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How Vivek Ramaswamy is pushing — delicately — to win over Trump supporters

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 14:32:28 GMT

VAIL, Iowa (AP) — Republican presidential hopeful Vivek Ramaswamy was more than 40 minutes into a town hall in rural Iowa when a woman in the crowd posed a pointed question. Or perhaps it was a suggestion. “I know you want to be president,” she said. “But would you consider being Trump’s vice president?”The query drew light laughter from attendees and a lengthy response from Ramaswamy. (The short answer: No.) It also highlighted the central challenge facing the wealthy entrepreneur, who has risen from little-known newcomer to as high as third in some Republican primary polls since joining the race nearly six months ago. While voters are increasingly interested in Ramaswamy, it’s former President Donald Trump who continues to be many conservatives’ favorite. With the first Republican primary debate in just over a week and the leadoff Iowa caucus five months away, he is delicately working to convince more voters that he could be their nominee and — as much as h...

Wilson throws TD pass before Cardinals mount comeback to beat Broncos 18-17

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 14:32:28 GMT

GLENDALE, Ariz. (AP) — Denver's Russell Wilson capped a lengthy preseason outing with a touchdown pass to Jerry Jeudy before the Arizona Cardinals rallied for an 18-17 victory Friday night.Cardinals third-string quarterback David Blough led the winning drive, hitting Brian Cobbs for an 18-yard touchdown pass with two seconds left to pull within 17-16. Arizona then converted its 2-point attempt when Emari Demercado pushed the pile and fell into the end zone. Russell Wilson and wife Ciara announce baby on the way Wilson — who played most of the first half — completed 7 of 13 passes for 93 yards and also absorbed several big hits, including a sack by Dennis Gardeck. The nine-time Pro Bowl selection didn't have much time to throw, particularly in the first quarter, but ended his outing on a good note after finding a wide-open Jeudy over the middle for a 21-yard touchdown strike on fourth down with 6:54 left in the second.It was Wilson's first game action since first-year Denver coach ...

Orioles drop series opener to streaking Mariners, 9-2, as Kyle Gibson allows career-high 9 earned runs

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 14:32:28 GMT

Kyle Gibson didn’t have it.The veteran right-hander allowed a career-high nine earned runs as the Orioles opened a series at T-Mobile Park with a 9-2 defeat Friday night, the Seattle Mariners’ eighth straight victory. Gibson, who entered as the American League leader in hits allowed, surrendered 12 in 5 1/3 innings.“That’s probably about as bad as I’ve executed pitches in a long time,” Gibson said. “I had a couple innings there where I felt a little bit better and in rhythm, but in general, just didn’t do very much well. Didn’t make pitches when I needed to. Didn’t limit damage. Didn’t execute some sliders in instances where I needed to. I think they had a good plan, and I didn’t execute my plan.”Gibson’s night began with a spectacular play behind him from Cedric Mullins, who robbed Julio Rodríguez of extra bases in his first opportunity in center field after being activated from the injured lis...

San Diego family in Maui fundraises, donates supplies to relief effort

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 14:32:28 GMT

SAN DIEGO -- A local San Diego family planned to have a reunion with friends and family in Maui this week, but are now trying to help with fire relief efforts any way they can.“A steward on the plane, he was native Hawaiian, he was speaking in Hawaiian and he said some native prayers in Hawaiian and it was just very somber trip over there,” Kirsten Morton said.It was a flight from San Diego to Maui unlike any other for Morton and her family. They’ve been traveling to Hawaii for most of their lives and the islands are home to not only family members, but also friends who are like family.“One is a firefighter, he’s been busy working. His wife is a schoolteacher in Lahaina at a local middle school there and that middle school is completely gone,” Morton said.When they heard wildfires had leveled Lahaina leaving so much loss and destruction, the Mortons knew their trip would be different this time. While her family friends fight the fires and also open their home to fire victims, M...

One winning ticket sold for Friday’s $55 million Lotto Max jackpot

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 14:32:28 GMT

TORONTO — Someone in Ontario is waking up $55 million richer.A single winning ticket was drawn for Friday’s Lotto Max jackpot.An Ontario ticket holder will also claim one of four available Maxmillion prizes of $1 million each.The jackpot for the next draw on Aug. 15 will be an estimated $13 million.The Canadian Press

Searching for the missing on Maui, some wait in agony to make contact. And then the phone rings.

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 14:32:28 GMT

WAILUKU, Hawaii (AP) — Leshia Wright heard the crackle of the fast-moving inferno closing in on her home in Lahaina and decided it was time to evacuate.The 66-year-old grabbed her medication for a pulmonary disease and her passport and fled the subdivision in the historic Hawaii oceanside community just minutes before flames engulfed the neighborhood. Hours later, she called family members and told them she slept in her car. Then her phone went dead.The next 40 hours were agony for her daughter in New York and sister in Arizona. But early Friday morning, Wright called back and told them she was OK.“I’m obviously relieved beyond words that my mother is alive,” said Alexandra Wright, who added that her mother finally was able to charge her phone after reaching a friend’s undamaged house on a quarter-tank of gas.The firestorm that killed dozens of people and leveled this historic town launched hundreds of people on a desperate search for their loved ones — many from thousands of ...

Barrels of drinking water for migrants walking through Texas have disappeared

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 14:32:28 GMT

HEBBRONVILLE, Texas (AP) — As one of the worst heat waves on record set in across much of the southern United States this summer, authorities and activists in South Texas found themselves embroiled in a mystery in this arid region near the border with Mexico.Barrels of life-saving water that a human rights group had strategically placed for wayward migrants traveling on foot had vanished.Usually, they are hard to miss. Labeled with the word “AGUA” painted in white, capital letters and standing about waist-high, the 55-gallon (208-liter), blue drums stand out against the scrub and grass, turned from green to a sundried brown. The stakes of solving this mystery are high.Summer temperatures can climb to 110 degrees Fahrenheit (43.3 degrees Celsius) in Texas’ sparsely populated Jim Hogg County, with its vast, inhospitable ranchlands. Migrants — and sometimes human smugglers — take a route through this county to try to circumvent a Border Patrol checkpoint on a busier highway about...

Developers have Black families fighting to maintain property and history

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 14:32:28 GMT

PHILLIPS COMMUNITY, S.C. (AP) — The Rev. Elijah Smalls Jr. once grew okra, butter beans and other vegetables in the neighborhood where his family has lived near the South Carolina coast since survivors of slavery bought patches of their plantation after the Civil War. Then came half-a-million-dollar homes in a nearby subdivision, overwhelming the drainage system. Runoff meant for sewers now pools in the 80-year-old veteran’s backyard, making gardening impossible.Smalls and his relatives in Phillips Community are the many Black families still living in historic settlement communities around Charleston. Like others all along the South Carolina coast, their land is being targeted by developers of vacation getaways and new homes. And as real estate prices rise from Myrtle Beach to Hilton Head, Black property owners have found themselves embroiled in disputes with investors and their own relatives.State reforms approved in 2017 provided what supporters described as “shark repellant” — a ...

Allies of Niger president overthrown by military are appealing to the US and others: Save his life

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 14:32:28 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — After nearly three weeks of appealing to the United States and other allies for help restoring Niger’s president to power, friends and supporters of the democratically elected leader are making a simpler plea: Save his life.President Mohamed Bazoum, leader of the last remaining Western-allied democracy across a vast stretch of Africa’s Sahara and Sahel, sits confined with his family in an unlit basement of his presidential compound, cut off from resupplies of food and from electricity and cooking gas by the junta that overthrew him, Niger’s ambassador to the United States told The Associated Press. “They are killing him,” said the ambassador, Mamadou Kiari Liman-Tinguiri, a close associate who maintains daily calls with the detained leader. The two have been colleagues for three decades, since the now 63-year-old president was a young philosophy instructor, a teacher’s union leader, and a democracy advocate noted for his eloquence.“The plan of the head of the...

Rising political threats take US into uncharted territory as 2024 election looms

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 14:32:28 GMT

DENVER (AP) — This week’s confrontation that ended with FBI agents fatally shooting a 74-year-old Utah man who threatened to assassinate President Joe Biden was just the latest example of how violent rhetoric has created a more perilous political environment across the U.S.Six days earlier, a 52-year-old Texas man was sentenced to three-and-a-half years in prison for threatening to kill Arizona election workers. Four days before that, prosecutors charged a 56-year-old Michigan woman for lying to buy guns for her mentally ill adult son, who threatened to use them against Biden and that state’s Democratic governor.Threats against public officials have been steadily climbing in recent years, creating new challenges for law enforcement, civil rights and the health of American democracy.The Capitol Police last year reported that they investigated more than double the number of threats against members of Congress as they did four years earlier. Driven by former President Donald Trump̵...