By Jasper Ward and Kanishka Singh WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. President Joe Biden said on Monday that at least 11 American citizens were among those killed in Israel following the weekend's attacks by Palestinian Islamist group Hamas. Washington believes it is likely U.S. citizens are also among those being held hostage by Hamas, Biden said in a statement. White House national security spokesman John Kirby later added it was not yet confirmed if Americans were taken hostage. 'I can't say definitively that we know Americans are being held hostage.

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By Joseph White and David Shepardson DETROIT (Reuters) – The United Auto Workers held off on additional strikes against Detroit Three auto plants on Friday, citing General Motors' unexpected willingness to allow workers at joint-venture battery plants to be covered by union contracts. GM's concession could be critical if rivals Ford Motor and Chrysler parent Stellantis follow suit, potentially clearing the way for final agreements that would shore up the union's position as the industry switches to making electric vehicles.

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By Joseph Ax (Reuters) -A New Mexico judge on Friday rejected a Republican challenge to the state's Democratic-drawn congressional lines, improving the odds Democrats will maintain their hold on all three of the state's districts in next year's election. The state is one of several in which crucial legal battles over congressional redistricting are still raging two years after most states enacted new maps following the once-a-decade U.S. Census. With Democrats only five seats short of recapturing a majority in the U.

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By Jose Luis Gonzalez and Brendan O'Boyle MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – Trucks attempting to enter the United States from Mexico queued for miles on Wednesday amid delays related to record migration at the U.S.-Mexico border, while an industry group said the value of goods stalled in Mexico had surpassed $1.5 billion. Thousands of trucks have been stranded on the Mexican side of the border after U.S. authorities shut down crossings and imposed extra security checks amid an increase in migration. In Ciudad Juarez, trucks waited to cross a bridge into Santa Teresa, New Mexico, after cargo processing was temporarily suspended at a bridge connecting the city to El Paso, Texas, to allow customs officers to assist in processing migrants arriving outside official crossings.

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By David Brunnstrom WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A 45-day stopgap measure passed by the U.S. Congress to avert a government shutdown has left potential funding shortfalls for strategic Pacific island states, which analysts and former officials say makes the U.S. allies economically vulnerable and possibly more receptive to Chinese approaches. The Biden administration had hoped to see Congress endorse by Sept. 30 new 20-year funding programs for Micronesia, the Marshall Islands and Palau, which after decades of relative neglect now find themselves at the center of a U.

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By Kanishka Singh WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Donald Trump's campaign said on Wednesday it raised over $45.5 million in the third quarter from July to September, nearly 30% higher than it raised in the previous quarter while the former U.S. president faces multiple legal charges. The acceleration in fundraising could be a sign that Trump's 2024 campaign coffers are benefiting from his legal problems, which include four indictments. The Trump campaign's statement on Wednesday did not provide details of how it arrived at that tally or its break up from where the funds were raised.

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By Ahmed Aboulenein and Steve Gorman WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Kaiser Permanente and union negotiators for 75,000 striking medical workers suspended a marathon round of contract talks without a settlement on Wednesday, the two sides said, hours after the largest such walkout ever in the U.S. healthcare sector commenced. Kaiser said in a statement released late in the day that tentative agreements had been reached on a number of unspecified issues and that the company would 'coordinate' with union leaders to 'reconvene bargaining as soon as possible.

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(Reuters) -The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) sought bids from power producers on Monday to increase its operating reserves by around 3,000 megawatts in case of any unexpected spikes in demand during the upcoming winter season. The Texas grid has been concerned about extreme weather since a deadly storm in February 2021 left millions without power for days as ERCOT struggled to prevent a grid collapse after the closure of an unusually large amount of generation. The request for proposals seeks capacity from both dispatchable generation and demand response solutions to cover the period of December 2023 through February 2024, the Texas power grid operator said, citing the significant peak load growth since last winter and retirements of dispatchable resources.

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By Steve Gorman and Dawn Chmielewski LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Negotiators for striking Hollywood actors resumed contract talks on Monday with representatives of major studios, television networks and streaming services, marking the first time the two sides have returned to the bargaining table since mid-July. Renewed talks between the SAG-AFTRA actors union and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) came eight days after the producers clinched a separate contract deal with Hollywood writers, who launched their own strike on May 2, about 10 weeks before the actors.

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By Tim Reid and James Oliphant ANAHEIM, California (Reuters) -Donald Trump campaigned in California on Friday, just two days after skipping the Republican presidential debate there, looking to build support in the state with the biggest prize in his party's 2024 White House nominating race. 'With your help, we're going to win the California primary,' the former president said to a crowd of Republican activists and party members who gave him a raucous standing ovation when he took the stage at the California Republican Party convention in Anaheim, 25 miles (40 km) south of Los Angeles.

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By Joseph Ax and Gabriella Borter NEW YORK (Reuters) -Pop megastar Taylor Swift was just a spectator on Sunday at New Jersey's MetLife Stadium, where she performed three sold-out concerts in May for more than 217,000 fans, but she was still the star of the show as she watched her rumored beau, Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce, face the New York Jets. With several celebrity friends joining her – including actors Ryan Reynolds, Blake Lively and Hugh Jackman – the singer saw the defending champion Chiefs eke out a 23-20 victory.

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(Reuters) – California Governor Gavin Newsom on Saturday vetoed a bill that would have paid unemployment benefits to striking workers, and had drawn strong support from labor unions and from his fellow Democrats in the state legislature. In rejecting the bill, Newsom noted that the state's unemployment trust fund is already nearing $20 billion in debt. 'Now is not the time to increase costs or incur this sizable debt,' he wrote in a message explaining his veto. The Democratic-majority legislature passed the bill in September amid several high-profile strikes.

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(Reuters) – Jailed former billionaire Sam Bankman-Fried considered paying former U.S. President Donald Trump to not run for re-election in 2020, according to an excerpt of a forthcoming book published on Sunday. In the excerpt published in the Washington Post, Michael Lewis, the author of 'Going Infinite: The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon', said Bankman-Fried at the time was planning to give $15 million to $30 million to Republican Senator Mitch McConnell to defeat the 'Trumpier' candidates in the Senate races.

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By David Shepardson and Hilary Russ WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) -Starbucks' former Chief Executive Howard Schultz defended himself and the coffee chain against allegations of 'union busting' at a U.S. Senate committee hearing in Washington on Wednesday. The Seattle-based company has previously denied allegations that it illegally fired pro-union baristas or spied on workers as hundreds of U.S. stores organized unions starting in late 2021. It also says it did not violate federal labor law by offering some new benefits – including higher wages, student loan repayment tools, and a savings account program – only to non-unionized stores, as the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has alleged.

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By Joseph Ax NEW YORK (Reuters) – The events underlying Donald Trump's indictment in New York – hush money payments to a porn star who claimed to have had a sexual encounter with him – took place nearly seven years ago. But any potential trial is still at minimum more than a year away, legal experts said, raising the possibility that the former U.S. president could face a jury in a Manhattan courtroom during or even after the 2024 presidential campaign, as he seeks a return to the White House.

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(Reuters) – The death toll from a violent storm that whipped up tornadoes in the Southern and Midwestern regions of the United States rose to at least 29 over the weekend, according to officials and media reports. In Memphis, Tennessee, two children and an adult were found dead on Saturday after the storm's heavy winds knocked trees onto several houses, according to the Memphis Police Department. In Tennessee's McNairy County, officials reported that an additional two people had died, having reported seven deaths earlier on Saturday, according to local media.

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By Karen Freifeld and Rich McKay NEW YORK/PALM BEACH, Florida (Reuters) -Donald Trump, the ex-president and frontrunner for the Republican 2024 nomination, flew into New York City on Monday for an historic court appearance to face charges stemming from a probe into hush money paid to a porn star. With New York taking security precautions and the mayor telling potential 'rabble-rousers' to behave, Trump was due to surrender at the Manhattan District Attorney's Office on Tuesday and will likely be fingerprinted prior to appearing before a judge for an arraignment where he will plead not guilty.

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(Reuters) -The University of Oklahoma said late on Friday that its Norman campus was safe and no threat had been found after police investigated a suspected shooting on the premises. University officials said on social media a comprehensive search had been conducted and no danger was detected and authorities issued an 'all clear' notification. 'There is no threat to campus. Alert has been canceled,' the university said on Twitter. Earlier on Friday, the school implemented a shelter-in-place protocol after a report of an active shooter at the Van Fleet Oval, a central location on the campus.

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(Reuters) – A Canadian Pacific freight train derailed and caught fire in Maine on Saturday, causing minor injuries to three rail employees. 'A total of three locomotive engines and six rail cars carrying lumber and electrical wiring derailed into a wooded area, where they caught fire and started a small forest fire,' Maine's Forest Department said in a statement to Reuters. Additional rail cars transporting hazardous materials did not derail, it said, adding that these hazardous materials are 'not at risk' of leaking and catching fire.

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By David Morgan WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. House Republicans will try to agree on a plan to lift the federal $31.4 trillion debt ceiling and cut government spending when Congress returns this week, after being stymied for months by Democratic President Joe Biden's demands they do so without conditions. House of Representatives Speaker Kevin McCarthy in a Monday speech at the New York Stock Exchange will lay out the conditions Republicans want Democrats to agree to in exchange for movement on the debt ceiling.

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(This July 13 story has been corrected to fix the spelling of ‘Kalpana Kotagal' in paragraph 2) By Daniel Wiessner (Reuters) – The U.S. Senate narrowly confirmed President Joe Biden's nominee to the agency that enforces workplace bias laws, giving Democrats a majority on the five-member panel that would allow it to enforce pro-worker polices backed by his administration. The Democrat-led Senate voted 49-47 along party lines on Thursday to confirm civil rights lawyer Kalpana Kotagal, a partner at prominent plaintiffs' law firm Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll, to a vacancy on the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC).

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(Reuters) – Tropical Depression Don has strengthened into a Tropical Storm in the central Atlantic on Monday and is forecast to turn southward within the next day or so, the U.S. National Hurricane Center (NHC) said in its latest advisory. The storm, located about 735 miles (1,180 km) west of the Azores, is packing maximum sustained winds of 40 miles per hour (65 km per hour), the Miami based forecaster said. (Reporting by Arundhati Sarkar in Bengaluru; Editing by Christian Schmollinger) Brought to you by www.

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By Steve Gorman and Gabriella Borter LOS ANGELES (Reuters) -Thousands of Los Angeles-area hotel workers went on strike on Sunday demanding pay hikes and improved benefits in a region where high housing costs make it difficult for low-wage earners to live close to where they hold jobs, union officials said. Unite Here Local 11, which represents 15,000 workers at more than 60 major hotels in Los Angeles and Orange counties, declared the strike a day after the workers' contract expired. It marks one of the largest strikes to hit the U.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A white powder found inside the White House late on Sunday, which led to the temporary closure of part of the presidential complex, was identified by Washington fire department as cocaine, the Washington Post reported. The Secret Service confirmed to Reuters that an 'unknown item' had been found that led to part of the White House being closed, but referred other questions to the fire department, which declined to comment. 'On Sunday evening, the White House complex went into a precautionary closure as officers from the Secret Service Uniformed Division investigated an unknown item found inside a work area,' a Secret Service spokesperson said in an emailed statement.

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By Rich McKay (Reuters) – The man who sold a fatal fentanyl-laced bag of heroin to actor Michael K. Williams, who played the shotgun-toting drug dealer Omar Little in the HBO crime drama 'The Wire,' was sentenced on Tuesday to 30 months in prison, according to court records. Carlos Macci, 72, was part of a four-man crew selling drugs from Brooklyn, and he sold the lethal dose to Williams, federal prosecutors said in court documents. Prosecutors had asked for a longer sentence of 48 months. 'For decades the defendant has been selling deadly narcotics: heroin and now heroin laced with fentanyl,' they wrote in court papers.

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(Reuters) – A fire broke out at Dow's Plaquemine chemical facility in Louisiana, the U.S. chemical maker said in a statement late on Friday. Everyone at the facility was accounted for and the fire was being managed by the company's Emergency Operations Center, Dow Louisiana said in a statement posted on Facebook, adding that they were in contact with officials. Explosions at the facility in Iberville Parish shook homes in the nearby state capital, Baton Rouge, WAFB TV reported. Plant officials said they were still working to assess the cause of the incident, which began around 9:15 p.

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By Sharon Bernstein and Julia Harte (Reuters) -Iowa's Republican-controlled state House of Representatives passed a bill in a special session on Tuesday banning abortions as soon as fetal cardiac activity can be detected, after around six weeks of pregnancy and before most women know they are pregnant. The ban is expected to swiftly pass the state Senate and be signed into law by Republican Governor Kim Reynolds, who called the special session after the Midwestern state's Supreme Court on June 16 blocked a similar measure passed in 2018 from going into effect.

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By Joseph Ax (Reuters) – U.S. prosecutors flagged a threatening social media post from Donald Trump in a late-night court filing on Friday, arguing that it suggests he might intimidate witnesses by improperly disclosing confidential evidence received from the government. On his Truth Social site, the former president wrote, 'IF YOU GO AFTER ME, I'M COMING AFTER YOU!' on Friday afternoon, a day after he pleaded not guilty to charges that he orchestrated a criminal conspiracy to try to reverse his 2020 election loss to Democrat Joe Biden.

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By Luc Cohen NEW YORK (Reuters) – Sam Bankman-Fried used money he stole from customers of his FTX cryptocurrency exchange to make than $100 million in political campaign contributions before the 2022 U.S. midterm elections, federal prosecutors said on Monday. An amended indictment accused the 31-year-old former billionaire of directing two FTX executives to evade contribution limits by donating to Democrats and Republicans, and to conceal where the money came from. 'He leveraged this influence, in turn, to lobby Congress and regulatory agencies to support legislation and regulation he believed would make it easier for FTX to continue to accept customer deposits and grow,' the indictment said.

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By Nate Raymond and Jonathan Stempel BOSTON (Reuters) -A U.S. appeals court on Monday upheld the conviction of a former senior executive at the private equity firm TPG Capital for participating in a vast U.S. college admissions fraud scheme by paying $50,000 to rig his son's college entrance exam results. The 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston rejected William McGlashan's argument that the indictment against him should have been dismissed because inflated ACT test scores cannot support the wire fraud charge underlying his conviction.

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