The state is one of the nation’s most competitive electoral battlegrounds, as the last three presidential elections firmly established. In 2026, in addition to the pivotal U.S. Senate contest, Michigan will host fiercely contested races for governor, U.S. House and the state Legislature.

Progressives scored high-profile victories in the past year with the election of democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani as New York City’s mayor and several U.S. House primaries where progressive candidates defeated longtime Democratic incumbents. While those contests all were waged on safe, heavily Democratic turf, the race to replace Democratic U.S. Sen. Gary Peters is expected to be a marquee matchup in the November general election, raising the stakes of Tuesday’s Democratic primary between U.S. Rep. Haley Stevens and former Detroit public health official Abdul El-Sayed.

Stevens has endorsements from much of the state’s Democratic establishment, including Peters, term-limited Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, former U.S. Sen. Debbie Stabenow and state Attorney General Dana Nessel. Her notable out-of-state backers include Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and South Carolina U.S. Rep. Jim Clyburn, who recently campaigned with Stevens in heavily Democratic Detroit.

El-Sayed has endorsements from prominent progressive leaders including U.S. Sens. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, and U.S. Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan.

While El-Sayed has outraised Stevens in the campaign overall, including more than doubling her fundraising haul in the first two weeks of July, the two were on roughly even footing in terms of available cash heading into the final stretch of the primary season. But Stevens has benefitted from heavy spending by outside groups, including a committee affiliated with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee.

The group, the United Democracy Project, has spent more than $30 million since June in support of Stevens and against El-Sayed, according to Federal Election Commission records. AIPAC’s political operation has been active in supporting pro-Israel candidates in primaries this year, but its sizable investment in the Michigan U.S. Senate primary marks a dramatic escalation in the group’s willingness to engage in a single contest.

State Sen. Mallory McMorrow’s July withdrawal from the primary has not added much clarity to the race. She has not endorsed either remaining candidate, and both campaigns are vying for her former supporters. Her name remains on the ballot.

The winner will face former U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers, who is unopposed for the Republican nomination. Rogers ran for the state’s other U.S. Senate seat in 2024 but narrowly lost to Democrat Elissa Slotkin.

Wayne County, home to Detroit, is the state’s most populous county and is a major source of votes in statewide Democratic primaries. Oakland and Macomb counties in the Detroit suburbs and Grand Rapids-based Kent County are key state battlegrounds in both primaries and general elections. Washtenaw County, home of the college town of Ann Arbor where El-Sayed has taught, is heavily Democratic and wields more influence in Democratic primaries than in Republican ones.

In previous establishment-vs.-progressive statewide Democratic primaries, the progressive candidates tend to post their strongest numbers in Washtenaw and Kent counties, regardless of the statewide outcome. Sanders carried both counties decisively in his narrow win over Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential primary and placed a close second in both in his 17-point primary loss to Joe Biden in 2020.

Wayne County has the state's highest share of Black residents, at about 37%, according to the U.S. Census. About 8% of Wayne County residents are of Arabic, Middle Eastern or North African descent, the highest share of any county in the nation.

In the 2016 and 2020 Democratic presidential primaries, Wayne delivered for the establishment candidates. Sanders carried almost every county in 2016, but Clinton still almost won based largely on the strength of her showing in Wayne County.

In the race for governor, Democratic Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson and Republican U.S. Rep. John James are the front-runners in their primaries. Benson faces Genesee County Sheriff Chris Swanson, while James’ lone remaining opponent is wealthy businessman and former 2024 presidential candidate Perry Johnson.

A handful of Michigan congressional districts could decide control of the U.S. House. Among the most competitive is the 7th District which includes Lansing, the state capital. The three-way Democratic primary features former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Bridget Brink, community organizer William Lawrence and former Navy SEAL Matt Maasdam. The winner will face freshman Republican U.S. Rep. Tom Barrett.

Competitive primaries are also underway to replace James in the 10th District and Stevens in the 11th District.

In the heavily Democratic 13th District anchored by Detroit, Shri Thanedar faces a tough primary challenge from state Rep. Donavan McKinney, who’s won endorsements from El-Sayed, Sanders, Lt. Gov. Garlin Gilchrist, Tlaib in the neighboring 12th Congressional District and several other of Thanedar’s progressive U.S. House colleagues.

Here are some of the key facts about the election and data points the AP Decision Team will monitor as the votes are tallied:

When do polls close?

Polls close at 8 p.m. local time, which is 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. ET. Polls in most of the state are in the Eastern time zone and close at 8 p.m. ET, but some polls in the Upper Peninsula along the Wisconsin border are in Central time and close at 9 p.m. ET.

What’s on the ballot?

The Associated Press will provide vote results and declare winners in contested primaries for U.S. Senate, U.S. House, governor, state Senate and state House.

Who gets to vote?

Any eligible voter may participate in any party’s primary. Michigan does not register voters by party.

How many voters are there?

As of July 6, there were about 8.3 million registered voters in Michigan.

How many people actually vote?

About 934,000 Democratic primary votes and about 880,000 Republican primary votes were cast in the 2024 U.S. Senate primaries.

How much of the vote is cast early or by absentee ballot?

About 63% of the vote in the 2024 state primary was cast early in-person or by mail. Michigan adopted early voting for statewide and federal races after voters approved a 2022 ballot measure expanding voting opportunities.

As of Friday, more than 1 million ballots had already been cast in Tuesday’s election.

When are early and absentee votes released?

Michigan counties vary in terms of when and how they release vote results, but the first vote updates of the night across the state tend to be a mix of results from mail, early in-person and in-person Election Day voting. The most populous counties of Wayne, Oakland, Macomb, Kent, Genesee and Washtenaw counties tend to release relatively few results from any vote type in the their first vote updates.

How long does vote-counting usually take?

In the 2024 Democratic U.S. Senate primary, the AP first reported results at 8:03 p.m. ET, or three minutes after polls closed in most of the state. The vote count surpassed the halfway mark at 12:03 a.m. ET. By 4:12 a.m. ET, about 95% of the vote had been counted.

When will the AP declare a winner?

The AP does not make projections and will declare a winner only when it’s determined there is no scenario that would allow a trailing candidate to close the gap. If a race has not been called, the AP will continue to cover any newsworthy developments, such as candidate concessions or declarations of victory. In doing so, the AP will make clear that it has not yet declared a winner and explain why.

How do recounts work?

Recounts in Michigan are automatic in statewide races if the vote margin is 0.1% or less of the total votes cast. There is no automatic recount in state legislative primaries. Under the state’s 2024 recount law, candidates may request and pay for a recount if they have a “good-faith belief” that there’s a “reasonable chance” they would have won the contest if not for a vote-counting error. The AP may declare a winner in a race that is subject to a recount if it can determine the lead is too large for a recount or legal challenge to change the outcome.

Are we there yet?

As of Tuesday, there will be 91 days until the 2026 midterm elections.

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Follow the AP’s coverage of the 2026 election at https://apnews.com/projects/elections-2026/.

The contest, as well as primaries for Missouri’s seven other U.S. House seats, will be the first held since Republican state lawmakers adopted a new congressional map backed by President Donald Trump that was designed to boost their party’s chances of keeping control of the chamber in November’s midterm elections.

In the St. Louis-based 1st Congressional District, freshman Democratic U.S. Rep. Wesley Bell seeks a second term. He must first clear a strong primary challenge from his predecessor, former U.S. Rep. Cori Bush, who was a member of the group of progressive House members known as The Squad.

Bell defeated Bush in the 2024 primary by nearly 6 percentage points with the help of about $8.6 million in outside spending from the political arm of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, which promotes U.S.-Israel relations. Bush has been a vocal critic of Israel since its response to the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack. The committee spent about $3.1 million in July against Bush and in support of Bell ahead of Tuesday’s primary.

The district is heavily Democratic. Democratic then-Vice President Kamala Harris received about 78% of the district vote in her unsuccessful 2024 presidential run against Trump.

On the other side of the state, Democratic U.S. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver is running for a 12th term on much different turf than the compact, Kansas City-based district he’s represented for more than 20 years. The Republican-controlled state Legislature’s mid-decade redistricting plan carved up heavily Democratic Kansas City among three districts and stretched what remained of Cleaver’s 5th Congressional District eastward to pick up heavily Republican areas. Cleaver is now running in a district that Trump carried with about 58% of the vote, compared with the current 5th District, which supported Harris with about 61% of the vote.

The six Republicans running to challenge Cleaver in November include former Boone County Clerk Taylor Burks, state Sen. Rick Brattin and former law professor Brett Hueffmeier. Burks led the Republican field in fundraising, more than tripling Brattin in both money raised and cash in the bank as of mid-July.

Voters will also decide the fates of four statewide ballot measures, including one that would make it harder to pass citizen-driven proposals to amend the state constitution and another that would eliminate the state income tax.

Amendment 4 would change the vote threshold required to pass voter-initiated ballot measures to amend the state constitution. Currently, only a simple statewide majority is needed to approve a constitutional amendment put on the ballot by voters. If Amendment 4 passes, a voter-initiated proposal would require a vote majority in each of the state’s congressional districts.

Amendment 5 would require the state Legislature to phase out individual income taxes in Missouri and expand sales taxes.

About half of Missouri’s 34 state Senate seats and all 163 state House seats are up for election in 2026. Republicans hold roughly 2-1 ratio majorities in both chambers.

Here are some of the key facts about the election and data points the AP Decision Team will monitor as the votes are tallied:

When do polls close?

Polls close at 7 p.m. CT, which is 8 p.m. ET.

What’s on the ballot?

The Associated Press will provide vote results and declare winners in contested primaries for U.S. House, state auditor, state Senate and state House, as well as in four statewide ballot measures.

Who gets to vote?

Any eligible voter may participate in any party’s primary.

How many voters are there?

As of the 2024 general election, there were 4.4 million registered voters in Missouri.

How many people actually vote?

About 586,000 Republican primary votes and about 322,000 Democratic primary votes were cast in the 2022 primaries for state auditor.

By comparison, about 698,000 Republican votes and about 379,000 Democratic votes were cast in the 2024 primaries for governor.

How much of the vote is cast early or by absentee ballot?

About 12% of the vote in the 2024 state primary was cast early in person or by mail. Missouri does not have a long tradition of pre-Election Day voting. The state began allowing no-excuse early voting in the 2022 general election.

When are early and absentee votes released?

Local election officials tend to release all or almost all results from mail and early in-person voting in the first vote update of the night. In roughly half of Missouri’s counties, they are released along with some results from in-person Election Day voting. But the state’s most populous jurisdictions tend to release very few in-person Election Day results in the first vote update.

How long does vote-counting usually take?

In the 2024 state primaries, the AP first reported results at 8:06 p.m. ET, or six minutes after polls closed. The vote count surpassed the halfway mark at about 10:20 p.m. ET. The last vote update of the night was at 12:26 a.m. ET, with about 99.9% of total votes counted.

When will the AP declare a winner?

The AP does not make projections and will declare a winner only when it’s determined there is no scenario that would allow a trailing candidate to close the gap. If a race has not been called, the AP will continue to cover any newsworthy developments, such as candidate concessions or declarations of victory. In doing so, the AP will make clear that it has not yet declared a winner and explain why.

How do recounts work?

Missouri does not have automatic recounts, but candidates for federal, judicial and state offices, including state Legislature, may request a recount if the margin is less than 0.5% of the vote. Candidates for local offices may request a recount if the margin is less than 1% of the vote. A court may also order a recount as part of an election contest proceeding. The AP may declare a winner in a race that is subject to a recount if it can determine the lead is too large for a recount or legal challenge to change the outcome.

Are we there yet?

As of Tuesday, there will be 91 days until the 2026 midterm elections.

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Follow the AP’s coverage of the 2026 election at https://apnews.com/projects/elections-2026/.

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Daniel Ramirez, 47, of Lubbock, Texas, posted bond on Saturday and was released early Sunday morning.

Ramirez was quick to defend his actions while walking out of jail.

“We ran into each other. I never hit her,” Ramirez said.

“But there’s video,” said Local 10’s Linnie Supall.

“What kind of video, that she was following me?” Ramirez asked.

“A video showing you shoving her to the ground,” said Supall.

“No, I never did. We ran into each other. It was an accident,” he said.

Ramirez was taken into custody on Friday at the Royal Caribbean terminal at PortMiami by officers with the Miami Police Department.

He appeared before a Miami-Dade judge on Saturday, and that hearing can be seen in the video below:

Ramirez’s arrest came several days after authorities released surveillance footage from the restaurant that they said showed Ramirez violently shoving a woman to the ground on July 26.

That victim, who works as a bartender at the Hard Rock Café, spoke to Local 10 News about the incident.

She said she observed Ramirez entering an employee-only area behind the bar and eating drink garnishes, and when she told him he couldn’t do that, he responded “B----, what do you want me to do, spit it out?” Both then left the bar area, she said.

“Immediately my heart started beating so fast,” said the woman who asked not to be identified.

According to an MPD arrest report, the bartender’s manager called her back over after Ramirez made a complaint.

“According to the victim, (Ramirez) told the manager that no woman was allowed to tell him what to do and that the victim needed to be reprimanded,” the arrest report states.

Police said the manager told the bartender to pretend like she was being reprimanded.

According to the victim, Ramirez fled after the initial confrontation in which she was shoved to the ground.

She said she began taking photos of him as he left the area, but alleges he confronted her again, knocking her to the ground a second time and causing her to lose consciousness.

“It was very, very disgusting, and I wonder how he would feel if it was done to someone in his family,” she said.

Police had been searching for Ramirez since the attack before locating him Friday at the Royal Caribbean cruise terminal at PortMiami.

The victim credited detectives for quickly identifying and locating the suspect.

“I’m really thankful that he was apprehended and arrested and that he’s sitting there thinking about his actions,” the victim said.

After posting his bond, Ramirez said he is going home to Texas.

At about 8:30 p.m., BSO deputies and Pompano Beach Fire Rescue crews responded to reports of a train that had struck a pedestrian near the intersection of North Dixie Highway and Northeast Second Street.

When crews arrived, they found a person who had been hit by a train. Investigators said the person was pronounced dead at the scene.

Detectives with the Broward Sheriff’s Office Crime Scene and Homicide units were notified and are investigating the circumstances surrounding the fatal crash.

The victim’s identity has not yet been released.

The order leaves in place a declaration — rejected by a judge as improper self-dealing — giving Trump and his family retroactive immunity for any tax audits.

Trump says new talks to wind down the war in Iran will start Monday afternoon, after announcing he's holding off on another massive wave of strikes. His comments once again brought oil prices down on hopes of reviving shipments through the Strait of Hormuz.

Immigration remains a stronger issue for Trump than the economy or Iran, according to a new AP-NORC poll, even after three people were killed in encounters with Immigration and Customs Enforcement last month.

Here is the latest:

Blanche order keeps Trump’s ‘self-dealing’ immunity for any past tax audits

The document released by Blanche on Sunday night keeps a provision of the IRS settlement that provided broad tax-audit immunity for Trump and family, while limiting its scope.

It clarifies that the immunity “applies by its terms only retroactively” to claims open at the time of the settlement, and does not protect the president from examination of future tax filings.

On Friday, Trump’s attorneys notified a court they would appeal a judge’s scathing ruling that characterized the settlement of the president’s lawsuit against the IRS as an improper exercise in self-dealing.

The judge said that because Trump manipulated the court system by suing an agency he controls, the government cannot claim in official proceedings that the agreement resulted from a legitimate legal process.

Trump says talks on Iran war will begin on Monday after he holds off on ‘massive’ strikes

Trump said new talks to wind down the war in Iran and revive traffic through the Strait of Hormuz will start Monday afternoon, after announcing he is holding off on new massive strikes he had threatened to unleash on the country. Iranian state media, however, quoted the country’s foreign ministry as saying Tehran was not currently holding negotiations with the United States.

Israel struck the Gaza Strip again over the weekend, after the U.S. and Hamas said a deal was reached for the militant group to disarm, a potential step toward ending the war in Gaza that depends on Israel stopping its attacks. The Israeli military said the strikes targeted militant operatives.

Hospitals in Gaza said at least 17 people were killed, including children. A strike on one residential apartment killed three family members including a 4-year-old child, according to Nasser hospital, where the bodies arrived.

▶ Read more

Why immigration remains strong for Trump among Republicans, according to a new AP-NORC poll

Immigration remains a stronger issue for Trump than the economy or Iran, according to a new AP-NORC poll, even after three people were killed in encounters with Immigration and Customs Enforcement in July.

Trump is not getting a glowing endorsement on his immigration approach from Americans overall, the new survey from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found: Only 39% of U.S. adults approve of his performance on immigration, a decline from 49% at the beginning of his second term.

Despite that, about 8 in 10 Republicans continue to approve of how Trump is handling immigration. That’s a slight decline from the beginning of Trump’s second term, when about 9 in 10 Republicans approved, but his support within his base has been mostly stable despite a chaotic year of immigration enforcement actions.

▶ Read more

Iran déjà vu: Trump once again threatens massive escalation against Tehran only to walk back

Trump has played this hand before during the 5-month-old Iran war.

It starts with a grim warning to Tehran that he’s on the cusp of ordering U.S. forces to “obliterate” its power plants or seize key parts of its oil industry if its leaders don’t quickly agree to U.S. terms to end the war. It ends with him edging away with a last-minute declaration, sometimes at the behest of Gulf allies, that he’s going to give diplomacy more time.

The hardball strategy aims to create movement in negotiation through pressure and chaos. But the tactic is facing a challenge with an Iranian theocracy that believes it holds a higher threshold for strategic pain than Washington.

The latest episode began on Friday when Trump grimly declared that he was “losing faith” in negotiations with Iran and warned that the U.S. military “ will be hitting them very hard.”

But by late Saturday night, Trump declared on social media that there were signs of progress on reaching an agreement and so he was calling off a plan to carry out new, massive strikes for the time being.

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Blanche rescinds fund for Trump allies after GOP senators threaten to block his attorney general bid

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche finally put it in writing, issuing a formal order late Sunday terminating Trump’s $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization fund” to compensate his political allies. The move follows weeks of negotiations with two Republican senators who were blocking his nomination for the permanent job.

A spokeswoman for Texas Sen. John Cornyn confirmed the deal, which comes ahead of a Tuesday confirmation vote for Blanche’s nomination in the Senate Judiciary Committee. The other GOP senator, North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis, did not have immediate comment.

Blanche said at a June hearing that the Justice Department would not move forward with the fund to compensate those who believe they were unfairly prosecuted, as he faced bipartisan outrage over the possibility that violent rioters who attacked police at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, could be considered for payments. But Cornyn and Tillis, both members of the Judiciary panel, have said they wanted to see the promise in writing before they endorsed Blanche’s nomination — especially as Trump continued to express support for the idea.

▶ Read more

According to Fort Lauderdale police, the burglary was reported at about 4:15 a.m. at the business in the 3600 block of Davie Boulevard.

The Dollar Stop owner said the thief or thieves smashed the glass front door before making their way inside.

Police said officers established a perimeter and detained a person of interest for questioning.

No arrests have been made at this time.

Police said the investigation remains ongoing.

Anyone with information about the burglary is asked to call the Fort Lauderdale Police Department or Broward Crime Stoppers at 954-493-8477.

Democratic U.S. Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez is running for reelection for the 3rd Congressional District seat she first won narrowly in 2022. A former auto shop co-owner, she is the best-known and best-funded of the four Democrats on the ballot. She also faces challenges from three Republicans, including state Senate Minority Leader John Braun, who has a key endorsement from President Donald Trump. The southwest Washington district is expected to be a key U.S. House battleground this fall.

Washington state has a top-two primary system in which all candidates compete on the same ballot and the two highest vote-getters regardless of party advance to the general election.

The 3rd Congressional District borders Oregon to the south and the Pacific Ocean to the west. Trump received 50.3% of the vote from 3rd District voters in 2024, besting the 47% Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris received. Gluesenkamp Perez received 50.1% of the vote in the 2022 general election and about 52% in 2024.

Incumbents are running for reelection in nine of the state’s 10 congressional districts. The exception is the 4th Congressional District, where Republican U.S. Rep. Dan Newhouse is retiring after six terms. Newhouse was among 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump following the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol by a mob of his supporters.

Eleven candidates are running to replace him, including Yakima County Commissioner Amanda McKinney and entrepreneur and former NASCAR driver Jerrod Sessler, both Republicans. Trump endorsed McKinney in January on the five-year anniversary of the insurrection. He previously endorsed Sessler’s unsuccessful bid to unseat Newhouse in 2024. Trump received 59% of the 4th District vote in the presidential election that year.

About half of Washington’s 49 state Senate seats and all 98 state House seats are up in 2026. Democrats currently control about 60% of seats in each chamber.

Three of Washington’s nine state Supreme Court justices are on Tuesday’s ballot, including Chief Justice Debra Stephens. A fourth seat is open. Although state Supreme Court seats are nonpartisan, liberals hold a majority and the ideological balance of the court is not at stake.

Here are some of the key facts about the election and data points the AP Decision Team will monitor as the votes are tallied:

When do polls close?

In-person voting centers close at 8 p.m. PT, which is 11 p.m. ET.

What’s on the ballot?

The Associated Press will provide vote results and declare winners in contested primaries for U.S. House, state Senate, state House and state Supreme Court.

Who gets to vote?

Any eligible voter may participate in the state’s top-two primary system.

How many voters are there?

As of July 1, there were about 5.1 million registered voters in Washington.

How many people actually vote?

About 2 million votes were cast in the 2024 all-party primary for governor. That was slightly higher than the roughly 1.9 million votes cast in the 2022 all-party U.S. Senate primary.

How much of the vote is cast early or by absentee ballot?

Washington conducts its elections almost entirely by mail, and very few voters cast their votes in person. In the 2024 state primary, about 58.5% of voters delivered their ballots to a drop box, while about 41.3% sent their ballots through the mail.

As of Thursday, about 699,000 ballots had already been cast in Tuesday’s election.

When are early and absentee votes released?

The first vote updates of the night tend to include mostly results from mail voting with relatively few results from early in-person or in-person Election Day voting. A handful of counties, including two of the more populous in the state, Spokane and Clark, often release the bulk of their absentee results in their first vote update, but most counties roll them out over the course of the night.

How long does vote-counting usually take?

In the 2024 state primary, the AP first reported results at 11:06 p.m. ET, or six minutes after polls closed. The last vote update of the night was at 11:43 p.m. ET, with about 51% of total votes counted. The vote count surpassed the 75% mark on the Thursday following the election at 7:56 p.m. ET and reached about 95% of the total vote six days after the election at 7:24 p.m. ET.

When will the AP declare a winner?

The AP does not make projections and will declare a winner only when it’s determined there is no scenario that would allow a trailing candidate to close the gap. If a race has not been called, the AP will continue to cover any newsworthy developments, such as candidate concessions or declarations of victory. In doing so, the AP will make clear that it has not yet declared a winner and explain why.

How do recounts work?

Machine recounts in Washington state are automatic if the vote margin between the top two candidates is less than 2,000 votes and less than 0.5% of the total votes cast for both candidates. Manual recounts are required for statewide contests if the margin is less than 1,000 votes and less than 0.25% of the total votes cast for both candidates. For all other races, manual recounts are required when the margin is less than 150 votes and less than 0.25% of the total votes cast for both candidates. The AP may declare a winner in a race that is subject to a recount if it can determine the lead is too large for a recount or legal challenge to change the outcome.

Are we there yet?

As of Tuesday, there will be 91 days until the 2026 midterm elections.

___

Follow the AP’s coverage of the 2026 election at https://apnews.com/projects/elections-2026/.

Online jail records show that Samantha Angelina Feliz was booked into the Broward County Main Jail Sunday on charges of aggravated manslaughter of a child, tampering with or fabricating physical evidence, failing to report a death, reporting false information concerning a missing child and obstructing a criminal investigation by providing false information to law enforcement about a missing person.

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

Police in Rockingham, North Carolina took Leon, 21, and Feliz into custody on July 22.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Leon was extradited to Broward County on July 26 and, as of Monday, is being held at the Broward County Main Jail without bond.

Feliz is expected to appear in Broward County bond court sometime on Monday.

According to the Coast Guard, Dustin Southwick was initially seen around 8 a.m. Saturday on his rental boat in Marathon.

Officials said Southwick was later seen aboard the rental boat, identified as the Mauney Marine, near the 33rd Street boat ramp around noon.

Search crews from the U.S. Coast Guard in Marathon are continuing efforts to locate him.

Anyone with information about Southwick’s whereabouts is asked to contact the Coast Guard Sector Key West.

The Slovenian rider’s UAE Team Emirates-XRG team announced its lineup for the three-week race on Monday, confirming Pogačar will take part after claiming a record-equaling fifth Tour de France crown last month.

“It was my first ever Grand Tour back in 2019 and an amazing experience,” Pogačar said. “Spain is a country I love to visit and race in and I think the time is right to go back.”

Exclusive clubs

Pogačar joined Belgian Eddy Merckx, Spaniard Miguel Indurain, and Frenchmen Jacques Anquetil and Bernard Hinault as the only riders with five Tour de France titles to their names.

Unlike male riders including Hinault, Anquetil, Merckx and Jonas Vingegaard, however, Pogacar has not won the Spanish Vuelta for a hat trick of Grand Tours wins.

Pogačar, who won the Giro d’Italia in 2024 by a big margin, is also bidding to become just the fourth male rider to win the Vuelta and Tour de France in the same year after Anquetil, Hinault and Chris Froome.

Spanish Vuelta

The 81st Vuelta starts on Aug. 22 with an individual time trial in Monaco – where Pogačar lives – before making its way through France and Andorra to Spain. It concludes in Granada on Sept. 13 after nearly 3,300 kilometers of racing.

The 27-year-old Pogačar won three stages when he finished third on his last and only appearance so far at the Vuelta.

“Joining Pogačar are João Almeida, Jay Vine, Pavel Sivakov, Pablo Torres, Kevin Vermaerke, Domen Novak and Ivo Oliveira,” UAE Team Emirates-XRG said.

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

Officials have not released information about the size of the fire, its cause or whether any structures were damaged.

Drivers were urged to avoid the area and use alternate routes while crews responded.

Feels like temperatures will range between 100 to 105° early Monday afternoon.

Storms are forecast to develop by mid-afternoon, and with a south-southwest wind, storms will remain along the east coast metro into the early evening.

Slow moving storms that develop could produce frequent lightning, gusty winds, heavy rain, and localized street flooding.

CLICK HERE for the latest forecast updates from Local 10’s Weather Authority.

Garcia reminded voters that during the early voting period, they are not limited to their assigned precinct.

“People need to know that they can go to any of our early voting sites,” she said. “They don’t have to go to their specific precinct. And they can go this week between 7 a.m. to 3 p.m.”

Some voters said they attended a candidate forum before voting to learn more about the judicial candidates on the ballot.

Kendra Howard said hearing directly from the candidates helped her better understand their qualifications and priorities.

“I wanted a chance to get to know them -- get to know a little more about their background,” Howard said. “It’s one thing to read about the person’s background online, and read on their campaign site. But it’s another thing to hear them answer the questions and hear the passion.”

Howard said she planned to take time to reflect before making her final choices.

“I’m not going to tell you that I know exactly who I’m going to vote for just yet, but I’m going to consider everything that was said here today,” she said. “I’m going to think about it. I’m gonna go home and then I’m going to make my decision.”

Garcia also sought to reassure voters about the integrity of the election process, emphasizing that Miami-Dade County uses paper ballots.

“I want to remind everyone that we do vote on paper,” she said. “We don’t vote connected to any internet or anything like that. It’s very safe.”

Early voting is available daily during the designated voting period, allowing registered voters to cast their ballots at any Miami-Dade County early voting location during operating hours.

VIEW LOCAL 10’S 2026 VOTING GUIDE for more information about early voting in South Florida. Early voting in Broward County begins Saturday.

The small Phoenix Tailings refinery tucked inside an office park in Exeter, New Hampshire, could play a key role in helping America break the chokehold China has on the processing of critical minerals, but it will take 14 to 18 months to build a new factory with a $500 million loan from the Pentagon to drastically expand the company's separation and metallization capacity, a particularly weak stage in the U.S. mines-to-magnets supply chain.

The task that workers carry out in heat-resistant suits and sealed face masks has become more urgent with the war in the Middle East rapidly drawing down munitions because critical minerals are a key ingredient in widely used U.S. weapons systems such as Tomahawk cruise missiles, THAAD interceptors and F-35 fighter jets. While the White House is demanding military contractors speed up weapons production, it’s also imposing even stricter rules banning them from sourcing critical-mineral components from China.

“It will be a tall order and a challenge to replenish these stocks and scale up in the time frame needed to meet defense demand and regulations,” said Anthony Balladon, the chief commercial officer and a co-founder. He said the company is working hard to greatly increase its capacity.

Although the U.S. is quickening its pace to rebuild the domestic supply chain of critical minerals, free of control from its most formidable rival, most new U.S. mines are years away from reality, so extracting some of these hard-to-pronounce elements from existing mine waste can help satisfy the growing demand in the meantime.

Phoenix Tailings

has big plans

As its name indicates, Phoenix Tailings taps tailings, or waste from traditional mining, as well as recycled magnets and disk drives as the raw materials for separation and metallization, the stage at which China has the strongest hold.

To make inroads, the company, based in Woburn, Massachusetts, plans to build a facility to extract and produce critical metals, such as neodymium, praseodymium, terbium, dysprosium, samarium and yttrium, which are needed in defense, aerospace and automotive industries.

“We call it the Freedom facility because, ultimately, the purpose of this is to ensure that the entire Western Hemisphere, the United States and its allies are free of Chinese influence within the rare-earth space,” Balladon said.

On a recent afternoon, two technicians in heat-resistant hazmat suits were operating an apparatus of cylinders, tubes, funnels and control panels set up on a platform with bright yellow railings. A chemical process involving electricity removes oxygen and turns the oxides feed into a grayish metal: neodymium-praseodymium, which can be used to make extremely strong permanent magnets used in fighter jets, missiles, radar systems and drones.

The metals Phoenix Tailings refines and other critical minerals play “an outsized role” in defense systems, Balladon said. A $150 million weapons system won’t work if it's missing critical minerals that may be worth only $20,000 to $30,000, he said.

The U.S. defense sector is particularly reliant on samarium and needs 50 to 100 tons each year, but the U.S. capacity is very limited, he said.

Phoenix Tailings is among the few companies capable of producing the final metal, according to Balladon, but its capacity is only about 200 kilograms (440 pounds) a year. He said the company will scale up to about 5 tons in the next three months but it will be next year or 2028 before it reaches its goal of 120-ton capacity.

Another US magnet maker looks to France

For years, the U.S. magnet maker Arnold Magnetic Technologies relied on China for samarium to produce the extremely strong, stable-in-high-temperature magnet that goes into precision-guided missiles such as the Tomahawks.

That doesn’t work any more. For Arnold, the solution has come from a relic of Europe’s past rare-earth industry — abandoned mined dirt in the French city of La Rochelle.

Solvay, a Belgium-headquartered chemical company, ceased operations to separate and process rare earths from the mined dirt in the 2000s. That was when China was building up most of the world’s processing capacities with a determination to dominate.

Then came April 2025, when China weaponized its near-monopoly by choking the outflow of processed critical materials and forcing the U.S. government to back off in their trade war. It was then that Solvay restarted separating neodymium and praseodymium at the La Rochelle site, and this year it began to separate heavy rare earths such as samarium, dysprosium and terbium, a Solvay spokesperson said.

“This ramp‑up is driven by several factors: rapidly growing demand for permanent magnets, increased geopolitical focus on supply chain security, and strong customer demand in Europe and the United States for more diversified, resilient and traceable sources of supply,” the company spokesperson said.

In Rochester, New York, where Arnold is headquartered, higher costs by Solvay, as compared with China, have not been a deal-breaker, because the samarium-cobalt magnets that it manufactures account for only a small cost in a weapon system, said Matt Blake, chief executive officer of Arnold Magnetic Technologies. “They are not the absolute cost drivers,” he said.

The surge in demand for such magnets has worked in the company’s favor, said Aaron Williams, the company’s chief commercial officer. “From our end, it’s a good opportunistic growth," he said.

But not all metals are equal

Brodie Sutherland, chief executive officer of Patriot Critical Minerals Corp., which seeks to explore and mine tungsten in the U.S., is concerned that the U.S. will not be able to get by without China-sourced tungsten after Jan. 1, 2027, a deadline imposed by the Pentagon.

The U.S. is fully dependent on imports, with China controlling roughly 80% of the global mine supply and an even larger share of downstream processing, Sutherland said.

Efforts to ramp up U.S. production will take years, he said, and in the meantime the Pentagon and its defense contractors will need to rely on existing inventories, expanded recycling and limited non-China sources.

Iran war and Trump's China order create pressure and opportunity

The need to increase production has become more urgent as the war with Iran digs into the U.S. military’s already diminished stockpiles of advanced missile interceptors. This could force the U.S. and its Middle Eastern allies to take more risks to conserve those air defenses, potentially putting American troops at risk, according to an analysis from the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank.

It also has raised concerns that the U.S. military would have diminished firepower in any potential future conflict with China. CSIS warned in May that it could take at least three years to replenish stockpiles of the Tomahawks, Patriots and THAADs, or Terminal High Altitude Area Defense interceptors.

But just last month, Trump, a Republican, complicated the mission by announcing stricter controls on defense contractors sourcing critical materials from China. His executive order also curtails the Pentagon’s waiver authority should a contractor cite “non-availability” of a domestic source. It criticizes defense contractors for failing to prioritize domestic production.

“It is the policy of the United States that not only the finished equipment deployed by our military, but also the critical materials and components necessary to manufacture, maintain, sustain, and repair that equipment, are sourced domestically or from allied nations,” the July 20 order declared.

In a statement, Lockheed Martin said “we continuously assess the global rare earth supply chain to ensure access to critical materials that support our customers’ missions.” Several other major U.S. defense contractors, including Raytheon Technologies and Northrop Grumman, didn’t respond to The Associated Press' requests for comment.

Balladon is confident that U.S. companies and partners can rise to the task. “Ultimately, with the right support and partners across the industry," he said, “we think we can make it happen.”

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Funk reported from Omaha, Nebraska.

Head Start, established in the 1960s to help fight poverty, has long been considered by experts to be a gold standard early learning program. Its regulations, which stretch more than 100 pages, outline requirements on everything from child-to-teacher ratios and child health screenings to family engagement.

The Republican administration would replace those regulations with around a dozen pages of rules, leaving most of the specifics up to state and local law, said the people familiar with the deliberations, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss information that was not yet public and because they feared reprisal.

The draft rules would require more documentation from parents who are homeless or unemployed, the people familiar with the deliberations told The Associated Press. An early version of the proposal also would have barred parents who are in the United States illegally from enrolling their children, even if the children are U.S. citizens. It’s unclear whether those provisions will make the final draft.

Head Start’s rules target poverty, experts say

Head Start serves more than half a million low-income babies, toddlers and preschoolers nationwide. For families that qualify, it offers free preschool and screenings to identify developmental delays. It also offers supports for families.

The changes to Head Start would deliver a win for conservatives who have sought wholesale elimination of it. The Trump administration would also further its efforts to eliminate regulations it views as onerous or unnecessary.

If the changes take effect, they could make Head Start unrecognizable, said Khari Garvin, who ran the Office of Head Start under President Joe Biden, a Democrat.

“We’d have the carcass of Head Start,” Garvin said. “You might have a program that’s called Head Start, but in substance it will not be.”

Proposal has a long way to go to take effect

The proposed rules were originally reported in The Bulwark. The White House, the Office of Management and Budget, and the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees Head Start, did not respond to questions about the changes.

Tommy Sheridan, deputy director of the National Head Start Association, said the organization has yet to see the proposed rules. But he said the potential for a massive overhaul has left the organization on edge.

“We’re very anxious,” Sheridan said. “When it does come out ... we’ll be ready to fight back where we need to fight back.”

Still, he emphasized that Head Start centers might not be impacted for months, if the rules get on the books at all. Once the proposal is made public, federal law requires the administration to give at least a month for the public to weigh in on it. Then, once finalized, it may take more time for the rules to take effect. There’s also the potential for a lawsuit to halt implementation.

Current rules cover dental screenings and staff-to-student ratios

Head Start was created as part of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s War on Poverty and targets the myriad challenges that low-income households face. It serves children and adults alike, coaching parents on reaching their goals, connecting them with services and even employing them.

Head Start operators, which include school districts and nonprofit organizations, are required to provide medical, dental and vision screenings for children and to monitor them for developmental delays. There’s also a curriculum framework and prohibitions on physical and emotional abuse of children.

Many of the features that make Head Start distinct from mainstream preschools are spelled out in 122 pages of performance standards. The Trump administration’s proposal would toss most of that rule book and replace it with a much shorter version that eliminates or loosens many requirements, the people familiar with the proposal said. But the proposal also calls for some new regulations, such as requiring all instruction in English.

Requirements around staff-to-student ratios and safety standards would be erased. Operators instead would be instructed to follow local and state laws, which are often far more permissive. And the new proposal also says nothing about suspensions and expulsions, the people said, making it easier for programs to kick out kids with disabilities who are difficult to educate.

Head Start is under threat

Head Start, which has enjoyed robust bipartisan support for decades, has faced several threats since Trump took office last year. Project 2025, a conservative policy blueprint authored by the official who is now Trump’s budget chief, called for the federal government to get rid of the program altogether. Last year, in a draft budget, the administration proposed exactly that, saying: “The federal government should not be in the business of mandating curriculum, locations, and performance standards for any form of education.” After public outcry, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., whose department oversees Head Start, told Congress the program’s funding was safe.

Funding for the program was disrupted not long after Trump took office, leading some programs to have to shutter temporarily. It was once again halted after a government shutdown in October that led some centers briefly to close their doors.

Earlier this year, Trump officials also erased a Biden-era rule that mandated raises and greater benefits for Head Start employees. When the rule went in to effect in 2024, Head Start teachers, the majority of whom have bachelor’s degrees, earned less than $40,000 a year on average.

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Associated Press writer Ali Swenson contributed reporting.

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

La sequía persistente y sucesivas olas de calor extremo han privado de agua a uno de los ríos más grandes de Europa, lo que llevó el lunes los niveles del Danubio en la capital de Hungría, Budapest, a alrededor de 10 centímetros (4 pulgadas), muy por debajo del anterior mínimo histórico de 33 centímetros (13 pulgadas) registrado en 2018.

No se espera que los niveles de agua aumenten en el Danubio en los próximos días, ni siquiera semanas, ya que no se pronostican lluvias significativas y, mientras una nueva ola de calor extremo se cierne sobre la región con máximas diurnas que superan los 38 grados Celsius (100 grados Fahrenheit), el consumo de electricidad y agua va en aumento.

La central nuclear de Paks, en Hungría, al borde del cierre

Los niveles récord del Danubio han dejado a la única central nuclear de Hungría —la planta de Paks, construida en la era soviética y con cuatro reactores— al borde de apagarse por completo por primera vez en sus 44 años de servicio.

La planta de Paks, que utiliza agua del Danubio para enfriar sus reactores, apenas producía el lunes 240 megavatios de energía en lugar de los 2.000 habituales, debido a reducciones sucesivas en la potencia de sus cuatro reactores.

En un video publicado en Facebook el lunes, el primer ministro húngaro, Péter Magyar, indicó que los ingenieros habían logrado mantener en funcionamiento temporalmente la última turbina operativa de la planta, evitando un cierre previsto para el fin de semana. Un apagado total probablemente ocurrirá recién el martes o el miércoles, señaló Magyar.

“Esto es una muy buena noticia, porque el cierre completo de la central de Paks todavía puede evitarse, al menos temporalmente, en uno de los días de mayor consumo”, indicó Magyar.

La planta de Paks, ubicada a unos 90 kilómetros (55 millas) al sur de Budapest, representa casi la mitad de la producción eléctrica de Hungría y alrededor de un tercio de su consumo. Hungría ha recurrido a importaciones regionales de electricidad, así como a fuentes renovables, para intentar compensar el déficit de la planta de Paks.

El gobierno de Hungría pidió la semana pasada a los principales usuarios industriales que redujeran su consumo de electricidad y solicitó ahorros voluntarios a los hogares para conservar el suministro, especialmente durante las horas de máxima demanda entre las 5 y las 10 de la tarde.

También anunció que los trenes de carga impulsados por electricidad no tendrían permitido circular durante las horas pico a partir del lunes, con el fin de ahorrar un estimado de 70 a 90 megavatios-hora de electricidad por día.

Aunque las medidas de ahorro fueron inicialmente voluntarias, el gobierno de Magyar emitió el sábado un decreto que permite que se vuelvan obligatorias para grandes consumidores industriales o comerciales.

Magyar dijo el lunes que la campaña de ahorro había resultado en que el día anterior se usaran 700 megavatios menos de electricidad, y dio las gracias a los húngaros por sus esfuerzos.

Serbia y Rumania lidian con los bajos niveles del Danubio

Mientras tanto, las plantas en países vecinos también han registrado caídas drásticas en la generación de energía, que se suman a interrupciones en el transporte fluvial y en la agricultura.

Las fuerzas armadas de Rumania utilizaron el lunes 180 kilogramos (397 libras) de explosivos para volar roca cerca del canal Bala, en el bajo Danubio, en un esfuerzo por redirigir agua hacia el cauce principal del río y en dirección a la central nuclear de Cernavoda, de propiedad estatal.

El caudal del Danubio ha caído a 1.500 metros cúbicos por segundo en Rumania, menos de un tercio de su promedio de julio. Las autoridades ya han apagado una unidad de reactor en la planta de Cernavoda, que está operando a aproximadamente la mitad de su capacidad normal.

El primer ministro interino, Ilie Bolojan, anunció el viernes un estado de alerta a nivel nacional en el sector energético y advirtió que los bajos niveles de agua del Danubio amenazaban con el cierre del segundo reactor de Cernavoda. Pidió a los ciudadanos que limitaran voluntariamente el uso de electricidad durante las horas pico de la tarde-noche.

En Serbia, la principal central hidroeléctrica del país opera a apenas el 20% de su capacidad debido al mínimo récord de agua en el Danubio, lo que llevó al primer ministro Djuro Macut a encabezar una reunión de emergencia el lunes centrada en los problemas energéticos.

Macut instó a los residentes a “minimizar el uso de grandes consumidores de electricidad en sus hogares, como los aires acondicionados”. Describió la situación en un comunicado a última hora del domingo como “grave y exigente”.

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Los periodistas de The Associated Press Jovana Gec en Belgrado, Serbia, y Stephen McGrath en Leamington Spa, Inglaterra, contribuyeron a este despacho.

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

Persistent drought and successive extreme heat waves have deprived one of Europe's largest rivers of water, pushing the Danube's levels in Hungary's capital Budapest to around 10 centimeters (4 inches) on Monday, well below the previous all-time low of 33 centimeters (13 inches) set in 2018.

Water levels are not expected to rise on the Danube in the coming days or even weeks as no significant rainfall is forecast, and as a renewed extreme heat wave bears down on the region with daytime highs topping 38 Celsius (100 Fahrenheit), electricity and water use are on the rise.

Hungary's Paks nuclear plant on brink of shutdown

The Danube's record low levels have pushed Hungary's only nuclear power plant, the Soviet-built, four-reactor plant at Paks, to the brink of powering down entirely for the first time in its 44 years in service.

The Paks plant, which uses water from the Danube to cool its reactors, on Monday was producing only 240 megawatts of power rather than the usual 2,000 due to successive power-downs of its four reactors.

In video posted to Facebook on Monday, Hungarian Prime Minister Péter Magyar said engineers had managed to keep the plan’s final operating turbine temporarily running, averting an expected shutdown on the weekend. A full power-down will likely only happen on Tuesday or Wednesday, Magyar said.

“This is very good news, because the complete shutdown of the Paks power plant can still be avoided, at least temporarily, on one of the biggest consumption days,” he said.

The Paks plant, located around 90 kilometers (55 miles) south of Budapest, accounts for nearly half of Hungary’s electricity production and around a third of its consumption. Hungary has relied on regional electricity imports as well as renewable sources to try to make up for the deficit from the Paks plant.

Hungary’s government last week asked major industrial users to curb their electricity consumption and sought voluntary savings from households in order to conserve supply, particularly in peak demand hours between 5 p.m. and 10 p.m.

It also announced that electric-powered freight trains would not be permitted to run during peak hours beginning on Monday in order to conserve an estimated 70 to 90 megawatt-hours of electricity per day.

While conservation measures were initially voluntary, Magyar’s government on Saturday issued a decree allowing for them to be made mandatory for large industrial or commercial consumers.

He said Monday that the conservation push had resulted in 700 fewer megawatts of electricity being used the previous day, and thanked Hungarians for their efforts.

Serbia and Romania grapple with low Danube levels

Meanwhile, plants in neighboring countries have also seen dramatic drops in power generation, as well as disruptions to shipping and agriculture.

Romania’s military on Monday used 180 kilograms (397 pounds) of explosives to blast rock near the lower Danube’s Bala Canal in an effort to redirect water into the river’s main channel and toward the state-owned Cernavoda nuclear power plant.

The Danube's water flow has fallen to 1,500 cubic meters per second in Romania, less than a third of its July average. Authorities have already shut down one reactor unit at the Cernavoda plant, which is operating at about half its normal capacity.

Acting Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan announced a nationwide state of alert in the energy sector on Friday, and warned that the Danube’s low water levels threatened the shutdown of Cernavoda’s second reactor. He appealed to citizens to voluntarily limit electricity usage in peak evening hours.

In Serbia, record-low Danube levels have pushed the country’s key hydroelectric plant to operate with only 20% of its capacity, prompting Prime Minister Djuro Macut to preside over an emergency meeting on Monday focusing on energy problems.

Macut appealed to residents to “minimize the use of big consumers of electricity in their homes, such as air conditioners.” He described the situation in a statement late on Sunday as “serious and demanding.”

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Associated Press writers Jovana Gec in Belgrade, Serbia, and Stephen McGrath in Leamington Spa, England, contributed to this report.

Grande had been due to star alongside her “Wicked” co-star Jonathan Bailey in a production of Stephen Sondheim’s “Sunday in the Park with George” at the Barbican theater in 2027.

Empire Street Productions said Sunday that Grande will no longer be part of the production.

“We know this cannot have been an easy decision, and she makes it with our complete understanding and support,” the company said. It said the production will open next summer as planned, with casting announced "in due course.”

A representative for Grande told People magazine that the 33-year-old singer “will be taking a step back from visibility after she completes the Eternal Sunshine Tour.”

“She looks forward to finishing the tour and ending it on a high note, both healthily and happily, and then taking a much-deserved break from public-facing work and appearances, which has led to endless, ongoing public scrutiny,” the statement said.

The tour is due to wrap up in London on Sept. 1.

Grande found fame as a child performer on Nickelodeon before releasing her debut album, “Yours Truly,” in 2013. She has won three Grammy Awards and was nominated for a supporting actress Academy Award for the big-screen adaptation of the musical “Wicked.”

The talks will seek to end the conflict and revive stalled cargo traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, a crucial waterway through which about a fifth of all traded oil and natural gas passed before the war.

Iranian state media quoted the country’s foreign ministry as saying Tehran was not currently holding negotiations with the United States.

Israel struck the Gaza Strip over the weekend, days after the U.S. and Hamas said a deal was reached for the militant group to disarm, a potential step toward ending the war in Gaza.

Hospitals in Gaza said at least 17 were killed in the weekend's strikes, including children. A strike on a residential apartment in southern Gaza killed three family members including a 4-year-old child, according to Nasser hospital, where the bodies arrived.

The Israeli military said the strikes had targeted militant operatives.

Here is a look at the most important developments in the Middle East today.

Trump announces renewed talks

Trump said Sunday he decided not to carry out major strikes against Iran at the urging of Gulf allies Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. He said a plan was in place for U.S. forces to carry out “the biggest attack since World War II,” but he decided to give diplomacy more time after hearing from key Gulf leaders, as well as at the request of unnamed Iranian officials.

“Now what we’re doing is we’re talking to them in the form of a negotiation. It begins tomorrow afternoon,” he said. He did not provide further details or say who would be involved in the talks.

Trump has had a pattern of threatening massive strikes which he later calls off, with the announcements often later upended by renewed attacks. The abrupt shifts have been a defining feature of the five-month war that has upended global markets and sent the prices of fuel and other basic goods soaring.

Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman, Esmail Baghaei, said Monday that Tehran was not currently holding negotiations with the United States. He said ongoing talks were with Oman, the country that lies on the other side of the Strait of Hormuz, and were focused only on establishing a temporary route for safe navigation through the strait.

Iran executes 2 men it says spied for Israel

Iran’s judiciary said it executed two men on Monday after convicting them of spying for Israel during both last year’s 12-day war and the ongoing conflict.

The judiciary’s Mizan news agency identified the two as Omid Behzad and Pouria Safvat, who were accused of providing military coordinates, images and other intelligence used in attacks on Iranian targets. It did not specify where the executions took place.

Last week, Iran publicly hanged two men convicted of killing four police officers during nationwide anti-government protests in January.

Gaza’s residents swelter in tents

Soaring temperatures in Gaza this summer have turned the makeshift tents sheltering hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians into suffocating ovens. Made of plastic sheets, the shelters trap heat during the day and offer little ventilation, forcing many families to spend hours outside.

The extreme weather compounds an already dire humanitarian crisis. With limited access to clean water, electricity and sanitation, overcrowded camps are grappling with flies, mosquitoes and other insects. Humanitarian agencies such as the Norwegian Refugee Council warn that the conditions heighten the risk of dehydration, heat-related illnesses and the spread of skin infections, diarrheal diseases and other communicable illnesses.

“It’s very hot. We can’t stay inside the tents. Our tent is made of nylon,” said Aida Abu Hadeesha, a woman displaced from the town of Rafah, near the border with Egypt. “There is no breeze, nothing, and our kids are suffering," she said, adding that the stifling heat didn't let up all night. "The flies and the cockroaches attack us.”

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Becatoros reported from Athens, Greece. Associated Press writer Julia Frankel in Jerusalem contributed to this report.

• Early voting begins today in Miami-Dade ahead of Florida’s Primary Election
• ‘We ran into each other’: Texas man denies shoving bartender in Bayside incident caught on camera
• U.S. 41 reopened after brush fire prompts closure

You can watch a live feed of our news broadcast at Local10.com/Live.

Russia has used glide bombs to smash Ukrainian towns and cities since it invaded its neighbor more than four years ago. The weapons are Soviet-era bombs retrofitted with guidance systems and can carry up to 3,000 kilograms (6,600 pounds) of explosives, leaving huge craters. Ukraine has no effective countermeasures against them.

Meanwhile, six people were killed by Ukrainian drone debris in Arkhipo-Osipovka, a small town on Russia’s Black Sea coast in the Krasnodar region, regional governor Veniamin Kondratyev said, adding that 40 others were wounded.

Also, three people were killed and two were wounded in Kyiv’s overnight attack on the illegally annexed Crimea, said the peninsula’s Russian-installed head, Sergei Aksyonov. He gave no details.

Neither side’s claims could be independently verified.

Russia's glide bombs are big and hard to stop

The Sunday evening onslaught on Zaporizhzhia killed a 71-year-old woman and wounded 31 people, including a 16-year-old girl, as the glide bombs damaged 22 apartment buildings in four districts of the city, Fedorov said.

While Moscow’s forces have captured the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant and hold other parts of the region, its capital city of the same name remains in Ukrainian hands. It is one of the four regions, also including Donetsk, Kherson and Luhansk, that Russia illegally annexed in September 2022 even though its forces do not completely control them.

Other large-scale damage of civilian areas of Ukraine has resulted from Russian ballistic missiles, and late Sunday President Volodymyr Zelenskyy made another urgent plea for countries to send Ukraine more U.S.-made Patriot air defense systems.

Only Patriot interceptors can reliably stop ballistic missiles, but they are in short supply due to the Iran war.

“The world has Patriot missiles. What matters now is for our partners to make the political decision to provide the necessary packages,” Zelenskyy said on social media. “The United States knows what we need. Europe knows what we need. Anti-ballistic missiles must protect people — not sit in stockpiles.”

U.S. President Donald Trump last week appeared to back off from his earlier commitment to give Ukraine a license to make Patriots itself. He said Friday that the licensing matter is still under discussion and he hasn’t made a final decision.

Zelenskyy has suggested an alternative to Trump whereby Elon Musk allows Ukraine to use Starlink satellites to target ballistic missile launch sites inside Russia. Officials haven't publicly said whether that is being considered.

Russia attacked Ukraine with 181 long-range strike drones overnight from Sunday to Monday, according to the Ukrainian air force. It said air defenses jammed and intercepted 163 drones, but 14 caused damage at 13 locations.

The Russian Defense Ministry said its forces struck four bulk carriers carrying cargo for the Ukrainian armed forces, including three in waters of the Black Sea and one in the port of Mykolaiv, but provided no further information.

Ukraine's long-range drone strikes cause more damage

As well the reported Russian deaths in drone attacks, Ukrainian drones also struck another major warehouse belonging to Wildberries, Russia’s biggest online shopping company.

The strike was part of a campaign that has hit more than a dozen of the retailer’s distribution hubs and severely disrupted its business.

A Wildberries warehouse in the Vladimir region east of Moscow caught fire in the latest attack, the company said Monday.

Three people were injured, Vladimir Gov. Alexander Avdeyev said.

Ukrainian drones also struck the Saratov oil refinery in southwestern Russia, Zelenskyy said. Kyiv has repeatedly targeted that refinery, and many others, since last year as it tries to choke fuel supplies to the Russian army and deny Moscow income from oil exports.

The Engels military air base near Saratov, which is the main base for Russian nuclear-capable strategic bombers, and other targets inside Russia, including fuel storage tanks at the Lyudinovskaya oil depot in Russia’s Kaluga region, were also targeted, according to Zelenskyy.

The Russian Defense Ministry on Monday reported that its air defenses overnight intercepted 131 Ukrainian drones over a number of Russian regions, as well as Crimea and the Black Sea.

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

Infantino’s secretive proposal to raise $4.2 billion from investors including the New York investment firm of Joshua Kushner was dropped early Saturday, days after the revelation in media reports provoked a global furor.

UEFA led the backlash and on Thursday its 55 member federations met to agree boycotting all FIFA events and competitions while the proposal was active.

Now lawyers for UEFA have informed FIFA that the European body is “actively considering legal action, arbitration, and/or regulatory complaints ... arising out of and in connection with the FFE (FIFA Forward Enterprise) plan proposed by FIFA and all related matters.”

The letter dated Friday from the legal firm Dechert in New York was seen Monday by The Associated Press.

The letter named 18 FIFA executives who it said should retain data, documents and electronic messages as potential evidence.

“UEFA puts you on formal notice that any destruction, deletion, alteration, concealment, or loss of relevant materials following receipt of this notice — or following any earlier date on which you were, or reasonably should have been, aware that proceedings were anticipated — may constitute spoliation of evidence,” the letter said.

On Saturday, UEFA signaled it wants to end Infantino’s decade-long presidency, saying he had lost the confidence of world soccer and that “no option should be off the table.”

Hours earlier, Infantino withdrew the divisive proposal that offered FIFA’s 211 member federations one-off payments of $20 million each with a mid-September deadline to accept.

The FFE spin-off valued by FIFA at $20 billion would have taken control of the soccer body’s money-making commercial and tournament operations. The 211 members already effectively own the Zurich-based not-for-profit governing body.

It was the project of just one man, FIFA’s chief operating officer Kevin Lamour said in a stinging statement Friday to the AP which said staff felt deceived by their boss Infantino.

Legal proceedings are “reasonably anticipated,” UEFA’s lawyer Andrew J. Levander wrote, citing the belief of soccer stakeholders that the plan was “fundamentally incompatible with the proper governance of football.”

Opposition to Infantino

UEFA has been most outspoken against its former employee Infantino while the Asian Football Confederation and CONCACAF, the North and Central American and Caribbean soccer body, also have made strong statements to oppose Infantino’s plan.

Infantino has most support from his traditional base in Africa, while South America’s CONMEBOL is relying on him to expand the 2030 World Cup to 64 teams from 48. That would give more hosting games to Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay, the home country of CONMEBOL president Alejandro Dominguez.

The private equity plan has provoked a stunning turnaround in fortunes for Infantino who left New York after the World Cup final two weeks ago seemingly a lock to be re-elected unopposed next March for a fourth and final term in office through 2031. The spin-off operation could have created a commissioner-like role for him beyond 2031 paying much more than his current $6 million annual salary and bonus deal as president.

FIFA briefed at the World Cup that Infantino had got pledged letters of support from about 200 of the 211 member federations.

Those letters are now likely being withdrawn across Europe with the Wales federation the first to announce its reversal.

The candidate deadline is Nov. 18 for an election exactly four months later in Morocco, one of Infantino's strongest allies and a co-host of the 2030 tournament with Spain and Portugal.

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AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer and AP World Cup coverage

The “register of economic beneficiaries” was accessed at night from Wednesday into Thursday last week, the government said. It said that the breach was noticed on Thursday, that measures were taken to secure data and the system taken offline.

The government said there were no indications that any data was altered or deleted.

The list of people behind companies, foundations and trusteeships is part of efforts to combat money laundering and terror financing.

Liechtenstein is a nation of 40,000 people between Switzerland and Austria, and the financial industry is central to its economy.

The government set up a crisis unit over the weekend to investigate the attack.

Un ciudadano griego y otro danés murieron y otros dos —todos operadores de vuelos privados fletados— fueron hospitalizados en la colisión, mientras que el esfuerzo de extinción en zonas montañosas y costeras durante el fin de semana se vio obstaculizado por poderosos vendavales.

Mientras partes del sur de Europa seguían sufriendo altas temperaturas, los bomberos en Francia vigilaban posibles rebrotes dentro de una zona quemada aún en llamas cuatro veces del tamaño de París.

La disminución de los vientos alimenta la esperanza

Los vientos fuertes amainaban el lunes, lo que permitió desplegar 12 aviones cisterna y 11 helicópteros en torno al balneario costero de Porto Germenos, donde se han emitido varias órdenes de evacuación.

“Por ponerlo en un titular: las condiciones son mejores, pero seguimos adelante porque todavía hay múltiples puntos de actividad”, dijo el portavoz del Servicio de Bomberos, Yiannis Artopios. “Este es un incendio difícil que nos ha preocupado”.

Unos 500 bomberos frenaron el avance del incendio, pero las autoridades advirtieron que las zonas en torno a Atenas seguían en alto riesgo. Más de 1.000 personas han sido evacuadas de la región, incluidas más de 250 rescatadas por embarcaciones desde playas de la zona.

El incendio fue atribuido a una línea eléctrica defectuosa de un parque eólico y llevó al arresto de dos contratistas acusados de incendio provocado por negligencia.

A pesar de los métodos de detección mejorados y de una cooperación ampliada entre los miembros de la Unión Europea, Grecia y otros países a lo largo de la costa mediterránea de Europa sufren incendios forestales devastadores cada verano a medida que los periodos con temperaturas de ola de calor se alargan.

Europa es el continente que se calienta más rápido en la Tierra, calentándose a más del doble del promedio mundial desde la década de 1980, según el servicio climático Copernicus de la Unión Europea. El aumento de las temperaturas y la sequía prolongada dejan la vegetación más seca y más combustible, lo que permite que los incendios se propaguen más rápido y ardan con mayor intensidad.

Persisten focos activos en el gran incendio en Francia

En Francia, miles de evacuados recibieron autorización el lunes para regresar a casa o a sus alojamientos vacacionales después de que un enorme incendio forestal se mantuviera contenido. Más de 224.000 personas habían huido en lo que las autoridades describieron como la mayor evacuación civil del país fuera de tiempos de guerra.

El fuego arrasó unos 420 kilómetros cuadrados (162 millas cuadradas), lo que lo convierte en el mayor incendio forestal registrado en Francia. El regreso del lunes incluye la península de Cap Ferret, un punto turístico a lo largo de la costa atlántica, y Le Porge, el municipio más afectado, donde 183 viviendas fueron destruidas. Los campings siguen cerrados.

Otro incendio forestal en Provenza no se reavivó durante la noche, pero el lunes aún no estaba contenido, ya que se esperaban vientos más fuertes, dijeron bomberos y autoridades. Unos 1.500 bomberos, apoyados por helicópteros cisterna, continuaron reforzando las líneas de contención a lo largo del fuego, que ha calcinado unos 18 kilómetros cuadrados (7 millas cuadradas) de terreno.

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Corbet informó desde París. Elena Becatoros en Atenas y Thomas Adamson en París contribuyeron a este despacho.

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

The Mutiara Sentosa 2 ferry was traveling from Indonesia’s second-largest city of Surabaya in East Java to the city of Makassar in South Sulawesi. Initial reports said it was carrying 271 people, including 39 crew members, based on the ship’s manifest, when the fire broke out between 6 a.m. and 7 a.m.

However, by Monday officials said many more people were aboard than listed, and the number of people missing was unclear. Officials were relying on reports from families of victims and survivors in an attempt to determine the number of the missing.

It is common in Indonesia for the number of passengers on a boat or ferry to differ from the manifest. Such discrepancies can complicate search and rescue efforts, said Nanang Sigit, the search mission coordinator who also heads the Surabaya Search and Rescue Office.

The cause of the fire remained under investigation. Indonesian navy ships assisted, along with a number of passing vessels, at the scene about 35 kilometers (22 miles) north of Sapudi island in the Sumenep regency.

The vessel was also loaded with 180 vehicles, mostly trucks.

Ahmad Abdul Karim, a survivor, said the fire appeared to have started in a truck on the lower vehicle deck.

“Fanned by the wind, the flames spread extremely quickly,” Karim said, “In less than 30 minutes, everyone had been instructed to move to the bow of the ferry.”

Another passenger, Azhari, said many passengers had just woken up when the fire erupted, apparently from the rear of the ferry.

“The fire spread quickly to the middle of the vessel,” Azhari, who goes by a single name, said in a television interview. “There was no other option for us but to jump into the sea.”

He said passengers were in the sea for about four hours before passing vessels began pulling them to safety.

Television news showed exhausted survivors disembarking from a rescue vessel at a harbor in Surabaya, while rescuers transported bodies to ambulances and grieving relatives waited for information.

Transportation Minister Dudy Purwagandhi said the government would review the performance of the ferry’s operator, Atosim Lampung Pelayaran, after the National Transportation Safety Committee, or KNKT, completes its investigation.

“First we need to determine the cause based on KNKT’s findings,” Purwagandhi said.

The ferry was built in Japan in 1992 and was sold to Indonesia in 2015. With a length of 160 meters (525 feet), it can accommodate 689 passengers and 49 crew, along with up to 181 vehicles.

The Mutiara Sentosa 2 serves the Surabaya-Makassar route, a voyage that typically takes around 40 hours and is primarily used by domestic travelers and cargo transport between the islands of Java and Sulawesi.

Indonesia is an archipelago of more than 17,000 islands where ferries are a common method of travel. Disasters occur regularly, with weak safety enforcement often blamed.

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Associated Press journalists Niniek Karmini and Edna Tarigan in Jakarta, Indonesia, contributed to this report.

The collision laid bare the danger at the most volatile front of Europe’s wildfire emergency. Flames bore down deeper into the region of the Greek capital, forcing fresh evacuations in the early hours of Monday. In France, firefighters guarded a still-burning scar four times the size of Paris.

The two crew members — one Greek and one Danish national — died when their helicopter collided with another near the seaside area of Psatha while tackling the fire that started Friday morning. The blaze raged through pine forests and scrubland through the weekend, whipped by gale force winds that often prevented water-dropping planes from operating.

The crew of the second helicopter – a Greek and a British national – were taken to a hospital, where their injuries were reported to be light. Foreign firefighting and helicopter crews are often deployed in Greece to help tackle wildfires during the country’s hot, dry summers.

Easing winds raise hopes of halting the advance of the flames

Strong winds were dying down Monday, raising hopes that the nearly 500 firefighters battling the blaze could manage to halt its advance. But authorities warned the broader Athens region of Attica remained at a high risk for wildfires due to a forecast increase in temperatures.

More than 1,000 people have been evacuated from the region, including more than 250 rescued by boats from beaches in the area. Evacuation orders were issued in the early hours of Monday for three more areas, while crews worked to create firebreaks in a forest to help halt the advance of the blaze.

Greece’s firefighting department said Sunday the fire apparently began from sparks emitted by a faulty power line transporting electricity from a private wind generator facility to the main electricity network.

Two people were arrested — an electrical engineer responsible for designing and overseeing the power project, and a contractor involved in constructing the electricity transmission network. Both face felony arson charges, while authorities had also issued an arrest warrant for the owner of the wind generator company.

Greece has devastating wildfires every summer, with hot, dry conditions and frequently strong winds making it easy for small sparks to trigger major blazes. Measures to limit fire risks, such as bans on barbecues and certain outdoor work such as welding and use of electrical power saws are often ignored. The vast majority of the hundreds of wildfires the country has each year are caused by negligence.

But some fires are deliberately set. On Sunday, authorities said one man was arrested on Kefalonia on suspicion of having started a fire that spread quickly in the southeastern part of the island, triggering the evacuation of nearby villages.

Major blaze in France contained, but hotspots remain

Farther west, France’s largest wildfire remained held within its perimeter on Sunday night after forcing 224,000 people to flee in what may have been the country’s largest civilian evacuation outside wartime.

Hot spots still burned within a 420-square-kilometer (162-square-mile) scar, thousands remained unable to return home, and nearly 3,000 firefighters were deployed against the Gironde megafire and a second blaze in Provence.

Together, fires in France and Spain have driven roughly a third of a million people from homes and vacation sites, emptied communities at the height of the European summer and stretched emergency services across simultaneous disasters.

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Adamson reported from Paris.

Two photographs published with the announcement showed Suu Kyi shaking hands with Arnaud de Baecque, the ICRC’s representative to Myanmar, and meeting with him in a wood-paneled room.

The Presidential Press and Information Bureau, which released the photographs, said the meeting was held Monday morning but did not disclose the location of the meeting or provide details about what was discussed.

The ICRC confirmed in a statement on Monday that one of its delegates visited Suu Kyi under its standards and procedures for visiting people deprived of liberty, and spoke with her in private, but it did not disclose details of the discussion.

The organization said it continues to engage with all relevant actors to maintain and expand its access to places of detention in Myanmar.

Two other photographs showed Suu Kyi cutting a pink birthday cake bearing the inscription, “Happy Birthday Aunty Suu,” suggesting they may have been taken during a celebration for her 81st birthday in June.

In the photos, Suu Kyi appeared relaxed and was smiling. She did not show any obvious signs of ill health, although her physical condition could not be independently assessed from the images.

The release came as calls are growing from other countries, including Myanmar's fellow members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, for access to or engagement with Suu Kyi as part of efforts to resolve the country's political crisis.

Kim Aris, her younger son living in London, and Myanmar democracy activists has been waging an online campaign named to demand evidence his mother is alive and well.

In a statement sent to the AP, Aris welcomed the reported ICRC visit, saying it could mark the first positive development concerning his mother in more than five years.

“This may be a first step, but it must not be the last,” Aris said.

He thanked governments, the international community and supporters for standing with his family and backing his campaign to seek proof of his mother’s well-being, while stressing that he had not yet received independent confirmation of her condition.

He said he hoped the visit would lead to direct family contact and her eventual release together with all political prisoners.

Suu Kyi was detained Feb. 1, 2021, when the army seized power from her elected government. She has not been seen publicly since then, and the last official photo of her released was in April, when she was moved from prison to house arrest and her sentence was reduced as part of a prisoner amnesty for a Buddhist holiday.

The country's military leaders, who have faced sanctions and widespread international isolation since seizing power in 2021, have sought to project a return to normalcy by holding a 2025 election and increased engagement with regional neighbors.

However, critics say the transition to a nominally elected government largely composed of former generals and holdovers from the previous military-led government has done little to change the military’s grip on power.

Nay Phone Latt, a spokesperson for the opposition National Unity Government, said the ICRC’s meeting with Suu Kyi shouldn’t be taken as a real move to address human rights or democracy issues.

“Since, from the outset, a country’s leader was wrongfully arrested and imprisoned by finding faults where there were none, she must be released without any conditions,” he said.

The General Assembly will begin debate on a proposed constitutional amendment intended to give Democrats greater latitude to draw congressional maps favoring their party, which currently represents seven of the state's eight House districts. The proposal would have to be approved by voters before lawmakers could begin considering new district lines.

Deep blue Maryland’s move, which the state's minority Republicans have called a blatant power grab, is the latest turn in the national battle over redistricting, which kicked off a year ago and has reshaped the U.S. House map ahead of this year’s midterms.

Democratic state Senate President Bill Ferguson blocked a different redistricting initiative earlier this year that could have put new maps in place before the fall elections, worried the move could backfire upon judicial review. But he has said his views shifted after the U.S. Supreme Court weakened the Voting Rights Act in late April. That decision offered new grounds for Republicans to swiftly reconfigure districts in Southern states with large minority populations that have elected Democrats, moves that Ferguson called “painful” to watch.

“It felt like the unwinding of any type of democratic norms in the blink of an eye,” Ferguson said in an interview.

Deep blue Maryland could gain one seat

Maryland's lone Republican representative in Congress is Rep. Andy Harris, chairperson of the House Freedom Caucus. Harris' 1st District is centered on the mostly rural Eastern Shore, part of a scenic peninsula separated from the rest of the state by the Chesapeake Bay.

In 2021, lawmakers tried to remake the maps in a way that made Harris' district more competitive for a Democrat to win, drawing in communities across the bay. But a judge struck down those districts in 2022, calling them a “product of extreme partisan gerrymandering.”

In light of that decision and in hopes of avoiding future adverse legal rulings, lawmakers will consider legislation to amend the state constitution to make clear that the parameters the judge cited — including that districts be compact in form and have regard given to “natural boundaries” — apply only to General Assembly districts, not congressional ones.

If approved by a three-fifths vote of both chambers, the amendment would go before voters in the Nov. 3 general election. If approved there, lawmakers could revisit the congressional maps for the 2028 election cycle under the constitution’s new guidance.

Republicans say the move sets up a gerrymander

In advance of the special session, Republicans criticized the move by Democrats and raised concerns about limits set on testimony for the special session.

“We are very concerned with the significant limitations on witnesses, and the reality that any bill hearing is obviously intended to be a brief and meaningless formality,” House Minority Leader Jason Buckel said in a statement.

Harris, in an interview, said the “gerrymandering that this constitutional amendment sets up” would break up areas of common interest into districts predominated by urban and suburban areas, disenfranchising rural voters. Such a move would “of course” face a court challenge, he said.

Gov. Wes Moore, a Democrat who has expressed frustration over lawmakers' refusal to redistrict earlier this year, cast the move as an urgent necessity in light of Republican moves elsewhere. The proposal currently before lawmakers will ultimately give voters, not “party bosses” the final say, he said.

“And if the people determine that there’s nothing to do, then there’s nothing to do. But if the people determine that we move, we move,” he said in an interview as he became chair of the National Governors Association.

Redistricting reverberates around the country

Maryland’s special session is part of a new phase in a national redistricting battle that began a year ago, when President Donald Trump urged Republican-led states to redraw congressional districts to help the party hold on to its slim House majority in the midterm elections. Republicans think they could win as many as 16 additional seats from new House maps enacted in eight states — Texas, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, Florida, Tennessee, Louisiana and Alabama. Democrats, whose counterattack faced several setbacks, think they could win up to six additional seats from new districts in California and Utah.

Now some states, such as Maryland and New York, are taking steps to redraw congressional districts ahead of the 2028 elections. New York’s Democratic-led Legislature has approved a proposed constitutional amendment to authorize mid-decade redistricting, repeal prohibitions on partisan gerrymandering and make it easier for lawmakers to bypass an independent redistricting commission in the future. The measure needs another round of legislative approval next year before it can appear on a statewide ballot.

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Associated Press reporters David A. Lieb in Jefferson City, Missouri, and Steven Sloan in Oklahoma City contributed to this report.

Futures for the S&P rose 0.6%, while futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 1.1%. Nasdaq futures were up 0.3% before the opening bell Monday.

In Asia, Japan’s Nikkei 225 index lost 0.9% and the U.S. dollar dipped against the yen after the U.S. and Japan confirmed they had acted to prop up the value of the Japanese yen against the dollar.

The retreat in oil prices Monday was just the latest of many big swings since the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran in late February. On-and-off fighting and comments from Trump about which way the conflict was heading have been the major drivers of rising and falling oil prices.

Just a day before Trump said he would order the military to pull back on the aggression, the president said he was “losing faith” in the negotiations with Iran, warning that the U.S. military “will be hitting them very hard.”

Brent crude, the international standard, fell $4.27, or 4.9%, to $83.66 per barrel. U.S. benchmark crude lost $4.86, or 5.8%, to $79.81 per barrel.

Early Monday in Tokyo, after the official announcement of the U.S. and Japan's currency intervention, the dollar fell to 155.20. The U.S. currency had risen to 40-year highs against the yen recently, last week trading near 164 yen.

By late Monday, a dollar bought 156.79 yen.

A weak yen helps to boost the profits of Japanese companies with big operations overseas, increasing their value in yen terms. It also has drawn millions of foreign tourists who have enjoyed their strong purchasing power in Japan.

But a cheap currency also weakens Japan's purchasing power overall, pushing up costs for the imports of oil and other essential goods.

The dollar's value has surged as it serves as a safe haven for investors in times of uncertainty, such as during war. Trump lauded the dollar's strength in comments to reporters, but a weaker dollar can help make U.S. exports more competitive.

The U.S. Treasury bought yen through the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, analysts said, to help boost its value.

It's a strong signal, said Stephen Innes of SPI Asset Management.

“Washington is no longer merely giving Tokyo permission to defend the yen. It is prepared to stand on the same side of the trade,” he said in a commentary.

In Asian trading, Japan's Nikkei 225 index lost 0.9% to 63,754.90, while the Kospi in South Korea dropped 5.1% to 6,257.45.

The Kospi soared 17.9% on Friday for its best day in history after losing even more of its value earlier in the week. The index is dominated by two tech giants, Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix, both of whose shares gained more than 25% on Friday. Shares in both companies fell 8.8% on Monday.

Hong Kong's Hang Seng index picked up 0.5% to 26,009.40 and the Shanghai Composite index lost 0.6% to 3,809.66.

In European markets at midday, Germany’s DAX gained 1.5%, while the CAC 40 in Paris climbed 1.1%. Britain’s FTSE 100 inched up 0.2%.

This week brings a slew of U.S. labor market data, highlighted by the government’s July jobs report on Friday.

Earnings season is also in high gear, with dozens of major companies reporting their latest profits, including Palantir, SpaceX, McDonald’s, The Walt Disney Co. and Uber, among others.

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Associated Press reporters Mayuko Ono and Mari Yamaguchi in Tokyo contributed to this report.

Less than 10 miles away, U.S. Rep. Haley Stevens was making her own appeal at another Black church, where one of the city’s most prominent pastors made the case for her.

There were fewer than 48 hours left in Michigan’s fiercely contested Democratic Senate primary. And after more than a year spent preaching starkly different visions for their party — with tens of millions of dollars poured into the race and national attention focused on it — both candidates had come to some of the same places looking for the votes to win it.

First, Black churches. Later, union halls. Then rallies surrounded by their core supporters.

Stevens, who has been through several competitive Democratic primaries, has a name for the frenzy of the closing days: “the last word phenomenon.”

“Everyone’s trying to get in their last points,” Stevens said.

Where the candidates chose to make those final points reflected the simple contest underneath all the money and ideological warfare: which one can assemble enough of Michigan’s Democratic coalition to win Tuesday.

The primary has become one of the clearest tests yet of where Democratic voters want their party to go. El-Sayed, a progressive backed by Sen. Bernie Sanders and other leaders on the party’s left, has run against much of the Democratic establishment. Stevens, a four-term congresswoman backed by Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer and many of Michigan’s top Democrats, has made electability and experience central to her case.

The stakes extend well beyond the primary. The nominee will need to bring a fractured Democratic coalition back together to defeat Republican Mike Rogers in November and hold an open seat that is critical to the party’s hopes of taking control of the Senate next year.

Both hopefuls focused on the Detroit area, where Democratic primaries are often decided

Democratic primaries in Michigan have long run through Detroit, where support from the city’s Black voters is often crucial.

El-Sayed’s pitch to those voters Sunday — during stops at three churches — centered on a vision of economic opportunity and equal treatment.

“I believe in the kind of America where no matter where you grow up, the color of your skin, how you pray, you deserve equal rights in this country,” El-Sayed told the congregation at Kingdom Covenant Church.

“You deserve to go to a good school, you deserve to get healthcare, you deserve to graduate and get a good job,” he added.

El-Sayed was joined by Democratic Reps. Summer Lee of Pennsylvania and Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts, as well as Yusef Jackson, the son of the late Rev. Jesse Jackson who is president of Rainbow PUSH Coalition.

Pastor David A. Johnson II said welcoming a political candidate was not something he typically did, but “this particular season, it’s time for us to do something different.”

For Robin Robertson, a 59-year-old Detroit resident, El-Sayed’s visit came just in time. Robertson said she had gone back and forth over whom to support, waiting until the campaign’s final days to decide.

She ultimately settled on El-Sayed, saying Stevens “had a good run.”

“His agenda seems to match more for me the things that we need right now,” Robertson said. “And then, he’s here in my little church. That was confirmation that I’m going to vote for him.”

Stevens, meanwhile, emphasized her longstanding connections to Detroit-area churches.

At a church in Pontiac on Sunday afternoon, Stevens stayed after the service to speak individually with congregants, greeting many like familiar faces.

“I come here year-round. This isn’t just a campaign thing,” Stevens said. “Our churches are places of community refuge, community connection.”

Stevens and her allies have also made a direct appeal to Black voters through advertisements highlighting her ties to former President Barack Obama and her work as chief of staff for his administration’s auto rescue effort from 2009 to 2011.

Her campaign acknowledges that a strong showing among Detroit voters will likely be necessary for her to win Tuesday.

Reggie Williams, a longtime constituent who was supporting Stevens at an Oakland County event Sunday evening, said he continues to back her because she “has always been there for the people.”

“She is out and about in the community, always has boots on the ground,” Williams said.

Stevens, El-Sayed will focus on different parts of Michigan on final day of campaigning

After spending much of Sunday pursuing some of the same Democratic constituencies, El-Sayed and Stevens will take different paths across Michigan for the final full day of the primary.

El-Sayed plans to remain in Detroit, joining canvass launches and trying to turn enthusiasm in the state’s largest city into votes.

“This has been the heart of my public service," El-Sayed said about his decision to end the campaign in Detroit. “We wanted to come back here and demonstrate what this movement is and what it could mean."

Stevens will head west, making stops across West Michigan as she tries to maximize support in a region with Democratic strongholds in cities such as Grand Rapids and Kalamazoo.

The divergent schedules reflect the final calculation facing both campaigns after more than a year of campaigning: There are few voters left to persuade, and increasingly the task is making sure the ones already won over actually cast a ballot.

For El-Sayed, that means leaning into a volunteer operation his campaign says has grown to 12,000 people statewide and trying to drive turnout in places such as Detroit. Stevens is relying on the broader institutional support she has accumulated across the state, including endorsements from many of Michigan’s most prominent Democratic officials, such as Sen. Gary Peters and Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.

By Monday night, there will be no more churches to visit, union halls to address or rallies to hold. The television ads that have blanketed Michigan will have run their course, too.

Then comes what Stevens described as the inevitable other side of the “last word phenomenon.”

“The votes will be counted,” she said. “The election will be had.”

Monday's witnesses are expected to include police officers and doctors involved in the immediate response to the killings, building on testimony some of their colleagues gave for the prosecution last week.

Witnesses in ensuing days could shed more light on the mental health issues at the heart of the case. Clancy's defense says she was a loving mother who was overmastered by postpartum psychosis, a dangerous psychiatric condition that afflicts a small proportion of women after childbirth and affects their hold on reality.

Prosecutors contend that she acted intentionally and should be held criminally responsible for the deaths of Callan, Dawson and Cora Clancy, who ranged in age from 8 months to five years.

Clancy, 35, wept at the defense table as ex-husband Patrick Clancy and other witnesses testified last week about the killings.

He found the children in the basement of the family's home in Duxbury, Massachusetts, and their mother gravely injured in the yard. She had jumped out a second-floor window and remains paralyzed from the waist down.

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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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Lindsay Clancy’s lawyers don’t dispute that the former labor and delivery nurse killed the children. But in the criminal trial and a medical malpractice lawsuit, her attorneys have said that she had bipolar disorder that wasn’t fully diagnosed until after the killings and that her condition seemed to worsen on an ever-shifting lineup of psychiatric prescriptions, some of them problematic for bipolar patients.

In the three months before the January 2023 killings, various clinicians prescribed Lindsay Clancy a range of antidepressants, sleep aids, an antipsychotic and other medications while she reported increasingly profound insomnia, anxiety, despair and confusion about what was real, according to her lawsuit.

Defendant sought help for postpartum depression

When she sought care at a postpartum depression program in late December 2022, providers noted that her symptoms might be due to medication, according to her lawsuit. It says those clinicians told her to taper off the antipsychotic drug and then discharged her after a day.

Clancy checked herself into a psychiatric hospital that New Year’s Eve and spent several days there. Once home, she resumed appointments with her psychiatrist, who last saw her for 17 minutes on Jan. 23, 2023, according to her lawsuit.

The next day, she believed a commanding voice was telling her to “kill the children so you can kill yourself,” according to her lawyers.

That evening, she asked her husband to run some errands, a request that prosecutors cast as a ploy to get him out of the house. In a rare site visit this past Friday, jurors passed the businesses to which he went, and then they were escorted through the Cape Cod-style home where the Clancys lived.

Father returns home to a shocking scene

In anguished testimony, Patrick Clancy told jurors last week about returning to a horrible scene at that house: a bloodied bedroom, an open window, his wife on the ground below it, the children in the basement, throttled with exercise bands.

“She killed the kids!” he told a 911 dispatcher on a call played in court.

In separate lawsuits, Lindsay and Patrick Clancy allege that various providers failed her and should have recognized she was a risk to herself and the children. The providers, at least those who have responded to date, deny the allegations and dispute that she clearly told them she intended to harm the children.

Prosecutor Shanan Buckingham sought in an opening statement last week to keep jurors' focus on the defendant, not her doctors.

“This is not a public debate about women’s mental health and how the medical system treats women," Buckingham said.

If convicted of murder, Lindsay Clancy faces life in prison without parole. If found not guilty due to a lack of criminal responsibility, she would be committed to a state mental health facility.

It starts with a grim warning to Tehran that he's on the cusp of ordering U.S. forces to “obliterate” its power plants or seize key parts of its oil industry if its leaders don't quickly agree to U.S. terms to end the war. It ends with him edging away with a last-minute declaration, sometimes at the behest of Gulf allies, that he's going to give diplomacy more time.

The hardball strategy — one that Trump honed during his years competing in New York’s real estate scene and has employed in politics — aims to create movement in negotiation through pressure and chaos. But the tactic is facing a challenge with an Iranian theocracy that believes it holds a higher threshold for strategic pain than Washington.

While Trump has reveled in the U.S. military decimating layers of Tehran’s leadership and devastating its air force and navy, Iran is betting it can outlast Trump as he faces diminished stockpiles of munitions and the difficulty of executing a war that is unpopular with the American electorate ahead of November’s midterm election

The latest episode began on Friday when Trump, surrounded by his Cabinet, grimly declared that he was “losing faith” in negotiations with Iran and warned that the U.S. military “ will be hitting them very hard."

Hours later, the White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt heightened speculation in Washington — and around the globe — with an ominous statement asserting "Iran will continue to pay until they come to the table in, what President Trump deems, a meaningful way.”

But by late Saturday night, Trump declared on social media that there were signs of progress on reaching an agreement and he was calling off a plan to carry out new, massive strikes for the time being.

The next day Trump emphasized that requests to give diplomacy more time from unnamed Iranian officials as well as leaders from Gulf allies — Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates — were key to his about-face.

“It would have been disastrous for them. And they didn’t want us to do it,” Trump said of Iran as he spoke to reporters on his way back to Washington from a weekend at his New Jersey golf club. “And frankly, Saudi Arabia didn’t want it either. They thought that a deal is imminent.”

Critics see Trump reaching for a reset button in this pattern

Trump may still come to the conclusion that a massive escalation in the conflict with Iran is necessary.

But critics say his hesitation also might reflect an unspoken understanding inside the administration that U.S. military might alone may not be enough to compel Iran to back down and bring an end to a now months-long war that Trump had earlier downplayed as a weeks-long excursion.

“I think what we’re seeing here is a president who has an approach that’s just rather erratic,” said Sen. Mark Kelly, an Arizona Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, on CBS News' “Face the Nation.” “At this point, he's trying to get us back to February. And I think if he could — if he had a big reset button he could hit — he would certainly take that option.”

There have been several moments over the course of the conflict when Trump has demonstrated his proclivity for the bellicose only to back off at the last minute, while declaring his threats spurred progress:

— In early April, the United States and Iran agreed to a two-week ceasefire in an announcement that came less than two hours before a deadline Trump had set for Tehran to capitulate or face attacks on bridges and power plants — strikes he said would mean “a whole civilization will die.”

— After days of dire threats against Iran, Trump announced on May 18 he was holding off on a major planned military strike because “serious negotiations” were underway, crediting Gulf allies for persuading him to show restraint.

— Then in June, Trump threatened to hit Iran “VERY HARD” and seize Iran’s energy base on Kharg Island to "assume total control of their Oil and Gas Markets,” he wrote on social media, only to call off the strikes in a later post after claiming that peace negotiations had progressed with high-level Iranian leaders.

Left unsaid by the president was that such an endeavor would require U.S. boots on the ground in Iran — a risky proposition politically for a president who campaigned on avoiding foreign entanglements and criticized past administrations for getting bogged down in endless wars.

Call with Saudi crown prince affected Trump's decision

With this latest episode, Trump suggested that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman played a particularly important role in him turning away from escalating the fight.

The U.S. president spoke by phone with the de facto leader of the kingdom on Saturday before announcing he was halting strikes that he later boasted would have one of the biggest U.S. operations since World War II.

The crown prince conveyed that an escalation in fighting could have a severe impact on the global economy if Tehran responded to a new U.S. bombardment by targeting some of the United States’ Gulf allies, according to a person briefed on the call who was not authorized to comment publicly and requested anonymity.

Saudi officials, the person added, have underscored in their engagements with the Trump administration that the kingdom is in a good position to defend itself against further potential Iranian strikes — as are fellow energy titans Qatar and the United Arab Emirates — but that Kuwait could be more vulnerable to attacks by Iranian-backed militias in Iraq.

As Trump threatens escalation, Republicans face tough polling

Trump has insisted that November’s midterm elections aren't shaping his approach to the conflict that’s spurred unease across the global economy.

But it's certainly on the minds of his fellow Republicans.

About two-thirds of U.S. adults say the war with Iran, which began Feb. 28, has not been worthwhile, according to polling from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research published last week. That includes the vast majority of Democrats and independents, as well as about 37% of Republicans.

One of Trump's most outspoken allies on Capitol Hill suggested on Sunday the administration needs to modulate its approach on Iran.

Louisiana Sen. John Kennedy said on NBC's “Meet the Press” that the debate in Washington has lost perspective on the devastation the U.S. military has inflicted on Iran since the start of the war.

Still, the Republican lawmaker acknowledged that further escalating the conflict could lead to a further surge in already elevated energy prices and “a lot of inflation for the American people.”

Kennedy made the case that tightening sanctions and targeting Iran's nuclear program — rather than escalating the conflict — might be the best bet for the moment.

“They’re all hellish choices,” Kennedy said. “But for the moment I’d maintain the status quo.”

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AP writer Melanie Lidman in Tel Aviv, Israel, contributed reporting.

A spokeswoman for Texas Sen. John Cornyn, one of the senators holding up Blanche’s nomination, confirmed the deal, which comes ahead of a Tuesday confirmation vote for Blanche’s nomination in the Senate Judiciary Committee. The other GOP senator, North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis, did not have immediate comment.

Blanche said at a June hearing that the Justice Department would not move forward with the fund to compensate those who believe they were unfairly prosecuted, as he faced bipartisan outrage over the possibility that violent rioters who attacked police at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, could be considered for payments. But Cornyn and Tillis, both members of the Judiciary panel, have said they wanted to see the promise in writing before they endorsed Blanche's nomination — especially as Trump continued to express support for the idea.

In a statement, Blanche said the order came after “good faith discussions.”

“My team and I have met with committee members and Senators over the past several weeks and addressed any concerns or outstanding questions," Blanche said.

DOJ order says ‘beyond any doubt’ that fund is dead

In a statement accompanying the order, the Justice Department said that “although the Acting Attorney General has repeatedly advised Congress through testimony, including under oath, as well as in written responses, that the Fund is not moving forward, and the Department has repeatedly represented to district courts that the Fund is not moving forward, today’s Order officially rescinds the May 18, 2026 Order.”

Since the settlement of the president's lawsuit against the IRS was announced, “No Members were appointed; no funds were transferred; no process for receiving claims was established; no claims were paid,” the order says. “This order establishes, beyond any doubt, that there is no Fund.”

The document released by Blanche on Sunday night also limits the scope of another provision of the settlement that provided broad immunity for Trump and members of his family from tax audits.

The deal clarifies that the tax audit immunity agreement “applies by its terms only retroactively” to claims open at the time of the settlement and does not protect the president from examination of future tax filings.

Cornyn, Tillis echo GOP colleagues' concerns as they block Blanche nomination

Cornyn, who lost reelection this year after Trump endorsed his primary opponent, and Tillis, who is retiring when his term ends in January, have blocked Blanche's nomination as many of their GOP colleagues have criticized the fund.

The Judiciary Committee postponed a vote on Blanche’s nomination that had been scheduled for Thursday morning after Tillis and Cornyn said they needed more from the administration before they could provide the necessary votes.

The two senators have repeatedly said the Justice Department seemed interested in reaching an agreement, but the White House wouldn’t budge even to aid the confirmation of Trump’s loyal former personal attorney, who has aggressively pursued the administration’s priorities as acting attorney general.

“I think as far as Blanche and the Department of Justice, we were pretty much on the same page,” Cornyn said Thursday. “But then when the president got wind of it, he wasn’t willing to go along with it.”

Blanche, who served as Trump’s defense lawyer in his criminal cases, entered the Justice Department last year as deputy attorney general. He was elevated to the top post after Pam Bondi was fired in April by Trump, who was frustrated by her failure to successfully prosecute his political enemies.

Though Blanche insisted he wasn’t auditioning for the permanent job, he has moved aggressively to pursue the Trump administration’s agenda and accelerate investigations into the president’s perceived foes.

Trump continues to express support for his settlement

The two sides have been negotiating for weeks, but Trump has said repeatedly during the talks that he thinks the fund should go forward and threatened to move forward with it if Blanche was not confirmed.

After the Thursday vote was delayed, Trump said in a social media post that he might pull Blanche’s nomination and resubmit it after Cornyn and Tillis leave office next year.

On Sunday evening, Trump said that people who had faced charges from the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol and could have benefitted from the fund had “their lives destroyed.”

“This would be a reimbursement for the pain that they suffered,” Trump said. “A lot of people like it.”

On Friday, Trump’s attorneys notified a court they would appeal a judge’s scathing ruling that characterized the settlement of the president’s lawsuit against the IRS as an improper exercise in self-dealing. The judge in her order last month referred one of Trump’s attorneys for potential disciplinary action and criticized Blanche’s involvement in the settlement, given his prior representation of Trump.

Blanche has said he disagrees “with the judge’s insinuations” about him. Justice Department lawyers had previously written in court papers that the fund was not moving forward but they refused a judge’s request to have Blanche and other administration officials file a declaration under penalty of perjury that the administration would not take any further action to create the fund.

The Justice Department said the court’s demands were “unnecessary.”

According to the arrest report, Tomas Raymundo Brito was driving east on Lincoln Drive. Just east of Southwest 154th Avenue, the victim stopped her vehicle in the roadway and got out to open the gate to her driveway.

As she walked past the driver’s side of her vehicle, investigators said Brito, 31, hit the rear of her car. The impact caused her vehicle to spin about 180 degrees clockwise, striking her and knocking her to the ground. Deputies said the truck then continued forward and struck her again, trapping her underneath.

Authorities said Brito got out and ran east on Lincoln Drive without calling for help or helping the victim.

The woman suffered life-threatening injuries and was taken to Jackson South Hospital, where she remains on life support.

A witness told investigators he followed Brito and saw him go into a shed at 15278 Lincoln Drive.

The witness then flagged down Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office deputies, who found Brito and took him into custody without incident.

According to the arrest form, Brito admitted he had drunk about five beers before the crash. He also admitted he was the driver and only person in the truck at the time.

He also told investigators he is from Guatemala and is in the U.S. without legal status. A records check showed he has never been issued a Florida driver’s license.

Deputies arrested him and took him to the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center after he was cleared at Jackson South Medical Center.

Brito faces charges of leaving the scene of a crash involving serious bodily injury and driving without a license causing death or serious bodily injury while unlawfully present in the United States.

Jail records also show he is being held on an immigration hold.

House Speaker Mike Johnson said in a post on X that throughout her career, Granger "broke barriers for women in public service.” He added that she “was a dear friend who will be greatly missed.”

Granger, who began her career as a high school teacher and a businesswoman, accomplished many firsts as a politician. She was the first woman elected mayor of Fort Worth, Texas, and the first Republican woman to chair one of the most powerful committees in Congress, the House Appropriations Committee.

First elected to the House in 1996, she did not seek reelection in 2024 and experienced worsening “health challenges” in her final months in Congress, according to a statement her office released in December 2024. Granger, who didn’t cast a vote in Washington after July 2024, didn’t specify or elaborate on those health challenges but said in the statement that frequent travel to Washington had become “both difficult and unpredictable" since early September of that year.

Granger graduated from Texas Wesleyan University in 1965 and considered a career in fashion design but followed her mother into teaching. She worked in the Birdville school district for nine years, teaching English literature and journalism, according to a profile compiled for the publication “Women in Congress, 1917-2006.”

A divorce would lead to a career change. To earn more money, Granger worked from home selling insurance. Her mother, Alliene Mullendore, who moved in with Granger after a stroke, helped keep an eye on the kids. Granger eventually built a successful insurance business that she managed for more than two decades.

“I was a high school teacher with three children, a 2-year and 6-month-old twins, and my husband left," Granger told The Hill in a 2008 profile. “It's the reason I talk so much to working mothers ... you just fight your way through the day.”

Granger got her political start serving on Fort Worth's zoning commission and then won office to the city council. She went on to win election as the city's first female mayor, serving from 1991 to 1995.

Granger’s “Code: Blue” programs included citizen patrol initiatives that halved the rampant crime rate and partnerships with the private sector that drew major businesses to the city. Her resuscitation of Fort Worth’s flagging economic fortunes drew national attention.

In 1996, she was recruited by both parties to run for the House under their banner, and she won as a Republican.

Upon entering Congress, she was named to an advisory board that consulted then-House Speaker Newt Gingrich. She also received seats on three committees: Budget, House Oversight, and Transportation and Infrastructure. She resigned those assignments as part of accepting a seat on the Appropriations Committee.

On the committee, she focused on defense spending, including championing the production of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter in Fort Worth.

When Republicans took charge of the House in 2023, Granger became the committee's chair, where she sought to enact steeper non-defense spending cuts than the top-line numbers House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and President Joe Biden agreed to as part of avoiding an economically disastrous government default.

Masataka Yoshida homered and drove in two runs, and Jake Bennett (7-4) allowed three runs in 5 2/3 innings to help the Red Sox win their fifth straight game. Boston is 23-3 since July 3.

Emmet Sheehan (4-8) was pulled after allowing five runs in 2 2/3 innings, with the Red Sox pushing across two runs in a 30-pitch first inning.

Rafaela and Wilyer Abreu then clocked Sheehan for back-to-back homers to start the third inning, followed by Yoshida’s solo shot for a 5-3 lead two batters later.

Rafaela went 7 for 14 with four homers and five RBIs in the series. He has an eight-game hitting streak with four straight multi-hit outings.

Jarren Duran picked up Boston’s fourth solo homer in the sixth inning off reliever Kyle Hurt.

The Red Sox added two more runs in the eighth inning on a wild pitch and passed ball.

Andy Pages had three RBIs, but the Dodgers couldn’t follow up any momentum created by their blockbuster trade for Detroit Tigers ace Tarik Skubal on Saturday night.

Dodgers catcher Dalton Rushing was pulled out of the lineup shortly before the game started because of right arm irritation, with Eliezer Alfonzo taking over behind the plate.

Up next

Red Sox: LHP Patrick Sandoval (0-0, 3.32 ERA) was set to start the opener of a three-game series at home against the Chicago White Sox on Tuesday night.

Dodgers: LHP Justin Wrobleski (11-2, 2.88 ERA) could get the call in the first of three games at the Chicago Cubs on Monday night.

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

Before late last week, the dollar was trading above 163 yen, touching 40-year highs. After regulators were suspected of stepping in, it fell below 160 yen.

Early Monday, after the official announcement of the intervention, the dollar fell to nearly 155.20 yen. That’s a big drop for the exchange rate. The dollar was trading at 156.70 yen early Monday Eastern time.

Even though it has attracted millions of bargain-hunting tourists, the yen's prolonged weakness against the dollar has been a source of frustration for Tokyo. Since Japan imports so much of what it consumes, a weak currency pushes prices higher. High oil prices have amplified that problem and that's putting pressure on the administration of Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi to do more to address the rising cost of living.

Joint intervention was needed to stem the yen's decline

Efforts earlier this year to raise the value of the yen against the dollar did little to budge the exchange rate.

Normally foreign exchange markets determine the relative values of currencies, but there are many factors that shape what happens in the markets.

A big gap between interest rates in the U.S. and Japan has led investors to sell yen and buy dollars to take advantage of the higher yields from dollar-denominated assets. Both the Bank of Japan and the Federal Reserve kept their interest rates unchanged at meetings last week, maintaining that gap.

So, last week, when the dollar slipped below 160 yen and stayed there, the U.S. side was suspected of lending a hand.

Officials usually stay mum on such actions. But on Sunday, Trump confirmed that the U.S. side had helped, and Japanese Finance Minister Satsuki Katayama likewise issued a statement saying the finance ministry had purchased yen in coordination with the U.S. Treasury Department.

“We will not hesitate to conduct further joint intervention,” she said.

Such overt acknowledgment of market intervention is rare, said Neil Newman, managing director and head of strategy at Astris Advisory Japan. He said the last big example was when governments intervened following a massive earthquake and tsunami disaster in northeastern Japan in 2011.

Why the US is helping support the yen

When asked why Washington was helping, Trump said Sunday that “We have a good relationship with Japan. We’re very strong —- very, very strong financially — and they are, you know, they have a weakening yen, and they wanted a little bit of help, and we’re always there for Japan. Japan’s been very good to us, with the exception, of course, of Pearl Harbor.”

Trump said the U.S. got “financial benefit” out of the intervention, calling it a “signal of friendship.”

“It’s also good for the world economy,” he said.

A weaker dollar makes U.S.-made goods more competitive, reducing their costs in yen terms, and might help increase American exports to Japan, Newman said.

“It’s very rare that the Americans will work with the Japanese on this, but there is an alignment of interests here basically between Japan and America,” Newman said.

It was a “low-cost” way for Washington to pay a favor to a key U.S. ally, while also protecting the stability of foreign exchange and bond markets, Shigeto Nagai, head of Japan economics for Oxford Economics, said in a report.

Analysts question if the intervention worked

The latest intervention appears to be having a more durable impact than earlier cases this year, and the yen may have a slightly stronger path for the rest of the year, Nagai said.

But the factors that have contributed to the yen's long-term weakness remain.

Takaichi has pushed to cut Japan's sales tax on food to 1% from 8% and to dramatically increase government spending. Such moves would tend to weaken the yen since it would increase inflation and add to Japan's already massive government debt.

The Bank of Japan has moved slowly to raise its benchmark rate from near zero to the current 1%, its highest level in 31 years but still well below the Federal Reserve' s rate of 3.5%-3.75%.

It likely will continue to slow-walk any changes as it evaluates the impact of the Iran war and other factors on the economy, Nagai said.

Meanwhile, a surge in oil prices because of the war and resulting higher inflation has kept the Fed from cutting rates.

“The yield differential remains wide, Japan’s energy-import burden remains significant, and the Bank of Japan is still moving more slowly than the market would normally require to generate a sustained currency reversal,” Stephen Innes of SPI Asset Management said in a commentary.

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Kurtenbach reported from Bangkok. AP journalist Mari Yamaguchi in Tokyo contributed to this report.

U.S. District Judge Charlotte Sweeney responded to an NCAA request for clarity about her Friday ruling that granted a fifth year to athletes who graduated high school in 2022 and were not included in the new NCAA rule that allows five seasons of eligibility for Division I players.

That decision, she said, still stands, but has no impact on other NCAA rules, including its prohibition on players signing pro contracts, then coming back to college.

The ruling, as first written, had the potential to upend the upcoming college football season, where teams are starting camp planning on the so-called “five for five” rule to take effect beginning next fall.

Extending it to players this fall granted hundreds a chance to return to school. In the direct aftermath of the decision, some media reports were listing players on NFL and CFL rosters who were signaling they’d be open to returning to school.

But that appears to be off the table after Sweeney's clarification that said there are no changes to the NCAA's rules regarding pros; no exceptions over when athletes can enter the transfer portal; and no impact on elements of the landmark House lawsuit settlement, which dictates how many players teams can put on rosters and how much schools can pay them.

The rulings out of U.S. District Court in Denver figures to impact sports differently. Football teams, for instance, have already started practice for this season, while baseball doesn't start for a while.

In making decisions, teams figure to factor the NCAA's coming appeal of Sweeney's order and whether to risk bringing back players who could then be declared ineligible if her decision is overturned.

NCAA President Charlie Baker issued a statement after Sweeney's initial ruling came out Friday, saying the ruling was potentially chaos-inducing and a reason Congress needs to pass the Protect College Sports Act. That bill, being considered in the Senate, includes lawsuit protection for the NCAA over eligibility rules, the likes of which they defending in several courts around the country.

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

Joe Mack homered, Xavier Edwards added an RBI single and Sandy Alcantara tossed six-plus solid innings for the Marlins, who won the final three games of the four-game series. Miami slugged six homers in the series, while the Mets went deep twice.

Alcantara (12-6) allowed four hits, including Luis Robert Jr.’s single and Jared Young’s double to open the seventh, and struck out five.

Petersen walked Marcus Semien before striking out Jorge Polanco and Francisco Alvarez and coaxed A.J. Ewing into a ground out to second.

Pete Fairbanks worked around a pair of walks in the ninth and earned his 17th save for the Marlins, who entered Sunday 1 1/2 games behind Philadelphia for the final National League playoff spot.

Mets relievers Brooks Raley, Luke Weaver and Huascar Brazobán each threw a hitless inning after spot starter Robert Stock (0-1) went a career-high five innings.

Stock, making his first big league appearance since June 8, 2025 and just the third start of his career, allowed three hits, including Mack’s homer, and struck out four. The right-hander made his big league debut in 2018 as a reliever for interim Mets manager Andy Green in San Diego.

Up next

Marlins have not announced a starter for Tuesday’s home series opener against Atlanta LHP Chris Sale (12-6, 2.08 ERA).

Mets LHP Sean Manaea (2-5, 4.42) starts Tuesday in the opener of a three-game series at Cleveland against Guardians LHP Joey Cantillo (8-6, 3.88).

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

La primera fase del proceso, establecido de común acuerdo, incluye “la adopción de las medidas necesarias para el restablecimiento de los servicios consulares”, indicó un comunicado difundido por las cancillerías de los dos países.

Lo siguiente, agregó el reporte oficial, será la normalización de las relaciones diplomáticas con un cronograma que ambos países convendrán. No proporcionó una fecha específica.

Las relaciones bilaterales se suspendieron en julio de 2024, cuando el gobierno del entonces presidente venezolano Nicolás Maduro anunció el retiro de las misiones diplomáticas en siete países: Argentina, Chile, Costa Rica, Perú, República Dominicana, Uruguay y Panamá.

La medida fue en respuesta a los cuestionamientos de los polémicos comicios presidenciales, en los que el organismo electoral venezolano declaró ganador a Maduro, en medio de las denuncias de fraude de la oposición, que aseguró que el excandidato Edmundo González había vencido al mandatario por una amplia diferencia de votos.

Organismos observadores internacionales, tales como el Centro Carter, calificaron de “creíbles” las actas electorales exhibidas por la oposición, en las que aseguraban se demostraba la victoria frente al gobierno en una proporción de 2 a 1.

Luego de que Delcy Rodríguez se convirtiera en presidenta encargada tras la incursión militar estadounidense en la que Maduro fue capturado, y que mostrara cercanía con la presidencia de Donald Trump, algunos otros países —entre ellos Chile y Perú — han anunciado acuerdos para restablecer relaciones diplomáticas con Venezuela.

Monday will feature a round of early showers near the Florida Keys, with another round of rain and storms in the afternoon. Because the storms are expected to move slowly, localized flooding cannot be ruled out. Highs could reach the lower 90s, with heat index values climbing into the triple digits.

Plan for unsettled weather to continue into Tuesday.

A resolution to the conflict, which has lasted more than five months, could give oil shippers the ability to send vessels out of the Persian Gulf, where tankers of oil and other products have been trapped during the fighting.

The price of U.S. crude oil fell 5% to $80.79 per barrel Sunday night. The price of Brent crude, the international standard, fell 5% to $83.87 per barrel.

Oil prices have been swinging widely since the U.S. and Israel launched attacks on Iran in late February, pushing past $100 per barrel multiple times during the spring.

As the conflict continued, high oil prices seeped into the cost of gasoline, jet fuel and many other products that are delivered using diesel. Motorists have paid more at the pump and customers shelled out more for airfare due to higher jet fuel costs. In some countries, fuel supplies ran low, leading to rationing and sporadic closures of schools and government offices.

Meanwhile, oil and gas companies amassed huge profits in the spring due to the high oil, gasoline and diesel prices that resulted when petroleum shippers couldn't get through the critical Strait of Hormuz, a narrow waterway that borders Iran, due to the fighting.

Prices for U.S. crude oil on Sunday night remained about 20% higher than before the conflict began.

By landing the reigning two-time American League Cy Young winner with time to spare and without sacrificing their pursuit of a third straight World Series title, they reinforced their status as both baseball’s dominant power and public enemy No. 1.

“It just seems like there’s always blowback with us,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said Sunday. “People are passionate. We feel good about it. There’s nothing that we did that no one else couldn’t have done.”

In the near term, Skubal’s arrival gives the Dodgers another powerful arm to an already loaded rotation responsible for the lowest WHIP and batting average in the majors. He is scheduled to make his debut on Tuesday at the Chicago Cubs, having gone 7-5 with a 2.79 ERA and 116 strikeouts in 96 2/3 innings over 16 starts for the Detroit Tigers this season.

“We got better,” reliever Edwin Díaz said “We got, like I said, one of the best pitchers in the league, and now we have him as a teammate, so that’s a really good plus for us.”

Having Skubal can allow the Dodgers to be cautious with Shohei Ohtani as he recovers from left knee soreness and a right biceps injury that have kept the two-way superstar from pitching since July 3. Ohtani will resume playing catch sometime during the three-game series against the Cubs, Roberts said, and the Dodgers remain optimistic he will be able to return to the mound this season.

“You can never predict the future, but if you said, ‘Hey, place a bet on it,’ I would be very confident placing it that he will be back pitching,” president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman said.

In the medium term, Skubal’s presence further strengthens the Dodgers’ already impressive credentials as they push to become the first National League team to three-peat. If healthy, they will be able to choose from an elite group of starters, many with proven playoff success such as Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Blake Snell.

Skubal brings his own track record, having gone 2-1 with a 2.04 ERA in six playoff starts over the past two postseasons. Friedman described his efforts last fall as “must-see TV.

“I was in awe watching the energy, the dominance he exhibited there, and I can’t wait to see it in Dodger blue,” Friedman said.

Not only did the acquisition further boost their own rotation, it should allow the Dodgers to move other starters into the bullpen, something they did to great effect during the 2025 title run.

“We’re not going to be flippant about this moment in time and how special this group, this era can be in the history of this incredibly storied organization, and we’re going to do everything we can to win the last game of the year,” Friedman said.

In the long term, the Dodgers’ trade for Skubal represents one more salvo in the looming battle over baseball’s finances and competitive balance.

Los Angeles made the trade without giving up any of its most touted prospects in what is regarded among MLB’s top farm systems, which has been a frequent pattern during this run of three titles over the previous six seasons. Those assets have allowed them to consistently upgrade through trades without needing to send established major league contributors back the other way.

Roberts credited the organization’s ability to find and develop talent as being just as important to the Dodgers’ recent success as much as their deep pocketbooks have allowed them to sign the likes of Ohtani to massive contracts.

“I just laud our front office,” Roberts said. “We have to have the players to be able to pull something like this off.”

As long as the current system is in place, the Dodgers will not apologize for their interest to acquire the best players available through whatever means are accessible to them.

“But as we’ve talked about a lot, whenever there’s a star-level player that is available that can really shift championship odds, those are the moments that we’ll be more aggressive,” Friedman said.

Skubal was with the Dodgers in the dugout during a 8-4 loss to the Boston Red Sox on Sunday night. The team also posted pictures of his new Dodgers' No. 29 jersey and locker and video of Skubal meeting his new teammates on social media.

“Just knowing he's in Dodger blue, it's pretty surreal,” Roberts said after the game. “I don't think I've felt this good after getting swept, so that's a silver lining.”

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

That hands-on approach to leadership is one of the reasons Adebayo was presented with the 2026 NBA Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Social Justice Champion Award.

“Boy, would have never thought we’d be here,” Adebayo said.

From toy drives and backpack giveaways to turkey drives and working with Miami’s youth, Adebayo’s community efforts caught the attention of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

“But your unwavering commitment to extending opportunities for young people,” Abdul-Jabbar said in a special video message before presenting the 29-year-old with the award.

“The Bam Books and Brotherhood Foundation, what it’s doing for kids to be literate, into sports, you can’t put a price on that kid engagement,” said James Cadogan, executive director of the NBA Social Justice Coalition. “But you can tell it’s authentic and from the heart.”

Cadogan said it was Adebayo’s consistency that stood out.

“It’s not just a me thing. To get this award, you have to impact a lot of lives. I feel like I’ve done that over the course of my career,” Adebayo said. “To be able to finally get the award... it’s not a big deal to me because I feel like impacting lives is more important.”

Humble is the best way to describe the nearly 7-foot star, with values he said were ingrained in him by his biggest fan — his mother.

“It warms my heart when I see her smile a lot,” Adebayo said. “Her seeing that I’m trying to do something good in this world -- that goes a long way.”

“Perfect pace, perfect read,” he said.

The 24-year-old Thorbjornsen sealed his spot in the FedEx Cup playoff after rolling into the Motor City No. 69 in the standings. The top 70 advance to the postseason after next week’s Wyndham Championship.

“Just to be in the playoff for the first time is very exciting, he said. ”It's great to be playing against the best players in the world."

Thorbjornsen started the fourth round three shots behind leader Davis Riley, whose rough start opened opportunities for the field.

“The start got the best of me and kind of put me behind the eight-ball early unfortunately,” Riley said.

Thorbjornsen took advantage, surging into the lead at No. 14 with his third of four birdies in a six-hole stretch and closing with a clutch, curling putt that went in the right side of the cup.

He's the eighth first-time winner this season on the PGA Tour and the second straight, following Jackson Koivun’s victory last week at the 3M Open.

“It was such a battle, playing with some great players," Thorbjornsen said. "Everyone was in the mix after nine holes.”

Xander Schauffele (65) briefly led during the final round and finished second, two shots behind Thorbjornsen.

“I played really well and he just beat me straight up, so hats off to him,” Schauffele said.

Riley (70) was another stroke behind in third, falling out of the lead with four bogeys.

Rasmus Hojgaard (68) was alone in fourth, four shots back.

Hideki Matsuyama (64), Matt Wallace (67), Kristoffer Ventura (68) were another stroke back, tied for fifth.

Thorbjornsen was born in Cleveland, grew up in Massachusetts and attended Stanford. He won the 2018 U.S. Junior Amateur over Akshay Bhatia, who has three PGA Tour wins.

He went straight to the PGA Tour in 2024 as the No. 1 player in the PGA Tour University ranking.

“I think it's one of the best programs in golf,” Thorbjornsen said. “It’s changed all of our lives.”

Thorbjornsen chipped in from 35 feet for birdie at No. 12 on a day when he accurately aimed for pins that left him with some short birdie putts before his long one on his 72nd hole.

He had a bogey-free round, an accomplishment many other players on the leaderboard were unable to pull off on a day that started with rain and became windy when the clouds cleared.

Riley started with a one-shot lead and quickly lost it — and couldn't find his ball in fescue at No. 4 after about a dozen people helped him try — with three bogeys through six holes.

He rallied with three birdies in a seven-hole stretch before giving back a stroke with a bogey at No. 17, taking away his chance to possibly force the tournament into a playoff.

The eighth and final Rocket Classic drew its strongest field and biggest crowds.

The PGA Tour is moving to a new model for 2028, effectively creating two tours and Rocket Mortgage decided not to exercise its option to host another tournament next year. The Detroit-based company isn’t interested in continuing to spend $15 million a year to be part of the second tier in the new era and didn’t want to double the costs to be part of the elite tier.

“There have been some conversations about having a tournament here again," tournament director Mark Hollis said. “Michigan deserves to have professional golf.”

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In preparation, the Betty T. Ferguson Recreational Complex in Miami Gardens was packed with students and parents picking up supplies and backpacks.

Parents and students could also pick up gently used uniforms.

On Sunday, Local 10 News’ Bridgette Matter sat down with incoming Miami-Dade Schools Superintendent Rafael Villalobos, who will replace current Superintendent Jose Dotres when he leaves his position in February.

They went over some changes parents should know about, including the school breakfast and lunch program.

The district was recently reassessed by the federal government, and free breakfast and lunch will be offered at 121 qualifying schools.

“The other families that are not part of the 121 schools, we did reach out to them directly, letting them know and encouraging them to apply,” said Villalobos. “And the reason we did that is so that people could prepare coming into the school.”

If your child’s school does not qualify, you can apply for free or reduced meals and will receive that if eligible.

And like in Broward County, Miami-Dade is also seeing declining enrollment.

“We have had a steady decrease of student enrollment, and we know that that decrease, there’s multiple factors that are related to it,” he said.

This school year, nine schools are set to be closed or repurposed in an effort to consolidate.

The district is also reminding drivers to be patient as buses and school traffic return to the roads.

“That said, we want to wish you an awesome beginning of the school year and thank you for choosing Miami-Dade County because we are your best choice,” said Villalobos.

Additionally, the district wanted to remind parents to have their contact information up to date with their child’s school.

“I’m running for governor to eliminate your property tax bill,” he said during an appearance on “This Week in South Florida” Sunday.

Fishback is a Republican and political newcomer. He’s a Davie native and a businessman who has gained steam online amid some controversial comments.

The 31-year-old has been accused of using antisemitic and racist language, and was asked about it by TWISF host Janine Stanwood.

“In both of these cases (of alleged racist remarks), you’re talking to Black people and you’re using the word ‘slave’, and ‘lynched’. Is that intentional?” asked Stanwood.

“What’s intentional is Byron Donalds took $104 million from some of the largest out of state donors in this country, people like Mark Zuckerberg gave him $5 million cause they wanna build data centers in Broward, Dade county,” Fishback replied.

Congressman Byron Donalds is the frontrunner in polling and fundraising, and is endorsed by Donald Trump, but according to the RealClearPolitics average, Fishback is a top contender.

He has received 9% of the vote, though still trailing by a large margin.

Fishback has been kept out of the state republicans’ key political events, including June’s Sunshine State Showdown.

The state party explained that he took part in an unsanctioned debate and attacked his fellow Republicans.

“The only people I think I’ve ticked off are Byron Donalds and his consultants,” Fishback said.

Fishback has centered his campaign around eliminating property taxes and banning all data centers from coming to Florida.

He says voters don’t care about his controversies.

“Genuinely I’ve never had a voter come up to me and complain about my language, because voters are not considered about my vote choice, they’re considered about how they’re gonna pay their electricity bill,” he said.

The Republican primary election is set for Aug. 18, with the winner facing the Democratic nominee on Nov. 3.

The Senate is likely to vote on the measure before leaving Washington at week's end for its traditional August recess, a period that many lawmakers want to spend shoring up their reelection prospects rather than working in the nation's capital.

The bill generally funds the federal government at current levels though Dec. 11. The House has passed a similar measure, but it did not include various exceptions sought by the White House. Senators have been spending recent days negotiating which of those exceptions to include.

One exception that did not make it into the bill, Democrats noted, was the administration's request to include $1 billion to build “Trump-class” battleships.

In another major difference with the House bill, Democrats say they also were able to include language that will ensure the administration cannot transfer funds from other programs to the Border Patrol.

The late-summer action on a funding fix is unusual. Normally, Congress waits until the final days or hours of a funding deadline to pass short-term funding extensions, but this time senators are acting two months before the end of the fiscal year on Sept. 30.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune said passing the measure was his top priority going into the August recess. He noted that the American people have already experienced two record-breaking government shutdowns in the past 10 months.

“We need to ensure that they do not face a third,” Thune said.

Both parties want to avoid another shutdown

A short-term funding extension is needed because Congress has struggled to get the dozen annual appropriations bills negotiated and approved before the Sept. 30 deadline. By extending government funding now, lawmakers can use the ensuing months to work out their differences on full-year funding.

It won't be an easy lift as Republicans seek a dramatic increase in defense spending while cutting non-defense spending. Trump proposed a 10% cut in non-defense programs overall. Meanwhile, he called for boosting defense spending by some 44%.

A potential shutdown before voters go to the polls is a scenario that both parties are looking to avoid, as polling indicated that neither party evaded blame for last fall's record 43-day shutdown. Democrats sought to extend an expiring health insurance tax credit and refused to go along with a short-term spending bill that did not include that priority. But Republicans said that was a separate policy fight to be held at another time.

A second spending battle over funding for the Department of Homeland Security took 76 days to resolve when Democrats refused to fund U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Border Patrol without changes to those operations.

The bill delays a controversial policy on grants

Sen. Susan Collins, the Republican chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, along with Democratic senators, are seeking to block a proposed rule from President Donald Trump's administration related to grants. The rule would require a senior political appointee at each agency to review grant proposals through criteria that include “ensuring that discretionary awards advance the President's policy priorities.”

Collins and Sen Patty Murray, the top Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, said the rule would not take effect during the course of the stopgap spending bill. Collins said she advocated for significant changes to the rule, “citing its potential to politicize grants and harm small, rural communities, families, and biomedical research.”

Democrats want to kill the administration's effort altogether. Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said it was a “disgraceful” effort that would “further politicize all federal grants.”

“While Republicans rejected killing the proposed rule outright, I’m going to keep fighting to put a stop to it once and for all, and I will keep pressing my Republican colleagues to do exactly that,” Murray said.

Democrats fear Trump would turn federal grants into a cudgel to punish perceived political foes and reward allies, while also undermining Congress's constitutional power of the purse. The White House Office of Management and Budget says its effort is about improving accountability to ensure taxpayer dollars aren't wasted or misused.

Kurtz went on the injured list with a sprained right thumb on July 11 and returned two weeks later. But he has struggled at the plate since then, going 1 for 18 in seven games since returning to the lineup. Kurtz was also hit on the left forearm with a pitch on Wednesday night but was able to return to the lineup for the next two games.

Manager Mark Kotsay said on Sunday that the team will determine the next steps for Kurtz after he visits the specialist.

The 23-year-old Kurtz is batting .256 with 21 homers and a team-high 69 RBIs. Kurtz ranks third in the majors with 79 walks and is fourth among qualifiers with a .396 on-base percentage going into Sunday's games. He also ranks 12th in the majors with an .879 OPS.

Kotsay said shortstop Jacob Wilson has been dealing with tendinitis in his knee that has prevented him from playing in the field since Wednesday. Wilson was a designated hitter the past three games and was out of the starting lineup on Sunday but should be back at shortstop for the series opener at Cincinnati on Tuesday. Wilson has gone 107 straight games without an error, three shy of Mike Bordick's record for a shortstop set in 2002.

The A's also expect to get right-hander J.T. Ginn off the injured list to start that game against the Reds. Ginn has been out since July 19 with a blister on his right middle finger. Ginn is 8-6 with a 3.46 ERA this season.

Third baseman Zack Gelof will begin a rehab assignment on Tuesday at Triple-A Las Vegas after being out since July 10 after suffering a cut on his right knee when he slid into the wall making a catch.

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It was the latest in a pattern of announcements the U.S. president has made to first threaten massive strikes and then later call them off. The abrupt shifts have been a defining feature of the five-month conflict that has sent prices of oil and basic goods soaring — and the announcements to date have been upended by renewed attacks days or even hours afterward.

Here is a look at some of Trump’s past major announcements about pausing strikes against Iran:

April 7

The United States and Iran agree to a two-week ceasefire to end the intense fighting that began on Feb. 28 with Israeli and U.S. attacks. Trump makes the announcement less than two hours before a deadline he had set for Tehran to capitulate or face attacks on bridges and power plants — strikes he said would mean “a whole civilization will die.”

April 21

Trump announces that the U.S. is indefinitely extending its ceasefire with Iran a day before it was to expire. He adds that he has been asked by mediators to hold off on attacks to give Iranian leaders time to come up with additional proposals. The fragile ceasefire lasts until May 8, when the U.S. carried out strikes on Iranian tankers.

May 18

After a weekend of dire threats against Iran, Trump says he is holding off on a major planned military strike because “serious negotiations” were underway. “There seems to be a very good chance that they can work something out. If we can do that without bombing the hell out of them, I’d be very happy,” he said. By May 27, U.S. strikes were back on after negotiations faltered.

June 11

After two days of back-and-forth attacks, Trump threatens further escalation, saying the U.S. would hit Iran “VERY HARD TONIGHT” and take “total control” of its oil and gas industries. Then, a few hours later, Trump posts on social media that there had been a breakthrough in negotiations and called off the strikes.

June 17

Trump signs an initial agreement with Iran that calls for a permanent end to hostilities and for reopening of the strait, and starts a 60-day negotiating clock to reach a final deal on the future of Iran’s nuclear program. Trump left the door open to abandoning it. “It’s a memorandum of understanding, and if I don’t like it, we’ll go back to shooting at them, dropping bombs,” he said.

July 7

After Iranian attacks on commercial ships in the strait, Trump launches new strikes on Iran while he is in Ankara, Turkey, attending the NATO leaders' summit. Later, he renews his threat to “just finish the job" on Iran after saying he believes the ceasefire is over.

July 27

Trump says he has paused two weeks of intense, daily U.S. strikes on Iran to give negotiations another chance. During 13 days of strikes, the U.S. military had targeted key military and commercial sites as clashes continued to escalate over shipping routes. In response, Iran had launched missiles and drones across the Middle East at countries that host U.S. troops.

Aug. 1

After telling reporters the U.S. would hit Iran “very hard,” Trump says on social media that he has canceled planned strikes, claiming Mideast allies had reached the parameters of a deal to end the war, including a reopening of the strait. “Based on this request, I have agreed, for the future benefit of the WORLD and, likewise, the survival of a successful and prosperous Iran, to cancel the attack, subject to being able to rapidly make a DEAL,” Trump said. In response, Iran’s defense minister said that the country was “neither surprised nor passive” following Trump’s announcement and said Iran continues to remain alert in the face of threats.

Over in the American League, Tampa Bay beefed up its rotation by adding right-hander Freddy Peralta while the New York Yankees acquired young slugger Luis García Jr. to give their Aaron Judge-less lineup a little more pop.

The trade deadline is Monday at 6 p.m. EDT and some of the biggest pitching prizes are already off the board. But other enticing options still remain, including San Diego Padres closer Mason Miller, San Francisco Giants second baseman Luis Arraez and Toronto Blue Jays outfielder Daulton Varsho.

Also on Sunday, the Chicago Cubs added Kevin Gausman to their rotation in a trade with the Toronto Blue Jays.

In other recent deals, the surprising Chicago White Sox picked up right-hander Luis Castillo from the Seattle Mariners, and the Atlanta Braves acquired outfielder Lane Thomas from the Kansas City Royals.

Dodgers land Skubal

Skubal is the latest star to join the high-priced roster for the Dodgers that already has big-name players like Shohei Ohtani, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Mookie Betts.

If everyone is healthy, he could be part of a rotation with Ohtani, reigning World Series MVP Yamamoto, fellow two-time Cy Young Award winner Blake Snell and Tyler Glasnow. The Dodgers led the majors with a 3.36 ERA from their starting pitchers going into Sunday's games and now add Skubal to the mix.

“I’m excited to be a Dodger,” an emotional Skubal said on Saturday night. “I’m excited to get down there and meet all those guys and chase three championships in a row. That’s hard to do, so I’m so excited to a part of that. But it’s a lot of different emotions. Definitely kind of a roller coaster a little bit.”

The Tigers received three minor league prospects in right-handers River Ryan and Brady Smith and outfielder Zyhir Hope.

Skubal is 7-5 this season with a 2.79 ERA and 116 strikeouts in 96 2/3 innings. He is 61-42 with a 3.04 ERA over seven seasons, all in Detroit. In two postseasons, Skubal is 2-1 with a 2.04 ERA in six starts.

Mets unload Peralta to Rays

The last-place New York Mets traded Peralta to the Rays for three minor leaguers, outfielder Aidan Smith, infielder Émilien Pitre and right-hander Gary Gill Hill.

Peralta, a two-time All-Star who can become a free agent following the World Series, has been a disappointment with the Mets after they acquired him from Milwaukee in a January trade.

But he could boost the middle of a strong rotation for the pitching-rich Rays, who began the day with the best record in the American League at 65-45 and a 3 1/2-game lead in the AL East over the New York Yankees.

Garcia ‘both sad and happy’ about trade to Yankees

García has spent his entire seven-year career with the Nationals but acknowledged he would be excited to move to the Yankees.

“I mean it’s a mix of both sad and happy,” García said. “There’s a new chapter in my career, so yeah, 50-50 right now.”

He has a career-high 23 homers and 76 RBIs this season and could help a lineup that's been without Judge for more than two months after he suffered a stress fracture in his right ribs.

“He's been a hitter who has really come of age this year,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “One of the best left-vs-right hitters in the National League. We think he fits our ballpark very well and should hopefully give a little jolt to our offense which has obviously scuffled a little over an extended period.”

The Nationals received four right-handed pitchers for Garcia — Jake Bird, Yovanny Cruz, Jack Cebert and Ben Grable.

Bird, 30, has a 5.93 ERA in 30 games with the Yankees this season, all in relief. Cruz, 26, has a 1.69 ERA in four games. Cebert and Grable have spent the full season in the minors.

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AP Baseball Writer Mike Fitzpatrick in New York and AP Sports Writer Josh Dubow in West Sacramento, California, and Charles Odum in Atlanta contributed to this report.

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Peralta, a two-time All-Star who can become a free agent this fall, has been a disappointment for the Mets after they acquired him from Milwaukee in a January trade.

“He gave us everything that he had, stepped out on the mound every single day and competed,” interim Mets manager Andy Green said. “I know he wanted better results. And I think when we struck the deal to get him, we were all hoping for a different set of circumstances on this day than what we’re looking at.”

Green said Peralta was informed of the trade during the early innings of a 2-0 loss to the Miami Marlins that dropped the Mets to 47-66 — their worst record through 113 games since 2003, the last time New York finished last in the NL East.

But Peralta could help a strong pitching staff with the Rays, who began the day with the best record in the American League at 65-45 and a 3 1/2-game lead in the AL East over the New York Yankees.

“Freddy is a proven major league starter with high-stakes experience and a strong track record,” Rays President of Baseball Operations Erik Neander said in a statement. “Adding a pitcher and competitor of his caliber strengthens our team as we push forward.”

The last-place Mets received outfielder Aidan Smith, infielder Émilien Pitre and right-hander Gary Gill Hill in exchange for Peralta. Pitre was a second-round pick of Tampa Bay in the 2024 draft while Hill was a sixth-round pick in 2022. Smith was picked in the fourth round of the 2023 draft by the Seattle Mariners, who sent him the Rays in the Randy Arozarena trade in July 2024.

The move came a day before baseball’s trade deadline at 6 p.m. EDT on Monday, and hours after the Los Angeles Dodgers landed the biggest prize on the market, ace pitcher Tarik Skubal, in a deal with the Detroit Tigers.

Before joining the Mets last offseason, Peralta went 17-6 with a 2.70 ERA over 33 starts in 2025. He led the National League in wins, finished fifth in Cy Young Award voting and helped the Brewers win their third straight NL Central crown.

With the Rays, the 30-year-old right-hander joins a rotation headed by All-Stars Drew Rasmussen and Nick Martinez. Left-hander Shane McClanahan, an All-Star in 2022 and 2023, is 9-6 with a 3.09 ERA in 20 starts but was placed on the 15-day injured list Friday with mid-back tightness on his left side.

Last winter, New York sent youngsters Brandon Sproat and Jett Williams to the Brewers for Peralta and right-hander Tobias Myers, giving up a pair of players rated among the game’s top 100 prospects in the anticipation Peralta would be the frontline starter the team needed.

Instead, he went 5-9 with a 4.99 ERA in 22 starts and failed to complete five innings in four of his last five outings for the Mets.

“I know he’s disappointed by it,” Green said. “He came here to anchor a rotation and felt the weight of that. I know from talking to him he certainly doesn’t feel like it went the way that he thought it would.”

He was 5-5 with a 3.90 ERA after beating Atlanta 8-1 on June 14, but is 0-4 with a 7.93 ERA in his past seven starts, including a June 20 dud when he allowed 10 runs and 10 hits over 2 2/3 innings at Philadelphia.

“I know that so far I let them down,” Peralta said late last month. “I haven’t (done) what I was supposed to do.”

Peralta becomes the latest pitcher traded away by the high-priced Mets, who are selling off assets for young prospects after beginning a miserable 2026 season with World Series aspirations.

“I think where we are today screams that we’re all wishing we were in a different spot,” said Green, who began the season as the Mets’ vice president of player development before moving into the manager’s chair following the firing of Carlos Mendoza on June 26.

They sent David Peterson to the Chicago Cubs for minor league infielder Cole Mathis one day before Mendoza’s dismissal and reliever A.J. Minter to Minnesota for minor league infielders Bruin Agbayani and Billy Amick last Friday.

Peterson and Minter are eligible for free agency after this season as well. New York also is expected to move pitcher Clay Holmes, reliever Brooks Raley and outfielder Tyrone Taylor before Monday’s deadline — and possibly players such as relievers Huascar Brazobán and Luke Weaver, each of whom are under team control next year.

Holmes, who broke his right fibula on May 15, made a rehab start for Single-A Brooklyn Sunday, when he allowed four runs in 5 1/3 innings. Raley, Weaver and Brazobán all threw a hitless inning of relief while Taylor pinch-ran in the ninth inning.

“Those guys were all healthy, rested, available, good to go,” Green said. “So we felt comfortable letting them do what they do during a baseball season.”

To open a spot for Peralta on the 40-man roster, Rays outfielder Jake Fraley (hernia) was transferred to the 60-day injured list.

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The Tigers traded the two-time reigning AL Cy Young Award winner to the Los Angeles Dodgers for three minor league prospects in a deal that was agreed to late Saturday night.

“Baseball has a funny way of challenging you to deal with change,” Tigers manager A.J. Hinch said before the series finale against the Athletics on Sunday. “Sometimes that’s difficult, sometimes it’s part of the game and part of the business. These guys are callous to some of the emotions that come with it.”

Hinch's team responded with an 11-0 win to complete the series sweep and keep the Tigers within 2 1/2 games of the last wild-card spot.

“We played a really good series in the midst of a lot of different things swirling around us,” Hinch said. “This group’s pretty tough. We go through it game by game and showed a lot of character, obviously.”

Moving on without Skubal will be the ultimate challenge. The ninth-round draft pick in 2018 developed into one of the best pitchers in baseball, winning the Cy Young in 2024 and '25 and posting a 2.40 ERA over the past three seasons.

Skubal is 7-5 this season with a 2.79 ERA and 116 strikeouts in 96 2/3 innings and had a major impact in the clubhouse. But with him set to become a free agent after the season, the Tigers opted to trade him for minor league right-handers River Ryan and Brady Smith and outfielder Zyhir Hope.

Hinch said it was important for the players to appreciate what Skubal gave the team while still understanding the task ahead.

“He wasn’t going to pitch today. So we have to be sort of cold about we got to move on and go play today’s game that he wasn’t going to impact despite the loss of his presence in our clubhouse,” Hinch said. "We have a ton of respect for what he brought every day, his preparation, his attitude, his desire to win. That impact doesn’t leave with him as he gets on a plane to go to a different team. The day-to-day does, and we’re going to have to find a way to overcome it.”

News of the trade broke during Detroit's 8-6 win over the A's on Saturday night with many players first hearing about it from fans near the dugout during the game. Skubal was back in the clubhouse beyond the center-field fence at the minor league stadium where the A's play when he got the news, making it impossible for the players to get the news directly from him until after the game.

But they managed to focus on the game and come up with the win.

“The team’s handled it really well,” first baseman Spencer Torkelson said. “Leading up to the trade, I thought we blocked out the noise amazing. Even in the sixth inning when everyone’s screaming at us from the stands that we traded our best pitcher, I think we kept our focus and kept the main thing the main thing. I think as a team we still believe in ourselves and we know that we’re definitely not out of it.”

The trade came at an uncertain time for the Tigers, who have overcome a slow start to the season to get close to playoff position.

Prized prospect Max Clark was called up from the minors on Friday and has delivered by reaching base safely nine times in three games. But the team also scratched Casey Mize from his scheduled start this weekend in case he gets traded before the deadline Monday.

“It’s a weird, weird place," Mize said. “We’ve played really good baseball the last couple days. We trade our best player. It says we’re 2 1/2 back, but obviously there’s a lot of teams still to overpass, so it’s certainly a strange spot."

The task now will be to try to get back to the playoffs without Skubal after they lost in Game 5 of the division series the past two seasons. Skubal started both of those losses. He had a rough start and took the loss in 2024 against Cleveland. He had a strong start last season with 13 strikeouts in six innings against Seattle but the bullpen squandered a 2-1 lead and the Tigers went on to lose 3-2 in 15 innings.

Skubal said Saturday night after the trade that it hurt that he couldn't help deliver Detroit its first World Series title since 1984.

“Over the last couple of years, we don’t get anywhere near to what we’ve done without Tarik Skubal,” Mize said. “I hope our fan base is appreciative of that, even if it maybe didn’t end the way that everyone wanted it to.”

The Tigers fans might get a chance to see Skubal again later this month when the Dodgers visit Detroit Aug. 28-30.

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Then they climbed inside the cockpit, took it around Indianapolis Motor Speedway's 14-turn, 2.439-mile road course and were even more impressed.

Palou, the four-time series champ, and Rossi, the 2016 Indianapolis 500 winner, became the first test drivers of the new model and both left the track giving the car rave reviews.

“I am very happy to announce that we will race it next year,” Palou joked Sunday. “I wish (it was next year) — like that's the level of excitement I think among everybody. I think everybody, when we saw it live for the first time, I was shocked at how good it looked and how excited I was to give it a try."

The Spaniard who drives for Chip Ganassi Racing certainly would be leading the pack again if he actually competed in the IR-28 next year because it isn't scheduled to debut until 2028. Naturally, though, Palou, who has won 21 of the last 64 races including Indy in 2025 and is on the cusp of clinching a fourth straight series title, would prefer everything goes quicker.

His interest in this model was piqued after seeing the initial renderings of the lighter, sleeker, jet-like looking car.

The higher sidepod and more expansive, wavier front wings make the car look larger while the digitally display featuring the car's position during a race, qualifying or practice appears just behind the redesigned, less bulky aero-screen give as a high-tech feature.

Designers promised the car would have roomier cockpits, run faster and race better all while adding safety features.

Rossi thought it was better than advertised. He started seven Formula 1 races in four seasons before moving to IndyCars in 2016 and at 6-foot-1, Rossi is one of IndyCar's tallest drivers.

"Not to draw comparisons to F1, we don't like doing that, but I think anyone who drives an F1 car for the first time, they notice how smooth the car is — not from a powertrain standpoint but from the surface standpoint,” Rossi said Saturday. “This car starts to get to that level.”

He added: “It's a little bigger, certainly more room for me. My knees aren't headed into the top of the chassis, which is great. But it's not like you're out there driving a Suburban.”

And even though the goal was not necessarily to post fast laps, both drivers enjoyed the ride. Track officials said no official or unofficial speeds were kept.

Instead, series officials asked Rossi and Palou to produce some baseline measures about the car's on-track performance, which can be used to help modify set-ups for future tests. That made it essentially a two-day shakedown with Rossi scheduled to run three hours on Saturday and Palou three hours Sunday.

There was just one problem — rain.

Each driver had their allotted time slot cut by at least half because of the cool, wet conditions that blanketed the Indianapolis area Saturday and Sunday. Still, it didn't dampen the spirits of either driver.

“It's pretty incredible to be able to be a part of the next evolution and to do it at a place that obviously means a lot to me and all of us here,” Rossi said. “It's small part to play in the history and the future of this championship, and that's super cool.”

What's next remains the great unknown.

While series officials have not yet scheduled the IR-28's next test, Palou wants other drivers to join the parade he and Rossi just led.

“It's super fun," Palou said. “It's just like being on a higher end car. It feels like one of those interiors that are like good leather and it's quiet inside. It's good, it's comfy, so, yeah, I can't wait to hopefully try it in the dry (conditions) and see how it really feels when I push it.”

IndyCar returns to action next Sunday at Portland, Oregon.

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AP auto racing: https://apnews.com/apf-AutoRacing

Kaptur, 80, was a passenger in a vehicle headed to a church service “when the car she was traveling in was struck,” the statement from her office said. The statement said she is “active, alert” and “looks forward to returning to a full schedule soon.”

The House is on its summer recess so she was not expected in Washington this week.

Kaptur, the longest-serving woman in House history, is in a rematch for her closely watched seat against former state Rep. Derek Merrin. In 2024, she won by just more than the 0.5% margin that would have triggered an automatic recount, with a libertarian candidate snagging about 4% of the vote.

Her office said first responders from the Toledo police and fire departments arrived promptly on the scene and had “medical professionals helping to take care of those involved in the crash.” The statement said “we look forward to any additional information from Toledo Police as they investigate the accident.”

The Toledo Police Department’s traffic division did not immediately respond to an AP query.

___

Smyth reported from Columbus, Ohio.

Lynx coach Cheryl Reeve wore a light blue shirt under her jacket that said, “Trans kids belong” as she directed her team — the top team in the WNBA — to a 108-100 win over the Fever. There were fans in the stands wearing T-shirts that read, “Trans kids belong in sports.”

It's the third straight Fever game that drew a rally after Cunningham recently voiced support for barring transgender girls and women from girls’ and women’s sports in an ESPN article published last week.

Before the contest, Cunningham and Reeve held a conversation at midcourt. Reeve didn't want to share the exact nature of their talk.

“Both of us understand that we have platforms and we both talked about wanting to, more than anything, educate,” Reeve said. “There are some things that we have in common, and maybe some things you differ on, just like any issues. I think it’s how you handle things. It was nice to be in person, for sure.”

Cunningham was booed by the crowd on her first touch of the game and throughout.

Outside the arena, dozens of fans gathered near the entrance. A person using a loud speaker repeated over and over, “Protect trans women.” There were signs held up that read, “Love is truth" and “Thank you Sophie.”

Asked how she and the team are navigating the outside conversations, Caitlin Clark said after the game, “I think we’re excellent.

“I think it’s for leagues and governing bodies to work with their athletes to find solutions,” Clark said. “Our focus is on basketball. That’s what we talk about and how we can get wins and obviously we didn’t do that tonight. So we need to find an area to improve in that way.”

Any reaction?

“I just answered,” Clark said.

Cunningham said Friday in Portland that she wasn't concerned about rallies against transgender participation in women’s sports becoming a distraction for the Fever.

“I think everyone who knows me personally, they know that I’m full of love. I’m bubbly. I love the people around me,” Cunningham said Friday. “I love basketball. I love inspiring the next generation and doing that in a positive light. And so that doesn’t even cross my mind. Doesn’t cross my teammates’ minds.”

___

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

Kuwaki closed with a 1-under 70 and looked like a winner as she waited nearly 30 minutes in the scoring room. Henseleit, in the final group, holed a 40-foot birdie putt on the 18th hole at Royal Lytham & St. Annes for a 70 to join Kuwaki at 5-under 279.

Henseleit then had the advantage in the playoff when the 23-year-old from Japan was in deep grass short of a bunker and had to lay up short of the green. Kuwaki hit wedge to 3 feet to save par and got another chance when Henseleit missed a 15-foot birdie putt for the win.

The tables turned on the second extra hole. Henseleit's tee shot on the 18th drifted far enough to the right that it was beneath a gorse bush. She did well to get that back to the fairway, and hit wedge to about 12 feet. But her par putt stayed left of the cup, and that left Kuwaki to tap in for par.

“Very happy with how I gave myself the opportunity to win today and how I handled myself. Just got a bit unlucky on the second playoff hole there,” Henseleit said. “I tried really hard and I guess it just wasn’t meant to be today.”

This is the second straight Women's British Open title for Japan, following Miyu Yamashita's victory last year at Royal Porthcawl. Kuwaki, often known for her fashion, becomes the fifth player from Japan to have won an LPGA major over the last three years.

“I can’t believe it,” Kuwaki said through a translator and the trophy presentation.

Tough round for Noh

The disappointment belonged to third-placed Yealimi Noh (74), the 25-year-old Californian who began the final round with a three-shot lead until it slowly went away with bogeys. She fell out of a share of the lead with a bogey on the 14th hole. Noh was one shot behind and had two reasonable looks at birdie — with Kuwaki already in the clubhouse at 279 — but failed to convert.

“It stings being one short,” said Noh, who had missed three straight cuts before this week. “I told myself this morning, no matter what happens I'm happy to be in this position again. A couple of weeks ago, I was losing a lot of motivation. This week has helped me feel so much better about my game.”

Haeran Ryu fell short in her bid to become the first player since Inbee Park to win three straight majors in one year. The Women's PGA and Evian Championship winner was still in the mix on the back nine. She needed birdies and instead closed with two straight bogeys for a 74 to tie for sixth.

Nelly Korda, the No. 1 player in women's golf and winner of the year's first two majors, started eight shots behind and closed with a 68. She was the leader in the clubhouse for the longest time at 2 under until Kuwaki finished.

Korda tied for fourth along with Jeeno Thitikul (73).

Eyes covered

Kuwaki, at No. 46 in the women's world ranking, played bogey-free over the last 13 holes as everyone around her made mistakes. She was in the scoring room after signing and stayed there, even as Henseleit and Noh had birdie chances on the final two holes to force a playoff.

Henseleit delivered with a most unlikely putt, 40 feet across the 18th green. The 27-year-old German raised her right arm as the golf ball still had a few feet to go and punched the air when it dropped for birdie.

It was only the second playoff since the Women’s British Open became a major in 2001.

Kuwaki covered her eyes when she watched the putt go in on TV, then broke into a smile. And moments later, she was in a cart and off to the 18th tee for a playoff and immediately in trouble. Her tee shot stayed short of a bunker but in the slope of thick grass. She smartly tried to get it back in play, and her wedge to 3 feet was as important a shot as any.

It gave her another chance, and the final mistake belonged to Henseleit with the tee shot on the 18th for the second playoff hole.

Kuwaki already has won twice this year and is fourth on the money list on the Japan LPGA, the tour that has produced five recent major champions, including Yamashita, Mao Saigo, Yuka Saso and Ayaka Furue. Kuwaki is now on that list.

“Just to be on a stage like this is just an honor, and every hole I was just focused shot-by-shot and just tried to enjoy it out there as much as I could,” she said.

___

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

El siniestro ocurrió la víspera, cuando la avioneta C208B de matrícula OB-2001 de la empresa Aerodiana se estrelló en el sector de Pueblo Viejo en la sureña región de Ica. La aeronave partió desde Pisco para sobrevolar las icónicas Líneas de Nazca.

Las autoridades confirmaron la muerte de siete italianos, dos españoles, dos alemanes, además de dos tripulantes peruanos.

La primera ministra de Italia, Giorgia Meloni, expresó el domingo a través de su cuenta de X el “profundo pesar” por la muerte de sus compatriotas y se solidarizó con los familiares.

Tras arribar a la zona, el ministro de Comercio Exterior y Turismo peruano declaró a la prensa que los expertos de la Comisión de Investigación de Accidentes Aéreos buscan “la evidencia mecánica que guarda el motor” como información para “contrarrestarla con las grabaciones de la comunicación”. Reveló que “hubo una llamada desde la nave para indicar que tenía una falla mecánica”.

Los especialistas deben evaluar “la trayectoria de la nave” entre otros elementos para determinar las causas del accidente, afirmó Valencia. No precisó una fecha en la que se podría conocer el informe. Indicó además que, según reportes de la Dirección General de Aeronáutica, la aeronave, “de lo que se sabe hasta el día de hoy, tenía todos los permisos”.

La autoridad mantuvo reuniones con los representantes de las embajadas que se desplazaron a Nazca para dar seguimiento a las investigaciones.

“Confiamos en que las autoridades competentes de Perú van a investigar todas las circunstancias con la brevedad posible”, señaló a los medios el cónsul de Alemania, Dennis Raffael, mientras la cónsul italiana, Elisa Polsinelli, confirmó que los familiares de las víctimas fueron informados la víspera, aunque no precisó si viajarán al país andino.

En tanto, el alcalde Nazca, Jorge Bravo, advirtió que el hecho afectará el turismo de la región por lo que se debe determinar las responsabilidades, declaró ante los medios.

Las Línea de Nazca son unos geoglifos gigantes grabados en el desierto hacen más de 1.500 años. Fueron declaradas Patrimonio Cultural de la Humanidad por la Unesco y se encuentran 450 kilómetros (280 millas) al sur de la capital Lima. Solo se pueden apreciar desde el aire o torres altas.

Leer en español

Over the weekend, faith leaders were urging their parishioners to make their voices heard this election season.

Miami-Dade officials have held a Get Out the Vote campaign, answering questions and giving out voter information materials while also offering to register people to vote.

“We’re here to do outreach to remind everybody that we have elections, and to let them know they can early vote by mail or go on election day,” said Miami-Dade Supervisor of Elections Alina Garcia. “People need to know they can go to any early voting sites, they don’t have to go to their specific precinct. They can go between 7 a.m. and 3 p.m. (and) on the weekends from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. And next week we’ll have an evening time from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.”

She said the county is ready for any and all who wish to cast their ballots early.

“All of our equipment is out and ready to go,” said Garcia. “I want to remind everyone we do vote on paper, we don’t connect to any internet or anything. It’s very safe.”

Early voting runs through Aug. 16 in Miami-Dade.

For specific hours and voting locations, check your county elections website or check out Local 10’s Voter Guide.

Leer en español

It happened early Sunday morning at Leslie Pet Grooming located near Northwest 52nd Street and 79th Avenue in Doral.

The front side of the business was left with a gaping hole in the front of the building once the car was towed away.

Local 10 News spoke to the owner, who said he woke up to a call from police around 6 a.m. saying someone had crashed into his business.

He said police officers told him the driver was backing into a parking space when they mistakenly hit the gas pedal instead of the brake, sending the car crashing into the building.

The owner said the crash caused between $15,000 and $20,000 worth of damage.

No injuries were reported in the crash.

Police did not say whether the driver would be facing any charges.

Leer en español

After Sunday’s practice at the Baptist Health Training Complex, linebacker Jacob Rodriguez, cornerback Chris Johnson, guard Jonah Savaiinaea and running back Ollie Gordon II discussed their growth, preparation and the excitement surrounding the first padded practice of camp.

Rodriguez, a second-round pick out of Texas Tech, has already stood out with his “violent” style of play and ability to find the football, traits Hafley praised early in training camp.

During Sunday’s practice, Rodriguez was active around the ball, making several would-be stops in the run game. Despite the team practicing without pads, running back Ollie Gordon II even described the rookie linebacker as a “magnet” to the football.

Rodriguez, who was known in college for punching the football out of opposing players’ hands, said creating turnovers comes down to being aggressive while knowing when to take the right shot.

“The worry is there, but you gotta do it. You gotta take a chance to hit,” Rodriguez said. “And I think you see what you punch, it’s like a boxer, you know, like if you see the ball, you punch it. If you’re just kind of throwing a blind punch, then that’s when it kind of gets risky like you could actually hit a face mask and actually break a knuckle or something, but you know if you’re seeing what you’re punching.”

Rodriguez said teammates have asked him about his ability to force fumbles, but his goal is to help the entire defense create more takeaways.

Rodriguez on the art of forcing fumbles by punching the ball out and if teammates ask him how to do it: pic.twitter.com/zbjonq7k93

— Ryan Mackey (@RyanMackeyWPLG) August 2, 2026

“I mean, some guys come like jokingly, and then we’ll kind of get into a conversation about it, but like I’m all about shooting everybody trying to go and take the ball away,” Rodriguez said. “If we can take 3 more a game, and that kind of stat that would help us win, it’d be unbelievable. So anything I could do to help everybody kind of take the ball away, not that I’m perfect at it or have it figured out, but, you know, I’ve just been fortunate enough to get a few.”

Rodriguez said he was able to meet former Chicago Bears cornerback Charles “Peanut” Tillman, who popularized the “Peanut Punch,” and learn more about the technique used to force the ball out of opponents’ hands.

Rodriguez’s path to the NFL has also helped shape his mindset. He told reporters the first thing he bought after receiving his first NFL paycheck was a bed.

While he was a walk-on at Texas Tech, Rodriguez said he initially slept on his brother’s floor, making the simple purchase a meaningful reminder of how far he has come.

Rodriguez will get his first taste of padded football Monday, something he said will help the team continue developing.

“I’m very excited for that,” Rodriguez said. “I think what we’ve been doing so far has been great. It’s helping us a lot with technique and where to use our hands and how to do a lot of the ins and outs and stuff, but, you know, football is played, like I said, physically, and when football pads come on and shoulder pads and everything else with it, you start to get to play real football.”

Gordon, who is entering his second NFL season, said he is also looking forward to putting the pads back on and getting back to the physical side of football.

“We all get to get in pads, we’d have some click clack and then, you know, it’s one of those days,” Gordon said.

The second-year running back said the biggest difference entering this season is having the ability to focus on football without the pressure of the draft process and learning everything for the first time.

RB Ollie Gordon on being more comfortable with the offense as he enters his second year in the NFL. pic.twitter.com/FhzhdUkqe6

— Ryan Mackey (@RyanMackeyWPLG) August 2, 2026

“Last year I felt like I gotta learn this, you know, you gotta train, you gotta do that,” he said. “But I feel like this year is more like, OK, I can ease into it. I know my study habit, learn how to take care of my body also now, so I feel like just those things make it easier.”

Cornerback Chris Johnson, the Dolphins’ first-round pick in the 2026 NFL Draft, also made his presence felt Sunday when he intercepted quarterback Quinn Ewers during team drills.

Johnson, who has been working at both outside corner and in the slot, said the versatility has helped him understand how all parts of the defense work together.

Chris Johnson on being asked to play both outside and slot corner. pic.twitter.com/Z5pbLdIpis

— Ryan Mackey (@RyanMackeyWPLG) August 2, 2026

“Yeah, it definitely helps, just being able to take certain things away from the field,” Johnson said. “If they can mess up timing out there, then I know that it’s a lot more traffic out there for the slot receiver to get to.”

Johnson said his interception, which was thrown by quarterback Quinn Ewers, came down to trusting his assignment and making a play when the opportunity presented itself.

Dolphins CB Chris Johnson on reeling in an INT (Ewers pass) during Sunday’s camp. pic.twitter.com/2xHweK8EZC

— Ryan Mackey (@RyanMackeyWPLG) August 2, 2026

“Yeah, really just playing my coverage, man,” Johnson said. “Started off in a bunch, motion to just a stack, so I get the calls from the safety. Obviously, we’re all on the same page, you know what we’re doing, so, you know, I cover the ground I’m supposed to cover and just make a play.”

Offense guard Jonah Savaiinaea, who moved to right guard this offseason and switched to No. 71, said the position change has helped him feel more comfortable entering his second NFL season.

Dolphins guard Jonah Savaiinaea talks about getting back to his roots, why he switched to No. 71 and switching to right guard. pic.twitter.com/Z4WwUvnRjU

— Ryan Mackey (@RyanMackeyWPLG) August 2, 2026

“I mean, the biggest thing is, you know, going into year two, I feel like that plays a big factor. I’ve been confident out there,” he said. “I mean, I’ve been watching myself and I was like, damn, you know, I, I didn’t have this, this time last year.”

Hafley called Savaiinaea a “pleasant surprise” before Sunday’s practice.

With the Dolphins bringing in 13 rookies from the 2026 draft class, the largest draft class since the NFL adopted a seven-round format in 1994, several young players will have opportunities to earn roles throughout training camp.

The Dolphins will hold their first padded practice of camp Monday at 9:30 a.m. at the Baptist Health Training Complex.

Since then, all her meals have come from local residents, and she isn't sure when her next one will come. Yet Dikra is certain she does not want to go back.

“I want to stay. I want to go to Spain,” Dikra said, who asked that her last name be withheld for safety reasons.

By Sunday afternoon, Dikra was among the last remaining migrants in the city after tens of thousands of the 60,000 migrants that had breached the border with Morocco on Thursday and Friday walked back to that country. At least 72 people died in the crossing, and the humanitarian crisis the sudden rush of people caused reignited a debate around immigration in Europe and beyond.

In Tangier, Dikra said she worked as a cleaner, but decided to leave alongside her sister and cousin, in part to escape her alcoholic father. She hopes to make use of a hairdressing diploma in continental Spain — from which she remains separated by the Strait of Gibraltar and the European Union's complex asylum system.

Migrants wonder what will happen with holdouts

Abdel Karim, 35, also from Morocco, waited outside Ceuta's official migration reception center on Sunday, asking for updates about what officials were saying they would do with the holdouts still in the city.

Karim was unemployed in Morocco, and had lived in continental Spain years ago, before he was expelled from France where he was living on the streets.

“In Morocco, I'm seen as a deportee,” Karim said. “Those who are deported know what it means — stress, depression, anguish.”

Karim said he saw posts on social media about those making the crossing and took advantage of the chaos. He crossed with 10 euros in his pocket, he said, and pointed to his blistered feet. In Spain, Karim said he wants to do whatever work he can find, and remained unfazed about how he would get there.

Ceuta and its sister city Melilla are not part of the European Union's Schengen area, and those traveling to mainland Europe must go through border checks upon arrival.

At a beach in Ceuta, hundreds of migrants who had arrived days earlier gathered on Sunday evening. Some crowded around an army truck where Spanish soldiers distributed water.

Senegalese migrant Cesse Aliou, 25, rested with a group of sub-Saharan men and women outside the nearby shelter. In Morocco, Aliou said he earned 279 euros ($322) a month at a call center, but the work wasn't stable.

So he boarded a train in Casablanca to Tangier and then to Fnideq, where he said he swam to Ceuta.

Across the street, on another wooded patch near the shelter, a group of migrants began fighting over water that local residents had brought to the area.

“We are very tired. To eat, to sleep, it's very difficult here," said Aliou, pointing to the scuffle. “You see how the situation is.”

Tras el entrenamiento del domingo en el Baptist Health Training Complex, el linebacker Jacob Rodríguez, el cornerback Chris Johnson, el guardia Jonah Savaiinaea y el corredor Ollie Gordon II hablaron sobre su evolución, su preparación y la emoción que rodea la primera práctica con protecciones del campamento.

Rodríguez, seleccionado en la segunda ronda procedente de Texas Tech, ya ha destacado por su estilo de juego “violento” y su habilidad para dar con el balón, cualidades que Hafley elogió al inicio del campo de entrenamiento.

Durante la práctica del domingo, Rodríguez estuvo muy activo cerca del balón y frenó varias jugadas de carrera. Aunque el equipo entrenó sin protecciones, el corredor Ollie Gordon II describió al linebacker novato como un “imán” hacia el balón.

Rodríguez, conocido en la universidad por sacar el balón a golpes de las manos de sus rivales, dijo que provocar pérdidas de balón es cuestión de ser agresivo y saber cuándo lanzar el golpe correcto.

“El miedo está ahí, pero hay que hacerlo. Tienes que arriesgarte a golpear”, dijo Rodríguez. “Y creo que se trata de ver lo que golpeas, es como un boxeador: si ves el balón, lo golpeas. Si tiras un golpe a ciegas, ahí es cuando se vuelve arriesgado, porque podrías pegarle a la máscara del casco y romperte un nudillo o algo así. Pero si estás viendo lo que golpeas, no.”

Rodríguez contó que sus compañeros le han preguntado por su facilidad para forzar balones sueltos, pero que su meta es ayudar a toda la defensa a arrebatar más balones.

“O sea, algunos vienen medio en broma, y luego terminamos hablando en serio del tema, pero yo estoy enfocado en que todos vayamos a quitar el balón”, dijo Rodríguez. “Si podemos robar tres más por partido, ese tipo de estadística nos ayudaría a ganar, sería increíble. Así que cualquier cosa que pueda hacer para ayudar a todos a arrebatar el balón. No es que sea perfecto en eso ni que lo tenga resuelto, pero he tenido la suerte de lograr unos cuantos.”

Rodríguez dijo que pudo conocer al excornerback de los Chicago Bears Charles “Peanut” Tillman, quien popularizó el “Peanut Punch”, y aprender más sobre la técnica que se usa para sacar el balón de las manos del rival.

El camino de Rodríguez a la NFL también ha moldeado su mentalidad. Les contó a los periodistas que lo primero que compró con su primer cheque de la NFL fue una cama.

Como jugador que llegó a Texas Tech sin beca, Rodríguez dijo que al principio dormía en el suelo del cuarto de su hermano, lo que convirtió esa sencilla compra en un recordatorio de lo lejos que ha llegado.

Rodríguez tendrá su primer contacto con el fútbol americano con protecciones el lunes, algo que, según él, ayudará al equipo a seguir creciendo.

“Estoy muy emocionado por eso”, dijo Rodríguez. “Creo que lo que hemos hecho hasta ahora ha sido genial. Nos ayuda mucho con la técnica, con dónde poner las manos y con todos los detalles del juego. Pero, como dije, el fútbol americano se juega de forma física, y cuando te pones las protecciones, las hombreras y todo lo demás, empiezas a jugar el fútbol de verdad.”

Gordon, que entra en su segunda temporada en la NFL, dijo que también tiene ganas de volver a ponerse las protecciones y regresar al lado físico del juego.

“Todos nos ponemos las protecciones, va a haber algo de contacto y, bueno, es uno de esos días”, dijo Gordon.

El corredor de segundo año señaló que la mayor diferencia al encarar esta temporada es poder concentrarse en el juego sin la presión del proceso del draft ni la de aprenderlo todo por primera vez.

“El año pasado sentía que tenía que aprender esto, entrenar aquello, hacer lo otro”, dijo. “Pero este año es más como: bueno, puedo tomármelo con calma. Conozco mis hábitos de estudio y también aprendí a cuidar mi cuerpo, así que siento que esas cosas lo hacen más fácil.”

El cornerback Chris Johnson, primera selección de los Dolphins en el Draft de la NFL de 2026, también dejó su huella el domingo cuando interceptó al quarterback Quinn Ewers durante las prácticas de equipo.

Johnson, que ha trabajado tanto de cornerback exterior como en el slot, dijo que esa versatilidad lo ha ayudado a entender cómo encajan todas las piezas de la defensa.

“Sí, definitivamente ayuda, poder quitarle ciertas cosas al rival en el campo”, dijo Johnson. “Si logras romperles el ritmo allá afuera, sé que hay mucho más tráfico para que el receptor del slot llegue a donde quiere.”

Johnson dijo que su intercepción, lanzada por el quarterback Quinn Ewers, fue cuestión de confiar en su asignación y hacer la jugada cuando se le presentó la oportunidad.

“Sí, básicamente jugar mi cobertura, nada más”, dijo Johnson. “Empezamos en formación cerrada, con movimiento hacia un stack, así que recibo las indicaciones del safety. Obviamente, estamos todos en la misma página, sabemos lo que hacemos, así que cubro el terreno que me toca cubrir y hago la jugada.”

El guardia ofensivo Jonah Savaiinaea, que pasó a guardia derecho esta temporada baja y cambió al número 71, dijo que el cambio de posición lo ha hecho sentirse más cómodo al encarar su segunda temporada en la NFL.

“O sea, lo más importante es que, al entrar en mi segundo año, siento que eso influye mucho. He estado seguro allá afuera”, dijo. “He estado viéndome en video y pensaba: caramba, esto no lo tenía por estas fechas el año pasado.”

Hafley calificó a Savaiinaea como una “grata sorpresa” antes de la práctica del domingo.

Con 13 novatos procedentes de la clase del draft de 2026 —la más numerosa desde que la NFL adoptó el formato de siete rondas en 1994—, varios jugadores jóvenes tendrán oportunidades de ganarse un puesto a lo largo del campo de entrenamiento.

Los Dolphins realizarán su primera práctica con protecciones del campamento el lunes a las 9:30 a.m. en el Baptist Health Training Complex.

Daniel Ramírez, de 47 años y residente de Lubbock, Texas, pagó una fianza el sábado y quedó en libertad la madrugada del domingo.

Al salir de la cárcel, Ramírez no tardó en defender su conducta.

“Nos tropezamos, yo nunca la golpeé”, dijo Ramírez.

“Pero hay un video”, le señaló Linnie Supall, de Local 10.

“¿Qué video, uno de que ella me estaba siguiendo?”, preguntó Ramírez.

“Un video que lo muestra empujándola al suelo”, respondió Supall.

“No, yo nunca hice eso. Nos tropezamos. Fue un accidente”, afirmó.

Ramírez fue detenido el viernes en la terminal de Royal Caribbean en PortMiami por agentes del Departamento de Policía de Miami.

Su arresto se produjo varios días después de que las autoridades divulgaran un video de vigilancia del restaurante que, según ellas, mostraba a Ramírez empujando violentamente a una mujer hasta tirarla al suelo el 26 de julio.

La víctima, que trabajaba como cantinera en el Hard Rock Café, habló con Local 10 News sobre lo ocurrido.

Contó que vio a Ramírez meterse en un área detrás de la barra, reservada solo para empleados, y comerse los adornos de las bebidas. Cuando le dijo que no podía hacer eso, él le respondió: “P---, ¿qué quieres que haga? ¿Que lo escupa?”, y ambos salieron del área de la barra.

“De inmediato, el corazón se me empezó a acelerar”, dijo la mujer, que pidió no revelar su identidad.

Según un informe de arresto del Departamento de Policía de Miami (MPD), el gerente de la cantinera la mandó a llamar de nuevo después de que Ramírez presentara una queja.

“Según la víctima, (Ramírez) le dijo al gerente que ninguna mujer tenía derecho a decirle qué hacer y que la víctima debía ser reprendida”, indica el informe de arresto.

La policía señaló que el gerente le pidió a la cantinera que fingiera estar siendo reprendida.

De acuerdo con la víctima, Ramírez huyó tras el primer enfrentamiento, en el que la empujó al suelo.

Contó que empezó a tomarle fotos mientras él se alejaba, pero asegura que la encaró de nuevo, la tiró al suelo por segunda vez y la dejó inconsciente.

“Fue algo muy, muy repugnante, y me pregunto cómo se sentiría él si le hicieran esto a alguien de su familia”, expresó.

La policía llevaba buscando a Ramírez desde el ataque y logró ubicarlo el viernes en la terminal de cruceros de Royal Caribbean en PortMiami.

La víctima agradeció a los detectives por identificar y localizar al sospechoso con rapidez.

“Estoy muy agradecida de que lo hayan capturado y arrestado, y de que esté ahí sentado pensando en lo que hizo”, dijo la empleada.

Tras pagar su fianza, Ramírez dijo que se va a casa, a Texas.

El rival de Lula, el senador Flávio Bolsonaro, ha contado con el apoyo abierto de integrantes del gobierno del presidente de Estados Unidos, Donald Trump, del presidente de Argentina, Javier Milei, y del primer ministro de Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu.

El presidente de Brasil afirmó en la convención de su partido que quiere impulsar la industria de defensa de su país, proteger sus minerales raros y sostuvo que “ningún chino, ningún estadounidense, ningún francés tocará” esos recursos sin respetar la soberanía de la nación sudamericana.

“Vamos a tener que ser mucho más audaces para cambiar muchas cosas en este país”, expresó Lula.

Otros miembros de su partido destacaron el riesgo de una intervención extranjera en las elecciones de Brasil, señalando a Trump y a Milei.

Sin embargo, Edinho Silva, presidente del Partido de los Trabajadores, afirmó durante la convención del domingo que “esta elección en Brasil determina el futuro de América Latina”. Argentina, Paraguay, Chile, Perú, Ecuador y Colombia han elegido recientemente a presidentes inspirados en Trump.

El padre de Flávio Bolsonaro, el expresidente Jair Bolsonaro, fue aliado de Trump, pero ahora cumple una condena de 27 años bajo arresto domiciliario por un intento de golpe de Estado.

Lula ha logrado atraer a partidos de centro alejándolos de su adversario de derecha y llega a la convención de su partido con una popularidad en las encuestas más alta que hace seis meses.

Su campaña está impulsando específicamente un cambio al sistema de impuesto sobre la renta de Brasil que cobra menos a las personas de bajos ingresos y un programa de condonación de deudas que rápidamente se ha vuelto muy popular.

Políticos del Partido de los Trabajadores han manifestado preocupación por amenazas patrocinadas desde el extranjero, como campañas coordinadas de bots automatizados y manipulación en redes sociales diseñadas para influir en los votantes y socavar la confianza en el sistema de votación electrónica de Brasil.

Lula dijo el miércoles en la convención del partido que no quiere a Trump como enemigo.

El vicepresidente Geraldo Alckmin, quien volverá a postularse junto a Lula, dijo el domingo que el sistema de votación electrónica de Brasil “es tan bueno que no le quita votos a argentinos y estadounidenses”, en referencia a Milei y Trump.

Lula cuenta con cierto nivel de interferencia

El gobierno de Trump también ha impuesto nuevos aranceles a las exportaciones brasileñas y cambió la designación de dos grupos criminales locales a grupos terroristas, medidas que —según analistas legales— podrían perjudicar a empresas y abrir un camino para otros tipos de intervención. Ambas decisiones ocurrieron después de que el senador Bolsonaro visitara la Casa Blanca y el Departamento de Estado.

Milei, de Argentina, viajó a Sao Paulo el 25 de julio para hablar en la convención del Partido Liberal de Bolsonaro y desató una crisis diplomática cuando insultó a Lula y al juez del Supremo Tribunal que supervisó el juicio y la condena del Bolsonaro mayor por el intento de golpe.

Netanyahu grabó un video en apoyo del adversario del presidente.

Lula ha dicho que está defendiendo la soberanía nacional de Brasil. Recientemente mantuvo una larga llamada con el presidente de China, Xi Jinping, líder de uno de los socios comerciales más importantes de Brasil.

Sus partidarios dicen que podría llevar al bloque comercial sudamericano Mercosur a cerrar acuerdos con socios de todo el mundo. Aunque Brasil es, por mucho, la mayor economía del grupo, Argentina, Paraguay y Uruguay también son miembros.

Al igual que su padre, el senador Bolsonaro ha intentado sembrar dudas infundadas sobre el sistema de votación de Brasil. Esas declaraciones han generado preocupación en el Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores, que en julio negó visas a dos funcionarios del Departamento de Estado de Estados Unidos, según se informó, por temores de que buscaran hacer lo mismo.

El Departamento de Estado negó esa afirmación en un comunicado.

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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.

“I do not believe that he is the right man to lead football forward on the world stage," Burnham said. “The plan that was put forward was offensive to many people, football people, around the world, and it can’t be the case that we just move on and forget that, it wasn’t acceptable."

On Saturday, European soccer's governing body UEFA said it had lost confidence in FIFA’s leadership — possibly paving the way for a challenge to Infantino’s presidency. The governing body for North and Central American and Caribbean soccer (CONCACAF) said FIFA leadership had “stopped putting football first.”

Infantino was forced into a backdown over his controversial plans to sell World Cup profits through a commercial subsidiary that would run its top competitions.

Infantino’s plans fell apart after UEFA’s 55-member nations agreed Thursday to boycott the World Cup and all other FIFA competitions. CONCACAF and the Asian Football Confederation also said they opposed the plan.

Despite Infantino's climbdown, UEFA said it would work with other confederations to "devise a plan to make sure that it cannot occur again.”

“No option should be off the table,” it said.

While Infantino has received pockets of public support from associations including 2022 World Cup host Qatar, Burnham's words were further evidence of the anger generated by his plans.

The next FIFA presidential election is in March in Rabat, Morocco. The deadline for candidates to enter the presidential contest is Nov. 18, exactly four months ahead of the vote.

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

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

Investigators are confident that the gunman, identified as 24-year-old Chad Williams, acted alone during the shooting Saturday at an In-N-Out location in Twin Falls, Police Chief Matthew Hicks said at a news conference.

In all, four people died, including Williams, and seven others were injured at the recently opened restaurant in the southern Idaho city of about 56,000 people. Authorities said Sunday that two of the injured were treated at a hospital and released, three were listed as stable, and two were in critical condition.

Hicks said an off-duty state trooper and an armed citizen — whose identities weren't immediately disclosed — both fired back and diverted the gunman from the restaurant.

“We believe their actions helped drive the suspect away from the scene, preventing further casualties,” the chief said. “We want to take a moment and commend the actions of the off-duty officer and the citizen, and their heroic action to stop this incident.”

Hicks said detectives are working to determine Williams' motives, and said the suspect's family was cooperating fully with law enforcement. Officials asked potential witnesses or anyone with information to contact police.

The chief also warned of misinformation spreading online identifying a different man as the shooter, saying that person had “no involvement in this incident whatsoever.”

In-N-Out worker among the victims

One of those killed was an employee, the fast-food chain’s owner said.

“My heart is broken, my chest is heavy, my eyes burn from the tears I've shed. We lost one of our beautiful Associates tonight,” In-N-Out owner Lynsi Snyder said in a statement released early Sunday on social media. “In-N-Out will be mourning with the families and praying for them as they tread through a very painful season.”

The FBI on Sunday encouraged the public to submit images and videos related to the shooting Saturday in Twin Falls that left seven other people wounded, some critically.

The In-N-Out had opened just about a week earlier, on July 24, as part of the California-based company’s recent expansion to Idaho.

Snyder did not identify the worker. Officials were still trying to notify relatives of victims and so were not yet releasing the names, ages or other details about the people hurt in the shooting, Twin Falls spokesperson Josh Palmer said Saturday.

Police who responded to the shooting found the body of the suspected gunman in an area near the restaurant, Palmer said.

Palmer said investigators were interviewing witnesses to the shooting. The restaurant is in a busy shopping plaza, and hundreds of people were in the area when it happened around 2 p.m.

Witnesses describe chaotic scene

Lane Koehn, 34, said he was at a stoplight near the In-N-Out when he saw a person with an AR-style rifle emerge from the drive-thru. A man with a pistol started firing at the shooter.

He then saw someone in an In-N-Out uniform drag a person, also wearing a uniform, bleeding from a gunshot wound to her chest across the parking lot. The employee, Koehn and the man with the pistol stayed until paramedics arrived for her.

“She was pretty bad off, but I don’t know. I hope she made it,” Koehn said.

He said the shooter fired at least three or four rounds and it was not clear whether or not anyone in particular was targeted.

Video taken by a driver from across the street captured a shooter, who appeared to be dressed in black, walking up to a white car carrying a long rifle, opening the driver-side door and popping the trunk. The person then walked to the trunk and reached inside. At that point the driver who shot the video left quickly, fearing that the man might be getting more weapons.

Twin Falls resident Haley Dodaro, 43, and her mother went to In-N-Out for lunch Saturday afternoon. While waiting in the drive-thru line, they saw people running across the road and workers bolting out of the restaurant. At first, Dodaro thought there might have been a fire, but then a man directing traffic in a reflective vest said there was a shooter.

“So that’s when we knew there was a shooting. People were running out crying and screaming. It was very scary,” Dodaro said in a text message to The Associated Press.

Employee told people to get down

Nayeli Rodriguez, 40, of Burley, was inside waiting for food with her daughters when she heard shots from the kitchen. An employee said it was a shooting and told people to get down. Rodriguez said an older man tried to protect her and her daughters, and they were among the last to run outside.

“We were trying to get as far as we could and some angels let us in their car,” Rodriguez said, also via text message. “I left my car there in the parking lot.”

Twin Falls is about 130 miles (205 kilometers) southeast of Boise and about 75 miles (120 kilometers) north of the Nevada border.

Hundreds of fans packed the stands for the non-padded workout, the first open practice of the Jon-Eric Sullivan and Jeff Hafley era.

Practice began with special teams drills, where wide receivers Kevin Coleman Jr., Malik Washington and Tahj Washington rotated at kick returner as the Dolphins opened the day.

The offense quickly found its rhythm.

On the first play of practice, running back De’Von Achane broke through the left side of the Dolphins offensive line behind offensive tackle Patrick Paul and offensive guard Kadyn Proctor for what would have been a 10-yard run with the first-team offense.

Quarterback Malik Willis responded with a few solid gains after defensive tackle Jordan Phillips forced him out of the pocket for an incompletion on his first throw of the day.

It didn’t take Willis long to settle in as he found tight end Cole Turner on a 10-yard out route. Turner made a contested catch over linebacker Jordyn Brooks in tight coverage. Willis then connected with receiver Malik Washington for a 20-yard gain on a slant route.

Willis also connected with South Florida native Tutu Atwell on a 60-yard deep slant pattern, but safety Dante Trader Jr. tracked him down and stopped him at the opposing 10-yard line.

The biggest play of the day came when Quinn Ewers stepped in with the second-team offense and connected with receiver Kevin Coleman Jr. for a 70-yard touchdown after cornerback Marco Wilson slipped midway through the route.

Wide receiver AJ Henning, who is entering his second NFL season, was one of the standouts of Sunday’s practice. He hauled in two touchdown receptions — one from Malik Willis and one Ewers — including catches of more than 50 yards, continuing his impressive start to training camp.

The Dolphins’ young receivers consistently stretched the field throughout practice, and several cornerbacks struggled at times after surrendering long touchdown completions to Henning and Coleman.

The defense still made several plays despite the offense’s strong showing. Defensive tackles Kenneth Grant and Zach Sieler repeatedly clogged running lanes, combining for several short yardage stops on Achane and running back Ollie Gordon II.

Cornerback Chris Johnson, who was selected with the 27th pick of the 2026 NFL Draft, made the play of the day for the defense, leaping to intercept an Ewers pass near the sideline that was intended for Henning who ran a comeback route.

Rookie linebacker Jacob Rodriguez was active throughout practice, flying to the football and making several would-be stops on ball carriers. EDGE Josh Uche also recorded what would have been a sack after beating right tackle Austin Jackson, who had another difficult day in pass protection.

Sunday marked the Dolphins’ first opportunity to practice in front of fans this summer. The team also added two LED video boards to help keep fans updated throughout practice, while large cooling fans provided relief from the South Florida heat.

It also reflected a shift for a Dolphins organization looking to win its first playoff game since the 2000 season.

There were no players greeting fans before practice, no orange jersey awarded to the previous day’s top performer and no music blaring over the speakers. Under Hafley and the new regime, Sunday’s practice had a businesslike atmosphere from start to finish.

There are a lot of young players on this roster who will now get a chance to shine during training camp. The Dolphins drafted 13 players in 2026 — their largest draft class since the NFL adopted a seven-round format in 1994.

The Dolphins will hold their first padded practice of training camp Monday at 9:30 a.m. at the Baptist Health Training Complex.

Injury news

Cornerback Darrell Baker Jr. did not practice Sunday as he continues to recover from what head coach Jeff Hafley called a lower-body injury.

Lula's rival, Sen. Flávio Bolsonaro, has enjoyed open support from members of U.S. President Donald Trump's administration, Argentina's President Javier Milei and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Brazil's president said in his party convention speech he wants to boost his country's defense industry, protect its rare minerals, and claimed “no Chinese, no American, no French will touch” these resources without respecting the South American nation's sovereignty.

“We will have to be much more daring to change a lot of things in this country,” Lula said.

Other members of his party highlighted the risk of foreign intervention in Brazil's elections, pointing to Trump and Milei. However,

“This election in Brazil determines the future of Latin America,” Edinho Silva, the Workers' Party chairman, said during Sunday's convention. Argentina, Paraguay, Chile, Peru, Ecuador and Colombia have elected Trump-inspired presidents in the recent past.

Flávio Bolsonaro's father, former President Jair Bolsonaro, was an ally of Trump but is now serving a 27-year sentence under house arrest for an attempted coup.

Lula has managed to draw centrist parties away from his right-wing adversary and arrives at his party’s convention with higher popularity in the polls than six months ago.

His campaign is specifically boosting a change to Brazil's income tax system that charges less to people on low incomes and a debt forgiveness program that has quickly become very popular.

Workers' Party politicians have expressed worries about foreign-sponsored threats of coordinated automated bot campaigns and social media manipulation designed to influence voters and undermine trust in Brazil's electronic voting system.

On Wednesday at the party convention, Lula said he doesn't want Trump as an enemy.

Brazilian Vice President Geraldo Alckmin, who will run again alongside Lula, said Sunday that Brazil’s electronic voting system “is so good that it doesn’t take votes from Argentines and Americans,” in a reference to Milei and Trump.

Lula is counting on some level of interference

The Trump administration has also imposed new tariffs on Brazilian exports and changed the designation of two local criminal groups to terrorist groups, which legal analysts say could hurt companies and open a path for other kinds of intervention. Both moves took place after Sen. Bolsonaro visited the White House and the Department of State.

Argentina’s Milei came to Sao Paulo on July 25 to speak at Bolsonaro’s Liberal Party convention and sparked a diplomatic crisis when he insulted Lula and the Supreme Court justice who oversaw the elder Bolsonaro's trial and conviction over the attempted coup.

Netanyahu recorded a video in support of the president’s adversary.

Lula has said he is defending Brazil's national sovereignty. He recently held a long call with China’s President Xi Jinping, the leader of one of Brazil's most important trading partners.

His supporters say he could lead South American trade bloc Mercosur into striking deals with partners worldwide. Though Brazil is by far the biggest economy in the group, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay are also members.

Like his father, Sen. Bolsonaro has recently tried to sow unfounded doubts about Brazil's voting system. Those statements have raised concerns at Brazil's foreign ministry, which in July denied visas to two U.S. Department of State officials reportedly due to fears they sought to do the same.

The U.S. Department of State denied that claim in a statement.

The full episode can be seen at the top of this page.

She joined host Janine Stanwood on the latest episode of “This Week in South Florida”, and their conversation can be seen at the top of this page.

He joined host Janine Stanwood on the latest episode of “This Week in South Florida”, and their conversation can be seen at the top of this page.

The fires in and around Spokane, the state's second largest city, burned about 8.2 square miles (about 21 square kilometers) over the weekend and were among dozens of wildfires across the Western U.S. that stretched the ability of federal, state and local agencies to fight them.

A total of about 390 square miles (1,000 square kilometers) has burned across the state, and some of the fires, including those in the Spokane area, have not been contained.

No one hurt or unaccounted for — so far

Fire and law enforcement officials said there had been no reports of injuries or people unaccounted for — but they stressed it was early in the response effort.

Officials also said that the evacuees in Spokane included patients at its U.S. Veterans Affairs hospital.

Video from the Spokane area showed buildings on fire, black smoke billowing up near neighborhoods, and the smoking ruins of homes, with only chimneys still standing. Several officials expressed concern that the area does not appear likely to get a break in coming days from the weather, which is expected to remain dry.

“We are not out of danger,” U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell said during a news conference with federal, state and local officials in Spokane. “The next couple of days will be challenging.”

Investigators had yet to determine how the blazes started.

Grassland in flames in parts of Idaho, Oregon and Utah

Spokane was hardly the only place struggling to contain fires.

Crews using bulldozers and helicopters continued for a 10th day to fight a fire that has burned nearly 525 square miles (about 1,360 square kilometers) of grassland in western Idaho and eastern Oregon. The area is home to cattle ranches, and authorities said the fire is threatening more than 600 homes and 800 other structures.

The weather in the area was expected to remain sunny — and dry — well into the week, with temperatures rising to more than 90 degrees Fahrenheit (32 degrees Celsius) on Wednesday. Officials say the fire was caused by lightning.

In central Utah, a massive blaze more than doubled in size over the weekend, jumping from 16 square miles (about 41 square kilometers) to about 56 square miles (145 square kilometers) by Sunday morning. More than 100 cattle have been killed, according to local law enforcement.

Officials called the fire “catastrophic" as heavy winds helped flames jump containment lines overnight. The fire is moving north toward Fillmore, a town of about 2,600 people and the seat of Millard County. Mandatory evacuations were ordered Sunday evening for the southern portion of Fillmore.

The National Weather Service issued warnings about the air quality across the northwest. It issued red flag fire warnings for parts of Utah and Montana and western Nebraska, and extreme heat warnings for the southern parts of Arizona, California and Nevada and northern Montana.

High winds make it hard to fight fires in Spokane area

While temperatures Sunday in Spokane were forecast to remain below 80 F (27 C), wind gusts from 35 mph (56 kph) to 45 mph (72 kph) had been expected by the afternoon, said Benjamin Cossel, public information officer for the federal response team from California called in Saturday night to deal with the fires.

“We have weather working against us, and we have terrain working against us,” Cossel said.

There were three fires in the Spokane area: the Old Trails Fire, the Fairview Fire and the Meadowview Fire. Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson declared a state of emergency Saturday, and the National Weather Service issued a “particularly dangerous situation” red flag alert for eastern Washington.

Cossel said that as it gets warmer during the day, cool air that's closer to the ground and keeping winds at bay will rise, allowing those winds to move through the area. The Spokane River cuts through the city of about 229,000 people, and there are steep canyons on both sides that channel the wind.

“They push the fire through the canyons, up, up the slopes, and then outside the slopes and around,” he said. “It's very, very hilly, very, very steep slopes, a lot of canyons that create really turbulent, really challenging sort of wind scenarios.”

Spokane sets up shelter for impacted residents

Authorities in Spokane set up a shelter at the city's main convention center. About 400 people were staying there, officials said Sunday.

Spokane County Commissioner Chris Jordan said relatives of his were in an area affected by the fires and that they don't know if their home is still standing. He said he spoke with them as they were leaving the home.

“They’re in their car and all they can see is smoke everywhere, and it was incredibly scary for so many people,” he said during the news conference.

Heather Rosenstrater, president and CEO of Avista Corp., the area's electric and natural gas utility, said about 10,000 people were without power Sunday, down from a peak of 30,000. Avista needs to repair two transmission lines, she said, so it's possible that demand for electricity over the next few days could cause outages.

Meanwhile, several larger fires continued to burn in less populated areas northwest of Spokane, including one about 80 miles (129 kilometers) from the city that has burned about 210 square miles (544 square kilometers). Another fire in eastern Oregon, about 70 miles (113 kilometers) to the northwest in the Stinkingwater Mountains, has burned about 336 square miles (870 square kilometers).

“The whole northwest is heavily impacted right now,” said Keila Vizcarra, the spokesperson for the federal team from California handling what's been named the Big Grass Fire in western Idaho and eastern Oregon.

The attack happened in Kabal, a town in Swat Valley in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, where demonstrators had gathered near a police station, chanting antimilitant slogans and demanding peace, district police chief Omar Khan said.

According to witnesses, shortly before the attack, speakers at the rally said that ensuring security and eliminating militancy were the state’s responsibility. They also accused authorities of failing to act decisively against militants, saying residents wanted to live without fear after years of violence that devastated the region.

Bilal Faizi, a spokesman for the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provincial emergency service, said the attacker struck dozens of people who were chanting antimilitant slogans and demanding peace. Police official Omar Khan said at least nine civilians and five officers were among the dead.

President and prime minister offer condolences

Pakistan’s President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif condemned the bombing, expressing deep sorrow over the loss of life. In separate statements they offered condolences to the families of those killed, prayed for the recovery of the wounded and directed authorities to ensure the wounded receive the best possible medical treatment. Zardari and Sharif also said Pakistan’s fight against terrorism would continue until it is eradicated.

Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi also condemned the attack. In a statement, he extending condolences to the families of those killed and prayers for the speedy recovery of the wounded.

The Swat Valley was once a stronghold of Islamic militants who imposed a strict interpretation of Sharia, or Islamic law, before the Pakistani military launched a major operation in 2007 that drove them out and restored government control.

However, militants have resurfaced in Pakistan’s Swat Valley in recent months, fueling fears that the Pakistani Taliban are seeking to regain a foothold in the region. In response, residents have repeatedly staged anti-Taliban rallies to protest the militants’ presence across the valley.

Suspicion falls on Pakistani Taliban

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the bombing, but suspicion is likely to fall on the Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP. The TTP is separate from, but allied with, Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers. Many of its leaders and fighters have found sanctuary in Afghanistan since the Taliban returned to power there in 2021.

Pakistan has long accused Afghanistan’s Taliban government of harboring TTP militants, an allegation Kabul denies.

Pakistan has experienced a surge in militant attacks in recent years, particularly targeting police and security forces.

On Friday, Pakistan's military spokesman Ahmad Sharif Chaudhry said that Pakistan has recorded 3,145 “terrorism incidents” since January. He said Pakistan had killed 2,084 militants since January, while 819 Pakistanis, including soldiers, police officers and civilians, had been killed.

Chaudhry also said Afghanistan-based militants had carried out 28 suicide attacks in Pakistan since January and alleged that most were carried out by Afghan nationals or people associated with Afghanistan’s security forces. He said the TTP and other militant groups were carrying out attacks inside Pakistan with the support of Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers and Pakistan would continue to target the TTP and its support infrastructure.

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Associated Press writers Rasool Dawar in Peshawar and Ishtiaq Mahsud in Dera Ismail Khan contributed to this story.

He joined host Janine Stanwood on the latest episode of “This Week in South Florida”, and their conversation can be seen at the top of this page.

Moreno, who has been publicly restrained in recent months as the bitter custody dispute has played out between Miller and his daughter Emily, said in a lengthy post: "If there are any basic standards of character required to hold elected office, Max Miller fails them. He should not serve in the House of Representatives.”

Moreno wrote that Miller “needs serious psychological help. He is a danger to my daughter, and I hold my breath every minute he has custody of my granddaughter."

Miller, who has been endorsed by President Donald Trump, said Sunday that he will remain in his race for reelection before a Wednesday deadline to replace him. Democrats have seen a new opportunity in the northeast Ohio congressional seat as the Republican incumbent has faced mounting pressure over the domestic abuse allegations in a bitter and drawn-out custody battle with his ex-wife.

“I’m not dropping out of this race and I’ll win in November,” said Miller, who denied abusing his former wife and his daughter.

Asked on Sunday evening if Miller should resign, Trump said that “so far it's accusations.”

“I'll be looking at it,” Trump said.

Scrutiny of Miller has escalated in recent weeks

Accusations against Miller, who was a White House adviser during Trump’s first term, have been public for years but have recently drawn increased scrutiny as back and forth in the case has escalated.

Emily Moreno has said that Miller scalded, hit and threatened her while they were married. Miller denied those allegations in the video, as he has in the past.

“It's incredibly upsetting,” Miller said, as he went through a list of the allegations.

Miller also said he had nothing to do with a broken collarbone on their 2-year-old daughter that led Emily Moreno to contact authorities. The pair, who were married in 2022 and finalized their divorce last year, have presented different theories about how the injury occurred, according to court filings and police reports detailed in an article in July in the magazine Mother Jones that first revealed the child’s injury.

Miller accompanied his announcement with the release of a voluminous cache of investigative and court documents, as well as audio and video clips, related to the custody dispute.

Spokesperson for Miller's ex-wife says video was ‘shameful’

A spokesperson for Emily Moreno, Stefan Mychajliw, said Sunday that the video was “shameful.”

“No loving parent would have ever used their daughter as a PR pawn to save their own political career,” Mychajliw said. “Miller can lie and spin on X, but he cannot do so under oath in a court of law. We are confident that justice will prevail in court.”

Sen. Bernie Moreno's statement on Sunday came after he had declined to comment on the specific allegations for months. Last week, a spokeswoman issued a statement saying the senator “will not litigate these matters in the media or respond to baseless public attacks.”

“Senator Moreno’s top priority is the safety and well-being of his daughter and granddaughter,” said the spokeswoman, Reagan McCarthy.

Potential GOP candidates eye Miller's seat

The senator’s statement was prompting some hand-wringing behind the scenes in his home state, where Trump-endorsed candidates like Miller typically win with ease.

Miller's Democratic opponent, Brian Poindexter, said no one facing such accusations “belongs in the halls of power.”

State Rep. Mike Dovilla, a U.S. Navy veteran and former presidential appointee to the Office of Personnel Management, and Kevin Coughlin, a former state senator and representative who ran for the U.S. House in 2024 and 2026, were among Republicans whose names were being floated should Miller drop his fall House bid, according to a high-ranking Republican who discussed the sensitive subject on condition of anonymity.

Democrats have recently called on Miller to resign, requested a congressional ethics investigation and suggested more help could be directed in the fall toward Poindexter.

Miller won reelection two years ago with just over 51% of the vote.

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Smyth reported from Columbus, Ohio.

The deal was finalized late Saturday night ahead of Sunday's trade deadline and was first reported by ESPN. It's rare for an All-Star to be traded in the middle of the season, only happening a handful of times before Saturday night.

“Kelsey is one of the league’s most dynamic players,” Mercury GM Nick U’Ren said. “She is a fierce competitor with a winning mentality who impacts the game on both ends of the floor. Her combination of shooting, explosiveness and decision-making allows her to create offense at a high level and makes her one of the league’s most complete guards. We have wanted Kelsey here for a long time, and we’re excited to finally bring her to Phoenix as we continue to build on our foundation.”

Plum will wear No. 0 for the Mercury. She is a free agent at the end of this season and has been sidelined since June 21 because of a lower leg injury. She practiced earlier this week and was expected to play Sunday in the Sparks' game against Portland before getting traded. Phoenix's next game is Monday at Chicago.

Plum was averaging a career-best 23.9 points and 6.4 assists before getting hurt. Los Angeles has struggled without her, including its last six games.

Phoenix is currently 11-19 and six games behind the New York Liberty, who sit in eighth place. New York edged Phoenix 94-92 on Saturday.

The Mercury are coming off a WNBA Finals appearance last season, but have seldom looked like that team despite returning stars Alyssa Thomas and Kahleah Copper.

Akoa Makani is averaging 9.4 points and 2.5 assists this season in 16 games. She was injured earlier in the season with a hamstring issue.

Los Angeles acquired Plum before last season in a blockbuster deal that sent the No. 2 pick to Seattle. The Sparks had hoped they could accelerate a rebuilding effort. Seattle used that pick on Dominique Malonga, who was an All-Star this season.

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

He joined host Janine Stanwood on the latest episode of “This Week in South Florida”, and their conversation can be seen at the top of this page.

Curator Marcus Lobbes and his team were greeted with boos and whistles as they took to the stage at the end of Saturday evening's performance of “Götterdämmerung,” German news agency dpa reported. However, there was warm applause for the singers and musicians, and particularly for conductor Christian Thielemann.

Festival organizers said ahead of the performance that it would be the first time AI took part on stage at the event, “not as a character, but as an image-generating force.” They said that singers would be “the fixed point within a visually seething cosmos of light, texture, history, and association, amidst projections that erupt, constantly shift, and merge into one another.”

The AI-assisted projections included scenes from previous performances of Wagner's “Ring” cycle and historical themes, and drew from images pre-selected by Lobbes, the director of the Academy for Theater and Digitality in Dortmund, and his team.

The collage that the technology projected on stage puzzled the audience, dpa reported, with images including former German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, the towers of the World Trade Center after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, and a special postage stamp marking German reunification in 1990.

The festival website said that “every performance will be unique — because the images and associations never stand still.” Two more performances are scheduled.

The film also made $572 million from over 73,500 screens internationally, with China contributing $121 million alone, adding up to a $927 million worldwide debut that is second only to “Endgame” ($1.2 billion).

Tom Holland’s run as the comic book webslinger has been a mighty one. “No Way Home,” his third standalone Spider-Man movie, made over $1.9 billion worldwide to become the eighth-highest earning movie of all time, not accounting for inflation. It was also the first movie since the beginning of the pandemic to cross the $1 billion mark.

But the triumph of “Brand New Day” also comes on the heels of another major movie featuring Holland and Zendaya: Christopher Nolan’s“The Odyssey,” which slid to second place in its third weekend in theaters with $51 million. Their combined might helped propel the biggest weekend of all time for North American movie theaters, with an estimated $430 million in total ticket sales, according to Rentrak.

“Spider-Man: Brand New Day” started strong, with a record $168 million opening day from 4,487 theaters in the U.S. and Canada, besting “Avenger: Endgame’s” $157 million Friday. The studio predicted it would lead to a $325 million opening weekend, which would still have beaten the second-place record. It takes the place of “Spider-Man: No Way Home” which opened to $260 million in December 2021. In the realm of best opening weekends in North America, they’re followed by “Avengers: Infinity War” ($257 million in 2018) and “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” ($247 million in 2015).

Expectations were always high for “Brand New Day,” which was directed by Destin Daniel Cretton and cost a reported $225 million to produce, not including marketing expenses. But there were worries it wouldn’t attract the same level of mass audience enthusiasm as its predecessor which integrated past Peter Parker actors Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield into the mix. In reality, interest was higher than ever. “Brand New Day” also received strong reviews from critics and audiences. It currently has a 90% on Rotten Tomatoes; Audiences gave it an “A” CinemaScore and a five-star rating on PostTrak.

Ticket buyers were predominately male (about 61%) and many were on the younger side, with slightly more than half the audience under the age of 25, according to PostTrak exit polls. The biggest group was between the ages of 18 and 24, which made up 36% of the audience; 27% were between the ages of 25 and 34. The box office analytics company EntTelligence estimates that about 24.1 million people attended “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” this weekend.

It’s also the biggest ever opening for Sony Pictures.

Tom Rothman, the Chairman and CEO of Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group, praised “the incomparable Tom Holland” in a statement. Rothman famously pushed back the production of the movie to allow Holland to act in “The Odyssey” as well.

Cries about the death of the superhero movie have been looming since “Endgame” with more than a few high-profile flops in the years since, including several from the once-impenetrable Marvel Studios. Still, when they work, they really work, most notably with “No Way Home” and “Deadpool & Wolverine,” which made over $1.3 billion.

Marvel Studios president and ‘Spider-Man’ producer Kevin Feige said in a statement, “This debut reflects the enduring power of Marvel’s characters, and the connection they continue to have with fans around the world — and, as audiences saw, it sets up exciting things to come.”

Producer Amy Pascal added that it “reinforces that moviegoers are hungry for stories that are both spectacular and deeply human.”

This year has also seen a resurgence of moviegoing from younger audiences, who have made hits out of movies like “Obsession,” “Backrooms” and “The Drama,” which also starred Zendaya.

They’re also helping blockbusters soar, and in a business that is partly propelled by momentum, “Spider-Man” had the benefit of coming after “The Odyssey,” which fell only 43% in its third weekend. “The Odyssey” has now earned $395.5 million domestically, bringing its global total to $911.4 million. The film will soon open in South Korea (Aug. 5), China (Aug. 14) and Japan (Sept. 11). Its studio, Universal, also became the first this year to surpass $4 billion globally thanks in part to “Michael,” which it distributed internationally, and “The Super Mario Galaxy Movie.”

A slew of animated PG-rated holdovers rounded out the top five: “Toy Story 5” was in third place with $6.3 million, followed by “Minions & Monsters” in fourth and “Moana,” in fifth. And there were bright spots further down the chart as well. In sixth place with $2 million, “Hadestown: The Musical” surpassed “Hamilton” to become the highest grossing live theater capture release ever with a running total of $18.2 million.

Paul Dergarabedian, the head of marketplace trends for Rentrak, said the “Spider-Man” effect could help the summer movie season surpass the $4 billion mark for the first time since the Barbenheimer summer of 2023, and the third-ever billion dollar August.

“This is perhaps the most important summer moviegoing season in the history of the business,” Dergarabedian said. August, he added, "could set up a home stretch of the box office year like no other and one that could push us over that $10 billion mark."

Top 10 movies by domestic box office

With final domestic figures being released Monday, this list factors in the estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Rentrak:

1. “Spider-Man: Brand New Day,” $355 million.

2. “The Odyssey,” $51 million.

3. “Toy Story 5,” $6.3 million.

4. “Minions & Monsters,” $5.8 million.

5. “Moana,” $5.3 million.

6. “Hadestown: The Musical,” $2 million.

7. “The Invite,” $1.2 million.

8. “I Want Your Sex,” $600,000.

9. “Young Washington,” $477,727.

10. “Obsession,” $470,000.

Two-a-days in full pads for two weeks straight? Sure. Practices scheduled for two hours that would sometimes bleed into three? You bet.

Not so much anymore.

“I'd go to jail today if I tried to do that,” McCarthy joked.

Or at least, the NFL's version of it. The league has evolved over the last 30 years. The Collective Bargaining Agreement banned two-a-days long ago. There are now specific time limits on practice, and they are policed down to the minute.

So McCarthy has made it a point to get ahead of the curve. Just how far ahead? Well, when the Pittsburgh Steelers walk onto Chuck Noll Field on Monday for their first padded practice of the McCarthy Era, they'll do it with one particular instruction in mind: no tackling. At all.

While most of the changes to camp at Saint Vincent College have been subtle as the team transitions from Mike Tomlin to McCarthy — the volume of the music over the loudspeakers is softer, for example — the decision to do everything but take a teammate to the ground is not.

Tomlin's 19 years in Pittsburgh often began with an “iron sharpens iron” approach during the club's annual stay at the small school tucked in the western Pennsylvania hills. Don't get McCarthy wrong. He plans to run a physical camp, but the “Tempered Steel” mantra the club has adopted — one printed on shirts worn by players and staff — is real in more ways than one.

“It’s a risk-assessment decision,” McCarthy said.

Banning tackling during camp is hardly new. A significant chunk of NFL teams, Pittsburgh's longtime rival the Baltimore Ravens included, have adopted the policy in recent years.

Still, these are the Steelers, who have historically embraced — by reputation if not always in reality — the idea of being a throwback of sorts. So yeah, expect an adjustment period.

“Obviously, I love to tackle,” inside linebacker Payton Wilson said. “It's been great in the past to get that in before the first preseason game, but that's what preseason games are for.”

The Steelers instead will “thud up," meaning defenders will try to wrap up ball carriers but not take them all the way to the ground. It's commonplace during the regular season, but not always in early August.

McCarthy stressed there are tools the team can use to refine their tackling technique without driving each other into the turf. From monitoring a player's positioning using GPS to video analysis to other “sports science” resources to coaching points that have been part of the game since its inception, McCarthy is confident the Steelers will be ready when they need to be ready.

“The long stride, short stride, the specifics of how the fundamentals are being taught to the approach, the strike, the wrap, the finish,” he said. “So these are constants that are taught throughout our whole team.”

The shift will require as much of a mental adjustment as a physical adjustment. Defensive tackle Cam Heyward's first 15 camps were defined in part by what Tomlin likened to full-on sparring as opposed to shadowboxing. There were certain days during camp — Family Day and the team's Friday Night Lights practice at nearby Greater Latrobe High School — when Heyward knew the intensity level would spike.

“It's an alpha sport,” the longest-tenured Steeler said. “And (we'd) just ramp it up.”

McCarthy still wants to do just that, but in a way designed to get the defending AFC North champions to Week 1 as healthy as possible.

His philosophical evolution has more to do with the way the NFL operates in 2026 than any concern about the age of the team he is taking over, though it should be noted that several of Pittsburgh's highest-profile defenders — Heyward, outside linebacker T.J. Watt and defensive back Jalen Ramsey — are all in their 30s.

The way McCarthy figures it, getting defenders in the right position to drop an opponent is the hardest part of the process. Once they get there, finishing the play should be the easy part.

That doesn't mean the Steelers won't be searching for gray areas. Linebacker Patrick Queen spent the first four seasons of his career in Baltimore, where former head coach John Harbaugh placed a “no tackling” edict. That didn't stop Queen and teammate Roquan Smith from “tackling everybody” one day just to prove a point.

Queen doesn't expect to go quite that far over the next few weeks. Besides, it's not like the Steelers are going to run around with flags on their hips like they're preparing for the 2028 Olympics.

“At the end of the day, you still got a chance to put yourself on somebody, put your hip on somebody,” he said. “Whatever you do pre-tackle, it's the same as putting somebody on the ground.”

Besides, there will still likely be drills like “backs on backers,” a perennial camp highlight in which running backs work on pass protection by fending off linebackers charging at them at full speed. It's a drill that helped running back Jaylen Warren first capture the coaching staff's attention as an undrafted rookie free agent in 2022, and one that in many ways lets football players be football players in the most primal way possible.

“We got dogs on the team,” Warren said. “The competition is what leads to that. I don't mind that at all.”

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AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/nfl

It occurred at the Old Navy located inside Oakwood Plaza in Hollywood.

During the event, shopping carts were quickly filled with jeans, shirts, shoes and other back-to-school essentials as children made their way through the store.

They weren’t doing it alone, though.

Volunteers, first responders and even people dressed as superheroes shopped right alongside the children, helping make the morning feel a little more special.

Every child also received a backpack filled with school supplies, giving them everything they need to start the school year prepared.

The event was organized by Voices for Children of Broward County, a nonprofit that supports children who have experienced abuse, neglect and abandonment.

According to the organization, the event “is a part of Voices’ year-long 15th anniversary celebration and expands its mission to ensure that every child and young adult in Broward County who has experienced abuse, neglect, or abandonment has access to essential resources and programs that promote long-term stability and well-being.”

Wildberries, Russia's largest online marketplace, is sometimes described as the country’s answer to Amazon. In under two weeks, Ukraine has struck over a dozen of the retailer’s depots, part of Kyiv’s aerial campaign aimed at undermining Moscow's war effort, hurting its economy and making people feel the consequences of the Kremlin’s all-out invasion of Ukraine.

Russian air defenses overnight shot down 635 Ukrainian drones, including over occupied Crimea and the Black and Azov Seas, according to the Defense Ministry in Moscow. The ministry did not say how many were launched or struck targets.

Meanwhile, Russia attacked Ukraine with 133 drones during the night, 24 of which hit targets, according to the Ukrainian air force. Later on Sunday, separate Russian attacks on the Ukrainian cities of Zaporizhzhia and Kharkiv killed at least two people, according to local officials.

Ukraine's campaign against Wildberries

Ukrainian drones targeted a Wildberries warehouse in the Samara region, some 800 kilometers (500 miles) from the Russian-Ukrainian border, according to local Gov. Vyacheslav Fedorishchev. He said a fire had broken out but there were no casualties.

Kyiv’s campaign against Wildberries first hit the company's sites in Elektrostal, just east of Moscow, and in the Tambov region July 18. Strikes followed on facilities across western and southern Russia, as well as Russian-held Crimea. At least nine people have been killed and scores wounded.

Two people were killed as a Ukrainian drone struck a residential building in the Saratov region east of Samara, local. Gov. Roman Busargin said.

He added that the strikes damaged civil infrastructure in Engels, where the deaths took place, and the regional capital, Saratov.

Both cities have been frequent targets for Ukrainian attacks in recent years. Engels hosts a military airbase, while Saratov is home to a large oil refinery.

In Russia’s Bashkortostan region further north, local Gov. Radiy Khabirov said that air defence had repelled a large-scale drone strike on “industrial facilities” in the city of Ufa. He did not specify what exactly was struck, but said that a blaze was being put out.

In the Udmurt Republic further northwest, three civilians died and two more were wounded in a Ukrainian drone strike, according to acting regional head Olga Abramova.

Abramova said air defenses shot down two Ukrainian drones and “prevented an attempted attack” by Kyiv. She said a civilian car was damaged in the strike, without clarifying if drone debris was the cause.

In Ukraine, one person died on Sunday as a Russian guided bomb struck a residential building in the southern city of Zaporizhzhia, according to local administration head Ivan Fedorov. Another attack on Sunday killed one person and set fire to a postal terminal on the outskirts of Kharkiv, in the northwest, said regional administration head Oleh Syniehubov.

Durante el fin de semana, líderes religiosos exhortaron a sus feligreses a hacer oír su voz en esta temporada electoral.

Las autoridades de Miami-Dade han realizado una campaña para promover el voto, en la que responden preguntas y reparten material informativo para los electores, además de ofrecer la posibilidad de inscribirse para votar.

“Estamos aquí para recordarle a todos que hay elecciones y para hacerles saber que pueden votar anticipadamente por correo o acudir el día de las elecciones”, dijo Alina García, supervisora de elecciones de Miami-Dade. “La gente necesita saber que puede ir a cualquier centro de votación anticipada, no tiene que ir a su precinto específico. Pueden hacerlo entre las 7 a.m. y las 3 p.m., y los fines de semana de 8 a.m. a 4 p.m. La próxima semana tendremos un horario nocturno, de 11 a.m. a 7 p.m.”

Dijo que el condado está listo para atender a todos los que deseen votar de forma anticipada.

“Todos nuestros equipos están instalados y listos para funcionar”, señaló García. “Quiero recordarle a todos que votamos en papel, no nos conectamos a internet ni nada por el estilo. Es muy seguro.”

La votación anticipada se extiende hasta el 16 de agosto en Miami-Dade.

Para conocer los horarios y lugares de votación, consulte el sitio web de elecciones de su condado o vea la Guía del Votante de Local 10.

El accidente ocurrió la madrugada del domingo en Leslie Pet Grooming, ubicado cerca de la calle 52 y la avenida 79 del noroeste, en Doral.

Tras retirar el auto con una grúa, la fachada del local quedó con un enorme boquete.

Local 10 News habló con el dueño, quien contó que se despertó alrededor de las 6 a.m. con una llamada de la policía que le avisaba que alguien había chocado contra su negocio.

Dijo que los oficiales le explicaron que el conductor intentaba estacionarse en reversa cuando pisó por error el acelerador en lugar del freno, y así fue como el auto terminó incrustado en el edificio.

El dueño calculó que el choque provocó daños por entre 15,000 y 20,000 dólares.

No se reportaron heridos.

La policía no precisó si el conductor enfrentará algún cargo.

Lots of tropical moisture covers South Floria and daytime heating will trigger that moisture into heavy downpours in spots.

We’re under a marginal threat (level 1 out of 4) of flooding today so street flooding is possible especially in those poor drainage neighborhoods.

Highs will make it into the lower 90s despite the clouds and storms around. Keep the umbrellas handy as these storms could hit anytime this morning, afternoon, or evening.

A wet pattern will settle in through at least midweek so hopefully we’ll put a bit of a dent in our drought. All, for now, is quiet in the tropics.

Trump is not getting a glowing endorsement on his immigration approach from Americans overall, the new survey from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found. Only 39% of U.S. adults approve of his performance on immigration, a decline from 49% at the beginning of his second term.

Despite that, about 8 in 10 Republicans continue to approve of how Trump is handling immigration. That’s a slight decline from the beginning of Trump’s second term, when about 9 in 10 Republicans approved, but his support on the issue within his base has been mostly stable since last summer despite a chaotic year of immigration enforcement actions.

Republicans are also more likely to approve of how Trump is handling immigration than the economy or Iran. In just the past month, Republican approval of Trump's handling of Iran dropped slightly in AP-NORC polling

The poll found that about half of U.S. adults say Trump has “gone too far” on deporting immigrants living in the U.S. illegally. That number has also remained steady for over a year, despite multiple immigration crackdowns that deployed federal law enforcement to large cities and at least 10 deaths involving encounters with immigration officers since the mass deportation campaign began. Republicans, however, are much less likely to say Trump has overstepped in his immigration enforcement actions.

Overall, Trump’s popularity has fallen since he took office last year, but the findings highlight the relatively muted impact of the past year’s aggressive immigration enforcement on his public standing. That’s a contrast with views of his handling of Iran, where he’s seen more recent signs of slippage, even among his own supporters.

Immigration remains a strong issue for Trump with Republicans

Americans remain divided on whether Trump has overstepped on immigration.

About half of U.S. adults say Trump has “gone too far” when it comes to restricting legal immigration, in line with the last time the question was asked in February. Roughly half — 47% — say Trump has exceeded his authority when it comes to deporting immigrants living in the U.S. illegally. In each case, about 3 in 10 say Trump’s actions have been “about right,” and closer to 2 in 10 say he hasn’t gone far enough.

Few Republicans – about 2 in 10 or fewer – say he’s “gone too far” on deporting immigrants in the country illegally or restricting legal immigration.

Most Americans, however, say he’s gone too far when it comes to using traffic stops to find and arrest immigrants living in the U.S. illegally — a practice that was at the center of two recent ICE shootings in Maine — and when it comes to sending federal immigration agents into U.S. cities. Republicans were also less likely to see these as oversteps.

James Leatherman, a 68-year-old Republican from San Antonio, is overall supportive of Trump’s handling of the presidency and backs him on immigration in particular.

“You cannot come in here illegally — you’re breaking the law,” he said.

More Americans disapprove than approve of the way ICE is enforcing immigration laws. About half of Americans “strongly" or “somewhat" disapprove of the agency's approach, while roughly 3 in 10 “strongly" or “somewhat" approve. There's a wide partisan split, though: About 6 in 10 Republicans approve of ICE’s approach, compared with about 2 in 10 independents and just 4% of Democrats.

Eric Coursen, 76, an independent from Chincoteague, Virginia, agrees with the president that there were issues with the immigration system. He said doesn’t believe in open borders — but he’s deeply opposed to how the administration has been enforcing immigration law.

“It’s like taking some bread when you’re hungry and you take it, you’re going to shoot that person rather than just, you know, get them for theft?” he said. “It’s just overkill.”

Trump’s approval on the economy remains low

About 3 in 10 U.S. adults, 32%, approve of how Trump is handling the economy. That’s down from 40% at the start of his second term, and marks a shift from his first presidential term when the economy was a stronger issue for Trump.

During Trump’s first term, his lowest approval on the economy was 40% in December 2017. Now, his rating is well below that.

Roughly 7 in 10 Republicans – 69% – approve of how Trump is handling the economy. That’s roughly in line with the share who approve of how he’s handing the presidency, but it’s slightly below the 78% who approved early in Trump’s second term.

Leatherman, despite his support for Trump, said he's feeling the pinch of higher prices in his budget. “I almost have to go to the bank to get a loan before I go grocery shopping,” he said.

About 7 in 10 U.S. adults describe the nation’s economy as “very” or “somewhat” poor, in line with April. Republicans are more optimistic, with about 6 in 10 saying that the U.S. economy is doing well, compared with about 2 in 10 independents and roughly 1 in 10 Democrats.

More Republicans approve of how Trump is handling healthcare

Healthcare has never been a strong issue for Trump. Unlike with immigration and the economy, a clear majority of U.S. adults has disapproved of Trump’s performance on healthcare across both presidential terms. That hasn’t changed in the new poll, which found that only about 3 in 10 Americans approve of how Trump is handling healthcare, in line with when the question was last asked in December.

He’s seen a rebound on the issue among his own supporters since late last year, though. Roughly 71% of Republicans now approve, compared with 59% in the December poll.

That shift comes as Democrats kicked off 100 days until the midterm elections last week, with leaders saying they’ll focus on healthcare cuts, in addition to the cost of living and the war in Iran. Democrats and independents continue to overwhelmingly disapprove of Trump’s handling of healthcare.

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The AP-NORC poll of 1,165 adults was conducted July 23-27 using a sample drawn from NORC’s probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for adults overall is plus or minus 3.7 percentage points. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus 6.0 for Republicans overall and plus or minus 5.4 for Democrats overall.

The remarks by Doron Spielman, spokesperson for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office, were some of the first public comments since U.S. President Donald Trump announced the agreement.

Spielman told The Associated Press that Israel's intelligence assessment is that Hamas remains committed to rebuilding its military rather than genuinely demilitarizing. He said the Israeli military would not withdraw from Gaza — where it controls more than 60% of the territory — before Hamas disarms.

“Our assessment is that if we redeploy before Hamas is truly disarmed, it will quickly expand its presence throughout Gaza, rebuild its terrorist infrastructure, once again threaten Israeli communities, and seek to carry out another Oct. 7-style attack,” he said, referring to the Hamas militant attack on Israel in 2023 that triggered the war in the Gaza Strip.

“Disarming means physically giving up the weapons. Nothing less,” Spielman said.

His comments come days after Hamas said that it would begin disarming as part of the U.S.-brokered ceasefire signed nine months ago to end the nearly three-year-long conflict. It marks a potential breakthrough in ending the conflict, but many hurdles, conditions and long timelines remain.

Hamas says it's agreed to disarm but the process has obstacles

Trump’s 20-point ceasefire plan calls on the militant group to surrender its weapons and destroy its vast network of tunnels. It also envisions Israeli forces withdrawing from Gaza, the arrival of a new technocratic Palestinian government, deployment of an international security force and the rebuilding of the battered Palestinian enclave.

Hamas disarming has been a sticking point and has deadlocked negotiations for months. In announcing the deal on social media on Thursday, Trump said it would be carried out in “carefully structured phases.”

A copy of the agreement obtained and verified by the AP said that all weapons held by the Hamas-run police will be transferred to the U.S.-backed Palestinian technocratic committee, known as the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza, upon its arrival in the enclave. It’s not clear when that would happen since it is contingent on other steps.

A process to decommission and store heavy weapons and to dismantle military production sites and tunnels will begin after the arrival of the Palestinian committee and the deployment of international forces. The process will be linked to a phased Israeli withdrawal, according to the agreement.

The areas Israel controls in Gaza have been mostly destroyed and depopulated. Most of the territory’s 2 million Palestinians are in the other part, where hundreds of thousands live in squalid tent camps and destroyed neighborhoods.

Israel appears unlikely to pull back significant forces or make other concessions ahead of its October elections. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu faces a tough reelection battle, with his far-right coalition partners urging him to keep up the pressure on Hamas and leave forces in Gaza, and opponents accusing him of failing to prevent the Oct. 7, 2023, attack.

Hamas-led militants attacked Israeli communities then, killing around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking 251 others hostage. Israel responded with a punishing military offensive that has killed more than 73,000 people, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.

The ministry, which was part of the recently dissolved Hamas-run government, maintains detailed records viewed as generally reliable by U.N. agencies and international organizations. It does not distinguish between civilians and militants but says women and children make up around half of all fatalities.

Israel warns that Hamas is rearming

While Spielman said Israel greatly appreciates Trump’s commitment to its security and to finding a durable resolution, the government's position on disarmament is based on detailed intelligence saying that Hamas continues to rearm, recruit fighters, and rebuild its military capabilities.

The White House did not provide additional comments on Sunday, when asked specifically about Israel’s assessment that Hamas remains committed to rebuilding its military.

U.S. officials, who briefed reporters on the disarmament agreement last week, said that Israel had been consulted at every step of the negotiations and was not being asked to do anything more than what it had committed to as part of the ceasefire and hostage release agreement signed last October.

It's unclear what exactly Israel conveyed to the White House. Two people with knowledge of the deal told the AP that Israel had communicated its issues with it to former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who's part of the Trump-led Board of Peace. One of them said that among the points Israel wanted was freedom to conduct military operations in Gaza. They spoke anonymously because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

According to another person familiar with the deal, the Israelis raised two other issues: that Qatar and Turkey not be involved in verifying the stages of the agreement, and that Hamas’ weapons be destroyed after confiscation. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

Israel continues to strike Gaza

Since the ceasefire was signed last October, Israel has continued striking Gaza, saying it’s targeting Hamas and its infrastructure.

Local Gaza hospitals said at least 17 were killed in the latest Israeli strikes, including children. A strike on a residential apartment in southern Gaza killed three family members, including their 4-year-old child, according to Nasser hospital, where the bodies arrived.

The Israeli military said the strikes had targeted militant operatives.

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Associated Press writer Aamer Madhani in Washington contributed to this report.

The Alpine Club of Pakistan identified the recovered climbers as Purja, Wang Zhong, Nima Sherpa and Kili Pemba Sherpa. The club praised military and civilian rescuers and volunteers involved in the recovery effort.

On Friday, rescuers located four other bodies but were able to recover only three — Omani Nathira Ahmed, American Mallory Geis and Nepalese Bahadur Gurung — because harsh weather grounded search-and-rescue helicopters.

Military-backed rescue teams resumed the search Sunday for the two remaining climbers, while efforts continued to bring down the bodies of Purja and the three others found by the ground team, local officials said.

On Saturday, Purja’s expedition company said the world had lost one of mountaineering’s greats. The company described him as “a leader who inspired millions through his courage, humility and unwavering belief that human potential is far greater than we often imagine.”

Alpine Club of Pakistan President Irfan Arshad Khan said the tragedy was “an immeasurable loss to the global mountaineering fraternity.” He paid tribute to military and civilian rescuers and Sherpas who took part in the search mission.

The expedition was led by Purja, the Nepal-born former British Army soldier widely known as Nims Dai.

He climbed the world’s 14 highest peaks in a record 189 days in 2019, an achievement featured in the Netflix documentary “14 Peaks: Nothing Is Impossible.” His record was broken in 2023.

A statement from Geis’ family said, “Mallory was a bright light who was loved deeply by her family and friends. She will be profoundly missed.”

The expedition was expected to be the last one for Pakistani guide Sohail Sakhi, who worked with Moving Mountains, a Pakistan-based adventure travel company. Sakhi also was a geographer and high-altitude photographer who had climbed some of the world’s major peaks, according to the company’s website. His body remained missing on Sunday.

Accidents are common on climbing expeditions in northern Pakistan because of avalanches, falling ice and rock, extreme altitude and rapidly changing weather.

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Riaz Khan reported from Peshawar, Pakistan.

Most of the 60,000 migrants who swam, scrambled and later charged into the tiny Spanish exclave in North Africa this week had walked back to Morocco by Sunday, but some stayed on in the hills surrounding the city. Spanish authorities continued searching for bodies in the waters near the stretch of urban beach that tens of thousand of migrants had breached days earlier.

Shops in Ceuta reopened, and the usual blend of residents and tourists in the city of 84,000 were filling the open-air terraces, restaurants and cafes.

At least 72 migrants died, including some who drowned and others who were killed in a stampede to cross a breakwater barrier, Spanish authorities said Sunday. Morocco reported 11 deaths on its side of the border, but it wasn’t immediately clear if these were in addition to those reported by Spain. The kingdom's authorities blamed misinformation and human traffickers for the breach, adding that they were investigating the events.

But the city that prides itself on being home to four cultures was still grappling with the aftermath of the border surge, with locals disagreeing on what caused it and who exactly is to blame.

“It's not the young men's fault,” said Mohamad Abdelkader Driss, 44, a waiter at a fish restaurant in town. “If you open the border, of course everyone comes in, but the young men aren't to blame. The authorities are responsible.”

Some migrants who returned to Morocco described a border that was effectively open and said authorities did little as they watched thousands of people cross.

The unauthorized arrivals on Thursday and Friday of 50,000 to 60,000, mostly young men, swelled Ceuta's population by more than half. Abdelkader lamented what happened, but said that those who breached the border behaved relatively well.

“It could have been much worse,” he said.

Far-right politicians call for remaining migrants to be expelled

The humanitarian crisis caused by the sudden rush of people reignited a debate around immigration in Europe and beyond. Over the weekend, far-right, anti-immigrant Spanish politicians and well-known right-wing influencers descended on the city, sparking counterprotests that included members of the Spanish city's large Muslim population, many of whom are of Moroccan descent.

Alvise Pérez, a far-right Spanish politician and member of the European Parliament, called on Saturday evening for migrants to be expelled as he faced an angry crowd of rival protesters. Pérez eventually had to shelter in a bar as residents banged on the windows, until police escorted him away.

Among the counter-protesters on Saturday was 20-year-old Ceuta resident and student Noor Ahmed. She denounced the protest and presence of figures like Pérez in her city as opportunistic.

“They just want to take advantage of the humanitarian crisis Ceuta is currently experiencing,” Ahmed said.

Santiago Abascal, the leader of the far-right Vox party, visited Ceuta on Sunday, slamming the Spanish government for the surge in migrant arrivals, which he called “an invasion.”

“The frontiers of Ceuta and Melilla are the walls of our home and homeland, and they are not being protected by a corrupt and traitorous government,” he said.

The Pope said he was alarmed

Pope Leo XIV on Sunday said he was “following with concern the alarming situation in Ceuta, asking God … that solutions of peace, stability and justice may be found.”

Migration has been one of Pope Leo’s priorities, which he underlined during a recent visit to Spain's Canary Islands, one of Europe’s main migrant entry ports.

The Mutiara Sentosa 2 ferry was traveling from Indonesia's second-largest city of Surabaya in East Java to the city of Makassar in South Sulawesi, with 232 passengers, 39 crew members and 181 vehicles, mostly trucks, and an excavator, when the fire broke out between 6 a.m. and 7 a.m. in waters off Sumenep regency, according to Indonesia’s National Search and Rescue Agency, or Basarnas.

The ferry operator, PT Atosim Lampung Pelayaran, reported the incident to the Surabaya search and rescue office about an hour later, Basarnas said in a statement. It said the company received information from the ferry's captain that the vessel was on fire near the northern tip of Madura island, but contact was later lost.

By 9:45 a.m., authorities determined the ferry was about 19 nautical miles north of Buruan Sapudi island after communicating with the nearby cargo vessel Meratus Project 3, which was unable to approach the burning vessel closely because it was carrying a flammable load.

Footage released by the National Search and Rescue Agency showed thick black smoke billowing from one side of the ferry and spreading across much of the ship while videos circulating on social media and messaging groups showed terrified passengers, mostly wearing life jackets, could be seen clustered on the deck and upper sections of the vessel awaiting rescue, some jumping into the sea as orange flames and black smoke billowed from the burning vessel.

The ferry was reported to be nearly engulfed by flames, with passengers gathered on the bridge and bow. A tugboat and another passing vessel moved in and began evacuating passengers shortly before 10 a.m., the statement said.

By Sunday evening, several nearby vessels managed to rescue 227 passengers and crew and recovered five bodies. At least 39 people remained unaccounted for.

The cause of the fire was not immediately known and remained under investigation.

Ahmad Abdul Karim, one of the survivors, said the fire appeared to have started from a truck on the lower vehicle deck.

“Someone came up from the lower deck and told us there was a fire. When we went down to check, two vehicles were already burning," Karim said, "Fanned by the wind, the flames spread extremely quickly. In less than 30 minutes, everyone had been instructed to move to the bow of the ferry.”

Search and rescue teams dispatched a rescue vessel from Surabaya, although officials estimated it would take about six hours to reach the scene. A rigid inflatable boat from the Sumenep rescue post was sent toward the location but later returned to shore because of rough seas and high waves. The Indonesian Navy also deployed a warship to assist.

The 160 meters (525 feet) long and 25 meters (82 feet) wide ferry was built in Japan in 1992 and operated on the Osaka-Shinmoji route as the “Ferry Osaka” before being sold to Indonesia in 2015. It serves the Surabaya-Makassar route, a voyage that typically takes around 40 hours and is primarily used by domestic travelers and cargo transport between Java and Sulawesi.

Indonesia is an archipelago of more than 17,000 islands where ferries are a common method of travel. Disasters occur regularly, with weak safety enforcement often blamed.

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Karmini reported from Jakarta. Associated Press writer Edna Tarigan in Jakarta, Indonesia, contributed to this report.

Desperate to save his job as chair of the Democratic National Committee, he is avoiding media appearances, monitoring his critics' social media posts and refusing — at least so far — to make any substantive changes at his troubled organization.

A half dozen state leaders and other committee members, most of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal conversations, described Martin as defensive and extremely distrustful of others, even some people on his own team, as calls for his resignation grow louder among Democratic operatives who lament his leadership decisions, lackluster fundraising and even his tendency to lash out in anger.

But there is no sign that the organization's membership plans to replace Martin before the midterm elections in November, even as some wonder how much longer he can hold on. The drama threatens to undermine the party's momentum in the battle to retake control of Congress from President Donald Trump's Republican Party.

“I sense no movement from the DNC to make a change, and so that decision’s up to Ken. And he’s told me he’s in it, so I trust him on making that decision," said Colorado Democratic Party Chair Shad Murib, a DNC member and strong Martin supporter. “What we’re seeing right now is a whole group of folks who live on Twitter and consultants fighting harder against Ken Martin than they’ve ever fought against Donald Trump.”

Martin did not grant an interview request. In a recent Substack post, Martin defended himself this way: “If the question is whether the Democratic Party will be ready to win — everywhere, at every level, in this election and for the decade ahead — the answer is a resounding yes.”

Martin's critics are everywhere all at once and some want him out

As one of its most important responsibilities, the DNC is tasked with building out the party's national infrastructure, including fundraising, to support the Democrats' next presidential nominee. Yet few members of the next class of White House prospects are willing to speak out on Martin’s behalf.

Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, who has traveled to key states in recent weeks before a potential presidential bid, praised the DNC for embracing a new primary calendar that promotes more diverse states such as South Carolina and Nevada.

But Moore declined three separate times to answer directly when asked whether he has confidence in Martin heading into 2028.

“My confidence is in the people,” Moore told The Associated Press. “My confidence is in making sure that we have a system in place that actually allows the people’s voices to be heard."

He said he is not looking for "wins on behalf of a political structure or party bosses.”

Others have been explicitly critical of Martin.

Shannon Watts, the former leader of Moms Demand Action and a member of the DNC’s finance committee in 2024, criticized Martin’s lack of communication with donors and key stakeholders. She said she was ready and willing to help Martin after he took over last year, but he never called.

She did, however, get a call from a DNC staffer urging her to delete a social media post that was critical of Martin. Such calls have become common occurrences in recent months.

“Ken needs to step aside. I think Ken knows he needs to step aside," Watts said. “There’s a reason he’s worried he’s going to be fired and it’s because he’s not up to the job.”

Even those close to Martin, including senior members of the DNC leadership, privately complain that Martin is not doing more to maintain ties with committee members, donors and prominent outside officials. He was known for building strong relationships in his previous post as leader of the Association of State Democratic Chairs, which is largely why he was elected national chair.

His allies are baffled as to why he has not done the same in his new job. There are also lingering frustrations over how Martin handled the follow-up report on the 2024 election. He promised to release the document, then withheld it, then eventually made it public while saying it was too flawed to be helpful.

Dems look to a possible change but there's no clear alternative right now

Few expect Martin to be replaced before the fall elections, largely because no clear alternative has emerged as the midterms loom. But members are looking toward the DNC's winter meeting after the November contests — and before the 2028 presidential primary process begins in earnest — as the most likely time to make a leadership change.

Former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley has fielded calls to discuss a candidacy to replace Martin, according to a person with knowledge of the conversations who requested anonymity to discuss private discussions. O'Malley, who did not respond to a request for comment, finished a distant third in the DNC chair election last winter.

The growing chorus of criticism has shaken the confidence of Martin's loyalists.

They were especially concerned about an essay this week by Rufus Gifford, the finance chairman for President Joe Biden’s reelection campaign, who warned that the DNC under Martin’s leadership was “spiraling toward irrelevance."

“At this point, I think there is no saving Martin’s chairmanship. He is a good man with good intentions but simply not meeting this critical moment,” Gifford wrote on Substack. “As Democrats, the only solution is to acknowledge the problem and fix it. Now.”

One Martin ally likened the fallout from Gifford's statement to the day after Biden's disastrous debate performance that effectively forced him to abandon his reelection campaign.

Martin has stayed on the road but remained quiet

Martin got a lifeline this week from New York Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, the House Democratic leader, who said while campaigning in Pennsylvania that Martin “has my full support.”

Jeffries noted that Democrats have won the overwhelming majority of elections since Martin took over the DNC, which also coincides with Trump's return to the White House. Jeffries also played down the party's financial challenges.

Federal filings show that the DNC reported about $16.3 million in the bank with more than $18 million in debt at the end of June, compared with the Republican National Committee reporting more than $128 million in cash and no debt.

The DNC under Martin used the party’s Washington headquarters as collateral to secure a $15 million line of credit last fall. His critics seized on the decision as an example of financial mismanagement, although the building was used as collateral under former party chairs as well.

DNC officials note that the committee has actually raised more money under Martin than it raised in 2018, the last time the party did not have the White House in a midterm year.

“The current DNC has raised the most money of any DNC without the White House in the 198-year history of the Democratic Party," Martin wrote recently on Substack.

While Martin has avoided national media appearances, which are considered a major responsibility for the chair, he has been traveling almost constantly to support party officials and key stakeholders across the country.

He visited six states over the past two weeks alone. This past week, for example, he met with civil rights leaders in Nashville, Tennessee, and mayors from across the country in Atlanta.

Kansas Democratic Party Chair Jeanna Repass said Martin should be praised for his commitment to strengthening state parties at a critical moment. Indeed, instead of hoarding the DNC's cash, Martin is distributing it aggressively to needy state parties, just as he promised while campaigning for the chairmanship.

“This is a ridiculous conversation to be having right now,” Repass said. “If people don’t like Ken, they can have a conversation with him in two years. But right now, we all need to be behind the chair and keep our heads down and do our jobs.”

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Associated Press writers Steven Sloan in Oklahoma City, Mike Catalini in Bethlehem, Pa., and Matt Brown in Washington contributed to this report.

The blast on Saturday evening at the Balzi Rossi, an upscale Italian establishment in central Moscow, killed three people, including the woman bomber, Russian state media said, citing local officials.

“Yesterday, a brutal terrorist act was committed in Moscow that claimed human lives. The victims are currently in the city’s hospitals, where they are receiving all necessary care,” Sobyanin wrote on social media Sunday.

He added that a probe into the attack was underway. “Those responsible for committing this crime will certainly be found and will face the punishment they deserve,” he wrote.

At least 21 people were wounded when the explosive device detonated at the restaurant on Kudrinskaya Square, the National Anti-Terrorism Committee said late on Saturday, according to Russian state news agency Ria Novosti.

A woman attempted to smuggle the bomb into the establishment, but a security guard refused to let her in before the bomb exploded, reported Ria Novosti. The Moscow Investigative Committee said on Saturday evening the attack was still being investigated.

As of early afternoon on Sunday, there was no further information from Russian authorities, and no one had publicly claimed responsibility.

According to Ria Novosti, the restaurant was closed for a private function on Saturday evening.

Footage released by Russian state media showed heavily armed law-enforcement officers, several ambulances and other emergency vehicles at the site.

Earlier this year, Russia’s Federal Security Service announced that authorities would tighten security around senior military and government officials, after a series of assassination attempts in Russian cities that followed the Kremlin's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

So far, Russian authorities have not drawn any connections between Saturday's blast and these earlier attacks or the war in Ukraine.

Russia previously said Kyiv was behind a car bombing in Moscow last April that killed Lt. Gen. Yaroslav Moskalik, a deputy head of the main operational department in Russia’s General Staff. Ukraine did not publicly claim responsibility.

But Ukraine's SBU security service earlier said it had organized the killing in December 2024 of Lt. Gen. Igor Kirillov, who headed the Russian military's nuclear, biological and chemical protection forces.

Kirillov was killed by a bomb hidden in a scooter outside his apartment building in Moscow, a day after Ukraine’s security service leveled criminal charges against him.

Among other prominent victims of bombing attacks in Russia were Daria Dugina, the daughter of influential nationalist thinker Aleksandr Dugin, and Vladlen Tatarsky, a well-known pro-Kremlin military blogger.

Kyiv denied involvement in the attack on Dugina, and did not respond to Russian accusations that it was behind Tatarsky’s death.

Cada helicóptero llevaba dos tripulantes, informó el departamento de bomberos griego. Se estaba llevando a cabo una operación de búsqueda y rescate cerca de Porto Germeno, y las autoridades no dieron información al momento sobre el estado de las personas a bordo.

La colisión dejó al descubierto el peligro en el frente más volátil de la emergencia de incendios forestales en Europa. Vientos huracanados empujaban las llamas hacia el interior de la región de Atenas y forzaban nuevas evacuaciones, Francia vigila las llamas en una extensa zona calcinada cuatro veces mayor que París para evitar que volvieran a expandirse y los grandes incendios de España por fin dejaron de avanzar.

El peligro inmediato se concentraba en Grecia. Las llamas se propagaron por el oeste de Ática, la región administrativa que incluye la capital, amenazando comunidades y un distrito industrial a las afueras de la ciudad de Megara, mientras las violentas ráfagas impedían que los aviones de extinción de incendios recogieran agua del mar. El peligro traía recuerdos sombríos en una región donde el incendio forestal de Mati de 2018 mató a 104 personas, el más mortífero de Europa en este siglo.

Pero la evolución de los fuegos más al oeste ofrecía poca sensación de que la emergencia estuviera terminando. El mayor incendio forestal de Francia seguía contenido dentro de su perímetro después de que 224.000 personas se vieran obligadas a huir en lo que pudo haber sido la mayor evacuación civil del país fuera de tiempos de guerra.

Todavía ardían focos activos en los 420 kilómetros cuadrados (162 millas cuadradas) de bosque devastado, muchos miles seguían sin poder regresar a casa y unos 3.000 bomberos seguían desplegados contra el megaincendio de Gironda y un segundo foco en Provenza que todavía no estaba contenido.

Sólo en Francia y España, el fuego ha expulsado aproximadamente a un tercio de millón de personas de hogares y lugares de vacaciones, ha vaciado comunidades en pleno verano europeo y ha puesto al límite a bomberos, aeronaves y servicios de emergencia en desastres simultáneos.

Una amenaza que se extiende por Europa

Las evacuaciones masivas en Francia y España son la medida más reciente de una amenaza de incendios forestales que crece en toda Europa.

Europa entró en 2026 tras su peor año de incendios forestales registrado, cuando ardieron más de 10.000 kilómetros cuadrados (3.860 millas cuadradas) en 2025. En las últimas cuatro décadas, los incendios forestales se han vinculado a casi 800 muertes en gran parte de Europa, según la Agencia Europea de Medio Ambiente.

Europa es el continente que se está calentando más rápido, ya que las temperaturas aumentan al doble de velocidad que el promedio global desde la década de 1980, según el Servicio de Cambio Climático Copernicus de la Unión Europea.

El cambio climático provocado por el ser humano hizo que las condiciones extremas de los incendios en Francia este año fueran al menos dos veces más probables, de acuerdo con científicos de World Weather Attribution en un análisis rápido realizado mientras los incendios aún seguían activos.

Vientos huracanados paralizan las labores cerca de Atenas

En Grecia se desplegaron cerca de 500 bomberos y 23 aeronaves, pero los vientos huracanados empujaron las llamas a través del bosque seco y paralizaron la respuesta, impidiendo que algunas aeronaves llegaran al mar para recoger agua.

Las autoridades griegas ordenaron la evacuación de Kandili, Agia Skepi y Toutouli mientras el humo se elevaba sobre las montañas. Las autoridades estaban especialmente preocupadas por Porto Germeno, una comunidad costera en el golfo de Corinto. El primer ministro, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, fue informado sobre la operación.

El incendio comenzó el viernes cerca de Agios Vasileios antes de barrer hacia Porto Germeno y adentrarse en las montañas boscosas al oeste de Atenas. Los bomberos evacuaron por mar a 254 personas el viernes y a otras 12 el sábado —una vía de escape de último recurso cuando el fuego y el humo cortan las pocas carreteras de salida de comunidades costeras.

El meteorólogo de incendios forestales Theodore Giannaros estimó que el incendio afectó entre 40 y 50 kilómetros cuadrados (15 a 19 millas cuadradas), mientras las autoridades no han emitido una cifra oficial.

En otros lugares de Grecia, las llamas ardían peligrosamente cerca de viviendas en Cefalonia, lo que obligó a evacuar aldeas del interior mientras aeronaves realizaban descargas de agua sobre la isla turística jónica. Los bomberos combatían otro incendio cerca de Nea Tenedos, en Calcídica.

A principios de esta semana, dos bomberos murieron combatiendo un incendio en Creta, mientras que un tercero murió en el Peloponeso.

“Un bosque prístino, un paraíso, fue entregado a las manos del fuego”, dijo el sábado el agricultor local Minas Tzortzanis. “No hay palabras para explicar lo que ha pasado. Destrucción. Destrucción total”.

Francia vigila una extensa zona calcinada

En el suroeste de Francia, el megaincendio en la región de Gironda seguía contenido dentro de su perímetro el domingo, aunque aún ardía, después de calcinar unos 420 kilómetros cuadrados (162 millas cuadradas) de bosque en apenas 10 días.

“La situación del incendio está ahora fija, lo que no significa que el incendio esté extinguido”, indicó el domingo la prefectura de Gironda, utilizando el término de los bomberos franceses para un fuego que ha quedado contenido dentro de su perímetro.

La región sigue bajo la máxima alerta roja por incendios forestales en Francia. Las condiciones secas, las temperaturas en fuerte ascenso alrededor de Burdeos y los vientos de la tarde elevaban el riesgo de que las llamas se reavivaran.

En Le Porge, funcionarios locales dijeron que unas 150 viviendas fueron destruidas. El mecánico Matthieu Plessis regresó el sábado a las ruinas de una casa que llevaba siete generaciones en su familia.

“Hay lugares que ya ni siquiera reconozco”, dijo. “Ya ni siquiera sabes qué había aquí, o quién vivía dónde”.

El domingo y el lunes se esperaba la llegada de bomberos adicionales procedentes de Ucrania, Lituania y la Polinesia Francesa para reforzar el operativo.

El fuego en Provenza deja de expandirse, pero aún no está contenido

En el sureste de Francia, cerca de 1.500 bomberos combatían un incendio separado en el departamento de Var que arrasó aproximadamente 18 kilómetros cuadrados (7 millas cuadradas) en poco más de un día.

El incendio de Gros Bessillon se estabilizó el domingo después de que su perímetro se mantuviera durante la noche, pero todavía no está contenido. Unas 2.500 personas fueron evacuadas mientras las llamas amenazaban comunidades cercanas.

Este es el cuarto gran incendio que golpea el centro de Var desde el 19 de julio. Otro más pequeño cerca de Brignoles a comienzos de la semana obligó al actor George Clooney y a su familia, junto con unos 700 residentes más, a evacuar antes de que fuera controlado.

El primer ministro, Sébastien Lecornu, señaló que los incendios forestales en Francia, por lo general, estaban bajo control, pero advirtió que las condiciones seguían siendo muy cambiantes. Lecornu también anunció el nombramiento de un coordinador nacional para supervisar la reconstrucción en las zonas devastadas.

Más de 1.170 kilómetros cuadrados (452 millas cuadradas) se han quemado en toda Francia desde el inicio del año.

España mantiene la línea mientras los equipos vigilan los perímetros

Los grandes incendios de España —parte de una temporada que ha matado al menos a 13 personas, produjo el mayor fuego forestal registrado del país y provocó una emergencia nacional — ya no avanzaban el domingo.

En la provincia de Zamora, cerca de la frontera portuguesa, más de 20 unidades terrestres y aéreas vigilan el perímetro del incendio de Fermoselle para evitar rebrotes en el escarpado paisaje de Arribes del Duero. La mayoría de los evacuados había regresado a casa, según medios locales.

El presidente del gobierno, Pedro Sánchez, ha pedido un pacto nacional para hacer frente a los incendios forestales, advirtiendo que el cambio climático los está haciendo más destructivos.

________

Adamson informó desde París; Nicolas Garriga en Lacanau, Francia; Michael Varaklas en Megara, Grecia; y Colleen Barry en Milán.

________

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

The collision laid bare the danger at the most volatile front of Europe’s wildfire emergency. Strong winds drove flames deeper into the region of the Greek capital and forced fresh evacuations, France guarded a still-burning scar four times the size of Paris, while Spain’s major fires stopped advancing.

Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis expressed “sorrow for the tragic accident” and extended condolences to the families of the firefighters killed in the crash.

"The loss of the Greek coordinator and the Danish pilot at the time they were attempting the major fire in Porto Gremeno fills us all with grief," Mitsotakis said in a statement.

The aircraft were Bell helicopters operating over the Psatha area west of Athens, each with a two-person crew. Foreign firefighting and helicopter crews are often deployed in Greece to help tackle wildfires during the country’s hot, dry summers.

The two crew members who were recovered alive were a Greek and a British national.

The flames had spread rapidly, threatening communities and an industrial district as violent gusts prevented firefighting aircraft from collecting water from the sea. The blaze carried a grim resonance in a region where the 2018 Mati wildfire killed 104 people, Europe’s deadliest blaze this century.

Farther west, containment brought no end to the emergency. France’s largest wildfire remained held within its perimeter after forcing 224,000 people to flee in what may have been the country’s largest civilian evacuation outside wartime.

Hot spots still burned within a 420-square-kilometer (162-square-mile) scar, thousands remained unable to return home, and nearly 3,000 firefighters were deployed against the Gironde megafire and a second, still-uncontained blaze in Provence.

Together, fires in France and Spain have driven roughly a third of a million people from homes and vacation sites, emptied communities at the height of the European summer and stretched emergency services across simultaneous disasters.

Record fire damage underscores Europe’s growing wildfire threat

The mass evacuations in France and Spain are the latest measure of a wildfire threat growing across Europe.

The continent entered 2026 after its worst fire year on record, with more than 10,000 square kilometers (3,860 square miles) burned in 2025. Over the past four decades, wildfires have been linked to nearly 800 deaths across much of Europe, according to the European Environment Agency.

Europe is the world’s fastest-warming continent. It has warmed more than twice the global average since the 1980s, according to the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service.

Human-caused climate change made the extreme fire-weather conditions behind this year’s French blazes at least twice as likely, scientists at World Weather Attribution found in a rapid analysis conducted while the fires were still burning.

Gale-force winds cripple aerial assault near Athens

Nearly 500 firefighters and 23 aircraft were deployed, but gale-force winds drove flames through dry forest and crippled the response, preventing some aircraft from reaching the sea to collect water.

Authorities ordered the evacuation of Kandili, Agia Skepi and Toutouli as smoke rose over the mountains. Crews were particularly concerned about Porto Germeno, a seaside community on the Gulf of Corinth.

The fire began Friday near Agios Vasileios before sweeping toward Porto Germeno and into the forested mountains west of Athens. Firefighters evacuated 254 people by sea Friday and another 12 Saturday — often the last escape route when fire and smoke cut the few roads from coastal communities.

Wildfire meteorologist Theodore Giannaros estimated the blaze had affected 40 to 50 square kilometers (15 to 19 square miles), though authorities had issued no official figure.

Elsewhere in Greece, flames threatened homes on Kefalonia, forcing evacuations from inland communities as aircraft made water drops over the Ionian island. Firefighters battled another blaze near Nea Tenedos on the peninsula of Halkidiki.

Earlier this week, two firefighters died fighting a fire on Crete, while a third was killed on the Peloponnese.

“A pristine forest, a paradise, was surrendered to the hands of the fire,” local farmer Minas Tzortzanis said Saturday. “There are no words to explain what has happened. Destruction. Total destruction.”

France holds off renewed flames

In southwestern France, the Gironde megafire remained held within its perimeter Sunday but continued to burn after scorching 420 square kilometers (162 square miles) of forest in 10 days.

“The fire is now fixed, which does not mean that the fire is extinguished,” the Gironde prefecture said, using the French firefighting term for a blaze whose advance has been stopped.

The region remained under France’s highest red forest-fire alert. Dry conditions, soaring temperatures around Bordeaux and afternoon winds threatened to rekindle the flames.

In Le Porge, local officials said about 150 homes were destroyed. Mechanic Matthieu Plessis returned Saturday to the ruins of a house that had been in his family for seven generations.

“There are places I don’t even recognize anymore,” he said. “You don’t even know what was here anymore, or who lived where.”

Firefighters from Ukraine, Lithuania and French Polynesia were expected Sunday and Monday to reinforce the operation.

Provence fire stops advancing but remains uncontained

In southeastern France, nearly 1,500 firefighters battled a separate blaze in the Var department that tore through about 18 square kilometers (7 square miles) in little more than a day.

The Gros Bessillon fire was stabilized Sunday after its perimeter held overnight, but it remained uncontained. Some 2,500 people were evacuated as flames threatened nearby communities.

It was the fourth major fire to strike central Var since July 19. A smaller blaze near Brignoles earlier in the week forced actor George Clooney and his family, along with about 700 other residents, to evacuate before it was brought under control.

Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu said France’s fires were generally under control but warned that conditions remained volatile. He appointed a national coordinator to oversee reconstruction in fire-ravaged areas.

More than 1,170 square kilometers (452 square miles) have burned across France this year.

Spain’s deadly fire siege eases

Spain’s major fires — which have killed at least 13 people, produced the country’s largest recorded wildfire and prompted a national emergency — were no longer advancing on Sunday.

In Zamora province near the Portuguese border, more than 20 ground and aerial units guarded the perimeter of the Fermoselle fire against flare-ups in the rugged Arribes del Duero landscape. Most evacuees had returned home, according to local media.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has called for a national pact to confront wildfires, warning that climate change is making them increasingly destructive.

___

Adamson reported from Paris. Associated Press writers Nicolas Garriga in Lacanau, France; Michael Varaklas in Megara, Greece; and Colleen Barry in Milan contributed to this report.

If the constitutional amendment passes, supporters hope to elect at least four conservative, anti-abortion justices to the seven-member court by 2033.

Kansas is considering the change amid concerns that increasingly contentious and expensive judicial elections in other states are making their courts more partisan and less independent. Spending in a single state Supreme Court race in Wisconsin last year topped $100 million.

Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly, a term-limited Democrat who opposes the measure, said gerrymandering and dark money have put the Legislature out of step with the state and, “to think you can make the judicial branch a part of that dysfunctional system is frightening.”

Republicans have a long list of rulings they question

GOP lawmakers cite multiple rulings by Kansas courts over the past two decades as reasons for change.

Most recently, a district court judge earlier this month reinstated a three-day grace period for voters to return mail ballots after Election Day, which GOP lawmakers had eliminated. Kansas Senate President Ty Masterson, seeking the Republican nomination for governor, called the decision “outrageous” and urged people to vote yes on the ballot question.

The same judge — a finalist to fill the most recent Supreme Court vacancy — blocked enforcement of a 2025 law banning gender-affirming care for transgender minors. Masterson described him as “radical.”

The list of rulings Republicans criticize also includes rulings on education funding back to 2004. Supreme Court decisions forced lawmakers to increase funding to comply with the state constitution.

“If we elect our Supreme Court, they won't force you to spend money on schools,” Masterson said in remarks in November to a conservative group, the Marion County Patriots for Liberty, the Marion County Record reported.

Abortion remains a key issue on both sides

Electing state Supreme Court justices gained currency among Republicans after a 2022 public vote affirming the high court’s landmark 2019 decision that Kansas' bill of rights guarantees bodily autonomy and access to abortion. Total spending by both sides has exceeded $12 million.

Legislators who worked to overturn the Supreme Court's protections, including Masterson, helped write this year's proposal.

Seven weeks after that 2022 vote, Attorney General Kris Kobach, then a GOP candidate for the office, told a Republican club in Wichita that electing justices would “slowly and quietly” put anti-abortion justices on the high court.

The vote-yes campaign's biggest donor — providing $1.7 million toward the campaign's $3.7 million in spending — is a Nashville-based nonprofit that supports Republican candidates, groups and causes. Kansans for Life, the state's most influential anti-abortion group, has spent at least $87,000 over the past 11 days on mailers and texts.

“Kansans can bring an end to this reign of abortion by voting ‘yes,’” Troy Newman, president of Operation Rescue, said in an editorial written by a staffer on the anti-abortion group’s website.

Meanwhile, the national and state affiliates for abortion provider Planned Parenthood contributed another $1.6 million toward the vote-no campaign's $8 million-plus in spending.

Jamie Swan, an engineer and college teaching assistant who knocked on doors for abortion rights in 2022, is doing the same to try to halt the proposal.

“I really believe that this is just a power grab,” she said.

Kansas legislators have no say in appointments

Backers of the Kansas proposal brush aside arguments that electing the justices will give wealthy donors control over the Supreme Court.

“Globally and over history, even in its imperfection, the best system is democracy,” said Elizabeth Patton, state director of the low-tax, small-government group Americans for Prosperity, which has spent $935,000 to promote the vote-yes campaign.

Twenty-two states elect their top court’s judges, eight in partisan races. Governors in 26 states appoint them. In South Carolina and Virginia, legislators pick the justices.

Kansas elected justices for nearly 100 years before voters amended the state constitution in 1958. The governor now picks one of three finalists named by a nominating commission controlled by attorneys. Legislators have no role.

A review of every state’s current and past constitutions shows that the last state to add an amendment like the one Kansas is contemplating was Mississippi in 1914. Since then, 18 states’ amendments went the opposite way.

Voters weigh in every six years on whether a justice remains on the bench through a yes-or-no ballot question, but they’ve never booted a sitting justice. Conservatives say that means justices face no consequences for errant decisions.

Retirements and deaths allowed the term-limited Kelly to appoint four of the current justices. Recently, she picked a district court judge who blocked enforcement of longstanding abortion restrictions in 2023.

“We don’t have a good way to fight back,” said state Sen. Mike Thompson, a conservative Kansas City-area Republican, who backs the measure.

The Canadian Union of Public Employees, which represents the 4,400 cabin crew at the airline, announced the strike on its Facebook page. WestJet confirmed the strike and canceled 495 flights Sunday, according to FlightAware, snarling travel plans in Canada in the middle of a three-day weekend. The airline said Sunday that the strike led to travel being canceled for 250,000 travelers.

Key issue is how flight attendants are paid for work performed while still on the ground

A key issue in the dispute is how flight attendants should be paid for duties performed while still on the ground. The union said some of that work is unpaid, while the company said its staff was indeed compensated, citing pay through a “credit hour” system rather than an hourly rate.

“We presented a proposal that would have set a new standard for cabin crew in Canada, making WestJet the only airline to offer an hourly rate covering all time before and after flights, plus a double-digit wage increase in year one among other priorities the union raised,” said Alexis von Hoensbroech, CEO of the WestJet Group. “Unfortunately, it wasn’t accepted.”

The airline's proposal included a 13% wage increase in October, increases of 2.5% each January for the next three years, retroactive wage payment to last January and additional pay for all hours worked, which is equivalent to another 12% of salary increase, according to WestJet. The proposal also boosted other benefits such as meal per diems, vacation allowance and maternity leave.

Alia Hussain, president of the union chapter that represents the cabin crew, said negotiators “tried until the very last minute to get a fair deal that recognizes the value of the work cabin crews do.”

“WestJet’s offer did not go far enough," Hussain said.

Both sides said they were willing to resume negotiations to reach an agreement.

Flight cancellations leave travelers stranded

Meanwhile, travelers whose flights were canceled struggled to find accommodations or alternate flights.

Keavin Ly, a systems administrator for an animation studio, was stuck in Squamish, British Columbia, with his girlfriend after the couple spent the week rock climbing. They were supposed to fly back to Los Angeles on Sunday morning. The airline offered to reschedule their flight for Aug. 4, but they're scrambling to figure out where to stay between now and then.

“Inconveniently, our Airbnb and car rentals are done, and everything’s booked,” said Ly, 29. They were entertaining the idea of sleeping in the back of a friend's rental car, he said.

Ly had planned to take time off from work to watch a friend compete in a national billiards competition, but now he fears he'll miss it. And his girlfriend will miss shifts as a nurse, he said.

“We’re pretty much at the behest of the airline striking a deal, the cabin crew with WestJet, but all in all I hope they get what they’re looking for and they deserve to get compensated more," Ly said.

The airline said it could not operate any of its scheduled flights on Boeing 737s or 787s, and travelers will be refunded or reaccommodated. WestJet said it would contact people who reserved with them directly via email, while those who booked through a travel agent or third-party platform should reach out to them.

WestJet Encore flights operated on a Q400, as well as code-share flights operated by airline partners, remain unaffected.

Airline and union under pressure to resume bargaining

Canada’s Minister of Jobs and Families, Patty Hajdu, called the strike “a disappointing development.”

“A strike or lockout does not mean an agreement can’t be reached; the expectation is that parties can and should come to an agreement at the bargaining table,” Hajdu said in a statement. “The federal government will always maintain that the strongest deals happen at the table. Canadians are counting on them to put their best efforts forward to reach a deal at the bargaining table.”

Last August, when Air Canada flight attendants went on strike over a similar issue, stranding more than 100,000 travelers during peak travel season, Hajdu directed Canada’s labor board to order them back on the job.

The union defied the order, forcing Air Canada back to the bargaining table where the parties hashed out a tentative deal. That work stoppage lasted three days before the sides came to an agreement.

WestJet caught the union off guard by publicly releasing its offer to the flight attendants, said John Gradek, a faculty lecturer on aviation management at McGill University in Montreal.

“This is a bargaining strategy on the part of WestJet to intimidate the union,” said Gradek. “I don’t think the union is happy this has gone public. Right now, the union is kind of trying to figure out what the next steps are going to be. The WestJet offer forces the union to come back to the table and get very specific.”

Gradek estimates the dispute is costing WestJet between Canadian $10 million and $15 million (U.S. $7.13 million and $10.69 million) a day.

Gradek doubts the dispute will last a week. He expects the federal government will give the two sides another day or so before intervening but isn’t sure the government will order the union back to work.

“They may try a different strategy,” he said. “They may want to sit in on the negotiations themselves.”

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Associated Press writer Bernard Condon contributed to this report. Bussewitz and Condon reported from New York.

El incendio Old Trails comenzó alrededor del mediodía, quemando matorrales y pasto en un área abierta, pero se extendió rápidamente hacia el norte y el este en dirección a zonas residenciales. Los autos se alineaban en las carreteras mientras la gente huía de sus hogares, y desde la autopista se veían llamas anaranjadas y rojas.

El incendio levantó una columna de humo que se extendió sobre la región y, hasta la noche, casi 4 millas cuadradas (10 kilómetros cuadrados) de terreno habían ardido, informó Courtney James, portavoz del Departamento de Recursos Naturales del estado de Washington.

La causa del fuego estaba bajo investigación.

James instó a los residentes de Spokane a acatar las órdenes de evacuación y a mantenerse atentos a las condiciones cambiantes y a las evacuaciones, ya que estaban cambiando rápidamente.

Se perdieron algunas estructuras, pero las autoridades aún no tenían un conteo preciso, indicó Jessica Watson, portavoz del DNR para el incendio. Los bomberos no habían logrado ninguna contención hasta la noche y el viento seguía soplando, agregó.

La empresa eléctrica Avista indicó que había introducido cortes de energía por seguridad pública en el área debido al graver riesgo de incendio.

El gobernador, Bob Ferguson, declaró el estado de emergencia el sábado después de que temperaturas inusualmente altas y fuertes vientos agravaran incendios forestales récord en todo el estado. El Servicio Meteorológico Nacional emitió una alerta de bandera roja por “situación particularmente peligrosa” para el este de Washington.

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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.

Skubal got the news during the Tigers' 8-6 win over the Athletics and was emotional after the game as he prepared to leave the team that drafted him in 2018 and developed him into a star to join the two-time defending World Series champions.

“I’m excited to be a Dodger," he said. "I’m excited to get down there and meet all those guys and chase three championships in a row. That’s hard to do, so I’m so excited to a part of that. But it’s a lot of different emotions. Definitely kind of a roller coaster a little bit.”

Skubal is the latest star to join the high-priced roster for the Dodgers that already has big-name players like Shohei Ohtani, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Mookie Betts. If everyone is healthy, he could be part of a rotation with Ohtani, reigning World Series MVP Yamamoto, fellow two-time Cy Young Award winner Blake Snell and Tyler Glasnow. The Dodgers lead the majors with a 3.36 ERA from their starting pitchers and now add Skubal to the mix.

The Dodgers are in first place in the NL West and were already the favorites to become the first team to three-peat since the New York Yankees from 1998-2000 before adding Skubal. They began the season with a $323.3 million opening-day payroll for their 40-man roster and a $163.7 million tax for a $487.1 million total. They will pay Skubal about $9.5 million for the remainder of the season.

ESPN first reported the deal and said the Tigers would receive three minor league prospects in right-handers River Ryan and Brady Smith and outfielder Zyhir Hope.

Skubal is eligible for free agency after the World Series. He has a $32 million salary, a record total in arbitration, after the team offered $19 million, and is expected to sign a massive contract in the offseason.

The 29-year-old lefty said in July that it was his preference to finish the season with the Tigers and to compete for a World Series championship, which has eluded the franchise since 1984. Skubal took the loss in the decisive Game 5 of the division series against Cleveland in 2024 and then got a no-decision in a 15-inning loss to Seattle in Game 5 of the division series last year.

He said it was “very tough” to leave the Tigers having fallen short of the goal of winning a title.

“Ever since that ’24 Game 5, the failure that I experienced on the mound, I’ve used that as fuel to try and bring a World Series to the city of Detroit. I truly did,” he said. “That whole offseason I’ve never been more motivated and then go in and we lose Game 5 again. That failure kind of sparks some more motivation, just to dig deeper and see how good you can truly be. The goal was always to win a World Series for the city, for the organization that took a chance on me. It’s tough. I love all those guys in there. They’re some of my best friends.”

Detroit planned to contend again this season, bolstering the Skubal-led rotation by giving two-time All-Star pitcher Framber Valdez a $115 million, three-year contract in free agency and retaining three-time All-Star infielder Gleyber Torres with a $22 million deal.

The Tigers, though, got off to a rough start and are currently 2 1/2 games out of the last wild-card spot in the American League.

“It’s crazy. Going into the season, this isn’t what I planned on doing,” Skubal said. “But circumstances change, situations change, and I’m very appreciative of everything the Tigers have done for me.”

They bounced back in June and most of July to get into playoff contention with Skubal leading a rotation and three All-Stars in the lineup: rookie infielder Kevin McGonigle, catcher Dillon Dingler and outfielder Riley Greene.

With a chance to possibly persuade management to keep Skubal by improving its playoff positioning, Detroit lost ground by dropping four of its last five games at home, including Skubal’s last start that was made even more memorable by a late-inning collapse.

The Tigers led Baltimore 7-0 after six innings Wednesday and lost 10-9 in 12 innings. Skubal started the game, recorded his 1,000th career strikeout and was cheered at every opportunity by a crowd of 34,406.

“I’ve watched this guy rise to the top of the sport,” manager A.J. Hinch said. “He’s carried us a lot. I’ll forever be grateful that our paths crossed and the things that he did for this organization and for a couple of playoff teams. His presence, his work ethic, his example, his dominance. There’s so much to go through, it’s hard to capture in one quote or kind of one setting. But I’m very grateful that I was able to manage him for the time that I did.”

Skubal is 7-5 this season with a 2.79 ERA and 116 strikeouts in 96 2/3 innings. He is 61-42 with a 3.04 ERA over seven seasons, all in Detroit. In two postseasons, Skubal is 2-1 with a 2.04 ERA in six starts.

Skubal had a minimally invasive surgery on May 6 to remove a loose body from his pitching elbow and returned to pitch on June 13.

“The way the surgery went is exactly how it was supposed to go,” he said in July.

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AP Sports Writer Larry Lage in Detroit contributed to this report

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