AP News in Brief at 6:04 a.m. EST

Suspect in National Guard attack struggled with ‘dark isolation’ as community raised concerns

The Afghan man accused of gunning down two National Guard members blocks from the White House last week had been unraveling for years, unable to hold a job and flipping between long, lightless stretches of isolation and taking sudden weeks-long cross-country drives. His behavior deteriorated so sharply that a community advocate reached out to a refugee organization for help, fearing he was becoming suicidal.

Emails obtained by The Associated Press reveal mounting warnings about the suspect, Rahmanullah Lakanwal, an asylum seeker whose erratic conduct raised alarms long before the attack that jolted the nation’s capital on the eve of Thanksgiving. The previously unreported concerns offer the clearest picture yet of how he was struggling in his new life in the United States.

Even so, when the community member who works with Afghan families in Washington state saw on the news that Lakanwal was named as the suspect in the National Guard shooting, they said they were stunned, unable to square the violence with the memory of seeing Lakanwal play with his young sons. The person spoke on the condition of anonymity to share undisclosed details while cooperating with the FBI in its investigation.

West Virginia National Guard Specialist Sarah Beckstrom, 20, and Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe, 24, were critically wounded in what officials described as an ambush attack on Wednesday afternoon, and Beckstrom died from her injuries the next day. Investigators are still working to establish a motive for the attack.

Lakanwal, 29, has been charged with first-degree murder.

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4 dead and 10 wounded in shooting at banquet hall in Stockton, California

STOCKTON, Calif. (AP) — Four people were killed and 10 wounded in a shooting during a family gathering at a banquet hall in Stockton, sheriff’s officials said Saturday.

The victims included both children and adults, said Heather Brent, a spokesperson for the San Joaquin County sheriff’s office. Early indications “suggest this may have been a targeted incident,” Brent said during a news conference at the scene.

Local officials said the suspected shooter has not been caught and pleaded with the public for help. Detectives were still working to identify a possible motive.

“If you have any information as to this individual, reach out immediately. If you are this individual, turn yourself in immediately,” San Joaquin County District Attorney Ron Freitas said during a news conference.

The shooting occurred just before 6 p.m. inside the banquet hall, which shares a parking lot with other businesses. Stockton is a city of 320,000 about 40 miles (64 kilometers) south of Sacramento.

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US halts all asylum decisions after shooting of National Guard members

BELLINGHAM, Wash. (AP) — The Trump administration has halted all asylum decisions and paused issuing visas for people traveling on Afghan passports, seizing on the National Guard shooting in the nation’s capital to intensify efforts to rein in legal immigration.

The suspect in Wednesday’s shooting near the White House that killed Specialist Sarah Beckstrom, 20, and critically wounded Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe, 24, both of the West Virginia National Guard, is facing charges including first-degree murder. Investigators are seeking to find a motive for the attack.

Rahmanullah Lakanwal is a 29-year-old Afghan national who had been living in Bellingham, Washington, about 80 miles (130 kilometers) north of Seattle. He worked with the CIA during the Afghanistan War. He applied for asylum during the Biden administration and was granted it this year under President Donald Trump, according to a group that assists with resettlement of Afghans who helped U.S. forces in their country.

The Republican administration is promising to pause entry to the United States from some poor nations and review Afghans and other legal migrants already in the country.

The two service members were deployed as part of Trump’s crime-fighting mission in the District of Columbia. Trump has sent or tried to deploy National Guard members to other cities to assist with his mass deportation efforts but has faced court challenges.

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Northwestern to pay $75 million in deal with Trump administration to restore federal funding

Northwestern University has agreed to pay $75 million to the U.S. government in a deal with the Trump administration to end a series of investigations and restore hundreds of millions of dollars in federal research funding.

President Donald Trump’s administration had cut off $790 million in grants in a standoff that contributed to university layoffs and the resignation in September of Northwestern president Michael Schill. The administration argued the school had not done enough to fight antisemitism.

Under the agreement announced Friday night, Northwestern will make the payment to the U.S. Treasury over the next three years. Among other commitments it also requires the university to revoke the so-called Deering Meadow agreement, which it signed in April 2024 in exchange for pro-Palestinian protesters ending their tent encampment on campus.

During negotiations, interim university president Henry Bienen said Northwestern refused to cede control over hiring, admissions, or its curriculum. “I would not have signed this agreement without provisions ensuring that is the case,” he said.

The agreement also calls for Northwestern to continue compliance with federal anti-discrimination laws, develop training materials to “socialize international students” with the norms of a campus dedicated to open debate, and uphold a commitment to Title IX by “providing safe and fair opportunities for women, including single-sex housing for any woman, defined on the basis of sex, who requests such accommodations and all-female sports, locker rooms, and showering facilities.”

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Grateful to be alive, residents who escaped the Hong Kong apartment blaze wonder what comes next

HONG KONG (AP) — It was just after 3 p.m. when William Li received the unusual call from his wife, who was at work, saying she’d heard from a friend that their building was on fire.

There were no alarms, no signs of smoke in his 2nd floor apartment, and no burning smell to give a sense of urgency, so the 40-year-old office worker who was home on a day off decided to change from his pajamas before heading outside.

But when he opened his door eight minutes after his wife called, it was already too late to escape as he was immediately engulfed by thick, black smoke.

“Everything went black before my eyes,” he told The Associated Press. “I thought to myself: I’m in serious trouble.”

That was just the beginning of Wednesday’s blaze at the Wang Fuk Court complex on the outskirts of Hong Kong. It would burn for more than 40 hours and engulf seven of the complex’s eight buildings before being finally extinguished Friday morning, claiming the lives of at least 128 people with dozens unaccounted for, making it Hong Kong’s deadliest fire since 1948.

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Tom Stoppard, sparkling playwright who won an Oscar for ‘Shakespeare In Love,’ dies at 88

LONDON (AP) — British playwright Tom Stoppard, a playful, probing dramatist who won an Academy Award for the screenplay for 1998’s “Shakespeare In Love,” has died. He was 88.

In a statement Saturday, United Agents said the Czech-born Stoppard — often hailed as the greatest British playwright of his generation — died “peacefully” at his home in Dorset in southwest England, surrounded by his family.

“He will be remembered for his works, for their brilliance and humanity, and for his wit, his irreverence, his generosity of spirit and his profound love of the English language,” they said. “It was an honor to work with Tom and to know him.”

Rolling Stones front man Mick Jagger was among those paying tribute, calling Stoppard “a giant of the English theater, both highly intellectual and very funny in all his plays and scripts.

“He had a dazzling wit and loved classical and popular music alike which often featured in his huge body of work,” said Jagger, who produced the 2001 film “Enigma,” with a screenplay by Stoppard. “He was amusing and quietly sardonic. A friend and companion and I will always miss him.”

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Shoppers spend billions on Black Friday to snag holiday deals, despite wider economic uncertainty

NEW YORK (AP) — Despite wider economic uncertainty hovering above this year’s holiday season, shoppers turned out in big numbers for Black Friday — spending billions of dollars both in stores and online.

Adobe Analytics, which tracks e-commerce, said U.S. consumers spent a record $11.8 billion online Friday, marking a 9.1% jump from last year. Traffic particularly piled up between the hours of 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. local time nationwide, when $12.5 million passed through online shopping carts every minute.

Consumers also spent a record $6.4 billion online on Thanksgiving Day, per Adobe. Top categories that saw an uptick in sales across both days included video game consoles, electronics and home appliances. Shopping services powered by artificial intelligence and social media advertising have also particularly influenced what consumers choose to buy, the firm said.

Meanwhile, software company Salesforce — which tracks digital spending from a range of retailers, including grocers — estimated that Black Friday online sales totaled $18 billion in the U.S. and $79 billion globally. And e-commerce platform Shopify said its merchants raked in a record $6.2 billion in sales worldwide on Black Friday. At its peak, sales reached $5.1 million per minute — with top categories including cosmetics and clothing, according to the Canadian company.

Mastercard SpendingPulse, which tracks in-person and online spending, reported that overall Black Friday sales excluding automotive rose 4.1% from a year ago. The retail sales indicator, which is not adjusted for inflation, showed online sales jumped by double digits (10.4%), while in-store purchases inched up 1.7%.

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Airlines work to fix software glitch on A320 aircraft and some flights are disrupted

Airlines around the world reported short-term disruptions heading into the weekend as they fixed software on a widely used commercial aircraft, after an analysis found the computer code may have contributed to a sudden drop in the altitude of a JetBlue plane last month.

Airbus said Friday that an examination of the JetBlue incident revealed that intense solar radiation may corrupt data critical to the functioning of flight controls on the A320 family of aircraft.

The FAA joined the European Union Aviation Safety Agency in requiring airlines to address the issue with a new software update. More than 500 U.S.-registered aircraft will be impacted.

The EU safety agency said it may cause “short-term disruption” to flight schedules. The problem was introduced by a software update to the plane’s onboard computers, according to the agency.

Airbus CEO Guillaume Faury apologized to customers after the required fix led to “significant logistical challenges and delays.”

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Trump says Venezuelan airspace should be viewed as closed. Maduro government slams ‘colonial threat’

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — President Donald Trump on Saturday said that the airspace “above and surrounding” Venezuela should be considered as “closed in its entirety,” an assertion that raised more questions about the U.S. pressure on Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro. His government accused Trump of making a ”colonial threat” and seeking to undermine the South American country’s sovereignty.

The White House did not respond to questions about what Trump posted on his Truth Social platform, and it was unclear whether he was announcing a new policy or simply reinforcing the messaging around his campaign against Maduro, which has involved multiple strikes in the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific Ocean on small boats accused of ferrying drugs as well as a buildup of naval forces in the region. More than 80 people have been killed in such strikes since early September.

The Republican president addressed his call for an aerial blockade to “Airlines, Pilots, Drug Dealers, and Human Traffickers,” rather than to Maduro.

Venezuela’s government said it “forcefully rejects” Trump’s claim about closing the airspace and that it was a “colonial threat” intended to undermine the country’s “territorial integrity, aeronautical security and full sovereignty.”

The Foreign Ministry said “such declarations constitute a hostile, unilateral and arbitrary act.”

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Trump officials and judge face off over flights to El Salvador in rare, high-stakes contempt probe

Two planes carrying Venezuelan migrants out of the U.S. were midair on March 15 when a federal judge in Washington ordered the Trump administration to turn them around.

Instead, the planes landed in El Salvador hours later, touching off an extraordinary power struggle between the judicial and executive branches of the U.S. government over what happened and why the judge’s order went unexecuted.

That fight entered a critical phase on Friday when U.S. District Judge James Boasberg relaunched an investigation to determine whether the Republican administration deliberately ignored his instruction, letting the planes continue onto El Salvador.

The judge previously concluded it did and threatened to have the responsible official or officials prosecuted on a contempt charge. The administration has denied any violation.

But an appeals court threw Boasberg’s decision out. The contempt probe appeared dead until in yet another twist, a larger panel of judges on the same appeals court ruled on November 14 that the investigation could proceed.