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

Supreme Court rejects Trump mail ballot restrictions ahead of midterms

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Monday rejected President Donald Trump’s bid to restrict mail ballots for the midterm elections, capping a flurry of last-minute legal action with voting already underway.

The decision allows states to continue sending out mail ballots under the same processes they’ve used for years and have accounted for nearly a third of votes cast.

It represented a stark defeat for Trump on an issue he consistently has emphasized as vital to ensuring election integrity even though there is virtually no evidence of fraud with mail ballots.

The Supreme Court majority did not detail its reasoning, as is typical for its emergency docket. Two justices, Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas, publicly dissented from the brief order.

The Trump administration had asked the court, once again at the center of a roiling political controversy, to clear the way for restrictions before the pivotal November contests for control of Congress.

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EPA eliminates rule that limits planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions from power plants

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Environmental Protection Agency said Monday it is repealing rules that limit planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions from power plants fueled by coal and natural gas and announced it is taking a separate but related step to prevent future administrations from regulating climate pollution from power plants.

The rule change, first proposed last year, represents a fundamental shift from efforts by Democratic Presidents Joe Biden and Barack Obama to address climate change and regulate carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that trap the sun’s heat.

Environmental groups decried the change, saying it would come at a cost to Americans’ health and further degrade the environment.

Revoking the Biden-era power plant rule would save industry more than $300 billion in costs and help “unleash” American energy, the EPA said. The change will allow utilities to “make the best decision for the ratepayers based on cost and cost savings, instead of being required to shut down facilities,” said EPA Assistant Administrator Aaron Szabo.

The power plant rule, to take effect soon after publication in the Federal Register, is expected to face immediate legal challenges.

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McConnell returns to the Senate for the first time since his June hospitalization

WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky returned to the Senate to vote on Monday for the first time in three months, looking noticeably more frail after he was hospitalized for a June fall in his home.

McConnell’s lengthy absence from the Senate generated a flood of criticism and online speculation, as he initially remained quiet for weeks about his condition. The 84-year-old senator eventually disclosed a month later that he had been “briefly unconscious” due to the fall and had also been treated for mild pneumonia in the hospital.

He briefly addressed reporters Monday from a wheelchair outside the Senate chamber, smiling but speaking slowly and with some difficulty. McConnell joked that he wasn’t sure how many reporters would be there after dodging so many questions during his almost two decades as leader.

He said he was back in the Senate to work on a pending farm bill and because he has an ongoing interest in NATO and “backing up our good friends who are totally in the fight against the Russians.”

Reporters and photographers were told by Senate staff not to take video of his remarks in the second-floor hallway, even though video is often permitted in that area. Still images were allowed.

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Trump calls AI risks a ‘hoax,’ says there is a ‘SICK conspiracy’ against AI and data centers

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump on Monday lashed out against concerns about rogue artificial intelligence, claiming that any efforts to limit the technology are part of a “SICK conspiracy.”

“AI taking over the World, destroying Humanity, and all other things bad, is a HOAX,” Trump posted on social media, later suggesting that those calling for guardrails on the technology had also warned about climate change, which he also called a hoax.

The president was pushing back against calls by tech leaders such as Anthropic’s Dario Amodei, OpenAI’s Sam Altman and SpaceXAI’s Elon Musk to have greater government oversight of AI. The rapidly evolving technology has become a source of controversy after a series of hacks in recent months that showed AI agents can conspire to deceive humans.

Many tech leaders generally say their goal is to develop the technology in ways that promote safety, address legal liability, feed economic growth, advance science and preserve national security. But they have also expressed concerns that an AI unshackled from human control could be destructive — a claim Trump rejected in a series of heated social media posts as he claimed to be the “Hoax Buster.”

Trump maintained that his presence in the Oval Office should assuage any fears about AI.

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New warnings about the risks of AI to humanity revive a long-running debate

LOS ANGELES (AP) — New warnings from within the artificial intelligence industry have revived a long-running debate over whether advanced AI could escape human control and ultimately threaten humanity’s survival, and whether the companies developing the technology are doing enough to prevent such a scenario.

The CEO of Anthropic, the San Francisco company behind Claude, said he thought the industry needed to reduce the speed of its work, cautioning Saturday that a swarm of AI agents might be able to take over the internet in six months to a year unless companies devoted more time to putting safeguards in place.

Days after two former Anthropic safety researchers publicly aired concerns that the existential threats AI might poste to humanity were receiving too little attention, Dario Amodei outlined a plan for companies like his and governments around the world to ensure that increasingly capable AI models remain aligned with the commands and values of responsible people.

Sam Altman, CEO of ChatGPT maker OpenAI, said this weekend that companies should start coordinating on AI safety without waiting for the government to introduce legislation. The “pacing” of AI development doesn’t mean stopping it, Altman wrote on X. “But it should be slower than it otherwise could be.”

Here’s what to know about the recent dire predictions and whether any brakes might be put on AI advancement:

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What the closure of Saudi Arabia’s East-West pipeline could mean for oil flows

CHICAGO (AP) — Saudi Arabia’s closure of a major oil pipeline after a recent attack is raising fears that global energy markets in crisis because of the war with Iran could face even starker shortages, pushing prices higher for fuel and other essentials.

The largest oil producer in the Middle East closed its East-West pipeline on Friday after the attack, which it blamed on drones from Iranian-backed militias in Iraq. Two regional officials told The Associated Press that repairs could take three to five weeks.

The pipeline is crucial to getting some crude out of the Middle East by shipping it to the Red Sea rather than through the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterway through which roughly a fifth of the world’s oil supply passed before the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran in February.

Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels have seized islands along key Red Sea shipping routes, further threatening Saudi exports. And while several limited alternatives remain, including trickles of tanker traffic in Hormuz, experts warn more supply shocks and higher prices straining households could pile up. Brent crude, the international standard, traded at more than $105 a barrel Monday.

Here’s what we know:

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Man pleads not guilty in the hanging death of a Mississippi woman

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — A man charged with murder in the hanging death of a Black woman in Mississippi pleaded not guilty Monday during his first court appearance.

The body of Tasia Fortune, 29, was found hanging from a tree behind an abandoned home in Jackson, the state capital, on Aug. 3.

On Friday, police arrested 51-year-old Jarques Ratliff on a murder charge after the state medical examiner deemed her death a homicide. Ratliff is also Black.

During Monday’s brief hearing in Municipal Court, a judge denied bond for Ratliff, who told the court he’s not guilty. Ratliff’s attorney at the hearing left the courthouse without speaking to reporters.

The case has attracted widespread attention because the manner of Fortune’s death recalled lynchings in the Southern state, which has a tumultuous civil rights history stained by episodes of racial violence.

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A Vermont man is on trial for shooting 3 Palestinian students. He claimed the CIA told him to do it

Jason Eaton insisted he was acting on orders from the CIA and Mossad when he shot three Palestinian college students who were walking past his home a few days after Thanksgiving. He said the U.S. and Israeli intelligence agencies transmitted the messages to him via FM radio and that God was commanding him to protect his Jewish neighbors.

Eaton’s claims were at the heart of his insanity defense as he went on trial Monday on attempted murder charges in a case that shook Burlington, Vermont, and reverberated in the West Bank, where the three wounded men grew up and became friends as schoolmates in Ramallah before moving to the U.S. for college.

The November 2023 shooting, weeks after the start of the Israel-Hamas war, spawned calls for a hate crime investigation. But no hate crime charges were filed as questions persisted about whether anti-Palestinian animus, an altered mental state or something else had compelled Eaton to open fire on Hisham Awartani, Tahseen Aliahmad and Kinnan Abdalhamid, who were all 20 at the time.

The men testified one after another as Eaton, now 51, watched stoically from the defense table in a Burlington courtroom. He has pleaded not guilty but doesn’t dispute that he was the shooter. If convicted, he faces up to life in prison. If found not guilty by reason of insanity, he could be ordered to undergo mental health treatment.

Defense lawyer Joshua O’Hara, previewing testimony from a defense psychiatrist, told jurors in an opening statement that Eaton was suffering from a delusional, psychotic disorder after losing his job at a credit union two weeks before the shooting.

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Kennedy Center board to propose new options for honoring Trump as center confronts solvency worries

The Kennedy Center Board of Trustees is planning to propose adding President Donald Trump’s name to the facility’s exterior in recognition of his saving the building from its “precarious fiscal position,” according to a new court filing in a suit aimed at blocking the move.

It’s the latest development in the case revolving around adding the president’s name to the exterior of the cultural and arts facility that sits along the Potomac River in Washington and reflects the Trump-aligned board’s efforts to honor the president.

The new information came out of a court filing made by Democratic Rep. Joyce Beatty of Ohio, an ex-officio member of the board. Beatty, who has led an effort to block Trump from putting his name on the building, said in a filing she was alerting the court to the proposal because it could implicate a pending decision before the court.

Both the court and the Kennedy Center board are expected to hold meetings Tuesday.

Beatty’s filing includes two exhibits. One is a draft vote to shut the center down, asserting the building is unsafe for occupancy. That assertion incorrectly cites a consulting group’s finding, “which expressly disclaimed providing any such opinion,” according to Beatty.

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Jean Smart wins fifth Emmy for final season of ‘Hacks’ and Noah Wyle gets his second for ‘The Pitt’

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Jean Smart made it a sweep with her fifth best actress award in a comedy for the fifth and final season of “Hacks,” Noah Wyle made it two for two as best actor for “The Pitt,” and “Widow’s Bay” was making waves at the 78th Emmy Awards on Monday night.

No actor had won an Emmy every year for a series that lasted more than three seasons until Smart did it Monday.

“What a ride this has been,” an emotional Smart said from the stage of the Peacock Theater after getting a standing ovation.

The 75-year-old Smart has won eight Emmys overall in a career that was already more than respectable when she landed her defining role of Deborah Vance, a brash stand-up comic pushing back against age, obscurity and sexism in the HBO Max series.

Wyle won the Emmy for the second season of “The Pitt,” HBO Max’s real-time emergency room drama, for playing Dr. Michael “Robby” Robinavitch, a role that brought him a major career revival after starring in “ER” in the 1990s.