Food insecurity is defined as the lack of access, at times, to enough nutritious food for an active and healthy lifestyle. Children who experience hunger are more likely to struggle in school and have health complications. In adults, studies reveal that food insecurity reduces worker productivity and drives up healthcare costs.

It’s why since 2020, Local 10 and Publix have teamed up for Food for Thought to address food insecurity in our communities.

Food for Thought raises awareness about the plight of hunger and comes alongside local nonprofits to support their efforts to get nutritious meals into the hands of those who need them most.

In the past five years, we’ve stocked school food pantries from the elementary to college levels, provided weekend backpack meals to underserved children, sponsored food drives, and planted vegetable gardens.

One of the organizations we’ve collaborated with is The Cupboard of Goodman JFS in Davie. Last year, Director of Operations Ross Adel told us the pantry was serving 600 families per month, which translated to 1,100 individuals.

“Every can of food that comes in here, every dollar that comes in here is just one more individual that we can feed,” said Adel.

In September, during Hunger Action Month, we will be working with more organizations to make healthy food accessible to vulnerable populations across South Florida.

If you’d like to find out more or get involved, the list below connects you with some local nonprofits that offer programs to feed families in our community.

If your nonprofit organization provides food services to South Florida families and would like our Food for Thought campaign to know about it, simply email our community relations department at community@local10.com.

Our goal is to connect those who have the means to help with those helping families fight food insecurity every day. Together, we can make a difference.

TO VIEW THE LATEST FOOD FOR THOUGHT STORIES, CLICK HERE.

Broward College Seahawk Marketplace

954-201-FOOD (3663)

https://www.broward.edu/students/seahawk-outreach/marketplace.html

Community Enhancement Collaboration

954-987-0625

https://www.cecwashpark.org/

Covenant House Florida

954-561-5559

https://www.covenanthouse.org/homeless-shelters/ft-lauderdale-florida

Health in the Hood

305-714-2262

Healthinthehood.org

Healthy Mothers, Healthy Babies of Broward County

954-765-0550

Hmhbbroward.org

Joshua’s Heart Foundation

305-944-4452

joshuasheart.org

La Bodega at the YMCA in Allapattah

305-635-9622

2370 NW 17th Avenue

*serves food to residents Monday- Friday, from 2 p.m. – 5 p.m.

LifeNet4Families

954-792-2328

Lifenet4families.org

Mobile School Pantry

954-297-4929

Mobileschoolpantry.org

One More Child

305-271-4121

Onemorechild.org

The Cupboard Goodman JFS

954-370-2140

https://www.jfsbroward.org/services/cupboard/

China considers self-governing Taiwan to be part of its territory and rejects the island’s claim to sovereignty. Beijing generally refers to Taiwan as “China’s Taiwan region.”

China’s Foreign Ministry on Thursday criticized the South Korean organizers of the biennial Gwangju Biennale, one of Asia's most prominent art exhibitions, saying the organizers have "stubbornly clung to the wrongful practice, allowing China’s Taiwan region to participate under a designation that is completely incompatible with its status.”

Spokesperson Guo Jiakun said China hopes the South Korean government will uphold its political commitment to the “one China” principle through concrete action.

The Chinese artists said the same day that they were withdrawing from the festival, which opens Saturday and runs through mid-November.

The “Taiwan Pavilion” is one of about 25 small national and institutional galleries to be operated separately from the biennale’s main exhibition site, under its so-called Pavilion Project.

“The organizers of the Gwangju Biennale used an incorrect name for China’s Taiwan region over its participation in the exhibition, causing a political issue to spill over onto the realm of art,” Chinese curator Ruan Yuelai told reporters through an interpreter. “The Chinese exhibition team cannot accept this and unanimously agreed to withdraw from the exhibition to express our strong protest.”

As of Friday afternoon, the Chinese participants had not yet removed their paintings, sculptures and other works originally planned to go on display in the “China Pavilion.”

The festival organizers apologize for the ‘confusion’

Taiwan’s Ministry of Culture said in August that Taiwan had planned to exhibit under the name “Taiwan Pavilion” but protested that organizers changed it to “National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts Pavilion.”

The art festival said Wednesday that it “deeply apologizes for causing concerns and confusion” to those involved in its “Pavilion Project," and said there had been differences with the Taiwan museum over the naming issue.

Organizers said they signed a contract with the National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts over its participation, so they thought Taiwanese artists would exhibit under the museum acronym, “NTMoFA.” They said the Taiwanese museum later insisted on the name “Taiwan Pavilion,” and said they felt pressure to accept the name.

Earlier in the week, China also warned of consequences for Taiwan after the island’s foreign minister attended a diplomatic forum in the island country of Palau. In May, China pressured an African country to exclude Taiwanese activists from an international human rights conference.

It's unclear whether the Chinese protest would trigger a major diplomatic spat with South Korea, which is now ruled by a liberal government which wants to improve ties with China, the country's biggest trading partner.

South Korea's Foreign Ministry said the naming decision was made by a non-governmental entity and has nothing to do with the government. It said South Korea hopes the latest issue won't affect relations and cooperation between the two countries.

Taiwan is a self-ruled island, but China claims it as part of its territory. The two sides split after a civil war in 1949. Beijing has stepped up its pressure on Taiwan, poaching diplomatic allies. The island now only has 12 diplomatic allies around the world.

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Associated Press writer Kanis Leung in Hong Kong contributed to this report.

The EU's Enlargement Commissioner Marta Kos said that the next few days “will be a very important test” after Mladic's remains were flown to Serbia on a government plane Thursday from The Hague, Netherlands, following his death in a hospital there last week.

Mladic was sentenced in 2017 to life imprisonment for orchestrating the massacre of more than 8,000 Muslims in Srebrenica in 1995; the yearslong siege of Bosnian capital of Sarajevo during the 1992-95 conflict; and other war crimes, including setting up concentration camps for detained non-Serb civilians and enemy soldiers.

Upon landing in Belgrade, Mladic's coffin was wrapped in the national flag and Serbian army soldiers carried his body from the plane to a van for transport to the military hospital. Serbia's Justice Minister Nenad Vujic was on the plane with Mladic's family members while groups of nationalist admirers lit flares as the convoy with the coffin passed under escort.

Mladic to be buried on Monday at a Belgrade cemetery

Mladic’s son, Darko Mladic, said on Friday that his father will be buried on Monday while a military commemoration ceremony is planned for Saturday. Mladic's coffin will placed in a church in Belgrade on Monday morning so people can pay their respects, his son said at a news conference.

Vujic had previously said that Mladic would receive full state honors at the funeral, sparking outrage across the volatile Balkans. The region remains ethnically divided decades after the war in Bosnia in 1992-95 killed over 100,000 people and left millions homeless.

Last year, Serbia buried another convicted war criminal, the former army chief of staff Nebojsa Pavkovic, with full military honors at a cemetery for distinguished individuals.

Serbia, which backed the Bosnian Serbs during the war, is formally seeking EU entry but remains defiant over its war role, accusing the West of an anti-Serb bias. After Mladic died last week, thousands of Serbs in their political entity in Bosnia and many in Serbia held vigils in his honor, and thousands could come to the funeral.

Other European officials condemn Mladic glorification

The Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights, Michael O’Flaherty, on Friday urged authorities in Serbia and in the Serb-run entity of Bosnia to “counter the glorification of convicted war criminals” that is illegal in Bosnia and “is not protected speech under the European Convention on Human Rights.”

“I abhor the public glorification of Ratko Mladic, a deceased war criminal convicted for the Srebrenica genocide and crimes against humanity, including statements by officials in Bosnia and Herzegovina’s entity of Republika Srpska and in Serbia,” Flaherty said in a statement.

Belgium's Foreign Minister Maxime Prevot said granting funeral honors for Mladic would be “shameful and disrespectful for the victims” He added that “I condemn that act in the strongest terms, and have passed this message to my Serbian counterpart in charge of European affairs this morning.”

Serbia's president says he has meetings on Monday

In Serbia, populist President Aleksandar Vucic, a former extreme nationalist who backed Serbia's expansionist policies in the past, said Friday that he has previously scheduled meetings on Monday, and that the funeral arrangements have been decided by Mladic's family.

“I have spoken to the Mladic family and I wish it all passes in a dignified way,” Vucic said, according to the pro-government Informer television. He added without elaborating that “I did all I could so that the funeral would pass as it should.”

Serbia's EU bid has been stalled under increasingly authoritarian Vucic due to a general democratic backsliding and his refusal to join the international sanctions against Russia over the invasion of Ukraine.

The massacre in Srebrenica was Europe’s first acknowledged genocide after World War II. A U.N. “safe haven” for Bosniaks (Bosnian Muslims), Srebrenica ended up being overrun by Serbs who forced men and boys to strip, killed them and bulldozed their bodies into mass graves.

Mladic was one of the most notorious figures of the war in Bosnia that left more than 100,000 people dead and over 1 million homeless before it ended in 1995 in a U.S.-brokered peace agreement.

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AP Writers Lorne Cook and Sam McNeil contributed from Brussels.

Great Big Game Show has arrived at Dania Pointe, transforming everyday visitors into game show contestants through a series of challenges testing knowledge, strategy, speed and luck.

The experience accommodates groups of two to 14 contestants, who are divided into red and blue teams and compete to rack up points throughout multiple rounds.

“I think everyone’s always wanted to be a contestant on a game show, and now is your chance,” general manager Justin Hambey said. “There’s music, you have a live host, so you really feel immersed in that experience.”

Local 10’s Alexis Frazier brought along several members of the Local 10 team to put the experience to the test.

And once the teams were divided, coworkers quickly became competitors.

From trivia to building challenges

The competition kicked off with “Build It Up,” which gave contestants 60 seconds to construct the tallest tower they could.

Communication under pressure proved to be just as important as building skills.

From there, contestants faced questions ranging from a first-grade to fifth-grade level.

The challenges continued to change throughout the experience. Some tested knowledge, while others required strategy, speed or a little bit of luck.

Another game, “Major Miners,” featured a format similar to a survey-style game show, with teams trying to guess answers on a board and earn points.

The Local 10 teams eventually found themselves tied, setting up a final spin to determine the winner.

One unfortunate spin landed on “Lose It All,” bringing the competition to a dramatic end — complete with screams and confetti for the winning team.

Escape rooms add another challenge

The game show isn’t the only attraction available.

Visitors can also take on The Escape Game, a 60-minute escape room experience where teams work together to solve puzzles and clues before time runs out.

“You work together with your team to solve clues and puzzles and find a way out within one hour,” Hambey said.

Among the adventures is “The Heist,” where participants attempt to recover a stolen painting.

“The Depths” takes players into an abandoned underwater laboratory, while “Ruins: Forbidden Treasure” sends teams on an adventure through the jungle.

Local 10’s teams tried another escape experience that even included a snowy surprise — but we’re not giving away the clues.

Great Big Game Show at Dania Pointe opens to the public Friday.

For information on booking an experience, click here.

With South Africa positioning itself as Africa's main data hub and U.S. technology companies like Amazon, Microsoft and Equinix increasingly setting up digital infrastructure in the country, civil society organizations have raised the alarm about the lack of transparency around the projects.

The country’s rights watchdog, the South African Human Rights Commission, told The Associated Press that it has received over 250 submissions from interested groups after it called for input in May this year.

According to South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, the country hosts 70% of Africa’s data center capacity, and the government has identified this as an opportunity in the global digital economy, inviting more tech companies to build digital infrastructure in the country.

However, as in other parts of the world, such as the U.S., where data centers have been increasing rapidly, their long-term environmental and societal impacts are coming under greater scrutiny.

The commission noted that the country had experienced “significant growth” in the establishment of data centers, cloud infrastructure and related digital systems.

“A key issue emerging from the process is precisely the availability, consistency and transparency of information relating to matters such as electricity and water demand, land use, infrastructure requirements, environmental impacts and impacts on surrounding communities,” said Dr. Eileen Carter, who leads the commission preliminary process.

One of the latest municipal approvals for a data center that has irked various quarters is an Equinix hyperscale facility to be built in Cape Town, a city that avoided a so-called “Day Zero” in 2018, when its taps were predicted to run dry due to water scarcity.

The country’s recent memory of widespread power cuts, known as “ loadshedding, ” has also raised concerns about the 160 megawatts of electricity estimated to be required to run the facility.

South Africa has seemingly overcome its electricity crisis, with the country’s power utility, Eskom, reporting a power surplus during the winter peak-demand season, but civil society groups are wary of the surplus power being sold to data centers.

Some experts say the call for a temporary halt to more approvals should not be taken as a rejection of potential foreign investment in the country, but rather as a mechanism to establish clear rules, especially around transparency.

“Serious investors are not deterred by clear rules. They price uncertainty, and an unregulated boom is the most uncertain environment of all,” said Pitso Tsibolane, a senior lecturer in Information Systems at the University of Cape Town.

He said one of the major problems was that operators were not required to disclose how much water, electricity and land they would use or commit to in binding terms, so every proposal was weighed without the numbers.

Operators have cautioned against comparing data centers being built in South Africa to large-scale data centers in the U.S. as the water, land and power needs there are much higher.

They point out that Eskom currently has a power surplus and that most data centers increasingly rely on renewable energy for electricity.

“It should be clear that the growth in energy demand due to data centers is not contributing to electricity scarcity in South Africa and that this increasing demand is not a cause of rising electricity tariffs,” said Internet Service Providers Association chairperson Sasha Booth-Beharilal.

“Local data centers apply new technologies to minimize their water usage, which is substantially lower than the global average.”

The organization represents tech companies operating in the sector and operating data centers in the country.

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

Berry, who died Monday at home at age 92, drew that connection in poignant writings across many decades.

“Persons cannot be whole alone,” Berry wrote in “The Unsettling of America: Culture and Agriculture,” his classic 1977 work. “It is wrong to think that bodily health is compatible with spiritual confusion or cultural disorder, or with polluted air and water or impoverished soil.”

While Berry inspired writers, artists, local-food activists, environmentalists, agrarians and many others, some of his deepest admirers were moved by his spiritual vision.

Spending Sundays amid the ‘timbered choir’

That's despite — or maybe because of — Berry's skepticism of organized religion. He called himself a “bad-weather churchgoer” because in finer weather, he often skipped church to spend Sundays in what he called nature's “timbered choir.”

He was too steeped in the Bible and his Baptist heritage to fit the common notion of “spiritual but not religious.” But he was too independent-minded to be pigeonholed into any one tradition. Defiantly non-conformist yet committed to neighborly and communal bonds, he quipped about creating an “International Brotherhood of Contraries” in one of his poems.

“One of the reasons Wendell has been read and loved by so many people who are in faith or spiritual traditions is that he was able to think about the most fundamental questions of land and water and community and health and a flourishing life in such an expansive way,” said Norman Wirzba, a longtime friend of Berry’s who has written and edited numerous essays about him.

“He was also able to show the industrial mindset is not just a technique, but it’s a spiritual way of seeing the world that turns out to be very damaging and degrading,” said Wirzba, a professor of Christian theology at Duke Divinity School.

Berry saw spirituality as integrated with the human body

Berry recoiled from any spirituality that was ethereal and other-worldly, Wirzba said. “Wendell was a master in showing that any spirituality that’s worth anything starts with the human body.”

Seekers found a kindred soul in Berry, one who accompanied them in a time haunted by species loss, environmental disasters and social alienation.

Many sought him out in person: seminarians, clergy, professors and others on a search for greater meaning. They found their way to Berry's farmhouse overlooking the Kentucky River in Port Royal, the prototype for the tiny hamlet that was the setting for much of his fiction. Visitors sat on Berry's porch or amid the towering bookshelves in his living room, bringing their anxieties and questions in conversation with the author and his wife, Tanya.

Of course, Berry reached many more through his writings.

“So today I find myself giving thanks for someone I knew rather well, yet never met,” wrote Derek Peterson, a youth development educator. He said Berry helped deepen his appreciation for the North Dakota farm where he and three previous generations of his family have lived.

“He helped me understand that loving a place is not sentimentality; it is a discipline,” Peterson wrote on Facebook. “To know a piece of Earth — its soil and water, trees and birds, seasons and wounds; to understand what happened here before you arrived and wonder seriously about what condition it will be in after you leave — is a particular way of being human.”

An author, activist, farmer and contrarian

Berry was many things. As an author, he wrote more than 40 books, publishing his final novel, “Marce Catlett: The Force of a Story,” at age 91 in 2025. As an activist, Berry took part in an occupation of the Kentucky governor’s office to protest mountaintop-removal mining. As a farmer, he plowed with a horse rather than a tractor, rejecting the “Get big or get out” mandate of industrial agriculture.

Berry embraced parts of his Baptist heritage. He took the Bible at its word when it says the Earth was made by God, and it was good — a gift to be cared for.

But he believed the Southern evangelical religion had gone wrong with a stark separation of the spiritual and the physical worlds. To Berry, it focused on other-worldly salvation while blessing slavery and, later, environmentally devastating practices of agriculture and coal mining.

The title character of his acclaimed 2000 novel, “Jayber Crow,” concludes that “Christ did not come to found an organized religion but came instead to found an unorganized one.” Young Jayber studies for the ministry but has too many doubts to continue, becoming instead a barber and church janitor and living out “questions to which you cannot be given answers.”

In one of his poems, Berry gleefully defied both the religious and the cynical.

“When they said, ‘I know my Redeemer liveth,’ I told them, ‘He’s dead,’” Berry wrote. “And when they told me ‘God is dead,’ I answered, ‘He goes fishing every day in the Kentucky River. I see Him often.’”

The title of his widely admired “Sabbath Poems” partly reflects that he wrote many of them on his Sunday amblings in nature. But it also hearkens to biblical concepts of “Sabbath” — that humans and the land need a time of rest, not the constant churn demanded of an industrial economy.

Berry sought to heal fragmented selves and society

In a time of rampant loneliness and anxiety, such a message is crucial, said Wirzba.

“More people today enjoy a standard of life that would have been unimaginable to people 100 years ago, but they’re not happy,” Wirzba said. Berry's answer, he said, is to “see the beauty of this world and see that it’s worth cherishing.”

Among Berry's longtime admirers was Russell Moore, editor at large at Christianity Today and author of a 2025 cover story on Berry for the evangelical magazine.

“He believed body and soul, heaven and earth, are meant to hold together,” Moore wrote after Berry's death. “When they do not, the result is what Berry saw as the most fundamental crisis of the modern era: the disintegration of persons and communities.”

Through The Berry Center in New Castle, Kentucky, the author's family promotes the values he championed through education, agricultural training and other means. The center launched a small cooperative for local farmers raising grass-fed beef — a model for helping maintain small-scale farms.

Berry’s death came just days after the center announced publication of a 50th anniversary edition of “The Unsettling of America.” It was his passionate manifesto for human-scale, sustainable farming and against the machines, chemicals and human displacement of the era of industrialized agriculture.

“The tragedy of this book is that it originated in the recognition of a still-continuing absurdity,” Berry wrote in a new foreword. That is the assumption “that we can produce food by means that destroy, in human culture and in nature, the sources of food.”

Yet Berry insisted in interviews that he refused to give in to cynicism. Hope, he noted, is not a sentiment but a theological virtue, something one is obligated to pursue.

“I haven’t quit,” he said in a 2013 interview. “You have to assume I have hope. If you want an easy life, indulge yourself in despair.”

___

Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

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“Forever Grateful/Golden Gate Park” opens Saturday and will also feature the Grateful Dead frontman Jerry Garcia ’s BMW, which remains in mint condition and has never been displayed publicly.

The two iconic artifacts will anchor an exhibition that immerses visitors in the colors, sounds and sights of the counterculture that flourished in San Francisco in the 1960s.

Kesey rode the bus dubbed “Furthur” during the cross-country trip by the late author and his Merry Band of Pranksters to expand human consciousness through art, music and mind-altering drugs.

“This invites people to communicate and connect around art, music, and activism,” said Kelly Harris, executive director of the Haight Street Art Center, which organized the exhibition. “In this day and age, when we need something to bridge community, we know that this space allows for that to happen and Furthur is the portal.”

A celebration of hippie love, activism

The exhibition aims to celebrate the city’s history of hippie love and activism at a time when San Francisco is grappling with widening economic inequality fueled by an AI-driven technology boom, and the nation confronts deepening political divisions and collective fatigue.

Formed in 1965, the Grateful Dead is synonymous with San Francisco and its counterculture. Members lived in a dirt-cheap Victorian in the Haight and later became a significant part of 1967’s Summer of Love.

And it all started with the bus.

Kesey bought the bus with the proceeds from “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.” In 1964, the writer and his friends drove it on a marijuana and LSD-fueled journey from coast to coast, helping introduce Americans to the emerging psychedelic scene.

That history-making road trip was later recounted in Tom Wolfe’s 1968 bestseller, “The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test.”

Upon their return to California, Kesey, who as a student had been a guinea pig for government tests of the mind-altering drug, shared his experiences at a series of parties at his home in the hills above Stanford University that became known as the “acid tests.”

The parties featured a local bar band called The Warlocks, which turned into the Grateful Dead. The bus became a defining feature of the “acid tests” as Kesey and his friends took the parties on the road, mainly around the Bay Area.

“This entire exhibit, it’s a very layered story of the Grateful Dead and their influence, their phenomenon, and their impact on communities, on society, on people, and how their legacy still lives on,” said Renee de Cossio, director of exhibitions at the Haight Street Art Center.

Deadheads can recite why they fell in love with the music, how it happened and the moment it all clicked. They embrace something just as important as the music itself — the community that comes together at a Dead show.

Exhibit immerses visitors in counterculture

Visitors will be invited to record their first encounter with the counterculture — whether it was becoming a Deadhead, as the band’s fans are called, while Garcia was still alive, discovering the band after his death, or experiencing the Grateful Dead for the first time through the exhibition.

Actors with the Third Rail Projects, a New York-based experiential performance company, will guide visitors through part of the exhibit, including a dark tunnel full of mirrors that leads into booths where they will start conversations with the audience.

They will then lead small groups to experience a liquid light show, a 1960s art form that mixes liquids of different densities in watch glasses and projects colorful, shifting psychedelic patterns onto every space of a room, creating the sensation of being inside a giant, multicolor lava lamp.

“You might go with the people that you came with, or you might get packaged with a couple other folks that you didn’t know, and you’ll then unpack the experience with each other and have a conversation with a stranger that you wouldn’t have had otherwise,” said Edward Rice, associate managing director at Third Rail Projects.

The exhibit, which runs through Oct. 25, will also feature photographs from the band’s many concerts in Golden Gate Park and a screen-printing station where visitors can create their own art.

It will also help launch an effort to restore the now-dilapidated “Furthur” bus, which got its name after a typo on its destination sign. The bus was kept on the Kesey family farm in Pleasant Hill, Oregon, and was last seen in public at Woodstock in 1969.

“The focal point is the Furthur bus. And Furthur is a call to action. Never stop creating, never stop exploring, keep going further,” Harris said.

Stefan Davis was the man who died after a crash involving a Miami-Dade deputy and a suspect wanted by the U.S. military happened near Northwest 51st Terrace and Northwest 33rd Avenue.

Surveillance video captured a car speeding through the area before the violent impact.

“I heard a boom,” said Norman Bradley, who was nearby at the time.

Other video angles show the force of the collision.

The Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office told Local 10 that deputies with the Robbery Intervention Unit were conducting a traffic stop when 21-year-old Luis Manuel Perez hit the gas and took off.

Perez was wanted for military desertion, according to deputies.

“When the car flipped on its side, we said, ‘Wow, what happened?’” Bradley said.

The crash left Davis seriously injured. He was rushed to the hospital, but later died.

The Nassau Guardian confirmed Davis’ identity and reported that he is a well-known artist from the Bahamas.

Friends say Davis loved spending time in Miami, especially around his birthday in early September.

Levin Wilson, a friend of Davis, said it is difficult to process the loss.

“Sorry to see such talent has left us in a tragic way,” Wilson said.

As of Thursday evening, Perez was being held at Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center.

The air war between Russia and Ukraine has intensified as the conflict stretches into its fifth year following Moscow’s invasion of its neighbor. Russian forces have relentlessly struck civilian areas.

Previously, these attacks occurred mostly at night — but now they are happening during the day as well. The front line in eastern and southern Ukraine remains largely deadlocked.

US envoys expected in Kyiv

Though U.S. efforts to negotiate a settlement have yet to produce a path to peace, in his nightly address Thursday Zelenskyy said that preliminary dates have been set for meetings in both Moscow and Kyiv. Ukraine’s negotiating team is in near-constant contact with the U.S. side and preparing for talks, he said.

“They confirmed they will have a meeting in Moscow and another one in Kyiv. We expect the latter to take place in the coming days. This is very important. It is important that America remain actively engaged,” he said, adding that Ukraine is ready for substantive, high-level negotiations.

Russian state news agency TASS reported Friday that American negotiators Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner would visit Moscow first, then Kyiv on Sept. 5-6, though this could not be independently verified.

Speaking with journalists Friday, presidential spokesperson Dmitry Peskov refused to confirm reports that Kushner and Witkoff would visit Moscow, only saying that the media would be informed if such a meeting took place.

U.S. officials did not immediately confirm the visit.

Kushner and Witkoff last visited Moscow in January 2026, where they met with Russian President Vladimir Putin. This would be their first visit to Kyiv.

After that meeting, Russian presidential aide Yury Ushakov described talks as constructive, but said “that reaching a long-term settlement can’t be expected without solving the territorial issue.”

However, further talks have lost momentum with the White House’s attention focused on its conflict with Iran.

In a news conference on Wednesday, Putin described negotiations as “frozen.”

Deadly strikes in Ukraine

The latest diplomatic developments came as a “massive” overnight Russian attack on the Odesa region killed one person and injured at least five others, including a child, regional head Oleh Kiper said in a post on Telegram. The attacks damaged multiple residential buildings, including two multi-story blocks.

Overnight strikes elsewhere in Ukraine killed two police officers in Dnipro, officials said, while a drone attack in Kyiv injured three people after hitting a residential building.

In Russia, a large-scale Ukrainian drone strike hit the Black Sea resort city of Sochi and the nearby district of Sirius, regional officials said Friday. They said the attack sparked a blaze at an oil depot but gave no further details. Russian media outlets reported two depots were hit, with one fire in Sochi and another in Sirius.

Ukraine has repeatedly targeted oil facilities that form the backbone of Russia’s economy, one of the world’s largest energy producers. Growing economic pressure and public frustration have mounted in Russia after months of escalating Ukrainian strikes on refineries and e-commerce hubs that have caused nationwide disruptions.

The barrages prompted Putin last month to decree that the state can temporarily seize control of critical infrastructure facilities if private owners fail to protect them from Ukrainian drone attacks or don’t rebuild them after strikes. Analysts said the move was aimed at forcing companies to pay for their own security and bring damaged assets back into service, despite the cost.

Drone washes up in Finland

Finnish authorities said Friday they were investigating how a Russian-made drone ended up on a rocky shoreline in the Pellinge archipelago east of Helsinki.

Finland’s Border Guard said what appears to be a Geoscan 701 drone, manufactured by a Russian company, was found on the shore. “The device model in question is used by both state and civilian operators, and it is not possible at this stage to determine its intended use or identify the country or entity operating it,” the Border Guard said in a statement.

State broadcaster Yle reported the drone was discovered Tuesday by a fisherman, Peter Kellgren, who said it “was out there in the open sea” and appeared to have drifted ashore from elsewhere.

Geoscan describes itself as one of Russia’s leading drone manufacturers, and says the 701 model is designed for large-scale aerial surveying.

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Claudia Ciobanu in Warsaw, Poland, and Katie Marie Davies in Manchester, England, contributed to this report.

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

It might be only just September, but the jockeying for next March's Academy Awards is well underway. Movies first started revving up their Oscar campaigns at the Cannes Film Festival in May. But now that the fall festivals, in Venice, Telluride and soon Toronto, are in full swing, so is the prognosticating about what's in the mix for awards.

There is much still to come. Sandworms! (“Dune: Part III”) Old Tom Cruise! (“Digger”) Oh my! But here's an early survey of the Oscar landscape, with a few predictions mixed in.

‘The Odyssey’ won't end up the best picture favorite

At this point, Christopher Nolan's epic deserves to be considered the movie to beat. His previous film, “Oppenheimer,” steamrolled its way to best picture and Nolan's first Oscar, for best director. His singular stature is such that back-to-back wins might sound good to academy members. But “The Odyssey” isn't quite as well-loved as “Oppenheimer,” and, fun fact, no movie that Homer translators have come out against has ever won best picture. OK, so that's a small subset. But being the front-runner for more than half a year is hard, and the academy has largely favored smaller films in recent years. This prediction could come back to bite me, but, right now, I'd take the field.

The New York movie is alive and well

It's going to be a good fall for NYC. A number of the season's standouts derive a lot of their texture and grit from the Big Apple. That includes Jordan Firstman's hysterical and surprisingly tender “Club Kid” (Nov. 6), in which he stars as a gay clubgoer who finds out he has a child; “Paper Tiger” (Nov. 13), James Gray's engrossing Queens-set drama about family and 1980s mafia corruption; “The Only Living Pickpocket” (Oct. 23), starring John Turturro as an aging pickpocket in a much-changed New York; “Once Upon a Time in Harlem” (Oct. 16), a long-in-coming documentary chronicling a 1972 gathering of Harlem Renaissance luminaries; and “The History of Concrete” (Sept. 18), John Wilson's delightfully meandering documentary about concrete and creativity.

Malkovich Malkovich Malkovich

Get ready to be reminded of this fact: John Malkovich has never won an Oscar. The twice-nominated actor (for “Places in the Heart” and “In the Line of Fire”) may have his best shot yet with his performance in Martin McDonagh's “Wild Horse Nine.” In it, he stars alongside Sam Rockwell as an aging CIA agent who's grown tired of keeping secrets on a trip to Easter Island in the early 1970s. Like Malkovich's best roles, his performance is full of wit, soulfulness and profanity.

The ‘Obsession’ sensation isn't over yet

Curry Barker's “One Wish Willow” horror movie has already set plenty of records, including being one of the most profitable movies ever made. But Focus Features is also preparing an awards campaign for the low-budget hit that could have “Obsession” competing in many of the top Oscar categories, including best picture and best actress for Inde Navarrette. It won't be the only early 2026 release to factor in the mix, though. Expect to hear more from Christopher Miller and Phil Lord's “Project Hail Mary” and Olivia Wilde's “The Invite,” among others.

At the Oscars, international film is here to stay

As in recent years, many of the top Academy Awards contenders are sure to hail from overseas. The makeup of the academy has grown more international in recent years, and global nominees have increasingly reflected that. Some of this year's standouts include:

— “All of a Sudden” (Nov. 25), an expansively tender Paris-set drama from Japanese filmmaker Ryusuke Hamaguchi (“Drive My Car”)

— “Fjord” (Oct. 9), Cristian Mungiu's Palme d'Or-winning Norway-set drama about political polarization

— “La Bola Negra” (Oct. 16), an epic that spans the interconnected lives of three gay men in Spain

— “Minotaur” (Nov. 20), Russian filmmaker Andrey Zvyagintsev's drama about betrayal and murder in Putin's Russia

— “Possible Love” (Oct. 23), Lee Chang-dong's awaited follow-up to 2018's acclaimed “Burning,” about two couples making a documentary

— “Fatherland” (Oct. 23), Paweł Pawlikowski's exquisite black-and-white drama about postwar Germany

— “Clarissa” (Dec. 11), Arie and Chuko Esiri‘s shimmering Nigeria-set reinterpretation of Virginia Woolf’s “Mrs. Dalloway”

Here’s a look at the latest developments in the Iran war and the wider Middle East. Full coverage can be found here.

Israel releases 4 more Lebanese civilians

Israel released four Lebanese civilians to Lebanese authorities on Friday as part of a deal between the countries, a day after the first was freed. All had been detained by Israeli forces in southern Lebanon, where troops now occupy a large swath in the wake of new fighting with Hezbollah began two days after the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran.

Israel on Thursday said it had agreed to release them after Lebanon provided assistance in searching for the bodies of Lebanese Jewish leaders who went missing in the 1980s during Lebanon’s civil war.

Officials said the release comes as a result of U.S. mediation and negotiations between Israel and Lebanon. Another round of talks is expected in Rome later this month.

Ship traffic remains low after latest attacks

Ship traffic on the Strait of Hormuz remained low after the renewed U.S. attacks on targets in Iran earlier this week and Iran's retaliatory attacks in the region, including firing at U.S. Gulf ally Kuwait on Thursday.

Fuel prices are again affected. Diesel hit a new record price in the U.S. on Friday, soaring to an average of $5.85 a gallon for the first time ever.

The benchmark U.S. crude price rose above $91 a barrel with the new wave of uncertainty around traffic on the strait, which Iran continues to use as leverage after six months of war with the U.S.

Fighting in Yemen has casualties on both sides

Fighting intensified overnight between Iran-backed Houthi rebels and Yemeni government forces along Yemen’s west coast near an important supply route.

ِAn official with the internationally recognized government's health ministry told The Associated Press there were an unspecified number of casualties on both sides in the fighting in mountainous Taiz province. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to speak with the media. A military official, who also spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to brief the media, confirmed casualties on both sides.

Jabal Nu’man overlooks a major supply route for Yemeni government forces between Taiz province and Mokha, a port city heavily targeted by the Houthis in recent weeks.

The Houthis’ expansion of attacks in these areas appears to indicate an effort to gain full control of the Bab el-Mandeb strait, the southern gateway to the Red Sea, according to Moahmed Abdelrahman, a Taiz province spokesperson.

Ahmed Nagi, a senior analyst on Yemen at the International Crisis Group, told the AP that the Houthis want to take control of the mountains overlooking the coast.

— Ahmed al-Haj in Aden, Yemen, and Fatma Khaled in Cairo

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This report will be updated throughout the day as new developments emerge.

Dozens of Lebanese prisoners are believed to be held in Israeli detention centers, including civilians as well as Hezbollah militants captured during fighting in southern Lebanon. A total of five detainees were released under the current deal, all civilians.

The first Lebanese prisoner, identified as Malek Ghazi, was released to the International Committee of the Red Cross and then to the Lebanese army on Thursday.

Associated Press journalists waiting at a checkpoint south of the city of Tyre in southern Lebanon saw a convoy of ICRC vehicles heading toward the Naqoura border crossing Friday morning and later return. The convoy then entered a Lebanese army barracks in Tyre.

Mahmoud Ayash, the brother of prisoner Hussein Ayash from the village of Harouf, who was waiting there, said his brother had been detained for about three months and had called from the border crossing in Naqoura to say that he had been released and was with the ICRC.

“I hope all our prisoners in Israeli prisons will be released and for all Lebanese citizens to be liberated,” he said.

Ahmed Atwe, also waiting at the checkpoint, said his relative, Mohammed Juheir, was a fisherman from the border town of Naqoura who was captured at sea by Israeli forces a year ago, when a ceasefire agreement was in place.

The ICRC said in a statement that the remaining prisoners had been transferred to it on Friday. The organization called for its teams to be granted access to the remaining prisoners, noting that it has not had access to detainees held in Israel since October 2023.

“Many families in Lebanon are still waiting for answers about the fate of loved ones who may be detained, deceased or otherwise unaccounted for," it said.

The office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement Thursday that Israel agreed to release five Lebanese civilians detained by Israeli forces in southern Lebanon after Lebanon provided assistance in searching for the bodies of Lebanese Jewish leaders who were “abducted and murdered by terrorist organizations” in the 1980s, during Lebanon’s civil war.

Officials said the prisoner release came as a result of U.S. mediation and as a result of ongoing negotiations between Israel and Lebanon. Lebanese President Joseph Aoun thanked the “United States under the leadership of President Donald Trump” in a statement Friday.

Other thorny issues remain to be resolved. Lebanon and Israel, which do not have diplomatic relations, entered into rare direct negotiations after the outbreak of the latest war between Israel and the Iran-backed Lebanese militant group Hezbollah on March 2.

Hezbollah fired missiles over the border, two days after the U.S. and Iran attacked Iran. Israel launched aerial bombardment and a ground invasion of Lebanon and is now occupying a large swath of the south.

Lebanon and Israel in June signed a U.S.-mediated framework deal under which Israeli forces were to withdraw from areas they are occupying in southern Lebanon in exchange for disarmament of the Iran-backed Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, but little progress has been made in implementation on the ground.

Hezbollah is not a party to the Lebanon-Israel talks and has said it will not give up its weapons in any area north of southern Lebanon’s Litani River. Israeli officials, meanwhile, have said they will not withdraw unless Hezbollah is disarmed throughout the country.

Another round of talks is expected to take place in Rome later this month.

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Sewell reported from Beirut.

Balogun also will miss Monaco’s match at Paris Saint-Germain in the French league on Friday after being omitted from the group traveling up to the capital.

Monaco said Balogun was back in group training. He hasn’t featured in any of the team’s four games so far this season.

The American striker was close to joining Everton for a reported 40 million pounds ($54 million) on Tuesday — the last day of the summer transfer window for most leagues in Europe — but opted to pull out of a deal because he felt uncomfortable that the English club raised doubts about his health in a medical examination, Monaco sporting director Thiago Scuro said.

Monaco is under pressure to sell Balogun, or another of its top players, because the club needs to generate money to comply with the French league’s financial rules.

Scuro said it was still possible Monaco sells the New York-born striker to a league where the transfer window remains open.

One such option is Saudi Arabia, where the window closes on Oct. 12.

Monaco begins the league phase of the Conference League on Oct. 15 and Balogun’s name did not appear on the club's provided squad list published by UEFA late Thursday.

Included on the list was Japan attacking midfielder Takumi Minamino, who is back after eight months out with a torn ACL in his left knee that forced him to miss the World Cup.

Minamino is also in Monaco's squad for the trip to PSG — a game Balogun will miss.

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See AP’s full soccer coverage here

Because diesel is used for many freight and delivery networks, higher diesel prices mean higher transportation costs for a long list of everyday goods. More expensive fuel is increasing bills for businesses across sectors — some of which have already passed off costs to consumers in the form of added fees on online orders and packages in the mail. And shoppers may see more and more sticker shock trickle into store shelves.

The increases could have political implications, with economic issues likely to be top of mind for many voters in November’s midterm elections.

One of the most immediate strains falls in the grocery aisle, particularly with produce, meat and other perishable foods that need to be hauled in and restocked frequently — or even harvested using diesel-powered farm equipment. It can take time for all of those costs to trickle down.

Still, experts warn that price hikes could mount the longer diesel remains expensive. A range of other products are also transported by diesel trucks, trains and boats, including clothing, cosmetics, furniture and more.

The price for regular gasoline has also been going up, although not as fast as the price of diesel. The average price was $4.15 a gallon, compared with $3.20 at this time last year, according to AAA.

What’s driving the latest jump for diesel

Before the U.S. and Israel launched their war against Iran in late February, the national average for a gallon of diesel was about $3.76 in the U.S., per AAA. Prices quickly climbed as the cost of crude oil — the main ingredient in diesel, as well as gasoline — soared amid supply chain disruptions and production cuts across the Middle East, notably with most tanker traffic bottlenecked in the key Strait of Hormuz.

Despite prices cooling some during hopes for peace earlier in the summer, oil has now renewed its climb as fighting once more escalates between the U.S. and Iran. Brent crude, the international standard, was trading at more than $95 a barrel Friday, up from roughly $70 before the war. Prices at the pump always follow closely behind.

The last time U.S. businesses and drivers saw sky-high fuel prices was in June 2022, when diesel reached as high as nearly $5.82 a gallon on average, months after the Ukraine war began and world leaders imposed sanctions against Russia, a leading oil producer.

When adjusted for inflation, however, prices have been higher in the past. Ahead of the 2008 financial crisis, for example, diesel peaked at about $4.74 a gallon — equivalent to $7.20 in 2026, according to the government’s latest data. And 2022’s record of nearly $5.82 would be about $6.56 this year when accounting for inflation.

That doesn’t take the pain away from today’s steep prices, which are already bringing ripple effects for the economy and wider costs of living. Drivers are feeling the pain each time they fill up gasoline, too.

The average $4.15 for a gallon of regular unleaded is up from $2.98 before the Iran war, although still well below the 2022 peak of nearly $5.02 a gallon nationwide.

Diesel has been more expensive than gasoline for decades, and its price has risen at a faster pace during recent energy crises. Some reasons include more limited supply, less flexibility in demand, and diesel’s position in global commerce overall. Individual households may find ways to drive less when gas prices are high, for example, but there’s fewer immediate substitutes for networks that rely on diesel to help produce and haul goods worldwide.

All eyes on food

Diesel is integral to every part of the food supply chain. It powers farm equipment and fishing boats as well as the trains, cargo ships and trucks that get food to grocery stores.

Fuel accounts for roughly 15% to 30% of the total cost of food, according to the Independent Grocers Alliance, a grouping of 7,500 global supermarkets. Because of this, higher diesel costs often result in more expensive food, although it can take a while for energy shocks to wind their way through the supply chain.

Items that need to stay refrigerated while they’re transported are often the first to see prices rise, according to David Ortega, a professor of food economics and policy at Michigan State University. In July, for example, overall U.S. grocery prices were up 2.7% compared to last July, but seafood prices were up 7% and fresh fruit prices were up 4.9%.

Ortega cautioned that there can be other factors at play when food prices go up or down. Lettuce also faced higher transportation costs in July, but a drop in demand due to the cyclospora outbreak caused prices to fall.

Still, consumers could feel more of a squeeze the longer diesel prices remain high.

“Early on, much of the cost increase gets absorbed along the supply chain through existing freight contracts and retailer margins,” Ortega said. “But as contracts reprice and fuel surcharges take hold, more of that cost makes its way to the grocery store.”

More fuel shocks

Back in April, e-commerce giant Amazon rolled out a temporary 3.5% fuel and logistics surcharge on some third-party sellers. And United Parcel Service, FedEx and the United States Postal Service also moved to add fees on some of the packages they ship earlier in the war, citing rising operational costs for fuel overall.

Ajesh Kapoor, CEO and founder of trucking technology company SemiCab, said trucking and transportations can adapt to rising diesel prices — but at some point there is a limit.

“Diesel price has a very, very direct impact on everything that moves on pretty much any mode,” Kapoor said.

The ramifications extend beyond the movement of consumer goods. Some public transit buses and trains also run on diesel — and diesel generators are often used for backup or emergency power, if not central electricity sources in some remote parts of the world.

Experts warn that the consequences could continue to deepen — particularly in countries in Africa and Asia, which rely more heavily on imports from the Middle East and have already been hit the hardest by energy shocks over the course of the war.

Neil Atkinson, energy analyst and senior fellow at the National Center for Energy Analytics, said refined oil products like diesel are becoming more expensive as supplies get stretched.

“This is gradually becoming a major crisis because A) the prices themselves are very high — but the physical stocks of these products are dwindling,” he said in a weekly briefing with maritime data firm Lloyd’s List Intelligence, pointing to the strain on the global refining system. “This cannot go on forever.”

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Associated Press writers Dee-Ann Durbin in Detroit and Mae Anderson in New York contributed to this report.

With one out, Tommy Edman singled to left and stole second and Mookie Betts walked, setting up Hernández who sent a 3-2 pitch into center for the Dodgers' eighth walk-off win of the season.

O'Brien (3-7) blew his sixth save of the season.

The Dodgers were hitless with eight other runners in scoring position before Hernández's hit. He and Edman, who went 4 for 5 batting leadoff in Shohei Ohtani's place, were the only players with hits.

Ohtani got the night off to rest neck, biceps and knee issues.

Cardinals reliever George Soriano loaded the bases with a leadoff walk to Hernández and consecutive two-out walks to pinch-hitter Max Muncy and Kyle Tucker in the eighth before pinch-hitter Dalton Rushing went down swinging.

St. Louis led 2-0 on RBI singles from Joshua Báez in the first and Ramón Urías in the third off Dodgers starter Tarik Skubal.

Cardinals starter Quinn Mathews allowed four hits, struck out four and walked four.

Skubal gave up two runs and tied his career high with 10 hits while striking out six.

Up next

Cardinals: RHP Kyle Leahy (10-4, 3.13 ERA) starts Friday's series opener at Colorado against RHP Ryan Feltner (5-9, 5.84).

Dodgers: LHP Blake Snell (2-1, 2.42) starts Friday's series opener against Washington LHP Jackson Kent (1-2, 5.59).

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See AP’s full MLB coverage here

Georgia Tech looked like it could pull off the improbable when quarterback Alberto Mendoza found receiver Dalen Penson for a 42-yard gain, putting the Yellow Jackets in field goal range. But Boo Carter blocked Aidan Birr's 45-yard attempt, and the Buffaloes stormed the field.

Coach Deion Sanders said his team, despite trailing all second half, never lost hope.

“If you'd know how many linemen grabbed me and said ‘I told y'all we got this, I told you we got this coach,'" Sanders said. "I mean you have no idea how many times I was shaken by a lineman and told that we got this, and I never doubted it."

A tough night for Lewis came together in the final two drives. The freshman quarterback took 9:07 off the clock with a 17-play, 61-yard drive that ended with a blocked field goal from 6-foot-9 Georgia Tech tight end Kevin Roche Jr.

Georgia Tech responded with a field goal scoring drive to take a 13-7 lead, but with newfound confidence, Lewis led a clutch two-minute drill for the win.

“I talked to him at halftime in front of the whole team... I told (Lewis) ‘Let’s go. Be that man. We believe in you. Let’s go.’ You know, I challenged him in front of the whole team,” Sanders said. “He took advantage of the moment.”

After a first half with six completions for 41 yards, Lewis finished the night 14-of-27 for 124 yards and a touchdown. Running back Micah Welch put the Buffaloes on the board with a 5-yard rushing touchdown in the second quarter, giving Colorado a short-lived 7-0 lead.

Georgia Tech responded 14 seconds later as Rahkeem Smith returned a kick 100 yards for a touchdown and tied the game. It was Smith’s first touch as a Yellow Jacket and the program’s first kick returned for a touchdown since Jahmyr Gibbs against Boston College in 2021.

Mendoza's debut

Mendoza finished the night 17-of-23 for 237 yards and dodged an injury scare that onlookers feared could affect his second half availability.

His debut featured promising moments, like scrambling away from traffic in the second quarter and throwing a 22-yard dart to Jordan Allen on the move. Mendoza capped off Georgia Tech's final drive with his longest completion of the night, a 42-yarder, to put the Yellow Jackets in field goal range.

He was sacked three times for a loss of 22 yards.

Reminiscent of 2023

Colorado's last time starting the season 1-0 was in 2023 in Sanders' debut with a 45-42 win against TCU, and it, too, was a thriller. The Buffaloes were the last to find the end zone in a barnburner, with Shedeur Sanders leading a 6-play, 82-yard drive late in the fourth.

Takeaway

Colorado: After seven seasons without a 1,000 yard rusher, Colorado has two strong prospects with Welch and Damian Henderson II splitting snaps in the backfield. Welch finished the night with 58 yards and a touchdown on 13 carries. Henderson had 12 carries for 65 yards.

Georgia Tech: Atlanta’s 74% humidity didn’t impact fan attendance, with 51,913 fans packed in Bobby Dodd Stadium’s third consecutive sell-out. The humidity helped contribute to ball control issues for Georgia Tech who fumbled three times in the first half, losing one.

Up next

Colorado hosts Weber State on Sept. 12.

Georgia Tech hosts No. 20 Tennessee on Sept. 12.

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Sign up for Top 25 poll alerts here, visit the Top 25 here and see AP’s full college football coverage here

The extraordinary disclosure made Thursday in the form of a note delivered to the judge offered the clearest glimpse yet of what may be keeping jurors from reaching a verdict on whether the Massachusetts mother is criminally responsible for killing her three children.

The jury has twice told Judge William Sullivan that it is unable to agree on a verdict. On Thursday, Sullivan brought in each juror individually and questioned them in private. The judge then reread his instructions on reasonable doubt before sending them back to continue deliberating.

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EDITOR’S NOTE: This story includes discussion of suicide. If you or someone you know needs help, the national suicide and crisis lifeline in the U.S. is available by calling or texting 988.

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Clancy's lawyer, Kevin Reddington, then asked Sullivan to dismiss the juror from the case, arguing the person had refused to follow the judge's instructions. Prosecutors objected, and Sullivan declined to remove the juror.

“I don’t feel it is proper for me to side with one side or the other of the deliberations,” the judge said. “I don’t feel it’s appropriate for me to say, ‘I agree with one juror or the 11.’ I have asked if they are able to follow my instructions. They swore earlier that they could.”

At one point and for the first time in the trial, Clancy was brought to join a sidebar conversation with the judge. Paralyzed from the waist down after her suicide attempt, Clancy uses a wheelchair, which Reddington pushed to the front of the courtroom.

“She has a right to know what’s going on,” he later told reporters.

Clancy, a 36-year-old former labor and delivery nurse, doesn’t deny strangling her children in the basement of their home in 2023 before trying to take her own life. Her attorney argues that postpartum psychosis led to her actions, while prosecutors say she knew what she was doing when she killed Cora, Dawson and Callan Clancy, ages 5, 3 and 8 months.

The prosecution argues she deliberately sent her then-husband on errands to get him out of the house, and prosecutors have questioned the seriousness of her suicide attempt.

Clancy’s livestreamed trial has generated intense interest, with reporters and spectators packing the courtroom. The case has also sparked deep public divisions over her culpability and the issues around maternal mental health after childbirth.

If the jury ultimately can’t agree on a verdict, the judge could declare a mistrial. Prosecutors would then have to decide whether to put Clancy on trial again, drop the charges or try to negotiate a plea deal with her lawyer.

If the jury decides Clancy was criminally responsible for her actions, it could convict her of either murder or manslaughter. If she is acquitted, a judge could still order her confined to a mental health facility if an evaluation determines that she poses a danger to the public.

Across the country and up and down ballots, candidates from both parties are increasingly on the attack over Flock cameras, the AI-powered nationwide network of automated cameras that record license plates and other characteristics of all passing vehicles, allowing law enforcement agencies to search and share that data. Although police say the cameras are an invaluable crime-fighting tool, some critics say their pervasiveness amounts to unconstitutional warrantless mass surveillance.

The cameras sold by Atlanta-based Flock Safety, which the company has said are running in 6,000 communities in every state but Alaska, have become a new campaign issue that candidates and strategists see as part of a backlash against powerful technology companies, connected to broader debates over the future of artificial intelligence and the associated boom in data center construction.

“We’ve seen candidates running on banning them, cutting off funding, or requiring warrants. That’s a credit to activists across the country who have raised concerns about their use,” Michael Soyfer, an attorney for the Institute for Justice, a public interest law firm litigating over the technology, said in a statement.

In response to questions about the cameras as a campaign theme, a Flock spokeswoman emphasized the company's claims about the power of its technology, saying it helped “solve approximately one million crimes and helped reunite roughly 10,000 missing people with their families.”

“We ask anyone weighing in on this issue to engage with the facts and the record: the crimes solved, the families reunited, the safeguards already in place, and what our technology actually does,” said MoMo Zhou, the company's vice president of communications. “We ask them to work with the communities using this technology to decide what rules should govern it and not to spread misinformation or ban a critical public safety tool outright that is helping to make communities safer.”

Flock opponents cite privacy concerns

License plate reader technology is decades old, and Flock was founded in 2017. But the company has faced a growing backlash this year — one that's crescendoed in recent weeks. It has come as awareness has grown about the sweeping reach of Flock's network, litigation has unfolded over constitutional questions related to the use of the cameras, and news media have documented cases of officers misusing the technology to stalk personal connections.

James Talarico, the Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate in Texas, recently declared, “Flock cameras have no place in Texas.” His Republican opponent Ken Paxton's campaign didn't respond to a request for comment.

Josh Shapiro, the Democratic Pennsylvania governor seeking reelection and considered a potential contender for the White House in 2028, said this week he would support a statewide ban. His Republican opponent, Pennsylvania Treasurer Stacy Garrity, said in a statement, “Flock cameras are an intrusive invasion of privacy and they should be banned.”

In Wisconsin, the issue dominated the governor's race this week.

Democratic nominee David Crowley, who is taking hits over his past comments in support of making Wisconsin a global AI and data hub, highlighted that he had issued an order limiting the use of Flock cameras in Milwaukee County, where he serves as county executive. He said that as governor he would “implement strict transparency and accountability laws that ensure Wisconsinites are not spied on.”

His Republican opponent, U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany, said in a statement that he would pause state funding for Flock cameras and create a task force to establish stronger privacy protections, penalties for misuse, limits on data retention and sharing and “safeguards against Communist China and foreign adversaries.”

The Wisconsin Democratic Party responded by posting a clip of Tiffany in April saying in response to a question about Flock cameras that he didn’t know what they were. Then the state Republican Party hit back, saying “Big Brother Crowley” had a long record of previously supporting police surveillance technologies.

The issue has also infiltrated Rhode Island’s gubernatorial race, where Democratic Gov. Dan McKee paused the installation of new cameras just weeks before the state’s Sept. 9 primary, citing privacy and transparency concerns. His primary opponent, former CVS executive Helena Foulkes, has questioned McKee’s motives for stopping the rollout so close to the election but agreed a review of how the data is being used was needed.

In Michigan, self-described democratic socialist William Lawrence, a Democratic nominee for the U.S. House, recently addressed the cameras by calling them “the most un-American thing I can imagine.” A spokesman for his opponent, incumbent Rep. Tom Barrett, noted that Barrett is a co-sponsor of legislation intended to ban federal agencies from using Flock cameras or other surveillance technology and to prevent state and local governments from using federal funds to buy them.

In Florida, where outgoing Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis's administration this week ordered the removal of automated license plate readers from state highway rights-of-way, Democratic Senate nominee Angie Nixon's campaign is selling a T-shirt that reads, “FLORIDA NEEDS TO GET THE FLOCK OUT.”

Law enforcement groups support the technology

While calls for bans or restrictions have mounted, other candidates have expressed more supportive or nuanced views, and policing groups have reiterated their strong backing for the company and its tech.

Mitchell Davis III, chief of police in Hazel Crest, Illinois, and the president of the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives, said in an interview that technology like Flock’s is “invaluable” and that the conversations around it have become “disturbing.”

“The disturbing thing for me right now is I’m seeing these communities that are telling their police departments that we’re no longer using these (automated license plate readers) in our communities, and that, I believe, that’s a huge mistake. Talk about the proverbial throwing the baby out with the bathwater,” he said. “Instead of focusing on eliminating the cameras, make sure that there’s proper guidelines and proper accountability for misuse of the cameras.”

President Donald Trump said recently at an Oval Office event that his administration was studying the issue and would have more to say soon.

Cayce Myers, an attorney who teaches courses that touch on public relations, political communications and privacy issues at Virginia Tech University, said Americans are increasingly living in a world where they are interfacing with new technologies like Flock cameras whether they want to or not.

“I think there’s a real synergy between the camera systems that we’re talking about and also this greater societal discomfort with AI and technology in general,” he said, adding that it seems obvious that new surveillance technologies will continue to become a major political issue.

For Josh Chavez, Flock cameras are one of his concerns about the intersection of emerging technologies and civil liberties in his stretch of West Texas where data center projects are proliferating. Chavez, an HVAC installer, is outspoken enough on data centers that he was invited to participate in a recent roundtable on the subject with Democratic gubernatorial candidate Gina Hinojosa, who is also a Flock critic.

“This is the government seeking more power, right?” Chavez said of the cameras. “In a partnership with Big Tech, who is seeking more money, all at the expense of us.”

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Associated Press reporters Scott Bauer in Madison, Wisconsin; Marc Levy in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania; Kimberlee Kruesi in Providence, Rhode Island; and Gary Fields in Washington contributed to this report.

The Americans have won 30 straight games in the tournament, dating to a loss to Russia in the 2006 semifinals. They'll have a young group of players trying to extend that run led by Caitlin Clark, Angel Reese and Paige Bueckers, who are making their debuts in the event.

It's not all youth for the U.S. as gold medal collector Breanna Stewart, who has already won three Olympic and three World Cup championships leads the squad.

Who could challenge the Americans

France will be the main competitor for the Americans, having lost by only one point in the 2024 Paris Olympics gold medal game. The French team is hungry to avenge that loss. Other teams that could be a threat to end the U.S. streak include Spain, Belgium and China. The Chinese team lost to the Americans in the 2022 World Cup final.

How the tournament works

The 16 teams were put into four groups and each will have a round-robin stage. The second- and third-place teams in each group will advance to a qualification round while the winner of the pool will advance to the quarterfinals. The four winners of the qualification rounds will then advance to the quarterfinals as well. In the 2022 World Cup there were only 12 teams and two pools. Teams had to play five games in six days before advancing to the quarterfinals. FIBA will be using two sites in Berlin to play the 36 games.

Where to watch the games

TNT will show all 36 games across TNT, truTV, and HBO Max as part of its multiyear rights deal with FIBA. The tournament runs from Sept. 4-13. The network hired Tina Charles and Renee Montgomery to be analysts during their studio coverage.

Charles helped the U.S. win three World Cups from 2010-18.

“There’s definitely going to be, challenges. you know, gold is earned. It’s not assumed,” she said in an interview with the AP. “When you put USA across your chest, there’s an expectation that you’re supposed to win, regardless of what your experience has been internationally. But I think people just don’t really understand how difficult that is.”

Charles knows that everyone wants to be the team to beat the U.S., which has won four straight World Cup championships.

“You’re playing the best players from around the world. You’re adjusting to different styles, you’re adjusting to the physicality of the game and how the referees will call these games and everybody wants to be the team that beats you. You have that bullseye on your back.”

FIBA ramping up its commitment to women's World Cup

FIBA has put more resources into this women's World Cup, looking to improve the player experience. Every player on every team will have their own hotel room for the first time. Some teams already had provided players with individual rooms. There is a dedicated weightlifting area and a private lounge that offers relaxation areas for teams.

FIBA Secretary General Andreas Zagklis told The Associated Press in an interview that providing these resources were important to the organization.

“We’re providing the same conditions as in the men’s World Cup,” he said. “We are providing also for the first time financial assistance to our members to prepare their teams.”

Why is there a break in the WNBA schedule?

With more than 50 WNBA players competing in the World Cup, the league is paused from Aug. 31-Sept. 16. This is the first time that the tournament is taking place during the WNBA season as usually it’s been after the Finals. The World Cup will move to a late November time slot in 2030 when Japan hosts it.

___

See AP’s full WNBA coverage here

The developments have created a sense of uncertainty about a popular voting method used by one-third of the nation’s voters.

North Carolina on Friday is scheduled to become the first state to widely distribute mail ballots for this year’s elections, which will determine the balance of power in Congress for the remainder of Trump’s term.

Election officials said that while they are closely monitoring the litigation, ballots will be mailed out as expected and the state is prepared to administer a secure election even if the new limits go forward.

“We believe that we are well positioned,” Sam Hayes, executive director of the State Board of Elections, told reporters during a news conference in Raleigh on Thursday.

Trump frequently castigates mail voting and has falsely blamed it for his 2020 loss to Democrat Joe Biden, which he sought to overturn. Though he has repeatedly voted by mail himself, the president is pushing to curtail access for others.

In March, Trump signed an executive order seeking to limit mail balloting. States would have to submit lists of eligible voters to the Postal Service through an online portal that apparently is still inactive. Ballot envelopes also would have to comply with new Postal Service rules and include barcodes.

Trump's directive has been held up by multiple lawsuits, but the U.S. Supreme Court last week handed down a procedural ruling in Trump's favor without weighing in on the merits of the case. On Thursday, the administration appealed another ruling to the nation's high court.

Election offices move forward, try to combat voter confusion

Election officials warn that headlines about the executive order and court fights have already confused some voters.

“The biggest part of this is that it has sparked questions about what it is. ‘What does this mean? What are you guys doing? Can I not vote by mail anymore?’” said Michael Dickerson, director of the Mecklenburg County Board of Elections.

“I just want people to be assured that, yes, you can still vote by mail,” he said, adding “it’s a safe and secure process.”

While the issue has ping-ponged around the courts, election workers in North Carolina have been working hard to get ready for the Friday deadline, officials there said in interviews.

Wake County elections employees have been processing absentee request forms, which come in daily online and in paper form, said Olivia McCall, the county's director of elections. They've also been coding ballots, running pre-election accuracy testing and packaging absentee packets that include a ballot, instructions and photo ID fliers, she said.

About 5,000 ballots will go out during Wake County's first wave, she said.

The turnaround time for ballots being returned could be quick, too, noted Dickerson, especially for military and overseas voters who can vote through an online portal.

“I guarantee you” votes will begin rolling in that way by Saturday, he said.

‘Business as usual,' North Carolina election official says

North Carolina Attorney General Jeff Jackson is among Democratic state officials who have aligned in one of the lawsuits challenging Trump's executive order and the changes proposed by the Postal Service.

In a recent court filing, a representative of the office argued it was “far too late in the election cycle to introduce such dramatic changes” and warned that implementing them would “imminently cause significant harm, confusion and disruption in North Carolina election administration.”

Officials with the State Board of Elections, which is led by a Republican majority, have projected confidence for a midterm cycle that is expected to see robust turnout, especially with a competitive U.S. Senate race on the ballot.

“It is business as usual, as far as I'm concerned,” Hayes, the board's executive director, said during the news conference.

The board has confirmed it has taken some initial steps to comply with the executive order, including submitting its envelopes to USPS for review. Hayes said they were approved. The state opted against submitting its voter information while the legal proceedings are pending.

A whistleblower told Congress this week that with the portal, the agency is rushing an untested product that is likely to be riddled with errors that could lead to millions of mail ballots being rejected. The Postal Service has declined to comment on the changes it’s trying to make to comply with Trump’s order given the ongoing litigation.

While the uncertainty around whether Trump’s executive order will be implemented has created confusion, the League of Women Voters of North Carolina is issuing its standard advice to voters, urging them not to wait until the last minute to return their ballot.

“They should fill out their absentee ballot and mail or hand deliver it as quickly as possible,” the group’s president, Jennifer Rubin, said.

USPS operational changes blamed for spike in rejected mail ballots

Election officials elsewhere also are warning voters to avoid delays in returning mail ballots, but not for reasons related to Trump's attempts to alter the rules.

They are pointing to a change in how the Postal Service processes mail —- with postmarks stamped at distant processing centers rather than local post offices — as a reason for what they say has been a spike in mail ballot rejections. In many states, mail ballots arriving several days after an election can still be counted as long as they are postmarked by the final day of voting.

In California, nearly 150,000 voters had their mail-in ballots rejected in the state's June primary, mostly because they were postmarked too late. Wisconsin officials wrote to the Postal Service after hundreds of ballots arrived too late to be counted during elections in April, which has prompted at least some of the state's 1,850 municipal clerks to start sending mail ballots to voters earlier than usual.

In Washington, where voting is done almost entirely by mail, state officials issued a report this week saying the number of mail ballots rejected in the August primary because of a late postmark was 32% higher than the primary two years earlier.

“Why are we disenfranchising Americans when we've had one of the best systems in the United States?” Democratic Sen. Maria Cantwell said during a news conference in her home state to promote the report.

The Postal Service has addressed the issue on its website, saying it is not changing its postmarking practices but acknowledging that “adjustments to our transportation operations” mean that postmark dates might not match the day mail was picked up by a letter carrier or dropped off at a post office. The agency said voters can request a manual postmark at a local post office.

More states are preparing to deliver mail ballots to their voters

Other states will soon follow North Carolina in kicking off their mail ballot process throughout September, including Alabama on Sept. 9. By the middle of the month, all states are required to send ballots to military and overseas voters.

David Becker, executive director of the Center for Election Innovation and Research and a former Department of Justice lawyer, said the time to implement any major election changes for this year's midterms “has long since passed.”

The group has filed legal papers supporting states in the fight against the new postal rules.

“That’s true even if they were good changes, which the mail EO definitely is not," Becker said. “The first ballots being mailed only confirms this fact.”

Don Millis, a Republican who also chairs the Wisconsin Election Commission, said it was not surprising that some local clerks had already started sending out mail ballots earlier than they normally would. The fear is that if the Supreme Court gives a green light to Trump's executive order, it would tilt the election into chaos.

“There’s a fundamental concern this thing is not going to work,” he said.

___

Associated Press writers Nicholas Riccardi in Denver and Tom Verdin in Sacramento, California, and video journalist Allen Breed in Raleigh, North Carolina, contributed to this report.

The Americans and everyone else will have to navigate around and over some of the tallest women on the planet: China’s 19-year-old Zhang Ziyu stands 7-foot-3. The U.S. team is already familiar with 6-10 Han Xu from her WNBA games with the New York Liberty.

If not for a passport mishap, Zhang and Han would be joined by another center — 6-7 Li Yueru, who plays with the WNBA's Dallas Wings. Li posted on social media Wednesday that her passport was lost in the mail and she won’t be able to compete.

China opens its campaign against the four-time defending champion in Berlin on Friday.

Tournament will be Zhang’s world debut

Zhang wasn’t playing when the U.S. beat China 83-61 in the 2022 World Cup final in Sydney for a fourth consecutive gold medal. She made her senior debut at the Women’s Asia Cup last year and helped China capture the bronze, averaging 14.8 points and 5.5 rebounds in the tournament.

Han praised her performance at that tournament and said she was ready to step onto the world stage.

“World Cup is a good moment for her, for the whole world to know her,” Han told The Associated Press. “I am so excited to play with her again.”

Both of Zhang’s parents played basketball and it was her mother who encouraged her to take up the sport.

As one of the oldest players in the Chinese roster at 26, Han takes on the responsibly of looking out for her younger teammates. She points out that Zhang is still “very young” and just starting her career.

“She’s a little girl, you know, like the heart is soft,” she said.

If Zhang plays on Friday — she missed China’s pre-tournament warmup against France on Tuesday and wasn't practicing during the brief time-slots open to media Wednesday and Thursday — her height alone will ensure she stands out against the tournament favorites.

“She’s good,” Han said on Wednesday. “She just needs some rest ... she has (a) big body and tall girl, and she needs some time to rest a little bit.”

On Thursday she said Zhang had practiced “a little bit” earlier before the media was allowed in.

U.S. guard Sonia Citron, also making her World Cup debut, says they’ll be prepared either way.

“I think just try to make it difficult for her, you know, to guard her as a team," Citron said. “Just don’t leave anybody on an island, but yeah, I think we’ll prep everything and then be ready.”

China’s ambitions for the World Cup

Few expect China to go further than it did in 2022, with France and Australia expected to be most likely challengers for the U.S.. But Zhang's introduction gives the Chinese an extra weapon they didn't have four years ago.

“At the last World Cup, we played our best, but before we played, we never thought we would do so well, but we gave 100%," Han said.. "I’ll try to do the same or better and try to focus every single game. “Especially me, I just try to focus because there’s so much noise around me.”

___ AP Basketball Writer Doug Feinberg contributed to this report.

___

See AP’s full WNBA coverage here

Search teams first heard voices from inside the tunnel in the morning, allowing them to locate the two men, Nepalese lawmaker Shri Ram Neupane said. Images showed a rescuer carrying one of the workers, covered in mud, on his back, while soldiers on either side helped.

One of those rescued said more people are alive inside the tunnel, according to army spokesperson Brig. Gen. Raja Ram Basnet, and the search is ongoing.

“I can’t explain what we are feeling at the moment. We are just grateful to god,” Amir Maharjan, the brother of one of those rescued, told The Associated Press.

Basnet confirmed the first trapped worker’s rescue, and Neupane posted about the second on his Facebook page shortly after.

Both men were flown to a hospital in Kathmandu, and Maharjan said his family was on its way there. One of the survivors was in critical condition, according to a statement from the prime minister’s office.

Officials identified the men as a mechanical foreman and a mechanical supervisor. They were rescued from a tunnel at the Trishuli 3A plant.

About 900 workers are missing from 12 hydropower projects in Nepal, with roughly 500 believed to be trapped in tunnels, according to authorities.

About 115 are believed trapped in the tunnel at Trishuli 3A alone, according to the Independent Power Producers Association of Nepal.

Nepal’s Communication Minister Bikram Timilsina wrote on his Facebook page that officials “are waiting for the rescue of more and more people.”

At least 1,287 people were killed in the Aug. 26 floods, likely caused by a glacier collapse, and more than 5,000 remain missing, according to the country’s disaster management agency. China said late Wednesday that 21 people were killed and 541 were missing on the Tibet side of the border.

Nepal’s disaster agency estimated Friday that flooding caused at least 387.5 billion Nepalese rupees ($2.5 billion) in damage to infrastructure and property.

___

This story has been updated to correct the characterization of the number of workers believed trapped in the tunnel at Trishuli 3A to dozens, not a dozen.

___

Saaliq reported from New Delhi.

The Cowboys got on the board in the first quarter when fullback Ricky Martin took an inside handoff, lowered his shoulder and powered his way into the end zone.

That gave Cooper City a 7-0 lead.

In the second quarter, Nick Dyer rolled out and dumped the ball off to sophomore Demario Dixon, who did the rest. Dixon found the end zone to put the Cowboys up 21-0.

Cooper City kept rolling from there, finishing with a 41-0 win and improving to 3-0 on the season.

France's CAC 40 slipped 0.1% to 8,275.17 in early trading, while the German DAX was little changed, inching down less than 0.1% to 25,982.69. Britain's FTSE 100 gained less than 0.1% to 10,834.34.

U.S. shares were set to be little changed with Dow futures down nearly 0.1% at 53,697.00, while S&P 500 futures inched up less than 0.1% to 7,757.00.

In Asia, Japan's benchmark Nikkei 225 rose 1.3% to finish at 65,020.94. South Korea's Kospi gained 1.6% to 6,687.21. Australia's S&P/ASX 200 declined 0.2% to 9,005.90. Hong Kong's Hang Seng jumped 1.7% to 25,650.87, while the Shanghai Composite lost 0.3% to 3,930.12.

In energy trading, benchmark U.S. crude edged down 55 cents to $90.75 a barrel. Brent crude fell 30 cents to $95.22 a barrel.

The six-month U.S. war with Iran, which has intensified lately, is the main cause behind the recent surge in energy prices.

Many nations depend on access to the Strait of Hormuz to import oil from the Middle East.

Iran fired at Kuwait on Thursday in retaliation for U.S. bombardments earlier in the week.

On interest rates, some investors are taking the recent remarks by Federal Reserve governor Christopher Waller as a sign that perhaps the Fed isn’t as likely to raise its short-term interest rates at its next policy meeting in two weeks as previously expected.

Waller said that, if new data next week shows inflation is cooling, he “would be inclined” to keep the Fed’s benchmark interest rate unchanged. Should the data show hotter inflation, he would consider a rate hike.

Market players are also closely watching what Japan's central bank might do on interest rates when its policy board meets later this month. Some analysts expect the Bank of Japan to raise its benchmark rate, and the question is by how much. Some reports say Japan is facing pressures to raise the interest rate so that the yen will move higher.

In currency trading, the U.S. dollar edged up to 156.41 Japanese yen from 155.84 yen. The euro cost $1.1624, down from $1.1631.

___

AP Business Writer Alex Veiga contributed to this report.

Yuri Kageyama is on Threads: https://www.threads.com/@yurikageyama

On Wednesday, the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office announced investigators had identified David Allen Snyder, formerly of Key West, as the man responsible for the killings. Deputies said Snyder died of natural causes in Idaho in 2008 at age 57 and never faced trial.

When authorities first contacted Barlow, she didn’t think they were calling with news that the case had been solved.

“At first I thought, because I do a little Googling, and I thought, oh they’re going to tell me about this podcast that they have,” Barlow said. “I just thought, don’t get your hopes up.”

Then investigators showed up at her home.

Barlow said three investigators carefully explained the breakthrough and gave her paperwork.

“They were very respectful, kind people,” Barlow said. “And they broached the subject gently and gave me the paperwork.”

Investigators told her DNA recovered from the crime scene eventually led them to Snyder through genetic genealogy and family-tree research.

“They told me that they found blood at the scene, not a lot,” Barlow said. “And it was the perpetrators, the murder monster, whatever you want to call him.”

Barlow said investigators explained that the DNA had been tested over the years before genealogy research produced a lead.

“They found a DNA click on one of those ancestries where you focus from the cousins out,” Barlow said. “It ended up where they found this girl who happens to be his daughter,” she said.

Authorities said a DNA sample from one of Snyder’s relatives was ultimately tested by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, confirming Snyder as the source of the DNA profile.

A lifetime of waiting

Barlow was just 19 when her sisters were killed.

She traveled to Florida immediately afterward and stayed for a month with her mother and future husband.

“We did our own investigation, but obviously we were in their way, and they kept telling us to go home,” Barlow said.

The sisters had traveled from New Jersey to the Keys for vacation. Investigators said they were last seen hitchhiking on Stock Island on May 2, 1973. Their bodies were found the following day in a wooded area near U.S. 1.

“It was shocking because I never expected it to be solved,” Barlow said. “I didn’t expect it to be solved six months into it.”

Snyder died without facing a trial, something Barlow said she has had to accept.

Still, she hopes the person responsible lived with the fear that his own loved ones could experience a similar tragedy.

“And I always thought, whoever did this, I hope they fear that somewhere someone was going to grab and do to their daughter or grandchild what happened to my sisters because it was monstrous,” she said.

Remembering Maggie and Mary

Barlow wants her sisters remembered for who they were, beyond the circumstances of their deaths.

“Maggie was strong and she was a little more of a daredevil,” Barlow said. “Mary was a sweet innocent girl. She had an excellent singing voice.”

Barlow remembers Maggie’s love of horses and her adventurous spirit.

“Maggie loved horses,” Barlow said. “She always wanted to have a horse ranch.”

The family also shared a love of adventure, and Barlow said she continues to carry that spirit with her.

“I’ve traveled all over and every time I go someplace like the Grand Canyon, I’ll go out there and I’ll say, ‘Maggie, Mary, look where we are,” Barlow said.

“Because if you give up your life because of some tragedy, that’s not honoring their life,” she said.

Her message after all these years?

“Not to give up, but don’t also let it control your life,” Barlow said. “I live my life full.”

It happened around 5:15 p.m. near the headquarters for Miami-Dade Fire Rescue located at 9300 NW 41st St. in Doral.

According to officials, rescue crews responded after receiving reports of a car that had been struck by lightning.

Investigators said an off-duty deputy was sitting inside his vehicle working an assignment when it was struck by lightning.

The deputy was taken by MDFR to HCA Florida Kendall Hospital in stable condition.

This is a breaking news story that will be updated as new information is made available.

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The violations include heavy rodent and roach activity, live flies landing on food, mold inside ice machines, improper food temperatures, and serious food-handling violations.

At one restaurant, inspectors found more than 50 rodent droppings, while another still had live roaches during a follow-up inspection.

All the places mentioned were allowed to re-open following an ordered cleanup and then a re-inspection.

**GIARDINO GOURMET SALADS

11624 N. KENDALL DR.

KENDALL

ORDERED SHUT 8/27

10 VIOLATIONS FOUND

“Stop Sale issued due to food not being in a wholesome, sound condition. Live, small flying insects found. Observed one live flying insect landing inside container of garbanzo beans at front counter. Observed 15+ live flies landing inside container of red onions under prep table in back prep area.”

“Live, small flying insects found. Observed one live fly landing inside container of garbanzo beans at front counter. Observed 10+ live flies flying and landing on clean equipment and inside container of garbanzo beans in dish area. Observed 15+ live flies landing inside container of red onions under prep table in back prep area. Observed 15+ live flies at mop sink, flying and landing on dry storage rack where canned goods and spices are stored. Observed 3 live flies on wall next to reach in cooler at back door.”

“No proof of required state approved employee training provided for any employees.”

“Accumulation of black/green mold-like substance in the interior of the ice machine/bin. Observed interior of ice machine soiled.”

“Cold holding equipment not maintained in good repair. Do not store time/temperature control for safety food in this unit until the unit is repaired. Observed reach in cooler at front counter facing front door with ambient temperature 45F. Repeat Violation.”

**KFC

7107 WEST MCNAB ROAD

NORTH LAUDERDALE

ORDERED SHUT 8/26

3 VIOLATIONS FOUND

“Roach activity present as evidenced by live roaches found. Approximately 3 live roaches crawling on cove molding and wall behind deep fryers in kitchen, discussed with operator to eliminate all roaches and clean and sanitize areas.”

**ICHIMI

MIDTOWN MIAMI

3250 NE 1ST AVE

MIAMI

ORDERED SHUT 8/26

23 VIOLATIONS FOUND

“Rodent activity present as evidenced by rodent droppings found. Observed approximately 18 rodents droppings under Single service storage by bathrooms hallway. Observed approximately 10 droppings at floor by alcohol storage room. Observed approximately 15 droppings behind white freezers by storage next to exit back door. Observed approximately 10 droppings under three compartment sink. Observed approximately 10 droppings behind freezer by walk in cooler.”

“Accumulation of black/green mold-like substance in the interior of the ice machine/bin.”

“Food-contact surface soiled with food debris, mold-like substance or slime. Observed green, red and blue cutting boards soiled by prep area by ware washing.”

“Ceiling/ceiling tiles/vents soiled with accumulated food debris, grease, dust, or mold-like substance. At kitchen and prep area.”

“Floor soiled/has accumulation of debris. Observed floor heavily soiled inside walk in cooler, behind freezers by storage, by cook line and storage.”

“Nonfood-contact surface soiled with grease, food debris, dirt, slime or dust. Observed reach in coolers soiled at cook line.”

“Dish machine not sanitizing properly. Discontinue use of dish machine for sanitizing and set up manual sanitization until dish machine is repaired and sanitizing properly. Observed Dishwasher (Chlorine 0ppm). Employee started setting up three compartment sink.”

FOLLOW-UP INSPECTION 8/27

“Observed approximately 8 rodents droppings under Single service storage by bathrooms hallway. Observed approximately 6 droppings at floor by alcohol storage room. Observed approximately 5 droppings behind white freezers by storage next to exit back door. Observed approximately 5 droppings under three compartment sink. Observed approximately 4 droppings behind freezer by walk in cooler.”

**NUEVA SAN SALVADOR RESTAURANT #4

1147 NW 22ND AVE.

MIAMI

ORDERED SHUT 8/24

35 VIOLATIONS FOUND

“Employee touched bare body part and then engaged in food preparation, handled clean equipment or utensils, or touched unwrapped single-service items without washing hands. Observed cook touching face and continued to cook food. Coached employee to wash hands properly.”

“Nonfood-grade bags used in direct contact with food. Observed bread stored on prep table inside Nonfood-grade bags.”

“Raw animal food stored over canned/bottled drinks. Observed raw pork container stored over plastic bottles of milk containers stored inside walk in cooler.”

“Raw animal food stored over/not properly separated from ready-to-eat food. Observed raw beef container stored over cooked pork container at walk in cooler.”

“Raw animal foods not properly separated from one another based upon minimum required cooking temperature when stored in a freezer - not all products commercially packaged. Observed raw chicken container stored over raw pork not commercially packaged at walk in freezer.”

“Rodent activity present as evidenced by rodent droppings found. Observed approximately 50+ droppings at shelves by storage. Observed approximately 25+ droppings under bags of flour at storage. Observed approximately 10+ droppings on top of cooking oil container by storage.”

“Single-use gloves not changed as needed after changing tasks or when damaged or soiled. Observed employee wearing gloves cleaning and preparing food with same gloves by cook line.”

“Time/temperature control for safety food cold held at greater than 41 degrees Fahrenheit. Observed raw chicken (45F - Cold Holding); raw beef (47F - Cold Holding); cooked yuca (51F - Cold Holding) at prep table across cook line. As per cook closed and open cooler busy hours. Employee stored inside walk in cooler for rapid cooling.”

“Time/temperature control for safety food, other than whole meat roast, hot held at less than 135 degrees Fahrenheit.’

“Observed cooked beef soup (123F - Hot Holding); refried beans (130F - Hot Holding), as per manager prepared today less than 2 hours.”

“Ware washing sanitizing solution exceeding the maximum concentration allowed. Observed Triple Sink (Chlorine 200+ppm). Employee diluted with water, Recheck; Triple Sink (Chlorine 100ppm).”

“Commercially processed ready-to-eat, time/temperature control for safety food opened and held more than 24 hours not properly date marked after opening. Observed milk containers opened not dated at walk in cooler.”

“No paper towels or mechanical hand drying device provided at handwash sink. Observed no paper towels at hand sink by cook line.”

“Required employee training expired for some employees.”

“Accumulation of black/green mold-like substance in the interior of the ice machine/bin. Across three compartment sink.”

“Ceiling tile missing. Observed above storage area a ceiling tiles soiled missing.”

“Dead rodent present. Observed one dead rodent stuck in a glue trap on top of shelves near bags of flour Maseca by storage.”

“Equipment in poor repair. Observed a reach in cooler empty in disrepair by storage. Observed reach in cooler drawers in disrepair at cook line.”

“Establishment charging automatic gratuity without properly disclosing the information on the menu and the bill.”

“Establishment using wood (other than a hard, close-grained wood) as a food-contact surface. Observed shelves by storage area.”

“Exterior door has a gap at the threshold that opens to the outside. Observed by exit back door.”

“Faucet/handle missing at plumbing fixture. Observed mop sink faucet missing near three compartment sink.”

“Floor area(s) covered with standing water. Observed standing water on floor by cook line and three compartment sink and by walk in coolers.”

“Floor tiles missing and/or in disrepair. Observed by mop sink area floor tiles in disrepair. Repeat Violation”

“Food stored on floor. Observed boxes of raw frozen meat stored on floor by freezer. Observed raw chicken container stored on floor inside walk in freezer.”

“No conspicuously located ambient air temperature thermometer in holding unit. Repeat Violation,”

“Nonfood-contact equipment exposed to splash/spillage not constructed of materials that are corrosion resistant, non-absorbent, smooth and easily cleanable.”

“Nonfood-contact surface soiled with grease, food debris, dirt, slime or dust. Observed reach in cooler gaskets soiled by storage area. Observed hoods soiled at cook line. Repeat Violation.”

“Screen in door torn/in poor repair - vermin present. Observed screen door back exit door torn.”

“Stored food not covered. Observed a container with raw chicken uncovered at walk in freezer. Repeat Violation,”

“Time/temperature control for safety food thawed in an improper manner. Observed cooked chicharron stored on prep table by reach in cooler thawing at room temperature.”

“Unsealed concrete floor in food preparation, food storage, ware washing area or bathroom. By ware washing area and walk in freezer entrance.”

“Walk-in cooler/freezer shelves with rust that has pitted the surface.”

“Water leaking from pipe and/or faucet/handle. Observed water leaking from pipe at hand sink by kitchen.”

“Wet wiping cloth not stored in sanitizing solution between uses. Observed on top of cooler by front counter. Repeat Violation.”

“Working containers of food removed from original container not identified by common name. Observed a container with sugar at front counter by coffee not labeled.”

**CLUB DE LA MILANESA

MIDTOWN MIAMI

3250 NE 1ST AVE.

MIAMI

ORDERED SHUT 8/25

20 VIOLATIONS FOUND

ALSO ORDERED SHUT 5/12/26 (RODENT ISSUE)

ALSO ORDERED SHUT 2/25/2026 (ROACH ISSUE)

“Rodent activity present as evidenced by rodent droppings found. Observed around 25+ droppings under cleaning products racks storage by mop sink. Repeat Violation.”

“Live, small flying insects found. Observed 5 live flies flying around bar area, landing on clean cups and landing on walls at bar area. Observed 3 live flies flying around Dishwasher machine. Observed 3 live flies flying and landing at prep table by Milanese preparation table.”

“Roach activity present as evidenced by live roaches found. Observed one live roach at floor by cleaning product s storage floor.”

“Dish machine chlorine sanitizer not at proper minimum strength. Discontinue use of dish machine for sanitizing and set up manual sanitization until dish machine is repaired and sanitizing properly. Observed bar Dishwasher (Chlorine 0ppm). Repeat Violation.”

“Employee began working with food, handling clean equipment or utensils, or touching unwrapped single-service items without first washing hands. Observed employee cleaning table getting soiled cups from table, and proceeded to get ice for customers by bar area.”

“Employee cracked raw shell eggs and then handled ready-to-eat food and/or clean equipment or utensils without washing hands. Observed employee cracked a raw shell eggs put it to cook at stove, and proceeded to get a clean plate to served.”

“Time/temperature control for safety food cold held at greater than 41 degrees Fahrenheit. Observed prep table; caramelize onions (47F - Cold Holding); sliced tomatoes (52F - Cold Holding); cheese sause (50F - Cold Holding) at prep table. As per employee rush lunch hours.”

“Time/temperature control for safety food, other than whole meat roast, hot held at less than 135 degrees Fahrenheit. Observed boiled eggs (87F - Hot Holding); cooked chicken (103F - Hot Holding) inside microwave. As per cook prepared less than 1 hour.”

“Commercially processed ready-to-eat, time/temperature control for safety food opened and held more than 24 hours not properly date marked after opening. Observed milk container not dated.”

“Employee has not received adequate training related to their assigned duties as evidenced by the inability to answer basic food safety questions. Observed cook unable to answered minimum cooking temperature of chicken.”

“Handwash sink used for purposes other than handwashing. Observed a plastic container stored inside hand sink bar area. Repeat Violation.”

“No currently certified food service manager on duty with four or more employees engaged in food preparation/handling.”

“No soap provided at handwash sink. Observed no soap at hand sink by ware washing area near freezer.”

“Employee beverage container on a food preparation table or over/next to clean equipment/utensils. Observed employee cup container stored on prep table by bar area near to customers water glass bottle. Observed an open cup with water at prep area near microwave.”

“Employee personal items stored in or above a food preparation area, food, clean equipment and utensils, or single-service items. Observed scooters stored across mop sink and storage cleaning area.”

“Hole in or other damage to wall. Observed wall missing above walk in cooler.”

“Ice scoop handle in contact with ice. Observed ice scoop handle touching ice at bar area.”

“Nonfood-contact surface soiled with grease, food debris, dirt, slime or dust. Observed reach in cooler gaskets soiled at prep tables throughout the kitchen and across fryer.”

“Single-service articles improperly stored. Observed SS boxes to go stored on floor between kitchen entrance and hallway bathroom.”

“Wall soiled with accumulated grease, food debris, and/or dust. Observed wall soiled on prep area across Dishwasher.”

**JOANNA’S MARKETPLACE

8247 S. DIXIE HIGHWAY

MIAMI

ORDERED SHUT 8/25

17 VIOLATIONS FOUND

“Dented/rusted cans present. See stop sale. Observed dented can of grape leaves, 4lb Dolma. Operator removed can from kitchen.”

“Live, small flying insects found. Observed 3 live flies in bakery kitchen, on counter and in air above food prep table. Observed 8 live flies in kitchen area across triple sink, on canned goods and dry food storage. Observed 10+ live flies inside bag of onions in kitchen area across dish machine. Observed 6 live flies near floor drain outside of walk in cooler.”

“Non-food grade paper/paper towel used as liner for food container. Observed lining romaine lettuce in deli”

“Stop Sale issued due to food not being in a wholesome, sound condition. Observed 10+ live flies inside bag of onions in kitchen area across dish machine.”

“Food-contact surface soiled with food debris, mold-like substance or slime. Observed dry food shelves soiled.”

“No paper towels or mechanical hand drying device provided at handwash sink. Observed none at hand sink at deli counter.”

“Non-pitting surface rust on food-contact equipment. Observed on multiple knife magnets. Repeat Violation.”

“Ceiling/ceiling tile shows damage or is in disrepair. Observed water damage. Repeat Violation.”

“Ceiling/ceiling tiles/vents soiled with accumulated food debris, grease, dust, or mold-like substance. Observed soiled tiles throughout kitchen. Repeat Violation.”

“Employee beverage container on a food preparation table or over/next to clean equipment/utensils. Observed water bottle on bakery counter. Repeat Violation.”

“Food storage container/container lid cracked or broken. Observed multiple containers with broken lids and chipped.”

“In-use wet wiping cloth/towel used under cutting board. Observed under board at deli counter.”

“Reach-in cooler shelves with rust that has pitted the surface. Observed in multiple coolers. Repeat Violation.”

“Unsealed concrete floor in food preparation, food storage, ware washing area or bathroom. Observed in parts of kitchen. Repeat Violation.”

“Walk-in cooler/freezer shelves with rust that has pitted the surface. Observed in walk in.”

“Wall soiled with accumulated grease, food debris, and/or dust. Observed dust accumulation. Repeat Violation.”

**OCEAN GRILL

1075 DUVAL ST.

KEY WEST

ORDERED SHUT 8/25

9 VIOLATIONS FOUND

ALSO ORDERED SHUT 7/16/26 (RODENT/ROACH ISSUES)

“Roach activity present as evidenced by live roaches found. Observed four live roaches crawling on the handwashing sink at ware washing area. Observed eight live roaches crawling on the floor under dishwasher at ware washing area. Observed one live roach crawling on glassware at ware washing area. Observed three live roaches crawling on the wall and on shelf where plates and metal cook pans are stored. Observed one live roach crawling on reach in lowboy at cook line where food is prepared. Observed in reach in cooler at cook line 2 live roaches crawling on gasket. Observed two live roaches, crawling on table slicer at prep area.”

“Ceiling tile missing. Observed missing ceiling tiles at entrance to women & men’s bathroom.”

“Commercially processed reduced oxygen packaged fish bearing a label indicating that it is to remain frozen until time of use no longer frozen and not removed from reduced oxygen package. See stop sale. Observed at cook line flip top, mahi thawed original ROP packaging.”

“In-use tongs stored on equipment door handle between uses. Observed at cook line tongs stored on oven handle.”

“Reach-in cooler /Reach-in freezer/ Walk-cooler interior/shelves have accumulation of soil residues. Surgeon interior of reach in freezer at cook line soiled with food debris.”

“Nonfood-grade bags used in direct contact with food. Observed at flip top workstation, mixed greens and baby arugula, stored in to go bags.”

“Stop Sale issued due to food not being in a wholesome, sound condition. Observed at cook line flip top raw chicken (50F - Cold Holding); crab cake (48F - Cold Holding); cut tomatoes (50F - Cold Holding), as per employee there since the previous night.”

“Time/temperature control for safety food cold held at greater than 41 degrees Fahrenheit. Observed at cook line flip top raw chicken (50F - Cold Holding); crab cake (48F - Cold Holding); cut tomatoes (50F - Cold Holding), as per employee there since the previous night.”

“Vacuum breaker missing at hose bibb or on fitting/splitter added to hose bibb. Observe my sink with no vacuum breaker at prep area.”

FOLLOW-UP INSPECTION 8/26

“At callback inspection observed 3 live roaches on the wall in dish area around door way. Observed 2 live roaches on the wall near handwashing sink . Observed one live roaches crawling on containers over triple sink until repairs. Observed 3 dead roaches inside lift lid unit on cook line . Observed one live roach crawling on lift lid unit on cook line.”

**HURRICANE HOLE

5130 OVERSEAS HIGHWAY

KEY WEST

ORDERED SHUT 8/25

14 VIOLATIONS FOUND

“Rodent activity present as evidenced by rodent droppings found. Observed approximately 20+ rodent droppings on floor near reach in cooler containing sauces next to the liquor storage room. Employee removed droppings and sanitized area.”

“Ceiling tile missing. Observed ceiling tiles missing near reach in cooler containing sauces next to liquor storage room.”

“Ceiling/ceiling tile shows damage or is in disrepair. Observed ceiling tiles in disrepair in the kitchen and ware washing area.”

“Ceiling/ceiling tiles/vents soiled with accumulated food debris, grease, dust, or mold-like substance. Observed ceiling tiles in the kitchen soiled with food debris.”

“Cove molding at floor/wall juncture broken/missing. Observed cove molding missing at prep sink near the dishwasher.”

“Equipment and utensils not properly air-dried - wet nesting. Observed clean plastic containers stacked together above preparation sink not properly air dried.”

“Food stored in a location that is exposed to splash/dust. Observed cove molding box of breads stored under dripping water from ac at walk in cooler.”

“Stored food not covered. Observed chicken wings at walk in cooler not covered.”

“Wall soiled with accumulated grease, food debris, and/or dust. Observed walls soiled in some areas in the kitchen behind equipment. Also observed wall near dishwasher soiled with black substance.”

“Water leaking from pipe and/or faucet/handle. Observed water leaking from pipe under handwash sink near office.”

“Raw animal food stored over/not properly separated from ready-to-eat food. Observed raw shrimp stored over cooked wings at reach in cooler across fryers.”

“Food-contact surface soiled with food debris, mold-like substance or slime.”

“No soap provided at handwash sink. Manager provided soap at time of inspection.”

“Non-pitting surface rust on food-contact equipment. Observed can opener rusted.”

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But Miami police and Miami-Dade deputies said “Dr. Lori” was actually Latonya Shanice Starks, who is not a licensed doctor ― and is instead a 33-year-old felon with no “legitimate job.”

Detectives said she was illegally performing injections ― some of which left patients with scarring, pain and abscesses. In one case, police said a victim believed the complications ultimately led her to have a miscarriage.

Authorities said Starks, of Aventura, ran Lori Dior Miami Med Spa at 5789 NW Seventh Ave. in Miami’s Liberty City neighborhood.

‘Lumps,’ ‘irritation’, ‘abscesses’ and a miscarriage

Authortiies said they received complaints in May and June about Starks who went to “Dr. Lori” to receive Sculptra, described in arrest reports as a “dermal filler.”

In one case, police said a woman who said she found Starks through the loridior_beautyspa Instagram page went to the clinic in September for Sculptra, “represented to her as a fat-dissolving injection.”

“The victim later learned she was allegedly injected with lemon bottle, which is a foreign fat-dissolving substance that is not approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration,” a Miami Police Department detective wrote in one of the arrest reports. “The victim stated that after receiving the injections, the substance later began breaking through her skin in the same areas where she had been injected.”

Investigators said the woman “suffered a severe adverse medical reaction and required repeated hospitalization over a period of approximately three months.”

The woman, who became pregnant in January, believed that she had a miscarriage months later because of medications she had to take to treat the complications, one arrest report states.

In another case, investigators said a woman who also found Starks through Instagram went to the clinic with her sister in October for injections.

One of the women, who said she was trying to get rid of “hip dips,” said Starks used an insulin needle to inject what the victim believed was Sculptra into her buttocks and abdomen area using an insulin-type needle, the report states.

A Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office detective noted that the substance is “typically injected from a larger syringe than an insulin-type needle because the particles can clog it.”

Authorities said the victim, who paid Starks $1,200, never saw a Sculptra box and wasn’t sure if that’s what she actually received. They said the victim also paid Starks $650 for her sister, who was in South Florida from Kentucky to celebrate her birthday, to get injections as a gift.

According to an arrest report, both women said they began experiencing “lumps and irritation” after getting the injections. Both women, police said, had to have multiple procedures to get abscesses drained and scarring repaired and both continue to suffer pain at their injection sites.

One of the women said she even lost her job “because she has missed work due (to) the multiple doctor appointments that she has had to go to repair her scarring and drain her abscesses,” police said.

Instagram posts and a felony record

Police said they reviewed the loridior_beautyspa Instagram, where videos showed “Starks filming herself while stating that she is no longer performing injections and instructing individuals to stop contacting her to request injections.”

A post on the account reads, “Lori Dior ONLY does trainings. I do not provide services. I can refer y’all to people but I stop (sic) doing liquid bbls 2 years ago.”

“My classes be soo GHETTO,” a post about a training session read.

Other posts include advertisements for Lori Dior’s “signature POWERBOOTY™ Buttock Enhancement Machine," showing what appear to be AI-generated clips of women having their buttocks significantly inflated by the machines on a beach.

Detectives said records revealed that Lori Dior was never licensed with the state and “further investigation revealed that Starks had previously received a cease-and-desist order from the state of Georgia for similar operations prior to conducting business in Miami.”

Georgia Department of Corrections records show Starks, a native of the Peach State, was convicted of committing multiple crimes, including first-degree forgery and shoplifting, in suburban Atlanta in 2010. Authorities said she was on probation at the time of her arrest on Wednesday.

Traffic stop and arrest

Starks, authorities said, was taken into custody after a traffic stop near her home in Aventura.

A search of her vehicle revealed “medical and cosmetic equipment, including needles, a sharps container, bandages, and packaging labeled Sculptra 150,” police said.

They said they received a warrant to search her apartment at the Portsview at the Waterways condo building at 3610 Yacht Club Drive and found “additional medical and cosmetic equipment.”

Authorities said Starks claimed that a registered nurse named “Kate,” whose last name, phone number or credentials she couldn’t provide, was doing the injections.

Starks is now facing three charges of practicing healthcare without a license causing serious injury, as well as two counts of felon in possession of a firearm.

Records show she was being held in the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center on a total bond of more than $30,000.

Editor’s note: This story has been edited to note that one of the cases was investigated by the Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office.

The boyfriend's mother, meanwhile, is accused of helping him cover up the crime, according to state police.

Royce Moser, 18, of North Strabane Township, faces a homicide charge in the death of Karoline Heintz, a student at PennWest California University whose body was found Aug. 20 after she failed to return to the southwestern Pennsylvania college, according to a criminal complaint.

Moser said he became angry with Heintz during a conversation in her vehicle in Moser’s driveway and that he had a “demon take over” and tell him to stab her, according to the police affidavit. A preliminary hearing was held Tuesday for Moser and his mother, Rachel Moser, in Heintz’s death.

An attorney for Royce Moser declined to comment on the charges against him, and a message left for a public defender representing Rachel Moser was not immediately returned.

The 37-minute video released Thursday is from an officer’s body-worn camera. It shows the California, Pennsylvania, police officer walking up to Karoline Heintz’s Jeep in the dark. The officer points a flashlight inside the back window, yells toward another officer nearby, then gets on his radio.

“Control, I need EMS here right now,” the officer said. “I’ve got an unconscious female in the back of this car right now. Any additional units, any in the available area, please.”

An operator radios back, “Is she breathing?”

“Negative,” the officer responds as sirens are heard in the background. “I’ve got blood everywhere.”

The officer then breaks two windows to gain access inside the vehicle.

“Get someone here now,” he said.

According to the affidavit, Moser said he told Heintz, “wait, I have something for you” before retrieving a knife from his home. The victim fell out of her vehicle after being stabbed and Moser put her in the back hatch before getting into the driver’s seat. Moser then asked his mother to follow him to PennWest California University in southwestern Pennsylvania to drop off the vehicle, the affidavit said.

Heintz’s father had asked police to look for his daughter’s vehicle after she failed to return to campus, and indicated an AirTag in the vehicle showed she was in a parking lot, according to a criminal complaint. Police found Karoline Heintz’s body in the vehicle. The AirTag also indicated Heintz had been at Moser's home earlier.

Royce and Rachel Moser were later located at Rachel Moser’s residence in Beallsville. According to the affidavit, Rachel Moser told her son to bathe and change his clothes, which she placed in a washing machine. She then took the knife and put it in a garbage bag to dispose of in the trash outside her home, according to the affidavit. The knife was retrieved after investigators obtained a search warrant.

Royce and Rachel Moser both were charged with tampering with evidence, abuse of a corpse and obstruction of justice. Rachel Moser, 56, also was charged with hindering the apprehension of a fugitive and criminal use of a communication device. Their next court appearance is a formal arraignment scheduled for Oct. 13.

Mother and son are being held without bail in the Washington County jail.

Heintz’s family issued a statement asking the public to respect their wishes for privacy.

“This is a parent’s worst nightmare,” the statement said. “It has been devastating for family, friends, and the whole community. Karoline was loved by all. She was a kind, smart, beautiful girl. We want justice for our “sweet” Karoline.”

The Hurricanes are preparing for their first game of the season and the first start for new quarterback Darian Mensah, who transferred to Miami from Duke.

Local 10 caught up with players at the team buses Wednesday night as they arrived at Stanford Stadium for a walkthrough.

Mensah spent the offseason working to build chemistry with his new teammates, particularly the offense.

“Yeah, I kind of just hang out in a group setting,” Mensah said. “I’ll try to hang out with certain groups of the offense like running backs, tight ends, receivers.”

Mensah said he also used extra time after practice to develop timing with his receivers.

“It’s not like a one-on-one thing, but, yeah, I’ll just hang out with them outside the ball, but, as far as the relationship goes, just trying to throw extra routes after practice,” Mensah said.

He said he also returned to plays where he felt he missed an opportunity.

“If I missed the throw that, you know, that kind of stuck with me, I’ll, I’ll come back and hit it with the same receiver in the same spot,” Mensah said. “And so, that’s kind of how I, you know, attacked that.”

The Hurricanes will look to begin the season with a win when they take on Stanford on Friday at 9 p.m. ET.

Manager Dave Roberts texted Ohtani after the 8-6 defeat Wednesday to let him know he would not be starting in the series finale. The two-way superstar responded with an emoji salute.

“He knows that it was the right decision,” Roberts said.

Ohtani told the training staff that his right biceps and neck were bothering him.

“That’s why I think you saw some grimacing and some kind of shaking of the arm, just trying to get it to fire, and he couldn’t do that,” Roberts said.

Ohtani's symptoms haven't improved in recent weeks, and a potential stint on the injured list isn't off the table.

“Unlikely, but not impossible,” Roberts said.

The manager said he would talk to Ohtani and team trainers later Thursday to see how he responded before deciding his status for Friday's series opener against Washington.

“He wants to be in there, but I’m not going to just put him in there because of the name on the back of his jersey,” Roberts said, describing Ohtani's health as day to day.

Center fielder Tommy Edman was in Ohtani's leadoff spot against the Cardinals, while Alex Call took over as the designated hitter, batting eighth.

Ohtani hasn’t pitched in a game since July 3 because of lingering pain in his left knee and the right biceps. At the plate, he's hitting .279 after striking out four consecutive times for the first time this season.

Before being shut down, Ohtani was 8-2 with a 1.79 ERA in 14 mound starts.

He threw a 20-pitch bullpen session last Friday but was scratched from a potential start at Detroit two days later. Roberts said that until he sees Ohtani throw another bullpen, he won’t know the next step in his pitching progression.

The Dodgers want a healthy Ohtani in October as they chase a third consecutive World Series championship.

“It’s up to us to kind of figure out how we navigate these next three-and-a-half, four weeks,” Roberts said, “but I’m very confident that we’ll see the guy we all expect to see.”

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See AP’s full MLB coverage here

“I wouldn’t call it a war,” Vance said after being asked during a White House press briefing about whether the fighting could end before voters cast their ballots in the Nov. 3 congressional elections. “Right now, there is no active shooting.”

Vance's assertion came even as Iran fired at U.S. Gulf ally Kuwait on Thursday as it continued to retaliate for rounds of U.S. strikes on Iran earlier in the week.

The vice president said the U.S. had a “responsibility” to carry out this week's strikes because Iran continued to target commercial vessels passing through the Strait of Hormuz.

Vance's attempt to minimize the intensity of the fighting illuminates the difficult task at hand for Trump and his administration as he tries to persuade American voters to keep Republicans in control of Congress, even as the unpopular conflict — one the White House said at its outset would last a matter of weeks — has driven up gas prices and left consumers grappling with higher inflation.

Vance said he didn’t want to set “artificial timelines.”

“But when you ask, ‘When will this end?’ You’re asking me a question like, ‘When will the Iranians stop shooting at ships?’” Vance said. “I think the reality is, I don’t know the answer to that question. You would have to ask the Iranians.”

The administration in July faced scrutiny after it reclassified four fallen soldiers as well as dozens of wounded troops in its Defense Casualty Analysis System, which Pentagon officials have repeatedly pointed to as the definitive source on the numbers of dead and wounded from the conflict. Those killed or wounded in fighting after a brief ceasefire between the U.S. and Iran fell apart were classified in a new category called “Overseas Operations” after initially being tallied in the totals from the war.

White House insists more oil is getting out of Gulf, but prices remain high

Brent crude prices hovered above $95 per barrel Thursday. The international benchmark was around $72 per barrel the day before the conflict began.

Still, Trump and his aides have sought to push that the U.S. Navy is in control of the Strait of Hormuz, where about 20% of the world's traded oil passed before the war. They insist a near prewar level of Gulf oil is now making its way out of the critical waterway.

Vance at Thursday's press briefing said the U.S. escorted about 15 million barrels of oil on Wednesday. This was after Energy Secretary Chris Wright told CNBC on Wednesday that 17 million barrels were carried through the strait on Monday with assistance from the U.S. Navy. About 20 million barrels of Gulf oil flowed through the strait prior to the start of the war.

But ship traffic through the strait remains well below prewar levels, according to independent firms that track marine traffic.

There were 102 transits last week and 126 the week before, according to shipping data company Lloyd’s List Intelligence, compared with 130 or more per day before the war.

Over the past 28 days, 5 million barrels a day have exited the strait on average, according to TankerTrackers.com. Other recent estimates have varied from 2 million barrels per day to 6 million barrels per day.

Trump has tried to soothe volatile markets

Over the course of the war, Trump has repeatedly reported progress in negotiations or called off threats of military action at the last moment when global markets have become jittery. And markets have reacted swiftly to his public signals of peace or hints of progress.

“The administration is still jawboning oil markets,” said Rosemary Kelanic, Middle East director at Defense Priorities, of the administration's claims of dramatically increased flows of oil. “And they appear to be doing it again to keep prices from going too high, so that they can extend the timeline before there’s a worse price spike.”

With Iran's refusal to back down in the face of the U.S. military campaign, Trump has settled on a dual-prong approach that combines economic pressure with threats of an escalation in force, if necessary.

Trump has consistently emphasized that the campaign launched by the U.S. and Israel has been devastating for Iran’s navy and air force. Iranian officials have said the country has suffered $270 billion in direct and indirect damage. Israeli military strikes in the first weeks of the war wiped out much of the theocratic government’s leadership structure, including its Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Still, Iran has found leverage through its own strikes on the strait and Gulf allies of the United States. But the administration has sought to make the case that the waterway will become less important by the day, even as it asserts that more oil is getting through.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a Fox Business interview this week that the Strait of Hormuz will become a “worthless piece of water” within two years as new land pipelines planned for the region bypass the energy chokepoint. Trump himself took to social media on Thursday to highlight a news report about Syria's effort to transform the port of Baniyas on the Mediterranean coast into a westward route to international markets for Gulf exporters.

Meanwhile, Iran and Oman have recently discussed a phased approach to jointly managing ship traffic through the Strait of Hormuz.

Trump settles into holding pattern before midterms, analysts say

The administration maintains it's making progress economically choking off Iranian hard-liners, including the powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. At the moment, it would be a leap for Trump to agree to any plan that puts Iran in position to claim control of the strait, analysts say.

“I find it hard to believe the president would agree to anything that hands back any modicum of IRGC control over the strait that has been wrested away,” said Richard Goldberg, who served as a senior adviser on Iran policy in Trump's first administration.

Aaron David Miller, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said Iran does not appear ready to “let Trump out of the box” despite the massive pain being inflicted on its economy.

At the same time, Miller said, Trump seems to have settled into a holding pattern ahead of the midterms — one in which he avoids both a return to the full-throttle bombardment of Iran and making any accommodations to Tehran on the Strait of Hormuz.

“The White House doesn't want a massive war, and they don’t want to be seen as offering massive concessions,” Miller said. “The tack they are taking avoids both of those things.”

___

AP writers Jonathan J. Cooper and Josh Boak in Washington and David McHugh in Frankfurt, Germany, contributed to this report.

Then he delivered a blow to their postseason hopes.

Rutschman homered twice in his return to Camden Yards, hitting solo shots in the first and sixth innings for the Boston Red Sox in a 6-5 win over Baltimore on Thursday night. The loss left the Orioles 1 1/2 games out of the final wild-card spot in the American League.

“That's a heck of a way to make a return,” Red Sox interim manager Chad Tracy said. “That was awesome.”

Rutschman received a standing ovation from the crowd — and from the Baltimore dugout — when he came to the plate with two outs in the first. Then he slugged a 1-1 pitch from Brandon Young over the wall in right field. It was the All-Star catcher's 10th homer of the season and second since being traded from the Orioles to the Red Sox in early August. He added another homer in the sixth to cut Baltimore's lead to 3-2.

Rutschman also received a video tribute between the first and second innings, and he got another big ovation despite having already done some damage offensively for his new team.

“All of it was special, a true testament to them as an organization,” Rutschman said after the game. "They do it right.”

Rutschman hit two homers for the Orioles against Boston on April 24. He's the first major league player to have a multihomer game on both sides of the same matchup in the same season, according to OptaSTATS.

Rutschman has battled elbow issues of late, but he was back in the lineup after missing the previous three games. He’s only batting .193 since the trade, but perhaps this is the start of a more productive stretch run.

Baltimore drafted Rutschman No. 1 overall in 2019. His arrival in the major leagues in 2022 was part of a significant turnaround in which the Orioles ultimately won the AL East in 2023 and made the playoffs in 2024.

However, the last two years have been a good deal less successful. Although Rutschman made the All-Star team for the third time this year, the Orioles traded him to Boston just before the deadline.

“A lot of memories, a lot of positive experiences. The people in Baltimore have always treated me with an unbelievable amount of respect and love, and I’ve always felt that when I’ve been here,” Rutschman said before the game. “So just a huge thank you from the bottom of my heart.”

Rutschman is now in better position to make the playoffs. Boston is almost certain to qualify, currently holding the second wild card. The Orioles could still sneak in, but right now they are in last place in the AL East.

So there was a decent amount at stake once the pregame reunions were over.

“He couldn't help himself. He stopped into the clubhouse quickly,” Orioles manager Craig Albernaz said before the game. “A lot of hugs, a lot of crap talk going back and forth. It was good to see him.”

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See AP’s full MLB coverage here

Among those hit with sanctions are Fidel Ernesto Castro, grandson of former President Raúl Castro, and Cuba’s Oil Industry Supply Import Company, known as Abapet. The company is responsible for importing special equipment and spare parts needed to sustain Cuba’s crumbling power grid.

The sanctions aim to push Cuba’s critical machinery offline and exacerbate its energy crisis, said Brett Erickson, a sanctions expert and managing principal at Obsidian Risk Advisors, a consulting firm.

“The U.S. is trying to really tighten the screws as much as possible,” he said.

“The Trump administration seems to have no seriousness to accept any change from Cuba other than a toppling of regime. Marco is not going to let that go,” he added, referring to U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

Erickson anticipated that Cuba’s government would try to circumvent the sanctions “because they have to.”

“They’ll get creative in how they try to procure these maintenance parts,” he said, warning it would be a costlier alternative, which in turn would raise inflation and further hurt Cuba’s economy.

Islandwide blackouts have become increasingly common, while daily outages in Cuba now surpass 24 hours as the aging grid fails and fuel reserves dwindle ever since U.S. President Donald Trump in late January threatened tariffs on any country that sells or provides oil to the island.

“The goal in theory is to create so much civilian hardship and suffering that they have no option but to essentially rise up and topple their government,” Erickson said. “It is an attempt to cause a humanitarian crisis.”

Talks earlier this year between the U.S. and Cuba have since halted, while sanctions have increased in recent months.

Erickson said he expects the U.S. to keep targeting smaller and smaller state companies to try and push them “into a death spiral.” The U.S. has previously sanctioned entities including Cuba's state-owned oil and gas company.

The U.S. State Department made the announcement just hours after Cuban officials held a press conference to share more details on the historic economic reforms approved in June.

When asked about the current situation in Cuba, Oscar Pérez-Oliva Fraga, Cuba’s deputy prime minister and minister of foreign investment, blamed the U.S. government.

“This past year has been very complex, and we know why,” he said. “The blockade is a genocide.”

He spoke before the sanctions were announced.

Among the Cubans exhausted by the ongoing outages is 49-year-old Yaqueline Bernal. She said Thursday that she hasn’t had electricity since Sunday and worries most about the consequences for her eight young grandchildren.

“If we don’t have power, we don’t have water,” she said. “You really don’t know what’s going to happen to you.”

Bruno Rodríguez, Cuba's foreign affairs minister, decried the latest sanctions on X.

“Collective punishment is a crime. So, too, is inflicting suffering on an entire population through measures coldly calculated to trigger a humanitarian crisis,” he said. “Enough with the abuse. Put an end to the blockade once and for all and allow Cuba to live in peace.”

Eugenio Martínez Enríquez, Cuba’s ambassador in Mexico, called Rubio “a liar without scruples.”

“We will not forget his crimes,” he wrote on X.

Meanwhile, Rubio asserted on X that those sanctioned “are part of the corrupt Castro financial and intelligence network.”

“Cuba’s Communist regime elites preside over a failed state where ordinary Cubans go hungry while the Castro family and other insiders enrich themselves through sanctions evasion and other illicit schemes — and seek to export subversive Marxist ideology to the United States and other states in the Western Hemisphere,” he wrote.

“Trump and I are unwavering in our commitment that Cuba will be free.”

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

Telle is currently the assistant secretary of the Army for civil works. But he spent more than 20 years working for Republican senators as well as in the White House during Trump's first term, serving as the president's chief liaison to the Senate, according to an Army bio.

“He is a Great Patriot, who is respected by all,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post.

Hegseth echoed that in his own post on X.

“Huge congrats to Adam. Strong and whip smart,” Hegseth wrote. “He is indeed a great Patriot — and will be an immediate asset to the @USArmy."

Driscoll gave no explanation for his decision to quit this week as the Army's top civilian official. His clashes with Hegseth have been widely reported, and some of Driscoll’s allies in the Army were ousted this year by Trump’s Pentagon chief.

Telle has been at the Army Office of Civil Works since August 2025, according to Legistorm, a website that tracks lawmakers and Capitol Hill staffers. Before that, Telle worked as chief of staff for Republican Sen. Bill Hagerty of Tennessee from 2021 to 2025.

Telle spent 18 months working in the White House during Trump's first term and 10 years working for the late Republican Sen. Thad Cochran of Mississippi, according to Legistorm.

Telle also worked as the chief staff member on the Senate Appropriations Committee’s Homeland Security Subcommittee, according to Hagerty's remarks when Telle was nominated for the civil works job in May 2025.

In his most recent job, Telle focused on matters involving commercial navigation, flood damage reduction and permitting under the Clean Water Act. Telle issued a statement in August about the approval of a company's plans to reroute an aging oil pipeline around a Wisconsin tribal reservation. In May, he was quoted in a story in The Forum, a newspaper in Fargo, North Dakota, about a $3.2 billion flood control project that will protect more than 200,000 people.

Telle will now be overseeing the nation’s largest fighting force at a time when the U.S. is still engaged in conflict with Iran and significant Army forces are stationed in the Middle East.

The war has significantly contributed to the U.S. military’s shortfall in critical weapons like the Patriot and THAAD defense missile interceptors systems, which are operated by the Army.

Driscoll, an Army veteran who served in Iraq, is a friend of Vice President JD Vance and had good relationships with both Republicans and Democrats in Congress.

His allies in the Army who were ousted by Hegseth included its top uniformed leader, Gen. Randy George. Gen. Christopher LaNeve took over as the Army’s acting chief of staff and recently pulled the plug on a drone modernization program that Driscoll had championed.

Driscoll spoke with Trump on the current state of the Army before he submitted his resignation, The Associated Press has reported.

Driscoll did not allude to any problems in the only public statement on his departure, saying Tuesday that it has been “the honor of a lifetime” to serve as Army secretary under Trump and Hegseth.

Democrats and Republicans lamented Driscoll’s departure, with some blaming Hegseth directly.

Sen. Thom Tillis, a North Carolina Republican who is retiring and sometimes has clashed with Trump, said on social media that Hegseth “is creating a leadership void at the top of our military ranks.”

Troopers and the Traffic Homicide Investigation unit are on scene investigating the crash.

A 2-year-old child was inside the vehicle of the driver who was hit. The child was turned over to the mother at the scene, and next of kin notification was completed.

The right three lanes of northbound I-75 are blocked while investigators work at the scene.

The Maryland Supreme Court ruled Thursday that the proposed constitutional amendment must be placed on the November ballot, reversing two lower court rulings that had blocked it from going to voters. But the court directed the ballot summary to be rewritten.

The decision marks a notable victory for Democrats, who are trying to counter a Republican redistricting movement advanced by President Donald Trump.

“Winning in court was only the first step,” said Ned Miller, chief strategist for Fight Back MD, which supports the ballot measure. “We are building the statewide campaign to educate voters, organize supporters and build the coalition necessary to stand up to Donald Trump and pass Question 3 in November.”

Democrats already hold seven of Maryland’s eight U.S. House seats. The proposed amendment would not change voting districts for this year's midterm elections. But if approved by voters, it could free Democratic lawmakers to draw new congressional districts that give the party a shot at a clean sweep in the 2028 elections.

State Senate Minority Leader Steve Hershey, one of several Republican lawmakers who sued, said he appreciated that the court found the ballot wording to be unfair. But he said it wasn't the role of the judiciary to rewrite what lawmakers had done.

“The Court ultimately provided political cover for the General Assembly by allowing this misleading constitutional amendment to remain on the ballot,” Hershey said in a statement.

Maryland amendment would sidestep a prior court case

Democratic Gov. Wes Moore called lawmakers into a special session in August to refer the amendment to the November ballot.

The amendment would undo the foundation of a 2022 court ruling that struck down a previous Democratic redistricting plan as a “product of extreme partisan gerrymandering.” That judge said a constitutional provision requiring compact districts that respect “natural boundaries” applied to congressional districts. But the proposed amendment would apply those parameters only to state legislative districts.

That could allow lawmakers to draw congressional districts that cross the Chesapeake Bay, potentially reshaping a district held by U.S. Rep. Andy Harris, the state’s only Republican representative and the chair of the conservative House Freedom Caucus.

Supreme Court overrules claims on missed deadlines

Lower courts ruled that lawmakers didn’t abide by their own requirements when referring the amendment to the ballot.

At the heart of the case was a law passed earlier this year that set a July 1 deadline for the secretary of state to certify information about statewide ballot questions to the Maryland State Board of Elections. The same law also set a 15-day public comment period.

Those deadlines had already passed by the time lawmakers approved the redistricting amendment on Aug. 4.

Lawyers for Democratic Attorney General Anthony Brown argued that those deadlines didn’t matter. They said that law didn’t apply to the redistricting amendment because lawmakers wrote their own ballot summary for it, using their constitutional authority. The Supreme Court ultimately ruled that the lower court got it wrong.

Republican lawmakers who sued also had won in lower courts on claims that the ballot question wording was misleading and that the amendment violated a single-issue requirement in the state constitution by including a provision giving original jurisdiction over congressional redistricting lawsuits to the state Supreme Court.

The state Supreme Court rejected the multiple-subject argument but concurred that the ballot wording was misleading. However, the court said that wasn't enough to prevent the amendment from going to the people. It instead directed a change to be made to the ballot wording that voters will see.

Maryland could join a national redistricting effort

Redistricting typically happens near the beginning of each decade, after new census data is released. But a mid-decade redistricting battle broke out last year after Trump urged Republican-led states to redraw congressional districts in the hopes that it might help Republicans hold onto a slim House majority in this year’s midterm elections.

Republicans had hoped to gain as many as 16 additional seats this year from new U.S. House districts enacted in Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, Tennessee and Texas. But the Missouri Supreme Court on Thursday blocked new congressional districts from being used in the November election. Instead it ordered a statewide vote in November on whether to uphold or reject the maps in response to a citizens' petition seeking a referendum.

Democrats hope to gain as many as five congressional seats from new districts this year in California and Utah.

In May, the Virginia Supreme Court struck down a redistricting effort that could have helped Democrats win up to four additional seats. It ruled that the Democratic-led legislature violated procedural requirements when placing an amendment on the ballot.

“This past year has been very complex and we know the reason,” said Oscar Perez-Oliva, Cuba’s minister of foreign trade and investment. “The unprecedented tightening of the US blockade and the exec orders.”

“It’s got shock value,” said John Kavulich, president of the nonpartisan, nonprofit U.S.-Cuba Trade and Economic Council.

Kavulich points to policies and statutes already in place, but says actual action — if the past is a guide — may be a long time coming.

“I’ll give you an example,” Kavulich said. “In 2022, the Biden-Harris administration authorized the first direct investment into a Cuban private company and first direct financing for a Cuban private company.”

“That was May of 2022. We are still waiting for the regulations to allow that.”

The new announcement follows reforms announced last month allowing Cuban citizens to open gas stations and pharmacies for the first time — sectors that had been controlled by the government.

Since January, Cuba has made more economic openings in its communist history, approving 176, as the U.S. capture of Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro ended Cuba’s main source of oil and U.S. sanctions crippled the economy to crisis levels.

“Now they’re trying to couch it that, well, we’re just expanding the definition of the revolution or this is within Fidel’s, you know — Fidel would have done the same thing,” Kavulich said. “No, I’m sorry, he wouldn’t have.”

Asked what Fidel Castro would have done, Kavulich said: “Well, he would have made a deal with President Trump a long time ago. Cuba would not have gotten to this stage.”

Cuba’s minister of foreign trade says the new reforms will go into effect on Wednesday.

El Ministerio de Agricultura del presidente Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva indicó el jueves que sopesaría la aplicación de medidas recíprocas si no se alcanza una solución satisfactoria.

“Las autoridades brasileñas manifestaron su indignación por la falta de diálogo antes de que se adoptara la medida”, señaló el ministerio en un comunicado, y añadió que la suspensión “no se corresponde con la profundidad de la asociación estratégica entre Brasil y la UE”.

La UE anunció la suspensión el martes, y la medida entró en vigor dos días después. Brasil, el mayor exportador mundial de carne de res, envió a la UE unas 108.000 toneladas de esta carne por un valor aproximado de 1.000 millones de dólares en 2025, según cifras del gobierno.

El bloque anunció en mayo que Brasil sería retirado de su lista de países autorizados a exportarle determinados productos de origen animal, alegando que el gobierno brasileño no había ofrecido garantías suficientes de que su producción ganadera cumpla las normas de la UE contra los promotores del crecimiento a base de antibióticos y otros fármacos restringidos.

La Asociación Brasileña de Industrias Exportadoras de Carnes, ABIEC, que brinda apoyo técnico al gobierno en las negociaciones con la UE, dijo que la decisión era preocupante para los productores locales y no reconocía lo que describió como la calidad de las exportaciones brasileñas de carne de res a 170 países.

“La carne de res brasileña seguirá vendiéndose en los mercados para los que está autorizada, pero no existe un sustituto automático para el mercado europeo, ya que distintos destinos requieren productos y cortes diferentes”, indicó la ABIEC en un comunicado.

La Confederación de Agricultura y Ganadería de Brasil envió un documento el miércoles por la noche, firmado por su presidente, al Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores brasileño, en el que sostuvo que la suspensión de la UE “deriva en la clara anulación y el menoscabo de los beneficios comerciales que Brasil espera legítimamente”.

La confederación brasileña añadió que la UE no tuvo en cuenta el rigor del sistema de inspección sanitaria del país sudamericano, y que debía subsanar dicho desequilibrio comercial.

En su comunicado del jueves, el Ministerio de Agricultura indicó que Brasil “se reserva el derecho de recurrir a los instrumentos apropiados para garantizar condiciones comerciales equilibradas, incluidas las medidas de reciprocidad previstas en el marco jurídico nacional, así como los mecanismos pertinentes establecidos en el acuerdo Mercosur-Unión Europea y el sistema multilateral de comercio”.

La UE no respondió a las solicitudes de comentarios que le hizo The Associated Press.

La portavoz de la Comisión Europea, Eva Hrncirova, dijo el martes que una nueva lista de países que cumplen las normas de la UE sobre antimicrobianos entraría en vigor el 3 de septiembre, lo que desencadenó el caso contra Brasil.

Las importaciones de carne han sido una fuente importante de oposición europea al acuerdo de libre comercio firmado en enero entre la UE y el Mercosur, un bloque comercial integrado por Brasil, Argentina, Paraguay y Uruguay. Brasil es el único miembro del Mercosur afectado por la suspensión de la UE.

Robson Goncalves, economista y profesor de la Fundación Getulio Vargas —una prestigiosa institución educativa y de investigación—, dijo que prevé que la UE aplique medidas adicionales contra Brasil hasta que el acuerdo UE-Mercosur entre plenamente en vigor.

El acuerdo es provisional, a la espera de una decisión del Tribunal de Justicia de la Unión Europea.

“Estos son los intentos más recientes de proteger al sector agroindustrial europeo de la competencia del sector agroindustrial del Mercosur”, apuntó Goncalves, quien describió el mecanismo utilizado para frenar las exportaciones brasileñas como “una medida política” de la UE, dado que su acuerdo comercial con el Mercosur aún no se ha implementado por completo.

“Vendrán otras medidas similares en los próximos años”, agregó.

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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.

More soaking storms will be possible Friday. In fact, the soggy weather could get an early start — perhaps as soon as the morning commute, around 7 or 8 a.m. Temperatures are forecast to peak around 90°F.

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The Pembroke Pines Police Department said it was made aware of the video early Thursday and that its Investigations Division is actively investigating the incident.

In the video recorded this past Sunday from a nearby dental office, which was blurred because of its graphic nature, a man appears to stomp on an adult duck and stand on it for several minutes. A second video appears to show several ducklings scattering as the man attempts to step on them.

The incident reportedly occurred near University Drive and Southwest 13th Street in Pembroke Pines.

Manuel Cavallini who owns the dental office told Local 10 News that he thought it was “crazy” for someone to kill ducks.

Four days later, the dead duck remained in the grass.

Police said the actions depicted in the video are “illegal and cruel” and emphasized that the department does not tolerate crimes against people or animals. The said he might be known to frequent a local McDonald’s.

“We don’t know if this is the first time he’s done this or if he’s victimizing other animals or other people,” said PPPD Cpt. Chris Rogers. “We want to catch this individual. If he needs psychiatric help, we’ll help him that way. If he’s just committing crimes for the sake of committing crimes, we want to ensure that he’s prosecuted.”

The age or identity of the man seen in the video was not immediately known.

Pembroke Pines police are asking anyone with information about the man or incident to contact them at 954-431-2225.

The official was a unit chief in ICE’s Office of Professional Responsibility, where background checks were backlogged as ICE added thousands of new officers to carry out President Donald Trump’s mass deportation campaign.

ICE’s human resources division was making final job offers before preliminary vetting steps had been completed, including fingerprints, identity verification and credit checks, the official's complaint warned.

“This unprecedented lowering of standards sacrifices proper risk mitigation for expediency, placing DHS at risk of infiltration and insider compromise,” the official wrote in a memo to the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector General dated August 2025.

The New York Times first reported on the whistleblower complaint Thursday. The Associated Press obtained the complaint and a related memo from the now-retired ICE official’s lawyer, Kevin Owen. The official's identity was redacted from the complaint. The Times said the official was a 17-year-agency employee and longtime Republican who had voted for Trump in 2020 and 2024.

ICE announced in January that it had hired 12,000 new officers in less than one year, a spree financed by a $75 billion infusion from Congress to increase the agency’s arrests and deportations.

The rapid pace of the hiring, fueled by a $50,000 signing bonus, raised concerns about the quality of the new employees. An investigation by The Associated Press found that some of the new hires had serious financial problems in their backgrounds, had been accused of misconduct in prior jobs, and had checkered employment histories.

In July, Tom Homan, the White House border czar, said ICE would investigate apparent shortcomings in the vetting of an officer who shot and killed a 25-year-old motorist in Maine.

The whistleblower complaint said that “systemic breakdowns in vetting” violated several federal rules and standards designed to ensure candidates are suitable for sensitive law enforcement and national security positions.

The complaint said the lack of vetting created “increased vulnerability to insider threats, infiltration and foreign influence,” undermined ICE’s law enforcement operations and eroded public confidence in the agency.

It asked the inspector general to investigate the personnel vetting failures and for the agency to immediately suspend the improper practices, hold accountable those responsible for the violations and to review all recent hires to identify potential “insider threats.”

The Office of Inspector General has previously announced that it is investigating ICE’s hiring and training process, as well as security clearances granted to contractors and political appointees.

In a statement, ICE said Thursday the whistleblower was no longer with the agency.

“The ICE Office of Professional Responsibility diligently applies the proper personnel vetting regulations, including guidelines for national security, and evaluates all available information for every applicant based on these factors,” the statement said.

As the AP previously reported, ICE acknowledged that some applicants received “tentative selection letters” after their initial applications and interviews. Some were allowed to begin training before their background investigations were completed.

The whistleblower is the second insider to call out ICE’s rush to put more officers on the streets as reckless.

A former agency lawyer and instructor at the ICE academy, Ryan Schwank, said the agency cut training on the use of force, firearms safety, and the rights of protesters last year. The Department of Homeland Security has since increased the amount of training for new officers.

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This story has been updated to correct the spelling of Kevin Owen, not Owens.

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The crash happened around 7:40 p.m. near Northwest 51st Terrace and Northwest 33rd Avenue.

According to MDSO, deputies with the agency’s Robbery Intervention Detail (RID) conducted a traffic stop on one of the vehicles shortly before the crash.

Deputies said they confirmed during that stop that the driver, Luis Manuel Perez, 21, of Miami, had an outstanding warrant from the U.S. military, but he fled from them.

“As additional RID units responded to the area the driver entered a dead-end street,” an MDSO spokesperson told Local 10 News in an email Thursday. “After turning around, the driver ran a stop sign, colliding with a civilian vehicle causing it to flip. The impact caused the vehicles to subsequently collide with an unmarked MDSO vehicle occupied by an RID deputy who was in the area searching for the subject.”

A picture obtained by Local 10 shows the flipped vehicle. A person can also be seen on the ground in the area, apparently in handcuffs.

“I seen him hit the car, and I seen him flip over in the air. And that’s when I ran over there,” one witness said. “I seen it while it happened. I seen it -- pieces of the car flying in the air.”

The driver of the civilian vehicle was taken by Miami-Dade Fire Rescue to Jackson Memorial Hospital’s Ryder Trauma Center in critical condition, but later died, authorities confirmed.

Deputies said Perez was taken into custody and transported to a local hospital to be evaluated, and the deputy was treated at the scene by Miami-Dade Fire Rescue.

“One of the police officers who was in the car, he came out and was shaking his arm,” neighbor Norman Bradley said. “His arm was kind of messed up.”

While an arrest affidavit for Perez states that he has an active fugitive warrant from the U.S. military, it does not specify the allegations against him. MDSO officials said additional charges are pending against him as well for Wednesday’s crash.

The victim’s identity has not yet been released as authorities work to notify the next of kin.

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The woman was identified in a closeout memo from the Broward County State Attorney’s Office as Melissa Payne.

“If at the time Melissa Payne used deadly force: she was not doing anything unlawful; was in a place she had a right to be; and ‘she reasonably believe[d] that using or threatening to use such force [was] necessary to prevent imminent death or great bodily harm,’ then she is immune from arrest and prosecution,” the memo stated.

Bart Diguglielmo, of Lauderhill, was shot on June 30 outside the Walmart located at 7900 W. McNab Road after an argument with Payne, deputies with the Broward Sheriff’s Office said.

According to the memo, the entire incident was captured on various video recording devices and shows Payne, who was with her niece and her niece’s baby; and Diguglielmo, who was alone inside his white Kia SUV, attempting to park in the same parking space.

Prosecutors said a “brief stalemate ensued” before Payne and Diguglielmo both exited their vehicles.

According to the memo, Diguglielmo abandoned his vehicle in the travel lane, grabbed a shopping cart and entered the Walmart as Payne parked her Chevy Malibu in the parking space.

Diguglielmo returned to his SUV about 90 seconds later and two witnesses reported that he told Payne, “I’m gonna f*** your shit up,” the memo states.

He then drove off at a high rate of speed, prosecutors said.

According to the memo, Diguglielmo parked about two aisles west of Payne’s car, walked toward her vehicle and then lingered under a tree nearby while smoking a cigarette.

Witnesses said Diguglielmo appeared angry as he watched Payne and was shaking.

Prosecutors said Diguglielmo then approached Payne’s car, at which point she exited her vehicle with her phone in one hand and a gun in the other.

Payne warned Diguglielmo, “If you keep coming up to me, I’m going to f***ing shoot you!” the memo stated.

According to the memo, a witness yelled out to both Payne and Diguglielmo, saying “It’s not worth it!”

Prosecutors said Payne continued warning Diguglielmo, “Don’t come over here!” “Don’t come near my car!” and “Don’t try that!”

The memo stated that Diguglielmo initially backed off, but then continued to approach Payne while making hand gestures.

Prosecutors said Payne ultimately shot Diguglielmo once in the abdomen.

He was taken to a hospital, where he later died from his injuries.

Melissa Rodriguez, an attorney for the man’s daughter, told Local 10 News, “Amanda Diguglielmo is very disappointed to hear that they won’t be pursuing criminal charges in the case. We have maintained that the situation did not warrant stand your ground immunity.”

In an exclusive interview with Local 10 News, Amanda Diguglielmo described her father as a devoted family man who worked as an emergency room trauma nurse for 30 years.

“He was a great man. He was a father, he was a grandfather (and) he was a brother,” she said.

Amanda Diguglielmo said her father was also a twin brother, a father of three and a sergeant in the Army.

When asked what she would miss most about her father, Amanda Diguglielmo said, “Everything — being able to call him, have lunch, holidays, everything.”

Amanda Diguglielmo and her attorney dispute that Payne shot Bart Diguglielmo in self-defense.

“This was not a situation of self-defense or stand your ground immunity. I don’t believe that the shooting was justified,” Rodriguez said earlier this month. “I believe that criminal charges should be filed.”

“Build the Wall” is a “Tetris” knockoff that transforms the classic game into an effort to “Protect the border from the coming horde." In “Rio Run,” which resembles the mobile favorite “Snake,” an icon resembling Trump runs around gathering potential border crossers.

In “Supply Line,” which looks like a condensed version of the arcade game “Tapper,” food moves along an assembly line and you must reject items that don't meet “Make America Healthy Again” standards.

Two of the games take place over the skies of the nation's capital. In “Flappy Bill,” an eagle carries a bill across the National Mall. In “Trump Savings Tycoon,” your goal is to collect money flying through the air to “Fill your kids' Trump Accounts,” the administration savings plan that offers $1,000 to every child born during Trump's term.

The White House announced Arcade on social media with a series of animations parodying Xbox, PlayStation and Nintendo loading screens. In one such post, the Sega logo turns into “MAGA,” as in Trump's “Make America Great Again” slogan.

Last week, UEFA filed requests for discovery of evidence connected to Infantino's proposal in three U.S. courts.

“While these applications are styled as legal pleadings with captions and docket numbers, they are little more than press releases in further support of UEFA’s smear campaign against FIFA and its leadership,” FIFA said in a filing in U.S. District Court in Colorado.

FIFA’s filing in Colorado on Thursday was a motion to intervene, asking that the discovery process be deferred or dropped.

One of UEFA's discovery requests was filed in the Southern District of New York and seeks disclosure of documents from Josh Kushner and his investment firm Thrive Capital Management. Kushner is the younger brother of Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump's son-in-law.

Thrive was involved in Infantino's FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE) proposal to sell stakes in the World Cup to private equity for $4.2 billion. FIFA withdrew the proposal on Aug. 1, just days after it was made public, after intense pushback.

Other court filings seeking discovery of evidence related to the World Cup sell-off were filed in Florida, where FIFA had its 2026 World Cup operational base, and in Colorado, against an adviser to Infantino, Greg Maffei, once the CEO of Liberty Media.

In a statement Monday to the outlet Axios, Kushner defended the proposal but said he did not anticipate the pushback.

“While we stand behind the motivations of FFE, we failed to appreciate the political dynamics of global football, and the lengths some would go to. Thrive has a long track record of being a partner to all constituents. Had we known what this would devolve into, we would not have gotten involved,” the statement said.

Kushner also agreed last month to purchase the NBA’s Los Angeles Lakers with partner Bob Iger.

UEFA has said in court documents that it is preparing a criminal complaint against Infantino in Swiss courts for possible financial mismanagement.

“Infantino claimed that the plan would ‘unleash the commercial potential and opportunity that FIFA has,’” UEFA lawyers told the courts. “In truth, it was a vehicle for Infantino and that small circle to acquire a permanent stake in and otherwise profit from FIFA’s most valuable assets to the detriment of FIFA, its members, and other parties within the football family.”

FIFA argued that UEFA's request “suffers from a fundamental defect: UEFA seeks discovery in aid of a foreign criminal proceeding that does not exist and that UEFA admittedly lacks the authority to initiate.”

In the filing, FIFA accused UEFA of coercing its European federations to oppose the plan.

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See AP’s full soccer coverage here

Jail records show Henry Mims, 53, of Fort Lauderdale, was arrested by the Broward County Sheriff’s Office.

Deputies said they responded to Mims’ home near the 2900 block of Northwest 10th Court in unincorporated Broward County. They said they spoke with Mims before going into the backyard, where several dogs were kept.

According to an arrest report, deputies found three “pit bull-type dogs” secured with heavy metal chains attached to large collars that appeared to be too heavy for the dogs.

One of the dogs appeared extremely thin, with its ribs, spine and hip bones visibly protruding, deputies said. The dog also had an apparent sore on its neck beneath the jawline.

They said the wound on that dog was “reddened,” showed hair loss and exposed tissue, and that additional scars and marks were visible on the dog’s body.

Another dog had visible redness around its neck that was consistent with prolonged pressure or rubbing from its collar and chain, the report states.

Two other dogs were housed in individual wire kennels, according to the report.

Broward County Animal Control officials told deputies that the conditions of the property and the circumstances involving the dogs were consistent with signs of neglect and “possible involvement in dog-fighting activities,” the report states.

After authorities explained their concerns about the animals’ condition, Mims voluntarily surrendered five of his six dogs to Broward County Animal Care, officials said.

Mims told authorities he was “tired of repeated visits from law enforcement and animal control,” according to the report.

One of the surrendered dogs, an American Staffordshire terrier, had apparent wounds on her neck from a heavy leash and collar, authorities said. The dog was later euthanized because of aggression, according to officials.

Four other American Staffordshire terriers were considered underweight and were infested with fleas, authorities said.

The sixth dog was not surrendered and remained with Mims. Authorities said the dog appeared to be healthy and well cared for.

Jail records show Mims is facing four counts of aggravated animal cruelty and one count of animal cruelty.

As of Thursday, he was being held on a $21,000 bond at the Broward County Main Jail.

The motion asks Marion County Superior Court to schedule a hearing for Sanchez to plead guilty and be sentenced. Online records did not indicate which charges he plans to plead guilty to.

“This is a positive development. We are finalizing an agreement with the prosecutor’s office that provides a path toward resolving the state’s case. We’re also encouraged by the constructive conversations taking place regarding the related civil matter. There is real momentum toward bringing this entire chapter to a close,” Nick Sanchez Jr., Mark Sanchez’s brother and legal adviser, said in a statement.

Sanchez faces a felony battery charge, along with three misdemeanor charges, for what prosecutors have said was a fight over parking.

The ex-NFL quarterback’s jury trial was scheduled to start Tuesday. The trial had been rescheduled five times since it was initially set to begin in December. Sanchez and Fox Sports also face a civil lawsuit filed by the truck driver, Perry Tole.

“We are pleased with the constructive and professional conversations we’ve had with Mr. Sanchez’s team,” attorney Matt Golitko, who represents Tole, said in a statement. "Our discussions have been productive and we’re on a positive path toward an agreement that will allow the parties to move forward. Mr. Tole appreciates the progress we have achieved and looks forward to an amicable resolution.”

A police affidavit alleges that Sanchez, smelling of alcohol, accosted Tole, who had backed his truck into a hotel’s loading docks in downtown Indianapolis. Tole claims in his lawsuit that Sanchez entered the truck without permission, then physically blocked and shoved Tole, who then doused Sanchez with pepper spray.

When Sanchez advanced after being sprayed, Tole pulled a knife to defend himself, authorities said. Sanchez was hospitalized with stab wounds to his upper right torso while Tole suffered a face laceration, according to a police affidavit.

Sanchez told police at the hospital that all he could remember was grabbing for a window, the court document said. Sanchez said he didn’t know who else was involved or where the altercation happened.

Sanchez was let go by Fox Sports in November and replaced by Drew Brees. Sanchez had joined Fox Sports as a game analyst in 2021 after appearing on ABC and ESPN for two years.

Sanchez had a 10-year NFL career before retiring in 2019. He spent four seasons with the New York Jets and also appeared in games with Philadelphia, Dallas and Washington.

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See AP’s full NFL coverage here

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From Doral to Miami Beach, investigators say Mobley, who lives in Miami’s Overtown neighborhood, would walk into a pharmacy, with a tote bag in hand, and beeline right to the beauty aisle.

But what happened next was far from pretty.

Police said she would stuff her bag full of cosmetics and skin care and would then stroll out.

According to her arrest report, she would take thousands of dollars’ worth of cosmetics every single time.

One day back in June, she allegedly stole from two CVS pharmacies on the same day. Detectives said she’s done at least 10 of these shopping sprees and would sometimes bring an accomplice.

But it all came to a halt when a CVS investigator recognized her in one of their stores.

“If you come back, you will have your baby locked up in jail,” Miami-Dade Judge Mindy Glazer said in court on Thursday. “You will not get out. You understand?”

Mobley faces 14 counts of theft, with motherhood around the corner.

Desde Doral hasta Miami Beach, los investigadores dicen que Mobley, quien vive en el vecindario Overtown de Miami, entraba a una farmacia con una bolsa en la mano y se dirigía directamente al pasillo de productos de belleza.

Pero lo que ocurría después estaba lejos de ser bonito.

La policía dijo que llenaba su bolsa con cosméticos y productos para el cuidado de la piel y luego salía caminando.

Según su reporte de arresto, se llevaba cosméticos por valor de miles de dólares cada vez.

Un día de junio, presuntamente robó en dos farmacias CVS el mismo día. Los detectives dijeron que ha realizado al menos 10 de estas incursiones de compras y que algunas veces llevaba a un cómplice.

Pero todo llegó a su fin cuando un investigador de CVS la reconoció en una de sus tiendas.

“Si regresas, tendrás a tu bebé encerrada en la cárcel”, dijo la jueza de Miami-Dade Mindy Glazer en la corte el jueves. “No saldrás. ¿Entiendes?”

Mobley enfrenta 14 cargos de robo, mientras se acerca la maternidad.

The school announced Lombardi's resignation Thursday. It also stated it would continue its ongoing investigation and “consider all appropriate corrective actions" as needed.

The school has not released specifics of that probe, noting in its July 27 announcement that employees and athletes aren’t permitted to address the topic “as is standard procedure with personnel matters.” Three days later, UNC released another statement that said its Office of University Counsel was conducting an investigation, an announcement coming on the first day of preseason camp.

Two people with knowledge of the situation previously told The Associated Press that a human resources complaint from a former employee was involved. They spoke on condition of anonymity because the school wasn’t publicly discussing case details.

Attorney Tom Mars, who is working with Lombardi, released a statement from his client confirming the resignation Thursday.

“I want to thank Chancellor (Lee) Roberts and Bill Belichick for the opportunity to serve as the GM of UNC Football,” Lombardi said in the statement. “I have decided it’s best for me to resign my position as GM to allow the team to focus on the ’26 season.”

The resignation comes five days after the Tar Heels beat TCU 15-10 in Dublin, Ireland, to start Belichick's second season in Chapel Hill. Belichick went 4-8 last year after leading the NFL's New England Patriots to six Super Bowl titles.

Lombardi attended for Belichick’s introductory news conference in December 2024, with Belichick announcing that day that the former GM of the NFL’s Cleveland Browns would serve as his college-level GM.

A few months into Belichick’s tenure, Lombardi said the goal was running a college program in a way similar to the NFL, saying the Tar Heels “consider ourselves the 33rd (NFL) team” because of the staff connections to the pros. That confident statement didn’t align with the on-field results; the Tar Heels had more more double-digit losses (five) than wins, along with multiple off-the-field distractions.

Lombardi was given a three-year deal paying him $1.5 million in base salary through the 2027 season. That made him by far the country’s highest-paid college football GM for the 2025 season, according to a USA Today salary database, another incongruity with the Tar Heels’ results.

At the college level, GMs across sports generally have front-office roles dealing with roster construction and negotiations over player compensation, with the heaviest work coming in the offseason.

Belichick said on July 30 that the team was “working through some things” in adjusting duties to compensate for Lombardi’s absence. Roberts said later that day the situation was “distressing to me and everyone else in the administration ... that this is something that we have to have to spend time on.”

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Según la policía, Mandrell Ceydrec Rolle Jr., de Pembroke Pines, fue arrestado el miércoles tras el choque con fuga ocurrido el 22 de agosto.

Rolle enfrenta un cargo por abandonar la escena de un choque con heridos, uno por conducción imprudente y uno por resistirse a un agente sin violencia.

Según la policía, el incidente comenzó alrededor de las 7 p.m. del 22 de agosto, cuando se realizaron múltiples llamadas al 911 sobre cuatro motociclistas todoterreno que presuntamente conducían de manera imprudente y a alta velocidad por Collins Avenue, en el Distrito Art Déco.

Los agentes que respondieron localizaron a los motociclistas y observaron la conducta imprudente, dijo la policía.

La policía dijo que el grupo continuó por Ocean Drive antes de detenerse en la cuadra 700.

Los agentes se acercaron a pie a los motociclistas y pusieron bajo custodia a uno de ellos, identificado como Kasshun Williams, sin incidentes, informaron las autoridades.

La policía dijo que Rolle vio a los agentes y huyó a alta velocidad a pesar de las repetidas órdenes de detenerse.

Mientras huía, Rolle atropelló a una niña de 10 años que estaba en la acera con su madre, según la policía.

El impacto derribó a la niña y le causó lesiones en el codo y la pierna. Fue atendida en el lugar por el Cuerpo de Bomberos de Miami Beach.

La policía de Miami Beach dijo que los detectives identificaron a Rolle durante la investigación y se enteraron de que estaba bajo libertad condicional federal por posesión de una ametralladora, un delito grave.

Los detectives obtuvieron una orden para su arresto y Rolle fue puesto bajo custodia el miércoles con la ayuda de la Unidad Táctica de Robos del Departamento de Policía de la ciudad de Miami.

“Hay cero tolerancia para conductas imprudentes que pongan en peligro la vida de nuestros residentes y visitantes”, dijo el jefe de la Policía de Miami Beach, Wayne A. Jones, en un comunicado. “Conducir imprudentemente una motocicleta todoterreno, atropellar a una niña de 10 años y huir sin prestar ayuda es inaceptable”.

Jones dijo que el departamento utilizaría sus recursos para identificar y responsabilizar a quienes pongan en peligro a otras personas en Miami Beach.

“Si decide poner en peligro a personas inocentes en Miami Beach, utilizaremos todos los recursos disponibles para identificarlo y responsabilizarlo”, dijo Jones.

Hasta la mañana del jueves, Rolle permanecía detenido en el Centro Correccional Turner Guilford Knight con una fianza de $2,650 USD.

El incidente ocurrió el 21 de agosto afuera del McDonald’s ubicado en 1310 S. Federal Highway.

Una madre de familia de la escuela secundaria Olsen Middle School dijo que estaba recogiendo a sus hijos cuando vio cómo la pelea se extendía hasta la calle.

“Básicamente, se le fueron encima entre varios a un hombre mayor”, dijo Yanelle Perez, madre de familia que presenció la pelea.

Patrick Utter también dijo haber estado presente durante el incidente y que intervino para ayudar al hombre, aunque agregó que ninguna de las partes estuvo exenta de responsabilidad.

“Un hombre que quizá tenía problemas de salud mental y estaba bebiendo entró al McDonald’s y dijo algo indebido; provocó a un grupo de jóvenes y ellos lo siguieron hasta aquí, al corredor de la US 1”, dijo Utter. “Esta zona de la US 1 es un poco problemática y, más importante aún, estos muchachos que pasan por aquí podrían necesitar mayor supervisión”.

De acuerdo con la Oficina del Sheriff de Broward, el hombre amenazó con pelear con los menores cuando todos se encontraban dentro del McDonald’s.

Cuando el hombre salió del restaurante, los agentes dijeron que los menores lo siguieron y posteriormente comenzó la pelea.

Los investigadores señalaron que están tratando de determinar si lo que se dijo dentro del restaurante justificaba lo que ocurrió posteriormente afuera.

También indicaron que aún están a la espera de hablar con el hombre, quien ya no se encontraba en el McDonald’s cuando llegaron los agentes.

Al final de la pelea, un video muestra a varios testigos tratando de auxiliar al hombre.

“Le quitaron la comida, lo golpearon y cayó al suelo”, dijo Perez. “Dos hombres mayores tuvieron que intervenir para detenerlos porque el hombre ya no podía defenderse. Había como 10 o 15 muchachos encima de él”.

La directora de Olsen Middle School, Janet Giancarli, envió un mensaje a los padres de familia sobre el incidente, en el que señaló:

“Un hombre adulto se acercó a los estudiantes e inició un enfrentamiento físico afuera del restaurante. La Oficina del Sheriff de Broward acudió al lugar e investigó. Nadie resultó herido”.

“Entendemos que actualmente circula en redes sociales un video de este incidente y que resulta preocupante. Aunque el hecho no ocurrió dentro de las instalaciones escolares ni durante el horario de clases, nos tomamos muy en serio cualquier situación que involucre a nuestros estudiantes y continuaremos trabajando estrechamente con las autoridades en relación con este asunto”, continuó el comunicado. “La seguridad y el bienestar de nuestros estudiantes siguen siendo nuestra máxima prioridad”.

Utter dijo que considera necesaria una mayor presencia policial en la zona.

“No tengo ninguna duda de que mi amigo Ed Tarks, Bernard y yo evitamos que este hombre tuviera un desenlace realmente terrible. Por eso acepté dar esta entrevista, porque al final del día necesitamos más apoyo de la policía en esta zona”, dijo Utter.

Miami-Dade Property Appraiser Tomas Regalado is a firm supporter of Amendment 3, while Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava is warning voters that the measure could force the county to cut services.

The amendment would increase Florida’s homestead exemption if approved by at least 60% of voters. Supporters say it would provide relief to homeowners struggling with rising costs, while critics argue local governments could lose billions in revenue.

Regalado said the need for tax relief is clear.

“People are hurting. A lot of people are losing their homes. We have to give them some kind of relief,” he said. “I think that the people here are so angry and so in need of relief that they will vote yes.”

Levine Cava disagrees, saying the county is already under financial pressure.

“Amendment 3 will cut us hard, it will cut services directly, I can promise you that,” she said.

Regalado: Governments need to get creative

Regalado, who previously served as mayor of Miami from 2009 to 2017, said local governments can adjust their spending to account for reduced property-tax revenue.

“It’s about getting creative, reducing the different spending line items that they have,” Regalado said.

Regalado acknowledged that Miami-Dade could lose hundreds of millions of dollars if the amendment passes, but argued the impact would be manageable.

“The fact of the matter is that real estate taxes, property taxes will continue to be one of the few revenues that the county and municipal government have,” Regalado said.

He said his office’s analysis estimates the county could lose between $300 million and $400 million in the first year.

“So that is not something that will break the government,” Regalado said. “The problem is that governments have to tighten their belt.”

He pointed to the foreclosure crisis in 2009, when he said Miami faced a deficit of more than $100 million.

“We reduced the salaries, but we did not fire police or firefighters or trash collectors,” Regalado said. “And then Miami came back.”

Regalado said the amendment would provide significant relief to Miami-Dade homeowners.

“Amendment 3 will give some relief to more than a half a million homestead here that we have in Miami-Dade County,” Regalado said.

“There is no way to explain how much a government, a local government will be hurting if Amendment 3 passes. But what I can tell you is that if Amendment 3 passes, thousands of thousands of people in Miami-Dade County will be able to keep their homes,” he added. “Amendment 3 is designed to help people keep their homes. It’s not designed to let governments do what they think they can do to get more revenue.”

Under the proposal, the homestead exemption would rise from the existing exemption to $150,000 initially and $250,000 the following year, according to Regalado.

“When people ask me in the street, what do you think of Amendment 3? Should I vote yes or should I vote no?” Regalado said. “And I said, if you want to keep giving money to the government, vote no. If you want your taxes reduced, vote yes.”

Levine Cava: ‘There’s no more fat to squeeze’

Levine Cava said the county has already spent years looking for ways to reduce costs.

“We have been belt tightening for a while and certainly in the last two years we’ve saved a lot of taxpayer money by consolidating, by reducing positions, finding other ways of economizing,” Levine Cava said.

“And the bottom line is there’s no more fat to squeeze,” she said.

The mayor made the comments ahead of the county’s first budget hearing for fiscal year 2026-27, where transit funding is expected to be among the major issues.

“We know that there will be a lot of discussion about transit cuts - transit is highly subsidized by the general fund,” Levine Cava said.

She said the county’s general fund is already under stress, including from requests for additional funding from the county’s constitutional offices.

“Our general fund is really under stress with five constitutional offices wanting more money as well and high cost of inflation,” Levine Cava added.

She said county revenues have not kept pace with rising costs and that the county has already reduced its general fund budgets.

“We have cut our general fund budgets three percent except in public safety and we propose to double it to six percent,” Levine Cava added.

Levine Cava also pointed to rising operating costs, including gasoline, and said the county has reduced its tax rate for two consecutive years.

“We have the lowest tax rate since 1982 and I was elected twice because people know that I am committed and fiscally responsible and we’re going to continue to find ways to save costs,” she said.

Health care another point of concern

Opponents of Amendment 3 have also raised concerns about its potential impact on public hospitals.

A recent Florida Policy Institute analysis estimated that public hospital districts and health systems across Florida could lose hundreds of millions of dollars in property-tax revenue over three years if the amendment passes.

For Miami-Dade, the report estimated Jackson Health System could lose more than $63 million in property-tax revenue over that period.

Dr. Olveen Carrasquillo of Jackson Health System said the potential cuts could affect patient care.

“As a doctor, I’m concerned about Amendment 3 because of the major impact it would have on the patients we provide care for,” Carrasquillo said.

Levine Cava said the impact on Jackson would ultimately affect workers and patients.

“No question about it. This will affect Jackson that means that will affect workers and the quality of our health care set You get what you pay for,” Levine Cava said.

Regalado disputes the idea that Amendment 3 would create the kind of financial crisis its opponents predict.

“Well, people should know when they hear from government officials, especially county and municipal, that this is a doomsday scenario, that is not correct,” he said.

He said governments have other sources of revenue, including building permits, airports, ports, water and sewer services and impact fees.

“There are many, many ways for the county and the municipal governments to get income,” Regalado added. “They don’t have to hurt the people. They can get creative and help the people and survive.”

The debate is expected to intensify as voters weigh whether the proposed constitutional amendment is worth the potential tax savings for homeowners — and the financial uncertainty facing local governments.

The decision Thursday marks a rare setback for Republicans in a national redistricting battle. Republicans had hoped Missouri’s new congressional boundaries could help them win an additional seat and hold onto their slim House majority in the midterms.

Missouri Attorney General Catherine Hanaway, a Republican, said she would immediately appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, asserting that the decision “has thrust our state into a full‑fledged constitutional crisis.”

Missouri’s new districts were used in the August primaries. But the state Supreme Court said they cannot be used in the November general election — or ever again, unless voters first uphold the new districts passed by the Republican-led Legislature.

The court ruled that the new districts were effectively placed on hold in December, when opponents submitted over 300,000 petition signatures seeking to put the map to a vote of the people. Republican Secretary of State Denny Hoskins waited until primary election day in August to reject the petition. He asserted that the referendum process cannot be used for congressional redistricting. A lower court agreed, but the Supreme Court overturned Hoskins’ decision.

“The referendum petition was legal, sufficient, and timely, and the secretary incorrectly concluded otherwise,” the court said in its ruling. The legislation containing the new districts “did not go into effect and will not go into effect unless and until approved by the voters.” As a result, the congressional map adopted after the 2020 census “remains in full force and effect for the November 2026 general election.”

Hanaway, whose office represented Hoskins, called the ruling an unprecedented violation of federal law. So did Republican Gov. Mike Kehoe, who proposed the new congressional map to lawmakers.

“Never before in American history has a court overturned a congressional map after a primary and before a general election," Hanaway said in a statement.

Court ruling hinged on referendum rights

The Missouri Constitution does not specifically say a referendum petition can be used for a congressional redistricting law passed by the Legislature. But the Supreme Court ruled that a constitutional provision allowing a referendum on “any act” of the Legislature encompasses congressional redistricting.

It rejected assertions from Hanaway's office that federal law prohibits referendum petitions on congressional redistricting.

“This is what democracy looks like," said Richard von Glahn, executive director of People Not Politicians Missouri, which sponsored the referendum petition. "The people of Missouri demanded a voice, and the court just confirmed what we’ve been saying all along. People, not politicians, will have the final say.”

Hoskins, acknowledging the loss, vowed to continue “the war to preserve our constitutional republic."

The ruling, which capped a year of political maneuvering and legal wrangling, was one of two to go against Republican officials Thursday. The Supreme Court also ruled that Hoskins had wrongly rejected a petition for a ballot proposal making it difficult for politicians to change measures enacted by voters through citizen initiatives. The court also ordered that measure to be placed on the November ballot.

Missouri redistricting targeted longtime Kansas City lawmaker

Missouri currently has six Republicans and two Democrats in the U.S. House.

After Trump urged Republicans to redraw congressional districts to their advantage, Kehoe called lawmakers into a special session last year to dramatically reconfigure the 5th Congressional District, held by Democrat Emanuel Cleaver.

Cleaver, who was unopposed in the August primary, has carried the Kansas City-based district with at least 60% of the vote in each of the past two elections.

Republican state Sen. Rick Brattin won an August primary in the reshaped 5th Congressional District, which had been stretched eastward to include rural Republican areas. About 59% of the district's voters were new under the revised map, according to an Associated Press estimate.

Cleaver had not posted campaign signs in many of the new rural areas, explaining that he was waiting for the Missouri Supreme Court’s decision. But he had vowed to continue his reelection campaign regardless of the outcome.

“Despite the cynical and deeply shameful attempt to silence many of our neighbors, the people fought back and won,” Cleaver said in a social media post Thursday.

Brattin, a Marine veteran and founding member of the conservative Missouri Freedom Caucus in the state Legislature, said the decision disenfranchises thousands of primary voters who now will be shifted to different districts with candidates they didn’t get to choose.

The court “handed Democrats a decision they desperately needed in their effort to help national Democrats retake the U.S. House of Representatives," Brattin said in a statement.

Redistricting battle spread to over a quarter of states

Congressional districts typically are redrawn at the start of each decade, based on new census data. But Trump’s quest for a midterm election advantage triggered an unusual mid-decade redistricting battle that spread to more than a dozen states — and triggered a dozen lawsuits in Missouri alone.

The Missouri Supreme Court ruling was one of only a few nationally to go against Republicans' redistricting plans.

Prior to its latest ruling, Missouri’s top court already had rejected claims that the special session was illegal, mid-decade redistricting isn’t allowed and the new districts aren’t compact enough.

After the Supreme Court heard arguments Wednesday, a couple hundred people chanted “Let us vote!” while rallying outside the courthouse. Grant Christensen, of Jefferson City, said he had signed the referendum petition to put the map to a vote.

“Gerrymandering is the same as voter suppression,” Christensen said. "Cutting up districts in order to steer them to vote one way or the other is not fair.”

And the employment outlook remains clouded by a shortage of workers – the result of President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown and the retirement of baby boomers – and by businesses’ stepped-up use of technology to do tasks that human beings used to do.

The August jobs report likely showed that U.S. employers – companies, government agencies and nonprofits – collectively added a net 65,000 jobs last month after they unexpectedly slashed 23,000 in July, according to a survey of forecasters by the data firm FactSet. Economists expect jobs at local schools to recover after plummeting by 50,000 in July in what they suspect was a statistical glitch in the Labor Department’s seasonal adjustments.

The unemployment rate is expected to have ticked up to a still-low 4.2% last month from 4.1% in July, FactSet says.

“It’s a very strange labor market,’’ David Kelly, chief global strategist at J.P. Morgan Asset Management, wrote in a commentary Monday.

The No. 1 puzzler: Hiring is weak, but layoffs are rare.

Employers haven’t been eager to take on new workers. The Labor Department reported Tuesday that gross hiring — before subtracting people who lost or left their jobs — fell 5% to fewer than 5.1 million new jobs.

In July, companies, government agencies and nonprofits together cut 23,000 jobs. So far this year, employers are adding 61,000 jobs a month, up from the 9,700 they averaged last year — the weakest hiring outside a recession since 2002. The lingering effects of high interest rates and Trump’s erratic trade policies discouraged companies from hiring in 2025.

Even though it’s rebounded from a bleak 2025, hiring this year remains well below the 166,000 monthly jobs created, on average, in 2023 and 2024, let alone the 491,000 a month recorded during the 2021-2022 hiring boom that followed pandemic lockdowns.

But the United States doesn’t need as many jobs as it did until recently to keep the national unemployment rate from rising. Trump’s immigration crackdown and baby boomer retirements mean fewer people are competing for work. More than 1.3 million people have dropped out of the U.S. labor force over the past year.

As a result, the "break-even’’ rate of monthly hiring, 155,000 in 2023-2024, has dropped, perhaps to nearly zero, according to a Federal Reserve study.

The Trump administration’s decision to withdraw work authorization for 330,000 Haitian and Syrian immigrants on July 27 is likely to worsen labor shortages, especially for specific workers such as caregivers. But the Haitians and Syrians won’t show up in the official unemployment rolls because they aren’t allowed to look for work and therefore can’t be counted among the jobless.

Instead of looking to hire from a diminished pool of available workers, “businesses are increasingly focused on boosting efficiency through technology and AI and increasingly seek to do more with their existing workforce,’’ EY-Parthenon economists Gregory Daco and Lydia Boussour wrote in a commentary this week.

Still, even if they aren’t hiring aggressively, companies are reluctant to let go of the staff they have. They retain memories of the unexpected labor shortages that followed the end of COVID-19 lockdowns.

So unemployment remains low. For the past year, the number of people applying each for unemployment benefits – a proxy for layoffs -- has stayed in a historically low range of around 200,000 to 230,000.

The result is what economists call a “no-hire, no-fire″ labor market in which those who have work enjoy job security, but times are tough for young workers trying to land entry-level jobs or unemployed people seeking to get back to work.

Wage gains last month were likely modest – bad news for families already struggling to keep up with the high cost of living. EY-Parthenon’s Daco and Boussour expect average hourly wages rose just 3% last year from a year earlier, the weakest year-over-year gain since May 2021 when the economy was paralyzed by the pandemic.

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It happened on Aug. 21 outside the McDonald’s located at 1310 S. Federal Highway.

An Olsen Middle School parent says she was picking up her kids when she saw the fight spilling out into the street.

“They basically jumped an old man,” said parent Yanelle Perez, who witnessed the fight.

Patrick Utter also said he was there for the incident, jumping into action to help the man, but adding that neither party was innocent.

“A guy that maybe had mental health issues, drinking, went into the McDonald’s and he said something wrong, he incited a bunch of young kids, and they followed him out here on the US 1 corridor,” said Utter. “The US 1 corridor is a little bit rough over here, and more importantly, these kids that are passing through here could use some supervision.”

According to the Broward Sheriff’s Office, the man threatened to fight the kids when they were all inside the McDonald’s.

When the man left the restaurant, deputies said the children followed him outside, after which the fight broke out.

Deputies said they are investigating whether whatever was said inside the restaurant justified what subsequently occurred outside.

They said they are still waiting to speak with the man, who was not still at the McDonald’s by the time deputies arrived.

At the very end of the fight, video showed several witnesses trying to help the man.

“They took his food, beat him up, and he fell on the floor,” said Perez. “They had to have two older gentleman stop it up because it the man, he couldn’t. There was like 10-15 kids on top of him.”

Olsen Middle School Principal Janet Giancarli sent a message to parents in regard to the incident, which stated:

“An adult male approached the students and initiated a physical confrontation outside of the restaurant. The Broward Sheriff’s Office responded and investigated. No one was injured.”

“We understand that a video of this incident is now circulating on social media and is concerning. While the incident did not occur on school grounds or during the school day, we take any situation involving our students seriously and we will continue to work closely with law enforcement regarding this matter,” the statament continued. “The safety and well-being of our students remain our highest priority.”

Utter said he feels there needs to be more law enforcement presence in the area.

“There’s no doubt in my mind, my friend Ed Tarks, Bernard and myself, saved this guy from a really horrific ending, and that’s why I’m going along with this interview, because we need some help over here with police at the end of the day,” said Utter.

On Sept. 14, one of the most consequential changes takes effect: eliminating the longstanding definition of what it means to “harm” an endangered species.

The clock is ticking, but the fight is far from over.

In less than two weeks, the Trump administration is set to eliminate a key protection that has allowed the federal government to consider destruction of an endangered species’ habitat as “harm” to the animal itself.

Environmental groups are pushing back.

“So if we don’t speak and say no, then they’ll just do it,” one protester said.

“These changes take the teeth out of this law. And what is the value of listing a species if you can’t protect its home?” said Nora Ives of Oceana.

The administration says the change corrects decades of regulatory overreach. But environmental groups say it could open the door to development and other activities in some of the very places endangered wildlife need to survive.

“We need to preserve our natural treasures,” said Mary Lou Cristino Flores, former regional manager of Surfrider Foundation in Florida. “We need to protect what we love, and we need to say no to offshore drilling projects that could continue to harm our Florida Keys economy and our natural wildlife.”

Here in Florida — home to more than a hundred federally protected species — the fight is intensifying.

“Protect gulf species, protect gulf lives!!” protesters chanted.

Over the weekend, that battle reached the Florida Keys, where environmental groups took to the streets to warn that what happens in Washington could soon be felt in their own backyard — and in their waters.

“This proposal is reckless. It puts our environment, our economy, and our way of life at risk,” one protester said.

“And so we want to call attention to that and call for restoring those endangered species act protections,” said Jewel Tomasula, national policy director of the Endangered Species Coalition.

But the fight is moving beyond protests.

Multiple federal lawsuits are challenging the rollbacks, with Earthjustice, Oceana and other conservation groups asking the courts to stop the new rules from taking effect.

“There’s no need to dismantle something that has worked for 50 plus years. And additionally, it allows human activity to go forward safely while protecting the species we all rely on for our ecological and our climate health,” Ives said.

The fight has reached Capitol Hill, too.

A bipartisan House bill would preserve the ESA’s longstanding definition of “harm.” Senators Adam Schiff and Sheldon Whitehouse have introduced a separate resolution to overturn the administration’s new rule.

“Right now there is a direct threat to Florida. Offshore drilling is being proposed right off our coastline, and the Trump administration needs to reverse plans and and not drill in the Eastern Gulf,” said Hunter Miller, deputy field director for Oceana Florida.

But conservation groups say getting lawmakers on board will take a groundswell of public pressure: loud enough that Washington can’t ignore.

“Our community is not going to be silenced. We want to be heard. These are the things that matter to us, and we’re going to let you know that we’re here,” one protester said.

“We will not be silent, and we will not allow anyone to play God with the endangered species of the Florida Keys. Wooooo!!!!” another protester said.

Conservation groups are now urging the public to make their voices heard — contact their lawmakers and tell them where they stand.

And with an election looming, how those lawmakers respond could have consequences at the ballot box.

The Army Corps had halted work without explanation on the Brandon Road Interbasin Project near Joliet, Illinois, in July, leaving officials in Illinois and Michigan struggling for answers about the pause even as environmental officials warned that invasive carp were being found alarmingly close to Lake Michigan.

Then Whitmer, a Democrat, called Trump.

The Wednesday phone call was a surprising intervention by the Democratic governor, who has developed an unusual relationship with a president who was once one of her fiercest political foes. Hours after the call, the stop-work order was lifted.

The episode underscores not only the unusual cross-party relationship Whitmer has cultivated with Trump, but also the top-down and relationship-driven nature of his administration — where direct phone calls and displays of deference to the president remain the best way to get things done.

“Governor Whitmer spoke with President Trump today to ask him to direct the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to lift the stop-work order,” Bobby Leddy, a spokesperson for Whitmer, said in a statement. “The governor underscored the urgency of the moment, noting that invasive carp were recently found just 80 miles from Lake Michigan — farther up the Illinois River than ever recorded.”

Whitmer's office said that Wednesday they had been notified that work on the project could resume. The White House referred questions to the Army Corps of Engineers, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

A pivotal project in flux under Trump

Illinois, Michigan and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers have spent years planning a gantlet of technologies in the Des Plaines River near Joliet to keep invasive carp from reaching Lake Michigan. The project has repeatedly faced uncertainty under Trump, despite his public support for it and hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funding approved under President Joe Biden.

In March, Whitmer pressed Trump to release federal funding for Brandon Road. Trump soon posted on Truth Social that he was “working with Governor Gretchen Whitmer” to protect the Great Lakes from invasive carp, and the Army Corps released funding for the project’s next phase the following month. The administration then issued another stop-work order in July, saying the project was undergoing an administrative review but offering little explanation.

“It’s time for the Trump Administration to uphold the federal government’s obligations, stop playing political games, and move this project forward,” Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker said in a July 30 statement.

The urgency increased in August, when the Illinois Department of Natural Resources detected hundreds of juvenile invasive carp about 80 miles from Lake Michigan, the first time carp of that size had been found that far upstream since monitoring began in 2010.

Whitmer's unique relationship with Trump

Whitmer, who is term-limited and set to leave office in January, has operated more freely with Trump during his second term after the two sparred repeatedly during his first. She has traveled to the White House to meet with him and welcomed him to Michigan, drawing criticism at times from fellow Democrats for her willingness to work with the Republican president.

Yet even after Michigan officials received word that the stop-work order had been lifted, officials in Illinois — where the project is located — had not been notified of the decision, raising questions about whether the project could remain in flux.

In stark contrast to Whitmer, Pritzker has emerged as one of Trump's most outspoken critics among the nation's governors as he considers mounting a bid for the 2028 Democratic nomination to replace him.

“Despite the Brandon Road Interbasin Project being in Illinois, the state has received no new communication from the Trump administration,” Matt Hill, spokesperson for Pritzker, wrote in a statement. “You would expect if the administration really cared about protecting the Great Lakes they would notify Illinois.”

___

Associated Press reporter Will Weissert contributed to this report.

The rollout of the gold-colored Teslas, which give passengers no way to take control in an emergency, comes as the company prepares to launch the service in other cities. Tesla shares have suffered amid a slump in vehicle sales, but they rose more than 5% Thursday on hopes that the futuristic-looking taxis will catch on quickly.

“No steering wheel, no pedals,” Tesla teased on X before the launch. Musk followed with a post showing a giant Cybercab floating above the Austin skyline and later wrote, “A Storm of Cybercabs.”

An invitation-only launch event was expected to be held later Thursday.

It is unclear how soon Musk intends to roll out the Cybercab service, but he needs to move quickly.

Tesla trails self-driving taxi leader Waymo in the number of cabs deployed and trips completed. To catch up, it must demonstrate that its camera-only system can safely navigate streets and avoid pedestrians. By contrast, Waymo and another rival, Amazon’s Zoox, supplement cameras with radar and a laser-based technology called lidar.

Even if the technology works well, Americans still need to be convinced.

A Pew Research Center survey conducted in February found that seven in 10 U.S. adults were “not too” or “not at all” comfortable riding in a driverless car.

Tesla stock was battered last year after Musk took over President Donald Trump’s government cost-cutting campaign, dubbed DOGE, and embraced extreme-right political candidates, sparking protests at Tesla showrooms and boycotts by car buyers in several countries.

Tesla posted a second consecutive annual decline in vehicle sales last year. Its profits plunged, and it lost its crown as the world’s bestselling electric vehicle maker to China’s BYD.

Austin has had a self-driving Tesla “robotaxi” service since June last year, but those cars are equipped with steering wheels and brake pedals. The service, which has since expanded to five other cities in Texas and Florida, initially carried passengers with safety drivers aboard to take over in case of problems.

Tesla has more than 200 “unsupervised” robotaxis in those cities, meaning they operate without safety drivers aboard, according to the monitoring site RobotaxiTracker. Waymo has more than 4,000 such vehicles in 14 cities.

In the Pew survey, 16% of U.S. adults said they would be “somewhat” comfortable riding in a driverless car, while 7% said they would be “extremely” or “very” comfortable.

Separate Gallup polling conducted in 2025 found that skepticism about the safety of driverless cars had risen over the previous several years. More Americans said all or mostly human-operated cars were the safest option than in a 2018 poll.

It is unclear whether Musk is the right person to coax people into cars with no human controls. Another Pew poll conducted in January found that nearly six in 10 U.S. adults had a “very” or “mostly” unfavorable view of him.

Musk eventually hopes to send full self-driving software to hundreds of thousands of Teslas through a software update. That would allow Tesla owners to turn their cars into taxis for hire when they are not using them.

But regulators in the U.S. and overseas have signaled that he still has some convincing to do.

Tesla has not received approval for drivers to use even its partial self-driving software in most European Union countries. In the U.S., where the software has been downloaded and used, regulators have opened several investigations into its safety.

One probe is examining the software’s role in several Tesla crashes in fog, sun glare and other low-visibility conditions, including one in which a pedestrian was killed. Another is investigating dozens of incidents in which Teslas using partial self-driving software ran red lights or drove on the wrong side of the road, sometimes crashing into other vehicles and causing injuries. A third is examining why Tesla apparently violated regulatory requirements by failing to report crashes promptly.

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's agriculture ministry said Thursday that it would consider reciprocal measures if a satisfactory solution is not reached.

“Brazilian authorities expressed their indignation at the lack of dialogue before the measure was adopted," the ministry said in a statement, adding that the suspension “does not match the depth of the strategic partnership between Brazil and the EU.”

The EU announced the suspension Tuesday, with the measure taking effect two days later. Brazil, the world's largest beef exporter, shipped about 108,000 tons of beef worth about $1 billion to the EU in 2025, according to government figures.

The bloc announced in May that Brazil would be removed from its list of countries authorized to export certain animal products to the bloc, arguing that Brazil had failed to provide sufficient guarantees that its livestock production meet EU standards against antibiotic growth promoters and other restricted drugs.

The Brazilian Association of Meat Exporting Industries, ABIEC, which provides technical support to the government in negotiations with the EU, said the move was concerning for local producers and failed to recognize what it described as the quality of Brazilian beef exports to 170 countries.

“Brazilian beef will continue to be sold in the markets for which it is authorized, but there is no automatic substitute for the European market, since different destinations require distinct products and cuts," said ABIEC in a statement.

The Confederation of Agriculture and Livestock of Brazil sent a document late Wednesday signed by its chairman to Brazil's foreign ministry saying that the EU suspension “results in the clear nullification and impairment of trade benefits legitimately expected by Brazil.”

The Brazilian confederation added that the EU failed to consider the rigor of Brazil’s health inspection system and needed to make amends for such a trade imbalance.

In its Thursday statement, the agriculture ministry said Brazil “reserves the right to resort to appropriate instruments to ensure balanced trade conditions, including reciprocity measures provided for under the national legal framework, as well as relevant mechanisms established in the Mercosur-European Union agreement and the multilateral trading system.”

The EU did not respond to requests for comment from The Associated Press.

European Commission spokesperson Eva Hrncirova said on Tuesday that a new list of countries that comply with EU rules on antimicrobials would take effect Sept. 3, which triggered the case against Brazil.

Meat imports have been a major source of European opposition to the free trade agreement signed in January between the EU and Mercosur, a trade bloc comprising Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay. Brazil is the only Mercosur member affected by the EU suspension.

Robson Goncalves, an economist and professor at Fundacao Getulio Vargas, said he expects the EU to enforce additional measures against Brazil until the EU-Mercosur agreement comes fully into force.

The deal is provisional, pending a decision by the European Court of Justice.

“These are the last attempts to protect European agribusiness from competition with Mercosur agribusiness," said Goncalves, who described the mechanism used to halt Brazilian exports as “a political measure” by the EU as its trade deal with Mercosur has yet to be fully implemented.

“Others like those will come in the next few years,” he said.

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According to police, Mandrell Ceydrec Rolle Jr., of Pembroke Pines, was arrested Wednesday following the Aug. 22 hit-and-run crash.

Rolle faces one count each of leaving the scene of a crash involving injury, reckless driving and resisting an officer without violence.

According to police, the incident began around 7 p.m. on Aug. 22 when multiple 911 calls were made about four dirt bike riders allegedly driving recklessly at high speeds along Collins Avenue in the Art Deco District.

Responding officers located the riders and observed the reckless behavior, police said.

Police said the group continued onto Ocean Drive before stopping in the 700 block.

Officers approached the riders on foot and took one of them, identified as Kasshun Williams, into custody without incident, authorities said.

Police said Rolle saw the officers and fled at a high rate of speed despite repeated commands to stop.

As he fled, Rolle struck a 10-year-old girl who was on the sidewalk with her mother, according to police.

The impact knocked the girl to the ground, injuring her elbow and leg. She was treated at the scene by the Miami Beach Fire Department.

Miami Beach police said detectives identified Rolle during their investigation and learned that he was on federal probation for felony possession of a machine gun.

Detectives obtained a warrant for his arrest, and Rolle was taken into custody Wednesday with assistance from the City of Miami Police Department’s Tactical Robbery Unit.

“There is zero tolerance for reckless behavior that endangers the lives of our residents and visitors,” Miami Beach Police Chief Wayne A. Jones said in a statement. “Driving a dirt bike recklessly, striking a 10-year-old child and fleeing without rendering aid is unacceptable.”

Jones said the department would use its resources to identify and hold accountable those who endanger others in Miami Beach.

“If you choose to endanger innocent people in Miami Beach, we will use every available resource to identify you and hold you accountable,” Jones said.

As of Thursday morning, Rolle was being held at the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center on a $2,650 bond.

El alcalde del Callao, César Pérez, dijo que no existe otra estatua registrada en el mundo que tenga la altura del diseño peruano. La estatua, con acabados de marmol, estará ubicada en un parque a pocos metros del Pacífico por lo que su estructura tendrá diseños para soportar cargas de viento de hasta 120 kilómetros por hora.

“Es un papa con DNI”, comentó en referencia a que Robert Prevost tiene un documento nacional de identidad peruana (DNI) que obtuvo tras nacionalizarse peruano en 2015 luego que fue nombrado en 2014 obispo de la ciudad de Chiclayo. Prevost también fue administrador encargado de la Diócesis de El Callao desde 2020.

El alcalde Pérez recordó que Prevost llegaba a El Callao manejando su propio vehículo desde Chiclayo en viajes que recorrían unos 600 kilómetros. En El Callao Prevost ayudó a distribuir alimentos para familias afectadas durante la pandemia del coronavirus.

En 2025 otra estatua del papa de siete metros de altura, elaborada con fibra de vidrio, fue inaugurada en Chiclayo, una ciudad en la costa norte de Perú, donde Prevost realizó su mayor actividad pastoral.

El papa León XIV realizará su primera gira por Latinoamérica del 6 al 16 de noviembre en la que visitará Uruguay, Argentina y finalizará en Perú, un país al que lo une su trabajo pastoral previo cuando fue sacerdote y obispo.

Prevost sirvió en total unos 22 años en el Perú. Llegó en 1985 como misionero agustino a un pueblo del norte peruano llamado Chulucanas, regresó en 1988 para desempeñar labores pastorales en Trujillo, y volvió en 2014 como obispo de Chiclayo, su último cargo hasta 2023.

Ese año el entonces papa Francisco llamó a Prevost para asumir un puesto clave en el Vaticano tras el fin de unas sangrientas protestas que remecieron Perú, las cuales exigían la renuncia de la entonces presidenta Dina Boluarte (2022-2025), considerada aliada de la actual presidenta Keiko Fujimori.

Esas protestas dejaron 50 civiles muertos, incluidos varios adolescentes, a manos de la fuerza pública, en un suceso donde la justicia no ha sancionado a ningún funcionario. En su última intervención ante la prensa local antes de partir al Vaticano, Prevost pidió a las autoridades políticas “aprender a escuchar mejor” para promover la justicia.

Officers with the Hollywood Police Department said they took Wayne Castellon into custody just after midnight on Tuesday.

According to investigators, HPD received reports of a suspicious person looking into vehicles late Monday night in the area of the 2600 block of Polk Street.

Responding officers observed a subject matching the description they were given, which was a person “wearing a hooded sweatshirt covering his head and full-face mask” after responding to the area.

Officers surveilled the subject, who was later identified as Wayne Castellon, for approximately two hours, watching him walk around several areas of the neighborhood while “looking over into vehicles with his light on his phone.”

Police said Castellon was seen “suspiciously walking aimlessly back and forth between the 2600 block to the 2100 block of Hollywood (Boulevard), Van Buren, Tyler, Polk and Taylor streets and in and out of the alleys continually loitering and looking into vehicles while concealing his face and lurking in the shadows,” according to an arrest form.

At one point, police said they observed Castellon stop along the 2100 block of Polk Street and “begin to urinate against residents’ trash cans on the sidewalk of the roadway” which was done “in plain view of the public as cars were driving by.”

When officers attempted to make contact with Castellon, police said he tried to run away, causing one officer to chase after him.

It didn’t take long for that officer to catch up to Castellon, with an arrest report stating the officer, “grabbed him from the backpack he was wearing, taking control of him and escorting him to the ground.”

Despite Castellon continuing to resist, police said they were able to take him into custody and found several items consistent with breaking into vehicles inside his backpack.

Castellon is now facing charges of possession of burglary tools with the intent to use, resisting an officer without violence, wearing a mask while committing a misdemeanor and exposure of sexual organs.

He is also charged with probation violation due to police discovering Castellon had an active warrant out of Palm Beach County for a case of burglary to a conveyance.

As of Thursday afternoon, Castellon was being held at the Broward County Main Jail on no bond.

La decisión judicial, fechada el miércoles y conocida por la prensa el jueves, responde a una acción de amparo elevada por un ciudadano que dijo actuar en nombre de los menores víctimas de reclutamiento que se encuentren en campamentos de grupos ilegales y que puedan resultar afectados por operaciones aéreas ofensivas.

En menos de un mes de gobierno, De la Espriella ha ejecutado al menos tres bombardeos contra distintos grupos armados ilegales, como parte de su estrategia de seguridad en la que ha prometido tener “mano de hierro”.

Tres menores de edad fueron identificados por el instituto forense entre una decena de cuerpos que dejaron los operativos militares, que incluyeron un bombardeo el 27 de agosto en una zona selvática del municipio de El Retorno, en el departamento de Guaviare, en el centro-sur del país.

El presidente y el Ministerio de Defensa defendieron la operación militar contra las disidencias de las extintas Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia, que continuaron en armas pese a que el Estado firmó un acuerdo de paz con la guerrilla hace una década.

Aseguraron que eran “combatientes” y responsabilizaron al grupo armado de violar el Derecho Internacional Humanitario al reclutar menores y utilizarlos como “escudos”.

La jueza de un juzgado de Familia de Bogotá les ordenó, como medida provisional mientras decide de fondo el caso, que se “abstengan de ejecutar operaciones aéreas ofensivas sobre objetivos respecto de los cuales exista información cierta, objetiva o razonablemente verificable acerca de la presencia” de menores reclutados, hasta tanto “se adopten y verifiquen las medidas de precaución y protección necesarias”.

El ministro del Interior, Rodrigo Lara, aseguró en la red social X que se trata de un “fallo absurdo e inconstitucional” que será apelado. Argumentó que establece un “criterio de una amplitud extraordinaria”, que en un conflicto interno como el colombiano termina haciendo “materialmente imposible el empleo de los bombardeos aéreos”.

El debate sobre los menores de edad reclutados en Colombia se ha sostenido a través de los años. El gobierno de Petro también fue cuestionado por ordenar bombardeos en los que murieron menores.

Tras ser reclutados bajo engaños, persuadidos con lujos o a la fuerza, los menores suelen ser utilizados para labores de vigilancia, tareas logísticas o de combate. Además, la organización internacional Human Rights Watch denunció en su más reciente informe que los grupos armados ilegales los estarían entrenando en el manejo de drones cargados con explosivos.

Al menos 97 menores han sido reclutados forzadamente entre enero y julio, según la estatal Defensoría del Pueblo, especialmente en departamentos como Cauca y Nariño, en el suroeste, y Norte de Santander, en el noreste.

It's what the tiny collectible figurines with the spring-laden oversize heads are known for: Give them a tap and watch their tops go, gyrating up and down or side to side. And any head can bobble - entertainers, athletes, politicians, animals, fictional characters, even your own if you get one personalized.

Kitschy, kind of funny, kind of clever, ubiquitous as giveaways at places like baseball games, who doesn't love a bobblehead? America most definitely does.

“I think they’re the ultimate Americana, sort of pop-culture icon,” says Phil Sklar, a bobblehead figurine aficionado who has parlayed that interest into founding the National Bobblehead Hall of Fame and Museum. The Milwaukee, Wisconsin, site offers visitors a chance to gawk at a vast array of the figurines as well as learn more about their history, and offers bobbleheads for sale. (Also very American? Spaces that celebrate highly specific interests.)

The dolls aren't an American invention. Sklar says there were head-nodding statues in China at least a few hundred years ago, seen by Europeans who brought versions back with them. Their popularity spread, and smaller versions were made, particularly in Germany.

But they reached their true head-bobbing potential in America, he says, first becoming popular in the 1960s by sports figures being given out at baseball games and then expanding to include a range of famous people, like the Beatles.

While there have been lulls over the decades in the level of public interest in the dolls, they've always been around, with whoever's in the public spotlight likely to become a bobblehead subject. Says Sklar: “They really have just been something that Americans have come to know and love."

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Part of a recurring series, “American Objects,” marking the 250th anniversary of the United States. For more American objects, click here. For more stories on the anniversary, click here.

Milei cast Trump’s comments as proof that his close relationship with the U.S. president — criticized by political opponents as overly deferential — was paying dividends.

“The United States is considering this change in position because it knows that Argentina has a reliable partner, aligned with Western values, in a strategically important position that can be a valuable ally in the decades to come,” Milei said in a nationally televised speech.

The Argentine leader then announced sweeping actions aimed at stopping the development of the deep-sea Sea Lion oil project, about 220 kilometers (140 miles) north of the islands, where British company Rockhopper Exploration and Israel’s Navitas Petroleum plan to begin drilling in the coming months and start pumping oil in 2028. Argentina considers the project an illegal exploitation of resources in waters it claims as its own.

He threatened tougher sanctions against companies involved in the offshore drilling and announced new funding for a naval base in Argentina’s southernmost province of Tierra del Fuego to bolster the country’s military presence near the islands, known in Argentina as the Malvinas.

“Argentina will not stand idly by,” Milei said. “Any further advance on the Malvinas Islands will be considered a violation of our national security.”

U.K. Defense Secretary Wes Streeting said Britain’s commitment to the Falkland Islands was "unshakeable.”

“Milei’s statement overnight tells us more about domestic politics in Argentina than it does about the Falkland Islands,” Streeting wrote on X.

Milei’s effort to refocus attention on the Falklands are a striking turn for a leader who has faced criticism at home for warming ties with Britain and professing admiration for Margaret Thatcher, the British prime minister detested in Argentina for leading the campaign to retake the archipelago during the 1982 Falklands War.

The two-month conflict, which killed 649 Argentine troops, 255 British service members and three islanders, remains a sore point in Argentina over four decades later.

The sovereignty claim is enshrined in Argentina’s constitution and frequently invoked as an expression of national identity, from banknotes to World Cup soccer chants. It is also one of the few causes that cuts across the country’s stark political divides, giving Milei, who is up for reelection next year, a welcome political opening as his approval ratings slip and the economy sputters.

“We can argue about my style. We can disagree over fiscal or exchange-rate policy,” Milei said. “But there are causes that rise above any political difference. The Malvinas is one of them.”

Some were skeptical.

“He wants to use the legitimate sovereignty claim over the Malvinas Islands to regain ground ahead of the election year and serve U.S. interests in its dispute with Britain,” said Nicolás del Caño, a leftist opposition lawmaker.

Trump questions US support for British sovereignty

Argentina maintains that it inherited sovereignty over the islands from its former colonizer, Spain, and that Britain has illegally occupied them since 1833. Britain rejects that claim, citing the islanders’ desire to remain a British overseas territory.

For decades, successive U.S. administrations have remained neutral on the competing claims while recognizing Britain’s de facto administration of the islands. Any departure from that position would be a major diplomatic affront and inflame already high trans-Atlantic tensions.

On Monday, Trump stirred concern in Britain when asked whether his administration was reviewing its stance on the decades-old dispute. “I always review every position,” he replied. “That’s just one of many.”

Then, in an interview aired Thursday with British broadcaster GB News, Trump dodged directly answering a question about whether the U.S. would “come to the aid” of Britain in another conflict over the Falklands. Instead, he repeated past complaints that Britain had not provided sufficient support for the U.S.-led bombing campaign against Iran.

“Your country was not there to help me,” Trump said, recalling Britain’s former prime minister, Keir Starmer, telling him the country did not have ships to contribute to the campaign. “It was pretty sad, the whole thing.”

The Trump administration has floated the Falklands as leverage before: An internal Pentagon email leaked in April first raised the prospect of Washington reconsidering its position on the islands as one possible way to punish NATO allies that declined to join the U.S. war on Iran.

His comments forced Downing Street to insist that Britain would not yield sovereignty over the Falklands.

“Sovereignty rests with the U.K., and the islanders’ right to self-determination is paramount,” British Prime Minister Andy Burnham’s spokesman, Tom Wells, said earlier this week, pointing to a 2013 referendum in which the roughly 4,000 people living in the Falkland Islands voted overwhelmingly in favor of remaining a British overseas territory.

Milei rallies Argentines around the flag

Under pressure from Argentina's populist opposition, which accuses him of neglecting Argentina’s sovereignty claim, Milei has grown more vocal on the Falklands as plans for large-scale oil production around the islands raise the economic stakes of the dispute.

In his speech, Milei warned that the Sea Lion project could usher in a broader Falklands oil boom, enriching the islands with resources Argentina claims as its own and further entrenching Britain’s presence.

“If we allow it, we will be creating an incentive for the British government to deepen the occupation of the islands and the exploitation of our resources,” Milei said.

He vowed to fast-track sanctions against companies involved in oil projects around the islands and extend penalties to suppliers, shareholders and directors. His proposed legislation could also bar companies tied to such projects from operating or signing contracts in Argentina.

Despite slashing public spending elsewhere as part of his austerity drive, Milei also pledged more money to build a naval base in Tierra del Fuego and upgrade Argentina’s telecommunications capabilities there to strengthen the country's presence in the South Atlantic.

“A poor country without armed forces can hardly make effective progress on its sovereignty claims,” he said.

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Associated Press writers Jill Lawless in London, Zeke Miller in Washington and Almudena Calatrava in Buenos Aires, Argentina, contributed to this report.

Liz Oyer says in her lawsuit that her March 2025 firing came after she declined a request from the staff of then-Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche to add Gibson to a list of individuals for whom the Justice Department would recommend the reinstatement of their gun rights. Oyer says she objected for public safety reasons given Gibson's prior domestic violence conviction that had resulted in the loss of his gun privileges.

The lawsuit says that hours after she drafted a memo conveying her concerns, a colleague pulled her out of a meeting and Justice Department security officers handed her a termination letter, instructed her to pack her belongings and escorted her from the building.

Blanche has denied Oyer's account of the basis for her termination, saying at his Senate confirmation hearing last month for the attorney general position that he now holds: “I didn’t even know of that. I had known nothing about Mel Gibson or that letter when I fired her. Nothing.”

Oyer's lawsuit, the latest in a series by Justice Department staffers challenging Trump administration terminations that they deem unlawful, was filed after she says the Merit Systems Protection Board — which handles personnel claims — had left her case in “prolonged limbo” and declined to take action on her complaint.

She said in a statement that her lawsuit, which was filed in federal court in Washington and seeks a court order declaring her firing unlawful and reinstating her to federal service, was about not only her but about the ability of all civil servants “to uphold the law without fear or favor.”

“If career officials like me can be fired for refusing to bend the rules to serve the president’s friends, then the message to every public servant is clear: loyalty to a politician matters more than loyalty to the Constitution. I cannot accept that,” she said.

Oyer maintains in her lawsuit that her firing violated civil service protections for career employees as well as her First Amendment free speech rights “because the removal was taken, in part, based on Ms. Oyer’s perceived political affiliation.”

“Indeed, when Ms. Oyer declined to disregard her duties in order to perform a favor for her politically-appointed superiors and President Trump, she was summarily terminated,” the lawsuit says.

In denying her claims at his confirmation hearing last month, Blanche said that Oyer was fired “for a number of reasons,”

“The decisions that she had made (as) pardon attorney in the weeks and months leading up to the end of President Biden’s term were completely inconsistent with President Trump’s authority, including recommending commuting every single individual on death row, which even President Biden didn’t do,” Blanche said at his confirmation hearing.

Before leaving office, Biden announced that he was commuting the sentences of 37 of the 40 people who were on federal death row, converting their punishments to life imprisonment.

He left in place the death sentences of Dylann Roof, who carried out the 2015 racist slayings of nine Black members of Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina; 2013 Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev; and Robert Bowers, who fatally shot 11 congregants at Pittsburgh’s Tree of life Synagogue in 2018, the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S history.

Oyer testified in opposition to Blanche's nomination, where Republican senators pressed her on her recommendations.

She told senators that Blanche's comments marked the first time that she had ever heard the explanation that she was fired because of recommendations on sentence commutations. She said the assertion that her firing was unrelated to Mel Gibson “materialized out of thin air and has never been stated before.”

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The Orange Blossom Classic was first played in 1933, providing Black college athletes with a stage during segregation. The event has since become a longstanding tradition centered on HBCU culture, community and education.

“This is the one event where I say it is entertainment, sports, culture, music, everything just all wrapped up into one,” said Kendra Bulluck-Major, executive director of the Orange Blossom Classic.

The weekend began with a career fair Tuesday.

The Classic’s annual scholarship fundraising luncheon is scheduled for Friday at Jungle Island, followed by two signature parties.

“Our sixth annual denim party is back. So, get your best denim outfits. Saturday night, we have our all-white party. Get your best white outfit,” Bulluck-Major said.

The weekend culminates Sunday at Hard Rock Stadium, where a fan fest will feature Miami artists including Trina and Trick Daddy, along with an appearance by actor Lorenz Tate.

South Carolina State will face Florida A&M University at 3 p.m. Sunday.

The game will also feature a showcase of HBCU marching band culture at halftime, with performances from the Marching 100 and Marching 101.

Organizers are also introducing a new in-stadium day party following halftime.

For Bulluck-Major, the Classic’s return is about connecting generations of fans.

“I have people who remember the original classic from 1933 to ‘78 and they say, I’m so glad you brought it back because it meant so much to our community,” she said. “And then I have the new generation who may not be familiar with the original classic, but they’re still excited about it.”

Since the Orange Blossom Classic returned in 2021, organizers say it has generated more than $100 million in economic impact for South Florida and more than $500,000 in scholarships.

Bulluck-Major said buying a ticket is also a way to support the Classic’s mission.

“We think of it as just purchasing a ticket, but I look at each one of our ticket purchasers as donors,” she said. “You purchase a ticket to this event, tickets as low as $25, you are a donor. You are helping to support a cause that helps give back to our community.”

Click here for more information on how to purchase tickets.

El Orange Blossom Classic se disputó por primera vez en 1933, brindando a los atletas universitarios afroamericanos un escenario durante la segregación. Desde entonces, el evento se ha convertido en una tradición de larga trayectoria centrada en la cultura de las HBCU, la comunidad y la educación.

“Este es el único evento del que digo que tiene entretenimiento, deportes, cultura, música, todo reunido en uno solo”, dijo Kendra Bulluck-Major, directora ejecutiva del Orange Blossom Classic.

El fin de semana comenzó con una feria de empleo el martes.

El almuerzo anual del Classic para recaudar fondos para becas está programado para el viernes en Jungle Island, seguido de dos fiestas emblemáticas.

“Nuestra sexta fiesta anual de mezclilla está de regreso. Así que pónganse sus mejores atuendos de mezclilla. El sábado por la noche tendremos nuestra fiesta de blanco. Pónganse su mejor atuendo blanco”, dijo Bulluck-Major.

El fin de semana culmina el domingo en el Hard Rock Stadium, donde un festival para aficionados contará con artistas de Miami, entre ellos Trina y Trick Daddy, además de una aparición del actor Lorenz Tate.

South Carolina State se enfrentará a Florida A&M University a las 3 p.m. del domingo.

El partido también contará con una exhibición de la cultura de las bandas de marcha de las HBCU durante el medio tiempo, con presentaciones de Marching 100 y Marching 101.

Los organizadores también están introduciendo una nueva fiesta dentro del estadio después del medio tiempo.

Para Bulluck-Major, el regreso del Classic se trata de conectar a generaciones de aficionados.

“Tengo personas que recuerdan el Classic original de 1933 a 1978 y dicen: “Estoy muy contento de que lo hayan traído de vuelta porque significaba mucho para nuestra comunidad”. Y luego tengo a la nueva generación, que quizás no esté familiarizada con el Classic original, pero aun así está entusiasmada”, dijo.

Desde que el Orange Blossom Classic regresó en 2021, los organizadores dicen que ha generado más de $100 millones USD en impacto económico para el sur de Florida y más de $500,000 USD en becas.

Bulluck-Major dijo que comprar un boleto también es una manera de apoyar la misión del Classic.

“Pensamos que simplemente estamos comprando un boleto, pero yo considero a cada uno de nuestros compradores de boletos como donantes”, dijo. “Usted compra un boleto para este evento, con boletos desde $25 USD, y es un donante. Está ayudando a apoyar una causa que ayuda a contribuir a nuestra comunidad”.

Haga clic aquí para obtener más información sobre cómo comprar boletos.

The Rockets didn't release terms of the deal, but multiple reports said it was a five-year, $208 million extension that would keep him in Houston until 2032.

“Amen represents everything we want our organization to be about,” Rockets general manager Rafael Stone said. “He has elite two-way ability, a toughness and the will to outwork his peers, and he competes in every circumstance. Year over year, he’s improved in every facet of his game, and we know his best basketball is ahead of him.”

Thompson, the fourth pick in the 2023 draft, started 79 games last season and averaged 18.3 points, 7.8 rebounds, 5.3 assists and 1.51 steals a game. He joined Luka Doncic as the only players in league history to average at least 18 points, seven rebounds, five assists and 1.5 steals a game.

He led the league in minutes played last season to become the third Rocket to do so, joining James Harden and Moses Malone, who both did it twice.

The 23-year-old, who has developed into the team's top defender, showed his versatility to play any guard position last season when he stepped in as the team's point guard with Fred VanVleet missing all season because of a knee injury.

Thompson has improved steadily in his three seasons in Houston after averaging 9.5 points as a rookie and scoring 14.1 points a game in Year 2.

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El paquete de normas publicadas en la Gaceta Oficial flexibiliza incluso los requisitos para que empresas extranjeras se asocien a las nacionales no estatales y abran cuentas en bancos extranjeros, al tiempo que otorga permisos para la gestión de transporte turístico, la instalación de agencias de viaje, así como el ejercicio de los guías, una práctica antes completamente restringida al marco estatal.

Las medidas fueron aprobadas por el Parlamento y el poderoso Partido Comunista, y fueron anunciadas en medio de un recrudecimiento de las sanciones de Estados Unidos, incluso un cerco petrolero desde enero, para presionar un cambio de modelo político que agravó la crisis que Cuba padece desde hace años caracterizada por largos apagones y desabastecimiento de bienes básicos.

Se trata de “las normas que implementan las transformaciones económicas y sociales relacionadas con la inversión extranjera, con el comercio exterior y con el turismo”, expresó durante una coferencia de prensa Oscar Pérez-Oliva Fraga, viceprimer ministro y titular de Inversión Extranjera en la isla.

En junio, la Asamblea Nacional del Poder Popular —el Parlamento— y el Partido Comunista tuvieron reuniones extraordinarias para aprobar un paquete de 176 medidas que darían un cambio de rumbo a la política económica del país y que fue calificada como históricas por los expertos pues rompió con más de seis décadas de un centralismo radical.

Las reformas contemplan la ampliación de las empresas privadas, permisos para que cubanos residentes en el extranjero inviertan en la isla incluso en el sector del turismo e importación sin directa. También se abrirá el mercado cambiario y bancario, entre otras medidas.

Muchas de estas reformas han estado siendo reglamentadas a través de normas, decretos o cambios en las directrices de las entidades.

Esta semana se informó, por ejemplo, que las firmas cubanas que hasta ahora solo podían ser pequeñas y medianas, ahora tienen autorizadas contratar más de 100 empleados, también se redujeron requisitos para la operación de sus socios.

En julio otras normativas ampliaron los rubros de empresas privadas a sectores que siempre se consideraron estratégicos o privativos del Estado en la isla como farmacias y explotación petrolera y minas.

Cuba atraviesa una dura situación económica agravada por la imposición del presidente Donald Trump de un cerco energético presionando un cambio de modelo político y financiero. Ello llevó a empresas internacionales socias históricas de la isla, como Meliá o la canadiense Sherritt, a retirarse o redujeran sus operaciones amenazadas con ser sancionadas por Estados Unidos.

“La situación es muy compleja”, reconoció Pérez-Oliva, quien destacó “la persecución y amenaza directa a inversionistas extranjeros que están presente en Cuba”.

“Hay empresas que han cedido y retirado del país, otras que permenecen. Estamos en un contexto adverso”, acotó el funcionario. Se desconoce la cantidad de firmas que optaron por salir de la isla.

La crisis económica y multisectorial se acompaña de una tensa situación energética con apagones de más de 30 horas y desabastecimiento de todo tipo.

El presidente Miguel Díaz-Canel aseguró que las transformaciones, a pesar de su corte aperturista, no obedece a una imposición de Estados Unidos. Ambos gobiernos reconocieron conversaciones, pero también que las mismas se encentran paralizadas.

The proposed arch is one of several projects the Republican president is pursuing to leave his lasting imprint on Washington, including renaming and renovating the Kennedy Center, building a huge new White House ballroom, refurbishing the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool and rebuilding a golf course in East Potomac Park that could significantly reduce the public’s access to running and biking paths.

“This will be one of the Great Pieces of American Architecture,” Interior Secretary Doug Burgum wrote on X, “befitting the most powerful Capital in the World.”

Along with the announcement on X, Burgum posted artistic mockups of the planned 250-foot-tall (76-meter) memorial arch, which will stand between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington National Cemetery.

The renderings showed a towering, white arch with gold detail, stamped with “ONE NATION UNDER GOD." On its top is a Lady Liberty-like gold figure with wings and a torch, as well as gold eagles, their wings spread outward.

The arch design, proposed by President Donald Trump, has already received early approval from the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts, whose commissioners were all appointed by the president.

The groundbreaking is set to begin without the arch having received final approval from the National Capital Area Planning Commission, which greenlit the site and preliminary plans at its July meeting. The commission is expected to take up the matter again this fall.

A National Park Service report released Friday backed the project, though it said there would be adverse effects to the sightlines between a host of iconic landmarks, disrupting the historical significance of dozens of nearby sites.

Many of Washington’s monuments, buildings and sites have been carefully planned over decades to reflect significant moments in the nation’s history and to evoke symbolism through sightlines that connect them to other landmarks.

A lawsuit filed by three veterans and an architectural historian argues “congressional authorization is necessary and lacking for this project,” said Nicolas Sansone, an attorney with Public Citizen Litigation Group representing the plaintiffs.

"We believe that construction cannot and should not proceed apace, and we are prepared to inform the court that it needs to, at this juncture, needs to step in," he said. Sansone did not specify what their next court filing would be, but he added that he's “very confident” that they'll find success.

Burgum, in a series of posts on X, defended the arch's construction on historical grounds, arguing that the idea for a monument had been bouncing around for more than a century, citing old reports of congressional attempts at and discussions of a monument in the circle.

“Despite Congress’s intent, the site became and remains today a barren traffic circle lacking any monumental treatment and significant historic value,” he wrote, adding that over 70 cities worldwide had “beautiful arches” but now the U.S. will have the “most spectacular and beautiful arch of them all!”

The court case is ongoing, with the Department of Justice filing a new document Thursday arguing that the lawsuit should be thrown out.

The April 5, 1970, feature written by then-AP writer Lynn Sherr, headlined “Making It Like, Wow,” ran with a photograph of Steinem — and her cat — at home, which doubled as her workplace. It carried its own editor's note introducing Steinem:

“She’s a writer who is almost as much written about as she writes. She’s as beautiful as the Beautiful People she records. She’s a name among name droppers. And she’s Everygirl’s answer to whether Cinderella can ever find success and happiness in the big city.”

As the AP looks back on Steinem's life and career, it is making that early profile available for readers. The story has been edited for typographical errors, but maintains the AP style — and mores — of the day.

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Making It Like, Wow

By LYNN SHERR

NEW YORK (AP) — It sounded like the bash of both decades. A New Year’s Eve party at Gloria Steinem’s!

Gloria who?

Gloria Steinem: the writer-activist-antiwar-gorgeous bachelor girl who was pictured with Henry Kissinger in Time and Life and who helped keep the cool in Harlem with Mayor Lindsay and who almost has a permanent guest swivel chair in Carson and Cavett’s TV studios and who nearly ran on the New York mayoralty ticket with Norman Mailer and Jimmy Breslin and who once let Ali MacGraw share her apartment—I mean, wouldn’t her party be crawling with names? I mean, didn’t she practically run New York?

And so Marty and Jeff, two journalism students in search of the Jet Set, crashed.

As it turned out, they’d have found more celebrities fox-trotting to Guy Lombardo. Steinem’s brownstone on that last day of 1969 yielded just six Black Panthers, four Long Island migrant workers, assorted interesting but unheard-of people and a doctor named Mortimer. No Lindsay, no Mailer, no Breslin, not even one Kennedy.

“Jimmy’s at home with his wife and Norman’s out in the country,” she apologized kindly.

“That’s what real life is like.”

Well, maybe. New Year’s Eve may have been all cold turkey on the table and ice cubes in the bathtub, but Gloria Steinem, 34, free-lance magazine writer and contributing editor to New York and Glamour magazines, hardly ekes out your basic subways-and-supermarkets existence as an Upper East Side Single.

A humbly born Midwesterner-turned-Manhattanite whose showgirl legs have not yet been hidden beneath a maxicoat and whose perfect-for-a-Pucci-dress body stays slim with Slender and Fresca, Steinem is Everygirl’s dream of Making It.

There was that party on the West Side, for instance. when the show-biz folk got to playing parlor games imitating famous people. “Well, I know about a thousand girls who would like to be Gloria Steinem,” joked one participant.

And then there was that press briefing in Washington, when Defense Secretary Melvin Laird was asked by Pentagon reporters about his alleged annoyance with the policy interference of White House foreign affairs adviser Henry Kissinger. “No. I don’t worry about Kissinger,” Laird answered, grinning over the bachelor adviser’s well-gossiped social life. “Not since I found out Gloria Steinem is going out with other men.”

Or there was that article in a Canadian newspaper, describing Gloria Steinem as possessing “the body of Raquel Welch, the brains of Eric Sevareid.”

“Eric Sevareid?” protested the real Gloria Steinem in her slightly nasal sotto voice. “Eric Sevareid is much too conservative.”

Thus, Gloria Steinem.

A political radical who has helped bail Black Panthers out of jail, she made Cesar Chavez a Name to Drop by organizing a fund-raising party for the grape-pickers on Long Island, at which Ethel Kennedy chose to make her first postassassination public appearance.

During the 1968 campaign, she worked—hard—first for Eugene McCarthy, then for Robert Kennedy, then for George McGovern, the South Dakota senator who is still a close friend. Steinem says he’d be one of two people she would name as references on a college application.

The other would be Harvard economist John Kenneth Galbraith.

Her datebook, a pocket-sized black leather, records in felt-pen scribblings the highlights of several social seasons: the New York Shakespeare Festival Benefit in 1965—to which she wore a chinchilla-ringed dress designed by Estevez; Truman Capote’s Masked Ball—to which she wore a silver mask with peacock feathers designed by her artist ex-roommate; summer days in the Hamptons and city nights at Elaine’s, the literary set bar. It is a world where people just know each other; where she happened to meet the Galbraiths at a lecture in Cambridge and then met McGovern at a weekend at their (“Kitty and Ken’s”) country home; where, after meeting Truman, he insisted that she interview Lee Radziwill and so she did, and then stayed with the Radziwills at that.

The datebook also records items that don’t make the gossip columns: treks to Lower East Side welfare projects, meetings for West Side day-care centers, concern for Vietnam veterans in outlying hospitals. Steinem moves, graceful, between both worlds—monied sophistication and tenement poverty—turning up at both in microshort clingy dresses and tall boots.

“She’s all together, she can make anything relevant,” explains Arnaldo Segarra, a handsome young Puerto Rican who grew up playing stickball in the sewers of El Barrios and who used to be an aide to Mayor Lindsay. “We even made her an honorary Puerto Rican. And not too many white Anglo-Saxon females get that.”

At a dinner for Herman Badillo in the Americana Hotel. Steinem slips in late wearing a slinky brown velvet dress with a train that settles on the floor like a puddle behind her. “It was my thrift shop bargain,” she says—“$15. I’m afraid to have it cleaned.”

Her blue-tinted aviator glasses—without which she cannot distinguish a Black Panther from a white Bircher—fit over a few strands of blonde-streaked brown hair and then disappear into the long, soft mane.

After the speech, Steinem waits in the lobby while the assemblyman friend who paid for her dinner retrieves her short brocade coat from the checkroom because she does not have 35 cents.

The dinner is a rare night out for Steinem that week. Most of her other engagements—including invitations from sought-after editors and glittering movie premieres—she has cancelled to meet story deadlines, and sits hunched over the typewriter at her roll-top oak desk.

That, for Gloria Steinem, is also Real Life.

What irks her is how it always comes out more Lively than Real.

Like that Sunday morning in a snowstorm, when she pulled on boots and a sheepskin coat—“the only good thing from the Rockefeller trip”—and trudged up to the Spanish Methodist Church on East 111th Street to lend support to a group of Young Lords in confrontation with the police. A local newspaper columnist the next week sniped that “Gloria Steinem was there in a fur coat.”

Or that item in Time, turning a party photograph into a tryst with Kissinger and calling her a “Gucci liberal.” “Henry’s real girl friend must have gotten angry,” she laughed. “Anyway, I don’t even own a pair of Gucci shoes.”

Stretched out barefoot in her multiprint living room, she wore a brown see-through shirt tucked into wide-legged brown denim pants with an Indian belt strung through the loops. Brown Swedish klogs rested beside the undulating benches of pink and purple. With a pearl-gray cat settled languidly on her lap, its tail stroking her slim waist, Steinem gently dismissed the myths of her rich girl image.

“Say that I have always worked for a living, my own living, that I buy my dresses off the rack,” she pleaded. “I have never been to Acapulco and I don’t go away for ski weekends.”

She assigned to her answering service the nonstop ringing of her unlisted telephone in the other, the working room of her apartment: a book-lined den with posters of Che Guevera (a Mailer-Breslin button had been pinned on it), Robert Kennedy (“Whenever I have a problem or have to face something bad. I think of Bobby, because he was always in over his head”) and La Causa.

Back in the living room, where a Spanish-speaking maid had just finished vacuuming, Steinem reached for an occasional cigarette. On the wall, American chintz ran into Oriental prints. A zebra skin covered the floor. A sleeping balcony jutted out from one corner.

“I know I’m doing the right thing by writing,” Steinem laughed, in her characteristic sociopolitical way of speaking in capital letters, “because it’s the only thing I do that doesn’t make me feel guilty.”

Not that she was born with a silver typewriter in her crib. Growing up in house trailers until age 11, then the slums of Toledo, Ohio, she tap-danced for a few dollars a night and learned to recognize bill collectors.

After a Phi Beta Kappa key at college (Smith, on scholarship), two years on a fellowship in India, then some work on Youth festivals in Cambridge, Mass., Steinem headed for New York.

Her first publishing job in 1960 was with Help, a political satire magazine. A boy friend at Esquire, an appreciative features editor—“Hell, I just wanted to meet her,” said Clay Felker—and good ideas landed her a first bylined piece in that magazine.

But it took more than good looks to get second assignments. Steinem worked hard, organized furiously. For Show magazine, she stuffed herself into a mini-cottontail suit and did an “I Was a Playboy Bunny” expose. It wowed the readers and earned the author—who would have preferred writing about politics—“offers to be a hooker on 57th Street, to commit myself to prison, all those things. I have it in the Mistake Section of my Anthology I’m putting together.”

Careerwise, it was no mistake. “A Bunny’s Tale” sent Steinem soaring into print with stories that sliced to the core of everyone from Jackie Kennedy to James Baldwin—articles which were sometimes trenchant, sometimes pedantic, but about which she is disarmingly frank. “If Forster, Dinesen and Proust are writers,” she once wrote, “then I must be something else.”

Steinem’s current choice of subjects—and the fact that she has been able to make that choice—sets her apart from all the other pretty girls who come to New York to find the Glass Slipper. “Here you are with a college degree and what does it mean?” she joked. “You write about lipstick and bunnies.”

Then, after some thought: “During the Kennedy administration you could go to discotheques because the world wasn’t coming to an end, Panthers weren’t getting shot in the next room. I’m happier not going to parties any more. Maybe that’s because I’m secure enough not to care.”

What she does care about, she is writing about: politics, urban sociology, women’s liberation.

One of her favorite TV talk show lines goes, “Men will be much happier, too, when they no longer have to deliver on a silver platter an identity to a lady.”

That goes for her own identity, as well. Felker, now editor of New York, says of her: “She is the ideal woman—beautiful, involved, and free to choose whatever she wants.”

Ladies like her too. The wife of a prominent journalist said, “If my husband were to leave me for Gloria Steinem, I would only consider it a further extension of his good taste.”

In her New York magazine article on “Women and Power”—now part of a book—Steinem quoted Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis as having said, “There are two kinds of women: those who want power in the world and those who want power in bed.”

“When Clay gave me a copy of the book, he inscribed it, ‘To the Third Kind,’” Steinem said, only half-smiling.

“That means I want both.”

Rain, a 20-year-old female, was the second to die out of a group of four whales that were moved to the Chicago aquarium in mid-August from a shuttered water park in Ontario. A whale named Peekachu died last week as caretakers tried to revitalize it.

The third whale to die, a 34-year-old male named Beethoven, had lived at Shedd Aquarium for decades, the aquarium said in an announcement.

The aquarium did not indicate the cause of the whales’ deaths in its announcement. “Necropsies, blood tests and additional exams” of their bodies are in process, it said.

“These deaths were unexpected and there is still much we do not know about what led to them," officials said in the statement.

Shedd Aquarium accepted 10 beluga whales as part of the mission to rescue 30 of them and four dolphins at Marineland, a water park in Ontario that closed its doors years ago and lost the ability to care for the animals. The Chicago aquarium announced Tuesday it welcomed the last two of those 10 — young males named Gimli and Yukon — from the Canadian park.

Twenty whales — 19 belugas and one killer whale — had died at Marineland since 2019, according to provincial government data obtained through Freedom-of-Information laws and official statements.

Officials at Shedd Aquarium previously told The Associated Press that moving the beluga whales was a complex, meticulously monitored process. The whales were hoisted in custom-made slings and held in temperature-controlled containers. Since they arrived, their health and behavior have been monitored on a minute-to-minute basis, they said.

Canadian Minister of Fisheries Joanne Thompson said she was “saddened” to hear of Rain's death. Canada's government “has taken reasonable steps to ensure the safe rescue of the whales,” she said in a statement to AP.

“My thoughts are with the care staff who worked tirelessly to support Rain and the other belugas.”

Georgia Aquarium, SeaWorld locations in San Diego and San Antonio, and Oceanogràfic Valencia in Spain are also taking in the animals rescued from Marineland.

The two beluga whales rehomed at Georgia Aquarium are “settling in nicely,” although it will take months before they are fully adjusted, the aquarium said in an email to AP. Most of the rescued whales in SeaWorld's care are in stable condition, although a handful are “eating less consistently than usual,” according to AnneMarie Iturrizaga, a spokesperson for the company that owns SeaWorld.

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Mayes-Osterman is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.

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Mama came to the shelter as a stray and, based on her condition, appears to have recently had puppies. Sadly, her puppies were never found. Despite being young — likely under two years old — Mama has been repeatedly overlooked.

Shelter staff say Mama is extremely sweet and simply needs some patience and time to feel comfortable. While she was nervous in the car and in the unfamiliar TV studio, her tail kept wagging whenever she saw someone.

Staff say fostering could be a great option for someone who wants to give Mama a chance to blossom in a calm home environment.

And Mama isn’t the only dog looking for a family. Amos, a larger adult dog who has also been at the shelter for months, is waiting for his chance, too.

The message from Animal Services is simple: don’t overlook adult or larger dogs. They can make wonderful companions when given the right home and a little love.

Click here for more information on how you can adopt a pet.

Mama llegó al refugio como una perrita callejera y, por su condición, parece haber tenido cachorros recientemente. Lamentablemente, sus cachorros nunca fueron encontrados. A pesar de ser joven, probablemente de menos de dos años, Mama ha sido ignorada repetidamente.

El personal del refugio dice que Mama es extremadamente dulce y simplemente necesita un poco de paciencia y tiempo para sentirse cómoda. Aunque estaba nerviosa en el auto y en el desconocido estudio de televisión, su cola no dejaba de moverse cada vez que veía a alguien.

El personal dice que acogerla temporalmente podría ser una excelente opción para alguien que quiera darle a Mama la oportunidad de desenvolverse en un ambiente tranquilo en un hogar.

Y Mama no es la única perrita que busca una familia. Amos, un perro adulto de mayor tamaño que también lleva meses en el refugio, también está esperando su oportunidad.

El mensaje de Servicios para Animales es simple: no ignore a los perros adultos o de mayor tamaño. Pueden ser compañeros maravillosos cuando se les brinda el hogar adecuado y un poco de amor.

Haga clic aquí para obtener más información sobre cómo puede adoptar una mascota.

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The Space Hub program aims to help address the aerospace workforce gap, inspire students to pursue STEM studies and increase awareness of careers in science-related fields.

The school is located at 1200 NW Sixth Ave.

State senators, representatives, students and Miami-Dade Schools Superintendent Rafael Villalobos were on hand to discuss the importance of the new program.

The funds will also support technology and equipment upgrades, renovations to the school’s current planetarium and the development of state-of-the-art discovery and aerospace research labs.

“This is the future. So beyond today, which is powerful and amazing, and their incredible work, it is that character, those morals, those values that are being instilled in our children. And they’re going to go out and lead our communities into a new frontier,” said new Miami-Dade Public Schools Superintendent Rafael Villalobos.

El programa Space Hub tiene como objetivo ayudar a reducir la brecha de trabajadores en el sector aeroespacial, inspirar a los estudiantes a cursar estudios STEM y aumentar el conocimiento sobre carreras en campos relacionados con la ciencia.

La escuela está ubicada en 1200 NW Sixth Ave.

Senadores estatales, representantes, estudiantes y el superintendente de las Escuelas de Miami-Dade, Rafael Villalobos, estuvieron presentes para hablar sobre la importancia del nuevo programa.

Los fondos también apoyarán mejoras de tecnología y equipos, renovaciones al planetario actual de la escuela y el desarrollo de laboratorios de última generación para descubrimiento e investigación aeroespacial.

“Este es el futuro. Así que más allá de hoy, que es poderoso y asombroso, y de su increíble trabajo, está ese carácter, esa moral, esos valores que se están inculcando en nuestros niños. Y ellos van a salir y liderar nuestras comunidades hacia una nueva frontera”, dijo el nuevo superintendente de las Escuelas Públicas de Miami-Dade, Rafael Villalobos.

The work being done at the research stations will continue at other sites, Forest Service Associate Chief Chris French said in an interview. An additional 41 research facilities that faced possible closure will remain open after local officials and members of Congress raised concerns about the reorganization, which was announced in March.

“Our primary goal was to get our facilities costs under control,” French told The Associated Press. “We’re not closing any ongoing science activities. We’re not closing any of the experimental forests that are important to our researchers.”

Research by forest service employees ranges from studies on invasive species and protecting water resources to how wildfires are changing as climate change dries out and heats up forests.

Bill Avey of the National Associated of Forest Service Retirees, an advocacy group, said the forest service has long struggled to pay for all its facilities and some opportunities for consolidation exist. But Avey, who worked at the service for four decades, said its current leaders including Chief Tom Schultz need to defend the importance of forest research more vocally.

“He should be doing a much better job of pushing back and justifying and explaining some of the research work,” Avey said. He added that the 41 facilities being retained likely would have closed as well if not for pushback from his group and others.

The 95 employees at the research stations slated for closure will be shifted to other sites within their commuting areas, Forest Service Communications Director Chad Douglas said. The closures — along with previously announced plans to shut regional offices in Atlanta, Milwaukee and Portland — will save about $16 million, officials said.

The reorganization also includes moving the agency’s headquarters from Washington to Salt Lake City. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins has said the move, expected to be completed by next summer, will bring leaders closer to the landscapes they manage and the people who depend on them.

Conservation groups have criticized the changes, warning that they could reduce access to forests and threaten wildlife habitat and clean air and water.

Federal data shows that the Forest Service has lost about 6,000 employees, or about 15% of its workforce, during Trump’s second term as part of the Republican administration’s sweeping cuts to agencies that oversee the nation’s natural resources.

During Trump’s first term, he moved the Bureau of Land Management to Colorado, citing many of the same reasons, including a desire to put top officials closer to the public lands they oversee. Former President Joe Biden’s administration reversed course, returning the bureau’s headquarters to Washington after two years.

El Departamento de Policía de Pembroke Pines dijo que tuvo conocimiento del video temprano el jueves y que su División de Investigaciones está investigando activamente el incidente.

En el video grabado el domingo pasado desde un consultorio dental cercano, que fue difuminado debido a la naturaleza gráfica de las imágenes, un hombre parece pisotear a un pato adulto y permanecer parado sobre él durante varios minutos. Un segundo video parece mostrar a varios patitos dispersándose mientras el hombre intenta pisarlos.

Según reportes, el incidente ocurrió cerca de University Drive y Southwest 13th Street en Pembroke Pines.

Manuel Cavallini, propietario del consultorio dental, dijo a Local 10 News que le parecía “una locura” que alguien matara patos.

Cuatro días después, el pato muerto permanece en el césped.

La policía dijo que las acciones mostradas en el video son “ilegales y crueles” y enfatizó que el departamento no tolera delitos contra personas o animales.

La edad o identidad del hombre que aparece en el video no se conocía de inmediato.

La policía de Pembroke Pines pide a cualquier persona que tenga información sobre el incidente que se comunique al 954-431-2225.

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According to sources, retired General Abelardo Colome Ibarra, known as “ El Fury,” is currently in worse condition.

Colome Ibarra was head of the Ministry of the Interior and highly respected by the Castro brothers and the Cuban military.

Cuban officials have remained silent after the Diario Las Américas, a Miami-based newspaper in Spanish, reported on Tuesday that Castro, 95, who formally retired in April 2021, had suffered a stroke and was on life support.

Castro’s last public appearance was on June 6 at a ceremony to commemorate the 62nd anniversary of Cuba’s Ministry of the Interior. He did not attend the official annual event to commemorate the historic assault of July 26, 1953.

Según fuentes, el general retirado Abelardo Colomé Ibarra, conocido como “El Furry”, se encuentra actualmente en peores condiciones.

Colomé Ibarra fue jefe del Ministerio del Interior y era muy respetado por los hermanos Castro y las fuerzas armadas cubanas.

Funcionarios cubanos han permanecido en silencio después de que Diario Las Américas, un periódico en español con sede en Miami, reportara el martes que Castro, de 95 años, quien se retiró formalmente en abril de 2021, había sufrido un derrame cerebral y se encontraba conectado a soporte vital.

La última aparición pública de Castro fue el 6 de junio en una ceremonia para conmemorar el 62.º aniversario del Ministerio del Interior de Cuba. No asistió al evento oficial anual para conmemorar el histórico asalto del 26 de julio de 1953.

La mujer fue identificada como Melissa Payne en un memorando de cierre del caso de la Fiscalía Estatal del Condado de Broward.

“Si en el momento en que Melissa Payne utilizó fuerza letal no estaba haciendo nada ilegal, se encontraba en un lugar donde tenía derecho a estar y ‘creía razonablemente que el uso o la amenaza de dicha fuerza era necesario para evitar una muerte inminente o lesiones corporales graves’, entonces está exenta de arresto y procesamiento”, señala el memorando.

Bart Diguglielmo, residente de Lauderhill, recibió un disparo el 30 de junio afuera del Walmart ubicado en 7900 W. McNab Road, después de una discusión con Payne, según informaron agentes de la Oficina del Sheriff de Broward.

De acuerdo con el memorando, todo el incidente quedó registrado por diversos dispositivos de video y muestra a Payne, quien estaba acompañada por su sobrina y el bebé de esta, y a Diguglielmo, quien se encontraba solo dentro de su SUV Kia blanco, intentando estacionarse en el mismo espacio.

Los fiscales señalaron que se produjo “un breve enfrentamiento” antes de que Payne y Diguglielmo salieran de sus respectivos vehículos.

Según el memorando, Diguglielmo dejó su vehículo en el carril de circulación, tomó un carrito de compras y entró al Walmart, mientras Payne estacionaba su Chevrolet Malibu en el espacio.

Diguglielmo regresó a su SUV unos 90 segundos después y, según dos testigos, le dijo a Payne: “Voy a hacer mierda tus cosas”, señala el memorando.

Después se alejó conduciendo a gran velocidad, según los fiscales.

De acuerdo con el memorando, Diguglielmo estacionó aproximadamente dos pasillos al oeste del automóvil de Payne, caminó hacia el vehículo de ella y permaneció un rato debajo de un árbol cercano mientras fumaba un cigarrillo.

Los testigos dijeron que Diguglielmo parecía enojado mientras observaba a Payne y que estaba temblando.

Los fiscales señalaron que Diguglielmo se acercó posteriormente al automóvil de Payne, momento en el que ella salió del vehículo con su teléfono en una mano y un arma de fuego en la otra.

Payne le advirtió a Diguglielmo: “¡Si sigues acercándote a mí, te voy a disparar!”, según el memorando.

De acuerdo con el documento, un testigo les gritó tanto a Payne como a Diguglielmo: “¡No vale la pena!”.

Los fiscales dijeron que Payne continuó advirtiéndole a Diguglielmo: “¡No vengas hacia acá!”, “¡No te acerques a mi auto!” y “¡No lo intentes!”.

El memorando señala que inicialmente Diguglielmo retrocedió, pero después volvió a acercarse a Payne mientras hacía gestos con las manos.

Los fiscales dijeron que finalmente Payne le disparó una vez en el abdomen.

Diguglielmo fue trasladado a un hospital, donde posteriormente murió a causa de sus heridas.

Melissa Rodriguez, abogada de la hija del hombre, declaró a Local 10 News: “Amanda Diguglielmo está muy decepcionada al enterarse de que no presentarán cargos penales en el caso. Hemos sostenido que las circunstancias no justificaban conceder inmunidad bajo la ley de defensa propia ‘Stand Your Ground’”.

En una entrevista exclusiva con Local 10 News, Amanda Diguglielmo describió a su padre como un hombre dedicado a su familia que trabajó durante 30 años como enfermero especializado en trauma en salas de emergencia.

“Era un gran hombre. Era padre, era abuelo y era hermano”, dijo.

Amanda Diguglielmo señaló que su padre también tenía un hermano gemelo, era padre de tres hijos y había alcanzado el grado de sargento en el Ejército.

Cuando le preguntaron qué sería lo que más extrañaría de su padre, Amanda Diguglielmo respondió: “Todo: poder llamarlo, almorzar juntos, las fiestas, todo”.

Amanda Diguglielmo y su abogada rechazan que Payne haya disparado contra Bart Diguglielmo en defensa propia.

“Esta no fue una situación de defensa propia ni un caso que justificara inmunidad bajo la ley ‘Stand Your Ground’. No creo que el tiroteo estuviera justificado”, declaró Rodriguez a principios de este mes. “Creo que deberían presentarse cargos penales”.

El choque ocurrió alrededor de las 7:40 p.m. cerca de Northwest 51st Terrace y Northwest 33rd Avenue.

Según MDSO, agentes de la Unidad de Intervención de Robos (RID) de la agencia realizaron una parada de tráfico a uno de los vehículos poco antes del choque.

Los agentes dijeron que durante esa parada confirmaron que el conductor, Luis Manuel Perez, de 21 años y residente de Miami, tenía una orden de arresto pendiente de las Fuerzas Armadas de EE.UU., pero huyó de ellos.

“A medida que unidades adicionales de RID respondían al área, el conductor entró en una calle sin salida”, dijo un portavoz de MDSO a Local 10 News en un correo electrónico el jueves. “Después de dar la vuelta, el conductor se pasó una señal de alto y chocó contra un vehículo civil, provocando que volcara. El impacto hizo que posteriormente los vehículos chocaran contra un vehículo de MDSO sin distintivos, ocupado por un agente de RID que se encontraba en el área buscando al sujeto”.

Una fotografía obtenida por Local 10 muestra el vehículo volcado. También se puede ver a una persona en el suelo en el área, aparentemente esposada.

“Lo vi chocar contra el auto y lo vi volcar por el aire. Y fue entonces cuando corrí hacia allá”, dijo un testigo. “Lo vi mientras sucedía. Lo vi, partes del auto volando por el aire”.

El conductor del vehículo civil fue trasladado por el Cuerpo de Bomberos de Miami-Dade al Centro de Traumatología Ryder del Hospital Jackson Memorial en condición crítica, pero posteriormente murió, confirmaron las autoridades.

Los agentes dijeron que Perez fue puesto bajo custodia y trasladado a un hospital local para ser evaluado, mientras que el agente fue atendido en el lugar por el Cuerpo de Bomberos de Miami-Dade.

Aunque una declaración jurada de arresto de Perez señala que tiene una orden de arresto activa como fugitivo de las Fuerzas Armadas de EE.UU., no especifica las acusaciones en su contra. Funcionarios de MDSO dijeron que también están pendientes cargos adicionales en su contra por el choque del miércoles.

La identidad de la víctima aún no ha sido divulgada mientras las autoridades trabajan para notificar a sus familiares.

“As I write this, I’m both older than I ever imagined I would become and happier than I ever imagined I could be,” she wrote in the introduction. “I’ve been rewarded with friends who are my chosen family. I have trusted friends in other countries, and we strive to be safe and free, and share hopes for a peaceful democracy in the world.”

Steinem added that she planned to live to 100.

“An Unexpected Life” follows such previous Steinem memoirs as “Revolution from Within” and “Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions.” In the latest book, she looks back to her childhood in Ohio in the 1940s and ’50s, when women were expected to marry and raise children. It continues through her political awakening, her rise in the second-wave feminist movement and her stature as an inspiration to young people, who in turn inspired her.

Here are some highlights from the upcoming memoir, scheduled for publication Sept. 22:

Spending two years in India after college changed Steinem's life

"Being in that country shattered Western romantic illusions with little ceremony, but it replaced them with new impressions far more real and less easily forgotten. As I learned once I was there, many Americans seem to have skipped from a sketchy knowledge of ancient India to a misunderstanding of its diversity. The teachings of Gandhi introduced me to nonhierarchical thinking, which I came to learn was the most common way of thinking in much of the rest of the world, too."

She counted conversation as a blessing

“My favorite model of human communication is sitting with others around a kitchen table or in a living room, anywhere we can gather equally and communicate in person with all five senses: a consciousness-raising group, a rap group, a book club, a quilting bee, or a talking circle. It doesn’t matter, as long as it’s a place where one can tell the truth, say an ‘unsayable’ thing, and hear other people say, ‘You feel like that? I thought only I felt like that!’”

An icon who set boundaries

“Terry Southern, a popular author and co-author of ‘Candy,’ a pornographic novel, was very visible on the New York social scene. I didn’t know him well, but for some reason we were both awaiting a mutual friend in that friend’s office, talking and sitting next to each other on the couch. He reached over, took hold of my wrists so I couldn’t move, and tried to kiss me. Without a moment’s thought, I bit him on the cheek. If you haven’t been trained to submit, you are like a cat; you just respond.”

She mused about relationships between men and women

“Other leaps of consciousness have actually been quite funny, like figuring out that despite the term man-hating lesbian — which I hope and believe is long forgotten — it may be the women who live with men who are more likely to hate them.”

Not all audiences are alike

“The worst audience for me has always been establishment males, and the worst circumstance has been one in which I have to convince them on behalf of some very important but unpopular issue. In those moments, I feel responsible not only for myself but also for the people who can’t be there but should be represented.”

Some second thoughts. (And, no, she didn't miss having children)

“Of course, I do have regrets. For one, I spent way too much time doing what was expected of me, and not enough doing what I loved. Given my generation, I also grew up assuming that I would have to marry my identity, not become it. This scary idea caused me to put off marriage and to live a temporary life. Not until my forties did I begin to see that a different kind of life was possible, one in which I wasn’t bound to fulfill my husband’s dreams and depend on him financially. I learned that the work I loved could also create the future I wanted.”

An optimist to the end

“People often ask me how I stay hopeful. I always explain that hope is a form of planning. I think about twenty, thirty, even fifty years ago and the leaps of consciousness I’ve experienced because of the women’s movement. Some of what we dreamed of decades ago is now really here.”

Yet these days, he’s not much different than any college coaching veteran just trying to get a handle on who’s eligible to play and who isn’t.

“What is strange about college athletics is that it seems like the rules change every day,” Malone said Thursday morning. “Like, literally every day. So that is the hardest part."

The NCAA’s move to a five-year, age-based eligibility model has begat a series of eligibility battles in courts across the country, along with last week’s rushed-into-place rules by football-playing power conferences trying to sort out that chaos with the start of the season now at hand.

The same questions hover in basketball, too, as to whether players can come back to college after in failed bids to make the pros or after closing what was supposed to be a four-year career in the spring.

The sport has the benefit of more time for those cases to make their way through the legal system. Still, preseason practices officially begin later this month, and there’s roughly two months remaining until the season kicks off on Nov. 1. It is unclear how much clarity will come between now and then as to the status of more than 250 men’s and women’s players involved in some type of court action tied to the NCAA's age-based eligibility model.

That includes for Malone's first UNC team. South Dakota transfer big man Cameron Fens committed last month to UNC when he appeared to be eligible to play a fifth season after one court ruling, only to be ineligible again based on a stay issued in response to an appeal.

“You put together the best team you can, you start practicing in the summer and now let’s unleash 80 players into the sport in the first week of August,” UConn men’s coach and two-time NCAA champion Dan Hurley said last month. “You can’t go on like this, no other sport is going like this. ... It is total chaos and it is not sustainable.”

Changing the eligibility model has led to legal fights

The change has largely centered around the NCAA's adoption of a five-year eligibility model that is due to be fully implemented next fall. It will allow players to have five years of eligibility with the clock starting when an athlete turns 19 or graduates from high school, whichever is earliest.

But that quickly led to lawsuits from four-year players in the high school class of 2022, who began their careers in the 2022-23 season and completed four seasons of eligibility but are seeking that fifth year.

In data as of Thursday morning, the NCAA said there have been 79 lawsuits with a total of 450 plaintiffs across all sports involved in litigation tied to the five-year rule, with 234 of those coming in men's basketball and 33 in women's basketball. Of that group, 154 men's players and 26 women's players have received some type of relief from the courts allowing them to play while the rest are currently be ineligible.

Yet things can change rapidly, with players moving from one category to the other.

Last season, basketball got a preview of what was to come when Alabama's Charles Bediako won a temporary restraining order allowing him to play five games for the Crimson Tide last year after playing in the NBA G League. An Alabama judge ultimately sided with the NCAA that Bediako should be ineligible.

And now, former St. John's standout guard RJ Luis Jr. is trying to play for new LSU coach Will Wade despite going pro after the 2024-25 season and spending time with two NBA teams. A Louisiana judge cleared the way for him last week to start practicing and potentially play for the Tigers; Luis was briefly under contract with the Utah Jazz and Boston Celtics but never played in an NBA game.

These fights have also come with the NCAA and major conferences pushing Congress for help by passing the Protect College Sports Act. That bipartisan measure has been touted by supporters as having the ability to tamp down on the lawsuits that have led to the eligibility issues.

A longer runway to basketball season could provide clarity

The Power Four football conferences — the SEC, Atlantic Coast Conference, Big Ten and Big 12 — all adopted bans of former pro athletes last week. The Big 12 banned professional athletes from competing in any league-sponsored sport, while the SEC and the ACC bans focused on men's and women's basketball along with football. The Big Ten's was limited to football.

The Big East, the only other league to win an NCAA title in the past decade, has yet to formally adopt a similar policy. But that league doesn't have football as a pressing concern with basketball as its flagship sport with the November tipoff, and that comes with the Big East in the first days of Tim Brosnan's tenure as commissioner.

A person with knowledge of the situation said Big East schools are discussing options and monitoring developments tied to the eligibility cases as well as the actions taken by other top leagues. The person spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because the league hasn’t publicly discussed those evaluations.

Back at UNC, Fens joined the roster as a county judge in Tennessee granted him and 18 other basketball players a temporary injunction to retain their eligibility for a fifth year.

But in recent weeks, that state’s Court of Appeals put on hold that order, meaning Fens can practice but is currently ineligible to play. That was one of multiple wins for the NCAA in ongoing litigation across the nation, including stays of injunctions in Ohio and South Carolina state courts as well as in a federal court in Colorado.

Malone — who coached three-time NBA MVP Nikola Jokic to the 2023 title with the Denver Nuggets — knows it all can change quickly. So he's leaning on his staff to keep him “attuned” to developments while he focuses on preparing the Tar Heels for November, and other pressing matters.

“I still haven't found a place to live, so I've got to find a place to live, man, you know?” he quipped.

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AP freelance writer Jim Fuller in Storrs, Connecticut, contributed to this report.

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A public notice shows the first of its kind survey of wastewater treatment plants was submitted to the White House for approval nearly two years ago during the Biden administration — a far longer wait than is typical.

Many wastewater treatment plants receive PFAS-contaminated waste. A nationwide survey of hundreds of plants would help identify the source of that PFAS and could inform new regulations to limit their spread, according to Robert Wood, director of the engineering and analysis division in the EPA’s Office of Water before his retirement in 2024.

“If we can determine the top one, the top two, the top three” industries that dump PFAS, said Wood, “then we start work on the detailed studies and the regulation to get after nationwide limits on PFAS for the predominant industrial dischargers.”

Researchers have linked the family of chemicals called PFAS to increased risk of certain cancers, developmental effects in children, resistance to vaccines and other health problems. The man-made chemicals once commonly used in products like waterproof shoes and nonstick pans are also widespread in the environment and hard to remove, making them an especially challenging public health threat. Wastewater treatment plants, for example, typically aren’t equipped to separate them from waste, which means they are released back into rivers and onto soil.

The survey was submitted to the White House Office of Management and Budget, which must approve it, in October 2024.

“This is sufficiently unusual and a very long period of time that it is worth asking the question: Is OMB just sitting on it?” said Stuart Shapiro, a former OMB staffer and dean at the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers University-New Brunswick in New Jersey. He said reviews typically take around 60 days.

The EPA and OMB did not respond to requests for comment.

The Trump administration's nuanced — and at times controversial — stance towards PFAS

The Trump administration has promised to combat PFAS. They've kept tough Biden-era limits on two common types of PFAS in drinking water and support work to find new ways to remove the chemicals from the environment.

They've also faced criticism from environmentalists and the Robert F. Kennedy Jr.-aligned “Make America Healthy Again” movement over what they see as an agency approach to chemical regulation that's too industry-friendly. Trump officials have delayed the most significant drinking water limits and scrapped a Biden-era effort to reduce PFAS in the wastewater of certain chemical manufacturers, restarting the regulatory process themselves.

The Biden-era EPA said that good data on PFAS in industrial wastewater is typically inaccessible, incomplete or inconsistent. With the new survey, officials sought to ask hundreds of wastewater treatment plants questions about their practices and to sample the industrial sources of the waste they treated.

If the work had started quickly, officials would already have some of the results, according to Betsy Southerland, a leader of the EPA’s Office of Water until 2017.

“It makes you wonder if they really want to stop PFAS — or if efforts to truly find out who is discharging is just too big a disruption for the chemical industry,” she said.

Officials also would have collected information on PFAS in biosolids, which are the treated solids water treatment plants produce in massive quantities. Those treated biosolids are often spread on farm fields as fertilizer. Officials wanted to survey biosolids to figure out the prevalence of PFAS.

Although concerns have been raised for years, officials have only recently studied the health implications of growing food on fields where PFAS-contaminated biosolids have been spread. The Biden-era EPA issued a draft report raising some concerns — a report Trump officials said had serious flaws. Agency officials, in their own draft document, said one of those flaws was that the agency had failed to conduct a national survey of PFAS in biosolids to better understand their occurrence and associated risks.

David Andrews, chief science officer at the nonprofit Environmental Working Group, said the Trump administration had created a logical paradox.

“The biosolids risk assessment was criticized by this administration for not including an EPA-run national occurrence study, and that exact survey has been sitting unapproved at OMB for nearly two years,” Andrews said.

Some states have already taken a look

A group representing public wastewater agencies questioned the need for the survey, saying that a lot of new data has been collected on PFAS in wastewater in recent years. That information is enough to take steps to regulate the industries that need to be addressed, and a new survey for more expensive sampling wouldn’t be useful, according to Cynthia Finley, director of regulatory affairs at the National Association of Clean Water Agencies.

“We would rather EPA look at what data is available already because there is a wealth of PFAS discharge information out there now,” said Finley.

Michigan is one of the states that has collected similar data on its own. The state had already limited the amount of certain PFAS wastewater treatment plants could dump into rivers and lakes several years ago when treatment plants started sampling the industrial waste they received.

With data in hand, “The treatment plants told their industries, 'Hey, you have to either stop discharging PFAS or reduce the amount of PFAS you are discharging to us,” to avoid violating limits on PFAS in rivers and lakes, according to Anne Tavalire, who works for the state on reducing PFAS at wastewater treatment plants.

She said the work helped achieve substantial reductions in PFAS released into the environment and in biosolids.

A “Make America Healthy Again” activist said it was good that the Trump administration had previously announced plans to tackle PFAS. But for their efforts to work, officials can't let polluters off the hook and must know where the pollution is coming from, according to Kelly Ryerson, whose social media account “Glyphosate Girl” focuses on agriculture and health.

The survey or a similar effort “is urgently needed data to help decrease toxic exposures and ultimately the chronic disease epidemic. We have no more time to waste in addressing these harmful exposures, especially on behalf of bureaucratic interests,” she said.

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The Associated Press receives support from the Walton Family Foundation for coverage of water and environmental policy. The AP is solely responsible for all content. For all of AP’s environmental coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/climate-and-environment

El respaldo del Senado al proyecto de ley se produce después de que la cámara baja votara abrumadoramente a favor el 6 de mayo. Ahora, pasa al presidente Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, quien se prevé que promulgue la medida.

La legislación propuesta crea un marco jurídico básico para las tierras raras y otros minerales críticos, así como un fondo para otorgar crédito a proyectos mineros. También contempla incentivos fiscales para el procesamiento dentro del país.

Brasil tiene las segundas reservas más grandes del mundo de elementos de tierras raras, que se utilizan en una amplia gama de productos, como teléfonos inteligentes, vehículos eléctricos, paneles solares y motores de reacción.

Aunque China sigue dominando los minerales críticos en las cadenas de suministro globales, Brasil se posiciona como una alternativa al aprovechar sus enormes reservas. Países de todo el mundo han mostrado interés, ya que buscan diversificar alianzas y reducir la dependencia de la potencia asiática.

En un análisis conjunto de la AP y Reporter Brasil se identificó una ola de inversión de Estados Unidos después de que China restringiera el año pasado las exportaciones de tierras raras en respuesta a los aranceles de Estados Unidos; tales inversiones incluyen la compra del único productor comercial de tierras raras de Brasil, Serra Verde, por parte de una firma en la que el gobierno estadounidense tiene participación.

En abril, USA Rare Earth dijo que había acordado pagar aproximadamente 2.800 millones de dólares por Serra Verde, propietaria de la mina de tierras raras y planta de procesamiento de Pela Ema, en el estado brasileño de Goiás.

Lula ha dicho repetidamente que la nación sudamericana debería buscar capitalizar el interés en los minerales para desarrollar una industria nacional, en lugar de simplemente exportar las materias primas.

“No vamos a repetir lo que pasó con la plata y el oro en América Latina”, dijo Lula a periodistas en Washington el 7 de mayo, tras su reunión con el presidente de Estados Unidos, Donald Trump. “Con las tierras raras, vamos a cambiar nuestro comportamiento. Queremos que Brasil sea el gran ganador de estas riquezas”.

El proyecto de ley establece el Fondo de Garantía de la Actividad Mineral con un aporte de 2.000 millones de reales (unos 391 millones de dólares) del gobierno federal para garantizar proyectos y actividades vinculados a la producción de minerales críticos y estratégicos.

La legislación también incluye un programa específico para incentivar el procesamiento y la transformación de los minerales en Brasil, con incentivos federales de 5.000 millones de reales (978 millones de dólares) en créditos fiscales durante cinco años.

Además, el proyecto de ley crea el Consejo Nacional para la Industrialización de Minerales Críticos y Estratégicos, que señalará los proyectos prioritarios que recibirán apoyo del fondo.

La minería, que en algunos casos podría realizarse cerca de reservas en la selva amazónica, conlleva importantes riesgos ambientales.

El Observatorio del Clima, la mayor red de grupos ambientalistas de Brasil, ha criticado el proyecto de ley, argumentando que aumenta la flexibilidad regulatoria sin contrapartidas económicas, climáticas o socioambientales.

“Los minerales críticos y estratégicos son necesarios para la transición energética, pero esto no puede convertirse en un cheque en blanco para la minería. No tiene sentido (...) acelerar propuestas legislativas que no garanticen los derechos de las comunidades y territorios afectados”, señaló Suely Araújo, coordinadora de Políticas Públicas del Observatorio del Clima, en un comunicado emitido el 1 de septiembre.

Leonardo Paz Neves, profesor de relaciones internacionales en la Fundación Getulio Vargas, un centro de estudios y universidad, dijo que Brasil debería entablar un debate público respecto de la exploración y producción de sus recursos.

“Ya hay acceso”, afirmó Paz Neves, al señalar la reciente compra de USA Rare Earth. “La gran pregunta aquí es si el Estado querrá intentar negociar algún tipo de acuerdo privilegiado respecto de ese acceso”.

Tras reunirse con Trump, Lula dejó claro que Brasil también está hablando con otros países. “Brasil tiene la obligación de compartir con quien quiera participar con nosotros, sea Estados Unidos, China, Alemania o Francia”.

En febrero, Brasil e India firmaron un memorando de entendimiento no vinculante sobre minerales críticos y tierras raras, reforzando la cooperación sobre recursos cruciales entre ambos países.

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

The report from the Government Accountability Office found delays and holes in how the Secret Service updates its policies regarding threats, and arrives after a few turbulent years for the agency charged with the president's protection.

The would-be assassin in Butler positioned himself on a roof left unsecured, nicking the president's ear with a bullet. Months later, a man with a rifle got surprisingly close to Trump at his West Palm Beach golf course. And in April, an armed man got beyond security barriers at the White House Correspondent's Dinner, where the president sat.

The report found that between 2015 and 2025 the Secret Service dealt with 83 security incidents and that they updated their protection policies in response to 25 of them. Among the incidents was a drone that made contact with President Barack Obama's motorcade in 2015 and another flown about 200 feet (60 meters) over a rally for then-presidential candidate Bernie Sanders.

Failing to document why the Secret Service decided not to change their policy is the concern, said Nathan Tranquilli, acting director of the Government Accountability Office, adding that the drone incidents were a “compelling example” of that.

“Some of the missing information has been relevant to subsequent attacks,” the report read. It cited the Butler incident, where the culprit flew a drone for 11 minutes over the crowd, which helped him position himself to get clear shot at Trump.

The Secret Service also failed to update eight of 22 protection policies within a required time frame of four years. A memorandum of understanding between the Secret Service and the Diplomatic Security Service, which designates each agencies' responsibilities for the president's overseas security, hasn't been updated since 1991, even though an annual review and update is required. As a consequence, the memorandum doesn't address newer threats, such as drones.

“When you look at the Secret Service and you look at their mission, really it's a zero fail mission, and they’ve got a ton of challenges,” said Tranquilli. “When decisions were being made about where to put time and energy, some of these things fell to the side, and, as a result, there were some delays.”

The report recommended three fixes, including that the Secret Service revise its policy to require that, when a security incident doesn't warrant a policy update, that the rationale is documented.

A spokesperson for the Secret Service did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but the report stated that the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees the Secret Service, agreed with all recommendations and plans to implement changes.

Thomas Ross, 37, is charged with conspiracy to distribute a controlled substance. He's accused of asking a campaign manager to plant a small amount of cocaine and a prescription amphetamine pill on his opponent, Louise Secker, in the weeks leading up to the Aug. 4 primary, according to court documents.

Ross, of Joplin, defeated Secker by only a few dozen votes.

Ross did not respond to a Thursday message seeking comment about the charge, which was filed Wednesday. The federal public defender's office assigned to his case didn't immediately reply to a message asking how Ross plans to plead.

Missouri's Republican Party chairman, Peter Kinder, called on Ross to drop out of the race, describing the circumstances of his arrest as “serious and deeply troubling.”

A former campaign manager for Ross told law enforcement officers that Ross provided him with a black nylon glove that contained a small, plastic bag of white powder and a pink and white capsule. He said Ross told him to place it in Secker's purse or vehicle while Ross was out of state on vacation, according to a probable cause statement signed by an FBI agent.

Law enforcement tests later showed the substances to be cocaine and Adderall.

The FBI statement said Ross sent numerous text messages to his campaign staffer regarding “the substance.” In one, Ross said he hoped “that we could make it happen” before Secker attended a Republican women's meeting at a Joplin restaurant in June, “which would be extreme egg on the face,” according to the FBI document.

U.S. Attorney R. Matthew Price said in a statement that voters deserve to have confidence in elections.

“Candidates are expected to conduct their campaigns with integrity, honesty, and respect for their opponents," Price said.

Two trailer truckloads of the famously creamy dark beer valued at 115,000 pounds ($155,000) were stolen from a depot near Liverpool in northwest England, the Cheshire Constabulary said Thursday.

“It is famously said that ‘Guinness is good for you,’ but that is only the case when it has been bought and paid for," Det. Sgt. Gary McClatchy said. “We will settle for nothing less than the full recovery of all the items stolen."

The Guinness had been destined for pubs, but was snatched Monday night by two drivers who pulled up to an industrial park in Runcorn and hauled away the trailers containing about 800 barrels of stout.

The value of the trailers was estimated at 50,000 pounds ($67,000).

The theft comes just weeks after a beer heist in the United States captured the public's attention because of the brewer's cheeky social media posts about the loss of roughly 34,000 cans of Pabst Blue Ribbon.

“To the thief: we don’t fault you for wanting to brag to your friends how much PBR you have, we just wish you obtained it the honorable way,” the company wrote on Instagram. “P.s. this is real and we are deadly serious.”

Police valued the Pabst theft from a Southern California warehouse at $70,000 and the company offered a $20,000 reward for information leading to the recovery of the stolen suds.

“We thank Maria for her work over the last 12½ years,” a Fox statement read, “and wish her all the best on her next chapter.”

There was no immediate reaction from Bartiromo. Her X account still showed a banner photo Thursday afternoon encouraging people to “grab yourself a cup of coffee, and join us every morning for Mornings With Maria.”

On his Truth Social platform late Thursday, President Donald Trump wrote: “I can’t believe Maria Bartiromo is no longer going to have her great show(s) on FoxNews/Business. Three different shows, always number one. Maria is a total professional, and a true warrior. Her fans, of which there are many, will not be happy. God bless you, Maria!”

Other high-profile, on-air personalities that have left Fox News Media in recent years include Tucker Carlson and Bill O’Reilly. Former Fox personality Pete Hegseth left the network in 2024 after being nominated as Trump's secretary of defense.

Bartiromo hosted “Mornings with Maria” on Fox Business Network, the last episode of which aired Thursday morning, as well as “Maria Bartiromo's Wall Street.”

The first show will be renamed “Mornings with Fox Business” and will feature rotating anchors, the company said in its statement. The second will be renamed “FBN's Wall Street” and will also use rotating anchors. Additionally, Bartiromo’s weekly Fox News show “Sunday Morning Futures” will be hosted by Jason Chaffetz for the time being.

Bartiromo has frequently earned praise from Trump, who has granted her multiple interviews over the years. He has called her a “great reporter.” Vice President JD Vance, talking with reporters Thursday afternoon, was asked about her departure but said he had not talked to her and didn't know the back story.

“I love Maria. I think she's an amazing person, an amazing talent," Vance said. “Whatever she does, she's gonna do great, and I wish her all the best. She's a very, very dear friend.”

In 2025, a lawsuit against Fox News by voting technology company Smartmatic alleged that Bartiromo spread false rumors about claims of election fraud on the air — a notion she had vehemently rejected.

Bartiromo had said before an earlier lawsuit involving Fox and Dominion Voting Systems that it’s “absurd” to think that she personally lobbied former Attorney General William Barr to aggressively investigate Trump’s charges of voter fraud during the 2020 election. Instead, she said she was doing a journalist’s job in asking follow-up questions. That case was settled in 2023.

Before Fox, Bartiromo worked for CNBC for 20 years as a financial journalist. Previously to that, she worked for CNN. At CNBC, she pioneered daily live reporting from the floor of the New York Stock Exchange and won an Emmy Award for a documentary about Google.

Having launched “Operation Economic Outcast” just last week to try to isolate Iran from its remaining global trade partners, the Trump administration also resumed strikes in recent days, prompting Iranian retaliation that has renewed concerns of an all-out regional war.

However, the combination of already intense sanctions on Iran and an off-and-on bombing campaign since the war began more than six months ago has not bowed the Iranian leadership and has left the administration struggling to find a way to wind down the conflict. Tehran has dug in its heels — to Trump’s frustration — as energy prices rise, the global economy roils and poll numbers on the administration's handling of the war dip ahead of November’s midterm congressional elections.

Trump said Wednesday that he didn't think the conflict would last “much longer,” but he again shrugged off suggestions that its unpopularity and high gasoline prices resulting from Iran's chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz would affect the elections for Republicans.

“It doesn’t matter. And I’m not affected by the election,” he told reporters. "I’m not running. But my party is running, and I’m going to help my party. But I think my party respects the fact that we’re not allowing Iran to have a nuclear weapon.”

A regional diplomat briefed on the matter described the current impasse between Tehran and Washington as reflective of both countries' domestic priorities: the midterm elections for Trump and Republicans and the internal crises within Iran.

Domestic issues are critical reasons why neither side is willing to blink first, said the diplomat, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive negotiations.

The diplomat said negotiations, including those between Iran and Oman or even Iran and the U.S., will not go anywhere without addressing the initial catalyst of war: Israel. And the diplomat was skeptical of the Trump administration's new sanctions plan, saying the threats require more explanation than what the U.S. has provided so far.

The Trump administration's economic isolation of Iran is off to a slow start

The administration's new push for Iran's economic isolation was announced with great fanfare last week and a dire warning for all remaining countries to cut off financial and trade ties with Iran or face U.S. retaliation — but the campaign so far has fallen flat.

Just one branch of an Egyptian bank in the United Arab Emirates has been targeted so far. For actual sanctions to bite, experts agree that they must apply to Iran’s main trading partners: mainly China but also India and Russia. But Trump is loath to target China especially as he is preparing to host President Xi Jinping later this month.

Trump also insists that the U.S. has control over the Strait of Hormuz, where one-fifth of the world’s oil transited before the war began. The strategic waterway has been a key pressure point for Iran, and reopening it fully has become one of the prime goals for the U.S. administration.

Ship traffic through the strait is well below pre-war levels due to the risk of attack if vessels don’t comply with an Iranian vetting regime near its coastline, which is in sharp contrast to the unhindered navigation before the war. There were 102 transits last week and 126 the week before, according to shipping data company Lloyd’s List Intelligence, compared with 130 or more per day before the war.

“As President Trump said, the strait is open and all mines have been cleared,” White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly said Thursday. “The naval blockade remains in full force and effect, and Operation Economic Outcast is underway to sever every remaining economic lifeline sustaining the regime.”

The White House has repeatedly touted the economic impact that the sanctions have had on Iran, citing its rampant inflation and the massive loss in the value of its currency. U.S. officials have described Iran's financial system as “one big house of cards.”

Going forward, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said “the price” Iran will pay will be primarily economic, “but we reserve the right ... to take military action when necessary — not just to protect ourselves but to prevent them from being able to threaten others as well.”

“They’re going to continue to feel the squeeze,” he told Fox News host Brian Kilmeade in an interview that aired Wednesday.

Vice President JD Vance said Thursday that he would not characterize the current situation as a “war” but that the administration would respond to any Iranian hostile action.

“Major combat operations are currently not ongoing, and they haven’t been ongoing in a very long time," Vance told reporters during a White House briefing. "In fact, what we did just a couple of days ago is that we made it harder for the Iranians to shoot at commercial shipping again in order to ensure the flow of oil and gas into world energy markets.”

Combining military force and sanctions on Iran ‘is the only option,’ one analyst says

Complicating things for the U.S., Iran’s leadership has shown signs of divisions between moderates more open to a diplomatic solution and hardliners who want to press ahead with a more confrontational approach.

President Masoud Pezeshkian is one of the most prominent voices still calling for a negotiated solution. But the hardliners appear to have gained the upper hand, and Iran shows no sign of backing down. Tehran continues to lash out at U.S. interests and allies around the region in response to military strikes.

“This kind of a hybrid approach — the combination of military force, blockade and economic pressure — that is the only option that seems to be available to the United States at this moment,” said Hamidreza Azizi, senior Iran analyst for the International Crisis Group.

Still, he said, “it’s been for a long time, but now maybe more than ever, a battle of endurance between the two sides.”

Amr Hamzawy, director of the Middle East program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, pointed to two main reasons for the deteriorating situation.

“One, none of the two parties is satisfied with the outcome — meaning that the current situation does not serve U.S. interests well, and it does not serve Iranian interests well,” Hamzawy said.

The other reason is how leaders from both sides are perceived at home.

“The Trump administration is afraid of being portrayed in the U.S. as an administration that failed to end a military campaign successfully, and that’s going to impact the midterm elections," he said. “And the Iranians, especially the Revolutionary Guard, are quite afraid of appearing as if they are submitting to U.S. sanctions with no actions on their side, which might hurt them domestically.”

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Magdy reported from Cairo. Associated Press writers Will Weissert in Washington and David McHugh in Frankfurt, Germany, contributed to this report.

The Senate’s backing of the bill comes after the lower house overwhelmingly voted in favor on May 6. It now heads to President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who is expected to sign the measure into law.

The proposed legislation creates a basic legal framework for rare earths and other critical minerals and a fund to provide credit to mining projects. It also provides for tax incentives for domestic processing.

Brazil has the world’s second-largest reserves of rare earth elements, used in a wide range of products, including smartphones, electric vehicles, solar panels and jet engines.

While China continues to dominate critical minerals in global supply chains, Brazil is positioning itself as an alternative by leveraging its vast reserves. Countries around the world have shown interest as they seek to diversify partnerships and reduce reliance on the Asian powerhouse.

A joint analysis by the AP and Reporter Brazil identified a wave of U.S. investment after China last year restricted rare earth exports in response to U.S. tariffs, including the purchase of Brazil’s only commercial rare earth producer, Serra Verde, by a firm in which the U.S. government has a stake.

In April, USA Rare Earth said it had agreed to pay approximately $2.8 billion for Serra Verde, owner of the Pela Ema rare earth mine and processing plant in Brazil’s Goias state.

Government-screening power

Lula has repeatedly said that the South American nation should seek to capitalize on interest in the minerals to develop a national industry, rather than simply export the raw materials.

“We’re not going to repeat what happened with silver and gold in Latin America,” Lula told journalists in Washington on May 7, after his meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump. “With rare earths, we’re going to change our behavior. We want Brazil to be the big winner of these riches.”

The bill establishes the Mineral Activity Guarantee Fund with a contribution of 2 billion reais (about $391 million) from the federal government to guarantee projects and activities linked to the production of critical and strategic minerals.

The legislation also includes a specific program to encourage processing and transforming the minerals in Brazil, with federal incentives of 5 billion reais ($978 million) in tax credits over five years.

In addition, the bill creates the National Council for the Industrialization of Critical and Strategic Minerals, which will indicate priority projects to receive support from the fund.

The council will screen and approve certain forms of foreign investment and influence in companies holding critical and strategic mineral rights, potentially giving the government a de facto veto.

That increases legal uncertainty for investors, said Jaques Paes, a business professor at the Getulio Vargas Foundation. “It puts rare earths in a political realm rather than a technical one.”

Environmental risks

Mining, which in some cases could happen near reserves in the Amazon rainforest, also comes with major environmental risks.

The Climate Observatory, Brazil’s largest network of environmental groups, has criticized the bill, alleging that it increases regulatory flexibility without economic, climate or socioenvironmental trade-offs.

“Critical and strategic minerals are necessary for the energy transition, but this cannot become a blank check for mining. It makes no sense (...) to accelerate legislative proposals that do not guarantee the rights of affected communities and territories,” said Suely Araújo, Public Policy Coordinator at the Climate Observatory, in a statement on Sept. 1.

Leonardo Paz Neves, an international relations professor at the Getulio Vargas Foundation, a think tank and university, said Brazil should engage in a public debate with regard to exploration and production of its resources.

“Access already exists,” said Paz Neves, pointing to USA Rare Earth’s recent purchase. “The big question here is whether the state will want to try to negotiate some kind of privileged agreement regarding that access.”

After meeting with Trump, Lula made clear that Brazil is talking to other countries too. “Brazil has the obligation to share with whoever wants to participate with us, be that the U.S., China, Germany or France.”

In February, Brazil and India signed a nonbinding memorandum of understanding on critical minerals and rare earths, enhancing cooperation on crucial resources between both countries.

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

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His first day comes as the district faces several challenges, including a proposal to potentially close more than two dozen schools because of declining enrollment.

Villalobos says under-enrolled schools can struggle to offer students a wide range of programs.

“When you have schools that are under enrolled, there are programs that are lacking that ultimately students are suffering because they are not receiving them,” Villalobos said.

He said schools operating at full capacity are more likely to have stronger elective programs, including music, art and physical education.

The possible school consolidations are raising concerns among parents.

Villalobos says the list of schools being considered for closure is preliminary. He is pausing community meetings to give the proposal a closer look.

“I wanna make sure that we have a proper set of research and communication, not only for my purposes as the new superintendent coming in, but also making sure that the board members have a better understanding of why those schools were selected, the process in which they were selected,” Villalobos said.

He says community meetings are expected to resume sometime after the second week of October.

James Dolphs Elmore Jr. was given the maximum sentence by a Galveston County jury a day after they found him guilty of manslaughter in the death of 16-year-old Laura Miller, whose body was found in the infamous area in 1986.

What became known as the “Texas Killing Fields” refers to a stretch of land along Interstate 45 southeast of Houston where the bodies of more than 30 girls and young women have been found. The area has inspired books, movies and a Netflix documentary.

Most of the deaths remain unsolved, and investigators believe multiple people may be responsible.

Miller's body was found 17 months after she went missing. After the long search for her and frustration with authorities, her father, Tim Miller, started Texas EquuSearch, a nonprofit that helps search for missing people.

“I begged, I pleaded for somebody to do something,” Miller told jurors. “I knew something happened to Laura, I just knew it. I just didn’t know what it was.”

Charges filed decades after Texas teenager's killing

Elmore, 61, had approached Miller several years ago, telling him he was there when Laura Miller died, and the two men met dozens of times. During the trial, jurors watched a video produced by Tim Miller showing the two men visiting locations connected to his daughter's death.

Elmore was arrested this year, accused of preparing the dose of cocaine that killed her.

Laura Miller was one of four young women whose bodies were found between 1984 and 1991 in a rural field off a desolate dirt road in League City, located about 28 miles (45 kilometers) southeast of Houston. The other three were: Audrey Cook, Heidi Fye-Villareal and Donna Prudhomme.

Elmore was accused in an indictment of preparing a vial of cocaine that was administered to Miller by Clyde Hedrick, who authorities have alleged was the person responsible for the deaths of the four women and had been Elmore’s longtime friend.

The district attorney’s office said in March that it had decided to seek grand jury indictments against Hedrick in the deaths, but the 72-year-old Hedrick died by suicide before the grand jury presentation.

Elmore’s attorney, Bill Agnew, told jurors that his client “didn’t have anything to do with this.” He also noted that had Hedrick lived, Elmore would have likely been called to testify at his trial.

“Clyde killed himself, and once that happened you’ve got one guy standing,” Agnew said.

Hedrick was convicted of manslaughter in 2014 in the death of Ellen Beason, a young woman whose body was found in 1985 after going missing the previous year. He was released on parole in 2022.

Few convictions in ‘Texas Killing Fields’ cases

Most of the deaths associated with the “Texas Killing Fields” remain unsolved.

When Kenneth Cusick was appointed district attorney in Galveston County last year, he said he would be taking a harder look at the cases.

In 2022, William Reece, an Oklahoma death row inmate, pleaded guilty to three murders in Texas: Laura Smither, 12; Jessica Cain, 17; and Kelli Cox, 20. Cox was from Denton, north of Dallas, but her body was found hundreds of miles away near the “Texas Killings Fields” area.

Reece received life sentences for all three murders.

Testifying at Elmore's trial, Tim Miller told jurors that he wanted to see Elmore punished for “mixing up the dope and giving the needle to Clyde.”

“You handed it to Clyde Hedrick. You handed it,” he said, as he pointed at Elmore and began to cry.

El anuncio, por cadena nacional de televisión, ocurre luego de que el presidente estadounidense Donald Trump, un aliado de Milei, afirmara que Washington podría reconsiderar su postura históricamente neutral sobre la soberanía de las islas.

“Las Islas Malvinas son argentinas, por historia y por derecho”, remarcó Milei. “Vamos a desplegar todas las herramientas del Estado, diplomáticas, económicas, judiciales y legales para disuadir a los actores estatales y no estatales que violenten nuestra soberanía”.

Argentina reclama desde 1833 la soberanía de las islas en el Atlántico sur, a las que los británicos denominan Falklands. Ambos países libraron una guerra por su dominio en 1982 en la que el país sudamericano resultó derrotado.

Milei adelantó que mediante un decreto ampliará los recursos del Ministerio de Defensa para construir una base naval integrada en la provincia de Tierra del Fuego, extremo sur del país y el punto continental más cercado al archipiélago.

“Asegurar nuestra preeminencia en este territorio no es un capricho político, es una cuestión de supervivencia y por ese motivo, cualquier avance adicional sobre las Islas Malvinas será considerado como una violación a nuestra seguridad nacional”, aseveró el mandatario.

El secretario de Defensa del Reino Unido, Wes Streeting, manifestó que el compromiso de su país con el remoto archipiélago, al que llaman Falkland Islands, era “inquebrantable”.

“La declaración de Milei de esta madrugada nos dice más sobre la política interna de Argentina que sobre las Islas Malvinas", escribió Streeting en X.

Por otra parte, Milei adelantó el envío al Congreso de una reforma de la actual legislación para endurecer las sanciones contra las compañías nacionales y extranjeras que participen de explotación hidrocarburífera en Malvinas.

A fines de 2025 las autoridades de las islas, autoproclamadas territorio británico de ultramar, dieron luz verde a las petroleras Rockhopper Exploration, de origen británico, y Navitas Petroleum Development and Production Limited, de origen israelí, para el desarrollo del yacimiento off shore “Sea Lion”, situado en la Cuenca Malvinas Norte.

“Si hoy no actuamos con firmeza y celeridad, en pocos meses tendrán la capacidad material de apropiarse de las reservas de petróleo que yacen bajo nuestro mar”, advirtió el presidente argentino. “Si lo permitimos estaremos generando un incentivo para que el gobierno británico profundice la ocupación de las islas y la explotación de nuestros recursos”.

Con una inversión cercana a los 2.000 millones de dólares para la perforación y explotación, Rockhopper y Navitas planean extraer 55.000 barriles diarios en el yacimiento Sea Lion a partir de 2028.

El proyecto del Poder Ejecutivo argentino contempla el jucio en ausencia contra compañías petroleras y proveedores. Además, amplicará las sanciones a otras actividades en las islas que afectan sus recursos naturales.

Milei hizo un llamado a la oposición para que acompañe sus iniciativas: “Hay causas que están por encima de cualquier diferencia política. Malvinas es una de ellas”.

Giro de Washington

El anuncio de Milei coincidió con la amenaza de Trump de reconsiderar la histórica postura de neutralidad que ha mentenido Estados Unidos con la disputa de sobernía del archipiélago en medio de las tensiones con Londres por el conflicto en Medio Oriente.

En una entrevista con la cadena británica GB News, Trump dijo que el conflicto bélico por Malvinas ha “quedado muy lejos” y admitió su malestar con el gobierno británico por no haber brindado apoyo militar durante la guerra en Irán.

El lunes había dicho ante consultas periodísticas acerca de si modificaría el alineamiento con Gran Bretaña que “siempre reviso todas mis posturas, esta es sólo una de muchas”.

Las declaraciones fueron leídas como un guiño por Milei, quien señaló que Estados Unidos evalúa “ese cambio de posición porque saben que en la Argentina tiene un socio confiable, alineado con los valores occidentales, en una posición de relevancia estratégica, que puede ser un aliado valioso en las décadas por venir".

Lucas Romero, director de Synopsis Consultores, dijo a The Associated Press que pareciera que Milei “está aprovechando las declaraciones de Trump para inflamar o sobreactuar un sentimiento malvinero, para embanderarse con la causa Malvinas”.

Según el politólogo, la estrategia del mandatario sería reposicionarse luego de que fuera muy cuestionado por sus críticas a los jugadores de la Selección Argentina que desplegaron una pancarta tras la victoria 2-1 ante Inglaterra en el Mundial que se jugó julio y que rezaba “Las Malvinas son argentinas”.

El gesto “inflamó muchísimo un sentimiento muy profundo en la Argentina, que es el reclamo por la soberanía de las islas, quizás una de las causas que mayor consenso social genera”.

Antes del discurso de Milei, el gobierno británico aclaró a través de Tom Wells, portavoz del primer ministro Andy Burnham, que la postura respecto de las islas es “inquebrantable”.

“La soberanía recae en el Reino Unido y el derecho de los isleños a la autodeterminación es primordial”, afirmó Wells. “Los isleños han expresado en repetidas ocasiones su deseo de seguir siendo un territorio británico de ultramar”.

Tras el conflicto bélico de 1982, Reino Unido a desoído las resoluciones de Naciones Unidas a restablecer las negociaciones diplomáticas con Argentina por la sobernía del archipiélago.

A pesar de que la Constitución argentina establece que la recuperación de las islas y el ejercicio de la soberanía sobre ellas “constituyen un objetivo permanente e irrenunciable”, la relación entre Argentina y el archipiélago es mínima.

No hay comercio directo con las islas —situadas a sólo 480 kilómetros del continente—, y sólo hay un vuelo mensual desde territorio argentino.

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La corresponsal de The Associated Press en Buenos Aires, Almudena Calatrava, contribuyó con este reporte.