AP Top News at 5:51 a.m. EDT

Obamas close DNC’s second night with rousing Harris endorsement and pointed warnings about Trump

CHICAGO (AP) — Warning of a difficult fight ahead, former President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama on Tuesday called on the nation to embrace Kamala Harris in urgent messages to the Democratic National Convention that were at times both hopeful and ominous. “America, hope is making a comeback,” the former first lady declared. She then tore into Republican Donald Trump, a sharp shift from the 2016 convention speech in which she told her party, “When they go low, we go high.” “His limited and narrow view of the world made him feel threatened by the existence of two hardworking, highly educated, successful people who also happened to be Black,” Michelle Obama said of Trump.

A double dose of Obama firepower, a doting spouse and a dance party: Takeaways from Day 2 of the DNC

CHICAGO (AP) — The Democratic National Convention’s second night showcased a double dose of Obama firepower to validate Vice President Kamala Harris and deliver an unsparing indictment of Republican Donald Trump. The convention also served up a raucous roll call of states that was essentially one big dance party. Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, ducked out of Chicago to hold a rally just up the interstate in Milwaukee, wooing voters in battleground Wisconsin. It was a recognition that, regardless of whatever good vibes may exist at the convention, Democrats expect this presidential election to be razor-close.

Pro-Palestinian protesters clash with police near Chicago’s Israeli consulate on second night of DNC

CHICAGO (AP) — Multiple pro-Palestinian demonstrators were arrested Tuesday after clashing with police during a protest that began outside the Israeli consulate and spilled out onto the surrounding streets on the second night of the Democratic National Convention. The intense confrontations with officers began minutes into the demonstration, after some protesters – many dressed in black, their faces covered – charged at a line of police that had blocked the group from marching. They eventually moved past the officers, but were penned in several times throughout the night by police in riot gear who did not allow protesters to disperse.

Moscow comes under one of the largest Ukrainian drone attacks but destroys them all

MOSCOW (AP) — Moscow came under one of the largest attacks yet by Ukrainian drones since the start of fighting in 2022, Russian authorities reported Wednesday, saying they destroyed all of those headed toward the capital. Russia downed 45 Ukrainian drones overnight, the Ministry of Defense said. It said 11 were destroyed over the Moscow region, 23 over the Bryansk region, six over Belgorod, three over Kaluga and two over Kursk. “This was one of the biggest attempts of all time to attack Moscow using drones,” Moscow Mayor Sergey Sobyanin said on his Telegram channel. He said strong defenses around the capital made it possible to shoot down all the drones before they could hit their intended targets.

Putin’s slow response to the Kursk attack could test the patience of some of his backers in Russia

A year ago this week, President Vladmir Putin strode onto a stage in the Kursk region to commemorate the 80th anniversary of one of the Soviet army’s proudest moments in World War II. Addressing a rapt audience that included soldiers fresh from fighting in Ukraine, Putin called the decisive victory in the Battle of Kursk “one of the great feats of our people.” Now, as Russia prepares to celebrate the 81st anniversary of that 1943 battle, Kursk is again in the news — but for a very different reason. On Aug. 6, Ukrainian forces made a lightning push into the region, seizing villages, taking hundreds of prisoners and forcing the evacuation of tens of thousands of civilians.

Blinken ends latest Mideast visit without a cease-fire, warning ‘time is of the essence’

DOHA, Qatar (AP) — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken ended his ninth visit to the Middle East since the war in Gaza began without securing any major breakthrough for a cease-fire deal, warning on Tuesday that “time is of the essence” even as Hamas and Israel signaled that challenges remain. After meetings in fellow mediating countries Egypt and Qatar, Blinken said that because Israel has accepted a proposal to bridge gaps with the militant group, the focus turns to doing everything possible to “get Hamas on board” and ensure both sides agree to key details on implementation. “Our message is simple.

Bus carrying Shiite pilgrims from Pakistan to Iraq crashes in Iran, killing at least 28 people

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — A bus carrying Shiite pilgrims from Pakistan to Iraq crashed in central Iran, killing at least 28 people, an official said Wednesday. The crash happened Tuesday night in the central Iranian province of Yazd, said Mohammad Ali Malekzadeh, a local emergency official, according to the state-run IRNA news agency. Another 23 people suffered injuries in the crash, 14 of them serious, he added. He said all the bus passengers hailed from Pakistan. There were 51 people on board at the time of the crash outside of the city of Taft, some 500 kilometers (310 miles) southeast of the Iranian capital, Tehran.

Trump campaigns to ‘make America safe again’ as Democratic convention zeroes in on his felony record

HOWELL, Mich. (AP) — Former President Donald Trump pledged Tuesday to “Make America Safe Again” while campaigning in Michigan as the Democrats who gathered in Chicago to nominate Kamala Harris branded him a career criminal. As part of a battleground campaign swing designed to counter the Democratic National Convention, Trump stood alongside sheriff’s deputies in the city of Howell and labeled Harris, a former San Francisco district attorney and California attorney general, as the “ringleader” of a “Marxist attack on law enforcement” across the country. “Kamala Harris will deliver crime, chaos, destruction and death,” Trump said in one of many generalizations about an America under Harris.

Fannie Lou Hamer rattled the Democratic convention with her ‘Is this America?’ speech 60 years ago

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — Vice President Kamala Harris is accepting the Democrats’ presidential nomination Thursday, exactly 60 years after another Black woman mesmerized the nation with a televised speech that challenged the seating of Mississippi’s all-white delegation to the 1964 Democratic National Convention. The testimony of Fannie Lou Hamer to the credentials committee in Atlantic City, New Jersey, was vivid and blunt. She described how she was fired from her plantation job in retaliation for trying to register to vote and brutalized in jail for encouraging other Black people to assert their rights. She told of arbitrary tests that white authorities imposed to prevent Black people from voting and other unconstitutional methods that kept white elites in power across the segregated South.

Plaything or peril? Brazilian kites are endangering lives and prompting a push for a national ban

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Two groups of men stood on opposite rooftops perched on a hillside overlooking Rio de Janeiro’s Ipanema beach, taunting one another. It was a macho showdown between opponents wielding unlikely weapons — kites. On this July morning in the impoverished neighborhood, they were using taut, sharp-edged kite lines — known as “cerol” in Portuguese — to slash their opponents’ lines, ripping their kites from the sky. Kite fighting has caused horrific injuries and even deaths, and a bill moving through Brazil’s Congress is seeking to prohibit the manufacture, sale and use of the razor-sharp lines nationwide, with violators facing one to three years in prison and a hefty fine.