AP News in Brief at 11:04 p.m. EDT

‘Seemed like goodbye’: Mariupol defenders make their stand

LVIV, Ukraine (AP) — Ukrainian fighters in the tunnels underneath Mariupol’s pulverized steel plant held out against Russian troops Thursday in an increasingly desperate and perhaps doomed effort to deny Moscow what would be its biggest success of the war yet: the complete capture of the strategic port city.

The bloody battle came amid growing speculation that President Vladimir Putin wants to present the Russian people with a battlefield triumph — or announce an escalation of the war — in time for Victory Day on Monday. Victory Day is the biggest patriotic holiday on the Russian calendar, marking the Soviet Union’s triumph over Nazi Germany.

Some 2,000 Ukrainian fighters, by Russia’s most recent estimate, were holed up at Mariupol’ssprawling Azovstal steelworks, the last pocket of resistance in a city largely reduced to rubble over the past two months. A few hundred civilians were also believed trapped there.

The defenders will “stand till the end. They only hope for a miracle,” Kateryna Prokopenko said after speaking by phone to her husband, a leader of the steel plant defenders. “They won’t surrender.”

She said her husband, Azov Regiment commander Denys Prokopenko, told her he would love her forever.

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It’s Chief Justice Roberts’ Court, but does he still lead?

WASHINGTON (AP) — John Roberts is heading aSupreme Court in crisis.

The chief justice has already ordered an investigation of the leak this week of a draft opinion suggesting the court could be poised to overturn Roe v. Wade, the 1973 case legalizing abortion nationwide. What comes next could further test Roberts’ leadership of a court where his vote already appears less crucial in determining the outcome in contentious cases.

“This is a time when the court is under siege, both externally and internally now,” said Roanoke College professor Todd Peppers, who writes about the court. “I just don’t think the spotlight has ever been brighter on the court in recent history.”

Speaking Thursday at a judicial conference in Atlanta, Roberts called the leak “appalling,” according to CNN.

Roberts’ court was facing challenges even before the leak, which the chiefcalled a “betrayal of the confidences of the Court.”Polling has shown a notable decline in the public’s approval of the court. And there have been recent calls for term limits for the justices and for increasing the number of justices as well as for a code of ethics, particularly following reports that Justice Clarence Thomas’ wife, Virginia, implored Donald Trump’s White House chief of staff to act to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. Confirmation hearings for the court’s newest justices have been contentious.

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FDA restricts J&J’s COVID-19 vaccine due to blood clot risk

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. regulators on Thursday strictly limited who can receive Johnson & Johnson’s COVID-19 vaccine due to the ongoing risk of rare but serious blood clots.

The Food and Drug Administration said the shot should only be given to adults who cannot receive a different vaccine or specifically request J&J’s vaccine. U.S. authorities for months have recommended that Americans get Pfizer or Moderna shots instead of J&J’s vaccine.

FDA’s vaccine chief Dr. Peter Marks said the agency decided to restrict the vaccine after taking another look at the data on the risks of life-threatening blood clots and concluding that they are limited to J&J’s vaccine.

“If there’s an alternative that appears to be equally effective in preventing severe outcomes from COVID-19, we’d rather see people opting for that,” Marks said. “But we’ve been careful to say that– compared to no vaccine– this is still a better option.”

The problem occurs in the first two weeks after vaccination, he added: “So if you had the vaccine six months ago you can sleep soundly tonight knowing this isn’t an issue.”

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Police boss journal cites early angst in Ronald Greene death

Within days of the deadly 2019 arrest of Ronald Greene, when body-camera video captured white troopers stunning, beating and dragging the Black motorist, the head of the Louisiana State Police wrote a stark note about the case in his journal: “Realize there is a problem — must address immediately.”

But well over a year went by — 462 days to be exact — before Col. Kevin Reeves opened an internal investigation into the actions of the troopers involved, including one who was recorded boasting he “beat the ever-living f(asterisk)(asterisk)k out of” Greene.

Eleven pages from Reeves’ three journals were released Thursday in response to a subpoena from a legislative committee looking into a possible cover-up of the case. And the panel’s chairman says the troubling questions raised by those few pages were enough to demand that Reeves comply by turning over all his journals, with a threat of contempt charges if he doesn’t.

“The documents themselves show that Colonel Reeves knew early on that there was an issue and considered possible measures to address it but ultimately didn’t,” Republican state Rep. Tanner Magee said. “This committee has sought to figure out why.”

While the handwritten pages are in places difficult to decipher, a page of notes dated just 12 days after Greene’s death are clear, a to-do list of possible actions in response to the case: suspending officers or putting them on administrative leave, opening up an internal probe and conducting a video audit of Master Trooper Chris Hollingsworth, who boasted of beating Greene and had a history of turning off his body-camera video.

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Official: US gave intel before Ukraine sank Russian warship

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. says it shared intelligence with Ukraine about the location of the Russian missile cruiser Moskva prior to the strike that sank the warship, an incident that was a high-profile failure for Russia’s military.

An American official said Thursday that Ukraine alone decided to target and sink the flagship of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet using its own anti-ship missiles. But given Russia’s attacks on the Ukrainian coastline from the sea, the U.S. has provided “a range of intelligence” that includes locations of those ships, said the official, who was not authorized to speak publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.

The Biden administration has ramped up intelligence sharing with Ukraine alongside the shipment of arms and missiles to help it repel Russia’s invasion. The disclosure of U.S. support in the Moskva strike comes as the White House is under pressure from Republicans to do more to support Ukraine’s resistance and as polls suggest Americans question whether President Joe Biden is being tough enough on Russia.

Since Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the invasion in February, the White House has tried to balance supporting Ukraine, a democratic ally, against not doing anything that would seem to provoke a direct war between Putin and the U.S. and NATO allies. As the war has gone on, the White House has ramped up its military and intelligence support, removing some time and geographic limits on what it will tell Ukraine about potential Russian targets.

The official who spoke Thursday said the U.S. was not aware that Ukraine planned to strike the Moskva until after they conducted the operation. NBC News first reported on the American role in the sinking of the ship.

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Tornadoes strike Texas, Oklahoma, cause widespread damaged

SEMINOLE, Okla. (AP) — A storm system spawned several tornadoes that whipped through areas of Texas and Oklahoma, causing damage to a school, a marijuana farm and other structures.

There were no reports of serious injuries following the Wednesday night tornadoes, but the system caused flooding in parts of Oklahoma and Arkansas, and more stormy weather took place Thursday.

Significant damage was reported in the Oklahoma city of Seminole, about 60 miles (97 kilometers) southeast of Oklahoma City, where Gov. Kevin Stitt said damage assessments were underway after he toured the area Thursday.

“(We’re) getting all the resources and supplies that the city wants and needs,” including generators, Stitt said. “Thank the Lord that nobody was hurt” and no deaths have been reported.

The National Weather Service said it found damage in Seminole from an EF2 tornado, which has winds speeds of up to 135 mph (217 kph).

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3 Israelis killed in stabbing attack near Tel Aviv

JERUSALEM (AP) — A pair of Palestinian attackers went on a stabbing rampage in a town near Tel Aviv on Thursday night, killing at least three people and wounding four others before fleeing in a vehicle, Israeli authorities said.

Police launched a massive search for the assailants, setting up roadblocks and dispatching a helicopter. The stabbing, coming on Israel’s Independence Day, was the latest in a string of deadly attacks in Israeli cities in recent weeks.

“We will get our hands on the terrorists and their supportive environment, and they will pay the price,” Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said after huddling with senior security officials late Thursday.

Israeli-Palestinian tensions have soared recently, with the attacks in Israel, military operations in the occupied West Bank and violence at Jerusalem’s most sensitive holy site. The site, home to the Al Aqsa Mosque, was the scene of new unrest earlier Thursday.

Alon Rizkan, a medic with Israel’s Magen David Adom rescue service, described a “very difficult call” when he arrived at the scene in Elad, an ultra-Orthodox town near Tel Aviv. He said he identified three dead people at various locations. At least four others were wounded, one critically, officials said.

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53 dead in China building collapse, search for trapped ends

BEIJING (AP) — Chinese state media say 53 people died in a building collapse one week ago in central China and 10 were rescued. Authorities said Friday the search had ended for people trapped from the collapse.

The last survivor was pulled out shortly after midnight on Thursday, 5 1/2 days after the residential and commercial building in the city of Changsha suddenly caved in on April 29.

At least nine people have been arrested in connection with the collapse on suspicion of ignoring building codes or committing other violations.

All of the survivors were reportedly in good condition after being treated in a hospital.

The arrested include the building owner, three people in charge of design and construction and five others who allegedly gave a false safety assessment for a guest house on the building’s fourth to sixth floors.

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Marcos redux? Dictator’s son may win Philippine presidency

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and Sara Duterte smile and chat of their love of burgers and mango shakes on the election trail in a carefree YouTube videobefore breaking into a short rap penned for their campaign for president and vice president of the Philippines by a popular singer.

Marcos Jr., the son of the late dictator who bilked the country out of billions and ruled for years with an iron fist, and Duterte, daughter of outgoing populist President Rodrigo Duterte, whose brutal anti-drug campaign has brought an investigation of crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court, like to keep things light.

Their carefully choreographed campaign whitewashes the past and is short on specifics about their vision for the future, but it appears to be resonating with the average Filipino, with the latest polls showing both with seemingly insurmountable leads in their races, which are held separately, in Monday’s elections.

The campaign has made deft use of social media, primarily TikTok and YouTube, to push the simple slogan of “unity” — “Uniteam” as they put it — and frame them as beyond politics and disagreements, said Adele Webb, a lecturer at the Queensland University of Technology and author of ”Chasing Freedom: The Philippines’ Long Journey to Democratic Ambivalence.”

“His message really is very well crafted with this avoidance strategy,” Webb said. “Let’s stop talking about the past, let’s stop fighting about what those martial law years really looked like, and let’s look forward, let’s move forward.”

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Virus found in pig heart used in human transplant

Researchers trying to learn what killed the first person to receive a heart transplant from a pig have discovered the organ harbored an animal virus but cannot yet say if it played any role in the man’s death.

A Maryland man, 57-year-old David Bennett Sr., died in March, two months after the groundbreaking experimental transplant. University of Maryland doctors said Thursday they found an unwelcome surprise — viral DNA inside the pig heart. They did not find signs that this bug, called porcine cytomegalovirus, was causing an active infection.

But a major worry about animal-to-human transplants is the risk that it could introduce new kinds of infections to people.

Because some viruses are “latent,” meaning they lurk without causing disease, “it could be a hitchhiker,” Dr. Bartley Griffith, the surgeon who performed Bennett’s transplant, told The Associated Press.

Still, development is under way of more sophisticated tests to “make sure that we don’t miss these kinds of viruses,” added Dr. Muhammad Mohiuddin, scientific director of the university’s xenotransplant program.