Minnesota voters will settle a moderate-versus-progressive Democratic U.S. Senate primary between centrist U.S. Rep. Angie Craig and progressive Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan. In the race for governor, Mike Lindell, known as the MyPillow Guy, leads a crowded Republican primary with President Donald Trump’s endorsement, while Sen. Amy Klobuchar faces minimal opposition for the Democratic nomination.

The Democratic primary for Wisconsin governor is another high-profile clash between the party’s establishment and progressive wings, as democratic socialist Francesca Hong tries to rise above establishment candidate David Crowley. In a Republican primary for U.S. House, Trump-backed candidate Michael Alfonso, the 26-year-old son-in-law of U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, is seeking to win Duffy’s former district.

And Republicans in South Carolina are casting ballots in a special primary election to replace the late U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham on the state’s general election ballot. The crowded race has attracted top party members, including two congressmen and a former governor — but Trump has endorsed Graham’s sister, Sen. Darline Graham, a political unknown appointed to serve out the final months of her late brother's current term.

Here's the latest:

Who is Sen. Darline Graham, the late Lindsey Graham’s sister?

Until her brother’s death, not much was known about Darline Graham, aside from their close relationship and hardscrabble upbringing.

Darline Graham was often at her brother’s side for big political moments, like the launch of his 2016 presidential campaign. The late senator often spoke of their difficulties early in life, and how the death of both parents in swift succession, when Darline was still a teen, bonded them together more tightly.

But Darline Graham has otherwise led a relatively quiet life with her husband and daughters in Lexington, South Carolina. She served in state government for years, working with people with disabilities and as agency head of the South Carolina Commission for the Blind.

Special Senate primary field features some of South Carolina’s top GOP names

A dozen hopefuls initially filed their paperwork, but not everyone was certified by the South Carolina Republican Party due to new party rules.

Here’s a look at the names that made it onto Tuesday’s ballots:

— U.S. Russell Fry, a two-term House member and Trump ally

— Sen. Darline Graham, sister of the late Sen. Lindsey Graham and appointed interim senator

— Mark Lynch, a businessman who ran against Lindsey Graham in the initial June primary

— U.S. Rep. Ralph Norman, a member of the conservative House Freedom Caucus

— Mark Sanford, a former governor who also served two stints in the U.S. House

Other candidates include Walterboro attorney Duke Buckner, Central farmer Danny Ford II, former Myrtle Beach Mayor Mark McBride, retired Air Force officer Glenda Gail Parker, and biomedical engineer and entrepreneur Sam Shepherd.

Trump’s immigration surge shapes Minnesota’s Democratic Senate primary

The immigration enforcement surge in the Minneapolis-Saint Paul metro area this year has added another schism in the primary between establishment-backed U.S. Rep. Angie Craig and progressive Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan, which otherwise echoed many of the other left vs. center divides in the Democratic Party this year.

Flanagan has attacked Craig for voting for tighter enforcement soon after Trump returned to office last year. Craig later expressed regret for her decision after the Republican president sent a surge of immigration enforcement officers into Minneapolis.

Craig says her experience winning tough races in Minnesota and fighting in Washington makes her the best person to take on Trump over immigration.

Voter who backed Mark Sanford as governor picks Graham in Senate race

Former Gov. Mark Sanford has been angling for a political comeback.

But Scott Brown said the Senate wasn’t the right move for Sanford, who became the subject of political jokes in 2009 when he went missing for days.

Staffers said Sanford had been on the Appalachian Trail. But he was actually in Argentina with a woman he was having an affair with, and Sanford spent his remaining months in office apologizing to the state.

“I voted for him when he was governor. I might even vote for him as a governor again,” Brown said when asked if Sanford had been a factor in the Senate primary. “I hate it for him.”

Frank Bohn felt more strongly about denying Sanford another chance at serving South Carolina.

“He was terrible as a governor, and he would be terrible as a senator,” said Bohn, who — like Brown — voted for Sen. Darline Graham in Tuesday’s primary.

Voters split over heft of Trump’s endorsement in South Carolina Senate primary

President Donald Trump endorsed Sen. Darline Graham’s candidacy even before she said she was running in South Carolina’s special GOP Senate primary. But voters who said they were voting for her seemed split over whether the president’s buy-in mattered.

“He’s the greatest president ever as far as I’m concerned,” Frank Bohn said after casting his ballot early last week for Graham. “President Trump means a lot.”

But for fellow early voter Scott Brown, who also said he was a Trump supporter, Graham’s debate performance won his support and meant more than the president’s endorsement.

“It never does,” Brown said when asked if Trump’s endorsement swayed him toward Graham.

Sometimes, a Wisconsin voter says, you can’t ‘vote your heart’

Standing in the afternoon heat outside the western Wisconsin fire hall where she’d voted, Sarah Atkins Hoggatt said she wished she could have voted for Hong.

“I embrace her ideology,” she said, ticking off issues like reproductive rights and “Medicare for All.” “I would have wanted to vote for her.”

But she also believes that Hong’s deeply progressive politics, combined with concerns among some voters with democratic socialist candidates, make a November victory much harder for her.

“I voted for someone who I think has a better chance” to beat Tiffany, said Atkins Hoggatt, 61, who sells construction material and drain systems. She voted for Crowley.

“I didn’t vote my heart,” she said.

Democrat Rebecca Cooke looks for a rematch against Rep. Derrick Van Orden in Wisconsin

A former Democratic fundraiser and small business owner is vying to face the Republican representative for a second time in a competitive Wisconsin congressional district.

Rebecca Cooke faces a primary challenge from former Eau Claire City Council President Emily Berge. Berge has run an underdog, insurgent campaign against Cooke, who is more well-known and better financed.

Cooke narrowly lost to Van Orden in 2024. She also ran in 2022 but lost in the Democratic primary.

Van Orden is one of President Donald Trump’s biggest supporters but will face a tough reelection bid in the narrowly divided 3rd Congressional District and in a year where the president's approval ratings are low in Wisconsin.

Personal connection, Lindsey Graham’s record helped sway voters toward Darline Graham

Frank Bohn said an interaction with Sen. Darline Graham in a parking lot was part of what tilted the scales in her favor in terms of his vote in South Carolina’s special Senate primary, when he cast his vote early last week in Horry County.

“She’s not a politician, but she was kin to probably one of the greatest senators ever,” Bohn said, reflecting on his impression of the political newcomer and the service of her brother, the late

Sen. Lindsey Graham. “Being not a politician, and just being able to follow the path of her brother … she could do no harm.”

Susan Bohn said her husband’s recollection helped make up her mind to vote for Darline Graham, too.

“I was going to vote for somebody else, but I changed my mind,” said Susan Bohn, who had been considering U.S. Rep. Ralph Norman.

Lindsey Graham’s Senate service helped tip one voter toward his sister

Debra Dowd said she was deciding between two candidates in the South Carolina Senate primary, U.S. Rep. Russell Fry and Sen. Darline Graham, but ended up going with the latter in part because she admired the late Sen. Lindsey Graham’s service.

“I just think her brother did a wonderful job for all the time he’s been in the Senate, so I went for her,” Dowd said after casting her ballot for the late senator’s sister in Conway during early voting last week.

It wasn’t all about Lindsey Graham’s service, though. Dowd said she considered President Donald Trump’s endorsement of Darline Graham, as well as her performance earlier this month, in which the candidate voiced strong support for the president’s agenda.

“Watching the debate, I liked her answers,” Dowd said. “Her debate performance was really good.”

Special GOP primary to replace late Sen. Lindsey Graham is taking place just a month after his death

The longtime South Carolina Republican lawmaker had been seeking a fifth term when he died suddenly a month ago, and the campaign to pick a new GOP nominee has been a whirlwind.

State law sets out the timeline that officials must follow for a special election when a seat becomes vacant. Candidates had about two weeks to file for the contest, then two weeks to campaign.

Graham’s sister was swiftly appointed to serve out the remaining months of his current term. In a move that surprised many political watchers in the state, Darline Graham also launched a primary bid, something she said came at the urging of President Donald Trump, with whom her late brother had been closely aligned.

Preliminary medical findings note Lindsey Graham died from an aortic tear.

Voter says Fry's experience won his vote in the South Carolina Senate primary

After casting his ballot during early voting in Conway last week, George Mitford said he picked U.S. Rep. Russell Fry in the special Senate GOP primary because he favored the two-term congressman’s experience over current Sen. Darline Graham, appointed last month to serve the rest of her late brother’s current term.

“I just thought he’d probably had more experience in this than she would have had,” Mitford said, adding that he had supported Sen. Lindsey Graham’s tenure in the Senate.

“I’m a conservative and a Republican, and I just think he was the best choice,” said Mitford, who lives in Fry’s district along South Carolina’s northern coastal area.

Vermont Democrats pick a challenger to long-serving Republican Gov. Phil Scott

The Democratic primary features a race between economist Amanda Janoo and Aly Richards, a former child advocacy organization CEO.

Richards, 40, grew up in Newbury, Vermont, and has received endorsements from former Vermont governors Howard Dean and Madeleine Kunin. She previously worked for former Gov. Peter Shumlin and on former President Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign.

Janoo, 38, was born on a farm in Strafford, Vermont. She began her career working with the United Nations and international development organizations.

Scott, who has served five terms and is one term away from becoming the state’s longest-serving governor, is running unopposed.

Vermont is one of two states, along with neighboring New Hampshire, that hold a gubernatorial election every two years.

Incumbent plans fight to retain redrawn US House seat in Alabama

Republicans redrew Alabama’s 2nd Congressional District after the U.S. Supreme Court severely weakened the Voting Rights Act earlier this year.

The redraw added a Republican-leaning seat to the state’s congressional map by shifting the boundaries of one represented by a Black Democrat.

The seat is now held by Democratic Rep. Shomari Figures, who was unopposed in his primary and has said he plans to aggressively defend the seat.

Six Republicans are competing in the special congressional primary for the chance to challenge Figures in November.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has placed Figures on its list of “frontline” candidates for extra support in what they consider the most pivotal districts. The National Republican Congressional Committee has similarly put the district on its list of targets for 2026.

‘She feels like one of us,’ Hong supporter says

In the Wisconsin governor’s race, software engineer Cody Chandler said he didn’t worry about electability when he cast his ballot for Hong.

“In the past I’d think about who could win,” said Chandler. “But this time I’m voting for who I want to win.”

He’s thrilled by Hong and the progressive movement around her.

“She’s probably the most exciting candidate I’ve seen,” said Chandler, 35, who voted in the town of Hudson. He sees himself as a progressive, someone inspired a decade ago by Sen. Bernie Sanders, and volunteered for Hong’s campaign.

“She seems to be like a real working-class person. Sure, she stumbles over her words sometimes — but so do I,” he said, laughing. “She feels like one of us.”

In Wisconsin, a Republican votes Democratic — and for the candidate she thinks can win

Linda Biles believes Hong’s politics will frighten voters like her — a Republican in a largely rural area who votes Democratic because she dislikes Trump and politicians who back him.

“I think just the word ‘socialism’ is turning off Republicans,” said Biles, a 71-year-old retired home economics teacher, after casting her ballot in the western Wisconsin town of Hudson. “It scares them away.”

Crowley, she said, was an obvious choice: “He’s got more of a chance of beating Tiffany,” she said.

A former NFL broadcaster votes for herself in Minnesota

Michele Tafoya is seeking the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate.

She strode into a suburban Minneapolis church with a phalanx of reporters and photographers watching. She checked in with poll workers, filled out her ballot and fed it into the counter.

“How are you?” she asked the top election official on site.

“I’ll be glad when you’re done,” the stressed-out official responded with a laugh.

In the parking lot out front, she argued that this will be the year voters end a 20-year losing streak for Republicans running statewide in Minnesota. Voters, she said, are fed up after widespread reports of fraud in public assistance programs.

“Minnesotans are ready. We’ve had a crisis of leadership here,” Tafoya said. “We’ve seen what career politicians have done in this state. They’ve brought us to a place of national embarrassment, and this state is ready for change.”

The U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board issued a final report into the August 2025 blast at Clairton Coke Works, which also injured 11 others, including contractors.

U.S. Steel has said the explosion happened when workers were flushing a gas valve with pressurized water in preparation for routine planned maintenance at the sprawling riverside industrial facility, the largest of its kind in the Western Hemisphere. The valve ruptured under intense pressure and released combustible coke oven gas.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration previously fined the company a total of $118,214 and issued 10 citations. OSHA had said that U.S. Steel’s written procedures, practices and training to safely maintain equipment and flush the gas valve were incomplete, outdated or inadequate.

The Chemical Safety Board report recommended that U.S. Steel develop a written procedure for washing valves with pressurized water in order to minimize the operation's hazards. It also recommended that an industrial cleaning contractor which used a pump truck to apply pressurized water to the valve develop written policies and procedures for cleaning piping systems containing flammable or toxic gas, and train its workers in such operations.

The Chemical Safety Board report found that when a valve would not close fully, U.S. Steel had a practice of injecting steam or high-pressure water into the cleanout port in an attempt to remove residue.

“U.S. Steel had no procedure for how to safely conduct this operation, but for at least three years before the incident, U.S. Steel employees had utilized pressurized water to clean valve seats on an ad hoc basis despite the lack of a formal procedure prescribing it,” according to the report's executive summary.

Chemical Safety Board member Sylvia Johnson said the blast "was the result of workers routinely performing a task incorrectly over a period of years until it ultimately led to a catastrophic explosion.”

The valve that failed was more than 70 years old and made from cast iron, which the report said is widely recognized as a brittle material. Numerous safety publications either ban or warn against using cast iron equipment in certain hazardous applications, including for flammable substances such as coke oven gas.

The report also said the two workers who died and two of the five seriously injured workers were located around buildings directly above the coke oven gas piping. If these buildings were located in a different area of the facility away from coke ovens, "this incident could have been far less severe,” said Drew Sahli, the Chemical Safety Board investigator in charge.

Before the blast, Clairton Coke Works had a history of accidents and explosions, and some current and former workers there say poor management and underinvestment have exacerbated air pollution and undermined workplace safety, Pittsburgh’s Public Source and The Associated Press have found.

The blast came on top of a string of other accidents at the Clairton plant over time, as well as a long history of legal battles between U.S. Steel and Allegheny County regulators, who regularly accuse the company of flouting environmental rules at the facility.

The report noted that a similar gas oven explosion occurred at the Clairton plant in July 2010, injuring 14 U.S. Steel employees and six contractors. The report criticized U.S. Steel for failing to conduct a subsequent facility siting evaluation after that incident.

It turned out to be an ultra rare collection of 97 “absolutely pristine” copies of Super Mario Brothers Duck Hunt, a popular Nintendo game that had been released in 1988, Ganos said.

After some initial research, Ganos found that the cartridges he held were not only a new variant of the game, but also the last known production date of it.

Most of the cartridges will go up for sale Friday in an online auction that will run until Sept. 9.

“I still don’t quite believe that any of this is happening,” Ganos said. “I just think it’s kind of serendipitous that this happened. It’s just still very bizarre to me.”

Ganos, a hard-core fan covered in Nintendo tattoos and who has operated Nintendo Wire, a news service for Nintendo announcements and nostalgia for over 10 years, said he would not venture to guess how much the games are worth.

But when he saw the box, he immediately knew it was special.

“It’s like pulling out like a Holy Grail,” Ganos said, later adding “they're gorgeous.”

The discovery came after the owner, Kevin Braun, of One Stop Wonders in Waukesha, outside Milwaukee, asked Ganos to help him sell some stuff, including common Nintendo games and Pokémon cards.

Braun mentioned the box of Mario cartridges that had been sitting in storage for years. He recalled buying them from a customer whose family had kept them for metal scraps but thought they were not worth much.

The cartridges of Super Mario Brothers Duck Hunt he had were made in 1993, long after the company discontinued the bundle in 1991. Braun and Ganos still aren’t sure why the copies they possess were made but assume they were either warranty replacements or part of a bundle with a box retailer that never panned out.

Knowing the potential significance of the possession, Ganos booked a flight immediately.

“I flew down to California with 97 carts in my carry-on luggage, sweating bullets going through TSA, like why do you have 97 little circuit boards in your carry on?” Ganos recalled thinking nervously.

He anxiously made it through airport security to meet with video game experts to have the cartridges verified and graded, giving them a perceived value.

There had never been a cartridge rated a perfect 10, on a .01 scaling basis at Professional Sports Authenticator video games, Ganos said.

Five of the 97 Ganos possessed received a perfect score.

“I think there’s going to be historic significance to the tens,” Ganos said when talking about how much the games may sell at the auction. “Like number one, it’s so many people’s childhoods, and number two, there’s never been a 10 in an NES cart before.”

Ultra rare video game cartridges, especially ones with unique production history, can be sold for six- to seven-figure prices in the collector’s market. Ganos said the 97 carts are also unique because of their perfect condition, that much like comic books or sports cards, often sell higher.

Ganos can't estimate the ultimate worth of the cartridges because they are incomparable to other video game collectibles he has seen before. They could be worth hundreds, thousands or tens of thousands, he said.

Ganos and Braun are only auctioning off three of the perfect 10 scored cartridges at Golden Pop’s Culture Auction beginning Friday. They are both keeping one copy with a score of a 10, and a few others rated in the higher 9’s.

The games can be played if the buyer wants. But because they are pristine, Ganos hopes to keep them that way.

“Finding uncirculated stuff for me is just like super exciting,” Ganos said. “This game was the first video game I’ve ever played. Mario Duck Hunt was just such a big part of my life growing up.”

Braun and Ganos also plan to do a charity auction after they are finished with the current one.

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Wilder is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.

About 100 firefighters from Mexico were on the way to help fight the blaze that's destroyed homes and other properties near Okanagan Lake in British Columbia. The fire has killed an 80-year-old woman and burned toward Summerland, a community of about 12,000 people roughly 300 kilometers (185 miles) east of Vancouver.

The fire showed “quite significant growth” in some areas overnight even without strong winds, said Cliff Chapman, director of provincial operations for the British Columbia Wildfire Service. He added crews were working around the clock to establish control lines and make it safe for evacuated residents to return home.

“We recognized and we heard even last night that people obviously would like to go home. They would like to see the extent of the damage,” Chapman said.

Provincial officials ramp up evacuations

Kevin Dunbar, British Columbia’s executive director for emergency response and recovery operations, called it one of the largest evacuations in recent British Columbia history.

British Columbia officials said they had secured 1,600 hotel rooms and 1,000 group-lodging spaces for evacuees in Okanagan after some residents faced delays getting emergency assistance during the weekend evacuation.

Beyond those already forced to flee, another 10,000 people have been told to be ready to leave on short notice. More than 100 wildfires were burning across the province, and officials warned that dry lightning could spark new fires in the Central Interior and Okanagan. The province also asked the federal government for help expanding lodging for evacuees.

RCMP are investigating whether criminal activity played a role in the fire. Chapman said about 4% of wildfires in British Columbia over the past decade were suspected of having been deliberately set, but officials have not said the Bald Range fire was intentionally started.

Evacuated residents recount emotional experience

Lucille and Gordon Beach of Summerland were in Vancouver for the weekend wedding of a granddaughter when they heard the fire had started. “We didn't feel too celebratory,” Lucille Beach said Tuesday.

The couple, staying for now in West Kelowna with their dog, haven't seen their home since leaving Friday but believed it was OK. It took a few days to adjust to the reality of what was happening, Lucille Beach said.

Carmen Bodzasy evacuated from Summerland, where she and her husband moved recently. She had to navigate evacuating on unfamiliar roads while he was away for work.

Before leaving, “I cried my eyes out for a minute, and I thought, you know what, if I had to restart over, what would I take with me?” She took photos of her parents' wedding, of her children's families and of her and her husband. “I thought if I didn’t have walls to go home to, at least I have memories to put up on my new one,” she said.

Holding her small dog Tuesday, she was not sure of the status of their home but said whatever happens, she intends to stay in Summerland, a place where people wave at passing motorists and stop to ask how you're doing.

“I’ll do whatever I can to help that town rebuild because everybody’s so kind there,” she said.

Other fires burning in the West

In the U.S., firefighters in California on Tuesday were fighting a blaze that’s burned roughly 3 square miles (8 square kilometers) in the Big Sur region of the state’s rugged central coast. Area state parks have closed and evacuation orders have been issued, including for a roughly 7-mile (11-kilometer) stretch of Highway 1, the state’s iconic coastal route. The highway was open as of Tuesday morning, California Highway Patrol spokesperson Ryan Moore said.

The Timber Fire has held east of the highway, authorities said.

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Gillies reported from Toronto. Associated Press writer Claire Rush contributed from Portland, Oregon.

Tornado warning sirens howled as the skies darkened. All flights were temporarily stopped at Chicago’s two major airports, and officials warned about delays as the backlog was cleared. In Ohio, power outages swept the state capital region.

Photos from the Chicago area that were posted on social media showed flooded roads, trees tangled in power lines and homes with gashes in the roof.

“No power. It was very scary. We were down in the basement,” Javid Jenkins in Homewood, a Chicago suburb, said. “We’re built for snow. We’re built for cold. We’re not built for this.”

Jenkins, 54, said he was driving around for gas to fire up a generator to preserve food in his refrigerator.

There were numerous reports of wind gusts of 80 mph (128 kph) or more at personal weather stations.

“Total devastation. No roof,” said Kerry Hourigan, standing outside her home of 25 years in the Chicago suburb of Tinley Park, Illinois. “Stupid thing but my focus was I just bought a new barbecue grill, and I have no idea where that is. It’s disappeared."

The National Weather Service bluntly warned earlier in the day: “These are dangerous storms!”

More than 600,000 customers lost electricity in Illinois and Indiana, according to poweroutage.us. Lake and Porter counties in Indiana and Will County, Illinois, south of Chicago, were especially hit hard. Farther east in Ohio, more than 166,000 customers were without power.

The fifth day of the 10-day Lake County Fair was canceled, disappointing fans who were hoping to see a professional wrestling event involving people under 5 feet (1.5 meters) tall.

Nearby in LaPorte County, Indiana, there’s a “tremendous amount of tree damage,” Commissioner Joe Haney said.

Officials in Columbus, Ohio, sent local government workers home early ahead of another round of storms. The library in Westerville, Ohio, closed after rain poured into the atrium.

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White reported from Detroit.

The S&P 500 fell 0.3% for a second modest drop since setting its all-time high on Friday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dipped 184 points, or 0.3%, and the Nasdaq composite sank 0.6%.

The action was stronger in the oil market, where the price for a barrel of Brent crude briefly jumped above $90 in the morning before falling back below $87. It eventually settled at $88.91, up 1.4% from Monday.

Such erratic moves have become typical since the United States and Israel attacked Iran in late February, which led to the closure of the Strait of Hormuz and kept much of the world’s oil pent up in the Middle East. Last month alone, Brent’s price veered between $72 and $102 per barrel.

Higher oil prices make inflation worse, and they’ve sent the average cost for a gallon of regular gasoline to $4.01, according to AAA. That’s up from less than $3.14 a year ago, though it’s down from last week’s nearly $4.09.

That has Wall Street’s attention focused on Wednesday, when the U.S. government will release the latest monthly reading on inflation. Economists expect it to show inflation remains high but that it decelerated to 3.4% in July from 3.5% in June.

That could help the Federal Reserve, whose members are notably split on whether they should be raising the country’s interest rates to keep a lid on inflation. While higher rates could help slow the increases of prices on store shelves, they would also slow the overall U.S. economy by making it more expensive for U.S. households and businesses to borrow money. They would also undercut prices for stocks and other investments.

Traders are betting on a coin flip’s chance that the Fed will raise its main interest rate at its next meeting in September, according to data from CME Group. If it does, that would be the first increase in more than three years. It also could anger President Donald Trump, who has been lobbying for lower interest rates.

Treasury yields have jumped since the war with Iran because of higher oil prices and worries about inflation, sending long-term mortgage rates to their highest levels in a year.

The 10-year Treasury yield eased back Tuesday, falling to 4.69% from 4.72% late Monday. But it remains well above its 3.97% level from before the war with Iran.

On Wall Street, On Holding dropped 20.3% even though the Swiss sneaker company reported a better profit for the latest quarter than analysts expected. It gave a forecast for upcoming revenue that fell short of analysts’ expectations, while saying it does not want to slash prices to drum up more sales.

Companies broadly have been blowing past analysts’ forecasts, which Wall Street loves because stock prices tend to follow the path of corporate profits over the long term. Earnings per share for S&P 500 companies are on track to be 50% higher than a year earlier, according to FactSet, and that’s a big reason U.S. stocks have been setting records recently despite worries about expensive oil, high inflation and other challenges.

Aramark, the food company and facilities manager, rallied 8.5% after reporting stronger profit and revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected. Cardinal Health added 1.3% after topping analysts’ profit expectations for the spring.

All told, the S&P 500 fell 24.91 points to 7,728.20. The Dow Jones Industrial dropped 184.13 to 53,791.85, and the Nasdaq composite sank 159.91 to 26,445.45.

In stock markets abroad, indexes were mixed in Europe and Asia. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng fell 1.1% for one of the world’s bigger moves.

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AP Business Writers Matt Ott and Elaine Kurtenbach contributed to this report.

Prompted by an Iranian assassination threat, Trump secretly flew out of last month’s NATO summit in Ankara, Turkey, on an alternate military aircraft while the White House made it appear he was with the press pool on Air Force One, according to a report published by The Washington Post.

Russia has released American military veteran Robert Gilman who spent more than four years in prison on disputed charges under abusive conditions and was said to be gravely ill and at risk of dying, a group advocating for him said Tuesday. Gilman was on his way to a U.S. military hospital in Texas, where he will be medically and psychologically assessed and treated.

The president’s media company has tried a half-dozen businesses to lift its stock, but nothing has worked. Now it’s getting back to its roots, telling investors Monday that Truth Social will focus on selling early high-speed access to his administration’s announcements on social media, a move raising ethical questions.

The Latest:

Trump heads off to Patriot Games to watch teen athletes compete

The president has departed Washington to attend the Patriot Games in Geneva, Ohio.

The games that are part the America’s sesquicentennial celebration and feature high school athletes from across the country that Trump has billed as a chance to display “the best of American skill, sportsmanship, and competitive spirit.”

Trump is arriving on the final day of the competition, in which the student athletes are competing for a slice of a $250,000 scholarship pool.

Kennedy Center ordered to pay legal fees to musician who cancelled show over Trump name change

A judge has ordered the Kennedy Center to pay more than $250,000 in legal fees and costs to a musician who was sued by the performing arts venue for cancelling a Christmas Eve performance last year, an act of protest against adding President Donald Trump’s name to the building.

D.C. Superior Court Judge Tanya Jones Bosier on Monday ordered the center to pay the musician, Chuck Redd, approximately $252,000 within 45 days. The same judge had dismissed the center’s lawsuit against Redd in June.

Lisa Banks, an attorney for Redd, described the center’s lawsuit as a “meritless” attempt to silence opposition to the name change.

Redd, a drummer and vibraphone player, had presided over holiday “Jazz Jams” at the Kennedy Center for 20 years.

The Kennedy Center didn’t immediately respond to an email seeking comment.

US military says it has fired on a ship in Gulf of Oman to enforce its blockade of Iranian ports

The U.S. military said Tuesday that its forces fired on a Panamanian-flagged ship in the Gulf of Oman that tried to evade the American blockade on Iranian ports, a move that comes as President Donald Trump tries to keep economic pressure on the Islamic Republic.

U.S. Central Command said the vessel had ignored warnings to stop, prompting an American helicopter to fire missiles into the engine room of the M/V Vela Nova, disabling the ship. U.S. Central Command’s statement does not say whether the ship’s crew suffered any casualties.

Central Command said it has redirected 55 commercial vessels attempting to run the blockade, disabled three non-compliant vessels and boarded two. The U.S. Navy currently has more than 15 warships, including two aircraft carriers and an amphibious assault ship, stationed in the waters of the Arabian Sea.

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Democratic Rep. Raskin launches inquiry into failed prosecution of constituent in Reflecting Pool case

Maryland Rep. Jamie Raskin, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, is launching an investigation into the Trump administration’s prosecution of former Olympian David Hearn over damage to the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.

Prosecutor Jeanine Pirro dropped the case after acknowledging damage to the pool was caused by a botched installation rather than vandalism. Trump then publicly rebuked Pirro, saying she “folded like an umbrella.”

In letters Tuesday, Raskin seeks records from the Justice and Interior departments on the decision to prosecute Hearn, a Maryland resident who lives in Raskin’s district. Raskin also seeks communications with the White House and evidence presented to the grand jury.

“At a minimum,” he wrote, “it appears that members of the Trump Administration were ready and willing to imprison an innocent American for a decade in a desperate effort to soothe an ex-landlord’s wounded ego about a terrible paint job and wasteful contract.”

Emails seeking comment were left Tuesday with Pirro’s office and the Interior Department.

Trump administration says more oil is flowing through Strait of Hormuz

Energy Secretary Chris Wright said on social media that nearly 9 million barrels of oil a day are getting shipped through the Strait of Hormuz — as the administration is suggesting that the supply pressures tied to the Iran war are easing.

Wright said that along with additional oil flowing through pipelines total oil flows from the region are averaging roughly 15 million barrels a day.

U.S. oil futures prices remain above the pre-war levels, with a barrel trading on Tuesday afternoon at $83. The Trump administration has tapped the strategic petroleum reserve to steady the market and that reserve last week fell below 300 million barrels, down by more than 100 million barrels since the start of 2026.

Wright is setting expectations that oil will keep going through the strait.

Trump announces release of American detained in Russia, says no prisoner swap took place

The U.S. president said Tuesday that Robert Gilman, a Marine veteran who was detained in 2022, is being released on a “humanitarian basis” after talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

“We appreciate this decision, and the fact that Russia asked for no one in return — No exchange took place,” Trump said in a social media post on Tuesday.

Gilman is scheduled to land at Andrews Air Force Base just outside of Washington, D.C. on Tuesday night, Trump said. He is being accompanied on the plane back to the U.S. by his mother, Nancy.

“I just spoke to him, and he had one request — A GREAT cheeseburger when he lands,” Trump said in his post. “I will take care of that!”

Sen. Ed Markey: Gilman’s return was long overdue

“It is a tragedy that it took Robert’s near-death condition for his case to receive the attention that it required for his release to be negotiated,” Markey said in the statement from Global Reach.

“Throughout his detention, Robert was subjected to physical torture, forced medication, and provocations by Russian authorities. There is no doubt that his treatment by Russian authorities is the reason Robert is in this precarious state today.”

State Department: Other Americans should be released as well

The State Department said that Gilman had been determined recently to have been wrongfully detained, and was released on humanitarian grounds.

This “was not part of an exchange, and no other concessions were provided,” the department said. It called Gilman’s release “a welcome step that we hope leads to the release of Americans unjustly held in Russia, such as wrongful detainee Stephen Hubbard.”

Gilman’s sister: ‘Why did they do this to such a wonderful person?’

Gilman’s sister, Lexie Hudson, credited President Donald Trump and Sen. Ed Markey for the former Marine’s release.

“There is no other reason that Robert is alive today other than that President Trump heard about the case and took action,” said Hudson, who thanked Markey in the statement from Global Reach “for leading our advocacy efforts in Congress.”

“The Russians treated my brother so badly,” Hudson said. “They hurt him for no reason, other than that he was both an American and a Marine. What did they get out of this? Why did they do this to such a wonderful person?”

Released American’s family flew to Texas to meet him, advocates say

Robert Gilman’s mother had been in Russia, attempting to see him there. Gilman had been in “a dissociative stupor” for 47 days due to the abuse he has suffered in prison, and was moved to a civilian hospital, where he was hooked up to a feeding tube and handcuffed to a bed, aid Eric ‌Lebson, chief strategy officer of Global Reach.

Now he’ll be medically and psychologically assessed and treated at a U.S. military hospital, Lebson said.

The 32-year-old teacher was convicted of beating a police officer after being taken off a train for causing a disturbance, and his sentence was extended last year to 10 years after he was found guilty of assaulting prison guards.

Sen. Edward Markey had called on Russia and the U.S. to work together to release the Massachusetts resident, one of at least 8 Americans who remained in Russian custody after a series of high-profile prisoner exchanges.

Former US Marine held in Russia for over 4 years has been released after group warned he was gravely ill

A former U.S. Marine who has been held in Russia for more than four years on disputed charges has been released, his advocates said Tuesday, days after warning he was gravely ill and at risk of dying.

Robert Gilman, a 32-year-old teacher detained since 2022, was on his way to a U.S. military hospital in Texas, according to Eric ‌Lebson, chief strategy officer of Global Reach, a group that’s been working to free him and other American detainees abroad.

Russian attacks kill 10 in Ukraine as Zelenskyy says Moscow is getting more North Korean missiles

Russia attacked Ukrainian cities with missiles, drones and glide bombs Tuesday, killing at least 10 civilians, officials said, as President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Moscow is getting more North Korean help to extend its 4-year invasion.

Zelenskyy said Russian forces used ballistic missiles supplied by North Korea in the overnight attack, and is preparing to deploy more North Korean troops to Russia. North Korean leader Kim Jong Un already sent thousands of troops and huge supplies of weapons to support Putin’s invasion.

Now Ukraine says Russia aims to exploit Kyiv’s critical shortage of Patriot air defense interceptors, which worsened after U.S. diplomacy to end the war fizzled and Washington turned its attention to the Iran war.

“Every step Russia takes — increasing ballistic missile production, bringing in North Korean equipment, preparing for mobilization — all of this shows that Moscow is preparing not for peace, but for escalation,” Zelenskyy said on social media.

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Trump told Ukraine it had no cards. Then Kyiv took the war to Russia

When Trump told the Ukrainian president in the Oval Office last year that he had “no cards” in the fight against Russia, Volodymyr Zelenskyy already had a bold plan to take the fight deep inside Russian territory.

While Trump was warmly welcoming President Vladimir Putin in Alaska and encouraging Ukraine to accept an unfavorable peace deal, Ukraine was smuggling drones for an attack that destroyed Russian bombers worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

And since then, Kyiv’s campaign of longer-range strikes has targeted Russian air defenses, oil infrastructure and military suppliers, embarrassing Putin and impressing Trump. When Trump and Zelenskyy met at a NATO summit in July, the American president said the Ukrainian leader had “been very effective” in the war.

An Associated Press analysis shows how Ukraine has shifted the narrative about the war in Washington, but it’s still not clear if it will be able to push Putin toward the negotiating table.

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Houthi rebels attack vessel in Bab el-Mandeb, killing four

Iranian-backed Houthi rebels fired missiles on a vessel in the Bab el-Mandeb strait on Tuesday and killed four people, Yemeni authorities said.

The transportation ministry of Yemen’s internationally recognized government said the dead included three Pakistani nationals and an Indonesian.

The ministry statement said the Houthis fired three ballistic missiles on the Yemeni commercial vessel, and then fired another missile that targeted rescue teams, wounding a Yemeni rescuer.

With the Strait of Hormuz effectively shut down by Iran, there has been a renewed focus on the Red Sea and Bab el-Mandeb Strait at Yemen’s southern tip, which is an alternate route for Saudi Arabia to ship its oil.

Congressional Democrats probe alleged coordination between ICE and Iran to deport detainees

Sens. Richard Blumenthal and Adam Schiff are requesting access to all potential communications between two private immigration detention centers and Iranian diplomats, according to two letters shared with The Associated Press.

Iranian asylum seekers sued last month, alleging that the Department of Homeland Security endangered them by sharing details of their application records with the Iranian government.

The applicants said they were forced to meet with Iranian Interests Section officials who had confidential information about their claims of persecution in Iran for converting to Christianity, for their sexuality or for participating in the Women, Life, Freedom protests against the Iranian government, according to court filings.

“These allegations that ICE shared asylum application records with the Iranian government are FALSE,” a DHS statement said.

In rejecting Trump’s Gaza plan, Netanyahu reprises a balancing act he has mastered

It’s possibly the most important job of any Israeli prime minister: maintain good relations with the United States while pushing back on demands seen as undermining Israel’s security.

No one has managed the balancing act longer than Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s longest-serving leader.

But with the Iran war at a stalemate, and U.S. President Donald Trump looking to advance peace efforts elsewhere, Netanyahu’s task is getting harder less than three months away from Israeli elections.

On Sunday, Netanyahu rejected Trump’s latest plan to advance the stalled ceasefire in Gaza, saying Israel will not withdraw from any of the roughly 60% of the territory it controls until Hamas has been completely disarmed — something the militant group controlling the other 40% has long resisted.

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Houthis hit Red Sea port city, threatening regional shipping

Iranian-backed Houthi rebels renewed attacks Tuesday on government-controlled areas in Yemen as the violence threatened to reignite civil war and raised fears over new threats to regional shipping lanes.

Yemen’s military said the rebels targeted the government-held port city of Mokha and the central province of Marib with missiles and drones but did not provide further details. The Houthis also hit Mokha with missiles and drones over the weekend and killed at least seven people, it said.

The escalation by the Houthis against government forces in Yemen and oil facilities in neighboring Saudi Arabia aims to threaten the kingdom’s alternative route for shipping its oil. The attacks could reignite Yemen’s civil war following a 2022 truce, and open a new front in the Middle East war.

Iran and Germany’s foreign ministers describe their call

Iran’s Abbas Araghchi said on his Telegram channel that in a call with Germany’s Johann Wadephul late Monday, he had “emphasized that making the Strait of Hormuz secure requires an end to the United States’ aggressive actions and unlawful interventions, including the naval blockade and other violations of U.S. obligations.”

Wadephul said on X that he had emphasized “the Strait of Hormuz needs to be opened unconditionally ensuring free and safe navigation for all.”

Iranian foreign minister underlines Tehran’s demands

Iran’s foreign minister says Tehran is insisting that the Strait of Hormuz won’t be reopened until the U.S. meets its conditions, after Trump said he wants compensation from Iran “for all of the people that they have killed” in the past.

Abbas Araghchi told reporters that Iran has “astonished the whole world” in the war against the United States and Israel, proving “that it is a tough and invincible power.”

Iran effectively closed the strait by threatening shipping after Israel and the U.S. attacked the country on Feb. 28.

Oil prices jumped, gasoline over $4 after Trump’s latest Iran war comments

Oil prices are settling in a state of uncertainty about when the Strait of Hormuz will reopen to global energy supplies, after jumping about 7.5% since Trump scoffed at Iranian demands for compensation for war damage.

Motor club AAA says the average price for a gallon of regular gasoline ticked up overnight to $4.01.

Brent crude oil was trading at about $87.61 a barrel early Tuesday, and U.S. benchmark crude at $82.19. Shares of major U.S. oil companies — including Chevron, ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips — were close to unchanged after jumping 4.5% on Monday.

Higher oil prices mean consumers pay more for all manner of products as companies pay more for fuel to produce and transport goods. Accordingly, the main event for Wall Street this week will be Wednesday’s update on U.S. inflation.

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But look skyward anyway Wednesday and, if you’re far enough north in the U.S. and Canada, you might savor a partial eclipse as the moon nibbles away at the sun.

Totality will begin near the North Pole, then streak southward across Greenland, Iceland, Spain and a patch of Portugal. Daytime darkness won’t last more than a couple minutes at best — shrimpy compared with North America’s epic 2024 eclipse — but it is continental Europe's first encounter with totality since 1999. Spain gets a much longer shot at totality next August, along with North Africa and the Middle East.

For the U.S., the Great American Eclipse of 2017 kicked off the sun-vanishing mania with more than two minutes of totality from Oregon to South Carolina. The amount of totality almost doubled in 2024, racing diagonally from Mexico's Pacific coast all the way past Newfoundland.

America's next coast-to-coast total solar eclipse isn't until 2045. So catch a partial now if you can.

Here's a list of some U.S. and Canadian cities in position to see a partial solar eclipse on Wednesday if skies are clear, in alphabetical order, with local times and the amount of sun coverage provided by NASA:

—Anchorage, Alaska, with 28% coverage. Begins at 7:36 a.m. and ends at 9:09 a.m., peaking at 8:21 a.m.

—Bangor, Maine, with 24% coverage. Begins at 12:54 p.m. and ends at 2:49 p.m., peaking at 1:53 p.m.

—Detroit with 3% coverage. Begins at 1:03 p.m. and ends at 2:08 p.m., peaking at 1:36 p.m.

—Montreal, Quebec, with 18% coverage. Begins at 12:50 p.m. and ends at 2:38 p.m., peaking at 1:45 p.m.

—New York City with 9% coverage. Begins at 1:07 p.m. and ends at 2:38 p.m., peaking at 1:54 p.m.

—Philadelphia with 7% coverage. Begins at 1:11 p.m. and ends at 2:35 p.m., peaking at 1:53 p.m.

—St. Johns, Newfoundland and Labrador, with 53% coverage. Begins at 2:28 p.m. and ends at 4:37 p.m., peaking at 3:35 p.m.

—Toronto, Ontario, with 8% coverage. Begins at 12:55 p.m. and ends at 2:23 p.m., peaking at 1:40 p.m.

—Washington, D.C., with 4% coverage. Begins at 1:17 p.m. and ends at 2:27 p.m., peaking at 1:53 p.m.

—Winnipeg, Manitoba, with 5% coverage. Begins at 11:25 a.m. and ends at 12:40 p.m., peaking at 12:02 p.m.

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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.

The Romeo Theatre, a family-owned two-screen cinema in Washington Township, announced on Facebook it will close its doors in mid-September after 40 years in the business.

Owners cited COVID-19 fallout, industry strikes and the rise of streaming services.

“While we have proudly served this community for the last 40 years, we are heartbroken to share that the Romeo Theatre will close its doors in mid-September,” the owner wrote on Facebook. “We had hoped our 40th year would be more celebratory, but we are grateful for the years we spent bringing entertainment to the community while staying true to our focus on family values.”

Decades of memories

For generations of families, the theater has been the setting for first movies, first dates and lifelong traditions.

Shannon Kuehnel said the news hit hard.

“I was really surprised when I heard about it, because it’s been open since I was a kid,” Kuehnel said.

Her memories stretch back to the theater’s earliest days.

“I remember seeing reruns of Jaws here when it opened and Taxi Driver,” she said.

Resident Stephanie Zimmerman echoed that sentiment.

“It’s sad. It’s been a staple in the community the whole time I’ve lived here — it’s good popcorn and wonderful people — so sad to see it go,” Zimmerman said.

COVID, strikes, streaming take their toll

The owners explained in their Facebook post that a year-long shutdown during the COVID-19 pandemic, followed by the actors’ and writers’ strikes, left the theater with limited film availability for roughly 18 months. Even with support from property owners, business never returned to pre-COVID levels.

“Since COVID, moviegoers’ habits have shifted toward streaming and premium on-demand options,” the owner wrote. “We have seen this change at the Romeo Theatre, and theatres nationwide have experienced similar attendance declines.”

The property owners are expected to bring in a new business to fill the space — but it will not be a theater.

Community responds

The announcement drew hundreds of comments online, including a message from the Washington Township supervisor.

“The Romeo Theatre has been so much more than a movie theatre — it has been part of the fabric of our community for 40 years,” the supervisor wrote.

Resident Carol Pelletier said the loss will be felt for years to come.

“It’s going to be a place that’s going to be missed here in town,” Pelletier said.

And for many, the theater’s famous popcorn holds a special place — right alongside the movies themselves.

“The popcorn, of course, is to die for,” Pelletier said.

The owners did leave the door open — at least a crack — for popcorn fans.

“Perhaps someday we will pop up around the community with our popcorn machine, offering delicious Romeo Theatre Popcorn-To-Go,” he wrote.

They want the city and the property’s owners to take stronger action.

Sterling Dickerson, who lives nearby, said the steady stream of people going in and out of the building has brought harassment and apparent drug use into the area.

“They overrun our neighborhood,” Dickerson said.

Dickerson pointed to the building at 10030 Cadieux as the center of the problem.

“The constant squatting and the people that’s harassing us. The drug use is amazing over here,” Dickerson said.

He said nuisance activity happens throughout the day and that nearby vacant properties have also seen problems.

Dickerson said he recently recorded video of Detroit police conducting a raid near the building.

“We are so frustrated over here,” Dickerson said. “I’m talking to you today because of this.”

Local 4 learned the building at 10030 Cadieux has been on the city’s radar for some time and is among properties tied to Real Token, a group that has drawn controversy over its ownership of hundreds of properties across Detroit.

Detroit Corporation Counsel Conrad Mallett, Jr. said the city has tried multiple times to secure the building.

“This property has been boarded up at least three times. We’ve had DPD out here,” Mallett said.

Simply boarding up a building with plywood hasn’t been enough to keep people out, Mallett explained.

He said the city may need to use stronger measures.

“Securing the buildings with plywood does not seem to be effective. We are probably going to have to upgrade securitization, to the point where we are probably going to have to do something called clear-view, or even steel grating, in order to keep people out of unsafe buildings,” Mallett said.

Mallett said the owner is currently under court-ordered receivership.

On Monday (Aug. 10), building inspectors posted Notice to Vacate warnings around the site as city staff prepared to secure the building again.

Detroit City Council member Latisha Johnson represents District 4.

She said the city needs to hold property owners accountable — but also stressed the importance of getting long-vacant properties back into use.

“It’s important for us to hold the owners of the properties accountable, but at the end of the day we have to get these properties occupied. A vacant property of any sort is no good for the community.” Johnson said.

Detroit’s law department and council staff are urging residents dealing with problem properties to keep reporting issues to the city.

They say those reports help investigators build cases against public nuisances.

Other charges were dropped. After entering the plea by video, Haddish was placed on 12 months' probation and told to avoid drugs and alcohol and complete a substance abuse evaluation. She was credited for the brief time she spent in jail following her arrest.

Haddish’s films include the comedy “Girls Trip,” “Night School,” “Like a Boss” and “The Kitchen.” She wrote the New York Times best seller “The Last Black Unicorn,” which earned a Grammy nomination. In 2018, Haddish won an Emmy for her appearance on “Saturday Night Live” and a Grammy in 2021 for her special “Black Mitzvah.”

At around 2:30 a.m. on Jan. 14, 2022, someone called 911 to report seeing a person who appeared to be asleep in the driver's seat of a white Ford Explorer with their foot on the brake in Peachtree City, about 30 miles (48 kilometers) south of Atlanta, according to a court filing. An officer spotted an SUV that matched the description given by the caller and stopped Haddish as she pulled into a neighborhood, according to a police report.

Haddish's lawyers in May asked a judge to dismiss the case, arguing that waiting more than four years for the case to be resolved had caused personal and professional difficulties and violated her right to a speedy trial. Fayette County State Court Judge Jason Thompson rejected her arguments.

The judge found that Haddish and her attorneys had requested some of the delays, including a request for a delay so she could attend a fashion show in Morocco and a request to leave a hearing early to catch a flight. He wrote that she also did not show any evidence of having missed specific performing opportunities or of actual financial harm because of the delay.

Haddish also was arrested in November 2023 in Beverly Hills, California, on suspicion of driving under the influence after police received a call and said Haddish appeared to be slumped over the wheel of a vehicle while the engine was still running.

Haddish reached a plea deal with prosecutors in that case in February 2024, pleading no contest to a vehicle code violation, and the two misdemeanor DUI charges against her were dropped, according to the Los Angeles Times.

The complaint — filed in the Southern District of New York — says that President Donald Trump's executive order last year targeting the Hague-based criminal court and the U.S. sanctions issued against a U.N. human rights expert and three Palestinian rights groups represent a “blatantly illegal attack on international justice and should be struck down," according to a press release.

The lawsuit is the latest example of organizations pushing back on what they call the Trump administration’s efforts to undermine international law and prevent efforts to combat impunity by governments around the world.

“The fact that so many leading human rights and humanitarian organizations have come together to challenge Trump’s unlawful executive order demonstrates the widespread harm it is causing across civil society groups dedicated to bringing those responsible for grave crimes to justice,” said Andrew Loewenstein of Foley Hoag LLP, the lead counsel representing the plaintiffs.

The groups assert that the financial and legal penalties against the ICC have forced them to “curtail a wide range of human rights and legal work in violation of their First and Fifth Amendment rights under the US Constitution and under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.”

Other organizations joining the lawsuit are the American Friends Service Committee, the Center for Constitutional Rights and the Open Society Institute.

The U.S. and Israel are not among the ICC’s member states, and neither nation recognizes the court’s authority. A White House official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss ongoing litigation, dismissed the lawsuit Tuesday, saying that the ICC’s actions have infringed on the sovereignty and national security of the U.S. and its closest ally, Israel. The State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Efforts to retain the global tribunal's power come as the ICC faces enormous pressure, both internally and from its more than 120 member states. Among those sanctioned by the U.S. last year was Karim Khan, who was the ICC’s chief prosecutor until he was removed from the post last month, nearly two years after sexual misconduct allegations against him first emerged, as detailed in stories by The Associated Press.

The Trump administration had issued those sanctions against Khan and a dozen other ICC staff in retaliation for warrants the court has issued for top Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, over the war in Gaza and investigations into U.S. personnel in Afghanistan.

“The Trump administration seeks a get out of jail free card for whomever it chooses. And with this case, we say no,” Liz Evenson, international justice director at Human Rights Watch, said during a press conference Tuesday.

Last month, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced that the U.S. was launching a “sweeping campaign to dismantle the threat posed by the International Criminal Court to U.S. sovereignty.”

In a video message, Rubio said the U.S. would pressure member states to withdraw from the institution, sanction organizations that work with the court and ban staff from traveling to the United States. Countries that “enjoy the benefits of the U.S. security umbrella” will be called upon to reject the court’s jurisdiction over U.S. citizens, he added.

Several countries, including U.S.-allied Venezuela, announced they would withdraw from the court shortly after Rubio's statements and Khan's removal.

British driver Andy Green reached 406.320 mph (653.908 kph) in a car powered by two hydrogen internal combustion engines with a combined 1,600 horsepower, setting the record for that vehicle category, according to the Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile, the international governing body of motor sports.

The 64-year-old retired Royal Air Force pilot rocketed across the crystalline crust at Utah’s famous Bonneville Salt Flats in a 32-foot (9.75-meter) car engineered by British construction equipment manufacturer JCB. The engines, adapted from those used in the company’s heavy machinery, mix pressurized hydrogen gas with air and ignite it to create bursts of power.

“It’s magic to be able to showcase this technology and to showcase how good the engineering is on the best racing surface in the world, Bonneville Salt Flats,” Green said after the run.

To be clear, Tuesday’s feat didn’t come close to approaching the overall land-speed record, which Green set with jet power in 1997. That year, he climbed into the Thrust SSC, a black needle sandwiched between two cartoonishly large jet engines, and drove it to an outright record of 763.035 mph (1,227.985 kph), breaking the sound barrier and achieving a feat no one has come close to matching. His runs in Nevada’s Black Rock Desert produced sonic booms that shook the nearby town of Gerlach.

In 2006, Green also set the land-speed record for a diesel-powered car — 350.092 mph (563.4 kph) — at the Bonneville Salt Flats. He returned there Tuesday with the goal of beating that mark using hydrogen power, which he has called the “fuel of the future.”

In targeting his diesel speed, Green easily topped the previous hydrogen combustion world record of 185.5 mph (298.5 kph). He had a 10-mile (16-kilometer) straightaway to build speed. A few dozen JCB staff members and reporters watched from a distance through cameras and binoculars.

Green said the inside of the car he used on Tuesday was “probably a little hotter” than in the jet-powered vehicle from 1997, with temperatures routinely above 122 degrees Fahrenheit (50 degrees Celsius).

“But I have been training four months for that, both training in the gym and actually just getting used to it with hot baths,” he said.

A remnant of a prehistoric lake bed, the Bonneville Salt Flats are about 100 miles (160 kilometers) west of Salt Lake City and sit atop a shallow aquifer that cools the tires. The low-friction surface and dry desert air are conducive to speed and have beckoned drivers since the first race there in 1914.

“It looks like snow, and it behaves a bit like packed snow — it is surprisingly slippery,” Green said.

Green was no stranger to speed when he took his first racing job. He had been flying supersonic military jets when he spotted a 1994 British newspaper ad seeking a high-speed driver to break the sound barrier.

Green did not approach supersonic speeds on Tuesday, but JCB engineers hope his feat with hydrogen power will shake up the clean-energy industry.

The company's chairman has argued that hydrogen can better handle the demands of heavy industries than electric power.

Hydrogen is only as clean as its source, and the vast majority is currently produced from fossil fuels. JCB signed a deal to buy green hydrogen, which is created using renewable energy but makes up a tiny fraction of global hydrogen production.

The concept and development of such technology has been around for decades, but has had a resurgence over the past several years, said Greg Keoleian, a professor of sustainable systems at the University of Michigan and co-director of the school’s MI Hydrogen initiative.

Many of the large automakers have already developed hydrogen internal combustion engines or hydrogen cell technology, but the higher cost of hydrogen production compared to gas and diesel is a barrier to wider usage, Keoleian said.

“It represents an important energy carrier for decarbonizing areas of the economy,” he said. “As far as its deployment, it’s influenced heavily by the cost.”

An emerging focus, he said, is extracting hydrogen from natural deposits instead of separating it from water, a prospect that could significantly reduce costs.

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

The shooting happened in the area of 7 Mile and Klinger Street on Aug. 11 at around 12:30 p.m.

According to Michael Chambers, the commander of the Detroit Police Department’s 11th Precinct, officers were patrolling the area and went into a business before they heard shots being fired outside.

The officers left the business to figure out where the shooting happened; they then saw a person fall to the ground on Klinger Street while two people ran away.

The officers ran to the victim and immediately rendered aid. The victim was taken to a local hospital and is expected to recover.

Chambers said additional officers responded and used a K9 unit to track the suspects. One of the suspects was found about a block away from where the shooting happened and was arrested.

The second suspect is still at large. Chambers said the second suspect is a man in his late teens to early 20s wearing dark clothing with a head covering.

No details were released as to what stemmed from the shooting.

You can watch the media briefing below:

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

4 crew members and 2 allied fighters killed, Yemen says

Six people were killed Tuesday by Houthis firing missiles on a vessel in the Bab el-Mandeb strait, Yemeni authorities said.

Yemen's coast guard said the dead included four crew members and two members of the government-allied National Resistance Forces. Houthis fired three ballistic missiles at the Yemeni commercial vessel, according to the Transportation Ministry of Yemen’s internationally recognized government.

They are the first known deaths from Houthi attacks on shipping off Yemen in the latest bout of fighting in the Arab country.

With the Strait of Hormuz effectively shut down by Iran, there has been a renewed focus on the Red Sea and Bab el-Mandeb strait at Yemen’s southern tip, which is an alternate route for Saudi Arabia to ship its oil.

The deadly vessel strike came amid Houthi attacks on the government-held port city of Mokha on the Red Sea and other areas of the country. Dozens of government troops and civilians have been killed in attacks since last week, according to the Yemeni military.

The strikes are part of an escalation by the Houthis against government forces in Yemen and oil facilities in neighboring Saudi Arabia, which supports the Yemeni government, and the kingdom’s shipping in the Red Sea.

The Houthi attacks could reignite Yemen’s civil war following a 2022 truce, and open a new front in the Middle East war.

Mohammed Abdul-Salam, the Houthis’ chief negotiator and spokesperson, accused Saudi Arabia in a social media post of exploiting the ceasefire to tighten an air and sea blockade it imposed in 2015.

He said the Houthis are open for negotiations but any settlement must include lifting the blockade.

US fires on ship it said was trying to break blockade of Iran

The U.S. military said Tuesday that its forces fired on a Panamanian-flagged ship in the Gulf of Oman that tried to evade the American blockade on Iranian ports. The move came as President Donald Trump tries to keep economic pressure on the Islamic Republic.

U.S. Central Command said the vessel had ignored warnings to stop, prompting an American helicopter to fire missiles into the engine room of the M/V Vela Nova, disabling the ship. The statement did not say whether the ship’s crew suffered any casualties.

Central Command said it has redirected 55 commercial vessels attempting to run the blockade, disabled three non-compliant vessels and boarded two. The U.S. Navy currently has more than 15 warships, including two aircraft carriers and an amphibious assault ship, stationed in the waters of the Arabian Sea.

Iran has kept up its attacks on ships in the Strait of Hormuz, largely shutting it off. It has refused to back down on demands that the U.S. end its blockade of Iranian ports, lift sanctions on the Islamic Republic and fulfill other conditions.

Iran effectively closed the strait after Israel and the U.S. attacked the country on Feb. 28. Attacks on the key waterway — through which roughly one-fifth of the world’s traded oil supplies passed before the war — and uncertainty around its future have kept energy prices a major focus of U.S. politics ahead of November’s midterm elections.

Pakistani official returns to Iran hoping to ease tensions with US

Pakistani Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi traveled Tuesday to Tehran for meetings with Iran's foreign minister and other officials.

Naqvi's visit aimed to encourage Iran to resume negotiations with the United States under an interim peace deal brokered by Pakistan in June, two officials said. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi posted photos from his meeting with Naqvi on his private Telegram channel.

It is Naqvi's sixth trip to Iran as part of Pakistan’s diplomatic efforts to ease tensions between Iran and the U.S.

—Munir Ahmed in Islamabad

Israel criticized at UN meeting over West Bank violence

Five European nations on the Security Council called a meeting Tuesday as Britain’s new U.N. Ambassador Sarah MacIntosh condemned escalating violence across the West Bank, calling settler attacks on Palestinian villages, some alongside Israeli soldiers, “appalling.”

Palestinian U.N. Ambassador Riyad Mansour said Israeli annexation of Palestinian territory is already “underway -- brutally and relentlessly.” He urged international action to chart a path for Palestinian self-determination and “freedom.”

Israeli U.N. Ambassador Danny Danon responded by saying: “Israel condemns all violence against Israelis and Palestinians” and ”does not tolerate extremism – we confront it.”

Danon said “extremist attacks" by Israelis are declining and accused council members of ignoring “rising” attacks by Palestinians.

Former Syrian President Assad sentenced to death in absentia

In Syria, a court sentenced former President Bashar Assad along with his younger brother to death for crimes against humanity and war crimes during Syria’s 14-year conflict that left about half a million people dead.

Assad and his brother Maher, who fled to Russia after insurgents marched into Damascus in December 2024, were sentenced in absentia at the Fourth Criminal Court in the Syrian capital.

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This story has been corrected to state that Bashar and Maher Assad fled to Russia in 2024, not 2014.

Michigan State Police responded to the area of I-75 near Clintonville Road in Oakland County on Aug. 9 just before 9 p.m. for reports of a car blocking lanes on the freeway.

When troopers arrived, they found the driver, a 44-year-old Flint man, asleep behind the wheel. When they woke him up, police said they saw open containers of alcohol on the passenger seat. After searching the Flint man’s car, troopers found two knives, 9 and 12 inches long.

According to police, the Flint man appeared intoxicated, and preliminary testing determined he was twice over the legal limit.

The man was taken to the Oakland County Jail on two counts of carrying a concealed weapon, two counts of felon in possession of a dangerous weapon, open intoxicants, operating without insurance, and operating while intoxicated.

Police said he was previously convicted of operating while intoxicated.

Interim front-office leader John Mozeliak announced several changes Tuesday to first-year manager Kurt Suzuki's coaching staff. The Angels have the majors' worst record at 45-74 as they head toward their 11th consecutive losing season, and they fired general manager Perry Minasian in late June.

“After spending time discussing with Kurt where we are as a coaching staff and where we want to go in the future, we felt it was best to make a change,” Mozeliak said in a statement. “With seven weeks remaining, we plan to use this time to evaluate what additional steps are needed to elevate our entire pitching program and best position us for success moving forward.”

Tim Leveque was appointed Los Angeles' interim pitching coach, and Michael Wuertz will be the club's interim bullpen coach. Leveque is in his first season as the pitching coach at the Angels' Double-A Rocket City affiliate after working in the Cardinals organization during Mozeliak's lengthy tenure with that club.

Maddux didn't last one full season with the Angels, who hired him last winter. The veteran pitching coach presided over a staff that has the majors' seventh-worst ERA at 4.51.

Chiti was in his first season as the bullpen coach after rejoining the Angels organization in late 2023. Scott also was in his first season with the Angels after several years with the Colorado Rockies.

Suzuki is on a one-year contract in his first major league managerial job.

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

Graham's sister, Darline Graham, a political unknown tapped to serve out the final months of her brother's term, is trying to overcome skepticism about her lack of experience in her campaign to replace him. She picked up President Donald Trump's swift endorsement though the rare open Senate seat has attracted a broad field, including some of the state's top Republicans.

For decades, South Carolina voters reliably returned Lindsey Graham to Washington despite periodic primary challengers who accused the dealmaker and foreign policy hawk of being insufficiently conservative.

Tuesday's contest features one of Lindsey Graham’s earlier foes, as well as two U.S. House members and Mark Sanford, the former governor and congressman seeking a political comeback in a field crowded with familiar faces.

Will goodwill toward Lindsey Graham boost his sister at the polls?

Lindsey Graham suffered a tear in his aorta at his Washington home and died on July 11.

Before funeral observances in Washington and South Carolina had even concluded, the campaign was on. State law proscribes a compressed timeline that forced candidates to navigate the decorum of mourning the senator's death while also jockeying to replace him.

A day after Graham’s death was announced, his sister accepted Republican Gov. Henry McMaster’s appointment to succeed her brother in an interim capacity. She was sworn in with her family and late senator’s staff standing behind her.

A week later, Darline Graham launched into the campaign herself, encouraged to run and then endorsed by Trump.

Some voters said her brother's reputation helped tilt them over the line to support Darline Graham.

“She’s not a politician, but she was kin to probably one of the greatest senators ever,” Frank Bohn of Horry County said.

While Darline Graham couldn't directly access the millions in Lindsey Graham's campaign account, there was no limit to how much could be transferred to the National Republican Senatorial Committee, which funded advertising to support her.

A super PAC that once supported Lindsey Graham has also spent hundreds of thousands of dollars backing Darline Graham. Mailers tout her as “President Trump's choice” and “Prepared to Carry on Lindsey's Legacy.”

Two congressmen are among those seeking the nomination

More familiar to South Carolina voters in their own right are two U.S. House members in the race, one of whom already has a statewide profile.

Fresh off an unsuccessful primary run for governor, U.S. Rep. Ralph Norman entered the Senate contest and snapped up endorsements from lawmakers including Sens. Rick Scott of Florida and Mike Lee of Utah, as well as South Carolina Rep. Nancy Mace.

One of the most conservative House members, Norman is well-known across South Carolina as a fiscal conservative. At times, however, he's been at odds with Trump, backing former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley in the 2024 presidential primary.

Also running is Rep. Russell Fry, who appeared poised to gain Trump's backing after Lindsey Graham's death. Despite lacking the president's endorsement, he announced his own candidacy and has been trying to boost his name recognition beyond his pro-Trump, Myrtle Beach-area district.

Voter George Mitford said Fry's service stood out to him over Darline Graham, who hasn't been in elected office.

“I just thought he’d probably had more experience in this than she would have had,” Mitford said, adding that he had supported Lindsey Graham’s Senate tenure.

Mark Sanford seeks another political comeback

The former South Carolina congressman and governor whose political ascendency was stalled by a 2009 extramarital affair is making yet another attempt to return to public office.

Sanford’s Senate bid comes just three months after he ended an effort to retake his former U.S. House seat, saying then he was quitting the race to establish a nonprofit to address the national debt, his signature issue.

Sanford had entered that contest on the last day of filing in a race alreadyfull of other Republicans. He's been crisscrossing South Carolina, reintroducing himself to voters after more than a decade out of statewide office.

Mark Lynch, a Greenville businessman who tried to oust Graham in last month's regular Republican primary, swiftly relaunched his campaign after Graham’s death. Lynch has campaigned as a Trump supporter, but in June, the president on social media called him a “lunatic” and a “disaster for the Republican Party.”

Who is the Democratic nominee for the Senate seat?

Dr. Annie Andrews, a Charleston physician, won her party’s June primary outright. Having set up her campaign based around challenging Graham, Andrews has been forced to pivot to a broader critique of the Republican contenders.

No Democrat has won a U.S. Senate seat here in decades. And when Graham last ran in 2020, he defeated his Democratic opponent, Jaime Harrison, by a 10 percentage point margin.

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Meg Kinnard can be reached at http://x.com/MegKinnardAP

Colombian President Abelardo de la Espriella said at least 181 people died in the 7.4 magnitude earthquake that struck Monday. He said around 2,595 more were injured and at least 195 remained missing. Civilian-run databases suggest the number of missing could be as high as 3,900.

De la Espriella also said 1,136 homes were destroyed and yet more damaged.

Authorities said the deaths were concentrated in cities including Cali, Pereira, Manizales and Quibdo, but local leaders and families worried about casualties and damage in rural areas, from where very little information has emerged. Aid agencies consider the first 48 to 72 hours as crucial for retrieving people alive, though that can be extended if they have access to food and water.

Soldiers, rescue personnel and families picked through the rubble on Tuesday, passing large pieces of concrete by hand along lines of volunteers.

Standing near the remains of his brother’s collapsed apartment building in Pereira, Jairo Vargas said he made the 220-kilometer (135-mile) drive from Medellin, hoping to find him alive.

“I’m absolutely certain he’s here. Absolutely certain,” Vargas said, adding that his brother’s car was still parked outside. But he fears his sibling did not survive.

“The debris surrounding my brother is soft,” he said, as heavy machinery rumbled nearby. “It’s possible that it’s protecting him, but we can’t hear any noises anymore. I don’t know. I have little hope.”

Colombia's new president faces his first serious challenge

The earthquake presents the first major test for first-time officeholder de la Espriella, who entered office just days before the natural disaster. The leader, who split the country in recent elections, now seeks to unite Colombia in its disaster response.

That challenge was particularly notable in Choco, the region surrounding the quake’s epicenter. It is one of Colombia's poorest and most neglected regions, often beset by warring armed groups. Much of Choco is accessible only by boat, through the jungle or by airplane.

Sterling Palacios, a religious and environmental leader in rural parts of the region, said Choco's capital was devastated along with smaller communities dotting the Atrato River, the region's most important throughway.

Homes there have been reduced to rubble and aftershocks continued to rumble, terrifying residents who slept in the streets overnight.

“There are towns where people have lost everything, where people have died, where homes have been destroyed,” he said. “We don’t have a full panorama of the damage, but we know it’s been massive.”

De la Espriella traveled to Quibdo in Choco on Monday night where he announced he was mobilizing “the entire military and police apparatus,” as well as deploying engineers, rescue workers and search dogs.

“Choco will never again be the ‘land of the forgotten,’” he said.

Palacios said the government's response has so far been “concentrated in the capital,” and that authorities flew the wounded from Quibdo to hospitals in the city of Medellín.

The biggest challenge, he said, remains towns in rural areas only reachable by boat — journeys that can take hours or days. That response is also complicated by a toxic slate of armed groups warring for control of the region who, during the COVID-19 pandemic, blocked healthcare workers from traveling to remote areas.

He said it could take locals and officials weeks to get a full scope of the devastation there.

“It's a risk and it's very difficult to predict” what could happen, he said.

Desperate residents seek news of their loved ones

Families posted information about missing loved ones on citizen-run websites.

Dana Carolina Zamora posted an image of her missing 60-year-old uncle, Miguel Ángel Zamora, cradling his dog. The farmer was living in a rural area of El Cairo, not far from the quake's epicenter in San Jose Del Palmar.

Local authorities said 80% of El Cairo, a town of about 7,000 people, was damaged. Zamora said her uncle lived in a traditional house of sticks and mud.

“We are afraid. We hope that is not the case, that he is all right and that it is only a communication failure. But we haven’t heard anything from him,” Zamora said.

The earthquake left many people unnerved after back-to-back quakes devastated neighboring Venezuela in late June, destroying hundreds of buildings and killing more than 6,300 people.

Mónica Sánchez owns a small company that makes work uniforms. Her home city, Pereira, was one of the worst hit, and a wall inside the factory collapsed. Sánchez and her 12 workers got outside just in time.

“It was shocking — the city fell down around us,” she said.

In Pereira on Tuesday, one military search team shouted, “Can you hear me!” into the rubble of a collapsed building. Excavators and heavy machinery were seen clearing heavy chunks of concrete.

Pereira’s municipal government said at least 58 buildings collapsed, while Cali Mayor Alejandro Eder said at least 40 buildings had collapsed.

Both cities enforced curfews Monday night to prevent looting. And in Pereira, the city government has banned privately owned vehicles from circulating, to clear the way for ambulances, police and rescue workers.

The U.S. State Department has announced it would provide $15.5 million for emergency shelter, food and other aid. Governments across Latin America have also lined up to help.

“This has been a tragedy for the whole city, for thousands of families,” Pereira Mayor Mauricio Salazar told local media, his voice quavering. “But here we are, and we will continue forward with the hand of God.”

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Suarez reported from Bogota, Colombia, and Janetsky reported from Mexico City. Associated Press reporter Manuel Rueda in Bogota contributed.

Netanyahu’s remarks cast more doubt on the deal to disarm Hamas, which was seen as a potential breakthrough for ending the war. They also marked a rare public display of friction with the Trump administration.

The agreement called for Hamas to begin disarming and for Israel to halt its strikes and begin withdrawing from the roughly 60% of Gaza it currently controls. It was based on an October ceasefire agreement that ended major military operations and brought about the release of the remaining hostages held in Gaza but has stalled on other fronts.

Netanyahu, who faces a tough battle for reelection in October, reiterated his stance that disarmament should come first. He said Israeli forces would continue to “do whatever is necessary to protect themselves, our territory, and our citizens.”

The Trump administration “sent us a draft. We did not agree. It is not our draft. We sent our comments. … This is our position,” Netanyahu said in a video posted on social media.

Mass funeral held for dozens killed in 2023 strike

Earlier on Tuesday, Palestinians gathered for a mass funeral of more than 100 bodies finally recovered from a deadly Israeli strike in Gaza in 2023. More than 300 people were killed on Nov. 22, 2023, weeks into the war with Hamas, when warplanes flattened a residential block in Gaza City’s Sabra neighborhood.

Around 40 bodies were recovered soon afterward in a frantic scramble of rough tools and bare hands, but most were buried deep beneath the rubble. Reports of the high number of victims in one of the war’s deadliest attacks took days to reach the public in the chaos just before its first ceasefire.

Over the weekend, first responders dug through the destroyed buildings and recovered remains of 112 victims, including 40 children, according to the Civil Defense, a rescue agency operating under the Hamas-run Interior Ministry.

It said 157 bodies still have not been found.

“The only crime of these martyrs was that they remained steadfast and resilient in their homes, believing that these homes would protect them,” one relative, Taysir al-Hassayna, told The Associated Press following the funeral prayers.

For the missing, it’s “as if their bodies had evaporated without a trace.”

The current ceasefire has allowed recovery of remains

Only now are some bodies of people killed in the war’s ferocious early months slowly being recovered, as the fragile ceasefire allows such efforts to push ahead in parts of devastated Gaza.

Those discoveries have contributed to the war’s rising toll. The Hamas-led militant attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killed around 1,200 people and saw 251 taken hostage. Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed more than 73,377 Palestinians, including since the ceasefire, Gaza’s Health Ministry said.

At least 7,400 people have been reported by relatives to still be under the rubble, Zaher al-Waheidi, head of the ministry’s records department, told the AP. The true number is likely thousands higher because in some cases entire families were killed in a single bombing, leaving no one to report the missing, al-Waheidi has said.

The people mourned on Tuesday were from a residential block belonging to the Hassayna and Abu Sharia clan, and many were related. AP has identified at least 60 families across Gaza who lost 25 or more family members during the first three months of war.

On Tuesday, the remains of the victims, wrapped in Palestinian flags, were laid in rows on the ground. Many were marked with photos, and flower petals were scattered around them all. Hundreds of people surrounded the bodies for funeral prayers, some standing on the rubble.

Following the prayers, people carried the bodies on stretchers along a narrow street lined by destroyed buildings and buried them in a nearby cemetery.

Deadly strikes continue and rebuilding is on hold

At least 1,252 people have been killed in Gaza since the ceasefire took effect, according to the territory’s Health Ministry.

The ministry, part of the Hamas-led government, maintains detailed casualty records that are seen as generally reliable by U.N. agencies and independent experts. It does not give a breakdown of civilians and militants but says women and children constitute roughly half of the dead.

Israel says its strikes are against militants who endanger its soldiers, took part in the Oct. 7 attack or carry out other violations. Five Israeli soldiers have been killed since the ceasefire.

The U.S.-backed ceasefire agreement last October called for Hamas to be disarmed and for Israel to withdraw. An International Stabilization Force was to be deployed, and an independent Palestinian administration was to oversee governance and reconstruction.

Israel says everything hinges on Hamas giving up its weapons, while Hamas says Israel must end its strikes and begin withdrawing from the territory. Each side accuses the other of violating the truce.

Gaza remains largely shattered. Most of its 2 million Palestinians are displaced, many living in tent camps where poor conditions and overcrowding have led to rodent infestations and outbreaks of infectious diseases such as chickenpox.

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This story was first published on Aug. 4, 2026. It was updated on Aug. 11, 2026, to correct how the proportion of women and children in the death toll in Gaza is characterized. They constitute roughly half of the dead, according to data from Gaza’s Health Ministry, not most of the dead. It was also updated to correct the dateline to DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip, not DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza City.

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Magdy reported from Cairo and Lidman from Tel Aviv, Israel. Associated Press writer Suzan Fraser in Ankara, Turkey, contributed to this report.

Robert Gilman, a 32-year-old Massachusetts teacher and former Marine, was freed after President Donald Trump said he spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin about his release, which Trump said was “very much on a Humanitarian Basis.”

“We appreciate this decision, and the fact that Russia asked for no one in return — No exchange took place,” Trump said on his Truth Social platform.

Arrests of Americans have become increasingly common in Russia in recent years. Concern has risen that Russia could be targeting U.S. nationals to use later as bargaining chips in talks to bring back Russians convicted of crimes in the U.S. and Europe. Five other Americans remain imprisoned in Russia with deteriorating medical issues, according to a news release from Global Reach, a group that’s been working to free them.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio posted a photo on social media of a gaunt-looking Gilman draped in an American flag and surrounded by his family aboard an airplane.

“While we appreciate this positive step, we are still seeking the immediate return of all other unjustly detained Americans,” Rubio stated.

Gilman will arrive at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland outside of Washington on Tuesday evening, Trump said in his post.

“I just spoke to him, and he had one request — A GREAT cheeseburger when he lands,” Trump wrote. “I will take care of that!”

Gilman is bound for a military hospital in Texas, where he will be medically and psychologically assessed and treated, Eric ‌Lebson, chief strategy officer of Global Reach, said in a statement.

Gilman had his prison sentence extended three times

Gilman was detained in 2022 on charges of beating a police officer after being taken off a train for causing a disturbance. He was convicted and handed a 3.5-year sentence.

He later was convicted of attacking a prison inspector during a cell check, beating an investigator and assaulting a guard. In October 2024, he was sentenced to eight years and one month. His sentence was extended in December to 10 years after he was found guilty of assaulting prison guards.

Russian media reported that he pleaded guilty to the charges and apologized to the guards he was charged with assaulting. The business daily Kommersant said he explained his actions by saying he wanted to stay in the prison where he was serving his sentence and avoid being moved to another penitentiary.

Gilman’s father has disputed the charges against his son, while the State Department has said the U.S. determined that Gilman was wrongfully detained,

Gilman's sister, Lexie Hudson, credited Trump and U.S. Sen. Ed Markey of Massachusetts with bringing about his release.

“There is no other reason that Robert is alive today other than that President Trump heard about the case and took action,” said Hudson, who thanked Markey “for leading our advocacy efforts in Congress.”

“The Russians treated my brother so badly," Hudson said. "They hurt him for no reason, other than that he was both an American and a Marine. What did they get out of this? Why did they do this to such a wonderful person?”

Russian officials did not immediately comment on Gilman's release. Russia’s Federal Penitentiary Service did not respond to a request for comment on his health deteriorating behind bars.

Gilman was hospitalized before his release

Gilman’s lawyer Irina Brazhnikova told the Russian news agency Interfax on Friday that Gilman was in a psychiatric ward of a civilian hospital, where he’s been since early July.

He was there “due to a psychiatric condition,” and according to doctors, his condition has worsened, but neither his defense lawyers, nor his family were allowed to visit, she said.

Before Gilman was flown out of Russia, he had been in “a dissociative stupor” for 47 days due to the abuse he had suffered in prison, according to Lebson. After Gilman was moved to the hospital, he was hooked up to a feeding tube and handcuffed to a bed.

Hospital reports conveyed Gilman’s condition “as dire and life-threatening,” pushing the U.S. government into action and leading to his release, Lebson said.

Markey had called on Russia and the U.S. to work together to get Gilman released. He was among at least eight Americans who remained in Russian custody after a series of high-profile prisoner exchanges with the U.S. in recent years.

Markey blamed Russia for Gilman's poor health, saying his return to the U.S. was long overdue.

“It is a tragedy that it took Robert’s near-death condition for his case to receive the attention that it required for his release to be negotiated," Markey said. "Throughout his detention, Robert was subjected to physical torture, forced medication, and provocations by Russian authorities. There is no doubt that his treatment by Russian authorities is the reason Robert is in this precarious state today.”

Zelenskyy said Russian forces used ballistic missiles supplied by North Korea in an overnight attack on the southeastern city of Zaporizhzhia, where a company said seven workers at its steel plant were killed and 21 injured.

Three more people, including a 15-year-old boy, were killed by Russian drones and artillery in the central Dnipropetrovsk region, authorities said.

In addition to the ballistic missiles, North Korea is preparing to deploy more of its troops to Russia, Zelenskyy said late Monday.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un signed a strategic partnership agreement in 2024, pledging mutual aid if either country faces aggression.

Kim has sent thousands of troops and huge supplies of weapons to support Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Some experts say the engagement with Moscow is helping improve North Korea’s military capabilities, and Zelenskyy said the battlefield experience would help Pyongyang menace other countries in its region.

Ukraine says Russia is poised to escalate the war

Ukraine says Russia is scaling up its production of ballistic missiles, aiming to exploit Kyiv’s critical shortage of Patriot air defense interceptors that can stop them, and claims Moscow is preparing to recruit more troops for a new push on the front line that stretches 1,250 kilometers (775 miles) along eastern and southern Ukraine.

“Every step Russia takes — increasing ballistic missile production, bringing in North Korean equipment, preparing for mobilization — all of this shows that Moscow is preparing not for peace, but for escalation,” Zelenskyy said on social media.

In an unusual step, Ukraine's air force didn't say in its daily report how many missiles Russia launched overnight. It was not clear whether the omission was deliberate, and Kyiv officials made no immediate comment.

U.S.-led diplomatic efforts to stop the war have fizzled as Washington grew frustrated with the lack of progress and its attention turned to the Iran war.

In an indication that Putin is determined to press on with the invasion, Russia’s highest court on Monday ordered that Yabloko, the only political party opposing the war, to be excluded from the ballot in the Sept. 18-20 parliamentary election.

“The Kremlin will not enter serious negotiations or make meaningful compromises on its demands as long as Putin believes that he has a viable military path to achieving his full objectives,” the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, said in an analysis Monday.

“Ukraine’s Patriot shortages offer Russia an opportunity to cause very serious damage to Ukraine over the coming winter and will therefore contribute to delaying meaningful negotiations and protracting the war,” it said.

Russia hits the grounds of a Kyiv children's hospital

Russian forces also struck parts of the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, overnight, according to officials. One strike hit the grounds of a children’s hospital, leaving two craters and shattering windows, the State Emergency Service said. Children and medical workers were in bomb shelters and nobody was hurt, it added.

At another location in Kyiv, a Russian strike started a fire in a warehouse that spread across about 1,200 square meters (nearly 13,000 square feet), according to emergency officials.

The Russian Defense Ministry said its forces overnight struck “military industrial facilities and transport and logistics centers” in Kyiv and Zaporizhzhia with “ground-based precision weapons.”

It said in a statement that it hit civilian storage facilities housing drones in Kyiv and a metallurgical plant in Zaporizhzhia.

Metinvest, a major Ukrainian mining and metals company with operations in Zaporizhzhia, said seven of its steel plant employees died as staff tried to reach shelters after a warning of an incoming ballistic missile.

The company, which employs tens of thousands of people, said in a statement that the attack damaged its blast furnace and other equipment and forced the plant to shut down.

Russia targeted Kyiv and Zaporizhzhia with Zircon anti-ship missiles and Iskander ballistic missiles, while launching 120 long-range strike drones across the country, Ukraine’s air force said.

Russia's biggest e-commerce company hit again

Meanwhile, the Russian Defense Ministry said its air defenses overnight intercepted nearly 400 Ukrainian drones over 14 regions and Crimea, the peninsula that Moscow illegally annexed from Kyiv in 2014.

Russia’s biggest online retailer, Wildberries, said its logistical facilities in the Voronezh region near the Ukrainian border came under attack and caught fire. It added that the fire was extinguished and goods stored there were “largely undamaged.”

Ukraine has repeatedly struck Wildberries warehouses and Russian oil facilities in what it says is a strategy to compel Putin to negotiate an end to the invasion.

Ukraine’s General Staff said its forces struck an oil refinery in the city of Orsk in Russia’s Orenburg region near the border with Kazakhstan, about 1,500 kilometers (930 miles) from Ukraine, causing a fire.

The refinery, with an annual processing capacity of about 44 million barrels of crude oil, produces gasoline, diesel and aviation fuel, among other products. The extent of the damage was being assessed, the military said.

Meanwhile, Romania’s Ministry of National Defense said its navy destroyed two drones drifting in the Black Sea about 90 nautical miles (166 kilometers) from the port of Constanta.

The Gerbera-type drones were neutralized by divers using controlled detonations, and some pieces were recovered, the ministry said, adding that Ukraine said the drones were not theirs.

UN says over 16,000 civilians are being held by Russia

The United Nations, meanwhile, estimates that more than 16,000 civilians detained by Russia during the war are still being “deprived of their liberty,” with many held incommunicado and on grounds that don’t comply with international law.

“Widespread and systematic torture and ill-treatment” of both Ukrainian civilian detainees and prisoners of war by Russia are continuing, including sexual violence, said Claudia Fuentes Julio, the U.N. assistant secretary-general for human rights.

She spoke at an informal meeting of the U.N. Security Council on Monday to spotlight the plight of civilians and soldiers taken following the Russia invasion.

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Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations contributed.

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

Now is not that time.

While the Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback is trying to soak in every moment of what he says will be his 22nd and final NFL training camp, he doesn't sound like someone who thinks he needs to be on the field when the Steelers host Green Bay in their exhibition opener on Thursday night.

“It's not real football,” Rodgers said.

At least, not “real” compared to what things will look like when the games start to count in September. Most defenses are vanilla. Most offenses too. The four-time MVP understands August is still a valuable time of year, just not for someone who has been in the league nearly as long as some of his teammates — backup quarterbacks Drew Allar (22) and Will Howard (24) — have been alive.

“I think preseason football is good to see guys with pads on, under the lights, how they react to the nerves,” he said.

Nerves that Rodgers once had himself. He remembers running onto the field as a rookie with Green Bay in 2005 and trying desperately to keep his breathing under control. He failed as much as he succeeded.

Back then, the goal was to make sure he could hear the play coming through the headset so he could repeat it with conviction in the huddle. And that was the easy part.

The challenge was then walking to the line of scrimmage and “trying to remember what else is going on in the play and who’s got what.”

Those jitters eventually subsided. It took a while, but they're long since gone. It's why he feels the Steelers will be better served with Rodgers watching from the sideline with a headset on while Howard — who didn't take a live snap last year after getting hurt early in camp — and Allar do the majority of the work.

Rodgers described the first game as traditionally “hectic,” one of many reasons his preference is to be in sweatpants offering perspective.

“I like to be the voice of reason, tell the occasional dad joke or one-liner,” he said. “Just help everybody settle in a little bit.”

Mike McCarthy, in his first season coaching his hometown team, played a little coy about whether he'll ask Rodgers to see a little game action, though McCarthy might have tipped his hand a bit when he said he'd divide the offense into three groups.

One group will handle the first couple of series. The second will play until halftime, with the third taking over for the final two quarters.

The math is pretty easy. Pittsburgh currently has four quarterbacks — Rodgers, Howard, Allar and Mason Rudolph — on the roster. Only one of them has operated a McCarthy offense in a game, and it's the one who will turn 43 in December.

“Frankly, the most important part is the health of the team,” McCarthy said. “That drives these decisions. That’s where you tend to maybe pull back and maybe not play the veteran or the older guys in those situations. You just lean on their experience.”

McCarthy is well-versed in what Rodgers can do. Howard and Allar remain very much works in progress and could have the opportunity to be a long-term part of Pittsburgh's future. They'll take their first real steps in that direction on Thursday, and Rodgers wants to help make sure those steps are more assured than tentative.

“Quarterback, just like all things, can be overcomplicated to make it seem more difficult than it might be sometimes,” he said. “It’s not easy, but you can simplify things, and that’s what I’m trying to help with.”

Rodgers' most recent preseason snaps came three years ago during the first of his brief two-season stint with the New York Jets. He was “open” to doing it last summer in Pittsburgh, though former head coach Mike Tomlin opted to hold him out. The decision looked like the right one when Rodgers threw for four touchdowns in a Week 1 win over his old team.

Rodgers was still finding his way back then. Now, he's far more familiar with the personnel around him and his reunion with McCarthy means he's ending his career in the same system where he began it a generation ago.

It's why he believes the real growth during camp comes on the practice field. He likes what he's seen so far, which is part of why he's just fine letting others get chased around by opponents during the waning days of summer.

“I think we’re right where I’d like to be,” he said. “I think we’re ahead of where we were last year. I think you’re seeing guys take some steps and then play with confidence.”

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

Existing home sales fell 1.7% last month from June to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.06 million units, the National Association of Realtors said Tuesday. That’s slightly above the 4.05 million pace economists were expecting, according to FactSet.

July sales, however, were up 0.7% compared with last year.

Home prices continued to rise, hitting unprecedented levels for the month of July, NAR said. The U.S. median sales price increased 2% from a year earlier, to $434,100.

In June, the median sales price hit $442,800, an all-time high for any month on data going back to 1999, NAR said. Home prices have risen on an annual basis for 37 months in a row.

Last week, mortgage buyer Freddie Mac reported that the benchmark 30-year fixed rate mortgage rate rose to 6.69%, its highest level in just over a year. It was the fifth consecutive week that the average rate rose, marking the latest strain for prospective homebuyers who are facing steep borrowing costs.

It is difficult to find good news about the U.S. housing market from the July report, said Carl Weinberg, chief economist at High Frequency Economics.

“No one who has a home already can afford to sell it,” said Weinberg. “People with ultra-low COVID-era mortgages cannot afford to give them up. If no one is selling, no one can be buying, and inventories are low.”

Home sales have been mostly hovering close to a 4-million annual pace for about three years, far short of the historic norm that is closer to 5.2 million.

The U.S. housing market has been in a slump since 2022, when mortgage rates began to climb from pandemic-era lows. Sales of previously occupied U.S. homes were essentially flat last year, stuck at a 30-year low.

Sales remain sluggish as mortgage rates have mostly trended higher in the months since the war between the U.S. and Iran started. Expectations of higher inflation amid surging oil prices have pushed up the long-term bond yields that lenders use as a guide to pricing home loans, causing mortgage rates to climb.

Home inventory levels also remain well below historical norms.

There were 1.54 million unsold homes at the end of last month, down 1.9% from June and 0.6% less than July last year, NAR said. That’s well short of the roughly 2 million homes for sale that was typical before the COVID-19 pandemic.

July’s month-end inventory translates to a 4.6-month supply at the current sales pace. Traditionally, a 5- to 6-month supply is considered a balanced market between buyers and sellers.

Regionally, prices in the Northeast continue to rise faster than the rest of the country, jumping 5.2% year-over-year, driven by a shortage of inventory.

NAR said that 29% of sales were first-time homebuyers, down from 33% in June but up slightly from 28% in July 2025. Historically, first-time buyers make up closer to 40% of home sales.

Jets coach Aaron Glenn said the 24-year-old Stiggers was conscious and talking on the field before being put on a stretcher and taken for further examination. There was no immediate word on Stiggers' condition, but Glenn indicated the cornerback was doing OK.

“He was able to talk and I want to make sure I go and see him after this, just to make sure I'm good with everything,” Glenn said. “But for the most part, he was good.”

The Jets and Buccaneers were in the middle of special teams drills when Glenn said Stiggers came to the sideline.

“He actually fell out,” Glenn said. “The good thing is, he was conscious. Our guys did a hell of a job, just like most medical staffs around this league do in situations like that, and they took the necessary steps just to make sure that we do everything we can to be on board when it comes to those situations.”

It was a somewhat scary scene, though, as several Jets teammates took a knee near the sideline and some formed a prayer circle. After several minutes, Stiggers was placed on a stretcher with what appeared to be an IV and loaded into the ambulance as fans seated near the area clapped in support.

“It was very sad, very emotional,” running back Breece Hall said. “You get on your knee and say a prayer for him and hope he’s OK."

Added defensive tackle Harrison Phillips: “What’s been shared to us is things are on the up and up.”

Practiced resumed after being halted for more than 10 minutes while Stiggers was being attended to.

Stiggers was earlier involved in one of the handful of chippy moments during the practice when he had his helmet flung down the field by a Buccaneers player after players on both teams scuffled.

Stiggers is entering his third season with the Jets after being a fifth-round draft pick in 2024. He was one of that draft's feel-good stories because he had no college football experience and was the first player drafted directly from the CFL, where he played for the Toronto Argonauts, since Miami took Jermaine Haley in 1999.

In 29 games, including five starts, with New York, Stiggers has 35 tackles, two fumble recoveries and three passes defensed. He is also one of the Jets' top special teams players.

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

Government data published overnight into Tuesday showed the outbreak has 4,381 confirmed cases, including 2,011 deaths. Starting from the first confirmed case, the death toll was reached almost three times faster than in the 2014-16 Ebola outbreak in West Africa, the worst on record.

The current outbreak was declared on May 15 but health authorities now say sequencing showed it began months earlier, in February.

It took about nine weeks for the outbreak to record the first 1,000 deaths, but it’s taken just around three weeks for the figure to double, as experts say the crisis is moving faster than efforts to track and manage it.

At the epicenter in eastern Congo's Ituri province, friends and family members gathered in tears on Tuesday for the burial of Jeannine Katusabe, 38, one of the latest to die.

Christophe Logo, a family representative, said Katusabe first sought traditional treatment at home and only went to the local Ebola treatment center after her condition worsened. “Unfortunately, she did not recover,” he said.

Identifying cases early can be nearly ‘impossible’

This is already the second-largest outbreak in history, behind the 2014-2016 outbreak's over 28,000 cases including over 11,000 deaths. The outbreak has been expanding across five eastern provinces near South Sudan, Uganda and Rwanda.

The ongoing outbreak has had a case fatality rate of 45.9%, more than the 39.6% rate recorded in the 2014-2016 outbreak.

This Ebola outbreak is unlike most previous ones. The rare Bundibugyo virus responsible for it has no approved vaccines or treatments. Clinical trials for those have begun in Ituri province.

Although the type of Ebola responsible for the 2014-2016 outbreak is considered the deadliest, government data shows this Bundibugyo outbreak has killed a higher percentage of people as care and support are not getting to patients quickly enough. Many people are reporting symptoms late or not at all.

“In the absence of an effective vaccine, control (for the outbreak) rests on identifying cases and then nursing them in secure facilities until they recover or sadly perish,” said Paul Hunter, a professor in medicine at the University of East Anglia in the U.K.

In a remote region like this with an ongoing conflict and interrupted communications, routine surveillance can be very difficult and “identifying cases early enough to prevent spread can be impossible,” Hunter said.

Authorities in eastern Congo have restricted public gatherings and shut the main airport in Ituri to limit spread of the disease. But mass movements due to trade, mining and displacements from conflict have continued.

The response has been behind from the start

The World Health Organization on Monday said some cases early in the outbreak were wrongly attributed to malaria and typhoid, and that early testing was conducted for the more common type of Ebola, delaying the realization of what was unfolding

Officials are “chasing the virus, the virus is ahead of us," the WHO regional director for Africa, Dr. Mohamed Yakub Janabi, told a news conference.

The new death toll is “alarming,” said Dr. Jean-Marie Akandabo, who is helping manage patients at a clinic in Ituri.

Akandabo said the major challenges he's seen are limited care for patients and poor community engagement. Some people have described widespread misinformation about the virus in sometimes hostile communities that long have been wary of outsiders after years of attacks by rebel groups.

“We must not take this disease lightly, because it continues to kill and no one is safe,” Akandabo said.

The current outbreak is the 17th — and largest — the Central African nation has faced. The first Ebola virus to be identified was in 1976 near the Ebola River in what is now Congo.

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Asadu reported from Abuja, Nigeria. Associated Press writer Mark Banchereau contributed from Dakar, Senegal.

The person spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity on Tuesday because the team had not yet made the announcement.

Vikings coach Kevin O'Connell pledged to supervise a true competition for the job between the newcomer Murray and the incumbent McCarthy. While Murray had the majority of the turns with the first team, McCarthy had plenty of opportunities in open-to-the-public practices as well.

With Murray learning a new system and staff after spending his first seven NFL seasons with the Arizona Cardinals, an earlier decision on the starter was always going to be ideal for him to maximize his time in training camp running the offense.

McCarthy was the 10th overall pick in the 2024 draft. He mostly struggled in his debut last year, when a variety of injuries limited him to 10 starts. Carson Wentz was also re-signed for veteran depth.

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

A few storms both today and tomorrow may be strong.

The Storm Prediction Center has issued a Marginal Risk (green, level 1/5) for severe weather for our southern communities, and a Slight Risk (yellow, level 2/5) for southwestern Lenawee County for today.

The main time frame will be between 3 p.m. and 8 p.m. with damaging winds, large hail, and heavy rain the main storm hazards.

We’ll have the same storm threats tomorrow with our northern areas under a Marginal Risk.

Wednesday afternoon will be the best time for storms to develop.

Much of the day both today and tomorrow will be dry and we’ll see some hazy sunshine. Smoke from wildfires out west will remain over the Great Lakes region, giving us some vivid sunrises and sunsets.

Temperatures today will reach the low to mid 80s with a southwest breeze.

Winds turn light tonight as we fall to the mid 60s. With some breaks in the cloud cover, you may catch some meteors! The Perseid Meteor shower peaks tomorrow and Thursday.

Highs Wednesday and Thursday will be in the low 80s before dropping to around 80° Friday and Saturday.

Though Michiganders across the state will only get to experience a partial eclipse, those watching the sky in parts of northern Russia, Greenland, Iceland, Spain and a small corner of Portugal will experience totality — the point at which the moon completely blocks the face of the sun.

In Detroit, the partial eclipse will begin at 1:03 p.m., reach its maximum coverage (around 3%) at 1:36 p.m., and end at 2:08 p.m. The farther northeast you are, the bigger the “bite” out of the sun will appear.

See how the eclipse will look in your city here.

Whether you’ll be in the path of totality or a partial eclipse, here are a few things to know ahead of tomorrow’s rare celestial event.

RELATED: Perseid meteor shower to peak this week — here’s what to know

What is a solar eclipse?

A solar eclipse occurs when a new moon moves between the sun and Earth, blocking out the sun’s rays and casting a shadow on parts of Earth.

How often do solar eclipses occur?

There are between two and five solar eclipses every year, each visible only along a specific area.

The last total solar eclipse viewable in the U.S. was on April 8, 2024, with only a small portion of southern Michigan able to experience totality.

The next total solar eclipse will take place on Aug. 2, 2027, and will be viewable in southern Spain, North Africa, Saudi Arabia and Yemen. In the U.S., the next three total solar eclipses will occur in 2033, 2044, and 2045.

What are the different types of solar eclipses?

There are four types of solar eclipses:

• Partial solar eclipse - Occurs when the moon partially obscures the sun’s disk and casts only its penumbra — the lighter, outer part of a shadow where a light source is partly blocked — onto the Earth
• Annular solar eclipse - Occurs when the moon isn’t big enough to cover the entire disk of the sun, and the sun’s outer edges remain visible to form a ring of fire in the sky. This happens when the moon is near apogee, the point in a geocentric orbit where an object is farthest away
• Total solar eclipse - Occurs when the moon covers the sun completely. This can only happen when the moon is near perigee, the point of the moon’s orbit closest to Earth
• Hybrid Solar Eclipse - This is the rarest type of solar eclipse, occuring when the same eclipse changes from an annular to a total solar eclipse, and/or vice versa, along the eclipse’s path

What safety measures should be taken when viewing a solar eclipse?

Other than the moment of totality, when the moon completely blocks out the sun’s light, it is not safe to view a total or partial solar eclipse with the naked eye.

Experts advise that viewers use specialized eye protection to avoid severe injury, as well as using solar filters when viewing an eclipse through a camera lens, binoculars, or telescope.

If I’m not in the path of totality, where can I watch the total solar eclipse on Wednesday?

NASA will be streaming the total solar eclipse live on Wednesday, beginning at 1:15 p.m. ET, at nasa.gov/live.

Drone strikes continued on Tuesday, hitting the town's power plant and oil refinery, the state-run National Oil Corporation said.

The attacks underscored the fragile state of security at Libya's critical infrastructure. In the country's east, in the city of Benghazi, a car bomb killed a senior military officer with a self-styled military force on Monday, the latest such bombing in the violence-stricken North African nation.

No group has so far claimed responsibility for either the drone strikes in the town of Zawiya, about 47 kilometers (about 30 miles) west of the capital of Tripoli, or the Benghazi bombing.

Monday's first drone strike ignited a massive blaze at the refinery's gasoline-storage tank that burned through the night and into Tuesday afternoon, according to the Civil Defense, a first responders agency. There were no reports of casualties, health authorities said.

Footage aired by local media showed massive flames and fireballs erupting from the tank, with black and orange smoke rising in the sky as firefighters sprayed what appeared to be foam or water in efforts to extinguish the blaze.

As the firefighters fought the flames, another drone hit close to a key oil tank nearby but did not cause any casualties, the company said. It said the tank, which held 4.5 million liters of fuel when it was hit, collapsed and the company declared a state of maximum emergency at the facility.

On Tuesday, two drones hit the town's power plant, with one damaging its firefighting system while the second landed close to the facility’s main fuel storage, setting it on fire. The national oil company said firefighters quickly got that fire under control and there were no casualties.

Oil infrastructure in Zawiya — which houses critical energy infrastructure, including Libya's largest oil refinery, an export terminal and a power plant — has come under frequent attacks, including over the weekend when the national oil company said drones hit a fuel tank and a desalination plant linked to the oil facilities. It said the tank was damaged.

By late Tuesday evening, the national oil company said all the fires had been extinguished.

The attacks come as tensions are rising between the government of western Libya and warlord Mohamed Bahroun who controls the city of Zawiya. Much of western Libya is ruled by local militias loosely allied to Prime Minister Abdul-Hamid Dbeibah's government in Tripoli.

Jalel Harchaoui, an analyst affiliated with the Royal United Services Institute in London, said the warlord has been cornered by the government and his forces “are likely to resort to desperate measures.”

The Benghazi bombing on Monday evening killed a senior officer with the forces of powerful commander Khalifa Hifter. Maj. Gen. Fawzy al-Mansouri, director of the military intelligence of Hifter’s self-styled Libyan National Army, was killed when an explosive-laden vehicle detonated near his car in the Sayyida Aisha neighborhood in Benghazi, the LNA said.

The LNA is allied with one of Libya’s two rival governments, which controls the country’s eastern and southern parts.

Libya, a largely lawless Mediterranean country, has been plunged into chaos and division following the 2011 uprising-turned-civil war, which toppled and later killed longtime dictator Moammar Gadhafi.

Amid the chaos, militias grew in wealth and power, particularly in Tripoli and the western part of the country.

The country has been divided for years between rival administrations in the east and west, each backed by armed groups and foreign governments. Currently, it is governed by Prime Minister Abdul-Hamid Dbeibah’s government in the west and by the administration of Prime Minister Ossama Hammad in the east.

Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, who is to arrive in Libya for a visit this week, is due to visit both Tripoli and Benghazi.

The 26-year-old Rice was booked into a Dallas County jail on May 19 for violating the terms of his probation, which stemmed from his role in a car crash that left multiple people injured on a Texas highway. He'd had surgery about a week before the sentence to clean up debris in his right knee, which had been causing inflammation throughout much of last season.

Rice was released in June, and he resumed his rehab work alongside Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes — who was rehabbing after his own surgery to repair torn knee ligaments — at their training facility in Kansas City leading into the start of training camp.

“It was tough. It was mentally tough,” Rice said of the jail stint Tuesday, the first time the wide receiver has spoken publicly about his offseason. “They gave me ways to communicate with my teammates as well as my athletic trainer. Besides the hard times in there, just tried to keep positive — as much Kevin Hart as I could to laugh, and communicating with my teammates on the outside.”

Rice has been brilliant for Kansas City when he's been available, catching 156 passes for 1,797 yards and 14 touchdowns, and helping the Chiefs win the Super Bowl after the 2023 season. But he also missed games to a suspension following the car crash, and several injuries have kept him off the field, resulting in just 28 games played over his first three seasons in the league.

The upcoming season is without question his most important yet.

Not only does Rice has much to prove to a growing chorus of doubters, he's also entering the final year of his rookie contract. If he wants to land a lucrative, long-term deal in Kansas City or elsewhere, Rice has to not only prove that he can stay on the field but also show that he can consistently be productive for an offense that desperately needs him to be.

“I mean, it's motivating,” Rice said of impending free agency. “Honestly, just being back on the field with my brothers right now is motivating. That's in the future. And I'm just focusing on what's happening right now, and that's getting better for the team.”

The Chiefs are coming off a 6-11 season in which Mahomes hurt his knee, several others went down with injuries, and what was once one of the NFL's premier offenses looked like a shadow of itself — even before all those players were sidelined.

Chiefs general manager Brett Veach spent most of his draft capital upgrading the defense, though, including both of his first-round picks, and the biggest move to help the offense was to sign Super Bowl MVP Kenneth Walker III to be their lead running back.

Otherwise, the Chiefs are banking on Rice and fellow wide receivers Xavier Worthy and Tyquan Thornton to take big steps forward in their development, all while hoping that 36-year-old tight end Travis Kelce can still be a reliable and effective pass-catcher.

“We're going to do some amazing things,” Rice predicted, “not only because we're great receivers but we have a great coaching staff around us, and a great quarterback and foundation in general.”

Mahomes has certainly looked like his normal self in camp, moving around on his reconstructed knee as if nothing ever happened. That bodes well for Rice, the passing game and the Chiefs in general as they prepare for the upcoming season.

“He was my motivation every morning,” Rice said.

Rice was asked whether he had anything to say to fans who felt let down by his off-the-field problems, or to young players who might be looking up to him. He went back to Mahomes and the teammates that have been with him through thick and thin.

“Find someone that you can lean on. Find someone you can talk to,” Rice said, “and basically don't be scared to vocalize yourself, or say exactly what's on your mind, because someone is going through the same thing. There's too many people in the world for there not to be someone going through the same thing.”

Notes: The Chiefs are signing DE Emmanuel Ogbah, who appeared in 10 games for them during the 2019 season. The veteran spent last season with Jacksonville. “It was disappointing the year we had him. I thought he was coming on and he got hurt, and we didn't have him at the end of the year,” Chiefs defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo said. “If he's part of our group, I'll be excited.”

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

Hobbs' selection Tuesday of John Giles, a former mayor of Mesa, a Phoenix suburb that is Arizona’s third-largest city, is an overture to the Republicans and conservative independents she must win in a state that was once a GOP stronghold. Republicans have expanded their voter registration advantage over Democrats since Hobbs eked out a narrow win over Kari Lake, a fierce ally of President Donald Trump, in 2022.

Hobbs is considered the most vulnerable Democratic governor in the country. Giles, a registered Republican for decades, changed his party affiliation to independent on May 17 and voted in the Democratic primary last month, according to county voting records.

The Republican nominee is U.S. Rep. Andy Biggs, who last week picked Sine Kerr, a farmer and Republican former state lawmaker, to be his running mate. Kerr's rural roots balance Biggs' base in parts of metro Phoenix.

In an interview with The Associated Press before Hobbs publicly announced that she had picked Giles, he said he still considers himself to be a conservative and said he stuck around the Republican Party probably longer than he should have in a crusade to save it. "A few months ago, I realized that it was time to give up that crusade,” Giles said.

Giles led a conservative city for a decade

Giles, who was Mesa's mayor from 2014 to 2025, has been a vocal Trump critic and has endorsed Democrats, including Trump's 2024 rival, then-Vice President Kamala Harris. Giles spoke in favor of Harris at the Democratic National Convention, saying Trump's policies would hurt Mesa.

Giles also backed Democrats running against Trump allies, including Hobbs in her 2022 race against Lake and the state's current U.S. senators, Mark Kelly and Ruben Gallego.

As mayor, Giles signed a proclamation promoting equal treatment for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender residents in housing and accommodations, a controversial move in the conservative city.

The Biggs campaign, in anticipation of Hobbs' announcement, launched a website highlighting Giles’ support for Harris in 2024 and his participation in the Democratic convention. Drew Sexton, a senior adviser in the Biggs campaign, issued a statement early Tuesday saying Hobbs’ selection of Giles “is of no surprise to Arizonans who have been paying attention. As Kamala Harris’ favorite Arizona mayor, Giles is aligned with Hobbs on all the issues that have hurt Arizonans the most over the past four years.”

Sexton also said Giles “has been an aspiring Democrat since he first voted for Joe Biden in 2020.”

As a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Giles can be an ambassador for Hobbs. Church members make up about 6% of the Arizona population. Latter-day Saints, widely known as Mormons, have been a reliably Republican voting bloc for decades, but many have been ambivalent about Trump since his first run for the White House.

Democrats have been working to woo Latter-day Saints turned off by Trump's penchant for foul language and demeaning rhetoric toward women and people of color, which clashes with the church’s values of humility, morality and compassion.

Biggs is also a member of the church.

Picking a Republican running mate hones the bipartisan image Hobbs has tried to create, contrasting with Biggs' background as a far-right congressman and, before that, the state Senate president. But it also risks inflaming tensions on the left.

In the AP interview, Hobbs said she takes a nonpartisan approach to her work in government. When she was asked whether some supporters might be frustrated because she picked a former Republican as her running mate, she said, “It shouldn't be a surprise.”

Both Hobbs and Giles portray Biggs as an extreme partisan. Giles said it’s disingenuous for Biggs to present himself as more of a moderate when he was “unapologetic about being the most conservative person in the room – in any room.”

Arizona is electing a lieutenant governor for the first time

Arizona is one of just five states without a lieutenant governor position, along with Maine, New Hampshire, Oregon and Wyoming.

That will change in January.

Voters added the post in 2022 to more clearly define the line of succession. Until then, the secretary of state will continue to serve as the next in line to be governor.

Gubernatorial succession is especially relevant in Arizona, where five governors since 1975 have entered the office through succession rather than election.

In fact, of Arizona's 12 governors over the past 50 years, only one, Republican Doug Ducey, entered and left the office through the typical pathways of being elected and serving out a full term. Among the others, one died, one was impeached and removed, one resigned after being convicted of fraud and two quit to accept presidential appointments.

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

Volunteers of America Michigan is marking National Thrift Shop Day on Aug. 17 with a one-day shopping event across all seven of its thrift store locations, featuring 25% off entire purchases, double loyalty points and hourly raffle drawings. The proceeds go directly to the organization’s programs for veterans, seniors, families and people with disabilities.

“VOA Michigan has been serving the community for 130 years,” said David Bann, vice president of development and communications at VOA Michigan. “Primarily, we serve veterans by offering them transitional housing in downtown Detroit.”

The organization operates a 40-bed Detroit Veterans Housing Program where veterans can live for up to two years, gain a permanent address and access support systems to get back on their feet. According to Bann, none of it would be possible without the thrift stores.

“We would not be able to offer those resources, we would not be able to help the vets if we didn’t have all this,” he said.

The stores run entirely on donated inventory - everything from vintage toys and 8-track players to Chanel bags and designer clothing with original tags still attached. One shopper even purchased her wedding dress and her bridesmaids’ gowns from a VOA Michigan location.

“We had somebody come in, buy her wedding dress and all her bridesmaids’ dresses,” Bann said. “She looked great. They looked great. The wedding was fantastic.”

The appeal, Bann says, is in the unpredictability.

“Every single thing in our store is unique. We don’t have doubles, we don’t have duplicates,” he said. “Every single thing is about the hunt because you can hunt, find it, and get something unique. And then you can really change somebody’s life while you’re doing it because when you spend money, it really does help the vets.”

Shoppers can also bring donations the day of the event. Bann encouraged anyone with unused items to drop them off, noting that donated goods are turned directly into revenue for the mission.

For those who shop, Bann framed it simply: “It’s the first step to the rest of their lives. And you’re doing it because you’re excited to go shopping and hunting.”

The Aug. 17 event runs at all seven VOA Michigan locations, including stores in Burton, Lansing, Marshall and Westland. Hourly raffle prizes include gift cards redeemable in-store. More information is available at VOAMI.org.

UNESCO, the Paris-based U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, said the continued exclusion of women and girls from education amounted to a grave violation of their fundamental rights.

“Afghanistan remains the only country in the world where girls and women are formally banned from secondary and higher education,” Hoda Jaberian, UNESCO’s program coordinator for education in emergencies, said in a news conference by video. “Five years is not a temporary interruption in a child’s education. It is clearly almost an entire secondary school cycle.”

Jaberian said: “UNESCO continues to call for the immediate and unconditional restoration of girls and women's right to secondary and higher education. It is not negotiable. It’s a basic human right and we reiterate that there is no substitute for this.”

The Taliban seized power on Aug. 15, 2021, as U.S. and NATO forces withdrew from the country after two decades of war.

Shortly after, it barred girls from secondary schools and later extended the restrictions to higher education, employment and other sectors, effectively excluding women and girls from public life.

The Taliban has maintained the ban despite appeals from the United Nations, humanitarian groups, human‑rights advocates, and several Islamic countries, insisting the issue is a domestic matter.

Jaberian said the restrictions are reversing two decades of progress that Afghanistan had made in education. While access to schooling for girls was severely limited in 2001, by 2021 nearly 1 million girls were enrolled in secondary education.

“Afghanistan had made really major progress in expanding girls’ access to education,” Jaberian said. “But unfortunately, much of that progress now has been completely reversed.”

UNESCO has been supporting education in Afghanistan by running community-based education, literacy and skills development programs.

The skills development and literacy classes take place in community spaces, often inside the homes of the literacy facilitators — with the knowledge of the authorities, the agency said. It said there were more than 1,000 literacy facilitators, most of them trained by UNESCO and its partners.

“While the restriction remains, we cannot abandon Afghan learners,” Jaberian said. “UNESCO work with communities and our partners from the communities to preserve every possible pathway to learning.”

“I started this company simply to give my kids a better life than I had,” said Bullis, who founded the Detroit-area roofing company after working his way up from the bottom of the industry. “I grew up so poor with nothing.”

That personal drive, he says, shapes every job his company takes on - and every dollar it doesn’t ask for upfront.

Michigan Home Restoration operates on an unusual promise: no money changes hands until the work passes inspection. Not the city’s inspection - their own, too.

“We don’t ask for a dollar down. We won’t take a dollar till we pass inspection,” Bullis said. “Even past that, after the city’s inspection, we send an inspector out and inspect it ourselves before we take any money.”

The policy, he says, isn’t a gimmick. It’s a guarantee.

“If you don’t like it, you don’t have to pay us - which, thank God, it’s never happened.”

In a market crowded with roofing contractors, Bullis believes his edge is a combination of structure, standards, and no-middleman pricing. He handles all sales himself.

“I believe in what I sell. I don’t have sales guys. I’m the only sales guy, and I’m an owner. So, you instantly cut out the middleman right there.”

That approach saves customers roughly 10% off the bat, he says - a meaningful difference when a new roof can run $25,000 or more.

Building the right team has been equally central to the company’s growth. Bullis likens his hiring philosophy to assembling a roster.

“Having a roofing company is like having a sports team. You’re only as good as your weakest player.”

When asked what he hopes customers associate with the Michigan Home Restoration name, Bullis didn’t hesitate.

“I want them to think of honesty from start to finish. How honest we are. It’s the truth. It’s simple.”

The company offers financing to help make major repairs accessible. “With the price of everything nowadays, it’s so hard to survive,” Bullis said. “Imagine having to put a $25,000 roof on.”

During his appearance on Live in the D, Bullis brought along his young son Luca - who, when asked if he was his father’s helper, corrected the record immediately: “I’m actually his boss.”

For more information or to schedule a free estimate, visit MHRRoof.com.

Bedrock and General Motors are asking Detroiters to share feedback to help shape the Renaissance Center and East Riverfront redevelopment plans through community engagement and the Community Benefits Ordinance (CBO) process.

The companies hope to incorporate the feedback to reimagine the more than 35 acres spanning the riverfront.

Related --> Detroit’s Renaissance Center redevelopment project to get $75M in public funding

How to get involved

Detroiters can visit the Riverfront Community Hub at Beaubien Place, 521 Atwater Street, to share feedback, tour exhibits, participate in workshops and directly engage with the project team. Visiting hours are Wednesday through Friday from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. and Saturday from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., starting Aug. 19.

Detroiters can also head to the Roadshow stops in each City Council District, at city events and celebrations, open houses and at local Block Clubs.

Residents can also attend weekly CBO meetings at Coleman A. Young Municipal Center on Tuesdays from Aug. 18 through Oct. 27 at 6 p.m.

For more information and updates, click here.

Click here to take the online survey.

Conceptual renderings

Related --> Mayor Duggan highlights redevelopment plans in Detroit

“Widespread and systematic torture and ill-treatment" of both Ukrainian civilian detainees and prisoners of war by Russia are continuing, including sexual violence, said Claudia Fuentes Julio, the U.N. assistant secretary-general for human rights.

She spoke at an informal meeting of the U.N. Security Council called by Latvia and the United Kingdom on Monday to spotlight the plight of civilians and soldiers taken during the war that Russia launched with a full-scale invasion of its neighbor in February 2022. The council, which counts Russia as a permanent member, heard the accounts as both Russia and Ukraine have escalated attacks in the four-year conflict.

Since the invasion, Julio said, U.N. human rights staff have interviewed 910 Ukrainian prisoners of war and 403 civilian detainees following their release. The U.N. has not been able to visit detention facilities in Russia, and its estimated figure of those held does not break down how many are adults or children.

More than 95% of the Ukrainian prisoners of war and 85% of the civilian detainees reported being tortured or ill-treated, often repeatedly, the U.N. official said. They also reported sexual attacks and inhumane conditions, including food deprivation and inadequate medical services.

The Geneva-based human rights office “has documented the execution of 129 Ukrainian prisoners of war at the beginning of their captivity, and the deaths of 48 Ukrainian prisoners of war in custody, resulting from torture, denial of medical care, or other inhumane conditions of detention,” Julio said.

Former detainees share their accounts with the United Nations

The U.N. Security Council also heard emotionally wrenching accounts from Crimean Tatar human rights activist Leniie Umerova, who called herself a “political prisoner” of the Russians for almost two years, and Khuan Leyva Garsiya, a Ukrainian soldier who was among the hundreds that held out for months at the Azovstal steel plant in the besieged city of Mariupol before turning themselves over to the Russians in May 2022.

Garsiya, who was born in Mariupol to a Ukrainian mother and Cuban father, spent 1,183 days as a POW. He said he weighed 55 kilograms (120 pounds) when he was freed, pulling out a picture of his emaciated body to show the council.

He said he was tortured, beaten harder and humiliated more than other prisoners because the Russians suspected that he was a foreign mercenary due to his Cuban ancestry or an American spy because he went to college in the United States.

“Russians were outraged that someone with a connection to Cuba, whom they consider an ally, would fight against their occupation army,” said Garsiya, who is still in the Ukrainian military.

He said the Russians tried to break the prisoners mentally and force them to confess to falsified crimes through tortures including freezing, beatings, electrocution and sexual abuse, he said.

“Two of my friends were beaten to death in detention centers in the Donetsk region,” Garsiya said. “Two of my friends died because of the conditions they were put in in Russian prisons and were returned in plastic bags to the homeland.”

For Umerova, her captivity began when she tried to enter Russia from Georgia to visit her seriously ill father in Crimea, which is part of Ukraine but has been occupied by Russia since 2014.

She said she was placed in detention on “fabricated charges.” But unlike many others, she was able to contact an attorney. In the third month, she said, her attorney obtained her release through a court order.

“But as soon as the prison gates opened, a bag was put over my head and I was taken away again.” In six months, she said she was moved to seven different facilities, calling it “a carousel of repression.”

What happened to her, Umerova said, is part of a system Russia uses to unlawfully detain, isolate, torture and fabricate charges against civilians. She named half a dozen women in Russian prisons today and said at least 84 women have faced criminal prosecution.

U.N. also said Russian detainees reported abuses

U.N. human rights experts also interviewed 816 Russians and 57 third-country national prisoners of war from over 45 countries who were members of the Russian armed forces in Ukraine, said Julio, the assistant secretary-general.

About half reported torture or ill-treatment, primarily during the initial stages of captivity and interrogation by Ukrainians, she said. But U.N. monitors reported that once they arrived in Ukrainian detention facilities, “the conditions generally comply with international humanitarian law and have improved since 2022.”

Russia’s deputy U.N. Ambassador Maria Zabolotskaya told the council the Russian armed forces are complying with international humanitarian law, which includes the treatment of prisoners. She claimed Russian prisoners in Ukraine faced “torture and degradation, and moral and physical abuse.”

She called the Security Council meeting part of “a disinformation campaign against Russia,” funded by NATO countries involved in the Ukraine conflict. The aim, she said, "is to derail efforts towards a peace settlement and to justify strikes on the territory of Russia and against civilians.”

Ukraine’s deputy U.N. Ambassador Volodymyr Pavlichenko said he was struck that during Monday’s meeting, Russia was not ready to discuss the return of POWs — “including their POWs” — and all civilian detainees including abducted children.

There will be blood drives on two days, on Aug. 11 and Aug. 13, at Gardner White stores throughout Michigan.

All donors will receive a $50 coupon toward a Gardner White purchase of $399 or more and will be entered to win a $500 Gardner White gift certificate. Also, donors who give blood between Aug. 1 and Aug. 28 will get a $20 Amazon gift card by email.

All blood types are needed.

Walk-ins are welcome. However, appointments are strongly recommended. Click here to make an appointment. You can also call 1-800-RED-CROSS or use the Red Cross Blood Donor App. Use sponsor code gardnerwhite.

The following Gardner White locations will be hosting a blood drive:

Tuesday, Aug. 11

11:30 a.m. to 5:15 p.m.

• Ann Arbor, 3725 Washtenaw, 48104
• Lansing, 8748 W. Saginaw Hwy, 48917
• Mt. Pleasant, 5260 E. Pickard Road, 48858
• Taylor, 22035 Eureka Road, 48180

Thursday, Aug. 13

11:30 a.m. to 5:15 p.m.

• Auburn Hills, 4445 N. Atlantic Blvd., 48326
• Cadillac, 2240 N. Mitchell Street, 49601
• Canton, 41661 Ford Road, 48187
• Chesterfield, 50400 Gratiot Avenue, 48051
• Howell, 4101 E. Grand River, 48843
• Saginaw, 2660 Tittabawassee Road, 48604
• Shelby Township, 14055 Hall Road, 48315
• Warren, 6500 E. 14 Mile Road, 48092
• Waterford, 4945 Dixie Highway, 48329

The verdicts by a court in Damascus are the first against Assad or any members of his inner circle since his family's five decades in power came to an end 20 months ago. They are mostly symbolic, however, because Assad and his brother Maher had fled to Russia, where they received asylum after the Syrian government’s stunning collapse in December 2024.

Six other former officials were also sentenced to death in absentia. The only former official sentenced to death and in custody is Assad’s maternal cousin Atef Najib, who oversaw a crackdown on dissent that led to an uprising that sparked the civil war. Najib stood inside a cage wearing a prisoner’s uniform as the judge read his sentence aloud, and a crowd gathered outside the heavily guarded courthouse.

Even though Assad is unlikely to ever face justice, the verdicts will be popular among many Syrians, especially those who have expressed frustration that the new government hasn’t moved with enough speed or strength against Assad-era figures.

Some human rights groups, though, expressed concerns that the trials were rushed, potentially unfair and, at the very least, exposed flaws in Syria's justice system.

“Bashar Assad used state agencies to commit war crimes and crimes against humanity,” said judge Fakhareddine al-Aryan during a court session that was aired live on state TV — a contrast with Assad-era trials, which were conducted in secret. The verdicts al-Aryan read aloud found Assad and the others guilty of premeditated murder, including against children, as well as other acts of brutality, including torture.

Al-Aryan said Najib could appeal.

“Today is the day of justice for all the wounded, martyrs, detainees and Syrians who were forced to leave their country,” said attorney Adnan al-Masalmeh who represented families of Najib's victims. “Today marks a victory of right against injustice, a victory of the Syrian people against the ousted regime.”

Najib is one of the highest-ranking security officials to be put on trial. He is a former army brigadier general who was in charge of political security in Syria’s southern Daraa province.

During his tenure, more than a dozen teenagers who scrawled anti-government graffiti on a school wall were arrested and tortured. The case became a catalyst for mass protests against the repressive policies of Assad’s security forces.

The protests were met by a brutal government crackdown in 2011 that spiraled into the civil war that ended with Assad’s ouster in a lightning rebel offensive.

Some of Najib's victims were present at the courthouse, including two who were teenagers in 2011 and expressed their opinions to The Associated Press.

“Today we reached a point where the blood was not wasted,” said Mouawiya Sayasneh, about those who died in the crackdown. Fifteen years later, “there is happiness that Atef Najib was sentenced to death,” he said.

Another man, Nayef Abazeid, who was detained at the age of 13 in 2011, expressed his satisfaction with the sentence, adding that “our biggest happiness will be when Bashar Assad is executed.”

Maher Assad was a former commander of the Syrian military’s 4th Armored Division — which opposition activists have accused of killings, torture, extortion and drug trafficking, in addition to running its own detention centers.

“Today’s scenes outside the courthouse reflect 15 years of pain and a justice long denied," said Hiba Zayadin, Syria researcher at Human Rights Watch. She said the rights group opposes the death penalty in all cases, including this one, because "it’s cruel and irreversible, especially when a fair trial isn’t guaranteed.”

She said the appeal process for Najib “needs to meet fair trial standards.” Real accountability for Assad-era crimes depends on Syria building a justice system that lasts, she said.

The Washington-based Syria Justice and Accountability Center described Tuesday’s conviction of Najib as a “historical step in Syria’s transitional period,” but said it exposed major flaws in the justice system which likely jeopardized his right to a fair trial.

It said that SJAC’s trial monitoring team attended Najib’s trial and documented multiple issues such as rushed proceedings and witness testimony that did not connect Atef to the crimes he was charged with. SJAC said Najib’s lawyer “lacked the capacity and willingness to meaningfully engage with the case or mount an adequate defense.”

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Associated Press writers Kareem Chehayeb and Bassem Mroue contributed to this report from Beirut.

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This story has been edited to correct that Bashar and Maher Assad fled to Russia following the collapse of their government in December 2024, not December 2014.

“Music is such a wonderful way for people to bond, for parents to bond. I know from the minute my kids were born, we’re singing to them,” Ms. Rachel, whose real name is Rachel Griffin Accurso, said.

Ms. Rachel launched her mega popular YouTube channel in 2019 with her husband, known online as Mr. Aron.

“I am a music educator, so I get excited about kids hearing a real clarinet on ‘Icky Sticky Bubble Gum’ and kids getting excited about hearing more real instruments,” said Ms. Rachel.

But that isn't the only education they'll get from the album. A song like “I Could Be Your Friend” gives kids a script for bolstering their social skills. “We’re always thinking about all kinds of kids, whether they have disabilities, whether they’re autistic,” she said. “We just want the world to feel like it’s helpful to all children and the musical worlds as well.”

The songs aren't limited by genre, either. Take the single “I Love a Rainbow” as an example: It's a big bossa nova number. Their take on the classic “Old McDonald” leans bluegrass.

“Music is at the heart of our show,” added Aron Accurso. “And so, we’ve always wanted to release the music and have families experience the music away from the screen.”

Big arrangements and simple songs

“I'm So Happy” was co-produced by Aron Accurso and Grammy winner Scott Riesett and principally arranged by Mr. Aron as well. Aron Accurso reimagined a number of Ms. Rachel's fan favorite songs and childhood classics with a team of 19 vocalists and 42 instrumentalists.

“It’s songs that people know from the show, but we decided to expand them and elevate them with new arrangements and reproducing them,” Aron Accurso explained. “It was a process of, you know, looking at them and saying, ‘OK, what else can we do to this to make it sparkle more? What can we add to it? What does it need to be on the album?’”

He says they most hope that the album will inspire “living room dance parties, because that’s what we love with our children,” he said. “We love to put on an album and dance around.”

An album next to advocacy

Ms. Rachel has made headlines over the last few years for using her social media platforms to advocate for global humanitarian crises, with particular attention given to the plight of children in Gaza and those detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Most recently, she shared comments about the mysterious death of 18-year-old Nolan Wells in Mississippi, a case shadowed by the state’s fraught racial history and lingering distrust in law enforcement.

“We know the investigation and everything that followed would have been different if Nolan Wells were white and his friends were black. Nolan and his family deserve justice,” she wrote on Instagram.

Ms. Rachel says she knows her album may bring attention to her advocacy and vice versa. “I view myself as an advocate for children’s rights so anytime they’re being violated by anyone anywhere, I want to be speaking out,” she said. “I want families to be happy and safe and healthy, and I think that’s a wonderful thing. So, if it’s brought up with the album, that’s great.”

'I'm So Happy' Tracklist

1. “I’m So Happy” 2. “I Love a Rainbow” 3. “Icky Sticky Bubble Gum” 4. “Phonics” 5. “Hop Little Bunnies” 6. “Caterpillar” 7. “Up and Down” 8. “Bubble Pop” 9. “Walkin’ at the Zoo” 10. “Open Shut Them” 11. “I Could Be Your Friend” 12. “I Listen to My Body” 13. “The Wheels on the Bus” 14. “Dino Play” 15. “Pop Those Bubbles” 16. “Old MacDonald” 17. “If You Should Meet an Elephant” 18. “Counting to 20!” 19. “B-I-N-G-O” 20. “Lobby Loo” 21. “Big Feelings” 22. “Together” 23. “I Love You to the Moon”

“One was in 2002 and the other passed away in 2009 and they were both 25,” she said. “One overdosed on OxyContin and the other one overdosed heroin after becoming addicted to heroin via OxyContin.”

Using a carnival merry-go-round as an allegory, “The Galloping Cure” opened Sunday at the Edinburgh International Festival, a haunting portrayal of the drug's destructive power that is among the most impactful of contemporary operas.

Mazzoli and librettist Royce Vavrek created a charismatic charlatan, Lucky Mack (baritone Justin Austin), who arrives at the faded community Yourtown in a white double-breasted suit and matching cowboy hat, easing residents' chronic pain by offering free rides on six fiberglass horses to get people hooked.

He starts charging money during the town's yearlong descent — “dynamic pricing,” he calls it — then rents hobbyhorses until people go broke. He demands noses, hair, kneecaps and tongues as payments, body parts he will use to build more carousel horses. By the final notes, wasted bodies resemble a skid row.

“When he offers you the cure, he never tells you the price,” sings Dr. Theresa Hart (mezzo-soprano Daniela Mack), whose endorsement of Lucky Mack leads to the death of her daughter Noy (soprano Gabrielle Turgeon).

This was the first of two launches for Mazzoli in a 71-day span. She becomes the first woman composer with a premiere at New York's Metropolitan Opera with “ Lincoln in the Bardo” on Oct. 19, a tight gap comparable to when Giuseppe Verdi’s “Il Trovatore” and “La Traviata” debuted 46 days apart in 1853.

A 45-year-old New Yorker originally from Lansdale, Pennsylvania, Mazzoli met Vavrek in 2009. They have become the Rodgers and Hammerstein of 21st-century American opera, previously creating “Song from the Uproar” (2012), “Breaking the Waves” (2016), “Proving Up” (2018) and “The Listeners” (2022).

“Galloping” runs through Wednesday in Scotland, moves to Sweden’s Norrlands Opera from Sept. 12-23 and the San Francisco Opera in the fall of 2027.

A Franz Kafka work was the genesis

Vavrek, a 43-year-old Canadian who also lives in New York, won a Pulitzer Prize for Du Yun's “Angel’s Bone.” He and Mazzoli had long contemplated an opioids opera but made progress only after commissioning a treatment in 2022 from author Karen Russell.

“It wasn’t until we collaborated with Karen that we found a way in that wasn’t preachy or predictable,” Mazzoli said. “Coming at it via this weird fairy tale allows us to bring in all sorts of compassion and allows us see it in an unexpected way.”

Russell joined Mazzoli and Vavrek for a Zoom meeting to discuss ideas, when they settled on Franz Kafka’s “A Country Doctor” as a starting point.

“There’s sort of this floorless void of existential suffering,” Russell said. “And then there’s also physical agony. Different kinds of pain are represented in that story and it feels like a fever dream to me.”

Russell's treatment initially was called “The Devil's Miracle.” She was influenced by the fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm.

“All of your daughters are going to starve unless you give me your youngest child, right?” she said. “It’s like the devil knows when to appear, and it’s often in the context of extreme desperation.”

Key meeting in Paris led to project’s green light

A breakthrough came in 2023, when Mazzoli and Vavrek’s earlier work, “Breaking the Waves” was performed at the Opéra Comique in Paris. It was co-produced by the former artistic director of the English National Opera, John Berry, and directed by Tom Morris, who would go on to direct “Galloping.”

Berry arranged for the creative trio to spend time at Hawkwood, a retreat at Stroud in the English Cotswolds, where they developed the thematic structure and Mazzoli wrote an initial melody. Around the same time, Mazzoli was finishing the composition of the second act of “Lincoln,” based on the George Saunders novel.

“I was working on them both concurrently, which I would not recommend to anyone,” Mazzoli said. “But you do what you have to do when these opportunities come up.”

A 2-hour, 15-minute work conducted by Stuart Stratford with one intermission, “Galloping” was composed for four primary characters. One of them, a pain-wracked old woman named Ivona Kowalski (soprano Susan Bullock), sings early on: “Life’s a joke and then you croak.”

Set designer Rebecca Ringst and lighting designer Lucy Carter used 120 vertical LEDs about 7 yards (6.5 meters) long that resembled needles and caused at times a hallucinatory effect. Mazzoli shifts themes to a darker register as addiction takes hold and the music turns to electronica by DJ Blume and Lorna Dune for teenagers’ raves, mixed into the Scottish Opera Orchestra.

There is a chorus of 14, singing sheep and a pair of dogs (hilariously portrayed by Catriona Hewitson and Edward Jowle), whose barks become words that Theresa understands as she becomes strung out.

“I’m really into finding that strange element that only works really for opera and some comic relief,” Vavrek said. “The dogs are funny. They’re silly.”

Set in a struggling town that could be anywhere

Lucky Mack similar to Harold Hill in Meredith Willson’s “The Music Man,” Sportin' Life in “The Gershwins' Porgy and Bess” and Dr. Dulcamara in Donizetti’s “L’elisir d’amore (The Elixir of Love).” Morris called him a “grifter/magician/snake-oil salesman.”

“It’s the same kind of charismatic person that will sell you on anything,” Mack said. “From an outsider’s point of view, you can objectively say, `Oh, well, I would never do that.' But actually, would you never do it? You don’t know until you’re in a situation. This is not a piece that passes judgment on any of those things but rather asks a really big question about who’s at fault for these ills in society and what we do moving forward.”

The Post said Monday the operation was prompted by an Iranian assassination threat against Trump. The ruse was carried out as journalists and some White House staff members were led to believe they were on the same plane as the president as he began his journey back to Washington from the annual gathering of NATO country leaders.

The Post cited material reviewed by the newspaper, a U.S. official familiar with the operation and another person with knowledge of the president’s travel. The Associated Press has not independently confirmed the report.

Trump had flown to the summit in a new Qatari-gifted and retrofitted red, white and navy blue jet. But ahead of departing Turkey, he said he would fly partway home on an older-model baby blue Air Force One plane instead.

The president at the time said the new luxury jet was being flown out ahead of his departure from Ankara to give some U.S. troops based in eastern England a chance to check out the new Air Force One.

In Ankara, Trump boarded the old Air Force One jumbo jet in view of television cameras ahead of the plane flying to Royal Air Force Mildenhall in the United Kingdom.

However, according to the Post report, after boarding the legacy Air Force One jet, he was secretly shuttled minutes later to a smaller plane — an Air Force C-32A — via an airport catering truck typically used to load meals and other supplies. Trump flew to Mildenhall on that smaller jet.

The White House did not respond directly to questions about the Post report of the secret operation to whisk Trump out of the country on a third aircraft, or the reported elaborate ruse to make it appear he was on the baby blue Air Force One jet flying to Mildenhall.

“As the President has said recently, there are many enemies of America who have their sights on him, and we use every tool at our disposal to address those threats,” White House communications director Steven Cheung said in a statement.

The U.S. Secret Service declined to comment. The Air Force, which maintains the fleet of executive travel aircraft, referred questions to the White House.

There have been questions about the safety of the new Qatari-gifted plane

While Trump was in Turkey, the U.S. military conducted a series of large strikes in Iran in retaliation for its attacks on merchant shipping in the region.

The New York Times and CBS News reported last month that intelligence officials had raised concerns about a potential attack on the president or his jet, triggering additional precautions and the decision not to use the newly inaugurated aircraft gifted to Trump by Qatar for the first leg of Trump’s trip home from Ankara.

The swap had spurred questions about the security of the Qatar-provided aircraft, and Trump said last month after the trip that it would undergo additional upgrades.

Cheung on Monday maintained that the new, Qatari-gifted plane was “a state-of-the-art aircraft that has been fitted with high-level security protocols that ensure the safety of the President and his staff.”

The new Post report on clandestinely putting Trump on a third aircraft and quietly whisking him out of the country adds a fresh layer to just how seriously concerned U.S. security officials were about the threat against Trump during the ongoing war with Iran.

Paul Eckloff, a former special agent with the Secret Service, said such an unusual move could either reflect actionable intelligence or an abundance of caution given volatility in the region with the wars in Iran and Ukraine.

“I would not say unprecedented, but it is an unusual occurrence,” Eckloff told The Associated Press.

The Post reported that to exit that plane without being seen by those uninvolved in the operation, Trump and several aides stepped aboard an airport catering truck, which was elevated planeside using hydraulics and positioned at a door on the opposite side of Air Force One’s entrance.

The small group of reporters who thought they were traveling with Trump were advised to lower their window shades ahead of takeoff.

After arriving at Mildenhall, news photographers captured images of Trump getting off the presidential plane — suggesting he reboarded Air Force One out of sight of the pack of journalists who thought they were traveling with him.

Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal called for a congressional briefing on what happened.

“It is unprecedented and it is surreal,” he said Monday on CNN, calling the incident “downright scary.”

After the brief visit to the base at Mildenhall, Trump boarded the new Air Force One aircraft to fly the rest of the way to Washington.

During a gaggle with reporters aboard the aircraft, Trump was asked directly if there was any credible threats on Air Force One by Iran.

“Well, I have a threat all the time. I’m number one on their list before you,” Trump said. He added to the traveling reporters, “But if I go, you go.”

___

This story has been corrected to show Blumenthal called for a congressional briefing on what happened, not a congressional investigation.

___

AP writers Josh Boak, Aamer Madhani and Konstantin Toropin contributed reporting.

The new class also includes Shawn Camp and Lee Thomas Miller, both elected in the contemporary songwriter category, and Bruce Channel as the veteran songwriter. They will be formally inducted during the 56th Anniversary Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame Gala later this year.

Swift, the 14-time Grammy Award winning artist, is elected in the contemporary songwriter/artist category. She's known for writing many of her own hits since launching her career in Nashville as a preteen. Those include her country singles “Teardrops On My Guitar” and “Love Story,” as well as her blockbuster pop hits “Blank Space,” “Anti-Hero,” and “Cruel Summer.” She became the youngest woman ever inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in June.

Lovett is elected in the veteran songwriter/artist category. He started his career in the folk scene before finding success for his clever lyricism and innovative country-Americana songs like “She's No Lady,” “Cowboy Man,” “Give Back My Heart,” “Why I Don’t Know,” “God Will” and more.

Camp began as a fiddle player for Shelby Lynne, Alan Jackson, Trisha Yearwood and others in the ’80s before becoming a hit songwriter. His credits include Garth Brooks’ “Two Piña Coladas,” Brooks & Dunn's “How Long Gone” and Willie Nelson’s “A Beautiful Time.”

Miller's hits include Terri Clark's “I Just Wanna Be Mad,” Trace Adkins' “You're Gonna Miss This,” Tim McGraw's “Nothin' To Die For” and “Southern Girl,” Chris Stapleton's “Whiskey And You” and many songs for Brad Paisley, including “The World.”

Texas talent Channel is perhaps best known for “Hey! Baby!” written in 1959 and recorded by José Feliciano, Ringo Starr, Conway Twitty, Anne Murray and DJ Ötzi; it may be most recognizable for its prominent placement in the 1987 film “Dirty Dancing.”

The Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame executive director Mark Ford made the announcement inside Belmont University’s R. Milton and Denice Johnson Center.

“This is always one of the most anticipated days on our calendar — the annual reveal of our incoming class,” Ford said in a statement. “We’re excited to once again add new names to a legendary list that began more than a half century ago.”

Most of the now-recalled cars were sold in the U.S. — where more than 508,000 model year 2025-2026 Camry Hybrids are affected.

According to documents published by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, these vehicles are equipped with a 7-inch (17.8 centimeters) display combination meter that can become blank at startup. And beyond turn signals and hazard lights, certain warnings like seat belt reminders and “key left in ignition” buzzers may also not function as a result.

These display failures increase crash risks — both for drivers who may not be able to see telltale indicators and “the ability of other road users to recognize the driver’s intent to change direction or indicate a vehicle hazard,” the NHTSA warns.

Texas-based Toyota Motor North America — a subsidiary of the larger Japanese automaker — says it will notify all known owners of the affected Camrys to bring their vehicles into a certified dealer. To remedy the issue, those dealers will later provide a software update free of charge.

Owner letters are set to be mailed starting Sept. 21 in the U.S., and Toyota expects to complete those notifications by early October. In the meantime, customers can check the NHTSA's and Toyota's online recall lookups to see if their car is affected.

Toyota confirmed to The Associated Press via email Tuesday that its recall affects markets in North America, the Middle East, Asia and some countries in other regions. The company said the 655,000 vehicles impacted globally were produced between December 2023 and July 2026 — across three plants located in the U.S., Japan and Thailand.

For more information, customers can visit Toyota's website or contact customer support at 1-800-331-4331.

Now it's getting back to its roots.

In a conference call with investors Monday, the company behind Truth Social said it will be unwinding much of its expansion and doubling down on its original media business by selling a form of White House access, a move that has raised big ethical questions among Democrats and government watchdogs.

Donald Trump started Truth Social after he was kicked off Twitter and Facebook, but the two reinstated him more than three years ago, so the company has had to transform itself. Instead of a “free speech” forum, it now acts more like a “hear it here first” site, a second White House press office where people get scoops from the president on everything from the Iran war to tariffs to the future of the U.S. central bank.

But shares of the parent company, Trump Media & Technology, kept falling so it decided to become more than a media company, and branched into unrelated industries like online betting, finance, investment funds, buying and storing bitcoin and nuclear energy.

Now it's returning to its original mission, with a twist: It's offering a special new service that grants fast access to President Trump's posts for a fee.

The new business could double or triple revenue

In a conference call with investors, the company's new chief executive, Kevin McGurn, said it had already signed up several high speed trading firms, each paying between $60,000 and $100,000 a month.

“We’re in the early innings,” said McGurn, noting that the potential market included data center companies, news organizations and developers of large language models, not just traders, and he was talking to them all.

McGurn has rejected the idea that the new business is an ethics quagmire as good-government groups have said, noting that other social media companies provide a similar service. As for the White House, it denies conflicts even exist between Trump the president and Trump the businessman where his private interests may influence his public policy.

Traders on Wall Street can make big money if they get White House news faster and so are signing up — 10 in the week since the service began, which may seem like a tiny number but translates into a major boost for the company. The monthly customers collectively are paying as much as $7 million and $12 million annually — two to three times the revenue the company took in for all its businesses last year.

Trump Media needs the money — and a lot more.

It's lost more than $1 billion since the start of last year, and its earnings report released Monday for the three months ended June 30 showed relief is not on the horizon. It lost another $238 million, though much of that was due to paper losses from the plunging value of its bitcoin holdings.

Time is running out

The clock is ticking to fix the company.

Trump Media depends partly on outside funding, specifically $1 billion raised from lenders with a special agreement that allows them to get paid back early. They can demand the company buy back their convertible notes on Nov. 30, 18 months before the loans mature.

That cashout date is just after the November midterms, which could impact the company should Democrats get control of Congress. Several current members, including Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, say they will hold formal investigations of Trump's businesses, including Trump Media, should they take over.

A third deadline is farther out, but the most consequential — the end of Trump's presidency.

Trump is a big draw for the platform's users, but it's not clear how many will read his posts after he leaves office, much less why traders will pay as much $1.2 million a year for sneak peeks at his posts if he's no longer able to declare on the site that the Strait of Hormuz is open or that he's hiking tariffs on dozens of countries.

Would Vance in the White House help Truth Social?

The special, high-speed service, called Truth API, includes posts from other top posters on the site, but no one comes near the president in popularity. He has 13 million followers. The second biggest poster, his son, Donald Jr., has 7.5 million.

Other heavily followed posters include Trump administration members who also may fall in popularity once out of office, including FBI director Kash Patel and Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

A wild card is JD Vance, who will be out of his vice presidential job in 2028 but, if he runs for president and wins, may continue to post on the site where he has five million followers.

The other business line that McGurn is choosing to hold onto is nuclear fusion, a technology still not commercially available but that is getting a big boost by the current administration.

The U.S. government has a helping hand

In June, the U.S. Department of Energy released a “road map” committing to government funding to speed the development of nuclear fusion as a national priority and calling for public-private partnerships.

Despite the help, investors still aren't convinced Trump Media has a rosy future.

After closing at about $62 shortly after it went public in 2024, the stock has plunged into the single digits, wiping out billions in stock market value.

On Tuesday, shares of Trump Media fell about 3.3% to $9.08.

Carrington came from behind and hit the Fever's Sophie Cunningham in the head and neck on a fast-break layup, knocking her to the court as the shot went in. The play was reviewed and upgraded to a Flagrant 2 after the referee said there was windup, impact and follow-through on the foul.

Carrington is Black and Cunningham is white. After Carrington was ejected, she posted “WHITE PRIVILEGE” on social media and tagged the Fever.

Responding to a clip of former NFL linebacker Emmanuel Acho criticizing her reaction, Carrington posted on X on Monday that she “never once claimed that the assessment of the foul was white privilege.”

“Try exercising your critical thinking skills, I know you studied psych. Furthermore, I’m the LAST thing from ignorant or asinine when it comes to speaking on ‘white privilege’, do ya research on that one,” Carrington wrote. "I actually went to school, one of the top universities might I add, to educate myself on this exact subject.

“I would never use that term as a rhetorical weapon knowing the historical and social weight it holds without having the proper evidence to substantiate it.”

The 28-year-old Carrington played for Stanford for four years before spending her final season of college ball at Baylor. She majored in psychology and African and African American studies at Stanford.

There has been no word from the WNBA on any additional punishment for Carrington for the hard foul. The Sky lost 97-88 to the Seattle Storm on Monday night. Carrington came off the bench, played 27 minutes and scored a career-high 26 points.

___

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

Here’s a list of back-to-school giveaways across Metro Detroit:

Aug. 7

• City of Southfield, 26000 Evergreen Rd, Southfield, MI 48037 - Free Backpacks w/School Supplies, Food, Games, Music, Giveaways, K-12 (4-7 PM)
• Boost Mobile, 26310 Eastgate Blvd, Roseville, MI 48066 - Free Backpack, Food, Giveaways, More (3 PM)
• Boost Mobile, 19620 Middlebelt Rd, Livonia, MI 48152 - Free Backpack, Food, Giveaways, More! (3PM)
• Center of Family Development, 2995 E Grand Blvd, Detroit, MI 48202 - Backpack giveaway, Free Diapers, Family Immunizations (12-4 PM)
• Back-to-school fair in Southfield
• • Where: Southfield Municipal Campus, 26000 Evergreen Rd. in Southfield
  • What: The Southfield Public Schools is holding its annual back-to-school fair, where there will be free backpacks and school supplies, entertainment, food, prizes, and more. For more information, email communications@southfieldk12.org.

Aug. 8

• Abundant Life Church, 29863 Dawson St, Garden City, MI 48135 - Free Backpacks & School Supplies, Food, Family Fun, Bounce House, Face Painting, Community Resources (2- 5 PM)
• Boost Mobile, 34873 Ford Rd, Westland, MI 48185 - Free Backpack, Food, Giveaways, More! (3 PM)
• Detroit Police Dept 11187 Gratiot Ave, Detroit, MI 48213 - Free Backpack w/School Supplies, Food, Music, Bounce Houses. (12- 4 PM)
• 12-4 PM -- Tuff Elites Back to School, Heilmann Community Center, 19601 Crusade St, Detroit, MI 48205

Aug. 9

• Greater Missionary Church, 2533 Carpenter, Detroit, MI 48212 - Free Backpacks/School Supplies, Dental Services, Food, Community Resources, Bounce Houses, Fun (1-4:30 PM)

Aug. 10

• Em Urgent Care 8030 N Middlebelt Rd, Westland, MI 48185 - Free School Supplies, Bounce Houses, Food Trucks, Giveaways (3:30-7 PM)

Aug. 11

• Greater Grace Temple, 23500 W. Seven Mile, Detroit, MI 48219 - All Free: Backpacks, School Supplies, Eye Exams, Glasses, Dental Care, Shots, Physicals, Zoo, Bike Helmets, Bike giveaway, Community Resources (11 AM- 2 PM)
• MI Dept Human Services, 4733 Conner, Detroit, MI 48210 - School Supplies Giveaway RSVP: (313) 926-8343 Mrs. Thurman (9 AM-1 PM)
• 4–6 PM -- Backpacks & Beats 2026
• • 400 Martin Luther King Jr. St. SE
  • Grand Rapids, MI 49503
  • Free school supplies while supplies last, including backpacks, notebooks, crayons, markers, colored pencils, dry erase markers, highlighters, pencils, pens, folders, scissors, calculators, sticky notes and glue sticks. Also includes a bounce house, hot dogs, ice cream, and community resources including healthcare, education, and food security information. Weather permitting.

Aug. 13

• Boost Mobile, 7451 Gratiot Ave. Detroit, MI 48213 - Free Backpack, Food, Giveaways, More! (3 PM)
• Boost Mobile, 19085 Eureka Rd, Southgate, MI 48195 - Free Backpack, Food, Giveaways, More! (3 PM)

Aug. 14

• Boost Mobile, 9169 Telegraph Rd, Redford, MI 48239 - Free Backpack, Food, Giveaways, More! (3 PM)
• Boost Mobile, 19100 Van Dyke Detroit, MI 48234 - Free Backpack, Food, Giveaways, More (3 PM)
• Kemeny Rec. Center, 2260 S. Fort St, Detroit, MI 48217 - Free Backpacks w/School Supplies, Lunch, Community Resources, Bounce Houses, Music, Face painting (12- 4 PM)
• New Era Detroit Back to School Event
• • 2-5PM
  • 19010 Schoolcraft Detroit, MI 48223
  • Free Uniform Giveaway (Child must be present)

Aug. 15

• Boost Mobile, 352 N Telegraph Rd, Pontiac, MI 48341 - Free Backpack, Food, Giveaways, More! (3 PM)
• Boost Mobile, 22844 John R. Rd, Hazel Park, MI 48030 - Free Backpack, Food, Giveaways, More! (3 PM)
• Boost Mobile, 6042 Rawsonville Rd, Belleville, MI 48111 - Free Backpack, Food, Giveaways, More! (3 PM)
• John F. Kennedy, Jr. Library, 24602 Van Born Rd, Dearborn Heights, MI 48125 -Backpacks with school supplies K-12 (11 AM)
• Levagood Park 801 N. Denwood St., Dearborn, MI 48128 - Backpack w/School Supplies, w/Ice Cream - Free Backpacks. (12- 2 PM)
• Douglas Ramsay Park, 14800 Longacre St, Detroit, MI 48227 - Free Backpacks w/ School Supplies, Free Books. Vendors Welcomed. (10 AM-1 PM)
• Magical Touch Quick Lube, 10700 Seven Mile W, Detroit, MI 48221 - Free Backpacks, Food, drinks, DJ (12-4 PM)
• Unity Baptist Church, 7500 Tireman Ave, Detroit, MI 48204 - Free Backpack w/School Supplies (11 AM- 2 PM)
• Beechwood Center, 421 Beechwood St., River Rouge, MI 48218 - Free Backpacks w/ School Supplies, Tacos, Pizza, DJ (2- 5 PM)
• 2-4 PM -- Back-to-school giveaway in Detroit
• • Where: 10700 W. Seven Mile Rd. in Detroit
  • What: The Peace Over Pistols event will provide 400 free backpacks for students in kindergarten through 12th grade. Children must be present at the event to receive a bag.
  • The event will also include a DJ, popcorn, cotton candy, and hot dogs. For more information or to donate school supplies, call 313-658-4391.
• 10 AM – 2 PM
• • Where: 12227 Findlay Ave. in Detroit
  • What: The Refuge Temple Cathedral of His Glory Church of God in Christ will host a free community day featuring free backpacks and school items distributed (while supplies last), free food, music, bounce houses, face painting, immunizations, a gaming truck, and more. For more information or to make donations, call 248-508-2182.
• 19493 Joann Detroit, MI 48205
• • What: Back-to-school event with bounce house, food & drinks, live DJ & music, and fun games. Giveaways and more.
  • Contact: 214-899-3100
• Peace Over Pistols Back 2 School Event
• • 12-4PM
  • 10700 W. 7 Mile/Meyers Detroit, MI 48221
  • Free Backpacks, Food, Music
• Purpose Driven Cares Back to School Even
• • 12PM-6PM
  • Calimera Park 19493 Joann Detroit, MI 48205
  • Food & Drinks, Music, Games, Giveaways

Aug. 16

• Penn-Vassar Park 3600 Pardee St., Dearborn, MI 48124 - Backpack w/School Supplies, w/Ice Cream - 125 Backpacks given away (12-2 PM)

Aug. 18

• Xfinity’s Back to School Giveaway for Local Families
• • 10AM-7PM
  • Xfinity Store 2911 Preyde Blvd, Ste 14 Lansing, MI 48912
  • Free Backpacks with school supplies, Tablet Raffle, Bike Raffle, Community Resources
  • Has to be within 20 miles of Lansing

Aug. 20

• Boost Mobile, 12042 E 10 Mile Rd, Warren, MI 48089 - Free Backpack, Food, Giveaways, More! (3 PM)
• Joseph Center, 8431 Rosa Parks, Detroit, MI - Backpacks w/School Supplies, Free Food, Haircuts, Braiding, Kids Zone, Health Screenings, Community Resources (2-6 PM)

Aug. 21

• Admire Dental 13219 Eureka Rd, Southgate, MI 48195 - Free Backpacks w/School Supplies (3 PM)

Aug. 22

• Boost Mobile, 866 Dix Hwy, Lincoln Park, MI 48146 - Free Backpack, Food, Giveaways, More! (3 PM)
• Schoolcraft Browns, 12416 Indiana Street, Detroit, MI 48204 - Free Backpack 1st 100 People (2 PM)
• Freedom Missionary Church 2228 Lakeview St, Detroit, MI 48215 (Watch) - All Free: Backpacks, school supplies, Face painting, food, haircuts, bounce house, & more! (1-4 PM)
• True Love Christian Ministries 6138 East Nevada St. Detroit, MI 48234 - Free: Food, Backpacks, school supplies, haircuts, community resources, bounce houses, activities Volunteers Welcomed, RSVP: Impact Detroit Youth
• Community Hub’s 3rd Annual Back-to-School Event Tickets, Saturday, August 22 • 1 PM - 5 PM | Eventbrite (1-5 PM)
• Taylor Christian Church, 11425 Telegraph Rd, Taylor, MI 48180 - Free backpacks, school supplies, face painting, giveaways, haircuts and inflatables (11 AM)
• Sweet Living Towers, 15400 Grand River Ave, Detroit, MI 48227 - All Free: Backpacks, school supplies, haircuts, hair styles, braids, nails, skin care, food, community resources, uniforms, health screenings, Kid Zone, Music & More (12-4 PM)
• Aiyanah’s Gift Annual Back to School Rally
• • 3PM
  • 3801 Martin Luther King Ave Flint, MI 48505
  • Free Backpacks with school supplies, Food, Games, Raffles, Face Painting, Bounce Houses
• Groomsday Back to School Drive
• • 12-4PM
  • Sweet Living Towers 15400 Grand River Detroit, MI 48227
  • All Free: Backpacks, Uniforms, School Supplies, Community Resources, Haircuts, Braids, Gift Cards and more!

Aug. 23

• Royal Party Store 20520 Lahser Rd, Detroit, MI 48219 - Free Backpacks w/School
• Supplies, Haircuts, Braiding, Food, Community Resources, Bounce Houses, more! (2- 7 PM)
• Faith Church 894 E Huron River Dr, Belleville, MI 48111 - 11:00 AM - 1:00 PM -Free Backpacks & School Supplies, Food, Hygiene Kits, K-12 (11 AM-1 PM)
• Tax Reliant 25755 W 8 Mile Rd, Redford Township, MI 48240 - Free School Supplies, Refreshments, Games. Activities, Giveaways (12- 3 PM)
• Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit, 4454 Woodward Avenue, Detroit, MI 48201
• Free Backpacks w/School Supplies, Clothing Swap, Free books, Crafts, community resources (1-3 PM) www.facebook.com/groups/michiganfreebies
• 2nd Annual Back 2 School Drive
• • 2-7PM
  • Royal Party Store 20420 Lahser Rd. Detroit, MI 48219
  • Free Backpacks, School Supplies, Haircuts, Braiders, Food, Bounce Houses, Giveaways and more!

Aug. 25

• WCCCD Back to School Rally
• • 11AM-2PM
  • Mary Ellen Stempfle University Center 19305 Vernier Rd. Harper Woods, MI 48225
  • Free Backpacks and School Supplies, Youth and Parent Workshops, Vendors, Community Resources and more!

Aug. 26

• WCCCD Back to School Rally
• • 11AM-2PM
  • Downriver Campus 21000 Northline Rd. Taylor, MI 48180
  • Free Backpacks and School Supplies, Youth and Parent Workshops, Vendors, Community Resources and more!

Aug. 27

• WCCCD Back to School Rally
• • 11AM-2PM
  • Northwest Campus 8200 W. Outer Dr. Detroit, MI 48219
  • Free Backpacks and School Supplies, Youth and Parent Workshops, Vendors, Community Resources and more!

Aug. 29

• Day of Dignity Drive-Thru Community Distribution
• • 12-5PM
  • Islamic Center of Detroit 14350 Tireman Ave, Detroit, MI 48228
  • All Free (ID Required): School Kits & Backpacks, Winter Jackets, Hygiene Kits, Hot Meals, Family Essentials, Health Services provided by ICD Staff, Gifts, Balloon Twisters

Aug. 30

• The Movement Stop the Violence 14^th Annual Back to School Giveaway and Resource Fair
• • 2-6PM
  • On The Go Barbershop 10230 Fenkell Ave. Detroit, MI 48238
  • All Free: Backpacks with school supplies, Access to Financial Resources, Health and Wellness Information, Educational Support Services, Community Programs, Haircuts for Students, Free Lunch for Kids, Petting Zoo and more!
• Detroit Heals Detroit Back to School Bash
• • 2-6PM
  • The Healing Hub 19510 Alcoy Detroit, MI 48205
  • Free Uniforms, Free Shoes, School Supplies, Food, Fun
• Detroit Highwaymen Backpack Drive
• • 12-3PM
  • 4746 Gratiot Ave. Kimball, MI 48074
  • All Free: Backpacks, Haircuts, Fingernail Painting, Finger Foods

Green Lantern is the winner of this year’s Vote 4 The Best category for best pizza (all types) in Metro Detroit.

Here are the results for the top five:

1. Green Lantern.
2. Toarmina’s Pizza.
3. Mootz Pizzeria & Bar in Detroit.
4. Alibi of Troy.
5. Square One Pizzeria in Mt. Clemens.

Congrats to all of our finalists.

This year’s Vote 4 The Best received more than 163,000 votes during the finalist phase, with Metro Detroiters supporting their favorite restaurants, venues, and local businesses in 80 different categories.

Our winner reveal begins Monday, Aug. 10.

Click here to view a full list of this year’s Vote 4 The Best winners as they are announced.

Methodology

Fans nominated their favorite businesses from June 1 through June 14 -- one nomination in each category per person.

After the nomination period closed on June 14, we announced the finalists for each category at the end of the week -- on June 19.

Voting on finalists opened June 22 during our Ford Fireworks special. Fans voted in each category once per day until voting ended on July 20.

Winners are announced from Aug 10 through Aug. 21.

Click here to read the official Vote 4 The Best rules.

Thanks to our Vote 4 The Best sponsor, Wallside Windows!

Have a question? Email us at clickondetroit@wdiv.com , and we’ll get you an answer.

The order advocates separating the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine into three different single-disease shots and administering all childhood immunizations at separate appointments whenever possible. It also directs the nation's health department to improve research on vaccines, which are already extensively studied, and present a plan to offer separate measles, mumps, and rubella vaccines for children, since that is not currently an option in the United States.

The renewed focus on vaccines marks a departure from the Trump administration’s recent efforts to emphasize less controversial health policies related to healthy eating, drug price negotiations and medical fraud crackdowns ahead of November’s midterm elections.

Public health experts have raised concerns that spacing out shots as Trump suggests can lead to an increased risk that children become infected with a vaccine-preventable disease before returning for another visit. Childhood vaccines — and how and when to give them in combination — go through rigorous studies, and safety tracking continues for years as the shots are used.

Trump called the announcement a “major victory for parents rights, religious and constitutional rights, and for the gold standard science.”

Speaking about the order at the Oval Office on Monday, Trump repeatedly suggested the number or timing of vaccines could play a role in rising rates of autism spectrum disorder, even as scientific consensus and decades of studies have firmly concluded there is no link. The order also includes several changes to the childhood vaccine schedule that his health department has already attempted, but that have been blocked by a federal judge. A White House official who insisted on anonymity to brief reporters said Trump was within his right to provide his own recommendation through the executive order and said the lawsuit blocking the health department's schedule was a separate issue.

Dr. Andrew Racine, president of the American Academy of Pediatrics, said the announcement spreads uncertainty, fear and confusion where “there doesn't need to be any of that.” He disputed Trump's recommendations and said previous ones should stand.

“Science about vaccines and their efficacy has not changed,” he said. “The distribution of viruses and other pathogens in our environment has not changed. Children in this country have not changed in the last 48 hours."

Sen. Bill Cassidy, the Republican chair of the Senate health committee, slammed the executive order in a social media post, saying vaccines are safe and do not cause autism.

“I'm a doctor. This executive order is wrong,” the Louisiana senator wrote. “The President does not have the expertise to make these changes.”

Who is in charge of vaccine policy?

Even as the order calls for revised vaccine recommendations, states, not the federal government, have the authority to require vaccinations for schoolchildren. The order advises states with school vaccine mandates to consider updating their laws to reflect the administration's preferred schedule, according to a White House fact sheet.

Last December, Trump ordered the Department of Health and Human Services to review how peer nations approach vaccine recommendations and consider revising U.S. guidance accordingly. The department responded by cutting the number of vaccines it recommends for every child, a move that has since been blocked in court.

Changes to federal childhood vaccine recommendations customarily require approval from the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The newly Senate-confirmed CDC director, Dr. Erica Schwartz, oversaw policies promoting vaccination of service members while in a leadership position at the U.S. Coast Guard.

However, public health law expert Lawrence Gostin at Georgetown University said the Supreme Court's interpretation of Trump's power may allow him to supersede Schwartz if she does not agree to new recommendations.

“This is clearly the first test for Dr. Erica Schwartz,” Gostin said in an email. “The President is placing her in an untenable position.”

Asked on a call with reporters why the president was advocating splitting MMR into three single-disease vaccines, the White House official did not provide any studies supporting the decision. They said that was Trump's long-held view and that some countries provide individual measles vaccines in certain circumstances.

Kush Desai, a Trump spokesperson, told The Associated Press that the president is “one of countless parents who have voiced questions and concerns about the combined MMR vaccine" and said the plan to develop single-disease vaccines would “give parents more options on timing and frequency for their children,” ultimately increasing vaccine uptake.

Studies of babies and toddlers in the U.S. have shown that the use of combination shots for childhood vaccines, rather than single ones, increased the likelihood of completing all recommended vaccinations by the age of 2.

Announcement follows other Trump administration vaccine actions

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an anti-vaccine activist before he entered politics, set out to overhaul immunization guidance at HHS in the first year of Trump’s term. He fired an entire 17-member vaccine advisory committee, installing replacements who made far more restrictive recommendations that have since been halted by a federal judge. He also personally directed the CDC to abandon its position that vaccines do not cause autism, without supplying any new evidence to support the change.

Throughout his second term, Trump has been fixated on connecting autism to vaccines. He has recently ramped up pressure on Kennedy to identify the cause of autism, something Kennedy had pledged to do with new research unveiled last year. Trump publicly prodded the health secretary for an update on autism research in a Cabinet meeting last month.

“How are you doing on the autism research?” Trump asked.

“We will have an answer for you,” Kennedy said.

Scientific consensus and decades of studies have firmly concluded there is no link between childhood vaccines and autism. Racine reiterated that point on Monday, noting that the potential link had been studied in “over 40 methodologically well-designed studies in over seven countries involving over 5 million children.”

“I'm not sure that there is anything that has been as thoroughly looked at as this question," he said. “And the answer is unequivocally no."

In the Oval Office, Kennedy repeated his assertion that he believes an unknown environmental factor is to blame for rising autism diagnoses and said that his department will deliver research findings “as soon as they are ready.”

Monday's order comes as students are returning to classrooms around the country and the nation contends with a measles outbreak that experts say could result in the U.S. losing its measles elimination status.

Doctors have raised concerns that Trump's falsehoods on vaccines could stoke vaccine hesitancy. Federal data shows U.S. kindergarten vaccination rates have been dropping, with the share of children with exemptions rising to an all-time high in the 2024-25 school year.

___

This story was first published on Aug. 10, 2026. It was published again on Aug. 11, 2026, to correct the name of the agency where Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. set out to overhaul immunization guidance. The agency was HHS, not DHS.

___

Associated Press writers Laura Ungar and Mike Stobbe contributed to this report. Swenson reported from New York.

The winner will advance to take on Republican U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany in November in an open race that could test the limits of progressives' appeal in a critical battleground state.

Democrats are hoping to capitalize on low approval ratings for President Donald Trump in a state he won in 2016 and 2024 to retain control of the governor’s office and flip both chambers of the Legislature to earn full control of Wisconsin state government for the first time since 2010.

In other races, U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy’s 26-year-old son-in-law Michael Alfonso is trying to win a five-way primary in Duffy’s old seat in the U.S. House. And Democrat Rebecca Cooke is looking to emerge from the primary to force a rematch with Republican U.S. Rep. Derrick Van Orden in the state’s most hotly contested and narrowly divided congressional district.

Democratic socialist shakes up Wisconsin race, fueled by national movement

Single mother and former line cook Francesca Hong, a democratic socialist, has tapped into Democratic anger with the party’s mainstream and Trump's “Make America Great Again” movement.

The 37-year-old known for sprinkling her comments with profanity and leaning into her edgy and sometimes humorous social media profile excited the liberal wing of the party. Hong called for free childcare and healthcare and a moratorium on artificial intelligence data center construction. But she also wrestled with her past support for defunding the police, saying at the race’s only debate that she would not support cutting law enforcement funding.

She also drew criticism for past social media posts in which she called for canceling Thanksgiving because “we should stop celebrating colonialism" and disparaged Valentine’s Day as “another day capitalism tells you how to show love.”

Hong has since downplayed the posts as her attempt at making jokes.

Hong supporter Dan Jakubek, 44, of Marshall, dismissed concerns over Hong's past statements and said her message of affordability is resonating across generations.

“I've never seen so many young, out of high school, college students revved up for change,” he said.

Establishment Democrats worried that a Hong win would make it easier for Tiffany to win in November, as her platform would be a tougher sell among moderate and independent voters who are critical in the swing state known for razor-thin election margins.

Gov. Tony Evers endorsed Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley, saying he has the best chance of beating Tiffany in November.

Crowley told supporters at a Sunday night rally that they must come together after the primary to beat Tiffany.

“Our ultimate goal is to make sure we don’t have a MAGA extremist occupying the governor’s office,” Crowley said.

Hong said she would welcome Evers' support after the primary.

“We have to come together to beat Tom Tiffany," she said Monday.

Democrat David Zimmerman, a 79-year-old retired industrial engineer professor in Madison, voted for Crowley on Tuesday. He said Hong's chance of beating Tiffany in November “worries me a lot" but he would vote for her if she's the nominee.

“I think she's going to have trouble winning,” he said.

Fellow Crowley voter Julie Martinson, 69, a bank worker from Madison, also said she was worried about Hong being able to win the general election. But Martinson also predicted Democrats would come together to support her.

“There's no reason we can't galvanize around her and get her in there, ” she said.

Hong is the first Asian American elected to the state Assembly in 2020. She is looking to become Wisconsin's first female governor and first Asian American governor. Crowley would be the state's first Black governor.

Chaotic Democratic primary saw candidates drop, come back in

Evers’ decision not to seek a third term created an open race for governor that initially had seven Democrats file to run.

Lt. Gov. Sara Rodriguez appeared to be making a move to consolidate mainstream Democratic support in July, but she dropped out in the middle of the month amid a campaign finance scandal. That led Crowley, who had dropped out a week earlier and endorsed Rodriguez, to get back in the race, this time with Evers' backing.

Former Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes, who was seen as an early front-runner after nearly beating Republican U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson in 2022, bowed out less than two weeks before the election amid questions about inappropriate behavior.

Sean Duffy’s son-in-law looks to win back Duffy’s old congressional district

Alfonso is looking to become the youngest member of Congress by winning Wisconsin’s 7th Congressional District, a seat previously held for nine years by his father-in-law before Duffy stepped down in 2019.

He secured Trump’s endorsement, who called him a “MAGA warrior,” to separate him from the field that also includes Kevin Hermening, a Trump supporter and longtime Republican operative in the congressional district.

Trump spoke on a telephone rally for Alfonso on Monday night, calling him “a fantastic young guy who’s going to be a star in Washington.” It was the second event Trump hosted for Alfonso in the primary.

Alfonso’s candidacy drew blowback from some longtime Republican leaders in the district who said he was too young and inexperienced for the job, especially compared with Hermening.

Democrat Cooke looks for repeat race against Rep. Derrick Van Orden

Cooke, a former Democratic fundraiser and small business owner, faces a challenge from former Eau Claire City Council President Emily Berge in Wisconsin's 3rd Congressional District. Berge ran an underdog, insurgent campaign against Cooke, who was more well-known and better financed.

Cooke narrowly lost to Van Orden in 2024 and also ran in 2022 but lost in the Democratic primary that year.

Van Orden is one of Trump’s biggest supporters but will face a tough reelection bid in a narrowly divided district in a year where Trump’s approval ratings are low in Wisconsin.

In Wisconsin, state Rep. Francesca Hong, a self-described democratic socialist, is the front-runner for the party's nomination for governor in a swing state where winning the governor's mansion is central to Democrats' hopes for 2028 and beyond. In Minnesota, Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan is running for the nomination for an open Senate seat against centrist Democratic Rep. Angie Craig.

The left vs. center theme is on display in Democratic primaries in multiple states voting Tuesday, with other significant races in places like Alabama and South Carolina.

Here's what to watch Tuesday night.

Does the left keep surging in swing states?

Left-leaning candidates have consistently won primaries, capitalizing on Democratic voter frustration at party leadership. Most wins came in reliably liberal urban areas, ranging from New York Cityto Denver. But last week, progressive candidate Abdul El-Sayed broke new ground by winning the party's nomination for a competitive Senate race in swing state Michigan.

Now Hong and, to a lesser extent, Flanagan are trying to claim even more purple terrain for the left.

President Donald Trump won Wisconsin in 2024 and its state legislature has long been in the hands of the GOP, but Democrats have been bullish about reversing that trend. Hong has maintained a steady lead in public polls against Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley, despite his endorsement by the state's current governor, Democrat Tony Evers. Hong is also helped by the presence on the ballot of multiple more traditional candidates who will split votes against her, including former Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes, who dropped out of the race late last month.

Hong has a trail of controversial statements, including vocal support for defunding the police in 2020, a position she now disavows. Prominent Democratic strategists fear that she can win the primary by appealing to the party's base but is a risk in the general election. The winner of the Democratic primary will face Republican Rep. Tom Tiffany in November.

The stakes are high in the race for Democrats nationally, not just Wisconsin residents. Democrats are hoping to win control of the state legislature, and the governor's mansion would give them an ability to redraw Wisconsin's map to counter the edge the GOP built up in this year's mid-decade redistricting. Without that, their path to a House majority in 2028 becomes challenging.

Democrats will also likely need to win Wisconsin to retake the White House in 2028, and the governor will have a key role in certifying the winner of the election. In 2020, Trump tried to claim Wisconsin despite it being won by Joe Biden, only to be blocked in part by Evers. Tiffany, who has been endorsed by Trump, supported the president's attempt to overturn the election.

Democrats have reliably won Minnesota during the Trump years, but by shrinking margins, and Republicans believe they have a shot at claiming the open Senate seat given the primary battle there. Craig represents a swing district and has taken more moderate stances, and Flanagan has slammed her for being supported by establishment Democrats and being too accommodating to Trump, especially on immigration.

Lamont won as an insurgent. Now he's establishment

When the Democratic establishment was worrying about insurgents from the left a generation ago, it fretted about the man who is currently Connecticut's governor, Ned Lamont.

A wealthy former entrepreneur, Lamont was an obscure Greenwich selectman when he mounted a primary challenge against the state's senior senator, Joe Lieberman, in 2006. Lamont argued that the centrist Lieberman, who had been the party's vice presidential nominee in 2000, wasn't a loyal enough Democrat and leaned too far to the right.

Lamont won that primary, but Lieberman ran in the general election as an independent and kept his Senate seat. Lamont kept running for office and eventually was elected governor in 2018. Now 72, Lamont is being challenged from the left by State Rep. Josh Elliott, 41, who alleges the governor hasn't fought Trump hard enough and that the solidly Democratic state deserves better than Lamont's fiscally moderate approach.

For months, Lamont largely ignored Elliott and focused on burnishing his own image. But in a sign of a potentially tightening race, he's begun to advertise against his challenger.

An incumbent cast as too old and too tied to big money

Also in Connecticut, Rep. John Larson faces his first primary challenge after 14 terms in the House from former Hartford mayor Luke Bronin.

The race follows familiar contours, as Bronin, 47, argues that Larson, 78, is too old and too tied to big money donors. Larson argues his experience and seniority put him in the best position to deliver for his voters.

There is also a growing list of longtime Democrats upset by younger challengers. Will one more name get added on Tuesday night?

In a Wisconsin House district, a rematch is likely

Democratic voters in a swath of western Wisconsin are expected to renominate Rebecca Cooke to face two-term Republican Rep. Derek Van Orden in Wisconsin’s 3rd District, setting up a rematch for one of the more competitive seats in the U.S. House.

In 2024, Cooke, a nonprofit executive and small business owner, lost narrowly to Van Orden, who was elected in 2022 and has been a devout supporter of Trump.

The district is a mix of Wisconsin farmland where Republicans have improved over the past decade and mini-metros with state universities giving them small but influential Democratic bases.

Cooke, of Eau Claire, faces Eau Claire City Council President Emily Berge on Tuesday, but Cooke has Democratic institutional support, including from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. Cooke has also raised roughly $8.6 million, far exceeding Berge’s roughly $729,000.

Van Orden is unopposed in Tuesday’s Republican primary.

In South Carolina, it's a famous name vs. experience

For a state with little mystery expected in November, South Carolina is again in the spotlight, this time holding primaries to nominate candidates for a special U.S. Senate election.

South Carolina voters voted on June 9 for nominees to statewide office, and then cast ballots in the June 23 primary runoffs for contests where no candidate reached 50% of the vote. And there were several, including GOP nominations for governor and nominations for several congressional seats.

Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham’s death on July 11 at age 71 of an aortic rupture to his heart ensured South Carolina voters were not finished deciding who would be on the November ballot. Voters on Tuesday will be deciding who will succeed the four-term Graham as the Republican nominee in the GOP-heavy Southern state.

They will be choosing from Graham’s sister Darline, who was appointed to fill the vacancy by Gov. Henry McMaster and who has been endorsed by Trump, as well as U.S. Reps. Russell Fry and Ralph Norman, former Rep. Mark Sanford and six other candidates.

If no one reaches 50% of the vote Tuesday -- that’s right -- there will be another runoff, this one on Aug. 25.

Ann Arbor is now doing something about that.

The City Council just approved two new programs that will work together. The first is called Sprout—it’s a mental health response team. No police, just trained clinicians who show up at low-risk calls like welfare checks or homelessness concerns. Situations where someone just needs a little help.

The second one is called Co-Response A2 Reach. It pairs a police officer with a mental health clinician. Together, they are in the same police car. They handle more difficult calls, but ones that still need a different approach, like someone in a mental health crisis, a suicide threat, or a substance use emergency. Situations where you need both mental health help and a police officer.

The whole idea is pretty straightforward: match the response to the situation. If it is a mental health call, send a mental health professional. If it is a safety threat, send both. That way, police can stay focused on crime, and people in crisis can get the help they need.

Ann Arbor City Administrator Milton Dohoney Jr. and Police Chief Andre Anderson joined Local 4 Live to talk about the new programs.

You can watch the full interview in the video at the beginning of this article.

Trump's administration is hoping that months of bombing have pushed Iran’s economy to a breaking point that will force its leadership to cave to demands to end its nuclear program and fully reopen the Strait of Hormuz to oil and natural gas tankers.

The Republican president on Monday said that since Iran is seeking compensation as part of any peace talks, he now intends to demand the same for the U.S. side. It's part of a larger pivot this weekend by Trump to argue that Iran is now on the cusp of financially collapsing, even though it has already endured decades of financial sanctions, which are often a longer-term strategy rather than an immediate tool of warfare that can halt a conflict.

The shift comes as U.S. stockpiles of key weapons have dwindled and as stop-start talks seem again to have stalled. But Trump insists the pressure can lead to a breakthrough.

“Yeah, they can make trouble, but they’re broke,” Trump told reporters. “They have no money. You know, Iran is broke, totally broke. And, they’re not paying their soldiers. They have inflation of 300%.”

Inflation is running high in Iran, although Trump's estimates were higher than what administration officials have been citing to reporters. But the prospect of a longer war also carries inflation risks for other nations, including the U.S., where the war and higher gasoline prices are unpopular.

Crude oil prices climbed on Monday as investors interpreted Trump’s comments as a sign that fewer ships would be traversing the Strait of Hormuz, continuing to limit global supplies of gasoline, jet fuel, natural gas and other forms of energy. The Iran war largely closed the waterway involved in shipping roughly 20% of global oil supplies before the conflict — and attempts to reopen the strait have been short-lived as it has become a source of leverage for the Iranians in negotiations.

Iran does not appear to be publicly intimidated by the prospect of more financial sanctions.

“Whenever Washington proves itself incapable of pursuing diplomacy, it retreats into sanctions; and whenever those sanctions fail to produce results, it simply increases the dose,” said Esmail Baghaei, spokesman for Iran’s Foreign Ministry, on social media. “The real risk is that American politicians, clinging to this bad habit, will instead strangle their own remaining chances of a less humiliating exit from a crisis of their own making.”

The White House has called this Operation Economic Fury

The president didn’t say what additional financial pressure would be applied, but the administration has since April 16 been engaged in what it calls Operation Economic Fury against Iran. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent called this component the “financial equivalent” of a bombing campaign as the countries that buy oil from Iran or bank with it could be sanctioned.

But one problem with this pivot is that the sanctions are unable to bite as quickly as the impact of the largely shuttered strait, said Richard Nephew, a senior research scholar at Columbia University who helped direct Iran sanctions strategy in the Obama administration.

Nephew stressed that the value of sanctions as a tool is limited because Trump has not articulated clear strategic goals for the war, at times stressing that it can't have a nuclear weapon, then emphasizing the strait and then talking about ballistic missiles. Instead, Trump has engaged in a massive series of aerial assaults and a level of destruction that has not produced the quick end that he initially promised.

“Economic pressure is a possible element in his strategy, but he’s yet to explain the purpose,” Nephew said. “Trump has systematically weakened his own hand through his inadequate use of force, inarticulate elucidation of an objective, and vacillation on negotiations.”

Still, the sanctions and the ongoing U.S. naval blockade of Iranian ports give the U.S. economic and financial leverage, said Juan Zarate, a deputy national security adviser in the George W. Bush administration. Zarate said the U.S. sanctions threatening third-party countries doing business with Iran also have an impact. But these things take time, he noted.

“The ultimate question will be how far the United States is willing to go to constrict Iran’s oil trade and threaten third countries with severe sanctions -- and whether it has the patience to test whether the economic pain will change the regime’s behavior,” Zarate said.

Past presidents used sanctions. Trump has said they didn't go far enough

Trump's latest pivot to economic issues with Iran is something of a flip-flop. Trump has long derided past presidents who used sanctions to limit Iran’s economic ability to pay for its military and nuclear development. In a speech last week in Las Vegas, he defended the bombing, missiles and drone attacks that began on Feb. 28 by indicating that the sanctions from previous administrations that date back to November 1979 had failed to succeed.

“It’s been 47 years, but really, it’s been 50 years because they’ve been saying 47 for three years, it’s been 50 years,” Trump said. “And no other president has done what you should have done a long time ago, because Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon, can’t have it.”

The Iranian economy has suffered gravely because of the war, with the International Monetary Fund estimating the overall economy shrinks by 5.4% and the Iranian government recently reporting an annual inflation rate of 88.6%. The U.S. Treasury Department said average loadings of Iranian oil have decreased from 1.8 million barrels per day before the war to less than 500,000 barrels per day over the past month.

The U.S. economy — the world’s largest — has continued to grow, but inflation is elevated and borrowing costs have risen in ways that have hurt Trump’s popularity and led to disapproval of the Iran war.

A senior U.S. official, insisting on anonymity to discuss strategy, said the U.S. military has set back Iran’s ability to produce, sell and ship oil and other energy resources. The administration sees the naval blockade of the strait and sanctions as effective and views Trump as having additional options that can be cranked harder in the weeks and months ahead.

Trump is essentially arguing that U.S. voters are better able to tolerate any economic inconveniences than Iranians, who have been in a state of economic hardship for years.

“It’s not just what the military can do — we’ve got the most powerful economy in the world as well," Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Monday in a joint appearance with Bessent. "And when you’ve got a motivated treasury secretary who can pull a lot of levers because he knows how to do it, you can put a lot of pressure on adversaries.”

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AP White House reporter Aamer Madhani contributed to this report.

James' arrival in Philadelphia has made the 76ers must-see TV, and they are all over the NBA's biggest days of the season.

James will make his 76ers debut against the NBA champion Knicks on Oct. 20. The game at Madison Square Garden will be part of a tripleheader, when the Knicks raise a banner to celebrate their first championship since 1973 and James then kicks off the final stop in his career.

He will return to LA to face the Lakers on Christmas, after Victor Wembanyama and the San Antonio Spurs are back in New York for an NBA Finals rematch to open a five-game schedule.

The NBA unveiled those games Tuesday as what it called a “sneak peek” at the 2026-27 schedule. The full schedule will be released Thursday.

The season begins with the Boston Celtics visiting Detroit in a rare 3 p.m. EDT start for a midweek game. The tripleheader is capped by the Spurs hosting Oklahoma City in a rematch of the Western Conference finals.

Those three games — opening night traditionally has featured two in recent years — will all be televised by NBC. ESPN then has all five games on Christmas.

That schedule: San Antonio at New York, Miami at Boston, Philadelphia at Los Angeles, Oklahoma City at Minnesota and Denver at Golden State.

James’ new team was always going to have a prominent place on the schedule, so the NBA struggled to put the puzzle together while waiting for his decision. Commissioner Adam Silver even said last month that he wanted James to announce his decision because teams and networks were calling to ask when the schedule would be completed.

The NBA's career scoring leader said it would be the Sixers about a week later, joining a team that already had acquired All-Star Jaylen Brown from Boston and is expected to be one of the top challengers for the Knicks' title.

James will play his first home game in Philadelphia on Oct. 22 against Cleveland, one of his former teams that hoped to get the 41-year-old Ohio native back for a third time. That will be part of an ESPN doubleheader preceding Denver visiting Oklahoma City.

Minnesota visits Miami to highlight the schedule on Oct. 21, when most teams will open their seasons. The Heat acquired two-time MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo from Milwaukee — and tried to bring James back as well — and the Timberwolves traded for flashy point guard LaMelo Ball. Golden State then faces the Lakers to cap that ESPN doubleheader.

The Spurs are also a top draw now behind Wembanyama, the NBA Defensive Player of the Year who helped San Antonio win Game 7 of the West finals in Oklahoma City to end the Thunder's title reign.

This will be his second time playing at Madison Square Garden on Christmas, after he delivered a massive 42-point, 18-rebound performance in 2024 in a loss in his first time playing on the holiday. This matchup will be his first time back on the court in New York since the Knicks set an NBA Finals record by rallying from 29 points down for a 107-106 victory in Game 4. They won the title in San Antonio in the next game.

San Antonio will face Houston and former Longhorns star Kevin Durant in a game at the University of Texas on Oct. 23 airing on Prime Video, the back of a doubleheader starting with the Knicks at the Celtics.

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AP NBA: https://apnews.com/nba

This week, two celestial treats are lighting up, or rather dimming, the sky.

First, we are heading to Iceland, where Wednesday afternoon the moon will slide between the Earth and the sun. In some parts of the world—like Greenland, Iceland, and Spain—the sun will be completely blocked. It’s a total eclipse, but not of the heart—just total darkness in the middle of the day.

For Spain, this is the first time that has happened since 1905, so more than 120 years. Here in Michigan, we get a partial eclipse, but not really. Part of the sun will get covered, but Sault Ste. Marie will see about seven percent of the sun covered. Detroit, just three percent. Not huge, but still worth seeing.

But what we’re really looking forward to is what happens the following night. That’s when the Perseid meteor shower peaks.

Now, what’s a meteor shower? Well, every year, Earth passes through a trail of dust and debris left behind by a comet. Those tiny pieces hit our atmosphere, heat up, and light up the sky. Under perfect conditions, you could see up to a hundred meteors an hour, and the best part? You do not need a telescope.

Buddy Stark, the planetarium manager at the University of Michigan Museum of Natural History, joined Local 4 Live to walk us all through it.

You can watch the full interview in the video at the beginning of this article.

We are not talking about one day anymore. This is five days, six locations all across Detroit, and every bit of it free.

So how did this all begin?

We have to go back 41 years to a man named Edward Deeb. He had a simple but powerful idea -- What if Detroit stopped everything and threw the biggest celebration in the city just for its kids?

He made it happen, and it never stopped.

Over four decades, more than two and a half million kids have been part of Metro Detroit Youth Day.

More than 2,300 college scholarships have been handed out, and generations of Detroit kids have grown up with this event as part of their story.

Now, the Boys and Girls Clubs of Greater Detroit are bringing it back in a big way. Five days, six locations, all across the city -- all free.

We are talking Belle Isle, Eastern Market, the Joe Louis Greenway, Michigan Central, Ralph C. Wilson Park, and more. And everything is there for the kids: sports, wellness, music, technology, arts, and leadership.

Addison Mauck, the program manager with the Detroit Riverfront Conservancy, one of the key partners making this week happen, joined Local 4 Live.

You can watch the full interview in the video at the beginning of this article.

Unc’s Pizza, located at 1133 Griswold Street, officially opens for business on Tuesday on the first floor of the historic Detroit & Northern Building.

A collaboration from Dime Store owners Larry Kahn, Ann-Marie Murphy and Jeff Alexander, and Tony Sacco of Mootz Pizzeria + Bar, the restaurant will offer up traditional fare like mozzarella sticks, chicken wings and tenders alongside it’s pizza offerings, while also leaving room for “creative license.”

“There’s incredible pride in Detroit-style pizza and demand for a place that really celebrates it,” said Sacco. “We took our time getting it right while having some fun.”

The eatery was named in honor of Kahn’s Uncle Paul, a World War II veteran and longtime Detroit Edison employee who Kahn says embodied the warm, neighborly spirit that inspired the concept.

“We wanted to create the neighborhood pizza place we all wish still existed,” Kahn said. “The kind of place where everyone feels welcome, families stay awhile and another chair is pulled up to the table.”

The 7,300-square-foot space was rehabilitated by Detroit-based RKP Group, featuring a nostalgic interior with 80 indoor seats and an outdoor patio that seats 50. Executive chefs Andrew Shedden and Josh Taylor will lead the kitchen.

Unc’s Pizza will be open Sunday through Thursday from 4 p.m. to 11 p.m. and Friday and Saturday from 4 p.m. to midnight.

For more information, visit uncspizza.com.

The cases span from Indigenous land rights, recent rollbacks on environmental safeguards and infrastructure projects. Despite their differences, they share a common path to the court.

In recent years, a mostly conservative Congress approved measures that environmentalists say violate constitutional rights. President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, whose administration has pursued a more environmentally focused agenda, vetoed some measures outright and parts of others.

But lawmakers overrode those objections, and the disputes ultimately reached the Supreme Court, which environmental advocates increasingly view as the last line of defense against the weakening of environmental protections in Brazil.

The cases illustrate the constraints facing the Lula administration. Despite notable achievements in reducing deforestation and directing resources to foster ecological investments, the government has often struggled to counter a conservative Congress where agribusiness interests wield significant influence.

“The government is very weak in the legislative arena," said Suely Araújo, a policy coordinator at the Climate Observatory, a network of environmental nonprofits. "It often opposes anti-environmental bills, but it lacks the political strength to persuade Congress to vote with it.”

Agribusiness holds considerable sway in Congress

The Lula administration is not only outnumbered in Congress, but also has less leverage to negotiate than previous Brazilian governments. In recent years, lawmakers have gained greater control over the federal budget, a key tool of political bargaining.

Agribusiness, one of Brazil’s most powerful economic sectors, also holds a majority in Congress and has pushed through measures that weaken environmental protections. As a result, the Supreme Court has emerged as a check on Congress, helping preserve parts of Lula’s environmental agenda when lawmakers push in the opposite direction.

The office of the president's chief of staff, which coordinates the government’s relations with Congress, said in a statement to The Associated Press it would not comment on cases pending before the Supreme Court.

Brazil is the world’s largest producer of soybeans and beef. While most Brazilian beef is consumed domestically, most soybeans are exported. From January through July 2026, China, Brazil's largest trading partner, bought 50% of its beef exports and 70% of its soybean exports, according to official trade data.

The expansion of Brazil’s agricultural frontier, particularly for cattle ranching and soybean production, is the country’s leading cause of deforestation, much of it in the Amazon.

The Parliamentary Agricultural Front did not respond to a request for comment. Agribusiness groups have long said they oppose illegal deforestation and point to increased agricultural productivity even as forest clearing has declined.

Protecting the rainforest is critical to tackling climate change. The Amazon helps regulate climate and rainfall patterns and stores vast amounts of carbon that, if released, could further accelerate global warming.

Shaping the future of Indigenous lands

On Friday, Brazil’s Supreme Court began reviewing final motions seeking clarification of a 2025 ruling that rejected the “time limit” thesis, a legal theory backed by the agribusiness caucus that would restrict Indigenous land claims to territories they occupied or were under legal dispute when the Constitution took effect on Oct. 5, 1988.

Supporters say the cutoff provides legal certainty for landowners. Indigenous groups argue it disregards decades of expulsions and forced displacement, particularly during Brazil’s agricultural expansion in the 20th century.

The justices are considering motions filed by the government, political parties, farmers and Indigenous organizations, with votes due by Aug. 18. Among other issues, they are expected to address compensation rules and possible deadlines for completing Indigenous land demarcations.

Ricardo Terena, a lawyer with the advocacy organization Articulation of Indigenous Peoples of Brazil, said some of the proposals could effectively stall future demarcations by adding administrative hurdles and broadening compensation rights for non-Indigenous occupants, allowing them to remain on disputed land until payment is made.

The Kawahiva Indigenous people, who remain isolated and uncontacted in the Amazon, is one of the many communities who may be affected by the proceedings. Authorities confirmed their presence in Mato Grosso state in 1999, but only completed the physical demarcation of their territory, mapping it out earlier this month.

According to the nonprofit Survival International, the remaining Kawahiva are nomadic hunter-gatherers who survived attacks and disease and continue to avoid contact with outsiders.

2 other cases that could reshape Amazon governance

On Wednesday, Brazil's top court is also scheduled to consider two other significant sets of cases: state laws that led to the end of the soy moratorium and a new environmental license law that fast-tracked approval of strategic infrastructure projects.

In January, major grain traders withdrew from the soy moratorium, a nearly 20-year-old pact credited with reducing Amazon deforestation by barring soy grown on cleared land. The agreement collapsed after top soy-producing states passed bills revoking tax benefits for participating companies. Justice Flávio Dino issued an injunction temporarily halting the state legislation, and the full court is now set to review his order.

Also on Wednesday, the court is expected to consider a challenge to the new environmental licensing law that took effect in February. The law fast-tracks permits for projects with significant impact, including mines, highways, and industrial plants.

Araújo of the Climate Observatory said she expects the Supreme Court to strike down at least what environmentalists consider the law's most clearly unconstitutional provisions, including those allowing self-licensing for projects with moderate environmental impacts. She added the law is already having tangible consequences in the Amazon, citing the paving of a controversial highway and plans to dredge a major river without adequate prior environmental review.

The environment ministry has defended the soy moratorium, saying it helped reduce Amazon deforestation even as Brazil expanded production. On the environmental licensing law, the ministry said the government had sought to veto provisions it considered problematic and remained concerned about maintaining minimum national standards.

“Brazil needs an environmental licensing system that is more efficient, predictable, technically robust and capable of addressing the challenges of an economy that must expand infrastructure investment while confronting climate change and biodiversity loss,” the ministry said.

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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.

More than 163,000 votes were cast this year during the finalist portion of Vote 4 The Best.

Voting was open for nearly a month, and now it’s time to reveal the winners for our 80 categories.

Eight winners will be revealed each weekday from Aug. 10 through Aug. 21. Here’s a list of the winners we’ve announce so far, as well as the schedule for the future announcements:

NOTE: If you click the link for each winner, you can see how the top five finalists finished for the category.

Aug. 10

• Best Burger: Miller’s Bar in Dearborn
• Best Detroit-style Pizza: Jet’s Pizza
• Best Bakery: Lil Daddy’s Cheesecakes Co. in Mount Clemens
• Best Dance Studio: Rhythm N Jump Dance Academy in St. Clair Shores
• Best Movie Theatre: MJR
• Best Mexican: Mojave Cantina in Clawson
• Best Ice Cream: Holy Cow! Creamery in Wyandotte
• Best Gourmet Market: Nino Salvaggio

Aug. 11

• Best Coney Dog: Lafayette Coney Island
• Best Pizza (all types): Green Lantern
• Best Sandwich/deli: Ventimiglia Italian Foods in Sterling Heights
• Best Coney Island: Leo’s Coney Island
• Best Sports Venue: Comerica Park
• Best Italian: Antonio’s Cucina Italiana
• Best Museum: Henry Ford Museum & Greenfield Village
• Best Polish: Polish Village Cafe in Hamtramck 

Aug. 12

• BBQ
• Fine dining
• Breakfast
• Steakhouse
• Tacos
• Farmer’s market
• Cider Mill
• Concert venue

Aug. 13

• Fried chicken
• Shawarma
• Brunch
• Soup/salad
• Festival
• Wings
• Donuts
• Middle Eastern

Aug. 14

• Florist
• Real Estate Agent
• Fries
• Bowling Alley
• Bagels
• Photographer
• Sushi
• Food truck

Aug. 17

• Gyro
• Tattoo parlor
• Haunted House
• Chinese
• Thai
• Boutique clothing store
• Roofing
• Book store

Aug. 18

• Coffee
• Hotel
• Sports bar
• Brewery
• Hair salon
• Law firm
• Irish pub
• Dog groomer

Aug. 19

• Comedy club
• Dive bar
• Margarita
• Rooftop Bar
• Live Music Bar
• Soul Food
• Indian
• Distillery

Aug. 20

• Wine bar
• Nail Salon
• Auto dealership
• Vegan/Vegetarian
• Golf course
• Karaoke Bar
• Pho
• Escape Room

Aug. 21

• Cannabis dispensary
• Cocktail bar
• Funeral home
• Barbershop
• HVAC Company
• Day spa
• Beauty Salon
• CBD Store

Click here to read the official Vote 4 The Best rules.

Thanks to our Vote 4 The Best sponsor, Wallside Windows!

Have a question? Email us at clickondetroit@wdiv.com, and we’ll get you an answer.

Michael Sowards, 49, was charged with two counts of firearm possession by a prohibited person, one count of ammunition possession by a prohibited person and three counts of felony firearms.

The Macomb County Sheriff’s Office said on May 4, in the 100 block of Dickinson in Mount Clemens, a mail carrier, a 34-year-old man, asked Sowards to secure his dog to ensure safe delivery.

Sowards allegedly responded by calling the mail carrier racial slurs and threatening to get his AR-15 rifle.

When deputies arrived at the scene, they placed Sowards into custody and found the following weapons in his home:

• One AR-15 style rifle chambered for 7.62x39mm rounds
• Two loaded magazines containing 7.62mm ammunition
• One CO2-powered pellet pistol
• One .22 caliber pellet rifle
• One additional pellet air rifle

On Aug. 10, Sowards pleaded guilty to one count of firearm possession by a prohibited person and ammunition possession by a prohibited person. Other charges were dismissed as part of the guilty plea.

He is scheduled to be sentenced on Sept. 29 at 8:30 a.m.

Zachary Kenneth Crutchfield is accused of attempted travel with intent to engage in illicit sexual conduct, attempted coercion and enticement of a minor, and attempted sexual exploitation of children.

Undercover investigation

According to an affidavit filed in U.S. District Court, an undercover FBI agent communicated online with a person investigators identified as Crutchfield between July 31 and Aug. 7.

The affidavit says the undercover agent presented a scenario involving minors and discussed plans to meet in Tennessee.

Investigators allege Crutchfield expressed interest in engaging in sexual activity with the purported minors and discussed travel arrangements.

The FBI affidavit states the person communicating with the undercover agent used the online name “Breeder Bull” and participated in online groups that investigators identified as being used to distribute child sexual abuse material.

Identifying the suspect

Investigators say they connected the online account to Crutchfield through photographs, identifying information and other records. An open-source records search identified a potential employer in Flint, according to the affidavit.

On Aug. 8, an FBI agent conducted surveillance at an address in Grand Blanc and at the Flint workplace identified in the affidavit. Investigators later observed Crutchfield leave the workplace and arrested him.

Evidence recovered

Following the arrest, investigators recovered Crutchfield’s phone and obtained a search warrant, according to the affidavit.

An FBI agent said an initial review of the device showed the Signal messaging application and United Airlines application were installed.

The affidavit states investigators also found an airline reservation in Crutchfield’s name that was consistent with travel plans discussed during the undercover investigation.

Case details

The federal complaint was signed Aug. 8 by FBI Special Agent Justin M. Thompson and sworn before U.S. Magistrate Judge Anthony P. Patti.

The case is being prosecuted in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan.

The complaint identifies Assistant U.S. Attorney Rawsthorne as the prosecutor assigned to the case.

The investigation was conducted by the FBI’s Detroit Division, Flint Resident Agency, as part of the Northeast Michigan Trafficking and Exploitation Crimes Task Force, according to the affidavit.

“There was no place where we could guarantee that you could go in and hear it,” he told The Associated Press. “So, we had to establish that.”

Freeman and his business partners, then-Mayor Bill Luckett and Howard Stovall, were inspired to open a juke joint in Clarksdale called Ground Zero Blues Club. Then, much more recently, they created “Morgan Freeman’s Symphonic Blues Experience,” a touring ensemble of blues musicians who marry the beloved Southern genre with classical, symphonic compositions. On Friday, they'll release an album under the same name.

The legendary actor is a producer and narrator on the release, not a performer. That's left up to the professionals: all-star acts like Taj Mahal, Keb’ Mo’, Shemekia Copeland, Tiernii Jackson, the Stax Music Academy Choir, the Chineke! Orchestra out of London, and many more.

“I like the blues. I like music. I cannot claim to be an aficionado. That’s not my place,” says Freeman. “I’m an enthusiast, but that’s a necessity.”

From live performances to a full-length record

Before the album, the “Morgan Freeman’s Symphonic Blues Experience” traveling performances were born out of a simple idea: How could Freeman and his team bring this music to the world?

“Blues is an important American story birthed in the Mississippi Delta out of hardship but obviously resonates with people and cultures on a global basis, both for how good it sounds, but also the message underneath it,” said Eric Meier, Freeman's partner and co-producer on the project who joined the actor's blues club in 2018. “We conceived of this concept to really take this music to new geographies and new audiences.”

Turning the live performance into an album meant cutting down a nearly two-hour show to around 45 minutes across 12 tracks, while still honoring the format. It includes video vignettes as well as “cinematic narration,” courtesy of Freeman, recorded at the club in Clarksdale.

“We offer a musical story, a 100-year arc from the 1930s to modern day, so the evolution of blues music,” says Meier.

Freeman's idiosyncratic voice opens the record, describing the genre with a real poetry, delivered atop a haunting rendition of Blind Willie Johnson's 1927 gospel blues classic, “Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground.”

“This is music that gave voice to a people, to their pain, their hope and their resilience,” Freeman recites. “Music isn't just melody, you know. It's memory, it's history wrapped in ribbon, the echoes of lives lived and lost, heartache and hope all tangled together. And nowhere is that truer than in the blues.”

Freeman wants to keep the blues alive

The last song on “Morgan Freeman’s Symphonic Blues Experience” sees singer-songwriter Muddy Waters' great-nephew Keith Johnson covering Raphael Saadiq and Ludwig Göransson's “I Lied to You” from the Oscar-winning 2025 film “Sinners.” It brings the 100-year story of blues to its coda, but it also serves as a reminder of the film's ability to bring the genre into mainstream conversation.

That's something Freeman hopes to accomplish, too. He wants to make sure blues is not forgotten.

“It is a responsibility that we’ve taken on. And the hope is that it, like everything else that catches on, takes root, as it were. You know, the blues is actually America’s music,” he says. “So, it’s incumbent upon us to water it, nurture it, keep it alive, keep it going.”

Meier adds that their album project predates “Sinners” — he says director Ryan Coogler told him the film's juke joint was partially inspired by Ground Zero Blues Club; the film is set in Clarksdale after all — but it has been “a wonderful coincidence” that both works have the power to bring the blues to the masses.

And maybe one day, “Morgan Freeman’s Symphonic Blues Experience” will receive the same kind of critical praise given to “Sinners.” The album is eligible for the 2027 Grammy Awards.

“We will be submitting in multiple categories,” says Meier. “You got room on your trophy shelf, Morgan?”

“Yeah, yeah. I want it,” Freeman smiles.

Adding Grammy Award-winner to his Academy Award-winner title? “Sounds pretty good to me.”

The crash happened just after 1:30 p.m. on Aug. 8 on the eastern part of Pontiac Lake near Walt’s Point Marina in White Lake Township.

According to the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office, a 40-year-old Fenton woman was swimming in Pontiac Lake when she was struck by a passing boat. She was taken to a local hospital suffering injuries to her back and numerous lacerations.

Investigators are searching for the boat’s operator. Witnesses described the vessel as a white speedboat or jet boat with dark accent striping. The operator is described as a man between 50 and 60 years old.

Anyone who saw the crash, recognizes the description of the boat or has photos is asked to contact the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office at 248-858-4950.

The Monroe County Sheriff’s Office in Florida says Stephen Matheny was pulled from the water near Marathon, Fla., around 11:20 a.m.

First responders began CPR immediately and transported the man to a nearby hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

Foul play is not believed to be a factor, according to the Sheriff’s Office.

An autopsy is pending.

Most storms will remain non-severe, but an isolated stronger storm could produce damaging wind gusts, large hail, and heavy rainfall. Frequent lightning will also be a concern with any thunderstorms that develop. If you have outdoor plans today. make sure to be weather-aware this afternoon and evening and have a way to receive weather alerts.

The unsettled weather pattern doesn’t completely go away after today. There is a marginal risk for severe thunderstorms Wednesday afternoon in our northern communities. Isolated chances linger on Thursday, although coverage is expected to be limited.

Drier weather develops by Friday and Friday night, providing a brief break before another round of unsettled weather arrives for the weekend. Forecast guidance continues to suggest a renewed chance for showers and thunderstorms, including periods of heavy rainfall, over the weekend. Temperatures will remain seasonable, with afternoon highs generally staying in the 80s through the remainder of the workweek.

🍇 Grapevine

🌅 Good morning! On this day in 1866, the world’s first roller skating rink opened to the public inside the Atlantic House Hotel in Newport, Rhode Island.

Here are a few things to know about for Tuesday, Aug. 11, 2026:

⛈️ 4Warn Weather: The threat for thunderstorms returns to Southeast Michigan this afternoon and evening, with a few storms potentially becoming strong to severe. Check out the 10-day forecast.

🚔 Revised Police Millage: Sumpter Township leaders voted unanimously on Monday to approve a revised police millage proposal to put before voters on the November ballot after a previous iteration failed in the August primary. Read more.

👟 Shoes for School: Local 4 is teaming up with the nonprofit Lace Up Detroit on Aug. 21 for their 2026 Back to School Campaign. Read more.

📸 Meet-and-Greet: British social media stars Josh & Jase will be meeting up with fans in Metro Detroit on Friday to cap off their summer visit to Michigan. Read more.

🎞️ Theatre Closure: A longstanding family-run theater in Macomb County announced Sunday evening that it will be closing its doors next month after 40 years in business. Read more.

🏊 Morning Dive

Good morning ☀️

Michigan DNR conservation officers used their knowledge of the area and specialized tracking skills to find the three individuals who went missing on the Muskegon River.

Jazman Hock, 28, of Muskegon; Sarah Vida, 28, of Muskegon; and Vida’s 9-year-old son, Kayden Kovalcik, were found safe and alive Friday, Aug. 7, after a dayslong search involving multiple law enforcement agencies, emergency responders and volunteers.

The three were located at about 4:36 p.m., approximately three-quarters of a mile northeast of the Mill Iron Road Boat Launch, police said.

A Michigan State Police K-9 team assisted DNR officers in the search.

Watch the emotional video here.

🗞️ Other headlines to know today

• Former Detroit school assistant principal pleads no contest to sex crime charge
• This was just voted the best coney dog place in Metro Detroit
• 13-year-old in ICU after car hits siblings on e-bike in Redford
• What we know about the deadly double shooting at a Southfield restaurant
• Oakland County vote could fund Planned Parenthood clinic through 2028
• Southfield gun shop employee lied about details in shooting during robbery, police say
• Lapeer man faces new charges in Thanksgiving crash that killed 5-year-old daughter, injures 2-year-old son
• Head lice are back: Consumer Reports warns some common treatments may fail
• ‘We’re so frustrated’: Neighbors feel unsafe as squatters, drug activity go on at vacant Detroit apartment
• 2 products sold in Michigan included in major Taylor Farms recall
• Body of 23-year-old Northville man recovered from Lake St. Clair after going missing in water
• ‘Two very different Americas’: CAIR criticizes Trump post targeting Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed
• Oakland County man arrested after being caught masturbating in Twelve Oaks Mall, police say
• Ferndale mother accused in special needs daughter’s death sentenced after plea deal
• DIA brings student art to Guardian Building in 5th annual Wayne County High School Art Exhibition
• Shelby Township man charged after stabbing 21-year-old man at Muskamoot Bay on Lake St. Clair
• Missing 4-year-old dies after drowning in Livingston County lake
• AAA: Michigan gas prices see double-digit drop since last week
• Oakland County deputies searching for boater who struck, injured swimmer in Pontiac Lake
• Find more Local News headlines here
• Find more Entertainment headlines here
• Find more Health headlines here
• Check out the latest ClickOnDeals here
• Introducing the ClickOnDetroit Help Desk: How it works and how to use it

🌎 Meanwhile

News from around the world via the Associated Press:

President Donald Trump on Monday signed an executive order calling for revamped childhood vaccine recommendations that promote his long-held but discredited theory that childhood shots should be spaced out into separate medical visits.

The order advocates separating the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine into three different single-disease shots and administering all childhood immunizations at separate appointments whenever possible.

It also directs the nation’s health department to improve research on vaccines, which are already extensively studied, and present a plan to offer separate measles, mumps, and rubella vaccines for children, since that is not currently an option in the United States. (Read more)

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The contiguous United States sizzled to its hottest month ever last month, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

July averaged 76.89 degrees Fahrenheit (24.94 degrees Celsius) across the Lower 48 states, eclipsing the Dust Bowl’s July 1936 by an eighth of a degree. Records go back to 1895.

Although it was unusually cool in Alaska, hotter-than-normal conditions blanketed the Lower 48, with the most excessive heat in the Mountain West, Southwest, Northern Plains and Southeast. The heat was so widespread that every one of the Lower 48 states was at least 1 degree Fahrenheit (nearly 0.6 degrees Celsius) warmer than the 20th century average, said Russ Vose, chief of monitoring at NOAA’s National Center for Environmental Information. (Read more)

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The first — and only — person to break the sound barrier in a car hits the track in Utah this week with new wheels and his eye on another record.

Twenty years ago, British driver Andy Green set the land speed record for a diesel-powered car, reaching 350.092 mph (563.4 kph) at Utah’s famous Bonneville Salt Flats. Green will return to the lunarlike landscape Tuesday and try to beat that mark, this time with a hydrogen-powered car.

The retired Royal Air Force fighter pilot aims not only to win another accolade but to showcase the power of hydrogen as a clean-energy alternative. It’s the “fuel of the future,” Green told The Associated Press in a July interview. (Read more)

---> Find more headlines from around the world right here <---

📝 Word Up

Today’s Word Up is: Eidetic / ī-ˈde-tik / (adjective) -- defined as “Having extraordinarily accurate and vivid recall, especially of visual images.”

Example: ”The artist used her eidetic recall to paint the complex landscape from memory alone."

🧹 Housekeeping

Hey, if you like this newsletter, let us know. We’d love your feedback. We also offer several other newsletters, including 4Warn Weather, All 4 Pets and more. Hopefully, we have one that caters to your interests — unless you’re only interested in the 2002 Disney film, “Snow Dogs.” We don’t have one for that, sorry.

✍🏽 Written and curated by: Jenny Sherman (Have something to say? Feel free to send an email here.)

From my personal experience as well as discussions with aging experts, here’s what I suggest adult children talk with their parents about and how to help them. I’ve included insights from several guests on episodes of Morningstar’s  The Long View podcast.

1. How healthy are your finances?

“If I had to do it all over again, I would have had conversations with (my mom) sooner about her finances,” author and journalist  Cameron Huddlestontold us on The Long View.

Our parents don’t want to be a burden, and it may seem like everything is fine, but appearances can be deceiving. Gently ask how they’re managing their bills: Are they paying on time, do they have enough money?

Then keep going with questions about income. Are they getting distributions from retirement funds or relying on Social Security and a pension? Do they have investments? They may not want to share all the paperwork, but you can ask them to put it someplace safe for you to access in case of emergency.

What you can do:

1. If the logistics are hard for your parents or they’re paying bills late, ask them about setting up autopay. Along with that, they’ll need account alerts and regular reviews to avoid errors or fraud.

2. See if their utility companies can add you as an authorized or emergency contact, so you get notified if they miss a payment or are in danger of shut-off.

3. If they have a lot of accounts to keep track of, help them streamline if possible. “We simplified our finances down just basically into one bank account and one credit card,” Sally Balch Hurme , an elder law attorney and author, told us on The Long View .

4. If you’ve noticed changes that may suggest they’re experiencing cognitive decline, encourage your parents to have a conversation with a healthcare provider.

5. Discuss with them who they want to be their durable power of attorney to manage and protect their assets.

6. If money is tight, help your parents get in touch with organizations such as local senior services or departments on aging. They could help with meals, transportation, or money management.

7. Depending on circumstances, you may be able to help them apply for Medicaid. The rules on eligibility vary by state, and there are asset limits and “look-back” restrictions. It’s a complicated process that often requires an attorney.

2. Do you have end-of-life plans and documents?

“If you die without a will,  state law is going to determine who gets your assets. … (Or) family members get into fighting over who gets what,” Huddleston says.

That’s why a will and a durable power of attorney are important. Even if there’s a will, though, beneficiary designations on various accounts can override it. If those are out of date, money could go to a place the parent didn’t ultimately intend.

Don’t overlook a healthcare power of attorney (aka healthcare surrogate or healthcare proxy), which is someone who can make medical decisions if your parent can’t. An advance directive (often called a living will) specifies what sort of end-of-life care they want. Then “family knows what your wishes are so they don’t end up in court fighting over whether to keep you on life support,” Huddleston says.

And finally, ask about your parents’ wishes for a burial, cremation, or memorial service, and whether they may have already bought a cemetery plot.

What you can do:

8. Huddleston’s recommendation: “Encourage them to meet with an estate planning attorney or an elder-law attorney as soon as possible. And if your parents don’t have the resources to pay for an attorney, perhaps you can offer paying for them as a gift.”

9. Help them review beneficiary designations on IRAs, life insurance policies, and bank accounts, especially if there’s been a death, divorce , or remarriage.

10. If your loved one has already completed these documents, make sure you know where they are.

Here’s what this all boils down to, attorney Hurme says, “Your family really can’t carry out your wishes if they don’t know what they are. They want to do the right thing. So don’t make them guess about it.”

3. Is your home still safe and comfortable for you?

A 2024 survey from AARP shows that the majority of older adults want to stay in their homes as long as possible. As people age, though, it can be difficult, especially if they’re far from the rest of the family. Can your parents still climb the stairs? Can they safely maintain a big yard? Let them know there are benefits for both of you: They could help you by handling the occasional school pickup, and they might get  a health boost from interacting with grandkids.

What you can do:

11. Explore whether your parents can stay in their home with adjustments: bedroom on the first floor, grab bars in the bathroom, video doorbell, wearable medical alert device like a watch or pendant, or a TV-based video calling system that family members can control from their phones.

12. Help them find someone to assist with meals, laundry, errands, and so on. If your parents have a long-term care insurance policy , check whether it covers some of these services. Vet these service providers carefully and check in on your parents even if you’re not giving hands-on help. Your attention and vigilance could protect them from exploitation.

13. If staying home isn’t in the cards for them anymore, look into home-sharing or an accessory dwelling unit that can offer both independence and proximity to younger relatives.

14. Explore continuing care retirement communities . With CCRCs, also known as life plan communities, people go in healthy and live independently, with “Someone to always rely on no matter what.” That’s the take from Joy Loverde , an author, speaker, and family caregiver who talked to us on The Long View . Fees and operators’ financial stability vary, so if your parents opt for a CCRC, make sure to do your research.

15. Look into assisted living. “There are assisted living communities that are excellent,” Loverde says. “And they also have therapists, and they have spiritual programs, and they have a family environment.” And again, a long-term care insurance policy can help with those expenses. Arrange to tour a facility with your parents so they can see how the residents are taken care of, the activities, and the food.

16. If you meet a brick wall and they just won’t talk about living elsewhere, then get to know their neighbors and exchange phone numbers. In an emergency, they could check on your folks.

Your loved ones may not be open to these tricky conversations the first time around, but raise the issue gently again, making sure they know how much you care.

Valentina Djeljosevic contributed to this article.

_____

This article was provided to The Associated Press by Morningstar. For more personal finance content, go to https://www.morningstar.com/personal-finance.

Amy C. Arnott, CFA, is a portfolio strategist for Morningstar and co-host of The Long View podcast.

Related Links:

How to Tackle Estate Planning Basics in 7 Steps

https://www.morningstar.com/personal-finance/how-tackle-estate-planning-basics-7-steps

What Retirees Might Give Up When They Age in Place

https://www.morningstar.com/retirement/what-retirees-might-give-up-when-they-age-place

5 Money Questions Every Couple Should Ask

https://www.morningstar.com/personal-finance/5-money-questions-every-couple-should-askespecially-before-valentines-day

The board is evaluating an application by Zen Cropscience for the confined field trial in northern Perak state that involves a genetically modified version of the MR219 rice variety that is tolerant to the herbicide glyphosate and resists diseases caused by bacteria and fungi.

The coalition of 61 organizations said Tuesday it had submitted a formal objection as part of a public consultation process that ended last week. The groups said the project is similar to one submitted for a field trial in Perlis state in 2019 that was later abandoned, and that they are renewing their earlier objections.

The groups said their main concern is the potential for genetically modified material to contaminate conventional and wild rice through cross-pollination or other means. They said Malaysia’s biosafety law has insufficient legal protection and compensation mechanisms for farmers who could suffer economic losses from accidental contamination of their crops.

Farmers also worry that the genetic modification could encourage greater use of glyphosate, potentially accelerating the development of herbicide-resistant “super weeds” that would require farmers to apply more herbicide to control them. They warned glyphosate residues could remain in harvested rice and enter the food supply.

The integration of a gene for fungal resistance is worrying as it could potentially compromise food safety by altering nutritional values or increasing allergenic and toxin levels, the coalition said.

Abdul Rashid Yob, who heads a farmers association representing 200,000 members nationwide, pointed to previous negative experience with the herbicide-tolerant Clearfield rice. While production initially improved, weeds quickly developed resistance, forcing farmers to use higher doses of herbicides, which raised production costs and degraded soil fertility, he said.

“GM rice will be much worse. It is not the answer,” he said.

Malaysia relies heavily on imported rice, with domestic production meeting only about half its national consumption needs, according to official data.

The National Biosafety Board has said the proposed trial would be carried out within an insect-proof contained net house on industrial land, far from agricultural areas. It has said the risk of cross-pollination is low and acknowledged the toxicological data for GMO rice hasn't been ascertained. It is unclear when the board will make a final decision.

Although the application is for a confined field trial rather than commercial cultivation, the coalition said the research should be canceled because GMOs cannot be completely controlled once released into the environment.

“There is no need for such a trial. We don't want GM crops,” said Mageswari Sangaralingam, from the Consumers Association of Penang.

The coalition said farmers have alternatives to genetically modified crops for managing weeds and disease, such as the use of robotic technology from Japan that could swiftly remove weeds.

The World Health Organization’s cancer research agency classified glyphosate in 2015 as “probably carcinogenic to humans,” based on limited evidence of cancer in humans and sufficient evidence from animal studies.

Other health and regulatory agencies have reached different conclusions. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has said glyphosate is “not likely to be carcinogenic to humans,” while the European Food Safety Authority said in 2023 that its review found no critical areas of concern regarding human, animal or environmental health.

“We’re right on schedule as far as offensive install, where we are execution-wise,” Whittingham said. “We’re obviously a long ways from where we need to be.”

Whittingham said the passing game has looked cleaner than it did during spring practice, while pass protection also has improved despite being tested by Michigan’s defensive front.

“The pass game, as we mentioned, it’s much cleaner right now than it was anytime during spring ball,” Whittingham said. “The pass pro seems to be on an upward trajectory.”

The Wolverines still have several questions to answer along the offensive line, particularly as they determine their best five players regardless of position.

“We’ve got to get the best five football players out there,” Whittingham said.

Offensive line competition continues

The left tackle competition remains unsettled, with Andrew Babalola, Evan Link and Blake Frazier receiving the majority of repetitions at the position, Whittingham said.

Michigan expects to have a clearer picture of its depth chart after roughly 10 practices.

Whittingham said that is typically when coaches begin making more definitive decisions about where to concentrate repetitions and what the two-deep depth chart could look like.

“You get about 10 practices under your belt, that’s about the time where you really start to make some definitive decisions,” Whittingham said.

The Wolverines also continue to build chemistry in a new offensive system.

Whittingham said the offense is beginning to look more organized as players become more comfortable with formations, personnel groupings and substitutions.

“Everything’s starting to tighten up,” Whittingham said. “But we still got, again, a ways to go.”

Underwood showing progress

Whittingham offered an encouraging assessment of quarterback Bryce Underwood, who is entering his second season with the Wolverines.

The coach said Underwood has made strides in several areas, including decision-making, pocket presence and getting the ball out more quickly.

“He’s getting the ball out quicker,” Whittingham said.

Whittingham also said Underwood appears more confident in the offensive line than he was a year ago.

That confidence, combined with continued work with offensive coordinator Jason Beck, should help Underwood keep developing as Michigan moves closer to the season.

“He is really continuing to be coachable,” Whittingham said.

Receivers looking to emerge

Michigan also is searching for additional playmakers at wide receiver alongside Andrew Marsh.

Whittingham singled out JJ Buchanan as one player who has stood out during camp.

The 6’3”, 215-pound receiver has impressed with his ability to make contested catches and use his size and athleticism downfield.

“At times unguardable in practice,” Whittingham said.

Whittingham also praised Salesi Moa, Jaime Ffrench and Channing Goodwin as receivers who have emerged during camp.

The goal is to have about seven receivers the coaching staff feels comfortable playing in games.

Whittingham said the Wolverines currently have roughly five to five-and-a-half players in that group.

Young players making impressions

Two freshman edge rushers, Carter Meadows and Tariq Boney, have made positive early impressions, though their opportunities have been limited by Michigan’s summer bridge program.

Whittingham said the freshmen have only been available for a handful of practices because of classes and orientation requirements.

“What we have seen has been very encouraging,” Whittingham said of Meadows.

The Wolverines also are evaluating a crowded cornerback competition.

Smith Snowden, Zeke Berry and Jyaire Hill are among the players competing for roles, with Shamari Earls also making a strong impression through five practices.

Staling making impact at linebacker

Nathaniel Staehling, a transfer from North Dakota State, has quickly emerged as a factor on Michigan’s defense.

Whittingham praised Staling’s instincts, tackling ability, block destruction and football intelligence.

“He’s a guy that’s going to figure in prominently in the defense this year,” Whittingham said.

Staling missed spring practice because of an injury but has been able to participate during fall camp.

Whittingham said the linebacker has quickly picked up Michigan’s defensive system and shown many of the qualities the staff expected when he arrived.

Whittingham emphasizes special teams

Special teams remain a priority for Whittingham, who said starters can contribute on those units, particularly if it gives them another opportunity to touch the ball.

He singled out punt coverage and return units as important areas while working to balance the workload for starters.

Whittingham said he attends every special teams meeting and remains involved in the unit while allowing special teams coordinator Kerry Coombs to run the operation.

His background as a special teams coordinator and years coaching specialists at Utah have shaped his approach.

“If the head coach puts an emphasis on it, players really buy in,” Whittingham said.

Michigan-Ohio State rivalry remains priority

Whittingham also addressed comments he previously made about Michigan’s rivalry with Ohio State that drew attention during Big Ten media days.

He emphasized that beating the Buckeyes remains a major priority for the Wolverines.

“We’re not trying to downplay that at all. It’s a huge game, gigantic,” Whittingham said.

Whittingham acknowledged he could have worded his previous comments differently but said the rivalry remains firmly in the minds of Michigan’s players and coaches.

“That game is of the utmost importance,” Whittingham said.

With camp still in its early stages, Whittingham said Michigan has plenty of work remaining before the Wolverines settle on their depth chart.

But after five practices, he believes the pieces are beginning to come together, the passing game is improving, and the offensive line competition is taking shape.

Several young players are pushing for larger roles as Michigan prepares for the 2026 season.

Jerome Younger entered the plea on Monday (Aug. 10) during a pretrial hearing in Macomb County Circuit Court.

Younger was an assistant principal at the Edward “Duke” Ellington Conservatory of Music and Art at Beckham Academy in Detroit.

The charge stems from an alleged assault involving a minor on Oct. 8, 2025.

Younger pleaded no contest to first-degree criminal sexual conduct involving a relationship, a life felony.

He was taken into custody following the hearing and will remain in custody pending sentencing.

As part of the plea, Younger is required to register as a Tier III sex offender for life.

The requirements also include lifetime electronic monitoring, registration under Wyatt’s Law and HIV testing.

The judge also ordered Younger to have no contact with the victim.

Younger is scheduled to be sentenced at 8:30 a.m. Sept. 24, 2026.

A no-contest plea does not admit or deny guilt but allows a defendant to be sentenced as if a guilty plea had been entered.

August is Tree Check Month, according to the Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, as it is the most likely time to see the Asian longhorned beetle and the damage it causes to trees.

Even though sightings of the Asian longhorned beetle are uncommon, people can still look for signs of the beetle by checking trees on their property and in their community for damage.

What is an Asian longhorned beetle?

The Asian longhorned beetle is a non-native, wood-boring beetle that’s considered invasive in North America, as it attacks more than 12 types of hardwood trees, including maples, elms, horse chestnuts, burches and willows.

There are no effective predators or diseases in North America to keep the Asian longhorned beetle populations in check.

Adult female Asian longhorned beetle will chew a small depression in tree bark to deposit each of her up to 90 eggs. After the eggs hatch, the larvae will eat their way into the tree’s heartwood, leaving tunnels that damage the tree.

By August the next summer, the beetles would bore round exit holes and emerge as adults to mate and start the cycle again.

What happens to infested trees?

According to the Michigan DNR, infested trees do not recover and will die. This can make trees become safety hazards as branches could drop and trees could fall over, especially during storms.

Since many types of trees could be affected and infestation is fatal, managing the beetle means removing both the infested and at-risk trees.

How to identify

An adult Asian longhorned beetle has a shiny, black body with white spots. Its body is about 1 to 1.5 inches long. It also has black-and-white antennae longer than its body, six legs, and feet that can appear bluish.

The white-spotted pine sawyer, a Michigan native, resembles the Asian longhorned beetle. However, the pine sawyer is brown to black, not shiny, and has a telltale white spot between its head and the top of its wing covers.

Signs of infestation

Here are the signs that a tree could be infested, according to the Michigan DNR:

• Round exit holes about the diameter of a pencil found in tree trunks and branches.
• Shallow, oval or round scars in the bark, where the adult beetle chewed an egg-laying site.
• Material that looks like wood shavings lying on the ground around the tree or in the branches.
• Dead branches or limbs falling from an otherwise healthy-looking tree.

Don’t move firewood

While the Asian longhorned beetle doesn’t move far on its own, it can hitchhike to a new area through untreated firewood. When traveling, the Michigan DNR recommends leaving firewood at home and buying locally or choosing certified, heat-treated firewood to prevent the beetle from spreading to new places.

How to report

If you see an Asian longhorned beetle or tree damage, report it to the ALB hotline at 866-702-9938 or submit an online report through the ALB webpage. You can take a photo of the beetle or the tree damage, or try to capture the beetle in a container and freeze it to preserve it for identification.

USDA and the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service are trying to eliminate the Asian longhorned beetle from the U.S. The ALB program has eradicated infestations in Illinois; Boston, Mass.; New Jersey, Brooklyn, Queens, Manhattan, Staten Island and Islip in New York; and a portion of East Fork State Park and Stonelick and Monroe townships in Ohio. Officials are continuing to work in other infested areas of Massachusetts, New York, Ohio and South Carolina.

Antonio’s Cucina Italiana is the winner of this year’s Vote 4 The Best category for best Italian in Metro Detroit.

Here are the results for the top five:

1. Antonio’s Cucina Italiana.
2. Da Francesco’s Ristorante & Bar in Shelby Township.
3. Luciano’s Italian Restaurant in Clinton Township.
4. Villa Restaurant and Pizzeria in Eastpointe.
5. La Strada Italian Kitchen & Bar in Birmingham.

Congrats to all of our finalists.

This year’s Vote 4 The Best received more than 163,000 votes during the finalist phase, with Metro Detroiters supporting their favorite restaurants, venues, and local businesses in 80 different categories.

Our winner reveal begins Monday, Aug. 10.

Click here to view a full list of this year’s Vote 4 The Best winners as they are announced.

Ventimiglia Italian Foods in Sterling Heights is the winner of this year’s Vote 4 The Best category for best sandwich/deli in Metro Detroit.

Here are the results for the top five:

1. Ventimiglia Italian Foods in Sterling Heights.
2. Bread Basket Deli.
3. New York Deli.
4. Ernie’s Market in Oak Park.
5. Breakaway Deli in Troy.

Congrats to all of our finalists.

This year’s Vote 4 The Best received more than 163,000 votes during the finalist phase, with Metro Detroiters supporting their favorite restaurants, venues, and local businesses in 80 different categories.

Our winner reveal begins Monday, Aug. 10.

Click here to view a full list of this year’s Vote 4 The Best winners as they are announced.

Leo’s Coney Island is the winner of this year’s Vote 4 The Best category for best coney island in Metro Detroit.

Here are the results for the top five:

1. Leo’s Coney Island.
2. National Coney Island.
3. Lafayette Coney Island in Detroit.
4. Senate Coney Island & Restaurant in Livonia.
5. American Coney Island in Detroit.

Congrats to all of our finalists.

This year’s Vote 4 The Best received more than 163,000 votes during the finalist phase, with Metro Detroiters supporting their favorite restaurants, venues, and local businesses in 80 different categories.

Our winner reveal begins Monday, Aug. 10.

Click here to view a full list of this year’s Vote 4 The Best winners as they are announced.

Comerica Park in Detroit is the winner of this year’s Vote 4 The Best category for best sports venue in Metro Detroit.

Here are the results for the top five:

1. Comerica Park in Detroit.
2. Little Caesars Arena in Detroit.
3. Ford Field in Detroit.
4. Jimmy John’s Field in Utica.
5. Keyworth Stadium in Hamtramck.

Congrats to all of our finalists.

This year’s Vote 4 The Best received more than 163,000 votes during the finalist phase, with Metro Detroiters supporting their favorite restaurants, venues, and local businesses in 80 different categories.

Our winner reveal begins Monday, Aug. 10.

Click here to view a full list of this year’s Vote 4 The Best winners as they are announced.

The Henry Ford Museum & Greenfield Village is the winner of this year’s Vote 4 The Best category for best museum in Metro Detroit.

Here are the results for the top five:

1. The Henry Ford Museum & Greenfield Village.
2. Detroit Institute of Arts.
3. Michigan Science Center in Detroit.
4. Detroit Historical Museum.
5. Cranbrook Art Museum in Bloomfield Hills.

Congrats to all of our finalists.

This year’s Vote 4 The Best received more than 163,000 votes during the finalist phase, with Metro Detroiters supporting their favorite restaurants, venues, and local businesses in 80 different categories.

Our winner reveal begins Monday, Aug. 10.

Click here to view a full list of this year’s Vote 4 The Best winners as they are announced.

Polish Village Cafe in Hamtramck is the winner of this year’s Vote 4 The Best category for best Polish in Metro Detroit.

Here are the results for the top five:

1. Polish Village Cafe in Hamtramck.
2. Sabina’s Restaurant in Melvindale.
3. Three Brothers Restaurant in Plymouth.
4. Polonia Restaurant in Hamtramck.
5. Polskis Pub and Grub in Clinton Township.

Congrats to all of our finalists.

This year’s Vote 4 The Best received more than 163,000 votes during the finalist phase, with Metro Detroiters supporting their favorite restaurants, venues, and local businesses in 80 different categories.

Our winner reveal begins Monday, Aug. 10.

Click here to view a full list of this year’s Vote 4 The Best winners as they are announced.

“Your country is in big trouble. You’re not winning,” Trump said, dressing down Zelenskyy in front of the world’s media. “You don't have the cards.”

The blowup in February 2025, three years into the war, was more than just a heated public exchange: The Ukrainian delegation was asked to leave the White House, and Washington briefly suspended intelligence sharing with Kyiv. In the ensuing months, as Russia made slow but steady gains on the battlefield, Trump warmly welcomed Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska and seemed ready to push Ukraine into an unfavorable peace deal, including forcing it to give up territory.

But even as Zelenskyy sat next to Trump, his forces were preparing an operation that would reveal Ukraine’s ability and ambition to take the war to Russia: Months later, drones smuggled into the country attacked Russian bombers, destroying or damaging planes worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

Since then, Kyiv has ramped up a campaign of longer-range strikes inside Russia and in areas Moscow has seized, increased production of weapons, targeted Russian air defenses, and hit oil infrastructure and the warehouses of a major retailer in a bid to ensure ordinary Russians feel the impact of the conflict.

In an embarrassment to Putin, Ukrainian drone strikes sent thick plumes of smoke billowing over St. Petersburg shortly before the opening of an international economic forum in June. Concern over Ukraine’s attacks led Russian authorities to scale down the May 9 military parade commemorating the defeat of Nazi Germany. Strikes on oil refineries have caused a summer fuel crisis.

By the time Trump and Zelenskyy met at a NATO summit in July, the American president said the Ukrainian leader had “been very effective” in the war. “We’ve actually developed a good relationship,” Trump added.

But as Ukraine’s strikes have intensified, so have Russia’s — and Kyiv faces major challenges in defending against them because of shortages of American Patriot air defense missiles.

In the first six months of the year, 1,396 civilians were killed in Ukraine, according to the U.N. Meanwhile, the world body said Russian authorities reported 250 civilians killed in the same period. On Monday, a strike that Ukraine said hit an oil refinery in Russia killed 13 people, according to local officials.

And while Ukraine's effort appears to have shifted the narrative about the war in Washington, it's still not clear if it will be able to push Putin toward the negotiating table.

Ukraine’s strikes are aimed at undermining the idea that Russia can afford to “just let this roll,” said Jack Watling, a senior research fellow at the London-based RUSI think tank.

The question of whether it will succeed depends on how much pain Ukraine can exact. “Logically, above a certain threshold, it does work but whether they can reach that threshold is an interesting question” — and one that depends at least partly on factors outside Kyiv's control, like continued European financial support, he noted.

Ukraine brings the war to Russia

While most of Ukraine's strikes have a range of less than 200 kilometers (125 miles), its longer-range attacks have increased dramatically this year. It launched three times as many of those strikes in July as it did in January, according to data from ACLED, an independent conflict monitor. Repeatedly hitting deep into Russia has forced its military to stretch air defenses over a larger area.

Many of its strikes have focused on four key categories of targets, according to an Associated Press analysis of hundreds of Ukrainian attacks this year — compiled from statements by Russian officials and state media and the Ukrainian military.

As the Iran war pushed up energy prices, leading the U.S. to ease sanctions on Russian oil, Kyiv ramped up strikes on oil infrastructure to deny the Kremlin revenue from fuel exports and force shortages on ordinary Russians. It is also striking defense manufacturing to damage Russia’s long-term ability to produce weapons, targeting air defenses to clear a path for its own arms, and hitting retail warehouses to bring the effects to ordinary Russians.

— As part of the campaign against oil infrastructure, Kyiv said it hit Russia’s largest oil refinery, more than 2,500 kilometers (1,550 miles) from Ukraine.

— Kyiv has also targeted defense manufacturing centers. It hit a factory making navigation systems multiple times, including with its own Flamingo missile.

— In July and August, Ukraine struck Wildberries warehouses. Kyiv said the company helps supply the Russian military. Moscow denies that.

— Many of Ukraine’s strikes on Russian air defenses and radar are around Russian-held Crimea and are often carried out with drones.

Maj. Robert “Magyar” Brovdi, the commander leading Ukraine’s drone war, told the AP its strikes in Crimea are also aimed at rendering the peninsula unusable as a staging ground for Russian forces.

Starlink gives Ukraine an advantage — for now

It’s not always clear if Ukraine’s attacks are effective — and some may have resulted in minimal or no damage. In May and June, Ukraine said it hit several satellite, reconnaissance or signals intelligence facilities in Russia, but satellite images analyzed by AP did not show major damage.

Still, Ukraine has one advantage that can help it strip back Russian air defenses and make its drone strikes more precise.

It has access to Elon Musk’s satellite communications service Starlink — which means its operators can control drones in real time in Russian-held Ukrainian territory. Russia has been blocked from using Starlink.

But Russia is also building its own version of Starlink, and is installing jamming systems that hamper Starlink connectivity, Brovdi said.

Ukraine is investing heavily in weapons production

Even before the Oval Office meeting, Ukraine scrambled to invest in new weapons — but that moment was “a real wake-up call," said a European military official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the front-line situation in detail. It became clear that U.S. support could be stopped “from one day to the next.”

Ukraine doubled down on production, churning out a growing array of weapons in larger numbers and shortening traditional research and production cycles from decades to years or even months.

Even so, Ukraine is still not able to produce as many missiles as it needs. It also took Ukraine time to make systems that could target facilities precisely enough that Kyiv felt comfortable using them to strike deep into Russia, Watling said.

And while Ukraine has begun to resolve navigational issues with its missiles, such as the Flamingo, those weapons are still not as accurate — or as stealthy — as their Western analogues. That often means hundreds of drones must be fired to overwhelm Russian air defenses to allow a missile to get through.

It's an expensive and time-consuming way to wage war since only 5% to 9% of what Ukraine fires gets past Russian air defenses, according to Watling.

But, although Russia's weapons are more powerful, Zelenskyy suggested at the NATO summit that Putin is “losing the initiative” in the war as Ukraine has moved the fight from the stalled battlefield to the sky.

Sitting next to Trump at the summit, the Ukrainian leader even cracked a joke, demurring when Trump asked him if he would accept Moscow as a venue for peace talks, as Putin has suggested.

“There are a lot of Ukrainian drones in the air," Zelenskyy said. "It would be dangerous.”

Skubal still intends to be much better than he was while allowing three runs on four hits over five innings Monday night in the Dodgers' 6-5 victory over the Kansas City Royals.

“I thought I competed well and gave our team a chance to win, and our offense picked me up big-time, defense picked me up big-time, and the bullpen was outstanding tonight,” Skubal said. “So all in all, a good team win, especially when I don’t feel like I performed up to my standard.”

Skubal left trailing 3-2 in the back-to-back Cy Young Award winner's decent, if unspectacular, first start in the home whites. His fastball command was decidedly lacking, and he was unable to get ahead early in most counts during an outing in which he managed just one 1-2-3 inning. The fireworks came instead from the Dodgers' slumbering offense, which awoke with Max Muncy's three-run double and Freddie Freeman's RBI single after Skubal departed.

Although he struck out six, Skubal didn't live up to manager Dave Roberts' pregame prediction of “an electric night” for the vaunted left-hander and his slumping club, which had lost eight of nine heading into this homestand.

“I thought he fought well,” Roberts said. “Tarik didn't have his best stuff, but he didn't relent. He kept going, and he gave us what he had for tonight.”

Even after everything he accomplished while becoming one of the majors' top starters with the Tigers, Skubal was particularly amped up for this debut in front of 51,799 fans eager to cheer their team's biggest trade-deadline addition in its bid to win three straight World Series titles. When Skubal was announced in the starting lineup for the first time, Dodgers fans responded with loud cheers and a serenade of “Skuuuuuu!”

“This one was special to me, so the nerves run a little bit higher,” Skubal said. “But it just means you care, so I think that’s all positive stuff. I was excited to go out there and pitch in front of the Dodger fans. It was a ton of fun to play the game today.”

Skubal threw 95 pitches against the Royals, and Jac Caglianone tagged two of them for a two-run homer and an RBI single. Skubal also issued two walks and hit a batter with a pitch in just his second career appearance at Dodger Stadium, taking the mound nine days after the defending champions acquired him from Detroit in the biggest trade of the deadline.

Los Angeles gave up three promising prospects for what might be a short-term rental of the 29-year-old Skubal, who will likely reap the benefits of free agency this winter.

Skubal made his Dodgers debut at Wrigley Field last Tuesday, pitching six innings of two-run, four-hit ball with six strikeouts in his new team’s 5-1 loss to the Chicago Cubs.

The back-to-back champions had the farm talent and the impetus to go out and get the AL's best pitcher over the past two seasons — and Skubal's reception at Chavez Ravine showed their fans still don't take their deep-pocketed team's winning mentality for granted.

But after that warm pregame reception, Skubal yielded two soft singles and a run to Kansas City’s first three batters, with Bobby Witt Jr. stealing second and scoring on Caglianone’s dribbler up the middle.

Nick Loftin then doubled in the third before Caglianone hit his 21st homer of the season to right, smashing a hanging slider for a 410-foot shot that induced grumbles from the stands.

Skubal retired six straight Royals after Caglianone's shot, but he got into trouble again in the fifth, hitting Loftin with a pitch and walking Witt with two outs. Skubal dug in and struck out Caglianone to end the inning, getting him with his signature changeup on his final pitch.

“Tarik Skubal — it’s nice to have him on our mound,” said a grinning Freeman, who drove in Shohei Ohtani with the go-ahead run. “I’m sure he wants to go deeper than five innings, but I like that every five, six days that he’s going to be on the mound for us.”

Los Angeles probably hoped for a more dominant beginning to Skubal's tenure, but it cares most about the games he'll pitch in October, when the champs expect to make their 14th consecutive playoff appearance.

Roberts is uncommonly impressed by Skubal after just more than a week together.

“This guy, he’s as different as anyone I’ve ever been around in this short period of time,” Roberts said. “He’s special in every way. ... He’s just built differently. The mind, the body, the focus, the humility, the willingness to serve, to help. He puts himself out there. He’s different than any player I’ve ever been around, really. Again, it’s a small sample, but I’ve dug in on him. I've got a pretty good gut. This guy is something like I’ve never seen.”

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

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

Trump demands Iran pay for decades of US military deaths

Trump's social media post Monday came after Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei stressed that Iran will not reopen the Strait of Hormuz until the U.S. meets its conditions.

Tehran wants the U.S. to end its blockade of Iranian ports, lift economic sanctions and release Iran’s frozen assets. It also said the U.S. must pay compensation for war damage.

“It is up to the U.S. side to stop and make amends for its illegal and destructive actions,” Baghaei said.

Trump responded that he is now demanding “compensation from Iran, for all of the people that they have killed and gravely wounded with their roadside bombs and many conflicts.”

The U.S. government has blamed Iran-backed militants for the deaths and injuries of hundreds of Americans over several decades. They include a 1983 bombing that killed 241 U.S. military personnel at a Marine compound in Beirut and the deaths of at least 603 U.S. troops in Iraq between 2003 and 2011.

Trump said he also wants Tehran to compensate the families of Iranian protesters who were killed.

“I have instructed my representatives to put this firmly into any, and all, future negotiations,” Trump said in his post.

The closure of the Strait of Hormuz — through which roughly one-fifth of the world’s traded oil supplies passed before the war — has kept energy prices as a major focus of U.S. politics ahead of November’s midterm elections.

Iran's supreme leader is said to want unity amid signs of division

Iran’s president said the country’s supreme leader is calling for “unity and cohesion” as the Islamic Republic faces economic hardships and sanctions stemming from its war with the United States.

President Masoud Pezeshkian described a nearly seven-hour meeting with Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei in an interview with Iranian state television that aired amid apparent tensions among the Islamic Republic’s leaders.

Pezeshkian told the state-run IRIB that he and Khamenei discussed “people’s livelihoods, the state of the market, employment, people’s housing,” as well as “problems that are now being created as a result of the (U.S.) sanctions.” He didn’t say when or where they met.

Most important, he said, was Khamenei’s emphasis on unity.

“All of the enemy’s plans are aimed at creating division,” Pezeshkian said. “What we have to do is prevent divisions from emerging.”

It is only the second time the Iranian president has said he has met with the new supreme leader since Khamenei was appointed in March following a U.S.-Israeli strike that killed his father. Khamenei, believed to have been wounded in the same attack, has not appeared in public since then.

Iran names former Revolutionary Guard leader to top security post

Iran on Sunday appointed Mohsen Rezaei, a military adviser to its new supreme leader, to head its powerful Supreme National Security Council.

Rezaei commanded Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard from 1981 to 1997, a period that includes Iran’s 1980s war with Iraq. The 71-year-old hard-liner last week threatened American forces with “serious risks and casualties” if the U.S. did not lift its blockade of Iranian ports.

Rezaei replaces Mohammad Bagher Zolghadr, who will become a political adviser to Khamenei.

While Rezaei appears willing to negotiate with the U.S. to “secure Iran’s maximalist aims, including control of the Strait of Hormuz,” he has also been “unwilling to present any Iranian concessions,” wrote the Institute for the Study of War, a U.S.-based think tank.

Israel declares closed military zone in Taybeh

Israel's military said Monday it had declared a Christian-majority town in the occupied West Bank a closed military zone to keep out Israeli settlers and other non-residents.

The new tactic is designed to keep Israelis out of Taybeh, which has been subject to arson, vandalism and settlers coming onto private and village property. The army said Palestinian residents and journalists would be allowed unless soldiers determine their presence poses a threat. The army said its troops would detain suspects and disperse gatherings to keep the peace.

The designation comes after months of the army and police struggling to maintain order throughout the territory, where at least 87 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli settlers or soldiers in 2026, according to the Ramallah-based Palestinian Health Ministry.

Yemen says the Houthi attack on a Red Sea town Sunday killed 7

Yemen's Iran-backed Houthi rebels attacked a Red Sea port town controlled by government forces on Sunday, killing seven and injuring 30 people. Yemen’s Defense Ministry — which operates under its internationally recognized government — said four military personnel and three civilians were killed.

Clashes continued Monday near the village of Taiz. The Houthi group said a 13-year-old child was killed by artillery shelling and another child was injured.

The attack on Mokha is the latest in one of the largest waves of Houthi strikes on Yemeni military positions and areas held by the Saudi-backed government since a 2022 truce. It comes as threats to shipping through the Strait of Hormuz have renewed focus on the Red Sea and Bab el-Mandeb Strait at its southern tip.

VinSpace will launch its satellites on a SpaceX Transporter rideshare mission run by Elon Musk’s company, which carries satellites from multiple customers on a single rocket to share launch costs, it said in a statement.

The satellites, which VinSpace said it will develop and operate, will test the company’s technology in orbit and support future commercial applications.

VinSpace is part of Vietnam’s Vingroup conglomerate and was established in November 2025. The company said in April that it planned to develop and launch its first satellites in 2027.

Founded by tycoon Pham Nhat Vuong, Vingroup is Vietnam’s largest privately owned company. It has a sprawling business empire that touches many aspects of daily life, from real estate and retail to healthcare, education and tourism.

It is going global as it invests heavily in high-tech industries such as electric vehicles, space, artificial intelligence and robotics, sectors central to Vietnam’s ambition to become Asia’s next tiger economy.

Vietnam has sought to build its aerospace capabilities for several decades but remains a relatively small player in the global space industry. It launched its first telecommunications satellite in 2008, followed by another in 2012, according to official documents.

In March, it inaugurated a major space science and technology center in Hanoi’s Hoa Lac High-Tech Park, aimed at expanding the country’s satellite development and use of space-based data. Vietnam aims to become a mid-level space power in Southeast Asia by 2030.

In February, Vietnam allowed SpaceX to launch its Starlink satellite internet service in the country. This was seen by some analysts as an effort by Vietnam to avoid U.S. tariffs. Starlink has since begun accepting orders in Vietnam.

VinSpace said the agreement with SpaceX is part of its plan to become a full-service aerospace company, developing capabilities ranging from satellite design and manufacturing to launch management, satellite operations and space-based data services.

“Reliable access to space is fundamental to turning satellite innovation into operational missions,” VinSpace CEO Thu Vu said in a statement.

VinSpace did not disclose the value of the contract or the number or specifications of the satellites.

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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.

Whoops!

Rookie teammate Carson Benge had already tossed it into the Atlanta crowd.

Recently shifted to a short-relief role in his fourth major league season, Senga closed out New York's 8-5 victory over the Braves with a scoreless ninth inning Monday night. Mauricio Dubón flied out to Benge in right field for the final out, and he turned toward the stands looking to send a fan home with a souvenir.

Senga, well aware of his achievement, held out his arms in disbelief with his mouth agape while watching the whole thing transpire. In a funny scene, he raised both hands trying to grab Benge's attention as Senga and Mets catcher Francisco Alvarez both called for the baseball in vain.

A sheepish Benge, when he realized what happened, put both hands on his head — and Senga doubled over in laughter.

After the game, Senga was asked if Benge ever managed to retrieve the ball for him.

“I think Bengie is trying to tell me I should have just punched him out,” a smiling Senga said through an interpreter.

Senga got the save opportunity in the ninth because the Mets placed closer Devin Williams on the 15-day injured list earlier in the day. Interim manager Andy Green was non-committal before the game about who would be his closer, but with New York leading 8-5 he called on Senga. The right-hander is 0-8 with an 8.12 ERA in eight starts and eight relief appearances this season.

Senga struck out Matt Olson and Michael Harris II to open the ninth, then issued a walk to Ozzie Albies before retiring Dubón.

Senga has not allowed a run in his last three appearances out of the bullpen. He came over from Japan and signed a $75 million, five-year contract to be a starter for the Mets before the 2023 season. He went 12-7 with a 2.98 ERA in 29 starts that year, making the NL All-Star team and finishing runner-up in Rookie of the Year voting and seventh in Cy Young Award balloting.

But he's largely struggled with injuries and ineffectiveness since, other than a strong stretch early in the 2025 season.

The last-place Mets are 6-1 on a nine-game trip following a significant selloff ahead of last Monday's trade deadline that depleted their bullpen.

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

At home he averages seven hours. The first night away — with or without earplugs and regardless of the bed's quality — his smartwatch tells him he gets about five.

“I feel normal, you know, no stress, nothing, but it’s just I notice I wake up continuously,” said Leoni, a sales director for a tech company who travels once or twice a month for work.

He is a victim of what sleep specialists call the first-night effect. The phenomenon has been confirmed by dozens of studies and is believed to have evolutionary roots, said Anna Wick, a senior sleep researcher at the University of Freiburg in Switzerland.

“It’s assumed to be an adaptation response that the sleeping brain remains vigilant in this unfamiliar environment,” Wick said.

You stay alert while sleeping

Ahmad Mayeli, a psychiatry professor and sleep researcher at the University of Pittsburgh, said most people experience it, and even those who may not notice it probably do on a small level. On average, people sleep about 20 to 30 minutes less in a new environment.

His research found that the frontal lobe, an area associated with the deepest stage of sleep, was more active, indicating a sense of alertness. In other words, not only do people sleep less, but also less deeply.

“They are saying that, like in dolphins, part of the brain is awake when you are sleeping,” Mayeli said. “It’s not exactly like dolphins, but still, studies show part of the brain is sleeping less.”

He noted that age makes a difference. The effect is more pronounced in children, adolescents and older adults, and it typically worsens with age. Those in their 20s are the least affected.

“Maybe it’s the sweet spot,” he said.

Anxiety can play a part

Mayeli suspects that the brain may be wired to be wary of new places because, historically, they were the most dangerous to rest.

“It doesn’t matter if it’s a Marriott hotel or it’s the savannah,” he said. “Your brain hasn’t gotten the memo that this place is completely safe.”

Wick said evidence suggests the effect fades after the first night.

Lisa Strauss, a psychologist specializing in cognitive behavioral treatment of sleep disorders, said several factors can impact sleep in a new place beyond evolutionary vigilance.

Travel itself can have a negative effect, even within the same time zone. Environmental factors may get in the way, like a flashing smoke alarm light in a hotel room. Relational tension, perhaps while visiting family members you're not close with, could also contribute.

Strauss noted that some people may sleep better the first night if they’re tired after a long day of travel or if the location provides a sense of disconnection from daily stressors. And people who have trouble sleeping at home might fare better because they don’t associate the new place with a history of difficulty sleeping.

While anyone can experience the first-night effect, Strauss said those who are more anxious at baseline are especially vulnerable. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy — the worry about whether they can sleep is what keeps them awake.

Leoni acknowledged there are times he goes into the first night thinking about how he'll sleep.

“Sometimes the thoughts come automatically,” he said. “You talk with your colleague, and you say, 'I’m going back to the room, but I’m not going to sleep anyway.’”

How to sleep better on the first night

Strauss recommends general sleep hygiene practices such as going to sleep in a cool, dark room at the same time every night, following a nighttime routine and turning off screens well before going to bed. Those are especially helpful if you start (or restart) doing them in the days or weeks before an important trip.

She suggested people try to make the environment their own by spending a little extra time in the new bed. They could read or do another peaceful, familiar activity to make the experience less novel. They could also bring familiar objects, like a favorite pillow or blanket.

For someone who is particularly anxious, Strauss recommended they visualize themselves in a safe, familiar environment out in nature, such as on a favorite hike or beach. They should notice the anxiety they're feeling, then repeat positive phrases to help lower feelings of hypervigilance. Her suggestion: “May you know that you are safe. May you know that you are loved. May you be at peace.”

Mayeli said the first-night effect is not really anything to worry about, and people can easily make up for missing an hour or two of sleep for one night. But he recommends arriving a day early to acclimate if you have an important meeting or event.

“If tomorrow matters, get there a night early,” he said, “so you’ll sleep like yourself when it counts.”

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Albert Stumm writes about wellness, food and travel. Find his work at https://www.albertstumm.com

Some communities south of Interstate 94 picked up 1 to 3 inches of rain Monday morning.

While much of Metro Detroit will get breaks from the rain Monday evening, the atmosphere will remain unsettled enough for additional showers and thunderstorms to develop overnight.

The greatest concern with any storms will be heavy rainfall and localized flooding, particularly in areas that have already received significant rain.

Another round possible overnight

Isolated thunderstorms are possible Monday evening before the better opportunity for rain shifts toward southern parts of Southeast Michigan overnight.

Another cluster of thunderstorms could move from the Upper Midwest into the southern Great Lakes late Monday night into Tuesday morning. The most likely window is roughly midnight through 6 a.m. Tuesday.

The highest rainfall potential appears to be south of I-94 and closer to the Michigan-Ohio state line.

Rainfall rates could locally exceed one inch per hour, and some locations could pick up more than two inches where thunderstorms repeatedly move over the same areas.

That could result in ponding on roads and localized street and low-lying flooding.

Severe weather risk is low, but not zero

A storm or two could become strong to severe overnight, but the overall severe weather risk for Metro Detroit remains low.

An isolated storm could produce wind gusts up to 60 mph or hail around one inch in diameter.

However, widespread severe weather is not expected, and the better environment for stronger storms is expected to remain farther south.

That makes heavy rain the more widespread concern, especially where the ground is already saturated from Monday morning’s rainfall.

Tuesday brings another opportunity for storms

Tuesday may not be completely dry after the morning activity moves through.

Another round of thunderstorms could develop or move into Southeast Michigan during the afternoon and evening, with the most likely window currently from about 3 p.m. to 8 p.m.

There is again a low risk that a few storms could become strong to severe south of I-96, with damaging wind gusts, hail and heavy rain possible.

How widespread or intense Tuesday’s storms become will depend partly on how much the atmosphere can recover after any morning thunderstorms.

If morning rain and clouds linger longer, that could limit instability and reduce the afternoon severe weather potential.

Use caution around flooded roads

Even without widespread severe thunderstorms, heavy rainfall can create dangerous conditions quickly.

Drivers should slow down when encountering heavy rain and never attempt to drive through a flooded roadway.

Water can be deeper than it appears, and it can be difficult to tell whether the road underneath has been damaged or washed away.

Pedestrians should also avoid walking through floodwaters.

The unsettled pattern continues Wednesday with another chance for showers and thunderstorms, particularly during the afternoon and early evening.

A quieter stretch is expected Thursday and Friday before rain and thunderstorm chances return for the weekend.

Share your weather photos with Local 4 at MIPics.

The township board voted Monday night (Aug. 8) unanimously to approve revised ballot language for a request to raise the police levy from three mills to five mills — an increase of two mills.

The measure failed in the primary, with 57% of voters rejecting it.

Township officials estimated turnout at about 24% to 25% and said roughly 14% of the total voter population voted the millage down.

If voters reject the proposal again in November, township board members said the police department would face a 41% cut to its operating budget.

Police Chief Eric Luke said that steep of a cut would be “devastating” to the department.

“This type of cut — we can’t sustain that. There’s no way for me to put a police department on the road, protect the residents, protect the officers with that kind of cut,” Luke said.

Luke said the department serves about 12,500 residents and responds to calls ranging from property damage to violent crimes. He said the department operates with as many as 18 sworn officers.

For roughly the past 15 years, Luke said police funding has come mainly from royalties from the Carleton Farms Landfill and the current 3-mill police millage.

Township Trustee Tim Rush said reduced staffing could lead to longer response times if the township has to rely on outside agencies.

“If we’re waiting on MSP or short-staffed here, that could be a great delay,” Rush said, referring to the Michigan State Police.

Rush said the department itself could be at risk if the measure fails again.

“We’d probably just have to close the doors on the Sumpter Township Police Department,” Rush said. “You can’t have a partially staffed police department.”

Resident Kristen McCray said rising costs make it difficult for some households to support another tax increase.

“I do feel like costs have gone up across the board for everyone in the country and especially in Michigan,” McCray said. “I’m wondering if we could go about it a different way instead of people also having to pay more out of pocket.”

Luke said calls for service have nearly doubled over the past five years, while the township’s population has increased by about 25% in recent years. He said the additional revenue would help keep the department’s budget in line with inflation and maintain current staffing.

“We would fail in our ability to respond properly to the runs coming in,” Luke said when asked what would happen if the millage fails a second time.

If approved, township officials said the millage is expected to raise more than $2.4 million in its first year.

The township held a special meeting focused on getting the verbiage right before putting the millage proposal back on the ballot, according to information shared from the township.

Sumpter Township Police Chief Eric Luke said the defeat has created a budget problem for the department, and he wants residents to understand the impact of having no additional millage support.

“We serve 12,500 residents,” Luke said. “It’s your typical police department — we respond to everything from damaged mailboxes to, unfortunately, everything up to homicides.”

Luke said the department handles the community’s policing needs with as many as 18 sworn officers.

For the past 15 years, police funding has come from two main sources: royalties from the Carleton Farms Landfill and a police millage currently set at three mills.

Last week, voters were asked to approve an increase to five mills. The measure failed, with 57% voting no.

Luke said some voters may have misunderstood what was being requested.

“I think there was a confusion of what we were asking for,” Luke said. “I learned late that some people thought it was five on top of the three, and tax fatigue.”

Luke said the failed vote means a 41% cut to the police department’s operating budget.

He said the proposed increase was not aimed at adding services, but at keeping the department’s budget in line with inflation.

“That would’ve enabled us to stay status quo,” Luke said.

Luke said calls for service have nearly doubled over the past five years, while the township’s population has increased by about 25% over the past few years. Without additional revenue, he said, the department would likely have to reduce staffing.

“We have to find a way out of it,” Luke said. “We cannot budget cut our way out of this situation. The township has to find a way to fill this gap.”

Local 4 will be at Monday night’s (Aug. 10) meeting.

Austin Thorpe appeared in court on Friday (Aug. 7) in Romeo for a preliminary examination.

At the conclusion of the hearing, Thorpe was bound over to Macomb County Circuit Court on the charges.

A judge added three charges during his examination: involuntary manslaughter, a second count of operating while intoxicated causing serious injury, and a second count of moving violation causing serious impairment of a bodily function.

Thorpe now faces:

• One count of involuntary manslaughter, a 15-year felony.
• One count of operating while intoxicated causing death, a 15-year felony.
• Three counts of operating while intoxicated causing serious injury, a five-year felony.
• Two counts of third-degree child abuse, a two-year felony.
• One count of moving violation causing death, a one-year misdemeanor.
• Three counts of moving violation causing serious impairment of a bodily function, 93-day misdemeanors.
• One felony count related to commission with a motor vehicle and adult advisory driver’s license sanctions.
• A second-offense habitual offender notice, which could be used as an aggravating sentencing factor.

The charges stem from a crash reported Nov. 27, 2025, in Bruce Township.

Prosecutors allege Thorpe was driving a 2011 Chevrolet Impala southbound on M-53 when he crossed through the center turn lane and collided head-on with a 2013 Chevrolet Impala traveling northbound.

It is also alleged that Thorpe failed to properly secure his 2-year-old son and 5-year-old daughter in the vehicle.

Thorpe, his two children and the driver of the other vehicle were taken to Henry Ford Macomb Hospital after the crash.

Thorpe’s 5-year-old daughter was later pronounced dead.

The 31-year-old is scheduled to be arraigned in Macomb County Circuit Court at 1:30 p.m. Monday, Aug. 24.

Salem Asmar was arrested on Monday (Aug. 10) following the stabbing Saturday, Aug. 8, 2026, and was charged with assault with intent to do great bodily harm less than murder.

Asmar was arraigned in 72nd District Court and was given a $100,000 cash or surety bond.

Officials said a record number of people and boats gathered at Muskamoot Bay on Saturday to take advantage of the warm weather.

While many people enjoyed the day, police said others became intoxicated and behaved irresponsibly.

More than 50 people were left stranded after failing to return with the groups they arrived with.

Police said multiple fights also broke out throughout the day, including the altercation that resulted in the stabbing.

Officials said the 21-year-old victim was stabbed following a disagreement.

The sheriff’s office did not release additional information about the victim’s condition.

The sheriff’s office said its marine deputies were on the water throughout the event and responded to incidents as the crowd grew.

Jazman Hock, 28, of Muskegon; Sarah Vida, 28, of Muskegon; and Vida’s 9-year-old son, Kayden Kovalcik, were found safe and alive Friday, Aug. 7, after a dayslong search involving multiple law enforcement agencies, emergency responders and volunteers.

The three were located at about 4:36 p.m., approximately three-quarters of a mile northeast of the Mill Iron Road Boat Launch, police said.

A Michigan State Police K-9 team and DNR conservation officers were involved in the discovery.

In body-worn camera footage released by the DNR on Monday (Aug. 10) on Facebook, CO Cameron Wright explained how the officers used their familiarity with the area to focus their search on a remote section of the riverbank.

Wright said the officers identified the location because they believed it was one of the most remote areas the river could have pulled the tubers.

The area was far from roads and houses, making it a particularly difficult place for someone to become lost.

The officers then spotted a trail through the grass in the middle of a logjam.

Wright said the trail indicated the tubers had traveled over logs, through the water and onto the riverbank before entering the woods.

The officers located footprints in the mud and began following the trail into the trees.

They searched for small changes in the environment that could show where the missing people had traveled, including disturbed vegetation and broken branches.

“We followed the track, looking for areas where ferns were tipped over, grass was bent, sticks were snapped, all in a certain direction,” Wright said.

What happened

The three people went missing after entering the Muskegon River on Tuesday, Aug. 4, from the Maple Island Boat Launch near Bridgeton, officials said.

The investigation began after the father of one of the women found her vehicle at the boat launch with a broken window.

Family members also reported that they had not heard from the group.

Two inflatable tubes believed to belong to the missing people were later found, and search crews discovered footprints that were evaluated as part of the investigation.

The search expanded to include multiple law enforcement agencies, emergency responders and volunteers.

Before the three were found, Kayden’s father, Brent Kovalcik, spoke about the uncertainty surrounding his son’s disappearance.

“I don’t know if they’re alive, I don’t know if they were kidnapped, I don’t know if they’re down the river, far, far away,” Kovalcik said.

The discovery Friday afternoon, Aug. 8, 2026, brought an emotional end to the search.

Officials said no additional information would be released at the time out of respect for the privacy of those involved.

A spokesperson for the Meta CEO also said the crew didn't immediately hear the radio call for help and by the time it did, another nearby ship had already rendered assistance.

The Aug. 3 incident gained attention in recent days after a passenger on the cruise ship posted on social media that the captain had said Zuckerberg’s yacht “refused” to respond.

The U.S. Coast Guard said the 21-foot Hewescraft vessel first hailed it for assistance at approximately 9:32 p.m., using a radio frequency all boats are expected to monitor. About 25 minutes later, the Coast Guard determined the vessel was not in distress and issued an assistance request. The skiff was able to make it safely to Farragut Bay after the Wilderness Legacy cruise ship towed it there, and helped it refuel.

When another ship is in distress, everyone in the area is obligated to respond as long as doing so doesn't put their own ship at risk. But maritime law expert Ian Ralby said this situation appears different, and the crew of Zuckerberg's yacht wouldn't face that legal obligation.

“It’s the difference between calling AAA and 911. You need an ambulance on site, that’s a distress call. You need somebody to give you a jump or to tow your car, you call AAA,” said Ralby, who is president of the nonprofit Auxilium Worldwide that focuses on promoting sustainable development and ocean governance, among other goals. It is a big difference in terms of the emergency type, he said. "Both concerning, both needing assistance, but the legal obligations to respond are very different.”

No obligation to help a ship that ran out of gas

Zuckerberg and his family were not on the 387-foot Launchpad yacht when this happened, according to his spokesperson, who didn't specify what the yacht was doing at the time.

“As the Coast Guard noted, the boat was not in distress, and by the time the crew reviewed the Coast Guard contact on a different radio channel from the one they were operating on, the assist was already underway. We’re grateful all parties are safe," Zuckerberg's spokesman Brian Baker said.

Retired Coast Guard Captain Aaron C. Davenport, who spent three decades with the branch of the military responsible for rescues on the water, said running out of gas simply isn't considered an emergency, and the Launchpad wasn't obligated to help.

“If Zuckerberg’s ship is there and this vessel just ran out of fuel, they’re under no obligation whatsoever to assist them. Zero,” said Davenport, who led rescues in the Bering Sea during his career. “Is it that common courtesy to help other mariners out? Yes, because someday you’re going to need assistance.”

The Coast Guard also isn't going to automatically deploy ships when a ship runs out of gas, but Davenport said that in the harsh environment of Alaska a ship that ran out of gas could become an emergency if it drifts into some rocks or a storm is brewing. The fact that this cruise ship responded saved the Coast Guard a trip.

“Alaska is a remote place so it could easily go from non-emergency to emergency and very quickly,” said Davenport, who worked as a consultant on security and maritime issues for several years before retiring.

Cruise ship passenger's post drew attention to this incident

The Alaska Beacon first reported on what happened after Michael Love, who said he was a passenger on the Wilderness Legacy cruise ship, posted on Bluesky on Aug. 5.

“Our boat rescued a stranded vessel last night and apparently we did that after the Coast Guard radioed Mark Zuckerberg’s yacht — which was closer — and they repeatedly refused to respond. (There was near unanimous booing when the captain announced this),” he said.

Coast Guard determined the skiff wasn't in distress

The Coast Guard said in a statement that they determined within half an hour of when the skiff radioed in that the small ship wasn't in distress. A marine assistance request was broadcast on their behalf, and the Wilderness Legacy responded, reaching the 21-foot vessel about an hour later.

Ralby said it's a little unusual that the Launchpad crew missed the call for help because it is common practice for ships to always be monitoring channel 16 on their radios and keep it as the default frequency to hear any distress calls or emergency notices. But typically the Coast Guard tries to keep channel 16 as free as possible so they might announce an emergency on that channel and ask anyone who can help to switch to a different channel to hear the details.

“The situation was resolved without any harm to life," said Ralby, who is a maritime lawyer with experience in more than 100 countries. "It does not seem that there was any immediate issue in terms of threat to life of mariners or concerns for the marine environment, which are the two main things that lead to that urgent distress call where all mariners no matter who they are legally obligated to try and respond.”

In an “open letter to the football family” revealed Monday, UEFA, CONCACAF and the AFC also said that “when trust is broken through deception, when an individual places himself above the collective that entrusted him with authority, that duty has been abandoned.”

UEFA runs soccer in Europe, CONCACAF is the confederation for North, Central America and the Caribbean, and the AFC governs the sport in Asia.

The letter was co-signed by UEFA president Aleksander Čeferin, AFC president Salman Bin Ibrahim Al-Khalifa, CONCACAF president Victor Montagliani and the general secretaries of the those continental governing bodies.

“Football is the world’s greatest shared passion. It belongs to no individual and no institution. It belongs to the players, the fans, the clubs, the member associations and every institution entrusted with safeguarding its future,” the open letter said. “It is in that spirit, as confederations representing its members, that we speak collectively today.”

Infantino is facing a revolt after his failed plan to sell stakes in the World Cup to private equity investors.

“It is not the conduct of a custodian of the game, but of one who believes the game is answerable to him,” the letter said. “These are not the qualities football deserves in its leadership. That is why we have taken this stance: not lightly and not alone, but together, and out of duty to the game we serve.”

Infantino got some support from outside the game, with U.S. President Donald Trump defending the FIFA leader in a social media post Monday night.

“FIFA would be making a terrible mistake if, for any reason, they even considered replacing President Gianni Infantino,” Trump posted. “He is fantastic, having just presided over the most successful World Cup, by four times, ever presented. If he is gone, it will never be as successful or profitable again! Thank you for your attention to this matter. President DJT”

UEFA previously issued a threat to boycott the World Cup and other FIFA competitions despite the governing body abandoning and apologizing for its failed plan.

Norway’s soccer federation called for Infantino to step down, while England's Football Association has also withdrawn its support for Infantino’s re-election next March.

“Football’s strength has always been its unity. We call for that unity to be honored now,” the letter said. “For leadership that serves football, not seeks to command it.”

Last Wednesday, FIFA said it had apologized for errors made over the failed plan but that senior staff at a crisis meeting in Morocco “reaffirmed their full support” for Infantino's presidency.

However, the nature of the meeting was also met with criticism.

“FIFA’s own letter also confirms that only one elected official was present at the leadership meeting in Morocco,” the open letter from the sport's three continental federations said. “No FIFA Council members or Member Associations were invited to participate. Only the management committee, composed of FIFA-employed senior staff, was present.”

FIFA was also urged to go further than just acknowledging mistakes were made.

“It treats this as a failure of communication, when what football witnessed was a failure of judgment,” the letter said. “There remains no recognition that attempting to sell an interest in the FIFA World Cup was a profound failure of judgment — not just a procedural misstep, but a fundamental breach of trust with the very institutions FIFA exists to serve.”

In a statement released Saturday, FIFA defended Infantino against what it called a “concerted and ongoing effort” to undermine his leadership of the organization.

___

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

Three days after defense attorneys filed a motion for release, prosecutors filed their response in Miami federal court, where a hearing on Thursday will determine if the brothers should stay in jail or be released during what could be a monthslong extradition process.

The brothers have repeatedly denied wrongdoing.

The detention hearing is likely to be the first time the Tates leave the Federal Detention Center in Miami since making a brief court appearance two days after their July 18 arrest. The Tates have become among the world’s most polarizing internet personalities with their promotion of wealth, male dominance and misogyny through their social media empire. The new allegations are the latest in the Tates' long-running international legal saga spanning the U.S., Britain and Romania.

Prosecutors claim a ‘heightened risk of flight’

According to the U.S. Attorney's Office filing, the Tates should be detained pending their extradition hearing because they cannot overcome the strong presumption against bail in international extradition cases.

The serious pending U.K. charges involving human trafficking and violent rapes and assaults against multiple victims, along with allegations in Romania that the Tates attempted to intimidate witnesses, present a clear public safety concern, prosecutors say.

“That the Tates also claim to maintain multiple passports and identities, have access to excessive wealth and influence in numerous countries, and are stridently unwilling to voluntarily return to face prosecution in the United Kingdom, collectively demonstrate a heightened risk of flight that no amount of bond could overcome,” the filing says.

The defense motion filed Friday acknowledges there is a presumption against bond in extradition proceedings but argues that release can be granted in special circumstances. It says the Tates’ high profile makes it nearly impossible for them to flee, and that they regularly post updates about their locations on social media.

While prosecutors call the brothers a flight risk, their attorneys said they have proved they are not by complying with all pretrial restrictions in Romania, where they are accused of luring women for sexual exploitation.

The U.K. has until mid-September to provide evidence to the State Department to support extradition, meaning the brothers could spend months in FDC Miami before the proceedings are resolved, the defense motion says. No date has been set for an extradition hearing. They are being held in a special unit for their own protection.

Legal troubles follow the Tate brothers

The brothers have long claimed that their violent and misogynistic statements have been taken out of context or were intended as jokes.

The former professional kickboxers, who have dual U.S. and U.K. citizenship, have millions of social media followers and are vocal supporters of President Donald Trump. The White House has said the brothers shouldn't expect any help from the president.

British prosecutors said the new charges relate to four new accusers and were brought after authorities received evidence from police in Bedfordshire, in southeastern England. The allegations, which span from 2010 to 2017, include rape, assault, trafficking and offenses relating to “indecent images of a child and extreme pornography.”

The brothers are already charged with rape, bodily harm, human trafficking and controlling prostitution for gain relating to three other accusers in the U.K. between 2012 and 2015.

The brothers moved to Romania in 2016 and were arrested there in 2022, accused of participating in schemes to lure women for sexual exploitation. They denied those allegations, and the Romanian case hasn't moved forward due to legal and procedural problems.

The Tates' attorneys have said the Romanian court has granted a U.K. request for extradition that will take effect after Romanian proceedings conclude.

Andrew Tate, 39, became famous a decade ago when he was a contestant on the U.K. reality television show “Big Brother.” He was ejected from the show when a video appeared to show him assaulting a woman.

He has amassed over 10 million followers on X but has been banned from other platforms, including YouTube, TikTok and Instagram, for violating hate speech guidelines. He has made widely condemned comments, such as saying women who are sexually assaulted should bear some responsibility for the attacks and sharing graphic descriptions of how he might attack women.

Tristan Tate, 38, has worked with his brother on multiple businesses, including the production of online webcam pornography.

Search teams and civilians picked through the remains of destroyed buildings in the country’s third-largest city, Cali, passing large pieces of concrete and other rubble down a long line of volunteers.

“Our building has basically been left in ruins, and the building next to ours? Completely collapsed,” said Álvaro López, who cradled his dog as he watched the search. The desperate scene recalled the searches still ongoing in neighboring Venezuela weeks after that country was devastated by two powerful earthquakes.

Besides Cali, the quake ravaged cities across western Colombia, including Pereira, Quibdo and Manizales, and was felt in neighboring Ecuador and Panama. The epicenter was in San Jose del Palmar, a community of about 4,800 people in the Choco region about 250 miles (400 kilometers) west of Bogota, the U.S. Geological Survey said.

Colombia’s President Abelardo de la Espriella said at least 87 people were injured and around 1,600 buildings were damaged, including at least 61 that completely collapsed. He declared an emergency to expedite funding for the quake recovery.

“We aren’t going to leave people alone. They are in our hearts and we are going to tend to people with our full determination,” he said.

Most powerful quake recorded in Colombia this century

Colombia’s Geological Service said Monday's quake was the country's strongest recorded “in the 21st century,” and that it was followed by several aftershocks.

Colombia’s Pacific region around the epicenter lies along the “Ring of Fire,” the line of seismic faults encircling the Pacific Ocean where most of the world’s earthquakes occur. The Pacific, particularly the Choco region, is one of Colombia's poorest, nestled in dense jungle. Much of Choco is only reachable by boat or plane, which may pose difficulty in assessing the wider toll.

Local authorities said the death toll included at least 40 people who were killed in the Risaralda region, where Pereira is located, and 27 people in the Valle del Cauca region, where Cali is located, including three children. Authorities also confirmed nine people killed in Choco, two in the Caldas region and a 73-year-old in the Antioquia region. It was not immediately clear where the other 32 people died.

The earthquakes left many in the Andean nation unnerved after two back-to-back quakes devastated neighboring Venezuela in late June, destroying hundreds of buildings and killing more than 6,300 people.

By Monday afternoon, people had begun reporting their loved ones missing on digital databases just as civilians did following Venezuela's earthquakes. One database had more than 2,000 people, mostly in Cali and Pereira, with the number steadily climbing.

Photos of the missing included a young mother and her baby in Pereira; another showed an 80-year-old woman in Cali whose family was desperately looking for details after her building collapsed.

Cities left devastated

Jorge Moncayo, a 64-year-old taxi driver in Cali, said he saw plumes of dust shoot up across the city as buildings collapsed. Residents and rescue workers were searching the rubble for survivors. The local government said that people remained trapped in a number of the city's 380 damaged buildings.

“My entire house shook. I’ve never lived through such a powerful earthquake,” he said. “We’re thanking God we’re alive.”

Little was known about the extent of the damage in Choco, a remote region where officials reported dozens of injured people and damaged buildings but few other details. Phone signals were out in many parts of the region's capital, Quibdo. The town closest to the earthquake’s epicenter, San Jose del Palmar, has no airport, and is located on top of a mountain ridge along a highway linking the cities of Cali and Pereira.

In Pereira, further south in the coffee-producing mountains of Colombia, photos and videos on local media showed pieces of the airport ceiling falling onto travelers taking shelter and screaming. People ran through rubble and plumes of dust, and residents said collapsed stores, residential buildings and homes lined the city. Pereira Mayor Mauricio Salazar told a local radio station there were at least 15 collapsed buildings where people were feared trapped.

In nearby Manizales, one of the towers of the neo-Gothic cathedral collapsed and fell on the nave. Mayor Jorge Eduardo Rojas asked residents to stay outside in case of aftershocks. Authorities said flights were suspended at the airports in Manizales, Quibdo, Armenia, Cartago, Buenaventura and Pereira as they assessed damage.

Offers of aid pour in from across the Americas

Small earthquakes, known as “temblores,” are common in central and western Colombia, but those above 6.0 magnitude are rare. In 1999, a 6.2 magnitude quake near the city of Armenia killed more than 1,100 people.

Response to the earthquake presents the first major challenge for de la Espriella, a Trump ally who was sworn in as president over the weekend. A divisive figure because of his pledge of an all-out crackdown on criminal groups, de la Espriella said he had personally taken charge of the government’s response to the emergency.

On Monday night, the U.S. State Department announced it would provide $15.5 million for emergency shelter, food and other earthquake response aid. Governments across Latin America also lined up to help.

El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele and Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum — whose countries were among the largest providers of aid to Venezuela following its recent crisis — said they were ready to assist Colombia.

“From El Salvador, we are in communication and ready to provide immediate support with our rescue teams, medical personnel, paramedics, supplies, or any other assistance that our Colombian brothers and sisters deem necessary,” Bukele said.

Chilean President José Antonio Kast said Chile, one of the region’s most earthquake-prone countries, “knows the pain and the challenge left by earthquakes” and pledged help.

___

Suárez reported from Bogotá and Janetsky reported from Mexico City. Associated Press journalists Manuel Rueda in Bogotá, Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations and Matthew Lee in Washington contributed to this report.

Update: Lapeer man faces new charges in Thanksgiving crash that killed 5-year-old daughter, injures 2-year-old son

Police believe alcohol played a role in the crash.

It happened at about 5:30 p.m. Nov. 27, 2025, on Van Dyke Avenue in Bruce Township.

According to authorities, Austin Thorpe was heading southbound with his 2-year-old son and 5-year-old daughter when he reportedly crossed over the center lanes. One northbound vehicle was able to swerve out of the way, but the car behind it was struck head-on.

Prosecutors said Thorpe had improperly secured his young children in the vehicle prior to the crash.

Thorpe, the children and the teenage driver of the northbound car were rushed to Henry Ford Macomb Hospital, where the 5-year-old girl died.

More than six months after the crash, Thorpe was arraigned Wednesday, June 3.

Thorpe faces charges of OWI causing death, two counts of OWI causing serious injury, two counts of third-degree child abuse, moving violation causing death, two counts of moving violation causing serious impairment of a body function, and commission of a felony with a motor vehicle.

He was also charged as a habitual offender. His bond was set at $500,000, and if released, Thorpe is prohibited from operating a motor vehicle.

A probable cause conference is scheduled for June 16.

Kendall, a West Point graduate who served as President Joe Biden's head of the Air Force, said on CNN Monday that he'll sue the administration, noting it has a history of retaliating against critics by stripping their clearances. “As my mother taught me years ago, you stand up to bullies,” said Kendall, who has denied disclosing classified information.

Mark Zaid, a prominent national security attorney who sued the administration after his own clearance was revoked by the Trump administration, confirmed in a post on X that Kendall had hired him. "More to come,"" Zaid wrote.

Zaid specializes in helping a variety of military and civilian clients maintain security clearances in the face of investigations.

Last year he became a target of the Trump administration’s efforts to strip security clearances from people they perceived to be enemies when he was named among 14 other people in an executive order signed by Trump. In a March 2025 executive order, Trump named former President Joe Biden and members of his family, Biden-era Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco, and New York state Attorney General Letitia James as being unsuitable to retain their clearances because it was “no longer in the national interest.”

In August 2025, Trump revoked the security clearances of 37 more current and former national security officials, some of whom worked on matters that have long infuriated Trump, like the intelligence community assessment that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election on his behalf.

Trump has tried to squelch reports of problems with the jet that Qatar gifted him last year, which he intends to use as Air Force One for the remainder of his term. His Justice Department last month subpoenaed New York Times reporters who wrote about security concerns with the jet, which lacks the advanced anti-missile technology of its predecessor. After being criticized by a federal judge for sloppy legal work, the government grudgingly withdrew the subpoenas.

Update: Body camera shows how DNR officers found missing Muskegon River tubers

Jazman Hock, 28, of Muskegon; Sarah Vida, 28, of Muskegon; and Vida’s 9-year-old son, Kayden Kovalcik, were located at about 4:36 p.m. on Friday (Aug. 7) by a Michigan State Police K-9 team and Michigan Department of Natural Resources conservation officers.

The three were found approximately three-quarters of a mile northeast of the Mill Iron Road Boat Launch, police said.

The discovery ended a widespread search that began after the group went missing following a tubing trip on the Muskegon River.

Officials said the three entered the water Tuesday, Aug. 4, from the Maple Island Boat Launch near Bridgeton.

The investigation began after the father of one of the women found her vehicle at the boat launch with a broken window.

Family members reported they had not heard from the group, and police said two inflatable tubes believed to belong to the missing individuals were later located.

Search crews also discovered footprints that were being evaluated as part of the investigation.

Before the three were found, Kayden’s father, Brent Kovalcik, spoke about the uncertainty surrounding their disappearance.

“I don’t know if they’re alive, I don’t know if they were kidnapped, I don’t know if they’re down the river, far, far away,” Kovalcik said.

Officials said no further information would be released at this time out of respect for the privacy of those involved.

We are relieved to report that Jazman Hock, Sarah Vida, and Kayden Kovalcik have been located alive and safe.

This is the outcome everyone involved had hoped for. We are incredibly grateful for the tireless efforts of the many law enforcement agencies, fire departments,… pic.twitter.com/e1zzgLxzt6

— MSP Sixth District (@mspwestmi) August 7, 2026

Twenty years ago, British driver Andy Green set the land speed record for a diesel-powered car, reaching 350.092 mph (563.4 kph) at Utah’s famous Bonneville Salt Flats. Green will return to the lunarlike landscape Tuesday and try to beat that mark, this time with a hydrogen-powered car.

The retired Royal Air Force fighter pilot aims not only to win another accolade but to showcase the power of hydrogen as a clean-energy alternative. It's the “fuel of the future,” Green told The Associated Press in a July interview.

Green will be driving the 32-foot (9.75-meter) JCB Hydromax, the brainchild of British construction equipment manufacturer JCB. The car is bright yellow, long and slim, resembling a pencil. It's powered by two hydrogen internal combustion engines with a combined 1,600 horsepower, which were adapted from engines used in the company’s construction machinery. They mix pressurized hydrogen gas with air and ignite it to create bursts of power.

In targeting the diesel-powered record, Green also hopes to easily clear the world land speed records for hydrogen internal combustion engines (185.5 mph/298.5 kph) and electric vehicles (341.3 mph/549.2 kph).

Green hit a new top speed of 368.347 mph (592.797 kph) in practice last week, but to officially earn the hydrogen record, he’ll have to do it Tuesday in front of the Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile, the international governing body of motor sports.

“What the peak speed is, I can’t say. We just don’t know,” he said. “Part of the adventure here is we’re going to find out.”

One thing Tuesday’s attempt will assuredly not do is approach the supersonic speeds Green reached with jet power three decades ago.

Green had already been flying supersonic military aircraft when he spotted a newspaper ad that read: “Wanted: High-speed driver to break the sound barrier,” according to the Guinness World Records. In 1997, he traveled faster than the speed of sound and set the outright land speed record — 763.035 mph (1,227.98 kph) — in a car powered by twin jet engines. His runs in Nevada’s Black Rock Desert produced sonic booms that shook the nearby town of Gerlach.

Now 64 years old, Green said he thought he was done racing but came out of retirement when JCB approached him with plans for the new car. The company has invested more than $134 million into hydrogen-powered engines that it says emit no carbon dioxide from the tailpipes.

“If you’re serious about emissions, you have to be serious about hydrogen, and a land speed project is the perfect way to prove it,” JCB Chair Anthony Bamford said at the car's unveiling in May. Bamford has also argued that hydrogen can better handle the demands of heavy industries than electric power.

But hydrogen is only as clean as its source, and the vast majority is currently produced from fossil fuels. JCB signed a deal to buy green hydrogen, which is created using renewable energy but makes up a tiny fraction of global hydrogen production.

Hydrogen combustion engines also present unique safety challenges due to the pressure and flammability of the gas.

“We're managing the risks very carefully,” Green said. The car endured rigorous testing, and Green said he spent months learning how it responds to the elements, how the engines work in tandem and how to deploy a parachute to slow the car on the low-friction salt crust.

Since the first race there in 1914, the glassy surface of the Bonneville Salt Flats has drawn generations of drivers seeking to set new land speed records. A remnant of a prehistoric lake bed, the salt flats are about 100 miles (160 kilometers) west of Salt Lake City and sit atop an aquifer that cools the car tires.

Spectators must stand about a quarter of a mile (400 meters) from the course's straightaway, which is 10 miles (16 kilometers) long, and often watch through wide-angle binoculars.

The expanse on the border of Utah and Nevada has been a backdrop for movies including “Independence Day” and “The World’s Fastest Indian,” and the series finale of “Mad Men.”

Green will start just after sunrise to beat the desert heat. His attempt comes a year after a driver died trying to set a land speed record at Bonneville's annual Speed Week. Chris Raschke lost control of his rocketlike vehicle called the Speed Demon last August and died from his injuries.

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Rico reported from Atlanta. Video journalist Serge Cartwright contributed reporting.

Elbridge Colby, an undersecretary of defense, made the remarks at a forum in the Philippines, his first stop in Southeast Asia, where he will also visit Indonesia, Thailand and Cambodia. He renewed Washington’s assurances that the U.S. is not backing away from Asia despite its current preoccupation with the Iran war and the Middle East.

“America is definitely not disengaging from Asia — to the contrary. Our vital national interests dictate our enduring presence here,” Colby told an audience that included foreign diplomats, generals, business executives and journalists.

“We are not leaving; in fact, we are digging in, to ensure a favorable balance of power where it matters most,” the Pentagon’s top policy adviser said. “We see Asia as of paramount importance.”

Colby stayed away from the usual U.S. tirade against China's growing aggression in the region, including in the disputed South China Sea. Washington has often expressed alarm over Beijing’s increasingly hostile actions against Philippine coast guard and naval forces in recent years.

Washington has repeatedly warned that it’s obligated to defend the Philippines, its oldest treaty ally in Asia, if Filipino forces, ships or aircraft come under armed attack, including in the South China Sea.

China and the Philippines, along with Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan, have been locked in territorial standoffs in the disputed waters, a key global trade route, for decades. Beijing virtually claims the entire waterway and has rejected a 2016 ruling in an arbitration case initiated by the Philippines that invalidated its expansive claims.

Colby repeated a vow by U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth in a speech at the Shangri-La defense conference in Singapore in May that the U.S. will build and sustain a strong defense in the Western Pacific "that ensures aggression is infeasible, escalation unattractive and war deemed irrational.”

Colby said the U.S. is committed to ensuring “we can sustain combat-credible power where it matters most. Yet this defense architecture cannot rest on American shoulders alone. It must be upheld by a network of highly capable, sovereign nations that have modernized their own forces and stepped up to secure their own territory — transforming our relationships into true partnerships of equals.”

He added: “When we ask our allies and partners to step up, to invest more in their own defense and to take responsibility for their own sovereign security, we are not signaling abandonment. We are looking for partners, not protectorates.”

Colby praised efforts by the Philippines, which holds large-scale combat exercises with U.S. forces each year, to strengthen its defense capabilities and cited similar efforts by Thailand, Indonesia and other security allies in Southeast Asia.

Shanghai’s Hongqiao and Pudong airports canceled more than 900 flights, or about 40% of those expected, after about 1,300 were canceled the day before, according to Shanghai Airport Group.

Shanghai also suspended some of its metro lines on Monday, and China Railway Chengdu Group suspended 115 trains, state news agency Xinhua reported.

Authorities warned of risks of severe flooding and landslides in some areas. State broadcaster CCTV reported that authorities in Yueqing, a city in Zhejiang province, searched for people trapped in flooded homes.

The China Meteorological Administration said Dolphin was moving northwest at 15 to 20 kilometers per hour (9 to 12 mph) and was expected to continue weakening.

Dolphin made landfall Sunday evening in Taizhou in Zhejiang province with winds of 151 kph (93 mph), after bringing heavy rain to northern Taiwan over the weekend.

Dolphin had forced at least 760,000 people to preemptively relocate, including over 390,000 people in Taizhou. Authorities in Shanghai and Fujian Province evacuated more than 210,000 and 160,000 people, respectively, from riskier areas.

Authorities in Zhejiang's capital city, Hangzhou, temporarily closed its iconic West Lake scenic spots as well as temples, parks and museums and will reopen on Tuesday.

Elsewhere, Tropical Storm Chan-hom was heading toward Japan’s Pacific coast. The storm had 83 kph (51 mph) winds Monday morning and was forecast to strengthen slightly before landfall Tuesday into Wednesday, according to the Japan Meteorological Agency.

Storm intensified monsoon in the Philippines

Dolphin did not directly hit the Philippines, but it helped intensify seasonal monsoon rains that set off flooding and landslides on the main northern island region of Luzon.

A landslide buried three houses Sunday night in the northern mountain resort city of Baguio, killing 10 people whose bodies were dug out in two days of frantic search by rescuers. Three people were rescued with injuries and brought to a hospital, Baguio officials said.

The deaths from the mudslide raised the death toll in nearly a week of torrential rains, floods and a tropical storm last week in the northern Luzon region to 19, the government’s Office of Civil Defense said.

More than a million people were affected by the heavy monsoon rains and floods, including about 98,000 who were displaced from homes.

Jones had a heart attack in his home Sunday in Washington, Virginia, as he was waiting to watch his beloved Atlanta Braves play baseball, his wife, Alma Viator, said on social media. Rappahannock County Sheriff Connie Compton confirmed his death.

Jones' fame came from his role as Cooter Davenport, the mechanic who got the Duke boys out of jams as they tried to do the right thing and fight the corrupt Boss Hogg in the fictional Hazzard County, Georgia.

After playing Cooter for all seven seasons of the series from 1979 to 1985, Jones turned to politics and was elected to the U.S. House from a district near Atlanta in 1988. The Democrat served two terms before he was redistricted out of the seat.

Jones was born in North Carolina and in college got involved in acting and civil rights, he wrote in his autobiography "Redneck Boy in the Promised Land: The Confessions of ‘Crazy Cooter.’"

Acting took over his life. Jones performed in numerous stage productions and had a few minor TV and movie roles in Atlanta during the 1970s before his life-defining break came on a TV show Jones defended as a modern-day morality tale and a fine example of Southern values.

For seven seasons, Jones was one of a small band of friends and family helping Bo and Luke Duke in “The Dukes of Hazzard.” The cousins were on probation for running moonshine and were constantly trying to clear their names and stop the crooked and powerful Boss Hogg from stealing or cheating.

The Duke boys drove a modified 1969 Dodge Charger called the General Lee with a Confederate flag on its roof. Cooter owned “Cooter's Garage” in the town square. Nearly every episode involved a car chase with jumps and stunts and a patrol car badly in need of repairs.

Cooter was often on the CB radio in his pickup truck saying “Breaker one, Breaker one. I might be crazy but I ain’t dumb. Crazy Cooter coming at you."

“The Dukes of Hazzard” was a hit for CBS and its popularity never waned. It went into syndication and later became a prominent fixture on cable's The Nashville Network.

Jones also credited the series with pulling him out of a self-destructive, alcoholic lifestyle that led to the failure of several marriages.

″It was like being in a Beatles movie,″ Jones said. ″Our lives changed.″

Tom Wopat, who played Luke Duke, said Jones was an integral part of making the series work.

“Ben Jones was a fine friend and a fierce advocate of all the best things we can offer in the entertainment business. He will be sorely missed,” Wopat wrote on Instagram.

After “The Dukes of Hazzard,” Jones went into politics. He kept his aw shucks personality, but took the issues seriously. In his four years in Washington, Jones was known as a Democrat who could buck his party. He was liberal on social issues and conservative on economics.

But even in politics, he made a splash. After losing in 1992 in his redrawn district, Jones ran for Congress again in 1994. He lost to Newt Gingrich in the elections that elevated the Republican to the Speaker's Office.

Jones would file an ethics complaint that Gingrich used tax-deductible donations to fund his partisan college course leading to a House reprimand and Gingrich's decision to leave the body.

Jones always embraced his role as Cooter. After moving to Virginia, he would open at least three “Cooter's” country stores in Nashville and Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, and near his home. They sold plenty of T-shirts, key chains and insulated tumblers and included Dukes of Hazzard memorabilia like one of the 300 or so General Lee cars used and abused in the TV series.

The show and Cooter lived on because it was funny, had plenty of action and car chases and had a good, family-friendly heart, Jones told the Richmond Times-Dispatch at a 2001 car show where he played in a band, signed autographs and met fans.

“The show reflects the values of the heartland of America. The good guys always win,” Jones said.

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This story has been updated to correct that Bo and Luke Duke were cousins, not brothers.