The futures for the S&P 500 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped 0.4%.

Germany's DAX lost 0.6% to 24,999.26 in early trading and the CAC 40 in Paris shed 1.1% to 8,349.33. Britain's FTSE 100 edged 0.2% lower, to 10,696.31.

Asian shares mostly rose, led by South Korea’s Kospi, which gained 4.4% to 7,096.89.

Investors’ appetite for stocks related to artificial intelligence revived despite a retreat on Wall Street, as Samsung Electronics gained 3.7%. Memory chipmaker SK Hynix advanced 4.9%.

In Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 picked up 0.5% to 66,422.60. Technology companies led gains, with stocks in SoftBank Group climbing 3.8%.

The U.S. dollar was trading at 163.36 yen as the Japanese currency wavered near its lowest level in 40 years. Expectations that the gap between U.S. interest rates and Japanese interest rates will widen due to higher inflation in the U.S. have helped to drive the dollar higher against the yen.

Elsewhere in Asia, Hong Kong's Hang Seng rose 1.3% to 25,210.81. The Shanghai Composite index bounced back from earlier losses to gain 0.3%, closing at 3,876.78.

In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 gained 0.2% to 8,839.00.

Taiwan's Taiex edged 0.1% higher and the Sensex in India fell 0.6%.

On Wednesday, U.S. stock indexes barely budged as oil prices rose 3%.

The S&P 500 edged 0.1% lower and the Dow Jones Industrial Average was nearly unchanged.

The Nasdaq composite fell 0.6% as Alphabet Inc., parent company of Google, sank 1.5% ahead of its earnings report, which arrived after trading ended. The company posted stronger-than-expected results for its second quarter, a sign that its massive artificial intelligence spending spree is paying off so far. However, its share price fell another 3.5% in premarket trading.

Tesla's share price dropped 1.3% on Wednesday and another 5.6% in after-hours trading after the car company run by Elon Musk said its profits fell last quarter as it shoveled more money into research and development, cutting into earnings from a sharp increase in vehicle sales.

Investors are looking for signs that the deluge of dollars going into processors, computer memory and other building blocks of the AI boom will yield enough profits to make the investments worthwhile. Such worries have kept AI stocks at the center of Wall Street’s swings for weeks.

Rising oil prices are weighing on stock prices since they raise costs for most businesses and erode their profits. They also can dent consumer spending.

Early Thursday, the price of a barrel of Brent crude oil, the international standard, was up 4.3% at $98.16, its highest level since early June.

It had fallen to less than $72 earlier this month, roughly where it was before the war with Iran. But continued fighting is preventing oil tankers from using the Strait of Hormuz to exit the Persian Gulf. Normally, a fifth of all oil and natural gas traded passes through the narrow strait.

U.S. benchmark crude gained 3.6% to $89.91 a barrel.

The U.S. military announced Wednesday that it was conducting a 12th night of strikes against Iran as both sides increasingly targeted civilian infrastructure.

Higher oil prices are threatening a reacceleration of inflation, which could push the Federal Reserve and other central banks to raise interest rates, slowing economies and undercutting prices for stocks and other investments.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.65% from 4.63% late Tuesday and from just 3.97% before the war with Iran began. It’s already helped bring long-term U.S. mortgage rates to their highest levels in nearly a year.

In other dealings early Thursday, the euro was unchanged at $1.1414.

McALLEN — In 2019, a historic theater’s marquee in McAllen’s downtown district once lauded, “Welcome to McAllen, 7th Safest city in America.”

The theater placed the message front and center ahead of a visit from President Donald Trump during his first term in office, using it to dispute the narrative at the time that the border was a dangerous place. The ranking itself came from a 2015 study by Smart Asset, a financial technology website.

Now, 10 years after that report, McAllen is highlighting its crime rate again — this time, celebrating its lowest crime levels in 40 years.

But McAllen is not unique. The decline in crime here is in line with a national and statewide trend that’s been ongoing for years.

Crime in Texas has been decreasing since 2023, according to Uniform Crime Reporting Data released by the Texas Department of Public Safety. In the last five years, crime in Texas peaked in 2022 — with a rate of 2,830.14 per 100,000 people — before trending downward.

Between 2022 and 2023, the state’s crime rate decreased by 3.3%, and between 2023 and 2024, the crime rate dropped another 8.2%. Then, between 2024 and 2025, Texas’ crime rate decreased by 13%.

McAllen, the second-largest city in the Rio Grande Valley with 151,000 people, reported a 21% drop in 2025. Brownsville, the Valley’s largest city with 193,000 people, also had a 21% drop in crime in 2025.

“We’ve been decreasing crime on a fairly consistent basis,” said McAllen Police Chief Victor Rodriguez.

He credited the crime rate drop on the city’s population growth, an engaged community that reports potential crimes to the police and elected officials who prioritize public safety funding, enabling the department to maintain two officers per 1,000 people.

Rodriguez also suggested that heightened immigration enforcement under Trump’s second term may have played a role in driving down crime.

“That saturation of law enforcement authorities in this part of the country also help us, I think, maintain a lower crime rate in this part of the country, in this part of the state, and for McAllen as well,” Rodriguez said.

ICE presence might have played a role, but it might not have driven down crime as much as it could have created fear in reporting it. However, it is still too soon to know, experts said.

McAllen and the state of Texas are not outliers, but part of a broad national trend, said Alex del Carmen, a former criminologist with the Dallas Police Department and current dean at Westfield State University in Massachusetts.

Homicides across major U.S. cities fell by about 21% between 2024 and 2025% and are down 44% from the peak in 2021, del Carmen said.

“Texas is riding that same wave,” he said.

The declining crime rate occurred in places with and without active immigration enforcement, said Thomas Abt, founding director of the Center for the Study and Practice of Violence Reduction.

“I haven’t seen any hard evidence that suggests that aggressive immigration enforcement has any effect on crime, positive or negative,” Abt said. “Part of it is that it’s too soon to know. It takes time for research to come out.”

However, research shows that immigrants are, on average, less likely than U.S. citizens to commit crimes, del Carmen and Abt said.

“That doesn’t mean that there aren’t immigrants out there who are engaged in crimes,” Abt said. “But if you look at immigrant populations, as a whole, you’ll see that they commit less offenses, and you’ll also see that cities that have higher populations of immigrants often have lower crime rates.”

Studies using Texas’ own arrest and conviction data, del Carmen said, consistently find that immigrants, including undocumented immigrants, are not responsible for the majority of the crimes that take place in the U.S.

Less reporting may be part of the drop

There is a legitimate concern that the decline in crime could be, at least partially, attributed to fear of reporting crimes among immigrant communities.

After the Immigration and Customs Enforcement launched a program to identify immigrants in local jails in 2008, known as Secure Communities, Hispanic victims were about 30% less likely to report crimes to police. And that effect extended to citizens, not just the undocumented, del Carmen said.

More recently, he added, surveys of foreign-born Latinos found 16% have avoided calling police or reporting a crime for fear of being questioned about their legal status, and police chiefs in Los Angeles and Houston have publicly attributed drops in crime reports from Latino residents to deportation fear.

Still, fear of reporting cannot account for all of the decline as homicide numbers, which are less subject to reporting bias, are also going down.

The most serious offenses tend to be the most reliable because there is typically more evidence available, Abt said. If a homicide occurs, undeniable evidence typically comes with it which is the remains of the victim.

​​”We have extremely reliable data on how many homicides we have,” he said. “We also have fairly reliable data on serious assaults and shootings, because people have to go to the hospital, and we can access those records.”

On the other end of the spectrum, the number of shoplifting or drug offenses are largely a function of how much attention law enforcement is paying to those things.

An example of that is during the pandemic, there were reports and anecdotal evidence of a massive increase in shoplifting and disorder that didn’t ultimately show up in data.

“Does that mean that it didn’t happen or does it mean that a lot of stores were just so discouraged that they stopped reporting it?” he said.

Back to normal

Instead, the drop in crime rate could just be a return to normal following a spike in crime that occurred across the country in 2020 and 2021.

In 2020, during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, the closure of businesses and public gatherings could have created a recipe for social disruption. That was further fueled by the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis by a white police officer, which prompted mass anti-police protests.

Additionally, Americans bought a record number of firearms in 2020, with first-time gun owners accounting for 40% of buyers

In the wake of the crime surge, Abt said there was a fractured view of criminal justice across the country, with many on the political right favoring aggressive law enforcement and many on the left wanting to de-emphasize or even defund the police.

“Neither of those extremes was particularly helpful,” Abt said.

What emerged, instead, was what he believed to be a more sensible approach. With the help of federal funding under President Joe Biden, cities returned to a balanced approach to fighting crime, investing in both law enforcement and in community groups.

“A more sensible center was created that said, ‘Look, we need cops, we need communities, and we need them to work together,’” he said.

In Texas specifically, del Carmen said, about 70% of statewide violent crime volume is concentrated in the most populated 25 jurisdictions. So when cities like Houston, San Antonio, and Dallas invest in hot-spot policing and violent crime reduction plans, the statewide numbers move.

“The honest answer is that no single actor gets to claim credit,” del Carmen said. “Declines this broad, occurring simultaneously in cities with very different policies, tell us structural and post-pandemic forces are doing much of the work.”

Reporting in the Rio Grande Valley is supported in part by the Methodist Healthcare Ministries of South Texas, Inc.

The visitors that year included President Donald Trump, on his way to a second term, U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson and dozens of other Republicans intent on making border security the election’s defining issue. It worked: Trump won Maverick County with 59% of the vote and carried other counties up and down the border.

But when James Talarico, the Democratic state representative running for U.S. Senate, visited Eagle Pass last week, the number of illegal crossings had been hovering near historic lows for months under an immigration clampdown from the Trump administration. He was there, he told hundreds gathered at a town hall, to learn about their worries and priorities.

“Usually when politicians show up to the border, they demonize, they weaponize, they grandstand for themselves,” Talarico said at the International Center for Trade. “We’re trying to do the opposite.”

As the nation reeled from two fatal shootings by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, including one in Houston, Talarico and his GOP opponent, Attorney General Ken Paxton, headed to South Texas last week to pitch voters on early versions of their border security platforms. Talarico brought a multi-point plan he road-tested across a weeklong tour, while Paxton delivered a familiar promise to follow Trump’s agenda and put “America first.”

At both candidates’ stops, interviews with nearly two dozen voters revealed how the frustrations some border residents had with the Biden administration’s response to record crossings have evolved into alarm about the Trump administration’s mass deportation campaign, as they see neighbors get deported and their friends’ businesses struggle. The comments mirror public polling, which has found many Latino voters who backed Trump are growing uneasy about his immigration enforcement. One recent survey found that one in five Hispanic business owners in the state have had at least one employee deported.

Numerous residents from Del Rio to McAllen, including some Republicans, said they hope the state’s next senator can help modernize the nation’s immigration system — decried as broken by members of both parties — in Washington, despite decades of congressional gridlock on the issue.

Still, many expressed complicated feelings, in some cases displaying the GOP’s durable baseline of support in a region where U.S. Customs and Border Protection jobs are among the most common and highest paying. While Trump is being aggressive with his crackdown, some said in interviews, the circumstances under former President Joe Biden — when crossings reached record highs — were untenable.

Republican Bob Drasner, a 77-year-old who has lived in the Rio Grande Valley for some eight years after decades of coming down seasonally, said the country needs a “good filter” when it comes to immigration. It is evident the country needs skilled workers, like talented doctors and lawyers, he said as he waited for Paxton to take the stage at a rally at a McAllen brewery.

“If I have a heart condition, I don’t care what color you are,” he said.

In Del Rio, Rodolfo Garcia, 59, waited outside on a scorching afternoon with his 16-year-old daughter, Celeste, to meet Talarico, who was scheduled to visit a Mexican restaurant. He’s supporting the Austin Democrat in part because he hopes Congress can craft a better pathway to citizenship, he said.

“He’s moderate,” Garcia said, standing feet away from Talarico’s bus.

To be sure, most voters told the Tribune that economic issues and driving down everyday costs were their top priorities this election year — highlighting the shifting dynamics surrounding immigration, only two years after Republicans leveraged it to earn massive wins in the state.

Talarico’s listening event in Eagle Pass and restaurant visit in Del Rio were just two stops on a cross-border tour the state lawmaker completed last week. The day of the town hall began 175 miles away in Sanderson, where Talarico unveiled what he is branding as a “commonsense” border security plan.

The main pillars of the plan call for hiring more Border Patrol agents and immigration judges, as well as leaning on surveillance technology to help detect illegal crossings and drug trafficking. Another cornerstone is opposition to a border wall proposed by the Trump administration that would slice through Big Bend National Park. Later on the tour, Talarico said “there are some parts of the border where a physical barrier makes sense” — but not in that sparsely trafficked part of West Texas.

Joining Talarico outside a motel in Sanderson was a group of local electeds who have been among the loudest voices opposing the Trump administration’s plans for the barrier through Big Bend: Terrell County Sheriff Thaddeus Cleveland, Jeff Davis County Judge Curtis Evans — both Republicans — and Alpine Mayor Catherine Eaves, an independent.

Cleveland, whose criticism of the Biden administration established his voice as an authority from the U.S.-Mexico border, said Americans had a false sense of security that a border wall would stop all illegal crossings. Instead, he said what works effectively is a combination of barriers and technology — like Talarico’s plan. A week prior, a group trying to cross the border had been detected by a drone, which led to their apprehension in an area where there is no wall currently, the sheriff said.

“I support barriers. But I support barriers where they work. And a barrier is not gonna work here,” said Cleveland, who spent decades as a Border Patrol agent before returning to his hometown of Sanderson to become sheriff. “His plan that I’ve had the opportunity to review, I can tell you that both parties speak it, up in Washington, D.C., they both say the same thing.”

As Talarico hit the road for his border tour, Paxton’s campaign responded by attacking the lawmaker’s voting record in the Legislature on numerous bills surrounding border security. They criticized Talarico for voting against two of the state’s biggest and latest immigration laws — one, from 2023, that lets state police arrest people suspected of having entered the country illegally and another from last year that requires most sheriffs in the state to work with ICE.

Paxton allies have also circulated previous comments from Talarico about the border. Senate Leadership Fund, the main super PAC linked to the upper chamber’s GOP leadership, recently blasted Talarico for calling people without legal status “undocumented Americans” who “lack citizenship documentation.”

Whether the attacks will land with border voters is an open question.

Amber Diaz, a 24-year-old breast-feeding counselor in Eagle Pass, recounted how her recently naturalized stepfather was all in on Trump until he started witnessing the president’s immigration crackdown. As news spread about the ICE shooting death of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Houston, he called her to talk about his worries.

The White House’s deportation push is certainly on the minds of South Texas residents. Rumors that ICE will partner with local Border Patrol agents frequently swirl around town, spooking people that authorities might show up at the local HEB — one of Eagle Pass’ two major grocery stores that is also frequented by thousands of Mexican nationals who cross the border with visas every day.

For his part, Paxton said his take on immigration is simple: “We need a secure border. We need to protect our country. We need to make sure that we take care of America first.” In his first rally speech since winning the GOP primary, Paxton touted the numerous times he sued to stop the Biden administration’s immigration policies and celebrated a recent endorsement from the biggest union for Border Patrol agents.

In the audience at his McAllen rally was Rocely Gomez, 40, and her 19-year-old son Mario Prado. The two, like numerous other Paxton supporters, back the president’s mass deportations and consider themselves “100% Republican.”

Gomez said her husband, who works for Border Patrol, is sleeping better with Trump back in office. She shared frustrations about how border security issues often feel confined to a binary of good or bad that oversimplifies a complex reality. Some people don’t have a husband who comes home unimaginably rattled by his day, Gomez said, like the time hers found an abandoned baby, or another where he encountered a young girl who said she had been raped while migrating north.

Gomez would like some sort of pathway to citizenship to exist, but she also wants border crossings under control.

“It’s kinda tough,” she acknowledged.

Shah, an emergency physician, will face Republican Jay Feely, a former NFL kicker who was endorsed by President Donald Trump in his primary, in the fall. Before becoming political opponents, Feely and Shah were part of the same team — the New York Jets. Shah was a doctor on the sidelines, while Feely was the kicker.

The DCCC backed Marlene Galán-Woods, a former Republican who switched parties at the beginning of Trump’s first term.

The competition for the 1st Congressional District, an affluent area that includes northeast Phoenix, Scottsdale, Fountain Hills and Paradise Valley, is expected to help determine control of the U.S. House. Although Republicans hold a voter registration advantage, the district has shifted toward the center over the last decade.

The seat is open because Republican Rep. David Schweikert ran for governor, losing to Rep. Andy Biggs in the GOP primary on Tuesday.

The DCCC's decision to endorse Galán-Woods, a former television journalist in Phoenix, puzzled local Democrats because there was little ideological difference between her and Shah. Both are moderates, and the race was not a proxy fight in the party's deepening feud between progressives and centrists.

“Our victory in this primary was a grassroots victory where Arizona voters made their voices heard,” Shah said Wednesday night in a statement that did not address the DCCC snub. “Now, it’s my job to earn the support of every voter in this district.”

Rep. Suzan DelBene, the DCCC Chair, issued a statement calling Feely an “extremist” and saying Shah “will always put his community first,” but did not address the controversy surrounding the support for Galán-Woods.

The National Republican Congressional Committee quickly released a digital ad Wednesday attacking Shah, labeling him a socialist and tying him to progressives in Congress.

“I’m a political outsider committed to delivering results,” Feely said in a statement.

The race was in some ways a replay of 2024, when Shah narrowly won in a crowded primary field that included Galán-Woods and lost in the general election. The DCCC did not endorse in the primary that year but backed Shah in the general.

The DCCC announced its support for Galán-Woods in May, when it added her to a list of candidates it was supporting in Republican-controlled districts. At the time, DelBene talked up Galán-Woods' experience in broadcast journalism but said nothing about Shah.

“I wasn’t exactly my party’s pick,” Shah told supporters Tuesday night. “And I was willing to stand up to that establishment. And that’s what the voters of this district want.”

Still, he has said he would work with the DCCC if nominated. He will need support from the party and its donors to win what's likely to be a tough race in a district Trump carried narrowly in 2024. Former Democratic President Joe Biden won the district in 2020 even as Schweikert was reelected.

Antiestablishment fervor has spooked congressional leaders, who fear that swing voters will see some insurgent candidates as too extreme and squander Democrats’ opportunity to take advantage of Trump’s unpopularity.

Last month progressive Randy Villegas beat a DCCC-backed candidate for a top battleground district in California's Central Valley. And similarly in Maine, Matt Dunlap defeated a more moderate rival backed by the party.

DCCC support generally brings an influx of money and staffing, both from the party itself and from the donors and interest groups that take its cues. But establishment support has been a turnoff for some voters.

“The Democratic Party needs to grow up and wake up,” said Maria Liong, a 24-year-old medical student who volunteered for Shah’s campaign. “They need to realize that they want candidates who listen to their people.”

In the GOP primary, Feely defeated Joseph Chaplik, a former state lawmaker popular with grassroots activists, for the party's nomination. He was in the NFL with seven teams over 14 seasons, including with the Arizona Cardinals from 2010 to 2013. He became an NFL broadcaster after retiring in 2014.

Feely and Shah overlapped on the Jets during the 2008 and 2009 seasons, when Shah worked home games as an airway management physician, according to his campaign. Every NFL game has an airway management doctor on the sideline to intubate and resuscitate a catastrophically injured player.

“It’s an old relationship,” Feely said of Shah on Tuesday night, before it was clear which Democrat he would face in November. “But whoever it is, I want to do this the right way. I want to run this the right way.”

___

This story has been updated to correct the spelling of Rep. Suzan DelBene’s last name on first reference, from DeBene.

___

Associated Press writers Jacques Billeaud and Wufei Yu contributed.

Discussion

At 400 AM CDT (0900 UTC), the center of Tropical Storm Bertha was located near latitude 29.0 North, longitude 92.2 West. Bertha is moving toward the west near 13 mph (20 km/h). A generally westward or west-northwestward motion is expected through tonight, followed by a turn toward the west-southwest on Friday. On the forecast track, the center of Bertha will move near or along the Louisiana and upper Texas coasts through this afternoon, and then move farther inland into Texas this evening and tonight.

Maximum sustained winds are near 45 mph (75 km/h) with higher gusts. Little change in strength is expected today, and Bertha is forecast to maintain tropical storm intensity up until it reaches the upper Texas coast later today. Bertha is expected to dissipate inland over Texas by tonight or Friday.

Tropical-storm-force winds extend outward up to 160 miles (260 km) mainly to the southeast of the center. The National Ocean Service station at Eugene Island, Louisiana, recently reported sustained winds of 39 mph (62 km/h) with a wind gust of 47 mph (76 km/h). An oil platform southeast of the center of Bertha recently reported sustained winds of 56 mph (90 km/h) at an elevation of 102 ft (31 m).

The estimated minimum central pressure is 1003 mb (29.62 inches).

Watches and Warnings

CHANGES WITH THIS ADVISORY:

The Tropical Storm Warning has been discontinued for the Louisiana coast east of the Terrebonne/Lafourche Parish line.

SUMMARY OF WATCHES AND WARNINGS IN EFFECT:

A Tropical Storm Warning is in effect for, * The Gulf Coast from the Terrebonne/Lafourche Parish line, Louisiana to Sargent, Texas

A Tropical Storm Warning means that tropical storm conditions are expected somewhere within the warning area, in this case within 24 hours.

For storm information specific to your area, including possible inland watches and warnings, please monitor products issued by your local National Weather Service forecast office.

Land Hazards

Key messages for Tropical Storm Bertha can be found in the Tropical Cyclone Discussion under AWIPS header MIATCDAT2 and WMO header WTNT42 KNHC.

WIND: Tropical storm conditions will continue spreading across portions of the northern and northwestern Gulf Coast within the warning area through today.

STORM SURGE: The combination of storm surge and the tide will cause normally dry areas near the immediate coast to be flooded by rising waters moving inland from the shoreline. The water could reach the following heights above ground somewhere in the indicated areas if the peak surge occurs at the time of high tide,

Port Bolivar, TX to Mouth of the Mississippi River, LA, 1-3 ft

The deepest water will occur along the immediate coast. Surge-related flooding depends on the relative timing of the surge and the tidal cycle, and can vary greatly over short distances. For information specific to your area, please see products issued by your local National Weather Service forecast office.

For a complete depiction of areas at risk of storm surge inundation, please see the National Weather Service Peak Storm Surge Graphic, available at hurricanes.gov/graphics_at2.shtml?peakSurge.

RAINFALL: Bertha is expected to produce total rainfall amounts of 2 to 4 inches with isolated totals to 6 inches through tonight along Texas Gulf Coast and South Texas. This rainfall may produce isolated flash flooding, especially in urban areas.

For a complete depiction of forecast rainfall associated with Bertha, please see the National Weather Service Storm Total Rainfall Graphic available at hurricanes.gov/graphics_at2.shtml?rainqpf and the Flash Flood Risk graphic at hurricanes.gov/graphics_at2.shtml?ero.

SURF: Swells generated by Bertha will continue spreading westward along the northern Gulf Coast during the next few days. These swells are likely to cause life-threatening surf and rip current conditions. Please consult products from your local weather office.

A depiction of rip current risk for the United States can be found at: hurricanes.gov/graphics_at2.shtml?ripCurrents

• TODAY IN SAN ANTONIO: Near 100°, feeling more like 105° to 110°
• T.S. BERTHA: Weak storm will bring some rain to coastal Texas today
• RAIN CHANCE TODAY & TONIGHT: 20% chance for San Antonio, higher near the coast
• NUECES & FRIO RIVERS: Continue to flood near Cotulla & Tilden

FORECAST

TODAY

Yesterday, we officially reached 100° at San Antonio Int’l for the first time this year, and we very well may do it again today. Expect sunny skies and a high near 100°, but high humidity will make it feel more like 105° to 110°.

In the later afternoon and overnight hours, there may be a spotty shower. Chance around San Antonio is only 20%, but a little higher closer to the coast because of Tropical Storm Bertha.

T.S. BERTHA

Tropical Storm Bertha is weakening as it nears the Texas Coast today. Still, it is expected to bring some showers and storms to areas along coastal Texas from Galveston to Corpus, and even near the Rio Grande Valley.

The system will continue to weaken and dissipate as it tracks west toward Texas, causing very little wind and surge impact to the coastal plains on Thursday before disappearing by Friday morning.

Bertha poses no significant threats to travel and will be gone by the weekend. If you have beach plans, keep them.

NUECES & FRIO RIVERS

It is taking a long time for the nearly 500 billion gallons of water that fell last week to drain into Choke Canyon and Lake Corpus Christi along the Nueces and Frio Rivers. Areas of Cotulla and Tilden along the rivers are still flooded. Cotulla, specifically, can expect the Nueces to remain at major flood stage through the weekend.

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• KSAT Connect: Share your weather photos.

The Houthi attack threatened to open a new front in a war that has roiled the global economy, sending prices for fuel and other goods surging across the world. With the standoff in the Gulf deepening, there were no signs of progress in diplomatic efforts to end the conflict.

U.S. Central Command said its strikes were designed to “further degrade Iran’s ability to threaten civilian mariners and commercial vessels transiting regional waters,” as the Americans push to regain control over the Strait of Hormuz and restore the flow of international shipping.

U.S. President Donald Trump warned on Wednesday that the U.S. would destroy one bridge or power plant each time Iran shoots at a ship in the strait.

Both sides have increasingly threatened civilian infrastructure. International law generally prohibits such attacks unless the infrastructure is being used for military purposes.

“From this point forward, any time the Islamic Republic of Iran shoots at a ship in the Strait of Hormuz, whether it be by Missile, Rocket, Drone, or any other device or weapon, the United States will bomb and destroy ONE BRIDGE OR POWER PLANT,” Trump wrote on social media.

Rubio says Iran doesn't seem serious about a deal

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, attending a regional summit in the Philippines, said Iran wants to talk but doesn’t seem serious about wanting a deal.

“The problem with them is you can’t make a deal with people unless they’re going to keep it. And these people make deals and then they break it almost immediately or they decide, ‘oh, let’s change the deal.’ That’s not how deals work,” Rubio said. “So now they’re paying the price for it, and maybe they’ll change their mind here over the next few days as they continue to suffer great losses.”

Iran-backed Houthis say they attacked oil tankers

The Houthis' SABA news agency said the rebels had struck two tankers, the Encelia and the Layla, in the Red Sea, leading to fires on both. That would be their first reported attack on a vessel since they announced a blockade of Saudi-linked shipping through the Bab el-Mandeb Strait earlier this week in retaliation for the kingdom’s blockade on Yemen and a recent attack on the international airport in Yemen’s rebel-held capital, Sanaa.

Bab el-Mandeb, at the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula, is a vital shipping chokepoint connecting the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden. Around 12% of the world’s trade, including a fourth of global container traffic, passes through there, moving between Europe and Asia via Egypt’s Suez Canal.

A senior official with the Houthis said the blockade on Saudi-linked shipping would remain in effect until a years-old Saudi blockade against the Houthis is lifted. The official gave no details of the attack and spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media.

The state-run Saudi Press Agency reported the Encelia was set ablaze by an attack while sailing overnight in the Red Sea, citing an unidentified source from the General Authority of Transport. It said there were no casualties. It did not mention the Layla.

The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations Center, UKMTO, said it received a report of a tanker being struck by “an unknown projectile” 70 nautical miles (80 miles, 130 kilometers) southwest of Al Shuqaiq, Saudi Arabia, in the Red Sea. It said no casualties had been reported.

Asked about the tanker attack, Rubio said he hoped the Houthis would “de-escalate.”

“I think the Houthis, frankly, got snookered into this thing by the Iranians. And they were smart to stay out of it, and they should stay out of it and they should stop. We’ll see what happens there. Obviously, it’s not a positive development,” Rubio said.

Both sides dig in over Strait of Hormuz dispute

The continued American airstrikes are occurring as both sides have dug in on their dispute over the Strait of Hormuz, a crucial waterway for global energy that remains largely closed. The closure of the strait, through which a fifth of the world’s traded oil and gas passed during peacetime, has jolted the world economy with effects far beyond the Middle East.

Iran says it has the right to manage traffic and potentially charge fees in the strait, which was open to all and toll-free before the war. It has attacked ships using a route through the strait that is overseen by U.S. forces and intended to be outside Tehran’s control.

In response to Iran’s attacks, the U.S. re-imposed a blockade on Iranian ports and began the widening campaign of strikes across the country. On Tuesday, Trump signaled that U.S. forces could soon target an under-construction Iranian nuclear site buried deep under a mountain.

Iran’s parliament speaker, Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, who has led negotiations with the U.S., appeared to brush off Trump’s threats.

“We have repeatedly said that the situation of the strait will not return to prewar conditions,” he wrote on social media.

U.S. strikes in Iran overnight

Iranian state media reported that U.S. missiles struck locations overnight near the cities of Ahvaz, Ramshir and Andimeshk in western Iran, and two people were killed in a U.S. missile strike in the town of Shalamcheh on the Iraqi border.

Iran has responded to U.S. attacks by targeting energy infrastructure and desalination plants providing drinking water in parched neighboring Gulf countries.

Jordanian authorities said Thursday the country's military had intercepted three missiles Thursday morning, with a fourth falling in an empty area, while six drones were intercepted Wednesday night.

Bahrain's Interior Ministry posted on X that sirens had sounded and urged the public to remain calm and head to a safe area.

Overnight, military officials in Kuwait said on social media that their air defenses were “confronting attacks by hostile drones.”

Iran’s Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi said Tehran would adopt an “eye for an eye” defense doctrine.

“Any aggression against Iran, including our infrastructure, will compel a powerful and decisive response,” he posted Wednesday on X.

Diplomatic efforts show no signs of progress

Iranian Interior Minister Eskandar Momeni held meetings in recent days in Pakistan, a key mediator in the conflict, seeking to revive diplomacy. But it was unclear what new arrangement might be reached to end the war, which lately has become a battle for control over the Strait of Hormuz.

Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif condemned “in the strongest possible terms” the attacks on the Saudi tankers in the Red Sea, a statement from his office said.

Iran’s Interior Ministry spokesperson Ali Zeinivand said “diplomacy isn’t called off” and that messages were still being exchanged, according to IRNA.

An Arab diplomat said Gulf states are increasingly pessimistic about finding an off-ramp for escalating hostilities and are particularly concerned about the latest round of threats.

The diplomat said regional countries, in addition to Pakistan and Turkey, are continuing to push for de-escalation but that chances for improvement currently appear bleak. The diplomat spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the situation.

___

Becatoros reported from Athens, Greece. Associated Press writers Collin Binkley and Konstantin Toropin in Washington, Bassem Mroue in Beirut, Michelle L. Price and Jim Gomez in Manila, Philippines, and Christopher Weber in Los Angeles contributed to this report.

The suspect, a 71-year-old man who the sheriff did not publicly identify, was accused of abusing three girls all under the age of 14, Salazar said.

Watch the full Wednesday news conference below:

The sheriff’s office obtained an arrest warrant for sexual abuse of a child under 14, a first-degree felony. The deputies attempted to execute the arrest warrant at the suspect’s home in the 3900 block of Gristmill Way, near State Highway 211 in west Bexar Countys, when Salazar said they heard a gunshot.

EMS pronounced the suspect dead at the scene. Salazar said the suspect was alone inside the home when the shooting happened, and he doesn’t believe any deputies will be placed on administrative leave since they were all outside the residence.

According to Salazar, the suspect is a military and law enforcement veteran from another state. The sheriff said some of the alleged abuse occurred in another state and later continued into Bexar County.

The suspect had access to the three girls “by virtue of his living situation,” Salazar said. The girls are all safe and with family members.

The sheriff’s office investigation is ongoing.

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• Questions remain in San Antonio missing baby case
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Rubio, who earlier held talks with his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov, said Moscow and Kyiv should have the incentive to end a “very blood war” that devastated both sides.

Rubio alluded to how U.S.-mediated talks have stalled, calling them “unsuccessful or at least unfruitful” in the past but insisted U.S. President Donald Trump was committed to the work “if conditions and factors have changed to make that possible.”

“That’s been the challenge, an end that both sides can accept. And we’ve tried and we’ll continue to try to see if we can, you know, find a middle ground that brings this about. And we’re prepared to play that role if the opportunity presents itself,” Rubio told reporters.

Lavrov largely ignored questions from reporters after the meeting. The Russian Foreign Ministry in Moscow said he emphasized to Rubio “the unacceptability of further arming” Ukraine and accused European countries of pursuing Russia's “strategic defeat.”

Lavrov reiterated Russia’s readiness for “a political and diplomatic resolution of the conflict” and commitment to agreements reached at a summit between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Trump in Alaska last year, the Russian ministry said.

Washington’s military support for Ukraine remains unchanged, with arms transfers continuing through NATO’s PURL initiative, Rubio said.

“There’s been no change to our policy in that regard. We want a peace deal. We want the war to end,” he added.

ASEAN talks focused on international conflicts

The meeting was held on the sidelines of an annual gathering by foreign ministers of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in Manila.

Three days of closed-door talks that started Tuesday have focused on the resurgent war in the Middle East, the conflict between Russia and Ukraine and, closer to home, the South China Sea, where a new clash flared Thursday.

U.S. efforts to broker an end to the Russia-Ukraine war have dropped off as indirect talks stalled and the Iran war took center stage. Renewed strikes by Washington and Tehran have been intensifying after an interim ceasefire deal collapsed.

Expectations for renewed discussions about ending the war comes as Ukraine has made significant progress this year but a rift between defense leaders has threatened to derail its efforts. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has undertaken a major government reshuffle, including its top military brass.

China defends maritime military actions

Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong renewed her country's alarm over the Chinese navy’s recent test-launch of a missile from a nuclear-powered submarine in the region, saying the lack of notification to the Philippines and Pacific nations where the missile flew over and landed was destabilizing.

“It comes in the context of a rapid military build-up of China’s nuclear arsenal without the transparency or reassurance the region expects,” Wong told a university forum in Manila on Thursday. “This is why Australia has described the test as provocative and destabilizing.”

China has defended its actions, saying the launch was part of annual exercises and that it gave countries in the area appropriate notice in advance.

Rubio also had a long meeting Wednesday with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and separately with Indian External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar.

Rubio told reporters he and Wang discussed a new altercation this week between Chinese and Filipino forces in a disputed shoal in the South China Sea, which Beijing claims virtually in its entirety. Rubio called the incident “escalatory.”

“Those need to be managed very carefully, because obviously, a conflict — be it economic or otherwise — between the U.S. and China would have a dramatic global impact,” Rubio said.

In Beijing, the Chinese coast guard said it took necessary measures, including monitoring and blocking, to drive away two Philippine ships that disregarded repeated warnings from the Chinese side in a confrontation on Thursday.

China said its operations were professional and lawful and urged the Philippines to stop its provocative actions infringing on Chinese territory. Philippine officials did not immediately issue a comment.

The Trump administration has repeatedly criticized China’s assertive actions in the South China Sea to the disadvantage of smaller claimant countries like the Philippines, Washington’s oldest treaty ally in Asia. Taiwan and ASEAN members Vietnam, Malaysia and Brunei have also been involved in the often-tense territorial standoffs.

ASEAN foreign ministers discussed the territorial disputes Tuesday, welcoming progress in yearslong negotiations between China and their regional bloc on a proposed non-aggression pact that both sides hope to conclude this year, according to a draft of a joint communiqué seen by The Associated Press.

The so-called code of conduct aims to prevent a major conflict in the disputed waters, a key global trade route, that could draw in the United States.

___

Associated Press journalists Ken Moritsugu in Beijing, Haruka Nuga in Bangkok and Fu Ting in Washington contributed to this report.

About 10 attackers opened fire and threw pipe bombs at soldiers at a security check point near a residential area in Narathiwat province Wednesday evening before fleeing, according to the regional Internal Security Operations Command. It said six civilians were injured during the attack, including a 10-year-old boy who remains hospitalized in stable condition.

Photos released by authorities showed a group identified as the attackers, dressed in black clothing and hats and riding on the back of a black pickup truck. Security officials said the truck was later found abandoned and set on fire about 21 kilometers (13 miles) away from the scene.

They said the attackers had stolen three AK-47 rifles, three bullet proof vests and three mobile phones from the soldiers, who were members of the country's paramilitary Ranger force, which operates as an auxiliary to the regular army and is usually deployed in border regions.

Narathiwat, along with Yala and Pattani, are Thailand’s southernmost provinces and are the only ones with Muslim majorities in the predominantly Buddhist nation. Since 2004, the provinces have been the site of a Muslim separatist insurgency that killed thousands.

Muslim residents have long complained of being treated like second-class citizens in Thailand, and separatist movements have been periodically active for decades. Heavy-handed crackdowns have fueled the discontent. Fighting continues to this day, but at a lower level.

The Internal Security Operations Command Region 4, which oversees security operations in southern Thailand, vowed in a Facebook post to “expedite the investigation and search for the perpetrators with the best efforts.”

Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul condemned the attack, saying it was a “terrorist attack that clearly aimed at killing government officials, and a serious threat to national security,” according to government spokesperson Rachada Dhnadirek.

Footage aired by public broadcaster Thai PBS showed homes and properties of residents nearby were also damaged. One home had damage to its roof, windows and doors, while a motorcycle parked outside the house was destroyed. Another home had bullet holes scattered across its metal front gate.

But river experts and visitors are urging caution — because not every stretch of the water is safe yet.

Brett Rimkus, a member of the flood advisory team at Garner State Park, checks the river every day. He said the cleanup has been remarkable.

“This is the best river we’ve had in probably 19 years,” Rimkus said. “The river’s looking absolutely wonderful. People are ready. We’ve had a drought for the last five years — so people have wanted to come out here and get in the water. It’s cold, the springs are full, and everything about it is screaming, ‘Let’s get in the water and finish out summer.’”

Rimkus said Andy’s on River Road plans to resume tubing Thursday, with more outfitters expected to follow through the weekend. He added that at its peak last week, floodwater crested seven feet over the dam at Garner State Park — and reached nearly 21 feet downstream near Concan.

Matthew Lopez, a visitor from Corpus Christi, said his family had a terrifying experience near Majors Crossing earlier this week — downstream from the dam, where currents are still running fast.

Lopez said his son flipped off a float, and his wife was swept into rapids, where she sustained cuts and bruises before grabbing onto a branch to pull herself out.

“When somebody tells you something, I would 110% listen — because that was scary,” Lopez said. “I thought I was going to lose my wife, my son. That scared me. So after that, it’s like — if we see anything rapid, don’t go. You got little kids, just don’t go.”

Lopez said several outfitters advised waiting until later in the week and recommended that experienced adults scout sections of the river before bringing children.

Rimkus said conditions vary significantly depending on where you put in.

“Talk to the outfitters when you’re going any part of the river — whether it’s in Garner, above Garner, below Garner,” Rimkus said. “You want to make sure that part of the river is right for you.”

He also recommended river shoes for all visitors, saying the flood turned over rocks and left sharper surfaces along the riverbed. Life jackets are strongly encouraged, especially for children.

Garner State Park drew more than 455,000 visitors in 2025, making it one of the most-visited state parks in Texas, according to the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department.

As of Wednesday, the National Weather Service maintained flood warnings downstream on the Frio and Nueces river systems in South Texas.

Visitors planning a trip this weekend are encouraged to check conditions directly with Concan-area outfitters.

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• ‘This feels like healing’: July 4 flood survivor returns to aid Kerr County recovery
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But when the temperature rises, safety must be part of the plan — and you have to prepare for it.

>> San Antonio finally hits 100° for the first time in 2026

Here are some common heat safety tips:

• Wear lightweight, light-colored, loose clothing
• Use sunscreen
• Take breaks in the shade
• Drink plenty of water and limit alcohol
• Never leave people or pets in a vehicle

The last two tips are stressed the most.

Leaving pets and people, especially children, in a vehicle during hot weather can lead to a tragic end.

Baptist Health System’s emergency medicine physician Dr. Anna Garza said drinking plenty of water helps to replenish the water your body sweats out.

She said when we sweat, it evaporates from our skin, helping to cool the body down.

KSAT’s Weather Authority meteorologist Shelby Ebertowski said when the forecast has heat and humidity, be aware.

“The humidity is the big factor, especially when you get, let’s say, Tropical Storm Bertha, or you just get a little bit more of that Gulf moisture making its way to Texas, it’s going to be feeling even warmer,” she said.

Humidity levels are factored into the heat index, and she said many people can feel the difference when it’s a dry heat versus a humid heat.

“It takes more of a toll on your body on days, (where we) see the high humidity,” Ebertowski said.

“The issue is that because it’s so humid, the moisture on our skin just can’t evaporate, which prevents our body’s natural cooling,” Garza explained.

She said this can cause people’s core body temperature to rise, leading to overheating.

“It can make our heart work really hard,” she said. “As we continue to try and sweat, we will sweat, but the sweat is just not going anywhere. Our blood pressure can drop, and people can get really sick. “

In addition, when people are taking in the sun’s heat, so do our vehicles.

The steering wheel, leather or vinyl seats and the console can get very hot, as well as the metal and plastic components of seatbelts, car seats and booster seats.

If they get really hot, these items can hurt people and children getting into vehicles.

“People don’t realize is that the metal portion of that buckle can get up to greater than 150 degrees Fahrenheit, and that can cause second degree burns, especially in children,” Garza said.

She said to not overlook the car seat harness.

“Make sure a child is fully clothed,” she said. “Don’t put them in there with just a diaper, just because the plastic piece that goes over the chest also gets very hot, and that can cause burns.”

She added that burns are rare, but they can happen.

If a hot car component contacts skin and there is redness, Garza said to run regular tap water over the area.

She advised not to use ice water and ice itself, because it can make the irritation or burn worse.

Garza also suggested putting up a windshield screen or cover to reduce the heat inside vehicles or possibly cover all the seats with a towel to prevent them from getting too hot.

Something else to consider is a mini attachable fan for an infant in the backseat.

A local mom said this may help infants in reverse-facing car seats get some cool air considering the back of the car seat is blocking the cool air blowing from the air vents.

She said every caregiver must consider the baby’s ability to reach and grab the fan and who else is in the backseat when the fan would be in use.

The feasibility and safety of the fan chosen, along with the family vehicle situation, are also factors to take into consideration.

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India’s “Cockroach” protests began more than a month ago over alleged leaks in some of the country’s most competitive entrance exams for medical colleges and government jobs. The movement has since expanded beyond exam grievances, drawing professionals and families while channeling broader frustration.

Thursday’s demonstrations at Jantar Mantar, a designated protest site in New Delhi, followed overnight clashes in which police used tear gas and batons to disperse crowds, the second such confrontation this week.

On Monday, thousands of protesters had defied restrictions and marched toward Parliament before police broke up the demonstration with tear gas and batons.

Protesters regrouped by Thursday morning, returning to the protest site despite roadblocks, while authorities suspended Delhi Metro services at 16 stations across central New Delhi in an effort to limit access to the demonstrations.

Modi tries to contain protest fallout

The issue of exam leaks has become a powerful symbol of frustration for millions of young Indians. Protesters are demanding the resignation of Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan, examination system reforms and compensation for families of students who died by suicide after exam paper leaks.

Facing mounting pressure, Modi addressed the issue publicly for the first time Thursday, announcing fast-track courts to handle examination paper leak cases. Fast-track courts are special courts created to speed up cases in India’s notoriously slow justice system.

“Nothing is more important than the welfare and future of our youth!,” Modi wrote on X.

The announcement failed to calm protesters, who said Modi was not addressing their demands for accountability and reform.

“Rather than providing solution which is convenient for him, he should work toward a solution which is convenient for the nation and set an example,” law student Daksh Bhargava said.

Cockroach party stays true to satirical origins

Leaders of the Cockroach Janta Party, which launched the protest movement, said they would not end the demonstrations until the education minister resigned. Staying true to the movement’s tongue-in-cheek style, its founder, Abhijeet Dipke, responded by posting a meme of Pradhan captioned, “Hi, my name is Nothing.”

The Cockroach movement began as online satire campaign in May and moved to the streets in June through smaller protests across cities. It gained momentum after prominent activist Sonam Wangchuk joined the demonstration and began a hunger strike that has lasted more than three weeks. Police forcibly transferred Wangchuk to a hospital over the weekend.

Protests reflect rising youth anger

For many young Indians, the protests have become one of the few visible expressions of dissent in a country where demonstrations against Modi’s government have led to a broader crackdown on activists, opposition figures and public protests.

The movement’s rapid growth beyond student groups reflects wider frustration among young Indians and echoes a broader trend across South Asia, where young people have driven anti-government movements in recent years.

The movement also has gained a following among Indians of all ages over concerns about government accountability, unemployment and economic opportunity.

Opposition parties have backed the protests, using the issue to challenge the government in Parliament. Demonstrations and solidarity events have been held in other Indian cities, reflecting how the movement has spread beyond the capital.

India has one of the world’s youngest populations, with millions entering a labor market that has struggled to create enough secure, well-paying jobs. Despite years of rapid economic growth, many young people say their prospects have not improved.

As one of the country’s largest voting blocs, India’s youth could also become an increasingly important political force ahead of future elections.

Mayor Gina Ortiz Jones recently suggested the city reconsider funding for some nonprofits, including the Botanical Garden, arguing that organizations charging admission should not also receive city support.

SABG Garden CEO Katherine Tremble said the nonprofit understands the city’s financial challenges but hopes any reductions are reasonable.

“So we understand that as a partner with the city, that some budget cuts are necessary,” Tremble said. “For us, it’s how do we come to an agreement on something that is reasonable so that we can continue to deliver on mission.”

The 39-acre Botanical Garden welcomed 430,000 visitors in 2025 and is on track to serve a record 50,000 people through community accessibility programs this year.

The nonprofit operates on a $14 million annual budget, including a $1.2 million investment from the city. Tremble said admission fees cover only about 20% of operating costs.

“One of the things that’s important to understand is that it takes a lot of manpower to maintain these 39 acres,” she said.

If city funding were eliminated entirely, Tremble said the garden’s mission would be affected.

“That would absolutely affect our ability to deliver on mission,” she said.

When asked whether staff reductions would become necessary, Tremble said, “That would be a hard reality that we would have to navigate at that point.” The Botanical Garden employs 179 people.

Despite the uncertainty, Tremble said she remains optimistic and confident the garden will continue serving the community.

“I try to focus on the positive,” she said.

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Speaking at a health summit in Ghana on Wednesday, Dr. Jean Kaseya, director-general of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, said 1,031 deaths have been confirmed.

“These are people dying. They are dying because we don’t have vaccines, we don’t have medicine, we don’t have funding,” he added.

The latest update from Congo’s Ministry of Health showed that as of Monday, 2,473 cases had been recorded in the latest outbreak. At least 737 patients were in isolation or hospitalized, it said.

The outbreak, which was declared on May 15, is unlike most previous Ebola outbreaks because the Bundibugyo virus responsible for it has no approved vaccines or treatments. It has also killed more people at a faster rate than any outbreak on record, including the 2013-2016 outbreak that is considered the worst on record with over 11,000 deaths out of at least 28,000 cases. That outbreak took about eight months from the first case to reach 1,000 deaths.

Conflict and community resistance are complicating the response

The World Health Organization has said the true scale of the outbreak could be ⁠two to four times larger than official figures indicate. Some communities at its epicenter also remain difficult to reach, mainly because of fighting involving rebel groups.

Ebola is rare, but highly contagious and can be contracted through contact with bodily fluids such as vomit, blood or semen. It can cause severe illness and is often fatal.

Officials have warned that 80% of new cases have emerged outside known chains of transmission, a sign the outbreak is spreading faster than health officials can track it even as they step up their response in Ituri province, the epicenter of the outbreak, and four other provinces where cases have been recorded.

Community resistance to Ebola teams, particularly those carrying out safe burials, has also hampered the response. Robert Ndjalonga, head of civil protection in Ituri province, said some communities have refused to allow burial teams to operate because they prefer traditional burials, increasing the risk of further transmission.

“The biggest challenge remains resistance from or outright refusal by some communities to accept response teams," Ndjalonga said. "On several occasions, burial teams have had to be escorted by security forces to ensure that safe and dignified burials could be carried out without incident.”

Shortages of burial supplies have delayed responses to reported deaths, while some affected health zones still lack operational burial teams, Ndjalonga said.

Attacks on health facilities and response teams have also forced front-line workers and aid groups out of some areas. Some health workers have gone on strike, saying they haven’t been paid since the outbreak started.

A member of a team carrying out safe Ebola burials was recently injured when assailants threw stones at the team’s vehicle following a burial in Bunia last week, according to provincial civil protection authorities.

The attack highlighted the challenges facing the response in eastern Congo. In Ituri’s Irumu territory, the local military administrator recently described Ebola as a greater threat than the Islamic State-affiliated Allied Democratic Forces insurgency and urged residents to support, rather than attack, health workers.

Containment efforts are faltering

A humanitarian worker involved in the response, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly, cited poor coordination between response agencies, delays in transferring patients to treatment centers and waits of more than four days for some Ebola test results.

“At times, it’s unclear who is doing what and where,” the worker said.

The delays have led some patients to leave health facilities before they can be diagnosed, increasing the risk of further transmission, the worker said.

Africa CDC head Kaseya called for intensified efforts to slow the outbreak on the first day of the health summit in Ghana Tuesday.

“If we do not stop this outbreak today, it could become one of the worst Ebola outbreaks the world has ever documented,” Kaseya said.

Less than 9% of the contacts of confirmed patients who are expected to be traced are currently being monitored, far below the level needed to contain the outbreak, according to Africa CDC. More than 60% of deaths are occurring in the community before patients can receive care.

Pierre Akilimali, the Ebola response incident manager at the National Public Health Institute of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, said the high number of community deaths suggests many infections are not being detected or isolated in time, allowing the virus to continue spreading.

Experts warn of a worsening crisis

Last month, researchers at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention used computer modeling to estimate how the outbreak could evolve. In a worst-case scenario, they said it could approach the scale of the 2014-2016 West Africa epidemic.

“There’s never been an Ebola outbreak that started with so many cases because it was so late to be identified,” said Trish Newport, emergency program manager for Doctors Without Borders, who has been working in Congo.

“It’s like the outbreak is outrunning the response,” Newport said.

University of Pittsburgh epidemiologist Dr. Jean Nachega, who is advising African health authorities, said he does not expect the outbreak to reach the CDC’s worst-case scenario but cautioned that the challenges remain “huge.”

___

Asadu reported from Abuja, Nigeria. Constant Same Bagalwa in Bunia, Congo, Mike Stobbe in New York and Naa Adorkor Cudjoe in Accra, Ghana, contributed.

The handover took place late Wednesday during a meeting with FBI Director Kash Patel at Prabowo’s residence in the Indonesian capital Jakarta. Patel arrived in Jakarta shortly after talks with Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet concerning joint efforts to combat international online scam operations that cheat victims out of billions of dollars annually.

The exchange underscored growing cooperation between Indonesia and the U.S. in recovering stolen cultural heritage and returning the items to the country of origin, Indonesia Culture Minister Fadli Zon said.

The artifacts from Papua are part of the cultural heritage of the Dani and Asmat tribes and Lake Sentani communities. They were repatriated through cooperation between Indonesia’s Culture Ministry and the FBI after provenance research established the objects had been smuggled out of Indonesia, Zon said.

“These are very valuable objects because this repatriation process is part of our effort to restore our cultural sovereignty,” Zon said, adding that the artifacts will be displayed at Indonesia’s National Museum.

Images from Indonesia's Presidential Secretariat show several polished stone ax heads and ceremonial objects traditionally associated with Papuan societies.

Traditional Papuan stone axes were more than utilitarian tools. Among highland communities such as the Dani, they historically served as symbols of wealth and status, were exchanged in marriage and ceremonial transactions and were often passed down as treasured ancestral heirlooms, the Culture Ministry said.

The return is the latest in a series of efforts by U.S. authorities to recover and repatriate Southeast Asian cultural property that was trafficked through international antiquities networks, the U.S. Embassy in Jakarta said in a statement.

Earlier this month, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Jay Clayton announced the return of two bronze, Buddhist sculptures depicting Avalokiteshvara from the eighth century, the embassy said.

During a repatriation ceremony at the Indonesian Consulate on July 10, Clayton said U.S. authorities would continue working with Homeland Security Investigations to combat illicit trafficking in cultural property and return stolen artworks to their origin countries.

The sculptures were stolen from Indonesian archaeological sites and sold to an American collector by the late antiquities dealer Douglas Latchford. The sculptures were among 34 Southeast Asian antiquities voluntarily relinquished by the collector in 2021 after investigators determined they had been looted.

The Indonesian sculptures were removed decades ago by organized looters before entering the international art market through Latchford, a Bangkok-based dealer who was indicted by U.S. authorities in 2019 for allegedly orchestrating a large-scale trafficking scheme involving antiquities looted from Cambodia and other Southeast Asian countries. The case was later dismissed following his death, the U.S. embassy said.

The FBI has previously assisted Indonesia in recovering stolen cultural objects, including bronze statues and artifacts from historical and archaeological sites, according to Zon, who expressed hope that the cooperation on cultural repatriation and restitution would continue.

Indonesia has intensified efforts in recent years to track down cultural treasures scattered abroad through colonial-era collecting, theft and illicit trafficking, including from the Netherlands, which colonized Indonesia for centuries.

The storm made landfall Wednesday afternoon in St. Bernard Parish about 40 miles (65 kilometers) east of New Orleans. The storm was forecast to reach the upper Texas coast on Thursday before dissipating inland in Texas by Friday.

Early Thursday, the storm was about 110 miles (175 kilometers) southwest of New Orleans and about 120 miles (190 kilometers) southeast of Lake Charles, Louisiana, moving west at 12 mph (19 kph) with maximum sustained winds of 45 mph (75 kph), the National Hurricane Center said.

The wind and storm surge were the main threats for the Deep South states. Parks and piers were closed up and down the coast, as were some low-lying roads. A tropical storm warning stretched from Alabama to Louisiana, including New Orleans where extreme heat was adding to misery.

Onlookers watched the storm surge at the Lake Pontchartrain estuary, with kids splashing in the floodwaters as Bertha approached the Louisiana Coast. Residents mowed their lawns even as streets filled up with water.

Tropical storm force winds were felt as much as 160 miles (260 kilometers) from the center of the storm, the hurricane center said. A wind gust of 44 mph (71 kph) was recorded at New Orleans Lakefront Airport on Wednesday afternoon. The strong gales knocked over a Waffle House sign onto a car in Panama City Beach, Florida.

But the heaviest rains were staying offshore, reducing the risks of flooding, the center said.

The storm is unlikely to leave behind widespread damage, Louisiana State Climatologist Jay Grymes said, adding that the impact should be manageable for coastal communities.

Gov. Jeff Landry called the forecast “encouraging” but also warned residents to be prepared for some flooding.

Storm surges up to 3 feet (1 meter) were possible in Louisiana and Alabama, forecasters said. Rain totals were forecast between 1 and 4 inches (3 to 10 centimeters), with higher amounts possible in isolated areas.

Elsewhere in the U.S., a line of storms on Tuesday generated reports of tornadoes stretching from Cincinnati to New Jersey. Torrential rains caused flash floods that swamped homes, washed out bridges and led to water rescues in West Virginia, authorities said.

Rare combination of tropical storm and heat warnings

Southern Louisiana was under tropical storm and extreme heat warnings for much of Wednesday — a rare double dose of suffering, the National Weather Service said.

It was the first time in at least two decades that’s happened in the area, the weather service said, citing records that date back to 2005.

Bertha is the second tropical storm of the Atlantic season

Bertha is the second tropical storm of the Atlantic hurricane season. Tropical Storm Arthur in June brought heavy rainfall to the southeastern U.S.

Bertha could dump heavy rain on coastal areas of Mississippi that are still recovering from flooding brought by Arthur that destroyed and damaged homes.

Hurricane Fausto in the Pacific is far from land

In the eastern Pacific Ocean, Hurricane Fausto churned far from land Wednesday. The hurricane was hundreds of miles west-southwest of the southern tip of Baja California with maximum sustained winds of 80 mph (130 kph).

It was forecast to gradually strengthen and the hurricane center said that ocean swells generated by Fausto were spreading along the Baja California coast and likely to cause life-threatening surf and rip tides.

___

Associated Press journalists Julie Walker in New York, Kim Chandler in Montgomery, Alabama, and Jaimie Ding in Los Angeles contributed to this report.

But with barely three months until November's contest, the perceived threat to rural life, ranchland and dwindling water supplies could become a defining issue for her longshot challenge to Republican Gov. Greg Abbott, dividing conservative rural areas that have traditionally served as a counterweight to Democrats' urban strongholds.

The backlash to energy-guzzling server warehouses that power artificial intelligence is also shaping other statewide campaigns from Arizona to Ohio to New York, and even giving Democrats a glimmer of hope in Texas, where Republicans have dominated for three decades.

“There is this little issue that I recently started hearing about that I wanted to tell you about, in case you don’t know,” Hinojosa quipped to a Democratic Party-organized crowd of about 160 seated on fold-out chairs at an Amarillo social club in Texas' panhandle. “It’s this issue of data centers.”

The crowd booed, and she went on: “They are owned by the richest men in the world. We’re all footing the bill. There are no rules. It is the wild west of data centers.”

The fast growth of massive data centers has already upended races for local offices across the country, often uniting conservatives and liberals in revolting against projects in their midst.

People don't like the secrecy surrounding the projects or the prospect of air, noise, water and light pollution. They fear electric bills going up, wells going dry and losing open space, farmland or forest.

Now the ripple effects have spread to top-of-the-ticket races, where incumbents and challengers are trying to show that they hear an angry electorate.

In Ohio, Democratic nominee Sherrod Brown aired a television advertisement attacking Republican U.S. Sen. John Husted as the "face of data centers in Ohio" as people gather signatures for a statewide referendum to outright ban their construction.

In Wisconsin, a Democratic candidate for governor, Francesca Hong, is pledging to “tax the rich, fund our schools and stop AI data centers” as she campaigns for her party's nomination in a crowded primary.

In Pennsylvania, Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro is facing heat from some voters who feel like he's been too welcoming to tech behemoths. Sam Burleigh, a Democrat whose rural community is fighting off data center projects, accused Shapiro of “allowing these data centers to come in and take over acres and acres of prime farmland.”

Texas is fertile ground for data centers

Any political unrest may be felt most acutely in Texas.

The state is poised to overtake northern Virginia as the largest global data center market by 2030, according to a report by commercial real estate giant JLL. It has lots of land, lots of energy and a friendly regulatory environment under Republican leadership.

In rural west Texas and its panhandle, gargantuan data centers are under construction, including one near Amarillo touted as the world's largest. Some come with designs for natural gas-fired turbines to power them.

Rumors are flying about others popping up — Google, which is building four data centers in northwest Texas, sponsored moderated conversations with officials and business elite in Lubbock and Amarillo in recent weeks — and it is sowing an outcry across small cities, tiny towns and sprawling ranches where people vote overwhelmingly Republican.

Google says its investments are advancing American innovation, fortifying cybersecurity and boosting energy capacity, while President Donald Trump has made data centers a top priority to help the U.S. compete against China for AI superiority.

But tech giants and developers can be secretive about their plans, making it impossible to know what will be built or what sort of pollution they'll create, critics say. Some worry that data centers will destroy rural Texas' low cost of living and sully sunsets and sweeping views that stretch toward the horizon.

Others say construction and an influx of workers are already causing havoc for ranchers and towns, driving up rents, snapping up farmland, illuminating the night sky, clogging roads and turning parts of rural Texas into industrial zones.

Opposition crosses a partisan divide

Democrats are prominent among the data center critics, but so are Republicans, including Texas' sitting agriculture commissioner, Sid Miller. They say there are many more Republicans who are quieter because they fear publicly opposing their governor and party.

“They're upset with Greg Abbott,” said Suzanne Bellsnyder, a former Republican activist from Spearman who writes a syndicated column that advocates for rural Texas. “Whether that translates into voting against him, I don't know.”

Abbott has aggressively advocated for big projects in Texas and, in November, he helped make Google's announcement of a $40 billion investment there, saying “Texas is the epicenter of AI development.”

Compounding that, Texas counties don't have zoning authority — precisely the local land planning authority that communities around the country are increasingly using to fight off data centers.

Abbott seems to recognize that data centers are dividing his base. In recent weeks, he ordered regulators to take steps to ensure Texans weren't paying higher electricity bills because of data centers and promised to push a legislative agenda next year to impose regulations on data centers.

At an East Texas campaign stop, Abbott said that includes taking away the state's billion-dollar-plus-per-year tax break and preventing data centers from being built in “rural Texas neighborhoods.”

Hinojosa and others derided Abbott's words about “rural Texas neighborhoods” as meaningless — "doublespeak that makes no sense to anyone," Hinojosa said — and lacking urgency or seriousness.

“Now we have this gold rush of data centers in our communities," Hinojosa said in an interview, adding that “people want a say, and I think that’s fair.”

As governor, she said she'd block a permit for a data center if it wasn't a good deal for Texans or residents hadn't gotten a say in the matter.

Abbott tries to soothe concerns

Abbott's campaign season turnabout on data centers doesn't seem to have soothed many.

Of great concern is the prospect that data centers will consume massive amounts of water and worsen drought conditions for ranchers and farmers in a state where water shortages already crippled the sugar cane industry.

“Oh, I guarantee you, it's on everybody's mind,” said Giles Dalby, a cattle rancher and a Republican county commissioner in west Texas.

Dalby, who raises Angus and Brangus cattle on ranchland that's been in his family for 125 years, pointed to fast-growing cities where water authorities have had to go to greater lengths to procure water, including the “water wars” between San Antonio and ranchers several years ago.

Texas is increasingly steamrolling over landowner rights in the quest for public water, Dalby said, and that could mean that data centers get in line ahead of ranchers when shortages or rationing worsen.

Clayton Tucker, a rancher and the Democratic nominee for state agriculture commissioner, said his campaign events are consumed by talk of data centers. It doesn't matter whether he's meeting with Democrats or Republicans.

“This is the most cross-partisan issue I’ve ever seen in my life,” Tucker said.

Meanwhile, protest groups are springing up, including one in Lubbock that is led by Republicans. The founders, Stephen Sanders and Hallie Bertrand, like some other Republican opponents of data centers, say it's possible or even certain they won't vote for Abbott, although they may not necessarily vote for Hinojosa.

There is still time for Abbott to push through major legislation before the election and “be a hero,” Sanders said.

The big question is whether enough rural voters will turn against Abbott to give Hinojosa a shot. It’s hard to tell, Bertrand said, especially when some know nothing about the issue.

“They'll just hit that button, Republican all the way down,” Bertrand said. "But I think it’s a step towards something that we have not seen in Texas in a long time, with people on the right switching to the left. Or scooting a little closer to the middle, maybe."

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Follow Marc Levy at http://twitter.com/timelywriter

The two-day meeting hosted by the Food and Drug Administration has the backing of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has described himself as a “big fan” of peptides and vowed to overturn industry restrictions put in place under President Joe Biden.

Peptide supporters include podcaster Joe Rogan and wellness influencers such as Gary Brecka, a supporter of Kennedy’s “Make America Healthy Again” agenda who sells peptide vials online. Social media platforms are brimming with testimonials from people claiming the substances helped them build muscle, recover from injuries or look younger.

Despite such support, the FDA’s two-day meeting is expected to showcase a stark split over the compounds.

FDA’s career scientists have made clear they don’t think there’s enough data to support making peptides more widely available, specifically from compounding pharmacies, which mix customized medicines that aren’t available from traditional drugmakers.

That’s also the stance of many medical and scientific experts who have weighed in ahead of the meeting.

“This is really alarming,” said Rita Jew, a pharmacist and president of the Institute for Safe Medication Practices. "There aren’t that many other substances people are injecting into themselves where you see that the clinical evidence is so lacking.”

But the panel of outside advisers convened for the meeting includes at least seven doctors or pharmacists with financial ties to the peptide industry. The group includes owners of wellness clinics that sell peptides, pharmacies that produce the formulas and online consulting businesses that promote them. Other expert panels appointed under Kennedy have faced criticism for apparent conflicts of interest.

Earlier this week, the FDA added several additional experts to the 20-member panel, including academics who don't have connections to the industry.

FDA scientists remain unconvinced of peptide safety and health benefits

The experts will take votes on whether the FDA should allow seven popular peptides to be added to a list of substances that are safe for compounding by pharmacies. The votes aren't binding and the FDA has periodically bucked the recommendations of its outside experts.

Peptides are the building blocks of more complex proteins, triggering hormones inside the body needed for growth, metabolism and healing. Drug companies have brought several to market as medications, including mainstay treatments for diabetes and weight loss.

Peptide supporters have asked the FDA to consider the seven peptides under review this week for various medical conditions, including ulcerative colitis, migraines and opioid addiction.

In recent years, the FDA had warned Americans about the risks of injecting peptides like BPC-157 and TB-500, both of which are set for review on Thursday. The chemicals are promoted online as a way to recover from injuries and reduce inflammation. Both are considered doping substances by international sports authorities.

In a scientific review posted ahead of the meeting, FDA scientists reiterated their longstanding concerns. Again and again, regulators said they could find little data on safety or effectiveness and raised concerns about risks of contamination, allergic reactions and quality control. Most of the data they did find came from studies in animals, including rats, and not humans.

For all seven peptides reviewed, the staffers recommended against making them available for compounding.

Peptide supporters will push FDA to ease access

The FDA assessment is only one part of more than 18 hours of discussions and presentations scheduled across two days. The meeting also includes opportunities for members of the public to address the FDA and its experts.

Ahead of the meeting, the FDA received more than 1,900 public comments, including from doctors and patients attesting to the benefits of peptides.

“For many people, this is about a therapy that is helping them, and whether they can get it safely and legally from a regulated pharmacy instead of taking their chances in the gray market,” states the American Academy of Peptide Medicine, a group that includes doctors and wellness clinic operators who promote peptides. The group's website states that it is “an educational academy, not a licensing or accrediting body.”

After the meeting, the FDA will review the votes, discussion and public comments before making a decision on whether to ease access to the peptides.

FDA-watchers say the most likely outcome may be a temporary policy reassuring pharmacies that they won’t be targeted for compounding the peptides under review. Formally placing the substances on FDA's list of drugs that are safe for compounding would require new regulations, which can take months or years to draft.

“We’re still going through this process, but I think it’s more than likely that the process will end up at the result that Secretary Kennedy wants,” said Nathan Beaver, an attorney specializing in FDA issues.

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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.

Cellphone video of the shooting, where three gunshots could be heard, circulated on social media.

Madison Police Chief John Patterson stressed at a news conference that the footage circulating was just one perspective of what happened.

“I want to take a moment to honestly and sincerely offer my heartfelt sympathies to his family for this loss," Patterson said. The man killed was in his 30s, Patterson said, but police did not release his name.

The shooting happened on a city street in a popular neighborhood lined with restaurants, bars, shops and residential homes less than 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) from the state Capitol. Footage shows numerous cars stopped in the intersection with people watching as it unfolded.

A white police officer shot and killed Tony Robinson, who was biracial, on the same street in 2015, a shooting that spurred large protests. The district attorney did not file charges against police in that case, determining the officer was justified.

The race of the officer who fired his gun on Wednesday and that of the man killed were not released by police.

But Black advocacy groups in Madison quickly spoke out against the crime and said they believed the man was Black.

“Another Black man is dead on a Madison street, and our community watched him die before we even knew his name,” said Brandi Grayson, the head of the Madison-based Black community advocacy group Urban Triage. “That is the cruelty of state violence.”

A crowd formed near where the shooting occurred on Wednesday with people chanting, “Arrest the cops!”

They placed flowers and candles where the man was shot and held a vigil, the crowd continuing to grow as the sun set.

Protesters also marched to the Wisconsin State Capitol and took the stage at a summer concert series, demanding the name of the officer and that he be held accountable. The Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra announced on social media the show was canceled.

Police were responding to calls that someone was attempting to enter parked vehicles in the neighborhood, Patterson said. The suspect fled on a bike through nearby backyards in an attempt to get away before officers contacted him in the street, Patterson said.

The suspect either fell off of his bike or was taken off of his bike by officers and during the struggle pulled out a knife and injured an officer, Patterson said. Police posted a picture of the knife in a news release.

An officer deployed a taser but it was unsuccessful, the chief said. The same officer who was injured by the knife fired his weapon and the man who was shot died later at the hospital, the chief said. He described the officer who fired his weapon as a veteran officer, but did not reveal any other details.

Another officer was injured, but it is not clear how, Patterson said. The other two officers were uninjured.

The Wisconsin Department of Criminal Investigation will investigate the shooting because it involves police officers. The four responding officers will be placed on administrative leave, per the police department's policy.

During a hearing on Monday, a judge cut down 19-year-old Vynzell Edward McGarity’s bond from $100,000 to $50,000. He was charged with reckless driving and racing on a highway causing serious bodily injury for the June 28 crash.

San Antonio police said McGarity was traveling eastbound on Southwest Military Drive, near Mango Avenue, in a Dodge Charger at a high rate of speed.

McGarity switched lanes and struck Maldonado as she attempted to cross the street, according to a police report.

McGarity is required to be on full house arrest, submit to random drug and alcohol testing, and cannot drive or be in possession of a firearm.

Sandra Maldonado, Monce’s mother, said her daughter was more than a victim in a deadly crash. She was a high school senior with plans to become a nurse, someone who loved animals and looked for ways to help others.

“She was a really cheerful girl. She would take food from her job and give it to people living on the street,” Maldonado told KSAT in Spanish.

Monce worked at El Pollo Loco on Southwest Military Drive when she was killed.

“She still played with toys,” Maldonado said. “She was just a girl, and he took that from her.”

Maldonado said she knew something was wrong the night Monce didn’t come home.

Instead of receiving a phone call, she got into her vehicle and drove to the restaurant where her daughter worked. She searched the parking lot, drove through the drive-thru and called out Monce’s name. As she continued searching, Maldonado’s older daughter mentioned hearing reports about a fatal crash nearby.

“My daughter said, ‘Mama, it’s Monce,’” she said. “I yelled at her, ‘Don’t tell me that. That’s not my daughter. I’m going to wait for the police.’ I went outside and sat on the sidewalk waiting.”

Maldonado said she later learned the victim was her daughter.

Since learning of McGarity’s bond reduction, Maldonado said it has been difficult news to accept.

“She was on her way home, and because of his recklessness, he killed her,” Maldonado said. “He still can go home, he can sleep in his bed. He can watch television. He can hug his mom. My Monce can’t do any of that anymore.”

The family’s attorney, Anthony Alcoser, criticized both the bond reduction and what he said was a lack of communication with the family before the hearing.

“What’s even more concerning is that no one from the DA’s office or the Victim Advocate Office notified my client about this hearing,” Alcoser said.

Alcoser also questioned whether the conditions of McGarity’s release adequately protect the public.

“Reducing this bond for this individual who had prior records for racing. Yes, he’s on an ankle monitor, he’s in a house, but that’s not stopping him from getting in the car and racing again. After the court’s actions yesterday, the streets are unsafer tonight.”

Court records also show this was not McGarity’s first encounter with law enforcement involving his driving.

In March, San Antonio police arrested McGarity on a reckless driving charge after an officer reported seeing his vehicle fishtail while accelerating through the intersection of Bowie Street and East Commerce Street.

The report stated officers found a speeding ticket in McGarity’s pocket that had been issued the day before. The citation alleged he was driving 90 mph in a 70 mph zone.

Maldonado said nothing will bring her daughter back, but she hopes her story will ensure Monce is remembered for who she was rather than only how she died.

She described the pain of losing an only child she raised as a single mother, saying Monce still slept beside her and had a future ahead of her. Now, she said, her focus is on seeking justice.

“I won’t stop until there is justice for my daughter,” Maldonado told KSAT. “I know they are not going to bring her back, but I don’t want her death to go without justice.”

Alcoser said the family is offering a $2,500 cash reward for information about the other vehicles police believe were racing with McGarity the night Monce was killed.

Previous coverage of this story on KSAT:

• ‘Everything is gone’: Family shares heartbreak after driver drag racing hits, kills 17-year-old girl

Officers responded to the shooting around 9:15 p.m. in the 1800 block of East Sonterra Boulevard, near the U.S. Highway 281 access road.

According to police, an unknown number of people pulled up in a vehicle next to the man and fired at least 12 shots before the vehicle sped off.

The victim, a 26-year-old man, was hit at least five times, police said. His condition is unclear.

Police are investigating if the shooting was targeted.

Additional information was not immediately available.

Read also:

• Suspect dies of self-inflicted gunshot wound during arrest attempt on far West Side, sheriff says
• Homeowners eager for capture of burglars who stole millions in Stone Oak neighborhood
• 18-year-old arrested after gunfire between multiple vehicles in far West Side, BCSO says

On Wednesday, the Red Sox matched that streak from 80 years ago, beating the Baltimore Orioles 6-3 in the opener of a doubleheader.

The streak ended hours later when they dropped the nightcap 5-1.

“That was a great ride, a 15-game winning streak,” first baseman Willson Contreras in a quiet clubhouse. “There’s nothing to be sad about. We have to be happy. We should be proud of what we did and from now keep playing the way we’ve been playing.”

After the loss, interim manager Chad Tracy was ready to speak to the team but saw Contreras and pitcher Sonny Gray talking, so he let those veterans handle it.

“We just won 15 games in a row and I think all of us knew it was going to end at some point,” Tracy said.

After the earlier win, Tracy said he understood the historical significance.

“I’ve read some stuff. I know Ted Williams was around back then, so I’m aware of the year and how long it’s been,” he said. “It’s cool that they’ve accomplished something great.”

When the afternoon game ended, the Red Sox took a little more time than usual on the field to soak it in as The Standells’ song “Dirty Water” played in the background like it does after each victory in Fenway Park.

They also enjoyed the moment in the clubhouse.

“Oh, yeah, absolutely between the staff. We were realizing the guys were going crazy in the locker room — they always do — but even more emphasis right now with what we’re going through,” Tracy said. “Everybody enjoys it for sure.”

Boston fired manager Alex Cora after a 10-17 start and seemed to be in for a long season under Tracy. The Red Sox were 37-48 and last in the AL East on July 1 following a 10-2 loss to Washington.

Three weeks went by — a stretch including the All-Star break — before Boston (52-49) lost again.

Tracy is the first manager since the 19th century to lead a team to a win streak of 15 games or more who didn’t start the season in the job, according to MLB.

With a 6-3 lead after six innings, Caleb Durbin, who hit a tiebreaking homer in Monday’s win over Baltimore, started thinking about how many outs were left.

“I think in the seventh inning I’m counting them down a little bit,” he said, smiling.

After the final out, left fielder Jarren Duran said he was able to appreciate the cheering crowd when he met with center fielder Ceddanne Rafaela and right fielder Wilyer Abreu.

“When I get to go see (them), I take a look around and I get to enjoy that moment, that’s always fun,” he said.

With the organization in its 126th season, the streak has more meaning for some.

“You look back at it and think about where you’re doing it and how long this franchise has existed. It’s been incredible,” Durbin said.

Orioles manager Craig Albernaz, who grew up watching the Red Sox about 45 miles away in Fall River, Massachusetts, showed his respect.

“I mean, a 15-game heater is really impressive,” he said. “You know, its tough to win one game in the big leagues and them going 15 straight, it’s really impressive.”

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

Charlotte MacInnes alleged Wilson defamed her or breached her confidence in four social media posts from September 2024 to July 2025 by falsely suggesting she had withdrawn a sexual harassment complaint against one of the film’s producers to advance her career.

MacInnes denied ever making such a complaint but Justice Elizabeth Raper of the Federal Court of Australia ruled Wednesday that none of Wilson’s posts were defamatory.

The dispute stemmed from an incident in September 2023 when MacInnes and the producer went swimming at Sydney’s Bondi Beach before later sharing a bath at the apartment where they were staying. Wilson later said on Instagram that MacInnes told her the next day that the producer had asked her to bathe and shower with her, making her feel uncomfortable, but that MacInnes later retracted the complaint.

Raper ruled that MacInnes failed to prove Wilson’s posts caused serious harm to her reputation or that Wilson breached her confidence. She dismissed the case and ordered MacInnes to pay costs, according to a written judgement provided by the court.

Wilson, who starred in the “Pitch Perfect” films and “Bridesmaids,” thanked the judge and Australia’s legal system in an Instagram post, calling the ruling a “substantial win” and saying she looked forward to moving on.

MacInnes’ legal representatives did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

“The Deb,” a musical comedy about two teenage girls preparing for a debutante ball in a small rural town, is reportedly set for a U.S. digital release on Aug. 25.

• TRIPLE DIGITS: SA Int’l reached 100° this afternoon (first time this year)
• T.S. BERTHA: Weak storm will impact Louisiana today, minimal impact on Texas Coast tomorrow
• NUECES & FRIO RIVERS: Continue to flood near Cotulla & Tilden

FORECAST

100° TODAY

Today marked the first official triple digit day in San Antonio with a high of 100° at SA International.

Other than the heat, there is a small (20%) chance for a stray shower overnight, with the approach of a very weak Tropical Storm Bertha.

T.S. BERTHA

Tropical Storm Bertha is weakening as it nears the Louisiana coast, bringing minor rain and wind to New Orleans.

The system will continue to dissipate as it tracks west toward Texas, causing minimal impact to the coastal plains on Thursday before disappearing by Friday morning. Bertha poses no significant threats to travel and will be gone by the weekend. If you have beach plans, keep them.

NUECES & FRIO RIVERS

It is taking a long time for the nearly 500 billion gallons of water that fell last week to drain into Choke Canyon and Lake Corpus Christi along the Nueces and Frio Rivers. Areas of Cotulla and Tilden along the rivers are still flooded. Cotulla, specifically, can expect the Nueces to remain at major flood stage through the weekend.

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.

She was scared, sure. But more than that, she was brought to tears.

“I thought I’d be a bit more petrified, but I was enamored. I was in awe. It was witnessing nature,” she says. “You can’t put it into words the emotions and the feelings that you experience.”

Viewers can watch Rei Ami's experience with sharks while off the Korean Peninsula when Discovery Channel’s “Shark Week” kicks off Sunday.

Twenty new, hourlong shows leap deep into the world of the ancient predators, from a record-setting dive attempt into shark-infested waters to trying to find out what triggers giant bull sharks to confront humans.

“Growing up, I always watched ‘Shark Week,’” says Rei Ami. “You see those epic commercials, with the great white jumping out and eating the chum and the tuna. That’s ingrained in my brain forever.”

Actor-comedian Ken Jeong joins her to start the week off with the show “K-Pop Shark Heroes” on Sunday. But while she went on two cage dives and two free dives with hammerheads and reef sharks and bull sharks, he preferred to stay out of the water.

“I’m more of the Christopher Nolan of the shark ‘Odyssey’ — just overseeing it,” Jeong jokes. “Just overlooking everything. High and dry. That’s when I do my best work.”

It’s a shark-a-thon

The seven nights of new shows ends Aug. 1 with a look at how great whites are moving further up the East Coast and an examination of how thresher sharks use their tails to stun and kill prey.

One highlight is watching high diver Molly Carlson leap 50 feet (15 meters) from a helicopter into a Plexiglas cage in the ocean surrounded by circling reef sharks. She's OK with jumping from enormous heights, but sharks terrify her.

“There was zero chances of me ever swimming with sharks. This was just not on my radar,” she says. “That’s always been my thing, and so for me to be invited to be on ‘Shark Week,’ I was like 'Why me?'”

Viewers will see Carlson, who has been frank about her struggles with anxiety, overcome her lifelong fear of sharks. Carlson hopes she can motivate others.

“If I can inspire that next 16-year-old girl who wants to just hide in her room and never come out because she’s scared of so many things, then I’m absolutely going to find a way to do this,” she says. “You’re allowed to be scared and do it anyways. And so I think that was the big purpose behind this project for me.”

This year’s highlights also include an attempt to locate a rumored 15-foot (4-meter) mako off the coast of Southern California, which would make it the largest ever documented.

Marine biologist Kendyl Berna, a “Shark Week” veteran who co-founded the ecology group Beyond the Reef, says her team of scientists were betting on the fact that a marine heat wave has made mako prey in those waters abundant, allowing the sharks to get bigger.

“Sharks are the cockroaches of the sea because they’ve been around for 450 million years. They’re older than dinosaurs, they’re older than trees. Sharks have just been around, but the form that they’re taking constantly changes,” she says.

‘Shark Week’ is fun but also educational

“Shark Week” has become a key part of the summer holiday TV schedule, a place where humans safe on land can see ancient apex predators unnervingly glide into view and snap open their jaws, fueling nightmares.

As always, there is a deep respect for the creatures and strong science beneath the amusing titles, sharky puns, dramatic music and racy titles like “Chum Island: Catching a Killer” and “Sharkzilla Takes New York.”

“While ‘Shark Week’ is very entertaining and thrilling, it is at the core very educational. And I think there’s still so much misinformation regarding sharks and how they behave,” says Rei Ami.

“Through these episodes, people can understand, there’s really no reason to fear them, you know? And I hope that message gets received.”

Discovery’s “Shark Week” has a rival — National Geographic’s “SharkFest,” which also has hours of sharky content. And there's Amazon Studios’ new movie “The Devil’s Mouth,” which has bull sharks terrorizing college students in a flooded cave system.

“Shark Week” also has practical advice about what to do when you find yourself face-to-snout with a shark, a rising concern from Korea to Brooklyn as interactions increase. The advice is clear: Stop splashing.

“It’s even more imperative that humans know how to act and react in a situation when they are in the waters and they see a shark,” says Rei Ami. “It would really, I think, help the public to understand how these apex predators work and behave.”

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This story has been updated to delete an incorrect reference to a K-pop song in the show being sung by Rei Amy.

Ramírez was activated from the injury list on Wednesday after the seven-time All-Star third baseman missed five weeks following left hand surgery. Cleveland stayed near the top of the AL Central while he was out, a testament to the young club's depth and resolve.

It wasn't easy.

“The last five weeks could have been a lot different, and it wasn’t,” manager Stephen Vogt said. "We kept our heads above water. You can use all the cliches you want, but we did not let the last five weeks determine the rest of our season.

“We had some low points. We had some high points, some in between. But really proud of what this group did over the last five weeks and we’ve got a lot of work left.”

Ramírez had been sidelined since getting hurt against Detroit on June 13 and having an operation to remove the hamate bone in his left hand.

The Guardians stayed afloat without Ramírez, going 15-15 and keeping pace with the division leaders.

In his first game back, Ramírez went 2 for 5 with an RBI and scored, but the Guardians were beaten 10-6 by the Twins. Not surprisingly, he made an immediate impact.

After receiving a warm ovation from Guardians fans, Ramírez singled in his first at-bat, hustled into second on a flyout and scored Cleveland's first run on a bloop single.

“Shows you what we missed,” Vogt said. “Gets a base hit, tags up right in the left fielder’s face, produces a run. I mean, just his presence. We felt like a lift up for the whole group today. Just so good to have him back.”

Twins manager Derek Shelton was equally impressed.

“He totally changes the dynamic of the lineup,” Shelton said. “You're talking about a guy they're going to build a statue next to (Larry) Doby and (Bob) Feller for. I was hoping it would be at the end of our series. You've got to give him credit. It's five weeks from a hamate with no rehab and he's back in major league games. That shows you what kind of player he is.”

Ramírez did not go on a minor league rehab assignment before being activated. The Guardians trusted him throughout his recovery. He had a similar injury to his right hand in 2019, the only other time he’s been on the injured list.

“Hosey's about winning,” Vogt said. “He’s not going to come back if he doesn’t believe that he can help us win. So it’s full trust in him, full trust in the medical staff. Everybody is on board with him being back in there today.”

Vogt said he would hold Ramírez back a little at the start.

“There’s going to be some limitations for him at first, but we’re going to be thoughtful about how much he plays, when he plays, things of that nature,” Vogt said. “But he’s done a great job of getting his body ready, which is most important and the wrist is feeling good.”

To make room for Ramírez, the Guardians optioned outfielder Kahlil Watson to Triple-A Columbus.

The 33-year-old Ramírez, who has numerous offensive club records, was batting .239 with 10 home runs and 33 RBIs in 72 games before getting hurt. The Guardians aren't the same without him in the lineup, and his mere presence should help a team that has struggled to score.

Watson played well in his stint with Guardians, batting .239 with one homer and 11 RBIs in 27 games. On Tuesday night, he made a game-ending leaping catch down the right-field line while crashing into the padded wall.

Vogt said Watson's contributions made his demotion a difficult decision.

“Khalil handled it like a true pro,” Vogt said. "He understood clearly. Not happy. No one wants to leave, but just the messaging was you came here when we needed you and you helped us. We saw an unbelievably talented player with Khalil Watson.

“He’s going to help us win a ton of games for a long time. It’s just not his time right now.”

Along with Ramírez, the Guardians could soon have outfielder Angel Martínez back as well. He's been out since June 13 with a non-displaced fracture when he fouled a pitch off his left foot. Martínez is on a rehab assignment at Double-A Akron and appears on the brink of being activated.

He went 1 for 4 with a walk Wednesday night.

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

Deputies responded to the shooting just after 9:15 p.m. Tuesday in the 12600 block of Emmett Grove, near Stillwater Parkway.

A caller told the dispatcher they heard multiple gunshots and saw several vehicles flee from the area at a high rate of speed, the Bexar County Sheriff’s Office said.

Upon arrival, deputies found multiple homes and vehicles were struck by the gunfire. Though no injured people or “active threats” were found at the scene, the sheriff’s office said several shell casings were recovered.

Less than 10 minutes later, BCSO said a dispatcher told deputies that a male with a gunshot wound to his lower body arrived at a nearby urgent care. He was later referred to a local hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.

BCSO said the male was uncooperative about his involvement. He does not face any criminal charges at this time.

Deputies determined an exchange of gunfire happened between two, possibly three, vehicles traveling through the area, the sheriff’s office said.

Around 10 p.m., BCSO said deputies were dispatched to the 12300 block of Wagon Boss for reports of a damaged vehicle, less than a mile away from where the first caller reported the shooting.

The sheriff’s office said the vehicle “had damage consistent with being at the location of the shooting.”

Deputies contacted and detained the last occupants of the vehicle at a nearby residence, identified as a 17-year-old boy and Aniya Brenae West, 18.

West was arrested on a charge of tampering with or fabricating physical evidence with intent to impair, BCSO said.

It was not immediately clear whether the 17-year-old was arrested or released. On Wednesday, a BCSO spokesperson said additional information could not be provided because of his age.

BCSO said it’s still in the process of determining whether any other people were involved.

Deputies are working to obtain additional evidence. Anyone with relevant information on the shooting is asked to contact the sheriff’s office at 210-335-6000.

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• Man arrested at I-35 construction site, accused of impersonating a police officer

The call Tuesday night came at the union's request.

Players have been sharing threats and harassment they’ve received on social media over the last few weeks. Chelsea Gray of the Las Vegas Aces posted a message from a man that included a racial slur. The man was tracked down and fired from his job at Hilton Grand Vacations.

“The conversation underscored the importance of addressing issues early through proactive communication and strengthening the league-union relationship,” the league and union said in a joint statement Wednesday. “The league committed to continuing to enhance security resources and will work with the players’ union to explore collaborations with organizations that share the values of our league and advance our shared priorities.”

Dealing with abuse toward players has been a priority of the league the last few years, including the “No Space for Hate” platform that was introduced last season. Part of that program included the use of AI technology that players can use to filter out hateful comments.

When harassment escalates, the league's security office launches an investigation.

Additional steps that were discussed in the meeting included pursuing accountability from tech companies and having more streamlined conversations between the WNBA and law enforcement.

“The biggest thing was communication,” WNBPA secretary Elizabeth Williams told reporters at shootaround Wednesday before her Chicago team played New York. “Communication from Cathy and the league side being a little more consistent, so we feel more comfortable.”

Alyssa Thomas received death threats and social media vitriol after she hit Caitlin Clark in the throat a few weeks ago. No foul was called on the play, but the league upgraded it to a Flagrant-2 foul and suspended her for a game. Thomas said at the time she hadn't heard from the league about the threats she had received.

Natasha Cloud, who previously said Engelbert hasn't done enough to help the players, backed off a bit on Tuesday.

“There’s only so much that the league can do because people are going to be miserable and they’re going to be continue to be hateful human beings,” the Sky guard said Tuesday after practice. “We can find these IP addresses. We can make sure that bans are banned for life from certain arenas, certain teams, certain leagues.”

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

The public can tour the majestic room and view its gilded ceilings and Greek frescoes en route to the nearby Mona Lisa, but they won’t see any crown jewels or empty display cases. The collections and precious jewels once displayed there have been removed, as the museum said the gallery is returning to its 17th-century original ceremonial purpose.

The stolen jewels remain unrecovered nine months later.

The gallery's former exhibits will be relocated elsewhere in the museum, said Christophe Leribault, the Louvre's director. “It’s also an opportunity to rediscover the splendid architecture and decor of this gallery,” he said.

Leribault was named to lead the Louvre in February after previous director Laurence des Cars resigned after the October crown jewels heist and a string of failures that battered confidence in the leadership of the world’s most-visited museum.

“That sinister day, when iconic pieces were taken, cannot be forgotten, and indeed, I believe, should not be,” said French Culture Minister Catherine Pegard. “It was a trauma for the entire world, which, for several days, expressed its shock and sadness in every language. It was a trauma for us, discovering the fragility of a place we thought unshakeable, and which, like so many others, proved vulnerable.”

Security at the Paris museum has been boosted with the addition of new surveillance cameras and anti-intrusion systems.

On the day of the heist, thieves took less than eight minutes to force their way through a window into the Apollo Gallery and steal crown jewels valued at 88 million euros ($102 million), in a weekend operation that stunned visitors and exposed glaring security vulnerabilities.

Security improvement is a priority of the decade-long “Louvre New Renaissance” plan launched last year, with an estimated cost of up to 800 million euros ($933 million) to modernize infrastructure, ease crowding and give the Mona Lisa a dedicated gallery by 2031.

The fire in rural Guadalajara comes less than two weeks after a deadly blaze devastated a small expat community in southern Spain. That small but extremely virulent fire killed 13 people, including several foreigners, in one of the southern European country's deadliest wildfires.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez on Wednesday visited the fire-ravaged area in Guadalajara, and called for a pact between political parties to fight climate change.

“Year after year we clearly see how climate change kills and destroys wealth in our communities,” Sánchez said in the village of Tamajón, located less than two hours by car northeast of Madrid. “This isn’t politics. It is science, it’s about facts.”

Some 34 villages have been evacuated in the area but there are no reported serious injuries or deaths. Over 200 firefighters were supported by land vehicles and aircraft on Wednesday.

Spain this year has already suffered 22 major forest fires, defined as a fire that burns over 500 hectares (1,235 acres.)

The Socialist leader said over 100,000 hectares (247,000 acres) had already been scorched through the first half of the year, matching the total yearly average for Spain over the last decade.

Spain’s Minister for Ecological Transition, Sara Aagesen, described the Guadalajara fire as “one of the largest in the recent history of our country” and the largest ever for the region of Castilla La Mancha.

The Guadalajara blaze is the second-largest on record in Spain’s history after some 37,000 hectares (91,000 acres) were burned last year in the northwest of the country, according to data from the ecological transition ministry, as cited by EFE news agency.

Regional authorities said firefighters supported by water-dumping aircraft had so far protected homes in all 40 villages in the burned area, 90% of which belongs to a national park. Firefighters hope to have the nearly week-old fire under control by Friday, said Emiliano García-Page, regional president of Castilla La Mancha.

Miguel Ángel Moreno, mayor of the village of Zarzuela de Jadraque, said its 100 residents were evacuated Friday, with 14 taking refuge at a Red Cross shelter.

Moreno said that the firefighters should receive as much admiration as the soccer players who won the World Cup on Sunday.

The firefighters “had to run from one side of the village to the other putting out fires,” Moreno told Spanish national television TVE. “Besides the heroes who won the World Cup, we have other heroes who remain nameless.”

New heat wave could complicate firefighting efforts

Spain’s weather agency said a heat wave that began Tuesday was expected to reach its peak between Wednesday and Thursday, with temperatures pushing 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) in several inland areas and crossing 42 Celsius (108 Fahrenheit) in parts of Andalusia, in southern Spain.

Guadalajara and large areas of Spain were under alert for high temperatures.

Like many other European countries, Spain is experiencing extreme heat, which is combining with wind and limited rainfall to create ideal conditions for small wildfires to grow unchecked.

Europe is the world’s fastest-warming continent, with temperatures increasing twice as quickly as the global average since the 1980s, according to the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service.

Globally, 2025 was the third-hottest year on record, bringing severe heat waves across Europe. Scientists warn that climate change is exacerbating the frequency and intensity of heat and dryness especially in southeastern Europe, making the region more vulnerable to health impacts and wildfires.

Europe facing hot, dry weather

In Sicily, firefighters said they had carried out more than 1,000 operations since Saturday and have put all the Italian island’s fire departments on double shifts to cope with the blazes.

The latest was a wildland-urban blaze in Agrigento, in central western Sicily that required the evacuation of 100 people from homes and a clinic, with 22 patients transferred to other facilities, the national service said. Firefighters were particularly concerned about an oxygen storage plant nearby.

For days, Italy’s Civil Protection agency has declared all of Sicily at the highest risk for wildfires. Winds and temperatures near or above 40C (100F) have fueled blazes from near Palermo on the northern coast to Catania in the east and now Agrigento in the west.

Greece was sweltering under what was forecast to be the last of a four-day heat wave. Temperatures were predicted to top 42 C (107 F), while several regions in southern and central Greece, including the wider Athens area, were on the highest alert level for wildfire danger.

Cyprus, meanwhile, issued a warning for high temperatures expected to reach 43 C (109 F).

In Britain, it hasn’t rained in more than a month in some areas, and much of the southern half of England is in a state of “prolonged dry weather,” one step before a drought. Thames Water, the country’s biggest water company, has banned its 10 million customers from using hoses to water lawns or wash cars starting Thursday.

France's public health agency on Wednesday said the country recorded at least 5,700 more deaths than usual during a historic heatwave last month, sharply increasing its estimates of the feared toll from record-shattering temperatures.

Public Health France said regions hit by the heat between June 17 and July 2 recorded 21,674 deaths from all causes. But without a heatwave, those same regions would have been expected to have seen far fewer deaths, or 15,910, based on statistical modeling using data from previous years, it said.

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Nicole Winfield in Rome, Elena Becatoros in Athens, Greece, Menelaos Hadjicostis in Nicosia, Cyprus, Jill Lawless in London and John Leicester in Paris contributed to this report.

The New Braunfels Transit Connect study recommends five potential regional bus routes connecting New Braunfels with San Antonio, San Marcos and Seguin as the population continues to grow and congestion along I-35 increases.

For commuters like Shannon Melton, the daily drive from New Braunfels to San Antonio can vary dramatically, anywhere from 50 minutes to two hours.

Despite the long commute, Melton said she would not trade her car for a bus.

“Me as a commuter, no, I would not. I could not trust the timeline,” she said. ”I think it would make me more late, more than anything else.”

Another commuter, Ava Miller, also said she wouldn’t be interested in using a commuter bus.

“I personally wouldn’t take a bus as a younger woman; sometimes buses are scary for younger people,” Miller said.

Regional planners said the study is intended to identify future transportation options as communities along the I-35 corridor continue to grow. The recommendations are still in the planning stages, and no funding has been approved or timeline established for implementation.

In a statement to KSAT, VIA Metropolitan Transit said regional connections will become increasingly important as Central Texas continues to grow. The statement can be read below:

“As the public transit provider for the greater San Antonio region, VIA is at the forefront of connecting people to what matters most — jobs, healthcare, education and each other. Our region is growing rapidly, and that growth doesn’t stop at the county line.

“Strengthening our connections with neighboring communities like New Braunfels isn’t just an opportunity, it’s essential to our shared economic future. As a partner with the AAMPO, VIA was proud to lend our technical expertise to this study and help envision what a more connected region can look like.

“This study is an important first step — but turning a plan into reality will take sustained conversation, real coordination and dedicated funding. VIA is ready to lead those conversations, and we look forward to being an active partner in building the connected, thriving region our community deserves.”

VIA Metropolitan Transit

While regional leaders continue discussing the proposal, some commuters say they would rather see improvements made to the existing highway.

“I think HOV lanes would help a lot for commuters; getting the construction finished would be the biggest thing,” a commuter said.

The proposed commuter bus routes remain conceptual, and additional planning, coordination and funding would be required before any service could begin.

Read also:

• San Antonio launches $2.3B push to finance airport expansion

On Goat Creek Road, close to Junction Road, Taqueria Jalisco saw water rise nearly to the roof. The owner told KSAT he hopes to keep paying his employees what he can but ultimately wants to reopen the business and keep its dozens of workers paid.

On Wednesday, volunteers and restaurant employees worked in the heat to clear out mud and clean patio furniture.

“This is one of my family’s favorite restaurants in town. It’s probably where we come the most,” volunteer Wyatt Wentreck said. “We love it here, so when we heard that it got hit so bad, I just wanted to come out and help how I could.”

John Martinez, an air-conditioning repairman, is working to replace the HVAC unit at the restaurant. He normally has breakfast at the restaurant every day with his father, and said this flood was different from last year’s.

“Last year, it came through the Guadalupe River, because the river came up so much from the north, but this time it came through the creeks,” he said.

Martinez said the community needs volunteers, donations and some companies with heavy machinery to clean up debris. He said it’s surreal that the area is facing this disaster again.

“A lot people are like, ‘I can’t believe I’m back here again, you know, volunteering, helping,’ but that’s what we’re here for,” he said. “I mean, we got to do whatever it takes to get this town back.”

Juan Gonzalez has lived in Kerr County for decades and was out helping clean up. He said his daughter and son-in-law own the restaurant, and he had never seen Goat Creek rise so high.

“I don’t have the words,” he said.

One organization, Kerr Together, is helping the community for the second year in a row. A spokesperson told KSAT people interested in making material donations can contact inkind@gem.org. Business donations can go through the Kerrville Area Chamber of Commerce Foundation.

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• Hill Country floods add new setbacks for Kendall County Women’s Shelter
• Officials urge Texans to file flood claims, document damage after recent flooding

The National Hurricane Center said Bertha made landfall in the afternoon in St. Bernard Parish, about 40 miles (65 kilometers) east of New Orleans. At landfall, Bertha's maximum sustained winds were around 45 mph (72 kph), and were expected to remain at that intensity until the storm reaches the upper Texas coast on Thursday.

The wind and storm surge were the main threats for the Deep South states. Parks and piers were closed up and down the coast, as were some low-lying roads. A tropical storm warning stretched from Alabama to Louisiana, including New Orleans where extreme heat was adding to misery.

By Thursday evening, the storm's center was located about 40 miles (70 kilometers) southwest of New Orleans.

Onlookers watched the storm surge at the Lake Pontchartrain estuary, with kids splashing in the floodwaters as Bertha approached the Louisiana Coast. Residents mowed their lawns even as streets filled up with water.

Tropical storm force winds were felt as much as 160 miles (260 kilometers) from the center of the storm, the National Hurricane Center said. A wind gust of 44 mph (71 kph) was recorded at New Orleans Lakefront Airport on Wednesday afternoon.

The strong gales knocked over a Waffle House sign onto a car in Panama City Beach, Florida.

But the heaviest rains were staying offshore, reducing the risks of flooding, the center said.

The storm is unlikely to leave behind widespread damage, Louisiana State Climatologist Jay Grymes said. The impact should be manageable for coastal communities, he said.

Gov. Jeff Landry called the forecast “encouraging” but also warned residents to be prepared for some flooding.

Storm surges up to 3 feet (1 meter) were possible in Louisiana and Alabama, forecasters said. Rain totals were forecast between 1 and 4 inches (3 to 10 centimeters), with higher amounts possible in isolated areas.

Bertha is expected to dissipate inland in Texas by Friday, the hurricane center said.

Elsewhere in the U.S., a line of storms on Tuesday generated reports of tornadoes stretching from Cincinnati to New Jersey. Torrential rains caused flash floods that swamped homes, washed out bridges and led to water rescues in West Virginia, authorities said.

Rare combination of tropical storm and heat warnings

Southern Louisiana was under tropical storm and extreme heat warnings for much of Wednesday — a rare double dose of suffering, the National Weather Service said.

It was the first time in at least two decades that’s happened in the area, the weather service said, citing records that date back to 2005.

Bertha is the second tropical storm of the Atlantic season

Bertha is the second tropical storm of the Atlantic hurricane season. Tropical Storm Arthur in June brought heavy rainfall to the southeastern U.S.

Bertha could dump heavy rain on coastal areas of Mississippi that are still recovering from flooding brought by Arthur that destroyed and damaged homes.

Hurricane Fausto in the Pacific is far from land

In the eastern Pacific Ocean, Hurricane Fausto churned far from land Wednesday. The hurricane was hundreds of miles west-southwest of the southern tip of Baja California with maximum sustained winds of 80 mph (130 kph).

It was forecast to gradually strengthen and the hurricane center said that ocean swells generated by Fausto were spreading along the Baja California coast and likely to cause life-threatening surf and rip tides.

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Associated Press journalists Julie Walker in New York, Kim Chandler in Montgomery, Alabama, and Jaimie Ding in Los Angeles contributed to this report.

Police reports obtained by KSAT 12 News show the crimes in the Estates at Champions Run subdivision date back to at least February 2026.

The reports detailed nine different break-ins and attempted break-ins there. Most appeared to have happened while the homeowners were out of town or away from home.

“Jewelry, cash, guns. That’s, to my knowledge, what they’re taking,” said one homeowner, who wanted to remain anonymous. “A lot of property damage. A lot of vandalism. Broken stuff. A lot of valuables stolen.”

He said in at least one case, the thief was able to saw their way into a safe.

The homeowner shared video showing a masked man attempting to get into his home earlier this month by breaking his window with a rock.

The thief ran off, though, when he triggered a burglar alarm.

Other video shows there may be two suspects involved. Either way, it is unsettling to many in the neighborhood.

“We have locks on our bedroom door, and we know what’s going to happen if someone were to come to our bedroom,” the unidentified homeowner’s wife said, referring to them arming themselves. “People have hired armed private security to sit in front of their house to protect them because our neighborhood is under attack.”

The husband and wife said until recently, it seemed most people in the neighborhood were in the dark about the crime spree.

They have since made it their mission to shed light on the situation by putting up wanted posters and arranging protests outside their gates.

“Now that we’ve gotten involved and we’re being proactive, things are happening,” the man said.

San Antonio Crime Stoppers recently issued an appeal, offering a reward of up to $5,000 for information about the suspect, who was caught on the couple’s camera.

Neighbors have also pooled their own money together, offering an additional $25,000 reward.

In the meantime, though, the couple said they feel both their neighborhood security company and San Antonio police have failed to do enough to help them.

A KSAT 12 News crew driving an unmarked car Wednesday morning was able to gain entry into the subdivision easily. Without any words spoken, a guard on duty opened the gate as the car approached.

In response to the criticism of police, the San Antonio Police Department emailed a statement saying:

“Property Crimes Detectives are actively working with the victims and the community to positively identify the suspect. Investigators take every burglary incident seriously and thoroughly investigate every case to bring justice and security to the victims and their families.”

KSAT 12 News also sent an email to the office of District 9 Councilwoman Misty Spears, whose district serves that neighborhood.

A spokesperson called on the phone, saying Spears was aware of the problem and the issue was discussed at a Public Safety Committee meeting.

She promised a written statement offering more details on what the councilwoman planned to do in response to the crime spree.

On Wednesday evening, Spears sent the following statement to KSAT 12 News:

“Crime stats only tell part of the story. We’re looking at what’s actually happening on the ground to build a real public safety strategy that protects residents.

“And let’s be clear: a gated entrance and a private security patrol do not replace the San Antonio Police Department. Private security can observe. SAPD can enforce the law and make arrests. My office will continue working with SAPD to protect the community.”

District 9 Councilwoman Misty Spears

Anyone with information about the burglaries is asked to call Crime Stoppers at 210-224-STOP (7867).

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In a Monday afternoon update, the San Antonio Police Department identified the bicyclist as Andrew Davila Jr., 52.

Davila died from gunshot wounds, according to the medical examiner’s office. His death was ruled a homicide.

The shooting happened just before 2:30 a.m. Thursday in the 800 block of Hammond Avenue, near South New Braunfels Avenue and Rigsby Avenue.

According to SAPD Acting Chief Jesse Salame, a probationary officer and a field training officer noticed a “suspicious” man, later identified as Davila, on a bicycle and attempted to stop him. However, Salame said Davila fled.

The officers chased Davila and notified additional officers in the area, who responded to assist with the investigation.

Davila was eventually found in front of a home on Hammond Avenue. As the officers “contacted” him, SAPD said Davila pulled out a handgun and pointed it in the direction of the officers.

Four of the five responding officers fired shots at Davila, Salame said. Despite officers’ attempts to save his life, Davila was pronounced dead at the scene.

The department identified the following four officers, who police said fired their weapons at Davila:

• Thomas Smith, 20 years of service
• Reed Butler, more than eight years of service
• Felix Rodriguez, two years of service
• Kenneth Hernandez, less than two years of service

All four officers have been placed on administrative duty until further notice, according to police.

SAPD said its shooting team and internal affairs unit will conduct separate investigations. Upon completion, the Bexar County District Attorney’s Office will review the findings of both reports.

Police said its investigation is ongoing.

More coverage of this story on KSAT:

• SAPD officers shoot, kill ‘suspicious’ armed man on East Side, police say

The closed-door briefing for committee members comes in the wake of two shootings in which ICE officers shot and killed two immigrants that they were trying to arrest, raising concerns over the agency's tactics at a time that it is ratcheting up its arrests.

The shootings in Maine and Houston over the span of a week have led to fierce criticism that there's not enough oversight of the agency key to President Donald Trump's mass deportation agenda. At least 10 people have died in encounters with immigration agents since Trump launched the crackdown after retaking office, and in the Maine shooting, family members of the ICE officer who opened fire say he had a history of violent behavior and never should have been given a badge and gun.

Rep. Seth Magaziner, a Democrat from Rhode Island, said they were told during the briefing that there have been 56 complaints of excessive force against ICE officers; 32 were cleared, and one was referred for disciplinary action. Magaziner said they were told no discipline had yet been handed out. The rest of the incidents are still under investigation, he said.

“It just defies belief that an agency of 20,000-plus officers with all of the chaos that we’ve seen over the last year and a half through the surges and civilians being injured and killed, that no one would be found to have violated use of force with the exception of possibly one person,” Magaziner said.

Homeland Security said in a statement Wednesday that ICE officers who violate the agency's policies are held accountable, their officers are trained in de-escalation tactics and take an annual refresher course on use of force policies. The agency also defended its officers, saying they are operating in an environment where they are constantly being attacked.

“When faced with dangerous circumstances, DHS law enforcement professionals have used their training to protect themselves, their fellow officers, and the public,” the agency said.

The use-of -force numbers mark an increase since February, when then-acting director Todd Lyons said during Senate testimony that ICE had opened 37 investigations for excessive force; 18 of those were closed, 19 were still pending, and one was referred for “further action,” Lyons said.

The ranking Democrat on the committee, Rep. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, said the ICE officials could not discuss the shootings in Maine or Houston, as those are both open investigations. Thompson, who said he came away with more questions than answers from the briefing, said he wanted to know who investigates use of force incidents: “Sometimes they said the FBI, sometimes they said HSI. Sometimes they said another entity.”

The officials said they were going to retrain officers who had gone through a shorter curriculum that was in place last fall, Thompson said. In June, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said the agency would be increasing the amount of training for new officers starting this month.

Thompson said he pressed for answers about how many officers had been brought back for retraining and how they're being retrained but couldn't get any clarity.

Thompson said he and the committee chair, Rep. Andrew Garbarino, R-N.Y., will follow up with ICE with a list of questions.

Garbarino said he appreciated ICE briefing the members.

“Today was an important opportunity for Members to receive timely answers on the status of body camera deployment for law enforcement in the field, training and vetting standards and requirements, and current guidance on the use of vehicle stops as part of immigration enforcement,” Garbarino said in a statement.

When it comes to vehicle stops, Magaziner said they were told that current guidance to ICE officers is to only do them when there’s no other alternative, and they’re supposed to use lights and sirens. But, Magaziner said, that guidance has only been passed along verbally to the staff as opposed to a written directive.

Both the shootings in Maine and Houston involved shootings of immigrants who were in moving vehicles, raising questions about ICE’s training and policies surrounding how it tries to apprehend people when they’re driving.

After the Maine killing, Trump administration officials told ICE officers to suspend most vehicle stops. But the next day, Trump announced on social media that he wanted ICE to keep doing them.

U.S. Central Command said the attacks were designed to “further degrade Iran’s ability to threaten civilian mariners and commercial vessels transiting regional waters,” as the Americans push to regain control over the Strait of Hormuz and restore the flow of international shipping.

President Donald Trump warned earlier Wednesday that the U.S. would destroy one bridge or power plant each time Iran shoots at a ship in the strait.

“From this point forward, any time the Islamic Republic of Iran shoots at a ship in the Strait of Hormuz, whether it be by Missile, Rocket, Drone, or any other device or weapon, the United States will bomb and destroy ONE BRIDGE OR POWER PLANT,” Trump wrote on social media.

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

Seyed Abbas Araghchi, Iran’s foreign minister, said his country would adopt an “eye for an eye” defense doctrine.

“Any aggression against Iran, including our infrastructure, will compel a powerful and decisive response,” he posted Wednesday on X.

Iranian state media reported that U.S. missiles struck locations late Wednesday near the cities of Ahvaz, Ramshir and Andimeshk in western Iran. Two people were killed in a U.S. missile strike in the town of Shalamcheh on the Iraqi boarder, Iranian state media said early Thursday.

Meanwhile, military officials in Kuwait said on social media that their air defenses were “confronting attacks by hostile drones, following the sinful Iranian aggression.”

Iran has responded to U.S. attacks by targeting energy infrastructure and desalination plants that provide drinking water in parched neighboring Gulf countries.

International law generally prohibits such attacks unless the infrastructure is being used for military purposes.

The costs of war are mounting

The closure of the strait, through which a fifth of the world’s traded oil and gas passed during peacetime, has jolted the world economy with effects far beyond the Middle East. A new threat by Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen to target Saudi shipping in the Red Sea puts another trade chokepoint at risk.

Trump traveled to Dover Air Force Base on Wednesday for the arrival of the remains of four U.S. service members. A day earlier Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth estimated in a fiery Senate hearing that the U.S. had spent $37.5 billion on the war so far.

Benchmark Brent crude oil rose to more than $93 a barrel in trading. That's up from less than $72 early this month, which is roughly where it was before the war. Gasoline prices are also climbing.

Iran says it has the right to manage traffic and potentially charge fees in the strait, which was open to all and toll-free before the war. It has attacked ships using a route through the strait that is overseen by U.S. forces and intended to be outside Tehran's control.

Iran's parliament speaker, Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, who has led negotiations with the U.S., appeared to brush off Trump's threats.

“We have repeatedly said that the situation of the strait will not return to prewar conditions," he wrote on social media..

Diplomatic efforts show no signs of progress

Before the latest strikes, Iranian Interior Minister Eskandar Momeni visited Pakistan, a key mediator in the conflict, seeking to revive diplomacy. But it was unclear what new arrangement might be reached to end the war, which lately has become a battle for control over the Strait of Hormuz.

Iran's Interior Ministry spokesman Ali Zeinivand said “diplomacy isn’t called off” and that messages were still being exchanged, without elaborating, according to IRNA.

An Arab diplomat said Gulf states are increasingly pessimistic about finding an off-ramp for escalating hostilities and are particularly concerned about the latest round of threats.

The diplomat said countries in the region, in addition to Pakistan and Turkey, are continuing to push for de-escalation. But, he said the chances for any improvement currently appear bleak. The diplomat spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the situation.

At a regional summit in the Philippines, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio denounced Iran’s actions in the strait.

“If we create a precedent in the Middle East where a nation state can decide that they are going to control an international waterway, charge a toll and if you don’t pay them, blow up your ships, we have created a very dangerous precedent which will repeat itself in other parts of the world, including in this region,” he said.

Rubio said the U.S. remains open to negotiations with Iran, “but right now they don’t seem to be serious about that” so instead the focus is on protecting shipping.

In response to Iran’s attacks, the U.S. re-imposed a blockade on Iranian ports.

Trump signals US may attack underground nuclear site

Speaking from the Oval Office on Tuesday, Trump gave a dim view on possible talks, saying the U.S. had “no interest in meeting.”

He signaled that U.S. forces could soon target an under-construction Iranian nuclear site buried deep under a mountain.

The site, known as Pickaxe Mountain, lies on the south side of Iran’s Natanz nuclear enrichment site, which was bombed by the U.S. during the 12-day war between Iran and Israel in 2025. But Pickaxe Mountain has remained untouched as Iran continues to dig at the site.

Iran has always insisted its nuclear program is peaceful, while resuming the enrichment of uranium to near weapons-grade levels since Trump scrapped a 2015 nuclear deal during his first term.

___

Binkley and Toropin reported from Washington. Contributing were Associated Press writers Bassem Mroue in Beirut; Michelle L. Price and Jim Gomez in Manila, Philippines; and Christopher Weber in Los Angeles.

But the colleges are short the millions they planned to receive as a result as their successes outpaced what lawmakers budgeted, prompting limits to the state’s performance-based funding.

Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board officials adjusted the funding formula during their Wednesday meeting, trimming the incentives that trigger additional dollars when schools educate high-need students. Colleges will now see smaller bonuses for getting low-income students and adult learners to graduation.

“These changes are necessary to ensure the financial sustainability of the CCF [community college finance] program,” Andy McLaurin, the THECB assistant commissioner of funding and financial aid, told board members.

Some colleges could see massive drops in state dollars in fiscal year 2027 in part because the state needed to proportionately reduce funding for all community colleges to stay within budget.

Nearly a dozen colleges would see state funding drop by at least 15%, compared to the prior year, according to THECB estimates. The Texarkana, Navarro and McLennan community college systems would be hit the hardest, with projected drops of at least 20%.

THECB spokesperson Bobbi Kessler said the state is navigating a cap of about $1.2 billion that it can distribute to colleges until the next legislative session, during which lawmakers will consider allocating additional dollars. Kessler emphasized that community colleges are “receiving more funding than ever before” under the state formula.

State lawmakers approved a revamped funding formula for community colleges in 2023 with near unanimous support to get more students ready for the workforce.

House Bill 8 gives colleges money primarily based on how many students complete industry certificates or associate’s degrees, transfer to universities or participate in dual credit. Bonuses are given based on educating high-need students, including those who are economically and academically disadvantaged as well as nontraditional adult learners.

Community college advocates celebrated the move away from a static, enrollment-based funding and toward a dynamic one. But while the new formula opens the door for more money from the state, it also introduces uncertainty that can be difficult to plan budgets around.

Education advocates criticized reducing the incentives community colleges get for educating low-income students and adult learners, the very students who need to go to college the most.

“These high-need student groups — students from low-income families, students who maybe were not entirely prepared for college when they completed high school — are the ones who really stand to gain the most,” said Jonathan Feinstein, the Texas state director of Education Trust. “It does raise concern in terms of this being a precedent so early.”

Feinstein said the funding weights for high-need students recognized that getting them to graduation requires more resources and costs more.

Yvonne Munoz, the chief of staff for state Rep. Vincent Perez, an El Paso Democrat who is on the Texas House Higher Education Committee, said Wednesday that lowering incentives for educating high-need students work against the students and the institutions that HB 8 set out to support.

Community colleges overshot expectations on student performance before.

Texas legislators during the last biennium approved a nearly $90 million supplementary budget to get schools the dollars they were owed. THECB officials can recommend a similar request this session — but it would be considered at a time when Texas’ top officials are ordering agencies to cut overall spending by 3%.

Paris Junior College president Stephen Benson wrote an editorial this month publicly urging the state to close the gap between the money community colleges earned and the money they will receive. The East Texas junior college could see a drop in funding of $1.4 million at a time when its enrollment increased by 20%.

“Successful colleges should not be penalized for exceeding expectations,” Benson wrote. “The timing couldn’t be worse. PJC is serving record numbers of students, expanding workforce programs, strengthening partnerships with school districts and employers, and producing outstanding student outcomes.”

As colleges navigate the funding gap, Ray Martinez III, the president of the Texas Association of Community Colleges, said in a statement to The Tribune that his group was partnering with the coordinating board to ensure that funding “keeps pace with the results students and colleges have earned.”

Martinez added that community colleges outperforming funding predictions is evidence that HB 8 is a success.

“When the Legislature passed House Bill 8 in 2023, it made a generational commitment — a bold and deliberate policy decision to tie state funding to student outcomes rather than enrollment,” Martinez said. “Our colleges answered that challenge, made significant institutional investments, and delivered results that exceeded projections.”

The Texas Tribune partners with Open Campus on higher education coverage.

Disclosure: Open Campus and Texas Association of Community Colleges 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.

Gov. Patrick Morrisey sent hundreds of National Guard members to the hardest-hit areas in the northern part of the state and declared a state of emergency for all 55 counties Tuesday night. The state Division of Natural Resources has been involved in 85 rescues, he said, and 19 National Guard and state police helicopters were either out on rescue missions or standing by if needed.

Three shelters were opened Wednesday that housed a total of more than 100 residents, the governor said at a news conference.

Governor says he is concerned about any fatalities

Asked if anyone was unaccounted for, Morrisey replied: “We don’t have an exact number but we are concerned about fatalities,” adding that “as soon as we have more information” officials will provide details.

“This is a time for West Virginians to come together to do everything possible, not only to pray for all those who are affected, but we’re going to need a lot of help in the days and weeks ahead,” he said. “Let’s help these communities rebuild.”

Lars Dalseide, Morrisey’s communications director, said in an email Wednesday night that “any specific information related to the flooding will only be released after established procedures are followed and the relevant facts are verified to ensure accuracy.”

Sgt. 1st Class Ariana Shuemake, the West Virginia National Guard’s public affairs officer, referred questions on whether there were any deaths to the governor's office.

Emails seeking similar information weren’t immediately returned by West Virginia Department of Homeland Security spokesman Andy Malinoski and the heads of the Lewis and Upshur county offices of emergency management.

Forecasters said up to 7 inches (18 centimeters) of rain fell. Morrisey said some places received 4.5 inches (11.4 centimeters) in 37 minutes.

“There’s no place for the water to go,” he said.

Dozens of people are rescued from vehicles stranded in floodwater

Video and photos on social media showed submerged vehicles in parking lots, including at a Walmart in Weston where muddy water surged far into the store. Across a nearby highway, a hotel’s main floor was inundated.

Emergency crews reported dozens of rescues of people stuck in submerged vehicles. However, some rescuers were unable to get to locations where floodwaters had cut off access.

Officials in some communities were still waiting for floodwaters to recede Wednesday before figuring out where the public can drop off donated supplies. Buckhannon Mayor Robbie Skinner said one such place will be West Virginia Wesleyan College.

“This is heartbreaking,” Skinner said. “This is not something you want to see in your hometown. But we will get past it. We will get through it.”

Rains were part of series of storms stretching from Ohio to New York City suburbs

The heavy rains were part of wide-ranging storms — which also produced reports of tornadoes — stretching from the Cincinnati area across New Jersey to the New York City suburbs. Damage from a possible tornado was reported in the area of St. Marys and Belmont in West Virginia.

The ground was already saturated after storms dumped more than 2 inches (5 centimeters) of rain throughout the state on Saturday.

Although the rain had cleared out Wednesday, flood warnings remained in several counties for low-lying areas and areas near rivers and creeks. Flood watches were posted for a large swath from eastern Tennessee, Virginia and North Carolina.

Emergency service communication channels buzzed with activity late Tuesday night in West Virginia’s Lewis and Upshur counties, which have about 40,000 residents combined. First responders performed water rescues Tuesday night into Wednesday, Lewis County Commissioner Agnes Quinn Queen said.

“The devastation across our county is extensive,” she said in a social media post.

Floodwaters forced the closure of portions of Interstate 79, U.S. Route 48 and numerous secondary roads. A sinkhole caused by the storm swallowed a vehicle at a bar in Fayetteville.

Tuesday’s storms occurred a decade after 23 people died when heavy rains fell for hours over the same areas.

Data from a U.S. Geological Survey water gauge showed one creek tributary, Sand Run, rose to a record level near Buckhannon, topping the mark set during a November 1985 flood event that resulted in 47 deaths statewide.

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Associated Press writer Dave Collins in Hartford, Connecticut, contributed to this report.

The West Texas school trustees voted unanimously Tuesday to proceed with a lawsuit against Education Commissioner Mike Morath and state leaders, arguing that funding restrictions imposed by the Legislature prohibit them from raising and spending money to meet the needs of their students.

“We can sit here on this stage, and we can complain about it,” Midland ISD Board President Josh Guinn said before the vote. But nothing changes, Guinn added, “until you have four people — elected school board members — in the state of Texas say, ‘Enough’s enough. You’re going to stop stealing our community’s money.’”

Guinn said in an interview that he expected the district to file the lawsuit by 5 p.m. Wednesday but could not yet confirm whether it occurred. Texas Education Agency officials declined to comment on Midland’s decision to sue.

Frustrations over funding include a decades-old state mandate known as recapture in which districts in wealthy communities relinquish excess dollars raised locally to districts that struggle to generate property tax revenue. Recapture has survived at least three legal challenges in the last 30 years — in 1995, 2005 and 2016, respectively.

Located in a community rich in oil and gas, Midland will pay the state more than $83 million for recapture this school year, according to the lawsuit draft. That represents 27% of the district’s $313 million generated locally.

Property taxes make up the majority of public school funding, while state dollars generally fill remaining gaps along with some federal aid.

The Midland school trustees contend that recent changes to Texas’ education funding system, dating back to 2019, unfairly deprived local communities of decision-making power over how they tax residents, instead granting much of that authority to the education commissioner.

Rather than allowing local school boards to set taxes within a certain range determined by the state, districts do so at the rate decided by the commissioner or risk losing state funding, they argue. Meanwhile, state leaders imposed requirements on how districts spend money raised locally, which the Midland trustees say prevents them from addressing their particular needs. Local needs vary across Texas’ more than 1,200 districts, they note.

Texas’ recapture system, often called Robin Hood, was enacted in 1993 after underfunded schools — led by the predominantly Hispanic and low-income Edgewood district in San Antonio — sued the state over substantial disparities in resources between their children and those attending school in wealthier communities.

Back then, recapture mostly affected wealthy suburban and oil-rich districts. In 1994, 34 school districts redistributed funding through the system, according to the Texas School Coalition.

Now, hundreds of districts — including those in major urban communities with declining enrollment and high numbers of students in poverty — pay more in recapture because of their local economies’ growth. The Austin school district — one of the largest in Texas — reported paying roughly $8.3 billion through recapture between 2000 and 2025.

Midland is among the top 10 districts in Texas sending money back to the state for recapture, according to education agency data.

Rather than using recapture as a tool for educational equity, the Midland trustees argue that state leaders use it in place of funding schools properly. They say recapture does not account for the fact that more than half of the district’s students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, which the state and federal governments consider a measure of poverty.

“Property wealth is not educational wealth. You cannot teach a child with a mineral appraisal,” Midland ISD trustee Matt Friez said Tuesday. “You need a teacher standing in front of the child. The recapture formula sees the minerals beneath our feet and does not adequately see what it costs out here in Midland to hire and retain a great teacher above them.”

When the Texas Supreme Court found recapture constitutional in 2016, it noted that lawmakers still needed to make improvements to public school funding. More than two-thirds of districts had sued in that case.

School administrators have since argued that state leaders have not prioritized investments in traditional neighborhood campuses but instead pushed to grow charter schools and create a voucher program that allows families to use public funding for private or home schooling.

When lawmakers approved funding changes in recent years, they did so with more restrictions on how districts could spend the money, arguing that schools had not focused enough on improving student outcomes.

“They’re setting the tax rate. We collect the taxes. We send it to the state,” Guinn, the Midland school board president, said Wednesday. “Then we get blamed as a local district and local board member for taxes being high. It’s just a revolving door.”

It is unclear whether additional school districts will join Midland’s lawsuit.

The legal challenge from Midland, a community that reliably votes Republican, comes as top GOP state leaders such as Gov. Greg Abbott push to abolish school property taxes. Kevin O’Hanlon and Kara Belew will represent the West Texas district in the lawsuit, according to the draft filing.

O’Hanlon represented the Texas Attorney General’s Office in Edgewood v. Kirby — the landmark school finance case that led to the creation of recapture. Belew has served as statewide budget director for Abbott, as one of the Texas Education Agency’s top finance experts and as a senior policy adviser for the conservative Texas Public Policy Foundation.

Disclosure: Texas Public Policy Foundation has been a financial supporter 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.

On the second day of a preliminary hearing for D4vd, whose legal name is David Burke, Los Angeles police criminalists described collecting samples of possible blood and DNA from his garage, where prosecutors allege Burke dismembered her body, and from his Tesla, where the body was found months later.

Burke has pleaded not guilty to charges of murder, sexual abuse of a child and mutilation of a body, and his lawyers have said he did not cause Rivas Hernandez’s death.

Techs test and swab Burke's garage and car

On Tuesday, authorities had said they had evidence that Burke had purchased chain saws, an inflatable pool and a shovel that were used to kill and dismember the teen who had known him for several years and even traveled to London with him.

On Wednesday, the testimony focused on the forensic evidence authorities said they found that they say proves he killed her and got rid of the body by hiding it in a Tesla that was registered to him.

Lauren Wallace, a criminalist with the Los Angeles Police Department, testified that she found apparent blood stains on rubber mats on the floor of the garage in Burke’s Hollywood home, as well as slits — most likely from a sharp object — on the mats. Prosecutors said in a filing before the hearing that blood found in the garage matched Rivas Hernandez's DNA.

Wallace testified that she did not find blood evidence on two chain saws in the garage that purchase records showed Burke had ordered soon after the girl's death.

But she said she sprayed the floor mats with a chemical that shows possible blood stains otherwise not visible by the naked eye by making it glow blue. A photo showed the whole area cloaked in bright blue, bringing soft gasps from people in the courtroom.

And she said possible blood evidence was found on garbage bags and cleaning wipes, and a rowing machine in the garage.

Another LAPD criminalist, Chelsea Murillo, found fewer and smaller but similar stains in the Tesla.

The defense pressed the witnesses over every step of the evidence collection process, attempting to show lapses in preserving potential crime scenes. Burke's attorney, Blair Berk, asked who had been wearing gloves — or not — with access to the car, and why Murillo didn't swab for DNA on the outside of the Tesla.

“It didn’t seem necessary,” Murillo said.

Defense attorneys often use preliminary hearings to explore potential weaknesses in the prosecution's case that can be exploited at trial.

Prosecutors say Burke killed to keep his career

Prosecutors are seeking to prove Burke, an indie-pop singer whose music and online presence brought him a huge following, began a sexual relationship with Rivas Hernandez when she was 13 and he was 18.

They said in a court filing that she had grown jealous of his relationships with other women and threatened to expose him and ruin his career the night before she was killed.

The court filing said he sent a car to pick her up on the night of April 23, 2025, and stabbed her when she arrived at his Hollywood home.

Prosecutors say he kept the body for weeks or months in the front trunk of the Tesla, where it was found after the car was towed 4 1/2 months later in September.

Los Angeles police homicide detective Joshua Byers testified earlier that when he was called to the Hollywood tow yard he found a body bag with a head and torso inside, and garbage bags with arms and legs. Byers testified that records showed Burke had bought such a body bag on Amazon, along with the chain saws and other tools prosecutors say were used in the dismemberment.

Wallace testified that a third chain saw that police said Burke had ordered was not found.

Rivas Hernandez's passport found by highway

A California Highway Patrol officer testified that a road worker in January had found Rivas Hernandez’s passport in a brushy dirt area in a rural section of Santa Barbara County, about 95 miles (150 kilometers) northwest of Burke’s Hollywood home.

Prosecutors have said Burke made two trips to the area, once on the night of the killing and again about six weeks later, where data shows he was at the spot where the passport was found.

Rivas Hernandez’s parents, Jesus Rivas and Mercedes Martinez, have been in the audience both days. They are not expected to testify.

The defendant, who has been held without bail since his arrest, appeared in court in his orange jail clothes and glasses.

D4vd made millions between 2023 and 2025

Financial witnesses testified that Burke’s music had earned him at least $10 million between 2023 and 2025.

Under the name D4vd (pronounced “David”), he began writing and recording songs for YouTube videos he created of the video game Fortnite as a teen.

The music was a blend of indie rock, R&B and lo-fi pop and made him a phenomenon on TikTok, Soundcloud and Spotify, where his top songs, including his 2022 breakthrough “Romantic Homicide,” have more than a billion plays.

In 2023, he released two EPs and opened for SZA on tour. Last year, he performed at the Coachella music festival and released a full album that he was on tour promoting when the body was discovered.

Trump paid respects to four U.S. service members who were killed in the Middle East and returned to their families at an Air Force base in Delaware. It was the third dignified transfer that Trump has attended since he launched the war in Iran in February.

Earlier in the day, Trump warned Iran that the U.S. will destroy one bridge or power plant each time Iran shoots at a ship in the Strait of Hormuz. The warning came after the U.S. carried out another wave of strikes on Iran, where air defenses opened fire over the capital, Tehran.

Here's the latest:

Endangered right whales could wait almost a decade for new US protections

New protections for endangered right whales in the North Atlantic would be postponed for nearly a decade under a plan that cleared a key hurdle in Washington with the full-throated support of the fishing and lobster industries.

Environmentalists say this could spell the end for the vanishing whales, which can drown after getting tangled up in fishing gear or being struck by boats. There are only about 380 North Atlantic right whales left.

The federal government has already paused any new right whale rules until 2028, and the House Natural Resources Committee voted on July 15 to extend that moratorium to 2035. A vote by the Republican-controlled Congress could happen as soon as this summer, and is almost certain to pass.

President Donald Trump ’s administration has thrown its support behind U.S. Rep. Jared Golden, a Democrat from Maine, in his efforts to further delay new regulations aimed at protecting right whales.

Fishing industries say they already follow some of the most comprehensive conservation measures in the world and more rules might drive them out of business.

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Republicans in Congress continue to back Iran war despite the political risk

Republicans on Capitol Hill are walking a cautious election-year line on the Iran war as it future seems increasingly uncertain and polls show most Americans think the war isn’t worth fighting.

The potential political peril has only grown in recent days, particularly for Republicans facing reelection in November. But while some GOP lawmakers say they want more information from the administration on the endgame and the escalating cost, they continue to defend Trump’s decision to engage and have voted repeatedly to cede congressional powers to the White House.

It’s still unclear, though, if more Republicans — many of whom have been privately questioning the conflict — will speak out publicly as the midterm elections approach. GOP lawmakers in both chambers are expected to face the next test of their loyalty this week as Democrats force new votes on whether Trump should seek congressional approval for military action against Iran.

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US-Canada bridge has been years in the making. But tension between countries is sapping the joy

The strained relationship between the North American neighbors is spoiling the celebration of an extraordinary project: a new six-lane bridge named for a famous Canadian who played hockey for the Detroit Red Wings.

After years of planning and billions of dollars in construction, the Gordie Howe International Bridge is ready for business, rising high over the Detroit River between Michigan and Ontario.

But a ceremony planned for Friday, with dignitaries from both countries meeting in the middle, has been scratched after Trump announced 50% tariffs this week on most Canadian goods.

A spokesperson for the Canadian minister of infrastructure said joint festivities now would be “inappropriate,” though a separate event in Windsor, Ontario, is scheduled. The bridge still is expected to open to car and truck traffic on Monday, followed by pedestrian and bike crossings starting Aug. 5.

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Democrats press ICE on oversight, say 1 officer referred for discipline over use of force

One Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer has been referred for discipline over a use of force incident since the beginning of the Trump administration, Democratic members of the House Homeland Security Committee said after a briefing with ICE officials about body cameras, vehicle stops and training.

The briefing came in the wake of two recent fatal shootings of immigrants by ICE officers, raising concerns over agency tactics at a time when it is ratcheting up arrests.

The shootings have led to fierce criticism that there is not enough oversight of the agency, which is key to Trump’s mass deportation agenda. At least 10 people have died in encounters with immigration agents during the crackdown.

ICE and the Department of Homeland Security did not respond to requests for comment. Officials have promised to hold responsible officers who violate policy. But they have also defended officers as operating in a dangerous environment.

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UK withdraws embassy staff from Iran

Diplomatic staff at the British Embassy in Tehran have been temporarily withdrawn amid growing escalations between the U.S. and Iran, including recent strikes in the Iranian capital. The United Kingdom said it was due to “the security situation.”

The country made a similar move in the days leading up to the beginning of U.S. and Israeli combat operations in late February. Other Western embassies have continued to operate in Tehran.

Questions about what prompted the decision were not immediately answered by U.K. officials.

Judge questions difference between Hegseth’s testosterone policy and transgender care for troops

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s new initiative to test and treat troops for low testosterone has prompted a federal judge to question the differences between that kind of testosterone replacement therapy and hormone treatment for transgender men in the military.

U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes in Washington raised the question Wednesday in an ongoing lawsuit against President Donald Trump’s ban on transgender troops. Reyes noted that the ban says “the Armed Forces must adhere to high mental and physical health standards ... without the benefit of routine medical treatment or special provisions.”

Reyes ordered both parties in the lawsuit to address “the similarities and differences in administering TRT, both medically and logistically, for trans men compared to other service members, including cis individuals.”

She also requested information on the Pentagon’s “basis for treating trans men and other service members differently between this new policy and the Military Ban.”

Judge weighs tribe’s request to block construction of a border wall across its reservation

A federal judge is weighing what he says is an unprecedented request by a Native American tribe to block the Trump administration from taking any steps to build 62 miles of border wall across part of its reservation without its consent.

U.S. District Judge Richard Leon in Washington, D.C., did not rule from the bench Wednesday after hearing arguments from attorneys for Tohono O’odham Nation and the federal government. But he appeared to be skeptical that U.S. laws tip in favor of the tribe’s request for a preliminary injunction.

Leon, who was nominated to the bench by Republican President George W. Bush, said he could not find a previous court ruling under comparable circumstances.

The tribe’s 2.8-million-acre reservation in the Sonoran Desert in Arizona abuts the Mexico border.

Justice Department attorney Adam Gustafson said Congress gave the executive branch broad discretion to decide the best way to control the nation’s southwest border.

US carries out 12th night of strikes on Iran

The U.S. military has announced another night of strikes as both sides are increasingly targeting civilian infrastructure.

The U.S. Central Command once again said the strikes are designed to “further degrade Iran’s ability to threaten civilian mariners and commercial vessels transiting regional waters” as the U.S. pushes to regain control over the Strait of Hormuz and restore the flow of international shipping.

Trump administration says it will submit Saudi Arabia nuclear deal to Congress

Saudi Arabia could obtain uranium enrichment capability for its civilian nuclear program under a new cooperation agreement with the administration.

Energy Secretary Chris Wright and Saudi Minister of Energy Abdulaziz bin Salman signed it Wednesday along with a related agreement intended to offer nuclear safeguards.

U.S. officials said the deals lay the legal foundation for a decades-long, multibillion-dollar partnership that advances key economic and strategic objectives including nuclear nonproliferation.

The 123 agreement provides access for U.S. companies in the Saudi nuclear energy program, benefiting American industry and workers, while helping to meet Saudi energy needs, the Energy Department said.

The agreement will now be transmitted to Congress for review.

House Republicans adopt $95 billion package for the Iran war and Trump’s priorities

Lawmakers adopted the proposal, a long-shot effort to fund the Iran war and other White House priorities over objections from Democrats and a few GOP holdouts in a final push before the midterm elections.

Republicans were divided, with conservatives wary because there are no offsetting budget cuts. But Speaker Mike Johnson plunged ahead, viewing the go-it-alone process as the best chance to usher Trump’s priorities through a split Congress despite skepticism in the Senate.

The tally was 216-214, with all Democrats opposed.

“Just bullets and bombs to finish the job,” said Rep. Jodey Arrington, R-Texas, chairman of the Budget Committee.

Democrats argued that the money should be spent at home.

“Republicans plan to spend tens of billions of dollars on Trump’s failed war in Iran,” Rep. Pete Aguilar of California, chairman of the House Democratic caucus, said this week. “Think about what we could spend with these resources instead.”

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Jackson promises state match for Trump Accounts seed money

Rick Jackson, the state’s GOP nominee for governor, said Wednesday that he will push for Georgia legislators to approve a state match for the $1,000 in seed money that the federal government is giving to some holders of Trump Accounts.

Babies born from 2025 to 2028 currently receive $1,000 from the federal government in their accounts.

Jackson, a wealthy businessperson and CEO of a healthcare company, said he believes Georgia lawmakers will support that, but “if they don’t, I will personally donate it myself.”

“It changed my life when I got a $100 Christmas gift in an orphanage,” he said.

Trump accuses Georgia senator and other Democrats of being communists

“The United States of America will never be a communist country,” Trump said, drawing big applause and a chant of “USA, USA.”

“The blue states are all going bad” because communism is a loser, he said. “It’s a loser and it always has been and it always will be.”

The crowd booed enthusiastically when Trump mentioned “your terrible Sen. Jon Ossoff”

“Jon Ossoff and the Democrat communists want to let the Marxists into power, bankrupt your families and leave you totally undefended with wide-open borders,” Trump said.

Trump jokes about running for a third term, again

The president opened his Georgia rally with a joke about running for a third term.

“Well, thank you very much, everybody. It’s a special place, and I am here to announce my candidacy,” the president said at the start of his speech, pausing as the crowd cheered.

After a few seconds, he held up his hand and waved it in front of him slightly. “I’m only kidding,” Trump added.

The president is constitutionally barred from running again in 2028, but has repeatedly suggested he might somehow do so anyway. Sometimes Trump suggests he’s joking, but he’s also said he might lead a constitutional movement to rewrite the Constitution in his favor.

Trump finally gets to Trump Accounts

After a nearly half-hour riff on unrelated topics, the president began talking about the subject of Wednesday’s event in Georgia.

“It’s hot as a pistol,” Trump said of Trump Accounts.

He then gave a brief description of how the accounts work, including the $1,000 in seed money that the government awards babies born from 2025 to 2028.

After that initial investment, the value of the account “goes up, and up, and up,” Trump said.

Trump wants credit on lower inflation in June due to lower oil prices that have since climbed

The U.S. president is tweaking his pitch to voters on inflation — wanting credit for the monthly dip in the consumer price index that was caused by energy prices falling due to a ceasefire in the Iran war.

But the ceasefire has failed to endure and oil prices have since jumped, with average gasoline prices at $4.06 a gallon. That’s up 4.3% over the past week and prices at the pump have jumped nearly 29% from a year ago, according to AAA.

Speaking in Georgia, Trump claimed the monthly drop had more to do with his management of the U.S. economy. That claim carries a political risk if the rising energy prices cause inflation to rise this month.

“It was announced just last week that inflation dropped by the largest amount in more than six years,” Trump said. “Because we’re doing it right. We’re running the country properly.”

Trump says his White House ballroom is actually a ‘military facility’

He told the rally crowd in Georgia, “We’re building a tremendous military facility at the White House. It’s a ballroom, but it’s also a big military facility.”

The president said it would feature a “drone port on top and tremendous things underneath.”

Trump originally said the project, which is expected to cost at least $400 million, would be paid for by himself and wealthy donors. But Trump now says the ballroom is supposed to include White House security upgrades like the drone port.

However, $1 billion in federal funding proposed for White House security upgrades has stalled in Congress.

The president also said crews building the ballroom are working from around 6 a.m. until late in the night, sometimes 11 p.m., and working Sundays.

Trump says dignified transfers are ‘the toughest thing I do’

The president said his visit to Dover Air Force Base on Wednesday for the dignified transfer of four service members was particularly difficult.

“It’s very tough to watch, to be honest with you,” Trump said. “I think it’s the toughest thing I do.”

Trump said he invited the family of 1st Lt. Tyler Feehan to join him on Air Force One on his trip to Georgia, where the family lives.

“We will carry Tyler’s memory in our hearts forever,” Trump said, describing him as a “flawless” person.

Trump shouts out Republican candidate for Georgia governor, Rick Jackson

“Gonna be your next governor, right here,” Trump said, gesturing toward Jackson, who was right next to the stage.

Trump had endorsed Lt. Gov. Burt Jones in the Republican primary, but was quick to praise Jackson after he won a fiercely fought Republican primary.

Trump congratulated Jackson on social media the day after the primary runoff in June, saying he “very successfully campaigned on being ‘TRUMP,’ and won.”

Trump is about to give remarks in Marietta, Georgia

Leading up to Trump’s arrival, the crowd gathered in a suburban Atlanta high school gym heard from several candidates for statewide office.

They also heard from U.S. Treasurer Brandon Beach, a former Georgia state senator; U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon; Small Business Administration Administrator Kelly Loeffler, a former U.S. senator from Georgia; and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.

Friend says soldier killed in the Middle East ‘always made people feel seen’

A friend of Angel Rampersad says the 28-year-old Army sergeant genuinely cared about people and made them feel important and seen.

Deonne Jinkins and Rampersad met in 2024 in Germany, where they served together and became good friends.

On Wednesday, the 22-year-old Jinkins recalled how Rampersad jumped in and set up a weekend celebration for Jinkins’ birthday within weeks of their first meeting.

“The fact that we had barely known each other, yet she showed up for me in such a big way, spoke volumes about the kind of person she was,” Jinkins said over Facebook Messenger. “I’ll never forget what she did for me that weekend.”

Jinkins said her friend “loved deeply, cared genuinely, and always made people feel seen and important.”

Rampersad’s family said in a brief statement she was a “gentle giant” who “stood up for those who couldn’t fight for themselves.”

“She loved her family fiercely and will live on in the hearts of everyone she touched,” the statement said.

Trump pays respects to four service members killed in Middle East

The president saluted as four cases draped with American flags were escorted off an airplane during a dignified transfer at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware.

He was joined by administration officials including Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Trump was scheduled to meet privately with grieving family members.

The White House said one of the families will be joining on Air Force One later on Wednesday when Trump flies to an event in Georgia, where the family lives.

Senate committee moves nomination forward for FEMA administrator

The Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs voted 8-4 Wednesday morning to advance Trump’s pick to lead the Federal Emergency Management Agency, Cameron Hamilton.

Hamilton is a former Navy SEAL who briefly led FEMA in a temporary role last year before being fired after defending the agency’s existence. His potential return marks a shift in the Trump administration’s stance toward the disaster agency, after Trump said early in his second term that he was considering eliminating it altogether.

If approved by the Senate, Hamilton would be the first permanent FEMA administrator in Trump’s second term. The agency has seen four temporary leaders and been roiled by upheaval, including the departure of thousands of staff.

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

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

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

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

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Iran war energy shock hits Southeast Asia hard

Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong raised her country’s concern over renewed attacks by the U.S. and Iran in the Middle East, warning that “the situation could deteriorate further without much warning.”

“We want to see an end to this war. We want to see a ceasefire. We want to see negotiations and we want the strait to be opened,” Wong told reporters at the ASEAN summit. The war’s impact on global energy markets has had a direct and personal impact on people, she said.

Southeast Asia’s reliance on fossil fuel imports from the Mideast has made the region particularly vulnerable, according to the International Energy Agency. Asian markets imported about 80% of the crude oil and almost 90% of the liquefied natural gas, or LNG, transiting through the Strait of Hormuz in 2025, the IEA said.

Rubio says US willing to be ‘patient’ with pace of change in Cuba

Asked whether the Trump administration’s goal is regime change in Cuba, Rubio told reporters that the U.S. is prepared to be “very realistic” and “patient” about a process of ensuring that the Cuban people “can experience prosperity, safety, security and a better life moving forward.”

Rubio insisted the country’s socialist economic model doesn’t work and that the Cuban government is most interested in holding on to power, not making reforms.

But he said that “we’ll keep talking to them about the kind of changes they can make” because it affects U.S. national security.

“It’s a failed state. But I’ve never laid out any timeline as to what change would look like or when it would happen,” Rubio said.

A plane was carrying food and hygiene kits to Cuba on Tuesday, part of U.S. efforts to directly aid residents.

Oil prices rise another 3%

A barrel of Brent crude, the international standard, was trading at $93.83 at midday Wednesday after briefly topping $95 to touch its highest price in six weeks as the war with Iran continues.

Rising oil prices threaten to reaccelerate inflation, which could push the Federal Reserve and other central banks to raise interest rates, which would slow economies and undercut prices for stocks and other investments.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.65%, helping to bring long-term U.S. mortgage rates to their highest levels in nearly a year. The yield was 3.97% before the war.

The auto club AAA said Wednesday that the average price for a gallon of regular gas in the U.S. jumped again overnight to $4.06. It had been below $3 before the United States and Israel attacked Iran.

The soldiers whose remains are being returned to their families

The four U.S. service members were identified by the Defense Department:

1. 1st Lt. Tyler James Feehan, 25, of Ewa Beach, Hawaii

2. Pvt. Isabella Gonzales, 19, of Carrollton, Texas

3. Sgt. Angel Rampersad, 28, of Ozone Park, New York

4. Army Sgt. Michael Emmanuel Swinton, 30, of Spring Lake, North Carolina

Since the war began on Feb. 28, 18 U.S. service members have been killed.

Trump to tell families of service members fallen in the Middle East, ‘we love your child’

Trump is at Dover Air Force Base, participating in the return of the remains of four U.S. service members killed in the Middle East.

Asked for his message to their families before he departed Joint Base Andrews, Trump said, “All I’m going to say is, ‘we love you. We love your child.’”

“All you can do is throw out your heart,” he said.

The Department of Homeland Security said shortly after the July 7 shooting that Salgado Araujo had “weaponized his vehicle in an attempt to run over an ICE law enforcement officer,” and that the officer had fired in self-defense.

But two men who were riding with Salgado Araujo wrote in statements submitted in court that the officers with Immigrations and Customs Enforcement were to the sides of their van, never in front or behind it; one of them described the government’s account as “a lie.”

Homebuilder died in front of his construction crew

Salgado Araujo, who was living without legal status in the U.S. for 35 years and running a homebuilding business, died that morning in front of his construction crew, including his own brother. His family said he had no criminal record.

His killing, one of at least 10 during immigration enforcement operations since the start of President Donald Trump’s mass deportation campaign, sparked widespread protests in Houston and calls for an i ndependent and transparent investigation. The officers were not wearing body cameras, and no photos and videos of the shooting have surfaced.

The three men who were with him that morning were arrested, and are now in immigration detention facilities. They have each filed habeas corpus petitions, alleging their confinement is unconstitutional and asking the court to order their release.

Jose Trinidad Rojas Pliego and Daniel Tirado Pantoja attached their accounts of the shooting to their petitions, which was first reported by the Texas Tribune. They both wrote that they have been in the U.S. for decades and have no criminal history. Victor Salgado, the brother of the man killed, has also asked a judge to order him released. But his attorney asked the court that his petition be sealed to protect his privacy, so his account of the killing is not yet public.

Rojas Pliego wrote in Spanish that Salgado Araujo picked him up at 6:30 that morning, which was their daily routine. They then picked up the other two men.

Passengers said they were ‘startled’ by vehicle following them

Tirado Pantoja said a vehicle soon began following them, “almost crashing” into their van. He wrote that they were “startled” and ran over a curb attempted to turn around.

The ICE vehicle chased them, Rojas Pliego wrote, and Salgado Araujo eventually thought they lost the tail. Then suddenly, the agents had them cornered.

Tirado Pantoja wrote that the ICE vehicle hit them from behind, then again on the driver’s side.

DHS, which oversees ICE, has said it was the other way around: they allege Salgado Araujo rammed the ICE vehicles with his van. A federal prosecutor in Texas has said that ICE officers were targeting two Guatemalan men who were potentially subject to deportation and driving a van similar to Salgado Araujo’s. DHS said he ignored commands and attempted to run over the officer with his vehicle, and the officer fired in self-defense.

Rojas Pliego wrote that’s “a lie” and “impossible:” “there wasn’t a single officer behind or in front of us, they were only on the sides.”

Tirado Pantoja, too, wrote that the agents were never in front of the vehicle, adding that Salgado Araujo had “put vehicle in park as the agents were shooting.”

After being shot, Salgado Araujo was handcuffed and thrown to the ground

Rojas Pliego wrote that the officers pulled Salgado Araujo wounded out of the car, handcuffed him and “threw him to the ground.”

Tirado Pantoja wrote that Salgado Araujo at some point said “Ya me mataron” – “they’ve already killed me.”

Rojas Pliego wrote that the same officer who fired the shot then “dragged us out violently, throwing us to the ground while we were handcuffed and chained from head to toe.”

Aaron Reitz, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Texas, issued a statement last week promising a full investigation by his office, the FBI, DHS and state and local law enforcement.

“We are doing everything we can to seek the truth and do the right thing,” he wrote.

DHS said in a statement Wednesday that its Office of Inspector General is also investigating. It said the FBI's Houston office “is leading an investigation into the potential assault on a federal law enforcement officer.”

A judge on Monday barred the government from deporting Rojas Pliego or removing him from the district without the court’s approval. A different judge, overseeing Tirado Pantoja’s case, on Wednesday ordered the federal government to notify the court with at least five days notice if they plan to transfer him outside of the district or deport him.

Raed Gonzalez Olivieri, a lawyer representing both men, wrote in their petitions that the circumstances of their detentions “are exceptional: those who now administer his custody shot at him at close range.” The petition says that puts them at increased risk of emotional and physical pain while incarcerated.

Both men applied for visas designed to protect immigrants who are victims of crimes and assist law enforcement. Gonzalez Olivieri wrote in their petitions that they survived “aggravated assault with a deadly weapon” and are material witnesses to the killing.

___

Associated Press reporter Valerie Gonzalez contributed to this report.

Jones is asking the San Antonio City Council to consider redirecting the remaining funds from the voter-approved program as the city faces a projected $158 million budget deficit or seeks to increase borrowing capacity for the 2027 bond program.

Ready to Work was approved by San Antonio voters in 2020 and launched in 2022. Funded through a dedicated one-eighth-cent sales tax, the program provides education, job training and career placement services to residents pursuing high-demand occupations.

According to data posted on the Ready to Work website, 16,883 people have enrolled in training programs, 8,062 have completed their training, and 5,762 have been placed in approved jobs.

One graduate, Sebastian Oberg, told KSAT in April that the program helped him secure full-time employment after struggling to find work.

“I think it’s great. I went last year having no job, and now I have a full-time job — and it’s a great job at that,” Oberg said. “My parents are super proud. I’m very happy with it.”

Oberg said he now earns $58,000 annually in his first job after completing the program.

“Oh yeah, 100%,” he said when asked whether the program was worth it. “I’d probably still be jobless.”

Financial information published by Ready to Work shows the program has collected more than $235 million in sales tax revenue and has spent nearly $112 million.

In a memo to City Council, Jones said her goal is to redirect the remaining funds without disrupting services for current participants.

“My intent would be that any diversion of funds does not impact those enrolled in the Ready to Work program,” Jones wrote.

The mayor added that, under the proposal, the program would stop accepting new applicants after a date agreed upon by the council and “would begin to wind down.”

Jones said increasing property taxes remains a last resort and suggested redirecting Ready to Work funding could instead help eliminate the projected budget shortfall or expand the city’s bonding capacity for future infrastructure projects.

The proposal is still in its early stages.

Because Ready to Work was established through a citywide election, redirecting its dedicated funding would require voter approval. Before that could happen, the City Council would first need to vote to place the measure on a future ballot.

KSAT has reached out to former Mayor Ron Nirenberg, who championed the creation of the Ready to Work program, and program officials for comment — neither had responded by publication time.

Read also:

• San Antonio Ready to Work program expected to end in 2030

The new tariffs, announced by U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday, are scheduled to come into effect Aug. 19. They cover a wide range of goods, including honey, liquor, cement, dairy products, some wood products, hockey sticks, essential oils, perfumes, candles, dog leashes and wigs.

They exclude energy products, potash, fish and critical minerals, but would include goods previously protected from import taxes by the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, or USMCA. That 2020 trade pact was not renewed by the U.S., triggering a new set of negotiations that could run until 2036.

Prince Edward Island Premier Rob Lantz said the tariffs create uncertainty.

“We’re living in a time when uncertainty is the new norm,” Lantz said Wednesday following a meeting of the country’s premiers and territorial leaders in the province's capital, Charlottetown.

Randall Bartlett, deputy chief economist with Desjardins, one of Canada’s largest financial institutions, said the tariffs will impact about $28 billion Canadian ($19.8 billion) worth of annual Canadian exports to the United States. That’s about 5% of what the U.S. imports from Canada each year.

They have the potential to shave two to three tenths of a percent off growth in 2026 and 2027 in Canada, Bartlett said, although he said he didn't expect a recession.

"We’re expecting it to keep more investment on the sidelines (and) probably suppress hiring. That weighs on consumer activity and residential investment as well,” Bartlett said.

Fen Osler Hampson, a professor of international affairs at Carleton University in Ottawa, said the products hit by the tariffs are items U.S. consumers can decide not to purchase if prices rise.

Losing U.S. customers could lead to layoffs for companies that employ 10 to 200 workers that are the “backbone of the Canadian economy."

“That does have ripple effects in an economy because if people are out of a job, they’re not going to be spending," said Hampson, who is co-chair of the Expert Group on Canada-U.S. Relations.

Dennis Barby, president and CEO of Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters, said the tariffs would inflict serious damage on manufacturers, workers and consumers on both sides of the border.

“These tariffs will raise costs, disrupt production, and make North America less competitive at a time when we should be strengthening our shared industrial base,” Barby said in a release.

British Columbia Premier David Eby said it’s frustrating the U.S. is proposing tariffs on some Canadian goods while also looking to invest in Canadian mines to secure metals and minerals.

“You can’t have a country on one hand attacking one group of families and workers while hoping to have access to the resources in Canada that the rest of the world wants,” said Eby, who added that Canada should limit access to the resources the U.S. wants if its stance remains.

Experts Bartlett and Hampson said the tariffs could be a negotiation tactic, and may not come into effect. Still, Canadian trade negotiators should be cautious moving forward, they said.

Hampson warned against retaliatory tariffs or reducing oil or electricity shipment to the U.S.

“You don’t want to poke the bear,” he said. “You get into that kind of war, we’re going to lose. We’re the smaller economy. They can absorb a hit much more than we can.”

Hampson said the tariffs could reflect the tense relationship between Trump and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, which has soured since Carney criticized his counterpart at the World Economic Forum in Davos.

On Tuesday, Carney said he and Trump have agreed to intensify trade talks.

The Austin, Texas, company reported second-quarter net income of $1.11 billion, or 32 cents per share. Excluding certain items, earnings were 33 cents per share, well short of the 53 cents per share forecast by Wall Street analysts, according to FactSet.

Revenue rose 26% to $28.24 billion, beating analysts’ forecast of $26.42 billion.

While the core car business had a solid quarter, Tesla is now focused on building out the infrastructure and AI software that underpins its robotaxis and robotics businesses, which Musk has said are the future of the company. And doing so requires a lot more spending.

Research and development spending surged about 49% from a year earlier to $2.37 billion — higher than its been going back at least four quarters.

“We’re investing a lot in growing the core business and really preparing for the future,” Musk said during a conference call with Wall Street analysts, promising that the spending will yield “incredible returns.”

CFO Vaibhav Taneja told analysts that the company expects capital expenditures will increase further in the second half of this year, driving full-year spending to more than $25 billion.

Taneja also forecast that spending on capital expenditures will continue growing for the next “2 to 3 years,” as the company seeks to expand its fleet of robotaxis, add AI compute infrastructure and build more production capacity for its Optimus humanoid robot, among several other products.

Tesla shares fell 4.1% in after-hours trading shortly. The stock ended the regular trading session 1.3% lower and is down just under 17% this year.

Earlier this month, Tesla reported that it delivered 480,216 cars in the second quarter, a 25% increase from the same period last year and its second straight quarterly gain. The sales also exceeded analysts’ expectations, according to a FactSet survey.

Tesla’s improving sales this year mark a big turnaround from a year ago, when many Europeans refused to buy the company’s cars because of Musk’s embrace of far-right political candidates in elections there.

The vast majority of the company’s vehicle deliveries last quarter were comprised of its Model Y crossover SUV and Model 3 sedan. Tesla rolled out less expensive versions of both models last year in hopes of boosting sales. It also cut the cost of leasing and loans in Europe.

Sales were also helped by a surge of EV buying in general in Europe as gas and diesel prices have risen due to the Iran war.

Just a few months ago, Tesla reported sales had fallen in 2025 for a second year in a row and it had to yield its crown as the world’s largest EV maker to China’s BYD.

Tesla's EV sales accounted for most of the company’s overall revenue, but the company got a boost from its energy generation and battery storage business, which posted revenue of $3.14 billion, a 13% gain compared to the second quarter last year.

The company also benefited from increased subscriptions for its driver assistance feature, available in the U.S., called Full Self-Driving (Supervised). The number of FSD subscribers has now reached nearly 1.5 million globally.

Tesla said it has now rolled out its robotaxi service to seven major metro areas in the U.S., and that it it expects production on its Optimus humanoid robot to begin later this year.

The company has also been investing in building new battery factories and in the infrastructure needed to produce its Tesla Semi and Cybercab.

The company noted that it has begun production of the Cybercab at a factory in Texas, and that the Tesla Semi is on track for production this year at a factory in Nevada.

Tesla executives didn't offer more specifics on how many robotaxis or Cybercabs will be on the road, nor how soon.

Musk noted that the company needs more time to test the Cybercab chassis and doesn't want to rush the expansion of robotaxis, saying he prefers to take a cautious approach.

“We’re working on what we believe is the most ambitious buildout of advanced infrastructure manufacturing capacity ever in history,” he said. “Our goals are very ambitious for robotaxi, but we do need to be cautious about causing any accidents or causing any harm to anyone."

The civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who is representing the Wells family, announced the preliminary findings Wednesday in front of a standing-room-only crowd at the annual NAACP National Convention in Chicago.

The autopsy report, he said, showed no evidence of fractures or deep tissue injuries. It described a “red discoloration” in the back of Wells' skull as “inconclusive” and meriting further investigation.

Without further information, the forensic pathologist, Dr. Roger Mitchell, wrote that he could not rule out the possibility that “non-accidental factors contributed to or caused the death."

Wells had traveled to an island off the coast of Mississippi on July 4 with a group of friends, who later returned to the mainland without him. His body was discovered two days later floating off the island's coast.

In his report, the pathologist pointed to several challenges inherent to the independent autopsy, including the decomposition of the body and outstanding questions about whether Wells was conscious when he entered the water.

Because an initial autopsy was performed by the medical examiner in Mississippi, Wells’ body arrived without organs or neck structures — making it impossible to determine if he had suffered a neck injury or whether water had entered his lungs, according to the report, which notes that the practice is not unusual.

Still, the revelation, relayed by Crump, prompted gasps from the crowd of several hundred in Chicago. The attorney called on state officials to provide that evidence for the family to review as part of their own independent investigation.

The Mississippi medical examiner, which has not released the results of the state autopsy, did not return a message seeking comment.

The second autopsy was paid for by former NFL player Colin Kaepernick, whose group Know Your Rights Camp has paid for other independent autopsies.

“This is only another part of the puzzle, and even though it tells us significant information, we still have more questions than we have answers at this time,” Crump said of the results.

The still-unknown circumstances around Wells’ death have touched off rampant online speculation and prompted calls from Black leaders for transparency from local authorities. Wells, who was Black, had traveled to the island with a group of high school friends, all of whom are white.

A reward of $125,000 — jointly funded by the Rev. Al Sharpton, actor and producer Tyler Perry and former NFL player Terrell Owens — is now being offered in exchange for information leading to an arrest and conviction in connection with the death.

The autopsy announcement comes two days after Wells was laid to rest in his hometown of Ocean Springs, Mississippi.

In his eulogy, Sharpton lamented the “inconsistencies and unanswered questions” that had placed a dark cloud over the grieving family.

He questioned why Wells’ friends had left him behind, taken his phone and keys and failed to report him missing. And he suggested local investigators had spoken prematurely in statements to the news media indicating no crime was suspected.

“The reason that a lot of people across the nation are looking at this Nolan situation is because we’re looking at the history in Mississippi,” Sharpton added. “We can’t have someone in law enforcement saying there was no foul play before there was an investigation.”

Jackson County Sheriff John Ledbetter said initial interviews suggested Wells chose to stay on the island and that his friends believed he would get a ride with someone else. He has said the friends were cooperating with the investigation, which remains ongoing.

“We are trying to be respectful and collaborative as much as we can,” Crump said. “But it’s always troublesome to all of us when these investigations just take forever.”

___

An earlier version of this report had an incorrect first name for the forensic pathologist. He's Dr. Roger Mitchell, not Robert Mitchell.

>>Flooding risk continues in La Salle County as Nueces River rises over 23 feet

During a news conference, La Salle County Flood Response incident coordinator Daniel Mendez said the Nueces River is currently at 28.96 feet.

Watch the full Wednesday news conference below.

According to the KSAT Weather Authority team, the Nueces River is not expected to rise any further. The river will remain in the major flood stage through Sunday and is not anticipated to decrease until next week.

La Salle County officials, in collaboration with state and local partners, have assisted residents with voluntary evacuations and checked on those who chose to shelter in place.

“Our fire department, law enforcement officers, emergency management staff and other state coordinating agencies have been working around the clock to protect lives, conduct door-to-door notifications and keep our community informed,” said Mendez.

As of 10 a.m. Tuesday, 599 La Salle County residents have chosen to shelter in place. Mendez said there were two voluntary evacuations, 122 self-evacuations and three water rescues over the course of the floods so far.

“I cannot stress enough: please stay off the flooded roadways,” Mendez said. “If you see barricades, they are there for a reason.”

According to a Facebook post by La Salle County Fire from 11:47 p.m. Tuesday, evacuation recommendations were in place for residents living:

• On Jay Street between Martinez Street and Copp Street
• On Martinez Street between Jay Street and Guadalupe Street

More than 300 first responders from Texas and other states are assisting with the flood response, officials said.

The American Red Cross has opened a shelter at the Alexander Convention Center for residents who have been displaced or who choose to evacuate voluntarily. Only service animals are allowed inside the shelter.

A separate pet shelter has been set up at the county fairgrounds.

Officials encourage residents to monitor updates from local authorities and be prepared to leave if evacuation recommendations become mandatory or flood conditions worsen.

Read also:

• City of Kerrville issues public notice for sanitary sewer overflow in downtown area
• Hill Country floods add new setbacks for Kendall County Women’s Shelter

“I just remember being taught that area was kind of dangerous, in the sense of there being steep slopes” and a quick drop-off into the river, he told The Associated Press. A few years earlier, Martin had warned a pair of young people playing in the water at that same spot to “be very careful.”

He saw five adults in the water and two children playing on the grassy bank nearby, tracking the description of the group provided by Delaware County authorities after the drownings.

Pastor may have taken ‘the last picture’ of the group

Martin and his family floated away to enjoy a beautiful summer evening. But when they returned past the spot about two hours later and saw the group still wading in the river, Martin thought to snap a photo.

“I don't know what it was. I said, I just need to capture this picture,” he said.

Martin said he knows the area well from 10 years of boating there and considered warning the people of the potential danger. But, unlike when he'd warned the two people earlier, there were two or three boats between him and them and he didn't want to cross between them and cause too many waves in the water.

He's been losing sleep over the decision since news broke of five people drowning that afternoon. It feels “surreal,” he said.

“I believe the picture I took may have been the last picture of them being alive,” he said.

The image didn't catch authorities' initial interest

Delaware County Sheriff Jeffrey Balzer has said authorities believe one of the adults began struggling to swim and the others successively went to that person's aid. All five were swept under and died. The two women’s bodies were recovered Sunday and the three other bodies a day later.

Neither Balzer's office nor the local EMS agency immediately responded to requests for verification of the photo and those who appear in it.

Martin said he feels certain the group he photographed is of the five people who perished Sunday; it's rare to see people fishing or swimming in that stretch of the river. He said he attempted to share the picture with both law enforcement and a news reporter at the scene the day after the drownings, but no one seemed interested.

Honduran authorities confirmed Tuesday that four of the five adults were Honduran citizens. One was Jose Mario Pineda Dias, 33, another his wife Marina Suyapa Regalado, 28. Pineda was from the department of Lempira and Suyapa from the department of Cortés, according to Flabia Zamora, director of consular affairs at the Honduran Foreign Ministry.

The names of the other couple and the fifth individual would be released once their families could be notified of their deaths, a spokesperson for Balzer said Wednesday.

U.S., Honduras still working to identify victims, help children

A Honduran embassy said the government is in contact with the victims' families and assisting local authorities in verifying their identities. In a statement, it added that Honduras stands ready to repatriate any of the victims should relatives request that — a process that could take six weeks.

An 8-year-old and a 10-year-old, children of one of the couples, were orphaned by the tragedy. A boy shouting for his mother was spotted by a passing driver on the day of the accident and reported to 911.

Scott Varner, a spokesman for Franklin County Children Services, said the youngsters have been in the agency's care since Monday and that they are working with relatives and family friends in Columbus who are providing them with a temporary home. The children were provided with therapy dogs as they coped with the trauma, he said.

The Honduran embassy statement said the consulate has checked in with family members about their well-being and stands ready to help once relatives make a decision on next steps for the children.

___

Associated Press reporter Hallie Golden contributed to this report.

Xavier Isiah Gutierrez, 21, is accused of impersonating another inmate with the first name “Xavier,” who was scheduled to be released from custody, the sheriff’s office said in a news release.

Authorities said Gutierrez is 6 feet tall, has brown hair and brown eyes.

At the time of Sunday’s escape, the sheriff’s office said Gutierrez was jailed stemming from a felony theft case in Brazoria County and an evading arrest warrant out of Pearland.

Deputies said they have now issued a warrant for Gutierrez on an escape charge, which is considered a third-degree felony.

“An investigation is currently underway to determine the circumstances surrounding this escape, including how Mr. Gutierrez was able to be released while impersonating another inmate,” HCSO said in a news release.

The sheriff’s office said it is reviewing the incident and is “committed to identifying any necessary improvements to its procedures and safeguards” to prevent a similar incident from happening again.

Anyone with information on Gutierrez’s escape is asked contact Detective Mike Bishop at michael.bishop@hayscountytx.gov or dispatch at 512-393-7896.

Individuals can also contact Crime Stoppers at 1-800-324-8477 or submit a tip online.

More recent local news coverage on KSAT:

• Worker dies in New Braunfels trench accident, Comal County Sheriff’s Office says
• 5,000+ medical students relocated from JBSA-Fort Sam Houston dorms over ‘infrastructure’ concerns
• Man accuses off-duty ICE agent of assault after long-running neighborhood dispute turns violent

Officers responded to the shooting just before 7 p.m. Monday in the 1500 block of Roosevelt Avenue, which is located near Fairbanks Street.

According to an SAPD preliminary report, the suspect shot the two men after an altercation escalated.

One of the victims, a 39-year-old man, was pronounced dead at the scene, police said.

The other victim, a 62-year-old man, was hospitalized after he was shot multiple times. SAPD confirmed on Wednesday that he later died from his injuries.

On Wednesday, the Bexar County Medical Examiner’s Office identified the 39-year-old man as Richard Arnold Carrillo, Jr. Monday was his 39th birthday, according to the ME’s office.

The 62-year-old victim was identified as Richard Arnold Carrillo, Sr. According to the medical examiner’s office, both men died of multiple gunshot wounds. Their deaths were ruled as homicides.

The suspect, 34, fled the scene and was later detained at a nearby hotel, officers said.

SAPD said its investigation remains ongoing.

Read also:

• SAPD bodycam footage shows exchange of gunfire between officers, suspect on North Side

A JBSA spokesperson confirmed to KSAT that Army, Navy and Air Force enlisted medical students assigned to the Medical Education and Training Campus (METC) “are being relocated to on-base temporary lodging.”

KSAT received several emails and calls from people claiming mold in the dorms is forcing hundreds of military members into base hotels.

JBSA’s official statement, however, cited “infrastructure” issues rather than mold specifically.

“This decision was made based on continuing infrastructure degradation that is rooted in the campus construction and can no longer be resolved through routine maintenance or ongoing repairs,” a JBSA official wrote in a statement to KSAT.

All affected service members faced “immediate relocation” while the base works toward a long-term solution.

“The relocation of these students to interim quarters demonstrates the Department of War commitment to its servicemembers to improve their quality of life,” the JBSA statement added.

The Department of War is investing more than $1.2 billion to “improve barrack conditions,” according to JBSA. Construction is expected to begin by the end of this year.

“Our primary focus is the safety, and quality of life of our students,” JBSA’s statement continued. “This relocation will allow the medical training pipeline to continue without compromise.”

KSAT asked a base official Wednesday for an interview and if any students were reported sick related to dorm conditions.

JBSA-Fort Sam Houston has yet to respond to KSAT’s request.

More recent local news coverage on KSAT:

• Seguin Police Department fires officer following excessive force complaint, investigation
• BCSO: 2 detained, 1 hospitalized after apparent exchange of gunfire between vehicles in NW Bexar County

San Antonio recorded its first 100-degree day of the year Wednesday, reaching the triple-digit mark later than we typically do.

On average, San Antonio’s first 100° day occurs around June 26. This year, however, the city managed to make it well into July before finally hitting the century mark.

The latest first 100° day on record came in September 2021. Meanwhile, there have been 23 years, since records began in 1886, when the city never reached 100° — most recently in 2007.

Why did it take so long?

The biggest reason: moisture.

Spring and early summer brought frequent rounds of rain across South Central Texas, leaving soils much wetter than normal. When the ground contains plenty of moisture, a portion of the sun’s energy goes toward evaporating water rather than heating the air.

This process is called evaporative cooling, and it can keep afternoon temperatures several degrees below their full potential.

The lush vegetation the area has seen this year has also helped. Plants release moisture into the atmosphere through a process called transpiration, which adds another layer of natural cooling. As a result, many afternoons that may have otherwise reached 100° topped out in the mid-to-upper 90s instead.

Even though temperatures stayed below 100°, it hasn’t exactly been comfortable. The same moisture that helped keep the thermometer in check also boosted humidity levels. That has pushed heat index values, also known as the “feels-like” temperature, well above 100° on many days.

What’s next?

Now that the hottest part of the summer nears, triple-digit temperatures are likely to become more common. As the ground gradually dries out, less energy will be used for evaporation and more will go directly into heating the air.

In other words, the inevitable has been delayed, but summer’s hottest stretch is still to come.

Check the latest forecast with the KSAT Weather Authority.

• Read more from the meteorologists on the Whatever the Weather page
• Download KSAT’s weather app for customized, accurate forecasts in San Antonio, South Texas or wherever you are
• Find the latest forecasts, radar and alerts on the KSAT Weather Authority page

That recommendation came during the same meeting at which Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board officials reduced similar incentives in existing outcomes-based funding for community colleges, which outperformed what lawmakers had budgeted.

The recommendation calls for financing the new incentives primarily with additional state funding but did not recommend a specific amount. Such incentive payouts would supplement, rather than replace, universities’ existing enrollment-based funding.

Lawmakers would have to create and finance the model when they return to Austin in 2027.

However, the call for additional money comes as state leaders signal they want to limit spending.

Last week, Gov. Greg Abbott, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and House Speaker Dustin Burrows instructed public universities, colleges and state agencies to request 3% less in baseline state funding, saying they wanted to preserve money for affordability measures and property tax cuts.

The THECB proposed a model that bases 40% of the incentive funding on rewarding universities when students remain enrolled and reach certain credit-hour milestones.

The bulk of funding, 60%, would be tied to students earning bachelor’s degrees that provide a financial return. That would be defined as a degree that allows the typical graduate to earn enough within 10 years to recoup the cost of college and surpass the earnings of a typical high school graduate. A THECB committee report notes that all bachelor’s degrees awarded by Texas public universities currently meet that threshold.

Universities could receive additional money for graduating economically or academically disadvantaged students, adult learners or those who returned after leaving college for an extended period of time. For example, schools would get more funding for graduating students who are federal Pell Grant recipients, which are to those from qualifying low-income families.

Universities could also receive additional funding for awarding degrees in high-demand fields and for helping students graduate with no more than 120% of the credit hours required for their degrees.

Texas currently distributes much of its funding for public universities based on the number and type of courses students take.

The schools also receive institutional enhancement funding, which is flexible state money they can use for academic programs, student services or other operating expenses. Lawmakers decide how much each institution receives individually based largely on their own priorities rather than a uniform formula, and the amounts vary widely.

Institutional enhancement funding has been a recurring point of leverage in lawmakers’ disputes with universities.

At the beginning of the 2025 legislative session, House and Senate budget writers proposed eliminating it. Meanwhile, Patrick threatened to reduce university funding if schools did not eradicate diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.

University leaders warned then that losing the money would force them to cut courses, student services and other operations. Lawmakers ultimately kept it, but included a budget rider directing THECB to examine whether it should be phased out and replaced with performance-based funding.

The THECB board members asked during Wednesday’s discussion why the state should not eliminate institutional enhancement funding outright and redirect all of it into the new performance-based model.

Daniel Harper, vice chancellor for finance and chief financial officer for the Texas State University System and one of several officials who developed the proposal, said the group modeled that option but found it would leave some universities without additional funding and make the proposal politically difficult to pass. For the current two-year budget cycle, universities received a total of about $400 million in institutional enhancement funding, he said.

“It’s been very challenging for the members that represent those districts to support policy that doesn’t provide any additional support for institutions,” Harper said.

Instead, the group proposed creating a new funding stream financed primarily with additional money while gradually redirecting some institutional enhancement funding into it.

The recommendation from THECB takes a page from funding at the community college level.

Lawmakers overhauled how community college got state dollars in 2023, tying more money to outcomes such as degree completions or transfers to universities. Those colleges have repeatedly earned more money than lawmakers budgeted by outperforming predictions. To lower those payouts, the THECB board voted Wednesday to reduce the bonuses community colleges get for educating low-income students and adult learners.

THECB spokesperson Bobbi Kessler said the university proposal is structured differently. Community college funding is adjusted as data are updated between legislative sessions. Under the university proposal, lawmakers would set each university’s allocation during the session based on past outcomes, which would remain fixed until lawmakers reassessed it the following session.

Sneha Dey contributed to this report.

The Texas Tribune partners with Open Campus on higher education coverage.

Disclosure: Open Campus 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.

House Republicans were divided over the plan, with conservatives wary because there are no offsetting budget cuts. But Speaker Mike Johnson plunged ahead, viewing the go-it-alone process as the best chance to usher President Donald Trump's priorities through the split Congress, despite skepticism in the Senate.

The vote tally was 216-214, with two Republicans and one independent joining Democrats in opposition.

“Just bullets and bombs to finish the job,” said Rep. Jodey Arrington, R-Texas, the chairman of the Budget Committee.

Democrats argued the money should be spent at home, particularly on efforts to lower costs for Americans.

“Republicans plan to spend tens of billions of dollars on Trump’s failed war in Iran,” said Rep. Pete Aguilar of California, chairman of the House Democratic caucus, this week. “Think about what we could spend with these resources instead.”

Congress is at a standstill over the U.S. war against Iran — unable to stop Trump's military strikes, but not having authorized the use of American military force — and politically torn over having to provide billions of taxpayer dollars to pay for it. Most Americans disapprove of Trump's Iran strategy, according to a recent AP-NORC poll.

The budget battle comes as Trump attended the dignified transfer of four service members killed in the Middle East, bringing the military death toll to 18. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told senators at a fiery hearing this week that the Pentagon is running short of cash, despite a massive $150 billion one-time allotment in last year's big budget bill.

Even as the House action advanced the resolution, Johnson’s strategy faces uncertainty in the Senate.

The package has $60 billion for the Pentagon and $13 billion for other national security needs, $12 billion for farmers struggling under Trump’s tariffs and $10 billion for voting law changes aligned with the SAVE America Act and proof-of-citizenship requirements that are Trump’s top priority.

A once rare budget tool is now the norm in split Congress

Republicans are relying on the budget reconciliation process, which enables approval on a majority vote in Congress, bypassing the Senate's ability to filibuster the measure t o stall or kill it.

Once rare, the reconciliation process is now Johnson's preferred strategy for pushing proposals through Congress. It's the way Republicans approved Trump's big tax breaks and spending cuts bill last summer and funded Homeland Security this year over Democrats' refusal to fund Trump's mass deportation agenda.

“No matter how you feel about current events, these funds are necessary to ensure our fighting forces remain ready, our troops are paid and our nation is safe," said Rep. Mike Rogers of Alabama, the Republican chairman of the Armed Services Committee.

But House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries said, “Republicans have literally ripped food from the mouths of hungry children, seniors and veterans to sustain the Trump war machine.”

Among those opposed was Rep. Kevin Kiley of California, a former Republican turned independent, who said he felt any war funding bill should be bipartisan. He also wanted to ensure Congress had a “much higher level of involvement” in bringing the war to an end, and he said this proposal did not set that process in motion.

Republicans Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky and Rep. Warren Davidson of Ohio also voted against.

This is the third time GOP leaders have relied on reconciliation, dubbing this version 3.0, and it's a lengthy process. If the House approves the budget resolution, it next goes to the Senate for a round-the-clock session to consider politically tough amendments — something senators would rather avoid in an election year.

The budget resolution sets out instructions for the various committees to draft legislation, which Johnson hopes could be done this summer, with final voting on the package once lawmakers return after the August recess.

Senators pan House's budget and have their own ideas

Senate Majority Leader John Thune has been noncommittal on the House package that also divides his own GOP majority, with some Republican senators preferring more money for the military and others demanding the costs be offset with cuts elsewhere.

“We’ll see,” Thune said this week.

Thune's focus, at the moment, is avoiding another government shutdown. He wants the Senate to approve a stopgap funding measure, called a continuing resolution, to provide routine government funding before lawmakers leave for the summer break.

If senators are unable to reach agreement on government funding, Thune has said he may hold onto the House's budget resolution and use it later in the fall as a way to push the resolution through the Senate over objections. He wants to prevent a federal shutdown when current funds expire, Sept. 30.

“It’s a possibility that, if necessary, we could pull that budget resolution passed by the House and use it to fund government,” Thune said. “I hope that’s not necessary.”

Thune has also clashed with Trump over the president's push for the SAVE America Act, which would require proof of citizenship for voting. The measure, while popular among Trump's most ardent supporters, does not have enough support among Senate Republicans for passage.

It's already against the law for noncitizens to vote in federal elections and experts warn the proposed new rules could make it more difficult for eligible Americans to cast ballots.

It also would provide for a pay raise next year ranging from 5% to 7% for service members, depending upon their rank.

The National Defense Authorization Act is generally one of the more bipartisan bills that Congress takes up on an annual basis. That's not the case this year. The vote was 216-212.

Democrats took issue with steep spending increases for the Pentagon as Republicans attempted to cut numerous non-defense programs through other bills. They also opposed some of the conservative social policy riders that were included.

For example, the bill includes a prohibition on gender-related medical care under the military health program known as TRICARE. It also eases hurdles for service members to carry a privately owned firearm on base, following Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's lead on the issue.

Republican leaders' decision to attach Trump's elections overhaul bill to the defense bill upon its passing also amplified the partisan divide. Speaker Mike Johnson is working to accommodate Republican lawmakers who are angry that the Senate won't pass the SAVE America Act and are insisting that it be included in must-pass bills until the Senate relents.

The House bill is testing a normally bipartisan process

Rep. Mike Rogers, the Republican chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, emphasized that he knows there were areas of disagreement, but he emphasized that Wednesday's vote was a step in a long process. He promised to work in a bipartisan manner on a final product that can pass both chambers and be signed into law.

Rogers said the United States needs to reverse decades of underinvestment and neglect in the nation's armed forces and defense industrial base.

“This bill will do that and much more,” he said. “It will build the ready, capable and lethal fighting force we need to deter China and other adversaries.”

Rep. Adam Smith, the ranking Democratic lawmaker on the Armed Services Committee, said the defense spending the administration has asked for this year is approaching $1.6 trillion when including separate efforts to pay for the war in Iran and boost weapons stockpiles.

“The American people are struggling to pay their bills and we're going to put $1.6 trillion into the defense budget. It's not a reasonable thing to ask,” Smith said.

Smith also expressed concern about the war with Iran and that in supporting the defense bill, lawmakers are “de facto supporting this war with no end in sight.”

“We are in an incredibly, incredibly dangerous time,” Smith said. “I want to maintain the bipartisan nature of this bill. I do. And I know that the chairman does. But if we're going to do this, we're going to need some Republicans to stand up to the president of the United States and say, ‘No. No, we’re not going to get you $1.6 trillion. No, we're not just going to give you a blank check for a war that is totally out of control."

The White House backs parts of the legislation

The spending increases authorized in the bill would not take effect until Congress follows up with a separate defense appropriations bill. The Senate has not yet approved its version of the defense measure. It's possible a final product won't be ready until after the midterm elections.

The White House applauded the spending levels authorized in the House bill and the Department of War designation that it says recognizes the “willingness to fight and win wars on behalf of our nation.”

The president issued an executive order last year renaming the Defense Department, but it's up to Congress to make the change official. The Congressional Budget Office has projected that the renaming could cost taxpayers as much as $125 million.

The White House's statement also said that the administration has a number of concerns with certain provisions in the bill and would work with Congress before a final bill is presented to the president. Among those concerns was a section of the bill it said would limit or undermine the president's ability to name military installations and property.

In 2023, during a national reckoning on issues of race in America, seven Army bases’ names were changed because they honored Confederate leaders. Last year, those bases reverted to their original names, but with different namesakes who share Confederate surnames. The Army found other service members with the same last names to honor.

“Think of that. The government is finally giving money back to our children,” Trump said to the crowd gathered at a Georgia high school

Some parents who opened accounts earlier this month for their babies say they're still waiting for their money. The accounts went live July 4, two days before Trump rang the opening bells for the New York Stock Exchange and the Nasdaq from the Oval Office.

The tax-advantaged accounts can be opened for any child under the age of 18, and more than 7 million accounts are already active, Trump said Wednesday. Babies born between January 1, 2025, and December 31, 2028 get $1,000 in seed money from the U.S. Treasury. Most of those families receive their $1,000 in one or two days, the Treasury Department said.

After the Trump Accounts are set up, parents, relatives, friends and employers can contribute to them. Some billionaires have also pledged philanthropic contributions to the accounts. The money is turned over to private firms that invest it in index funds, a type of mutual fund that tracks the performance of the stock market. The money can’t be accessed until the child turns 18, and only then for specific purposes, such as going to school, opening a business or buying a home.

At the rally Wednesday, Rick Jackson, Georgia’s GOP nominee for governor, said he would push for state lawmakers to match the $1,000 in seed money from the federal government. Jackson, a wealthy businessman and CEO of a healthcare company, said he believes Georgia lawmakers will support that, but “if they don’t, I will personally donate it myself.”

Boosters of the program say it’s a chance to give more Americans a stake in the stock market. They hope it will stem the rising popularity of democratic socialists, who seek to raise taxes on corporations and wealthy people to ease the cost of things like food and healthcare for low-income and middle-class Americans.

Some parents were told it could take 4 weeks for the deposit

For babies born since Trump took office last year, $1,000 from the U.S. Treasury is supposed to kick off the accounts. While some parents report receiving the money, others said in interviews and on social media they're still waiting for their $1,000.

Masaki and Kristina McLellan, new parents from Bergen County, New Jersey, said in an interview they were wary of signing up for the accounts because they worried it was a promotional stunt for the president. But the $1,000 incentive persuaded the couple, whose daughter Maya was born in late March, to start an account anyway.

Masaki McLellan said he applied for the account July 6. At first, the application was rejected, but the account was activated after he called the Trump Account hotline. He was told he'd see the money in the account in 10 days. Now, he says, he's been told it will take up to four weeks.

Kristina McLellan said she was disappointed it was taking so long to fund her daughter's account. But the infant has multiple other investments already compounding for her. Maya's parents have already started a 529 college savings plan and a custodial brokerage account for her. The Trump Account is the third investment account in the little girl's name.

“We definitely want to give her options for her future and make sure she can choose what she wants to do,” said McLellan, a studio director for a local news station, who returns from maternity leave next week.

The Treasury Department emphasized the McLellans’ case is unusual and said only a sliver of those who apply need customer support.

Treasury says most parents wait only 1 or 2 days

The Treasury Department said that the lag between opening an account and receiving the seed funding constitutes “standard processing time, like receiving a tax refund,” and that the overwhelming majority of parents are waiting only one to two days. But the department likes to give parents a conservative estimate for how long it might take for the money to be transferred, such as the estimate of up to four weeks given to the McLellans.

“Trump Accounts level the playing field by allowing every parent to invest in their children’s future, not just wealthy families with trust funds,” the department said.

The government also unveiled an initiative last month that permits child welfare agencies to open accounts on behalf of foster youth.

"With roughly 1 million sign-ups per month before launch, Trump Accounts have become the most popular and successful government-backed savings product in U.S. history,” the Treasury Department said.

On Wednesday, Trump called the accounts “the most consequential” part of his signature tax and spending cuts bill, also known as the One Big Beautiful Bill.

Trump faces pressure over his handling of the economy

Trump's stop in Georgia comes as he and fellow Republicans face pressure in the midterm elections for their handling of the economy. Only 33% of U.S. adults approve of Trump’s economic leadership, among the lower ratings of his second term, according to a June survey by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. Trump pledged to lower costs, but his tariffs and the war in Iran have instead helped to increase prices.

Trump Accounts are similar to baby bonds, championed by Democratic-led cities and states meant to shrink the wealth gap between low- and high-income children. But unlike most baby bonds, which generally target kids from disadvantaged backgrounds, Trump Accounts are available to families of all incomes.

The program has faced criticism from those who say it does nothing to help families in a child's first years of life, when children are most likely to experience poverty, homelessness and hunger. And the Republican bill that created the program also slashed funding for programs that are disproportionately used by children, including Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.

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This story has been corrected to show the mother's surname is McLellan, not McClellan.

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Associated Press writers Seung Min Kim and Adriana Morga contributed to this report.

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

It is a second trial for Hadi Matar, who was found guilty in a New York state attempted murder case last year. The federal terror charges focus more on Matar's alleged motive for the attack on the renowned author and free-speech advocate in 2022.

Prosecutors started working Wednesday to persuade jurors that Matar was trying to carry out a 1989 fatwa, or religious ruling, that called for Rushdie's death because of what some Muslims saw as blasphemy in his 1988 novel “The Satanic Verses.”

“Fulfill the fatwa — that’s what Hadi Matar intended to do,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Timothy Lynch said in an opening statement at a federal courthouse in Buffalo, New York, about 70 miles (110 km) from the arts and intellectual retreat where Rushdie was assaulted. The Booker Prize-winning author is expected to testify later this week about the stabbing that nearly killed him and left him blind in one eye.

Defense attorney Nathaniel Barone urged jurors to keep their minds open.

“You’re going to have to ask yourselves: What was Hadi Matar’s intent?” Barone said in his opening.

Speaking to The Associated Press outside of court, Barone said the biggest challenge facing prosecutors is determining Matar's state of mind at the time of the attack.

""Certainly, they can't do that demonstrably. There's no facts. There's no hard evidence," Barone said. “They’ll have to draw together different events, different circumstances, and then ask that jury to connect the dots. And that’s difficult to do because there could be a number of reasonable, plausible explanations as to what he was thinking.”

Prosecutors contend that Matar's writings, communications and other materials showed he acted out of loyalty to Iran’s theocratic government and the Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group; Iran's late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issued the fatwa.

A stunned audience saw Rushdie's stabbing

Matar, 28, has pleaded not guilty to federal charges that include engaging in an act of transnational terrorism. Currently serving a 25-year New York State prison sentence, he faces a potential life sentence if convicted in the federal case.

The attack — which jurors saw on video Wednesday — unfolded in front of a horrified audience at the Chautauqua Institution, where Rushdie was about to discuss writer safety.

His assailant, wearing a medical mask, strode onstage and stabbed Rushdie repeatedly, continuing even as the writer got up and fell backward. Spectators rushed to pull the attacker off Rushdie and assisted the lone state trooper on site in holding the assailant face-down before he could be handcuffed.

Zachary Colvin's body-camera video was also played and showed Matar informing the trooper he had no weapons in his pockets, admitting he had a fake New Jersey driver's license, and telling him his real name was Hadi.

Asked by the defense whether Matar was cooperative as he was being detained, Colvin said: “Initially he did attempt to knee me, but he was cooperative beyond that.”

As one of the videos played, Matar, 28, placed his head down on the defense table several times before looking back up at the screen. Otherwise, he spent much of the time writing notes on a yellow pad and exchanged comments with his lawyers — and waved at Colvin when asked to point him out in court.

Rushdie, now 79, has recounted the assault and his lengthy recovery during Matar's earlier trial, in a memoir and in multiple interviews.

“The thing that happens when you get really a close-up look at death — that’s as close as you can get without actually doing the dance of death and heading off to nowhere — it stays with you,” he told The Associated Press in 2024. “There’s a shadow.”

Federal terrorism trial hinges on Matar's motivation

Born in the U.S. to parents who immigrated from Lebanon, Matar is a citizen of both countries. His mother has said he turned moody and withdrawn after a 2018 trip to Lebanon, where Hezbollah is based.

Prosecutors say his attack on Rushdie was propelled partly by remarks that the late Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah made in 2006, amid an uproar in the Muslim world over caricatures of Islam’s Prophet Muhammad in European newspapers. Nasrallah opined that “the problem began the day Salman Rushdie wrote 'The Satanic Verses' ” and that the furor over the cartoon wouldn't have happened if someone had followed through on Khomeini’s fatwa.

Matar started researching Rushdie in 2020, asking online contacts where the writer lived and eventually looking into where his office was, what sports teams he followed and where he watched games, Lynch said in his opening statement. He said Matar kept sticky notes and a notebook about his project.

“We need to kill him ASAP,” Matar wrote, according to the prosecutor. He said Matar framed the killing as part of what he considered a jihad, or holy war, and added: “Become a warrior and just get it over with.”

In Matar’s New Jersey bedroom, federal agents found photos of Khomeini, his now-deceased successor Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and a Hezbollah figure, Lynch said. Matar's computer held a photo of him saluting in a Hezbollah-related T-shirt, plus a video about Khomeini’s fatwa, and Matar asked a contact in 2022 whether the edict was still valid, the prosecutor said.

And the fake ID Matar carried echoed a Hezbollah figure's name, prosecutors said.

“The defendant wanted everyone to know he was doing this for Hezbollah," Lynch told jurors.

Matar declined to testify at his state court trial, and it is unclear whether he will take the stand in federal court. At his state court sentencing, Matar said he believed in free speech but blasted Rushdie as “a hypocrite” and a “bully.”

How Ayatollah's edict affected Rushdie

Rushdie was born in India, raised in Britain — where he was knighted by the late Queen Elizabeth II — and now is a U.S. citizen. He won the Booker Prize in 1981 for his novel “Midnight’s Children” and became most famous, and notorious, for “The Satanic Verses.” A dream sequence about the Prophet Muhammad sparked often-violent protests erupted against Rushdie, who was born into a Muslim family.

Khomeini's 1989 fatwa drove Rushdie into hiding for years. Although the edict was rescinded, Iran hasn’t focused on it in recent years. Iran's government denied involvement in the 2022 stabbing, but its Foreign Ministry's then-spokesperson suggested Rushdie invited trouble by insulting Islam.

Hezbollah's Nasrallah did not comment on the attack.

After “Knife,” Rushdie's memoir about the stabbing, he returned to fiction with last year's “The Eleventh Hour,” a book of short stories and novellas. He received a Dayton Literary Peace Prize lifetime achievement award in November.

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Peltz reported from New York. Associated Press writer Bassem Mroue contributed from Beirut.

U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright and Saudi Minister of Energy Abdulaziz bin Salman formally signed the nuclear cooperation agreement, known as a “123 agreement,” alongside what the Trump administration described as a “bilateral safeguards agreement.”

The U.S. administration released scant details of the deal, but the framework paves the way for the building of a uranium enrichment facility in Saudi Arabia after a joint U.S.-Saudi study, according to a person familiar with the matter who was not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

“These agreements reflect our two nations’ shared commitment to strengthening U.S.-Saudi commercial relations, delivering prosperity at home and security to our allies abroad,” Wright said in a statement. “Rest assured, these agreements uphold the highest standards of nuclear safety and nonproliferation, while relying on the world’s best nuclear technology and scientists, designed right here in the United States.”

Earlier, Secretary of State Marco Rubio sought to head off emerging criticism of the decision under questioning by reporters about the risk that helping the Saudis fulfill their long-standing desire to enrich their own uranium could lead to new rounds of nuclear proliferation and competition in a volatile region.

“The U.S. is not going to reach any agreement with any country in the world that leads to the risk of proliferation,” said Rubio, who was traveling in the Philippines on Wednesday.

The agreement does not include the International Atomic Energy Agency 's Additional Protocol, which would allow for more monitoring, inspections and verification, according to a second person familiar with the decision.

The deal is expected to last 30 years and involve U.S. firms in developing the program. The Energy Department in a statement said it will be submitted for review to Congress, where it could face opposition.

The oil-rich kingdom's Energy Ministry said the agreement bolsters “efforts to diversify energy sources, advance cutting-edge technologies, and expand opportunities for cooperation and investment in ways that serve the mutual interests of the two friendly countries.”

The announcement comes during the war against Iran launched by the U.S. and Israel, in part, to wipe out Tehran’s ability to develop a nuclear weapon. Iran has insisted its nuclear enrichment program is peaceful.

Ahead of the announcement, Alexander Bollfrass, a nuclear expert at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London, called the deal “a revolutionary new approach” to nuclear nonproliferation policy.

“The revolutionary aspect of this agreement is that the United States is not asking Saudi Arabia to abide by the highest possible safeguards, internationally monitored safeguards that are standard and are available today, but instead is willing to at least theoretically transfer highly sensitive technology without the same level of oversight that one would expect,” Bollfrass said.

President Donald Trump, during his first term, and former President Joe Biden tried to reach a nuclear deal with the kingdom to share American technology.

Enrichment could open the door to weaponization

Nonproliferation experts warn any spinning centrifuges within Saudi Arabia could open the door to a possible weapons program for the kingdom, something its assertive de facto leader, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, has suggested he could pursue if Tehran obtains an atomic bomb.

Wright traveled to Saudi Arabia last year shortly before Trump visited and discussed building out the kingdom’s commercial nuclear power industry with his Saudi counterpart. The U.S. Department of Energy has not responded to multiple requests for comment.

Already, Saudi Arabia and nuclear-armed Pakistan signed a mutual defense pact after Israel launched an attack on Qatar targeting Hamas officials. Pakistan’s defense minister then said his nation’s nuclear program “will be made available” to Saudi Arabia if needed, something seen as a warning for Israel, long believed to be the Middle East’s only nuclear-armed state.

Some lawmakers are hesitant about giving Saudis enrichment capability

Enrichment isn’t an automatic path to a nuclear weapon — a nation also must master other steps, including the use of synchronized high explosives, for instance. But it does open the door to weaponization, which has fueled the West's concerns over Iran’s program.

The United Arab Emirates, a neighbor to Saudi Arabia, signed a 123 agreement with the U.S. to build its Barakah nuclear power plant with South Korean assistance. But the UAE did so without seeking enrichment, something nonproliferation experts have held up as the “gold standard” for nations wanting atomic power.

Rubio, as a Republican senator representing Florida, backed a bipartisan 2018 proposal that called for requiring Congress to approve any 123 agreement with Saudi Arabia. The bill was reintroduced by a group of Democratic lawmakers in March but has not passed into law.

Typically, 123 agreements — which authorize U.S. companies to sell nuclear technology abroad — go into effect unless veto-proof majorities of Congress pass joint resolutions of disapproval.

Rosemary Kelanic, the Middle East director at Defense Priorities, a Washington think tank, said that uranium enrichment capability could give Saudi Arabia “a potent source of leverage to extract future concessions from Washington, including new security guarantees, by threatening to weaponize its program unless the United States promises enhanced military protection.”

US firms could be winners in expected deal

Rep. Brad Sherman, a California Democrat, predicted the deal would benefit U.S. nuclear giant Westinghouse, which builds the large light-water reactors Saudi Arabia is seeking.

The Trump administration said last month it is providing $17.5 billion in loans to speed development of 10 new large nuclear reactors designed by Westinghouse to meet skyrocketing power demand from massive data centers. The new reactors could use the same design, Westinghouse’s AP1000, in the planned Saudi deal.

Sherman said the U.S. military is “bombing Iran because they insist upon enriching and reprocessing” nuclear material.

Now it appears that U.S. officials “are entering into an agreement with Saudi Arabia, giving them the green light to reprocess and to enrich, and the only difference I see here is that Westinghouse stands to make an awful lot of money on this deal, whereas the Iranians were not enriching American companies,” Sherman said at a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing Wednesday.

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Price reported from Manila, Philippines. Associated Press writers Danica Kirka in London and Will Weissert contributed to this report.

The potential political peril has only grown in recent days, particularly for Republicans facing reelection in November. But while some GOP lawmakers say they want more information from President Donald Trump’s administration on the endgame and the escalating cost, they continue to defend the president’s decision to engage and have voted repeatedly to cede congressional powers to the White House.

“Is anyone out there in the real world happy with gas prices? No,” said Louisiana Sen. John Kennedy, a Republican who grilled military leaders for more detail at a contentious hearing Tuesday. “But I think they understand why gas prices are as high as they are.”

It’s still unclear, though, if more Republicans — many of whom have been privately questioning the conflict — will speak out publicly as the midterm elections approach. GOP lawmakers in both the House and Senate are expected to face the next test of their loyalty this week as Democrats force new votes on whether Trump should seek congressional approval for military action against Iran.

As Congress considers whether to weigh in, the U.S. has carried out waves of airstrikes in recent days as the two countries clash over control of the Strait of Hormuz. Gas prices have spiked again and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told senators at the hearing Tuesday that the U.S. had spent $37.5 billion on the war so far. On Wednesday, Trump traveled to Dover Air Force Base for the arrival and dignified transfer of the remains of four U.S. service members.

“I do think the combination of the hearings, plus the fact that we are in this new escalatory phase where Americans have been killed, and Americans are experiencing the rising costs — I think it’s important that people be held accountable,” said Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen, a Democrat who is expected to lead the next war powers vote as soon as Thursday. “And this is a very unpopular war.”

Polls find Americans disapprove of the war

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

Only about two-thirds of Republicans approve of Trump’s handling of the situation in Iran, according to the Washington Post/Ipsos poll. Most Republicans, about 6 in 10, think the war has been worth fighting and are confident that the military action and ensuing negotiations will prevent Iran from development nuclear weapons, but a sizable share — about one-third — are not convinced.

Republican Sen. Mike Rounds of South Dakota, who is up for reelection this year, said that he tries to explain to voters that he has seen the intelligence and believes the war was necessary to prevent Iran from having a nuclear weapon. But we need to “finish the job,” Rounds said.

“It’s challenging” to explain it to people back home, Rounds said. “It’s complicated, and a lot of the stuff we know, we can’t talk about, because it’s classified.”

Maine Sen. Susan Collins, another Republican up for reelection, questioned military leaders at Tuesday’s hearing on the closure of the Strait of Hormuz.

“It seems to me that there’s been a different plan almost daily with dealing with this problem,” she told Hegseth and Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

War powers votes have shifted as conflict has dragged on

Opposing the war can have a political cost, as well. Collins was one of four Republicans to side with Democrats when the Senate passed a war powers resolution on Iran for the first time in June. The vote greatly angered Trump, who attended a GOP Senate luncheon the next day and called the four Republicans “losers.”

One of the other Republicans to vote for the war powers resolution was Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy, a Republican who lost his Senate seat in a primary after Trump endorsed one of his opponents.

In the closed-door luncheon, Cassidy told Trump directly that he needed to give more details to the public about the conflict. “This was supposed to last four weeks, it’s lasted four months,” he said. “Our original objectives have not been achieved.”

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

Cassidy wouldn’t say Wednesday whether recent developments would change his vote when the Senate takes up the next resolution to halt the war.

“I’m not commenting on that,” he said.

House to consider war powers resolution

The House is expected to consider a war powers resolution Thursday after also approving a similar measure in June. It is unclear whether enough Republicans could again vote with Democrats to pass the resolution, led by Democratic Rep. Pramila Jayapal of Washington.

House Speaker Mike Johnson has aggressively lobbied his members against the war powers measures. Echoing Trump, Johnson said this week that the U.S. has ensured that Iran doesn’t have a nuclear weapon that “would be a disaster for everybody.”

Still, he said, there is a global understanding that “now we got to wrap it up.”

Asked about the war on Wednesday before his Dover trip, Trump voiced continued confidence in his approach.

“Americans don’t want high gasoline prices but they aren’t against the war,” he said.

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Associated Press writer Amelia Thomson DeVeaux contributed to this report.

Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein set the June 1 trial date at the request of lawyers on both sides. Under the approved schedule, defense lawyers will begin filing requests in early September to challenge the indictment and the couple will return to the courtroom Nov. 17 for oral arguments on the motions.

Maduro, 63, and his wife, Cilia Flores, 69, have been held at a Brooklyn jail since U.S. forces seized them from their Caracas home in a middle-of-the-night raid and brought them to New York in early January.

Neither spoke during Wednesday’s 15-minute hearing as each sat separately at a defense table, surrounded by their lawyers. Both have pleaded not guilty. They face potential life prison sentences if a jury agrees that they were part of a conspiracy to send cocaine into the U.S.

As he was led into the courtroom, the bespectacled Maduro greeted the judge’s staff and shook hands with lawyers for him and his wife. Noticeably thinner in a tan jail suit and with his thick mustache, he seemed upbeat, smiling and chatting with his lawyer. He listened to a Spanish interpretation of the proceeding through headphones and clasped his hands in front of him in a prayerlike gesture. He had a black pen wedged in his right fingers and sporadically jotted notes on a white pad.

As deputy U.S. marshals led him out, he waved to someone in the gallery.

President Donald Trump’s administration has defended the raid to capture Maduro as a “surgical law enforcement operation” in a criminal case first brought six years ago. Maduro has called himself a prisoner of war and his capture a kidnapping.

U.S. prosecutors say Maduro carried out a conspiracy to move thousands of tons of cocaine into the U.S. by colluding with Venezuelan law enforcement to help drug kingpins.

“I am not guilty. I am a decent man, the constitutional president of my country,” he said in Spanish at his arraignment in January.

Maduro’s lawyer, Barry Pollack, has said he expects to contest the legality of Maduro’s “military abduction.”

During Wednesday's hearing, Pollack said he will first challenge the indictment on sovereign immunity grounds because if that is successful, Maduro won't have to continue litigating the case.

The lawyers have said there are complex legal defenses that the court must address before a trial can begin.

Maduro and Flores have not asked to be released on bail.

The case was put on hold almost immediately after the July 2 indictment, when the Louisiana Supreme Court said the local court and special prosecutor did not follow procedures surrounding the indictment. The dismissal by special prosecutor Laurie White came a day after New Orleans District Attorney Jason Williams, Democratic Mayor Helena Moreno and five City Council members sent a letter urging her to drop the case.

“What I did was not a crime, it was never a crime,” said Murrill, a Republican. “I think this was a malicious prosecution.”

At the center of the case are deepening rifts between the state's Republican leaders and Democrats who control Louisiana’s most prominent city.

Orleans Parish online court records show White submitted the letters from the elected city officials and the prosecutor to a judge before dismissing each count. The case against Murrill was then ordered “closed.”

In a prepared statement, White said she performed her lawful duty as a special prosecutor and noted that a grand jury brought the indictment.

White also criticized what she described as interference in the case but did not go into detail.

“Extraordinary interference in this situation has been truly unfortunate, and we should all hope that it doesn’t set a precedent,” White said.

Reached by phone later in the day, White declined further comment.

Republican Gov. Jeff Landry had promised a swift pardon, saying Murrill would not have her reputation tarnished by an “Orleans Kangaroo court.”

Appearing with Murrill at a news conference on the state's preparations for Tropical Storm Bertha, Landry said he would welcome state and federal investigations into how and why Murrill was indicted.

“I think the feds need to come in,” Landry said.

Moreno was among those who had accused the state’s top law enforcement official in May of making threats against public officials.

The initial 16-count indictment handed up by a New Orleans grand jury accused Murrill, the state’s first female attorney general, of intimidation and malfeasance.

For months, political tensions intensified between Louisiana Republicans and New Orleans officials over a new law that abolished a court clerk office won by an exoneree, Calvin Duncan, who spent nearly three decades in prison. The change consolidated that job with another clerk’s office, which Republican supporters said would make the local judicial system more efficient.

New Orleans leaders opposed the change. In May, the City Council set a special election that would have given Duncan a chance to win the newly combined job. Murrill responded by warning local officials in letters that they could lose their offices for violating state “usurper” laws, which forbid support for an unauthorized officeholder.

The mayor was among those who had accused the state’s top law enforcement official in May of making threats against public officials.

Murrill said she had merely advised city officials of what the law was and that they had broken it. “I didn’t write that law. The Legislature wrote that law. I just explained it to them.”

Murrill called the indictment a threat of extortion and public intimidation, “to put me in jail for telling them that I'm going to carry out my official duties.”

In their Tuesday letter, the mayor and City Council members said they were not intimidated by Murrill's previous letters.

“While the correspondence at issue contained threatening language directed toward public officials, we never believed those threats could lawfully or practically be carried out. We continue serving the people of New Orleans without hesitation,” the mayor and council members wrote.

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Associated Press reporter Jack Brook contributed to this story.

“I have no ill will toward Coach Kiffin,” Golding said Wednesday at SEC Media Days.

Golding was the up-and-coming defensive coordinator who was asked to pick up the pieces when his old boss, Lane Kiffin, abruptly left for LSU for a seven-year, $91 million deal just as the Rebels were about to embark on their first trip to the College Football Playoff last season.

Partly thanks to the fact that the coach had two of the game's most explosive players in quarterback Trinidad Chambliss and running back Kewan Lacy, Golding racked up two wins, over Tulane and Georgia, and almost a third.

That made Mississippi's decision to give him a five-year contract right after Kiffin's departure look like a stroke of genius. It also gave Golding a spot at the podium in Tampa, where he opened up and became an early favorite to “win” the 38th version of the SEC's annual preseason football gabfest.

“It’s the ex, right? There’s always going to be the history," said Golding, who is married with three children. "Do you have an ex? Are you married? Well, if you do get married and you have an ex that your wife knows about, like, she doesn’t ever end; she’s never dead. She’s always going to get brought up, and so that’s kind of where it is right now. That’s always going to be there a little bit, which is fun to a certain degree.”

Fun, indeed. And it's no sure thing that Ole Miss is going to take a step back from last year's 13-2 record and its trip to the national semifinals just because its celebrity coach, Kiffin, has moved west. (By the way, Ole Miss hosts LSU on Sept. 19.)

Chambliss is returning off a 3,900-yard, 22-touchdown season and a win in court, where he was granted a sixth year of eligibility. Lacy's 73-yard touchdown run in Mississippi's CFP loss to Miami capped a playoff stretch that identified him as a first-tier threat. The Rebels have launched Heisman Trophy campaigns for both.

“You know they’re really good players,” Golding said. “I’m not going to talk to you about that. Y'all already know that.”

Golding flicks away questions about tampering allegations

Golding was equally colorful about tampering, a topic the Rebels were drawn into this offseason when Clemson's Dabo Sweeney accused Ole Miss of unethically luring linebacker Luke Ferelli, who had barely moved from Cal to Death Valley when he suddenly bailed for Mississippi.

Without getting into details of the Ferelli affair — which served as a rare example of a coach calling out another coach for tampering — Golding pointed to one of the key problems about the transfer portal, saying it's only natural a player would want to know he has a place to go before he leaves his current school. Add agents into the mix, who can easily circumvent rules that prohibit contacting the player, and chaos ensues.

“By design it’s put a lot of people in bad positions,” Golding said. “Let’s not act like recruiting in college football for the last 100 years is the most moral thing.”

Golding is a new homeowner and it's Kiffin's old house

When it comes to ethics and morals, though, the conversation down South seems to funnel back to Ole Miss these days. And Golding and Kiffin.

Kiffin's move, the pundits say, showed college sports' money-grubbing opportunistic side at its worst. The much-debated bill circulating in Congress intended to regulate the industry includes what's known as a “Lane Kiffin Rule" that restricts when coaches can leave for new jobs.

It has made for great headlines. Golding's reaction to it — golden, as well. And in a sign that all may truly be forgiven, ESPN reported that not long after Kiffin bailed for Baton Rouge Golding bought his house in Oxford.

He said he and Kiffin text frequently, and there's a friendship there that goes beyond coaching.

“I can separate the two. Some people can’t,” Golding said. "I probably shouldn’t say this, but I don’t care, all right? Like I told an Ole Miss group the other day, ‘In 2021, if you said you could look in 2025 and you’re about to be 11-1 and go to the playoff, would you take it if your coach was leaving?’ Hell yeah. You would. Everybody won from it. It’s OK.”

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U.S. District Judge Keith P. Ellison issued the directive on Monday after an attorney for Jose Trinidad Rojas Pliego, a passenger in Salgado Araujo’s van during the shooting, filed a petition seeking his release from immigration detention.

The order also said Rojas Pliego cannot be transferred to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility outside of the Southern District of Texas while the petition is pending without the court’s permission.

A DHS spokesperson said ICE will comply with the court order.

Rojas Pliego, a Mexican citizen, has lived in the United States since 1998 and has no criminal record, according to his petition. The filing added that he is in a common law marriage with a U.S. citizen, with whom he has three children and four stepchildren — all of whom are also U.S. citizens.

Rojas Pliego has been in ICE custody since the July 7 shooting. The petition, filed on Monday, says he is detained in the Montgomery ICE Processing Center in Conroe, north of Houston.

“Petitioner is neither a flight risk nor a danger to the community,” the filing said.

The two other passengers in the van — Daniel Tirado Pantoja and Salgado Araujo’s brother Victor Hugo Salgado Araujo — have also filed similar petitions seeking release from ICE detention.

Tirado Pantoja came to the U.S. from Mexico in 1996 and also has no criminal history, according to his petition. He is also in a common-law marriage with a legal permanent resident — commonly known as a green card holder. He has a son and a stepdaughter, both of whom are U.S. citizens.

DHS must notify the court at least five days before any planned deportation or transfer of Tirado Pantoja — who is also currently detained in the Conroe facility — outside of the region, according to an order signed by U.S. District Judge Alfred Bennett on Wednesday and shared with The Texas Tribune by his attorney.

Ruby Powers, a Houston immigration attorney representing Victor Hugo Salgado Araujo, who was the front seat passenger, asked a federal district judge to keep her client’s petition sealed because she fears the high-profile case could put Victor Hugo Salgado Araujo and his family in danger of “retaliation or intimidation.”

Elkhorn coral populations were decimated by a 2023 heat wave and a less severe one in 2024 that left them functionally extinct — meaning remaining colonies are too small and far apart to reproduce in the wild — from Broward County to the Florida Keys, said Diego Lirman, associate professor of marine biology at the University of Miami. Heat causes coral to bleach, which can be fatal if it lasts long enough.

Researchers have been propagating them at coastal nurseries, but decided to bring some ashore now because of indications that 2026 will be “a really bad year” for bleaching — perhaps even worse than 2023, Lirman said. Coral has been showing indications of heat stress as water temperatures rise.

Coral populations are living creatures that form reefs, globally important for seafood production, protecting coastlines from storm surges and tourism. But scientists fear they could be lost because of climate change: Florida coral has experienced four mass bleaching events in the past decade.

“They seem to be blending into each other and corals are not getting time to recover,” Lirman said.

Divers focused Wednesday on collecting genetically diverse coral pieces, wrapping each in wet bubble wrap and placing them in coolers before sanitizing them and putting them in tanks at the hatchery.

The university exchanges coral with other researchers and facilities to preserve as much original genetic diversity as possible in nurseries and in hatcheries, “so if one goes down you don’t lose the last remaining genetic information,” Lirman said.

“You never know: You may have some that are resistant to disease, some that are resistant to temperature, some that are resistant to acidification,” he said. “Once we lose them, then that information is lost.”

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

The S&P 500 edged down by 0.1%, coming off its best day in three weeks. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dipped 6 points, or less than 0.1%, and the Nasdaq composite fell 0.6%.

Despite the modest moves for indexes, stocks had some big swings underneath the surface. Philip Morris International rallied 3.3% after the seller of Marlboro cigarettes reported stronger profit and revenue for the latest quarter than expected. Its shipments of smoke-free products rose 7.5%.

AT&T climbed 3.5% after reporting a stronger profit than analysts expected. CEO John Stankey also said the telecom is accelerating plans to send roughly $10 billion to its shareholders this year through the buybacks of its stock.

Super Micro Computer soared 19.8% after the seller of AI servers said it expects to report stronger profit margins for the latest quarter than it had earlier forecast. It, though, also said that revenue will likely come in at the low end of its forecasted range of $11 billion to $12.5 billion.

On the losing side of the market was GE Vernova, which fell 8.7% after reporting a weaker profit for the latest quarter than analysts expected.

Alphabet sank 1.5% ahead of its earnings report, which arrived after trading ended for the day.

Anticipation was high, and not just because the parent company of Google is one of the largest stocks on Wall Street. It’s also one of the biggest spenders on artificial-intelligence technology.

Investors are looking for signs that the deluge of dollars going into processors, computer memory and other building blocks of the AI boom are producing enough profits to make the investments worth it. If Alphabet and other “hyperscalers” say that isn’t the case, stocks of chip companies and other AI winners would look very expensive following their monumental moves higher.

Such worries have kept AI stocks at the center of Wall Street’s swings for weeks, and they helped drag the market up and down Wednesday.

Micron Technology swung between a loss of 3.6% and a gain of 1.2% before finishing with a drop of 1.2%. That’s after it jumped 14.4% in the first two days of this week to reclaim nearly all its 13.3% plunge from the week before. It’s still up 236% for the year so far.

All told, the S&P 500 fell 10.24 points to 7,498.96. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dipped 6.06 to 52,218.58, and the Nasdaq composite sank 146.30 to 25,690.90.

Stocks broadly also felt pressure from continuing climbs for oil prices, which raise costs for most businesses and erode their profits.

The price for a barrel of Brent crude oil, the international standard, rose 3.4% to $94.07 and briefly topped $95 in the morning to touch its highest level in nearly six weeks. That’s up from less than $72 early this month, which is roughly where it was before the war with Iran.

Rising oil prices are threatening a reacceleration of inflation. That in turn could push the Federal Reserve and other central banks to raise interest rates, which would slow economies and undercut prices for stocks and other investments.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.65% from 4.63% late Tuesday and from just 3.97% before the war with Iran began. It’s already helped bring long-term U.S. mortgage rates to their highest levels in nearly a year.

Oil prices have climbed as fighting in the Middle East keeps oil tankers from using the Strait of Hormuz to exit the Persian Gulf. Normally, a fifth of all oil and natural gas traded passes through the narrow strait.

The auto club AAA said Wednesday that the average price for a gallon of regular gas in the U.S. jumped again overnight to $4.06. That’s still below highs of around $4.56 per gallon in May, but it had been below $3 before the United States and Israel attacked Iran in late February.

In stock markets abroad, indexes climbed in Europe following a mixed session in Asia.

London’s FTSE 100 rose 1.2%, while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng fell 1% for two of the world’s bigger moves.

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AP Business Writers Yuri Kageyama and Matt Ott contributed to this report.

The Mountain View, California-based company said Wednesday it earned $112.11 billion, or $9.11 per share, in the April-June period. That's up from $28.2 billion, or $2.31 per share, in the same period a year earlier.

Revenue grew 24% to $119.8 billion from $96.43 billion.

Analysts, on average, were expecting revenue of $117.06 billion, according to a poll by FactSet. Google did not disclose an adjusted earnings figure that's comparable to analysts' expectations, which was $2.88 per share. Google saw a net gain of $98 billion, mainly as a result of gains on its equity investments — mostly in SpaceX, which went public in June.

“Our AI investments are redefining what’s possible across every part of our business,” said CEO Sundar Pichai in a statement.

Emarketer analyst Nate Elliott called the results “impressive,” especially in regards to AI.

“On the consumer side, Gemini is now within a whisker of becoming Google’s third different 1 billion-user consumer AI product, alongside AI Overviews and AI Mode,” he said. "On the enterprise side, AI demand is driving enormous growth in the cloud business. And continued strong growth in search advertising backs up Google’s claim that AI is additive to search, not a replacement.”

As usual, digital ads fueled by Google’s dominant search engine propelled the quarter's revenue growth, boosted by World Cup advertising, especially on YouTube.

The tech giant also saw strong growth in its cloud business, boosted by its AI portfolio consisting of chips, models, data, security, and agent platforms.

Alphabet's shares climbed $2.71 to $344.62 in after-hours trading.

But the greenlight comes with certain conditions.

The European Commission — which serves as the EU's antitrust enforcer — said that even with a Paramount-Warner combo, enough competitors would exist across markets like film production and streaming in its 27-nation bloc. Still, when it comes to distributing movies to theaters, the Commission warned of high concentration that could lead to “worse rental and distribution terms for cinema operators, ultimately disadvantaging consumers.”

To address this, the Commission said Skydance-owned Paramount agreed to end its European Economic Area stake in United International Pictures — a longstanding venture with another major studio, Universal, that Paramount has used to distribute films in theaters outside North America. The company must end that partnership within 13 months of closing its Warner acquisition, the Commission said, and not enter any new agreements with Universal for the next 10 years.

Among other terms, current distribution of Warner films must be shifted to the same pipeline Paramount is using in these European countries. The European Commission said its approval was conditional on the company's commitments and that it would monitor their implementation, without expanding further on how that would be enforced.

Paramount welcomed the EU's greenlight, which it said represented “a major milestone” toward completing its acquisition. In a Wednesday statement, the company added that such clearances reflect how a Paramount-Warner combo “will enhance consumer choice” and create a business with a scale “capable of competing with the tech companies that have come to dominate the industry.”

Universal did not respond Wednesday to a request for comment about Paramount's new film distribution commitments in Europe.

A Paramount-Warner combo would mean putting HBO Max, fan favorite titles like “Harry Potter” and even CNN under the same roof with CBS, “Top Gun” and the Paramount+ streaming service. Beyond movies and streaming, both American companies also own a handful of European-based TV assets — including Warner's TVN Group in Poland, as well as localized channels for flagship Paramount brands like MTV and Nickelodeon.

Ongoing challenge from US states

The EU's blessing marks the latest in a chain of regulatory clearances inching the merger closer to becoming a reality, but the deal faces other challenges. In the U.S., a federal judge on Monday ordered the companies to pause their transaction for at least two weeks.

That spans from a lawsuit brought forth by California and 11 other states seeking to block Paramount and Warner's merger altogether — on the grounds such a tie-up would “extinguish competition” in Hollywood and lead to fewer choices for consumers, particularly moviegoers and cable customers in the U.S.

Paramount has called the states’ claims meritless. And the company reiterated that on Wednesday — saying findings from the EU's approval “directly refute key assumptions that underpin the state AGs’ complaint,” particularly when it comes to competition from newer or smaller film studios.

Either way, the deal is set to be halted until at least a preliminary injunction hearing, currently slated for Aug. 3. When granting the temporary restraining order earlier this week, U.S. District Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín said states had made a strong case about a combined Paramount-Warner’s potential to “substantially lessen competition” and that the merger would be “difficult, if not impossible, to unwind” without a pause.

Other regulatory clearances

In contrast to the states' case, the Trump administration's U.S. Justice Department said it wouldn’t block the deal — and instead released a lengthy statement in support, maintaining a Paramount-Warner combo would bring "benefits for American consumers and workers.”

Paramount says it's also received regulatory clearances from countries like Australia, China and Canada. Other reviews remain in progress — including from the U.K., which has separately suggested it may intervene.

The clock is ticking. The company has pledged to start paying Warner shareholders added “ticking fee” compensation amounting to about $7 million per day if the deal isn’t closed by Sept. 30.

Including debt, Paramount’s proposed purchase of Warner is valued at nearly $111 billion based on current outstanding shares.

Beyond central antitrust reviews, regulators in Europe have also effectively approved of the billions of dollars in financial backing Paramount has secured from three Gulf states: Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. In regulatory filings, Paramount has maintained that these sovereign funds will not have any voting rights. Still, critics have sounded the alarm about what their money could mean in terms behind the scenes influence.

They equaled the 1946 American League champs, who were led by future Hall of Famer Ted Williams.

Jarren Duran had a two-run triple and a sacrifice fly, and Caleb Durbin — who hit a tiebreaking homer when they posted their 14th straight victory on Monday — chipped in with a two-run single.

Ceddanne Rafaela added a solo home run for Boston in a makeup from Tuesday’s rainout.

Christian Encarnacion-Strand had a solo homer for Baltimore, his second in two games.

Red Sox rookie left-hander Jake Bennnett (6-3) worked 5 2/3 innings, giving up three runs — one coming on a sun-aided RBI double by Tyler O’Neill — on nine hits.

He took a 102.8 mph liner off the stomach from Taylor Ward in the fifth, but remained in the game after being checked by a trainer, interim manager Chad Tracy and first baseman Willson Contreras, who appeared to make him breath while telling him to lift his arms.

Aroldis Chapman got the final three outs for his 23rd save and 390th of his career, tying Hall of Famer Dennis Eckersley for ninth all-time.

The Red Sox jumped out to a 4-0 lead against Dean Kremer (1-3) in the first on Durbin’s line single and Duran’s two-out hit.

Encarnacion-Strand hit his homer into the batter’s eye to make it 5-2 in the fourth but Rafaela hit his over the Green Monster in the bottom half.

Kremer lasted six innings, allowing six runs.

Up next

Orioles: RHP Kyle Bradish (6-9, 3.61 ERA) is set to start the nightcap.

Red Sox: LHP Eduardo Rivera (0-0, 2.89 ) will start the second game.

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

The president saluted as four transfer cases carrying the service members' remains were escorted off an airplane during the dignified transfer at Dover Air Force Base. The ritual is one of the most somber duties of a commander in chief. It was the third that Trump has attended since he launched the war in Iran in February.

Speaking at an event in Georgia hours later, Trump described the ritual as “the toughest thing I do.”

“I’ve been there many times before," he said of Dover. “This was, in particular, something very sad.”

Earlier in the day, Trump said his message to families was simple: “We love you. We love your child," Trump told reporters.

Trump was accompanied at the dignified transfer by administration officials including Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Also present were Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., and Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del.

During the ritual, transfer cases draped with the American flag and holding the remains of the fallen soldiers are carried from the military aircraft that transported them to awaiting vehicles to take them to the mortuary facility at the base. There, the service members are prepared for their final resting place.

Fallen troops came from Hawaii, Texas, New York and North Carolina

Two U.S. Army soldiers killed in Iranian missile and drone attacks in Jordan were returned during the dignified transfer. The remains of a third service member who is believed to be the soldier missing after the Jordan attacks were also returned, as well as the remains of a soldier killed in Iraq during a detonation of an Iranian drone.

The soldiers killed in Jordan were identified by the Defense Department as Tyler James Feehan, 25, of Ewa Beach, Hawaii; and Isabella Gonzales, 19, of Carrollton, Texas. The soldier who disappeared after the Jordan attacks is Angel S. Rampersad, 28, of Ozone Park, New York, the Defense Department said.

The soldier killed in Iraq was identified as Michael Emmanuel Swinton, 30, who lived in Spring Lake, North Carolina.

Trump said Feehan's family accepted an invitation to join him on Air Force One on Wednesday as he traveled to an event in Georgia, where the family lives. Speaking at the event in Marietta, Trump described Feehan as a “flawless” person who was “going all the way — he was going to be a general.”

“We will carry Tyler's memory in our hearts forever, and I just want to thank you," he told Feehan’s parents during his remarks. “It’s an honor to have you here today.”

Trump previously said the soldiers died while protecting America and other nations from Iran.

“We feel very badly, but you know, those great people, those great patriots were out there fighting so that Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon,” Trump told reporters on Sunday. He added that the U.S. was striking Iran “in honor” of the fallen troops.

Trump vows to retaliate for each US death

The U.S. has launched multiple retaliatory strikes against Iran as an interim agreement to end the war falls apart. Trump on Monday said that every time Iran kills an American soldier, “they will pay for that killing many times over!”

Since the war began on Feb. 28, 18 U.S. service members have been killed.

Trump on Tuesday said that while almost all the incoming fire in Jordan was stopped, some made it through.

“They did slip something through in Jordan,” he said. “If we had other operators, you know, it would have not happened, unfortunately.” He added that "we let other people do the job — and sometimes it doesn’t work out so well.”

Trump did not elaborate on his comments, and it was not immediately clear who he was saying was responsible for protecting U.S. forces in Jordan.

Trump attended two previous dignified transfers since the outset of the war, most recently in March.

Soldier had planned to marry fiance and attend law school

Feehan, a first lieutenant who was killed Saturday, will be posthumously promoted to the rank of captain and awarded the Bronze Star, Purple Heart and Combat Action Badge. He was assigned out of Fort Bragg, North Carolina, to the 32nd Army Air and Missile Defense Command.

Feehan’s family said in a statement that their hearts were shattered by his loss. They remembered Feehan, who went by “Tivo,” as someone who “packed in more living” in his 25 years than most do in a lifetime.

“He chased adventure relentlessly,” the statement said. “He believed deeply in the power of military service, especially what it builds in a person: discipline, leadership, character.”

He planned to marry his fiance and attend law school after his deployment. The family said they’re starting a scholarship in his name.

Gonzales, who was killed Friday, was a private with the 10th Army Air and Missile Defense Command in Ansbach, Germany. She graduated last year from Hebron High School in Carrollton, near Dallas, school officials said.

Rampersad, a sergeant who was believed to have been killed in Friday's attacks, was assigned to the 57th Air Defense Artillery Regiment, 52nd Air Defense Artillery Brigade, 10th Army Air and Missile Defense Command in Ansbach, Germany.

In a brief statement, Rampersad’s family called her a “gentle giant” who “stood up for those who couldn’t fight for themselves.”

“She loved her family fiercely and will live on in the hearts of everyone she touched,” the statement said.

Deonne Jinkins, 22, a friend, said Rampersad “loved deeply, cared genuinely, and always made people feel seen and important.”

Swinton, a sergeant who was killed Sunday, will receive a Bronze Star, Purple Heart and Combat Action Badge, and will be promoted to staff sergeant. He enlisted in the Army in 2017 and was assigned to the 55th Air Defense Artillery Regiment, 108th Air Defense Artillery Brigade, out of Fort Bragg, North Carolina.

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Binkley reported from Washington. Associated Press writers Michael Catalini in Morrisville, Pa., and Sudhin Thanawala in Atlanta contributed to this report.

That work was far from done when a new round of storms began pummeling the state this week, triggering catastrophic flash floods in some of the same areas devastated in 2025. At least two people died. Hundreds needed rescue.

But residents in some hard-hit areas said a year of preparation did make a difference. Newly installed flood sirens sounded in the darkness, warning people to get out. Phones buzzed with alerts that weren't sent out in last year's disaster.

Still, stories of people surprised to find their homes inundated by rising rivers illustrate the challenges of trying to bolster early warning systems in a vast, rural area known as Flash Flood Alley.

Some agencies were more proactive about sending wireless alerts

Over the last decade, a variety of Texas state and local agencies missed opportunities to implement flood warning systems along the Guadalupe River, the AP reported after last summer’s floods killed 136 people, including 28 at a sleepaway camp for girls.

That changed after the tragedy as lawmakers and others scrutinized a lack of preparedness by government agencies and riverside camps.

Unlike last summer, when local officials in Kerr County said they had been reluctant to “cry wolf” and order evacuations and failed to send out wireless alerts to warn of flash floods, Kerr County issued four alerts and the city of Kerrville issued one early on Thursday as the risk for flooding became apparent, according to an Associated Press review of available data.

They warned residents along Quinlan Creek to evacuate to higher ground, and of “extremely dangerous” flash flooding. Those alerts came alongside flood watches, warnings and emergencies sent to broadcast outlets, weather radios and mobile phones by the National Weather Service. People who signed up for the CodeRED notification emergency system in Kerr County also received text message warnings.

“Last year, we got no alarms. We had no idea what was going on,” said Suzanne Sutphin Gschwind, of Kerrville.

“This year, very different,” she said, with multiple texts and calls coming in from local authorities, a weather channel and her doorbell camera. One night the warnings arrived “about every two hours.”

“I think we would all like to err on the side of too much,” she said.

The warnings didn't reach everyone

Between the early morning hours of Tuesday and about 9 a.m. Thursday, the National Weather Service sent 38 alerts to people in certain southwest Texas communities, including 14 tornado warnings and 24 warnings that flooding was occurring or imminent and could be “life threatening.”

Those Weather Service notifications, though, often don’t contain the highly localized information put in alerts sometimes sent by municipal and county emergency agencies — and people in some places may not have gotten any of those local alerts, which can be more decisive for people considering whether to seek high ground.

An Associated Press review of wireless emergency alert data did not find any listed as sent by agencies in Uvalde County, which was hit hard by flooding, though agencies in that county might have used other means to alert the public.

Jaclyn Gonzales was awakened at 2 a.m. Wednesday by a friend who called to warn that a tornado might be headed toward her Uvalde-area home. When she jumped out of bed, the floor was wet.

“It was the shock of the water to my feet that made me really wake up,” she said.

Kat Sprawls only learned floodwaters were nearing her Batesville home when a friend called her at 3:30 a.m. Friday. It took five or six calls before she woke up, because she had her phone on do-not-disturb mode.

“There's no warning system at all. It's just like the flood in Kerrville last year — we had no warnings,” Sprawls said. “Over half of Batesville is under water now."

Zavala County Sheriff's Department secretary Jessica Belmarez said the department is updating its Facebook page with evacuation information and that law enforcement officers were going door-to-door in affected areas, including Batesville.

The network of flood sirens is expanding

Newly installed sirens in Ingram and in Kerr and Kendall counties were used this week to warn residents, said state Sen. Paul Bettencourt, who authored legislation in 2025 to help fund the sirens. Twenty-eight additional counties are also eligible for flood warning funding. Most are in the process of putting together implementation plans for review by the Texas Water Development Board.

“Between the outdoor sirens, and the cellphone alerts, the response was very positive in getting people out of the way and to higher ground,” Bettencourt said. “It’s an enormous improvement over a year ago.”

Three of six new sirens installed in Kerr County were used to warn people to seek high ground, said Tara Bushnoe, manager of the Upper Guadalupe River Authority. The other three were in areas with only minor flooding, Bushnoe said.

The small town of Comfort had one warning siren for years. The volunteer fire department recently installed two more.

“Some people just don’t want to leave — that’s our problem here,” said Danny Morales, the assistant fire chief. “But we did set them off twice, probably an hour from one to another, just because we had people just lingering, and not wanting to move."

Private companies are working to fill the gaps

Ian Cunningham founded River Sentry after the 2025 floods, building flood siren towers for privately owned sites like RV parks, camps and hotels. The sirens are triggered by rising water levels.

So far, the company has installed 104 sirens along the Guadalupe River, Cunningham said, including several near the site of an RV park where more than three dozen people died in 2025.

“We installed them about three months ago and did not expect them to be used so soon,” Cunningham said.

Hohonu, which has developed water-level sensor technology and a real-time data network, received a state contract that will make it easier for agencies to purchase its flood warning technology.

Watch Duty, a fire-tracking app used by millions, expanded earlier this year to help monitor floods.

Officials say the changes saved lives

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said the lessons of 2025 led to a better emergency response this time.

“Everybody in Texas has been far more prepared to deal with what has happened this year,” Abbott said during a news conference in Uvalde. “Lives have been saved.”

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This story has been updated to correct the spelling of Hohonu.

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Associated Press reporters Jamie Stengle in Dallas, Claudia Lauer in Philadelphia and Jesse Bedayn in Uvalde, Texas, contributed to this report.

Officer Rafael Morado, a three-year veteran of SAPD, was handed an indefinite suspension May 26 for violating rules including emergency vehicle responses and truthfulness of members, city discipline records show.

On Dec. 29, while operating a marked patrol unit, Morado disregarded six red lights and at times traveled at speeds that were twice the speed limit, according to records. The code-two designation assigned to the call prohibited officers from driving in this manner.

While responding to the call, Morado and an officer in a second patrol unit crashed into each other at Brady Boulevard and South Calaveras Street, records show.

Neither officer notified a supervisor of the crash, and they continued to the call, according to records.

SAPD supervisors learned of the wreck 13 days later, after another officer reported that the vehicle he was assigned to was damaged.

At roll call a day later, on Jan. 12, Morado came forward after a supervisor asked if anyone had information about the damage.

According to records, Morado verbally stated he struck a curb.

While later filling out a vehicle damage form, however, Morado wrote he was unsure if he struck the lead vehicle or a curb, records show.

It remains unclear if the other officer in the wreck has been disciplined.

Read also:

• Records: SAPD officer found passed out in front of far West Side bar suspended 30 days

Luminate, the industry data and analytics company that provides insight into changing behaviors across music listenership, examined streams of each song performed by each musician two days before the final (Friday and Saturday) and compared those figures to the final and the day afterward (Sunday and Monday.)

They found:

1. Global streams of Justin Bieber's “Everything Hallelujah” more than doubled, rising 110% from 592,000 streams to 1.25 million.

2. Global streams of Madonna's “Music” rose 66%, from 193,000 streams to 321,000.

3. BTS' “Dynamite” also grew in terms of global streams, from 2.14 million to 3.05 million for an increase of 43%.

4. And Shakira and Burna Boy's official anthem for the 2026 World Cup, “Dai Dai,” also saw a slight bump for an addition of 3.48 million new global streams. That's a 24% increase, from 14.78 million to 18.27 million. In the U.S. alone, streams of “Dai Dai” rose 52%, from 1.68 million streams to 2.55 million.

Luminate also found that the aforementioned artists only saw considerable jumps in the songs they performed on the field last weekend as opposed to their full catalogs. That phenomenon is more common for Super Bowl halftime performers.

Take Bad Bunny for example: After his record-breaking performance this year, streams of his catalog jumped 175% in the U.S. on the day after the Super Bowl, when compared to the previous Monday.

Juan Montez, 57, was initially last seen Sunday morning in the 600 block of Edgebrook Lane, according to DPS.

Below is the original story from Tuesday, July 21.

ORIGINAL: A CLEAR Alert has been issued for a missing 57-year-old man last seen on the city’s North Side.

Juan Montez, who may be in danger, was last seen at approximately 9 a.m. on July 19 in the 600 block of Edgebrook Lane, according to the Texas Department of Public Safety.

Montez is described as 5 feet and 9 inches tall with black hair and brown eyes. DPS said Montez was last seen wearing a white T-shirt, blue shorts and sandals.

The agency said Montez could be traveling in a silver 2016 Chrysler 200 with the Texas license plate VKN9978.

Anyone with information on Montez’s whereabouts is asked to contact the San Antonio Police Department at 210-207-7660 or 911.

In a video, Mamdani described the Israeli prime minister as a “war criminal” and said he is not welcome in New York City.

“It is clear that we do not have the independent legal authority to enforce this warrant,” he said in the video posted on X. “The federal government however does and I call on them to join the ICC and execute this warrant,” he added, referring to the International Criminal Court.

Mamdani had told the New York Times earlier this month that he and the city’s legal department were discussing arresting Netanyahu if he comes to New York City for the U.N. General Assembly in September.

President Donald Trump on Monday told Netanyahu in a social media post that he “will not be arrested, in any way, shape, or form, while in the United States of America.” The post did not directly mention Mamdani.

Mamdani had said throughout his mayoral election campaign last year that he would seek to order the city’s police to arrest Netanyahu under the criminal court's warrant over Netanyahu’s role in the war in Gaza.

In his video message Tuesday, Mamdani said his administration has reviewed all avenues available and determined the city can't execute the arrest warrant.

“I want to be equally clear, Benjamin Netanyahu is not welcome in New York City, nor is any other war criminal at large,” he said.

Danny Danon, the Israeli ambassador to the U.N., responded by telling the mayor “enough.”

“You were elected to serve New Yorkers, not Hamas’ propaganda,” he said in a statement on social media. “Do your job!”

The world’s top war-crimes court issued arrest warrants for Netanyahu and others in 2024, accusing them of crimes against humanity in connection with the war in Gaza.

They said there was reason to believe Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant have used “starvation as a method of warfare” by restricting humanitarian aid and have intentionally targeted civilians in Israel’s campaign against Hamas in Gaza — charges Israeli officials deny.

Rita Elizondo, 73, was sentenced to six years of deferred adjudication and must pay back her 104-year-old mother Maria $14,000 as part of a plea agreement accepted in 399th Criminal District Court on Tuesday.

Elizondo must also perform 120 hours of community service, court records show.

Elizondo, a longtime political consultant who served as SAHCC’s president from 1998 to 2004, was indicted late last year on accusations she drained tens of thousands of dollars from her mother’s bank accounts while serving as her power of attorney.

Elizondo pleaded no contest to financial abuse of the elderly between $2,500 and $30,000. As part of the plea agreement, prosecutors waived additional charges of misapplication of financial property between $2,500 and $30,000 and exploitation of the elderly, records show.

Her sentencing hearing included a recorded statement from Maria, who previously asked KSAT not to use her last name.

“At my age, every postponement carries a weight. No amount of money can restore what was broken,” Maria read on camera.

“This was a family dispute that has finally been resolved,” Elizondo’s attorney, Gerry Goldstein, told KSAT via telephone Wednesday,

Although records obtained by KSAT show the unauthorized transactions totaled more than $48,000, Elizondo was charged under statutes covering fraud up to $30,000 only.

Unauthorized transactions included skin rejuvenation and large mortgage payment

The transactions included cash withdrawals of $5,000 and $2,000, $910 on skin rejuvenation in Elizondo’s name and a payment to a mortgage company of $17,797.53, all made within a two-week period in March and April 2024, financial records show.

Maria eventually sent Elizondo a demand letter informing her that the unauthorized transactions caused her great financial harm.

The letter revoked Elizondo’s power of attorney and demanded that more than $48,000 be paid back.

Maria’s family previously confirmed to KSAT that they attempted to settle the matter through mediation, but Elizondo declined to comply with it.

Read more reporting on the KSAT Investigates page.

“We grieve every death, every act of violence, and every enforcement practice that unnecessarily endangers human life or diminishes the God-given dignity of our immigrant neighbors,” said Bishop Sue Briner with the Southwestern Texas Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

“When fear begins to shape the daily lives of our neighbors, it is time for the church to show up,” she said.

A news conference inside the Capitol brought together leaders from the United Methodist Church, the Episcopal Diocese of Texas, the South Central Conference of the United Church of Christ, the National Council of Jewish Women and more. Texas Impact, an interfaith grassroots network, organized the event.

The religious leaders condemned the “grave moral evil” of deportations, detention centers and enforcement-related deaths involving U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and urged ICE agents and government officials to “examine their conscience.” Those who determine that their actions are immoral should “resign and find other work,” said Jim Harrington, who works with immigrants at St. James Episcopal Church in Austin.

“Following orders is never a justification in the Christian tradition — nor in international law — to perpetuate evil,” Harrington said.

Dan De Leon, senior pastor at Friends Congregational Church in College Station, invoked the Sermon on the Mount. “Jesus says, ‘Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.’ Notice that Jesus does not say, ‘Blessed are the peacekeepers,’ which is what ICE alleges to be doing in our communities,” he said.

Jewish leaders turned to their faith as well: “Jewish tradition teaches that whoever saves a life saves the entire world, and conversely, whoever destroys a life destroys the whole world,” said Bettie Forman with the National Council of Jewish Women.

Others called for accountability and transparency.

“Candidates for law enforcement must be properly vetted, fully and carefully trained, and held accountable when they do not meet appropriate standards,” said Elyse Rosenberg, who represented the National Council of Jewish Women and is a member of Temple Beth Shalom in Austin.

“Throughout our history, we have repeatedly seen first-hand the consequences of governments exercising unchecked power on vulnerable populations,” she said, adding that accountability includes impartial investigations of agent-involved shootings.

The religious leaders also pressed for:

• Clear limits on the use of lethal force and an end to dangerous tactics when pulling over vehicles.
• Restrictions on using unmarked vehicles and plainclothes agents.
• Clearly visible identification and body cameras for federal immigration agents.
• Independent oversight of ICE operations with meaningful consequences if agents violate policy or the law.

Families also deserve humanity and should never learn through social media that a loved one has been detained, seriously injured or killed, said Grace Bonilla with Texas Impact.

The news conference was organized in response to the July 7 death of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo during a traffic stop by ICE agents in Houston.

“We are here today because Texans of faith and conscience refuse to accept what we witnessed in Houston as proper immigration enforcement,” Bonilla said.

“That conviction does not conflict with border security. We recognize the federal government’s responsibility to enforce our immigration laws and maintain our borders, but enforcement must never come at the expense of human life,” she said.

Texas Rep. Vikki Goodwin, the Democratic candidate for lieutenant governor, attended the news conference, calling the religious leaders’ requests reasonable and encouraging legislators to pay heed.

“I think the local or state government can have an impact on federal government by saying, ‘You’re coming into our state, this is what we want to see here.’ We want safety, not ICE agents who are wearing masks, who are frightening our community.”

“This is not a partisan issue; this is a humanity issue,” Goodwin said.

This story is published through a collaboration between The Texas Tribune and Religion News Service.

Disclosure: Vikki Goodwin has been a financial supporter 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.

Adams, 25, was charged with possession of a firearm obtained in a crime, possession of a restricted/prohibited firearm, no license while in possession of a loaded firearm and possessing a prohibited device, according to an online release from the Durham Regional Police Service in Ontario.

Adams was one of four people arrested.

“Isaiah is completely innocent in this matter,” Adams’ attorney Adam Weisberg said in a statement. “He had no knowledge of any firearm, and he will be fully exonerated.”

The report says that on Friday, police concluded an investigation into a male believed to be in possession of a firearm and involved in drug trafficking. Two of the other people arrested were charged with possession of fentanyl with intent to distribute.

The Cardinals are scheduled to have their first practice of training camp on Thursday. A person familiar with the situation told The Associated Press that Adams was expected to be in camp Thursday. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because the team is not commenting on the details of Adams' situation.

“We are aware of the situation involving Isaiah Adams,” the Cardinals said in a statement. “Out of respect for the process, we will refrain from commenting further at this time.”

Adams — who was born in Ajax, Ontario — is a third-year player for the Cardinals and in the mix for a starting job. He was a third-round pick out of Illinois in 2024.

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

“Texas should be a leader when it comes to innovation and technology, but that only works if Texans get a say and get a share of that economic growth — and that’s not what’s happening right now,” Talarico said at a news conference in Austin where he rolled out his plan. “We’re often told in our politics that we have to choose between policies that are pro-growth and pro-people. I reject that choice, and the plan that we’re outlining today to hold data centers accountable, I think, strikes a balance between welcoming those investments while also protecting working people.”

Talarico’s proposals include:

• setting minimum federal requirements to protect the grid, environment, jobs and transparency related to new data center development, “preventing a race to the bottom for communities competing to recruit data centers;”
• ending “sweetheart tax deals for big tech companies” by repealing the state’s data center sales tax exemption;
• ensuring large energy users pay for their own infrastructure and grid interconnection costs;
• requiring data centers use closed-loop water systems that reuse a fixed amount of water;
• granting local communities the authority to approve and reject data center development in their towns;
• releasing government records detailing individual tax break data for data center facilities in Texas.

Talarico is among several Texas Democrats pushing back on data centers, calling the rapid influx of the facilities in Texas a product of corporate greed and Republican leadership more sympathetic to big business than everyday people. State Rep. Gina Hinojosa, the Democratic candidate for governor, visited Amarillo and Lubbock over the weekend on a tour focused on rural communities’ concerns about data centers, and she was poised to announce her own data center plan Thursday.

“Data centers are jacking up utility bills across the state of Texas,” Talarico said. “Billionaire-backed politicians are giving sweetheart tax deals to giant AI companies and then sticking us with the bill.”

The Texas Tribune reported in April that the state is poised to lose $3.2 billion in tax revenue over the next two years because of a sales tax exemption granted to data centers that lawmakers first approved in 2013, when the facilities were smaller and used fewer resources. Local officials have asked the state to give them more authority to regulate data center development in their communities. Tracking data center growth in Texas is also difficult, as the state does not log new data center construction, and information about their location and energy use has not been made public.

Republican officials, including Gov. Greg Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, have recently projected greater concern around the impact of data center development on communities, though President Donald Trump remains a staunch advocate for the rapid growth of AI-related facilities. Talarico’s GOP opponent, Attorney General Ken Paxton, has been quieter on the issue. A spokesperson for Paxton’s campaign did not immediately provide comment Wednesday.

Recent public polling found that a majority of Texans oppose the construction of data centers in their community, with opposition strongest in rural communities, where data centers are more likely to be built and which have historically voted red.

Last week, state Rep. Vikki Goodwin, state Sen. Sarah Eckhardt and Clayton Tucker — the Democratic nominees for lieutenant governor, comptroller and agriculture commissioner, respectively — backed a moratorium on data center development.

“This isn’t about being anti-technology, it’s not about being anti-AI,” Tucker, who has made reining in data center development central to his campaign, said. “It’s about who controls that AI. Because right now, it’s not us. It is a few greedy folks from Wall Street, from Silicon Valley, some of them not even based in the United States.”

Talarico did not call for a moratorium, saying he wanted to support innovation and technology while ensuring local communities had a say in projects looking to build near them. Projects that did not meet “basic guardrails,” he said, should not move ahead.

His plan overlaps significantly with a sweeping regulatory scheme Abbott proposed last month. Abbott later also called for a ban on data center development in “rural neighborhoods.”

The three-term governor, who is running for a fourth, previously championed the growth of data centers, declaring in November that Texas would become the “epicenter of AI development” while announcing Google had made a $40 billion investment in cloud and artificial intelligence infrastructure in the state. Lawmakers passed an addition to the sales tax exemption in 2015, during Abbott’s first term.

Talarico said Wednesday he didn’t know the details of Abbott’s plan, but that he was “willing to work with anybody, including the governor, to pass these commonsense regulations.”

“It should be plain for anybody to see, whether it’s the governor or whether it’s our campaign,” he said. “All of us are hearing the same thing from Texans all over the state, and that is that we don’t have a balance between welcoming growth and protecting people.”

In a statement to the Tribune after the news conference, Talarico said the governor “signed one of the country’s biggest data center giveaways. If he is serious about helping working Texans, he should immediately end these sweetheart tax breaks for data centers.”

Disclosure: Google has been a financial supporter 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.

So when Kovar, 64, bought a Ford F-150 last fall, his hope was to be better prepared for any new crisis.

“I was interested in trying to find some sort of power backup situation,” he said.

Now, Kovar has a setup from Ford that allows drivers of certain F-150 models to plug their vehicle directly into their electric meter to power parts of their home during an outage.

It is the latest example of automakers broadly adapting their electrification technologies to the home energy business, especially as demand on the grid increases and sales of electric vehicles slow. Car companies are looking to leverage their multibillion dollar EV investments to tap into a promising market in vehicle, home and grid technology, both for backup power and for supporting electrical grid resiliency.

“They’re trying to look for other businesses that they might sell into,” said Parth Vaishnav, assistant professor of sustainable systems at the University of Michigan.

Ford's latest connects F-150 drivers to their meter

Drivers of the F-150 PowerBoost hybrid and F-150 Lightning electric pickup trucks can now plug in a one-foot long adapter to a 240-volt outlet onboard. That adapter — which Ford made with company Global Power Products — makes the vehicle compatible to plug into a longer, separate cable. That cable connects to a transfer switch installed directly on one's electric meter.

Through the adapter and cable series, homeowners can connect their vehicle essentially right to their home’s breaker box. The homeowner simply turns on and off which breaker switches they want for which devices they want powered.

“The way we think about it, especially for customers who already have a compatible vehicle is, you already own the power source, it’s in your driveway,” said Amanda Roraff, Ford's grid and energy services business acceleration lead.

The Lightning might provide power for two to three days, depending on what home devices are being used, and the PowerBoost Hybrid, up to five days on a single tank of gas.

The automaker says its solution is a less expensive way to supply backup power. Conventional, diesel-powered portable generators and full-home standby setups require expensive installation, costing several thousands of dollars. This solution, which also requires professional installation at the meter, starts around $1,100.

The setup only applies to about 200,000 vehicles so far, and it is also exclusively for outages. Ford also offers its Home Integration System for bidirectionality, sending power both from the vehicle to the home and from the home to the vehicle, while also being able to feed the grid.

Other automakers are boosting their energy solutions

Over 630,000 U.S. vehicles already have this functionality, estimates say, and automakers are rapidly expanding their available options with the goal of full vehicle-to-grid support in the long run.

South Korean auto brand Kia and Wallbox, an EV charging company, have teamed up so that drivers of eligible compatible vehicles can have home power backup during outages or during periods of high demand, to cut their utility use. They can send power back to the grid.

Tesla’s technology is similar — allowing drivers of equipped vehicles to connect to their home using additional Tesla hardware. The Cybertruck provides full vehicle-to-home capability, where other Tesla models can only connect to and power specific devices or appliances.

General Motors is also in the energy space.

A recent partnership with WeaveGrid, for instance, allows homeowners who drive certain GM EVs — and have the automaker’s home system and a proper grid interconnection — to enroll in some grid reliability utility programs. Once an outage is detected, GM’s vehicle-to-home tech has the capability to disconnect one's home from the grid and start supplying power from their GM EV.

“If you can imagine the future as we go forward, it's having the ability — now that we have this single platform — that allows our customer to experience our system,” said Wade Sheffer, vice president of GM energy, “but also can have the full control of the energy.”

The capability is an important lifeline amid EV sales slowdown

Not only is this business critical amid growing grid demand and increasing power outages, experts say automakers need to pivot with the EV market less active under current U.S. federal policy. Pure EV sales in the U.S. year-over-year are down 23.8%, according to a July Cox Automotive report on the first half of 2026. This demonstrates what an asset that EV and hybrid ownership can be.

The tech is not without challenges.

On the industry side, these systems have to undergo third-party testing to ensure they meet safety standards, and the vehicle and the charger need to be programmed to communicate. It also requires the approval of the utility where the capability is being used. It could take years to get an interconnect agreement.

On the customer side, homeowners need to understand their vehicles' abilities and how to self-manage their system. It also just brings another generator of power into the home mix.

Still, experts see opportunity, especially with interest in EV sales high outside of the U.S.

“We already know during an outage, its impact, providing electricity to the home,” said Scott Samuelsen, engineering professor emeritus at the University of California, Irvine. “This is going to become very, very popular.”

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Alexa St. John is an Associated Press climate reporter. Follow her on X: @alexa_stjohn. Reach her at ast.john@ap.org.

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Read more of AP’s climate coverage.

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

Alamo Drafthouse Cinema will operate the massive 86-foot-wide curved dome theater and an adjacent 14-theater complex. Alamo's owner, Sony Pictures Entertainment, announced the plan to restore the Dome and reopen it in early 2028.

Alamo's plan will preserve the distinctive Cinerama Dome's geodesic exterior and large logo that have been a Hollywood landmark since the theater opened in 1963. The dome will not have in-theater dining, as is common in other Drafthouse theaters.

“There is no moviegoing destination anywhere in the world that commands the affection, history, and cultural significance of the Cinerama Dome. It represents the kind of singular experience we value and champion,” said Ravi Ahuja, Chairman and CEO, Sony Pictures Entertainment. Alamo Drafthouse CEO Michael Kustermann said the dome would be its new West Coast flagship theater.

The dome's massive screen supports 70 mm projection, which is having a moment thanks to Christopher Nolan's “The Odyssey.”

It was commissioned in 1963 by Pacific Theatres founder William R. Forman as a state-of-the-art way to see movies using three projectors for its custom curved screen. When the dome closed in April 2021, it was one of only three theaters in the world with that capability. Its operator, Pacific Theaters, announced the closing was caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Michael O’Leary, the president and CEO of the movie theater trade group Cinema United, applauded the news.

“The Cinerama Dome has been a treasured and important landmark for movie fans and the entire film community for over six decades,” O’Leary said in a statement. “The timing could not be better with moviegoers making clear this year that they love the unique experience of seeing a movie on the big screen.”

Alamo Drafthouse will also reopen a 14-theater complex next to the dome that used to be operated by ArcLight Cinemas, which also shut down in 2021. Those theaters will have in-theater dining, although the chain has faced backlash recently for its pivot to an in-seat ordering operation that requires use of personal phones.

A photo snapped by a passing boater sometime Sunday apparently shows them about thigh deep in the Scioto River, fishing poles in hand, standing around a big log. Calm as the surface appeared, the river was running high and fast, according to U.S. Geological Survey data. All five adults ended up drowning, authorities have said.

After the photo was taken, if it was indeed them, the group might have returned to shore. It is not quite clear. What Delaware County Sheriff Jeffrey Balzer has said is that one of the adults was struggling to swim in the river when several others went into the water to help. All five were swept under, he said.

The two women's bodies were recovered Sunday and the three men's bodies were found Monday.

On Tuesday, Honduran authorities confirmed that four of the five adults were Honduran citizens — Dias and Regalado and another married couple whose names have not yet been released. The fifth adult also has yet to be identified.

Flabia Zamora, director of consular affairs at the Honduran Foreign Ministry, told reporters Tuesday that they were working with U.S. authorities to bring their bodies home.

Zamora said that once U.S. officials have identified all the victims, Honduras will start the repatriation process, which could take at least a month.

She said the couple’s children are in the care of the state of Ohio and that arrangements will be made to reunite them with relatives in Honduras.

One of the children, a boy wrapped only in a towel, fled the riverbank in a panic and ascended to the road as the adults were drowning. According to a passing driver who called 911, “He was screaming, ‘Mama! Mama!’ and he was about to come out onto the road, and he was crying.” She said she was afraid he was headed onto a multilane road that snakes along the Scioto's eastern banks.

Brenda Raya, who described herself as a relative, has launched a GoFundMe campaign to cover funeral and transportation costs, as well as childcare costs for the two orphaned children. She said they are 8 and 10.

“The emotional and financial burden is overwhelming, and we want to honor the memory of our loved ones while providing for the children left behind,” she wrote.

The drownings occurred along the O’Shaughnessy Reservoir. The reservoir and its 18 miles (29 kilometers) of shoreline are the property of the city of Columbus. According to the city’s Recreation and Parks Department, Jet Skis, tubing and swimming are not permitted in any city of Columbus reservoir.

Lt. Heather Byers, of the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, said rivers can be deceptively calm on the surface.

“Even though the water doesn’t seem to be moving very quickly, you can still get swept away in very slow-moving water,” she said. “Also, since you can’t always see the bottom, you never know if you’re in, you know, you could be in 2 to 3 feet of water, what you’re comfortable standing in, and then the next thing you know you’re at 4 or 5 feet.”

Besides the currents and the depths, people can catch a foot between the rocks, snag their clothes on a branch or lose their balance on slippery algae.

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González reported from Honduras. Julie Carr Smyth in Columbus, Ohio, and John Raby in Charleston, West Virginia, contributed to this report.

Sheriff’s deputies responded to the worksite just before 11:30 a.m. Tuesday in the 600 block of Gold Coast Drive.

Upon their arrival, deputies said the man worked alongside a crew working on a trench at the location when an apparent “accident happened.”

The worker, who was later identified as Somerset resident Cornelio Martinez, 34, was pronounced dead at the scene, the sheriff’s office said.

Deputies said their investigation is ongoing.

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The tornado touched down Wednesday morning, remaining on the ground for about eight minutes before dissipating. It left behind damaged businesses, downed trees and structural damage along its path, but no serious injuries were reported.

One of the areas that has rebounded quickly is the Santikos Palladium, a movie theater near The Rim. Although fencing remains around parts of the property, the theater has reopened, and signs direct customers that it is operating normally.

Mike Segovia went to the theater for a movie, but after seeing images of the storm’s destruction, he said he was surprised by how much progress had been made.

“When my daughter invited me to the movies, I’m going, ‘Is it up and running?’” Segovia said. “‘Yeah, Dad, it’s ready to go.’ So I couldn’t believe it. I actually wanted to come and look at it myself. As I look around, where are the trees that were down? I don’t see too much damage right now, and I’m grateful for that.”

Segovia said the damage appeared less extensive than he expected.

“After a while you realize, yes, it was devastating, but it was more cosmetic,” he said.

Not every business has reopened. A nearby Marshalls store remains closed, with its entrance taped off and parts of the exterior signage still missing.

In the Tanglewood subdivision, residents said crews responded almost immediately after the storm. While some broken and uprooted trees remain, much of the debris has been cleared from neighborhoods and front yards.

“Local workers were on it,” resident Victor Rosales said. “They were here maybe an hour afterwards chopping down trees, making sure people were good and stuff like that.”

Asked about the recovery effort, Rosales described it as “fast, thank God.”

The most extensive damage occurred at the Oasis Apartments near UTSA Boulevard, where the tornado ripped the roof off one building. While cleanup crews have removed much of the debris, the building remains without a roof.

Gage Commercial Construction, which is assisting with repairs at the complex, said the recovery process for a project of that size will take several weeks. The company’s immediate priorities are stabilizing the property, restoring power and HVAC service, and then beginning reconstruction.

The company said only the building that lost its roof remains without power.

The University of Texas at San Antonio Police Department said the storm displaced at least 10 students.

Despite the damage, authorities said no serious injuries were reported as a result of the tornado.

Below is Gage Commercial Construction’s full statement:

“When the tornado hit, Gage Commercial Construction had a response team onsite at The Oasis Apartments within hours that morning. The full-service contractor has an existing relationship with the ownership group, and Gage was their first call.

“The first priority in a situation like this is to take control of the site. Once the fire department finished their response that morning, Gage mobilized crews to secure the property with fencing and boarding of public entryways. This is for safety but also to protect the property from looting, which can be a common occurrence when disaster strikes.

“The damage was fairly substantial as about a quarter of the roof was pulled off, and quite a few units at the top of the building needed full reconstruction. In addition to water damage throughout there was wind damage with fences, trees, and light poles down. The pool area also took quite a hit, and the concrete carports were damaged.

“Debris was cleared and the remediation process began which includes a temporary watertight roof to protect from further damage as the rain continued. We worked to extract water from the damaged units and set up power stations, dehumidifiers, and temporary HVAC units. When the power goes out, air quality is a major concern, and all that moisture can lead to mold, so crews worked to stabilize the air to prevent further damage. This remediation process is still ongoing, as it can take several weeks with a project of this size. The goal is to get the property to a stable place, and get power and HVAC restored while the planning to build it back happens next.

“As remediation continues, Gage will work alongside the property owners to connect them to the right partners, including a public adjuster to help with insurance claims and an architect and engineer to work on the repair plans. The process to rebuild can take several months while insurance is dealt with, plans are developed, and coordination with the city.”

Gage Commercial Construction

Read also:

• San Antonio crews remove dozens of tornado-damaged trees as cleanup efforts continue

Mathieu van der Poel led his Alpecin-Premier Tech teammate Philipsen to his first stage victory of this Tour by controlling the pace and containing counterattacks through the last kilometers.

Philipsen finished just ahead of Mauro Schmid and Olav Kooij.

The Belgian rider described a “a rollercoaster of emotions” after what had been a disappointing Tour for him personally.

“I prepared very, very well. I was in the shape of my life, I think, and the first stages, the first 12 days were just horrible. I couldn’t find myself, couldn’t find the feeling I was hoping for,” said Philipsen, who thanked his team colleagues.

“I was like an angry bird at the table. I was just disappointed in myself, angry that I couldn’t take (a) stage win, that I didn’t find my feeling. And the team, they had to deal with it, not only the riders, the staff. This one is for them to keep on believing,” Philipsen said.

Pogačar plays it safe

Pogačar, who is chasing a third straight Tour title and fifth overall, maintained his lead of just over 4½ minutes over Remco Evenepoel, the winner of the previous two stages.

But it was a bad day for Pogačar’s UAE Emirates XRG teammate Adam Yates, who struggled and only made it back within the time limit. The British rider slumped over his handlebars, clearly exhausted.

The race ends Sunday in Paris.

Sprinters’ last chance

The relatively flat 174.7-kilometer (108.5-mile) route from Chambery to Voiron was the last favorable stage for sprinters before the Tour takes to the Alps, and it led to a day of attempted breakaways with many riders vying to put themselves in contention.

Van der Poel was among the leaders after Côte de Saint-Jean d’Arvey, the last significant climb, and they were joined by others before Yates’ problems began in the peloton.

Mads Pedersen was next to attack the leaders with 65 kilometers remaining, and the green jersey-holder invigorated the group when he joined them.

More sprinters broke away, swelling the group to 30 riders, before Pedersen, Ben Healy, Michal Kwiatkowski, Felix Engelhardt, Ed Planckaert and Jasper Stuyven struck out 57 kilometers from the finish.

Stuyven attacked on his own 26 kilometers from the line, leaving his five former co-leaders to chase or wait for the main bunch. They were caught. The only question was whether the 34-year-old Stuyven had the stamina to claim his first Tour stage win.

The Belgian rider was caught with less than 4 kilometers remaining, and Van der Poel did the rest for Philipsen.

Race for green jersey heats up

Philipsen's stage win moved him just behind Pedersen in the contest for the green jersey awarded to the rider with the most points.

With four stages remaining, Pedersen of Lidl-Trek had 452 points, followed by Philipsen on 445. Biniam Girmay of Eritrea was next with 361 points.

Doping test concerns

Cycling’s governing body, the UCI, responded to criticism of unannounced anti-doping controls after Pogačar and his main rival Jonas Vingegaard were woken in the early hours of Sunday for tests by the Swiss-based International Testing Agency.

Vingegaard subsequently crashed during Sunday’s stage and had to abandon the race.

The UCI said it acknowledged the night-time testing “can disrupt riders’ rest and recovery” and said it remained an exceptional measure.

“While fully aware of how onerous such a measure is for riders, the UCI nevertheless underscores that these controls serve an overriding interest: the fight against doping,” the body said in a statement.

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

Agent Tim Harrison was captured on camera June 10 walking onto the driveway of a Northwest Side home belonging to the parents of Cody Sparks and then striking Sparks.

“He walked onto my property, eyes locked, ready to rumble, which I did not expect,” said Sparks.

Sparks said Harrison punched him twice in the head before he was able to tackle Harrison into the home’s garage door.

“From there I had no choice. I grabbed his testicles, and I squeezed them,” said Sparks.

Both men are heard in the recording yelling to people off camera to call 911.

The door sustained structural damage, and more than a month after the incident, dried blood remains on the driveway.

An Animal Care Services report obtained by KSAT Investigates states Harrison was bitten on his leg by one of the family’s dogs and suffered four puncture wounds to his calf.

Harrison was treated at the scene by paramedics, the ACS report states.

‘We used to kind of be friends’

Sparks said he used to live at his parents’ home, but even after moving away, he returns almost daily to walk the family’s two dogs.

He said his relationship with Harrison turned sour about 18 months ago.

“We used to kind of be friends. We were neighbors,” said Sparks. “He likes to stop and intimidate me, so he’ll stop in the middle of the road whenever I’m walking.”

Sparks said he began to record his interactions with Harrison after Harrison spit on him.

In one incident, recorded by Sparks in May 2025, Harrison challenged Sparks to fight him in the street after accusing him of revving his engine at Harrison and Harrison’s child.

“Come on down, Cody. Mutual combat. I’m right here buddy,” Harrison is heard saying on the recorded video.

The argument came weeks after Sparks was arrested at a nearby residence for tampering with evidence and drug possession.

The tampering case was dismissed in February, and Sparks recently entered pretrial diversion in the drug case in hopes of completing the program and getting the charge removed from his record.

“You and your druggie buddies will be found again. I’ll make sure of it,” Harrison said in the May 2025 recording, as he appeared to reference Sparks’ legal issues.

The night of June 10, Sparks said he began recording Harrison after the man called Sparks a “pu***” and told him to “go get your mommy.”

The footage shows Harrison walk onto the driveway as Sparks repeatedly tells him not to come onto the property.

Officers called to the scene interviewed both Harrison and Sparks.

Harrison told the officers that he walked to the home to speak with Sparks’ mother and that Sparks approached him and “took a swing” at him.

The claim contradicts what was recorded on Sparks’ cell phone.

SAPD’s incident report states that the footage shows Harrison was the first to make physical contact.

Weeks after the fight, Harrison has not been criminally charged.

An SAPD spokesperson told KSAT the case remains under investigation.

“I feel that he feels he’s above the law, that he’s invincible and that he can do whatever he wants to anyone, even trespass and beat someone up on their own property,” said Sparks.

Sparks’ dog was required to be quarantined for 10 days after biting Harrison’s leg.

Sparks confirmed to KSAT that after the incident, he was contacted by ICE’s Office of Personal Responsibility.

ICE officials have declined to say what, if any, action has been taken against Harrison since June 10.

An ICE spokeswoman told KSAT via email, “U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement does not comment on ongoing investigations.”

A woman who answered the door at Harrison’s home spoke with KSAT at length but said she would need to consult with the family’s attorney before commenting on the record.

Since the start of 2025, SAPD has responded 19 times to incidents involving three neighboring homes on the same street: Harrison’s home, the home next door and Sparks’ parents’ home.

Ten of the incidents were for threats, disturbances and disturbances with neighbors.

SAPD earlier this month declined to release the incident reports from the disturbances, claiming in a letter to the Texas Attorney General that some of them are related to an ongoing criminal investigation while another one is related to a closed criminal investigation that did not end up going to court.

Public Health France said regions hit by the heat from June 17 to July 2 recorded 21,674 deaths from all causes. But without a heat wave, those same regions would have been expected to have seen far fewer deaths, or 15,910, based on statistical modeling using data from previous years, it said.

The difference between expected and actual deaths — a total of 5,764 — are therefore considered to be “excess” deaths during the heat wave, the agency said.

It said the excess mortality, with 36% more deaths that would normally have been expected, was the highest from any heat wave since 2003. A historic heat wave that year caused an estimated 15,000 deaths in France.

France registered its hottest-ever days on June 24 and June 25 this year — with a national average of 30 C (86 F) — as well as record heat at night and peak temperatures that soared well above 40 C (104 F) in many places.

Just over half of the unexpected deaths occurred during and in the immediate wake of that hottest period, over three days from June 25 to June 27, the public health agency said.

“This unprecedented episode, characterized by its early onset, intensity, and duration, exposed nearly the entire population to extreme heat during a period when school and work activities were still in full swing,” the agency noted.

All told, across Europe, extreme temperatures that hit exceptionally early and hard this year saw well over 10,000 more deaths at the height of the heat wave than would normally have been expected, according to figures that are still emerging across the continent.

In France, the Paris region appears to have been hardest hit, recording 1,999 unexpected deaths — around 80% more than would otherwise have been anticipated without a heat wave, the French health agency said.

Funeral service directors in Paris said they struggled to find places to store bodies before burial or cremation, with some mortuaries saying they were full and having to turn bodies away.

Nearly half of the more than 21,600 people who died passed away in hospitals, which wrestled with surges of patients suffering from heat-related ailments. About a third died at home and the rest were mostly deaths in care homes for older people, the agency said.

The latest estimated death toll, which the agency said will be updated later in the year with more complete data, was sharply higher than initial figures it had given. It had previously reported around 2,000 additional deaths from all causes for the week of June 22 to June 28, the peak in France of the heat wave that also broke temperature records in many other parts of Europe.

Experts caution that it takes a while for a full picture to emerge, and that many heat-related deaths will never formally be recorded as such. For example, a heart attack, which can be triggered by extreme heat exposure, especially in people who are older or have underlying health issues, may be listed on a death certificate simply as a heart attack.

Ukraine has made significant progress in the war this year, and a rift between the country’s outgoing army chief and its defense minister threatened to derail its efforts. Both men lost their jobs following Zelenskyy’s major government reshuffle last week.

The top-level changes late Tuesday were intended to draw a line under an unwelcome spasm of political turmoil that lasted almost a week and prompted rejoicing in Russia. It was not clear whether Zelenskyy's measures would achieve that goal.

The new army chief, 43-year-old Maj. Gen. Mykhailo Drapatyi, belongs to a new generation of Ukrainian generals who have come up through the ranks during the battle against Russian aggression. He became known for his daring and courage in 2014, the year that Russia seized and illegally annexed Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula — eight years before Moscow's all-out invasion.

Zelenskyy said Drapatyi and other commanders must present an updated defense strategy, including continued reform of the corps system, faster weapon and drone deliveries, stronger air defense against Russian strikes and a clearer mobilization plan.

Russia says the changes in Kyiv won't alter the front line

There is no sign that the two countries are any closer to a peace settlement, despite U.S.-led diplomatic efforts.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Wednesday that Moscow is sticking to its previous demands. They include Kyiv withdrawing its forces from the four eastern regions that Russia has seized but doesn’t fully control, renouncing any aspirations to NATO membership and sharply cutting the size of its army.

Peskov told reporters that the Ukrainian political and military changes reflect strains in Kyiv.

“Kyiv’s regime is trembling from within. It can be seen with the naked eye,” Peskov said.

Nor will the top-level alterations change the front line, he told reporters, claiming that Russian forces are on the offensive.

With the war’s roughly 1,250-kilometer (800-mile) front line mostly off-limits to independent observers, Russia and Ukraine have also engaged in a propaganda battle.

Fedorov's future is still uncertain

Zelenskyy met separately Tuesday with outgoing defense minister Mykhailo Fedorov, a 35-year-old tech-savvy entrepreneur credited with swiftly developing Ukraine’s drone technology that has given it a battlefield edge.

Fedorov locked horns with outgoing commander-in-chief Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi, a 60-year-old veteran trained in the Soviet Union before Ukraine’s independence.

Street protests in Kyiv and other cities demanded Fedorov’s return, viewing him as a key military modernizer, and urged Zelenskyy to fire Syrskyi, regarded as part of the old guard.

The demonstrations looked set to continue on Friday, despite Syrskyi's exit.

“It is good that the dialogue is working. At the same time, we should not forget the protesters’ second demand — to reinstate Mykhailo Fedorov as defense minister,” Dmytro Koziatynskyi, a veteran and former combat medic who has emerged as an informal voice of the protests, wrote on Threads.

Zelenskyy offered Fedorov what he called a respected position in the government that would unify the country’s technology sector. It wasn’t clear if Fedorov accepted the offer -- or whether the latest moves would satisfy protesters and calm the streets.

Fedorov said after his dismissal last week that he had been offered jobs by some global defense tech companies.

Fedorov supported Drapatyi's appointment, calling it a “new hope in the fight of free people for freedom and justice” and “a voice for change that could not go unheard.”

Fedorov had criticized Syrskyi publicly before his dismissal, saying the general was blocking his reform efforts and needed to be replaced for Ukraine not to fail in its resistance against Russia.

Outgoing military chief points to recent battlefield achievements

Syrskyi defended his wartime record in a statement Wednesday.

Among other things, he claimed Ukrainian forces had clawed back 743 square kilometers (287 square miles) of Russian-occupied Ukrainian territory this year and said he was handing his successor an army that was not only defending but also conducting offensive operations.

It was not possible to independently verify his claim.

Fedorov called Syrskyi to thank him for his military triumphs, including defending the Kyiv region at the time of Russia's February 2022 full-scale invasion, the Kharkiv counteroffensive operation later that year and other battles, calling them “already an important part of Ukraine’s history.” But he added that the country must “move even faster and write new chapters, correcting all previous mistakes.”

The political crisis began last Thursday, when Zelenskyy overhauled his wartime government, replacing his prime minister and firing Fedorov after just six months in the post.

The reshuffle immediately drew thousands of protesters into the streets of Kyiv and other cities, framing Fedorov’s removal as Zelenskyy siding with an entrenched military old guard over a reformer.

Zelenskyy said Wednesday that he’s also appointing Maj. Gen. Ihor Skybiuk as chief of the General Staff as part of the overhaul.

Russia and Ukraine keep up their long-range strikes

The political maneuvers took place against a backdrop of continued deadly strikes by Russia and Ukraine on each other's soil.

Ukrainian drones overnight struck two more sprawling warehouses of Russia’s major online retailer, Wildberries, in Russia’s southern regions of Krasnodar and Stavropol, Wildberries founder Tatyana Kim and Russian officials said Wednesday.

The strikes came four days after Ukraine’s long-range drones hit massive Wildberries warehouses in the Moscow region and in the Tambov region, killing eight people and wounding dozens, according to officials.

Zelenskyy said, without naming the facilities, that they were used by Russia to supply sanctioned components for the production of drones and navigation equipment.

Russian attacks, meanwhile, have also struck several major Ukrainian logistics hubs and retail facilities over the past week.

Russia attacked Ukraine with four missiles of various types and 216 long-range strike drones overnight from Tuesday to Wednesday, according to the Ukrainian air force.

In the southern Odesa region, a Russian drone killed a woman when it struck a two-story apartment building, regional military administration head Oleh Kiper said.

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

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The FA said Wednesday that Eckert had been charged for three incidents that came to light during the end of season playoffs.

Southampton was expelled from the Championship playoff final in May after admitting to spying on other teams, including semifinal opponent Middlesbrough.

The FA said it was alleged Eckert acted in an “improper manner and/or brought the game into disrepute” by authorizing the observation of opponents' training sessions.

Southampton was charged by the English Football League with the unauthorized filming of Middlesbrough’s practice sessions ahead of their two-legged semifinal, which it went on to win and go within one game of promotion to the Premier League.

It was expelled from the final after admitting to spying on Oxford United and Ipswich earlier in the season. The EFL also imposed a four-point deduction for next season, while Middlesbrough was reinstated to the final, which it lost 1-0 to Hull City.

An arbitration panel laid bare the influence of Eckert in the scandal, saying it was “a contrived and determined plan from top down to gain a competitive advantage” and analysts who carried out the unauthorized filming “felt pressurised to do the observations that Mr. Eckert and the senior coaches wished them to do.”

Expulsion from the playoffs deprived Southampton of the chance of promotion to the top flight and a guaranteed windfall of at least $270 million in future earnings.

Despite the controversy Southampton said it was sticking by its coach.

“As a board, we are fully behind him,” owner Dragan Šolak said in June, “and together we only have one objective — we want promotion back to (the) Premier League.”

Eckert also said in June that he had “made a mistake” and took “full responsibility.”

Eckert has until July 28 to respond to the FA charges.

___

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

Rubio spoke at the start of an annual meeting in the Philippine capital, Manila, with counterparts from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations who have expressed alarm over the resurgent fighting in the Middle East that has battered their region. Despite Washington’s preoccupation with Iran, Rubio said, “We’re with ASEAN 100%.”

“If we create a precedent in the Middle East where a nation-state can decide that they are going to control an international waterway, charge a toll and if you don’t pay them, blow up your ships, we have created a very dangerous precedent which will repeat itself in other parts of the world, including in this region,” he said.

Washington's top diplomat also renewed allegations that Iran has reneged on commitments under a collapsed interim ceasefire deal. Rubio said Iran “has been reaching out to the United States, both directly and indirectly, to engage in talks about settling the differences.” He said that while “the U.S. would love to reach a diplomatic settlement," the Trump administration is “not going to sit by and let ships be blown up or Americans be attacked.”

Top diplomats from the U.S., China, Russia and several other countries are in Manila this week to take part in at the ASEAN ministerial gathering. Newly minted British Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband was arriving Wednesday, his office said.

Sergey Lavrov, Russia's foreign minister, told reporters that Moscow would like to see a quick settlement between the U.S. and Iran.

“There are those eager to incite each party to keep the conflict going, but we aren’t one of those,” he said.

“We would like to see it stop — it impacts the global economy and Russia is part of the global economy,” Lavrov said, adding that Moscow is “interested in stable global energy prices to pursue long-term economic policies.”

Southeast Asia hit hard by energy shock from Iran war

Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong underscored her country's concern over the renewed attacks in the Middle East, warning that “the situation could deteriorate further without much warning.”

“We want to see an end to this war. We want to see a ceasefire. We want to see negotiations and we want the strait to be opened,” Wong told reporters.

“People are being affected by what is happening and has happened to global energy markets and the effect on people has been direct and personal,” she said.

Overreliance on fossil fuel imports from the Middle East has made Southeast Asia particularly vulnerable to the energy shock triggered by the Iran war, according to the International Energy Agency, which called the crisis a “stark wake-up call” for the region’s energy security.

Asian markets imported about 80% of the crude oil and almost 90% of the liquefied natural gas, or LNG, transiting through the Strait of Hormuz in 2025, the IEA said.

Rubio and allies reaffirm commitment to counter growing Chinese influence

Rubio also met with counterparts in the four-nation Quad partnership, which is made up of the U.S., Australia, India and Japan. They discussed maritime and transnational security, among other issues, and issued a joint statement that reaffirmed their commitment to maritime security initiatives aiming to counter China’s growing influence in the region.

During the meeting, Japanese Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi voiced strong opposition to any attempts to change the status quo by force in the region, including in the disputed South China Sea and East China Sea, where China's increasingly aggressive actions have sparked concern.

Tokyo has a long-running dispute over Japan-controlled islands, which Beijing also claims, in the East China Sea.

Wong echoed his concern, saying, “We have real concerns about behavior that is destabilizing and risky.”

The Trump administration has repeatedly criticized China's assertive actions in the South China Sea to the disadvantage of smaller claimant countries like the Philippines, Washington's oldest treaty ally in Asia.

Rubio met separately with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, telling reporters later that they discussed a new altercation this week between Chinese and Filipino forces in a disputed shoal. Rubio called the incident “escalatory."

“It speaks to areas of disagreement when it comes to our policies with China,” Rubio said. “Those need to be managed very carefully, because obviously, a conflict — be it economic or otherwise — between the U.S. and China would have a dramatic global impact.”

He said they also talked about a trade board that is meant to allow the two governments to discuss certain goods, and that he hopes it can be a “deliverable” from a planned meeting in the U.S. in September between President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping.

Wang protested to Rubio about “recent negative words and actions by the U.S. side,” according to the Chinese Foreign Ministry. It was not clear what he referred to, but Trump recently accused China of meddling in the 2020 election and the U.S. administration shortened visas for Chinese journalists.

ASEAN foreign ministers discussed the territorial disputes Tuesday, welcoming progress in yearslong negotiations between China and their regional bloc on a proposed non-aggression pact that aims to prevent a major conflict in the disputed waters that could draw in the United States.

Rubio and Lavrov to discuss Ukraine

Rubio said he will meet Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, on Thursday and discuss the war in Ukraine. He suggested he also would use the meeting to find other areas of potential cooperation between the U.S. and Russia.

He said the U.S. remains open to playing a role in ending the conflict “if that opportunity presents itself.”

Rubio said those efforts have “kind of fallen off a little bit over the last few months” but he will use the meeting with Lavrov to see if there’s an opportunity to renew talks.

Lavrov, meanwhile, said he will ask Rubio about Trump’s claim that a settlement on the war in Ukraine is getting close.

Rubio also met with his Indian counterpart, External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, a U.S. official said. They discussed both regional issues and the Iran war, along with a yet-to-be completed trade agreement to lower Trump’s tariffs on Indian goods.

___

Associated Press journalists Haruka Nuga and Anton Delgado in Bangkok, Mari Yamaguchi in Tokyo and Fu Ting in Washington contributed to this report.

In a letter sent to Texas Family Initiative — EMPOWER’s parent entity — Texas Department of Family and Protective Services Commissioner Audrey O’Neill notified the company that “EMPOWER has failed to perform satisfactorily under its Community-Based Care contract after continuous quality improvement plans, corrective action plans, and other remedial measures.”

In a separate letter sent to judges, attorneys and advocates, O’Neill said the action came “following an extensive assessment” and was done with “one priority in mind: helping ensure children, youth, and families receive safe, stable, and high-quality services.”

The agency also noted that the decision came after conditions within EMPOWER continued to present safety problems and contributed to “critical breakdowns in case planning and decision-making, resulting in the deaths of two children. Additionally, medical mismanagement stemming from staff turnover caused a child to suffer a lupus flare-up and hospitalization.”

Those services and care to more than 2,000 children in EMPOWER’s care will now transition to two other contractors: Our Community Our Kids (OCOK) and Texas Family Care Network (TFCN). The move prompts even more questions about the state’s rocky progress in handing off state foster care management to private companies.

A representative for EMPOWER informed The Texas Tribune that it was not allowed to comment on the state’s action without getting its statement pre-cleared by DFPS. 

Late Tuesday the company, through a spokesperson, emailed a statement that said it was “disappointed” by DFPS’ decision 

“We are proud of our dedicated staff, providers and partners and the positive impact they have made in the lives of countless children and families,” EMPOWER’s statement said. 

The agency’s drastic move comes less than a week after the Texas Attorney General’s office — which represents DFPS in court — filed a court motion to extend EMPOWER’s receivership until Oct. 14. 

“While progress has been made, the conditions that gave rise to the receivership have not been fully resolved,” the July 17 motion stated. 

EMPOWER’s contract for the fiscal year ending in August was $137.6 million.

DFPS selected EMPOWER to manage and oversee foster care children in nine north Texas counties: Dallas, Collin, Ellis, Fannin, Grayson, Hunt, Kaufman, Navarro and Rockwall. But in its first two years, the state issued more than a dozen notices to the agency outlining its shortcomings when it came to training, staffing and case management.

More than a year ago, attorneys with the Dallas County district attorney’s office took their complaints to state Sen. Angela Paxton, R-McKinney, and she carried a bill creating the receivership process for DFPS to take over the supervision of poor performing foster care contractors.

After a second child’s death in two years occurred in March, the state petitioned a Dallas County district judge to allow it place EMPOWER under its supervision. The move is the latest challenge to the state’s efforts to privatize all of its foster care management system and occurs as the agency tries to settle its ongoing 15-year federal lawsuit over foster care conditions. That lawsuit, which comes with court-appointed monitors of foster care placements and resulting improvements, has cost Texas taxpayers more than $200 million.

DFPS has declined to offer details about their ongoing negotiations with EMPOWER since it took over the supervision of the company’s work in March. The agency’s supervision was supposed to end in June, but instead, DFPS requested that the receivership be extended to August. It also requested that when it files its official progress report on EMPOWER to the Dallas court in August, that it be sealed from public view.

It hasn't worked out that way. With a little more than three months to go, both parties are grappling with self-inflicted wounds and messy missteps that have complicated their paths to victory in key races.

Trump steered the country into a war against Iran with no end in sight, disrupting the global flow of oil and spiking prices at the pump. He remains fixated on purging his party of dissent and relitigating his election defeat six years ago.

On the other side of the aisle, Democrats are in the throes of an internal civil war between moderates and progressives, as democratic socialists successfully oust incumbents. Some candidates have imploded in spectacular fashion, jeopardizing races the party had expected to win.

The drama has turned existential as each party faces a moment of reckoning. Democrats remain shaken by Trump being elected again and are desperately searching for a path back to power. Republicans are beginning to contemplate a post-Trump era even as the president maintains an iron grip on the party.

Frank Luntz, a longtime pollster, said the year has been consumed by “a sense of chaos and confusion.”

“We really do not know what’s going to happen in November," he said.

Candidates have been rocked by scandal

Democrats' latest turmoil has unfolded in Wisconsin, one of the most narrowly divided battleground states.

Lt. Gov. Sara Rodriguez abandoned her bid for governor after a campaign finance scandal just as she seemed to be consolidating support. Now the party establishment is concerned her departure will elevate Francesca Hong, a democratic socialist who's viewed by party leaders as a potentially weak opponent against U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany, the likely Republican nominee.

“If we lose, Trump’s most loyal lackey in Congress takes control of Wisconsin, and that’s turned regular Democratic angst into flop sweats,” said longtime Wisconsin liberal activist Scot Ross. Still, he predicted that once the focus moves past the primary fight, Democratic voters would unite behind the party's candidate.

Then there's Maine, where the party is eager to defeat Republican Sen. Susan Collins as part of a nationwide push to regain control of the chamber.

Graham Platner, an oyster farmer and political outsider, rode a wave of grassroots energy to the Democratic nomination, only to drop out after an allegation of sexual assault, which he denies.

Supporters had hoped Platner would be the kind of candidate who could win white working-class voters back to the party, despite controversies including a tattoo widely recognized as a Nazi symbol and a history of inflammatory social media posts. Democrats are holding a convention this weekend to choose a replacement candidate.

Celinda Lake, a Democratic pollster and consultant, said activists and voters have been willing to overlook potential vulnerabilities while supporting outsiders for office.

“There is something in the air that has made these candidates incredibly reckless and thinking that they can get away with it," she said, pointing to the president as a potential explanation. “I think Trump has kind of created a high-risk environment."

Marc Short, the former chief of staff to Trump's first-term vice president, Mike Pence, said the dynamic was reminiscent of 2010 when the tea party ushered in a wave of unvetted Republican candidates who famously beat establishment figures in primaries but lost in November, costing Republicans the Senate even as they made gains in the House.

The shoe, he said, is now on the other foot.

“I feel like when there is a lot of energy on one side that you can tend to nominate candidates that create hurdles for you and limit what your gains could be,” he said.

Divisions between Democrats are on display in key races

Other races are forcing Democrats to confront some of their deepest divisions.

In Michigan, Senate candidate and progressive favorite Abdul El-Sayed has worried party leaders like Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer who fear he's too far left to win in the seat, which Democrats will need to hold onto if they want a shot at winning the majority this year. Supporters point to the enthusiasm he's garnered as a way forward for the party.

The primary also highlights a schism over Israel. El-Sayed has described Israel’s military campaign in Gaza as a genocide, an accusation rejected by Israel and the White House. In response, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, and its affiliated groups have spent close to $30 million backing primary rival Haley Stevens.

Adam Green, co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, said it's clear voters across the country are rebelling against a political system they see as rigged and are yearning for candidates willing to fight on their behalf.

He said candidates like El-Sayed would serve as proof of concept going into 2028 that “bold, shake-up-the system economic fighters" are more electable in purple and red states than "stale, status quo corporate-aligned Democrats.”

In Washington, Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., downplayed the idea the ideological divisions would endanger Democrats.

“A healthy party is a party that has arguments," he said. “I think our party should be debating ideas. We should be having hotly contested primaries."

Republicans rocked by retirements and ousted incumbents

Republicans are facing their own challenges as they try to buck historical precedent and maintain congressional control.

Trump reshaped this year’s Senate map by sidelining some Republican incumbents and promoting loyalists to replace them. That includes in Texas, where he ousted longtime Sen. John Cornyn and endorsed Ken Paxton, a fiery conservative with a lengthy history of corruption allegations.

Republican leaders had warned his nomination would put the state in play and force the party to spend millions of dollars defending what would have otherwise been a safe seat.

Others chose to leave the party. In North Carolina, Sen. Thom Tillis declined to run for reelection after feuding with Trump. Democrats hope to flip the seat with former Gov. Roy Cooper.

Whit Ayres, a longtime Republican pollster and strategist, said Trump “has exacerbated the problem” of a political culture that has produced more extreme candidates on both sides of the aisle thanks to closed primaries.

Trump can boost candidates — or hold them back

Republicans have historically struggled when Trump isn't on the ballot. But he also risks weighing candidates down.

Just 37% of U.S. adults approve of how he's handling the presidency, according to the most recent AP-NORC poll, which shows deep dissatisfactions over his handling of the economy and other issues.

But instead of staying focused on lowering prices, Trump has continued his bombardment of Iran in a struggle for control over the Strait of Hormuz, a critical waterway for global oil supplies. He also delivered a primetime address in which he continued to dispute his 2020 loss in an appeal for more restrictive voting laws.

“Trump is our biggest ally," said Lake, the Democratic pollster and consultant. “He’s the best things that Democrats have going. And it’s the gift that keeps on going."

But Jenny Beth Martin, chair of the grassroots conservative group Tea Party Patriots Action, disagreed.

“President Trump is the single greatest advantage Republicans have in the midterm elections," she said in a statement. “The energy and enthusiasm he generates is incomparable, and we’re counting on him to motivate his supporters to go to the polls.”

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Associated Press writers Scott Bauer in Madison, Wis., and Steven Sloan in Washington contributed to this report.

The 32-year-old South Korean singer's second full-length album looks back on a decade of change as she moves from the uncertainty of her early 20s.

“It has seven tracks, and they reflect the emotions and feelings I’ve experienced from my early 20s until now — like a chronicle of my life,” Kim told The Associated Press.

The album, released seven years after her last major project, the 2019 EP “GENERASIAN,” marks a return for an artist who has spent her career shifting between genres and exploring questions of identity, belonging and self-discovery. It arrives 13 years after her debut full-length album, “A Voice.”

When Kim released “GENERASIAN,” she said global interest in South Korea and its music, including K-pop, was still developing. She said the album came from a desire to speak about her own identity and perspective as an Asian woman born in South Korea.

“That was a period when no one had really told that story properly,” she said. “I wanted to show that perspective properly — not through the way it’s usually seen from abroad, but from my own point of view.”

Kim said her new album represents a move away from the broader cultural questions of “GENERASIAN” and toward a more personal reflection.

“After I finished ‘GENERASIAN,’ I thought about my next step for a long time,” she said. “Each album feels like a record of what I was feeling at that time, and then I move on. This time, I wanted to focus more on my own individual story.”

Kim broke through in 2011 as part of South Korean folk-pop duo Togeworl before launching her solo career in 2013. She won two Korean Music Awards in 2020.

The singer said the album’s title reflects the uncertainty she felt during the years it covers — a period she described as moving through a “wasteland” while searching for direction.

The album’s title track, “Never Gonna Be Alone,” begins at a wedding and explores the paradox of feeling most alone when surrounded by a bride and her guests. Kim said that feeling became more familiar as she entered her 30s and attended more weddings. The song’s warm, string-laden sound belies its unsettling lyrical undertone.

“INSA” — the Korean word for “greeting” — features rapper Bree Runway and plays on the formality of everyday exchanges Kim encountered when she entered the music industry. She said she often felt a sense of distance from the people and glamour around her.

“It wasn’t that I felt like one of them, but more this strange sense that I was somehow separate,” she recalled.

Kim said she hopes listeners who are also navigating uncertain futures can find something familiar in her journey. The album draws inspiration from South Korean novelist Yang Gui-ja, American writer Joan Didion and Studio Ghibli film “Spirited Away” — works that similarly explore self-identity and transformation.

Chief Jason Brady notified Michael Godinez via a termination letter KSAT obtained Tuesday. The now-former officer was officially let go June 18.

Godinez’s last dispatch in Seguin

According to a police report, Godinez and four additional officers were dispatched on an assault in progress call May 20 at the Stone Ranch Townhomes in the 1300 block of C. H. Matthies Jr. Road.

The five officers arrested Danny Lee Villela, 48. According to jail records, he was booked into the Guadalupe County Adult Detention Center on the following charges:

• Having a prohibitive substance or item in a correctional facility (third-degree felony)
• Family violence assault (Class A misdemeanor)
• Resisting arrest, search or transport (Class A misdemeanor)
• Possessing less than two ounces of marijuana (Class B misdemeanor)

As of Tuesday, court records show Villela remains in custody at the Guadalupe County Adult Detention Center.

Complaint made against Godinez

In a formal complaint filed one day after the incident, Seguin Police Department Lt. Marcos Martinez alleged that Godinez may have used excessive force against Villela.

Godinez was the first officer on scene, according to the complaint obtained by KSAT on Tuesday. Upon arrival at the apartment, documents show Godinez directed a family member away from Villela so he could place him in handcuffs.

“It is not clearly visible on BWC (body-worn camera) from Ofc (Officer) Godinez’s viewpoint. However, it appears the subject (Villela) was struck several times on the back side of the head,” Martinez alleged in the complaint.

According to Seguin PD Administration Lt. Michael G. McCann, Godinez was terminated for violating the department’s Response to Resistance and Aggression policy.

McCann said Godinez could face criminal charges in connection with the May 20 incident. As of Tuesday night, Godinez is not facing any charges.

Until his June 18 termination, McCann said Godinez joined Seguin PD in August 2023.

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The whales are among the first six of a pod of 30 to be moved to the United States, with the other four transferred to Shedd Aquarium in Chicago.

SeaWorld said the whales made the trip in specialized cold-water containers, traveling by truck and plane with marine mammal veterinarians and animal care teams accompanying them throughout the journey.

The belugas will receive around-the-clock monitoring and immediate care as they adjust to their new environment. Care teams will watch for signs that the whales are settling in, including eating, exploring and socializing.

Officials said the transfer is an important milestone, but not the end of the effort. More rescues from Marineland of Canada are still being planned.

Additional rescued beluga whales are expected to be relocated to Georgia Aquarium, SeaWorld San Diego and Oceanogràfic Valencia in Spain, pending government approval.

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A report issued Tuesday by the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime estimated that scams caused estimated losses in the Asia-Pacific region alone of as much as $114 billion in 2025. It warned that even as authorities conduct raids on industrial-sized scam centers mostly located in border regions of Myanmar, Laos, and Cambodia, criminals have responded by shifting to other parts of the world or operating on a smaller scale.

Patel arrived in Cambodia from neighboring Thailand which co-hosted a two-day summit with the U.S. this week on scam centers that was attended by representatives of nearly 20 countries and hundreds of law enforcement officials.

The head of the top U.S. law enforcement agency met with Thai Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul for talks on joint cooperation to tackle scam centers and other transnational crimes, such as human trafficking and drug trafficking, particularly through information sharing and intelligence exchanges.

Cybercrime has flourished in Southeast Asia where law enforcement is weak, particularly in Cambodia and Myanmar. Scam centers are also linked to human trafficking. Thousands of foreign nationals who are employed to run “romance” and cryptocurrency scams to swindle victims are often recruited with false job offers and then forced to work in conditions of near-slavery.

Cambodia this year claims to have accelerated a crackdown on the scam operations, whose proliferation there is “a top priority for the U.S. government,” according a U.S. Embassy statement. Washington appreciates Hun Manet’s pledge to counter this problem and is coordinating closely with the Cambodian government to battle the problem, it said.

The embassy said Patel’s visit “reinforces the need for strong, joint efforts to combat transnational cybercrime, including increased efforts to hold high-level scam bosses accountable and for improved information sharing regarding complicit officials and scam compound owners.”

The U.S. also “fully supports efforts to ensure justice for victims and criminal accountability for online scam operators, those who enable or protect them, and those complicit in related human trafficking crimes,” it added.

Cambodia will host an international conference on combating cyber scams in September, Hun Manet said in a post on his Telegram social media account.

“It was a bit more of a rugged crowd. And they were small crowds,” she says in a recent interview with The Associated Press. “I could only enter after the bar closed. That was after midnight because I was underage. And as long as the bar wasn’t still serving, then I could go in and play while everybody was finishing up their last call.”

It was “character building,” she says, painting an image of a bygone era of her life in Northern Ontario and one dramatically opposed to the glitz and glamour associated with the five-time Grammy Award winning country musician. But those days were instrumental to what became her career. “I spent a lot of years dreaming about things that would eventually come but took a little while,” she says.

As Twain describes it, her latest album, “Little Miss Twain,” out Friday, is the period of her life from her earliest performances at age 8 all the way to her late-20s, when she inked her major label record deal.

“There’s this whole gap of life that I’ve never written,” she says. “I wanted to fill in story wise, personal story wise. … It’s a phase of my life that not a lot of my fans would know about.”

Revisiting the past — in more ways than one

A number of the songs on “Little Miss Twain” have been sitting with the singer for many years. “'Rockstars' I was writing probably 10 years ago now, and ‘Northern Town' is one that’s been around for a long time,” she says.

The title track of the record, “Little Miss Twain,” is its emotive heart — a song for her mother, who died in a car crash in 1987, alongside her stepfather, and never got to experience her success. For Shania, it was an opportunity to reflect on “my mother being my manager and my agent, my driver and my coach, even though she couldn’t sing a note,” she said. “She would drive me around to all these stages, underage in the bars, and that’s where I got my experience.”

The song was one of the last ones to make the collection, she says, but “it was this missing piece that came to me.” That's at least partially due to the inclusion of Tanya Tucker, who duets with Twain on the track.

On the chorus, Twain sings “According to my mother / I'm the next Tanya Tucker.”

Twain says of having Tucker on the record: “I don’t know if I would ever really be able to explain in words what it meant and what it would have meant to my mother.”

The song also features her son Eja D’Angelo Lange on background vocals; he appears on a few of the album's tracks. “I get to fulfill a lot of things that my mother would not have been able to share with me,” she says about working with her son. “It’s really beautiful.”

Genre explorations from a country music giant

Pulling from her early years allowed Twain to focus on some of her musical loves in and outside of country music. Listen closely and you'll hear “Motown, the country and western that my grandparents used to play like Marty Robbins” she says. “There’s a lot of rock edge stuff in there. ‘Faded Blue Jeans’ is very much a bluesy rock song” — it features Queens of the Stone Age's Josh Homme.

The multi-genre moments on the album, with credits that also include Ronnie Wood, work for Twain's current voice, which now features a wizened rasp. “I don’t have the little sweet sound I had years ago, but I have a new sound that I actually like,” she says. “And I think I write songs a bit differently because of it.”

A number of years ago, Twain contracted Lyme disease, which affected her voice. In 2018, she had implants placed in her larynx. “It’s a very unusual procedure to have for a singer,” she says. “I had damaged nerves in my larynx. So the vocal cords were perfectly fine.” The surgery worked, and the continued result is a kind of gravelly tone, a vocal fry, and additional distinction to her already unmistakable voice.

When her audience listens to “Little Miss Twain” for the first time, Twain hopes they will leave the experience with “a sense and a feeling of the atmosphere that I grew up in, the environment that shaped me, the experiences that developed me as a person and as an artist,” she says.

She wants them to get to know the cover singer at the local bar, the woman who didn't have childhood success. “I hope they learn,” she takes a beat, “about the missing chapter of who I am.”

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio blamed Iran for the Houthi rebel group's naval blockade against Saudi Arabia but hoped it could be de-escalated.

The Houthis are armed and significantly influenced by Iran but are independent of Iran’s supreme leader, unlike the Lebanese militant Hezbollah group and several Iran-backed Iraqi militias.

“Anything that restricts shipping through the Red Sea would be problematic for the same reasons that the Strait of Hormuz is problematic,” Rubio said on the sidelines of a regional summit in the Philippines. The U.S. is closely monitoring the situation, he said, and has contacted Saudi Arabia a number of times over the last week about the threats.

The Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world's oil passes in peacetime, has been fully or partially closed since the war in Iran started on Feb. 28 with U.S. and Israeli attacks.

“It’s not a new threat, but it’s one that’s manifested itself in the past, but at the gist of that issue is the fact that, again, Iran is in the middle of it. Talking about the troublemaker in the region, it’s Iran,” he added.

Meanwhile, Pakistan on Wednesday condemned the Houthi threats and said they violate established principles of international law.

The Houthis opened a new front against Saudi Arabia by declaring a naval blockade of the kingdom, threatening the flow of global oil supplies and trade. With the Strait of Hormuz blocked, Saudi Arabia has relied on a pipeline to the Red Sea to get millions of barrels of oil out to market.

Three Houthi officials said the group warned international shipping companies on Monday to avoid transiting through the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, the gateway to the Red Sea on the opposite side of the Arabian Peninsula from the Strait of Hormuz. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to journalists.

A news agency in Yemen run by the Houthis, SABA, said Tuesday that six ships in the Red Sea were forced to reroute after they received warnings from the rebel group. The Associated Press could not immediately confirm the claim but tracking data from MarineTraffic.com showed at least three tankers appeared to make U-turns on Tuesday.

Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry on Wednesday warned that the actions “threaten regional security, undermine freedom of navigation, challenge the rules-based maritime order and jeopardize uninterrupted flow of global commerce.”

The Foreign Ministry in Islamabad said Pakistan was “particularly concerned by reports of threats directed against vessels engaged in lawful commercial trade with the Kingdom.”

The ministry warned that “any hostile act against Pakistani-flagged vessels or Pakistani maritime interests will be regarded as a grave threat to Pakistan’s national security and sovereign interests.”

Pakistan and Saudi Arabia are longtime allies, and the kingdom is one of Pakistan’s largest oil suppliers.

Last year, the two countries signed a mutual defense pact defining an attack on either nation as an attack on both. The agreement followed Israeli attacks on the neighboring Gulf state of Qatar. Pakistan has also repeatedly condemned Iranian attacks on Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia.

Pakistan brokered an interim peace deal between the U.S. and Iran in June and is currently mediating between the two sides after they resumed attacks on each other earlier this month.

Pakistan and Saudi Arabia have maintained close defense ties for decades, in part because of Islamabad’s longstanding commitment to help defend Islam’s holiest sites, Mecca and Medina, in the kingdom. Pakistani troops were first deployed to Saudi Arabia in the late 1960s amid concerns over the war in Yemen involving Egypt.

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Associated Press writers Fatma Khaled in Cairo and Michelle Price in Manila contributed to this report.