Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy wasn’t going to risk being accused of being ungrateful this time.
With peace talks on the table and a chance to rebound from his disastrous White House scolding six months ago, Zelenskyy made sure to show his gratitude to U.S. President Donald Trump during Monday’s meeting in the Oval Office.
In fact, he said thanks nine times to Trump and others in the first minute of their brief public meeting that preceded a short news conference.
“Thanks so much, Mr. President,” he said. “First of all, thank you for the invitation and thank you very much for your efforts, personal efforts to stop killings and stop this war. Thank you.”
In February, Zelenskyy’s meeting with Trump quickly spiraled into a public relations disaster when Vice President JD Vance berated him for not being sufficiently thankful.
“You should be thanking the President for trying to bring an end to this conflict,” Vance said in a moment that caught Zelenskyy off guard. “Have you said thank you once? In this entire meeting? No, in this entire meeting, have you said thank you?”
Zelenskyy tried to defend himself, saying he had always expressed his appreciation to the U.S. for the military and financial support it provided after Russia invaded it in 2022. But the damage was done.
World leaders took their cue and learned that flattery is the way to winning over the unpredictable Trump, a strategy on full display in a larger meeting later in the day that included other European leaders and the head of NATO.
Zelenskyy was advised by his peers on how to approach the meeting, said German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who had a much smoother Oval Office debut in June.
“He asked for that,” Merz said. “He saw that my meeting with Donald Trump went very differently from his meeting.”
With a chance to make a better second impression in the Oval Office, gratitude diplomacy was front and center for Zelenskyy.
And he twice thanked his European allies who had arrived as reinforcements in Washington to present a unified front to push for a ceasefire and security guarantees if there is a peace deal with Russia.
In a subsequent meeting with top leaders from Europe, Zelenskyy expressed his thanks at least seven times, including two mentions for a map Trump had presented him.
“Thank you for the map, by the way,” he said.
He was not alone.
Trump himself used the T-word about a dozen times in the later meeting and heaped praise on his fellow leaders from Europe.
He called Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni a great leader with a long career ahead, said he liked French President Emmanuel Macron even more since he’s gotten to know him — something he noted was unusual for him — and he complimented Merz’s tan.
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who has worked hard to forge a close relationship with Trump, thanked the president four times, noting that after three years of fighting, nobody else had been able to bring the conflict as close to a possible end.
“So I thank you for that,” Starmer said.
Ben Hodges, former commanding general of the U.S. Army in Europe, said the “whole lot of deference and homage” paid to Trump was “nauseating but necessary” to keep Trump in support of NATO.
NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, who addressed Trump as “dear Donald” during the meeting, later called the president “amazing.”
Walmart has recalled frozen, raw shrimp sold in 13 states because federal health officials say it could have potential radioactive contamination.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration asked Walmart to pull three lots of Great Value brand frozen shrimp from stores after federal officials detected Cesium-137, a radioactive isotope, in shipping containers and a sample of breaded shrimp imported from Indonesia.
The products could pose a “potential health concern” for people exposed to low levels of Cesium-137 over time, FDA officials said.
“If you have recently purchased raw frozen shrimp from Walmart that matches this description, throw it away,” FDA officials said in a statement.
The risk from the recalled shrimp is “quite low,” said Donald Schaffner, a food safety expert at Rutgers University.
Cesium-137 is a byproduct of nuclear reactions, including nuclear bombs, testing, reactor operations and accidents. It’s widespread around the world, with trace amounts found in the environment, including soil, food and air.
The level detected in the frozen breaded shrimp was far lower than FDA intervention levels. However, the agency said that avoiding potentially contaminated products could reduce exposure to low-level radiation that could lead to health problems over time.
The FDA is investigating reports of Cesium-137 contamination in shipping containers and products processed by P.T. Bahari Makmur Sejati, doing business as BMS Foods of Indonesia. U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials alerted FDA that they found Cesium-137 in shipping containers sent to U.S. ports in Los Angeles, Houston, Miami and Savannah, Georgia.
FDA officials collected several product samples and detected contamination in one sample of frozen breaded shrimp. The shipping containers and products were denied entry into the U.S.
However, the FDA then learned that Walmart had received potentially affected products imported after the first detection, from shipments that did not trigger contamination alerts.
Walmart immediately recalled the products, a company spokesperson said. They include Great Value brand frozen raw shrimp with lot codes 8005540-1, 8005538-1 and 8005539-1, all with best-by dates of March 15, 2027. The shrimp was sold in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Mississippi, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Texas and West Virginia. Consumers should discard the products or return them to any Walmart store for refund.
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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
Wall Street is holding steady on Tuesday, stuck in a summer lull.
The S&P 500 slipped 0.2%, a day after barely budging, and remains near its all-time high set last week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 68 points, or 0.2%, as of 9:35 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was down 0.4%.
Home Depot rose 3.1% to lead the Dow higher after reporting results for the latest quarter that were a bit short of what analysts expected.
The retailer said homeowners have been focused on smaller, less expensive home repairs while putting off bigger projects because of high interest rates and continuing concerns about inflation. But it stood by its prior forecast for revenue and profit over the full year.
Other big retailers will deliver their latest profit updates in coming days. Lowe’s and Target are on deck for Wednesday, while Walmart and Ross Stores will report on Thursday.
The week’s likely headliner, though, will not arrive until Friday, which could keep trading on Wall Street relatively quiet until then. That’s when the chair of the Federal Reserve, Jerome Powell, will give a highly anticipated speech in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. The setting has been home to big policy announcements from the Fed in the past, and the hope on Wall Street is that Powell may give a hint that cuts to interest rates are coming soon.
The Fed has been keeping its main interest rate steady this year, primarily because of the fear of the possibility that President Donald Trump’s tariffs could push inflation higher. But a surprisingly weak report on job growth across the country and worries about the U.S. economy may be superseding that.
Traders on Wall Street widely expect the Fed to cut interest rates at its next meeting in September. Treasury yields have come down notably in the bond market as a result, and they remained lower on Tuesday.
The yield on the 10-year Treasury slipped to 4.31% from 4.34% late Monday.
Strategists at Bank of America, though, warn that Powell may not sound as inclined to cut interest rates as the market is expecting. He could remain non-committal and discuss the possibility of a worst-case scenario for the economy called “stagflation.” The Fed has no good tool to fix that situation, where the economy stagnates at the same time as inflation remains high.
On Wall Street, Palo Alto Networks climbed 6.5% after reporting profit and revenue for the latest quarter that topped analysts’ expectations. The cybersecurity company also gave forecasts for profit and revenue in its upcoming fiscal year that were above Wall Street’s.
Tegna rose 4.8% after Nexstar Media Group said it will buy the owner of 64 television stations across the country for $22 per share in cash, giving the deal a total value of $6.2 billion, including debt. Nexstar, which owns the CW and local television broadcasters of its own, added 7.2%.
The companies said combining will give them a broader reach and allow them to better compete with Big Tech and legacy media.
Viking Therapeutics tumbled 39.7% after the biopharmaceutical company released results from a clinical trial of its oral tablet, which could treat obesity and other metabolic disorders.
In stock markets abroad, indexes rose in Europe after falling modestly in Asia.
Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 index slipped 0.4% as market heavyweight SoftBank Group Corp. fell 4% after it announced it was taking a $2 billion stake in U.S. chip maker Intel.
Intel, which has been climbing recently on reports that the Trump administration may take an ownership stake in the company, climbed 7.5%.
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AP Business Writers Matt Ott and Elaine Kurtenbach contributed.
President Donald Trump says he has begun arrangements for a face-to-face meeting between Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelenskyy to discuss a pathway to end Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
“I called President Putin, and began the arrangements for a meeting, at a location to be determined, between President Putin and President Zelenskyy,” Trump said in a social media posting following lengthy talks at the White House on Monday with Zelenskyy and European leaders. “After that meeting takes place, we will have a Trilat, which would be the two Presidents, plus myself. Again, this was a very good, early step for a War that has been going on for almost four years.”
Earlier on Monday, Trump said during talks with Zelenskyy and European leaders that a potential ceasefire and who gets Ukrainian territory seized by Russia should be hashed out during a face-to-face meeting between the warring countries’ two leaders.
The talks at the White House came days after Trump hosted Putin for a summit at a U.S. military base in Alaska in which he tilted toward Putin’s demands that Ukraine make concessions over land seized by Russia, which now controls roughly one-fifth of Ukrainian territory.
“We’re going to let the president go over and talk to the president and we’ll see how that works out,” Trump said during his meeting with Zelenskyy and the European leaders. Trump and Zelenskyy also expressed hope of soon holding three-way talks among the U.S., Russian and Ukrainian leaders.
Trump also said he would back European security guarantees for Ukraine as he met with Zelenskyy and the leaders of France, Britain, Germany, Italy and Finland, as well as the president of the European Commission and the head of NATO.
Trump stopped short of committing U.S. troops to a collective effort to bolster Ukraine’s security. He said instead that there would be a “NATO-like” security presence and that all those details would be hashed out with EU leaders.
“They want to give protection and they feel very strongly about it and we’ll help them out with that,” Trump said. “I think its very important to get the deal done.”
Speaking Monday before the White House meetings took place, Russia’s Foreign Ministry rejected the idea of a possible NATO peacekeeping force in Ukraine. Such a scenario could see further escalation and “unpredictable consequences,” ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova warned.
Trump’s engagement with Zelenskyy had a strikingly different feel to their last Oval Office meeting in February. It was a disastrous moment that led to Trump abruptly ending talks with the Ukrainian delegation, and temporarily pausing some aid for Kyiv, after he and Vice President JD Vance complained that Zelenskyy had shown insufficient gratitude for U.S. military assistance.
Zelenskyy at the start of the meeting presented a letter from his wife, Olena Zelenska, for Trump’s wife, Melania. Trump hand-delivered a letter to Putin from the U.S. first lady urging him to consider the children impacted by the conflict and bring an end to the brutal 3 1/2 year war.
Trump at one point needled Zelenskyy over Ukraine delaying elections. They had been scheduled for last year but were delayed because of the ongoing Russian invasion. Ukrainian law does not allow presidential elections to be held when martial lawis in effect.
Trump joked that a similar circumstance wouldn’t play well in the U.S.
Zelenskyy faced criticism during his February meeting from a conservative journalist for appearing in the Oval Office in a long sleeve T-shirt. This time he appeared in a dark jacket and buttoned shirt.
Zelenskyy has said his typically less formal attire since the start of the full-scale Russian invasion in 2022 is to show solidarity with Ukrainian soldiers.
Monday’s hastily assembled meeting came after Trump met in Alaska on Friday with Putin. After that meeting, Trump said the onus is now on Zelenskyy to agree to concessions of land that he said could end the war.
Trump said he plans to talk to Putin after his meetings with Zelenskyy and European leaders.
“We’ll see in a certain period of time, not very far from now, a week or two weeks, we’re going to know whether or not we’re going to solve this or is this horrible fighting going to continue,” Trump said.
The European leaders were left out of Trump’s summit with Putin. They want to safeguard Ukraine and the continent from any widening aggression from Moscow. Many arrived at the White House with the explicit goal of protecting Ukraine’s interests — a rare show of diplomatic force.
Ahead of Monday’s meeting, Trump suggested that Ukraine could not regain Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014, setting off an armed conflict that led to its broader 2022 invasion.
“President Zelenskyy of Ukraine can end the war with Russia almost immediately, if he wants to, or he can continue to fight,” Trump wrote Sunday night on social media. “Remember how it started. No getting back Obama given Crimea (12 years ago, without a shot being fired!), and NO GOING INTO NATO BY UKRAINE. Some things never change!!!”
Zelenskyy responded with his own post late Sunday, saying, “We all share a strong desire to end this war quickly and reliably.” He said that “peace must be lasting,” not as it was after Russia seized Crimea and part of the Donbas in eastern Ukraine eight years ago, and “Putin simply used it as a springboard for a new attack.”
European heavyweights in Washington
Putin opposes Ukraine joining NATO outright, yet Trump’s team claims the Russian leader is open to Western allies agreeing to defend Ukraine if it comes under attack.
European leaders suggested forging a temporary ceasefire is not off the table. Following his meeting with Putin on Friday, Trump dropped his demand for an immediate ceasefire and said that he would look to secure a final peace settlement between Russia and Ukraine — a sudden shift to a position favored by Putin.
At the start of Monday’s meeting with European leaders, the German and French leaders praised Trump for opening a path to peace, but they urged the U.S. president to push Russia for a ceasefire.
“I would like to see a ceasefire from the next meeting, which should be a trilateral meeting,” said German Chancellor Friedrich Merz.
Trump, for his part, on Monday reiterated that a broader, war-ending peace agreement between the two countries is “very attainable,” but that “all of us would obviously prefer the immediate ceasefire while we work on a lasting peace.”
The other European leaders in attendance were: European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, French President Emmanuel Macron, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni, Finnish President Alexander Stubb and NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte.
‘A big step’
European leaders are still looking for a concrete details about what U.S. involvement would be toward building a security guarantee for Ukraine.
Still, Rutte, the NATO Secretary-General, called Trump’s commitment to security guarantees “a big step, a breakthrough.”
Zelenskyy outlined what he said his country needed to feel secure, which included a “strong Ukrainian army” through weapons sales and training. The second part, he said, would depend on the outcome of Monday’s talks and what EU countries, NATO and the U.S. would be able to guarantee to the war-torn country.
Trump briefed Zelenskyy and European allies shortly after the Putin meeting. Details from the discussions emerged in a scattershot way that seemed to rankle the U.S. president, who had chosen not to outline any terms when appearing afterward with Putin.
Rose Hammond pushed authorities for years to lower the 55 mph speed limit on a two-lane road that passes her assisted living community, a church, two schools and a busy park that hosts numerous youth sports leagues.
“What are you waiting for, somebody to get killed?” the 85-year-old chided officials in northwest Ohio, complaining that nothing was being done about the motorcycles that race by almost daily.
Amid growing public pressure, Sylvania Township asked county engineers in March to analyze whether Mitchaw Road’s posted speed is too high. The surprising answer: Technically, it’s 5 mph too low.
The reason dates back to studies on rural roads from the 1930s and 1940s that still play an outsized role in the way speed limits are set across the U.S. — even in urban areas.
Born from that research was a widely accepted concept known as the 85% rule, which suggests a road’s posted speed should be tied to the 15th-fastest vehicle out of every 100 traveling it in free-flowing traffic, rounded to the nearest 5 mph increment.
But after decades of closely following the rule, some states — with a nudge from the federal government — are seeking to modify if not replace it when setting guidelines for how local engineers should decide what speed limit to post.
Drivers set the speed
The concept assumes that a road’s safest speed is the one most vehicles travel — neither too high nor too low. If drivers think the speed limit should be raised, they can simply step on the gas and “vote with their feet,” as an old brochure from the Institute of Transportation Engineers once put it.
“The problem with this approach is it creates this feedback loop,” said Jenny O’Connell, director of member programs for the National Association of City Transportation Officials. “People speed, and then the speed limits will be ratcheted up to match that speed.”
The association developed an alternative to the 85% rule known as “City Limits,” which aims to minimize the risk of injuries for all road users by setting the speed limit based on a formula that factors in a street’s activity level and the likelihood of conflicts, such as collisions.
The report points out the 85% rule is based on dated research and that “these historic roads are a far cry from the vibrant streets and arterials that typify city streets today.”
Amid a recent spike in road deaths across the country, the Federal Highway Administration sent a subtle but important message to states that the 85% rule isn’t actually a rule at all and was carrying too much weight in determining local speed limits. In its first update since 2009 to a manual that establishes national guidelines for traffic signs, the agency clarified that communities should also consider such things as how the road is used, the risk to pedestrians, and the frequency of crashes.
Leah Shahum, who directs the Vision Zero Network, a nonprofit advocating for street safety, said she wishes the manual had gone further in downplaying the 85% rule but acknowledges the change has already impacted the way some states set speed limits. Others, however, are still clinging to the simplicity and familiarity of the longstanding approach, she said.
“The 85th percentile should not be the Holy Grail or the Bible, and yet over and over again it is accepted as that,” Shahum said.
Rethinking the need for speed
Under its “20 is Plenty” campaign, the Wisconsin capital of Madison has been changing signs across the city this summer, lowering the speed limit from 25 mph to 20 mph on local residential streets.
When Seattle took a similar step in a pilot program seven years ago, not only did it see a noticeable decline in serious injury crashes but also a 7% drop in the 85th percentile speed, according to the Vision Zero Network.
California embraces the 85% rule even more than most states as its basis for setting speed limits. But legislators have loosened the restrictions on local governments a bit in recent years, allowing them to depart from the guidelines if they can cite a proven safety need. Advocates for pedestrians and bicyclists say the change helps, but is not enough.
“We still have a long way to go in California in terms of putting value on all road users,” said Kendra Ramsey, executive director of the California Bicycle Coalition. “There’s still a very heavy mindset that automobiles are the primary method of travel and they should be given priority and reverence.”
But Jay Beeber, executive director for policy at the National Motorists Association, an advocacy organization for drivers, said following the 85% rule is usually the safest way to minimize the variation in speed between drivers who abide by the posted limit and those who far exceed it.
“It doesn’t really matter what number you put on a sign,” Beeber said. “The average driver drives the nature of the roadway. It would be patently unfair for a government to build a road to encourage people to drive 45 mph, put a 30 mph speed limit on it, and then ticket everyone for doing what they built the road to do.”
80 is the new 55
Fears about oil prices prompted Congress in the 1970s to set a 55 mph national maximum speed limit, which it later relaxed to 65 mph before repealing the law in 1995 and handing the authority to states. Since then, speed limits have kept climbing, with North Dakota this summer becoming the ninth state to allow drivers to go 80 mph on some stretches of highway. There’s even a 40-mile segment in Texas between Austin and San Antonio where 85 mph is allowed.
Although high-speed freeways outside major population centers aren’t the focus of most efforts to ease the 85% rule, a 2019 study from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety — a research arm funded by auto insurers — illustrates the risks. Every 5 mph increase to a state’s maximum speed limit increases the chance of fatalities by 8.5% on interstate highways and 2.8% on other roads, the study found.
“Maybe back when you were driving a Model T you had a real feel for how fast you were going, but in modern vehicles you don’t have a sense of what 80 mph is. You’re in a cocoon,” said Chuck Farmer, the institute’s vice president for research, who conducted the study.
A town’s attempt at change
If elected officials in Sylvania Township, Ohio, got their way, Mitchaw Road’s posted speed limit would be cut dramatically — from 55 mph to 40 mph or lower. The county’s finding that the 85% rule actually calls for raising it to 60 mph surprised the town’s leaders, but not the engineers who ran the study.
“If we don’t make decisions based on data, it’s very difficult to make good decisions,” Lucas County Engineer Mike Pniewski said.
For now, the speed limit will remain as it is. That’s because Ohio law sets maximum speeds for 15 different types of roadways, regardless of what the 85% rule suggests.
And Ohio’s guidelines are evolving. The state now gives more consideration to roadway context and allows cities to reduce speed limits based on the lower standard of the 50th percentile speed when there’s a large presence of pedestrians and bicyclists. Authorities there recently hired a consultant to consider additional modifications based on what other states are doing.
“States have very slowly started to move away from the 85th percentile as being kind of the gold standard for decision-making,” said Michelle May, who manages Ohio’s highway safety program. “People are traveling and living differently than they did 40 years ago, and we want to put safety more at the focus.”
It’s unclear whether any of these changes will ultimately impact the posted speed on Mitchaw Road. After years of futile calls and emails to state, county and township officials, Hammond says she isn’t holding her breath.
Air Canada said it suspended plans to restart operations on Sunday after the union representing 10,000 flight attendants said it will defy a return to work order. The strike was already affecting about 130,000 travelers around the world per day during the peak summer travel season.
Canada’s largest airline now says it will resume flights Monday evening. Air Canada said in a statement that the union “illegally directed its flight attendant members to defy a direction from the Canadian Industrial Relations Board.”
“Our members are not going back to work,” Canadian Union of Public Employees national president Mark Hancock said outside Toronto’s Pearson International Airport. “We are saying no.”
Hancock ripped up a copy of the back-to-work order outside the airport’s departures terminal where union members were picketing Sunday morning. He said they won’t return Tuesday either.
The federal government didn’t immediately provide comment on the union refusing to return to work.
Hancock said the “whole process has been unfair” and said the union will challenge what it called an unconstitutional order.
Less than 12 hours after workers walked off the job, Federal Jobs Minister Patty Hajdu ordered the 10,000 flight attendants back to work, saying now is not the time to take risks with the economy and noting the unprecedented tariffs the U.S. has imposed on Canada. Hajdu referred the work stoppage to the Canada Industrial Relations Board.
The airline said the CIRB has extended the term of the existing collective agreement until a new one is determined by the arbitrator.
The shutdown of Canada’s largest airline early Saturday was impacting about 130,000 people a day. Air Canada operates around 700 flights per day.
Tourist Mel Durston from southern England was trying to make the most of sightseeing in Canada. But she said she doesn’t have a way to continue her journey.
“We wanted to go see the Rockies, but we might not get there because of this,” Durston said. “We might have to head straight back.”
James Hart and Zahara Virani were visiting Toronto from Calgary, Alberta for what they thought would be a fun weekend. But they ended up paying $2,600 Canadian ($1,880) to fly with another airline on a later day after their Air Canada flight got canceled.
“It’s a little frustrating and stressful, but at the same time, I don’t blame the flight attendants at all,” Virani said. “What they’re asking for is not unreasonable whatsoever.”
Flight attendants walked off the job around 1 a.m. EDT on Saturday. Around the same time, Air Canada said it would begin locking flight attendants out of airports.
The bitter contract fight escalated Friday as the union turned down Air Canada’s prior request to enter into government-directed arbitration, which allows a third-party mediator to decide the terms of a new contract.
Last year, the government forced the country’s two major railroads into arbitration with their labor union during a work stoppage. The union for the rail workers is suing, arguing the government is removing a union’s leverage in negotiations.
Hajdu maintained that her Liberal government is not anti-union, saying it is clear the two sides are at an impasse.
Passengers whose flights are impacted will be eligible to request a full refund on the airline’s website or mobile app, according to Air Canada.
The airline said it would also offer alternative travel options through other Canadian and foreign airlines when possible. Still, it warned that it could not guarantee immediate rebooking because flights on other airlines are already full “due to the summer travel peak.”
Air Canada and CUPE have been in contract talks for about eight months, but they have yet to reach a tentative deal. Both sides have said they remain far apart on the issue of pay and the unpaid work flight attendants do when planes aren’t in the air.
The airline’s latest offer included a 38% increase in total compensation, including benefits and pensions, over four years, that it said “would have made our flight attendants the best compensated in Canada.”
But the union pushed back, saying the proposed 8% raise in the first year didn’t go far enough because of inflation.
Special U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff said Sunday that Russian leader Vladimir Putin agreed at his summit with President Donald Trump to allow the U.S. and European allies to offer Ukraine a security guarantee resembling NATO’s collective defense mandate as part of an eventual deal to end the 3 1/2-year war.
“We were able to win the following concession: That the United States could offer Article 5-like protection, which is one of the real reasons why Ukraine wants to be in NATO,” he said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” He added that it “was the first time we had ever heard the Russians agree to that.”
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, speaking at a news conference in Brussels with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said that “we welcome President Trump’s willingness to contribute to Article 5-like security guarantees for Ukraine, and the ‘Coalition of the willing’ — including the European Union — is ready to do its share.”
Witkoff, offering some of the first details of what was discussed at Friday’s summit in Alaska, said the two sides agreeing to “robust security guarantees that I would describe as game-changing.” He added that Russia said that it would make a legislative commitment not to go after any additional territory in Ukraine.
Zelenskyy thanked the United States for recent signals that Washington is willing to support security guarantees for Ukraine, but said the details remained unclear.
“It is important that America agrees to work with Europe to provide security guarantees for Ukraine,” he said. “But there are no details how it will work, and what America’s role will be, Europe’s role will be and what the EU can do, and this is our main task, we need security to work in practice like Article 5 of NATO, and we consider EU accession to be part of the security guarantees.”
Witkoff defended Trump’s decision to abandon his push for Russian to agree to an immediate ceasefire, saying the president had pivoted toward a peace deal because so much progress was made.
“We covered almost all the other issues necessary for a peace deal,” Witkoff said, without elaborating.
“We began to see some moderation in the way they’re thinking about getting to a final peace deal,” he said.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio insisted there would be “additional consequences” as Trump warned before meeting with Putin, if they failed to reach a ceasefire. But Rubio noted that there wasn’t going to be any sort of deal on a truce reached when Ukraine wasn’t at the talks.
“Now, ultimately, if there isn’t a peace agreement, if there isn’t an end of this war, the president’s been clear, there are going to be consequences,” Rubio said on ABC’s “This Week.” “But we’re trying to avoid that. And the way we’re trying to avoid those consequences is with an even better consequence, which is peace, the end of hostilities.”
Rubio, who is also Trump’s national security adviser, said he did not believe issuing new sanctions on Russia would force Putin to accept a ceasefire, noting that the latter isn’t off the table but that “the best way to end this conflict is through a full peace deal.”
“The minute you issue new sanctions, your ability to get them to the table, our ability to get them to table will be severely diminished,” Rubio said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
He also said “we’re not at the precipice of a peace agreement” and that getting there would not be easy and would take a lot of work.
“We made progress in the sense that we identified potential areas of agreement, but there remains some big areas of disagreement. So we’re still a long ways off,” Rubio said.
Zelenskyy and Europeans leaders are scheduled to meet Monday with Trump at the White House. They heard from the president after his meeting with Putin.
“I think everybody agreed that we had made progress. Maybe not enough for a peace deal, but we are on the path for the first time,” Witkoff said.
He added: “The fundamental issue, which is some sort of land swap, which is obviously ultimately in the control of the Ukrainians — that could not have been discussed at this meeting” with Putin. “We intend to discuss it on Monday. Hopefully we have some clarity on it and hopefully that ends up in a peace deal very, very soon.”
President Donald Trump meets with Russia's President Vladimir Putin Friday, Aug. 15, 2025, at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, Alaska. At left is Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and second from right is Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
For decades, Miles “Burt” Marshall was the man you went to see in a stretch of upstate New York if you had some money to invest but wanted to keep it local.
Working from an office in the charming village of Hamilton, down the road from Colgate University, Marshall prepared taxes and sold insurance. He also took money for what was sometimes called the “8% Fund,” which guaranteed that much in annual interest no matter what happened with the financial markets.
His clients spread the word to family and friends. Have a retirement nest egg? Let Burt handle it. He’ll invest it in local rental properties and your money will grow faster than in a bank.
Marshall was friendly and folksy. He gave away gift bags with maple syrup, pickles and local honey in jars labeled with cute sayings like, “Don’t be a sap. For proper insurance coverage call Miles B. Marshall.”
“He would tell you about all the other people that invest. Churches invest. Fire companies invest. Doctors invest,” said one client, Christine Corrigan. “So you’d think, ‘Well, they’re smart people. They wouldn’t be doing this if it wasn’t okay to do … Why are you going to be the suspicious one?”
Then it all came crashing down.
Marshall owed almost 1,000 people and organizations about $95 million in principal and interest when he filed for bankruptcy protection two years ago, according to the trustee’s filings.
This summer, the 73-year-old businessman was indicted on charges that his investment business was a Ponzi scheme. He could face prison time if convicted.
Marshall’s lawyers declined to comment.
Total losses by Marshall’s investors fall short of the multibillion-dollar Ponzi scheme masterminded by Bernie Madoff. But they loom large in the small, college town of about 6,400 people and its largely rural surrounding area.
Many investors were Colgate professors, laborers, office workers or retirees. Some lost their life’s savings of tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars. Corrigan and her husband, who own a restaurant 30 miles (48 kilometers) east, were owed about $1.5 million.
Now they’re wondering how someone who seemed so reliable, who held annual parties for his clients and even called them on their birthdays could betray their trust.
“You look at life differently after this happens. It’s like, ‘Who do you trust?’” said Dennis Sullivan, who was owed about $40,000. “It’s sad because of what he’s done to the area.”
A reliable local businessman
Marshall and his wife lived in a brick Victorian, blocks from his office. Aside from insurance and tax preparation, he rented more than 100 properties and ran a self-storage business and a print shop.
His parents had run an insurance and realty business in the area and the Marshall name was respected locally.
Though he quit college, he was a federally enrolled tax professional. To many in the area, he seemed knowledgeable about money and kept a neat office.
“He had French doors and a beautiful carpet and a big desk and he just looked like he was prosperous and reliable,” Corrigan said.
Marshall began taking money from people to buy and maintain rental properties in the 1980s. People got back promissory notes — slips of paper with the dollar amount written in. Withdrawals could be made with 30 days’ notice. People could choose to receive regular interest payments.
Participants saw the transactions as investments. Marshall has called them loans.
For many years, Marshall made good on his promises to pay interest and process withdrawals. More people took part as word spread. Sullivan recalls how his parents gave Marshall money, then he did, then his fiancee, then his fiancee’s daughter, then his son, and even his snowmobile club.
”Everybody gets snowballed into it,” Sullivan said.
A number of investors lived in other states, but had connections to the area.
The promise of 8% returns was unremarkable in the ’80s, a time of higher interest rates. But it stood out later as rates dropped. Marshall told a bankruptcy proceeding that he assumed appreciation on his real estate would more than cover the debts.
“That’s obviously false now,” he said, according to filings, “but that’s what I always thought.”
Reckoning with more than $90 million in debt
The money stopped flowing by 2023.
Marshall filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection that April, declaring more than $90 million in liabilities and $21.5 million in assets, most of it in real estate.
He explained in a filing that he had been been hospitalized for a “serious heart condition” that required two surgeries, costing him $600,000. As news of his illness spread, there was a run on note holders asking for their money back.
The bankruptcy trustee, Fred Stevens, blamed Marshall’s insolvency on incompetent business practices and borrowing from people at above-market rates. The trustee contended that by 2011, Marshall was using new investment money to pay off previous investors, the hallmark of a Ponzi scheme.
Prosecutors claim Marshall falsely represented the profitability of his real estate business and had his staff generate “transaction summaries” with bogus information about account balances and earned interest.
Money was funneled into his other businesses and he spent hundreds of thousands of investors’ dollars on personal expenses, including airline travel, meals out, groceries and yoga studios, according to prosecutors.
Marshall’s clients feel betrayed.
“We left it there so that it would accumulate. Well, it accumulated in his pocket,” Barbara Baltusnik said of her investment.
The ripple effects of multimillion-dollar losses
Marshall pleaded not guilty in June to charges of grand larceny and securities fraud. He’s accused of stealing more than $50 million.
Marshall’s home and properties were sold as part of bankruptcy proceedings, which continue. People who gave Marshall their money stand to recoup around 5.4 cents on the dollar from the asset sales. Potential claims against financial institutions are being pursued, according to the trustee.
Baltusnik said she and her husband were owed hundreds of thousands of dollars and now she wonders how she will pay doctors’ bills. Sullivan’s mother moved in with him after losing her investment.
In Epworth, Georgia, retiree Carolyn Call will never see money she hoped would help augment her Social Security payments. She found out about Marshall though an uncle who lived in upstate New York.
“I’m just able to pay my bills and keep going,” she said. “Nothing extravagant. No trips. Can’t do anything hardly for the grandkids.”
The federal budget deficits caused by President Donald Trump’s tax and spending law could trigger automatic cuts to Medicare if Congress does not act, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office reported Friday.
The CBO estimates that Medicare, the federal health insurance program for Americans over age 65, could potentially see as much as $491 billion in cuts from 2027 to 2034 if Congress does not act to mitigate a 2010 law that forces across-the-board cuts to many federal programs once legislation increases the federal deficit. The latest report from CBO showed how Trump’s signature tax and spending law could put new pressure on federal programs that are bedrocks of the American social safety net.
Trump and Republicans pledged not to cut Medicare as part of the legislation, but the estimated $3.4 trillion that the law adds to the federal deficit over the next decade means that many Medicare programs could still see cuts. In the past, Congress has always acted to mitigate cuts to Medicare and other programs, but it would take some bipartisan cooperation to do so.
Democrats, who requested the analysis from CBO, jumped on the potential cuts.
“Republicans knew their tax breaks for billionaires would force over half a trillion dollars in Medicare cuts — and they did it anyway,” said Rep. Brendan F. Boyle, the top Democrat on the House Budget Committee, in a statement. “American families simply cannot afford Donald Trump’s attacks on Medicare, Medicaid, and Obamacare.”
Hospitals in rural parts of the country are already grappling with cuts to Medicaid, which is available to people with low incomes, and cuts to Medicare could exacerbate their shortfalls.
As Republicans muscled the bill through Congress and are now selling it to voters back home, they have been highly critical of how CBO has analyzed the bill. They have also argued that the tax cuts will spur economic growth and pointed to $50 billion in funding for rural hospitals that was included in the package.
President Donald Trump at a White House event on July 30 with Health and Human Service Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., left, and Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Mehmet Oz, right.
Kylan Darnell became an overnight celebrity in the TikTok niche that documents the glitzy, ritualistic recruitment process for sororities. As a 21-year-old rising senior four years later, she’s taking more of her sorority life offline.
Darnell has until now been the embodiment of RushTok, a week-long marathon that has teens at schools around the country meticulously documenting their efforts to land a cherished spot in a sorority during the colorful, girly and enigmatic recruitment process known as rush week.
Reactions to the content that once catapulted her to fame — depicting her life as a Zeta Tau Alpha member at the University of Alabama — had become so negative that it was affecting her mental health, she said.
“This year it was just like a whole different level of hate,” Darnell said.
Citing a need to protect prospects from harassment, many sororities have made similar moves, issuing a de facto ban against talking to the press or posting on social media during rush week at Alabama, where almost 13,000 students participate in the nation’s largest on-campus Greek life.
A centuries-old tradition
Across the country, rush is typically a 10-day event where “prospective new members” try out sororities through rounds of activities prescribing a strict slate of outfits and etiquette. In the lead-up, girls often submit “social resumes” and letters of recommendation from sorority alums.
Participation often requires an eye-opening price tag.
After spending sometimes tens of thousands of dollars on outfits, makeup and plane tickets, each of this week’s 2,600 recruits paid $550 to participate. It’s non-refundable if they don’t get picked. If accepted, they’ll pay an average $8,400 a semester to live in the sorority house, or $4,100 if they live elsewhere, according to the Alabama Panhellenic Association.
The pressure can be so intense that an industry of consultants now helps girls navigate the often mysterious criteria for landing a desired sorority. Some charge up to $10,000 for months of services that can begin in high school.
Throughout rush, many events are invite-only. At any point, girls can get a dreaded call informing them they’ve been dropped — that a sorority is no longer interested in letting them join. Matches are finally made on bid day as prospects rank top choices and sororities make offers.
Morgan Cadenhead, now 20, gained such an audience on RushTok despite being dropped that she covered most of her tuition with income from social media. Then came the social cost as she was slammed online for criticizing Greek life. Now the marketing major — featured on Lifetime’s “Sorority Mom’s Guide to Rush!” — said she’s looking for offline work.
A zealous TikTok following
A fixation with rush was renewed when sororities resumed in-person recruiting after the pandemic.
Social media became flooded with “outfit of the day” and “get ready with me” videos showing sorority members and recruits in well-lit rooms, sometimes flaunting exorbitantly priced designer wear or pieces purchased on Amazon, always precisely curated.
Alabama’s Greek life got attention before, when its traditionally white sororities racially integrated, accepting their first Black members in 2013. Targeted by protests following allegations of racial discrimination, the university agreed with the Justice Department in 2016 to encourage diversity. Today, Black students outside of traditionally Black sororities and fraternities represent 2% of the total Greek membership, the university website says.
Meanwhile, online attention to rush has led to books, a polarizing documentary and the reality television series, widening the appeal of sororities in the South in particular, according to Lorie Stefaneli, a New York City-based consultant who flies to Tuscaloosa each year for rush.
Stefaneli coaches girls from around the country, and about a third of her clients enroll at Alabama. She says many are drawn by the vibrant depictions of sisterhood, showing female friendships that can ensure girls feel seen and supported.
“That’s the reason why a lot of them want to go to Alabama, is because they see it on TikTok,” Stefaneli said.
Recruits told to stop posting — or else
If they gain enough followers to become social influencers, RushTok participants can earn ad revenue and brand deals. Darnell’s posts brought her financial independence, more than covering the $58,000 it costs her annually to attend Alabama from out-of-state.
Rush can be fun and help girls build confidence, but it’s also an “emotional rollercoaster,” especially for girls who feel they need to reveal themselves to a massive audience, Stefaneli said. She answers phone calls at all hours of the night during rush week.
“I’m literally a therapist, I’m talking these girls down from a ledge,” she said.
Numerous incoming freshmen told The Associated Press this week that they were expressly prohibited from speaking with the media or even posting about rush at Alabama. Darnell said the most selective “Old Row” houses will automatically drop prospects who do.
“Now a lot of girls just come to the university to be influencers,” she said. “It kind of gets in the way of sisterhood.”
Some incoming freshmen — including Darnell’s 19-year-old sister Izzy, with a vast social media following of her own — have chosen to post anyway, satisfying a demand that can reach millions of views within days.
Izzy Darnell — who wouldn’t share her choices for sorority ahead of Saturday’s bid day — said her older sister’s acumen has equipped her to navigate criticism and potentially predatory business deals. But she worries about how other girls might handle the fame and money.
“I just fear what some girls will do because they think they have to,” Izzy Darnell said.
Singer Sean Kingston was sentenced to three and a half years in prison Friday after being convicted of a $1 million fraud scheme in which he leveraged his fame to dupe sellers into giving him luxury items that he then never paid for.
Kingston, whose legal name is Kisean Paul Anderson, and his mother, Janice Eleanor Turner, were convicted in March by a federal jury of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and four counts of wire fraud. Turner was sentenced to five years in prison last month.
Before U.S. Judge David Leibowitz handed down Kingston’s sentence, the singer apologized to the judge in the South Florida courtroom and said he had learned from his actions. His attorney asked if he could self-surrender at a later date due to health issues, but the judge ordered him taken into custody immediately. Kingston, who was wearing a black suit and white shirt, removed his suit jacket and was handcuffed and led from the courtroom.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Marc Anton described Kingston as someone addicted to his celebrity lifestyle even though he could no longer afford to maintain it.
“He clearly doesn’t like to pay and relies on his celebrity status to defraud his victims,” Anton said Friday.
The federal prosecutor described a yearslong pattern by Kingston of bullying victims for luxury merchandise and then refusing to pay.
“He is a thief and a conman, plain and simple,” Anton said.
Defense attorney Zeljka Bozanic countered that the 35-year-old Kingston had the mentality of a teenager — the age he was when he vaulted to stardom. The attorney said Kingston had almost no knowledge of his finances, relying on business managers and his mother.
“No one showed him how to invest his money,” Bozanic said. “Money went in and money went out on superficial things.”
Bozanic said Kingston has already started paying back his victims and intends to pay back every cent once he is free and can start working again.
Leibowitz rejected the idea that Kingston was unintelligent or naive, but the judge said he gave Kingston credit for accepting responsibility and declining to testify rather than possibly lying in court. That was in contrast to Kingston’s mother, whose trial testimony Leibowitz described as obstruction.
Kingston and his mother were arrested in May 2024 after a SWAT team raided Kingston’s rented mansion in suburban Fort Lauderdale. Turner was taken into custody during the raid, while Kingston was arrested at Fort Irwin, an Army training base in California’s Mojave Desert, where he was performing.
According to court records, Kingston used social media from April 2023 to March 2024 to arrange purchases of luxury merchandise. After negotiating deals, Kingston would invite the sellers to one of his high-end Florida homes and promise to feature them and their products on social media.
Investigators said that when it came time to pay, Kingston or his mother would text the victims fake wire receipts for the items, which included a bulletproof Escalade, watches and a 19-foot (5.9-meter) LED TV, investigators said.
When the funds never cleared, victims often contacted Kingston and Turner repeatedly, but were either never paid or received money only after filing lawsuits or contacting law enforcement, authorities said.
Kingston, who was born in Florida and raised in Jamaica, shot to fame at age 17 with the 2007 hit “Beautiful Girls,” which laid his lyrics over Ben E. King’s 1961 song “Stand By Me.” His other hits include 2007’s “Take You There” and 2009’s “Fire Burning.”
A former police chief known as the “Devil in the Ozarks” spent months planning his escape from an Arkansas prison, and said lax security in the kitchen where he worked allowed the convicted murderer to gather the supplies he needed, an internal review by prison officials released Friday said.
The Department of Corrections’ critical incident review of Grant Hardin’s May 25 escape from the Calico Rock prison provides the most detailed description so far of his planning and the issues that allowed him to walk out of the facility.
Hardin was captured 1.5 miles (2.4 kilometers) northwest of the Calico Rock prison on June 6. Authorities said he escaped by donning an outfit he designed to look like a law enforcement uniform.
Hardin, who worked in the prison’s kitchen, said he spent six months planning his escape and used black Sharpie markers and laundry he found lying around the kitchen to create the fake uniform, according to the report. Hardin fashioned a fake badge using the lid of a can.
“Hardin stated he would hide the clothes and other items he was going to need in the bottom of a trash can in the kitchen due to no one ever shaking it down,” the report says.
Two prison employees have been fired for procedure violations that led to Hardin’s escape. They include a kitchen employee who allowed Hardin on a back dock unsupervised and a tower guard who unlocked the back gate that Hardin walked through without confirming his identity. Several other employees have been suspended and one demoted, lawmakers were told this week.
The kitchen’s staff was “very lax on security,” Hardin told investigators, allowing him to gather what he needed for his escape. Hardin said he didn’t have any help from staff or other inmates. Hardin had constructed a ladder from wooden pallets in case he needed to scale the prison fence but didn’t need it.
“(Hardin) stated when he walked up to the gate, he just directed the officer to ‘open the gate,’ and he did,” the report says.
After he escaped from the prison, Hardin survived on food he had smuggled out of the prison along with distilled water from his CPAP machine. Hardin also drank creek water and ate berries, bird eggs and ants.
“He said his plan was to hide in the woods for six months if need be and begin moving west out of the area,” the report says.
Hardin, a former police chief in the small town of Gateway, near the Arkansas-Missouri border, is serving lengthy sentences for murder and rape. He was the subject of the TV documentary “Devil in the Ozarks.”
The report is one of two reviews into Hardin’s escape, which is also being investigated by the Arkansas State Police. A legislative subcommittee has also been holding hearings about the escape.
Republican Rep. Howard Beaty, who co-chairs the Legislative Council’s Charitable, Penal and Correctional Institutions Subcommittee, said the panel hoped to discuss both reports with officials at a hearing next month.
Republican Sen. Ben Gilmore, who sits on the panel, said he didn’t think the department’s review took a thorough enough look at the systemic issues that enabled Hardin’s escape.
“They have focused on the final failure instead of all of the things that led up to it,” he said.
The report also cites confusion among corrections officials in the early stages of Hardin’s escape about which law enforcement agencies had been notified, the report says.
“It is obvious there was a lot of confusion during the beginning stages of opening the command center and of notifications being made,” the report says.
Hardin had been misclassified and shouldn’t have been held at the primarily medium-security prison, according to the review. After he was captured, Hardin was moved to a maximum-security prison. He has pleaded not guilty to escape charges, and his trial is set for November.
Hardin’s custody classification hadn’t been reviewed since October 2019, the report says.
The Department of Corrections’ review says officials had taken several steps since Hardin’s escape, including removing the electric locks from the gates to prevent someone from walking out without an officer present.
The report also calls for additional cameras after finding a blind spot on the dock Hardin used, and for any “shakedown” searches for contraband to include mechanical rooms and side rooms.
This combo of images released by the Arkansas Department of Corrections shows the recapture of escaped inmate Grant Hardin, an ex-police chief and convicted killer, by Arkansas law enforcement officers and the U.S. Border Patrol, June 6, 2025, near Moccasin Creek in Izard County, about 1.5 miles (2.4 kilometers) northwest of Calico Rock prison. in Calico Rock, Ark.
Greg Iles, the Mississippi author of the “Natchez Burning” trilogy and other works, has died. He was 65.
Iles died Friday after a decades-long battle with the blood cancer multiple myeloma, his literary agent Dan Conaway posted Saturday on Facebook.
Initially diagnosed with the incurable condition in 1996, he kept his illness private until completing his final novel, “Southern Man,” which was published in 2024.
Iles was born in Germany but moved to Natchez, Mississippi, with his family when he was just three years old and developed a deep connection with the region. Many of his stories are set in Mississippi, including the “Natchez Burning” trilogy, historical fiction suspense novels exploring race and class in the 1960s Jim Crow South.
Conaway described Iles as “warm, funny, fearless, and completely sui generis.”
“To be on the other end of the phone as he talked through character and plot, problem-solving on the fly, was to be witness to genius at work, plain and simple,” he wrote on Saturday. “As a writer he fused story-craft, bone-deep humanity, and a growing sense of moral and political responsibility with the ferocious precisions of a whirling dervish or a master watchmaker.”
In March 2011, Iles suffered a ruptured aorta and a partial leg amputation and spent eight days in a medically induced coma after another driver struck his car on Highway 61 near Natchez. He eventually recovered.
Iles performed with the musical group The Rock Bottom Remainders along with popular authors Stephen King, Amy Tan and others.
New York Times best-selling author Greg Iles of Natchez, Miss., states the need for a change of the Mississippi state flag during the seventh annual Statehood Day celebration Thursday, Dec. 10, 2015, in Jackson, Miss.
Canada’s government forced Air Canada and its striking flight attendants back to work and into arbitration Saturday after a work stoppage stranded more than 100,000 travelers around the world during the peak summer travel season.
Federal Jobs Minister Patty Hajdu said now is not the time to take risks with the economy, noting the unprecedented tariffsthe U.S. has imposed on Canada. The intervention means the 10,000 flight attendants will return to work soon.
The government’s action came less than 12 hours after workers walked off the job.
“The talks broke down. It is clear that the parties are not any closer to resolving some of the key issues that remain and they will need help with the arbitrator,” Hajdu said.
Hajdu said the full resumption of services could take days, noting it is up to the Canada Industrial Relations Board. Meanwhile, Wesley Lesosky, president of the Air Canada Component of the CUPE union, accused the government of violating the flight attendants’ constitutional right to strike — and decried Hajdu for only waiting hours to intervene.
“The Liberal government is rewarding Air Canada’s refusal to negotiate fairly by giving them exactly what they wanted,” Lesosky said.
Air Canada did not immediately have additional comments when reached Saturday afternoon. But Air Canada Chief Operating Officer Mark Nasr previously said it could take up to a week to fully restart operations. It’s likely that travelers will continue to see disruptions in the coming days.
Existing agreement will stay in place through arbitration
The shutdown of Canada’s largest airline early Saturday is impacting about 130,000 people a day, and some 25,000 Canadians may be stranded. Air Canada operates around 700 flights per day.
According to numbers from aviation analytics provider Cirium, Air Canada had canceled a total of 671 flights by Saturday afternoon — following 199 on Friday. And another 96 flights scheduled for Sunday were already suspended.
Hajdu ordered the Canada Industrial Relations Board to extend the term of the existing collective agreement until a new one is determined by the arbitrator.
“Canadians rely on air travel every day, and its importance cannot be understated,” she said.
Union spokesman Hugh Pouliot didn’t immediately know what day workers would return to work. “We’re on the picket lines until further notice,” he said.
The bitter contract fight escalated Friday as the union turned down Air Canada’s prior request to enter into government-directed arbitration, which allows a third-party mediator to decide the terms of a new contract.
‘Such little progress has been made’
Flight attendants walked off the job around 1 a.m. EDT on Saturday. Around the same time, Air Canada said it would begin locking flight attendants out of airports.
Ian Lee, an associate professor at Carleton University’s Sprott School of Business, earlier noted the government repeatedly intervenes in transportation strikes.
“They will intervene to bring the strike to an end. Why? Because it has happened 45 times from 1950 until now,” Lee said. “It is all because of the incredible dependency of Canadians.”
Last year, the government forced the country’s two major railroads into arbitration with their labor union during a work stoppage. The union for the rail workers is suing, arguing the government is removing a union’s leverage in negotiations.
The Business Council of Canada had urged the government to impose binding arbitration in this case, too. And the Canadian Chamber of Commerce welcomed the intervention.
“With valuable cargo grounded and passengers stranded, the government made the right decision to refer the two sides to binding arbitration,” said Matthew Holmes, the executive vice president for the Chamber of Commerce — adding that “close to a million Canadians and international visitors could be impacted” if it takes Air Canada a week to be fully operational again.
Hajdu maintained that her Liberal government is not anti-union, saying it is clear the two sides are at an impasse.
Passengers whose flights are impacted will be eligible to request a full refund on the airline’s website or mobile app, according to Air Canada.
The airline said it would also offer alternative travel options through other Canadian and foreign airlines when possible. Still, it warned that it could not guarantee immediate rebooking because flights on other airlines are already full “due to the summer travel peak.”
Many travelers expressed frustration over Air Canada’s response to the strike.
Jean‐Nicolas Reyt, 42, said he had heard little from Air Canada just hours before his upcoming flight from France scheduled for Sunday.
“What’s stressful is to not hear anything from Air Canada,” said Reyt, who is trying to return to Montreal, where he is an associate professor of organizational behavior at McGill University. He said he only received one email from the airline on Thursday warning of potential strike disruptions, but had no further information as of Saturday evening in Cannes, where he was visiting family.
Reyt assumes his upcoming flight could be canceled — much like the scores of other lengthy disruptions this weekend. “I’m just very surprised that Air Canada let it go this far,” he said. “It’s really a bit disheartening that they fly you somewhere abroad and then they just don’t fly you back.”
Jennifer MacDonald, of Halifax, Nova Scotia, expressed similar frustration. She has been trying to help her brother and cousin get home to Edmonton, Alberta since the second leg of their Air Canada trip was canceled during what was supposed to be a 1-hour layover in Montreal on Friday night.
The two had to pay $300 out of their own pocket for a hotel, MacDonald said. All Saturday morning, they tried to look for rebooking options, but everything was sold out, she added. Eventually, they opted to book a new flight for Aug. 22 out of Halifax, with another family member volunteering to make an eight-hour drive to pick them up in Montreal and bring them back east on Saturday.
“It will be a multiday ordeal and a multi thousand dollar trip,” MacDonald said. But as stressful as the disruptions have been, she added that her family stands in solidarity with the flight attendants. “We hope that Air Canada lifts the lockout and negotiates fairly.”
Following the news of the Canadian government forcing arbitration on Saturday, Reyt also expressed concern for Air Canada’s flight attendants. “I think the flight attendants are making some reasonable arguments,” he said, adding that he hopes the intervention isn’t “a way just to silence them.”
Sides are far apart on pay
Air Canada and the Canadian Union of Public Employees have been in contract talks for about eight months, but they have yet to reach a tentative deal.
Both sides say they remain far apart on the issue of pay and the unpaid work flight attendants do when planes aren’t in the air.
“We are heartbroken for our passengers. Nobody wants to see Canadians stranded or anxious about their travel plans but we cannot work for free,” Natasha Stea, an Air Canada flight attendant and local union president, said before the government intervention was announced.
The attendants are about 70% women. Stea said Air Canada pilots, who are male dominated, received a significant raise last year and questioned whether they are getting fair treatment.
The airline’s latest offer included a 38% increase in total compensation, including benefits and pensions over four years, that it said “would have made our flight attendants the best compensated in Canada.”
But the union pushed back, saying the proposed 8% raise in the first year didn’t go far enough because of inflation.
The U.S. plans to build a $750 million factory in southern Texas to breed billions of sterile flies, ramping up its efforts to keep flesh-eating maggots in Mexico from crossing the border and damaging the American cattle industry.
Secretary Brooke Rollins announced Friday that the U.S. Department of Agriculture hopes to be producing and releasing sterile male New World screwworm flies into the wild within a year from the new factory on Moore Air Base outside Edinburg, Texas, about 20 miles (32 kilometers) from the border. She also said the USDA plans to deploy $100 million in technology, such as fly traps and lures, and step up border patrols by “tick riders” mounted on horseback and train dogs to sniff out the parasite.
In addition, Rollins said the U.S. border will remain closed to cattle, horse and bison imports from Mexico until the U.S. sees that the pest is being pushed back south toward Panama, where the fly had been contained through late last year through the breeding of sterile flies there. The U.S. has closed its border to those imports three times in the past eight months, the last in July, following a report of an infestation about 370 miles (595 kilometers) from the Texas border.
American officials worry that if the fly reaches Texas, its flesh-eating maggots could cause billions of dollars in economic losses and cause already record retail beef prices to rise even more, fueling greater inflation. The parasite also can infest wildlife, household pets and, occasionally, humans.
“Farm security is national security,” Rollins said during a news conference at the Texas State Capitol in Austin with Texas Gov. Greg Abbott. “All Americans should be concerned. But it’s certainly Texas and our border and livestock producing states that are on the front lines of this every day.”
The pest was a problem for the American cattle industry for decades until the U.S. largely eradicated it in the 1970s by breeding and releasing sterile male flies to breed with wild females. It shut down fly factories on U.S. soil afterward.
The Mexican cattle industry has been hit hard by infestations and the U.S. closing its border to imports.
Mexico’s Agriculture ministry said in a statement Friday that Mexico Agriculture and Rural Development Secretary Julio Berdegué Sacristán and Rollins signed a screwworm control action plan. It includes monitoring with fly-attracting traps and establishing that livestock can only be moved within Mexico through government-certified corrals, the statement said.
And on the X social media platform, Berdegué said, “We will continue with conversations that lead to actions that will permit the reopening of livestock exports.”
The new fly-breeding factory in Texas would be the first on U.S. soil in decades and represents a ramping up of the USDA’s spending on breeding and releasing sterile New World screwworm flies. The sterile males are released in large enough numbers that wild females can’t help but mate with them, producing sterile eggs that don’t hatch. Eventually, the wild fly population shrinks away because females mate only once in their weekslong lives.
In June, Rollins announced a plan to convert an existing factory for breeding fruit flies into one for breeding sterile New World Screwworm flies, as well as a plan to build a site, also on the air base near Edinburg, for gathering flies imported from Panama and releasing them from small aircraft. Those projects are expected to cost a total of $29.5 million.
The Panama fly factory can breed up to 117 million flies a week, and the new Mexican fly factory is expected to produce up to 100 million more a week. Rollins said the new Texas factory would produce up to 300 million a week. She said President Donald Trump’s administration wants to end the U.S. reliance on fly breeding in Mexico and Panama.
“It’s a tactical move that ensures we are prepared and not just reactive, which is today what we have really been working through,” Rollins said.
Washington’s police department chief said that a Trump administration order installing a federal official as its head would upend command structure and be a “dangerous” threat to law and order. Police Chief Pamela Smith’s statement came in a court filing as the city seeks to block the federal takeover of its police department in court.
Washington’s top legal official sought an emergency restraining order in federal court blocking a Trump administration move to put a federal official in charge of its police. District of Columbia Attorney General Brian Schwalb argues the police takeover is illegal and threatens to “wreak operational havoc.”
The lawsuit comes after U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi said Thursday night that Drug Enforcement Administration boss Terry Cole will assume the police chief’s duties and approval authority for any orders issued to officers. It was unclear where the move left the city’s current police chief, Smith, who works for the mayor.
Schwalb argues the new order goes beyond Trump’s authority and implementing it would “sow chaos” in the Metropolitan Police Department. “The administration’s unlawful actions are an affront to the dignity and autonomy of the 700,000 Americans who call D.C. home. This is the gravest threat to Home Rule that the District has ever faced, and we are fighting to stop it,” Schwalb said.
The Justice Department declined to comment on the district’s lawsuit, and a White House spokesperson did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment Friday morning.
The police takeover is the latest move by Trump to test the limits of his legal authorities to carry out his agenda, relying on obscure statutes and a supposed state of emergency to bolster his tough-on-crime message and his plans to speed up the mass deportation of people in the United States illegally.
It also marks one of the most sweeping assertions of federal authority over a local government in modern times. While Washington has grappled with spikes in violence and visible homelessness, the city’s homicide rate ranks below those of several other major U.S. cities, and the capital is not in the throes of the public safety collapse the Trump administration has portrayed.
Chief had agreed to share immigration information
Schwalb had said late Thursday that Bondi’s directive was “unlawful,” arguing it could not be followed by the city’s police force. He wrote in a memo to Smith that “members of MPD must continue to follow your orders and not the orders of any official not appointed by the Mayor,” setting up the legal clash between the heavily Democratic district and the Republican administration.
The district’s attorney general is an elected position and the city’s top legal officer. It’s separate from federal U.S. attorney appointed by the president to serve in Washington, a role now filled by former Fox News Channel host and judge Jeanine Pirro. Trump also appointed Bondi as U.S. attorney general, the nation’s top law enforcement official.
Bondi’s directive came even after Smith had told MPD officers hours earlier to share information with immigration agencies regarding people not in custody, such as someone involved in a traffic stop or checkpoint. The Justice Department said Bondi disagreed with the police chief’s directive because it allowed for continued enforcement of “sanctuary policies,” which generally limit cooperation by local law enforcement with federal immigration officers.
Bondi said she was rescinding that order as well as other MPD policies limiting inquires into immigration status and preventing arrests based solely on federal immigration warrants. All new directives must now receive approval from Cole, the attorney general said.
Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser pushed back Thursday, writing on social media that “there is no statute that conveys the District’s personnel authority to a federal official.”
The president has more power over the nation’s capital than other cities, but D.C. has elected its own mayor and city council since the Home Rule Act was signed in 1973.
Trump is the first president to exert control over the city’s police force since it was passed. The law limits that control to 30 days without congressional approval, though Trump has suggested he’d seek to extend it. Schwalb argues the president’s role is narrow under the law, limited to requiring the mayor to provide police services for federal purposes.
Residents are seeing a significant show of force
A population already tense from days of ramp-up has begun seeing more significant shows of force across the city. National Guard troops watched over some of the world’s most renowned landmarks and Humvees took position in front of the busy main train station. Volunteers helped homeless people leave long-standing encampments — to where was often unclear.
Department of Homeland Security police stood outside Nationals Park during a game Thursday between the Washington Nationals and the Philadelphia Phillies. DEA agents patrolled The Wharf, a popular nightlife area, while Secret Service officers were seen in the Foggy Bottom neighborhood.
Bowser, walking a tightrope between the Republican White House and the constituency of her largely Democratic city, was out of town Thursday for a family commitment in Martha’s Vineyard but would be back Friday, her office said.
The uptick in visibility of federal forces around the city, including in many high-traffic areas, has been striking to residents going about their lives. Trump has the power to take over federal law enforcement for 30 days before his actions must be reviewed by Congress, though he has said he’ll re-evaluate as that deadline approaches.
Officers set up a checkpoint in one of D.C.’s popular nightlife areas, drawing protests. Troops were stationed outside the Union Station transportation hub as the 800 Guard members who have been activated by Trump started in on missions that include monument security, community safety patrols and beautification efforts, the Pentagon said.
Troops will assist law enforcement in a variety of roles, including traffic control posts and crowd control, National Guard Major Micah Maxwell said. The Guard members have been trained in de-escalation tactics and crowd control equipment, Maxwell said.
National Guard troops are a semi-regular presence in D.C., typically being used during mass public events like the annual July 4 celebration. They have regularly been used in the past for crowd control in and around Metro stations.
President Donald Trump announced plans to deploy federal officers and the National Guard to the District in order to place the DC Metropolitan Police Department under federal control and assist in crime prevention in the nation's capital.
When Terrence Dwyer received a knock on his door and a flyer for a solar panel system small enough to fit on his deck, he was quickly sold. Solar systems that plug into regular wall outlets have been popular in Europe for years and are gaining traction in the U.S. for their affordability and simple installation.
“We thought absolutely, let’s do this right away,” said Dwyer, who lives in Oakland, California.
These small-scale solar systems could become attractive to more homeowners now that President Donald Trump’s sweeping budget-and-policy package will scrap residential rooftop solar tax credits and may shift interest to cheaper alternatives. Even before the GOP bill passed, manufacturers of the smaller systems known as plug-in or balcony solar were seeing increased demand and other positive signs such as a new Utah law streamlining regulations for homeowners to buy and install them. The systems about the size of a door haven’t been as widely adopted in the U.S. as in Europe because of lack of awareness, patchwork utility rules and limited availability.
The $2,000 plug-in solar system installed on Dwyer’s backyard deck in March consists of two 400 watt panels, an inverter, a smart meter and a circuit breaker. It saves him around $35 per month on his power bill because he is consuming less energy from the grid, but he said reducing his carbon footprint was his primary motivation.
“We like the environmental benefits of solar and wanted to engage with solar in some fashion,” Dwyer said.
Had Dwyer opted for rooftop solar, he would have paid $20,000 for the system and $30,000 to upgrade his roof to support the panels.
Installing a plug-in solar system requires some homework. What power companies let customers do with energy-generating equipment varies, which is why prospective purchasers should check their utility’s policies first. Building permits might be required depending on the municipality. Some systems can be self-installed, while others may require an electrician. For example, some kits have meters that must be wired into a home’s circuit breaker.
Removing hurdles for plug-in solar
Dwyer bought his system from Bright Saver, a nonprofit company in California that advocates for plug-in solar. In addition to the type Dwyer bought, the company also offers a smaller model costing $399 that recently sold out in six days.
“The interest and demand have been overwhelming,” said Cora Stryker, a founder of Bright Saver. “It is clear that we are hitting a nerve — many Americans have wanted solar for a long time but have not had an option that is feasible and affordable for them until now.”
Kevin Chou, another founder of Bright Saver, said wider adoption of the systems in the U.S. has been hindered by utility policies that create uncertainty about whether they’re allowed and a lack of state and local policies to make clear what rules apply.
Some utilities contacted by The Associated Press say plug-in solar systems require the same interconnection applications as rooftop panels that send electricity back to the wider network. But Steven Hegedus, an electrical engineering professor at University of Delaware, said he doesn’t understand why a utility would need to require an interconnection agreement for plug-in solar because, unlike rooftop systems, they are designed to prevent energy from flowing to the grid.
Still, if in doubt, a customer should follow their utility’s policy.
During the early days of plug-in solar’s growth, some opposition from utilities is likely since customers are buying less energy, said Robert Cudd, a research analyst at the California Center for Sustainable Communities at the University of California, Los Angeles.
“Utilities really prefer everyone being a predictable and generous consumer of the electricity they sell,” Cudd said.
This year, Utah enacted a novel law supporting plug-in solar by exempting certain small-scale systems from interconnection agreements and establishing safety requirements such as being certified by a nationally recognized testing organization such as Underwriters Laboratories. It appears to be the only state that’s passed legislation supporting plug-in solar, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
Republican state Rep. Raymond Ward, who sponsored the legislation, said the smaller systems allow people to better manage where their energy comes from and what they pay.
“Europe has these things. You can go buy them and they work and people want them. There is no reason why we shouldn’t have them here in the United States,” Ward said.
Bright Saver says they are lobbying other states for similar legislation.
Alexis Abramson, dean of the University of Columbia Climate School, also applauded Utah’s move.
“We actually need more localities, more states putting in allowances for this type of equipment,” she said.
Plug-in solar availability and savings potential
Some questions remain about how much customers could save. Severin Borenstein, a professor at the University of California, Berkeley’s Haas School of Business, said the cost of some portable solar systems in the U.S. would make it hard for customers to come out ahead on their utility bills over the time they own them. He estimates the price of a $2,000 system in the U.S. works out to paying about $0.20 a kilowatt-hour over a 25-year period, which only saves people money if they have high utility costs. By comparison, Borenstein said the cost of systems sold in Europe, typically around $600, is equivalent to paying about $0.05 or $0.06 per kilowatt-hour over 25 years.
Baltimore resident Craig Keenan said saving money was only part of why he installed one of the smaller Bright Saver models on his balcony in July.
“I’m interested in renewable energy because the amount of carbon emissions that we produce as a species is very, very unsustainable for our world,” he said.
He said he expects the system will save him about $40 per year on utility bills, so it would take him about 10 years to recoup the cost of the kit.
Keenan, a mechanical engineer, said installation took him 10 to 15 minutes.
“I think anyone can install this,” he said. “It’s not complicated. It doesn’t require a technical degree.”
Other companies selling plug-in solar kits include Texas-based Craftstrom. It has sold about 2,000 systems in the U.S. since 2021, mostly in California, Texas and Florida. The company’s basic kits contain a solar panel that can fit in a backyard or other sunny space, along with equipment to maintain and regulate the flow of energy including an inverter and smart meter.
Kenneth Hutchings, Craftstrom’s chief revenue officer, said their U.S. sales rose this year even before the passage of the GOP tax bill, and he expects demand for plug-in solar to increase further as federal rooftop solar credits expire.
The company advises customers to notify their power company before installation, but it has “never had any pushback from any utility,” said Michael Scherer, one of the founders of Craftstrom.
China-based EcoFlow plans to begin selling plug-in solar systems in Utah and expand to other states if supportive legislation is passed, said Ryan Oliver, a company spokesperson.
“This is an example of where technology is sort of ahead of the regulators,” Oliver said, adding: “As this rolls out to more of a nationwide product, we expect it will become more mainstream as people understand it better.”
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Associated Press video journalist Mingson Lau in Baltimore contributed to this report.
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The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.
A library book has been returned nearly 82 years after it was borrowed from the San Antonio Public Library. It came with a letter noting that “Grandma won’t be able to pay for it anymore.”
The book is “Your Child, His Family, and Friends” by marriage and family counselor Frances Bruce Strain. It was checked out in July 1943 and returned this past June from a person in Oregon, the library said in a news release.
“After the recent death of my father, I inherited a few boxes of books he left behind,” the person wrote in a letter that was shared by the library on Instagram and signed with the initials P.A.A.G.
The book was a guide for parents on helping their children navigate personal relationships. It was checked out when the person’s father was 11 years old.
“The book must have been borrowed by my Grandmother, Maria del Socorro Aldrete Flores (Cortez),” the person wrote. “In that year, she transferred to Mexico City to work at the US Embassy. She must have taken the book with her, and some 82 years later, it ended up in my possession.”
The book had received write-ups in various newspapers at the time. The Cincinnati Enquirer described it in June 1943 as a “complete guidebook to the personal relationships of the child with his family and the outside world.” The New York Times noted a month later that Strain was a psychologist and mother of two who was “best known for her wise, sensitive, but unsentimental presentation of sex education.”
The person who returned the book wrote in the letter: “I hope there is no late fee for it because Grandma won’t be able to pay for it anymore.”
The library said in a news release that it eliminated overdue fines in 2021. The inside cover of the book was stamped with the warning that the fine for overdue books was three cents a day. Not accounting for inflation, the penalty would amount to nearly $900.
Three cents in July 1943 amounts to 56 cents in today’s money, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Inflation Calculator. That would add up to more than $16,000.
The library noted that the book is in “good condition.” It’ll be on display in the city’s central library through August. It will then be donated to the Friends of San Antonio Public Library and sold to benefit the library.
Eight decades may seem like a long time for an overdue library book, but it’s nowhere near the record. Guinness World Records says the most overdue library book was returned to Sidney Sussex College, University of Cambridge, England, in 1956.
It was borrowed in 1668, some 288 years earlier. No fine was extracted.
U.S. stocks are hanging around their record levels on Friday as Wall Street heads toward the finish of another winning week.
The S&P 500 edged down by 0.1% from the all-time high it set the day before, but it’s still on track to close its fourth winning week in the last five. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 86 points, or 0.2%, as of 10:10 a.m. Eastern time, and flirting with its record set in December. The Nasdaq composite slipped 0.2%, hurt by losses for tech stocks.
The U.S. stock market set records this week as expectations built that the Federal Reserve will deliver a cut to interest rates at its next meeting in September. Lower rates can boost investment prices and the economy by making it cheaper for U.S. households and businesses to borrow to buy houses, cars or equipment, but they also risk worsening inflation.
A disappointing report about inflation at the U.S. wholesale level on Thursday made traders pare back bets for coming cuts to interest rates, but they’re still overwhelmingly expecting them. Such anticipation has sent Treasury yields notably lower in the bond market, and they held there following a mixed set of updates on the economy on Friday.
One said shoppers boosted their spending at U.S. retailers last month, as economists expected, while another said that manufacturing in New York state unexpectedly grew. A third said industrial production across the country shrank last month, when economists were looking for modest growth.
Another report suggested sentiment among U.S. consumers is worsening because of worries about inflation, when economists expected to see a slight improvement.
“Overall, consumers are no longer bracing for the worst-case scenario for the economy feared in April,” when President Trump announced his stunning set of worldwide tariffs, according to Joanne Hsu, director of the University of Michigan’s surveys of consumers. “However, consumers continue to expect both inflation and unemployment to deteriorate in the future.”
On the losing end of Wall Street was Applied Materials, which fell 11.7% even though it reported better results for the latest quarter than analysts expected. The focus was on the company’s forecast for a drop in revenue during the current quarter.
Its products help manufacture semiconductors and advanced displays, and CEO Gary Dickerson pointed to a “dynamic macroeconomic and policy environment, which is creating increased uncertainty and lower visibility in the near term, including for our China business.”
Sandisk fell 3.7% despite reporting a profit for the latest quarter that blew past analysts’ expectations. Investors focused instead on the data storage company’s forecast for profit in the current quarter, which came up short of Wall Street’s.
Stock indexes rose 0.8% in Shanghai but fell 1% in Hong Kong after data showed China’s economy may have slowed in July under pressure from uncertainty surrounding Trump’s tariffs.
“Chinese economic activity slowed across the board in July, with retail sales, fixed asset investment, and value added of industry growth all reaching the lowest levels of the year. After a strong start, several months of cooling momentum suggest that the economy may need further policy support,” ING Economics said in a market commentary.
European stock indexes were mixed ahead of a meeting later in the day between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, which could dictate where the war in Ukraine is heading.
In the bond market, the yield on the 10-year Treasury was holding at 4.29%, where it was late Thursday. The two-year Treasury yield, which more closely tracks expectations for Fed action, eased to 3.72% from 3.74%.
Warren Buffett is celebrated after being featured on the Forbes list of 100 Greatest Business Minds during the Forbes Media Centennial Celebration at Pier 60 on September 19, 2017 in New York City.
The deployment by Vectus Global is meant to help the government of Haiti recover vast swaths of territory seized in the past year and now controlled by heavily armed gangs, said the person, speaking to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity to discuss the plans.
The company, which provides logistics, infrastructure, security and defense, is run by Prince, a major donor to U.S. President Donald Trump. Prince previously founded the controversial security firm Blackwater.
The deployment was first reported by Reuters.
Vectus Global also will assume a long-term role in advising Haiti’s government on how to restore revenue collection capabilities once the violence subsides, the person said.
In June, Fritz Alphonse Jean, then-leader of Haiti’s transitional presidential council, confirmed that the government was using foreign contractors. He declined to identify the firm or say how much the deal was worth.
Romain Le Cour Grandmaison, head of Haiti Observatory at the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, said the operations would violate U.S. law unless the U.S.-based private military company had permission from the U.S. government to work in Haiti.
“In the absence of a coherent, jointly led Haitian and international strategy, the use of private firms is more likely to fragment authority and sovereignty than to advance resolution of the crisis,” he said.
A Trump administration official said the U.S. government has no involvement with the hiring of Vectus Global by the Haitian government. The U.S. government is not funding this contract or exercising any oversight, said the official, who requested anonymity to discuss the situation.
The office of Haiti’s prime minister did not return a message for comment, nor did members of Haiti’s transitional presidential council.
The private contractors, which will come from the United States, Europe and other regions, are expected to advise and support Haiti’s National Police and a U.N.-backed mission led by Kenyan police officers that is struggling to suppress gang violence.
The U.N.-backed mission has 991 personnel, far less than the 2,500 envisioned, and some $112 million in its trust fund — about 14% of the estimated $800 million needed a year, according to a recent U.N. report.
Paraison once served as head of security for Haiti’s National Palace and was involved in a new task forced created earlier this year made up of certain police units and private contractors. The task force has operated outside the oversight of Haiti’s National Police and employed the use of explosive drones, which some human rights activists have criticized.
Diego Da Rin, an analyst with the International Crisis Group, said that while there’s an obvious need for more anti-gang operations, “there is a risk of escalating the conflict without having enough personnel to extinguish the fires that Viv Ansanm can ignite in many places.”
Viv Ansanm is a powerful gang federation created in September 2023 that saw the merging of gangs, including G-9 and G-Pèp — once bitter enemies. The United States designated it as a foreign terrorist organization earlier this year.
The gang federation was responsible for coordinating a series of large-scale attacks early last year that included raids on Haiti’s two biggest prisons that led to the release of some 4,000 inmates. Viv Ansanm also forced the closure of Haiti’s main international airport for nearly three months, with the violence eventually prompting then-Prime Minister Ariel Henry to resign.
“Viv Ansanm has a military might that they don’t always show,” said Da Rin, the analyst.
At least 1,520 people were killed and more than 600 injured from April to the end of June across Haiti. More than 60% of the killings and injuries occurred during operations by security forces against gangs, with another 12% blamed on self-defense groups, according to the United Nations Integrated Office in Haiti.
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