AP News Digest 2:20 p.m.

Here are the AP’s latest coverage plans, top stories and promotable content. All times EDT. For up-to-the minute information on AP’s coverage, visit Coverage Plan at https://newsroom.ap.org.

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ONLY ON AP

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NEO-NAZIS-FACEBOOK — Dozens of far-right extremists use Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and Twitter to promote their brands, new research shows. By carefully toeing the line of propriety, key architects of Germany’s far-right harness the power of mainstream social media to promote festivals, fashion brands, music labels and mixed martial arts tournaments. By Erika Kinetz. SENT: 1,810 words, photo

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TOP STORIES

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CONGRESS-BUDGET — Democrats are set to push their 10-year, $3.5 trillion social and environment package through the House Budget Committee over Republican opposition. Party leaders continue private talks that are sure to make significant changes before the measure ever reaches the full House. By Alan Fram. UPCOMING: 700 words, photos by 4 p.m. Committee meeting begins after 2 p.m. EDT.

BIDEN-BASE — President Joe Biden is losing support among critical groups in his political base as some of his core campaign promises falter, raising concerns among Democrats that the voters who put him in office may feel less enthusiastic about returning to the polls in next year’s midterm elections. By National Political Writer Steve Peoples. SENT: 1,200 words, photos.

MISSING PEOPLE OF COLOR-DISPARITIES — Many families and advocates for missing people of color are glad the attention paid to Petito’s disappearance has helped unearth clues that likely led to the tragic discovery of her body and they mourn with her family. But some also question why the public spotlight so important to finding missing people has left other cases shrouded in uncertainty. By Lindsay Whitehurst, Terry Tang and Adriana Gomez. SENT: 1,100 words, photos. This is the Monday Spotlight

SUPREME-COURT-POLITICS — Three Supreme Court justices delivered the same plea in rapid succession in recent days: Don’t view justices as politicians. The justices have reason to be concerned. Recent polls show a sharp drop in approval of a court now dominated by conservatives. By Mark Sherman and Jessica Gresko. SENT: 1,080 words, photos.

UNITED STATES-PAKISTAN-INTELLIGENCE — The Taliban’s takeover of Kabul has deepened the mutual distrust between the U.S. and Pakistan, two putative allies who have tangled over Afghanistan But both sides still need each other. By Nomaan Merchant. SENT: 1,150 words, photos.

CANADA-CHINA-US-HUAWEI — China, the U.S. and Canada completed a high-stakes prisoner swap Saturday with joyous homecomings for two Canadians held by China and for an executive of Chinese global communications giant Huawei Technologies charged with fraud. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau hugged diplomat Michael Kovrig and entrepreneur Michael Spavor after they landed in Calgary, Alberta. Meng’s return to China was carried live on state TV. By Rob Gillies. SENT: 1,130 words, photos.

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TRENDING NEWS

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ITALY-WILD-BOARS — Basta! Romans say enough to invasion of wild boars in city. SENT: 490 words, photos.

SCHOOL-ATTACK-PLOT-PENNSYLVANIA — 4 accused of plotting 2024 school attack on Columbine anniversary. SENT: 440 words.

MICHAEL K. WILLIAMS-AUTOPSY — Autopsy: Actor Michael K. Williams died of drug intoxication. SENT: 400 words, photo.

SPAIN-VOLCANO — La Palma Airport flights canceled due to volcanic ash cloud; new vent emerges. SENT: 330 words, photos.

TROPICAL-WEATHER — Hurricane Sam strengthened into a Category 3 hurricane in the Atlantic Ocean and is expected to strengthen even more as the weekend progresses. SENT: 180 words.

TV-JEOPARDY-AMODIO — Matt Amodio’s historic run on “Jeopardy!” has now netted him more than $1 million in non-tournament play, making him the third person in the show’s history to pass that mark. SENT: 120 words, photo.

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MORE ON THE VIRUS OUTBREAK

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VIRUS OUTBREAK-VACCINE-REVENUE — Billions more in profits are at stake for some vaccine makers as the U.S. moves toward dispensing COVID-19 booster shots to shore up Americans’ protection against the virus. SENT: 790 words, photos.

VIRUS-OUTBREAK-ISRAEL BOOSTER — Israel is pressing ahead with its aggressive campaign of offering coronavirus boosters to almost anyone over 12 and says its approach was further vindicated by a U.S. decision to give the shots to older patients or those at higher risk. SENT: 1,060 words, photos.

VIRUS OUTBREAK-NYC SCHOOLS — New York City schools have been temporarily blocked from enforcing a vaccine mandate for its teachers and other workers by a federal appeals judge just days before it was to take effect. SENT: 200 words, photo.

VIRUS-OUTBREAK-SOUTH-AFRICA-VACCINE-TRAIN — South Africa has sent a train carrying COVID-19 vaccines into one of its poorest provinces to get doses to areas where healthcare facilities are stretched. The vaccine train, named Transvaco, will go on a three-month tour through the Eastern Cape province and stop at seven stations for two weeks at a time to vaccinate people. The initiative was launched by the state-owned rail company Transnet. SENT: 580 words, photos.

VIRUS-OUTBREAK-TENNESSEE — A third federal judge has blocked Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee’s order allowing families to opt out of school mask mandates. The decision is the latest development in the ongoing legal battle over Lee’s order launched by parents and advocates alarmed over the spike in coronavirus cases in Tennessee’s schools. SENT: 460 words, photo.

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UN GENERAL ASSEMBLY

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UN-GENERAL-ASSEMBLY — In today’s world, few conflicts stay local. There’s India’s fight over the Kashmir region with bitter rival Pakistan, Haiti’s inner turmoil spilling into a migrant crisis at the U.S.-Mexico border and questions about the Ethiopian government’s role in reported starvation deaths in the Tigray region. All will come into full view when leaders from those regions address the U.N. General Assembly. SENT: 390 words, photos. With: UN-GENERAL-ASSEMBLY-5-QUOTES. SENT: 280 words, photo.

UN-GENERAL-ASSEMBLY-ROYALS — Britain’s Prince Harry and Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, met with a top U.N. official amid the world body’s biggest gathering of the year. The royals came to U.N. headquarters to speak with Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed. All three were due to appear later at the Global Citizen citizen concert in New York’s Central Park. SENT: 190 words, photos.

UN GENERAL ASSEMBLY-RUSSIA — Russia’s foreign minister says the United States, China, Russia and Pakistan are working together to ensure that Afghanistan’s new Taliban rulers keep their promises including forming a genuinely representative government. UPCOMING: 600 words by 5 p.m., photos.

UN-GENERAL-ASSEMBLY-HAITI — Amid an outcry over the U.S. treatment of Haitian asylum-seekers, the beleaguered island country’s embattled prime minister pointedly said that inequalities and conflict drive migration, but he stopped short of directly criticizing Washington over the issue. SENT: 415 words, photos.

UN-GENERAL-ASSEMBLY-INDIA — Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi didn’t directly mention Pakistan or China in his speech to the United Nations General Assembly, but the targets of his address were clear. He called upon the international community to help the women, children and minorities of Afghanistan and said that it was imperative the country not be used as a base from which to spread terror. SENT: 280 words, photos.

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WASHINGTON/ POLITICS

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STATES-CYBERSECURITY-HIRING-STRUGGLES — Hiring and retaining people capable of helping fend off a constant stream of cyberattacks and other online threats tops the list of concerns for state technology leaders. There’s a severe shortage of those professionals and not enough financial firepower to compete with the federal government, global companies and specialized cybersecurity firms. SENT: 1,080 words, photos.

TRUMP-TICKET — The rewards of an early Donald Trump endorsement will be on display Saturday in Georgia. A three-man ticket of candidates he’s backing in 2022 Republican primaries for statewide office will take the stage with him. SENT: 1,080 words, photos. UPCOMING: Event begins at 5 p.m.; Trump expected at 7 p.m.

ARKANSAS-GOVERNOR-SARAH-SANDERS — Former Trump White House press secretary Sarah Sanders is running to be Arkansas’ governor, but she’s not talking much about the state in her campaign. She’s nationalizing the race, and Arkansas isn’t the only place where President Joe Biden is the main focus. SENT: 1,030 words, photos.

JOHN HINCKLEY JR. — Lawyers for the man who tried to assassinate President Ronald Reagan are scheduled to argue in court that 66-year-old John Hinckley should be freed from restrictions placed on him after he moved out of a Washington hospital. SENT: 860 words, photo.

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NATIONAL

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ELECTION REVIEWS-EXPLAINER — The most closely watched attempt by Republicans to examine the 2020 presidential election in a battleground state lost by former President Donald Trump is coming to an embarrassing end in Arizona, but their efforts are cranking up elsewhere. SENT: 1,200 words, photos.

BORDER-MIGRANT-CAMP — The Texas border crossing where thousands of Haitian migrants converged in recent weeks will be partially reopened late Saturday afternoon, U.S. Customs and Border Protection said. SENT: 1,120 words, photos. With: BORDER-MIGRANT-CAMP-OHIO-FRIENDSHIP — Man drives from Ohio hoping to help Haitian friend at border. SENT: 1,030 words, photos, video.

POLICE TRAINING — Since the death of George Floyd and the protests that followed, police departments around the country are increasingly pushing for training, particularly as calls to defund police rise and cities pass reforms aimed at cracking down on police brutality. SENT: 970 words, photo.

GAYS IN MILITARY — Military academy students are marking the 10th anniversary of the end of “don’t ask, don’t tell” this week. They say there is now wide acceptance of gays, lesbians and bisexuals, but not as much for transgender students. SENT: 870 words, photos.

WESTERN-WILDFIRES — Firefighters hope shifting winds and cooling temperatures over the next few days will aid their efforts to battle a destructive wildfire in a drought-stricken forest in California’s far north that has displaced thousands of people and burned at least 100 structures. SENT: 570 words, photos, video.

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INTERNATIONAL

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AFGHANISTAN — The Taliban hanged a dead body from a crane in the main square of Herat city in western Afghanistan, a witness said, in a gruesome display that signaled a return to some of the Taliban’s methods of the past. SENT: 530 words, photos.

ETHIOPIA-TIGRAY-CRISIS-KILLING — One man said he counted 55 corpses as he escaped from his town in northern Ethiopia. Another asserted he was rounded up with about 20 men who were shot in front of him. Yet others claimed Tigray forces went door-to-door killing men and teenage boys. The accounts from the town of Kobo are the latest allegations against Tigray forces as they push through the Amhara region in what they call an attempt to pressure Ethiopia’s government to end a 10-month war. SENT: 1,010 words, photos.

HUNGARY-POLAND-LEAVING-EU? — When Hungary and Poland joined the European Union in 2004, after decades of Communist domination, they thirsted for Western democratic standards and prosperity. Yet 17 years later, as the EU ramps up efforts to rein in democratic backsliding in both countries, some of the governing right-wing populists in Hungary and Poland are comparing the bloc to their former Soviet oppressors — and flirting with the prospect of exiting the bloc. SENT: 990 words, photos.

KOREAS-TENSIONS — The powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said that her country will take steps to repair ties with South Korea, and may even discuss another summit between their leaders, if the South drops what she described as hostility and double standards. SENT: 510 words, photos.

MEXICO-HAITIAN MIGRANTS — As U.S. authorities moved out the last of the more than 14,000 migrants gathered beside a border bridge in Del Rio, thousands of other Haitians who were en route to the border from South America were realizing their time window to make it to the United States had closed. So now, as they have done before, they are looking to legalize their status in the countries they find themselves in, get work and wait until the next opportunity to once again head north. SENT: 890 words, photos.

GERMANY-ELECTION — Germany’s closely fought election on Sunday will set the direction of the European Union’s most populous country after 16 years under Angela Merkel, whose party is scrambling to avoid defeat by its center-left rivals after a rollercoaster campaign. The environmentalist Greens also are eyeing at least a share of power. SENT: 840 words, photos.

MIGRATION-TURKEY-BACKLASH — Fatima Alzahra Shon thinks neighbors attacked her and her son in their Istanbul apartment building because she is Syrian. The 32-year-old refugee from Aleppo was confronted on Sept. 1 by a Turkish woman who asked her what she was doing in “our” country. Shon replied, “Who are you to say that to me?” The situation quickly escalated. SENT: 1,090 words, photos.

SOMALIA-ATTACK — Police said a vehicle laden with explosives rammed into cars and trucks at a checkpoint leading to the entrance of the Presidential Palace, killing at least eight people. SENT: 90 words, photos.

SWITZERLAND-SAME-SEX-MARRIAGE — Voters in Switzerland will decide Sunday whether to allow same-sex marriages in the rich Alpine country, one of the few in Western Europe where gay and lesbian couples do not already have the right to wed. SENT: 700 words, photos.

HONG KONG — The Hong Kong group that had organized annual vigils in remembrance of victims of the Chinese military’s crushing of the 1989 Tiananmen Square pro-democracy protests voted to disband amid an ongoing crackdown on independent political activism in the semi-autonomous city. SENT: 500 words, photos.

TAIWAN-NATIONALIST-PARTY — Fraught relations with neighboring China are dominating the election for the leader of Taiwan’s main opposition Nationalist Party. Four candidates, including incumbent Chairman Johnny Chiang, are competing for the leadership of the party that has advocated closer relations with Beijing. SENT: 450 words, photos.

BRITAIN-SHORTAGES — In a U-turn, the British government is expected to ease visa rules for truck drivers to help fix supply-chain problems that have triggered long lines at gas stations and some shuttered pumps. SENT: 390 words, photo.

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HOW TO REACH US

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At the Nerve Center, Rob Jagodzinski can be reached at 800-845-8450 (ext. 1600). For photos, ext. 1900. For graphics and interactives, ext. 7636. Expanded AP content can be obtained from http://newsroom.ap.org. For access to AP Newsroom and other technical issues, contact apcustomersupport@ap.org or call 844-777-2006.