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

Kimmel’s future hangs in balance after ABC suspends his late-night show over Charlie Kirk comments

NEW YORK (AP) — Jimmy Kimmel’s television future hung in the balance Thursday after ABC suspended his late-night show following the host’s comments about the assassination of Charlie Kirk, leaving the network’s parent company to decide whether supporting him is worth the risk to its business.

Two other companies that operate dozens of ABC stations came out against Kimmel, and they are being cheered on by a Trump administration regulator who can make life difficult for ABC’s owner, the Walt Disney Co.

But advocates for free speech say it’s time for the company to take a stand.

Kimmel made several remarks on his show Monday and Tuesday about the reaction to the conservative activist’s killing last week, suggesting many Trump supporters are trying to capitalize on Kirk’s death. “The MAGA gang (is) desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and doing everything they can to score political points from it,” Kimmel said.

The chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, Brendan Carr, said Kimmel appeared to be making an intentional effort to mislead the public that the man accused in the fatal shooting was a right-wing Trump supporter. Authorities say 22-year-old Tyler Robinson grew up in a conservative household in southern Utah but was enmeshed in “leftist ideology.”

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Kimmel’s suspension is the latest display of Trump’s growing power over the US media landscape

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump has used threats, lawsuits and government pressure as he remakes the American media landscape, unleashing his long-standing grievances against an industry that has mocked, criticized and scorned him for years.

He’s extracted multimillion-dollar settlements, forced companies into costly litigation and prompted changes to programming that he found objectionable.

Now Trump is escalating his campaign of censure and retaliation, invigorated by successful efforts to push ABC late-night host Jimmy Kimmel off the air for his commentary on conservative activist Charlie Kirk’s assassination.

Speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One while returning from Great Britain on Thursday, Trump said federal regulators should consider revoking broadcast licenses for networks that “give me only bad publicity.”

“All they do is hit Trump,” he said. “They’re licensed! They’re not allowed to do that. They’re an arm of the Democrat Party.”

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Charlie Kirk’s Turning Point taps his widow as its next leader. Questions about its future remain

PHOENIX (AP) — Turning Point USA, the organization Charlie Kirk founded to mobilize young, Christian conservatives, has seen a massive surge in interest and support since the activist’s assassination last week.

As conservatives mourn Kirk’s death, the group appears poised to remain a MAGA juggernaut as it plots its future without Kirk at the helm.

The group’s board announced Thursday that Kirk’s widow, Erika Kirk, had been unanimously elected as its next leader and will serve as CEO and board chair.

“This was what Charlie hoped for and wanted and he said so numerous times,” Tyler Bowyer, the group’s chief operating officer, said on social media. “Erika is one with Charlie and Charlie is one with Erika.”

Turning Point became a multimillion-dollar operation under Charlie Kirk’s leadership, and was credited with helping to return President Donald Trump to office. Since Kirk’s killing, his podcast and social media have attracted millions of new followers. There has been an outpouring of interest in expanding Turning Point’s footprint on college and high school campuses, the group’s spokesperson says, and future large-scale events are continuing as planned.

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Trump asks the Supreme Court for an emergency order to remove Lisa Cook from the Fed board

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration on Thursday asked the Supreme Court for an emergency order to remove Lisa Cook from the Federal Reserve’s board of governors.

The Republican administration turned to the high court after an appeals court refused to go along with ousting Cook, part of President Donald Trump’s effort to reshape the Fed’s seven-member governing board and strike a blow at its independence.

The White House campaign to unseat Cook marks an unprecedented bid to reshape the Fed board, which was designed to be largely independent from day-to-day politics. No president has fired a sitting Fed governor in the agency’s 112-year history.

Cook, who was appointed to the Fed’s board by President Joe Biden, a Democrat, has said she won’t leave her post and won’t be “bullied” by Trump. One of her lawyers, Abbe Lowell, has said she “will continue to carry out her sworn duties as a Senate-confirmed Board Governor.”

Separately, Senate Republicans on Monday confirmed Stephen Miran, Trump’s nominee to an open spot on the Fed’s board. Both Cook and Miran took part in Wednesday’s vote in which the Fed cut its key interest rate by a quarter-point.

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Trump wraps up UK state visit with gratitude for his hosts while largely sidestepping tough issues

AYLESBURY, England (AP) — President Donald Trump said Thursday that he was “tremendously thankful” for the pageantry and splendor lavished on him during his second state visit to the United Kingdom as he wrapped up a trip that largely sidestepped major public disagreements over difficult trade and geopolitical issues.

The mutual warmth, along with Trump’s abundance of kind words bestowed on the host country, suggested that an all-out charm offensive by the royal family and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer had its desired effect, even though there was a notable lack of progress on some key matters.

Trump and Starmer signed what both sides hailed as a historic agreement on science and technology, and they held a roundtable with global business leaders where they suggested the deal could mean significant job gains. Among the topics tackled mostly in private talks between Trump and Starmer were the wars in Ukraine and Gaza and U.S. tariff rates on steel imported from Britain.

“The bond between our countries is like no other anywhere in the world,” Trump said at a news conference at Chequers, the 16th-century manor house northwest of London that serves as a rural retreat for British leaders. The U.S. and U.K., the American president said, have “done more good for the planet than any other nation in history.”

Joining in the bonhomie, Starmer said that “time and time again, it is British and American men and women, side by side, changing the path of history and turning it towards our values, towards freedom, democracy and the rule of law.”

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DC leaders defend crime fighting efforts to Congress as federal law enforcement surge continues

WASHINGTON (AP) — D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser on Thursday defended her policies to Congress as President Donald Trump’s law enforcement surge is in its second month and lawmakers act to further limit the city’s authority.

She was invited to the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform to answer questions about crime in the nation’s capital. Trump issued an emergency order last month that federalized the city’s police department and launched a surge of law enforcement. The emergency order expired earlier this month but federal agencies and the National Guard continue their operations in the city.

Bowser listed off the city’s accomplishments in reducing crime, acknowledging that the federal intervention had enhanced those achievements.

“Any crime is too much crime,” Bowser said. “But we’re trending in the right direction.”

Bowser is leading the city at a time when the district’s self-governance is being challenged in ways never before seen since the passage of the Home Rule Act of 1973, which grants the district some autonomy. Federal leaders retain significant control over local affairs, including the approval of the budget and laws passed by the D.C. Council.

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Gunman kills 2 at Israeli-run crossing between West Bank and Jordan. 4 soldiers killed in Gaza

JERUSALEM (AP) — A Jordanian aid truck driver opened fire and killed two people at an Israeli-run border crossing in the occupied West Bank on Thursday, officials said. The Israeli military also said that four soldiers were killed in the southern Gaza Strip, and that a drone had struck in the area of the southern Israeli city of Eilat.

The Israeli military referred to the shooting at the crossing with Jordan as a militant attack. Israel’s Magen David Adom rescue service said that two men, around 60 and 20 years old, were killed. The military said the attacker had been “neutralized,” without elaborating.

Jordan’s Foreign Ministry condemned the attack and identified the shooter as Abdel-Mutalib al-Qaisi, a man in his late 50s who it said had been driving aid trucks bound for Gaza for three months.

Three Israelis were killed in a September 2024 attack at the crossing, when a retired Jordanian soldier opened fire. That attack appeared to be linked to the ongoing Israel-Hamas war. The Allenby Bridge Crossing over the Jordan River, also known as the King Hussein Bridge, is mainly used by Palestinians and tourists. It was closed after the attack.

The military said the drone had been launched “from the east,” without elaborating. Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels have repeatedly fired drones and missiles at Israel, often drawing retaliatory airstrikes.

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Judge blocks Trump administration from deporting Guatemalan migrant children

WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge on Thursday blocked President Donald Trump’s administration from immediately deporting Guatemalan migrant children who came to the U.S. alone back to their home country, the latest step in a court struggle over one of the most sensitive issues in Trump’s hard-line immigration agenda.

The decision by U.S. District Judge Timothy J. Kelly comes after the Republican administration’s Labor Day weekend attempt to remove Guatemalan migrant children who were living in government shelters and foster care.

Trump administration officials said they were seeking to reunify children with parents who wanted them returned home. “But that explanation crumbled like a house of cards about a week later,” Kelly, who was nominated by Trump, wrote. “There is no evidence before the Court that the parents of these children sought their return.”

Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin in a statement insisted on the administration’s initial claims that parents requested being reunited with their children. “This judge is blocking efforts to REUNIFY CHILDREN with their families. Now these children will have to go to shelters,” McLaughlin said. “All just to ‘get Trump.’ This is disgraceful and immoral.”

White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson in a statement said that “The lower court wrongly interjected itself into this effort” of reuniting families.

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Prosecutor says stalking suspect ambushed Pennsylvania police officers, killing 3

NORTH CODORUS, Pa. (AP) — A suspected stalker armed with a rifle hid inside his ex-girlfriend’s home in the rolling farmland of southern Pennsylvania and ambushed police officers who came to arrest him, killing three of them in a shootout, a prosecutor said Thursday.

Two other officers were seriously wounded before police shot the suspect to death in a hail of gunfire that capped a 15-hour ordeal after a trail camera captured an image of the suspect, armed with an AR-style rifle, peering through a scope into the house Tuesday night.

The ex-girlfriend and her mother called the police and then fled the house for their safety after officers dispatched Tuesday night were unable to find him there. Police didn’t find him at his own home so arrived back at the house Wednesday afternoon.

Using a drone, six officers scoured the property, including farm buildings, before they noticed the door to the home was unlocked — even though the ex-girlfriend and her mother had locked it before fleeing.

Four plainclothes detectives from the Northern York County Regional Police Department wearing bulletproof vests opened the door and were immediately fired on by the suspect, 24-year-old Matthew James Ruth, who was carrying an AR-style rifle with a suppressor, York County District Attorney Tim Barker said.

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Nvidia to invest $5 billion in struggling rival Intel

Nvidia, the world’s leading chipmaker, announced on Thursday that it’s investing $5 billion in Intel and will collaborate with the struggling semiconductor company.

Nvidia said it will spend $5 billion to buy Intel common stock at $23.28 a share. The investment, which is subject to regulatory approvals, comes a month after the U.S. government took a 10% stake in Intel.

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang called it “a fusion of two world-class platforms” that combines Intel’s strength in making conventional computer chips, known as CPUs, that power most laptops, with Nvidia’s focus on the specialized graphics chips that are critical for artificial intelligence.

“This partnership is a recognition that computing has fundamentally changed,” Huang told reporters Thursday. “The era of accelerated and AI computing has arrived.”

Intel shares jumped nearly 23%, its biggest one-day percentage gain since 1987. Nvidia shares added more than 3%.