Catania’s airport will remain closed until early Saturday, which falls on the Ferragosto holiday that marks the height of the Italian summer holiday season when millions flock to the sea and mountains, deserting Italian cities.

While Etna’s activity often interrupts flights at the airport, located 30 kilometers (20 miles) south of the volcano, this is the longest emergency since 2002.

“Volcanic ash can be a great risk for aircraft,” said Boris Behncke, a researcher at the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology’s Etna Observatory. “It can be sucked into the motors, and force them to stall. This is why everyone is so very cautious with aircraft when there is a volcanic ash emission.”

Etna is the largest active volcano in Europe. The latest activity has been unusual for its persistence and sustained ash emissions. Northerly winds have spread light amounts of ash to Malta and northern Africa.

“There have been many shorter interruptions — and stronger eruptions — over the past few decades, but this event is different because the ash emission from Etna’s summit has been much more persistent,” Behncke said.

The closure has forced planes to be rerouted to other airports on the island, which has pushed up taxi fares and car rental prices, according to the Corriere della Sera daily. The Codacons consumer association has announced it will file a complaint with Italy’s competition authority following complaints about price gouging.

The SAC airport operator said 36% of nearly 2,000 flights scheduled to arrive in Catania from Aug. 6-12 had been canceled, while more than 600 were diverted to Palermo, Trapani and Comiso in Sicily and Lamezia Terme in Calabria. Flights were able to depart Catania over the weekend, but the airport was officially closed to both incoming and outgoing flights Monday. Comiso also was briefly closed.

The Italian train company Trenitalia has added six trains along the Palermo-Messina-Catania route to help ease the travel pressure.

Italy's federation of travel agencies and tour operators has called for a task force to coordinate responses to disruptions caused by Mount Etna and said it would ask for a review of how airlines handled the cancellations and passenger assistance.

“Operators are working around the clock to provide assistance, cancellations and alternative travel arrangements, but they cannot bear the burden of structural shortcomings and the management responsibilities of others," FIAVET President Gian Mario Pilieri said in a statement.

The Electoral Commission of Zambia said it was suspending the counting immediately “in view of the security situation and continued threats of violence.”

The commission said it would review the decision in 24 hours.

Thursday’s election in the copper-rich southern African country saw President Hakainde Hichilema seeking a second term in office.

He is being challenged by 13 other candidates including Brian Mundubile, the leader of an alliance of opposition parties who is seen as Hichilema’s strongest challenger.

Zambia has held largely peaceful elections but there was some criticism of Hichilema ahead of the election by the opposition and independent rights groups, which said his government was clamping down on dissent.

Mundubile's alliance accused the government of being behind a law enforcement agency raid on its offices days before the election and claimed the action was designed to hurt the alliance’s election campaign.

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

The 7.4 magnitude earthquake affected a large swath of western Colombia, from urban centers like Cali and Pereira to remote and rugged areas in the department of Chocó. As of Thursday evening, authorities had confirmed more than 280 dead, thousands injured and nearly 11,000 dwellings destroyed. Responders have managed to rescue nearly 350 people, but hundreds are still missing.

Colombian President Abelardo de la Espriella has promised a robust governmental response. But with so much need spread across a large area, aid groups will also play important roles helping those needing shelter, supplies and economic assistance.

Responders say helping Colombia with stronger democratic and civic institutions could be more straightforward than in Venezuela, where the interim government's response was widely criticized. But the affected area in Colombia is also much larger, complicating efforts.

“Institutional capacity does not remove the humanitarian need,” said Catalina Vargas, Colombia country director for the humanitarian group CARE. “The most severely affected area, Chocó, is also one of the most isolated and underserved parts of the country, so access remains the binding constraint regardless of the strength of national institutions.”

For those who can help, giving cash is ideal to give groups flexibility and agility, said Abe Diaz, head of disaster relief for Amazon, which is providing requested supplies to partners.

"Unrequested product donations overwhelm communities and force responders to divert resources from life-saving work just to sort and store unwanted supplies,” Diaz said.

Here are some organizations collecting donations for Colombia earthquake recovery, including U.S. groups responding on the ground and some local organizations accepting outside funds.

U.S.-based groups already on the ground

All Hands and Hearts has provided search and rescue tools like jackhammers and pickaxes to the Pereira fire department as well as blankets and rehydration supplies for those affected. Link to donate.

CARE has a longtime presence in Colombia. Its immediate support will focus on food assistance through cash and vouchers, emergency supply care packages, and protection and emotional support for affected families. Link to donate.

Direct Relief is funding medical responders on the ground and preparing to deliver requested medications and healthcare supplies. Link to donate.

GEM is joining with local partners to provide essential kits with food, water, and hygiene necessities. Link to donate.

Operation Blessing is focusing its initial response on providing food and water, as well as solar lanterns, to displaced people. Link to donate.

Save the Children has worked in Colombia for over 40 years and has begun psychosocial support activities and set up multiple child-friendly spaces in affected areas. Link to donate.

World Central Kitchen is providing food and water for displaced people, first responders and volunteers, including in more remote mountain communities. Link to donate.

Marc Anthony leads Sunday benefit concert for Colombia and Venezuela

Latin music stars Marc Anthony, Luis Fonsi, Chayanne, Feid, Jay Wheeler and many more will perform at an international benefit concert for Venezuela and Colombia on Aug. 16 at 6 p.m. EDT at Miami’s Kaseya Center. It will be carried live on Univision, ViX, WAPA and TelevisaUnivision radio stations, iHeartLatino and Venevision Play in Venezuela.

Viewers can donate by scanning on-screen QR codes, texting UNIDOS to 707070 or visiting univision.org during the broadcast. Proceeds will go to All Hands and Hearts, CARE, GEM, TECHO and World Central Kitchen.

Colombia-based groups accepting outside donations

Abaco Colombia, an association of 26 food banks across Colombia, is distributing food to affected families across the impacted regions. They accept online donations, though the payment processor requires a passport number.

Cruz Roja Colombiana teams are doing search and rescue, offering medical attention and psychosocial support, and filling other needs. They accept online donations, though the payment processor requires a passport number.

Fundación Solidaridad por Colombia: The foundation supports youth initiatives, nutrition and health, and community building. It's partnering with GEM to deliver relief supplies and food to displaced people in Pereira and other locations. They accept PayPal.

Fundación Semillas de Oportunidades supports youth through art and sport from its base in Quibdó, Chocó. They are supporting families of young people across Chocó. They accept PayPal.

Manos Visibles, a network of organizations dedicated to racial and territorial equity, is collaborating with a local trade school to help restore at least 100 homes in the city of Buenaventura. They accept online donations, though the payment processor requires a passport number.

Presentes Corporation, a 43-year-old organization in Colombia focused on community resilience, is partnering with the Miami-based nonprofit Give to Colombia to facilitate donations from the U.S. Their Colombia Se Levanta, or Colombia Rises, fund accepts online donations.

Refugio Huellas de Amor in Pereira is supporting rescue animals already in their care as well as other impacted animals. Huellitas Callejeras Barranquilla is sending vets and medical supplies to affected areas. Both accept PayPal.

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Associated Press staff writer Megan Janetsky contributed reporting from Mexico City.

Associated Press coverage of philanthropy and nonprofits receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content. For all of AP’s philanthropy coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/philanthropy.

The 3.9% proposed increase to the tax rate is lower than the city had previously discussed, but a vocal minority of council has shown it’s already dead set against the idea.

Tens of millions of dollars and more than 100 city jobs were also on the chopping block in the city’s $4.4 billion FY 2027 budget proposal and two-year plan, which they presented to City Council on Thursday morning.

San Antonio is also looking to raise millions more in various new or increased fees, permits and other revenue sources — from charging short-term rentals more expensive permits to recovering a share of city expenses at major Fiesta events.

The city has been projecting a $158 million deficit in FY 2028 as projected expenses outpace revenue. The city balances its budget over two years, though, so the course-correcting starts now.

The deficit is within the city’s $1.76 billion general fund, the largest part of its budget, which covers services such as police, fire, parks, the San Antonio Metropolitan Health District, Animal Care Services and regular street maintenance.

Between the assorted tax hike, new revenues, budget cuts and updated projections, city staff actually expect to end FY 2028 with an extra $49 million to be used for FY 2029.

Tax hike

Property taxes are one of the main contributing factors to the city’s projected deficit.

Unlike previous years when soaring property values and new construction helped fuel budget growth, the city’s taxable base will actually shrink this year.

Raising the city’s current tax rate by 2.129 cents per $100 of valuation would raise close to $29 million in FY 2027, staff said.

That would mean the average homestead, with a taxable value of $231,356, would pay $49 more than if the rate stayed the same.

However, because the average homestead value has also declined from $233,909 in 2025, city staff said the actual difference in their tax bill compared to last year would be closer to $35.

Additionally, senior and disabled homeowners with a tax freeze — roughly 47% of all homesteads in the city — would be unaffected.

The city last raised its property tax rate in 1992, and has either cut or kept it flat every year since. The proposed increase to 56.288 cents would be the highest the rate has been since 2014.

The city’s plans to balance the budget also rely on an additional, 4.4% tax increase in FY 2028.

“We went through 9/11. We went through the financial crash in the early 2000s. We went through COVID. Yet somehow we didn’t raise taxes on the citizens,” Councilman Marc Whyte (D10) said. “Yet somehow today we think that this is something that should be considered.”

Whyte, Councilwoman Marina Alderete Gavito (D7) and Councilwoman Misty Spears (D9) all voted against a procedural item in an attempt to take the tax increase off the table.

Though their effort failed, an increase isn’t a done deal yet.

City Manager Erik Walsh confirmed staff would prepare alternate scenarios, without a tax rate increase, for council to consider.

On the other side, though, some would like to see what would be possible if the city were to take the tax rate further.

“I would definitely appreciate the different scenarios, not only without a property tax increase in any form, but also any other kinds of scenarios we could look at, even with the larger increase — just to see where that money could go towards improvements in services,” Councilman Ric Galvan (D6) said.

Cuts

City staff plans nearly $90 million worth of cuts to the general fund over the next two years, though a portion of it will just be shifting it to different areas of the budget.

Walsh said the cuts include cutting 101 city positions in FY 2027, more than half of which are currently filled.

However, Walsh said the city would work with those employees to find other vacant positions within the city for them to go into.

Walsh also said he didn’t think “there’s any major reductions to services that people will feel.”

However, avoiding a tax rate increase this year would require finding roughly $29 million in cuts, Walsh said.

If the city were to try and avoid raising the tax rate in FY 2028 as well, it would take about $65 million worth of cuts, which he believes would be “significant.”

Other revenue

The proposed budget lists more than 100 new or increased fees, permits, rental costs or other revenue sources in the general fund alone over the next two years, which the city expects it will bring in more than $30 million in that time frame.

Some, like increasing the EMS transport fee from $1,500 to $1,700, are expected to bring in millions of extra dollars. Others, like a $5 increase to the price of a city-provided dangerous dog collar, are only expected to bring in a few hundred dollars.

Mayor’s proposals

Mayor Gina Ortiz Jones has also thrown out ideas of her own, including diverting dollars dedicated to the voter-approved Ready to Work program and sending a letter to business and philanthropic leaders to chip in to help pay for certain items.

Walsh told reporters diverting money from the Ready to Work program had not been included in the proposed budget.

At least one of the programs Jones had solicited business leaders to fund, a hiring program for military spouses, was set to be cut, as was the scholarship portion of an education partnership program.

Jones had also previously highlighted the San Antonio Botanical Garden as an example of a group that could have its entire $1.2 million in annual funding trimmed. However, the proposed budget had only the $200,000 pruning, as city staff had originally planned.

The mayor pointed to the group again Thursday, as she talked about the choices among the proposed cuts.

“If we are looking at, again, reducing the tuition reimbursement — eliminating the tuition reimbursement program for our citizens, why would we still be giving the San Antonio Botanical Garden $1 million?” she said.

• 101 positions eliminated — More than half of the positions are currently filled, but the city plans to try and move them into other vacant positions.
• Citywide hiring freeze — For non-essential support positions in FY 2027 and FY 2028.
• 49 new SAPD officers — The officers are split between filling 22 vacant Park Police positions with new SAPD officers and 27 new positions for the new airport terminal.
• No additional patrol officers — There are no extra positions included toward the city’s multi-year goal of adding 360 cops to the street.
• New veterinary hospital — Animal Care Services expects to open a new facility at its campus in 2027. The project includes the renovation of the existing clinic.
• Non-San Antonio resident library card fee — $20 fee for library card holders who don’t live in San Antonio.
• Street maintenance — $129.8 million for the street maintenance program, up $7.4 million this year.
• 3% raise for civilian employees — Effective Oct. 1.
• 4% raise for SAPD —Effective Oct. 1 under a tentative union contract.
• 5% raise for SAFD — Effective Oct. 1 under a union contract.
• Short-term rental permits — Fees increasing from $300 to $450 for Type 1 permits and from $450 to $1,000 for Type 2 permits.
• Fiesta event recovery — City is aiming to recover 50% of police expenses from major Fiesta events.

Community Input Sessions

The city has at least 11 budget town halls scheduled between Monday, Aug. 17 and Tuesday, Aug. 25. More details can be found here.

More City Hall coverage on KSAT:

• Cuts, tax hikes, and ballot measures: San Antonio set for messy budget conversations
• San Antonio City Council to discuss putting second Spurs arena vote on November ballot
• San Antonio arena debate heats up as City Council faces $158 million budget shortfall

With France experiencing its driest year ever, a new fire raced through woodlands overnight in the Landes region on the southwest coast. The blaze forced more than 500 people to evacuate their homes in the town of Luglon as hundreds of firefighters deployed to the area, the regional administration said Friday.

It’s one of several fires scorching forests around France this week, including in normally cooler and wetter regions in the north and Brittany. A historic fire devoured forests near Bordeaux last month and pushed a quarter of a million people from their homes.

After the U.K. recorded its hottest day of the year on Thursday, firefighters spent Friday tackling fires across the West Midlands, in central England, that led to thousands of emergency calls and forced people to flee from burning homes. Nineteen people were hospitalized, the ambulance service said.

The historic temperatures are linked to human-caused climate change, and are hitting countries more designed for long cold seasons and ill-equipped for this sort of heat, with limited air conditioning.

Meanwhile, efforts to contain a wildfire in Germany were complicated by unexploded World War II munitions, and shifting winds in Croatia spread flames deeper into a coastal suburb and forced more than 1,000 people to flee.

UK wildfires come as London records its hottest day of the year

In the town of Stourbridge, where a huge blaze started Thursday, TV footage showed the fires consuming houses, with many left without roofs as flames burned inside the charred walls. About 20 to 30 homes were completely destroyed, Stourbridge lawmaker Cat Eccles told the BBC.

A woman who was evacuated from her home in Stourbridge said police knocked on her door and urged her to leave immediately.

“They thought the fire was changing directions, and they didn’t know which direction it was going in,” Jane Baxter told BBC Radio. “So, it was literally ‘grab what you need and get out.’”

Simon Tuhill, chief fire officer of West Midlands Fire Service, said an investigation will be launched but the fire was believed to have started in the grassland before spreading to homes nearby.

The Met Office, the official weather agency, said 38.1C (100.6 F) was recorded in west London on Thursday, marking the hottest day of the year. While temperatures cooled slightly on Friday, many parts of the country have seen little to no rain for weeks. This July has been the driest in England and Wales since records began in 1836.

Firefighters battle forest fire in Germany

All 1,800 residents of the village of Gey in Germany’s North Rhine-Westphalia state were evacuated after a wildfire in the nearby Hürtgen forest threatened to reach their homes. Nearly 300 hectares (1.16 square miles) of forest were ablaze on Friday morning, local authorities said.

Unexploded ordnance from World War II in the forest hampered firefighting efforts, German news agency dpa reported.

The fire advanced to within 300 meters (1,000 feet) of Gey, which sits on the edge of the forest near the Belgian border. Overnight a shift in wind direction raised the risk that the flames could reach Gey by morning, prompting officials to order the initial evacuation.

The cause of the blaze remains unknown.

Fire in Croatia leaves 14 hospitalized

In Croatia, 14 people were hospitalized, of whom seven remained in life-threatening condition early Friday, from a fire that raged overnight by the coastal town of Omis and forced more than 1,000 people to evacuate their homes.

The fire erupted late Thursday in an Omis suburb and quickly spread because of strong wind. Public broadcaster HRT said the blaze came close to the town’s center, and parts of Omis were left without electricity while many cars were burned.

Croatian media published photos from a crowded sports hall in Omis where people crammed on beds and on the floor. Witnesses told HRT that people were jumping into the sea after boats also caught fire.

Firefighters put out the blaze by Friday morning as other crews in planes headed further south toward the Peljesac peninsula where another wildfire broke out overnight.

Firefighters keep Albania's largest wildfire from spreading to homes

Albania has been battling dozens of wildfires in recent weeks, with 11 active fires reported across the country Friday.

The largest fire is in the Gure-Lure area, where the perimeter near residential homes has been brought under control, eliminating the risk of the flames spreading to the houses.

Three people have been prosecuted over that fire, which engulfed Lura National Park. They are suspected of failing to take the necessary measures to protect and safeguard the territory under their responsibility from fire, authorities said.

Meanwhile, in northern Greece, more than 300 vacationers and residents were evacuated by sea Thursday after a wildfire swept through a pine forest and threatened seaside homes, authorities said.

Belgium expected to set another heat record

After marking its hottest Aug. 13 on record, with a high of 32.6 C (90.68 F) on Thursday, Belgium was expecting to hit its highest temperature of the summer on Friday, climbing to 37 C (98.6 F) in the capital, Brussels.

Belgium is going through its third heat wave of the summer and fears about a severe drought have been high, with some water restrictions in place in certain towns, although rain was forecast for Saturday.

The mercury was also set to hit 37 C (98.6 F) in the neighboring Netherlands. The country is suffering from severe drought, with water shortages in some areas, but Dutch authorities have held off declaring a water crisis as rain is expected in the coming days.

French nuclear reactors shut down during heatwave

France also has shut down six nuclear reactors in recent days because of extreme heat and drought — and because a mass of jellyfish washed up outside one power plant on the English Channel coast, utility company EDF said. Large numbers of jellyfish are appearing on many French beaches in connection with unusually warm sea temperatures.

Water used to cool some French nuclear reactors is drawn from nearby rivers, and then discharged back at a slightly higher temperature. France is experiencing its driest-ever year and had its hottest-ever June and July, so river levels are low and river waters are warmer than usual. Plant operators are obliged to halt activity if the river temperatures get too high, according to EDF.

In a statement, the company said the shutdowns had minimal impact on France’s electricity production. It said extreme weather poses no safety risks to the reactors themselves, and that the measures were taken ″to protect flora and fauna.″

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Hui reported from London. Stefanie Dazio in Berlin; Claudia Ciobanu in Warsaw, Poland; Zana Cimili in Pristina, Kosovo; Jovana Gec in Belgrade, Serbia; and Lorne Cook in Brussels contributed to this report.

The future for the S&P 500 edged 0.1% higher Friday while Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped 0.1%. Nasdaq futures rose 0.1%.

The U.S. stock market hit all-time highs Thursday on new data that showed inflation cooled in July, as well as a decline in oil prices.

However, oil is rebounding to end the week after two United Arab Emirates tankers were attacked while trying to cross the Strait of Hormuz.

New numbers for U.S. retail sales arrive Friday before the opening bell after shoppers slowed their spending in June from May. There had been a notable bump in spending in both April and May as Americans dipped into their U.S. tax refunds.

Consumers, while resilient, have become more careful about how they spend money with more of their paychecks going to groceries and gasoline.

The average price of gas rose again overnight to $4.08, according to motor club AAA. That's 92 cents more per gallon than at this time last year.

Brent crude, the international standard, climbed 24 cents to $87.31 per barrel early Friday. U.S. benchmark crude rose almost 1% to $81.83.

Businesses and households have had difficulty budgeting for gasoline and shipping because energy prices have become extremely volatile as fighting continues in the Middle East. Hopes for a U.S. deal with Iran have faded and the Strait of Hormuz, where a fifth of the global oil supply usually transits each day, remains bottled up.

There was a level of relief after new reports this week showed consumer inflation, as well as rising costs in the pipeline before it reaches consumers, slowed in July.

If inflation appears to be in check, the Federal Reserve could hold off on raising interest rates. Higher rates would help keep a lid on inflation, but they do so by intentionally slowing the economy and making it more expensive for everyone to borrow money.

“The disinflation ducks are starting to line up, and with oil also backing off, the market has steadily stripped away the case for another near-term Fed hike,” Stephen Innes of SPI Asset Management said in a commentary.

In equities trading Friday, Reddit’s stock surged more than 12% before the bell with the social media platform joining the S&P 500 next week. Applied Materials slumped after the second quarter performance of the computer chip equipment maker fell short of investor expectations.

Britain's FTSE 100 fell 0.1% to 10,761.60 after Nigel Farage regained the seat in Parliament he quit a month ago, beating trash-can wearing comic candidate Count Binface in a widely mocked special election.

In Germany, the DAX rose 0.7% to 26,476.21, while the CAC 40 in Paris edged less than 0.1% lower to 8,654.97.

Tokyo's Nikkei 225 index gained 0.6% to 68,713.80, while the Kospi in South Korea rose 2.4% to 6,977.94.

The U.S. dollar dipped to 159.15 Japanese yen from 159.16 yen. The euro edged down slightly to $1.1555 from $1.1556.

“This investigation was all started because of a complaint that had been given to the DA’s office, who then referred it to law enforcement,” Meredith Chacon said. “Which is an unusual way that a case can be referred.”

Arrest affidavits accuse the San Antonio attorney Calfas of offering legal services in exchange for sex and paying women for sex, according to documents tied to a Texas Department of Public Safety investigation.

Chacon, who is now a defense attorney, handled a human trafficking case against a lawyer, Mark Benavides. He was sentenced to 80 years in prison, convicted of exchanging legal services for sex.

Chacon said her experience with Benavides’ case taught her these allegations reflect a sobering reality: criminal conduct like this can turn up in unexpected places.

“This does happen at that level,” Chacon said. “You’re not shielded from those things happening just because you reach a certain socioeconomic status or because you have a certain profession.”

Human trafficking charge

One affidavit outlines the evidence investigators used to allege the human trafficking charge, including jail phone calls between a woman and an inmate from March to May of 2024.

Those phone calls show a woman reached out to Calfas for help for her brother, who was in Guadalupe County jail, documents show.

Prosecutors allege Calfas offered two ways to pay for legal services — in cash or, as the document quotes, “the other way.”

Authorities allege Calfas never ultimately provided the legal services discussed in the calls, the affidavit states.

Chacon said people often have a certain image of what human trafficking looks like, but explained it can mean many things.

“Trafficking is anytime someone is forced by physical force, by fraud or by covert coercion,” Chacon said.

Based on the allegations laid out in the documents, Chacon said it appears the case may center on fraud.

Specifically, she said, by taking the allegations from the document at face value, it appears the woman was tricked into sexual acts, believing she would get help from Calfas for her brother.

“It looks like it’s a fraud-based human trafficking,” she said.

Solicitation of prostitution charge

A second affidavit alleges a Snapchat video shows two women and Calfas in his downtown office. Prosecutors allege the video shows Calfas having sex with a woman, and then paying in what appears to be cash.

The Snapchat video showing the alleged transaction was labeled with the caption ‘the deed is done,’ documents state. The video is dated May 31, 2024, the documents state.

The affidavit also cites evidence that the women shown in the Snapchat video were alleged sex workers, including Cash App payments labeled “for (victim)’s love” and “investments,” OnlyFans accounts and mentions of strip clubs in Las Vegas.

Chacon said social media and digital evidence can be compelling for jurors.

“There is tangible evidence that law enforcement can get. And then that makes it very illustrative for a jury later,” she said.

KSAT has reached out to Calfas for comment but has not heard back.

Read more:

• Affidavit: Attorney Neil Calfas accused of coercing woman for sex in exchange for legal help

The strike came a day after the United Nations said July was the deadliest month for Ukrainian civilians since the weeks following Moscow's all-out invasion of its neighbor more than four years ago.

At least 437 civilians were killed and 2,610 wounded last month, the U.N. monitoring mission in Kyiv said, as Russia escalated its bombing of Ukrainian towns and cities. That was 70% higher than in July last year and 30% up on June of this year.

Overall, since Russia's invasion on Feb. 24, 2022, U.N. human rights monitors say the war has killed at least 16,874 civilians, including 820 children, and wounded 51,273, including 3,126 children.

“Every month this year the number of killed and injured civilians has increased. That trend accelerated sharply in July,” said Danielle Bell, head of the U.N. human rights monitoring mission in Kyiv. “The number of civilian casualties in July was the highest we documented in a single month since March 2022.”

The Russian strike in northern Ukraine’s Sumy region early Friday also wounded four other people, including the dead boy’s father and grandmother, who were hospitalized with severe burns, the regional military administration chief Oleh Hryhorov said.

Russian glide bombs hit residential areas near front line

In Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, a Russian glide bomb demolished six floors of a 10-story apartment block, killing one person and wounding 16 others, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said.

Russia is launching around 220 glide bombs every day against settlements near the front line in eastern and southern Ukraine, Zelenskyy said in a social media post Friday.

Russian forces crush settlements with the brute force of 3,000-pound (1,300-kilo) glide bombs, artillery, missiles and drones, then send in infantry units to attack the exposed defenders. The tactic has rendered many towns and villages uninhabitable.

In addition, Russian forces struck two tugboats in the Black Sea that were escorting cargo ships carrying Western weapons for Ukraine, the Defense Ministry in Moscow said.

It also said that its drones overnight hit Ukraine’s southern Izmail port’s railway station which it said is used for transporting military cargo and fuel for the Ukrainian armed forces.

In all, Russia attacked 12 Ukrainian regions overnight, wounding dozens of people, Zelenskyy said.

Ukrainian drones strike a major port north of Moscow

Ukrainian forces, meanwhile, extended their long-range strike campaign against Russian infrastructure, hitting the port of Ust-Luga in the Leningrad region north of Moscow and starting a brief fire, its governor Alexander Drozdenko said.

Ust-Luga is one of Russia’s largest oil and gas export terminals located more than 800 kilometers (500 miles) from Ukraine.

It has been a frequent target of Ukrainian drone attacks this summer, as Kyiv seeks to undermine Russian oil exports that provide Moscow with vital revenue for its war effort.

Ukraine also launched another attack on the premises of Wildberries, Russia’s biggest online retailer, which Kyiv says helps supply the Russian military.

The attack damaged a wall of a Wildberries warehouse in the Tver region north of Moscow, the region’s acting governor, Vitaly Korolyov, said.

Wildberries reported “insignificant damage” and said the goods stored at the site were not damaged.

The Russian Defense Ministry said Friday its air defenses overnight intercepted 553 Ukrainian drones over 18 Russian regions, as well as occupied Crimea and the waters of the Azov and the Black seas.

NATO warplanes shoot down a drone over Latvia

NATO fighter jets shot down a drone that entered Latvian airspace in the early hours of Friday, the Latvian army and an official for the military alliance said.

Latvian authorities did not say what the origin of the drone was, but said it had entered Latvia “as a result of Russian electromagnetic warfare.”

Several drones have previously crossed the border into Latvia. Most of them are thought to be Ukrainian drones that strayed off course due to Russian electronic jamming.

Two Italian Eurofighter jets were scrambled to tackle the drone and one of them shot it down, NATO spokesperson Allison Hart said.

Two Turkish fighter jets were also deployed, she said.

Residents in five municipalities in eastern Latvia were warned about the threat to airspace and told to take shelter.

Also, a drone crashed in woodland in Romania 5 kilometers (3.1 miles) from the border with Ukraine, the NATO member’s Defense Ministry said Friday.

Military radars did not detect the drone, which landed in eastern Tulcea County, because it was flying at a “very low” altitude, the ministry said. It provided no details about the drone’s origin.

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Associated Press reporters Claudia Ciobanu in Warsaw, Poland, Lorne Cook in Brussels and Stephen McGrath in Leamington Spa, England contributed to this report.

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

Farage, leader of the anti-immigration Reform UK party who some see as a possible next prime minister, abruptly quit his seat in July amid an investigation into whether he failed to report a 5 million pound ($6.7 million) gift from an overseas crypto billionaire.

He denied wrongdoing and ran again for the seat to prove he had voters’ support, regaining it with 63% of Thursday’s vote in an unusual election on the hottest day of the year. Binface, a serial candidate who has challenged prime ministers past and present, represented a protest vote and finished second in a field of 34 candidates — many of them also jokers — with about 27%, according to the results announced Friday.

Farage hailed the result as an “overwhelming win” that increased his vote share over the last election, but it’s hard to draw broad conclusions from the election given the lack of genuine rivals and the fact that Farage has long been popular in the conservative constituency on the east coast of England.

“Today the voters in Clacton have stuck up two fingers to the entire political establishment,” Farage said, referring to the British equivalent of a crude gesture that employs the middle finger in other cultures.

The result will send him back to the House of Commons, but an investigation by a parliamentary watchdog that was suspended when he stepped down was resumed hours after the result was announced. That means Farage could be forced out of Parliament — and face yet another election.

Farage reshaped UK politics and led Reform to top of polls

Farage, the chief cheerleader in getting Britain to vote to leave the European Union a decade ago, has shattered the country's longstanding two-party system by positioning himself to the right of the Conservative Party.

With Farage’s win, the party has just eight of the 650 seats in the House of Commons, but is popular nationally by drawing on a mix of cultural grievances and a vow to stop what he has called an invasion of migrants crossing the English Channel in inflatable rafts. Reform has frequently changed the national conversation and forced the governing center-left Labour Party and the Conservatives, long the dominant parties, to address Reform’s key issues.

But with Farage under scrutiny and a Labour leadership shakeup that installed Andy Burnham as prime minister, some analysts say Labour is regaining popularity.

Farage still faces investigation over an undeclared donation

Pressure will continue to mount on Farage as Parliament’s standards watchdog investigates an undeclared donation he got in 2024 from Christopher Harborne, a Thailand-based cryptocurrency billionaire. Farage says he didn’t need to declare the money because it was a personal gift he used to fund his security and was made before he was elected.

When he resigned on July 7, he complained of an “establishment hit job” and a media-driven “witch-hunt.”

Farage also faces an investigation into his financial relationship with George Cottrell, an aristocratic crypto-gambling entrepreneur who served eight months in a U.S. prison for fraud a decade ago after offering to launder money for undercover agents posing as drug traffickers.

Cottrell remains close to Farage and has reportedly given him money for security and staff. Farage has denied wrongdoing and stood by the man he calls “Posh George.”

Labour Party chairwoman Bridget Phillipson said the election was no victory for Farage, and he needs to come clean over his finances and relationship with Cottrell.

“The mountain of sleaze and scandal he and Reform are now engulfed in has grown and grown while he’s been trying to distract the public by fighting a by-election against a bin,” Phillipson said.

Farage was a no-show at the vote count

Farage’s gambit to resign and run again backfired when other parties refused to participate and he was left facing a massive field of independent and small-party candidates, including novelty acts such as Howling Laud Hope of The Official Monster Raving Loony Party and Marcus White from the Everyone is God Party.

Farage declared victory in the early morning and blew off the official declaration where he would have had to stand alongside the other candidates — a time-honored tradition in British politics.

“I’m damned if I’m going to stand on a stage, having won a resounding victory ... and be demeaned and humiliated by nobodies,” Farage told supporters at a victory party.

Farage also said he didn’t attend because police told him about an “organized campaign to disrupt and degrade the result.” A spokesperson for Reform said there was a credible threat against him, though police disputed that.

Binface, who ran on a wacky platform that included a vow to “cut your taxes, and raise everyone else’s,” build one affordable home, and nationalize singer Adele, declared himself the "winning candidate of the candidates who bothered to turn up for the results."

Under the black cape, trash can helmet and ample body armor straight out of a low-budget sci-fi film, Binface’s alter-ego is Jon Harvey, a middle-aged comedian who spent most of the campaign doing media interviews and trying to stay cool in the costume during a sweltering summer.

Binface has hinted that if Farage faces another election, he could return to run again.

“Over one in four people in this constituency would rather have Count Binface as their MP than the leader of Reform UK,” Binface said on X, "and I’m just getting started.”

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Melley reported from London.

The Taliban regained control of Afghanistan on Aug. 15, 2021, after it launched an offensive as the U.S. and other NATO troops withdrew from the country after two decades of war. The withdrawal led to chaotic scenes at and around Kabul’s airport with thousands wanting to leave.

“Thank God, the past five years have passed in safety,” said Mohammad Qasim, 30, reflecting on the anniversary that comes against a backdrop of economic hardship in a conflict-stricken country. “Our wish and hope from the government is to create job opportunities for the youth.”

“We, along with the entire nation, call upon the government to create employment opportunities for the youth and to encourage them to pursue education,” he added.

Taliban curbs women's rights despite pledge

Before the takeover, the Taliban stated that, upon assuming power, it would allow women access to education, employment and public participation, albeit in accordance with its interpretation of Islamic principles.

Soon after it seized power, the Taliban imposed an indefinite ban on girls’ education beyond the sixth grade and, a few months later, also banned higher education for women until “further notice.”

Women also were banned from entering gyms, parks and public baths, from taking part in sports and traveling to distant locations without a “mahram,” or male guardian.

Taliban spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid has repeatedly said the administration is working to establish conditions under which girls and women can attend classrooms or university campuses in line with Islamic Sharia laws. The restrictions, nevertheless, remain in force.

While the U.N. has acknowledged that the country has become more stable since the takeover, it has warned that lasting stability cannot be possible unless the Taliban rulers — who remain isolated internationally — lift restrictions on women and girls, protect basic rights and address terrorism concerns.

“A reduction in conflict has brought tangible benefits for many Afghans and created opportunities to focus on recovery, development and regional economic cooperation,” the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, or UNAMA, said in a statement ahead of the anniversary. It added, however, that the restrictions on women and girls impede Afghanistan’s recovery and its reintegration with the international community.

UN says Afghanistan in world's most severe women's rights crisis

In a statement this week, the U.N.'s agency on women’s rights, said Afghan women and girls are living under the world’s most severe restrictions, which not only violate their rights but also threaten the country’s social and economic future.

“Half a decade after the Taliban takeover in August 2021, Afghanistan has systematically dismantled the rights of half its population, making it a global outlier with no parallel in the modern world,” U.N. Women said.

“In the past year alone, this exclusion of women and girls from education, employment, public life, justice systems and healthcare has only intensified, entrenching what remains the world’s most severe women’s rights crisis,” it said.

Fazila Soroush, a 39-year-old Kabul-based entrepreneur and an advocate for women’s rights, said the government had “demonstrated its worth to the people through its actions in every area.”

“We consider it essential that the officials of the Islamic Emirate who had announced the closure of schools and universities until further notice, now make a clear and practical decision regarding this matter,” she said.

In the streets of Kabul, preparations for the anniversary celebrations were underway. Vendors sold the Taliban’s white with black scripted flags while painters were busy writing slogans in praise of Islamic laws on walls, including: “The Islamic system has been achieved at the cost of the martyrs’ blood” and “Our commitment stands firm: Consolidation and implementation of Islamic Sharia.”

Taliban says it brought security and stability

Molvi Hayatullah Mahajar Farahi, deputy minister in the Taliban government for broadcasting at the Ministry of Information and culture, said in the five years the administration has delivered security, stabilized the currency, improved infrastructure and formed industrial parks that have created jobs.

“Naturally, challenges and difficulties exist, yet we can highlight several accomplishments,” Farahi told The Associated Press.

Farahi, when asked, did not address the issue of the education of girls and women but said “the level of investment made in universities surpasses anything seen in the past.

“The Emirate continues its efforts to further organize and improve services for our citizens in the fields of education and other sectors,” he stated.

The deputy minister rejected a U.N. report that documented terrorist networks in Afghanistan, saying “these are merely enemy propaganda, spread to portray the country as unstable.”

Asked to comment about its international isolation, Farahi insisted the Taliban government was engaged with some 40 countries. The Taliban government currently is only formally recognized by Russia.

“The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan has fulfilled all the requirements necessary for official recognition. It is now up to the international community and others to step forward and take the appropriate action,” he said.

UN points at broader educational crisis

The bans have left an estimated 2.4 million girls excluded from secondary education, UNESCO, the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, said this week — a 200,000 increase from last year. The restrictions have reversed two decades of progress that Afghanistan had made in education, the agency said.

Pointing at a broader educational crisis, the agency said 53% of primary school-aged children are out of school. Schools lack basic infrastructure such as water, sanitation or heating, while natural disasters have also led to hundreds of school closures.

Meanwhile, the U.N. World Food Program said child malnutrition has reached critical levels in a third of Afghanistan’s provinces and is expected to worsen as funding shortfalls force cuts in food distributions and other support.

In Kabul, Dost Mohammad Khan expressed support for the Taliban administration, saying the past five years have brought stability. He said however, that the country needs trained professionals such as doctors and engineers, urging the authorities to keep “all sectors operational.”

“We also call upon the Islamic Emirate to permit women to attend school under the sharia dress code and we urge the public to heed the directives of the Emirate also,” said the 38-year-old.

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Fraser reported from Ankara, Turkey.

Officers responded to the crash around 1:45 a.m. in the 5300 block of Rittiman Road, which is located near Thornwood.

A man and a woman were in a sedan that jumped a curb, crashed through a fence onto H-E-B warehouse property and hit a tree, police said.

Upon arrival, officers said they found the man unconscious on the ground. The woman was in the front seat area of the sedan with her legs stuck under the dash.

Firefighters were eventually able to remove the woman from the vehicle, SAPD said.

Further information was not readily available. Check back later for updates.

Read also:

• Second woman arrested, accused of robbing Knicks fans at knifepoint after NBA Finals in San Antonio
• Woman, 19, charged with manslaughter in connection with Stone Oak crash, affidavit says

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

2 oil tankers hit by drones as they transited Strait of Hormuz

Two tankers owned by Abu Dhabi’s state-owned oil and gas company ADNOC were attacked Thursday evening while transiting the Strait of Hormuz, the company said. It added that the attack caused no injuries and that “the situation has been brought under control.”

The British military’s United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations Center said two vessels were reported to have suffered minor damage when attacked by drones while transiting the Strait of Hormuz. It did not identify them as the ADNOC ships but it appeared to be the same incident.

The UAE's Foreign Ministry blamed the attacks on Iran and said they were a “flagrant violation” of the United Nations' principles of freedom of navigation.

“Targeting commercial shipping and using the Strait of Hormuz as a tool of economic coercion or blackmail represents acts of piracy by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps, and constitutes a direct threat to the stability of the region, its peoples, and global energy security,” the Foreign Ministry said.

There was no immediate response from Iran.

Activists bring food and water to Palestinians under siege by Israeli settlers

Activists marched through the occupied West Bank bringing food and water to Palestinians who have been under siege by Israeli settlers for days.

Three Palestinian families in the town of Qusra have been unable to leave their homes for nearly a week after settlers surrounded the area. Israeli troops intervened multiple times, but the settlers have kept returning.

The standoff in the northern West Bank town of Qusra is the latest in a wave of settler violence convulsing the territory, which Israel seized in the 1967 Mideast war and which would make up part of a future Palestinian state.

Defense Minister Israel Katz instructed the army to prepare a plan to transfer power to the police to enforce civilian related matters, the Defense Ministry said in a statement.

Drone intercepted over Irbil in area home to hotels and consulates

In Iraq, a drone was intercepted over Irbil in the country's semiautonomous northern Kurdish region, in an area of the city where a number of hotels and consulates are located.

The regional counterterrorism service said in a statement that there were no casualties.

It was not immediately clear who had launched the drone, but since the beginning of the war between Iran and the United States and Israel, Iran and Iranian-backed Iraqi militant groups have launched regular attacks on U.S. military and diplomatic facilities in Iraq and on bases of exiled Iranian Kurdish dissident groups.

Kushner will head to Middle East for talks on Gaza

President Donald Trump’s son-in-law and negotiator Jared Kushner will travel to the Middle East next week to try to advance plans for an end to the conflict in Gaza after a deal recently announced by the Trump administration ran into Israeli opposition.

An official with the Board of Peace, the body Trump established to oversee the fragile ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war, said Kushner, board high representative Nickolay Mladenov, and executive board member and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair would arrive in Israel on Sunday.

The group will then travel to Cairo, where meetings of a Palestinian technocratic group set to assume control of Gaza under a U.S.-brokered ceasefire deal have been taking place for the past several months, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because planning for details of the trip has not yet been finalized.

The trip was reported earlier by Axios.

— Matthew Lee in Washington

ORIGINAL STORY: The Texas Department of Public Safety issued a Silver Alert for a 68-year-old man last seen on the West Side.

Ovidio Chojolan, 68, was last seen at 2 a.m. Wednesday, according to DPS, in the 5500 block of Harefield Drive.

DPS said Chojolan was last seen wearing a light blue T-shirt with “Florida” on it and blue jeans. He is 5 feet, 3 inches tall.

Authorities asked anyone who sees Chojolan to call 911.

Read also:

• Lake Travis High School football player dies after medical emergency at practice, superintendent says

• TRIPLE-DIGIT COUNT: 3 days at SA Int’l, more elsewhere
• TODAY: Hot, 10% chance afternoon downpour
• WEEKEND: Near 100° each day
• NEXT WEEK: String of triple digits, hottest weather of the year

FORECAST

TRIPLE DIGIT COUNT

The official weather site for San Antonio is the San Antonio International Airport, where we’ve only seen 3 100-degree days this year. However, as you look elsewhere, you can see that that number is much higher!

A SHOT AT A SHOWER THIS AFTERNOON

While it’ll still be hot, expect a few more clouds today. There is a 10% chance for you to see a shower in the afternoon, slightly higher chances nearer to the coast. Highs will be near 100°.

WEEKEND

It’ll stay dry and hot over the weekend. Each day, highs will be close to 100°. Good pool and splashpad weather!

NEXT WEEK

With the heat high right overhead, next week will feature a string of triple-digit days, and potentially our hottest weather of the year so far. By next weekend, there are some indications, we could see small rain chances return.

QUICK WEATHER LINKS

• WATCH LIVE: Doppler Radar
• Hourly and 10-Day Forecast
• Download FREE KSAT Weather Authority App: Up-to-date forecast information and livestreams from trusted local meteorologists.
• KSAT Connect: Share your weather photos.

A rescue operation was launched after a sudden rush of water and debris entered the tunnel at the Vishnugad-Pipalkoti hydroelectric project in Chamoli district later Thursday night, said top district official Gaurav Kumar.

Of 22 people who were working in the tunnel, 12 have been rescued alive and another three are still missing, the chief minister of Uttarakhand state Pushkar Singh Dhami told reporters.

Rescue teams from the national and state Disaster Response Force, Indo-Tibetan Border Police and fire services are fighting rising water and debris with as they search for the remaining workers, officials said.

“When our team reached the site and started the operation, there was a lot of water inside the tunnel and water was also seeping from the sides. Since then, the water level has increased considerably,” said the commander of the National Disaster Response Force team, Amrit Lal Meena.

Construction accidents are common in India, where rapid infrastructure growth often collides with fragile geology, construction lapses, extreme weather and safety standards.

In the Himalayan region, fragile mountains, seismic activity and unpredictable underground conditions make tunnel projects especially risky. An explosion inside a coal mine in neighboring Meghalaya state in February killed at least 18 workers. In 2023, a tunnel section in northern Uttarakhand state collapsed, trapping 41 workers for 17 days before they were rescued.

This year’s ratings come as at least five school districts sit on the brink of state intervention — Austin, Waco, Greenville, Ector County and Ralls.

Preliminary ratings released by Austin ISD officials Thursday showed two middle schools each failed state standards for a fifth consecutive year, while the district as a whole earned a B. Meanwhile, Ector County and Greenville district officials said their campuses made gains in the ratings this year.

AISD Superintendent Matias Segura told the Austin Current he has not been in communication with state officials regarding the education commissioner’s plans for the district.“I understand there is an anxiousness and concern in the community,” Segura told the Current. “We are going to be here tomorrow, the teachers are going to show up, we are going to do the work to ensure their student gets what they need, regardless of what that looks like for that specific family, for that specific school. AISD will continue to be here; we have been here for 145 years.”

The letter grades campuses receive can shape community perceptions. Often, parents use the scores to pick a school for their kids. Businesses may also weigh the ratings when choosing which regions to invest in or move to, as they anticipate that schools labeled high-performing will graduate more students prepared for the workforce.

Meanwhile, Texas leaders are leaning on state intervention to fix chronic academic underperformance as five years of failing grades brings bruising state sanctions. The education commissioner must close a persistently failing campus when it reaches that threshold or replace a district’s locally elected school board with appointees he selects.

Ratings for schools and districts largely depend on three primary metrics: how students perform on STAAR and meet college and career readiness benchmarks; how results on state tests improve over time; and how well schools are educating underserved children.

Texas schools that trigger state takeovers tend to serve predominantly Black, Latino and low-income students, while majority-Black schools last year received more Fs than A ratings. Critics of the state’s accountability system say school ratings fail to account for the challenges facing high-poverty schools, which often work with fewer resources to serve children with higher needs.

Proponents of the grades say Texas families deserve transparency about how well schools educate their children. State leaders also say the ratings allow them to identify which districts fail to concentrate on student learning.

Parents face a changing education landscape with more access to schooling options outside of traditional neighborhood campuses. This school year marks the first time Texas families can use public taxpayer dollars to fund their children’s private schooling or home-school education.

Districts have until Sept. 11 to appeal their grades to the Texas Education Agency.

Kevin Rideout “is in good health in the care of US officials,” SIM International said in a statement.

He will soon be reunited with his extended family, the statement added.

Rideout was kidnapped in the West African country's capital, Niamey, on Oct. 21 by three armed individuals and was probably driven out of town, according to information provided by a security official at the time.

No armed group claimed responsibility for the abduction.

Niger has long faced attacks from armed groups including jihadis linked to al-Qaida and the Islamic State organization.

The U.S. Embassy in Niamey issued a security alert a day after Rideout's kidnapping warning that American citizens “remain at a heightened risk of kidnapping throughout Niger, including in the capital city.”

Niger is ruled by a military junta that took power in 2023 after deposing the democratically elected president, Mohamed Bazoum. The new authorities ousted Western partners including the United States, which had soldiers in Niger, and forged a new security and diplomatic alliance with Russia.

In June, more than 30 people were killed when gunmen attacked the main airport in Niamey. It was the second attack this year at the airport, a strategic hub that serves as the ruling military’s command, hosting its air force base and most of its drones and aircraft. It’s also the headquarters of the regional alliance that brings together troops from Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso.

The violence is the latest sign of armed groups increasingly targeting cities and urban centers in Africa’s Sahel region.

The storm is forecast to bring rain to the Hawaiian Islands starting late Friday as well as high winds and dangerous surf, the National Hurricane Center said.

A hurricane warning is in effect for Hawaii County and a tropical storm watch is in place for Maui County including the islands of Maui, Lanai, Molokai and Kahoolawe, forecasters said.

Lala was about 455 miles (735 kilometers) east-southeast of Hilo, Hawaii, and about 670 miles (1,075 kilometers) east-southeast of Honolulu with maximum sustained winds of 60 mph (95 kph) while moving west-northwest, the Miami-based center said.

Lala is forecast to strengthen into a hurricane as it approaches the Big Island. It's expected to be near the island Saturday. A hurricane warning means hurricane conditions are expected, and it is typically issued 36 hours before potential tropical-storm-force winds.

The system could bring rainfall totals of 8 inches to a foot (up to about 30 centimeters) across Maui and the Big Island, with as much as 25 inches (nearly 64 centimeters) possible across the Big Island, forecasters said. That could produce life-threatening flooding and mudslides, the center said.

Also in the Pacific, Tropical Storm Hernan formed Thursday but wasn't threatening land and was weakening while moving south.

Hernan was about 1,505 miles (2,420 kilometers) west-southwest of the southern tip of the Baja California peninsula of Mexico with maximum sustained winds around 40 mph (65 kph), the center said.

In the Atlantic Ocean, former Tropical Storm Cristobal weakened and degenerated into a post-tropical remnant low on Thursday, the center said. It was about 500 miles (805 kilometers) west of the Azores and didn't threaten land.

The backing came from 2030 World Cup co-host Morocco, Qatar, Egypt, Mauritania, Lebanon and Sudan, with four of the signatories being FIFA council members.

“We, the undersigned leaders of our respective football associations, express our full support for Mr. Gianni Infantino, President of FIFA, and reaffirm our confidence in his leadership and continued commitment to the development of football worldwide,” the statement read.

“We deeply appreciate Mr. Infantino’s sustained efforts to advance football globally, expand opportunities across all regions and strengthen the game’s role in bringing people and communities together.”

The statement said the signatories “look forward to continuing our close cooperation with him towards a stronger and more prosperous future for world football, expanding opportunities and further enhancing Arab football’s contribution to the global game.”

Infantino is facing a revolt after his plan to sell stakes in the World Cup to private equity investors. He withdrew the $20 billion proposal after a furious backlash by global soccer officials, including European body UEFA, which has warned of a boycott of all FIFA games and events.

UEFA teamed up with CONCACAF — the confederation for North, Central America and the Caribbean — and the Asian Football Confederation — and issued an open letter Monday saying Infantino’s plan was a “fundamental breach of trust” and described it as “deception.”

And on Thursday, the Football Association of Ireland said in a statement it has withdrawn its support for Infantino to be re-elected as FIFA president in March, saying “recent events have raised significant concerns regarding governance, transparency and the lack of meaningful consultation.”

The soccer federations in England and Wales did the same last week, while Northern Ireland said it was backing UEFA's stance.

New Zealand Football issued a statement Friday local time saying it had withdrawn its support for the candidature of Infantino and was seeking an independent review of steps taken to develop the FIFA Forward Enterprise scheme.

New Zealand Football broke ranks with its Oceania confederation, saying it “formed the view that decisions and actions within FIFA have contributed to a breakdown in trust and increased division within international football, and that an independent review is required to restore confidence and trust.”

Without commenting on Infantino's position, the OFC said it welcomed FIFA’s decision to withdraw the FFE proposal and its commitment to review the issues surrounding the project.

“OFC recognizes the progress achieved over the last decade in advancing football development in Oceania under FIFA’s leadership and encourages FIFA to use the review as an opportunity to identify and implement any changes that may be necessary," the statement said.

Schism in Asian bloc over Infantino support

By expressing support for Infantino, Qatar and Lebanon aligned against the Asian Football Confederation. Infantino’s official Instagram account previously has posted letters of support from several member federations, including Morocco, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.

The four FIFA council members among the signatories were Qatar Football Association president Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, Egyptian Football Association president Hany Abo Rida, Moroccan Football Federation president Fouzi Lekjaa and Mauritanian Football Federation president Ahmed Yahya.

The other two were Lebanese Football Association president Hashem Haidar and Moatasem Gafar, president of the Sudan Football Association.

Infantino has been FIFA president since 2016 and seemed sure to be re-elected unopposed next year in Morocco.

FIFA has set a Nov. 18 deadline for challengers to come forward.

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See AP’s full soccer coverage here

Many Christians in Israel, who make up less than 2% of the country’s population, are worried visible signs of their faith will draw harassment, which has increased as multiple conflicts grip the region.

“I’m scared after the sister was beat up,” said Sister Mayela, a Mexican nun who’s lived in Jerusalem on and off for more than two decades. “Before, one could live with more confidence. Some people spat, some said hi. Now we have to live trusting in God.”

She finds resilience in her faith — and in support from Israelis like the volunteers. Even that, though, didn’t prevent a teen from spitting right behind her as they passed a group of ultra-Orthodox Jews recently. The teen said she was only clearing her throat, but the volunteer reported it to police.

Incidents like that are among the challenges for Christians in Israel, particularly since the Hamas-led attack on Oct. 7, 2023, plunged the country back into war and polarization. But interfaith leaders and researchers are encouraged by better policing and prosecution as well as the recent appointment of a government envoy to the Christian world, who is Greek Orthodox.

In northern Israel, many Christians say they feel the state isn’t doing enough to protect them from crime because they’re not Jewish. But those concerns didn’t stop groups of Catholics from joining a recent joyous pilgrimage on Mount Tabor, where the Gospels say Jesus appeared transfigured alongside the Jewish prophets Moses and Elijah.

“In a world where darkness is filling the hearts of people, we need to diffuse God’s light to other people,” said Sister Muna, the nun who led one youth group.

For many Christians and Jews, protecting coexistence in the Holy Land is a moral imperative after their own long histories of religious persecution.

“I don’t want Christians to go out of their house in Jerusalem … and have fear,” said Yisca Harani, the Jewish Israeli educator and activist who escorted Sister Mayela. “I’ve gone through this 2,000 years in my Jewish history. I’m not going to let that happen.”

Occasional flare-ups occur in multifaith Old City

In the Old City, Jewish men in black hats and tzitzit tassels, Muslim women in hijabs and Christian priests in flowing robes walk past each other daily in the maze of stone alleyways. Many are headed to pray at the Western Wall, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre or the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound. These are some of the most sacred sites respectively for Judaism, Christianity and Islam, and they are close to each other.

“If you stroll around in your habit, sooner or later you’ll get some spitting next to you,” said the Rev. Alberto Pari, who leads interfaith dialogue and Christian-Jewish relations as secretary to the Custody of the Holy Land, the Catholic order ministering to holy sites across the region. “But it’s important not to generalize, because that unleashes antisemitism.”

Religious Freedom Data Center, the organization that Harani founded to track harassment of Christians, has recorded a near-tripling of incidents in Jerusalem from four years ago to the last three months recorded — about one a day now — virtually all by Jewish religious nationalists.

A Jewish man from a settlement in the occupied West Bank was indicted in the violent attack on the nun in April. The French Biblical and Archeological School of Jerusalem where the nun is a researcher expects “effective prosecution at the criminal and civil levels,” said the school’s director, Friar Olivier Poquillon.

Israel's government tackles anti-Christian incidents

Among those reaching out to Catholic leaders to denounce the attack and offer support was Ambassador George Deek, Israel's new envoy tasked with building what he calls the “special relationship” between Christians and the country, to both keep Christians safe and partner on issues like fighting antisemitism.

“We believe that every incident against Christians is immoral, illegal and should be prosecuted. That’s exactly what we are going to do,” Deek told The Associated Press. “We want to make sure that Israel continues to prosper and grow as a place where Christians can not only survive, but they can thrive.”

Around the time that the nun was attacked, two other incidents drew global condemnation. An Israeli soldier smashed a crucifix in a family garden and another stuck a cigarette in the mouth of a statue of the Virgin Mary in southern Lebanon, where the military is fighting Hezbollah militants. The soldiers involved received military prison sentences.

Most Israelis find harassment unacceptable. But Jewish religious nationalists, particularly uneducated young men, remain a threat, said John Munayer of the Rossing Center for Education and Dialogue, an interreligious organization in Jerusalem.

Their hostility to Christians is grounded in the history of persecution of Jews in Christian-majority European countries, in faith practices they see as idol-worshipping, and in a “general intolerance” for anyone who’s not Jewish near sacred areas like the Western Wall, Munayer said.

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict spills over in Christian-Jewish tensions

Then there’s the overhanging trauma of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, since most local Christians in Israel and the occupied West Bank are Palestinian.

In Taybeh, the last entirely Christian village in the West Bank, Jewish settlers recently cut through house fences and destroyed fruit and vegetable gardens, said the Rev. Bashar Fawadleh, parish priest of Christ the Redeemer Catholic Church.

“All the people here are afraid,” he said. “Settlers come and go every day.”

Israel’s army declared the village a closed military zone earlier this week to curb the attacks. But concerns about Israel’s ability and willingness to rein in the settlers remain even among evangelicals, who are among the staunchest Christian supporters of Israel.

“What happens in Taybeh is really troubling,” said David Parsons, spokesperson for International Christian Embassy Jerusalem. “Israeli leaders have realized for some time that Christian support for their nation is not only vital, it’s a strategic interest.”

And yet since the Oct. 7, 2023, attack, “generalized fear and skepticism” pervaded all interreligious work, Pari said. The interfaith music institute he directs, Magnificat, was invited to play at a peace march in Jerusalem. But when the Palestinian members saw that the stage had been set up by an Old City gate flanked by Israeli flags, they refused to play.

“I felt a real failure,” Pari said. “We think that as Christians, we have a very important role to patch things back together. ... It will be difficult, but we can do it.”

Israeli Christians hold tight to faith and identity

That faith-grounded resilience prevailed among the Mount Tabor pilgrims, who gathered on the mountain to celebrate the feast of the Transfiguration last week. Rising interfaith tensions and crime have driven many of the area’s Christians to emigrate, several said.

“It’s very difficult that we keep our identity as Christians in the Middle East, but it’s the most important,” said John Akleh, 20, who came with Sister Muna’s group.

Ten pilgrims from nearby Nazareth — where Jesus grew up — started the climb at 4:15 a.m. led by the Rev. Fadi Shallufi in a yearly tradition they’ve maintained even in wartime.

“We will have a lot of sacrifice, but you will be sure in this land something will change,” Shallufi told them as he celebrated Mass in the mountaintop basilica.

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Associated Press journalists Ibrahim Hazboun and Moshe Edri contributed from Jerusalem.

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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 Interior Department released a statement late Thursday saying: “Our U.S. Park Police are on the scene and the investigation is ongoing. The public should know we will find the person responsible for this disgusting act.”

The Friends of the National World War II Memorial, a nonprofit organization that helps maintain the site, said: “There are many places in our country for expression, debate, and disagreement. A national memorial honoring those who served and those who never returned home should never be used as a canvas for vandalism.”

The Veterans of Foreign Wars called the vandalism “an act of profound disrespect, a slap in the face to the veterans who served and sacrificed and to the families who carried that burden at home.”

The World War II Memorial is just east of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool on the Mall. After a botched repair job earlier this year left the pool with peeling blue sealant and green algae, President Donald Trump blamed the issues on vandalism without providing evidence.

“I’m not too concerned,” deGrom said following a 7-0 loss to the Angels. “I mean, hopefully I’ll make my next (start). We’ll see. It was tight in the second inning, and it just didn’t want to loosen up,
so I don’t know, I haven’t really had this before.”

The 38-year-old right-hander, who has been dealing with a left hip and glute injury since the All-Star break, escaped a two-on, one-out jam in the first but gave up two runs and five hits during a 32-pitch second. He was replaced by right-hander Peyton Gray to begin the third with the Angels leading 2-0.

It was the first time deGrom permitted five hits in an inning since Sept. 5, 2017, with the New York Mets.

“I wasn’t going to risk it once I heard (it was) the triceps,” Rangers manager Skip Schumaker said. “Obviously, you don’t want to hear anything arm-related. You pull a guy out in the second inning, it’s concerning. But we’ll figure it out when he gets some imaging. We won’t know until they get in there.”

This seven-game road trip began with the Rangers placing pitcher Nathan Eovaldi on the 15-day injured list because of elbow inflammation Monday. Texas beat the Angels 4-1 that night but lost the next three games to fall to 60-62 and two games behind first-place Houston in the AL West.

Now, the Rangers might have to navigate the next few weeks without their two best starting pitchers.

“Our starting pitching has taken a hit, that is reality,” Schumaker said. “With two guys going down, we’ll see what it looks like, but it’s never easy when you’re No. 1 and No. 2 guys are down.”

A two-time Cy Young Award winner, deGrom allowed six hits, struck out three and walked one. He needs two strikeouts to become the ninth active pitcher and 94th in major league history to reach 2,000.

In three starts against the Angels this season, deGrom has yielded 10 earned runs in 10 innings.

“It was very disappointing,” he said of Thursday night's start. “I needed to go out there and give us some length and wasn’t able to do it. I said I could probably keep going, and they said, ‘Well, we’re not going to risk this right now,’ so we’ll just see how it is tomorrow and I’ll go from there.”

One of baseball’s best pitchers when healthy, deGrom made at least 31 starts per season and pitched to a 2.53 ERA across 622 1/3 innings from 2017-19 with the Mets.

He won NL Cy Young Awards with New York in 2018 and 2019 and led the National League with 255 strikeouts in 2019 and 104 strikeouts during the pandemic-shortened 2020 season.

But deGrom made only 35 starts because of injuries from 2021-24 and underwent his second Tommy John surgery in June 2023, which sidelined him for much of his first two seasons with Texas in 2023 and 2024.

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See AP’s full MLB coverage here

Australia led all but 150 meters of the women's 4 x 200 freestyle relay, with the team of Inez Miller, Lani Pallister, Hannah Casey and Milla Jansen winning in 7 minutes, 42.40 seconds to lower the country's championship mark of 7:44.12 set at the 2018 Pan Pacs.

Katie Ledecky swam the anchor leg for the U.S., but couldn't overhaul Jansen although she got within a body length in the closing meters. Erin Gemmell, Anna Peplowski, Rylee Erisman and Ledecky took silver in 7:43.10, also going under the old championship mark.

“I've kind of struggled with the 200 individually from a flat start over the last couple years, but I always know I'll have something in me for the relay and I'll pull out a good split,” Ledecky said. “I love swimming that anchor leg.”

McIntosh helped Canada earn the relay bronze.

The U.S. team of Luke Hobson, Aaron Shackell, Patrick Sammon and Gabriel Jett won the men's 4 x 200 free relay in a championship record of 6:59.37. The Americans led the entire race, with Jett's explosive turn off the final wall helping him hold off a charging Sam Short of Australia on the anchor leg.

“I just kind of poured everything on,” Jett said. “I swim with my eyes closed, so I didn't know where I was.”

McIntosh briefly dipped under her own world-record pace early in the 400 IM. McIntosh finished in a championship record time of 4:28.01 after qualifying second-quickest for the eight-woman final at the outdoor pool.

McIntosh was disappointed with her time in the 200 free after losing to Pallister of Australia on opening night of the four-day international meet.

“Just trying to forget about it,” McIntosh said.

Jenna Forrester of Australia was second in 4:31.50. Agostina Hein, an 18-year-old from Argentina, took bronze after coming into the final with the fastest time in preliminaries.

Meg Harris of Australia surprised herself with a victory in the women's 100 freestyle from Lane 6. She touched in 52.60 seconds, beating American Gretchen Walsh, who was second in 52.78 after being 0.01 seconds under world-record pace at the turn. Olivia Wunsch of Australia was third.

American Simon Manuel, the 2016 Olympic champion, finished fourth.

The U.S. went 1-2 in the men's 100. Jack Alexy won in 47.14, lowering his championship-record time of 47.40 from the preliminaries. Teammate Patrick Sammon was second at 47.62. Guilherme Caribe of Brazil was third.

American McKenzie Siroky won the 100 breaststroke for her first international medal. She outdueled Tang Qianting of China down the stretch to touch first in 1:05.32. Tang was second in 1:05.46.

The U.S. swept the 50 backstroke events.

Quintin McCarty won the men's race in 24.51, lowering the championship record set by Isaac Cooper of Australia in the prelims. Cooper took silver.

Katharine Berkoff won the women's race in a career-best 26.90, bettering her championship mark set in the prelims. Teammate Regan Smith was second in 27.14.

American Van Mathias earned his third medal of the meet, winning the 100 breaststroke in 58.02, lowering his championship record from the prelims. He took silver in the 50 butterfly and gold in the world record-setting 4 x 100 mixed medley relay Wednesday.

The men's 400 IM was won by Tomoyuki Matsushita of Japan in 4:06.75. His time erased American Ryan Lochte's championship mark of 4:07.59 set at the 2010 Pan Pacs, also in Irvine.

“Next time I come back to the U.S. I'm going to get gold again,” a smiling Matsushita said through a translator.

American Carson Foster was second.

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The Heisman Trophy winner led one touchdown drive for the Raiders (0-1) in four series — not including a kneel-down at the end of the first half — and finished 10 of 16 for 97 yards and a 6-yard TD pass to Jack Bech.

“I thought he led a good scoring drive as far as getting in and out of the huddle and commanding the group and getting the play calls down,” Raiders coach Klint Kubiak said. “I saw the same guy that we’ve seen in practice. I see an ascending player.”

Mendoza was more critical in his self-evaluation.

“Unfortunately, I let my teammates down today,” Mendoza said. “But it's a growing experience, and I feel like we're all growing. It showed me that I need to grow a lot.”

Mendoza became the first top overall draft selection to throw a touchdown pass in his first preseason game since 2018, when Baker Mayfield had two for Cleveland against the New York Giants.

Mendoza just missed a second touchdown pass in the fourth quarter, throwing beyond the reach of Deven Thompkins. He was sharp at times, threading a 19-yard pass in the second quarter between three defenders to fellow rookie Malik Benson.

While noting that everything came together on that play, including his timing with the receiver, Mendoza said some of his throws were a bit off.

“There's other passes I made that did not have great timing and anticipation,” Mendoza said. “But that was one that was a good connection. You see (starter) Kirk (Cousins) is timing and anticipation — boom, boom, boom. So that's an area I've got to grow in.”

The expected rematch of college football national championship quarterbacks didn't happen because the Cardinals (1-1) decided not to play Carson Beck, who has sore ribs. Mendoza led Indiana to a 27-21 victory over Beck and Miami in the title game in January.

“Being the preseason, we just didn't want to risk it,” Cardinals coach Mike LaFleur said. “It was kind of a bummer for our fan base and (media) and me and all us because we want to see these guys out there.”

Raiders pass rusher Maxx Crosby also did not play, which wasn't completely unexpected after Kubiak said Tuesday that his playing status was to be determined. Crosby, who underwent knee surgery in January, has participated in training camp.

Teammate Jermod McCoy, who hasn't played in nearly two years because of a torn ACL, played with the second-team defense at cornerback. He was the primary defender on two Cardinals touchdowns.

Each team's starting quarterback played one series, both resulting in touchdowns.

Las Vegas' Cousins was 5 of 6 for 50 yards and a 13-yard touchdown pass to Michael Mayer. Arizona's Jacoby Brissett completed all five passes for 44 yards and a 7-yard TD to Marvin Harrison Jr.

Brissett and former Raider Gardner Minshew combined to go 15 of 15 for 123 yards and three touchdowns in the first half to build a 21-14 lead. That string of completions extended 16 early in the second half before Minshew finally threw an incomplete pass on a rollout to the right.

Rookie Jeremiyah Love, drafted third overall by the Cardinals, made his preseason debut and rushed for 58 yards on 11 carries.

Injury report

Cardinals: Rookie right guard Chase Bisontis, who was drafted in the second round, injured his left knee. LaFleur said the injury appears serious. ... LaFleur said he didn't think Love's ankle injury was a major concern.

Up next

Cardinals: Host Dallas on Aug. 22.

Raiders: At Houston next Thursday.

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

Trump is visiting the Nassau County Police Academy in suburban Long Island, where the White House said he will release new FBI crime statistics showing a decrease in violent crime for 2025.

“President Trump promised to make America safe again and the data proves he has done just that,” White House spokesperson Lauren Bis said. “Unlike Defund-the-Police Democrats, President Trump will always stand with our law enforcement officers and deliver safer American neighborhoods.”

Trump's visit is aimed at boosting Republican candidates in closely contested races across his home state, but just how much his presence will help is in question as he faces lagging approval ratings and a deeply unpopular war in Iran with no end in sight.

Trump narrowly won Nassau County in 2024, flipping it for Republicans for the first time in more than two decades. It's home to two Democratic House seats that Republicans now see as winnable this fall, and it's home turf for Nassau County executive Bruce Blakeman, the Trump-endorsed Republican challenging Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul.

Trump will be joined by Attorney General Todd Blanche and FBI Director Kash Patel in Nassau County, which has one of the largest police forces in the nation.

Crime becoming a theme in New York races

It's the second time this year Trump has visited New York in support of Blakeman and other Republicans. He stopped by the Hudson Valley area in May for a speech in which he said Blakeman would curb “out of control” crime.

Crime has emerged as a significant issue in the governor's race, with both candidates claiming to have the better track record of making New Yorkers safe. Hochul visited a different Long Island police department in July to announce a statewide investment in policing technology.

A statement from Blakeman said he's grateful Trump is visiting “to tour our outstanding, state-of-the-art law enforcement facilities” and pay tribute to law enforcement workers.

In a Fox Business interview Thursday, Blakeman played down concerns that Trump's visit would be unpopular with voters in New York City.

“When the most powerful person in the world comes to visit you and shows that you have a relationship together, I think that’s a very good thing,” Blakeman said, adding that even voters who disagree with Trump might appreciate a governor with a direct line to the president.

Hochul campaign spokesperson Ryan Radulovacki said the governor "has invested billions in public safety to protect New Yorkers — ‘MAGA all the way’ Bruce Blakeman is bringing Donald Trump to tour the county where he let violent crime spike to decade highs and Trump’s unaccountable ICE agents abuse their power.”

For GOP, safety is seen as a winning issue

Matt Gorman, a Republican strategist, said Trump's visit stands to boost Blakeman along with Republican challengers looking to unseat a pair of Democratic incumbents in Nassau County districts. Michael LiPetri Jr. is challenging Rep. Tom Suozzi in New York's 3rd Congressional District, while Jeanine Driscoll is opposing Rep. Lauren Gillen in the 4th Congressional District.

The focus on crime is seen as a cornerstone issue for Republicans that appeals to Trump's base along with suburban swing voters, Gorman said.

“On the strategic level, crime is an issue that Republicans feel comfortable going on offense with, where the country kind of broadly agrees with them,” he said.

Trump is touting the issue as he faces low approval ratings on a number of other issues, including the economy and the Iran war. An AP-NORC poll from August 2025 found that Trump’s handling of crime was among his strongest issues, though his approval on the issue had fallen by 10 points by December 2025.

Trump lashes out over report finding he hasn't reduced crime

While many of Trump's recent swing-state speeches have focused on his tax breaks and economic policies, Trump often mentions his effort to curb crime by deploying the National Guard in Washington, New Orleans and other Democrat-led cities.

This week, Trump lashed out at the Center for American Progress and threatened to sue the liberal think tank over a report finding that the National Guard deployments failed to reduce crime. Without giving evidence, Trump said in a social media post that “crime is way down since I took Office, and they know it.”

For Trump, talking about crime reduction during his trip to New York offers a chance to reach voters across political and class divisions, said Jesse Hunt, a Republican strategist.

“The issue of crime and safety is a massive winner for Republicans,” Hunt said. “What we’ve seen from the Trump administration and Republicans in general is a real focus on that issue. And they should highlight the successes.”

The White House said the new FBI statistics will show year-over-year decreases in murder, rape, robbery and aggravated assault. Crime experts often caution against drawing too much from single-year changes and encourage a focus on long-term patterns.

Mangione could still change his mind about the plea, said the person, who was not authorized to talk publicly about the case and spoke to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity. Previous plea talks in June broke down.

Lawyers for Mangione and the Justice Department declined comment prior to the late-morning court hearing, which was hastily requested by prosecutors and defense lawyers earlier this week.

Mangione, 28, was charged by both federal and state prosecutors with ambushing Thompson, 50, outside a New York City hotel on Dec. 4, 2024, as the insurance executive walked to UnitedHealth Group’s annual investor conference.

A trial on state murder charges is scheduled to start next month. It is unclear whether that trial would go forward if Mangione pleaded guilty in the federal case.

Mangione faces two federal charges that he stalked Thompson to cause his death. Both the federal and state cases could lead to a life prison sentence. A federal judge earlier this year tossed out additional charges that could have exposed Mangione to a potential death penalty.

Mangione had complained about the prospect of two trials, telling a judge in February: “It’s the same trial twice. One plus one is two. Double jeopardy by any commonsense definition.”

Under New York law, a state prosecution could potentially be barred if the federal case is resolved first. The state’s double jeopardy protections kick in if a jury has been sworn in a prior prosecution, such as a federal case, or if that prosecution ends in a guilty plea. Mangione’s cases involve different charges arising from the same course of conduct.

In a letter last month, state prosecutors objected to the possibility of a guilty plea in the federal case wiping out the state case.

U.S. District Judge Margaret M. Garnett has delivered some setbacks to the defense, including ruling in January that prosecutors could use items collected from Mangione’s backpack during his arrest as evidence against him.

They included a 3D-printed pistol that investigators said matched the one used to kill Thompson and a notebook in which authorities say Mangione described his intent to kill an insurance executive.

In June, Mangione’s lawyers said they would pursue a psychiatric defense in the state case but reversed course a day later. The defense, involving claims that he was suffering from extreme emotional disturbance at the time of the killing, isn’t allowed in federal court.

Surveillance video of the killing showed a masked gunman shooting Thompson from behind. Police say “delay,” “deny” and “depose” were written on the ammunition, mimicking a phrase used to describe how insurers avoid paying claims.

Mangione, a University of Pennsylvania graduate from a wealthy Maryland family, was arrested five days later at a McDonald’s in Altoona, Pennsylvania, about 230 miles (370 kilometers) west of Manhattan.

He has become a cause célèbre for some people upset with the health insurance industry.

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Durkin Richer reported from Washington.

“I commented a week ago on that,” Kiffin said after practice in Baton Rouge. “That's the comment that I had and we're moving forward.”

LSU's official online store has removed replica Daniels jerseys from the menu of those for sale, which include the No. 9 of 2019 Heisman Trophy winner Joe Burrow and the No. 3 of former star receiver Odell Beckham Jr.

Meanwhile, Pickett showed no interest in relinquishing the No. 5 when he spoke with reporters after Thursday's practice.

“I’ve been wearing the number my whole life, since I was 4 years old,” Pickett said. “That was the number I was promised. I wish Jayden the best. Good player — he did real good here.”

Daniels, drafted second overall by the Washington Commanders in 2024, said in a social media post on Thursday that the matter would not affect his preparation for the NFL season.

“I have been locked in on training camp and that has been my No. 1 focus,” Daniels said in the post. “I have a lot of gratitude for my time at LSU and I'm proud of what my teammates and I accomplished there.

“Obviously there are issues to get worked out” with LSU, Daniels continued. “My hope is that it will get done privately. ... I realize the business of football is unique and I trust that this can all be resolved.”

Daniels' statement came in the wake of reports about a letter in which his Miami-based attorney, Adam Kenner, demanded that LSU no longer use his client's name, image or likeness to promote the university or its athletic programs.

Pickett wore a No. 3 jersey as a freshman last year but was wearing No. 5 when August camp opened last week. The 6-foot-5 cornerback is a former five-star recruit who had three interceptions in 2025.

Kiffin said last week that Pickett was promised the opportunity to wear No. 5 when he signed with LSU in December 2024, when Brian Kelly was coaching the Tigers. Kelly was fired in October 2025, and Kiffin was hired at the end of the regular season.

“When a kid’s promised something to come to a school, he should wear it,” Kiffin said during an Aug. 5 media session. “So at that point, I don’t think it’s really my decision. We should honor what he was told.”

Pickett is the first player to wear No. 5 since Daniels left LSU. Under LSU policy, the only number football players cannot wear is No. 20, worn by the late Billy Cannon, who was the Tigers' first Heisman winner in 1959.

Top LSU officials, including athletic director Verge Ausberry, have declined to comment on the matter.

A number of images of Daniels that are on display at LSU would be considered in the public domain, and not subject to any contractual agreements between the university and the quarterback. But LSU has in the past featured Daniels in promotional videos shown in Tiger Stadium or and elsewhere, and it remains to be seen whether LSU might edit some of those out should the dispute become protracted.

Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow — who won the 2019 Heisman Trophy and led LSU to a national title — declined to comment on the specifics of Daniels' situation after Thursday night’s preseason game against the Detroit Lions. But he said he's had conversations about his No. 9 not being issued to another player.

“They told me that they wouldn’t use it again, but you never know what happens,” he said.

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AP Sports Writer Joe Reedy in Cincinnati contributed to this report.

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In all, three ballistic missiles fired by the Iran-backed Houthis struck the ship in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, just off Yemen’s coast, as it was coming into port, killing six people and injuring at least nine others, according to Yemeni authorities.

It was part of an escalating campaign by the Houthis and their first deadly attack this year on a vessel navigating the strait, which connects the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden and accounts for roughly 12% of global trade.

“People were burning ... it was a strange scene of doomsday,” said Zaheer Ahmed, a Pakistani crew member recovering at a hospital in the port city of Mokha.

“I shouted for help and a Yemeni soldier came to my aid,” said Ahmed, who was injured in both legs.

All three of the crew members The Associated Press interviewed Wednesday at the hospital described intense fire, panic and damage aboard the ship, which was struck before dawn on Tuesday.

Muhammad Alteno, an Indonesian crew member, said he was in “complete shock” after witnessing another Indonesian crew member — a friend — die in the attack. Alteno said he had tried to rescue his friend, who was trapped inside the room they shared, after the first missile strike.

“But the flames were so intense that I couldn't breathe,” Alteno said. “I managed to escape with some of the (other) crew members.”

Two members of Yemen's government-allied National Resistance Forces were killed in the attack, as were three crew members from Pakistan.

The attack was one of many in recent weeks by the Houthis, who have killed government forces and civilians in an escalating campaign on the government-held city of Mokha and other areas, according to the Yemeni military. The rebel group has also intensified its attacks on troops and oil facilities in neighboring Saudi Arabia, which supports the Yemeni government.

The attacks risk reigniting Yemen’s civil war following a 2022 U.N.-brokered truce, and could open a new front in the Middle East war.

The Houthis declared a blockade several weeks ago on Saudi-linked ships leaving the Bab al-Mandeb strait in retaliation for a yearslong Saudi siege on Yemen and recent attacks on the Houthi-controlled capital, Sanaa. The Houthis had said they would only stop vessels connected to Saudi Arabia or going in and out of its Red Sea ports.

During a similar blockade it announced during the war in Gaza, the Houthis attacked over 100 vessels before a punishing U.S. and Israeli air campaign put an end to the attacks in early 2025.

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Ezzidin reported from Cairo.

The wildfires across the West Midlands, which saw several houses burned to the ground, have been “one of the most significant” incidents the region’s fire service has ever dealt with, chief fire officer Simon Tuhill said.

A child and three firefighters were taken to the hospital following the wildfire in Stourbridge.

West Midlands mayor Richard Parker described the “multiple fires across our region” as an “extremely worrying and fast-moving situation."

British Prime Minister Andy Burnham has been kept abreast of the situation and has, according to Parker, pledged to support fire and rescue services in the West Midlands with any additional resources they need.

The fires, the cause of which has yet to be determined and which could take days to put out, came on the hottest day of the year, when the mercury struck 38.1 degrees Celsius (100.6 degrees Fahrenheit) in west London, a tenth of a degree higher than the previous high set on June 28.

Britain is experiencing its fifth heat wave of the year, with the first recorded in May. The latest extreme heat means 2026 has now had a record four days with temperatures of 36 C (96.8 F) or higher. It also has matched 2022 with two days reaching 38 C.

These are historic temperatures as a result of human-caused climate change.

Nearby France has also endured its fifth heat wave this year and, if anything, the situation is worse. Temperatures in France approached 41 C (106 F) in several areas, from Aquitaine in the southwest to the Rhone River valley in the east, according to the national weather service.

Britain and France ill-equipped for this sort of heat

This summer has shown that both Britain and France are ill-equipped to deal with these levels of heat. Air conditioning is a rarity outside of shops and offices, for example.

In Britain, nurses have collapsed from heat exhaustion while working in hospitals, many housed in aging buildings that lack adequate cooling, the Royal College of Nursing said Thursday.

“When nursing staff are collapsing, feeling dizzy, sick or even being admitted to the very hospitals they work in because their workplaces cannot handle the heat, it shows just how badly they are being failed,” said Nicola Ranger, the college’s chief executive and general secretary.

Wildfire fears remain a clear and present danger

With the land parched and no sign of any meaningful rain coming, authorities across Europe remain on high alert for wildfires.

French firefighters were back in action after a desperate summer and are threatening to go on strike to demand more staff and resources to cope with increasingly extreme weather events.

One broke out late Wednesday in the northern Pas-de-Calais region, and another in Brittany, far from the hotter, drier and more fire-prone regions in southern France. A historic fire devoured forests near Bordeaux last month and pushed a quarter of a million people from their homes.

In northern Greece, more than 300 vacationers and residents were evacuated by sea Thursday after a wildfire swept through a pine forest and threatened seaside homes, authorities said.

The Fire Service said nine water-dropping planes and seven helicopters were assisting 250 firefighters around the Siviri resort on the popular Halkidiki peninsula. There were no initial reports of injuries or serious property damage.

In Britain, which is increasingly looking sandy brown rather than its traditional luscious green, firefighters have been out in force this week trying to contain a wildfire in the New Forest in southern England.

Some 1,017 wildfires have been recorded in England and Wales this year, according to data from the National Fire Chiefs Council, the same as last year’s record-breaking total.

Though not on the same level as those witnessed in France, Greece and Spain, they provide ample evidence of the need for the U.K. to adjust to a new reality.

Unsurprisingly, drought conditions are spreading

Like many parts of Europe, Britain and France are facing widespread drought conditions that have shriveled crops and drained rivers, heaping pressure on water resources for households, agriculture and the environment, and forcing all parts of society to seek both short- and long-term measures to mitigate the impacts of climate change.

Britain’s Southern Water, which oversees supplies in the south of England, has applied for a rare drought order which would ban businesses from nonessential water use, including cleaning cars and filling nondomestic swimming pools, saying an “exceptional” lack of rain is threatening supplies. Environment Secretary Angela Eagle will decide on the application, which would be the first such ban since May 2006.

With temperatures soaring, many people headed to beaches and outdoor pools or found other ways to cool off. In Bordeaux in southwestern France, children and adults sought relief in the city’s iconic “water mirror.” Some frolicked in fountains, splashed their faces and filled up water bottles. Birds too quenched their thirst.

The most intense heat is forecast to move eastward away from Britain and France on Friday and then recede over the weekend.

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Charlton reported from Paris. Costas Kantouris in Thessaloniki, Greece contributed.

The pregame pomp before the Minnesota Twins played the Philadelphia Phillies — adjacent to the farmland where the 1989 fantasy was filmed — featured 26 members of the Hall of Fame emerging from the outfield corn just as the ghost players did in the movie.

With some of the loudest cheers saved for former Phillies third baseman Mike Schmidt and former Twins catcher Joe Mauer, the capacity crowd of about 8,000 at the newly constructed ballpark in northeast Iowa soaked up the surreal atmosphere as the aged stars strolled into the infield for proper introductions.

Fireworks were launched from the cornfield during the national anthem, and Phillies slugger Kyle Schwarber followed with his own big bang — a stalk shot to right on Twins starter Taj Bradley's third pitch of the game that set the tone for a 7-1 win on Thursday night.

After stealing the show at the inaugural 2021 event, which was played on the same footprint at a temporary setup that also hosted the 2022 game, Kevin Costner did not appear.

But the star of the film — as the restless farmer Ray Kinsella who reconnects with his late father by playing catch on his front-yard ballfield — narrated the pregame video that helped pump some old-guard nostalgia through the new-school broadcast on global streaming giant Netflix.

Both teams emerged from the corn together to take their places along the lines like on opening day, and Twins All-Star Byron Buxton — who came off the injured list in the afternoon to play — took the microphone to evoke a line from James Earl Jones, who played the author Terence Mann in the movie.

“The one constant through all the years has been baseball," Buxton said before Schwarber followed with a brief script on an idyllic late-summer night after heavy rain moved through the area earlier in the day.

Then came the legends, and living ones at that, unlike those wool-clad lads in the movie.

Schmidt and Steve Carlton wore Phillies uniforms along with Jim Kaat, who played for both teams. Mauer and Bert Blyleven donned Twins jerseys. The others — Andruw Jones, Harold Baines, Fred McGriff, Adrián Beltré, Andre Dawson, Larry Walker, Cal Ripken Jr., Iván Rodríguez, Jim Thome, Scott Rolen, Tony Pérez, Tony La Russa, Jeff Kent, Fergie Jenkins, Joe Torre, CC Sabathia, Billy Wagner, Rollie Fingers, Lee Smith and Trevor Hoffman — helped form a half-ring around the diamond to represent about one-third of the Cooperstown contingent that's still alive.

This was the largest such gathering at a ballpark, not including the annual ceremonies at the Hall of Fame in upstate New York, since the All-Star Game in 2008 that feted the final season at old Yankee Stadium.

Phillies manager Don Mattingly relished the brief pregame mingle before the grand entrance, with many in the group contemporaries of his as a player in the 1980s and 1990s and a few others in Jones and Kent he was able to coach with the Los Angeles Dodgers.

“It was definitely good to see the boys,” Mattingly said.

No place evokes baseball and family nostalgia like the Field of Dreams

Before the game, Buxton played catch with his 12-year-old son on the nearby movie site that remains open to the public for no cost on non-event days. Twins manager Derek Shelton did the same with his 78-year-old father, a former educator who coached him on his high school baseball team. Shelton later complained that his arm was in weaker shape.

“You don’t get old enough that an experience like that is not emotional to be able to do something with your father,” Shelton said.

Mattingly, whose son just happens to be the club's general manager, found himself harkening back to Indiana childhood ballgames with his brothers upon arrival on the team bus.

“This place reminds me of when I was a kid,” Mattingly said. "You’d go down a dirt road, and all of sudden you’d see a cornfield and then there’d be a field there."

Both teams wore throwback uniforms — the Twins in home threads from their first season in 1961 and the Phillies in road jerseys circa 1940 — in step with the hand-operated scoreboard in right field.

The permanent ballpark built for all kinds of events — including the opportunity to host MLB games on a recurring basis — also has plenty of amenities with the video board in left field, a state-of-the-art sound system and, of course, indoor plumbing.

The feel of the farm was just as strong as the buzz of the ballpark, with natural sponsor John Deere pledging $100,000 per home run hit to hunger-relief organization Feeding America.

The special environment didn't erase the circumstance of the stretch run of the regular season, though, with both the Twins and Phillies in the thick of their respective wild-card races.

“We’re not in Minnesota for three days," Phillies star Bryce Harper said, "but we’re still playing the Twins three times and we've still got to win some games."

Even in defeat, the Twins enjoyed taking part in something bigger than simply the 123rd game on their schedule.

“As you grow in this game and get older and play more games, the shine of being in the big leagues and walking out on a big league field starts to wear off,” catcher Ryan Jeffers said. “Moments like this kind of bring that excitement and that energy and the goosebumps similar to your debut day.”

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Qusai Abu Rida was holed up inside with his teenage son when settlers cut the water and electricity, leaving them to drink well water as dozens of Israeli settlers erected tents outside. His Palestinian American brother in Ohio, who owns the house, watched the siege unfold on security cameras and called for updates.

The standoff in the northern West Bank town of Qusra is the latest in a wave of settler violence convulsing the territory, which Israel seized in the 1967 Mideast war and which would make up the main part of a future Palestinian state.

On Thursday, U.S. Ambassador Mike Huckabee referred to the settlers as “terrorists” — a word American officials usually reserve for Palestinian militants. It was an unusually sharp rebuke from the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump, who has given unprecedented support to Israeli settlement over the years.

Mounting criticism of Israel from the United States could pose a challenge for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is trying to maintain good relations with his country's closest ally as he mobilizes ultranationalist voters ahead of a tough battle for reelection in October.

Settlers have remained in the area despite the army intervening

On Sunday, dozens of settlers arrived at the homes in Qusra, blocking doors and preventing occupants from leaving, according to the families.

Israeli troops have intervened multiple times, but the settlers keep returning, said Loui Ridi, the homeowner in Ohio who spells the family name differently. Rights groups have long accused Israeli forces of turning a blind eye to settler violence or of intervening to protect the settlers.

“It's a cycle,” Ridi said. “They need to be prevented from the entire area, not just removed and moved 100 feet away so when the (Israeli military) leaves, they come back.”

On Tuesday, Israel’s military condemned the siege as “illegal, reprehensible, and unacceptable,” and declared Qusra a closed military zone. The next day, dozens of settlers returned, tried to block the road with rocks and clashed with Israeli soldiers, according to video shot by village residents.

On Thursday, the military said troops dismantled “two illegal outposts” in Qusra and a nearby village, and detained one Israeli. It said more soldiers were sent to “carry out defensive missions and patrols.”

Qusra Mayor Abdel Azim Wadi said that Israeli forces evacuated more than a dozen homes to take up positions in the village. The settlers, though removed from their outposts, remain in other parts of the village, he added.

Abu Rida said soldiers gave the occupants of all the homes 30 minutes to evacuate and move into one of the besieged houses. The military said the soldiers have been told to allow families to remain in their homes and not to operate in them, but families have not yet returned, Abu Rida said.

It's still not clear when families in the besieged area will be able to get basic supplies and what would happen to their homes. Israel’s military said the families had basic supplies like food and water when it checked in on them on Wednesday.

But Ridi said Thursday that after water and electricity lines had been reconnected, settlers cut them again.

Settler violence has surged in recent years

Netanyahu's government, the most ultranationalist and religious in Israel's history, has presided over a surge of settlement construction in the West Bank. It views the West Bank as the biblical and historical homeland of the Jewish people and is opposed to the creation of a Palestinian state.

On Thursday, members of Netanyahu's Cabinet joined in celebrating the rebuilding of a settlement elsewhere in the West Bank that had been dismantled in 2005. "The era of withdrawals and expulsions has ended. The era of construction and Zionism begins,” Defense Minister Israel Katz said at the ceremony.

During Trump's first term, he signaled broad acceptance of the settlements, which most of the international community views as illegal and an obstacle to peace. At the start of his second term, he lifted sanctions imposed by the Biden administration on settlers accused of violence.

Huckabee, a longtime supporter of the settlements, has condemned the rising violence.

“Actions by those who carried out this horrific act of terror meant to intimidate and harass this family are disgusting,” Huckabee said in his post about the events in Qusra. He said the embassy has been coordinating with the Israeli military and police.

Qusra has been a focus of settler attacks

The U.N. humanitarian office in April said it had recorded more settler attacks in Qusra than in any other West Bank community in 2026. A 25-year-old resident was shot and killed by an off-duty Israeli reservist in March, and eight others have been wounded in the attacks, according to the U.N.

Violence between settlers and Palestinians last month left two Israelis and four Palestinians dead in a nearby northern West Bank village. In the aftermath, a mosque in Qusra was set on fire and the word “revenge” was graffitied on its wall in Hebrew.

A total of 87 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli settlers and soldiers this year, according to the Palestinian Authority's Health Ministry. Israel says some were involved in terrorism, which it defines broadly to include militant attacks and rock-throwing. Palestinian authorities do not distinguish between militants and civilians when recording deaths in the conflict.

Palestinian officials have reported 1,476 attacks by Israeli settlers in 2026, including several instances in which settlers seized Palestinian homes and property.

The military says it works to maintain law and order in the territory, and Israeli Cabinet ministers have blamed the attacks on a small group of young extremists acting outside the law.

Some 2.8 million Palestinians live under Israeli military rule in the West Bank, with the Palestinian Authority exercising limited autonomy in population centers. The settlers, who now number over 560,000, are Israeli citizens. There have been no Israeli-Palestinian peace talks in over a decade.

“This is not a life that can continue this way,” said Wadi, the mayor of Qusra. “Too much pressure eventually causes an explosion.”

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This story has been updated to correct the first name of the homeowner to Loui.

___

Metz reported from Jerusalem.

The slowdown Thursday for people in the capital, Taipei, and six other cities and localities was part of the last phase of the island's annual Han Kuang exercises, military drills that began last week and aim to model a response to a possible Chinese military invasion.

Telecommunication operators slowed mobile web traffic to 256 Kbps, making it difficult to exchange anything other than texts. Usually, residents can access 5G in major cities.

Taiwan's President Lai Ching-te apologized to the public for the inconvenience, “We ask for your understanding and support, as this is a necessary drill,” he said.

Taiwan has stepped up the intensity of the Han Kuang drills, incorporating reservists and more civilians into the exercises with a focus on real-world scenarios. Previously, urban resilience drills in Taipei went largely unnoticed as they were not disruptive. For example, air raid drills in the metro station didn’t stem the flow of passengers.

This year, integrating civilians and coordinating with local governments was a key part of the exercises, according to the Taipei Times.

At a Taipei metro station Thursday afternoon, passengers waited to be released after the station's gates were shut for the simulation as part of air raid drills.

Allen Hsieh, a tourist from Hong Kong who was among the passengers who waited 30 minutes to be let out of the station, said he found the exercises to be convincing.

“The exercise did not cause me any inconvenience. I know that Taiwan needs to conduct exercises, given the current situation. I can understand that,” he said. “I did not expect it to be so real. I thought I would only receive text messages.”

Lai also visited a hospital as it simulated how to relocate its critical operations to underground facilities as part of the drills.

Taiwan is ramping up its defense exercises and purchases in response to heightened tensions with China, which claims the island as its own. China sends military planes, as well as Coast Guard ships and other vessels towards Taiwan on a daily basis and carries out large-scale military exercises from time to time.

Between Wednesday to Thursday morning, 18 Chinese warplanes and 11 navy ships operated around Taiwan, the island's Defense Ministry said.

The warning is typical of the harsh rhetoric that North Korea often deploys ahead of major U.S.-South Korean military exercises and suggests the country could conduct more missile tests in coming days. Experts say North Korea has often used its rivals' drills as a pretext to ramp up its testing activities to expand its weapons arsenals and promote public support for leader Kim Jong Un.

The U.S. and South Korean militaries are to start their major summertime Ulchi Freedom Shield exercises Monday and have described their scope as similar to past years. The allies have said the 11-day exercises are meant to strengthen their readiness against North Korean threats and reiterated that they are defensive in nature.

In a statement carried by state media Friday, North Korea’s Foreign Ministry called the U.S.-South Korean training “a rehearsal for an aggressive war” that is triggering a different level of instability in the region.

“It is our consistent principle of ensuring security to respond to a new level of a threat with a new level of a deterrent,” the statement said. North Korea “will more clearly express its stance on the enemies to cope with any threats and challenges through the responsible and decisive exercise of the right to legitimate self-defense.”

North Korea also said the drills would be of a “more serious provocative nature and dangerousness than last year” and involve all the military assets and war-fighting modes of the U.S. and South Korea, a claim that those countries haven’t said.

A U.S. military statement issued Friday said U.S. and South Korean forces will practice joint operations in complex scenarios, including a live-fire exercise to test joint precision targeting and maneuver, a wet gap crossing, and distribution of prepositioned military equipment.

North Korea's neighbors detected two ballistic missile launches off the North's east coast in the past week. North Korea hasn’t commented on the launches, but outside experts assess they were likely meant to protest the U.S.-South Korean drills or upgrade its weapons systems.

Kim has ignored the U.S. and South Korea’s offers to resume diplomacy and focused on taking steps to bolster his nuclear arsenal since his diplomacy with U.S. President Donald Trump broke down in 2019. Experts say Kim will likely eventually aim to use his advancing nuclear program to win greater U.S. concessions such as extensive sanctions relief.

North Korea has expanded cooperation with Russia in recent years by supplying troops and ammunition to support its war against Ukraine in return for economic and military assistance. North Korea has also recently pushed to deepen ties with China, its biggest trading partner.

The bridge — known as Nero's Bridge, named for the former Roman emperor — once connected Rome’s city center with the Tiber’s right bank.

“Nero is the most famous person linked to this area, because precisely in Nero’s circus, where the Vatican is now located, the Apostle Peter was martyred,” said Antonella Bonini, an archaeologist at Rome’s cultural heritage superintendency.

“However, scholars consider the bridge to be older (than Nero’s era) — built by Caligula, Nero’s uncle,” she said, adding that it existed as early as 39 AD.

The Tiber’s flow has fallen below 80 cubic meters (2,825 cubic feet) per second, about half the historic average for the month of July, according to Giovanni Giganti, coordinator of the Rome civil protection service’s center for water management.

“We are facing a major water crisis. And it is a crisis that is also due to the fact that this winter we did have quite abundant rainfall, but then the dry periods ... were quite long,” Giganti said.

It was the program’s sixth state championship — and fifth under McClure. But the 2025 title was especially sweet after Antonian had fallen in the state final each of the previous two seasons.

“A lot of people thought like it was like a rebuilding year — but all of us, we were like, ‘No, this is our year’,” said Antonian senior right side Lucy Rote.

One of the ways the Apaches finally got over the hump was through McClure’s motivational tactics.

It started with Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’” and has now shifted to scenes from the show “Ted Lasso,” where the team’s “Believe” sign originated.

“We have a lot of Ted Lasso in this gym,” said Rote. “I think it’s I think it is really inspiring, because a lot of the clips are very relevant to what we’re going through, especially last year.”

To that same tune, Antonian believes it can defend its title in 2026.

“If you’re having a bad day, it’s OK, because you still have that belief that it’s going to get better,” McClure said. “Even if you’re having a great day, there’s still that belief that it can still get better.”

The Apaches continued their winning ways, opening their season the same way they ended it in November — with a victory — defeating Davenport 3-0.

“We’re definitely meshing and becoming more friends,” said Apaches senior middle blocker Maci Cantu. ”I feel like we definitely, like, push each other to become the best version of ourselves.”

“Humble but hungry; that’s what I see with this team,” McClure said. “They’re still very humble, even though they’re reigning state champions. It was great winning, but we’re not done yet.”

Read more reporting and watch highlights and full games on the Big Game Coverage page.

They’re headed to the LLWS for the second time in the last three years. In the past, they finished the Little League World Series tournament as the fourth-best team in the world. Flash forward to now, they told KSAT how they plan on taking this program further.

“Our defense is going to be one of the best in the USA,” said Kase Yarbough, who plays shortstop for the team.

“We are a power defense team,” he added.

“We don’t crack under pressure. We exceed over pressure,” said Walker Yost, another shortstop star.

Yost also plays second and outfield.

“If we face really good players, we could probably beat them if we’re doing good.”

Head coach Greg Yost has been coaching for a decade. He knows how to win. Yost said the goal isn’t a world title. It’s making sure his team is having fun in the wins and learning from the losses.

Even being this far is something Yost is proud of.

“There’s a lot of good baseball in Texas,” said Yost.

“I do think they’re battle-tested and they’re ready to take on the United States and whatever teams we see domestically,” he added. “Just winning the regional tournament is a big win. Do I think they can have success in Williamsport? Absolutely.”

Boerne will play on Aug. 21. Their opponent is TBD.

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• Boerne heads to Little League World Series after judge dissolves temporary restraining order

The 18-year-old woman said the man rushed into the vehicle after she left it running to make the delivery in the 10000 block of Prescott Drive, according to the preliminary report.

Officers responded around 12:15 p.m., the report said, and later deployed its helicopter to locate the vehicle.

The SUV was found roughly three miles down the road in the 7200 block of Leafwood Drive, SAPD said. Police were not authorized to pursue an arrest at the time, so they said they surrounded the vehicle instead.

An 18-year-old man bailed out of the SUV and ran about a block away from police on foot, according to police at the scene. He was later detained for questioning.

The man’s identity and charges are unclear at this time.

SAPD said the investigation is ongoing.

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• San Antonio Spurs’ full 2026-27 regular season schedule release reflects resurgence in popularity

The dismissal marks the latest setback in swing states’ efforts to prosecute fake electors who tried to keep Trump in the White House after he lost to Joe Biden in 2020.

Three other fake elector cases in Arizona, Michigan and Georgia have been dismissed. Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes recently dismissed her office’s criminal case but vowed to bring it back to a grand jury in hopes of securing another indictment. The dismissal was a legal maneuver aimed at getting around a deadline for starting new grand jury proceedings after Mayes lost an appeal earlier in June.

Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford, who is also running for governor as a Democrat, brought charges relating to forgery and “offering a false instrument for filing or record” against the six Nevada Republicans, who pleaded not guilty.

His office plans to appeal the ruling.

The defendants included Michael McDonald, the chair of the Nevada Republican Party, and Jesse Law, the former chair of the Clark County Republican Party.

In a Thursday statement, McDonald’s defense attorney Richard Wright called the attorney general’s plans to appeal “hasty” and “premature” and said continuing the case was politically motivated.

After the 2020 election, the six Republican electors gathered outside of the Nevada Legislature to sign a certificate giving the state’s six electoral votes to Trump, despite Biden winning the state by more than 30,000 votes. The ceremony was broadcast online, and the video footage was used as evidence in the case.

The case has revolved around the defendants’ intent behind submitting the certificate.

Prosecutors argue the defendants intended for their documents to be mistaken for actual electoral votes that then-Vice President Mike Pence would count on Jan. 6, 2021.

The defendants say submitting the certificate was an act of “political theater” designed to publicize their concerns about the election. They were preserving their rights to challenge the official election results and had no intent to deceive a government agency into accepting the GOP certificate as real, their attorneys argued.

Nevada Judge Mary Kay Holthus agreed.

She found there was a lack of evidence that showed the electors intended to deceive government officials, and she determined that the state failed to disclose exculpatory evidence to the grand jury.

“The fact that Defendants openly announced both their actions and their asserted purpose, rather than concealing their conduct or attempting to secretly induce governmental reliance, weighs against a reasonable inference that they acted with fraudulent intent,” Holthus wrote in her ruling.

Jurisdiction had also been an issue, but the case eventually landed in Clark County, which is home to Las Vegas and leans Democratic.

The case was originally scheduled for a trial in Nevada's capital of Carson City, but the attorney general's office voluntarily dismissed the case to pursue it instead in Southern Nevada, which leans more Democratic.

Courts have dismissed similar cases in Michigan and Georgia, and a special prosecutor dropped a federal case in late 2024 that charged Trump with conspiring to overturn the 2020 election. Those cases ended after Trump defeated Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris in 2024. A fake electors case is ongoing in Wisconsin.

At the World Athletics U20 Championships last week in Eugene, Oregon, Taylor put sprinters everywhere on notice.

He won gold medals in the 100m, 200m, 4x100m races, becoming the first male to win gold in those three events at the U20 Championships.

Taylor’s 9.94 in the 100m is a personal best. His 19.83 in the 200m is a championship record. His 38.16 in the 4x100m is a U20 world record. His anchor leg time of 8.75 seconds is the stuff of legends.

KSAT 12 Sports anchor Larry Ramirez sat down with Taylor before he left San Antonio for Texas Tech to join the Red Raiders track and field program.

Read also:

• San Antonio’s Tate Taylor completes sprint double with 200-meter gold at World U20 Championships
• Harlan High School product Tate Taylor continues rapid ascension using coach’s guidance

Discussion

At 300 PM GMT (1500 UTC), the center of Post-Tropical Cyclone Cristobal was located near latitude 39.4 North, longitude 36.8 West. The post-tropical cyclone is moving toward the northeast near 16 mph (26 km/h) and this motion is expected to continue today.

Maximum sustained winds are near 30 mph (45 km/h) with higher gusts. Cristobal is expected to dissipate later tonight.

The estimated minimum central pressure is 1018 mb (30.06 inches).

Watches and Warnings

There are no coastal watches or warnings in effect.

Land Hazards

None.

The vote was 7-2, with Councilmembers Misty Spears and Marc Whyte voting against the measure.

Councilwomen Marina Alderete Gavito and Phyllis Viagran were absent from Thursday’s vote. Viagran later said she would have voted against it, citing concerns over the speed of the election process.

The proposal would continue the ⅛ cent sales tax dedicated to Pre-K 4 SA for another 20 years. The current authorization was approved by voters in 2020 and runs through June 2029. Voters first approved the dedicated tax in 2012.

The 20-year proposal is the longest funding authorization Pre-K 4 SA has sought. Previous authorizations have been eight years at a time.

District 2 Councilman Jalen McKee-Rodriguez, a former educator, has been one of the proposal’s strongest advocates.

He said the current eight-year funding structure doesn’t give the program enough financial certainty to make major long-term investments.

“The problem with the 8 years is that an 8-year authorization, is that it doesn’t leave a lot of financial stability or certainty for financial institutions,” said the councilman.

McKee-Rodriguez added that certainty could allow Pre-K 4 SA to make larger investments in its facilities and programs and ultimately expand access to more San Antonio families.

Other city leaders who support Pre-K 4 SA believe the longer authorization could help the program address changing community needs, including expanding infant and toddler care, growing Pre-K 3 sites, strengthening partnerships with childcare providers and supporting the early-childhood workforce.

McKee-Rodriguez also argued that families are struggling with the cost of childcare, making access to affordable early childhood education an economic issue as well as an educational one.

He said the long-term commitment could give families and the program more certainty.

He pushed back on concerns about locking in funding for 20 years, arguing that voters and future leaders would still have options.

“Even though this is reauthorizing Pre-K for SA for 20 years, there’s always the power of the vote,” said McKee-Rodriguez. “And in 10, 15 years, we find that the program is not necessary, or it’s achieved all of its goals, we can then begin to transition out of that.”

The program’s Chief Executive Officer, Sarah Baray, told City Council on Thursday the program has directly served more than 14,000 students at its own centers and supports an additional 13,000 children through 119 local schools and child development centers.

The first cohort of the program, which started in 2013, had roughly 650 4-year-olds who are now beginning their senior year of high school.

The program now operates four education centers and serves about 2,000 students each year. It has also expanded beyond its traditional focus on 3- and 4-year-olds, recently adding infant and toddler classrooms at its South Education Center. That expansion comes as demand for childcare remains high.

Spears, who represents District 9, said her vote was not a rejection of Pre-K 4 SA itself. Her concern is the length and timing of the proposed funding commitment and whether the city has enough information about how the money would be spent over 20 years.

“They were asking for funding without producing a strategic plan for how they would use the extension or reauthorization that would go for 20 years,” Spears told KSAT.

She added she wants to see a clear plan before asking taxpayers to commit to the funding for two decades. She also questioned how the needs of education and San Antonio families could change over that amount of time.

“You need to be able to make sure what you’re doing is effective and where you want to continue spending that taxpayer money,” Spears said.

Her concerns were echoed by Whyte, who also voted against putting the measure on the ballot. He shared Spears’ concerns about the length of the proposed tax commitment and the lack of details about how the additional funding would be used, factors that ultimately swayed his vote.

One of the biggest questions surrounding Thursday’s vote is why voters are being asked to make the decision now when the current authorization doesn’t expire until 2029. Some argue waiting would make long-term planning more difficult.

McKee-Rodriguez told KSAT that Pre-K 4 SA currently leases two of its four education centers and would like to eventually move into buildings it owns. He reiterated that a 20-year funding horizon could make those kinds of investments more financially realistic.

However, those on the opposite end said that reason is precisely why voters need more information before committing to 20 years of funding.

For families, supporters say the long-term investment could mean more access to early childhood education and childcare. For taxpayers, the decision represents a commitment to continue dedicating a portion of local sales-tax revenue to the program for two decades.

City Council has until Monday to officially order the November election. They will discuss further details of the program again on Sept. 1.

After that, San Antonio voters will decide on Nov. 3 whether to approve the 20-year Pre-K 4 SA funding reauthorization.

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• Tax increase part of San Antonio’s $4.4B draft budget

The document states Angel Jacinta Hernandez, 31, was wanted since June 29 on two counts of aggravated robbery, a first-degree felony. She additionally faces a charge of failure to identify fugitive from justice by refusing or giving false information, a Class-B misdemeanor.

On June 14, Hernandez and several other people allegedly approached two people wearing Knicks clothing as they walked in the 600 block of Market Street the night after their team beat the San Antonio Spurs to win the NBA Finals, according to the affidavit.

Details in the document describe Hernandez, with a knife in hand, demanding the Knicks fans to surrender their clothing.

The affidavit said Hernandez and the group she was with allegedly assaulted the New York fans and robbed them of their merchandise.

Among the group was Abcdee Rodriguez, 30, who was arrested weeks later on the same felony charges as Hernandez.

The assaulted pair snapped a photo of the vehicle Hernandez was in before she fled from the scene. The San Antonio Police Department said that information helped narrow down potential suspects.

On June 29, the pair selected Hernandez in a lineup of potential suspect photos, the affidavit said.

SAPD took Hernandez into custody Wednesday night and booked her into the Bexar County Adult Detention Center just after midnight Thursday. Her bond is set at $172,500, jail records show.

Read also:

• Affidavit: South Side woman accused of robbing two Knicks fans at knifepoint after NBA Finals game
• Knicks fan says father was ‘lying in a pool of his own blood’ after assault outside River Walk hotel
• ‘An unprovoked attack’: Knicks fan assaulted after NBA Finals in San Antonio speaks out for first time

The Tennessee man was executed for killing a motel maid in 1985 and the Oklahoma man for killing his girlfriend in 2003. In Alabama, a man was put to death for killing a 5-year-old girl he had offered to pay her mother to abuse.

Having three executions in one day was a coincidence in scheduling, but reflected a trend of increased executions in the U.S. Eleven states executed a total of 47 people in 2025, the highest number since 2009. With Thursday's injections, 22 executions have been carried out this year in the U.S. with nearly a dozen more scheduled.

The last time three executions were carried out on the same day was on Jan. 7, 2010, when Louisiana, Ohio and Texas put inmates to death. Three executions were scheduled on the same day in 2018, but only one went forward after a Texas man was reprieved and Alabama prison officials had problems with the IV line.

Florida executed two men the same day in July and has executed 31 overall since the start of 2025.

Oklahoma prisoner said he regretted killing his girlfriend

Carlos Cuesta-Rodriguez, 70, received an injection at the state penitentiary in McAlester in Oklahoma's third execution this year.

Cuesta-Rodriguez turned his head toward two relatives watching and mouthed “I love you” but had no last statement. He was declared dead at 10:13 a.m. after several minutes of labored breathing.

Convicted of murdering his girlfriend at their Oklahoma City home in 2003, Cuesta-Rodriguez had said he regretted killing Olimpia Fisher and told a board he didn’t want clemency. Fisher, 43, planned to leave Cuesta-Rodriguez when he shot her.

Fisher’s daughters, Cinthya Allen and Katya Wallis, said in a statement they hoped the execution brings awareness to preventing domestic violence, adding they are “raising our families to reflect the love and faith in God that she taught us.”

Tennessee man challenged execution after previous one was halted

Anthony Darrell Hines was executed in Tennessee for the 1985 stabbing death of Catherine Jean Jenkins, 54, as she worked as a motel maid in Kingston Springs.

Hines said “not right now, thank you” when asked if he had final words, then said, “Tell my son hello."

Hines' son witnessed the execution. He reconnected with his father four days earlier after not seeing him since he was 3 years old.

Minutes after the execution chamber curtain opened, Hines asked his spiritual adviser: “How long do I have?” Soon afterward, witnesses heard groans and heavy breathing while the adviser put her hands on his shoulders and prayed. Hines was pronounced dead at 10:43 a.m.

Afterward, Jenkins’ son said his mother had only a plastic spray bottle to defend against Hines' knife.

“I hope he felt severe pain because what he did to my mother is nothing compared to what he may have just gone through,” Dennis Jenkins said.

Hines' execution comes three months after another man's attempted lethal injection was stopped after medical staff couldn’t establish a backup IV line for over an hour.

Hines, 66, appealed unsuccessfully, saying the doctor who oversaw the May execution was unqualified and likely to botch his execution as well.

Alabama man asked to be executed swiftly

Alabama executed Jeremy Williams for the 2021 rape and murder of the young Georgia girl.

“I want to thank God for forgiving me for my sins so I can meet him in peace,” Williams said on the gurney. He rocked his head back and forth, smiled and appeared to sing or speak before becoming still. A member of his family cried quietly throughout, and Williams was pronounced dead at 6:16 p.m.

Williams, who pleaded guilty to killing Kamarie Holland, had written the Alabama attorney general’s office seeking an immediate execution date so his victim’s family “may have some type of closure.”

The 42-year-old raped and strangled Holland after offering her mother $2,500 for the child to perform a sex act, prosecutors said, adding he filmed his attack.

“The unspeakable nature of this crime is exactly why we have the death penalty statute,” Gov. Kay Ivey said in a statement afterward.

The mother is serving a 20-year prison sentence after pleading guilty to sex trafficking.

Russell County District Attorney Richard Chancey described Kamarie’s final moments as “horrific.”

"That baby didn’t die in peace,” he said at a later news conference, recalling Williams' last words about dying in peace.

Russell County Sheriff Heath Taylor, who called the case the worst he'd investigated in 39 years of law enforcement, said he believed Williams sought swift execution over worries about how he would be treated in prison.

"He didn’t want to look over his shoulder for 30 years, in my opinion,” Taylor said.

It was Alabama’s first execution this year. A nitrogen gas execution was blocked in June after a federal judge ruled the method unconstitutional.

Williams also was a suspect in the 2005 death of his infant daughter in Alaska, but charges weren't filed until 2022.

Corey Holland, Kamarie’s father, had said she was an exuberant child who loved princesses and made people laugh.

“She loved playing dress-up, all her little Halloween costumes and her princess stuff I got her,” he said.

___

This story has been revised to correct that the Alabama man offered to pay the mother, but didn't actually do so. It also was updated to correct the name of the Russell County Sheriff. He is Heath Taylor, not Heather Taylor.

___

Associated Press writers Jeffrey Collins and Hallie Golden contributed.

The use of uncertified teachers comes as districts across Texas struggle to fill classrooms.

As part of KSAT Investigates’ “Dangerous Lessons” investigation earlier this year, we found Texas lost over 4,600 teachers between the 2023-24 and 2024-25 school years.

That shortage forced districts to compete for a limited pool of certified educators, particularly in hard-to-fill subjects.

“We’re all competing for that one or two math teachers amongst 15 or 16 districts,” South San Antonio ISD Superintendent Saul Hinojosa said.

South San ISD is among the districts that hired uncertified teachers, but Hinojosa said the district spent the past several years working to reduce that number.

“If we were to go to a doctor’s office, I don’t think anybody would be wanting to be operated on by a physician who doesn’t have that credential,” Hinojosa said.

Since the district has worked to decrease the number of uncertified teachers in classrooms, Hinojosa said the district has already seen improvements in subjects such as reading and math.

“We have already seen the impact of having better qualified staff this past year,” Hinojosa said. “It means that we’re on the right track. It means we’re making the right decisions.”

Requirements for Texas teacher certification

There are five requirements to become a certified teacher in Texas, according to the Texas Education Agency.

• Obtain a Bachelor’s Degree 
• Complete an educator preparation program 
• Pass certification exams
• Submit a state application after all requirements are met
• Complete fingerprinting and national background check

Where are uncertified teachers working?

The numbers show uncertified teachers made up about 3% of the more than 127,000 people who taught in Bexar County during the school year.

Data shows the reliance on uncertified teachers varied significantly from district to district.

Edgewood ISD had the highest rate of uncertified teachers in Bexar County during the last school year, with about one out of every five teachers lacking a state certification.

“We’ve been taking lots of measures to be proactive about it, but it’s nothing we didn’t foresee happening,” Edgewood ISD Superintendent Dr. Eduardo Hernandez said.

Hernandez said the district’s focus is on ensuring students still have quality educators in their classrooms.

“My attitude towards it is we still need a quality teacher in every classroom,” Hernandez said, “so how do we develop from within and then, of course, attract and retain teachers as usual.”

The use of uncertified teachers comes as districts across Texas struggle to fill classrooms.

Uncertified teachers lead to learning loss, research shows

Jacob Kirksey, an associate professor of education policy at Texas Tech University, has spent years researching the impact of uncertified teachers on Texas students.

“My research shows, on average, it links to learning loss of about three months in math and four months in reading for students,” Kirksey said.

He also raised concerns about what the increasing use of uncertified teachers could mean for the profession.

“If we legitimize the hiring of uncertified teachers,” Kirksey said, “what we’re doing is we’re essentially saying that just anyone from off the street can go in and lead a classroom of kids.”

“Is there a place in Texas schools for uncertified teachers?” asked KSAT Investigates reporter Daniela Ibarra.

“Yes, there is a place in Texas schools for uncertified teachers, but it is not in elementary classrooms,” said Kirksey. “It is not special education classrooms. It is not in kindergarten classrooms.”

Parents divided over uncertified teachers

KSAT asked viewers on social media to share their experiences with uncertified teachers and received hundreds of responses.

Some parents said they appreciate people who are willing to step into classrooms amid the teacher shortage, but believe educators teaching core subjects should be certified.

“I appreciate those willing to step into the classroom, but I believe educators teaching core subjects like math and science--especially in STEM schools-- should be certified,” commented Michele Rosales Resurez, who shared that her own daughter had an uncertified math teacher in middle school.

“To [the teacher’s] credit, my daughter liked the teacher,” Rosales Resurez added, “but many students struggled to meet expectations, likely due in part to the lack of consistency.”

Other parents defended the practice.

“A certification doesn’t define the teacher’s ability to teach,” commented Kirstin Butterworth. “Some ‘uncertified’ teachers even have higher test scores than seasoned ‘certified’ teachers.”

New certification requirements take effect

Texas law requires those teaching core classes to be certified by the start of the 2029-30 school year.

Starting this school year, Texas requires K-5 teachers who teach reading or math to be certified, unless their school district received an extension.

KSAT Investigates checked the state data and found that more than half of the school districts with schools in Bexar County received an extension.

• Boerne ISD
• Comal ISD
• East Central ISD
• Edgewood ISD
• Judson ISD
• Northside ISD
• San Antonio ISD
• Schertz-Cibolo-Universal City ISD
• Somerset ISD
• South San Antonio ISD
• Southwest ISD

Read more reporting on the KSAT Investigates page.

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

Yemeni soldier killed in clashes with Houthis

At least one government soldier was killed and another critically wounded in clashes with the Houthis in the mountainous province of Taiz, Yemeni military officials told The Associated Press.

The fighting came as part of a spate of recent Houthi attacks on government-held areas across the country. Dozens of government troops have been killed since last week, the Yemeni military said.

The Houthis also said they launched another drone attack on an Aramco oil refinery in Saudi Arabia. Saudi officials did not immediately comment on the reported attack in the city of Jazan. Last weekend, the Houthis fired drones at the refinery, where the Saudi Energy Ministry reported a fire but no casualties.

Last month, the Houthis announced a blockade of Saudi shipping, threatening another key trade route in the region.

US carrier heads toward Middle East after issues reported on long-deployed USS Lincoln

The Pacific-based aircraft carrier USS George Washington has begun heading toward the Middle East as reports have emerged of mental health and supply issues aboard the long-deployed USS Abraham Lincoln.

The Lincoln has been supporting the U.S. war against Iran, and its deployment has included a record-setting uninterrupted time at sea of more than 260 days.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told reporters on Thursday that reports of trouble on the carrier were “completely misrepresented.”

Speaking during a trip to Panama, he said the U.S. military could maintain the blockade of Iranian ports indefinitely, “because we’ll rotate ships in and out, as we have and we’ll continue to.”

The USS George Washington left port in Da Nang, Vietnam, last week, a Navy statement said. The carrier, along with a cruiser and a destroyer, have since been spotted crossing the Singapore Strait.

A Navy official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to detail sensitive ship details, confirmed that the Washington was in the Strait of Malacca, which links the Pacific and Indian oceans and puts the carrier on a course to head into the Indian Ocean. The Wall Street Journal reported earlier that the Washington would replace the Lincoln as one of the two aircraft carriers now stationed in the Middle East.

The move would leave the waters of the Pacific without a U.S. carrier presence for an unknown period of time.

— Konstantin Toropin in Washington

Peace laureate calls for UN pressure to resolve Yemen conflict

Hans Grundberg, the U.N. special envoy for Yemen, told the U.N. Security Council in a video briefing Thursday that Yemen is at greater risk of returning to large-scale conflict than at any time since a 2022 truce paused the fighting.

Yemen faces “catastrophe” from rising hunger and from health services crumbling amid the fighting, said U.N. humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher. He said 6 million people in Yemen face emergency levels of food insecurity bordering on famine, “the highest number globally.”

Yemeni Nobel peace laureate Tawakkol Karman told reporters outside the chamber that Houthi rebels bear the primary responsibility for the “collapse of the state” in her home country.

But the human rights campaigner also blamed Iran for backing the Houthis, Saudi Arabia for its intervention on behalf of the government ousted by the Houthis, the United Arab Emirates for its involvement in the conflict and the international community for its failure to do enough to protect civilians.

Karman was invited to brief the U.N. Security Council as an independent civil society voice on Yemen, but was blocked from speaking because of “strong opposition,” Danish Deputy Ambassador Sandra Jensen Landi said. Instead, Karman spoke to reporters outside the council chamber.

Iran and Oman working to clean oil spills off their coasts

Oil spills spreading off the coasts of Iran and Oman are raising concerns about environmental damage as oil shipments have come under fire in the Iran war.

Iran said Thursday it's working to clean up an oil spill off Qeshm Island in the Strait of Hormuz. Images distributed by Iran’s semiofficial news agency ISNA showed oil fouling the island's beaches.

While Iran hasn't said what caused the spill, the firm TankerTrackers.com says it appears to have started with an Iranian attack on a bulk carrier off Oman. Iran has repeatedly attacked shipping in the strait since the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran on Feb. 28.

Oman is responding to another spill in the Arabian Sea, coming from a tanker grounded off its southern coast. The tanker Caroline Bezengi — a sanctioned vessel believed to be part of Russia’s “shadow fleet” — has been grounded since reporting an explosion in June. No party has claimed responsibility and the cause is unknown.

A British maritime risk and response company said Thursday it has been hired to salvage the tanker and stop the oil leak off Oman. Oil from the ship has been spreading for weeks, reaching shores hundreds of kilometers (miles) north of the vessel.

JD Vance says Iran war will end with US in stronger position

Vice President JD Vance appeared to be lowering expectations for the Strait of Hormuz to return to the way it was before the war. He predicted in an interview on Fox News Channel that the war will end with the U.S. in a stronger position, with Iran not having a nuclear weapon, and with the Strait of Hormuz “returned to a place where oil and gas prices are stable for the American people.”

He did not say anything about the strait being open and toll-free for transiting ships, as he had in the past.

Vance’s comments also seemed to suggest that the administration was more acutely focused on the economic impact of the war than the original aims of the war itself.

“That’s goal number one: keep oil and gas cheap for Americans all over our country,” he said.

The second goal, according to Vance, is to ensure that Iran will never get a nuclear weapon.

Kushner will head to Middle East for talks on Gaza

President Donald Trump’s son-in-law and negotiator Jared Kushner will travel to the Middle East next week to try to advance plans for an end to the conflict in Gaza after a deal recently announced by the Trump administration ran into Israeli opposition.

An official with the Board of Peace, the body Trump established to oversee the fragile ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war, said Kushner, board high representative Nickolay Mladenov, and executive board member and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair would arrive in Israel on Sunday.

The group will then travel to Cairo, where meetings of a Palestinian technocratic group set to assume control of Gaza under a U.S.-brokered ceasefire deal have been taking place for the past several months, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because planning for details of the trip has not yet been finalized,

The trip was reported earlier by Axios.

— Matthew Lee in Washington

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Click here for full AP coverage on developments in the West Bank.

The call for quiet was part of last-ditch efforts to find anyone else alive in the aftermath of the 7.4 magnitude quake that struck the South American country Monday, killing more than 280 people and leaving hundreds more missing.

“Unfortunately, we are reaching a point where the probability of finding survivors is dwindling,” said David Santiago Tamayo, director of the National Unit for Disaster Risk Management, in a press conference Thursday night. “But the mission is to never stop searching and find all those reported missing.”

Aid agencies consider the first two to three days after a quake to be the prime window for retrieving survivors. People trapped in debris can live longer if they have access to food and water.

The death toll rose Thursday to 281, authorities said, with another 348 people rescued.

As time runs out, rescuers, families and volunteers across the country continue to hold on to hope.

“There might be two more people alive here, and I’m hopeful,” rescuer Daiana Rojas told The Associated Press. “We have been hearing sounds since 2:30 a.m., so our hope remains.”

Rojas and her family were unharmed by the quake, the most powerful to hit Colombia in this century. She has been volunteering to help search for survivors in Cali, one of the most heavily damaged cities, along with Pereira, Manizales and Quibdó.

“I thought that was going to be my last moment alive,” she said, recalling the terror of the quake. “Seeing this situation in my city breaks my heart.”

Rojas has witnessed two people being pulled alive from the debris, as well as the recovery of bodies.

“They are not a relative or a friend of mine, but it feels as they were,” she said of the survivors who have been found. “Whenever rescuers ask for silence, everyone stays still and tries not to move, speak or whisper. But when signs of life are found, all the teams start to applaud.”

Critical hours

The devastation has tested Colombia’s new President Abelardo de la Espriella and his government as they scramble to respond while aid groups seek to help the hardest-hit communities.

“The situation is complex, but we are using all our capacity and the capacity that has come from other countries,” de la Espriella said.

The president added nearly 400 people remain missing, though civilian-run databases put the number at more than 4,200. More than 3,900 people were reported injured, while nearly 10,600 homes were destroyed and more than 65,800 damaged. In total, more than 44,900 families have been affected, he said.

Authorities recognize that the rescue effort has entered a grim phase as search teams begin shifting toward recovering bodies. But as the government moves forward with plans to help those affected and rebuild the country, finding potential survivors remains a priority. “Our priority is saving lives,” de la Espriella said. “These are human beings who are trapped under the rubble.”

In other developments, a 4.2 magnitude aftershock struck Thursday in San José del Palmar, in the Chocó region — the epicenter of the earthquake. More than 160 aftershocks have rocked the country, according to the Colombian Geological Survey.

“We’re pretty shaken up, but we’re in good spirits. We can see everyone working hard to get through this very complex situation,” volunteer helper Jairo Galán said in Cali, where food and donation centers were set up.

Colombia, with a population of 54 million people, experiences an average of 2,500 earthquakes each month, most of them small. That's equivalent to about 80 tremors per day, according to the geological survey.

More international aid arrives

Meanwhile, international aid continues to arrive.

Speaking to reporters in Quibdó, in the Chocó region, Colombian Vice President José Manuel Restrepo said rescuers had concluded the search for survivors and bodies in the area and would now shift their focus to the “humanitarian phase.”

The region has received some 7 tons of humanitarian aid, with another 10 tons expected to arrive late Thursday night. An additional 20 tons of supplies are expected to arrive on Friday. “That’s almost 40 tons of humanitarian aid, containing everything people will need at this moment,” Restrepo said.

Earlier today, a group of rescuers from the Los Angeles County Fire Department arrived to help with search efforts and structural engineering assessments. Other countries, including Peru, El Salvador, Mexico and Brazil, have also offered assistance.

De la Espriella announced on X that Colombia will receive a $10 million donation from the United Arab Emirates.

The Chinese ambassador to Colombia said China will provide $1 million in financial aid and more than $2 million in humanitarian assistance.

The South American Football Confederation and the Colombian Football Federation also jointly announced a $1 million donation to support reconstruction efforts.

“Soccer transcends the pitch and remains close to its people, especially in the most difficult times,” they said in a statement.

The Colombia disaster unfolded less than two months after neighboring Venezuela endured back-to-back earthquakes. The contrast between the two countries' responses was stark.

In Venezuela, acting President Delcy Rodríguez waited nearly four hours before addressing the nation. In Colombia, de la Espriella announced an emergency command post to oversee rescue efforts barely an hour after the earthquake. For weeks, Venezuelan civilians were clawing through rubble by hand. Hours after the earthquake in Colombia, rescue teams were searching for survivors with cranes and excavators.

The contrast was a reminder of the differences between the nations — their political systems, resources and the strength of their institutions — and a demonstration of how those can take on life-or-death importance.

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Suarez reported from Bogota, Colombia. Batschke reported from Santiago, Chile.

“A People’s History: The American Experiment on Stage” examines how theater artists have interpreted major moments in the nation’s history, from the fight for women’s suffrage to the Vietnam War and its protests.

“It’s this wonderful exhibition looking at how different artists have processed American history and how they have put it on stage,” said Remus Moore, assistant curator for the McNay’s Tobin Collection of Theatre Arts.

The 900-square-foot exhibition is organized around the ideals of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness found in the Declaration of Independence.

Moore said the exhibit gives visitors a chance to consider both the past 250 years and what the country’s next 250 years could look like.

Among the works on display is material connected to “The Contrast,” a 1787 production Moore described as the first play written and produced by Americans on an American stage after the country gained independence.

Visitors will also find “Uncle Fatso,” a larger-than-life puppet from Bread and Puppet Theater in Vermont, a group known for using theater and puppetry to protest the Vietnam War, nuclear weapons and other issues.

Other highlights include a large portrait of actor Marlon Brando and paper cutout designs by artist Robert Indiana for “The Mother of Us All,” an opera exploring the women’s suffrage movement.

Moore said the variety of works reflects both the diversity of theatrical art and the complexity of American history.

“I hope people just really appreciate the vast array of artwork,” he said.

“A People’s History: The American Experiment on Stage” remains on view at the McNay Art Museum through early November.

More America250 coverage on KSAT:

• San Antonio veterans were on front lines of fight to repeal Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell
• San Antonio exhibit highlights rancheras’ overlooked role in the American Revolution

A Louisiana grand jury in June declined to indict Christopher Gillum on a state terrorism charge that could have carried up to a 15-year sentence, court records show.

Gillum, who had been held without bond, was released shortly after the grand jury’s decision and is not facing charges in any other jurisdictions, according to his attorney, Dylan Utley. He declined to comment further.

Gillum's release has not previously been reported.

The 45-year-old ex-police officer, who is from Chapel Hill, North Carolina, had been arrested in Florida in April with hundreds of rounds of ammunition and a handgun while on his way to Louisiana to commit a mass shooting, according to the Okaloosa County Sheriff’s Office. The investigation had involved the FBI and authorities across Louisiana, North Carolina and Florida.

Authorities did not name the event Gillum was allegedly targeting, but his arrest came on the eve of the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, which attracts hundreds of thousands of festivalgoers annually.

Gillum, who is white, had “expressed recent threats to harm ‘Black people’ ”, according to authorities. His family had reported him missing in North Carolina and said he had a history of self-harm.

Lester Duhe, a spokesperson for Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill, said in a statement that Gillum’s family had taken him “to a treatment facility out of the state” and that he is not facing additional criminal charges.

Duhe said there were “several jurisdictional issues” that complicated the case after Gillum was extradited to Louisiana following his arrest.

“The threat relayed to a family member actually occurred in North Carolina,” Duhe said. “The defendant never entered the State of Louisiana until after his arrest.”

Gillum had been planning to travel to the Florida Keys “during the same period he would have been suspected to travel to Louisiana,” Duhe added.

Gillum was charged under a Louisiana statute for the crime of “terrorizing,” which requires that “a crime of violence is imminent or in progress or that a circumstance dangerous to human life exists or is about to exist.”

Jonathan Guidry, the foreperson for the grand jury, declined to comment on the decision to not indict Gillum.

Katherine Schweit, a former Chicago prosecutor and FBI executive who ran the agency’s active shooter program, said that thwarted acts of mass violence do not always lead to indictments, but prosecutors often seek an array of criminal charges when possible.

“It’s very difficult to convince a jury, or to convince a grand jury, that something might have happened,” Schweit told The Associated Press.

Law enforcement authorities in North Carolina, where Louisiana court records list Gillum as residing, told the AP that they were not aware he had been released from custody.

“If we’ve got an individual that was accused of such an action, we would want to know if in fact he did return to Alamance County,” said Byron Tucker, a spokesperson for the Alamance County Sheriff’s Office in North Carolina.

Nazneen Ahmed, a spokesperson for North Carolina Attorney General Jeff Jackson, said their office is not involved and that criminal prosecution authority in the state generally belongs to local district attorneys.

The office of the Florida Attorney General did not respond to a request for comment about whether Gillum may face additional criminal charges in its jurisdiction. The U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Eastern District of Louisiana also did not return messages seeking comment.

In a statement, the FBI New Orleans office said the decision whether to charge Gillum rested with prosecutors.

The New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival declined to comment.

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This story was first published on Aug. 12, 2026. It was updated on Aug. 13, 2026, to correct that Nazneen Ahmed, a spokesperson for North Carolina’s attorney general, said their office is not involved in legal proceedings surrounding Christopher Gillum and that criminal prosecution authority in the state generally belongs to local district attorneys, not that there are no plans for the state to pursue charges.

___

Brook 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.

An official with the Board of Peace, the body Trump established to oversee the fragile ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war, said Kushner, board high representative Nickolay Mladenov, and executive board member and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair would arrive in Israel on Sunday.

The group will then travel to Cairo, where meetings of a Palestinian technocratic group set to assume control of Gaza under a U.S.-brokered ceasefire deal have been taking place for the past several months, the official said. The trip was reported earlier by Axios.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because planning for details of the trip has not yet been finalized, said the meetings would demonstrate the determination of Trump and the Board of Peace to “see peace, prosperity and sustainable security emerge” in a demilitarized Gaza where Hamas has ceded control to allow reconstruction of the devastated territory.

But Israel has dismissed a recent deal announced by Trump for Hamas to disarm and Israel to withdraw its forces from the Palestinian territory, marking a rare public display of friction with the Trump administration. Though Hamas accepted the plan to decommission its weapons, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in recent days that Israel would not withdraw until Hamas has completely disarmed.

The deal had been seen as a potential breakthrough for ending the war in Gaza. The agreement was based on an October ceasefire that ended major military operations and brought about the release of the remaining hostages held in Gaza, but it has stalled on other fronts.

The Lincoln has been supporting the U.S. war against Iran, and its deployment has included a record-setting uninterrupted time at sea of more than 260 days. Several Democratic lawmakers are pressing for accountability from the Pentagon over conditions aboard the carrier, which Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Thursday said were “completely misrepresented.”

Extended deployments of carriers during the Iran conflict have raised concerns about the impact on service members who are away from home for long periods as well as the increasing strain on the ship and its equipment. While renewed hostilities between the U.S. and Iran have calmed in recent weeks, the Navy has reimposed a blockade on Iranian ports in the crucial Strait of Hormuz, and the Trump administration has offered no clarity on how it intends to wind down the war.

Hegseth told reporters that the U.S. can maintain the blockade “indefinitely.”

A new aircraft carrier is heading west from the Asia-Pacific

The USS George Washington left port in Da Nang, Vietnam, last week, a Navy statement said. The carrier, along with a cruiser and a destroyer, have since been spotted crossing the Singapore Strait.

A Navy official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to detail sensitive ship details, confirmed that the Washington was in the Strait of Malacca, which links the Pacific and Indian oceans and puts the carrier on a course to head into the Indian Ocean. The Wall Street Journal reported earlier that the Washington would replace the Lincoln as one of the two aircraft carriers now stationed in the Middle East.

The move would leave the waters of the Pacific without a U.S. carrier presence for an unknown period of time. The Trump administration sees China, the dominant power in the region, as “a settled force” that only needs to be deterred from dominating the U.S. or its allies and not the top global adversary that it was under the Biden administration.

The Lincoln originally deployed Nov. 21 from San Diego, and it arrived in the Middle East in January, ahead of the launch of the Iran war on Feb. 28. The Navy conceded that the conflict created a “highly contested environment where traditional supply hubs in the Middle East were disrupted by combat actions.” That, in turn, led to shortages and loss of mail aboard the aircraft carrier, the Navy said in a statement.

“Leadership prioritized mission-critical supplies: first food, then hygiene items, then mail,” the statement said, before assuring that sailors aboard the ship now have access to clean water and “healthy meal options.”

Democrats call for scrutiny, while the Pentagon defends conditions aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln

Democratic lawmakers are calling for investigations, more information and greater visibility into conditions aboard the ship, which was originally set to return home in May.

“The Lincoln’s prolonged deployment is especially significant because it is occurring in the context of continuing military operations against Iran and the possibility that substantial US naval forces will be required in the region for an extended period,” Connecticut Sen. Richard Blumenthal, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, wrote in a letter to Navy leadership asking for a response to several questions.

Arizona Sen. Ruben Gallego, a Marine Corps veteran, said on social media that he is looking to take a bipartisan delegation on an official oversight visit to the ship and that the way sailors are being treated is “not just disgusting; it’s dangerous.”

Hegseth told reporters during ​a visit to Panama that he wants the Lincoln's sailors home and crews rotated as quickly as possible but pushed back against reports of problems aboard.

“We make sure that every ship, every crew, every captain has everything we can provide them at every single moment. Some deployments are longer than others, and ​I have more respect and gratitude for those sailors than ​anybody. What they do in those high seas in those austere ⁠conditions with less port calls — it’s incredible.”

Navy leaders, including acting Secretary Hung Cao, last week held a tense town hall for families of troops aboard the USS Lincoln, at which the commanders of the Navy’s air and surface forces promised to do everything they could to relieve the aircraft carrier. MS NOW reported earlier on the meeting.

When reports of food shortages aboard the ship first surfaced in April, the Navy pushed back, calling those reports “false.”

Reports of mental health concerns and more aboard the ship

Reports have since emerged that sailors on the Lincoln are struggling with mental health concerns. The Navy said in its statement that it has “not observed an increase in suicidal ideations or attempts aboard the ship,” but officials declined to provide data, citing operational security and patient privacy concerns.

The Navy official said that a sailor aboard the Lincoln went overboard in early August but that the person was quickly recovered, treated by the ship’s medical department and transferred off ship for follow-on care. The official would not say if it was being considered a suicide attempt.

U.S. Central Command, which oversees military operations in the Middle East, pushed back on reports about poor conditions.

“The Sailors and Marines of the Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group remain resilient and resolved after more than 260 days at sea, 10,000 aircraft flights, and 1.5 million pounds of ordnance expended,” the command said on social media.

Other carriers also have had long runs that have raised concerns about morale. The USS Gerald R. Ford returned home in mid-May after an 11-month deployment, the longest since the Vietnam War, during which it supported the U.S. war with Iran and the capture of Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro.

During its deployment, the Ford experienced a fire in a laundry space that forced the carrier to turn around and return to the Mediterranean Sea for repairs and left hundreds of sailors without places to sleep.

Concerns about the demands of battle and the dangers of overextending ships and their crew predate the Iran war, with a number of mishaps on ships battling Houthi rebels in Yemen in 2024 and 2025, including the aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman on a longer-than-expected deployment.

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Associated Press writer Ben Finley contributed to this report.

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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.

The new mandate would likely cost billions of dollars and revert the Navy’s most advanced ships to a system that takes more sailors to operate and is more difficult to maintain.

The memo directs the Pentagon and the Navy to present Trump with plans to remove the Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System, also known as EMALS, within two months. It also says the Ford-class carrier's electromagnetic weapons elevators should be replaced.

The move comes after years of Trump railing against the new, magnetically powered catapult system that shoots fighter jets off the deck of the carriers. It also comes at a time when the U.S. military is trying to find funding from Congress for all its desired equipment and as the Navy is struggling to fill its ships with enough sailors.

Trump's ire with the new technology goes back to at least 2017 in his first term, when he claimed the new system is “not good” and “doesn't have the power” of the older, steam systems in an interview with Time magazine.

“You're going to goddamned steam,” Trump said at the time. The topic has frequently come up since then at rallies and other events.

While Trump is looking to roll back the latest technology, the newest Chinese aircraft carriers employ electromagnetic catapults and France said it plans to use the system on its new carrier.

Trump's memo directs the fourth Ford-class carrier, the USS Doris Miller, to be the first ship to include the new changes. That will leave the USS Gerald R. Ford, as well as the forthcoming USS John F. Kennedy and USS Enterprise, untouched.

However, redesigning an already finalized ship for such a major system change will not be an easy task.

General Atomics, the company that makes EMALS, told The Associated Press in an email that the decision not to proceed with the system on the USS Doris Miller “warrants careful reconsideration.”

Trump's memo that mandates the removal of the system also noted that one of the issues facing shipbuilding is the Navy's constant design changes, “which have resulted in cost growth, delays, and cancellations.”

General Atomics said the work on the Doris Miller's catapults and arresting gear was already halfway complete and said “changing course now would introduce significant cost, schedule, and integration risks."

The move comes as Congress will weigh the necessary budget and funding bills that the Trump administration has said they need to fund the Pentagon and the Iran war.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth estimated last month that the war's cost grew to $37.5 billion as Republicans prepared a $95 billion package to fund the military, along with other White House priorities.

Hegseth said the supplemental war funding is an “urgent, necessary” injection of money, and with Trump's proposed $1.5 trillion defense budget a generational investment in the military.

The House narrowly adopted both but the Senate still must act when it returns in September.

Some of the key advantages to the electromagnetic system are its ability to launch aircraft at faster speeds while being easier to maintain, requiring fewer sailors to operate and using less space aboard the ship.

EMALS aboard the USS Ford cut the number of sailors need to operate the catapults from about a dozen to two.

Reverting to a system that requires more people to operate it comes as the Navy has struggled to translate its recruiting successes in the past year to actually filling jobs on warships. At the start of the year, the Navy had about 20,000 unfilled posts across the fleet.

In February, the Navy touted the system in a press release that said it allowed the USS Ford to launch and recover aircraft at a higher rate than its predecessor, the Nimitz-class ships.

In a letter to families, Lake Travis ISD superintendent Curtis Null identified the student as Odin Hensley.

“Odin had been part of the Lake Travis ISD family for many years, beginning at Lake Pointe Elementary School,” Null wrote in the letter. “At Lake Travis High School, he was a dedicated two-sport athlete who excelled in wrestling and football.”

According to the letter, Null described Hensley as a “valued teammate, classmate and friend” who “touched many lives.”

“During this difficult time, we ask that you keep Odin’s family, teammates and classmates, coaches, athletic trainers, teachers and all those who knew and loved him in your thoughts and prayers,” Null wrote.

Lake Travis High School counselors will be available at the campus counseling center for students, staff and families, the superintendent said. Additional counselors will also be on standby.

Hensley suffered the medical emergency at approximately 8 a.m. Monday. The Lake Travis High School football team said in a Facebook post that the incident required the response of Travis County STAR Flight.

The team canceled football activities for the rest of Monday “out of an abundance of caution.”

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The full schedule release highlighted the revival of the Spurs as one of the league’s top teams to watch. At least 34 of their regular season games will air across five national networks and streaming services — compared to 22 national games during the 2025-26 season.

Five of San Antonio’s games will air on ABC and KSAT 12:

• Friday, Dec. 25, 2026 (Christmas Day) at New York Knicks, 11 a.m.
• Saturday, Jan. 30, 2027 at Golden State Warriors, 4:30 p.m.
• Saturday, Feb. 6, 2027 vs. Los Angeles Lakers, 7:30 p.m.
• Sunday, Feb. 28, 2027 vs. Denver Nuggets, Noon
• Sunday, March 14, 2027 at Oklahoma City Thunder, 1:30 p.m.

As previously announced, the Spurs will open the season at home Oct. 20 against the Oklahoma City Thunder, a rematch of their epic, seven-game Western Conference Finals series last season.

Three days later, the Spurs will face the Houston Rockets at the Moody Center in Austin, the first I-35 series game outside the “Rodeo Road Trip” in February.

Kevin Durant, a former men’s basketball star at The University of Texas at Austin, is entering his second season with the Rockets and is set to square off with San Antonio in the new home of the Longhorns.

Chase for the Cup

San Antonio will be in Group C during the fourth annual NBA Cup this fall alongside the Golden State Warriors, Los Angeles Lakers, Portland Trail Blazers and Sacramento Kings. Each team in the group will play four games — one against each Group C opponent.

NBA Cup Group Play games will be held on seven different dates throughout the fall. Below are the Spurs’ Group C matchups (all times are Central):

• Friday, Nov. 6: at Sacramento Kings, 9 p.m.
• Friday, Nov. 13: vs. Golden State Warriors, 8:30 p.m.
• Wednesday, Nov. 25: at Portland Trail Blazers, 9 p.m.
• Friday, Nov. 27: vs. Los Angeles Lakers, 8:30 p.m.

ESPN said Wednesday the Spurs-Trail Blazers game will air on the network as part of a triple-header on the day before Thanksgiving. The Lakers-Spurs game will be the second game of a Black Friday doubleheader on Amazon Prime Video.

The NBA Cup quarterfinal (Dec. 4-5) and semifinal rounds (Dec. 8 and/or Dec. 9) will be held in the days leading up to the championship game. The NBA Cup title game will take place Dec. 11 at historic Hinkle Fieldhouse in Indianapolis.

All NBA Cup quarterfinal, semifinal and championship games will air exclusively on Amazon Prime Video.

Euro-steppin’

The league also announced Wednesday the tipoff times for San Antonio’s international games against the New Orleans Pelicans.

The Spurs are scheduled to face the New Orleans Pelicans, a fellow Southwest Division opponent, for two games: one in Paris (Jan. 14, 2027) and another in Manchester, England (Jan. 17, 2027).

The Paris game will tip off at 1 p.m. while the England game will start at approximately 9:30 a.m. Central Time. Both games will air on Amazon Prime Video.

The ‘Rodeo Road Trip’

The San Antonio Stock Show and Rodeo will take over the Frost Bank Center and Freeman Coliseum next February and force the Spurs out on the road again for the team’s annual “Rodeo Road Trip.”

According to Visit San Antonio’s website, the stock show and rodeo will take place Feb. 11-28, 2027.

The Spurs’ first game on the eight-game trip will be Tuesday, Feb. 9, 2027, against the Dallas Mavericks (7 p.m. tipoff). The game will air on NBC and Peacock.

The next five on the road will be as follows (all times Central):

• Thursday, Feb. 11, 2027 at Oklahoma City Thunder, 8:30 p.m. (Amazon Prime Video)
• Saturday, Feb. 13, 2027 at Orlando Magic, 6 p.m.
• Monday, Feb. 15, 2027 (Presidents Day) at Miami Heat, 4 p.m. (NBC)
• Wednesday, Feb. 17, 2027 at Memphis Grizzlies, 7 p.m.
• Thursday, Feb. 18, 2027 at Minnesota Timberwolves, 6:30 p.m. (Amazon Prime Video)

The Spurs will return to the Moody Center in Austin for the final two games of the road trip.

San Antonio will face Memphis at 7 p.m. Friday, Feb. 26, 2027, and Denver at noon on Sunday, Feb. 28, 2027. The game against the Nuggets will air live at noon on ABC and KSAT 12.

The TV breakdown

San Antonio’s 34 national TV/streaming games this season will be broadcast across ABC, ESPN, NBC, Peacock and Amazon Prime Video.

Below is how many times each broadcaster will air the Spurs:

• 10 (Amazon Prime Video)
• 9 (NBC)
• 8 (ESPN)
• 5 (ABC/KSAT 12)
• 2 (Peacock)

San Antonio joins teams like the Knicks, the new-look Philadelphia 76ers and the Lakers who will have 34 of their games air on national TV.

“The energy around Spurs basketball continues to grow, and the 2026-27 season gives us another opportunity to build on that momentum,” Spurs Sports & Entertainment CEO R.C. Buford said in a Thursday news release.

“San Antonio is home, and we’re looking forward to bringing our community together while reaching audiences in Austin, Paris and Manchester,” Buford continued. “We’re excited for what this season will bring to our fans and proud to represent San Antonio and share the spirit, culture and community that make our city special everywhere the Spurs take the court.”

In the release, the team said regular season single-game tickets will go on sale to the public at 10 a.m. Friday on Ticketmaster. Tickets can also be accessed through the team’s website and mobile app.

Members of the official Spurs Fan Club can now purchase tickets through exclusive presale access.

For a link to the full schedule, click here and scroll down to the San Antonio Spurs page.

More San Antonio Spurs coverage on KSAT:

• NBA announces 2026 Emirates NBA Cup groupings; Spurs receive more national television exposure
• Spurs schedule sneak peek: San Antonio to face Thunder on Opening Night, Knicks on Christmas Day

“It’s another device to help someone get compliant when they are not,” Homan said Thursday in an interview on Fox News Channel's “Fox & Friends.” “You can't just go from 0 to 100, right, and the first thing you go for is lethal force.”

Homan's remarks were the Trump administration's first public defense of ICE's plan to spend up to $20 million to purchase thousands of “conductive distraction and de-escalation devices” for officers and agents. The devices are known as the G.L.O.V.E., which stands for Generated Low Output Voltage Emitter, and are manufactured by Compliant Technologies LLC. They have been used in recent years by some jails and police departments.

The plan has drawn intense criticism from civil rights groups, Democrats in Congress, and some use-of-force experts, who say ICE agents have been too quick to use force while carrying out President Donald Trump's crackdown on illegal immigration. At least six people have been shot and killed by immigration enforcement agents since last year, including motorists last month in Maine and Texas.

Homan argued the gloves could help avoid such encounters. He said they would give another less lethal option to ICE officers, similar to Tasers or pepper spray, for use in potentially violent situations on the streets and in detention facilities. He said that it would “be awhile” before the gloves are deployed in the field by ICE officers because the agency is still working out training protocols and other policy issues.

In Bardstown, Kentucky, Nelson County Jailer Justin Hall said Thursday that his agency began using the gloves four years ago to try to gain compliance when inmates are out of control. He said that, unlike Tasers, the shocks do not incapacitate people and make them fall or leave contact or burn marks.

Hall estimated that he had been shocked by the gloves more than 10 times during training, and the pain was intense but stops once the gloves are no longer touching skin. He said the shock gloves have been used sparingly, but are helpful as an initial deterrent when de-escalation techniques do not work.

“It’s just a safer way. It’s safer on the inmate. It’s safer on the staff. And most of the time, most of the time we get compliance,” he said. “It's been a great tool for our facility.”

Geoffrey Alpert, a criminology professor at the University of South Carolina who has written extensively about police use-of-force and tactics, said the devices should be studied more broadly to ensure departments have proper guidance on when and how they should be used. He said it might be a wiser investment for ICE to start with a smaller purchase, given how little is known about them.

“You are wholesaling these to a group of officers who may not be trained in other strategies like de-escalation or trained to interact with the public in non-enforcement ways, like most local police officers are,” he said. “User error is almost predictable at some level. The tech may be fine, but let’s take a minute and make sure that it is used in an appropriate custom and practice.”

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Foley reported from Iowa City, Iowa. AP reporter Claudia Lauer contributed to this report from Philadelphia.

The federal investigation also found that California's corrections department failed to provide victims with a way to report sexual abuse and harassment without retaliation. On top of that, staff who were tasked with investigating the misconduct were often themselves accused of sexual abuse or harassment.

The investigation, which began during the Biden administration, focused on two state prisons: the Central California Women’s Facility in Chowchilla and the California Institution for Women in Chino. It uncovered numerous instances where guards regularly sexually abused incarcerated women. In at least one instance, a guard was convicted of rampant abuse over roughly a decade and sentenced to 224 years in prison.

State says it's making improvements. Advocates say it's not enough.

The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation said in a statement that it “enforces a zero-tolerance policy as mandated by the federal Prison Rape Elimination Act,” a federal law passed in 2003 designed to prevent sexual assaults in prisons.

The state agency also said that audits conducted by independent entities trained by the DOJ found the two prisons were in compliance with federal standards as recently as 2024 and 2025.

“CDCR is fully committed to supporting victims of sexual assault and ensuring safe avenues exist for both incarcerated persons and staff to confidentially report misconduct,” spokesperson Will Matthews wrote in an email.

Over the course of the DOJ investigation, the prison agency independently investigated and prosecuted both staff and incarcerated people who violated federal rape prevention laws, he added.

Emily Wonder, who works for Sister Warriors, which advocates for incarcerated women and transgender people, said state audits evaluate prison conditions based on a very “low bar” that allows abuse and neglect to slip through the cracks.

“It's not a very strong protection mechanism in general,” Wonder said. Sister Warriors, other groups and lawmakers are pushing for additional legislation to bolster protections for women, increase opportunities for reporting misconduct and improve transparency.

Federal authorities echoed that assessment on Thursday, saying that there weren’t sufficient mechanisms for victims to come forward.

Women don't have resources to report assaults, Justice Department says

Women were told to report misconduct on an online system that wasn’t confidential and that accused officers had access to, according to Harmeet K. Dhillon, assistant attorney general for the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division.

Dhillon said that women are “fully aware of this gap in confidentiality, and this serves as a deterrent from women reporting this misconduct.” She named at least one sergeant whose job was to investigate misconduct who was himself sentenced to 15 years in prison after pleading guilty to receiving child sexual abuse images at work.

“The upshot of our investigation is that California’s prison system, when it comes to women, has inadequate systems in place to deter, detect, and hold accountable rampant sexual misconduct and assault on female prisoners,” Dhillon said at a news conference in Los Angeles on Thursday.

The Associated Press has previously exposed similar patterns of rampant abuse by federal prison staff against women held in a Dublin, California, facility that at the time was nicknamed the “rape club.” The prison was closed following the AP investigation.

Justice Department sets a deadline to address problems

The federal government on Thursday gave California's prison system 49 days to remediate the conditions that enabled the rampant abuse, warning that a failure to do so could result in civil litigation.

The measures include expanded camera coverage, enhanced confidential reporting channels and strengthened investigative protocols.

The corrections department was implementing many of those changes before the federal investigation, Matthews said.

But Wonder, whose organization has participated in a state-funded working group with the corrections department since 2023, said that advocates “haven’t seen any meaningful changes” despite regular meetings and pressure from the public.

“We’ve been really frustrated, feeling like we’re spinning our wheels,” Wonder said.

U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli, appointed by President Donald Trump as the top federal prosecutor in Los Angeles, said California has to take action.

“The State must confront the persistent failure of its own employees to prevent and address sexual abuse at these facilities,” Essayli said in a statement, “and the systemic breakdowns that have permitted these conditions to persist.”

• THIRD TRIPLE DIGIT DAY: 102° today at SA International
• LOW BRINGS A SHOWER OR TWO: Very small rain chance Friday
• A STRING OF TRIPLE DIGITS: Next week could be our hottest stretch of the year
• STILL WATCHING THE TROPICS: Potentially Dolly & Edouard, too

FORECAST

ANOTHER DAY AT THE CENTURY MARK

Today was our hottest day so far this year with a high of 102°, but tomorrow shouldn’t be quite as hot due to additional clouds overhead.

A SHOT AT A SHOWER FRIDAY

A non-tropical swirl over Eastern Mexico will work its way up the Rio Grande on Friday. While this disturbance could stir up a shower, rain chances sit at only 10%. Added clouds on Friday will bring temperatures down slightly.

A STRETCH OF TRIPLE DIGIT HEAT

Everyday next week could feature a high at 100° or above. Unfortunately, the heat high has found its footing and will park itself over the middle of the country, leaving us dry and HOT.

TROPICS

The next named system would be “Dolly” and may form in the southern Atlantic, however, it will also likely will fall apart once arriving to the Caribbean. Another wave behind that could later become Edouard.

QUICK WEATHER LINKS

• WATCH LIVE: Doppler Radar
• Hourly and 10-Day Forecast
• Download FREE KSAT Weather Authority App: Up-to-date forecast information and livestreams from trusted local meteorologists.
• KSAT Connect: Share your weather photos.

Gun rights activists and Republican lawmakers called the change a historic win for the Second Amendment, while gun control groups said the ruling will leave Americans less safe.

In 1934, following high-profile shootings, Congress used its taxing power to enact the National Firearms Act. The law required individuals to pay a $200 fee before transferring or making certain firearms — on top of registering them — in an effort to curtail these activities. But last year, the One Big Beautiful Bill ended that tax for some categories, including short-barrel shotguns, short-barrel rifles and silencers.

The same day President Donald Trump signed the bill into law in July 2025, firearms trade groups, gun businesses and a San Angelo gun owner sued to overturn parts of the NFA. Just over a month later, Texas and 14 other Republican-led states joined the lawsuit.

On Aug. 5, U.S. District Judge James Wesley Hendrix in Lubbock ruled that the regulations, enacted under lawmakers’ authority to impose taxes, could not continue after the tax was revoked.

“The challenged NFA provisions are unconstitutional,” the Trump-appointed judge wrote. “Congress’s choice to eliminate the transfer and making taxes matters, and the defendants cannot save the NFA’s regulatory scheme by referring to a power that Congress never invoked. Efforts to render the NFA constitutional must come from Congress, not this Court.”

Hendrix limited the effect of his order to the states that joined the lawsuit. The judge also gave the federal government seven days to file an emergency appeal. When the Department of Justice did not, the ruling took effect Thursday.

The DOJ could still appeal within 60 days of Hendrix’s decision, but its plans are unclear.

“The Department respects Americans’ Second Amendment rights and is currently assessing the impact of the court’s ruling,” the DOJ said in a Thursday statement.

The lack of an emergency appeal also came after a group of Republicans in Congress, including nine from Texas, urged newly appointed U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche not to fight the court decision. On Thursday, they cheered the win.

“The Trump administration has delivered a decisive victory for the Second Amendment,” U.S. Rep. Chip Roy, R-Austin, said in a post on X.

Others — including state Rep. Wes Virdell, R-Brady, and Brandon Herrera, a Republican candidate running for 23rd Congressional District who is known as “The AK Guy” — celebrated by making a purchase after the ruling took effect at midnight.

“Last night was an amazing experience to be a part of history in the making,” Virdell said in a Thursday post on X.

Gun control groups blasted the DOJ’s decision, saying short-barrel rifles and shotguns are powerful weapons that have been used in mass shootings, while silencers can make it difficult for bystanders and law enforcement to detect if and where a gun has been fired.

“Today, our government is failing us,” Brady President Kris Brown said in a statement. “Today, the gun industry and silencer dealers are celebrating, while Americans are left less safe.”

The Bears announced in June that they were moving forward with a stadium development project in Hammond, Indiana. They have completed their review of what they are calling the Lost Marsh site, and they are doing their due diligence on the Wolf Lake Terminal site. They could merge the two options together in some way.

“Even though we’ve had occasional meetings with the state of Illinois, our sole focus at this point in time is working on a world-class stadium and mixed-use development in Hammond, Indiana,” team President Kevin Warren said Thursday.

The Bears also had been considering Arlington Heights — about 30 miles northwest of Chicago — as a potential location for an enclosed stadium. Wherever they end up, a name change is off the table.

“We will be the Chicago Bears whether we’re in Arlington or whether we’re in Hammond,” chairman George McCaskey said.

The Bears, a charter NFL franchise, have played in Illinois since the team’s founding in 1920 as the Decatur Staleys. They moved to Chicago in 1921 and called Wrigley Field home before they started playing at Soldier Field in September 1971.

The Bears’ lease runs through 2033, but they can pay a fee to break the lease early. Soldier Field is about 40 miles south of Halas Hall — the team’s headquarters in Lake Forest — and Hammond is about 20 miles south of the team’s lakefront stadium.

McCaskey acknowledged the “anxiety” of a move to northwest Indiana for the team's fans.

“But when I’ve driven that route, other than a sign telling me so, I wouldn’t know that I’ve just crossed the state border,” he said. “And as Kevin said, once people see the building, once they get in there, once they understand that our top priority from day one was a world-class stadium experience, we think we’ll make that adjustment. We think Bears fans are up for that.”

The Bears ramped up their focus on Indiana after a proposal to provide financial incentives for the team to build its new home in Illinois stalled in the state legislature. A committee in the Indiana House of Representatives passed a bill in February that established a Northwest Indiana Stadium Authority to finance, construct and lease a stadium.

The Illinois Senate passed a bill that would have cleared the way for Arlington Heights and Chicago to create local stadium authorities, creating a pathway for the Bears to avoid paying property taxes on a new stadium. But the House adjourned without taking up the measure on the last day of the state’s spring legislative session.

McCaskey said the team has had minimal conversations with Illinois legislators since June. Asked if he was hopeful about Illinois coming up with a plan and building in Arlington Heights, McCaskey demurred.

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell “has said to us many times in league meetings, ‘Hope is not a strategy,’” McCaskey said. “We have to deal with the here and now. We have to deal with real circumstances, and these are the real circumstances.”

Speaking before McCaskey and Warren held their news conference, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker said his office has been in contact with the team.

“We’re working hard to make sure that there’s an opportunity for the Bears to stay in the state of Illinois, whether it’s in Chicago or in Arlington Heights,” Pritzker said.

“I also want, at the same time, to protect the fans and the taxpayers of the state. So we’re going to do everything we can to make sure that that happens.”

The Bears have been pursuing a new home for years, but the process has been hampered by repeated twists and turns.

The team announced in September 2021 that it had signed a purchase agreement for 326 acres of land in Arlington Heights. The $197 million deal with Churchill Downs Inc. was finalized in 2023.

In September 2022, the team unveiled a nearly $5 billion plan for Arlington Heights that called for an enclosed stadium that could host Super Bowls and Final Fours. The conceptual illustrations also provided for a year-round entertainment district with restaurants and shopping.

But the Bears shifted their focus toward building a new stadium next to Soldier Field after Warren was hired as team president in January 2023, replacing the retiring Ted Phillips. The plan to transform Chicago’s Museum Campus got an enthusiastic endorsement from Mayor Brandon Johnson and a tepid reception from Pritzker and state legislators when it was announced in April 2024.

The team switched gears again in May 2025, announcing it had made “significant progress” with local leaders in Arlington Heights.

Amid lingering efforts to secure tax incentives in Illinois, along with as much as $855 million in public money for infrastructure at the Arlington Heights site, the Bears began to take a closer look at possible options in northwest Indiana.

“We’re in regular, almost daily communication with the state of Indiana working on this,” Warren said. “We have an excellent deal, a win-win partnership together. And the cost of the significance of this decision from a stadium standpoint, we will make sure that we take our time to get this right.”

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See AP’s full NFL coverage here

The plan to remake the flagship campus’ core curriculum replaces the sprawling menu of classes students can now take to meet core requirements with a more structured core curriculum organized around the humanities, social sciences and science, technology, engineering and math.

But how the overhaul connects to UT-Austin’s new Center for the Humanities remains unclear.

A report from a 22-member faculty task force appointed by UT-Austin President Jim Davis proposes 12 requirements across the core areas, compared with the current 10.

Davis described the existing core to the University of Texas System regents as a “haphazard grab bag of classes,” pointing to a course on the history of college football as an example of a specialized class that may be a worthwhile elective but, in his view, should not to fulfill half of a student’s U.S. history requirement.

UT students would have to take courses focused on Western civilization, great questions of human life, the principles of American politics, world politics and cultures, great ideas in science and computer science and artificial intelligence, according to the proposal.

Recommendations include creating a “Texas 40: Great Thinkers” list for courses on great questions of human life and three separate 40-author lists for British, American and world literature courses. Great questions courses would have to draw at least two-thirds of their content from the thinkers list.

Faculty members would have a chance to shape their own courses with their creativity and expertise, one of the taskforce members, Richard Reddick, told The Texas Tribune.

“Academic freedom is a big piece of this,” Reddick said. “I can’t imagine telling our faculty colleagues, ‘Here’s your syllabus, teach this.’ It’s not going to work.”

The task force recommends students complete four of the proposed requirements at UT-Austin, rather than accepting transfer or dual-credit coursework from elsewhere. That would include the great questions of human life, principles of American politics, great ideas in science, and computer science and artificial intelligence.

The new requirements would take 36 credit hours, down from the current 42. That would leave students six additional hours for electives, courses in their major or other classes.

Under the proposal, specialized classes not selected for the new core would remain available as electives, but university leaders acknowledged their future could depend on whether enough students enroll.

The taskforce also recommended UT-Austin offer a small-class option for every core requirement over time, prioritize in-person teaching and limit fully online core classes.

University officials plan to begin offering new courses in fall 2027 and make the redesigned core mandatory for a new incoming class in fall 2028. The taskforce has not yet identified which courses would qualify. Its report recommends three faculty-led committees decide what proposals meet the new standards.

Earlier in the meeting, three UT-Austin students criticized Davis and regents for what they described as a lack of transparency and meaningful student and faculty input into recent academic changes.

They pointed to the consolidation of gender and ethnic studies; plans to move biology operations to make room for the School of Civic Leadership; and the closure of the Physics, Mathematics and Astronomy Library.

“You have shown how little you regard the wants and needs of students, staff and professors by bulldozing prominent institutions without allowing feedback from the people they affect the most,” said Elise James, a government major who is a member of the Students for a Democratic Society.

University officials said the review included student input. Reddick, a professor of higher education leadership and policy in the College of Education, and Kristin Patterson, an associate professor of instruction in biology and undergraduate studies in the College of Natural Science, served on the core-curriculum task force.

Patterson and Reddick told the Tribune that the group met weekly for an hour and a half and heard from students and faculty across campus as well as from outside experts. Students generally praised the classes they had taken but found the current core difficult to navigate, the professors said.

Under the proposal, each requirement could be fulfilled by multiple courses, and faculty members from all departments would be invited to develop them.

UT-Austin officials are reviewing the courses all undergraduates must take after a 2025 state law required public university governing boards to certify that those courses prepare students for civic and professional life and support workforce preparation.

The law also requires boards to consider the courses’ potential cost and effect on students’ time to degree. The boards must complete their first review by Jan. 1 and repeat it at least once every five years.

The regents did not vote on UT-Austin’s proposed changes. Davis said he would return to the board for approval as officials develop and staff the new courses.

Last week, the Texas State University System regents were the first to act under the new law, approving revised core-course lists for its seven institutions. At Texas State University in San Marcos, the review changed the learning outcomes for 115 courses to focus on what students should be able to do after taking them — rather than particular attitudes, beliefs or values — and removed eight Honors courses that were no longer taught.

The law did more than require universities to review their core curriculums. At UT-Austin, it also replaced the Faculty Council, an elected body that advised university leaders on curriculum and other matters, with faculty advisory groups appointed by the president, including the core-curriculum task force.

But the push to reshape what UT-Austin students learn predates last year’s law.

Republican state leaders have long argued that Texas’ public universities are too liberal or too focused on ideas that do not prepare students for careers.

In 2021, lawmakers gave UT-Austin $6 million to create the Civitas Institute, a think tank focused on individual liberty, limited government, private enterprise and free markets. Two years later, UT regents created the School of Civic Leadership to house the institute before lawmakers could vote on a bill that would have required the university to do so.

The school and the institute had or were set to have 42 tenured or tenure-track faculty members as of Aug. 3, according to records obtained by the Tribune, nearly triple the 15 positions lawmakers proposed requiring. Its major, Civics Honors, enrolled 103 students when it began last fall.

As UT-Austin built up the School of Civic Leadership, it accelerated plans to consolidate seven College of Liberal Arts departments, including African and African Diaspora Studies, American Studies, Mexican American and Latino Studies and Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies, into two new departments by fall 2026.

Davis said the restructuring followed a review that found wide disparities in student-to-faculty ratios across the college.

Lauren Gutterman, whose appointment as chair of American Studies ends Saturday, said she expects to become an associate professor in the new Department of Social and Cultural Analysis.

Gutterman said she was not aware of any faculty members in the consolidated units losing their jobs, though she added that some staff members were fired or reassigned. She worries university leaders will not replace professors who leave, retire or receive outside offers.

“They’re not going to kind of fire us wholesale, but find ways of chipping away at the faculty within these units,” Gutterman said.

Meanwhile, Davis and university leaders have said little publicly about the Center for Humanities, whose website notes it will focus on teaching and research tied to the core curriculum.

Davis did not answer questions after the regents’ meeting. UT spokesperson Mike Rosen did not respond to questions about who created, approved or funded the center or how it will fit alongside the existing Humanities Institute, which was established in 2001 to support humanities research.

The Austin American-Statesman first reported the center this month. The center’s website was created July 8, according to its underlying code. Eight of the 11 faculty members listed on the website work at the Civitas Institute while five previously worked at the University of Florida’s Hamilton School for Classical and Civic Education, a state-backed program that later became a college. Neither Center for Humanities Director Robert Ingram nor Humanities Institute Director Tanya Clement responded to a request for comment.

Patterson and Reddick said the core-curriculum task force’s work is complete. They did not know about the Center for Humanities or what role, if any, it will play in the core-curriculum overhaul, the professors said. The task force’s written report lists both Ingram and Jill Ingram, a professor of humanities at the Center, as members.

Before the 2025 law, a major academic initiative — such as a new center — would generally have been developed with faculty input and presented to the Faculty Council for discussion and a vote before moving to university leaders and regents, said Liliana Garces, a professor in the UT-Austin’s College of Education.

“I was very surprised, to say the least, to learn about the center from a news article,” Garces said.

At Thursday’s meeting, regents praised Davis’ core-curriculum proposal and his leadership.

Board Chair Kevin P. Eltife said UT-Austin had “lacked that in the past.” Board Vice Chair Janiece Longoria said Davis was “proving that we’re capable of doing hard things” by replacing a core that had grown “like an amoeba, way out of control.”

The Texas Tribune partners with Open Campus on higher education coverage.

Disclosure: Open Campus, Texas State University and The University of Texas System have been financial supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in The Texas Tribune’s journalism. Find a complete list of them here.

This week, Cuba commemorated Castro with events including the International Book Fair, art exhibitions, concerts and gatherings of delegates from leftist organizations across the continent.

Posters bearing his image hang in hospitals, while billboards displaying his slogans — including his widely known “Homeland or Death” — line the streets. His presence is so familiar that many Cubans refer to him simply as Fidel.

“I believe (Fidel Castro) leaves Cuba a legacy of dignity, morality, tireless work and concern for the poor,” writer and essayist Miguel Barnet, who also is a member of the National Assembly, told The Associated Press. “And a philosophy that was translated into concrete policies in areas such as culture, education and public health.”

An island in crisis

Castro’s centennial comes as Cuba faces an ever-intensifying squeeze that began when the Trump administration imposed a fuel blockade in January and followed up with a series of sanctions aimed at pressuring the communist government to make political and economic changes. The measures have deepened a five-year economic crisis fueled by earlier U.S. sanctions and a failed domestic financial overhaul.

For Cubans, the effects have been far-reaching: prolonged power outages, shortages of fuel and medicine, declining industrial and tourism activity, flight cancellations, transportation restrictions and reduced work and school hours.

Castro governed Cuba for five decades, from 1959 until he handed over the presidency to his brother in 2008, holding massive rallies and making hourslong speeches. He remained influential until his death in 2016.

“Fidel left us everything, everything good that came from Cuba’s revolutionary process,” said Argelia Mustelier, a 61-year-old retiree who lives in Old Havana. “In these difficult times we’re living through, he would have found a way to bring some happiness to his country and his people.”

From guerrilla campaigns to leading a country

Fidel Castro Ruz was born Aug. 13, 1926, in eastern Cuba’s sugar country, where his Spanish immigrant father first worked recruiting labor for U.S. sugar companies and later built up a prosperous plantation of his own. Shortly after graduating as a lawyer, he became politically active.

In 1953, Castro and more than 100 others attacked the Moncada Barracks in Santiago de Cuba in an unsuccessful attempt to overthrow dictator Fulgencio Batista. Castro was captured and later released, then went into exile in Mexico. He returned to Cuba with fellow rebels and launched a guerrilla campaign that culminated in Batista’s ouster in 1959 and Castro’s rise to power.

Castro took power and radically transformed Cuba through agrarian reform, a massive literacy campaign and the nationalization of private businesses, policies that put his government on a collision course with the U.S.

Across Latin America and developing nations, Castro became a symbol of anti-colonial and revolutionary movements. His policies also fueled deep opposition, first among wealthy Cubans, many of whom fled to the United States, and later among those who opposed the Communist Party’s monopoly on political power.

“He is a controversial figure,” said historian Manuel Cuesta Morúa, president of the opposition Council for the Democratic Transition in Cuba.

“There was no justification for sacrificing freedoms … There was no justification for preventing the rest (of the Cuban people) — and the country’s political diversity and plurality — from expressing themselves,” Cuesta said. “That created a rift whose consequences we are still living with today.”

For many younger Cubans, Castro remains an icon, but his influence is less immediate for them than for older generations who lived under his leadership.

“Our generation didn’t experience him as an active leader. What we saw was a less visible Fidel, one who rarely appeared in public,” 27-year-old Cristian Cohello said. “What remains of Fidel Castro right now, of what he left behind, is nothing; absolutely nothing.”

Raúl Castro makes an unusual appearance

On Thursday, the former president and brother of the leader, 95-year-old Raúl Castro, made an unusual public appearance — who was reportedly last seen in June and has not been seen in public since May 1 — during a tribute at the Karl Marx Theater in Havana.

Dressed in an olive-green uniform, Raúl Castro stood next to President Miguel Díaz-Canel and one row ahead of his own grandson and bodyguard, Raúl Guillermo Rodríguez Castro, who has been cited as one of the island’s negotiators with the United States.

Hours later, Díaz-Canel attended an exhibition of photographs — 30 printed and another 100 projected on a screen — of Fidel Castro taken throughout his life and with prominent figures such as Pope John Paul II and Venezuelan leader Hugo Chávez, both now deceased.

“It is a glorious day for Cuba, 100 years ago Fidel was born ... a man who embodies the ideas for which Cuba fights and the ideas for which we are fiercely defending ourselves against imperial threats,” Díaz-Canel told a group of journalists.

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

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This story has been corrected to fix the spelling of historian Manuel Cuesta Morúa’s name.

General. By submitting an entry to the Texas Eats & Firstmark Credit Union Instagram sweepstakes (“Sweepstakes”), brought to you by KSAT 12 (“Sponsor”) and Firstmark Credit Union (the “Co-Sponsor”), entrant acknowledges and agrees that entrant has read, understands, and agrees to be bound by these official Sweepstakes rules (“Official Rules”). By entering the Sweepstakes, entrants agree to waive any right to claim any ambiguity or error in these Official Rules, or the Sweepstakes itself, and agree to be bound by all decisions of the Sponsor, whose decisions are binding and final in all matters related to the Sweepstakes. Failure to comply with these Official Rules or any Sponsor instructions relating to the Sweepstakes’ Official Rules may result in disqualification from the Sweepstakes.

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How To Enter. The Sweepstakes begins at 8:00 p.m. on Thursday, August 13, 2026 and runs through Thursday, August 20, 2026 to 12:00 p.m. (the “Sweepstakes Period”). Sponsor’s time clock will be the official time clock of the Sweepstakes. To enter, you must completely and accurately fill out the Sweepstakes entry form provided on the Sponsor’s Sweepstakes page at https://www.instagram.com/eldereats/?hl=en (“Entry Form”). Eligible Entrants must “like” the post on the IG Account, share the Post on your own Instagram story, save the post, Follow the @firstmarkcu and @eldereats Instagram account and comment on the post (collectively, an “Entry”). Each additional comment on the Post will be considered an additional entry. You may enter unlimitedly per person and per email address and per telephone number during the Sweepstakes Period. “Liking” content other than the original Post does not qualify as an Entry. Entrants must be the natural person assigned to any submitted email account by the provider responsible for the assigning email addresses for the domain associated with such email account. Entrant must also be an authorized account holder for any submitted telephone number. Any attempt by any entrant to obtain more than the stated number of entries using multiple/different email addresses, identities, registrations and logins, or any other methods will void such entries and that entrant may be disqualified if discovered by Sponsor. Entries generated by a script, macro or other automated means will be disqualified if discovered by Sponsor. The use of automated or third-party software or web site to enter and/or play is prohibited. Entries that are inaccurate, incomplete, illegible, or corrupted are void and will be disqualified if discovered by Sponsor. If Entry Form permits or requires submission of user-generated content (“UGC”), by entering into the Sweepstakes, entrant represents and warrants as follows: (1) that they created and fully own or have properly licensed all UGC materials or information, can submit such UGC without violating any applicable law, agreement with any third-party, and/or third-party right of any kind (including without limitation any intellectual property, data protection, privacy, or publicity right); and (2) that all UGC entrant hereunder will be true and correct in all respects. UGC may not contain personally identifiable information or other similar sensitive/confidential information of any third-party or content that is offensive, inappropriate, or inconsistent with the Sponsor/Co-Sponsor’s image or the spirit or purpose of the Sweepstakes. By submitting UGC, entrant represents and warrants that all UGC content complies with the User Conduct section of the Sponsor station websites Terms of Use available at https://www.grahammedia.com/terms. UGC may not have been previously published or otherwise made public elsewhere. Furthermore, without limitation on anything set forth herein to the contrary, Sponsor will have the irrevocable, transferable, and fully sublicensable right and license (but not the obligation) to exploit all such UGC in any manner it so elects to promote the Sweepstakes, its business, brand, products, and/or services, throughout the world in perpetuity, and in all media, now or hereafter known. All received entries become the property of the Sponsor and will not be acknowledged or returned except as disclosed in these Official Rules.

Selection of Winners. Four (4) potential winners will be selected via random drawing on or around Thursday, August 20, 2026, from among all eligible entries received during the Sweepstakes Period.

Odds. The odds of winning depend on the number of eligible entries.

Winner Notification and Verification. Potential winner(s) will be subject to verification of eligibility and compliance with these Official Rules. In addition, Sponsor will attempt to notify the potential winner(s) via direct message on the Entry platform (“Notification”). Potential Sweepstakes winner(s) must respond promptly and supply all requested information including full name, email address and telephone number. Potential Sweepstakes winner(s) must completely and accurately execute and return any required affidavit of eligibility, release of liability, publicity release and/or prize acceptance form (“Forms”) within 48 hours of Notification. Potential winners may be required to display a copy of a valid government photo ID in addition to the submission of any Forms. A potential winner may be disqualified and, time permitting, an alternate winner may be selected by random drawing from among all remaining entries if: (1) a potential winner cannot be contacted/does not respond to Sponsors’ first Notification attempt as directed; (2) a winner does not fulfill the eligibility requirements; (3) a winner does not adhere to the Official Rules; (4) a winner does not sign and return the Forms or provide required ID by the deadline set forth above; and/or (5) if the Notification is returned as undeliverable, refused, or declined. A POTENTIAL PRIZE WINNER IS NOT A WINNER UNTIL HIS OR HER ELIGIBILITY AND COMPLIANCE WITH THESE OFFICIAL RULES HAS BEEN VERIFIED BY THE SPONSOR. Sponsor reserves the right to contact all Sweepstakes entrants using the contact information provided in the Entry Form in connection with the Sweepstakes entry. The official record(s) of entries will remain the property of Sponsor. If a printing, programming, or other error leads to more prize claims than there are prizes provided for in the Official Rules, prize(s) will be awarded in a random drawing from among all eligible prize claims received at each prize tier.

Prize(s) Four (4) Visa Gift Cards. Approximate Retail Value (“ARV”) of each Visa Gift Card: $50. Approximate Retail Value (“ARV”) of all prizes: $200. Unless otherwise stated, subject to winner verification and compliance with these Official Rules, all prizes will be available for pick up at the office of the Sponsor/Administrators (address provided below). Sponsor and Co-Sponsor not responsible for loss, delay, or damage in shipping. There will be no substitution, transfer, or cash equivalent for prizes, except at the sole discretion of Sponsor, which may substitute prizes of comparable value. Limit one prize per person and per household. Payments of all federal, state, and local taxes related to the award of the prize are solely the responsibility of the winner. Prizes may not be sold, bartered, or auctioned. Prize is awarded “as is” with no warranty or guarantee, either express or implied. All properly claimed prizes will be awarded provided a sufficient number of eligible entries are received, but in no event will Sponsor award more prizes than are provided for in the Official Rules. Unclaimed prizes will not be awarded. For tax purposes, the winner of a prize with an ARV of at least $600 will be required to accurately complete and submit IRS Form W-9 to the Sponsor and Sponsor will arrange to issue an IRS Form 1099 MISC to winner reflecting the value of the prize.

Disclaimer and Representations. Each winner assumes all liability for any injuries or damages caused or claimed to be caused by winner’s participation in the Sweepstakes and/or the acceptance and/or use of any prize, and releases the Sponsor, Co-Sponsor, Instagram and their respective parent companies, subsidiaries, and affiliates, and all of their officers, directors, agents, and employees (collectively, “Releasees”), from any such liability. Releasees are not responsible for: the failure of any entry to be received by the Sponsor because of electronic device errors or failures of any kind, internet disruption, telecommunications, network, electronic, telephone or mobile service outages, delays, busy signals, or any equipment malfunctions or other technical difficulties that may prevent the Sponsor from receiving any entry submission; entries that are illegible, unintelligible, incomplete, stolen, misdirected, garbled, delayed by computer transmissions, lost, late or damaged; any injury or damage to the entrant’s or any other person’s electronic device related to or resulting from participation or accessing or downloading any materials related to the Sweepstakes; or any human errors, any inaccurate transcription of entry information, errors in any promotional or marketing materials or errors in these Official Rules. If you choose to enter using your mobile phone, standard message and data rates may apply.

Sponsor reserves the right to disqualify any individual from participation in the Sweepstakes if Sponsor concludes, in its sole discretion, that such person: (a) has attempted to tamper with the entry process or other operation of the Sweepstakes; (b) has failed to comply with or has attempted to circumvent these Official Rules; (c) has committed fraud or attempted to undermine the legitimate operation of the Sweepstakes; or (d) has acted toward Sponsor, any other entity affiliated with the Sweepstakes, or any other entrant in an unfair, inequitable, threatening, disrupting, or harassing manner. If a dispute arises regarding compliance with these Official Rules, Sponsor may consider, in its sole discretion, data reasonably available to Sponsor through information technology systems in Sponsor’s control, but Sponsor will not be obligated to consider any data or other information collected from any other source. Any failure by Sponsor to enforce any of these Official Rules will not constitute a waiver of such Official Rules. If there is a conflict between any term of these Official Rules and any marketing or entry materials used in connection with the Sweepstakes, the terms of these Official Rules will govern.

Sponsor also reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to modify these Official Rules for clarification purposes without materially affecting the terms and conditions of the Sweepstakes. Sponsor reserves the right to cancel, terminate or modify the Sweepstakes if an insufficient number of entries are received or if the Sweepstakes is not capable of running as planned, including, without limitation, as a result of infection by computer virus, bugs, tampering, unauthorized intervention, or technical failures of any sort, or for any reason beyond Sponsor’s control. If due to circumstances beyond the control of the Sponsor, any event related to the Sweepstakes or prize is delayed, rescheduled, postponed, cancelled or has a change of venue, the Sponsor reserves the right, but is not obligated, to cancel or modify the Sweepstakes. Notice of cancellation or modification of the Sweepstakes will be published on Sponsor’s website. If cancellation occurs prior to Sponsor’s receipt of any entries, Sponsor will not be obligated to award prize(s). If cancellation occurs after Sponsor’s receipt of entries, winner(s) will be selected by random drawing from among all eligible, non-suspect entries received prior to cancellation, provided Sponsor is able to do so.

Sponsor defines “personal information” as any information that identifies you as an individual or is directly linkable to you as an identifiable individual. Entry constitutes (a) permission to share all personal information collected in connection with your participation on the Sweepstakes with business partners, including Co-Sponsors to be used for informational and/or commercial purposes and (b) permission to Sponsor and Co-Sponsors to contact you using this personal information for commercial purposes including advertising and telemarketing. Sponsor is not responsible for the privacy practices of these entities.

Entry constitutes permission (except where prohibited by law) to use winner’s name, home city and state, likeness and/or voice for commercial purposes including advertising, promotion and publicity without additional compensation. The winner’s name and city of residence may be posted online and disclosed to those who make a timely request for a winners list.

By accessing these Official Rules or entering the Sweepstakes on ksat.com, you are deemed to agree to be bound by ksat.com‘s Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.

In Case of Dispute. EXCEPT WHERE PROHIBITED, ENTRANTS AGREE THAT ALL DISPUTES, CLAIMS AND CAUSES OF ACTION ARISING OUT OF OR CONNECTED WITH THIS PROMOTION, OR PRIZE AWARDED, WILL BE RESOLVED INDIVIDUALLY WITHOUT RESORT TO ANY FORM OF CLASS ACTION, AND ALL CLAIMS, JUDGMENTS, AND AWARDS WILL BE LIMITED TO ACTUAL OUT-OF-POCKET COSTS INCURRED BY ENTRANT WITH REGARD TO THIS PROMOTION, BUT IN NO EVENT SHALL DAMAGES INCLUDE ATTORNEYS’ FEES, PUNITIVE, INCIDENTAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, OR OTHER DAMAGES. All issues and questions concerning the construction, validity, interpretation, and enforceability of these Official Rules, or the rights and obligations of entrants and Sponsor(s) in connection with the Sweepstakes will be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of state where the Sponsor is located as set forth below (“State”), without giving effect to any choice of law or conflict of law rules or provisions that would cause the application of the laws of any other jurisdiction. The state and federal courts located in the State will be the exclusive forum for any dispute relating to these Official Rules and/or this Sweepstakes. All entrants and winner(s) agree, by their participation in the Sweepstakes, to submit to the personal jurisdiction of the state and federal courts in the State and waive the right to sweepstakes jurisdiction.

Severability: If any provision(s) of these Official Rules are held to be invalid or unenforceable, all remaining provisions hereof will remain in full force and effect.

Winner List. For the name(s) of the winner(s), send request and a self-addressed stamped envelope to Sponsor at 1408 N. St. Mary’s San Antonio, TX 78215. Attn: Winner’s List, or request it online at help.ksat.com . Be sure to specify the name of the sweepstakes for which you are requesting the list of winner(s). Request must be postmarked after Sweepstakes Period and received by Sponsor no later than 60 days after the close of the Sweepstakes Period.

Sponsor/Administrator: KSAT 12, 1408 N. St. Mary’s Street, San Antonio, TX 78215

Co-Sponsor: Firstmark Credit Union, 2023 Gold Canyon Rd, San Antonio, TX 78232

The Sweepstakes is in no way sponsored, endorsed or administered by, or associated with, Instagram.

The restaurant at 1014 S. Alamo St. is owned by chef Iris Gonzales-Ornelas, who operates the business alongside her family.

It got its start in 2015 with a location in the Brooks area, then moved to the former home of Rosarios in Southtown, before opening at its present location in December of last year.

The local restaurant gained notoriety when the Food Network’s “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives” featured its Caribbean nachos in an episode of the popular television show.

Read more of this story at the San Antonio Business Journal website.

Editor’s note: This story was published through a partnership between KSAT and the San Antonio Business Journal.

More recent SABJ coverage on KSAT:

• Oxbow plans 10 new buildings at Pearl for retail expansion
• Rackspace Technology, executives named in securities fraud lawsuit over AI strategy
• Terry Black’s hotel renderings reveal glass greenhouse structure

The 24-year-old Hunt started the week by winning the 100-meter final and made it two-for-two Thursday by taking the 200 gold at Alexander Stadium. She’s also in contention to be in two relay teams.

“I am only 50% through as I have set out for the full set of four golds," Hunt said. “Now I am incredibly excited for the relays because I get to do them and have so much fun with my friends.”

The ever-affable Hunt likes to quote a “High School Musical” character when she says “I want it all” on the track. But the University of Cambridge alum can get more serious, too, like when she recently discussed the legacy of colonialism associated with the Commonwealth Games.

Here's what to know about her career:

Medals include silver in 200 at world championships

Hunt was the surprise silver medalist in the 200 at the world championships last September in Tokyo, where she ran 22.14 seconds in the final — U.S. sprinter Melissa Jefferson-Wooden was the winner.

At the 2024 Olympics in Paris, Hunt ran the third leg on the British women’s 4x100 relay team that won silver.

In the youth ranks, Hunt set an under-18 women's world best in the 200 when she ran a 22.42 in June 2019 in Mannheim, Germany.

Hunt juggled academics — studying English Literature — while training and overcame a leg injury to reach world-class levels. After her silver medal in Tokyo last year, she told the BBC she's glad she stayed in school: “You can be an academic badass and a track goddess.”

Hunt quotes ‘High School Musical’ character

When describing her goals, Hunt cites a “High School Musical” character Sharpay Evans and the song called “I Want it All.”

Hunt mentioned it in the pre-championships news conference and again after winning gold in the 100 on Monday night.

“That performance is one step closer to being like Sharpay Evans,” she said after the victory. “I really want to win it all and I’m so happy now I’ve got one out of four done. Hopefully I can take this momentum and the good vibes into the rest of the week.”

Hunt's issue with the Commonwealth Games

Hunt gives fans a behind-the-scenes view of her life as an athlete with video updates on her YouTube page. Her “vlog” touches on everything from meals to sightseeing to anti-doping tests.

The sprinter's most recent video was a review of her time at the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow where she won a silver medal in the 100.

Hunt takes a few minutes in the video to discuss the history of the games, saying she doesn't “ethically or morally agree with the kind of notion of a Commonwealth Games.” The games, she added, “used to celebrate a colonial empire.”

“I think the Commonwealth Games provides the opportunity for us to reflect on ourselves and our history with colonialism, also the fact that England as we know it was rebuilt post-war by the Windrush generation, by immigrants,” Hunt said.

Athletes discuss this privately, she said, but that's where it stays.

“I think a lot of people are afraid to speak about it openly. I think as a white athlete, it’s important for me to speak about my thoughts on it. ... I just kind of wish there was more dialogue and more conversation about that.”

She concludes: “You’re more than free to disagree with it and you’re more than free to think that if I have these views it’s hypocritical for me to compete.”

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

During an appearance on KSAT’s Pickup Lines, Russ told anchor Ernie Zuniga he once envisioned a career in radio after listening to National Public Radio broadcasts while growing up in New Orleans.

“I really wanted to be a radio guy,” Russ said.

After a year at the University of Alabama, however, Russ returned home unsure of his next step. His parents encouraged him to find a job, leading him to work aboard the historic Steamboat Natchez, where thousands of meals were prepared daily.

The experience sparked his interest in professional cooking.

Russ enrolled in Delgado Community College’s culinary program before honing his skills in New Orleans restaurants, including the Ritz-Carlton. He said working alongside classically trained chefs opened his eyes to techniques and possibilities he had never imagined.

His career eventually took him across the country and overseas, with stops in Arizona, New Hampshire, New York, Maryland and Europe before landing in San Antonio in 2012.

The move also shaped his personal life. While working at a Maryland hotel, Russ met pastry chef Elise, who would later become his wife and business partner. Today, the couple owns Clementine in Castle Hills and has three children.

Russ said they intentionally built Clementine as a neighborhood restaurant inspired by the local dining culture he grew up with in New Orleans.

“We’re not going to be millionaires,” he said. “Let’s go have a good life. Let’s create a great life for our kids.”

Despite earning national recognition and James Beard Award nominations, Russ said his focus remains simple: continuing to make Clementine the best it can be while raising his family in San Antonio.

“We love our neighborhood,” he said. “That’s our focus.”

Watch the full Pickup Lines with chef John Russ in the video player above.

More Pickup Lines episodes:

• Pickup Lines: Little Joe reflects on hardship, family and the experiences that shaped his career
• Pickup Lines: Gordon Hartman says discipline, determination paved the way from homebuilder to inclusion pioneer
• Pickup Lines: USAA executive Jenna Saucedo-Herrera reflects on leadership, resilience and giving back

Ernie Zuniga started Pickup Lines, a digital talk show, straight from his vehicle. The segments feature a diverse range of guests, including executives, small business owners, and everyday individuals, as they share personal journeys, news, and stories.

According to a GCSO spokesperson, the deputies were dispatched just before 2:45 a.m. Thursday to a home in the 400 block of Hurst Lane in Seguin. The spokesperson said a male called 911 and told the dispatcher that the unidentified man was “going to kill her.”

The sheriff’s office said multiple deputies arrived at the home within seven minutes of the 911 call. Upon arrival, the deputies heard screaming from inside the home and made entry, GCSO said.

After the deputies made entry, the spokesperson said the man was seen holding a knife to the woman’s neck. Deputies said they commanded the man to drop the knife, but he refused.

The deputies, who felt an “immediate threat” to the woman and themselves, said they were “compelled to shoot” the man. A spokesperson said the man died as a result of at least one gunshot wound.

In a follow-up statement to KSAT, the sheriff’s office said the deputies will be placed on paid administrative leave and that the Texas Department of Public Safety’s Texas Rangers will be leading the investigation into this case.

After three days, the GCSO spokesperson also said those deputies will be scheduled to “return to the office to perform administrative duties, pending the results of the Texas Rangers investigation.”

At this time, it is unclear how many deputies responded to the residence, how many deputies fired their weapons and how many times the man may have been struck by gunfire.

KSAT directed those questions to DPS, who sent the following statement late Thursday morning:

At the request of the Guadalupe County Sheriff’s Office, the Texas Rangers are investigating an officer-involved shooting that occurred on August 13, 2026, in the 400 block of Hurst Lane in Guadalupe County. The identity of the deceased is being withheld pending notification of next of kin. This remains an active and ongoing investigation, and no additional information is available for release at this time

Texas Department of Public Safety spokesperson

More recent news coverage on KSAT:

• Woman, 19, charged with manslaughter in connection with Stone Oak crash, affidavit says
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Hill Country Family Services is one of four nonprofits selected by the Community Foundation of the Texas Hill Country to distribute emergency financial assistance to flood-affected families in Kendall and Bandera counties.

In just two weeks of operation, the organization has already helped 39 families — and staff members are assisting every single working day.

The Community Foundation granted $94,000 to Hill Country Family Services as part of a broader $1.6 million emergency financial assistance effort across the Hill Country region. The amount each family receives is based on household size, with additional factors considered — such as whether children or people with disabilities live in the home.

Austin Dickson, CEO of the Community Foundation of the Texas Hill Country, said the flexibility of the funding is what makes it effective in the immediate aftermath of a disaster.

“Emergency financial assistance is nimble, flexible funding for families who know best what they need next in their recovery,” Dickson said. “And it’s the first step in recovering after a disaster — whereas home repair programs and other things will come in future months.”

Families register through a needs assessment and receive direct cash payments. Dickson said the needs vary widely, from unpaid bills and rent to mold treatment and drywall repairs.

“Almost everybody has an unpaid bill that they’re stressing about right now,” he said. “And so it’s an honor to be able to take care of that for them.”

Inside Hill Country Family Services, families also have access to a food pantry set up like a grocery store. Families shop on a point system based on household size, choosing from fresh produce, meats, dairy and canned goods.

Executive Director Bryce Boddie said the setup is designed like that on purpose.

“It’s shopping with dignity for our clients,” Boddie said.

Boddie said the immediate response after the floods focused on finding shelter for displaced families and ensuring that people had food after losing power. Now, a month later, the needs have shifted.

“We’ve got a lot of homes without sheetrock. We’ve got a lot of homes that need to be re-leveled,” Boddie said. “And I think for that, they’re asking, who’s here to help?”

The Community Foundation has raised $750,000 for the 2026 flood disaster so far — a stark contrast to the roughly $150 million raised following last year’s flooding.

With FEMA individual assistance not declared for the entire affected region, nonprofits like Hill Country Family Services are carrying much of the financial recovery burden.

Boddie said his organization is ready to keep showing up.

“For those families, when something like this happens, it’s a big hit on your finances,” he said. “We can help step in and bridge that gap for them so that they can get back on their feet.”

The foundation said it may issue additional grants as needs across the region continue to grow.

Hill Country Family Services is located at 114 W. Advogt St. in Boerne. Flood-affected families in the Hill Country counties can register for assistance through a needs assessment at the organization or by clicking here. Both English and Spanish-speaking staff members are available on-site in Boerne.

More Hill Country floods coverage on KSAT:

• Ingram ISD students return to class as flood repairs continue
• Catholic Charities Archdiocese of San Antonio continues flood relief for Hill Country families

The Hennepin County search warrant obtained by The Associated Press identified the man as Nathan Brown, 41. It says he stabbed his wife, 41-year-old Kristen Brown, and their daughter, Evie Brown, inside the daycare that Kristen Brown operated out of the family's basement in Hopkins, a suburb of Minneapolis. He then fatally shot himself in an upstairs closet.

Hopkins police said in a statement Thursday that they are still investigating.

According to police records, a father dropping off two of his children for daycare heard screams coming from the basement. The father entered the home and initially thought Nathan Brown was performing CPR before realizing it was an attack. The witness called 911 and fled with his children and two other children.

Authorities said Wednesday that they believe Nathan Brown earlier killed a 78-year-old relative at her home in Burnsville, about 20 miles (32 kilometers) from Hopkins. Nathan Brown had recently been living there, investigators said. Police have not released the woman’s identity or said how she was related to Brown.

The warrant says the parent who witnessed the daycare attack told investigators that Kristen Brown had recently sent parents a letter that the daycare would soon be closing, citing “relationship issues with Nathan.”

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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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Six other children were present, but none were physically harmed, authorities said.

Authorities have not released any information about a potential motive for the killings. They said there was no history of police calls to the Hopkins address.

Records show that Kristen Brown had been licensed by the state since 2019. The daycare had a capacity of 10 children and was found to be in compliance during visits in 2023, 2024 and 2025. Family members of Kristen Brown declined to comment on Thursday.

Kristen Brown opened Brown Bear Childcare a few months after giving birth to Evie. In a 2019 post on the daycare’s Facebook page, Brown wrote that she hoped to help her daughter and other children “blossom into happy, intelligent, caring individuals.”

Kristen Brown had a bachelor’s degree in elementary education foundations from the University of Minnesota Twin Cities and was certified in vision therapy, according to her daycare’s Facebook page. She incorporated music and cooking classes into her days with the children and would take them on field trips to a science museum and an orchard.

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Rico reported from Atlanta.

During an hourslong meeting that was conducted virtually, the board voted to add Trump's name to the building's facade so it would read “The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts Restored and Renovated By President Donald J. Trump.” The plaza in front of the building would be named after Trump and most of the space at the venue would be closed for two years to allow for substantial renovations.

The changes, described by Rep. Joyce Beatty, an Ohio Democrat who is an ex-officio board member, and her lawyers, amount to a dramatic test of U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper.

He ruled in May that letters affixed to the building that spelled out Trump's name were added illegally and he ordered their removal, a decision that the Republican administration failed to persuade courts to overturn. At the same time, Cooper blocked a two-year closure that was set to take effect July 5, saying an earlier board vote authorizing the shuttering was “ill-informed and seemingly preordained.”

“This latest development is a transparent effort to circumvent the Court’s ruling, and flies in the face of the statutes that Congress passed,” Beatty said in a statement. “I will continue to fight for this treasured national monument.”

A Kennedy Center representative did not respond to a request for comment.

Much of Thursday's board meeting was expected to focus on the extent of closures required to allow for renovations that the Kennedy Center's management says are needed to improve safety. In response to the judge's criticism of the earlier vote, the institution's leaders said they would provide the board with three options to consider.

They included a complete closure or a partial closure that would allow “some continued public access and limited programming in spaces unaffected” by the work. A third option would “consider a highly limited series of phased closures to address only the Center’s most serious infrastructure needs while scheduling and maintaining a full slate of programming.”

Ultimately, the board decided to close the building for two years while leaving the potential for some degree of programming to still happen in an outdoor space known as the Reach. The decision to move ahead with the two-year closure, in addition to the moves to memorialize Trump, could revive questions about whether the board seriously considered the full range of options, a point Democrats emphasized after the meeting.

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, a Rhode Island Democrat who is also an ex officio board member, criticized a “sham meeting.”

“What happened today was nothing more than a rubber stamp on a decision the President made months ago that the Board already tried to effectuate without doing proper due diligence,” he said in a statement.

The Kennedy Center has become a metaphor for presidential power

During Trump's second term, the Kennedy Center has become an unlikely — and highly visible — metaphor for presidential power. While he largely ignored the institution during his first term in Washington, Trump moved quickly to oust its leadership when he returned to office in January 2025 and replaced it with a board of trustees that named him chairman.

His name was quickly added to the building, before coming down in June in response to Cooper's order. The area where it once stood is now covered by a massive tarp.

The Kennedy Center moves are part of Trump's broader push to reshape the physical landscape of the nation's capital in ways that have few modern parallels.

He demolished the East Wing of the White House and is building a controversial ballroom in its place, though an appeals court ruled last week that construction should stop because Congress didn't approve the project. Trump has said he will take the case to the Supreme Court.

His remodel of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool has also stumbled after algae returned and U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro refuted his claims that a vandal was responsible for the damage.

Meanwhile, Trump is planning extensive renovations of a golf course in East Potomac Park, which could significantly reduce the public’s access to running and biking paths. He is also moving forward with a triumphal arch that will sit near Arlington National Cemetery.

Trump has derided the Kennedy Center as “rusted, rotted, and rat and bug infested” and threatened to hand the building over to Congress after Cooper rejected the closure and the addition of the president’s name to the building.

The institution’s leadership has argued that it’s in genuine need of repair and updating.

Matt Floca, the Kennedy Center’s executive director and chief operating officer, guided a group of journalists through the building in April, highlighting severe water damage that he said corroded steel in some places as thin as tissue paper. Some pieces of equipment, including several 800-ton chillers that help cool the building, are decades old and in need of replacement.

At the time, Floca said he considered doing the repairs individually but insisted it was his recommendation to Trump to close the building and move forward with the renovation all at once.

“When the president asked, ‘How do you make these projects the best? How do you make them really excellent and deliver them efficiently?’ My recommendation was you close the building and you do everything over a definite period of time, two years,” he said.

More recently, the legal battles became the subject of barbs and jokes as comedian Bill Maher accepted the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor in late June. At the start of the program, Pamella Roland DeVos, a Kennedy Center trustee appointed by Trump, described the institution as a “national cultural center open not just for some but for every American patron who wants to experience the greatest art and expression the world has to offer.”

“The responsibility that comes with it is one our board takes very seriously,” she said.

A fan blade in the Boeing 737-800's right engine broke loose, sending fragments flying out of the engine that broke the window and damaged the fuselage in several other places, according to a preliminary report by the National Transportation Safety Board. Greece turned the investigation over to the U.S. agency under international aviation rules.

The July 10 accident happened after the flight departed the northern Greek city of Thessaloniki. Investigators found bird remains inside the engine, suggesting the plane may have struck birds during takeoff, though they haven't determined what caused the fan blade to break loose.

The 61-year-old passenger suffered neck and shoulder injuries and friction burns.

Panicked passengers helped the man after the window broke

The flight attendants told investigators they heard and felt loud, continuous vibration and saw smoke or fog fill the cabin before the oxygen masks dropped from the ceiling.

One flight attendant then noticed some passengers standing and calling for help. The man in a row 11 window seat was partially lodged in the damaged window, and other passengers pulled him back into the cabin.

The injured passenger was moved to row 12, where a doctor on board tended to him. Other passengers retrieved a metal box from the flight attendants and used it to try to block the opening until the plane could land.

A series of short videos recorded inside the plane and shared by Radio Thessaloniki showed passengers wearing oxygen masks after the cabin lost pressure. Another appeared to show the broken window, with a man seated nearby wearing an oxygen mask. A third video, apparently filmed after the aircraft landed, showed first responders working in the aisle.

The engine's fan blades were inspected in May

Maintenance records show the fan blades in the right engine had undergone ultrasonic inspections in May 2026 and November 2025, with no damage found. But flight crews had reported four suspected bird strikes to the same engine over the previous year, according to the NTSB. Bird remains were found after two of them.

Jeff Guzzetti, a former NTSB and Federal Aviation Administration investigator who reviewed the preliminary report, told The Associated Press that the required maintenance appears to have been performed on schedule. Investigators, however, will likely examine how the inspections were conducted and whether the previous suspected bird strikes contributed to preexisting damage.

“We know what happened and even to some extent why it happened, but there’s still unanswered questions that the NTSB will get at,” Guzzetti said.

The NTSB last month reprimanded Ryanair CEO Michael O’Leary after he told investors the investigation was focused on foreign object damage rather than the plane’s age or maintenance history. The agency said investigators had not ruled anything out and O’Leary wasn’t authorized to discuss the investigation.

Ryanair said Thursday it would not comment further until the NTSB investigation is complete. Boeing and CFM International, the engine maker, said they are assisting with the investigation.

FAA had ordered fixes after similar accidents

The FAA issued three directives last year requiring airlines to strengthen parts of the engine coverings on Boeing 737s after two previous fan blade failures sent pieces of the engine coverings flying. In one accident, a Southwest Airlines passenger was killed in 2018 after debris struck the fuselage and knocked out a window, causing the cabin to rapidly lose pressure.

The directives, which took effect in April 2025, require changes aimed at keeping pieces of the engine covering from breaking away and striking the plane if a fan blade breaks loose. Among other things, airlines must replace certain fasteners and spacers that attach the engine’s inlet covering and revise their maintenance and inspection programs.

The FAA gave airlines until July 2028 to complete the major modifications, and the NTSB report says the required changes had not yet been made to the Ryanair plane.

Guzzetti said the latest accident could prompt the FAA and NTSB to examine whether that deadline should be moved up.

“It takes time to do the maintenance, to get the parts, and the risk at the time was assessed such that the industry could probably wait that long. Now with this event,” Guzzetti said, “that may change things.”

Asked whether the July 2028 deadline could change, the FAA declined to comment on the open investigation, saying it closely supports the NTSB and will “take any necessary safety actions based on the evidence.”

The plane returned about an hour after takeoff

The 737-800, which can seat up to 189 passengers, was delivered new to Ryanair in 2008, according to flight-tracking site Flightradar24.

Flight records show the plane climbed above 15,000 feet (4,570 meters) about six minutes after departure before descending to about 6,000 feet (1,830 meters) “to burn fuel for 30 minutes” and returning to Thessaloniki about an hour after takeoff, Flightradar24 said.

The flight was operated by Malta Air, a subsidiary of Ryanair, Europe’s largest budget carrier.

The plane landed normally and passengers returned to the terminal. One passenger requested and received medical assistance on the ground, the airline said in a statement at the time.

But to the children and staff at the Alamo Heights ISD school, he is much more than the person who keeps the building running. He is “Mr. Ralph,” a beloved staff member known for his kindness, magic tricks and artwork that fills parts of the campus.

Narvaez said he checks the cafeteria, teacher workroom, teacher lounge, gym and library each day as part of his regular duties. Along the way, he has also found ways to connect with students through painting and drawing.

“I love doing artwork for the kids, and they get real happy when they see it,” Narvaez said.

He started doing artwork when he was in middle school, after watching his father constantly drawing. Now, he wants to inspire kids the same way.

His work can be seen across the school. In the library, Narvaez painted ceiling tiles with book titles, including some in Spanish. In the cafeteria, he created a large mural by himself, coming in on Saturdays to work on it.

At the school’s play H-E-B, he added detailed chalk art and said he is already thinking about new ideas for the space.

“To do the art I come over the weekends and sometimes during my lunch break, I’ll eat 30 minutes and the other 30 minutes I’ll draw or paint,” he said.

Students have taken notice.

“In the past, they come up to me and they want my autograph,” Narvaez laughed. “It makes me feel good. It makes me want to draw and paint more.”

Narvaez said his artwork is also a way to help young children feel more comfortable, especially when they are anxious at the start of the school year.

“Especially first day of school, they get nervous and stuff like that,” he said. “I talk to them a lot and sometimes do little magic tricks for them and show my paintings, and it makes them feel a little bit more comfortable.”

He even surprised the KSAT team with a painting during a visit to the campus.

As students return Wednesday for their first day of school, many of Howard Early Childhood Center’s newest learners will get to meet the custodian whose creativity and kindness have made him a familiar and comforting presence on campus.

Read also:

• IDEA Public Schools welcomes 18K students on first day
• Viewers share back-to-school photos on KSAT Connect
• GMSA backpack giveaway: Students, parents excited ahead of new school year

Today on Texas Eats NOW:

KARBACH BREWING COMPANY

2032 Karbach St, Houston, TX 77092

Karbach Brewing Company is a Houston craft brewery rooted in time-honored German brewing tradition, offering fresh beer alongside a full restaurant, biergarten, and expansive event space open for seven days a week. Known for pairing quality craftsmanship with a lively, family- and pet-friendly atmosphere, the brewery features live sports on a large outdoor screen and private event venues. The Hoppadillo IPA has earned multiple medals at both the World Beer Cup and the Great American Beer Festival, a reflection of the brewery’s commitment to quality as its core value.

The seasonal standout is the Karbachtoberfest Märzen, a Bavarian-style lager brewed with 100% imported German malt and hops. True to tradition, it is brewed in spring and lagered through the summer, producing a crisp, clean, and balanced finish without excessive bitterness. The beer is available on draft and in cans at the brewery, and can be found statewide at major retail partners including H-E-B, Walmart, and Kroger. Three weekends of Karbachtoberfest celebrations, featuring a 40-foot traditional German beer hall, run from September into October on the brewery grounds.

GOODE COMPANY ARMADILLO PALACE

5015 Kirby Dr, Houston, TX 77098

Armadillo Palace is a sprawling Texas honky-tonk restaurant and live music venue opened in 2004 by the Goode Company. Spread across 17,000 square feet with one dance hall, two bars, and three stages, it is one of Houston’s premier destinations for live music — particularly during rodeo season, when the venue comes fully alive with performances and private events. A Walk of Fame embedded in the entryway pays tribute to Texas-born music legends.

The kitchen fires over mesquite wood and brines proteins for 24 hours before they ever hit the grill. The 12-ounce heritage pork chop, bone-in and grilled over mesquite, is finished with a house-made tomato bacon jam. The Kennedy Ranch discada features skirt steak slow-stewed in a beer sauce with fresh tomatoes, cilantro, and onions. Texas deer camp quail legs are wrapped in applewood smoked bacon, cooked over mesquite, glazed with quail marinade, and served over white cheddar grits. Rounding out the spread are smoked chicken collard greens and a house-made mac and cheese.

FIFE AND FARRO

221 Newell Ave, San Antonio, TX 78215

Fife and Farro is a wood-fired pizza and pasta restaurant that opened in April 2024 inside Pullman Market. The concept centers on locally sourced ingredients, with fresh mozzarella made on-site every 20 minutes and dough that is worked by hand, shaped with semolina for manageability, and fired in a wood-burning oven until blistered and bubbly.

The Americano pizza builds on a fresh mozzarella and oregano base, dotted with pesto, house tomato sauce, and pieces of meatball, finished tableside with dollops of ricotta. A take on the New Orleans muffuletta arrives as a generously stacked sandwich of mortadella, salami, capicola, provolone picante, and a house giardiniera tapenade with mayonnaise.

BIRD DOG

1701 S Interstate 35, San Marcos, TX 78666

Bird Dog is a San Marcos comfort food restaurant owned by Michael De La Cruz, specializing in made-to-order chicken tenders, loaded hot dogs, and a roster of creative side items. Opened in 2025 along the east side of Interstate 35, the spot has built a following for its scratch approach to classic American fare, including fresh-baked desserts and agua frescas to round out the menu.

Chicken tenders are soaked in buttermilk, pressed for even thickness, double-breaded, and fried to order — served as a six-piece meal with toast and fries, and optionally finished with white gravy. The hot dog program is where creativity runs deep: the CAB beef dog is wrapped in bacon and topped with queso and fried pickles; the Wicked Chili Dog layers chorizo chili, queso, and pickled jalapeños over a bacon-wrapped dog; and the Hot Mess features a no-nitrate dog wrapped in bacon topped with asada, grilled peppers and onions, and queso — landing somewhere between Tex-Mex and a Philly. A loose-grind smash burger rounds out the savory menu, and cinnamon rolls baked fresh in-house, finished with butter sauce and icing, close things out on a sweet note.

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The company operates a vast nationwide network of automated cameras that record the license plate numbers and other characteristics of all passing vehicles every day. Thousands of law enforcement agencies in 49 states can search and share Flock's data across jurisdictions to aid their investigations.

Police have credited the technology as an important crime-fighting innovation that has helped locate missing people and track suspects in violent crimes. But some critics say its pervasiveness amounts to unconstitutional warrantless mass surveillance. Dozens of cities and agencies have nixed their relationships with Flock amid concerns that the data can be accessed for immigration enforcement or used in unauthorized tracking, after a flurry of examples surfaced of law enforcement officers misusing the technology for personal searches.

CEO says changes will drive accountability

In an interview, Flock CEO Garrett Langley said many of the product changes will make what were once optional guardrails mandatory for its users to implement by Jan. 1.

Among them: All law enforcement customers will have to implement an audit tool that's intended to flag abnormal search behavior. When the system detects abnormal behavior, the user would be locked out pending an internal review, the company said in a description of the changes provided ahead of Thursday's announcement.

Flock, which says its customers own the data that the cameras record, is also shortening the standard data retention window from 30 days to seven. It said it will allow data to be preserved for longer when it is evidence tied to a case number.

Law enforcement users will now also be required to enter a code from their records management system tying each search to a specific case before it is run, something Langley said civil liberties advocates have long been calling for. Overrides for emergencies would be automatically flagged for review, the company said.

Customers will also be allowed to decide which offense types — such as homicide or arson — outside agencies can search their data for, which would allow a customer to block outside searches related to immigration enforcement, the company said.

Langley said that change will give individual cities and departments control to use the system in a manner “consistent with community values.”

Critics say updates still leave room for abuses, supporters urge balance

Critics of the company reacted skeptically to the changes, which they said appeared designed to address the growing bipartisan anger about the cameras but could still leave room for police to abuse the system.

The American Civil Liberties Union said in a blog post that the shortened evidence retention window could be “a step in the right direction,” but it characterized the other changes as “retreads” of inadequate safety measures.

Robert Frommer, a senior attorney at the Institute for Justice, a public interest law firm that's led closely watched litigation over the technology, called the changes “window dressing” from a company in “panic mode.”

“This is window dressing that doesn’t address the fundamental problem, which is that police officers are the ones deciding who and when to search, and that should be done by judges with real warrants,” he said.

Andrew Guthrie Ferguson, a professor at the George Washington University Law School whose scholarship has focused on policing, big data surveillance and the Fourth Amendment, said Thursday’s shifts were “better than the opposite” but called for further scrutiny of the technology in the form of “sustained democratic engagement with the rules and judicial checks on access at a minimum.”

Ferguson said he’s been surprised to see the “growing community backlash” against Flock specifically, given that the technology isn't new and other companies sell it as well. But Flock and the movement against it have “captured people’s sense that maybe they don’t want to be surveilled all the time,” he said.

More than 50 agencies or jurisdictions have canceled, suspended or rejected a contract or deactivated their cameras since the beginning of the year, according to a tracker maintained by DeFlock, a grassroots group formed to track the use of license plate reader technology and push back against it. Cameras around the country have also been vandalized.

In Congress, Republican representatives filed at least two bills aiming to restrict the use of the technology in July.

Ian Adams, an associate professor of criminology at the University of South Carolina currently working on a Flock-related research study, said many of the concerns raised about how the company's data can be used are not new concerns in law enforcement.

“Anyone with policing experience could have reasonably foreseen that what have been termed as ‘curiosity searches’ by officers, searches for private reasons not related to police work, were going to be a problem this technology faced,” he added, noting that other technologies and platforms like the FBI’s Criminal Justice Information had faced those issues.

Law enforcement experts said it's a common tension of “policing in a democracy” — balancing useful technology that officers say helps solve and prevent crime with the community's interest and right to privacy.

“It's a balancing act. A community has a legitimate interest in how information is used, but it also has a legitimate interest in the effectiveness of a police department in preventing crime,” said Chuck Wexler, executive director of the Police Executive Research Forum, a Washington-based nonpartisan think tank. “I think a balance can be struck, but it's more likely to come from department policy than company changes.”

Successes and failures have captured attention

Flock, based in Atlanta, Georgia, often posts to its website what the company deems to be everyday examples of success stories for its cameras, including finding missing seniors and catching car thieves.

But the tech has also been used in high-profile cases that have garnered national attention, such as the search for a suspect in a fatal shooting at Brown University and in tracking and arresting a former North Carolina police officer who authorities say had made threats that he planned to carry out a mass shooting at a festival in Louisiana. A grand jury declined to bring charges in that case in June, and state authorities said the former officer's family had taken him to a treatment facility out of state where he does not face further charges.

Abuses have also drawn widespread attention. The Washington Post reported earlier this month finding nearly 50 instances of police officers charged or accused of using the cameras for unauthorized purposes, many for tracking current or former romantic partners or family members.

Just this week, six employees — including four officers — of the Savannah Police Department in Georgia were fired after they were accused of searching for friends and family using the tool and allowing an officer from an outside agency to use the city’s cameras.

The Savannah department said it was made aware of the misuse through Flock’s voluntary audit function.

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Lauer reported from Philadelphia.

The person, who was not authorized to talk publicly about the case and spoke to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity, cautioned that Mangione could change his mind. If he follows through, it would be a stunning development in a case that rattled business leaders while galvanizing their critics.

Mangione’s lawyers, and spokespeople for the Justice Department and Manhattan federal prosecutors, declined to comment.

Mangione is accused of traveling to New York City to ambush Thompson, 50, then shooting him outside a Manhattan hotel on Dec. 4, 2024, as the executive walked to UnitedHealth Group’s annual investor conference.

Mangione is due in court on Friday for a hastily scheduled hearing in the federal case, which involves two counts of stalking. It wasn’t clear what charge or charges Mangione is expected to plead guilty to. The hearing, in Manhattan federal court, comes as his lawyers have been talking with federal prosecutors about a possible resolution to one of two criminal cases against Mangione in Thompson’s death. Previous talks in June broke down.

Mangione, 28, has been charged in both federal and state court in New York and still faces the possibility of a trial in his unresolved state case. Mangione’s state murder trial is set to begin Sept. 8. Both sets of charges carried the possibility of a life sentence.

Mangione has pleaded not guilty and has spoken out publicly against the prospect of two trials, telling a judge in February: “It’s the same trial twice. One plus one is two. Double jeopardy by any commonsense definition.”

Under New York law, a state prosecution could be barred if the federal case is resolved first, but it isn’t automatic.

The state’s double jeopardy protections kick in if a jury has been sworn in a prior prosecution, such as a federal case, or if that prosecution ends in a guilty plea. Mangione’s cases involve different charges arising from the same course of conduct.

Once Mangione pleads guilty, his lawyers could then ask the judge in the state case to throw out those charges on double jeopardy grounds. State prosecutors argue their case is distinct and double jeopardy shouldn't apply.

Mangione’s federal charges allege that he traveled across state lines by bus to stalk and kill Thompson and that he used means such as a cellphone, the internet, interstate highways and staying at a hostel that serves out-of-state customers while planning and carrying out the attack. The state charges pertain to the killing itself, as well as firearms offenses.

In a letter last month, state prosecutors objected to the possibility of a guilty plea in the federal case wiping out the state case.

“Obviously, any guilty pleas in these matters must account for the seriousness of defendant’s offenses, the loss of an innocent life, the impact of those crimes on the victim’s family, and the other state interests that are implicated, including the sanctity of life principle that underpins the state homicide charges,” Assistant District Attorney Joel Seidemann wrote.

Mangione’s decision to plead guilty comes after a series of setbacks for his defense.

In January, U.S. District Judge Margaret Garnett took the death penalty off the table but ruled that prosecutors could use items collected from Mangione’s backpack during his arrest as evidence against him.

They included a 3D-printed pistol that investigators said matched the one used to kill Thompson and a notebook in which authorities say Mangione described his intent to kill an insurance executive.

In June, Mangione’s lawyers said they would pursue a psychiatric defense in the state case but reversed course a day later. The defense, involving claims that he was suffering from extreme emotional disturbance at the time of the killing, isn’t allowed in federal court.

Surveillance video of the killing showed a masked gunman shooting Thompson from behind. Police say “delay,” “deny” and “depose” were written on the ammunition, mimicking a phrase used to describe how insurers avoid paying claims.

Mangione, an Ivy League graduate from a wealthy Maryland family, was arrested five days later at a McDonald’s in Altoona, Pennsylvania, about 230 miles (about 370 kilometers) west of Manhattan.

He has become a cause célèbre for people upset with the health insurance industry.

An online fundraiser for his legal defense fund raised more than $1.5 million, and several dozen supporters have shown up to his court appearances, some wearing green clothing — the color worn by the Mario Bros. video game character Luigi — and “FREE LUIGI” T-shirts.

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Durkin Richer reported from Washington.

McALLEN — A federal judge upheld a temporary restraining order against government contractors building a border wall along the Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge, pausing construction until Aug. 27.

Spencer Construction LLC and Royal Concrete Products LLC were prohibited from continuing construction or related work and from entering the property that belongs to Hidalgo County Irrigation District No. 2, according to the judge’s ruling, which upholds a temporary restraining order issued by a state district court in Hidalgo County on July 30.

The irrigation district petitioned the state district court for the restraining order, arguing that the contractors trespassed onto their property and began work on the border wall without its consent.

The irrigation district, which is a public corporation that distributes water for agriculture, owns a 120-foot strip of land that housed one of its irrigation canals, as well as 60 feet on either side of the canal.

The irrigation district claimed that Spencer, a Tucson-based company, began interfering with and altering the property on July 20, according to the petition. It also alleged that the company’s activities “recklessly allowed large amounts of dirt to fall into the irrigation canal,” which interfered with the infrastructure.

Royal, a local subcontractor, delivered and poured concrete materials for the border wall construction, which the irrigation district said constituted an ongoing trespass of the property and interfered with the infrastructure.

Prior to seeking a restraining order, the irrigation district said it had contacted Spencer demanding that the company halt its work, but that the company did not stop.

Ruben R. Peña, the attorney representing Spencer, said the company is complying with the restraining order, but that it was only acting as a contractor for the government.

“We don’t have a dog in that fight,” Peña said.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to questions about the restraining order.

The Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge has been a possible site for border infrastructure since President Donald Trump’s first term, given its location along the Rio Grande. Anti-border wall activists protested and held rallies calling for the refuge’s protection, fearing that a border wall would interfere with the environment and the natural movement of wildlife.

Federal lawmakers had secured protections against border wall construction for the site during Trump’s first term, by preventing funds to be appropriated for border wall construction in certain environmentally or historically significant areas.

But last year’s One Big Beautiful Bill, Trump’s signature spending bill, channeled funding for border wall construction that bypassed the appropriations process, allowing construction to move forward at Santa Ana.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection has said that the border wall in Santa Ana will measure 30 feet tall and will include access gates so visitors will still be able to access land south of the wall.

Reporting in the Rio Grande Valley is supported in part by the Methodist Healthcare Ministries of South Texas, Inc.

Monday’s announcement by the Republican president calls for separating combination shots — including the measles, mumps and rubella, or MMR, vaccine — into separate injections. Appointments for that and other vaccinations should be spaced out whenever possible, the order states.

To accomplish that, drugmakers would need to revive a slate of individual vaccines that have not been widely used in the U.S. for decades. They would also have to build new manufacturing plants capable of producing millions more vaccine doses than the nation currently uses.

For parents, unbundling the MMR vaccine and spacing out the shots would mean returning to the doctor’s office many more times than is currently needed. Those appointments could also strain pediatricians who typically administer the shots, while driving up costs tied to syringes and other medical supplies.

Studies in the U.S. and other countries have shown that combination vaccines increase the likelihood that children will be fully protected from infectious diseases before starting school.

Health experts say there is no scientific basis for changing course.

“We do things that are less convenient and more expensive if there’s a good reason to do it,” said Dr. Anna Durbin, of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. “There is no good justification for this. I think it’s very bad public health policy.”

Trump's plan would require vaccine manufacturing overhaul

Under Trump's executive order, federal officials are instructed to develop within 90 days plans for breaking up the MMR shot and spacing out other vaccines.

But pharmaceutical scientists and former regulators say those changes would likely take years and require drugmakers to spend tens of millions of dollars on new studies and manufacturing facilities.

Currently, there are no individual vaccines in the U.S. for measles, mumps or rubella. All the vaccines approved for those viruses by the Food and Drug Administration are combination shots. That three-in-one approach has been the standard in the U.S. since the 1970s.

Dr. Jesse Goodman, a former FDA vaccine chief, said companies may have to conduct large studies showing their new individual shots produce immune system-boosting reactions in children similar to the current versions. The specifics would depend upon the quality of data from the original standalone vaccines and how it's viewed by FDA regulators.

“The question is how much has changed since then and how comfortable will the FDA and the companies be relying on those comparisons?” said Goodman, who is now a professor at Georgetown University.

Manufacturers may also have to demonstrate the safety of new manufacturing facilities and procedures, given that individual measles shots haven’t been widely produced in the U.S. for decades.

Designing, constructing and getting federal sign-off for new vaccine plants typically takes about five years, according to industry experts.

Additionally, Goodman said the FDA would have to review and license each unbundled vaccine separately, a process with no precedent.

“I don’t think there’s any comparable example of removing hugely effective public health measures that protect babies for no documented scientific reason,” he said.

Individual shots for measles and related diseases tend to be used by lower-income countries that can’t afford the MMR shot. Merck, GSK and the handful of other companies that supply U.S. childhood vaccines make only the combination shot.

In separate statements, Merck and GSK said they stand by the safety and effectiveness of their products. Neither discussed plans to unbundle their shots.

“To date, there has been no published scientific evidence that shows any benefit in separating the combination MMR vaccine into three individual shots,” Merck said in an emailed statement.

Parents would need to make many more trips to the doctor

The MMR shot is currently delivered in two doses — the first at the age of 1 and the second dose after age 4. Splitting up the shot into its three separate components would mean six office visits. Spacing out other shots for pertussis and other infectious diseases could multiply the number of visits many more times.

As the number of visits goes up, parents are more likely to miss appointments or stop making them, according to Durbin.

“It’s going to be less convenient, more expensive and you’re going to have fewer people getting vaccinated,” she said.

For well over a decade, Trump has expressed his view — against medical groups’ guidance — that American children receive too many vaccines and that they should be given in smaller doses over a longer period of time. Last year he called on called on Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to look at reducing the number. Kennedy and other officials have pointed to smaller countries, such as Denmark, that recommended slightly fewer vaccinations than the U.S.

But breaking up combination shots will result in kids receiving many more individual shots than other comparable nations, Durbin notes.

White House spokesman Kush Desai said the Trump administration’s efforts on the MMR vaccine “will give parents more options on timing and frequency for their children, which ultimately will increase vaccination rates for all three diseases.”

Vaccine order is not legally binding

Despite the precedent-breaking nature of Trump’s order, some experts are skeptical it will result in meaningful changes.

Neither the White House nor the FDA can compel drugmakers to develop and seek approval for new vaccines. And from a business perspective, companies have little incentive to develop individual versions of vaccines they already sell in combination shots.

“They’d be competing against themselves, and there’s no reason to do that,” said Dr. Paul Offit, a Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia vaccine researcher and former government adviser.

While Trump’s order calls for more federal research and recommendations, only state governments have the legal authority to require vaccinations for schoolchildren. The order simply advises states to consider updating their laws to reflect the Trump administration’s approach.

“I think states will ignore this,” Offit said. “I think that bottom line is that we don’t need to look to Donald Trump for our medical advice.”

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AP videojournalist Mary Conlon in New York contributed to this report.

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

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Follow the AP's coverage of immunizations at https://apnews.com/hub/immunizations.

Opening statements at the murder trial in Las Vegas are expected to begin Monday.

Family members and fans of the legendary rapper have been waiting for decades to learn the truth behind the 1996 drive-by shooting that left Shakur dead at the height of his career.

Shakur was just 25 when he was shot near the Las Vegas Strip at a time when he was in the middle of a fierce battle for dominance in a music scene shaped by rival gangs.

Authorities three years ago charged Duane “Keffe D” Davis with murder, describing him as the “shot caller” who orchestrated the killing. Davis has pleaded not guilty and could be sentenced to life in prison if he’s convicted.

Sixteen jurors were picked for the trial, which is expected to last about a month. During the selection process, potential jurors were asked about their favorite books and movies, if they had any strong feelings about gangs, and whether they had listened to Shakur’s music.

Shakur still is considered one of the most influential rappers of all time. With hits like “California Love” and “Dear Mama,” more than 75 million of his records have been sold worldwide, including seven albums released after his death.

He was in the passenger seat of a BMW driven by Death Row Records co-founder Marion “Suge” Knight on Sept. 7, 1996, when shots were fired from a Cadillac at a red light. Knight survived but Shakur died six days later.

Prosecutors have not accused Davis, now 63, of pulling the trigger that night, instead saying that he made the calls that led to Shakur’s death and provided the gun.

In Nevada, a person can be convicted of murder for helping another person commit the crime.

Davis is the only person still alive who was in the car where prosecutors said the fatal shots originated.

The case against Davis was revived when Davis published the book “Compton Street Legend,” about the shooting and his time in the Crips, in 2019 as well as his statements during police and media interviews.

Davis’ attorneys unsuccessfully fought to block from the trial details written in the book and said during a 2008 police interview. They argued the book was fictionalized and had a co-author, making it impossible to know which parts Davis wrote.

They also argued Davis’ previous interview with a federal task force was supposed to be confidential and not used against him.

Among those who could be called to testify in the trial is Knight, the rap music mogul whose label represented Shakur. He continually has said that he wants no part in the trial.

Knight, who is serving a 28-year sentence for running over and killing a Compton businessman in 2015, is the only surviving person who was in the car with Shakur at the time of the shooting.

Prosecutors expect to call between 35 and 45 witnesses, ranging from people who saw Shakur moments before he was shot to those who were associates of both Shakur and Davis at the time. Sean “Diddy” Combs, who Davis claimed wanted Shakur and Knight dead, will not be one of those witnesses, attorneys said.

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Associated Press writers John Seewer in Toledo, Ohio, and Rio Yamat in Las Vegas contributed to this report.

The Democratic National Committee is expected to vote at its summer meeting in Austin, Texas, on the new order that frontloads states with more diverse populations.

The meeting comes ahead of bitterly contested midterm elections that will decide control of Congress later this year. Democratic voters have delivered mixed messages on the direction they want to see the party go — backing candidates viewed as more left-wing as well as moderates in consequential primaries across several states.

The group also is convening at a time of internal turmoil, with some members calling for DNC Chairman Ken Martin to be replaced. Critics have questioned Martin's leadership decisions and the party's fundraising, which lags well behind that of Republicans just months before the crucial midterms.

Martin had his defenders, though, on Thursday. William Owen, a committee member from Tennessee, pointed to the victories in special elections that Democrats have won under Martin.

“I think all of us are working as hard as we can to elect Democrats across the country,” Owen said during a resolutions committee hearing. He added later: “I’m tired of people criticizing Ken Martin and criticizing the DNC.”

Martin himself addressed the spotlight he's been under during remarks on Thursday.

“There’s all these stories about ‘Democrats in disarray’ and ‘Ken Martin this,’ ‘Ken Martin that," he said, adding an expletive. “You know, who’s not focused on that? Me. You shouldn’t be either. I want you to focus on power and support.”

New calendar would cement S

outh Carolina as first primary

The party is expected to give final approval to a calendar that has South Carolina's primary first on Jan. 22, followed by Nevada on Feb. 1. New Hampshire, New Mexico, Michigan and Virginia would round out the early states, voting throughout February.

The overhaul shows Democrats’ effort to give greater influence to states reflecting the party’s coalition, particularly Black and Latino voters. It follows years of a calendar led by Iowa and New Hampshire, two states with overwhelmingly white electorates.

The proposed calendar would cement South Carolina at the start of the calendar, reflecting a change former President Joe Biden pushed for after that state revived his struggling 2020 campaign.

South Carolina has long been the first Southern contest and has served as a key test of candidates’ support among Black voters.

2 traditional early states aren't happy

Iowa and New Hampshire officials have expressed disappointment with the decision after the early approval at a committee meeting in July. Rita Hart, the Iowa Democratic Party chair, said it was a sign the party is “out of touch with voters.”

New Hampshire congressional leaders, including Sens. Jeanne Shaheen and Maggie Hassan, said the decision was wrong for their state and the country. New Hampshire's secretary of state is required by law to schedule its presidential primary at least seven days before any other state holds a similar contest, setting up a potential conflict with the DNC calendar.

The GOP still needs to draw up its calendar. Republicans are expected to stick with their traditional early-state lineup led off by Iowa and New Hampshire.

Questions linger about Democrats' next steps

Democratic primaries already have been testing which direction the party is headed in, through races in states such as Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin.

While there's been a split between more progressive candidates who buck the party's establishment and those with more moderate views who have backing from party officials, the common thread is that Democratic voters have been looking for change.

Republicans, confronting high prices and the president's sagging approval, have been eager to cast the party as moving too far to the left.

Meanwhile, the DNC's leadership and financial concerns continue.

The gathering also coincides with financial struggles confronting Democrats, including lackluster fundraising and carrying debt. The DNC reported about $16 million in cash on hand in its most recent Federal Election Commission filing, along with more than $18 million in debt. The GOP, meanwhile, reported nearly $129 million cash on hand in its latest FEC filing.

Martin isn't expected to be replaced before the midterms, as the party has no clear alternative to take over. But members have said the most likely time for a leadership change may be the DNC’s winter meeting after the November contests — and before the 2028 presidential primary process begins in earnest.

Martin, desperate to save his job, has been avoiding media appearances, monitoring his critics’ social media posts and refusing — at least so far — to make any substantive changes at his troubled organization. He said in a recent Substack post the Democratic Party "will be ready to win — everywhere, at every level, in this election and for the decade ahead.”

___ Associated Press writer Steve Peoples in New York contributed to this report.

The ruling allows people to purchase silencers, short-barreled rifles, short-barreled shotguns and certain other firearms without registration, while also removing an extra layer of background checks.

The order benefits parties that brought the lawsuit, including some dealers based outside northern Texas, but it is not a national injunction. Advocates say there are similar challenges in federal courts in other states. Separately, some states have their own prohibitions on silencers.

U.S. District Judge James Hendrix in Lubbock, Texas, said regulations in a 1930s-era law are unconstitutional. He said the rules must fall after the Republican-controlled Congress and President Donald Trump eliminated a $200 permit tax on the devices.

Hendrix said his Aug. 5 order would take effect in seven days unless the government appealed. There was no sign of a filing Wednesday in online entries at Hendrix’s court or the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

The government’s refusal to pursue an immediate appeal “is a failure to defend public safety,” said Emma Brown, executive director at Giffords, the gun violence prevention group.

An email Thursday seeking comment from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, which enforces the law, was not immediately answered. Under court procedure, the government still could file an appeal in the weeks ahead, even while Hendrix’s order stands.

Gun Owners of America said two members acquired suppressors at Silencer Shop in Leander, Texas, without having to register.

“Our members are putting the historic victory into action. The era of federal registration for constitutionally protected arms must end,” said Erich Pratt, the group’s senior vice president.

The National Firearms Act has been around since 1934 in response to concerns about mafia violence. It regulates firearms that are considered the most dangerous, though gun-rights advocates say it conflicts with the Constitution’s Second Amendment.

“The system of regulating these weapons has been effective. The need is no less today than it was after the Prohibition era almost a century ago,” said Giffords chief counsel Adam Skaggs.

The S&P 500 climbed 0.7% and topped its prior record set last week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 69 points, or 0.1%, and the Nasdaq composite gained 0.8%.

Wall Street relaxed after a report showed prices at the U.S. wholesale level were 4.7% higher last month than a year earlier. While that’s more painful than anyone would like, it’s not as bad as June’s 5.5% inflation rate at the wholesale level, and it was slightly better than economists expected.

If inflation continues to trend that way, the Federal Reserve could decide to hold off on hikes to interest rates. Higher rates would help keep a lid on inflation, but they do so by intentionally slowing the economy and making it more expensive for everyone to borrow money.

Fed officials are split on whether they should have already begun hiking interest rates. But Thursday’s report, following a similar update on inflation at the U.S. consumer level the day before, has traders now betting on just a 35% chance that the Fed will raise the federal funds rate at its next meeting in September. That’s down from the roughly 50% probability seen two days ago, according to data from CME Group.

Any increase by the Fed would be the first in more than three years. It also could anger President Donald Trump, who has been lobbying for lower interest rates.

Treasury yields sank in the bond market, which eases pressure on stocks and other investments. The yield on the 10-year Treasury fell to 4.65% from 4.68% late Wednesday and from 4.72% on Monday, though it’s still well above its 3.97% level from before the war with Iran sent oil and gasoline prices surging.

Oil prices eased back on Thursday, helping to limit worries about inflation. The price for a barrel of Brent crude oil fell 2.1% to $87.07.

It’s been swinging sharply recently and pinballed between $72 and $102 last month as hopes rose and fell that a deal in the war could allow oil tankers to freely exit the Middle East again and deliver crude worldwide.

On Wall Street, stocks in the real-estate industry climbed to some of the market’s bigger gains. When interest rates are lower and bonds are paying less in yield, the dividends that many real-estate investment trusts pay look more attractive.

Lower mortgage rates could also drive more activity in the housing market, and the average long-term U.S. mortgage rate fell this week for the first time in six weeks.

AvalonBay Communities, which owns apartments across the country, rose 2.3%. Homebuilder D.R. Horton added 2.8%.

Fossil Group climbed 5.9% after the seller of watches and jewelry became one of the latest companies to report better results for the latest quarter than analysts expected. Such reports have helped drive Wall Street to records because stocks tend to track the path of corporate profits over the long term.

They helped offset a drop for Cisco Systems, which fell 8.4% even though the tech giant reported stronger profit and revenue for the latest quarter than Wall Street expected.

Analysts said investors may be worried about its profit margins going forward, and its stock has been shaky through the summer amid worries that AI-related stocks in general shot too high.

All told, the S&P 500 rose 50.49 points to 7,798.99. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 69.72 to 53,839.99, and the Nasdaq composite climbed 214.54 to 26,803.03.

In stock markets abroad, indexes dipped in Europe following a mixed finish in Asia.

South Korea’s Kospi again had one of the world’s biggest moves and jumped 3.6%. Seoul has been at the center of the world’s swings for artificial-intelligence stocks because its market is dominated by two tech giants, Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix.

___

AP Business Writers Yuri Kageyama and Michelle Chapman contributed to this report.

Platner won Maine's Democratic primary for the right to challenge veteran Republican Sen. Susan Collins, but he dropped out in July after Politico reported that a former girlfriend said he sexually assaulted her. Platner denied the allegation but said at the time he left the race that he was stepping aside because of the importance of defeating Collins.

Platner will appear at an event organized by Hancock County Activists called “Labor Day Rally for Labor” at Ellsworth City Hall, near his hometown, organizers said. Hancock County Democrats posted a notice about the event on the party's website, but removed the reference to Platner on Thursday afternoon.

“The rally will kick off a series of events leading up to the primaries, with musical performances and featured speaker Graham Platner, who will talk about the history of unions and the important role organized labor has played in our communities and our country,” the notice initially stated.

The event is not being hosted or organized by the Hancock County Democratic Committee and it has no affiliation with the Maine Democratic Party, a party source said. Posting information about the event online was consistent with Hancock County Democrats' past practice, said Marcia Myers, chair of the county Democratic committee.

“We felt people should be aware of it, and informed about it,” said Myers. “It's certainly notable that Graham Platner is a person scheduled to speak. We post this as information for people and they can decide whether to attend or not.”

Platner spoke at the rally last year, said Carol Leonard, who works with the community organization group Acadia Action, which is also helping to host the event. He’s not expected to talk about the campaign, but instead will focus on the history of the U.S. labor movement, she said.

The state party hastily called a special convention and nominated former state Senate President Troy Jackson after Platner dropped out.

Platner has kept a low profile since dropping out of the race and did not respond to requests for comment.

Jenny Racicot, who has accused Platner of sexual assault, and Lyndsey Fifield, who has accused Platner of domestic abuse, said in a joint statement Thursday that Platner is “trying to sweep the truth under the rug and pretend things are back to normal.” The Associated Press does not usually identify victims of abuse, but Racicot and Fifield came forward on their own. Platner has denied the allegations.

The Maine Republican Party also criticized Democrats for the event.

“If Graham Platner is still a heroic leader for Maine Democrats, as this speaking event indicates, their party is out of touch with Maine," said Maine Republican Party spokeswoman Kristina Parker, adding that Maine voters were “disgusted” by Platner's actions.

Platner, 41, is an oyster farmer and combat veteran who filled theaters around Maine with his booming voice and progressive politics. He has no experience in elected office, but fashioned a campaign focused on working-class issues such as the high costs of housing and healthcare.

Platner’s campaign was beset with controversies for months. Among them, media reports emerged that the candidate had previously exchanged sexually explicit text messages with several women while he was married. He also had a tattoo recognized as a Nazi symbol, which he said he didn’t realize until he was several weeks into the campaign. He later had it covered up with a different design.

Platner grew up in Sullivan, a tiny town near Ellsworth and about 170 miles up the coast from Portland.

___

Associated Press writer Kimberlee Kruesi contributed to this report from Providence, Rhode Island.

Also, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, the youngest person to hold the role, will leave the Trump administration at the end of the month to spend more time with her young family. Leavitt, 28, called it a “bittersweet decision” in a social media post Wednesday shortly after President Donald Trump announced she would be stepping down.

Here's the latest:

Vance appears to be lowering expectations for the Strait of Hormuz to return to the way it was

He predicted in an interview on Fox News Channel on Thursday that the war will end with the U.S. in a stronger position, with Iran not having a nuclear weapon, and with the Strait of Hormuz “returned to a place where oil and gas prices are stable for the American people.”

He did not say anything about the strait being open and toll-free for transiting ships, as he had in the past.

Vance’s comments also seemed to suggest that the administration was more focused on the war’s economic impact than the original aims of the war.

“That’s goal number one: keep oil and gas cheap for Americans all over our country,” he said.

The second goal, according to Vance, is to ensure Iran will never get a nuclear weapon.

“I feel confident we’re accomplishing both of these goals, but it’s an inherently unpredictable thing because the Iranians themselves are unpredictable and they sometimes don’t honor the commitments they’ve made to us.”

Blanche seeks to rally a depleted Justice Department workforce in first speech as attorney general

Attorney General Todd Blanche sought to rally a depleted Justice Department workforce Thursday in his first speech since taking the reins of the beleaguered agency, promising rank-and-file staff that he will lead them with integrity.

Blanche’s speech inside the storied Great Hall at Justice Department headquarters represented an effort to reassure lawyers and law enforcement officials following a tumultuous confirmation battle that exposed deep concerns about the agency’s direction under Republican President Donald Trump.

Blanche vowed to uphold the rule of law “without fear or favor,” and told staff he would welcome their ideas and encourage disagreement.

Without mentioning specific moves that have raised alarms from critics that Blanche is still functioning as Trump’s personal lawyer, the attorney general acknowledged he would “not get every decision right.”

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Hegseth says the military can maintain the Iranian blockade ‘indefinitely’

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, speaking to reporters in Panama, said that “the United States Navy can maintain a blockade like that because we’ll rotate ships in and out, as we have and we’ll continue to.”

The statement comes as the deployment of the USS Abraham Lincoln heads into its ninth month and has included a record-setting uninterrupted time at sea of more than 240 days.

Several Democratic lawmakers are pressing the Pentagon for accountability over conditions aboard the carrier, including increasing reports of morale and supply issues.

Hegseth dismissed those reports as “completely misrepresented” and claimed that “every ship, every crew, every captain has everything we can provide them at every single moment.”

Wall of US Embassy in Brazil’s capital is vandalized as relations remain tense

One of the walls of the U.S. Embassy in Brazil’s capital was vandalized on Thursday as tensions between the countries remained high. Police said they detained one man in connection with the case but that he has already been released.

The messages against the U.S. government sprayed on the wall of its Brasilia embassy come as President Donald Trump places high tariffs on some Brazilian goods and revokes the Brazilian ambassador’s visa to Washington.

Brazilians rarely vandalize embassies and consulates of any country.

A message that read “The USA makes war and profits from death” was written in Portuguese and English outside the embassy.

The American embassy in Brasilia said in a statement that it is committed to Brazilians and to staffers’ security.

Brazil’s government did not comment on the incident.

Judge dismisses Trump administration lawsuit alleging antisemitism at Harvard University

A federal judge in Boston on Thursday dismissed a Trump administration lawsuit that accused Harvard University of turning a blind eye to harassment of Jewish students.

The decision from U.S. District Judge Richard G. Stearns said the administration failed to prove an ongoing violation of federal civil rights laws. The judge said the lawsuit, filed in March, mostly focuses on incidents during the 2023-24 academic year, with a few from March 2025.

The cases were “too isolated and episodic” to prove a persistent civil rights violation at the Ivy League campus in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the judge said.

The lawsuit accused Harvard of failing to protect Jewish students during pro-Palestinian demonstrations that roiled the campus after Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attacks on Israel. The Trump administration argued that Harvard officials did nothing as Jewish students were “harassed, physically assaulted, stalked, and spat upon.”

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Democratic senator calls for Hegseth to discuss civilian deaths from US strikes

The ranking Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee is calling out the number of civilian deaths from U.S. military operations under Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.

Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island cited a recent Pentagon report to Congress that said 153 civilians were killed last year from U.S. airstrikes against Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen. Reed also said the Pentagon has yet to release a report into a U.S. airstrike in Iran this year that involved a missile hitting an Iranian primary school, killing up to 168 people.

“This did not happen in a vacuum,” Reed said in a statement Thursday, noting that Hegseth had “gutted” an office focused on reducing civilian harm.

Reed called for Hegseth to explain the incidents before Congress.

Judge dismisses Trump administration lawsuit alleging antisemitism at Harvard University

A federal judge in Boston on Thursday dismissed a Trump administration lawsuit that accused Harvard University of turning a blind eye to harassment of Jewish students.

The decision from U.S. District Judge Richard G. Stearns said the administration failed to prove an ongoing violation of federal civil rights laws. The judge said the lawsuit, filed in March, mostly focuses on incidents during the 2023-24 academic year, with a few from March 2025.

The cases were “too isolated and episodic” to prove a persistent civil rights violation at the Ivy League campus in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the judge said.

The lawsuit accused Harvard of failing to protect Jewish students during pro-Palestinian demonstrations that roiled the campus after Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attacks on Israel. The Trump administration argued that Harvard officials did nothing as Jewish students were “harassed, physically assaulted, stalked, and spat upon.”

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New aircraft carrier heads toward the Middle East after reports of issues on long-deployed USS Lincoln

The Pacific-based aircraft carrier USS George Washington has begun heading toward the Middle East, according to Navy statements and open-source information.

It comes as reports have emerged of mental health and supply issues aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln, whose long deployment in support of the Iran war includes a record-setting uninterrupted time at sea of more than 240 days.

The Navy acknowledges the war has created an environment “where traditional supply hubs in the Middle East were disrupted by combat actions.” That, in turn, led to shortages and loss of mail aboard the Lincoln.

“Leadership prioritized mission-critical supplies: first food, then hygiene items, then mail,” the Navy statement said, before assuring that sailors aboard the ship now have access to clean water and “healthy meal options.”

Several Democratic lawmakers have called for investigations, more information and greater visibility into conditions aboard the USS Lincoln.

Kennedy Center board votes to add Trump’s name to the building’s facade

The Kennedy Center board has voted to add President Donald Trump’s name to the facade of the performing arts building. That’s according to Rep. Joyce Beatty and lawyers.

The move Thursday comes after the board decided to move forward with a two-year closure to allow for substantial renovation work, while some outdoor programming may continue.

Kennedy Center board moves forward with a 2-year closure to allow for renovations, AP sources say

The Kennedy Center will move forward with a two-year closure of the sprawling performing arts venue to allow for substantial renovation work, while some outdoor programming may continue, according to two people familiar with the matter.

The decision, made Thursday by a board largely composed of President Donald Trump’s allies, amounts to a doubling down on the institution’s initial plan so changes could be made that leaders said were necessary for safety. Critics have raised concerns that Trump could move ahead with more drastic renovations as part of his second-term effort to remodel Washington in his image.

The two people were not authorized to publicly discuss the board’s action before an official announcement and spoke on condition of anonymity.

U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper in May blocked a closure set to take effect July 5. It was not immediately clear whether the board’s move would prompt another round of legal challenges. Cooper had ruled that the board’s March 16 vote backing the move appeared “ill-informed and seemingly preordained.”

In moving forward, board members may face pressure to prove they have thoroughly considered their options.

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Associated Press reporter Steven Sloan contributed to this report.

Trump White House says it’s losing $19B-$26B a year in revenue as countries dodge tariffs

The Trump White House said in a new report on Thursday that countries are routing their exports through third countries to avoid U.S. tariffs, estimating tax revenue losses of $19 billion to $26 billion annually.

The report specifically highlights that China responded to new tariffs in 2018 by sending its goods to other nations ranging from Mexico to Malaysia for packaging and limited assembly — a practice known as transshipping. That pattern made it look like U.S. imports from China had dropped, but enabled Beijing to continue growing its manufacturing sector in ways that could challenge U.S. factories and employment.

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Democrats are gathering to give final approval to their 2028 presidential primary calendar

Democrats are gathering to finalize their 2028 presidential primary calendar this week, setting the stage for a wide-open contest to succeed President Donald Trump and chart a path ahead as the party’s voters oscillate between progressive and more moderate candidates.

The Democratic National Committee is expected to vote at its summer meeting in Austin, Texas, on the new order that frontloads states with more diverse populations.

The meeting comes ahead of bitterly contested midterm elections that will decide control of Congress later this year. Democratic voters have delivered mixed messages on the direction they want to see the party go — backing candidates viewed as more left-wing as well as moderates in consequential primaries across several states.

The group also is convening at a time of internal turmoil, with some members calling for DNC Chairman Ken Martin to be replaced.

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Did you pay tariffs last year? You might be due a refund from FedEx or UPS

If you bought something from an overseas vendor last year, it might be time to check your bank account.

Shippers including FedEx and UPS that acted as customs brokers for imported packages and received tariff refunds from the U.S. government have started to pass on those refunds to the customers that originally paid the tariffs.

The refunds to consumers are the last step in a monthslong process that kicked off in February when the Supreme Court struck down sweeping tariffs implemented by President Donald Trump in March 2025 under the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act on goods from almost every country. The court ordered the government to return the tariffs it collected.

So far, about $100 billion in tariffs have been refunded to companies who paid them under a system set up by U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

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US unemployment claims rise but remain at historically healthy levels

The Labor Department reported Thursday that 209,000 people filed jobless claims last week, up from a revised 200,000 the week before and higher than the 205,000 forecasters had expected. The four-week average of applications, which smooths out week-to-week volatility, was unchanged at 199,000.

The overall number of people collecting employment benefits the week that ended Aug. 1 dropped by 22,000 to 1.78 million.

Claims for jobless benefits are a proxy for layoffs, and they’ve been at a historically low range of around 200,000 to 230,000 a week for the past year, suggesting Americans who have jobs enjoy unusual job security. The U.S. unemployment rate is low at 4.1%, as the economy has proven resilient despite a spike in energy prices caused by the fighting with Iran.

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US stocks rise toward records as oil prices drop and inflation gets less bad

The stock market is rising toward an all-time high Thursday following the latest sign that inflation is getting less bad. Stocks also got a lift from easing oil prices in their latest yo-yo move.

The S&P 500 climbed 0.8% and was on track to top its record set last week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 185 points, or 0.3%, as of 10:15 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 1% higher.

Wall Street relaxed after a report showed prices at the U.S. wholesale level were 4.7% higher last month than a year earlier. While that’s still very high, it’s not as bad as June’s 5.5% inflation rate at the wholesale level, and it was slightly better than economists expected.

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House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries says party is in a moment of ‘generation change’

During an interview at the National Association of Black Journalists convention in Atlanta, Jeffries said progressive wins in recent congressional races show generational change.

“I think transition, change, renewal will continue to be an important part of the story, and that energy is being brought to the House in a variety of different ways, including from our progressive members,” Jeffries said.

But he also highlighted his own ascent to Democratic leader and some moderate wins as part of the same trend.

“I think we’ll see what happens in terms of what the caucus looks like on the other side of the midterm election,” Jeffries said when asked if the party’s progressive wing would have greater influence. “Our focus right now is making sure that we win as many seats as we can in November.”

But Trump’s vaccine order is not legally binding

Despite the precedent-breaking nature of Trump’s order, some experts are skeptical it will result in meaningful changes.

Neither the White House nor the FDA can compel drugmakers to develop and seek approval for new vaccines. And from a business perspective, companies have little incentive to develop individual versions of vaccines they already sell in combination shots.

“They’d be competing against themselves, and there’s no reason to do that,” said Dr. Paul Offit, a Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia vaccine researcher and former government adviser.

While Trump’s order calls for more federal research and recommendations, only state governments have the legal authority to require vaccinations for schoolchildren. The order simply advises states to consider updating their laws to reflect the Trump administration’s approach.

“I think states will ignore this,” Offit said. “I think that bottom line is that we don’t need to look to Donald Trump for our medical advice.”

Trump’s vaccine plan would require manufacturing overhaul

Under Trump’s executive order, federal officials are instructed to develop within 90 days plans for breaking up the MMR shot and spacing out other vaccines.

But pharmaceutical scientists and former regulators say those changes would likely take years and require drugmakers to spend tens of millions of dollars on new studies and manufacturing facilities.

Currently, there are no individual vaccines in the U.S. for measles, mumps or rubella. All the vaccines approved for those viruses by the Food and Drug Administration are combination shots. That three-in-one approach has been the standard in the U.S. since the early 1970s.

Dr. Jesse Goodman, a former FDA vaccine chief, said companies would have to conduct large studies showing new individual shots produced immune system-boosting reactions in children similar to the current versions.

US ambassador condemns settler siege of Palestinian homes in the West Bank

Israeli settlers have besieged three homes in the occupied West Bank for several days, including one owned by a Palestinian American, in what the U.S. ambassador called a “horrific act of terror” on Thursday.

Mike Huckabee’s remarks on X represented an unusually sharp rebuke from the Trump administration of the latest episode in a surge of settler violence in the region.

Starting Sunday, settlers gathered around three houses in the village of Qusra, according to local officials, Palestinian American homeowner Loui Ridi, and Ridi’s brother. At times numbering dozens, the settlers threw stones, attempted to bring down a stone wall nearby, and prevented the occupants from leaving as their food and water dwindled.

Israeli troops have intervened to try to restore order. On Thursday morning, Ridi’s brother, Qusai Abu Rida, who had holed up in the house with his own teenage son to defend it, said they were moved by Israel’s military to another home but still cannot leave the area.

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USAID fallout: In Nepal, when the aid workers stopped coming, the women and babies started dying

One baby at a time, the world is marching toward a grim milestone: Because of global cuts to foreign aid, the Gates Foundation has predicted 2025 will be the first year this century where child deaths will increase.

And while global child mortality data for 2025 won’t be available for several months, health officials are already bracing for a surge in deaths among the world’s youngest and most vulnerable.

The decision by President Donald Trump’s administration to dissolve the United States Agency for International Development — once the world’s largest humanitarian donor — gutted maternal and neonatal care, decimated nutrition programs for millions of pregnant women and children and left scores of birthing centers devoid of equipment, medicine and staff.

The U.S. government has repeatedly insisted that no one — and, particularly, no children — have died because of its funding cuts. But The Associated Press has documented the deaths of women and children from Myanmar to Nigeria.

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Reflecting Pool’s botched repairs threaten to tarnish the National Park Service’s reputation

President Donald Trump’s botched repairs at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool have landed the National Park Service in a political predicament.

The beloved federal agency, its iconic park rangers and other employees have been serving the public while managing controversial demands by the Republican president — from revising exhibits at parks and other sites to the demolition of important structures under its stewardship, such as the White House’s East Wing, to arresting visitors for alleged vandalism at the pool.

Critics say the monthslong Reflecting Pool saga and other demands by Trump risk undermining the integrity of a federal agency that’s long been held in high esteem by the American public.

“Never — not once in decades — have I witnessed such systematic degradation, disrespect and dismantling of the National Park Service as I see today under the thumb of President Donald Trump and Interior Secretary Doug Burgum,” said Bill Wade, a former park ranger and superintendent.

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Rubio and Bessent stayed on decoy flight from Turkey as Trump switched planes, official says

The two most senior members of Trump’s Cabinet, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, flew out of last month’s NATO summit in Turkey on what was effectively a decoy plane following an Iranian threat, while Trump was secretly moved to a smaller military jet, a senior U.S. official said Wednesday.

The official, who was briefed on the situation and spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive details of presidential travel, said Rubio was aware of the switch and details of the threat behind it but could or would not say why he had stayed on the plane. The official said Bessent was likely aware but did not know for sure.

The official, however, noted that security precautions for the president — especially one who has been the target of several assassination attempts — are more robust than those for even top members of the Cabinet.

Under the U.S. Constitution, the secretaries of State and Treasury follow the vice president and the highest ranking member of each chamber of Congress in the presidential line of succession.

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— Matthew Lee

Kennedy Center board set to vote on whether to move forward with closure

The Kennedy Center’s board is expected to meet Thursday to consider plans for the performing arts venue’s future after a federal judge blocked an earlier move for a two-year closure that would allow for substantial renovations.

Ahead of the meeting, the Kennedy Center’s management said it would present the board with three approaches for consideration.

The options would include a complete closure or a partial closure that would allow “some continued public access and limited programming in spaces unaffected” by the work. A third option would “consider a highly limited series of phased closures to address only the Center’s most serious infrastructure needs while scheduling and maintaining a full slate of programming.”

In blocking earlier plans for closure, U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper ruled the board’s March 16 vote backing the move appeared “ill-informed and seemingly preordained.” In moving forward, the board, which is largely made up of President Donald Trump’s allies, may face pressure to prove they’ve thoroughly considered their options.

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White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt is leaving the Trump administration

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, the youngest person to hold the role, will leave the Trump administration at the end of the month to spend more time with her young family.

Leavitt, 28, called it a “bittersweet decision” in a social media post Wednesday shortly after President Donald Trump announced she would be stepping down. She recently returned to the White House podium after the birth of her second child, a daughter named Viviana, in May. She also has a 2-year-old son.

“The truth is since returning to the White House after the birth of my daughter, I have felt in my heart that I cannot be the best mom my two young children deserve while devoting the constant time, energy, and attention required of the White House Press Secretary — and that is why I have ultimately made the bittersweet decision to depart the White House and embark on a new chapter in my life,” Leavitt wrote.

Trump did not outline plans for who might replace her in the high-profile role.

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The New York Times reported this week that Randall Lane was paid by RJ Shook, whose company, Shook Research, worked with Forbes since 2016 to publish rankings of wealth advisers. The payment was made after Shook sold a majority stake in the company to a private equity firm a year ago.

A internal email dated July 23 and reviewed by The Associated Press confirmed that Lane, who had been editor and chief content officer, no longer worked for the company. It provided no other details of his departure. Lane had worked for Forbes for nearly 16 years and as its top editor since 2017.

“When this undisclosed conflict of interest was brought to our attention, we examined the situation closely and took the appropriate action immediately,” a spokesperson for Forbes said in an email Thursday. She added: “Forbes remains focused on delivering trusted journalism."

A person who works at Forbes and spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue told the AP that the staff discovered the apparent reasons behind the firing by reading the Times story. A subsequent email sent out this week said the company could not comment on the matter further.

Former editor quoted as saying he ‘made a mistake’

The Times quoted a person familiar with Lane’s thinking as saying he considered the payment a gift in return for advice he had provided Shook over the years.

"'I made a mistake, and I take responsibility for it," Mr. Lane said in a statement to The Times. I should have disclosed the gift and failing to was a serious error in judgment. I deeply regret that, and I lost the job and team I love because of it."

Lane and a spokesperson for Forbes did not respond to requests for comment.

It's unclear why Shook paid Lane. But the company and Forbes apparently had a close relationship. On its website, for example, Shook Research lists 12 rankings of wealth advisers and management teams in partnership with Forbes.

Also unclear is why Lane thought disclosing the payment would have solved the ethical issues it may have raised. Traditional newsrooms typically forbid journalists from accepting payments from sources or business partners to avoid conflicts of interest — or even the appearance of conflict.

Forbes' statement of editorial values and standards says that the company "prohibit(s) all staff members and contributors from accepting compensation, privileges or favors of any kind from people, companies or groups featured in their coverage.

“Any real or perceived conflicts of interest or relationships at all (financial, professional, legal actions, personal or otherwise) must be avoided and/or discussed with the appropriate managing editor. If approved, it must be explicitly disclosed in the story to readers to maintain their trust,” it reads. “Any attempt to evade or failure to honor these solemn responsibilities is a serious offense and is subject to review and swift disciplinary action.”

Public trust in media is flagging

The Times report comes at a low moment for public trust in the media. A majority of Americans — 57% — said they have low confidence in journalists to act in the best interests of the public, according to a Pew Research Center analysis in February.

Forbes was founded in 1917 and developed into an influential biweekly account of corporate America, putting giants like Steve Jobs and Warren Buffett on its cover.

Lane was apparently aware of trust issues in the news business. In 2024, he published a column titled, “How Forbes Delivers Journalism You Can Trust.”

“Thomas Jefferson famously noted that we get the government we deserve,” he wrote. “That’s true of our media too.”

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Associated Press journalist Hannah Schoenbaum contributed to this report.

White families make up the largest share of participants so far, as do those considered low-income, the comptroller’s office noted in a report released earlier this month. The report did not say how many students previously attended private school or received home schooling, but new data shows that 70%  of families who have joined or have pending invites to the program fall into that category.

While it appears unlikely that the majority of first-year voucher recipients will come from public schools, the largest numbers of participating families live within the boundaries of some of the state’s most populous districts — with Houston, Dallas and Northside in the San Antonio area leading the way.

“No Texas child should be trapped in a failing school or forced to attend a school that is unable to provide the services they need to address disabilities such as dyslexia, dysgraphia or auditory processing disorders,” newly appointed Comptroller Don Huffines said in a statement. “I am committed to improving and growing this program so every Texas child can have the opportunity to reach their dreams.”

Texas invested $1 billion in the program, making it one of the largest in the country. Republican state leaders made several key promises when it became law: that it would primarily benefit students with disabilities, those from low-income families and those longing to escape their neighborhood public schools.

However, state Sen. Sarah Eckhardt, an Austin Democrat running against Huffines in November, said the first voucher report “proves this program is a billion-dollar handout to exclusive private schools concentrated in big cities, while public schools across the state are underfunded and closing at an alarming rate.”

As the program rolls out for the upcoming school year, children with disabilities make up roughly 24% of students, while pre-K families comprise 11% of participants, the most of any grade level.

And of the more than 122,000 families invited to participate, 85,344 accepted as of July 29. 

The number of participants increased to 101,600 by Aug. 13, Huffines said. More than 100,000 students remain on the waitlist.

The numbers continue to change as families accept or decline their invitations, according to the comptroller’s office. More than 20,700 families have declined invites so far, most of whom previously had children in public school. 

State officials invited 15,000 families to the program this week, all of whom earn between $66,000 to $165,000 per year for a family of four.

State officials expect to have more complete data by early September, after hearing back from waitlisted families who received offers because others declined or did not confirm enrollment. First-year numbers could also shift during the school year if students drop out of the program.

Senate Bill 2 — the Texas law creating the education savings accounts, or ESAs — required that the comptroller’s office submit an annual report to legislators summarizing demographic information of participating students by Aug. 1. Huffines, a former Republican state senator, was sworn in as the state’s new finance chief the same day.

Participating parents with a child in private school will receive about $10,500 annually. Home-schoolers can receive up to $2,000 per year. Children with disabilities qualify for up to $30,000 — an amount based on what it would cost to educate that child in a public school.

The average per-student award is between $7,500 and $8,000, according to the comptroller’s office. Those numbers could fluctuate as participation changes. 

Fewer than 30 students with disabilities received the full $30,000 award. 

When lawmakers debated the program last year, Republicans argued that vouchers would benefit all Texans — not just white and wealthy families. Democrats worried that ESAs would drain resources from public schools as state funding is tied to attendance.

The state considered roughly 274,000 applicants in order of priority:

• Students with disabilities and their siblings in families with an annual income at or below 500% of the federal poverty level, which includes a four-person household earning less than roughly $165,000 a year (12% of applicants).
• Families at or below 200% of the poverty level, which includes a four-person household earning less than roughly $66,000 (32% of applicants).
• Families between 200% and 500% of the poverty level (29% of applicants).
• Families at or above 500% of the poverty level (22% of applicants). These families collectively can receive up to $200 million of the program’s total budget. Children who attended public school for at least 90% of the prior school year will receive priority within this group (5% of applicants).

Early returns show that families in the first two tiers received the majority of the funding so far. About 68,000 students come from low-income households, 17,300 come from low-to-middle income families, and fewer than 30 come from the wealthiest group, according to the Aug. 1 report. 

In that earlier data, roughly 41% of participating students are white; 28% are Hispanic; and 14% are Black. By comparison, 24% of Texas public school students are white; 53% are Hispanic; and 13% are Black. About 60% of public school students are considered low-income, defined as a family of four earning $61,050 or less annually.

Blanche's speech inside the storied Great Hall at Justice Department headquarters represented an effort to reassure lawyers and law enforcement officials on the heels of a tumultuous confirmation battle that exposed deep concerns about the direction of the agency under Republican President Donald Trump.

Blanche vowed to uphold the rule of law “without fear or favor,” and told staff he would welcome their ideas and encourage disagreement. Without mentioning specific moves that have raised alarms from critics that Blanche is still functioning as Trump’s personal lawyer, the attorney general acknowledged he would “not get every decision right.”

“Everything that I do will not be the right path or the right decision,” said Blanche, who served as Trump's criminal defense lawyer before entering the department last year as deputy attorney general. “No one does that, but I do promise you this: I promise you that I will work as hard as any of you. I promise that I’ll listen to you. That I will listen to the ideas that you have, or adjustments that we need to make, and if we need to make them, I will make them.”

Blanche is assuming control of the Justice Department at a turbulent time, with mass firings and resignations having hollowed out the workforce and a slew of politically charged investigations drawing concerns that the agency is being used as a weapon to target the president's perceived foes.

He was confirmed by the Senate early Saturday by the narrowest of margins, opposed by two Republicans who expressed concerns about what they described as the politicization of the Justice Department under Trump.

Blanche told the workforce he is proud of the department's work under the second Trump administration to tackle violent crime, illegal drug trafficking and violent gangs and cartels.

"It’s easy to focus on the negative or the news story that is critical of something we’re doing or something that we’ve done, or questions something that we're doing or something that we've done," Blanche said. “But do not forget that we have accomplished a tremendous amount of good, positive work in the past year and a half.”

Justice Connection, a network of alums, said in a statement that “Blanche’s platitudes will only resonate if his actions start matching his words." The group noted that the department under Blanche's leadership has pushed out employees who opposed decisions in high-profile cases or who were deemed insufficiently loyal to the administration's agenda.

“Thousands more have left because leadership has consistently violated the principles Blanche articulated: prosecuting defendants based only on the facts and the law; holding those who attack law enforcement accountable; and respecting the courts,” the group said.

The 2026-27 NBA schedule was released Thursday, setting the dates for the two former NBA Finals MVPs to return to face the teams that traded them this summer.

The schedules for opening night and Christmas had already been unveiled earlier this week, so those two games were among the most intriguing matchups not yet known. Brown, who was dealt from the Celtics to the rival Philadelphia 76ers in a stunning move, will play his first game back in Boston on Jan. 21.

Antetokounmpo was expected to be traded by Milwaukee this offseason — at one point speculation was that he might be swapped for Brown — and was eventually dealt to Miami. The Heat will travel to face the Bucks for the first time on Jan. 28.

Both of those games, which will be on Thursday nights, will stream on Prime Video.

Other details about the schedule:

From start to finish

The season will open Oct. 20 with a tripleheader, highlighted by LeBron James, Brown and the 76ers visiting the Knicks, who will receive their rings after winning the franchise's first championship since 1973.

The regular season ends April 11. All-Star weekend is set for Feb. 19-21 in Phoenix.

Busy nights and nights off

Every team will play on Monday, Nov. 2, and there will then be no games the following night, which is Election Day in the U.S. The league is leaving that first Tuesday in November as an open day in hopes that fans and members of the NBA community will participate in the voting process.

No teams will play on Saturday, April 10, the second-to-last day of the regular season. Every team is then in action on the final day, with all the games matching Eastern Conference teams and the one interconference matchup scheduled to begin at 6:30 p.m. EDT. The games involving West teams are set for 8:30 p.m.

Where to watch the games

There will be 90 regular-season games televised nationally on ABC or NBC, up from 79 last season. Every team will be scheduled to appear on national TV at least twice.

Throughout the season, games will stream on Peacock on Monday nights, be shown on NBC and Peacock on Tuesdays, be televised by ESPN on Wednesdays, and stream on Prime Video on Fridays.

Saturday night primetime games on ABC begin Dec. 12 with the Knicks visiting the Heat, while NBC's “Sunday Night Basketball” returns Jan. 24 with Oklahoma City visiting Golden State.

Prime Video will begin streaming Thursday night doubleheaders in January and some Saturday afternoon games starting Feb. 6 with Portland at Memphis, when Ja Morant returns to face the Grizzlies for the first time.

A lot of TV time

The NBA champion Knicks have the most appearances on ABC with six, while the Lakers, 76ers, San Antonio Spurs and Minnesota Timberwolves all are featured on ESPN eight times.

The Knicks, Spurs, 76ers, Thunder, Warriors, Nuggets, Lakers and Houston all get the maximum 11 appearances on NBC.

Back-to-backs and schedule breaks

Teams will average 14.2 back-to-backs this season, the lowest total since the NBA Cup was added to the schedule, and no team will have more than 16. No team will play eight games in 12 nights, or 18 in 30.

There are 59 back-to-backs involving at least 750 miles of travel, down from 74 last season.

No team will be scheduled to play the night before games in the NBA Cup, or if they are in nationally televised games on Christmas Day, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Presidents Day, Sunday nights on NBC or Saturday nights on ABC.

Milestone moments

If Kevin Durant averages 26 points, as he did in his first season in Houston, he could move past Kobe Bryant into fourth place on the career scoring list sometime around Jan. 16, when the Rockets would be at the midpoint of their schedule.

Rick Carlisle is set to become the eighth man to coach 2,000 NBA games on March 8, when the Indiana Pacers play their 65th game of the season.

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See AP’s full NBA coverage here

“I can confirm what’s already public: lab testing showed the substance in the baggies was not meth,” Reitz, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Texas, said in a statement to the Tribune.

Reitz didn’t say what substance was actually in the plastic bags the FBI found in the van driven by Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, the 52-year-old Mexican shot by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers on July 7.

On July 14, a week after Salgado Araujo’s killing, the FBI suggested there could be meth inside the van when it sought a search warrant to test “crystal-like substances.”

The search warrant affidavit was made public the day after it was filed, a move that critics saw as unusually fast and aimed at staining the victim’s and witnesses’ names, but the test results still haven’t been released a month later.

Reitz’s office didn’t respond to questions about whether the test results will be made public, citing the ongoing investigation into the shooting. A spokesperson for the FBI’s Houston office said they “continue to decline commenting on an open investigation.”

U.S. Rep. Sylvia Garcia, D-Houston, the Harris County District Attorney’s Office and a lawyer representing Salgado Araujo’s brother have insisted the substance in the bags was salt that the men mixed with water and lemon to stay hydrated while working construction during the hot Texas summers.

“They made the announcement (about the search warrant) with full intention to cause harm, period. They could have done the test before the announcement, but normally within one or two days you already know if it’s drugs or not,” said attorney Raed Gonzalez, who is representing two of the witnesses, José Trinidad Rojas Pliego and Daniel Tirado Pantoja, for their habeas corpus petitions challenging their detention.

“If they arrest a client of mine right now with something that looks like marijuana, it’s immediately sent for analysis and we have the result the next day because they have to book him,” Gonzalez added. “You have it that fast, within one or two days.”

Reitz said that “there was never a ‘suggestion’ of narcotics. We had probable cause, which is exactly why we test substances law enforcement believes may be illegal. That’s the process working as designed.”

Reitz added that there’s nothing unusual about federal officials quickly making information like the search warrant affidavit public “when the public deserves transparency.”

The FBI crime lab is one of the largest and most sophisticated in the country, if not the most, and a drug test is a “fairly straightforward” procedure, said Seth Stoughton, a former police officer who became a professor of policing and public safety at the University of South Carolina.

“When it’s in the government’s interest to get an answer quickly, they can get an answer quickly,” he said. “But the opposite is also true: with the right couple of phone calls, somebody can slow-walk something.”

If a drug test is high priority, Stoughton said, a drug test can take a few days to a week. For lower priority tests, he added, “it may take significantly longer than that.”

“I think we see it in multiple administrations and sometimes with state and local police agencies, where there is a reluctance to release information that they think might make them look bad or that might contradict a narrative that they are trying to establish,” Stoughton said. “One of the hard-earned lessons in policing at every level is that it is much better to be upfront with information, even if that information seems bad for you, than it is to try and hide information.”

Early in the morning of July 7, Salgado Araujo picked up his brother Víctor and their fellow workers, Rojas Pliego and Tirado Pantoja, and headed to a construction job in his van. A little before 7 a.m., two unmarked ICE vehicles without emergency lights or sirens started following them through Magnolia Park, a heavily Latino Houston neighborhood.

ICE argued in a statement that Salgado Araujo rammed their vehicles trying to flee and the officers shot in self-defense. The other men in the van later said Salgado Araujo never tried to hit the officers after and instead ICE vehicles struck them from behind and the side.

“When we look at other things this administration has done towards victims and witnesses, it’s to attempt to tarnish their name and put doubt in the public’s mind about their intentions and their good moral character,” said Ruby Powers, the attorney for Víctor Salgado Araujo.

Only Rojas Pliego has been released. Víctor Salgado Araujo and Tirado Pantoja remain in ICE detention centers.

“We moved on,” Powers added. “They tried to do something. They were unsuccessful because my client and those in the van were of good moral character, they were good, hard-working individuals, just trying to go to work.”

Jaquelin Flores was taken into custody Wednesday and released from the Bexar County jail on a $100,000 bond the same day, jail records show.

San Antonio police responded to the two-vehicle crash around 11 a.m. on Aug. 3 at the intersection of Hardy Oak Boulevard and Sable Canyon.

Upon arrival, officers found two drivers injured and a T-bone crash involving two SUVs.

One driver, identified as Flores, suffered minor injuries and was taken to a local hospital.

The other driver, identified as 64-year-old Valerie Keeney, was pronounced dead at the scene, San Antonio police said.

After further investigation, officers determined that Keeney attempted to turn left onto Hardy Oak Boulevard southbound when she was hit by Flores, who was traveling northbound on the same street, the affidavit said.

The collision caused Keeney to be trapped in her vehicle before she later died from her injuries.

Further investigation and witness statements revealed that Flores didn’t possess a driver’s license at the time of the crash and was driving twice over the posted speed limit, the affidavit states.

Authorities retrieved data from Flores’ airbag control module, which showed she was traveling 87 mph before the fatal collision, the affidavit said.

Flores’ next hearing is scheduled for Nov. 10, according to jail records.

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Burnet and Webb middle schools received a fifth consecutive failing accountability rating from the Texas Education Agency, the Austin school district announced Thursday, triggering a state law that directs Education Commissioner Mike Morath to either close the schools or appoint a board of managers to replace the elected school board.

Meanwhile, Dobie Middle School broke its streak of four consecutive failing ratings by earning a D, pausing the school’s accountability clock and avoiding the immediate threat of triggering the state intervention law for the campus.

Overall, the Austin school district received a B grade, an improvement from last year’s rating, district leaders announced Thursday. The ratings are preliminary until districts have a chance to appeal, the education agency reviews those appeals and finalizes campus grades in December.

Thursday’s announcement, which comes a day before TEA publicly releases accountability ratings statewide, moves Austin ISD one step closer to potential state intervention after months of district efforts to avoid it. The district has until Sept. 8 to appeal the data that led to the ratings.

District leaders will review data across schools to determine which ratings, if any, they would appeal, Superintendent Matias Segura said in an interview. Segura said he has not been in communication with TEA about whether the agency has plans to take over the district.

The A-F accountability system measures student achievement, academic growth and college and how well the school prepared students for life after high school. Under Texas law, five consecutive failing ratings mandates the education commissioner close the campus or take over the district by replacing the elected school board with a board of managers.

“I understand there is an anxiousness and concern in the community,” Segura said. “We are going to be here tomorrow, the teachers are going to show up, we are going to do the work to ensure their student gets what they need, regardless of what that looks like for that specific family, for that specific school. AISD will continue to be here; we have been here for 145 years.”

Two dozen Austin ISD schools, including Burnet, Dobie and Webb, were under state-mandated improvement plans last school year due to repeated failing ratings. But only those three middle schools were one failing rating away from triggering the state intervention law. District leaders closed another middle school, Paredes, in July after warning the school board the campus could receive a fourth consecutive failing rating for 2025-26 based on its testing performance last spring. That rating was confirmed Thursday.

Segura declined to speculate on the state education agency’s next steps for Austin ISD, but said the district is focused on doing the work the agency expects to improve student outcomes. Change takes time, he said.

Monthslong effort to avoid intervention falls short

At the end of the 2025-26 school year, Austin ISD closed 10 schools, seven of which were on state-mandated improvement plans. But the district could not close Dobie, Webb or Burnet during the school year to avoid state intervention. A TEA rule prohibits districts from closing a campus during a school year in which it could receive a fifth consecutive failing rating. To avoid another failing accountability rating, the district would have needed to close the schools before the 2025-26 school year began.

Austin ISD leaders spent months attempting to avoid state intervention after Segura told trustees in January that beginning- and middle-of-the-year testing data showed academic progress at Dobie, Webb and Burnet, but likely not enough improvement to avoid additional unacceptable ratings, potentially triggering a state takeover.

In the spring, board members voted to hand operational control of the three schools to Texas Council for International Studies, a nonprofit and the only organization that bid to manage the schools, hoping the partnership would qualify for a two-year pause on accountability ratings.

TEA later denied that request, saying the nonprofit did not meet the state’s requirements.

District leaders initially said they would submit additional evidence supporting the organization’s track record, but Austin ISD abandoned the partnership in July, just weeks after it formally began. As an explanation for the change, district leaders said the schools had shown enough academic progress for the district to resume operating the campuses itself.

Preliminary STAAR results released in June suggested the three schools were improving, but not enough to lift most students to grade-level performance. TEA considers students who approach, meet and exceed grade level expectations to be passing.

Burnet and Dobie posted notable gains in reading and math, helping improve their accountability scores. Webb also improved but continued to lag academically, with only about 15% of students meeting or exceeding grade-level expectations in reading and just under 10% doing so in math.

How Austin ISD schools performed

According to the state’s report, across Austin ISD:

• 61 schools open in 2025-26 received received an A or B rating
• 31 campuses open in 2025-26 got a D or F rating
• 8 schools broke their chain of consecutive unacceptable ratings
• 35 campuses increased a letter grade

Last year, a dozen Austin ISD schools faced three consecutive unacceptable ratings. Following a combination of academic improvement and school consolidations, only two of those schools – Linder and Pecan Springs elementaries – will receive a fourth unacceptable rating this year.

Segura said he brought campus leaders with a history of improving campuses to those schools and feels confident the schools will improve.

State law requires schools that receive one to two failing ratings to develop targeted improvement plans. After a third failing rating, schools must implement a state-approved turnaround plan, which can include replacing school leadership and operating with largely a new staff.

What happens next?

Austin ISD leaders have until Sept. 8 to appeal the ratings if they believe the agency made an error. Segura said district leaders would examine the preliminary data to determine what, if anything, would be appealed. The agency would then have 90 days to review the appeals and the campus grades would become final in early December.

“These are not negligible increases in As and Bs or even performance; these are significant,” Segura told the Current. “At the same time, the area that has been an immense focus for the district is middle schools, and certainly with Burnet, Webb and Dobie we took an aggressive intervention of restarting the campus. We made adjustments over the course of the year and we didn’t see the growth that we would have expected or hoped to have seen.”

With Burnet and Webb now receiving a preliminary fifth consecutive failing rating, Austin ISD will cross the legal threshold for state intervention if those ratings become final. The education commissioner would then determine whether to appoint a board of managers to govern the district or instead close the campuses while placing the district under state oversight with an appointed conservator.

Segura said he spent time at Burnet, Webb and Dobie this summer, and there will be two new campus leaders at the schools, adding the district was in a better position to support students based on what administrators saw last year.

TEA has taken different approaches in previous interventions.

In Houston ISD, state education leaders took over the school district, replacing the elected school board with a board of managers and superintendent. The district saw higher standardized test scores but also enrollment losses of more than 13,000 students.

Earlier this year, the agency intervened in Wichita Falls ISD by approving the transfer of students from a chronically-failing middle school to another campus, which was to be operated by Third Future Schools, appointing a conservator and closing the school that triggered the state intervention.The founder of Third Future Schools is the state-appointed superintendent of Houston ISD.

Segura said as the district progresses through the fall semester, he will work with the school board to determine what is best for the schools, including exploring a path similar to that taken by Wichita Falls. “Nothing is off the table, but, again, we are not there yet,” Segura said.

The agency is expected to notify Austin ISD later this year of its decision and timeline for any intervention, though it has not said when that announcement will come.

The decision from U.S. District Judge Richard G. Stearns said that President Donald Trump's administration failed to prove an ongoing violation of federal civil rights laws. The judge said the lawsuit, filed in March, mostly focuses on incidents that took place in the 2023-24 academic year, with a few from March 2025.

The cases were “too isolated and episodic” to prove a persistent civil rights violation at the Ivy League campus in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the judge said.

“We disagree with the ruling and are assessing next steps,” said Harmeet Dhillon, assistant attorney general for civil rights at the Department of Justice. Harvard did not immediately provide a comment on the decision.

The lawsuit accused Harvard of failing to protect Jewish students during pro-Palestinian demonstrations that roiled the campus after Hamas' Oct. 7, 2023, attacks on Israel. The Trump administration argued Harvard officials did nothing as Jewish students were “harassed, physically assaulted, stalked, and spat upon.”

In a statement after the lawsuit was filed, Harvard said it “cares deeply about members of our Jewish and Israeli community and remains committed to ensuring they are embraced, respected, and can thrive on our campus.”

Harvard President Alan M. Garber says the university formed a task force to combat antisemitism. The university also hired a new provost and new deans and reformed its discipline policies to make them “more consistent, fair and effective,” Garber has said.

The government's case sought to recover billions of dollars in federal research grants awarded to Harvard since October 2023. Trump officials argued they had a right to recoup the money under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, a federal law barring discrimination based on race or national origin.

The lawsuit is among several actions the government has taken against Harvard since the Ivy League university refused a list of demands made by the White House after Trump, a Republican, returned to office last year. Trump officials have separately sought to cut Harvard's research funding and limit its ability to enroll foreign students and U.S. military members.

In a separate legal case last year, a federal judge ordered the Trump administration to reverse more than $2.6 billion in federal funding cuts to Harvard. That decision found that the White House put unconstitutional conditions on federal funding, using antisemitism as a “smokescreen for a targeted, ideologically-motivated assault” on universities.

Despite their bitter dispute, Harvard and the Trump administration have held some negotiations, and Trump himself said the two sides had been close to reaching an agreement. But when the Justice Department filed this civil rights lawsuit in March, it pointed to an extraordinary impasse. When colleges are found in violation of federal civil rights law, they almost always reach compliance through voluntary agreements.

The man died in Buta, the capital of Bas-Uele, after traveling there from Isiro in Haut-Uele province, said Jean Kaseya, director general of Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.

He was a motorcycle-taxi driver who had sought treatment at several hospitals before he died, Jean-Jacques Muyembe, head of Congo’s National Institute ​for Biomedical Research, said. His colleagues tried to forcibly take his dead body, prompting police intervention and concerns that more people may have been exposed to the virus, Muyembe added.

The outbreak in eastern Congo, considered the fastest-growing one yet, is on track to surpass the deadliest one in history, which erupted over a decade ago and killed over 11,000 people, the World Health Organization said Wednesday. There are no approved vaccines or treatments for the rare Bundibugyo virus responsible for the current outbreak.

It has killed over 2,100 people out of more than 4,500 cases, according to the latest government figures. This death toll has been reached almost three times faster than in the 2014-16 Ebola outbreak in West Africa — the worst in history.

The outbreak is unfolding in some of the most challenging conditions imaginable, with strikes by some unpaid health workers, threats by rebel groups, anger from long-traumatized communities and misinformation asserting that Ebola isn’t real.

Bas-Uele is a vast province in northeastern Congo that borders the Central African Republic, where there is recurring armed violence that has forced thousands to flee and take refuge in the province. Access can be difficult due to bad and poorly connected roads as well as limited communication networks, and there are frequent population movements related to gold mining and displacement from conflict.

As of Thursday, six out of 26 of Congo’s provinces have been impacted. About 90% of all cases and 80% of deaths are concentrated in Ituri province, the WHO said Wednesday.

Mercy Corps, an aid group, warned Thursday that Ebola cases have been reported along a major travel route about 35 kilometers (22 miles) from Congo's border with South Sudan, expressing concern over the outbreak's “widening footprint.” No cases have been confirmed in South Sudan so far.

Unpaid health workers' strikes and low contact tracing hamper response

Meanwhile, health workers at the Nizi Treatment Center in Ituri province, one of the most affected in the area, went on strike Thursday, leading to the temporary closure of the center after they said they have not been paid for three months.

Kaseya on Thursday called on the Congolese government to pay the outstanding salaries.

“We need to pay health workers,” he told reporters. “This is the responsibility of the government, not partners. And they told us that money is available.”

The real scope of the outbreak remains unknown. It was declared on May 15, but the WHO now says sequencing showed it began months earlier, in February.

Health authorities have said between 60% and 70% of new cases are recorded outside contacts being monitored, and that the disease is spreading at an “alarming” rate. Contact tracing helps break chains of transmission by finding exposed people early and reacting quickly if they show symptoms.

“We are chasing the virus; the virus is ahead of us,” the WHO regional director for Africa, Dr. Mohamed Yakub Janabi, said this week.

On Thursday, Kaseya from Africa CDC said “the concept of contact tracing in DRC has become useless.”

Trials for treatments and vaccines are underway

Ebola is rare but highly contagious and can be contracted from bodily fluids such as vomit, blood or semen, and from contaminated surfaces and materials such as bedding and clothing. The disease it causes is severe and often fatal.

Clinical trials of two possible treatments for this type of Ebola began last month in Ituri, the most affected of the five provinces in Congo where cases have been reported.

Two vaccines developed specifically for the Bundibugyo virus are now being tested in people for the first time, the WHO said Wednesday.

WHO also plans to test whether an existing Ebola vaccine could protect people against the virus after studies in animals showed promising results.

Kaseya said on Thursday that the Africa CDC supports the use of Ervebo, a vaccine authorized against the Zaire Ebola strain in provinces impacted by Bundibugyo virus. He said some studies show some cross-protection from the available vaccines.

“We are in a gray area,” he said. “And when you are in a gray area, you have to make strong decisions to stop seeing people dying."

___

Associated Press reporters Constant Same Bagalwa in Bunia, Congo, Justin Kabumba in Goma, Congo and Jean-Yves Kamale in Kinshasa contributed.

Academy museum director and president Amy Homma said in a statement that the honorees,’ “extraordinary careers exemplify the creativity, innovation, and excellence that continues to move the industry forward.”

The event’s host committee includes Questlove, Judd Apatow, Teyana Taylor, Ludwig Göransson, Seth Rogen and Demi Moore. Co-chairs are Robert Rodriguez, Steven Spielberg and Kate Capshaw.

The gala raises money to support the museum, from its exhibitions to its public screenings. Theron and Carpenter will be participating in several of those public programs — Theron for a conversation with the museum’s teen council and a screening of “Mad Max: Fury Road,” and Carpenter for three nights of screenings of his films, including “Halloween,” which ties in to the museum’s new exhibition entitled The Horror Show.

Last year’s edition honoring Bruce Springsteen, Penélope Cruz, Bowen Yang and filmmaker Walter Salles raised over $12 million.

About 8 million people in the southern African country of 22 million were registered to vote at more than 13,500 polling stations in the one-day election. Voters were also choosing members of Parliament and local government councilors. The Electoral Commission of Zambia said results were expected Monday.

Voters bundled in thick jackets had queued in long lines before dawn outside polling stations across Lusaka, some huddling around makeshift fires as election officials prepared for voting.

European Union observers monitored voting at one polling station in Lusaka. Separately, a local election observer said poor voter direction, confusion over voter rolls and crowd management issues caused delays and frustration at some polling stations.

Mathias Ngoma, in his 70s, said he has voted in every election he could because “it’s the only voice I have.”

“I braved the cold to choose leaders I am hoping will make things better in our constituency,” he said.

Competing visions for Zambia’s future

The election is widely seen as a referendum on Hichilema' s handling of the economy. Elected in 2021, he is seeking a second term after restructuring Zambia’s massive foreign debt, stabilizing the economy and attracting investment.

Hichilema, one of 14 candidates, cast his ballot shortly after midday in Lusaka’s Kabulonga suburb. He described the election as a choice between continuing his government’s reforms or reversing course.

“This election is really about the people of Zambia and their future — progress as opposed to regression,” he told reporters.

Brian Mundubile, considered by analysts to be the strongest opposition candidate, cast his vote in the Olympia area. He assured Zambians that their “second independence” was imminent and encouraged them to cast their ballots peacefully.

Mundubile, who leads an alliance of opposition parties, has campaigned on promises to lower the cost of living, improve agriculture and restore democratic freedoms while accusing Hichilema’s government of undermining democratic institutions.

“This is a revolution,” he said after voting. “The will of the Zambian people will certainly prevail in this election.”

Many still struggle despite recent economic growth

Many Zambians say they don’t feel the benefits of recent economic growth as unemployment, food prices and an unstable electricity supply continue to strain household budgets.

Meki Mulota, 40, an entrepreneur, said she wanted better conditions for entrepreneurs.

“The cost of living has been high,” she said. “I want to see a government that will create an environment where entrepreneurs can sustain their businesses.”

Christopher Banda said he backed Hichilema because he believed the country was on the right track.

“I’m voting for stability,” he said. “There’s been a high cost of living ... but I think we’re heading in the right trajectory.”

A presidential candidate must win more than 50% of the vote to avoid a runoff.

Zambian copper production draws international interest

The election is being closely watched abroad because Zambia is a major producer of copper and is seeking to sharply increase production of the metal, which is critical to electric vehicles, renewable energy and power grids.

China is Zambia’s largest foreign investor and has extensive mining interests in the country, while the United States has sought a greater role as Washington seeks to diversify its critical-mineral suppliers and reduce its reliance on China.

Hichilema has courted investment from both China and Western partners, including the U.S., as he seeks to increase annual copper production to 3 million metric tons by 2031.

Security concerns shadow the vote

Security and political tensions rose in the final days of the campaign. Police deployed additional officers and warned against violence, disruptions at polling stations, and the circulation of false results.

Opposition parties and rights groups, including Amnesty International, accused Hichilema’s government of shrinking democratic space and using state institutions to target critics and political rivals, allegations the government rejects.

Hichilema spent four months in jail on treason charges as an opposition leader under former President Edgar Lungu, whom he defeated in 2021.

Lungu remained an influential political figure until his death in South Africa last year. A prolonged dispute between his family and the government over his funeral and burial added to tensions ahead of the election.

Zambia is regarded as one of southern Africa’s more stable democracies, with a history of peaceful transfers of power. Hichilema’s 2021 victory marked the country’s third transfer of power to an opposition candidate since multiparty democracy returned in 1991.

___

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

His former sponsor should be along for the ride.

Take a look at pit road on NASCAR's brightest day and don't be surprised to see celebrities from the kitchen to the stage rooting on Johnson.

Even with the white flag about to drop on Johnson's racing career, he's still one of stock car racing's biggest stars — and by Daytona, he should have a spot on the Hollywood Walk of Fame to prove it.

“I'm going out swinging,” Johnson said with a laugh.

Maybe new Legacy Motor Club investor and Phillies slugger Bryce Harper can offer some tips.

The 50-year-old Johnson is busy in the boardroom these days looking for investors and growing his race team as the majority owner of Legacy. Almost as busy as he was on the track, when he was one of three drivers to win seven NASCAR Cup Series championships, earning a spot in the Hall of Fame.

Johnson is expected to make his 703rd and final — for real, this time — Cup start in February's Daytona 500.

Until then, the two-time Daytona 500 champion is spending his time sharpening Legacy's future.

Johnson growing into ownership role

Johnson used to spend his race weekends signing countless autographs in the garage. The fan requests are still there, for sure, only now his signature is needed more on the dotted line for deals including trying to back long-time sponsor Lowe’s to the 48 — a number Hendrick Motorsports driver Alex Bowman surrendered for the Daytona 500. Johnson also soon hopes to announce Legacy’s third driver for the 2027 season.

“I’ve approved press releases, rollout plans, all the elements have all been approved,” Johnson said. “It’s just a matter of slotting them all in.”

Johnson added some big-time winners to his race team last month as part of a strategic ownership group that includes championship athletes, Grammy Award winners, entrepreneurs, investors, motorsport greats and cultural leaders.

The Legacy investors include six-time IndyCar champion Scott Dixon, four-time IndyCar champion Dario Franchitti, a two-time National League MVP in Harper, Indianapolis 500 winner Tony Kanaan, former U.S. Open champion Andy Roddick, Grammy Award winner Darius Rucker, celebrity chef Guy Fieri, and six-time MLB All-Star Chase Utley.

“Jimmie's a good friend of mine and I like what he's doing,” Utley said. “It's interesting and it's going to be a good experience.”

Johnson said his star-studded friend group are true investors who are equitable partners in Legacy. More celebrity investors are expected to be announced later this year.

“Sure, I did well racing,” Johnson said. “But I don't have an enterprise like Penske or Hendrick to activate and utilize and drive that success year over year.”

Johnson became the majority owner of Legacy under a restructuring ahead of last season in which investment adviser Knighthead Capital Management bought into the Cup Series team.

Johnson has about enough investors in Legacy to fill a Daytona 500 grid.

“I knew at some point I'd probably want an investor, but I didn't know what that would look like,” Johnson said. “There was a lot of thought around other franchises and leagues, how you create profitability. The stick-and-ball sport and the way they do it makes a lot of sense. It's just a different way to generate the income to win races and championships. From there, to bring investors on, you need a pathway to profitability.”

The roadmap for Legacy turning a profit took a bit of a detour when the organization decided to add a third charter team for next season.

“It's over the horizon,” Johnson said. “A very short horizon. With the strategic ownership group like this, the IP internally, the assets they can activate with and help with, it only helps our case there.”

Erik Jones and John Hunter Nemechek are expected to return with Riley Herbst widely expected to join Legacy in 2027.

Jones is 20th and Nemechek is 28th in the Cup points standings. The drivers are winless and have a combined three top-five finishes as Legacy has yet to break through into a franchise that can at least compete for checkered flags.

“Some days look good,” Johnson said. “some days don't.”

Johnson dedicated to turning Legacy into winner

Johnson only raced in Cup this season at the Daytona 500 and the debut race at Naval Base Coronado.

He has a few races on deck in other racing series, just as much for fun and without the competitive pressures of NASCAR.

“I've been slowly weaning myself off,” Johnson said. “Now that I've found something that's keeping me so busy and so invigorated in the sport, I'm still competing, it's the race within the race, I am fully ready and also very excited for that day and the build up for it and all the great collaborations that will be announced shortly.”

Johnson has won 83 career races in his NASCAR career and a record five consecutive series titles. He is the only racer to be selected The Associated Press Male Athlete of the Year.

Johnson and his team sent a submission for a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and he was selected for one for next year.

“I sat and watched on YouTube and they announced my name and I was like, ‘holy smokes! It worked.’ So wild,” Johnson said.

Johnson is aggressively pushing for the Star to be unveiled on the Tuesday of Daytona 500 week.

Johnson found his comfort zone at Legacy

Johnson's last full-time season in NASCAR was 2020 and he spent the ensuing years chasing success in IndyCar. He even moved his family to England all while dealing with the aftermath of a family tragedy.

Johnson never had a podium finish in two years in IndyCar and wrecked out of his only Indianapolis 500 in 2022.

“That was really intentional for me go there and have fun and do it,” Johnson said. “As the two years went by, I was kind of shocked that I didn't ... I was having tons of fun, but I wasn't fulfilled. I was like, ‘what the hell is this?’ The opportunity with (Legacy) came about and I wasn't sure where it would go or how fulfilling it would be. While thinking through the two years of IndyCar, and slowing down my Cup career, what does it look like post-driving? What do I want to do?”

Johnson went on to compete in endurance races and worked in broadcasting. There was only one true calling for him and it was back at the race courses — even if not always behind the wheel — at Daytona and Dover and Darlington.

“I was going to end up back in NASCAR,” Johnson said. “I had no idea it was going to turn into this.”

He's ready for one final time — and one more win — at Daytona.

“Let's blow this thing up,” Johnson said. “Why not?”

___

AP auto racing: https://apnews.com/hub/auto-racing

“When you see those red lights flashing, it means stop,” said Tesilia Soliz, the Northside Independent School District’s director of transportation.

Northside ISD Chief of Police Richard Palomo said the district plans to increase traffic enforcement as campuses reopen.

“We will be enforcing traffic laws. We do have units that run radars,” Palomo said.

District officials say drivers must stop before approaching a bus that is loading or unloading students when the stop signs are extended.

Palomo also reminded drivers that pedestrians and students in crosswalks have the right of way.

Drivers should also keep their distance behind buses. Soliz encouraged drivers to stay at least 10 feet back so bus drivers can see vehicles in their mirrors.

On divided highways, the rules change. Palomo said drivers traveling on the opposite side of a road with a median do not have to stop for a bus. However, if the road is not divided, traffic in both directions must stop until the bus moves.

Texas’ standard active school zone speed limit is 20 mph. Palomo said drivers who illegally pass a stopped school bus with flashing red lights can face fines of up to $1,250. Repeat violations can carry harsher penalties.

“If you have multiple offenses for disregarding the stop bus sign, you’re gonna possibly lose your license,” Palomo said.

Northside ISD buses are also equipped with cameras that can help document violations. Soliz said the district has eight cameras on buses — four inside and four outside — along with audio and video recording.

More Back to School coverage on KSAT:

• Ingram ISD students return to class as flood repairs continue
• IDEA Public Schools welcomes 18K students on first day
• Viewers share back-to-school photos on KSAT Connect

The Labor Department reported Thursday that 209,000 people filed jobless claims last week, up from a revised 200,000 the week before and higher than the 205,000 forecasters had expected. The four-week average of applications, which smooths out week-to-week volatility, was unchanged at 199,000.

The overall number of people collecting employment benefits the week that ended Aug. 1 dropped by 22,000 to 1.78 million.

Claims for jobless benefits are a proxy for layoffs, and they've been at a historically low range of around 200,000 to 230,000 a week for the past year, suggesting that Americans who have jobs enjoy unusual job security. The U.S. unemployment rate is low at 4.1%, as the economy has proven resilient despite a spike in energy prices caused by the fighting with Iran.

"The labor market has yet to show any sign of wear and tear from the surge in oil prices since the start of the war with Iran and the global energy supply shock,'' Carl Weinberg, chief economist at High Frequency Economics, wrote in a commentary.

The story is less encouraging for those trying to break into the job market and for those who lost their jobs and are looking for new work. Companies, scarred by worker shortages that followed the end of COVID-19 lockups four to five years ago, are reluctant to let go of staff; but they aren't eager to take on new workers. Economists regularly refer to a "no hire, no fire'' job market.

Last month, in fact, companies, government agencies and nonprofits together cut 23,000 jobs instead of increasing them, the Labor Department reported last week. So far this year, employers are adding 61,000 jobs a month. That is an improvement on the 9,700 they averaged last year — the weakest hiring outside a recession since 2002. The lingering effects of high interest rates and President Donald Trump's erratic trade policies discouraged companies from hiring in 2025.

Still, hiring this year remains well below the 166,00 monthly jobs created, on average, in 2023 and 2024, let alone the 491,000 a month recorded during the 2021-2022 hiring boom that followed pandemic lockdowns.

The report specifically highlights that China responded to new tariffs in 2018 by sending their goods to other nations ranging from Mexico to Malaysia for packaging and limited assembly — a practice known as transshipping. That pattern made it look like U.S. imports from China had dropped, but enabled Beijing to continue growing its manufacturing sector in ways that could challenge U.S. factories and employment.

Peter Navarro, the White House trade adviser, told reporters on a conference call that China is laundering its exports through more than 40 countries, though he claimed that the issues raised in the report were really more about other nations enabling the avoidance of tariffs.

“For years, the great transshipment scam has let communist China launder its exports,” Navarro said.

The report comes ahead of a planned September visit by Chinese Leader Xi Jinping, who President Donald Trump described in flattering terms during his own visit to Beijing in May.

The Chinese government has described its relationship with the U.S. as one of “strategic stability,” yet its government policies that support exports of manufactured goods have destabilized the auto, metals and electronics sectors in America, Europe, Japan and elsewhere.

Navarro said that other nations such as India could also transship to avoid new tariffs and said that new trade frameworks pursued by the Trump administration are going to contain provisions that ensure trade partners that engage in the practice will be penalized.

The Trump administration has levied high tariffs on much of the world in hopes of protecting U.S. manufacturers, hitting allies and rivals alike with import taxes. At the same time, those tariffs have created new inflationary pressures at home.

The report includes a range of estimates for the scale of transshipments to avoid tariffs, citing government and private sector numbers to estimate roughly $34.2 billion to $303 billion of goods transshipped each year. It used a central figure of $75 billion worth of goods being transshipped to estimate how much in tax revenues have been lost.

To address the challenge, Navarro said that U.S. Customs and Border Protection has started to use artificial intelligence in a prototype program to stop transshipments. Navarro said that when an importer has been found to have falsified the origins of a good, its imports can be retroactively tariffed going back roughly a year.

The president’s tariffs during his second term have faced an array of legal challenges, with the Supreme Court overturning some of them in February. America continues to import more than it exports to the rest of the world, but the trade imbalance so far this year at $371 billion is running about $189 billion lower that it did during the same period last year.

The confirmed human case follows a series of positive mosquito trap samples collected across the county this season, the county said in a social media post. Eight mosquito trap samples have now tested positive for the virus.

Hays County Health Department officials are urging residents to take the following precautions:

• Use an EPA-registered insect repellent when outdoors
• Wear long, loose and light-colored clothes
• Remove or treat standing water around homes or workplaces to reduce mosquito breeding grounds

Approximately 80% of people infected with West Nile Virus experience no symptoms, health officials said. However, others may develop fever, headache, body aches, rash or other flu-like symptoms.

People age 50 and older, as well as those with weakened immune systems, are considered at greater risk of developing severe illness, the county said.

The Hays County Health Department and Hays County Development Services said they will continue human health and mosquito surveillance throughout mosquito season.

More recent news coverage on KSAT:

• Guadalupe Co. sheriff’s deputies shoot, kill man accused of menacing woman, GCSO says
• Lake Travis High School football player dies after medical emergency at practice, superintendent says

Today on Texas Eats NOW:

MOREA ITALIAN STEAKHOUSE

101 Club Dr, Floresville, TX 78114

Morea Italian Steakhouse in Floresville blends premium Texas steaks with classic Italian cuisine in a casual yet refined setting. Located near local recreational destinations, the restaurant serves Rosewood Texas Prime cuts, house-made pastas, seafood dishes, and creative appetizers. Menu highlights include the Plate Maserati, an 8-ounce prime beef dish topped with Gorgonzola truffle sauce, brisket pappardelle, lamb rigatoni, burrata ravioli, and lemon shrimp risotto.

Guests can also enjoy fried mozzarella, wild mushroom and Parmesan rice balls, burrata and tomato boards, and flash-fried Brussels sprouts with hot honey. A full bar features craft cocktails, margaritas, old fashioneds, and sangria, while desserts such as tiramisu provide a sweet finish. With elegant lighting, attentive service, and indoor and patio seating, Morea Italian Steakhouse offers an elevated dining experience with a Texas twist.

GRISTMILL RIVER RESTAURANT & BAR

1287 Gruene Rd, New Braunfels, TX 78130

Gristmill River Restaurant & Bar in historic Gruene serves hearty Texas comfort food from the scenic ruins of an 1878 cotton gin overlooking the Guadalupe River. The longtime New Braunfels destination is known for generous portions and classic dishes, including hand-breaded chicken fried steak, fire-roasted chicken, baby back ribs, burgers, and fresh fish. Appetizers include colossal onion rings, homemade spicy queso, spinach-artichoke dip, chicken poblano quesadillas, and bacon-wrapped jalapeño Texas Torpedoes.

The restaurant’s full bar features specialty margaritas, frozen fruit drinks, and local beers, while desserts include classic pecan pie. Its scenic setting, Texas-inspired menu, and relaxed atmosphere make Gristmill a popular destination for visitors exploring Gruene. Patrons can enjoy their meals while taking in views of the Guadalupe River and the historic surroundings of one of the area’s most recognizable dining spots.

WAFFLELICIOUS

2188 TX-46 Ste 109, New Braunfels, TX 78132

Wafflelicious in New Braunfels puts a creative spin on breakfast and lunch with sweet and savory heart-shaped waffles, loaded waffle sandwiches, classic breakfast plates, fresh pastries, and specialty coffee drinks. The menu features indulgent options such as the Berry Dream, Banana Nut Crunch, S’mores, and Apple Strudel waffles, along with savory favorites including the Southern Chicken Waffle Sandwich, Waffle Benedict, and American Breakfast.

Diners can also build their own waffles or choose from croissants, danishes, chicken salad sandwiches, and specialty lattes such as the Longhorn Latte. With a relaxed coffee-shop atmosphere and table plug-ins for working or casual gatherings, Wafflelicious offers a comfortable spot to enjoy an oversized breakfast, a sweet treat, or a cup of specialty coffee.

Follow Texas Eats and David Elder on Facebook and Instagram for more food info, pictures, videos and giveaways.

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Officers were dispatched just before 9:30 p.m. to the 11100 block of Baywood Drive, which is located near the intersection of Northwest Military Highway and Lockhill Selma Road.

SAPD said the man was riding a bicycle on Silver Oaks. At some point, police said a male and a female approached him, pushed him off his bike and stabbed him several times.

The victim was transported to a local hospital with non-life-threatening injuries to his upper body, SAPD said.

According to police, the suspects fled the scene with the victim’s bike and backpack.

Police said its investigation remains ongoing.

Read also:

• BCSO: Confession over jail phone call leads to murder charge for suspect in NE Bexar County shooting

Officers responded to the shooting around 5 a.m. in the 13200 block of Blanco Road, which is located near Wurzbach Parkway.

According to an SAPD preliminary report, one of the males was shot in the torso area, while the other was shot in the lower body.

A sergeant at the scene said one of the males suffered non-life-threatening injuries to his knee. The other male suffered possible life-threatening injuries.

SAPD did not have any information on the shooter, though officers were investigating the remote area.

One of the males is in his 20s, while the other is a juvenile, according to the sergeant.

SAPD said its investigation is ongoing.

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• Man stabbed multiple times during fight on North Side, police say