Discussion

At 500 AM AST (0900 UTC), the center of Subtropical Storm Josephine was located near latitude 38.7 North, longitude 68.3 West. The storm is moving toward the northeast near 13 mph (20 km/h), and this motion, along with an increase in forward speed, is expected to continue into tonight. A gradual turn toward the east is forecast on Friday and into the weekend. On the forecast track, Josephine should move away from the United States and remain south of Nova Scotia and Newfoundland during the next couple of days.

Maximum sustained winds are near 65 mph (100 km/h) with higher gusts. Some additional strengthening is forecast through the day today while Josephine begins to transition to an extratropical cyclone. Josephine is expected to become a powerful extratropical cyclone with hurricane-force winds by early Friday.

Winds of 40 mph extend outward up to 415 miles (665 km) from the center.

The estimated minimum central pressure is 988 mb (29.18 inches).

Watches and Warnings

There are no coastal watches or warnings in effect.

Land Hazards

WIND: Gale-force winds are possible in gusts along portions of the northeastern United States coast through today. See products issued by your local National Weather Service office for more details.

COASTAL FLOODING: Minor to locally moderate coastal flooding is ongoing along portions of the U.S. Mid-Atlantic coast and will continue through the rest of the week around times of high tide. Please refer to products issued by your local National Weather Service forecast office for more information.

SURF: Large swells generated by Josephine are affecting much of the eastern seaboard of the United States and portions of Atlantic Canada. These swells are likely to cause life-threatening surf and rip current conditions. Please consult products from your local weather office.

A depiction of rip current risk for the United States can be found at: hurricanes.gov/graphics_at5.shtml?ripCurrents

For the carriage drivers, it's unclear what comes next.

“No one can come up with an appropriate answer because there is none,” said Alexus Lawson, a 28-year-old carriage driver from Queens who grew up with horses and has worked as a riding instructor. Now, she worries about what would become of 7-year-old Starlight and her other horses. “Without a job, how can I take care of my horses?”

The New York City Council is expected to pass a bill Thursday that would ban horse-drawn carriage rides by June 2028, pulling back the reins after the death of a teenage tourist last spring spurred the latest call to end the rides after decades of opposition from activists.

But the one question that has come up time and again — what to do with drivers whose jobs would be eliminated — remains largely unanswered.

The legislation requires Mayor Zohran Mamdani's office to develop a plan by next April to help the more than 150 remaining drivers find other work. That would include referrals for job openings in the city's transit, hospitality and taxi industries, as well as career counseling. It also would anticipate the administration considering some form of compensation for industry workers.

City Hall is working on a detailed plan for the transition of the workforce and has started discussions on potential compensation, a spokesperson for the mayor said. And Mamdani himself has said government has a “civic responsibility to ensure that we are not leaving anybody out to dry.”

Medet Fidan, a former cab driver who traded his steering wheel for a set of reins after ride sharing apps upended the taxi industry, said he felt like he was being targeted.

“I think the city is leaving us a big mess,” said Fidan, 56, who has been driving a carriage for 15 years. “We’re going to lose our businesses, we’re going to lose our jobs, we’re going to lose our livelihoods.”

Council Speaker Julie Menin “will remain engaged in the transition process,” a spokesperson said, adding that the legislation seeks to address the longstanding question of what happens to displaced carriage drivers by setting a firm deadline for City Hall to act.

The union representing the drivers has vowed to file a legal challenge “the minute the ink dries” on the legislation.

Mamdani's two immediate predecessors as mayor had both called to end the industry, but neither succeeded.

Former Mayor Bill de Blasio campaigned on ending the rides on day one of his administration but the effort wilted amid a backlash from unions and a big media blitz involving actor Liam Neeson. Eric Adams, the mayor just before Mamdani, floated a ban late in his term but the proposal went nowhere.

The latest push began in June after an 18-year-old Indian tourist, Romanch Mahajan, died after jumping from a runaway carriage during a ride. That appeared to be the first fatality involving a horse carriage in Central Park since the rides began.

Mahajan's family has personally appealed to the city to end the rides, offering tearful testimony that they thought the rides were safe. His father, Deepak Mahajan, told lawmakers that his son jumped from the carriage to help his mother after she was thrown out of her seat after the horse suddenly bolted.

Carriage drivers have expressed sympathy for Mahajan and his family but argue that they are being unfairly targeted because of a single accident.

“It does nothing for alternate employment, for the continuation of our businesses,” said Christina Hansen, a longtime carriage driver and industry spokesperson. “Who’s going to pay my rent while I’m looking for a job?”

French President Emmanuel Macron said the measures aim to protect city centers, businesses and public buildings.

The ban on demonstrations planned Thursday in Paris, Lyon, Lille and Grenoble was seen by some as an infringement on French people’s right to protest.

But high school and university student groups said they will continue to mobilize, even though the autumn school break started this week.

Macron said the strategy adopted for the coming days is to ban protests requested by “individuals or groups with no legitimate authority.” His remarks came after a special security meeting at the Elysée Palace.

“Where trade unions submit requests to hold demonstrations, prefects will examine them in accordance with the law, but alternative routes will be proposed” to protect city centers, businesses and public buildings, Macron said.

“The rules are simple, and I think they’re just common sense. The general recommendation is that there should be no demonstrations in the coming days," he said. “For those who still want to protest, if they are trade unions, prefects will propose alternative routes."

Macron blamed the weekend's violence on “actions led by radical far-left groups who aimed to bring the Republic down," in addition to criminals who came to loot.

The turmoil in Paris and other French cities has prompted a strong security response from the government. Night curfews have been implemented in some areas of the French capital, as well as in other cities where calm has been restored.

The Paris police prefecture said Thursday's ban was necessary given the risk of street violence that erupted over the weekend, when groups of masked youth clashed with police forces, looted shops and torched cars.

The ban in Paris will last until 8 p.m. local time and apply to areas including the Elysée presidential palace, both houses of parliament, and the city's main train stations. Areas in downtown Paris which were severely hit by the looting are also covered.

Authorities are bracing for another big protest day

Thursday's planned protests were seen as a prelude to Saturday's big demonstration, when activists from the “ yellow vest ” movement, whose demonstrations over fuel prices shook France in 2018 and 2019, and the CGT labor union, are expected to join.

Some of those protests, including marches in Lyon, will also be banned, local authorities said.

Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu, who met union representatives on Wednesday, said a “massive” security operation was planned for Saturday to prevent a repeat of the violence by small groups of rioters that had exposed shortcomings in security measures.

Union representatives said their meeting with Lecornu did not result in concrete proposals. They are now focusing on another big day of action scheduled on Nov. 5, and called on private and public sector employees to join.

From student protests to a broader social movement

The demonstrations first erupted last month in a high school in Creteil, southeast of Paris, over a lack of staff. From there, class strikes, blockades and demonstrations spread to other Paris suburbs and then nationwide, even in smaller towns.

High school students have raised concerns about underfunded schools, dilapidated facilities and staff shortages, particularly in lower-income neighborhoods. Some also called for a reform of the university admissions system, seen by many as complex and unfair.

With the government unable to respond to students' demands, the school demonstrations and blockades have morphed into larger protests over soaring living costs, just months before next year's presidential election to choose Macron's successor.

Here is the latest news from the Middle East. Read our full coverage here.

7 oil tankers damaged in Strait of Hormuz, Iran's state television says

Iran’s state television reported that seven oil tankers caught fire and were damaged overnight Thursday after being targeted or striking naval mines in the Strait of Hormuz.

If verified, it would be the largest single-day number of vessels damaged in the waterway since the start of the Iran war on Feb. 28 when the United States and Israel launched joint strikes against Iran.

Quoting a statement by the Revolutionary Guard's navy, the Iranian report said that four of the tankers were transferring oil when they were targeted and caught fire. Another three were damaged and immobilized when they hit naval mines.

The report didn't provide details about possible casualties or the flags of the tankers.

The report also warned that the Revolutionary Guard may target U.S. bases in the region if the U.S. tried to allow oil tankers to transit through other parts of the strait.

The Revolutionary Guard had routinely targeted U.S. bases in Gulf countries during the war.

Yemen's government warns that rallies in support of Houthi rebels could be targeted

Yemen’s Defense Ministry said on Thursday that rallies and mobilization programs by the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels will be considered legitimate military targets and warned residents in Houthi-held areas against taking part.

The announcement was shared in a social media post and is considered a major escalation against the Houthis as well as civilians living in areas under their control. Pro-Houthi rallies are regularly staged on Fridays, the Muslim day of prayer.

Deliberate attacks on civilians could amount to a war crime.

Rallies and what Houthis call “cultural courses” are one of the Iranian-backed group’s main tools for mobilization of supporters and fighters. The Defense Ministry statement said such gatherings are used by the Houthis to mobilize children for combat.

Death toll from strike on Saudi airport rises to 2

Saudi Arabia's Civil Aviation Authority said Thursday that the number of people killed in an attack the night before on the King Fahd International Airport has risen to two.

The dead are a Saudi citizen and an Indian national who was living in the kingdom, according to a statement. Another eight people suffered injuries in the attack, which occurred late on Wednesday.

Saudi authorities didn't say who was responsible for the attack or provide any details. The Houthis also have not issued any statements.

King Fahd Airport on the country's east near Bahrain and Qatar has been attacked previously amid a wider wave of Houthi missile and projectile strikes targeting major Saudi airports.

A disabled Syrian man is killed in an Israeli forces raid

A civilian with special needs was killed during an Israeli forces' raid on the village of Jamla in southern Syria’s Daraa province on Thursday, the Syrian state news agency SANA reported.

The report did not give more details about how the man was killed. The Israeli military said in a statement that soldiers had “identified a suspect approaching them and carried out a suspect apprehension procedure.”

“The suspect continued to approach the soldiers, who responded by firing toward him in order to remove the threat,” it said, adding that the incident is under review.

After the ouster of former Syrian President Bashar Assad in a lightning Syrian rebel offensive in December 2024, Israel seized control of a U.N.-patrolled buffer zone in southern Syria and has occupied it since.

Jamla is not inside the Israeli occupied zone but Israeli forces often make incursions into areas outside the zone.

A UN official calls for economic pressure on Israel

The U.N.’s special rapporteur for the West Bank and Gaza urged Indonesians to use their economic clout to pressure Israel into stopping what she called unlawful actions in the Palestinian territories.

Francesca Paola Albanese told the World Conference on Creative Economy 2026 that a “just economy” should abide by an economic boycott, divestment and sanctions led by Palestinians.

She said that means avoiding using services or purchasing goods that boost the Israeli economy.

The special rapporteur also criticized Indonesia’s participation in the U.S.-created Board of Peace.

Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim-majority nation, has long been a strong supporter of Palestinians.

Iran puts new drones on display

Iran’s state television on Thursday showed dozens of military drones it claimed are more powerful and more sophisticated than previous iterations.

The report showed the drones in an underground location, adding that a new version of the “Arash” drone now has a 100 kg (220-pound) warhead - twice as powerful as before.

Iranian Army Chief Gen. Amir Hatami was quoted as saying on the state television's website that Iran has "reached a significant level of maturity in the field of drones and unmanned systems in general” and that more drones will be unveiled in the future.

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

There is one sign she and the other 4 million-plus tourists who visit Acadia annually can no longer see at the summit: a marker explaining the mountain’s sacred significance to the Wabanaki people in the region. “Today, visitors from everywhere find meaning on the mountain,” it said.

It was among 30 markers removed from Acadia under a Trump administration campaign to strip national parks of materials deemed disparaging to American history, according to the National Parks Conservation Association.

But when park staff took down the summit sign at the orders of Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, they also unraveled some of the trust that took decades to build between Acadia National Park and the Wabanaki people. The Wabanaki Confederacy, also known as “the people of the dawnland,” has inhabited the northern seaboard for over 10,000 years and was the first known stewards of land that includes much of the national park. It was a gathering place to trade, hunt, fish and pick sweetgrass.

Some of the signs removed from Acadia were developed over years of partnerships with organizations including Friends of Acadia, the Schoodic Institute and the Native Plant Trust — with consultation from citizens of the Wabanaki Nations. They know the mountain in Maine as Wapuwoc — “white mountain of the first light.” From October to March, it’s the first place to see the sunrise in the continental United States.

“Getting to a place where our language is in these parks and it is educational … erasing that or setting that back has big implications for how far we’ve come,” said Maulian Bryant, the Wabanaki Alliance's executive director.

Bryant says the removed signs reflected “the good stuff.”

“These signs don’t say 96% of Wabanaki people died from smallpox, or there were 26 nations and now there’s four,” she said. “If we really want to get into the real history, that’s a whole other slice of cake.”

Other signs removed from Cadillac’s summit addressed issues of climate change, informing visitors that “Acadia’s future will be warmer and wetter” and that “In the last century, average annual precipitation has increased by six inches.”

During their tenure under the Biden administration, former National Park Service director Chuck Sams and former Interior Secretary Deb Haaland — the first Native Americans to hold these positions — aimed to reflect the experiences of all Americans throughout the national parks. Before leaving his post in February 2025, Sams saw parts of his work unraveled by the current administration.

This “attempt to rewrite history into a single narrative … is also counter to our democracy. And counter to the idea that we are a plural nation,” said Sams.

Lawsuit against national park removals advances

Now, a coalition of conservation, history and science organizations are fighting in court to get the Acadia signs and hundreds of other items put back. Under Burgum's 2025 campaign, signs, books, films and exhibits covering topics such as slavery, climate change and the massacre of Native Americans were flagged and removed from national parks and monuments nationwide.

“Some of it’s been put back, and then some of it has been removed again,” said the Center for American Progress' Angelo Villagomez. He was part of the progressive policy group's team that examined a database leaked earlier this year and found that a third of national parks had flagged exhibits featuring history or science. Of those, Black and Indigenous history were most targeted.

Portions of all flagged material have since been reviewed and cataloged by a committee led by Joy Beasley, a National Park Service associate director. However, in a June affidavit, she writes that the spreadsheet is “unlikely to capture every removal, revision, or replacement.”

The Interior Department did not respond to The Associated Press’ questions about the current status of sign and exhibit removal or the ongoing lawsuit filed by the nonprofit coalition in February against the federal government.

The parks “are America’s storytellers,” said Todd Martin of the National Parks Conservation Association, a plaintiff in the lawsuit. “It’s their duty to preserve and interpret American history, the good, the bad, and the ugly.”

Jenny McBurney, a government publications librarian at the University of Minnesota who co-founded the project Save Our Signs, feels it’s more important than ever for park visitors to document revised signs.

“People are going to go to the parks and think that they will get to learn history there when in fact they will be learning an incomplete history,” said McBurney.

Wabanaki culture — past and present — shared in Acadia

Despite the job cuts, threats of land reduction, talks of privatization and even demolition within some parks, Indigenous groups and park partners have persevered.

In Maine, members of the Wabanaki Confederacy — comprised of the Maliseet, Mi’kmaq, Passamaquoddy, Penobscot and Abenaki principal nations — carry on the cultural traditions and spiritual practices that helped them maintain sovereignty and connection to their ancestral land after settlers arrived. That includes sharing their culture with tourists.

Penobscot Nation citizen Jennifer Neptune had mixed emotions about the attempted erasure of her people from Acadia and their ancestral homeland.

“It’s hard to get good signage in national monuments, in national parks,” said Neptune. “It’s a real gut punch when it (removal) happens, not just for Indigenous people, but for Black people, for the people whose stories don’t get shared.”

Over the past decade, she’s seen real change from the National Park Service, playing an integral part in bringing Wabanaki voices to the table to create Indigenous-designed spaces.

In partnership with Acadia, the privately owned Abbe Museum, which is largely overseen by Wabanaki people, hosts a program that brings Native voices into the park through music, arts and culture.

Nick Bear and members of a Wabanaki drum circle perform on Cadillac Mountain annually as part of this collaboration. “That’s just like bringing those ceremonies right back to the original sites,” he said.

In July, Passamaquoddy basket maker Lydia Soctomah demonstrated traditional Wabanaki basketry using pounded ash bark and sweetgrass outside the Sieur de Monts Nature Center. Both the ash tree and sweetgrass are part of the Wabanaki creation story, she said.

“Making a basket is worth 1,000 memories for me,” said Soctomah, whose grandmother was a well-known basket maker. “I was always told it holds a part of your spirit.”

Sweetgrass access an example of shared stewardship

Access to sweetgrass has long been difficult for Wabanaki people as they were pushed from coastal lands onto reservations. In Acadia, it’s been nearly nonexistent since the park’s creation in 1916. But over the past decade, park staff and Wabanaki members have collaborated to change that.

In 2017, scientist Suzanne Greenlaw, a citizen of the Houlton Band of Maliseet Indians, partnered with the U.S. Forest Service, Acadia’s Schoodic Institute and 14 traditional gatherers to conduct a Wabanaki-led sweetgrass study in hopes of allowing tribal access.

“It was really impactful because we had never had those kinds of co-stewardship relationships,” said Greenlaw, adding that those relationships, built over time, have not changed.

By the end of the Biden administration, there were over 400 co-stewardship or co-management agreements with tribes, 159 within the National Park Service alone, says Sams. Programs in Acadia were among them.

These programs, he says, allow tribes to fulfill their obligation to protect, preserve and enhance natural resources, and the federal government to fulfill its obligation to allow tribal access for hunting, fishing, and gathering foods and medicines.

Sams cautiously hopes there will be a rebuilding period for the park service under the next administration.

“There are always ebbs and flows with every administration,” he said. “Nobody has seen that more than American Indian tribes.”

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

The award came just days after the Trump administration announced sweeping new sanctions on the court, which is based in The Hague, Netherlands, as part of its campaign to dismantle the tribunal over investigations into the United States and its allies, including Israel.

“The European Union is built on respect for multilateralism and international institutions, and this prize recognizes the important work of the court in upholding international law and justice,” European Parliament President Roberta Metsola said.

Her announcement at the parliament in Strasbourg, France, was greeted with a standing ovation.

The annual EU award, named after Soviet dissident and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Andrei Sakharov, was created in 1988 to honor individuals or groups who defend human rights and basic freedoms.

A court under fire welcomes the award

ICC President Tomoko Akane of Japan welcomed the award, saying that it “comes at a time when the court and its officials face unprecedented challenges.”

“Against this backdrop, the Sakharov Prize carries particular significance, reaffirming the importance of independent judicial institutions and of those who work to uphold international law,” she said in a statement.

The ICC opened in 2002 as a court of last resort to prosecute senior leaders it deems responsible for crimes that, according to its founding treaty, “deeply shock the conscience of humanity.” It has jurisdiction over war crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide and the crime of aggression.

The Trump administration's sanctions cut off the court from U.S.-based financial services, technology companies and even using U.S. dollars. They set a six-month timeline for U.S. companies and individuals that have business with the court to wind that business down.

The EU considers options to respond

In a statement after their summit last week, EU leaders said that the 27-nation bloc “deeply regrets” the Trump administration’s sanctions move and “urges the United States to reverse these latest measures.”

They noted that the U.S. has delayed the full impact of the sanctions by six months, and that “this creates space for diplomacy,” and expressed hope that the measures can ultimately be reversed.

Should diplomacy fail, however, the leaders insisted on “the EU’s readiness to take all necessary measures.”

They tasked the European Commission “to take all appropriate initiatives” to help protect the ICC and mitigate the impact of the sanctions, “specifically towards EU companies so that they can continue providing services to the Court.”

One possible retaliatory measure is the EU “blocking statute,” which could be used to protect European court staff, and possibly the Dutch-based court itself, by preventing European companies from complying with the U.S. measures.

An award for when rights and justice come under attack

The ICC and its officials were nominated for the prize by the Socialist and Democrats group in the European Parliament. The group, which unites center-left parties across Europe, said that it was “proud to have put forward their candidacy at a time when international justice is under attack.”

The Sakharov winner is chosen by the European Parliament's president and top EU lawmakers from among candidates nominated by the parliament’s various political groups. The assembly says the award is “the highest tribute paid by the European Union to human rights work.”

Imprisoned Tanzanian opposition leader Tundu Lissu and Taraneh and Romina Rahimi — twins being held in prison for taking part in demonstrations against the Iranian government — were the others to make the EU shortlist.

Last year’s prize went to journalists Andrzej Poczobut and Mzia Amaghlobeli, who were imprisoned in Belarus and Georgia, respectively. Metsola said at the time that “their courage has made them symbols of the struggle for freedom and democracy.”

Several Sakharov laureates, including Nelson Mandela, Malala Yousafzai, Denis Mukwege and Nadia Murad, went on to win the Nobel Peace Prize. Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado, who won the Nobel Peace Prize last year, picked up the Sakharov Prize in 2024.

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Mike Corder reported from The Hague, Netherlands.

Investigators say advances in DNA technology helped link Austin to the cold case decades later. He was indicted on a first-degree murder charge in August 2021 and has opted for a bench trial. That means his case will be decided by a judge and not a jury.

In addition to the first-degree murder indictment, Austin was also charged in 2021 with two counts of armed kidnapping and one count of armed sexual battery.

Prosecutors had previously indicated they would seek the death penalty if Austin is convicted, but they waived that in favor of the bench trial.

After both sides rested their cases on Wednesday, closing arguments in the trial will begin Thursday at 10 a.m.

‘I felt terrorized’: Survivor testifies

Testimony began Wednesday with the judge hearing from the surviving victim in the cold case.

Now 61 years old, he told prosecutors that he had just turned 20 in December of 1985 and was living with McCray, whom he considered a friend, when they were attacked in their St. Johns Avenue duplex.

NOTE: News4JAX is not naming the man because he is a surviving victim.

The man acknowledged that he and McCray had been intimate for “a week or two” but said the relationship was open and he would not consider them a couple.

He said that when McCray came home on Dec. 23, he had fallen asleep in her bed after taking cold medicine, although it was unusual for them to sleep in each other’s rooms.

He said McCray gave him another dose of cold medicine with codeine after she got home, and the two fell asleep in her bed.

The man then described waking up in the early morning hours of Christmas Eve to a stranger hovering over McCray’s bed with a knife. He said it was too dark to make out any of the person’s features, but it was clearly a man.

McCray’s friend said the stranger told him to lie on his stomach, and then he took strong, canvas straps from the futon in the other bedroom and tightly bound his hands behind his back and his legs at the ankles.

He said he heard the stranger take McCray into his bedroom next door and heard her pleading with the stranger not to cut her. He said he heard them move downstairs and didn’t know what happened after that except that they left the apartment.

McCray’s friend said it took him a while to free himself from the bindings, but when he did, he called the police.

“I felt terrorized and scared and shaky,” he said.

Once the police arrived, a search began for McCray, and hours later, she was found stabbed to death on Old Middleburg Road.

McCray’s friend said he moved out of the duplex immediately because he didn’t feel safe there while the killer was not identified.

McCray’s friend was himself a prime person of interest in the case for decades because police questioned his account of what happened.

But when police began investigating the cold case again in 2019 and 2020, they contacted McCray’s friend, who provided a DNA sample for comparison.

It wasn’t a match to the 1985 sexual assault kit samples.

Solving the cold case

That sent cold case detectives in a different direction, concentrating on another name that had risen to the surface in the early days of the investigation: David Nelson Austin.

Austin had been behind bars in Michigan since 1991, serving a life sentence for convictions in sexual assault cases there, when investigators tracked him down to get a DNA sample.

When they compared Austin’s sample to the 1985 evidence, it was a match.

The lead cold case detective said Austin’s name first popped up in the case because he had previously lived at the duplex where McCray and her friend were attacked.

During opening statements, attorneys for both sides confirmed that Austin had lived there before McCray moved in.

The state implied that was the reason there were no signs of forced entry from the night of the attack. The defense, on the other hand, suggested that Austin’s previous residence in the apartment could offer an alternate explanation for why Austin’s DNA was found on one of the swabs from McCray’s sexual assault kit.

On Wednesday, prosecutors played an interview cold case detectives conducted with Austin in Michigan. During the interview, he said he didn’t know McCray and never had any contact with her.

Original investigation

Several criminal experts testified to their roles in the 1985 murder investigation that led to the discovery of McCray’s body and the DNA that later pointed to Austin.

Former medical examiner investigator Lou Eliopulos described in graphic detail what McCray’s body looked like when it was found in a vegetated ravine near I-295 and Old Middleburg Road hours after she had been taken from the duplex. He said he saw no obvious ligature marks or defensive injuries.

On cross-examination, Eliopulos said rigor mortis was present at the scene, which is generally seen within about 30 minutes of death, but he did not offer a more precise estimate of how long McCray’s body had been there.

Pathology assistant Arlene Monarch testified that she assisted with McCray’s 1985 autopsy and collecting evidence for her sexual-assault kit. She said samples were collected before the body was washed, but she could not recall whether outside investigators had collected other samples first or the exact collection sequence.

Those samples were preserved, and a grant from the U.S. Justice Department to JSO’s Cold Case Unit covered the cost of having them re-examined in 2019, after McCray’s family reached out to the Jacksonville-based group, Project: Cold Case, and the JSO Cold Case Unit.

Family reaction

McCray’s family said in 2021 that they were relieved to finally be getting answers decades after her death.

“She was a kid, you know? She had her whole life ahead of her, and she needed to live it, but she wasn’t given the chance,” Joey Bray, a cousin of McCray, said after the indictment was announced in 2021.

The DNA evidence was developed thanks to a grant to the JSO Cold Case Unit from the U.S. Justice Department.

“I always have that question in the back of your mind -- what happened to her, why. I wanted justice for her,” Bray said. “I’m just glad we know. We have answers.”

The 2026 Employer Health Benefits Survey, released Thursday, found that covered workers were paying hundreds of dollars more toward their premiums this year compared with last year. The costs were particularly pronounced for employees at small businesses made up of 10 to 99 workers who typically shoulder a larger share of their insurance costs than those at bigger companies.

Rising healthcare costs have emerged as an important issue for voters in the midterm elections and are part of broader affordability concerns. An AP-NORC poll conducted in October found that about 7 in 10 registered voters call healthcare “one of the most important issues” in this election.

Almost 157 million Americans under retirement age rely on employer-sponsored healthcare coverage. According to the KFF study, employers report that workers are paying on average $7,471 annually toward the premiums for employer-sponsored family health benefits this year, which is up roughly 9%, or $621, from last year.

“Workers are paying a bigger chunk this year,” said Matthew Rae, associate director of KFF’s Program on the Health Care Marketplace, “which also brings up the issue of affordability.”

President Donald Trump has tried to make healthcare affordability part of his midterms pitch, saying that his most-favored nation prescription drug pricing would reduce costs and promising rebates for some Americans. But other steps taken by Trump's Republican administration have raised costs for some, and the survey indicates that many are seeing their health insurance expenses climb without clear improvements in benefits.

The impact could be felt more acutely among small businesses, which employ roughly 62.3 million people, or 45.9% of private-sector workers, according to the Small Business Administration.

Covered workers at smaller firms contributed an average of $9,687 in 2026 toward family coverage, compared with $6,840 at firms with 200 or more workers, the survey says. In 2025, they paid roughly $8,900, compared with about $6,200 for larger firms, the report said. The survey found that covered workers at smaller firms contribute an average of 37% of the premium for family coverage, compared with 25% at larger firms.

And 32% of covered workers at small firms are enrolled in plans in which they must pay more than half the family premium, compared with just 6% at larger companies.

The rising costs have meant small businesses must strike a balance between maintaining attractive benefits for their employees and meeting other increasingly costly expenses.

Jenna Caligaris, who manages an upstate New York contractor with roughly 25 workers, said the pressures of providing health insurance to her workers keep her up at night.

Caligaris said that because her firm operates in a field that is extremely competitive for workers, the company looks for any way to keep employees from taking on more insurance cost-sharing. Her firm provides 80% of coverage to its nonunion workers, with employees covering the rest.

From stretching the lifespan of company vehicles and tools to cutting down the size of workers’ year-end bonuses and putting an end to the annual company picnic, “we’re trying to maintain coverage and stay competitive — so we'll have to eat these price increases," Caligaris said.

In the past three years, the company has switched insurers to save on costs yet is getting hit this year by a 25% increase in premiums, Caligaris said.

Rae, at KFF, said small firms face higher deductibles than larger companies and more volatility in the market.

KFF’s annual health benefits survey of large and small employers includes roughly 1,900 employers with 10 or more workers.

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Associated Press reporter Josh Boak contributed to this report.

With days before a close election in Israel in which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu could lose power, and before next month’s U.S. midterm election in which war-linked high prices have sparked voter anger, there are concerns that U.S.-Israeli attacks on Iran could resume.

“Netanyahu wants to attack Iran, that’s not even a question,” Danny Citrinowicz, a researcher at Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies and a former Iran specialist in Israel’s military and intelligence services, told The Associated Press.

He accused Israel of rushing into another round with Iran without revamping its strategy. A clear Netanyahu victory in the Oct. 27 election means an attack is almost guaranteed, he said. Main opposition candidates are likely to focus on domestic issues first, but “in general terms, I believe we are on a one way towards another kinetic escalation,” Citrinowicz said.

Iran repeats threat to attack U.S. bases in the region

Iranian state television reported the claims about the latest attacks on ships, which the AP couldn't independently confirm. The report cited the Revolutionary Guard Corps navy, which again threatened to strike U.S. military bases in the region if the U.S. keeps helping to guide commercial ships through the strait.

The report didn't mention casualties. Iran still asserts control over the waterway, a central point of leverage in any talks with the U.S. over the war.

October has had the most reported attacks on commercial shipping since March in the war's opening weeks, according to a British military monitor, the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations. UKMTO didn't report the latest attacks, but it has noted new reluctance by some shippers to report incidents.

Oil producers have found ways to keep crude flowing, experts say, but at a mounting cost.

Iran says it's open to diplomacy but also self-defense

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi on Wednesday said that a wary Tehran remains open to diplomacy, but is ready to defend itself.

Iran has warned that it has learned important military lessons from the war that began with U.S. and Israeli attacks on Feb. 28. In recent days, Tehran has indicated that it could expand targets to include infrastructure such as undersea cables and data centers.

The United States, for its part, is sending more military assets to the region, including a third aircraft carrier and thousands of troops, to join the largest force of American warships and aircraft in the Middle East in decades.

Mediators, meanwhile, have been trying to bring Washington and Tehran back to formal talks.

Iran still promotes its latest proposal that would end the war and fully open the strait within a week if the U.S. meets several conditions. Those conditions, which include ending the U.S. blockade of Iranian ports, echo ones in the deal that fell apart within days of both sides signing it in June.

In late September, U.S. President Donald Trump rejected that seven-day proposal, but both sides have acknowledged that indirect discussions have continued.

The stakes are even higher if all-out war resumes

A return to full fighting would again endanger civilians throughout the region and complicate global deliveries of oil, natural gas and related products like fertilizer from the region and likely bring another spike in prices.

Now the landscape of the conflict has widened with the recent surge in fighting between Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen, and Saudi Arabia. The Saudi kingdom backs a coalition of forces with Yemen’s internationally recognized government that is fighting the rebels.

The Houthis' repeated deadly attacks on airports and other facilities inside Saudi Arabia have pressured the close U.S. ally, which has sought military aid.

The escalation also has threatened a crucial shipping corridor, the Bab el-Mandeb at the southern end of the Red Sea.

Faith Hedgepeth was a 19-year-old sophomore at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill when she was beaten to death in her off-campus apartment in September 2012. Miguel Salguero Olivares was arrested nine years later after being pulled over for driving while intoxicated and providing a DNA sample that prosecutors say matched evidence from the crime scene.

He has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder, rape and burglary charges.

Testimony began Oct. 7 following eight days of jury selection. Salguero Olivares did not testify and his attorneys rested their case Wednesday without calling any witnesses. Nearly two dozen witnesses testified for the prosecution, including Hedgepeth’s roommate and other friends, crime scene technicians, state and local law enforcement and a DNA expert.

Early testimony focused on Hedgepeth’s life and her last night alive, when she and her roommate returned home from a club around 2 a.m. Karena Rosario testified that she was drunk and sick when Hedgepeth drove them home but later called a friend to pick her up and she went out again, leaving Hedgepeth in the apartment alone. She returned hours later that Sept. 7 to find Hedgepeth’s body.

An autopsy showed Hedgepeth suffered extensive skull fractures and cuts to her face and head, and she was also badly beaten on her arms and legs.

Prosecutors allege that Salguero Olivares, now 33, was a stranger who killed Hedgepeth in a fit of rage. They said his DNA was found on a rum bottle covered in blood that investigators identified as the weapon in the killing, in Hedgepeth's body and on a note written on a fast-food bag found at the scene.

Erin Ermish, a forensic scientist with the state crime lab, testified that she could never say with 100% certainty that a DNA sample came from a particular person. But she said DNA swabbed from Hedgepeth’s body was 170 septillion times more likely to be a mixture of DNA from Hedgepeth and Salguero Olivares than from Hedgepeth and an unknown individual. One septillion is a 1 followed by 24 zeros.

Ermish also said the mixture of DNA from the top of the rum bottle was 48.6 tredecillion times more likely to be from Hedgepeth and Salguero Olivares than two unknown, unrelated individuals. One tredecillion is a 1 followed by 42 zeros.

In cross-examining witnesses, defense attorneys questioned Rosario’s account of that night, the processing of the crime scene and the reliability of some DNA evidence. They pointed out that police failed to search some areas of the apartment and later lost some possible blood evidence.

Several jurors cried after viewing autopsy photos of Hedgepeth, according to local media accounts. Salguero Olivares, meanwhile, cried when prosecutors played video of a jailhouse call between him and a friend who has since died.

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The story has been updated to correct the spelling of Faith Hedgepeth’s last name on one reference.

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Ramer reported from Concord, New Hampshire.

Minor tidal flooding continues around high tide within the St. Johns River basin, Intracoastal Waterway and portions of the Northeast Florida coast, including Flagler County. Water levels could reach roughly 1.5–1.9 feet above normally dry ground in affected areas, flooding vulnerable roads, parking lots and low-lying locations. A Coastal Flood Advisory is in effect for portions of the area.

The bigger concern is increasing tidal flooding Saturday morning through Monday. Another surge of strong onshore winds, combined with higher astronomical tides surrounding the full moon, could produce moderate flooding along the Atlantic coast, Intracoastal Waterway and St. Johns River basin. Water could reach around 2.5 feet above normally dry ground in vulnerable coastal and Intracoastal locations, potentially affecting roads and some structures. Moderate beach erosion is also possible. Coastal Flood Watches or Warnings may become necessary as the event approaches.

A high risk of rip currents continues today through Friday at beaches from St. Simons Island through Flagler Beach, with breakers of 3–6 feet. Our message: sunny weather does not mean safe swimming conditions. Stay out of the ocean and follow beach patrol guidance.

The weekend also turns cloudier, windy and wetter. Saturday has the highest rain chance at 70%, with highs near 72. Sunday brings a 40% chance of showers, mainly during the afternoon, with highs near 71. Windy conditions continue into Monday with a 30% chance of showers and highs in the lower 70s. For coverage planning, coastal flooding around high tide, worsening beach conditions and Saturday’s rain are the priorities heading into the weekend

Josephine is moving northeastward away from the United States, while forecasters are monitoring a separate disturbance east-southeast of Bermuda for possible development.

As of the latest advisory, Josephine had maximum sustained winds of 65 mph and was moving northeast at 13 mph.

The storm is expected to transition into a powerful extratropical cyclone, potentially producing hurricane-force winds by early Friday.

Meanwhile, a trough of low pressure several hundred miles east-southeast of Bermuda is producing disorganized showers and thunderstorms.

The NHC gives this system a 10% chance of developing into a tropical or subtropical system over the next 48 hours and the next seven days. Increasingly unfavorable upper-level winds are expected to limit its chances of development later this week.

Josephine is forecast to continue moving farther northeast and away from the United States. Although the Atlantic disturbance has a low chance of development, conditions can change, and residents should continue monitoring official forecasts for updates.

The results suggest that voters are ready for Congress to tackle core issues, despite Trump’s centrality in the midterm campaign.

About 8 in 10 registered voters, including a large majority of Republicans and Democrats, say lowering the cost of living should be one of the highest priorities for the session coming up, the survey from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds.

Justin Campbell, a 31-year-old Democrat from Brookhaven, Mississippi, said he wants the government to focus on helping people like him rather than wealthy people.

“I’m not a millionaire and probably won’t ever be," he said. "I prefer policy that helps me instead of someone I’ll never be.”

Most voters also want Congress to prioritize ending the war with Iran, with roughly 7 in 10 saying this should be a top focus. Substantially fewer voters, about 4 in 10, want Congress to make investigating the Trump administration a high priority, and only about 2 in 10 want Congress to prioritize supporting the Republican president's agenda.

But the poll also indicates that there are deep divisions within the parties on what to focus on, with moderate Democrats and Republicans differing sharply from voters on the left and right wings of their parties.

Most Democratic voters who identify as supporters of democratic socialism are hoping for a Congress that will investigate the Trump administration, and many want to end military aid to Israel, while MAGA Republicans are interested in Congress supporting Trump’s agenda.

Moderates in both parties, meanwhile, are much likelier to want Democrats and Republicans to find common ground.

Most voters want Congress to focus on reducing costs and ending the war

Lowering the cost of living and ending the Iran war overshadow a wide range of other issues as voters consider priorities for the next Congress.

While most registered voters say reducing costs and ending the war should be among the highest priorities for Congress, only about half say reducing the budget deficit and finding common ground between the two parties should be high priorities. About 4 in 10 want investigating the Trump administration and passing new laws regulating artificial intelligence to be high priorities.

Fewer, about 3 in 10, prioritize ending military aid to Israel, and only about 2 in 10 want a focus on supporting Trump's agenda.

Though most registered Democrats want Congress to investigate the Trump administration, that falls behind the larger priorities of lowering costs and ending the conflict with Iran. About 6 in 10 registered voters who identify as Democrats call investigations into the Trump administration “one of the highest priorities.”

Arthur Brown, a 71-year-old Democrat in Magee, Mississippi, wants to see the next Congress work on making the economy stronger and prices lower. He feels less urgently about holding Trump accountable, mostly because there’ll be only two years left in Trump’s term. He thinks it’s more important to try to turn the economy around.

“They should just focus on, you know, trying to tackle these problems,” he said. “Eventually down the road, justice will come.”

For Republican voters, bolstering Trump's goals also falls behind lowering the cost of living, ending the war in Iran and reducing the budget deficit.

In a strikingly tepid show of support for the president, only about 4 in 10 Republican voters say the next Congress should make supporting the Trump administration's agenda one of its highest priorities.

Most democratic socialists want Congress to investigate Trump

House Democrats have begun planning an ambitious 100-day agenda for what they would do if they win control of Congress in November. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York has said the Democratic Party's top priorities include making life more affordable and conducting vast oversight of the Trump administration.

But there are potential schisms in the party awaiting Democrats if they win a governing majority. The Democratic Party has reckoned in primary campaigns with a growing wing of democratic socialists. Their progressive stances on some issues have divided the party — including on whether to continue military aid to Israel, whether to compromise with Republicans and how strongly to investigate the Trump administration.

About three-quarters of Democratic voters who identify as supporters of democratic socialism say one of the top priorities should be investigating the Trump administration, compared with slightly less than half of Democrats who say they're not democratic socialists.

Democratic socialists are also more likely to want Congress to end military aid to Israel and less likely to say it’s a top priority to find common ground between the two parties.

Campbell, the Democrat in Mississippi, identifies as a democratic socialist and wants Congress to hold the Trump administration accountable.

“It feels a little cliche to just say roll back the past two years, but honestly, mostly just roll back the stuff he’s done the past two years," Campbell said.

Most MAGA Republicans want Congress to support Trump

Republicans are broadly aligned on what they want the next Congress to do, regardless of whether they identify with the Make America Great Again movement — except when it comes to Trump.

At least half of MAGA and non-MAGA Republicans want leaders to lower costs, end the Iran war and reduce the federal budget deficit.

Richard Longo, a 74-year-old Republican in Lake Forest, California, wants to see the president’s agenda pursued in the next Congress but is especially worried about balancing the budget.

“You’re not going to balance the budget in one year, but you have to have a plan," Longo said.

But while about 6 in 10 MAGA Republicans want Congress to prioritize supporting the Trump administration's agenda, only about 2 in 10 Republicans who are not supporters of MAGA say the same.

Lisa Ostlund, a 46-year-old from Wayland, Massachusetts, who identifies as a MAGA supporter, wants to see the next Congress prioritize Trump's agenda. She doesn't support everything Trump does, but she credits his policies with her recent ability to find housing after struggling with homelessness for several years.

“You got to care about your American people," Ostlund said. "He definitely doesn’t say it right, but you do have to put them first.”

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The AP-NORC poll of 1,119 adults was conducted Oct. 8-12 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 3.9 percentage points.

“Wind, hush!” the speaker advised, describing the power to bring about change.

Jeffries nodded along, the words resonating beyond the church’s soaring brick walls, days out from the midterm elections that will determine control of Congress for the remainder of President Donald Trump’s term in the White House.

“We’re on the verge of taking back control of the House,” Jeffries told The Associated Press in an interview afterward.

“When this storm has passed, and it will, those of us who have served in the Congress during this time will be part of bringing about a better chapter in the United States of America,” he said. “That’s the mission. And failure is not an option."

Jeffries is on track to become House speaker, if Democrats sweep to power and elect him to the job, one of the most powerful positions in the U.S., second in line to the presidency. He has been campaigning across the country in more than 50 cities for House Democrats as they try to oust Republicans and win back majority control.

He would make history as the first Black American to hold the gavel.

A new generation of leadership, a 100-day agenda

The New York City-born Jeffries is a new generation of leadership at the Capitol, known for his deliberative, calm-is-a-choice style of governing. He would be the first Democratic speaker since Nancy Pelosi of California.

Democrats are preparing a 100-day agenda focused on lowering the cost of living and conducting oversight of Trump’s Republican administration, as Jeffries puts it, to “hold the crooks accountable.”

“What we’ve seen is he is quietly effective,” said Rep. Brad Schneider of Illinois, outgoing chairman of their party’s centrist New Democrat Coalition. “Rather than chasing rabbits, what Leader Jeffries has kept the caucus doing is focused on accomplishment, success and a plan for our future.”

First elected in 2012, Jeffries is sandwiched between the Pelosi-era elders who have held great sway in Congress and liberal millennial New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's generation, bridging the two.

A corporate lawyer, he grew up the son of a counselor and a social worker, steeped in Brooklyn's Cornerstone Baptist Church. He earned a political science degree at the State University of New York at Binghamton and a master's in public policy at Georgetown and graduated magna cum laude at New York University School of Law.

At 29, he made his first run for office, an insurgent himself, eager to oust a longtime New York state Assembly member. He failed, twice. Eventually he won a statehouse seat. He ran for Congress, mounting a challenge to a 30-year incumbent who stepped aside.

Since then Jeffries has been on a steady rise, representing parts of the district once held by trailblazing Rep. Shirley Chisholm.

“Faith and the community were always a central part of my journey," he said.

He said that's the case for many of his generation, “who grew up in the midst, you know, of some challenging times — the crack cocaine epidemic, a lot of community violence. A lot of people’s lives were prematurely lost.”

“It leads to a desire to want to improve the quality of life for hardworking people, who could have fled difficult circumstances but remained in the community, worked hard to turn things around,” he said.

At the Toledo church, the area's long-serving Democratic Rep. Marcy Kaptur told the congregation that when she first ran for office, Chisholm was the only member of Congress to campaign for her. Now another from Brooklyn is ready to lead.

“This man wants to do something for the people of this country,” she said.

‘Sky’s the Limit' as Democrats work to take charge

Jeffries never bought into the theory that voters gave Republicans a mandate in 2024 with control of the White House and Congress, leaving Speaker Mike Johnson of Louisiana with one of the smallest majorities in modern times.

He set about to win power back for Democrats.

Democrats used the tools available to force votes that GOP leadership tried to avoid — on releasing the Jeffrey Epstein files and halting the Iran war.

They voted against the GOP’s big tax breaks and spending cuts bill, Jeffries delivering an eight-hour speech spotlighting cuts to Medicaid healthcare and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, known as SNAP.

At times, it seemed Jeffries, not Johnson, was in charge — including when Democrats shut down the government because Republicans refused to fund tax credits for the Affordable Care Act that millions of people relied on to buy health insurance.

Jeffries often sprinkles old-school hip hop lyrics into his speeches, and he said the music has been a soundtrack to life, as songs are for any generation.

“‘Sky’s the Limit’ is one of my favorite songs from The Notorious B.I.G.," he said, “because it really did track a journey from negativity to positivity and overcoming life’s adversity.”

Challenges ahead for the party leader

Jeffries will be tested almost immediately if Democrats take control. The House speaker is elected when the new Congress convenes Jan. 3.

He is facing a new generation of upstarts, including a handful of candidates backed by the Democratic Socialists of America.

Rep. Greg Casar, D-Texas, the chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, said that Democrats are often a “party of nervous lawyers” at a time when voters are demanding change.

“To his credit,” he said about Jeffries, “in these key moments and opportunities where we've been able to take action, we’ve surprised people.”

Jeffries is described as a listener, who often jots down what colleagues say in meetings, a bottom-up style of leadership that works to build consensus. He said he has spoken to all the incoming Democrats. "Everybody’s got to chart their own path,” he said.

“On the other side of this election, I think what will unite House Democrats is the fact that we know things are broken in this country,” he said. "We've got to do something transformational about the affordability crisis.”

A sense of purpose for the country's future

After the service, members of the congregation gathered in the church basement for a luncheon honoring the bishop's anniversary years of service, with steaming trays of chicken, greens, sweet potatoes and desserts.

Church member Lorna McKinstry, 74, a retired police dispatcher, said she was hopeful the country could begin to end its divisions.

“I want us to be a United States of America,” she said.

Jeffries visited over lunch before pushing on to the next stops, driven by a sense of purpose that the country can do better.

Those in Congress “have a responsibility to stop the madness from continuing to hurt everyday Americans," he said, "and chart a more hopeful path toward making this country the best version of herself.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday agreed “in principle” to resume three-way negotiations involving officials from Russia, Ukraine and the United States, but no date was set for a meeting. Putin's consent came in talks in St. Petersburg with U.S. President Donald Trump’s envoy, Steve Witkoff, who the previous day had met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Norway.

Representatives of those three countries held three rounds of negotiations early this year, meeting twice in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, in January and February, followed by further talks in Geneva in February.

However, little progress was reported beyond exchanges of prisoners of war, and deadly attacks continued. Russia and Ukraine remain far apart in their terms for stopping the fighting.

Zelenskyy, who says only a meeting of leaders can end the deadlock, commented on the prospect of “technical talks” between delegations: “We’ll see what happens this time.”

Zelenskyy sees ‘no change’ in Moscow's attitude

Russia’s aerial attacks hit 12 regions of Ukraine overnight, killing at least two people and wounding 34 others, including five children, Zelenskyy said on social media Thursday.

The Ukrainian capital endured a noisy night as 21 ballistic missiles came in three waves, he said, smashing apartment buildings, energy facilities, a railway station and the Kyiv subway system, shopping malls and businesses. One person was killed in Kyiv.

Multiple attacks on the eastern city of Kharkiv and the surrounding area left one person dead and at least 13 wounded, the State Emergency Service said.

Ukrainians are bracing for the winter, as a recent escalation in Russian attacks targets the power grid to deny civilians heat, light and running water during the bitterly cold months. Ukraine says Russia is stockpiling ballistic missiles for an annual campaign that Ukrainians describe as “ weaponizing winter. ”

The Russian bombardment showed “there has been no real change in (Moscow’s) attitude toward everything that is happening,” Zelenskyy said.

The Ukrainian leader has pleaded with Washington to supply more Patriot air defense ammunition that can stop ballistic missiles and to heap more sanctions on Russia that might make Moscow pursue peace.

But Trump has agreed to a deal with Putin to import diesel from Russia and waived heavy sanctions on Moscow, while U.S. officials say Patriot ammunition is in short supply.

Ukrainians chide Trump envoy for flattering Putin

Witkoff, the Trump envoy who met with Putin in St. Petersburg on Wednesday, was harshly criticized in Ukraine and in the U.S. for praising the Russian leader as a “humanitarian” for ordering the release of a retired American teacher imprisoned on charges of fighting as a mercenary in Ukraine.

The five-year anniversary of Russia’s all-out invasion of its neighbor comes on Feb. 24. The fighting has resulted in hundreds of thousands of troop casualties on the battlefield and thousands of civilians killed in aerial strikes.

Also, assassination attempts against foes of Putin have been common during his more than two decades in power. Those close to the victims and the few survivors have blamed Russian authorities, but the Kremlin has routinely denied involvement.

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said the “brutal” Russian attacks demonstrated “what Russian ‘humanism’ truly sounds like.”

“Appeasement, servility, and flattery will not stop this war. Only strength will,” Sybiha said on social media.

Russia says it intercepted more than 800 Ukrainian drones

Russia’s Defense Ministry said that air defenses overnight downed 808 Ukrainian drones, with two people reported wounded.

Moscow’s Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said that 630 of the drones were fired toward the Russian capital between late Wednesday and early Thursday. Moscow airports temporarily restricted air traffic overnight.

The Russian military hit the facilities involved in making and storing drones and cruise missiles and transport infrastructure in Kyiv in overnight strikes, the Defense Ministry said. Infrastructure in the southern port of Odesa and vessels used for the Ukrainian armed forces were also hit, it said.

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

The album was a word-of-mouth hit and, coupled with 1980’s “Baby Beluga,” transformed the Egypt-born singer of Armenian descent into one of North America's most famous children's musicians. Raffi's fun and heartwarming songs, including “Down By the Bay” and “Shake My Sillies Out,” remain a mainstay for parents and teachers of young children, even as the way kids consume music has changed significantly.

“Well, the technology changes; children don’t,” Raffi told The Associated Press in a recent interview via Zoom from his home in western Canada.

And the 78-year-old isn't done yet. His latest album, “Love is Everywhere,” comes out Friday and features songs that celebrate individuality (“No One Like You”), as well as “ABC Democracy” — a pro-voting anthem that reflects his longstanding willingness to wade into politics and activism. He's also marking the 50th anniversary of “Singable Songs” with a special reissue Nov. 13.

Raffi spoke to the AP about the enduring appeal of his music, why he once turned down a deal from the producers of “Shrek,” and his kinship with Ms. Rachel, the children's entertainer who has been an outspoken advocate for kids in Gaza and those detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Remarks have been edited for clarity and brevity.

AP: What's the process of writing a Raffi song in 2026? And how is it different from when you were working in the '70s?

RAFFI: What’s the same is that I’m considering my audience and what songs would appeal directly to them, and what songs would stretch the imagination of a child. And what’s different is that I’ve got 50 years of songwriting behind me right now, so I certainly feel confident, more so than ever, in what I’m doing.

It’s a good feeling to know that when I write and record a song now, it’ll have a long shelf life. My fans still tell me that “Baby Beluga” is the one song that will calm their child when needed, and I think, “Wow, that song came out, what, 46 years ago?”

AP: The new album is called “Love is Everywhere.” At a time when so much of what’s happening in the world is so frightening, is it harder to write such hopeful songs?

RAFFI: The theme of the album is the power of love. This album is a response to these times that, for so many of us, feel anxious and worrisome. And the fact is that love is everywhere. You can say, “How is that so?” And I would say to you, “Are there children everywhere? Yes. Is there love everywhere? Yes.”

It’s so wonderful that there are others echoing this call of love, and Ms. Rachel is doing this brilliantly. I’m such a champion of this kind of effusive expression of love and caring for every child.

AP: What’s your relationship with Ms. Rachel? I know you’ve defended her against some blowback she’s gotten, particularly regarding her comments about the crisis in Gaza.

RAFFI: Well, Ms. Rachel is a “Beluga grad” (Raffi's term for children who grew up listening to his music). We had a wonderful video meeting about a year ago. I told her how happy I am with what she’s done on her YouTube offerings.

And then I saw her very brave stance on the rights of Palestinian children, like the right of any child, to live and thrive. When we say every child, we mean it. How would anyone deny the children of any region or any people the right to self-determination, to love and respect? I’m right there with Ms. Rachel. Her heart and my heart resonate well.

AP: When “Singable Songs” was released 50 years ago, kids were listening on record players or cassettes. Nowadays, they're listening via Spotify or YouTube. Has that changed how kids listen to music?

RAFFI: Well, the technology changes; children don’t. It’s up to us adults, though, to make sure that the technology that children are surrounded by doesn’t interfere with the healthy development of their brains, hearts and imagination.

AP: One track that stood out to me from the new album was “ABC Democracy.” What was the inspiration for that song?

RAFFI: I wrote “ABC Democracy” a year ago and released it as a single. And then I found out that children loved that song. It must be because I wrote the best first line of a song ever: “A, B, C, Dee-mocracy!” They hear that, and they’re hooked because they love the ABCs. And then there can be this conversation with mom or dad as to, “Hey, what is this about?” Learning about our civic duties from a young age — who could ask for more than that?

AP: What do adults tend to sometimes forget or get wrong about kids?

RAFFI: You don’t need to talk down to a child. Children are very intelligent. They ask great questions.

You should respect the intelligence of the young learner — keep in mind that young children are learning the most sophisticated tasks of language acquisition, syntax, grammar and conversational skills all without being in university.

AP: You’ve been clear about never wanting to exploit kids for cash through advertising, toys, etc. What offers have you left on the table?

RAFFI: You wouldn’t exploit those who you respect, right? Why would you exploit the innocence of a young child who isn’t able to appraise the sales pitch if you’re directly advertising or even indirectly to children through fast food joints?

It’s not fair to young children to have someone they look up to selling them things that they’re not old enough to understand.

So I’ve consistently left on the table all these offers, including one from the producers of “Shrek” who wanted to make a “Baby Beluga” film. We asked the question, “Will this movie be directly advertised through fast food joints?” “Oh yes,” they said. So we said, “No thank you. We don’t do that.”

AP: Finally, we had a lightning round of questions from kids that we wanted to pose to you. Nine-year-old Coco asks, “Do you like apples or bananas better?”

Raffi: Both!

AP: Four-year-old Miles asks, “What do you look like? Are you a giant?”

RAFFI: Ha! (In deep voice) Yes I am! To a small child, I probably look quite big, but no bigger than other adults. I’m about 5-foot-8 1⁄2.

AP: Six-year-old Walt asks, “What part do you play in ‘Bananaphone’?”

RAFFI: I’m the guy who sings about the banana and eats it too. That’s me. A troubadour with a peel!

AP: Four-year-old Henry asks, “What’s your favorite song?”

RAFFI: It might just be “Bananaphone,” or it might be “Baby Beluga.” I really like “Baby Beluga” because, you know, it’s a love song, and when you love a beautiful creature like a Beluga whale, you want to protect it.

AP: Seven-year-old Elsa asks, “How do you choose what to sing about?”

RAFFI: Well, I just think of what would be fun for me, and then I think of what would be fun for the audience that I’m singing with, because they sing with me. That’s how I decide.

Variations of the voter ID proposals are being decided in the midterm elections in California, Colorado and Nevada — three states where conservative activists collected petition signatures to bypass Democratic-led legislatures and place the issue directly before voters.

The voter ID measures are among about 30 questions on November ballots affecting state policies on voting and elections. They account for roughly 1 in 5 of all state ballot measures nationwide. Some mirror policies that President Donald Trump has pushed unsuccessfully at the national level and build off a Republican narrative that noncitizen voting is a problem, though data indicates it is rare.

Several measures address changes to congressional voting districts, as part of a national redistricting battle spurred by Trump. Others could change the way primaries are conducted, make it more difficult for voters to amend their state constitutions or — in Missouri — make it harder for lawmakers to change measures that voters approve.

Taken together, the measures highlight a long-running debate about who can participate in elections and how to ensure voting is both accessible and secure.

“Ballot measures have become a battle zone for the future of American democracy, including direct democracy itself,” said Chris Melody Fields Figueredo, executive director of the Ballot Initiative Strategy Center, a group that backs progressive ballot issues.

California proposition is one of several voter ID measures

When voting by mail, most states already require a voter’s signature for a ballot to count. Only Georgia, Minnesota, New Mexico and Ohio require some sort of government-issued identification number to be included with mail-in ballots.

California's Proposition 39 would require a government-issued ID to vote in person or the last four digits of that identification number to vote by mail.

In the August primary, nearly 90% of California's ballots were cast by mail, and more than 52,000 ballots — less than 1% of the total — were rejected for nonmatching or missing signatures, according to the secretary of state's office.

The proposed constitutional amendment doesn't directly repeal California's current signature requirement. But the intent is for the four-digit verification to replace it, said Carl DeMaio, a Republican state Assembly member whose organization Reform California backed the voter ID initiative.

“If California gets this done through citizens, maybe it will shame the politicians into getting this going in a moderate and reasonable and bipartisan way nationwide,” DeMaio said.

Though Trump hasn't endorsed the California proposition, opponents contend it is similar to a bill he backed in Congress to require a photo ID to vote, or a photocopy for ballots returned by mail.

“Prop 39 is just another Trump power grab that is intended to make voting harder, less secure and more expensive for Californians,” said Brittany Stonesifer, a voting rights attorney at Common Cause California.

About 7 in 10 registered voters nationally favor requiring all voters to provide valid photo identification at their voting place in order to vote, according to an October poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. Though support is stronger among Republicans, a majority of Democratic voters also favor a voter ID requirement.

In addition to citizen initiatives in Colorado and Nevada, voter ID amendments also were referred to the November ballot by Republican-led legislatures in Arizona, North Carolina and Ohio.

Citizen voting measures spread to six states

Ballot measures in Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Kansas, South Dakota and West Virginia would reinforce current election practices limiting voting to U.S. citizens. Since 2018, at least 15 states have adopted similar measures, including all eight states where they appeared on the ballot in 2024 and in Texas last year.

Many critics argue the measures are largely symbolic and unnecessary, because voting by noncitizens is rare and already forbidden in most states.

No state constitutions explicitly allow noncitizens to vote. But some municipalities in California, Maryland and Vermont, as well as the District of Columbia, do allow voting by noncitizens in some local elections such as for school board and city council.

States need to act because the nation's founders “gave the states the rights to determine who can vote,” said Becky Arps, research director for Americans for Citizen Voting.

Changes to primaries are proposed in Massachusetts and Alaska

A pair of Massachusetts ballot measures could reshape state elections. One amendment would scrap separate party primaries in favor of an open primary in which the top two vote recipients — no matter the party — advance to the general election.

Another would allow people to register to vote on the same day as the election, instead of the current 10-day-in-advance deadline.

In Alaska, voters are again being asked whether to repeal a system of open primaries and ranked choice voting. A similar measure narrowly failed two years ago.

Redistricting efforts face voter referendums

Republican lawmakers in Missouri passed new congressional districts for the midterm elections, after Trump urged GOP-led states to redistrict to try to win additional House seats. But the Missouri Supreme Court and U.S. Supreme Court both blocked the new map from being used in the November election because of a referendum petition.

Voters now will decide whether to uphold or reject the new districts. If approved, the map could be used in the 2028 election.

Maryland voters, meanwhile, will decide whether to approve a redistricting amendment backed by Democratic state lawmakers that could pave the way for a new U.S. House map ahead of the 2028 election. Proponents' campaign signs urge a “yes” vote as a means to “stop Trump.”

In Colorado, where some Democrats also want to redistrict, a ballot initiative backed by a conservative group would instead prohibit any mid-decade redistricting from favoring one political party and require approval from both an existing independent commission and the state Supreme Court.

Ballot initiatives could get new hurdles or protections

Proposed amendments in North Dakota and South Dakota would make it harder to amend their state constitutions by requiring 60% approval from voters instead of a simple majority. A similar 60% threshold is proposed in Utah for future citizen initiatives that raise taxes. All were referred to the ballot by Republican-led legislatures.

Several states already have supermajority requirements for certain ballot measures, including 60% thresholds to pass constitutional amendments in Florida and tax initiatives in Arizona. Two years ago, amendments to legalize recreational marijuana and create abortion rights both received majority support but still failed because of Florida's supermajority threshold.

Measures in several other states seek to strengthen citizen ballot initiatives. A Missouri amendment proposed by a citizens group would make it harder for lawmakers to change voter-approved citizen initiatives by requiring revisions to get an 80% vote in the state House and Senate. That comes after the Republican-led Legislature last year repealed a paid sick leave law approved by voters and referred a new constitutional amendment to the November ballot to reverse voter-approved abortion rights.

A Montana ballot measure would make the citizen initiative process a fundamental right, and a Colorado measure would require ballot questions to be written “in plain language at no more than an eighth-grade reading level.”

___

Associated Press writer John Hanna contributed to this report.

If the report is verified, it would be the largest number of vessels damaged in the waterway in a single day since the start of the Iran war on Feb. 28.

Brent crude, the international standard, gained 3.2% to $112.27 per barrel. It has been bouncing between $97 and $112 in recent days on uncertainty about when the war with Iran will allow the global energy industry to return to normal.

U.S. benchmark crude rose 2.8% to $99.80 per barrel.

In early European trading, Germany's DAX shed 1.1% to 25,367.96, while the CAC 40 in Paris declined 1.3% to 7,816.67. Britain's FTSE 100 was down 0.7% at 10,678.67.

The future for the S&P 500 lost 1% and that for the Dow Jones Industrial Average was 0.7% lower.

In Asia, Tokyo's Nikkei 225 lost 2.7% to 62,907.84 on heavy selling of big tech companies like SoftBank Group, which lost 6.9%.

Computer chip equipment maker Tokyo Electron fell 7% and testing equipment maker Advantest lost 6%.

In South Korea, the Kospi dropped 3.5%, to 5,533.77. Big memory chipmakers led the decline, with Samsung Electronics down 4%. SK Hynix lost 5.5%.

AI stocks, at the center of market action in recent months, are under pressure from worries that construction of data centers may slow as it is becoming increasingly expensive to borrow money.

Hong Kong's Hang Seng shed 3% to 22,934.68, and the Shanghai Composite index gave up 1.5% to 3,658.03.

Taiwan's Taiex lost 1.8%.

In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 declined 0.4% to 8,793.20.

The U.S. stock market rose Wednesday following strong profit reports from SpaceX, Capital One Financial and other big companies.

The S&P 500 added 0.6% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 0.7%. The Nasdaq composite climbed 1.1%.

SpaceX helped lead the market and climbed 7.8% after reporting a stronger profit for the summer than analysts expected. Elon Musk, who runs the company that makes money from artificial-intelligence technology, rockets and other businesses, also said that SpaceX took a step to consider a possible merger with Tesla, his electric-vehicle company.

Tesla rose 3.4% and was one of the strongest forces lifting the S&P 500.

Other stocks rallying on profit reports that topped analysts’ expectations included Capital One Financial, which rose 2.5%, and Winnebago Industries, which climbed 10.7%.

Expectations are high for profit growth for all kinds of companies during the summer, and they need to meet them to justify the big runs their stock prices have made despite worries about high inflation, higher interest rates and other challenges weighing on Wall Street.

Netflix fell 5.3% even though the streaming service reported a stronger profit than analysts expected. Investors focused instead on worries that Netflix’s momentum may be slowing.

In other dealings early Thursday, the dollar fell to 157.22 Japanese yen from 158.14 yen late Wednesday. The euro slipped to $1.1231 from $1.1233.

Four to watch in Week 11

Bartram Trail (6-2) at (4) Mandarin (7-1), 6:30 p.m.

The Mustangs are looking to nail down their top seed in the Region 1-5A bracket. Their Week 11 game against St. Augustine looms after this one. Mandarin has handled every District 2-5A opponent with ease and should be able to put a bow on that against the Bears. Only one team has shaken up Mandarin (Raines in Week 5), and the Mustangs won’t see a defense like that until a potential regional final with Buchholz or in the state series rounds. QB Knox Annis continues to improve throwing the ball (16 TDs, 3 INT). RB Shaunqueze Foster is at 1,145 rushing yards (13 TDs) and WR Brysen Wright is getting closer to a 1,000-yard receiving season (730, 8 TDs). Will Jones and Jace Kemp have also come into their own as pass catchers (8 combined TDs). Defensively, Kindrid Outland is one of the better defensive linemen in the area and sets the tone (13.55 TFL, 30 tackles). Keion Herring and Jerel Stephens have combined for 94 tackles. The Bears continue to show promise. They’re young and still a team on the rise but are positioned to make the playoffs this season. QB Xander Camus has passed for 1,542 yards and 16 TDs. RB Blake Soares could crack the 1,000-yard rushing barrier (693 yards, 7 TDs) with a couple more strong games. Cam Ganther and Leo Marucci have been Camus’ favorite targets with a combined 11 TD catches. On defense, Major Granados leads the way with 14 TFL.

(8) Ed White (6-2) at (5) Bradford (9-0), 7:30 p.m.

The Tornadoes are chasing perfection for the first time since 2023 when they started with 14 wins before coming up short in the state championship game. Bradford QB Cy Cubbedge has put together and excellent season, passing for 20 TDs and rushing for six more. RB Iyen Addison is one good carry away from a 1,000-yard rushing season (974, 11 TDs). WR Kaidrin Jackson has turned nine of his 22 catches into TDs. Packaged with a strong Bradford defense fronted by Parviele Lee (46 tackles, 17 for loss), Danny Torres (43 tackles, 25 for loss) and Graceyn McClellan (36 tackles, 11 for loss), Bradford is more versatile across the board than it has been. To finish the regular season unbeaten, Bradford can’t let Ed White get loose and do what it does best. The Commanders can run the ball better than anyone thanks to powerful backs Vedo Jones (808 rushing yards, 7 TDs) and Rontrez Loyd (944 rushing yards, 10 TDs). The loss of QB King Boylston to an injury hurt the Commanders against Columbia last week. Mike Hinson has played in place of Boylston, and he’s passed for five TDs, but his effectiveness isn’t the same as what Boylston brings. On defense, Derrick Brown leads Ed White in tackles (87) and TFL (10). Ed White is built for the big ground attack, but Columbia erased that in a running clock game in Week 9. Will Bradford stack the box and force the Commanders to try and throw it more than they’re used to?

Ponte Vedra (3-5) at (9) Nease (5-3)

The Battle of the Bridge has always been a great one. The Panthers have won three straight in this series. The Sharks lead the all-time series 12-5, with all of those victories coming consecutively. This game is huge for playoff implications. Nease is currently No. 3 in the Region 1-5A playoff standings behind Mandarin and Buchholz; the Sharks are sixth. Ponte Vedra will likely make the postseason with a win in one of its final two games. It faces district champ Creekside in Week 11. Nease has recovered well from a 1-3 start that included losses to Creekside, St. Augustine and Mandarin, all high quality (and high rankings points) teams. QB Aiden Phifer has passed for 14 TDs and rushed for four others. RB Enrique Ordonez is closing in on a 1,000-yard rushing season (748, 3 TDs). Tyshawn Ford has been a versatile playmaker. He has passed for, caught and rushed for a TD this season. TE Chase Phifer is tops on the team in receiving TDs (5). Chase Bogle leads the Nease defense with 13.5 tackles for loss and 10 sacks. As uneven as Ponte Vedra’s record is, they’ve lost three games by a combined 17 points, including one in OT. They’ve been competitive in every game except a blowout loss to Mandarin (34-10). QB Carter Sole, RB Alex Winkles and WRs Cade Turner and Trent Player have been the consistent performers for the Sharks. Winkles has 10 total TDs, six of them through the air. Mike Aker leads the defense (12 TFL, 9 sacks, INT).

(1) Raines (8-0) at Cocoa (3-4)

The Vikings would be in the Open division if the playoffs began today. But they could be just one MaxPreps algorithm refresh away from moving out. That’s why Raines needs to close with fury and deliver a statement. The Vikings have been the area’s best team going on three years. They’ve won 33 consecutive regular-season games, unbeaten since a 26-0 loss to Mainland on Sept. 15, 2023. This Cocoa team isn’t like previous editions, or even the one that lost to eventual state champ Cardinal Mooney in the state semifinals last year. They’ve slipped a bit, but they’ve scheduled tough and have a top-55 ranking in the state. This is the final game for Raines to deliver an exclamation point to doubters. Even next week’s Northwest Classic against rival Ribault won’t do much for Raines when it comes to the algorithm. QB Samon-Ellison Morgan has grown up substantially this year for the Vikings. He looks poised and is in command of this offense. RB TJ Williamson has 10 rushing TDs, followed by Ellison’s six. The defense did the heavy lifting early this season and the offense has started pulling its load. The Vikings remain ridiculously good on defense. Troy Butler, Johdeem Jones and Chenaniah Doran have combined for 25 tackles for loss and 12 sacks. In the secondary, DB Zion Green has three of Raines’ seven interceptions.

Next four to watch

Beachside (3-4) at Fletcher (4-4), 6:30 p.m.: The Senators have slumped but they still find themselves clinging to a playoff spot in Region 1-5A. The Senators have still been able to put up numbers, but they’ve allowed way too many points in recent weeks. The Barracudas are in spoiler mode at this point, and they could very well bump Fletcher from the playoff chase with an upset here.

(7) Bolles (5-2) at Jackson (7-1), 6:30 p.m.: The winner gets the District 3-2A title. Jackson has turned things around this year with an excellent QB in Hans Price. It’s Jackson’s best season since going 8-2 in the regular season in 2022. Bolles has been up and down in spots this season but the Bulldogs are still excellent. ATH Jaxon Flowers is a rising star and RB Xander Edwards remains a tough player to bring down.

Middleburg (4-3) at Clay (5-2): The Blue Devils are ranked No. 8 in Region 1-5A and hold a nice lead over No. 9 Fleming Island for that final spot. But remember, those teams still have a weather-delayed game to finish. Middelburg is ranked 13^th and likely playing for a seven-win season and perhaps an invitational tournament or bowl game bid. Still a lot on the line in this Clay County collision.

Independent game to watch

(6) Fernandina Beach (3-6) at (1) Episcopal (9-0): The Eagles are trying to post the second unbeaten season in school history (2002). Moving down and playing as an independent this season has infused the Eagles with a shot at history. Their offense has been electric behind QB Justice Turpin (25 passing TDs), RB Amir Allen (712 rushing yards, 14 TDs) and WR Brayden Wessinger (328 receiving yards, 7 TDs). Don’t let the Pirates’ record fool you. They’re a strong squad. Fernandina Beach has played a far more challenging schedule and will be well-prepared for this game. RB Fred Jones (705 rushing yards, 7 TDs), QBs Blake Rothermel and Talan Van Delinder and ATHs Beck Rohe and Aydin Poe give the Pirates some juice.

Week 10 schedule, Florida

Monday, Oct. 19

Bishop Kenny 49, North Florida Educational 21 (completion of suspended Week 1 game)

Thursday, Oct. 22

Ridgeview (1-7) at Orange Park (2-5)

Friday, Oct. 23

Baldwin (3-5) at KIPP Bold City (1-7), 6:30 p.m.

Bartram Trail (6-2) at Mandarin (7-1), 6:30 p.m.

Beachside (3-4) at Fletcher (4-4), 6:30 p.m.

Bishop Kenny (3-4) at Parker (1-7), 6:30 p.m.

Bishop Snyder (1-8) at Seven Rivers Christian (3-6)

Bolles (5-2) at Jackson (7-1), 6:30 p.m.

Bronson (2-7) at Old Plank Christian (5-3)

Christ’s Church Academy (8-1) at Englewood (1-7), 6:30 p.m.

Crescent City (3-5) at Trenton (7-1), 7:30 p.m.

Duval Charter (4-5) at First Coast Christian (1-8)

Ed White (6-2) at Bradford (9-0), 7:30 p.m.

Fernandina Beach (3-6) at Episcopal (9-0)

First Coast (1-7) at Creekside (6-2)

Flagler Palm Coast (6-2) at Atlantic Coast (0-8), 6:30 p.m.

Fleming Island (4-4) at St. Augustine (8-0)

Halifax Academy (1-7) at Eagle’s View (0-9)

Hamilton County (4-4) at Fort White (5-3), 7:30 p.m.

Hilliard (8-0) at Cornerstone Classical (6-2)

Impact Christian (1-8) at Trinity Christian (4-4)

Interlachen (5-3) at Atlantic (7-1)

Middleburg (4-3) at Clay (5-2)

Oakleaf (4-4) at Buchholz (8-0)

Palatka (3-5) at Wolfson (4-5), 6:30 p.m.

Ponte Vedra (3-5) at Nease (5-3)

Raines (8-0) at Cocoa (3-4)

Ribault (5-3) at Riverside (2-6), 6:30 p.m.

St. Joseph (4-5) at Saint Stephen’s Episcopal (5-3)

Sandalwood (5-3) at Tocoi Creek (3-5)

Suwannee (6-2) at Godby (5-3)

Union County (5-4) at Paxon (7-2), 6:30 p.m.

Wakulla (6-2) at Baker County (6-2)

West Nassau (6-2-1) at Keystone Heights (2-7), 7:30 p.m.

West Port (2-6) at Matanzas (1-7)

Westside (1-7) at Menendez (4-4)

Yulee (5-3) at Columbia (8-0), 7:30 p.m.

Zarephath Academy (1-6) at Umatilla (4-4)

OFF: Harvest, Providence, Stanton, University Christian.

Week 10 schedule, Georgia

Friday, Oct. 23

Brunswick (3-4) at South Effingham (5-2), 7:30 p.m.

Camden County (5-3) at Valdosta (7-0), 8 p.m.

Frederica Academy (3-6) at Bulloch Academy (8-1), 7:30 p.m.

Glynn Academy (3-4) at Greenbrier (2-5), 7:30 p.m.

Jenkins (3-4) at Ware County (5-2), 7:30 p.m.

Mitchell County (6-1) at Charlton County (5-1-1), 7:30 p.m.

Pierce County (6-1) at Brantley County (3-4), 7:30

Last week: 29-7. Season: 274-50-1 (.845).

Week 10 predictions

State series

Thursday, Oct. 22

Ridgeview (1-7) at Orange Park (2-5): Raiders continue climb to .500. N4J pick: Orange Park 34, Ridgeview 14.

Friday, Oct. 23

Baldwin (3-5) at KIPP Bold City (1-7), 6:30 p.m.: Indians don’t let Greyhounds start a winning streak. N4J pick: Baldwin 35, KIPP Bold City 6.

Bartram Trail (6-2) at (4) Mandarin (7-1), 6:30 p.m.: Mustangs set up major Week 11 showdown against unbeaten St. Augustine. N4J pick: (4) Mandarin 38, Bartram Trail 21.

Beachside (3-4) at Fletcher (4-4), 6:30 p.m.: Senators can’t lose another game if they want to hang on to their slim playoff hopes in Region 1-5A. N4J pick: Fletcher 34, Beachside 21.

Bishop Kenny (4-4) at Parker (1-7), 6:30 p.m.: The Caleb Mattison Show rolls on. N4J pick: Bishop Kenny 42, Parker 14.

(7) Bolles (5-2) at Jackson (7-1), 6:30 p.m.: Bulldogs wrap up district title over a strong Tigers team. N4J pick: (7) Bolles 38, Jackson 14.

(8) Ed White (6-2) at (5) Bradford (9-0), 7:30 p.m.: Commanders need to get healthy before the playoffs. N4J pick: (5) Bradford 31, (8) Ed White 21.

First Coast (1-7) at Creekside (6-2): Knights have racked up three straight district titles. Buccaneers want to try and finish strong. N4J pick: Creekside 38, First Coast 13.

Flagler Palm Coast (6-2) at Atlantic Coast (0-8), 6:30 p.m.: Stingrays very likely headed for a winless season. N4J pick: Flagler PC 31, Atlantic Coast 14.

Fleming Island (4-4) at (3) St. Augustine (8-0): District title will become official with a win here. Then, it’s prep for a colossal Week 11 game against Mandarin. N4J pick: (3) St. Augustine 42, Fleming Island 13.

Hamilton County (4-4) at Fort White (5-3), 7:30 p.m.: Indians get back on track. N4J pick: Fort White 28, Hamilton County 20.

Impact Christian (1-8) at (7) Trinity Christian (4-4): Conquerors can name their score. N4J pick: (7) Trinity 42, Impact 0.

Middleburg (4-3) at Clay (5-2): Blue Devils take another small step towards shoring up a playoff position. N4J pick: Clay 24, Middleburg 20.

Oakleaf (4-4) at Buchholz (8-0): Knights need an upset of this magnitude to make the playoffs. N4J pick: Buchholz 38, Oakleaf 13.

Palatka (3-5) at Wolfson (4-5), 6:30 p.m.: Panthers too much for the Wolfpack. N4J pick: Palatka 28, Wolfson 13.

Ponte Vedra (3-5) at (8) Nease (5-3): Battle of the Bridge goes to the Panthers. N4J pick: (8) Nease 31, Ponte Vedra 27.

(1) Raines (8-0) at Cocoa (3-4): Will it be the Open division for the Vikings? N4J pick: (1) Raines 34, Cocoa 13.

Ribault (5-3) at Riverside (2-6), 6:30 p.m.: Neither team is headed to the playoffs, but Trojans ensure winning season. N4J pick: Riverside 28, Ribault 21.

Sandalwood (5-3) at Tocoi Creek (3-5): Toros too much for the Saints. N4J pick: Tocoi Creek 34, Sandalwood 27.

Suwannee (6-2) at Godby (5-3): Bulldogs have struggled against stronger teams. N4J pick: Godby 27, Suwannee 21.

Wakulla (6-2) at Baker County (6-2): Wildcats stay on the winning path. N4J pick: Baker County 21, Wakulla 20.

West Port (2-6) at Matanzas (1-7): Difficult season for both teams. N4J pick: West Port 27, Matanzas 20.

Westside (1-7) at Menendez (4-4): Falcons wrap up season of at least .500. N4J pick: Menendez 35, Westside 13.

Yulee (5-3) at (2) Columbia (8-0), 7:30 p.m.: Tigers are legit state title contenders. N4J pick: (2) Columbia 42, Yulee 17.

Independent predictions

Bishop Snyder (1-8) at Seven Rivers Christian (3-6): Cardinals can’t pick up second win. N4J pick: Seven Rivers 38, Bishop Snyder 7.

Bronson (2-7) at Old Plank Christian (5-3): Defenders continue to firm up SSAA playoff ranking. N4J pick: Old Plank 34, Bronson 14.

(3) Christ’s Church Academy (8-1) at Englewood (1-7), 6:30 p.m.: Eagles get to nine wins as playoffs come into focus. N4J pick: (3) Christ’s Church 48, Englewood 13.

Crescent City (3-5) at Trenton (7-1), 7:30 p.m.: Raiders stumble here. N4J pick: Trenton 42, Crescent City 20.

Duval Charter (4-5) at First Coast Christian (1-8): Panthers get back to .500 before the playoffs. N4J pick: Duval Charter 44, First Coast Christian 14.

(6) Fernandina Beach (3-6) at (1) Episcopal (9-0): Pirates have played a rugged schedule. Eagles have not. In an upset … N4J pick: (6) Fernandina Beach 35, (1) Episcopal 34.

Halifax Academy (1-7) at Eagle’s View (0-9): Warriors have one final chance, but they’ve been shut out in seven of their nine games. N4J pick: Halifax 28, Eagle’s View 6.

(5) Hilliard (8-0) at Cornerstone Classical (6-2): I think this is going to be a shootout. N4J pick: (5) Hilliard 49, Cornerstone 41.

Interlachen (5-3) at Atlantic (7-1): Sharks have become a solid team this season. N4J pick: Atlantic 31, Interlachen 21.

St. Joseph (4-5) at Saint Stephen’s Episcopal (5-3): Flashes drop a close one. N4J pick: Saint Stephen’s 34, St. Joseph 30.

Union County (5-4) at (4) Paxon (7-2), 6:30 p.m.: Golden Eagles in a good one. N4J pick: (4) Paxon 34, Union County 28.

(2) West Nassau (6-2-1) at Keystone Heights (2-7), 7:30 p.m.: Warriors close season strong. N4J pick: (2) West Nassau 49, Keystone Heights 0.

Zarephath Academy (1-6) at Umatilla (4-4): Bulldogs cruise here. N4J pick: Umatilla 38, Zarephath 14.

Ridgeview (1-7) at Orange Park (2-5): Raiders continue climb to .500. N4J pick: Orange Park 34, Ridgeview 14.

OFF: Harvest, Providence, Stanton, University Christian.

The storm had maximum sustained winds of 65 mph (100 kph) and was centered about 265 miles (425 kilometers) south of Nantucket, Massachusetts, and about 585 miles (940 kilometers) southwest of Halifax, Nova Scotia.

The National Hurricane Center in Miami said Josephine was forecast to continue moving away from the United States and remain south of Nova Scotia and Newfoundland.

The National Weather Service posted a gale warning for parts of the Northeast and mid-Atlantic, meaning winds above 39 mph (63 kph) were possible through midmorning Friday. Small watercraft were also advised of hazardous conditions south to North Carolina's Outer Banks.

Minor to moderate coastal flooding was also expected to continue through the week on the mid-Atlantic coast.

In the Pacific, Tropical Storm Vance was well off Mexico's southwestern coast and may intensify to a major hurricane.

It had maximum sustained winds of 45 mph (75 kph) late Wednesday and was forecast to become a hurricane Thursday and a major hurricane Saturday, the U.S. center said.

Vance was located about 505 miles (815 kilometers) south of Acapulco, Mexico.

Nunchucks are a weapon used in martial arts consisting of two sticks or rods connected by a rope or chain.

The incidents are heightening concerns about female politicians’ safety and raising concerns about security in a country where lawmakers are highly accessible to the public.

Man detained after entering lawmaker's office with nunchucks

Police say that a 56-year-old man entered Western Australian state government minister Hannah Beazley’s electorate office in suburban Perth on Wednesday, brandishing nunchucks and making verbal threats. Beazley wasn't in the office at the time.

The man was detained and charged with being armed in a way that may cause fear and with threatening to perform an unlawful act. He spent the night in police custody and will appear in a Perth court later Thursday, police said.

There was no allegation the man’s behavior was connected to the driver who hit federal lawmaker Helen Haines with his car in the east coast state of Victoria on Monday.

Haines' alleged attacker, Brendan Nugent, appeared in a court on Wednesday charged with intentionally causing serious injury, dangerous driving causing serious injury and causing harm to a federal official. He did not enter pleas and remains in custody.

Police are still searching for a motive.

Haines, a 65-year-old independent lawmaker, remained in critical condition on Thursday in a Melbourne hospital where surgeons have amputated both her legs, a health department statement said.

Australians worry attacks threaten tradition of accessible politicians

Both the Haines and Beazley incidents have raised concerns about the safety of female politicians, who account for a growing proportion of lawmakers in Australian parliaments.

Just under 50% of federal lawmakers and a majority of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s Cabinet are women.

Australian lawmakers are some of the most accessible in the world and political violence has traditionally been rare. But there are fears that increasingly toxic public debate driven by social media creates additional risks for elected women.

Albanese said the fact that the threat to Beazley came so soon after the alleged attack on Haines was “just heartbreaking.” Beazley is the daughter of Albanese's former federal colleague, Kim Beazley.

“We can have debate and disagreement, but do it in a way without descending into the sort of violence that we have seen in too many parts of the world,” Albanese told Australian Broadcasting Corp. “It’s certainly not who we are as Australians.”

Albanese attended an online security briefing this week for women lawmakers in his center-left Labor Party. Security agencies addressed misogynistic threats directed at them.

Male and female federal lawmakers agree that women are facing the worst of the online abuse.

“Of course people are concerned. They’re anxious,” Albanese said. “There has been a normalization of behavior that can be very aggressive in a way that wasn’t happening a couple of decades ago.”

Beazley says staff were rattled but safe

Hannah Beazley said she was in the state parliament when the man entered her electorate office demanding to see her.

Beazley said two members of her staff had been “rattled,” but had remained safe behind a security screen.

“We don't know his motives at all,” she told reporters on Wednesday.

Governor-General Sam Mostyn, who is only the second woman to ever serve as the British monarch’s representative in Australia, said that she was abused on social media for speaking at a press conference on Wednesday alongside Haines’ husband Phil Haines.

“Like any woman who has stepped up into any position across any part of our society, there is a unique and pernicious form of attack that comes our way,” Mostyn told ABC.

“Women across the country know that there are certain things that are reserved for women in that attack that go to our gender and they are often vicious and just despicable,” she added.

They're accusing Prime Minister Donald Tusk's liberal government of failing to fulfill its promise to relax Poland's strict abortion laws, and protesting even though the parliament passed two bills on Tuesday aimed at easing abortion rules. The measures are likely to be vetoed by the conservative president, Karol Nawrocki.

Passing the draft laws now, a year before the next parliamentary election, is a case of “token gestures” rather than a genuine effort to reform abortion law, said Zofia Marcinek of the Abortion Dream Team, a reproductive rights activist group in Warsaw.

She said the liberal government knew the draft laws stand no chance of withstanding Nawrocki's veto, and has merely tried to create the impression of taking action because it needs women's support to win elections next year.

Most abortions are performed secretly

Since 1993, legal abortions have been allowed in Catholic Poland only in cases of severe fetal abnormality, risk to the mother’s life and health, or the pregnancy being a result of rape or incest.

Polish women have been pushing for the legalization of abortion ever since, including in a nationwide wave of demonstrations of women wearing black called “Black Protest,” which began in 2016.

Rather than being liberalized, Poland’s abortion laws were tightened further, banning abortions of fetuses with congenital defects in 2020 under the national-conservative Law and Justice (PiS) government.

Despite the laws, abortions remain common in Poland, an overwhelming majority of which are carried out by women at home using pills obtained from outside the country. Women who undergo abortions, including by taking pills, do not face criminal responsibility under Polish law. But people helping them, including doctors and family, can potentially be prosecuted.

And abortion remains a taboo subject in Poland, which now has one of Europe’s most restrictive abortion laws, with only Malta imposing stricter limits.

Activists accuse Polish government of disinformation

Tusk’s pro-European coalition won the 2023 election in part on a promise to liberalize Poland’s abortion laws. But in 2024, Tusk said his government wouldn't be able to overcome the likely veto of a conservative president. Instead, measures were introduced to prevent hospitals from refusing to perform legal abortions on religious grounds.

"The state will increasingly effectively stand on the side of the woman when she is making dramatic decisions in her life,” Tusk said in 2024 when he announced the measures.

Polish hospitals performed 573 abortions in the first half of 2026, compared to 452 in the whole of 2022 before Tusk came to power, according to data from the national health fund. But activists say tens of thousands of abortions happen yearly outside of hospitals.

Activists organizing Thursday’s protests are claiming the Tusk government has betrayed Polish women — and that Tusk's claims that women's access to abortion has improved during his administration have actually complicated getting care for some women.

“The government's promises act as a type of disinformation,” Marcinek told the AP. “Women getting pregnant hear the prime minister say that everything is ok, that there is access to abortion, and then they end up in the hospital and see that is not the case. So they come to us when it's very late and very complicated and expensive to help them.”

Meanwhile, international donors are less interested in supporting Polish women's rights because they mistakenly believe things have improved, Marcinek said.

Activists dispense abortion pills outside parliament

In 2025, the Abortion Dream Team opened an “ abortion clinic ” across from the parliament building in Warsaw where women can get information about their options, or even take their abortion pills in the company of supporting activists.

This September, the activists also launched a parcel locker dispensing abortion pills at the same location, nicknamed “Abortomat."

The dispenser is operated by the international feminist non-profit Women Help Women. It enables women needing abortions to get the pills the next day, rather than wait for up to two weeks for home delivery, Marcinek said.

“There are also people who cannot safely order such pills at their own address, for example because of an unsupportive family or abusive partner," she said. “These women can get a pin number and pick up the pills in the machine the next day.”

“In Poland, assisting with an abortion is a criminal offence. Even passing the pills from hand to hand can be considered a crime,” the Abortion Dream Team wrote in a statement. "That’s why we’re hacking the Criminal Code and bringing abortion into the 21st century.”

The Golden State Warriors rookie began his career Wednesday night by refusing to back down from the reigning NBA scoring champion, who punctuated their prolonged on-court exchange of trash talk by making a spectacular half-court shot in Lendeborg's face at the halftime buzzer.

Doncic also won this fight decisively on the scoreboard when the Los Angeles Lakers blew out Lendeborg and the Warriors 127-105, with Doncic scoring 28 points in just three quarters.

Yet Lendeborg somehow wasn't finished talking: He called out the six-time All-Star as a complainer and a free-throw merchant during his postgame news conference.

“I lost all respect (for Doncic), man," Lendeborg said. “That was awful. ... A lot of flopping, a lot of foul-baiting, a lot of praying to the ref, man. Interesting first game for me, for sure."

The Warriors' 24-year-old rookie first-round pick said he sparred with Doncic on the court because of the Slovenian superstar's constant complaining to the officials — admittedly a common feature of most games in Doncic's nine-year career.

Lendeborg, who won an NCAA title with Michigan last season, said he enjoyed watching highlights of Doncic's electric scoring performances in the past — but he has a more jaded perspective on Doncic's skills now.

“Me getting frustrated, it’s not about the foul being called,” Lendeborg said. “It’s about him complaining the entire game, and then you get the foul call, and congratulations, bro. And then you talk to me like you did something great? Bro, come on. That’s just weak, you know? It kind of threw me off for a little while, because like I said, I had so much respect for him. Gone, man. Gone.”

Lendeborg and Doncic exchanged insults for much of the second quarter, with Lendeborg being whistled for a technical foul after saying something so loud and profane it caught the officials' attention.

“I was telling him he sucks,” Lendeborg said with a smile. “‘You can’t score on me.’ I said it the whole game. I said a couple of cuss words, obviously. That’s why I got the technical and all that, but I was letting him know, because he was laughing and talking, all this because of that one foul call."

Doncic mostly laughed off Lendeborg's provocations, but the Lakers star obviously thrives amid confrontation. He was whistled for 16 technical fouls last season, earning a one-game suspension for exceeding the single-season limit.

“He was talking crazy, but I wasn’t trying to talk back this season,” Doncic said of Lendeborg. “Not trying to get techs. For the first time, that was not a double tech, because I didn’t say nothing, so I’m working on it. As you see, I think it worked great.”

Doncic got the ultimate victory at the final buzzer — but his halftime win was incredibly sweet as well.

“I knew that was going in before I got it in my hands,” Doncic said with a grin. “I work on those.”

He got the ball near the scorer's table and let it fly with nearly 3 seconds left on the clock. When it banked through and set off pandemonium in the Lakers' downtown arena, Doncic gleefully pointed at the fuming Lendeborg, who wasn't impressed.

“His only bucket on me was a banker from half court,” Lendeborg said. “I know it’s a team sport. He had 28 on us as a team. Me, I took my matchup personally. Tried not to get called on the fouls. Tried my best. I was thinking about playing him with my hands behind my back to see if that worked. Probably would have still got a foul call. But interesting.”

A Warriors official then steered Lendeborg away from further denigrating one of the greatest players in modern basketball, but the rookie had already done more than enough to stoke this burgeoning personal feud as a fascinating new addition to these California teams' historic rivalry.

Doncic and Lendeborg should see each other again Oct. 30, when the Lakers visit San Francisco.

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See AP’s full NBA coverage here

BioWare announced the closure on social media Wednesday following a report by Bloomberg that also said the company is laying off 400 people, including about 50 at BioWare.

The Redwood Shores, California-based maker of popular titles like “Battlefield” and “The Sims” closed the $55 billion sale of its business to Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund PIF, investment firm Silver Lake Partners and Affinity Partners, which is run by President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, in August.

Representatives for EA did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment on the layoffs.

“What generations of BioWare built together is something to celebrate and remember,” the studio said via social media. “These games became so much more because you played them, debated your choices, fell in love with characters, and made these worlds your own.”

BioWare built its reputation on immersive role-playing adventures, from sword-and-sorcery fantasies like “Baldur’s Gate” and “Dragon Age” to science fiction epics like “Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic” and “Mass Effect.”

But its effort to branch out into multiplayer shooters, 2019’s “Anthem,” steered away from the studio’s strength as a creator of compelling single-player narratives. It failed to find the sort of loyal audience that keeps online hits like “Fortnite” and “Overwatch” humming.

Meanwhile the latest installments of its two most popular original franchises — 2017’s “Mass Effect: Andromeda” and 2024’s “Dragon Age: The Veilguard” — met with mixed reviews and disappointed many fans. A new chapter of “Mass Effect” was in development before BioWare announced its shutdown.

BioWare, based in Canada, was founded in 1995 and acquired by EA in 2007.

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Associated Press Writer Lou Kesten in Washington contributed.

The National Weather Service issued multiple warnings as severe thunderstorms moved through the state overnight Tuesday and into Wednesday, encouraging people to seek shelter and stay away from windows as damaging 2- to 3-inch (5- 7.6-centimeter) hail struck the area. Hail pummeled people's roofs, shattered windows and dented cars.

Tornado watches were issued for multiple areas — the first the state has seen since October 2010.

Warm, moist air moving north fuels storms coming off the California coast. Changing winds can make them spin, creating the conditions for tornadoes, said Ryan Bernhart, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Flagstaff.

“This is very unusual for this area at this time of the year,” Bernhart said.

Strong winds toppled trees in Flagstaff and Mesa, with some landing on walls and carports. A few dozen ponderosa pines over 30 feet (9 meters) tall fell down in the Coconino National Forest, northwest of Flagstaff.

“These are not small trees that are down," Bernhart said. “These are pretty strong trees that had been knocked down.”

The greatest threat to the Phoenix metro area is heavy rainfall and flash flooding tonight and Thursday morning, said Mark O’Malley, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service office in Phoenix.

___

Jessica Hill reported from Las Vegas.

Dr. Jean Kaseya, director general of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said the Oct. 28 meeting would “strengthen our collective response.”

On Tuesday, Nigeria reported its first case, linked to a traveler from Uganda who arrived in the country earlier this month.

Uganda, which declared itself Ebola-free in July after recording 20 cases, has denied claims that Nigeria’s first case originated there. Nigerian authorities said they were tracing 44 contacts.

The patient, a foreign national who entered Nigeria on Oct. 5, was initially treated for malaria symptoms but failed to recover, arousing suspicions in the attending physicians, Odianosen Ehiakhamen, an assistant director at the Nigeria Center for Disease Control, told a local media outlet late Tuesday.

He said the 44 contacts are mostly healthcare workers but also the patient's spouse, a Swiss national.

Nigeria and Kenya, which has recorded nine cases, are the latest countries to report cases linked to travelers who passed through Uganda.

The latest outbreak was first detected in Congo in May after spreading undetected for months, according to the World Health Organization. It has since infected more than 9,500 people and killed nearly half of them, making it the fastest-spreading Ebola outbreak in history.

“Ebola is now affecting three regions of Africa. The situation demands urgent action and political leadership at the highest level,” Kaseya said in a post on X.

The WHO said on Wednesday that it had advised “all countries in the region to sustain a high level of readiness as the DRC outbreak continues to evolve.”

In parts of Congo, including North Kivu, health authorities say the disease is out of control, with most recorded deaths occurring in the community and contact tracing struggling to keep pace with the virus’s spread.

The outbreak involves the rare Bundibugyo virus, for which there is no approved vaccine or treatment. France has also recorded a case.

The answer, delivered during a debate with Democratic challenger Adam Hamilton, aligned Marshall with President Donald Trump's freshly antagonistic posture toward Ukraine, which has spent more than four years defending itself against an invasion. Trump says Ukraine's strikes on Moscow's refineries are responsible for high fuel costs, and said he wants to alleviate the problem by importing Russian diesel.

Marshall balked at that Wednesday, saying “it doesn't sound like a great idea.” But he said ”if this brings Russia to the bargaining table, and it ends the war, then I am all for it right now.”

Hamilton sharply criticized Marshall's stance, saying “nobody believes” Ukraine is to blame.

“What you said just now is you’re going to sell out our friends in Ukraine,” Hamilton said. “That’s not OK."

It was the second and final debate in the Kansas Senate race before the Nov. 3 election. Marshall is seeking a second term, and the race is considered close even though a Democrat hasn’t won a Senate seat in Kansas since 1932. Hamilton is the founder and senior pastor of the nation’s largest United Methodist church.

The cost of diesel is a particularly potent issue in Kansas because the fuel powers its agricultural economy. Hamilton has repeatedly talked on the campaign trail about high diesel prices as a consequence of an “unnecessary” war with Iran waged by Trump. Diesel averaged $6.32 a gallon this week, up from $3.62 a gallon a year ago, according to AAA.

Hamilton has called for suspending federal fuel taxes as a temporary solution while the war in Iran continues. He said he would work to force Trump to end the Iran war. Marshall said he wants the war to end as soon as possible, without committing to trying to force it.

Marshall also tried to tie Hamilton to liberal Democrats' Green New Deal proposals for shifting the U.S. economy fully to renewable energy to combat climate change, suggesting those ideas have prevented the U.S. from building new diesel refineries.

Hamilton said he supports parts of the Green New Deal but not the entire package.

They know there is still work to do. But with a huge Atlanta crowd behind them and Reese dominating the last two games, there's reason to believe in a team that never even had a WNBA Finals win until this series.

Reese had 21 points and 12 rebounds to help the Dream beat the Golden State Valkyries 97-71 on Wednesday night and take a 2-1 lead. It was the second straight strong game for Reese, who had 30 points and 16 rebounds in Game 2, which the Dream also won for their first victory ever in the championship round. She has a double-double in each game of the finals.

“It feels good when you’re in the finals. It’s a long season and you play against everybody and go through and push through, but when you can do it at the highest level, this is what you live for, this is what the offseason is for," Reese said. "I put the work in for this moment and I’m just happy I could lead the team to a win. We’re feeling good going into Saturday.”

That game will also be played at State Farm Arena. Both games in Atlanta were originally set for the Gateway Center Arena, where the Dream play most of their home games. The league was able to work with the Atlanta Hawks to play Games 3 and 4 there so that they could have a much bigger crowd. Gateway only seats 3,500. State Farm Arena can seat more than 17,000 fans.

And they made a difference.

“Protect home court,” said Atlanta's Rhyne Howard, who had 16 points and five steals. “Giving our fans a show. We fought for this arena so we had to protect it. It’s big. We went and stole one but we can’t let them come in and do the same thing.”

With the game tied at 49 in the third quarter, Atlanta scored eight straight, including four by Reese. Golden State got within 59-55 on Tiffany Hayes’ layup, but could get no closer as Atlanta closed the quarter scoring 12 of the final 14 points.

“I’m most proud of the second half because the first few possessions were a little sloppy. I was really close to using a timeout. They pulled together on their own and got it worked out, cleaned it up themselves,” Atlanta coach Karl Smesko said. “They knew what mistakes they were making, and they huddled up. And then they started making plays, and it started. The crowd started getting behind it.”

Atlanta has dominated the third quarter so far in the series, outscoring Golden State 63-35 combined in the three games.

With Atlanta up 17 in the fourth quarter, Jordin Canada overthrew Reese on the break, but she saved the ball by throwing it over her head underneath the basket to Howard, who got fouled.

Golden State could never recover. Gabby Williams scored 15 points and Hayes added 14 for the Valkyries.

“Disappointed in our fight. This game they wanted it more than us,” Hayes said. “That’s not who we are, who we’ve been and how we got here.”

Wednesday night’s game was sold out, as is Game 4 on Saturday. The crowd included many music stars, including Ludacris. Former NBA player Enes Kanter Freedom said he was going to be at the game. The Atlanta Dream and State Farm Arena offered him a private suite for his protection. He refused to sit in it and left the arena.

The game got off to a slow start as Atlanta led 9-1 after the first five minutes. Golden State missed its first eight shots before Aminata Gueye scored the first basket for the Valkyries with 4:39 left. They got within 13-10 before Naz Hillmon hit consecutive 3-pointers and then Reese hit one. The Dream led 23-15 after the opening quarter.

The hot 3-point shooting continued in the second quarter as Atlanta built its lead to 37-26 midway through the period. Golden State was able to hang around and only trailed 46-40 at the break as the teams combined to shoot 15-for-31 (48%) from behind the arc. That was more made 3-pointers in the first 20 minutes then in either Game 1 or Game 2.

Reese had 15 points and WNBA Sixth Woman of the Year Janelle Salaun had 11 for the Valkyries.

Game 1 and 2 had huge ratings with the opener on NBC averaging 2.1 million, the most ever to watch a first game of the Finals. Game 2, which was broadcast on USA Network, averaged 1.33 million viewers.

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See AP’s full WNBA coverage here

But now, some of the key data centers at the heart of its technical prowess have been knocked out by Ukrainian drone attacks in the 4 1/2-year-old full-scale invasion, suffering damage that could take a long time to repair.

Ukraine this month hit three main data centers belonging to tech giant Yandex, one for Russia’s biggest bank, Sberbank, and one for social media platform VKontakte, the country's equivalent to Facebook.

While Yandex, Sberbank and VKontakte are coy about the damage, people and businesses across Russia have reported widespread interruptions to cloud services. Banking, e-commerce, geolocation and ride-hailing services, as well as Alisa, Yandex’s virtual assistant, and multimodal AI chatbots all have suffered lasting disruptions.

The fallout even spread to Russia’s judicial system, reportedly forcing arbitration courts to cancel or postpone sessions and cutting database access.

Most experts predict repairing the damage could take months, if not years. Some warn that Moscow’s aspirations to become a leader in AI development could be significantly set back.

“This effectively sets Russia far behind in the AI race,” said Mikhail Klimarev, head of the Internet Protection Society activist group.

Data centers have been hit by both sides in the war

Data centers are the latest targets of aerial campaigns waged by both sides against each other’s vital infrastructure.

Russian missiles and drones have pummeled Ukraine’s power grid and other key sites, part of Kremlin efforts to weaken morale and resistance. Moscow stepped up those attacks as winter approaches, taking advantage of a shortage of U.S.-supplied Patriot interceptors, whose stockpiles have been drained by Washington's war with Iran.

Ukraine retaliated with waves of drone attacks against Russian oil refineries, triggering a massive fuel crisis and bringing the war home to millions of civilians.

U.S. President Donald Trump has blamed the attacks for higher global oil prices, which have escalated largely due to the U.S. war in Iran. Earlier this month, Trump struck a deal with President Vladimir Putin to import diesel oil, shocking Ukraine and its allies.

Ukraine also hit huge warehouses for Russia's top online retailers, Wildberries and Ozon.

Kyiv's attacks on Russian data centers closely followed Moscow’s recent strikes on data centers in Ukraine, which disrupted the internet and TV broadcasts.

On Oct. 8, Ukrainian drones hit a Yandex data center in Sasovo in the Ryazan region that houses two of the company’s three supercomputers. A data center in Kaluga was hit a day later and the one in Vladimir was struck Oct. 11.

The data center and AI hub for Sberbank was hit Oct. 14 in Balakovo in the Saratov region, and four days later, Kyiv struck a data center in St. Petersburg serving VKontakte.

Data centers are vulnerable

While oil refineries and warehouses are easy prey, data centers are even softer targets — massive buildings packed with servers and supporting power and cooling infrastructure. Lasting damage can result from a drone carrying a relatively light load of explosives.

The vulnerability of data centers was exposed by Iran, whose drones hit two Amazon Web Services data centers in the United Arab Emirates and one in Bahrain. AWS said last month it was unable to restore access to the resources and data hosted at two of them.

Yandex has run drills for an accident that could incapacitate one of its six data centers, but it was caught unprepared when its three key facilities were hit over four days. It wasn’t immediately clear why air defenses near the sites had failed.

“The problem in Russia is that they’ve got to cover a big country with air defense and they don’t have enough,” said Nick Reiners, senior geotechnology analyst at Eurasia Group.

Russia’s efforts to build a ‘sovereign internet’ backfire

Ukraine has stored critical data on servers in allied European countries, helping limit the damage from Russian attacks. But Moscow’s strict digital sovereignty policy requires all data storage at home, making it extremely vulnerable.

“Because all the infrastructure and all the data is located inside Russia, it’s relatively easier to take down,” Reiners said.

Klimarev predicted the data center attacks could encourage many top Russian companies to move data abroad, while the authorities could ease their efforts to tighten internet controls to minimize the damage.

“Paradoxically, the strikes on data centers have saved the Russian internet from isolation, as they will now have to move computing assets, most likely, to Europe,” Klimarev said. “It’s quite likely that many Russian businesses are now roaming the European market to rent computing assets.”

Russians are vexed by service disruptions

Yandex dominates digital life in Russia and many former Soviet nations. It provides a wide variety of functions, including a search engine, cloud storage, payment apps, geolocation and ride-hailing services, and e-commerce platforms.

“Yandex is kind of like Uber and Amazon and Google and everything rolled into one,” with everything "concentrated in just a few data centers,” Reiners said. “From a strategic perspective, they’re an excellent target.”

The attacks on Yandex caused unprecedented disruptions, paralyzing payments, online orders, taxi rides and access to personal data.

Moscow resident Igor Mann said he couldn’t collect an order he placed with Yandex Market, an e-commerce platform. He said he tried using a virtual private network, but “nothing worked.”

Taxi driver Pavel Belyavskiy, who gets orders via Yandex’s ride-hailing app, couldn't connect with passengers.

“On several orders already, I’ve ended up waiting for a long time and had to cancel the ride because I couldn’t even get in touch with the passenger,” he said.

The attacks also caused temporary disruptions at some major companies and banks that rely on Yandex cloud services.

“It’s not just about convenience — it’s also about work ... tied to everyday life,” said another Moscow resident, Eduard Malyavko.

A blow to Russia’s AI ambitions

Yandex said it restored most key cloud services in the following days as it turned to other data centers in Russia. But the damage to the company’s AI development efforts is widely seen as massive and longer-lasting.

Yandex has invested in huge data centers as the global AI boom fuels demand for computing power. The company’s three supercomputers used to develop models are ranked among the top 500 in the world. Its most powerful computer — at the Sasovo data center — was ranked 19th.

Yandex didn't disclose the extent of the strikes' consequences, but satellite images indicated its data centers sustained serious damage. Some observers noted that fires triggered by the attacks probably seriously damaged high-end chips and other key equipment.

“With this kind of hit, it’s hard to expect that at least something was left intact — the data centers' equipment is fragile, demanding and expensive,” Klimarev said. “Soot from the fire is bad for electronics.”

While Russia already lagged years behind the U.S. and China, “Ukraine’s drone strikes will likely still set back Russian AI efforts further,” said Connor Martin, an expert with the Council for Foreign Relations.

He said in a commentary that Russia likely will struggle to quickly replace the U.S.-designed Nvidia A100 chips powering Yandex’s supercomputers.

Klimarev also said the global deficit of high-end chips, combined with the sanctions on their delivery to Russia, will make repairs long and costly.

“I’m not sure it can be done in half a year, a year, or even at all,” he said.

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Kelvin Chan in London contributed.

“'Ashley, it's your favorite president,'” Iowa's Republican nominee for U.S. Senate recently recounted to an audience of her supporters. “That's how he introduced himself.”

She had had a more forceful message about communicating with President Donald Trump on the debate stage with her Democratic opponent, Josh Turek, as she tried to win over undecided voters.

“I’ll be President Trump’s ally when it is important for Iowa, but I will push back on him,” promised Hinson, who currently serves in the U.S. House. “He knows this.”

Although many Republicans are walking a political tightrope in this year's midterm elections, Hinson's balancing act is more challenging than most. Iowans have been hamstrung by manufacturing job losses, health care clinic closures and shrunken farm profits since Trump returned to the White House, but Hinson also is relying on the president's loyalists to show up for her.

On Thursday, Hinson will join Trump for a rally in Sioux City, which is in Iowa's conservative northwest corner. The visit to safe territory is geared toward boosting turnout even as it ties her more tightly to an unpopular president.

“I will be there at the rally to welcome him to Iowa because I think this is a contrast election," Hinson said on Fox News last week. “There was never a good time to elect a tax-and-spend liberal to the United States Senate but now would be the worst time.”

Trump is expected to visit the state again Nov. 1. He is “anxious for Iowans to hear his message before they vote,” Iowa Republican Party Chair Jeff Kaufmann said in announcing the president's schedule.

Turek, a state lawmaker, was in Sioux City for a campaign event Tuesday and told reporters he was happy for Trump to visit to see how his tariffs and the Iran war have “hurt Iowa more than any other state.” Although Turek says he's willing to work with Trump on issues like immigration, he called Hinson a rubber stamp for the president's bad policies.

There are more examples of Hinson bucking the president

When Hinson kicked off her campaign last year, she touted Trump’s endorsement and said she was running to be Trump’s “top ally” in the Senate. Almost a year later, Hinson instead says she wants to be “Iowa’s best bipartisan fighter."

The message has crystallized since the summer, with more examples of Hinson vocalizing positions at odds with the president. Recent polling from late September and early October suggests it could work as she carves out about 1 in 10 voters who disapprove of the president even as she continues to secure overwhelming support from those who approve of Trump.

In August, she said Trump’s plan to increase beef imports from foreign countries in an attempt to lower prices was "a bad idea” that would hurt Iowa farmers.

Last month, two of Hinson's Iowa colleagues in the House broke with the White House and voted against Trump's ability to continue the war with Iran without congressional approval.

Hinson didn’t, but she said later the war has gotten too costly for Americans and called for Trump to bring the conflict to a “successful and immediate end.”

More recently, Hinson criticized Trump’s decision to ease sanctions on Russia in exchange for diesel fuel. She said Tuesday that the U.S. needs to make sure “dictators aren’t allowed to win wars.”

“I think the president and I share the goal of lowering costs for working families and for people who are using diesel,” she told reporters after a campaign event. “I, again, just don’t think we need to be making any deals with Russia.”

Hinson said she hadn’t talked with the president about the issue.

“Maybe I’ll have a chance to come have a conversation with him at the rally," she added.

Turek says he'll work with Trump on immigration

Hinson isn't the only one pitching bipartisanship. So is Turek. In fact, he's the only Iowa candidate seeking federal office who explicitly mentions Trump in general election television advertisements, according to an Associated Press analysis of AdImpact data.

In one, Turek is behind the wheel speaking directly to a camera about Interstate 35, which “connects Iowa to the southern border and the broken immigration system that both parties have failed to fix." He says: “In the U.S. Senate, I’ll work with anyone to fix it, including President Trump, to secure the border, stop the flow of drugs into Iowa.”

Turek has pushed back on the president’s policies, including tariffs and the war in Iran, as the catalysts of high costs that are hurting Iowans, but his message on working with the president on immigration and other select issues stands out from other Democrats. Republicans say he's just pretending to be a moderate to get elected.

Mazie Stilwell, executive director of the progressive organization Progress Iowa, said Turek's message on immigration targets a bloc of voters on an issue that's particularly important to them but doesn't overshadow his otherwise disciplined focus on the high costs facing Iowans.

Trump’s visit to the state Thursday, she added, is “a terrific reminder of the disaster that he has been and his administration has been for our bottom line, for everyday Iowans who are trying to make ends meet.”

Iowa Senate races often draw big spending

Iowa is no stranger to competitive Senate races even though Trump won the state by double digits in the last presidential election.

Ad spending on broadcast and cable television has already surpassed $200 million this cycle, AdImpact shows. But in today’s dollars, the total ad spending in the 2020 Senate race was even higher.

Republicans have spent slightly more for Hinson than Democrats for Turek. That was the opposite in 2020, when Democrats spent nearly $30 million more than the GOP did in their unsuccessful effort to unseat Sen. Joni Ernst.

Iowa Republican activist Kelley Koch has been concerned that complacency will dampen turnout from conservatives, even those who are loyal to the president.

"They say, ‘Why are you all hyped up about the midterms, Kelley, Trump will take care of everything,'” Koch said.

It’s an assumption she’s working to counteract, and she expects “the Trump effect” from his visits will help protect Republican majorities in the House and Senate.

And while Koch supports Hinson, she doesn’t like it when she talks about pushing back on Trump.

“Right now,” Koch said, “we had better unite around our president.”

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Associated Press reporter Aaron Kessler in Washington contributed.

On the eve of a major protest planned for Oct. 17, he was photographed at a Celine Dion concert. Early Monday morning, with French cities still smoldering and littered with wreckage from the riots, Macron was flying abroad to secure a favorable fuel supply deal.

Presidential contenders on the far right and far left seized on the unrest to attack him. Macron himself acknowledged “failures” in planning and intelligence gathering.

Constitutionally barred from seeking a third consecutive term, the centre-right president entered the crisis with his popularity at its lowest since he took office in 2017 — below even the levels recorded during the “yellow vest” protests against social injustice and inequality that began in 2018.

He has yet to endorse a candidate, and it is unclear how much influence his backing would carry. Polls show moderates trailing far-right and far-left contenders.

With further protests planned for Thursday and Saturday, here is a look at France’s political landscape and how candidates are positioning themselves to succeed Macron.

The far right seeks to broaden support for Le Pen’s bid

Far-right leader Marine Le Pen, seen as the favorite in next year's election, has sought to turn anger over the riots into support for her presidential bid, presenting herself as the alternative to a government she described as powerless.

“We are facing a state that is collapsing,” Le Pen told broadcaster FranceInfo on Wednesday. “We are facing a government in its final days that has, in reality, lost its grip and can no longer maintain control,” she said, blaming the violence on “far-left rioters” and “looters from the suburbs.”

Earlier this year, a Paris appeals court cleared a path for Le Pen to run by shortening a ban on seeking public office that had threatened her presidential ambitions. And now she is “the only candidate to capitalize on this event,” according to Frédéric Dabi, director general of Ifop, a pollster. That makes it hard to imagine her failing to reach the election's runoff, he added.

Jordan Bardella, president of Le Pen's National Rally party, has urged citizens to channel their anger into votes and promised, if she is elected, “to reestablish security.” He and Le Pen have called for more police equipment and personnel and tougher sentences for rioters.

Authorities have repeatedly blamed “far-left radicals” and opportunistic criminals for the violence.

The far left backs protesters' grievances

Far-left presidential contender Jean-Luc Mélenchon has backed the protest movement while condemning looting and vandalism. He has accused the government of inflaming tensions through its policing and failure to address demonstrators’ demands.

Protesters are calling for higher wages and pensions, better healthcare and other public services, and more funding for education.

Mélenchon, who joined Saturday’s peaceful march through Paris, has faced accusations from opponents that his criticism of police excuses violence.

His party, France Unbowed, has also backed student protests and high school blockades that began in mid-September, supporting demands for more teachers, better facilities and changes to university admissions.

Observers said it was too early to tell whether Mélenchon would gain or lose support. Violence attributed to radical far-left activists could deepen reservations among moderate voters, while his prominent support for protesters’ demands could strengthen his appeal on the left.

Wide field of candidates vying to succeed Macron

Political analysts also stress that electoral effects from events like last weekend's violence must be measured over time.

Polls before Saturday's violence and the only one conducted afterward show Le Pen as the clear front-runner, while placing Mélenchon in second position, though he remained in a close contest with more moderate contenders.

“Behind her, nothing is set in stone, nothing is guaranteed,” Dabi said on Sud Radio, stressing that three candidates appear in a position to reach the runoff.

The broad field of candidates features several centrists, including two former prime ministers appointed by Macron. Earlier this month, socialists and their allies chose a center-left European Parliament lawmaker as their presidential candidate.

None has managed to gain traction in opinion polls. The first round of the presidential election is scheduled for April 18 and a runoff on May 2.

But first she has to convince New Mexicans that they should keep Democrats in charge. The state persistently ranks near the bottom nationally on poverty, crime and public education, and disenchanted voters are pleading for change.

A loss would be embarrassing for Democrats, who hold all the top state offices and have controlled the Legislature nearly continuously for almost a century. Haaland blames President Donald Trump for compounding the state's problems by cutting social programs that New Mexicans disproportionately rely on and increasing the cost of living by waging war against Iran. She proposes expanding existing tax credits and spending more on safety net programs to help families make ends meet.

Haaland, a citizen of Laguna Pueblo in west-central New Mexico, once relied on government assistance as a single mother. She rose through the ranks, serving in Congress for two years before being tapped as President Joe Biden’s interior secretary.

A victory in the governor’s race could elevate Haaland's standing in the Democratic Party. The party recently named New Mexico as one of the earliest states for its next presidential primary, bolstering its prominence in national politics and ensuring more visits from White House hopefuls.

Gregg Hull, the Republican contender and a former mayor of fast-growing Rio Rancho, said New Mexico can no longer afford more of the same and is “primed for a shift.” If he wins, Hull promises to cut taxes, which he said will fight poverty by allowing people to keep more money in their pockets.

“I think the time has come to have a leader who is going to focus on the true solutions to these problems,” Hull said.

Haaland’s national star power meets Hull’s local pitch

Haaland has leveraged her national profile into a nearly $20 million campaign fund and endorsements from big Democratic names, including former President Barack Obama and former U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.

U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren joined Haaland at an Albuquerque daycare center this week to read stories to preschoolers and promote New Mexico’s fledgling universal childcare program, which Haaland has pledged to preserve.

“I have known and worked with Deb Haaland for many years, and she is a fighter on behalf of opportunities for all of our children,” Warren said.

Hull, meanwhile, has emphasized his record leading Rio Rancho, a suburb of Albuquerque, through a period of fast economic growth. He says he would apply lessons from that experience to attract large employers to the state and boost workers’ incomes.

That pitch resonates with A.J. Rodriguez, a school security guard who lives in Edgewood and said local success means more to him than federal experience.

“I do like how he was running Rio Rancho," Rodriguez said. “I liked his stance on crime.”

Soaring oil prices pad state coffers

New Mexico’s next governor will face stubborn challenges but also inherit a financial cushion that could be used to address them.

As the nation's No. 2 oil-producing state, New Mexico has used record revenues over the years to build substantial budget reserves and multibillion-dollar permanent funds that help pay for schools and childcare. Higher energy prices stemming from the war with Iran have provided an additional boost.

In that windfall, Hull sees an opportunity to reduce New Mexicans’ tax burden. He has a plan to gradually phase out state income tax for all residents while reining in recent growth in state spending.

“If you want to raise people out of poverty, the best way to do that is to improve their personal wealth,” he said.

Haaland favors doubling down on free childcare and free college tuition and shoring up government assistance for healthcare and food after federal cuts under Trump. Once a supporter of the Green New Deal, a sweeping plan for transitioning away from fossil fuels to fight climate change, Haaland acknowledges the oil and gas industry’s role in funding New Mexico’s social safety net.

But she said the surging revenue comes at the cost of higher prices.

“I’m not happy about that because it’s caused people a lot of heartache,” Haaland said.

New Mexico voters focus on affordability

Chris Flores, a volunteer for Hull's campaign, believes strongly in the candidate’s proposal to eliminate income tax, starting with the lowest income New Mexicans.

“I’ll be able to pay off the biggest debt that I’ve ever had,” said Flores, who lives in Albuquerque. She meant the student loans that have prevented her from fixing up her house and saving for retirement.

Rodriguez is skeptical of the tax break plan and wonders how the state will make up for lost income. Still, he says Democrats have “mismanaged” New Mexico's persistent problems, and it's time for a Republican to set the state's political agenda.

Journeyman plumber Alfred Lujan blamed Republicans for rising prices, and said it costs him $150 to fill up his work truck with diesel. He said Haaland understands what it means to live on a tight budget.

“She’s had setbacks in her life and she’s come back from that," the 47-year-old Albuquerque resident said. “That’s really what makes me gravitate toward her.”

At a campaign event in Gallup, Haaland’s celebrity status with some Native American voters was on display. She took selfies with students and accepted gifts of handmade jewelry and pottery from supporters.

Generita Francisco and Angela Bahe, both citizens of the Navajo Nation, were attracted to her pledge to help residents enroll in public health benefits. Both said they are priced out of the insurance market and forced to rely on Gallup’s aging and understaffed Indian Health Service hospital.

The two women, who left with autographs, have watched Haaland’s political rise with pride. But if she's elected, they vowed to hold her to a high standard.

“Everything she’s promising, she needs to fulfill it,” Bahe said.

His last three films — “Ida,” “Cold War” and his latest, “Fatherland” — are all 90 minutes or less. Each is shot in black and white, in a boxy academy ratio. And none has a single ounce of fat on it.

“It feels a bit controversial what I’m doing,” Pawlikowski says, chuckling. “I’m quite aware that it’s provocative to be so stripped down.”

In an era where three-hour movies are commonplace, Pawlikowski, the 69-year-old Polish filmmaker, has refined a style of less is more. His movies are brief but unhurried, lean yet profound.

“You try to distill it, distill it, distill it,” he says.

That approach has made Pawlikowski a leading international filmmaker and a hero to lovers of short movies. “Ida” (2013), about a Polish woman who finds out she’s Jewish just as she’s about to become a nun, won the Academy Award for best international film. “Cold War” (2018), about a doomed romance in postwar Poland, won him best director at the Cannes Film Festival and an Oscar nomination for best director. “Fatherland,” too, won him best director in Cannes in May.

A postwar Germany, divided between ‘Stalin or Mickey Mouse’

In the 82-minute film, which Mubi releases in select theaters Friday, Hanns Zischler plays the German Nobel Prize-winning novelist Thomas Mann and Sandra Hüller his daughter, Erika. In the aftermath of World War II, they take a road trip through the ruins of Germany. They’re itinerant in their home country, traveling between U.S.-controlled Frankfurt and Soviet-controlled Weimar.

“Stalin or Mickey Mouse” is how one character frames the choice before the Manns in a Germany beginning to reckon with, or forget, the past. For Pawlikowski, it’s a dichotomy with shades of today’s political divisions. In Poland, “Ida” was criticized by right-wing nationalists who said it showed the country in a bad light.

“There was an election campaign going on, and it was a bad time to show it,” Pawlikowski says. “But it wasn’t just the right that attacked. It was attacked for being antisemitic. All these people can be struck in their narratives and find something in your film that they hate.”

“Art is good for you, but it’s not going to solve any problems,” he adds.

Cutting scenes and maintaining rhythm

The value art has next to political power is at the center of “Fatherland.” Mann, having fled to America to escape the Nazis, is being courted by both the West and the East. Meanwhile, former Nazis are returning to society and advancing their own view of Germany.

Pawlikowski began by taking real events and condensing them. Mann’s trip was with his wife, not his daughter. They visited more places over a longer period of time, but Pawlikowski limited himself to two cities and five days.

That was only the start of Pawlikowski paring things down. What’s most missing in “Fatherland,” you realize afterward, are the transitory moments that lead into or out of a scene.

“You don’t need the scenes that get you from A to B. Just have strong scenes side by side. They will function regardless,” Pawlikowski says. “The main thing is that it has music and a good rhythm.”

Unlike his somber, terse movies, Pawlikowski is chatty, self-deprecating and quick to laugh. He likes to shoot for five days in a week, have a day off and spend the other day editing — a part of the process usually not begun until after production is over.

“People say, ‘Oh your scripts are so well done,’” he says. “The ideas are there and there’s a beginning and a middle and an end. But actually, it’s the luxury of being able to write and rewrite all the time and sometimes shoot something else and scrap another thing.”

For Hüller, doing more with less dialogue

Reshoots for larger productions can be costly. But on “Fatherland,” it was easier.

Pawlikowski kept two locations, hotel rooms, dressed for shooting, just in case. He originally had a big emotional scene when Erika finds out her brother died and meets up with an Associated Press reporter character named Betty (Anna Madeley). After looking at it, he decided to reshoot the scene with Erika, feeling overwhelmed with grief, simply opening her window and screaming at loud Germans on the nighttime street below.

“I looked at it and wondered, ‘Maybe Betty’s not the thing. Maybe she should just be alone with her memory of Klaus and take it out on the poor Nazis,’” says Pawlikowski.

The result is one of the standout moments in Hüller’s otherwise restrained performance. Hüller, whose remarkable 2026 has also included the films “Project Hail Mary,” “Digger” and “Rose,” suspected going into “Fatherland” that Pawlikowski’s precision would heighten her scenes.

“It has a lot to do with presence and awareness,” Hüller says. “And with a rich inner movement that’s not necessarily seen on the outside. But you can feel it, in some way. The more precise this inner movement is, the better it works in that very precise (camera) frame. That’s something I had to find out.”

Still, there was dialogue Hüller loved that she had to accept being cut.

“There was one line where Sandra said, ‘Oh, I love that line,’” says Pawlikowski. “OK, but you’re never going to miss it because what we have has such a beautiful flow to it. Just because it’s a clever line doesn’t mean we have to have it.”

For Pawlikowski, paring away isn't just an aesthetic. It's a way of life.

“I’m all into simplifying life, anyways,” he says, smiling. “Stick to your friends. Like what you like. Try to be honest. If you can do that in film, or any kind of art form, it helps. And you feel you’re within yourself.”

Federal authorities are investigating potential fraud in her family's immigration paperwork and have issued grand jury subpoenas to some of her relatives, a person briefed on the investigation told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss an ongoing investigation.

Omar, who was born in Somalia and is a naturalized U.S. citizen, said Wednesday in her first interview since the search that she is “confident in the fact that I didn’t do anything wrong.”

The progressive Minnesota Democrat has been a frequent critic and target of President Donald Trump, who has on multiple occasions pushed for the prosecution of his perceived political enemies.

In the interview with MS NOW, Omar said she was rattled by the search weeks out from the Nov. 3 midterms, which will decide control of the House and Senate. She is running for reelection in a deep blue district centered in Minneapolis and is expected to retain her seat.

Omar recalled waking around 6 a.m. to Homeland Security investigators banging on her door with a warrant. They searched for four or five hours and seized 17 items, including phones, notebooks, a Somali language children’s book and a vintage camera that her husband had received as a gift, she said.

The Justice Department has shared few details about the case other than saying it was a criminal investigation.

Omar came with her family to the U.S. at age 12, after they obtained asylum. She became a U.S. citizen five years later, in 2000.

“It would be a huge undertaking to, I suppose, indict a 12-year-old for so cleverly conspiring to defraud immigration services to come to the United States. I'm sure there are a lot of smart 12-year-olds, but that seams like a leap,” she said in the interview.

The search drew sharp condemnation from congressional Democrats, who also questioned the timing. The Justice Department has historically avoided overt investigative actions involving candidates in the immediate run-up to an election.

Omar said the agents were “intrusive but polite,” logging the items they took and putting back everything else in its place.

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Associated Press reporter Alanna Durkin Richer contributed from Washington.

Trump, who was repeatedly interrupted by protesters early in his speech, sought to reassure South Carolinians on Wednesday that the late Sen. Lindsey Graham held his sister in high esteem. “Everybody respects her. She’s smart and incredible. She’ll never let you down,” Trump said as he made a case for her.

He said Graham's Democratic opponent, pediatrician Annie Andrews, would "be the most extreme and one of the most crazy people in the entire country. It would be a disaster.”

The president initially focused his remarks along Republican attack lines that accuse Andrews of supporting surgeries for transgender minors, which she denies. But the president over an hour and a half drifted from subject to subject, spending relatively little time on South Carolina.

Instead, he mused about renaming bodies of water, lamented that he should have won the Nobel Prize and the Pulitzer Prize, and did an imitation of a female bodybuilder. He ticked through some of the things he has done since returning to office, like his push to lower drug prices, and some goals for the rest of his term, such as expanding the death penalty.

Although South Carolina is not typically a midterm battleground, Trump has been deeply invested in Graham. He supported her appointment to replace Lindsey Graham after his death in July, and he backed her in a special primary when she faced several more experienced Republican opponents. But some distance emerged between the Republican president and the senator over the weekend over his decision to waive Ukraine war sanctions on Russia that were set to be imposed under a law named after Lindsey Graham.

Republicans want to make sure Andrews doesn't pull off an upset victory. More than $34 million has flowed into the race, and Republicans have hammered Andrews as a “radical liberal."

Trump this week is rallying every day for candidates across the country, even in conservative areas, and imploring voters to “pretend I'm on the ballot” in hopes of averting a lackluster midterm turnout for Republicans.

“Darline Graham knows that our campaign’s momentum is so strong she called Donald Trump to come campaign for her in South Carolina," Andrews said in a fundraising appeal email.

Darline Graham rushed to define herself — and clung close to Trump

Lindsey Graham had been on a glide path to a fifth term when he died of an aortic tear. Darline Graham, former director of the state agency for the blind, received bipartisan support when she was appointed to serve out her brother's term. But her decision to run for the seat in the midterms prompted skepticism that the political neophyte was up for the job.

Darline Graham had the endorsement of Trump, who campaigned for her before the runoff with U.S. Rep. Ralph Norman. A stumble over a question related to U.S. policy in Taiwan, in which Graham admitted she was “not that informed on national security,” prompted questions over her readiness.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who is from South Carolina and spoke ahead of Trump on Wednesday, said Graham was driven by the same kind of hope for America that her brother was.

“As long as Donald Trump is in the White House, and Darline Graham is in the Senate, we can all hope for a better country," he said.

Waiting for her at a weekend event in Mount Pleasant, Nanette Tumbleston said she felt strongly Graham should win, shuddering to think of what might happen if the seat fell to Democrats.

“I hope that everybody’s eyes will be open and we’ll have a Republican win," Tumbleston said, adding that she feared progressives' influence in the Democratic Party. “I just can’t see how they can see that the world’s going to be a better place with those policies.”

Andrews pivoted from Lindsey Graham to Darline Graham

Andrews launched her campaign more than a year before Lindsey Graham's death. She pivoted to criticizing Darline Graham as “Trump-endorsed and unqualified.”

Andrews argues that Republican policies have weakened not only the broader U.S. economy but also the financial situations of children and families, centering her message on “building a South Carolina that we can all afford,” as she said last week in Columbia.

As the pediatrician seemed to gain steam this fall, Republican groups infused millions of dollars into the race, characterizing the spending as an insurance policy for Graham. Trump attacked Andrews on social media, saying the Democrat doesn’t represent “the Values of the Great People of South Carolina.”

Some Andrews supporters acknowledge that while Democrats might ultimately break through in South Carolina, it might take more time.

Paul Davis, of Aiken, said “people are really angry and fed up, and they can’t afford things.” However, he said a Democratic victory “may be a cycle or two away.”

The candidates accuse each other of being unqualified

At their only debate, Graham and Andrews disagreed on issues including healthcare but primarily accused each other of inexperience.

“It is nothing personal, but she has shown time and time again that she is not up for the job,” Andrews said, calling Graham's interim appointment “a nice gesture."

Graham said serving while processing her brother's death showed “just how strong I am,” adding that ”I’m just as qualified as you are.”

At the Columbia rally, some of Andrews' supporters said they were hopeful, despite Democrats' years of Senate losses in the state. When Lindsey Graham last ran in 2020, he defeated Democrat Jaime Harrison by 10 percentage points in a contest that turned into South Carolina’s most expensive ever.

“It’s definitely frustrating," said Emily Glenham, a Columbia copywriter. "It’s definitely been disappointing, but you can’t not have hope.”

Sandra Martin, of West Columbia, agreed Andrews had “a good chance” but looked more toward the future.

“Georgia did it,” she said. “If Georgia can do it, there’s no reason we can’t, someday.”

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Price reported from Washington. Meg Kinnard can be reached at http://x.com/MegKinnardAP

Freedom demanded he be allowed to sit in his purchased seat, and for the second time this season didn’t make it through a WNBA game. He posted a video at halftime saying he had been thrown out of the arena.

“I just got kicked out of a WNBA game for the second time in a row for supporting WOMEN!” Freedom said on his post. "Let that sink in AMERICA!"

The video posted by Freedom showed him being informed at the entry gate: “If you come in you have to agree to go to the suite.”

Freedom responded: “I purchased tickets, right? Just because I purchased tickets, I would like to sit in my seat. That's all I want.”

An Atlanta police officer told Freedom: “You're free to go to the city of Atlanta streets. That's another private establishment over there. He's free to go there. He just can't be here.”

A State Farm Arena public relations official said Freedom “was offered the suite for his safety and he rejected it.”

Before the game, a State Farm Arena statement said Freedom had been offered the suite.

“Enes Kanter Freedom has contacted federal, state and local authorities, the WNBA, the Atlanta Dream and State Farm Arena officials to express concerns about his personal safety during his planned attendance at Game 3 of the WNBA Finals tonight,” the statement said. "The safety and security of our guests and team members is our highest priority.

“Following consultations with the WNBA, Dream ownership, State Farm Arena leadership and security officials, we have directed Mr. Freedom to watch tonight’s game from a private luxury suite. This arrangement is intended to address his security concerns and help provide a safe and positive experience for him and other guests. The suite will have additional security and will be his designated viewing location for the game. State police have also assigned an officer to Mr. Freedom at his request.”

Freedom announced on social media on Monday he planned to attend the game. It was his first WNBA game since late August, when he went to see Chicago host Indiana. He was ejected from the game and banned from the arena for getting into a heated interaction with Sky guard Natasha Cloud.

Freedom said he was motivated to attend the game after learning that Golden State star Gabby Williams said she would support a trans athlete playing in the league.

“As you all know, this all started with an interview featuring Gabby Williams of the Golden State Valkyries, when she said, ‘I have no problem with trans athletes playing on my team or against my team,’" Freedom said in his post. "Her words gave me so much hope and motivation to come out as a woman and officially declare for the WNBA draft. I can’t wait to watch my favorite player, the woman who inspired me to become who I am today!”

Freedom and Royce White, another former NBA player, have declared for the WNBA draft, saying they identify as women. But a person familiar with the decision told The Associated Press in August they are not eligible. WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert has since made that position public.

On Wednesday, Freedom posted a photo of himself in Atlanta and also posted a copy of a letter from Engelbert in which she said replied to a question from Indiana Rep. Marlin A. Stutzman about the eligibility of transgender athletes to play in the league.

“With respect to your questions regarding eligibility, only women are eligible to play in the WNBA and the individuals you cite in your letter are both men,” Engelbert said, referring to Freedom and White.

Freedom replied: “Apparently the WNBA still can't define what a WOMAN is, but they're absolutely certain they know what a MAN is! How convenient!”

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This story corrects Freedom's quote to “Apparently the WNBA still can’t define" what a WOMAN is. A previous version had it as “the WNBA still can define.”

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See AP’s full WNBA coverage here

Trump told reporters at the White House that he had asked Russian President Vladimir Putin during a recent call to free Stephen Hubbard and that, unlike previous releases, the U.S. did not have to give up anyone in return.

“He is the happiest man around," Trump said of Hubbard, describing the 74-year-old retired teacher from Michigan as a “very high-quality, innocent man.” Hubbard's legal team denied the Russian accusations, saying he was not involved in any military activity.

The release occurred during a visit to St. Petersburg by U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff, who in a face-to-face interaction with Putin praised the Russian leader as a “humanitarian” as the men held talks about Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and as Trump simultaneously pushes Kyiv to make a deal that stops the fighting.

Hubbard, who before his arrest had lived in Ukraine for years, was sentenced in 2024 to nearly seven years in prison during closed court proceedings. Prosecutors said he had signed a contract with the Ukrainian military after Russia's invasion in 2022, and that he fought alongside Kyiv's forces until being captured two months later.

The U.S. government under President Joe Biden's administration designated Hubbard as wrongfully detained. His family also disputed the Russian allegations.

“He was just for bait. It was all about bait. And that’s why they kidnap Americans,” his sister, Patricia Hubbard Fox, said in an interview with The Associated Press. She said she expected Hubbard to stay with her in Colorado.

“Steven James Hubbard is the face of America,” she said. “They could do that to anybody. They just happened to see him. ‘Oh, that’s an American, let’s go get him.’”

US envoy calls Putin a ‘humanitarian’

Witkoff, a key Trump administration figure who has tried without success to steer Russia and Ukraine toward a settlement to end a war that will hit the five-year mark in February 2027, thanked Putin for releasing Hubbard, telling him, “Because of you, he's going home to his family.”

“You talk so much about my president, President Trump, being a humanitarian. You are a humanitarian also, sir,” Witkoff said.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Russian media Wednesday that Hubbard’s release was “raised by the American side for a certain time,” and Putin decided to free the man out of “humanitarian considerations.”

Speaking to reporters after the talks, Putin aide Yuri Ushakov said the Kremlin leader had pardoned Hubbard, who upon his release was taken to St. Petersburg's Pulkovo airport for Witkoff to bring him home to the United States.

Video showed Witkoff and Hubbard shaking hands, with the newly released American thanking the envoy. Witkoff introduced Putin envoy Kirill Dmitriev to Hubbard and described him as someone “who had a lot to do with this happening.”

“We just met President Putin, he sends you blessings and wishes you good things,” Witkoff added.

Hubbard, a U.S. Air Force veteran, taught English overseas and had by 2012 retired to Cyprus, where one of his sons is a priest. He later moved to Ukraine to be with a woman he had met, his lawyers said, remaining in the country after the relationship ended and living there at the time of Russia's 2022 invasion. He was detained in April of that year after Russian forces took control of the area where he was living.

His case was taken up by lawyers at the U.S.-based law firm of Boies Schiller Flexner and the Russian firm of EPAM Law, which together had represented Marc Fogel, the American teacher freed from Russian custody last year, and worked for his release.

“They thought they weren't going to see him again alive, and Stephen didn't think he was going to come out of there alive,” one of Hubbard's lawyers at Boies Schiller, Martin De Luca, said in an interview of Hubbard's family. “Obviously, they're overjoyed, but they feel very much like it's a miracle.”

His sister said she had spoken with Hubbard soon after his release. “That was awesome. He was just laughing. He said, ‘I can’t believe this is happening,’” Hubbard Fox said of her brother.

Trump told reporters Wednesday night that Hubbard is expected to visit the White House some time in the coming days.

Other Americans remain jailed in Russia

The release occurred at a dynamic moment in relations between the United States, Ukraine and Russia, with the Washington-Kyiv relationship being roiled by fresh tensions at the same time that the Trump administration has advanced policies that aid Putin.

Those include Trump's move last week to waive sanctions on Russia imposed by a bill that Congress overwhelmingly passed to support Ukraine. Named after the late South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, the legislation targeted the flow of financial resources fueling Moscow’s war.

That decision followed Trump’s announcement of a deal to import Russian diesel fuel in a long-shot effort to curb high gas prices ahead of next month's U.S. midterm elections.

Witkoff met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Norway on Tuesday. He was expected to exchange ideas from that meeting, as well as proposals from European and American colleagues, in his talks with Russian leaders in St. Petersburg.

Hubbard is the second American freed by Russia in roughly two months, following the release in August of Marine veteran Robert Gilman, who had been gravely ill and was imprisoned on disputed charges of assaulting a police officer.

Other Americans, including some with serious illnesses, remain jailed in Russia. Hubbard was the last remaining American designated as wrongfully detained, although advocates say that label should be applied to other prisoners.

When asked Wednesday night if he thinks more Americans will be released, Trump told reporters, “Yeah, I think so. That’ll come."

Russia reported more arrests of foreigners in recent days. The FSB security service said Wednesday it detained a German national suspected of mercenary activities and last week announced arrests of a Swedish national suspected of sabotage and a Japanese journalist accused of espionage.

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Associated Press writers Thomas Peipert and Michelle L. Price contributed to this report.

Leo, 71, had part of one lung removed last week in the first major health event of his 17-month pontificate. The surgery confirmed he had adenocarcinoma, the most common type of lung cancer. Leo was discharged from Rome’s Gemelli Polyclinic on Saturday, four days after surgery, and said he would gradually resume his activities.

The pope's personal physician, Dr. Luigi Carbone, and his surgeon, Dr. Stefano Margaritora, said the final tests on tissue removed during the surgery confirmed the diagnosis and that the cancer had not spread.

“A subsequent oncology assessment confirmed that no further treatment is necessary,” the doctors said in a statement.

The pope had the lower section, or lobe, of his right lung removed to try to ensure that all the cancer was removed.

Additional treatment is offered for patients whose cancer has spread, such as into the lymph nodes, or who have certain other signs that their cancer might be particularly aggressive. Surgery often can be enough when tumors are caught very early, such as when someone has an X-ray or other scan that shows a spot long before it’s large or causing symptoms.

The pope appears to have had one of those “incidental findings,” a nodule in his lung spotted during another exam.

In an interview with Vatican News on Saturday, Margaritora, the chief thoracic surgeon at Rome’s Gemelli hospital, confirmed that the nodule was found by chance during routine abdominal examinations, and that the pope had not been experiencing any symptoms.

“The statements suggest that this is a stage I lung cancer for which surgery is highly effective and expected to be curative,” said Dr. Stephen Liu, a lung cancer expert at Georgetown’s Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center. He said the lack of further treatment suggests a relatively small cancer, and that it had not spread to lymph nodes.

The pope carried on business while in the hospital, including a call with Russian President Vladimir Putin, and has appeared strong in two public appearances at the Vatican since his surgery: the traditional Sunday blessing from a window overlooking St. Peter's Square and Wednesday's longer audience in the square, greeting the faithful from around the world.

“Thank you! Thank you for the support of your prayers,” Leo said during the audience.

His next major engagement is an ambitious Nov. 6-17 trip to Uruguay, Argentina and Peru.

Margaritora told Vatican News that there was “no clinical reason” to prevent the trip, which includes a dozen flights, two helicopter rides and high altitude stops.

The pope had revealed that a nodule would be surgically removed during the traditional Sunday blessing on Oct. 11, in an unusually transparent disclosure broadcast on live television that broke the tradition of secrecy surrounding papal health issues.

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AP medical writer Lauran Neergaard contributed to this report.

Movement is toward the north at 6 mph. The storm should turn northeastward by tomorrow with a large increase in forward speed.

Josephine should move away from the United States and remain south of Nova Scotia and Newfoundland.

Maximum sustained winds are near 65 mph with higher gusts. Some strengthening is expected, though Josephine is anticipated to remain a subtropical storm through early Thursday.

Further strengthening is likely by late Thursday as Josephine becomes a post-tropical cyclone with hurricane-force winds.

Winds of 40 mph extend outward up to 415 miles from the center.

The estimated minimum central pressure is 990 mb or 29.24 inches.

What is a Subtropical Storm? A subtropical storm is a hybrid low-pressure system that blends features of both tropical storms and regular non-tropical storms.

They draw on warm ocean waters like tropical storms, but also gain energy from temperature contrasts due to fronts in the atmosphere.

They feature a broader wind field and are often associated with weather fronts, unlike purely tropical systems which have uniform temperatures around a tight center.

They can pack strong winds and if they lose their frontal characteristics and warm completely, they can transition into a full tropical storm or hurricane.

In the Central Atlantic a new trough of low pressure, located several hundred miles east-southeast of Bermuda, is producing a large area of disorganized showers and thunderstorms.

Some development of this system is possible during the next day or two while it moves slowly north-northeastward. Upper-level winds are forecast to become too strong for further development by the weekend.

The formation chance through 48 hours and 7 days is 10 percent.

Becky Drury said she ran to see what was going on but immediately saw the shooter and rushed back to the classroom.

“I turned to shut the door behind me, but the shooter was already there,” Drury said. “Before I could do anything more, he shot me at close range and I fell to the ground.”

Her left hand was nearly severed by a gunshot, and her right arm was struck as well. Unable to get up or defend herself or others, she said, “I did the only thing I could do, which was to pretend to be dead in the hope he would not shoot me again.”

Three children — ages 5, 8 and 11 — and a teacher were killed at Silver Rail Elementary in Bend, Oregon, last Thursday when a former student there, 16-year-old Griffin J. John II, blasted his way through locked doors with a shotgun and attacked the classroom. Another student was critically injured.

The pump-action shotgun used in the attack was purchased legally, Bend Police Chief Mike Krantz said in an update to the city council Wednesday. But he didn't say who bought it and added that investigators are still piecing together how it ended up in the shooter's hands.

The Associated Press previously reported it had been purchased by the shooter's mother, according to a law enforcement source who was not authorized to discuss the investigation.

Authorities said another teacher threw her phone at the attacker and then tackled him and wrestled with him for control of the weapon, likely saving lives before the shooter was shot by a father who followed him into the building.

Some news reports had suggested that Drury threw herself on top of one student to protect her. Drury, who remains hospitalized, said she wanted to correct the record.

“Accurate, respectful reporting is a truly important service that will help heal the wounds inflicted by that awful day,” she said.

The district closed schools after the shooting but reopened them Wednesday everywhere but Silver Rail. Dozens of officers were at each school to welcome children, the Bend Police Department said.

“We do have some families that are still not ready yet, and we most certainly have some Silver Rail families that are still going through a lot of processes,” said Bend-La Pine Schools Superintendent Steven Cook.

In a social media post, the police department said its investigation includes serving search warrants at the attacker's home, as well as on his electronic devices and social media accounts.

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Associated Press journalist Hallie Golden in Seattle contributed.

The fire broke out at a building that housed golf carts at Golf Carts of St. Augustine off US-1, just north of the St. Augustine Airport, SJCFR told News4JAX.

Flames were shooting through the business’s roof when crews arrived.

Just before 9 p.m., crews said that they had contained most of the fire, but firefighters would remain on the scene to monitor hotspots and ensure the fire would not reignite.

A large plume of smoke was visible from the highway as more than five fire trucks were spotted trying to put out the flames. The St. Augustine Fire Department also responded.

No injuries were reported.

The State Fire Marshal is investigating the cause of the fire.

“It was just an unfortunate game of whack-a-mole,” Andrew Friedman, president of baseball operations, said Wednesday. “The knee got to a better spot, and then just kind of the biceps area was bothering him. Some of that would calm down for some period, some of that would get re-irritated. It was just a lot of different things he was trying to contend with at once.”

Ohtani and the Dodgers are equally enthused about him returning to two-way duties next season. What both sides need to figure out is how to keep him healthy while hitting and pitching into October.

“I'm not only expecting him to pitch,” Friedman said, “we're excited about him pitching.”

Ohtani didn't pitch after July 3 this year due to injuries that also affected his hitting. He had his worst offensive numbers since joining the Dodgers in December 2023, and his 30 home runs were his fewest since 2019 with the Los Angeles Angels. His three-run drive in Game 4 of the National League Championship Series against Milwaukee snapped a 25-game homerless streak.

Ohtani turns 33 next July and has undergone two Tommy John surgeries on his right elbow during his MLB career. Friedman said how to better manage Ohtani's two-way workload for a potential full season next year had yet to be discussed since the season ended last week with a four-game sweep at the hands of the Brewers in the NLCS.

“I expect us to throw our heads together and figure out both in the batter's box, on the mound, just how we marry all that together to have him impact us as much as he can during the regular season and then also be in a really good spot going into October,” Friedman said.

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See AP’s full MLB coverage here

Brandon Wayne Meredith, 44, was arrested and charged Oct. 16 with one count of Lewd or Lascivious Battery and one count of Battery. He is listed as the training chair for Cub Scout Pack 152 in Yulee.

The arrest report for Meredith is only about three pages long. The second page contains a narrative that appears to be heavily redacted, limiting the information available. But here are some of the details known at this point:

The Nassau County Sheriff’s Office was called to a home in Yulee on Oct. 16 for a report of battery. The report insinuates that Meredith would touch the victim in an unwanted manner.

As recently as Oct. 10, there appears to have been a FaceTime call where inappropriate touching was attempted, but the victim refused to allow it.

The report also shares that someone associated with Meredith had personally witnessed him groping and touching the victim. That person said they would talk with him about the behavior being inappropriate, and he would stop for a short while before the behavior would pick up again.

He was booked into the Nassau County Jail on Oct. 16 on $65,000 bond.

“We take allegations of sexual misconduct involving minors extremely seriously. We encourage anyone who believes they may have been victimized to come forward so our detectives can investigate and ensure those concerns are addressed,” Sheriff Bill Leeper said.

The Yulee Lions Club holds the charter for Cub Scout Pack 152. The organization did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Anyone who believes they may have been victimized by Meredith is asked to contact Detective Chloey Reifschneider at Ch1612@nassauso.com.

“One of the reasons that I did that is ‘ Zuckerbucks,'” U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany said in a debate, using a term coined by opponents of the money.

Tiffany also said he opposed certifying Wisconsin's election results because clerks in Milwaukee and Dane counties advised voters they could claim to be “indefinitely confined” due to the COVID-19 pandemic and receive absentee ballots without showing a photo ID.

More than 200 communities across Wisconsin received about $10 million in grants from the Zuckerberg-funded Center for Tech and Civic Life to help run elections during the pandemic.

“That’s why I objected, because the people of the state of Wisconsin, they did not want that,” Tiffany said.

The debate exchange was an example of how Trump's false claims about election fraud and his attempt to prevent Joe Biden from taking office continue to ripple through American politics.

Tiffany’s opponent, Democrat David Crowley, said Tiffany’s explanation of his actions in 2020 was inadequate.

“He didn’t say anything nefarious was going on with our elections,” Crowley said. “He didn’t say anything happened throughout the process. He just didn’t like the fact of how money was being spent.”

Crowley said Tiffany can't be trusted to certify the results of the 2028 presidential election.

But Tiffany said, “I will certify the election in 2028 regardless of who the winner is.”

In 2024, Wisconsin voters approved a constitutional amendment backed by Republicans that bans the use of private grant money to run elections.

Trump unsuccessfully tried to disqualify 220,000 absentee ballots from Milwaukee and Dane counties, a move Tiffany supported. Tiffany, who is endorsed by Trump, also voted against counting electoral votes in Pennsylvania and Arizona.

Five of the past seven presidential elections in Wisconsin have been decided by less than a percentage point. Trump won in 2024 and 2016, but lost in 2020.

Gangs in Haiti had opened fire on an armored vehicle three days earlier the first major attack since an international gang suppression force began operating in the violence-wracked Caribbean country. The four Salvadoran soldiers have been missing since they fled the burning vehicle in the Santo area of Croix-des-Bouquets, Port-au-Prince.

Addressing Haitian gang leaders, Bukele demanded that they return the Salvadorans “alive, unharmed” and warned that, if they do so, “everything will go back to the way it was before the kidnapping.” If not, the Salvadoran leader — who drew international attention for his contentious war on his own country's gangs — said it would result in a more powerful operation.

“Today’s attack is nothing compared to what is coming if they do not release the four hostages alive. And do not take our words as empty threats,” he wrote on the social media platform X.

It was not immediately clear if Bukele intended any further action to be carried out by Salvadoran, Haitian or international security forces in the area.

In his post, the Salvadoran leader shared video of armored vehicles with shattered windows driving through plumes of smoke.

Haiti’s government issued a news release Wednesday evening saying the “abduction” of the aviation technicians was an “absolute priority.”

It noted that a meeting was held at the prime minister’s office “to assess the ongoing interventions and determine the necessary measures to strengthen operations, in close collaboration with the Gang Repression Force.”

“The release of the abducted soldiers is an absolute priority, and all necessary resources are being mobilized to achieve this goal,” the government said.

It wasn’t immediately clear if Haitian authorities received confirmation that the Salvadoran soldiers are alive.

A spokesperson for the gang suppression force did not immediately respond to a message seeking details.

Bukele said the four men are aviation technicians and that the Salvadoran mission in Haiti “consists only of pilots and technical personnel” whose main job is to carry out medical evacuations, “not to wage war.”

The U.N.-backed force is still fighting gangs in the community where Sunday's attack occurred, warning residents in the area to remain indoors.

No one has claimed responsibility for the attack on the Salvadoran troops and it comes as Haiti prepares for its first general election in more than a decade. It also showcases the power of the gangs that control an estimated 70% of Port-au-Prince.

El Salvador is among a number of countries – including Chad, Jamaica and Guatemala – to form a part of a gang suppression force with more than 2,000 troops on the ground in Haiti.

The U.N. in 2025 originally approved up to 5,550 security personnel and more than 50 civilian staff to be sent to Haiti to dismantle armed gangs.

In early October, El Salvador passed a law extending its armed forces’ participation in the force for a year. The law also authorized the mission to “deploy civilian and military personnel according to the mission’s needs,” expanding its role beyond medical evacuations, as stipulated in the previous decree.

The multinational force received at least a six-month extension through March 2027 from the U.N. Security Council.

Gang violence has displaced nearly 1.5 million people in Haiti in recent years, with more than 5,700 people killed or injured from January through mid-September and more than 230 people kidnapped, according to the United Nations.

The area where the armored vehicle was targeted is controlled by gangs including Chèn Méchan; Kraze Barye, led by Vitelhomme Innocent; and 400 Mawozo, led by Lanmo Sanjou. Both gang leaders have been sanctioned by the U.N. and the U.S.

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Associated Press writer Dánica Coto contributed from Puerto Rico.

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

Polling suggests a tight race between Netanyahu, leader of the nationalist Likud party, and his chief rival, Gadi Eisenkot, who leads the centrist Yashar!, for control of the government.

Israelis vote for parties, which then form alliances to create a majority coalition. No single party has ever won a majority in the 120-member parliament, or Knesset.

Here is a look at some of the most important leaders of the major parties ahead of the election:

Benjamin Netanyahu, prime minister

Netanyahu, 77, is Israel’s longest-serving prime minister and the most dominant force in Israeli politics, having persevered through wars, crises, scandals and the Oct. 7, 2023, attack — the deadliest in Israel's history. He is the longtime leader of the Likud party, and supporters point to his record on security and the economy, as well as his close ties with U.S. President Donald Trump, who has endorsed Netanyahu.

Netanyahu's opponents say he's responsible for the policy and security failures that preceded the Oct. 7, 2023, attack and accuse him of mismanaging the wars that followed. In 2024, the International Criminal Court issued a warrant for Netanyahu's arrest over allegations of war crimes and crimes against humanity. He is also embroiled in a years-long legal scandal at home, having been charged with fraud, breach of trust and accepting bribes. Netanyahu denies any wrongdoing.

Gadi Eisenkot, former military chief of staff

Eisenkot, 66, comes from a working-class family of Jewish Moroccan immigrants. He spent four decades rising through the ranks of Israel's military, eventually becoming the chief of staff. The general currently leads the largest opposition party — the centrist Yashar! — after entering politics in 2022. His son and two nephews were killed in combat in Gaza following the Oct. 7 attacks.

Eisenkot also served as an observer in Netanyahu's war cabinet, but resigned after eight months, when he accused the prime minister of lacking a clear strategy. He has since positioned himself as a moderate alternative to Netanyahu, but remains hawkish on security. Eisenkot is credited with formulating Israel’s so‑called “Dahiyeh Doctrine,” a military strategy calling for the use of disproportionate power in areas from which militants launch attacks.

If he succeeds in forming a coalition, Eisenkot could become the first Israeli prime minister of Mizrahi descent. Israel's Mizrahim, who come from North Africa and the Middle East, have historically faced discrimination from the country's European-descended elite.

Naftali Bennett, former prime minister

Bennett, 54, is the right-wing and religiously observant leader of Beyachad (Together), a joint ticket with centrist politician Yair Lapid. He opposes Palestinian independence and supports settlement-building in the occupied West Bank.

Before entering the Knesset in 2013, Bennett served as Netanyahu's chief of staff and also was head of the Yesha Council, an umbrella organization of local authorities inside Israeli settlements. His conservative Yamina party won seven seats, which helped him cobble together a coalition of both left-wing and Arab parties. He then briefly served as prime minister in 2021, the result of a power-sharing agreement, also with Lapid.

While Bennett, like Netanyahu, takes a hard line toward the Palestinians, the two men have deep disagreements over Netanyahu's handling of security issues and his battle against the Israeli legal system.

Itamar Ben-Gvir, national security minister

Ben-Gvir, 50, is Israel's national security minister and a far-right provocateur with multiple convictions, including for supporting a terrorist organization. He leads Otzma Yehudit (Jewish Power), an ultra-nationalist party whose strong showing in the last election secured him his Cabinet post and helped push Netanyahu's coalition further to the right.

He is a trained lawyer who gained recognition by successfully defending right-wing Jewish extremists accused of violence against Palestinians. When Ben-Gvir was a teenager, the military refused to draft him because of his extreme views. He was also a follower of Meir Kahane, the violently racist rabbi who advocated for expelling Palestinians from Israel, Gaza and the West Bank.

Ben-Gvir has also laid out plans for what he says would be the “voluntary” emigration of roughly 2 million Palestinians from the Gaza Strip, where he has advocated for re-building Jewish settlements.

Mansour Abbas, Knesset member and leader of Ra'am

Abbas, 52, is a Palestinian Arab politician and dentist from northern Israel. He leads Ra'am, an Islamist party that was the first Arab-led party to join a governing coalition in 2021.

His strategy has been to focus on more local issues, such as crime in Arab communities, rather than the larger Israeli-Palestinian conflict, in the hopes it will win Ra'am more seats in the Knesset and court potential coalition partners.

As part of this push, Abbas named former police commander and centrist Jewish politician Yoav Segalovitz as the number two candidate on Ra'am's electoral list. Abbas has served in the Knesset since 2019.

The decision leaves in place a lower-court block on the policy. It was adopted after an executive order from President Donald Trump, a Republican who has taken several steps to roll back transgender rights during his second term.

The brief order did not detail its legal reasoning. Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas would have allowed the policy to be enforced as the lawsuit played out in lower courts.

The Supreme Court has previously allowed other Trump administration policies for transgender people to move ahead for now, including restrictions on military service and passport sex markers.

Trump's order called on the Bureau of Prisons to revise its medical care policies so that federal funds aren’t spent “for the purpose of conforming an inmate’s appearance to that of the opposite sex.”

The new policy would halt surgeries, taper off hormones and end social accommodations like makeup and wigs. Prisons would continue to offer mental health services.

Attorneys for transgender inmates challenged the policy in court and U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth ordered treatments to continue. Lamberth, who was nominated to the bench by Republican President Ronald Reagan, pointed out that untreated gender dysphoria can cause severe side effects like depression, anxiety and suicidal thoughts.

The Trump administration appealed, arguing that treatments raised security concerns and “could no longer be justified.” A divided appeals court panel left the order in place.

About 600 inmates were receiving hormone therapy in 2025, the agency said in court records. The government has not detailed evidence of security problems linked to hormone therapy for transgender inmates during the 30 years it has been provided, they wrote.

“This ruling will prevent serious and irreparable harm to plaintiffs and the class while we continue to challenge the government’s unlawful efforts to deny medically necessary healthcare for political reasons," said Aditi Shah, staff attorney at the ACLU of Washington, D.C.

The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment.

The conservative-majority Supreme Court has previously upheld state laws banning certain medical treatments for transgender youth, and restricting sports participation by transgender athletes in women’s sports.

Sunny and cool through Friday. Becoming windy with coastal showers this weekend.

The steady onshore wind continues through the weekend with the increasing risk of coastal hazards and tidal flooding. Skies remain sunny with comfortable temperatures through Friday. The northeasterly wind will increase through Friday and continue this weekend. Cloudy skies with wind driven showers will increase Saturday with partly cloudy and breezy conditions on Sunday.

The main impacts will be along our coastal and beach zones. The marine and coastal hazards, include dangerous surf conditions with High Surf Advisories. Minor Tidal Flooding will continue along the St. Johns River Basin with minor Coastal Flooding possible along portions of the northeast FL Coast and south of St. Augustine. Tides will average 1.5 to 1.8 feet above normal.

The strengthening northeasterly winds will develop Friday with Gale conditions are possible for the Atlantic waters.

Tonight: Mostly clear and cool with a light breeze.

Thursday: Sunny and cool. Lows in the 40s for SE GA, 40s and 50s for NE FL, 60s along the beaches. Highs in the 70s to low 80s. Wind: NE 5-15 mph. Mostly clear overnight.

Friday: Increasing wind under sunny skies. The northeast winds will increase through the day. Lows in the 40s and 50s inland and 60s along the beaches. Highs in the 70s. Wind: NE 15-20 mph with stronger gusts.

Weekend: Strong northeasterly winds with partly cloudy to mostly cloudy skies. Wind: NE 15-20 mph with Gusts 30 - 40 mph. Rain chances will average 50-80 percent mainly across coastal NE FL on Saturday, 30-60 percent on Sunday.

Looking ahead: Breezy conditions with a slight chance of showers early next week.

Sunrise: 7:34 a.m.

Sunset: 6:48 p.m.

“That was awesome. He was just laughing. ... He said, ‘I can’t believe this is happening,'" Patricia Hubbard Fox told The Associated Press in a phone interview as she headed to Denver's airport to catch a flight to San Antonio to meet her brother.

President Donald Trump said he had asked Russian President Vladimir Putin during a phone call earlier this month to free Hubbard, a 74-year-old retired teacher from Michigan. Hubbard was headed home following a visit to St. Petersburg by U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff, who also held talks with Putin about the war in Ukraine.

“He’s out of Russia territory. He is free, praise God. He really thought he was going to die in prison,” Hubbard Fox said, adding that her brother suffered beatings and starvation while he was held captive.

She said her brother was in perfect health when he was “kidnapped” in 2022 and accused of fighting alongside Kyiv's forces. She said he now suffers from an enlarged heart and likely has post-traumatic stress disorder.

Her brother was accused of signing a contract with the Ukrainian military and sentenced in 2024 to nearly seven years in prison during closed court proceedings. The U.S. government under the Biden administration designated him as wrongfully detained, and his legal team has also disputed the Russian allegation, saying he was not involved in any military activity.

Hubbard, a U.S. Air Force veteran, taught English overseas and retired in 2012 to Cyprus, where one of his sons is an Orthodox Christian priest. He later moved to Ukraine to be with a woman he had met, his lawyers said, and remained in the country after the relationship ended and was living there at the time of Russia’s invasion.

Hubbard Fox also disputed the claim that her brother was a mercenary, saying he was used as “bait” in Putin's war with Ukraine.

“Putin is as evil as they come,” she said.

Hubbard Fox said her brother would probably come live with her in Colorado, and they both were looking forward to a family reunion. And perhaps she will be able to get some peaceful sleep in her own bed.

Hubbard Fox said she has slept on her couch for four years in solidarity with her brother “because I figured he didn’t have a bed. Why should I have a bed?”

The debate kicked off a breakneck final stretch in one of the nation’s most closely watched and competitive Senate races. Former President Barack Obama will rally in Detroit on Saturday, followed by Trump on Sunday.

Wednesday’s hourlong debate followed one on Oct. 8 that devolved into personal insults and attacks, with the candidates continuing to argue even during a commercial break. This time, the exchanges were slightly less contentious and focused on policy, though both candidates repeatedly returned to their central attacks.

“Those playing MAGA bingo at home, you just heard like three of the buzzwords,” El-Sayed said after Rogers criticized his policies. Rogers later shot back: “The bingo game ought to be how many times can he put the word Trump in any answer.”

The most contentious exchange came when Rogers again tried to link El-Sayed to the Muslim Brotherhood, repeating an allegation he and Trump have raised in recent weeks. El-Sayed has denied any affiliation with the group.

“If you are going to go to the United States Senate, we need to know: Are you for America, or are you for these terrorist groups overseas?” Rogers said.

El-Sayed, who would be the country's first Muslim senator, called Rogers’ questioning of his commitment to the Constitution “shameful.”

“I’m proud to be an American," El-Sayed said. “I’m proud of our Constitution that guarantees all of us the right to pray as we choose to pray.”

Rogers offered qualified criticism of Trump’s tariffs, calling them a “mixed bag” and questioning those imposed on Canada because of the close ties between the two countries’ auto industries. But he also praised Trump’s immigration enforcement and defended the threat posed by Iran, while El-Sayed blamed the president’s war there for higher gas and grocery prices.

The Supreme Court on Wednesday refused to allow the Trump administration to immediately enforce new medical restrictions for transgender people in prison. An executive order by Trump had called on the Bureau of Prisons to revise its medical care policies so that federal funds aren’t spent “for the purpose of conforming an inmate’s appearance to that of the opposite sex.” The new policy, blocked earlier by a lower court, would halt surgeries, taper off hormones and end social accommodations like makeup and wigs.

Elsewhere in U.S. politics, Republican Vivek Ramaswamy ’s team confirmed late Tuesday that it produced a controversial advertisement featuring the estranged mother of Amy Acton. His campaign added that it will spend $4 million to promote it despite facing bipartisan rebuke for dredging up the painful childhood of his Democratic opponent in Ohio’s governor’s race. Vice President JD Vance said during a campaign visit to Ohio on Wednesday that he is “disgusted” by the Republican pushback against the ad.

Here's the latest:

Trump wrapped up his remarks in South Carolina

The president ran through many of his regular rally points, including showing a video of a CNN reporter describing polls showing his high support among Republicans, and bringing an athlete on stage—in this case, Holyfield.

He wrapped up after about an hour and a half.

Kansas Sen. Roger Marshall says the Ukraine war has caused high diesel prices, not the Iran war

Marshall, who is seeking a second term, responded during a televised debate Wednesday night to Democratic challenger Adam Hamilton’s call for suspending federal fuel taxes as long as the war with Iran continues.

Hamilton said suspending fuel taxes is only a temporary solution and that Congress must act to force Trump to end the war.

Marshall responded that he’s not opposed to suspending fuel taxes and that he wants the war to end as quickly as possible, though he didn’t commit to trying to force an end.

Marshall also said, “The real problem with the cost of diesel in particular is, No. 1, the Ukraine war, and because the diesel production has gone down.”

Hamilton responded, “Nobody believes that.” He blamed the war in Iran and accused Marshall of “selling out” Ukraine.

Trump laments another prize he didn’t win — the Pulitzer Prize

The president was recounting how he didn’t win the Nobel Peace Prize despite his efforts to try to end wars, a subject he brings up frequently while insisting he doesn’t mind that he didn’t win.

Trump on Wednesday at one point referred to it as the “Pulitzer” and then a few moments later added: “I didn’t get the Nobel Prize,” he said. “I should have gotten the Pulitzer for writing too.”

It’s not clear what work of his writing he felt deserved the honor.

Trump muses on changing the names of bodies of water

The president drifted from subject to subject and has spent only a fraction of his remarks on the race in South Carolina.

At one point, he began recounting how he signed orders to change the name of Lake Ontario to Lake America and the Gulf of Mexico to Gulf of America.

He told the crowd how he had been looking for a river to rename, including possibly the Hudson River or the Mississippi, but said he was focused more on renaming either the Atlantic or Pacific Ocean.

“I’m not going to put either Trump or America on any other ocean,” he said.

Trump, interrupted by a string of protesters, seems to marvel that one may have been punched by a rally attendee

The president was interrupted by about 10 protesters in the first half hour of his remarks in South Carolina, with one of the last having a bit of a melee on the floor.

Trump said “Wow” and, “I loved that. I watched that.”

As the protester was removed by security, Trump said that one of the rally attendees threw a punch and said that he reminded him of Evander Holyfield, the boxer who accompanied the president to the rally.

“He got whacked,” Trump said.

El-Sayed and Rogers face off in final Michigan Senate debate

Democrat Abdul El-Sayed and Republican Mike Rogers are facing off Wednesday night in their final debate for Michigan’s open U.S. Senate seat, following a contentious first meeting earlier this month that featured repeated personal insults and name-calling.

The first half of Wednesday’s debate remained contentious but focused more on policy. Rogers, who has balanced loyalty to Trump with criticism of some of his policies, called the president’s tariffs a “mixed bag” while praising his approach to border security.

El-Sayed, meanwhile, sought to tie Rogers closely to Trump, accusing the Republican of having “cheer-led” the war in Iran.

“Those playing MAGA bingo at home, you just heard like three of the buzzwords,” El-Sayed said after Rogers spoke.

Trump takes the stage at South Carolina rally

Trump has begun his remarks in a livestock arena in Pendleton, part of the campus of South Carolina.

Within minutes, at least two protesters had shouted to interrupt his remarks. They were escorted out by police.

Darline Graham calls Andrews ‘a fraud that’s prescribing bad medicine’

Referencing her Democratic opponent’s status as a physician, GOP Sen. Darline Graham said Annie Andrews is “spreading blatant lies about her record” in “slick ads.”

Graham also accused Andrews of being “the most radical liberal candidate to ever run for office” in South Carolina.

Campaigning to succeed her late brother, Graham called herself “a little bit tougher” than Lindsey Graham on immigration.

“It’s simple,” she said, to swelling applause. “If you’re here illegally, you’ve got to go.”

Trump is en route to the rally site in Pendleton to stump with Graham.

Many states deciding control of the Senate are seeing big boost in early voting, AP analysis shows

Voter turnout is soaring compared with the last midterm election in many of the states that are expected to decide control of the U.S. Senate, according to an Associated Press analysis of early voting two weeks before Election Day.

In Texas, early voting is up 74% compared with 2022. In Kansas it’s more than doubled. Maine, North Carolina and Ohio also have seen increases of more than 30% in early in-person and mail voting compared with the same point in 2022.

Democrats are trying to flip Republican-held Senate seats in each of those states. In most of them, Republicans are accounting for a smaller share of advance voters than they did four years ago.

Midterm elections typically favor the party out of power in Washington. With Republicans in control of both chambers of Congress and the White House, it’s a distinctly different environment than 2022, when Democrats were in charge.

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McMaster says being South Carolina governor has been ‘best job I’ve ever had’

Speaking ahead of the president at Wednesday’s rally near Clemson, Gov. Henry McMaster thanked South Carolina voters for his 10 years in the state’s top spot, a time frame he said “seems like it’s gone by so fast.”

McMaster was lieutenant governor in 2016 when he became the first statewide-elected official in the country to endorse Trump’s presidential bid.

They have been close allies ever since, and McMaster ascended to the governor’s office when Trump selected then-Gov. Nikki Haley to be his United Nations ambassador.

McMaster on Wednesday called Trump “the most incredible man I ever met in my life.”

Trump administration again targets offshore wind farms

The Trump administration is asking a federal judge to let it reconsider a major federal permit granted for a large offshore wind farm, making it the fourth project the Republican leadership has targeted in recent months.

The Interior Department wants to reconsider its own approval for the construction and operations plan for the New England Wind project off Massachusetts.

The plan was approved in 2024 during the Biden administration. The Justice Department said the approval ignored major adverse impacts of the project.

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, a Rhode Island Democrat, warned that the administration now risks derailing a legislative effort to speed up permitting reviews for new energy and infrastructure projects. The Senate reached a bipartisan deal in September on a permitting bill, which has not yet been voted on.

The administration is using executive orders, agency actions and the courts to try to stop development of offshore wind, which Trump has attacked as “ugly” and unreliable.

Thousands of California voters receive duplicate ballots in vendor error

About 7,800 voters in Central California received duplicate mail ballots because of a vendor error, but election and campaign officials expressed confidence that the mistake would not impact results on Election Day.

The bulk of the duplicate ballots arrived at homes in the city of Tulare in the state’s farm belt, most of which is located in the highly competitive 22nd Congressional District, where Republican Rep. David Valadao is being challenged by progressive Democrat Randy Villegas.

Tulare County election officials faulted a “printer vendor error” and instructed voters to submit one ballot and destroy the other.

Valadao campaign strategist Robert Jones said, “We are confident that this won’t impact the results of the election.” Villegas said in a statement, “I have confidence in our election process.”

Mark Kelly says Democrats will hold ‘the corrupt president’ accountable

Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona and his wife, Gabby Giffords, spoke to a crowd of Democrats preparing to knock on doors on behalf of state legislative candidates outside Phoenix.

He said the political system is geared toward the rich and powerful, not normal Americans, and called Trump the most corrupt person to ever hold public office in the country.

“When we win elections, we can hold them accountable,” Kelly said. “We can end the corruption in Washington, D.C., the corrupt president and his family.”

Kelly is a potential 2028 presidential candidate. Giffords was a member of Congress when she was shot in the head in an attempted assassination.

Dozens of protesters line up along entrance to Trump’s South Carolina rally

The president doesn’t land in South Carolina for several hours, but dozens of people carrying anti-Trump signs are lining the road to the livestock arena where he will appear with Sen. Darline Graham, shouting at rally attendees as they enter the venue.

“This whole ‘Trump’ thing ain’t working,” read one sign. Another proclaimed that Trump’s “America First” policy platform is “un-Christian.”

Some of the people behind a barricade separating them from the roadway in rural South Carolina waved American or pride flags. One held a red and yellow flag of the former Soviet Union.

Kamala Harris encourages hospitality workers to get out the vote ahead of midterms

Former Vice President Kamala Harris rallied about 200 hospitality workers Wednesday afternoon in Las Vegas, encouraging them to campaign for Democratic candidates ahead of Nov. 3.

“Please keep fighting,” she said. “It’s making a difference. You are making a difference.”

The Culinary Workers Union, which represents 60,000 Nevada hospitality workers, is a critical political powerhouse for Democrats, knocking on thousands of doors every election.

She joined Democratic governor candidate Aaron Ford and Democratic Rep. Dina Titus at the union’s headquarters, where the crowd sang “Happy Birthday” to Harris, whose birthday was yesterday.

Harris said for her birthday she wants Attorney General Ford and Titus to win. Ford hopes to oust Republican Gov. Joe Lombardo in one of the most competitive governor races.

“It’s going to be tight,” Harris said. “It will not be easy, but we don’t want to have any regrets on the 14th day about what we could have done these 13 days, right?”

Trump reacts to Ramaswamy ad, says ‘the mother is a witness to things, also’

Trump was asked about the widely criticized ad from Ohio Republican gubernatorial candidate Vivek Ramaswamy that features the estranged mother of his Democratic opponent, Amy Acton, calling her “a liar.”

“The fact is I know nothing about it. But I hear the mother went very rogue on the daughter,” Trump told reporters as he left the White House. Acton’s birth mother, Donna Arthur, “doesn’t have a lot of respect for the daughter. And I think the mother is a witness to things, also. So who knows,” he went on.

Arthur lost custody of her children after their stepfather was indicted for raping Acton as a child.

Still, Trump called it “a very unusual situation to have a mother hate a daughter that much,” adding: “I don’t think that has anything to do with Vivek.”

Ramaswamy has claimed credit for the ad and has said he will spend $4 million to promote it.

Trump defends decision not to move on late Sen. Graham’s Russian sanctions bill

The president said criticism of his decision to put on hold the sweeping new sanctions package targeting the Russian economy is coming from “people who don’t know how life works.”

Trump argued that holding off enacting the legislation named after South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham helped pave the way for Wednesday’s release of Stephen Hubbard, an American who had been jailed for more than four years in Russia on charges of fighting as a mercenary in Ukraine.

Graham, who had championed the tougher sanctions package, died in July.

“If you would have put those sanctions on or whatever you want to call them, you could forget about him,” Trump said of Hubbard. “You’d never see him again. He’d be back in jail for 25 years.”

Trump added that his team is also “very close to a deal” to end the Russia-Ukraine war.

“When you’re close to a deal and you have very delicate negotiations, you don’t put sanctions on,” he said.

Trump administration asks Supreme Court to lift halt on Big Bend border wall

The Trump administration asked the Supreme Court on Wednesday to let it resume building a border wall project through the Big Bend region of Texas.

The government filed an emergency appeal asking the justices to lift a lower court decision halting construction. That ruling marked a setback to one of President Donald Trump’s signature projects.

The administration has been racing forward with construction on a border wall and other infrastructure from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico.

But in the Big Bend region, the administration has run into opposition from ranchers, residents, business owners and environmentalists who argue the projects are a waste of money in an area of historically low illegal immigration and say construction could harm the region’s beautiful landscapes.

Opponents have filed numerous lawsuits seeking to stop the project, which in the Big Bend consists of a mixture of walls, vehicle barriers and surveillance technology.

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Biographer for founding father Hamilton has contributed to US Senate candidate Hamilton in Kansas

The $1,000 contribution on Monday from author Ron Chernow is listed among more than 160 donations in a report filed Tuesday with the Federal Election Commission by Democratic candidate Adam Hamilton’s campaign.

Chernow wrote the acclaimed, bestselling 2004 biography of Alexander Hamilton, the nation’s first treasury secretary under President George Washington, who also published dozens of essays defending the U.S. Constitution to help get it ratified in 1788. Chernow’s book helped inspire the acclaimed 2016 musical “Hamilton” on Broadway.

Adam Hamilton is trying to unseat incumbent Republican Sen. Roger Marshall to become the first Democrat in Kansas to win a Senate seat since 1932. He is the founder and senior pastor of the nation’s largest United Methodist church.

Trump says he’s been ‘pretty happy with Russia’ for not getting involved in Iran

U.S. Envoy Steve Witkoff called Vladimir Putin a “humanitarian” after the Russian president freed a U.S. citizen, Stephen Hubbard, who had been jailed for more than four years.

When reporters asked Trump about Witkoff’s description of Putin as a humanitarian, the president said “well I guess you could say for that particular purpose” of releasing Hubbard, but added, “I wouldn’t say anything one way or the other.”

“We have been pretty happy with Russia” for staying out of the Iran war, Trump continued, noting that the U.S. is still trying to negotiate an end to the war in Ukraine.

“So the last thing I want to do is upset an apple cart,” he said, “where we’re getting close to settling a war.”

Sister of imprisoned American Stephen Hubbard says he is in disbelief following release by Russia

Hubbard’s younger sister said she spoke with her brother on the phone after his release and described him as in disbelief.

“He was just laughing because he was just, he said ‘I can’t believe this is happening,’” Patricia Hubbard Fox said during a phone interview as she headed to Denver’s airport to catch a flight to San Antonio to meet her brother.

“He really thought he was going to die in prison,” she added, saying her brother suffered beatings and starvation in prison.

Hubbard Fox said her brother was in perfect health when he was “kidnapped” in 2022 and accused of fighting alongside Kyiv’s forces following Russia’s invasion. Now, she said, he likely has post-traumatic stress disorder from the ordeal and suffers from an enlarged heart.

US orders some diplomats, family members to leave Saudi Arabia as fears of Houthi attacks rise

The State Department is ordering some diplomats and the families of U.S. government employees to leave Saudi Arabia following a series of deadly attacks in the country by Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels and rising fears of an escalation in hostilities.

The department said Wednesday it had ordered the departure of nonessential staff at the U.S. embassy in Riyadh and its satellite consulates. The embassy had been badly damaged at the start of the Iran war and had been operating with only a skeleton staff for months, although in recent weeks some diplomats had returned.

“Iranian-supported Houthis have engaged in hostilities against Saudi Arabia, including attacks on civilian airports and other critical infrastructure resulting in civilian casualties and severe travel disruptions. The hostilities have the potential to escalate rapidly beyond that immediate area,” the department said in a new travel alert.

Trump says Hubbard is doing well after release from Russia

Speaking to reporters at an unrelated White House event, Trump said the release of Stephen Hubbard came together quickly after Trump asked Vladimir Putin to release Hubbard during a phone call last week.

“I hear he’s in pretty good shape,” Trump said. “He went through a lot. I spoke to him this morning. He is the happiest man around.”

Trump called the 74-year-old Hubbard a “very high quality, innocent man.”

A retired teacher from Michigan, Hubbard was jailed in Russia for more than four years on charges of fighting as a mercenary in Ukraine.

Authorities this week issued a warning to communities east of the capital, Pretoria, to stop drinking water from their taps after 408 people including children fell ill and were treated at various health facilities.

Like other cities in the country, the capital and its suburbs have long had issues with the cleanliness of the region's water, and it remains a contentious political issue.

On Wednesday, city officials were distributing water to residents through emergency tankers, while the charity organization Gift of the Givers supplied the community with bottled water.

Most of those who fell ill were children under 4. According to health and city officials, the people fell ill after drinking contaminated water from a water treatment plant which supplies water to several communities east of Pretoria.

Authorities confirmed that the water at the plant had not been chlorinated for about three weeks, rendering it unsafe for human consumption. Officials said the municipality had trouble obtaining chlorine from its usual supplier.

They said the plant gets water from the Bronkhorstspruit River, which is badly contaminated with sewage pollution from poorly functioning wastewater treatment plants upstream.

An initial investigation revealed that officials failed to inform residents about the poor quality of the water.

Nasiphi Moya, mayor of the city of Tshwane, which includes Pretoria and surrounding communities, said that an investigation found that city officials had failed to warn affected areas “that the water being supplied had not been chlorinated and therefore should not be drunk or used for cooking, washing or bathing, even after boiling.”

Various political parties have called for Moya to resign, and for other officials to be fired, to take responsibility for the water contamination.

In the coastal city of Gqeberha, in the Eastern Cape province, at least 111 students from Rhodes University have been treated for a gastrointestinal illness over the last few days, the university said Wednesday.

University and water authorities were investigating the cause of the outbreak, but they also suspected it was due to the water quality.

“Students who experienced severe symptoms were taken to hospital for medical attention and have since returned to campus,” university spokesperson Olwetu Gwanya said on Wednesday.

Staff and students were urged to remain vigilant and practice safe water use, food handling and personal hygiene, both on and off campus.

“These measures include drinking boiled and cooled or bottled water, using safe water to prepare food and brush teeth, avoiding ice and uncooked food washed in untreated water and washing hands regularly with soap and water,” Gwanya said.

The incident was the latest in an annual olive harvest that has been marked by violence between Israeli settlers and Palestinian villagers attempting to gather their crops.

The Israeli military said the farmers and volunteers had failed to seek prior approval for the harvest and were detained “due to the security risk posed by conducting an uncoordinated harvest near an Israeli community.” It later added that it viewed “the arrival of dozens of activists as an act intended solely to provoke, which undermines the harvesting process.”

Lander is running in the Nov. 3 elections to represent a heavily Democratic New York City district in the U.S. House of Representatives.

“The occupation is a crime under international law," Lander wrote on social media after he was detained. “Harvesting olives isn’t a crime under any law I know.”

“These detentions by the IDF are one more attempt to undermine Palestinians’ right to harvest their olive groves, travel on their roads, and live in their homes,” he added in a post after his release.

This year, Palestinians have been required to coordinate with the Israeli military to access more of their privately owned farmland than in previous years. The anti-settlement group Peace Now said last week that the army had expanded by nearly 30% the area of farmland that Palestinians cannot enter without prior approval, to 34 square miles (88 square kilometers). The Israeli military declined to comment on the exact figures but said Palestinian farmers must coordinate access to areas under Israeli security control.

The detained volunteers were taken to a police facility. Lander was among them but “released after it became known that he was a congressional candidate," the Israeli police said in a statement.

Israeli rights group Yesh Din and the Palestinian Farmers’ Union have said the 2026 harvest has been the most violent in recent history, with hundreds of reported thefts, clashes and arson attacks.

Much of the violence has unfolded on land outside Palestinian villages, where Palestinians have historically harvested olives and Israeli settlers have increasingly erected outposts without authorization from Israel’s government.

But there were no clashes before Israeli forces arrived Wednesday, according to Beck Strober, a spokesperson for Protect the Harvest, the advocacy group that organized the volunteers at the grove.

Jill Jacobs, one of a dozen American rabbis detained, condemned the Israeli government restricting the ability of Palestinians to harvest freely.

“The Israeli government is actively advancing the forced displacement of Palestinian communities across the West Bank, using its military to deny Palestinians access to their land and intimidate those who stand alongside them,” Jacobs, chief executive of T’ruah: The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights, said in a statement.

Lander, who was endorsed by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, defeated U.S. Rep. Dan Goldman in a primary for New York’s 10th Congressional District. The race was viewed as a referendum on the Democratic party's support for Israel. Both candidates are Jewish and have criticized Israel, but only Lander called the war in Gaza a genocide.

Lander was not the first U.S. politician detained in the West Bank this year. U.S. Rep. Ro Khanna, a California Democrat, said Israeli forces detained him during a visit in July.

“Obviously, man, I’m remorseful and sorry for putting this team in this situation,” Jacobs said. “Sometimes when you go through life, situations occur and a four-second, three-second decision can alter your life, honestly.”

Jacobs was removed this week from the commissioner’s exempt list, which had prevented him from playing or practicing. The NFL had placed Jacobs on that list Aug. 30, shortly after charges were filed against him. He pleaded no contest last month to misdemeanor counts of battery and criminal damage to property.

The NFL is still investigating Jacobs over the incident, so the league still could hand out more discipline to the three-time Pro Bowl running back. But for now, Jacobs is eligible to play again for the Packers after missing the first six games of the season.

“I thought I’d be playing sooner,” Jacobs said. “But, you know, the optics of everything, I understand the other side. For me, like I said, I’m just grateful to be able to play. It was one of them things where I didn’t want to sit the whole year and then figure it out. I’m just grateful to be back on the team and to be back playing.”

Jacobs doesn't discuss details of his arrest

Jacobs was arrested May 26, three days after police officers came to his Wisconsin home to investigate a disturbance. According to police, the woman told them that Jacobs grabbed her and threw her to the ground as she was trying to exit a garage door, causing her to hit her head. Police said Jacobs also took her phone from her while she was on the ground.

Police said they noticed redness on her face and neck and could feel a bump on the back of her head.

The criminal complaint against him noted that a surveillance video from the camera system in their garage corroborated the woman’s statement. Both Jacobs and the victim have gone to court attempting to have that video and other evidence sealed permanently.

Jacobs declined to discuss the specifics of his case but said he hopes to use the situation as an opportunity to grow into a better person.

“Obviously you never want to be in this situation, but just me being honest, for my life, it was probably one of the best things to ever happen to me,” Jacobs said. “I say that because it gave me a chance to sit down and reevaluate what’s important and what I want my life to look like, and what do I want people to know me for. When they think of me, what are they going to say?”

Jacobs didn't fear possibility he might not play again

Jacobs was asked Wednesday if he’d feared the possibility he might never play again after his arrest.

“I wasn’t overly concerned about that because in my heart, I know what happened and what didn’t happen,” Jacobs said. “And I’ll just trust the legal process. So for me, I wasn’t ever overly concerned of not playing again. It was just a matter of when.”

Green Bay quarterback Jordan Love said Jacobs had spoken to the team about the situation back when the incident occurred and added that the Packers are “happy to have Josh back, for sure.” Green Bay’s offense ranks last in the NFL in yards rushing per game (59.8) and yards per carry (2.9).

Coach Matt LaFleur hasn’t indicated what kind of workload Jacobs might get Sunday at Detroit, or even whether he would play at all. Jacobs was unable to practice or play while on the commissioner’s exempt list, but he was able to attend meetings and lift weights and condition with the Packers’ strength coaches.

“I think people learn from their mistakes and I think he’s extremely remorseful and I do believe that he’s a good person,” LaFleur said. “I’ve been around him quite a bit and I just, I believe in second chances.”

LaFleur’s comment Wednesday was more measured than what he said Sept. 1, after the charges were filed but before Jacobs pleaded no contest to the two misdemeanors. LaFleur said then that “I believe him and I trust him” and added that “I’m going to do that until proven otherwise.”

Jacobs was asked if he feels he needs to earn back the respect of teammates and what he would say to fans.

“I don’t think I had to earn respect back from the guys because I’m the same person every day,” Jacobs said. “Like I said, at the end of the day, we’re human. We all make mistakes. It’s just different for me because I’m in the public eye. But you know, like I said, I’ll let other people speak to my character and who I am and who I consistently have been.

“When it comes to earning the respect of the fans, I mean, for me, it’s more of a thing of not trying to put this organization in a position where it looks negative in any type of way. But at the end of the day, people are always going to have their opinion. People are going to believe what they believe, and it’s not really my job to try to explain or discount certain things. All I can try to do is control what I can control and move on from there.”

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See AP’s full NFL coverage here

Later Wednesday, an attack on King Fahd International Airport in eastern Saudi Arabia left one Saudi resident dead, the Saudi Civil Aviation Authority said. Global flight-tracking service Flightradar24 said flights have been diverted away from the airport in Damman.

The United States ordered some diplomats to leave Saudi Arabia as fears of escalating Houthi attacks rise.

Here is the latest news from the Middle East on Wednesday. Read our full coverage here.

1 killed in attack on King Fahd International Airport

One Saudi resident was killed in an attack on King Fahd International Airport in eastern Saudi Arabia on the Persian Gulf near Bahrain and Qatar, the Saudi Civil Aviation Authority announced early Thursday.

The aviation authority also said eight people were injured in the late Wednesday attack and the airport in Dammam suffered some material damages. Global flight-tracking service Flightradar24 said on X that flights have been diverted away from the airport.

Authorities did not say who carried out the attack or provide further details. The Iranian-backed Houthis h ave not commented on the attack.

King Fahd airport has been attacked previously amid a wider wave of Houthi missile and projectile strikes targeting major airports in Saudi Arabia.

US orders some diplomats to leave Saudi Arabia

The State Department is ordering some diplomats and the families of U.S. government employees to leave Saudi Arabia following a series of deadly attacks in the country by Iran-backed Houthi rebels and rising fears of an escalation in hostilities.

The department said Wednesday it had ordered the departure of nonessential staff at the U.S. Embassy in Riyadh and its satellite consulates. The embassy had been badly damaged at the start of the Iran war and had been operating with only a skeleton staff for months, although some diplomats had returned in recent months.

In a new travel alert, the department said, “Iranian-supported Houthis have engaged in hostilities against Saudi Arabia, including attacks on civilian airports and other critical infrastructure resulting in civilian casualties and severe travel disruptions. The hostilities have the potential to escalate rapidly beyond that immediate area.”

Riyadh airport partially reopens

A limited number of Saudi airlines took off and landed at the country’s main airport on Wednesday, two days after authorities notified airlines that they could resume operations with prior permission.

Saudia and FlyNas were operating flights Wednesday, according to flight-tracking data published by FlightAware. Major carriers, including Lufthansa and Air France, have canceled flights through mid-November.

Riyadh’s King Khalid International Airport has been hit multiple times this month by Yemen’s Houthi rebels and shut down on Oct. 10.

The Houthis have acknowledged attacking the airport, claiming without evidence that Saudi Arabia provided military equipment to government forces through the facility.

Iran billboard portrays Trump behind bars

A billboard-like art installation that went on display north of Iran's capital features a live actor portraying U.S. President Donald Trump behind bars. A mockup of a prison cell protrudes from the billboard where the actor walks and occasionally sits. It went on display late Tuesday in Tajrish Square.

“Not seeing this scene is a crime,” is written on the billboard, while other messages include a reference to an early September U.S. strike on a wedding ceremony in the southern Iranian town port of Sirkik that Iranian state media said killed two women and two children and wounded more than 60 other people.

Tehran resident Farzaneh Arabzadeh, 30, said she hopes the scene becomes reality because Trump started the war by attacking Iran and "did something that put our people in a worse situation.”

Houthi missile hits army camp next to Yemeni airport

Houthi military spokesman Brig. Gen. Yahya Saree said a ballistic missile struck a military camp adjacent to Yemen's Aden airport in Khor Maksar district.

The Houthis claim the military camp houses a command center for the Saudi-led forces fighting the rebels.

A transportation ministry official in Aden said airport operations were temporarily suspended and the tarmac wasn't damaged. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief the media.

This is the second time the Houthis claim to have targeted the military camp inside the airport complex in five days and the third this month.

— By Sara El Deeb in Beirut and Samy Magdy in Cairo

Iran says it's open to diplomacy to end war with US

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Wednesday on X that Iran remains open to diplomacy if the U.S. demonstrates a willingness to build trust and reach a resolution.

But if the U.S. "chooses war over diplomacy, it’ll certainly result in an even greater strategic failure,” he added.

That echoed remarks he wrote in the Financial Times but gave no details of talks with Washington through mediators on Iran’s recent seven-day proposal to end the war and fully reopen the Strait of Hormuz.

Meanwhile, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters on Wednesday that mediation efforts are welcomed, though the final decision on terms rests with Trump.

US congressional candidate detained in West Bank

Brad Lander, a Democrat running for a New York seat in the U.S. House of Representatives, was briefly detained by Israeli police on Wednesday as he joined rabbis and other volunteers accompanying Palestinian farmers during the annual olive harvest in the occupied West Bank.

Dozens of other volunteers also were detained, according to a spokesperson for Protect the Harvest, the group that organized the visit.

Israeli police said four foreign activists will be referred for a deportation hearing, while 32 people were questioned and released and will be prohibited from returning to the area. Another 40 were released because there were no grounds for further detention, police said.

The Israeli foreign ministry said in a post on X that Lander was “harvesting headlines” in “a calculated political provocation.”

This year’s Palestinian olive harvest has been the most violent in recent history, according to Israeli rights group Yesh Din and the Palestinian Farmers’ Union.

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

SEIU Local 1000, the largest union for California government workers — representing more than 100,000 employees, including auditors, nurses and counselors — hit the picket lines in cities across the state for the first time since the union's founding in 2004. Members overwhelmingly voted to authorize the strike earlier this month, accusing the state of failing to bargain in good faith after their contract expired in June.

Irene Green, who’s worked with the state’s Employment Development Department for 17 years, said workers were picketing because the state refused to compromise with union leaders on raising salaries, among other issues.

“Seventeen years with the state, I feel disrespected,” said Green, who leads a labor council for the union. “I’ve given up a lot of my time, a lot of my pay in order to help the state out, time and time again.”

Green was among dozens of members picketing outside the secretary of state building in Sacramento on Wednesday afternoon. Most of them wore purple union shirts and many held signs. One read: “Noted. NO raise and RTO with these gas prices??? The math is not mathing,” using an acronym to refer to a return-to-office mandate ordered by Newsom.

The order required state workers to return to the office four days a week by July 1. Newsom, who's preparing to leave office in January and eyeing a 2028 presidential run, argued that the mandate would improve workplace collaboration and innovation, which will help government better serve the public. He vetoed a bill backed by the union last month that would have required state agencies to provide a written justification for making workers report to the office.

The California Department of Human Resources said it was “focused on achieving a fair and responsible agreement and continues to be available at the bargaining table.”

The union argues that remote work saves the state money it would otherwise spend on office space and improves people's work-life balance.

The union is also pushing for the state to raise workers' salaries by 20% over the next three years and increase the state contribution toward employees' healthcare costs.

State workers are fighting for a better future, said Josh Guile, who works for the secretary of state's office and leads a labor council within the union.

“Today we’re out here to say enough is enough,” Guile said at a rally in Sacramento. “We deserve a fair contract.”

Jessica Brooks, an innovation analyst at the state's Department of Health Care Services, said she was picketing because the state refused to bargain in good faith. The state should give workers a raise in part to help them afford costs associated with reporting to the office most of the week, she said.

“It's got to be one or the other: Give us a raise or let us save money, both personally and with the state by working from home,” she said.

The electric vehicle maker reported third-quarter net income of $787 million, or 22 cents per share, down 44% from the year-earlier period. Excluding certain items, though, earnings per share of 48 cents beat Wall Street analyst expectations by 3 cents.

One standout for the quarter was Tesla's $1.5 billion in free cash flow, a measure of cash generated after subtracting investments needed to keep the business running. Given big artificial intelligence spending, analysts had expected Tesla would report it had burned through cash, not generated it.

“It seems Tesla is taking a more capital-efficient approach, delaying longer-term projects to be able to self-fund their AI growth,” said Morningtar analyst Seth Goldstein, calling the cash jump the big surprise of the quarter.

Revenue was basically flat at $28 billion, falling slightly short of analysts’ forecast.

In a SpaceX conference call after that company reported earnings on Tuesday, Musk said a long-rumored merger with Tesla might be in the works. He said that special committees had been set up at each company to discuss a possible combination, while cautioning that many hurdles remain.

Musk declined to discuss the possible merger further on Tesla’s conference call.

Tesla stock fell 3.2% in after-hours trading after climbing 3.6% during the regular trading session.

The company also reported doubling capital spending for the quarter to $4.7 billion, but analysts had expected a far bigger increase. The shortfall raised questions as to whether growth in the business in future months might not be as fast as investors had expected, a concern that Tesla heightened in its conference call when it said it was cutting its full-year 2026 capital spending estimate from $25 billion to $20 billion.

On the positive side, Tesla reported that a big selling feature of Tesla's cars, driver-assistance software that Tesla owners pay for separately, are in high demand with 75% of vehicles sold in North America including a subscription to the service.

The company calls the feature Full-Self Driving (Supervised), the word in parenthesis added after regulators said the term was misleading because the software requires drivers to stay alert and ready to take control at any time.

Profit margins also held up despite concerns that discounts to boost sales may have squeezed profitability in recent quarters. For the three months through September, Tesla reported that it made 18.1 cents for every dollar of car sales, up almost 3 cents from a year earlier.

Tesla had previously reported selling nearly 490,000 vehicles last quarter, a rise from the prior three months. The increase followed a brutal drop stretching more than a year amid backlash over Musk’s support for President Donald Trump and right-wing politicians in Europe.

The parent company of Facebook and Instagram reported net income of $9.86 billion, or $3.83 per share, for the July-September period. That’s up from a profit of $2.71 billion, or $1.05 per share, in the same period a year earlier.

Revenue grew 26% to $64.60 billion, up from $51.24 billion in the prior-year quarter and above the $63.34 billion expected by Wall Street analysts.

“We hit major milestones this quarter toward delivering personal superintelligence for everyone — including launching Muse and Muse Wonder, our first frontier model,” said CEO Mark Zuckerberg in a statement. “Our investments are paying off, the core business is strong, and we’re seeing velocity across the board.”

In August, Meta reached an $18 billion settlement with 48 U.S. states over the effects of social media on teen mental health. The company agreed to take steps to keep children under 13 off Instagram and Facebook and teens ages 14 and 18 in age-appropriate accounts.

Excluding the impact of a $9.89 billion charge related to this agreement, the company's third-quarter earnings would have been $7.40 per share, Meta said. The-year ago quarter included a one-time tax charge of nearly $16 billion.

On Wednesday, a judge ordered Meta to pay New Mexico $25 billion after a jury found the company liable for deceiving users about privacy on Facebook, marking the biggest fine ever against the tech giant.

Meta said the number of daily active users on its “family of apps” — Facebook, Messenger, Instagram and WhatsApp — grew 3% from a year earlier to an average of 3.64 billion.

And during a call with analysts, Zuckerberg noted that more than 10 million people in the U.S. and Canada have set up accounts for Muse, the personal artificial intelligence agent the company launched in August.

“About 25% of people who have set up Muse use it on any given day,” he said. The agent is for people 18 and over and is designed to help users with day-to-day tasks like schedules, shopping and other plans.

The CEO noted that Muse requires significant computing power to run, but that the company expects to improve its cost efficiency by more than 10 times in the next year, “which will enable it to be profitable once the revenue lines are at scale.”

For the current quarter, Meta is forecasting revenue in the range of $73 billion to $76 billion, the midpoint of which is higher than the $73.65 billion analysts are expecting.

Total expenses were $51.61 billion, an increase of 68% year-over-year. This includes the charge stemming from its multistate legal settlement.

The Menlo Park, California-based company had 66,775 employees as of Sept. 30, a decrease of 15% year-over-year.

Management narrowed its estimate for 2026 capital expenditures. It now anticipates spending will range from $135 billion to $145 billion, compared with an earlier estimate of $130 billion to $145 billion.

Meta didn’t provide an estimate for spending next year but noted that it expects to continue investing aggressively to support its core and AI businesses.

The company also did not give revenue guidance for 2027. But it said it expects losses at its Reality Labs segment to narrow to around $15 billion next year as the company shifts investments to other areas, primarily AI. Reality Labs builds Meta’s augmented reality, virtual reality and related wearable devices.

Also Wednesday, Meta announced that its board approved the creation of a new class of publicly listed, nonvoting Class C common stock, effective in January. The move is intended in part to boost the company’s ability to raise capital for AI infrastructure investments.

“Meta plans to issue nonvoting shares to fund AI investments without diluting CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s control,” said Andrew Rocco, stock strategist at Zacks Investment Research.

Meta’s shares closed up 0.5% in regular trading Wednesday. The shares rose 2.9% in after-hours trading after the results were released. The stock is up 5.7% so far this year.

The lawsuit seeks to stop attorney Darren Indyke and accountant Richard Kahn from accepting any payments from Epstein's estate, estimated at more than $100 million. They serve as coexecutors, and New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez said they “stand to benefit substantially” from the estate unless a federal judge intervenes.

Indyke worked as Epstein’s attorney for roughly two decades. Both he and Kahn have testified in Congress that they did not know about Epstein’s abuse, though Torrez has a different view.

“None of this could be done by just one man,” Torrez said at a news conference, where he stood with two of Epstein's accusers. “This was something that was facilitated, that was made possible by handlers, by lawyers, by accountants, by others who have yet to face real consequences.”

In response to the lawsuit, an attorney for the pair said they “emphatically reject” the allegations and note that New Mexico officials never sought to interview Indyke and Kahn before going to court. Dan Weiner said they would have cooperated.

“Not a single woman has ever accused Mr. Indyke or Mr. Kahn of committing sexual abuse or witnessing sexual abuse, nor claimed at any time that she or anyone else reported to them any allegation of Mr. Epstein’s abuse,” Weiner said in an email.

The U.S. Justice Department declined to comment on any federal investigation of Indyke or Kahn.

Epstein owned the Zorro Ranch for decades

Earlier this year, Indyke and Kahn agreed as executors of the estate to settle a class-action lawsuit brought against them by Epstein accusers for up to $35 million. They did not admit any wrongdoing as part of the deal.

Torrez’s lawsuit is an effort to possibly recover more money for victims, with New Mexico acting as the plaintiff.

Epstein purchased the Zorro Ranch in Stanley, a sparsely populated ranching community about 30 miles (50 kilometers) south of Santa Fe, in 1993. He built a massive home on the property, which spanned thousands of acres, and constructed several guest homes, a private airstrip and a helipad.

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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. There is also an online chat at 988lifeline.org

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Epstein died by suicide in a New York jail cell in August 2019 while awaiting trial on federal sex trafficking charges.

His former girlfriend and close associate, Ghislaine Maxwell, is serving a 20-year prison sentence after her 2021 conviction on sex trafficking charges in New York. Witness testimony at Maxwell’s trial alleged she and Epstein had sexually abused women at the ranch.

“We cannot undo what happened or return what was taken from us, but we can demand answers,” said Epstein accuser Anouska De Georgiou. “We can pursue justice and we can insist that wealth, power and influence never place anyone beyond accountability.”

The Associated Press does not name people who say they were sexually abused unless they have come forward publicly.

Indyke and Kahn played key roles, lawsuit says

The lawsuit accuses Indyke and Kahn of conspiracy and racketeering in supporting the “Epstein Enterprise.”

“They arranged payments to survivors to purchase their silence and leave them indebted to Epstein, handled costs for expenses connected to the abuse, monitored survivors’ spending, and prepared tax returns for some survivors,” the lawsuit states.

The lawsuit points to financial records indicating over $3 million in payments were made — with no discernible business purpose — from Epstein-related accounts directly to girls or women from 2003 to 2013.

Between 2013 and 2019, the lawsuit states, Indyke and Kahn authorized and signed off on payments totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars to “the enterprise’s sex trafficking survivors, including those who also acted as recruiters, and other expenses including legal fees, apartment rent and tuition.”

According to the suit, some payments were funneled through a nonprofit that was overseen by Indyke and Kahn. The complaint states that more than $30,000 was paid out by the C.O.U.Q. Foundation in 2012 to girls or women for purposes apparently unrelated to the charity.

The lawsuit also notes a 2017 email from Kahn to Epstein regarding payment of “the latest batch of medical expenses for girls.”

“At the end of the day this is not about the past. It is about the truth. It’s about justice, and it’s about making sure that accountability does not end with Epstein,” said Julia Molchanova, another Epstein accuser.

No crimes were pursued in New Mexico

Epstein never faced charges in New Mexico, though the state attorney general's office in 2019 confirmed that it was investigating and planned to forward its findings to federal authorities in New York. Hector Balderas, who was attorney general at the time, said New Mexico's outdated laws failed to protect children from abuse.

Epstein was not required to register as a sex offender in New Mexico, despite a 2008 guilty plea in Florida.

Torrez reopened the state’s investigation this year. In August, he sued the Justice Department, accusing it of blocking the state from investigating alleged sex crimes. The government said it was not releasing some information to the state because disclosing victim-identifying information would violate court orders in New York.

Also in August, a commission established by state lawmakers to investigate whether local authorities looked the other way, released a 119-page report that said authorities repeatedly deferred to investigations in New York, Palm Beach, Florida, and the Virgin Islands, while leaving Epstein’s offenses in New Mexico unexamined and unpunished.

Epstein’s estate sold the ranch in 2023 to the family of Don Huffines, a Republican who is the Texas state comptroller. The money was set aside for creditors.

Probate proceedings related to Epstein’s will and assets are being handled in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

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White reported from Detroit. AP reporter Mead Gruver in Fort Collins, Colorado, contributed to this story.

During a campaign visit to Ohio, Vance told reporters he was “disgusted” by fellow Republicans who were pushing back against the ad, then later drew cheers at a political rally when he defended Ramaswamy, a biotech billionaire and 2024 presidential candidate.

Vance said he has watched Democrats “throw every dirty trick in the political book at Vivek,” who he considers a close personal friend -- including calling him a ‘murderer' — while “the whole time Vivek has stood tall and talked about what he wants to accomplish.”

“And now the media and the Democrats in the state of Ohio are obsessed because, guess what, Vivek Ramaswamy had the audacity to run a TV commercial which calls it out as it is and calls Amy Acton a liar,” he said.

During the same rally, U.S. Sen. Jon Husted shared the stage with Vance and Ramaswamy, but steered clear of discussing the ad, in which Acton’s birth mother, Donna Arthur, calls her daughter “a liar” and insinuates that she has mental health issues. Arthur lost custody of her children after their stepfather was indicted for raping Acton, and the candidate has not seen her since 1978.

“I would not have run that ad,” Husted said in a statement to The Associated Press. A day earlier, his Democratic opponent, former Sen. Sherrod Brown, called the spot “disgusting” and said everybody — including Husted — should denounce it.

President Donald Trump also weighed in Wednesday, telling reporters he knew nothing about the ad but had heard that “the mother went very rogue on the daughter.”

“It’s a very unusual situation to have a mother hate a daughter that much, but I don’t think that has anything to do with Vivek,” the president said.

‘Let’s heal,' Acton implores voters

Acton, Ohio's former state health director, spent the day traveling to a previously scheduled campaign appearance in rural Wyandot County, in the northwestern part of the state. Her campaign also released a new positive ad, which — somewhat ironically — featured her appealing to voters to “find more breathing room, and let's heal what has divided us.” She has made no secret of facing homelessness and abuse as a child.

In Cincinnati, the vice president said “politics is a tough business” and that the contents of Ramaswamy's ad were “not really my concern.” He said he was focused on supporting Republican candidates in the midterm elections.

“I’m a little bit disgusted when I see Republicans across the country who are whining more about that advertisement than they are about what the congressional Democrats and other Democrats want to do to the United States of America,” Vance said in his first public comments on the ad, which has roiled one of the most contentious and expensive governor's races in the country.

Some Republicans denounce ad, Ramaswamy. Haley calls him ‘a bad guy’

The video was criticized by both Democrats and Republicans when it exploded into public view Tuesday, just two weeks before Election Day.

Nikki Haley, who sparred with Ramaswamy during the 2024 Republican presidential primary over the personal nature of his attacks, called him "a bad guy” in a social media post Tuesday. “It’s a shame he continues to get away with it,” she wrote. Meghan McCain called it “dastardly” and Dan Hauser, a long-time aide to Republican Sen. Mike Lee of Utah, said he deleted his post sharing the video once he realized “the very serious accusations that caused their issues.”

The Ramaswamy campaign's initial statement on the ad did not claim responsibility for its production, but the candidate eventually did so when he spoke to reporters at an evening campaign event. His campaign will spend $4 million to air it on TV and online in the closing weeks of the race, despite the backlash. He didn't address the ad in remarks at the rally where Vance spoke outside Cincinnati.

Police and court records show Cledith Arthur was arrested and charged with the rape of his stepdaughter, then 12, in July 1978, after Acton’s biological father reported him to authorities. The abuse allegedly happened from December 1976 to April 1978. Cledith Arthur, who has since died, failed to show for a court appearance and became a fugitive.

Acton said she has not seen her mother since she appeared in a courtroom in the late 1970s. Her campaign on Tuesday posted a video of her brother who supported her backstory about living in a tent and being abused.

Vance told reporters before the rally that Acton “lies about every single one of her positions.”

Acton's campaign declined to respond to Vance's comments, saying that her painful backstory was not the centerpiece of her run for governor.

Voter: ‘I don’t think it’s right’

Michael Wedding, 20, came to Vance's rally Wednesday — but not to support Ohio's Republican ticket. He said he would be parting with his large Republican family and vote for Acton for governor, adding that he attended the rally in large part to see Ramaswamy in person.

He said he had seen the ad and found it “very, very gross.”

“She was sexually abused as a child," he said of Acton, "and I thought it was kind of scummy that they would use that in an advertisement. I don’t think it’s right to use her sexual abuse as a kid, or give any sort of platform to that.”

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Binkley reported from Washington. Associated Press video journalist Patrick Aftoora-Orsagos contributed to this story from Sharonville, Ohio.

The Department of Justice appealed after federal judges ruled in June in favor of advocates who said the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program risked becoming a tool for political retribution. But it dropped two appeals Wednesday in single-sentence joint agreements, which stipulated that each side would pay its own fees.

Federal officials provided no explanation, but advocates praised the ruling.

“The Trump administration’s attempt to weaponize public service loan forgiveness against organizations it disagrees with was anti-democratic and unlawful from the start," Dan Zibel, an attorney for the group Student Defense, said in a written statement. "This is a significant victory for millions of Americans who have dedicated their careers to public service.”

The PSLF program was designed to make jobs in government, public schools, fire and police departments, public hospitals and nonprofits more attractive by forgiving loans for qualified employees after a decade’s worth of payments.

But last fall, President Donald Trump’s administration wrote a new rule to empower Education Secretary Linda McMahon to kick employers out of the program if she decides their work has a “substantial illegal purpose.”

The vaguely phrased rule was targeted at employers who support undocumented immigrants or transgender youth, potentially affecting borrowers who worked at schools, public hospitals and legal aid groups.

The overhaul amounted to a major reworking of a program that has canceled loans for more than 1 million Americans.

But just before it was set to take effect in July, U.S. District Judge Myong Joun in Massachusetts vacated the U.S. Education Department’s changes, saying they overstepped the agency’s power and threatened to violate First Amendment protections for free speech. The ruling came in response to a pair of lawsuits filed by more than 20 states along with a coalition of nonprofit groups and cities.

On the same day, District Judge Amir Ali in Washington issued a similar ruling in a case brought by nonprofit organizations.

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

Goodell said in his news conference at the end of the NFL’s annual fall meeting that Dr. Allen Sills, the league's chief medical officer, has gone through the steps that were followed and added that the union had a right to call for a review.

“Obviously, there was a medical evaluation, and I think our protocols were incredibly good there,” Goodell said. “The protocols were followed. Our process is to make sure that’s the case, and our chief medical officer has gone through that, so we’re comfortable that what we’ve seen in the protocols have happened.”

Sills on Tuesday offered a passionate defense of the Eagles medical staff. The NFL said officials were in touch with team doctors and trainers, as well as the Cleveland Clinic in London, where the Eagles were playing the Jaguars on Oct. 11.

League executive vice president Jeff Miller said officials had a good sense of the course of events, which included Hurts being evaluated at a hospital the day before the game. Miller disputed a report that Hurts was awake for more than 30 hours before playing against Jacksonville, saying that the 28-year-old returned to the hotel and slept for roughly seven or eight hours.

Hurts is on injured reserve and expected to miss the rest of the season after a blood clot in his left calf traveled to his lungs. The Eagles and agent Nicole Lynn said Monday that Hurts has deep vein thrombosis and bilateral pulmonary emboli.

His treatment involves blood thinners, and Hurts will not be allowed to participate in any football activities until he is off them.

Goodell downplayed the role that international travel may have had in the situation.

“The most important thing here is Jalen’s health, ultimately, and the future of him,” Goodell said. “He’s a wonderful young man: not just a great player, but he’s someone we all care deeply about. I’m more worried about his health, ultimately, but the protocols were followed.”

Sills said Tuesday the decision to allow someone with a blood clot to fly depends on several variables, including the location, a patient's history and more.

“What I can tell you is expert people getting a lot of opinions,” Sills said. "This isn’t just one doctor saying yay or nay. You’re going to poll a panel of experts both within the team and outside the team to get the best judgment and experience with a particular condition.”

U.S. Senator Lisa Blunt Rochester, D-Del., wrote a letter to Goodell asking questions about how the situation was handled and requesting a briefing for her office and members of the committee on health, education, labor and pensions. Blunt Rochester said her husband died at age 52 after tearing an Achilles tendon playing basketball and having blood clots travel to his heart and lungs.

“I am deeply relieved that Mr. Hurts' story did not end the way my husband's did,” she wrote in the letter dated Wednesday. “The NFL's influence and reach offer a vital opportunity to turn this tragedy into a force for preventing lost lives both in sports and outside of it.”

Hurts was six games into his fifth season as Philadelphia's starting quarterback. He was Super Bowl MVP when the Eagles won it all two years ago.

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See AP’s full NFL coverage here

Curry Pajcic said his client, Kelly Lund, was walking across the bridge Oct. 17 when the collision happened. He said she was traveling 35 to 45 mph and showed photos of blood on the Wonderwood Expressway sidewalk.

“Our City Council and our mayor passed a law that mandated no more than 15 miles an hour,” Pajcic said. “If there’s a state law, everybody would know about it and it would make our streets safer.”

Pajcic said Lund’s injuries include broken bones and multiple facial fractures. She faces additional surgeries and dental work, he said.

Dr. Shilpa Amin, chair of emergency medicine at HCA Memorial, said the hospital’s trauma center sees two to four e-bike injury cases per week.

The Jacksonville City Council passed legislation in September lowering the sidewalk speed limit for e-bikes to 15 mph.

The Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office said in a statement that it expects riders to operate safely and obey applicable laws.

“We take the issue of reckless and unsafe e-bike use seriously, particularly when it poses a threat to motorists, pedestrians, and other road users,” the statement said.

“These motorized bicycles are dangerous and they can be deadly and something needs to be done about them,” Pajcic said.

The roundtable brought a national health policy discussion to Clay County, focusing on efforts to expand nutrition education in medical schools and improve food served in hospitals.

HHS’ Advancing Nutrition Education initiative encourages medical schools to provide at least 40 hours of nutrition education across four years, or an equivalent competency-based program, beginning in fall 2026. The department says 80 institutions across 36 states have committed.

“Lincoln Memorial was one of the first hospitals in the country to adopt our 40-hour nutrition education for medical students,” Kennedy said.

The Make Hospital Food Healthier pledge encourages hospitals to align menus and food-service practices with federal dietary guidelines when clinically appropriate and feasible. Recommendations include limiting ultra-processed foods and sugary drinks and emphasizing fruits, vegetables and whole grains.

Kennedy is asking all of the medical schools in the country to consider promoting the initiative. He said so far, 80 schools have signed on. He talked about the quality of hospital food.

“Its low quality food, it has lots of sugars and salts and other ingredients that aggravated poor health,” Kennedy said.

Participants included leaders from local hospitals, health systems and medical schools.

• Rep. Aaron Bean
• Dr. James Toldi, dean of Lincoln Memorial University’s Orange Park campus — signed the medical school nutrition education commitment
• Dr. Aaron Carpenter, president of North Florida for Nemours Children’s Health — signed the Healthy Hospital Pledge
• Dr. Morhaf Ibrahim, founder and president of Ibrahim Heart Clinic and PremierCardia
• Scott Kashman, CEO of Ascension St. Vincent’s Health System in Northeast Florida
• Dr. Karthik Krishnamurthy, Mohs surgeon at Parks Dermatology Center
• Dr. Jason McConnell, president of Lincoln Memorial University — signed the medical school nutrition education commitment
• Dr. Teanna Moore, dean and chief academic officer of Lincoln Memorial University’s DeBusk College of Osteopathic Medicine
• Dr. Stephen Motew, president and system CEO of UF Health — the University of Florida’s medical school signed the commitment
• Chad Patrick, CEO of HCA Florida Orange Park Hospital
• Dr. Kent Thielen, CEO of Mayo Clinic in Florida
• Dr. Christopher Reeder, dean of Lake Erie College of Osteopathic Medicine-Jacksonville University — signed the medical school nutrition education commitment
• Matthew Zuino, president and CEO of Baptist Health

Kennedy said there was strong enthusiasm for the effort among the medical leaders at the meeting.

“It was gratifying to me to meet this pantheon of extraordinary medical leadership from medical schools, from the hospitals in the Jacksonville area,” he said. “If we want to make America healthy, we’ve got to start with nutrition.”

He said the administration is also focusing on healthier food through the military, Head Start and Women, Infants and Children programs. Kennedy said the federal government is changing food subsidy programs and has encouraged Florida to seek a SNAP waiver to help recipients access healthier food.

Bean said local community partners can help people learn about better food choices.

“We are learning that protein should be the basis of any diet because once you eat protein you get full and your continuing to consume some of the bad food. It’s educating people on better choices; everybody has the power to do this themselves,” Bean said.

What teachers were told vs. what the numbers show

Columbia County school employees were told to expect around a 21% increase in their insurance rates for 2027.

But according to Columbia County Teachers Association President Dr. Jenee Delaney, when the actual numbers came out, many were shocked.

Delaney said depending on the plan and coverage level, some employees are looking at increases of 60, 80 and even 200 percent.

She points to one example where an employee covering only themselves could see their monthly premium nearly triple, going from $17 to $51 under one of the proposed plans.

Under the originally discussed 21% increase, that same employee would have paid just over $20 a month.

For families, the numbers are even more striking, with some monthly premiums jumping by hundreds of dollars depending on the plan.

Teachers say the timing couldn’t be worse.

Schools are already struggling with staffing shortages, and an increase of this size could push more educators out of the profession entirely.

“We might be looking at a loss of employees just for the mere fact that there was no way for them to make a living and still pay for their insurance. And even with that, we are missing teachers and having substitutes having to teach the classes,” Mickey Garrett, a Columbia County teacher, said.

Union representatives say this isn’t just a Columbia County problem; it’s a statewide issue.

“The state needs to step in and do something about insurance in the state of Florida because it’s not going to get better. And teachers are hit especially hard. And they do it for law enforcement. They do it for firefighters. They need to do it for teachers,” Dr. Jenee Delaney, Columbia County Teachers Association President, said.

The school board is meeting Oct. 27 to discuss options.

Teachers said they are hoping the board will push back on the proposed rates and find a solution that doesn’t force employees to choose between their paycheck and their health coverage.

Council member Rory Diamond, who serves as the city’s liaison to JTA, spoke with News4JAX about his push to have Ford testify before local lawmakers.

“JTA is a nightmare. It’s an absolute living nightmare,” Diamond said. “200 employees got fired. There’s a $40 million deficit. There’s people who can’t get to work and school like they used to because of huge leadership problems at JTA.”

Subpoena voted on, but voluntary appearance expected

Diamond and other city leaders on the Financial Audit and Oversight Select Committee voted Tuesday to subpoena Ford. But Diamond says that may not be necessary. After speaking with Ford’s team, he says Ford indicated he will appear voluntarily.

“His folks told me he’s going to voluntarily come,” Diamond said. “And to his credit, he’s never not shown up when we asked him to come over the last several years. So I expect that he’ll do that.”

Diamond says the appearance will not happen this Friday, but is expected within the next several weeks. He hopes to have Ford testify before the holiday season.

Documents requested in the subpoena are due Oct. 30.

Questions about ridership data and federal funds

Among the key questions Diamond wants answered: whether JTA’s administration inflated ridership numbers for its Navi and Skyway systems to obtain federal funds — and who else bears responsibility for the financial shortfall.

“I’m very curious whether or not we falsified numbers about ridership,” Diamond said. “It sure looks like paying employees to be on the Navi doesn’t look right to me.”

Diamond drew a distinction between the city council’s inquiry and a separate criminal probe being conducted by the State Attorney General’s office. He said the council’s goal is accountability, not prosecution.

“We’re here to speak for the people to get the answers so that we could avoid this happening again,” he said.

Ford heading to new role in Dallas

Ford is set to begin a new position at DART — Dallas Area Rapid Transit — which pays him more than $515,000 a year. News outlets in Dallas have been closely following the JTA investigation. Earlier today, however, DART board members said they are standing behind their decision to hire Ford.

The Titans had announced Tuesday that Elliott was released, saying only that it came after his involvement in an unspecified incident at the team’s facility five days earlier.

A person briefed on the incident told The Associated Press on Wednesday that Elliott had a gun in his car and went to the parking lot to retrieve it after a dispute with another player. The person spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity because the incident is being reviewed.

Elliott's agent, Malki Kawa, could not be reached for comment.

The NFL prohibits league personnel from taking a firearm to club facilities, stadiums and team hotels and on team planes or buses.

The Titans promptly notified the league of the incident involving Elliott, which is being reviewed, the NFL said.

Speaking to reporters, Saleh defended Jordan's character.

“Unfortunately, rules are rules with regard to guns on property, and sometimes it’s far greater than the knee-jerk reaction of kicking somebody when they’re down,” the coach said.

“He’s a good man. Made a terrible, had a terrible lapse in judgment that I recognize as a call for help more than a criminal act,” Saleh added. "He’s never committed a crime in his entire life and he pulled a gun, in the parking lot.”

Right tackle JC Latham, who was involved in the altercation with Elliott on the practice field, called the episode an unfortunate situation.

“I don’t really have too much to say about it," Latham said Wednesday. “There ain’t never been no bad blood between us two. We were here on the summer getting treatment. Before that, we hung out whenever we were in the same city together. We actually had never had an argument leading up to it."

Elliott appeared in five games this season with one start and had 11 tackles. He followed Saleh to Nashville after a two-year stint with the San Francisco 49ers, where he played in 31 games with 29 starts.

The 6-foot-4 defensive tackle was selected by the Cleveland Browns in the third round of the 2020 draft. He spent his first four seasons in Cleveland before signing a two-year, $7 million deal with San Francisco.

Tennessee added him as a free agent in the offseason on a two-year, $8 million deal.

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AP Pro Football Writer Rob Maaddi in Tampa, Florida, contributed to this report.

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See AP’s full NFL coverage here

The district said the rollout of the OPEN GATE Weapons Detection System will add one more layer of protection for its youngest students. Students at John E. Ford Elementary School near downtown demonstrated how it works.

“This technology is just part of our multilayered approach to safety and security,” Jackson Short, DCPS police chief, said. “We do believe that our youngest students deserve the same level of protection and the same level of security.”

Students wore their backpacks in the front to allow students to quickly remove items if detected through screening.

The school has been using the weapons detectors for months because it’s a K-8 and by now many students are used to it.

“I was like, is this going to be like scary? Like, is it going to take a while? Like, will it affect me getting late to class? It was actually pretty quick and easy, and it made me feel safer,” Mackenzie Peterson and Madeline Herbin, students said.

DCPS is actually using an interesting acronym, BLUE, to remind students what needs to be taken out of your child’s bag before going through the detectors. It stands for “Binders, Laptops, Umbrellas, and Eyeglass cases.”

By the end of the school year, DCPS plans to have the devices installed at 30 elementary schools.

“We had a couple of situations last year...where elementary school students did bring real firearms to school. So anything we can do to get ahead of that, prevent that and help keep everybody safe, I think it is worth it,” Short said.

A parent of a 7-year-old said she’s against the technology.

“I’m already on edge. She doesn’t even go to school, but because of all these shootings and things, I just don’t think that’s the most appropriate step they could be taking,” Rachel Faullin said.

A parent of a 3-year-old said she wants it in schools.

“Definitely for metal detectors. I feel like it would take away a lot of worries for a lot of parents with their kids going to school and mine is only three and I like that they’re incorporating that before he even goes,” Anastasia Hodge said.

Parents will be notified before the system is installed at their child’s school.

The rollout of the technology comes as school board members debate who should be allowed to carry firearms on campus.

After Tuesday’s school board meeting, members are considering whether certain parents, employees, and other qualifying adults should be allowed to keep firearms in vehicles on school property.

Supporters say lawful gun owners have a right to protect themselves. Critics worry it could lead to more gun thefts and confrontations.

The discussion comes one month after Baldwin Middle-Senior High Principal Michael Smith was reassigned after a loaded gun was found in his vehicle on campus.

Superintendent Dr. Christopher Bernier clarified that firing an employee over that is a district decision and is not dictated by state law.

Board Chair Charlotte Joyce became emotional while referencing the 2018 Parkland shooting.

“Seventeen children and adults died in three minutes. Three minutes. There was one (School Resource Officer) on campus. And you know how big that campus was?” Joyce said. “He couldn’t have got there in three minutes, even if he would have been inside the building.”

Victor Romero, 62, was charged with murder in the death of Koran Irvine, 46, who was found just after 7 p.m. Tuesday wounded and unconscious in the driver’s seat of a vehicle on the New Jersey-bound side of the bridge’s upper level.

Irvine, of Valley Cottage, New York, was pronounced dead at a hospital. The shooting near the end of the evening rush snarled traffic for hours on the busy Hudson River span that connects Manhattan and Fort Lee, New Jersey.

Romero, of Haverstraw, New York, retired from the New York Police Department in 2001 after he was wounded in the hand and chest in an off-duty shootout with men attempting to rob his family’s Brooklyn laundromat in June 2000. Using his service weapon, Romero shot one of the men in the stomach, arm and leg, and another man in the legs, according to news accounts from the time.

A telephone number listed for Romero in public records rang unanswered. Information on a lawyer who could comment on his behalf was not immediately available. Romero, a drug detective in Brooklyn, had been working for the NYPD for six years when the laundromat shooting occurred, according to a New York Post article from the time.

Irvine worked for Con Edison, the utility said in a statement, calling the shooting a “senseless act of violence."

“Our deepest condolences go out to his family, friends, colleagues, and everyone who knew and loved him,” the company said.

Closed bridge lanes reopened about five hours after the shooting, the span’s operator, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, said.

Opened to traffic in 1931, the iconic, double-decked bridge carries around 100 million vehicles each year, according to the Port Authority, which calls it the world's busiest. The bridge and its entrances are teeming with cameras.

Its entrances can be difficult to navigate, as drivers often veer across packed lanes, causing heavy traffic even under normal circumstances.

The Interior Department wants to reconsider its own approval for the “construction and operations plan” for the New England Wind project off of Massachusetts. The plan was approved in 2024 during the Biden administration. The Justice Department said in a filing Tuesday that the court should send the permit back to Interior, because the plan was approved despite major adverse impacts.

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, a Rhode Island Democrat, warned that the administration now risks derailing a legislative effort to speed up permitting reviews for new energy and infrastructure projects. The Senate reached a bipartisan deal in September on a permitting bill, which has not yet been voted on.

“This is how you blow up a permitting deal,” he said in a statement Wednesday.

The Trump administration is using executive orders, agency actions and the courts to try to stop the development of offshore wind, a technology that President Donald Trump has attacked as “ugly” and unreliable compared to fossil fuels such as coal and natural gas. Officials started buying back offshore wind leases after federal judges blocked its efforts to stop construction on five major East Coast projects.

The Interior Department also wants to reconsider its prior approval of the construction and operations plan for Revolution Wind, a wind farm for Rhode Island and Connecticut that has finished construction, and for the Maryland Offshore Wind Project, which has not yet begun construction.

In August, a judge granted the administration's request to reconsider the permit for the stalled New Jersey project Atlantic Shores. That project had been halted soon after Trump returned to office because co-owner Shell walked away from it.

Last year, a federal judge said the Trump administration could reconsider the permit granted to the Massachusetts project SouthCoast Wind days before the president’s inauguration to a second term.

Pasha Feinberg, an offshore wind strategist at the Natural Resources Defense Council, said the Trump administration’s attacks on offshore wind are escalating at a time when Americans are struggling with surging utility bills.

“It’s long past time for the Trump administration to realize its war on clean energy is backfiring," Feinberg said.

The National Ocean Industries Association, which represents offshore industries including oil and wind, said it's concerned about the uncertainty that comes with reopening federal approvals for offshore energy projects, particularly those already under construction or in operation.

“The Senate has made meaningful progress on deep reforms that would provide greater certainty for energy projects across the board,” said the association's president, Erik Milito. The administration's actions “underscore why Congress needs to get this done,” he said.

The plans for New England Wind call for up to 129 wind turbines that could supply as much as 2,600 megawatts of clean energy to power more than 900,000 homes each year. The developer, Avangrid, declined to comment Wednesday. Construction has not begun.

The project's federal approval was challenged in court by ACK for Whales, a group of Nantucket, Massachusetts, residents who say they are concerned about the negative impacts of offshore wind development. The lawsuit in District Court for the District of Columbia contends that the federal government failed to comply with numerous statutes.

The federal defendants in the case filed a motion Tuesday stating that remand of the permit is warranted, so Interior could make a new decision. The government also told the court in 2025 it wanted to reconsider New England Wind’s approval.

Interior said in a statement Wednesday that the latest filing complied with a briefing schedule and was not announcing a policy change. Its position on offshore wind has remained consistent throughout this administration, the statement said.

Avangrid built another wind farm, Vineyard Wind, off the coast of Massachusetts in a joint venture with Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners. Construction finished in March, making it the first project to reach this stage during Trump’s time in office. Vineyard Wind was one of the projects the administration tried to halt construction on, citing concerns over national security.

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McDermott reported from Providence, R.I.

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

On Wednesday, days after News4JAX asked pointed questions, the district confirmed that a current staff member has served as interim head coach while an uncleared candidate, Jerrand Nesmith, was publicly presenting himself as the team’s head coach.

Nesmith was interviewed by News4JAX ahead of the season and referred to in team posts and outside outlets as the head football coach at Riverside High School. DCPS confirmed Friday that Nesmith was never employed by the district.

In its latest statement to News4JAX on Wednesday, DCPS answered some but not all of our follow-up questions, saying, “As we previously shared, Mr. Nesmith was never employed by Duval County Public Schools nor served in an official capacity, although he was offered the coaching position at Riverside High School.”

The district also revealed that school leadership confronted Nesmith directly about his public statements. “Because employment was contingent upon the successful completion of the district’s hiring and screening requirements, school leadership addressed Mr. Nesmith directly regarding his engagement in media statements and social media posts that inaccurately represented his employment status,” DCPS said.

What happened after that is unclear to News4JAX and parents we spoke to.

The district confirmed that “a current Riverside High School staff member has served as the interim head coach” throughout the process.

News4JAX has asked the district who that staff member is.

News4JAX is also asking DCPS who granted Nesmith access or permission to be around students before his employment process was completed.

On Wednesday afternoon, a district spokesperson provided this response:

“I appreciate your follow-up questions. At this time, I will defer to the information we have previously shared. School leadership will continue to communicate directly with their stakeholders, including the student-athletes and their families, to address questions and provide guidance.”

How the story came to light

News4JAX began asking questions after receiving an anonymous tip claiming Nesmith had not been cleared to work for the district. News4JAX contacted DCPS and requested verification of employment and clearance status for multiple Riverside football staff members, including Nesmith. In an initial response, DCPS said it was looking into the request.

A week later, DCPS confirmed that Nesmith was never employed by the district, despite being referred to in team posts and outside outlets as the head football coach at Riverside High School.

The district said Nesmith was offered a coaching position earlier this year, but emphasized that an offer does not constitute employment. Candidates must complete the hiring process and meet district requirements before they are authorized to begin working with students.

In an earlier statement, DCPS said Nesmith “failed to meet employment requirements,” resulting in “non-employment with the district,” and that he “never received the required clearance or authorization to work with students.” The district also said it “never announced or identified him as an employee of the district” and that it is aware of outside sources referring to Nesmith as the head coach.

Parents describe confusion, lack of communication

Parents of players told News4JAX they are frustrated by what they describe as a lack of clear communication about the coaching situation. Some parents said they have not seen Nesmith on the sidelines this season. News4JAX went to Riverside’s game Friday against Raines and did not see him on the sideline.

Parents also raised concerns about guidance and direction for players, particularly those hoping to play at the next level. Some told News4JAX that stats have not been consistently uploaded, and they worry that could affect recruiting opportunities.

School board member demands answers

Duval County District Five School Board Member Reginald “Reggie” Blount also weighed in on the situation, calling for accountability.

Blount said, “I am deeply disturbed by the recent incidents in our school district. As the District 5 representative, I expect the Superintendent and key district personnel to take every necessary measure to ensure the safety and well-being of our students. This includes verifying that all personnel with access to students have been properly vetted and cleared for employment, as well as ensuring that community volunteers meet all applicable screening and background-check requirements.”

What remains unclear

DCPS has not explained why Nesmith did not receive clearance, saying it cannot discuss the details of any individual’s hiring process. The district has not alleged any wrongdoing by Nesmith and has not said why the employment requirements were not met.

News4JAX also called Riverside’s athletic director and Nesmith and left messages. As of publication, neither had responded.

DCPS outlines steps required to coach

According to the district’s website, DCPS lists multiple steps required to become an athletic coach, including submitting an application through the district’s online portal, being interviewed by school administration, receiving an offer, and completing the human resources process and assigned tasks in the employment portal. DCPS also emphasizes that no volunteer coaches are permitted in or on any DCPS athletic facility or with any students or athletes.

The Angels fired Kurt Suzuki on Wednesday after they lost 100 games in his only season in charge of the long-struggling club.

Baseball operations consultant John Mozeliak announced in a statement that the team had declined the 2027 option on Suzuki's contract. Suzuki has been offered the opportunity to stay with the organization as a special assistant.

“Kurt has earned tremendous respect in our clubhouse, and I've seen firsthand how much he cares about our players,” Mozeliak said. “I do not believe our record this year was a true reflection of his true abilities as a manager.”

Mozeliak said he made the decision in coordination with Kroenke Sports & Entertainment, which reached a deal to purchase controlling ownership of the Angels from Arte Moreno on Sept. 1.

The sale is not expected to close until next year, but the sports conglomerate run by Los Angeles Rams owner Stan Kroenke is already making significant changes to its beleaguered baseball team. Right after the Angels' season ended last month, Mozeliak said he would endorse Suzuki's return for next season.

The Angels went 62-100 — the first 100-loss season in franchise history — and finished last in the AL West in their only season under Suzuki, who ended his 16-year major league playing career as a catcher for the Halos in 2021-22. Suzuki had never been a manager at any level before he was hired exactly one year ago by general manager Perry Minasian, who had employed Suzuki as his special assistant for the previous three seasons.

Minasian was fired by Moreno last June, and longtime St. Louis Cardinals GM Mozeliak stepped in on a temporary basis to run the front office while leading the search for a permanent GM to replace him.

That transition plan has been thrown into flux by Moreno's decision to sell, and Mozeliak didn't indicate whether he has a long-term future in his own job, although he said he had been looking “toward 2027 and beyond” while reaching the decision to fire Suzuki. Mozeliak's current contract ends in December, with the possibility of an MLB work stoppage looming.

Mozeliak also indicated that Suzuki's entire coaching staff is not expected to return in its current positions, but some members had been offered staff positions in the organization.

Mozeliak already fired Suzuki's pitching coach, Mike Maddux, and two staffers in August because he felt the team wasn’t making sufficient use of the technology and analytics available to its pitchers. Mozeliak promoted Tim Leveque, the Angels' Double-A pitching coach, to the major league staff at the time.

Suzuki’s replacement will be the seventh manager to lead the team in nine seasons since it parted with Mike Scioscia after the 2018 season. The Angels have had 11 consecutive losing seasons and 12 straight non-playoff seasons, both the longest active skids in the major leagues.

The Angels now have MLB's third current managerial vacancy, all in the AL West. The Seattle Mariners and the Houston Astros also parted ways with their managers after the season.

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See AP’s full MLB coverage here

In Texas, early voting is up 74% compared with 2022. In Kansas it’s more than doubled. Maine, North Carolina and Ohio also have seen increases of more than 30% in early in-person and mail voting compared with the same point in 2022.

Democrats are trying to flip Republican-held Senate seats in each of those states. In most of them, Republicans are accounting for a smaller share of advance voters than they did four years ago.

The AP’s data, which runs through Tuesday, gives a snapshot of potential voter enthusiasm — and where it might be lacking — after early voting has opened in most states during a midterm cycle that has shifted in often unpredictable ways.

Dissatisfaction with President Donald Trump’s tariffs, the persistently high cost of living, and high gas and diesel prices caused by the Iran war have generated political blowback against Republicans in places the party didn’t anticipate having to defend this year.

Nationally, more than 13 million mail-in and early in-person votes have been cast, compared with 9 million at the same point in 2022. The increase also reflects a few additional states that expanded their early voting opportunities and ones that made more of their data available since the last midterms.

Midterm elections typically favor the party out of power in Washington. With Republicans in control of both chambers of Congress and the White House, it's a distinctly different environment than 2022, when Democrats were in charge.

Democrats energized by competitive Senate races in GOP-leaning states

Senate Democrats were expected to face a tough map this cycle, defending a number of battlegrounds with only a few opportunities to flip seats in areas Trump won by single digits in 2024. Republicans currently hold a 53-47 majority in the chamber.

But with gas and diesel prices up significantly from where they were a year ago and Trump increasingly unpopular among voters, Democrats have been wading into traditionally Republican states, hoping to win there for the first time in decades.

Earlier this month, Republicans pulled back spending in a once-competitive North Carolina Senate race and dumped close to $12 million into Kansas, a state Trump won by 16 percentage points in 2024, to support GOP Sen. Roger Marshall against Democrat Adam Hamilton.

Trump held a rally Monday in the state, where more than 55,000 people have cast their ballots so far — more than double the 27,000 people who had voted at this point in the cycle in 2022. That year, Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly narrowly won reelection while Republican Sen. Jerry Moran won overwhelmingly.

Specific races seem to be drawing voters to the polls

Texas also has seen a massive surge, even though early in-person voting just started Monday. The number of ballots cast two weeks from Election Day has reached nearly 1 million, up from roughly 550,000 at the same stage in 2022. Texas’ data doesn’t show ballots returned by party registration.

The surge comes as Democrat James Talarico and Republican state Attorney General Ken Paxton compete for the Senate seat currently held by GOP Sen. John Cornyn, whom Paxton defeated in a primary runoff with Trump’s endorsement.

Democrats have targeted Paxton, who is benefiting from millions in outside spending, over corruption allegations and his impeachment by the Texas Legislature, though he was later acquitted.

Talarico is trying to become the first Democrat to win statewide in more than three decades. Incumbent GOP Gov. Greg Abbott also is in an election fight against Democratic state lawmaker Gina Hinojosa.

Ohio has top races up and down the ballot this year, with tight contests for U.S. Senate, House and governor. Total spending on the Ohio Senate race will reach close to $500 million, according to AdImpact.

The increased attention is reflected in the votes, with 156,000 more ballots cast so far compared with 2022, a 30% increase. Some voting laws have changed in Ohio since 2022, including the state eliminating its grace period for receiving mail ballots, a change that forces voters to return those ballots earlier.

In Maine, where five-term Republican Sen. Susan Collins is seeking reelection against Democrat Troy Jackson, there’s been an increase of 39% in ballots cast this year compared with two weeks before the election in the 2022 midterm.

Advance vote hasn't increased in every competitive state

In Michigan and Georgia, two states where Democrats are defending Senate seats, the total number of early votes cast is high, but similar to four years ago.

Both states shattered their midterm voting records in 2022, with reproductive rights on the ballot in Michigan and a highly competitive U.S. Senate race in Georgia that year.

Iowa, which voted three times for Trump in presidential years, has competitive contests for governor, Senate and in three of its four House districts. Early voting there two weeks out from the election is down about 6% from the same period four years ago.

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Ryan Dubicki and Michaela Herbst of The Associated Press Election Services team contributed to this report from Washington.

But federal authorities argued Wednesday that the ceremonies were part of an elaborate, decade-long marriage fraud ring that netted a half-dozen people in Massachusetts millions of dollars. Prosecutors charged six people, including the alleged ringleader Jennifer Gonzalez, with conducting as many as 20 marriages to help immigrants obtain legal status.

The other five were allegedly paid by Gonzalez to take part in the marriages — several of them taking part in multiple nuptials. Each marriage cost an immigrant from $38,000 to $40,000. All face charges including harboring illegal aliens, conspiracy to harbor illegal aliens, conspiracy to commit marriage fraud and marriage fraud.

“What an affront the alleged conduct revealed here today must be to those who play by the rules," U.S. Attorney Leah Foley told reporters. "To see a for-profit business whose sole purpose is helping people cheat and skip the line by simply paying for it must be so offensive and disheartening to those who follow our country’s laws.”

Five of the six were arrested Wednesday morning. A sixth defendant is currently in state prison serving a sentence for a firearms crime.

“Ms. Gonzalez got rich off selling the American Dream all the while investing her money in another country,” Foley said, detailing how Gonzalez allegedly used profits from the marriage ring to buy businesses and real estate in the Dominican Republic. She is an American citizen.

An attorney for Gonzalez, 43, of Fall River, Massachusetts, had no comment. Gonzalez made an initial appearance Wednesday, and a hearing will be held Friday to determine if she will be held in detention while the case is pending.

The arrests are the latest effort to crack down on marriage fraud and come as the Trump administration has increased restrictions on both legal and illegal immigration and reduced the avenues available for people to enter the country or become a citizen.

In August, 11 people were charged with participating in a multimillion-dollar scheme to help hundreds of Chinese nationals fraudulently obtain green cards through sham marriages to U.S. citizens. In that scheme, American citizens were paid as much as $30,000 to enter into bogus marriages with immigrants seeking lawful permanent resident status. The decade-long scheme netted tens of millions of dollars.

Three years ago, a similar scheme was prosecuted in Massachusetts. Marcialito Biol Benitez, a 49-year-old Philippine national living in Los Angeles, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit marriage fraud and immigration document fraud. Benitez admitted operating a large-scale marriage fraud agency in which he arranged marriages between foreign nationals and American citizens.

In the latest case, prosecutors said the investigation was ongoing. They allege in the court documents that some of the defendants lied on applications for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, by falsely claiming they never had been married. Gonzalez is also accused of spending $120,000 she received in SNAP benefits. Prosecutors also accused the defendants of engaging in housing and unemployment fraud.

None of the immigrants who entered into the marriages have been charged.

“Marriage fraud undermines the processes that ensure honest, lawful individuals can marry United States citizens and enjoy everything the United States has to offer to them,” John Soares, assistant special agent in charge, Homeland Security Investigations in New England, told reporters. “Fraudsters, like the individuals arrested today, make that process more difficult.”

Kane's England teammate Declan Rice scored a second-half equalizer for last season's runner-up to secure a 2-2 draw at six-time winner Bayern in a matchup of two European heavyweights in the Champions League on Wednesday.

Rice traded passes with Viktor Gyokeres before finding the target eight minutes from time.

Kane converted a penalty earlier in the second half to increase his total to 16 goals in 23 career matches against Arsenal, having scored every season against the London club from 2014-15 to 2023-24 — mostly with Tottenham.

Kane also sent Alphonso Davies in on goal when Bayern responded to Eberechi Eze's opener for Arsenal.

It was Kane’s 10th straight Champions League match with a goal – moving within one of Cristiano Ronaldo’s record of scoring in 11 consecutive games (set in 2017 and 2018).

“We had some good moments, just not enough over the full 90 (minutes),” Kane said.

Elsewhere, Real Madrid had a more straightforward 4-1 victory over Leipzig after needing three goals in the final 10 minutes of a victory over Roma last week.

Madrid faces Barcelona in the “clasico” on Sunday.

Earlier, Manchester United’s crisis deepened after a 4-1 debacle at competition newcomer Como, leaving coach Michael Carrick at risk.

Also, Aston Villa moved second in the league-phase standings with a 3-1 win over Norwegian club Viking. Unai Emery’s team has won all three of its matches, scored 12 and conceded three to trail only two-time defending champion Paris Saint-Germain on goals scored.

In other results, it was: Inter Milan 1, Shakhtar Donetsk 0; Sporting Lisbon 2, LASK 3; Lille 2, Galatasaray 4; Club Brugge 3, Lens 0; and Real Betis 1, Feyenoord 0.

Madrid and Betis — which scored through a penalty kick from Isco — have also won all three of their matches.

Austrian champion LASK earned its first Champions League victory.

Mbappé scores as Madrid warms up for clasico

Real Madrid is involved in an ongoing battle with the Spanish league over alleged refereeing controversies but José Mourinho’s team should have little to complain about after a complete performance against Leipzig.

Bernardo Silva’s first goal for Real Madrid came just before halftime as the former Manchester City midfielder prodded in from close range after goalkeeper Maarten Vandevoordt couldn’t quite gather a shot from Arda Guler.

Guler added the second after the break.

Kylian Mbappé made it 3-0 with his 73rd career Champions League goal before Tidiam Gomis pulled one back for Leipzig, then Yan Diomande restored Madrid’s three-goal advantage.

Man United struggles

United has now been outscored 6-1 in its last two European matches.

Nico Paz scored twice and also set up another score for Cesc Fabregas’ Como, which was playing in the fourth division of Italian soccer just seven years ago.

“We got outplayed for most of the game so it was a very disappointing night," United midfielder Youri Tielemans said. "It’s everything. You can be good tactically but if the effort is not good (then it won't work) and vice versa. You need to be good at everything and tonight we were poor. It comes down to that.”

United was already in turmoil, with defender Lisandro Martinez last week calling out the club’s hierarchy over its offseason recruitment, with director of football Jason Wilcox the apparent target of his criticism.

In January, Ruben Amorim had a fallout with Wilcox which swiftly led to the manager being fired after just 14 months in the job.

Now Carrick could be on the way out.

In the other early game, Galatasaray won at Lille with Victor Osimhen scoring against one of his former clubs.

Nico Paz puts on a show

Paz has been auditioning to take over Lionel Messi’s playmaker spot with Argentina and his performance against United was a case in point.

At the tiny 10,000-seat Giuseppe Sinigaglia stadium, Paz put Como ahead two minutes in with a curling shot from the edge of the area when Harry Maguire allowed him some space.

United became the first English team to concede in the opening two minutes of consecutive major European matches after Pablo Barrios scored in the opening minute of Atletico Madrid’s 2-0 win last week.

Tasos Douvikas then took a pass from Paz before lobbing in over goalkeeper Senne Lammens for his third goal in three Champions League matches.

For Como’s third, Paz went in virtually uncontested before shooting around Lammens. Center back Jacobo Ramon scored Como's fourth.

Joshua Zirkzee pulled one back for United in the stoppage time.

United has won only one of its last 11 Champions League away matches.

Como moved up to ninth in the standings, while United dropped to 20th.

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See AP’s full soccer coverage here

The spot, airing on Maine radio in the form of a country song, is from the Senate Leadership Fund, a super PAC aligned with Senate Republicans. Among the lyrics in the jingle: “If he’ll screw his own family, he’ll screw yours too.”

Collins told reporters during a campaign appearance in Lewiston that she “had nothing to do with that ad.” She added that federal law bans her from coordinating with the super PAC, but she has publicly called for it to be removed.

Previously, in a Politico story in September, Collins referenced Jackson's relationship with a second cousin.

“I’m not going to bring up the fact that the mother of his two children is his second cousin,” Collins said. “I don’t know whether people know that or not.”

In an op-ed published Wednesday, Lana Pelletier, Jackson's partner, criticized the radio ad and other attacks on her family by Collins and her supporters, saying she never thought they “would stoop this low.”

“Sen. Collins has been quick to demand respect and decency for herself. My family deserved the same,” Pelletier said.

“I am not a helpless woman who needs politicians to tell the world what happened in my own life. And I am not a punchline or a caricature of where I come from,” she added.

Jackson, a former state lawmaker and lumberjack, and Pelletier are longtime partners who have two sons together.

Jackson's campaign manager, Dan Gottlieb, said Wednesday that Collins owes Jackson's family an apology.

“Susan Collins herself spread these disgusting personal attacks on Troy's family,” he said. “Now she wants Mainers to believe she's above the very attacks she helped spread.”

Democrats are hoping for a win by Jackson over the incumbent Collins as the party tries to retake the Senate.

Also Wednesday, Collins lamented how negative much campaign advertising has been during this election cycle.

“This race is unique in Maine history in the number of personal attacks,” Collins said.

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Kruesi reported from Providence, Rhode Island.

Facebook’s deception was intentional and executives consistently misled users about how the platform worked, state District Court Judge Francis J. Mathew wrote in his ruling.

“Facebook promised users that they (the users) controlled their data. This was false,” he said.

Jurors in September found Meta liable for over 43 million violations of New Mexico consumer protection laws for making misleading public statements about how it handled users' personal data. The case was brought after political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica harvested Facebook data to generate targeted political ads during the 2016 election season.

The award will serve as a warning to tech companies that New Mexico will hold them accountable, state Attorney General Raúl Torrez said at a news conference.

“This judgment should be a signal, an unambiguous message, to Silicon Valley,” he said.

Meta said the ruling and Torrez's office's approach to enforcement “makes it all but impossible to do business in the state of New Mexico.”

“At its core, this lawsuit seeks to impose a tax on speech to enforce new rules for what people can say online. We are confident we will prevail on appeal,” C.J. Mahoney, the company’s chief legal officer, said in a statement.

The Menlo Park, California, company has a market value of $1.8 trillion and brought in more than $200 billion in revenue last year. Company shares traded 2% higher after Wednesday's announcement, and it was scheduled to report its quarterly earnings later in the day.

New Mexico goes it alone

In August, Meta reached a settlement with nearly all states and territories — except New Mexico and Florida — to pay $18 billion and add stronger child-safety measures to its Facebook and Instagram platforms.

The settlement ended a trial over teen social media addiction and resolved a pivotal case years in the making that sought to hold the tech giant accountable for the role its platforms played in undermining children’s mental health. The effort targeted features designed to grab young people’s attention.

New Mexico didn’t join the multistate settlement, choosing to go after the company on its own.

The director of a nonprofit that supports stronger policies toward corporations said $25 billion is “a drop in the bucket for Meta,” but demonstrates people want accountability.

“Right now, they are rolling out Muse, an AI assistant encouraging people to trust it with everything from their bank accounts to their medical information,” added Nidhi Hegde, executive director of the American Economic Liberties Project. "Which is why we need more enforcers with courage and laws with actual teeth to rein them in.”

At the trial, attorneys for the state cited a 2010 Washington Post op-ed in which Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote that the company didn't sell user data.

“You have control over how your information is shared,” Zuckerberg said. “We do not and never will sell any of your information to anyone.”

New Mexico officials sought fines of $35 billion to $40 billion, arguing the company would only change if its stock price were impacted.

Meta's lawyers, meanwhile, asserted that the state failed to prove the company made misleading statements and that content moderation actually harmed people in New Mexico. They wanted the company to pay $3.4 billion at most and said an award many times larger would be unconstitutional.

Although interest would accrue on the penalty during the appeal process, Meta could succeed in reducing the number of violations for which it is found liable.

The $25 billion award far exceeds a $5 billion fine the Federal Trade Commission levied against Facebook in 2019.

Peter Ormerod, an associate law professor at Villanova University, was surprised by the size of the New Mexico judgment because previous legal settlements over Cambridge Analytica were much lower.

“It comes out to about $12,000 per person in New Mexico,” he said. “It’s quite unlike anything else we’ve seen.”

Under the New Mexico Constitution, fines for violating consumer protection laws go toward education spending. It could take years for the state to get the money while the company appeals.

Company argues that the state failed to prove harm

The trial focused on accusations Facebook deceived users about a breach stemming from a third-party personality quiz that harvested data from roughly 87 million profiles and sold it to Cambridge Analytica. The now-defunct firm’s clients included Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign.

Attorneys for New Mexico argued that the state's entire population was deceived, and that Facebook allowed misinformation or violent content to proliferate.

Meta’s lawyers argued the state failed to prove people were harmed by deceptive statements. Zuckerberg in a video deposition denied that Facebook profited off harmful content and said the company had to balance free speech with content moderation.

In a partial win for the company, jurors rejected assertions that Facebook made false claims about removing harmful content, including misinformation about the COVID-19 pandemic.

Meta lawyers said it has changed policies since the lawsuit was filed in 2021 and catches and removes an estimated 99% of content violating its standards.

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This story was updated to correct the spelling of the judge's last name.

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Associated Press reporter Matthew Brown and Technology Writer Barbara Ortutay contributed to this report. Schuettler is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.

Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed “in principle” to restart the talks after Nov. 10, Putin's foreign affairs adviser, Yuri Ushakov, told reporters following a meeting in St. Petersburg between the Russian leader and U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff.

The talks will focus on “building a security system for Russia and Ukraine after the conflict ends,” Ushakov said.

Witkoff's talks with Putin about Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine took place as U.S. President Donald Trump presses Kyiv to make a deal that stops the fighting.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he supported the push from Washington to restart talks swiftly.

"The agenda is clear: to end the war, bring peace closer, and, as I understand it, prepare everything for a meeting at the leaders’ level,” Zelenskyy said in an audio message issued late Wednesday.

Russia, he added, "has said many times already that it is ready to meet in one format or another. Then something changed. Things were canceled. We’ll see what happens this time.”

Shortly after his message, a missile alert sounded over Kyiv, and loud explosions were heard in the capital.

Representatives of the three countries held three rounds of negotiations early this year, meeting twice in Abu Dhabi in January and February, followed by further talks in Geneva in February.

However, little progress was reported beyond exchanges of prisoners of war as Moscow and Kyiv stuck to their longstanding basic demands.

Latest proposals to end the war have little of value, Kremlin says

The discussion in St. Petersburg lasted about three hours, the Kremlin said, and came a day after Witkoff met with Zelenskyy and some European leaders in Norway's capital, Oslo.

The proposals that emerged from the Oslo meeting “contained little of real value in the context of resolving the Ukrainian crisis,” Ushakov said.

However, he later told Russian state TV that while Moscow isn’t “fully satisfied” with the Oslo proposals, they are a step in the right direction.

Witkoff’s meetings suggested leaders are keen to bring new momentum to U.S.-led peace efforts, more than 4½ years after the war began. Efforts by the Trump administration since early last year to end the war have made no significant progress.

Witkoff and Putin met at St. Petersburg’s Constantine Palace, with Ushakov and Russian presidential envoy Kirill Dmitriev also at the table. Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, joined the discussion by video, Ushakov said.

During the meeting, Witkoff and Kushner proposed a three-way meeting with the U.S., Russia and Ukraine at the technical level and shared progress on their talks with Zelenskyy a day earlier, according to a U.S. official familiar with the talks who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the private meeting.

Witkoff and Kushner also discussed a postwar economic plan, European security and plans for the upcoming meeting, the official said.

Putin says he's ready to consider restoring economic ties with US

In televised opening remarks, Putin said he was ready to consider prospects for the restoration of U.S.-Russia economic ties and that he was prepared to discuss the U.S.-led conflict with Iran. Moscow stands ready to use its relationship with Tehran to help bring peace, he said.

Ushakov said “large-scale joint economic projects that offer significant prospects for cooperation” between Russia and the U.S. were discussed in detail with Witkoff.

“Some of these are, in fact, nearing the implementation stage,” he said.

In other developments Wednesday, Russia released a retired American teacher who had been imprisoned on charges of fighting as a mercenary in Ukraine. Witkoff said it appeared to be a goodwill gesture by the Kremlin after Trump asked Putin to free Stephen Hubbard.

Putin also met with Chinese Premier Li Qiang, who was in St. Petersburg for talks with other Russian officials, the Kremlin said.

Russia has cultivated its ties with China, and the two countries last month vetoed a U.S. proposal for U.N. experts to keep monitoring sanctions on Iran.

Putin and Witkoff also discussed a possible meeting next month between the Russian, Chinese and U.S. leaders at an economic summit in China, Ushakov said, adding that Beijing is already preparing for it.

Norway's prime minister sees a possible ‘new phase’ in talks

After his trip to Russia, Witkoff returned for more consultations in Oslo, where he met with Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre at the airport before flying back to the U.S. The meeting lasted just over an hour, Norwegian broadcaster NRK reported.

“I think we may have entered a phase now where the Russians are also looking for opportunities for diplomacy,” Støre told the broadcaster. He said the new talks were likely to happen in mid-November.

Asked whether Zelenskyy could accept a border running along the current front line, Støre said: “I don’t think Ukraine will ever formally accept it and say that this is the new border. But whether they can live with it is another matter.”

Trump presses Zelenskyy to compromise

At the White House on Tuesday, Trump increased the pressure on Zelenskyy to come to an agreement with Russia as relations between the two leaders have soured again.

“We want Zelenskyy to make a deal,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office. “We’ve given a lot to Ukraine. We’ve gotten absolutely nothing back except grief, death, tremendous monetary loss.”

If that doesn’t happen, “I think it’s going to be a very bad thing,” Trump said.

Amid fears that Washington was turning its back on Ukraine, Zelenskyy said Kyiv is once again receiving early warnings from its partners about incoming Russian missiles, after recent strikes that he said occurred without enough notice from allies.

Russian attacks kill 5 people and wound at least 23 others, Ukraine says

Overnight Russian attacks in Kyiv left three people dead and 12 wounded, while 10 residential buildings were damaged, the city’s military administration said.

Energy facilities were targeted in Kyiv and three other cities in Russian attacks early Wednesday, Ukrainian Prime Minister Serhii Koretskyi said. Outside the eastern city of Kharkiv, two people died and 11 others were wounded when drones exploded in a residential area, he said.

The Russian Defense Ministry said its forces struck a warehouse, an electrical substation and a bulk carrier at sea that was headed to the Ukrainian port of Odesa.

The Russian Defense Ministry reported Wednesday that its air defenses intercepted 373 Ukrainian drones over multiple Russian regions overnight, as well as the illegally annexed Crimean Peninsula 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

Varsity 4 Independent coaches poll, Week 10/11

Rank, (previous), school, record, points, (first-place votes)

1. (T2) Episcopal (9-0, SSAA), 105 (5)

Last week’s result: Beat Eagle’s View, 68-0. This week: vs. Fernandina Beach (3-6).

2. (1) West Nassau (6-2-1, SSAA), 101 (2)

Last week’s result: Lost to Jackson, 24-19. Next week: at Keystone Heights (2-7), 7:30 p.m.

3. (T2) Christ’s Church (8-1, SSAA), 84 (4)

Last week’s result: Beat True Institute, 57-6. This week: at Englewood (1-7), 6:30 p.m.

4. (4) Paxon (7-2, SSAA), 71

Last week’s result: Beat Keystone Heights, 50-0. This week: vs. Union County (5-4), 6:30 p.m.

5. (6) Hilliard (8-0, FHSAA), 53

Last week’s result: Beat Dixie County, 28-22. This week: at Cornerstone Classical (6-2).

6. (NR) Union County (5-4, SSAA), 40

Last week’s result: Beat Father Lopez, 56-38. This week: at Paxon (7-2), 6:30 p.m.

Dropped out

Stanton (8-2, SSAA), lost to KIPP Bold City, 22-20.

Others receiving votes

Interlachen (5-3, SSAA), 21; Fernandina Beach (3-6, SSAA), 18; Stanton (8-2, SSAA), 12; Bishop Snyder (1-8, SSAA), 10 (1); Providence (3-6, FHSAA), 8; Cornerstone Classical (6-2, SSAA), 6; Old Plank Christian (5-3, SSAA), 6.

Week 10 schedule, Florida

Monday, Oct. 19

Bishop Kenny 49, North Florida Educational 21 (completion of suspended Week 1 game)

Thursday, Oct. 22

Ridgeview (1-7) at Orange Park (2-5)

Friday, Oct. 23

Baldwin (3-5) at KIPP Bold City (1-7), 6:30 p.m.

Bartram Trail (6-2) at Mandarin (7-1), 6:30 p.m.

Beachside (3-4) at Fletcher (4-4), 6:30 p.m.

Bishop Kenny (3-4) at Parker (1-7), 6:30 p.m.

Bishop Snyder (1-8) at Seven Rivers Christian (3-6)

Bolles (5-2) at Jackson (7-1), 6:30 p.m.

Bronson (2-7) at Old Plank Christian (5-3)

Christ’s Church Academy (8-1) at Englewood (1-7), 6:30 p.m.

Crescent City (3-5) at Trenton (7-1), 7:30 p.m.

Duval Charter (4-5) at First Coast Christian (1-8)

Ed White (6-2) at Bradford (9-0), 7:30 p.m.

Fernandina Beach (3-6) at Episcopal (9-0)

First Coast (1-7) at Creekside (6-2)

Flagler Palm Coast (6-2) at Atlantic Coast (0-8), 6:30 p.m.

Fleming Island (4-4) at St. Augustine (8-0)

Halifax Academy (1-7) at Eagle’s View (0-9)

Hamilton County (4-4) at Fort White (5-3), 7:30 p.m.

Hilliard (8-0) at Cornerstone Classical (6-2)

Impact Christian (1-8) at Trinity Christian (4-4)

Interlachen (5-3) at Atlantic (7-1)

Middleburg (4-3) at Clay (5-2)

Oakleaf (4-4) at Buchholz (8-0)

Palatka (3-5) at Wolfson (4-5), 6:30 p.m.

Ponte Vedra (3-5) at Nease (5-3)

Raines (8-0) at Cocoa (3-4)

Ribault (5-3) at Riverside (2-6), 6:30 p.m.

St. Joseph (4-5) at Saint Stephen’s Episcopal (5-3)

Sandalwood (5-3) at Tocoi Creek (3-5)

Suwannee (6-2) at Godby (5-3)

Union County (5-4) at Paxon (7-2), 6:30 p.m.

Wakulla (6-2) at Baker County (6-2)

West Nassau (6-2-1) at Keystone Heights (2-7), 7:30 p.m.

West Port (2-6) at Matanzas (1-7)

Westside (1-7) at Menendez (4-4)

Yulee (5-3) at Columbia (8-0), 7:30 p.m.

Zarephath Academy (1-6) at Umatilla (4-4)

OFF: Harvest, Providence, Stanton, University Christian.

Week 10 schedule, Georgia

Friday, Oct. 23

Brunswick (3-4) at South Effingham (5-2), 7:30 p.m.

Camden County (5-3) at Valdosta (7-0), 8 p.m.

Frederica Academy (3-6) at Bulloch Academy (8-1), 7:30 p.m.

Glynn Academy (3-4) at Greenbrier (2-5), 7:30 p.m.

Jenkins (3-4) at Ware County (5-2), 7:30 p.m.

Mitchell County (6-1) at Charlton County (5-1-1), 7:30 p.m.

Pierce County (6-1) at Brantley County (3-4), 7:30 p

Varsity 4 independent Super 6, Week 11

1. (2) Episcopal (9-0, SSAA)

Last week’s result: Beat Eagle’s View, 68-0. This week: vs. Fernandina Beach (3-6). Coaches poll ranking: 1.

Why they’re here: The Eagles move to the top spot for the first time as they chase the second unbeaten season in program history (2002). The schedule has been lean but Episcopal has throttled teams. The finale will be very challenging this week.

2. (1) West Nassau (6-2-1, SSAA)

Last week’s result: Lost to Jackson, 24-19. Next week: at Keystone Heights (2-7), 7:30 p.m. Coaches poll ranking: 2.

Why they’re here: The Warriors fall out of the top spot for the first time this season after back-to-back losses. Their schedule has been so much more difficult than any other of the Super 6 teams, so I’m hesitant even dropping them a spot. They’ll make up ground in the SSAA state playoffs.

3. (3) Paxon (7-2, SSAA)

Last week’s result: Beat Keystone Heights, 50-0. This week: vs. Union County (5-4), 6:30 p.m. Coaches poll ranking: 4.

Why they’re here: The Golden Eagles have been rock solid this season. They’ve got a tough Union County team this week in hopes of cashing in on an eight-win regular season.

4. (4) Christ’s Church (8-1, SSAA)

Last week’s result: Beat True Institute, 57-6. This week: at Englewood (1-7), 6:30 p.m. Coaches poll ranking: 3.

Why they’re here: Eagles and RB Jaylin Robinson have been obliterating teams as they barrel towards the SSAA state playoffs. Only loss was a 31-29 thriller to No. 3 Paxon in Week 3.

5. (6) Hilliard (8-0, FHSAA)

Last week’s result: Beat Dixie County, 28-22. This week: at Cornerstone Classical (6-2). Coaches poll ranking: 5.

Why they’re here: Red Flashes continue to ride the hot streak of RB DJ Alderman (28 rushing TDs, 1,765 yards) as they chase a perfect regular season.

6. (NR) Fernandina Beach (3-6, SSAA)

Last week’s result: Beat Providence, 3-6. This week: at (1) Episcopal (9-0). Coaches poll ranking: NR.

Why they’re here: Five of Pirates losses have all come to quality state series teams. The other is to No. 2 West Nassau. They’ve got a 25-8 win over Union County on Oct. 8, so they get in ahead of the Tigers.

Dropped out

Stanton (8-2, SSAA), lost to KIPP Bold City, 22-20.

Keep an eye on

Cornerstone Christian (6-2, SSAA); Interlachen (5-3, SSAA); Old Plank Christian (5-3, SSAA); Stanton (8-2, SSAA); Union County (5-4, SSAA).

Week 10 schedule, Florida

Monday, Oct. 19

Bishop Kenny 49, North Florida Educational 21 (completion of suspended Week 1 game)

Thursday, Oct. 22

Ridgeview (1-7) at Orange Park (2-5)

Friday, Oct. 23

Baldwin (3-5) at KIPP Bold City (1-7), 6:30 p.m.

Bartram Trail (6-2) at Mandarin (7-1), 6:30 p.m.

Beachside (3-4) at Fletcher (4-4), 6:30 p.m.

Bishop Kenny (3-4) at Parker (1-7), 6:30 p.m.

Bishop Snyder (1-8) at Seven Rivers Christian (3-6)

Bolles (5-2) at Jackson (7-1), 6:30 p.m.

Bronson (2-7) at Old Plank Christian (5-3)

Christ’s Church Academy (8-1) at Englewood (1-7), 6:30 p.m.

Crescent City (3-5) at Trenton (7-1), 7:30 p.m.

Duval Charter (4-5) at First Coast Christian (1-8)

Ed White (6-2) at Bradford (9-0), 7:30 p.m.

Fernandina Beach (3-6) at Episcopal (9-0)

First Coast (1-7) at Creekside (6-2)

Flagler Palm Coast (6-2) at Atlantic Coast (0-8), 6:30 p.m.

Fleming Island (4-4) at St. Augustine (8-0)

Halifax Academy (1-7) at Eagle’s View (0-9)

Hamilton County (4-4) at Fort White (5-3), 7:30 p.m.

Hilliard (8-0) at Cornerstone Classical (6-2)

Impact Christian (1-8) at Trinity Christian (4-4)

Interlachen (5-3) at Atlantic (7-1)

Middleburg (4-3) at Clay (5-2)

Oakleaf (4-4) at Buchholz (8-0)

Palatka (3-5) at Wolfson (4-5), 6:30 p.m.

Ponte Vedra (3-5) at Nease (5-3)

Raines (8-0) at Cocoa (3-4)

Ribault (5-3) at Riverside (2-6), 6:30 p.m.

St. Joseph (4-5) at Saint Stephen’s Episcopal (5-3)

Sandalwood (5-3) at Tocoi Creek (3-5)

Suwannee (6-2) at Godby (5-3)

Union County (5-4) at Paxon (7-2), 6:30 p.m.

Wakulla (6-2) at Baker County (6-2)

West Nassau (6-2-1) at Keystone Heights (2-7), 7:30 p.m.

West Port (2-6) at Matanzas (1-7)

Westside (1-7) at Menendez (4-4)

Yulee (5-3) at Columbia (8-0), 7:30 p.m.

Zarephath Academy (1-6) at Umatilla (4-4)

OFF: Harvest, Providence, Stanton, University Christian.

Week 10 schedule, Georgia

Friday, Oct. 23

Brunswick (3-4) at South Effingham (5-2), 7:30 p.m.

Camden County (5-3) at Valdosta (7-0), 8 p.m.

Frederica Academy (3-6) at Bulloch Academy (8-1), 7:30 p.m.

Glynn Academy (3-4) at Greenbrier (2-5), 7:30 p.m.

Jenkins (3-4) at Ware County (5-2), 7:30 p.m.

Mitchell County (6-1) at Charlton County (5-1-1), 7:30 p.m.

Pierce County (6-1) at Brantley County (3-4), 7:30 p

Varsity 4 News4JAX Super 10 Coaches poll, Week 10

Rank, (previous) school, record last year, classification

1. (1) Raines (8-0, Class 3A), 138 (12)

Last week’s result: Beat Riverside, 48-0. This week: at Cocoa (3-4).

2. (2) Columbia (8-0, Class 4A), 128 (1)

Last week’s result: Beat Ed White, 42-22. This week: Yulee (5-3), 7:30 p.m.

3. (3) St. Augustine (8-0, Class 4A), 112 (1)

Last week’s result: Beat Orange Park, 52-8. This week: vs. Fleming Island (4-4).

4. (4) Bradford (9-0, Class 2A), 95 (2)

Last week’s result: Beat University Christian, 27-24. This week: vs. Ed White (6-2), 7:30 p.m.

5. (6) Mandarin (7-1, Class 5A), 89

Last week’s result: Beat Beachside, 47-6. This week: vs. Bartram Trail (6-2), 6:30 p.m.

6. (5) Bolles (5-2, Class 2A), 61

Last week’s result: Lost to Trinity Christian, 20-17 (OT). This week: at Jackson (7-1), 6:30 p.m.

7. (9) Trinity Christian (4-4, Class 1A), 58

Last week’s result: Beat (5) Bolles, 20-17, OT. This week: vs. Impact Christian (1-8).

8. (8) Nease (5-3, Class 5A), 45

Last week’s result: Beat Bartram Trail, 41-27. This week: at Ponte Vedra (3-5).

9. (5) Ed White (6-2, Class 4A), 36

Last week’s result: Lost to (2) Columbia, 42-22. This week: at Bradford (9-0), 7:30 p.m.

10. (NR) University Christian (6-3, Class 1A), 23

Last week’s result: Lost to Bradford, 27-24. This week: Off.

Others receiving votes

Creekside (6-2, Class 6A), 15; Oakleaf (4-4, Class 5A); 13; Westside (1-8, Class 3A), 10 (1); Fletcher (4-4, Class 5A), 9; Ponte Vedra (3-5, Class 5A), 3; Baker County (6-2, Class 3A), 2; Bartram Trail (6-2, Class 5A), 2; Clay (5-2, Class 4A), 2; Jackson (7-1, Class 2A), 2; Bishop Kenny (3-5, Class 3A), 1.

Week 10 schedule, Florida

Monday, Oct. 19

Bishop Kenny 49, North Florida Educational 21 (completion of suspended Week 1 game)

Thursday, Oct. 22

Ridgeview (1-7) at Orange Park (2-5)

Friday, Oct. 23

Baldwin (3-5) at KIPP Bold City (1-7), 6:30 p.m.

Bartram Trail (6-2) at Mandarin (7-1), 6:30 p.m.

Beachside (3-4) at Fletcher (4-4), 6:30 p.m.

Bishop Kenny (3-4) at Parker (1-7), 6:30 p.m.

Bishop Snyder (1-8) at Seven Rivers Christian (3-6)

Bolles (5-2) at Jackson (7-1), 6:30 p.m.

Bronson (2-7) at Old Plank Christian (5-3)

Christ’s Church Academy (8-1) at Englewood (1-7), 6:30 p.m.

Crescent City (3-5) at Trenton (7-1), 7:30 p.m.

Duval Charter (4-5) at First Coast Christian (1-8)

Ed White (6-2) at Bradford (9-0), 7:30 p.m.

Fernandina Beach (3-6) at Episcopal (9-0)

First Coast (1-7) at Creekside (6-2)

Flagler Palm Coast (6-2) at Atlantic Coast (0-8), 6:30 p.m.

Fleming Island (4-4) at St. Augustine (8-0)

Halifax Academy (1-7) at Eagle’s View (0-9)

Hamilton County (4-4) at Fort White (5-3), 7:30 p.m.

Hilliard (8-0) at Cornerstone Classical (6-2)

Impact Christian (1-8) at Trinity Christian (4-4)

Interlachen (5-3) at Atlantic (7-1)

Middleburg (4-3) at Clay (5-2)

Oakleaf (4-4) at Buchholz (8-0)

Palatka (3-5) at Wolfson (4-5), 6:30 p.m.

Ponte Vedra (3-5) at Nease (5-3)

Raines (8-0) at Cocoa (3-4)

Ribault (5-3) at Riverside (2-6), 6:30 p.m.

St. Joseph (4-5) at Saint Stephen’s Episcopal (5-3)

Sandalwood (5-3) at Tocoi Creek (3-5)

Suwannee (6-2) at Godby (5-3)

Union County (5-4) at Paxon (7-2), 6:30 p.m.

Wakulla (6-2) at Baker County (6-2)

West Nassau (6-2-1) at Keystone Heights (2-7), 7:30 p.m.

West Port (2-6) at Matanzas (1-7)

Westside (1-7) at Menendez (4-4)

Yulee (5-3) at Columbia (8-0), 7:30 p.m.

Zarephath Academy (1-6) at Umatilla (4-4)

OFF: Harvest, Providence, Stanton, University Christian.

Week 10 schedule, Georgia

Friday, Oct. 23

Brunswick (3-4) at South Effingham (5-2), 7:30 p.m.

Camden County (5-3) at Valdosta (7-0), 8 p.m.

Frederica Academy (3-6) at Bulloch Academy (8-1), 7:30 p.m.

Glynn Academy (3-4) at Greenbrier (2-5), 7:30 p.m.

Jenkins (3-4) at Ware County (5-2), 7:30 p.m.

Mitchell County (6-1) at Charlton County (5-1-1), 7:30 p.m.

Pierce County (6-1) at Brantley County (3-4), 7:30 p

Varsity 4 Super 10 for Week 10

Rank (previous), school, record, classification

1. (1) Raines (8-0, Class 3A)

Last week’s result: Beat Riverside, 48-0. This week: at Cocoa (3-4). Coaches poll ranking: 1.

Why they’re here: Vikings are charging towards a spot in the Open division if they finish unbeaten. They’ll be at the mercy of the chaotic MaxPreps rankings system, but Raines has proven it belongs there.

2. (2) Columbia (8-0, Class 4A)

Last week’s result: Beat Ed White, 42-22. This week: Yulee (5-3), 7:30 p.m. Coaches poll ranking: 2.

Why they’re here: The Tigers are certainly in the conversation for a spot in the Open division playoffs. They’re poised for a perfect regular season, and, at worst case, the No. 1 seed in Region 1-4A if they miss out on the Open division.

3. (3) St. Augustine (8-0, Class 4A)

Last week’s result: Beat Orange Park, 52-8. This week: vs. Fleming Island (4-4). Coaches poll ranking: 3.

Why they’re here: Yellow Jackets have a big challenge in Week 11 with Mandarin on deck, but they’ll first need to get by Fleming Island to wrap up the district title.

4. (6) Mandarin (7-1, Class 5A)

Last week’s result: Beat Beachside, 47-6. This week: vs. Bartram Trail (6-2), 6:30 p.m. Coaches poll ranking: 5.

Why they’re here: Mustangs have been barreling towards the playoffs, but they need to handle business this week and next to solidify the top seed in Region 1-5A.

5. (7) Bradford (9-0, Class 2A)

Last week’s result: Beat University Christian, 27-24. This week: vs. Ed White (6-2), 7:30 p.m. Coaches poll ranking: 4.

Why they’re here: The Tornadoes have been excellent this season. They’ll wrap up a perfect regular season with a win this week.

6. (9) Trinity Christian (4-4, Class 1A)

Last week’s result: Beat (5) Bolles, 20-17, OT. This week: vs. Impact Christian (1-8). Coaches poll ranking: 7.

Why they’re here: Conquerors have played the area’s most challenging schedule and had their issues in losses to Ed White, Columbia, Carrollwood Day and American Heritage. But Trinity remains dangerous week after week. They should have beaten the Bulldogs by two possessions last week (two lost fumbles inside 3-yard line, two blocked field goals).

7. (5) Bolles (5-2, Class 2A)

Last week’s result: Lost to Trinity Christian, 20-17 (OT). This week: at Jackson (7-1), 6:30 p.m. Coaches poll ranking: 6.

Why they’re here: Bulldogs started with ferocity and fizzled out in a big way against Trinity last week. They’re looking to lock up district title this week and finish strong with a Week 11 showdown against unbeaten Buchholz.

8. (4) Ed White (6-2, Class 4A)

Last week’s result: Lost to Columbia, 42-22. This week: at Bradford (9-0), 7:30 p.m. Coaches poll ranking: 9.

Why they’re here: Commanders got running clocked last week without injured QB King Boylston. Can they end Bradford’s perfect season and get things back on track?

9. (10) Nease (5-3, Class 5A)

Last week’s result: Beat Bartram Trail, 41-27. This week: Ponte Vedra (3-5). Coaches poll ranking: 8.

Why they’re here: Panthers have pulled themselves from their 1-3 start and recovered nicely. Barring a collapse, they should be comfortably in the playoffs.

10. (8) University Christian (6-3, Class 1A)

Last week’s result: Lost to (7) Bradford, 27-24. This week: Off. Coaches poll ranking: Coaches poll ranking: 10.

Why they’re here: Christians are dangerous. They took unbeaten Bradford down to the wire last week.

Keep an eye on

Baker County (6-2, Class 3A); Bartram Trail (6-2, Class 5A); Clay (5-2, Class 4A); Creekside (6-2, Class 6A); Jackson (7-1, Class 2A).

Week 10 schedule, Florida

Monday, Oct. 19

Bishop Kenny 49, North Florida Educational 21 (completion of suspended Week 1 game)

Thursday, Oct. 22

Ridgeview (1-7) at Orange Park (2-5)

Friday, Oct. 23

Baldwin (3-5) at KIPP Bold City (1-7), 6:30 p.m.

Bartram Trail (6-2) at Mandarin (7-1), 6:30 p.m.

Beachside (3-4) at Fletcher (4-4), 6:30 p.m.

Bishop Kenny (3-4) at Parker (1-7), 6:30 p.m.

Bishop Snyder (1-8) at Seven Rivers Christian (3-6)

Bolles (5-2) at Jackson (7-1), 6:30 p.m.

Bronson (2-7) at Old Plank Christian (5-3)

Christ’s Church Academy (8-1) at Englewood (1-7), 6:30 p.m.

Crescent City (3-5) at Trenton (7-1), 7:30 p.m.

Duval Charter (4-5) at First Coast Christian (1-8)

Ed White (6-2) at Bradford (9-0), 7:30 p.m.

Fernandina Beach (3-6) at Episcopal (9-0)

First Coast (1-7) at Creekside (6-2)

Flagler Palm Coast (6-2) at Atlantic Coast (0-8), 6:30 p.m.

Fleming Island (4-4) at St. Augustine (8-0)

Halifax Academy (1-7) at Eagle’s View (0-9)

Hamilton County (4-4) at Fort White (5-3), 7:30 p.m.

Hilliard (8-0) at Cornerstone Classical (6-2)

Impact Christian (1-8) at Trinity Christian (4-4)

Interlachen (5-3) at Atlantic (7-1)

Middleburg (4-3) at Clay (5-2)

Oakleaf (4-4) at Buchholz (8-0)

Palatka (3-5) at Wolfson (4-5), 6:30 p.m.

Ponte Vedra (3-5) at Nease (5-3)

Raines (8-0) at Cocoa (3-4)

Ribault (5-3) at Riverside (2-6), 6:30 p.m.

St. Joseph (4-5) at Saint Stephen’s Episcopal (5-3)

Sandalwood (5-3) at Tocoi Creek (3-5)

Suwannee (6-2) at Godby (5-3)

Union County (5-4) at Paxon (7-2), 6:30 p.m.

Wakulla (6-2) at Baker County (6-2)

West Nassau (6-2-1) at Keystone Heights (2-7), 7:30 p.m.

West Port (2-6) at Matanzas (1-7)

Westside (1-7) at Menendez (4-4)

Yulee (5-3) at Columbia (8-0), 7:30 p.m.

Zarephath Academy (1-6) at Umatilla (4-4)

OFF: Harvest, Providence, Stanton, University Christian.

Week 10 schedule, Georgia

Friday, Oct. 23

Brunswick (3-4) at South Effingham (5-2), 7:30 p.m.

Camden County (5-3) at Valdosta (7-0), 8 p.m.

Frederica Academy (3-6) at Bulloch Academy (8-1), 7:30 p.m.

Glynn Academy (3-4) at Greenbrier (2-5), 7:30 p.m.

Jenkins (3-4) at Ware County (5-2), 7:30 p.m.

Mitchell County (6-1) at Charlton County (5-1-1), 7:30 p.m.

Pierce County (6-1) at Brantley County (3-4), 7:30 p.m.

The center of the cyclone was at sea and posed no threat to land. Vance was located about 520 miles (835 kilometers) south of Acapulco, Mexico.

Maximum sustained winds were around 40 mph (65 kph), according to an advisory from the Miami-based hurricane center.

De la Espriella, a conservative Trump ally, says he wants to prevent cultural institutions from being taken over by what he calls “atheist social communism.”

The removed exhibits addressed the history of social movements, including feminist and LGBTQ+ activism, and Colombia’s political violence.

The changes have sparked protests by civil rights groups, artists and students who accuse the government of censorship and warn that important parts of the country’s history could be erased.

Dozens of demonstrators gathered Wednesday outside the museum in downtown Bogotá as riot police guarded its entrance.

“I find it outrageous that they want to erase part of our history,” said Azul Riascos, a history student. He said the government was promoting a vision of Colombia as exclusively white, Catholic and Spanish-speaking that excluded Black, Indigenous and LGBTQ+ communities.

Gimena Sánchez-Garzoli, director for the Andes at the Washington Office on Latin America, said the Colombian government’s approach reflects a broader trend among Trump allies who are copying U.S. political narratives and strategies.

Trump has been fiercely critical of museums in Washington, particularly those tied to the Smithsonian Institution. The White House released a report in July branding leaders of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History as radical activists and has ordered signs installed outside the museum telling visitors that some of the exhibits are inaccurate.

Nearly three months after that order, such signs haven’t been installed. The museum’s director, Anthea Hartig, told Congress that the White House report “does not fairly or accurately characterize the full body of work at the museum.”

Sánchez-Garzoli said Trump’s cooperation with allied Latin American governments on security and counternarcotics efforts also has an ideological dimension.

“These are imported narratives about terrorism and about being ‘woke,’” anthropologist Arturo Sanabria said during Wednesday’s protest, describing the Colombian government’s approach as a form of neocolonial intervention.

Colombia’s Culture Minister Paola Holguín said the government was reviewing and redesigning exhibitions and curatorial practices at other museums overseen by her ministry.

The Foreign Ministry also renamed a courtyard previously honoring an Indigenous leader, describing the change as part of the president’s campaign against “woke” ideology.

“The government is making serious efforts in a cultural battle that probably doesn’t exist,” political scientist Estefanía Cardozo said outside the museum. “It is inventing one to erase identities that cannot be erased because they already exist.”

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Associated Press writer Steven Sloan contributed from Washington.

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

The S&P 500 added 0.6% and pulled within 0.8% of its all-time high set earlier this month. The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 360 points, or 0.7%, and the Nasdaq composite climbed 1.1%.

SpaceX helped lead the market and climbed 7.8% after reporting a stronger profit for the summer than analysts expected. Elon Musk, who runs the company that makes money from artificial-intelligence technology, rockets and other businesses, also said that SpaceX took a step to consider a possible merger with Tesla, his electric-vehicle company.

Tesla rose 3.4% and was one of the strongest forces lifting the S&P 500.

Other stocks rallying on profit reports that topped analysts’ expectations included Capital One Financial, which rose 2.5%, and Winnebago Industries, which climbed 10.7%.

Expectations are high for profit growth for all kinds of companies during the summer, and they need to meet them to justify the big runs their stock prices have made despite worries about high inflation, higher interest rates and other challenges weighing on Wall Street.

Winnebago was able to report a more resilient profit than expected even as high fuel prices and frustration among U.S. shoppers restrain interest in recreational vehicles, for example. CEO Michael Happe said its more expensive towable RVs are a tougher sell, but customers are interested in its “more accessible” offerings.

On the losing side of Wall Street was Netflix, which fell 5.3% even though the streaming service reported a stronger profit than analysts expected. Investors focused instead on worries that Netflix’s momentum may be slowing. The company’s forecast for revenue growth in the final three months of the year fell short of analysts’ expectations.

AT&T fell 6.4% even though it likewise delivered a stronger profit for the latest quarter than analysts expected. It gave a forecast for growth this year in an underlying measure of earnings before income taxes and some other things that fell short of some analysts’ expectations.

Among AI stocks, which have been at the center of the market’s action in recent weeks, the movements remained unsettled.

After leading the rest of the market for years because of the frenzy around AI, stocks in the industry have become shaky on worries that the build out of data centers may slow because of how much more expensive it’s become to borrow money.

CoreWeave, which has borrowed money to buy AI chips that it rents out to customers over the cloud, has been particularly volatile. Its stock bounced between an early gain of nearly 4% and a drop of 4.5% Wednesday morning before finishing with a dip of 0.5%. A day earlier, it careened between a gain of 5% and a drop of more than 6%.

Other AI-linked stocks were more resilient, and Nvidia’s rise of 2.5% was the strongest force lifting the S&P 500.

Besides SpaceX’s profit report showing strength for AI spending, another encouraging signal for the industry came from Super Micro Computer, which sells AI servers and services. It said it expects to report stronger revenue for the summer than it had earlier forecast because of “increased demand for AI platforms,” and its stock rallied 9.5%.

All told, the S&P 500 rose 44.60 points to 7,757.17. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 360.21 to 52,856.09, and the Nasdaq composite climbed 278.04 to 26,702.86.

In the bond market, the yield on the 10-year Treasury erased an early dip and climbed back to 5.12%, where it was late Tuesday.

It swung with oil prices, which remained unsteady. The price for a barrel of Brent crude drifted between $108 and $111 before settling at $108.82.

It’s been yo-yoing between $97 and $112 through October on uncertainty about when the war with Iran will allow the global energy industry to return to normal.

In stock markets abroad, indexes rose in Europe following a mixed finish in Asia. South Korea’s Kospi jumped 3.3% for one of the world’s biggest moves as AI stocks regained strength.

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AP Business Writers Michelle Chapman and Elaine Kurtenbach contributed to this report.

“I thought Boone managed a good season, especially with the pitching staff," Steinbrenner said Wednesday. "The bottom line is the players didn’t live up to their end of the bargain in the playoffs.”

New York has gone 17 seasons without a World Series title. That matches the Yankees' longest drought since winning their first championship in 1923, a gap between titles in 1978 and ’96.

“If we don’t win a championship while I’m here, I’m sure that will be a frontline story of it all and how people think of me and how a fanbase reacts,” Boone said. "I understand that.”

Steinbrenner spoke alongside Cashman during a joint Zoom news conference from team's spring training ballpark in Tampa, Florida, and Boone followed with a video news conference from Yankee Stadium.

New York went 93-68 and finished second in the AL East to Tampa Bay. After sweeping Boston 2-0 in an AL Wild Card Series, the Yankees were swept 3-0 by the Rays in a Division Series.

“In the end, the majority of the responsibility — I’ll say it for the fifth time — in my mind, my opinion, lies with the position players and the inability to score on a consistent basis throughout the course of the entire season for the most part,” Steinbrenner said. “Not on the shoulders of Aaron Boone does the blame lie.”

Captain Aaron Judge was limited to 66 games and hit .241 with 18 homers and 41 RBIs. The three-time AL MVP was sidelined from June 1 through Sept. 7 by a fractured rib, returned for seven games, then had a season-ending calf injury.

Giancarlo Stanton's regular season ended with a calf injury on April 24.

“Look, losing Stanton and losing Judge for 80-plus percent of the season in the offense’s defense was not part of the plan and it certainly had an effect," Steinbrenner said. “We just have to figure out how much of it was that.”

He doesn't feel a need to publicly pressure players in the manner of his father, George Steinbrenner.

“I'm not convinced that with this team, in this day and age, that that’s as big of a motivator as you think it is,” Hal Steinbrenner said. “Twenty, 25 years ago, different generation, just a different scenario.”

Boone heads into last season of contract

Boone finished his ninth season as manager and has one season left on a two-year contract extension agreed to in February 2025. The 53-year-old former third baseman has led New York to a 790-565 regular-season record and three first-place finishes in the AL East but a 27-30 postseason mark.

"At the end of the day, we haven’t won a championship with me at the helm," he said. "Ultimately that’s what has to happen to satisfy certainly myself — that's why I'm doing this — but to answer those questions ultimately.”

Steinbrenner and the Yankees front office evaluated Boone after the season-ending loss.

"We had a weeklong conversation about Aaron Boone and was he part of the problem this year, and I don’t believe he was. I think he had a good year managing-wise," Steinbrenner said. “But, yes, I would consider, of course, moving on from Aaron Boone if I thought he was a huge part of a problem.”

Boone defended not calling out players publicly for mistakes.

“I know I get accused sometimes of being too positive in the media and I would say if you watch my post(game) conferences this year, there were a lot of days where I was talking about our struggles. But does that mean I’m calling individuals out in a public way?” Boone said. "There is probably a time and place for that, but generally speaking to me that’s not leadership. That’s me giving red meat to people that want to be upset with somebody.”

Cashman will stay on as GM

Cashman, who turns 60 in July, said he and the team have agreed to a new contract and are working on minor details. He became general manager in February 1998 and is the most senior head of baseball operations in the major leagues — San Diego’s A.J. Preller, hired in August 2014, is second.

When Cashman took over from Bob Watson in 1998, it was the 15th change at GM since George Steinbrenner bought the Yankees in January 1973. Cashman has been the only GM under Hal Steinbrenner, who succeeded his father as controlling owner in November 2008.

New York has won four World Series, seven AL pennants and 15 AL East titles since Cashman became GM. He had been working under a four-year contract announced in December 2022.

“Cash is great every season,” Steinbrenner said. “The roster he put together, the team that we rolled out of spring training with was as good as any in baseball in my opinion. We had a lot of bumps and bruises along the way, but the team was fantastic and it was a world championship-caliber team.”

Financing with affiliat

e of Apollo Global Management

Yankee Global Enterprises, the team's parent company, announced a $2.6 billion financing agreement in August with Apollo Sports Capital, an affiliate of Apollo Global Management. The deal included debt and equity.

“It is not a precursor to fully selling the team,” Steinbrenner said. “The whole goal of the Apollo deal was to bring in capital into the company that would be there for us, to give us more financial stability for years and years to come, including the years when I’m out of here and the third generation is running the team.”

___

See AP’s full MLB coverage here

Collins is trying to fend off a challenge from Democrat Troy Jackson, a onetime state Senate president, and on Wednesday she made appearances with Joe Manchin, a West Virginian who became an independent late in his career before retiring.

After stopping for breakfast at Simones' Hot Dog Stand in Lewiston, Collins spoke of how she and Manchin were “part of every piece of bipartisan legislation that passed and became law” during their time together in office.

Manchin said to lose Collins would be “to lose the soul of the Senate.” He praised her independent streak, her willingness to buck Republican President Donald Trump and her record of fighting for Maine's interests.

“This is a true blue-blooded Maine person who knows exactly where she came from,” Manchin said.

They stopped later a New Balance shoe facility in Norway. Jackson, 58, is scheduled to campaign Thursday in Portland with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the progressive congresswoman from New York.

Collins, 73, is in what may be her toughest reelection fight as she seeks her sixth term.

It's only the second time that she's sought reelection in a midterm with a sitting Republican president, and the national trends are much less favorable to the GOP than they were the last time she did so, in 2002. Trump's approval has fallen well below where it was when he took office last year, and a recent poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found that a strong majority of voters want change in Washington.

‘We need more people like Susan Collins’

Collins has been working to persuade voters that she is independent of Trump and willing to break with him. In Manchin, she enlisted a politician who was one of the most moderate voices in the Senate. Manchin said in 2023 that Trump would “ destroy democracy in America” if he was elected to a second term.

Among the few dozen Collins supporters at the Lewiston event was Mike Marcotte.

“I may not have always been a fan of her complete package of votes, but when I look at the vitriol that's in the U.S. Senate right now, we need more people like Susan Collins,” he said.

Jackson got a late start on campaigning after the party's initial nominee existed the race, but trails Collins in the money race by less than $3 million after an aggressive quarter in which he raised more than $20 million. Jackson has campaigned relentlessly and his events have drawn hundreds. Collins has largely stuck to smaller appearances.

Some of Jackson's backers demonstrated across the street from the hot dog stand. A few held signs bearing the face of Brett Kavanaugh, the U.S. Supreme Court justice whom Collins voted to confirm and whose vote eventually helped overturn the constitutional right to abortion.

“Someone needs to stand up and be a check on Donald Trump and his harmful policies,” said David Sysko.

Collins' loyalty to Trump has been a central focus of the race

Collins has broken with Trump and Republicans over the years. She voted to convict him at his impeachment trial in 2021. Increasingly during the campaign, she has worked to distance herself from the president as Democrats argue that she is too close to him.

Collins said in early October that she is “not exactly his favorite senator,” and that she did not expect Trump to campaign in Maine. He has steered clear of the state with the Nov. 3 election nearing.

Pinning Collins to Trump is central to the Democrats’ strategy. In one ad, a nurse says the state is in a healthcare crisis “because of Susan Collins and Donald Trump,” citing Collins’ vote for Trump’s push for Medicaid cuts. Collins did vote to advance the bill in a procedural move to open debate, but ultimately voted against it.

Trump also was a major focus of four contentious debates between the candidates this month, where Collins sought to distance herself from the president and Jackson repeatedly accused her of doing Trump's bidding.

Asked at the final debate to name a time in which she bucked her own party and succeeded, Collins gave the example of rallying support against Trump's nomination of Pete Hegseth, who was confirmed as defense secretary.

Democrats seized on the moment and released a statement that said the exchange “underscores a central question in the Maine Senate race: Does Collins, a Republican in a state that disapproves of President Donald Trump and has grown bluer in recent years, stand up to her party enough to earn the independent streak she has staked her career on?”

Jackson has characterized Collins as out of touch with the struggles of working-class people in Maine. He has described Collins as a “rubber stamp” for the president and criticized her votes on Kavanaugh and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump's second-term health secretary. Collins has said she does not regret either vote.

Republicans have cast Jackson as a bully

Republican ads against Jackson, a logger from northern Maine, have focused more on accusations of his having a volatile personality and behaving like a bully with female colleagues. Jackson has denied those accusations.

Collins distanced herself on Wednesday from a Republican super PAC attack ad that she said “should be taken down.”

The senator was a top target of Democrats in 2020 when she defeated challenger Sara Gideon by nearly 9 percentage points. Collins is the only Republican senator from New England, a distinction she has had since January 2013.

The department said Wednesday it had ordered the departure of non-essential staff at the U.S. Embassy in Riyadh and its satellite consulates. The embassy had been badly damaged at the start of the Iran war and had been operating with only a skeleton staff for months, although some diplomats had returned in recent months.

In a new travel alert, the department said, "Iranian-supported Houthis have engaged in hostilities against Saudi Arabia, including attacks on civilian airports and other critical infrastructure resulting in civilian casualties and severe travel disruptions. The hostilities have the potential to escalate rapidly beyond that immediate area.”

A series of previous alerts for Saudi Arabia issued over the past several days have used almost identical language and noted that U.S. government personnel need special permission to use any Saudi airport. The Houthis have routinely targeted Riyadh’s King Khalid International Airport, and it had been closed since Oct. 10 following a severe attack.

But earlier Wednesday, aircraft from a limited number of Saudi airlines took off and landed at the airport, two days after Saudi aviation authorities notified airlines that they could resume operations with prior permission.

Still, major carriers like Lufthansa and Air France have canceled flights to Riyadh through mid-November. Saudi airlines, including Saudia and FlyNas, were among those operating flights Wednesday.

The Houthis have acknowledged attacking the airport, claiming without evidence that Saudi Arabia provided military equipment to government forces through the facility.

Although the ordered departure applies only to Saudi Arabia, U.S. embassies in other Gulf countries will see temporary staffing changes, the department said. Those embassies are already under “restricted operations” that limit the number of personnel working there.

Meanwhile, tensions grew as Saudi Arabia’s Energy Ministry said debris from an intercepted drone killed two people and injured two others at an Aramco-operated oil field in the country’s southeast.

The Saudi-led coalition fighting the Houthis also said the group had fired five drones toward Saudi Arabia early Wednesday. The coalition said the drones were intercepted and destroyed over the holy city of Madinah and the Eastern Region.

The attempted attack was the latest on Saudi Arabia since the resurgence of fighting with the Houthis in mid-July.

The government filed an emergency appeal asking the justices to lift a lower court decision halting construction. That ruling marked a setback to one of President Donald Trump's signature projects.

The administration has been racing forward with construction on a border wall and other infrastructure from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico.

But in the Big Bend region, the administration has run into opposition from ranchers, residents, business owners and environmentalists who argue the projects are a waste of money in an area of historically low illegal immigration and that construction could harm the region's scenic landscapes.

Opponents have filed numerous lawsuits seeking to stop the project, which in the Big Bend consists of a mixture of walls, vehicle barriers and surveillance technology.

Ruling in one of those cases, Judge Kathleen Cardone on Oct. 2 ordered the government to stop construction across the roughly 500-mile project area while the case plays out in the courts. It was a major victory for the bipartisan opposition.

The case hinges on sweeping waivers signed by the secretary of Homeland Security that allow U.S. Customs and Border Protection to bypass environmental and other regulations that would otherwise slow down construction of such a major project.

The government argued that the Big Bend sector is an area of high illegal entry, and said legislation dating back to 1996 explicitly gives the secretary these far-reaching powers as necessary to build physical barriers or roads near the border to stop people from crossing illegally.

Opponents disagreed, arguing that Congress gave that power to waive regulations specifically in areas of “high illegal entry.” They said Big Bend, a remote and rugged region, doesn’t fit that description.

Cardone sided with the opponents.

“The Court finds that Plaintiffs are likely to succeed on the merits of their major questions doctrine claim that the Big Bend Waivers were issued in excess of the Secretary’s authority,” she wrote.

Trump has long vowed to build a border wall along the roughly 2,000-mile length of the southwest border. Last summer, Republicans in Congress allocated Homeland Security $46 billion to finish the project, which will be a mixture of 30-foot-tall steel bollard walls, vehicle barriers and surveillance technology.

The opposition in Texas’s Big Bend region had been brewing for months, but it escalated in August when bulldozers were spotted clearing land in Big Bend National Park.

The preliminary injunction filed by Cardone stops construction there as well as land up and downriver from the park that is owned by private landowners or the state.

The government has argued that if this region is one of the only areas left without a wall or other border infrastructure, illegal immigration could end up funneling to the Big Bend. But opponents have argued that other forms of infrastructure such as drones or surveillance towers are just as effective and a lot less expensive than the wall plans.

The lawsuit, filed Tuesday in Washington, seeks a court order barring the administration from purging legally registered voters from statewide voter registration lists or denying ballots to legally registered voters.

The plaintiffs, including Sen. Chuck Schumer and Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, also ask for a ruling that the administration has illegally threatened state election officials with prosecution before the Nov. 3 election.

The lawsuit cites the Justice Department’s recent actions in California, where it sued to block state election officials from counting mail-in ballots cast by people whom the federal government has identified as “likely” noncitizens until their immigration status can be confirmed.

“For over a decade now, President Donald J. Trump has bombarded the American people with lies and misinformation about American elections and voter fraud," the suit says. "While these lies have been debunked at every turn, that has never deterred the President from employing them as a pretext to seize control over elections, even as courts overwhelmingly reject that effort.”

The Justice Department said in a statement that election integrity is a top priority for the administration and the department's actions on that front are grounded in law and under court litigation.

The Democratic leaders' lawsuit was assigned to Chief Judge James Boasberg, who has been vilified by the White House for rulings against the Trump administration since the start of the Republican president’s second term.

The suit's other plaintiffs are the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and the Democratic Governors Association. Its named defendants are Trump, the Justice Department, Attorney General Todd Blanche, the Department of Homeland Security and DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin.

“I’m going to loop tobacco at the fair,” the seventh grader told them. “And they’re, like, 'What?' They don’t have a clue.”

To be fair, most people don’t.

At 12, Sophie was the youngest contestant in the North Carolina State Fair’s annual tobacco stringing contest, which pays homage to a way of life that was already largely past when her parents were kids.

Traditionally, tobacco was harvested by hand, hung in a log barn and cured to a golden-brown color with a wood fire that had to be stoked day and night. But before it could go into the barn, the green tobacco had to be strung on long wooden sticks.

What you called this practice depended on what part of the state you lived in. Because the fairgrounds are in the capital, Raleigh, they call it a stringing contest.

“Where I grew up, in the middle of the state, we call it stringing,” said Pat Short, superintendent of the fair’s Heritage Circle. “But down east, in the eastern part of the state, they call it looping tobacco.”

Today, North Carolina’s flue-cured tobacco crop is harvested mostly by machine and packed tightly into natural gas-heated metal bulk barns that look more like shipping containers.

It’s a different world from when 97-year-old Ruth Coats, the oldest contestant, worked her family’s tobacco near the Virginia border. Once the state’s largest cash crop, tobacco was the beating heart of many family farms. Tobacco “allotments” — the rights to grow it — were hereditary.

“It was good, hard work, but it made you much stronger,” she said with a giggle. “A lot of memories of my family and friends.”

Teams like The Tie Masters and Mule Stringers compete

Although North Carolina remains the nation’s No. 1 tobacco producer, the leaf has fallen to the state’s third most valuable cash crop, behind corn and soybeans. Growers produced more than 248 million pounds (112 million kilograms) last year, valued at nearly $546 million, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Most tobacco ends up in smoking products.

“When we were growing up, if people had anywhere from 6 to 10 acres of tobacco, they could actually raise enough money to raise their family,” said Ken Jones, Sophie's grandfather. “But now, most of the guys contract (with tobacco companies) 400 to 600 acres (162 to 243 hectares) of tobacco at one time.”

On Friday, teams with names like The Tie Masters, the Mule Stringers and 89 & Twine battled it out in a white tent as temperatures reached 90 degrees Fahrenheit (32 Celsius).

With a “ready set and go” from Short, a pair of “handers” gathered clumps of yellow-green leaves from a table and passed them to the stringer, who wrapped twine around the stems of the leaves, then the stick.

When they’d strung at least 36 bundles, they wrapped the twine around the stick’s end and tore it off.

The fastest teams can tie a stick in under a minute.

Three generations of one family vied for first place

Peggy Medlin remembers being so fast as a teenager that her boss let the other two loopers go.

“And I made $6 for looping 600 sticks,” the 89-year-old recalled with a grin.

But it’s not just about speed. Before presenting a stick to the judges, a worker gave each a couple of good shakes to make sure no leaves fell out.

“Because in the curing process, that would be a bad thing if it caused it to catch on fire,” explained Andrea Ashby, director of public affairs for the state Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services.

A dozen teams competed this year. Sophie was one of three generations of her family vying for the $250 first prize.

Sandy Jones grew up on a southeastern North Carolina farm and learned to loop from her mother. She taught her own daughter, Annie, when she was about 5, and her granddaughter when she was about the same age.

Jones’ squad, the defending champion Maple Hill Loopers, included her husband, Ken, and son-in-law Mike Sunday. Sophie, mom Annie and her great-aunt comprised The 3 Suckers — a play on the small side shoots that can stunt the growth of healthy leaves.

The Maple Hill Loopers were edged out by The Benson Nites, which finished with a time of just under one minute and four seconds.

The Suckers didn’t place, but that didn’t matter to Sophie.

“I think of it as tradition,” she said.

Short said the tobacco strung at the fair — which was grown at the nearby Oxford Tobacco Research Station — will be sold to a contractor and likely go into cigarettes. Sophie confessed to being a bit conflicted about tobacco, a plant that has killed untold humans, but is also showing promise in vaccine production and other pharmaceutical research.

“Every single year I go, I’m like, `Why do we do this? It’s, like, bad for people,’” she said. “But the leaves can also get used for, like, different things, not just smoking.”

And when she has kids of her own, she’s going to teach them how to loop.

“It makes my heart smile,” her grandmother said.

By creating a nonprofit to manage his blockbuster $1 billion commitment, Gilbert says he is sending a signal to city residents that he is not in it for the money.

The total cost of the project might reach $2.2 billion and includes investments from General Motors.

“We all share the goals of bringing new life to the Renaissance Center, of building a thriving riverfront district for all to enjoy, and of maximizing positive community impact,” Gilbert said in a statement. “I cannot think of a better way to accomplish these goals than through a nonprofit organization dedicated to this mission in perpetuity.”

According to Gilbert’s statement, the new organization will be a 501(c)(4) nonprofit, which can engage in unlimited lobbying. Donations to such organizations are not tax-deductible. Gilbert did not return requests for comment.

Jamaine Dickens, chair of the city Neighborhood Advisory Council for the section of the city where the Renaissance Center is located, said the project could generate 8,000 local construction jobs. It would also make the riverfront a more inviting place, he said.

“Detroit is one of the most segregated communities in America, but that riverfront is where everyone comes together and enjoys it all at the same time, despite age, despite gender, despite race,” he said.

Nonprofit structure can lead to public good

Gilbert’s announcement is the latest in a string of commitments to Detroit from the Rocket Mortgage founder and one of many large-scale investments by philanthropy into the city’s future. In 2013, a group of foundations put a combined $816 million into a plan known as the “grand bargain,” which allowed the city to fulfill its pension obligations and fend off bankruptcy without selling art treasures from the Detroit Institute of Arts.

Last year, when the Kresge Foundation announced it would relocate its headquarters to Detroit from its longtime home in the suburbs, it committed nearly $200 million to development projects in the northwest region of the city.

Rip Rapson, Kresge’s president and a key player in the grand bargain, hailed Gilbert’s announcement in an email, saying it was a “powerful reminder” of the important role foundations can play in democratizing public spaces, making them useful and accessible to all of the city’s residents and visitors alike. It would transform the riverfront area from being “less than inviting at best, and forbidding at worst” to a destination point.

By making the investment through a nonprofit, Rapson said, Gilbert was sending a positive message. Rapson told a gathering of Kresge staff the day of Gilbert’s announcement that the details would need to be examined, but he thought that “the creation of what will, in effect, be a form of conservancy, strikes me as a move genuinely aimed at ensuring … that civic engagement will be a priority in the project’s design and operations.”

Some advocates question use of tax incentives

Developers often argue that new construction creates jobs and adds to city revenue to build parks and provide other public services. But, historically, major development projects in Detroit, like those in most major cities, have come under fire because of tax incentives local jurisdictions give to developers. According to a 2024 report from Detroit Action, a progressive nonprofit advocacy group, the city lost almost $750 million in tax revenue because of tax abatements and other favorable tax treatment given to corporate developers. Detroit Action, which did not return calls for comment, was skeptical in its report.

“For these benefits to materialize, the City must prioritize its residents’ needs first,” the report states. “Deficiencies in critical areas like housing, education, and transportation prevent working class Detroiters from fully benefiting from the jobs and amenities development brings.”

The Renaissance Center project has received $75 million from the Detroit Downtown Development Authority, which will be reimbursed, and is seeking more than $300 million in other tax benefits.

Dickens, of the neighborhood advisory group, said that any slim revenue that comes in after covering operational expenses and debt would be directed right back into the project, rather than adding to Gilbert’s fortune.

The traditional narrative used by opponents of tax breaks for building is, “We don’t want tax incentives to make a billionaire richer,” Dickens said.

“Dan Gilbert would erase that narrative for this project by saying this is not a profit-making venture, this is an impact-making venture,” Dickens said. “He’s saying ‘I’m not in this for the money I’m in this for the impact.’”

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

Stocks of both companies rose sharply Wednesday after Musk said that each had formed “special committees” to discuss a possible combination. The deal would be worth trillions of dollars, a massive melding of the world's biggest provider of rocket launches and satellite internet service with the second largest electric vehicle maker.

Musk says a deal makes sense given the future of both companies relies heavily on artificial intelligence. The two have already combined forces in AI chip production and a possible — perhaps impossible — project to make flying cars.

In early afternoon trading, SpaceX shot up 8% and Tesla 3.5%.

The world's biggest deal for the world's richest man

At current market values, the combination would create a $3.5 trillion behemoth. The biggest company now on the market, chipmaker Nvidia, is valued at $5.2 trillion.

The combination had been rumored for months before Musk told financial analysts on a Tuesday conference call that dual committees of directors had been assembled to discuss the issue. He added that, as the biggest owner of both companies, he cannot interact with the committees, and isn't even privy to their discussions.

Musk owns 11% of SpaceX, though he holds a majority of the voting control, and 19% of Tesla.

If the deal goes through, it would almost certainly top the current record holder, Vodaphone AirTouch’s deal for Germany's Mannesmann to create a mobile giant back more than a quarter of a century ago.

In today's dollars, that deal was worth $354 billion.

Musk said in the conference call that there's “lots to be gained from cooperating on developing super intelligence," the new term for artificial intelligence he adopted after President Donald Trump last month ordered U.S. officials to use it to remove any negative connotations.

Specifically, Musk pointed to the companies combined efforts to make AI chips at their Terafab factory in Texas and the need for AI to make Tesla's humanoid robots work. Tesla also needs AI for its vehicles to operate without drivers, a challenge that could be met more easily with a SpaceX satellite hook up. And Tesla could benefit if SpaceX's project called Starmind is successful in putting massive data centers in orbit.

Another possible reason Musk likes a combination: It will make him richer.

A change-in-control provision in a hotly debated, potential trillion-dollar Tesla compensation plan approved last year, says many of the performance targets would be considered automatically met in certain kinds of mergers, including requirements that Tesla deliver 20 million vehicles, put million self-driving Tesla robotaxis on the streets and deploy a million robots.

With Wednesday's gains in Tesla and SpaceX, Musk regained the status of the world's first and only trillionaire. Forbes estimates his net worth at $1.004 trillion, up $80 billion after a few hours of trading.

Wall Street loves the merger, but is deeply conflicted

Most financial analysts who cover the two companies have been telling investors that their shares are a bargain, according to research firm FactSet — even though by nearly all measures the shares are exceedingly expensive.

SpaceX share are trading at 100 times its expected earnings over the next year. Tesla at 170 times. Big publicly traded companies in the U.S. as measured the S&P 500 stock index are trading at 19 times.

Many of the analysts also work for banks that hope to win business advising Musk on future deals, helping to sell stocks and bonds to finance his ambitious projects, including building “cybercabs” without steering wheels and sending astronauts to the Moon and possibly Mars.

When Musk took SpaceX public in June, nearly two dozen banks and other financial firms had a hand in the IPO, taking in an estimated $500 million in fees.

Midterms could bring more scrutiny

For all the enthusiasm on Wall Street for the merger, another center of U.S. power might have doubts — Washington.

Many lawmakers, most conspicuously Democrats, think Musk has too much power already and may want to crack down on his companies in a way that could hurt them most — federal contracts and regulation.

SpaceX has huge contracts with the federal government, and hopes for many more as NASA aims to put astronauts on the moon again soon. Meanwhile, Tesla is already the target of several safety investigations over the driver assistance software that Musk is hoping to use to turn millions of his cars into completely autonomous, self-driving vehicles and taxis.

The Democrats could scuttle things should they win big in midterm elections next month.

House Democrats have called for investigations into those SpaceX contracts and Musk’s work with the Department of Government Efficiency.

Musk also has drawn criticism from politicians after speeds for a military version of SpaceX’s satellite communications service were slowed for Ukraine following President Donald Trump’s deal to get more diesel fuel from Russia amid a push to end the war.

The idea that Musk has grown so powerful that he can impact U.S. policy and the fate of nations at war is deeply troubling to some lawmakers from both parties, who've called for investigations into Ukraine satellite service.

SpaceX recognized the danger of politics disrupting its plans. In a filing for its initial public offering in June, it warned that a change in control of Congress could have a “material and adverse impact on our growth and competitive position.”

Musk has been the biggest donor the GOP candidates for the midterms, contributing $276 million since July alone.

In an upbeat speech Wednesday at a company conference for developers and investors in Berlin, Huang also laid out tools to keep AI applications from running amok by confining them in a digital “sandbox.”

“Europe's AI economy is starting, and it's accelerating, and it's great to see,” Huang, striding across the stage in his trademark leather jacket and sneakers, said in front of some 3,000 developers, analysts and journalists at Berlin's Tempodrom auditorium.

Huang, whose company designs the computer chips and software used by AI developers like Anthropic and OpenAI, frequently name-checked European partner companies such as Siemens, Mercedes-Benz and Volkswagen's Audi.

“Europe is building its AI economy" as the technology moves from language models to so-called physical AI in manufacturing, Huang said. “Every company in the future will be an AI company.”

Mercedes-Benz CEO Ola Kallenius, whose company is working on developing autonomous driving technology with Nvidia, said that the technology could reduce the number of auto fatalities caused by human error “down to zero... we will have safer streets once we have full autonomy.”

Huang said Nvidia's design for the Vera Rubin DSK Pod, a ready-made modular computing center made by partners and delivered in a shipping container-like box, can reduce the time needed to set up an AI data center at a prepared site from months to days. The pod “will change the way people build AI centers,” Huang told attendees of the Nvidia GTC conference.

He said Nvidia had invested $10 billion in European startups and partners in the past year.

Building out data centers is key for Europe, which has only about 5% of the world's AI computing capacity, compared to 75% in the U.S. Lack of the massive computing power, or “compute” in digital jargon, needed to train AI applications is a key obstacle for European developers.

“The big bottleneck is compute,” said Jeannette zu Fürstenberg, president and managing director of General Catalyst, ahead of the speech. General Catalyst invests in AI companies.

Huang was briefly interrupted by protesters who stood up with a banner urging him to “clean up" his business. Huang promised “to talk to you later” and urged security to avoid rough handling as they removed the protesters.

Huang also addressed concerns about safety by talking about the company's OpenShell open-source software designed to exert external control over what AI applications are doing and block them if they violate company policy.

The committee voted 7-1 on Oct. 20, with member Rahman Johnson dissenting, to subpoena Ford to testify regarding the authority’s financial matters.

Ford’s testimony would come in his last week with JTA, where the authority has said he is serving in an advisory capacity after Cleveland Ferguson took over as interim CEO.

Ford is set to depart JTA to lead Dallas Area Rapid Transit, where he was hired after his resignation in Jacksonville.

Ford’s testimony is set for 11:15 a.m. Oct. 23. However, committee members said that should Ford be willing to speak to the committee but could not attend that day, they would be amenable to adjusting to his schedule. Council member Will Lahnen, who leads the Finance Committee, said his testimony will be in the near future.

Some committee members expressed concern that Ford’s testimony was being compelled too hastily. Council member Ron Salem, not a Finance Committee member, said he wanted to hear from other JTA executives before issuing the subpoena to Ford.

“I just don’t want to jump to a subpoena when it is maybe we haven’t given enough time to at least answer the question, because then it turns into almost an adversarial process, unnecessarily,” said Johnson, who was the Council liaison to JTA until July.

Those committee members who voted in favor of the subpoena said that while they were disappointed with the pace at which they moved, they felt it was necessary to hear from Ford before his move to Texas.

“If Mr. Ford had like six more months on his contract … I would start at the bottom, work my way up, get the documents first, get a really nice set of questions. I would love to do it that way,” said Council member Rory Diamond, the current Council liaison to JTA.

“But Mr. Ford is an employee of JTA until end of today, tomorrow, and then he’ll be headed to go be the CEO of DART next week.”

Council President Nick Howland and committee member Chris Miller, who serves on the Financial Audit and Oversight Committee looking into JTA’s finances, said they had both reached out to Ford in the hours before the Finance Committee meeting, with no response.

Ford’s subpoena before the committee comes amid a criminal investigation by the Florida Office of the Attorney General. JTA has received two subpoenas by Richard Mantei, an investigator with the attorney general’s office specializing in public corruption.

Those subpoenas have focused on certain contracts between JTA and private companies, the authority’s tuition reimbursement program, certain communication between JTA and other public officials, employee travel, JTA sponsorships and ridership numbers.

The subpoena by the committee also serves as a reversal from a position previously held by several Council members that they did not want a full investigation into JTA’s practices.

While the Council’s Financial Audit and Oversight Committee was set up in September to analyze potential changes to spending on capital projects by the authority, Howland did not grant that committee the ability to compel testimony.

Ford resigned from JTA on July 3, without providing a reason. While his resignation was initially effective Jan. 8, 2027, Ford’s hiring at DART pushed that date up to October. He is slated to begin his work Oct. 26 with DART.

The DART board voted 9-6 on July 14 to name one of three candidates its next CEO, but did not formally name Ford as its choice until July 21.

Ford’s selection brought some pushback from DART board members and public speakers as its selection, with some citing “red flags” they felt had come up during Ford’s time at JTA.

Those included JTA’s financial issues, which had not yet fully come to light but had been included in media reports, and the authority’s trimming of some paratransit and bus services while continuing to service autonomous vehicles Downtown.

But a majority of board members said they felt their questions about Ford’s past had been answered, as Ford addressed those issues to the board during its July 21 meeting, which was partly held behind closed doors.

DART’s board chair said he spoke to Jacksonville Mayor Donna Deegan, along with JTA board members. Chair Randall Bryant said Deegan told him that “I hope Dallas is fortunate enough to get him.”

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“Tom Cruise is a global icon,” said Kathleen Kennedy, chair of AFI's board of trustees, in a statement. She praised Cruise's commitment as an actor and producer and his belief in movies' ability to bring people together.

Cruise, 64, has worked in film for more than four decades, starring in movies including “Risky Business,” “A Few Good Men,” “Jerry Maguire,” “Minority Report” and the “Mission: Impossible” series. He has received three Academy Award nominations for acting: best actor in “Born on the Fourth of July” and “Jerry Maguire” and supporting actor for “Magnolia.”

As a producer, Cruise was nominated when “Top Gun: Maverick” received a best picture nomination.

Last year, he received an honorary Oscar at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' Governors Awards.

The AFI Life Achievement Award, established in 1973, recognizes a person whose work has advanced film and stood the test of time. Cruise will join a roster that includes John Ford, Bette Davis, Sidney Poitier, Steven Spielberg, Denzel Washington, Nicole Kidman and Eddie Murphy, who received the honor earlier this year.

Proceeds from the tribute gala support AFI's education and arts initiatives.

The appeal was launched within hours of the NFL issuing the suspension, with a hearing scheduled to take place on Thursday.

“We adamantly deny Sam spit on anyone,” Franklin's agent Harold Lewis told The Associated Press by phone. “We look forward to the process to fully exonerate him tomorrow at the hearing and (provide him) the apology he deserves.”

Franklin also denied the allegation in a message posted on his Instagram account, saying he's “not a dirty player."

He said he was defending himself without resorting to spitting at anyone. His social media post included a video showing Las Vegas offensive lineman Delmar Glaze appearing to strike Franklin in a sensitive area below the waist during the Raiders' successful extra-point attempt in Buffalo’s 33-30 win.

Without providing details or video evidence, the NFL said it disciplined Franklin for violating its sportsmanship rules after determining he spit at an opponent following the extra-point attempt with 1:32 remaining.

Lewis said Franklin was also struck in a similar fashion during a Raiders’ successful field-goal attempt earlier in the game.

The appeal is tentatively scheduled to be heard by former player James Thrash, one of four people jointly appointed by the NFL and NFLPA to handle the appeals process. It's unclear how long it will take Thrash to issue a ruling.

The Bills (5-1) have a bye weekend and Franklin's suspension was set to begin Monday and run through Nov. 2, a day after Buffalo hosts the Baltimore Ravens.

Franklin is a special teams ace and joins Bills starting safety C.J. Gardner-Johnson in getting a one-game suspension for spitting in the direction of Raiders players.

Gardner-Johnson was ejected for his action during the second quarter, which was captured by TV cameras and replayed during the broadcast. Following the game, Gardner-Johnson apologized to his teammates. He also told reporters, “I’ll take my consequences,” while adding that he has to be better at controlling his emotions.

Franklin, meanwhile, was not initially penalized following the play.

A video posted on social media by an NFL Network reporter shows a scuffle occurring following the successful PAT, with Glaze blocking Bills linebacker Michael Hoecht while at the same time pulling Franklin’s undershirt. Franklin responded by shoving Glaze from the side. Glaze then turned to Franklin and appeared to shove the Bills player’s helmet.

It’s not clear whether Franklin spit at anyone. And the 14-second clip he posted did not show the scuffle that followed.

With the team off, coach Joe Brady was not immediately made available to reporters for comment.

___

See AP’s full NFL coverage here

The FBI’s cyber division warned the vulnerabilities could allow malicious actors to remotely execute code in the programming language, PHP, which powers websites and web applications. That raised the risk of sensitive data and networks being compromised, said the agency, which recommended that operators take websites offline if they can't update them immediately.

The website of the Finnish government, for one, was only partly available Wednesday. A message to visitors said government websites were experiencing a temporary disruption and were fully or partially unavailable while the issue was being resolved.

“The potential impact is enormous,” said Ismael Valenzuela, vice president of labs, threat research and intelligence at cybersecurity firm Arctic Wolf, adding that PHP powers roughly 70% of websites where the server-side programming language is known.

The exposed vulnerabilities, Valenzuela added, put a “significant portion of the internet’s business and commercial infrastructure at potential risk," and while it doesn't mean all websites are vulnerable, the flaws demand “immediate attention”

The PHP Foundation, which includes developers who work on securing the programming language, said Wednesday it had released fixes for the vulnerabilities, along with instructions on how to update systems.

Artificial intelligence agents helped uncover the vulnerabilities. In a blog post, OpenAI said it had led a coalition of researchers, security providers and others to address vulnerabilities in PHP over the past two months.

“PHP’s maintainers led the fixes and release, with our teams and partners like Wiz, Cloudflare, and others contributing research, technical support, and coordination to prepare protections ahead of disclosure,” the company said.

San Francisco-based OpenAI called the flaws “one of the most impactful security issues in recent memory.” It said AI appeared to find the vulnerabilities before any attackers did.

“As significant as they are, these bugs are among several significant vulnerabilities we’ve already found and are working to fix, and we expect similar findings to increase sharply in the coming months,” OpenAI said.

AI agents have been blamed for a host of high-profile security incidents in recent months. The episodes have highlighted the vulnerabilities in AI security and raised questions over how the fast-growing technology can be developed safely as its usage becomes more widespread globally. But experts also pointed out that AI can also help with discovering cyber vulnerabilities, as it did in the PHP case.

“There’s an important paradox here. We want AI to move quickly enough to find vulnerabilities humans might miss, while also making sure that increasingly autonomous systems operate within boundaries we understand and control," said Raghu Nandakumara, vice president of industry Strategy at cybersecurity company Illumio.

“The faster AI becomes at finding weaknesses, the more important it becomes to think about what happens after those weaknesses are exposed, especially when organizations can’t immediately patch every affected system,” Nandakumara added. "The lesson isn’t that AI is inherently dangerous or inherently protective. It’s that speed without control creates a new kind of security problem.”

Valenzuela, of Arctic Wolf, said AI advances are also changing what flaws are considered “exploitable," noting that some of these vulnerabilities have existed for more than a decade.

“What changed wasn’t the underlying code, but the ability to find those weaknesses and turn them into working exploits,” he said.