Motorists can expect intermittent ramp closures in both directions of I-96 between Kent Lake Road and I-275 on Friday and Saturday, Nov. 1-2.

The intermittent closures will take place from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Friday and 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Saturday, according to the Michigan Department of Transportation.

The closures, which will last for about an hour at each ramp, will allow crews to make pavement markings as part of a multi-year reconstruction of I-96 in western Oakland County.

Weather affects all work and may results in delays or cancellations.

The construction project, which is nearing completion, also includes the creation of flex lanes in each direction of the freeway between Kent Lake Road and I-275.

A flex lane uses a highway’s shoulder as a traveling lane during heavy traffic periods in the morning and afternoon. The flex lanes will go into effect early next year.

 

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SMART announced that voters can get free rides in Oakland, Macomb and Wayne counties on Election Day this year.

According to SMART, they will offer free rides on fixed bus routes, connector services, ADA Paratransit and SMART Flex.

The rides will be free from 12 a.m. to 11:59 p.m. on Nov. 5.

"Voting is a fundamental right, and transportation should never stand in the way of someone making their voice heard," SMART General Manager Dwight Ferrell said in a statement. "This is the second time weve provided free rides on Election Day, and it reflects our continued commitment to being a pillar in the community."

Related election information Check if you're registered to vote in Michigan Find your polling location How to get an absentee ballot  View your sample ballot  More information about early voting

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NEW YORK (AP) — Halloween has plenty of traditions, from candy to jack-o’-lanterns — and the annual spectacle of Heidi Klum’s costume.

The supermodel-turned-TV personality is fond of surprising her guests with her elaborate costumes, like in 2022, when she arrived at the event on the end of a fishing line, encased in a slithering worm costume.

“I just wanted to be something random,” she explained while lying on the floor for maximum worm-like effect. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone being a rain worm before.”

Last year, she enlisted the help of several Cirque du Soleil performers as the tail feathers to her peacock costume.

“A lot of planning goes into it, you know,” Klum said through her peacock beak, with husband Tom Kaulitz next to her, dressed as an egg. “Because first, you have to have an idea.”

At her 2008 party she dressed as Kali, the Hindu goddess of death and destruction — complete with multiple arms, dangling heads and a deep coat of blue body paint.

Klum told The Associated Press she would immediately be planning her look for the following year. “After tonight I’ll be thinking about what I’ll do next year. It’s always got to be different. Completely different,” she said.

Other notable Klum costumes over the years have included a giant Transformer, a clone (complete with several Klum-lookalikes) an elderly version of herself, and an alien experiment gone awry.

The star has also transformed into a terrifying butterfly, an ape, a cat, a crow — and cartoon characters including Jessica Rabbit and Fiona from “Shrek.”

Her tip to those still trying to decide what to wear this Halloween? Leave the store-bought masks at home.

“I personally don’t like it when people hide behind those full masks. I prefer when people get a little bit creative and they play with their face, when they put a lot of makeup on,” she told the AP in 2007. “I always love that the most on me, I really go scary on the face.”

The end of daylight saving time is near. And come Sunday, time will shift back an hour for most of the U.S.

When is daylight saving time?

For states that follow daylight saving time, it begins on the second Sunday of March, when clocks “spring forward,” and ends when clocks “fall back” on the first Sunday of November each year.

This year, daylight saving time began on March 10 and will end on Sunday, Nov. 3 at 2 a.m., so mark your calendar and enjoy an extra hour of sleep. Sunrise and sunset will shift to be about an hour earlier.

Time will “spring forward” again on March 9, 2025.

How did daylight saving time come to be?

Some say Benjamin Franklin invented daylight saving time while others point to different individuals. According to an article published on the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health website, pushing clocks forward during the warmer months to make more use of daylight and thus conserve energy was adopted during WWI.

The Uniform Time Act of 1966 established a standardized system of daylight saving time throughout the U.S.

Who doesn’t observe daylight saving time?

Hawaii and Arizona, except the Navajo Nation, don’t observe daylight saving time. Guam, American Samoa, North Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, all U.S. territories, also don’t observe daylight saving time according to the Department of Transportation, which oversees timezones.

In 2022, the U.S. Senate passed a bill that would have made daylight saving time the new permanent standard time beginning in November 2023, but the legislation didn’t pass in the House of Representatives. In recent years, state legislatures have considered at least 650 bills and resolutions to institute yearlong daylight saving time should federal law allow it, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Maryland Del. Brian Crosby, a Democrat from St. Mary’s County, sponsored legislation in 2021 to establish Eastern Daylight Time in the state year-round. The bill didn’t pass in 2021, nor did subsequent iterations introduced again by Crosby in 2022 and 2023.

DETROIT — Free agency technically began Thursday, but the Tigers could skip the preliminaries.

They finished the 2024 season with no free agents, so there are no early negotiations or decisions on qualifying offers to tend to. The one player with an option — a team option — is pitcher Casey Mize, but that is a mere formality.

The Tigers won’t exercise that $3.1 million option for 2025. Instead, they will pay Mize a $10,000 buyout and retain control. Mize can either re-sign or head to arbitration.

That’s not to say team president Scott Harris and his staff don’t have some decisions to make. They have until Monday to either reinstate or remove four players from the 60-day injured list to or from the 40-man roster.

The four players are shortstop Javier Báez (hip), right-handed pitchers Alex Faedo (shoulder), Sawyer Gipson-Long (Tommy John surgery) and Brendan White (elbow). Báez, Faedo and Gipson-Long are expected to be put back on the 40-man.

White, who debuted in 2023 but has struggled to stay healthy, could be designated for assignment.

Players currently on the 40-man roster who may be vulnerable include pitchers Ricky Vanasco and Bryan Sammons, and utility players Ryan Vilade and Bligh Madris.

The Tigers also have until Monday to add any potential minor-league free agents to the roster. They did so last year with pitcher Keider Montero. There are no obvious candidates this year, but here is a partial list of soon-to-be minor-league free agents:

Pitchers: Miguel Diaz, Wilkel Hernandez, Jake Higginbotham, Garrett Hill, Freddy Pacheco, Angel Reyes, Devin Sweet, Andrew Vasquez, Troy Watson, Adam Wolf.

Catchers: Eliezer Alfonso, Anthony Bemboom, Tomas Nido.

Infielder: Riley Unroe.

Outfielder: Oscar Mercado.

By NICHOLAS RICCARDI and REBECCA BOONE

DENVER (AP) — A national campaign is backing ballot measures in six states to end partisan primaries, seeking to turn down the temperature in a polarized country by removing a process that gives the most active members of both major parties an outsize role in picking the country’s leaders.

The $70 million effort to replace traditional primaries with either nonpartisan ones or ranked choice voting is run by Unite America, a Denver organization dedicated to de-polarizing the country.

“People are losing faith in democracy itself,” said Kent Thiry, the group’s co-chair and the former chief executive officer of the kidney dialysis firm DaVita Inc, during a Denver debate about the initiative on the Colorado ballot.

Nick Troiano, Unite America’s executive director, said the goal is to end a system where 85% of congressional seats are effectively filled in partisan primaries because the districts are so overwhelmingly Democratic or Republican that whoever wins the relevant primary is virtually guaranteed victory in November.

Troiano said the Republican congressmen who voted to overturn the 2020 election after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol almost all represented noncompetitive districts and have had to answer only to their party’s voters.

Supporters are excited at the breadth of the campaign.

“It’s eclipsed by the presidential election, but this is the most important year for this sort of structural reform that I can recall,” said Edward Foley, a law professor at Ohio State University.

But some skeptics contend that changing the structure of primaries won’t make much of a difference in polarization given how so much of the country lives in either heavily Democratic or heavily Republican communities — and will naturally elect people who occupy those ideological extremes.

“It seems like it’s adding political complexity, weakening political parties, and it’s not clear what problem they’re solving,” said Lee Drutman of the New America Foundation in Washington, D.C.

The ballot measures include proposals to switch to ranked choice voting in reliably Democratic Colorado, evenly divided Nevada and two reliably Republican states where a sharp swing to the right among GOP primary voters have left traditional Republicans scrambling — Idaho and South Dakota.

Swing-state Arizona and conservative Montana both have measures to shift from partisan primaries to nonpartisan ones. In deep blue Oregon, an initiative would allow parties to still run their own primaries but require them to use ranked choice voting in certain statewide and federal races.

The ballot initiatives come as an unusual number of measures affecting voting are on state ballots in November.

Eight states will consider conservative-led measures to ban voting by noncitizens, which is already illegal under federal law. Connecticut voters will decide whether to allow anyone in their state to vote by mail, and Ohio whether to have a nonpartisan commission draw their state’s legislative lines.

The biggest change in U.S. elections could come from increased adoption of ranked voting. It requires every voter to rank candidates in order of preference. If one does not get a majority, the lowest-scoring candidate is eliminated and that politician’s votes are reallocated to whoever their voters picked second. This continues until one candidate wins more than 50% of the vote.

Ranked voting is a more complex way of running elections that is touted as producing winners who better represent the whole electorate. The process is used in two states — Alaska and Maine — as well as a handful of cities such as New York and San Francisco.

It allowed a Democrat, Rep. Mary Peltola, to win the race for Alaska’s single congressional seat in 2022 even as the state’s GOP governor and senator also won re-election. That result angered many Republican activists, who then pushed bans on the process in Republican-controlled states such as Florida and Tennessee. Now, even as additional states consider adopting ranked voting, Alaska voters will consider a ballot measure to repeal it.

Critics contend the campaign to attack partisan primaries is an effort to mute the voices of ideologically committed voters.

“This is trying to bring centrism back,” said Jason Lupo, a conservative political strategist in Colorado who opposes the measure in that state, during a recent debate in Denver. “This is a way to eliminate progressives; this is a way to eliminate conservatives.”

Critics also warn the proposed changes come as conservatives have become more distrustful of election processes following Trump’s lies about fraud costing him the 2020 race.

“It does make elections more complicated, and that in turn makes elections harder to trust,” said Trent England, the founder of the conservative group Save Our States, during a recent debate on the Idaho ballot measure. “Do we really think that now is the time to be doing that?”

Still, advocates of the ballot measures contend that something has to change.

Chuck Coughlin, a veteran Republican strategist in Arizona who used to work for Sen. John McCain, in 2022 wanted to support a Democrat running for Congress in one primary and incumbent Republicans running for county supervisor in the other. But he was allowed to vote only in one primary in a state where the Republican Party had swung sharply to the right.

“I’m like ‘I can’t do this anymore,”‘ Coughlin said after 2022, in which every candidate he worked for lost the Republican primary and the GOP nominees for governor, attorney general and secretary of state all lost to Democrats in November because they were too extreme for the state’s evenly-divided electorate. “I can’t just run elections to the fringe.”

Coughlin was thrilled to get help from Unite America, which donated $5 million to his Arizona initiative earlier this month.

The group was founded in 2013 to promote political independents. Troiano, who ran unsuccessfully as an independent for a Pennsylvania congressional seat, arrived to take it over three years later. He’s helped steer it toward investing more in structural changes to democracy such as nonpartisan redistricting.

Unite America has several wealthy supporters, such as board members Kathryn Murdoch, daughter-in-law of media mogul Rupert Murdoch, and Kenneth Griffin, founder of the hedge fund Citadel. Its resources have become a target for opponents of its ballot measures, who contend that ranked choice voting and other changes to partisan primaries will mainly help deep-pocketed candidates win elections.

Opponents of the measures zero in on the funding as a reason to oppose the switch.

“It’s not the type of people I want writing my election law,” said Sean Hinga, a labor leader spearheading opposition to the Colorado ballot measure.

Boone reported from Boise, Idaho. Associated Press writers Becky Bohrer in Juneau, Alaska, and Claire Rush in Portland, Oregon, contributed to this report.

By CHRISTINE FERNANDO

CHICAGO (AP) — Billboards with the words “STOP Child Gender Surgery.” Pamphlets warning about endangering minors. “PROTECT PARENT RIGHTS” plastered on church bulletins.

As voters in nine states determine whether to enshrine abortion rights in their state constitutions, opponents are using parental rights and anti-transgender messages to try to undermine support for the ballot proposals.

The measures do not mention gender-affirming surgeries, and legal experts say changing existing parental notification and consent laws regarding abortions and gender-affirming care for minors would require court action. But anti-abortion groups hoping to end a losing streak at the ballot box have turned to the type of language many Republican candidates nationwide are using in their own campaigns as they seek to rally conservative Christian voters.

“It’s really outlandish to suggest that this amendment relates to things like gender reassignment surgery for minors,” said Matt Harris, an associate professor of political science at Park University in Parkville, Missouri, a state where abortion rights are on the ballot.

Since the U.S. Supreme Court eliminated constitutional protections for abortion, voters in seven states, including conservative Kentucky, Montana and Ohio, have either protected abortion rights or defeated attempts to curtail them.

“If you can’t win by telling the truth, you need a better argument, even if that means capitalizing on the demonization of trans children,” said Dr. Alex Dworak, a family medicine physician in Omaha, Nebraska, where anti-abortion groups are using the strategy.

Tying abortion-rights ballot initiatives to parental rights and gender-affirming is a strategy borrowed from playbooks used in Michigan and Ohio, where voters nonetheless enshrined abortion rights in the state constitutions.

Both states still require minors to get parental consent for abortions, and the new amendments have not yet impacted parental involvement or gender-affirming care laws in either state, said David Cohen, a law professor at Drexel University.

“It’s just recycling the same strategies,” Cohen said.

In addition to Missouri and Nebraska, states where voters are considering constitutional amendments this fall are Montana, Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Maryland, Nevada and South Dakota.

Missouri’s abortion ballot measure has especially become a target. The amendment would bar the government from infringing on a “person’s fundamental right to reproductive freedom.”

Gov. Mike Parson and U.S. Sen. Josh Hawley, both Republicans, have claimed the proposal would allow minors to get abortions and gender-affirming surgeries without parental involvement.

The amendment protects reproductive health services, “including but not limited to” a list of items such as prenatal care, childbirth, birth control and abortion. It does not mention gender-affirming care, but Missouri state Sen. Mary Elizabeth Coleman, a Republican and lawyer with the conservative Thomas More Society, said it’s possible that could be considered reproductive health services.

Several legal experts told The Associated Press that would require a court ruling that is improbable.

“It would be a real stretch for any court to say that anything connected with gender-affirming care counts as reproductive health care,” said Saint Louis University law and gender studies professor Marcia McCormick. She noted that examples listed as reproductive health care in the Missouri amendment are all directly related to pregnancy.

As for parental consent for minors’ abortions, she pointed to an existing state law that is written similarly to one the U.S. Supreme Court found constitutional, even before Roe v. Wade was overturned.

Most states have parental involvement laws, whether requiring parental consent or notification. Even many Democratic-leaning states with explicit protections for transgender rights require parental involvement before an abortion or gender-affirming care for minors, said Mary Ruth Ziegler, a law professor at the University of California, Davis School of Law.

A state high court would have to overturn such laws, which is highly unlikely from conservative majorities in many of the states with abortion on the ballot, experts said.

In New York, a proposed amendment to the state constitution would expand antidiscrimination protections to include ethnicity, national origin, age, disability and “sex, including sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, pregnancy, pregnancy outcomes, and reproductive health care and autonomy.” The constitution already bans discrimination based on race, color, creed or religion.

The measure does not mention abortion. But because it is broader, it could be easier for opponents to attack it. But legal experts noted that it would also not change existing state laws related to parental involvement in minors getting abortions or gender-affirming care.

The New York City Bar Association released a fact-sheet explaining that the measure would not impact parental rights, “which are governed by other developed areas of State and federal law.” Yet the Coalition to Protect Kids-NY calls it the “Parent Replacement Act.”

Rick Weiland, co-founder of Dakotans for Health, the group behind South Dakota ‘s proposed amendment said it uses the Roe v. Wade framework “almost word for word.”

“All you have to do is look back at what was allowed under Roe, and there were always requirements for parental involvement,” Weiland said.

Caroline Woods, spokesperson for the anti-abortion group Life Defense Fund, said the measure “means loving parents will be completely cut out of the equation.” Weiland said those claims are part of a “constant stream of misinformation” from opponents.

If this campaign strategy failed in Michigan and Ohio, why are anti-abortion groups leaning on it for the November elections?

Ziegler, the University of California, Davis law professor, said abortion-rights opponents know they may be “playing on more favorable terrain” in more conservative states like Missouri or in states like Florida that have higher thresholds for passing ballot measures.

“Anti-abortion groups are still looking for a winning recipe,” Ziegler said.

Associated Press writer Geoff Mulvihill in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, contributed to this report.

The Associated Press receives support from several private foundations to enhance its explanatory coverage of elections and democracy. See more about AP’s democracy initiative here. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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By MARC LEVY

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Billions of dollars in advertising are raining down on voters across the Rust Belt, Rocky Mountains and American southwest as the two major political parties portray their opponent’s candidates as extreme in a struggle for control of the U.S. Senate.

In three races alone — Ohio, Pennsylvania and Montana — more than $1 billion is projected to be spent by Nov. 5.

The race in Ohio could break the spending record for Senate races. The race in Montana will go down as the most expensive Senate race ever on a per-vote basis. And, late in the game, Democrats are sending millions more dollars to Texas, a GOP stronghold where the party has new hopes of knocking off two-term conservative stalwart Sen. Ted Cruz, an upset that could help them protect their majority.

Republicans need to pick up two seats to capture a surefire majority, and one of those — West Virginia — is all but in the bag for the GOP.

Other races are more volatile and less predictable.

For Democrats, the brutal math of this year’s election cycle is forcing them to defend eight seats in tough states. Losses by established incumbents could amount to an extinction-level event for Democrats who represent reliably Republican states.

The election also will test the down-ballot strength of both parties in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania, the premier presidential battleground states known as the Blue Wall for their relatively reliable Democratic voting history. Wins there by Republicans would dramatically alter the Senate playing field.

All told, data from political ad tracking firm AdImpact projects that more than $2.5 billion will be spent on advertising in Senate races in this two-year campaign cycle, slightly more than the 2022 total.

That includes a half-billion dollars in Ohio alone, another $340 million in Pennsylvania and $280 million in Montana, population 1.1 million, or less than one-tenth of the population of either Ohio or Pennsylvania. The most expensive Senate race ever was Democrat John Ossoff ‘s victory in a Georgia contest that went to a runoff in 2021 and decided Senate control, according to data from the campaign finance-tracking organization Open Secrets.

Generally, campaign strategists say Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump is polling ahead of his party’s Senate candidates in Senate battleground states, while Democratic candidates in those states are polling ahead of their presidential nominee, Kamala Harris.

That means there is a slice of voters who could vote for Trump but not back Republicans in Senate races — or who could split their tickets with Democratic Senate candidates.

Such splits have been rare. In Maine, in 2020 voters backed Democrat Joe Biden for president and re-elected Republican Sen. Susan Collins, for instance.

Republican strategists said they expect the party’s major super PACs to spend until election day in seven states where Democrats are defending Senate seats: Michigan, Montana, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, where polls show competitive races, but also Nevada and Arizona, where Republicans are encouraged by strong early voting numbers.

Republicans are most confident about flipping the seat in deep-red Montana, where Republican Tim Sheehy is challenging third-term Democratic Sen. Jon Tester. They are also optimistic about reliably red Ohio, where Republican Bernie Moreno is challenging third-term Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown.

Torunn Sinclair, a spokesperson for a pair of Republican-aligned super PACs, said one — American Crossroads — is pulling $2.8 million out of Montana, while the pair are plunging several million more into Pennsylvania.

There, Republican David McCormick is trying to knock off three-term Democratic Sen. Bob Casey in a presidential battleground undercard that both sides say is close.

McCormick, a former CEO of the world’s largest hedge fund, has hammered the message in two debates that Casey is a “sure thing” to back the Biden-Harris administration’s agenda.

In recent days, Casey began running an ad in conservative areas that touts his “greedflation” legislation to pursue price-gouging. The ad says “Casey bucked Biden to protect fracking” and “sided with Trump” on trade and tariffs.

Republicans say Casey’s ad showing Trump is similar to a TV ad that Sen. Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin is airing and speaks to both Democrats’ need to protect themselves against Harris’ vulnerability in their states.

“They’re hoping to peel off enough Trump voters to win,” Sinclair said.

Still, Casey ran a similar ad in 2018’s midterm election when he won easily — even though that ad didn’t mention Trump — while Casey’s campaign notes that he has long split with Democrats by opposing free trade agreements and supporting fossil fuel-power projects.

Democrats, conversely, say they are forcing competitive contests late in the campaign in two red states, Texas and Nebraska. Ousting incumbent Republicans from one or both of those seats could help Democrats to at least a 50-50 split in the Senate should Democrats lose in Montana or Ohio.

In Texas, U.S. Rep. Colin Allred, a former professional football player, has proven adept at raising small-dollar donations in his challenge to incumbent Republican Sen. Ted Cruz. Allred has outraised every Senate candidate nationally, except Tester and Brown.

The ad spending advantage for Allred has been 3-to-2, according to AdImpact, with the Democratic-aligned Senate Majority PAC touting a new seven-figure digital ad buy and a separate $5 million TV ad buy attacking Cruz on a key issue for Democrats, abortion rights.

On top of that, Democrats hope Harris’ rally in Houston on Friday with Allred and Beyoncé can help Allred by boosting Black voter turnout.

In Nebraska, independent Dan Osborn — a tattooed former labor leader who supports abortion rights — appears to have consolidated Democratic and independent voters while making some inroads with Republicans, Democratic strategists say.

While Osborn is running as an independent and hasn’t said which party he’d caucus with, he’s getting support from a liberal super PAC that has helped him amass a significant spending advantage over Republican Sen. Deb Fischer.

In both states, Republicans acknowledge that they’ve had to spend money unexpectedly to shore up their incumbents’ prospects, but they also say they expect to win comfortably.

In Ohio, Brown has tried to personalize his appeal by appearing in most of his own ads and speaking directly into the camera.

“I’m Sherrod Brown and I have a question,” Brown says, looking into the camera and leaning his elbow on what might be a wood-working shop table. “Have you ever heard Bernie Moreno talk about what he’s going to do for Ohio?”

Brown also makes a personal appeal to potential swing voters, saying he has spent his career fighting for workers and veterans and working with law enforcement and “presidents of both parties to do what’s best for our state.”

Elsewhere, strategists expect first-term Florida Sen. Rick Scott will fend off a challenge from Democrat Debbie Mucarsel-Powell and that Democrat Angela Alsobrooks in deep-blue Maryland will beat former Gov. Larry Hogan to fill a seat being vacated by Democratic Sen. Ben Cardin.

Associated Press reporter Julie Carr Smyth in Columbus, Ohio, contributed to this report. Follow Marc Levy at twitter.com/timelywriter.

By CALVIN WOODWARD, JEFF AMY and JONATHAN J. COOPER

WASHINGTON (AP) — For the millions of Americans on the radar of the Kamala Harris and Donald Trump campaigns and those of their allies, the apocalypse is only a text message away.

The very future of the republic is at stake, some of the texts say and many others imply. But you — yes, YOU, Sally, Jose or insert-your-first-name here — can save it. For as little as $7.

Texting is a cheap and easy way to reach potential voters and donors, without all the rules meant to keep traditional paid broadcast advertising a bit honest. Both sides are working the texting pipeline aggressively. In the last days of the campaign, the pinging of phones can be relentless.

“All day, every day,” Robyn Beyah said of the torrent as she stood in line to get into a Kamala Harris rally outside Atlanta last week. “They have my number. We’re practically besties.”

Beyah is cool with that. She considers the text bombing “harmless” because it’s for a candidate she believes in. She even invites the Harris campaign to “harass me with text messages.” Not all voters are so charitable.

“To be honest with you, at this point, I’ve tuned it out of my brain,” said Ebenezer Eyasu of Stone Mountain, Georgia, standing in the same Harris rally line. He said the dozen or so texts he gets each day have become “background noise.”

Sarah Wiggins, a 26-year-old graphic designer from Kennesaw, Georgia, who supports Harris, prefers face to face persuasion. “I feel like it’s all about people around you,” she said. “Word of mouth is underrated.” As for the texts, “I just delete, to be honest. I don’t want to read it.”

Many Trump supporters also get pestered. Several at his rally in Tempe, Arizona, last week professed low-grade aggravation about that.

“They’re more of an annoyance than anything else,” said Morse Lawrence, 57, a physician assistant from Mesa, Arizona. “I get bombarded by text messages outside of political things as well. People wanting to buy my house, people wanting to sell me insurance, it’s all of it.”

He figures it’s an effective marketing strategy for campaigns even if the great majority of recipients don’t bite. “You go fishing and you catch two fish, you’ve got a meal for the day.”

Jennifer Warnke, 57, of St. John’s, Arizona, also at the Trump rally, expressed mixed feelings about what’s happening on her phone.

“They’re at least reaching out, because for years nobody ever called me,” she said. “I’ve been a registered Republican all my life and nobody ever called.”

She added: “It’s annoying, but it’s almost over.”

The campaigns spin a fantasy

Trump’s campaign, although uniquely fixated on selling hats via text, shares certain traits with the Democrats.

Both sides traffic in dire warnings should the other side win. Both cook up phony deadlines to get you to hurry up with your money. Both play on the fantasy that luminaries — whether Harris, Trump, George Clooney, Nancy Pelosi or Donald Trump Jr. — are texting you personally, instead of the machinery that really is.

Texts under the name of Trump Jr. come with a twist, if a transparent one: “Please don’t give $5 to help dad before his critical deadline. I’m serious. Don’t. … Let me explain.”

The explanation is a link to a page asking for lots more than $5. You can choose $20.24 if you are a basic Trump supporter in 2024 or $47 if you think the 45th president was the greatest ever and want to make him the 47th.

Trump himself seems to be heavily into merch. “I’m shipping you a Gold MAGA Hat!” say texts in his name. “Should I sign it?”

Tap through and you see the MAGA hat with gold lettering will cost you $50. But there’s more.

“Here’s my offer to you,” the digital Trump says. “If you place your order before the midnight deadline, I may add my signature and a quick personal note right on the brim!” May — or may not.

Thirteen days from Election Day, as she prepared to take the stage for a CNN town hall, Harris took a moment to confide in a Virginian she doesn’t know at all. At least that’s the scene sketched by a text in her name.

“Hi Chris, it’s Kamala Harris,” says the message. “It would mean the world to me if you added another donation to our campaign before my town hall on CNN tonight. Donald Trump and his allies are currently outspending us across the battleground states.”

A donation of $40 is suggested. No hat is offered. Despite the message’s angst over cash, Harris’ campaign and affiliated Democratic groups have raised over $1 billion in mere months and kept a large financial advantage over Trump in the campaign’s last leg.

The pings keep coming

Ping: “It’s Elizabeth Warren. ”

Ping: “From Trump: I JUST LEFT MCDONALD’S.”

Ping: “We’ve asked NINE TIMES if you support Kamala Harris … but you never completed the poll.”

Ping: “I just got off the debate stage.” — signed by Harris running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.

Ping: “This is a BIG F#@%ING DEAL.” — in the name of Democratic strategist James Carville.

Ping: “It’s Nancy Pelosi. I need you to see this.”

Ping: “But you haven’t stepped up to defend our Senate majority!?! Rush $7 now.”

Ping: “I have a McGift for you! It’s President Trump. Want to take a look?”

Are they legit?

Despite the sucker-born-every-minute undertone of some of the presidential campaign texts, experts say you can be reasonably confident that donations to the official candidate campaigns or the main party organizations will be used for your intended purpose.

But many more groups are pitching for your election-season cash, not all of them are legit and sorting that out takes work. Some voter-mobilization groups that claim to be funded by the left, for example, may be mischief-makers from the right, or just out to collect personal information on you.

This month, the League of Women Voters of Wisconsin wrote to the U.S. and state attorneys general to report that thousands of fraudulent text messages from an anonymous source were sent to young people threatening $10,000 fines or prison time if they vote in a state where they are not eligible to cast ballots.

The scam was meant to intimidate students from out of state who are legally entitled to vote in Wisconsin if they are attending college there, or to vote back at home instead, the letter said.

Last weekend, thousands of Pennsylvania voters received a text message that falsely claimed they had already voted in the election, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported Monday. It was from AllVote, which election officials have repeatedly flagged as a scam, the paper said. The group said the false claim was the result of a typo.

Experts say to read the fine print at the bottom of any fundraising link you open. It must outline the name of the group and where the money will go.

From there, people can go to sites such as OpenSecrets or the Federal Election Commission to see breakdowns of revenue and spending by groups that are registered political action committees. High overhead and low or no spending on ads or canvassing are red flags.

For all those traps, Beverly Payne of Cumming, Georgia, who has already voted for Harris and volunteers for her, welcomes the pings.

“I get texts every 30 minutes and I answer every single one of them,” Payne said. One favorite was about an ice cream flavor rolled out for Harris by Ben & Jerry’s, Kamala’s Coconut Jubilee layered with caramel and topped with red, white and blue star sprinkles. “I had to donate to that,” she said.

“It’s our culture now, we’re all addicted,” Payne said of texts and Harris’ use of them. “Maybe that’s why she has a billion dollars.”

Amy reported from Atlanta, Cooper from Tempe, Arizona. Associated Press writer Brian Slodysko contributed to this report.

When Mark Craighead and Lamarr Monson were released from prison and exonerated for murders they didn’t commit in Detroit, they pledged to help others who have been wrongfully convicted. Now the pair, united by a common cause, are raising money for a nonprofit they recently created – Freedom Ain’t Free – to connect innocent people behind bars with attorneys, paralegals, private investigators, firearm experts, and other legal resources.

By SCOTT BAUER, CHARLOTTE KRAMON, GARY D. ROBERTSON and LISA MASCARO

CROSS PLAINS, Wis. (AP) — At this stage of the election, the arguments have been made, the airwaves flooded with ads, the inboxes and doorsteps stuffed with flyers. What’s left is to get out the vote.

It’s a crucial step that can make or break campaigns, turning Americans into voters by nudging them to the polls — or the mailbox or ballot drop-box — with their choices.

Democrats this year are relying on a traditional strategy of targeted phone calls, text messages and door-knocking, from the party and its allies, to encourage turnout for Vice President Kamala Harris. Former President Donald Trump has outsourced much of the Republican operation to groups such as America PAC, the organization supported by billionaire Elon Musk, which has taken the unorthodox and possibly illegal step of giving away $1 million a day in prize money.

Now the two sides are going head-to-head to get their voters out in battleground states:

WISCONSIN

Kathy Moran never thought she’d be standing on the street at sunset, political flyers in a bag slung over her shoulder, trudging door to door trying to persuade people to vote.

But Moran, a 64-year-old retired employment attorney, said on a crisp late October night that she couldn’t sit on the sidelines any longer.

“With the overturning of Roe v. Wade, which I couldn’t imagine, I just had to get involved,” she said while canvassing the streets of Cross Plains, a village of about 4,000 people on the outskirts of Wisconsin’s liberal capital city of Madison.

It’s volunteers like Moran who Democrats hope will make the difference in swing states like Wisconsin, where four of the past six presidential elections have been decided by 21,000 votes or less.

The Democrats’ approach to getting out the vote is clear: they are tapping a vast network of activists, volunteers, Democratic Party faithful and others to spread out across the country to ensure their voters go to the polls.

What America PAC is doing for Trump is less clear.

America PAC is targeting infrequent voters in Wisconsin by canvassing neighborhoods and sending mailings and digital and text ads, said the organization’s spokesperson, Andrew Romeo.

However, America PAC refused a request from The Associated Press to observe the work in person.

Republicans have privately expressed concerns about whether America PAC is doing enough to get out the vote for Trump in crucial battleground states. Whatever their methods, more Republicans are voting early than in past elections, another sign of high enthusiasm.

“A get-out-the-vote operation can’t turn a jump ball into a landslide,” said Wisconsin Democratic Party Chairman Ben Wikler. “But it can absolutely turn a 50-50 race into a 49.5-50.5 race.”

Moran said she logs between 8,000 and 14,000 steps on a typical night of canvassing and encounters mostly Harris voters as she knocks on the doors of houses decorated with skeletons, grave markers and a few political signs.

One woman refuses to engage with Moran, saying through the closed glass screen door it’s “none of her business.” Another man says he’s already voted but wouldn’t say for whom.

Another spots her “Harris/Walz” and “, la” buttons, smiles and says, “I see you’re with Harris.” He assures her that everyone in his house is voting for her.

Moran enters notes on an app so voters committed to Harris aren’t bothered again.

GEORGIA

The Harris campaign has more than 40,000 volunteers plus a staff of 220 working out of 32 field offices across the state. The campaign says its volunteers and staff have knocked on more than a million doors, including more than 100,000 last weekend alone, and has made two million phone calls.

“The ground game is very, very busy,” said state Sen. Freddie Powell Sims, a Dawson Democrat. “We are knocking on doors everyday, but the communities are huge. There’s a lot of ground to cover, but we have extremely diligent volunteers going out and putting their all into this race.”

Sims said she’s unsure who will win Georgia because she’s seen similar on-the-ground enthusiasm from Republicans.

The Trump campaign says it has nearly 25,000 volunteers working in Georgia, and has hosted more than 2,000 events there over the last three months.

At one event, eight women in matching pink Trump jackets with ‘47’ emblazoned on the sleeves and personalized etchings of their names marched into a spacious ranch south of Atlanta as part of Team Trump’s Women’s Tour.

The audience in South Fulton was small, but RNC co-chair Lara Trump and former U.S. Sen. Kelly Loeffler urged supporters to rally their friends to vote for Trump.

Kim Burnette signed up to phone bank with the Trump campaign this year, calling infrequent voters who are registered Republicans.

“A lot of people are saying they’re going to vote,” Burnette said. “It’s looking good.”

Candace Duvall drove about 30 miles to the event and showed up decked out in gold Trump merch — she patched sparkly letters spelling out his name onto her t-shirt and wore earrings that displayed his mug shot. She rushed to the polls on the first day of early voting to vote for Trump, but she’s still receiving a flurry of texts, calls, and paper flyers from his campaign.

“He’s our only chance,” Duvall said. “I really think he was chosen by God, and I think this is good vs. evil.”

Camilla Moore and Lisa Babbage, chair and vice chair of the Georgia Black Republican Council, also showed up to support the women for Trump.

The pair has been mobilizing Black voters in South Fulton through events over the last few months.

“It has been easier this time than ever before,” Moore said.

People are less shy about supporting Trump now than they were in 2020, Moore said. They’re more open to conversation as they make the case for the former president.

NORTH CAROLINA

Charles Benson, 68, of Kinston, North Carolina, said he’s getting contacted several times a week, mostly by text, about the election and voting.

Benson, who is retired, attended Trump’s rally in nearby Greenville in late October, two days after he voted early in person. Still, candidate mailers keep filling his mailbox.

“I’m ready for it to be over,” Benson said. “I’m tired of taking that stuff out of the mail every day.”

Emma Macomber, 76, of New Bern, another Trump supporter at the Greenville rally, said she’s been contacted regularly, largely through text, being asked for political donations and to make sure that she votes.

Macomber said she’s already cast her ballot and has made some contributions.

“I want it to be over, but I’m scared for it to be over,” she said. “Because I don’t know what’s in the future, and I think everyone’s afraid of the unknown.”

Kramon reported from Atlanta, Robertson from Raleigh, North Carolina, and Mascaro from Washington.

By SUSAN HAIGH

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — U.S. Rep. Jahana Hayes isn’t a member of the historically Black sororities and fraternities known as the “Divine Nine.”

But throughout her hotly contested reelection campaign this year, Hayes, the first Black woman to represent Connecticut in Congress, has sometimes felt like she’s a fellow soror, the term used by Black Greek organizations for sorority sisters. On their own, members have shown up to call voters, organize fundraisers, knock on doors, cheer Hayes on at campaign events and even offer pro bono legal help.

“I had people from Massachusetts come in to volunteer,” said Hayes, a Democrat who is seeking a fourth term. “I’ve had people who had previously been considering going to a battleground state like Pennsylvania and are saying, ‘No, we’re going to stay right here and help out in this race in Connecticut.’”

Downballot candidates like Hayes — particularly Black women — have benefited from a surge in support this year from volunteers who happen to be members of Black Greek organizations, many energized by Kamala Harris’ presidential run. The vice president is a longtime member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Inc., which was founded at her alma matter, Howard University, in 1908. Harris pledged AKA as a senior at Howard in 1986.

Collectively known as the National Pan-Hellenic Council, the nine historically Black sororities and fraternities are nonpartisan and barred from endorsing candidates because of their not-for-profit status. The organizations focus on voter registration drives, civic engagement and nonelectoral initiatives and are careful not to show favor to a particular candidate. But many of the groups’ members, as individuals, have been “extremely active” in federal and state races around the country this year, said Jaime R. Harrison, chairman of the Democratic National Committee.

“I think that’s a part of the Kamala Harris effect,” Harrison said during a recent visit to Connecticut.

There were women affiliated with all the D9 sororities on a recent get-out-the-vote bus tour through New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware and Maryland to support Black women on the ballot.

Along with other volunteers, they knocked on hundreds of doors, made thousands of calls and sent out hundreds of postcards, urging people to vote. The trip was organized by the Higher Heights for America PAC, a nearly 13-year-old organization that works to elect progressive Black women.

Members of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Inc. showed off their crimson and cream colors while stumping in Maryland for Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Angela Alsobrooks, a fellow Delta who is in a closely watched race against former Republican Gov. Larry Hogan.

Volunteers who are D9 sorority members also campaigned for Democratic U.S. Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester of Delaware, an honorary member of Alpha Kappa Alpha who is running for the U.S. Senate. If both candidates were elected, it would mark the first time two Black women have served in the Senate simultaneously.

Latosha Johnson, a social worker from Hartford, recently participated in a get-out-the-vote phone banking session for Hayes along with other Black women who, like her, are members of Alpha Kappa Alpha. She said there’s a realization among many Black and brown voters that the stakes in the election are particularly high. And if Harris wins, she’ll need allies in Congress, Johnson said.

“If we don’t get her a Congress that’s going to be able to move things,” Johnson said, “that becomes hard.”

Hayes is in a rematch against former Republican George Logan, a former state senator who identifies as Afro-Latino but has not seen an outpouring of support from D9 members, according to his campaign.

Both Harris and former President Donald Trump are courting Black voters in the final days of the presidential race. Harris’ campaign has expressed concern about a lack of voting enthusiasm among Black men.

While Republicans have made some inroads with Black voters, two-thirds still identify as Democrats. About 2 in 10 identify as independents. About 1 in 10 identify as Republicans, according to a recent poll from the AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.

Voter registration and nonpartisan get-out-the-vote efforts by the sororities and fraternities, coupled with the mobilization of individual members, could potentially have an impact on some of these races, said Darren Davis, a professor of political science at the University of Notre Dame.

“In local elections, in statewide elections, where the Black vote is more powerful and concentrated as opposed to in national elections, D9 organizations have this tremendous untapped ability to reach and to mobilize disaffected voters,” Davis said.

The D9 fraternal groups were founded on U.S. college campuses in the early 1900s when Black students faced racial prejudice and exclusion that prevented them from joining existing white sororities and fraternities. In a tradition that continues today, the organizations focused on mutual upliftment, educational and personal achievement, civic engagement and a lifelong commitment to community service.

Many of the fraternities and sororities served as training grounds for future civil rights leaders, including the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks.

Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity Inc. member Brandon McGee is a former Democratic state representative who now leads Connecticut’s Social Equity Council on cannabis. As the father of two daughters, he is excited about helping Harris and Hayes win.

“I want my babies to see me working for a female who looks like their mother. And even beyond looking like their mother, a female,” he said. “And I want my babies to know, ‘You can do the same thing.’”

This story has been edited to correct that Alpha Phi Alpha is a fraternity not a sorority. Also, Latosha Johnson is a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha, not Delta Sigma Theta.

New York State Police and New York Park Police are working to recover the bodies of a mother and her two children who went over the American side of Niagara Falls on Monday night in an incident investigators are calling "intentional."

Police say they responded to an incident on Goat Island at about 9 p.m. According to investigators, 33-year-old Chianti Means, 9-year-old Roman Rossman and 5-month-old Mecca Means crossed over the safety guard rail and went over the falls on Luna Island.

Investigators say this incident was intentional but the circumstances remain under investigation.

New York State Trooper James O'Callaghan says the family has been very cooperative, which has allowed police to speed up their investigation.

Police held a press conference on Wednesday afternoon to provide an update.

New York State police provide more information after mother and two children went over Niagara Falls

The New York State Police Unmanned Aircraft Systems, Aviation and Underwater Recovery Units are all helping with the investigation.

Police said search and recovery efforts have been ongoing since the night of the incident and they will continue. They said they are putting every effort forward that they possibly can. Crews will reevaluate things on Thursday based on what they gather between now and then.

If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health, there is always help available.

Erie County Crisis Services: (716) 834-3131 Niagara County Crisis Services: (716) 285-3515 National Suicide Prevention Hotline: 988This story was originally published by

Scripps News Buffalo

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Vice President Kamala Harris is visiting Arizona and Nevada on Thursday while former President Donald Trump will make stops in Nevada as well, along with New Mexico.

With its five electoral votes, New Mexico is not considered a battleground state. The state has gone for Democratic presidential candidates since 2004.

However, New Mexico has the highest percentage of Hispanic residents in the country, and the Trump campaign has claimed that it has made inroads with the voting bloc, which traditionally favors Democrats. New Mexico is also a border state, which allows Trump to focus on his strict immigration policies.

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Most political experts, however, do not believe Trump will be able to flip New Mexico. The most recent poll from the Albuquerque Journal shows Harris with a 9-point advantage in the state.

Thursday will likely be the last time Harris and Trump will travel to the West before Election Day as the focus on the bigger electoral prizes on the East Coast.

Depending on what happens in places like Georgia, North Carolina and Pennsylvania, a candidate could either secure the race or have to wait for votes to be counted in places like Arizona and Nevada.

Republicans are hopeful about their chances in both states because of the high turnout rate of early GOP voters. However, political insiders have expressed caution about reading too much into the numbers because it's not clear whether the early voters are new voters or the same people who would have voted on Election Day.

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Meanwhile, Harris will attempt to remind voters, especially Latinos, about racially charged rhetoric coming from Trump and his supporters.

Her rallies in Arizona and Nevada will feature influential Hispanic and Latino figures, including Jennifer Lopez and the musical group Los Tigres del Norte.

The FBI is searching for masked armed robbery suspects who have hit jewelry stores in several states, including Michigan.

According to the FBI Chicago division, there are four masked suspects who were involved in the armed robberies in Illinois, Michigan and Missouri.

The FBI said the first jewelry store robbery happened on July 13, 2023, where three men walked into a store in Bridgeview, Illinois. It's believed they also hit another jewelry store in Brdigeview on Jan. 9, 2024.

On Aug. 7, 2024, the FBI believes the suspect robbed Marium Jewelry in Dearborn, and then allegedly hit a jewelry store in Winchester, Missouri.

The FBI is offering a reward of up to $15,000 reward. Anyone with information is asked to call them at FBI at 1-800-CALL-FBI or your local FBI office.

See the surveillance video from Dearborn below

The bitter 2024 U.S. election is taking a toll on relationships across America. So much so that even immediate family members have become divided within their own home.

Gen Z voters are even making light of it in the latest viral trend on TikTok: canceling out your family members vote. In the videos, content creators call out older family members for voting against their candidate. Meanwhile some young women are praising their conservative fathers for voting against Trump in this particular election.

The heated rhetoric in the election means that conflict is a reality for many families and friends across America. But does it really have to be this way?

Colette Fehr doesn't think so. In a recent interview with Scripps News' Morning Rush, the licensed family therapist revealed some tips to help navigate the tension.

"Our political views tend to be tied up in our identity and they're really emotional," Fehr explained. "It's better to set boundaries around topics that are too inflammatory." Be explicit, but kind, when drawing lines around topics that can get too heated.

Engaging in respectful dialogue can also help both sides gain perspective. And focusing on shared values can go a long way in diffusing tension, according to Fehr.

A key aspect is to look at the bigger picture. After all, politicians come and go, but you'll always be connected to your family, one way or another, no matter what happens.

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