USD en asistencia humanitaria.

“Hemos enviado más de 2,400 palés hasta ahora”, dijo Richardson. “Se trata de unas 1,440 toneladas métricas de ayuda, con un valor superior a los $12 millones USD”.

La organización también cuenta con equipos sobre el terreno en Venezuela que trabajan para distribuir los suministros directamente a los sobrevivientes.

“En Venezuela tenemos un equipo con dos almacenes y realizamos distribuciones casi todos los días”, dijo Richardson.

Los voluntarios han desempeñado un papel fundamental para mantener la operación de ayuda, y muchos han hecho importantes sacrificios personales para colaborar.

“Ha sido increíble”, dijo Richardson. “Hay personas que han utilizado todas sus vacaciones pagadas para venir como voluntarios. He escuchado de personas que incluso renunciaron a sus trabajos para ayudar como voluntarios”.

A pesar de la enorme respuesta, Richardson afirmó que la crisis humanitaria está lejos de terminar.

“Esto apenas comienza”, dijo. “Seguimos teniendo una necesidad muy alta de artículos básicos: alimentos enlatados, proteínas enlatadas, vegetales enlatados y frutas enlatadas”.

GEM continúa aceptando donaciones y reclutando voluntarios mientras las labores de recuperación en Venezuela entran en su segundo mes. Los organizadores aseguran que la necesidad de alimentos, suministros y apoyo económico sigue siendo urgente.

Haga clic aquí para obtener más información sobre cómo ser voluntario o hacer una donación.

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While the storm came inland along the Texas/Louisiana border Thursday afternoon – much farther north than initially expected and outside of the NHC forecast cone issued early Thursday morning – after riding the coastline of southern Louisiana all morning, it left little mark on eastern Texas besides elevated tides at the coast and isolated pockets of heavy rainfall, mainly in a few residential suburbs southwest of Houston.

The highest wind reports across the upper Texas coast stayed under the 39 mph tropical storm threshold on Thursday, according to the National Weather Service in Houston. Rainfall totals did top 5.7 inches in parts of Fort Bend County, which did require a flash flood warning at around 9 PM local time Thursday.

The Flash Flood Warning in southwest Houston, however, was the only such flood watch or warning issued yesterday for Bertha. The rest of eastern Texas outside of the Houston metro largely saw light rainfall totals of 1 to 3 inches or less.

Some lingering rainfall associated with Bertha’s remnants continues through South Texas, west of San Antonio, this morning, but the storm’s remnants will quickly push into northern Mexico today, where it’ll continue to fizzle out, with no major impacts expected.

Atlantic basin closed for business until further notice

Overall conditions across the Atlantic basin look unsupportive for tropical development over the next few weeks, especially in the main development belt stretching from Africa through the Caribbean.

If we see any candidates for development into the first week of August, they will likely come out of the subtropics, either in the eastern Gulf like Bertha or east of Florida. For now though, our models are showing a whole lotta nothing on the Atlantic side to round out July and into the first week of August, so enjoy the 7^th inning stretch before the peak of the season ramps up later in August.

On Thursday, the Trump Administration announced a series of new sanctions against Cuba targeting the government’s military conglomerate Gaesa. However, this time it includes companies like Coral S. A. that took over operations from some sectors of GAESA to avoid U.S. sanctions and keep import operations in Cuba functioning.

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The question many academics that follow Cuba like me are asking is whether the U.S. strategy moving forward is to force Cuba to eventually sell some of GAESA’s assets to the U.S.

July 23 update: US continues to send mixed signals as to what will be done with Cuba

This past Monday, the U.S. Department of State issued a 100-page report entitled “Cuba: The Capital of 21^st Century Communism” that outlined why Cuba is a national security threat not only to the U.S., but to the entire world. The Cuban government reacted at once and not only criticized the report but blamed Secretary of State Marco Rubio with threatening the island nation.

On Wednesday at a press conference in the Philippines, Rubio, when asked by a reporter what the U.S. plan was for Cuba, used a much more diplomatic tone and said the U.S. is still willing to negotiate with Cuba.

Washington continues to send mixed signals as to what will be done with Cuba. What we do know is that the strategy used in Venezuela did not bring about regime change.

July 21 update: First humanitarian aid from US will arrive in Cuba

Today, the first humanitarian aid will arrive in Cuba as part of Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s offer to help the Cuban people as they experience the worst economic situation since the early 1990’s. Today’s cargo includes 700 hygiene kits and 700 food items to be distributed directly to the Cuban people by Catholic Relief Services Caritas Cuba and other faith-based organizations.

Secretary Rubio wants to let the Cuban people clearly know that the U.S. stands behind them and is willing to continue to help them as part of the U.S. commitment of $100 million in humanitarian aid.

July 20 update: Cuba releases artist Luis Manuel Otero Alcantara

This past Saturday, Cuba released artist and opposition leader Luis Manuel Otero Alcantara after serving five years in jail. Otero Alcantara was one of the leaders of the San Isidro movement that led to large protests across the island nation five years ago.

Upon arriving in Miami, Otero Alcantara thanked the Cuban American community for its support and asked Cuba to release all political prisoners in jail.

July 16 update: US Department of Defense pays $3 million to US personnel affected by Havana Syndrome

The U.S. Department of Defense has paid $3 million in compensation to U.S. personnel affected by the mysterious condition known as Havana Syndrome, making the first payment under the 2021 Havana Act.

Havana Syndrome first appeared in 2016 when U.S. diplomats and intelligence officers in Havana, Cuba reported unusual symptoms, including intense head pressure, dizziness, nausea, hearing disturbances and memory problems.

July 14 update: New U.S. sanctions increase pressure on Cuba’s military-run economy

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

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.

El jueves, la Administración Trump anunció una nueva serie de sanciones contra Cuba dirigidas al conglomerado militar del gobierno, GAESA. Sin embargo, esta vez también incluye a empresas como Coral S. A., que asumieron operaciones de algunos sectores de GAESA para evitar las sanciones de Estados Unidos y mantener en funcionamiento las operaciones de importación en Cuba.

La pregunta que muchos académicos que siguen de cerca a Cuba, como yo, se están haciendo es si la estrategia de Estados Unidos de ahora en adelante es obligar a Cuba a vender eventualmente algunos de los activos de GAESA a Estados Unidos.

Actualización del 23 de julio: Estados Unidos sigue enviando señales contradictorias sobre lo que hará con Cuba

El pasado lunes, el Departamento de Estado de Estados Unidos publicó un informe de 100 páginas titulado “Cuba: La capital del comunismo del siglo XXI”, en el que expone por qué Cuba representa una amenaza para la seguridad nacional no solo de Estados Unidos, sino de todo el mundo. El gobierno cubano reaccionó de inmediato y no solo criticó el informe, sino que acusó al secretario de Estado, Marco Rubio, de amenazar a la isla.

El miércoles, durante una conferencia de prensa en Filipinas, Rubio, al ser preguntado por un periodista sobre cuál era el plan de Estados Unidos para Cuba, utilizó un tono mucho más diplomático y dijo que Estados Unidos sigue dispuesto a negociar con Cuba.

Washington continúa enviando señales contradictorias sobre lo que hará con Cuba. Lo que sí sabemos es que la estrategia utilizada en Venezuela no logró un cambio de régimen.

Actualización del 21 de julio: Primera ayuda humanitaria de EE. UU. llegará a Cuba

Hoy, la primera ayuda humanitaria llegará a Cuba como parte de la oferta del secretario de Estado Marco Rubio de ayudar al pueblo cubano mientras atraviesa la peor situación económica desde principios de la década de 1990. La carga de hoy incluye 700 kits de higiene y 700 artículos de alimentos que serán distribuidos directamente al pueblo cubano por Catholic Relief Services Caritas Cuba y otras organizaciones religiosas.

El secretario Rubio quiere que el pueblo cubano sepa claramente que Estados Unidos está de su lado y está dispuesto a seguir ayudándolos como parte del compromiso de Estados Unidos de brindar $100,000,000 USD en ayuda humanitaria.

Actualización del 20 de julio: Cuba libera al artista Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara

El pasado sábado, Cuba liberó al artista y líder opositor Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara después de cumplir cinco años en prisión. Otero Alcántara fue uno de los líderes del movimiento San Isidro que encabezó grandes protestas en toda la isla hace cinco años.

Al llegar a Miami, Otero Alcántara agradeció a la comunidad cubanoestadounidense por su apoyo y pidió a Cuba liberar a todos los presos políticos en prisión.

Actualización del 16 de julio: Departamento de Defensa de EE.UU. paga $3 millones USD a personal estadounidense afectado por el Síndrome de La Habana

El Departamento de Defensa de Estados Unidos ha pagado $3 millones USD en compensación al personal estadounidense afectado por la misteriosa condición conocida como Síndrome de La Habana, realizando el primer pago bajo la Ley de La Habana de 2021.

El Síndrome de La Habana apareció por primera vez en 2016, cuando diplomáticos y oficiales de inteligencia estadounidenses en La Habana, Cuba, reportaron síntomas inusuales, incluidos intensa presión en la cabeza, mareos, náuseas, alteraciones auditivas y problemas de memoria.

Actualización del 14 de julio: Nuevas sanciones de EE.UU. aumentan la presión sobre la economía controlada por los militares en Cuba

Estados Unidos impuso el lunes nuevas sanciones dirigidas a empresas controladas por GAESA, el conglomerado económico militar de Cuba, así como a algunas de las brigadas militares responsables de reprimir protestas como las que vimos el otro día.

¿Cuánto tiempo más podrá resistir el gobierno cubano? Continúa llegando información a funcionarios estadounidenses que indica que hay sectores dentro del gobierno cubano cada vez más preocupados por cuánto tiempo podrán sobrevivir sin negociar con el gobierno de Estados Unidos antes de enfrentar un colapso total de su sistema.

Actualización del 10 de julio: ¿Tiene el nieto de Raúl Castro plena autoridad para negociar por el gobierno cubano?

Como esperaba, parece haber una pequeña fisura dentro del círculo interno del gobierno cubano. Algunos han criticado a Raulito (nieto de Raúl Castro) por ofrecer negociar directamente con el presidente Trump. La crítica se centra en si tiene plena autoridad para negociar en nombre del gobierno cubano o si solo está negociando en nombre de la familia Castro.

Ayer, el Partido Comunista de Cuba (PCC) respaldó los esfuerzos de Raulito, pero el liderazgo militar ha permanecido en silencio.

Actualización del 8 de julio: Las Naciones Unidas no tienen derecho legal para levantar el embargo de EE.UU. a Cuba

Cada año, Cuba argumenta ante las Naciones Unidas que el embargo económico de Estados Unidos es la causa de sus problemas económicos. Cada año, Cuba pierde más apoyo para ese argumento. Las Naciones Unidas no tienen un derecho legítimo ni legal para levantar el embargo. Solo el Congreso de Estados Unidos puede levantar el embargo.

La maquinaria de propaganda del gobierno cubano ha fracasado. La mayoría de los cubanos en la isla, incluidos economistas residentes en Cuba, responsabilizan al gobierno cubano por las actuales malas condiciones económicas.

Actualización del 6 de julio: Nieto de Raúl Castro dice que Cuba está dispuesta a negociar con EE.UU.

Reuters informó temprano esta mañana que Raulito, nieto de Raúl Castro, conocido como “El Cangrejo”, anunció que Cuba está dispuesta a negociar con Estados Unidos. La pregunta que debemos hacernos es si Raulito está negociando en nombre de la familia Castro o del gobierno cubano.

Sabemos que Cuba ha estado vendiendo algunos de sus activos, incluidos algunos pertenecientes al conglomerado económico militar GAESA, durante las últimas semanas. El intento de Cuba por atraer inversión extranjera no ha despertado mucho interés debido al temor de perder el dinero invertido.

Actualización del 2 de julio: La cultura del miedo en Cuba complica una transición democrática

Cuando hablamos de Cuba, normalmente nos concentramos en su sistema político y económico centralizado. Sin embargo, no reconocemos que las personas que han vivido bajo regímenes totalitarios han tenido que sobrevivir bajo una cultura del miedo. Ese sistema de gobierno crea un conjunto psicológico de actitudes y valores que ayuda a definir el comportamiento diario para alinear los deseos y necesidades de la población con las restricciones impuestas por el gobierno.

Romper con esos comportamientos podría tomar años de entrenamiento psicológico y de cambios. Por lo tanto, la transición de un Estado totalitario hacia alguna forma de gobierno democrático podría tomar tiempo.

Las actualizaciones de junio del Dr. Andy S. Gómez pueden consultarse haciendo clic aquí.

El Dr. Andy S. Gómez es el analista sobre Cuba de Local 10. Gómez es considerado uno de los principales especialistas sobre Cuba. Trabajó en educación superior durante 32 años antes de retirarse de la Universidad de Miami en 2012.

Si bien la tormenta se adentró en tierra firme a lo largo de la frontera entre Texas y Luisiana el jueves por la tarde, mucho más al norte de lo previsto inicialmente y fuera del cono de pronóstico del NHC emitido a primera hora del jueves, después de recorrer la costa del sur de Luisiana durante toda la mañana, dejó poca huella en el este de Texas, aparte de mareas elevadas en la costa y zonas aisladas de fuertes lluvias, principalmente en algunos suburbios residenciales al suroeste de Houston.

Según el Servicio Meteorológico Nacional de Houston, los vientos más fuertes registrados en la costa norte de Texas se mantuvieron por debajo del umbral de tormenta tropical de 63 km/h el jueves. Las precipitaciones superaron los 14,5 cm en algunas zonas del condado de Fort Bend, lo que provocó una alerta de inundación repentina alrededor de las 21:00 hora local del jueves.

Sin embargo, la alerta de inundación repentina en el suroeste de Houston fue la única advertencia o aviso de inundación emitido ayer por Bertha. En el resto del este de Texas, fuera del área metropolitana de Houston, se registraron precipitaciones ligeras de entre 2,5 y 7,5 centímetros o menos.

Esta mañana continúan algunas lluvias residuales asociadas a los restos de Bertha en el sur de Texas, al oeste de San Antonio, pero los restos de la tormenta se desplazarán rápidamente hacia el norte de México hoy, donde se disiparán gradualmente y no se esperan impactos importantes.

Atlantic Basin permanecerá cerrado hasta nuevo aviso.

En general, las condiciones en toda la cuenca del Atlántico no parecen propicias para el desarrollo de ciclones tropicales en las próximas semanas, especialmente en el principal cinturón de desarrollo que se extiende desde África hasta el Caribe.

Si vemos algún candidato a desarrollarse durante la primera semana de agosto, probablemente provendrá de las zonas subtropicales, ya sea en el este del Golfo, como Bertha, o al este de Florida. Por ahora, nuestros modelos no muestran prácticamente nada en la costa atlántica para lo que resta de julio y la primera semana de agosto, así que disfruten de este tramo ^final antes de que comience la temporada de máxima actividad a finales de agosto.

Según la Oficina del Sheriff de Miami-Dade, la balacera ocurrió en el 785 de la calle 81.

No se dieron a conocer de inmediato más detalles.

Vea Local 10 News o actualice esta página para conocer las novedades.

Leer en español

According to police, the incident was reported at 7:27 a.m. in the area of Northeast Miami Avenue and 80^th Terrace.

Police said the victim was stabbed during an armed robbery in which his wallet was stolen.

The victim was transported by Miami Fire Rescue medics to Jackson Memorial Hospital’s Ryder Trauma Center. His condition has not yet been released.

Anyone with information about the robbery and stabbing is asked to call the Miami Police Department or Miami-Dade Crime Stoppers at 305-471-8477.

Leer en español

According to MDSO, the shooting happened at 785 81^st St.

No other details were immediately released.

Watch Local 10 News or refresh this page for updates.

Según la Policía, el incidente fue reportado a las 7:27 a.m. en el área de Northeast Miami Avenue y la calle 80 Terrace.

La Policía informó que la víctima fue apuñalada durante un robo a mano armada en el que le robaron la cartera.

La víctima fue trasladada por paramédicos de Miami Fire Rescue al Centro de Trauma Ryder del Hospital Jackson Memorial. Su condición aún no ha sido divulgada.

Cualquier persona con información sobre el robo y el apuñalamiento debe llamar al Departamento de Policía de Miami o a Miami-Dade Crime Stoppers al 305-471-8477.

We’re not expecting a washout this weekend, but a shift in our winds from the Everglades (southwest) will shift the thunderstorm zone over the metro area of Broward and Miami-Dade counties. Numerous daily showers and thunderstorms are expected to bring drought relief, especially in the afternoons. This pattern will last well into next week.

The New York-based company said Friday it earned $3.11 billion, or $4.53 a share, compared to $2.89 billion, or $4.08 a share, in the same period a year earlier. The results beat analysts' forecasts, who were looking for AmEx to earn a profit of $4.40 a share, according to FactSet.

AmEx continues to benefit from global economic growth that has disproportionately benefited the wealthy and high net worth individuals, as its customer bases skews heavily toward those demographics with the Platinum Card, Gold Card and other high-end credit cards. Its customers often put almost all of their spending on credit cards, and pay those cards off at the end of each month. The average AmEx customers spent $6,759 on their cards in the quarter, up from $6,393 in the same period a year earlier.

But at the same time, the company is spending heavily to keep those customers as it faces increased competition from other high-end credit card products like JPMorgan Chase's Sapphire Reserve Card, Citigroup's Strata card and Capital One's Venture X brand. The company's quarterly expenses rose 12% from a year ago, costs that went into increased marketing as well as refreshes of its credit card products.

While the company upped its guidance on how much revenue it expects to bring in this year, the company did not change its profit outlook for the year, as the company plans to put more resources into marketing and bringing in new customers. The company also expects to put additional investments into technology like artificial intelligence, like many other Fortune 500 companies.

Those efforts seem to be paying off. The company signed up another 3 million customers in the second quarter, of which three-quarters of those new customers signed up for an AmEx card with an annual fee.

The work takes place at the National Institute of Criminalistics in Brasilia, the country's capital, where federal police have set up a “gold lab” that collects and analyses samples from across the country.

The objective is to determine if a newly acquired sample — gold seized in a police raid, for example — comes from a protected area, meaning it has been illegally mined. It's called “gold fingerprinting” — tracing the origin of gold samples with high precision.

Tracing gold is like looking at a person's DNA, experts say

At the lab, sparkling gold flakes are kept in tiny, coin-shaped vessels, but the most valuable thing about them is the data they hold. Each speck is unique because while it forms in nature, inside a rock or a riverbed, the gold deposits absorb particles from the area, such as traces of silver and copper.

And that's the fingerprint. It allows the investigators to determine if gold seized during a police raid was actually mined in the area its purported owner claims it came from, or if it was illegally sourced from a national forest or Indigenous land — in which case its analysis would match stored data from the protected area.

Gustavo Geiser, a federal police forensics expert, says the method has been developed since 2019 in collaboration with Brazilian universities. The investigators use tools such as X‑ray fluorescence spectrometry, scanning electron microscopy and laser ablation mass spectrometry.

“As we advanced, the forensic examinations became increasingly complex,” Geiser said, but the question before them was always the same: “Where did this gold come from?”

If the forensics prove a gold sample was illegally mined, the information then helps police build a case and move forward with further investigations and possibly charges.

Criminals insert illegally mined gold into legal markets

Those involved in environmental crimes in the Amazon frequently resort to fraud to introduce their goods into legal markets, not just when it comes to gold but also for cattle and timber. Lately, a worldwide surge in gold prices has only spurred on the mining rush in the Amazon rainforest.

Amazon Mining Watch, a platform that uses satellite imagery to track mining, estimates that about 496,000 hectares (1.2 million acres) of rainforest have been cut down for mining since 2023, including some 223,000 hectares (551,000 acres) in the Brazilian Amazon.

Brazil's Federal Court of Accounts, its top audit institution, said last year there was evidence indicating that mining permits granted by the National Mining Agency to small-scale miners were being used to pawn off gold extracted from protected areas in the Amazon.

Greenpeace, in its own independent report in May, based on publicly available records, satellite imagery and aerial surveillance, detailed how the scheme works.

On paper, an owner of a legally authorized mine in the Amazon would declare that tons of gold had been extracted at that mine.

However, satellite and aerial imagery would show that there had not been any activity at the site of the legal mine. Meanwhile, images of bordering Indigenous lands, where mining is banned, would reveal large-scale mining operations — a “ghost mine” scam as Greenpeace calls it.

A federal court in Para, a northern state severely impacted by illegal mining, issued an order this month for institutions like the Central Bank and the National Mining Agency to enact effective control and traceability of all gold, from the mines to the markets. Brazil’s federal prosecutors also filed a lawsuit against the National Mining Agency, seeking better oversight of mining permits.

Prosecutor André Porreca, who is leading the case, said the permits have become a front used "to launder gold extracted by criminal organizations from Indigenous territories and protected areas.”

Geiser, the forensic expert, says the Brasilia gold lab is an important piece of the puzzle that helps battle crime and strengthen global gold supply chains.

“Being able to state that it (gold) has a legitimate origin and therefore is valid for inclusion in a country’s or a bank’s financial reserves, I believe provides solidity not only to the market but also to the countries’ financial bonds,” he said.

There is no data on how many criminals the lab has helped put behind bars, but Geiser says crime networks have recently begun exploiting neighboring countries such as Venezuela, French Guiana and Suriname, to launder illegally mined gold. Samples from abroad have made it to his lab, where they have joined the constantly growing database, he said.

The growing crime has also forced regional countries to strengthen collaboration through the Amazon International Police Cooperation Center, headquartered in the Brazilian city of Manaus.

Illegal gold mining leads to devastating mercury contamination

The Amazon is the world’s largest rainforest and a key regulator of global climate, so anything that degrades it could accelerate global warming, researchers say.

A 2023 analysis by MapBiomas, a nonprofit that monitors land-use, said that over 90% of Brazil’s mining is taking place in the Amazon region, with nearly 40% of it illegal, in protected areas.

Though illegal gold mining is a relatively small driver of deforestation, compared to agriculture, the harm it inflicts on the environment is nearly impossible to reverse — especially because of the use of mercury to extract gold. Once the gold is separated, the mercury is released into the rivers, contaminating water sources and fish essential to Indigenous life.

A 2023 study by Fiocruz, a Brazilian science institute, said 21.3% of fish in Amazonian markets exceeded the World Health Organization's safety limits for mercury levels — with children between 2 and 4 years old consuming mercury at levels up to 31 times the recommended maximum.

Brazil signed the U.N. agreement known as the Minamata Convention on Mercury, which commits it to eliminate mercury use in gold mining.

The Ministry of Mines and Energy published a draft this month on easing out mercury that's up for debate, meant to take place until Aug. 7. Federal prosecutors have urged that Indigenous groups — the ones most affected by the contamination — be consulted, but that has not yet happened.

A total ban on mercury would both curb environmental contamination and also bolster forensics investigations, according to Geiser of the federal police, whose lab can detect any traces of mercury in its samples.

“It will make it even clearer that any mining using mercury ... is illegal,” he added.

___

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

Also, a series of explosions sounded near a military base hosting U.S. forces in northern Iraq and sirens rang out in Bahrain on Friday, hours after the American military said it finished its 13th night of strikes against Iran. The conflict has flared again over the past week, as the U.S. has pounded Iran while Tehran has attacked ships in the Strait of Hormuz and targeted U.S. assets and allies in the region.

Here's the latest:

US tariff hikes linked to claims of foreign forced labor dismay and anger trading partners

Trump’s latest set of tariff hikes drew objections Friday from America’s trading partners including China and Japan, with Australia’s trade minister slamming them as “completely unjustified.”

The administration announced extra tariffs of 10% to 12.5% on 60 economies late Thursday, saying the countries had failed to adequately enforce a ban on goods made with forced labor.

Australian Trade Minister Don Farrell rejected claims linking Australia, a major exporter of beef, gold and copper, to modern slavery.

“We believe that amongst all of the countries in the world Australia does take the issue of slavery, modern slavery, seriously, and will continue to do that,” Farrell told reporters in Adelaide.

Japan also protested the 12.5% tariff imposed on its exports, noting Tokyo had been reassured by the Trump administration that there would be no more tariffs on top of an earlier agreement on a 10% U.S. import duty.

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Journalists urge correspondents’ association to stand up to Trump at rescheduled press dinner

Hundreds of former or retired journalists and eight press freedom groups are asking the White House Correspondents’ Association to stand up to the Trump administration’s recent attacks on the media at its rescheduled dinner this week — a dinner President Donald Trump says he’ll attend.

The first dinner was cut short in April when a gunman, who prosecutors say was trying to assassinate Trump, opened fire at the Washington Hilton. The much smaller rescheduled dinner will take place Friday, with enhanced security precautions, at the capital’s Waldorf Astoria Hotel, formerly the Trump International Hotel.

The letter expands on a similar one issued in April, before the first dinner. It notes that since then, “the administration’s attacks on journalists and press freedom have become even more egregious.”

The letter, organized by former ABC News correspondent Lisa Stark and producer Ian Cameron, cites in particular the recent subpoenas by the Justice Department to New York Times journalists who reported on security concerns over the president’s Qatari-gifted Air Force One jet. Additional subpoenas of the journalists’ phone records have included even the mother of one reporter and two spouses.

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Explosions are heard near a US base in northern Iraq as US-Iran fighting escalates

A series of explosions sounded near a military base hosting U.S. forces in northern Iraq and sirens rang out in Bahrain on Friday, hours after the American military said it finished its 13th night of strikes against Iran.

The conflict has flared again over the past week, as the U.S. has pounded Iran while Tehran has attacked ships in the Strait of Hormuz and targeted U.S. assets and allies in the region.

The strait, which is a crucial passage for the world’s energy supplies, is at the center of the latest fighting since Iranian attacks can effectively shut the waterway, sending fuel prices soaring worldwide and causing widespread economic turmoil. The Iranian-allied Houthi rebels added further pressure this week by targeting two Saudi tankers in the Red Sea, making good on a threat to cut off an alternative route for the region’s oil.

Despite the unpopularity of the war in the U.S. and the widespread damage it has caused in Iran and to the global economy, the latest round of fighting has no clear off-ramp.

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Trump imposes double-digit tariffs on dozens of countries as his 10% levies are set to expire Friday

President Donald Trump is going ahead with new double-digit tariffs on dozens of U.S. trading partners just as the clock runs out Friday on stopgap levies he imposed after a stinging defeat at the Supreme Court.

The United States will slap taxes of 10% to 12.5% on imports from 60 trading partners accounting for 99% of U.S. imports, charging that they have inadequately enforced bans on goods produced by forced labor.

“The United States has had a forced labor import ban for nearly a century, and rigorously enforces it; it’s well past time for our trading partners to do the same,” said U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer.

The new tariffs will take effect just as temporary 10% worldwide tariffs expire at 12:01 a.m. Friday. Trump had turned to those temporary levies after the Supreme Court struck down his biggest and boldest tariffs in February.

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The International Medieval Combat Federation's annual world championship roared into gear in northern Denmark this week. First staged in Spain in 2014, it features armor-clad competitors fighting with 14th-century medieval weapons. But it’s also a modern combat sport with safety rules and sporting conventions.

A mixture of historical and modern techniques

“It’s historically inspired,” combat federation spokesperson Kamila Studencka said. “It’s a mix of modern techniques with historical ones. We have something between full combat sports and fencing.”

And while the swords and axes are blunted, the battles are anything but harmless reenactments. Studencka said some competitors are attracted by “the violence,” while others prefer the technical aspects of face-to-face duels.

“Some people like the friendship and being a team member … to be a part of something bigger,” she added.

This year’s championship is being held in the shadow of Spøttrup Castle, a formidable Danish fortress that was completed around 1520.

The event has drawn fighters from 30 countries, including the United States, Canada, China, and Brazil.

Brazilian competitor Rodrigo Sinckevicius, who traveled with a team of eight from São Paulo, said he previously competed in jiu-jitsu and other mixed martial arts, but when he first saw this kind of medieval combat, he “couldn’t believe it.”

“People falling and grabbing and the sound of the steel cracking, it’s like something that you cannot fake,” added the 33-year-old, who works in sales back home.

Duels and team events

The four-day championships, which opened Thursday, see competitors battle in one-on-one “duels” made up of two one-minute rounds each. Opponents are eliminated after hitting the ground three times or when they submit. If neither happens, marshals declare a winner based on points scored.

There are also chaotic mass-team events, known as “Buhurt,” in which up to 10 competitors on either side participate.

Martin Gill, from Milton Keynes, England, said he first got involved “to hit someone in the face with an ax.”

“This had that kind of niche appeal to it, that people were willing to consensually come up and say, ‘You can hit me in the face with the ax, as hard as you can,’” the 37-year-old geotechnical engineer said.

The IMCF says fighters wear thick, shock-absorbing padded garments beneath the armor to distribute the force of impact, and that fights are strictly controlled by trained marshals who enforce the rules of engagement. It says that overall injury rates are comparable to those in mainstream full-contact martial arts.

Gill said almost everything the competitors wear, including his 30-kilogram (66-pound) suit of armor, is historically accurate. Some outfits and fighting techniques are informed by the writings of 14th-century Italian knight Fiore Dei Liberi and German fencing master Johannes Liechtenauer.

“We follow manuscripts as best we can,” said Gill. “Everything is legitimate techniques from all of their writings throughout the 14th century.”

A growing sport

Nearly 600 fighters are taking part in this week's championship. The sport, an unflinching blend of mixed martial arts, fencing, and historical reenactment, has been growing in popularity.

Competitor Alex King, a 37-year-old financial crime specialist from Shoreview, Minnesota, said that when he first started three years ago, there were just 10 or so members in his local team. Now there are over 50.

“In America, it’s definitely growing, with the short videos you see now highlighting the sport,” King said. “A lot of people have become interested.”

The last big event in the U.S. featured over 40 teams, he added.

Men and women compete in separate events. Miisa Kaivos, a 27-year-old bartender from Helsinki, Finland, said the women’s side of the sport is also “drastically growing all around the world.”

“It’s amazing to see,” said Kaivos. “It’s always nice to come to these events and fight each other, and have that awesome girl power.”

Now those scattered acts of giving have a name and a public face: the Brighter Days Ahead Foundation. Launched in May, it will focus on causes Grande has advocated for in the past, including LGBTQ+ rights, reproductive health, immigrant rights, and mental health. Grande is doing this at a moment when philanthropic support for these causes is eroding, said Shauna Nep, Grande’s philanthropic adviser.

“We’re seeing the support for the kinds of issues she cares about going down drastically and the attacks going up aggressively,” Nep said.

This summer, Grande is using her Eternal Sunshine Tour to fund and promote the foundation, highlighting national and local nonprofits at each tour stop. Names of her grantee organizations are shown on screens in the center of the arena during the pre-show countdown. And fans who donate to the nonprofit can enter a sweepstake for a chance to win a trip to see her final tour date in London.

“The fan experience is still completely intact,” Nep said. “We’re meeting them where they are instead of taking them away from anything.”

Tour funds will be split among the featured local organizations, though none have been distributed yet. The grants announced so far have come entirely from Grande’s personal giving, a foundation spokesperson said.

In many ways, Grande, who also starred in the “Wicked” movies, is following in the footsteps of earlier generations of entertainers who lent their names to once controversial causes like HIV/AIDS and created their own foundations to help move large sums of money.

But today, celebrities’ platforms are larger than ever, giving them even more sway, noted Genevieve Shaker, who teaches courses on celebrity philanthropy and fundraising leadership at Indiana University’s Lilly School of Philanthropy.

“In the past, prior to social media, celebrities might be more dependent on traditional media to share stories about what they’re doing,” she said. “Now they have their own kind of media empire where they can leverage lots of channels to communicate, including about philanthropy and causes and nonprofits.”

Nonprofit Trans Lifeline is grateful for celebrity support

Trans Lifeline, which runs a crisis hotline for transgender people, is one of the nonprofits Grande has supported. The group has received $125,000 total — $75,000 in emergency funding last June and $50,000 when the foundation formally launched in May.

The money helped Trans Lifeline relaunch a microgrants program that distributed $100,000 directly to trans people across the country in partnership with five grassroots organizations, said Dante Alviar Horton, its executive director. Some of the funding also went toward improving benefits for the organization’s direct service crisis workers.

Trans Lifeline relies almost entirely on individual donors. Visibility gained from celebrity supporters has helped sustain the group, Alviar Horton said. He pointed to Trans Lifeline’s recent collaboration with designer Conner Ives on the “Protect the Dolls” T-shirt campaign, which raised more than $500,000 after celebrities like Pedro Pascal began wearing the shirts publicly.

“I was grateful that there were people in the celebrity sphere that cared enough to be like, ‘This matters,’” Alviar Horton said.

Celebrity philanthropy has often been dismissed as image management, allowing entertainers to have red carpet moments without putting much money or thought behind their advocacy efforts. Grande resisted creating a formal foundation for years for exactly that reason, Nep said.

“She does not want anyone to think that she thinks of herself as a philanthropist,” Nep said. “She knows she’s an artist.”

However, Nep, who has worked with the singer since 2018, encouraged Grande to formalize her giving so she could strategically move money to nonprofit groups and more easily collaborate with funding partners.

Grande's Brighter Days Ahead Foundation is a fiscally sponsored project of the Entertainment Industry Foundation, a public charity established in 1942 to support Hollywood’s philanthropic efforts. It allows celebrities, including Charlize Theron and Olivia Rodrigo, to easily create nonprofits to raise and distribute funds.

The largest of her foundation’s four funds is “Protect and Defend,” which supports organizations doing legal and legislative work for transgender youths, immigrants, and reproductive rights. The foundation is the largest funder for several of the grassroots organizations it supports and typically provides unrestricted grants. These groups typically get little support from institutional and government funders. Transgender-focused organizations, specifically, have seen funding dwindle as needs increase, Nep noted.

Grande's advocacy looks to meet the moment

Grande has been a longtime advocate for causes at the center of her philanthropy. In 2019, she donated roughly $250,000 in concert proceeds to Planned Parenthood after several states passed abortion restrictions. She has publicly discussed her struggles with post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety, and depression, expressed appreciation for her gay and transgender fans, and has spoken out against the Trump administration’s immigration policies.

Grande’s activism and personal connection to these issues echo an earlier era when celebrities led the charge on funding for AIDS and HIV, Shaker said. Elizabeth Taylor co-founded the American Foundation for AIDS Research, or amfAR, in 1985 after watching friends suffer from HIV/AIDS and its stigma. For similar reasons, singer Elton John founded the Elton John AIDS Foundation in 1992, the same year he first publicly identified himself as gay.

The political climate facing transgender people today rivals what HIV/AIDS advocates confronted decades ago, said Anne Aslett, CEO of the Elton John AIDS Foundation.

Back in the 1980s and ’90s, John was watching close friends like singer Freddie Mercury succumb to AIDS-related illnesses, she said.

It was “really, really tough” to raise money for HIV/AIDS work among the broader public, including within the entertainment industry, she said. Because of his global stardom, John was able to humanize the cause for people, even those who didn’t share his views on politics or sexuality, Aslett said.

From the outset, the foundation was shaped by his authentic interest in supporting AIDS research and his insistence on listening to people with lived experience of the epidemic, Aslett said. That is what has helped sustain the organization for more than three decades, she said. But that personal interest and connection aren’t enough to really drive philanthropic success.

“Artists are hard-wired to pay attention to human emotion,” Aslett said. “They’re very empathetic. But that alone isn’t enough. They have to have a good structure underneath to make it work.”

_____

Stephanie Beasley is fellowship director and a senior writer at the Chronicle of Philanthropy, where you can read the full article. This article was provided to The Associated Press by the Chronicle of Philanthropy as part of a partnership to cover philanthropy and nonprofits supported by the Lilly Endowment. The Chronicle is solely responsible for the content. For all of AP’s philanthropy coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/philanthropy.

El Centro Nacional de Huracanes (NHC, por sus siglas en inglés) en Miami indicó el viernes que el riesgo de que se produzcan algunos efectos debido al viento y las lluvias en la zona ha aumentado, pero aún es demasiado pronto para determinar la ubicación exacta o su posible magnitud.

Fausto se encontraba lejos de tierra firme, a unos 2.090 kilómetros (1.300 millas) al oeste del extremo sur de la península de Baja California, en México, y a unos 2.575 kms (1.600 millas) al este de Hilo, Hawái. El meteoro tenía vientos máximos sostenidos que rondaban los 161 kilómetros/hora (100 mph).

El NHC señaló que el oleaje generado por Fausto podría provocar marejadas y corrientes de resaca potencialmente letales en partes del sur de California.

Fausto se ha estado formando en el Pacífico mientras la tormenta tropical Bertha avanzaba por la costa del golfo de México. El meteoro causó un fuerte oleaje y algunas inundaciones al sur de Luisiana y Texas al tocar tierra por segunda vez el jueves. Hacia el final de la noche, el NHC declaró que Bertha se había disipado.

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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.

Studio 10 caught up with Kevin and the cast from LIV Night Club in South Beach ahead of the movie’s premiere.

Watch the interview above.

Newly released bodycam footage shows what happened in the moments before the takedown, and officers say it changes the picture entirely.

The bodycam video shows an officer punching and taking down 42-year-old Justin Ikeler before putting him in handcuffs.

It was a different video — showing another angle of the encounter, which happened Tuesday just before noon — that originally spread online and stirred controversy, with some arguing the officer used excessive force.

But police say the bodycam video shows Ikeler physically assaulting a woman just before the takedown. When officers tried to take him into custody, he refused and “assumed a fighting stance with his fist,” according to police. He was then taken down and handcuffed.

The incident happened under the South Bridge in Fort Pierce. Multiple people said they witnessed the fight but didn’t want to appear on camera.

Witnesses said they heard a lot of shouting before seeing the officer take Ikeler to the ground, and said that both Ikeler and the woman had been under the bridge since before the incident started.

The Fort Pierce Police Department said Ikeler was taken to the St. Lucie County Jail.

According to county records, Ikeler remains in custody at the St. Lucie County Jail, facing one charge of resisting an officer without violence.

Police said the woman involved declined to press charges and told officers the dispute began after Ikeler falsely accused her of stealing his wallet.

The case remains under investigation.

Video taken from Sky 10 captured an intense scene in Fort Lauderdale, with police guns drawn as a group of people moved slowly, hands raised.

On the ground, officers zeroed in on a black BMW with front side-panel damage as a tow truck moved in to haul it away.

The scene unfolded in a neighborhood just south of Sunrise Boulevard and east of I-95, where detectives had tracked a stolen vehicle and a possible getaway driver, authorities said. A K-9 unit worked the trail, searching for a suspect still on the loose.

According to police, the chase began south in Hallandale Beach, where a vehicle was stolen and the driver refused to stop. It carried into Hollywood, where officers from two different jurisdictions ended up colliding with each other, authorities said.

Video showed a badly damaged Hollywood police cruiser, with a battered Hallandale Beach cruiser parked nearby at South Federal Highway and Van Buren Street.

Police set up perimeters close by, in the 3000 block of Hayes Street and the 3000 block of Johnson Street near the Tri-Rail tracks, apparently searching for someone — or several people — connected to the stolen car investigation.

A Broward Sheriff’s Office helicopter was spotted in the air Thursday night, signaling that a suspect or suspects tied to the investigation remain on the run, believed to have bailed out at some point during the pursuit.

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The Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office said they took Gary Jackson into custody on Wednesday.

According to deputies, they were alerted to a Miami-Dade County Department of Regulatory and Economic Resources case regarding a victim stating that Jackson, who was doing business as Metal Roof Masters LLC, “presented her with a written contract totaling $14,000.00 to repair the entire roofing system” on Feb. 9.

Deputies said the victim made a payment of $7,800 to Jackson five days later, and a subpoena served to JP Morgan Chase Bank showed the check was deposited into Jackson’s account. Authorities said he was the sole person authorized to access the funds.

Over the course of several months, multiple attempts to contact Jackson were allegedly made via mail and phone, but deputies said he “has not made any attempt to reach a resolution or provide full restitution.”

Additionally, investigators said they searched the Florida Construction Industry Licensing Board and the Miami-Dade County Construction Trades Qualifying Board and found that Jackson is not a licensed contractor under any state or county statutes or ordinances.

They did, however, determine through a search of the Florida Division of Corporation that Jackson was the owner of Metal Roof Masters LLC.

Deputies said the MDSO Special Predator Enforcement Team detained Jackson, and he was later booked into the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center on charges of third-degree grand theft and engaging in contracting without a license.

As of Thursday afternoon, Jackson remained behind bars, with documents indicating that he was already out on felony bond at the time of his arrest.

That bond was for a sex offender registry case in which documents show Jackson was accused of failing to report to authorities as a transient sexual offender, which was statutorily required following a conviction.

An arrest form from that case states he was convicted of performing a lewd or lascivious act on a child under 16, which requires him to report with the state of Florida every 30 days.

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The incident happened outside the Mobil at 16861 Miramar Parkway in Miramar.

According to police, first responders arrived to find a man who had suffered serious injuries and rushed him by helicopter to a nearby hospital.

That man was later pronounced dead, authorities said.

Workers at the gas station told Local 10 News the victim worked at their car wash and was likely closing at the time of the incident.

He was later identified as Teofilo Vargas, 51, by his son Alan, who spoke to Local 10 News’ Roy Ramos.

“He was a good person,” said Vargas, who was asked why he thinks someone would have done this to his father.

“I have no idea,” he said.

Vargas described his father as a calm, hard worker who didn’t have any problems with anyone.

“He was working here washing cars,” he said. “I don’t know what could’ve led up to this.”

Officers said the suspect fled after the stabbing, which led authorities to set up a perimeter in the area. Miramar Parkway was closed for a period of time between Southwest 164th Avenue and 172nd Avenue.

“So what we do know is that there was an altercation with two men, and one was stabbed,” Miramar police spokeswoman Janice McIntosh said.

Officers indicated they knew the identity of the suspect, but have yet to release it to the public.

“The police know who they are looking for, but they are still asking the public, if they see or hear anything suspicious to report it immediately, because he is still at large,“ McIntosh said.

Anyone with information is urged to contact the Miramar Police Department or Broward Crime Stoppers at 954-493-8477.

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• Drunken driver crashes into vehicle stopped at red light in Coral Springs, killing occupant, police say
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• Victim in Miramar stabbing dies, police continue search for suspect

The district announced the change after its four-year participation in the federal Community Eligibility Provision (CEP) came to an end. According to Miami-Dade County Public Schools, updated federal eligibility data determined the district no longer qualifies to provide free breakfast and lunch to every student districtwide.

“Our goal is to protect families from any hardship while keeping free breakfast and lunch available to as many students as possible,” Chief Operations Officer Luis E. Diaz said in a statement. “We’re launching a comprehensive outreach campaign to ensure families have clear, step-by-step guidance.”

Under the new meal program, all students attending the district’s 121 CEP schools will continue receiving free breakfast and lunch.

At schools that do not qualify under CEP, meal prices will be:

Elementary and K-8 schools:

• Free breakfast
• Lunch: $4.20 full price or 40 cents for students who qualify for reduced-price meals

Middle and high schools:

• Breakfast: $2.50 full price or 30 cents reduced price
• Lunch: $4.20 full price or 40 cents reduced price

Families with students attending non-CEP schools can begin applying for free or reduced-price meals on Aug. 10 through mdcpsnutrition.net.

Students who are directly certified through programs such as SNAP, TANF, Medicaid, foster care, Head Start, migrant services or homeless assistance will continue receiving free meals automatically without submitting an application.

The district said all students will receive free meals during the first 30 days of the school year, or until their eligibility status has been determined.

School officials are encouraging families to complete applications as early as possible to avoid any interruption in meal benefits.

M-DCPS said it will work directly with families to explain eligibility requirements, assist with the application process and ensure students continue to have access to nutritious meals that support their health and academic success.

CEP and Non-CEP Schools List:

Emiliano Grillo, Jackson Koivun and Gary Woodland opened with 64s, and Scheffler topped the group at 65 in his first appearance in the event.

Coming off a fourth-place finish Sunday in the British Open, Scheffler was 1 under through eight holes, then birdied five of the next eight.

“I didn’t hit a bunch of fairways early, but I was able to kind of manage my way around and get out of some trouble areas without making any bogeys. That was important keeping my momentum going,” he said. “Once I started to hit fairways and gave myself some looks, was able to start making some birdies.”

Kohles’ second shot from 241 yards out on the par-5 finishing hole settled 4 feet from the cup. The short putt capped a career-best round for the 36-year-old who has split the season between the PGA and Korn Ferry tours.

In a nine-hole stretch beginning on No. 6, he birdied every other hole and added another birdie at No. 15 to tie for the lead at 7 under.

“I was just in control all day,” he said.

Three weeks ago, Kohles nearly got his first career win, but a double bogey on the final hole resulted in a third-place finish at the John Deere Classic.

“Of course you would like the outcome to be different, but you’ve just got to keep putting the pedal down and see where you go,” he said.

Koivun birdied four holes on the front nine and three on the back during a bogey-free round at the TPC Twin Cities where scores are traditionally low. In the tournament’s seven previous years, the average winning score was 19 under.

“Playing smart, playing for a score. Just executing when the time is right and getting aggressive when you can,” he said. “Just felt like I did a good job of taking advantage of that today.”

In his 13th tour start, but just third as a professional, 64 is the lowest score in Koivun’s 43 career rounds. The 21-year-old turned professional in June after dominating at Auburn, including a school-record 11 wins.

Grillo made birdie on five of his first seven holes and added three straight birdies starting at No. 12. However, he played the final three holes in 1-over.

“Any day beating Scottie Scheffler is a good day, so I’ll take that,” he said.

Defending champion Kurt Kitayama shot 68.

___

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

A three-judge panel on Thursday declined to issue a preliminary injunction against the new districts, paving the way for them to be used in the Aug. 6 primary elections. Tennessee had revised its congressional districts in May, shortly after a U.S. Supreme Court ruling weakened federal Voting Rights Act protections for minorities.

President Donald Trump has urged Republican-led states to redraw districts to their advantage to try to hold on to a slim U.S. House majority in the November elections. Tennessee is among eight GOP states to do so since last year. Trump is hoping the mid-decade redistricting can help Republicans buck a historical pattern in which the president’s party typically loses seats in midterms.

Opponents of Tennessee’s new congressional districts had argued in court that Republican lawmakers who passed the plan were motivated at least partly by racial discrimination, in violation of the U.S. Constitution.

Republicans have insisted they were motivated only by partisan politics, seeking to win the lone Democratic-held seat among the state’s nine districts. Legislatures are free to draw partisan districts under a 2019 Supreme Court ruling.

The federal judges — two Trump appointees and one appointee of former President Barack Obama — wrote in their opinion that the lawsuit is unlikely to succeed because the plaintiffs “lack any direct evidence of racial motivation."

“The road to a reliably 9-0 map runs through Memphis,” the ruling states. “Thus, political motivations readily explain the map’s dilutive effects.”

The Supreme Court in late April struck down a majority-Black congressional district in Louisiana as an illegal racial gerrymander. That decision weakened protections in the federal Voting Rights Act of 1965 that allowed minorities an opportunity to elect the candidate of their choice. It also opened a pathway for Republicans in several Southern states to cite political intentions while redrawing voting districts with large minority populations that have elected Democrats.

In Tennessee, Republicans carved up a Memphis-based district with a majority-Black population that has been represented for about two decades by Democratic Rep. Steve Cohen, who is white. The metropolitan area was instead placed in parts of three districts, with Cohen’s reshaped district stretching a couple hundred miles eastward before reaching north toward the Nashville suburbs.

Cohen announced soon after the redraw that he was ending his bid for reelection.

Amber Sherman, a Memphis voter and plaintiff in the lawsuit, criticized the ruling, saying it’s “painful” to head into an election under a map that weakens the voices of Black voters.

“We deserve the same opportunity to shape our future as anyone else,” Sherman said. “When our voting power is diluted, our neighborhoods have a harder time making their voices heard on the issues that shape our daily lives.”

Ari Savitzky, an attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union Voting Rights Project, told the judges in mid-June that Republicans who are “essentially an all-white-controlled legislative body" chose to destroy the state’s lone pocket of Black political power in federal elections.

Attorney Taylor Meehan, representing Tennessee election officials, rejected the assertion of racially discriminatory motivations. She also argued it was too late to revert to Tennessee’s previous congressional districts, noting that primary election ballots already had been finalized using the new boundaries. Early voting began July 17.

“Racial data was turned off” when crafting the new districts, Meehan said. “The map was drafted for politics.”

The 214-208 vote requiring congressional approval for the war came just before the Senate narrowly rejected a similar resolution, 47-49. Though the votes forced by Democrats are largely symbolic, they are meant as a signal to the Republican president that his support on Capitol Hill is chipping away as the war drags on and lawmakers in both parties have questioned his administration’s endgame.

The war has had “no clear mission, no strategy, no end goal,” said Washington Rep. Pramila Jayapal, a Democrat who led the resolution on the House floor.

The House resolution passed after a handful of Republicans voted with Democrats to end the war. But the vast majority of Republicans in both chambers voted to back the war and cede congressional war powers to Trump.

Joint U.S. and Israeli airstrikes launched the war in late February. A tenuous ceasefire deal was reached in April, but Trump declared the ceasefire was “over” earlier this month.

Trump has insisted that continued U.S. attacks against Iran do not mean a return to war or long-term action. After the first House vote to halt the war in early June, he posted on social media that it was “unpatriotic” and “meaningless.”

A statement of administration policy issued by the White House on Thursday noted that the resolutions don’t have the force of law and encouraged lawmakers to vote against them.

“The President has the Constitutional authority to defend the United States and our citizens from the danger posed by the Iranian regime,” the policy statement said. “This requires the ability to act decisively to ensure it never obtains a nuclear weapon.”

Continued American airstrikes are occurring even as diplomatic efforts show little public sign of progress and officials on both sides have dug in on the dispute over the Strait of Hormuz, a crucial waterway for global energy that remains largely closed. The unpopular war threatens further worldwide economic disruption and is sending fuel prices up ahead of midterm U.S. elections this fall.

“We are in this new escalatory phase where Americans have been killed, and Americans are experiencing the rising costs — I think it’s important that people be held accountable,” said Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen, a Democrat who led the Senate effort on Thursday. “And this is a very unpopular war.”

Most Republicans vote to cede congressional powers

As the House debated the resolution Wednesday evening, Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Brian Mast, R-Fla., read out names of 18 service members killed since the war began.

“To belittle this mission is to belittle and demean the very service these members gave their life for,” Mast said. “Their sacrifice was not meaningless. This operation is bringing reckoning for the hundreds of times Iran has attacked and killed people of the United States of America.”

The top Democrat on the panel, New York Rep. Gregory Meeks, said that presidents are supposed to make the case to Congress.

The service members who died made the ultimate sacrifice for “an illegal unauthorized war that the American people don’t want,” Meeks said.

Democrats said they would continue to force Republicans to vote on the issue.

“If Donald Trump won’t listen to the people and end this war then Congress must,” said Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.

Trump is watching Iran votes closely

Republicans on both sides of the Capitol know that voting against the war can have a political cost, even as many of them have privately questioned the Trump administration’s handling of the conflict.

In his post after the June House vote, Trump called the four Republicans who voted with Democrats “GRANDSTANDERS!” and said they should be “ashamed of themselves.”

“They would rather have our Country fail than give me another, of many, victories,” he said.

When the Senate passed a war powers resolution on Iran for the first time in June, Trump called the four Republicans who voted for it “losers” and then reprimanded them at a Senate GOP luncheon that he attended the next day.

Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy, one of the Republicans who had voted with Democrats, said afterward that he had clashed with Trump over the issue. He said he told Trump directly that he needed to give more details to the public about the conflict.

“This was supposed to last four weeks. It’s lasted four months,” said Cassidy, who had just lost reelection in a primary after Trump endorsed one of his opponents. “Our original objectives have not been achieved.”

Trump argued back, Cassidy later told reporters, and he told the president that he wouldn’t change his vote until he got a briefing. The White House later relented, giving Cassidy a one-on-one meeting, and the Louisiana Republican changed his vote in a late-night do-over vote before the Senate left for a two-week recess.

Cassidy voted against the resolution again on Thursday.

Polling finds Americans disapprove of the war

Most Americans disapprove of the way Trump is handling the situation with Iran, according to recent polling. A Washington Post/Ipsos poll conducted in July found that few Americans think the war in Iran has been worth fighting, and most aren’t confident that the U.S. military action in Iran and negotiations to end the war will prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons.

Only about two-thirds of Republicans approve of Trump’s handling of the situation in Iran, according to the poll. Most Republicans, about 6 in 10, think the war has been worth fighting and are confident that the military action and ensuing negotiations will prevent Iran from development nuclear weapons, but a sizable share — about one-third — are unconvinced.

Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., said that if Congress can’t force Trump to seek congressional authorization then lawmakers should block war funding. The House on Wednesday adopted a Republican-only $95 billion budget proposal, including money for the Iran war, but its future is uncertain in the Senate.

“He wants to break the law, fine, let him break the law, but we control the appropriations process, and that’s what we need to use,” Kaine said.

___

Associated Press writers Steven Sloan and Amelia Thomson DeVeaux contributed to this report.

En medio de un escenario cargado de incertidumbre, los equipos negociadores de ambos países se reunieron entre el martes y jueves en la capital mexicana para avanzar en los diálogos que mantienen desde mayo sobre las reglas de origen, la seguridad económica, la agricultura y la industria automotriz, uno de los sectores que se ha visto más golpeado por los aranceles estadounidenses.

Mientras Estados Unidos apuesta a proteger a su industria pese a los costos en inflación que la política ha implicado para los estadounidenses, el gobierno de Claudia Sheinbaum ha centrado sus esfuerzos en lograr una disminución importante de los gravámenes de 10% que desde el año pasado Washington impuso a los productos mexicanos que no están cubiertos por el T-MEC, así como a los camiones medianos y pesados que tienen un impuesto de 25%. También está vigente un gravamen de 50% al acero y el aluminio y una cuota compensatoria del 17% al tomate mexicano.

Ante la nueva ronda de aranceles que anunció el jueves la administración de Donald Trump, el secretario mexicano de Economía, Marcelo Ebrard, informó que la decisión no representa un cambio para México debido a que se mantiene el gravamen de 10% que se aplicaba desde el año pasado a los productos mexicanos no cubiertos por el T-MEC, y señaló en un vídeo, que se difundió en las redes sociales, que el anuncio “no afecta o cambia la posición que teníamos hasta ahora”.

Resultados de la tercera ronda

Durante la tercera fase, los negociadores continuaron avanzando en temas como el acero, el aluminio, los sectores estratégicos, el fortalecimiento de las cadenas de valor y la sustitución de importaciones de Asia, informó el jueves en un comunicado la Secretaría de Economía de México.

La próxima ronda de negociaciones bilaterales se realizará en la primera quincena de septiembre.

Pese a que no se llegaron a acuerdos concretos en esta fase, Ebrard se mostró optimista y dijo que “seguimos avanzando en nuestras conversaciones” y tratando de “aproximar las posiciones de lo que Estados Unidos está buscando con lo que México está buscando a partir de lo que nos es común que es la integración económica”.

En la sesión del jueves estuvo presente el principal negociador comercial estadounidense, Jamieson Greer, quien se reunió más temprano con Sheinbaum en el palacio de gobierno para discutir sobre los acuerdos bilaterales y los avances en la revisión del T-MEC que se inició el primero de julio, y que se vio perturbada por la decisión de Washington de no extender automáticamente la vigencia del tratado por 16 años, como quieren México y Canadá, con lo que se activó el mecanismo de revisiones anuales hasta 2036.

Al referirse al encuentro con la presidenta mexicana, la oficina de Geer dijo en su cuenta de X que en la reunión se discutió sobre el progreso en las negociaciones, y añadió que la administración de Trump espera con interés la colaboración continua con México para lograr un “comercio equilibrado" y "resolver los desafíos económicos transfronterizos”.

En su habitual conferencia matutina, Sheinbaum descartó que dentro de la revisión del T-MEC se vayan a incluir temas de seguridad y otros asuntos bilaterales, e indicó que las negociaciones se centrarán en asuntos comerciales.

Pero Greer dijo la víspera durante una comparecencia en el Senado estadounidense que a Trump le resultaría difícil aceptar una renovación o la revisión del T-MEC si México no coopera en temas claves como el tratado bilateral de aguas de 1944 y la seguridad.

El representante comercial estadounidenses indicó que durante los próximos cinco meses se espera lograr avances en las reglas de origen del tratado, que es una de las principales preocupaciones de Washington, y las normas laborales y ambientales.

Las presiones alternas a las negociaciones

En medio de las tensiones generadas por las políticas comerciales, México también ha enfrentado en los últimos meses fuertes presiones y reclamos de parte de Estados Unidos en asuntos de seguridad y migración que también han perturbado los diálogos bilaterales.

México escaló este mes los reclamos por la muerte de 17 de sus connacionales y solicitó a las fiscalías estatales de Estados Unidos que investiguen penalmente los casos de migrantes fallecidos mientras estaban bajo custodia del Servicio de Inmigración y Control de Aduanas (ICE) o durante redadas de esa agencia.

The letters have raised concerns among some state lawmakers, including one who said some constituents who received them are U.S. citizens.

Alaska Division of Elections Director Carol Beecher told state lawmakers during a hearing this week that it appears “a lot of old data was picked up somehow" when the division conducted voter roll maintenance that compares its list with information held by the Division of Motor Vehicles. The process usually yields about 200 names for further review, she said.

Beecher estimated during Wednesday's hearing that the number of letters sent was around 3,500, but a Division of Elections spokesperson, Steve Kirch, on Thursday said the total was 3,048.

The revelation comes at a time of heightened sensitivity surrounding claims of noncitizen voting. Research and prosecutions have shown it to be extremely rare, but President Donald Trump and his allies have raised alarms since the presidential election cycle two years ago that noncitizen voting is widespread.

The president also has been trying to push voting changes through Congress that would require people to provide documents proving their citizenship to register to vote and a now-halted executive order that sought to create a federal list of verified voters, even though voter rolls are maintained by the states.

Citizenship verification 'is not disenfranchising' voters

The Alaska letter asks recipients to affirm their citizenship status via letter, phone or email, and Beecher said the division is not requiring paperwork or documentation. Those who receive the letter are moved to a list of “inactive” voters. If the division doesn't hear back from the recipient, they still would be able to cast a special kind of ballot that also requires voters to attest to their qualifications to vote, she said.

“It is not disenfranchising the individual from being able to vote, but it’s a measure the division has to take to make sure that we only have citizens voting,” she said.

People who respond to the letter to say they are citizens will be moved back to the active list, Kirch said.

State Rep. Andrew Gray, a Democrat, said the only people who had contacted his office about the letters were people who are citizens. Another Democrat, state Rep. Ashley Carrick, asked if the letters were related to Alaska's decision late last year to share detailed data about the state's voters with the U.S. Department of Justice.

Beecher said it was not: “It has nothing to do with that,” she said, adding: “The information that we have received is specifically from DMV.”

She said the Division of Elections has not heard from the Department of Justice “regarding any list or the list that we provided that they identified noncitizens on that.”

DMV says request it received was ‘nonroutine’

Alaska was one of at least 16 states that have provided or said it would provide to the Trump administration detailed information about its voters — including dates of birth, driver’s license numbers and partial Social Security numbers, according to the Brennan Center. Alaska and Texas also signed agreements. The information is being run through a Department of Homeland Security program that checks for citizenship but has been criticized for its potential to flag eligible voters.

Voting and civil rights groups in Alaska earlier this year sued over the state's sharing of the information. That case is still pending.

In response to questions, the Division of Motor Vehicles released a memo Thursday saying the Division of Elections in March provided the agency “with a list of approximately 15,200 DMV license and identification applicants and requested that DMV provide citizenship information for these records.” The memo described it as a “nonroutine request.”

The memo said the Division of Elections followed up in June, seeking clarification. The DMV said it responded to say that data it provided “included only those records where DMV’s latest confirmed status for an individual was other than ‘Citizen.’”

Kirch said his agency had sent the DMV its “entire voter list and they ran ours against theirs.”

Officials unsure why so many voters had their status questioned

Beecher, during the legislative hearing, said it remained unclear why the list of voters identified as potential noncitizens was so large this time. It is possible people applied to get a driver's license before they were citizens and since then became citizens but that didn't show up in DMV records, she said.

“I believe that people probably don’t realize that all of these governmental entities don’t necessarily talk to each other,” she said.

Kirch gave an example on Thursday. He said if a person was not a citizen some years ago when they received their driver's license but since became a citizen and registered to vote when they applied for the annual dividend the state pays to residents from its oil-wealth fund, data from the DMV would still show them as not being a citizen.

He said people should update their information with the DMV to ensure they are not flagged in future citizenship checks.

The Fever put out a statement Thursday that didn't directly address Turner's comments.

“Protecting our players and employees and maintaining a respectful, professional workplace is our top priority,” the Fever said. “Our policy is to take concerns seriously, investigate thoroughly, and act promptly when appropriate to protect the people in our organization and ensure everyone is treated with professionalism and respect. Fostering trust and safety in that process means we do not comment on personnel matters involving former employees.”

Turner’s comments were part of a series of posts she made in defense of transgender athletes.

"To date there’s been one out trans player in the league. They caused zero problems,” Turner wrote in the posts on X on Wednesday. “An issue that has caused problems though? Last year on my WNBA team a male staff member was fired for sexual harassment, but we were encouraged to keep quiet about it. That is an issue."

She didn't provide details of the firing.

Turner’s comments came after a former teammate, Fever guard Sophia Cunningham, had also weighed in on the issue of transgender athletes competing in women’s sports.

"I got a lot of negative feedback about me hating trans. And I’m like, ‘I never once said that,’” Cunningham was quoted as saying in a story published this week by ESPN. “I think that I am here to extend love. But I also think with that love is truth, being honest. And I want to protect young girls in a locker room, or young girls in sport who shouldn’t have to go against biological men."

___

AP WNBA: https://apnews.com/hub/wnba-basketball

California has become notorious for its ponderously slow vote counts that can drag on for weeks and sometimes longer, largely the result of multiple changes over the years that were intended to increase turnout but have done little to achieve that. Among the changes: Every voter receives a mail-in ballot that can arrive at an election office seven days late and still be counted, provided the envelope is postmarked by Election Day.

Yet even with that generous weeklong window, the primary driver of the higher rejection numbers is late-arriving ballots, according to data compiled by the secretary of state's office. Voting experts suspect the main problem is postmarks on ballots that came after Election Day, making them ineligible to be counted. The culprit could be U.S. Postal Service changes that might affect the timing of when postmarks are applied.

Late-arriving ballots drove the rejections

According to state data, 148,241 mail ballots were rejected in the June election, or a rate of 1.73% of all mail ballots.

In raw numbers, that's up from the 2024 primary, when 108,982 mail ballots were rejected, or a 1.56% rate. In 2022, 105,818 mail ballots were voided during the primary, or a rate similar to 2024.

Lateness accounted for 93,479 rejected ballots in June, by far the largest category for disqualifying a ballot. That was up from about 70,000 in the 2022 primary and about 76,000 in the 2024 primary, though turnout in those elections was smaller compared to last June.

Kim Alexander, president of the nonpartisan California Voter Foundation, said the jump in rejected ballots because of lateness is a major concern that — along with postal procedures — might also be connected to a late surge in ballots in June. Many voters waited until the final days to make a decision in a wide-open and chaotic race for governor.

“Ballots rejected due to lateness are caused primarily to being postmarked too late to count, not because they arrived too late to count,” Alexander wrote in an email.

Rejection rates have fluctuated over time, but the growing number of those set aside for lateness compared to recent elections “does really demand the question why this is happening,” said Mindy Romero, director of the Center for Inclusive Democracy, a nonpartisan research group.

Lawmakers concerned about USPS postmark changes

In January, a group of mostly Democratic U.S. senators sent a letter to the U.S. Postal Service, alarmed that mail-processing changes might affect postmark dates for mail-in ballots during an election year that will determine control of Congress.

Updated agency policy says postmarks might not indicate the first day the Postal Service received the mail, but rather the day it was handled in one of its processing centers. Those centers are increasingly likely to be further away from certain communities because of recent consolidations within the Postal Service, which could further delay postmarks.

On Thursday, two Wisconsin Democrats, U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin and Gov. Tony Evers, called on the Postal Service to address delays that caused hundreds of ballots to arrive after Election Day in the state in April. In June, a federal judge halted President Donald Trump’s executive order that sought to create a federal voter list and limit who can receive a mail ballot.

Earlier this year, California election officials urged voters to send their mail ballots early, warning that Postal Service changes could lead to slower mail service.

In California, the highest mail ballot rejection rate in June — 3.52% — was in Tulare County, in the agriculture-heavy Central Valley. It was followed by Alpine County, south of Lake Tahoe, and Merced County, also in the Central Valley, which both notched a 3.36% rejection rate.

Mismatched signatures and multiple ballots in an envelope

Nearly 44,000 ballots were set aside because the voter’s signature didn't match the one on record with county officials. Over 8,300 ballots were rejected because there was no signature on the returned ballot envelope.

In 743 cases, the voter had already cast a ballot, so the mail ballot was voided. Other reasons for rejection included a ballot being missing from the return envelope, or multiple ballots were sent back in a single envelope.

The data didn’t break down the uncounted ballots by party registration.

Florida, Texas and other large population states quickly wrap up vote counting, while California is a national laggard.

After the June primary, President Donald Trump seized on California’s reputation as the national slowpoke in vote counting to renew his long-standing criticism of the state’s elections, while the Republican’s Department of Justice launched an investigation into Los Angeles County’s elections.

There is no indication of any widespread problems with mail voting, which has gained in popularity among Democrats and Republicans alike. A report by the Brookings Institution published in 2025 found that the number of cases of mail voting fraud was minuscule — about four cases per 10 million mail ballots.

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In an arrest warrant, police made a circumstantial case against Alejandro Leon Jr. and Samantha Angelina Feliz. They said the body of their still-missing baby girl, identified as “Angelina,” has still not yet been found, but signs ― including DNA blood evidence ― point to her death.

Police in Rockingham, North Carolina took Leon, 21, and Feliz, 20, into custody on Wednesday. They’re set to face multiple charges, including manslaughter, upon their return to South Florida.

Authorities said the investigation began after a relative contacted the Hollywood Police Department in July 2025 to report that he hadn’t seen the child since that February and said the couple made unsettling statements that Angelina “was part of a scam and denied ever having a baby.”

A relative who met with Feliz at a Hollywood park in March 2025 told investigators that after asking Feliz about Angelina, she replied, “What baby? There is no baby.”

“Since that time, Feliz has claimed that there never was a baby, that the baby was a hoax and that she was scamming everyone for money,” the HPD arrest warrant states.

But police said the couple referenced the girl in prior text messages and had had taken photos of Feliz visibly pregnant. Additionally, police said they took photos and videos with Angelina after her birth, which was believed to have been at home with no birth certificate issued.

Authorities said the last photo of Angelina was taken on Jan. 5, 2025. The baby looked “visibly ill and malnourished.”

“In this final photo, the victim is showing no signs of life,” police said of the image.

At one point, officers with the Lantana Police Department in Palm Beach County located and interviewed the couple and both maintained that “Feliz was never pregnant and had never given birth to a baby.”

“They further claimed that the story was fabricated in hopes that their families would feel sorry for them and give them money,” HPD Detective Nancie Toler wrote. “During the interview, Feliz indicated that there were numerous text messages between her, Leon, and family members discussing the pregnancy and how she made the story up.”

Police said Feliz claimed to have been “wearing a pregnant belly cast making her look pregnant” as part of the claimed “scam.”

“Moreover, during said interviews both Feliz and Leon advised that law enforcement would never find a ‘record’ of any baby,” Toler wrote. “Feliz further eluded (sic) to the fact that the (baby) had belonged to a crack addict and they were only watching (her).”

Authorities said a search of a storage unit in Hollywood ― where the couple is believed to have been living at one point ― revealed “baby clothing, a positive Clearblue Easy pregnancy test, black semi auto handgun, what appears to be a blood-stained towel, three notebooks containing verbiage of a gender reveal and victim shower, and multiple electronic devices.”

Crime lab results “indicated the presence of blood on the baby clothing and towels” and DNA testing showed it “was from a biological child of Leon and Feliz,” the warrant states.

In the warrant, Toler wrote that since the initial report, law enforcement has tried and failed to contact Feliz and Leon.

“Moreover, during the course of this investigation, law enforcement has attempted to locate the victim’s remains utilizing cadaver dogs at Leon and Feliz’s prior residences however, each search yielded negative results,” the detective wrote.

Toler laid out her case for charges as follows:

After authorities issued an arrest warrant, the couple is set to face charges of aggravated manslaughter of a child, tampering with or fabricating physical evidence, failure to report a death to the medical examiner’s office, false information concerning a missing child, and false reports to law enforcement during an investigation.

Police are asking anyone with information on the case to contact Broward Crime Stoppers at 954-493-8477.

The president — nor his administration — will move to stop the extradition of Andrew and Tristan Tate to the United Kingdom, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said tersely.

“No, we have already answered that question,” she said.

Their attorney had name-checked both the president and Secretary of State Rubio this week, suggesting they could step in and spare the brothers, who broadcast their MAGA support to their millions of followers.

Both were arrested last week in Miami by U.S. Marshals. Both built a social media brand as hyper-masculine bad boys with self-described contempt for women.

These newly released court documents detail why the U.K. has asked to send them back to face justice: newly alleged crimes against women they called “cam girls” involved in their webcam business.

One describes Andrew Tate putting her in a chokehold repeatedly while raping her.

Another details Tristan Tate repeatedly choking, beating and raping her.

Thirty-eight new charges — a total of 59 in the U.K. involving seven women from 2010 to 2017.

The documents also reveal British prosecutors knew they would be in Miami last weekend. And there they were.

Andrew Tate broadcast a plan to co-host a boxing event here in South Florida.

Prosecutors alerted the U.S. and formally requested their arrest for extradition right there.

The Tates’ attorneys are fighting the extradition and they asked to have the brothers get out on bail during that process.

Prosecutors consider them a flight risk and are fighting that. It all comes back here to federal court for the next hearing on Monday.

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And the Aug. 18 primary is happening within the context of growing cost-of-living concerns. A recent University of North Florida poll asked likely midterm election voters what they thought was the most important problem facing Florida. Fifty percent said affordability and cost of living.

Democratic candidates include rap music executive and free speech activist Luther Campbell, former Broward mayor and commissioner Dale Holness, community organizer Elijah Manley and U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who is changing districts after the redraw.

And then there is the embattled incumbent seeking to make a comeback — former U.S. Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick — who resigned ahead of a House Ethics Committee expulsion threat in the wake of her indictment, accused of stealing federal funds. She denies wrongdoing.

On the issues: Affordability

We asked each Democratic primary candidate for Florida’s Congressional District 20 what their specific policy plan is to address what Florida voters say is their top concern: affordability and cost of living.

Here’s what each had to say.

Affordability and cost of living: Candidate responses

Click each candidate's name to read his or her response.

Luther Campbell

“My specific policy is to create jobs, create more money, bring more money to the district. I mean, when you look at this district, Congressional District 20, is no different than the other district in America. The high cost of living, insurance, property tax, out of the roof. I could bring in subsidies, use federal dollars to bail out the over 50-year-old seniors who are suffering from the high cost of insurance. So people don’t get disenfranchised, that’s why when you look at my campaign, it’s not built off special interest groups. It’s not built off people who normally put money into PACs. You know, my campaign is a $5 campaign and we’re running it like that.

"The cost of living, so I need to bring in big, high-paying jobs like port expansion built by us. I need to deal with the affordable housing crisis with my plan called ‘Built by Us for Us’, affordable housing plan, so people can be able to live here. And that’s the main thing. My plan calls for, you know, a federal tax credit when it comes to the entertainment industry, attract those major networks and major corporations to come into the district to create those high-paying jobs. One thing I know, there is a budget and the budget has been approved. And then that budget, there’s a lot of money that I can bring back to my congressional district to help the people in my district.”

Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick

“Well, the biggest issue that we have with cost of living, especially for our district, is the economy. Several prices have gone up when it comes to food, and we're seeing that throughout the country. So that is one of our biggest things we're trying to attack: bringing the prices down. Also looking at what's going on with our seniors, our seniors who are on a fixed income now are suffering more than we've ever seen before. Many of our seniors are suffering with trying to figure out how to eat. Creating some kind of package or pot for them, so they can get more funding. That could be done with increasing the COLA. COLA is the cost-of-living adjustment that happens to Social Security. We have to do that immediately.”

Dale Holness

“One, we must put more money into housing because that’s the biggest crisis that there is. How do we do that? The voucher system that we have from the federal government has not been expanded since 2017. There are a lot of people on waiting lists, some are now homeless, because we have not done so. That’s one that we must do right away. Two, we can use that same choice voucher system for housing to direct it towards building new units. If we build more units affordability can be reduced because you have more supply and it will meet the demand more. There’s so much more we can do in Congress to help partner with local government to build more affordable housing, to do a lot more to help our communities.

“Further, the child tax credit that had lifted so many people out of poverty need to be increased and made permanent so that young families, with children, can be supported to build the future of America. We are competing globally, we’re not just competing among states. China and India is producing more engineers than we do. And in a competitive world, we must do more to build and strengthen the future. Also, our unions around attack. Union wages are higher than other wages in the same workplace therefore, we must give unions the ability to organize themself rather than limit them to being able to organize. It is because of unions why we have a 40-hour workweek. It is because of unions that we have child labor laws. It is because of unions that we have safe workplace. So that’s a big part of what we must do to help lift the standards of living for people and create prosperity for all.

“The tax credit that we just gave to the wealthiest Americans need to be taken back. They must pay their fair share. If we want to grow economy, we put money into the pockets of working families, they will spend it and stimulate the economy.

“We also have the opportunity zone act that identifies high poverty, low income, high unemployment communities. That should be reformed.

“Investment towards helping those young people get technical training if they need it, get them into college, if they are able to, put it in place health centers in these communities so that we can reduce the cost. The health program that we have in our country is not good because if someone has no insurance, what happens? They depend on emergency care, which costs you and I more as taxpayers, because instead of getting primary care to prevent illness, they end up in the hospital and in emergency care, which is much more costly for us .”

Elijah Manley

“There’s an affordability crisis hitting our working families here in Broward County, and I want to address it by guaranteeing healthcare to all people as a human right through Medicare for All, bringing the cost of housing down, implementing rent control for our families, and making sure everybody makes enough money to live because right now the wages are too low for anybody to live off of.”

Debbie Wasserman Schultz

“We have to extend the enhanced premium tax credits that Republicans let expire in December. We’ve seen in our community premiums for affordable care at policies double, triple, and even quadruple. When we extend those premium tax credits, we will be able to make sure we start to bring those costs down. We absolutely need to make sure we bring this war in Iran to an end. Iran is now in control of the Strait of Hormuz and they weren’t at the start of this, so we’ve gone backwards, and that’s driven the cost of gas. Just that action alone will help to make sure we can get a handle on the cost of gas.

“Grocery prices, not only do we have grocery prices that too high, but the prices are different because they use dynamic pricing in in the same grocery chain from one side of town to another. We have to pass legislation to prevent collusion and price gouging from grocery store chains and make sure that they have equitable pricing across the board because they shouldn’t be allowed to charge customers more depending on what side of town they live on those.

“We have to focus on affordable housing. I passed an amendment that will become law that will take housing vouchers, right now housing vouchers can’t be used to pay for a security deposit, so people spend a year and a half on a housing voucher list, they get to the top of it, they have a place they want to live and they can’t use the housing voucher for the security deposit. That’s wrong and we have to change that, and that right there will be able to allow a lot more people to be able to get access to affordable housing. And when we implement the the road to Affordable Housing Act, which is now law even though President Trump refused to sign it, we’re going to be able to start to really aggressively implement all the affordable housing mechanisms that are included in that law.”

On the issues: Political division

The UNF poll found that, for 12% of Florida Democratic voters who are likely to vote in the midterms, political division is also a leading concern. So we also asked each Democratic primary candidate to address that issue.

Here’s what the candidates had to say.

Political division: Candidate responses

Click each candidate's name to read his or her response.

Luther Campbell

“That’s what makes me different to anybody else in this campaign. You know, the so-called experienced politicians, they have a career of fighting Trump, they have a career of fighting Republicans, MAGA, or whatever it is. I have no history in fighting those individuals. Anything that I’ve ever gotten past, whether it was through the school board, or whether it was through county commission, or whether it was through the city, I was always able to work with people not based on party affiliation, but just based on bringing common sense, real solutions that directly affect my community. So I’m not going to Washington to fight Trump. I’m going to Washington to bring the money back. I’m not going to fight Republicans. I’m not going to get on TV and CNN with all the catchphrases and all that. At the end of the day, my job is to bring resources back to Congressional District 20, to improve the quality of life for the individuals who live there.”

Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick

“We are going to have to stop being so extreme. It seems like the media only wants to cover drama. It seems like they only want to cover the person who's saying the most craziest comment. But the truth is, the people who are saying the craziest things and the most outlandish things,they don't get the work done. We need to start uplifting people who are reasonable, who are getting the work done. I dig my heels in, and I'm very reasonable of how we get to a solution, not how we get more political targeting, political games, or even getting political power and clout. And I think that's what we need. The community is asking for results. We just have to stop the petty politics and the personal attacks. Because when you're personally attacking someone every single day, no one cares. Their only concern is how are you going to help me and my family? We're trying to eat. We're trying to survive, and we're trying to have enough left for our future. And that's what this election is about.”

Dale Holness

“I sincerely believe that together as Americans we can do better. I served on the county commission where we had a Republican on there and we work together to pass laws that was in the benefit of our people. If we have to reach across the aisle we ought to. That’s doesn’t mean that we give up on our principal, we must stand firm on fulfilling the needs of the American people. So we don’t need to cast dispersions on the other side, we must deal with the fact of the matter that face us, one issue or another. There are what the facts are, and this is where we need to be. So we must work together to do better as a nation and we’re a great country, but we certainly can do better than we’re doing right now.”

Elijah Manley

“You know, I don’t think that this country and this community is as divided as people say. I don’t think this is Democrat versus Republican or Black versus White. I think this is the billionaires versus working people. And when we all come together, regardless of our political party or what we believe, we can create a country that works for everybody. To me, this is not a time for the status quo or continuing politics as it is now. We need change, we need new people, and we need to get rid of the establishment in Washington.”

Debbie Wasserman Schultz

“I always reach across the aisle. Almost every bill I introduce I introduce alongside a Republican co-lead, whether it is my breast cancer legislation that will actually be on the floor this week, making sure we can find common ground. It’s important to develop relationships and to not treat the your opponent like the enemy, and so even though we have very significant differences, I have always tried to reach across the aisle to work together develop relationships with Republican colleagues so that we can work on the issues like fighting cancer and making sure that we work on children’s safety issues, so many different issues that we can find common ground on and I always try to make sure that I can do that from the very beginning.”

Kagan, one of the court's three liberal justices, told an audience of lawyers and judges from the 9th U.S. Circuit in Bellevue, Washington, that at significant times, on some big issues, "the court has checked the executive branch.”

The court has sided with the Trump administration in the vast majority of cases to come before it so far, including largely upholding his immigration crackdown and expanding Trump's authority over federal regulatory agencies. But Kagan pointed to key rulings where the president did not get what he sought, such as decisions rejecting Trump's sweeping tariffs and his efforts to strip birthright citizenship from the children of people who are in the U.S. illegally.

“Is this court very conservative? Does it do a bunch of things that are out of the playbook of the conservative legal movement that I think are deeply wrong? You know, yes,” Kagan said. “But is this court the kind of puppet for the current administration? I think definitely not.”

Polling has found public trust in the Supreme Court at historic lows in recent years, and a number of critics of the current court have suggested political motivations on the part of its justices. Trump has personally assailed justices who rule against him in stark terms. One liberal justice, Ketanji Brown Jackson, said in May after the court struck down a majority-Black district in Louisiana and weakened the Voting Rights Act that the institution risked being seen as political.

Chief Justice John Roberts, who was among those joining the court's liberal justices on some key cases such as birthright citizenship and tariffs, has fought back against the perception that the justices are “political actors,” calling it a misunderstanding.

Kagan, often seen as a bridge-builder, echoed that approach in her comments Thursday, which followed her testimony before Congress alongside conservative Justice Amy Coney Barrett last week on security threats and other issues facing the court.

Kagan reiterated her support for appointing a committee of retired judges to enforce the Supreme Court's first code of ethics, adopted in 2023 during a storm of criticism over undisclosed trips and gifts from wealthy benefactors to some justices. While the justices are taking the ethics code seriously, opinions differ on the court about how or whether it might be enforced, and no conclusions have been reached, she said.

Kagan also offered a view from the bench of a historic moment from the court's past term, when Trump himself took a front-row seat for arguments over his birthright citizenship order. He was the first sitting president to attend oral arguments.

It was largely a “non-event” for the justices, Kagan said. Trump took a seat off to the side, in an area relatively far from the bench typically reserved for members of Congress, and the court made no announcement of his presence. Many in the audience couldn't see him, she noted.

“He was just like a person who came in and sat down and then had to listen to an argument,” Kagan said.

The president remained for about half of the lengthy arguments, leaving when the other side began making its case.

“You really did kind of think, he probably has other things to do, you know?” said Kagan, who served as solicitor general during the Obama administration. “I was sort of thinking, I worked for a president, and when a president walks into the room, you get the whole ‘Hail to the Chief' stuff. And there was like none of that. And so, I don’t know, I think he probably won’t come back.”

The Division I Cabinet, which approved the new rule last month, issued a similar statement last month after a group of basketball players filed a lawsuit in an Ohio state court contending the age-based model unfairly shuts them out of further competition. More lawsuits have been filed across the country since, some of them reportedly with their coaches' encouragement.

The board statement indicates it won't budge from its stance like it did when, in response to former Vanderbilt quarterback Diego Pavia's 2024 court win, it granted an additional year to athletes who had competed at non-NCAA schools for at least one season and were set to complete their eligibility.

“We are encouraged by the Division I membership’s broad support of the age-based eligibility rules," the board said Thursday. "The design of the new rules, including its implementation strategy, was thoughtful and well informed, and was unanimously supported by the Cabinet, including its student-athlete members.

"The Board has no plans to modify their application, notwithstanding a series of lawsuits recently filed on behalf of student-athletes with no remaining eligibility. We look forward to ensuring that the age-based eligibility rules are enforced consistently so that all institutions play by the same rules, like all participants in sports.”

The age-based eligibility rule allows athletes five seasons of competition over a five-year period that begins with their full-time enrollment or the academic year following their 19th birthday, whichever occurs first. The move all but eliminates waivers or redshirt years for extended eligibility except for religious missions, pregnancy or active-duty military service. Extensions will no longer be considered for athletes who are injured.

Athletes whose eligibility expired by spring 2026 under the traditional model — four years of competition over five years — will not be allowed a fifth year of competition under the new rules that go into effect this fall.

That was the impetus for the first lawsuit, in Ohio. A judge granted a preliminary injunction that allowed the players to enter the transfer portal and the case now heads to trial. Athletes in other cases across the country also have won preliminary injunctions.

Earlier this week, SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey said the conference ended up supporting the rule despite some leaders’ misgivings about its timing. Sankey said there was a thought that the Protect College Sports Act currently circulating in the Senate could solve the problem. He also said the conference wasn’t presented with data to justify the change.

“We got on a fast track in this environment because ... people are looking for solutions,” he said in an interview with The Associated Press. “That doesn’t mean there are solutions but it’s just ‘Oh, what we’re doing isn’t working. There’s so many waivers, there’s so much controversy about eligibility, this must be better.’ But we’re not sure if it is.”

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AP National Writer Eddie Pells contributed to this report.

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

Thursday's announcement by Harbinger Sports Group did not say what percentage of the Athletics it had acquired. Cuban, who maintains a minority stake in the Mavericks, is the general partner and president of the Atlanta-based group. Atlanta Falcons minority owner Rashaun Williams is the founder and chief investment officer.

Co-founder and CEO Steve Cannon is vice chairman of AMB Sports and Entertainment that oversees Mercedes-Benz Stadium and the Falcons. Managing partner Jonathan Mariner is the former chief financial officer for Major League Baseball.

“We are minority investors looking to make our investors a lot of money,” Cuban said.

John Fisher is the majority owner of the A's and is overseeing construction of a $2 billion, 33,000-capacity domed stadium on the Las Vegas Strip.

“We are very pleased to welcome Harbinger Sports Partners as an investor in the Athletics,” the team said in a statement. “The experience of their principals across sports, media, and entertainment, combined with their long-term perspective, makes them a valuable addition to our ownership group as we work to build the future of the franchise in Las Vegas.”

This is Harbinger's first investment, according to its news release, and it has raised more than $460 million in less than six months. Investing in the A's is part of “a long-term strategy centered on the Las Vegas sports market,” the group said.

“Las Vegas represents one of the greatest sports investment opportunities of our generation,” Williams said in a statement. “We’re not simply investing in a baseball franchise. We’re investing in a city that has fundamentally changed the economics of professional sports.”

The company touted the success of professional sports in Las Vegas, pointing to the increased valuations of the NFL's Raiders and NHL's Golden Knights since they began playing in the city and saying it expects the A's to receive a similar boost. The Raiders moved from Oakland in 2020 and the expansion Golden Knights launched in 2017.

“Our conviction is simple,” Williams said. “The next decade of sports ownership will look very different than the last. We believe Las Vegas will sit at the center of that transformation, and Harbinger intends to be one of the firms helping shape its future.”

The A’s are playing the second of three planned seasons at a minor league ballpark in West Sacramento, California.

Club officials have said the Las Vegas ballpark is on target to open in time for the 2028 season. The stadium already is becoming part of the city's skyline, with work being performed on the upper deck.

“As someone who helped lead the development of Mercedes-Benz Stadium, I was incredibly impressed with the Athletics’ vision,” Cannon said in a statement. “The new ballpark will be more than a baseball stadium. It will become a year-round entertainment venue and another landmark destination on the Las Vegas Strip.”

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AP Sports Writer Schuyler Dixon in Dallas contributed to this report.

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

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The video captures the black SUV pulling away as people step out of their damaged vehicles, looking around in disbelief after the collisions.

According to Aventura police, the driver didn’t stop after the first crash.

Investigators said the driver, who they identified as 65-year-old Jonathan Eismann of Miami Beach, once a well-known chef in South Florida, was behind the wheel of a black 2020 Ford Escape when he struck a red BMW, pushing it into the rear of a GMC on Biscayne Boulevard just before 4:30 p.m. on July 13.

Police said Eismann then continued south, and as he approached the Northeast 203rd Street intersection, drove onto the center median to get around stopped traffic before sideswiping a Nissan Rogue carrying two people.

The newly obtained video shows part of that second crash and the driver continuing away from the scene as motorists react to what had just happened.

According to the arrest report, the victims followed Eismann to Aventura Mall, where officers took him into custody.

Police said both victims suffered minor injuries, and Eismann was arrested on two felony charges of leaving the scene of a crash involving injury.

The arrest has drawn renewed attention because it is not the first time Eismann has faced allegations of fleeing a crash.

In 2012, investigators said Eismann was fleeing another collision when he lost control of his vehicle, jumped a curb in west Miami-Dade struck 29-year-old Jean Carlos Ruiz, a husband and father who was killed in that crash while waiting at a bus stop on his way to work.

Seven years later, Eismann pleaded guilty to careless driving involving death and leaving the scene of a crash involving injury as part of a plea agreement. He was sentenced to one year of probation and lost his driver’s license, avoiding prison.

Now, years after that deadly case, Eismann is once again accused of leaving crash scenes—this time after police say he caused two collisions within minutes before victims tracked him down and officers arrested him at Aventura Mall.

Arch Manning of Texas, the latest in the long line of football's royal family of quarterbacking, took 20 minutes worth of questions Thursday to close out SEC Media Days. He mostly spoke about 2026.

“I'm not worried about anything in the future right now,” he said. “I’m worried about getting through this interview.”

He did just fine.

Sporting a burnt-orange necktie and a Longhorn pin on his lapel, the son of Cooper, nephew of Peyton and Eli, and grandson of Archie ran the gantlet with reporters lined up three-deep to speak with him.

— How does it feel to be compared to others, both in and out of your family? “I’m trying to do better not comparing myself to others. They say comparison is the defeat of joy.”

— Is he looking forward to leading the Longhorns into Uncle Peyton’s old stomping grounds, Neyland Stadium at Tennessee? “They’ve got a good coach and good players. We’re excited to go. I’m not going to make it about me.”

— What’s his favorite hobby? Answer: golf. “I broke 80 for the first time last week. Well, pretty much. I gave myself a putt.”

Certainly, there's still work to do for the 22-year-old junior-to-be, whose body and reputation took a beating with the Longhorns over a tumultuous, 10-3 season in 2025.

Heading into his second season as the starter, Manning insists he tries to minimize the expectations that have been heaped on him since he emerged in high school as a surefire star-to-be — or the criticism from those who said his 3-2 start last year that dropped him down those NFL draft boards made him one of the biggest busts in college football history.

“Everyone has an opinion and people get paid to talk in the media, so there's really nothing you can do,” he said. “I'm trying to control the controllables.”

He got sacked 23 times last season and was under pressure more than that. Because he's a Manning, everything from his reactions after bad plays to his release time — somewhere around 3.2 seconds — got dissected way more than would those of a typical above-average college QB.

Texas opened last season with a 14-7 loss to Ohio State and followed that five weeks later with a six-sack, 29-21 loss to a Florida team that turned out not to be very good.

Standing out in the loss to the Gators was the image of Manning virtually folded in half, sandwiched by a pair of linebackers, after one of the six sacks. And a video of him plopping down on the bench, dejected, after one of his two interceptions that day. That he came back from that game to go 7-1, throw 20 touchdown passes and get the 'Horns back in the playoff conversation sometimes gets overlooked.

Texas plays both teams again this year, starting with the Buckeyes on Sept. 12. The Longhorns brought in receiver Cam Coleman from Auburn and a pair of running backs, Hollywood Smothers (N.C. State) and Raleek Brown (Arizona State), to help their star QB.

“I think what he got put through probably would have melted or destroyed 99% of people in his shoes,” coach Steve Sarkisian said. “All he did was stay consistent and true to who he was, which was to continue to work hard, continue to be a great teammate, try to get better, and he did.”

And that, Manning said, is pretty much the goal again for 2026.

If he lives up to expectations, then it would be no big surprise to hear his name called first come draft day. He is scheduled to graduate in December. Neither that — nor any conversation about his family, his future or his place in the game — are going to shift his focus.

“I just want to be remembered as a good teammate and someone who did whatever it took to help the team win and help the team get closer,” he said. “I'm not really worried about my legacy. I just want to win games and have a good time.”

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The Republican administration this week urged leading U.S. Senators to rename Penn Station as it undertakes a projected $8 billion redesign of the dreary, underground Manhattan transit hub that also happens to be the busiest in the western hemisphere.

But the U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, in a Wednesday letter seeking congressional funding approval for the rehab and other major transportation priorities, stopped short of saying what the station’s moniker should be changed to.

Spokespersons for the transportation agency provided the letter but didn’t respond to follow up questions Thursday.

Duffy has made it no secret he would welcome seeing his current boss’ name etched across the rail station’s facade.

“I imagine you’re asking, ’Is this going to be Trump Station?' ” the former Wisconsin congressman said last summer as officials sought bids for the project’s master developer. “I think that has a nice ring to it.”

Trump spokesperson Karoline Leavitt, when asked earlier this year, simply responded: “ Why not?”

In his second White House stint, the term-limited Republican has sought to burnish his legacy through public works projects, from a massive new White House ballroom to a triumphal arch and a failed attempt to rename the Kennedy Center. Earlier this month, Florida's Palm Beach airport changed its name to the President Donald J. Trump International Airport.

Trump has said name change idea wasn't his

Trump, for his part, has acknowledged a possible name change was floated in talks with the Senate’s top Democrat, U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer, of New York.

But he pushed back at the notion that he suggested it in exchange for unfreezing federal funding for the Gateway project, a major rail tunnel running under the Hudson River from Penn Station into New Jersey.

“Chuck Schumer suggested that to me, about changing the name of Penn Station to Trump Station,” Trump said earlier this year aboard Air Force One.

At the same time, he argued that it doesn’t make much sense for such a major New York landmark to be named after another state.

“I LOVE Pennsylvania, but it is a direct competitor to New York, and ‘eating New York’s lunch!’,” he said on his social media platform Truth Social as he stressed the renaming idea was “brought up by certain politicians and construction union heads, not me.”

New York's Pennsylvania Station, like a handful of others in the country, is named after the Pennsylvania Railroad, the now defunct passenger rail company that built the once grand midtown station.

Opened in 1910, the original station was considered a marvel of the Beaux Arts style, with imposing, Roman-style columns and an expansive waiting area.

It was razed in 1963 to make way for Madison Square Garden, forcing commuters to navigate cramped corridors and dingy train platforms underneath the famous arena.

Recently released renderings call for a return to the hub’s original classical style, with a stone facade, rows of columns and a grand concourse with soaring ceilings. 0ne inside wall also bears Trump’s seal and name.

Critics slam name-change idea

U.S. Rep. Jerry Nadler, a Manhattan Democrat, said Duffy’s letter underscores how the Trump administration is “waging a hostile takeover of Penn Station” and seeking to “strip control” from local authorities.

“I strongly oppose this ridiculous proposal and am once again demanding answers on the funding,” he wrote on X. “New York taxpayers and transit riders must not be forced to foot the bill for a Trump vanity project.”

The Riders Alliance, a local transit advocacy group, said the renaming idea was “another huge red flag” that the Penn Station project could become “another multibillion dollar vanity boondoggle.”

“We should be talking about improving service, saving time and money, not monuments, ribbon cuttings or nameplates,” spokesperson Danny Pearlstein said in a statement.

The Trump administration ordered Amtrak, the national passenger rail service, to assume control of the massive redesign last year.

For years, the Penn Station project had been mired in political infighting among the local transit agencies that use the station. James Dolan, the billionaire owner of the NBA’s New York Knicks and NHL’s New York Rangers, has also strongly opposed any plans to relocate MSG.

The current plans would keep the famous arena, where Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce married earlier this month, but demolish a theater located on the site.

Spokespersons for Amtrak referred questions to the federal transportation department. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority and New Jersey Transit, which run trains from the station, didn’t immediately comment.

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Gangs and drug traffickers are increasingly encroaching on Ashaninka land and using the rivers in the Amazon and adjacent land for drug routes. Ashaninka leaders say they’ve reported violent episodes — as recent as this month — and asked for protection, including a meeting with Brazilian officials in the capital on Thursday. Security forces have been deployed. But in this region, their presence is usually temporary, while the threats remain permanent, various Indigenous groups say.

The invasion of Ashaninka territory is part of a broad transformation of the Amazon border as criminal routes expand, through what experts call the Solimoes River route.

Indigenous territories are key to this route. Experts say protecting Indigenous land is one of the most effective ways to curb deforestation in the Amazon, the world’s largest rainforest and a key regulator of global climate. But the very forests these communities help protect leave them vulnerable: Dense tree cover in remote, hard-to-reach areas offers attractive hiding sites for drug traffickers.

Despite appeals to authorities, Ashaninka and other Indigenous people say the Brazilian government's help falls short.

“There is an institutional and intercultural blind spot in the public security services provided to Indigenous peoples,” said Maj. Jonatas Soares, a police officer based in the border city of Tabatinga, in Brazil’s Amazonas state near Colombia and Peru.

“The state formally recognizes their territories, yet it fails to translate that presence into continuous protection tailored to their specific needs.”

Indigenous communities become vulnerable as criminal networks expand into the Amazon

The Solimoes River route, which includes a series of navigable rivers flowing from the Peruvian border to Manaus in Brazil, has become a primary route over the past decade for moving cocaine produced in Peru, Colombia and Bolivia to the Brazilian ports on the Atlantic coast, where it is then funneled into domestic and overseas markets, particularly in Europe.

This route is now mostly controlled by the Brazilian gang Red Command, according to Col. César Mello, a retired Amazonas state police officer and professor at the Federal University of Para and the University of the State of Amazonas.

The remote location of Indigenous territories, lack of government oversight, language barriers and cultural differences “make Indigenous peoples a vulnerable population and an attractive source of labor for criminal organizations,” said Col. Mello.

Criminal groups often recruit Indigenous youth by offering them money and status in communities where economic opportunities are scarce. When that doesn't work, they use violence, Col. Mello added.

Preserving traditions has strengthened the Indigenous resistance

The Ashaninka have become an enduring block to trafficking networks in Peru and Brazil.

In the past, drug traffickers approached the community seeking to build a clandestine airstrip inside their territory. The Ashaninka refused.

“We have a long history of opposing any kind of illegal activity,” said Francisco Piyãko, coordinator of the Organization of Indigenous Peoples of the Jurua River.

Local tensions escalated earlier this month after a group of armed men reportedly invaded the Kampa Indigenous territory, located along the winding Amonia River in the western Amazon. On July 6, a group of five Spanish-speaking men, carrying machine guns, threatened families and searched for the territory’s main leaders.

Piyãko filed a formal complaint with Acre state authorities and the Brazilian Army, prompting the deployment of security forces.

“It’s one thing for outsiders to enter our territory to steal resources, like timber and wildlife. But this was different. They entered our land looking for our leaders, intending to kill them,” Piyãko said.

Brazil’s Ministries of Indigenous Peoples and Justice did not respond to requests for comment. The Brazilian Army and the Acre state government’s press office also did not respond.

The Foreign Ministry said its representatives would welcome the Ashaninka leaders in Brasilia to hear their concerns and assess further applicable actions with Peru's government.

Earlier this year, Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Flávio Dino ordered the federal government to intensify efforts against criminal organizations operating in the Amazon, citing official records and investigations that showed their growing presence and threat to Indigenous communities.

The community is shaken by the recent threats but determined to resist. Piyãko stressed, however, that confronting armed criminal groups is not the Indigenous responsibility but the duty of the state — both Brazil and Peru.

“They allowed this to happen through their absence, so they bear that responsibility,” he added.

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The first day of school is set for Aug. 10, and district leaders are warning drivers they will face tougher enforcement for passing a bus while students are getting on or off.

It is a violation officials say happens too often: A school bus comes to a stop, the stop arm extends, lights begin flashing and some drivers continue moving.

Broward County School Board Chair Sarah Leonardi said the cameras are intended to change driver behavior and prevent dangerous situations.

“These cameras are meant to deter dangerous driving, and people passing school buses on the road,” she said.

Broward County School Board member Allen Zeman said drivers need to understand the importance of slowing down and following the law.

“The message for Broward County is crystal clear: take your time, save a life,” he said.

Broward County School Board members, along with Superintendent Howard Hepburn, unveiled the new school bus safety program on Thursday.

“For this program, it’s going to be a 30-day grace period and warning, starting at the beginning of the school year just to make sure every citizen in Broward County is educated on this program,” Hepburn said.

The warning period ends Sept. 9. After that, school officials say drivers who illegally pass a stopped school bus with its stop arm extended and lights flashing could receive a $225 citation.

“Our school police officers will be doing their due diligence and go through each infraction and reviewing it, just to make sure they are accurate, and issuing those infractions to folks who are violating the law,” Hepburn added.

The AI-powered camera technology will be installed on all 1,300 Broward County school buses. Each bus will have at least eight cameras recording from multiple angles whenever students are boarding or exiting.

The system includes an AI overview camera that provides a wider view of traffic and works with license plate recognition cameras to identify violations.

“This sort of gives a bird’s-eye view of all the traffic across all lanes and it’s synchronized with the license plate reading cameras,” said Steve Randazzo with BusPatrol.

The equipment costs about $10,000 per bus. District leaders said taxpayers will not pay for the program through the school district’s budget.

“Zero dollars comes out of the school district budget,” Randazzo added. “To operate the program, BusPatrol takes on all of those expenses.”

The cost of the program is expected to be covered through citation revenue. BusPatrol funded the camera installation and will use most of the revenue to cover expenses associated with the program, including court costs and personnel who review citations.

Of each $225 citation, $140 will go to BusPatrol, while $85 will go to Broward County Public Schools for additional safety initiatives and enhanced safety protocols.

The district reported 1,244 illegal passings during the 2025-26 school year.

Broward County school police officers will also review citations before they are issued to make sure violations are accurate.

The reports indicate that bus operators saw 1,244 vehicles pass a school bus while the stop arm was extended and the bus was either loading or unloading students. Officials say the total includes incidents involving district buses, as well as charter schools and vendors that transport students.

District leaders say the goal is not to write more tickets — it is to keep students safe.

Richardson had the top time of 10.90 seconds in the women's race. That was despite taking an extra moment in the starting block to make sure she didn't false start and shutting it down early to conserve energy. Richardson is a big favorite to win with reigning 100-meter world champion Melissa Jefferson-Wooden skipping the event to focus on the 200.

The semifinals and final will be held Friday at Icahn Stadium.

Lyles, the reigning Olympic champion, started slow — just like Richardson — but quickly powered up to full speed. He finished in 9.97 seconds to edge Ronnie Baker in the second heat. The top time was turned in by Christian Coleman, who went 9.96 in the first heat. Kenny Bednarek, a two-time Olympic silver medalist in the 200, won his heat as well.

Bednarek and Lyles were involved in a shoving and shouting match at U.S. championships last summer as they crossed the finish line of a hotly contested 200-meter final at Hayward Field in Eugene, Oregon.

The fourth and final heat of the men's race Thursday contained some drama. There was a false-start warning given to the field and then, after settling back into the starting blocks, the sprinters were instructed to stand back up. Soon after, another false start was called and Ja’Darien Parker was disqualified. Courtney Lindsey ended up winning the heat.

There were several champions crowned Thursday night, including Madison Wiltrout (javelin), Isaac Grimes (long jump) and Rudy Winkler (hammer throw). In the women's 10,000 meters, Sydney Vaught made a decisive move at the midway point to drop most of the pack. She then pulled away on the last lap to beat Katie Izzo. Vaught finished in a time of 33 minutes, 30.60 seconds.

The men's race saw Woody Kincaid patiently wait for his opportunity to take control. He overtook Grant Fisher with around 200 meters to go and held Fisher off down the stretch for the win. Kincaid finished in 30:13.66.

This is a fast track, with Jamaican great Usain Bolt breaking the 100-meter world record by running 9.72 seconds at Icahn Stadium in 2008. Bolt would eventually lower the mark to its current time of 9.58 at the 2009 world championships in Berlin.

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Un jurado federal del sur de Florida declaró culpable el miércoles a Olushola Yusuf, de 60 años y residente de Tampa, por conspiración para distribuir drogas ilegalmente y cinco cargos de distribución ilegal de drogas. Ahora enfrenta la posibilidad de pasar el resto de su vida en una prisión federal.

Las autoridades informaron que Yusuf era propietaria de Chans Pharmacy, ubicada en 2092 N. University Drive, así como de Striderite Pharmacy, legalmente registrada como Boots LLC, en 7326 Royal Palm Blvd., en Margate.

En esos establecimientos, dispensó “al menos 326,079 pastillas” de la dosis más alta de este potente y adictivo opioide a “casi todos los clientes de sus farmacias”, muchos de los cuales recorrían largas distancias para obtener el medicamento, afirmaron los fiscales.

Según las autoridades, ninguno de ellos tenía una necesidad médica del analgésico.

“Algunos clientes pagaban hasta $1,300 USD al mes en efectivo a Yusuf por los medicamentos. Algunos clientes eran traficantes de drogas que recogían pastillas de oxicodona supuestamente en nombre de decenas de pacientes que no estaban presentes”, señala un comunicado del Departamento de Justicia de Estados Unidos. “Según testigos que declararon durante el juicio, Yusuf mantenía las puertas de sus farmacias cerradas con llave durante el horario comercial e instruía a los empleados para que solo abrieran la puerta a determinados clientes identificados”.

Las autoridades indicaron que continuó con estas prácticas a pesar de las advertencias de sus empleados y de la Administración para el Control de Drogas (DEA).

“Olushola Yusuf no simplemente ignoró las señales de alerta. Construyó su negocio en torno a ellas”, dijo el fiscal federal Jason A. Reding Quiñones en el comunicado. “Inundó deliberadamente a las comunidades del sur de Florida con más de 335,000 pastillas de oxicodona de alta dosis, incluso después de que sus empleados y la DEA le advirtieran sobre los peligros de su conducta”.

Tras su condena, Yusuf enfrenta una posible pena de 20 años de prisión por cada cargo, para un máximo de hasta 120 años tras las rejas. Su sentencia está programada para el 14 de octubre.

Hasta el jueves, permanecía detenida en el Centro de Detención Paul Rein de la Oficina del Sheriff de Broward, en Pompano Beach, bajo custodia del Servicio de Alguaciles de Estados Unidos, según los registros de la agencia.

Las autoridades informaron que una coacusada, Saman Gimenez, se declaró culpable de conspiración para distribuir drogas ilegalmente y también será sentenciada en octubre.

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Detectives accused Ladavion King of fatally shooting Natasha “Tasha” Moses, a mother of four who worked for the city of St. Petersburg for 12 years, on Wednesday in the Childs Park area.

A St. Petersburg Police Department spokesperson released a statement saying Moses had worked as a city sanitation technician and died after the “targeted attack” on 12th Avenue South, near 40th Street.

King fled in a silver pickup truck and was speeding southbound on Interstate 75 when a Florida Highway Patrol trooper performed a Precision Immobilization Technique, or PIT maneuver, according to deputies.

King refused to get out of the truck, so there was a standoff involving FHP troopers and Lee County Sheriff’s Office deputies near Alico Road, and a law enforcement-involved shooting, according to deputies.

Lee Sheriff Carmine Marceno released a statement saying he was “incredibly proud” of the LCSO deputies in the special operations unit, crisis negotiation team, advanced technology support unit, K-9, and patrol, who responded to the “barricaded subject.”

The Florida Department of Law Enforcement responded to investigate the law enforcement-involved shooting.

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Los detectives acusaron a Ladavion King de matar a tiros el miércoles a Natasha “Tasha” Moses, madre de cuatro hijos que trabajó durante 12 años para la ciudad de St. Petersburg, en el área de Childs Park.

Un portavoz del Departamento de Policía de St. Petersburg informó en un comunicado que Moses trabajaba como técnica de saneamiento para la ciudad y murió tras el “ataque dirigido” ocurrido en 12th Avenue South, cerca de 40th Street.

Según los agentes, King huyó en una camioneta plateada y circulaba a exceso de velocidad hacia el sur por la Interestatal 75 cuando un agente de la Patrulla de Carreteras de Florida (FHP) realizó una maniobra PIT (Técnica de Inmovilización de Precisión).

Los agentes informaron que King se negó a salir de la camioneta, lo que provocó un enfrentamiento con agentes de la FHP y de la Oficina del Sheriff del condado Lee cerca de Alico Road, seguido de un tiroteo con agentes del orden.

El sheriff del condado Lee, Carmine Marceno, emitió un comunicado en el que dijo sentirse “increíblemente orgulloso” de los agentes de la unidad de operaciones especiales, el equipo de negociación de crisis, la unidad de apoyo tecnológico avanzado, la unidad K-9 y la patrulla de la Oficina del Sheriff del condado Lee que respondieron al caso del “sospechoso atrincherado”.

El Departamento de Cumplimiento de la Ley de Florida (FDLE) acudió para investigar el tiroteo en el que participaron agentes del orden.

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A South Florida federal jury convicted Olushola Yusuf, 60, of Tampa, of conspiracy to illegally distribute drugs and five counts of illegal drug distribution on Wednesday. She‘s staring down the possibility of spending the rest of her life in federal prison.

Authorities said Yusuf owned Chans, located at 2092 N. University Drive, as well as Striderite Pharmacy ― legally Boots LLC ― at 7326 Royal Palm Blvd. in Margate.

At those stores, she dispensed “at least 326,079 pills” of the most powerful dose of the potent and addictive opiate to “nearly all her pharmacy customers,” many of whom drove long distances to get the drug filled, prosecutors said.

None of them had a medical need for the pain reliever, they said.

“Some customers paid as much as $1,300 a month in cash to Yusuf for the drugs. And some customers were drug dealers, who picked up oxycodone pills purportedly on behalf of dozens of patients at a time who were not present,“ a news release from the U.S. Department of Justice states. ”According to witnesses at trial, Yusuf kept the doors to her pharmacies locked during business hours, directing employees only to open the door for certain identified customers.”

Authorities said she continued these practices despite warnings from employees and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.

“Olushola Yusuf did not simply ignore red flags. She built her business around them,” U.S. Attorney Jason A. Reding Quiñones said in the news release. “She knowingly flooded South Florida communities with more than 335,000 high-dose oxycodone pills, even after her employees and the DEA warned her about the dangers of her conduct.”

Multiple people working at the Pembroke Pines shopping plaza where Chans was located said they suspected something was going on with the store.

“The first time that I walked in there, it really wasn’t anything,” a worker, who asked that his identity be concealed, said. “When when I looked at the shelves, they only had like maybe a handful of products.”

Additionally, they said a Lexus parked outside of the storefront belonged to the pharmacy owners. It remained outside of the business as of Thursday, filled with boxes.

Yusuf, following her conviction, now faces the possibility of a 20-year sentence on each count: up to 120 years behind bars. She’s set to be sentenced on Oct. 14.

As of Thursday, she was being held in the Broward Sheriff’s Office’s Paul Rein Detention Facility in Pompano Beach on behalf of the U.S. Marshals Service, agency records show.

Authorities said a co-defendant, Saman Gimenez, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to illegally distribute drugs and is also scheduled to be sentenced in October.

The Royals, who did not give details, said they expect Quatraro back soon.

Paul Hoover was the team's acting manager for the series-opening game in Detroit, where Vance Wilson was the bench coach and José Alguacil coached third base. They will serve in those roles until Quatraro returns.

During the offseason, Kansas City gave Quatraro a three-year contract extension that runs through 2029 with a team option for 2030. He replaced Mike Matheny after the 2022 season and has led the Royals to a 267-322 record over three-plus seasons.

Kansas City won 82 games last year and 86 in 2024, giving the franchise consecutive winning seasons for the first time in a decade and Quatraro finished second last season in voting for AL Manager of the Year voting. The Royals' record this season ranks among the worst in the majors.

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En una orden de arresto, la policía presentó un caso basado en pruebas circunstanciales contra Alejandro Leon Jr. y Samantha Angelina Feliz. Indicó que el cuerpo de su bebé, identificada como “Angelina”, aún no ha sido encontrado, pero que los indicios, incluida evidencia de ADN en manchas de sangre, apuntan a que la menor murió.

La policía de Rockingham, Carolina del Norte, arrestó el miércoles a Leon, de 21 años, y a Feliz, de 20. Ambos enfrentarán múltiples cargos, incluido homicidio involuntario, cuando sean trasladados de regreso al sur de Florida.

Las autoridades informaron que la investigación comenzó después de que un familiar se comunicó con el Departamento de Policía de Hollywood en julio de 2025 para reportar que no había visto a la niña desde febrero de ese año y que la pareja había hecho declaraciones inquietantes asegurando que Angelina “era parte de una estafa y negaban haber tenido un bebé”.

Un familiar que se reunió con Feliz en un parque de Hollywood en marzo de 2025 dijo a los investigadores que, al preguntarle por Angelina, ella respondió: “¿Qué bebé? No hay ningún bebé”.

“Desde entonces, Feliz ha afirmado que nunca hubo un bebé, que el bebé era un engaño y que estaba estafando a todos para obtener dinero”, señala la orden de arresto del Departamento de Policía de Hollywood.

Sin embargo, la policía indicó que la pareja hacía referencia a la niña en mensajes de texto anteriores y que se habían tomado fotografías en las que Feliz aparecía visiblemente embarazada. Además, las autoridades informaron que ambos tomaron fotografías y videos con Angelina después de su nacimiento, el cual se cree ocurrió en la vivienda sin que se emitiera un certificado de nacimiento.

Las autoridades señalaron que la última fotografía de Angelina fue tomada el 5 de enero de 2025. La bebé lucía “visiblemente enferma y desnutrida”.

“En esta última fotografía, la víctima no muestra signos de vida”, indicó la policía sobre la imagen.

En un momento de la investigación, agentes del Departamento de Policía de Lantana, en el condado Palm Beach, localizaron y entrevistaron a la pareja, y ambos sostuvieron que “Feliz nunca estuvo embarazada y nunca dio a luz a un bebé”.

“También afirmaron que la historia fue inventada con la esperanza de que sus familias sintieran lástima por ellos y les dieran dinero”, escribió la detective del Departamento de Policía de Hollywood, Nancie Toler. “Durante la entrevista, Feliz indicó que existían numerosos mensajes de texto entre ella, Leon y familiares hablando del embarazo y de cómo ella había inventado toda la historia”.

La policía informó que Feliz afirmó haber estado “usando un vientre falso de embarazo para aparentar que estaba embarazada” como parte de la supuesta “estafa”.

“Además, durante dichas entrevistas, tanto Feliz como Leon dijeron que las autoridades nunca encontrarían un ‘registro’ de ningún bebé”, escribió Toler. “Feliz también insinuó que la bebé pertenecía a una adicta al crack y que ellos solo la estaban cuidando”.

Las autoridades informaron que un registro en una unidad de almacenamiento en Hollywood, donde se cree que la pareja vivió en algún momento, permitió encontrar “ropa de bebé, una prueba de embarazo positiva Clearblue Easy, una pistola semiautomática negra, lo que parecía ser una toalla con manchas de sangre, tres cuadernos con anotaciones sobre una revelación de género y un baby shower, además de múltiples dispositivos electrónicos”.

Los resultados del laboratorio criminalístico “indicaron la presencia de sangre en la ropa y las toallas del bebé”, y las pruebas de ADN demostraron que “provenía de un hijo biológico de Leon y Feliz”, señala la orden.

En la orden, Toler escribió que, desde el reporte inicial, las autoridades intentaron sin éxito localizar a Feliz y Leon.

“Además, durante el curso de esta investigación, las autoridades intentaron localizar los restos de la víctima utilizando perros especializados en la detección de cadáveres en las antiguas residencias de Leon y Feliz; sin embargo, todas las búsquedas dieron resultados negativos”, escribió la detective.

Toler presentó los fundamentos de los cargos de la siguiente manera:

Después de que las autoridades emitieran una orden de arresto, la pareja enfrentará cargos por homicidio involuntario agravado de un menor, alteración o fabricación de evidencia física, no reportar una muerte a la oficina del médico forense, proporcionar información falsa sobre un menor desaparecido y presentar denuncias falsas ante las autoridades durante una investigación.

La policía solicita a cualquier persona con información sobre el caso que se comunique con Broward Crime Stoppers al 954-493-8477.

Bowman, who had been in the final year of his contract at powerhouse Hendrick Motorsports, signed a one-year extension before announcing his future plans on Thursday.

The 33-year-old Bowman missed four races earlier this season because of vertigo and also was sidelined in 2022 because of a concussion and the following year because of a back injury. He drives the No. 48 Chevrolet for Hendrick and currently sits 29th in points, well below the 16-driver cutline for the postseason.

“I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about what’s next, and this feels like the right decision at the right time,” Bowman said. “The sport asks a lot of you, and I’ve learned it’s important to listen to your body and make the right choices for yourself. ...

“My focus now is on making the most of my time on the racetrack and competing for wins. We still have a lot to accomplish, and I want to close my career on a high note for our team and our fans. To have the chance to do that with this organization and these people is really special.”

While driving most of his 12-year career for Hendrick, Bowman has eight Cup Series victories and has qualified for the playoffs seven times since 2018. The 2027 campaign would be Bowman’s 10th with Hendrick.

“Alex has meant so much to our organization for a long time,” team owner Rick Hendrick said. “He’s overcome adversity, won big races and represented our team and partners with professionalism, personality and class. Alex is a tremendous talent in the race car and an even better person outside of it. We’re proud he’ll have the opportunity to finish his full-time career with us on his terms. He’s family.”

Bowman is expected to eclipse 400 career Cup starts next season. He has competed in 307 races for Hendrick, which ranks sixth in team history.

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El video muestra a la SUV negra alejándose mientras varias personas salen de sus vehículos dañados y observan a su alrededor con incredulidad tras los choques.

Según la policía de Aventura, el conductor no se detuvo después del primer choque.

Los investigadores informaron que el conductor, identificado como Jonathan Eismann, de 65 años y residente de Miami Beach, quien en el pasado fue un conocido chef del sur de Florida, conducía una Ford Escape negra modelo 2020 cuando chocó contra un BMW rojo, empujándolo contra la parte trasera de una GMC en Biscayne Boulevard poco antes de las 4:30 p.m. del 13 de julio.

La policía indicó que Eismann continuó hacia el sur y, al acercarse a la intersección de Northeast 203rd Street, condujo sobre el separador central para evitar el tráfico detenido antes de rozar una Nissan Rogue en la que viajaban dos personas.

El video obtenido recientemente muestra parte de ese segundo choque y al conductor alejándose de la escena mientras los automovilistas reaccionan a lo que acababa de ocurrir.

Según el informe de arresto, las víctimas siguieron a Eismann hasta Aventura Mall, donde los agentes lo arrestaron.

La policía informó que ambas víctimas sufrieron heridas leves y que Eismann fue arrestado por dos cargos graves de abandonar la escena de un choque con personas lesionadas.

El arresto ha vuelto a llamar la atención porque no es la primera vez que Eismann enfrenta acusaciones de huir de un choque.

En 2012, los investigadores informaron que Eismann huía de otro choque cuando perdió el control de su vehículo, saltó un borde de la acera en el oeste de Miami-Dade y atropelló a Jean Carlos Ruiz, de 29 años, esposo y padre de familia, quien murió en el incidente mientras esperaba un autobús para ir a trabajar.

Siete años después, Eismann se declaró culpable de conducción descuidada con resultado de muerte y de abandonar la escena de un choque con personas lesionadas como parte de un acuerdo con la fiscalía. Fue sentenciado a un año de libertad condicional y perdió su licencia de conducir, evitando la prisión.

Ahora, años después de aquel caso mortal, Eismann vuelve a ser acusado de abandonar escenas de choques, esta vez después de que la policía afirma que provocó dos colisiones en cuestión de minutos antes de que las víctimas lo siguieran y los agentes lo arrestaran en Aventura Mall.

David and Sara LeBlanc had a rotating display of the roughly 6-foot-tall (1.8-meter-tall) ornaments decorating their Ogunquit lawn until officials in the small coastal town deemed them to be impermissible advertising for their attached restaurant, The Omelette Factory.

The couple initially resisted the town's removal order, insisting the roosters were meant to comfort their daughter Pyper, not advertise their business.

“Roosters don’t lay eggs,” David LeBlanc told The Associated Press on Wednesday.

But they eventually came to an agreement with the town allowing them to keep two of the roosters in front of their home.

As for what to do with the others? That's where friends, neighbors and complete strangers came in.

It started with a beloved stuffed rooster

The LeBlancs took in Pyper as a foster child and later adopted her. She arrived with a stuffed rooster, and roosters became her favorite animal, her parents said. When her father took her to a Tractor Supply Store to play with baby chicks last year, she noticed a large rooster sculpture for sale and asked her dad what it was saying.

“I think he wants to come home,” David LeBlanc said he told her.

Eventually, their collection grew to more than two dozen roosters, which they set up in batches for seasonal and holiday displays. Pyper took to hiding behind one each morning while waiting for the school bus, which her parents said helps her regulate her emotions and navigate transitions.

But the couple ruffled feathers when they added a rooster to their restaurant’s logo, which is featured on its shirts and other merchandise. Although the LeBlancs said they view the rooster as a “family crest,” the town saw their lawn statues as advertising.

A code enforcement officer, Tyler McOsker, issued the LeBlancs $450 in fines and ordered them in April to "remove all unpermitted signage, including but not limited to rooster statues."

McOsker didn't respond to an email requesting comment. But he told the Zoning Board of Appeals in June that he had no idea the roosters were connected to Pyper’s autism diagnosis until the couple appealed the fines. He also pointed to a May 2025 article in a local weekly newspaper that described the roosters as a “fun and unconventional way to announce that The Omelette Factory is officially open for business.”

“That, to me, is the definition of a sign. You’re announcing you’re opening,” McOsker told the board.

David LeBlanc said the reporter misinterpreted a customer’s joke about the roosters serving as an “Open” sign.

“We never said that,” he said.

The town offers a compromise

The zoning board discussed the issue last month. At one point, board member Jay Smith voiced frustration at the lack of medical proof that the roosters were necessary.

“I’m inclined to think there may be some merit to a comfort animal on the front lawn … but the point is, how many does it take?” he said.

Autism spectrum disorder is a complex developmental condition that affects different people in different ways, and comfort objects are frequently incorporated into therapy for autistic children to help manage transitions, support emotional regulation and provide a sense of familiarity, Beverley Cush Evans, a professor of special education at Lesley University, told the AP.

“It’s part of who they are and what they need," she said.

Eventually, the board decided it lacked the authority to rescind the fines but tried to accommodate the family by granting a disability variance that essentially deemed two roosters necessary for Pyper’s access to the home.

“I want to emphasize we’re talking about two roosters. If they have babies or multiply in the night — no,” another board member said.

The variance requires the roosters to be part of a railing, however, and for now, they are just bolted to the steps. The couple has been fined another $500 for noncompliance.

A show of support

David LeBlanc said he is moving on from the dispute and is focusing on the good that has come from it. The family has given roosters to others to “foster” and show their support for autism acceptance, starting with a man named Sam who lives up the road. Though Pyper was sad to see them go, she understands the adage about making lemonade, LeBlanc said.

“She understands that the roosters being taken away were the lemons, and Sam and his friends, fostering them, are the lemonade,” he said. “It’s a beautiful thing.”

Thanks to news coverage and a Roosters of Ogunquit Facebook page, the story has spread far and wide. One supporter wrote in from New Zealand sharing pictures of his children with a rooster statue in their yard.

Hetal Patel, who owns a motel in nearby Wells and has a relative with autism, wanted to buy a rooster after hearing about Pyper. They were sold out in the Ogunquit area, though, so she and her son went to New Hampshire last week to get one.

“We found the last one,” she said. “We couldn’t wait to put it out. People were so supportive, they were honking. It was so nice to see all the love for Pyper.”

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The county’s taxpayers paid $2,500 to Sitki Dogan, a Turkish-American muralist based in Palm Beach, and $2,000 to Rahiem Milton, a Miami-based artist, according to Miami Herald reporter Doug Hanks.

Neither of the portraits was unveiled during a ceremony to honor the former commission chair on July 13, since the county also paid $280 for a print, according to Hanks, who has been covering Miami-Dade County government since 2014.

Hanks reported that the $280 print unveiled at the County Commission chambers was a reproduction of a portrait that Miami Gardens officials commissioned of Gibson, who was the city’s mayor from 2003 to 2012.

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The United States will slap taxes of 10% to 12.5% on imports from 60 trading partners accounting for 99% of U.S. imports, charging that they have inadequately enforced bans on goods produced by forced labor.

“The United States has had a forced labor import ban for nearly a century, and rigorously enforces it; it’s well past time for our trading partners to do the same,” said U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer.

The new tariffs will take effect just as temporary 10% worldwide tariffs expire at 12:01 a.m. Friday. Trump had turned to those temporary levies after the Supreme Court struck down his biggest and boldest tariffs in February.

Now he's tapping more durable tariffs under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974, which permits the president to impose import taxes and other sanctions against countries found to engage in “unjustifiable,” “unreasonable” or “discriminatory” trade practices. Trump used Section 301 to impose big tariffs on China in his first term, and they survived court challenges.

More Section 301 tariffs are likely coming: The U.S. Trade Representative’s office has launched a probe into whether 16 countries — accounting for 70% of U.S. imports — have overproduced goods, pushing down prices and putting U.S. companies at a disadvantage in global markets. The administration has yet to complete that investigation.

Trump, who argues that high tariffs will revive American manufacturing, last year overturned decades of U.S. policy that favored lower tariffs and ever-freer trade. Invoking the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEEPA, he imposed double-digit tariffs on imports from almost every country on Earth, saying America’s longstanding trade deficit amounted to a national emergency.

But the Supreme Court ruled that IEEPA did not authorize tariffs. The decision forced the administration to pay refunds to importers that had paid the tariffs.

In response, Trump announced 10% worldwide tariffs under Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974. But he can only use Section 122 levies for 150 days; time runs out on them Friday.

The administration initially proposed the forced labor tariffs last month. Since then, some countries have tightened forced labor enforcement and qualified for lower tariffs, said a senior administration official who spoke under condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly on the matter. For example, the official said, the tariff on imports from India initially was set at 12.5% but now will be 10%.

Some products — including oil and gas and fertilizer — are exempted from the new tariffs announced Thursday. Also being spared are products that qualify for duty-free status under the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement, the North American trade pact Trump negotiated in his first term.

The tariffs drew immediate fire from critics.

“Today’s forced labor justification is too convenient to be taken seriously,” said U.S. Rep. Richard Neal of Massachusetts, the top Democrat on the House Ways and Means Committee. “Forced labor is a real and pervasive problem in our supply chains and demands serious enforcement. It should never be cheapened into a pretext for a tariff policy built on dubious legal theories and personal grievances.''

Brazil, which faces a 12.5% forced-labor tariff, called the U.S. move “arbitrary and unjustified” in a statement. It plans to trigger its reciprocity law — which could call for retaliatory tariffs on the United States — and take a complaint to the World Trade Organization. The United States, the Brazilian government said, “chose to manipulate an issue of great importance to human rights and the struggles of workers worldwide in order to accuse 59 countries and the European Union of unfair practices.”

Chile's Undersecretary for International Economic Relations Paula Estévez said that the country has “solid labor institutions, a robust regulatory framework and a firm commitment to the prevention and eradication of forced labor.” Chile faces a 12.5% rate.

“The Government of Chile considers that the application of this measure to our country is inconsistent with these standards, as well as with the technical, political, and legal background presented throughout the investigation process,” she said.

Tariffs are paid by companies in the United States that import foreign products. The importers usually try to pass along the cost by charging consumers higher prices. Americans are already frustrated by the high cost of living. So the administration is taking a risk in rolling out new tariffs ahead of the Nov. 3 midterm elections.

Human rights watchers say that it’s reasonable to be skeptical of the motivation behind the tariffs. But they say the levies could make an impact on the problem of forced labor.

The tariffs are being imposed on countries that the U.S. found either failed to impose or failed to effectively enforce a ban on importing goods made with forced labor.

Forced labor is defined by the International Labor Organization Forced Labor Convention of 1930 as “all work or service which is exacted from any person under the menace of any penalty and for which the said person has not offered himself (or herself) voluntarily.”

According to the latest statistics from the ILO, which is a U.N. agency focused on human and labor rights, about 27.6 million people were in forced labor worldwide on any given day in 2021.

“We’ve gone on record for years now advocating for import bans, not as a magic bullet, it’s not a silver bullet, but as a potentially effective tool in combating forced labor across the globe,” said Martina Vandenberg, founder and president of The Human Trafficking Legal Center.

“It’s possible to be extremely critical of tariffs, as we are, and to be very concerned about blanket tariffs used as bludgeons against countries,” she said. “And yet I think it’s undeniable that there is a significant response in terms of the adoption of import bans.”

However, Vandenberg and her organization urged in testimony that the tariffs be implemented in a phased approach to give countries time to implement a ban or a plan for enforcement.

“Our concern is that the import bans will be thin slips of paper with no enforcement,” she said. “Countries need time to build import ban mechanisms that are meaningful and enforceable.”

In a statement, Dominic LeBlanc, the Canada-U.S. Trade Minister, said the move “is not unexpected.”

LeBlanc said Canada shares the U.S.’s objective of ensuring that goods produced with forced labor don’t enter the supply chain.

“We will continue engaging constructively with the United States on this matter, as well as other outstanding issues, over the coming weeks to the mutual benefit of our citizens,” LeBlanc said.

Kenya Davis, partner at Boies Schiller Flexner, said the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, a U.S. federal law passed in 2021 that prohibits the importation of goods made wholly or in part in China’s Xinjiang region or by designated entities, is the most significant legislation related to forced labor that the U.S. has passed before the tariffs.

“The level of effectiveness is certainly up for debate, but it certainly has drawn attention to the issue of labor trafficking and forced labor,” she said. “And so, if nothing else, these import bans will serve that function of bringing greater awareness to forced labor.”

But without a “comprehensive approach” that provides transparency about what the investigations consisted of, and programs that provide countries aid in enforcing bans, “I’m very cautious in my enthusiasm about the (tariffs),” she said.

Isabelle Glimcher, senior research scientist for global labor at the NYU Stern Center for Human Rights, said one flaw in the tariffs is that they focus on levying the tax on countries based on goods they import — not goods they make domestically.

But she said the impending tariffs threat has spurred several countries — such as India — to amend their foreign trade policies to include a forced labor import ban. European Union forced labor regulations due to go into effect later next year are also contributing, she said.

“Not all of these things are necessarily or wholly attributable to the Section 301 investigations, but does seem like countries are responding and starting to take all of this seriously,” she said.

___

Anderson reported from New York. AP Writers Nayara Batschke in Santiago, Chile, Mauricio Savarese in Sao Paulo and Jim Morris in Vancouver, Canada, contributed to this story.

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Residents are pushing back against a plan to remove dozens of mature trees near Legion Memorial Park.

Construction workers are already hard at work on a new development called Adella 3 that Acre Developments plans to build on the site.

But first, for it to go up, trees have to come down -- a total of 46 of them, including five large oaks.

Some residents, including Peter Ehrlich, are livid and have filed appeals with the city.

“Every tree is crucial,” he said. “The developer’s architect should work diligently to save those trees, not to just kill them, because some of the oak trees are 120 or 150 years old.”

Attorney David Winker represents an environmental group that has also filed an appeal.

“We feel strongly that they should stay, and also that they haven’t met the code requirements, which are to show that there’s no alternative, that they can’t build their building because of these trees that are on a public park,” said Winker.

The issue has sparked strong emotions among dozens of residents who say preserving the tree canopy helps reduce heat, provides shade, improves air quality, and protects wildlife.

“It’s crucial, but unfortunately, developers in such a desperate bid to build as quickly as they can to help their general contractors to have sites with no trees and city officials who receive campaign contributions from developers bend over backwards to kill trees as quickly as they possibly can,” said Ehrlich.

As mitigation for the tree loss, the developer has agreed to plant 103 new trees in and around the property once construction is complete.

“We’ve got eight appeals tonight -- it’s unprecedented,” said Winker. “We have so many appeals going on and some people have expressed frustration with the number of appeals, but it really is, why are the appeals happening? Because the city shouldn’t be approving these in the first place.”

Local 10 News reached out to the attorney representing the developer but has not heard back as of the time of this story’s publication.

Two days after the story aired, a spokesperson for the city of Miami provided an update to this story.

“Neither the City, nor the developer/property owner are removing multiple trees from within Legion park. The owner of the Adela project is proposing to remove (1) Live Oak from within Legion park which has a severe lean and is in poor/hazardous condition. The tree has already had large branch failures and has severe decay,” the spokesperson said.

Correction: There was only one appeal submitted about this property. 7 other appeals were also submitted for different properties with tree removals in the city of Miami.

A lawsuit filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in Oklahoma City on behalf of Rhonda Grayson and Jeffrey Kennedy names Principal Chief David Hill and the Muscogee Nation Citizenship Board as defendants.

It says that Hill and the citizenship board are violating an 1866 treaty between the tribe and the U.S. government by refusing to recognize Black Creek Freedmen as citizens as ordered by the Muscogee Nation Supreme Court in July 2025.

The board had denied the applications of Grayson and Kennedy in 2019 because they could not identify a lineal descendant of the tribe, but the court said the pair are entitled to tribal citizenship.

However, Hill and the board have not yet issued the citizenship cards, denying Grayson and Kennedy their “right to vote and the ability to participate fully as members of the Nation,” according to the lawsuit.

Last August, Hill blocked the tribe’s citizenship board from issuing citizenship cards until leaders decide how to change the tribe’s constitution. The tribe's headquarters is in Okmulgee, about 100 miles (160 kilometers) northeast of Oklahoma City.

The Associated Press left messages Thursday seeking comment from Hill and the Muscogee Nation Citizenship Board. The Muscogee Nation is one of five tribes in Oklahoma that once practiced slavery.

Under the 1866 treaty, the tribe abolished slavery and granted citizenship to the formerly enslaved. The Muscogee Nation adopted in 1979 a constitution that restricted membership to the descendants of people listed as “Muscogee (Creek) Indians by blood” on the Dawes Rolls, a census of members of the five tribes created around 1900.

When the Dawes Rolls were created, people were listed on two separate rolls: those who were Muscogee and those who were identified by the U.S. government as Freedmen.

The court's 2025 ruling also directed the board to apply the treaty of 1866 to future applicants who can trace an ancestor to either roll. The decision could create a path to tribal citizenship for thousands of new members who are not Muscogee by blood.

Attorney Damario Solomon-Simmons, a Black Creek Indian who is one of the lawyers representing Grayson and Kennedy, said Thursday that there about 100,000 Black Creeks across the United States.

Successful legal cases were brought against two of the five Oklahoma tribes, the Seminole Nation and the Cherokee Nation, which have since granted citizenship to Freedmen descendants.

“Every day of non-compliance is another day that Black Creek Freedman are denied our birthright and our very identity as citizens,” said Grayson, president of the Muscogee Creek Indian Freedmen Band.

“The fight is bigger than every one of us," she told reporters Thursday. "It belongs to every Black Creek Freedman descendant who has carried this history, protected these stories and refused to let our identity be dismissed or diminished.”

————————-

Williams is a member of AP's Race & Ethnicities Team. He reported from Detroit.

El sospechoso fue identificado en un informe de arresto como Eliezer Santana, de Coconut Creek. Los registros de la cárcel muestran que fue arrestado el miércoles por la Oficina del Sheriff de Broward.

Los investigadores acusan a Santana de violar a la víctima “más de 20 veces entre 2004 y 2005” mientras se desempeñaba como instructor de JROTC y se encontraba “en una posición de poder y confianza sobre la víctima”, según el informe de arresto.

Las autoridades informaron que los hechos ocurrieron en Miramar, Davie y Pembroke Pines.

Según el informe, la víctima dijo a los investigadores que Santana comenzó a “ganarse su confianza con fines de abuso” durante 2004 y 2005 al decirle “lo hermosa que se veía” y que “merecía a alguien que la cuidara”.

El informe señala que, mientras estaban dentro de la oficina de JROTC en Miramar, Santana se sentaba cerca de la víctima hasta excitarse, antes de frotarle los muslos y los hombros mientras se tocaba el pene por encima de la ropa.

La víctima dijo a los investigadores que tuvo relaciones sexuales con Santana en más de una ocasión dentro de la oficina de JROTC cuando no había nadie más presente, según el informe.

También afirmó que el abuso continuó en el estacionamiento de un complejo de apartamentos en Sherman Circle, en Miramar, incluido un incidente en el asiento trasero de una camioneta, dijeron los detectives.

El informe de arresto de Santana omite el nombre de la escuela de JROTC donde trabajaba.

Los investigadores informaron que entrevistaron en mayo a un ex compañero de trabajo, quien dijo a los agentes que con frecuencia veía a la víctima dentro de la oficina de Santana con la puerta cerrada, pero que no presenció ninguna conducta sexual.

Según las autoridades, otro testigo dijo a los agentes que presentó una denuncia formal ante el director de la escuela durante ese mismo período, en la que alegó que Santana “hablaba de manera inapropiada” con otra estudiante y estaba “ganándose su confianza con fines de abuso”.

El testigo dijo a los investigadores que “le aseguraron que sus preocupaciones serían atendidas y que se notificaría a las autoridades correspondientes, pero la policía nunca fue informada”, señala el informe.

Las autoridades indicaron que posteriormente se permitió a Santana trasladarse al condado Miami-Dade y que dejó de trabajar para las Escuelas de Broward.

Los registros judiciales y de la cárcel muestran que Santana también enfrentó acusaciones en el condado Miami-Dade. Los registros indican que en un caso de 2004 fue acusado de agresión sexual por una persona con autoridad familiar o de custodia contra una víctima de entre 12 y 17 años.

En el caso actual en Broward, los registros muestran que Santana enfrenta un cargo de agresión sexual por una persona con autoridad de custodia contra una víctima de entre 12 y 18 años.

Hasta la mañana del jueves, permanecía detenido sin derecho a fianza en la cárcel principal del condado Broward.

The Raiders hold a fifth-year option.

Mendoza was the last of the Raiders' 10 draft picks to sign.

“I’m excited to get this thing signed," Mendoza said on the team's social media post. "I’m excited to be a part of the silver and black. Can’t wait.”

He ran the third-team offense in organized team activities and minicamp, but is expected to take on a larger role in training camp, which begins Wednesday.

Veteran Kirk Cousins, who signed a free-agent contract worth $20 million guaranteed, enters camp as the No. 1 quarterback.

How long Cousins hangs on to that spot will be the main storyline in camp and perhaps into the season.

Mendoza hopes to translate the success he experienced in his final season of college football in which he won the Heisman Trophy and led Indiana to its first national championship.

Also, star pass rusher Maxx Crosby said on his podcast “The Rush” that he would join the rookies for their training camp. Crosby has been working his way back from knee surgery.

___

AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/nfl