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

By The Associated Press

Russia grinds on in eastern Ukraine; Bakhmut ‘destroyed’

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russian forces have turned the eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut into ruins, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said, while Ukraine’s military on Saturday reported missile, rocket and air strikes in multiple parts of the country that Moscow is trying to conquer after months of resistance.

The latest battles of Russia’s 9 1/2 month war in Ukraine have centered on four provinces that Russian President Vladimir Putin triumphantly — and illegally — claimed to have annexed in late September. The fighting indicates Russia’s struggle to establish control of those regions and Ukraine’s persistence to reclaim them.

Zelenskyy said the situation “remains very difficult” in several frontline cities in eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk and Luhansk provinces. Together, the provinces make up the Donbas, an expansive industrial region bordering Russia that Putin identified as a focus from the war’s outset and where Moscow-backed separatists have fought since 2014.

“Bakhmut, Soledar, Maryinka, Kreminna. For a long time, there is no living place left on the land of these areas that have not been damaged by shells and fire,” Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address, naming cities that have again found themselves in the crosshairs. “The occupiers actually destroyed Bakhmut, another Donbas city that the Russian army turned into burnt ruins.”

Some buildings remain standing in Bakhmut, and the remaining residents still mill about the streets. But like Mariupol and other contested cities, it endured a long siege and spent weeks without water and power even before Moscow launched massive strikes to take out public utilities across Ukraine.

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France advances to semifinals at World Cup, tops England 2-1

AL KHOR, Qatar (AP) — France’s players reacted as if they had already won the World Cup. What they were actually celebrating, though, was Harry Kane’s missed penalty.

The match wasn’t over yet, but France was leading 2-1 when Kane, England’s captain and its best player, stepped up to take a penalty that would even the score in the 84th minute of Saturday’s match at Al Bayt Stadium.

He sent his shot high over the bar and defending champion France held on to win 2-1 for a spot in the semifinals.

“That’s football,” England coach Gareth Southgate said. “There is nobody I would rather have in that situation and if we had one tomorrow, I’d feel exactly the same way.”

France is looking to become the first country to successfully defend its World Cup title since Brazil — led by Pele — won back-to-back tournaments in 1958 and 1962. Italy also won two World Cups in succession in 1934 and 1938.

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Ronaldo fails again in likely last chance to win World Cup

DOHA, Qatar (AP) — Cristiano Ronaldo choked up with emotion as the tears ran down his cheeks. He momentarily covered his face with his hand, but couldn’t hide his disappointment.

This moment was too big.

It was likely the last World Cup match for the 37-year-old Ronaldo, and probably his last chance to win soccer’s biggest prize.

When it mattered most, he couldn’t conjure up the kind of soccer magic that has made him one of the greatest players the sport has ever seen.

Ronaldo was dropped from the starting lineup for the second straight match on Saturday. The five-time player of the year came on as a substitute in the second half with his team already trailing, but his one real chance was saved easily by the opposing goalkeeper. In the end, Morocco beat the Portuguese 1-0 to become the first African team to reach the tournament’s semifinals.

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US soccer journalist Grant Wahl dies at World Cup

LUSAIL, Qatar (AP) — Grant Wahl, an American journalist who helped grow the popularity of soccer in the U.S. and reported on some of the biggest stories in the sport, died Saturday while covering a World Cup match between Argentina and the Netherlands. He was 49.

Wahl fell back in his seat in a section of Lusail Stadium reserved for journalists during extra time of the game, and reporters adjacent to him called for assistance.

Emergency services workers responded very quickly, treated him for 20 or 30 minutes on site and then took him out on a stretcher, said Keir Radnedge, a veteran British sports journalist who was working nearby at the time.

The World Cup organizing committee said he was taken to Doha’s Hamad General Hospital, but it did not state a cause of death. “We are in touch with the US Embassy and relevant local authorities to ensure the process of repatriating the body is in accordance with the family’s wishes,” it said in a statement.

Wahl, who wrote for Sports Illustrated for more than two decades and then started his own website, was a major voice informing an American public of soccer during time of increased interest after the U.S. hosted the 1994 World Cup. He also brought a critical eye to the organizational bodies of the international sport.

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USC’s Williams wins Heisman after leading Trojan turnaround

NEW YORK (AP) — Caleb Williams brought sizzle, excitement and star power back to Southern California football.

And now the Heisman Trophy, too.

Williams, the dynamic quarterback who was the catalyst for the Trojans’ turnaround season, won the Heisman on Saturday night to make USC the first school to take home college football’s most prestigious player of the year award eight times.

Williams received 544 first-place votes and 2,031 points to easily outpoint TCU quarterback Max Duggan (1,420).

Williams is the fourth transfer to win the Heisman in the last six years, joining Baker Mayfield (2017) and Kyler Murray (2018) of Oklahoma and Joe Burrow (2019) of LSU.

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Heavy rain, wind, snow blows through California into Sierra

RENO, Nev. (AP) — A winter storm packing powerful winds, heavy rain and potentially several feet of snow in the Sierra Nevada shut down mountain highways, toppled trees and triggered flood watches and avalanche warnings on Saturday from the coast of Northern California to Lake Tahoe.

More than 250 miles (400 kilometers) of the Sierra remained under a winter storm warning at least until Sunday night or early Monday from north of Reno to south of Yosemite National Park.

As much as 4 feet (1.2 meters) of snow is expected to fall by the end of the weekend in the upper elevations around Lake Tahoe, and as much as 6 feet (1.8 meters) in more remote parts of the Sierra to the north and south.

A 70-mile (112-kilometer) stretch of eastbound U.S. Interstate 80 was closed “due to zero visibility” from Colfax, California to the Nevada state line, transportation officials said. Chains were required on much of the rest of I-80 in the mountains from Reno toward Sacramento.

A stretch of California Highway 89 also was closed due to heavy snow between Tahoe City and South Lake Tahoe, California, the highway patrol said.

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Biden called gay marriage ‘inevitable’ and soon it’ll be law

WASHINGTON (AP) — A decade ago, then-Vice President Joe Biden shocked the political world and preempted his boss by suddenly declaring his support for gay marriage — one of the country’s most contentious issues — on national television. But not everyone was surprised.

A small group had attended a private fundraiser with Biden weeks earlier in Los Angeles where he disclosed not only his approval but his firm conclusion about the future of same-sex marriage.

He predicted, “Things are changing so rapidly, it’s going to become a political liability in the near term for someone to say, ‘I oppose gay marriage.'”

“Mark my words. And my job — our job — is to keep this momentum rolling to the inevitable.”

The day that Biden envisioned may have arrived. He plans on Tuesday to sign legislation, passed by bipartisan majorities in Congress, to protect gay unions — even if the Supreme Court should revisit, as some fear or hope, its ruling supporting a nationwide right of same-sex couples to marry.

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Scientists lower alert for Mauna Loa, say eruption could end

HONOLULU (AP) — Scientists lowered the alert level for the Mauna Loa volcano on Hawaii’s Big Island from a warning to a watch on Saturday and said the mountain’s first eruption in nearly 40 years may soon end.

The U.S. Geological Survey’s Hawaiian Volcano Observatory said in a bulletin that the eruption on the mountain’s northeast rift zone was continuing, but lava output and volcanic gas emissions were “greatly reduced.”

“High eruption rates will not resume based on past eruptive behavior and current behavior suggests that the eruption may end soon,” the observatory said. “However, an inflationary trend of Mauna Loa’s summit is accompanying the decreased activity and there is a small possibility that the eruption could continue at very low eruptive rates.”

Meanwhile, it said, a lava flow front had “stagnated” nearly 2 miles from Saddle Road, the vital highway that residents and tourists alike use to travel between the city of Hilo on the east side of the island and coastal resorts to the west.

Scientists said earlier this week that the road was no longer under imminent threat from the lava, allaying fears previously that it could be cut off.

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Rural voters ‘in the trenches’ on climate, leery of Biden

NEW YORK (AP) — Drought in California meant Raquel Krach, a rice farmer and graduate student in the Sacramento Valley, planted very little. Using groundwater, she and her husband planted 75 acres this year to maintain their markets. The rest of the 200 acres she typically sows remained empty due to an inadequate water supply.

The 53-year-old Democrat said it’s clear to her that climate change is responsible. But she says that notion is a deeply divisive one in her community.

“Our connections to our neighbors are pretty limited because our views are so different. Climate change is normally a topic we don’t even broach because our views are so different,” Krach said.

The impacts of climate change hit communities across the country, including Krach’s, yet voters in rural communities are the least likely to feel Washington is in their corner on the issue. Rural Americans and experts suggest there’s a disconnect between the way leaders talk about climate change and the way these communities experience it.

AP VoteCast, a sweeping survey of the 2022 midterm electorate, shows clear differences between urban and rural communities in voter sentiment on President Joe Biden ’s handling of climate, and whether climate change is impacting their communities.

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Pioneering Black feminist Dorothy Pitman Hughes dies at 84

NEW YORK (AP) — Dorothy Pitman Hughes, a pioneering Black feminist, child welfare advocate and community activist who co-founded Ms. Magazine with Gloria Steinem and appeared with her in one of the most iconic photos of the second-wave feminist movement, has died. She was 84.

Hughes died Dec. 1 in Tampa, Florida, at the home of her daughter and son-in-law, said Maurice Sconiers of the Sconiers Funeral Home in Columbus, Georgia. Her daughter, Delethia Ridley Malmsten, said the cause was old age.

Hughes and Steinem forged a powerful speaking partnership in the early 1970s, touring the country at a time when feminism was seen as predominantly white and middle class, a divide dating back to the origins of the American women’s movement. Steinem credited Hughes with helping her become comfortable speaking in public.

In one of the most famous images of the era, taken in October 1971, the two raised their right arms in the Black Power salute. The photo is now in the National Portrait Gallery.

Hughes, her work always rooted in community activism, organized the first shelter for battered women in New York City and co-founded the New York City Agency for Child Development to broaden childcare services in the city.

The Associated Press

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