FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Jury selection in the groundbreaking trial of a former sheriff’s deputy charged with failing to confront the killer of 14 students and three staff members at a Florida high school five years ago got off to a speedy start Wednesday, with the preliminary round concluding in just one day.

Circuit Judge Martin Fein had tentatively scheduled three days of preliminary jury selection, seeking 50 candidates whose schedules and employment would allow possibly two months of service at the trial of former Broward County Deputy Scot Peterson.

But by the end of Wednesday, the judge ended the process after finding 55 finalists out of 300 prospects interviewed.

Those 55 will be brought back Monday for questioning by prosecutors and Peterson’s attorney about their knowledge of the 2018 shooting at Marjory Stoneman High School in Parkland, and whether they can be fair in judging Peterson’s alleged refusal to confront shooter Nikolas Cruz at the scene.

Six jurors and four alternates will be chosen. Florida is one of six states that allow six-member juries for trials other than capital murder. The others are Arizona, Connecticut, Indiana, Massachusetts and Utah. All other states use 12-member juries in felony trials.

If all goes according to plan, opening statements would be given the middle of next week.

While Fein tried to dissuade additional comments Wednesday, two prospective jurors demanded to speak to him outside of the presence of the others. One said he already knew he couldn’t be fair because he considers Peterson “a coward.” Another said his boss’s daughter was one of the 17 wounded in the shooting. Both were dismissed.

Peterson, 60, is charged with seven counts of felony child neglect involving four students killed and three wounded on the top floor of a three-story classroom building. He becomes the first U.S. law enforcement officer prosecuted for his alleged actions and inaction during a school shooting. Texas authorities are still considering charges for the officers who failed last year to confront the gunman at an Uvalde elementary school who killed 19 children and two teachers.

On Feb. 14, 2018, Peterson approached the building with his gun drawn 73 seconds before Cruz reached the third floor, but instead of entering, he backed away as gunfire sounded. He has said he thought the shots were coming from outside the building, perhaps from a sniper. His attorney Mark Eiglarsh says he will call 22 witnesses who also thought the shots came from outside.

Eiglarsh also argues that under Florida law, Peterson had no legal obligation to enter the building and confront Cruz.

Peterson is also charged with three counts of misdemeanor culpable negligence for the adults shot on the third floor, including a teacher and an adult student who died. He also faces a perjury charge for allegedly lying to investigators. He could get nearly a century in prison if convicted on the child neglect counts and lose his $104,000 annual pension.

Prosecutors did not charge Peterson in connection with the 11 killed and 13 wounded on the first floor before he arrived at the building. No one was shot on the second floor.

Peterson retired shortly after the shooting and was fired retroactively.

Cruz pleaded guilty in 2021 to the killings. In a penalty trial last year, his jury couldn’t unanimously agree on whether he deserved the death penalty. The 24-year-old former Stoneman Douglas student was then sentenced to life in prison.

In Uvalde, a report by lawmakers put nearly 400 officers at Robb Elementary School shortly after the shooting began from an array of federal, state and local agencies, many of them heavily armed.

They waited more than an hour to confront and kill the 18-year-old gunman. At least five officers were put under investigation after the shooting and were either fired or resigned, although a full accounting is unclear.

The head of the Texas Department of Public Safety, Col. Steve McCraw largely blamed Uvalde’s school police chief, who was later fired by trustees.

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Associated Press reporter Acacia Coronado in Austin, Texas, contributed to this report.

COLUMBUS — A Donald Trump-backed Ohio Republican whose military record was called into question during his unsuccessful 2022 congressional campaign says he is abandoning plans to run again next year.

J.R. Majewski tweeted Tuesday that he is bowing out of his latest effort to win the GOP nomination and take on Democratic U.S. Rep. Marcy Kaptur due to his mother’s health.

“Last cycle, I lost my father before the primary election and I can’t risk not giving my full attention to my family,” he said on Twitter. “But don’t fret, I love this country too much to stay idle.”

He had planned to focus his campaign on working-class citizens and “putting America first.”

Majewski, of Port Clinton on Lake Erie, first drew public attention for drawing a sprawling banner supporting Trump across his lawn, and the former president went on to promote Majewski’s political future at a rally in southwest Ohio in November.

The former nuclear power industry worker was the surprise winner of last year’s four-way Republican primary for the Toledo-area 9th Congressional District, winning just under 36% of the vote. He bested two sitting Republican state lawmakers and a third rival to secure the nomination, but ultimately lost to Kaptur, the longest serving woman in Congress, by more than 13 percentage points.

Ahead of the election, The Associated Press reported that Majewski had misrepresented his military record to voters. He claimed he has served in the Air Force in Afghanistan, but public records indicated he had never deployed there and instead spent six months on a base in Qatar. Majewski denied the report and defiantly remained in the race, saying his deployment was classified and therefore not present in public records.

The AP later reported that Majewski was demoted in the military for driving drunk on an air base, another contradiction to his previous statements.

All three were sworn in during the transit agency’s May meeting and will serve three-year terms.

Falkowski, who serves as board president, is the chief operating officer of Cleveland-based Singerman, Mills, Desberg, and Kauntz and has served the Laketran board since 2011.

During his tenure, he’s led the agency through a financial recovery plan, launched two alternative-fuel fleet transitions, including operating Ohio’s first battery-operated electric bus, expanded services to Tyler Boulevard in Mentor and successfully passed two sales tax referendums.

“During this past three-year term, we navigated the pandemic, while still keeping promises we made to the public like service along Tyler and expanded hours,”  Falkowski said.

“While ridership was recovering, we took the time to add passenger amenities, building our new indoor transit centers, and now we’re now looking at how to improve services with the pandemic behind us to make sure we can meet the demand of our aging population here in Lake County,” he added.

Sheets, the former owner and president of Diversified Business Systems, brings 40 years of IT and engineering expertise to the agency and will be completing his third term on the board.

Stenger’s reappointment begins her first full term with the agency, as she was first appointed last July to fill a vacant seat.

Stenger is a legal researcher of the Lake County Prosecutor’s Office, a past board member of the Lake County Society for Rehabilitation and a lifelong advocate for people with disabilities.

The board is responsible for the general oversight of the Lake County public transportation system, including the annual budget and fare structure.

Trustees serve the agency voluntarily. Meetings are open to the public and are held on the last Monday of each month.

Rider Alerts

This week, Laktran’s Route 4 detour, in both directions, began due to bridge construction on U.S. Route 20 over the Grand River between Casement Avenue and Fobes Street in Painesville Township, agency officials announced.

Construction will continue through Oct. 31.

Details of the detour are as follows:

Eastbound

• Right on Erie Street

• Right on North State Street

• Left on Main Street

• Left on Casement Avenue

• Right on East Erie Street

Westbound

• Left on Casement Avenue

• Right on Main Street

• Right on Nprtj St. Clair Street

Buses can be tracked during the detour by using the Laketran Real-Time map at info.laketran.com/RouteMap/Index.

1798: Robert Willan, the father of modern dermatology, describes a skin condition called eczema solare, or skin sensitivity to light.

1820: English physician Sir Everard Home first proposes that skin pigmentation has protective effects against the sun and that a component of sunlight other than heat affects the skin.

1878: Otto Veiel of Austria describes tannins as a form of sun protection. However, the darkening effect of tannins on the skin prevents them from being commercialized as a sunscreen.

1889: Erik Johan Widmark of Stockholm publishes a landmark study that experimentally proves UV radiation can cause skin erythema and burns.

1891: Dr. Hammer of Stuttgart, Germany, is the first to specifically recommend the use of chemical sunscreens to prevent UV radiation from causing erythema solare of the skin; he uses quinine prepared in an ointment as the first human sunscreen.

1896: Dr. Paul Unna, a German physician, first describes an association between sun exposure and skin cancer: he explains precursor skin cancer changes, such as hyperkeratosis, on sun-exposed skin.

1910: Dr. Unna develops a sunscreen from chestnut extract, sold under the names “Zeozon” and “Ultrazeozon.”

1920s: Coco Chanel popularizes the idea of tanning after photographs of her are taken following a Mediterranean cruise. Her friend, Prince Jean-Louis de Faucigny-Lucigne, says: “I think she may have invented sunbathing.” Tanned skin becomes a sign of a healthy, leisurely, and privileged way of life in Western culture.

1928: Dr. G. M. Findlay publishes a paper with the first experimental proof of the association between UV radiation and skin cancer in an animal study (mice).

1935: Eugene Schueler, founder of today’s L’Oréal, develops the first tanning oil with UV radiation-filtering properties; the active ingredient is benzyl salicylate.

1938: Swiss chemist Franz Greiter gets sunburned while climbing Mt. Piz Buin — an event that will inspire him to create the first modern sunscreen a decade later.

1942: Stephen Rothman and Jack Rubin first describe para-aminobenzoic acid, active ingredients that will become the most popular in sunscreens in the U.S. for many years.

1942: The Army Air Force approaches the American Medical Association Council of Pharmacy and Chemistry for a “top secret experiment” to study the most effective protective substances to prevent sunburn of men stranded in the desert or on life rafts. They find that dark red veterinary petroleum is waterproof, inexpensive and free of toxicity.

1944: Pharmacist Benjamin Green, who served as an airman during World War II and used red veterinary petroleum, develops a more pleasing, consumer-friendly version of the product by adding cocoa butter and coconut oil, a combination that eventually becomes the Coppertone suntan lotion.

1946: Swiss chemist Franz Greiter develops and commercializes the first modern sunscreen, known as “Gletscher Crème,” or Glacier Cream. He names his brand Piz Buin in honor of the mountain he climbed.

1962: Greiter is credited with inventing the sun protection factor (SPF) rating; the original Gletscher Crème has an SPF rating of 2.

1967: Water-resistant sunscreens are developed.

1978: The U.S. Food and Drug Administration begins to regulate the booming sunscreen market. UV tanning beds also start to appear in the U.S.

1980s: Australia, followed by other countries, accepts the definition of SPF as “the ratio of UV energy needed to produce a minimal erythemal dose on protected to unprotected skin.” SPF becomes the standard in testing sunscreen formulations.

1990s: Most sunscreen products in the market have SPFs ranging from 15 to 30; avobenzone (with octyl triazone added to increase photostability) is the most common ingredient for UVA protection, whereas octyl methoxycinnamate is the most common ingredient for UVB protection.

2007: The International Agency for Research on Cancer publishes a landmark study confirming the association between tanning beds and melanoma.

2008: Marine scientist Roberto Danovaro and colleagues publish the first study describing the potential role of sunscreen ingredients causing coral bleaching in areas with high levels of human recreational use.

2018: Following ecotoxicologist Craig Downs and colleagues’ paper raising concern for potential harm of two sunscreen ingredients — oxybenzone and octinoxate — on coral bleaching and underwater ecosystems, Hawaii becomes the first state to pass a bill banning the sale of sunscreens containing oxybenzone and octinoxate, active ingredients found in most major sunscreen brands.

2019: The FDA‘s Muraili Matta and colleagues’ study in the Journal of the American Medical Association details the application of four commonly available sunscreens on healthy volunteers that resulted in plasma concentrations above the exceeded level established by the FDA for waiving nonclinical toxicology studies for sunscreen. The active ingredients included in the study are avobenzone, oxybenzone, octocrylene, and ecamsule. This study has served as a catapult for the need for further studies to determine the significance of these findings as the chemicals were being absorbed by the body.

Sources: National Library of Medicine, American Academy of Dermatology, American Cancer Society, Cancernet.org, Melanoma Research Foundation

Earth has pushed past seven out of eight scientifically established safety limits and into “the danger zone,” not just for an overheating planet that’s losing its natural areas, but for well-being of people living on it, according to a new study.

The study looks not just at guardrails for the planetary ecosystem but for the first time it includes measures of “justice,” which is mostly about preventing harm for countries, ethnicities and genders.

The study by the international scientist group Earth Commission published in Wednesday’s journal Nature looks at climate, air pollution, phosphorus and nitrogen contamination of water from fertilizer overuse, groundwater supplies, fresh surface water, the unbuilt natural environment and the overall natural and human-built environment. Only air pollution wasn’t quite at the danger point globally.

Air pollution is dangerous at local and regional levels, while climate was beyond the harmful levels for humans in groups but not quite past the safety guideline for the planet as a system, the study from the Swedish group said.

The study found “hotspots” of problem areas throughout Eastern Europe, South Asia, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, parts of Africa and much of Brazil, Mexico, China and some of the U.S. West — much of it from climate change. About two-thirds of Earth don’t meet the criteria for freshwater safety, scientists said as an example.

“We are in a danger zone for most of the Earth system boundaries,” said study co-author Kristie Ebi, a professor of climate and public health at the University of Washington.

If planet Earth just got an annual check-up, similar to a person’s physical, “our doctor would say that the Earth is really quite sick right now and it is sick in terms of many different areas or systems and this sickness is also affecting the people living on Earth,” Earth Commission co-chair Joyeeta Gupta, a professor of environment at the University of Amsterdam, said at a press conference.

It’s not a terminal diagnosis. The planet can recover if it changes, including its use of coal, oil and natural gas and the way it treats the land and water, the scientists said.

But “we are moving in the wrong direction on basically all of these,” said study lead author Johan Rockstrom, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany.

“This is a compelling and provocative paper – scientifically sound in methodology and important for identifying the dimensions in which the planet is nearing the edge of boundaries that would launch us into irreversible states,” Indy Burke, dean of the Yale School of the Environment said in an email. She wasn’t part of the study.

The team of about 40 scientists created quantifiable boundaries for each environmental category, both for what’s safe for the planet and for the point at which it becomes harmful for groups of people, which the researchers termed a justice issue.

Rockstrom said he thinks of those points as setting up “a safety fence’ outside of which the risks become higher, but not necessarily fatal.

Rockstrom and other scientists have attempted in the past this type of holistic measuring of Earth’s various interlocking ecosystems. The big difference in this attempt is that scientists also looked at local and regional levels and they added the element of justice.

The justice part includes fairness between young and old generations, different nations and even different species. Frequently, it applies to conditions that harm people more than the planet.

An example of that is climate change.

The report uses the same boundary of 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit of warming since pre-industrial times that international leaders agreed upon in the 2015 Paris climate agreement. The world has so far warmed about 2 degrees Fahrenheit, so it hasn’t crossed that safety fence, Rockstrom and Gupta said, but that doesn’t mean people aren’t being hurt.

“What we are trying to show through our paper is that event at 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit there is a huge amount of damage taking place,” Gupta said, pointing to tens of millions of people exposed to extreme hot temperatures.

The planetary safety guardrail of 1.5 degrees hasn’t been breached, but the “just” boundary where people are hurt of 1 degree has been.

“Sustainability and justice are inseparable,” said Stanford environmental studies chief Chris Field, who wasn’t part of the research. He said he would want even more stringent boundaries. “Unsafe conditions do not need to cover a large fraction of Earth’s area to be unacceptable, especially if the unsafe conditions are concentrated in and near poor and vulnerable communities.”

Another outside expert, Dr. Lynn Goldman, an environment health professor and dean of George Washington University’s public health school, said the study was “kind of bold,” but she wasn’t optimistic that it would result in much action.

Jason Lyle Conrad, 39, of Akron, was spotted on an Akron street around 9:40 a.m. by law enforcement officers on the ground and in an Ohio State Highway Patrol helicopter. A brief foot chase took place before he was taken into custody, according to the Summit County Sheriff’s Office.

Conrad was handcuffed and wearing a medical boot when he arrived at Summa Health White Pond Medical Center in Akron Tuesday morning. Authorities said he somehow removed the boot, which he was wearing for an undisclosed previous injury, and then ran away from the officer who had driven him to the facility.

A sheriff’s office spokesman said the deputy was not injured in the incident and the escape remains under investigation. He declined further comment.

Conrad was being held in the county jail on several charges, including felony drug possession and trafficking and weapons counts. He will now also face an escape charge, authorities said Wednesday.

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea’s attempt to put its first spy satellite into space failed Wednesday in a setback to leader Kim Jong Un’s push to boost his military capabilities as tensions with the United States and South Korea rise.

After an unusually quick admission of failure, North Korea vowed to conduct a second launch after it learns what went wrong. It suggests Kim remains determined to expand his weapons arsenal and apply more pressure on Washington and Seoul while diplomacy is stalled.

South Korea and Japan briefly urged residents to take shelter after the launch.

The South Korean military said it was salvaging an object presumed to be part of the crashed North Korean rocket in waters 125 miles west of the southwestern island of Eocheongdo. Later, the Defense Ministry released photos of a white, metal cylinder it described as a suspected rocket part.

A satellite launch by North Korea is a violation of U.N. Security Council resolutions that ban the country from conducting any launch based on ballistic technology. Observers say North Korea’s previous satellite launches helped improve its long-range missile technology. North Korean long-range missile tests in recent years demonstrated a potential to reach all of the continental U.S., but outside experts say the North still has some work to do to develop functioning nuclear missiles.

The newly developed Chollima-1 rocket was launched at 6:37 a.m. at the North’s Sohae Satellite Launching Ground in the northwest, carrying the Malligyong-1 satellite. The rocket crashed off the Korean Peninsula’s western coast after it lost thrust following the separation of its first and second stages, the North’s official Korean Central News Agency said.

South Korea’s military said the rocket had “an abnormal flight” before it fell in the water. Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno told reporters that no object was believed to have reached space.

North Korean media said the country’s space agency will investigate what it calls “the serious defects revealed” by the launch and conduct a second launch as soon as possible.

“It is impressive when the North Korean regime actually admits failure, but it would be difficult to hide the fact of a satellite launch failure internationally, and the regime will likely offer a different narrative domestically,” said Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha University in Seoul. “This outcome also suggests that Pyongyang may stage another provocation soon, in part to make up for today’s setback.”

Adam Hodge, a spokesperson at the U.S. National Security Council, said in a statement that Washington strongly condemns the North Korean launch because it used banned ballistic missile technology, raised tensions and risked destabilizing security in the region and beyond.

The U.N. imposed economic sanctions on North Korea over its previous satellite and ballistic missile launches but has not responded to recent tests because China and Russia, permanent Security Council members now locked in confrontations with the U.S., have blocked attempts to toughen the sanctions.

Seoul’s military said it boosted military readiness in coordination with the United States, and Japan said it was prepared to respond to any emergency. The U.S. said it will take all necessary measures to ensure the security of the American homeland and the defense of South Korea and Japan.

South Korea’s capital, Seoul, issued alerts over public loudspeakers and cellphone text messages telling residents to prepare for evacuation after the launch was detected, and Japan activated a missile warning system for Okinawa prefecture in southwestern Japan, in the rocket’s suspected path.

“Please evacuate into buildings or underground,” the Japanese alert said.

Japanese Defense Minister Yasukazu Hamada said Japan plans to keep missile defense systems deployed in its southern islands and in southwestern waters until June 11, the end of North Korea’s announced launch window.

KCNA didn’t provide details of the rocket or the satellite beyond their names. Experts earlier said North Korea would likely use a liquid-fueled rocket as most of its previously tested long-range rockets and missiles have done.

Though it plans a fuller investigation, the North’s National Aerospace Development Administration attributed the failure to “the low reliability and stability of the new-type engine system applied to (the) carrier rocket” and “the unstable character of the fuel,” according to KCNA.

On Tuesday, Ri Pyong Chol, a top North Korean official, said the North needs a space-based reconnaissance system to counter escalating security threats from South Korea and the United States.

However, the spy satellite shown earlier in the country’s state-run media didn’t appear to be sophisticated enough to produce high-resolution imagery. Some outside experts said it may be able to detect troop movements and large targets such as warships and warplanes.

Recent commercial satellite imagery of the North’s Sohae launch center showed active construction indicating North Korea plans to launch more than one satellite. In his Tuesday statement, Ri also said North Korea would test “various reconnaissance means” to monitor moves by the United States and its allies in real time.

With three to five spy satellites, North Korea could build a space-based surveillance system that allows it to monitor the Korean Peninsula in near real-time, according to Lee Choon Geun, an honorary research fellow at South Korea’s Science and Technology Policy Institute.

The satellite is one of several high-tech weapons systems that Kim has publicly vowed to introduce. Other weapons on his wish list include a multi-warhead missile, a nuclear submarine, a solid-propellant intercontinental ballistic missile and a hypersonic missile. In his visit to the space agency in mid-May, Kim emphasized the strategic significance of a spy satellite in North Korea’s standoff with the United States and South Korea.

Easley, the professor, said Kim likely increased pressure on his scientists and engineers to launch the spy satellite after rival South Korea successfully launched its first commercial-grade satellite aboard its domestically built Nuri rocket earlier this month.

South Korea is expected to launch its first spy satellite later this year, and analysts say Kim likely wants his country to launch its spy satellite before the South to reinforce his military credentials at home.

After repeated failures, North Korea successfully put its first satellite into orbit in 2012 and a second one in 2016. The government said both are Earth observation satellites launched under its peaceful space development program, but many foreign experts believe both were developed to spy on rivals.

Observers say there has been no evidence that the satellites have ever transmitted imagery back to North Korea.

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Associated Press writer Mari Yamaguchi in Tokyo contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON — Hard-fought to the end, the debt ceiling and budget cuts package is heading toward a crucial U.S. House vote as President Joe Biden and Speaker Kevin McCarthy assemble a coalition of centrist Democrats and Republicans to push it to passage over fierce blowback from conservatives and some progressive dissent.

Biden is sending top White House officials to meet early Wednesday at the Capitol to shore up support ahead of voting. McCarthy is working furiously to sell skeptical fellow Republicans, even fending off challenges to his leadership, in the rush to avert a potentially disastrous U.S. default.

Despite deep disappointment from right-flank Republicans that the compromise falls short of the spending cuts they demanded, McCarthy insisted he would have the votes needed to ensure approval.

“We’re going to pass the bill,” McCarthy said as he exited a lengthy Tuesday night meeting at the Capitol.

Quick approval by the House and later in the week the Senate would ensure government checks will continue to go out to Social Security recipients, veterans and others and would prevent financial upheaval at home and abroad. Next Monday is when the Treasury has said the U.S. would run short of money to pay its debts, risking an economically dangerous default.

The package leaves few lawmakers fully satisfied, but Biden and McCarthy are counting on pulling majority support from the political center, a rarity in divided Washington, testing the leadership of the Democratic president and the Republican speaker.

Overall, the 99-page bill restricts spending for the next two years, suspends the debt ceiling into January 2025 and changes policies, including new work requirements for older Americans receiving food aid and greenlighting an Appalachian natural gas line that many Democrats oppose.

For more than two hours late Tuesday as aides wheeled in pizza at the Capitol, McCarthy walked Republicans through the details, fielded questions and encouraged them not to lose sight of the bill’s budget savings.

The speaker faced a sometimes tough crowd. Leaders of the hard-right House Freedom Caucus spent the day lambasting the compromise as falling well short of the spending cuts they demand, and they vowed to try to halt passage by Congress.

“This deal fails, fails completely,” Rep. Scott Perry, R-Pa., the chairman of the Freedom Caucus, said earlier in the day, flanked by others outside the Capitol. “We will do everything in our power to stop it.”

A much larger conservative faction, the Republican Study Committee, declined to take a position. Even rank-and-file centrist conservatives were unsure, leaving McCarthy desperately hunting for votes.

Rep. Nancy Mace, R-S.C., said after the “healthy debate” late into the night she was still a no.

Ominously, the conservatives warned of potentially trying to oust McCarthy over the compromise.

“There’s going to be a reckoning,” said Rep. Chip Roy of Texas.

Biden was speaking directly to lawmakers, making more than 100 one-on-one calls, the White House said.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said the spending restrictions in the package would reduce deficits by $1.5 trillion over the decade, a top goal for the Republicans trying to curb the debt load.

McCarthy told lawmakers that number was higher if the two-year spending caps were extended, which is no guarantee.

But in a surprise that could further erode Republican support, the GOP’s drive to impose work requirements on older Americans receiving food stamps ends up boosting spending by $2.1 billion over the time period. That’s because the final deal exempted veterans and homeless people, expanding the food stamp rolls by 78,000 people monthly, the CBO said.

House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries said it was up to McCarthy to turn out votes from some two-thirds of the Republican majority, a high bar the speaker may not be able to reach. In the 435-member House, 218 votes are needed for passage.

Still, Jeffries said the Democrats would do their part to avoid failure.

“It is my expectation that House Republicans would keep their promise and deliver at least 150 votes as it relates to an agreement that they themselves negotiated,” Jeffries said. “Democrats will make sure that the country does not default.”

Liberal Democrats decried the new work requirements for older Americans, those age 50-54, in the food aid program. And some Democratic lawmakers were leading an effort to remove the surprise provision for the Mountain Valley Pipeline natural gas project. The energy development is important to Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., but many others oppose it as unhelpful in fighting climate change.

The top Democrat on the House Natural Resources Committee, Rep. Raul Grijalva of Arizona, said including the pipeline provision was “disturbing and profoundly disappointing.”

Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, had this warning for McCarthy: “He got us here, and it’s on him to deliver the votes.”

Wall Street was taking a wait-and-see approach. Stock prices were mixed in Tuesday’s trading. U.S. markets had been closed when the deal was struck over the weekend.

The House aims to hold procedural votes Wednesday afternoon with final action expected in the evening. It would then send the bill to the Senate, where Democratic Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Senate Republican leader McConnell are working for passage by week’s end.

Schumer called the bill a “sensible compromise.” McConnell said McCarthy “deserves our thanks.”

Senators, who have remained largely on the sidelines during much of the negotiations between the president and the House speaker, began inserting themselves more forcefully into the debate.

Some senators are insisting on amendments to reshape the package from both the left and the right flanks. But making any changes to the package at this stage seemed unlikely with so little time to spare before Monday’s deadline.

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Associated Press writers Farnoush Amiri, Mary Clare Jalonick and Seung Min Kim contributed to this report.

PITTSBURGH — Robert Bowers carried out the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history when he killed 11 people and injured seven others by storming a Pittsburgh synagogue and shooting everyone he could find. On that, everyone agrees.

Even though Bowers’ defense conceded the point Tuesday at the outset of his federal trial, they hope to spare the suburban truck driver from a possible death sentence over the Oct. 27, 2018, attack at the Tree of Life synagogue.

His lead lawyer, Judy Clarke, said during opening statements that Bowers “shot every person he saw” that day in the building, which was being shared by members of three congregations, Dor Hadash, New Light and the Tree of Life. But she questioned whether Bowers had acted out of hatred or an irrational belief that he needed to kill Jews to save others from the genocide he claimed they were enabling by helping immigrants come to the U.S.

“He had what to us is this unthinkable, nonsensical, irrational thought: that by killing Jews, he would attain his goal,” Clarke said. “There is no making sense of this senseless act. Mr. Bowers caused extraordinary harm to many, many people.”

Prosecutors, who rejected the 50-year-old Bowers’ offer to plead guilty in exchange for taking the death penalty off the table, opened their case by describing for jurors the terror he sowed as he moved through the synagogue, opening fire indiscriminately.

“The depths of the defendant’s malice and hate can only be proven in the broken bodies” of the victims and “his hateful words,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Soo C. Song told the 12 jurors and six alternates hearing the case.

As Song spoke, some of the survivors in the somber courtroom dabbed tears. Bowers, seated at the defense table, showed no reaction.

Prosecutors have said Bowers made incriminating statements to investigators and left an online trail of antisemitic statements that they say shows the attack was motivated by religious hatred. Police shot Bowers three times before he surrendered.

After opening statements, prosecutors began presenting their case by playing an initial 911 call from Bernice Simon, who reported “we’re being attacked!” at the synagogue and that her husband, Sylvan Simon, had been shot.

Shannon Basa-Sabol, the dispatcher who took that call, testified that she advised Bernice Simon to find the wound and stanch the bleeding. Then the dispatcher heard additional gunfire and screaming as Bernice, too, was shot. Neither of the Simons survived.

“Bernice, are you still with me?” Basa-Sabol asked in the recording, There was no answer.

Song also described in detail how worshippers from three congregations arrived that Sabbath to pray and socialize in what should have been a safe place.

She described how Tree of Life members Cecil and David Rosenthal showed up early as usual to help greet and set up for worship — brothers who were fully integrated into their congregation despite their intellectual disabilities. She also told how the oldest victim, 97-year-old Rose Mallinger, typically offered a weekly prayer for peace at Tree of Life, while another victim, Jerry Rabinowitz of Congregation Dor Hadash, was a medical doctor who was killed after running toward the sound of gunshots seeking to help.

But she said the story of that day is not just of atrocity, but of survival and of police heroics in confronting and stopping Bowers. “Life survived and emerged from the Tree of Life synagogue,” Song said.

Bowers, who is from the Pittsburgh suburb of Baldwin, also injured seven people, including five police officers who responded to the scene, investigators said.

In a filing earlier this year, prosecutors said Bowers “harbored deep, murderous animosity towards all Jewish people.” They said he also expressed hatred for HIAS, founded as the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, a nonprofit humanitarian group that helps refugees and asylum seekers.

Prosecutors wrote in a court filing that Bowers had nearly 400 followers on his Gab social media account “to whom he promoted his antisemitic views and calls to violence against Jews.”

In the long run-up to the trial, Bowers’ lawyers did little to cast doubt on whether he was the gunman and instead focused on trying to save his life. As an indication that the trial’s guilt-or-innocence phase would be almost a foregone conclusion, they spent little time during jury selection asking how potential jurors would reach a verdict.

Instead, they focused on the penalty phase and how jurors would decide whether to impose the death penalty in a case of a man charged with hate-motivated killings in a house of worship. The defense lawyers, who recently said Bowers has schizophrenia and brain impairments, probed whether potential jurors could consider factors such as mental illness or a difficult childhood.

The families of those killed are divided over whether the government should pursue the death penalty, but most have voiced support for it.

The three congregations have spoken out against antisemitism and other forms of bigotry since the attack. The Tree of Life congregation also is working with partners on plans to overhaul its current structure, which still stands but has been closed since the shootings, by creating a complex that would house a sanctuary, museum, memorial and center for fighting antisemitism.

The death penalty trial, which is being presided over by Judge Robert Colville, is proceeding three years after now-President Joe Biden said during his 2020 campaign that he would work to end capital punishment at the federal level and in states that still use it. His attorney general, Merrick Garland, has temporarily paused executions to review policies and procedures, but federal prosecutors continue to vigorously work to uphold death sentences that have been issued and, in some cases, to pursue new death sentences at trial.

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Associated Press reporter Michael Rubinkam in northeastern Pennsylvania contributed to this report.

The Vine Street project will include resurfacing, replacement of curb ramps to meet Americans with Disabilities Act requirements, replacement of pavement markings, and adjustment of existing castings to grade within paving limits.

All work is projected to be completed within the existing right-of-way.

No utilities will be relocated as part of the project, the department confirmed in a news release.

Vehicle and pedestrian traffic will be maintained in the work zone and at all roadway crossings during construction.

Additionally, traffic will be maintained by reducing the number of through lanes or by using flaggers.

The project is scheduled for construction in 2024 with an estimated construction cost of $2.2 million.

The department is seeking public input regarding this project.

Comments can be submitted through www.transportation.ohio.gov/projects/projects/89274.

Comments can also be sent via mail to:

Mark Alan Carpenter, P.E. District Environmental Coordinator, 5500 Transportation Blvd. Garfield Heights, OH, 44125, or by phone at 216-584-2089 or email via mark.carpenter@dot.ohio.gov.

Comments will be received until June 23.