Postal Service chief says work stopped on computer system key to Trump effort to limit mail voting

WASHINGTON (AP) — The top official at the U.S. Postal Service said Thursday that the agency has stopped work on developing a controversial computer system that was central to President Donald Trump’s effort to limit mail voting after the Supreme Court rejected his executive order this week.

“There’s an injunction so we’re not doing anything,” postmaster general David Steiner told The Associated Press in an interview.

Steiner, a onetime chief executive of Waste Management, has spent most of the past year atop the postal service navigating political and financial challenges. He’s pressing Congress for changes that would help him resolve what he has called a “liquidity crisis.”

And Trump’s efforts to largely eradicate mail voting turned the postal service into an unlikely arbiter of who is eligible to vote just months before this year’s critical midterm elections, a role Steiner seemingly had little interest in playing. Unlike Trump, who was sharply critical of the Supreme Court decision and ridiculed some of the justices, Steiner offered no assessment of the court’s action.

Steiner also declined to take a position on Trump’s policy, presenting himself as the leader of an “independent agency of the executive branch” whose influence over the president’s order was limited to operational concerns.

Judge orders Kennedy Center to provide 30 days’ notice before making any major physical changes

WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge on Thursday ordered the Kennedy Center to provide 30 days’ notice before making any major physical changes to the building, including demolishing it as President Donald Trump has threatened.

U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper said his ruling would “avoid any confusion on that score given more recent events,” including the building’s sudden closure to the public on Wednesday.

Matt Floca, the Kennedy Center’s executive director and chief operating officer, said he closed the iconic performing arts center temporarily due to “acute risks to public safety resulting from continued structural deterioration” of the aging building. The building will be closed for at least seven days to “assess existing safety risks in those portions of the main building exhibiting severe structural deterioration,” Floca said.

The temporary closure, which occurred without notice, is separate from a vote Tuesday by the Kennedy Center’s board to close the center indefinitely for repairs, Floca and other officials said. The closure was based on an inspection of the roof terrace canopy and a partial ceiling collapse earlier this month, Floca said. The closure may be extended after evaluation next week, he added.

Trump, who was named the Kennedy Center’s chairman last year by loyalists on the board, said Wednesday that his efforts to restore the aging building deserve recognition, “because frankly, if we don’t do that, it’s going to close. It’ll end up being ripped down. It’s in very, very bad shape, very dangerous shape.”

Trump withdraws Lance Schroyer, a former Oklahoma state trooper, as his nominee to lead ICE

WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House said Thursday that it was withdrawing its nomination of Lance Schroyer, a former Oklahoma state trooper, to lead U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, ensuring that an agency at the forefront of President Donald Trump’s domestic agenda will remain without a Senate-confirmed leader for at least a while longer.

Schroyer, who has little experience in immigration, is close to Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, a former U.S. senator from Oklahoma.

The White House offered no comment in a brief statement.

The latest setback comes as the agency remains under withering scrutiny over its handling of enforcement operations. Critics have question how ICE has recruited and trained officers as it raced to hire thousands to carry out Trump’s promise of mass deportations. Officers have shot and killed multiple people, including two American citizens in Minneapolis earlier this year.

Sen. Rand Paul, the chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, had refused to hold a hearing on the nominee until DHS provided him with information he had been seeking about civilian deaths during ICE enforcement operations.

Russia votes in wartime parliamentary election set to secure the Kremlin's power

It's a challenging time for Russia to hold a parliamentary election, even one whose outcome is all but assured.

The economic and political climate has been seriously affected by 4½ years of full-fledged war with Ukraine. Swarms of enemy drones have inflicted massive damage on Russian oil refineries and logistical facilities. The public, which no longer sees the fighting as something distant, is increasingly nervous.

United Russia, the main Kremlin party, is poised to keep its overwhelming grip on the State Duma alongside a few other parties aligned with President Vladimir Putin. Still, authorities have tightened control over the first wartime balloting for the lower chamber of parliament since the 2022 full-scale invasion.

The Kremlin stifled even the slightest signs of dissent before three days of voting that began Friday in Russia's Far East. The only party that dared to criticize the war was unceremoniously removed from the ballot, and a few anti-war politicians have been imprisoned or forced to flee abroad.

For the first time, the election includes residents of four Ukrainian regions that Moscow illegally annexed after the invasion. Ukraine has called the vote illegal.

The driver who slammed into an LA bus before a news helicopter crash is charged with murder

LOS ANGELES (AP) — An SUV driver was under the influence of drugs when she swerved into the wrong lane, blew a red light and slammed into a Los Angeles city bus, killing two riders, prosecutors said Thursday as they charged her with murder.

It was a tragedy compounded by the subsequent fatal crash of a TV news helicopter that had been covering the collision.

Bailee Lynn Rios was speeding and impaired when she drove her 2004 Ford Expedition the wrong way down a busy avenue and struck a vehicle before plowing into a city bus on Tuesday, Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman told a news conference.

Rios, 36, faces two charges of second-degree murder in the deaths of the two people on the bus, identified as Daniel Castillo, 46, and Gage Weida, 31.

Rios was being held on $4.1 million bail and is scheduled to appear in court Friday. Online court records did not list a lawyer who might speak on her behalf, and the public defender’s office said it had not been appointed to represent her.

Former US Sen. Jon Kyl of Arizona, a 'workhorse' who shaped water policy, dies at 84

PHOENIX (AP) — Former U.S. Sen. Jon Kyl, a longtime Republican lawmaker from Arizona who shaped landmark water policies in the U.S. West and guided the confirmation of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, has died. He was 84.

Kyl died Wednesday night from a neurological disorder, said Gordon James, a communications professional who is a longtime friend of the Kyl family. Kyl had withdrawn from public life in December 2025 after announcing he had been diagnosed with dementia.

Kyl spent almost three decades in Congress, serving in both chambers, and watched his party undergo a drastic transformation, with his career spanning Ronald Reagan’s presidency to President Donald Trump’s first term.

“Arizonans are mourning the loss of former U.S. Senator Jon Kyl,” Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs said in a post. “Throughout his decades of public service in the House and Senate, he was a dedicated statesman who always cared deeply for our state.”

Former Republican Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey, who considered Kyl a mentor, described the former senator in a February 2025 interview with The Associated Press as a true statesman and a “workhorse” among Washington, D.C.’s “showhorses.”

UN-backed experts cite possible US war crimes in Iran strikes

GENEVA (AP) — Experts commissioned by the U.N.’s top human rights body say they have found “reasonable grounds” to believe the United States committed war crimes in two strikes in Iran, including on a school in the southern city of Minab. They also accuse Iran’s theocratic government of carrying out crimes against humanity against its own people, in a report published Thursday.

The report, while not binding, adds to international evidence gathered about crimes in the war in Iran, and could eventually be used in efforts to reach justice in international courts.

The fact-finding mission on Iran, chaired by jurist Sara Hossain of Bangladesh, is made up of independent experts and was created in 2022 by the Human Rights Council, the U.N.’s top human rights body, which is based in Geneva.

The experts were expected to present their findings on Monday to the council, which is made up of 47 U.N. member countries.

The White House issued a scathing statement in response, with spokesperson Anna Kelly saying the human rights body has “accomplished nothing for human rights while spouting unserious nonsense for decades.”

Bail set for ICE officer accused of lying and assault in non-fatal shooting in Minneapolis

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — A federal immigration officer charged with shooting a Venezuelan man during the immigration crackdown that roiled Minneapolis early this year made a brief first appearance Thursday before a Minnesota judge, following months of legal and political battles over whether he would be extradited from Texas to face state charges.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer Christian Castro, handcuffed and dressed in an orange jumpsuit, stood quietly in a glass enclosure in a Minneapolis jail courtroom for the hearing. He faces a separate hearing Friday in federal court for charges that he lied to investigators about the January shooting.

Judge Paul Scoggin set bail at $400,000, or $200,000 if Castro agreed to a series of conditions, including that he sign a waiver saying he wouldn’t fight extradition back to Minnesota if he leaves the state while out on bail.

Castro, 52, signed the waiver during the hearing but was still listed as a county jail prisoner late Thursday afternoon.

He was arrested Wednesday in downtown Minneapolis by officers with the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension on state charges of assault and false reporting of a crime stemming from the shooting of Julio Cesar Sosa-Celis.

Body found in Grand Canyon was missing hiker, wife says, bringing flood death toll to 3

GRAND CANYON NATIONAL PARK, Ariz. (AP) — Human remains found in the Grand Canyon this week were those of the last remaining person missing after the deadly flash flooding in late August, the victim’s wife said Thursday.

The discovery of Timothy Allen Smith brought the death toll to three from flooding that devastated the Phantom Ranch area at the canyon bottom and damaged the water pipeline serving the South Rim.

Smith, 53, was a pilot from western Wyoming's Star Valley. His remains were found Monday near Crystal Rapids on the Colorado River that runs through the canyon.

The remains of Smith's two backcountry companions, Brent Rosenkranz, 42, and John Giusti, 46, both of Granbury, Texas, were found earlier.

Smith grew up in Granbury and lived with his wife in Star Valley Ranch, about 40 miles (64 kilometers) southwest of Jackson.

Man who sprayed Minnesota Rep. Omar with vinegar sentenced to 14 months in prison

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — The man who sprayed vinegar at Democratic U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar during a Minneapolis town hall was sentenced Thursday to 14 months in prison after reaching a deal with prosecutors.

The sentencing of 56-year-old Anthony Kazmierczak came nearly eight months after the Jan. 27 assault. At the time, Minneapolis-St. Paul was facing an immigration crackdown that led to angry protests, arrests and the killing of two U.S. citizens by federal officers.

Kazmierczak was also sentenced to three years of supervised release, which includes no contact with Omar. U.S. marshals escorted him from the courtroom after he was sentenced.

“This wasn't a spur of the moment act,” U.S. District Judge Joan N. Ericksen said before handing down the sentence, noting that Kazmierczak had secured tickets for the town hall weeks in advance.

“An attack on a public figure is not a political statement. It is misguided, selfish, and inconsistent with any concept of a free or democratic society,” Ericksen said. Spraying anything at an elected official “is a terrifying thing, and you knew that when you did it.”