The center of the Super Typhoon Sinlaku pounded the Northern Mariana Islands early Wednesday, the National Weather Service said.

It's the strongest tropical typhoon on Earth so far this year and was packing sustained winds of up to 150 mph (240 kph) that were likely to bring widespread power outages to the islands, home to roughly 50,000 people.

Some areas already were seeing extensive flooding.

“It’s hitting us hard,” Mayor Ramon “RB” Jose Blas Camacho of Saipan, told The Associated Press late Tuesday. “It’s so difficult for us to respond with this heavy rain, heavy wind to rescue people. Objects are just flying left and right.”

Camacho said some people have been rescued. He said trees were thrown about and wooden and tin structures had collapsed. He said he hoped the glass door to his office doesn't break.

“It’s already bending. That’s how powerful this is,” he said.

Farther south, in Guam, a U.S. territory with several U.S. military installations and about 170,000 residents, tropical force winds and torrential rainfall were leading to flash flooding, the weather service said.

The monster storm slowed to a crawl as it approached the islands, raising fears that the fierce winds won’t go away quickly and worsen its impact.

“This is not going to be an easy night for anyone across Tinian or Saipan. This is going to be a loud night,” said Landon Aydlett, a meteorologist with the weather service. Many “will wake up to a different island,” he said during a Facebook video broadcast.

Saipan is the largest of the Northern Mariana Islands. The worst of the storm was hitting hit during darkness and was expected to last for hours until at least daybreak Wednesday, the weather service said.

Camacho was concerned about the slow speed of the storm.

“That’s the scary part, ” He said, saying “it's better to speed up so it can just exit.”

About 50,000 people live on the Northern Mariana Islands, with most on Saipan, known for its laid-back resorts, snorkeling and golf as well as the capital.

While it’s expected to weaken slightly over the next few days, Sinlaku was crossing the islands as a Category 4 typhoon.

In Guam, where Typhoon Mawar knocked out power for days in 2023, U.S. military officials warned personnel to shelter in place. The military controls about one-third of the land on the island, a critical hub for U.S. forces in the Pacific.

Before turning toward Guam and the Northern Marianas, the storm left significant damage to the outer islands and atolls of Chuuk in the Federated States of Micronesia, Aydlett said from his weather service station on Guam.

Glen Hunter, who grew up on Saipan, has weathered numerous typhoons.

“We sit in what they call ‘Typhoon Alley,’” he said early Tuesday after waking up to strong gusts and seeing downed trees.

For the most part, residents live in sturdy, fully concrete homes and those in substandard wooden houses with tin roofs tend to stay with family or in government shelters, he said.

Tourism-dependent Saipan — the site of one of World War II’s bloodiest battles in the Pacific — was still recovering from 2018's Super Typhoon Yutu when the coronavirus pandemic hit in 2020, he said. The economy has yet to rebound, Hunter said.

President Donald Trump has approved emergency disaster declarations for Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands, allowing for additional help with emergency services.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency said it was coordinating support across multiple agencies, dispatching nearly 100 FEMA staff as well as other personnel.

A super typhoon is a name given to the strongest tropical cyclones. Monitored by the Joint Typhoon Warning Center in Guam, super typhoons are the equivalent of Category 4 or 5 hurricanes in the Atlantic, with winds of at least 150 mph (240 kph). There have been more than 300 super typhoons identified over the past 80 years.

Typhoons and super typhoons are “very common” in the Pacific, but the peak season is similar to the Atlantic hurricane season, which runs from summer to fall, said Jason Nicholls, AccuWeather’s lead international forecaster.

“As we’ve seen this year, you can get tropical systems in the West Pacific any time of year,” Nicholls said. “But getting them in April is a little unusual.”

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Associated Press reporters Gabriela Aoun Angueira in San Diego; Jennifer Sinco Kelleher in Honolulu and Seth Borenstein in Washington contributed to this report.

According to the Conroe Police Department, the collapse happened around 11:50 a.m. Saturday in the 3600 block of South Loop 336 East as a crew with Engitex Construction was installing underground piping.

• FIRST REPORT: One person dies in Conroe trench collapse

Investigators said the trench, which had approximately 10-foot dirt walls, gave way and trapped two workers inside. Co-workers immediately began rescue efforts before emergency crews arrived.

One of the workers, identified as Jose Arevalo, 44, of Houston, died at the scene. His body was taken to the Montgomery County Medical Examiner’s Office for an autopsy.

The second worker, 34, of Houston, was pulled from the trench and transported to a hospital. Authorities said he has since been released.

Multiple agencies responded to the scene, including the Conroe Fire Department, The Woodlands Fire Department, North Montgomery County Fire ESD No. 1, Caney Creek Fire Department and the Montgomery County Hospital District.

Detectives and crime scene investigators conducted an initial investigation and said there is no evidence of foul play. Officials described the incident as a tragic accident.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration is also investigating the collapse.

“Smith,” “Johnson,” “Williams,” “Brown," and Jones,” remained the top five last names in the United States in 2020, as they were in 2010, according to a tally from the last U.S. head count. Most of the fastest-growing last names from 2010 to 2020 were Asian, according to the Census Bureau.

The top three of those were “Zhang,” “Liu,” and “Wang.”

Rounding out the top 10 most common last names in 2020 were “Garcia,” “Miller,” “Rodriguez,” “Davis,” and “Martinez.” The only change from 2010 was “Rodriguez” which jumped ahead of “Davis” for the No. 8 spot.

The Census Bureau has tallied counts of the most common last names in each once-a-decade head count since the 1990 Census. The 2020 Census was the first since 1990 to provide data on first names, although the Social Security Administration keeps a count of the most popular male and female first names for babies each year.

The Census tally showed that the most popular male first names at the start of this decade were “Michael,” “John,” “James,” “David,” and “Robert,” while the most common female first names were “Mary,” “Maria,” “Jennifer,” “Elizabeth,” and “Patricia.”

Not too much has changed since 1990. Back then, the most popular male first names were “James,” “John,” “Robert,” “Michael,” and “William.” The most popular female first names were “Mary,” “Patricia,” “Linda,” “Barbara,” and “Elizabeth.”

Unlike the Social Security Administration's count, the Census Bureau's tally includes everyone, not just newborns.

“The names people choose are a function of what they are exposed to, so culture certainly plays a role, but so does social influence,” said Jonah Berger, a professor of marketing at the University of Pennsylvania. “People are constantly exposed to names of others around them, and that can shape not only which names they like, but also which ones they avoid.”

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Follow Mike Schneider on the social platform Bluesky: @mikeysid.bsky.social.

Authorities in Kansas reported several people with minor injuries after storms passed through on Monday. Three people were left with minor injuries in rural Franklin County, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) southwest of Kansas City, according to the sheriff’s office. In the town of Ottawa, officials said there was structural damage, but no deaths or injuries. A National Weather Service survey team will assess damage in the Ottawa area on Tuesday to determine whether a tornado passed through there, according to Chelsea Picha, a meteorologist with the weather service’s office in Topeka.

In neighboring Miami County, two people reported minor injuries, several homes were destroyed and recreational vehicles and campers were overturned, according to the sheriff’s office. Power lines were de-energized in Hillsdale until cleanup could be safely completed, the sheriff’s office said.

Three tornadoes touched down in southern Minnesota, where some damage to farms was reported, according to Jake Beitlich, a meteorologist in the Twin Cities office. There were also reports of baseball-sized hail that caused damage to vehicles in the area, he said.

A tornado touched down near Gilman, a village of about 380 people in northwestern Wisconsin, said Jeff Boyne, a meteorologist in the National Weather Service’s La Crosse, Wisconsin, office, but he said the damage was minor. The weather service was still working to determine the tornado’s rating. The storms peeled the roof off a manufactured home in Steuben, a village of about 120 people in southwestern Wisconsin, he said, but there have been no reports of any injuries in the state.

A number of schools around the Madison area were forced to close Tuesday morning due to lack of power. More than 25,000 customers were without power in Wisconsin on Tuesday morning, according to poweroutage.us.

Forecasters warned of significant river and small stream flooding expected through the end of the week in the Upper Great Lakes with the heaviest rainfall expected overnight into Wednesday with scattered flash flooding.

In Michigan, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer declared a state of emergency Friday at the Cheboygan Lock and Dam Complex as record snowfall in March and the recent rain have elevated water levels. More pumps were being added to help push water toward Lake Huron on Monday. As of 7 a.m. Tuesday, the water level was 7.68 inches (19.5 centimeters) below the top of the structure, according to a state website.

The Labor Department reported Tuesday that its producer price index — which measures inflation before it hits consumers — rose 0.5% from February and 4% from March 2025. The year-over-year gains was the biggest in more than three years. Energy prices surged 8.5% from February.

Excluding volatile food and energy prices, so-called core producer prices rose a modest 0.1% from February and 3.8% from a year earlier. The gains in wholesale prices were smaller than economists had forecast.

The surge in prices complicates the work of the inflation fighters at the Federal Reserve, who have faced intense pressure from President Donald Trump to lower their benchmark interest rate. But some Fed policymakers are inclined to raise rates instead, as higher energy costs increase the inflation threat.

Food prices, which will most certainly be front and center in next year's midterm elections, fell by 0.3% in March after surging by 2.4% in the previous month.

Wholesale prices can offer an early look at where consumer inflation might be headed. Economists also watch it because some of its components, notably measures of health care and financial services, flow into the Fed’s preferred inflation gauge — the personal consumption expenditures, or PCE, price index.

The most recent peek at inflation in the U.S. validates a recent shift by the U.S. Federal Reserve to intensify its focus on rising costs, wrote Carl Weinberg, the chief economist at High Frequency Economics.

“The decline in food prices is overdue, and welcome news for everyone,” Weinberg said Tuesday. “Food price increases are at the core of political arguments over affordability.”

The Labor Department reported last week that soaring gasoline prices pushed consumer prices up 3.3% last month from a year earlier, the biggest year-over-year increase since May 2024. Compared to February, March consumer prices jumped 0.9%, biggest gain in nearly four years.

The war in Iran will lead to an annual decline in oil demand for the first time since the pandemic, when billions of people were trying to live in isolation, according to a forecast Tuesday by the International Energy Agency.

The agency, formed after the 1974 oil crisis, said that oil demand is expected to decrease by an average of 80,000 barrels a day this year, a sharp revision from the increase of 850,000 barrels a day that it had forecast before the war began.

The drop-off in March was particularly severe because of attacks on energy infrastructure and the shutdown of the Strait of Hormuz, according to the IEA, which expects a decline in demand of 1.5 million barrels in the current quarter.

While the biggest cuts in oil usage have initially come from the Middle East and Asia Pacific region, demand destruction is anticipated to spread as oil prices increase and scarcity continues.

The House bill, called the Alert Act, has the backing of key industry groups. The National Transportation Safety Board said recently that the legislation, since amended, now addresses its recommendation to require all aircraft flying around busy airports to have key locator systems that let pilots know more precisely where other aircraft are flying around them.

The NTSB has been recommending the new technology systems since 2008, and Chairwoman Jennifer Homendy has said such a system would have prevented the collision of the American Airlines jet and Army Black Hawk helicopter that sent both aircraft plunging into the icy Potomac River.

Two key House committees unanimously advanced the bill last month. The bill is now being brought up for a full House vote under rules that won't allow any amendments. But victims’ families said they want to make sure the bill has strict timelines to guarantee the reforms will be completed. And they worry the House bill would allow military flights to continue flying without broadcasting their locations on routine training flights and not just secret missions.

“January 29, 2025 made clear what is at stake. The 67 lives lost that day should be honored with an improved system that prevents this from happening again,” the main families group said Tuesday in a new statement. “And the flying public should not have to wait longer than necessary for those protections to be in place.”

Sponsored by Republican Sam Graves and Democrat Rick Larsen, the legislation needs to secure two thirds of House support to advance to the Senate. Separate legislation called the ROTOR Act that the Senate crafted came up one vote short in the House. Senators Ted Cruz and Maria Cantwell have also said the Alert Act still needs to be improved.

Earlier this year, the NTSB's Homendy sharply criticized the original version of the bill as a “watered down” measure that wouldn’t do enough to prevent future tragedies. But the board said the revised version would now address the shortcomings their investigation identified and require the Federal Aviation Administration, Transportation Department and the military to take needed actions.

National Transportation Safety Board members at a hearing in late January were deeply troubled over years of ignored warnings about helicopter traffic dangers and other problems, long before the collision.

Everyone aboard the American Airlines jet, flying from Wichita, Kansas, and the helicopter died when the two aircraft collided. It was the deadliest plane crash on U.S. soil since 2001, and the victims included 28 members of the figure skating community.

A helicopter route in the approach path of a Reagan National Airport runway didn't ensure enough separation between helicopters and planes landing on the airport's secondary runway, and the route wasn't reviewed regularly, the board said. The poor design of that route was a key factor in the crash along with air traffic controllers relying too much on pilots seeing and avoiding other aircraft.

The bill now requires planes to have Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast In systems that can receive data about the locations of other aircraft. Proponents of the use of such systems said they would have alerted the pilots of an American Airlines jet sooner about the impending collision with the Black Hawk helicopter. Most planes already have the complementary ADS-B Out systems that broadcast their locations.

The NTSB cited systemic weaknesses and years of ignored warnings as the main causes of the crash, but Homendy has said that if both the plane and the Black Hawk had been equipped with ADS-B In and the systems had been turned on, the collision would have been prevented. The Army’s policy at the time of the crash mandated that its helicopters fly without that system on to conceal their locations, although the helicopter involved in this crash was on a training flight, not a sensitive mission.

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This story has been updated to correct the last name of Rep. Rick Larsen, not Larens.

In fact, a new Fox News poll indicates people are more upset about taxes than they were last year. The findings from the survey, which was conducted in late March, are another sign that Americans are on edge about their personal finances as the U.S. experiences a spike in inflation and sluggish economic growth. Other polling finds that frustration goes beyond personal tax obligations, with many believing that wealthy people and corporations are not paying their fair share, while others worry about government waste.

The surveys come after Trump and Republicans passed a massive tax and spending cut bill last year. The legislation enacted a range of tax breaks, including a boosted child tax credit and new tax deductions for tips and overtime. Tax refunds are up this season, and many households are expected to see more income from the Republicans' tax legislation, but the Congressional Budget Office estimated it will ultimately give the largest benefits to the richest Americans.

Republicans have touted the law as evidence that they are making life more affordable for working families. But polling shows that many Americans may not be feeling the benefits, especially as their tax refunds get eaten up by higher prices.

Most say taxes are too high

About 7 in 10 registered voters say the taxes they pay are “too high,” according to the Fox News poll. That’s up from about 6 in 10 last year. The poll shows heightened concern among very liberal voters and Democratic men, but there has also been a sizable increase among groups that Republicans want to court ahead of the midterm elections, such as moderates, rural voters and white voters without a college degree.

Discontent about taxes has been rising for the past few years. Recent polling from Gallup, conducted in March, found about 6 in 10 U.S. adults say the amount of federal income tax they have to pay is “too high,” a finding that’s been largely consistent in the annual poll since 2023. That’s approaching the level of unhappiness found in Gallup’s polling from the 1980s through the 1990s, before President George W. Bush's 2001 and 2003 tax cuts.

Now, about half of Democrats and about 6 in 10 Republicans say their federal income taxes are too high. Republicans tend to view their tax bill more negatively than Democrats, but Gallup’s polling shows that this gap often shrinks when a Republican is president.

Many believe the rich aren’t paying enough in taxes

Most Americans are troubled by the belief that some wealthy people and corporations don’t pay their fair share of taxes, according to a Pew Research Center poll conducted in January. About 6 in 10 Americans said each of those notions bothers them “a lot,” a measure that is largely unchanged in recent years.

By contrast, only about 4 in 10 U.S. adults in that poll said the amount they personally pay in taxes bothers them a lot.

About 8 in 10 Democrats are bothered “a lot” by the feeling that some corporations and rich people aren’t paying their fair share, the Pew survey found, compared to about 4 in 10 Republicans. Government spending is a bigger issue for Republicans, according to the Fox News poll, which found that 75% of registered voters — and a similar share of Republican voters — say “almost all” or “a great deal” of government funding is wasteful and inefficient.

That points to a perception problem for many Americans. Even if their own tax bill is manageable, the idea that the wealthy are underpaying — or that the government is wasting their dollars — bothers many. About half of Americans, 49%, in the Gallup poll say the income tax they will pay this year is “not fair,” which is in line with the record high from 2023.

Broad unhappiness with Trump’s tax approach

Americans’ tax frustration was rising before Trump re-entered the White House, but it’s still a problem for the president's party — especially if Americans are not feeling the relief that he promised.

The Fox News poll found that about 6 in 10 registered voters, 64%, say they disapprove of how Trump is handling taxes, up from 53% last April. Disapproval has risen most sharply among independents, but also among Democrats and Republicans.

This aligns with a broader feeling that Trump isn’t doing enough to address inflation. Most Americans said Trump had hurt the cost of living “a lot” or “a little” in his second term, according to an AP-NORC poll conducted in January. Roughly 9 in 10 Democrats and about 6 in 10 independents said Trump has had a negative impact on the cost of living.

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This story has been updated to correct that less than half of Republicans, 43%, said Trump has helped the cost of living, while 33% said he hasn't made a difference and only 23% said he has hurt it.

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The Fox News poll was conducted among 1,001 registered voters from March 20-23. The Gallup poll was conducted among 1,000 U.S. adults from March 2-18. The Pew Research Center poll was conducted among 8,512 U.S. adults from Jan. 20-26. The AP-NORC Poll was conducted among 1,203 U.S. adults from Jan 8-11.

Martin said the government had acted to end the “destructive blockade” and that tax cuts they offered were the largest in Europe to cope with fuel prices that have soared after the U.S.-Israel war on Iran led to the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, a vital channel for the world’s oil.

“The basic core claim that we are doing nothing and are falling behind other countries is simply untrue," Martin said.

Martin led a motion to support his coalition made up of the center-right Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael parties along with some independents ahead of a no-confidence vote brought by Sinn Fein, the largest opposition party.

If Martin's motion passes, it would make the no-confidence motion moot. But if it fails, it would have the effect of a no-confidence vote and force his government to resign, leading Parliament to pick a new prime minister or trigger a general election.

Opposition politicians blasted Martin for failing to respond sooner to the protests, criticized the aid package as insufficient and said the government was failing to tackle the broader cost-of-living crisis in Ireland.

Sinn Fein Leader Mary Lou McDonald said it was brazen of the coalition to bring the confidence vote after abandoning struggling, hardworking people.

“As you backslap, congratulate, flatter each other, just know that beyond your bubble people see a government out of touch,” McDonald said. “It is your own arrogance, your lack of judgment, your lack of any empathy that has left people with no conclusion other than this: Your time is up."

Social Democrats, Labour, People Before Profit, Aontu, The Green Party and Independent Ireland have said they would vote no-confidence.

Protests began April 7 with slow-moving convoys clogging roadways. They grew as word spread on social media as truckers, farmers and taxi and bus operators blocked key infrastructure and the main thoroughfare in the capital, Dublin.

Demonstrators called for price caps or tax cuts to alleviate soaring fuel costs they said will drive people out of business.

Martin said the government can learn from the protests, but defended the response by police and military to clear roadblocks at the country's sole oil refinery at Whitegate in County Cork and at several depots. They caused more than a third of gas pumps to run dry.

“We had to clear Whitegate and the ports because we export about 90% of everything we make in this country,” Martin said. “The ports are the lifeblood of economy, and if the ports were blockaded for any length of time, people would have lost jobs, part-time production would have ceased, and it would have been very, very serious."

The demonstrations were tolerated until the weekend, when police used pepper spray in clashes with some protesters and an army truck knocked down a log barricade at the Galway port. Many protesters said they achieved their goal in getting the government to compromise.

Lawmakers were also scheduled to vote Tuesday on the fuel support package amounting to 505 million euros ($595 million) that Martin said will ease some cost-of-living pressures.

The package would include direct payments to truckers and school bus operators and fuel subsidies for agricultural and fishing industries. The relief measure would follow a 250 million euro tax break approved three weeks ago.

The approach sharply differs from much of Europe’s prevailing attitudes on immigration in which governments are trying to reduce the number of arrivals and step up deportations, and contrasts with the harsh immigration policies of the Trump administration.

Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez hailed the measure as “an act of justice and a necessity." He reiterated his government's position that people who already live and work in the country of 50 million people should “do so under equal conditions” and pay taxes.

“We recognize rights, but we also demand obligations,” Sánchez wrote on social media.

The government estimates that half a million people living in the shadows of Spanish society could be eligible to apply; analysts say the number is likely higher. Spanish think tank Funcas estimates there are roughly 840,000 migrants living in Spain without authorization.

Spain's population has risen sharply in recent years to include around 10 million people who were born outside the country, or one in every five residents. Many are from Colombia, Venezuela and Morocco.

Immigrants from Latin America and African countries work in key sectors including agriculture, tourism and the service sector.

Those who meet certain conditions can now apply for a one-year residency and work permit, Migration Minister Elma Saiz said, adding that migrants could begin applying in person on April 20 and online on Thursday. The window to apply will close June 30.

Immigrants must have arrived in Spain before Jan. 1 and must prove that they have been living in the country for at least five months. That can be done by presenting “public or private” documents, Saiz said. Applicants must also show that they have no criminal record, the government said.

After a year, the migrants will be eligible to apply for other work or residency permits.

Major questions remain about how Spain's government will handle the expected amount of paperwork within the short timeframe.

A Spanish union representing immigration officers demanded more resources on Tuesday, warning that the government is not prepared to meet the challenge.

Migrants will be able to apply in-person in 60 social security offices, 371 post offices and five immigration offices across Spain, the government said.

It's not the first time that Spain granted amnesty to immigrants who are in the country illegally. It did so six times between 1986 and 2005, including under conservative governments.

Spain's opposition Popular Party slammed the measure, with party leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo calling it unsafe and unsustainable. His center-right party carried out two previous mass legalizations of migrants in the early 2000s.

The Sánchez government's measure was fast-tracked via a decree that amends immigration laws. By doing it that way, the government was able to bypass parliament, where it lacks a majority and where a previous amnesty attempt stalled.

Saiz lauded the measure as a way that Spain, which has been among the fastest-growing European Union economies for two years, can continue to expand.

“Our prosperity is demonstrably linked to our management of migration and the contributions of foreign workers,” she said. “Their contribution allows us to grow economically, generate employment and wealth, and maintain our welfare system.

Though last week's ceasefire appeared to hold, the showdown over the Strait of Hormuz risked reigniting hostilities and deepening the regional war's economic fallout.

Meanwhile in Washington, direct talks between the Israeli and Lebanese ambassadors to the U.S. were set to begin, the first such negotiations in decades.

Pakistan proposes second round of Iran talks

Talks aimed at permanently ending the conflict in Iran — which began Feb. 28 with U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran — failed to produce an agreement last weekend, though Pakistan has proposed hosting a second round in the coming days.

Two Pakistani officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter with the media, said the first talks were part of an ongoing diplomatic process rather than a one-off effort.

Two U.S. officials said Monday that discussions were still underway about a new round of talks. A diplomat from one of the mediating countries said that Tehran and Washington had agreed to it.

The talks could happen Thursday, according to the U.S. officials. The location, timing and composition of the delegations had not been decided, although Islamabad and Geneva are being considered as host cities.

The U.S. officials and the diplomat spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomatic negotiations.

The war, now in its seventh week, has jolted markets and rattled the global economy as shipping has been cut off and airstrikes have torn through military and civilian infrastructure across the region.

The fighting has killed at least 3,000 people in Iran, more than 2,000 in Lebanon, 23 in Israel and more than a dozen in Gulf Arab states. Thirteen U.S. service members have also been killed.

Tankers turned around after blockade took effect

The blockade is intended to pressure Iran, which has exported millions of barrels of oil, mostly to Asia, since the war began. Much of it has likely been carried by so-called dark transits that evade sanctions and oversight, providing cash flow that’s been vital to keeping Iran running.

Both the nature of enforcement and the extent to which ships will comply remained unclear during the first full day of the blockade Tuesday. Tankers approaching the strait Monday turned around shortly after it took effect, though one reversed course again and transited the waterway.

The tanker Rich Starry had been waiting off the coast of the United Arab Emirates, according to shipping data firm Lloyd’s List, which cited data from the energy cargo-tracking firm Vortexa. It was not immediately clear whether the tanker had earlier docked in Iran. Yet it was listed by the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control as linked to Iranian shipping.

Lloyd’s List, citing ship registry and tracking data, reported that the vessel is owned by a Chinese shipping company and ultimately bound for China.

U.S. Central Command did not immediately respond to questions about the tanker after it cleared the 21-mile-wide (nearly 34-kilometer) waterway. A day earlier, Central Command said the blockade applied to vessels going to and from Iranian ports.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Chinese tankers will not be allowed passage through the strait. "So they're not going to be able to get their oil,” he told reporters Tuesday on the sidelines of IMF-World Bank meetings.

Since the start of the war, Iran has curtailed maritime traffic, with most commercial vessels avoiding the waterway.

Iran’s effective closure of the strait, through which a fifth of global oil transits in peacetime, has sent oil prices skyrocketing, pushing up the cost of gasoline, food and other basic goods far beyond the Middle East.

U.S. President Donald Trump said Monday that Iran's control of the strait amounted to blackmail and extortion as the U.S. blockade took effect. He said in a social media post that Iran’s navy had been "completely obliterated,” but it still had “fast attack ships.”

He warned that “if any of these ships come anywhere close to our BLOCKADE, they will be immediately ELIMINATED."

Iran threatened to retaliate against Persian Gulf ports if attacked.

“If you fight, we will fight," Iran's parliamentary speaker, Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, said in a statement addressed to Trump.

French President Emmanuel Macron and British prime Minister Keir Starmer will co-chair a conference Friday for nations willing to deploy warships to escort oil tankers and container ships through the Strait of Hormuz. The deployment will happen “when security conditions allow,” Macron’s office said Tuesday.

Israel and Lebanon scheduled for talks

The talks in Washington between Israel and Lebanon were expected to be preliminary, focused on setting parameters rather than resolving core issues.

After more than a year of near-daily strikes in southern Lebanon, Israel escalated its offensive in the early days of the Iran war following Hezbollah launching rockets into Israel. The fighting has carved a path of destruction from agricultural towns near the border to Beirut, killing more than 2,000 people and displacing in excess of 1 million others, according to Lebanese authorities.

After the ceasefire in Iran, Israel pressed ahead with its air and ground campaign, insisting that the truce does not apply to fighting in Lebanon. It has, however, halted strikes in the country’s capital since April 8, after a deadly bombardment that hit several crowded commercial and residential areas in central Beirut and killed more than 350 people in one day.

It sparked an international outcry and threats by Iran that it would end the ceasefire.

The fighting has intensified in and around the Lebanese town of Bint Jbeil. The Israeli military said Tuesday that it killed three Hezbollah militants after they fired on troops, wounding 10.

Fighting has intensified in recent days between Israeli ground forces and Hezbollah militants in and around Bint Jbeil, with the army saying Monday it had killed over 100 Hezbollah fighters over the past week.

Lebanese officials have pushed for a ceasefire. Israel has framed the negotiations around Hezbollah’s disarmament and a potential peace deal, without publicly committing to halting hostilities or withdrawing its forces.

Israel wants Lebanon’s government to assume responsibility for disarming Hezbollah, much as was envisaged in a November 2024 ceasefire. But the militant group has survived efforts to curb its strength for decades and said on Monday that it will not abide by any agreements that may result from the talks.

Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar on Tuesday floated the idea of cooperation with the Lebanese government to dismantle Hezbollah.

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Metz reported from Ramallah, West Bank. Associated Press writers Aamer Madhani, Matthew Lee, and Fatima Hussein in Washington, Sylvie Corbet in Paris, Toqa Ezzidin in Cairo, Natalie Melzer in Jerusalem and Farnoush Amiri at the United Nations contributed to this report.

The S&P 500 added 0.7% after rallying the day before back to where it was before the United States and Israel launched attacks on Iran in late February. It's just 0.6% below its record and on track for its ninth gain in the last 10 days.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 172 points, or 0.4%, as of 10:30 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 1.2% higher.

They followed gains for stock markets worldwide as expectations rose for a possible return to talks by the United States and Iran. Such prospects also helped lower the price of oil, whose production and transportation has been snarled by the fighting.

The price for a barrel of Brent crude oil, the international standard, fell 3.5% to $95.91. That’s still above its roughly $70 level from before the war, but it’s well below its peak of $119 reached a couple times when worries about the war hit their heights.

To be sure, hope has often quickly swung into doubt in financial markets since the war began, which has caused extreme and sudden reversals. Much of the stress has been due to the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow waterway that’s the main avenue for crude oil produced in the Persian Gulf area to reach customers worldwide. Blockages there have kept oil off the global market, which has in turn driven up its price.

And that has meant a blast of higher inflation. In the United States, inflation at the wholesale level accelerated to 4% in March from 3.4% the month before, according to the latest data released Tuesday. That was actually better than the 4.6% rate economists expected, but it could all filter down to U.S. households if businesses fully pass the increases through.

The effect is worldwide. Global inflation this year looks set to accelerate to 4.4% this year from 4.1% in 2025, according to the International Monetary Fund, which had earlier thought inflation would slow to 3.8%.

The IMF on Tuesday also downgraded its forecast for global economic growth to 3.1% this year from the 3.3% it had forecast in January.

On Wall Street, strong profit reports from several companies and expectations for more helped make up for such worries. At their heart, stock prices tend to follow the path of corporate profits over the long term.

BlackRock gained 3.4%, and Citigroup rose 1% after the financial companies reported stronger profit and revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected.

JPMorgan Chase also delivered a better-than-expected quarter, but its stock dipped 0.8% as CEO Jamie Dimon said bank officials cannot predict how the “increasingly complex set of risks” will play out given so much uncertainty.

Amazon climbed 2.6% after saying it would buy Globalstar, a mobile satellite services company, for $90 per share in either cash or Amazon stock. Globalstar rose 8.9%.

Software companies also rallied a second day, recovering some of their sharp losses from earlier in the year taken on worries that rivals powered by artificial-intelligence technology could make them obsolete. AppLovin rose 2.6%, and ServiceNow climbed 1.4%.

That in turn helped private-credit companies rebound. These companies have lent money to software businesses and others that may be under threat from AI, and they've seen investors rush to try to pull their money on worries that some of the loans may not get repaid.

Blue Owl Capital rose 5.7% to trim its loss for the year so far to 40.2%. Ares Management climbed 4.3%, and Apollo Global Management rose 2.9%.

They helped offset a 6% drop for Wells Fargo, which reported weaker revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected.

In stock markets abroad, indexes rose across much of Europe and Asia. South Korea’s Kospi jumped 2.7%, and Japan’s Nikkei 225 rose 2.4% for two of the bigger gains.

In the bond market, Treasury yields ticked lower. The yield on the 10-year Treasury edged down to 4.28% from 4.30% late Monday.

___

AP Business Writers Chan Ho-him and Matt Ott contributed to this report.

Jury selection is set to start as early as Tuesday in the onetime movie mogul's latest retrial, where jurors will weigh — for the third time — whether he raped hairstylist and actor Jessica Mann in a Manhattan hotel in 2013.

But “it's not going to be a mirror image of the last trial,” new Weinstein lawyer Marc Agnifilo told Judge Curtis Farber last month.

This time, jurors will weigh only one charge based on one accuser, rather than the array of allegations that were aired at Weinstein’s previous trials in New York and Los Angeles. The Oscar-winning producer denies all the accusations and declared in court this winter that he had “acted wrongly, but I never assaulted anyone.”

The judge has indicated he might revisit some rulings about exactly what evidence gets presented about Weinstein's and Mann's years of interactions. And Weinstein's recent change in attorneys could shift the trial's tenor and tactics.

Agnifilo and his partners took on the case only in February, when longtime Weinstein lawyer Arthur Aidala stepped aside from the retrial to focus on the former studio boss’s appeals and civil matters. Both Aidala and Agnifilo are well-known New York defense attorneys, but their litigation styles differ. Aidala is folksy, while Agnifilo is more buttoned-up.

Weinstein wielded significant clout in the entertainment industry, having built his reputation on such critical and popular hits as “Shakespeare in Love,” “Pulp Fiction” and “Chocolat.” He also became a prominent Democratic donor.

Then a series of sexual harassment and sex assault allegations against Weinstein began to emerge in news media in 2017, propelling the #MeToo movement.

He was criminally charged in New York in 2018 and in Los Angeles two years later.

Weinstein went to trial and was convicted of some — but not all — counts in both cases. His initial New York convictions were overturned, spurring a retrial last year.

The retrial verdict was mixed: Weinstein was convicted of forcing oral sex on production assistant and producer Miriam Haley in 2006, but he was acquitted of forcibly performing oral sex that same year on model-turned-psychotherapist Kaja Sokola. The jury didn’t decide on the rape charge involving Mann because the foreperson refused to keep deliberating.

Weinstein subsequently considered pleading guilty, according to Aidala. Evidently, Weinstein ultimately rejected the idea.

Mann has testified that she had a consensual, on-and-off relationship with the then-married Weinstein. But when he cornered her in a Manhattan hotel room where she was staying on a weekend getaway, she protested, “I don’t want to do this,” she told jurors. She said he kept making advances and demands until she “just gave up.”

Weinstein hasn’t testified at any of his trials, but his lawyers have contended that he never had non-consensual sex.

The defense claimed that Mann and his other accusers willingly entertained his sexual overtures because they wanted his help with their show-business aspirations. The women, by contrast, said Weinstein dangled his Hollywood influence to draw them into his orbit and then victimize them.

His sexual assault conviction involving Haley carries the potential for up to 25 years in prison; no sentencing date has been set. In this case, the yet-to-be-decided rape charge is a lower-level felony punishable by up to four years behind bars. Weinstein, 73, already has served longer than that.

Weinstein suffers from various health problems and uses a wheelchair. He said in court in January that he's haunted by the possibility that he might die in New York’s notorious Rikers Island jail.

“My mental state is collapsing. … My spirit is breaking,” he told the judge.

Weinstein’s lawyers have argued that his New York conviction last year was poisoned by bad blood among jurors. Meanwhile, he's appealing the Los Angeles verdict.

The Associated Press generally does not identify people without their permission if they say they have been sexually assaulted. Haley, Mann and Sokola agreed to be named.

The USSF said Crocker was leaving to pursue an unidentified international soccer opportunity, and a person familiar with the decision, speaking to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because Crocker's new job was not announced, said he will work in Saudi Arabia. His hiring by Saudis was first reported by Fox.

Crocker's departure was a surprise, given the U.S. is co-host of the World Cup starting June 11 and the contract of men’s coach Mauricio Pochettino ends after the tournament. The USSF next month will open its 200-acre, 17-field training center and office complex in Fayetteville, Georgia, an Atlanta suburb.

Dan Helfrich, hired as the U.S. federation's chief operating officer in November, “will provide executive oversight and support across the federation’s sporting operations,” the USSF said in a statement. Helfrich will work with assistant sporting director Oguchi Onyewu — a former national team defender — and Tracey Kevins, head of development for the women’s youth national team.

Crocker, 51, was hired by the USSF in April 2023 after serving as Southampton's director of football since February 2020.

Crocker oversaw the decisions to rehire Gregg Berhalter as men's coach in June 2023, to fire Berhalter in July 2024 after first-round elimination at the Copa America and to hire Pochettino that September.

He also made the recommendation to hire Emma Hayes as women's national team coach starting in the spring of 2024. Hayes led the women's team to the Olympic gold medal.

___

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

The Pakistani officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter with the press.

A senior Hezbollah official on Monday said the Lebanese militant group will not abide by any agreements that may result from direct Lebanon-Israel talks set to start Tuesday in Washington.

Lebanese officials hope to broker a ceasefire in the Israel-Hezbollah war that has killed at least 2,089 people in Lebanon. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said he doesn’t want a ceasefire and the goal is Hezbollah’s disarmament and a potential peace agreement between Lebanon and Israel.

A U.S. blockade of Iranian ports that began Monday and Iran’s threatened retaliation set up an extraordinary showdown posing serious risks for the global economy and raising the specter of a ceasefire collapse and resumed fighting.

Here is the latest:

Bessent says economic pain ‘worth taking’ to end a nuclear Iran

As the Iran war drives up the cost of energy around the world, Bessent told a group reporters Tuesday that “a small bit of economic pain for a few weeks is worth taking off the incalculable tail risk of either a nuclear Iran or a nuclear Iran that uses that weapon.”

Asked about the impact of soaring gas prices on consumers, Bessent said “there is nothing more transient than what we are seeing now.”

“So the conflict will end, prices will come down, and then headline inflation will come down, and with that, gasoline prices will come down,” Bessent said.

US treasury secretary says China ‘not going to be able to get their oil’

Scott Bessent was asked about Chinese tankers passing through the Strait of Hormuz after Iran recently demanded to collect tolls as a precondition for reopening the waterway.

“Those ships aren’t going to be allowed out anymore, ” Bessent told a group of reporters on the sidelines of the IMF World Bank meetings. “So they’re not going to be able to get their oil.”

When asked what his message to those paying the tolls would be: “You’re not going to pass,” Bessent said. And if a country pays the toll, “they are in violation of US sanctions, and that never ends well.”

Israel says 10 soldiers wounded in gun battle with Hezbollah in the strategic Lebanese town of Bint Jbeil

The Israeli military said a “cell” of three Hezbollah militants fired on the troops, wounding ten, three of them severely. It said the soldiers returned fire, killing two of the militants, and the third was later killed by an airstrike.

Fighting has intensified in recent days between Israeli ground forces and Hezbollah militants in and around Bint Jbeil, with the army saying Monday it had killed over 100 Hezbollah fighters over the past week.

Bint-Jbeil’s elevated location overlooking the UN-mandated Blue Line that divides Israel and Lebanon has made it a strategic point for Hezbollah. It was among dozens of villages and towns south of the Litani River that received an evacuation warning from the Israeli army early last month when the war started.

A president and a pope square off over Iran war

Pope Leo XIV, a studious and soft-spoken cleric, and Donald Trump, an unapologetically bellicose and pugilistic politician, have long been on a rhetorical collision course. Now their disagreement over the war in Iran has escalated in spectacular fashion.

On social media, Trump said Leo was “Weak” and captive to the “Radical Left,” even suggesting that Leo somehow owed his position to Trump.

The pope has declared Trump’s threats toward Iran “truly unacceptable” and pointed his flock to biblical text and church doctrine on war and peace, explaining that his purpose is not about Trump at all. “I’m not afraid of the Trump administration,” Leo said Monday on the way to Africa, “or of speaking out loudly about the message of the Gospel, which is what the Church works for.”

It’s a spectacle involving the world’s two biggest megaphones, both held by Americans for the first time.

▶ Read more about how they got to this point

Fuel protests have Ireland’s government facing possible no-confidence vote

Ireland ’s government could face a no-confidence vote Tuesday in Parliament over how it has handled a week of fuel protests that blocked access to oil supplies and a major port and caused massive traffic jams.

Prime Minister Micheál Martin announced new tax cuts to try to end the crisis that began after the U.S.-Israel war on Iran led to the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. But opposition parties blasted the government for failing to respond sooner and criticized the aid it offered, saying soaring fuel costs will drive people out of business.

Sinn Fein, the largest opposition party, called for the no-confidence vote scheduled Tuesday evening. But Martin’s coalition government has scheduled an earlier vote of support that could make the no-confidence motion moot.

▶ Read More

Pakistan’s prime minister briefs president on US-Iran talks, to visit Saudi Arabia and Turkey

Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif briefed President Asif Ali Zardari Tuesday on recent U.S.-Iran talks and said he will visit Saudi Arabia and Turkey this week to advance peace efforts. The announcement by the president’s office comes amid reports that Pakistan is seeking to host a second round of talks between Washington and Tehran in the coming days.

According to the statement, Zardari urged Sharif and other officials to remain engaged with the United States, Iran and other key regional and global powers to sustain the peace process and promote regional stability.

The statement said Zardari appreciates Pakistan’s role in facilitating rare direct talks between the United States and Iran, saying it had “reaffirmed its position as a responsible and pivotal state in the international community” and demonstrated its peacemaking credentials.

Italy suspends military partnership with Israel

Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni said Tuesday that her government has suspended the automatic renewal of a defense agreement with Israel, citing “the current situation.”

Meloni and other Italian government officials have strongly condemned Israel’s air and bombing campaign in Lebanon, which has hit civilians as well as an Italian convoy that is part of a U.N. peacekeeping force. The agreement, ratified in 2005, includes ongoing cooperation between the two countries’ defense ministries and armed forces. It is automatically renewed every five years.

Citing fallout from the Iran war, IMF cuts the outlook for global growth, expects higher inflation

The Iran war has stalled the world’s economic momentum, the International Monetary Fund warned Tuesday as it downgraded its forecast for global growth to 3.1% in 2026, an expected deceleration from last year’s 3.4% expansion.

U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran — and Tehran’s closing of the Strait of Hormuz and retaliatory strikes on oil refineries and other energy infrastructure in neighboring countries — have driven oil and gas prices sharply higher around the world. As a result, the IMF marked up its expectation for global inflation to 4.4% from 4.1% in 2025.

Massive investment in data centers and artificial intelligence, and rising productivity combined to strengthen economic numbers, but “War in the Middle East has halted this momentum,’′ IMF chief economist Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas wrote in a blog post accompanying the fund’s latest World Economic Outlook.

The IMF’s forecast assumes the war ends soon and energy prices rise “a moderate 19%″ this year. Things could be much worse.

Israel’s top diplomat denies disputes with Lebanon, says ‘the problem is Hezbollah’

Israel’s Foreign Minister Gideon Saar is floating the idea of cooperation with the Lebanese government to dismantle Hezbollah.

“Hezbollah has also its financial roots, there are a lot of dimensions holding this organization, practically keeping Lebanon under Iranian occupation,” Saar said Tuesday, adding that the Lebanese government itself views the Iran-backed militant group as “unlawful.”

Israel and Lebanon are set to begin their first direct talks in decades Tuesday, with large gaps in what each side wants from the negotiations.

Lebanese officials want a ceasefire, while Israeli officials have said they are not interested in a ceasefire but want the talks to focus on disarming Hezbollah as an essential step toward a potential peace deal between the two countries.

Hezbollah militant group renewed its war with Israel on Mar. 2, when it fired missiles into northern Israel. About 2,088 people in Lebanon have been killed in Israeli airstrikes since then, according to figures from Lebanon’s Health Ministry.

US forces to join combat drills in Philippines to show commitment to Asia while fighting Iran

More than 17,000 American and Filipino military personnel will participate in one of their largest annual combat exercises in the Philippines, aiming to show the United States’ staunch commitment to Asia despite its preoccupation with the Middle East, a U.S. military official said Tuesday.

“Our message is our dedication and commitment to our alliance and regional security,” Col. Robert Bunn, a spokesperson for U.S. forces, said when asked what message the U.S. military wants to send with its large deployment despite the war in the Middle East.

Bunn did not immediately specify the number of U.S. forces joining the April 20-May 8 maneuvers. Last year, about 9,000 U.S. military personnel joined the Balikatan — Tagalog for shoulder-to-shoulder — exercises.

This year’s drills between the U.S. and Philippines will expand to include Japan, France and Canada, which have signed visiting forces agreements with Manila, the Philippine military said.

Macron urges US-Iran talks to resume

French President Emmanuel Macron urged for the resumption of negotiations between the U.S. and Iran as he had phone calls with President Donald Trump and Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian.

“It is essential, in particular, that the ceasefire be strictly respected by all parties and that it include Lebanon,” Macron said in a post on X Tuesday.

He also called for the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz “without restrictions or tolls.”

Macron stressed France and the U.K. will also host a conference in Paris this Friday, bringing together by videoconference non-belligerent countries ready to contribute to a mission aimed at restoring freedom of navigation in the strait when security conditions allow.

US wholesale prices surge as Iran war drives up the cost of energy

The Labor Department reported Tuesday that its producer price index — which measures inflation before it hits consumers — rose 0.5% from February and 4% from March 2025. The year-over-year gains was the biggest in more than three years. Energy prices surged 8.5% from February.

Excluding volatile food and energy prices, so-called core producer prices rose a modest 0.1% from February and 3.8% from a year earlier. The gains in wholesale prices were smaller than economists had forecast.

Wholesale prices can offer an early look at where consumer inflation might be headed. The Labor Department reported last week that soaring gasoline prices pushed consumer prices up 3.3% last month from a year earlier, the biggest year-over-year increase since May 2024. Compared to February, March consumer prices jumped 0.9%, biggest gain in nearly four years.

IEA predicts Iran war will drive down oil demand more sharply than at any time since the pandemic

The war in Iran will lead to an annual decline in oil demand for the first time since the pandemic, when billions of people were trying to live in isolation, according to the International Energy Agency.

The agency, formed after the 1974 oil crisis, said Tuesday that oil demand is expected to decrease by an average of 80,000 barrels a day this year, a sharp revision from the increase of 850,000 barrels a day that it had forecast before the war began.

The drop-off in March was particularly severe because of attacks on energy infrastructure and the shutdown of the Strait of Hormuz, according to the IEA, which expects a decline in demand of 1.5 million barrels in the current quarter.

While the biggest cuts in oil usage have initially come from the Middle East and Asia Pacific region, demand destruction is anticipated to spread as oil prices increase and scarcity continues.

South Korea says it will provide humanitarian assistance to Iran

South Korea says it provided $2 million in humanitarian assistance to Lebanon through international organizations and has also decided to provide $500,000 in aid to Iran through the International Red Cross.

Seoul’s Foreign Ministry said Tuesday it hopes the aid will help ease the humanitarian crisis in affected regions

Red Cross delivers first emergency aid shipment to Iran since war began

The Red Cross delivered its first emergency aid shipment to Iran since the war began over a month ago, which is expected to meet the needs of nearly 25,000 people.

The International Committee of the Red Cross said in a statement Tuesday that it dispatched assistance to the Iranian Red Crescent Society, or IRCS, including five truckloads delivered Monday.

Supplies included blankets, jerrycans, tarpaulins, hygiene kits and solar lamps. The remaining aid shipment, comprised of nine aid trucks, will be given to IRCS later this week.

Macron, Starmer to co-chair talks on Strait of Hormuz mission to protect shipping

French President Emmanuel Macron and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer will co-chair a conference Friday in Paris, bringing together non-belligerent nations willing to participate in a mission in the Strait of Hormuz “when security conditions allow.”

Other participants will take part via videoconference, Macron’s office said. European and other partners are ready to contribute to a “purely defensive mission aimed at restoring freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz,” the statement said.

France and Britain have been working in recent weeks to set up an operation to escort oil tankers and container ships to help ensure safe passage through the strait.

‘Rich Starry’ reportedly headed for China

The tanker is listed by the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control as linked to Iranian shipping. It is flagged to Malawi, one of several landlocked countries often cited in so-called “false flag” operations, in which ships are registered under foreign flags with little or no connection to their owners, complicating oversight.

According to MarineTraffic, a maritime analytics provider, the vessel was headed for Sohar, an Omani port outside the strait. Lloyd’s List, citing ship registry and tracking data, reported it is owned by a Chinese shipping company and ultimately bound for China.

Vessel reported exiting Strait of Hormuz

A tanker that aborted an attempt to exit the Strait of Hormuz on Monday turned around and transited the waterway early Tuesday, in one of the first tests of the U.S. blockade.

The Rich Starry, a chemical and oil tanker, had been waiting off the coast of the United Arab Emirates, according to shipping data firm Lloyd’s List, which cited data from the energy cargo-tracking firm Vortexa.

The U.S. military said on Monday that the blockade applied only to vessels traveling to or from Iranian ports, and it was not immediately clear whether the Rich Starry had earlier docked in Iran or was carrying Iranian oil. U.S. Central Command did not immediately respond to questions about the vessel.

France says Lebanon must be included in ceasefire, calls Israeli strikes ‘intolerable’

French Foreign Affairs Minister Jean-Noël Barrot reaffirmed Tuesday that Lebanon must be included in the initial ceasefire agreement.

“The ceasefire must absolutely include Lebanon, which under no circumstances can be the scapegoat of the Israeli government,” Barrot said on French radio RFI.

Israel’s strikes on Lebanon are “intolerable,” he said, because they undermine the ceasefire reached between the United States and Iran and because it strengthens militant group Hezbollah.

“Destroying Lebanon, targeting the Lebanese state, does not weaken Hezbollah — quite the opposite, it strengthens it,” Barrot said.

Spain’s prime minister asks China to do more to end war

Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said he sees China as the main global interlocutor that can help end the war in Iran and other conflicts, such as Ukraine, and urged the Asian giant to do more on the diplomatic front.

“I find it very difficult to find other interlocutors, beyond China, who can resolve this situation created in Iran and the Strait of Hormuz,” he said Tuesday after meeting Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Sánchez is in China for his fourth trip in just over three years as Spain looks to strengthen its political and commercial ties with the world’s second-largest economy.

Sánchez said Spain wants to avoid impunity for those who commit crimes and described what has happened in Gaza as “genocide.”

“International law is being violated today, fundamentally by one country: the government of Israel,” he said. “There is also an absolutely illegal response from the Iranian regime regarding a war that we have described from the very beginning as a mistake and an illegality.”

Merz says he supports talks between Israel and Lebanon

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said in a phone call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that he supports direct peace talks between the Israeli and Lebanese governments, which are set to start Tuesday in Washington.

Merz called for an end to hostilities in southern Lebanon and said militant group Hezbollah must lay down its arms, the German chancellery said in a statement Monday night.

Merz reaffirmed his government’s strong support of a diplomatic understanding between the U.S. and Iran and its readiness to contribute to freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz if the necessary conditions are met, his office said.

Merz also expressed deep concern about developments in the Palestinian territories and said there must be no de facto partial annexation of the West Bank.

Xi floats proposal to promote Middle East peace

Chinese President Xi Jinping floated a four-point proposal for promoting Middle East peace during a meeting Tuesday with Sheikh Khaled bin Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the crown ⁠prince of Abu Dhabi, Chinese official news agency Xinhua reported.

Xi’s proposal calls for upholding the principle of regional peaceful coexistence and respecting national sovereignty while underscoring the principles of coordinating development and security, Xinhua reported.

“Safeguard the authority of the international rule of law. It can’t be ‘use it when it suits us, discard it when it doesn’t,’ and we cannot allow the world to revert to the law of the jungle,” Xi said.

Oil falls and stocks gain on hopes of renewed US-Iran talks

Asian stocks were trading higher tracking and oil fell on Tuesday as expectations rose over a possible second round of talks between the U.S. and Iran.

Benchmark U.S. crude fell 1.7% early Tuesday to $97.37 a barrel. Brent crude, the international standard, was down 0.9% to $98.49 per barrel.

Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 was up 2.3% to 57,804.81. South Korea’s Kospi jumped 2.7% to 5,968.06.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rose 0.5% to 25,783.41, while the Shanghai Composite index climbed 0.5% to 4,007.93.

Oil prices continued to pull back on Tuesday from earlier gains.

Pakistan proposes second round of talks in Islamabad

Pakistan has proposed hosting a second round of talks between the United States and Iran in Islamabad in the coming days, before the end of the ceasefire, two Pakistani officials said.

The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter with the press, said the proposal would depend on whether the parties request a different location.

One of the officials said that, despite ending without an agreement, the first talks were part of an ongoing diplomatic process rather than a one-off effort.

— By Munir Ahmed

It’s a common complaint sent to KPRC 2’s help desk.

What can Houston residents do?

Peggy Kidwiler says the Spring Branch block where her family has lived for decades has slipped from tidy yards and neighborly evenings to overgrown lots, trash and cars left for days.

Kidwiler says she’s used the city’s 3-1-1 line but see little enforcement or follow-up. The family has lived on Forest Grove since the 1950s, and the complaint to KPRC 2 lists parties, beer cans and a house with multiple vehicles parked on the grass.

“And in these little neighborhoods, they, no one seems to care about them. So, it’s like nothing’s done,” said Kidwiler. “The cars that are parked in yards, that probably shouldn’t be, and it happens all over now.”

“Some people put fences up in the yards in the front, and that never should have happened, but they’re letting them. Some people hide junk behind it.”

Residents without homeowners’ associations often rely on civic clubs, not HOAs, to press for neighborhood standards. KPRC 2 reviewed the City of Houston civic club database and found many listings that appear inactive.

“She’ll report it and nothing happens. Nothing happens,” said Kidwiler.

Kidwiler said the change has affected how her elderly mother feels about being outdoors. Neighbors reported trash thrown into yards and people walking through the block at night.

“My mom has a problem with the safety of the neighborhood. Also, it, it’s not near as safe as it was 50 years ago, 30 years ago. Even a couple years ago she used to sit out on her driveway, enjoy the evening breeze, enjoy the neighbors coming over and talking. And now so many times she’s afraid. She’s afraid to do that because there’s people walking by that Trash gets thrown out in the yard, her yard. People don’t care about it.”

What residents can do

Start with 3-1-1 and get a service request number for any code, trash or parking complaint. Take clear photos, note addresses and record dates and times.

Follow up on the 3-1-1 case number if there is no response. If 3-1-1 does not resolve the issue, contact your city council member’s office and provide the case number and photos.

RELATED: How to find your Houston city council person

Only contact Houston police for noise, threats, trespassing or other immediate safety issues. Do not call police for routine code complaints such as yard debris unless there is an immediate danger.

Electoral authorities continued the count for a third straight day after the failure to deliver ballots to voting centers forced authorities to extend voting into Monday.

With 75% of ballots tallied, official results on Tuesday showed Keiko Fujimori, the conservative daughter of a disgraced former president, leading the count with 16.8% of support, while Rafael López Aliaga, the ultraconservative former mayor of Peru’s capital, Lima, earned 12.8%.

Jorge Nieto Montesinos held a close third place with 11.87% of the vote, maintaining a narrow mathematical chance of reaching the June 7 runoff.

The sluggish pace of the count mirrored Peru’s 2021 presidential election, a contest where final tallies weren't completed until five days after the polls closed.

A presidential candidate needs more than 50% of votes to win outright. The two candidates with the most votes will advance to the runoff. The winner will be Peru’s ninth president in just 10 years.

The election has been mired with logistical issues that left thousands of people in the country and abroad unable to cast ballots. That prompted authorities to allow more than 52,000 residents of Lima to vote on Monday. The extension, announced after vote counting had begun Sunday evening, also covered Peruvians registered to vote in Orlando, Florida, and Paterson, New Jersey.

“I’m fed up,” Iris Valle, 56, said as she waited to vote Monday at a public school in Lima. She feared that her employer would cut her pay for not showing up early, because she had to meet her voting obligation.

Voting is mandatory for Peruvians from the ages of 18 to 70. Failure to do so comes with a fine of up to $32.

The election took place amid a surge in violent crime and corruption that has fueled widespread discontent among voters, who largely view candidates as dishonest and unprepared for the presidency.

Peru’s economy, however, has defied both the crime surge and the political instability stemming from a revolving door of presidents, having had three since October alone. Aided by its status as one of the world’s largest copper producers, the country posted more than 3% growth in 2024 and 2025. Though that’s lower than the 5%-6% annual growth it saw in the 2000s.

Will Freeman, a fellow for Latin American Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, explained that the independence of the country’s central bank has also contributed to economic growth.

“Although Peru has had all these presidents, it has had only one central bank president since the mid-2000s, Julio Velarde,” Freeman said. “He’s been a real source of stability and given investors some confidence that there is an institutional core that remains from one presidency to the next in Peru.”

Still, Freeman warned, Peru can't afford to be complacent as current growth is lower than the 5%-6% annual rates the country saw in the 2000s and recent congressional decisions point to “a more conservative economic populism.”

In her fourth bid for the presidency, Fujimori has promised to crack down on crime with an iron fist, but she has also defended laws that experts say make it difficult to prosecute criminals. The laws, which her party backed in recent years, eliminated preliminary detention in certain cases and raised the threshold for seizing criminal assets.

If elected, she has said that judges presiding over criminal cases will be anonymous and prisoners will have to work to earn their food.

Meanwhile, López Aliaga has proposed building prisons in the country’s Amazon region, allowing judges to conceal their identities and expelling foreigners who are living illegally in Peru.

Voters were also asked to choose the members of a bicameral Congress for the first time in more than 30 years, following recent legislative reforms that concentrate significant power in the new upper chamber.

___

Regina Garcia Cano reported from Caracas, Venezuela.

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Follow AP’s coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america

The 30-second message features a variety of voters, among them a busy farmer and a flight attendant, explaining why they cast their ballots by mail. Sponsored by the 200,000-member American Postal Workers Union, the advertising campaign announced Tuesday will begin airing this week in Ohio, where Union Army soldiers during the Civil War cast the first mail ballots in 1864. It will then move to other states.

The ad ends with the message: “Vote by mail — keep it, protect it, expand it.” It comes two weeks after Trump signed an executive order that seeks to create a nationwide list of verified eligible voters and subsequently bar postal workers from sending absentee ballots to those who are not on each state’s approved list.

The order was met swiftly with lawsuits and opposition from postal workers. The National Rural Letter Carriers’ Association said USPS is “not equipped or authorized to decide who is or is not entitled to vote” and pushing it into such a role “risks politicizing one of the nation’s most trusted public institutions.” The union also said it threatens confidence in the mail and in elections.

Messages were left seeking comment from the White House and the Postal Service.

Jonathan Smith, president of American Postal Workers, said his union's TV ad was produced before Trump's executive order was issued, not in response to it. An executive order on elections that Trump signed last year also targeted mail ballots by seeking to require they be returned by Election Day, even though more than a dozen states allow a grace period.

Smith said the union wants to encourage people to continue voting by mail. But he expressed concern about the potential ramifications of requiring postal workers to determine who should receive an absentee ballot and who should not.

“It is our position that it is not the job of the postal workers to verify voter eligibility," he said. "It is our job to move mail from one destination to the next. He added: “We do not want to be politicized.”

Trump's latest election executive order is already facing lawsuits by various groups, including Democrats in Washington who argue that the Constitution empowers states and Congress, not the president, to set election rules.

Trump, who as recently as last month voted by mail, has publicly bashed mail voting as a source of fraud and is pushing Congress to curtail it through sweeping legislation. Mail voting has existed for more than a century and had steadily been increasing in popularity in both Democratic- and Republican-led states until 2020, when Trump started to target the method, levying baseless claims of mass fraud. It has now becomes less popular among Republicans.

A report by the Brookings Institution published in 2025 found that cases of mail voting fraud occurred in only a tiny fraction of total mail ballots cast — about four cases out of every 10 million mail ballots.

The TV ad is intended to be a direct message to voters, not the president.

“Our message is to America: Vote by mail is efficient, it’s safe, and it’s successful. Period,” Smith said. “This is educating the American people that you can use vote by mail and you can be guaranteed that your voice will be heard and your vote will be counted.”

It’s not a holiday marked by fireworks or parades. Instead, it lives in lecture halls, research labs, and classrooms—anywhere people gather to talk about the strange, beautiful rules that govern the universe at its smallest scales.

On this particular morning, in a university physics lab, a group of students crowd around a whiteboard filled with symbols that look more like art than math. Their professor smiles as he writes a simple phrase: “Reality is not as solid as it seems.”

That’s the heart of quantum physics.

A century ago, thinkers like Albert Einstein and Niels Bohr debated what would become one of the most successful—and most confusing—scientific frameworks ever created. Einstein famously resisted parts of it, uncomfortable with its randomness. Bohr leaned into the uncertainty, insisting that at the quantum level, probability—not certainty—rules the universe.

Today, their arguments feel less like contradictions and more like the foundation of a new technological era.

Quantum mechanics explains how particles can exist in multiple states at once, how they can be “entangled” across vast distances, and why measuring something can fundamentally change it. It’s the reason your smartphone works, your GPS can pinpoint your location, and why researchers believe the next leap in computing could transform everything from medicine to cybersecurity.

One student raises a hand: “So… nothing is really fixed?”

The professor pauses. “Not at the smallest level,” he says. “And that uncertainty is exactly what makes it powerful.”

That’s what World Quantum Day tries to capture—not just the science, but the wonder of it. Around the world, institutions host public talks, virtual events, and demonstrations to make the invisible visible: lasers splitting particles, simulations of quantum states, and explanations of how the universe behaves when you zoom in far enough.

Outside the lab, most people never think about quantum physics. But it’s everywhere. In the light hitting your eyes. In the chips powering your devices. In the equations that quietly run modern life.

As the day ends, the students leave the lab still debating what they learned—not because the answers are unclear, but because they are beautifully incomplete.

And maybe that’s the point.

World Quantum Day isn’t about fully understanding the universe. It’s about realizing how much there still is to discover.

Our ‘DRAINED’ Investigation into the Houston water department means we get a lot of questions about water in Houston. So, when these devices started popping up around town, Amy Davis got questions about it.

Here is your answer! The five-foot-tall metal structures are water sampling stations connected to the public water supply, Houston Public Works confirmed.

What the green boxes are

Houston Public Works told KPRC 2 the city has approximately 450 of the stations installed across its main water system. About 100 more are being added in the Kingwood area, with installation expected to take roughly three months.

The stations sit in public right-of-way areas and are used by city crews to assess the quality of the public water supply.

Why the city switched

State regulations require all public water systems to routinely monitor drinking water distribution systems for bacteria and disinfection residual levels under the Revised Total Coliform Rule, or RTCR.

Historically, the city collected water samples from hose bibs at private homes and businesses. In 2021, Houston Public Works chose to transition from that method to dedicated sampling stations located in public right-of-way areas.

How testing works

Water is tested monthly at the sampling stations, according to Houston Public Works. Results that do not meet standards are reported to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, known as TCEQ.

TCEQ is aware of the installation of the sampling stations, the city said.

Customers can stay up to date on their public water system by using Texas Drinking Water Viewer (https://dwv.tceq.texas.gov/). Drinking Water Viewer is a live database that contains information about the quality of your drinking water, including all analytical results, and your public water system’s compliance with state regulations. Coliform samples can be viewed by clicking on the “Microbial/Coliform” link under the “Samples” icon in the navigation menu. https://youtu.be/kNFLF29lWRA?si=VYRe2_v0q3v1Y0ph

What this means for residents

The transition to dedicated sampling stations removes the burden of water testing from private homeowners and businesses and moves collection to neutral, city-controlled locations.

What you can do

If residents see water quality issues such as discolored or brown water, they can report the problem to Houston’s 3-1-1 line and request a service case number.

Mark, a Houston Heights resident, reached out to KPRC 2 ‘ENOUGH’ reporter Amy Davis after noticing he was paying a monthly fee for an inactive water meter. Customer service told him there was nothing he could do about it. That’s not true.

What the ordinance actually says

Following KPRC 2’s years-long “DRAINED” investigation into Houston’s water billing issues, the city changed its ordinance. Customers can now pay a one-time $150 fee to cap an inactive meter — including irrigation meters — and lock it so no further charges are applied.

When Mark called Houston Water Department customer service, he was told the option wasn’t available for irrigation meters. Davis confirmed that information was incorrect.

“I checked — and that’s wrong,” Davis said.

What you should do

If you’re in the same situation as Mark, Davis recommends two steps: Call the Houston Water Department directly and contact your city council representative for additional help.

How ‘DRAINED’ led to change

The meter-capping ordinance is one of several major reforms that came out of KPRC 2’s “DRAINED” investigation — a years-long effort that exposed widespread billing problems, faulty meters and corruption inside Houston’s Public Works department.

Before the investigation, customers were charged monthly fees for meters they weren’t using, with no path to opt out. The city’s ordinance change directly addressed that.

Since 2022, the KPRC 2 Investigates team has helped customers recover more than $300,000 in refunds and credits.

The ‘DRAINED’ investigation: A brief history

The “Drained” investigation, led by Amy Davis and Investigative Producer Andrea Slaydon, began after hundreds of Houston customers reported receiving shockingly high water bills.

Among those early cases:

• Rick Naranjo received a $23,000 bill for his Sagemont home.
• Julia Benjamin fought a $38,000 bill tied to a running leak in her home, which had been flooded by Hurricane Harvey.
• Andrea Harclerode was billed for years for water her neighbor was using, resulting in a $15,000 charge.

More than 500 customers contacted KPRC 2 about high water bills during the investigation.

City hall responds

On Oct. 31, 2023, 27 water customers signed up to speak at a Houston City Council meeting, sharing emotional stories of financial hardship caused by billing errors.

Kingwood resident Jan Adelman told council members about a nearly $700 water bill that arrived while his wife was hospitalized.

“My wife was in the hospital for 19 days during that time, so there is no way we used that water. I wasn’t home,” Adelman said.

Adelman told the council his wife passed away less than a month after the bill arrived.

City leaders could no longer ignore the issues. By 2024, newly elected Mayor John Whitmire unveiled a comprehensive Houston water bill improvement plan, including a commitment to replace every broken remote read device on water meters across the city.

Corruption uncovered, arrests made

The “Drained” investigation also exposed corruption inside Houston Public Works. In November 2023, Davis reported on questionable city contracts — work that sparked a criminal investigation and led to the indictment of seven people.

Public Works manager Patrece Lee was identified as the mastermind behind a multimillion-dollar scheme to divert tax dollars to herself, friends and family. She was charged with engaging in organized criminal activity, abuse of official capacity and four counts of bribery.

Six others — including Lee’s brother, a city contract employee and several contractors — were also charged. In early 2025, all seven reached plea deals. Lee received a 10-year prison sentence.

Where things stand now

Houston Water Department has replaced broken remote read sensors on more than 125,000 meters. Those sensors electronically transmit meter readings to the department, improving billing accuracy.

Davis and the KPRC 2 Investigates team say they are still hearing from customers with billing concerns and continue to investigate ongoing issues.

Viewers who have a water billing problem or story to share can email Davis at ADavis@kprc.com or Slaydon at ASlaydon@kprc.com.

Many of the issues you ask us about could be avoided if you follow these guidelines.

The Texas Department of Insurance recently released an auto insurance “Bill of Rights” for drivers, outlining key protections most people never knew they had.

What to do immediately after a crash

The steps taken right after a crash can protect both safety and any future insurance claim.

First, make sure everyone involved is safe.

Second, take photos of all vehicle damage and the surrounding scene — this step is easy to forget in the chaos.

Third, exchange names and license plate numbers with the other driver, and capture video footage if anyone has a dash cam.

Fourth, call your insurance company as soon as possible.

Fifth, save every estimate, receipt, and note from every phone call related to the claim.

Know your rights at the repair shop

Texas law gives drivers more control over vehicle repairs than many realize.

Drivers have the legal right to choose their own repair shop and decide what parts go on their vehicle. An insurance company cannot dictate the brand, age, vendor or condition of parts used in a repair. Drivers can also ask the shop to provide a cost estimate upfront — and should save that estimate for their records.

What insurance companies are required to do

Complaints about insurance companies going silent after a claim is filed are common. Texas law sets firm deadlines to prevent that.

When a claim is filed, the insurance company must acknowledge it within 15 days. Once the insurer has all the information it needs, it has 15 business days to approve or deny the claim in writing — with a possible extension, but only if the company explains why. If the claim is approved, payment must be issued within five business days.

If any of those deadlines are missed, the policyholder may be entitled to collect the claim amount, plus interest and attorney fees. Keeping thorough records is essential.

Additional rights for Texas drivers

The Texas Department of Insurance outlines several other protections for policyholders:

• Ask questions freely. Drivers can ask their insurance company about their policy, the claims process, and whether a loss is covered — without fear of it affecting their premium, renewal status or coverage.
• Dispute a claim payment. Policyholders can challenge the amount paid or what a policy covers by contacting the insurance company, the repair shop, or by consulting an attorney or appraiser.
• Cancel a policy at any time and receive a refund of the remaining premium.
• File a complaint with TDI if an insurance company is not following the rules.

The full auto insurance Bill of Rights is available at tdi.texas.gov.

Need help with insurance?

Drivers with questions or complaints can contact the Texas Department of Insurance for free:

📞 1-800-252-3439 🌐 www.tdi.texas.gov

To shop and compare rates and coverage, visit HelpInsure.com or opic.texas.gov.

The negligence case centers on seven medical professionals accused of failing to provide adequate care in the weeks leading up to Maradona’s death five years ago at a home outside Buenos Aires. Maradona, widely regarded as one of the greatest soccer players of all time, died at age 60 from cardiac arrest while recovering from a procedure to treat a blood clot on his brain.

The seven defendants are charged with culpable homicide, a crime similar to involuntary manslaughter that alleges that the accused were aware that their reckless conduct posed a risk and failed to prevent it. If convicted, they face prison sentences ranging from eight to 25 years.

Defense attorneys argue that the captain of Argentina’s 1986 World Cup-winning team suffered from multiple serious medical conditions and that no crime was committed.

Maradona had suffered a series of medical problems, some because of an excess of drug and alcohol consumption. He was reportedly near death in 2000 and 2004.

Among those on trial are physician Leopoldo Luque, Maradona’s personal doctor during the final years of his life, psychiatrist Agustina Cosachov and psychologist Carlos Díaz.

Hearings will take place twice a week, on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Slightly less than 100 witnesses are expected to testify, including family members, people close to the former player, medical professionals and police officers.

Judges Alberto Gaig, Alberto Ortolani and Pablo Rolón are expected to deliver a verdict in early June.

Fernando Burlando, attorney for Maradona's two eldest daughters and plaintiffs in the case, Dalma and Giannina, told reporters before Tuesday’s hearing that he had confidence in the new panel.

“We place enormous trust in them," Burlando said. ”They are judges with extensive experience and backgrounds."

He said that Maradona’s daughters remain “very exhausted.”

“It is very difficult," Burlando said. “They are Maradona’s daughters, and that alone is not easy, and the fact that they cannot even have a moment of relief to know what happened to their father ... although we are convinced of what happened.”

The initial trial ended in a mistrial last May after Julieta Makintach, one of the three judges overseeing the proceedings, stepped down following criticism over her participation in a documentary about the case.

Makintach withdrew after prosecutors presented footage showing her featured prominently in the documentary “Divine Justice,” which covered events from the aftermath of Maradona’s death, when allegations and suspicions of foul play first emerged, through the start of the trial.

“I present my resignation with serenity, without renouncing the right to exercise my defense in the appropriate arenas,” Makintach wrote in a letter sent to judicial authorities in June.

Maradona died on Nov. 25, 2020, weeks after undergoing surgery for a subdural hematoma. He had been admitted earlier that month to a clinic in La Plata, suffering from anemia and dehydration, before being transferred to Clínica Olivos, where he underwent the procedure. After being discharged on Nov. 11, he moved to a home outside Buenos Aires, where he remained under medical supervision.

A 20-member medical panel appointed to investigate Maradona’s death released a report in 2021, where they accused Maradona’s medical team of acting in an “inappropriate, deficient and reckless manner,” leaving him in agony and without help for more than 12 hours before his death.

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Follow AP’s coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america

They’re not the only perennial contender to miss the playoffs, either, with the reigning Presidents' Trophy-winning Winnipeg Jets as well as the Toronto Maple Leafs failing to qualify.

The Buffalo Sabres among the half dozen newcomers in the 16-team field. The Pittsburgh Penguins and Philadelphia Flyers are back in the dance, too, and set for a cross-state rivalry series in the first round.

The Colorado Avalanche have been dominant since October and go in as the favorite after clinching the best regular-season record in the NHL. That has rarely been an indicator of who hoists the Cup at the end of four rounds.

“Every team in the playoffs can win,” Dallas Stars defenseman Tyler Myers said. “Every series is a tough series. That’s what’s so amazing about the NHL playoffs: It brings out the best in everybody, in every team, and it creates an unbelievable battle no matter who’s playing.”

New blood in the NHL playoffs

Buffalo ended the longest postseason drought in league history at 14 seasons and did so after losing 18 of its first 29 games. The Sabres not only did that but finished atop the Atlantic Division.

“It’s something that we strived for from Day One,” said Lindy Ruff, who is among the favorites to be coach of the year. “You’ve got to feel good about getting there. It’s hard. We’re in a division that’s been extremely hard to get there. You’ve got to look back and say that we did a lot of good things to get to this point.”

The Sabres also look as if they can do some damage in the wide-open East without Florida. They've been the best team since the Olympic break.

Also hot down the stretch was Pittsburgh, which qualified for the first time since 2022 in new coach Dan Muse's first season. The Penguins were 6-1 long shots on BetMGM Sportsbook in October to make it, but now the trio of Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Kris Letang gets another chance.

“A lot of people doubted us and I guess counted us out, and it just put fuel on the fire for us,” said defenseman Ryan Shea, who's set to make his NHL playoff debut at 29. “I’ve been in the playoffs in the AHL, which was fun, but this is the best league in the world.”

The Utah Mammoth made it in the franchise's second season in Salt Lake City. The Anaheim Ducks are also back with a young core coached by three-time Cup-champion Joel Quenneville.

The Central Division path is the toughest

Colorado is justifiably the best bet to win it all. Nathan MacKinnon could be the MVP, Cale Makar the top defenseman, and the reacquisition of Nazem Kadri at the trade deadline gives the Avalanche the depth to envision another parade in Denver this summer, four years since the previous one.

To do so, they'll have to go through either Dallas or the Minnesota Wild in the second round just to reach the West final.

“Confident for sure: Believe in this group. I know we have what it takes,” captain Gabriel Landeskog said. "It’s going to be a long, tough road and mentally, physically grinding. I think we’re ready for it.”

Stars versus Wild opens the playoffs with a bang, pitting two of the top seven teams in the league in a best-of-seven series that ensures one of them will be golfing by mid-May. It's the result of a division-focused format that Commissioner Gary Bettman has said leads to the best first round in sports.

"That makes for great matchups," Bettman said. “If you’re a fan of the game and you’re looking for excitement, you’re looking to be entertained, you’re looking for intriguing stories, this format does it.”

From going for gold to chasing the silver chalice

Several players who won gold with the U.S. at the Olympics have the chance to add a Stanley Cup ring to their trophy case for the year.

Colorado's Brock Nelson scored 30 goals after being a difference-maker in Milan. Carolina's Jaccob Slavin, Buffalo's Tage Thompson, Tampa Bay's Jake Guentzel, Minnesota's Matt Boldy, Quinn Hughes and Brock Faber, Ottawa's Brady Tkachuk and Jake Sanderson are all in the running, as are two goaltenders: Boston's Jeremy Swayman and Dallas' Jake Oettinger.

The same goes for some Canadian stars who see their silver medals as a symbol of losing and get an opportunity to make up for it. That includes Edmonton's Connor McDavid following two consecutive losses in the final, and Crosby after an injury kept him from playing in the gold medal game and is chasing a fourth NHL title.

"That’s the best time of year," Crosby said. “That’s why you play.”

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AP Sports Writer Pat Graham in Denver contributed to this report.

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AP NHL: https://apnews.com/hub/nhl

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio will take part in the talks in Washington with Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Yechiel Leiter and Lebanese Ambassador to the U.S. Nada Hamadeh Moawad.

Hezbollah opposes the direct talks, and will not be represented. Wafiq Safa, a high-ranking member of the militant group's political council, told The Associated Press that it will not abide by any agreements made in the talks.

At least 2,089 people have been killed in Israeli strikes in Lebanon, the Health Ministry said, among them 252 women, 166 children and 88 medical workers, while 6,762 others were wounded. More than 1 million people are displaced.

The Lebanese government hopes the talks will pave the way to an end to the war. While Iran has set ending the wars in Lebanon and the region as a condition for talks with the United States, Lebanon insists on representing itself.

Iran-backed Hezbollah and other critics are skeptical of such direct talks, maintaining that Lebanon's government in Beirut lacks leverage and that it should instead back the position of Iran, Hezbollah's key ally and patron.

Hezbollah enjoys wide influence in Beirut’s southern suburbs, as well as large swaths of the country’s southern and eastern provinces. Hezbollah-allied politicians hold two Cabinet minister positions, though the group's ties have soured with Lebanon’s top political authorities, who have been critical of Hezbollah’s decision to enter the war last month and who have since criminalized the group's military activities in the country.

The Israeli military has continued an invasion into southern Lebanon, which some Israeli officials have said aims to create a “security zone” from the border to the Litani River, some 30 kilometers (20 miles) to the north.

Israel’s defense minister says hundreds of thousands of people uprooted from southern Lebanon will not be allowed to return home until the area is demilitarized and Israel believes its northern communities are safe. Hezbollah, though weakened in its last war with Israel that ended in November 2024, still fires drones, rockets and artillery daily into northern Israel and on ground troops inside Lebanon.

The Israeli and Lebanese governments are meeting to discuss ways to ensure long-term security on Israel’s northern border and support for Lebanon seeking to take control of its territory and political future from Iran-backed Hezbollah, a U.S. State Department official said. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly about the talks.

They will be the first talks between the two since 1993.

Lebanon's top political authorities, critical of Hezbollah's decision to fire rockets towards Israel on March 2 in solidarity with Iran, quickly proposed direct talks in a bid to stop the escalation, hoping that Israel would not launch its ground invasion. Israel did not respond positively until last week, after it launched 100 strikes across the country, including in the heart of the Lebanese capital.

Beirut wants a truce as a prerequisite to talks, similar to Pakistan-brokered negotiations between the U.S. and Iran.

“Israel’s destruction of Lebanese territories is not the solution, nor will it yield any results,” said Lebanese President Joseph Aoun Monday, who came to power vowing to disarm non-state groups including Hezbollah. “Diplomatic solutions have consistently proven to be the most effective means of resolving armed conflicts globally.”

Israel has ruled out a ceasefire.

Foreign Minister Gideon Saar Tuesday denied having disputes with Lebanon, and said "the problem is Hezbollah."

“Hezbollah has also its financial roots, there are a lot of dimensions holding this organization, practically keeping Lebanon under Iranian occupation,” Saar said.

Hezbollah and its supporters are critical of the direct talks, calling them a free concession to Israel unless there is first an end to the war and a pullout of Israeli troops from the country.

Hezbollah Secretary-General Naim Kassem delivered a fiery speech calling on Lebanon to cancel the talks. Hezbollah wants a return to the 2024 agreement under which talks were conducted indirectly with the U.S., France and the United Nations peacekeeping mission in southern Lebanon as mediators.

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Lee reported from Washington. Associated Press writer Toqa Ezzidin in Cairo contributed to this report.

“We have proposed to Germany a bilateral drone deal covering various types of drones, missiles, software and modern defense systems. Our teams are starting concrete work,” Zelenskyy said at a joint news conference with Chancellor Friedrich Merz during a visit to Berlin.

Merz said that Germany’s commitment to supporting Kyiv's war effort is “a very clear signal” to Russia.

“We will not waver in our efforts to defend Ukraine,” he said.

U.S.-led diplomatic efforts to end Russia’s war on its neighbor have recently petered out as the Iran war grips the Trump administration’s attention, although Tammy Bruce, the deputy U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, told the U.N. Security Council on Monday that Washington “will continue to push for a negotiated and durable end” to the war.

Russia has occupied about 20% of Ukraine so far. That includes the Crimean Peninsula, which Russia seized in 2014.

Weapon production funding

Ukraine has the capacity to produce twice as much military equipment as it's currently deploying, but lacks funding to step up production, according to Zelenskyy.

“We simply don’t have enough money,” he said.

A key to unlocking that potential lies in obtaining a promised loan of 90 billion euros ($106 billion) from the European Union, which had been held up by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, but his impending departure from office after a weekend election could now free up the money.

Ukraine needs those funds “urgently,” Merz said.

Ukrainian Defense Minister Mykhailo Fedorov, who accompanied Zelenskyy to Berlin, said Germany and Ukraine agreed a defense package valued at 4 billion euros ($4.7 billion). The agreement is “a massive boost” for Ukraine's air defense against Russian barrages, Fedorov said on X, allowing Kyiv to buy “several hundred” American-made Patriot missiles.

After Berlin, Zelenskyy was due to visit Norway, another important financial and military ally, while defense leaders from the 50-plus partner nations who regularly gather to coordinate weapons aid for Kyiv will hold an online meeting Wednesday, Ukraine’s Defense Ministry said.

Ukrainian troop shortfall

Kyiv is heavily reliant on U.S. intelligence for targeting inside Russia and needs more sophisticated American-made air defense systems to stop Russian missile attacks on its power grid. If the Iran war drags on, it could erode vital U.S. support for Kyiv, Zelenskyy fears.

Furthermore, the Ukrainian army is short-handed, facing around 200,000 troop desertions and draft-dodging by around 2 million people, Fedorov said in January.

Germany will help Kyiv facilitate the return home of Ukrainian men of military age, Merz said.

“We need rapid, tangible progress here,” he said.

Domestically developed unmanned platforms are playing a vital role in holding back Russia's invasion. Ukraine makes air and sea drones, missiles that have reached around 1,750 kilometers (1,000 miles) into Russia, as well as battlefield robots that help make up for its troop shortage.

Ukraine has been approached about security cooperation, especially battle-tested drone production, by eight Middle East and Gulf countries, as well as Turkey, Iraq and countries in Southeast Asia and Africa, Zelenskyy said on Monday.

Ukraine reportedly posts battlefield successes

Despite its handicaps, Western analysts and officials say Ukraine has in recent months recorded battlefield successes against Russia’s bigger army, disrupting a spring offensive started by Russia amid improving weather, as fields dry out and new foliage on tree lines offers more cover.

Meanwhile, the long-range drones and missiles that Kyiv designs and produces are repeatedly striking oil facilities and manufacturing plants deep inside Russia.

Ukraine “is in a much better place than it has been at any stage in this horrific war,” Finnish President Alexander Stubb said at the Brookings Institution in Washington on Monday.

Ukraine “is on top from a military perspective,” Stubb said, noting that last month Ukraine fired more drones and missiles at Russia than vice versa.

Moscow has also claimed progress on the battlefield. Independent verification of each side’s claims wasn't possible.

Russian attacks on Ukraine kill 5 civilians

Meanwhile, a Russian missile attack on the eastern Ukraine city of Dnipro killed four people and left 21 hospitalized with injuries, 10 of them in serious condition, regional authorities said Tuesday.

The city’s attorney general’s office said the victims, all civilians, were driving or walking past the scene of the strike in the city, 485 kilometers (300 miles) southeast of Kyiv.

Elsewhere, a 52-year-old woman was killed in a Russian drone strike in the southern city of Kherson that also left one man seriously wounded, authorities said.

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Hanna Arhirova reported from Kyiv, Ukraine. Derek Gatopoulos contributed to this report from Kyiv.

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

Leo’s visit to Annaba, the modern-day Hippo, was a spiritual homecoming for the American pope on his second full day in Algeria. He arrived Monday on a first-ever papal visit, against the backdrop of his calls for peace that have sparked a feud with U.S. President Donald Trump over the war in Iran. It's the first stop on Leo’s four-country Africa tour.

The pope arrived at the ruins in a rainstorm and with tight security, with sharpshooters positioned around the site and policemen stationed every few yards (meters) along roads leading to it.

Leo prayed under under a tent looking out over the ruins of the ancient Roman city, including its theater, market and basilica where Augustine preached and the adjoining baptistry. In a sign of peace, he planted an olive tree and watched as white doves were set free.

Accompanied by the current head of his Augustinian religious order, the Rev. Joseph Farrell, Leo then walked amid the muddy ruins for a few minutes, pausing to listen to an Algerian choir.

Leo proclaimed himself a “son of St. Augustine” on the night of his election and has cited Augustine prolifically in his first year, making clear that he's the guiding inspiration of Leo's pontificate. For this trip, Leo is focusing on Augustine as a bridge-builder as he aims to press a message of peace and Christian-Muslim coexistence.

“God’s heart is torn apart by wars, violence, injustice and lies,” Leo later told a small gathering of nuns and elderly people in Annaba.

The visit also draws attention to the North African origins of Augustine, who spent only five years in Italy but is often seen through a Eurocentric lens as one of the greatest Western thinkers of Christianity for his writings on truth, evil, creation and grace.

Leo's Augustinian religious order was founded in Italy in the 13th century, inspired by the saint.

A life in North Africa, looking to Rome

St. Augustine was born in 354 to a Berber mother and Roman father in Thagaste, today the Algerian city of Souk Ahras near the border with Tunisia. At the time, the swath of North Africa was part of the Roman Empire, including Carthage in today’s Tunisia, where Augustine was educated and taught rhetoric.

He left North Africa for Rome in 383 and then Milan, where he converted to Christianity. He returned to his homeland soon thereafter, founded a monastery at Hippo where he developed the rule of his order in use today, emphasizing community life. He became a bishop and in Hippo wrote some of the most important works in the Western canon, including “Confessions” and “The City of God.”

A new book, “Augustine the African,” by Catherine Conybeare, an Augustine scholar at Bryn Mawr college in Pennsylvania, explores Augustine from his perspective: As a North African, looking to Rome as the center of his universe but feeling insecure there about his Punic-accented Latin.

“One of the most important thinkers in the Western intellectual tradition actually came from Africa, spent almost his whole life in Africa,” Conybeare told The Associated Press. “How does that change things?”

“Of course, because his successors — the people who carried on his heritage — were in Europe, they got to tell the story,” she said. And Europe got his body: After Augustine died in Hippo in 430, his body was taken eventually to Pavia, Italy, though a forearm remains in the basilica dedicated to him in Annaba.

In welcoming Leo, President Abdelmadjid Tebboune expressed the “immense pride” Algerians feel over St. Augustine. He called him “a cherished son of this land, which having been his first cradle, proudly became his initial resting place.”

A personal visit for Leo

Leo made clear en route to Algeria and in remarks to Algerian authorities how deeply personal and important this visit is to him, because of his spiritual connection to St. Augustine. He had visited twice before, while he was superior of the Augustinian order.

“This journey, which is very special for several reasons, was supposed to be the first of my pontificate,” Leo told reporters on the papal plane. “As early as last May, I had said that on my first journey, I would like to visit Africa. Several people immediately suggested Algeria because of St. Augustine.”

In the end, other trips intervened, but he kept the appointment.

The saint, he said, represents “a very important bridge in interreligious dialogue" that the world could use today.

“We must always seek bridges to build peace and reconciliation," he said. "This journey, then, truly represents a valuable opportunity to continue with the same voice, with the same message, that we wish to convey: to promote peace, reconciliation, respect and consideration for all peoples.”

Also Tuesday, Leo was visiting a small community of Augustinians in Annaba. He was finishing the day by celebrating Mass at the Basilica of St. Augustine, the 19th century basilica overlooking the ruins of Hippo which contains the relic of the saint. Thousands of pilgrims visit the basilica each year, including Muslims.

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

Local 99 of the Service Employees International Union announced on social media that it won a tentative agreement with “major gains” including raises and more hours. The district announced that an agreement in principle had been reached with SEIU Local 99 allowing schools to be open Tuesday and they would work to finalize the details of a tentative agreement.

SEIU Local 99 said the tentative deal also included protections against subcontracting, stopped IT layoffs and increased staffing. SEIU Local 99 told members to report to work as usual on Tuesday and thanked its fellow unions and the Los Angeles community, saying the “victory belongs to ALL of us.”

Teachers, principals and staff had been prepared to walk out for a strike if the deal was not reached. Unions representing teachers and principals reached tentative contract agreements with nation’s second-largest school district over the weekend.

All three unions that represent about 70,000 workers across the Los Angeles Unified School District had pledged to go on strike if any of the three did not reach a tentative agreement.

The three unions have never gone on strike at the same time — administrators have remained on duty during previous teacher walkouts to help keep schools open. That was the case in 2023 when Local 99 workers went on strike and teachers joined them for three days. About 150 of the district's 1,000 schools remained open.

Experts say the surge is part of a seasonal phenomenon, but a combination of timing, weather and biology is making them especially noticeable right now.

Lovebugs, scientifically known as Plecia nearctica, typically appear twice a year in Texas, usually in the spring and fall. But every few years, populations spike, leading to the kind of swarms many Houstonians are seeing now.

One of the biggest reasons for the current explosion is recent weather conditions. Rain and moisture create the perfect environment for lovebug larvae to develop in soil and decaying vegetation. When conditions are right, large numbers emerge at once.

Once they emerge, their life cycle adds to the problem. Adult lovebugs only live about three to five days, but during that time, their sole purpose is to mate, often while flying in pairs, and lay eggs. Because they emerge in massive waves, even a short lifespan can feel like a prolonged invasion.

They’re also particularly drawn to Houston’s environment. Lovebugs are attracted to:

• Vehicle exhaust, which mimics the smell of decaying organic matter where they lay eggs
• Highways and traffic, which is why they seem worse during commutes
• Light-colored surfaces, like cars and buildings

That’s why drivers across the Houston area are feeling the impact the most, with insects splattering across windshields and even clogging radiators in extreme cases.

Timing also plays a role. Lovebugs are most active during the day, especially from mid-morning to late afternoon, which overlaps with peak driving hours.

Despite the frustration, experts say lovebugs are harmless to humans. They don’t bite or sting, and they actually play a helpful role in the ecosystem. Their larvae break down decaying plant material, and adults help with pollination.

The good news: the swarm won’t last forever.

These outbreaks typically peak within a couple of weeks and fade as quickly as they arrive.

Until then, Houstonians, we may just have to ride it out and keep our windshields clean.

The IMF downgraded its forecast for global growth to 3.1% in 2026 from the 3.3% it had forecast back in January. The expected growth would mark a deceleration from a 3.4% expansion in 2025.

U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran — and Tehran's closing of the Strait of Hormuz and retaliatory strikes on oil refineries and other energy infrastructure in neighboring countries — have driven oil and gas prices sharply higher around the world.

As a result, the IMF marked up its expectation for global inflation this year to 4.4% from 4.1% in 2025 and from the 3.8% it had forecast for this year in January.

Until the war, the world economy had shown surprising resilience in the face of President Donald Trump's protectionist policies, which built a wall of import taxes around the United States, the world's biggest economy and once a market practically wide open to imports. The damage was less than feared partly because Trump's tariffs last year ended up being lower than what he'd originally announced.

A tech boom, marked by massive investment in data centers and artificial intelligence, and rising productivity also combined to strengthen the world economy.

"War in the Middle East has halted this momentum,'' IMF chief economist Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas wrote in a blog post accompanying the fund's latest World Economic Outlook.

The IMF's forecast assumes that conflict in the Persian Gulf is short-lived and that energy prices rise "a moderate 19%'' this year. Things could be much worse. In a “severe scenario'' in which the energy shocks spill into next year and central banks are forced to raise interest rates to combat inflation, global growth could drop to 2% in 2026 and 2027. ”Despite the recent news of a temporary ceasefire, some damage is already done, and the downside risks remain elevated,'' Gourinchas wrote.

The fund slightly downgraded its forecast for U.S. growth this year to 2.3%. The 21 European countries that share the euro currency, hard hit by soaring natural gas prices, will collectively grow 1.1% this year, down from 1.4% in 2025, the IMF forecast.

Hardest hit are likely to be deeply indebted poorer countries that import energy and can't afford to buffer their economies with stepped-up government spending and tax relief. The IMF sharply lowered the outlook for Sub-Saharan Africa, for instance, to 4.3% this year from the 4.6% it had expected in January.

One winner that's emerging from the conflict is Russia, an energy exporter that stands to benefit from higher prices. The IMF upgraded its forecast for the Russian economy, hard hit by sanctions following the invasion of Ukraine in 2022, to a still-modest 1.1%.

Meanwhile, the governor of the National Bank of Ukraine has tried to keep Russia’s war in his country at the center of talks among global economic leaders. But in a Monday interview with reporters, Andriy Pyshnyy noted how higher oil prices due the war in Iran are hurting his country.

He said through a translator that annual inflation in March hit 7.9% in Ukraine, well above the forecast of 7% in large part because of higher fuel costs. He estimated that fuel prices could push up annual inflation by 1.5 percentage points to 2.8 percentage points.

Pyshnyy noted that there could also be higher fertilizer and production costs in an economy that is seeking stable prices as part of the ongoing war with Russia, which attacks Ukraine by air on average every 3 to 4 minutes.

“We are trying to walk on a razor blade,” he said of a mission complicated by external factors.

The IMF is a 191-nation lending organization that works to promote economic growth and financial stability and to reduce global poverty.

The clock officially ran out on the proposal late Monday night as the state legislative session ended, a casualty of internal party disagreements. In the end, the Maryland Senate left the bill in a committee, with Democrats who control the chamber concerned it could backfire under judicial review.

The unusual mid-decade redistricting, which started when Trump encouraged Republican-controlled Texas to redraw their map last year, is expected to continue next week. Republicans want to change congressional boundaries during a special legislative session in Florida, while Democrats are asking voters to approve a redistricting referendum in Virginia.

But Democrats will not be poised to pick up a seat in Maryland, where the proposed map would have made it easier for voters to oust the state's lone Republican member of the U.S. House.

Moore disagreed with another powerful Maryland Democrat on plans

Moore, a potential 2028 presidential candidate, said he disagreed with another powerful Maryland Democrat, state Senate President Bill Ferguson, about “what is required to be able to make sure we’re fighting back” against Trump.

“This is not a political game to me,” Moore said in an interview with The Associated Press. “I don’t look at this as some kind of political talking point. I look at the fact that I think Donald Trump is actively trying to manipulate and change the rules around the November election and beyond because he knows he cannot win on his policies.”

Ferguson has said redistricting could actually cost Democrats seats in Maryland because, in the inevitable legal battle that would ensue, a court could order a new map that would be even less favorable to the party. He refused to budge despite pressure from Moore and U.S. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries.

While speaking at National Action Network in New York on Thursday with the Rev. Al Sharpton, Moore complained that Trump was urging some states to redraw maps to favor Republicans, while telling other states to “sit on your hands.”

“Don’t play with me,” Moore said. “And if the rest of the country is going to have this conversation about mid-decade redistricting, then so should Maryland, and so should every other state. Because until it is done nationally, we have to make sure that this election is not stolen right before our face so this pain is made permanent.”

But while Moore named a panel in November that proposed the new map for Maryland, the governor could not prevail on the heavily Democratic Maryland Senate to approve it.

When it was before the Democratic-controlled General Assembly, the governor told lawmakers in January that the state needed to act to counter what he called “political redlining” by Trump in other states at the cost of Black representation in Congress.

Moore, who is the nation's only serving Black governor, compared Trump’s push for Republican-friendly redistricting to discriminatory housing practices, saying the president and his allies “are doing everything in their power to silence the voices and trying to eliminate Black leadership — elected leadership — all over this country.”

Democrats outnumber Republicans 2-1 in Maryland and already hold a 7-1 advantage in the state’s U.S. House delegation, with Rep. Andy Harris the lone GOP representative.

The Maryland House passed legislation containing a new map in early February, but the measure ran into opposition from Ferguson.

The senator pointed out a map adopted in 2021 that would have made it easier to flip Harris’ seat was ruled unconstitutional by a judge who called it “a product of extreme partisan gerrymandering.” Maryland passed another map in 2022, and the parties dropped their legal fight.

Meanwhile, here's a look at what's happening in other states this month in mid-decade redistricting efforts:

Florida

Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis has scheduled a special session next week for the Republican-dominated Legislature to draw new congressional districts.

Currently, 20 of Florida’s 28 congressional seats are held by Republicans.

Congressional districts in Florida that are redrawn to favor Republicans could carry big consequences for Trump’s plan to reshape districts in GOP-led states, which could give Republicans a shot at winning additional seats in the midterm elections and retaining control of the closely divided U.S. House.

Virginia

Early balloting has already begun for a vote on a constitutional amendment for a new congressional map in Virginia next week.

After a cascade of redistricting efforts, Republicans believe they can win a combined nine more U.S. House seats in Texas, Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio, while Democrats think they can win a total of six more seats in California and Utah. Virginia could give Democrats an extra four seats.

Vitale said Monday that biopsy results had confirmed a diagnosis of melanoma in his lung and liver cavity, which will have him starting immunotherapy. It marks his fifth battle with cancer, which sidelined him from the airwaves for two years before his return shortly before March Madness in 2025.

“I've beaten melanoma,” the 86-year-old Vitale said in a statement released by ESPN. “I've beaten lymphoma. I've beaten vocal-cord cancer. I've beaten lymph-node cancer. I'm 4 for 4 and I'm fully confident I'm going to make it 5 for 5."

Separate from his ESPN statement, Vitale posted on social media Monday that he had gone through 10 days of testing that included scans, MRIs, bloodwork and a biopsy.

"I obviously did not get the report today that I was hoping for when my oncologist called,” Vitale said, noting he planned on “winning the battle” and adding: “Now at least I know what I face.”

Vitale has made himself a fixture in college basketball, earning the affectionate nickname “Dickie V” with his voice and exuberant style offering a soundtrack to some of the biggest moments in the sport's history. He's inching closer to five decades with ESPN going back to its 1979 launch, armed with a contract through the 2027-28 season as well as the creation of a basketball event named in his honor this past season.

And every step of the way he's quick to tell anyone and everyone how “lucky” he feels to still be working after years of fighting cancer.

That started in 2021 with melanoma, followed by treatments for lymphoma. There were also chemotherapy treatments, radiation for vocal-cord cancer and surgery by summer 2024 to remove cancerous lymph nodes from his neck, while he was unable to speak for a time after the vocal-cord surgery, leaving him having to scribble on eraser-board messages to communicate.

Still, Vitale said in his ESPN statement that he feels “fantastic." And he quickly turned the focus of his statement to his long-running efforts to raise money for pediatric cancer research, notably with next month’s annual gala in his name that has raised more than $105 million in its two-decade history.

“At 86 years young, I've lived a hell of a life, and I'm more motivated than ever to raise money for kids battling cancer,” Vitale said, adding that he hopes to raise $12 million with the 21st “Dick Vitale Gala” set for May 1 in Sarasota, Florida.

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AP college basketball: https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-college-basketball-poll and https://apnews.com/hub/college-basketball

“I’m not really sure I have words to describe that feeling, what that meant,” Fudd said of getting drafted. “I don’t think it’s fully sunk in. It's nothing I could have imagined. The feeling of sitting with my family, with Morgan (Valley), hearing your name called, go up there. Such a surreal feeling,”

Fudd will pair again with former Huskies teammate Paige Bueckers, who was the Wings' top pick last year. Bueckers — who along with Fudd gave UConn a record seven No. 1 selections — was in attendance at the draft along with Fudd's Huskies teammates.

“Paige is an incredible player, everyone knows that,” Fudd said. “She’s someone that makes playing basketball with easy.”

UCLA stars Lauren Betts and Gabriela Jaquez went in the top five, a little over a week after leading the Bruins to their first NCAA championship.

Their teammate, Kiki Rice, went sixth to Toronto, the first pick for the expansion franchise. The Tempo chose to have the higher pick in the college draft after winning a coin toss, giving the Portland Fire the top choice in the expansion draft earlier this month.

UCLA broke UConn’s record of having four players drafted in the first round, a mark the Huskies set in 2002, when Angela Dugalic went ninth to Washington, teaming her again with Betts. And, Giannna Kneepkens was chosen by Connecticut with the last pick of the opening round.

The Bruins later broke the mark for the most players drafted from one team when Charlisse Leger-Walker was selected by Connecticut with the third pick in the second round. Tennessee (1997, 2008), Notre Dame (2019) and South Carolina (2023) held the previous record with five players taken.

The new collective bargaining agreement that was ratified last month gave huge pay raises to rookies. Fudd will make nearly seven-times what Bueckers earned last season as the top choice. The No. 2 and No. 3 picks will get $466,913 and $436,016, respectively.

Second- and third-round picks will make $270,000 — which is more than the previous maximum salary in the old CBA.

“I’m just blessed and grateful to come at this time,” said No. 8 pick Flau'jae Johnson, who was drafted by Golden State before getting traded to Seattle. “The 30th season. My goal is to leave it better than I found it. It’s a gratitude thing, but also a responsibility thing. I’m taking that with full force.”

Minnesota took Olivia Miles of TCU with the No. 2 pick. Miles decided to stay in college last season instead of enter the WNBA draft. She transferred from Notre Dame to the Horned Frogs. She helped the team reach the Elite Eight for the second consecutive year.

“Deep breath that’s why I got emotional,” Miles said of finishing her journey. “It’s finally here, finally heard my name. This is what this was for.”

After Seattle took Spain center Awa Fam Thiam at No. 3, Washington selected the 6-foot-7 Betts before the Chicago Sky followed with Jaquez, who is the sister of Miami Heat player Jaime Jaquez Jr. She now has family bragging rights not only with a national championship, but also was picked higher than him. Jaime was taken 18th in the NBA draft in 2023.

Portland took Spanish guard Iyana Martin Carrion with its first-ever pick. Indiana took South Carolina's Raven Johnson with the 10th pick and Washington drafted Cotie McMahon of Ole Miss next.

Connecticut took French player Nell Angloma with the 12th pick. A second Gamecock went next with Madina Okot drafted by Atlanta. Seattle drafted Duke's Taina Mair with the 14th choice.

The Sun closed out the first round choosing Kneepkens.

International flavor

There were 11 international players taken in the draft who didn't play at a U.S. college, including three in the first round with Fam Thiam, Martin Carrion and Angloma.

Fam Thiam was the highest selected player from Spain ever drafted in the league. Three Spanish players were taken in all.

“Incredibly excited for our country and the global game,” said Marta Suarez, who was drafted by Seattle in the second round before getting traded to Golden State. “The WNBA is growing, attracting talent from all over the world.”

WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert said in her pre-draft press conference that the league planned to play either an exhibition game or a regular-season game overseas next year.

Mother-daughter combo

Fudd and her mother, Katie Smrcka-Duffy Fudd, became the second mother-daughter pair to have been drafted into the WNBA. Smrcka-Duffy Fudd was taken in 2001 by the Sacramento Monarchs in the fourth round, but never played a game. Pam McGee was taken second overall in the 1997 draft, also by Sacramento. Her daughter, Imani McGee-Stafford, was drafted 10th overall by Chicago in 2016.

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

The NASA History Office marked the anniversary of the Apollo 13 accident, recalling one of the most harrowing near-disasters in American space exploration. Two days into the mission, a routine procedure set off a chain of events that would test the limits of human ingenuity and courage.

Disaster strikes 210,000 miles from Earth

Apollo 13 had been on course to land in the Moon’s Fra Mauro region when a routine stirring of the spacecraft’s oxygen tanks triggered a catastrophic failure.

The crew reported hearing a loud bang. Within moments, they discovered oxygen tank 2 was completely empty, and tank 1’s pressure was falling fast.

“Houston, we’ve had a problem,” the crew reported, in words that would become permanently etched in the history of human spaceflight.

The crippled spacecraft was more than 210,000 miles (330,000 km) from Earth. With the crew’s lives on the line, the race to bring them home safely had begun.

Inside mission control

Inside the Mission Operations Control Room, at what is now NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, flight directors and engineers immediately went to work.

Eugene F. Kranz, identifiable by his signature white vest, was on duty as one of four Apollo 13 flight directors tasked with managing the unfolding crisis. A photograph taken during a television transmission just before the accident captures the atmosphere of the room in that pivotal moment.

Visible on the large screen in the control room was astronaut Fred W. Haise Jr., Apollo 13’s lunar module pilot, a glimpse of the crew just before their mission changed forever.

A crew, a crisis, a comeback

Apollo 13 carried Commander Jim Lovell, Command Module Pilot Jack Swigert, and Lunar Module Pilot Fred W. Haise Jr.

In the hours and days that followed the explosion, NASA engineers and the crew worked together in real time, using the lunar module as a lifeboat to conserve power, water and oxygen for the long journey back to Earth.

The crew splashed down safely on April 17, 1970, a testament to the skill, determination and teamwork of everyone involved.

NASA would later describe the mission as a “successful failure,” a catastrophe that, remarkably, never claimed a life.

The message comes as Distracted Driving Awareness Month is underway, and new data is raising serious concerns about driver behavior in Texas.

According to the safety app Life360, about 70% of trips in Houston involve drivers using their phones, based on data from more than 100 million users worldwide.

The findings place Texas among the most distracted states in the country, with risky habits happening at an alarming rate.

Data shows Friday is the most dangerous day to drive, with 68% of trips involving phone use.

The most dangerous times are during the morning and afternoon rush.

Teens are the most distracted, with 73% of trips involving phone activity, while grandparents are considered the safest drivers.

Experts say the numbers highlight a growing and dangerous trend.

“Having an honest conversation as a family about how problematic this is and making sure people understand how much distracted driving leads to crashes and, unfortunately, fatalities. It’s a real problem,” said Mike Zeman with Life360.

The Texas Department of Transportation urges drivers to take simple steps to avoid distractions, including keeping both hands on the wheel and eyes on the road, putting phones out of reach or using settings to block notifications, and pulling over in a safe place if a call or message is necessary.

With more drivers relying on smartphones for navigation, music and communication, officials say staying focused behind the wheel is critical as distracted driving continues to rise.

The 18-year-old attacker, armed with a shotgun, fired randomly inside a vocational high school in Siverek, Sanliurfa province. He later killed himself with the same shotgun after being “cornered by police,” Gov. Hasan Sildak said.

The attack left 10 students, four teachers, a canteen employee and a police officer hurt, Sildak said. While most of them were being treated in Siverek, five of the teachers and students were transferred to a hospital in the provincial capital because their conditions were more serious, the governor said.

The motive for the attack remains unclear. School shootings are rare in Turkey.

The attacker did not have a criminal record, Sildak said. The school had been declared safe and no permanent police officer was assigned to protect it, he added, calling the shooting an “isolated incident.”

NTV television and other media reports said the assailant had threatened an attack on the school on social media prior to the shooting.

One student told the state-run Anadolu Agency that he and a friend jumped out of their classroom window to flee the attacker.

“He suddenly entered the classroom and fired. He fired four or five times. Two people were hit. He then went into the next classroom,” Anadolu quoted Omer Furkan Sayar as saying. “We first threw ourselves to the ground and then two of us jumped out of the window.”

Sayar continued: “He didn't say anything, he entered and started to shoot directly.”

Earlier, media reports said all students were evacuated and police special operations units were deployed after the assailant refused to surrender.

“The individual was cornered inside the building through police intervention and died after shooting himself," Sildak told reporters, adding that a “comprehensive” investigation into the shooting would be carried out.

Video footage showed dozens of students running out of the school toward the gate and onto the street.

A $5,000 reward is being offered by Texas EquuSearch for any information on Ashanti Allen’s whereabouts.

According to search officials, Allen was last seen April 8 leaving her apartment complex in near 8700 Main Street in Houston. She was reported missing on April 10 and her disappearance is now the focus of an ongoing missing persons investigation.

Allen’s mother, Trisa Gaines Colbert, said she received a strange text from her daughter’s cellphone on April 10, reading, “I’m leaving and never coming back.”

“That was suspicious to me, so when I saw that, I instantly went up to her apartment, knocked, and no one was there,” Colbert stated. “I looked in the garage, and the vehicle was also missing.”

EquuSearch says Allen’s case is especially concerning because she is in the late stages of a high-risk pregnancy, raising urgency for search efforts.

Colbert said she got access to her daughter’s home and saw her clothes and the baby’s clothes were still inside.

Investigators say it is unclear what Allen was wearing when she disappeared. Authorities are also looking for her vehicle, described as a white Lincoln MKX SUV.

Colbert stated Allen has been using a wheelchair to get around as she was struggling to walk due to her recently passing out while pregnant.

“She was barely getting around,” Colbert said.

Colbert said Allen’s apartment complex’s surveillance video shows Allen and another person leaving the complex before her disappearance.

“I just feel hopeless and devastated,” Colbert said.

Colbert made a heartfelt plea directly to her daughter.

“Baby, we’re all looking for you. We want you back and safe. This is your first baby coming. My grandson. We just want you to be back,” she said.

Anyone with information about Allen’s whereabouts or details related to her disappearance is urged to contact the Houston Police Department at 832-394-1840 or Texas EquuSearch at 281-309-9500.

Officials say the search remains active as crews and volunteers work to locate her safely.

Houston police responded to reports of a shooting in the 5700 block of Gessner around 8 p.m.

When they arrived, they said they discovered two men had been fighting in the parking lot when one of them took out a gun and shot the other.

Police said the only information they have about the suspect is that he’s in his 20s and left in a red vehicle.

A raffle in France is offering the chance to win a $1 million portrait by the Spanish artist for the price of a 100-euro ticket ($117), with proceeds going to Alzheimer’s research. The draw takes place later Tuesday at Christie’s auction house in Paris.

The third iteration of the “1 Picasso for 100 euros” lottery is for Picasso's “Head of a Woman," with proceeds going to Alzheimer’s research.

The gouache on paper was painted by Picasso in 1941.

The first such raffle in 2013 saw a Pennsylvania man who worked at a fire-sprinkler business win “Man in the Opera Hat,” which the Spanish master painted in 1914 during his Cubist period.

The oil-on-canvas “Still Life” was raffled off in 2020 and made a very happy mom of Claudia Borgogno, an accountant in Italy whose son bought her the ticket as a Christmas present.

Painted in 1921, that painting was purchased for the raffle from billionaire art collector David Nahmad, who argued in an Associated Press interview that Picasso would have approved of raffling his work. Picasso died in 1973.

The Alzheimer Research Foundation, the charity raffle’s organizer, is based in one of Paris’ leading public hospitals and says it has become France’s leading private financier of Alzheimer-related medical research since its founding in 2004.

The organizers’ online sales platform said the number of tickets for Tuesday's draw have been capped at 120,000, meaning it could net 12 million euros ($14 million) if they’re all sold.

Of that, 1 million euros will be paid to the Opera Gallery, an international art dealership that owns the painting.

Organizers said the two previous Picasso raffles raised a total of more than 10 million euros for cultural work in Lebanon and water and hygiene programs in Africa.

We have a bunch of breaking news from overnight to jump right into, so let’s get into it.

There was a deadly pedestrian crash on the South Loop that had the freeway shut down for multiple hours on Tuesday morning. Police said the driver who hit the pedestrian will likely not face charges since they tried to avoid the crash.

Then, we had two shootings. In one of the shootings, which happened in west Houston, two men were shot after police said they had been in an ongoing fight. Police said one of the men shot the other first, and then the other man managed to take the gun and shoot back.

The last shooting happened at a gas station on Gessner. Police said the two men got into a fight and one person was shot to death. The suspect is currently on the run.

To read more, click here.

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TODAY:85 ° TONIGHT: 70°

KPRC 2 Meteorologist says:

“We enter into a much quieter weather pattern after this past weekend’s powerful storms. The most organized severe weather and flash flooding risks are focused on Central Texas. Houston will only see a few hit-or-miss showers through the end of the week, with any areas of true concern focused on the central part of our state.”

Get your forecast details here.

TOP STORIES

Houston-area man facing federal charges for attack targeting OpenAI founder Sam Altman

Federal and local authorities say a Houston-area man accused of targeting Sam Altman carried out a “planned and deliberate” attack in San Francisco that is now being treated as an act of domestic terrorism.

During a Monday evening press conference, officials with the San Francisco Police Department, Federal Bureau of Investigation, and prosecutors outlined new details in the case against Daniel Moreno-Gama, 20, who they say traveled from Texas to California to carry out the attack.

‘A crisis situation’: State threatens to pull public safety funding over ordinance limiting when HPD can call ICE

Houston Mayor John Whitmire says he is considering all options after receiving a letter from the State of Texas threatening to pull $110 million in state public safety grants from the city over its recently passed ordinance limiting when the Houston Police Department can call U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

Camp Mystic official says he didn’t see flood warnings issued the day before storm hit

The director of the Texas summer camp where 27 campers and counselors were killed by a devastating flood in 2025 testified Monday that he did not see official warnings issued the day before the storm hit, that staff had no meetings about the pending danger and that they did not make the call to evacuate until it was too late.

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The shooting happened in the 12600 block of Ashford Meadow Drive.

Westside officer are at a shooting scene 12600 Ashford Meadow. Two adult males transported in stable condition. Initial information is the males shot each other during an altercation. 202 pic.twitter.com/ZzeMoiShyT

— Houston Police (@houstonpolice) April 14, 2026

Police say the initial information they have is that the two men shot each other during a fight.

Lt. Larry Crowson says that after being shot, one of the men was able to take away the gun from the other man and shoot him with his own gun.

Both men have been transported to a hospital. They are in serious, but stable condition and are expected to survive.

Crowson said they are looking for witnesses and gathering more information. They will then present their findings to the district attorney’s office to see if any charges will be filed.

Officers with the Pasadena police department responded to reports of a man with multiple stab wounds on 500 Mobile around 2:30 a.m.

When officers arrived, they said the man was lying in the roadway with a pool of blood around him.

The man was transported to the hospital, where he later died.

There’s no word on whether any suspects have been arrested.

Wafiq Safa, a high-ranking member of Hezbollah's political council, spoke on the eve of the talks expected in Washington between Lebanese and Israeli ambassadors to the U.S. It will be the first time in decades that envoys from Lebanon and Israel, which do not have diplomatic relations, meet face-to-face in direct talks.

“As for the outcomes of this negotiation between Lebanon and the Israeli enemy, we are not interested in or concerned with them at all," Safa told The Associated Press.

"We are not bound by what they agree to,” he added in a rare interview with international media. He spoke next to a cemetery as an Israeli drone buzzed overhead.

Historic negotiations at a sensitive time

Lebanese officials are looking to broker a ceasefire in the Israel-Hezbollah war in the U.S. talks.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, meanwhile, has said the goal is Hezbollah's disarmament and a potential peace agreement between Lebanon and Israel. Shosh Bedrosian, a spokesperson for Netanyahu said Monday that there will be no ceasefire with Hezbollah.

Separately, in U.S.-Iran peace talks held last weekend in Pakistan, Iran has sought to include Lebanon in any ceasefire deal of its own with the U.S. Israel and the U.S. have insisted Lebanon would not be a part of it.

Hours after Tehran and Washington announced a truce last Wednesday, Israel launched more than 100 strikes across Lebanon, including in densely packed residential and commercial areas of central Beirut.

And though the U.S.-Iran talks broke up without an agreement, Safa said Hezbollah has been informed that Iran “was able to obtain a cessation of attacks" in the entire administrative region of Beirut, Lebanon's capital, including Beirut's southern suburbs — a Hezbollah-strong area known as Dahiyeh.

Israeli strikes on Beirut and its southern suburbs have halted since Wednesday but intense fighting has continued in southern Lebanon.

Hezbollah's entry into the war

Israel and Hezbollah have fought multiple wars since the Iran-backed Lebanese militant group was formed in the 1980s as a guerrilla force fighting against Israel’s occupation of southern Lebanon at the time.

The latest round began on March 2, two days after Israel and the U.S. launched a war on Iran. Hezbollah entered the fray, firing missiles across the border into Israel. Israel responded with aerial bombardment and a ground invasion.

Since then, the war has displaced more than 1 million people in Lebanon and killed more than 2,000, including more than 500 women, children and medical workers. Many Lebanese have blamed Hezbollah for pulling Lebanon into the war, accusing it of acting on behalf of its patron, Iran.

Safa said Hezbollah's actions were preemptive because its leaders believed “Israel was preparing for a second battle with Lebanon” with the aim of destroying Hezbollah.

It was “an appropriate moment for Hezbollah ... to rebuild a new equation” and restore deterrence against Israel, he said, denying any prior deals with Tehran that Hezbollah would enter the war if Iran was attacked.

After a U.S.-brokered ceasefire halted the last Israel-Hezbollah war in November 2024, Israel continued to carry out near-daily strikes in Lebanon that it said aimed to stop the group from rebuilding. Hezbollah wants to avoid a return to that status quo, Safa said.

‘Black Wednesday’

Israel has claimed that its strikes on Lebanon last Wednesday killed more than 250 Hezbollah militants. More than 100 women and children were among the over 350 people killed, according to Lebanon’s health ministry.

That would mean that, according to Israel’s assertion, every adult male killed that day was a Hezbollah member.

“None of our officials or cadres was killed in Beirut," Safa said. ”Those who died in Beirut are 100% civilians." He did not deny that members of the group were killed outside of the Lebanese capital.

Israel claimed to have killed Hezbollah leader Naim Kassem's secretary who was also his nephew, Ali Yusuf Harshi, as well as some high-level commanders.

Safa said Kassem’s secretary was not killed, although “maybe a relative of his was.”

He also confirmed for the first time that he was wounded during the earlier, 2024 Israel-Hezbollah war, after being targeted by two Israeli strikes in Beirut, "but God granted me survival.”

Later Monday in a televised address, Kassem himself urged Lebanon to pull out of direct talks with Israel, calling the negotiations a “free concession” to Israel and the U.S.

Souring relations with the government

Relations between the Lebanese government and Hezbollah — which is not just a militant group but also a political party with a parliamentary bloc — have grown increasingly tense.

The government last year approved a plan to remove all weapons that are not property of the state — its security forces or military — and later said it had largely completed the task south of the Litani River, where Hezbollah militants are now fighting with Israeli forces.

After March 2, the government went further, declaring Hezbollah's armed wing illegal.

Safa said Hezbollah is currently not directly speaking with President Joseph Aoun or Prime Minister Nawaf Salam but that all its communications are going through Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, the head of the Hezbollah-allied Amal party.

Safa said that if there is a ceasefire and a withdrawal of Israeli troops from Lebanon, Hezbollah — which calls itself a “resistance” movement against archenemy Israel — is ready to negotiate with the Lebanese government about the fate of its weapons.

“The issue of resistance weapons is a Lebanese matter that has nothing to do with Israel or the United States,” he said.

The incident happened on the South Loop East at Golfrest Boulevard around midnight.

Houston police said the pedestrian was attempting to cross the highway. They also said the driver attempted to swerve and avoid hitting the pedestrian, but was unable to do so.

The driver is not expected to face any charges.

The highway was shut down for multiple hours, opening just before 5 a.m.

We enter into a much quieter weather pattern after this past weekend’s powerful storms. The most organized severe weather and flash flooding risks are focused on Central Texas. Houston will only see a few hit-or-miss showers through the end of the week, with any areas of true concern focused on the central part of our state.

The big story for Houston this week is less about wet weather and much more about the warmth and humidity. Highs are expected to be well above the typical 80 degrees for this time of year, likely reaching the mid-80s and creeping up near 90 degrees by Saturday. Mornings will start in the 70s, keeping the city on the muggy side.

Weekend cold front brings more storms and lower temperatures:

A cold front is currently forecast to move into Houston Saturday evening into Sunday. This front is expected to bring a line of showers and thunderstorms as it passes, followed by a noticeable cool down.

Sunday highs dip to around 76 degrees and it gets cooler on Monday with a high of 68 degrees. A few mornings next week dip to the 50s.

Exact timing and impact could shift as the week progresses, so we’ll keep you updated.

Tesla’s Giga Texas increased its annual treated water use by more than 200 million gallons in just two years, raising concerns about whether Austin can fulfill its long-term water conservation plans as Elon Musk advances plans for a new semiconductor plant expected to push demand even higher.

From 2023 to 2025, Tesla’s annual treated water use rose about 68% to 556 million gallons becoming Austin Water’s third-largest customer — up from fifth in 2023, according to Austin Water. The increase is raising new concerns about how water limits are applied, as residents are urged to conserve water while large industrial users continue to expand. In March, Musk announced Terafab, a proposed $20-25 billion semiconductor fabrication plant near Giga Texas, also known as the Gigafactory, in eastern Travis County. Environmentalists warn the project could further strain a persistently drought-stricken region and potentially clash with the city’s long-term water planning efforts.

“It’s extremely alarming,” said Paul DiFiore, an environmental attorney who sits on Austin’s Water Forward task force. “All of a sudden, they’re using more water than the vast majority of people in the city.”

Tesla began construction of the Gigafactory in the summer 2020, with the help of $13.9 million tax rebate from Travis County. The factory opened in April 2022 and has since become one of Austin Water’s largest consumers, with usage rising in a short period of time.

Environmental Attorney Sarah Faust, who also sits on Austin’s Water Forward Task Force, said that Tesla was granted a service extension request from Austin Water, a process that does not require City Council approval. Austin Water said it provides water to only a portion of the Gigafactory, and the company’s property extends across the service boundaries of multiple utility providers.

By last fall, the factory had produced 500,000 vehicles — a manufacturing process that, Faust noted, requires a significant amount of water.

In a separate city process first approved in 2018, the city has worked to solidify and refine its 100-year water resource plan known as “Water Forward.” The plan, which was last updated in 2024, is intended to balance water needs against a future of climate change, the possibility of increasingly severe drought and continued growth.

Faust said the task force charged with updating the plan takes into account large commercial consumers, but “when we get new, big users that grow dramatically in a short amount of time, that does cause a little bit more concern.”

She acknowledged that economic development is important, but said as many Austinites are being asked to conserve, the sharp increase in water use raises questions about whether conservation efforts are being applied evenly, or whether large industrial users are operating under different constraints.

“From a policy perspective, from a water planning perspective,” Faust said, “I hope [Austin Water] is utilizing [its tools] to the greatest degree to ensure that as much recycling and reuse is done and that appropriate limits are put on water used for commercial purposes.”

Austin Current reached out to Tesla to ask what is driving the increase in water use, whether it expects demand to rise and what conservation measures are in place or plans to put in place. The company did not respond before publication, leaving key questions about future water demand unanswered.

In a statement, Austin Water said it is required to provide water within its service area for any permitted development. Per the city’s Drought Contingency Plan, the utility could limit or curtail water usage under emergency conditions.

Keisuke Ikehata, a water treatment expert and associate professor of civil engineering at Texas State University, agreed the increase in water use from 2023 to 2025 “is quite a big jump,” one that underscores the scale of industrial demand entering the region

“We really need to be very careful in terms of planning how the industry grows and how our community grows,” he said, “That is certainly a lot of water.”

But Tesla’s current water use in Central Texas may be just the start to much larger demand curve.

New factory could multiply water demand

In March, Musk announced at Austin’s old Seaholm Power Plant plans to build Terafab as part of a joint effort involving SpaceX, Tesla and xAI. The factory would produce chips to power Musk’s vast technology portfolio. When announcing the venture, Musk called it “the most epic chip-building exercise in history by far.”

Ikehata said a typical North American semiconductor plant might require one to two million gallons of water a day, or around 350 to 700 million gallons of water annually, a baseline that underscores how water-intensive chip manufacturing can be.

Reports indicate that at least part of the facility would be built near the Gigafactory in eastern Travis County. But Musk said in an X post last month that Terafab would not fully fit on that campus and would require “thousands of acres.” A Travis County commissioner said the court has only recently been made aware of the plans and has not yet received any formal proposal, leaving key details about water sourcing and infrastructure unresolved.

“It will be far bigger than everything else combined there,” Musk wrote.

If the facility lives up to its promise, Ikehata said it could need several more million gallons of water a day — potentially billions annually — than a typical semiconductor plant. Those millions of gallons of additional water would push total demand far beyond current levels in the area.

“​​They use a lot of water at their facilities,” Ikehata said. Water “is required to clean all kinds of things that they are manufacturing.”

Austin Water told Austin Current it has not yet received a request for water service at the proposed facility.

The water must be extremely pure when cleaning chips, which are exceedingly small and precisely fabricated, he said.

Those chips are in “cars and satellites and cell phones, we need those chips everywhere,” Ikehata said. “The tiniest bit of an error can cause a complete catastrophe.”

Balancing growth against limits

Ikehata acknowledged an ongoing tension in Central Texas: balancing rapid growth with the reality of a limited water supply, a constraint that becomes more acute as large industrial users expand.

“I’m very much supportive of economic growth. I’m an engineer. I love development,” he said. “But I want responsible development… Responsible water use is very important and has to be carefully evaluated. Stakeholders should be involved, and I’d like to see transparency.”

Council Member Ryan Alter echoed Ikehata’s sentiment, saying the economic benefits of bringing Terafab to Austin could be significant, particularly as the region competes for major industrial projects.

“We want those jobs. We want the economic activity that comes along with that,” Alter said. “But we also have to balance the environmental impacts.”

Alter said the key to making the proposal successful in Austin will be strong collaboration between the company and the city, especially as questions about water capacity and long-term supply remain a top concern.

“I think water is the limiting factor of our city,” he said. Alter said large water users could help offset their impact through reuse, infrastructure improvements or other measures that reduce strain on the system, though those solutions would need to scale alongside demand.

“I think there are ways where we can work together so that everyone comes out ahead,” he said. “That’s hopefully the conversation we’re going to have.”

Pending WNBA approval of the sale, the Connecticut Sun will move to Houston next season and will be renamed the Houston Comets.

• RELATED: WNBA returning to Houston, Comets make a return in 2027

In the first round with the 12th pick, the Sun selected Nell Angloma from France, and with the 15th pick (via Minnesota Lynx), Gianna Kneepkens from the recently crowned NCAA Champions, UCLA.

With the 12th pick, we select Nell Angloma! Welcome to Connecticut!#WNBADraft #CTSun pic.twitter.com/oCde78Knte

— Connecticut Sun (@ConnecticutSun) April 14, 2026

Then, in the second round, the Sun went back to UCLA with their selection of Charlisse Leger-Walker and then a UConn selection in the third round, picking forward Serah Williams.

After the selection of Serah Williams, the Sun decided to make a trade.

🚨TRADE ALERT🚨 pic.twitter.com/BZ0EBZWYTe

— Connecticut Sun (@ConnecticutSun) April 14, 2026

Williams was sent to the Portland Fire for Taylor Bigby and the Fire’s 2027 third-round pick.

The WNBA season begins on May 8th, as the Sun will presumably begin their final season before moving to Houston.

But no birthday cake, because sugar isn't healthy for the aging primate.

Fatou, a western lowland gorilla, arrived in what was then West Berlin in 1959. She was believed to be about 2 years old at the time, though her exact birth date isn't known — April 13 is her designated birthday. Gorillas can live for around 35-40 years in the wild and longer in captivity.

Fatou became the zoo’s oldest resident in 2024, following the death of Ingo the flamingo. The bird was believed to be at least 75 and had lived at the zoo since 1955.

Fatou was likely born in the wild in western Africa, but the story goes that a French sailor took her out of Africa and bartered her to cover his bar tab in Marseille, France, according to the Guinness World Records. A French animal trader then reportedly sold her to the zoo.

These days, Fatou lives in an enclosure of her own and prefers to keep her distance from the zoo’s other gorillas in her old age. She's lost her teeth and she suffers from a touch of arthritis and hearing loss.

But Christian Aust, the Berlin Zoo's primate supervisor, said that she's friendly with the zookeepers, if still a bit stubborn.

At 69 years old, she's earned it. Alles Gute zum Geburtstag, Fatou.

Trout's second home run of the game bounced off the back wall behind the Angels bullpen in left-center, giving Los Angeles a two-run lead in the eighth inning on a night when Judge had already homered twice to put the New York Yankees ahead.

And there was more drama to come — after two three-time MVPs both homered twice in the same game for the first time in 70 years.

Trent Grisham hit his second homer of the evening (and season) to tie the score in the ninth. Moments later, José Caballero trotted home on Jordan Romano's game-ending wild pitch to give the Yankees a pulsating 11-10 win that stopped a five-game losing streak.

“It was great. That’s baseball for you,” Trout marveled. "It’s what fans want, and to be able to see something like that, pretty cool.”

Only once before had a pair of players already three-time MVPs each homered twice in the same game, according to STATS Perform.

After Stan Musial had gone deep twice, Roy Campanella hit a tying, three-run drive in the ninth for his second of the game and Don Zimmer followed with a walk-off single to lead the Brooklyn Dodgers over the St. Louis Cardinals 9-8 at Ebbets Field on June 21, 1956.

Trout nearly hit a third Monday night. He flied out to Cody Bellinger in front of the center-field wall, leaving the bases loaded in the fourth after the Angels tied the score 4-all with four unearned runs following Caballero's error on Trout's leadoff grounder to shortstop.

Judge had looked forward to crossing paths with Trout in a Yankee Stadium weight room.

“I was going to talk some smack to him after the one he hit all the way to the warning track,” Judge said, “but I didn’t get a chance to and then he answers right back with two big homers for him. You put that guy in a clutch situation, a big moment and he’s going to show up every single time, so it’s fun going back and forth with a guy like that, especially in New York and the Bronx.”

New York had lost five straight after an 8-2 start and had been 0-6 in one-run games.

There were seven home runs that traveled a total of 2,846 feet — more than half a mile — with the Yankees hitting five. Judge's first went 456 feet deep into the left-field bleachers and left the bat at 116.2 mph, the hardest-hit home run of the season.

Grisham and Trout each had five RBIs, and Judge had three.

Baseball's top four active home run leaders were all in the game. Judge, with 374, moved one ahead of teammate Paul Goldschmidt. New York slugger Giancarlo Stanton, who leads active players with 454, missed by about a foot with a double off the center-field wall in the fifth. Trout has 408 homers.

Trout, 34, won AL MVPs in 2014, '16 and '19 but has struggled with injuries for much of the past five seasons.

“He’s the greatest of all time. It’s been fun to watch his whole career, coming up at such a young age and instantly just putting yourself at the top of the list. It's special," Judge said.

Judge, who turns 34 on April 26, won AL MVPs in 2022, ‘24 and ’25.

“Those are two of the greats, so it’s really fun to watch,” Yankees starter Will Warren said.

Judge and Caballero each hit a two-run homer off Yusei Kikuchi for a 4-0 second-inning lead on an unseasonably warm 77-degree night. After Caballero’s error led to the unearned runs off Warren, Grisham pinch hit in the fifth and connected for a three-run drive against Shaun Anderson for a 7-4 lead.

Trout countered with a three-run homer in the sixth against Jake Bird, who was demoted to Triple-A after the game.

Judge’s homer off Anderson leading off the bottom half gave him 47 multi-homer games, one more than Mickey Mantle and trailing only Babe Ruth’s 68 among Yankees.

“To be surrounded by some greats like that, it’s special,” Judge said.

Josh Lowe knotted the score at 8 with a seventh-inning sacrifice fly, and Trout’s two-run drive in the eighth off Camilo Doval put the Angels ahead 10-8 with his 31st multi-homer game. Judge, watching from right field, shook his head.

“Every time he comes to the Bronx, man, he puts on a show," Judge said. "I hate to see it, but it’s fun competing against a guy like that.”

Jazz Chisholm Jr. singled to start the ninth against Jordan Romano, and Grisham reached down and pulled a slider into the right-field seats as the closer put both hands on his head.

Caballero doubled and stole third without a throw. And after Austin Wells walked, Caballero scored when Romano bounced a full-count slider to Ryan McMahon to the backstop on the ninth pitch of the plate appearance.

New York had not won a game while allowing double-digit runs since beating Minnesota 14-12 on July 23, 2019.

Yankees manager Aaron Boone described his own feelings as “tough ... for the belly.”

Then he switched his thoughts to his players.

“You get a lead, then you get another lead, and then it’s gone,” he said. "For the guys, maybe it was good to have a game like that where it was a little messy."

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

Atletico is at home to defend its 2-0 win from the first leg and try to make it to the last four of the European competition for the first time in nearly a decade.

Before last week's first leg, Barcelona beat Atletico 2-1 in Madrid in a Spanish league game on April 4. The teams had already met twice in the Copa del Rey semifinals, when Atletico won 4-0 at home and then advanced to the final despite a 3-0 loss in Barcelona in the second leg.

Atletico last made it to the semifinals in 2017. Barcelona lost to Inter Milan in last year's last four.

Coach Diego Simeone has not ruled out Jan Oblak’s return even though the goalkeeper hasn’t played since March 10 because of a muscle injury. He has been practicing with the squad for the last few days and is expected to be fit to play.

Barcelona coach Hansi Flick has not ruled out midfielder Frenkie de Jong making his first start after a long absence because of a hamstring injury.

Whichever team advances on Tuesday will face Arsenal or Sporting Lisbon in the semifinals. Arsenal won the first leg 1-0 in Lisbon last week. Their second leg in England is on Wednesday.

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

Wearing formal office wear, reading glasses and leather shoes, the 68-year-old leader said he did the impromptu workout to ease any worry about his health at a time when people were already beset with problems sparked by the war in the Middle East.

“I challenge anyone who are saying that I am sick, that they come and exercise with me,” Marcos told reporters. “You come to the gym with me. Let’s see who can lift the weights better.”

“Those people who tell you that I’m sick, that I’m paralyzed, they’re all liars,” Marcos said.

Rumors about the president’s deteriorating health and even death have swirled on social media after he briefly vanished from public view in January then later acknowledged in a video message that he was taken to a hospital for an abdominal ailment that he ascribed to stress and age.

Marcos then laughed off rumors of his demise and said he had been diagnosed with diverticulitis. The condition involves inflammation of small pouches in the digestive tract, usually in the colon, that causes pain, fever, nausea or constipation.

His last hospital checkup a couple of months ago showed he had been cured of that ailment, Marcos said, and added that he was back on normal diet and was regularly exercising.

When asked if he was taking any maintenance medicine, Marcos said he was taking medication for gout and for high blood pressure.

Since taking office in mid-2022, Marcos has grappled with multiple complex problems and political dilemmas.

Those include an increasingly hostile territorial dispute with Beijing in the South China Sea, devastating earthquakes, typhoons and flooding, economic difficulties, tumultuous relations with his vice president and a corruption scandal involving powerful legislators and allies that has sparked public outrage.

The six-time European champion trails 2-0 after the first leg of the quarterfinal in Paris. But it is hoping for the type of Anfield night that saw it rout Barcelona 4-0 in the semifinals in 2019 to overturn a 3-0 first leg loss.

“There is a belief that we can do special things . . . but we need to be very, very, very special," coach Arne Slot said ahead of the match. “We know we need an exceptional performance to go through to the next round.”

Defending champion PSG totally dominated the first leg last week and could have ran up a more commanding lead if it had taken its chances.

Coach Luis Enrique warned his team about the potential to slip up with the semifinals within touching distance.

“You need to be really careful, there could be pitfalls and it could be a trap,” he said. “Everyone says, ‘You won (the first leg) easily and you were much better than (the) opposition.’ It might be the case but things can change so quickly in a football match.”

Barcelona must also overturn a 2-0 first leg loss against Atletico Madrid if it is to advance to the semifinals.

___

James Robson is at https://x.com/jamesalanrobson

___

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

The March export data released by China’s customs agency Tuesday missed analysts’ estimates and was sharply down from the 21.8% export growth recorded for January and February.

Imports last month surged 27.8%, up from the 19.8% year-on-year increase in the first two months of this year.

Technology-related exports including a jump in shipments of semiconductors from China on the global artificial intelligence boom have powered its robust exports in early 2026, but economists say impacts from the prolonged Iran war could affect overall global demand for Chinese exports this year.

“China’s exports have decelerated as the Iran war starts to affect global demand and supply chains,” said Gary Ng, a senior economist for Asia Pacific at French bank Natixis.

Despite the significant rebound in China's export growth in January and February, external demand is likely to weaken due to the war's energy shock, Bank of America economists led by Helen Qiao wrote in a recent research note. The risks will "arise from a persistent global slowdown in overall demand if the conflict lasts longer than currently expected,” they wrote.

But economists, including those from Bank of America, also noted that the energy supply disruptions could further strengthen global demand for China’s renewable energy technologies such as solar cells, wind turbines and electric vehicles, while enduring semiconductor demand on the AI frenzy is expected to help export momentum.

“Despite the energy price shock, exports should stay solid in the coming quarters, thanks to strong demand for semiconductors and green technologies,” wrote Zichun Huang, a China economist at Capital Economics in a note Tuesday.

The late timing of the Lunar New Year, which fell in mid-February, probably also negatively impacted China's export data last month with some holiday-related disruptions spilling over, Huang added.

U.S. President Donald Trump’s elevated tariffs on Chinese exports and tensions between Washington and Beijing have also been straining China’s shipments to the U.S. over the past months, with China stepping up its exports to other regions including Europe, Southeast Asia and Latin America.

Analysts are also closely watching Trump’s planned visit to Beijing in May to meet with Chinese leader Xi Jinping following a delay due to the Iran war.

China's exports to the U.S. fell 26.5% year-on-year in March, widening from a 11% drop in January and February, while those to the European Union and Southeast Asia rose 8.6% and 6.9%, respectively.

Chinese leaders have set an annual economic growth target for 2026 of 4.5% to 5%, the lowest since 1991. China met its “around 5%” economic growth target for 2025 on strong exports — with a record high $1.2 trillion trade surplus — and analysts say exports likely will continue to be a key driver for maintaining economic expansion this year as a prolonged property sector slump in China weighed on domestic demand and investments.

Some economists believe China has so far been relatively well-positioned in shielding itself from the impacts from the Iran war, which has sent fuel prices surging and is threatening worsening global inflation. China’s vast oil reserves and diversified energy sources mean it’s less affected by the fallout from the war, including shipping disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz, a key waterway for energy transport, they said.

Sony Pictures unveiled new footage from “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” Monday at CinemaCon in Las Vegas, in which Zendaya’s character MJ apparently has a boyfriend.

Five years after “Spider-Man: No Way Home” became a sensation in theaters, earning over $1.9 billion worldwide thanks in part to the appearance of past Spider-Men Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield, the webslinger’s fourth standalone movie is one of the most hotly anticipated of the summer. Its trailer already broke records, with over 1 billion views in its first four days.

Tom Holland, in a video message, told the exhibitors in the audience that it’s the most emotional Spider-Man movie yet, and “the most grown-up.” He introduced an early scene in the new film showing the aftermath of his decision at the end of “No Way Home.” In the sequence, he attends a housewarming party for MJ and Jacob Batalon’s Ned and introduces himself as “Maynard … just a neighbor from across the hall.”

Destin Daniel Cretton, who made the Marvel movie “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings” stepped in to direct this newest “Spider-Man,” which opens in theaters on July 31.

Sony Pictures has for years kicked off the annual conference and trade show for movie theater owners, where throughout the week Hollywood's major studios bring out stars and new footage hoping to wow the people putting their films on the big screen. The studio announced the development of an R-rated adaptation of the video game “Bloodborne,” and the release date of “Godzilla Minus One” director Takashi Yamazaki’s English language debut, “Grand Gear,” which will begin filming soon. It’s scheduled to hit theaters on Feb. 18, 2028.

They also debuted new footage from the “Spider-Verse” finale, revealed the title of the next “Jumanji” movie — “Open World” — previewed “Weapons” filmmaker Zach Cregger's “Resident Evil,” and gave the audience a first look at Jeremy Strong playing Mark Zuckerberg in Aaron Sorkin's “The Social Reckoning,” a companion piece to “The Social Network.”

Oscar-winner Mikey Madison (“Anora”) plays Facebook engineer Frances Haugen and Jeremy Allen White is then-Wall Street Journal reporter Jeff Horwitz in the film, which comes out in October. Haugen leaked thousands of pages of internal Facebook records to the Journal, yielding a 2021 investigation known as the “Facebook Files.” The series of stories alleged the social media giant was prioritizing profits over safety and hiding its own research from investors and the public.

“It was time to say more,” said Sorkin, who described this film as “a real David and Goliath story.”

In the footage, Strong's Zuckerberg quips that he's “a professional defendant” and pushes back on an adviser saying, “I’m not two years out of a dorm room anymore.”

Sony Chairman and CEO Tom Rothman said he believes “it’s going to be an Olympic level movie year overall” while also acknowledging the industry’s “serious challenges” including that admissions have been down since before the pandemic.

Studios, he said, need to deliver a variety of great films for all audiences. He also made some recommendations for theaters, imploring them to enforce longer theatrical windows “even if that means you cannot play every film,” to get rid of endless advertising before films and make going to the theater more affordable.

“I’m not heckling,” Rothman said. “I’m rooting for you.”

The lower-key four-day Australian visit comes after the couple announced in 2020 they planned to “step back” as senior royals and to become financially independent in their Californian base.

The Sussexes describe their visit as privately funded, and they flew to Melbourne business class from Los Angeles on a commercial Qantas Airways flight. But there have been public complaints about the added security costs for police agencies as the couple visits Melbourne, Canberra and Sydney.

The cost of security explains why the couple won’t be greeted by thousands of people at public events as they were during their 16-day tour as newlyweds in 2018 to Australia, New Zealand, Fiji and Tonga.

The couple’s children Prince Archie, 6, and Princess Lilibet, 4, are not traveling with them. Meghan announced she was pregnant with their first child while she was in Sydney in 2018.

Melbourne’s Herald Sun newspaper descried the latest visit as a ”faux royal tour to shore up Brand Sussex.”

There have been criticisms of the couple attending paid ticketed events while in Australia.

The Sussexes reject criticisms that the visit is a publicity tour.

“The program is rooted in long-standing areas of work for the Duke and the Duchess, with a clear focus on amplifying organizations delivering measurable impact. The visit prioritises listening, learning and supporting communities rather than promotion,” the Sussexes' office said in a statement.

There were also “a small number of private engagements” to “support broader commercial, charitable and commercial objectives,” the statement said.

Afua Hagan, a media commentator on the British royal family, said the news media typically portrayed the Sussexes as “villains.”

“This is a privately funded trip. To pay for that, they’re going to have to have some commercial interest,” Hagan told Australian Broadcasting Corp.

“If they didn’t have commercial interest, the problem would be: ‘Oh my goodness, these people are leeching off the Royal Family and the taxpayers whether or not they’re making their own money. How dare they make their own money.’ They can’t do right for doing wrong,” Hagan added.

Giselle Bastin, a Flinders University expert on the British royals, said the Sussexes’ decision to use their titles to pursue private interests will be perceived by many as a conflict of interest.

“It’s well known that the Sussexes are in dire need of income and so a staging of a quasi-royal tour to Australia is being regarded as a rather desperate attempt to monetise their status as royalty,” she said.

Their first public engagement was at Melbourne's Royal Children's Hospital. Harry's grandmother Queen Elizabeth II opened the facility in 1963 and his parents, Princess Diana and the then-Prince Charles, visited in 1985.

The Sussexes shook hands with dozens of well-wishers and were filmed by hundreds of onlookers' phones as they entered the hospital foyer.

When asked by a reporter what he looked forward to most about his Australian visit, Harry replied: “Everything.”

“It's good to be back,” he added.

Also in Melbourne, Meghan is scheduled to visit a women’s shelter and Harry a veterans’ art museum.

Harry will visit the Australian War Memorial in the national capital, Canberra. The couple will join an Invictus Australia sailing event on Sydney Harbor.

The 2018, the couple hosted the opening of the Invictus Games in Sydney. Harry founded the sporting event in 2014 where sick and injured military personnel and veterans compete.

Once a leading candidate to replace outgoing Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, Swalwell suspended his campaign — then announced he would resign from Congress — following allegations that he sexually assaulted a woman. A lengthy lineup of remaining candidates is scheduled to gather Tuesday in Sacramento, their first public appearance together since Swalwell's departure reshaped the wide-open contest.

Meanwhile, lawyers said a woman would detail new allegations of misconduct against Swalwell on Tuesday in Beverly Hills.

In a crowded race with no clear leader in the heavily Democratic state, Swalwell's exit presents an opportunity for his one-time rivals to pick off former supporters just weeks before mail ballots go to voters in early May. The outcome of the June 2 primary election featuring more than 50 candidates is unpredictable.

Democrats have feared for months that the large field of candidates dividing the vote could result in the party being locked out of the November election, with only Republicans appearing on the general election ballot under a quirk in the state's election rules.

Republicans, meanwhile, have yet to settle on a preferred candidate. President Donald Trump endorsed conservative commentator Steve Hilton, but Republicans at a state convention did not endorse a candidate for governor, with Hilton splitting support with Chad Bianco, the Riverside County sheriff.

No clear beneficiary with Swalwell out

Swalwell’s decision to suspend his campaign Sunday followed allegations published in the San Francisco Chronicle and later by CNN. He remained defiant, saying, “I will fight the serious, false allegations that have been made — but that’s my fight, not a campaign’s.”

On Monday, he said he planned to resign from Congress but did not provide a date for his departure. He wrote on X that it was unfair for his constituents to have him distracted from his duties. He said he would continue to fight the allegations against him and added, “I must take responsibility and ownership for the mistakes I did make.”

It's difficult to predict where Swalwell's supporters will go, and it's possible they could scatter across the field of seven established Democrats remaining in the race, with some voters losing interest in the contest.

Swalwell is perhaps best known nationally as a House manager in Trump’s second impeachment trial in early 2021, and he didn't have strong ties to Democrats across the state outside his San Francisco Bay Area district.

Democrats have been struggling to find traction with voters.

Billionaire hedge fund manager-turned-liberal activist Tom Steyer has tapped his personal fortune to blanket media with ads. Former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa is trying for a comeback after he flopped in a 2018 run for governor, and Katie Porter is among the leading Democrats after she fell short in a 2024 run for U.S. Senate.

Porter posted a line from a San Francisco Chronicle column on X saying “Democrats can pull victory from the jaws of defeat by coalescing around Porter.” Steyer said he secured the support of a handful of lawmakers, including Rep. Jared Huffman, a Democrat whose coastal district runs north of San Francisco, not far from Swalwell’s home turf. Villaraigosa pitched a new ad promising to lower gas and grocery costs in a state known for its punishing cost of living.

While Swalwell has suspended his campaign, his name cannot be removed from the ballot.

“Nobody has really caught fire,” said Democratic consultant Andrew Acosta, who is not involved in the campaign. Swalwell’s supporters “will scatter out to other candidates.”

Many Democrats hoped former Vice President Kamala Harris, or U.S. Sen. Alex Padilla, would enter the contest, but they declined.

Lawmakers switch support

In Sacramento, a handful of state lawmakers quickly switched their support from Swalwell to Steyer. Democratic Assemblymember Nick Schultz said he believes Steyer will put in the work to form strong relationships with the legislature. Steyer’s business background — he has never held public office — means he’ll challenge the status quo, Schultz added.

Democratic Assemblymember Corey Jackson — who also shifted to Steyer — said he wanted to back a candidate who had a legitimate chance of winning. He said in a statement that he and Steyer shared a “commitment to building an economy rooted in dignity for working people.”

San Jose’s Democratic Mayor Matt Mahan, running for governor in his first statewide election, sought to distinguish his record from Steyer and Hilton, the Republican candidate known for hosting a show on Fox News for six years.

With Swalwell out, “now we have a field that’s got a billionaire who made his fortune investing in private prisons, ICE facilities, oil and gas companies … and a MAGA-backed TV commentator on the other hand,” Mahan said on MS NOW’s “Morning Joe.”

“California deserves so much better,” Mahan said.

Swalwell’s swift downfall came amid rising pressure for him to leave Congress. He earlier lost the support of powerful labor unions that had backed his candidacy, along with one-time allies, including California U.S. Sen. Adam Schiff and Rep. Jimmy Gomez.

Leo’s arrival in Algiers marks the start of an 11-day tour of four African nations — Algeria, Cameroon, Angola and Equatorial Guinea — that will bring the first U.S.-born pope deep into the growing heart of the Catholic Church.

Leo is in Algeria to promote Christian-Muslim coexistence in the majority Muslim nation at a time of global conflict, and to honor the locally born inspiration of his religious spirituality, St. Augustine.

The trip began, however, against the backdrop of a growing feud between the Leo and Trump over the Iran war. Trump overnight said he didn’t think Leo was doing a good job as pope and suggested he should “stop catering to the Radical Left.”

Leo responded by saying his appeals for peace and reconciliation are rooted in the Gospel, and that he didn’t fear the Trump administration.

‘Neocolonial tendencies’

In his first remarks in Algiers, Leo tied his current appeal for peace to the country's struggle for independence from France, obtained in 1962. Hundreds of thousands of people died in the revolution during which French forces tortured detainees, disappeared suspects and devastated villages as part of a strategy to maintain a grip on power.

“God desires peace for every nation, a peace that is not merely an absence of conflict but one that is an expression of justice and dignity,” Leo told a crowd of several thousand people at the monument to Algeria’s martyrs.

At a later meeting with President Abdelmadjid Tebboune and other government authorities, Leo praised Algerians for their solidarity and respect for one another, which he said provided an important perspective today “on the global balance of power.”

“Today, this is more urgent than ever in the face of continuous violations of international law and neocolonial tendencies,” he said without elaborating, though he has previously spoken about Russia's war in Ukraine, the Iran war and Israel's invasion of southern Lebanon.

Great Mosque visit

Leo's visit dominated news headlines in Algeria, where a tiny Catholic community of around 9,000 people made up mostly of foreigners exists alongside the Sunni Muslim majority of about 47 million.

El Moudjahid, a state-run daily newspaper, declared that “the planet is staring at Algeria,” while Arabic-language daily Echorouk wrote that “the land of peace and coexistence speaks to the world.”

Leo visited the country's Great Mosque and stood silently with his hands clasped in front of him, as if in prayer. He thanked the mosque rector for receiving him in this “divine space, space of God” that is also a study center.

“Through this place of prayer, through the search for truth, including through study and through the ability to recognize the dignity of every human being, we know — and today’s gathering is proof of this — that we can learn to respect one another, live in harmony, and build a world of peace,” Leo said in Italian in a rare, off-the-cuff comment.

Tebboune hailed the historic nature of Leo's visit and the pride Algerians felt over St. Augustine, “a cherished son of this land.”

But others downplayed the significance of the visit.

“God’s religion is Islam, which has illuminated this land for 14 centuries,” said Lamia Sellimi, a literature teacher at a high school near the Basilica of Our Lady of Africa. “Algerians are deeply attached to their religion, which is one of the foundations of our identity. As such, this visit is merely a circumstantial event.”

A violent past of martyrs

Algeria fought a civil war in the 1990s that is known locally as the “black decade,” when around 250,000 people were killed as the army fought an Islamist insurgency. Among them were 19 Catholics, including seven Trappist monks from the Tibhirine monastery south of Algiers, who were kidnapped and killed in 1996 by Islamic fighters. Also among them were two nuns from Leo’s Augustinian religious family.

All 19 were beatified in 2018 as martyrs for the faith in what was then the first such beatification ceremony in the Muslim world.

Leo paid homage to the 19 martyrs and visited the remaining Augustinian nuns who run a social services project out of the Algiers basilica that helps people of all faiths.

The Algiers archbishop likes to remind audiences that Leo was elected on May 8, the Catholic feast day of the 19 martyrs. Immediately after Leo’s election, Vesco invited him to visit.

Leo has also made a mantra out of one of the sayings of the martyred prior of the Tibherine monastery, Christian de Chergé, who spoke of an “unarmed and disarming peace.” Leo has cited the line starting from the night of his election.

Personal and pastoral visit

Leo's Augustinian religious order was inspired by the teachings of St. Augustine of Hippo, the fifth-century theological and philosophical titan of the early Christian church who was born in what is today Algeria and spent all but five years of his life there.

On Tuesday, Leo will visit Annaba, the modern-day Hippo where St. Augustine was bishop for three decades, and will literally walk in the footsteps of the saint.

From his first public words as pope, Leo proclaimed himself a “son of St. Augustine,” and he has repeatedly cited the church father in speeches and homilies.

“I don’t know if I have seen a statement, a homily, an apostolic letter or exhortation that doesn’t reference Augustine,” said Paul Camacho, associate director of the Augustinian Institute at Villanova University, Leo’s Augustinian-run alma mater outside Philadelphia. “The shadow that he casts on Western thought, not just the Roman Catholic Church but on Western thought more broadly, is very, very long indeed.”

___

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

Trump later suggested he was willing to engage with Iran, saying he had spoken to “the other side.” This came after he warned on social media that Iranian warships coming “anywhere close” to the U.S. blockade would be destroyed.

Ceasefire talks between the U.S. and Iran ended Sunday without an agreement, raising questions about what happens when the current two-week truce expires on April 22. The Israeli military, meanwhile, pushed ahead with its offensive in southern Lebanon, engaging in fierce fighting with Hezbollah militants over a strategic town, while the group fires rockets and drones at northern Israel.

Here is the latest:

China’s export growth slows as war raises uncertainty

China’s exports grew 2.5% in March from a year ago, significantly slowing from the previous two months as uncertainties rose from the Iran war and its impact on energy prices and global demand.

The March export data released by China’s customs agency Tuesday missed analysts’ estimates and was sharply down from the 21.8% export growth recorded for January and February.

Technology-related exports including a jump in shipments of semiconductors from China on the global artificial intelligence boom have powered its robust exports in early 2026, but economists say impacts from the prolonged Iran war could affect overall global demand for Chinese exports this year.

Israeli military says soldier killed in Lebanon

Israel’s military said a reserve soldier was killed and three others wounded in fighting in southern Lebanon.

The military said late Monday that the reservist killed was a firefighting vehicle driver.

The death brought the number of Israeli soldiers killed in the current war in Lebanon to 13.

Pakistan proposes second round of talks in Islamabad

Pakistan has proposed hosting a second round of talks between the United States and Iran in Islamabad in the coming days, before the end of the ceasefire, two Pakistani officials said.

The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter with the press, said the proposal would depend on whether the parties request a different location.

One of the officials said that, despite ending without an agreement, the first talks were part of an ongoing diplomatic process rather than a one-off effort.

— By Munir Ahmed

Vance says Iranians made ‘some progress’ in talks on nuclear issues

U.S. Vice President JD Vance said in an interview with Fox News Channel’s “Special Report” that negotiations “did make some progress” in the Islamabad talks on the U.S. insistence on the removal of nuclear material from Iran as well as a mechanism to ensure uranium cannot be enriched in the future.

“They moved in our direction,” Vance said in the interview. He said he thought Iranian negotiators were “unable to cut a deal” and needed to get approval from others in Tehran.

Vance also said that U.S. negotiators made clear that Trump “would be very happy if Iran was treated like a normal country, if it had a normal economy,” but he did not go into details about what he meant.

“There really is, I think, a grand deal to be had here. But, it’s up to the Iranians, I think, to take the next step,” Vance said.

The White House won’t say if talks are in the works

The White House was not responsive to queries about whether new talks were being weighed.

“President Trump, Vice President Vance and the negotiating team have made the U.S. red lines very clear. The Iranians desperation for a deal will only increase with President Trump’s highly effective Naval blockade now in effect,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said.

US and Iran could be headed toward a second round of talks, AP sources say

The sides are weighing new in-person negotiations in a bid to reach a deal aimed at ending their six-week war before the ceasefire expires next week, two U.S. officials and person familiar with the development said.

The three said discussions were still underway about a new round of talks, while a diplomat from one of the mediating countries went further to say Tehran and Washington have agreed to it.

All four spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomatic negotiations.

It’s unclear if the same level of delegation would be expected to attend, the diplomat and U.S. officials said.

The diplomat and U.S. officials said Islamabad, Pakistan, was once again being discussed as the host location. The U.S. officials also said Geneva was a possibility, and that while the venue and timing had not been decided, the talks could happen Thursday.

The White House didn’t immediately respond to a message seeking comment.

Trump told reporters earlier Monday that “we’ve been called by the other side” and “they want to work a deal.”

— By Farnoush Amiri, Aamer Madhani and Matthew Lee

Official says Iran is seeking compensation from 5 Middle East countries

Iran’s representative to the United Nations has demanded compensation from countries it says participated in the U.S. and Israeli war effort against Iran.

Iran’s state media report the nations include Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Jordan.

Iran’s official news agency, IRNA, said that the U.N. representative, Amir-Saeid Iravani, claimed the countries had violated international law and had to “make full compensation for the damages caused to the Islamic Republic of Iran, including payment of compensation for all material and moral damages resulting from their international violations.”

Many US Catholics dismayed by Trump’s verbal attack on Pope Leo

A majority of U.S. Catholic voters supported Trump in his 2024 presidential victory.

Yet across the broad Catholic political spectrum – even among conservative-leaning bishops – there is dismay over Trump’s unprecedented verbal assault on Pope Leo XIV, the first American to lead their church.

Leo says he is sharing a Gospel message and not directly attacking Trump or anyone else with his appeals for peace and criticism of attitudes fueling the Iran war.

Criticism of Trump came from Archbishop Paul Coakley, head of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, and from Minnesota-based Bishop Robert Barron, who only a few days ago was applauding Trump as an Easter guest at the White House.

Barron called the president’s remarks “entirely inappropriate and disrespectful” and urged him to apologize.

▶ Read more

Thune says US has been ‘effective’ in Iran war but needs a plan to end it

“They do need a plan for how to wind this down, how to get an outcome that actually leads to a safer, more secure Middle East and, by extension, a stronger national security position for the United States,” the Senate majority leader told reporters after returning from a two-week recess Monday.

On Trump’s blockade of ships entering or leaving the Strait of Hormuz, Thune said that “penalizing those who do business with the Iranians may get people’s attention,” including China, which depends on energy in the region.

“That probably more than anything else right now, is going to be the key issue to resolving the situation, getting the Iranians to the table,” Thune said.

Majority Leader Thune says White House spending request for war ‘has been scaled back’

Senate Majority Leader John Thune says it’s his understanding that a potential request from the White House to pay for the Iran war has been scaled back, but he did not give a specific number.

Congress is still waiting for the request, which could total hundreds of billions of dollars. The Pentagon sent the White House a request for $200 billion last month, but Trump has not yet asked Congress to approve any new amount for the war.

Thune, a Republican from South Dakota, told reporters that the request will be an “inflection point” for Republicans, as Congress will have to vote to approve it. That is a “power that Congress has to influence what happens there,” he said.

UN says Israel has opened second crossing for aid deliveries to Gaza

The U.N. humanitarian office reports that Israeli authorities reopened the Zikim crossing into northern Gaza for the first time in more than 40 days, the U.N. spokesperson said.

Five international aid groups recently said humanitarian conditions in Gaza have deteriorated further since the Iran war began.

Over the weekend, supplies were unloaded, and the U.N. resumed collecting the cargo inside Gaza on Monday, starting with food, nutrition products and other humanitarian items, spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said.

Opening the Zikim crossing “will help address a critical need by allowing supplies to enter northern Gaza directly, so we don’t have to truck them from the south,” where Kemen Shalom is the only other crossing open for goods, he said.

But despite the opening, Dujarric said, “Major constraints remain.”

He pointed to Israeli customs clearance delays, insufficient screening capacity, which makes approval for critical items difficult, and blanket bans on some U.N. agencies and partner organizations “that are central and critical to the joint humanitarian response in Gaza.”

Global financial organizations warn of oil shock

The directors of the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the International Energy Agency said Monday that the war’s damage to energy facilities could keep fuel and fertilizer prices high for “a prolonged period.”

Fatih Birol, executive director of the IEA, said the disruptions to oil supplies from the conflict is “the greatest energy security challenge in history.” One-third of the 80 Mideast energy facilities his agency is monitoring have been damaged.

Birol spoke at IMF headquarters after meeting with Kristalina Georgieva, managing director of the IMF, and Ajay Banga, president of the World Bank.

Birol warned that April could be worse than March for the world economy because many fuel shipments from before the war were still arriving in ports last month.

U.S. oil prices were $98 a barrel in afternoon trading, after topping $100 earlier Monday.

US military has 16 warships in the Middle East

But military officials have offered few details about how a blockade of Iranian ports would actually work.

Aside from the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, the U.S. Navy has 11 destroyers, three amphibious assault ships, and a littoral combat ship, all in the waters of the Middle East, a defense official said.

A second defense official says no U.S. warships are in the Persian Gulf — the body of water that forms most of Iran’s coastline.

Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military operations.

Trump said the blockade had taken effect Monday.

The second defense official pointed to a notice to mariners as a more accurate representation of the military’s plans. It says access to Iranian ports is being restricted, but how these measures “will be applied in practice ... are in development.”

— By Konstantin Toropin

Oil prices ease back from their morning spurts as US stocks rally on a still-hopeful Wall Street

The S&P 500 rallied 1% Monday and is back to within 1.3% of its record. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 0.6%, and the Nasdaq composite rose 1.2%.

Even in the oil market, where prices jumped above $100 per barrel after ceasefire talks failed to end the war, prices pared their leaps as Monday progressed. The moves for financial markets overall were much more modest than the extreme swings that have hit since the war began in late February.

▶ Read more

Naval blockades can be a tool for applying pressure

Blockades alone typically don’t settle military conflicts, but they can be a way of exerting pressure on an adversary’s economy, experts tell the AP. That’s likely President Donald Trump’s intention in declaring a U.S. blockade of Iranian ports.

Blockades are “very much a gradual tool,” said Sidharth Kaushal, a naval power expert at the Royal United Services Institute defense and security think tank in London.

Throughout history, blockades have been a way for one power to drain another’s economy by disrupting the flow of goods in and out of a country. But they take time, and can also require significant resources by the blockading force.

“It’s a form of economic warfare,” said Raul Pedrozo, professor of international law at the U.S. Naval War College.

Navigating the legal questions of a US blockade

To meet international law, a blockade of the Strait of Hormuz must be officially announced and effectively and impartially enforced, legal experts tell the AP.

“You have to apply it to everybody going in and out of Iran,” said Raul Pedrozo, professor of international law at the U.S. Naval War College. “It doesn’t just apply to people we don’t like.”

The requirements are to warn mariners of any blockade and ensure it is enforced fairly and responsibly. International law experts will also be watching to see if the U.S. allows humanitarian aid, food or medicine to reach Iran.

“How it is carried out will determine whether it is lawful or not,” Todd Huntley, a retired Navy captain and director of Georgetown University’s National Security Law Program.

Netanyahu focuses on Iran in Holocaust speech

The Israeli leader says the war against Iran was a powerful contrast to the Holocaust.

In an address marking Israel’s annual Holocaust memorial day, Netanyahu said that while Jews were like an “abused animal crying in agony” at the hands of the Nazis, the modern state of Israel fights back against its enemies.

He then listed several Iranian nuclear sites alongside Nazi death camps.

“Had we not acted, the names Natanz, Fordow, Isfahan and Parchin might have been remembered eternally in infamy, just like Auschwitz, Treblinka, Majdanek, and Sobibor,” he said.

Netanyahu often uses the annual address to lash out at Iran.

Finnish president says he doesn’t see US withdrawal from NATO; allies will assist after Iran war ends

During a panel on Monday, Finland’s President Alexander Stubb said that he “sees no signs” of America abandoning the trans-Atlantic alliance despite Trump’s threats over NATO countries’ refusal to help with the Strait of Hormuz.

“So don’t underestimate the interest of the United States to stay engaged with the alliance,” Stubb said at an event at the Brookings Institution.

The European leader has often leveraged his good relationship with Trump — the two men have played golf together and speak regularly — to argue against his “America First” posturing. Stubb also reiterated that a “coalition of the willing” would help ensure the critical waterway was opened after the war ended.

“It’s my job as president of Finland to try to save the situation and convince the Americans that without allies, it’s difficult to project power,” he said.

At least 2 tankers turn around after approaching the Strait of Hormuz

The vessel-tracker MarineTraffic said in a post on the social platform X that the ships reversed course within minutes of approaching the critical waterway, shortly after the U.S. blockade began.

It said one of the tankers departed the United Arab Emirates’ Sharjah anchorage on Monday, bound for China. It was not immediately clear where the second vessel was headed.

Iran war has some US water utilities facing a fluoride shortage

It’s not just gas prices: Some U.S. water utilities are reporting that the war is disrupting their ability to maintain recommended fluoride levels in the drinking water.

The Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies says it expects additional shortages as the war stresses the supply chain. Israel is a major supplier of the chemical used to fluoridate drinking water.

The number of water utilities affected so far is small, but the shortage is affecting hundreds of thousands of people.

Dentists say a short-term drop in fluoride levels should be fine for most people, but longer-term disruptions could put Americans, especially young children, at higher risk for tooth decay.

▶ Read more

Trump says ‘we’ve been called by the other side’ but offers no details on conversation

Speaking outside the Oval Office on Monday, Trump suggested the U.S. is still willing to engage with Iran to negotiate a resolution.

“I can tell you that we’ve been called by the other side,” Trump said, adding, “We’ve been called this morning by the right people, the appropriate people, and they want to work a deal.”

Trump did not say who called or what was discussed.

Trump confirms that Strait of Hormuz blockade started at 10 am Monday

“We can’t let a country blackmail or extort the world because that’s what they’re doing,” Trump said of Iran.

Trump repeated his argument that safeguarding the strait is of greater concern to other parts of the globe than the United States. The effective closure of the strait since the start of the war, however, impacts global oil prices — which has led to surging gas prices for American motorists and rising inflation on other goods.

“We don’t use this strait,” Trump said. “We have our own oil and gas, much more than we need.”

Trump says he won’t apologize to Pope Leo over Iran war criticisms

Trump is refusing to apologize for sharply criticizing Pope Leo, saying that the pontiff “went public” in his criticisms of the war in Iran, and “I’m just responding.”

In comments to reporters outside the Oval Office, Trump added, “There’s nothing to apologize for” and said of Leo, “He’s wrong.”

Trump was also asked about posting an image of himself as a saintlike healer, which seemed to draw comparisons between himself and Jesus Christ.

The image was posted Sunday night and drew widespread condemnation from Evangelical Christian leaders and has since been taken down.

Trump said, “I did post it.” But he suggested it had something to do with the Red Cross and insisted: “It’s supposed to be me as a doctor making people better.”

Iranian official says US blockade will backfire

Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baqaei derided the blockade as a “revenge of choice” against the global economy.

“Is it ever worthwhile to cut off one’s nose to spite one’s face?!” he wrote on the social platform X.

OPEC oil production tumbled before US threatened blockade

The closure of the strait severely crimped output from OPEC last month. The 12-nation oil cartel, with members in the Middle East, Africa and Venezuela, said Monday that production tumbled by 7.89 million barrels a day in March, to 20.79 million barrels.

“Disruptions to shipping operations in the region raised persistent concerns about regional supply flows, while strong buying of prompt spot market barrels, production cuts, and declarations of force majeure further supported the upward price momentum,” OPEC said.

The organization said demand appears to be steady this year, but cut its forecast for the current quarter, citing the war.

Netanyahu spokeswoman rules out a ceasefire with Hezbollah

Shosh Bedrosian told reporters Monday that Israel’s upcoming talks with Lebanon will focus on disarming Hezbollah and establishing peaceful relations between the two countries.

“We will not discuss a ceasefire with Hezbollah, which continues to carry out indiscriminate attacks against Israel and our civilians,” she said.

Israel and the Lebanese army have both been unable to forcibly disarm Hezbollah.

US-Iran ceasefire is holding despite failed peace talks, Pakistan’s prime minister says

Efforts are underway to resolve the remaining disputes between Washington and Tehran as a two-week ceasefire brokered by Pakistan remains intact, said the country’s prime minister, Shehbaz Sharif.

In televised remarks at a Cabinet meeting, Sharif cautioned that peace efforts take time, citing past agreements such as the Geneva accords.

Trump says Iranian ships that come ‘anywhere close’ to US blockade will be destroyed

The president made the comment on social media just after the blockade of Iran was expected to begin. Trump said Iran has some “fast attack ships” remaining even after much of its navy was destroyed by U.S. strikes.

“Warning: If any of these ships come anywhere close to our BLOCKADE, they will be immediately ELIMINATED, using the same system of kill that we use against the drug dealers on boats at Sea,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.

He added: “It is quick and brutal.”

Where things stand on ceasefire talks

The current truce between the U.S. and Iran appears to be holding, with no word on whether negotiations will resume before it expires on April 22.

Pakistan’s foreign minister, Ishaq Dar, said his country will try to facilitate a new round of dialogue between Iran and the U.S. in the coming days. There was no immediate reaction from either side.

A key obstacle seems to be a perception on both sides that they won the war and that each has time on its side.

▶ Read more

Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon have killed 2,089 people during the latest Hezbollah-Israel war

That’s an increase of 34 deaths since the previous day’s count, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry. It said Monday that among those killed were 252 women, 166 children, and 88 medical workers.

The number of wounded has increased to 6,762 people since the war began on March 2, when Hezbollah fired rockets toward northern Israel in solidarity with Iran, sparking Israel’s ground invasion and aerial bombardment campaign that has displaced over one million people.

Ahead of anticipated direct talks in Washington on Tuesday, the strikes across both sides of the tense frontier and fierce ground fighting in southern Lebanon have intensified.

Stage is set for an extraordinary showdown over shipping off Iran’s coast

The U.S. military has vowed to blockade all Iranian ports to pressure Tehran into agreeing to open the crucial Strait of Hormuz and accepting a peace deal. Iran responded with threats on all the ports of U.S. allies in the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman.

The showdown contains serious risks for the global economy and raises the specter that a ceasefire that is currently holding could collapse.

It was not clear if the blockade had started when the designated time of 10 a.m. EDT (2 p.m. GMT) arrived. Minutes earlier, a notice to mariners issued by the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations agency, which monitors maritime security, said the restrictions included “the entirety of the Iranian coastline, including ports and energy infrastructure.”

The notice added that transit through the strait “to or from non-Iranian destinations is not reported to be impeded by these measures,” but it added that ships “may encounter military presence” in the strait.

During a Monday evening press conference, officials with the San Francisco Police Department, Federal Bureau of Investigation, and prosecutors outlined new details in the case against Daniel Moreno-Gama, 20, who they say traveled from Texas to California to carry out the attack.

Federal agents were seen at the suspect’s reported home in Spring on Monday morning as part of a “court-authorized law enforcement operation,” according to the FBI’s Houston field office.

Agents are conducting official activity at a residence near Camberwell Court.

Acting FBI Special Agent in Charge Matt Cobo described the attack as a “dangerous and deliberate plan to bring violence to San Francisco.”

“This was not spontaneous. This was planned, targeted, and extremely serious,” Cobo said, noting the suspect allegedly crossed state lines to target both an individual and a major technology company.

Federal authorities confirmed that Moreno-Gama’s residence is in Spring, where agents executed a search warrant earlier Monday.

Officials also emphasized that attacks targeting technology companies can have broader public safety implications.

View our latest statement regarding an incident that occurred early this morning at a North Beach residence. Officers have made an arrest, and no injuries were reported as a result of this incident. pic.twitter.com/t4DsF31uxh

— San Francisco Police (@SFPD) April 10, 2026

Targeted attack at Altman’s home

According to SFPD Deputy Chief Luke Martin, the incident began around 4:12 a.m. Friday, April 10, when Moreno-Gama allegedly threw a Molotov cocktail at Altman’s home.

Witnesses were able to extinguish the flames, and no injuries were reported.

Security footage captured the suspect, who was later seen about an hour afterward outside OpenAI headquarters.

Escalation at OpenAI headquarters

Police say Moreno-Gama returned near OpenAI headquarters, where he allegedly threatened to burn down the building.

Authorities say he used a chair in an attempt to smash through glass doors and made threats toward people inside.

Officers responded and took Moreno-Gama into custody. He is currently being held at the San Francisco County Jail.

Investigators say he was found in possession of additional incendiary devices at the time of his arrest.

Charges and terrorism designation

San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins announced a series of charges against Moreno-Gama, including:

• Attempted murder of Sam Altman
• Attempted murder of a security guard
• Attempted arson
• Possession and use of a destructive device
• Exploding or igniting a destructive device

Additional charges tied to the incident at OpenAI headquarters include attempted criminal threats and attempted arson.

“[This was] an attempt on Mr. Altman’s life and an extreme danger to those around him and those who work for his company,” Jenkins said.

She also called for a reduction in heated rhetoric surrounding artificial intelligence.

“In no way should we be at the point where a man could have lost his life over differences of opinion,” she added.

If the attacks were carried out in an effort to influence public policy, prosecutors said the case will be treated as an act of domestic terrorism.

U.S. Attorney Craig H. Missakian said evidence recovered from the suspect included a written document outlining anti-AI views and suggesting he had “killed or attempted to kill” the CEO.

According to court records, Moreno-Gama’s document contained a section titled “Your Last Warning,” in which he allegedly claimed he had “killed / attempted to kill” Altman and that he intended to lead by example in encouraging violence.

The document also reportedly listed names and addresses of executives and investors connected to AI companies.

A second section discussed what the suspect described as the “existential threat of artificial intelligence,” while a third took the form of a direct letter to Altman, warning him to “redeem” himself if he survived the attack.

Separate shooting under investigation

Authorities also addressed a separate shooting reported in the same area early Sunday morning but said there is currently no evidence linking that incident to Moreno-Gama.

Ongoing investigation

Officials say the investigation remains active as authorities continue to analyze evidence and potential connections, including activity in the Houston area.

“This type of conduct… will never be accepted in San Francisco,” Jenkins said.

• Conroe judge pleads guilty to December DWI charge

KPRC 2 obtained videos from a traffic stop that happened around 2:30 a.m. on Dec. 10 in the city of Montgomery.

According to the footage, an officer pulled Judge Waggoner over after observing him speeding and swerving.

“You were going 65 in a 35 man, that’s way too fast,” the officer told Judge Waggoner. “You were swerving a bit, too.”

Officer says he smelled alcohol, judge denies drinking

In the video, the officer immediately points out signs he says are consistent with intoxication.

“Your eyes are red, glossy, gazed out. You stuck a piece of gum in or whatever Altoids or something when I walked up,” the officer tells Waggoner.

• PREVIOUS: Conroe judge told officers to ‘be aware that he is a judge’ during DWI stop

When asked how much he had to drink, the judge initially downplays it saying it was “not enough to be an issue.”

Moments later, when pressed again, he denies drinking altogether.

Officer: “What have you had to drink tonight?

”Waggoner: “Nothing.”

Officer: “You had something, man. I smell it.”

Judge offers emotional explanation

Instead of alcohol use, the judge offers another explanation for his condition.

“I was crying,” said Judge Waggoner.

He goes on to explain he had just left a friend’s house after an emotional conversation.

• Conroe judge facing DWI charge hosts campaign event, avoids questions about criminal history

“I just got into a very deep conversation about 9/11 and the Afghanistan war and I was very upset,” he told the officer.

Sobriety testing begins, then stops

The video shows Waggoner initially complying with field sobriety tests as the officer walks him through instructions.

But that cooperation appears to shift.

“I feel like these tests are designed to make me fail,” the judge told the officer.

• ‘I had a bad day’: Conroe judge releases statement after DWI arrest

At one point, he becomes hesitant about continuing.

“Actually, I don’t want to take any of this because I’m nervous about it,” Waggoner tells the officer.

He does acknowledge he was speeding during the stop.

Judge Waggoner refuses a breath test and consents to a blood draw in the patrol car.

He is then seen refusing a blood draw when taken to the hospital and then the officer obtains a warrant before his blood is drawn.

“I am the judge” comment caught on camera

Inside the patrol car, Judge Waggoner is told he will be going before a judge for his charge.

“So this is going to get complicated here because I am the judge,” Waggoner responds.

• Conroe judge arrested for DWI, arrested three times before

The officer responds by clarifying his position and jurisdiction, noting the stop did not happen in Conroe.

“The City of Conroe? How’s it going to be complicated?” the officer responded backed to Waggoner.

Officer notes his position during stop

At another point in the video, an officer can be heard acknowledging Waggoner’s role, but making clear it does not change the situation.

“He’s a judge. He’s still getting a ticket. 61 in a 35 is insane,” the officer said.

Responding officers can be heard on bodycam talking about the judge’s signs of intoxication.

“I can smell it from him from the distance,” said another responding officer.

The officer conducting the field sobriety test said the judge was “not following my finger.”

• Court records: Conroe judge disciplined for DUI during military service

You can also see the officer retrieving a handgun from his vehicle.

Waggoner was initially also charged with unlawful possession of a firearm, but that charge was dropped.

Guilty plea and political run

Court records show Waggoner pleaded guilty to DWI last month.

Waggoner ran for Montgomery County’s precinct one but lost in the primary to Scott Carson.

After the loss in the race, Waggoner wrote on his Facebook page:

“Serving this community from the bench for the last four years has been the highest honor of my professional life. As this chapter closes, my first priority is to say thank you.

To the voters: Whether you cast your ballot for me or another, your participation is what keeps our system of local government accountable. To those who shared their stories: Hearing how a fair hearing or a moment of respect impacted your lives reminded me daily why this work matters. Your trust was my greatest reward.

The Justice of the Peace and Municipal Court represent the “People’s Court.” In these seats, judicial temperament outweighs political policy. A judge’s primary duty is to ensure that every individual who walks through those doors is treated with dignity, heard with patience, and judged with impartiality.

Campaigning allows you to see the best and worst of your community, and over these last few weeks, I have met some truly exceptional individuals who care deeply about our future. Our community is at its strongest when we choose leaders who prioritize people over politics and morals over greed. I am confident the best person for these courts will emerge to serve you with the same integrity this community deserves.

My commitment to the integrity of our court has always come before any politics. I encourage each of you to reach out, meet the candidates, and look for the leader who understands that this office is about people, not politics. When you find that heart for service, embrace it.

While my time in this specific role is concluding, my dedication to this community is not. I look forward to the future and plan to remain deeply involved in the community we all call home. It has been a privilege to serve you."

Under Texas law, a misdemeanor DWI conviction does not automatically disqualify someone from running for judicial office in the future.

KPRC 2 reached out to Waggoner for comment regarding the body camera footage and his guilty plea but has not received a response.

Onyedim’s dad is a huge Texans fan, and the Richmond Foster graduate grew up watching the AFC South franchise.

“Being able to go to my hometown team, my dad said, ‘I don’t watch too much football,’ but when he watched football, he definitely watched the Houston Texans,” Onyedim told KPRC 2 in a telephone interview. “It was a blessing to go meet with the team that my dad loves watching. It would be, amazing to play for my hometown team.

“I grew up always watching them, being a big J.J. Watt fan and everything. So, that would be great.”

Onyedim also has visits with the Carolina Panthers, Los Angeles Chargers and Arizona Cardinals.

An Iowa State transfer, Onyedim is former all-district selection at Foster High School.

The Texans already have Iowa State alums David Montgomery, Jayden Higgins, Jaylin Noel and Xavier Hutchinson on the team. Perhaps Onyedim could become the fifth former Cyclone on the squad.

“They are great players,” Onyedim said. “The Texans love how the program was ran.”

Onyedim had 48 tackles and 2 /12 sacks with 8 1/2 tackles for losses for the Aggies.

“I feel like my senior year helped me a lot,” said Onyedim, who is represented by Range Sports. “Just showing teams that I could play in any defense. It just shows versatility. I could play it in an attacking defense, whatever y’all need me to play.

“I feel like a lot of did what we have to do and showed out. I feel like we changed the history of A&M football. I feel like they’re just getting started with that program with Mike Elko and everything going on.”

He had 90 tackles, 13 tackles for losses and three sacks at Iowa State where he was an honorable mention All-Big 12 conference.

He was a teammate of Texans players Jayden Higgins, Jaylin Noel and Xavier Hutchinson.

He had 12 sacks as a high school senior.

Onyedim (6-foot-3 1/2, 292 pounds) has posted a 32-inch vertical leap with a 9-3 broad jump.

He’s regarded as a versatile player as a three-technique.

“They see me attacking and think I’m a really good front player,” Onyedim said. “They see me being a beast on their team. They love the way I play football.”

Onyedim studied communications.

“I’d like to be a color analyst in the studio or something like that when I’m done playing,” Onyedim said. “Like what Shaq is doing.”

Aaron Wilson is a Texans and NFL reporter for KPRC 2 and click2houston.com

Super Typhoon Sinlaku is on track to barrel over the Northern Mariana Islands late Tuesday local time with widespread rain and flooding along with destructive winds that could cause lengthy power outages, the National Weather Service said.

Guam, a U.S. territory with several American military installations and about 170,000 residents, isn't expected to take a direct hit but still could see damaging winds.

The tropical typhoon — the strongest on Earth so far this year — was producing sustained winds of 173 mph (278 kph) on Monday as it neared the islands of Rota, Tinian and Saipan, according to the Joint Typhoon Warning Center.

While it’s expected to weaken slightly over the next few days, Sinlaku should cross by the islands as a Category 4 or 5 typhoon.

The typhoon has stayed mostly on a track that puts it going over or just skirting along Tinian and Saipan, said Joshua Schank, a lead meteorologist in Guam for the weather service.

About 50,000 people live on the three islands, with most on Saipan, known for its laid-back resorts, snorkeling and golf as well as the capital of the Northern Mariana Islands.

Saipan was the site of one of World War II’s bloodiest battles in the Pacific, in which more than 50,000 Japanese and American soldiers and local civilians died.

In Guam, where Typhoon Mawar knocked out power for days in 2023, U.S. military officials warned personnel to prepare for the storm and shelter in place. The military controls about one-third of the land on the island, a critical hub for U.S. forces in the Pacific.

The island already was being hit by heavy rains and wind gusts up to 60 mph (96 kph) very early Tuesday, Schank said. Most businesses were closed and residents were told to stay home, he said.

Before turning toward Guam and the Northern Marianas, the storm left significant damage to the outer islands and atolls of Chuuk in the Federated States of Micronesia, said Landon Aydlett, a meteorologist with the weather service on Guam.

Glen Hunter, who grew up on Saipan, has weathered numerous typhoons. “We sit in what they call ‘Typhoon Alley,’" he said early Tuesday after waking up to strong gusts and seeing downed trees.

For the most part, residents live in sturdy, fully concrete homes and those in substandard wooden houses with tin roofs tend to stay with family or in government shelters, he said.

Tourism-dependent Saipan was still recovering from 2018's Super Typhoon Yutu when the coronavirus pandemic hit in 2020, he recalled. The economy has yet to rebound, he said.

While bracing to take a direct hit, Hunter is also anticipating the possibility of going weeks or months without electricity and running water.

“We’re remote, beautiful islands in the Pacific, which is a plus, but in times of recovery it becomes a massive negative to getting things into our damaged ports, and so what we would hope for is just as much support as we can get from the outside world, the federal government, the military,” he said.

President Donald Trump on Saturday approved emergency disaster declarations for Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands, allowing for additional help with emergency services.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency said it is coordinating support across multiple agencies, dispatching almost 100 FEMA staff as well as personnel from the Environmental Protection Agency, Department of Transportation and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

“We are ready to respond to this event,” Robert Fenton, a FEMA regional administrator, said from Guam on Monday afternoon local time. The agency began preparing supplies and staff late last week, he said.

FEMA’s response comes amid the record-long Department of Homeland Security Shutdown, but the agency’s emergency response functions continue during a funding impasse. Over 10,000 disaster personnel are still paid and FEMA’s disaster relief fund — which the agency said had about $3.6 billion around the end of March — can be spent until it runs out.

A super typhoon is a name given to the strongest tropical cyclones that brew in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, where Earth’s most intense storms usually form.

Monitored by the Joint Typhoon Warning Center in Guam, super typhoons are the equivalent of Category 4 or 5 hurricanes in the Atlantic, with winds of at least 150 mph (240 kph). There have been more than 300 super typhoons identified since the warning center started using that name nearly 80 years ago.

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Associated Press reporters Gabriela Aoun Angueira in San Diego and Jennifer Sinco Kelleher in Honolulu contributed.

Keiko Fujimori, the conservative daughter of a disgraced former president, and Rafael López Aliaga, the ultra conservative former mayor of Peru’s capital, Lima, lead the pack of 35 candidates with 62% of ballots tallied. Official results showed Fujimori had received 16.88% of the votes tallied, while López Aliaga earned 13.88%.

Electoral authorities counted votes throughout Monday even though thousands of Peruvians were back at the polls for a second day of voting. Authorities granted the one-day extension for more than 52,000 voters in Lima as well as to Peruvians registered to vote in Orlando, Florida, and Paterson, New Jersey.

Voting is mandatory for Peruvians from the ages of 18 to 70. Failure to do so comes with a fine of up to $32.

“I’m fed up,” Iris Valle, 56, said as she waited to vote Monday at a public school in Lima. She feared that her employer would cut her pay for not showing up early because she had to meet her voting obligation.

A presidential candidate needs more than 50% of votes to win outright. However, a runoff in June is virtually assured given the deeply divided electorate and the pool of candidates, the largest in the Andean country’s history. The winner will be Peru’s ninth president in just 10 years.

The election took place amid a surge in violent crime and corruption that has fueled widespread discontent among voters, who largely view candidates as dishonest and unprepared for the presidency.

Many of the contenders responded to the crime concerns with wide-ranging proposals, including building megaprisons, restricting food for prisoners and reinstating the death penalty for serious crimes.

Peru’s economy, however, has defied both the crime surge and the political instability stemming from a revolving door of presidents, having had three since October alone. Aided by its status as the world’s second-largest copper producer, the country posted more than 3% growth in 2024 and 2025.

In her fourth bid for the presidency, Fujimori has promised to crack down on crime with an iron fist, but she has also defended laws that experts say make it difficult to prosecute criminals. The laws, which her party backed in recent years, eliminated preliminary detention in certain cases and raised the threshold for seizing criminal assets.

If elected, she has said judges presiding over criminal cases will be anonymous and prisoners will have to work to earn their food.

Meanwhile, López Aliaga has proposed building prisons in the country’s Amazon region, allowing judges to conceal their identities and expelling foreigners who are living illegally in Peru.

Voters were also asked to choose the members of a bicameral Congress for the first time in more than 30 years, following recent legislative reforms that concentrate significant power in the new upper chamber.

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Garcia Cano reported from Caracas, Venezuela.

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Follow AP’s coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america

We enter into a much quieter weather pattern after this past weekend’s powerful storms. The most organized severe weather and flash flooding risks are focused on Central Texas. Houston will only see a few hit-or-miss showers through the end of the week, with any areas of true concern focused on the central part of our state.

The big story for Houston this week is less about wet weather and much more about the warmth and humidity. Highs are expected to be well above the typical 80 degrees for this time of year, likely reaching the mid-80s and creeping up near 90 degrees by Saturday. Mornings will start in the 70s, keeping the city on the muggy side.

Weekend cold front brings more storms and lower temperatures:

A cold front is currently forecast to move into Houston Saturday evening into Sunday. This front is expected to bring a line of showers and thunderstorms as it passes, followed by a noticeable cool down.

Sunday highs dip to around 76 degrees and it gets cooler on Monday with a high of 68 degrees. A few mornings next week dip to the 50s.

Exact timing and impact could shift as the week progresses, so we’ll keep you updated.

Four business owners and a trade association sued the state of Texas and acting Comptroller Kelly Hancock on March 2 over the agency’s emergency rules that removed women and minorities from the HUB program and stripped their businesses of their HUB certifications. The temporary injunction on Monday blocked the emergency rules and re-instituted the plaintiffs’ certifications.

The HUB program was created through bipartisan legislation during the 1990s to give minority- and women-owned businesses a leg up when seeking state contracts. The program does not set quotas for the the number of HUB-certified businesses, but sets goals that state agencies generally strive to meet.

The plaintiffs include Houston-based general contractors Ipsum General Contractors, LLC and Houston Construction Services; Sugarland-based medical technology distributor Mpulse Healthcare & Technology LLC; Burleson-based restoration firm Williams Professional Water Restoration Service LLC; and the greater Houston chapter of the National Association of Minority Contractors, a nonprofit trade association that represents 155 minority- and women-owned contractors.

Along with Hancock, the lawsuit also names Texas Department of Transportation Executive Director Marc Williams, Texas Health and Human Services Commission Executive Commissioner Stephanie Muth and Texas Facilities Commission Executive Director Will McKerall, whose departments all implemented Hancock’s changes to the HUB program.

Travis County district judge Amy Meachum set a trial date for the suit for Nov. 9.

The background: HUB businesses received 3,634 contracts totaling more than $4 billion in 2024, according to the Comptroller’s Office. Republicans in the state Legislature filed several bills aimed at killing the HUB program entirely last year, but legislation failed in both chambers.

In October, Hancock announced that his office would not issue new or renewed certifications while the program was being reviewed. His decision pushed the program into the national battle over government initiatives seen as those focused on “diversity, equity and inclusion.” The comptroller’s office then cited emergency powers to restructure the program in December, removing all women and minority business and limiting eligibility to only service-disabled veteran business owners.

“Businesses deserve a level playing field where government contracts are earned by performance and best value — not race or sex quotas,” Hancock, who is running in a competitive GOP primary for comptroller, wrote on social media at the time.

That change shrank the program from more than 15,000 participants to just under 500. HUB certified business owners said at the time that the change risked undercutting their business strategy and would hurt their bottom line.

State Sen. Royce West, a Dallas Democrat who co-authored the 1999 bill that codified the program into state law, said the Legislature, not the comptroller, is empowered to change the program.

“The Legislature voted. The answer was no,” West said. “The Comptroller doesn’t get to override that decision because he disagrees with it — that’s not his role under the Texas Constitution, and these business owners deserve to have that principle upheld in court.”

This is the first lawsuit challenging Hancock’s changes to the program.

Why the businesses are suing: During a news conference in Austin announcing the suit in March, the business owners said they are suing because they all lost out on government contracts after Hancock stripped their HUB certification in December.

“In this country, the legislature passes the laws, not the comptroller, and Texas is no different,” Alphonso David, president & CEO of the Global Black Economic Forum, and lead counsel for the plaintiffs, wrote in a statement. “The HUB case highlights a fundamental American principle — members of the executive branch cannot rewrite laws passed by the state legislature. They cannot deny citizens of their legal rights without a court order, legislative approval, or due process.

“Acting Comptroller Hancock took a program created by statute and rewrote it without any legal authority. His actions are baseless and unlawful and must be reversed.”

The businesses ultimately want the court to restore the program to its original form, arguing that Hancock overstepped his statutory authority, deprived them of state contracts without due process and violated the Texas Constitution.

Ruben Mercado Jr., founder of Ipsum General Contractors, said a contract he was drafting a $1 million bid for was withdrawn after Hancock restructured the program in December.

Wendell Stamley, president of the National Association of Minority Contractors, said its members in Texas have seen government contracts canceled and work they were expecting be unexpectedly returned to competitive bidding.

What state officials said: The comptroller’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the injunction granted on Monday. In a statement in March, Hancock defended the changes to HUB by pointing to the 2023 U.S. Supreme Court decision that ended affirmative action in college admissions and a 2025 executive order by Gov. Greg Abbott that banned DEI policies in Texas agencies.

“Every Texas business is equally eligible to compete for state contracts, regardless of race or gender,” Hancock wrote. “Through the Centralized Master Bidders List, the primary system agencies use to notify vendors of bidding opportunities, any qualified business can register and compete. Texas will continue expanding opportunity for small businesses across our state the right way — rooted in fairness, equal treatment, and the Constitution.”

“I want to continue being proud of all that my city does for our community, but for that, we need transparency and we need communication,” Alexis Saenz, a McAllen resident, told the commissioners. “I demand you reject public funding, approvals and local resources for ICE.”

Saenz was one of nine speakers during McAllen’s city commission meeting who pushed against the possible Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility. A McAllen warehouse located in an industrial park in McAllen’s trade corridor, less than five miles from the Anzalduas International Bridge, was included in a list of potential sites that circulated online in February.

The pushback comes as more residents across the country, including in Texas, are urging their city officials to use their local authority to stop or disincentive ICE’s use of warehouses for the detainment of immigrants.

A Dallas-area facility was also among the potential sites. In February, the facility’s owner, Majestic Realty Co., confirmed it had been contacted about the potential sale of the facility but said it had not and would not enter into any agreement with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security for the use of the building as a detention facility.

Aside from the location, little is known about ICE’s plans for the McAllen warehouse. At the end of March, DHS paused the purchase of warehouses as part of a review of contracts signed under former DHS Secretary Kristi Noem.

DHS did not respond to questions from The Texas Tribune.

City officials have also not heard from the federal government on the potential facilityremained in the dark.

In a text message to the Tribune, McAllen Mayor Javier Villalobos said he had not heard from anyone on the issue.

Making elected officials aware and getting them to address the issue publicly is the first step in possibly preventing the ICE facility from moving forward for Isaac Amani Newman, co-founder of For the People Alliance, a civic engagement organization in the Rio Grande Valley. The group rallied residents to speak at the McAllen meeting. They previously mobilized residents to speak out against a potential data center near the city of Harlingen and helped push city officials there to approve a resolution opposing data centers.

“We need to know where our city leaders even stand on this to begin with,” Newman said.

After the residents made their public comments, cCity commissioner Rudy Castillo said he had not heard of the issue before the meeting but supported placing an item on the agenda to discuss the potential ICE facility.

“I’m glad people came out,” Castillo said. “Our voice will be heard if we speak.”

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

Iran responded with threats on all ports in the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman, taking aim at U.S.-allied countries.

At least two tankers approaching the strait Monday turned around soon after the U.S. blockade began, vessel tracker MarineTraffic said in a post on X.

The U.K. Maritime Trade Operations agency said the blockade restricted “the entirety of the Iranian coastline, including ports and energy infrastructure.” Its notice to mariners said transit through the strait to or from non-Iranian places was not reported to be impeded though ships “may encounter military presence.”

The U.S. blockade and Iran's threatened retaliation set up an extraordinary showdown that posed serious risks for the global economy and raised the specter that the ceasefire could collapse and the fighting could resume. Talks aimed at permanently ending the conflict — which began Feb. 28 with U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran — failed to reach an agreement this past weekend.

Trump says the blockade has begun

“We can’t let a country blackmail or extort the world because that’s what they’re doing,” Trump said of Iran at the White House, where he announced the blockade had started.

He suggested the U.S. remains willing to engage with Iran.

“I can tell you that we’ve been called by the other side,” Trump said, adding that "they want to work a deal.”

Discussions between the U.S. and Iran about a second round of in-person negotiations are underway, two U.S. officials and a person familiar with the development said Monday. A diplomat from one of the mediating countries said Tehran and Washington have agreed to more talks.

All four spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomatic negotiations.

Iran’s effective closure of the strait, through which a fifth of global oil transits in peacetime, has sent oil prices skyrocketing, pushing up the cost of gasoline, food and other basic goods far beyond the Middle East.

Before the U.S. blockade, Tehran had allowed some ships perceived as friendly to pass while charging considerable fees, leading to accusations it is holding the global economy hostage.

Some analysts are doubtful that the United States can restore normal shipping through force alone. And it’s not clear how the blockade will work or what the dangers might be to U.S. forces.

The question is essentially who can endure the most pain: Could a blockade make Iran’s economic situation untenable and force it to concede? Or will it drive global oil and other prices so high that Trump is forced to back down?

The blockade could have far-reaching effects

The U.S. military's Central Command announced the blockade would be enforced “against vessels of all nations entering or departing Iranian ports and coastal areas” on the Persian Gulf and Gulf of Oman.

CENTCOM's decision to allow ships traveling between non-Iranian ports to transit the strait was a step down from Trump’s earlier threat to blockade the waterway.

In a social media message, Trump said Iran’s navy had been "completely obliterated” but still had “fast attack ships.” Trump warned that “if any of these ships come anywhere close to our BLOCKADE, they will be immediately ELIMINATED."

Iran issued threats of its own.

“Security in the Persian Gulf and the Sea of Oman is either for everyone or for NO ONE,” the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting reported Monday. “An Iranian military statement said: “NO PORT in the region will be safe.”

The threats halted the limited ship traffic that resumed in the strait since the ceasefire, according to a report from Lloyd’s List Intelligence. Marine trackers say over 40 commercial ships have crossed since the start of the ceasefire last week, down from 100 or more vessel passages per day before the war.

The blockade is intended to pressure Iran, which has exported millions of barrels of oil since the war began, much of it likely carried by so-called dark transits that evade Western sanctions and oversight.

But the effects will be felt far beyond Iran. The price of Brent crude oil, the international standard, hovered Monday just under $100 per barrel. It cost roughly $70 per barrel before the war.

Iran says ‘if you fight, we will fight'

Top-ranking Iranian officials threatened retaliation.

Ebrahim Rezaei, a spokesperson for the Iranian parliament’s National Security Commission, dismissed U.S. the threat of a U.S. blockade as “more bluffing than reality.”

“It will make the current situation (Trump) is in more complicated and makes the market — which he is angry about — more turbulent,” he said in a post on X.

The Iranian parliament speaker, Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, addressed Trump in a statement: “If you fight, we will fight.”

Meanwhile, Iran’s representative to the United Nations, Amir-Saeid Iravani, demanded compensation from five Middle Eastern countries — Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates — that Iran says violated international law by aiding the war effort against it, the Islamic Republic’s state-run media reported.

Legal experts are watching

U.S. military officials have offered few details about how the blockade will actually work.

The U.S. Navy has 16 warships, including the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, in the Middle East, a defense official said. A second defense official said no American warships are in the Persian Gulf, which forms most of Iran’s coastline. Both spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military operations.

Under international law, the blockade must be impartially enforced. Legal experts will also be watching to see if the U.S. allows humanitarian aid to reach Iran.

“How it is carried out will determine whether it is lawful or not,” said Todd Huntley, a retired Navy captain and director of Georgetown University’s national security law program.

Ceasefire holds after talks end without agreement

The blockade threat came after marathon U.S.-Iran ceasefire talks in Pakistan ended without an agreement on Saturday.

U.S. Vice President JD Vance said the talks stalled after Iran refused to accept American terms on refraining from developing a nuclear weapon. Vance told FOX News Channel's “Special Report” that some progress was made on nuclear issues, but he felt Iran's negotiators couldn't make a deal without approval from Tehran.

Iran has insisted its nuclear program is peaceful. However, it has pushed forward with steps that could give it the ability to build a nuclear weapon, including enriching uranium to near weapons-grade levels and developing long-range missiles potentially capable of delivering a bomb.

Iran’s ambassador to India, Mohammad Fathali, said the main sticking points for Tehran were its nuclear program, war reparations and sanctions relief.

The ceasefire expires April 22. The fighting has killed at least 3,000 people in Iran, 2,089 in Lebanon, 23 in Israel and more than a dozen in Gulf Arab states. Thirteen U.S. service members have been killed.

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Corder reported from The Hague, Netherlands, Frankel from New York. Associated Press writers Melanie Lidman in Tel Aviv, Israel; Farnoush Amiri at the United Nations; Aamer Madhani, Matthew Lee, Konstantin Toropin, Collin Binkley, Ben Finley and David Klepper in Washington; Kareem Chehayeb in Beirut; Sheikh Saaliq in New Delhi; Jill Lawless in London; Ghaya Ben MBarek in Tunis, Tunisia; and Russ Bynum in Savannah, Georgia, contributed to this report.

In a letter from the Office of Governor Greg Abbott delivered Monday to Mayor Whitmire, the State says the new ordinance violates an April 15, 2025 certification between the City of Houston and the Public Safety Office of the Governor (PSO) which states the city would, “participate fully… in all aspects of the programs and procedures utilized by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security‚” to notify DHS of all information requested by DHS regarding undocumented immigrants in HPD’s custody and detains such undocumented immigrants in accordance with requests by DHS.

• RELATED: Houston City Council passes ordinance limiting when HPD can call ICE

The letter also says the certification also states the city and HPD “do not have, and will continue not to have any policy, procedure, or agreement that in any way limits or impedes” HPD’s receipt or DHS’s issuance of detainer requests.

The letter continues by saying it is a notification that the new ordinance is a breach of the certification and “imperils all grant agreements between the City and PSO for Fiscal Year 2026.” It asks the mayor to respond by April 20 to “confirm that the City will not enforce, and will act to repeal, the ordinance. Failure to do so may result in PSO exercising its sole discretion terminate all such grants.”

What is the ordinance?

The revised immigration ordinance focused on drawing a clearer line between the responsibilities of the Houston Police Department and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, particularly during routine traffic stops and investigations.

Under the new ordinance, officers would only be allowed to detain someone for as long as reasonably necessary to complete the original purpose of a stop or investigation.

The ordinance makes clear that an ICE administrative warrant alone, a civil document that does not allege a criminal offense, would not justify a stop, arrest, or continued detention by HPD.

• HPD gives ICE 30-minute window to respond to warrants, mayor and police chief explain policy

If no crime is suspected, the individual must be released.

Previously, when officers encountered an immigration warrant, they were required to call a supervisor to the scene.

That supervisor then verified the warrant before contacting ICE, whose agents were then given a limited window to respond.

The updated ordinance now requires HPD to provide quarterly reports to city council members detailing its interactions with ICE.

Mayor Whitmire responds

In response to the letter from the Office of the Governor as well as another letter from Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, Whitmire released a statement.

“Last week, I voted for the revised “Prop A” Ordinance on Immigration believing it affirmed our original policy: Houston enforces state and local law-not federal law, and we are not ICE. However, Governor Abbott disagrees.

Today, the state notified the City of Houston that it is withdrawing $110 million in public safety grants because the ordinance violates the grants agreements between the state and the City of Houston.

This action follows a letter from Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who has started an open investigation into whether the ordinance violates Senate Bill 4 (SB4). I repeatedly warned the ordinance sponsors, Council Members Salinas, Kamin, and Pollard about the legal and financial risks associated with this approach.

This is a crisis situation. The potential loss of state funding poses real challenges for the Houston Police and Fire Departments and will impact public safety services across our city, the 2026 FIFA World Cup preparations and the Homeland Security Department. Our public safety departments rely on a combination of local, state, and federal resources to operate effectively.

We have significant work ahead and I’m considering all options."

Over several hours of sometimes emotional testimony at a court hearing packed with families of campers who were killed, Edward Eastland provided the most detailed description yet of how camp staff did or didn't respond as floodwaters along the Guadalupe River quickly rose to historic levels, trapping children and counselors in cabins before they were swept away in the early morning dark of July Fourth.

“I wish we never had camp that summer,” Eastland said near the end of his testimony. He acknowledged lives could have been saved if camp staff acted sooner, but insisted they could not have anticipated the severity of the storm.

This week's hearing comes during a legal battle between the camp owners and victims' families who have filed multiple lawsuits and the families' demands to preserve the damage at the camp site as evidence.

And it comes as Camp Mystic plans to reopen in less than two months. The camp has applied with state regulators to renew its license so that it can open an elevated area that did not flood. Camp operators have said nearly 900 girls have registered to attend.

Eastland acknowledged the camp had no detailed written flood evacuation plan. He also said more campers would have survived if he and his father, camp co-owner Richard Eastland, as well as a camp safety director had made quicker decisions to evacuate.

By the time they did, the waters were so high and so fast they were producing rapids that swirled around some cabins, he said.

Eastland also acknowledged staff didn't use simple measures like using campus loudspeakers to tell campers and counselors to leave their cabins and get to higher ground earlier in the storm.

Cici Steward, whose 8-year-old daughter Cile is the only camp victim still missing, said after the testimony the state should deny the camp's license.

“It is so clear they are incapable of keeping children safe," Cici Steward said.

Eastland attorney Mikal Watts declined comment immediately after the hearing.

Missed warnings and missed chances to evacuate

Eastland said he and other staff were signed up for an emergency warning system on their phones and used other weather apps. But he said he did not see flood watch social media posts by the National Weather Service and the Texas Department of Emergency Management on July 2 and 3.

Eastland said he thought the local “CodeRED” mobile phone alert system and phone weather apps staff had at the time “was enough.”

A July 3 National Weather Service alert asked area broadcasters to note that locally heavy rainfall could cause flash flooding in rivers, creeks, streams and low-lying areas, all features of the Camp Mystic property.

Eastland said that his father typically monitored weather issues and that he did not believe camp staff held a meeting about the alerts and warnings that day.

The storms would hit in the overnight hours, killing 25 campers, two teenage counselors and Richard Eastland, who had loaded up his large SUV with campers before the vehicle was swept away. None survived.

“We did not expect what was going to happen,” Edward Eastland said.

“You were warned,” said Brad Beckworth, an attorney representing the Steward family.

Eastland says campus loudspeakers were not used to issue a weather warning

The courtroom heard part of a video of “Taps” played over loudspeakers when the campers went to bed at around 10 p.m. July 3.

Eastland said he went to bed about 11 p.m. and never received a National Weather Service flash flood warning at 1:14 a.m.. He said he slept through a CodeRED alert text at the same time that warned of a flood event that could last several hours.

His father called him on a walkie-talkie shortly before 2 a.m. to tell him about hard rain falling and the need to move canoes and water equipment off the riverfront. They did not move to evacuate cabins at that point.

“It was not reasonable to do that at that time,” Eastland said. “The water wasn’t out of the Guadalupe River. It was pouring down rain and lightning and the cabins were safe at that time.”

Richard Eastland made the call to evacuate cabins about 3 a.m., Edward Eastland said.

Lawyers for the families introduced a signed statement from a counselor who described the horror of the night. She woke up during the storm and could see girls running for shelter.

“The water was rising faster than anything I have ever witnessed,” the counselor wrote. She said Edward Eastland eventually approached the cabin in knee-deep water, told her it was too late to leave and they should ride out the storm there.

The counselor said she tried to keep the children out of the rising water pouring in before she was eventually swept away herself.

Eastland also tearfully described trying to grab two girls and a third who jumped on his back while he stood bracing himself in a cabin doorway before they were washed away. He and a counselor eventually were pushed into a tree.

“The water was over my head very quickly. The water was churning,” Eastland said.

At one point, several family members left the courtroom during a cellphone video taken the night of the flood. Someone could be heard yelling “Help!” in the background.

Flooding killed at least 136 people along the Guadalupe River

All told, the destructive flooding killed at least 136 people along a several-mile stretch of the river, raising questions about how things went so terribly wrong.

Texas health regulators said last week they are investigating hundreds of complaints filed against the camp owners. The Texas Rangers are also helping look into allegations of neglect, according to the Texas Department of Safety, although the scope of the state’s elite investigations unit was not immediately clear.

The hearing is scheduled to continue Tuesday.

The decision caps a swift political fall for the seven-term lawmaker, who had been seen as one of the leading candidates in California’s gubernatorial race before dropping out Sunday after the allegations surfaced, claims he has continued to deny.

The San Francisco Chronicle, followed by CNN, first reported allegations that Swalwell had sexually assaulted a woman twice, including when she worked for him. CNN also reported that three other women alleged various kinds of sexual misconduct by Swalwell — including sending them unsolicited explicit messages or nude photos.

“I am deeply sorry to my family, staff, and constituents for mistakes in judgment I’ve made in my past,” Swalwell said on social media. “I will fight the serious false allegation made against me. However, I must take responsibility and ownership for the mistakes I did make.”

The House Ethics Committee had begun an investigation into whether Swalwell engaged in sexual misconduct toward an employee working under his supervision, the panel announced Monday. Other lawmakers were pushing for a quick vote to expel him from Congress.

Another lawmaker, Republican Rep. Tony Gonzales of Texas, said Monday that he would file his "retirement from office" when Congress returns Tuesday. Gonzales, who had already said he would not seek reelection, gave no further details on his plans to step down.

Gonzales had acknowledged an affair with a staff member who later died by suicide and was also facing renewed calls for an expulsion vote in the wake of the allegations against Swalwell.

Several Democrats had quickly called on Swalwell to resign in the days after the allegations came to light, including prominent allies such as Arizona Sen. Ruben Gallego. California Sen. Adam Schiff, who withdrew his endorsement for Swalwell's gubernatorial bid, told reporters Monday that “the whole thing is just shocking and deeply upsetting.”

“I think he made the right decision to resign,” Schiff said.

Swalwell wrote in the statement posted to social media that he was “aware of efforts to bring an immediate expulsion vote” and that it was “wrong” without due process.

“But it's also wrong for my constituents to have me distracted from my duties. Therefore, I plan to resign my seat in Congress,” Swalwell wrote. He did not provide a timeframe, saying only that he would work with his staff in the coming days to ensure their work can continue.

Swalwell, an Iowa native, was elected in 2012 and represents a House district east of San Francisco. He launched a presidential run in April 2019 but shuttered it a few months later after failing to catch on with voters.

Swalwell was one of Donald Trump’s top Democratic antagonists in Congress, serving as a prominent member of the House Judiciary and Intelligence committees during the president’s first term and as one of several Democratic prosecutors for Trump’s second impeachment after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.

He was removed from the intel committee by then-House Speaker Kevin McCarthy in 2023 based on his contact with a suspected Chinese spy, Christine Fang.

Fang was reported to have come into contact with Swalwell’s campaign as he was first running for Congress in 2012 and participated in fundraising for his 2014 campaign.

Federal investigators alerted Swalwell to their concerns and briefed Congress about Fang in 2015, at which point Swalwell says he cut off contact with her. He was not accused of wrongdoing and a House Ethics Committee investigation that was opened in 2021 closed two years later without any action.

Swalwell’s planned departure from the House will trigger a special election in his district, which he won by over 30 percentage points in 2024. In California, the governor is responsible for calling a special election, which he must do “within 14 calendar days of the occurrence of the vacancy,” according to state election law.

The future of the House Ethics probe is uncertain, as the panel often ends its investigations when lawmakers resign. The Ethics Committee said the mere fact that it is investigating the allegations against Swalwell, and publicly disclosing its review, does not itself indicate that any violation has occurred.

—

Associated Press reporter Mary Clare Jalonick in Washington contributed to this report.

Moss, a second-team All-Southeastern Conference selection, rushed for 404 yards and six touchdowns last season. He averaged 5.2 yards per carry as he returned from a knee injury two seasons ago when he led the team with 765 rushing yards and 10 touchdowns with a 6.3 average per run.

Moss has run the 40-yard dash in the 4.5 range with a 31 1/2 inch vertical leap, a 9-11 broad jump and 16 reps of 225 pounds in the bench press.

Moss rushed for 114 yards and one touchdown as a freshman and was named the Aggies’ Top Offfensive Newcomer.

Aaron Wilson is a Texans and NFL reporter for KPRC 2 and click2houston.com

Flash forward two years later and Dell is making a strong recovery from a dislocated knee and torn anterior cruciate, medical collateral and lateral collateral ligaments. After undergoing two surgeries performed by Dr. James Andrews and missing the entire season last year, after getting hurt in December 2024 while catching a touchdown pass against the Kansas City Chiefs at Arrowhead Stadium, Dell is making tangible progress.

Texans coach DeMeco Ryans addressed Dell’s medical outlook during the NFL owners meetings and emphasized that the former University of Houston star won’t be rushed back into organized team activities.

Texans general manager Nick Caserio said Monday that the team will evaluate where Dell stands after spring workouts to determine his activity level at training camp. He was noncommittal on a timeline.

“With Tank, honestly, it’s probably a day-to-day, we’ll kind of see where he is,” Caserio said. “Probably have a better idea as we get through the spring of what his availability is going to be in training camp. He’s been here pretty religiously, since he’s been able to do more once he’s gotten out of the rehab stage.”

Dell has fought through all of the doubt and frustration of an injury that interrupted the dynamic start to his NFL career, leaning on faith, hard work, family, friends and coaches like Ryans to remain positive and optimistic.

Dell called it the hardest year of his life.

The Texans are optimistic about Dell’s medical outlook, but aren’t rushing the process. Dell has posted several workout videos showing himself cutting and catching passes and lifting weights as he works his way back from the injury.

The Texans do expect Dell to participate in the offseason conditioning program.

“Tank, he’s grinding, great attitude,” Ryan said during the NFL meetings at the Arizona Biltmore. “Don’t know if OTA’s he’ll be there, but I know he’ll back for us at some point this year. As I told Tank, it’s not a matter of getting back to OTA’s just to get back, it’s just a matter of getting back in a really good spot physically to where you stay there.

“That’s the main thing. It’s not about how quickly he returns. It’s just about Tank returning because we saw what Tank can do: the playmaking that he provides to our entire team. Just getting him back, whenever that time is, it’s going to lift our team.”

Caserio emphasized they won’t hesitate to draft a wide receiver, but that decision won’t be determined by how Dell is doing.

“As far as a receiver position, if there is a receiver that we like that we feel we want to add to the team then we’re going to take him independent of what’s going on,” Caserio said. “In the end, the competition will sort itself out. DeMeco [Ryans] and I talk about this all the time. Get them in the building, they’ll figure it out. Not us.

“Ultimately, it’s going to be up to the performance of the players. We try to stay true to that and not get so, ‘Well, we have this.’ Well, honestly, that could change in a heartbeat. You always want to be prepared and have some contingencies in place, but I would say a person’s individual situation doesn’t necessarily correlate to, well, we have to draft this over here. If you draft it, you draft it.”

Dell is looking forward to making a healthy return and get back to playing the game he loves.

“What I’ve been through is something that taught me to be humble and just keep working, I’m back, I’m feeling good right now,” Dell said hosting a shopping spree at Academy Sports and Outdoors for athletes from Boys & Girls Club of Greater Houston in honor of National Women’s and Girls Sports Day. “Once the season comes, I’m gonna cook up.”

Running free, catching touchdown passes, bolting past coverage.

That’s the vision for Dell. The comeback trail is being paved month by month for Dell as he continues to strengthen his surgically repaired knee after a devastating knee injury a year ago that sidelined him for the entire season.

Dell tried to make a return for the end of the season as the Texans made another playoff run that ended in the divisional round, but it was regarded as too soon for him to get back out there.

“I was making a push, I wanted to be out there with the guys,” Dell said. “Last year, that football season alone, was the hardest year of my life. Just sitting out of football for a year straight. Been playing football since I was five and that was my first year I ever had to sit out of football so that was hard. I tried to make a push back, it didn’t go as planned. I got time now and I’ll be ready.”

Dell is rehabbing from injuries sustained while catching a touchdown in December 2024 against the Chiefs at Arrowhead Stadium.

“He worked very hard,” Texans general manager Nick Caserio said last season. “I think our performance group, they do a really good job. I would anticipate him being available for the offseason and then really April, May and June we’ll probably have a better idea. Knowing Tank, he’s probably cautiously optimistic that he’s going to be able to go out there and be Tank Dell.

“I think everybody is hoping that’s the case, but you never know. None of us control injuries and what happens. but I think everybody is rooting for Tank. He’s worked very hard and had a great attitude. I’m excited to see him out there moving around. Nobody is more excited than he is, so it will be good once we start getting on the field and getting on the grass to see what that looks like.”

When Dell got hurt, Texans quarterback C.J. Stroud was inconsolable as he burst into tears. It was a traumatic experience for Dell and his best friend.

Stroud supported Dell, just as Dell is now behind the embattled former NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year after he had five interceptions and five fumbles, and seven total turnovers in two playoff games. The Texans’ season ended in a loss to the New England Patriots as Stroud threw a career-high four interceptions in one half at Gillette Stadium.

Stroud was the subject of heavy criticism locally and nationally and on social media with lots of cruel jokes and commentary surrounding one of the most successful young quarterbacks in the league.

“In every way possible, like he was there for me,” Dell said of his support for Stroud. “People can say what they want about seven, you know. They sitting on the couches just typing on the computer, typing on their phones. But everybody knows who seven is.

“Especially in the facility, we know who he is. And when we get back out there with him, it’s going to be special. So, we can let them say what they want about him.”

Dell had a good time supporting the athletes from Boys & Girls Club of Greater Houston.

“It’s fun,” Dell said. “My sister used to do sports and I just know how she felt about sports. So, it’s fun to just see them have a future in sports. I feel like it’s a good thing and I’m excited.”

One of the biggest elements that the Texans’ offense was missing all season: the presence of a dangerous slot receiver.

That’s because Dell missed the entire season.

Dell tried to make it back for the end of this season, but the plan was always for him to spend the season sidelined after undergoing several surgeries to repair a dislocated knee.

Now, Dell is poised to make a healthy comeback for the 2026 season. He has remained in good spirits throughout a long, grueling rehabilitation process.

“Very supportive, you know, from top to bottom,” Dell said. “Everybody in the facility, from the coaching staff to even our cooks in the facility, everybody was supportive of me. Praying for me, of course, keeping me in their prayers, and especially my teammates and my closest people.”

The Texans missed the spark Dell provides to the offense with his outstanding route running skills and explosiveness after the catch.

He has caught 98 career passes for 1,376 yards and 10 touchdowns in 25 career games.

The knee injury marked the latest adversity for Dell whose dynamic rookie season was ended prematurely by a broken fibula that required surgery to repair the damage. Months later, Dell was the victim of a gunshot wound in his leg during a mass shooting in Florida while attending a party as an innocent bystander.

Then, he injured his knee in Kansas City after taking over as a starter when Stefon Diggs tore his anterior cruciate ligament and caught 51 passes for 667 yards and three touchdowns.

Stroud, coming off an erratic performance in the playoffs against the Patriots and Pittsburgh Steelers, is thrilled to have one of his best friends back for next season.

“Tank is a brother of mine, somebody who’s like blood to me,” Stroud said. “To see what he’s gone through the last two years has been heartbreaking and he’s been through a lot. But I know he’s grown a lot as a person and as a young man, especially as a man of God. So, I’m proud of him. The smile he continues to have on his face is contagious.

“I think for him too, being here every day putting in the work and putting his best foot forward in some situations that were out of his control, I think is amazing to see him do that. So, I’m super proud of him and I can’t wait to get him on the field. You all know the connection we have.”

Dell is inspirational to his teammates, including Pro Bowl wide receiver Nico Collins.

“Yeah, man, you know, Tank, he wants to be out here,” Collins said this past season. “We got to continue to keep his spirits up, tell him we out here for you. Be in his corner no matter what. You know, like nobody want to miss the game you love. It’s heartbreaking, it’s crushing when you can’t be out there with your brothers.

“You see them every day and you’re like, dang, I miss you bro, you know what I’m saying. We know in spirit he’s getting better, so we’re going to go out here keep spinning it for him and make plays for him and keep his spirits up. We going to pick up where we left off. He’s in great spirits, though.”

• ‘Encouraging and uplifting,’ how presence of injured wide receivers Tank Dell, Stefon Diggs fired up Texans in win
• Sources: Texans’ Tank Dell tore medial collateral, lateral collateral, as well as ACL, dislocated knee, meniscus damage

PREVIOUS: A crushing blow for Texans: Tank Dell suffers ‘significant’ knee injury, a dislocated knee cap, team upset, emotional

“You all know the connection we have and I know he’s getting his No. 1 back, so he’s happy about that,” Stroud said of Dell wearing his college jersey next year after wearing No. 3 previously. “I’m happy for him to get Uno back. So, we’re going to be coming back trim and I can’t wait to get my brother back on the field. I think our connection, hopefully our chemistry picks right back up where we left off.”

Aaron Wilson is a Texans and NFL reporter for KPRC 2 and click2houston.com

Sharon Simmons, dressed in a "DoorDash Grandma” T-shirt, walked up to the Oval Office’s exterior door and knocked as media cameras rolled. Trump popped out and said, “Hello. Nice to see you,” before proclaiming, “Look at this!” and then, glancing toward a pack of nearby reporters, offering, “This doesn’t look staged, does it?”

It was, of course. Making it onto the White House grounds alone requires obtaining prior permission and passing through security, while accessing the Oval Office — not to mention getting so close to the president — would have been impossible without additional screenings and background checks.

Still, the White House has attempted to call more attention to a piece of the Trump-backed tax and spend package approved last summer that allows Americans to temporarily deduct some federal taxes from income earned on tips. It lets certain workers deduct up to $25,000, but phases out for those with higher incomes.

Officials are intensifying the publicity effort ahead of Tax Day on Wednesday — even as the issue has been overshadowed for weeks by the war in Iran that has raised gas prices and spooked financial markets, and more immediately by Trump’s feud with Pope Leo XIV.

McDonald’s is a longtime favorite of the president — and fare he's used to political ends before.

He famously ordered it, along with vast piles of other fast food, to serve the visiting NCAA football champion Clemson Tigers in 2019 during his first term, when a government shutdown had reduced White House kitchen staff. Trump also staged one of the most memorable stops of his successful 2024 reelection campaign by visiting a Pennsylvania McDonald’s restaurant, where he worked the fry station and took reporters’ questions from the drive-thru window.

On Monday, Simmons, who DoorDash said was from Arkansas, recounted how the tax changes had helped reduce the amount of income she had to claim. Simmons subsequently told reporters she had earned more than $11,000 in tips a year. Exact figures on her savings were difficult to verify without Simmons' tax statement wasn't provided to reporters.

Trump then asked, “Would you like to do a little news conference with me?" and had her stand awkwardly beside him as he took questions about his threats to blockade the Strait of Hormuz and his refusal to apologize to Pope Leo.

The president eventually asked Simmons: “I think you voted for me. Do you think?” To which she responded, “Um, maybe.” Undaunted, Trump continued: “I heard you're a great supporter. We appreciate it.”

When a reporter later asked if the White House was a good tipper, Simmons hesitated: “Um ... potentially.”

“Wait,” Trump crowed, reaching into his pocket for a $100 bill and handing it to Simmons with a grin. She took the money, laughed and finished, “Yes, very," as the president patted her on the back and beamed.

Trump also invited Simmons and her husband to a UFC bout he's helping to stage on the White House lawn to mark his 80th birthday in June. And he turned to Simmons again to press her on if she believes “men should play in women's sports” — a frequent topic of his as he blasts Democrats for being too supportive of transgender rights.

“I really don’t have an opinion on that,” Simmons replied, prompting Trump to push, “I’ll bet you do.”

“No, no," she insisted. “I’m here about no tax on tips.”

The White House later said that Trump personally delivered the food — consisting of cheeseburgers and fries — to West Wing staff.

It didn't say if he got a tip for doing so.

Swalwell’s decision to suspend his campaign Sunday followed allegations that he sexually assaulted a woman twice, including when she worked for him, that were published Friday in the San Francisco Chronicle and later by CNN. While pulling out of the race he remained defiant in a post on the social platform X, saying, “I will fight the serious, false allegations that have been made — but that’s my fight, not a campaign’s.”

On Monday, he posted a statement on X, saying he planned to resign from Congress but did not provide a date for his departure. He wrote it was unfair for his constituents to have him distracted from his duties.

For rival candidates in a wide-open race, the key issue is where Swalwell’s supporters will go. He was among the most prominent Democrats in the contest, with mail ballots scheduled to go to voters in early May in advance of the June 2 primary election. Most of the well-known candidates are expected to appear on stage together Tuesday during a forum in Sacramento.

Katie Porter, one of the leading Democrats, posted a line from a San Francisco Chronicle column on X, "Democrats can pull victory from the jaws of defeat by coalescing around Porter.” Billionaire hedge fund manager-turned-liberal activist Tom Steyer said he secured the support of a handful of lawmakers, including Rep. Jared Huffman, a Democrat whose coastal district runs north of San Francisco, not far from Swalwell's home turf. Antonio Villaraigosa, the former Los Angeles mayor, pitched a new ad promising to lower gas and grocery costs in a state known for its punishing cost of living.

With seven established Democrats and two leading Republicans on a primary ballot with more than 50 candidates, the race remains fluid. While Swalwell has suspended his campaign, his name cannot be removed from the ballot.

“Nobody has really caught fire,” said Democratic consultant Andrew Acosta, who is not involved in the campaign. Swalwell's supporters “will scatter out to other candidates.”

Shifting alliances with Swalwell's departure

In Sacramento, a handful of state lawmakers quickly switched their support from Swalwell to Steyer. Democratic Assemblymember Nick Schultz said he believes Steyer will put in the work to form strong relationships with the legislature. Steyer's business background — he has never held public office — means he’ll challenge the status quo, Schultz added.

Democratic Assemblymember Corey Jackson — who also shifted to Steyer — said he wanted to back a candidate who had a legitimate chance of winning. He said in a statement that he and Steyer shared a “commitment to building an economy rooted in dignity for working people.”

San Jose's Democratic Mayor Matt Mahan, running for governor in his first statewide election, sought to distinguish his record from Steyer and another leading candidate, Republican Steve Hilton, who hosted a show on Fox News for six years and has Trump’s endorsement.

With Swalwell out, “now we have a field that’s got a billionaire who made his fortune investing in private prisons, ICE facilities, oil and gas companies … and a MAGA-backed TV commentator on the other hand,” Mahan said on MS NOW’s “Morning Joe.”

“California deserves so much better,” Mahan said.

Many voters remain distant from governor's race

Swalwell is perhaps best known nationally as a House manager in President Donald Trump’s second impeachment trial during his first term in early 2021. But in a media environment dominated by Trump, the race remains distant from many California voters.

After the publicity about sexual misconduct allegations, “I think there are probably more people who know who Eric Swalwell is than can articulate a Tom Steyer position paper,” Acosta added.

Swalwell was considered a leading contender along with Steyer and Porter and two Republicans, Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco and Hilton. But Republican activists haven't rallied around Hilton, despite Trump's support; at a California Republican Party convention over the weekend the party declined to endorse a candidate in the race.

Democrats have feared the party’s large number of candidates could lead to them getting shut out of the general election in November. That’s because California has a primary system in which only the top two vote-getters advance to the general election, regardless of party.

Swalwell had become a clear target for his Democratic rivals as he began to lock up institutional support. Some had seized on rumors of sexual misconduct that circulated on social media for weeks before the Chronicle’s report.

The San Francisco Chronicle spoke to a woman who alleged Swalwell sexually assaulted her in 2019, when she worked for him, and again in 2024. The woman said she did not go to police at the time of the assaults because she was afraid she would not be believed. In both cases the woman said she was too intoxicated to consent to sex. CNN reported on allegations that appeared to come from the same woman, and spoke to several other women who accused Swalwell of other sexual misconduct.

Neither outlet named the woman, and The Associated Press has not been able to independently verify her account and identity. Her lawyer declined to comment.

The alleged 2024 incident occurred in New York, and the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office said it’s investigating. That office urged anyone with knowledge to contact its special victims division. The Alameda County District Attorney's office, which covers Swalwell's California district, said no one has reached out to the office with allegations against Swalwell.

House colleagues call for Swalwell to resign

Swalwell's swift downfall came amid rising pressure for him to leave Congress. He earlier lost the support of powerful labor unions that had backed his candidacy, along with one-time allies like California U.S. Sen. Adam Schiff and Rep. Jimmy Gomez.

Some representatives had said they would support the rare step of expelling him from the U.S. House should he refuse to step aside. The House Ethics Committee opened an investigation Monday.

Swalwell, who is originally from Iowa, was elected in 2012 and represents a House district east of San Francisco. He launched a presidential run in April 2019 but shuttered it a few months later after failing to catch on with voters.

___

Associated Press writer Sophie Austin in Sacramento contributed.

Authorities allege 20-year-old Daniel Moreno-Gama threw the incendiary device about 4 a.m. Friday, setting an exterior gate at Altman’s home alight before fleeing on foot, police said. Less than an hour later, Moreno-Gama allegedly went to OpenAI’s headquarters about 3 miles (4.83 kilometers) away and threatened to burn down the building.

Moreno-Gama is opposed to artificial intelligence, writing about AI’s purported risk to humanity and “our impending extinction,” according to a federal criminal complaint.

“This was not spontaneous. This was planned, targeted and extremely serious,” said FBI San Francisco Acting Special Agent in Charge Matt Cobo during a press conference.

No one was injured at Altman's home or the company offices, authorities said.

Moreno-Gama faces state and federal charges

Moreno-Gama faces charges including two counts of attempted murder and attempted arson in California state court, San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins. He tried to kill both Altman and a security guard at Altman's residence, she alleged. He is set to appear in court Tuesday, and online state court records do not yet show if he has an attorney.

Jenkins said the state charges carry penalties ranging from 19 years to life in prison.

On Monday morning, FBI agents went to Moreno-Gama’s home in Spring, Texas, a suburb of Houston, where they spent several hours before leaving. He has been charged by federal prosecutors with possession of an unregistered firearm and damage and destruction of property by means of explosives. Those charges carry respective penalties of up to 10 years and 20 years in prison.

The federal court documents do not list an attorney for Moreno-Gama, and he has not yet had his first appearance in federal court.

Authorities allege Moreno-Gama traveled from his home in Texas to San Francisco and visited Altman’s home early Friday morning.

Authorities say Moreno-Gama was opposed to artificial intelligence

When Moreno-Gama was arrested Friday, officials found a document on him in which he “identified views opposed to Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the executives of various AI companies,” court documents say. The document discussed AI’s purported risk to humanity and “our impending extinction,” according to the criminal complaint.

Surveillance video images included in the criminal complaint show a person dressed in a dark hoodie and pants that the FBI alleges is Moreno-Gama approaching the driveway of Altman’s home. In various images, the person can be seen tossing the Molotov cocktail, which landed at the top of a metal gate and started a small fire.

Surveillance video images from outside OpenAI’s headquarters allegedly show Moreno-Gama grabbing a chair and using it to hit a set of glass doors. Authorities said Moreno-Gama was approached by the building’s security personnel, who told investigators he “stated in sum and substance” that he came to the headquarters “to burn it down and kill anyone inside,” according to the complaint.

San Francisco police arrested Moreno-Gama and recovered “incendiary devices, a jug of kerosene, a blue lighter, and a document.” Moreno-Gama was being held Monday in the San Francisco County Jail on the state charges, and was expected to appear in court on Tuesday.

U.S. Attorney Craig Missakian said authorities “will treat this as an act of domestic terrorism, and together with our partners, prosecute him to the fullest extent of the law.”

Authorities say Moreno-Gama's anti-AI document contained threats against Altman

The document in which Moreno-Gama discussed his opposition to AI also made threats against Altman, officials said.

“Also if I am going to advocate for others to kill and commit crimes, then I must lead by example and show that I am fully sincere in my message,” Moreno-Gama is alleged by authorities to have written in the document.

Advocacy groups that have issued grave warnings about AI’s risks to society condemned the violence.

Anthony Aguirre, president and CEO of the Future of Life Institute, said in a written statement Friday that “violence and intimidation of any kind have no place in the conversation about the future of AI.”

Another group, PauseAI, said in a statement that the suspect had no role in the group but joined its forum on the social media platform Discord about two years ago and posted about 34 messages there, none containing explicit calls to violence but one that was flagged as “ambiguous.”

Discord said Monday that it has banned Moreno-Gama for “off-platform behavior.”

Altman addressed the threats in a blog post

Hours after the attack on his house, Altman posted a photo of his husband and their toddler in a blog post addressing the threats against him.

“Normally we try to be pretty private, but in this case I am sharing a photo in the hopes that it might dissuade the next person from throwing a Molotov cocktail at our house, no matter what they think about me,” Altman wrote.

He added that “fear and anxiety about AI is justified” but it was important to “de-escalate the rhetoric and tactics and try to have fewer explosions in fewer homes, figuratively and literally.”

Altman has become a preeminent voice in Silicon Valley on the promise and potential dangers of artificial intelligence. The attack comes days after The New Yorker published an in-depth investigation that touched on concerns some people have about him and the company.

Debate about the impact of AI is growing

The attack came at a time of growing debate about the societal effects of AI assistants like OpenAI’s ChatGPT that millions of people are turning to for information, advice, writing help and to do work on their behalf.

An annual report published Monday by Stanford University called the AI index found that most people believe AI’s benefits outweigh its drawbacks, “but nervousness is growing and trust in institutions to manage the technology remains uneven.”

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Lozano reported from Houston and Oyekanmi reported from Spring, Texas. Associated Press journalists Matt O'Brien from Providence, Rhode Island and Rebecca Boone from Boise, Idaho contributed.

Gonzales had already said he would not seek reelection after admitting to an affair with a staff member who had later died by suicide. His retirement announcement came just hours after Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell of California said he would be resigning from Congress as he also confronted allegations of sexual misconduct.

House Republican leaders had already called on the three-term Gonzales to not seek reelection as they try to hold on to a strongly Republican district in November's midterm elections. And the House Ethics Committee had initiated an investigation. Under House ethics rules, lawmakers may not engage in a sexual relationship with any employee of the House under their supervision.

“There is a season for everything and God has a plan for us all,” Gonzales said in a social media post. “When Congress returns tomorrow, I will file my retirement from office.”

He said it has been a privilege “to serve the great people of Texas.” He gave no further details on his plans to step down. Previously, he had insisted he would serve out the remainder of his term as the GOP works to hold its slim House majority.

Last month, the top Republican and Democratic members on the House Ethics Committee said in a joint statement that an investigative panel would look into whether Gonzales engaged in sexual misconduct toward an employee in his office and whether he discriminated unfairly by dispensing special favors or privileges.

That announcement came the same day that Gonzales, appearing on the “Joe Pags Show,” was asked if he had a relationship with the aide, Regina Ann Santos-Aviles.

“I made a mistake and I had a lapse in judgment, and there was a lack of faith, and I take full responsibility for those actions,” Gonzales said.

Gonzales went on to say he had reconciled with his wife and had asked God to forgive him. He also said he looked forward to the Ethics Committee investigation.

But as lawmakers returned from a two-week break on Monday, there was a growing clamor among members to take a stand against alleged sexual misconduct. Swalwell's alleged transgressions brought renewed attention to the issue.

Comments from lawmakers on social media suggested some were open to an expulsion trade-off of sorts that would affect each party equally.

Rep. Teresa Leger Fernandez, D-N.M., said both Gonzales and Swalwell “are not fit to serve in Congress given their sexual transgressions against women who work for them.”

“There’s already been a resolution announced to expel Swalwell that I will support. I will introduce a resolution to expel Rep. Gonzales,” Leger Fernandez said.

In a separate post that came after the Texas lawmaker made his retirement announcement, she challenged Gonzales to make it "effective immediately.”

“He has until 2PM tomorrow — when we will file his expulsion,” she said on X.

Naim Kassem spoke in a televised address on the eve of the scheduled meeting between Lebanon and Israel's ambassadors to the United States, as both sides set a framework for negotiations.

The latest round of fighting was sparked by Hezbollah firing rockets into northern Israel on March 2, after the United States. and Israel attacked Iran, a Hezbollah patron.

At least 2,055 people have been killed in Israeli strikes in Lebanon, the Health Ministry said, among them 252 women, 165 children and 87 medical workers, while 6,588 others were wounded. More than 1 million people have been displaced.

Lebanon's government, which says it's committed to disarming Hezbollah, had called for direct talks early on in the war. Last week, Israel announced their approval of talks, but both sides don't appear to be on the same page.

Lebanon hopes for a ceasefire as a prerequisite, similar to Iran and U.S. talks brokered by Pakistan. However, Israel has framed the talks as peace negotiations with Hezbollah's disarmament as a priority, with no mention of a ceasefire or a withdrawal of its forces from southern Lebanon.

“We refuse negotiations with the Israeli entity. These negotiations are pointless,” Kassem said in a televised address, calling it a “free concession” to Israel and the U.S. “The opportunity is still there. We call for a historic and heroic position to cancel these negotiations.”

He called for a return to the ceasefire that halted the last Israel-Hezbollah war in 2024. At the time, talks were done indirectly, with the U.S., France and the U.N. peacekeeping mission in southern Lebanon mediating.

Kassem also slammed Lebanon's government for criminalizing Hezbollah's military activities and the ongoing diplomatic approach with Israel, saying "it did not take us any step forward," as well as the government's decision to expel Iran's ambassador from the country and criminalize the Iranian Revolutionary Guard's presence.

“We will let the front line speak,” Kassem said.

Strategic border town

Fierce fighting rocked the southern Lebanese town of Bint Jbeil on Monday, as Israeli troops appeared to encircle the area while Hezbollah militants launched rockets and artillery in an effort to push them back.

The clashes in the hilly town that overlooks the U.N.-mandated Blue Line dividing the two countries just over 3 kilometers (2 miles) away have intensified over the past week, after Iran and the U.S. agreed to a temporary truce. On Tuesday, Lebanon and Israel's ambassadors to the U.S. are set to meet in Washington for an in-person meeting to kick off landmark direct negotiations.

Israel has scaled back its attacks in Lebanon, especially in Beirut, after a series of deadly strikes without warning hit the heart of the capital in some of its busiest residential and commercial areas, killing more than 350 people.

At the same time, Israel appears to have stepped up strikes and a ground invasion in southern Lebanon, where it intends to create a security zone along the Litani River, almost 30 kilometers (18 miles) from the border. Bint Jbeil is among dozens of towns and villages south of the river that Israel called to evacuate early on in the war.

Hezbollah political official Wafiq Safa told The Associated Press Monday that in the town of Bint Jbeil, “there are bloody battles that are still being fought until now” and confirmed that a large number of the group’s fighters were besieged there.

“So far, this battle has not ended,” he said. “Of course, there are martyrs for us. This is very normal. There are certainly losses to the Israeli enemy.”

Israel's military said that its troops surrounded Hezbollah infrastructure and started ground operations in Bint Jbeil and surrounding areas, killing more than 100 Hezbollah fighters. Hezbollah didn't immediately announce any fatalities among its ranks, and Israel didn't comment on its military casualties.

On Sunday, Hezbollah said that it carried out at least five attacks on Israeli troops in the town and outskirts with rockets, artillery and drones. According to the group, Israeli troops were positioned near a school, a hospital and juncture that surrounds the heart of Bint Jbeil. Israel said that its troops attacked Hezbollah forces conducting surveillance from the Bint Jbeil Government Hospital and found a cache of machine guns and rockets.

When Israel occupied southern Lebanon until its withdrawal in 2000, it had relied on Bint Jbeil and other elevated locations for strategic vantage points. A major turning point was Hezbollah retaking the town, and the victory speech by then-leader Hassan Nasrallah in a stadium there. The Israeli military on Monday shared a satellite photo showing the stadium apparently destroyed in a strike.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said during a Cabinet meeting Monday that the military was expanding beyond the five hilltops it controlled in southern Lebanon since the ceasefire with Hezbollah in 2024, toward a “solid, deeper security zone." He said that it was in order to protect northern Israel.

Lebanese Red Cross volunteer buried

Elsewhere, a Lebanese Red Cross volunteer killed in an Israeli strike Sunday while on a mission in the southern village of Beit Yahoun was laid to rest in Choueifat, just south of Beirut.

Hassan Badawi, 31, and a colleague were going to a house that was struck by Israel a short drive from where they were stationed, his colleagues said at the funeral. Their trip was coordinated with the U.N. peacekeepers who liaise with the Israeli army, and they received the go-ahead, the colleagues said. They drove in ambulances clearly marked with the Red Cross emblem, flashed their emergency lights and wore helmets and flak jackets, they said.

"That is the only protection we have,” said paramedic Ahmad Assi, 29, a friend of Badawi.

Badawi often relayed the horrors he witnessed to friends and family while on duty.

“He said they were bombing everywhere, that he felt stuck, like he had to stay because there were too many wounded people that needed his help,” said Mohammed Cheito, a friend of Badawi from Lebanese University, where they studied engineering together a decade ago.

On Monday, an Israeli strike near the entrance to Red Cross offices in the coastal city of Tyre killed a wounded person who was being transported, damaging several Red Cross vehicles. A person familiar with the matter, but who wasn't authorized to disclose the information, said on condition of anonymity that the strike targeted a man on a motorcycle transporting the wounded. It's unclear who either people were.

The International Committee of the Red Cross urged for the protection of humanitarian and medical workers in a statement on Monday.

“Saving lives must never cost a life,” said Agnès Dhur, head of the ICRC delegation in Lebanon. “They must be allowed to reach and help the wounded and return unharmed.”

The Israeli military didn't immediately respond to The Associated Press when asked for comment.

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Associated Press writers Abby Sewell in Beirut, Isabel DeBre in Choueifat, Lebanon, and Melanie Lidman in Tel Aviv, Israel, contributed to this report.

Leo says he is sharing a Gospel message and not directly attacking Trump or anyone else with his appeals for peace and criticism of attitudes fueling the war.

Criticism of Trump came from Archbishop Paul Coakley, head of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, and from Minnesota-based Bishop Robert Barron, who only a few days ago was applauding Trump as an Easter guest at the White House. Barron called the president’s remarks “entirely inappropriate and disrespectful” and urged him to apologize.

The dismay extended into an even more solid base of Trump support — conservative Christian evangelicals. Many were appalled that Trump followed his Truth Social attack on Leo by posting an image depicting himself as a Christ-like savior.

“TAKE THIS DOWN, MR. PRESIDENT,” posted David Brody, a prominent Trump-supporting commentator with the Christian Broadcasting Network. “You’re not God. None of us are. This goes too far. It crosses the line.”

By midday Monday, the image had been taken down from Truth Social. And speaking at the White House, the president claimed that he never intended to liken himself to Jesus when he posted the picture.

“How did they come up with that?" he asked. “It’s supposed to be me as a doctor, making people better. And I do make people better. I make people a lot better."

Trump: No apology needed

On his clash with the pope, Trump was equally defiant: “There’s nothing to apologize for. He’s wrong.”

The president's feud with American religious communities comes just six months before voting begins in this fall's midterms as Trump grapples with low approval ratings and dissension from his MAGA base over the war with Iran. But few groups of voters have been more loyal to Trump — and important to his political success — than those on the religious right.

For now, some Trump allies are optimistic that the dispute will soon be forgotten.

“There is a deep reservoir of appreciation for the president and his faith-based policies that transcends and eclipses any disagreement over a social media post,” Ralph Reed, who sits on the president’s faith advisory board, told The Associated Press.

Through American history, numerous U.S. presidents have had policy differences with various popes. But experts on the Vatican and religious history could recall no exchange comparable to the back-and-forth between Trump and Leo over the pope’s condemnation of America's role in the Iran war.

“This is unprecedented criticism of a Pope from a US president,” David Campbell, a political science professor at the University of Notre Dame, said via email.

“As to whether it will have a big effect on how US Catholic voters regard Trump, that is an open question,” Campbell added. “Given that attitudes toward the president are driven largely by people’s party preference — which is hard to move -- it probably will not have a huge impact on Catholics’ attitudes toward Trump.”

David Gibson, director of Fordham University’s Center on Religion and Culture, noted that many lay Catholics have been standing by Trump in recent weeks and have been critical of their bishops who critique the president.

“If this attack on the pope does not shift that dynamic in a marked way it will truly be a watershed moment ... with American Catholics choosing a Catholic-baiting president over their own pope,” Gibson said.

Looking far back into world history, Trump’s attempt to “strong-arm Pope Leo” isn’t anything new, said Kathleen Sprows Cummings, a professor of American Studies and History at Notre Dame.

“Emperors, monarchs, and despots have long threatened popes in an effort to force them to bend to their will,” she said via email. “In an American context, however, Trump’s invective does represent a historic reversal.”

“For most of this country’s history, Americans viewed the pope as war-mongering, money-grubbing, anti-democratic menace who had designs on the White House,” she added. “Today, the menace is in the White House, and the pope is the one defending the ideals of liberty and human dignity.”

At a prayer service Saturday, the pontiff denounced the “ delusion of omnipotence ” that he said was fueling the war with Iran. Without citing Trump or the U.S. specifically, the pope said: “Enough of the display of power! Enough of war!”

On Monday, he was specific in responding to the president’s criticisms, saying “I have no fear of the Trump administration.”

Vance suggests Vatican should stay out of politics in some cases

Vice President JD Vance, a Catholic convert who occasionally has sparred with church leaders over their criticism of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, said in an interview on Fox News Channel on Monday night that the president’s social media post with the Jesus-like image was “a joke."

"Of course, he took it down because he realized a lot of people weren’t understanding his humor,” Vance said.

He repeatedly dismissed the focus on the president’s fight with the pope, saying it “isn’t particularly newsworthy" and there will be disagreements from time to time with the Vatican.

But Vance also suggested the pope should stay in his lane.

“I certainly think that in some cases, it would be best for the Vatican to stick to matters of morality, to stick to matters of what’s going on with the Catholic church, and let the president of the United States stick to dictating American public policy," Vance said.

Catholics Vote Common Good, a nonprofit group that generally supports progressive causes, urged Vance to speak out on the rift.

“At a moment when the Holy Father is being attacked and the dignity of the Church is being undermined, silence is not neutrality. It is complicity,” said Denise Murphy McGraw, the organization’s national co-chair.

Some vocal evangelical supporters of Trump criticized the meme depicting him as healer apparently resembling Jesus, even while maintaining support for Trump himself.

“It isn’t hard to condemn this outright,” said Willy Rice, a candidate for president of the Southern Baptist Convention and pastor of Calvary Church in Clearwater, Florida.

“Many Christians appreciate the President’s administration and have supported him in meaningful ways, but this is wrong,” Rice posted on X.

Also weighing in was Doug Wilson, co-founder of the Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches, a staunchly conservative Calvinist denomination with an outsized influence in the current administration. Its churches’ members include Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.

“I was very grateful to see how many conservative Christians immediately denounced the blasphemous Jesus/Trump image,” Wilson posted on X.

Megan Basham, a conservative evangelical commentator, posted that she agreed with Trump’s criticisms of Leo as “Weak on crime, and terrible for Foreign Policy.” But she assailed his meme as “OUTRAGEOUS blasphemy” and urged Trump to “ask for forgiveness from the American people and then from God.”

A look at the numbers for religious blocs as election nears

Such public dissension against Trump from evangelical leaders is rare.

In 2024, white evangelical Protestants were a significant component of Trump’s winning coalition, according to AP VoteCast. About one-third of Trump voters, 34%, identified as white evangelical or born-again Christians, compared with only 8 percent of Harris voters. White evangelicals made up about 2 in 10 voters that year, and the vast majority, 79%, voted for Trump.

A February AP-NORC poll found that about two-thirds of white born again Protestants approve of how Trump is handling his job as president, while about one-third disapprove.

Catholics were much unhappier with Trump’s performance in that poll. Only about 4 in 10 approved of his handling of the presidency, similar to Americans overall.

William Barbieri, a Catholic University ethics professor, said Trump’s remarks seemed aimed more at his political base than at Leo himself.

“Pope Leo’s response has been calm and measured, in a way that creates a contrast unflattering to the President,” Barbieri said via email.

“He is opposing resorts to lethal force ... and expressing solidarity with suffering people in many countries,” said Barbieri, contrasting the start of Leo’s pastoral journey to Africa this week with Trump’s appearance at an Ultimate Fighting Championship event on the weekend.

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This story has been corrected to attribute a quote to David Gibson of Fordham University, not to David Campbell of Notre Dame.

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Crary reported from New York and Smith from Pittsburgh. Associated Press writers Amelia Thomson DeVeaux and Michelle L. Price in Washington contributed.

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

Ramagem, also a former lawmaker, was sentenced in September to 16 years in prison for his role in the coup attempt by supporters of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro in 2023. Brazil's federal police said he fled the South American nation before he would have started serving his sentence.

Sen. Jorge Seif said in his social media channels that he had informed the U.S. embassy in Brasilia that Ramagem should not remain in custody for he was being persecuted at home. Seif did not give details as to why the former Brazilian intelligence agency chief had been put under custody.

On Monday, Ramagem appeared as in custody in ICE's online detainee database, although where he is being held was not specified.

“The political persecution against President Bolsonaro, his sons and his allies is now hitting an elected lawmaker in foreign soil,” Seif said. “In our document (to the U.S. embassy) we showed all the reasons that justify and defend the concession of political asylum to Ramagem and his family.”

Ramagem was stripped of his seat in Brazil's congress in December as a consequence of his conviction in the coup case one month earlier.

Earlier on Monday, Brazil's federal police said in a statement that a “fugitive of the country's justice was arrested" in Orlando, but did not mention Ramagem by name.

Brazil's federal police also said the unnamed fugitive was recently sentenced by the country's top court for the same three counts as Ramagem's conviction.

ICE and Ramagem's lawyer did not respond a request for comment from The Associated Press.

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Follow the AP’s coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america

Court filings show the U.S. Department of Justice, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the state of Texas dismissed their claims after entering into a settlement agreement with Colony Ridge.

• RELATED: Trump’s DOJ will move forward with Colony Ridge settlement despite concerns from judge

The cases centered on allegations of predatory land sales that left some buyers facing foreclosure.

The agreement includes a $68 million investment into the development aimed at improvements and oversight. It does not include direct compensation for many homeowners who lost their land.

Maria Acevedo, who said she was a main witness in the case, spoke with KPRC 2 by phone.

Acevedo said she is still dealing with the financial impact and is waiting to see whether the agreement will provide any meaningful relief.

• RELATED: Trump’s DOJ plans to settle Colony Ridge case without compensating victims

KPRC 2 went to the Colony Ridge office seeking answers but was told no one was available for an interview after filling out a request form.

In a statement, Colony Ridge attorney Jason Ray said the lawsuits have been dismissed and the settlement will move forward without oversight from a federal judge. He said the company will administer the agreement while working with state and federal agencies.

Ray said Colony Ridge will offer relief options to some buyers through the agreement, including up to four months of interest-free forbearance for those experiencing financial hardship. He said those payments could be moved to the end of a loan without additional interest.

It remains unclear how many people would qualify for those programs or how the relief would be distributed.

For now, some residents say they are still waiting for answers.

The move comes after George’s recent felony conviction, which led to his removal from office. But Wong’s appointment is raising new questions not just about how the process works, but whether it’s fair.

How did this happen?

Under Texas law, when an elected official is suspended, they are unable to perform their duties. In those cases, a visiting judge is assigned to step in and ensure the office continues to function.

That’s what happened here.

• RELATED: Fort Bend County Judge KP George suspended after felony conviction last month

A visiting judge, Jeth Jones was appointed to oversee the situation and ultimately selected Wong to temporarily fill the role.

Reporter Re’Chelle Turner asked Judge Jones why he choose Wong and he stated he could not comment on pending cases.

Political analyst Mark Jones says this type of assignment is standard practice in cases like this.

“When these types of cases occur, you go outside of the county generally because of the potential conflict of interest, and so a higher court appointed him to serve in this case,” Jones said.

Why Daniel Wong?

Wong is not just stepping into the role, he’s also the Republican nominee for Fort Bend County judge. He previously defeated George in the primary and is already on the ballot for November.

He was appointed, not elected, and will serve in the position temporarily until voters make a final decision later this year.

Why isn’t there a special election?

There will not be a special election to fill the role immediately.

Experts say that’s because the race is already underway.

“The Republicans have chosen their November candidate, and the Democrats will choose their candidate in May,” Jones explained. “Also, under Texas law, when a county judge is removed, we don’t have a special election.”

On the Democratic side, Dexter McCoy and Rachelle Carter are facing off in a May runoff to determine who will challenge Wong in November.

Concerns about fairness

That timing is raising concerns for some, including McCoy.

“I think there are a lot of questions around how this appointment process took place… that somehow we arrived at someone who has no county experience but happens to be the GOP nominee for this seat,” McCoy said. “People are concerned.”

When asked whether he is considering legal action, McCoy said:

“I think at this point all options are on the table.”

Carter also weighed in, saying the situation deserves closer review.

“This may warrant some review to ensure the process is clear and fair. At face value, it could be viewed as creating an unfair advantage,” Carter said in a statement.

However, she emphasized her focus remains on voters and key issues facing the county.

“My focus right now is not on the appointment itself, but on what matters most to the residents of Fort Bend County,” Carter said.

“Ultimately, the people of Fort Bend County will decide who should lead, and I trust that process.”

Carter released a full statement that reads:

“This may warrant some review to ensure the process is clear and fair. At face value, it could be viewed as creating an unfair advantage.

“My focus right now is not on the appointment itself, but on what matters most to the residents of Fort Bend County.

“This election should be about the future—how we manage growth responsibly, how we invest in infrastructure to keep our communities moving, and how we ensure public safety across the county. Those are the issues I am hearing about every day from voters, and that is where my attention remains.

“I believe voters want leadership that is steady, solutions-oriented, and prepared to serve. That is what I offer through my experience as an associate judge, business owner, and longtime resident of this community.

“As for any legal action, I am focused on my campaign and connecting with voters across the county. Ultimately, the people of Fort Bend County will decide who should lead, and I trust that process.

What happens next?

For now, Wong is expected to serve as interim county judge until voters decide who will lead Fort Bend County in the November election.

The suspension marks the first time in modern history that a sitting judge in Fort Bend County has been removed from office.

George was suspended on Friday following a civil lawsuit filed before his conviction. The lawsuit, brought by a Fort Bend County resident, alleges George violated her First Amendment rights by removing her during the public comment portion of a commissioners court meeting.

George was convicted of money laundering on March 20.

• Fort Bend County Judge KP George found guilty in money laundering case tied to campaign finances

Shortly after the suspension, Judge Jeth Jones appointed Wong, the Republican nominee for the position, to temporarily fill the role. The appointment is allowed under state law but ultimately left to the judge’s discretion.

Wong learned about his appointment during a phone call from KPRC 2 reporter Mario Diaz and was unaware he had been selected.

In a statement released afterward, Wong said, “As County Judge, my focus is and will always be on the people of Fort Bend County.”

Not everyone agrees with how the appointment was handled. Dexter McCoy, a Democratic candidate who could face Wong in the November election if he wins in a runoff election against Judge Rachelle Carter, criticized the decision, accusing Judge Jones of abandoning judicial independence and influencing the upcoming race.

George had been set to serve until 2027 after losing in the March primary and has declined to comment on the suspension and appointment.

He is scheduled to return to court on May 5, where he faces additional allegations tied to an alleged social media hoax that prosecutors say benefited his campaign.

For now, Wong will assume the duties of county judge as the situation continues to unfold.

“There is a season for everything and God has a plan for us all,” Gonzales said in a statement Monday evening. “When Congress returns tomorrow, I will file my retirement from office. It has been my privilege to serve the great people of Texas.”

Gonzales’ resignation announcement came about an hour after Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-California, announced his own resignation from the House. Swalwell’s move to step down came in the wake of allegations from numerous former staffers who said the Democrat engaged in sexual misconduct, including sexual assault.

Members of Congress had planned to bring expulsion resolutions against both lawmakers this week, and numerous members from each party indicated they would vote in favor. Gonzales’ statement did not specify whether his “retirement from office” would be effective immediately, though his prior announcement that he would not seek reelection suggested his latest statement referred to resignation.

Gonzales, a Navy veteran first elected in 2020, admitted to having an affair with a staffer in early March, weeks after the San Antonio Express-News reported on the extramarital tryst, including text messages in which the staffer pushed back against Gonzales’ requests for nude photos.

After finishing second in the March Republican primary, GOP leaders — including U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson — urged him to drop his reelection bid, and Gonzales followed suit soon after. But most Republicans had stopped short of calling for his resignation or expulsion until the Swalwell allegations brought sexual misconduct to the fore, opening the door for expelling one member from each party without upsetting the partisan makeup of a narrowly divided House.

The House Ethics Committee had opened an investigation into the San Antonio congressman to determine whether he “engaged in sexual misconduct towards an individual employed in his office” and “discriminated unfairly by dispensing special favors or privileges.”

House rules prohibit members of Congress from engaging in sexual relationships with their employees.

A former Gonzales campaign staffer came forward last week saying Gonzales had been sexually inappropriate with her as well, including sharing text messages in which the then-candidate had asked her for nude photos and for sex.

The most moderate Republican from Texas in Congress, Gonzales was both an outspoken voice on the need for border security and an occasional critic of his party’s approach to immigration.

His pending resignation will leave Texas’ 23rd Congressional District vacant. Gov. Greg Abbott has the power to set a special election date at his discretion.

The 23rd District, which runs from San Antonio to El Paso County and includes numerous West Texas border towns, was a swing district throughout the 2010s but had become more Republican in recent cycles through a combination of redistricting and political shifts, especially among its majority-Hispanic population.

But with Democrats enthused by a recent string of special election overperformances, including a state Senate flip in North Texas, the race to replace Gonzales could be more competitive. National Democrats were already eyeing the seat as a pickup opportunity in the November general election, encouraged by recent trends suggesting Hispanic voters have shifted leftward since 2024.

The Republican nominee in the November general election is Brandon Herrera, a gun rights activist and YouTuber who had challenged Gonzales in the primary in two successive cycles.

Herrera, who is much further right than Gonzales, initially took issue with Gonzales’ vote, in the wake of the Robb Elementary School shooting in Uvalde, for a bipartisan gun safety bill loathed by hardline gun rights activists. As Gonzales’ affair came to light, Herrera has been deeply critical of the congressman’s ethical conduct, and had called for him to resign for months.

Gonzales has previously called Herrera a “known neo-Nazi” — an allegation Herrera disputes as “obvious[ly]” untrue.

While the district is not on congressional Democrats’ target list, Herrera’s controversial online persona has made Democrats in Texas and Washington more interested in the seat. Democrats have shared clips of Herrera discussing owning a copy of “Mein Kampf” and YouTube clips in which he refers to a gun as the “original ghetto blaster” and makes Holocaust puns.

The Democratic nominee in the November election is Katy Padilla Stout, a San Antonio attorney and former elementary school teacher.

Both would be expected to enter a special election for the remainder of Gonzales’ term if Abbott schedules it. Unlike the general election, it would be open to multiple candidates from both parties.

The high cost of fuel, equipment, and fertilizer — compounded by the Iran war — and also tariffs, perceived “price gouging” by suppliers, and low soybean prices driven by a global supply glut. All of it weighs on Bartek, who is chairman of the Nebraska Soybean Association.

“Our biggest struggles are our inputs, be it fertilizer, seed, chemical, parts,” Bartek said. “There has been so much drastic markup in all of these. And I just kind of feel like the farmer’s kind of painted in the corner.”

Bartek’s concerns are shared by many Midwest soybean producers. Costs, such as equipment, have crept up over time while soybean prices have stayed low. Tariffs levied by the Trump administration last year and the resulting monthslong trade war with China only made things worse, they say. Then the Iran war bottled up shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, restricting global fertilizer supplies and sending fertilizer prices sky high. A ceasefire deal announced April 7 raised hope that bottlenecks in the strait would abate, but the future of the agreement was uncertain.

“A lot of producers are pretty nervous going into this year,” said Justin Sherlock, a soybean farmer and president of the North Dakota Soybean Growers Association. “It looks like we’re going to have another year of negative returns.”

Years of rising costs, low soybean prices

Soybeans, which are used for livestock feed, food and biofuels, are among the top U.S. agricultural exports. That hasn’t always been the case. Before the 1960s soybeans weren’t a major crop in the U.S, according to Chad Hart, an agricultural economist at Iowa State University. It wasn’t until the 1990s that soybean production accelerated due to international demand — primarily from China — and soybeans and corn are now dominant in U.S. agriculture.

But U.S. soybean farmers, who typically also grow corn, have been facing financial issues for years even before the onset of the Iran war. Soybean prices have been persistently low in recent years. The global market has been awash in soybeans, driven in part by Brazil, which surpassed the U.S. as the world’s largest soybean producer years ago.

“If we look at global soybean production over the past several years, it continues to set record, after record, after record,” Hart said. “There’s been just large supplies globally, and that has led to depressed prices.”

Meanwhile, Midwest soybean farmers’ costs have risen. Overall farm production expenses, including seed and pesticide, have increased over time, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Operating costs for soybean production have stayed elevated since 2020 and are projected to increase again in 2026, according to the agency.

The cost of land also is a major issue for farmers, experts say. Midwest crop land values have increased. And most regional farmers rent some of their land, according to Joana Colussi, research assistant professor in the department of agricultural economics at Purdue University.

Bartek, who rents three-quarters of his land, said landowners are increasing rents, causing further financial strain.

“There’s a lot of what I call absentee landowners that have absolutely no idea what goes on on the farm,” he said. “All they know is their taxes went up and you get to make up the difference, some way, somehow.”

“They’re very concerned about negative margins driven by low prices and high cost,” said Paul Mitchell, a professor of agricultural and applied economics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, of farmers. “There’s just a liquidity cash crunch for a lot of them and they’re just trying to figure out how to deal with everything.”

The number of farms in the U.S. has shrunk over time and consolidation in farming is a long-term trend, though farmers’ financial pressures wrought by high input costs and low commodity prices have contributed, Hart said. Larger farms tend to be more competitive and depend on large, expensive machinery.

“The financial reserves need(ed) on a farm are much greater than they used to be,” Hart said. “We’re a bit more sensitive to the financial conditions these days because so much capital is being utilized within the farm business.”

Tariffs, trade war have lasting impacts

Market forces aren’t the only issue weighing on farmers. Sweeping tariffs levied by President Donald Trump in April 2025 exacerbated a trade war with China, the top buyer of U.S. soybeans. China responded with retaliatory tariffs and effectively boycotted U.S. soybeans, cutting off a major export market for Midwest farmers and driving the price of soybeans even lower.

“When that was announced and soybean prices basically collapsed, if you could afford to hold on to your beans and wait for better times, you were OK,” said Mike Cerny, a soybean, and winter wheat corn farmer in Sharon, Wisconsin. “If you had a mortgage due or payments due or cash flow needs and you had to sell at that point, you were taking it pretty rough.”

The U.S. and China eventually reached a deal in late 2025. Beijing committed to buying 12 million metric tons of soybeans by January and at least 25 million metric tons annually for the next three years. China has since met its initial soybean purchase goal and the Trump administration also rolled out a $12 billion temporary aid package in December to boost farmers affected by the trade war.

But the damage is already done, experts and farmers say. While China’s renewed purchases and the federal payments are helping, it’s not enough to recover farmers’ losses. Even after federal assistance, farmers still lost almost $75 per harvested acre of soybeans in the 2025 crop, according to the American Soybean Association. And the trade war further pushed China toward competing soybean exporters, such as Brazil — accelerating a trend of declining U.S. soybean exports to China.

“When China decided to stop purchasing, we couldn’t find enough other markets to replace those sales,” Hart said. “We’re still feeling the impacts today. When you look at where soybean exports are today versus where we would normally expect them to be, we’re still running anywhere from 15% to 20% behind normal.”

Joseph Glauber, former chief economist at the Department of Agriculture between 2008 and 2014, said global competitors to U.S. soybean farmers gained from the trade war.

“When China has put on tariffs against the U.S. they’ve tended to buy then from Brazil or Argentina, largely Brazil,” Glauber added. “We’re not nearly as dominant in the world as we used to be in terms of the global export market for soybeans.”

Iran war drove up fuel, fertilizer costs

After the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran on Feb. 28, a severe slowdown in shipping traffic through the Strait of Hormuz sent the price of oil soaring. The shipping disruption also largely stopped the export of nitrogen fertilizers manufactured in the Persian Gulf and limited access to key fertilizer ingredients. The price of urea, the most widely traded nitrogen fertilizer, skyrocketed.

Soybeans don’t require nitrogen fertilizer, but it’s vital for corn and most soybean farmers also grow corn. About half the global supply of urea comes from the Middle East, and Qatar and Saudi Arabia are two of the top sources of U.S. fertilizer imports, according to the American Farm Bureau Federation.

The U.S. and Iran agreed to a two-week ceasefire last week that included reopening the strait of Hormuz, but traffic remained slowed amid disagreements over Israeli attacks in Lebanon, and the price of urea remains elevated.

Many Midwest farmers bought their fertilizer well in advance of the spring planting season. But some farmers who didn’t buy early face elevated prices. Dave Walton, a corn, soybean, and hay farmer in Iowa and vice president of the American Soybean Association, said in March that some of his neighbors didn’t have cash on hand last fall to buy fertilizer and were struggling to budget for fertilizer due to high prices.

The war also caused gasoline and diesel prices to surge, causing further headaches for farmers. Oil prices dropped following the ceasefire announcement, but the war and the closure of the strait will have lasting impacts on farmers, said Seth Goldstein, a senior equity analyst at Morningstar, an investment research company. Facilities in the Middle East that are critical for exporting chemicals, oil and other commodities were damaged or destroyed during the war and it will take time for supply chains to recover, he said.

“Facilities have been hit, like liquid natural gas plants,” Goldstein added. “You are also looking at a big supply crunch in commodity chemicals, which are the inputs for crop chemicals.”

“We burn a lot of diesel fuel,” said Chris Gould, a corn and soybean farmer in Maple Park, Illinois. “It’s hard to say if I’m gonna come out ahead or behind on this whole deal. But I suspect I’m gonna come out behind.”

Concerns about the future

Farmers’ financial problems are showing up in some measures. Farm bankruptcies, while still relatively low, continued to climb in 2025, according to the American Farm Bureau Federation. In a survey of 400 farmers conducted by researchers at the Purdue Center for Commercial Agriculture in late March, almost half said their farm operation is financially worse off than it was a year ago.

Goldstein, the Morningstar analyst, said farmers’ high costs and low revenues contributed to the spike in bankruptcies between 2024 and 2025. If costs rise faster than crop prices going forward, he added, that “would strain farmers again and likely lead to more bankruptcies.”

After 43 years of farming, Bartek said the smell of fresh dirt still gets him excited for spring planting. But he’s also heard of farmer suicides, bankruptcies and “retirement sales” where farmers are forced to auction off their operations due to financial problems. Bartek compares farmers to gamblers who put “millions of dollars in the dirt” hoping for returns.

At times, Bartek doubts his own decision to go into farming. He’s also worried about his son, who purchased a farm a few years ago.

Bartek wonders: “Did I do the right thing helping him get into farming?”

___

Kelety reported from Phoenix.

___

This story is a collaboration between Lee Enterprises and The Associated Press.

Trump was asked about his comments toward the U.S.-born head of the Catholic Church, as well as the post depicting himself as a saint-like healer, in a hastily called question-and-answer session with reporters at the White House.

“He was very much against what I’m doing with regard to Iran, and you cannot have a nuclear Iran. Pope Leo would not be happy with the end result,” Trump said, adding, “I think he’s very weak on crime and other things, so I’m not” going to apologize.

“He went public," the Republican president added. "I’m just responding to Pope Leo.”

That response followed Leo pushing back on Trump’s broadside against him the previous evening, telling reporters that the Vatican’s appeals for peace and reconciliation are rooted in the Gospel and that he doesn’t fear the Trump administration.

“To put my message on the same plane as what the president has attempted to do here, I think is not understanding what the message of the Gospel is,” Leo told The Associated Press aboard the papal plane en route to Algeria. “And I’m sorry to hear that, but I will continue on what I believe is the mission of the church in the world today.”

The back-and-forth between the world's two most influential Americans served to deepen a burgeoning schism as the U.S. war in Iran stretched into its seventh week.

History’s first U.S.-born pope stressed that he was not making a direct attack against Trump or anyone else with his general appeal for peace and criticisms of the Iran war and other conflicts around the world.

“I’m not afraid of the Trump administration or of speaking out loudly about the message of the Gospel, which is what the Church works for," said Leo, who said he had a different perspective on foreign policy than elected officials.

“I will continue to speak out strongly against war, seeking to promote peace, promoting dialogue and multilateralism among states to find solutions to problems,” he said.

Trump speaks to his much-criticized social media post

The image posted by the president Sunday night showed Trump wearing a biblical-style robe and laying hands on a bedridden man as light emanates from his fingers — while a soldier, a nurse, a praying woman and a bearded man in a baseball cap all look on admiringly. The sky above is filled with eagles, an American flag and vaporous images.

“I did post it, and I thought it was me as a doctor and it had to do with the Red Cross,” Trump said. “It’s supposed to me as a doctor, making people better. And I do make people better. A lot better.”

He blamed the “fake news” for any confusion over the image, though it drew criticism from a wide range of people, including some of Trump's own evangelical supporters, who objected to the notion that Trump was likening himself to Christ. Even Iran's president, Masoud Pezeshkian, assailed the “desecration of Jesus" while also speaking up to defend the pope.

The post was deleted from Trump's account late Monday morning. Trump didn't provide details on how that happened.

Trump had charged that Leo is not ‘doing a very good job’

The president criticized the pope in a lengthy social media post while flying back to Washington from Florida on Sunday night. He kept up the denunciation after deplaning, telling reporters, “I’m not a fan of Pope Leo."

Leo said Saturday during an evening prayer service at St. Peter’s Basilica that a “delusion of omnipotence” was fueling the U.S.-Israel war in Iran. The comments came the same day that the United States and Iran began face-to-face negotiations in Pakistan during a fragile ceasefire.

The talks were being led on the U.S. side by Vice President JD Vance, a Catholic who recently released a book about his faith. Asked about Trump's post depicting himself as Jesus on Monday evening, Vance told Fox News Channel that it was “a joke” and said it’s “a good thing” that Trump “likes to mix it up on social media” and is “not filtered.”

“Of course, he took it down because he realized a lot of people weren’t understanding his humor,” Vance said of the post.

The pope's Saturday criticisms meanwhile, followed him earlier naming Trump directly and expressed optimism that the president would seek “an off-ramp” in Iran. An even stronger condemnation came after Trump warned of mass strikes against Iranian power plants and infrastructure, writing on social media that “an entire civilization will die tonight.” Leo described that as a “threat against the entire people of Iran” and said it was “truly unacceptable.”

While it’s not unusual for popes and presidents to be at cross purposes, it’s exceedingly rare for the pope to directly criticize a U.S. leader — and Trump’s stinging response is equally uncommon.

“Pope Leo is WEAK on Crime, and terrible for Foreign Policy,” the president wrote in his post, adding, “I don’t want a Pope who thinks it’s OK for Iran to have a Nuclear Weapon."

Leo's opposition to war irked Trump

Leo, who began an 11-day trip to Africa on Monday, has previously said that God “does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war, but rejects them.” He's also referred to an Old Testament passage from Isaiah, saying that “even though you make many prayers, I will not listen — your hands are full of blood.”

Still, in his comments on Monday, as in his Sunday night social media post, Trump went far beyond the war in Iran in criticizing Leo.

“I don’t want a Pope who criticizes the President of the United States because I’m doing exactly what I was elected, IN A LANDSLIDE, to do." His post also claimed that Leo was only elected pontiff “because he was an American, and they thought that would be the best way to deal with President Donald J. Trump.”

“If I wasn’t in the White House, Leo wouldn’t be in the Vatican,” Trump wrote, adding, “Leo should get his act together as Pope, use Common Sense, stop catering to the Radical Left, and focus on being a Great Pope, not a Politician. It’s hurting him very badly and, more importantly, it’s hurting the Catholic Church!”

In his comments to reporters after stepping off Air Force One on Sunday, Trump said of Leo, “I don’t think he’s doing a very good job. He likes crime, I guess,” adding, “He’s a very liberal person.”

Archbishop Paul S. Coakley, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, also said he was “disheartened” by Trump’s comments.

“Pope Leo is not his rival; nor is the Pope a politician," Coakley said in a statement. “He is the Vicar of Christ who speaks from the truth of the Gospel and for the care of souls.”

___

Winfield reported from aboard the papal plane. Associated Press writer Michelle L. Price contributed to this report.

There was no stage, no spotlight — just Yellow Springs, where he’s lived for decades, a place he spent summers as a child while his father worked as dean of students at nearby Antioch College.

It’s in places like this, away from the glare, where Chappelle finds clarity and continues to sharpen a comedic voice that has sparked debate, drawn criticism and, through it all, refused to bend.

“I’ve had a lot of support from my people,” said Chappelle, an Emmy and Grammy winner. “That’s what’s sustained me.”

He sat down with The Associated Press before walking through the town, where he'd recently participated in the ribbon-cutting for a restored 19th-century schoolhouse that now houses a public radio station and will serve as office space for his company, Pilot Boy Productions.

Enduring the backlash over his jokes

Chappelle said he didn’t initially expect his voice to carry the weight it does today.

“Sometimes people will attach things to your voice that don’t necessarily have anything to do with you,” he said. “Your responsibility is to be true to yourself and your work.”

That voice has become one of the most scrutinized in comedy, particularly after criticism of jokes about transgender people in his Netflix specials. The backlash surrounding “The Closer” in 2021 drew protests and internal pushback at Netflix, turning his work into a flashpoint in broader debates over comedy, culture and free speech.

Chappelle said he has never set out to provoke controversy, describing his work as an extension of the same stand-up he has always done. He said the reaction often felt disconnected from the audiences who continue to show up.

“The media used to talk (expletive) about jokes that I did … and none of that stuff swayed my audience,” he said. “So I feel like I need to be true to something.”

Chappelle said being in Yellow Springs allows him a different perspective without the pressures of the entertainment industry.

“One of the best sovereignties that a person can enjoy is the sovereignty of their mind,” he said. “Just the idea of knowing where you land and the rest of the world begins.”

Reconsidering ‘Chappelle’s Show'

For many fans, Chappelle’s voice is still tied to “Chappelle’s Show,” the Comedy Central series that premiered in 2003 and quickly became a cultural force with its sharp satire on race, politics and pop culture.

The show ran for two full seasons with an abbreviated third season released in 2006 after Chappelle walked away during production. It was a decision he later attributed to burnout and concerns about the show's direction.

Now, Chappelle says he’s at least open to the idea of revisiting it.

“If you’d asked me that question a year ago, I’d have told you absolutely not,” he said. “But in the last few weeks … I’m considering it.”

Chappelle acknowledged the comedy landscape has shifted, with digital platforms and social media creating new pathways for humor and a new generation of creators shaping the conversation in real time.

Finding perspective on criticism

As he walked through town, Chappelle framed criticism less as a verdict than something to endure. He pointed to “The Muhammad Ali Reader,” a collection that documents the intense criticism the late boxing legend faced during his career.

“It’s every negative thing they said about him,” he said. “And history proved him to be absolutely right. ... As bad as that weather was, there’s another side to it."

Chappelle framed the tension around his work in a broader cultural context.

“Black life in America, there’s always an ‘or else’ to all of it,” he said. “Don’t say this or else; don’t do that or else. And then there’s those few brave people who say, ‘Or else what?’”

Watching comedy’s next chapter

Even as he reflects on his own career, Chappelle said he’s paying close attention to the next generation of comedians. He pointed to Druski as part of a new wave showing how audiences engage with comedy.

“I love what he does,” Chappelle said before drawing a distinction between digital success and stand-up. That freedom to fail, he suggested, is essential to the development as a comedian — which can be harder to find in today's fast-moving digital landscape.

“One of the worst things that can happen to a comedian is becoming successful before they get good,” Chappelle said. “Because you miss the part where you get to explore and make mistakes.”

Still performing, still reflecting

Chappelle remains active onstage, including upcoming performances tied to the Netflix Is a Joke Fest in Los Angeles in May.

Back home, he continues to perform at his own comedy club — which used to be a firehouse — in Yellow Springs, where he has hosted surprise sets and brought in high-profile guests, including Travis Scott, Lizzo, Wyclef Jean, Marsha Ambrosius, Clipse, 50 Cent and Christopher Cross.

The village has also drawn attention beyond its size. Over the weekend, Michelle Obama and her brother, Craig Robinson, interviewed Chappelle for their podcast at the radio station.

After decades in comedy, he said he doesn’t spend much time thinking about his legacy, though the idea occasionally comes up in conversation with peers like Chris Rock.

“I’ll be like, ‘They’re gonna write books about us,’” he said. “And those guys will laugh. But they might … or they might not.”

Asked whether he feels he’s living out his purpose, Chappelle paused.

“Man, I’m a lucky guy in that respect,” he said. “I don’t know if I’m doing that on purpose, but I dreamt of being a famous comedian. Took me 40 years, but I did it. … This is better than I dreamt of.”

That's because President Donald Trump and many U.S. conservatives have long embraced Orbán, who has become an icon among the global right for his anti-immigrant stance. The American president's agenda has striking parallels with the way the Hungarian leader used the levers of government to tilt the media, judiciary and electoral system to keep his party in power for 16 years.

Trump supported Orbán’s reelection bid and even dispatched Vice President JD Vance to Budapest last week — in the midst of the Iran war — to stump for the incumbent.

Orbán's loss was a reminder of how the war has diminished Trump's ability to help allied politicians overseas, as well as of the limited ability of leaders to use their power to tilt voting in their direction in an age of worldwide discontent over incumbents of all ideological stripes.

“Oppositions can win despite a tilted playing field,” said Steven Levitsky, a politics professor at Harvard and coauthor of the book “How Democracies Die.” “Democracies are facing many challenges in many parts of the world, but so are autocracies.”

Orbán’s defeat has immediate global implications because he was the European leader closest to Russian President Vladimir Putin and had blocked European Union aid to Ukraine, which is defending itself after Russian's 2022 invasion.

His fall was celebrated on Sunday by both Democrats and Republicans, some of whom criticized their own administration for such overt support for the Hungarian leader.

“Don’t fiddle-paddle in other democracies’ elections,” Republican Rep. Don Bacon of Nebraska said on the social media site X.

“The freedom-loving people of Hungary have voted decisively in favor of democracy and the rule of law,” posted Republican Sen. Roger Wicker of Mississippi.

Vance on Monday said he went to Budapest because Orbán was one of the few European leaders to stand up to the European Union bureaucracy in Brussels. “We went because it was the right thing to do,” Vance said on Fox News.

Matt Schlapp, chairman of the American Conservative Union, is part of the wing of the American right that embraced Orbán. The Conservative Political Action Conference, which Schlapp's group hosts, held its first European session in Budapest and has made Hungary a regular destination.

Orban was a featured speaker at the group's conference in Dallas in 2022.

Schlapp said there's an easy explanation for Orbán's loss.

“Eventually, democracies just want change,” he said. “In democracies, you don't have kings, and the people in the end speak.”

"The people of Hungary were saying, 'We're having a difficult time with inflation, the economy and the war. Let's try the new guy,'” Schlapp said, noting that he backs Trump's Iran war but the turmoil it's created, especially in European energy markets, hurt Orbán.

Diana Sosoaca, a far-right member of the European Parliament from Romania, on Sunday called Vance's Hungarian visit “a big mistake” given widespread revulsion at the Iran war on the continent.

“You invite a representative of the United States of America, who created the big disorder in this world?” Sosoaca said in an interview posted by the Kremlin-controlled network RT, formerly known as Russia Today. “It was the biggest mistake he could do before the elections.”

How Orbán consolidated power

An anti-communist activist in his youth, Orbán was initially elected prime minister in 1998 but took a turn to the right after being voted out in 2002. Upon returning to office in 2010, Orbán and his Fidesz party implemented a legal framework to consolidate authority that he and his allies developed while he was out of power.

Orbán embraced what he dubbed “illiberal democracy,” building a barrier on Hungary's southern border to block migrants from Africa and Asia who were moving northward through Europe. He and his party stifled LGBTQ+ rights, cracked down on freedom of the press and undermined judicial independence.

Orbán cemented his power when his Fidesz party won enough seats in Parliament during the 2010 global recession to rewrite the country's constitution. They restructured the judiciary to funnel appointments to the bench through party loyalists, redrew legislative districts to make it much harder for Fidesz members to lose elections and helped push Hungary's media companies to be sold to tycoons allied with Orban.

The European Union has declared Hungary an “electoral autocracy.”

Orbán backers have scoffed at suggestions that the Hungarian leader is an enemy of democracy, and on Sunday he quickly conceded his loss. Democrats have worried that Trump will try to use his own executive power to tilt November's midterm elections or the 2028 presidential vote to his party, much as Trump tried to use his official powers to overturn Democrat Joe Biden's win in the 2020 presidential election.

“Most importantly for American voters, even a guy who rigs the system can be defeated when the people unite and turn out against him,” said Ian Bassin of Protect Democracy, a nonpartisan group that says it combats authoritarianism.

Democrats weigh in

Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna of California took the opportunity to jab at Vance: “Your ally Orban conceded. In 2028, will you @JDVance follow suit if you lose?” he posted on X.

Levitsky said defenders of democracy shouldn’t take too much comfort from Orbán’s loss, noting that in some ways Trump has been more oppressive. He cited Trump’s use of the Justice Department to investigate political opponents and the shooting deaths of protesters by immigration officers -- steps that Orban’s government never took, Levitsky said.

But Sen. Chris Van Hollen, a Maryland Democrat, said he sees parallels between Trump's and Orban’s political projects, as well as the potential fate of their parties at the polls.

“He was essentially doing what Donald Trump is trying to do here in the United States,” Van Hollen said of Orban. “My read of the election is that the people of Hungary rejected that, just like people in the United States are rejecting that here at home.”

Trump made no public comments Sunday about the election results in Hungary.

___

Riccardi reported from Denver.

Ballabina currently serves as executive vice chancellor for the Texas A&M University System, where she is Chancellor Glenn Hegar’s top deputy and oversees day-to-day operations across the system’s 12 universities and eight state agencies. She previously served as chief of staff to former Texas A&M President Mark A. Welsh III. 

Ballabina initially served on the presidential search committee before recusing herself to apply for the job, according to the system.

The decision follows months of upheaval at the flagship campus after Welsh resigned amid political backlash over a secretly recorded classroom discussion of gender identity that was posted online.

The search unfolded as regents took a more assertive role in responding to controversy and shaping what can be taught, part of a broader political remaking of Texas higher education under new state laws.

Ballabina is set to lead the state’s largest public university, which enrolled 72,289 students in fall 2025, and enforce new system rules that restrict how race, gender, sexual orientation and gender identity can be discussed in class.

The board voted 8-0 to approve Ballabina as sole finalist after spending about 30 minutes in closed session. Regent David C. Baggett was absent.

“Every member of this board knows her and has worked with her and has seen first-hand her steady leadership, her sound judgment and her constant commitment to making Texas A&M University better,” board Vice Chair Jay Graham said after the vote. “She understands what makes this place unique, our values, our traditions and our responsibility to serve the people of Texas.”

State law requires regents to wait 21 days before making the hire official.

Ballabaina holds a bachelor’s degree from Tarleton State University, a master’s degree from Stephen F. Austin State University and a doctorate in public affairs from the University of Texas at Dallas. 

Ballabina has worked in the system for more than three decades, holding senior leadership roles at both the university and Texas A&M Agrilife, and helped cultivate partnerships such as Aplin Center, a new campus hub for hospitality, retail and food-and-nutrition education, and coordinating statewide disaster recovery efforts after Hurricane Harvey, according to the system.

She said in a statement that she was “honored by the trust and confidence of the Board of Regents and Chancellor Hegar.”

Texas A&M has cycled through leaders in recent years.

In 2023, M. Katherine Banks resigned as president after the failed hiring of Kathleen McElroy, an experienced Black journalism professor at the University of Texas at Austin whom Texas A&M had recruited to revive its journalism program. McElroy walked away from an offer that university officials had watered down after vocal groups outside the university had criticized her past work for the New York Times and support for diversity.

Welsh followed as president, working to rebuild trust with faculty by reversing some of Banks’ unpopular changes and promising not to micromanage. But that approach later put him at odds with regents who wanted a leader who would respond more quickly to political controversy. His downfall came in September 2025 after he initially told a student he would not fire lecturer Melissa McCoul for discussing gender identity in a children’s literature course. He ultimately did fire McCoul.

Leonard Bright, president of the Texas A&M chapter of the American Association of University Professors, said Ballabina’s selection brought “some level of relief” because faculty had feared regents might choose a politician. But he said her lack of classroom and research experience raises questions.

“Is she going to stand up for faculty when there are political attacks?” he asked.

B. Don Russell, a Texas A&M professor and chair of the university’s distinguished professors group, offered a more supportive view, saying Ballabina was “among the most open for discussions with faculty” of the administrators he has worked with. He said her broad experience across the university system and in state politics will serve A&M well. He did not see her lack of traditional classroom background as a major limitation.

Since Welsh’s resignation, Tommy Williams — a former Texas lawmaker, Texas A&M alum and one-time top government relations official for the system — has served as interim president.

There’s also been a broader political remaking of Texas higher education since 2023. Lawmakers have banned diversity, equity and inclusion offices, programs and training; expanded regents’ authority over curriculum; and imposed rules limiting protesting on campus, including bans on encampments and overnight demonstrations. Supporters of these new laws say they keep universities focused on their core mission of providing degrees that lead to profitable careers. Opponents say they undercut universities’ mission to be spaces for open inquiry.

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

Disclosure: New York Times, Texas A&M University, Texas A&M University System and University of Texas at Austin have been financial supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune’s journalism. Find a complete list of them here.

The Texans general manager reiterated that supportive stance regarding the former NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year on Monday when asked for the thinking behind the team exercising a $25.9 million 2027 fifth-year club option. Caserio characterized the decision as an easy one, even after Stroud had a rocky postseason with a combined five interceptions and five lost fumbles with seven turnover in two playoff games.

“I don’t really think that affects his future,” Caserio said. “He’s our quarterback. We’ve said that from the beginning. I think that was really more of a procedural thing. I don’t want to say it was a no-brainer, but it was kind of a no-brainer, so we’re glad he’s here.

“Again, it’s more of a part of the process. So, we’re excited about his offseason. I think he’s had a good approach, had a good attitude here. I think he’s put a lot of work in from March and April. I’m so excited to have him around here in the spring and I’m excited to keep moving forward.”

Previously at the NFL scouting combine in February, Caserio threw cold water on unfounded trade speculation surrounding Stroud.

Stroud was named in trade rumors previously dismissed by KPRC 2 as completely unfounded. Stroud will remain the Texans’ QB1 going forward.

While the Texans aren’t engaging in contract negotiations at this time, they can shift that approach anytime. Ideally, they would be happy to reward Stroud provided he proves himself this season after being intercepted a career-high four times in an AFC divisional round loss to the New England Patriots.

“It’s moronic,” Caserio said in response to a question from KPRC 2. “We’re not trading him. He’s our quarterback. He’s going to be playing quarterback for the Houston Texans in 2026. Anything beyond that, you guys can speculate on that, but we’re not trading C.J. Stroud.”

Stroud has been the subject of heavy criticism since that game. However, the organization has had his back. It was an uncharacteristically sloppy performance from Stroud, who completed 64.5 percent of his throws as he passed for 3,041 yards, 18 touchdowns and eight interceptions while missing three games due to a concussion.

A former Pro Bowl selection who declined an alternate invitation to the Pro Bowl, Stroud has passed for 10,876 yards, 62 touchdowns and 25 interceptions in three NFL seasons.

Stroud led the NFL in touchdown to interception ratio with a 23:5 clip as a rookie, passing for 4,108 yards.

“He’s been a good player, and won a lot of football games,” Caserio said. “Quarterback is the hardest position to play in sports. He had some ups and downs. That’s natural for a position, but, overall, he’s had a pretty significant impact on what we are as a program. He’s not going anywhere.

Since the playoffs, the Texans and Stroud have taken several steps to move forward from a career-high four-interceptions in the team’s 28-16 loss in the divisional round to the New England Patriots.

The steps include adjusting his offseason approach, improving the supporting cast on offense, and making a coaching change. Jerry Schuplinski has been named quarterbacks coach, replacing Jerrod Johnson.

“C.J. is a young quarterback,” Texans coach DeMeco Ryans said during NFL meetings at the Arizona Biltmore. “Being early in his career, he’s gained a ton of valuable experience, including in the playoffs. It hasn’t gone as we would like it to there. You always want to win it all.

“But when you go through those difficult moments, those tough times, you learn from them. I know C.J. has learned from those moments. Now, we’ve got to go out and improve and show it on the field. The way he’s attacked the offseason, working hard, throwing every day, staying dialed in. I’m excited to see how that translates into a really great year for us.”

For All-Pro defensive end Will Anderson Jr., the fifth-year option is a precursor to what is expected to be a blockbuster deal this offseason. It’s regarded as a matter of when, not if a huge contract will be struck. The deal is regarded as complex and not imminent at this time, per sources, with both sides obviously motivated.

League sources predict the contract could make him the highest-paid defensive player in the NFL, with average annual compensation of $50 million.

His fifth-year option carries a guaranteed price tag of $21.512 million.

“I love Will Anderson, love everything that he brings to our organization,” Ryans said. You talk about a leader and a guy who does everything the right way, everything I’ve asked of him.

“I just remember speaking with Will, he was our first 30 visit, the first guy we had in. That meeting is still the best visit I’ve ever seen. He’s just that type of guy. He’s a leader in all respects. I love having Will and what he provides our organization.”

Without getting into specifics about future plans, the McNair family made it clear how highly they value both players.

“We’ll let DeMeco and Nick [Caserio] make the football decisions there, but they’re exciting, really good young players,” Texans chairman and CEO Cal McNair said. “We hope to have them around for a long, long time.”

PHOENIX -- #Texans Cal McNair and Hannah McNair on potential long-term deals for Will Anderson Jr., C.J. Stroud: 'Exciting, really good players, we'll hope to have them around a long, long time. .. It's a good problem to have when you have so many guys you want to keep under… pic.twitter.com/WunQinzX0g

— Aaron Wilson (@AaronWilson_NFL) April 1, 2026

A year from now, cornerback Kamari Lassiter and safety Calen Bullock will be eligible for extensions. Both were named Pro Bowl alternates after the 2025 season.

“It’s a good problem to have when you have so many guys you want to keep under contract,” Hannah McNair said. “If we keep drafting the way we do, this is going to be something we talk about every year.”

Aaron Wilson is a Texans and NFL reporter for KPRC 2 and click2houston.com

Annual domestic box-office grosses are still down about 20% from pre-pandemic levels, competition from streaming has only intensified and there are very real worries about what consolidation might mean for the release schedule as Warner Bros. stares down new ownership under Paramount.

It’s under these precarious conditions that Hollywood executives and movie theater owners are gathering this week in Las Vegas for CinemaCon, the annual exhibition and trade show made famous — or at least slightly less obscure — by Seth Rogen's show “The Studio” and his “old school Hollywood buffet.” Real-life Hollywood executives have bigger concerns than throwing a party, however.

A critical time for movie theaters

As “F1” and “Top Gun: Maverick” producer Jerry Bruckheimer said last week in a statement: “We are at a defining point in the future of this industry.”

Bruckheimer, “Oppenheimer” producer Emma Thomas and “Sinners” director Ryan Coogler are teaming up to do something about it. Just last week, Cinema United, the trade organization representing some 60,000 movie screens in the U.S. and abroad, announced that Bruckheimer would be chairing their newly established filmmaker leadership council, with Thomas as vice chair and Coogler as one of its inaugural members.

Other members include Brad Bird, Celine Song and Jason Reitman, who will advise on issues facing theatrical moviegoing, including windows, referring to the number of days films play exclusively in movie theaters before being available to buy or rent at home, and consolidation.

“Our industry is strongest when it works together to promote the singular experience of seeing a movie on the big screen,” Cinema United president and CEO Michael O’Leary said in a statement. “The importance of having Jerry and Emma at the helm of this initiative, at such a critical time for our industry, cannot be overstated.”

The Paramount and Warner Bros. elephant in the room

Much of the public and private handwringing will revolve around Paramount’s pending acquisition of Warner Bros. Both studios will be hyping their upcoming slates to theater owners, in separate presentations: Warner Bros. is planned for Tuesday and Paramount is on Thursday. The question is how much, if at all, executives from either company will address the elephant in the room from the stage as former 20th Century Fox Chair and CEO Stacey Snider did in 2018 with the Disney acquisition looming.

While Paramount Skydance chairman and CEO David Ellison has said that he would like to grow the combined Paramount and Warner Bros. slate to more than 30 movies a year, there are lingering concerns from organizations such as Cinema United.

Historically, fewer standalone studios have meant fewer movies made for theaters, and between the pandemic, the strikes, the ramping up of streaming services and general financial instability, the release schedule has taken the hit. In 2019, there were 112 wide releases, or films released in over 2,000 theaters. This year, for the first time since the pandemic, that number is up to 115, according to Comscore.

On Monday morning, more than a thousand Hollywood professionals, including Denis Villeneuve, Kristen Stewart, J.J. Abrams and Joaquin Phoenix came out against the merger in an open letter arguing that it would only further reduce jobs.

The show must go on, with stars and footage to help

Doom and gloom is hardly ever the prevailing mood at CinemaCon, however. The studios wouldn’t shell out big bucks to bring out their stars and footage if there weren’t some optimism and excitement about what’s to come.

The audience-driven studio Angel announced five new movies from the Colosseum stage Monday: A Cold War drama starring Jeff Daniels as President Ronald Reagan, an Owen Wilson and Alan Ritchson action movie and a remake of the John Wayne movie “Angel and the Badman” starring Tommy Lee Jones, among the titles. The studio behind the box office hit “Sound of Freedom” plans to release 10 films in theaters this year.

Universal’s president of domestic distribution Jim Orr said he thinks the mood going into the conference is “very optimistic.”

“The first part of the year we’ve seen some extraordinary titles and great business, including our own ‘Super Mario Galaxy Movie,’” Orr said. “I think it should be quite the celebration in Vegas this year.”

This summer has Christopher Nolan’s “The Odyssey,” a Steven Spielberg sci-fi spectacle, a Star Wars movie, the live-action “Moana,” a fifth Toy Story and a new “Spider-Man.” And later this year there’s a new Marvel movie, “Avengers: Doomsday” and the third “Dune,” both coming out on the same day, December 18. Could Dunesday be the new Barbenheimer?

There have also been bright spots for movie theaters recently, including increased audience interest in premium large formats, like IMAX and 70 mm, and a PG-rating box office boom suggesting that families and younger audiences haven’t entirely abandoned the big screen for the small one.

The recent success of films like “Project Hail Mary,” “Hoppers” and “Wuthering Heights” also show that it’s not just franchises that are bringing people to the theaters — although it’s wrong to underestimate the importance of tentpoles like “The Super Mario Galaxy Movie.”

“At least from the box-office perspective, we are going in on a very positive note,” said Paul Dergarabedian, who heads marketplace trends for Comscore.

Plus, those inside the industry are often quick to remind that the business has survived its share of existential crises, whether it’s streaming, piracy, VHS or television.

Thomas, who is producing “The Odyssey,” emphasized the “profound cultural value in gathering together with a group of strangers and connecting while experiencing something special on the big screen,” in her statement about partnering with the movie theater trade organization.

“That is what this is about: making sure that cinemas of all sizes, around the world, can continue to present our stories in the best possible setting, so movie fans of all ages can enjoy them as they were intended to be seen,” Thomas said.

It was the first time Leeds has won a league match at Old Trafford since 1981 and the Yorkshire club moved up to 16th place in the 20-team table.

“I feel tired and relieved but also proud of the boys," Leeds coach Daniel Farke said. “It was a fantastic performance. We are into the crunch time of the season and you have to keep your nerve and stick to your plan.”

Manchester remained in third but missed a chance to move clear of Aston Villa, with which it is tied on points.

Leeds started on the front foot and almost scored in the second minute but Senne Lammers made an excellent point-blank save from Dominic Calvert-Lewin.

However, its pressure paid off two minutes later when Okafor side-footed home with style after everyone missed Jayden Bogle’s deep cross from the right.

Leeds was all over United during the opening half hour and a second arrived in the 29th. A ball was half cleared to Okafor, whose first-time shot from outside the box took a slight deflection as it flew past Lammers and into the far corner.

United interim coach Michael Carrick had never lost a game at home since replacing Rubem Amorim in mid-January and his task got even harder 10 minutes into the second period when Lisandro Martínez was sent off for pulling Calvert-Lewin’s hair.

However, the 10 men kept plugging away in what was a pulsating end-to-end encounter and got a goal back after 68 minutes when Casemiro bulleted a header past Karl Darlow from a Ruben Fernandes cross.

Both sides had more chances in a thrilling last 20 minutes. United had two shots knocked off the goal-line and Leeds failed to make the most of its frequent counterattacks but neither could find the net again.

“We didn’t start the game particularly well," Carrick said. “We didn’t quite have the rhythm or click.

“I’m pleased the way we went about the second half but it was more difficult when you are a man down.”

Farke, meanwhile, was ecstatic at taking all three points from one of Leeds' fiercest rivals at such a crucial juncture in a testing campaign.

“A win is always good for the mood and the confidence. It is also good for the table," he said.

“A few more points are needed but tonight we edge three points closer. Nothing is achieved yet. We have to stay humbled, grounded and hungry to make sure we get as many points as possible.”

___

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

Timothy Hudson was initially charged in February and subsequently indicted on March 10. But the breadth of the case was not known until a seal was lifted Friday, weeks after U.S. District Judge Beth Bloom in Miami said he would be prosecuted as an adult at the request of the government.

Anna Kepner had been traveling on the Carnival Horizon ship in November with her family. Before the ship was scheduled to return to Florida, her body was found concealed under a bed in a room she was sharing with two other teens, including the younger stepbrother.

The cause of Kepner's Nov. 6 death was determined to be mechanical asphyxia, which is when an object or physical force stops someone from breathing.

Kepner's father, Christopher Kepner, released a statement, saying the family was placing “trust in the justice system to pursue the truth with care and integrity.”

“At the same time, we are deeply troubled that, despite the seriousness of the charges, he has not been taken into custody. ... The situation is deeply painful and complex for the entire family,” Kepner said.

Email and voicemail messages seeking comment from Hudson’s attorneys about the charges were not immediately returned Monday. Hudson has remained free in the care of an uncle since his arrest in February.

“Our hearts go out to the victim’s family during this unimaginable loss,” U.S. Attorney Jason Reding Quiñones said in a written statement. “A federal grand jury has returned an indictment charging serious offenses that allegedly occurred aboard a vessel in international waters.”

Kepner was a high school cheerleader at Temple Christian School in Titusville, Florida, some 40 miles (65 kilometers) east of Orlando. At her memorial service in November, family members encouraged people to wear bright colors instead of the traditional black “in honor of Anna’s bright and beautiful soul.”

Teens are rarely prosecuted in federal court. Hudson pleaded not guilty when he was initially charged in February, though the proceedings were not public because of his age and neither were court documents. He was seen at the courthouse wearing a ball cap and a hoodie pulled tightly around his face.

A judge on Feb. 6 said Hudson must wear an electronic tether while living with an uncle. The order was changed to allow him to join his father for a few days last week at a landscaping business, newly unsealed court records show.

Prosecutors objected to Hudson's release, citing dangerousness, and asked a judge Monday to revisit that order now that he has been charged as an adult. Defense lawyers will have a week to respond.

“He committed these crimes against a victim with whom he had no apparent relational strife, and whom he was being raised to view as a sibling,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Alejandra López said in a court filing.

Fiorentina's season-best five-game unbeaten run lifted Paolo Vanoli’s men above Cagliari into 15th place.

Robin Gosens got the only goal in the 28th minute when he headed home a cross from Jack Harrison, the winger on loan from Leeds United.

Lazio lost for the first time since March 1. Lazio dominated the match, particularly in the first half. It remained in ninth place.

___

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

Regan Prater also pleaded guilty to attempting to aid a foreign terrorist organization for efforts to provide the militant group Hezbollah “a list of personally identifiable information for individuals purportedly affiliated with the government of Israel,” according to a criminal information filed in February.

Sentencing is scheduled for Sept. 9 in Knoxville.

A public defender representing Prater did not immediately respond to an email and phone message requesting comment.

Prater was arrested last April in connection with the arson at the Highlander Research and Education Center in New Market. The arrest came more than six years after the March 2019 blaze, which caused more than $1.2 million in damage, prosecutors say.

An affidavit filed in federal court in East Tennessee last year said Prater’s posts in several group chats affiliated with white supremacist organizations connected him to the crime. In one private message, a witness who sent screenshots to the FBI asked a person authorities believe was Prater whether he set the fire.

“I’m not admitting anything,” the person using the screen name ‘Rooster’ wrote. But he later went on to describe exactly how the fire was set with “a sparkler bomb and some Napalm.”

A white-power symbol was spray-painted on the pavement near the site of the fire. The affidavit describes it as a “triple cross” and says it was also found on one of the firearms used by a shooter who killed 51 people at mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, on March 15, 2019, about two weeks before the Highlander fire.

Prater was initially charged in 2025 with one count of arson. On Monday, the previous indictment was dismissed in favor of the criminal information filed in February which included the charge related to the Lebanese group Hezbollah. In a plea agreement filed the following day in February, the government agreed that a sentence of no more than 20 years was appropriate.

Prater was previously sentenced to five years in federal prison for setting a fire in June 2019 at an adult video and novelty store in East Tennessee. He pleaded guilty and was ordered to pay $106,000 in restitution in that case. At the scene of that fire, investigators found a cellphone they later determined belonged to Prater. The phone included a short video showing a person inside the store lighting an accelerant, according to the affidavit.

Highlander is known as a place where civil rights figures including Rosa Parks and John Lewis received training. Parks attended a workshop there on integration in 1955, about six months before she famously refused to move to the back of a bus in Montgomery, Alabama. She always credited Highlander with helping her become a more determined activist.

Parks returned to Highlander two years later with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. for the school’s 25th anniversary celebration, where King gave a keynote address on achieving freedom and equality through nonviolence.

The blaze at Highlander broke out in the early morning of March 29, 2019. No one was injured, but decades’ worth of irreplaceable documents were lost. They included artifacts, speeches and other materials from different eras, including from the Civil Rights Movement.

The government revealed the decision in court papers as it agreed to settle a lawsuit filed by advocacy and historic preservation groups who had sought to block the Feb. 9 removal. A judge approved the deal.

The Interior Department and National Park Service “have confirmed their intention to maintain a Pride flag at Stonewall,” lawyers for the government and the groups wrote in a joint court filing.

The flag — one of several Pride banners at the 7.7-acre (3.1-hectare) park — won’t be removed, except for “maintenance or other practical purposes,” the filing said.

Under the agreement, within a week, the park service will hang three flags on its flagpole at the monument. The Pride flag will be positioned below the U.S. flag, in accordance with U.S. flag code, and above the park service flag. Each will measure 3 feet by 5 feet (0.9 meters by 1.5 meters).

The site also features a large Pride flag on a city-controlled flagpole and smaller flags on a fence surrounding the monument, which is across the street from the Stonewall Inn, the gay bar where a 1969 police raid sparked an uprising and helped catalyze the modern LGBTQ+ rights movement. Those flags weren't removed.

“We fought the Trump administration and won,” said Manhattan Borough President Brad Hoylman-Sigal wrote on X. The Democrat helped organize a protest Pride flag raising after the government-authorized banner was removed.

“We as an LGBTQ community celebrate the legal climb-down by the gutless Trump Administration on their contemptuous attempt to erase queer people from American history at Stonewall,” Hoylman-Sigal, the first openly gay person elected to his job, wrote.

Mayor Zohran Mamdani, a Democrat, called the Trump administration’s reversal “a victory for the LGBTQ+ community and for our entire city” and “a reminder that New Yorkers won’t let our history be rewritten.”

The Gilbert Baker Foundation, which honors the Pride flag creator who died in 2017, was among the organizations that sued over the removal.

“Stonewall is sacred ground in the fight for LGBTQ+ liberation, and this resolution helps ensure that the Rainbow Flag will continue to fly there, where it belongs,” foundation President Charley Beal said.

The Pride flag had become a flashpoint for arguments over Republican President Donald Trump ’s approach to Stonewall and various other historical properties.

After a yearslong campaign by activists who wanted the flag symbolizing LGBTQ+ pride to be flown daily inside the park service-run site, the banner was formally installed in 2022 during Democrat Joe Biden ’s tenure.

At the time, park service officials called it a sign of the government’s commitment to “telling the complex and diverse histories of all Americans.”

When it removed the flag in February, the park service said it was complying with federal guidance on flag displays. A Jan. 21 memo largely restricted the agency to displaying U.S., Interior Department and POW/MIA flags, with exemptions that include providing “historical context.”

The park service insisted the monument “remains committed to preserving and interpreting the history and significance of this site” through exhibits and programs. But LGBTQ+ activists saw the flag’s removal as a targeted affront meant to diminish a site that is all about their fight for rights and visibility.

Activists Michael Petrelis and Steven Love Menendez, who fought to have the park service fly the Pride flag, said they were pleased with Monday's agreement. But, they said, they were dismayed that other symbols, such as the even more inclusive Progress Pride flag, were left out.

“I look forward to the day when the flag display can restored to its original intent that allows all iterations of LGBTQ+ flags to fly,” Menendez said. “Until then at least we have the original rainbow flag flying to serve as a beacon of light.”

Democratic President Barack Obama created the Stonewall monument in 2016.

After Trump returned to office last year, he took aim at diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, and many references to transgender people were excised from the Stonewall monument’s website and materials.

Trump’s administration similarly has put national parks, museums and landmarks under a messaging microscope, aiming to remove or alter materials that it says are “divisive or partisan” or “inappropriately disparage Americans.”

___

Anthony Izaguirre contributed to this report.

Farmers' costs, such as equipment, have crept up over time while soybean prices have stayed low. Tariffs levied by the Trump administration last year and the monthslong trade war with China only made things worse, soybean producers say. Then the Iran war bottled up shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, restricting global fertilizer supplies and sending fuel and fertilizer prices soaring. A ceasefire deal announced April 7 raised hope that bottlenecks in the strait would abate, but the future of the agreement was uncertain and experts say it will take time for global supply chains to recover.

The AP and Lee Enterprises interviewed experts and soybean farmers across multiple Midwest states.

Here are key takeaways from the report:

Rising costs, low soybean prices have hurt farmers' margins

Soybeans, which are used for livestock feed, food and biofuels, are among the top U.S. agricultural exports. But soybean prices have been persistently low in recent years. The global market has been awash in soybeans, driven in part by Brazil, which surpassed the U.S. as the world’s largest soybean producer years ago.

“If we look at global soybean production over the past several years, it continues to set record, after record, after record,” said Chad Hart, an agricultural economist at Iowa State University. “There’s been just large supplies globally, and that has led to depressed prices.”

Meanwhile, Midwest soybean farmers’ costs have risen. Overall farm production expenses, including seed and pesticide, have increased over time, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Operating costs for soybean production have stayed elevated since 2020 and are projected to increase again in 2026, according to the agency.

The cost of land also is a major issue for farmers, experts say. Midwest crop land values have increased. And most regional farmers rent some of their land, according to Joana Colussi, research assistant professor in the department of agricultural economics at Purdue University.

The U.S.-China trade war in 2025 has lasting impacts

Sweeping tariffs levied by President Donald Trump in April 2025 exacerbated a trade war with China, the top buyer of U.S. soybeans. China responded with retaliatory tariffs and effectively boycotted U.S. soybeans, cutting off a major export market for Midwest farmers and driving the price of soybeans even lower. The U.S. and China eventually reached a deal in late 2025. Beijing committed to buying 12 million metric tons of soybeans by January and at least 25 million metric tons annually for the next three years. China has since met its initial soybean purchase goal and the Trump administration also rolled out a $12 billion temporary aid package in December to boost farmers affected by the trade war.

But the damage is already done, experts and farmers say. While China’s renewed purchases and the federal payments are helping, it’s not enough to recover farmers’ losses. Even after federal assistance, farmers still lost almost $75 per harvested acre of soybeans in the 2025 crop, according to the American Soybean Association. And the trade war further pushed China toward competing soybean exporters, such as Brazil — accelerating a trend of declining U.S. soybean exports to China.

Joseph Glauber, former chief economist at the Department of Agriculture between 2008 and 2014, said global competitors to U.S. soybean farmers gained from the trade war. The U.S. is not as dominant in the global soybean export market as it used to be, Glauber added.

The Iran war further drove up costs for farmers

After the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran on Feb. 28, a severe slowdown in shipping traffic through the Strait of Hormuz sent the price of oil soaring. The shipping disruption also largely stopped the export of nitrogen fertilizers manufactured in the Persian Gulf and limited access to key fertilizer ingredients. The price of urea, the most widely traded nitrogen fertilizer, skyrocketed.

Soybeans don’t require nitrogen fertilizer, but it’s vital for corn and most soybean farmers also grow corn. About half the global supply of urea comes from the Middle East, and Qatar and Saudi Arabia are two of the top sources of U.S. fertilizer imports, according to the American Farm Bureau Federation.

The U.S. and Iran agreed to a two-week ceasefire last week that included reopening the strait of Hormuz, but traffic remained slowed amid disagreements over Israeli attacks in Lebanon, and the price of urea remains elevated.

Many Midwest farmers bought their fertilizer well in advance of the spring planting season. But some farmers who didn’t buy early face elevated prices.

The war also caused gasoline and diesel prices to surge, causing further headaches for farmers. Oil prices dropped following the ceasefire announcement, but the war and the closure of the strait will have lasting impacts on farmers, said Seth Goldstein, a senior equity analyst at Morningstar, an investment research company. Facilities in the Middle East that are critical for exporting chemicals, oil and other commodities were damaged or destroyed during the war and it will take time for supply chains to recover, he said.

Ramsey County Attorney John Choi and Sheriff Bob Fletcher said at a news conference they are pursuing information from the Department of Homeland Security that they need for their investigation into the arrest of ChongLy “Scott” Thao, 56, on Jan. 18. Ramsey County includes the state capital of St. Paul.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers bashed open the front door of Thao’s St. Paul home at gunpoint — without a warrant as far as Choi and Fletcher have been able to determine — then led him outside in just his underwear and a blanket in freezing conditions.

“There are many facts we don’t know yet, but there’s one that we do know. And that is that Mr. Thao is and has been an American citizen. There’s not a dispute over that," Fletcher said. “There’s no dispute that he was taken out of his house, forcibly taken out of his home and driven around.”

The sheriff continued: "Is that good law enforcement, to take an American citizen out of their home and drive them around aimlessly, trying to determine what they can tell them?”

DHS, which oversees ICE, has refused so far to cooperate with Ramsey County, or with other state and local investigations into the killings by federal officers of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis during the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.

“ICE does not ‘kidnap’ people," the agency said in a statement that called Ramsey County's announcement “nothing but a political stunt to demonize ICE law enforcement.”

Choi said they’re trying to determine whether any crimes were committed that they could prosecute under state or federal law. He also said St. Paul police were investigating another case related to the immigration crackdown for potential violations, but he declined to provide details.

“This is not about any type of predetermined agenda other than to seek the truth and to investigate the facts,” Choi said.

Agents who arrested Thao eventually realized he was a longtime U.S. citizen with no criminal record, Thao said in an interview with The Associated Press in January. They returned him to his home after a couple of hours.

Homeland Security later said ICE officers had been seeking two convicted sex offenders. But Thao told the AP he had never seen the two men before and that they did not live with him. The Minnesota Department of Corrections later said one of the two wanted men was still in prison.

The ICE statement did not address the county’s request for evidence, but it asserted that investigators “concluded sexual predator targets had ties to the property” — something that Thao and his family denied.

Videos captured the scene, which included people blowing whistles and horns, and neighbors screaming at more than a dozen gun-toting agents to leave Thao’s family alone.

Thao declined to comment on the announcement Monday.

The director of the trial division in the County Attorney's Office, Hao Nguyen, said they wrote to DHS, ICE and local federal prosecutors March 20 outlining the evidence they're seeking.

“We know there are reports, there’s just no way that there aren’t," Nguyen said. "We want also to know who was working that day, who was working that month. Where did they report to? Who did they report to? We also want to understand what recordings might be out there in terms of digital recordings, witness interviews, video recordings.”

They set a deadline of April 30, after which they could sue or convene a grand jury, Choi said.

The state and the chief prosecutor in neighboring Hennepin County, which includes Minneapolis, sued the Trump administration last month to gain access to evidence they say they need to independently investigate three shootings by federal officers in Minneapolis, including the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti. It happened during the surge of around 3,000 federal law enforcement officers into Minnesota.

Choi urged members of the public who might have evidence about Thao's case or other potential violations to come forward. Minnesota and Hennepin County have made similar appeals.

The Trump administration has suggested Minnesota officials lack jurisdiction to investigate federal law enforcement actions. But Fletcher said he believes they do.

“There is no such thing as absolute immunity for federal agents," the sheriff said. "There’s qualified immunity for all law enforcement in a lot of different capacities. But seizing a person out of their home who’s an American citizen, they’re not immune from that.”

___

Karnowski reported from Minneapolis. Associated Press reporter Jack Brook contributed to this story from New Orleans.

The fugitive was later identified as Raymond Howard, 34. He escaped from law enforcement in Louisiana some time last year.

Several hours after the search was announced, officials confirmed that Howard had been taken into custody.

The S&P 500 rose 1% and is back to where it was before the United States and Israel attacked Iran in late February, just 1.3% below its all-time high set early this year. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 301 points, or 0.6%, and the Nasdaq composite climbed 1.2%.

Even in the oil market, where prices jumped above $100 per barrel after ceasefire talks over the weekend failed to end the war, prices pared their leaps as Monday progressed. The moves for financial markets overall were much more modest than the extreme swings that have hit since the war began.

Markets have been pinballing between worries that the war will last a long time and hopes for a resolution because all the parties would benefit from a freer flow of crude oil.

After the weekend’s talks failed, President Donald Trump announced a blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, which raises the pressure on Iran by trying to prevent it from making money by selling oil.

A blockade would keep even more oil off the global market, after prices already jumped for everyone worldwide because of Iran’s restrictions on traffic in the important strait. The narrow waterway is how much of the oil produced in the Persian Gulf area reaches customers worldwide.

Iran responded by threatening all ports in the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman. Afterward, the price for a barrel of Brent crude, the international standard, rose 4.4% to settle at $99.36 and is well above its roughly $70 level from before the war.

But it remains below the $119 peak it’s touched at times, when worries about the U.S.-Iran war have been at their heights. It also pulled back from its nearly $104 price reached earlier Monday morning.

“Markets are taking some encouragement from the fact that the two sides are talking and that the broader ceasefire seems to be holding, for now,” according to Sameer Samana, head of global equities and real assets at Wells Fargo Investment Institute.

Speaking outside the Oval Office, Trump suggested on Monday the United States is still willing to engage with Iran.

“I can tell you that we’ve been called by the other side,” Trump said.

In the meantime, big U.S. companies are beginning to tell investors how much money they made during the first three months of the year. Strong reports could help make up for Wall Street's worries about the Strait of Hormuz because stock prices tend to follow the trend of corporate profits over the long term.

Goldman Sachs, the investment bank, said it made $5.63 billion in profit during the quarter, more than investors expected. But financial analysts pointed to some potentially concerning signals underneath the surface, including lower revenue from the trading of fixed income, commodities and currencies. Its stock fell 1.9%.

Big banks traditionally lead earnings reporting season each quarter, and Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, and Bank of America will all report later this week. So will Johnson & Johnson, Netflix and PepsiCo.

Helping to lead Wall Street on Monday was Sandisk, which jumped 11.8% after learning it will replace Atlassian Corporation in the Nasdaq 100 index before trading begins on April 20. That means it will get included in funds that track the index, such as Invesco’s QQQ, which controls nearly $395 billion in investments.

The only stock to rise more in the S&P 500 index was Oracle. It gained 12.7% to recover some of its sharp recent losses taken on worries that it may be spending too much to build its artificial-intelligence capabilities.

Different kinds of worries about AI have been hammering software companies, centered on the risk that their businesses may become obsolete. They also rallied to recover some of their big recent losses.

ServiceNow climbed 7.3% to trim its loss for the year so far to less than 42%, and AppLovin climbed 6.7% to get its loss for 2026 down to 38%.

All told, the S&P 500 rose 69.35 points to 6,886.24. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 301.68 to 48,218.25, and the Nasdaq composite climbed 280.84 to 23,183.74.

In the bond market, Treasury yields ticked lower as oil prices receded from their morning highs. The yield on the 10-year Treasury fell to 4.29% from 4.31% late Friday.

That could offer some relief for the housing market and rates for mortgages, which have been climbing with Treasury yields since the war began on worries about high oil prices and inflation. A report on Monday said that sales of previously occupied homes were weaker in March than economists expected.

In stock markets abroad, indexes fell across much of Europe and Asia. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng fell 0.9%, and South Korea’s Kospi dropped 0.9% for two of the world’s larger losses.

___

AP journalists Yuri Kageyama, Matt Ott and Mayuko Ono contributed to this report.

The Oscar-winning actor and co-host of “The View” has launched the imprint WhoopInk, a partnership with Blackstone Publishing that will focus on bringing “fresh, diverse new talent to the marketplace” and on works spanning across genres. According to Blackstone, Goldberg will be “intimately involved” with the imprint, on everything from cover design to promotion.

At least one WhoopInk author already is well known to Goldberg — Rick Bleiweiss, a Blackstone executive who signed up Goldberg's “Bits and Pieces: My Mother, My Brother, and Me” for the publisher. Goldberg plans to publish the next novel in Bleiweiss' “Pignon Scorbion & the Barbershop Detectives” mystery series and to release some of her own books, including a collaboration with longtime business partner Tom Leonardis and a follow-up to “Bits and Pieces,” a bestselling memoir that comes out in paperback this week.

“I am personally looking forward to finding new authors, working with established authors, and bringing influential voices into this curated imprint,” Goldberg said in a statement Monday.

Numerous other celebrities have overseen their own imprints in recent years, including Sarah Jessica Parker,John Legend and Questlove. Reese Witherspoon, Dakota Johnson and Dua Lipa are among the public figures who have formed their own book clubs.

Courtney Williams, 40, who is charged with four counts of communicating and disclosing national defense information about a “special military unit” at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, after working for it as a civilian, appeared in federal court in Raleigh.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Brian Meyers agreed to release Williams, who was arrested last week and wore a striped jumpsuit in court, under home detention and location monitoring. She's barred from having contact with the media or using social media, Meyers said.

Williams' attorney, Christian Dysart, declined to comment after the hearing, which came more than a week after a criminal complaint was filed in her case.

The complaint was unsealed last week on the same day a grand jury indicted Williams and the U.S. Justice Department announced her arrest. An FBI official said then her alleged disclosures put “our nation, our warfighters, and our allies at risk.” Each count is punishable by up to 10 years in prison, the government says, along with monetary penalties.

Court documents say Williams, who was hired as a defense contractor in 2010 and became a Department of Defense employee months later, worked for a “special military unit” at Fort Bragg until 2016 and held a top-secret security clearance.

Although the reporter and unit are not named in the court filings, dates and details match an article and book about the Army’s secretive Delta Force written by Seth Harp.

Williams, who lives about 35 miles (56 kilometers) from Fort Bragg, was the focus of a 2025 Politico article with the headline: “My Life Became a Living Hell: One Woman’s Career in Delta Force, the Army’s Most Elite Unit.” The article, which describes Williams as serving previously in the Army as an interrogator and Arabic linguist, coincided with the release of Harp’s book, “The Fort Bragg Cartel,” which alleges sexual harassment and discrimination.

The indictment alleges that between 2022 and 2025, Williams was in contact with the author, resulting in more than 10 hours of phone calls and exchanging hundreds of text messages.

The indictment alleges in part that Williams unlawfully disclosed a “cover alias identity issued and owned” by the unit; tactics and techniques the unit used to “execute covert missions without being detected”; and “true names of individuals” assigned to the unit, and “their capture during a sensitive military mission in a foreign country.”

Harp said last week in a written statement that Williams is a “courageous whistleblower” on discrimination and harassment within Delta Force and contends former unit members reveal incidentally on podcasts and YouTube shows unit details that the government now labels a crime by Williams.

“I am confident that the DOJ’s slapdash indictment, full of misleadingly juxtaposed quotations taken out of context, will fall apart upon careful scrutiny,” Harp wrote.

An FBI agent's affidavit said that Williams had signed nondisclosure documents regarding classified materials while working for the unit and as she left her job.

The affidavit says Williams messaged the journalist on or about the article's release expressing concern about “the amount of classified information being disclosed.” And in another alleged exchange, she told her mother she may get arrested “for disclosing classified information.”

Led by the antiwar group Jewish Voice for Peace, the crowd of hundreds initially attempted to stage a sit-in inside the Manhattan offices of the two Democratic lawmakers they accused of abetting Israel’s intensifying attacks in Lebanon and the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran.

After demonstrators were blocked by security from entering the building, they stopped traffic outside, chanting “fund people, not bombs” as they were arrested and loaded onto three buses.

Among the 90 people taken into custody were whistleblower Chelsea Manning, actor Hari Nef and New York City Council Member Alexa Avilés, according to a JVP spokesperson.

The demonstration focused on a set of resolutions introduced by Sen. Bernie Sanders that could block the sale of more than $600 million in bombs to Israel.

Similar measures previously introduced by Sanders, an independent from Vermont, have failed. But the most recent effort this past summer drew support from more than half of Senate Democrats amid widespread hunger and suffering in Gaza. Schumer and Gillibrand were not among them.

Protesters on Monday said Israel’s air and ground offensive in southern Lebanon, along with the larger U.S.-Israeli war on Iran, added to the urgency of the vote, which is expected later this week.

“This is the moment when Schumer and Gillibrand must listen to their constituents,” said Sonya Meyerson-Knox, the communications director with Jewish Voice for Peace. “The majority of Americans and New Yorkers want a resolution to what the Israeli government is doing.”

Inquiries to Schumer and Gillibrand were not immediately returned.