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

The move comes after voters in off-year elections earlier this month cited economic concerns as their top issue, resulting in big wins for Democrats in races in Virginia and New Jersey.

Trump slapped tariffs on most countries in April. He and his administration have been long insisted that tariffs don’t increase consumer prices, despite economic evidence to the contrary.

Record-high beef prices have been a particular concern, and Trump has said he intended to take action to try to lower them. Trump’s tariffs on Brazil, a major beef exporter, have been a factor.

The executive order also removes tariffs on tea, fruit juice, cocoa, spices, bananas, oranges, tomatoes and certain fertilizers. Some of the products covered aren’t produced in the United States.

FAA takes first steps to restore flights after shutdown strain, but some limits remain

The Federal Aviation Administration on Friday halved the number of flights that airlines have to cut from their schedules at 40 busy airports as the country's aviation system continues to recover from the longest government shutdown ever.

The agency said that beginning Saturday airlines will only have to cut 3% of their flights instead of the current 6%.

The number of canceled flights peaked last Sunday when nearly 3,000 flights — or about 10% — were cut as a result of the FAA order combined with continued shortages of controllers and severe weather in parts of the country.

By Friday afternoon, the flight tracking website FlightAware showed just 159 cancellations for Saturday in the U.S.

The rollback comes amid improved staffing levels at air traffic controller facilities after the record 43-day shutdown ended Wednesday night, the FAA and Department of Transportation said, adding that they will continue to monitor the situation throughout the weekend and evaluate whether normal operations can resume.

Government will release September jobs report next week, ending data drought from federal shutdown

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Labor Department will release its numbers on September hiring and unemployment next Thursday, a month and a half late, marking the beginning of the end of a data drought caused by the 43-day federal government shutdown.

The statistical blackout meant that the Federal Reserve, businesses, policymakers and investors have largely been in the dark about inflation, job creation, GDP growth and other measures of the U.S. economic health since late summer.

Thomas Simons and Michael Bacolas at Jefferies, a financial firm, wrote in a commentary Friday that over 30 reports from the Labor Department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Commerce Department's Bureau of Economic Analysis and Census Bureau were delayed by the political standoff.

The Labor Department did not release its weekly report on the number of Americans signing up for unemployment benefits for seven straight weeks. That jobless claims report is seen as a potential early indicator of where the labor market is headed.

The Labor Department did release its consumer price index for September — the most popular measurement of inflation — nine days late on Oct. 24. The government made an exception for that report because of its urgency: It is used to calculate the annual cost of living adjustment for tens of millions of Americans receiving Social Security and other federal benefits.

At Trump’s urging, Bondi says US will investigate Epstein’s ties to Clinton and other political foes

NEW YORK (AP) — Acceding to President Donald Trump’s demands, U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi said Friday that she has ordered a top federal prosecutor to investigate sex offender Jeffrey Epstein’s ties to Trump political foes, including former President Bill Clinton.

Bondi posted on X that she was assigning Manhattan U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton to lead the probe, capping an eventful week in which congressional Republicans released nearly 23,000 pages of documents from Epstein’s estate and House Democrats seized on emails mentioning Trump.

Trump, who was friends with Epstein for years, didn’t explain what supposed crimes he wanted the Justice Department to investigate. None of the men he mentioned in a social media post demanding the probe has been accused of sexual misconduct by any of Epstein’s victims.

Hours before Bondi’s announcement, Trump posted on his Truth Social platform that he would ask her, the Justice Department and the FBI to investigate Epstein’s “involvement and relationship” with Clinton and others, including former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers and LinkedIn founder and Democratic donor Reid Hoffman.

Trump, calling the matter “the Epstein Hoax, involving Democrats, not Republicans,” said the investigation should also include financial giant JPMorgan Chase, which provided banking services to Epstein, and “many other people and institutions.”

Officials in North Carolina city vow to resist looming federal immigration crackdown

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) — Officials and community leaders opposing a pending federal immigration crackdown in North Carolina’s largest city characterized it Friday as an invasion, and urged Charlotte residents to protest peacefully and record agents' actions from a distance.

“We are living in the strangest of times,” said Mecklenburg County Commissioner Susan Rodriguez-McDowell, the granddaughter and wife of immigrants. “A time when a felonious reality TV personality is occupying the White House. Unfortunately, we have seen this movie before, and now they want to film an episode of Shock and Awe show here in our city.”

The gathering comes a day after Sheriff Garry McFadden confirmed that federal officials, whom he declined to identify, told him U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents would start an enforcement operation there by Saturday or early next week. The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees CBP, won't comment on future or potential operations. But the community is preparing for the types of enforcement actions seen in Chicago and other Democratic-led cities.

“We’ve seen what has taken place in other cities across this country when the federal government gets involved,” said state Rep. Jordan Lopez. “We have seen the undisciplined agents pointing weapons at unarmed civilians, the indiscriminate rounding up of civilians who are sleeping in their homes in the middle of their night in Chicago. We have seen the worst of law enforcement.”

Local and state officials say they have received no formal notification from President Donald Trump’s administration about a mission to Charlotte. But local organizations are training volunteers on how to protest and to safely document any attempts to perform a sweep, as well as informing immigrants of their rights.

Russian drone and missile attack on Kyiv kills 6 people and injures at least 35

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russia unleashed a major missile and drone barrage on Kyiv early Friday, killing six people, leaving gaping holes in apartment buildings and starting fires as the sound of explosions boomed across the city and lit up the night sky. A pregnant woman was among at least 35 people wounded, Ukrainian authorities said.

Russia used at least 430 drones and 18 missiles in the nighttime attack, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said.

Russia has waged a devastating aerial campaign against Ukraine since its all-out invasion of its neighbor nearly four years ago. U.S.-led diplomatic efforts this year to stop the fighting have so far come to nothing.

Friday's aerial assault, which also targeted Odesa in the south and Kharkiv in the northeast, was mostly aimed at Kyiv, where drones and missiles smashed into high-rise apartment blocks, according to Zelenskyy.

It was “a specially calculated attack to cause as much harm as possible to people and civilians,” he said in a post on Telegram.

US military's 20th strike on alleged drug-running boat kills 4 in the Caribbean

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. military's 20th strike on a boat accused of transporting drugs has killed four people in the Caribbean Sea, the U.S. military said Friday, coming as the Trump administration escalates its campaign in South American waters.

The latest strike happened Monday, according to a social media post on Friday by U.S. Southern Command, which oversees military operations in the Caribbean and Latin America. The latest strike brings the death toll from the attacks that began in September to 80, with the Mexican Navy suspending its search for a survivor of a strike in late October after four days.

Southern Command's post on X shows a boat speeding over water before it's engulfed in flames. The command said intelligence confirmed the vessel “was involved in illicit narcotics smuggling, transiting along a known narco-trafficking route, and carrying narcotics.”

Southern Command's post marked a shift away from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's practice of typically announcing the attacks on social media, although he quickly reposted Southern Command's statement.

Hegseth had announced the previous two strikes on Monday after they had been carried out on Sunday. Meanwhile, the Trump administration is expanding the U.S. military's already large presence in the region by bringing in the USS Gerald R. Ford aircraft carrier. The nation's most advanced warship is expected to arrive in the coming days after traveling from the Mediterranean Sea.

College football coach John Beam from ‘Last Chance U’ has died after being shot

OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) — Celebrated former football coach John Beam, who was featured in the Netflix series “Last Chance U” that showcased the connections he made with players others wouldn’t gamble on, has died after being shot on the college campus where he worked, the Oakland Police Department said Friday.

The suspect, who police say knew and targeted Beam, 66, has been arrested.

Beam's death a day after he was shot at Laney College rattled the community with scores holding a vigil outside the hospital before he died and remembering him as someone who always tried to help anyone.

Oakland Assistant Chief James Beere said the suspect went on campus for a “specific reason” but did not elaborate on what that was. “This was a very targeted incident,” he said.

Beere did not say how Beam and the suspect knew each other but said the suspect was known to loiter around the Laney campus. The suspect had played football at a high school where Beam had worked but not at the time the coach was employed there.

Israel returns 15 Palestinian bodies to Gaza, where displaced families endure winter rains

KHAN YOUNIS, Gaza (AP) — Israel returned the bodies of 15 Palestinians to Gaza on Friday, officials at Nasser hospital in Khan Younis said, in the latest step to fulfilling the terms of the fragile U.S.-brokered ceasefire agreement.

The bodies were returned after militants late Thursday handed over the body of one of the last four remaining Israeli hostages taken during the Oct. 7, 2023, attack that launched the war in Gaza.

Israel identified the returned body as that of Meny Godard, who was abducted from Kibbutz Be’eri in southern Israel. His wife, Ayelet, was killed during the attack.

The armed wings of Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad said Godard’s body was recovered in southern Gaza.

The remains of 25 hostages have been returned to Israel since the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas began on Oct. 10. There are still three more in Gaza that need to be recovered and handed over. Hamas returned 20 living hostages to Israel on Oct. 13.

Judge says he'll approve opioid settlement with OxyContin maker Purdue and Sackler family

NEW YORK (AP) — A federal bankruptcy court judge on Friday said he will approve OxyContin-maker Purdue Pharma’s latest deal to settle thousands of lawsuits over the toll of opioids that includes some money for thousands of victims of the epidemic.

The deal overseen by U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Sean Lane would require members of the Sackler family who own the company to contribute up to $7 billion over 15 years. The new agreement replaces one the U.S. Supreme Court rejected last year, finding it would have improperly protected members of the family against future lawsuits. The judge said he would explain his decision in a hearing on Tuesday.

It's among the largest in a series of opioid settlements brought by state and local governments against drugmakers, wholesalers and pharmacies. It could close a long chapter — and maybe the entire book — on a legal odyssey over efforts to hold the company to account for its role in an opioid crisis connected to 900,000 deaths in the U.S. since 1999, including from heroin and illicit fentanyl.

Lawyers and judges involved have described it as one of the most complicated bankruptcies in U.S. history. Ultimately, attorneys representing Purdue, cities, states, counties, Native American tribes, people with addiction and others were nearly unanimous in urging the judge to approve the bankruptcy plan for Purdue, which filed for protection six years ago as it faced lawsuits with claims that grew to trillions of dollars.

Purdue lawyer Marshall Huebner told the judge that he wishes he could “conjure up $40 trillion or $100 trillion to compensate those who have suffered unfathomable loss.” But without that possibility, he said: “The plan is entirely lawful, does the greatest good for the greatest number in the shortest available timeframe.”