Rochester police will soon have new cameras for officers and road patrol vehicles.

The city council unanimously approved a five-year, $345,363 contract with Axon Enterprises based in Scottsdale, AZ, for 20 bodycams and 10 in-car cameras, all of which have livestreaming capabilities.

Police Chief George Rouhib said the department has been using Watchguard bodycams but Axon’s cameras had advanced features.

In addition to better-quality images, the cameras include license-plate readers, an AI assistant, and redaction software. The contract includes a supplemental language translator which helps with up to 50 languages, he said.

More than three dozen languages are spoken by Oakland County’s residents who speak English as a second language, according to the U.S. Census.

“When the individual speaks into the camera, the software will identify the language and translate it into English and vice versa,” he said. “The software will also store our department policies, allowing officers to access critical information easily while in the field, ensuring compliance and informed decision making.”

He said the current cameras are out of warranty and cannot be repaired. The new equipment, he said, will be good for an estimated five years.

The in-cruiser cameras can also read license plates and alert officers to stolen cars.

All road patrol vehicles will have cameras, he said.

The city adopted bodycams in 2021 as a way to improve evidence collection and document police officers’ actions.

By COLLIN BINKLEY, AP Education Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration is pressing for a deal with Harvard University that would require the Ivy League school to pay far more than the $200 million fine agreed to by Columbia University to resolve multiple federal investigations, according to two people familiar with the matter.

Harvard would be expected to pay hundreds of millions of dollars as part of any settlement to end investigations into antisemitism at its campus, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. Harvard leaders have been negotiating with the White House even as they battle in court to regain access to billions in federal research funding terminated by the Trump administration.

The White House’s desire to get Harvard to pay far more than Columbia was first reported by The New York Times, which said the school has signaled a willingness to pay as much as $500 million.

Harvard did not immediately comment.

The Trump administration plans to use its deal with Columbia as a template for other universities, with financial penalties that are now seen as a staple for future agreements. Last week, Columbia leaders agreed to pay $200 million as part of a settlement to resolve investigations into alleged violations of federal antidiscrimination laws and restore more than $400 million in research grants.

Columbia had been in talks for months after the Trump administration accused the university of allowing the harassment of Jewish students and employees amid a wave of campus protests over the Israel-Hamas war. Harvard faces similar accusations but, unlike Columbia, the Cambridge, Massachusetts, school challenged the administration’s funding cuts and subsequent sanctions in court.

Last week, President Donald Trump said Harvard “wants to settle” but he said Columbia “handled it better.”

The Trump administration’s emphasis on financial penalties adds a new dimension for colleges facing federal scrutiny. In the past, civil rights investigations by the Education Department almost always ended with voluntary agreements and rarely included fines.

Even when the government has levied fines, they’ve been a small fraction of the scale Trump is seeking. Last year, the Education Department fined Liberty University $14 million after finding the Christian school failed to disclose crimes on its campus. It was the most the government had ever fined a university under the Clery Act, following a $4.5 million fine dealt to Michigan State University in 2019 for its handling of sexual assault complaints against disgraced sports doctor Larry Nassar.

The University of Pennsylvania agreed this month to modify school records set by transgender swimmer Lia Thomas, but that school’s deal with the Trump administration included no fine.

The Trump administration has opened investigations at dozens of universities over allegations of antisemitism or racial discrimination in the form of diversity, equity and inclusion policies. Several face funding freezes akin to those at Harvard, including more than $1 billion at Cornell University and $790 million at Northwestern University.

Last week, Education Secretary Linda McMahon called the Columbia deal a “roadmap” for other colleges, saying it would “ripple across the higher education sector and change the course of campus culture for years to come.”

The Associated Press’ education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

By ERIC TUCKER

WASHINGTON (AP) — Ghislaine Maxwell, the imprisoned former girlfriend of disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, is open to answering questions from Congress — but only if she is granted immunity from future prosecution for her testimony, her lawyers said Tuesday.

A spokeswoman for the committee that wants to interview her responded with a terse statement saying it would not consider offering her immunity.

Maxwell’s lawyers also asked that they be provided with any questions in advance and that any interview with her be scheduled after her petition to the U.S. Supreme Court to take up her case has been resolved.

The conditions were laid out in a letter sent by Maxwell’s attorneys to Rep. James Comer, the Republican chair of the House Oversight Committee who last week issued a subpoena for her deposition at the Florida prison where she is serving a 20-year-prison sentence on a conviction of conspiring with Epstein to sexually abuse underage girls.

The request to interview her is part of a frenzied, renewed interest in the Epstein saga following the Justice Department’s July statement that it would not be releasing any additional records from the investigation, an abrupt announcement that stunned online sleuths, conspiracy theorists and elements of President Donald Trump’s base who had been hoping to find proof of a government coverup.

Since then, the Trump administration has sought to present itself as promoting transparency, with the department urging courts to unseal grand jury transcripts from the sex-trafficking investigation and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche interviewing Maxwell over the course of two days at a Florida courthouse last week.

In a letter Tuesday, Maxwell’s attorneys said that though their initial instinct was for Maxwell to invoke her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination, they are open to having her cooperate provided that lawmakers satisfy their request for immunity and other conditions.

But the Oversight Committee seemed to reject that offer outright.

“The Oversight Committee will respond to Ms. Maxwell’s attorney soon, but it will not consider granting congressional immunity for her testimony,” a spokesperson said.

Separately, Maxwell’s attorneys have urged the Supreme Court to review her conviction, saying she dd not receive a fair trial. They also say that one way she would testify “openly and honestly, in public,” is in the event of a pardon by Trump, who has told reporters that such a move is within his rights but that he has not been not asked to make it.

“She welcomes the opportunity to share the truth and to dispel the many misconceptions and misstatements that have plagued this case from the beginning,” he said.

A 70-year-old man accused of sexually abusing two children in his family has opted out of trial with a plea in Oakland County Circuit Court.

At a pretrial hearing July 28, Southfield resident Lawrence Edward Miles pleaded no contest three counts of first-degree criminal sexual conduct and two counts of second-degree criminal sexual conduct for allegedly assaulting a boy and girl — both under 10 years old. According to the Oakland County Prosecutor’s Office, the charges stem from a series of assaults that occurred in 2024 and 2025.

A no contest plea is not an admission of guilt but is treated as such for sentencing purposes. It can also offer some liability protection in civil cases.

Miles is scheduled to be sentenced on Oct. 16 by Judge Daniel O’Brien. He faces up to life in prison for first-degree CSC, with a mandatory minimum of 25 years behind bars. Second-degree criminal sexual conduct carries a penalty of up to 15 years in prison. Both convictions require lifetime electronic monitoring upon parole and AIDS/STD testing.

Miles is in the Oakland County Jail, denied bond.

3rd suspect in Oakland County purse-snatchings faces criminal charges

Fundraiser underway to support family of woman run over by truck outside Holly business

Prosecutor: Alleged human trafficker facing charges after victim escapes

 

By EDDIE PELLS, AP National Writer

In its push to remove transgender athletes from Olympic sports, the Trump administration provided the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee a detailed legal brief on how such a move would not conflict with the Ted Stevens Act, the landmark 1978 federal statute governing the Olympic movement.

That gave the USOPC the cover it needed to quietly change its policy, though the protection offers no guarantee the new policy won’t be challenged in court.

Olympic legal expert Jill Pilgrim called the Trump guidance “a well thought-out, well-reasoned set of arguments for people who want to look at it from that perspective.”

“But I’d be pretty shocked if this doesn’t get challenged if there is, somewhere along the line, a trans athlete who’s in contention for an Olympic team or world championship and gets excluded,” said Pilgrim, who has experience litigating eligibility rules for the Olympics and is a former general counsel for USA Track and Field.

The USOPC’s update of its athlete safety policy orders its 54 national governing bodies to rewrite their participation rules to ensure they are in sync with the executive order Trump signed in February called “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports.”

When the USOPC released the guidance, fewer than five had rules that would adhere to the new policy.

Among the first adopters was USA Fencing, which was pulled into a congressional hearing earlier this year about transgender women in sports when a woman refused to compete against a transgender opponent at a meet in Maryland.

One of the main concerns over the USOPC’s change is that rewriting the rules could conflict with a clause in the Ted Stevens Act stating that an NGB cannot have eligibility criteria “that are more restrictive than those of the appropriate international sports federation” that oversees its sport.

While some American federations such as USATF and USA Swimming follow rules set by their international counterparts, many others don’t. International federations have wrestled with eligibility criteria surrounding transgender sports, and not all have guidelines as strict as what Trump’s order calls for.

World Rowing, for example, has guidelines that call for specific medical conditions to be met for transgender athletes competing in the female category. Other federations, such as the one for skiing, are more vague.

White House lawyers provided the USOPC a seven-paragraph analysis that concluded that requiring “men’s participation in women’s sports cannot be squared with the rest of the” Ted Stevens Act.

“And in any event, permitting male athletes to compete against only other fellow males is not a ‘restriction’ on participation or eligibility, it is instead, a neutral channeling rule,” according to the analysis, a copy of which was obtained by The Associated Press.

Once the sports federations come into compliance, the question then becomes whether the new policy will be challenged, either by individual athletes or by states whose laws don’t conform with what the NGBs adopt. The guidance impacts everyone from Olympic-level athletes to grassroots players whose clubs are affiliated with the NGBs.

Shannon Minter, the legal director at the National Center for LGBTQ Rights, said it will not be hard to find a transgender athlete who is being harmed by the USOPC change, and that the White House guidance “will be challenged and is highly unlikely to succeed.”

“There are transgender women. There are some international sporting organizations that have policies that permit transgender women to compete if they meet certain medical conditions,” Minter said. “Under the Ted Stevens Act, they can’t override that. So, their response is just to, by brute force, pretend there’s no such thing as a transgender woman. They can’t just dictate that by sheer force of will.”

Traditionally, athletes on the Olympic pathway who have issues with eligibility rules must first try to resolve those through what’s called a Section IX arbitration case before heading to the U.S. court system. Pilgrim spelled out one scenario in which an athlete wins an arbitration “and then the USOPC has a problem.”

“Then, it’s in the USOPC’s court to deny that person the opportunity to compete, and then they’ll be in court, no doubt about that,” she said.

All this comes against the backdrop of a 2020 law that passed that, in the wake of sex scandals in Olympic sports, gave Congress the power to dissolve the USOPC board.

That, combined with the upcoming Summer Games in Los Angeles and the president’s consistent effort to place his stamp on issues surrounding sports, is widely viewed as driving the USOPC’s traditionally cautious board toward making a decision that was being roundly criticized in some circles. The committee’s new policy replaces one that called for reliance on “real data and science-based evidence rather than ideology” to make decisions about transgender athletes in sports.

“As a federally chartered organization, we have an obligation to comply with federal expectations,” CEO Sarah Hirshland and board chair Gene Sykes wrote to Olympic stakeholders last week. “The guidance we’ve received aligns with the Ted Stevens Act, reinforcing our mandated responsibility to promote athlete safety and competitive fairness.”

The USOPC didn’t set a timeline on NGBs coming into compliance, though it’s believed most will get there by the end of the year.

CHICAGO — Twenty-year-old Eric Mun didn’t want to believe it: Only one kid in the family could make it to medical school — and it wasn’t going to be him.

Mun had done everything right. He graduated high school with honors, earned a scholarship at Northwestern University and breezed through his biology courses.

He immigrated to Alabama from Korea as a toddler. From the quiet stretches of the South, he dreamed of helping patients in a pressed white coat.

But dreams don’t pay tuition. And with new borrowing limits, Mun’s family can only support one child through school.

“My parents already implied that my older brother is probably going to be the one that gets to go,” Mun said.

President Donald Trump’s sweeping “big, beautiful” tax and spending bill, signed into law earlier this month, imposes strict new caps on federal student loans, capping borrowing for professional schools at $50,000 per year. The measure particularly affects medical students, whose tuition often exceeds $300,000 over four years.

Aspiring physicians like Mun have been thrown into financial uncertainty. Many members of the medical community say the measures will send shock waves through a system already laden with economic barriers, discouraging low-income students from pursuing a medical degree.

“It might mean there are people who want to be doctors that can’t be doctors because they can’t afford it,” said Dr. Richard Anderson, president of the Illinois State Medical Society.

Before the passage of Trump’s budget bill, the Grad PLUS loan program allowed graduate students to borrow their institution’s total cost of attendance, including living expenses. The program was slashed as part of a broader overhaul to the federal student loan system.

Now, beginning July 1, 2026, most graduate students will be capped at $20,500 in federal loans per year, with a total limit of $100,000. Students in professional schools, like medical, dental or law school, will face the $50,000 annual cap and a total limit of $200,000.

Mun’s parents work at an automobile assembly plant. Throughout high school, he knew he would have to rely on scholarships and federal loans to pay his way through college.

Mun’s voice faltered. “I’m just trying to remain hopeful,” Mun said.

Also folded into the bill: the elimination of several Biden-era repayment plans, cuts to Pell Grants and limits to the Parent PLUS loans program, which allows parents of dependent undergraduates to borrow.

Proponents of the Republican-backed bill said the curbed borrowing will incentivize medical schools and other graduate programs to lower tuition. The tuition of most Chicago-area medical schools is nearly $300,000 for four years, not including cost-of-living expenses.

Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine has a $465,000 price tag after accounting for those indirect costs, according to the school’s website. Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science trails closely behind at nearly $464,000.

“One of the main concerns about the Grad PLUS program is money that is going to subsidize institutions rather than extending access to students,” said Lesley Turner, an associate professor at the University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy.

Still, many medical professionals expressed doubt that schools will adjust their costs in response to the bill. Tuition for both private and public schools has been steadily climbing for decades, up 81% from 2001 after adjusting for inflation, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges.

There’s some evidence that Grad PLUS may have contributed to those tuition hikes. A study co-authored by Turner in 2023 found that prices increased 65 cents per dollar after the program’s introduction in 2006. There was also little indication that Grad PLUS had fulfilled its intended goal of expanding access to underrepresented students.

But Turner cautioned against the abrupt reversal of the program. After accounting for inflation, the lifetime borrowing limits now placed on graduate students are lower than they were in 2005, she said. Many students may turn to private loans to cover the gap, often at higher interest rates.

More than half of medical students relied on Grad PLUS loans, according to AAMC. The median education debt for indebted medical students is around $200,000, with most repayment plans lasting 10 to 20 years. The median stipend for doctors’ first year post-MD was just $65,100 in 2024.

“I think for many reasons, it would have been reasonable to put some sort of limit on Grad PLUS loans, but I think this is a very blunt way of doing it,” Turner said.

In a high-rise on Northwestern’s downtown campus last week, 20 undergraduate students and alums from local colleges gathered for the Chicago Cancer Health Equity Collaborative Fellows program. The eight-week summer intensive offers aspiring medical professionals a deep dive into cancer health disparities information and research. Participants like Mun have been left reeling after the flurry of federal cuts.

Alexis Chappel, a 28-year-old graduate of Northeastern Illinois University, watched a family member struggle with addiction growing up. She was deeply moved by the doctors who supported his recovery, and it inspired her to pursue medicine. But she has no idea how she’ll cover tuition.

“I feel like it’s in God’s hands at this point,” Chappel said. “I just felt like it’s a direct attack on Black and brown students who plan on going to medical school.”

Just 10% of medical students are Black and 12% are Latino, according to AAMC enrollment data. Socioeconomic diversity is also limited: A 2018 analysis found that 24% of students came from the wealthiest 5% of U.S. households.

Dr. Tricia Pendergrast, who graduated from Feinberg in 2023, relied entirely on Grad PLUS loans to fund her medical education. Juggling classes and clinicals, she had little money saved and no steady stream of income. Pendergrast was so strapped for cash that she enrolled in SNAP benefits — a program also cut under Trump’s budget bill.

Now an anesthesiologist at University of Michigan Health, she’s documented her concerns on TikTok for her 48,000 followers.

“It’s not going to improve representation, and it’s not going to improve access,” Pendergrast said. “It’s going to act as a deterrent for people who otherwise would be excellent physicians.”

For low-income students, the application process is already fraught with economic obstacles, Pendergrast said. Metrics like GPA and the Medical College Admissions Test, or MCAT, are heavily weighted in admissions, and may disadvantage students from underresourced schools. Many students also lack mentorships or networks to guide them through the process, she noted.

“I think the average medical student is going to be richer and whiter, and not from rural areas and not from underserved communities,” Pendergrast said.

The elimination of Grad PLUS loans comes amid a mounting nationwide physician shortage. A recent AAMC report predicted a shortfall of 86,000 physicians by 2036. Meanwhile, a significant portion of the workforce is poised to enter retirement: The U.S. population aged 65 and older is expected to grow 34.1% over the next decade.

The shortage is particularly concentrated in primary care. In practice, that means longer waiting times for patients, and an increased caseload on physicians, who may already suffer from burnout.

“If the goal is truly to make America healthy again, then we need to have a strong physician workforce …  We should be coming up with ideas to make it more accessible for people who want to be doctors as opposed to hindering that,” Anderson said.

Sophia Tully, co-president of the Minority Association of Pre-Med Students at Northwestern, said she and her peers have struggled to reconcile with a system that often feels stacked against them. The 21-year-old plans on taking an extra gap year before medical school in an effort to save money.

Tully summed up the environment on campus: “For lack of a better word, people are panicking.”

By MELINA WALLING and MATTHEW DALY

When President Donald Trump rolled out a plan to boost artificial intelligence and data centers, a key goal was wiping away barriers to rapid growth.

And that meant taking aim at the National Environmental Policy Act — a 55-year-old, bedrock law aimed at protecting the environment through a process that requires agencies to consider a project’s possible impacts and allows the public to be heard before a project is approved. Data centers, demanding vast amounts of energy and water, have aroused strong opposition in some communities.

The AI Action Plan Trump announced last week would seek to sweep aside NEPA, as it’s commonly known, to streamline environmental reviews and permitting for data centers and related infrastructure. Republicans and business interests have long criticized NEPA for what they see as unreasonable slowing of development, and Trump’s plan would give “categorical exclusions” to data centers for “maximum efficiency” in permitting.

A spokeswoman for the White House Council on Environmental Quality said the administration is “focused on driving meaningful NEPA reform to reduce the delays in federal permitting, unleashing the ability for America to strengthen its AI and manufacturing leadership.”

Trump’s administration has been weakening the law for months.

“It’s par for the course for this administration. The attitude is to clear the way for projects that harm communities and the environment,” said Erin Doran, senior staff attorney at environmental nonprofit Food & Water Watch.

Here’s what to know about this key environmental law, and Trump’s effort to weaken it:

What is NEPA and why does it matter?

NEPA is a foundational environmental law in the United States, “essentially our Magna Carta for the environment,” said Wendy Park, a senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, another environmental group, referring to the 13th century English legal text that formed the basis for constitutions worldwide.

Signed into law by President Richard Nixon in 1970, NEPA requires federal agencies proposing actions such as building roads, bridges or energy projects to study how their project will affect the environment. Private companies are also frequently subject to NEPA standards when they apply for a permit from a federal agency.

In recent years, the law has become increasingly important in requiring consideration of a project’s possible contributions to climate change.

“That’s a really important function because otherwise we’re just operating with blinders just to get the project done, without considering whether there are alternative solutions that might accomplish the same objective, but in a more environmentally friendly way,” Park said.

But business groups say NEPA routinely blocks important projects that often take five years or more to complete.

“Our broken permitting system has long been a national embarrassment,” said Marty Durbin, president of the U.S. Chamber’s Global Energy Institute. He called NEPA “a blunt and haphazard tool” that too often is used to block investment and economic development.

The White House proposal comes as Congress is working on a permitting reform plan that would overhaul NEPA, addressing long-standing concerns from both parties that development projects — including some for clean energy — take too long to be approved.

What’s happened to NEPA recently?

NEPA’s strength — and usefulness — can depend on how it’s interpreted by different administrations.

Trump, a Republican, sought to weaken NEPA in his first term by limiting when environmental reviews are required and limiting the time for evaluation and public comment. Former Democratic President Joe Biden restored more rigorous reviews.

In his second term, Trump has again targeted the law.

An executive order that touched on environmental statutes has many agencies scrapping the requirement for a draft environmental impact statement. And the CEQ in May withdrew Biden-era guidance that federal agencies should consider the effects of planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions when conducting NEPA reviews.

Separately, the U.S. Supreme Court in May narrowed the scope of environmental reviews required for major infrastructure projects. In a ruling involving a Utah railway expansion project aimed at quadrupling oil production, the court said NEPA wasn’t designed “for judges to hamstring new infrastructure and construction projects.”

“It’s been a rough eight months for NEPA,” said Dinah Bear, a former general counsel at the Council on Environmental Quality under both Democratic and Republican presidents.

John Ruple, a research professor of law at the University of Utah, said sidelining NEPA could actually slow things down. Federal agencies still have to comply with other environmental laws, like the Endangered Species Act or Clean Air Act. NEPA has an often overlooked benefit of forcing coordination with those other laws, he said.

Some examples of cases where NEPA has played a role

A botanist by training, Mary O’Brien was working with a small organization in Oregon in the 1980s to propose alternative techniques to successfully replant Douglas fir trees that had been clear-cut on federal lands. Aerially sprayed herbicides aimed at helping the conifers grow have not only been linked to health problems in humans but were also killing another species of tree, red alders, that were beneficial to the fir saplings, O’Brien said.

The U.S. Forest Service had maintained that the herbicides’ impact on humans and red alders wasn’t a problem. But under NEPA, a court required the agency to redo their analysis and they ultimately had to write a new environmental impact statement.

“It’s a fundamental concept: ‘Don’t just roar ahead.’ Think about your options,” O’Brien said.

O’Brien, who later worked at the Grand Canyon Trust, also co-chaired a working group that weighed in on a 2012 Forest Service proposal, finalized in 2016, for aspen restoration on Monroe Mountain in Utah. Hunters, landowners, loggers and ranchers all had different opinions on how the restoration should be handled. She said NEPA’s requirement to get the public involved made for better research and a better plan.

“I think it’s one of the laws that’s the most often used by the public without the public being aware,” said Stephen Schima, senior legislative counsel at environmental law nonprofit Earthjustice. “NEPA has long been the one opportunity for communities and impacted stakeholders and local governments to weigh in.”

Schima said rolling back the power of NEPA threatens the scientific integrity of examining projects’ full impacts.

“Decisions are going to be less informed by scientific studies, and that is one of the major concerns here,” he said.

Ruple said uncertainty from NEPA changes and competing opinions on how to comply with the law’s requirements may invite even more litigation.

“And all of this will fall on the shoulder of agencies that are losing the staff needed to lead them through these changes,” he said.

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This story has been updated to correct the date to 2012, not 2018, for a U.S. Forest Service proposal for aspen restoration in Utah.

Follow Melina Walling on X @MelinaWalling and Bluesky @melinawalling.bsky.social.

The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

By LUIS ANDRES HENAO and DAVID CRARY

MONTREAL (AP) — Throughout his new term, starting with his inaugural address, President Donald Trump has said he was “saved by God” to make America great again. In Canada, Prime Minister Mark Carney rarely evokes religion in public; his victory speech in April never used the word God. “Canada forever. Vive le Canada,” he ended.

As Canada and the U.S. now skirmish over Trump’s tariff threats and occasional bullying, the leaders’ rhetoric reflects a striking difference between their nations. Religion plays a far more subdued role in the public sphere in Canada than in its southern neighbor.

Trump posed in front of a vandalized Episcopal parish house gripping a Bible. He invites pastors to the Oval Office to pray with him. His ally, House Speaker Mike Johnson, says the best way to understand his own world view is to read the Bible.

Such high-level religion-themed displays would be unlikely and almost certainly unpopular in Canada, where Carney — like his recent predecessors — generally avoids public discussion of his faith. (He is a Catholic who supports abortion rights.)

There are broader differences as well. The rate of regular church attendance in Canada is far lower than in the U.S. Evangelical Christians have nowhere near the political clout in Canada that they have south of the border. There is no major campaign in Canada to post the Ten Commandments in public schools or to enact sweeping abortion bans.

Kevin Kee, a professor and former dean at the University of Ottawa, has written about the contrasting religious landscapes of the U.S. and Canada, exploring the rise of American evangelist Billy Graham to become a confidant of numerous U.S. presidents.

Christianity, Kee said, has not permeated modern Canadian politics to that extent.

“We have a political leadership that keeps its religion quiet,” Kee said. “To make that kind of declaration in Canada is to create an us/them situation. There’s no easy way to keep everybody happy, so people keep it quiet.”

A dramatic loss of Catholic power in Quebec

The mostly French-speaking province of Quebec provides a distinctive example of Canada’s tilt toward secularism. The Catholic Church was Quebec’s dominant force through most of its history, with sweeping influence over schools, health care and politics.

That changed dramatically in the so-called Quiet Revolution of the 1960s, when the provincial government took control of education and health care as part of a broader campaign to reduce the church’s power. The rate of regular church attendance among Quebec’s Catholics plummeted from one of the highest in Canada to the one of the lowest.

Among religiously devout Canadians, in Quebec and other provinces, some are candid about feeling marginalized in a largely secular country.

“I feel isolated because our traditional Christian views are seen as old-fashioned or not moving with the times,” said Mégane Arès-Dubé, 22, after she and her husband attended a service at a conservative Reformed Baptist church in Saint Jerome, about 30 miles (nearly 50 kilometers) north of Montreal.

“Contrary to the U.S., where Christians are more represented in elected officials, Christians are really not represented in Canada,” she added. “I pray that Canada wakes up.”

The church’s senior pastor, Pascal Denault, has mixed feelings about the Quiet Revolution’s legacy.

“For many aspects of it, that was good,” he said. “Before that, it was mainly the Catholic clergy that controlled many things in the province, so we didn’t have religious freedom.”

Nonetheless, Denault wishes for a more positive public view of religion in Canada.

“Sometimes, secularism becomes a religion in itself, and it wants to shut up any religious speech in the public sphere,” he said. “What we hope for is that the government will recognize that religion is not an enemy to fight, but it’s more a positive force to encourage.”

Denault recently hosted a podcast episode focusing on Trump; he later shared some thoughts about the president.

“We tend to think that Trump is more using Christianity as a tool for his influence, rather than being a genuine Christian,” he said. “But Christians are, I think, appreciative of some of his stances on different things.”

Trump’s religion-related tactics — such as posing with the Bible in his hands — wouldn’t go over well with Canadians, Denault said.

“They’d see that as something wrongful. The public servant should not identify with a specific religion,” Denault said. “I don’t think most Canadians would vote for that type of politician.”

Repurposed church buildings abound in Montreal

In the Montreal neighborhood of Hochelaga-Maisonneuve, the skyline is dotted with crosses atop steeples, but many of those churches are unused or repurposed.

For decades, factory and port workers worshipped at Saint-Mathias-Apotre Church. Today it’s a restaurant that serves affordable meals daily for more than 600 residents.

The manager of Le Chic Resto Pop, Marc-Andre Simard, grew up Catholic and now, like many of his staff, identifies as religiously unaffiliated. But he still tries to honor some core values of Catholicism at the nonprofit restaurant, which retains the church’s original wooden doors and even its confessional booths.

“There’s still space to be together, to have some sort of communion, but it’s around food, not around faith.” Simard said during a lunch break, sitting near what used to be the altar of the former church.

Simard says the extent to which the Catholic Church controlled so much of public life in Quebec should serve as a cautionary tale for the U.S.

“We went through what the United States are going through right now,” he said.

Elsewhere in Montreal, a building that once housed a Catholic convent now often accommodates meetings of the Quebec Humanist Association.

The group’s co-founder, Michel Virard, said French Canadians “know firsthand what it was to have a clergy nosing in their affairs.”

Now, Virard says, “There is no ‘excluding religious voice’ in Canada, merely attempts at excluding clergy from manipulating the state power levers and using taxpayers’ money to promote a particular religious viewpoint.”

History reveals why role of religion is so different in U.S. and Canada

Why are Canada and the U.S., two neighbors which share so many cultural traditions and priorities, so different regarding religion’s role in public life?

According to academics who have pondered that question, their history provides some answers. The United States, at independence from Britain, chose not to have a dominant, federally established church.

In Canada, meanwhile, the Catholic Church was dominant in Quebec, and the Church of England — eventually named the Anglican Church of Canada — was powerful elsewhere.

Professor Darren Dochuk, a Canadian who teaches history at University of Notre Dame in Indiana, says the “disestablishment” of religion in the U.S. “made religious life all the more dynamic.”

“This is a country in which free faith communities have been allowed to compete in the marketplace for their share,” he said.

“In the 20th century, you had a plethora of religious groups across the spectrum who all competed voraciously for access to power,” he said. “More recently, the evangelicals are really dominating that. … Religious conservatives are imposing their will on Washington.”

There’s been no equivalent faith-based surge in Canada, said Dochuk, suggesting that Canada’s secularization produced “precipitous decline in the power of religion as a major operator in politics.”

Carmen Celestini, professor of religious studies at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, said that even when Canadian politicians do opt for faith-based outreach, they often take a multicultural approach — for example, visiting Sikh, Hindu and Jewish houses of worship, as well as Christian churches.

Trump’s talk about Canada becoming the 51st state fueled a greater sense of national unity among most Canadians, and undermined the relatively small portion of them who identify as Christian nationalists, Celestini said.

“Canada came together more as a nation, not sort of seeing differences with each other, but seeing each other as Canadians and being proud of our sovereignty and who we are as a nation,” she said. “The concern that Canadians have, when we look at what’s happening in America, is that we don’t want that to happen here. “

Crary, who reported from New York, was the AP’s Canada bureau chief from 1995-99.

Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

ALLEN PARK — The Detroit Lions’ hole at the center position was its most significant question mark entering camp, but some clarity has been provided after the first week of practice.

Lions veteran Graham Glasgow has been playing center for the last four practices — after rookie Tate Ratledge handled responsibilities for the first three practices — and reading between the lines on comments from Lions offensive coordinator John Morton, it seems that might be the team’s preferred course of action going forward.

Morton told reporters Monday that Glasgow is “at the center now” because “I think that’s more natural for him.” He noted the importance of trust between the center and quarterback, which is worth paying attention to since Glasgow has actually played center for quarterback Jared Goff in regular-season games.

“We’ve been in pads, what, for (three) days now. So that’s the real, true reading of where we’re going to be. I do like where we’re at right now,” Morton said Monday morning. “I think Ratledge has done a good job. I mean, we had him at center first and now we moved him to guard. Glasgow is at the center now; I think that’s more natural for him because that center and quarterback, that needs to be right.”

Campbell echoed those feelings Tuesday morning.

“Look, we just finished two days with Graham back at center in pads, and it’s looked pretty good. It’s looked pretty dang good,” Campbell said. “I think every day that it looks pretty dang good, it looks a little clearer. So it’s good to have him in there and it’s good for Tate, too, to get those right guard reps, so we’re holding tight right now.”

Over his nine-year career, Glasgow has primarily played guard. He has ample experience at center, though, having played center for an entire season in 2018 (Frank Ragnow’s rookie year), half of 2022 (with the Denver Broncos), and a few spot starts in Ragnow’s absence since returning to Detroit in 2023.

“I think things are going pretty well right now, to be honest,” Glasgow said after his fourth day of center work. “There’s a couple of little things to work out out there. I probably could’ve changed the protection today a couple times, maybe in the two-minute (drill), but other than that, today was a good day.”

Plus, Glasgow said that he actually likes playing center. If the Lions were to make him the starting right guard but still give him some center responsibilities to take a load off Ratledge, he’d rather just be the full-time starting center.

“I do like playing center. Center’s fun,” Glasgow told reporters. “I like the mental load that comes with it. I think there’s — it’s a challenge, but I think that’s something that I’m pretty good at, so I like to do it. If it came to me having to play center and make the calls or me be a guard and then think about the calls anyways just to make sure that the calls were right, I’d probably rather just play center.”

Asked how Ratledge had been doing late last week (the first day with Glasgow repping at center), Goff said, “It’s been great. Tate, I thought, was doing a good job, and Graham was in there today. I’ve been comfortable with Graham for quite some time. So whoever it ends up being, I’ll be good with.”

Of course, as it pertains to Morton’s comments, there’s still plenty of time for things to change. This time last week, it seemed the Lions believed Ratledge could be the guy — why else would they have put him there to begin training camp?

“I do like the way it’s going right now,” Morton said of the offensive line’s progress. “It’s still early, the more we do it, the better we’re going to get.”

A third person has been charged in connection with a string of purse-snatchings in Oakland County which also allegedly involves sibling co-defendants.

Snyomee Stanley, 21, of Taylor is facing felony charges of unarmed robbery and stealing/retaining a financial transaction device, along with third-degree retail fraud — a misdemeanor — for a crime reported outside the Marshall’s store in White Lake Township on July 9. An Oakland County special operations unit and Taylor police arrested her on July 24 and she was subsequently arraigned in 52-2 District Court in Clarkston.

Bond was set at $10,000 cash with a 10% provision, which allowed her to be released from jail after posting $1,000. She did that on July 28.

An ongoing investigation into multiple purse-snatching incidents in Oakland County tied Stanley to the White Lake crime. A brother-sister duo from Pontiac, Phylasia Rufus, 21, and Cartier Rufus, 20, are facing charges for similar incidents in retail parking lots in Auburn Hills and Commerce Township, and Cartier Rufus is facing charges for the White Lake Township incident along with Stanley. Stanley’s arrest information has been shared with law enforcement in Auburn Hills and Commerce townships, according to officials.

According to police, force was used to steal purses from female victims in at least two of the crimes, causing minor injuries.

Cartier Rufus was on parole for a similar offense at the time of his arrest, police said.

The Rufuses remain in custody at the Oakland County Jail.

Phylasia Rufus’ cases were recently advanced to Oakland County Circuit Court after she waived her right to preliminary exams in district court. Cartier Rufus’ next court appearance is scheduled for July 31. Stanley’s next court appearance is scheduled for Aug. 7.

DETROIT (AP) — Bo Bichette’s two-run single broke a scoreless tie in the eighth inning and the Toronto Blue Jays defeated the slumping Detroit Tigers 6-1 on Saturday night.

Nathan Lukes, George Springer and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. homered in a four-run ninth as the Blue Jays won their fourth in a row and increased their AL East lead to 6 1/2 games over the New York Yankees.

The Tigers have lost six straight and 12 of 13, but still hold a comfortable lead in the AL Central. They’ve scored only 33 runs during that stretch (2.5 per game) and were held to a pair of Jake Rogers singles on Saturday.

Four Toronto pitchers combined for 13 strikeouts and one walk. The Blue Jays are 8-1 since the All-Star break and have won 21 of 26 overall.

Riley Greene’s ninth-inning groundout plated Detroit’s only run.

Tarik Skubal allowed five hits in six scoreless innings for the Tigers. He walked three and struck out seven.

Toronto starter Kevin Gausman permitted one hit and one walk in six shutout innings, striking out 10.

Braydon Fisher (4-0) pitched a perfect seventh for the win.

Detroit threw out a runner at the plate on an unusual play in the sixth. With the bases loaded and one out, Tyler Heineman hit a soft flare into center field that Matt Vierling grabbed on a short hop. Springer had to hold up at third to see if the ball would be caught on a fly, and Vierling’s throw home was in time to get him.

Key moment

Pinch-hitter Joey Loperfido and Springer started the eighth with singles and moved up on a wild pitch by Will Vest (5-2). Guerrero grounded out before Bichette hit a two-run single past diving second baseman Gleyber Torres.

Key stat

Detroit has been outscored 89-33 over the last 13 games.

Up next

RHP Max Scherzer (1-0, 5.14 ERA) faces one of his former teams Sunday when Toronto tries for a four-game sweep. RHP Jack Flaherty (5-10, 4.77) pitches for the Tigers.

DETROIT — Round and round it goes. The Tigers’ bullpen carousel continues to spin through veteran right-handed relievers.

Carlos Hernandez and Geoff Hartlieb have come and gone. Next up, 33-year-old Luke Jackson.

“There’s no question we’ve been cycling through some arms,” manager AJ Hinch said before the game Saturday. “And I feel for some of the arms that are now gone. But Luke is going to get an opportunity here. He’s a veteran guy who I think has some upside to recapture some of the usage he’s had in the past.”

The Tigers designated Hartlieb for assignment and signed Jackson, who had been released by the Texas Rangers on Friday. The Rangers will pay the remainder of his $1.5 million contract for this year. The Tigers will pay him the prorated MLB minimum.

Jackson, who has 15 games of postseason experience and was part of the Atlanta Braves’ 2021 World Series championship run, features an elite slider, which he throws off a 94-mph four-seam fastball.

In 2019, he posted a 36.7% whiff rate. In 2023, it was still at 30%. This year, it’d fallen to 22.4%. In 39 games with the Rangers this year, he had a 4.11 ERA with a team-high nine saves.

But his strikeout rate (15.8%) and walk rate (12.5%) were both well off his career norms.

“The swing-and-miss hasn’t been there this year, but we’re hoping to get more out of that,” Hinch said. “The breaking ball is real. He’s a guy who has been there and done that a little bit.”

He got five outs against the Tigers on Sunday.

“We try to give opportunity when it’s there and to the guys we feel can help us win,” Hinch said. “On the front end, I don’t know how long the opportunity is going to be for some of these guys.”

The Tigers gave Hernandez 11 games. Hartlieb got two.

“This one could be anywhere,” Hinch said of Jackson’s potential run. “Luke has been through the league and has run the gauntlet. He’s pitched in the back end of games this year. But performance matters and certainly we expect Luke to make a better impact.

“But the message is, when opportunity opens up, however big or small, try to come in, take it and run with it. We clearly are searching for the right combination of bullpen arms to stay here.”

Important to note, the signing of Jackson does not preclude the Tigers from pursuing other bullpen arms this week prior to the trade deadline.

Montero optioned

The Tigers optioned right-hander Keider Montero back to Triple-A Toledo after the game Friday to clear a roster spot for Tarik Skubal’s return from the paternity list.

“Keider has been on the shuttle between Toledo and the big leagues,” Hinch said. “Some of it has been where the health of our team has been. Some of it has been an execution issue.”

After getting tagged for six runs (five earned) and nine hits in four innings Friday, Montero’s ERA ballooned to 4.66 with a 1.432 WHIP.

“It’s about execution and he’s going to work his tail off,” Hinch said. “He really takes to a plan that’s laid out in front of him. You see it when he’s good. He’s got two types of spin, two types of fastballs and the occasional changeup. But when he’s not, it’s long at-bats and big counts and he’s spraying the ball and getting himself in harm’s way.

“The ebbs and flows of a young pitcher can be sometimes hard to navigate. But he’s going to put the work in and that’s why we sent him down — to work.”

Hinch said Montero would continue to start at Toledo, but did not rule out the possibility of him being a bullpen piece in the final two months.

“We’ve proven we’re willing to do anything,” he said. “We’ll use our players accordingly. We’re not pursuing that right now but I don’t think we’d turn our backs on an idea like that.”

The move also clears the way for rookie right-hander Troy Melton to take the fifth spot in the rotation.

The emergence of Troy is part of this conversation when you make a move like this,” Hinch said. “Troy was at a really good place at a really good time. He needed the challenge of being up in the big leagues.”

Around the horn

The Tigers traded outfielder Brewer Hicklen, who was designated for assignment Wednesday, to the Phillies for cash considerations.

ALLEN PARK — Here are some observations from Day 6 of Detroit Lions training camp.

• Saturday marked the first practice of the year with fans in attendance, and per usual, there was a noticeable change in the energy. Supporters in attendance gave Lions owner Sheila Hamp a standing ovation when she arrived, and later started a chant for linebacker Alex Anzalone, who returned to practice amid a contract dispute with the team.

• Ultimately, Anzalone didn’t partake much in team activities while continuing to work through rehabbing his hamstring. Neither did edge defender Al-Quadin Muhammad, who was spotted running the hill near the practice field alongside cornerback D.J. Reed. UDFA safety Ian Kennelly, who missed Friday’s practice with an undisclosed injury, did not practice again Saturday but was spotted working off to the side with trainers.

• Saturday was also the second day with pads, and the defense was feasting early on. Linebacker Jack Campbell dropped running back Jahmyr Gibbs for a loss on the second play of the day. Two plays later, edge defender Aidan Hutchinson brought down running back David Montgomery for no gain.

Defensive linemen Keith Cooper Jr. and Ahmed Hassanein immediately got a stop for the second team, and Roy Lopez, who returned to practice for the first time since suffering a foot injury on Monday, stuffed running back Jabari Small for no gain.

UDFA running back Kye Robichaux eventually snapped the drought for the offense, breaking off an explosive run after being sprung by UDFA tackle Mason Miller in the open field. Two plays later, Robichaux had another run of 10-plus yards.

• Rookie defensive tackle Tyleik Williams returned to practice on Saturday after missing Friday for personal reasons. On the first team’s second session of 11-on-11 reps, he and veteran DJ Reader teamed up to stuff Gibbs on a run. And on the very next play, Williams was at the front of another run stop for minimal or no gain. Hutchinson ended the set with a tackle-for-loss on Montgomery. A few plays later, Grant Stuard dropped Craig Reynolds for a loss, and Cooper and Chris Smith also teamed up for a stop for no gain.

• Fans hoping to see some plays from third-round receiver Isaac TeSlaa were treated to big plays from multiple rookie receivers.

UDFA Jackson Meeks ran a slot fade down the left sideline and got perfect placement on a ball from quarterback Kyle Allen, hauling the pass in with one hand while going to the ground. Seventh-rounder Dominic Lovett caught a tight-windowed pass between two defenders on another great throw from Allen for a touchdown in a 7-on-7 red-zone drill.

“I love being able to sit back and watch those guys work,” veteran receiver Amon-Ra St. Brown said of the rookie class. “It’s a lot of fun cheering them on. They make big plays. I mean, Meeks had a one-hand catch today, Dom had one the other day, Isaac’s ending practice with touchdowns, so it’s awesome to see.”

Between TeSlaa, Lovett and the rest of the veteran receiving core, the Lions have about six receivers who have a pretty good shot of making the roster. But if Lovett can uphold his production while remaining a factor on special teams, he’s going to have a huge opportunity to be a weekly contributor come this fall.

“You guys know, and they know, they’ve been told, ‘Man, if you can help on special teams and continue to develop at your role in your position, there’s a place for you,’” Lions head coach Dan Campbell said.

TeSlaa closed the practice with one of the plays of the day. He ran a slot fade to the end zone against cornerback Dicaprio Bootle and went up to haul in a throw from Jared Goff, going down at the 1-yard line and electrifying the crowd one last time.

“I would say, Lovett has…popped more early out on the field, but I thought TeSlaa had a really good day yesterday,” Campbell said before Saturday’s practice. “I can see the uptick now with him. He’s got to stack another good day, but that was good to see yesterday. And that’s the first day of pads, by the way.”

• For the third straight practice, veteran Graham Glasgow took reps at center while rookie Tate Ratledge played left guard. In addition to struggling with the interior defensive line on run plays, Ratledge also registered a false start early in the practice.

• Hutchinson’s 2025 Defensive Player of the Year campaign is officially on. He had another standout practice, sacking Goff in team period off a nasty spin move to beat offensive tackle Dan Skipper. Hutchinson also had another highlight-reel spin on Skipper during one-on-one drills.

“I see a player that is very confident in his abilities. I see a player that appears to bend even better than last year, and I see a player who was hungry that’s even hungrier,” Campbell told NFL Network after practice. “He’s gonna have a hell of a season for us.”

• Linebacker Zach Cunningham was the most noticeable player on the field Friday, but he got off to a rough start on Saturday. He bit on play-action on the first pass attempt of the day and got torched by tight end Sam LaPorta, who ran wild after making a catch to give the offense an early explosive play.

• The best reps from the offense came in 7-on-7 red-zone drills, with all three strings making light work of the defense.

The first team got things rolling with a first-play touchdown to receiver Jameson Williams, as Goff fed the ball into a tight window for the connection. Goff then had two really nice passes to receiver Kalif Raymond and fed the ball to tight end Shane Zylstra for a completion near the sideline. Goff finished things off with a dart to receiver Tom Kennedy in the end zone.

Kennedy connected with quarterback Hendon Hooker two plays later, going up to high-point a ball on a fade route and getting two feet down in the end zone while working against cornerback Tyson Russell.

Allen, meanwhile, went 5-for-6 on red-zone attempts, with his only incompletion coming on a ball to Lovett in the end zone where the receiver could only get one foot in.

• The first-team defense got its revenge after the 7-on-7 period during full-team red-zone drills. Cornerback Terrion Arnold defended a throw to St. Brown on the first play, followed by a sack in which Reader pressured first before the whole line converged on Goff.

• During the final 11-on-11 period of the day, Raymond caught a crosser from Goff and took it 45 yards to the house for a score. Shortly after, Hassanein pressured Hooker for a near-sack after beating tackle Giovanni Manu. TeSlaa ended the day with his phenomenal catch over Bootle.

• Manu had a tough day. He got beat cleanly twice in a one-on-one pass-rush drill, losing to edge defender Mitchell Agude on a speed rush and getting beat by defensive lineman Pat O’Connor on a swim move. He was almost beaten by Hassanein on a bull rush but recovered in time to anchor and stave off the rush.

Hassanein continues to stand out in a positive way. In addition to the win over Manu during one-on-ones, he used a Hutchinson-esque spin move to beat Miller. Cooper also had a terrific rep, using a push-pull move to beat veteran Trystan Colon.

By Max Reinhart, The Detroit News

A 31-year-old man is in jail after his girlfriend told police he kidnapped her, hit her with a liquor bottle and threw her down a set of stairs.

Michigan State Police said the woman fled the man’s home and sought help at a nearby residence when he fell asleep.

At about 1:05 a.m. Friday, dispatchers received a report that a woman with “obvious injuries” was sitting on the porch of a home on Ithaca Avenue in Royal Oak Township, according to an MSP social media post.

Authorities said troopers arrived and found the woman with two black eyes and bruises and cuts on her body. She told police that her boyfriend had held her against her will at his home on Cloverdale Avenue for the last three days.

There, he allegedly took her cell phone so she couldn’t call for help, strangled her, struck her with a liquor bottle and threw her down the stairs when she attempted to leave. The woman told police she was able to escape when he fell asleep.

She was transported to a nearby hospital while troopers responded to the suspect’s home, according to the MSP post.

He initially refused to exit the house. Troopers first removed the man’s father and the suspect later complied with orders and was taken to the Oakland County Jail.

The suspect has not yet been identified by name. The case is under review by the Oakland County Prosecutor’s Office, MSP said.

A spokesperson for the prosecutor’s office didn’t immediately respond to a request for an update on the case.

By Max Bryan, The Detroit News

A move from the group Let’s Open Northville to remove on-street dining from Northville’s downtown has drawn opposition from the city, a statewide organization and area business owners.

Described as a group of businesspeople and residents who want to permanently reopen Main and Center streets in the downtown area, Let’s Open Northville won a lawsuit against the city this month to remove bollards that blocked access to cars and trucks, restricting the area to pedestrians. The bollards were initially installed to allow for socially distanced dining during the COVID-19 epidemic, but were left up on a seasonal basis.

Wayne County Circuit Judge Charlene Elder ruled in her July 9 decision that the downtown streets are meant for street traffic.

Now, Let’s Open Northville wants to remove street dining blocked off by concrete barriers from the two thoroughfares. The group alleges in a July 18 motion that the city’s installation of concrete barriers that allow patrons of certain restaurants to dine in parallel-parking spaces violates Elder’s order. Elder said in her order that the streets would “close only for festivals, parades, and special events as they always have.”

“(The city) never used concrete barriers to create on-street dining or block temporary on-street parking spaces pre-COVID,” the motion reads.

Let’s Open Northville said in their motion that the city told them they would not remove the concrete barriers because some of the restaurants had on-street platform dining before COVID. The city also allegedly told the group that the restaurant owners gave them permission to install the barriers.

Kate Knight, director of Northville’s Downtown Development Authority, said the city would file a motion in response Friday. Knight said the city has allowed for dining on the streets since the early 2010s.

“(The motion) feels punitive toward a long-established restaurant tradition in Northville,” Knight said. “We complied with the court order to open streets with a very quick turnaround last week.”

The city’s move has garnered support from the Michigan Downtown Association. In a letter to Knight and City Manager George Lahanas, MDA chairwoman Cristina Sheppard-Decius said public roads are meant to be flexible “to work with the current environment and needs of the community.”

“Historically, communities such as Birmingham, Royal Oak, Grand Rapids, Northville, and many more have long-established ordinances and policies dating back to 2007 allowing for on-street platform dining cafes − establishing a best practice in public space, street and curbside management in Michigan,” Sheppard-Decius’ letter reads.

Knight also said business owners who use the barriers have invested thousands of dollars in temporary infrastructure because it’s uncertain if they’ll be able to have on-street dining in the future.

Some business owners who use the barriers have spoken out about the motion. Paul Gabriel, owner of Browndog, said he had street dining before COVID-19.

“They opened the streets. They’ve just allowed the restaurants to have their outdoor street dining like they always have, so I’m not exactly sure of how this is in violation,” he said.

Gabriel said getting rid of on-street dining would “dramatically” impact his business. He said Browndog, which offers ice cream and shakes, generates a good amount of revenue in the summer months from outdoor seating.

Michelle Lussier, owner of Table 5, said she would lose up to 15% of her business if her on-street dining were to go away.

Lussier also said she would like to move past the legal battle.

“Let’s just realize that we have this great downtown, and let’s do what we can to keep it great,” she said.

It’s been 20 years since the Metzger brothers of AJR began busking on the streets of their home town, New York City, and 10 since they the trio released its debut album, “Living Room.”

Since then they’ve released four more studio albums and a series of EPs, including the upcoming “What No One’s Thinking.” AJR has also hit the charts with singles such as “I’m Ready,” “World’s Smallest Violin,” “Way Less Sad” and the Top 10 “Bang!,” and the siblings — who record and perform under the surname Met — have also collaborated with Weezer, Ingrid Michaelson, Mike Love of the Beach Boys and Grosse Pointe-raised Quinn XCII.

This year finds them hot off AJR’s first full-scale arena tour last year, and in the midst of working on a Broadway musical. The summer tour also finds Jack (nee Evan) and Ryan (nee Joshua) out mostly as a duo, while oldest brother Adam, who’s an adjunct professor at Columbia University and works on climate issues, has a Ph.D. and is executive director of the promotes his new book “Amplify: How to Use the Power of Connection to Engage, Take Action, and Build a Better World.” But his brothers are carrying the torch around the country, with a new single, “Betty,” advancing the EP…

* Jack Met says via Zoom that AJR’s career trajectory isn’t exactly what he expected but adds that “if it was going to happen, it’s exactly the way that I guess I thought it would or I expect it to go. We’ve never been the coolest thing…It’s been a very slow trajectory; we’ve been doing this for 20 years all told, and it took about 10 years to kinda start getting popular. And it really has been, like, one fan at a time, and I think that’s actually made us able to stay for such a long time.”

* He adds that he and his two older brothers have largely gotten along, without any Oasis or Kinks kind of drama between them. “We grew up in a pretty small apartment, and we all shared a bedroom growing up, like three of us, for 15 years until Adam went to college. It kind of forced us to be close. There was nowhere else to go. There was no other bedroom, couldn’t sleep in the bathroom. So it kind of forced us to make up games together and put on fake shows together in the living room, `cause you had no option. And once we started getting on (tour) buses and sharing dressing rooms, it just felt like we were back in the bedroom.”

* The “What Everyone’s Thinking” EP is due out Aug. 29 and came as a bit of a surprise for AJR. “We didn’t really have a plan to write this year at all. We were planning to work on this Broadway show that we’re writing, and essentially what happened was I said to Ryan, ‘I’m just curious in the moment, if we sit down, what will happen.'” After experiencing some writer’s block, he says, “we realized and we remembered that we’d been through some kind of crazy stuff during the last few years; we’ve dealt with the loss of family members (including their father during 2023), career stuff, friendships and everything. When we realized that, OK, we’re suppressing some stuff, it was like, ‘OK, there it is. Let’s just inject it into the music.’ So we did, and the songs kind of came pouring out — five songs that are very personal and very emotional. It’s definitely our most emotional body of work.”

* The song “Betty,” Jack says, “is about the fear of commitment and the fear of the idea of forever. It’s not so much about relationship issues as just issues within yourself, of that fear. We thought that was a brutally honest and scary thing to write about, but we kind of had to.”

* The Broadway musical, meanwhile, is an adaptation of Crockett Johnson’s 1955 children’s novel “Harold and the Purple Crayon; AJR is writing songs, while Rick Elice (“Jersey Boys,” “The Addams Family,” “The Cher Show”) is collaborating on the book. “We loved that book forever and reimagined it, basically. We took Harold’s character and reimagined him into an adult, facing adult issues and realizing that he kinda can’t draw his problems away anymore. He’s dealing with loss. It’s very much based on our own experiences. We’re in the middle of working on it now. This was conceptualized back in 2020. We’re a good amount down the road now, and we’ve written a bunch of songs and a story and everything like that. We just love it, ’cause Broadway is the first thing we ever wanted to do. It’s impacted every single song I think we’ve ever made, to some degree.”

AJR, Goth Babe, Cavetown and Madelyn Mei perform at 6:20 p.m. Tuesday, July 29 at the Pine Knob Music Theatre, 33 Bob Seger Drive, Independence Township. 313-471-7000 or 313Presents.com.

By JOCELYN GECKER, Associated Press

As artificial intelligence technology becomes part of daily life, adolescents are turning to chatbots for advice, guidance and conversation. The appeal is clear: Chatbots are patient, never judgmental, supportive and always available.

That worries experts who say the booming AI industry is largely unregulated and that many parents have no idea about how their kids are using AI tools or the extent of personal information they are sharing with chatbots.

New research shows more than 70% of American teenagers have used AI companions and more than half converse with them regularly. The study by Common Sense Media focused on “AI companions,” like Character. AI, Nomi and Replika, which it defines as “digital friends or characters you can text or talk with whenever you want,” versus AI assistants or tools like ChatGPT, though it notes they can be used the same way.

It’s important that parents understand the technology. Experts suggest some things parents can do to help protect their kids:

— Start a conversation, without judgment, says Michael Robb, head researcher at Common Sense Media. Approach your teen with curiosity and basic questions: “Have you heard of AI companions?” “Do you use apps that talk to you like a friend?” Listen and understand what appeals to your teen before being dismissive or saying you’re worried about it.

— Help teens recognize that AI companions are programmed to be agreeable and validating. Explain that’s not how real relationships work and that real friends with their own points of view can help navigate difficult situations in ways that AI companions cannot.

“One of the things that’s really concerning is not only what’s happening on screen but how much time it’s taking kids away from relationships in real life,” says Mitch Prinstein, chief of psychology at the American Psychological Association. “We need to teach kids that this is a form of entertainment. It’s not real, and it’s really important they distinguish it from reality and should not have it replace relationships in your actual life.”

The APA recently put out a health advisory on AI and adolescent well-being, and tips for parents.

— Parents should watch for signs of unhealthy attachments.

“If your teen is preferring AI interactions over real relationships or spending hours talking to AI companions, or showing that they are becoming emotionally distressed when separated from them — those are patterns that suggest AI companions might be replacing rather than complementing human connection,” Robb says.

— Parents can set rules about AI use, just like they do for screen time and social media. Have discussions about when and how AI tools can and cannot be used. Many AI companions are designed for adult use and can mimic romantic, intimate and role-playing scenarios.

While AI companions may feel supportive, children should understand the tools are not equipped to handle a real crisis or provide genuine mental health support. If kids are struggling with depression, anxiety, loneliness, an eating disorder or other mental health challenges, they need human support — whether it is family, friends or a mental health professional.

— Get informed. The more parents know about AI, the better. “I don’t think people quite get what AI can do, how many teens are using it and why it’s starting to get a little scary,” says Prinstein, one of many experts calling for regulations to ensure safety guardrails for children. “A lot of us throw our hands up and say, ‘I don’t know what this is!’ This sounds crazy!’ Unfortunately, that tells kids if you have a problem with this, don’t come to me because I am going to diminish it and belittle it.”

Older teenagers have advice, too, for parents and kids. Banning AI tools is not a solution because the technology is becoming ubiquitous, says Ganesh Nair, 18.

“Trying not to use AI is like trying to not use social media today. It is too ingrained in everything we do,” says Nair, who is trying to step back from using AI companions after seeing them affect real-life friendships in his high school. “The best way you can try to regulate it is to embrace being challenged.”

“Anything that is difficult, AI can make easy. But that is a problem,” says Nair. “Actively seek out challenges, whether academic or personal. If you fall for the idea that easier is better, then you are the most vulnerable to being absorbed into this newly artificial world.”

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ALLEN PARK — If you hang around the Detroit Lions‘ practice field, it won’t take long to hear Ahmed Hassanein’s voice.

The sixth-round rookie isn’t shy in letting out a roar while getting in reps alongside his new teammates, whether that’s before the ball is snapped to amp himself up or after in reaction to the play’s result. It happened at least twice Friday, as the Lions completed their fifth practice of training camp.

“In my mentality, it gets the whole defense together,” Hassanein said of his shouts. The habit began at Boise State, where coaches would know the defensive end was ready when they could hear him. “I get encouraged when somebody else yells. … This is just me. I love playing like that. Whatever it takes, you know?”

Hassanein’s relentless motor has been as advertised since the Lions selected him with the 196th overall pick in April’s draft. His physical abilities need to be honed — he only started playing football in 2018, after moving back to the United States from Egypt — but his hustle is never questioned, and that effort, as general manager Brad Holmes has previously pointed out, can “make up (for) a lot of things.”

“With the way he plays, the mentality he plays with, the effort he plays with, he’s everything we’re about here,” defensive coordinator Kelvin Sheppard said of Hassanein on Thursday. “Like I said, it’s just that development piece, the learning curve.”

Hassanein, trying to absorb all the information available to him, has made a concerted effort to observe and learn from Aidan Hutchinson. Hassanein imitated one of the Hutchinson’s signature moves — a swim move to the inside — during Tuesday’s practice.

Hutchinson took notice, jokingly telling the rookie to “stop studying my tape.”

“He’s really been helping me a lot, and I’m super grateful for him,” Hassanein said. “Everybody in the room, honestly, (defensive line) Coach Kacy Rodgers, they’ve been teaching me. Because I’ve only been doing this for seven years, so I just want to learn and want to grow. … Being an open book and being a sponge. Not to have that like, ‘Oh, I know everything’ type of guy. No, I know nothing. But at the end of the day, I’m gonna give you 100%, I’m gonna run to the ball, I’m gonna run through somebody’s face.”

Fans have been clamoring for a long-term answer on the edge opposite Hutchinson. Perhaps the role could be filled by Hassanein, but that’s likely a down-the-road development than something we’ll see immediately. Sheppard doesn’t want expectations to get too high for Hassanein in Year 1, but there are clear reasons for optimism going forward.

“This guy is a rookie. He just started playing football six years ago,” Sheppard said. “He just learned the English language six, seven years ago. … (But) that guy’s all in. Whatever his potential is, Ahmed will reach it because he’s going to work at it that way.”

By JOCELYN GECKER, Associated Press

No question is too small when Kayla Chege, a high school student in Kansas, is using artificial intelligence.

The 15-year-old asks ChatGPT for guidance on back-to-school shopping, makeup colors, low-calorie choices at Smoothie King, plus ideas for her Sweet 16 and her younger sister’s birthday party.

The sophomore honors student makes a point not to have chatbots do her homework and tries to limit her interactions to mundane questions. But in interviews with The Associated Press and a new study, teenagers say they are increasingly interacting with AI as if it were a companion, capable of providing advice and friendship.

“Everyone uses AI for everything now. It’s really taking over,” said Chege, who wonders how AI tools will affect her generation. “I think kids use AI to get out of thinking.”

For the past couple of years, concerns about cheating at school have dominated the conversation around kids and AI. But artificial intelligence is playing a much larger role in many of their lives. AI, teens say, has become a go-to source for personal advice, emotional support, everyday decision-making and problem-solving.

‘AI is always available. It never gets bored with you’

More than 70% of teens have used AI companions and half use them regularly, according to a new study from Common Sense Media, a group that studies and advocates for using screens and digital media sensibly.

The study defines AI companions as platforms designed to serve as “digital friends,” like Character. AI or Replika, which can be customized with specific traits or personalities and can offer emotional support, companionship and conversations that can feel human-like. But popular sites like ChatGPT and Claude, which mainly answer questions, are being used in the same way, the researchers say.

As the technology rapidly gets more sophisticated, teenagers and experts worry about AI’s potential to redefine human relationships and exacerbate crises of loneliness and youth mental health.

“AI is always available. It never gets bored with you. It’s never judgmental,” says Ganesh Nair, an 18-year-old in Arkansas. “When you’re talking to AI, you are always right. You’re always interesting. You are always emotionally justified.”

All that used to be appealing, but as Nair heads to college this fall, he wants to step back from using AI. Nair got spooked after a high school friend who relied on an “AI companion” for heart-to-heart conversations with his girlfriend later had the chatbot write the breakup text ending his two-year relationship.

“That felt a little bit dystopian, that a computer generated the end to a real relationship,” said Nair. “It’s almost like we are allowing computers to replace our relationships with people.”

How many teens are using AI? New study stuns researchers

In the Common Sense Media survey, 31% of teens said their conversations with AI companions were “as satisfying or more satisfying” than talking with real friends. Even though half of teens said they distrust AI’s advice, 33% had discussed serious or important issues with AI instead of real people.

Those findings are worrisome, says Michael Robb, the study’s lead author and head researcher at Common Sense, and should send a warning to parents, teachers and policymakers. The now-booming and largely unregulated AI industry is becoming as integrated with adolescence as smartphones and social media are.

“It’s eye-opening,” said Robb. “When we set out to do this survey, we had no understanding of how many kids are actually using AI companions.” The study polled more than 1,000 teens nationwide in April and May.

Adolescence is a critical time for developing identity, social skills and independence, Robb said, and AI companions should complement — not replace — real-world interactions.

“If teens are developing social skills on AI platforms where they are constantly being validated, not being challenged, not learning to read social cues or understand somebody else’s perspective, they are not going to be adequately prepared in the real world,” he said.

The nonprofit analyzed several popular AI companions in a “ risk assessment,” finding ineffective age restrictions and that the platforms can produce sexual material, give dangerous advice and offer harmful content. The group recommends that minors not use AI companions.

A concerning trend to teens and adults alike

Researchers and educators worry about the cognitive costs for youth who rely heavily on AI, especially in their creativity, critical thinking and social skills. The potential dangers of children forming relationships with chatbots gained national attention last year when a 14-year-old Florida boy died by suicide after developing an emotional attachment to a Character. AI chatbot.

“Parents really have no idea this is happening,” said Eva Telzer, a psychology and neuroscience professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. “All of us are struck by how quickly this blew up.” Telzer is leading multiple studies on youth and AI, a new research area with limited data.

Telzer’s research has found that children as young as 8 are using generative AI and also found that teens are using AI to explore their sexuality and for companionship. In focus groups, Telzer found that one of the top apps teens frequent is SpicyChat AI, a free role-playing app intended for adults.

Many teens also say they use chatbots to write emails or messages to strike the right tone in sensitive situations.

“One of the concerns that comes up is that they no longer have trust in themselves to make a decision,” said Telzer. “They need feedback from AI before feeling like they can check off the box that an idea is OK or not.”

Arkansas teen Bruce Perry, 17, says he relates to that and relies on AI tools to craft outlines and proofread essays for his English class.

“If you tell me to plan out an essay, I would think of going to ChatGPT before getting out a pencil,” Perry said. He uses AI daily and has asked chatbots for advice in social situations, to help him decide what to wear and to write emails to teachers, saying AI articulates his thoughts faster.

Perry says he feels fortunate that AI companions were not around when he was younger.

“I’m worried that kids could get lost in this,” Perry said. “I could see a kid that grows up with AI not seeing a reason to go to the park or try to make a friend.”

Other teens agree, saying the issues with AI and its effect on children’s mental health are different from those of social media.

“Social media complemented the need people have to be seen, to be known, to meet new people,” Nair said. “I think AI complements another need that runs a lot deeper — our need for attachment and our need to feel emotions. It feeds off of that.”

“It’s the new addiction,” Nair added. “That’s how I see it.”

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The Associated Press’ education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.