WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden has all but announced he's running for reelection, but key questions about the 2024 campaign are unresolved: Who will manage it? Where will it be based? When will he finally make it official? Advisers have long said he planned to wait until after March, when the year's first fundraising period wraps up. That was an effort to help manage expectations because many donors who gave generously to Democratic causes during last fall's elections were looking for a break. But an announcement isn't imminent even now, aides insist, and probably won't come until at le ..read more

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Control of the Wisconsin Supreme Court, and likely the future of abortion access, Republican-drawn legislative maps and years of GOP policies in the key swing state rests with the outcome an election Tuesday that has seen record campaign spending. The winner of the high-stakes contest between Republican-backed Dan Kelly and Democratic-supported Janet Protasiewicz will determine majority control of the court headed into the 2024 presidential election. The court came within one vote of overturning President Joe Biden’s narrow win in 2020, and both sides expect another close ..read more

LUSAKA, Zambia (AP) — Vice President Kamala Harris is pushing for $7 billion in private-sector investments to help Africa prepare for the effects of climate change. The announcement comes as she wraps up her weeklong trip to the continent on Saturday. Harris plans to visit a farm outside Lusaka where workers are using new techniques and technology to grow more produce, part of her effort to demonstrate ways to secure food supplies despite global warming. “The United States is committed to these types of innovative solutions to support climate adaptation, mitigation and resilience,” she said Fr ..read more

WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) — A voting machine company’s defamation case against Fox News over its airing of false allegations about the 2020 presidential election will go to trial after a Delaware judge on Friday allowed a jury to decide whether the conservative network aired the claims with actual malice, the standard for proving libel. Superior Court Judge Eric Davis ruled that neither Fox nor Dominion Voting Systems had presented a convincing argument to prevail on whether Fox acted with malice without the case going to a jury. But he also ruled that the statements Dominion had challenged consti ..read more

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Biden administration said Friday that the U.S. will open an embassy in the South Pacific island nation of Vanuatu in its latest move to blunt China’s increasing influence in the Indo-Pacific. The new embassy in Port Vila will be the fifth diplomatic mission that the U.S. has either opened or announced that it will build in the region over the past three years as it seeks to confront what it sees as a threat or challenge from China. “Consistent with the U.S. Indo-Pacific strategy, a permanent diplomatic presence in Vanuatu would allow the U.S. government to deepen relation ..read more

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. (AP) — In a highly unusual ruling, a state court judge on Thursday voided a U.S. Marine’s adoption of an Afghan war orphan, more than a year after he took the little girl away from the Afghan couple raising her. But her future remains uncertain. For now, the child will stay with Marine Maj. Joshua Mast and his wife, Stephanie, under a temporary custody order they obtained before the adoption. The Masts will have to re-prove to the court that they should be granted a permanent adoption. Despite the uncertainty, the ruling was a welcome move for the Afghan couple, who had be ..read more

MONTPELIER, Vt. (AP) — Hundreds of young people gathered on the lawn of the Vermont Statehouse on Friday as part of a nationwide series of events to help build support for transgender rights amid what they denounced as an increasingly hostile climate. Chanting, “We're here, we're queer, get used to it!" many draped themselves in pride flags or carried posters with messages like “yay gay” or “protect trans kids.” Similar events were planned at capitols in states including South Carolina, Alabama, Minnesota, Nebraska and Montana, and at other venues Friday and this weekend Young people, some as ..read more

LUSAKA, Zambia (AP) — Vice President Kamala Harris paused Friday during a whirlwind diplomatic swing through Africa for something much more personal: A visit to the site of her maternal grandfather’s home in Lusaka, where he lived as an Indian public servant in the 1960s. P.V. Gopalan was working with the newly independent Zambia government six decades ago on refugee resettlement and lived at 16 Independence Ave., where Harris visited as a little girl. The home no longer exists; rather, an office building now stands on the plot of land. The location was identified using plot numbers in public ..read more

NEW YORK (AP) — Former President Donald Trump will be arraigned Tuesday after his indictment in New York City, court officials said Friday, his formal surrender and arrest presenting the historic, shocking scene of a former U.S. commander in chief forced to stand before a judge. While Trump and his lawyers prepared for his defense, the prosecutor in his hush money case defended the grand jury investigation that propelled him toward trial, while congressional Republicans painted it all as politically motivated. In a letter obtained by The Associated Press, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Brag ..read more

WASHINGTON (AP) — A celebrity and insatiable publicity hound long before he was president, Donald Trump has been photographed countless times. But never like this. Now that a New York grand jury has voted to indict him for his role in the payment of hush money to a porn actor, Trump will have to appear at district attorney headquarters in Manhattan to be booked, fingerprinted and get a mug shot taken. The former president, the first ever to be indicted, is expected to surrender to authorities early next week. New York Police Department policy prohibits publicly releasing mug shots, though they ..read more