AP News in Brief at 6:04 p.m. EDT

At least 5 dead after Amazon cargo plane barreled off runway at Miami airport

MIAMI (AP) — An Amazon cargo plane barreled off a runway at Miami International Airport on Sunday, killing at least five people as it struck vehicles and burst into flames, authorities said.

The aircraft overran the runway around 2 p.m. after arriving from San Juan, Puerto Rico. Five people were killed, three critically injured and two others hospitalized with less severe injuries, Miami-Dade County officials told a news conference.

Miami-Dade Rescue Fire Chief Ray Jadallah said some people were trapped inside vehicles. The pilot and copilot were also trapped in the plane. Fire crews were still dealing with a fuel leak on the plane several hours after the crash, Jadallah said.

More than 60 Miami-Dade Fire Rescue units responded to the crash, arriving to find the aircraft on fire as crews worked to extinguish the flames and assess patients.

The Prime Air plane came to rest beside a roadway near two semi-trucks, according to images from the scene. The aircraft appeared to be resting on its belly and was largely intact despite the fire.

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Trump administration makes another appeal to the Supreme Court to allow mail ballot restrictions

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration on Sunday renewed its appeal to the Supreme Court to allow new restrictions on mail ballots in time for the midterms.

The filing came after U.S. District Court Judge Indira Talwani extended an order against the Postal Service enforcing President Donald Trump’s executive order for the November elections.

The legal wrangling is happening even as states start sending out mail ballots, leaving the administration little time to make big changes in mail ballot rules.

“Ballots have already begun to be mailed in North Carolina, and more States will begin the mailing process as the injunction remains in place — including Alabama on September 9 and at least five States the week of September 13,” Solicitor General John Sauer said in the filing.

“Once those ballot envelopes enter the mailstream, there is no retrieving them. And while the injunction allows the Postal Service and the States to continue taking steps to ensure that their envelopes satisfy the Rule’s requirements … each day the injunction is in place risks sowing confusion and chaos because the injunction makes those preparatory steps voluntary, rather than mandatory.”

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A whiplash election year enters its final stretch as Trump holds wild cards

WASHINGTON (AP) — In the earliest days of this election cycle, the U.S. wasn’t at war with Iran.

The East Wing of the White House was still standing and the Kennedy Center wasn’t threatened with demolition. Artificial intelligence data centers weren’t bipartisan shorthand for the tech sector’s excess. Democratic socialists were largely confined to the outer edges of political discourse. Lake Ontario’s name wasn’t in question.

Since President Donald Trump entered politics more than a decade ago, he’s had a knack for dominating the national conversation so thoroughly that it can be hard to keep up. But as the final midterm of his presidency rapidly approaches, the landscape is proving especially volatile, with Trump often stirring the tumult.

“Some of these things are out of our control,” House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Louisiana Republican, told reporters last week when pressed on whether the frenzy will hurt his party’s election prospects.

Even the map itself has been in flux, with Texas, California and Florida among the states that have redrawn congressional districts. Missouri’s Republican attorney general is appealing a court ruling last week that blocked a Trump-backed map there.

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German far-right party set for regional election triumph but uncertain of governing

MAGDEBURG, Germany (AP) — The far-right Alternative for Germany was projected to win a strong victory in a regional election Sunday, but it wasn’t immediately clear whether it would be able to fulfill its ambition of forming the country’s first far-right state government since World War II.

The party of German’s unpopular leader, Chancellor Friedrich Merz, was set for a disastrous result in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt. The anti-migration and Russia-friendly Alternative for Germany’s candidate for governor said that “we have written history.”

Ulrich Siegmund, 35, told public broadcaster ARD that voters had sent a signal that “things cannot carry on like this” and that it was “also a signal toward Berlin.” Of Germany’s unpopular leader, he said: “A very good campaigner for us in this election campaign was Friedrich Merz. Every day this man is in the chancellery is one too many.”

Alternative for Germany, or AfD, went into the vote seeking an absolute majority in the state legislature to govern on its own. That would overcome the so-called firewall of mainstream parties’ refusal to work with AfD, but it was unclear long after polls closed whether it would happen.

A first state government would be the biggest prize in the anti-migration party’s 13-year history, at a time of widespread discontent with a national government that has yet to persuade voters that it can get the country’s sluggish economy moving.

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US envoys Witkoff and Kushner hold talks in Ukraine after meeting with Putin

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner held “encouraging” talks in Kyiv on Sunday in their first official visit to Ukraine, but made no breakthrough toward ending Russia’s full-scale invasion.

The Trump administration’s push to end the fighting has lost momentum, with the focus on the Iran war for the past six months.

The trip by the Americans, part of a renewed effort to end the war, followed a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow on Saturday, as both sides have escalated their aerial attacks in the more than 4 1/2-year all-out war.

Despite the latest diplomatic push, the core demands of Moscow and Kyiv remain mutually exclusive, especially over territorial concessions, underscoring the difficulty of reaching an agreement. Kushner acknowledged the challenge, saying the U.S. was working “behind the scenes” to create the conditions for a possible deal.

“It’s a very, very hard problem, but we’re going to try,” Kushner said.

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Iran says it plans to announce a new ‘exclusion zone’ near the Strait of Hormuz

CAIRO (AP) — The new head of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council on Sunday said Tehran plans to announce an “exclusion zone” outside the Strait of Hormuz aimed at vessels it believes are attempting to transit the waterway.

Mohsen Rezaei’s comments to Iran’s state broadcaster came with few details, a day after the U.S. struck three Iranian oil tankers in response to Tehran launching ballistic missiles at U.S. warships. Experts called the launches a dangerous escalation after Iran’s previous attacks at sea targeted commercial shipping.

The new zone should be announced in the coming days and weeks and “will begin from the line of the U.S. naval blockade, extend toward the Strait of Hormuz, and from this side continue into the Persian Gulf,” Rezaei said. “Any ship that enters this area with the intention of passing through the Strait of Hormuz and is identified will be placed on our sanctions list.”

It is not clear where Iran defines the location of the weekslong U.S. blockade, which is aimed at Iranian ports and keeping Tehran from shipping out its oil. The U.S. military has said over 20 warships are supporting the blockade, which as of Sunday had redirected 92 commercial ships and disabled three.

The U.S. has been introducing new measures to increase the economic pain on Iran after negotiations collapsed and no end to the intermittent fighting appears in sight. Meanwhile, Iran continues to attack some ships trying to transit the strait, which has become an important source of leverage for Tehran in the war that began Feb. 28 with U.S. and Israeli strikes.

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US tourism groups want to win Canadian visitors back. A testy trade war isn’t helping

LAS VEGAS (AP) — Appeals from American tourism organizations seemed to be everywhere Josh Loewen looked over the last year. Billboards and banners proclaimed a state or city’s love for Canada. Online and social media ads offered special deals for travelers from north of the border.

As a Vancouver resident and marketing executive himself, Loewen said he understands the conciliatory overtures. The number of Canadians traveling to the United States plunged after President Donald Trump returned to office with remarks about making Canada the 51st state. An acrimonious trade war between the two countries now is threatening to reinforce the informal boycott just as it appeared to be easing slightly.

“It’s such a big ask right now,” Loewen, 45, said of the U.S. tourism industry’s attempts to woo Canadians like him back before a new president occupies the White House. “It’s just a wasted effort.”

Relations between the U.S. and Canadian governments have deteriorated sharply since their trade negotiations collapsed last month. Trump imposed import taxes of up to 50% on a range of Canadian products. Canada’s government responded in kind. Trump ordered the U.S. government to change the name of border-spanning Lake Ontario to “Lake America.” Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney dismissed insults from members of Trump’s Cabinet as childish and undignified.

The bilateral rift has not stopped state and local tourism officials and popular destinations like Graceland from trying to persuade Canadian visitors to return.

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Months after Venezuela earthquakes, a family refuses to give up search for their missing relative

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Antonella Molina, her nephew Pedro Molina and a group of friends set out at 8 a.m. on a recent Saturday, hands full of flyers, walking carefully through the rubble that remains throughout La Guaira after two catastrophic back-to-back earthquakes 10 weeks ago.

Their mission is to find 18-year-old Andrés Molina — Antonella’s nephew and Pedro’s cousin — who they haven’t heard from since the double earthquakes hit Venezuela on June 24. Andrés is among tens of thousands who remain missing, according to an independent account, far surpassing the government estimate of 1,500.

Weeks before, Antonella and other relatives pulled the bodies of Andrés’ mother and brother from the collapsed remains of their 10-story apartment building that collapsed in La Guaira, the coastal area just north of the capital Caracas that was one of the hardest hit. The building once housed more than 30 people but there was no sign of Andrés, not even the backpack he always carried.

Neighbors told the family they have seen Andrés wandering the destruction collecting scrap metal; they hold out hope that he survived.

“There are a lot of things that give us hope,” Antonella said. “And one of those is love.”

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Volcanic island in Indonesia erupts, forcing the cancellation of hundreds of flights

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — A volcano erupted in Indonesia early Sunday, prompting the cancellation of all flights at Jakarta’s Soekarno-Hatta International Airport and disrupting other domestic airports as ash drifted across western parts of the country.

The volcanic island of Anak Krakatau, located in Indonesia’s Sunda Strait between the main Java and Sumatra islands, had showed signs of activity since Friday before erupting for 30 seconds at 3:53 a.m. Sunday and for 16 seconds about three hours later, Indonesia’s Geological Agency said. Closed-circuit camera footage showed lava flares from the volcano.

No casualties were reported and no evacuation order was issued. The nearest settlement is more than 16 kilometers (10 miles) away, but authorities warned residents and visitors to stay at least 3 kilometers (2 miles) from the active crater.

Volcanic ash spread across parts of Jakarta and Lampung province on Sumatra’s southern tip, Indonesia’s Center for Volcanology and Geological Hazard Mitigation said.

AirNav Indonesia closed airspace around Soekarno-Hatta and Halim Perdanakusuma airports in Jakarta, as well as six other airports, including Radin Inten II Airport in Lampung, because of volcanic ash.

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Defending champions Aryna Sabalenka and Carlos Alcaraz reach the US Open quarterfinals

NEW YORK (AP) — Defending champions Aryna Sabalenka and Carlos Alcaraz are back to the quarterfinals at the U.S. Open, and they made it look easy.

The top-ranked Sabalenka solved some early struggles holding serve and overpowered Taylor Townsend 6-4, 6-3 on Sunday. Alcaraz also advanced in straight sets, beating Tommy Paul 6-4, 6-3, 6-4 in the second match at Arthur Ashe Stadium.

“I’m happy with that performance,” Alcaraz said. “I played my game. I tried to play my style. Tommy’s such a talented player. His shots are pretty dangerous and it’s sometimes pretty difficult to control the ball when it comes to you, so I just tried to be ready.”

Townsend broke Sabalenka three times in her first four service games as she looked to spring the upset. Sabalenka found a groove, regained her confidence and did not lose another point after falling behind 3-1 in the second set.

“I love matches like that because it was really challenging,” Sabalenka said. “Going through tough challenges and overcoming those challenges, it definitely gives you strength and really strong belief that you can do it.”