AP News Digest 7:23 a.m.

Here are the AP’s latest coverage plans, top stories and promotable content. All times EDT. For up-to-the minute information on AP’s coverage, visit Coverage Plan at https://newsroom.ap.org.

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ONLY ON AP

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BIDEN-AP INTERVIEW — President Joe Biden says the American people are “really, really down” after a tumultuous two years with the coronavirus pandemic, volatility in the economy and now surging gasoline prices that are slamming family budgets. But he stressed that a recession was “not inevitable” and held out hope of giving the country a greater sense of confidence. By Josh Boak. SENT: 1,300 words, photo With BIDEN-AP INTERVIEW-TAKEAWAYS — Takeaways from AP interview: Biden on inflation, US psyche; BIDEN-AP INTERVIEW-TRANSCRIPT — The complete half-hour interview (both sent).

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TOP STORIES

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CAPITOL RIOT-WATERGATE — Watergate and Jan. 6 are a half-century apart, in vastly different eras, and they were about different things. But in both episodes, a Republican president tried to do an end run around democracy. Friday is the 50th anniversary of the Watergate break-in that eventually consumed Richard Nixon’s presidency. The anniversary intersects with the continuing House hearings on the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the Capitol. Mysteries from both affairs endure. Is there a smoking gun yet to emerge in the investigation into Donald Trump’s actions leading to the insurrection? And why did Nixon indulge in political malfeasance when he was on a smooth path to reelection? By Calvin Woodward. SENT: 1,390 words, photos. With WATERGATE-TIMELINE — From the crime to the consequences; WATERGAATE-QUIZ — Wallowing in Watergate 50 years later: A political quiz. (both sent). An abridged version is also available.

CAPITOL RIOT-INVESTIGATION — Donald Trump’s extraordinary effort to overturn his 2020 election defeat came into ever-clearer focus, with testimony describing his pressuring Vice President Mike Pence in vulgar private taunts and public entreaties to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s victory in the run-up to the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection. By Lisa Mascaro and Mary Clare Jalonick. SENT: 1,190 words, photos, video. With CAPITOL RIOT-INVESTIGATION-TAKEAWAYS — Pence under pressure, then in danger. SENT: 1,320 words, photos.

RUSSIA-UKRAINE-WAR — The executive arm of the European Union has recommended that Ukraine be granted candidate status to one day join the 27-nation bloc. The promise of membership in a union created to safeguard peace on the continent holds deep symbolism for the nation at war. But it is only the first step in a process that could take decades. SENT: 400 words, photos, video.

RANSOMWARE-TARGETING NATIONS — Costa Rica has been reeling from unprecedented ransomware attacks disrupting everyday life for the last two months. The situation is raising questions about the United States’ role in protecting friendly nations from cyberattacks at a time when Russian-based criminal gangs are targeting less developed countries. By Alan Suderman and Ben Fox. SENT: 1,060 words, photo.

CHINA-AIRCRAFT-CARRIER — Beijing launched a new-generation aircraft carrier, the first such ship to be both designed and built in China, in a milestone as it seeks to extend the range and power of its navy. The Type 003 carrier christened Fujian left its drydock at a shipyard outside Shanghai in the morning and tied up at a nearby pier, state media reports said. By David Rising and Ken Moritsugu. SENT: 1,270 words, photos.

YELLOWSTONE-NATIONAL PARK FLOODING — A gnawing uncertainty hung over the Yellowstone National Park gateway town of Gardiner this week following unprecedented flooding that shut down one of America’s most beloved natural attractions and swept away roads, bridges and homes. By Matthew Brown and Brian Melley. SENT: 1,080 words, photos.

ALABAMA-CHURCH-SHOOTING — A single gunman hasopened fire inside a suburban Alabama church, killing two people and wounding a third at a small group meeting before being taken into custody, authorities say. SENT: 530 words, photos.

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TRENDING

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BRITAIN-ASSANGE — The British government has ordered the extradition of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to the United States to face spying charges — a milestone, but not the end of the decade-long legal saga. WikiLeaks said it would challenge the order, and has 14 days to lodge an appeal. SENT: 650 words, photos.

MUSIC-SONGWRITERS-HALL-OF-FAME — After a glittering career stuffed with No. 1 hits — not to mention a two-year pandemic delay — Mariah Carey was finally inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame, but not before challenging her new fellow members to do better by women. By Entertainment Writer Mark Kennedy. SENT: 780 words, photos.

FASHION-MARILYN MONROE DRESS — Ripley’s Believe It or Not! on Thursday denied claims that Kim Kardashian’s wearing of the iconic Marilyn Monroe “Happy Birthday” dress to the Met Gala left it with new damage. SENT: 600 words, photos.

HEAT WAVE-CATTLE DEATHS — Industry officials say thousands of cattle in feedlots in southwestern Kansas have died of heat stress due to soaring temperatures, high humidity and little wind in recent days. SENT: 530 words, photos.

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MORE ON RUSSIA-UKRAINE

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RUSSIA-UKRAINE-WAR-SAVED-BY-SNAILS — The wartime disruption to supplies of grain and other crops from Ukraine that feed the world has captured global attention and sent food prices soaring. But the production of other, more niche foodstuffs has been hit as well. Before the Russian invasion sent Ukraine’s economy into a tailspin, Ukrainians were successfully producing snails, oysters, edible frogs, vegetable-based milks, craft beers, cheeses and other products for European markets. Farmer Olena Avramenko was living a quiet life with her snails, rearing them for export to Spain. When Russian soldiers occupied her village, she sheltered in her basement, cooking up meals of snails for hungry villagers. Now the Russian have left, and she says raising more snails and dreaming up new snail recipes is keeping her sane. SENT: 610 words, photos.

AUSTRALIA-UKRAINE — Australia’s new Prime Minister Anthony Albanese says he would take advice on whether to accept President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s invitation to visit Ukraine during an upcoming European trip. SENT: 270 words, photos.

HAWAII-SUPERYACHT-RUSSIA — A Russian-owned superyacht seized by the United States arrived in Honolulu Harbor on Thursday flying an American flag. SENT: 190 words photos.

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VIRUS OUTBREAK

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VIRUS OUTBREAK-THAILAND — Thailand is lifting a pre-arrival registration requirement for foreign visitors that was seen as onerous and a drag on the recovery for its ailing tourism industry. SENT: 270 words, photos.

VIRUS OUTBREAK-GERMANY — Germany’s health minister urged residents and visitors to wear face masks indoors to protect themselves and others from the coronavirus, but he acknowledged that current data doesn’t justify making mask use a legal requirement. SENT: 250 words.

VIRUS-OUTBREAK-BIDEN — In an abrupt change of course, the White House is now declining to comment on the frequency of President Joe Biden’s COVID-19 testing regimen, even as it maintains that it would inform the public if he were to ever test positive for the coronavirus. SENT: 340 words, photo.

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WASHINGTON/POLITICS

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CONGRESS-GUNS — Democratic and Republican senators were at odds Thursday over how to keep firearms from dangerous people as bargainers struggled to finalize details of a gun violence compromise in time for their self-imposed deadline of holding votes in Congress next week. SENT: 750 words, photos.

SUPREME COURT-JUSTICES SECURITY — President Joe Biden signed a bill that will give around-the-clock security protection to the families of Supreme Court justices. The new law, which passed the House this week and the Senate last month, comes eight days after a man carrying a gun, knife and zip ties was arrested near Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s house after threatening to kill the justice. SENT: 240 words, photo.

ELECTION 2023-KENTUCKY-GOVERNOR — Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron won former President Donald Trump’s endorsement in his 2023 bid for governor, offering a momentum boost given the ex-president’s enduring popularity among Republican voters in the state. SENT: 450 words, photos.

BIDEN-CLIMATE — President Joe Biden, who has recently been focused on boosting oil production to reduce rising gas costs, will turn his attention to climate change on Friday when he convenes a virtual meeting of some of the world’s biggest economies. SENT: 260 words, photos.

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INTERNATIONAL

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HUNGARY-FINANCIAL-FIGHT — Hungary has discounted the price of gasoline at the pump. But not if you have a foreign license plate. It’s also taxing what it calls “extra profits” of industries including airlines, with carriers like Ryanair and EasyJet increasing ticket prices to cope. The nationalist government argues that it’s trying to ease an economic downturn and the highest inflation in nearly 25 years amid Russia’s war in Ukraine, but the unusual moves by the central European country are alienating companies and threatening a renewed standoff with the European Union. SENT: 980 words, photos.

ITALY-RIVER-DROUGHT — Water is so low in large stretches of Italy’s largest river that local residents are walking through the middle of the expanse of sand and shipwrecks are resurfacing. Authorities fear that if it doesn’t rain soon, there’ll be a serious shortage of water for drinking and irrigation for farmers and local populations across the whole of northern Italy. SENT: 860 words, photos.

HONG-KONG-NEW-TEXTBOOKS-EXPLAINER — Hong Kong is preparing to introduce new middle school textbooks that will deny the Chinese territory was ever a British colony. China’s Communist rulers say the semi-autonomous city and the nearby former Portuguese colony of Macao were merely occupied by foreign powers and that China never relinquished sovereignty over them. SENT: 820 words, photos.

CHINA HEALTH-CODE — Angry bank customers who traveled to a city in central China attempting to retrieve their savings from troubled rural banks were stopped in their tracks by a common technology: a QR code. SENT: 700 words.

SOUTH-AFRICA-SCANDAL-EXPLAINER — South African President Cyril Ramaphosa could face criminal charges and is already facing calls to step down over claims that he tried to cover up the theft of millions of dollars in U.S. currency that was hidden inside furniture at his game farm. SENT: 760 words, photos.

PHILIPPINES-BEHEADINGS — Two long-wanted Abu Sayyaf militant commanders accused of beheading two kidnapped Canadian tourists and a German in the southern Philippines have surrendered to authorities, officials say. SENT: 450 words, photo.

SOLOMON-ISLANDS-AUSTRALIA — Australia’s new foreign minister has visited the Solomon Islands to assure the South Pacific island nation it does not need a security pact with China. The Solomons is the fifth Pacific nation that Foreign Minister Penny Wong has visited since her center-left Labor Party came to power in May 21 elections. SENT: 420 words, photo.

INDIA-MILITARY-RECRUITMENT — Hundreds of youths in India burned train coaches, vandalized railroad property and blocked rail tracks and highways with boulders as an angry backlash continued for a second day against a new short-term government recruitment policy for the military. SENT: 420 words, photos.

VATICAN-BELGIUM-ABUSE — One of Pope Francis’ proposed new cardinals, the retired bishop of Ghent, Belgium, has bowed out of accepting the honor over his insufficient response to cases of clergy sexual abuse, the Belgian bishops conference says. SENT: 400 words.

WTO-MINISTERS-MEETINGS — World Trade Organization members have reached a string of deals and commitments aimed to limit overfishing, broaden production of COVID-19 vaccines in the developing world and reform a 27-year-old trade body that has been back on its heels in recent years. SENT: 400 words, photos.

JAPAN-FUKUSHIMA-RULING — Japan’s top court has ruled that the government was not liable for the 2011 Fukushima nuclear crisis, dismissing thousands of evacuees’ demands that the state, not just the utility, pay compensation for the damages inflicted to their lives. SENT: 580 words, photos.

MALAYSIA-LAWYERS-PROTEST — Hundreds of Malaysian lawyers staged a protest Friday to condemn the anti-graft agency’s unprecedented probe of a senior judge who convicted former Prime Minister Najib Razak, calling it a threat to judicial independence. SENT: 380 words, photos.

ISRAEL-PALESTINIANS — Israeli forces shot dead three Palestinians and wounded eight others during a military operation in the occupied West Bank town of Jenin, the Palestinian Health Ministry says. The military said the troops traded fire with militants. SENT: 270 words.

ISRAEL-JOURNALIST-KILLED — The Al Jazeera news network has published an image of the bullet that it says killed its veteran reporter Shireen Abu Akleh while she was covering an Israeli military operation in the occupied West Bank last month. SENT: 330 words, photos.

SPAIN-WORLD DESERTIFICATION — Politicians and experts are meeting in Madrid to discuss ways to tackle drought and the increasing spread of deserts across the globe. SENT: 250 words.

EUROPE-FLIGHTS — Britain’s Gatwick Airport has slashed its number of daily flights over the summer because of staff shortages as the global aviation industry struggles to meet a resurgent demand for travel. SENT: 250 words, photos.

PANAMA-PAPERS — A Panamanian judge acquitted 39 people in a money laundering case Thursday, including lawyers Jurgen Mossack and Ramón Fonseca, who were key figures in the Panama Papers case. SENT: 250 words.

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NATIONAL

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FREEDOM-RIDERS-VACATED-CONVICTIONS — Legendary civil rights leader Bayard Rustin and three other men who were sentenced to work on a chain gang in North Carolina after they launched the first of the “freedom rides” to challenge Jim Crow laws will have their sentences posthumously vacated, more than seven decades later. SENT: 540 words, photos.

TEXAS-SCHOOL-SHOOTING-INVESTIGATION — The chairman of a Texas legislative committee investigating the nation’s deadliest school shooting in a decade says that it’s unclear whether the small city of Uvalde’s local police department would testify before the panel voluntarily, raising more questions about when details will come out in a case where pressure is mounting for information to be released. SENT: 440 words, photos.

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HEALTH & SCIENCE

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BIRD-FLU — The bird flu outbreak that led to the deaths of more than 40 million chickens and turkeys in the U.S. this year and contributed to a spike in egg and meat prices appears to finally be waning, but experts caution the virus hasn’t disappeared and they worry another surge in cases is possible this fall. SENT: 830 words, photos.

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BUSINESS/ECONOMY

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JUNETEENTH-COMERCIALIZATION — Retailers and marketers have been quick to commemorate Juneteenth with an avalanche of merchandise from ice cream to T-shirts to party cups. But many are getting backlash on social media for what critics say undermines the day, designated as a federal holiday last year to honor the emancipation of enslaved African Americans. A search for Juneteenth items among online sellers like Amazon and J.C. Penney produced everything from toothpicks with pan-African flags to party plates and balloons. By Retail writer Anne D’Innocenzio. SENT: 770 words, photos.

FINANCIAL MARKETS — Global stocks and Wall Street futures rebounded after tumbling the previous day on fears economic activity will be depressed by interest rate hikes to cool inflation. London, Frankfurt, Shanghai and Hong Kong advanced. Tokyo retreated. Oil prices rose to stay close to $120 per barrel. By Business Writer Joe McDonald. SENT: 460 words, photos.

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SPORTS

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BKN-NBA FINALS — The Golden State Warriors are NBA champions once again, topping the Boston Celtics 103-90 for their fourth title in the last eight seasons. Stephen Curry scored 34 points for the Warriors, who claimed the franchise’s seventh championship overall. By Sports Writer Kyle Hightower. SENT: 1,000 words, photos. With: BKN--NBA Finals-Celtics (sent).

BKN-ON-BASKETBALL-NBA-FINALS — Greatest shooter ever. That’s what everyone has been calling Golden State’s Stephen Curry for years now, for obvious reasons. Nobody in the history of basketball has made more 3-pointers or made the art of throwing a ball through a hoop look easier than Curry does. He has earned that distinction. And it still seems like he has been undersold. By Basketball writer Tim Reynolds. SENT: 900 words, photos.

GLF--US OPEN-DAY 1 — For one day at least, the U.S. Open was wide open. Five of the top six on the leaderboard played their way onto The Country Club course through qualifying. The other was four-time major winner Rory McIlroy, who slammed and tossed aside his clubs during the round but also made enough shots with them to remain just one stroke off the lead. By Sports writer Jimmy Golen. SENT: 770 words, photos. With: GLF--US Open-Tarren; GLF--US Open-Notebook, GLF--US Open-Key Hole; GLF--US Open-Glance (both sent).

SOC--WCUP-2026 HOST CITIES — Atlanta, Houston, Miami, Philadelphia and Seattle and Kansas City, Missouri, were the newcomers among the 11 U.S. sites picked to host games at the 2026 World Cup, while Baltimore, Cincinnati, Denver, Nashville, Tennessee, and Orlando, Florida, were left out. By Ronald Blum. SENT: 800 words, photos. With SOC--WCup-2026 Reaction (sent).

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HOW TO REACH US

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