AP News in Brief at 11:04 p.m. EST

Maine bars Trump from ballot as US Supreme Court weighs states’ authority to block former president

PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — Maine’s Democratic secretary of state on Thursday removed former President Donald Trump from the state’s presidential primary ballot under the Constitution’s insurrection clause, becoming the first election official to take action unilaterally as the U.S. Supreme Court is poised to decide whether Trump remains eligible to return to the White House.

The decision by Secretary of State Shenna Bellows follows a ruling earlier this month by the Colorado Supreme Court that booted Trump from the ballot there under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment. That decision has been stayed until the U.S. Supreme Court decides whether Trump is barred by the Civil War-era provision, which prohibits those who “engaged in insurrection” from holding office.

The Trump campaign said it would appeal Bellows’ decision to Maine’s state courts, and Bellows suspended her ruling until that court system rules on the case. In the end, it is likely that the nation’s highest court will have the final say on whether Trump appears on the ballot in Maine and in the other states.

Bellows found that Trump could no longer run for his prior job because his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol violated Section 3, which bans from office those who “engaged in insurrection.” Bellows made the ruling after some state residents, including a bipartisan group of former lawmakers, challenged Trump’s position on the ballot.

“I do not reach this conclusion lightly,” Bellows wrote in her 34-page decision. “I am mindful that no Secretary of State has ever deprived a presidential candidate of ballot access based on Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment. I am also mindful, however, that no presidential candidate has ever before engaged in insurrection.”

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Trump is blocked from the GOP primary ballot in two states. Can he still run for president?

DENVER (AP) — First, Colorado’s Supreme Court ruled that former President Donald Trump wasn’t eligible to run for his old job in that state. Then, Maine’s Democratic secretary of state ruled the same for her state. Who’s next?

Both decisions are historic. The Colorado court was the first court to apply to a presidential candidate a rarely used constitutional ban against those who “engaged in insurrection.” Maine’s secretary of state was the first top election official to unilaterally strike a presidential candidate from the ballot under that provision.

But both decisions are on hold while the legal process plays out.

That means that Trump remains on the ballot in Colorado and Maine and that his political fate is now in the hands of the U.S. Supreme Court. The Maine ruling will likely never take effect on its own. Its central impact is increasing pressure on the nation’s highest court to say clearly: Can Trump still run for president after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol?

After the Civil War, the U.S. ratified the 14th Amendment to guarantee rights to former slaves and more. It also included a two-sentence clause called Section 3, designed to keep former Confederates from regaining government power after the war.

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Israeli strikes across Gaza kill dozens of Palestinians, even in largely emptied north

DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israeli forces bombarded cities, towns and refugee camps across Gaza on Thursday, killing dozens of people in a widening air and ground offensive against Hamas that has forced thousands more to flee from homes and shelters in recent days.

The war has already killed over 20,000 Palestinians and driven around 85% of the population of 2.3 million from their homes. Much of northern Gaza has been leveled, and it has been largely depopulated and isolated from the rest of the territory for weeks. Many fear a similar fate awaits the south as Israel expands its offensive to most of the tiny enclave.

Israel has vowed to dismantle Hamas — which is still putting up stiff resistance, even in the north — and bring back more than 100 hostages still held by the militants after their Oct. 7 attack into southern Israel. The assault killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians.

Israeli officials have brushed off international calls for a cease-fire, saying it would amount to a victory for Hamas.

The United States — while providing crucial support for the offensive — has urged Israel to take greater measures to spare civilians and allow in more aid. But humanitarian workers say the amount of food, fuel and medical supplies entering is still far below what is needed, and 1 in 4 Palestinians in Gaza is starving, according to U.N. officials.

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American-Canadian-Israeli woman believed to be held hostage in Gaza pronounced dead

TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — A hard-hit Israeli kibbutz on Thursday announced the death of Judih Weinstein — an American-Canadian-Israeli woman who had been thought to be held hostage in Gaza.

The news came six days after Weinstein’s husband, Gad Haggai, was also pronounced dead.

Weinstein, 70, and Haggai, 73, were taking an early morning walk near their home in Kibbutz Nir Oz on the morning of Oct. 7 when Hamas militants burst across the border into Israel, killing about 1,200 people and kidnapping 240 others.

In the early hours of the morning, Weinstein was able to call emergency services and let them know that both she and her husband had been shot and send a message to her family.

Weinstein and her husband had been thought to be among the hostages still held in captivity in Gaza. But six days ago, the kibbutz announced that Haggai was killed Oct. 7 and his body was taken to Gaza.

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Election officials see a range of threats in 2024, from hostile countries to conspiracy theorists

ATLANTA (AP) — For election officials preparing for the 2024 presidential election, the list of security challenges just keeps growing.

Many of the concerns from four years ago persist: the potential for cyberattacks targeting voter registration systems or websites that report unofficial results, and equipment problems or human errors being amplified by those seeking to undermine confidence in the outcome.

Add to that the fresh risks that have developed since the 2020 election and the false claims of widespread fraud being spread by former President Donald Trump and his Republican allies. Death threats directed at election workers and breaches of voting equipment inside election offices have raised questions about safety and security. Some states have altered their voting and election laws, expanded legislative control of local elections and added penalties for election workers who violate rules.

The turmoil has contributed to a wave of retirements and resignations among election staff, creating a vacuum of institutional knowledge in some local election offices.

With Trump running again and already warning that the 2024 vote is “on its way to being another rigged election,” election workers are bracing for a difficult year that will have no margin for error.

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Venezuela will hold military exercises off its shores as a British warship heads to Guyana

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — President Nicolás Maduro ordered Venezuela’s armed forces to conduct defensive exercises in the Eastern Caribbean after the United Kingdom sent a warship toward Guyana’s territorial waters as the South American neighbors dispute a large border region.

In a nationally televised address Thursday, Maduro said that 6,000 Venezuelan troops — including air and naval forces — will conduct joint operations off the nation’s eastern coast near the border with Guyana.

Maduro described the impending arrival of British ship HMS Trent to Guyana’s shores as a threat to his country. He argued the ship’s deployment violates a recent agreement between the South American nations.

“We believe in diplomacy, in dialogue and in peace, but no one is going to threaten Venezuela,” Maduro said in a room where he was accompanied by a dozen military commanders. “This is an unacceptable threat to any sovereign country in Latin America.”

Venezuela and Guyana are currently involved in a border dispute over the Essequibo, a sparsely populated region the size of Florida with vast oil deposits off its shores.

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As Gaza war grinds on, tensions soar along Israel’s volatile northern border with Lebanon

TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — Israeli officials are stepping up threats against the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, warning that Israel is running out of patience as the two sides continue to trade fire along Israel’s volatile northern border.

Benny Gantz, a member of Israel’s War Cabinet, said Wednesday that if the international community and the Lebanese government don’t restrain Hezbollah, Israel will. Israel’s army chief, Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi, said the military is in a state of high readiness and has approved plans in case it decides to open a second front in the north.

The fighting along Israel’s northern border broke out when Hezbollah began firing rockets shortly after the Oct. 7 cross-border attack by Hamas triggered the war in Gaza.

While at a lower intensity than the battle in Gaza, the simultaneous fighting has caused destruction, displacement and death on both sides and raised fears of a wider regional war.

Here is a look at the battle between Israel and Hezbollah:

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AP concludes at least hundreds died in floods after Ukraine dam collapse, far more than Russia said

MYKOLAIV, Ukraine (AP) — They recognized the TV repairman.

The residents of Oleshky in Russian-occupied southern Ukraine could not identify many of those they buried after a catastrophic dam collapse in June sent water coursing through their homes and shattered their lives. The bodies were too bloated and discolored, volunteer rescuers and health workers said. They described seeing faces that resembled rubber masks, frozen in that last frenzied gasp for air. But to those secretly keeping count of the drowned, Yurii Bilyi was no stranger.

The cheerful 56-year-old was a town fixture. He had serviced many homes and spent his days working from a shop just across the street from the churchyard where he was buried, in a hurriedly dug mass grave, The Associated Press has learned.

Anastasiia Bila, his daughter, remembers his last words clearly over the unstable phone connection. “Nastya,” he affectionately called her, hoping to soothe her anxieties as flood waters rose quickly, inundating 600 square kilometers (230 square miles), submerging entire towns and villages along the banks of the Dnipro River, the majority in Russian-occupied areas. “I’ve seen worse under occupation.”

Over six months since the catastrophic explosion that destroyed the Kakhovka Dam in the southern Kherson region, an AP investigation has found Russian occupation authorities vastly and deliberately undercounted the dead in one of the most devastating chapters of the 22-month war. Russian authorities took control of the issuance of death certificates, immediately removing bodies not claimed by family, and preventing local health workers and volunteers from dealing with the dead, threatening them when they defied orders.

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World population up 75 million this year, standing at 8 billion on Jan. 1

The world population grew by 75 million people over the past year and on New Year’s Day it will stand at more than 8 billion people, according to figures released by the U.S. Census Bureau on Thursday.

The worldwide growth rate in the past year was just under 1%. At the start of 2024, 4.3 births and two deaths are expected worldwide every second, according to the Census Bureau figures.

The growth rate for the United States in the past year was 0.53%, about half the worldwide figure. The U.S. added 1.7 million people and will have a population on New Year’s Day of 335.8 million people.

If the current pace continues through the end of the decade, the 2020s could be the slowest-growing decade in U.S. history, yielding a growth rate of less than 4% over the 10-year-period from 2020 to 2030, said William Frey, a demographer at The Brookings Institution.

The slowest-growing decade currently was in the aftermath of the Great Depression in the 1930s, when the growth rate was 7.3%.

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Celtics send Detroit to NBA record-tying 28th straight loss, beating Pistons 128-122 in OT

BOSTON (AP) — Hoping to avoid a 28th straight loss that would match the longest losing streak in NBA history, the Detroit Pistons forced overtime against the league-best Celtics on Thursday night before Boston recovered to win 128-122.

Despite making it to overtime for the first time in the skid, Detroit matched the “Trust the Process” Philadelphia 76ers with 28 consecutive losses. The Pistons need a victory at home against Toronto on Saturday night to avoid breaking the record.

Detroit opened a season-high 21-point lead in the first half only to trail 106-100 in the final two minutes of regulation. Jaden Ivey scored six straight points to erase the deficit, then Bojan Bogdanovic made a putback with 4.6 seconds left to send it to OT.

But Derrick White scored 10 of his 23 points in the extra period and Kristaps Porzingis had six in the overtime — dunking after a full-court pass from Jayson Tatum and then sinking a pair of free throws to make it 125-117. Porzingis had 35 points — 11 in the fourth quarter, and eight of those during a 10-0 run that turned a four-point deficit lead into a 106-100 lead.

Tatum had 31 points and 10 assists for Boston, which won its fourth straight and its ninth in the last 10 games.

The Associated Press