AP-National

By EMMA BURROWS, DASHA LITVINOVA and JIM HEINTZ Associated Press Russian President Vladimir Putin basked in a victory early Monday that was never in doubt, as partial election results showed him easily securing a fifth term after facing only token challengers and harshly suppressing opposition voices. With little margin for protest, Russians crowded outside polling

By JENNIFER PELTZ Associated Press NEW YORK (AP) — Judge Juan M. Merchan looked across his high-ceilinged courtroom, facing the defendant in a complicated case. Not the one everyone knows about. Yes, Merchan could become the first judge ever to oversee a former U.S. president’s criminal trial: Donald Trump’s hush money case. But on a

By JONATHAN LANDRUM Jr. AP Entertainment Writer LOS ANGELES (AP) — Usher was named entertainer of the year at the 55th annual NAACP Awards on Saturday night, which highlighted works by entertainers and writers of color. After Usher accepted his award at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles, the superstar R&B singer spoke about being

By SCOTT BAUER Associated Press MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Wisconsin voters are set to decide whether to make it unconstitutional to accept private grant money to help administer state elections, one of two Republican-backed ballot measures that Democrats say are meant to make it harder to conduct elections in the presidential battleground state. A related

By DAVID A. LIEB Associated Press People in North Carolina may have a little more riding on this year’s NCAA men’s and women’s basketball tournaments, as they will be able to legally bet on the games through their smartphone apps and computers for the first time. For the sixth straight year, the number of states

By TIA GOLDENBERG Associated Press TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — Hamas’ unprecedented raid on southern Israel has prompted a legal predicament: How does a country scarred by the deadliest attack in its history bring the perpetrators to justice? Israel is holding hundreds of Palestinians from Gaza accused of taking part in the Oct. 7 attack

By SOPHIA TAREEN Associated Press CHICAGO (AP) — Voters are set to cast their ballots to decide competitive U.S. House races during the Illinois primary. Democratic incumbents in at least two Chicago-area races are locked in energetic challenges in the strongly Democratic territory. U.S. Rep. Danny Davis faces one of the toughest reelections of his

By COLLEEN LONG Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden attended the annual Gridiron Club and Foundation Dinner this weekend, the first time during his presidency. It came as the 2024 election looms, and the night was jam-packed with politicians and other leaders. In one of several digs at his GOP rival, Donald Trump,

By JON GAMBRELL Associated Press DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — A suspected attack by Yemen’s Houthi rebels saw an explosive detonate near a ship early Sunday in the Gulf of Aden, potentially marking their latest assault on shipping through the crucial waterway leading to the Red Sea. The British military’s United Kingdom Maritime Trade

By SIBI ARASU Associated Press BENGALURU, India (AP) — Bhavani Mani Muthuvel and her family of nine have around five 20-liter (5-gallon) buckets worth of water for the week for cooking, cleaning and household chores. “From taking showers to using toilets and washing clothes, we are taking turns to do everything,” she said. It’s the

GUATEMALA CITY (AP) — A number of government and aid agencies in Haiti have reported their facilities and aid supplies have been looted as Haiti spirals into another wave of gang violence. Gangs have raged through Haiti in recent weeks attacking key institutions and shutting down the main international airport. The chaos has pushed many

By DALATOU MAMANE Associated Press NIAMEY, Niger (AP) — Niger’s junta says the U.S. military presence in the country is no longer justified after holding high-level talks with U.S. diplomatic and military officials this week, Niger plays a central role in the U.S. military’s operations in the Sahel, and is home to a major airbase.

ALBUEQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — New Mexico State police are seeking a suspect they have now identified in the shooting death of one of their officers. State Police Chief Troy Weisler said during a news conference Saturday that authorities are looking for 33-year-old Jaremy Smith of Marion, South Carolina, in the fatal shooting of Officer Justin

BEIRUT (AP) — Israeli airstrikes hit several sites in southern Syria early Sunday wounding a soldier, Syrian state media reported. State news agency SANA, citing an unnamed military official, said air defenses shot down some of the missiles, which came from the direction of the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights at around 12:42 a.m. local time. The

PHOENIX (AP) — The former elections director for a rural Arizona county who resigned last year because a flap over the hand-counting of ballots has been elevated to a top electoral post for the state. Lisa Marra left her job in southeastern Arizona’s Cochise County last year after refusing to follow the directives of the

GRINDAVIK, Iceland (AP) — A volcano in Iceland erupted Saturday evening for the fourth time in three months, sending orange jets of lava into the night sky. Iceland’s Meteorological Office said the eruption opened a fissure in the earth about 3 kilometers (almost 2 miles) long between Stóra-Skógfell and Hagafell mountains on the Reykjanes Peninsula.

By MEG KINNARD and JILL COLVIN Associated Press VANDALIA, Ohio (AP) — Former President Donald Trump claimed that he — not President Joe Biden — will protect Social Security and warned of a “bloodbath” if he loses in November as he campaigned for Senate candidate Bernie Moreno in Ohio. Trump, speaking on a wind-whipped airfield

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — The police department in Albuquerque, New Mexico, says a fourth officer has resigned during an investigation into alleged wrongdoing by officers assigned to a unit charged with stopping impaired drivers. The department says investigators had been trying to schedule an interview with Nelson Ortiz, but he resigned Thursday. Ortiz joined the

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has become his party’s official nominee for July’s highly anticipated presidential election, which will allow him to stroll into a third consecutive term with no real competition on the horizon. That is ot unusual to Venezuela. The July 28 election has been plagued with controversy since Maduro’s

By AUDREY McAVOY Associated Press HONOLULU (AP) — Maui’s mayor says he is prioritizing housing, evaluating evacuation routes and hiring more firefighters as his Hawaii community recovers from the deadliest U.S. wildfire in more than a century. Mayor Richard Bissen outlined the steps in emotional remarks more than seven months after the Aug. 8 wildfire