AP News in Brief at 12:04 a.m. EST

President Donald Trump said in an interview that aired Sunday that he “won't be extorted” by Democrats who are demanding negotiations to extend the expiring Affordable Care Act subsidies. Echoing congressional Republicans, the president said on CBS' “60 Minutes” he'll negotiate only when the government is reopened.

Trump said Democrats “have lost their way” and predicted they’ll capitulate to Republicans.

“I think they have to,” Trump said. “And if they don’t vote, it’s their problem.”

Trump’s comments signal the shutdown could drag on for some time as federal workers, including air traffic controllers, are set to miss additional paychecks and there's uncertainty over whether 42 million Americans who receive federal food aid will be able to access the assistance. Senate Democrats have voted 13 times against reopening the government, insisting they need Trump and Republicans to negotiate with them first.

Trump administration says SNAP will be partially funded in November

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — President Donald Trump’s administration said Monday that it will partially fund SNAP for November, after two judges issued rulings requiring the government to keep the nation’s largest food aid program running.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture, which oversees the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, had planned to freeze payments starting Nov. 1 because it said it could no longer keep funding it during the federal government shutdown. The program serves about 1 in 8 Americans and is a major piece of the nation’s social safety net. It costs more than $8 billion per month nationally. The government says an emergency fund it will use has $4.65 billion — enough to cover about half the normal benefits.

Exhausting the fund potentially sets the stage for a similar situation in December if the shutdown isn't resolved by then.

It’s not clear exactly how much beneficiaries will receive, nor how quickly they will see value show up on the debit cards they use to buy groceries. November payments have already been delayed for millions of people.

“The Trump Administration has the means to fund this program in full, and their decision not to will leave millions of Americans hungry and waiting even longer for relief as government takes the additional steps needed to partially fund this program,” Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell, who led a coalition of Democratic state officials in one of the lawsuits that forced the funding, said in a statement.

G2 or not G2: Trump's new favorite term for US-China relations carries a lot of history's baggage

WASHINGTON (AP) — In diplomacy, even short words matter. And with a brief Truth Social post, President Donald Trump may have revealed his approach to the U.S.-China relationship — to the delight of reputation-conscious Beijing but to the worries of U.S. allies concerned with China's ascending global power.

“The G2 WILL BE CONVENING SHORTLY!" Trump wrote moments before he headed into a widely watched summit with Chinese leader Xi Jinping on Oct. 30 in South Korea, reviving a phrase that dates to the early 2000s but had been rejected by Washington for at least the past decade — including during Trump's first term.

G2, or Group of Two, was first proposed by American economist C. Fred Bergsten in 2005 to urge what he considered the necessity for the two major economies to talk to each other. It has come to imply a power equilibrium between the two nations — something that Beijing has long coveted as it ascended from regional powerhouse to pivotal global player.

But that equilibrium, and how China might approach it, stirs fears among U.S. allies and partners.

“The G2 concept implies that China and the United States are peers on the global stage and their positions should be given equal weight,” said Neil Thomas, a fellow on Chinese politics at the Asia Society Policy Institute.

Republicans seek to tap into Trump energy on eve of Election Day in New Jersey, Virginia

TOTOWA, N.J. (AP) — New Jersey Republicans are trying to ride the coattails of Donald Trump’s 2024 electoral momentum, with gubernatorial candidate Jack Ciattarelli courting voters in a key — and traditionally Democratic — stronghold that contributed to the president's gains in the state.

Ciattarelli and Virginia candidate Winsome Earle-Sears are crisscrossing their respective states, while Trump spoke at telephone rallies with voters later Monday. This comes after their opponents, U.S. Rep. Mikie Sherrill and Abigail Spanberger, campaigned over the weekend alongside former President Barack Obama.

It’s a delicate balance for Republicans, who want to catch some of Trump’s electoral energy by drawing infrequently voting conservatives to the polls while not dismissing concerns about increasing costs. Democrats are urging voters to see the off-year election as a referendum on Trump’s economic policies and his efforts to expand his power.

Trump said Monday that Virginia voters should back “Republicans up and down the ballot” in an effort to make the state more affordable. “Republicans will bring back everything that you want,” he said at the virtual town hall alongside Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin.

Still, the president was seemingly hesitant to assert himself in the race. Despite throwing barbs at Spanberger, Trump avoided key opportunities to endorse Earle-Sears by name. The lieutenant governor did not speak during the call.

NYC mayoral candidates make final push ahead of Election Day

From Coney Island to the Bronx, the candidates in New York City’s mayoral race spent Monday crisscrossing the five boroughs in a final, frenzied day of campaigning on the eve of Election Day.

As candidates made final pitch to voters, President Donald Trump urged New Yorkers to cast their ballot for former Gov. Andrew Cuomo over Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa in an effort to defeat Democratic nominee Zohran Mamdani. The president posted that voters “really have no choice.”

The campaign hurtled toward its end after more than 735,000 votes were cast during the city’s nine days of early, in-person voting — more than four times the number of ballots cast during the only other mayor's race to allow early voting, in 2021.

The tally was well short of the nearly 1.1 million early, in-person votes cast during last year's presidential election, but some voting locations saw large crowds Sunday, the last day of early voting. The line at one polling place in downtown Brooklyn snaked around the building and, at one point, took an hour to cast a ballot.

Cuomo's schedule was packed Monday, with stops in each of the boroughs for a get-out-the-vote effort. He wasted little time in attacking Mamdani. At one early stop, the former governor likened a potential Mamdani administration to left-wing governments in Latin America.

What's on the ballot in the first general election since Donald Trump became president

WASHINGTON (AP) — One year after Donald Trump retook the White House and set into motion a dramatic expansion of executive power, the Republican president figures prominently in state and local elections being held Tuesday.

The results of those contests — the first general election of Trump's second term — will be heralded by the victors as either a major repudiation or resounding stamp of approval of his second-term agenda. That's especially true in high-profile races for Virginia and New Jersey governor, New York City mayor and a California proposition to redraw its congressional district boundaries.

More than half of the states will hold contests on Tuesday. Here's a look at some of the major statewide and local races on the ballot:

In New Jersey, Democrat Mikie Sherrill and Republican Jack Ciattarelli are the nominees to succeed term-limited Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy. Sherrill is a four-term U.S. representative and former Navy helicopter pilot. Ciattarelli is a former state Assemblyman backed by Trump. In 2021, Ciattarelli came within about 3 percentage points of toppling Murphy.

In Virginia, Republican Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears and Democratic former U.S. Rep. Abigail Spanberger look to replace term-limited Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin. While Spanberger has made some efforts to focus on topics other than Trump in stump speeches, the president remained a major topic of conversation throughout the campaign, from comments Earle-Sears made about him in 2022 to some of his more polarizing policies, such as the so-called One Big Beautiful Bill tax and spending cut measure and the widespread dismissal of federal workers, many of whom live in northern Virginia.

Anatomy of a news story: '60 Minutes' invites audience into the editing process with Trump interview

During his “60 Minutes” interview, President Donald Trump called Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer a “kamikaze,” complained about investigators searching through his wife's closet, spoke in detail about ending wars and turned the tables on interviewer Norah O'Donnell to ask about safety in Washington, D.C.

None of that was seen by people who watched the CBS telecast Sunday night.

Less than half of O'Donnell's interview, conducted Friday, actually made it onto the air. But CBS posted a transcript and video of the full 73-minute discussion online, so viewers could see for themselves what the president said that the network deemed worthy for inclusion in the 28-minute on-air segment.

That offered viewers a rare look inside the editing process at one of journalism's best-known institutions, showing the dozens of decisions on clarity and newsworthiness that go into telling the story you see on television.

Beyond “60 Minutes,” the process is essentially the same throughout the world of journalism, from local newspapers to The New York Times, from specialty websites to The Associated Press. In short: Much like the old notion that everyone's a critic, with this move everyone can be an editor.

Israel hands over bodies of 45 Palestinians after Hamas returns the remains of 3 soldiers

DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israel handed over the bodies of 45 Palestinians on Monday, the Red Cross said, a day after militants returned the remains of three hostages. Israeli officials identified the three as soldiers who were killed in the Hamas-led attack on Oct. 7, 2023 that triggered the war in Gaza.

The exchange marked another step forward for the tenuous, U.S.-brokered ceasefire intended to end the deadliest and most destructive war ever fought between Israel and Hamas.

Since the truce took effect on Oct. 10, Palestinian militants have released the remains of 20 hostages, with eight now remaining in Gaza.

For each Israeli hostage returned, Israel has been releasing the remains of 15 Palestinians. With Monday's return, the bodies of 270 Palestinians have been handed back since the start of the ceasefire.

The Red Cross said it had facilitated the transfer of 45 Palestinian bodies to Gaza on Monday morning. Zaher al-Wahidi, a spokesperson at the Gaza Health Ministry, told The Associated Press that Nasser Hospital received the bodies around noon.

Diane Ladd, 3-time Oscar nominee, dies at 89

OJAI, Calif. (AP) — Diane Ladd, a three-time Academy Award nominee and actor of rare timing and intensity whose roles ranged from the brash waitress in “Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore” to the scheming parent in “Wild at Heart,” has died at 89.

Ladd’s death was announced Monday by daughter Laura Dern, who issued a statement saying her mother and occasional co-star had died at her home in Ojai, California, with Dern at her side. Dern, who called Ladd her “amazing hero” and “profound gift of a mother,′ did not immediately cite a cause of death.

“She was the greatest daughter, mother, grandmother, actress, artist and empathetic spirit that only dreams could have seemingly created,” Dern wrote. “We were blessed to have her. She is flying with her angels now.”

A gifted comic and dramatic performer, Ladd had a long career in television and on stage before breaking through as a film performer in Martin Scorsese’s 1974 release “Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore.” She earned an Oscar nomination for supporting actor for her turn as the acerbic, straight-talking Flo, and went on to appears in dozens of movies over the following decades. Her many credits included “Chinatown,” “Primary Colors” and two other movies for which she received best supporting nods, “Wild at Heart” and “Rambling Rose,” both of which co-starred her daughter. She also continued to work in television, with appearances in “ER,” “Touched by Angel” and “Alice,” the spinoff from “Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore,” among others.

Through marriage and blood relations, Ladd was tied to the arts. Tennessee Williams was a second cousin and first husband Bruce Dern, Laura's father, was himself an Academy Award nominee. Ladd and Laura Dern achieved the rare feat of mother-and-daughter nominees for their work in “Rambling Rose” and they also were memorably paired in “Wild at Heart,” a personal favorite of Ladd's and winner of the Palme d'Or at the 1990 Cannes Film Festival. In the dark, farcical David Lynch noir, her character, Marietta, is willing to try anything — including murder — to keep her daughter (Laura Dern) away from her ex-con lover, played by Nicolas Cage. Ladd would be called upon by the director for some Lynchian touches, and countered with some of her own.

North Korea's longtime ceremonial head of state Kim Yong Nam has died

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — Kim Yong Nam, a longtime North Korean ceremonial head of state best known for his trademark propaganda-filled speeches with a deep, booming voice in support of the ruling Kim dynasty, has died, state media reported Tuesday.

The Korean Central News Agency said that Kim Yong Nam, former president of the Presidium of North Korea’s rubber-stamp Supreme People’s Assembly from 1998 to 2019, died Monday of multiple organ failure at the age of 97.

KCNA said that leader Kim Jong Un visited the bier of Kim Yong Nam early Tuesday to express deep condolences over his death. Kim Yong Nam is not related to Kim Jong Un, the third generation of his family to rule North Korea since its foundation in 1948.

“Comrade Kim Yong Nam faithfully upheld the party's ideology and leadership and displayed his distinctive competence and experience on the international stage, making notable contributions in the history of our country's politics and diplomacy,” KCNA said.

KCNA said North Korea will hold a state funeral for him on Thursday. It released a list of 100 funeral committee members with Kim Jong Un’s name at the top.