President Donald Trump arrives to speak at the 2025 House Republican Members Conference Dinner at Trump National Doral Miami in Doral, Fla., Monday, Jan. 27, 2025. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)2025-01-29T11:06:49Z Just a little over a week into his second term, President Donald Trump is taking steps to maximize his power, sparking chaos and what critics contend is a constitutional crisis as he challenges the separation of powers that have defined American government for more than 200 years.The new administrations most provocative move came this week, as it announced it would temporarily halt federal payments to ensure they complied with Trumps orders barring diversity programs. The technical-sounding directive had enormous immediate impact before it was blocked by a federal judge, potentially pulling trillions of dollars from police departments, domestic violence shelters, nutrition services and disaster relief programs that rely on federal grants. Though the Republican administration denied Medicaid was affected, it acknowledged the online portal allowing states to file for reimbursement from the program was shut down for part of Tuesday in what it insisted was an error. Legal experts noted the president is explicitly forbidden from cutting off spending for programs that Congress has approved. The U.S. Constitution grants Congress the power to appropriate money and requires the executive to pay it out. A 50-year-old law known as the Impoundment Control Act makes that explicit by prohibiting the president from halting payments on grants or other programs approved by Congress. The thing that prevents the president from being an absolute monarch is Congress controls the power of the purse strings, said Josh Chafetz, a law professor at Georgetown University, adding that even a temporary freeze violates the law. Its what guarantees theres a check on the presidency. Democrats and other critics said the move was blatantly unconstitutional.What happened last night is the most direct assault on the authority of Congress, I believe, in the history of the United States, Sen. Angus King, an independent from Maine, said Tuesday. While some Republicans were critical, most were supportive.I think he is testing the limits of his power, and I dont think any of us are surprised by it, said Sen. Kevin Cramer, a North Dakota Republican who is close with Trump.At first blush, the Trump administration appears to be following the correct procedures in identifying potential spending cuts, and the Impoundment Control Act outlines a procedure for how they could become permanent, said Rachel Snyderman, a former official at the Office of Management and Budget who is now at the Bipartisan Policy Center.Congress must eventually sign off on any cuts the administration wants to make, Snyderman said, though she noted that no president since Bill Clinton, a Democrat, has been successful in getting that done. Congress did not act on $14 billion in impoundment cuts Trump proposed during his prior term, she said.We have to see what the next steps are, Snyderman said.The proposed halt on grants comes after Trump, who during the campaign pledged to be a dictator on day one, has taken a number of provocative moves to challenge legal constraints on his power. He fired the inspectors general of his Cabinet agencies without giving Congress the warning required by law, declared that there is an immigrant invasion despite low numbers of border crossings, is requiring loyalty pledges from new hires, challenged the constitutional guarantee of birthright citizenship and is moving career staff out of key positions at the Department of Justice to ensure his loyalists control investigations and prosecutions. On Tuesday evening, the new administration made its latest move, trying to prune the federal workforce by offering pay until the end of September for those who agree to resign by the end of next week.The Trump actions have all led to a cascade of court challenges contending he has overstepped his constitutional bounds. A federal judge in Seattle has already put on hold Trumps attempt to revoke birthright citizenship, calling it a blatant violation of the nations foundational legal document. On Tuesday, nonprofit groups persuaded a federal judge in Washington to put the administrations spending freeze order on hold until a fuller hearing on Feb. 3. Democratic attorneys general also rushed to court to block the order. New Mexico Attorney General Raul Torrez, a Democrat, said the swiftness of the court action against Trumps spending freeze demonstrates the carelessness of the order.My hope is that the president, working with Congress, can identify whatever his priorities are and can work through the normal constitutional order that is well established that limits the power of Democratic and Republican presidents, he said.The grant freeze administration officials described it as a pause fits with a long-sought goal of some Trump allies, including his nominee to run the Office of Management and Budget, Russell Vought, to challenge the constitutionality of the Impoundment Control Act. They contend the president, as the person in charge of distributing funds, should be able to have some control over how the money goes out. Though theres little doubt the new administration wanted a court fight over its power to control spending, experts agree that this was likely not the way they hoped to present it.This is a really sloppy way of doing this, said Bill Galston, of the Brookings Institution, adding that he thought it was an administration error. This is just classic Trump. He believes its better to be fast and sloppy than slow and precise.In her first press conference, Trumps new press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, on Tuesday urged organizations that need the grants to call the administration and show how their operations are in line with the presidents agenda.Its incumbent on this administration to make sure, again, that every penny is accounted for, Leavitt said.Republican lawmakers largely took the freeze in stride.This isnt a huge surprise to me, said Rep. Dusty Johnson of South Dakota during the House Republican retreat at one of the presidents Florida golf resorts. Clearly, Donald Trump campaigned in no small part on the idea that the Biden administration was putting out a lot of money that was not consistent with Donald Trumps values.But Democrats and others were furious at the move, which seemed designed to undercut congressional authority.If President Trump wants to change our nations laws, he has the right to ask Congress to change them, Sen. Bernie Sanders, an independent from Vermont, said in a statement. He does not have the right to violate the United States Constitution. He is not a king.Chafetz, of Georgetown University, said the lack of pushback from Republican members of Congress was especially alarming because the legislative branch is the one whose powers are most at risk in the latest power play.Even if Trump loses the legal battle, Chafetz said, he and his followers might feel like theyve won by pushing things to this extreme.Damaging the institutions they dont like, he said, seems to be their whole theory of governance.___Riccardi reported from Denver. Associated Press writers Kevin Freking and Lisa Mascaro in Washington and Morgan Lee in Albuquerque, New Mexico, contributed to this report. RSShttps://feedx.net https://feedx.site

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., waves to reporters as he rides the train to go to meet with Sen. John Thune, R-S.D. at the Capitol in Washington, Dec. 17, 2024. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana, File)2025-01-29T12:04:45Z WASHINGTON (AP) Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s anti-vaccine advocacy is outside the mainstream. His previous statements on abortion could alienate Republicans. But a new poll finds that not all of his controversial health goals are unpopular in fact, at least one has broad support among Democrats and Republicans.As Kennedys Senate confirmation hearings begin, his bid to become the nations top health official could depend on how staunchly he sticks to these personal beliefs during questioning. He has already softened some of his long-held views. Hes facing some skepticism from the public, according to a new survey from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. Only about 3 in 10 US adults approve of President Donald Trump nominating him to be secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. About 4 in 10 disapprove, while about one-quarter are either neutral or dont know enough to say. But he has points of strength, too. Trumps choice of Kennedy is especially popular among Republicans: About 6 in 10 approve, compared to about 1 in 10 Democrats. And while many Americans disagree with some of Kennedys controversial health stances including beliefs around reevaluating childhood vaccine recommendations and changing guidelines around fluoride in drinking water and raw milk consumption some of his other stances, like reformulating processed foods, are broadly popular.Heres what AP-NORC polling shows about which of Kennedys priorities are likely to be popular among U.S. adults and which might be less well-received. More oppose than support reevaluating widely used vaccines Kennedy has long been a vaccine skeptic, and he and Trump have falsely claimed that childhood vaccines are dangerous and tied to rising autism rates. His opposition to vaccines is broad, and he has said that theres no vaccine that is safe and effective.AP-NORC polling suggests that reevaluating vaccine recommendations would be unpopular with many Americans.About 4 in 10 Americans strongly or somewhat oppose reconsidering the governments recommendations around widely used vaccines, like the flu vaccine, and about 3 in 10 are in favor. Another 3 in 10 Americans, roughly, are neutral. Republicans are more likely than Democrats to favor reconsidering government recommendations for widely used vaccines, although their support isnt overwhelming. About 4 in 10 Republicans favor reevaluating vaccine recommendations, compared with about 2 in 10 Democrats.Wide support for restrictions on ingredients in processed foodsOne of Kennedys ideas is popular across the board: getting some chemicals out of processed foods. Kennedy has vowed to ban certain food additives and crack down on ultra-processed foods that are tied to obesity and diabetes rates.About two-thirds of Americans somewhat or strongly favor restricting or reformulating processed foods to remove ingredients like added sugar or dyes. This is an area where Democrats and Republicans agree: About 7 in 10 in each group favor the restrictions. Support is particularly high among U.S. adults with a higher household income, though research from the National Institutes of Health has indicated that ultra-processed foods are consumed at higher rates in low-income groups. Roughly 8 in 10 adults with a household income of $100,000 or more per year support the restrictions, compared with about half of Americans with a household income of $30,000 or less. More oppose than support removing raw milk restrictionsKennedy indicated before the election that he would be keen to end the Food and Drug Administrations aggressive suppression of raw milk. The FDA and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have called raw milk one of the riskiest foods people can consume because of the possibility for contamination. This is a proposal for which hed have to do some convincing to get the public on board. About 4 in 10 U.S. adults strongly or somewhat oppose removing restrictions on the sale of unpasteurized or raw milk. About 2 in 10 Americans favor this idea, with Republicans being more likely than Democrats to be in support. But even Republicans are split: About 3 in 10 are in favor, and about 3 in 10 are opposed. Americans generally want Medicare and Medicaid to cover weight loss drugsKennedy has criticized prescription weight loss drugs like Ozempic, saying higher-quality food could solve the obesity problem in the U.S., but in December he pivoted, saying the drugs have a place in making sure people are not obese, in addition to lifestyle changes.Americans see weight loss drugs as a good solution for adults who are obese. About half of U.S. adults say its very good or somewhat good for adults to use weight loss drugs if they are struggling with obesity or a weight-related health condition. And about half also favor Medicare and Medicaid covering the cost of these drugs if they are prescribed for weight loss for people with obesity. More oppose than support removing fluoride from drinking waterKennedy has said he wants the federal government to advise local governments against putting fluoride in their drinking water. The CDC has said small amounts of added fluoride in drinking water prevent cavities and tooth decay. More Americans are opposed than in favor of removing fluoride from drinking water, but many dont have an opinion on the issue, leaving room for shifts in either direction. About 4 in 10 Americans oppose removing fluoride from the water supply, and about one-quarter are in favor. An additional one-third are neutral, saying they dont favor or oppose it. About one-third of independents and Republicans favor it, compared with about 2 in 10 Democrats.The idea of removing fluoride from drinking water is particularly unpopular with adults 60 and older, and the data suggests that younger Americans might be more open to it. About half of adults 60 or older oppose removing fluoride from the water, compared with about 4 in 10 adults between the ages of 30 and 59. Only about 2 in 10 adults under 30 are opposed to this. Kennedys views on abortion may be at odds with RepublicansKennedy has previously expressed support for abortion rights, which contradicts the beliefs of many of the Republican lawmakers who will need to confirm him, though he has said that he will follow Trumps directives on the topic.Hes in a bit of a bind on the issue. About 6 in 10 voters in Novembers election said abortion should be legal in all or most cases, according to AP VoteCast, a survey of more than 120,000 voters. About one-third said it should be illegal in all or most instances. But like the Republican senators who will be questioning him, conservative voters see the issue differently. Among Republican voters, about 6 in 10 said abortion should be illegal in at least most cases, and only about 4 in 10 said it should be mostly legal.___The AP-NORC poll of 1,147 adults was conducted Jan. 9-13, using a sample drawn from NORCs probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for adults overall is plus or minus 3.9 percentage points. LINLEY SANDERS Sanders is a polls and surveys reporter for The Associated Press. She develops and writes about polls conducted by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, and works on AP VoteCast. twitter

A supporter holds a poster with a photo of Laken Riley before Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally March 9, 2024, in Rome Ga. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart, File)2025-01-29T05:17:27Z WASHINGTON (AP) President Donald Trump on Wednesday will sign the Laken Riley Act into law as his administrations first piece of legislation. It mandates the detention and potential deportation of people in the U.S. illegally who are accused of theft and violent crimes before theyve actually been convicted.The measure swiftly passed the Republican-controlled Congress with some Democratic support, despite immigrants rights advocates decrying it as extreme enough to possibly trigger mass roundups of people for offenses as minor as shoplifting. Trump has made a promised crackdown on illegal immigration unprecedented in the nations history a centerpiece of his political career, however, and is now suggesting the law might only be the beginning. This shows the potential for additional enforcement bills that will help us crack down on criminal aliens and totally restore the rule of law in our country, the president said at a conference of House Republicans held at his Doral golf club in Florida. The law is named for Laken Riley, a 22-year-old Georgia nursing student who went out for a run in February 2024 and was killed by Jose Antonio Ibarra, a Venezuelan national in the U.S. illegally. Ibarra was found guilty in November and sentenced to life without parole. To have a bill of such importance named after her is a great, a great tribute, Trump said. This new form of crime, criminal, illegal aliens, its its massive, the numbers are massive and you add that to the crime we already had. The speed at which the act cleared Congress and the fact that Trump is preparing to triumphantly sign it at the White House surrounded by lawmakers and other supportive, invited guests just nine days after taking office adds to its potent political symbolism for conservatives. Critics say the measure is using a tragedy to effectively unleash chaos and cruelty while doing little to fight crime or fix an antiquated federal immigration system that hasnt been overhauled in decades. Under the Laken Riley Act, federal officials are required to detain any immigrant arrested or charged with crimes like theft or assaulting a police officer, or offenses that injure or kill someone. It further gives legal standing to state attorneys general to sue the U.S. government for harm caused by federal immigration decisions potentially allowing the leaders of conservative states to help dictate immigration policy set by Washington. Ibarra had been arrested for illegal entry in September 2022 near El Paso, Texas, amid an unprecedented surge in migration, and released to pursue his case in immigration court. Federal officials say he was arrested by New York police in August 2023 for child endangerment and released. Police say he was also suspected of theft in Georgia in October 2023 all of which occurred before Rileys killing. This is the right thing to do, House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., said after the act cleared the House. Its always good when the right thing is also the popular thing. Some Democrats, however, have questioned the acts constitutionality. Immigrant advocates are bracing for mass detentions that they say will trigger subsequent, costly construction of immigration lockup facilities to house the people arrested. They dont just get to celebrate. They get to use this for their mass deportation agenda, Naureen Shah, deputy director of government affairs in the equality division of the American Civil Liberties Union, said of the acts supporters.The ALCU says the act can allow people to be mandatorily locked up potentially for years because at some point in their lives, perhaps decades ago, they were accused of nonviolent offenses.Hannah Flamm, interim senior director of policy at the International Refugee Assistance Project, said the law violates immigrants basic rights by allowing for detaining people who havent been charged with, much less convicted of, wrongdoing. Still, she said, The latent fear from the election cycle of looking soft on crime snowballed into aiding and abetting Trumps total conflation of immigration with crime. Flamm said the act is likely to be challenged in court on its parameters directing mandatory detentions, as well as its granting legal standing to state attorneys general in immigration cases and policy. But she also predicted that a need to pay for more immigration detention centers will give advocates a chance to challenge how federal funds are appropriated to cover those costs. I think it is pivotal to understand: This bill, framed as connected to a tragic death, is pretext to fortify a mass deportation system, Flamm said. The signing of the Laken Riley Act follows a flurry of first-week executive orders by Trump that are designed to better seal off the U.S.-Mexico border and eventually move to deport millions of immigrants without permanent U.S. legal status. The new administration has also canceled refugee resettlement and says it may attempt to prosecute local law enforcement officials who do not enforce his new immigration policies.Were tracking down the illegal alien criminals and were detaining them and were throwing them the hell out of our country, Trump said. We have no apologies, and were moving forward very fast. WILL WEISSERT Weissert covers national politics and the White House for The Associated Press. He is based in Washington. twitter mailto

We start this week with Emanuel's rundown on the DeepSeek situation, the Chinese-made AI that has rocked stock markets and the wider AI industry. After the break, Sam explains how metadata in U.S. government memos lists Project 2025 members as the memo authors. In the subscribers-only section, Jason and Sam explain how GitHub is showing the U.S. government's purging of information in real time.Listen to the weekly podcast onApple Podcasts,Spotify, orYouTube. Become a paid subscriber for access to this episode's bonus content and to power our journalism.If you become a paid subscriber, check your inbox for an email from our podcast host Transistor for a link to the subscribers-only version! You can also add that subscribers feed to your podcast app of choice and never miss an episode that way. The email should also contain the subscribers-only unlisted YouTube link for the extended video version too. It will also be in the show notes in your podcast player. DeepSeek Mania Shakes AI Industry to Its CoreMemos to Federal Employees Were Written By People With Ties to Project 2025, Metadata ShowsTrumps Administration Is Taking Down Sites About Gender Identity All Over the InternetGitHub Is Showing the Trump Administration Scrubbing Government Web Pages in Real Time

Chinese artists perform a lion dance at the Dongyue Temple on the first day of the Chinese Lunar New Year in Beijing on Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Andy Wong)2025-01-29T05:54:53Z BEIJING (AP) Lunar New Year festivals and prayers marked the start of the Year of the Snake around Asia and farther afield on Wednesday including in Moscow.Hundreds of people lined up in the hours before midnight at the Wong Tai Sin Taoist temple in Hong Kong in a bid to be among the first to put incense sticks in the stands in front of the temples main hall.I wish my family will be blessed. I hope my business will run well. I pray for my country and wish people peace. I hope this coming year is a better year, said Ming So, who visits the temple annually on the eve of the Lunar New Year.The holiday known as the Spring Festival in China, Tet in Vietnam and Seollal in Korea is a major festival celebrated by diaspora communities around the world. The snake, one of 12 animals in the Chinese zodiac, follows the just-ended Year of the Dragon. The pop-pop-pop of firecrackers greeted the new year outside Guan Di temple in Malaysias capital, Kuala Lumpur, followed by lion dances to the rhythmic beat of drums and small cymbals. Ethnic Chinese holding incense sticks in front of them bowed several times inside the temple before sticking the incense into elaborate gold-colored pots, the smoke rising from the burning tips. Many Chinese who work in bigger cities return home during the eight-day national holiday in what is described as the worlds biggest annual movement of humanity. Beijing, Chinas capital, has turned into a bit of a ghost town, with many shops closed and normally crowded roads and subways emptied out. Traditionally, Chinese have a family dinner at home on New Years Eve and visit temple fairs on the Lunar New Year to watch performances and buy snacks, toys and other trinkets from booths.Many Chinese take advantage of the extended holiday to travel both in the country and abroad. Ctrip, an online booking agency that operates Trip.com, said the most popular overseas destinations this year are Japan, Thailand, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, Australia, the United States, South Korea, Macao and Vietnam. Russians cheered, waved and took smartphone photos of a colorful procession with drummers, costumed dancers and large dragon and snake figures held aloft that kicked off a 10-day Lunar New Year festival in Moscow on Tuesday night.The Chinese and Russian governments have deepened ties since 2022, in part to push back against what they see as U.S. dominance of the world order.Visitors shouted Happy New Year in Russian and expressed delight at being able to experience Chinese food and culture in Moscow, including folk performances and booths selling snacks and artwork.___Associated Press video journalists Alice Fung in Hong Kong and Syawalludin Zain in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, contributed to this story. KEN MORITSUGU Moritsugu covers political, economic and social issues from Beijing for The Associated Press. He has also reported from New Delhi, Bangkok and Tokyo and is the APs former news director for Greater China and for Japan and the Koreas. twitter

The Palisades Fire ravages a neighborhood amid high winds in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood of Los Angeles, Tuesday, Jan. 7, 2025. (AP Photo/Ethan Swope, File)2025-01-29T05:03:44Z LOS ANGELES (AP) When disaster strikes, government emergency alert systems offer a simple promise: Residents will get information about nearby dangers and instructions to help them stay safe.As the deadly LA wildfires and other major emergencies have shown, alerts rely on a complicated chain of communication between first responders, government administrators, third-party companies and the public. Sometimes, the chain breaks.After the wind-driven wildfires broke out in Southern California on Jan. 7, evacuation orders for some neighborhoods including the part of Altadena where the majority of deaths occurred came long after houses were reported on fire. On Tuesday, Los Angeles County officials approved an outside review of how alerts functioned in the Eaton Fire and Palisades Fire in response to residents demands. City officials declined to answer APs questions about a lag in some Palisades Fire alerts, though Fire Capt. Branden Silverman said responding to a fire and determining evacuation needs can take some time. Its an increasingly common issue: After-action reports and investigations revealed issues with alert systems in other California blazes: in the 2017 Tubbs Fire, which killed 22 people in Santa Rosa; the 2018 Camp Fire, which killed 85 people in Paradise; the Woolsey fire, which started the same day and killed three in Malibu; as well as in Colorados 2021 Marshall Fire, which destroyed more than 1,000 homes outside Denver; and in Hawaiis 2023 Lahaina Fire, which decimated that historic town and killed 102. It could take months to know why some evacuation orders lagged in the Los Angeles fires. Several residents who lost homes in the Eaton Fire told The Associated Press they received no notifications about their neighborhoods. For others, the first warning was an urgent text message in the middle of the night. Susan Lee Streets, who signed up for the alert app Nixle, did not get any alerts specific to her west Altadena neighborhood before she and her family left of their own accord around 10 p.m. after losing power and cell reception.If we had even been informed that houses and other structures were burning down, we would have known better what was happening, she said. We almost went to sleep that night with two kids and a dog and two cats in the house.Only after 3 a.m. did an alert hit her phone. Destroyed along with the house are the Christmas ornaments she saved for her children, and countless other family keepsakes. We lost everything, everything, Streets said, breaking into tears. Tricia Wachtendorf, director of the Disaster Research Center at the University of Delaware, said alerts have to be specific and clear. Research has shown that for them to be effective, people have to hear, understand, believe, personalize and confirm them before they react.Just because you send the message at 3 a.m. doesnt mean someone is hearing it, Wachtendorf said.The hours between midnight and 3:30 a.m. appear to have been particularly challenging for first responders in Los Angeles County, based on an AP review of scanner traffic recordings and data from CalFire, the states chief fire agency; the Federal Emergency Management Agency, or FEMA; and the Watch Duty app. Resources were stretched thin, and hurricane-force winds had grounded air support, limiting authorities ability to get a top-down perspective on the flames.Calls reporting burning homes were flooding in as embers blew onto roofs and yards. During one half-hour period, 17 new addresses were relayed to firefighters, even as some crews ran low on fuel. By 12:07 a.m., CalFire records show, dozens of neighborhoods had been ordered to evacuate because of the Eaton Fire, all of them east of Altadenas North Lake Avenue. None of the neighborhoods to the west where all of the 17 confirmed fatalities occurred, as first reported by the Los Angeles Times had received evacuation warnings or orders, despite house fires being reported there more than an hour earlier. Over the next three hours, fire crews would go from begging for resources on the eastern flank of the blaze to radioing the command center to make sure it knew the fire was spreading west along the foothills near Sunset Ridge. Just before 3:30 a.m., evacuation orders expanded significantly, with residents in 12 areas of Altadena and elsewhere told to leave now.Jodi and Jeff Moreno first heard about the fire from a neighborhood app. But the first official warning only came around 2:30 a.m., when authorities yelled through a bullhorn to evacuate. The couple grabbed their three daughters, their dog and some important papers, and fled. There were no text alerts until after they were gone. On the neighborhood apps, some people were going, some people were staying. It was a wide variety of responses. We were navigating it on our own, Jodi Moreno said. Its hard for us to gauge where exactly is that fire, where are the embers blowing. ... Those are things I would rely on people who are monitoring it for information. Desperate for more information, both the Morenos and Streets downloaded the Watch Duty app, which maps evacuation zones and consolidates information from multiple sources into a single stream. Launched in 2021 and today covering 22 states, it became a lifeline for them.The ideal system for warning people is informing them, right? said Nick Russell, vice president for operations at Watch Duty. Theres certainly diligence necessary in the execution of official evacuation warning and orders or shelter in place, whatever the condition might be, he said. But telling people why that discussion is taking place between law enforcement and fire is important. And thats what were doing.The process of issuing evacuation notices starts with firefighters or other personnel on the ground recommending action, Russell said. It then moves up the chain of command to sheriffs, who ultimately put out any order. During major emergencies that communication can be hampered by issues such as limited radio connectivity, wind noise or other technical problems. Incident command stations may have trouble synthesizing the large amounts of information they are getting from different agencies, something that is critical for understanding the scope of an emergency like a fire.In Los Angeles County, residents who sign up for emergency notifications through the AlertLACounty website are then directed to a list of 57 links to other specific neighborhood or city alert system signups, as well as a general one covering 19 other cities. The city of Los Angeles and the Sheriffs Department also have alert systems.It is not clear how the overlapping systems, which use different software programs, work together, or whether officials coordinate. A 2024 Hazard Mitigation plan directed the citys Emergency Management Department to assess gaps in alert and warning systems in areas with poor cellphone connectivity and then implement a solution to ensure alerts reach people. But that goal was given a medium priority level and a long-term timeline, with completion expected sometime in the next 10 years. Meanwhile the countys Hazard Mitigation Plan, last updated in 2020, did not include a focus on emergency alerts or public notifications. Instead its high-priority goals had to do with educating people about winds impact on wildfire risk and with community wildfire protection. Officials at the Countys Coordinated Joint Information Center declined to comment other than to say that an independent review of evacuations and emergency notifications is planned and the Office of Emergency Management, County Fire Department and Sheriffs Department plan to fully engage with it. CHRISTOPHER L. KELLER Keller works with reporters and editors to find stories in data and documents and contributes context to spot and breaking news stories for The Associated Press. mailto REBECCA BOONE Rebecca is a correspondent based in Idaho. twitter mailto RSShttps://feedx.net https://feedx.site

The narrative that OpenAI, Microsoft, and freshly minted White House AI czar David Sacks are now pushing to explain why DeepSeek was able to create a large language model that outpaces OpenAIs while spending orders of magnitude less money and using older chips is that DeepSeek used OpenAIs data unfairly and without compensation. Sound familiar?Both Bloomberg and the Financial Times are reporting that Microsoft and OpenAI have been probing whether DeepSeek improperly trained the R1 model that is taking the AI world by storm on the outputs of OpenAI models.Here is how the Bloomberg article begins: Microsoft Corp. and OpenAI are investigating whether data output from OpenAIs technology was obtained in an unauthorized manner by a group linked to Chinese artificial intelligence startup DeepSeek, according to people familiar with the matter. The story goes on to say that Such activity could violate OpenAIs terms of service or could indicate the group acted to remove OpenAIs restrictions on how much data they could obtain, the people said.The venture capitalist and new Trump administration member David Sacks, meanwhile, said that there is substantial evidence that DeepSeek distilled the knowledge out of OpenAIs models.Theres a technique in AI called distillation, which youre going to hear a lot about, and its when one model learns from another model, effectively what happens is that the student model asks the parent model a lot of questions, just like a human would learn, but AIs can do this asking millions of questions, and they can essentially mimic the reasoning process they learn from the parent model and they can kind of suck the knowledge of the parent model, Sacks told Fox News. Theres substantial evidence that what DeepSeek did here is they distilled the knowledge out of OpenAIs models and I dont think OpenAI is very happy about this.I will explain what this means in a moment, but first: Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha hahahhahahahahahahahahahahaha. It is, as many have already pointed out, incredibly ironic that OpenAI, a company that has been obtaining large amounts of data from all of humankind largely in an unauthorized manner, and, in some cases, in violation of the terms of service of those from whom they have been taking from, is now complaining about the very practices by which it has built its company.The argument that OpenAI, and every artificial intelligence company who has been sued for surreptitiously and indiscriminately sucking up whatever data it can find on the internet is not that they are not sucking up all of this data, it is that they are sucking up this data and they are allowed to do so.OpenAI is currently being sued by the New York Times for training on its articles, and its argument is that this is perfectly fine under copyright law fair use protections.Training AI models using publicly available internet materials is fair use, as supported by long-standing and widely accepted precedents. We view this principle as fair to creators, necessary for innovators, and critical for US competitiveness, OpenAI wrote in a blog post. In its motion to dismiss in court, OpenAI wrote it has long been clear that the non-consumptive use of copyrighted material (like large language model training) is protected by fair use.OpenAI and Microsoft are essentially now whining about being beaten at its own game by DeepSeek. But additionally, part of OpenAIs argument in the New York Times case is that the only way to make a generalist large language model that performs well is by sucking up gigantic amounts of data. It tells the court that it needs a huge amount of data to make a generalist language model, meaning any one source of data is not that important. This is funny, because DeepSeek managed to make a large language model that rivals and outpaces OpenAIs own without falling into the more data = better model trap. Instead, DeepSeek used a reinforcement learning strategy that its paper claims is far more efficient than weve seen other AI companies do.OpenAIs motion to dismiss the New York Times lawsuit states as part of its argument that the key to generalist language models is scale, meaning that part of its argument is that any individual piece of stolen content cannot make a large language model, and that what allows OpenAI to make industry-leading large language models is this idea of scale. OpenAIs lawyers quote from a New York Times article about this strategy as part of their argument: The amount of data needed was staggering to create GPT-3, it wrote. It was that unprecedented scale that allowed the model to internalize not only a map of human language, but achieve a level of adaptabilityand emergent intelligencethat no one thought possible.As Sacks mentioned, distillation is an established principle in artificial intelligence research, and its something that is done all the time to refine and improve the accuracy of smaller large language models. This process is so normalized in deep learning that the most often cited paper about it was coauthored by Geoffrey Hinton, part of a body of work that just earned him the Nobel Prize. Hintons paper specifically suggests that distillation is a way to make large language models more efficient, and that distilling works very well for transferring knowledge from an ensemble or from a large highly regularized model into a smaller, distilled model.An IBM article on distillation notes The LLMs with the highest capabilities are, in most cases, too costly and computationally demanding to be accessible to many would-be users like hobbyists, startups or research institutions knowledge distillation has emerged as an important means of transferring the advanced capabilities of large, often proprietary models to smaller, often open-source models. As such, it has become an important tool in the democratization of generative AI.In late December, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman took what many people saw as a veiled shot at DeepSeek, immediately after the release of DeepSeek V3, an earlier DeepSeek model. It is (relatively) easy to copy something that you know works, Altman tweeted. It is extremely hard to do something new, risky, and difficult when you dont know if it will work.Its also extremely hard to rally a big talented research team to charge a new hill in the fog together, he added. This is the key to driving progress forward.Even this is ridiculous, though. Besides being trained on huge amounts of other peoples data, OpenAIs work builds on research pioneered by Google, which itself builds on earlier academic research. This is, simply, how artificial intelligence research (and scientific research more broadly) works.This is all to say that, if OpenAI argues that it is legal for the company to train on whatever it wants for whatever reason it wants, then it stands to reason that it doesnt have much of a leg to stand on when competitors use common strategies used in the world of machine learning to make their own models. But of course, it is going with the argument that it must protect [its] IP.We know PRC based companies and others are constantly trying to distill the models of leading US AI companies, an OpenAI spokesperson told Bloomberg. As the leading builder of AI, we engage in countermeasures to protect our IP, including a careful process for which frontier capabilities to include in released models, and believe as we go forward that it is critically important that we are working closely with the US government to best protect the most capable models from efforts by adversaries and competitors to take US technology.

Palestinians who have returned walk among the rubble of buildings largely destroyed by Israeli army bombardments in Beit Lahia, northern Gaza Strip, Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2025, after Israel began allowing hundreds of thousands of Palestinians to return to the heavily damaged area last Monday.(AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)2025-01-29T15:35:30Z JERUSALEM (AP) An Israeli official said Wednesday that Hamas will release three Israelis, including two women and an 80-year-old man, and five Thai nationals in the next hostage release, slated for Thursday.The official named the Israel women as Arbel Yehoud, 29, Agam Berger, 19, and the man as Gadi Mozes, 80. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak on the record, said the hostages families had approved publication of their names.The official did not name the Thai nationals set to be freed.THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. APs earlier story follows below.CAIRO (AP) The leader of important U.S. ally Egypt on Wednesday rejected President Donald Trumps suggestion that Egypt take in displaced Palestinians from Gaza, defying a U.S. president who has shown little patience for dissent from international partners. Trump over the weekend told reporters that Egypt and Jordan should take in Palestinians from war-torn Gaza, an idea that has long been rejected by those countries and the Palestinians themselves because they say it would undermine the notion of Palestinian statehood and foment instability in their states. Trump said he would urge the leaders of both countries, which are key allies to the U.S. in the Middle East and major recipients of American aid in the region, to accept the idea, saying the resettlement could be temporary or long term. It is not clear if Trump could force Egypt or Jordan to agree, but he has in his first days in office and on the campaign threatened hefty tariffs against American allies to get his way.In his first public comments since Trump floated the suggestion Saturday, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi called the idea an injustice which Egypt would not be party to. In a news conference in Cairo with the visiting Kenyan president, el-Sissi said the transfer of Palestinians cant ever be tolerated or allowed. The solution to this issue is the two-state solution. It is the establishment of a Palestinian state, he said. The solution is not to remove the Palestinian people from their place.He said his government would work with the Trump administration to achieve peace that is based on the two-state solution between Israel and the Palestinians.Trump on Saturday said he would urge Egypt and Jordan to accept people from Gaza so that we just clean out that whole thing, calling the territory a demolition site. The debate over the fate of displaced Palestinians came as hundreds of thousands of people in Gaza were streaming toward the north of the war-ravaged territory to return to what is left of their homes, after being told to evacuate the area earlier on in Israels war against Hamas.The return was taking place as part of a ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas which began earlier this month and has allowed for a pause in the fighting, the scheduled release of dozens of hostages held in Gaza and freedom for hundreds of Palestinians imprisoned or detained by Israel. The 15-monthlong war, set off by Hamas Oct. 7, 2023 attacks on Israel, has killed more than 47,000 Palestinians, most of them women and children according to local health authorities, who do not distinguish between civilians and combatants in their count. The fighting has obliterated vast areas of Gaza, displacing some 90% of its 2.3 million population, often multiple times.The theme of displacement has been recurrent in Palestinian history and the idea of staying steadfast on ones land is an integral element of the Palestinian identity. Palestinians fear that if they leave their land, they may never be allowed to return.Those fears have been compounded by far-right members of Israels government who support rebuilding Jewish settlements in Gaza, from which Israel withdrew troops and settlers from in 2005. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says that idea is unrealistic.Egypt and Jordan have each made peace with Israel but support the creation of a Palestinian state in the occupied West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem. They fear that the permanent displacement of Gazas population could make that impossible.Egypt and Jordan receive billions of dollars in American aid each year. Military assistance to Egypt and Israel was exempted from a U.S. funding freeze to global aid programs.

A student raises their hand in a classroom at Tussahaw Elementary school Aug. 4, 2021, in McDonough, Ga. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson, File)2025-01-29T05:02:32Z WASHINGTON (AP) Americas children have continued to lose ground on reading skills in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and have made little improvement in math, according to the latest results of an exam known as the nations report card.The findings are yet another setback for U.S. schools and reflect the myriad challenges that have upended education, from pandemic school closures to a youth mental health crisis and high rates of chronic absenteeism. The national exam results also show growing inequality: While the highest-performing students have started to regain lost ground, lower-performing students are falling further behind.Given every two years to a sample of Americas children, the National Assessment of Educational Progress is considered one of the best gauges of the academic progress of the U.S. school system. The most recent exam was administered in early 2024 in every state, testing fourth- and eighth-grade students on math and reading. The news is not good, said Peggy Carr, commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics, which oversees the assessment. We are not seeing the progress we need to regain the ground our students lost during the pandemic. Among the few bright spots was an improvement in fourth grade math, where the average score ticked up 2 points on a scale of 500. Its still 3 points lower than the 2019 pre-pandemic average, yet some states and districts made significant strides, including in Washington, D.C., where the average score increased 10 points. For the most part, however, American schools have not yet begun to make progress. Growing numbers of students lack basic reading skillsThe average math score for eighth grade students was unchanged from 2022, while reading scores fell 2 points at both grade levels. One-third of eighth grade students scored below basic in reading, more than ever in the history of the assessment.Students are considered below basic if they are missing fundamental skills. For example, eighth grade students who scored below basic in reading were typically unable to make a simple inference about a characters motivation after reading a short story, and some were unable to identify that the word industrious means to be hard working.Especially alarming to officials was the divide between higher- and lower-performing students, which has grown wider than ever. Students with the highest scores outperformed their peers from two years ago, making up some ground lost during the pandemic. But the lowest performers are scoring even lower, falling further behind.It was most pronounced in eighth grade math: While the top 10% of students saw their scores increased by 3 points, the lowest 10% decreased by 6 points.We are deeply concerned about our low-performing students, said Lesley Muldoon, executive director of the National Assessment Governing Board, which sets policies for the exam. For a decade, these students have been on the decline. They need our urgent attention and our best effort. The drop in scores continues a post-pandemic slideThe latest setbacks follow a historic backslide in 2022. In that years exam, student achievement fell across both subjects and grade levels, in some cases by unprecedented levels.This round of testing again featured students whose lives were disrupted by the pandemic. When COVID hit in 2020, the fourth graders were in kindergarten, and the eighth graders were in fourth grade. But Carr said poor results can no longer be blamed solely on the pandemic, warning that the nations education system faces complex challenges.A survey done alongside the exam found in 2022 that fewer young students were reading for enjoyment, which is linked to lower reading scores. And new survey results found that students who are often absent from class a persistent problem nationwide are struggling the most.The data are clear, Carr said. Students who dont come to school are not improving.The results provide fresh fuel for a national debate over the impact of pandemic school closures, though theyre unlikely to add clarity. Some studies have found that longer closures led to bigger academic setbacks. Those slower to reopen were often in urban and Democratic-led areas, while more rural and Republican-led areas were quicker. The new results dont show a direct link on the topic, Carr said, though she said students clearly do better when theyre in school.Among the states that saw reading scores fall in 2024 are Florida and Arizona, which were among the first to return to the classroom during the pandemic. Meanwhile, some big school systems that had longer closures made strides in fourth grade math, including Los Angeles and New York City.The success of big urban districts 14 of which saw notable improvement in fourth-grade math when the nation as a whole saw only minor gains can be credited to academic recovery efforts funded by federal pandemic relief, said Ray Hart, executive director of the Council of Great City Schools. Investing in efforts like intensive tutoring programs and curriculum updates is really proving to make a difference, he said. Republican lawmakers cast blame on Biden administrationThe U.S. Education Department said the results are heartbreaking and reflect an education system that is failing students despite billions of dollars in annual funding and more than $190 billion in federal pandemic relief.The Trump Administration is committed to reorienting our education system to fully empower states, to prioritize meaningful learning, and provide universal access to high-quality instruction, the department said in a statement. Change must happen, and it must happen now.Republicans in Congress were quick to cast blame on former President Joe Bidens administration.Rep. Tim Walberg, R-Mich., chair of the House Education and Workforce Committee, said the decline is clearly a reflection of the education bureaucracy continuing to focus on woke policies rather than helping students learn and grow.Im thankful we have an administration that is looking to reverse course, he said in a reference to President Donald Trump.Compared with 2019 results, eighth grade reading scores are now down 8 points. Reading scores are down 5 points in both grades. And in fourth grade math, scores are down 3 points.Yet officials say theres reason to be optimistic. Carr highlighted improvement in Louisiana, where fourth grade reading is now back above pre-pandemic levels, and in Alabama, which accomplished that feat in fourth grade math.Carr was especially laudatory of Louisiana, where a campaign to improve reading proficiency resulted in both higher- and lower-performing students exceeding 2019 scores.She drew attention to the states focus on the science of reading a research-backed approach that focuses on teaching phonics, or the building blocks of words, as children build toward literacy. The concept has been embraced by a growing number of blue and red states and has been credited for gains in some states.I would not say that hope is lost, and I would not say that we cannot turn this around, Carr said. Its been demonstrated that we can.___Annie Ma contributed reporting from Washington, and Sharon Lurye contributed from New Orleans.___The Associated Press education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find APs standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org. COLLIN BINKLEY Binkley covers the U.S. Education Department and federal education policy for The Associated Press, along with a wide range of issues from K-12 through higher education. twitter mailto

This image provided by NASA shows a top-down view of the OSIRIS-REx Touch-and-Go-Sample-Acquisition-Mechanism (TAGSAM) head with the lid removed, revealing the remainder of the asteroid sample inside. (NASA via AP)2025-01-29T16:00:04Z CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) Asteroid samples fetched by NASA hold not only the pristine building blocks for life but also the salty remains of an ancient water world, scientists reported Wednesday.The findings provide the strongest evidence yet that asteroids may have planted the seeds of life on Earth and that these ingredients were mingling with water almost right from the start.Thats the kind of environment that could have been essential to the steps that lead from elements to life, said the Smithsonian Institutions Tim McCoy, one of the lead study authors.NASAs Osiris-Rex spacecraft returned 122 grams (4 ounces) of dust and pebbles from the near-Earth asteroid Bennu, delivering the sample canister to the Utah desert in 2023 before swooping off after another space rock. It remains the biggest cosmic haul from beyond the moon. The two previous asteroid sample missions, by Japan, yielded considerably less material. Small amounts of Bennus precious black grains leftovers from the solar systems formation 4.5 billion years ago were doled out to the two separate research teams whose studies appeared in the journals Nature and Nature Astronomy. But it was more than enough to tease out the sodium-rich minerals and confirm the presence of amino acids, nitrogen in the form of ammonia and even parts of the genetic code. Some if not all of the delicate salts found at Bennu similar to whats in the dry lakebeds of Californias Mojave Desert and Africas Sahara would be stripped away if present in falling meteorites. This discovery was only possible by analyzing samples that were collected directly from the asteroid then carefully preserved back on Earth, the Institute of Science Tokyos Yasuhito Sekine, who was not involved in the studies, said in an accompanying editorial.Combining the ingredients of life with an environment of sodium-rich salt water, or brines, thats really the pathway to life, said McCoy, the National Museum of Natural Historys curator of meteorites. These processes probably occurred much earlier and were much more widespread than we had thought before. NASAs Daniel Glavin said one of the biggest surprises was the relatively high abundance of nitrogen, including ammonia. While all of the organic molecules found in the Bennu samples have been identified before in meteorites, Glavin said the ones from Bennu are valid real extraterrestrial organic material formed in space and not a result of contamination from Earth.Bennu a rubble pile just one-third of a mile (one-half of a kilometer) across was originally part of a much larger asteroid that got clobbered by other space rocks. The latest results suggest this parent body had an extensive underground network of lakes or even oceans, and that the water evaporated away, leaving behind the salty clues.Sixty labs around the world are analyzing bits of Bennu as part of initial studies, said the University of Arizonas Dante Lauretta, the missions chief scientist who took part in both studies. Most of the $1 billion missions cache has been set aside for future analysis. Scientists stress more testing is needed to better understand the Bennu samples, as well as more asteroid and comet sample returns. China plans to launch an asteroid sample return mission this year.Many are pushing for a mission to collect rocks and dirt from the potentially waterlogged dwarf planet Ceres in the main asteroid belt. Jupiters moon Europa and Saturns moon Enceladus also beckon as enticing water worlds. Meanwhile, NASA has core samples awaiting pickup at Mars, but their delivery is on hold while the space agency studies the quickest and cheapest way to get them here.Are we alone? McCoy said. Thats one of the questions were trying to answer.___The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institutes Science and Educational Media Group and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

This image provided by Budweiser shows the Budweiser 2025 Super Bowl NFL football spot. (Budweiser via AP)2025-01-29T13:00:06Z NEW YORK (AP) Get ready for an onslaught of ads full of celebrities, cute animals and snack brands during breaks in the action at Super Bowl 59 on Feb. 9, when the Philadelphia Eagles face the Kansas City Chiefs at the Caesars Superdome in New Orleans. Anheuser-Busch, Meta, PepsiCo, Frito-Lay, Taco Bell, Uber Eats and others will vie to win over the more than 120 million viewers expected to tune in for the broadcast on Fox and via the free livestream on Tubi.Demand for ad space was robust this year, said Mark Evans, executive vice president of ad sales for Fox Sports, with ad space selling out in November and a waitlist for marketers ready to take the space of anyone who pulled out.The high demand seems to have pushed prices to a record, with a few ad spots reportedly selling for a record $8 million and even $8 million-plus for 30 seconds. Fox declined to comment on the specific price tag for 30 seconds, which can vary depending on placement and other factors. But in an earnings call in November, CEO Lachlan Murdoch said ad space had sold out at record pricing. Last year, a 30-second spot went for around a reported $7 million. The Super Bowl is a hot ticket for advertisers because the live viewing audience is so large. Last year, an estimated 123.7 million viewers tuned into the game, according to Nielsen. Evans said the mix of ad categories for the most part includes the usual suspects: beverages, snacks, tech companies and telcos. There will be a focus on AI in more commercials, he said, and slightly more pharmaceutical companies advertising this year. One category thats down is movie promos and streamers. Another traditionally big category for the Super Bowl, automakers, are mainly sitting it out after a tough year in the sector, with only Stellantis Jeep and Ram brands having announced an appearance.The California wildfires in January made the lead up to the game less predictable than usual. State Farm pulled out of its planned advertising to focus on the fires. And some other advertisers faced production delays. But Evans said accommodations were made wherever possible. These are unique circumstances. ... So were being as accommodating as possible to try to make sure that everybody can get done what they need to get done, he said. But more importantly, you know, dont put themselves or anybody else in harms way because of it.Advertisers are expected to begin releasing their ads in the days ahead of the game. One of the first ads to debut was an ad for Budweiser which wont air nationally but will air in some regional markets featuring a Clydesdale foal that helps make a beer delivery.Another Anheuser-Busch brand, Michelob Ultra, also released its ad, which shows Willem Dafoe and Catherine OHara as pickleball hustlers.Hellmanns ad brings Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal back together for a reprise of the Katzs Deli scene in When Harry Met Sally.Teasers have abounded this year, from an Uber Eats teaser starring Charli XCX and Martha Stewart to Chris Hemsworth and Chris Pratt touting Metas Smart Glasses. MAE ANDERSON Anderson reports for The Associated Press on a wide range of issues that small businesses face. She is based in New York. twitter mailto

Solar panels system funded by United States Agency for International Development (USAID) are seen in the Lebanese-Syrian border town of Majdal Anjar, eastern Bekaa valley, Lebanon, Nov. 9, 2022. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein, File)2025-01-29T17:11:13Z NEW YORK (AP) Freezing foreign aid. Withdrawing from the Paris climate agreement. Prohibiting nonprofits that receive U.S. foreign aid from providing abortions.Then Monday, the new Trump administration announced a freeze on all federal loans and grants, though a judge has paused that until next Monday. Nonprofits of all sizes are now grappling with how these changes will impact their missions with some even stepping in to replace a very small part of the funding the U.S. government is withholding. The pause on federal funding is creating a tremendous amount of confusion, and we dont have clarity about what happens from here, said Fatimah Loren Dreier, executive director of the HAVI, a public health organization that specializes in stopping gun violence. And that confusion has ripple effects on communities that are particularly vulnerable to shifts. The U.S. government is the largest single global humanitarian funder, giving $ 13.9 billion in 2024, and largest supporter of U.N. agencies, meaning any changes to foreign assistance have sweeping impacts across geographies and issues. The State Department and U.S. Agency for International Development are the main agencies that oversee foreign assistance, which Trump paused for 90 days to review if every grant and dollar aligns with his foreign policy. Yuriy Boyechko, who founded the New Jersey-based nonprofit, Hope for Ukraine, said he woke up to a barrage of messages on Sunday from the grassroots organizations he works with in Ukraine. They feared what would happen if USAID stops making grants there. He pointed specifically to programs that send trucks of firewood to rural areas that dont have electricity. The people who remain are often elderly and poor, he said, and use the wood both to heat their homes and to cook.I really dont know how theyre going to get through the winter, he said. The organizations that make the deliveries are mostly volunteer run, Boyechko said, and dont have the capacity to buy the wood or fuel needed to transfer it without regular funding from USAIDs office in Kyiv. He suggested that anyone who is concerned about the funding for humanitarian aid in Ukraine call their representatives or the White House.What made America great and what makes America great is generosity. And this is not a good move for America, and this is not a good move for humanity as a whole, he said, noting that Ukraine has really relied on the U.S. for its support.USAID said all programs and grants without a waiver approved by the Secretary of State, are paused, but did not specifically say whether humanitarian aid to Ukraine would be halted.In fiscal year 2023, the most recent data available, $68 billion had been obligated in U.S. foreign aid to programs that range from disaster relief to health and pro-democracy initiatives in 204 countries and regions.It is not the first time billionaire philanthropist Mike Bloomberg has stepped in after Trump announced he was withdrawing from the landmark Paris climate agreement. The former New York City mayor pledged on Jan. 23 to fund the U.S. governments share of the budget for the main offices of U.N. Climate Change. He also covered the cost of the U.S. commitment from 2016 to 2019, in the amount of $10.25 million. Being able to step in to be nimble and quick, not to replace the role of government, but just to show whats possible and to continue to move progress forward when governments are not, is really important to Bloomberg Philanthropies, said Antha Williams, who leads its environment program. The U.N. climate body was established as part of the historic 2015 climate agreement that aims to keep warming under 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels. It organizes the annual climate negotiations, where countries set emissions reduction targets and commit to financing climate adaptation and mitigation measures, and tracks progress toward those goals. Williams said Bloomberg Philanthropies wanted to offer certainty to U.N. Climate Change that their budget would be met. In addition to funding the U.N. Climate Change secretariat, Bloomberg Philanthropies will continue to support a coalition now named America is All In. It brings together local governments, companies and universities, who report on progress toward climate goals, which the federal government will stop doing after pulling out of the agreement. Joanna Depledge, a historian of international climate negotiations, called that reporting critical, as it provides a picture of trends in emissions and therefore progress made toward, the Paris agreement targets.Communication from USAID and the State Department with their grantees and contractors has been sparse, according to attorneys and consultants who work with foreign aid recipients. The publication Devex, which reports on international development, convened a webinar of experts on foreign aid on Monday to field questions about how to comply with stop work orders, how to manage cash flows, the likelihood of receiving a waiver. Susan Reichle, a retired senior USAID officer, said organizations need to make the case that their work is important not just to the agency, but to the American people and to Congress. Every day that goes by that the U.S. is not leading and meeting its obligations, whether contractual obligations or cooperative agreements or grants, we are actually hurting our national security, she said. Some organizations are hit by both the pause on foreign aid and the order called the Global Gag Rule that prohibits nonprofits receiving U.S. foreign assistance from providing abortion services or even talking about abortion as a potential option. MSI Reproductive Choices, an international nonprofit that provides reproductive health services, did not sign onto the rule under the last Trump administration, meaning that it hasnt won that much U.S. funding in recent years. Still, a mobile health clinic they run in Zimbabwe is funded through the U.S. embassy there, and Beth Schlachter, senior director of U.S. external relations, said that work would stop unless another funder comes forward. However, she said no amount of philanthropic funding can make up for the loss or pause of U.S. funds, meaning large donors are facing very difficult choices. Given the breadth of whats just happened in the last week, its not as if other donors are only looking at gaps in reproductive health services now. Theyre looking across the range of their development concerns, she said.___Associated Press coverage of philanthropy and non-profits receives support through the APs collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content. For all of APs philanthropy coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/philanthropy. THALIA BEATY Beaty reports on philanthropy for The Associated Press and is based in New York.

The U.S. Department of Education building is seen in Washington, Nov. 18, 2024. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana, File)2025-01-29T17:00:51Z WASHINGTON (AP) Private school vouchers and other school choice initiatives would expand under an order coming from President Donald Trump telling government agencies to repurpose federal dollars.The Education Department is being told to use discretionary money to prioritize school choice programs and give states new guidance on how they can use federal money to support K-12 voucher programs. The executive order that he plans to sign Wednesday could free up some pockets of federal money to be used on school choice, but it is not clear how far he could move the needle with federal money alone. The vast majority of school funding comes from state and local sources, and school choice policies are generally the purview of state governments.The order says traditional public schools have failed students and that the new administration will reverse course by opening up opportunities for students to attend the school that best fits their needs. Other agencies, including the departments of Defense and Health and Human Services and the Bureau of Indian Education, would be directed to help states and families find ways to use existing federal money for school choice programs. The signing, as conservative groups are celebrating National School Choice, comes the same day that results from a national exam found that Americas students have continued to fall behind in reading and made little improvement in math in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. The order cites the National Assessment of Educational Progress finding that 70% of eighth-grade students were not proficient in reading and 72% were not proficient in math. Responding to the results, the Trump administration said it is committed to reorienting our education system to fully empower states, to prioritize meaningful learning and provide universal access to high-quality instruction. Trump campaigned on a promise to expand school choice, long a key part of the Republican education agenda. He promised to create massive funding preferences for states that adopt universal school choice a policy that lets almost all families use taxpayer-funded education money to attend private schools, homeschooling or other options beyond local public schools.Arizona became the first state to adopt universal school choice in 2022 and several Republican-states have followed. Opponents say the policy is designed to gut public education.During his first term, Trump also tried to expand school choice and he made Betsy DeVos, a prominent school choice advocate, as education secretary. DeVos worked with governors to expand state policies but failed to get Congress to pass legislation that would have provided tax breaks for donations made to scholarships for private schools or other education options.Trump has nominated billionaire professional wrestling mogul Linda McMahon to serve as his next education chief. McMahon, whose Senate hearing has not been scheduled yet, has called for an expansion of school choice policies.___The Associated Press education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find APs standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org. COLLIN BINKLEY Binkley covers the U.S. Education Department and federal education policy for The Associated Press, along with a wide range of issues from K-12 through higher education. twitter mailto ZEKE MILLER Zeke is APs chief White House correspondent twitter mailto

This combination of photos provided by the International Transport Workers Federation shows conditions on board the Sister 12, a cargo ship whose workers say they haven't been paid in more than a year. (ITF via AP)2025-01-29T14:00:19Z More ships than ever are being abandoned around the world by their owners, according to the United Nations labor and maritime organizations, leaving thousands of workers stuck on board without pay or the means to travel home to their families.Cases have doubled in the past three years, impacting more than 3,000 seafarers across some 230 ships in 2024, according to an Associated Press analysis of U.N. data. Last years figures could rise even further given the time that can elapse before vulnerable, frustrated workers reach out to report their plight.By international guidelines, workers are considered abandoned if shipowners fail to pay two or more months of wages, provide basic supplies or otherwise stop communicating with the crew.The only leverage seafarers have sometimes is to stay on a vessel until they get paid, said Helen Meldrum, a ship inspector with the International Transport Workers Federation, which advocates for ship workers rights. A sailor gives a tour of the deteriorating conditions on board the Sister 12, the cargo ship where he has worked for more than a year without pay. (ITF) Its a phenomenon rarely visible from shore, and one hitting hardest the smaller shipping companies servicing less profitable trade routes. Many crews reporting a lack of pay are on corroded ships built decades ago. The top countries for cases last year were the United Arab Emirates, Turkey, Egypt and Saudi Arabia.The worst cases have seen entire crews suffering weeks without adequate food or fresh water, or living on dark ships without electricity. Some workers languish on board for years, such as Abdul Nasser Saleh, whom the Associated Press profiled last year in a story exploring abandonment in U.S. ports and abroad. This image from video provided by Abdul Nasser Saleh shows him in his bedroom aboard the cargo ship Al-Maha at the seaport of Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, in January 2024. Saleh lived and worked on the ship for nearly a decade without pay. (Courtesy Abdul Nasser Saleh via AP) This image from video provided by Abdul Nasser Saleh shows him in his bedroom aboard the cargo ship Al-Maha at the seaport of Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, in January 2024. Saleh lived and worked on the ship for nearly a decade without pay. (Courtesy Abdul Nasser Saleh via AP) Share Share Copy Link copied Email Facebook X Reddit LinkedIn Pinterest Flipboard Print Read More The AP found that shipowners often stopped paying workers when their costs skyrocketed or business dried up. Owners commonly left ships docked in ports where crews lacked immigration paperwork to step foot on land or at anchorages only reachable by boat.The number of abandonment cases in 2024 surpassed the earlier record set in 2023.Governments and organizations like Meldrums can report abandoned ships to the U.N., which verifies the basic facts and petitions the owner and relevant authorities to find a resolution. Meldrum has recently been appealing to authorities for help getting proper food, fuel and back-pay for crews on three cargo ships run by a company called Friends Shipping. Workers on board the Sister 12, now moored off the coast of Yemen, have been confined to the ship for more than a year without receiving a paycheck, according to her review. Theyre essentially imprisoned on these vessels, Meldrum said. It goes way beyond exploitation.Abdul Razzaq Abdul Khaliq, a Syrian sailor on board the Sister 12, wrote to AP over WhatsApp that the ship was full of insects and the crew had to use seawater for bathing. Photos and videos he shared show the faucets spewing cloudy brown water, rust blanketing the deck and only a few rotting pieces of produce in the pantry.(T)here is no food on the ship, there is no water, there is no life, he wrote. Friends Shipping, which has offices in Turkey and Dubai, has a pattern of abandonment linked to its fleet. Nineteen of the 22 ships listed on its website have been named in abandonment cases, according to U.N. data, though some of those ships may have since been sold. The company boasts a slogan of We Make the World Smaller.Meldrum said Friends Shipping hires workers who are unaware of the companys reputation, then leaves them in such dire conditions that many are willing to go home at the first chance even without pay. A new crew will be staffed and the same thing happens, she said. This combination of photos provided by Abdul Nasser Saleh shows the deck of the cargo ship Al-Maha, abandoned by its owners, at the seaport of Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, in January 2024. (Courtesy Abdul Nasser Saleh via AP, File) This combination of photos provided by Abdul Nasser Saleh shows the deck of the cargo ship Al-Maha, abandoned by its owners, at the seaport of Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, in January 2024. (Courtesy Abdul Nasser Saleh via AP, File) Share Share Copy Link copied Email Facebook X Reddit LinkedIn Pinterest Flipboard Print Read More Friends Shipping didnt respond to APs questions about abandonment on their fleet or the welfare of their crews. A person who responded to messages sent to the companys WhatsApp number in Turkey said that provisions were supplied to the crew on the Sister 12 and all workers on the ship would be disembarked, without providing details.Despite global treaties on labor rights, there are few avenues for holding owners accountable in an industry where ships are often registered under nondescript shell companies and fly the flags of countries unrelated to their operations.Flag registries are expected to act as first responders to help repatriate seafarers and ensure they have food and medical care, according to U.N. guidelines. A decade-old amendment to the Maritime Labor Convention signed by more than 90 nations also requires the flag states to vouch for the ships they register by requiring insurance to cover several months of wages if business goes south. APs reporting found many flag states still dont intervene. Panama, Palau and Tanzania each registered dozens of the ships reported as abandoned in 2024.The yearslong rise in abandonment cases could mean more seafarers are becoming willing to report abuse by their employers, but the overall figures likely underestimate the true picture of worker exploitation at sea. Cases first spiked amid the global pandemic and have kept rising as shipowners are pinched by inflation and other rising costs.The ITF, the group that advocates for workers, said it helped workers recover more than $10 million in back-pay last year. Inspectors were still fighting for another $10 million they say is owed.Associated Press reporter Aaron Kessler contributed to this report.This story was supported by funding from the Walton Family Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.__Contact APs global investigative team at [emailprotected] or https://www.ap.org/tips/ HELEN WIEFFERING Wieffering is a reporter on the Global Investigations team. She is based in Washington, D.C. twitter mailto

U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., leaves Manhattan federal court, May, 14, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Stefan Jeremiah, File)2025-01-29T05:05:54Z NEW YORK (AP) Former U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez faces the likelihood of a long prison term when he is sentenced Wednesday for selling his once-considerable clout in Washington for gold bars, a luxury car and hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash bribes.Prosecutors have asked a federal judge to give the Democrat 15 years behind bars for crimes that include acting as an agent of the Egyptian government.Menendezs lawyers say he deserves less than two years in prison, citing his decades of public service and a life largely well-lived after the son of Cuban immigrants rose from poverty to become the epitome of the American Dream.In the morning, Judge Sidney H. Stein signaled that a stiffer penalty was likely on the way when he gave a seven-year prison sentence to Fred Daibes, 67, one of two New Jersey businessmen convicted of paying bribes to the senator. Prosecutors had requested a nine-year prison term while his lawyers had asked for less than two years in prison, similar to the request for leniency by Menendezs attorneys. Stein also fined the real estate developer $1.75 million. Prior to the announcement of his sentence, a tearful Daibes told Stein that the jury verdict had left him borderline suicidal, and requested leniency so that he could care for his 30-year-old autistic son. In the early afternoon, the judge imposed a sentence of eight years on the second businessman, Wael Hana, and fined him $1.25 million and ordered him to forfeit $125,000. That sentence was announced minutes after Hana told the judge: I am an innocent man. First and foremost, I never bribed Senator Menendez or asked his office for influence.The judge, though, said the jurys verdict was very, very substantial.Stein was scheduled to sentence Menendez in the afternoon. A third businessman pleaded guilty and testified against Menendez at a trial last year. Menendez resigned from the Senate after his conviction last year, though he lost much of his power in fall 2023 when the charges against him were revealed and he was forced to surrender his powerful post as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.The trial traced Menendezs dealings with Egyptian officials and his quest to aid three men who showered him with lucrative gifts found during a 2022 raid on the Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, home he shared with his wife, Nadine.FBI agents who searched the house found $480,000 in cash, some of it stuffed inside boots and the pockets of clothing hung in the couples closets. They also seized gold bars worth an estimated $150,000. Prosecutors said Menendez had put his high office up for sale in exchange for this hoard of bribes, including by serving Egypts interests as he worked to protect a meat certification monopoly Hana had established with the Egyptian government.Among other things, Menendez provided Egyptian officials with information about the staff at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo and ghostwrote a letter to fellow senators encouraging them to lift a hold on $300 million in military aid to Egypt. Prosecutors said that for other bribes, Menendez attempted to persuade a federal prosecutor in New Jersey to go easy on Daibes, a politically influential real estate developer accused of bank fraud.And at the trial, another businessman, Jose Uribe, testified that he helped Nadine Menendez get a Mercedes-Benz convertible after the senator sought to pressure state prosecutors to drop criminal probes of his associates.Menendez has insisted that he is innocent of any crime, saying repeatedly that his interactions with Egyptian officials were normal for the head of the Foreign Relations Committee, and that he always put American interests first. He denied taking any bribes and said the gold bars belonged to his wife.Nadine Menendez faces trial in March on many of the same charges as her husband after spending the last year battling breast cancer.Prosecutors said in a court filing that long prison terms are a warranted punishment for this extraordinary abuse of power and betrayal of the public trust. The defendants engaged, for years, in a corruption and foreign influence scheme of stunning brazenness, breadth, and duration, resulting in exceptionally grave abuses of power at the highest levels of the Legislative Branch of the United States Government, they wrote.Menendezs lawyers, in a presentence submission, said he had already suffered greatly.Unsurprisingly, Senator Menendezs conviction has rendered him a national punchline and stripped him of every conceivable personal, professional, and financial benefit, his lawyers wrote. Bob is now 71, with his long-built reputation in tatters. He has suffered financial and professional ruin.Menendezs law license has been suspended and will be revoked if his conviction stands. His state pension is in jeopardy. His name has already been stripped from an elementary school in New Jersey. His once broad circle of friends and political allies have largely disappeared, his lawyers said. While all defendants suffer inevitable personal and professional consequences if convicted of serious federal crimes, Senator Menendez in many important respects has already been punished relatively more harshly due to his position.In court papers, the lawyers described how Menendez devoted much of his life to his country and his community after he was scarred by the early loss of his father, who killed himself when Menendez was 23 after he was unable to pay off gambling debts.They described a 50-year history of public service in heroic terms, tracing a career in which Menendez was mayor of Union City, New Jersey, a state lawmaker, a member of the U.S. House and then a senator from 2006 to 2024.Yet he also had the distinction of being the only U.S. senator indicted twice.In 2015, he was charged with selling his influence to a wealthy Florida eye doctor and entrepreneur who prosecutors said lavished him with luxury vacations and campaign contributions. But the jury in that case couldnt reach a unanimous verdict. Federal prosecutors dropped the case rather than put him on trial again. MICHAEL R. SISAK Sisak is an Associated Press reporter covering law enforcement and courts in New York City, including former President Donald Trumps criminal and civil cases and problems plaguing the federal prison system. twitter mailto

Dario Amodei, the CEO of the AI company Anthropic, has responded to the current hysteria in his industry and the financial markets around a new and surprisingly advanced Chinese AI model called DeepSeek by saying it proves the United States needs export controls on chips to China in order to ensure China doesnt take a commanding lead on the global stage, not just for AI but for everything.As I wrote earlier this week, Amodei believes that DeepSeeks current advantages over American AI companies are overstated and temporary. The true cost of the DeepSeek R1 is not entirely clear and almost certainly much higher than DeepSeeks paper claims because it is building on previous research published by American companies and DeepSeeks own previously released V3 model. Additionally, Amodei argues that American companies will be able to recreate the same efficiencies in their model training soon, if they havent already, and then gain the lead again when those efficiencies are paired with American companies much greater access to more and better. The US already has export controls on chips to China, and Amodei argues that DeepSeek shows that they are more existentially important than they were a week ago.At the same time, Amodei believes that making AI that is smarter than almost all humans at almost all things will require millions of chips, tens of billions of dollars (at least), and is most likely to happen in 2026-2027. Multiple American companies, Amodei says, will definitely have the money and chips this requires. The important question, and the reason the US needs export controls on chips, is whether China will be able to get millions of chips in order to do this as well.If they can, we'll live in a bipolar world, where both the US and China have powerful AI models that will cause extremely rapid advances in science and technologywhat I've called countries of geniuses in a datacenter. A bipolar world would not necessarily be balanced indefinitely. Even if the US and China were at parity in AI systems, it seems likely that China could direct more talent, capital, and focus to military applications of the technology. Combined with its large industrial base and military-strategic advantages, this could help China take a commanding lead on the global stage, not just for AI but for everything.In one of his footnotes, Amodei expands on this: To be clear, the goal here is not to deny China or any other authoritarian country the immense benefits in science, medicine, quality of life, etc that come from very powerful AI systems, he said. Everyone should be able to benefit from AI. The goal is to prevent them from gaining military dominance.To state the obvious here, its not just China that can direct talent, capital, and focus to military applications of the technology. OpenAI, arguably the leading AI company in the United States and the world, has already partnered with American military defense technology company Anduril to deploy advanced artificial intelligence (AI) solutions for national security missions. the US Military is already purchasing OpenAI software for war, and companies like Amazon, Google, and Microsoft are always competing for US military contracts. AI could have a lot of uses but the military is definitely one of them for US companies. Thats not something only China is doing.Overall, Amodei piece is pretty diplomatic. It doesnt vilify DeepSeek and Chinese researchers and respects their contributions to computer science. It acknowledges that societies deserve the benefits of technology even if we disagree with their governments. But the ultimatum Amodei says we are facing is: Do we want to live in a world in which an all powerful US owned AI is dominating the world or do we want to live in a world in which an all powerful China-owned AI is dominating the world.If China can't get millions of chips, we'll (at least temporarily) live in a unipolar world, where only the US and its allies have these models. It's unclear whether the unipolar world will last, but there's at least the possibility that, because AI systems can eventually help make even smarter AI systems, a temporary lead could be parlayed into a durable advantage. Thus, in this world, the US and its allies might take a commanding and long-lasting lead on the global stage [...] Well-enforced export controls are the only thing that can prevent China from getting millions of chips, and are therefore the most important determinant of whether we end up in a unipolar or bipolar world.If I had to choose, I guess I would choose the US AI dystopia over the Chinese AI dystopia. But those arent really the only choices available to us. Even if we just accept the assumption that AI will be as powerful as Amodei and other AI company CEOs tell us they are, are we really unable to even imagine a world in which we choose not to weaponize and militarize them in ways that brings humanity to the brink? Would preventing our own homegrown AI companies from doing exactly that not be a good place to start?

Palestinians gather outside of a health clinic run by the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees, known as UNRWA, in the Shuafat refugee camp in Jerusalem, Monday, Jan. 27, 2025. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)2025-01-29T18:58:55Z JERUSALEM (AP) In the Shuafat refugee camp, a hardscrabble district in east Jerusalem surrounded by a concrete wall, cars inched their way toward an Israeli checkpoint.Intense security makes venturing out of the camp exasperating. But 42-year-old Areej Taha didnt need to leave for medical treatment Monday. She had her toothache treated and picked up her insulin shots at a U.N.-run neighborhood clinic a block from where her kids were finishing their day at a U.N.-run school. In the absence of municipal services, the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees, known as UNRWA, is the main provider of decent free healthcare and education to residents of Shuafat camp. If UNRWA left, Taha said, I dont want to have to think about what we would do.But those services and everything from garbage pickup to water-system maintenance may begin disappearing after a pair of Israeli laws come into effect Thursday banning UNRWA from operating on Israeli territory and prohibiting Israeli officials from any contact with the agency. The most immediate impact will be in east Jerusalem, which Israel seized during the 1967 Mideast war and annexed in a move not recognized by most of the world. UNRWAs headquarters there faces immediate shutdown. The bans passed by the Israeli legislature in October also threaten UNRWAs operations across the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip, where it is the lifeline for some 2 million Palestinians, most of whome are homeless from the 15-month Israel-Hamas war. Israel has long criticized UNRWA, contending it perpetuates Palestinians refugee status. The campaign against the agency has intensified from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other right-wing politicians since Hamas Oct. 7, 2023 attack on southern Israel. Israeli claims that around a dozen of UNRWAs 13,000 employees in Gaza participated in the attack and that many others support or sympathize with Hamas.The agency denies knowingly aiding armed groups and says it acts quickly to purge any suspected militants among its staff. Palestinian parents are flabbergasted How the legislation will be implemented and whether UNRWA operations will have to halt was unclear Wednesday, hours before the laws go into effect. Even UNRWA officials said they didnt know what will happen.Israeli government spokesman David Mencer flatly said Wednesday that UNRWA will be banned from operating in Israel in 48 hours. Leeron Iflah, deputy director-general of Israels Jerusalem Affairs Office, told The Associated Press that starting next week, all the kids in UNRWA schools will get placed in all kinds of schools in east Jerusalem.But an Israeli government official with knowledge of the laws details said there was no intention to physically shut institutions, only that it will become harder for the agency to operate without coordinating with Israeli authorities. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the plans.A total shutdown would end primary healthcare for up to 80,000 Palestinians in east Jerusalem through some two dozen medical centers, UNRWA officials say. It would also halt education and vocational training for up to 1,000 kids in the middle of a school year. Now hes supposed to leave school? Go where? How? He just started liking school, said municipal worker Karim Hawash, looking over at his 13-year-old son who was kicking a soccer ball against the wall in Shuafat camp. Already the schools here are so overcrowded.There are no municipal schools inside the camp, meaning kids who leave UNRWA schools would have to make their way in and out daily through the Israeli checkpoints to still-unknown destinations.Beginning of the end? The immediate effect on UNRWAs work in the West Bank or Gaza Strip is unknown but aid workers say the crackdown threatens UNRWAs role as the backbone of humanitarian logistics in the region. Shutting down the headquarters will impact everything that we are able to do, Jonathan Fowler, UNRWAs senior communications manager, said from the east Jerusalem compound. The agency provides a vast sweep of basic services to 1.1 million Palestinians in the West Bank and 2 million in Gaza. During the Israel-Hamas war, it has been the main agency ensuring delivery of food, medical supplies and other aid that Gazas population relies on to survive. UNRWA uses storage facilities in Israel for Gaza-bound aid convoys and needs to communicate with Israeli authorities who control access to Gaza to move material in and out now threatened by the crackdown.Mencer said aid needs to be redirected to other U.N. agencies and other NGOs operating in Gaza.In the West Bank as well, UNRWA employees wont have freedom of movement like they did before, said Arieh King, a deputy mayor of Jerusalem. They cannot get in and out of Israel through the borders, the checkpoints. Controversial agencyBorn from one of the most sensitive issues in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the fate of Palestinian refugees, UNRWA is no stranger to controversy.When roughly 700,000 Palestinians fled or were forced from their homes during the 1948 war over Israels creation, an event Arabs call the Nakba, or catastrophe, Israel refused to let them return. Arab governments resisted their integration.In 1949, the U.N. General Assembly created UNRWA to help this population sleeping in the open and clutching their house keys. It was meant to be temporary, until a political end to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict could be reached. But the system became permanent.The roughly 1 million Palestinians who landed on UNRWAs rolls after fleeing the wars in 1948 and 1967 have become almost 6 million, in the West Bank, Gaza, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria. The dozens of tent camps that UNRWA set up decades ago across the Middle East have been built up into dense neighborhoods of apartment blocks and humming markets.The international community has decided over and over that we should continue doing what we do because there has not been a just and lasting solution, Fowler said. There are not the sort of functioning state structures that can provide these kinds of services. Israel has long argued that the agency perpetuates the conflict by maintaining a steadily growing refugee population. President Donald Trump has also been hostile to the agency, cutting off funding during his first term.UNRWAs defenders believe Israels efforts to eliminate the agency have to do with wanting Palestinian refugees to give up hopes of returning to old homes in what is now Israel. Home to 7 million Jews, Israel says a large-scale return of Palestinian refugees would end its Jewish majority.In Shuafat refugee camp, Palestinians whose families fled there in 1948 have the coveted blue IDs of Jerusalem residents, allowing them to travel anywhere Israeli citizens may go. They pay taxes to the Israeli municipality and are subject to Israeli law. But in 2002, when Israel erected its separation barrier with the stated purpose of keeping out suicide bombers, Shuafat camp was left outside the wall, severed from the rest of the city by checkpoints and stranded in a political and bureaucratic limbo.The camps population exploded as Palestinians from the West Bank, although not allowed to live there, realized that no one was enforcing the rules.Israeli officials insist theyre committed to improving services for Palestinians in east Jerusalem but say its a long road. It cant work in one day, Iflah said when asked how the municipality planned to replace UNRWA in Shuafat camp. In just a few days, though, Taha will need more insulin. With no blue ID meaning she cant enter Jerusalem she doesnt know what shell do. ISABEL DEBRE DeBre writes about Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Paraguay and Uruguay for The Associated Press, based in Buenos Aires. Before moving to South America in 2024, she covered the Middle East reporting from Jerusalem, Cairo and Dubai. twitter mailto

FILE- The seal of the Board of Governors of the United States Federal Reserve System is displayed in the ground at the Marriner S. Eccles Federal Reserve Board Building in Washington, Feb. 5, 2018. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik, File)2025-01-29T05:05:06Z WASHINGTON (AP) The Federal Reserve left its benchmark interest rate unchanged Wednesday after cutting it three times in a row last year, a sign of a more cautious approach as the Fed seeks to gauge where inflation is headed and what policies President Donald Trump may pursue. The Fed reduced its rate last year to 4.3% from 5.3%, in part out of concern that the job market was weakening. Hiring had slowed in the summer and the unemployment rate ticked up, leading Fed officials to approve an outsized half-point cut in September. Yet hiring rebounded last month and the unemployment rate declined slightly, to a low 4.1%. In its statement Wednesday, the Fed upgraded its assessment of the job market, calling it solid, and noting that the unemployment rate has stabilized at a low level in recent months. The Fed also appeared to toughen its assessment of inflation, saying that it remains somewhat elevated. Both a healthier job market and more stubborn inflation typically would imply fewer Fed rate cuts in the coming months. Fed Chair Jerome Powell has said it is harder to gauge where inflation is headed, in part because of increased uncertainty around what policies Trump will adopt and how quickly they will affect the economy. Trump has promised widespread tariffs, tax cuts, and mass deportation of immigrants, all of which could push prices higher. The Fed typically keeps interest rates high to slow borrowing and spending and cool inflation. Powell said in December that the central bank has entered a new phase, in which it expects to move more deliberately. In December, Fed officials signaled they may reduce their rate just twice more this year. Goldman Sachs economists believes those cuts wont happen until June and December. In November, inflation was just 2.4%, according to the Feds preferred measure, not far from its 2% target. But excluding the volatile food and energy categories, core prices rose a more painful 2.8% from a year earlier. The Fed pays close attention to core prices because they are often a better guide to inflations future path. Its unclear how of if Trump will respond to the Feds decision to stand pat. Last week in Davos, Switzerland, Trump said that he would bring down energy prices, then demand that the Fed lower borrowing costs. Later, when asked by reporters if he expected the Fed to listen to him, he said, yes. Presidents in recent decades have avoided publicly pressuring the Fed out of deference to its political independence. Most other central banks in developed countries are cutting their interest rates. The European Central Bank, for example, is widely expected to reduce borrowing costs at its next meeting on Thursday. The Bank of Canada said Wednesday it has also cut its rate, and the Bank of England is also expected to do so next month.The Bank of Japan, however, is actually raising its rate from a rock-bottom level. Japan has finally experienced some inflation after decades of slower growth and bouts of deflation. A Fed rate cut in March is still possible, though financial markets futures pricing puts the odds of that happening at just one-third. As a result, American households and businesses are unlikely to see much relief from high borrowing costs anytime soon. The average rate on a 30-year mortgage slipped to just below 7% last week after rising for five straight weeks. The costs of borrowing money have remained high economywide even after the Fed reduced its benchmark rate. That is because investors expect healthy economic growth and stubborn inflation will forestall future rate cuts. They recently bid up the 10-year Treasury above 4.80%, its highest level since 2023. Another reason for caution among Fed policymakers this year is that they will want to evaluate any changes in economic policy by the Trump administration. Trump has said he could slap tariffs of 25% on imports from Canada and Mexico as early as Feb. 1. During his presidential campaign he threatened to impose taxes on all imports. The Trump administration has also said it will carry out mass deportations of migrants, which could push up inflation by reducing the economys ability to produce goods and services. At the same time, some economists say Trumps promises to deregulate the economy could lower prices over time. When Trump imposed tariffs on a limited number of imports in 2018 and 2019, Fed economists expected the biggest impact to fall on economic growth, with the inflationary impact being relatively minor. As a result, when growth did slow, the Fed ended up cutting its key rate in 2019, rather than raising it to fight off any inflationary impact. CHRISTOPHER RUGABER Rugaber has covered the Federal Reserve and the U.S. economy for the AP for 16 years. He is a two-time finalist for the Gerald Loeb award for business reporting. twitter mailto RSShttps://feedx.net https://feedx.site

Rapper A$AP Rocky arrives at the Clara Shortridge Foltz Criminal Justice Center in Los Angeles, Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)2025-01-29T05:00:26Z Rihanna has made her first appearance at the Los Angeles trial of her partner, rapper A$AP Rocky, with whom she has two toddlers. The singer superstar on Wednesday morning sat out of view of the courtrooms cameras, next to Rockys mother and sister in the downtown Los Angeles criminal courthouse. Security brought her into the courtroom surreptitiously to avoid crowds.Rocky has been standing trial on two felony charges that he fired a handgun at a former friend, known by the name A$AP Relli, who testified Wednesday about the moment Rocky allegedly fired a gun at him on a Hollywood street in 2021. I was hit. Or I was grazed. I didnt have a hole or nothing, Relli told jurors.The trials key witness said he grabbed one of their mutual friends who were with Rocky after the first shot was fired and stood behind him for protection. He said he did not see Rocky fire the second shot, and Rocky ran away moments later. Relli then testified he was walking after Rocky and shouting at him when Rocky turned around and fired. Rocky had lifted the gun up and aimed downward, Relli said.When jurors were being selected, prosecutors asked them whether Rihannas connection to the case, especially if she appeared in court, would affect their ability to deliver a guilty verdict. Nearly all those questioned had heard of her far more than had heard of Rocky and some described themselves as fans, but all said they felt it would not affect their decisions. Rocky, whose legal name is Rakim Athelston Mayers, could get up to 24 years in prison if hes convicted of two felony counts of assault with a semi-automatic firearm. Earlier in the trial, which began on Jan. 21, Relli, born Terell Ephron, said he and Rocky, members of A$AP, a crew of creators at a New York high school, had been close but their relationship eroded after Rocky became famous.He said their relationship had been strained for years and was getting worse in the previous days, but he was still furious when Rocky pulled a gun on him after a scuffle that began the moment the two met up near the W Hotel. I told him to use it. Because mentally I couldnt believe it, Relli testified, with his old friend staring at him intently from the defense table. I physically could not believe there was a gun in my face. That was the breaking point for me.He said he had expected to argue but also to reconcile with Rocky, and the last thing he wanted to do was to get into a fight that could ruin the modest music management business he had built. His lawyer says the shots he fired were blanks from a starter pistol that he carried as a prop. Hes famous, Relli said. Im nobody.Raised in Harlem, Rockys rap songs became a phenomenon in New York in 2011. He had his mainstream breakthrough when his first studio album went to No. 1 on the Billboard 200 in 2013. The second one, in 2015, did the same.Hes set to have his biggest career year as a multimedia star. This Sunday, hes nominated for a Grammy Award for best music video for his song Tailor Swif, at the ceremony at Crypto.com Arena just two miles (3 kilometers) from the Los Angeles courthouse where his trials being held. Hes also set to headline the Rolling Loud Music Festival, to star opposite Denzel Washington in a film directed by Spike Lee, and to co-chair the Met Gala in May. But the prospect of a conviction and the possibility of lengthy prison sentence casts a shadow over all of it. Rocky and Rihanna, both 36, have two sons together: 2-year-old RZA Athelston Mayers and 1-year-old Riot Rose Mayers. She revealed she was pregnant with the younger boy after headlining the Super Bowl halftime show in 2023 with a visible baby bump. The singer and the rapper, who are both fashion moguls, first became close when he provided a verse to her 2012 song Cockiness (Love It) and they performed it at the MTV Video Music Awards. They became a couple in 2020. ANDREW DALTON Dalton covers entertainment for The Associated Press, with an emphasis on crime, courts and obituaries. He has worked for the AP for 20 years and is based in Los Angeles. mailto

President Donald Trump speaks to reporters aboard Air Force One en route from Miami to Joint Base Andrews, Md., Monday, Jan. 27, 2025. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)2025-01-29T18:23:06Z Follow live updates on President Donald Trumps return to Washington WASHINGTON (AP) President Donald Trumps budget office on Wednesday rescinded a memo freezing spending on federal grants, less than two days after it sparked widespread confusion and legal challenges across the country. The Monday evening memo from the White House Office of Management and Budget sparked uncertainty over a crucial financial lifeline for states, schools and organizations that rely on trillions of dollars from Washington and left the White House scrambling to explain what would and wouldnt be subject to a pause in funding. The White House confirmed that OMB pulled the memo Wednesday in a two sentence notice sent to agencies and departments, but said that Trumps underlying executive orders targeting federal spending in areas like diversity, equity and inclusion and climate change, remained in place.Administration officials said the notice to halt loans and grants was necessary to conduct a review to ensure that spending complies with Trumps recent blitz of executive orders. Agencies had been directed to answer a series of yes or no questions on each federal program by Feb. 7. The questions included does this program promote gender ideology? and does this program promote or support in any way abortion? Still, the vaguely worded memo, combined with incomplete answers from the White House throughout the day, left lawmakers, public officials and average Americans struggling to figure out what programs would be affected by the pause. Even temporary interruptions in funding could cause layoffs or delays in public services. The freeze was scheduled to go into effect at 5 p.m. Tuesday, but was stayed by a federal judge until at least Monday after an emergency hearing requested by nonprofit groups that receive federal grants. An additional lawsuit by Democratic state attorneys general was also pending. The Executive Orders issued by the President on funding reviews remain in full force and effect and will be rigorously implemented by all agencies and departments, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said, blaming the confusion on the courts and news outlets, not the administration. This action should effectively end the court case and allow the government to focus on enforcing the Presidents orders on controlling federal spending. Trump administration officials said programs that provide direct assistance to Americans, including Medicare, Social Security, student loans and food stamps, would not be affected. But they sometimes struggled to provide a clear picture.Leavitt initially would not say whether Medicaid was exempted from the freeze, but the administration later clarified that it was.Although Trump had promised to turn Washington upside down if elected to a second term, the effects of his effort to pause funding were being felt far from the nations capital. Organizations like Meals on Wheels, which receives federal money to deliver food to the elderly, and Head Start which provides early childcare in lower income communities, were worried about getting cut off. Democratic critics of the order moved swiftly to celebrate the action.This is an important victory for the American people whose voices were heard after massive pressure from every corner of this countryreal people made a difference by speaking out, said Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash. Still, the Trump administrationthrough a combination of sheer incompetence, cruel intentions, and a willful disregard of the lawcaused real harm and chaos for millions over the span of the last 48 hours which is still ongoing.Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York said that Americans fought back and Donald Trump backed off. CHRIS MEGERIAN Megerian covers the White House for The Associated Press. He previously wrote about the Russia investigation, climate change, law enforcement and politics in California and New Jersey. twitter mailto ZEKE MILLER Zeke is APs chief White House correspondent twitter mailto

A declassified World War II-era CIA guide to simple sabotage is currently one of the most popular open source books on the internet. The book, called Simple Sabotage Field Manual, was declassified in 2008 by the CIA and describes ways to train normal people to be purposefully annoying telephone operators, dysfunctional train conductors, befuddling middle managers, blundering factory workers, unruly movie theater patrons, and so on. In other words, teaching people to do their jobs badly.Over the last week, the guide has surged to become the 5th-most-accessed book on Project Gutenberg, an open source repository of free and public domain ebooks. It is also the fifth most popular ebook on the site over the last 30 days, having been accessed nearly 60,000 times over the last month (just behind Romeo and Juliet).Sabotage varies from highly technical coup de main acts that require detailed planning and the use of specially-trained operatives, to innumerable simple acts which the ordinary individual citizen-saboteur can perform, the guide begins. Simple sabotage does not require specially prepared tools or equipment; it is executed by an ordinary citizen who may or may not act individually and without the necessity for active connection with an organized group; and it is carried out in such a way as to involve a minimum danger of injury, detection, and reprisal.Do you work for the federal government? I would love to hear from you. Using a non-work device, you can message me securely on Signal at +1 202 505 1702. Otherwise, send me an email at jason@404media.co.The guides intro was written by William Wild Bill Donovan, who was the head of the Office of Strategic Services during World War II, which later became the CIA. The motivating factor for writing the guide, according to a passage within it, is that citizen saboteurs were highly effective at resisting the Nazis during World War II, and the Office of Strategic Services wanted to detail other ways sabotage could be done: Acts of simple sabotage are occurring throughout Europe. An effort should be made to add to their efficiency, lessen their detectability, and increase their number, the guide states. Widespread practice of simple sabotage will harass and demoralize enemy administrators and police, the guide states, adding that citizens often undertake acts of sabotage not for their own immediate personal gain, but to resist particularly obnoxious decrees.Because it was written during active wartime, the book includes various suggestions for causing physical violence and destruction, such as starting fires, flooding warehouses, breaking tools, etc. But it also includes many suggestions for how to just generally be annoying within a bureaucracy or office setting. Simple sabotage ideas include:Insist on doing everything through channels. Never permit short-cuts to be taken in order to expedite decisions.Make speeches. Talk as frequently as possible and at great length. Illustrate your points by long anecdotes and accounts of personal experiences. Never hesitate to make a few appropriate patriotic comments.Bring up irrelevant issues as frequently as possible.Haggle over precise wordings of communications, minutes, resolutions.Misunderstand orders. Ask endless questions or engage in long correspondence about such orders. Quibble over them when you can.In making work assignments, always sign out the unimportant jobs first. See that the important jobs are assigned to inefficient workers of poor machines.To lower morale and with it, production, be pleasant to inefficient workers; give them undeserved promotions. Discriminate against efficient workers; complain unjustly about their work.Hold conferences when there is more critical work to be done.Multiply paperwork in plausible ways.Make mistakes in quantities of material when you are copying orders. Confuse similar names. Use wrong addresses.Work slowly. Think out ways to increase the number of movements necessary on your jobPretend that instructions are hard to understand, and ask to have them repeated more than once. Or pretend that you are particularly anxious to do your work, and pester the foreman with unnecessary questions.Snarl up administration in every possible way. Fill out forms illegibly so that they will have to be done over; make mistakes or omit requested information in forms.The guide also suggests general devices for lowering morale and creating confusion, which include Report imaginary spies or danger to the Gestapo or police, act stupid, Be as irritable and quarrelsome as possible without getting yourself into trouble, Stop all conversation when axis nationals or quislings enter a cafe, Cry and sob hysterically at every occasion, especially when confronted by government clerks.It is impossible to say why this book is currently going viral at this moment in time and why it may feel particularly relevant to a workforce of millions of people who have suddenly been asked to agree to be loyal and work under the quasi leadership of the worlds richest man, have been asked to take a buyout that may or may not exist, have had their jobs repeatedly denigrated and threatened, have suddenly been required to return to office, have been prevented from spending money, have had to turn off critical functions that help people, and have been asked to destroy years worth of work and to rid their workplaces of DEI programs. Maybe it's worth wondering why the most popular post in a subreddit for federal workers is titled To my fellow Feds, especially veterans: were at war.

A person heads into a Target store Thursday, Jan. 11, 2024, in Lakewood, Colo. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski, File)2025-01-28T22:40:53Z NEW YORK (AP) Targets rollback on diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives is raising questions about the retail giants philanthropic commitment to fighting racial disparities and promoting progressive values in liberal Minneapolis, where it is based, and beyond.Target and the Target Foundation have made six-figure donations in recent years to groups working on Black economic empowerment and LGBTQ+ acceptance. Racial equity is still listed as a cornerstone of the foundations local grantmaking. But some fundraisers now wonder whether those types of gifts remain a primary concern for the brand, as Target joins other major American companies in curtailing internal DEI efforts attacked most prominently by President Donald Trumps administration.Billions of dollars are spent annually on DEI, but rather than reducing bias and promoting inclusion, DEI creates and then amplifies prejudicial hostility and exacerbates interpersonal conflict, The White House said in a statement accompanying Trumps executive orders. Corporations including Walmart, Amazon and Meta are retreating from policies intended to counter discrimination, many of which were implemented after the Minneapolis police killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in 2020. Philanthropic advisors say the conservative backlash is also chilling support from some funders who fear that backing race-based nonprofit work could bring legal challenges like the one that successfully shuttered the Fearless Funds grant contest for Black women business owners. Target announced Jan. 24 that it would conclude the DEI goals previously set to increase Black employees representation and advancement, improve Black shoppers experiences and promote Black-owned businesses. The company plans to stop submitting reports to external diversity surveys and named Human Rights Campaigns Corporate Equality Index as an example. It is also further evaluating our corporate partnerships to ensure they are directly connected to our roadmap for growth, according to a memo posted on its website. Target did not share publicly what those changes meant for its philanthropy which totaled $384 million last year in cash and products from the corporation and its foundation, according to the company. In response to an Associated Press inquiry, the company described philanthropy as a key way Target engages with communities, whether in our hometown of Minneapolis-St. Paul, in the communities surrounding our stores, or in the countries where our supply chain exists. A company spokesperson told AP that the recent update does not impact Target Foundation giving but added that, as always, the foundation will continue to evaluate how it best supports organizations, coalitions and networks. Also unchanged is the Target Circle community giving program that allows loyalty members to decide which nonprofits the company supports. Target did not say what impact the internal changes might have on its corporate giving.Whenever you see corporate leadership making shifts in priorities, it worries folks in the foundation space about what impacts that might have on both existing giving and future initiatives, said OutFront Minnesota Executive Director Kat Rohn, who said their LGBTQ+ advocacy group is not a Target partner. The changes have already influenced how one longtime partner sees their relationship. Twin Cities Pride Executive Director Andi Otto said he learned about the changes when he contacted Target about re-upping its sponsorship of his nonprofits programming celebrating the LGBTQ community. Target had consistently contributed around $50,000, Otto said.As he pitched Target on recommitting this year, Otto said he was asked to set up a meeting with company leaders. On the call, according to Otto, executives explained that they still wanted to sponsor Twin Cities Pride but let him know they would be removing internal DEI policies.Otto said he appreciated the heads up but chose to reject Targets sponsorship after his board discussed the impact of the companys moves on the community they serve. Inclusion falls by the wayside when there arent checks to ensure it, he added.It isnt always just about the money that they give to us as a nonprofit, but its about what they are doing for the community in getting small, BIPOC- or LGBTQ-owned businesses into their stores and giving them a platform to do so, Otto said.Twin Cities Pride had seen this coming. Otto recalled that Target didnt carry Pride Month merchandise at its stores last June after the collection received backlash in 2023 and said the nonprofit feared things would just continue down that slope.Progressive activists are now calling for a boycott of Target. Nina Turners working-class advocacy group We Are Somebody is asking customers to instead purchase directly from minority-owned brands. At least one Black-owned brand, Oh Happy Dani, has begun the process of removing our remaining products from Target shelves, according to a LinkedIn update from founder Danielle Coke Balfour. Corporate philanthropy can be a reliable source of significant nonprofit funding. Target has long had a very significant presence in the Twin Cities and is notable for its support of education, arts and other diversity efforts. Target and the Target Foundation together were the fifth-largest corporate giver in the state in 2022, according to the Minnesota Council on Foundations.But Rohn, the LGBTQ advocate and fundraiser, said corporate philanthropy can sometimes put nonprofits in a tough spot by pitting their values against the need to sustain their programs. She expects that more nonprofits will step back from corporate relationships as Twin Cities Pride did when their missions no longer align with their sponsors.To that point, Twin Cities Pride shared Monday that more than $50,000 had been raised since the nonprofit cut Target as a sponsor. Individuals donated more than half the total, according to Otto. The Minneapolis Foundation also contributed.Right now, all of us in the LGBTQ nonprofit sector are afraid because we dont know what companies will choose to do and what the outcome is going to be, Otto said. I think everybody right now agrees that it was the best decision to make, and that (if) we stick together, well see things on the other side.___Associated Press coverage of philanthropy and nonprofits receives support through the APs collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content. For all of APs philanthropy coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/philanthropy. JAMES POLLARD Pollard covers philanthropy for The Associated Press with a focus on Gen Zs giving habits and technologys uses in charitable work. He is based in New York. twitter mailto

People follow a virtual speech of President Donald Trump at the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Jan. 23, 2025. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber, File)2025-01-29T16:26:43Z WASHINGTON (AP) The Trump administrations push for a sweeping pause on federal grants and loans totaling potentially trillions of dollars is on hold for now, on the order of a federal judge. But the legal battle over the plan that set off panic and confusion across the country is just beginning, and it could become a constitutional clash over control of taxpayer money and expansion of executive power before the Supreme Court.Heres a look at the legal issues at play: The power of the purse The Constitution gives Congress control over federal spending, a setup key to the framers vision of separating major powers between branches of government. Once appropriations are approved, the White House has the job of doling out money to states, agencies and nonprofits through the Office of Management and Budget. Typically, the White House sends out money according to the priorities laid out in Congress, though there have been times when presidents have refused to spend all the cash they get. Thomas Jefferson, for example, declined to use money set aside for gunboats in the early 1800s. When the president wont spend money that Congress has set aside, its called impoundment.Trumps Republican administration has framed the halt to federal grants and loans as a brief pause that would allow for an across-the-board review to align spending with his ideological agenda, rather than an impoundment. What does the law say? A showdown between Congress and President Richard Nixon in the 1970s led to a law laying out specific rules around impoundment. Nixon had tried to halt billions of dollars in federal funding for things ranging from social programs to water treatment. The administration faced a wave of lawsuits that it overwhelmingly lost, said William Ford, a policy analyst at the nonpartisan group Protect Democracy. Congress also passed the Impoundment Control Act in response. The act says that if theres a delay in sending out federal money, the White House is supposed to tell Congress about the pause and how much money is involved. There are some exceptions for logistical issues related to specific programs. The law also says any longer-term freeze has to get congressional approval. While duels over spending have continued since then, the law has rarely been invoked, Ford said. The issue could head to the Supreme Court Trump allies have suggested in the past that the Impoundment Control Act is unconstitutional, arguing the White House should have more control over spending. The clash could end with the administration pursuing specific funding cuts, or it could end up challenging before the conservative-majority Supreme Court, said John Yoo, a Berkeley Law professor who served in the George W. Bush administration. The justices weighed in on the Nixon funding fight in a case known as Train v. New York. The court unanimously found that the president couldnt block sewage treatment funding that had already been approved by Congress. What else might happen next? The White House has said that the funding freeze wouldnt affect programs that send money to individual people, like Social Security, Medicare, food stamps, student loans and scholarships.It could still affect trillions of dollars and cause widespread disruption in a wide range of programs, from the National Science Foundation to Meals on Wheels. Its also set off at least two lawsuits, one helmed by the group Democracy Forward representing nonprofits that get federal funding and another from nearly two dozen Democratic states. They say the pause is clearly unconstitutional and breaks federal contracting law. The nonprofits say ideological bent of the proposed review also violates their freedom of speech. The temporary stay issued by U.S. District Judge Loren L. AliKhan in Washington lasts until Feb. 3, when shell consider whether to extend the block or let the plan go forward. LINDSAY WHITEHURST Whitehurst covers the Supreme Court, legal affairs and criminal justice for The Associated Press in Washington, D.C. Past stops include Salt Lake City, New Mexico and Indiana. twitter mailto RSShttps://feedx.net https://feedx.site

Syria's de facto leader Ahmad al-Sharaa, formerly known as Abu Mohammed al-Golani, walks in the presidential palace ahead of his meeting with Walid Ellafi, Libyan minister of state for communication and political affairs, in Damascus, Dec. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Mosa'ab Elshamy, File)2025-01-29T19:00:03Z DAMASCUS, Syria (AP) The Syrian factions that toppled President Bashar Assad last month named an Islamist former rebel leader as the countrys interim president on Wednesday in a push to project a united front as they face the monumental task of rebuilding Syria after nearly 14 years of civil war.The former insurgents also threw out Syrias constitution, adopted under Assad, saying a new charter would be drafted soon.The appointment of Ahmad al-Sharaa, who was once aligned with al-Qaida, as Syrias president in the transitional phase came after a meeting of the former insurgent factions in Damascus, the Syrian capital. The announcement was made by the spokesperson for Syrias new, de facto governments military operations sector, Col. Hassan Abdul Ghani, the state-run SANA news agency said. The exact mechanism under which the factions selected al-Sharra as interim president was not clear. Formerly known as Abu Mohammed al-Golani, al-Sharaa is the head of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, which led the lightning offensive that toppled Assad in early December. The group was once affiliated with al-Qaida but has since denounced its former ties. In recent years, al-Sharaa has sought to cast himself as a champion of pluralism and tolerance and promised to protect the rights of women and religious minorities.The United States had previously placed a $10 million bounty on al-Sharaa but canceled it last month after a U.S. delegation visited Damascus and met with him. Top U.S. diplomat for the Middle East, Barbara Leaf said after the meeting that al-Sharaa came across as pragmatic. Speaking at Wednesdays meeting, al-Sharaa, who was in military uniform, stressed the heavy task and a great responsibility that Syrias new rulers face.If the victor is arrogant after his victory and forgets the favor of Allah upon him, it will lead him to tyranny, he said, according to a video released hours later. Among the priorities for rebuilding Syria, he said, will be filling the power vacuum legitimately and legally and maintaining civil peace by seeking transitional justice and preventing revenge attacks in the wake of Assads disastrous reign. Syrians took to the streets in Damascus and elsewhere to celebrate the announcement, honking car horns and in some cases firing in the air. Many expressed support for al-Sharaa. This person is someone who is intelligent and has a good understanding and he was the leader of the battle that freed Syria, said Abdallah al-Sweid, who was among those celebrating at Umayyad Square in Damascus. He is someone who deserves to be president.Others even those who had rejoiced at Assads ouster appeared critical of the way the appointment was made and the lack of clarity on next steps.The problem is not in the decisions. The problem is in the timing, the previous promises and the confusion, said Mohammad Salim Alkhateb, an official with the National Coalition of Syrian Revolution and Opposition Forces a group formed by members of the opposition to Assad in exile. Qatar was the first to react to al-Sharaas appointment, which had been expected, saying it welcomed decisions aimed at enhancing consensus and unity among all Syrian parties. The statement added that this should help pave the way for a peaceful transfer of power through a comprehensive political process.Western nations, although they have moved to restore ties with Damascus after Assad was overthrown, are still somewhat circumspect about Syrias new Islamist rulers. Abdul Ghani, the spokesman, also announced Wednesday that Syrias constitution adopted in 2012, under Assads rule was annulled. He said al-Sharaa would be authorized to form a temporary legislative council until a new constitution is drafted.All the armed factions in the country would be disbanded, Abdul Ghani said, and would be absorbed into state institutions. Since Assads fall, HTS has become the de facto ruling party and has set up an interim government largely composed of officials from the local government it previously ran in rebel-held Idlib province. The interim authorities have promised they would launch an inclusive process to set up a new government and constitution, including convening a national dialogue conference and invite Syrias different communities, though no date has been set.As the former Syrian army collapsed with Assads downfall, al-Sharaa has called for creation of a new unified national army and security forces, but questions have loomed over how the interim administration can bring together a patchwork of former rebel groups, each with their own leaders and ideology.Even knottier is the question of the U.S.-backed Kurdish groups that have carved out an autonomous enclave early in Syrias civil war, never fully siding with the Assad government or the rebels seeking to topple him. Since Assads fall, there has been an escalation in clashes between the Kurdish forces and Turkish-backed armed groups allied with HTS in northern Syria. The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces were not present at Wednesdays meeting of the countrys armed factions Wednesday and there was no immediate comment from the group.At the World Economic Forums annual meeting in Davos this month, Asaad al-Shibani, Syrias new foreign minister and HTS official, said the country needs the international communitys help as it begins rebuilding after the brutal civil war.___Sewell reported from Beirut. ABBY SEWELL Sewell is the Associated Press news director for Lebanon, Syria and Iraq. She joined the AP in 2022 but has been based in the region since 2016, reporting and guiding coverage on some of its most significant news stories. twitter mailto

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., President Donald Trump's choice to be Secretary of Health and Human Services, appears before the Senate Finance Committee for his confirmation hearing at the Capitol in Washington, Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2025. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)2025-01-29T21:56:04Z WASHINGTON (AP) Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was pressed to clarify his views on vaccines, abortion and public health priorities in the first of two Senate hearings as he tries to make the case to become President Donald Trumps health secretary.Kennedy is seeking to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, the $1.7 trillion agency that funds medical research, public health outreach, food and drug safety, hospital oversight, funding for community health care clinics as well as Medicare and Medicaid.Republicans on the Senate Finance Committee expressed hope Kennedy could help reduce chronic diseases and health care costs. Democrats repeatedly used quotes and transcripts from his books and public appearances to pin him down on several issues, especially vaccines and abortion. Sen. Ron Wyden, a Democrat, argued that from abortion to universal health care, Mr. Kennedy has changed his views so often its nearly impossible to know where he stands. On Thursday Kennedy will appear before the Senates Health, Education, Labor and Pension Committee.Some takeaways from Wednesdays hearing: Senators wanted to know: Where does Kennedy stand on vaccines now?Kennedy insisted hes not opposed to vaccines despite a long history of calling them dangerous and Democrats werent buying it.Frankly you frighten people, said Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island.I am not anti-vaccine, Kennedy told the committee. He also said, I support the measles vaccine. I support the polio vaccine. I will do nothing as HHS secretary that makes it difficult or discourages people from taking either of those vaccines. But before he was nominated, Kennedy sought to discredit vaccines. He has said COVID shots are a crime against humanity, told FOX News he still believes in the debunked idea that vaccines can cause autism, and urged people in 2021 to resist CDC guidelines on when kids should get vaccines.And during the hearing Kennedy said that most experts agree that 6-year-olds shouldnt get COVID-19 vaccines because theyre not at risk. Thats not true of the experts who set vaccine policy: The Food and Drug Administration authorized COVID-19 shots for children as young as age 6 months and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends children get vaccinated. Most experts agree that COVID vaccines are safe and effective for children, Dr. James Campbell of the American Academy of Pediatrics said after hearing Kennedys remark.Sen. Maggie Hassan, a Democrat from New Hampshire, grilled Kennedy about changing his position.There is no reason that any of us should believe that you have reversed the anti-vaccine views that you have promoted for 25 years, she said. Kennedy was pressed on his shifting views on abortionKennedys nomination has been met with criticism from both abortion rights advocates and anti-abortion forces as his stance seemed to have shifted. During the hearing, several Democrats pushed Kennedy about changing his views to better appeal to Trump. Ive never seen any major politician flip on that issue quite as quickly as you did when Trump asked you to be HHS secretary, said Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont.Sen. Michael Bennet, a Democrat from Colorado, questioned Kennedys shifting views on abortion by quoting his previous statements that abortion should be left up to the pregnant woman, not the government. Hassan said she was confused: You have clearly stated in the past that bodily autonomy is one of your core values. The question is: Do you stand for this value or not? Kennedy repeatedly leaned on the phrase: I have always believed abortion is a tragedy including during questioning from Republican Sen. James Lankford of Oklahoma.Republicans expressed hope Kennedy could fix a troubled health care systemIn his opening remarks, Idaho Senator Mike Crapo, the Finance committees chairman, praised Kennedys commitment to combatting chronic conditions and said prioritizing disease prevention will save lives, reduce costs and build a healthier, stronger country.Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, who was vocal in criticizing vaccine requirements during the COVID-19 pandemic, brought up a conversation he had with Kennedy when the former Democrat was considering joining forces with Trump. The senator called it an answer to his prayers.We need to heal and unify this divided nation, Johnson said. Cant we come together as a nation and do this? Kennedy repeatedly called for more research on long-established therapiesAgain and again on Wednesday, Kennedy suggested he simply wants to do more research on vaccines, drugs and other products that have already been vigorously studied by government and independent scientists.Kennedy said that Trump asked him to study the safety of mifepristone, the abortion pill that has been used more than 6 million times in the U.S. to terminate pregnancies.The FDA approved the drug in 2000 after a four-year review and has repeatedly reaffirmed its safety after reviewing dozens of studies in tens of thousands of women.Here are the safety studies that tell us mifepristone is safe and effective, Hassan said, brandishing a pile of what she said were 40 of them. Kennedy again called for additional research when questioned about his unsupported claims that increased school shootings could be related to higher prescribing of antidepressants.Kennedy said his remarks were misrepresented and that he was suggesting antidepressants might play a role among other factors, such as social media.I dont think anyone can answer that question right now Kennedy said.Antidepressants and other prescription drugs are subject to multiple, large clinical trials that evaluate their safety and efficacy before they are approved. Additionally, the FDA has multiple systems for monitoring emerging side effects with drugs after they are on the market and regularly issues updates and alerts to address risks.On Alzheimers, Kennedy also misstated the state of the science and research.A sticky gunk called amyloid plays a role in Alzheimers disease but Kennedy wrongly claimed the National Institutes of Health ignores any other potential culprits.The NIH shut down studies of any other hypothesis, Kennedy said.But the NIHs $3.8 billion budget for Alzheimers and similar dementias includes researching a range of other factors that may underlie how Alzheimers develops.Senators used Kennedys own words against himReading from podcast transcripts and his own writings, Bennet asked Kennedy about his prior statement that COVID-19 was engineered to target white and Black people while sparing Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese people.Kennedy denied saying it was deliberately targeted. Bennet also asked Kennedy about a claim that Lyme disease is likely a militarily engineered bioweapon.I probably did say that, Kennedy responded.___Associated Press writer Amanda Seitz contributed to this report. ___The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institutes Science and Educational Media Group and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump listens as former Republican presidential candidate, North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, speaks on stage during a campaign event in Laconia, N.H., Jan. 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke, File)2025-01-30T19:19:28Z BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) When North Dakotas petroleum association was going to hold a banquet honoring top fracking executives last year, it turned to Gov. Doug Burgum. The two-term Republican, now President Donald Trumps pick to lead the Interior Department, co-hosted the event at the governors mansion. And when energy industry lobbyists were looking for help taking on Biden administration greenhouse gas rules, they also turned to Burgum. In an email to Burgums office seeking the legal heft the state could provide, an industry lobbyist argued that combating such regulations required a one-two punch from industry and government. While it is not surprising that the governor of the third-largest oil producing state would have a close relationship with fossil fuel producers, records obtained by the Associated Press reveal Burgums administration eagerly assisted the industry even as the governor was profiting from the lease of family land to oil companies. And his assistance came at a time when Burgum was leaning on those very connections to build his national profile in the Republican Party. If confirmed to run the Interior Department as soon as Thursday Burgum will have vast control over federal lands, including the issuance of oil and gas leases, as well as a mandate from Trump to extract such resources even though the U.S. is producing record amounts of fossil fuels. Those ties concern Democrats and environmentalists who say his zeal to expand drilling was troubling. Are you going to protect our resources, or are you going to drill, baby, drill? Sen. Mazie Hirono, a Hawaii Democrat, asked during Burgums confirmation hearing this month. The selection of Burgum, who briefly pursued the presidency in 2023 before endorsing Trump, represents an abrupt pivot from Bidens emphasis on combating climate change. It also signals that Trump intends to follow through on a proposal made last spring when he urged oil and gas CEOs to donate $1 billion to his campaign in exchange for the dismantling of Bidens environmental agenda. The White House did not respond to a request for comment, and a spokesman for Burgum declined to make him available for an interview. Governor Burgum worked tirelessly to build a prosperous economy in North Dakota, spokesman Rob Lockwood said in a statement. This economic growth included sustainably developing natural resources. As governor, he met with job creators and leaders who generated opportunities for the people of North Dakota.Under the partisan glare of Washington, and faced with stricter federal ethics rules governing conflicts of interest, Burgum has pledged to sell his interest in his familys lease with the shale oil giant Continental Resources, as well as another one with Hess, a Chevron subsidiary. He has also pledged to sell stock held in a handful of energy companies, some of which he interacted with as governor, which are worth as much as $200,000 according to his 2023 financial disclosures. Close ties to an industry titanThere is perhaps no better demonstration of Burgums close ties to oil and gas producers than his friendship with Harold Hamm, the founder of Continental Resources who is responsible for much of North Dakotas fracking boom. The billionaire Oklahoma wildcatter advises Trump on energy policy and is widely viewed as playing a role in helping Burgum secure the nomination to lead Interior.Hamm did not respond to a request for comment made through his company. During his 2023 state-of-the-state speech, Burgum likened Hamm to Teddy Roosevelt for his grit, resilience, hard work and determination that he said changed North Dakota and our nation. The shout-out came after Hamm had donated $50 million toward a library honoring Roosevelt in western North Dakota a passion project of Burgums. The documents obtained by AP reveal that several months later Hamm gifted Burgum a set of cuff links along with a note thanking Burgum for his friendship and willingness to take a break from the grueling task of running for president to speak at an energy conference that Hamm had hosted in Oklahoma City. These were not his only displays of patronage. Though Burgum, an independently wealthy former software company CEO, had a dim chance of winning the Republican presidential primary, Hamms Continental Resources contributed $250,000 in the summer of 2023 to a super PAC supporting Burgum, campaign finance disclosures show. He also contributed to Burgums campaign for governor.Emails between Burgum and Hamms offices reveal the two communicated often. In a May 2020 email, Hamms executive assistant asked if Burgum had time to talk with Hamm and shared a briefing document that railed against wind power, blasting wind turbines as a blight on our special places and sacred lands while excoriating tax breaks for wind energy providers as unconscionable. This does NOTHING to Make America Great Again! the document states. Though Burgum set a goal in 2021 to make North Dakota carbon neutral by 2030, he has adopted Hamms tone. During his Senate confirmation hearing this month, he was dismissive of renewable energy, such as wind power, suggesting such sources were unreliable when compared to fossil fuels. In early 2023, as Hamm prepared to publish a memoir, Continental lobbyist Blu Hulsey emailed to ask if Burgum could write a blurb praising the book, the newly obtained records show. Burgum happily complied, heaping praise on the memoir, which the governor called an inspiring story worthy of sharing. Burgum added that Hamms impact was immeasurable. Ethics experts say there are other aspects of their relationship that pose a greater conflict of interest. As governor, Burgum never disclosed that his family leased roughly 200 acres of farmland to Continental for well drilling, as previously reported by CNBC. When Burgum ran for president and faced greater transparency requirements, he revealed making $50,000 in royalties from Continental in 2023. Despite this relationship, Burgum routinely took action that benefited Hamms company. As chairman of North Dakotas Industrial Commission, which regulates the oil and gas industry, he voted nearly a dozen times or more on measures that had favorable outcomes for Continental, records show. North Dakota is a leading energy producing state, Lockwood, the Burgum spokesman said. Tens of thousands of families and mineral owners have similar arrangements. As the publicly available disclosures show: the cited agreement began many years before he became governor.Burgum also used the governors office to support a proposed pipeline that received $250 million in financial backing from Hamm. If completed, it will transport earth-warming CO2 gas that is the byproduct of ethanol fuel production to North Dakota, where it will be stored deep underground. Its been touted as a way to decarbonize the atmosphere, but has also run into stiff resistance from landowners, who fear their property will be seized to complete the project.Sarah Vogel, a Democrat and former North Dakota Agriculture Commissioner who previously sat on the commission, said Burgum seemed more like a cheerleader of the industry than a regulator. I dont think he had a regulators mindset. He had a promoters mindset, which has probably made him beloved in the oil and gas industry, Vogel said.Other executives have ties to BurgumHamm is not the only oil executive or lobbyist who has cultivated ties with Burgum, emails and office schedules show. Ryan Berger, a lobbyist for Occidental Petroleum, emailed Burgums staff last year seeking a meeting for Occidental CEO Vicki Hollub after Burgum moderated a panel she participated in at an oil industry conference. In an ideal world, a face-to-face over lunch or dinner would be amazing, Berger wrote in a May 2024 email. He added that Hollub had recently discussed energy issues directly with President Trump and we thought you would benefit from hearing from her to see if there are mutually shared policies and perspectives that could be amplified this year.Berger declined to comment on the email. Lockwood, the spokesman, declined to say if Burgum a meeting with Hollub happened. The records revealed that a Whos Who of oil executives had calls scheduled with Burgum. The include: CEOs of Chevron and Exxon; Marathon Oil officials had an audience with Burgum in 2022; and the governor also spoke before the Hess Corporations board of directors dinner. Burgums family also has an oil lease with Hess that paid him as much as $1,000, according to his financial disclosure. Burgum turned down an invitation to address an American Petroleum Institute convention in Washington, the records show, but agreed to speak at a private dinner for the American Exploration and Production Council in 2023, which drew top executives from Conoco Phillips, Devon Energy, Hilcorp and others. When Burgum was a leading contender last year to be Trumps vice presidential pick, he co-hosted a banquet at the governors mansion with the North Dakota Petroleum Council that drew fracking industry heavy hitters, lobbyists and executives. Burgum, Hamm and Chris Wright, the CEO of Liberty Energy who is now Trumps pick for energy secretary, addressed attendees as they dined on beef, walleye cakes and bourbon caramel-topped cobbler.On Inauguration Day, Burgum declined an invitation to attend a party at the posh Hay-Adams Hotel that was hosted by Hamm and a number of petroleum trade associations and oil companies. Burgums presence may not have been missed. Many of those executives and lobbyists, who will have business before the Interior Department, can reach him.___Slodysko reported from Washington. BRIAN SLODYSKO Slodysko is an investigative reporter for the Associated Press based in Washington. mailto JACK DURA Dura covers the North Dakota state government for The Associated Press. He is based in Bismarck, North Dakota. twitter mailto

Tulsi Gabbard, President Donald Trump's choice to be the Director of National Intelligence, arrives to appear before the Senate Intelligence Committee for her confirmation hearing on Capitol Hill Thursday, Jan. 30, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/John McDonnell)2025-01-30T05:06:12Z WASHINGTON (AP) Tulsi Gabbard, President Donald Trumps pick to be director of national intelligence, faced sharp criticism from Democrats and Republicans alike Thursday during a fiery confirmation hearing focused on her past comments sympathetic to Russia, a meeting with Syrias now-deposed leader and her past support for government leaker Edward Snowden.Gabbard started her hearing by telling lawmakers that big changes are needed to address years of failures of Americas intelligence service. She said too often intelligence has been false or politicized, leading to wars, foreign policy failures and the misuse of espionage. And she said those lapses have continued as the U.S. faces renewed threats from Russia and China.The bottom line is this must end. President Trumps reelection is a clear mandate from the American people to break this cycle of failure and the weaponization and politicization of the intelligence community, Gabbard told the Senate Intelligence Committee. Gabbard promised to be objective and noted her military service, saying she would bring the same sense of duty and responsibility to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, which oversees and coordinates the work of 18 intelligence agencies. The questions raised by senators about Gabbards judgment and experience make her one of the more contentious of Trumps Cabinet nominees. Given thin Republican margins in the Senate, she will need almost all GOP senators to vote yes in order to win confirmation. A former Democratic congresswoman from Hawaii, Gabbard is a lieutenant colonel in the National Guard who deployed twice to the Middle East and ran for president in 2020. She has no formal intelligence experience, however, and has never run a government agency or department. Its Gabbards comments, however, that have posed the biggest challenge to her confirmation. She has repeatedly echoed Russian propaganda used to justify the Kremlins invasion of Ukraine and in the past opposed a key U.S. surveillance program. In a back-and-forth Thursday that at times grew heated, lawmakers from both parties raised concerns about her statements supportive of Snowden, a former National Security Agency contractor who fled to Russia after he was charged with revealing classified information about surveillance programs.Several senators, including Republicans James Lankford of Oklahoma and Susan Collins of Maine, pressed Gabbard on whether she would push to pardon Snowden, or whether she considered him a traitor. On the last question, Gabbard repeatedly declined to answer.Yes or no, is Edward Snowden a traitor to the United States of America? asked Democratic Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado.As someone who has served in uniform in combat, I understand how critical our national security is, Gabbard responded, before Bennet cut her off, saying Apparently, you dont.Gabbard said that while Snowden revealed important facts about surveillance programs she believes are unconstitutional, he violated rules about protecting classified secrets. Edward Snowden broke the law, she said. Gabbard has been accused of spreading Russian disinformation by Republican lawmakers and has even won praise in Russian state-controlled media. Sen. Jerry Moran, a Kansas Republican, asked Gabbard on Thursday whether Russia would get a pass from her.Senator Im offended by the question, Gabbard responded. Because my sole focus, commitment and responsibility is about our own nation, our own security and the interests of the American people.A 2017 visit with Syrian President Bashar Assad is another point of contention. Assad was recently deposed as his countrys leader following a brutal civil war in which he was accused of using chemical weapons. Following her visit, Gabbard faced criticism that she was legitimizing a dictator and then more questions when she said she was skeptical that Assad had used chemical weapons.I just do not understand show you can blame NATO for (Russian President Vladimir) Putins brutal invasion of Ukraine, and when Assad used chemical weapons against his own people, you didnt condemn him, said the committees senior Democrat, Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia. Gabbard defended her meeting with Assad, saying she used the opportunity to press the Syrian leader on his human rights record.I asked him tough questions about his own regimes actions, Gabbard said.Senators also pressed her about her changing views of the surveillance program known as Section 702, which allows authorities to collect the communications of suspected terrorists overseas. As a lawmaker, Gabbard sponsored legislation that would have repealed it. She argued then that the program could be violating the rights of Americans whose communications are swept up inadvertently, but national security officials say the program has saved lives. She now says she supports the program, noting new safeguards designed to protect Americans privacy.Gabbard defended her change of opinion, and said her critics are opposed to her nomination because she asks tough questions and doesnt always follow Washington dogma.The fact is what truly unsettles my political opponents is that I refuse to be their puppet, she said.Gabbard is among a couple of nominees who are facing more difficultly gaining unanimous support from Republican senators. Sens. Todd Young, Susan Collins and James Lankford were among the most aggressive questioners Thursday, but it remained unclear if they were satisfied enough by her responses to move her out of committee and confirm her on the Senate floor. The committee has not yet scheduled a vote. There has been much discussion over whether the committee vote on Gabbard should be made in public or in private as the panel usually operates. Many of Trumps supporters want it to be public to pressure any GOP senator who is considering opposing her nomination.Sen. Tom Cotton, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, supports Gabbards nomination and said at the start of Thursdays hearing that he hopes she can rein in an office that he said has grown too large and bureaucratic.Cotton, an Arkansas Republican, noted that the Office of the Director of National Intelligence is now larger, in terms of staffing, than any of the agencies it was created to oversee.Look at where conventional thinking has got us. Maybe Washington could use a little more unconventional thinking, Cotton said. Ms. Gabbard, I submit that, if confirmed, the measure of your success will largely depend on whether you can return the ODNI to its original size, scope, and mission.__Associated Press writers Ellen Knickmeyer and Byron Tau contributed to this report. FARNOUSH AMIRI Amiri covers Congress for The Associated Press, with a focus on foreign policy and congressional investigations. She previously covered politics for AP as a statehouse reporter based in Columbus, Ohio. twitter mailto

Subscribe Join the newsletter to get the latest updates. Success Great! Check your inbox and click the link. Error Please enter a valid email address. At an all hands meeting inside Meta Thursday, Mark Zuckerberg did not address Metas $25 million settlement with Donald Trump that will see the company paying $22 million for the eventual establishment of the Trump Presidential Library. But Zuckerberg did say that he had to be increasingly careful about what he says internally at Meta because everything I say leaks. And it sucks, right?Meta made changes to the question-and-answer section of the company all hands meeting because of the leaks, Zuckerberg said, according to meeting audio obtained by 404 Media.I want to be able to be able to talk about stuff openly, but I am also trying to like, well, were trying to build stuff and create value in the world, not destroy value by talking about stuff that inevitably leaks, he said. So rather than take direct questions, the company used a poll system, where questions asked beforehand were voted on so that main themes of questions were addressed.There are a bunch of things that I think are value-destroying for me to talk about, so Im not going to talk about those. But I think itll be good. You all can give us feedback later, he added. Maybe its just the nature of running a company at scale, but its a little bit of a bummer.

Datasets aggregated on data.gov, the largest repository of U.S. government open data on the internet, are being deleted, according to the websites own information. Since Donald Trump was inaugurated as president, more than 2,000 datasets have disappeared from the database. As people in the Data Hoarding and archiving communities have pointed out, on January 21, there were 307,854 datasets on data.gov. As of Thursday, there are 305,564 datasets. Many of the deletions happened immediately after Trump was inaugurated, according to snapshots of the website saved on the Internet Archives Wayback Machine. Harvard University researcher Jack Cushman has been taking snapshots of Data.govs datasets both before and after the inauguration, and has worked to create a full archive of the data.Because data.gov is an aggregator that doesnt always host the data itself, this doesnt always mean that the data itself has been deleted, that it doesnt exist elsewhere on federal government websites, or that it wont be re-hosted elsewhere. Further research will be necessary to determine what has happened to any given dataset, or to see if it turns up elsewhere on a government website. For example, 404 Media found some datasets in Cushmans analysis that are no longer accessible on data.gov but can still be found on individual agency websites; we also found some datasets that seem to still exist because data.gov links to working websites but give a file-not-found error message when trying to download the file itself.Disproportionately, the datasets that are no longer accessible through the portal come from the Department of Energy, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the Department of the Interior, NASA, and the Environmental Protection Agency. But determining what is actually gone and what has simply moved or is backed up elsewhere by the government is a manual task, and it's too early to say for sure what is gone and what may have been renamed or updated with a newer version.This is because data.gov doesnt always host the data that it is indexing. Sometimes the data is hosted directly on data.gov, but other times it links to an individual agencys website, where the data is actually hosted. This means archiving and analyzing data.gov is not straightforward.Some of [the entries link to] actual data, Cushman told 404 Media. And some of them link to a landing page [where the data is hosted]. And the question iswhen things are disappearing, is it the data it points to that is gone? Or is it just the index to it thats gone?For example, National Coral Reef Monitoring Program: Water Temperature Data from Subsurface Temperature Recorders (STRs) deployed at coral reef sites in the Hawaiian Archipelago from 2005 to 2019, a NOAA dataset, can no longer be found on data.gov but can be found on one of NOAAs websites by Googling the title.Stetson Flower Garden Banks Benthic_Covage Monitoring 1993-2018 - OBIS Event, another NOAA dataset, can no longer be found on data.gov and also appears to have been deleted from the internet. Three Dimensional Thermal Model of Newberry Volcano, Oregon, a Department of Energy resource, is no longer available via the Department of Energy but can be found backed up on third-party websites.Determining what is gone, why its gone, and where it went seems like it would be straightforward, and it would seem like you could attribute all of it to malice on the part of an administration that has declared war on climate change and government equity efforts. But archivists who have been working on analyzing the deletions and archiving the data it held say that while some of the deletions are surely malicious information scrubbing, some are likely routine artifacts of an administration change, and they are working to determine which is which. For example, in the days after Joe Biden was inaugurated, data.gov showed about 1,000 datasets being deleted as compared to a day before his inauguration, according to the Wayback Machine.Because of the overall large number of datasets as well as the way that data.gov works, it is still too early to say what, specifically, has been deleted, though archivists and academics like Cushman are working on triaging the situation. It can reasonably be surmised that climate and environmental research and data, as well as research about marginalized communities and minorities are among the datasets that have been purged. This is in part because the Trump administration deleted huge swaths of climate data during his first term, and because Trump issued an executive order asking all federal agencies to delete anything related to diversity, equity and inclusion.Data.gov serves as an aggregator of datasets and research across the entire government, meaning it isnt a single database. This makes it slightly harder to archive than any individual database, according to Mark Phillips, a University of Northern Texas researcher who works on the End of Term Web Archive, a project that archives as much as possible from government websites before a new administration takes over.Some of this falls into the We dont know what we dont know, Phillips told 404 Media. It is very challenging to know exactly what, where, how often it changes, and what is new, gone, or going to move. Saving content from an aggregator like data.gov is a bit more challenging for the End of Term work because often the data is only identified and registered as a metadata record with data.gov but the actual data could live on another website, a state .gov, a university website, cloud provider like Amazon or Microsoft or any other location. This makes the crawling even more difficult.Phillips said that, for this round of archiving (which the team does every administration change), the project has been crawling government websites since January 2024, and that they have been doing large-scale crawls with help from our partners at the Internet Archive, Common Crawl, and the University of North Texas. Weve worked to collect 100s of terabytes of web content, which includes datasets from domains like data.gov.The Environmental Data & Governance Institute (EDGI) published a report in 2019 detailing How the Trump administration has undermined federal web infrastructures for climate information, which included not just deleting datasets but also, in some cases, not deleting datasets but deleting the links to them, changing descriptions of them, or making them much harder to find. For example, during Trumps first term, the Department of Transportations information on climate change was deleted, republished in a different form elsewhere, then deleted again from that new place, the report found.James Jacobs, a Stanford Libraries researcher who also works with a group called Free Government Information, told 404 Media in an email that data.gov has always been kind of a government data junk drawer (I call it that lovingly ;-)). That is, it was a really great effort to get the vast federal apparatus to start to think about collecting and preserving data. But there are no specific regulations that tell agencies that they *have to* use data.gov. Some agencies use it heavily, some put up a few excel spreadsheets and called it a day.I assume some of those datasets in data.gov have bad urls to old agency pages that no longer exist (its really problematic when an agency decides to redesign its site and its base domain changes and all the links to important information and data are broken), Jacobs added. Some of it is probably link rot and content drift and some of it is no doubt Trump admin policy driven (e.g. anything having to do with DEI).Harvards Cushman said that, because this is the internet, there are always things that are being added, breaking, changing, or vanishing, and that some of this happens on purpose and some of it happens on accident. So determining what is being purged, when there are so many data points, is not always trivial. If you want to answer why any given thing is gone, it becomes an individual research question. Cushman said he is working on compiling this info now and will publish it soon.All of this is to say that even under the best circumstances, government datasets and research can get lost or deleted, and archiving it is not always easy. When an administration specifically makes a point of deleting research, this already fragile ecosystem is stressed even further. All of these suddenly disappeared datasets must be taken in with the context that we know the Trump administration has ordered agencies to delete and edit specific webpages, and 404 Medias own reporting has shown targeted deletions of pages relating to diversity, equity, and inclusion as well as climate change.In a post from this week on Free Government Information, Jacobs explained that the government information crisis is bigger than you think.There is a difference between the government changing a policy and the government erasing information, but the line between those two has blurred in the digital age, Jacobs wrote. He explained that before the internet, government documents were printed and were archived by being distributed among many different libraries as part of the Federal Depository Library Program. The internet has made a lot of government information more accessible, but it has also made it a lot more fragile.In the print era, libraries did a good (but not perfect) job of preservation through inertia (ie collect and catalog a document, put it on a shelf, and leave it there until a patron wanted it), Jacobs told 404 Media in an email. In the digital era, that system of distribution/preservation/access has broken down because digital publications are no longer distributed to libraries, and government entities a) publish a LOT more on the internet; but b) have no clear regulations or policies regarding preservation.It is absolutely true that the Trump administration is deleting government data and research and is making it harder to access. But determining what is gone, where it went, whether its been preserved somewhere, and why it was taken down is a process that is time intensive and going to take a while.One thing that is clear to me about datasets coming down from data.gov is that when we rely on one place for collecting, hosting, and making available these datasets, we will always have an issue with data disappearing, Phillips said. Historically the federal government would distribute information to libraries across the country to provide greater access and also a safeguard against loss. That isn't done in the same way for this government data.

Tigers are visible at the Ranthambore National Park in Sawai Madhopur, India on April 12, 2015. (AP Photo/Satyajeet Singh Rathore, File)2025-01-30T19:02:16Z BENGALURU, India (AP) India doubled its tiger population in a little over a decade by protecting the big cats from poaching and habitat loss, ensuring they have enough prey, reducing human-wildlife conflict, and increasing communities living standards near tiger areas, a study published Thursday found.The number of tigers grew from an estimated 1,706 tigers in 2010 to around 3,682 in 2022, according to estimates by the National Tiger Conservation Authority, making India home to roughly 75% of the global tiger population. The study found that some local communities near tiger habitats have also benefited from the increase in tigers because of the foot traffic and revenues brought in by ecotourism.The study in the journal Science says Indias success offers important lessons for tiger-range countries that conservation efforts can benefit both biodiversity and nearby communities. The common belief is that human densities preclude an increase in tiger populations, said Yadvendradev Jhala, a senior scientist at Bengaluru-based Indian National Academy of Sciences and the studys lead author. What the research shows is that its not the human density, but the attitude of people, which matters more. Wildlife conservationists and ecologists welcomed the study but said that tigers and other wildlife in India would benefit if source data were made available to a larger group of scientists. The study was based on data collected by Indian government-supported institutions. A Royal Bengal tiger drags a wild boar after killing it at the Ranthambhore national park in Sawai Madhopur, Rajasthan, India, on June 10, 2015. (AP Photo/Deepak Sharma, File) A Royal Bengal tiger drags a wild boar after killing it at the Ranthambhore national park in Sawai Madhopur, Rajasthan, India, on June 10, 2015. (AP Photo/Deepak Sharma, File) Share Share Copy Link copied Email Facebook X Reddit LinkedIn Pinterest Flipboard Print Read More Arjun Gopalaswamy, an ecologist with expertise in wildlife population estimation, said estimates from Indias official tiger monitoring program have been chaotic and contradictory. He said some of the figures in the study are significantly higher than previous estimates of tiger distribution from the same datasets. But he added that the papers findings seem to have corrected an anomaly flagged repeatedly by scientists since 2011 related to tiger population size and their geographic spread. Tigers disappeared in some areas that were not near national parks, wildlife sanctuaries or other protected areas, and in areas that witnessed increased urbanization, increased human use of forest resources and higher frequency of armed conflicts, the study said. Without community support and participation and community benefits, conservation is not possible in our country, said Jhala. Tigers are spread across around 138,200 square kilometers (53,359 square miles) in India, about the size of the state of New York. But just 25% of the area is prey-rich and protected, and another 45% of tiger habitats are shared with roughly 60 million people, the study said.Strong wildlife protection legislation is the backbone of tiger conservation in India, said Jhala. Habitat is not a constraint, its the quality of the habitat which is a constraint, he said. Wildlife biologist Ravi Chellam, who wasnt part of the study, said that while tiger conservation efforts are promising, they need to be extended to other species to better maintain the entire ecosystem. There are several species, including the great Indian bustard and caracal which are all on the edge, Chellam said. And there is really not enough focus on that. ___Follow Sibi Arasu on X at @sibi123___The Associated Press climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find APs standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org. SIBI ARASU Sibi reports on climate change from India and South Asia twitter mailto RSShttps://feedx.net https://feedx.site

British actress and singer Marianne Faithfull poses during a photo-call for her movie 'Irina Palm' at the 57th International Film Festival Berlin 'Berlinale' in Berlin, Tuesday, Feb. 13, 2007. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber, File)2025-01-30T18:53:37Z NEW YORK (AP) Marianne Faithfull, the British pop star, muse, libertine and old soul who inspired and helped write some of the Rolling Stones greatest songs and endured as a torch singer and survivor of the lifestyle she once embodied, has died. She was 78.Faithfull passed away Thursday in London, her music promotion company Republic Media said. It is with deep sadness that we announce the death of the singer, songwriter and actress Marianne Faithfull, a company spokesperson said in a statement. Marianne passed away peacefully in London today, in the company of her loving family. She will be dearly missed.The blonde, voluptuous Faithfull was a celebrity before turning 17, homeless by her mid-20s and an inspiration to peers and younger artists by her early 30s, when her raw, explicit Broken English album brought her the kinds of reviews the Stones had received. Over the following decades, her admirers would include Beck, Billy Corgan, Nick Cave and PJ Harvey, although her history would always be closely tied to the Stones and to the years she dated Mick Jagger. One of the first songs written by Jagger and Keith Richards, the melancholy As Tears Go By, was her breakthrough hit when released in 1964 and the start of her close and tormented relationship with the band. She and Jagger began seeing each other in 1966 and became one of the most glamorous and notorious couples of Swinging London, with Faithfull once declaring that if LSD wasnt meant to happen, it wouldnt have been invented. Their rejection of conventional values was defined by a widely publicized 1967 drug bust that left Jagger and Richards briefly in jail and Faithfull identified in tabloids as Naked Girl At Stones Party, a label she would find humiliating and inescapable. One of the hazards of reforming your evil ways is that some people wont let go of their minds eye of you as a wild thing, she wrote in Memories, Dreams and Reflections, a 2007 memoir. Jagger and Richards often cited bluesmen and early rock n rollers as their prime influences, but Faithfull and her close friend Anita Pallenberg, Richards longtime partner, also opened the band to new ways of thinking. Both were worldlier than their boyfriends at the time, and helped transform the Stones songwriting and personas, whether as muses or as collaborators.Faithfull helped inspire such Stones songs as the mellow tribute She Smiled Sweetly and the lustful Lets Spend the Night Together. It was Faithful who lent Jagger the Russian novel The Master and Margarita that was the basis for Sympathy for the Devil and who first recorded and contributed lyrics to the Stones dire Sister Morphine, notably the opening line, Here I lie in my hospital bed. Faithfulls drug use helped shape such jaded takes on the London rock scene as You Cant Always Get What You Want and Live with Me, while her time with Jagger also coincided with one of his most vulnerable love songs, Wild Horses.On her own, the London-born Faithfull specialized at first in genteel ballads, among them Come Stay With Me, Summer Nights and This Little Bird. But even in her teens, Faithfull sang in a fragile alto that suggested knowledge and burdens far beyond her years. Her voice would later crack and coarsen, and her life and work after splitting with Jagger in 1970 was one of looking back and carrying on through emotional and physical pain. She had become addicted to heroin in the late 60s, suffered a miscarriage while seven months pregnant and nearly died from an overdose of sleeping pills. (Jagger, meanwhile, had an affair with Pallenberg and had a baby with actor Marsha Hunt). By the early 70s, Faithfull was living in the streets of London and had lost custody of the son, Nicholas, she had with her estranged husband, the gallery owner John Dunbar. She would also battle anorexia and hepatitis, was treated for breast cancer, broke her hip in a fall and was hospitalized with COVID-19 in 2020.She shared everything, uncensored, in her memoirs and in her music, notably Broken English, which came out in 1979 and featured her seething Whyd Ya Do It and conflicted Guilt, in which she chants I feel guilt, I feel guilt, though I know Ive done no wrong. Other albums included Dangerous Acquaintances, Strange Weather, the live Blazing Away and, most recently, She Walks in Beauty. Though Faithfull was defined by the 1960s, her sensibility often reached back to the pre-rock world of German cabaret, and she covered numerous songs by Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill, including Ballad of the Soldiers Wife and the sung ballet The Seven Deadly Sins. Her interests extended to theater, film and television. Faithfull began acting in the 1960s, including an appearance in Jean-Luc Godards Made In U.S.A. and stage roles in Hamlet and Chekhovs Three Sisters. She would later appear in such films as Marie Antoinette and The Girl from Nagasaki, and the TV series Absolutely Fabulous, in which she was cast as and did not flinch from playing God. Faithful was married three times, and in recent years dated her manager, Francois Ravard. Jagger was her most famous lover, but other men in her life included Richards (so great and memorable, she would say of their one-night stand), David Bowie and the early rock star Gene Pitney. Among the rejected: Bob Dylan, who had been so taken that he was writing a song about her, until Faithfull, pregnant with her son at the time, turned him down.Without warning, he turned into Rumpelstiltskin, she wrote in Faithfull, published in 1994. He went over to the typewriter, took a sheaf of papers and began ripping them up into smaller and smaller pieces, after which he let them fall into the wastepaper basket.Faithfulls heritage was one of intrigue, decadence and fallen empires. Her father was a British intelligence officer during World War II who helped saved her mother from the Nazis in Vienna. Faithfulls more distant ancestors included various Austro-Hungarian aristocrats and Count Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, a 19th century Austrian whose last name and scandalous novel Venus in Furs helped create the term masochism.Faithfulls parents separated when she was 6 and her childhood would include time in a convent and in what she would call a nutty sex-obsessed commune. By her teens, she was reading Simone de Beauvoir, listening to Odetta and Joan Baez and singing in folk clubs. Through the London art scene, she met Dunbar, who introduced her to Paul McCartney and other celebrities. Dunbar also co-founded the Indica Gallery, where John Lennon would say he met Yoko Ono.The threads of a dozen little scenes were invisibly twining together, she wrote in her memoir. All these people gallery owners, photographers, pop stars, aristocrats and assorted talented layabouts more or less invented the scene in London, so I guess I was present at the creation.Her future was set in March 1964, when she attended a recording party for one of Londons hot young bands, the Rolling Stones. Scorning the idea that she and Jagger immediately fell for each other, she would regard the Stones as yobby schoolboys and witnessed Jagger fighting with his then-girlfriend, the model Chrissie Shrimpton, so in tears that her false eyelashes were peeling off.But she was deeply impressed by one man, Stones manager Andrew Loog Oldham, who looked powerful and dangerous and very sure of himself. A week later, Oldham sent her a telegram, asking her to come to Londons Olympic Studios. With Jagger and Richards looking on, Oldham played her a demo of a very primitive song, A Tears Go By, which Faithfull needed just two takes to complete.Its an absolutely astonishing thing for a boy of 20 to have written, Faithfull wrote in her 1994 memoir. A song about a woman looking back nostalgically on her life. The uncanny thing is that Mick should have written those words so long before everything happened. Its almost as is if our whole relationship was prefigured in that song.___Brian Melley contributed from London.

In 2015, a federal worker named Katherine Spivey gave colleagues a presentation about how to write plainly, so that the general public can more easily understand content on government websites. One of her pieces of advice, among many, was to use pronouns such as the word you to describe the reader rather than jargon like beneficiary or purchaser.Theres already a great barrier between citizens and the government, Spivey said.Remember, your reader is a person, not an entity use pronouns to speak directly to your readers. It requires a lot less work and it requires a lot less words.Spiveys presentation had nothing to do with gender identity, gender pronouns, diversity, equity, or inclusion. It was about the broad concept of pronouns, the part of speech we (a pronoun!) use constantly. And yet, after Donald Trump was inaugurated, the government webpage archiving a video of Spiveys presentation was first edited to remove a timestamp link that went to the section of the video about pronouns. Later, the page archiving the video was deleted entirely (a copy of the video is still available on YouTube and on the Internet Archive).The tweak is one of hundreds that have been revealed across government via Githubs commit tracking, which shows version changes to code, websites, and other projects managed on the site. Github is also revealing a widespread, scattershot effort to not only change government policies on DEI but also to wholesale nuke language that actually has nothing to do with it and are retroactively changing descriptions of research and events that happened in the past to remove any reference to DEI. The Github pages reveal not only the imprecision with which these changes are being made but also a willingness to literally rewrite and delete history. 0:00 /65:02 1 Many of the deletions catalogued on Github demonstrate the pettiness and lengths to which the Trump administration is going to seek and destroy anything that it could possibly conceive as being related to DEI. They also show that the government has hundreds of employees and contractors who have been tasked with being the anti-DEI police across the entire government. Many of the changes are frivolous, but many of them are not, and represent the destruction of critical institutions, research, and public data.There are far more alarming deletions than Spiveys video, of course.The Federal Committee on Statistical Methodology, an office of the government that determines how the federal government should carry out statistical research to, for example, determine if a federal program is working, has nuked its page about best practices for researching sexual orientation, gender identity, and sex characteristics. This page had years of research about how to best do basic government research about the American people for the Census, the National Institutes of Health, and other government agencies to allow for better understanding of how sexual and gender minority populations [are faring] relative to the general or other population groups, including economic, housing, health, and other differences. These insights can lead to potential resources and interventions needed to better serve the community. These data meet critical needs to understand trends within larger population groups.Similarly, the National Institutes of Health deleted a page about the Sexual & Gender Minority Research Office, which has done critical research about the health and wellbeing of LGBTQ+ people.It is impossible to catalog everything that has been deleted, tweaked, or scrubbed. But here are some more:The U.S. Web Design System has deleted its pages on inclusive web design, which many web designers referred to when thinking about how to make their websites more accessible. The Github shows that much of the research and underlying principles that went into it were also deleted.According to Github, a page about behavioral guidelines for government employees is slated to get rid of a bullet point that says dont make derogatory comments on race, color, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, though the change has not appeared on the live site yet.GSA research about how much money the federal government spends at businesses owned by women, veterans, and other groups as been deleted from the internetThe description of a government panel at a conference from 2022 about neurodiversity has been edited to remove the term DEIA from its description. Similarly, the word inclusion has been deleted from a government training about why the Americans with Disabilities Act is important for accessibility at sports venues.

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., President Trump's nominee to serve as Secretary of Health and Human Services testifies during a Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions hearing for his pending confirmation on Capitol Hill, Thursday, Jan. 30, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Rod Lamkey, Jr.)2025-01-30T16:10:22Z WASHINGTON (AP) Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s long record of doubting the safety of childhood vaccinations persisted as a flash point for him Thursday in a confirmation hearing where senators, including a key Republican, shared intensely personal details about the impact vaccine skepticism had on their lives. In one response, Kennedy refused to flatly reject a long-discredited theory that vaccines cause autism, despite years of studies and research that have found they do not. His vaccine views could jeopardize his standing with just a few Republicans and has certainly not helped him win over any votes among Democrats in his bid to become health secretary. If all Democrats reject Kennedys nomination, he can only afford to lose three Republican votes. Much attention was focused on the questions from Sen. Bill Cassidy, the Republican chairman of the health committee, who is also a physician. Cassidy, who is up for reelection next year, expressed pointed concern about Kennedys vaccines views, noting that the nominees broad popularity had given him a powerful platform on the subject. Whether its justified or not, I have constituents who partly credit you for their decision to not vaccinate their child, Cassidy told the nominee. He shared with Kennedy a personal story about an 18-year-old woman whose liver was failing from a hepatitis infection.It was the worst day of my medical career because I thought $50 of vaccines could have prevented this all, Cassidy said. He then asked Kennedy to promise as health secretary that he would unequivocally reassure parents that the Hepatitis B and measles vaccines do not cause autism.Kennedy would not. Instead he avoided answering directly, saying if the data is there, I will absolutely do that.Then, in a rare show of across-the-aisle cooperation, Sen. Bernie Sanders, a Vermont independent, followed up on Cassidys line of questioning. Again, Kennedy refused to give a definitive answer. At times, the questioning was intensely personal. Sen. Maggie Hassan, Democrat of New Hampshire, shared her anguish as a mother who has spent decades wondering what caused her 36-year-old sons cerebral palsy. She worried about whether vaccines contributed to her sons condition after an infamous study years ago falsely found a link between autism and vaccines. That study has since been roundly discredited.Hassan said Kennedys suggestions that vaccines could cause autism were hurting families. He is re-litigating and churning settled science so we cant go forward and find out what the cause of autism is and treat these kids and help these families, she said, later adding: When you continue to sow doubt about settled science, it makes it impossible for us to move forward. Aside from Cassidy, Republicans on the health committee remained friendly to Kennedy. Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama, who said his two sons wanted to vote for Kennedy in the presidential election, told the hearing that granddaughter, due in the coming weeks, would not be a pincushion when it came to vaccines. Two others expressed doubts about the safety of vaccines, although both said theyve vaccinated their own children. Sen. Markwayne Mullin, an Oklahoma Republican, chided his colleagues for scrutinizing Kennedys skeptical stances on vaccinations.We cant question science? Mullin asked.In his opening remarks, Kennedy once again rejected the anti-vaccine label and instead said he is pro-safety. He repeated many of the same lines he offered to the Senate Finance Committee on Wednesday. Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia, where the Gardasil vaccine to guard against cervical cancer is made, questioned Kennedys financial disclosure forms, which state that he still plans to collect fees in cases referred to the law firm in a suit against that vaccine. Last year, Kennedy made $850,000 off the deal.How can folks who need to have confidence in federal vaccine programs trust you to be independent and science-based when you stand to gain significant funding if lawsuits against vaccine manufacturers are successful? Kaine asked. Kennedy told Kaine he has given away his rights in the case. Democrats and Republicans alike repeatedly pressed the nominee on his plans around abortion, with Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina asking if he would appoint pro-life deputies and several Democrats asking him how he would handle the abortion drug mifepristone. The Biden administration defended lawsuits against the use of the drug, including its availability over telehealth. Kennedy said no decision had yet been made about how to handle the controversial drug, which the Food and Drug Administration approved to end pregnancies safely more than two decades ago. With mifepristone, President Trump has not chosen a policy and I will implement his policy, Kennedy told the committee. Kennedy wants to lead the $1.7 trillion agency that oversees health care coverage Medicare, Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act marketplace for roughly half the country, approves then recommends vaccines for deadly diseases and conducts safety inspections of food and hospitals.During a three-hour hearing on Wednesday before the finance committee, which will ultimately decide whether to send Kennedys nomination to the Senate floor for a vote, Kennedy misstated basic facts about Medicare and Medicaid. But Republicans mostly expressed support for his proposals to push healthier foods to Americans and research the root of chronic diseases like obesity. AMANDA SEITZ Seitz is an Associated Press reporter covering federal health care policy. She is based in Washington, D.C. twitter mailto STEPHEN GROVES Groves covers Congress for The Associated Press. twitter mailto

Kansas Secretary of State Scott Schwab, left, and Cynthia Kaiser, a deputy assistant director in the FBI's Cyber Division, participate in a meeting of the National Association of Secretaries of State in Washington, Thursday, Jan. 30, 2025. (AP Photo/Christina A. Cassidy)2025-01-30T11:34:27Z WASHINGTON (AP) The nations cybersecurity agency has played a critical role in helping states shore up the defenses of their voting systems, but its election mission appears uncertain amid sustained criticism from Republicans and key figures in the Trump administration.President Donald Trump has not named a new head of the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, and for the first time since it was formed, there are no plans for anyone in its leadership to address the main annual gathering of the nations secretaries of state, which was being held this week in Washington.On Thursday, a panel on cyberthreats included an update from an FBI official who said the threats remained consistent.Im often asked what the FBI sees as the top cyberthreats facing the U.S., and really the FBIs answer for the last several years has been the same: China, China, China, ransomware, Russia, Iran, North Korea, Cynthia Kaiser, a deputy assistant director in the bureaus Cyber Division, told attendees at the National Association of Secretaries of State meeting. Trumps new homeland security secretary, Kristi Noem, said during her Senate hearing that CISA had strayed far off mission. She pledged to work with senators should you wish to rein them in with legislation. The agency formed in 2018 during the first Trump administration is charged with protecting the nations critical infrastructure, from dams and nuclear power plants to banks and voting systems. It is under the Department of Homeland Security, but CISA is a separate agency with its own Senate-confirmed director. The agency has received bipartisan praise from many state and local election officials, but Trump and his allies remain angry over its efforts to counter misinformation about the 2020 presidential election and the coronavirus pandemic. The agencys first director, Chris Krebs, was fired by Trump after Krebs highlighted a statement issued by a group of election officials that called the 2020 election the most secure in American history. That drew Trumps ire as he was contesting his loss to Democrat Joe Biden. Republicans have claimed repeatedly since then that CISA had worked with social media companies to censor conservative viewpoints on issues related to elections and health.Agency officials have disputed that: CISA does not censor, has never censored, the agencys then-director, Jen Easterly, said last fall in an interview with The Associated Press. Nevertheless, Republicans continue to blame the agency and insist changes are necessary.Joe Bidens Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) was more focused on undermining President Trump than they were protecting our own critical infrastructure, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., chair of the newly formed House subcommittee on Delivering on Government Efficiency, said in a social media post last week. The thugs responsible for that kind of waste and abuse will be held accountable!During the 2020 election, agency officials worked with states to help them notify social media companies about misinformation spreading on their platforms, but they have said they never instructed or sought to coerce those companies to act. For the 2024 election, CISA and other federal agencies alerted the public to various foreign misinformation campaigns, including a fake video linked to Russia purporting to show the mishandling of ballots in Pennsylvania. In recent months, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has echoed the GOP claims and announced plans to dismantle the companys fact-checking program.One of the first actions Trump took after returning to the White House on Jan. 20 was a signing of an executive order ending federal censorship and instructing his attorney general to investigate federal actions under the previous administration and to propose remedial actions. There is little information about whats next and whether CISAs mission could change under new leadership.Project 2025, a conservative blueprint for a Republican administration, recommended that CISA be moved to the Transportation Department and focused solely on protecting government networks and coordinating the security of critical infrastructure. It said the agency should only help states assess whether they have good cyber hygiene in their hardware and software in preparation for an election nothing more. Thats what the agency has been doing in recent years, by providing training and security reviews.Voting systems were designated critical infrastructure after an effort by Russia in 2016 to interfere in that years presidential election, which included scanning state voter registration databases for vulnerabilities.Some state election officials were initially resistant to the idea of federal assistance. But many now credit the agency and federal money with helping them improve security ahead of the 2020 and 2024 presidential elections. Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon, a Democrat who is president of the secretaries of state association, said it was understandable that a new administration needed time to decide what role it wanted for the cybersecurity agency. But he hoped its work with the states would continue, both in improving election security and highlighting disinformation campaigns.We need to know if a foreign adversary is seeking to misdirect and mislead Americans on any subject, whether its elections or science or national security or foreign policy, he said in a phone interview Thursday from Minnesota before he was scheduled to leave for Washington. RSShttps://feedx.net https://feedx.site

Dick Button smiles next to a painting of him while honored at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships in San Jose, Calif., Thursday, Jan. 4, 2018. (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez, File)2025-01-31T00:53:37Z NEW YORK (AP) Dick Button was more than the most accomplished mens figure skater in history. He was one of his sports greatest innovators and promoters.Button, winner of two Olympic gold medals and five consecutive world championships, died Thursday, said his son, Edward, who did not provide a cause. He was 95.As an entrepreneur and broadcaster, Button promoted skating and its athletes, transforming a niche sport into the showpiece of every Winter Olympics.Dick was one of the most important figures in our sport, Scott Hamilton said. There wasnt a skater after Dick who wasnt helped by him in some way.Buttons impact began after World War II. He was the first U.S. mens champion and his countrys youngest at age 16 when that competition returned in 1946. Two years later, he took the title at the St. Moritz Olympics, competing outdoors. He performed the first double axel in any competition and became the first American to win the mens event. By the way, that jump had a cheat on it, Button told the U.S. Olympic Committee website. But listen, I did it and that was what counted. That began his dominance of international skating, and U.S. amateur sports. He was the first figure skater to win the prestigious Sullivan Award in 1949 no other figure skater won it until Michelle Kwan in 2001.In 1952, while a Harvard student, he won a second gold at the Oslo Games, making more history with the first triple jump (a loop) in competition. Soon after, he won a fifth world title, then gave up his eligibility as an amateur. All Olympic sports were subject to an amateur/professional division at the time. I had achieved everything I could have dreamed of doing as a skater, said Button, who earned a law degree from Harvard in 1956. I was able to enjoy the Ice Capades (show) and keep my hand in skating, and that was very important to me. With the Emmy Award-winning Button as the TV analyst, viewers got to learn not only the basics but the nuances of a sport foreign to many as he frankly broke down the performances. He became as much a fixture on ABCs Wide World of Sports as Jim McKay and the hapless ski jumper tumbling down the slope.Dick Button is the custodian of the history of figure skating and its quintessential voice, 1988 Olympic champion Brian Boitano said in Buttons autobiography. He made the words lutz and salchow part of our everyday vocabulary.After a 1961 plane crash killed the entire U.S. figure skating team on the way to the world championships, which then were canceled, Button persuaded ABC Sports executive Roone Arledge to televise the 1962 event on Wide World. Thats when he joined the network as a commentator.Buttons death coincided with another tragedy in the skating world, Wednesday nights crash of an American Airlines flight that collided with an Army helicopter and plummeted into the Potomac River outside Washington, D.C., killing everyone on board. Two teenage figure skaters, their mothers, and two former world champions who were coaching at the Skating Club of Boston were among the 14 people killed from the skating community. Button skated for the Boston club and remained close to it for the rest of his life. The trophy room at the club is named in his honor.He also provided opportunities for skaters to make money after their competitive careers. He ran professional events he created for TV for years, attracting many top names in the sport Hamilton, Torvill and Dean, Kristi Yamaguchi, Kurt Browning and Katarina Witt.Buttons Candid Productions, formed 1959, also produced such made-for-TV programs as Battle of the Network Stars. He also dabbled in acting, but the rink was his realm.Dick Button created an open and honest space in figure skating broadcasting where no topic or moment was off-limits, said Johnny Weir, the three-time U.S. champion and current NBC Sports figure skating analyst. He told it like it was, even when his opinion wasnt a popular one. His zingers were always in my mind when I would perform for him, and I wanted to make him as happy and proud as I would my coaches.I think that is something very special about commentating figure skating. As an athlete, we rarely have an opportunity to speak, and we rely on the TV voices to tell our story for us. Nobody could do it like Mr. Button.___AP sports: https://apnews.com/sports

Police and coast guard boats are seen around a wreckage site in the Potomac River from Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, Thursday, Jan. 30, 2025, in Arlington, Va. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)2025-01-31T01:00:34Z WASHINGTON (AP) The airspace around Washington, D.C., is congested and complex a combination aviation experts have long worried could lead to catastrophe.Those fears materialized Wednesday night when an American Airlines plane collided with a military helicopter, taking the lives of 67 people, including three soldiers and more than a dozen figure skaters. Even in peak flying conditions, experts said, the airspace around Reagan Washington National Airport can challenge the most experienced pilots, who must navigate hundreds of other commercial planes, military aircraft and restricted areas around sensitive sites. This was a disaster waiting to happen, said Ross Aimer, a retired United Airlines captain and chief executive officer of Aero Consulting Experts. Those of us who have been around a long time have been yelling into a vacuum that something like this would happen because our systems are stretched to extremes. There was no immediate word on the cause of the collision, but officials said flight conditions were clear as the jet arrived from Wichita, Kansas. Investigators have already begun examining every aspect of the crash, including questions about why the Army Black Hawk helicopter was 100 feet above its permitted altitude and whether the air traffic control tower was properly staffed. A Federal Aviation Administration report obtained by The Associated Press described staffing levels as not normal for the time of day and volume of traffic. As authorities piece together the nations deadliest U.S. airline crash since 2001, the tragedy has raised new concerns about the specific dangers at Reagan National, which has seen a series of near-misses in recent years. Experts and some lawmakers said they are concerned that the airspace is about to get more congested in the wake of Congress decision last year to ease restrictions that had limited the airport to nonstop flights within 1,250 miles (2,012 kilometers) of Washington, with few exceptions. Lawmakers enabled airlines to launch new routes to destinations like Seattle and San Francisco. The plan fueled intense debate about congestion versus convenience, with some legislators heralding new flights to their home states while others warned of potential tragedy. The flight that crashed Wednesday was not part of the expansion. It was added by American Airlines in January of last year amid a push by Kansas lawmakers for more service between Reagan National and Wichita. Airliners and helicopters in close proximityCommercial aircraft flying in and out of Reagan National have long had to contend with military helicopters traversing the same airspace within at-times startling proximity. Even if everybody is doing what theyre supposed to be doing, youve only got a few hundred feet separation between aircraft coming in to land and the many helicopters along that route, said Jim Brauchle, a former U.S. Air Force navigator and aviation attorney. It doesnt leave a whole lot margin of error.Pilots have long warned of a nightmare scenario near the airport with commercial jetliners and military helicopters crossing paths, especially at night when the bright lights of the city can make seeing oncoming aircraft more difficult. Retired U.S. Army National Guard pilot Darrell Feller said the deadly collision reminded him of an incident he experienced a decade ago when he was flying a military helicopter south along the Potomac River near Reagan National.An air traffic controller advised him to be on the lookout for a jetliner landing on Runway 3-3, an approach that requires planes to fly directly over the route used by military and law enforcement helicopters transiting the nations capital. Not always easy to spot airlinersFeller was unable to pick out the oncoming jetliner against the lights of the city and cars on a nearby bridge. He immediately descended, skimming just 50 feet over the water to ensure the descending jetliner would pass over him.I could not see him. I lost him in the city lights, Feller, who retired from the Army in 2014, recounted Thursday. It did scare me.Fellers experience was eerily similar to what experts said may have happed with the crew of the Army helicopter Wednesday shortly before 9 p.m. as they flew south along the Potomac and collided with an American Airlines Flight 5342 landing at Runway 3-3. As the American Airlines jet approached the airport, air traffic controllers asked its pilots if they could land on Runway 3-3 rather than the longer and busier north-south runway. The jets pilots altered their approach, heading over the east bank of the Potomac before heading back over the river to land on 3-3.Less than 30 seconds before the crash, an air traffic controller asked the Army helicopter if it had the American Airlines plane in sight, and the military pilot responded that he did. The controller then instructed the Black Hawk to pass behind the jet. Seconds after that last transmission, the two aircraft collided in a fireball. Feller, who served as an instructor pilot for the D.C. National Guard, said he had several rules for new pilots to avoid such collisions. He warned them to stay below the mandated 200-foot ceiling for helicopters. And he urged them to be on guard for planes landing on 3-3 because they could be difficult to spot. Those planes landing lights are not pointed directly at you, Feller said, adding that those lights also get mixed up with ground lights, with cars.Not the first such deadly crashWednesdays crash was reminiscent of a deadly collision in 1949, when Washingtons airspace was considerably less crowded. A passenger plane on final approach to what is now Reagan Airport collided with a military plane, plunging both aircraft to the Potomac River and killing 55 people. At the time, it was the deadliest air crash in the U.S.Jack Schonely, a retired Los Angeles Police Department helicopter pilot, said hes been a passenger on helicopter rides through D.C. and was always struck by how complicated it seems for the pilots. Youve got two large airports. Youve got multiple restricted areas. Youve got altitude restrictions. Routine restrictions, and a lot of air traffic, he said. Theres a lot going on in a tight area.Robert Clifford, an aviation attorney, said the U.S. government should temporarily halt military helicopter flights in the airspace used by commercial airlines near Reagan National.I cant get over how stunningly clear it is that this was a preventable crash and this should never, ever have occurred, Clifford said. There have been discussions for some time about the congestion associated with that and the potential for disaster. And we saw it come home last night. __ Foley reported from Iowa City, Iowa. Associated Press journalists Michael R. Sisak and Joseph Frederick in New York, Alan Suderman in Richmond, Virginia, Heather Hollingsworth in Mission, Kansas, and Adriana Gomez Licon in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, contributed to this report. RYAN J. FOLEY Foley covers state and national news for The Associated Press and is based in Iowa City, Iowa. A 20-year AP veteran, hes known for investigative reporting and using open records laws to obtain information. twitter mailto JIM MUSTIAN Mustian is an Associated Press investigative reporter for breaking news. twitter mailto MICHAEL BIESECKER Biesecker is a global investigative reporter for The Associated Press, based in Washington. He reports on a wide range of topics, including human conflict, climate change and political corruption. twitter instagram mailto

Tulsi Gabbard, President Donald Trump's choice to be the Director of National Intelligence, arrives to appear before the Senate Intelligence Committee for her confirmation hearing on Capitol Hill Thursday, Jan. 30, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/John McDonnell)2025-01-31T00:32:36Z WASHINGTON (AP) Conspiracy theories about vaccines. Secret meetings with dictators. An enemies list.President Donald Trump s most controversial Cabinet nominees Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Tulsi Gabbard and Kash Patel flooded the zone Thursday in back-to-back-to-back confirmation hearings that were like nothing the Senate has seen in modern memory.The onslaught of claims, promises and testy exchanges did not occur in a political vacuum. The whirlwind day Day 10 of the new White House all unfolded as Trump himself was ranting about how diversity hiring caused the tragic airplane-and-helicopter crash outside Washingtons Ronald Reagan National Airport.And it capped a tumultuous week after the White House abruptly halted federal funding for programs Americans rely on nationwide, under guidance from Trumps budget pick Russ Vought, only to reverse course amid a public revolt. The American people did not vote for this kind of senseless chaos, said Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., earlier.It was all challenging even the most loyal Republicans who are being asked to confirm Trumps Cabinet or face recriminations from an army of online foot-soldiers aggressively promoting the White House agenda. A majority vote in the Senate, which is led by Republicans 53-57, is needed for confirmation, leaving little room for dissent. Here are some takeaways from the day: Tulsi Gabbard defends her loyalty and makes some inroadsGabbard is seen as the most endangered of Trumps picks, potentially lacking the votes even from Trumps party for confirmation for Director of National Intelligence. But her hearing before the Senate Intelligence Committee offered a roadmap toward confirmation. It opened with the chairman, Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., swatting back claims that Gabbard is a foreign asset, undercover for some other nation, presumably Russia. He said he reviewed some 300 pages of multiple FBI background checks and shes clean as a whistle.But Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the panel, questioned whether she could build the trust needed, at home and abroad, to do the job.Gabbard, a lieutenant colonel in the Army Reserve, defended her loyalty to the U.S. She dismissed GOP Sen. Jerry Moran, a Kansas Republican, when he asked whether Russia would get a pass from her.Senator, Im offended by the question, Gabbard responded.Pressed on her secret 2017 trip to meet with then-Syrian President Bashar Assad, who has since been toppled by rebels and fled to Russia, she defended her work as diplomacy.Gabbard may have made some inroads with one potentially skeptical Republican. Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, asked whether Gabbard would recommend a pardon for Edward Snowden. The former government contractor was charged with espionage after leaking a trove of sensitive intelligence material, and fled to residency in Russia.Gabbard, who has called Snowden a brave whistleblower, said it would not be her responsibility to advocate for any actions related to Snowden.Picking up one notable endorsement, Gabbard was introduced by one of the Senates more influential voices on intelligence matters, Richard Burr, the retired Republican chairman of the Intelligence Committee. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. pressed again on vaccine safetyKennedy faced a second day of grilling to become Health and Human Services secretary, this time at the Senate Health committee, as senators probed his past views against vaccines and whether he would ban the abortion drug mifepristone.But what skeptical Democratic senators have been driving at is whether Kennedy is trustworthy if he holds fast to his past views or has shifted to new ones echoing concerns raised by his cousin Caroline Kennedy that he is a charismatic predator hungry for power.Youve spent your entire career undermining Americas vaccine program, said Sen. Chris Murphy D-Conn. It just isnt believable that when you become secretary you are going to become consistent with science.Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., took the conversation in a different direction reading Kennedys comments about the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in which he said in a social media post: Its hard to tell what is conspiracy and what isnt. Wow, Kaine said. Kennedy responded that his father, the late Robert F. Kennedy, told him that people in positions of power do lie.But Kennedys longtime advocacy in the anti-vaccine community continued to dominate his hearings.Sen. Maggie Hassan, D-N.H., choked back tears when she told Kennedy that his work caused grave harm by relitigating what is already settled science rather than helping the country advance toward new treatments and answers in healthcare.But Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., immediately shifted the mood saying his own sons are fans of the nominee and he thanked Kennedy for bringing the light particularly to a younger generation interested in his alternative views.Pressed on whether he would ban the abortion drug mifepristone, Kennedy said its up to Trump.I will implement his policy. A combative Kash Patel spars with senators over his pastKash Patel emerged as perhaps the most combative nominee in a testy hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee as the nominee to lead the FBI.Confronted with his own past words, writings and public comments, Patel, a former Capitol Hill staffer turned Trump enthusiast, protested repeatedly that his views were being taken out of context as unfair smears.Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., read aloud Patels false claims of voter fraud in the 2020 election and another about his published enemies list that includes former Trump officials who have been critical of the president.Were going to come after you, she read him saying.Patel dismissed her citations as a partial statement and false.Klobuchar, exasperated, told senators: Its his own words.Patel has stood by Trump in the aftermath of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack at the Capitol and produced a version of the national anthem featuring Trump and the so-called J6 choir of defendants as a fundraiser. The president played the song opening his campaign rallies. During one jarring moment, Sen. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., asked Patel to turn around and look at the U.S. Capitol Police officers protecting the hearing room.Tell them youre proud of what you did. Tell them youre proud that you raised money off of people that assaulted their colleagues, that pepper sprayed them, that beat them with poles, Schiff said.Patel fired back: Thats an abject lie, you know it. I never, never, ever accepted violence against law enforcement.Patel said he did not endorse Trumps sweeping pardon of supporters, including violent rioters, charged in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.I do not agree with the commutation of any sentence of any individual who committed violence against law enforcement, Patel said.In another Cabinet development, Republicans on the Senate Budget Committee advanced Trumps budget nominee Russ Vought toward confirmation after Democrats boycotted the meeting in protest.Vought was an architect of Project 2025 and influential in the White House memo to free federal funding this week, which sparked panic in communities across the country. Advocacy organizations challenged the freeze in court, and the White House quickly rescinded it, for now. ___Associated Press writers Farnoush Amiri, Matt Brown and Stephen Groves contributed to this report.

Former Gov. Doug Burgum, President-elect Donald Trump's choice to lead the the Interior Department as Secretary of the Interior, testifies before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Jan. 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)2025-01-30T23:53:47Z The Senate confirmed Doug Burgum as interior secretary late Thursday after President Donald Trump tapped the North Dakota billionaire to spearhead the Republican administrations ambitions to boost fossil fuel production.The vote was 79-18. More than half of Senate Democrats joined all 53 Republicans in voting for Burgum. Burgum, 68, is an ultra-wealthy software industry entrepreneur who came from a small North Dakota farming community, where he worked at his familys grain elevator.He served two terms as governor of the oil-rich state and launched a presidential campaign in 2023, but dropped out months later and quickly endorsed Trump.Trump also picked Burgum to chair a new National Energy Council thats tasked with achieving American energy dominance. He would have a seat on the National Security Council a first for the interior secretary. His directive from Trump is to make it even easier for energy companies to tap fossil fuel resources, including from public lands. That raised alarms among environmentalists and some Democrats as greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuels bake the planet. Burgum eagerly assisted the energy industry during his time as governor, when he was also profiting from the lease of family land to oil companies, according to records obtained by The Associated Press.During his confirmation hearing, Burgum said the U.S. can use energy development as leverage to promote peace and to lower consumer costs. He raised concerns about the reliability of renewable power sources promoted under former President Joe Biden, and said the U.S. needs to generate more electricity from sources such as coal and nuclear that can run constantly.Democrats in response accused the Trump administration of abandoning an all of the above energy policy to favor fossil fuels.They said wind is dead on the offshore. They are trying to do as much of this as possible to create demand for coal, for fossil gas, Hawaii Democratic Sen. Brian Schatz said during a Thursday floor speech. Wyoming Sen. John Barrasso, the second-ranking Republican in the Senate, said Burgum would rightfully prioritize energy innovation over regulation.Hes going to take the common-sense action of unlocking our lands for oil and for gas production, Barrasso said. He added that more than 600,000 acres of land in Wyoming have been approved for energy production but were not offered for development by the Biden administration. The U.S. currently produces more crude oil than any nation in history, according to the Energy Information Administration. More cost-effective technology in recent decades drove drilling booms in states including New Mexico, Texas and North Dakota, where vast expanses of rural farmland have been industrialized by oil and gas companies.The booms brought billions of dollars in tax revenue to state and federal governments. But burning those fuels is also unleashing immense volumes of carbon dioxide that scientists say is warming the planet.The Interior Department has jurisdiction over a half-billion acres of federal land and vast areas offshore. Those areas produce about one-quarter of U.S. oil annually. The interior secretary also oversees the National Park Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Bureau of Land Management and other subagencies.Burgum succeeds Deb Haaland, who under Biden sharply scaled back oil and gas sales and promoted solar and wind projects on federal lands.Trump made energy development a centerpiece of his first term and is again vowing to abolish restrictions on the industry that are intended to protect the environment and public health. Burgum, during his hearing earlier this month before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources committee, suggested to lawmakers that carbon dioxide from fossil fuels could be captured to neutralize their contribution to global warming.Carbon-capture skeptics say the technology is untested at scale and allows the fossil-fuel industry to continue largely unchanged even as climate change becomes increasingly urgent. During Haalands tenure at the Interior Department, officials also reversed actions taken during Trumps first term that weakened protections for imperiled species while making it easier for private developers to pursue projects on public lands.Republicans in Congress have said they plan to again seek changes to rules on endangered species and they want Burgum to help.Burgum says federal lands can be used for many purposes including recreation, logging and oil and gas production that can lift local economies.Not every acre of federal land is a national park or a wilderness area, he told lawmakers. RSShttps://feedx.net https://feedx.site

This photo provided by Vertex Pharmaceuticals in January 2025 shows a tablet and bottle of the JOURNAVX (suzetrigine) medication. (Vertex Pharmaceuticals via AP)2025-01-30T23:14:57Z WASHINGTON (AP) Federal officials on Thursday approved a new type of pain pill designed to eliminate the risks of addiction and overdose associated with opioid medications like Vicodin and OxyContin.The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said it approved Vertex Pharmaceuticals Journavx for short-term pain that often follows surgery or injuries. Its the first new pharmaceutical approach to treating pain in more than 20 years, offering an alternative to both opioids and over-the-counter medications like ibuprofen and acetaminophen. But the medications modest effectiveness and lengthy development process underscore the challenges of finding new ways to manage pain.Studies in more than 870 patients with acute pain due to foot and abdominal surgeries showed Vertexs drug provided more relief than a dummy pill but didnt outperform a common opioid-acetaminophen combination pill. Its not a slam dunk on effectiveness, said Michael Schuh of the Mayo Clinic, a pharmacist and pain medicine expert who was not involved in the research. But it is a slam dunk in that its a very different pathway and mechanism of action. So, I think that shows a lot promise. The new drug will carry a list price of $15.50 per pill, making it many times more expensive than comparable opioids, which are often available as generics for $1 or less.Vertex began researching the drug in the 2000s, when overdoses were rocketing upward, principally driven by mass prescribing of opioid painkillers for common ailments like arthritis and back pain. Prescriptions have fallen sharply in the last decade and the current wave of the opioid epidemic is mainly due to illicit fentanyl, not pharmaceutical medicines. Opioids reduce pain by binding to receptors in the brain that receive nerve signals from different parts of the body. Those chemical interactions also give rise to opioids addictive effects. Vertexs drug works differently, blocking proteins that trigger pain signals that are later sent to the brain.In trying to develop medicines that dont have the addictive risks of opioid medicines, a key factor is working to block pain signaling before it gets to the brain, Vertexs Dr. David Altshuler, told The Associated Press last year. Commonly reported side effects with the drug were nausea, constipation, itching, rash and headache.The new medication has side effect profiles that are inherently, not only different, but dont involve the risk of substance abuse and other key side effects associated with opioids, said Dr. Charles Argoff of the Albany Medical Center, who consulted for Vertex on the drugs development.The initial concept to focus on pain-signaling proteins came out of research involving people with a rare hereditary condition that causes insensitivity to pain.Vertex has attracted interest from Wall Street for its ambitious drug pipeline that involves winning FDA approval for multiple drugs across several forms of chronic pain, which generally represents a bigger financial opportunity than acute pain. But the Boston drugmakers share price plummeted in December when Vertex reported disappointing mid-stage results in a study of patients with chronic nerve pain affecting the lower back and legs. The drug didnt perform significantly better than placebo, the research found.We believe the data reflect a near worst-case scenario for this key pipeline program, biotechnology analyst Brian Abrahams said in a research note to investors, adding that the results jeopardized estimates that Vertexs pipeline could be worth billions across multiple forms of pain.Still, Vertex executives said they plan to move forward with a new, late-stage study of the drug, theorizing that a different trial design could yield better results and pave the way for FDA approval in chronic pain.___AP video journalist Mary Conlon contributed to this story from New York.___The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institutes Science and Educational Media Group and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

President Donald Trump talks with reporters as he signs executive orders in the Oval Office at the White House, Thursday, Jan. 30, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)2025-01-30T21:31:12Z WASHINGTON (AP) President Donald Trump said his 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico are coming on Saturday, but hes still considering whether to include oil from those countries as part of his import taxes.We may or may not, Trump told reporters Thursday in the Oval Office about tariffing oil from Canada and Mexico. Were going to make that determination probably tonight.Trump said his decision will be based on whether the price of oil charged by the two trading partners is fair, although the basis of his threatened tariffs pertains to stopping illegal immigration and the smuggling of chemicals used for fentanyl.The risk of tariffs on Canadian and Mexican oil could undermine Trumps repeated pledge to lower overall inflation by reducing energy costs. Costs associated with tariffs could be passed along to consumers in the form of higher gasoline prices an issue that Trump placed at the center of his Republican presidential campaign as he vowed to halve energy costs within one year. One year from Jan. 20, we will have your energy prices cut in half all over the country, Trump said at a 2024 town hall in Pennsylvania. AP VoteCast, an extensive survey of the electorate, found that 80% of voters identified gas prices as a concern. Trump won nearly 6 in 10 voters who said they worried about prices at the pump.The United States imported almost 4.6 million barrels of oil daily from Canada in October and 563,000 barrels from Mexico, according to the Energy Information Administration. U.S. daily production during that month averaged nearly 13.5 million barrels a day. Matthew Holmes, executive vice president and chief of public policy at the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, said Trumps tariffs would tax America first in the form of higher costs.This is a lose-lose, Holmes said. We will keep working with partners to show President Trump and Americans that this doesnt make life any more affordable. It makes life more expensive and sends our integrated businesses scrambling. But Trump showed no concerns that import taxes on the United States trading partners would have a negative impact on the U.S. economy, despite the risk shown in many economic analyses of higher prices.We dont need the products that they have, Trump said. We have all the oil you need. We have all the trees you need, meaning the lumber.The president also said that China would pay tariffs for its exporting of the chemicals used to make fentanyl. He has previously stated a 10% tariff that would be on top of other import taxes charged on products from China.Oil prices were trading at roughly $73 a barrel on Thursday afternoon. Prices spiked in June 2022 under President Joe Biden to more than $120 per barrel, a period that overlapped with overall inflation hitting a four-decade high that fueled a broader sense of public dissatisfaction with the Democratic administration. Gas prices are averaging $3.12 a gallon across the United States, roughly the same price as a year ago, according to AAA.___ JOSH BOAK Boak covers the White House and economic policy for The Associated Press. He joined the AP in 2013. twitter mailto

Rebel leader of group of Alliance Fleuve Congo (AFC) including M23, Corneille Nangaa, addresses a news conference in Goma, Democratic republic of the Congo, Thursday, Jan. 30, 2025. (AP Photo/Brian Inganga)2025-01-30T09:14:23Z GOMA, Congo (AP) Rwanda-backed rebels who captured eastern Congos largest city said Thursday they want to take their fight to the far-off capital, Kinshasa, while Congos president called for a massive military mobilization to resist the rebellion and his defense minister rejected calls for dialogue.In a video message on Thursday, Congos Defense Minister Guy Kabombo Muadiamvita said he has directed plans for any dialogue with the rebels to be completely burned immediately.We will stay here in Congo and fight. If we do not stay alive here, lets stay dead here, said Muadiamvita, a close ally of Congos president.At a briefing where they sought to assert their control over the eastern city of Goma and surrounding territory in the neighbouring South Kivu province, the M23 rebels said they would be open to dialogue with the government, also proposed by the east African regional bloc of which Rwanda is a member. Their motive, however, is to gain political power, Corneille Nangaa, one of the political leaders of M23, said during the briefing. We want to go to Kinshasa, take power and lead the country, Nangaa said. He did not indicate how the rebels planned to advance on the capital, more than 1,500 kilometers (nearly 1,000 miles) away. Rwandas leader, Paul Kagame said he spoke with Angolas President Joao Lourenco a mediator in the conflict who also met with Congos leader a day earlier and both leaders committed to working with other African countries to resolve the hostilities. U.S. President Donald Trump described the conflict as a very serious problem when asked about it Thursday but declined to comment further, and a U.N. spokesman said the agency is disturbed by reports that neighboring Rwandan forces have crossed the border in the direction where the rebels are said to be advancing.The M23 rebels are backed by some 4,000 troops from neighboring Rwanda, according to U.N. experts, far more than in 2012 when they first captured Goma. They are one of more than 100 armed groups vying for control in Congos mineral-rich east, which holds vast deposits estimated to be worth $24 trillion that are critical to much of the worlds technology. Congolese President Flix Tshisekedi, meanwhile, called on young people to enlist massively in the military, as a crucial meeting of neighbors asked the Congolese government to talk with the rebels. Rwandas leader also threatened to deal with any confrontation with South Africa, which has complained that fighting in eastern Congo has left South African peacekeepers dead.In his first public remarks since the M23 rebels advanced into, Goma on Monday, Tshisekedi vowed a vigorous and coordinated response from his forces to push back the rebels while reaffirming his commitment to a peaceful resolution. On Thursday, he met with French Foreign Minister Jean-Nol Barrot in Kinshasa, the Congolese presidency said on X, noting that France has provided significant support to Congo in recent U.N. meetings on the issue. (Congo) expects a little more action in the face of this crisis, it added. Dead bodies, looting in GomaGoma remained largely without electricity and water on Thursday, as the bodies of several alleged government soldiers lay in the streets, horrifying residents, including children.M23 rebels escorted some 2,000 government soldiers and police officers who they said surrendered to an undisclosed location, some of them singing anti-Tshisekedi songs.The U.N. Humanitarian Coordinator in Congo said basic services are largely paralyzed in Goma, a humanitarian hub critical for more than 6 million people displaced by the conflict. After several days of intense clashes, the city is now (faced) with massive humanitarian needs and severely impacted response capacities, said Bruno Lemarquis, the humanitarian coordinator.Footage from Goma showed residents carrying food items and goods looted from stores and warehouses in the city. This is something that is going to exacerbate a dangerous cycle of violence as desperate times call for desperate measures, the U.N. World Food Program emergency coordinator in eastern Congo, Cynthia Jones, said Thursday. South Kivu gripped by fearAfter capturing much of Goma, the rebels were advancing toward South Kivus provincial capital, Bukavu, causing fear and panic among residents, witnesses said Thursday.Nn Bintou, a civil society leader, said gunshots and explosions were heard in Mukwinja, a captured town 86 miles (135 kilometers) from Bukavu.The Congolese military has been weakened after hundreds of foreign military contractors withdrew and handed over their arms to the rebels. Residents of Goma described seeing soldiers changing into civilian clothing and dropping their guns as they crossed over the border to Rwanda or took shelter in foreign peacekeeping bases.The (Congolese) military bases in Bukavu have been emptied to reinforce those in Nyabibwe, Bushushu, and Nyamukubi along the way to the capital, one youth leader said, speaking on the condition of anonymity because he was worried about his safety. Neighbors urge talks with M23 as tensions growA summit of the regional East African bloc called for an immediate and unconditional ceasefire in eastern Congo and strongly urged Tshisekedis government to hold talks with the rebels. Tshisekedi was conspicuously absent from the virtual summit attended by Rwanda, also a member.While African countries as well as the U.N. and U.S. have called for an immediate ceasefire, the risk of a regional war has increased, analysts say, exacerbated by the rebels advance into South Kivu and diatribes between Rwandan and South African officials. Congo is a member of the southern Africa regional bloc and also that of east Africa, whose peacekeeping force it expelled last year after deeming it ineffective.South African President Cyril Ramaphosa blamed the Rwanda Defense Force militia for the fighting that has resulted in the deaths of 13 South African peacekeepers in eastern Congo. He also said his government will ensure the peacekeepers are sufficiently supported during this critical mission.His comment drew an angry response from Kagame, who called the South African peacekeepers a belligerent force working alongside armed groups that target Rwanda. If South Africa prefers confrontation, Rwanda will deal with the matter in that context any day, the Rwandan leader said on the social media platform X.Who are the M23 and what do they want?The chaotic situation with the M23 has its roots in ethnic conflict, stretching back decades to the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, when 800,000 Tutsis and others were killed by Hutus and former militias. M23 says it is defending ethnic Tutsis in Congo. Rwanda has claimed the Tutsis are being persecuted by Hutus and others involved in the genocide. Many Hutus fled into Congo after 1994. Unlike in 2012 when the rebels seized Congo for days, observers say their withdrawal could be more difficult now. The rebels have been emboldened by Rwanda, which feels Congo is ignoring its interests in the region and failed to meet demands of previous peace agreements, according to Murithi Mutiga, program director for Africa at the Crisis Group, a think tank. Ultimately, this is a failure of African mediation (because) the warning signs were always there. Kigali was adopting very bellicose rhetoric and the Congolese government was also adopting very, very aggressive rhetoric, Mutiga said.___Asadu reported from Abuja. AP journalists Ruth Alonga in Goma, Jean-Yves Kamale and Christina Malkia in Kinshasa, Congo, Mark Banchereau in Paris and Edith M. Lederer in New York contributed to this report.

CORRECTS ID - Thai hostages who were freed from Hamas, from left to right, Surasak Rumnao, Sathian Suwannakham, Bannawat Saethao, Watchara Sriaoun, and Pongsak Thaenna hold the Thailand flag in Israel, Thursday, Jan. 30, 2025. (Royal Thai Embassy in Tel Aviv via AP)2025-01-30T22:55:22Z BEER YAAKOV, Israel (AP) When the mother of one of the Thai hostages held in the Gaza Strip for over a year caught sight of her son on a Facebook livestream after his release Thursday, he had changed so much that she didnt recognize him at first.Surasak Rumnao, 32, who was kidnapped from the southern Israeli town of Yesha on Oct. 7, 2023, looked pale and puffy, said his mother, Khammee Lamnao. I was so happy that I could not eat anything. His father brought some food to me but I did not want to eat at all, Khammee said on a video call with The Associated Press after the release of her son.Dozens of Israeli doctors, nurses and representatives from Israel and Thailand waved flags, sang and cheered Thursday as the five Thai hostages stepped off a military helicopter and entered a hospital outside Tel Aviv, where they will spend a few days undergoing medical tests and recuperating. Three Israelis were also released on Thursday, and Israel released 110 Palestinian prisoners in the exchange. Besides Sarusak, Watchara Sriaoun, 33, Sathian Suwannakham, 35, Pongsak Thaenna, 36, and Bannawat Saethao, 27, were released in Thursdays exchange. Hamas militants kidnapped 31 Thai nationals during the assault on southern Israel, making them the largest group of foreigners held captive. Many of the Thai agricultural workers lived in compounds on the outskirts of southern Israeli kibbutzim and towns, and Hamas militants overran those places first. During an earlier ceasefire in November 2023, 23 Thai nationals were released in a deal negotiated between Thailand and Hamas, with assistance from Qatar and Iran.According to Thailands Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 46 Thais have been killed during the conflict, including two Thai citizens who were killed on Oct. 7, 2023 and their bodies taken into Gaza.Dr. Osnat Levzion-Korach, the director of Shamir Medical Center outside Tel Aviv where the five were taken, said they were in fair health, though most were held underground and were not exposed to sunlight for extended periods of time. She said they did not appear to be malnourished and credited their young age with helping them survive captivity in fairly good physical shape. Thailands ambassador to Israel, Pannabha Chandraramya, said she facilitated video calls between the hostages and their families after they arrived at the hospital, describing them as incredibly emotional, with shouts of joy and tears. She said it was one of the happiest days of her life, to see their release just a week before she ends her five-year term.Pannabha said there was no immediate information available about the last Thai hostage left in Gaza, Nattapong Pingsa, nor the two Thai workers whose bodies were taken into Gaza.Thai Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra thanked Qatar, Egypt, Iran, Turkey, the United States, Israel, and the Red Cross, for helping to negotiate the Thais release in a separate deal from the Israel-Hamas ceasefire. He said Thailands minister of foreign affairs would travel to Israel this weekend. Ambassador Pannabha said the Thai government may bring some relatives of the released hostages to Israel, though many dont have passports, and that the government would help those released return home as soon as they are medically cleared to travel. Israel will recognize the released Thai hostages as terror victims, a designation that entitles them to financial benefits and health care, said Alex Gandler, the deputy spokesperson of Israels Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He said Israels ambassador in Thailand visited some of the hostages released in the previous ceasefire deal on Thursday and that the Israeli government maintains contact with them. Gandler added that since the released Thais did not have family in Israel to greet them upon their release, some of their former employers came to meet them at the hospital.Gandler said Israel is committed to releasing all the hostages, regardless of nationality. There are still one Thai, one Nepali and one Tanzanian hostage, as well as the bodies of a Tanzanian and the two Thais being held in Gaza, according to the prime ministers office. Israel hopes all the international hostages will be released, both living and dead, Gandler said, which Israel and Hamas will begin discussing next week. MELANIE LIDMAN Lidman is an Associated Press reporter based in Tel Aviv, Israel.

In this image provided by the U.S. Coast Guard, wreckage is seen in the Potomac River near Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, Thursday, Jan. 30, 2025 in Washington. (Petty Officer 2nd Class Taylor Bacon, U.S. Coast Guard via AP)2025-01-31T05:09:23Z ARLINGTON, Va. (AP) A midair collision between an Army helicopter and a jetliner killed all 67 people aboard the two aircraft, officials said, as they scrutinized the actions of the military pilot in the countrys deadliest aviation disaster in almost a quarter century.At least 28 bodies were pulled from the icy waters of the Potomac River after the helicopter apparently flew into the path of the American Airlines regional jet late Wednesday while it was landing at Ronald Reagan National Airport, just across the river from Washington, officials said Thursday. The plane carried 60 passengers and four crew members, and three soldiers were aboard the helicopter.President Donald Trump told a White House news conference that no one survived.We are now at the point where we are switching from a rescue operation to a recovery operation, said John Donnelly, the fire chief in the nations capital. The crash occurred before 9 p.m. in some of the most tightly controlled and monitored airspace in the world, just over 3 miles (about 4.8 kilometers) south of the White House and the Capitol.Air crash investigations can take months, and federal investigators told reporters they would not speculate on the cause. National Transportation Safety Board investigators recovered the cockpit voice recorder and the flight data recorder from the Bombardier CRJ700 airplane, agency spokesperson Peter Knudson said. They were at the agencys labs for evaluation. The plane was found upside-down in three sections in waist-deep water, and first responders were searching miles of the Potomac, Donnelly said. The helicopter wreckage was also found. Images from the river showed boats around the partly submerged wing and the mangled wreckage of the planes fuselage.American Airlines CEO Robert Isom said the plane was making a normal approach when the military aircraft came into the path of the jet. One air traffic controller was responsible for coordinating helicopter traffic and arriving and departing planes when the collision happened, according to a report by the Federal Aviation Administration that was obtained by The Associated Press. Those duties are often divided between two people, but the airport typically combines the roles at 9:30 p.m, once traffic begins to slow down. On Wednesday the tower supervisor directed that they be combined earlier.The position configuration was not normal for the time of day and volume of traffic, the report said. A person familiar with the matter, however, said the tower staffing that night was at a normal level.The positions are regularly combined when controllers need to step away from the console for breaks, during shift changes or when air traffic is slow, the person said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal procedures.The Federal Aviation Administration has long struggled with a shortage of air traffic controllers.Officials said flight conditions were clear as the jet arrived from Wichita, Kansas, carrying, among others, a group of elite young figure skaters, their parents and coaches, and four union steamfitters from the Washington area. A top Army aviation official said the crew of the helicopter, a Black Hawk, was very experienced and familiar with the congested flying that occurs daily around the city.Both pilots had flown this specific route before, at night. This wasnt something new to either one of them, said Jonathan Koziol, chief of staff for Army aviation.The helicopters maximum allowed altitude at the time was 200 feet (about 60 meters), Koziol said. It was not immediately clear whether it exceeded that limit, but Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said altitude seemed to be a factor in the collision.Koziol said investigators need to analyze the flight data before making conclusions about altitude.Trump opened the news conference with a moment of silence honoring the crash victims, calling it an hour of anguish for the country.But he spent most of his time casting political blame, lashing out at former President Joe Bidens administration and diversity efforts at the Federal Aviation Administration, saying they had led to slipping standards even as he acknowledged that the cause of the crash was unknown. Without evidence, Trump blamed air traffic controllers, the helicopter pilots and Democratic policies at federal agencies. He claimed that the FAA was actively recruiting workers who suffer severe intellectual disabilities, psychiatric problems and other mental and physical conditions under a diversity and inclusion hiring initiative.Inside Reagan National, the mood was somber Thursday as stranded passengers waited for flights to resume, sidestepping camera crews and staring out the windows at the Potomac, where recovery efforts were barely visible in the distance. Aster Andemicael had been there since the previous evening with her older adult father, who was flying to Indiana to visit relatives. She spent much of the long night thinking about the victims and their families.Ive been crying since yesterday, Andemicael said, her voice cracking. This is devastating.Flights resumed around midday.The deadliest plane crash since November 2001Wednesdays crash was the deadliest in the U.S. since Nov. 12, 2001, when an American Airlines flight slammed into a residential area of Belle Harbor, New York, just after takeoff from Kennedy Airport, killing all 260 people aboard and five people on the ground.The last major fatal crash involving a U.S. commercial airline occurred in 2009 near Buffalo, New York. Everyone aboard the Bombardier DHC-8 propeller plane was killed, along with one person on the ground, bringing the total death toll to 50.Experts often highlight that plane travel is overwhelmingly safe, however. The National Safety Council estimates that Americans have a 1-in-93 chance of dying in a motor vehicle crash, while deaths on airplanes are too rare to calculate the odds. Figures from the Department of Transportation tell a similar story.But the airspace around Reagan National can challenge even the most experienced pilots no matter how ideal the conditions. They must navigate hundreds of other commercial planes, military aircraft and restricted areas around sensitive sites.Just over 24 hours before the fatal collision, a different regional jet had to go around for a second chance at landing at Reagan National after it was advised about a military helicopter nearby, according to flight tracking sites and control logs. It landed safely minutes later. Tragedy stuns WichitaThe crash devastated the Kansas city, which prides itself on being in Americas heartland. Wichita hosted the U.S. Figure Skating Championships this year for the first time, along with training camps for top young skaters. The city has been a major hub for the aircraft industry since the early days of commercial flight, and it is home to the U.S. headquarters for Bombardier, which manufactured the jetliner. So many regional workers have jobs tied to the industry that the areas economy slumps when sales dip.Several hundred people gathered in the city council chambers for a prayer vigil.We will get through this, but the only way we will get through this is together, said the Rev. Pamela Hughes Mason of St. Paul AME Church.Collision happened in tightly controlled airspaceFlight 5342 was inbound to Reagan National at an altitude of about 400 feet (122 meters) and a speed of about 140 mph (225 kph) when it rapidly lost altitude over the Potomac, according to data from its radio transponder. The Canadian-made Bombardier CRJ-700 twin-engine jet, manufactured in 2004, can be configured to carry up to 70 passengers.A few minutes before the crash, air traffic controllers directed the jet to a shorter runway, and flight-tracking sites showed that it adjusted its approach.Less than 30 seconds before the collision, an air traffic controller asked the helicopter if it had the arriving plane in sight. A crewmember said the aircraft was in sight and requested visual separation allowing it to fly closer than otherwise might be allowed if pilots did not see the plane. Controllers approved the request.Seconds later, the two aircraft collided.___Gomez Licon reported from Miami. Associated Press writers Zeke Miller, Meg Kinnard, Chris Megerian, Michael Biesecker in Washington; Claudia Lauer in Arlington, Virginia; Brian Melley in London; John Hanna in Wichita, Kansas; and Sarah Brumfield in Cockeysville, Maryland, contributed. LOLITA C. BALDOR Baldor has covered the Pentagon and national security issues for The Associated Press since 2005. She has reported from all over the world including warzones in Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria. twitter mailto TARA COPP Copp covers the Pentagon and national security for the Associated Press. She has reported from Afghanistan, Iraq, throughout the Middle East, Europe and Asia. twitter mailto ADRIANA GOMEZ LICON Gomez Licon writes about national politics for The Associated Press. She is based in Florida. twitter mailto

In this photo provided by Kaitlin Marie Sells, Sam Lilley, left, pilots a small airplane that took off from Savannah, Ga., on Aug, 6, 2022, for a flight to reach the 1,500 flight hours required for Lilley to begin training to become an airline pilot. (Kaitlin Marie Sells via AP)2025-01-31T05:02:32Z ATLANTA (AP) Sam Lilley knew he wanted to fly and began training to be a pilot, like his father, right out of college. You dont really expect to meet people that find their purpose so early on in life, and Sam found his in flying, said Kaitlin Sells, who met Lilley while they were students at Georgia Southern University.Lilley was the first officer aboard the American Airlines jet carrying 60 passengers and four crew members that collided midair Wednesday night with an Army helicopter carrying three soldiers, legislators in Georgia said. Authorities say there were no survivors after the two aircraft plummeted into the Potomac River in the countrys deadliest aviation disaster since 2001. At least 28 bodies have been pulled from the icy waters of the river as recovery operations continue.Lilley and the rest of the American Airlines crew were traveling on a daily direct route from Wichita, Kansas, to Washington, D.C., at the time of the collision. The soldiers aboard the Black Hawk helicopter were conducting an annual night proficiency training flight, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said, adding they were a fairly experienced crew.Here is what we know so far about some members of the two flight crews: Sam LilleyLilleys father, Timothy Lilley, told WAGA-TV in Atlanta that he was in Washington waiting for answers.This is undoubtedly the worst day of my life, said Timothy Lilley, who also is a longtime pilot and served as a U.S. Army helicopter pilot for 20 years, noting he flew similar routes in and out of the Pentagon. I was so proud when Sam became a pilot, he wrote on Facebook. Now it hurts so bad I cant even cry myself to sleep. I know Ill see him again but my heart is breaking.Timothy Lilley said his son was excelling in his career and personal life at the time of his death and was engaged to be married later this year. Sam Lilley graduated in 2018 with a degree in marketing but decided to become a pilot. He had earlier graduated from Richmond Hill High School, just south of Savannah, Georgia, where he had been an active member of Coastal Community Christian Church.A local news story from 2011 highlighted his efforts to raise money to build a water well in a Zambian village.Sells, his friend from college, said there was no one better suited to be a pilot.There was no one that cared more. There was no one that was more passionate, Sells said, saying Lilley valued taking care of people and them putting their trust in him.Outside the plane, Lilley was devoted to making others happy and the type of person who always was the first onto a dance floor, Sells said.I dont think Ive ever seen that man in a bad mood, spreading negativity, Sells said. He was the type of person where if someone was not having a good time or someone was upset, he would do everything in his power to pull them out of it. Jonathan CamposThe captain of the American Airlines flight was 34-year-old Jonathan Campos, according to multiple media reports. His aunt, Beverly Lane, told the New York Times that Campos had wanted to be a pilot since the age of 3.I think he wanted to be free, and be able to fly and soar like a bird, Lane said.She told the newspaper she talked with Campos on Wednesday, just before the fateful flight. He told her he was looking forward to an upcoming Caribbean cruise with family. Campos was a 2015 graduate of Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach, Florida, where he studied Aeronautical Science, according to the university.Danasia ElderDanasia Elder was a flight attendant on the commercial flight, WSOC-TV in Charlotte, North Carolina, reported.Elders brother-in-law, Brandon Payne, described her as full of life, highlighting her love for God, her kids and travel. She was married with two children, Kayden and Dallas.She was a great wife, a great parent, a great friend, Payne told the news station. She was very bright, very smart. She was an entrepreneur. This flight attendant thing was kind of like one of her dreams she wanted to do.Payne said he is proud of his sister-in-law for pursuing her dream.She would want yall do the same thing she did. Chase your dreams, no matter what. Dont let nothing scare you, push you away. Just believe in yourself, believe in God, and follow the path, Payne said. Ryan OHaraRyan OHara was one of three soldiers aboard the Black Hawk helicopter.Ryan was just the most committed, disciplined person I remember working with, said Josh Muehlendorf, a senior instructor pilot in the U.S. Army. He had such great integrity.The two flew together numerous times on the same route in D.C. several years prior to the fatal crash and OHara took rules and procedures seriously, according to Mehlendorf.Ryan was one of those crew chiefs who always had our back, he said. Its really hard to stomach a guy as professional and excellent as he was. Andrew EavesMississippi Gov. Tate Reeves said on the social platform X that the state was mourning the death of Andrew Eaves, who was also aboard the Army helicopter.Eaves was from the small town of Brooksville in eastern Mississippi, Reeves said.His wife Carrie Eaves confirmed he was on the helicopter in a Facebook post Thursday.We ask that you pray for our family and friends and for all the other families that are suffering today. We ask for peace while we grieve, the post read.She also asked that people refrain from posting negative comments on social media.These families children do not need to suffer more pain, she wrote.___Yamat reported from Las Vegas. Associated Press journalists Nadia Lathan in Austin, Texas, and Safiyah Riddle in Montgomery, Alabama, contributed. JEFF AMY Amy covers Georgia politics and state government for The Associated Press. He began work with the AP in 2011 and covered Mississippi for eight years before transferring to the Atlanta bureau in 2019. twitter RIO YAMAT Yamat covers Nevada and the U.S. Southwest for The Associated Press. She is based in Las Vegas. twitter mailto

Brexit supporters gather during a rally in London, Friday, Jan. 31, 2020. Britain officially leaves the European Union on Friday after a debilitating political period that has bitterly divided the nation since the 2016 Brexit referendum. (AP Photo/Frank Augstein, File)2025-01-31T05:50:11Z LONDON (AP) Five years ago Friday, two crowds of people gathered near Britains Parliament some with Union Jacks and cheers, others European Union flags and tears.On Jan. 31, 2020 at 11 p.m. London time midnight at EU headquarters in Brussels the U.K. officially left the bloc after almost five decades of membership that had brought free movement and free trade between Britain and 27 other European countries.For Brexit supporters, the U.K. was now a sovereign nation in charge of its own destiny. For opponents, it was an isolated and diminished country.It was, inarguably, a divided nation that had taken a leap into the dark. Five years on, people and businesses are still wrestling with the economic, social and cultural aftershocks.The impact has been really quite profound, said political scientist Anand Menon, who heads the think-tank U.K. in a Changing Europe. Its changed our economy.And our politics has been changed quite fundamentally as well, he added. Weve seen a new division around Brexit becoming part of electoral politics. A decision that split the nationAn island nation with a robust sense of its historical importance, Britain had long been an uneasy member of the EU when it held a referendum in June 2016 on whether to remain or leave. Decades of deindustrialization, followed by years of public spending cuts and high immigration, made fertile ground for the argument that Brexit would let the U.K. take back control of its borders, laws and economy.Yet the result 52% to 48% in favor of leaving came as a shock to many. Neither the Conservative government, which campaigned to stay in the EU, nor pro-Brexit campaigners had planned for the messy details of the split.The referendum was followed by years of wrangling over divorce terms between a wounded EU and a fractious U.K. that caused gridlock in Parliament and ultimately defeated Prime Minister Theresa May. She resigned in 2019 and was replaced by Boris Johnson, who vowed to get Brexit done.It wasnt so simple. A blow to the British economyThe U.K. left without agreement on its future economic relationship with the EU, which accounted for half the countrys trade. The political departure was followed by 11 months of testy negotiations on divorce terms, culminating in agreement on Christmas Eve in 2020.The bare-bones trade deal saw the U.K. leave the blocs single market and customs union. It meant goods could move without tariffs or quotas, but brought new red tape, costs and delays for trading businesses.It has cost us money. We are definitely slower and its more expensive. But weve survived, said Lars Andersen, whose London-based company, My Nametags, ships brightly colored labels for kids clothes and school supplies to more than 150 countries.To keep trading with the EU, Andersen has had to set up a base in Ireland, through which all orders destined for EU countries must pass before being sent on. He says the hassle has been worth it, but some other small businesses he knows have stopped trading with the EU or moved manufacturing out of the U.K. Julianne Ponan, founder and CEO of allergen-free food producer Creative Nature, had a growing export business to EU countries that was devastated by Brexit. Since then she has successfully turned to markets in the Middle East and Australia, something she says has been a positive outcome of leaving the EU.Having mastered the new red tape, she is now gradually building up business with Europe again.But weve lost four years of growth there, she said. And thats the sad part. We would be a lot further ahead in our journey if Brexit hadnt happened.The governments Office for Budget Responsibility forecasts that U.K. exports and imports will both be around 15% lower in the long run than if the U.K. had remained in the EU, and economic productivity 4% less than it otherwise would have been.Brexit supporters argue that short-term pain will be offset by Britains new freedom to strike trade deals around the world. Since Brexit. the U.K. has signed trade agreements with countries including Australia, New Zealand and Canada. But David Henig, a trade expert at the European Center for International Political Economy, said they have not offset the hit to trade with Britains nearest neighbors.The big players arent so much affected, Henig said. We still have Airbus, we still have Scotch whisky. We still do defense, big pharmaceuticals. But the mid-size players are really struggling to keep their exporting position. And nobody new is coming in to set up.A lesson in unintended consequencesIn some ways, Brexit has not played out as either supporters or opponents anticipated. The COVID-19 pandemic and Russias invasion of Ukraine piled on more economic disruption, and made it harder to discern the impact of Britains EU exit on the economy.In one key area, immigration, Brexits impact has been the opposite of what many predicted. A desire to reduce immigration was a major reason many people voted to leave the EU, yet immigration today is far higher than before Brexit because the number of visas granted for workers from around the world has soared. Meanwhile, the rise of protectionist political leaders, especially newly returned U.S. President Donald Trump, has raised the stakes for Britain, now caught between its near neighbors in Europe and its trans-Atlantic special relationship with the U.S.The world is a far less forgiving place now than it was in 2016 when we voted to leave, Menon said.Can Britain and the EU be friends again?Polls suggest U.K. public opinion has soured on Brexit, with a majority of people now thinking it was a mistake. But rejoining seems a distant prospect. With memories of arguments and division still raw, few people want to go through all that again.Labour Party Prime Minister Keir Starmer, elected in July 2024, has promised to reset relations with the EU, but has ruled out rejoining the customs union or single market. Hes aiming for relatively modest changes such as a making it easier for artists to tour and for professionals to have their qualifications recognized, as well as on closer cooperation on law enforcement and security.EU leaders have welcomed the change of tone from Britain, but have problems of their own amid growing populism across the continent. The U.K. is no longer a top priority.I completely understand, its difficult to get back together after quite a harsh divorce, said Andersen, who nonetheless hopes Britain and the EU will draw closer with time. I suspect it will happen, but it will happen slowly and subtly without politicians particularly shouting about it. JILL LAWLESS Lawless is an Associated Press reporter covering U.K. politics and more. She is based in London. twitter mailto

National Transportation Safety Board Chair Jennifer Homendy speaks during a press conference at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, Thursday, Jan. 30, 2025, in Arlington, Va., as board members look on. (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough)2025-01-31T05:02:38Z WASHINGTON (AP) A collision between an American Airlines passenger jet and an Army helicopter near Washington, D.C., that killed 67 people brought renewed focus on the federal agency charged with investigating aviation disasters.National Transportation Safety Board Chairwoman Jennifer Hommendy described the investigation into the crash Wednesday night as an all-hands-on-deck event for the agency during a news conference Thursday in which she appeared with members of the board and a senior investigator overseeing the probe.Here are some things to know about the NTSB: What does the agency do?The NTSB is an independent federal agency responsible for investigating all civil aviation accidents as well as serious incidents in the U.S. involving other modes of transportation, such as railroad disasters and major accidents involving motor vehicles, marine vessels, pipelines and even commercial space operators.Were here to ensure the American people that we are going to leave no stone unturned in this investigation, Hommendy said, noting the probe is in the very early stages. We are going to conduct a thorough investigation of this entire tragedy, looking at the facts.The agency has five board members who serve five-year terms and are nominated by the president and confirmed by the U.S. Senate. How will the investigation work?For the investigation into Wednesdays crash, the NTSB will establish several different working groups, each responsible for investigating different areas connected to the accident, board member Todd Inman said.Inman said those groups include operations, which will examine flight history and crewmember duties; structures, which will document airframe wreckage and the accident scene; power plants, which will focus on aircraft engines and engine accessories; systems, which will study the electrical, hydraulic and pneumatic components of the two aircraft; air traffic control, which will review flight track surveillance information, including radar, and controller-pilot communications; survival factors, which will analyze the injuries to the crew and passengers and crash and rescue efforts; and a helicopter group. The investigation also will include a human-performance group that will be a part of the operations, air traffic control and helicopter groups and will study the crew performance and any factors that could be involved such as human error, including fatigue, medications, medical histories, training and workload, Inman said. How long will the investigation take?NTSB officials did not say Thursday how long the investigation would take, but accident investigations often take between one to two years to complete. The agency typically releases a preliminary report within a few weeks of the accident that includes a synopsis of information collected at the scene.What is the NTSBs history?The NTSB history dates to 1926, when Congress passed a law charging the U.S. Department of Commerce with investigating aircraft accidents.It was established as an independent agency within the U.S. Department of Transportation in 1967 and then separated by Congress in 1974 as a stand-alone organization, fully independent from any other federal agencies.Since its creation in 1967, the agency reports it has investigated more than 153,000 aviation accidents and incidents.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio speaks after being sworn in by Vice President JD Vance in the Vice Presidential Ceremonial Office in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building on the White House campus, Tuesday, Jan. 21, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)2025-01-31T05:05:12Z WASHINGTON (AP) Trump administration changes have upended the U.S. agency charged with providing humanitarian aid to countries overseas, with dozens of senior officials put on leave, thousands of contractors laid off, and a sweeping freeze imposed on billions of dollars in foreign assistance. Secretary of State Marco Rubio defended the pause on foreign assistance Thursday, saying the U.S. government is not a charity.Aid organizations say the funding freeze and deep confusion over what U.S.-funded programs must stop work as a result has left them agonizing over whether they could continue operating programs such as those providing round-the-clock nutritional support to extremely malnourished infants and children, knowing that closing the doors means that many of those children would die.Current and former officials at the State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development say staffers were invited to submit requests to exempt certain programs from the foreign aid freeze, which President Donald Trump imposed Jan. 20 and the State Department detailed how to execute on Jan. 24. Three days later, at least 56 senior career USAID staffers were abruptly placed on administrative leave. Three officials said many of those put on leave were lawyers involved in determining what programs might qualify for waivers, helping write proposals and submitting those waiver requests as they believed they had been invited to do. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal. A Trump administration directive that aid organizations interpret as a gag order has left them unwilling to speak publicly for fear of permanently losing U.S. funding.In an internal memo Monday about the staffing changes, new acting USAID administrator Jason Gray said the agency had identified several actions within USAID that appear to be designed to circumvent the Presidents Executive Orders and the mandate from the American people. As a result, we have placed a number of USAID employees on administrative leave with full pay and benefits until further notice while we complete our analysis of these actions, Gray wrote.A former senior USAID official said those put on leave had been helping aid organizations navigate the confusing process to seek waivers from the aid pause for specific life-saving projects, such as continuing clean water supplies for displaced people in war zones.Others were identified as having been involved in diversity, equity and inclusion programming, which the administration has banned.On Thursday, a USAID human resources official who tried to reverse the action, saying there was no justification for it, was himself placed on leave, according to two of the officials who had viewed internal emails and verified them as authentic. Reporters from ProPublica and Vox first reported the emails on X.The State Department and White House didnt respond to messages seeking comment about the staffing changes.The new leaders at USAID also abruptly laid off contractors who made up about half the workforce in the agencys humanitarian bureau Tuesday, knocking them out of systems so that some vanished in the middle of videoconferences, the former senior official said. The targeted institutional service contractors do everything from administrative and travel support to grant processing and data analytics. The staffing changes came three days after the State Department issued guidelines last Friday for implementing Trumps executive order freezing foreign assistance for 90 days. The department says its reviewing the money the United States is spending to ensure it adheres to administration policy. The guidelines initially exempted only military aid to Israel and Egypt and emergency food programs but also said program administrators and implementors could apply for waivers for programs that they believe would meet administration standards. On Tuesday, Rubio issued a broader waiver for programs that provide other life-saving assistance, including medicine, medical services, food and shelter, and again pointed to the possibility of waivers. Rubio pointed to the broadened exemptions in an interview Thursday with SiriusXM host Megyn Kelly. We dont want to see people die and the like, he said.Rubio said there would be a program-by-program review of which projects make America safer, stronger or more prosperous.The step of shutting down U.S.-funded programs during the 90-day review meant the U.S. was getting a lot more cooperation from recipients of humanitarian, development and security assistance, Rubio said. Because otherwise you dont get your money.The State Department said that since the aid freeze went into effect, it has approved dozens of waivers, although many were returned because they did not include enough detail. It said waiver requests for programs costing billions of dollars have been received and are being reviewed. The department did not specify how many waiver requests had been denied but said thus far its actions had stopped more than $1 billion from being spent on programs and projects that are not aligned with an America First agenda.Even with the broadening of exemptions for life-saving care, uncertainty surrounds what U.S.-funded programs legally can continue. Hundreds of thousands of people globally are going without access to medicine and humanitarian supplies and clinics are not getting medicine in time because of the funding freeze, aid organizations warn.AP reporter Rebecca Santana in Washington contributed. ELLEN KNICKMEYER Foreign policy, national security, foreign policy & climate twitter

United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken walks during a visit to the site of Moldelectrica Chisinau Substation in Braila, a USAID supported project, south of the capital of Moldova, Wednesday, May 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Vadim Ghirda, File)2025-01-31T06:19:02Z CHISINAU, Moldova (AP) President Donald Trumps abrupt freeze of U.S. foreign aid is sending shockwaves through Eastern Europe, leaving pro-democracy groups, independent media, civil society initiatives and local governments scrambling to make ends meet in a region often defined by rivalries between East and West. The U.S. State Department said that the 90-day freeze aims to root out waste and block so-called woke programs to expose U.S.-funded activities that run contrary to our national interests as Trump aggressively rolls out his America First agenda. Fears of a rise in influence from Russia and ChinaEastern Europe has been a longtime geopolitical battleground where Western foreign policy interests often collide with those of Moscow or Beijing.Many fear the cessation of U.S. funds could expose Washingtons allies and create a vacuum that its foes could gladly seek to fill.In Moldovas case, foreign donor support is vital to balancing the media landscape, says Oxana Greadcenco, the director of independent media platform Moldova.org. Many television networks and media institutions are funded by Russia so there needs to be a counterbalance ... This is an unprecedented situation, but we are trying not to panic. The U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID, informed her that grants officially ended on Jan. 24 and they arent allowed to spend any remaining funds in their accounts. This week, Greadcenco promoted their online Patreon campaign, which garnered 135 new backers in two days, which should cover salaries for the platforms 16-strong staff through March, she said. We did not expect it to impact Moldova so severely, as we thought there would only be a partial cut in funds, she told The Associated Press. Being aware of how much Moldova depends on U.S. funds, not just NGOs and the press but also local municipalities, many public institutions this is a shock for everyone. Vital aid for former communist countries Since the 1990s, USAID has invested several billion dollars in countries like Moldova, Serbia, Albania, Kosovo, and Bosnia and Herzegovina all former communist countries with aspirations of joining the European Union. In these countries, USAID money has promoted democratic institutions and reforms, aided infrastructure and energy security projects, bolstered businesses and economies, and supported a significant number of nongovernmental organizations and independent media platforms. The agency says it tailors its approach to each countrys unique challenges and opportunities.Its no exaggeration to say that we have democracy in Moldova, in part thanks to American financial support, Valeriu Pasa, the chairman of the Chisinau-based think-tank WatchDog, said in a statement on Wednesday. He added that the U.S. benefits from us being more democratic and developed, ensuring we dont turn into a Russian or Chinese colony.The wide-ranging effects of the USAID spending freeze spanning different sectors highlight how critical the funds are to the region.Sytrime Dervisholi, executive director of the Prefabricated Construction Association of Kosovo, says the halted USAID funds will adversely affect her associations ability to provide technical assistance to member companies that require vocational education and training, and access to grants. Kosovo, but also our association is dependent on foreign aid, mostly on U.S. aid, she said. So we really do hope that this measure will be canceled after 90 days, when the funding reviews by U.S. officials have concluded.Safet Gerxhaliu, an independent economic analyst in Kosovo, also believes the USAID freeze could have a very negative impact on the countrys future, affecting everything from the government to the private sector and education.I do believe that the impact is very bad, because those measures come at the same time that Kosovo is under sanctions from the European community, he said. Brussels froze some funding to Kosovo in 2023 following a series of clashes with ethnic Serb minorities.Although Serbia obtained EU candidate status in 2012, the Balkan nation is also a key ally of Russia and China in Europe. Under the government of populist President Aleksandar Vucic, reforms in areas such as strengthening the rule of law and tackling corruption have been slow, and the USAID suspension could further hamper progress. We currently have a USAID project about public financing. Training for local NGOs regarding following of public finances, Nemanja Nenadic from Transparency International organization in Serbia, told the AP. This has been put on hold. US funds help monitor electionsFor the Promo-LEX Association, a longtime pro-democracy and human rights NGO in Moldova, USAID funds are vital since they account for about 75-80% of its projects, which include monitoring elections, political financing and parliamentary oversight.All USAID-funded activities have been put on hold. Without immediate alternative support, these crucial activities may not continue at the same scale or effectiveness, said Ion Manole, the associations executive director. Given previous Russian interference through illicit campaign funding, political corruption, and disinformation our observation mission is essential to ensuring electoral transparency. Moldova will hold a pivotal parliamentary election this fall which comes after the pro-Western government accused Russia of meddling in two key votes last year including backing a vast vote-buying scheme in the country of about 2.5 million people.Without resources, we cannot deploy long-term observers, conduct election-day monitoring, or track foreign interference effectively, Manole said. A change to an anti-Western government could affect Moldovas European path and ... significantly destabilize the whole of Eastern Europe and the Black Sea region.We remain hopeful that the U.S. governments evaluation process will allow programs like ours to resume, he said, adding that his NGO is already seeking alternative funding, mainly from European donors. A geopolitical opportunity for Moscow Cristian Cantir, a Moldovan associate professor of international relations at Oakland University, told the AP that any suspension of aid gives Russia an unnecessary opportunity to exploit and benefit further from Moldovas weaknesses, which the lack of USAID funding would exacerbate.Moscow would therefore have greater abilities to derail Chisinau from its European Union integration course, he said. Similarly, cutting funding to independent news outlets makes it more difficult for journalists to hold corrupt politicians many of whom have connections to Russia accountable and therefore weakens Moldovas sovereignty and institutional independence.The Trump administration has cast the aid freeze as an accountability quest to justify American spending abroad. Beyond support for Ukraine in recent years, the U.S. is spending about $40 billion in foreign aid annually, according to the U.S. State Department.Greadcenco of the Moldova.org news platform hopes that other international partners will consider stepping in to stem a potential longer-term shortfall. These funds are vital to keeping Moldova afloat, she said. I dread to think what the complete cessation of these funds would mean for our country.___Stephen McGrath reported from Sighisoara, Romania. Jovana Gec in Belgrade, Serbia, Llazar Semini in Tirana, Albania, and Florent Bajrami in Pristina, Kosovo, contributed to this report. RSShttps://feedx.net https://feedx.site

FILE -Released hostage Ilana Gritzewsky poses for a portrait in her apartment in Kiryat Gat, Israel, on Dec. 15, 2024, near photos of her boyfriend, Matan Zangauker, who is being held hostage by Hamas in the Gaza Strip. (AP Photo/Tsafrir Abayov), File)2025-01-31T05:13:15Z TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) When Ilana Gritzewsky returned to Israel after being held captive in Gaza for 55 days in November 2023, she had so much adrenaline coursing through her body she couldnt sleep for two days.You dont understand that its really over, Gritzewsky recalled. You dont know who you are or even what your name is. A ceasefire between Israel and Hamas is underway and hostages are being released in stages. But after the initial jubilation of being freed, the released captives who have been held for more than 15 months are likely to endure a trying reentry, based on the testimony of those who were held hostage themselves.Gritzewsky, 31, who is originally from Mexico, was kidnapped with her boyfriend from Kibbutz Nir Oz on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas-led militants burst across the border, killing around 1,200 people, and kidnapping around 250 people, in an attack that sparked the war in Gaza. Gritzewsky was released after 55 days during the only previous ceasefire deal a year ago. More than a year later, Gritzewsky has lingering health issues. She hasnt regained all of the weight that she lost, shes prediabetic, and has lingering pain issues from the kidnapping, when her pelvis and jaw were broken and her leg was burned from the motorcycle exhaust. She suffered hearing loss in one ear. Im still not able to really take care of myself, she said. I dont think my brain has really grasped everything Ive gone through. Shes acknowledges she has neglected her own recovery as she advocates tirelessly for her boyfriends release.Fifteen hostages have been released from Gaza, in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners and detainees, as the current ceasefire for the war that has devastated Gaza moves into its second full week. More than 47,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza and wide swaths of the territory have been destroyed. Hamas is expected to release small groups weekly throughout the ceasefires initial six-week phase. There are approximately 80 hostages left in Gaza, almost half of whom Israel believes to be dead. The joy of a warm embrace, and a new reality sets inWhen Gritzewsky was freed, she was able to do what she had dreamed of during her captivity: hug her mother and see her family.She was desperate for a good steak, but due to concerns about health complications spurred by eating too much or too quickly in those with prolonged vitamin and nutritional deficiencies, it took time before she could eat what she wanted.Youre used to hostage conditions, so whenever you get food you put some to the side. You ask if you can go to the bathroom, if you can sleep, she said.The leadup to her release was traumatic. Gritzewsky said she was told four times she was being released, only to be brought to a different location. Each time her transfer didnt lead to freedom.I thought this was going to be my life forever, that I was going to be a doll for Hamas terrorists, Id end up having babies with them, I wanted to just smash my head into the wall and die, she said.Watching the released hostages enter Israel over the past week was a storm of emotions, said Gritzewsky. Its finally starting. Our heroes are starting to come out, and theyre leaving on their own two feet, she said. But theres also uncertainty about whether the ceasefire will hold. Gritzewskys boyfriend, Matan Zangauker, 25, is not on the list of 33 hostages expected to be released in the first stage of the ceasefire.Hostages must adjust to regaining their autonomyThe hostages stay in the hospital for several days as they undergo a battery of tests to determine next steps. All 15 of the hostages released over the past two weeks returned in stable condition but were suffering from mild starvation and vitamin deficiencies, according to Dr. Ami Banov, an Israeli military doctor who has treated the released hostages. He said many of them suffered injuries in the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack and that the medical care they received was nonexistent or poor quality. Many of them still have pieces of shrapnel in their body.Some of the women who have returned recently said they were held in tunnels and deprived of sunlight for at least eight months straight, said Banov, which can lead to major vision or skin issues. Those who were held in captivity with others seem to be faring better mentally than hostages who were kept alone, he said. Each hostage is accompanied by a dedicated team of doctors, nurses, specialists, psychologists, and social workers, medical officials said.One of the most important things is allowing the returned hostage to lead the recovery, explained Ofrit Shapira, a psychoanalyst who heads a group of health professionals treating freed hostages, their families, and survivors of the Oct. 7 attack. Everyone treating them must ask their permission for each little thing, from turning off a light to changing bedsheets to carrying out medical tests. They took everything away that defines them as humans, especially privacy and autonomy, and its a challenge to help them regain that, she said.Doctors refer to this process as grounding said Banov, who likened it to a decompression process, gradually helping the hostages understand they have regained control over such decisions as what to eat, what to wear and where and when to meet their families.We feel obligated to give them the option to do whatever they feel right, he said. But he said everything is being done in very small steps.Adina Moshe was freed after 49 days in captivity. In a first-person account on the Israeli news site N12, she said some hostages will return knowing little about any destruction to their homes or the fates of their loved ones. They will remain suspicious of people and have to contend with aggressive media. Any improvement in their condition can easily reverse, she said.In their souls, they will continue to remain in the tunnels for a long time, she wrote.It will take a long time to repair wounds of the soulAvichai Brodutch, whose wife and three children were kidnapped on Oct. 7 from Kibbutz Kfar Aza will never forget waiting for them to return in the hospital and the moment he saw them for the first time.The elevator doors opened and I got my family, reborn, he said. Brodutch said the return was both overwhelming and joyful because he feared his family had been killed during Hamas initial attack. He said they returned thin and lice-ridden.The physical issues were quickly treated. But Brodutch said captivity left a lasting imprint on his familys mental well-being. Each day, he hears a new story about something that happened in Gaza. They relive Oct. 7 over and over, and the challenges remain largest for his wife, Hagar, who cared for their three children and a neighbors child, Abigail Edan, then 3, while in captivity.Its going to take a long time to repair the wounds of the soul, he said. MELANIE LIDMAN Lidman is an Associated Press reporter based in Tel Aviv, Israel.

Israeli captive Arbel Yehoud, 29, who has been held hostage by Hamas in Gaza since October 7, 2023, is escorted by Hamas and Islamic Jihad fighters as she is handed over to the Red Cross in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, Thursday Jan. 30, 2025.(AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)2025-01-31T10:22:04Z Israeli strikes hit an unofficial border crossing in eastern Lebanon early Friday morning, killing two people and wounding 10, according to Lebanons Health Ministry.The Israeli military said in a statement that it struck a military site that included underground infrastructure for developing and producing combat equipment, in addition to infrastructure for crossing the Syrian-Lebanese border, used by the militant group Hezbollah in the Bekaa Valley.Hamas also released the names of three male hostages set to be released Saturday in the fourth round of exchanges in the ceasefire deal that has paused fighting in Gaza.The previous day in Gaza, Hamas released eight hostages in exchange for 110 Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.The chaotic sight of armed fighters escorting Israeli hostages through a crowd of thousands of onlookers caused Israeli leaders to briefly delay the release of the Palestinian prisoners, underscoring the fragility of the current truce. ___Heres the latest: Hamas releases names of hostages to be released in next exchange Hamas released the names of three male hostages set to be released Saturday. The list of hostages to be released includes Yarden Bibas, 35, Keith Siegel, 65, and Ofer Kalderon, 54, Israeli officials confirmed, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive matter.Saturdays release will be the fourth since the Israel-Hamas ceasefire took effect. Yarden Bibas was taken from Kibbutz Nir Oz on Oct. 7. Photos taken during the abduction appear to show him wounded. His wife, Shiri, and two boys, Ariel and Kfir, were also taken captive at the kibbutz. Hamas has claimed that Shiri Bibas and the two boys were killed in an Israeli airstrike, but Israel has not verified the claim.Keith Siegel, an American Israeli originally from Chapel Hill, North Carolina, was taken hostage from Kibbutz Kfar Aza along with his wife, Aviva Siegel. Aviva Siegel was released during a brief ceasefire period in November 2023, and since then has waged a high-profile campaign to free Keith and the other hostages remaining in Gaza.Kalderon, a French-Israeli hostage, was captured by the militants from Kibbutz Nir Oz along with his two children. His ex-wife, Hadas, was also taken captive. The two children and Hadas Kalderon were released during the hostage exchange in November. Israeli strikes hit LebanonBEIRUT Two people were killed and 10 others were wounded in an Israeli strike on an unofficial border crossing in eastern Lebanon early Friday morning, Lebanons Health Ministry said.The Israeli military said in a statement that it struck a military site that included underground infrastructure for developing and producing combat equipment, in addition to infrastructure for crossing the Syrian-Lebanese border, used by the militant group Hezbollah in the Bekaa Valley.The statement also accused Hezbollah of launching a reconnaissance drone toward Israel Thursday, saying its a violation of the ceasefire agreement that halted the Israel-Hezbollah war in late November.Lebanons state news agency said Israel launched four strikes on the Janta border crossing in the eastern province of Baalbeck, while two other strikes targeted two illegal Syria-Lebanon border crossings in northern Lebanon late Thursday and early Friday. In a statment, Hezbollah legislator Ibrahim Moussawi called the strikes a very dangerous violation and a blatant and explicit aggression, adding that the Lebanese state, represented by the presidency, the government and the army, is required to take immediate action.Hezbollah has long relied on Iran for weapons, moving arms into Lebanon through Syria. Hezbollah leader Naim Kassem has said that the fall of Syrian President Bashar Assad disrupted that route, and that the group will find alternative supply channels.