AP News in Brief at 6:04 a.m. EST

The about-face comes after Saturday’s shooting death of Alex Pretti by federal agents raised doubts — including from some Republicans — over how the Trump administration has gone about aggressively deporting migrants and confronting protesters opposed to the policy.

But it's just the latest in a string of moments where Trump has first taken a maximalist position only to appear to later retreat.

Earlier this month, Trump repeatedly threatened Iran with military action if his administration found the Islamic Republic was using deadly force to squelch recent antigovernment protests. Human rights groups said thousands were killed, but Trump says he’s holding off on acting after he received assurances Tehran was suspending hundreds of planned executions.

Last week, Trump first announced plans to impose new tariffs on European allies that refused to go along with his calls for the U.S. to take control of the Arctic territory of Greenland — only to abruptly cancel the tariffs after saying he’d come to terms of the “framework” of an agreement. The White House offered scant details about the deal, which Trump announced the day after the stock market saw one of its worst days in months in response to his tariff threat.

Experts say the divide between Minnesota and federal authorities is unprecedented

A new Minnesota website lays out evidence to counter what officials have called federal misinformation after immigration agents fatally shot two residents during the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, deepening an unprecedented divide, experts said Monday.

Minnesota also went to court to preserve evidence from the Saturday shooting of Alex Pretti after its own investigators were blocked from the scene by federal authorities.

Experts say the line being drawn between Minnesota and the U.S. government goes against years of cooperation between local and federal agencies on law enforcement missions.

But they also said the state’s hand has been forced by an administration that has acted against decades of practice — from declining to allow state officials access to evidence gathered by federal authorities to barring its own Civil Rights division from probing the shootings of Pretti and Renee Good, who was shot to death by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer on Jan. 7.

Former federal prosecutors under Republican and Democratic presidential administrations said the divide was deeply troubling, though a call Monday between Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and President Donald Trump may signal a way forward after both expressed that progress was made.

More arctic air expected in parts of the South still covered in ice and riddled with power outages

When a massive winter storm descended on the Northeast and parts of the South over the weekend, Lisa Patterson planned to stick it out at her family's home in Nashville.

But after she and her husband lost power, trees fell onto their driveway and their wood stove proved no match for the frigid temperatures, the couple and their dog had to be rescued and taken to a warming shelter.

“I’ve been snowed in up there for almost three weeks without being able to get up and down my driveway because of the snow. I’m prepared for that. But this was unprecedented," Patterson said.

The family was among many across Tennessee and other parts of the South that have fled to warming shelters as crews worked to restore power to hundreds of thousands of households in the face of a new influx of arctic air expected to spur freezing temperatures Tuesday in places already covered in snow and ice.

At least 30 deaths have been reported in states afflicted with severe cold, including two people run over by snowplows in Massachusetts and Ohio, fatal sledding accidents that killed teenagers in Arkansas and Texas, and a woman whose body was found covered in snow in Kansas. In New York City, officials said eight people were found dead outdoors over the frigid weekend.

ICE agents will have a security role at Milan-Cortina Olympics, US sources say

MILAN (AP) — U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents will have a security role during the upcoming Milan Cortina Winter Games, according to sources at the U.S. embassy in Rome.

The sources who confirmed ICE participation on Tuesday said that federal ICE agents would support diplomatic security details and not run any immigration enforcement operations.

During previous Olympics, several federal agencies have supported security for U.S. diplomats, including the investigative component of ICE called Homeland Security Investigations, the sources said. They could not be named because they are not authorized to speak publicly.

Milan Mayor Giuseppe Sala said that ICE would not be welcome in his city, which is hosting most ice sports.

"They are not welcome in Milan. They are not aligned with our democratic way of managing security,'' Sala told RTL Radio 102.

Russia offers cash bonuses, frees prisoners and lures foreigners to replenish its troops in Ukraine

For average wage earners in Russia, it's a big payday. For criminals seeking to escape the harsh conditions and abuse in prison, it's a chance at freedom. For immigrants hoping for a better life, it's a simplified path to citizenship.

All they have to do is sign a contract to fight in Ukraine.

As Russia seeks to replenish its forces in nearly four years of war — and avoid an unpopular nationwide mobilization — it's pulling out all the stops to find new troops to send into the battlefield.

Some come from abroad to fight in what has become a bloody war of attrition. After signing a mutual defense treaty with Moscow in 2024, North Korea sent thousands of soldiers to help Russia defend its Kursk region from a Ukrainian incursion.

Men from South Asian countries, including India, Nepal and Bangladesh, complain of being duped into signing up to fight by recruiters promising jobs. Officials in Kenya, South Africa and Iraq say the same has happened to citizens from their countries.

Workers from Bangladesh sought jobs in Russia but instead got sent to combat in Ukraine

LAKSHMIPUR, Bangladesh (AP) — A labor recruiter persuaded Maksudur Rahman to leave the tropical warmth of his hometown in Bangladesh and travel thousands of miles to frigid Russia for a job as a janitor.

Within weeks, he found himself on the front lines of Russia’s war in Ukraine.

An Associated Press investigation found that Bangladeshi workers were lured to Russia under the false promise of civilian work, only to be thrust into the chaos of combat in Ukraine. Many were threatened with violence, imprisonment or death.

AP spoke with three Bangladeshi men who escaped from the Russian military, including Rahman, who said that after arriving in Moscow, he and a group of fellow Bangladeshi workers were told to sign Russian documents that turned out to be military contracts. They were taken to an army camp for training in drone warfare techniques, medical evacuation procedures and basic combat skills using heavy weapons.

Rahman protested, complaining that this was not the work he agreed to do. A Russian commander offered a stark reply through a translation app: “Your agent sent you here. We bought you."

Trump to visit Iowa in an effort to focus on affordability amid fallout from Minneapolis shooting

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — President Donald Trump is headed to Iowa on Tuesday as part of the White House’s midterm-year pivot toward affordability, even as his administration remains mired in the fallout in Minneapolis over a second fatal shooting by federal immigration officers this month.

While in Iowa, the president will make a stop at a local business and then deliver a speech on affordability, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said. The remarks will be at the Horizon Events Center in Clive, a suburb of Des Moines.

The trip will also highlight energy policy, White House chief of staff Susie Wiles said last week. It’s part of the White House’s strategy to have Trump travel out of Washington once a week ahead of the midterm elections to focus on affordability issues facing everyday Americans — an effort that keeps getting diverted by crisis.

The latest comes as the Trump administration is grappling with the weekend shooting death of Alex Pretti, an ICU nurse killed by federal agents in the neighboring state of Minnesota. Even as some top administration officials moved quickly to malign Pretti, the White House said Monday that Trump was waiting until an investigation into the shooting was complete.

Trump was last in Iowa ahead of the July 4 holiday to kick off the United States’ upcoming 250th anniversary, which morphed largely into a celebration of his major spending and tax cut package hours after Congress had approved it.

Minnesota killing produces backlash against Trump administration from Second Amendment advocates

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

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

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

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

Leavitt qualified that “when you are bearing arms and confronted by law enforcement, you are raising … the risk of force being used against you.”

Iran's crackdown has killed at least 6,126 people, activists say as the country's currency plunges

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran's bloody crackdown on nationwide protests killed at least 6,126 people while many others still are feared dead, activists said Tuesday, as a U.S. aircraft carrier group arrived in the Middle East to lead any American military response to the crisis. Iran's currency, the rial, meanwhile fell to a record low of 1.5 million to $1.

The arrival of the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier and guided missile destroyers accompanying it provide the U.S. the ability to strike Iran, particularly as Gulf Arab states have signaled they want to stay out of any attack despite hosting American military personnel.

Two Iranian-backed militias in the Mideast have signaled their willingness to launch new attacks, likely trying to back Iran after U.S. President Donald Trump threatened military action over the killing of peaceful protesters or Tehran launching mass executions in the wake of the demonstrations.

Iran has repeatedly threatened to drag the entire Mideast into a war, though its air defenses and military are still reeling after the June war launched by Israel against the country. But the pressure on its economy may spark new unrest as everyday goods slowly go out of reach of its people.

The new figures Tuesday came from the U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency, which has been accurate in multiple rounds of unrest in Iran. The group verifies each death with a network of activists on the ground in Iran.

India and EU clinch the 'mother of all deals' in a historic free trade agreement

NEW DELHI (AP) — After nearly two decades of negotiations, India and the European Union announced Tuesday they have reached a free trade agreement to deepen economic and strategic ties. The accord — dubbed the “mother of all deals” — could impact as many as 2 billion people.

The deal is also one of the biggest bilateral engagements on commerce and comes as Washington targets both India and the EU with steep import tariffs.

“This agreement will bring major opportunities for the people of India and Europe,” India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in a virtual address to an energy conference. “It represents 25% of the global GDP and one-third of global trade.”

India and the EU also agreed on a framework agreement for deeper defense and security cooperation, and a separate pact aimed at easing mobility for skilled workers and students, signaling their partnership extends beyond commerce.

Speaking at a joint news conference in New Delhi with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President António Costa, the Indian leader said the partnership with the EU “will strengthen stability in the international system” at a time of ”turmoil in the global order.”