Prominent Republicans and gun rights advocates helped elicit a White House turnabout this week after bristling over the administration’s characterization of Alex Pretti, the second person killed this month by a federal officer in Minneapolis, as responsible for his own death because he lawfully possessed a weapon.

The death produced no clear shifts in U.S. gun politics or policies, even as President Donald Trump shuffles the lieutenants in charge of his militarized immigration crackdown. But important voices in Trump's coalition have called for a thorough investigation of Pretti’s death while also criticizing inconsistencies in some Republicans’ Second Amendment stances.

If the dynamic persists, it could give Republicans problems as Trump heads into a midterm election year with voters already growing skeptical of his overall immigration approach. The concern is acute enough that Trump’s top spokeswoman sought Monday to reassert his brand as a staunch gun rights supporter.

“The president supports the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding American citizens, absolutely,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — A heavy Russian drone bombardment of Ukraine’s southern city of Odesa killed at least three people and wounded 23, including two children and a pregnant woman, officials said Tuesday, as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called for speedier U.S. efforts to end Russia's almost 4-year-old invasion of his country.

The Odesa attack involved more than 50 drones, some of them models recently upgraded by Russia to improve their range and strike power, according to Ukrainian authorities.

The drones targeted the power grid, which Russia has repeatedly bombarded during the coldest winter in years, and also hit five apartment blocks, officials said. Emergency crews retrieved the bodies of two men, aged 90 and 52, and a woman from the rubble, authorities said.

“The rescue operation will continue until the fate of all people who may be under the rubble is clarified,” Zelenskyy said on the Telegram messaging app, adding that an informal Protestant place of worship was also damaged.

She had it figured down to the last dollar. The looming insurance payment, balanced against the hard-earned paycheck. The cost of keeping her children fed, covered mostly with government SNAP assistance. And when Shelby Williams reviewed the family budget for November, she told herself that this month would truly be one for giving thanks.

After living with her parents for more than two years, Williams and her two children were finally moving into an apartment of their own in her hometown of Reeds Spring, Missouri. They would celebrate with a Thanksgiving meal made by the kids, the grandparents joining them at the table.

The funds for the needed groceries were all lined up — until the federal government shut down on Oct. 1.

Now Washington is running again. But as Americans prepare for the Thanksgiving holiday, the relieved gratitude of families in Williams’ community, and the many others still recovering from the suspension of government paychecks and food assistance during the 43-day shutdown, is tempered by lingering stress and economic insecurity.

BANGKOK (AP) — It often starts with a text message asking if you are available on weekends, looking for a part-time job or you get a simple “hello” from an unknown number. Halfway across the world, a laborer is usually pulling in 12-16 hour days, sending non-stop messages, hoping someone will take the bait.

The ultimate goal is always to take your money — victims have lost tens of billions to scams and hundreds of thousands of people are in forced labor to keep the schemes going. These workers are often housed in massive complexes scattered across southeast Asia, where the industry has flourished.

Here is why rooting out the scamming industry is such a complex issue:

The crackdown in Myanmar

TOKYO (AP) — Japan announced Friday that its seafood exports have resumed for the first time since China imposed a ban over the discharge of treated radioactive wastewater from the tsunami-hit Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant more than two years ago.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Minoru Kihara told reporters that 6 metric tons (6.6 tons) of scallops harvested in Hokkaido were shipped to China on Wednesday, the first shipment to that country since Beijing banned all Japanese seafood in August 2023.

Beijing announced in June that it would ease the ban and prepare for the resumption of imports, following repeated negotiations between the two sides.

The wastewater discharges from the Fukushima Daiichi plant — debated for years at home over concern about the reputational damage to the region and its local produce — had also become a major political issue between Japan and its neighbors, including China and South Korea.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Congressional Budget Office on Thursday confirmed it had been hacked, potentially disclosing important government data to malicious actors.

The small government office, with some 275 employees, provides objective, impartial analysis to support lawmakers during the budget process. It is required to produce a cost estimate for nearly every bill approved by a House or Senate committee and will weigh in earlier when asked to do so by lawmakers.

Caitlin Emma, a spokeswoman for the CBO said in a written statement that the agency “has identified the security incident, has taken immediate action to contain it, and has implemented additional monitoring and new security controls to further protect the agency’s systems going forward.”

The Washington Post first wrote the story on the CBO hack, stating that the intrusion was done by a suspected foreign actor, citing four anonymous people familiar with the situation.

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — A 60-meter (196-foot) tower collapsed during demolition work at a decommissioned thermal power plant in the South Korean city of Ulsan, killing at least one person and leaving six others trapped under rubble, officials said Friday. A second person was feared dead.

Rescue workers pulled two people to safety shortly after responding to the tower collapse on Thursday afternoon. Another worker, who was rescued later, was pronounced dead at a hospital early Friday, said Kim Jeong-shik, an official with Ulsan’s fire department.

Crews have also located another worker believed to be dead. Kim said the search for the remaining people was suspended Friday morning due to concerns over unstable rubble and will resume after stabilization work.

“We have deployed rescue dogs and they’re conducting searches now. We also have a lot of detection equipment on site, including thermal cameras and endoscopes,” Kim said in a briefing.

U.S. airlines began canceling hundreds of flights Thursday due to the Federal Aviation Administration’s order to reduce traffic at the country’s busiest airports starting Friday because of the government shutdown.

More than 500 flights scheduled for Friday were already cut nationwide, and the number of cancellations climbed steadily throughout Thursday, according to FlightAware, a website that tracks flight disruptions.

The FAA order to cut flights at 40 of the busiest airports across the U.S. includes New York, Los Angeles and Chicago, according to a list distributed to the airlines and obtained by The Associated Press. But the impact will disrupt travel at many smaller airports too.

The FAA seeks to reduce service by 10% across “high-volume” markets to maintain travel safety as air traffic controllers exhibit signs of strain during the shutdown. The move also comes as the Trump administration is ramping up pressure on Democrats in Congress to end the shutdown.

LIMA, Peru (AP) — Peru’s Congress on Thursday declared Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum persona non grata after Mexico decided to grant asylum to former Peruvian Prime Minister Betssy Chávez, in what Peruvian officials called repeated interference in the South American country’s internal affairs.

The legislative decision was adopted with 63 votes in favor, 34 against and two absentee votes, after a debate in which right-wing congressmen argued that Sheinbaum has maintained a hostile position towards Peru since she took office in 2024 by backing former Peruvian President Pedro Castillo.

Castillo, who ordered the dissolution of Parliament in December 2022, was removed from office and remains in detention on charges of alleged rebellion and conspiracy.

On Monday, Peru’s interim President José Jerí severed diplomatic relations with Mexico over Sheinbaum’s decision to grant asylum to Chávez, who is being prosecuted for the attempted dissolution of Congress in 2022 led by Castillo. The Peruvian Attorney General’s Office is seeking a sentence of up to 25 years in prison for Chávez, who served as Castillo’s prime minister.

NEW YORK (AP) — Wall Street lost ground Thursday as influential technology stocks fell and once again steered the broader market.

The technology sector has been the driving force behind the market’s direction, whether up or down, all week. Thursday’s losses pushed nearly every major index solidly into weekly losses. If that momentum holds on Friday, it would break a three-week winning streak for the S&P 500, the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the Nasdaq composite.

The S&P 500 fell 75.97 points, or 1.1%, to 6,720.32. The Dow fell 398.70 points, or 0.8%, to 46,912.30. The Nasdaq fell 445.80 points, or 1.9%, to 23,053.99.

The biggest weights on the market included Nvidia, which fell 3.7%, and Microsoft, which fell 2%. Their huge values give them outsized influence over the market's direction. Other big stocks dragging down the market included Amazon, which slumped 2.9%.

LONDON (AP) — Using a formal document affixed with a royal seal, King Charles III has formally stripped his brother Andrew Mountbatten Windsor of the title of prince.

The disgraced royal has also lost the designation “his royal highness” after the king issued a Letters Patent, a centuries-old type of document used by monarchs to bestow — and remove — appointments or titles.

An announcement published Wednesday in The Gazette — the U.K.’s official public record — said “THE KING has been pleased by Letters Patent under the Great Seal of the Realm dated 3 November 2025 to declare that Andrew Mountbatten Windsor shall no longer be entitled to hold and enjoy the style, title or attribute of ‘Royal Highness’ and the titular dignity of ‘Prince.'”

The king also formally removed the title Duke of York from his brother.

CHICAGO (AP) — A federal judge said Thursday she will order federal agents in Chicago to restrict using force against peaceful protesters and media, saying current practices violate their constitutional rights.

The preliminary injunction came in response to a lawsuit alleging federal agents have used excessive force in their immigration crackdown in the Chicago area.

U.S District Judge Sara Ellis 's ruling, which is expected to be appealed by President Donald Trump's administration, refines an earlier temporary order that required agents to wear badges and banned them from using certain riot-control techniques, such as tear gas, against peaceful protesters and journalists. After repeatedly chastising federal officials for not following her previous orders, she added a requirement for body cameras.

Ellis, who began Thursday’s hearing by describing Chicago as a “vibrant place” and reading from poet Carl Sandburg’s famous poem about the city, said it is “simply untrue” that the Chicago area is a violent place of rioters. A day earlier, attorneys for both sides repeatedly clashed in court over the accounts of several incidents during the immigration crackdown that began in September, including one where a Border Patrol commander threw a cannister of tear gas at a crows.

FRISCO, Texas (AP) — Police in a Dallas suburb say 24-year-old Dallas Cowboys defensive end Marshawn Kneeland was found dead of an apparent suicide after evading authorities in his vehicle and fleeing the scene of an accident on foot.

Frisco police said Thursday they are investigating the possible suicide. They said Kneeland didn't stop for Texas Department of Public Safety troopers over a traffic violation in a chase that was joined by Frisco police on Wednesday night.

Authorities lost sight of the vehicle before locating it crashed minutes later. During the search after Kneeland fled the crash site on foot, officers said they received word that Kneeland might be suicidal. He was found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound early Thursday morning, about three hours after the crash. Police didn't say where Kneeland's body was found.

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LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — The grim task of finding and identifying victims from the firestorm that followed a UPS cargo plane crash in Louisville, Kentucky, entered a third day Thursday as investigators gathered information to determine why the aircraft caught fire and lost an engine on takeoff.

The inferno consumed the enormous plane and spread to nearby businesses, killing at least 12 people, including a child and three UPS crew on the plane, and ending any hope of finding survivors in the crash at UPS Worldport, the company’s global aviation hub.

Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg described the scene as “horrific,” with charred, mangled metal and “still some smoke rising from piles of debris.” Part of the plane's tail, he said, appeared to be sticking out of a storage silo.

“You hear people say, ‘Oh, you only see that in the movies.’ This was worse than the movies,” Greenberg told reporters.