AP News in Brief at 12:04 a.m. EST

Trump picks Dr. Oz to run Medicare and Medicaid, Linda McMahon for Education, Lutnick for Commerce

WASHINGTON (AP) — President-elect Donald Trump on Tuesday tapped billionaire professional wrestling mogul Linda McMahon to be secretary of the Education Department, tasked with overseeing an agency Trump has promised to dismantle. He also selected Dr. Mehmet Oz, a former television talk show host and heart surgeon, to head the agency that oversees health insurance programs for millions of older, poor and disabled Americans, and named Wall Street executive Howard Lutnick to lead the Commerce Department.

McMahon led the Small Business Administration during Trump’s initial term from 2017 to 2019 and twice ran unsuccessfully as a Republican for the U.S. Senate in Connecticut.

McMahon served on the Connecticut Board of Education for a year starting in 2009 and has spent years on the board of trustees for Sacred Heart University in Connecticut. She’s seen as a relative unknown in education circles, though she has expressed support for charter schools and school choice.

“Linda will use her decades of Leadership experience, and deep understanding of both Education and Business, to empower the next Generation of American Students and Workers, and make America Number One in Education in the World,” Trump said in a statement.

In nominating McMahon, Trump is rewarding a loyal backer of his movement who, along with Lutnick, has also helped lead his transition team. She was with him Tuesday as he attended a launch of SpaceX’s Starship craft in Texas.

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‘Bomb cyclone’ brings high winds and soaking rain to Northern California and Pacific Northwest

SEATTLE (AP) — What was expected to be one of the strongest storms in the northwest U.S. in decades arrived Tuesday evening, knocking out power and downing trees across the region.

The Weather Prediction Center issued excessive rainfall risks beginning Tuesday and lasting through Friday as the strongest atmospheric river — a large plume of moisture — that California and the Pacific Northwest has seen this season bears down on the region. The storm system is considered a “ bomb cyclone,” which occurs when a cyclone intensifies rapidly.

The areas that could see particularly severe rainfall will likely reach from the south of Portland, Oregon, to the north of the San Francisco area, said Richard Bann, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service Weather Prediction Center.

“Be aware of the risk of flash flooding at lower elevations and winter storms at higher elevations. This is going to be an impactful event,” he said.

Hurricane-force winds, which are gusts above 75 mph (121 kph), could be felt along the Oregon coast, according to the National Weather Service in Medford, Oregon. And near Seattle, conditions for a “mountain wave” were shaping up, bringing large, low elevation wind gusts that could cause widespread power outages and downed trees, said Larry O’Neill, director of the Oregon Climate Service and Oregon State University associate professor.

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The Kremlin has revised its nuclear policy. Does that make the use of atomic weapons more likely?

The 4-year-old document has a bland, bureaucratic title — “Basic Principles of State Policy on Nuclear Deterrence” — but its contents are chilling, especially with its newest revisions.

Better known as Russia’s nuclear doctrine, the revamped version that was signed Tuesday by President Vladimir Putin spells out the circumstances that allow him to use Moscow’s atomic arsenal, the world’s largest.

This new version lowers the bar, giving him that option in response to even a conventional attack backed by a nuclear power. That possibly could include the use of U.S.-supplied ATACMS missiles by Ukraine to hit Russian territory — which Moscow says happened Tuesday when six missiles hit the Bryansk region.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov emphasized that such strikes could potentially be a trigger for a nuclear response under the revised document.

Its first iteration was signed by Putin in 2020, and he approved the latest version Tuesday, according to the Kremlin. It outlines when Russia could dip into its atomic arsenal.

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Ukraine fires several US-made longer-range missiles into Russia for the first time

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Ukraine fired several American-supplied longer-range missiles into Russia, officials said Tuesday, marking the first time Kyiv used the weapons that way in 1,000 days of war.

The use of the Army Tactical Missile System, known as ATACMS, came as Russian President Vladimir Putin formally lowered the threshold for using nuclear weapons, opening the door to a potential nuclear response by Moscow to even a conventional attack by any nation supported by a nuclear power. That could include Ukrainian attacks backed by the U.S.

A Telegram channel affiliated with the Ukrainian military posted a video Tuesday that it says shows U.S.-supplied ATACMS missiles being fired from an undisclosed location in Ukraine. The Associated Press could not independently verify the date and location the video was filmed.

According to a U.S. official, Ukraine fired about eight of the missiles, and just two were intercepted by the Russians. The official said that the U.S. was still assessing battle damage, but that the missiles struck an ammunition supply location in Karachev, a city of about 18,000 people in Russia’s Bryansk region. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence assessments.

The developments marked a worrying escalation in the conflict that has repeatedly ratcheted up international tensions. U.S. officials recently expressed dismay at Russia’s deployment of North Korean troops to help it fight Ukraine, while Moscow seethed when Washington eased restrictions on the ATACMS in recent days.

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US envoy says Israel-Hezbollah truce is ‘within our grasp’ as Gaza food crisis worsens after looting

BEIRUT (AP) — A United States envoy said an agreement to end the Israel-Hezbollah war is “within our grasp” after talks in Lebanon on Tuesday.

However, there was no such optimism in the Gaza Strip, where the looting of nearly 100 aid trucks by armed men worsened an already severe food crisis.

Amos Hochstein, the Biden administration’s pointman on Israel and Lebanon, arrived as Hezbollah’s allies in the Lebanese government said the militant group had responded positively to the proposal, which would entail both its fighters and Israeli ground forces withdrawing from a U.N. buffer zone in southern Lebanon.

The buffer zone would be policed by thousands of additional U.N. peacekeepers and Lebanese troops. Israel has called for a stronger enforcement mechanism, potentially including the ability to conduct military operations against any Hezbollah threats, something Lebanon is likely to oppose.

An Israeli airstrike on Tuesday hit a Lebanese army base in the southern town of Sarafand, killing three soldiers, the army said – the second deadly strike on Lebanese soldiers in as many days. The Israeli military did not immediately comment. At least 41 soldiers have been killed by Israeli bombardment the past month, according to the Lebanese army.

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Multiple election offices report receiving mailed ballots misdirected from other states

HELENA, Mont. (AP) — Terry Thompson had an election to run for voters in Cascade County, Montana. Why then, she thought, was her office in Great Falls being sent mailed ballots completed by voters in places such as Wasilla, Alaska; Vancouver, Washington; and Tampa, Florida?

It was only about a dozen ballots total from voters in other states. But she said it still raised concerns about the ability of the U.S. Postal Service to deliver election mail and whether the errant ballots would ever be counted.

“I mean, I would have had to been doing FedEx overnight envelopes to all these states to try to get them where they needed to go,” said Thompson, the county’s election administrator.

She received about a half dozen others that should have gone to county election offices in other parts of Montana. For those, she said she “just had to hope and pray” they made it back on time.

While a stray ballot ending up in the wrong place can happen during election season, the number of ballots destined for other states and counties that ended up at Thompson’s office is unusual. The Associated Press found it wasn’t an anomaly. Election offices in California, Louisiana, New Mexico and elsewhere also reported receiving completed ballots in the mail that should have gone to other states.

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California voters reject measure that would have raised minimum wage to nation-high $18 per hour

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — Voters in California have rejected a ballot measure that would have raised the state minimum wage to $18 per hour by 2026, the highest in the country.

Opponents, including the California Chamber of Commerce, said it would have increased costs, led to higher taxes and pushed businesses to cut jobs.

“With the economy and costs top of mind for many voters this election, that message appears to have resonated,” said Jennifer Barrera, the chamber’s president and CEO.

Proponents estimated that the measure would have benefited 2 million workers, including hotel and grocery employees.

“Proposition 32’s failure to pass is disappointing for all Californians who believe that everyone who works should earn enough to support their families,” said Kathy Finn, president of UFCW 770, a Southern California union representing nearly 30,000 workers in various sectors.

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SpaceX launches giant Starship rocket, but aborts attempt to catch booster with mechanical arms

SpaceX on Tuesday launched another Starship rocket, but passed up catching the booster with giant mechanical arms.

Unlike last month’s success, the booster was directed to a splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico. The catch was called off just four minutes into the test flight from Texas for unspecified reasons, and the booster hit the water three minutes later.

Not all of the criteria for a booster catch was met and so the flight director did not command the booster to return to the launch site, said SpaceX spokesman Dan Huot. He did not specify what went wrong.

At the same time, the empty spacecraft launched from Texas atop Starship soared across the Gulf of Mexico on a near loop around the world similar to October’s test flight. Skimming space, the shiny retro-looking craft descended into the Indian Ocean for a controlled but destructive end to the hourlong demo.

It was the sixth test for the world’s biggest and most powerful rocket that SpaceX and NASA hope to use to get astronauts back on the moon and eventually Mars.

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Biden appeals to world leaders to stay in the climate fight as Trump casts shadow

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — President Joe Biden made an urgent appeal to fellow world leaders Tuesday to surge money to developing nations to curb climate change as he wrapped up his final appearance at a major international summit.

Biden used the closing day’s events at the Group of 20 gathering to announce hundreds of millions of dollars in new climate and development pledges and underscore his commitment to stemming the impact of climate-damaging fossil fuels on the planet.

But Biden’s end-of-presidency call to leaders of the world’s major economies was shadowed by the reality that many of his latest proposals were likely to be blocked — and past climate initiatives rolled back — under President-elect Donald Trump.

Nonetheless, Biden insisted it was up to the leaders in the room to take on the existential crisis.

It’s critical that developing countries have “enough firepower and access to capital” to combat climate change and protect themselves from its effects, Biden told heads of government at a working session.

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The dark energy pushing our universe apart may not be what it seems, scientists say

NEW YORK (AP) — Distant, ancient galaxies are giving scientists more hints that a mysterious force called dark energy may not be what they thought.

Astronomers know that the universe is being pushed apart at an accelerating rate and they have puzzled for decades over what could possibly be speeding everything up. They theorize that a powerful, constant force is at play, one that fits nicely with the main mathematical model that describes how the universe behaves. But they can’t see it and they don’t know where it comes from, so they call it dark energy.

It is so vast it is thought to make up nearly 70% of the universe — while ordinary matter like all the stars and planets and people make up just 5%.

But findings published earlier this year by an international research collaboration of more than 900 scientists from around the globe yielded a major surprise. As the scientists analyzed how galaxies move they found that the force pushing or pulling them around did not seem to be constant. And the same group published a new, broader set of analyses Tuesday that yielded a similar answer.

“I did not think that such a result would happen in my lifetime,” said Mustapha Ishak-Boushaki, a cosmologist at the University of Texas at Dallas who is part of the collaboration.

The Associated Press